n 
 
 CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME 
 OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT 
 FUND GIVEN IN 1 89 1 BY 
 
 HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE 
 
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 9cr 
 
 SI94S 
 
 NOV 31949 I 
 
 ja wiTtopoHfl ^ 
 
 Cornell University Library 
 PR 4074.T6 1900 
 
 Tommy and Grizel, 
 
 3 1924 013 211 515 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31 92401 321 1 51 5 
 
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AND CLUNG TO IT, HIS TEETH SET 
 
TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 J. M. BARRIE 
 
 ILLUSTRATED BY BERNARD PARTRIDGE 
 
 NEW YORK 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 1900 
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 KOSIIJA NHOr • SSaaj AlISSHAINn 
 
 SNOS s,«aNai«os sai^vHO 
 
 Aa '0061 'XHOIHAoIOO 
 
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CONTENTS 
 
 Chaftcr Pask 
 
 I. Uow Tommy found a Way 1 
 
 II. The Search for the Treasure . . . 13 
 
 III. Sandys on Woman . . 32 
 
 IV. Grizel of the Crooked Smile 47 
 
 V. The Tommy Myth 63 
 
 VI. Ghosts that haunt the Den 80 
 
 VII. The Beginning of the Duel 93 
 
 VHI. What Grizel's Eyes said 110 
 
 IX. Gallant Behavior of T. Sandys .... 122 
 
 X. Gavinia on the Track . . 136 
 
 XI. The Tea-Party 142 
 
 XII. In which a Comedian challenges Tragedy 
 
 to Bowls 162 
 
 XIII. Little Wells of Gladness 180 
 
 XIV. Elspeth 195 
 
 XV. By Prosen Water 205 
 
 XVI. " How could you hurt your Grizel so ! " 216 
 
 XVII. How Tommy saved the Flag 229 
 
 XVIII. The Girl she had been 240 
 
 XIX. Of the Change in Thomas 252 
 
 XX. A Love-Letter 268 
 
Yl 
 Chapter 
 
 XXI. 
 
 XXII. 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 XXV. 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 XXX. 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Paob 
 
 The Attempt to carry Elspeth by Num- 
 bers .... 290 
 
 Grizel's Glorious Hour . ... . 305 
 
 Tommy loses Geizel 315 
 
 The Monster 329 
 
 Mr. T. Sandys has returned to Town . 346 
 
 Grizel all alone . . 363 
 
 Grizel's Journey . . . . . 880 
 
 Two of them . . . . . 391 
 
 The Red Light . 408 
 
 The Little Gods desert him . . 419 
 
 " The Man with the geeetin' Eyes " . 437 
 
 Tommy's Best Work . . . . 454 
 
 The Little Gods return with a Lady . 465 
 A Way is found foe Tommy . . .477 
 
 The Perfect Lover ... . . 498 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGK 
 
 AND CLUNG TO IT, HIS TEETH SET Frontispiece 
 
 TO MEET MR. T. SANDYS .... . . . 30 
 
 THE LAST HE SAW OF HER . ..... 58 
 
 " SHE IS STANDING BEHIND THAT TREE LOOKING AT 
 
 us" 186 
 
 SHE DID NOT LOOK UP, SHE WAITED . ... 206 
 " I SIT STILL BY HIS ARM-CHAIR AND TELL HIM WHAT 
 
 IS HAPPENING TO HIS GRIZEL " . . . ... 244 
 
 THEY TOLD AARON SOMETHING 304 
 
 " BUT MY FRIEXDS STILL CALL ME MRS. JERRY," SHE 
 
 SAID SOFTLY . . . . . 350 
 
 "I WOKE UP," SHE SAID .... ... .... 416 
 
 SHE NODDED, AND PUT HER FINGER TO HER LIPS . . 434 
 HE HEARD THEIR SEDUCTIVE VOICES. THEY DANCED 
 
 AROUND HIM IN NUMWERS 474 
 
TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 HOW TOMMY FOUND A WAT 
 
 O. P. Pym, the colossal Pym, that vast and rolling 
 figure, who never knew what he was to write about until 
 he dipped grandly, an author in such demand that on 
 the foggy evening which starts our story his publishers 
 have had his boots removed lest he slip thoughtlessly 
 round the corner before his work is done, as was the 
 great man's way — shall we begin with him or with 
 Tommy, who has just arrived in London carrying his 
 little box and leading a lady by the hand ? It was Pym, 
 as we are about to see, who in the beginning held 
 Tommy up to the public gaze, Pym who first noticed his 
 remarkable indifference to female society, Pym who 
 
 gave him But, alack, does no one remember 
 
 Pym for himself; is the king of the Penny Number 
 already no more than a button that once upon a time 
 kept Tommy's person together? And we are at the 
 night when they first met ! Let us hasten into Maryle- 
 bone, before little Tommy arrives and Pym is swallowed 
 like an oyster, 
 
 1 
 
4 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 This is the house, 22 Little Owlet Street, Marylebone, 
 but which were his rooms it is less easy to determine, 
 for he was a lodger who flitted placidly from floor to 
 floor according to the state of his finances, carrying his 
 apparel and other belongings in one great armful and 
 spilling by the way. On this particular evening he 
 was on the second floor front, which had a fireplace 
 in the corner, furniture all his landlady's and mostly 
 horse-hair, little to suggest his calling save a noble 
 saucerful of ink, and nothing to draw attention from 
 Pym, who lolled, gross and massive, on a sofa, one leg 
 over the back of it, the other drooping, his arms ex- 
 tended and his pipe, which he could find nowhere, 
 thrust between the buttons of his waistcoat, an agree- 
 able pipe-rack. He wore a yellow dressing-gown, or 
 could scarcely be said to wear it, for such of it as 
 was not round his neck he had converted into a cushion 
 for' his head, which is perhaps the part of him we 
 should have turned to first. It was a big round head, 
 the plentiful gray hair in tangles, possibly because in 
 Pym's last flitting the comb had dropped over the banis- 
 ters, the features were ugly and beyond life-size, yet 
 the forehead had altered little except in color since 
 the day when he was near being made a fellow of his 
 college ; there was sensitiveness left in the thick nose, 
 humor in the eyes, though they so often watered; 
 the face had gone to flabbiness at last, but not without 
 some lines and dents, as if the head had resisted the 
 
HOW TOMMY FOUND A WAX 3 
 
 body for a space before the whole man rolled content- 
 edly down hill. 
 
 He had no beard. " Young man, let your beard 
 grow." Those who have forgotten all else about Pym 
 may recall him in these words ; they were his one coun- 
 sel to literary aspirants, who, according as they took it, 
 are now bearded and prosperous or shaven and on the 
 rates. To shave costs threepence, another threepence for 
 loss of time, nearly ten pounds a year, three hundred 
 pounds since Pym's chin first bristled. With his beard 
 he could have bought an annuity or a cottage in the 
 country, he could have had a wife and children and 
 driven his dog-cart and been made a church-warden. 
 All gone, all shaved, and for what ? When he asked 
 this question he would move his hand across his chin 
 with a sigh, and so, bravely to the barber's. 
 
 Pym was at present suffering from an ailment that 
 had spread him out on that sofa again and, again, acute 
 disinclination to work. 
 
 Meanwhile all the world was waiting for his new 
 tale. So the publishers, two little round men, have 
 told him. They have blustered, they have fawned, 
 they have asked each other out to talk it over behind 
 the door. 
 
 Has he any idea of what the story is to be about ? < 
 
 He has no idea. 
 
 Then at least, Pym, excellent Pym, sit down and dip, 
 and let us see what will happen. 
 
4 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 He declined to do even that. While all the world 
 waited, this was Pym's ultimatum : 
 
 " I shall begin the damned thing at eight o'clock." 
 
 Outside, the fog kept changing at intervals from black 
 to white, as lazily from white to black (the monster 
 blinking), there was not a sound from the street save of 
 pedestrians tapping with their sticks on the pavement as 
 they moved forward warily, afraid of an embrace with 
 the unknown ; it might have been a city of blind beg- 
 gars, one of them a boy. 
 
 At eight o'clock Pym rose with a groan and sat down 
 in his stocking soles to write his delicious tale. He was 
 now alone. But though his legs were wound round his 
 waste-paper basket, and he dipped often and loudly in 
 the saucer like one ringing at the door of Fancy, he 
 could not get the idea that would set him going. He 
 was still dipping for inspiration when T. Sandys, who 
 had been told to find the second floor for himself, 
 knocked at the door and entered, quaking. 
 
 " I remember it vividly," Pym used to say when ques- 
 tioned in the after years about this, his first sight of 
 Tommy, " and I hesitate to decide which impressed me 
 more, the richness of his voice, so remarkable in a boy 
 of sixteen, or his serene countenance with its noble fore- 
 head, behind which nothing base could lurk." 
 
 Pym, Pym ! it is such as you that makes the writing 
 of biography difS.eult. The richness of Tommy's voice 
 could not have struck you, for at that time it was a 
 
HOW TOMMY FOCnSTD A WAY 5 
 
 somewhat squeaky voice, and as for the noble forehead 
 behind which nothing base could lurk, how could 
 you say that, Pym, you who had a noble forehead 
 yourself ? 
 
 No, all that Pym saw was a pasty-faced boy sixteen 
 years old and of an appearance mysteriously plain; hair 
 light brown and waving defiance to the brush, nothing 
 startling about him but the expression of his face, which 
 was almost fearsomely solemn and apparently unchange- 
 able ; he wore his Sunday blacks, of which the trousers 
 might with advantage have borrowed from the sleeves, 
 and he was so nervous that he had to wet his lips before 
 he could speak. He had left the door ajar for a private 
 reason, but Pym, misunderstanding, thought he did it to 
 fly the more readily if anything was flung at him ; and 
 so concluded that he must be a printer's devil. 
 
 Pym had a voice that shook his mantelpiece orna- 
 ments; he was all on the same scale as his ink-pot. 
 " Your Christian name, boy ? " he roared, hopefully, for 
 it was thus he sometimes got the idea that started him. 
 
 " Thomas," replied the boy. 
 
 Pym gave him a look of disgust. " You may go," he 
 said. But when he looked up presently, Thomas was 
 still there. He was not only there, but whistling, a short 
 encouraging whistle that seemed to be directed at the 
 door ; he stopped quickly when Pym looked up, but 
 during the remainder of the interview he emitted this 
 whistle at intervals, always with that anxious glance at 
 
6 TOMMY AKD GRIZEL 
 
 his friend, the door, and its strained joviality was in odd 
 contrast with his solemn face, like a cheery tune played 
 on the church organ. 
 
 " Begone 1" cried Pym. 
 
 " My full name," explained Tommy, who was speaking 
 the English correctly, but with a Scots accent, "is 
 Thomas Sandys. And fine you know who that is," he 
 added, exasperated by Pym's indifference, " I 'm the T. 
 Sandys that answered your advertisement." 
 
 Pym knew who he was now. "You young ruf&an," he 
 gasped, " I never dreamt that you would come ! " 
 
 " I have your letter engaging me in my pocket," said 
 Tommy, boldly, and he laid it on the table. Pym sur- 
 veyed it and him in comic dismay, then with a sudden 
 thought produced nearly a dozen letters from a drawer 
 and dumped them down beside the other. It was now 
 his turn to look triumphant and Tommy aghast. 
 
 Pym's letters were all addressed from the Dubb of 
 Prosen Farm, near Thrums, N. B., to different adver- 
 tisers, care of a London agency, and were Tommy's 
 answers to the " wants " in a London newspaper which 
 had found its way to the far North. " X Y Z " was in 
 need of a chemist's assistant, and from his earliest years, 
 said one of the letters, chemistry had been the study of 
 studies for T. Sandys. He was glad to read, was T. 
 Sandys, that one who did not object to long hours would 
 be preferred, for it seemed to him that those who 
 objected to long hours did not really love their work, 
 
HOW TOMMY POUND A WAT 7 
 
 their heart was not in it, and only where the heart is, 
 can the treasure be found. 
 
 " 123 " had a vacancy for a page-boy ; " Glasgow Man " 
 for a photographer ; page-boy must not be over fourteen, 
 photographer must not be under twenty. "I am a little 
 over fourteen, but I look less," wrote T. Sandys to 
 " 123 ; " "I am a little under twenty," he wrote to 
 "Glasgow Man," "but I look more." His heart was in 
 the work. 
 
 To be a political organizer I If " H and H," who 
 advertised for one, only knew how eagerly the under- 
 signed desired to devote his life to political organizing I 
 
 In answer to " Scholastic's " advertisement for jani- 
 tor in a boys' school, T. Sandys begged to submit his 
 name for consideration. 
 
 Undoubtedly the noblest letter was the one applying 
 for the secretaryship of a charitable society, salary to 
 begin at once, but the candidate selected must deposit 
 one hundred pounds. The application was noble in 
 its offer to make the work a labor of love, and almost 
 nobler in its argument that the hundred pounds was 
 unnecessary. 
 
 " Eex " had a vacancy in his drapery department. T, 
 Sandys had made a unique study of drapery. 
 
 Lastly "Anon" wanted an amanuensis. "Salary," 
 said " Anon," who seemed to be a humorist, " salary 
 large but uncertain." He added, with equal candor, 
 "Drudgery great, but to an intelligent man the pick- 
 
8 TOMMY AND GKIZBI. 
 
 ings may be considerable." Pickings ! Is there a finer 
 word in the language ? T. Sandys had felt that he 
 was particularly good at pickings. But amanuensis ? 
 The thing was unknown to him, no one on the farm 
 could tell him what it was. But never mind. His 
 heart was in it. 
 
 All this correspondence had produced one reply, the 
 letter on which Tommy's hand still rested. It was a 
 brief note, signed 0. P. Pym, and engaging Mr. Sandys 
 on his own recommendation "if he really felt quite 
 certain that his heart (treasure included) was in the 
 work." So far good, Tommy had thought when he 
 receiTcd this answer, but there was nothing in it to 
 indicate the nature of the work, nothing to show whether 
 0. P. Pym was "Scholastic," or "123," or «Kex," or 
 any other advertiser in particular. Stop, there was a 
 postscript : " I need not go into details about your duties, 
 as you assure me you are so well acquainted with them, 
 but before you join me please send (in writing) a full 
 statement of what you think they are." 
 
 There were delicate reasons why Mr. Sandys could not 
 do that, but, oh, he was anxious to be done with farm 
 labor, so he decided to pack and risk it. The letter said- 
 plainly that he was engaged ; what for he must find out 
 slyly when he came to London. So he had put his letter 
 firmly on Pym's table, but it was a staggerer to find that 
 gentleman in possession of the others. 
 
 One of these was Pym's by right, the remainder were 
 
HOW TOMMY FOUNB A WAY 9 
 
 a humorous gift from the agent who was accustomed to 
 sift the correspondence of his clients. Pym had chuckled 
 over them and written a reply that he flattered himself 
 would stump the boy, then he had unexpectedly come 
 into funds (he found a forgotten check while searching 
 his old pockets for tobacco-crumbs), and in that glory 
 T. Sandys escaped his memory. Result, that they were 
 now face to face. 
 
 A tiny red spot, not noticeable before, now appeared 
 in Tommy's eyes. It was never there except when he 
 was determined to have his way. Pym, my friend, yes, 
 and everyone of you who is destined to challenge Tommy, 
 'ware that red light. 
 
 " Well, which am I ? " demanded Pym, almost amused. 
 Tommy was so obviously in a struggle with the 
 problem. 
 
 The saucer and the blank pages told nothing. " Which- 
 ever you are," the boy answered, heavily, "it's not 
 herding nor foddering cattle, and so long as it's not 
 that, I '11 put my heart in it, and where the heart is, 
 there the treasure " 
 
 He suddenly remembered that his host must be ac- 
 ' quainted with the sentiment. 
 
 Easy-going Pym laughed, then said, irritably, "Of 
 what use could a mere boy be to me?" 
 
 " Then it 's not the page-boy ! " exclaimed Tommy, 
 thankfully. 
 
 "Perhaps I am ' Scholastic,' " suggested Pym. 
 
10 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 " No," said Tommy, after a long study of his face. 
 
 Pym followed this reasoning, and said, touchily, 
 "Many a schoolmaster has a red face." 
 
 "Not that kind of redness," explained Tommy; 
 without delicacy. 
 
 « I am • H and H, ' " said Pym. 
 
 " You forget you wrote to me as one person," replied 
 Tommy. 
 
 " So I did. That was because I am the chemist, and I 
 must ask you, Thomas, for your certificate." Tommy 
 believed him this time, and Pym triumphantly poured 
 himself a glass of whiskey, spilling some of it on 
 his dressing-gown. 
 
 "Not you," said Tommy, quickly, "a chemist has a 
 steady hand." 
 
 " Confound you! " cried Pym, " what sort of a boy is 
 this ? " 
 
 " If you had been the draper .you would have wiped 
 the drink off your gown," continued Tommy, thought- 
 fully, " and if you had been ' Glasgow Man ' you would 
 have sucked it off, and if you had been the ' Charitable 
 Society ' you would n't swear in company." He flung 
 cut his hand. "I'll tell you who you are," he said, 
 sternly, "you're ' Anon.' " 
 
 Under this broadside Pym succumbed. He sat down 
 feebly. " Right," he said, with a humorous groan, 
 " and I shall tell you who you are. I am afraid you 
 are my amanuensis I " 
 
HOW TOMMY POUND A WAT 11 
 
 Tommy immediately whistled, a louder and more 
 glorious note than before. 
 
 " Don't be so cocky," cried Pym in sudden rebellion. 
 " You are only my amanuensis if you can tell me what 
 that is. If you can't — out you go." 
 
 He had him at last ! 
 
 Not he ! 
 
 " An amanuensis," said Tommy, calmly, " is one who 
 writes to dictation. Am I to bring in my box ? it 's at 
 the door." 
 
 This made Pym sit down again. " You did n't know 
 what an amanuensis was when you answered my 
 advertisement," he said. 
 
 " As soon as I got to London," Tommy answered, " I 
 went into a bookseller's shop pretending I wanted to 
 buy a dictionary, and I looked the word up." 
 
 " Bring in your box," Pym said, with a groan. 
 
 But it was now Tommy's turn to hesitate. " Have 
 you noticed," he asked, awkwardly, " that I sometimes 
 whistle ? " 
 
 "Don't tell me," said Pym, "that you have a dog 
 out there." 
 
 " It 's not a dog," Tommy replied, cautiously. 
 
 Pym had resumed his seat at the table and was once 
 more toying with his pen. "Open the door," he com- 
 manded, " and let me see what you have brought with 
 you." 
 
 Tommy obeyed gingerly, and then Pym gaped, for 
 
12 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 what the open door revealed to him was a tiny roped 
 box, with a girl of twelve sitting on it. She was 
 dressed in some dull-colored winsey, and looked cold 
 and patient and lonely, and as she saw the big man 
 staring at her she struggled in alarm to her feet and 
 could scarce stand on them. Tommy was looking ap- 
 prehensively from her to Pym. 
 
 "Good God, boy," roared Pym, "are you married?" 
 
 " No," cried Tommy in agony, " she 's my sister, and 
 we're orphans, and did you think I could have the 
 heart to leave Elspeth behind ? " He took her stoutly 
 by the hand. 
 
 "And he never will marry," said little Elspeth, 
 almost fiercely ; " will you. Tommy ? " 
 
 " Never ! " said Tommy, patting her and glaring at 
 Pym. 
 
 But Pym would not have it ; " Married," he shouted, 
 " magnificent ! " and he dipped exultantly, for he had 
 got his idea at last. Forgetting even that he had an 
 amanuensis, he wrote on and on and on. 
 
 " He smells o' drink," Elspeth whispered. 
 
 "All the better," replied Tommy, cheerily. "Make 
 yourself at home, Elspeth, he 's the kind I can manage. 
 Was there ever a kind I couldna manage ? " he whis- 
 pered, top-heavy with conceit. 
 
 "There was Grizel," Elspeth said, rather thought- 
 lessly, and then Tommy frowned. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THE SEARCH FOK THE TREASURE 
 
 Six years afterward Tommy was a famous man, as 
 I hope you do not need to be told, but you may be 
 wondering how it came about. The whole question, 
 in Pym's words, resolves itself into how the solemn 
 little devil got to know so much about women. It made 
 the world marvel when they learned his age, but no 
 one was quite so staggered as Pym, who had seen him 
 daily for all those years, and been damning him for 
 his iadifEerence to the sex during the greater part of 
 them. 
 
 It began while he was still no more than an aman- 
 uensis, sitting with his feet in the waste-paper basket, 
 Pym dictating from the sofa and swearing when the 
 words would not come unless he was perpendicular. 
 Among the duties of this amanuensis was to remember 
 the name of the heroine, her appearance and other 
 personal details, for Pym constantly forgot them in 
 the night, and he had to go searching back through 
 his pages for them, cursing her so horribly that Tommy 
 signed to Elspeth to retire to her tiny bedroom at the 
 top of the house. He' was always most careful of 
 
14 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 Elspeth, and with the first pound he earned he in- 
 sured his life, leaving all to her, but told her nothing 
 about it, lest she should think it meant his early 
 death. As she grew older he also got good dull books 
 for her from a library, and gave her a piano on the 
 hire system and taught her many things about life, 
 very carefully selected from his own discoveries. 
 
 Elspeth out of the way, he could give Pym all the 
 information wanted. -• Her name is Felicity," he would 
 say at the right moment, " she has curly brown hair 
 in which the sun strays and a blushing neck, and her 
 eyes are like blue lakes." 
 
 "Height," roared Pym, "have I mentioned it?" 
 
 " 'No, but she is about five feet six." 
 
 " How the — could you know that ? " 
 
 "You tell Percy's height in his stocking soles, and 
 when she reached to his mouth and kissed him she 
 had to stand on her tiptoes so to do." 
 
 Tommy said this in a most business-like tone, but 
 could not help smacking his lips. He smacked them 
 again when he had to write, 
 
 "Have no fear, little woman, I am by your side." 
 
 Or, " What a sweet child you are." 
 
 Pym had probably fallen into the way of making 
 the Percys revel in such epithets because he could not 
 remember the girl's name, but this delicious use of 
 the diminutive, as addressed to full-grown ladies, went 
 to Tommy's head. His solemn face kept his secret, 
 
THE SEARCH FOR THE TREASCTRK 15 
 
 but lie had some narrow escapes, as once when saying 
 good-night to Elspeth he kissed her on mouth, eyes, 
 nose, and ears, and said, "Shall I tuck you in, little 
 woman ? " He came to himself with a start. 
 
 "I forgot," he said, hurriedly, and got out of the 
 room without telling her what he had forgotten. 
 
 Pym's publishers knew their man, and their arrange- 
 ment with him was that he was paid on completion 
 of the tale. But always before he reached the middle 
 he struck for what they called his honorarium, and 
 this troubled them, for the tale was appearing week 
 by week as it was written. If they were obdurate 
 he suddenly concluded his story in such words as 
 these : 
 
 " Several years have passed since these events took 
 place, and the scene changes to a lovely garden by 
 the bank of old Father Thames. A young man sits 
 by the soft-flowing stream, and he is calm as the scene 
 itself, for the storm has passed away, and Percy (for 
 it is no other) has found an anchorage. As he sits 
 musing over the past, Felicity steals out by the French 
 window and puts her soft arms round his neck. 'My 
 little wife ! ' he murmurs. The End, unless you pay 
 up by messenger" 
 
 This last line, which was not meant for the world 
 (but little would Pym have cared though it had been 
 printed), usually brought his employers to their knees, 
 and then, as Tommy advanced in experience, came the 
 
16 TOMMY A^SD GKIZBL 
 
 pickings, for Pym, with money in his pockets, had 
 important engagements round the corner and risked 
 intrusting his amanuensis with the writing of the next 
 instalment, " all except the bang at the end." 
 
 Smaller people in Tommy's state of mind would have 
 hurried straight to the love-passages, but he saw the 
 danger and forced his Pegasus away from them. " Do 
 your day's toil first," he may be conceived saying to 
 that animal, " and at evenfall I shall let you out to 
 browse." So, with this reward in front, he devoted 
 many pages to the dreary adventures of pretentious 
 males, and even found a certain pleasure in keeping 
 the lady waiting. But as soon as he reached her he 
 lost his head again. 
 
 " Oh, you beauty ! oh, you small pet ! " he said to 
 himself, with solemn transport. 
 
 As the artist in him was stirred, great problems pre- 
 sented themselves; for instance, in certain circumstances 
 was darling or little one the better phrase ? Darling in 
 solitary grandeur is more pregnant of meaning than 
 little one, but little has a flavor of the patronizing 
 which darling perhaps lacks. He wasted many sheets 
 over such questions, but they were in his pocket when 
 Pym or Elspeth opened the door. It is wonderful how 
 much you can conceal between the touch on the handle 
 and the opening of the door if your heart is in it. 
 
 Despite this fine practice, however, he was the 
 shyest of mankind in the presence of women, and this 
 
THE SEARCH EOR THE TEEASUEE 17 
 
 shyness grew upon him with the years. Was it because 
 he never tried to uncork himself ? Oh, no ! It was 
 ahout this time that he one day put his arm round 
 Clara, the servant, not passionately, but with delibera- 
 tion, as if he were making an experiment with machin- 
 ery. He then listened as if to hear Clara ticking. He 
 wrote an admirable love-letter, warm, dignified, sincere, 
 to nobody in particular, and carried it about in his 
 pocket in readiness. But in love-making, as in the 
 other arts, those do it best who cannot tell how it is 
 done, and he was always stricken with a palsy when 
 about to present that letter. It seemed that he was 
 only able to speak to ladies when they were not there. 
 Well, if he could not speak he thought the more ; he 
 thought so profoundly that in time the heroines of Pym 
 ceased to thrill him. 
 
 This was because he had found out that they were 
 not flesh and blood, but he did not delight in his dis- 
 covery ; it horrified him, for what he wanted was the 
 old thrill. To make them human so that they could be 
 his little friends again, nothing less was called for. 
 This meant slaughter here and there of the great Pym's 
 brainwork, and Tommy tried to keep his hands off, but 
 his heart was in it. In Pym's pages the ladies were the 
 most virtuous and proper of their sex (though dread- 
 fully persecuted), but he merely told you so at the 
 beginning, and now and again afterward to fill up, 
 and then allowed them to act with what may be called 
 
 2 
 
18 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 rashness, so that tlie story did not really suffer. Before 
 Tommy was nineteen he changed all that. Out went 
 this because she would not have done it, and that 
 because she could not have done it ; fathers might now 
 have taken a lesson from T. Sandys in the upbringing of 
 their daughters ; he even sternly struck out the dimin- 
 utives. With a pen in his hand and woman in his head 
 he had such noble thoughts that his tears of exaltation 
 damped the pages as he wrote, and the ladies must 
 have been astounded as well as proud to see what they 
 were turning into. 
 
 That was Tommy with a pen in his hand and a hand- 
 kerchief hard by, but it was another Tommy, who, when 
 the finest bursts were over, sat back in his chair and 
 mused. The lady was consistent now, and he would 
 think about her and think and think, until concentra- 
 tion, which is a pair of blazing eyes, seemed to draw 
 her out of the pages to his side, and then he and she 
 sported in a way forbidden in the tale. While he sat 
 there with eyes riveted he had her to dinner at a 
 restaurant, and took her up the river, and called her 
 "little woman," and when she held up her mouth he 
 said, tantalizingly, that she must wait until he had 
 finished his cigar. This queer delight enjoyed, back he 
 popped her into the story, where she was again the 
 vehicle for such glorious sentiments that Elspeth, to 
 whom he read the best of them, feared he was becoming 
 too good to live. 
 
THE SEARCH FOE THE TEEASTJEB 19 
 
 In the meantime the great penny puhlic were slowly 
 growing restive, and at last the two little round men 
 called on Pym to complain that he was falling off, and 
 Pym turned them out of doors and then sat down hero- 
 ically to do what he had not done for two decades, to 
 read his latest work. 
 
 "Elspeth, go upstairs to your room," whispered 
 Tommy, and then he folded his arms proudly. He 
 should have been in a tremble, but latterly he had often 
 felt that he must burst if he did not soon read some of 
 his bits to Pym, more especially the passages about the 
 hereafter; also the opening of Chapter Seventeen. 
 
 At first Pym's only comment was, " It is the same old 
 drivel as before ; what more can they want ? " 
 
 But presently he looked up, puzzled. "Is this chap- 
 ter yours or mine ? " he demanded. 
 
 "It is about half and half," said Tommy. 
 
 " Is mine the first half ? Where does yours begin ? " 
 
 " That is not exactly what I mean," explained Tommy, 
 in a glow, but backing a little ; " you wrote that chapter 
 first, and then I — I " 
 
 " You re-wrote it ! " roared Pym, " you dared to meddle 
 with — " He was speechless with fury. 
 
 " I tried to keep my hand off," Tommy said, with dig- 
 nity, " but the thing had to be done, and they are human 
 now." , / 
 
 " Human ! who wants them to be human ? The fiends 
 seize you, boy, you have even been tinkering with my 
 
20 TOMMY AND GKIZEIi 
 
 heroine's personal appearance ; what is this you have 
 been doing to her nose ? " 
 
 •'•' I turned it up slightly, that 's all," said Tommy. 
 
 " I like them down," roared Pym. 
 
 -'I prefer them up," said Tommy, stifly. 
 
 " Where," cried Pym, turning over the leaves in a 
 panic, " where is the scene in the burning house ? " 
 
 " It 's out," Tommy explained, " but there is a chapter 
 in its place about — it 's mostly about the beauty of the 
 soul being everything, and mere physical beauty nothing. 
 Oh, Mr. Pym, sit down and let me read it to you." 
 
 But Pym read it, and a great deal more, for himself. 
 No wonder he stormed, for the impossible had been 
 made not only consistent, but unreadable. The plot was 
 lost for chapters, the characters no longer did anything, 
 and then went and did something else ; you were told 
 instead how they did it ; you were not allowed to make 
 up your own mind about them ; you had to listen to the 
 mind of T. Sandys; he described and he analyzed; the 
 road he had tried to clear through the thicket was im- 
 passable for chips. 
 
 "A few more weeks of this," said Pym, "and we 
 should all three be turned out into the streets." 
 
 Tommy went to bed in an agony of mortification, but 
 presently to his side came Pym. 
 
 " Where did you copy this from ? " he asked. " 'It is 
 when we are thinking of those we love that our noblest 
 thoughts come to us, and the more worthy they are of 
 
 4j 
 
THE SEAKCH FOK THE TEBASTJBB 21 
 
 our love the nobler the thought, hence it is that no one 
 has done the greatest work who did not love God.' " 
 
 "I copied it from nowhere," replied Tommy, fiercely; 
 " it 's my own." 
 
 " Well, it has nothing to do with the story, and so is 
 only a blot on it, and I have no doubt the thing has been 
 said much better before. Still, I suppose it is true." 
 
 " It 's true," said Tommy ; " and yet " 
 
 " Go on. I want to know all about it." 
 
 " And yet," Tommy said, puzzled, " I 've known noble 
 thoughts come to me when I was listening to a brass 
 band." 
 
 Pym chuckled. " Funny things, noble thoughts," he 
 agreed. He read another passage : 
 
 " ' It was the last half hour of day when I was admitted 
 with several others to look upon my friend's dead face. 
 A handkerchief had been laid over it. I raised the 
 handkerchief. I know not what the others were think- 
 ing, but the last time we met he had told me something, 
 it was not much, only that no woman had ever kissed 
 him. It seemed to me that as I gazed the wistfulness 
 came back to his face. I whispered to a woman who 
 was present, and stooping over him she was about to — 
 but her eyes were dry, and I stopped her. The handker- 
 chief was replaced, and all left the room save myself. 
 Again I raised the handkerchief. I cannot tell you how 
 innocent he looked.' " 
 
 " Who was he ? " asked Pym. 
 
22 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 "Nobody," said Tommy, with some awe; "it just 
 came to me. Do you notice how simple the wording is ? 
 It took me some time to make it so simple.'* 
 
 " You are just nineteen, I think ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 Pym looked at him wonderingly. 
 
 " Thomas," he said, " you are a very queer little 
 devil." 
 
 He also said, "And it is possible you may find the 
 treasure you are always talking about. Don't jump to 
 the ceiling, my friend, because I say that | I was once 
 after the treasure myself, and you can see whether I 
 found it." 
 
 Prom about that time, on the chances that this mys- 
 terious treasure might spring up in the form of a new 
 kind of flower, Pym zealously cultivated the ground, 
 and Tommy had an industrious time of it. He was 
 taken ofE his stories, which at once regained their 
 elasticity, and put on to exercises. 
 
 "If you have nothing to say on the subject, say 
 nothing," was one of the new rules which few would 
 have exj cted from Pym. Another was, "As soon as 
 you can ,ay what you think, andTiot what some other 
 person has thought for you, you are on the way to 
 being a remarkable man." 
 
 " Without concentration, Thomas, you are lost ; con- 
 centrate though your coat-tails be on fire. 
 
 "Try your hand at description, and when you have 
 
THE SEAKCH FOR THE TEBASTTBB 23 
 
 done chortling over the result reduce the whole by half 
 without missing anything out. 
 
 "Analyze your characters and their motives at the 
 prodigious length in which you revel, and then, my 
 sonny, cut your analysis out. It is for your own 
 guidance, not the reader's. 
 
 " ' I have often noticed,' you are always saying. The 
 story has nothing to do with you. Obliterate yourself. 
 I see that will be your stiffest job. 
 
 " Stop preaching. It seems to me the pulpit is 
 where you should look for the treasure. Nineteen, 
 and you are already as didactic as seventy." 
 
 And so on. 
 
 Over his exercises Tommy was now engrossed for so 
 long a period that as he sits there you may observe 
 his legs slowly lengthening and the coming of his 
 beard. No, his legs lengthened as he sat with his 
 feet in the basket, but I feel sure that his beard burst 
 through prematurely some night when he was thinking 
 too hard about the ladies. 
 
 There were no ladies in the exercises, for despite 
 their altercation about noses Pym knew thd,i. on this 
 subject Tommy's mind was a blank. But he recog- 
 nized the sex's importance, and, becoming possessed 
 once more of a black coat, marched his pupil into the 
 somewhat shoddy drawing-rooms that were still open 
 to him, and there ordered Tommy to be fascinated for 
 his future good. But it was as it had always been. 
 
24 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 Tommy sat white and speechless and apparently bored, 
 could not even say "You sing with so much expres- 
 sion," when the lady at the piano-forte had finished. 
 
 " Shyness I could pardon ? " the exasperated Pym 
 would roar, "but want of interest is almost immoral. 
 At your age the blood would have been coursing through 
 my veins. Love ! You are incapable of it. There is 
 not a drop of sentiment in your frozen carcass." 
 
 " Can I help that ? " growled Tommy. It was an 
 agony to him even to speak about women. 
 
 " If you can't," said Pym, " all is over with you. 
 An artist without sentiment is a painter without col- 
 ors. Young man, I fear you are doomed." 
 
 And Tommy believed him and quaked. He had 
 the most gallant struggles with himself. He even 
 set his teeth and joined a dancing class, though 
 neither Pym nor Elspeth knew of it, and it never 
 showed afterward in his legs. In appearance he was 
 now beginning to be the Sandys of the photographs, 
 a little over the middle height and rather heavily 
 built; nothing to make you uncomfortable until you 
 saw his face. That solemn countenance never re- 
 sponded when he laughed, and stood coldly by when 
 he was on fire ; he might have winked for an eternity 
 and still the onlooker must have thought himself mis- 
 taken. In his boyhood the mask had descended scarce 
 below his mouth, for there was a dimple in the chin 
 to put you at your ease, but now the short brown 
 
THE SEARCH FOR THE TREAStTRB 25 
 
 beard had come, and he was forever hidden from the 
 world. 
 
 He had the dandy's tastes for superb neckties, vel- 
 vet jackets, and he got the ties instead of dining; he 
 panted for the jacket, knew all the shop-windows it 
 was in, but for years denied himself with a moan so 
 that he might buy pretty things for Elspeth. When 
 eventually he got it, Pym's friends ridiculed him. 
 When he saw how ill his face matched it he ridiculed 
 himself. Often when Tommy was feeling that now 
 at last the ladies must come to heel, he saw his face 
 suddenly in a mirror and all the spirit went out of 
 him. But still he clung to his velvet jacket. 
 
 I see him in it stalking through the terrible dances, 
 a heroic figure at last. He shuddered every time he 
 found himself on one leg, he got sternly into every- 
 body's way, he was the butt of the little noodle of an 
 instructor ; all the social tortures he endured grimly in 
 the hope that at last the cork would come out. Then, 
 though there were all kinds of girls in the class, merry, 
 sentimental, practical, coquettish, prudes, there was no 
 kind, he felt, whose heart he could not touch ; in love- 
 making, as in the favorite Thrums game of the dambrod, 
 there are sixty-one openings and he knew them all. Yet 
 at the last dance as at the first the universal opinion of 
 his partners (shop-girls mostly from the large millinery 
 establishments, who had to fly like Cinderellas when the 
 clock struck a certain hour) was that he kept himself 
 
26 TOMMY AliTD GEIZEL 
 
 to himself, and they were too much the lady to make 
 up to a gentleman who so obviously did not want them. 
 
 Pym encouraged his friends to jeer at Tommy's want 
 of interest in the sex, thinking it a way of goading him 
 to action. One evening, the bottles circulating, they 
 mentioned one Dolly, goddess at some bar, as a fit 
 instructress for him. Coarse pleasantries passed, but 
 for a time he writhed in silence, then burst upon them 
 indignantly for their unmanly smirching of a woman's 
 character, and swept out, leaving them a little ashamed. 
 That was very like Tommy. 
 
 But presently a desire came over him to see this girl, 
 and it came because they had hinted such dark things 
 about her. That was like him also. 
 
 There was probably no harm in Dolly, though it is 
 man's proud right to question it in exchange for his 
 bitters. She was tall and willowy and stretched her 
 neck like a swan and returned you your change with 
 disdainful languor ; to call such a haughty beauty Dolly 
 was one of the minor triumphs for man, and Dolly they 
 all called her, except the only one who could have given 
 an artistic justification for it. 
 
 This one was a bearded stranger who, when he knew 
 that Pym and his friends were elsewhere, would enter 
 the bar with a cigar in his mouth and ask for a whiskey 
 and water, which was heroism again, for smoking was 
 ever detestable to him and whiskey more offensive than 
 quinine. But these things are expected of you, and by 
 
THE SEARCH FOE THE TBBASUEE 27 
 
 asking for the wMskey you get into talk with Dolly, 
 that is to say, you tell her several times what you want, 
 and when she has served every other body you get it. 
 The eommeroial must be served first ; in the bar-room 
 he blocks the way like royalty in the street. There is a 
 crown for us all somewhere. 
 
 Dolly seldom heard the bearded one's "Good-even- 
 ing ; " she could not possibly have heard the " Dear," 
 for though it was there it remained behind his teeth. 
 She knew him only as the stiff man who got separated 
 from his glass without complaining, and at first she put 
 this down to forgetfulness and did nothing, so that he 
 could go away without drinking, but by and by, wher- 
 ever he left his tumbler, cunningly concealed behind a 
 water-bottle or temptingly in front of a commercial, she 
 restored it to him, and there was a twinkle in her eye. 
 
 " You little rogue, so you see through me ! " Surely 
 it was an easy thing to say, but what he did say was 
 " Thank you." Then to himself he said, " Ass, ass, 
 ass ! " 
 
 Sitting on the padded seat that ran the length of the 
 room, and surreptitiously breaking his cigar against the 
 cushions to help it on its way to an end, he brought his 
 intellect to bear on Dolly at a distance, and soon had a 
 better knowledge of her than could be claimed by those 
 who had Dollied her for years. He also wove romances 
 about her, some of them of too lively a character, and 
 others so noble and sad and beautiful that the tears 
 
28 TOMMY AJSD GKIZEL 
 
 came to his eyes and Dolly thought he had been drink- 
 ing. He could not have said whether he would prefer 
 her to be good or bad. 
 
 These were but his leisure moments, for during the 
 long working hours he was still at the exercises, toiling 
 fondly and right willing to tear himself asunder to get 
 at the trick of writing. So he passed from exercises to 
 the grand experiment. 
 
 It was to be a tale, for there, they had taken for 
 granted, lay the treasure. Pym was most considerate 
 at this time, and mentioned woman with an apology. 
 
 " I have kept away from them in the exercises," he 
 said in effect, "because it would have been useless (as 
 well as cruel) to force you to labor on a subject so 
 uncongenial to you, and for the same reason I have 
 decided that it is to be a tale of adventure, in which the 
 heroine need be little more than a beautiful sack of coals 
 which your cavalier carries about with him on his left 
 shoulder. I am afraid we must have her to that extent, 
 Thomas, but I am not asking much of you ; dump her 
 down as often as you like." 
 
 And Thomas did his dogged best, the red light in his 
 eye; though he had not and never could have had 
 the smallest instinct for story-writing, he knew to the 
 finger-tips how it is done, but forever he would have 
 gone on breaking all the rules of the game. How he 
 wrestled with himself ! Sublime thoughts came to him 
 (nearly all about that girl) and he drove them away, 
 
THE SEARCH FOR THE TEEASUEB 29 
 
 for he knew they beat only against the march of his 
 story, and, whatever befall, the story must march. 
 Eelentlessly he followed in the track of his men, push- 
 ing the dreary dogs on to deeds of valor. He tried 
 making the lady human, and then she would not march ; 
 she sat still and he talked about her, he dumped her 
 down and soon he was yawning. This weariness was 
 what alarmed him most, for well he understood that 
 there could be no treasure where the work was not 
 engrossing play, and he doubted no more than Pym 
 that for him the treasure was in the tale or nowhere. 
 Had he not been sharpening his tools in this belief for 
 years ? Strange to reflect now, that all the time he 
 was hacking and sweating at that novel (the last he 
 ever attempted) it was only marching toward the waste- 
 paper basket. 
 
 He had a fine capacity, as has been hinted, for self- 
 deception, and in time, of course, he found a way of 
 dodging the disquieting truth. This, equally, of course, 
 was by yielding to his impulses. He allowed himself 
 an hour a day, when Pym was absent, in which he 
 wrote the story as it seemed to want to write itself, 
 and then he cut this piece out, which could be done 
 quite easily,__as it consisted only of moralizings. Thus 
 was his day brightened, and with this relaxation to look 
 forward to he plodded on at his proper work, delving 
 so hard that he could avoid asking himself why he was 
 still delving. What shall we say ? he was digging for 
 
30 TOMMY AiTD GBIZEL 
 
 the treasure in an orcliard, and every now and again 
 he came out of his hole to pluck an apple, but though 
 the apple was so sweet to the mouth, it never struck 
 him that the treasure might be growing overhead. At 
 first he destroyed the fruit of his stolen hour, and even 
 after he took to carrying it about fondly in his pocket 
 and to re-writing it in a splendid new: form that had 
 come to him just as he was stepping iiito bed, he con- 
 tinued to conceal it from his oyerseer'sjeyes. And still 
 he thought all was over with him when Pym said the 
 story did not march. 
 
 " It is a dead thing," Pym would roar, flinging down 
 the manuscript, " a dead thing because the stakes your 
 man is playing for, a woman's love, is less than a 
 wooden counter to you. You are a fine piece of mecha- 
 nism, my solemn-faced don, but you are a watch that 
 won't go because you are not wound up. Nobody can 
 wind the artist up except a chit of a girl, and how you 
 are ever to get one to take pity on you, only the gods 
 who look after men with a want can tell." 
 
 " It becomes more impenetrable every day, " he said. 
 "No use your sitting there tearing yourself to bits. 
 Out into the street with you. I suspend these sittings 
 until you can tell me you have kissed a girl." 
 
 He was still saying this sort of thing when the 
 famous "Letters" were published, T. Sandys author. 
 " Letters to a Young Man about to be Married " was the 
 full title, and another almost as applicable would have 
 
o 
 
 3 
 
THE SEAECH FOE THE TEEASHEB 31 
 
 been "Bits Cut out of a Story because they Prevented 
 its Marching." If you have any memory you • do not 
 need to be told how that splendid study, so ennobling, 
 so penetrating, of woman at her best, took the town. 
 Tommy woke a famous man, and except Elspeth no 
 one was more pleased than big-hearted, hopeless bleary 
 Pym. 
 
 " But how the has it all come about ! " he kept 
 
 roaring. 
 
 " A woman can be anything that the man who loves 
 her would have her be," says the " Letters," and " Oh," 
 said woman everywhere, " if all men had the same idea 
 of us as Mr.rSandys! " 
 
 " To meet Mr. T. Sandys." Leaders of society wrote 
 it on their invitation cards. Their daughters a-thirst 
 for a new sensation thrilled at the thought, ' ' Will he 
 talk to us as nobly as he writes ! " and oh, how willing 
 he was to do it, especially if their noses were slightly 
 tilted. 
 
CHAPTEE, in 
 
 SANDYS ON WOMAN 
 
 " Can you kindly tell me the name of the book I 
 want ? " 
 
 It is the commonest question asked at the circulating 
 library by dainty ladies jiist out of the carriage, and the 
 librarian after looking them over can usually tell. In 
 the days we have now to speak of, however, he an- 
 swered, without looking them over: 
 
 "Sandys's Letters." 
 
 " Ah, yes, of course. May I have it, please ? " 
 
 "I regret to find that it is out." 
 
 Then the lady looked naughty. "Why don't you 
 have two copies?" she pouted. 
 
 "Madam," said the librarian, "we have a thousand." 
 
 A small and very timid girl of eighteen, with a neat 
 figure that shrank from observation, although it was al- 
 ready aware that it looked best in gray, was there to drink 
 in this music and carried it home in her heart. She was 
 Elspeth, and that dear heart was almost too full at this 
 time ; I hesitate whether to tell or to conceal how it 
 even created a disturbance in no less a place than the 
 House of Commons. She was there with Mrs. Jerry, 
 and the thing was recorded in the papers of the period 
 
SANBXS ON WOMAN 83 
 
 in these blasting words : " The Home Secretary was 
 understood to be quoting a passage from - Letters to a 
 Young Man/ but we failed to catch its drift owing to an 
 unseemly interruption from the ladies' gallery." 
 
 " But what was it you cried out ? " Tommy asked 
 Elspeth when she thought she had told him everything. 
 (Like all true women, she always began in the middle.) 
 
 "Oh, Tommy, have I not told you? I cried out 
 'I'm his sister.' " 
 
 Thus, owing to Elspeth's behavior, it can never be 
 known which was the passage quoted in the House, but 
 we may be sure of one thing, that it did the House 
 good. That book did everybody good, even Pym could 
 only throw ofE its beneficent efEects by a tremendous 
 effort, and young men about to be married used to ask 
 at the bookshops, not for the "Letters," but simply for 
 " Sandys on Woman," acknowledging Tommy as the 
 authority on the subject, like Mill on Jurisprudence, or 
 Thomson and Tait on the Differential Calculus. Con- 
 troversies raged about it. Some thought he asked too 
 much of man, some thought he saw too much in 
 women ; there was a fear that young people, knowing 
 at last how far short they fell of what they ought to be, 
 might shrink from the matrimony that must expose 
 them to each other, now that they had Sandys to guide 
 them, and the persons who had simply married and 
 risked it (and it was astounding what a number of them 
 there proved to be) wrote to the papers suggesting that 
 
 8 
 
34 TOMMY AliTD GRIZBI. 
 
 he might yield a little in the next edition. But Sandys 
 remained firm. 
 
 At fimT!^ took for granted that he was a very aged 
 gentleman ; he had indeed hinted at this in the text, 
 and when the truth came out ("And just fancy, he is 
 hot even married ! " ) the enthusiasm was doubled. 
 "Not engaged!" they cried, "don't tell that to me. 
 No unmarried man could have written such a eulogy 
 of marriage without being on the brink of it." Perhaps 
 she was dead ? It ran through -'the town that she was 
 dead. Some knew which cemetery. 
 
 The very first lady Mr. Sandys ever took in to dinner 
 mentioned this rumor to him, not with mlgar curiosity, 
 but delicately, with a hint of sympathy in waiting, and 
 it must be remembered, in fairness to Tommy, that aU 
 artists love sympathy. This;;sympathy uncorked him, 
 and our Tommy could flow' comparatively freely at last. 
 Observe the delicious change. 
 
 " Has that story got abroad ? " he said, simply. "The 
 matter is one which, I need not say, I have never men- 
 tioned to a soul." 
 
 " Of course not," the lady said, and waited eagerly. 
 
 If Tommy had been an expert he might have turned 
 the conversation to brighter topics, but he was not; 
 there had already b^en long pauses, and in dinner talk 
 it is perhaps allowable to fling on any faggot rather 
 than let the fire go out. "It is odd that I should be 
 talking of it now,'"' he saia, musingly. 
 
SANDYS ON WOMAN 35 
 
 " I suppose," she said, gently, to bring him out of the 
 reverie into which he had sunk, " I suppose it happened 
 some time ago ? " 
 
 " Long, long ago," he answered. Haying written as 
 an aged person, he often found difB.culty in remembering 
 suddenly that he was two-and-twenty. 
 
 " But you are still a very young man." 
 
 " It seems long ago to me," he said, with a sigh. 
 
 « Was she beautiful ? " 
 
 " She was beautiful to my eyes." 
 
 "And as good I am sure as she was beautiful." 
 
 " Ah me ! " said Tommy. 
 
 His confidante w^as^ burning to know more and hop- 
 ing they were being observed across the table, but she 
 was a kind, sentimental creature, though stout, or 
 .because of itj^JaaCfeshe said, " I am so afraid that my 
 questions pain you." 
 
 " No, no," said Tommy, who was very, very happy. 
 
 " Was it very sudden ? " 
 
 « Fever." 
 
 "Ahl But I meant your attachment." 
 
 " We met and we loved," he said, with gentle dignity. 
 
 " That is the true way," said the lady. 
 
 " It is the only way," he said, decisively. 
 
 " Mr. Sandys, you have been so good, I wonder if you 
 would tell me her name ? " 
 
 "Felicity," he said, with emotion. Presently he 
 looked up. " It is very strange to me," he said, won- 
 
36 TOMMY AST) GEIZEIi 
 
 deringly, "to find myself saying these things to you 
 •who an hour ago were a complete stranger to me. But 
 you are not like other women." 
 
 " No, indeed ! " said the lady, warmly. 
 
 "That," he said, "must be why I tell you what I 
 have never told to another human being. How mys- 
 terious are the workings of the heart." 
 
 "Mr. Sandys," said the lady, quite carried away, 
 "no words of mine can convey to you the pride with 
 which I hear you say that. Be assured that I shall 
 respect your confidences." She missed his next remark 
 because she was wondering whether she dare ask him 
 to come to dinner on the twenty-fifth, and then the 
 ladies had to retire, and by the time he rejoined her 
 he was as tongue-tied as at the beginning. The cork 
 had not been extracted ; it had been knocked into 
 the bottle where it still often barred the way, and 
 there was always, as we shall see, a~flavor of it in the 
 wine. 
 
 " You will get over it yet, the summer and the flowers 
 will come to you again," she managed to whisper to 
 him kind-heartedly as she -^as going. 
 
 " Thank you," he said, with that inscrutable face. It 
 was far from his design to play a part, he had indeed 
 had no design at all, but an opportunity for sentiment 
 having presented itself, his mouth had opened as at 
 a cherry. He did not laugh afterward even when he 
 reflected how unexpectedly Felicity had come into his 
 
SANDYS OK WOMAN 37 
 
 life, he thought of her rather with affectionate regard, 
 and pictured her as a tall slim girl in white. When 
 he took a tall slim girl in white in to dinner he could 
 not help saying, huskily : 
 
 " You remind me of one who was a very dear friend 
 of mine. I was much startled when you came into the 
 room ? " 
 
 " You mean someone who is dead ? " she asked, in 
 awe-struck tones. 
 
 "Fever," he said. 
 
 " You think I am like her in appearance ? " 
 
 "In every way," he said, dreamily, "the same sweet 
 — pardon me, but it is very remarkable. Even the 
 tones of the^voice are the same. I suppose I ought 
 not to ask your age?" 
 
 " I shall be twenty-one in August." 
 
 "She would have been twenty-one in August had 
 she lived," Tommy said, with fervor. " My dear young 
 lady " 
 
 This was the aged gentleman again, but she did not 
 wince; he soon found out that they expect authors 
 to say the oddest things, and this proved to be a great 
 help to him. 
 
 "My dear young lady, I feel that I know you very 
 well." 
 
 " That," she said, " is only because I resemble your 
 friend-oatwardly. The real me (she was a bit of philoso- 
 pher also) you cannot know at all." 
 
38 TOMMY Ami GRIZBL 
 
 He smiled sadly. "Has it ever struck you," he 
 asked, " that you are very unlike other women ? " 
 
 "Oh, how ever could you have found that out ?" she 
 exclaimed, amazed. 
 
 Almost before he knew how it came about he was on 
 terms of very pleasant sentiment with this girl, for 
 they now shared between them a secret that he had 
 confided to no other. His face, which had been so 
 much against him hitherto, was at last in his favor; 
 it showed so plainly that when he looked at her more 
 softly or held her hand longer than is customary, he 
 was really thinking of that other of whom she was the 
 image. Or if it did not precisely show that, it sug- 
 gested something or other of that nature which did just 
 as well. There was a sweet something between them 
 ■which brought them together, and also kept them apart ; 
 it allowed them to go a certain length, while it was also 
 a reason why they could never, never exceed that dis- 
 tance; and this was an ideal state for Tommy, who f 
 could be most loyal and tender so long as it was 
 understood that he meant nothing in particular. She 
 was the right kind of girl, too, and admired him the 
 more (and perhaps went a step farther) because he 
 remained so true to Felicity's memory. 
 
 You must not think him calculating and cold-blooded, 
 for nothing could be less true to the fact. When not 
 engaged, indeed, on his new work, he might waste some 
 time planning scenes with exquisite ladies, in which he 
 
SANDYS ON WOMAN 39 
 
 sparkled or had a hidden sorrow (he cared not which) ; 
 but these scenes seldom came to life. He preferred very 
 pretty girls to be ratl^er stupid (oh, the artistic instinct 
 of the man !), but insteadT^of keeping them stupid, as he 
 wanted to do, he found himself trying to improve their 
 minds. They screwed up their noses in the effort. 
 Meaning to thrill the celebrated beauty, who had been 
 specially invited to meet him, he devoted himself to a 
 plain woman, for whose plainness a sudden pity had 
 mastered him (for like all true worshippers of beauty 
 in women, he always showed best in the presence of 
 plain ones). With the intention of being a gallant 
 knight to Lady I-Won't-Tell-The-Name, a whim of the 
 moment made him so stiff to her that she ultimately 
 asked the reason ; and such a charmingly sad reason 
 presented itself to him that she immediately invited 
 him to her riverside party on Thursday week. He had 
 the conversations and incidents for that party ready 
 long before the day arrived; he altered them and 
 polished them as other young gentlemen in the same 
 circumstances overhaul their boating costumes; but 
 when he joined the party there was among them the 
 children's governess, and, seeing her slighted, his blood 
 boiled, and he was her attendant for the afternoon. 
 
 Elspeth was not at this pleasant jink in high life. 
 She had been invited, but her ladyship had once let 
 Tommy kiss her hand for the first and last time ; so he 
 decided sternly that this was no place for Elspeth. 
 
40 TOMMT ASJ> GBIZEL 
 
 When temptation was nigh he first locked Elspeth up, 
 and then walked into it. 
 
 With two in every three women he was still as shy 
 as ever, but the third he escorted triumphantly to the 
 conservatory. She did no harm to his work, rather sent 
 him back to it refreshed ; it was as if he were shootilig" 
 the sentiment which other young men get rid of more ^ 
 gradually by beginning earlier, and there were such 
 accumulations of it that I don't know whether he ever 
 made up on them. Punishment sought him in the night, 
 when he dreamt constantly that he was married, to 
 whom scarcely mattered j he saw himself coming out of 
 a church a married man, and the fright woke him up. 
 But with the daylight came again his talent for dodging 
 thoughts that were lying in wait, and he yielded as 
 recklessly as before to every sentimental impulse. As 
 illustration, take his humorous passage with Mrs. Jerry. 
 Geraldine something was her name, but her friends 
 called her Mrs. Jerry. 
 
 She was a wealthy widow, buxom, not a day over 
 thirty when she was merry, which might be at inappro- 
 priate moments, as immediately after she had expressed 
 a desire to lead the hig her life. "But I have a theory, 
 my dear," she said solemnly to Elspeth, " that no woman 
 js able to do it who cannot see her own nose without the 
 help of a mirror." She had taken a great fancy to 
 Elspeth, and made many engagements with her and kept 
 some of them, and the understanding was that she 
 
SAOTJYS ON WOMAN 41 
 
 apprenticed herself to Tommy through Elspeth, he 
 being too terrible to face by himself, or, as Mrs. Jerry 
 expressed it, "all nose." So Tommy had seen very 
 little of her and thought less until one day he called by 
 passionate request to sign her birthday-book, and heard 
 himself proposing to her instead. 
 
 For one thing it was twilight, and she had forgotten 
 to ring for the lamps. That might have been enough, 
 but there was more ; she read to him part of a letter in 
 which her hand was solicited in marriage, " and for the 
 life of me," said Mrs. Jerry, almost in tears, "I cannot 
 decide whether to say yes or no." 
 
 This put Tommy in a most awkward position. There 
 are probably men who could have got out of it without 
 proposing, but to him there seemed at the moment 
 no other way open/ The letter complicated matters 
 also by beginning "Dear Jerry" and saying "little 
 Jerry" farther on, expressions which stirred him 
 strangely. 
 
 "Why do you read this to me ? " he asked, in a voice 
 that broke a little. 
 
 "Because you are so wise," she said. "Do you 
 mind ? " 
 
 " Do I mind ! " he exclaimed, bitterly. ( " Take care 
 you idiot ! " he said to himself.) 
 
 " I was asking your advice only. Is it too much ? " 
 
 "Not at all. I am quite the right man to consult 
 at such a moment, am I not 1 " 
 
42 TOMMY AND GBIZBL 
 
 It was said with profound meaning, but his face was 
 as usual. 
 
 " That is what I thought," she said, in all good faith. 
 
 "You do not even understand! " he cried, and he was 
 also looking longingly at his hat. / ^ 
 
 " Understand what ? " 
 
 " Jerry," he said, and tried to stop himself, with the 
 result that he added " dear little Jerry." ( " What am I 
 doing I " he groaned.) 
 
 She understood now. "You don't mean — " she be- 
 gan, in amazement. 
 
 "Yes," he cried, passionately. "I love you. Will 
 you be my wife ? " ( " I am lost ! ") 
 
 " Gracious ! " exclaimedr Mrs. Jerry, and then on 
 reflection she became indignant. "I would not have 
 believed it of you," she said, scornfully. "Is it my 
 money or what ? I am^not at all clever, so you must 
 tell me." V-^ 
 
 With Tommy of course it was not her money. Except 
 when he had Elspeth to consider he was as much a 
 Quixote about money as Pym himself, and at no moment 
 of his life was he a snob. 
 
 " I am sorry you should think so meanly of me," he 
 said, with dignity, lifting his hat, and he would have 
 got away then (which when you come to think of it was 
 what he wanted) had he been able to resist an impulse 
 to heave a broken-hearted sigh at the door. 
 
 "Don't go yet, Mr. Sandys," she begged, "I may 
 
SANDYS OK WOMAN 48 
 
 have been hasty. And yet — why, we are merely 
 acquaintances." 
 
 He had meant to be very careful now, but that word 
 sent him off again. " Acquaintances ! " he cried, " no, 
 we were never that." 
 
 " It almost seemed to me that you avoided me." 
 
 " You noticed it ! " he said, eagerly. " At least you 
 do me that justice. Oh, how I tried to avoid you I" 
 
 " It was because " 
 
 "Alasl" 
 
 She was touched of course, but still puzzled. "We 
 know soTlittle of each other," she said. 
 
 " I see," he replied, " that you know me very little, 
 Mrs, Jerry, but you — oh, Jerry, Jerry, I know you as 
 no other man has ever known you ! " 
 
 " I wish I had proof of it," she said, helplessly. 
 
 Proof! She should not have asked Tommy for 
 proof. "I know," he cried, "how unlike all other wo- 
 men you are. To the world you are like the rest, but in 
 your heart you know that you are different, you know it 
 and I know it, and no other person knows it." 
 
 Yes, Mrs. Jerry knew it, and had often marvelled 
 over it in the seclusion of her boudoir, but that another 
 should have found it out was strange and almost 
 terrifying. 
 
 "I know you love me now," she said, softly, "only 
 love could have shown you that, but — oh, let me go 
 away for a minute to think," and she ran out of the room. 
 
44 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 Other suitors have been left for a space in Tommy s 
 state of doubt, but never, it may be hoped, with the 
 same emotions. Oh, Heavens, if she should accept him ! 
 He saw Elspeth sickening and dying-rtf-the news. 
 
 His guardian angel, however, was very good to Tommy 
 at this time, or, perhaps, like cannibals with their pris- 
 oner, the God of sentiment (who has a tail) was fatten- 
 ing him for a future feast, and Mrs. Jerry's answer was 
 that it could never be. 
 
 Tommy bowed his head. 
 
 But she hoped he would let her be his very dear 
 friend. It would be the proudest recollection of her life 
 that Mr. Sandys had entertained such feelings for her. 
 
 Nothing could have been better, and he should have 
 found difficulty in concealing his delight, but this 
 strange Tommy was really feeling his part again. It 
 was an unforced tear that came to his eye. Quite 
 naturally he looked long and wistfully at her. 
 
 "Jerry, Jerry," he articulated, huskily, and whatever 
 the words mean in these circumstances he really meant, 
 then he put his lips to her hand for the first and last 
 time, and so was gone, broken but brave. He was in 
 splendid fettle for writing that evening. Wild animals 
 sleep after gorging, but it sent this monster, refreshed, 
 to his work. 
 
 Nevertheless, the incident gave him some uneasy 
 reflections. Was he indeed a .jnonster, was one that 
 he could dodge as yet, but suppose Mrs. Jerry told his 
 
SANDYS OK WOMAN 45 
 
 dear Elspeth of what had happened ? She had said that 
 she would not, but a secret in Mrs. Jerry's breast was 
 like her pug in her arms, always kicking to get free. 
 
 "Elspeth," said Tommy, "what do you say to going 
 north and having a sight of Thrums again ? " 
 
 He knew what she would say. They had been talk- 
 ing for years of going back ; it was the great day that 
 all her correspondence with old friends in Thrums 
 looked forward to. 
 
 " They made little of you, Tommy," she said, " when 
 we left, but I 'm thinking they will all be at their win- 
 dows when you go back." 
 
 " Oh," replied Thomas, " that 's nothing. But I should 
 like to shake Corp by the hand again." 
 
 " And Aaron," said Elspeth. She was knitting stock- 
 ings for Aaron at that moment. 
 
 "And Gavinia," Tommy said, "and the dominie." 
 
 " And Ailie." 
 
 And then came an awkward pause, for they were both 
 thinking of that independent girl called Grizel. She 
 was seldom discussed. Tommy was oddly shy about 
 mentioning her name ; he would have preferred Elspeth 
 to mention it, and Elspeth had misgivings that this was 
 so, with the result that neither could say Grizel without 
 wondering what was in the other's mind. Tommy had 
 written twice to Grizel, the first time unknown to 
 Elspeth, but that was in the days when the ladies of the 
 penny numbers were disturbing him, and against his 
 
46 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 better judgment (for well he knew she would never 
 stand it) he had begun his letter with these mad words, 
 "Dear little woman." She did not answer this, but 
 soon afterward she wrote to Elspeth, and he was not 
 mentioned in the letter proper, but it carried a sting 
 in its tail: "P. S.," it sai(^ "How is Sentimental 
 Tommy ? " 
 
 None but a fiend in human shape could have written 
 thus, and Elspeth put her protecting arms round her 
 brother. " Now we know what Grizel is," she said. " I 
 am done with her now." 
 
 But when Tommy had got back his wind he said, 
 nobly : " I '11 call her no names. If this is how she 
 likes to repay me for — for all my kindnesses, let her. 
 But, Elspeth, if I have the Chance, I shall go on being 
 good to her just the same." 
 
 Elspeth adored him for it, but Grizel would have 
 stamped had she known. He had that comfort 
 
 The second letter he never posted. It was written a 
 few months before he became a celebrity, and had very 
 fine things indeed in it, for old Dr. McQueen, Grizel's 
 dear friend, had just died at his post, and it was a letter 
 of condolence. While Tommy wrote it he was in a 
 quiver of genuine emotion, as he was very pleased to 
 feel, and it had a specially satisfying bit about death 
 and the world never being the same again. He knew it 
 was good, but he did not send it to her, for no reason I 
 can discover save that postscripts jarred on him. 
 
CHAPTER rV 
 
 GRIZBL OF THE CBOOKED SMILE 
 
 To expose Tommy for what he was, to appear to 
 be scrupulously fair to him so that I might really 
 damage him the more, that is what I set out to do 
 in this book, and always when he seemed to be fina- 
 ing a way of getting round me (as I had a secret 
 dread he might do) I was to remember Grizel and be 
 obdurate. But if I have so far got past some of his 
 virtues without even mentioning them (and I have), 
 I know how many opportunities for discrediting him 
 have been missed, and that would not greatly matter, 
 there are so many more to come, if Grizel were on 
 my side. But she is not; throughout those first chap- 
 ters a voice has been crying to me, "Take care, if 
 vou hurt him you will hurt me," and I know it to 
 be the voice of Grizel, and I seem to see her, rocking 
 her arms as she used to rock them when excited in 
 the days of her innocent childhood. "Don't, don't, 
 don't," she cried at every cruel word I gave him, and 
 she to whom it was ever such agony to weep dropped 
 a tear upon each word so that they were obliterated, 
 and "Surely I knew him best," she said, "and I al- 
 
48 TOMMY AOT) GEIZBL 
 
 ways loved him," and she stood there defending him, 
 with her hand on her heart to conceal the gaping 
 wound that Tommy had made. 
 
 Well, if Grizel had always loved him there was 
 surely something fine and rare about Tommy. But 
 what was it, Grizel, why did you always love him, 
 you who saw into him so well and demanded so much 
 of men ? When I ask that question the spirit that 
 hovers round my desk to protect Tommy from me 
 rocks her arms mournfully, as if she did not know 
 the answer ; it is only when I seem to see her as she 
 so often was in life, before she got that wound and 
 after, bending over some little child and looking up 
 radiant, that I think I suddenly know why she al- 
 ways loved Tommy. It was because he had such need 
 of her. 
 
 I don't know whether you remember, but there were 
 once some children who played at Jacobites in the 
 Thrums den under Tommy's leadership; Elspeth, of 
 course, was one of them, and there were Corp Shiaeh 
 and Gavinia, and lastly, there was GrizeL Had Tom- 
 my's parents been alive she would not have been al- 
 lowed to join, for she was a painted lady's chUd, but 
 Tommy insisted on having her, and Grizel thought 
 it was just sweet of him. He also chatted with her 
 in public places, as if she were a respectable char- 
 acter, and oh, how she longed to be respectable! but, 
 on the other hand, he was the first to point out how 
 
GEIZBL 01" THE CROOKED SMILE 49 
 
 superbly he was behaving, and Ms ways were master- 
 ful, so the independent girl would not be captain's 
 wife ; if he said she was captain's wife he had to 
 apologize, and if he merely looked it he had to apolo- 
 gize just the same. 
 
 One night the painted lady died in the den, and 
 then it would have gone hard with the lonely girl 
 had not Dr. McQueen made her his little housekeeper, 
 not out of pity, he vowed (she was so anxious to be 
 told that), but because he was an old bachelor, sorely 
 in need of someone to take care of him. And how 
 she took care of him ! But though she was so happy 
 now, she knew that she must be very careful, foj- 
 there was something in her blood that might waken 
 and prevent her being a good woman. She thought 
 it would be sweet to be good. 
 
 She told all this to Tommy, and he was profoundly 
 interested and consulted a wise man, whose advice 
 was that when she grew up she should be wary of 
 any man whom she liked and mistrusted in one breath. 
 Meaning to do her a service. Tommy communicated 
 this to her, and then, what do you think, Grizel would 
 have no more dealings with him ! By and by the 
 gods, in a sportive mood, sent him to labor on a farm, 
 whence, as we have seen, he found a way to London, 
 and while he was growing into a man Grizel became 
 a woman. At the time of the doctor's death she was 
 nineteen, tall and graceful, and very dark and pale, 
 
 4 
 
50 a?OMMT AND GEIZEL 
 
 When the winds of the day flushed her cheek she 
 was beautiful, but it was a beauty that hid the mys- 
 tery of her face; the sun made her merry, but she 
 looked more noble when it had set, then her pallor 
 shone with a soft radiant light, as though the mys- 
 tery and sadness and serenity of the moon were in it. 
 The full beauty of Grizel came out only at night, 
 like the stars. 
 
 I had made up my mind that when the time came to 
 describe Grizel's mere outward appearance I should 
 refuse her that word beautiful because of her tilted 
 nose. But now that the time has come I wonder at 
 myself. Probably when I am chapters ahead I shall 
 return to this one and strike out the word beautiful, 
 and then as likely as not I shall come back afterwards 
 and put it in again. Whether it will be there at the 
 end God knows. Her eyes at least were beautiful, they 
 were unusually far apart and let you look straight into 
 them and never quivered, they were such clear, gray, 
 searching eyes, they seemed always to be asking for the 
 truth. And she had an adorable mouth. In repose it 
 was perhaps hard because it shut so decisively, but 
 often it screwed up provokingly at one side, as when she 
 smiled or was sorry or for no particular reason, for she 
 seemed unable to control this vagary, which was per- 
 haps a little bit of babyhood that had forgotten to grow 
 up with the rest of her. At those moments the essence 
 of all that was characteristic and delicious about her 
 
GEIZBL OF THE CROOKED SMILE 61 
 
 seemed to have run to her mouth, so that to kiss Grizel 
 on her crooked smile would have been to kiss the whole 
 of her at once. She had a quaint way of nodding her head 
 at you when she was talking ; it made you forget what 
 she was saying, though it was really meant to have pre- 
 cisely the opposite effect. Her voice was rich, with many 
 inflections ; when she had much to say it gurgled like a 
 stream in a hurry, but its cooing note was best worth 
 remembering at the end of the day. There were times 
 when she looked like a boy. Her almost gallant bear- 
 ing, the poise of her head, her noble frankness, they all 
 had something in them of a princely boy who had never 
 known fear. 
 
 I have no wish to hide her defects. I would rather 
 linger over them, because they were part of Grizel, and 
 I am sorry to see them go one by one. Thrums had not 
 taken her to its heart. She was a proud purse, they 
 said, meaning that she had a haughty walk ; her sense 
 of justice was too great, she scorned frailties that she 
 should have pitied (how strange to think that there was 
 a time when pity was not the feeling that leapt to 
 Grizel's bosom first). She did not care for study, she 
 learned French and the pianoforte to please the doctor, 
 but she preferred to be sewing or dusting. When she 
 might have been reading she was perhaps making for 
 herself one of those costumes that annoyed every lady of 
 Thrums who employed a dressmaker, or more probably 
 it was a delicious garment for a baby, for as soon as 
 
62 TOMMY AND 6EIZBL 
 
 Grizel heard that there was a new baby anywhere all 
 her intellect deserted her and she became a slave. 
 Books often irritated her because she disagreed with the 
 author, and it was a torment to her to find other people 
 holding to their views when she was so certain that hers 
 were right. In church she sometimes rocked her arms, 
 and the old doctor by her side knew that it was because 
 she could not get up and contradict the minister ; she 
 was, I presume, the only young lady who ever dared to 
 say that she hated Sunday because there was so much 
 sitting still in it. 
 
 Sitting still did not suit Grizel, at all other times she 
 was happy, but then her mind wandered back to the 
 thoughts that had lived too closely with her in the old 
 days, and she was troubled. What woke her from these 
 reveries was probably the doctor's hand placed very ten- 
 derly on her shoulder, and then she would start and 
 wonder how long he had been watching her and what 
 were the grave thoughts behind his cheerful face. Por 
 the doctor never looked more cheerful than when he was 
 drawing Grizel away from the ugly past, and he talked 
 to her as if he had noticed nothing ; but after he went 
 upstairs he would pace his bedroom for a long time, and 
 Grizel listened and knew that he was thinking about 
 her. Then perhaps she would run up to him and put 
 her arms around his neck. These scenes brought the 
 doctor and Grizel very close together, but they became 
 rarer as she grew up, and then for once that she was 
 
GKIZEL OF THE CROOKED SMILE 53 
 
 troubled she was a hundred times irresponsible with 
 glee, and, " Oh, you dearest, darlingest," she would cry 
 to him, " I must dance, I must, I must, though it is a 
 Fast Day, and you must dance with your mother this 
 , instant, I am so happy, so happy ! " Mother was his 
 nickname for her, and she delighted in the word ; she 
 lorded it over him as if he were her troublesome boy. 
 
 How could she be other than glorious when there was 
 so much to do ? The work inside the house she made 
 for herself and outside the doctor made it for her. At 
 last he had found for nurse a woman who could follow 
 his instructions literally, who understood that if he said 
 five o'clock for the medicine the chap of six would not 
 do as well, who did not in her heart despise the ther- 
 mometer and who resolutely prevented the patient from 
 skipping out of bed to change her pillow-slips because 
 the minister was expected. Such tyranny enraged every 
 sufferer who had been ill before and got better, but what 
 they chiefly complained of to the doctor (and he agreed 
 with a humorous sigh), was her masterfulness about 
 fresh air and cold water. Windows were opened that 
 had never been opened before (they yielded to her 
 pressure with a groan), and as for cold water it might 
 have been said that a- bath followed her wherever she 
 went, not, mark me, for putting your hands aud face in, 
 not even for your feet, but in you must go, the whole 
 of you, "as if," they said, indignantly, "there was some- 
 thing the matter with our skin " 
 
54 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 She could not gossip, not even with the doctor, who 
 liked it of an evening when he had got into his carpet 
 shoes. There was no use telling her a secret, for she 
 kept it to herself forevermore. She had ideas ahout 
 how men should serve a woman, even the humblest, that 
 made the men gaze with wonder and the women (curi- 
 ously enough) with irritation. Her greatest scorn was 
 for girls who made themselves cheap with men, and she 
 could not hide it. It was a physical pain to Grizel to 
 hide her feelings, they popped out in her face, if not in 
 words, and were always in advance of her self-control. 
 To the doctor this impulsiveness was pathetic ; he loved 
 her for it, but it sometimes made him uneasy. 
 
 He died in the scarlet-fever year. " I 'm smitten," he 
 suddenly said at a bedside, and a week afterwards he 
 was gone. 
 
 "We must speak of it now, Grizel," he said when he 
 knew that he was dying. 
 
 She pressed his hand; she knew to what he was 
 referring. " Yes," she said, " I should love you to 
 speak of it now." 
 
 "You and I have always fought shy of it," he said, 
 " making a pretence that it had altogether passed away. 
 I thought that was best for you." 
 
 "Dearest, darlingest," she said, "I know, I have 
 always known." 
 
 " And you," he said, "you pretended because you 
 thought it was best for me." 
 
GEIZBL OP THE CEOOKBD SMILE 55 
 
 She nodded. "And we saw through each other all 
 the time," she said. 
 
 " Grizel, has it passed away altogether now ? " 
 
 Her grip upon his hand did not tighten in the least. 
 "Yes," she could say honestly, "it has altogether 
 passed away." 
 
 " And you have no more fear ? " 
 
 "No, none." 
 
 It was his great reward for all that he had done for 
 Grizel. 
 
 "I know what you are thinking of," she said when he 
 did not speak. " You are thinking of the haunted little 
 girl you rescued seven years ago." 
 
 "No," he answered, "I was thanking God for the 
 brave wholesome woman she has grown into. And for 
 something else, Grizel, for letting me live to see it." 
 
 " To do it," she said, pressing his hand to her breast. 
 
 She was a strange girl, and she had to speak her 
 mind. "I don't think God has done it all," she said. 
 ' ' I don't even think that He told you to do it. I think 
 He just said to you, ' There is a painted lady's child at 
 your door ; you can save her if you like.' " 
 
 " No," she went on when he would have interposed, 
 " I am sure He did not want to do it all ; He even left I 
 little bit of it to me to do myself. I love to think that a 
 have done a tiny bit of it myself. I think it is the 
 sweetest thing about God that He lets us do some of it 
 ourselves, Po I hurt you, darling ? " 
 
56 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 No, she did not hurt him, for he understood her. 
 " But you are naturally so impulsive," he said, " it has 
 often been a sharp pain to me to see you so careful." 
 
 " It was not a pain to me to he careful, it was a joy. 
 Oh, the thousand dear delightful joys I have had with 
 you." 
 
 " It has made you strong, Grizel, and I rejoice in 
 that; but sometimes I fear that it has made you too 
 difficult to win." 
 
 " I don't want to be won," she told him. 
 
 " You don't quite mean that, Grizel." 
 
 " No," she said at once. She whispered to him im- 
 pulsively. " It is the only thing I am at all afraid of 
 now." 
 
 « What ? " 
 
 « Love." 
 
 " You will not be afraid of it when it comes." 
 
 "But I want to be afraid," she said. 
 
 " You need not," he answered. " The man on whom 
 those clear eyes rest lovingly will be worthy of it all. 
 If he were not, they would be the first to find him out." 
 
 " But need that make any difference ? " she asked. 
 "Perhaps though I found him out I should love him 
 just the same." 
 
 "Not unless you loved him first, Grizel." 
 
 "No," she said at once again. "I am not really 
 afraid of love," she whispered to him. "You have 
 made me so happy that I am afraid of nothing." 
 
GEIZBIi OF THE CROOKED SMTLB 57 
 
 Yet she wondered a little that he was not afraid to 
 die, but when she told him this he smiled and said, 
 "Everybody fears death except those who are dying." 
 And when she asked if he had anything on his mind 
 he said, " I leave the world without a care. Not that 
 I have seen all I would fain have seen. Many a time, 
 especially this last year, when I have seen the mother 
 in you crooning to some neighbor's child, I' have thought 
 to myself, 'I don't know my Grizel yet, I have seen 
 her in the bud only ' and I would fain — " He broke 
 off. "But I have no fears," he said. "As I lie here 
 with you sitting by my side, looking so serene, I can 
 say, for the first time for half a century, that I have 
 nothing on my mind." 
 
 "But, Grizel, I should have married," he told her. 
 " The chief lesson my life has taught me is that they 
 are poor critturs, the men who don't marry." 
 
 "If you had married," she said, "you might never 
 have been able to help me." 
 
 " It is you who have helped me," he replied. " God 
 sent the child. He is most reluctant to give any of us 
 up. Ay, Grizel, that's what my life has taught me, 
 and it 's all I can leave to you." The last he saw of her 
 she was holding his hand and her eyes were dry, her 
 teeth were clenched, but there was a brave smile upon 
 her face, for he had told her that it was thus he would 
 like to see her at the end. After his death she con- 
 tinued to live at the old house ; he had left it to her 
 
58 TOMMY AKD GEIZEL 
 
 (" I want it to remain in the family," he said) with all 
 his savings, which were quite sufficient for the needs 
 of such a manager ; he had also left her plenty to do, 
 and that was a still sweeter legacy. 
 
 And the other Jacobites, what of them ? Hie, where 
 are you, Corp ? Here he comes, grinning, in his spleet 
 new uniform to demand our tickets of us. He is now 
 the railway porter. Since Tommy left Thrums " steam " 
 had arrived in it, and Corp had by nature such a gift 
 for giving luggage the twist which breaks everything 
 inside as you dump it down that he was inevitably 
 appointed porter. There was no travelling to Thrums ; 
 without a ticket. At Tilliedrum, which was the junc- 
 tion for Thrums, you showed your ticket and were 
 then locked in. A hundred yards from Thrums Corp 
 leapt upon the train and fiercely demanded your ticket. 
 At the station he asked you, threateningly, whether you 
 had given up your ticket. Even his wife was afraid of 
 him at such times, and had her ticket ready in her hand. 
 
 His wife was one Gavinia, and she had no fear of 
 him except when she was travelling. To his face she 
 referred to him as a doited sumph, but to Grizel plead- 
 ing for him she admitted that despite his warts and 
 quarrelsome legs he was a great big muckle sonsy, 
 stout, buirdly weU-set up, wise-like, havering man. 
 When first Corp had proposed to her she gave him a 
 clout on the head, and so little did he know of the sex 
 that this discouraged him. He oontiuued, however. 
 
THE LAST HE SAW OF HER 
 
GEIZEL OF THE CROOKED SMILE 59 
 
 to propose and she to clout him until he heard, accident- 
 ally (he woke up in church), of a man in the Bible who 
 had wooed a woman for seven years, and this example 
 he determined to emulate, but when Gaviuia heard of 
 it she was so furious that she took him at once. Dazed 
 by his good fortune, he rushed off with it to his aunt, 
 whom he wearied with his repetition of the great news. 
 
 "To your bed wi' you," she said, yawning. 
 
 "Bed I" cried Corp, indignantly. "And so, auntie, 
 says Gavinia, 'yes,' says she, 'I'll hae you.' Those 
 were her never-to-be-forgotten words." 
 
 " You pitiful object," answered his aunt, " men hae 
 been married afore now without making sio a stramash." 
 
 "I daursay," retorted Corp, "but they hinna married 
 Gavinia," and this is the best known answer to the 
 sneer of the cynic. 
 
 He was a public nuisance that night, and knocked 
 various people up after they had gone to bed to tell 
 them that Gavinia was to have him. He was eventu- 
 ally led home by kindly though indignant neighbors, 
 but early morning found him in the country carrying 
 the news from farm to farm. 
 
 "No, I winna sit down," he said, " I just cried in to 
 tell you Gavinia is to hae me." Six miles from home 
 he saw a mud-house on the top of a hill and ascended 
 genially. He found at their porridge a very old lady 
 with a nut-cracker face, and a small boy. We shall see 
 them again, "Auld wifie," said Corp, "I dinna ken 
 
60 TOMMY AND GRIZEIj 
 
 you, but I 've just stepped np to tell you that Gavinia 
 is to hae me." 
 
 It made him the butt of the sportive. If he or 
 Gavinia were nigh they gathered their fowls round 
 them and then said, "Hens, I didna bring you here to 
 feed you, but just to tell you that Gavinia is to hae me." 
 This flustered Gavinia, but Grizel, who enjoyed her own 
 jokes too heartily to have more than a polite interest in 
 those of other people, said to her, "How can you be 
 angry ! I think it was just sweet of him." 
 
 " But was it no vulgar ? " 
 
 "Vulgar!" said Grizel. "Why, Gavinia, that is 
 how every lady would like a man to love her." 
 
 And then Gavinia beamed. " I 'm glad you say that," 
 she said, "for though I wouldna tell Corp for worlds, 
 I fell likit it." 
 
 But Grizel told Corp that Gavinia liked it. 
 
 " It was the proof," she said, smiling, " that you have 
 the right to marry her. You have shown your ticket. 
 Kever give it up, Corp." 
 
 About a year afterward Corp, armed in his Sunday 
 stand, rushed to Grizel's house, occasionally stopping 
 to slap his shiny knees. "Grizel," he cried, "there's 
 somebody come to Thrums without a ticket ! " Then 
 he remembered Gavinia's instructions. "Mrs. SHach's 
 compliments," he said, ponderously, " and it 's a boy." 
 
 " Oh, Corp I " exclaimed Grizel, and immediately 
 began to put on her hat and jacket. 
 
GEIZEL OF THE CROOKED SMILE 61 
 
 Corp watched her uneasily. "Mrs. Shiach's compli- 
 ments," he said, firmly, " and he 's ower young to be 
 bathed yet. But she 's awid to show him off to you," 
 he hastened to add. "'Tell Grizel,' was her first 
 words." 
 
 Tell Grizel ! They were among the first words of 
 many mothers. None, they were aware, would receive 
 the news with quite such glee as she. They might 
 think her cold and reserved with themselves, but to see 
 the look on her face as she bent over a baby, and to 
 know that the baby was yours ! What a way she had 
 with them ! She always welcomed them as if in coming 
 they had performed a great feat. That is what babies 
 are agape for from the beginning. Had they been 
 able to speak they would have said "Tell Grizel" 
 themselves. ^ 
 
 "And Mrs. Shiach's compliments," Corp remembered, 
 " and she would be windy if you would carry the bairn 
 at the christening." 
 
 " I should love it, Corp ! Have you decided on the 
 name ? " 
 
 " Lang syne. Gin it were a lassie we were to call her 
 Grizel " 
 
 " Oh, how sweet of you I " 
 
 "After the finest lassie we ever kent," continued 
 Corp, stoutly;. "But I was sure it would be a laddie." 
 
 " Why ? " 
 
 "Because if it was a laddie it was to be called after 
 
62 TOMMY AST) GEIZBL 
 
 Him," he said, with emphasis on the last word ; " and 
 thinks I to mysel', ' He '11 find a way.' What a crittur 
 he was for finding a way, Grizel ! and he lookit so holy 
 a' the time. Do you mind that swear-word o' his, 
 ' Stroke ' ? It just meant damn, but he could mate 
 even damn look holy." 
 
 " You are to call the baby Tommy ? " 
 
 "He'll be christened Thomas Sandys Shiach," said 
 Corp. " I hankered after putting something out o' the 
 Jacobites intil his name, and I says to Gavinia, ' Let 's 
 call him Thomas Sandys Stroke Shiach?' says I, 'and 
 the minister '11 be nane the wiser,' but Gravlnia was 
 seandalizyed." 
 
 Grizel reflected. "Corp," she said, "I am sure 
 Gavinia's sister will expect to be asked to carry the 
 baby. I don't think I want to do it." 
 
 " After you promised ! " cried Corp, much hurt. " I 
 never kent you to break a promise afore." 
 
 "I will do it, Corp," she said, at once. 
 
 She did not know then that Tommy would be in 
 church to witness the ceremony, but she knew before 
 she walked down the aisle with T. S. Shiach in her arms. 
 It was the first time that Tommy and she had seen each 
 other for seven years. That day he almost rivalled his 
 namesake in the interests of the congregation, who, 
 however, took prodigious care that he should not see it. 
 All except Grizel. She smiled a welcome to him, and 
 he knew that her serene gray eyes were watching him. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE TOMMT MYTH 
 
 On the evening before the christening Aaron Latta, 
 his head sunk farther into his shoulders, his beard gone 
 grayer, no other perceptible difference in a dreary man 
 since we last saw him in the book of Tommy's boyhood, 
 had met the brother and sister at the station, a barrow 
 with him for their luggage. It was a great hour for him 
 as he wheeled the barrow homeward, Elspeth once more 
 by his side, but he could say nothing heartsome in 
 Tommy's presence and Tommy was as uncomfortable 
 in his. The old strained relations between these two 
 seemed to begin again at once. They were as self- 
 conscious as two mastiffs meeting in the street and both 
 breathed a sigh of relief when Tommy fell behind. 
 
 "You're bonny, Elspeth," Aaron then said, eagerly. 
 " I 'm glad, glad to see you again." 
 
 "And him, too, Aaron? " Elspeth pleaded. 
 
 "He took you away frae me." 
 
 " He has brought me back." 
 
 " Ay, and he has but to whistle to you and away you 
 go wi' him again. He 's ower grand to bide lang here 
 
64 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 " You don't know Mm, Aaron. We are to stay a long 
 time. Do you know Mrs. McLean invited us to stay 
 with her? I suppose she thought your house was so 
 small ; but Tommy said, ' The house of the man who 
 befriended us when we were children shall never be too 
 small for us.' " 
 
 "Did he say that? Ay, but, Elspeth, I would rather 
 hear what you said." 
 
 " I said it was to dear, good Aaron Latta I was going 
 back and to no one else." 
 
 "God bless you for that, Elspeth." 
 
 "And Tommy," she went on, "must have his old 
 garret-room again, to write as well as sleep in, and the 
 little room you partitioned off the kitchen will do nicely 
 for me." 4 
 
 " There 's no a window in it," replied Aaron, " but it 
 will do fine for you, Elspeth." He was almost chuck- 
 ling, for he had a surprise in waiting for her. " This 
 way," he said, excitedly, when she would have gone into 
 the kitchen, and he flung open the door of what had 
 been his warping-room. The warping-mill was gone, 
 everything that had been there was gone ; what met the 
 delighted eyes of Elspeth and Tommy was a cosy parlor, 
 which became a bedroom when you opened that other 
 door. 
 
 "You are a leddy now, Elspeth," Aaron said, husky 
 with pride, " and you have a leddy's room. Do you see 
 the piano?" 
 
THE TOMMY MYTH 65 
 
 He had given up the warping, having at last "twa 
 three hunder' " in the bank, and all the work he did now 
 was at a loom which he had put into the kitchen to keep 
 him out of languor. " I have sorted up the garret, too, 
 for you," he said to Tommy, "but this is Elspeth's 
 room." 
 
 " As if Tommy would take it from me ! " said Elspeth, 
 running into the kitchen to hug this dear Aaron. 
 
 " You may laugh," Aaron replied, vindictively, " but 
 he is taking it frae you already ; " and later, when 
 Tommy was out of the way, he explained his meaning : 
 " I did it all for you, Elspeth ; Elspeth's room I called 
 it ; when I bought the mahogany arm-chair, ' That 's 
 Elspeth's chair,' I says to mysel', and when I bought 
 the bed, 'it's hers,' I said; ay, but I was soon dis- 
 annulled o' that thait, for in spite of me, they were all 
 got for him. Not a rissom in that room is yours or 
 mine, Elspeth; every muhlen belongs to him." 
 
 " But who says so, Aaron ? I am sure he won't." 
 
 " I dinna ken them. They are leddies that come here 
 in their carriages to see the house where Thomas Sandys 
 was born." 
 
 " But, Aaron, he was born in London 1 " 
 
 "They think he was born in this house," Aaron 
 replied, doggedly, "and it's no for me to cheapen 
 him." 
 
 "Oh, Aaron, you pretend " 
 
 "I was never very fond o' him," Aaron admitted, 
 5 
 
66 TOMMY AinJ GKIZBL 
 
 "but I winna clieapen Jean Myles's bairn, and when 
 they chap at my door and say they would like to see the 
 room Thomas Sandys was born in I let them see the best 
 room I have. So that 's how he has laid hands on your 
 parlor, Elspeth. Afore I can get rid o' them they gie a 
 squeak and cry ' Was that Thomas Sandys's bed ? ' and 
 I says it was. That 's him taking the very bed frae you, 
 Elspeth." 
 
 " You might at least have shown them his bed in the 
 garret," she said. 
 
 " It 's a shilpit bit thing," he answered, " and I winna 
 cheapen him. They 're curious, too, to see his favorite 
 seat." 
 
 " It was the fender," she declared. 
 
 " It was," he assented, " but it 's no for me to cheapen 
 him, so I let them see your new mahogany chair. 
 ' Thomas Sandys's chair ' they call it, and they sit down 
 111 it reverently. They winna even leave you the piano. 
 ' Was this Thomas Sandys's piano ? ' they speir. ' It 
 was,' says I, and syne they gowp at it." His under lip 
 shot out, a sure sign that he was angry. " I dinna 
 blame 'him," he said, "but he had the same masterful 
 way of scooping everything into his lap when he was a 
 laddie, and I like him none the mair for it ; " and from 
 this position Aaron would not budge. 
 
 " Quite right, too," Tommy said when he heard of it. 
 " But you can tell him, Elspeth, that we shall allow no 
 more of those prying women to come in ; " and he really 
 
THE TOMMY MYTH 67 
 
 meant this, for he was a modest man that day, was 
 Tommy. Nevertheless, he was, perhaps, a little annoyed 
 to find, as the days went on, that no more ladies came to 
 be turned away. 
 
 He heard that they had also been unable to resist the 
 desire to shake hands with Thomas Sandys's school- 
 master. " It must have been a pleasure to teach him," 
 they said to Cathro. 
 
 "Ah me, ah me!" Cathro replied, enigmatically. It 
 had so often been a pleasure to Cathro to thrash him. 
 
 " Genius is odd," they said. " Did he ever give you 
 any trouble ? " 
 
 "We were like father and son," he assured them. 
 With natural pride he showed them the ink-pot into 
 which Thomas Sandys had dipped as a boy. They were 
 very grateful for his interesting reminiscence that when 
 the pot was too full Thopaas inked his fingers. He pre- 
 sented several of them with the ink-pot. 
 
 Two ladies, who came together, bothered him by ask- 
 ing what the Hugh Blackadder competition was. They 
 had been advised to inquire of him about Thomas 
 Sandys's connection therewith by another schoolmaster, 
 a Mr. Ogilvy, whom they had met in one of the glens. 
 
 Mr. Cathro winced, and then explained with emphasis 
 that the Hugh Blackadder was a competition in which 
 the local ministers were the sole judges. He therefore 
 referred the ladies to them. The ladies did go to a local 
 minister for enlightenment, to Mr. Dishart, but after 
 
68 TOMMY ANB GRIZEl 
 
 reflecting, Mr. Dishart said that it was too long a story, 
 and this answer seemed to amuse Mr. Ogilvy, who hap- 
 pened to be present. 
 
 It was Mr. McLean who retailed this news to Tommy. 
 He and Ailie had walked home from church with the 
 newcomers on the day after their arrival, the day of the 
 christening. They had not gone into Aaron's house, for 
 you are looked askance at in Thrums if you pay visits 
 on Sundays, but they had stood for a long time gossip- 
 ing at the door, which is permitted by the strictest. 
 Ailie was in a twitter, as of old, and not able even yet 
 to speak of her husband without an apologetic look to 
 the ladies who had none, and, oh, how proud she was of 
 Tommy's fame ! Her eyes were an offering to him. 
 
 "Don't take her as a sample of the place, though," 
 Mr. McLean warned him, "for Thrums does not catch 
 fire so readily as London." It was quite true. "I was 
 at the school wi' him," they said up there, and implied 
 that this damned his book. 
 
 But there were two faithful souls, or more strictly 
 one, for Corp could never have carried it through with- 
 out G-avinia's help. Tommy called on them promptly 
 at their house in the Bellies Brae (four rooms but a 
 lodger), and said, almost before he had time to look, 
 that the baby had Corp's chin and Gavinia's eyes. He 
 had made this up on the way. He also wanted to say, 
 so desirous was he of pleasing his old friends, that he 
 should like to hold the baby in his arms, but it was 
 
THE TOMMY MYTH 69 
 
 such a thundering lie that even an author could not 
 say it. 
 
 Tommy sat down in that house with a very warm 
 heart for its inmates, but they chilled him, Gavinia 
 with her stiff words and Corp by looking miserable 
 instead of joyous. 
 
 "I expected you to come to me first, Corp," said 
 Tommy, reproachfully. "I had scarcely a word with 
 you at the station." 
 
 " He couldna hae presumed," replied Gavinia, primly. 
 
 " I couldna hae presumed," said Corp, with a groan. 
 
 " Fudge ! " Tommy said. " You were my greatest 
 friend, and I like you as much as ever, Corp." 
 
 Corp's face shone, but Gavinia said at once, " You 
 werna sic great friends as that. Were you, man ? " 
 
 "No," Corp replied, gloomily. 
 
 " Whatever has come over you both ? " asked Tommy, 
 in surprise. "You will be saying next, Gavinia, that 
 we never played at Jacobites in the den ! " 
 
 "I dinna deny that Corp and me played," Gavinia 
 answered, determinedly, "but you didna. You said to 
 us, 'Think shame,' you said, 'to be playing vulgar 
 games when you could be reading superior books.' 
 They were his very words, were they no, man ? " she 
 demanded of her unhappy husband, with a threaten- 
 ing look. 
 
 " They were," said Corp, in deepest gloom. 
 
 "I must get to the bottom of this," said Tommy, 
 
70 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 rising, " and as you are too great a coward, Corp, to 
 tell the truth, with that shameless woman glowering at 
 you, out you go, Gavinia, and take your disgraced bairn 
 with you. Do as you are told, you besom, for I am 
 Captain Stroke again." 
 
 Corp was choking with delight as Gavinia withdrew 
 haughtily. " I was sure you would sort her," he said, 
 rubbing his hands, "I was sure you wasna the kind to 
 be ashamed o' auld friends." 
 
 " But what does it mean ? " 
 
 " She has a notion," Corp explained, growing grave 
 again, " that it wouldna do for you to own the like o' us. 
 'We mauna cheapen him,' she said. She wanted you 
 to see that we hinna been cheapening you." He said, 
 in a sepulchral voice, " There has been leddies here, and 
 they want to ken what Thomas Sandys was like as a 
 boy. It 's me they speir for, but Gavinia she just shoves 
 me out o' sight, and, says she, ' Leave them to me.' " 
 
 Corp told Tommy some of the things Gavinia said 
 about Thomas Sandys as a boy, how he sat rapt in 
 church, and instead of going bird-nesting, lay on the 
 ground listening to the beautiful little warblers over- 
 head, and gave all his pennies to poorer children, 
 and could repeat the shorter Catechism, beginning at 
 either end, and was very respectful to the aged and 
 infirm, and of a yielding disposition, and said, from his 
 earliest years, ' I don't want to be great, I just want to 
 be good.' " 
 
THE TOMMY MYTH 71 
 
 "How can she make them all up?" Tommy asked, 
 with respectful homage to Gavinia. 
 
 Corp, with his eye on the door, produced from beneath 
 the bed a little book with colored pictures. It was 
 entitled " Great Boyhoods," by Aunt Martha. " She 
 doesna make them up," he whispered, " she gets them 
 out o' this." 
 
 « And you back her up, Corp, even when she says I 
 was not your friend ! " 
 
 " It was like a t' knife intil me," replied loyal Corp, 
 " every time I forswore you it was like a f knife, but I 
 did it, ay, and I '11 go on doing it if you think my friend- 
 ship cheapens you." 
 
 Tommy was much moved, and gripped his old lieu- 
 tenant by the hand. He also called Gavinia ben, and 
 before she could ward him off, the masterful rogue had 
 saluted hex on the cheek. " That," said Tommy, " is to 
 show you that I am as fond of the old times and my old 
 friends as ever, and the moment you deny it I shall 
 take you to mean, Gavinia, that you want another 
 kiss." 
 
 " He 's just the same I " Corp remarked, ecstatically, 
 when Tommy had gone. 
 
 "Idinna deny," Gavinia said, "but what he's fell 
 taking," and for a time they ruminated. 
 
 " Gavinia," said Corp, suddenly, " I wouldna wonder 
 but what he 's a gey lad wi' the women! " 
 
 « What makes you think that ? " she replied, coldly, 
 
72 TOMMY AJJD GEIZBL 
 
 and he had the prudence not to say. He should Lave 
 followed his hero home, to be disabused of this mon- 
 strous notion, for even while it was being propounded 
 Tommy was sitting in such an agony of silence in a 
 woman's presence that she could not resist smiling a 
 crooked smile at him. His want of words did not 
 displease Grizel ; she was of opinion that young men 
 should always be a little awed by young ladies. 
 
 He had found her with Elspeth on his return home. 
 Would Grizel call and be friendly, he had asked himself 
 many times since he saw her in church yesterday, and 
 Elspeth was as curious ; each wanted to know what the 
 other thought of her, but neither had the courage to 
 inquire, they both wanted to know so much. Her name 
 had been mentioned, but casually, not a word to indicate 
 that she had grown up since they saw her last. The 
 longer Tommy remained silent the more, he knew, did 
 Elspeth suspect him. He would have liked to say, in 
 a careless voice, " Eather pretty, is n't she ? " but he 
 felt that this little Elspeth would see through him at 
 once. 
 
 For at the first glance he had seen what Grizel was, 
 and a thrill of joy passed through him as he drank her 
 in, it was but the joy of the eyes for the first moment, 
 but it ran to his heart to say, " This is the little hunted 
 girl that was ! " and Tommy was moved with a manly 
 gladness that the girl who once was so fearful of the 
 future had grown into this. The same unselfish delight 
 
THE TOMMY MYTH 73 
 
 m her for her own sake came over him again when he 
 shook hands with her in Aaron's parlor. This glorious 
 creature with the serene eyes and the noble shoulders 
 had been the hunted child of the Double Dykes ; he 
 would have liked to race back into the past and bring 
 little Grizel here to look. How many boyish memories 
 he recalled, and she was in every one of them. His 
 heart held nothing but honest joy in this meeting after 
 so many years ; he longed to tell her how sincerely he 
 was still her friend. Well, why don't you tell her, 
 Tommy, it is a thing you are good at, and you have been 
 polishing up the phrases ever since she passed down the 
 aisle with Master Shiach in her arms ; you have even 
 planned out a way of putting Grizel at her ease, and 
 behold, she is the only one of the three who is at ease. 
 What has come over you ? Does the reader think it was 
 love ? No, it was only that pall of shyness ; he tried to 
 fling it ofE, but could not ; behold Tommy being buried 
 alive. 
 
 Elspeth showed less contemptibly than her brother, 
 but it was Grizel who did most of the talking. She 
 nodded her head and smiled crookedly at Tommy, but 
 she was watching him all the time. She wore a dress 
 in which brown and yellow mingled as in woods on an 
 autumn day, and the jacket had a high collar of fur, 
 over which she watched him. Let us say that she was 
 watching to see whether any of the old Tommy was left 
 in him. Yet with this problem confronting her she 
 
74 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 also had time to study the outer man. Tommy the 
 dandy, his velvet jacket (a new one), his brazen waist- 
 coat, his poetic neckerchief, his spotless linen. His 
 velvet jacket was to become the derision of Thrums, but 
 Tommy took his bonneting haughtily, like one who was 
 glad to suifer for a Cause. There were to be meetings 
 here and there where people told with awe how many 
 shirts he sent weekly to the wash. Grizel disdained his 
 dandy tastes ; why did not Elspeth strip him of them ? 
 and, oh, if he must wear that absurd waistcoat, could 
 she not see that it would look another thing if the 
 second button was put half an inch farther back! How 
 sinful of him to spoil the shape of his silly velvet jacket 
 by carrying so many letters in the pockets. She 
 learned afterward that he carried all those letters 
 because there was a check in one of them, he did not 
 know which, and her sense of orderliness was outraged. 
 Elspeth did not notice these things. She helped 
 Tommy by her helplessness. There is reason to believe 
 that once in London when she had need of a new hat, 
 but money there was none, Tommy, looking very defiant, 
 studied ladies' hats in the shop-windows, brought all his 
 intellect to bear on them, with the result that he did 
 concoct out of Elspeth's old hat a new one which was 
 the admiBed of 0. P. Pym and friends, who never knew 
 the name of the artist. But obviously he could not take 
 proper care of himself, and there is a kind of woman, of 
 whom Grizel was one, to whose breasts this helplessness 
 
THE TOMMY MYTH 75 
 
 makes an unfair appeal. Oh, to dress him properly! 
 She could not help liking to be a mother to men, she 
 wanted them to be the most noble characters, but com- 
 pletely dependent on her. 
 
 Tommy walked home with her, and it seemed at 
 first as if Elspeth's absence was to be no help to him. 
 He could not even plagiarize from " Sandys on Woman." 
 No one knew so well the kind of thing he should be 
 saying, and no one could have been more anxious to 
 say it, but a weight of shyness sat on the lid of Tommy, 
 Having for half an hour raged internally at hia 
 misfortune, he now sullenly embraced it. "If I am 
 this sort of an ass, let me be it in the superlative de- 
 gree," he may be conceived saying bitterly to himself. 
 He addressed Grizel coldly, as "Miss McQueen," a. 
 name she had taken by the doctor's wish soon after 
 she went to live with him. 
 
 "There is no reason why you should call me that," 
 she said. " Call me Grizel, as you used to do." 
 
 " May I ? " replied Tommy, idiotically. He knew 
 it was idiotic, but that mood now had grip of him. 
 
 "But I mean to call you Mr. Sandys," she said, 
 decisively. 
 
 He was really glad to hear it, for to be called 
 Tommy by anyone was now detestable to him (which 
 is why I always call him Tommy in these pages). 
 So it was like him to say, with a sigh, "I had 
 hoped to hear you use the old name." 
 
76 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 That sigh made her look at him sharply. He knew 
 that he must be careful with Grizel and that she was 
 irritated, but he had to go on. 
 
 " It is strange to me," said Sentimental Tommy, 
 "to be back here after all those years, walking this 
 familiar road once more with you. I thought it would 
 make me feel myself a boy again, but, heigh ho, it 
 has just the opposite effect, I never felt so old as I 
 do to-day." 
 
 His voice trembled a little, I don't know why. Grizel 
 frowned. 
 
 " But you never were as old as you are to-day, were 
 you ? " she inquired, politely. It whisked Tommy 
 out of dangerous waters and laid him at her feet. 
 He laughed, not perceptibly or audibly, of course, 
 but somewhere inside him the bell rang. No one 
 could laugh more heartily at himself than Tommy, 
 and none bore less malice to those who brought him 
 to land. 
 
 " That, at any rate, makes me feel younger," he said, 
 candidly ; and now the shyness was in full flight. 
 
 "Why ?" asked Grizel, still watchful. 
 
 " It is so like the kind of thing you used to say to 
 me when we were boy and girl. I used to enrage 
 you very much, I fear," he said, half gleefully. 
 
 " Yes," she admitted, with a smile, " you did." 
 
 " And then how you rocked your arms at me, Grizel I 
 Do you remember ? " 
 
THE TOMMY MYTH 77 
 
 She remembered it all so well! This rocking of 
 the arms, as they called it, was a trick of hers that 
 signified sudden joy or pain. They hung rigid by 
 her side and then shook violently with emotion. 
 
 "Do you ever rock them now when people annoy 
 you ? " he asked. 
 
 "There has been no one to annoy me," she replied, 
 demurely, "since you went away." 
 
 "But I have come back," Tommy said, looking 
 hopefully at her arms. 
 
 "You see they take no notice of you." 
 
 "They don't remember me yet. As soon as they 
 do they will cry out." 
 
 Grizel shook her head confidently, and in this she 
 was pitting herself against Tommy, always a bold 
 thing to do. 
 
 "I have been to see Corp's baby," he said, sud- 
 denly, and this was so important that she stopped in 
 the middle of the road. 
 
 " What do you think of him ? " she asked, quite 
 anxiously. 
 
 "I thought," replied Tommy, gravely, and making 
 use of one of Grrizel's pet phrases, "I thought he was 
 just sweet." 
 
 "Isn't he!" she cried, and then she knew that 
 he was makjng fun of her. Her arms rocked. 
 
 " Hurray ! " cried Tommy, " they recognize me now I 
 Don't be angry, Grizel," he begged her, "you taught 
 
T8 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 me long ago what was the right thing to say about 
 babies, and how could I be sure it was you until I saw 
 your arms rocking ? " 
 
 "It was so like you," she said, reproachfully, "to try 
 to make me do it." 
 
 " It was so unlike you," he replied, craftily, " to let 
 me succeed. And, after all, Grizel, if I was horrid in 
 the old days I always apologized." 
 
 " Never ! " she insisted. 
 
 "Well, then," said Tommy, handsomely, "I do so 
 now," and then they both laughed gayly, and I think 
 Grizel was not sorry that there was a little of the boy 
 who had been horrid left in Tommy, just enough to 
 know him by. 
 
 " He '11 be vain ? " her aged maid, Maggy Ann, said 
 curiously to her that evening. They were aU curious 
 about Tommy. 
 
 "I don't know that he is vain," Grizel replied, 
 guardedly. 
 
 " If he 's no vain," Maggy Ann retorted, " he 's the 
 first sou of Adam it could be said o'. I jalouse it 's his 
 bit book." 
 
 " He scarcely mentioned it." 
 
 " Ay, then, it 's his beafd." 
 
 Grizel was sure it was not that. 
 
 " Then it '11 be the women," said Maggy Ann. 
 
 " Who knows ! " said Grizel of the watchful eyes, but 
 she smiled to herself. She thought not incorrectly that 
 
THB TOMMY MTTH 79 
 
 she knew one woman of whom Mr. Sandys was a little 
 afraid. 
 
 About the same time Tommy and Elspeth were discuss- 
 ing her. Elspeth was in bed, and Tommy had come into 
 the room to kiss her good-night — he had never once 
 omitted doing it since they went to London, and he was 
 always to do it, for neither of them was ever to marry. 
 
 " What do you think of her ? " Elspeth asked. This 
 was their great time for confidences. 
 
 " Of whom ? " Tommy inquired lightly. 
 
 « Grizel." 
 
 He must be careful. 
 
 " Rather pretty, don't you think ? " he said, gazing at 
 the ceiling. 
 
 She was looking at him keenly, but he managed to 
 deceive her. She was much relieved, and could say 
 what was in her heart. " Tommy," she said, " I think 
 she is the most noble-looking girl I ever saw, and if she 
 were not so masterful in her manner she would be beau- 
 tiful." It was nice of Elspeth to say it, for she and 
 Grizel were never very great friends. 
 
 Tommy brought down his eyes. " Did you think as 
 much of her as that ? " he said. " It struck me that her 
 features were not quite classic. Her nose is a little 
 tilted, is it not?" 
 
 " Some people like that kind of nose," replied Elspeth. 
 
 "It is not classic," Tommy said, sternly. 
 
CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 GHOSTS THAT HAUNT THE DEK 
 
 LooKiJTG through the Tommy papers of this period, 
 like a conscientious biographer, I find among them 
 manuscripts that remind me how diligently he set to 
 work' at his new book the moment he went North, and 
 also letters, which, if printed, would show you what a 
 wise and good man Tommy was. But while I was 
 fingering those there floated from them to the floor a 
 loose page, and when I saw that it was a chemist's bill 
 for oil and liniment I remembered something I had nigh 
 forgotten. "Eureka!"! cried, "I shall tell the story 
 of the chemist's bill, and some other biographer may 
 print the letters." 
 
 Well, well, but to think that this scrap of paper should 
 flutter into view to damn him after all those years ! 
 
 The date is Saturday, May 28th, by which time 
 Tommy had been a week in Thrums without doing any- 
 thing very reprehensible, so far as G-rizel knew. She 
 watched for telltales as for a mouse to show at its hole, 
 and at the worst, I think, she saw only its little head. 
 That was when Tommy was talking beautifully to her 
 about her dear doctor. He would have done wisely to 
 
GHOSTS THAT HAXJNT THE DEN 81 
 
 avoid this subject, but he was so notoriously good at 
 condolences that he had to say it. He had thought it 
 out, you may remember, a year ago, but hesitated to 
 post it, and since then it had lain heavily within him, 
 as if it knew it was a good thing and pined to be up 
 and strutting. 
 
 He said it with emotion ; evidently Dr. McQueen had 
 been very dear to him, and any other girl would have 
 been touched, but Grizel stiffened, and when he had 
 finished this is what she said, quite snappily: 
 
 "He never liked you." 
 
 Tommy was taken aback, but replied, with gentle 
 dignity, " Do you think, Grizel, I would let that make 
 any difference in my estimate of him ! " 
 
 "But you never liked him," said she, and now that 
 he thought of it, this was true also. It was useless to 
 say anything about the artistic instinct to her, she did 
 not know what it was, and would have had plain words 
 for it as soon as he told her. Please to picture Tommy 
 picking up his beautiful speech and ramming it back into 
 his pocket as if it were a rejected manuscript. 
 
 "I am sorry you should think so meanly of me, 
 Grizel," he said with manly forbearance, and when she 
 thought it all out carefully that night she decided that 
 she had been hasty. She could not help watching 
 Tomfliy for back-slidings, but, oh, it was sweet to her to 
 decide that she had not found any. 
 
 "It was I who was horrid," she announced to him 
 
 B 
 
82 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 frankly, and Tommy forgave her at once. She offered 
 him a present. " When the doctor died I gave some of 
 his things to his friends, it is the Scotch custom, you 
 know. He had a new overcoat, it had been worn but 
 two or three times, I should be so glad if you would let 
 me give it to you for saying such sweet things about 
 him. I think it will need very little alteration." 
 
 Thus very simply came into Tommy's possession the 
 coat that was to play so odd a part in his history. " But, 
 oh, Grizel," said he, with mock reproach, " you need not 
 think that I don't see through you ! Your deep design 
 is to cover me up. You despise my velvet jacket!" 
 
 " It does not — " Grizel began, and stopped. 
 
 " It is not in keeping with my doleful countenance," 
 said Tommy, candidly, " that was what you were to say. 
 Let me tell you a secret, Grizel, I wear it to spite my 
 face. Sha'n't give up my velvet jacket for anybody, 
 Grizel; not even for you." He was in gay spirits be- 
 cause he knew she liked him again, and she saw that 
 was the reason and it warmed her. She was least able 
 to resist Tommy when he was most a boy, and it was 
 actually watchful Grizel who proposed that he and she 
 and Elspeth should revisit the den together. How often 
 since the days of their childhood had Grizel wandered it 
 alone, thinking of those dear times, making up her mind 
 that if ever Tommy asked her to go into the den again 
 with him she would not go, the place was so much 
 sweeter to her than it could be to him. And yet it was 
 
GHOSTS THAT HAUNT THE DEN 83 
 
 Grizel herself who was saying now, "Let us go back to 
 the den." 
 
 Tommy caught fire. «We sha'n't go back," he cried, 
 defiantly, " as men and women ; let us be boy and girl 
 again, Grizel, let us have that Saturday we missed long 
 ago. I missed a Saturday on purpose, Grizel, so that we 
 should have it now." 
 
 She shook her head wistfully, but she was glad that 
 Tommy would fain have had one of the Saturdays back. 
 Had he waxed sentimental she would not have gone a 
 step of the way with him into the past, but when he was 
 so full of glee she could take his hand and run back into it. 
 
 "But we must wait until evening," Tommy said, 
 " until Corp is unharnessed ; we must not hurt the feel- 
 ings of Corp by going back to the den without him." 
 
 " How mean of me not to think of Corp ! " Grizel 
 cried; but the next moment she was glad she had not 
 thought of him, it was so delicious to have proof that 
 Tommy was more loyal. 
 
 " But we can't turn back the clock, can we, Corp ? " she 
 said to the fourth of the conspirators, to which Corp re- 
 plied, with his old sublime confidence, " He '11 find a wy." 
 
 And at first it really seemed as if Tommy had found a 
 way. They did not go to the den, four in a line or two 
 abreast, nothing so common as that. In the wild spirits 
 that mastered him he seemed to be the boy incarnate, 
 and it was always said of Tommy by those who knew 
 him best that if he leapt back into boyhood they had to 
 
84 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 jump with him. Those who knew him best were with 
 him now. He took command of them in the old way. 
 He whispered, as if Black Cathro were still on the prowl 
 for him. Corp of Corp had to steal upon the den by 
 way of the Silent Pool, Grizel by the Queen's Bower, 
 Elspeth up the burn side, Captain Stroke down the 
 Eeekie Brothpot. Grizel's arms rocked with delight in 
 the dark, and she was on her way to the Cuttle Well, 
 the trysting-place, before she came to and saw with con- 
 sternation that Tommy had been ordering her about. 
 
 She was quite a sedate young lady by the time she 
 joined them at the well, and Tommy was the first to 
 feel the change. "Don't you think this is all rather 
 silly," she said, when he addressed her as the Lady 
 Griselda, and it broke the spell. Two girls shot up 
 into women, a beard grew on Tommy's chin, and Corp 
 became a father. Grizel had blown Tommy's pretty 
 project to dust just when he was most gleeful over it, 
 yet instead of bearing resentment he pretended not even 
 to know that she was the culprit. 
 
 " Corp," he said, ruefully, " the game is up ! " And 
 "Listen," he said, when they had sat down, crushed, 
 by the old Cuttle Well, "do you hear anything?" 
 
 It was a very still evening. " I hear nocht," said Corp, 
 " but the trickle o' the burn. What did you hear ? " 
 
 -- 1 thought I heard a baby cry," replied Tommy, with 
 a groan, "I think it was your baby, Corp. Did you 
 hear it, Grizel ? " 
 
GHOSTa THAT HAUNT THE DEN 85 
 
 She understood, and nodded. 
 
 "And you, Elspeth?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " My bairn ! " cried the astounded Corp. 
 
 "Yours," said Tommy, reproachfully, "and he has 
 done for us. Ladies and gentlemen, the game is up." 
 
 Yes, the game -was up, and she was glad, Grizel said 
 to herself, as they made their melancholy pilgrimage 
 of what had once been an enchanted land. But she felt 
 that Tommy had been very forbearing to her, and that 
 she did not deserve it. Undoubtedly he had ordered 
 her about, but in so doing had he not been making half- 
 pathetic sport of his old self, and was it with him that 
 she was annoyed for ordering, or with herself for obey- 
 ing ? And why should she not obey when it was all 
 a jest? It was as if she still had some lingering 
 fear of Tommy. Oh, she was ashamed of herself. She 
 must say something nice to him at once. About what ? 
 About his book, of course. How base of her not to 
 have done so already, but how good of him to have over- 
 looked her silence on that great topic. 
 
 It was not ignorance of its contents that had kept her 
 silent ; to confess the horrid truth, Grizel had read the 
 book suspiciously, looking as through a microscope for 
 something wrong, hoping not to find it, but looking 
 minutely. The book, she knew, was beautiful, but it 
 was the writer of the book she was peering for ; the 
 Tommy she had known so well, what had he grown 
 
86 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 into ? In her heart she had exulted from the first, in 
 his success, and she should have been still more glad 
 (should she not ?) to learn that his subject was woman, 
 but no, that had irritated her, what was perhaps even 
 worse, she had been still more irritated on hearing that 
 the work was rich in sublime thoughts. As a boy, he 
 had maddened her most in his grandest moments. I can 
 think of no other excuse for her. 
 
 She would not accept it as an excuse for herself now. 
 What she saw with scorn was that she was always 
 suspecting the worst of Tommy. Very probably there 
 was not a thought in the book that had been put in with 
 his old complacent waggle of the head. " Oh, am I not 
 a wonder ! " he used to cry when he did anything big, 
 but that was no reason why she should suspect him of 
 being conceited still. Very probably he really and truly 
 felt what he wrote, felt it not only at the time, but also 
 next morning. In bis boyhood, Mr. Cathro had chris- 
 tened him Sentimental Tommy, but he was a man now, 
 and surely the sentimentalities in which he had dressed 
 himself were flung aside forever like old suits of clothes. 
 So Grizel decided eagerly, and she was on the point of 
 telling him how proud she was of his book, when 
 Tommy, who had thus far behaved so well, of a sudden 
 went to pieces. 
 
 He and Grizel were together, Elspeth was a little in 
 front of them, walking with a gentleman who still 
 wondered what they meant by saying that they had 
 
GHOSTS THAT HAXTNT THE DEN 87 
 
 heard his baby cry. " Por he 's no here," Corp had said 
 earnestly to them all, " though I 'm awid for the time 
 to come when I '11 be able to bring him to the den and 
 let him see the Jacobites' lair." 
 
 There was nothing startling in this remark, so far as 
 Grizel could discover, but she saw that it had an im- 
 mediate and incomprehensible effect on Tommy. First, 
 he blundered in his talk as if he was thinking deeply 
 of something else, then his face shone as it had been 
 wont to light up in his boyhood when he was suddenly 
 enraptured with himself, and lastly down his cheek and 
 into his beard there stole a tear of agony. Obviously, 
 Tommy was in deep woe for somebody or something. 
 
 It was a chance for a true lady to show that womanly 
 sympathy of which such exquisite things are said in the 
 first work of T. Sandys, but it merely infuriated Grizel, 
 who knew that Tommy did not feel nearly so deeply 
 as she this return to the den, and therefore what was 
 he in such distress about ? It was silly sentiment of 
 some sort, she was sure of that. In the old days she 
 would have asked him imperiously to tell her what was 
 the matter with him, but she must not do that now, she 
 dare not even rock her indignant arms, she could walk 
 silently only by his side, longing fervently to shake 
 him. 
 
 He had quite forgotten her presence ; indeed, she was 
 not really there, for a number of years had passed and 
 he was Corp Shiach walking the den alone. To-morrow 
 
88 TOMMY AND GBIZBL 
 
 he was to bring his boy to show him the old lair and 
 other fondly remembered spots, to-night he must re- 
 visit them alone. So he set out blithely, but to his 
 bewilderment he could not find the lair. It had not 
 been a tiny hollow where muddy water gathered, he 
 remembered an impregnable fortress full of men whose 
 armor rattled as they came and went, so this could not 
 be the lair. He had taken the wrong way to it, for 
 the way was across a lagoon, up a deep-flowing river, 
 then by horse till the rocky ledge terrified all four- 
 footed things ; no, up a grassy slope had never been 
 the way. He came night after night trying different 
 ways, but he could not iind the golden ladder, though 
 all the time he knew that the lair lay somewhere over 
 there. When he stood still and listened he could hear 
 the friends of his youth at play, and they seemed to be 
 calling, " Are you coming, Corp ? why does not Corp 
 come back?" but he could never see them, and when 
 he pressed forward their voices died away. Then at 
 last he said, sadly to his boy, "1 shall never be able to 
 show you the lair, for I cannot find the way to it," and 
 the boy was touched, and he said, " Take my hand, 
 father, and I will lead you to the lair; I found the 
 way long ago for myself." 
 
 It took Tommy about two seconds to see all this, 
 and perhaps another half minute was spent in sad but 
 satisfactory contemplation of it. Then he felt that for 
 the best effect Corp's home life was too comfortable, so 
 
GHOSTS THAT HAUNT THE DEN 89 
 
 Gavinia ran away with, a soldier. He was now so sorry 
 for Corp that the tear rolled down. But at the same 
 moment he saw how the effect could be still further 
 heightened by doing away with his friend's rude state 
 of health, and he immediately jammed him between the 
 buffers of two railway carriages and gave him a wooden 
 leg. It was at this point that a lady who had kept 
 her arms still too long rocked them frantically, then 
 said, with cutting satire, " Are you not feeling well, 
 or have you hurt yourself? You seem to be very 
 lame," and Tommy woke with a start to see that he 
 was hobbling as if one of his legs were timber to the 
 knee. 
 
 " It is nothing," he said, modestly, " something Corp 
 said set me thinking. That is all." 
 
 He had told the truth, and if what he imagined was 
 twenty times more real to him than what was really 
 there, how could Tommy help it ? Indignant Grizel, 
 however, who kept such a grip of facts, would make no 
 such excuse for him. 
 
 "Elspeth!" she called. 
 
 "There is no need to tell her," said Tommy, but 
 Grizel was obdurate. 
 
 " Come here, Elspeth," she cried, vindictively, " some- 
 thing Corp said a moment ago has made your brother 
 lame." 
 
 Tommy was lame, that was all Elspeth and Corp 
 heard or could think of as they ran back to him. When 
 
90 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 did it happen ? Was lie in great pain ? Had he fallen ? 
 Oil, why had he not told Elspeth at once ? 
 
 "It is nothing," Tommy insisted, a little fiercely, 
 
 "He says so," Grizel explained, "not to alarm us. 
 But he is suffering horribly. Just before I called to 
 you his face was all drawn up in pain." 
 
 This made the sufferer wince. "That was another 
 twinge," she said, promptly. "What is to be done, 
 Elspeth ? " 
 
 "I think I could carry him," suggested Corp, with 
 a forward movement that made Tommy stamp his foot, 
 the wooden one. 
 
 " I am all right," he told them, testily, and looking 
 uneasily at Grizel. 
 
 " How brave of you to say so," said she. 
 
 "It is just like him," Elspeth said, pleased with 
 Grizel's remark. 
 
 " I am sure it is," Grizel said, so graciously. 
 
 It was very naughty of her. Had she given him a 
 chance he would have explained that it was all a mis- 
 take of Grizel's. That had been his intention, but now 
 a devil entered into Tommy and spoke for him. 
 
 "I must have slipped and sprained my ankle," he 
 said. "It is slightly painful, but I shall be able to 
 walk home all right, Corp, if you let me use you as 
 a staff." 
 
 I think he was a little surprised to hear himself say- 
 ing this, but as soon as it was said he liked it. He was 
 
GHOSTS THAT HAUNT THE DEN 91 
 
 Captain Stroke playing in the den again after all, and 
 playing as well as ever. Nothing being so real to 
 Tommy, as pretence, I daresay he even began to feel his 
 ankle hurting him. « Gently," he begged of Corp, with 
 a gallant smile and clenching his teeth so that the pain 
 should not make him cry out before the ladies. Thus 
 with his lieutenant's help, did Stroke manage to reach 
 Aaron's house, making light of his mishap, assuring 
 them cheerily that he should be all right to-morrow and 
 carefully avoiding Grizel's eye, though he wanted very 
 much to know what she thought of him (and of herself) 
 now. 
 
 There were moments when she did not know what to 
 think, and that always distressed Grizel, though it was 
 a state of mind with which Tommy could keep on very 
 friendly terms. The truth seemed too monstrous for 
 belief. Was it possible she had misjudged him ? Per- 
 haps he really had sprained his ankle. But he had 
 made no pretence of that at first, and besides, yes, she 
 could not be mistaken, it was the other leg. 
 
 She soon let him see what she was thinking. " I am 
 afraid it is too serious a case for me," she said, in 
 answer to a suggestion from Corp, who had a profound 
 faith in het medical skill, "but if you like — " she was 
 addressing Tommy now — "I shall call at Dr. Gemmell's 
 on my way home, and ask him to come to you." 
 
 " There is no necessity, a night's rest is all I need," 
 he answered, hastily. 
 
92 TOMMY AND 6EIZEL 
 
 " Well, you know best," she said, and there was a 
 look on her face which Thomas Sandys could endure 
 from no woman. 
 
 " On second thoughts," he said, " I think it would be 
 advisable to have a doctor. Thank you very much, 
 Grizel. Corp, can you help me to lift my foot on to 
 that chair. Softly — ah ! — ugh ! " 
 
 His eyes did not faU before hers. " And would you 
 mind asking him to come at once, Grizel ? " he said, 
 sweetly. 
 
 She went straight to the doctor. 
 
CHAPTEE VII 
 
 THE BEGnrNTNG OF THE DUEL 
 
 It was among old Dr. McQueen's sayings that when 
 he met a man who was certified to be in no way remark- 
 able he wanted to give three cheers. There are few of 
 them, even in a little place like Thrums, but David 
 Gemmell was one. 
 
 So McQueen had always said, but Grizel was not so 
 sure. " He is very good-looking and he does not know 
 it," she would point out, " oh, what a remarkable man ! " 
 
 She had known him intimately for nearly six years 
 now, ever since he became the old doctor's assistant, on 
 the day when, in the tail of some others, he came to 
 Thrums aged twenty-one to apply for the post. Grizel 
 had even helped to choose him, she had a quaint recol- 
 lection of his being submitted to her by McQueen, who 
 told her to look him over and say whether he would do ; 
 an odd position in which to place a fourteen-year-old 
 girl, but Grizel had taken it most seriously, and indeed 
 of the two men only Gemmell dared to laugh. 
 
 " You should not laugh when it is so important," she 
 said, gravely ; and he stood abashed, although I believe 
 he chuckled again when he retired to his room for the 
 
94 TOMMY AND GKIZEh 
 
 night. She was in that room next morning as soon as he 
 had left it, to smell the curtains (he smoked) and see 
 whether he folded his things up neatly and used both 
 the brush and the comb, but did not use pomade, and 
 slept with his window open, and really took a bath 
 instead of merely pouring the water into it and laying 
 the sponge on top — (oh, she knew them ! ) — and her 
 decision after some days was that though far from per- 
 fect, he would do, if he loved her dear darling doctor 
 sufficiently. By this time David was openly afraid of 
 her, which Grizel noticed, and took to be in the circum- 
 stances a satisfactory sign. 
 
 She watched him narrowly for the next year, and after 
 that she ceased to watch him at all. She was like a con- 
 gregation become so sure of its minister's soundness that 
 it can risk going to sleep. To begin with, he was quite 
 incapable of pretending to be anything he was not. OL, 
 how unlike a boy she had once known ! His manner, 
 like his voice, was quiet; being himself the son of a 
 doctor, he did not dodder through life amazed at the 
 splendid eminence he had climbed to, which is the weak- 
 ness of Scottish students when they graduate, and often 
 for fifty years afterwards. How sweet he was to Dr. 
 McQueen, never forgetting the respect due to gray hairs, 
 never hinting that the new school of medicine knew 
 many things that were hidden from the old, and always 
 having the sense to support McQueen when she was 
 scolding him for his numerous naughty ways. When 
 
THE BEGINNING OF THE DUEL 95 
 
 the old doctor came home now on cold nights it was not 
 with his cravat in his pocket, and Grizel knew very well 
 who had put it round his neck. McQueen never had the 
 humiliation, so distressing to an old doctor, of being 
 asked by patients to send his assistant instead of coming 
 himself. He thought they preferred him and twitted 
 David about it, but Grizel knew that David had some- 
 times to order them to prefer the old man. She knew 
 that when he said good-night and was supposed to have 
 gone to his lodgings, he was probably off to some poor 
 house where, if not he, a tired woman must sit the long 
 night through by a sufferer's bedside, and she realized 
 with joy that his chief reason for not speaking of such 
 things was that he took them as part of his natural 
 work and never even knew that he was kind. He was 
 not specially skilful, he had taken no honors either at 
 school or college, and he considered himself to be a very 
 ordinary young man. If you had said that on this point 
 you disagreed with him, his manner probably would 
 have implied that he thought you a bit of an ass. 
 
 When a new man arrives in Thrums, the women 
 come to their doors to see whether he is good-look- 
 ing. They said No of Tommy when he came back, 
 but it had been an emphatic Yes for Dr. Gemmell. 
 He was tall and very slight, and at twenty-seven as 
 at twenty-one, despite the growth of a heavy mus- 
 tache, there was a boyishness about his appearance, 
 which is, I think, what women love in a man more 
 
96 TOMMY AJJD GEIZBL 
 
 than anything else. They are drawn to him by it, 
 and they love him out of pity when it goes. I sup- 
 pose it brings back to them some early, beautiful stage 
 in the world's history when men and women played 
 together without fear. Perhaps it lay in his smile, 
 which was so winning that wrinkled old dames spoke 
 of it, who had never met the word before, smiles be- 
 ing little known in Thrums, where in a workaday 
 world we find it sufficient either to laugh or to look 
 thrawn. His dark curly hair was what Grizel was 
 most suspicious of ; he must be vain of that, she 
 thought, until she discovered that he was quite sen- 
 sitive to its being mentioned, having ever detested 
 his curls as an eyesore and in his boyhood clipped 
 savagely to the roots. He had such a firm chiu, if 
 there had been another such chin going a-begging, I 
 should have liked to clap it on to Tommy Sandys. 
 
 Tommy Sandys ! All this time we have been neg- 
 lecting that brave sufferer, and while we talk his 
 ankle is swelling and swelling. Well, Grizel was not 
 so inconsiderate, for she walked very fast and with 
 an exceedingly determined mouth to Dr. Gemmell's 
 lodgings. He was still in lodgings, having refused 
 to turn Grizel out of her house, though she had offered 
 to let it to him. She left Trord, the doctor not being 
 in, that he was wanted at once by Mr. Sandys, who 
 had sprained his ankle. 
 
 Now, then, Tommy ! 
 
THE BEGINNING OF THE DUEL 97 
 
 For an hour, perhaps until she went to bed, she re- 
 mained merciless. She saw the quiet doctor with the 
 penetrating eyes examining that ankle, asking a few 
 questions, and looking curiously at his patient. Then 
 she saw him lift his hat and walk out of the house. 
 
 It gave her pleasure, no, it did not. While she 
 thought of this Tommy she despised, there came in 
 front of him a boy who had played with her long 
 ago when no other child would play with her, and 
 now he said, "You have grown cold to me, Grizel," 
 and she nodded assent, and little wells of water rose 
 to her eyes and lay there because she had nodded 
 assent. 
 
 She had never liked Dr. Gemmell so little as when 
 she saw him approaching her house next morning. 
 The surgery was still attached to it, and very often 
 he came from there, his visiting-book in 'his hand, to 
 tell her of his patients, even to consult her; indeed 
 to talk to Grizel about his work without consulting 
 her would have been difficult, for it was natural to 
 her to decide what was best for everybody. These 
 consultations were very unprofessional, but from her 
 first coming to the old doctor's house she had taken it 
 as a matter of course that in his practice, as in affairs 
 relating to his boots and buttons, she should tell him 
 what to do and he should do it. McQueen had intro- 
 duced his assistant to this partnership half-shamefacedly 
 and with a cautious wink over the little girl's head, 
 
 7 
 
&8 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 and Gemmell fell into line at once, showing her his 
 new stethoscope as gravely as if he must abandon it 
 at once, should not she approve ; which fine behavior, 
 however, was quite thrown away on Grizel, who, had 
 he conducted himself otherwise, would merely have 
 wondered what was the matter with the man ; and as 
 she was eighteen or more before she saw that she had 
 exceeded her duties, it was then, of course, too late to 
 cease doing it. 
 
 She knew now how good, how forbearing he had been 
 to the little girl, and that it was partly because he was 
 acquainted with her touching history. The grave cour- 
 tesy with which he had always treated her, and which 
 had sometimes given her as a girl a secret thrill of 
 delight, it was so sweet to Grizel to be respected, she 
 knew now to be less his natural manner to women than 
 something that came to him in her presence because he 
 who knew her so well, thought her worthy of deference, 
 and it helped her more, far more, than if she had seen 
 it turn to love. Yet as she received him in her parlor 
 now, her too spotless parlor, for not even the ashes in 
 the grate were visible, which is a mistake, she was not 
 very friendly. He had discovered what Tommy was,, 
 and as she had been the medium she could not blame 
 him for that, but how could he look as calm as ever 
 when such a deplorable thing had happened ? 
 
 " What you say is true, I knew it before I asked you 
 to go to him, and I knew you would find it out, but 
 
THE BEGINNING OP THE DUEL 99 
 
 please to remember that he is a man of genius, whom 
 it is not for such as you to judge." 
 
 That was the sort of haughty remark she held ready 
 for him while they talked of other cases, but it was 
 never uttered, for by and by he said : 
 
 "And then there is Mr. Sandys's ankle. A nasty 
 accident, I am afraid." 
 
 Was he jesting ? She looked at him sharply. " Have 
 you not been to see him yet ? " she asked. 
 
 He thought she had misunderstood him. He had 
 been to see Mr. Sandys twice, both last night and 
 this morning. 
 
 And he was sure it was a sprain ? 
 
 Unfortunately it was something worse, dislocation. 
 Further mischief might show itself presently. 
 
 " Hemorrhage into the neighboring joint on inflamma- 
 tion ? " she asked scientifically and with scorn. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 Grizel turned away from him. -' I think not," she 
 said. 
 
 Well, possibly not, if Mr. Sandys was careful and 
 kept his foot from the ground for the next week. The 
 doctor did not know that she was despising him, and he 
 proceeded to pay Tommy a compliment. " I had to re- 
 duce the dislocation, of course," he told her, " and he 
 bore the wrench splendidly, though there is almost no 
 pain more acute." 
 ■" Did he ask you to tell me that ? " Grizel was thirst- 
 
100 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 ing to inquire, but she forbore. Unwittingly, however, 
 the doctor answered the question. "I could see," he 
 said, that Mr. Sandys made light of his sufferings to 
 save his sister pain. I cannot recall ever having seen a 
 brother and sister so attached." 
 
 That was quite true, Grizel admitted to herself. In 
 all her recollections of Tom.my she could not remember 
 one critical moment in which Elspeth had not been fore- 
 most in his thoughts. It passed through her head, 
 " Even now he must make sure that Elspeth is in peace 
 of mind before he can care to triumph over me," and 
 she would perhaps have felt less bitter had he put his 
 triumph first. 
 
 His triumph! Oh, she would show him whether it 
 was a triumph. He had destroyed forever her faith in 
 David Gemmell ; the quiet, observant doctor, who had 
 such an eye for the false, had been deceived as easily as 
 all the others, and it made her feel very lonely ; but, 
 never mind, Tommy should find out, and that within the 
 hour, that there was one whom he could not cheat. Her 
 first impulse, always her first impulse, was to go straight 
 to his side and tell him what she thought of him; her 
 second, which was neater, was to send by messenger her 
 compliments to Mr. and Miss Sandys, and would they, if 
 not otherwise engaged, come and have tea with her that 
 afternoon ? Not a word in the note about the ankle, 
 but a careful sentence to the effect that she had seen Dr. 
 Gemmell to-day and proposed asking him to meet them. 
 
THE BEGINNING OF THE DUEL 101 
 
 Maggy Ann, who had conveyed the message, came 
 back with the reply. Elspeth regretted that they could 
 not accept Grizel's invitation, owing to the accident to 
 her brother being very much more serious than Grizel 
 seemed to think. " I can't understand," Elspeth added, 
 " why Dr. Gemmell did not tell you this when he saw 
 you." 
 
 " Is it a polite letter ? " asked inquisitive Maggy 
 Ann, and Grizel assured her that it was most polite. 
 "I hardly expected it," said the plain-spoken dame, 
 "for I'm thinking by their manner it's more than can 
 be said of yours." 
 
 " I merely invited them to come to tea." 
 "And him wi' his leg broke ! Did you no ken he was 
 lying on chairs." 
 
 " I did not know it was so bad as that, Maggy Ann. 
 So my letter seemed to annoy him, did it ? " said Grizel, 
 eagerly and I fear well pleased. 
 
 "It angered her most terrible," said Maggy Ann, 
 "but no him. He gave a sort of a laugh when he read 
 it." 
 
 " A laugh ! " 
 
 " Ay, and syne she says, ' It is most heartless of 
 Grizel ; she does not even ask how you are to-day ; one 
 would think she did not know of the accident,' and she 
 says, ' I have a good mind to write her a very stiff 
 letter,' and says he in a noble, melancholic voice, ' We 
 must not hurt Grizel's feelings,' he says, and she says, 
 
102 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 ' Grizel tMnks it was nothing because you bore it so 
 jheerfully ; oh., how little she knows you/ she says, and 
 ' You are too forgiving, ' she says ; and says he, ' If I 
 have anything to forgive Grizel for I forgive her will- 
 ingly,' and syne she quieted down and wrote the letter." 
 
 Forgive her ! Oh, how it enraged Grizel. How like 
 bhe Tommy of old to put it in that way. There never 
 bad been a boy so good at forgiving people for his own 
 crimes, and he always looked so modest when he did it. 
 He was reclining on his chairs at this moment, she was 
 sure he was, forgiving her in every sentence. She 
 Bould have endured it more easily had she felt sure that 
 he was seeing himself as he was, but she remembered 
 him too well to have any hope of that. 
 
 She put on her bonnet and took it off again; a terrible 
 bhing, remember, for Grizel to be in a state of indeci» 
 sion. For the remainder of that day she was not wholly 
 inactive. Meeting Dr. Gemmell in the street she im- 
 pressed upon him the advisability of not allowing Mr. 
 Sandys to move for at least a week. 
 
 ' ' He might lake a drive in a day or two," the doctor 
 thought, " with his sister." 
 
 "He would be sure to use his foot," Grizel main- 
 bained, ' ' if you once let him rise from his chair ; you 
 know they all do," and Gemmell agreed that she was 
 right. So she managed to give Tommy as irksome 
 a, time as possible. 
 
 But next day she called. To go through another 
 
THE BEGINNING OF THE DUEL 103 
 
 day without letting him see how despicable she thought 
 him was beyond her endurance. Elspeth was a little 
 stiff at first, but Tommy received her heartily, and with 
 nothing iu his manner to show that she had hurt his 
 finer feelings. His leg (the wrong leg, as Grizel remem- 
 bered at once) was extended on a chair in front of him, 
 bat instead of nursing it ostentatiously as so many 
 would have done, he made humorous remarks at its ex- 
 pense. "The fact is," he said, cheerily, "that so long 
 as I don't move I never felt better in my life. And I 
 daresay I could walk almost as well as either of you, 
 only my tyrant of a doctor won't let me try." 
 
 " He told me you had behaved splendidly," said 
 Grizel, " while he was reducing the dislocation. How 
 brave you are ! Tou could not have endured more 
 stoically though there had been nothing the matter 
 with it." 
 
 " It was soon over," Tommy replied, lightly. " I 
 think Elspeth suffered more than I." 
 
 Elspeth told the story of his heroism. " I could not 
 stay in the room," she said, "it was too terrible," and 
 Grizel despised too tender-hearted Elspeth for that, she 
 was so courageous at facing pain herself. But Tommy 
 had guessed that Elspeth was trembling behind the 
 door, and he had called out, "Don't cry, Elspeth, I 
 am all right, it is nothing at all." 
 
 " How noble ! " was Grizel's comment when she 
 heard of this, and then Elspeth was her friend again, 
 
104 TOMMY AND 6RIZBL 
 
 insisted on her staying to tea, and went into the kitchen 
 to prepare it. Aaron was out. 
 
 The two were alone now, and in the circumstances 
 some men would have given the lady the opportunity 
 to apologize, if such was her desire. But Tommy's was 
 a more generous nature, his manner was that of one less 
 sorry to be misjudged than anxious that Grizel should 
 not suffer too much from remorse; if she had asked 
 his pardon then and there I am sure he would have 
 replied, "Eight willingly, Grizel," and begged her not 
 to give another thought to the matter. What is of 
 more importance, Grizel was sure of this also, and it 
 was the magnanimity of him that especially annoyed 
 her. There seemed to be no disturbing it. Even when 
 she said, " Which foot is it ? " he answered, " The one 
 on the chair," quite graciously as if she had asked a 
 natural question. 
 
 Grizel pointed out that the other foot must be tired 
 of being a foot in waiting. It had got a little exercise, 
 Tommy replied lightly, last night and again this morn- 
 ing when it had helped to convey him to and from his 
 bed. 
 
 Had he hopped ? she asked, brutally. 
 
 No, he said, he had shuffled along. Half rising, he 
 attempted to show her humorously how he walked now- 
 adays, tried not to wince, but had to. Ugh, that was 
 a twinge ! Grizel sarcastically offered her assistance 
 and he took her shoulder gratefully ; they crossed the 
 
THE BEGINNING OF THE DUEL 105 
 
 room, a tedious journey. "Now let me see if you can 
 manage alone," she says, and suddenly deserts him. 
 
 He looked rather helplessly across the room ; few 
 sights are so pathetic as the strong man of yesterday 
 feeling that the chair by the fire is a distant object to- 
 day. Tommy knew how pathetic it was, but Grizel did 
 not seem to know. 
 
 "Try it," she said, encouragingly, "it will do you 
 good." 
 
 He got as far as the table and clung to it, his teeth 
 set. Grizel clapped her hands. " Excellently done ! " 
 she said, with fell meaning, and recommended him to 
 move up and down the room for a little, he would feel 
 ever so much the better for it afterwards. 
 
 The pain — was — considerable, he said. Oh, she 
 saw that, but he had already proved himself so good at 
 bearing pain, and the new school of surgeons held that 
 it was wise to exercise an injured limb. 
 
 Even then it was not a reproachful glance that 
 Tommy gave her, though there was some sadness in it. 
 He moved across the room several times, a groan 
 occasionally escaping him. " Admirable ! " said his 
 critic, "bravo! would you like to stop now?" 
 
 "Not until you tell me to," he said, determinedly, 
 but with a gasp. 
 
 "It must be dreadfully painful," she replied, coldly, 
 "but I should like you to go on," and he went on until 
 suddenly he seemed to have lost the power to lift his 
 
106 TOMMY AND GEIZBI. 
 
 feet. His body swayed, there was an appealing look on 
 his face. " Don't be afraid, you won't fall," said Grizel, 
 but she had scarcely said it when he fainted dead away, 
 and went down at her feet. 
 
 " Oh, how dare you ! " she cried in sudden flame, and 
 she drew back from him. But after a moment she 
 knew that he was shamming no longer. Or she knew it 
 and yet could not quite believe it, for hurrying out of 
 the room for water she had no sooner passed the door 
 than she swiftly put back her head as if to catch him 
 unawares. But he lay motionless. 
 
 The sight of her dear brother on the floor paralyzed 
 Elspeth, who could weep only for him and call to him to 
 look at her and speak to her, but in such an emergency 
 Grizel was as useful as any doctor and by the time 
 Gemmell arrived in haste the invalid was being brought 
 to. The doctor was a practical man who did not ask 
 questions while there was something better to do ; had 
 he asked any as he came in Grizel would certainly have 
 said: "He wanted to faint to make me believe he really 
 has a bad ankle, and somehow he managed to do it," 
 and if the doctor had replied that people can't faint by 
 wishing, she would have said that he did not know Mr. 
 Sandys. 
 
 But with few words Gemmell got his patient back to 
 the chairs, and proceeded to undo the bandages that 
 were round his ankle. Grizel stood by, assistin'g 
 silently ; she had often assisted the doctors, but never, 
 
THE BEGESTNING OF THE DUEL 107 
 
 before with that scornful curl of her lip. So the band- 
 ages -were removed and the antle laid bare. It was 
 very much swollen and discolored, and when Grizel saw 
 this she gave a little cry and the ointment she was hold- 
 ing slipped from her hand ; for the first time since he 
 came to Thrums she had failed Gemmell at a patient's 
 side. 
 
 " I had not expected it to be — like this," she said, in 
 a quivering voice, when he looked at her in surprise. 
 
 "It will look much worse to-morrow," he assured 
 them, grimly. " I can't understand. Miss Sandys, how 
 this came about." 
 
 "Miss Sandys was not in the room," said Grizel, 
 abjectly, " but I was, and I " 
 
 Tommy's face was begging her to stop. He was still 
 faint and in pain, but all thought of himself left him 
 in his desire to screen her. "I owe you an apology, 
 doctor," he said, quickly, "for disregarding your 
 instructions. It was entirely my own fault, I would try 
 to walk." 
 
 "Every step must have been agony," the doctor 
 rapped out, and Grizel shuddered. 
 
 "Not nearly so bad as that," Tommy said, for her 
 sake. 
 
 -•Agony," insisted the doctor, as if for once he 
 enjoyed the word. "It was a mad thing to do, as 
 surely you could guess, Grizel. Why did you not 
 prevent him ? " 
 
108 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 " She certainly did her best to stop me," Tommy 
 said, hastily, " but I suppose I had some insane fit on 
 me, for do it I would. I am very sorry, doctor." 
 
 His face was wincing with pain and he spoke jerkily, 
 but the doctor was still angry. He felt that there was 
 something between these two which he did not under- 
 stand, and it was strange to him and unpleasant to find 
 Grizel unable to speak for herself. I think he doubted 
 Tommy from that hour. All he said in reply, however, 
 was, " It is unnecessary to apologize to me ; yon your- 
 self are the only sufferer." 
 
 But was Tommy the only sufferer ? Gemmell left, 
 and Elspeth followed him to listen to those precious 
 words which doctors drop, as from a vial, on the other 
 side of a patient's door, and then Grizel, who had been 
 standing at the window with head averted, turned slowly 
 round and looked at the man she had wronged. Her 
 arms, which had been hanging rigid, the fists closed, 
 went out to him to implore forgiveness. I don't know 
 how she held herself up and remained dry-eyed, her 
 whole being wanted so much to sink by the side of his 
 poor tortured foot and bathe it in her tears. 
 
 So, you see, he had won ; nothing to do now but for- 
 give her beautifully. Go on, Tommy, you are good at it. 
 
 But the unexpected only came out of Tommy. Never 
 was there a softer heart. In London the old lady who 
 sold matches at the street-corner had got all his pence; 
 had he heard her, or any other, mourning a son sen- 
 
THE BEGrSNING OP THE DUEL 109 
 
 tenced to the gallows, he would immediately have won- 
 dered whether he might take the condemned one's place. 
 (What a speech Tommy could have delivered from the 
 scaffold!) There was nothing he would not jump at 
 doing for a woman in distress, except perhaps destroy 
 his note-book. And Grizel was in anguish, she was his 
 suppliant, his brave lonely little playmate of the past, 
 the noble girl of to-day, Grizel whom he liked so much. 
 As through a magnifying-glass he saw her top-heavy 
 with remorse for life, unable to sleep of nights, crushed 
 and 
 
 He was not made of the stuff that could endure it. 
 The truth must out. "G-rizel," he said, impulsively, 
 "you have nothing to be sorry for. You were quite 
 right. I did not hurt my foot that night in the den, but 
 afterwards, when I was alone, before the doctor came. 
 I ricked it here, intentionally, in the door. It sounds 
 incredible, but I set my teeth and did it, Grizel, because 
 you had challenged me to a duel, and I would not give 
 in." 
 
 As soon as it was out he was proud of himself for 
 having the generosity to confess it. He looked at Grizel 
 expectantly. 
 
 Yes, it sounded incredible, and yet she saw that it 
 was true. As Elspeth returned at that moment Grizel 
 could say nothing, she stood looking at him only over 
 her high collar of fur. Tommy actually thought that 
 she was admiring him. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 WHAT GEIZBIi's EYES SAID 
 
 To be the admired of women, how Tommy had fought 
 for it since first he drank of them in Pym's sparkling 
 pages ! To some it seems to be easy, but to him it was 
 a labor of Sisyphus. Everything had been against him. 
 But he concentrated. No labor was too herculean; he 
 was prepared if necessary to walk round the world to 
 get to the other side of the wall across which some men 
 can step. And he did take a roundabout way. It is my 
 opinion, for instance, that he wrote his book in order to 
 make a beginning with the ladies. 
 
 That as it may be, at all events he is on the right side 
 of the wall now, and here is even Grizel looking wist- 
 fully at him. Had she admired him for something he 
 was not (and a good many of them did that) he would 
 have been ill-satisfied ; he wanted her to think him 
 splendid because he was splendid, and the more he 
 reflected the more clearly he saw that he had done a 
 big thing. How many men would have had the courage 
 to rick their foot as he had done ? (He shivered when 
 he thought of it.) And even of these Spartans how many 
 would have let the reward slip through their fingers J 
 
WHAT GEIZEL'S EYES SAID 111 
 
 rather than wound the feelings of a girl ? These had 
 not been his thoughts when he made confession, he had 
 spoken on an impulse, but now that he could step out 
 and have a look at himself, he saw that this made it a 
 still bigger thing. He was modestly pleased that he 
 had not only got Grizel's admiration but earned it, and 
 he was very kind to her when next she came to see him. 
 No one could be more kind to them than he when they 
 admired him. He had the most grateful heart, had our 
 Tommy. 
 
 When next she came to see him ! That was while his 
 ankle still nailed him to the chair, a fortnight or so 
 during which Tommy was at his best, sending gracious 
 messages by Elspeth to the many who called to inquire, 
 and writing hard at his new work, pad on knee, so like 
 a brave soul whom no unmerited misfortune could 
 subdue, that it would have done you good merely to 
 peep at him through the window. Grizel came several 
 times, and the three talked very ordinary things, 
 mostly reminiscences ; she was as much a plain-spoken 
 princess as ever, but often he found her eyes fixed on 
 him wistfully, and he knew what they were saying, 
 they spoke so eloquently that he was a little nervous 
 lest Elspeth should notice. It was delicious to Tommy 
 to feel that there was this little unspoken something 
 between him and Grizel; he half regretted that the 
 time could not be far distant when she must put it 
 into words, as soon, say, as Elspeth left the room, 
 
114 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 than Tommy, thus nobly behaving, was prepared for, 
 and his shook came to him at the very moment when 
 he was modestly expecting to receive the prize. She 
 had called when Elspeth happened to be out, and 
 though now able to move about the room with the help 
 of a staff he was still an interesting object. He saw 
 that she thought so, and perhaps it made him hobble 
 slightly more, not vaingloriously, but because he was 
 such an artist. He ceased to be an artist suddenly, 
 however, when Grizel made this unexpected remark : 
 
 " How vain you are ! " 
 
 Tommy sat down, quite pale. " Did you come here to 
 say that to me, Grizel ? " he inquired, and she nodded 
 frankly over ber high collar of fur. He knew it was true 
 as Grizel said it, but though taken aback he could bear 
 it, for she was looking wistfully at him, and he knew 
 well what Grizel's wistful look meant ; so long as women 
 admired him Tommy could bear anything from them. 
 " God knows I have little to be vain of," he said, humbly. 
 
 " Those are the people who are most vain," she replied, 
 and be laughed a short laugh, which surprised her, she 
 was so very serious. 
 
 "Your methods are so direct," he explained. "But 
 of what am I vain, Grizel ? Is it my book ?" 
 
 " No," she answered, " not about your book but about 
 meaner things ; what else could have made you dislocate 
 your ankle rather than admit that you had been rather 
 silly?" 
 
WHAT GEIZBL's BYES SAID 115 
 
 Now silly is no word to apply to a gentleman, and 
 despite his forgiving nature, Tommy was a little dis- 
 appointed in Grizel. 
 
 " I suppose it was a silly thing to do," he said, with 
 just a touch of stiffness. 
 
 " It was an ignoble thing," said she, sadly. 
 
 " I see. And I myself am the meaner thing than the 
 book, ami?" 
 
 " Are you not ? " she asked, so eagerly that he laughed 
 again. 
 
 "It is the first compliment you have paid my book," 
 he pointed out. 
 
 " I like the book very much," she answered, gravely ; 
 "no one can be more proud of your fame than I. You 
 are hurting me very much by pretending to think that 
 it is a pleasure to me to find fault with you." 
 
 There was no getting past the honesty of her, and he 
 was touched by it. Besides, she did admire him, and 
 that, after all, is the great thing. " Then why say such 
 things, Grizel ? " he replied, good-naturedly. 
 
 " But if they are true ? " 
 
 "Still let us avoid them," said he, and at that she 
 was most distressed. 
 
 " It is so like what you used to say when you were 
 a boy ! " she cried. 
 
 "You are so anxious to have me grow up," he replied, 
 with proper dolefulness. " If you like the book, Grizel, 
 you must have patience with the kind of thing that pro- 
 
116 TOMMY ANT) GRIZBL 
 
 duced it. That night in the den when I won your scorn, 
 I was in the preliminary stages of composition. At such 
 times an author should be looked up, but I had got out, 
 you see. I was so enamoured of my little fancies that I 
 forgot I was with you. No wonder you were angry." 
 
 "I was not angry with you for forgetting me," she 
 said, sharply. (There was no catching Grizel, however 
 artful you were.) "But you were sighing to yourself, 
 you were looking as tragic as if some dreadful calamity 
 had occurred " 
 
 " The idea that had suddenly come to me was a touch- 
 ing one," he said. 
 
 " But you looked triumphant, too." 
 
 "That was because I saw I could make something 
 of it." 
 
 " Why did you walk as if you were lame ? " 
 
 "The man I was thinking of," Tommy explained, 
 "had broken his leg. I don't mind telling you that 
 it was Corp." 
 
 He ought to have minded telling her, for it could add 
 only to her indignation, but he was too conceited to give 
 weight to that 
 
 "Corp's leg was not broken," said practical Grizel. 
 
 " I broke it for him," replied Tommy, and when he 
 had explained, her eyes accused him of heartlessness. 
 
 "If it had been my own," he said, in self-defence, "it 
 should have gone crack just the same." 
 
 " Poor Gavinia ! Had you no feeling for her ? " 
 
WHAT GRIZEL'S byes SAID 117 
 
 "Gavinia was not there," Tommy replied, triumph- 
 antly. "She had run off with a soldier." 
 
 "You dared to conceive that ?" 
 
 "It helped." 
 
 Grizel stamped her foot. " You could take away dear 
 Gavinia's character with a smile ! " 
 
 "On the contrary," said Tommy, "my heart bled for 
 her. Did you not notice that I was crying ? " But 
 he could not make Grizel smile, so to please her he 
 said, with a smile that was not very sincere, "" I wish I 
 were different, but that is how ideas come to me, at least 
 all those that are of any value." 
 
 " Surely you could fight against them, and drive them 
 away ? " 
 
 This to Tommy, who held out sugar to them to 
 lure them to him ! But still he treated her with 
 consideration. 
 
 " That would mean my giving up writing altogether, 
 Grizel," he said, kindly. 
 
 " Then why not give it up ? " 
 
 Really I But she admired him, and still he bore with 
 her. 
 
 " I don't like the book," she said, " if it is written at 
 such a cost." 
 
 " People say the book has done them good, Grizel." 
 
 " What does that matter if it does you harm ? " In 
 her eagerness to persuade him her words came pell-mell. 
 " If writing makes you live in such an unreal world it 
 
118 TOMKy AOT) GKIZEL 
 
 must do yoa harm. I see now what Mr. Cathro meant 
 long ago when he called you Senti " 
 
 Tommy winced. "1 remember what Mr. Cathro 
 called me," he said, with surprising hauteur for suet 
 a good-natured man. "But he does not call me that 
 now. No one calls me that now except you, Grizel." 
 
 "What does that matter," she replied, distressfullyj 
 " if it is true ? In the definition of sentimentality in 
 the dictionary " 
 
 He rose, indignantly. *' You have been looking me 
 up in the dictionary, have you, Grizel ?" 
 
 " Yes, the night you told me you had hurt your ankle 
 intentionally." 
 
 He laughed without mirth now. " I thought you had 
 put that down to vanity." 
 
 "I think," she said, "it was vanity that gave you 
 the courage to do it," and he liked one word in this 
 remark. 
 
 " Then you do give me credit for a little courage ? " 
 
 "I think you could do the most courageous things," 
 she told him, " so long as there was no real reason why 
 you should do them." 
 
 It was a shot that rang the bell; oh, our Tommy 
 heard it ringing. But to do him justice he bore no 
 malice, he was proud, rather, of Grizel's marksmanship. 
 " At least," he said, meekly, " it was courageous of 
 me to tell you the truth in the end ? " but to his sur- 
 prise she shook her head. 
 
WHAT GEIZBL'S BYES SAID 119 
 
 "Fo," she replied, "it was sweet of you. You did 
 it impulsively because you were sorry for me, and I 
 think it was sweet. But impulse is not courage." 
 
 So now Tommy knew all about it. His plain-spoken 
 critic had been examining him with a candle and had 
 paid particular attention to his defects, but against them 
 she set the fact that he had done something chivalrous 
 for her, and it held her heart though the others were in 
 possession of the head. How like a woman ! he thought 
 with a pleased smile. He knew them. 
 
 Still he was chagrined that she made so little of 
 his courage, and it was to stab her that he said, with 
 subdued bitterness, "I always had a suspicion that 1 
 was that sort of person, and it is pleasant to have it 
 pointed out by one's oldest friend. No one will ever 
 accuse you of want of courage, Grizel." 
 
 She was looking straight at him, and her eyes did not 
 drop, but they looked still more wistful. Tommy did 
 not understand the courage that made her say what she 
 had said, but he knew he was hurting her, he knew that 
 if she was too plain-spoken it was out of loyalty, and 
 that to wound Grizel because she had to speak her mind 
 was a shame, yes, he always knew that. 
 
 But he could do it, he could even go on, "And it is 
 satisfactory that you have thought me out so thoroughly, 
 because you will not need to think me out any more. 
 You know me now, Grizel, and can have no more fear 
 of me." 
 
120 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 " When was I ever afraid of yoa ? " she demanded. 
 She was looking at him suspiciously now. 
 
 " Never as a girl ? " he asked. It jumped out of him ; 
 he was sorry as soon as he had said it. 
 
 There was a long pause. " So you remembered it all 
 the time," she said, quietly. "You have been making 
 pretence — again ! " 
 
 He asked her to forgive him, and she nodded 
 her head at once. " But why did you pretend to have 
 forgotten ? " 
 
 " I thought it would please you, Grizel." 
 
 " Why should pretence please me ? " She rose sud- 
 denly in a white heat, " You don't mean to say that you 
 think I am afraid of you still ? " 
 
 He said No a moment too late. He knew it was too 
 late. 
 
 "Don't be angry with me, Grizel," he begged her, 
 earnestly, "1 am so glad I was mistaken, it made me 
 miserable, I have been a terrible blunderer, but I mean 
 well, I misread your eyes." 
 
 " My eyes ? " 
 
 " They have always seemed to be watching me, and 
 often there was such a wistful look in them, it reminded 
 me of the past." 
 
 ''You thought I was still afraid of you! Say it," 
 said Grizel, stamping her foot, but he would not say it, 
 It was not merely fear that he thought he had seen in 
 her eyes, you remember. This was still his comfort, 
 
WHAT GEIZEL'S EYES SAID 121 
 
 and 1 suppose it gave the toucli of complacency to his 
 face that made Grizel merciless. She did not mean to 
 he merciless, but only to tell the truth. If some of her 
 words were scornful, there was sadness in her voice all 
 the time instead of triumph. " For years and years," 
 she said, standing straight as an elvint, " I have been 
 able to laugh at all the ignorant fears of my childhood, 
 and if you don't know why I have watched you and 
 been unable to help watching you since you came back, 
 I shall tell you. But I think you might have guessed, 
 you who write books about women. It is because I 
 liked you when you were a boy, you were often horrid, 
 but you were my first friend when every other person 
 was against me; you let me play with you when no 
 other boy or girl would let me play, and so all the time 
 you have been away I have been hoping that you were 
 growing into a noble man, and when you came back 
 I watched to see whether you were the noble man I 
 wanted you so much to be, and you are not. Do you 
 see now why my eyes look wistful ? It is because 
 I wanted to admire you, and I can't." 
 
 She went away, and the great authority on women 
 raged about the room. Oh, but he was galled ! There 
 had been five feet nine of him, but he was shrinking. 
 By and by the red light came into his eyes. 
 
CHAPTEE TX 
 
 GAT.TiAyr BEHAVIOE OF T, SAITDTS 
 
 These were now no fewer than three men engaged, 
 each in his own way, in the siege of Grizel, nothing in 
 common between them except insnlted vanity. One was 
 a broken fellow who took for granted that she preferred 
 to pass him by in the street; his bow was also an 
 apolc^y to her for his existence ; he not only knew that 
 she thought him wholly despicable bat agreed with her; 
 in the long ago yesterday, for instance) he had been 
 happy, courted, esteemed, he had eren esteemed him- 
 self, and so done nsefnl work in the world, bat she had 
 flung him to earth so heavily that he had made a hole 
 in it ont of which he oonld nerer climb; there he lay 
 damned, hers the glory of destroying him ; he hoped she 
 was prond of her handiwork. That was one Thomas 
 Sandys, the one perhaps who pat on the Telret jacket in 
 the morning, bnt it might be number two who took titat 
 jacket off at night. He was a good-natnred cynic, vastly 
 amnsed by the airs this little girl pnt on before a man 
 of note, and he took a maUcioas pleasure in letting her 
 see that they entertained him. He goaded her inten- 
 tionally into expressions of temper becaose she looked 
 
GAIiAST BEHAVIOR OF T. SAXDTS 123 
 
 prettiest then, and trifled with her hair (but this was in 
 imagination only) and called her a qnaint child (bat this 
 was beneath his breath). The third — he might be the 
 one who wore the jacket — was a hai^hty boy who was 
 not only done with her forever bat meant to let her see 
 it. (His soul cried, Oh, oh for a conservatory and some 
 of society^s darlings, and Grizel at the window to 
 watch how he got on with them ! ) And now that I 
 think of it there was also a fourth, Sandys the grave 
 author, whose life in two vols. 8vo I ought at this 
 moment to be writing without a word about the other 
 Tommies. They amused him a good deal. When they 
 were doing something big he would suddenly appear and 
 take a note of it. 
 
 The boy, who was stiffly polite to her (when Tommy 
 was angry he became very polite), told her that he had 
 been invited to the Spittal, the seat of the Bintoul 
 family, and that he understood there were some charm- 
 ing girls there. 
 
 "I hope you will like them," Grizel said, pleasantly. 
 
 "If yon could see how they will like me ! '' he wanted 
 to reply, but of coarse he coold not, and unfortunately 
 there was no one by to sar it for him. Tommy often 
 felt this want of a secretary. 
 
 The abject one found a glove of Grizel's that she did 
 not know she had lost and put it in his pocket. There 
 it lay unknown to her. He knew that he must not 
 even ask them to bury it with him in his grave. This 
 
124 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 was a little thing to ask, but too much for him. He 
 saw his effects being examined after all that was mortal 
 of T. Sandys had been consigned to earth, and this pa- 
 thetic little glove coming to light. Ah, then, then Grizel 
 would know ! By the way what would she have known? 
 I am sure I cannot tell you. Nor could Tommy, forced 
 to face the question in this vulgar way, have told you ; 
 yet whatever it was it gave him some moist moments. 
 If Grizel saw him in this mood her reproachful look 
 implied that he was sentimentalizing again. How little 
 this chit understood him 
 
 The man of the world sometimes came upon the glove 
 in his pocket and laughed at it as such men do when 
 they recall their callow youth. He took walks with 
 G-rizel without her knowing that she accompanied him, 
 or rather, he let her come, she was so eager. In his 
 imagination (for bright were the dreams of Thomas!) 
 he saw her looking longingly after him, just as the dog 
 looks, and then not being really a cruel man, he would 
 call over his shoulder, '- Put on your hat, little woman ; 
 you can come." Then he conceived her wandering with 
 him through the den and Caddam Wood, clinging to his 
 arm and looking up adoringly at him. " What a loving 
 little soul it is ! " he said, and pinched her ear, whereat 
 she glowed with pleasure. " But I forgot," he would add, 
 bantering her, " you don't admire me ; heigh ho, Grizel 
 wants to admire me, but she can't ! " He got some satis- 
 faction out of these flights of fancy, but it had a scurvy 
 
GALLANT BEHAVIOR OP T. SANDYS 125 
 
 way of deserting him in the hour of greatest need ; 
 where was it, for instance, when the real Grizel ap- 
 peared and fixed that inquiring eye on him ? 
 
 He went to the Spittal several times, Elspeth with 
 him when she cared to go, for Lady Rintoul and all the 
 others had to learn and remember that, unless they made 
 much of Elspeth, there could be no T. Sandys for them. 
 He glared at anyone, male or female, who on being intro- 
 duced to Elspeth did not remain, obviously impressed, 
 by her side. ' ' Give pleasure to Elspeth or away I go," 
 was written aU over him, and it had to be the right 
 kind of pleasure too, the ladies must feel that she was 
 more innocent than they, and talk accordingly. He 
 would walk the flower-garden with none of them until 
 he knew for certain that the man walking it with little 
 Elspeth was a person to be trusted. Once he was con- 
 vinced of this, however, he was very much at their ser- 
 vice, and so little to be trusted himself that perhaps 
 they should have had careful brothers alsa He told 
 them one at a time that they were strangely unlike all 
 the other women he had known, and held their hands 
 a moment longer than was absolutely necessary, and 
 then went away, leaving them and him a prey to con- 
 flicting and puzzling emotions. 
 
 Lord Rintoul, whose hair was so like his skin that in 
 the family portraits he might have been painted in one 
 color, could never rid himself of the feeling that it must 
 be a great thing to a writing chap to get a good dinner, 
 
126 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 but her ladyship always explained him away with an 
 apologetic smile which went over his remarks like a 
 piece of india-rubber, so that in the end he had never 
 said anything. She was a slight, pretty woman of nearly 
 forty and liked Tommy because he remembered so 
 vividly her coming to the Spittal as a bride. He even 
 remembered how she had been dressed, her white bonnet, 
 for instance. 
 
 " For long," Tommy said, musing, " I resented other 
 women in white bonnets: it seemed profanation." 
 
 " How absurd ! " she told him, laughing. " You must 
 have been quite a small boy at the time." 
 
 "But with a lonely boy's passionate admiration for 
 beautiful things," he answered, and his gravity was a 
 gentle rebuke to her. " It was all a long time ago," he 
 said, taking both her hands in his, " but I never forget, 
 and, dear lady, I have often wanted to thank you." 
 What he was thanking her for is not precisely clear, 
 but she knew that the artistic temperament is an odd 
 sort of thing, and from this time Lady £intoul liked 
 Tommy and even tried to find the right wife for him 
 among the families of the surrounding clergy. His 
 step was sometimes quite springy when he left the 
 Spittal, but Grizel's shadow was always waiting for him 
 somewhere on the way home to take the life out of 
 him, and after that it was again. Oh sorrowful disillu- 
 sion, oh world gone gray. Grizel did not admire him, 
 T. Sandys was no longer a wonder to Grizel. He went 
 
GALLANT BEHAVIOE OP T. SANDYS 127 
 
 home to that as surely as the laborer to his evening 
 platter. 
 
 And now we come to the affair of the Slugs. Corp 
 had got a holiday, and they were off together fishing 
 the Drumly Water, by Lord Rintoul's permission. They 
 had fished the Drumly many a time without it, and this 
 was to be another such day as those of old ; the one who 
 woke at four was to rouse the other. Never had either 
 waked at four, but one of them was married now, and 
 any woman can wake at any hour she chooses, so at four 
 Corp was pushed out of bed and soon thereafter they 
 took the road. Grizel's blinds were already up. " Do 
 you mind," Corp said, " how often when we had boasted 
 we were to start at four and didna get roaded till six, 
 we wriggled by that window so that Grizel shouldna 
 see us ? " 
 
 " She usually did see us," Tommy replied, ruefully. 
 " Grizel always spotted us, Corp, when we had anything 
 to hide, and missed us when we were -anxious to be 
 seen." 
 
 " There was no jouking her," said Corp ; " do you 
 mind how that used to bother you ? " a senseless remark 
 to a man whom it was bothering still, or shall we say to 
 a boy, for the boy came back to Tommy when he heard 
 the Drumly singing ; it was as if he had suddenly seen 
 his mother looking young again. There had been a 
 thunder-shower as they drew near, followed by a rush of 
 wind that pinned them to a dyke, swept the road bare. 
 
128 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 banged every door in the glen, and then sank suddenly 
 as if it had never been, like a mole in the sand. But 
 now the sun was out, every fence and farm-yard rope 
 was a string of diamond drops, there was one to every 
 blade of grass, they lurked among the wild roses, larks 
 drunken with song shook them from their wings, the 
 whole earth shone so gloriously with them that for a 
 time Tommy ceased to care whether he was admired 
 We can pay nature no higher compliment. 
 
 But when they came to the Slugs! — The Slugs of 
 Kenny is a wild crevice through which the Drumly cuts 
 its way, black and treacherous, into a lovely glade where 
 it gambols for the rest of its short life ; you would not 
 believe to see it laughing that it had so lately escaped 
 from prison. To the Slugs they made their way, not to 
 fish, for any trout that are there are thinking forever of 
 the way out and of nothing else, but to eat their luncheon, 
 and they ate it sitting on the mossy stones their per- 
 sons had long ago helped to smooth and looking at 
 a rowan branch, which now, as then, was trailing in the 
 water. 
 
 There were no fish to catch, but there was a boy trying 
 to catch them. He was on the opposite bank, had 
 crawled down it, only other boys can tell how, a bare- 
 footed urchin of ten or twelve with an enormous bagful 
 of worms hanging from his jacket-button. To put a new 
 worm on the hook without coming to destruction he first 
 twisted his legs about a young birch and put his arms 
 
GALLANT BEHAVIOE OP T. SANDYS 129 
 
 round it. He was after a big one, he informed Corp, 
 though he might as well have been fishing in a treatise 
 on the art of angling. 
 
 Corp exchanged pleasantries with him, told him that 
 Tommy was Captain Ure, and that he was his faithful 
 servant Alexander Bett, both of Edinburgh. Since the 
 birth of his child, Corp had become something of a 
 humorist. Tommy was not listening. As he lolled in 
 the sun he was turning, without his knowledge, into one 
 of the other Tommies. Let us watch the process. 
 
 He had found a half-fledged mavis lying dead in the 
 grass. Kemember also' how the larks had »&ng after 
 rain. 
 
 Tommy lost sight and sound of Corp and ^the bpy. 
 What he seemed to see was a baby lark that had got out 
 of its nest sideways, a fall of half a foot only,'^ buf ■s, 
 dreadful drop for a baby. " You can get back thi.4 way," 
 its mother said, and showed it the way, which was quite 
 easy, but when the baby tried to leap, it fell on its back. 
 Then the mother marked out lines on the ground from 
 one to the other of which it was to practise hopping 
 and soon it could hop beautifully so long as its mother 
 was there to say every moment, " How beautifully you 
 hop." " Now teach me to hop up," the little lark said, 
 meaning that it wanted to fly, and the mother tried to do 
 that also, but in vain ; she could soar up, up, up bravely, 
 but could not explain how she did it. This distressed 
 her very much, and she thought hard about how she had 
 
 9 
 
130 TOMMY Airo GKIZEL 
 
 learned to fly long ago last year, but all she could recall 
 for certain was that you suddenly do it. " Wait till the 
 sun comes out after raiu," she said, half remembering. 
 " What is sun, what is rain ? " the little bird asked ; " if 
 you cannot teach me to fly, teach me to sing." " When 
 the sun comes out after rain," the mother replied, 
 " then you will know how to sing." The rain came, and 
 glued the little bird's wings together. "I shall never 
 be able to fly nor to sing," it wailed. Then of a sudden 
 it had to blink its eyes, for a glorious light had spread 
 over the world, catching every leaf and twig and blade 
 of grass in tears and putting a' smile into every tear. 
 The baby bird's breast swelled, it did not know why; 
 and it fluttered from the ground, it did not know how. 
 "The sun has come out after the rain," it trilled, 
 "thank you, sun, thank you, thank you, mother, did 
 you hear me, I can sing ! " And it floated up, up, up, 
 crying " Thank you, thank you, thank you ! " to the sun, 
 " mother, do you see me, I am flying ! " and being but 
 a baby it soon was gasping, but still it trilled the same 
 ecstasy, and when it fell panting to earth it stiU trilled, 
 and the distracted mother called to it to take breath or 
 it would die, but it could not stop. " Thank you, thank 
 you, thank you ! " it sang to the sun till its little heart 
 burst. 
 
 With filmy eyes Tommy searched himself for the 
 little pocket-book in which he took notes of such sad 
 thoughts as these, and in place of the book he found a 
 
GALLANT BEHAVIOR OF T. SANDYS 131 
 
 glove wrapped in silk paper. He sat there with it in 
 his hand, nodding his head over it so broken-heartedly 
 you could not have believed that he had forgotten it for 
 several days. 
 
 Death was still his subject, but it was no longer a 
 bird he saw, it was a very noble young man, and his 
 white dead face stared at the sky from the bottom of 
 a deep pool. I don't know how he got there, but a 
 woman who would not admire him had something to 
 do with it. No sun after rain had come into that tragic 
 life ; to the water that had ended it his white face 
 seemed to be saying, "Thank you, thank you, thank 
 you." It was the old story of a faithless woman. He 
 had given her his heart and she had played with it. 
 Tor her sake he had striven to be famous, for her alone 
 had he toiled through dreary years in London, the goal 
 her lap in which he should one day place his book, a 
 poor trivial little work he knew (yet much admired by 
 the best critics) ; never had his thoughts wandered for 
 one instant of that time to another woman, he had been 
 as faithful in life as in death, and now she came to the 
 edge of the pool and peered down at his staring eyes 
 and laughed. 
 
 He had got thus far when a shout from Corp brought 
 him, dazed, to his feet. It had been preceded by an- 
 other cry as the boy and the sapling he was twisted 
 round toppled into the river together, uprooted stones 
 and clods pounding after them and discoloring the pool 
 
132 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 into which the torrent rushes between rocks, to swirl 
 frantically before it dives down a narrow channel and 
 leaps into another caldron. 
 
 There was no climbing down those precipitous rocks. 
 Corp was shouting, gesticulating, impotent. " How can 
 you stand so still ? " he roared. 
 
 For Tommy was standing quite still, like one not 
 yet thoroughly awake. The boy's head was visible 
 now and again as he was carried round in the seething 
 water ; when he came to the outer ring down that chan- 
 nel he must infallibly go, and every second or two he 
 was in a wider circle. 
 
 Tommy was awake now, and he could not stand still 
 and see a boy drown before his eyes. He knew that to 
 attempt to save him was to face a terrible danger, 
 especially as he could not swim, but he kicked off his 
 boots. There was some gallantry in the man. 
 
 " Ton wouldna dare ! " Corp cried, aghast. 
 
 Tommy hesitated for a moment, but he had abun- 
 dance of physical courage. He clenched his teeth and 
 jumped. But before he jumped he pushed the glove 
 into Corp's hand, saying, " Give her that, and tell her it 
 never left my heart." He did not say who she was, he 
 scarcely knew that he was saying it. It was his dream 
 intruding on reality, as a wheel may revolve for a 
 moment longer after the spring breaks. 
 
 Corp saw him strike the water and disappear, he tore 
 along the bank as he had never run before, until he got 
 
GALLANT BEHAVIOR OF T. SANDYS 133 
 
 to the water's edge below the Slugs and climbed and 
 fought his way to the scene of the disaster. Before he 
 reached it, however, we should have had no hero had not 
 the sapling, the cause of all this pother, made amends 
 by barring the way down the narrow channel. Tommy 
 was clinging to it and the boy to him, and at some risk 
 Corp got them both ashore, where they lay gasping like 
 fish in a creel. 
 
 The boy was the first to rise, to look for his fishing- 
 rod, and he was surprised to find no six-pounder at the 
 end of it. " She has broke the line again ! " he said, for 
 he was sure then and ever afterward that a big one had 
 pulled him in. 
 
 Corp slapped him for his ingratitude, but the man 
 who had saved this boy's life wanted no thanks. " Off 
 to your home with you, wherever it is," he said to the 
 boy, who obeyed silently, and then to Corp, " He is a 
 little fool, Corp, but not such a fool as I am." He lay 
 on his face shivering, not from cold, not from shock, but 
 in a horror of himself. I think it may fairly be said 
 that he had done a brave if foolhardy thing; it was 
 certainly to save the boy that he had jumped, and he had 
 given himself a moment's time in which to draw back if 
 he chose, which vastly enhances the merit of the deed. 
 But sentimentality had been there also, and he was now 
 shivering with a presentiment of the length to which it 
 might one day carry him. 
 
 They lit a fire among the rocks at which he dried his 
 
134 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 clothes, and then they set out for home, Corp doing all 
 the talking, « What a town there will be about this in 
 Thrums ! " was his text, and he was surprised when 
 Tommy at last broke silence by saying, passionately, 
 "Never speak about this to me again, Corp, as long 
 as you live. Promise me that. Promise never to men- 
 tion it to anyone. I want no one to know what I did to- 
 day, and no one ever will know unless you tell ; the boy 
 can't tell, for we are strangers to him." 
 
 "He thinks you are a Captain Ure and that I'm 
 Alexander Bett, his servant," said Corp. " I telled him 
 that for a divert." 
 
 " Then let him continue to think that." 
 
 Of course Corp promised. '•' And I '11 go to the stake 
 afore I break my promise," he swore, happily remem- 
 bering one of the Jacobite oaths, but he was puzzled. 
 They would make so much of Tommy if they knew. 
 They would think him a wonder. Did he not want 
 that? 
 
 "No," Tommy replied. 
 
 "You used to like it; you used to like it most 
 michty." 
 
 " I have changed." 
 
 " Ay, you have ; but since when ? Since you took to 
 making printed books ? " 
 
 Tommy did not say, but it was more recently than 
 that. What he was surrendering no one could have 
 needed to be told less than he ; the magnitude of the 
 
GALLANT BEHAVIOE OF T. SANDYS 135 
 
 sacrifice was what enabled him to make it; he was 
 always at home among the superlatives, it was the little 
 things that bothered him. In his present fear of the 
 ride that sentimentality might yet goad him to, he 
 craved for mastery over self, he knew that his struggles 
 with his Familiar usually ended in an embrace, and he 
 had made a passionate vow that it should be so no 
 longer. The best beginning of the new man was to 
 deny himself the glory that would be his if his deed 
 were advertised to the world. Even Grizel must never 
 know of it, Grizel whose admiration was so dear to him. 
 Thus he punished himself, and again I think he deserves 
 respect. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 GAVINIA ON THE TKACK 
 
 Corp, you remember, had said that he would go to 
 the stake rather than break his promise, and he meant 
 it too, though what the stake was and why such a pother 
 about going to it, he did not know. He was to learn 
 now, however, for to the stake he had to, go. This was 
 because Gavinia, when folding up his clothes, found in 
 one of the pockets a glove wrapped in silk paper. 
 
 Tommy had forgotten it until too late, for when 
 he asked Corp for the glove it was already in Gavinia's 
 possession, and she had declined to return it without 
 an explanation. " You must tell her nothing," Tommy 
 said, sternly ; he was uneasy, but relieved to find that 
 Corp did not know whose glove it was, nor even why 
 gentlemen carry a lady's glove in their pocket. 
 
 At first Gavinia was mildly curious only, but her 
 husband's refusal to answer any questions roused her 
 dander. She tried cajolery, fried his take of trout 
 deliciously for him, and he sat down to them sniffing. 
 They were small, and the remainder of their brief career 
 was in two parts. First he lifted them by the tail, 
 then he laid down the tail. But not a word about the 
 glove. 
 
GAVINIA ON THE TRACK 137 
 
 She tried tears. "Dinna greet, woman," he said, in 
 distress ; " what would the bairn say if he kent I made 
 you greet ! " 
 
 Gavinia went on greeting, and the baby, waking up, 
 promptly took her side. 
 
 "D — n the thing! " said Corp. 
 
 " Your ain bairn ! " 
 
 " I meant the glove," he roared. 
 
 It was curiosity only that troubled Gavinia. A reader 
 of romance, as you may remember, she had encountered 
 in the printed page a score of ladies who on finding 
 such parcels in their husbands' pockets left their homes 
 at once and forever, and she had never doubted but that 
 it was the only course to follow, such is the power of 
 the writer of fiction. But when the case was her own 
 she was merely curious ; such are the limitations of the 
 writer of fiction. That there was a woman in it she 
 did not believe for a moment. This of course did not 
 prevent her saying, with a sob, " Wha is the woman ? " 
 
 With great earnestness Corp assured her that there 
 was no woman. He even proved it. " Just listen 
 to reason, Gavinia. If I was sich a black as to be chief 
 wi' ony woman, and she wanted to gie me a present, 
 weel, she might gie me a pair o' gloves, but one glove, 
 what use would one glove be to me ? I tell you if a 
 woman had the impidence to gie me one glove, I would 
 fling it in her face." 
 
 Nothing could have been clearer, and he had put it 
 
138 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 thus considerately because when a -woman, even the 
 shrewdest of them, is excited (any man knows this) one 
 has to explain matters to her as simply and patiently 
 as if she were a four-year-old, yet Gavinia affected to 
 be unconvinced, and for several days she led Corp the 
 life of a lodger in his own house. 
 
 "Hands off that poor innocent," she said when he 
 approached the baby. 
 
 If he reproved her she replied, meekly, " What can 
 you expect frae a woman that doesna wear gloves ? " 
 
 To the baby she said, " He despises you, my bonny, 
 because you hae no gloves, ay, that 's what maks him 
 turn up his nose at you, but your mother is fond o' you, 
 gloves or no gloves." 
 
 She told the baby the story of the glove daily, with 
 m.any monstrous additions. 
 
 When Corp came home from his work she said that 
 a poor love-lorn female had called with a boot for him 
 and a request that he should carry it in the pocket 
 of his Sabbath breeks. 
 
 Worst of all, she listened to what he said in the night. 
 Corp had a habit of talking in his sleep. He was 
 usually taking tickets at such times, and it had been 
 her custom to stop him violently, but now she changed 
 her tactics, she encouraged him. " I would be lying in 
 my bed," he said to Tommy, " dreaming that a man had 
 fallen into the Slugs, and instead o' trying to save him 
 J cried out ' Tickets there, all tickets ready,' and first 
 
GAVIKIA ON THE TRACK 139 
 
 he hands me a glove and neist he hands me a boot and 
 havers o' that kind sich as onybody dreams, but in the 
 middle o' my dream it comes ower me that I had better 
 waken up to see what Gavinia 's doing, and I open my 
 een, and there she is, sitting up, hearkening avidly to 
 my every word and putting sly questions to me about 
 the glove." 
 
 " What glove ? " Tommy asked, coldly. 
 
 " The glove in silk paper." 
 
 " I never heard of it," said Tommy. 
 
 Corp sighed. "No," he said, loyally, "neither did 
 I," and he went back to the station and sat gloomily 
 in a wagon. He got no help from Tommy, not even 
 when rumors of the incident at the Slugs became noised 
 abroad. 
 
 " A'body kens about the laddie now," he said. 
 
 "What laddie ?" Tommy inquired. 
 
 « ffim that fell into the Slugs." 
 
 •'•' Ah, yes," Tommy said, " I have just been reading 
 about it in the paper. A plucky fellow, this Captain 
 Ure who saved him. I wonder who he is." 
 
 " I wonder ! " Corp said, with a groan. 
 
 "There was an Alexander Bett with him, according 
 to the papers," Tommy went on. " Do you know any 
 Bett?" 
 
 " It 's no a Thrums name," Corp replied, thankfully, 
 "I just made it up." 
 
 "What do you mean ? " Tommy asked, blankly. 
 
140 TOMMY ANB GRIZBL 
 
 Corp sighed, and went back again to the wagon. He 
 was particularly truculent that evening when the six 
 o'clock train came in. " Tickets there, look slippy wi' 
 your tickets." His head bobbed up at the window of 
 
 another compartment. " Tick " he began and then 
 
 he ducked. 
 
 The compartment contained a boy, looking as scared 
 as if he had just had his face washed, and an old 
 woman who was clutching a large linen bag as if expect- 
 ing some scoundrel to appear though the floor and grip 
 it. With her other hand she held on to the boy, and 
 being unused to travel they were both sitting very self- 
 conscious, humble and defiant, like persons in church 
 who have forgotten to bring their Bible. The general 
 effect, however, was lost on Corp, for whom it was 
 enough that in one of them he recognized the boy of 
 the Slugs. He thought he had seen the old lady before 
 also, but he could not give her a name. It was quite 
 a relief to him to notice that she was not wearing 
 gloves. 
 
 He heard her inquiring for one Alexander Bett and 
 being told that there was no such person in Thrums. 
 " He 's married on a woman of the name of Gavinia," 
 said the old lady, and then they directed her to the 
 house of the only Gavinia in the place. With dark 
 forebodings Corp skulked after her. He remembered 
 who she was now. She was the old woman with the 
 nut-cracker face on whom he had cried in more than 
 
GAVTNIA OK THE TRACK 141 
 
 a year ago to say that Gavinia was to have him. Her 
 mud cottage had been near the Slugs. Yes, and this 
 was the boy who had been supping porridge with her. 
 Corp guessed rightly that the boy had remembered his 
 unlucky visit. " I 'm doomed ! " Corp muttered to 
 himself, pronouncing it in another way. 
 
 The woman, the boy, and the bag entered the house 
 of Gavinia and presently she came out with them. She 
 was looking very important and terrible. They went 
 straight to Ailie's cottage, and Corp was wondering why, 
 when he suddenly remembered that Tommy was to be 
 there at tea to-day. 
 
CHAPTEE XI 
 
 THE TEA-PABTT 
 
 It was quite a large tea-party, and was held in what 
 had been the school-room ; nothing there now, however, 
 to recall an academic past, for even the space against 
 which a map of the world (Mercator's projection) had 
 once hung was gone the color of the rest of the walls, 
 and with it had faded away the last relic of the Hanky 
 School. 
 
 "It will not fade so quickly from my memory," 
 Tommy said to please Mrs. McLean. His affection 
 for his old schoolmistress was as sincere as hers for 
 him. I could tell you of scores of pretty things he 
 had done to give her pleasure since his return, all 
 carried out, too, with a delicacy which few men could 
 rival, and never a woman, but they might make you 
 like him, so we shall pass them by. 
 
 Ailie said, blushing, that she had taught him very 
 little. "Everything I know," he replied, and then, 
 with a courteous bow to the gentleman opposite, " except 
 what I learned from Mr. Cathro." 
 
 "Thank you," Cathro said, shortly. Tommy had 
 behaved splendidly to him, and called Mm his dear 
 
THE TBA-PAETY 143 
 
 preceptor, and yet the dominie still itched to be at 
 him with the tawse as of old. "And fine he knows 
 I'm itching," he reflected, which made him itch the 
 more. 
 
 It should have been a most successful party, for 
 in the rehearsals between the hostess and her maid 
 Christina every conceivable difficulty had been ironed 
 out. Ailie was wearing her black silk, but without 
 the Honiton lace, so that Miss Sophia Innes need 
 not become depressed, and she had herself taken the 
 chair with the weak back. Mr. Cathro, who, though a 
 lean man, needed a great deal of room at table, had been 
 seated far away from the spinet, to allow Christina to 
 pass him without climbing. Miss Sophia and Grizel had 
 the doctor between them, and there was also a bachelor, 
 hut an older one, for Elspeth. Mr. McLean, as stout 
 and humorsome as of yore, had solemnly promised his 
 wife to be jocular but not too jocular. Neither minister 
 could complain, for if Mr. Dishart had been asked 
 to say grace, Mr. Gloag knew that he was to be called 
 on for the benediction. Christina, obeying strict orders, 
 glided round the table leisurely as if she were not in 
 the least excited, though she could he heard rushing 
 along the passage like one who had entered for a race. 
 And, lastly, there was as chief guest, the celebrated 
 Thomas Sandys. It should have been a triumph of 
 a tearparty, and yet it was not. Mrs. McLean could 
 not tell why. 
 
144 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 Grizel could have told why, her eyes told why every 
 time they rested scornfully on Mr. Sandys. It was he, 
 they said, who was spoiling the entertainment, and 
 for the pitiful reason that the company were not mak- 
 ing enough of him. He was the guest of the evening, 
 but they were talking admiringly of another man, and 
 so he sulked. Oh, how she scorned Tommy ! 
 
 That other man was of course the unknown Captain 
 TJre, gallant rescuer of boys, hero of all who admire 
 brave actions except the jealous Sandys. Tommy had 
 pooh-poohed him from the first, to Grizel's unutterable 
 woe. 
 
 " Have you not one word of praise for such a splen- 
 did deed ? " she had asked, in despair. 
 
 " I see nothing splendid about it," he replied, coldly. 
 
 " I advise you in your own interests not to talk in 
 that way to others," she said. "Don't you see what 
 they will say?" 
 
 " I can't help that," answered Tommy the Just. " If 
 they ask my opinion I must give them the truth. I 
 thought you were fond of the truth, Grizel." 
 
 To that she could wring her hands only and say 
 nothing. But it had never struck her that the truth 
 could be so bitter. 
 
 And now he was giving his opinion at Mrs. McLean's 
 party, and they were all against him, except in a meas- 
 ure Elspeth's bachelor, who said, cheerily, " We should 
 all have done it if we had been in Captain TJre's place ; 
 
THE TBA-PAHTY 145 
 
 I would have done it myself, Miss Elspeth, thoughr not 
 fond of the water." He addressed all single ladies by 
 their Christian name, with a Miss in front of it. This 
 is the mark of the confirmed bachelor and comes upon 
 him at one-and-twenty. 
 
 " I could not have done it," Grizel replied, decisively, 
 though she was much the bravest person present, and 
 he explained that he meant the men only. His name 
 was James Bonthron. Let us call him Mr. James. 
 
 " Men are so brave ! " she responded, with her eyes 
 on Tommy, and he received the stab in silence. Had 
 the blood spouted from the wound, it would have been 
 an additional gratification to him. Tommy was like 
 those superb characters of romance who bare their 
 breast to the enemy and say, " Strike 1 " 
 
 "Well, well," Mr. Cathro observed, "none of us 
 was on the spot, and so we had no opportunity of show- 
 ing our heroism. But you were near by, Mr. Sandys, 
 and if you had fished up the water that day instead of 
 down, you might have been called upon. I wonder 
 what you would have done ? " 
 
 Yes, Tommy was as exasperating to him still as in 
 the long ago, and Cathro said this maliciously, yet feel- 
 ing that he did a risky thing, so convinced was he by 
 old experience that you were getting in the way of a 
 road machine when you opposed Thomas Sandys. 
 
 " I wonder," Tommy replied, quietly. 
 
 The answer made a poor impression, and Cathro 
 10 
 
146 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 longed to go on. " But he was always most dangerous 
 when he was quiet," he reflected uneasily, and checked 
 himself in sheer funk. 
 
 Mr. Gloag came, as he thought, to Tommy's defence. 
 " If Mr. Sandys questions," he said, heavily, " whether 
 courage would have been vouchsafed to him at that try- 
 ing hour, it is right and fitting that he should admit 
 it with Christian humility." 
 
 "Quite so, quite so," Mr. James agreed, with hearti- 
 ness. He had begun to look solemn at the word " vouch- 
 safed." 
 
 " For we are differently gifted," continued Mr. Gloag, 
 now addressing his congregation ; " to some is given 
 courage, to some learning, to some grace. Each has 
 his strong point," he ended abruptly, and tucked rev- 
 erently into the jam, which seemed to be his. 
 
 "If he would not have risked his life to save the 
 boy," Elspeth interposed hotly, " it would have been 
 because he was thinking of me." 
 
 " I should like to believe that thought of you would 
 have checked me," Tommy said. 
 
 " I am sure it would," said Grizel. 
 
 Mr. Cathro was rubbing his hands together covertly, 
 yet half wishing he could take her aside and whisper, 
 " Be canny, it 's grand to hear you, but be canny ; he 
 is looking most extraordinar meek, and unless he has 
 cast his skin since he was a laddie, it 's not chancey to 
 meddle with him when he is meek." 
 
THE TEA-PABTY 141 
 
 The doctor also noticed that Grizel was pressing 
 Tommy too hard, and though he did not like the man, 
 he was surprised, he had always thought her so fair- 
 minded. 
 
 " For my part," he said, " I don't admire the unknown 
 half so much for what he did as for his behavior after- 
 wards. To risk his life was something, but to disappear 
 q^uietly without taking any credit for it was finer and 
 I should say much more difficult." 
 
 " I think it was sweet of him," Grizel said. 
 
 "I don't see it," said Tommy, and the silence that 
 followed should have been unpleasant to him. But he 
 went on calmly, " Doubtless it was a mere impulse that 
 made him jump into the pool, and impulse is not cour- 
 age." He was quoting Grizel now, you observe, and 
 though he did not look at her, he knew her eyes were 
 fixed on him reproachfully. "And so," he concluded, 
 "I suppose Captain Ure knew he bad done no great 
 thing and preferred to avoid exaggerated applause." 
 
 Even Elspeth was troubled, but she must defend her 
 dear brother. "He would have avoided it himself," 
 she explained, quickly; "he dislikes praise so much 
 that he does not understand how sweet it is to smaller 
 people." 
 
 This made Tommy wince. He was always distressed 
 when timid Elspeth blurted out things of this sort in 
 company, and not the least of his merits was that he 
 usually forbore from chiding her for it afterwards, so 
 
148 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 reluctant was lie to hurt her. In a world where there 
 were no women except Elspeths, Tommy would have 
 been a saint. He saw the doctor smiling now, and at 
 . once his annoyance with her changed to wrath against 
 him for daring to smile at little Elspeth. She saw the 
 smile, too, and blushed, but she was not angry, she 
 knew that the people who smiled at her liked her, and 
 that no one smiled so much at her as Dr. Gemmell. 
 
 The dominie said, fearfully, "I have no doubt that 
 explains it, Miss Sandys. Even as a boy I remember 
 your brother had a horror of vulgar applause." 
 
 " Now," he said to himself, " he will rise up and smite 
 me." But no, Tommy replied, quietly : 
 
 " I am afraid that was not my character, Mr. Cathro, 
 but I hope I have changed since then, and that I could 
 pull a boy out of the water without wanting to be 
 extolled for it." 
 
 That he could say such things before her was terrible 
 to Grizel. It was perhaps conceivable that he might 
 pull the boy out of the water, as he so ungenerously 
 expressed it, but that he could refrain from basking in 
 the glory thereof, that, she knew, was quite impossible. 
 Her eyes begged him to take back those shameful words, 
 but he bravely declined; not even to please Grizel 
 could he pretend that what was not was. No more sen- 
 timent for T. Sandys. 
 
 " The spirit has all gone out of him ; what am I afraid 
 of ? " reflected the dominie, and he rose suddenly to 
 
THE TEA-PARTY 149 
 
 make a speech, tea-cup in hand. " Cathro, Cathro, you 
 tattie-doolie, you are riding to destruction," said a warn- 
 ing voice within him, but against his better judgment he 
 stifled it and began. He begged to propose the health 
 of Captain TJre. He was sure they would all join with 
 him cordially in drinking it, Including Mr. Sandys, who 
 unfortunately differed from them in his estimation of 
 the hero. That was only, however, as had been con- 
 clusively shown, because he was a hero himself, and 
 so could make light of heroic deeds. With other sly 
 hits at Mr. Sandys. But when all the others rose to 
 drink the toast, Tommy remained seated. The dominie 
 coughed. 
 
 --Perhaps Mr. Sandys means to reply," Grizel sug- 
 gested icily, and it was at this uncomfortable moment 
 that Christina appeared suddenly, and in a state of sup- 
 pressed excitement requested her mistress to speak with 
 her behind the door. All the knowing ones were aware 
 that something terrible must have happened in the 
 kitchen. Miss Sophia thought it might be the china 
 tea-pot. She smiled reassuringly to signify that what- 
 ever it was she would help Mrs. McLean through, and 
 so did Mr. James. He was a perfect lady. 
 
 How dramatic it all was, as Ailie said frequently 
 afterwards. She was back in a moment, with her hand 
 on her heart. "Mr. Sandys," were her astounding 
 words, "a lady wants to see you." 
 
 Tommy rose in surprise, as did several of the others. 
 
150 TOMMY AJSB GKIZEL 
 
 "Was it really you ? " Ailie cried. " She says it was 
 you!" 
 
 "I don't understand, Mrs. McLean," he answered, "I 
 have done nothing." 
 
 " But she says — and she is at the door ! " 
 
 All eyes turned on the door so longingly that it 
 opened under their pressure, and a boy who had been 
 at the keyhole stumbled forward. 
 
 " That 's him ! " he announced, pointing a stern finger 
 at Mr. Sandys. 
 
 " But he says he did not do it," Ailie said. 
 
 "He 's a liar," said the boy. 
 
 His manner was that of the police, and it had come 
 so sharply upon Tommy that he looked not unlike a 
 detected criminal. 
 
 Most of them thought he was being accused of some- 
 thing vile, and the dominie demanded, with a light heart, 
 " Who is the woman ? " while Mr. James had a pleasant 
 feeling that the ladies should be requested to retire. 
 But just then the woman came in, and she was much 
 older than they expected. 
 
 "That's him, granny," the boy said, still severely, 
 " that 's the man as saved my life at the Slugs." And 
 then, when the trath was dawning on them all and there 
 were exclamations of wonder, a pretty scene suddenly 
 presented itself, for the old lady, who had entered with 
 the timidest courtesy, slipped down on her knees before 
 Tommy and kissed his hand. That young rascal of a 
 boy was all she had. 
 
THE TKA.-PAETY 151 
 
 They were all moved by her simplicity, but none quite 
 so much as Tommy. He gulped with genuine emotion 
 and saw her through a maze of beautiful thoughts that 
 delayed all sense of triumph and even made him forget 
 for a little while to wonder what Grizel was thinking of 
 him now. As the old lady poured out her thanks trem- 
 blingly, he was excitedly planning her future. He was 
 a poor man, but she was to be brought by him into 
 Thrums to a little cottage overgrown with roses. No 
 more hard work for those dear old hands. She could 
 sell scones, perhaps. She should have a cow. He would 
 send the boy to college and make a minister of him ; 
 she should yet hear her grandson preach in the church 
 to which as a boy 
 
 But here the old lady somewhat imperilled the picture 
 by rising actively and dumping upon the table the con- 
 tents of the bag, a fowl for Tommy, 
 
 She was as poor an old lady as ever put a half-penny 
 into the church-plate on Sundays, but that she should 
 present a hen to the preserver of her grandson her mind 
 had been made up from the moment she had reason to 
 think she could find him, and it was to be the finest hen 
 in all the country round. She was an old lady of infinite 
 spirit, and daily, dragging the boy with her lest he 
 again went a-fishing, she trudged to farms near and far 
 to examine a,nd feel their hens. She was a brittle old 
 lady who creaked as slie walked and cracked like a whin- 
 pod in the heat, but she did her dozen miles or more a 
 
152 TOMMY AND GBIZBL 
 
 day and passed all the fowls in review and could not he 
 deceived by the craftiest of farmers' wives, and in the 
 tail of the day she became possessor and did herself 
 thraw the neck of the stoutest and toughest hen that 
 ever entered a linen bag head foremost. By this time 
 the boy had given way in the legs, and hence the rail- 
 way journey, its cost defrayed by admiring friends. 
 
 With careful handling he should get a week out of her 
 gift, she explained complacently, besides two makes of 
 broth ; and she and the boy looked as if they would like 
 dearly to sit opposite Tommy during those seven days 
 and watch him gorging. 
 
 If you look at the matter aright it was a handsomer 
 present than many a tiara, but if you are of the same 
 stuff as Mr. James it was only a hen. Mr. James tit- 
 tered, and one or two others made ready to titter; it 
 was a moment to try Tommy, for there are doubtless 
 heroes as gallant as he who do not know how to receive 
 a present of a hen. Grizel, who had been holding back, 
 moved a little nearer. If he hurt that sweet old 
 woman's feelings she could never forgive him, never. 
 
 He heard the titter, and ridicule was terrible to him, 
 but he also knew why Grizel had come closer and what 
 she wanted of him. Our Tommy, in short, had emerged 
 from his emotion, and once more knew what was what. 
 It was not his fault that he stood revealed a hero. The 
 little gods had done it ; therefore let him do credit to 
 the chosen of the little gods. The way he took that old 
 
THE TEA-PAETY 158 
 
 lady's wrinkled hand and bowed over it, and thanked 
 her was an ode to manhood. Everyone was touched, 
 those who had been about to titter wondered what on 
 earth Mr. James had seen to titter at, and Grizel almost 
 clapped her hands with joy; she would have done it 
 altogether had not Tommy just then made the mistake 
 of looking at her for approval. She fell back, and, 
 intoxicated with himself, he thought it was because her 
 heart was too full for utterance. Tommy was now 
 splendid, and described the affair at the Slugs with an 
 adorable modesty. 
 
 "I assure you it was a much smaller thing to do than 
 you imagine ; it was all over in a few minutes ; I knew 
 that in your good nature you would make too much of 
 it, and so, foolishly, I can see now, I tried to keep it 
 from you. As for the name Captain Ure, it was an 
 invention of that humorous dog, Corp." 
 
 And so on, with the most considerate remarks when 
 they insisted on shaking hands with him. " I beseech 
 you, don't apologize to me ; I see clearly that the fault 
 was entirely my own. Had I been in your place, Mr. 
 James, I should have behaved precisely as you have 
 done, and had you been at the Slugs you would have 
 jumped in as I did. Mr. Cathro, you pain me by hold- 
 ing back; I assure you I esteem my old dominie more 
 than ever for the way in which you stuck up for Captain 
 Ure, though you must see why I could not drink that 
 gentleman's health." 
 
154 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 And Mr. Cathro made the best of it, wringing 
 Tommy's hand effusively, while muttering, "Fool, 
 donnard stirk, gowk!" He was addressing himself 
 and any other person who might be so presumptuous 
 as to try to get the better of Thomas Sandys. Cathro 
 never tried it again. Had Tommy died that week his 
 old dominie would have been very chary of what he 
 said at the funeral. 
 
 They were in the garden now, the gentlemen without 
 their hats. "Have you made your peace with him?" 
 Cathro asked Grizel, in a cautious voice. "He is a 
 devil's buckie, and I advise you to follow my example, 
 Miss McQueen, and capitulate. I have always found 
 him reasonable so long as you bend the knee to him." 
 
 " I am not ^his enemy," replied Grizel, loftily, " and if 
 he has done a noble thing I am proud of him and will 
 tell him so." 
 
 " I would tell him so," said the dominie, " whether 
 he had done it or not." 
 
 "Do you mean," she asked, indignantly, "that you 
 think he did not do it ? " 
 
 "No, no, no," he answered, hurriedly, "for mercy's 
 sake, don't tell him I think that." And then, as Tommy 
 was out of earshot, " But I see there is no necessity for 
 my warning you against standing in his way again, 
 Miss McQueen, for you are up in arms for him now." 
 
 " T admire brave men," she replied, " and he is one, 
 is he not ? " 
 
THE TEA-PARTY 155 
 
 "You'll find him reasonable," said the dominie, dryly. 
 
 But though it was thus that she defended Tommy 
 when others hinted doubts, she had not yet said she was 
 proud of him to the man who wanted most to hear it. 
 For one brief moment Grizel had exulted on learning 
 that he and Captain Ure were one, and then suddenly, 
 to all the emotions now running within her, a voice 
 seemed to cry, " Halt ! " and she fell to watching 
 sharply the doer of noble deeds. Her eyes were not 
 wistful, nor were they contemptuous, but had Tommy 
 been less elated with himself he might have seen that 
 they were puzzled and suspicious. To mistrust him 
 in face of such evidence seemed half a shame, she was 
 indignant with herself even while she did it, but she 
 could not help doing it, the truth about Tommy was 
 such a vital thing to Grizel. She had known him so 
 well, too well, up to a minute ago, and this was not the 
 man she had known. 
 
 How unfair she was to Tommy while she watched. 
 When the old lady was on her knees thanking him, and 
 every other lady was impressed by the feeling he 
 showed, it seemed to Grizel that he was again in the 
 arms of some such absurd sentiment as had mastered 
 him in the den. When he behaved so charmingly about 
 the gift she was almost sure he looked at her as he had 
 looked in the old days before striding his legs and 
 screaming out, " Oh, am I not a wonder ? I see by 
 your face that you think me a wonder ! " All the 
 
156 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 time he was so considerately putting those who had 
 misjudged him at their ease she believed he did it con- 
 siderately, that they might say to each other, " How 
 considerate he is ! " When she misread Tommy in such 
 comparative trifles as these, is it to be wondered that 
 she went into the garden still tortured by a doubt about 
 the essential ? It was nothing less than torture to her; 
 when you discover what is in her mind, Tommy, you 
 may console yourself with that. 
 
 He discovered what was in her mind as Mr. Cathro 
 left her. She felt shy, he thought, of coming to him 
 after what had taken place, and with the generous 
 intention of showing that she was forgiven he crossed 
 good-naturedly to her. 
 
 " You were very severe, Grizel," he said, " but don't 
 let that distress you for a moment; it served me right 
 for not telling the truth at once." 
 
 She did not flinch. " Do we know the truth now ? " 
 she asked, looking at him steadfastly. " I don't want 
 to hurt you, you know that, but please tell me, did you 
 really do it ? I mean, did you do it in the way we have 
 been led to suppose ? " 
 
 It was a great shock to Tommy. He had not for- 
 gotten his vows to change his nature, and had she been 
 sympathetic now he would have confessed to her the 
 real reason of his silence. He wanted boyishly to tell 
 her, though of course without mention of the glove, but 
 her words hardened him. " Grizel ! " he cried, reproach" 
 
THE TEA-PARTS' 157 
 
 fully, and then in a husky voice, " Can you really think 
 so badly of me as that ? " 
 
 " I don't know wha,t to think," she answered, pressing 
 her hands together. " I know you are very clever." 
 
 He bowed slightly. 
 
 " Did you ? " she asked again. She was no longer 
 chiding herself for being over-careful ; she must know 
 the truth. 
 
 He was sUent for a moment. Then, "Grizel," he 
 said, "I am about to pain you very much, but you give 
 me no option. I did do it precisely as you have heard. 
 
 "And may God forgive you for doubting me," he 
 added with a qmver, " as freely as I do." 
 
 You will scarcely believe this, but a few minutes 
 afterwards, Grizel having been the first to leave, he saw 
 her from the garden going, not home, but in the direc- 
 tion of Corp's house, obviously to ask him whether 
 Tommy had done it. Tommy guessed her intention at 
 once and he laughed a bitter ho-ho-ha and wiped her 
 from his memory. 
 
 "Farewell, woman, I am done with you," are the 
 terrible words you may conceive Tommy saying. Next 
 moment, however, he was hurriedly bidding his hostess 
 good-night, could not even wait for Elspeth, clapped his 
 hat on his head, and was off after Grizel. It had sud 
 denly struck him that, now the rest of the story was out,. 
 Corp might tell her about the glove. Suppose Gavinia 
 showed it to iierl 
 
158 TOMMY AKD GKIZEL 
 
 Sometimes he had kissed that glove passionately, 
 sometimes pressed his lips upon it with the long tender- 
 ness that is less intoxicating but makes you a better 
 man, but now for the first time he asked himself bluntly 
 why he had done those things, with the result that he 
 was striding to Corp's house. It was not only for his 
 own sake that he hurried, let us do him that justice. It 
 was chiefly to save Grizel the pain of thinking that he 
 whom she had been flouting loved her, as she must think 
 if she heard the story of the glove. That it could be 
 nothing but pain to her he was boyishly certain, for 
 assuredly this scornful girl wanted none of his love. 
 And though she was scornful she was still the dear com- 
 panion of his boyhood. Tommy was honestly anxious 
 to save Grizel the pain of thinking that she had flouted 
 a man who loved her. 
 
 He took a different road from hers, but to his annoy- 
 ance they met at Couthie's corner. He would have 
 passed her with a distant bow, but she would have none 
 of that. 
 
 "You have followed me," said Grizel, with the hate- 
 ful directness that was no part of Tommy's character. 
 
 " Grizel ! " 
 
 " You followed me to see whether I was going to 
 question Corp. You were afraid he would tell me what 
 really happened. You wanted to see him first to tell 
 him what to say." 
 
 "Keally, Grizel " 
 
THE TE4-PABTV 150 
 
 "Is it not true?" 
 
 There are no questions so offensive to the artistic 
 nature as those that demand a yes or no for answer. 
 " It is useless for me to say it is not true," he replied, 
 haughtily, " for you won't believe me." 
 
 " Say it, and I shall believe you," said she. 
 
 Tommy tried standing on the other foot, but it was 
 no help. "I presume I may have reasons for want- 
 ing to see Corp that you are unacquainted with," he 
 said. 
 
 " Oh, I am sure of it ! " replied Grizel, scornfully. She 
 had been hoping until now, but there was no more hope 
 left in her. 
 
 " May I ask what it is that my oldest friend accuses 
 me of ? Perhaps you don't even believe that I was 
 Captain Ure ? " 
 
 "I am no longer sure of it." 
 
 " How you read me, Grizel I I could hoodwink the 
 others, but never you. I suppose it is because you 
 have such an eye for the worst in anyone." 
 
 It was not the first time he had said something of this 
 kind to her, for he knew that she suspected herself of 
 being too ready to find blemishes in others, to the neglect 
 of their better qualities, and that this made her uneasy 
 and also very sensitive to the charge. To-day, however, 
 her own imperfections did not matter to her; she was 
 as nothing to herself just now and scarcely felt his 
 insinuations. 
 
160 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 "I think you were Captain Ure," she said, slowly, 
 " and I think you did it, but not as the boy imagines." 
 
 " You may be quite sure," he replied, " that I would 
 not have done it had there been the least risk. That, I 
 flatter myself, is how you reason it out." 
 
 " It does not explain," she said, " why you kept the 
 matter secret." 
 
 "Thank you, Grizel! Well, at least I have not 
 boasted of it." 
 
 " No, and that is what makes me " She paused. 
 
 " Go on," said he, " though I can guess what agree- 
 able thing you were going to say." 
 
 But she said something else. "You may have noticed 
 that I took the boy aside and questioned him privately." 
 
 " I little thought then, Grizel, that you suspected me 
 of being an impostor." 
 
 She clenched her hands again, it was all so hard to 
 say, and yet she must say it. " I did not. I saw he 
 believed his story. I was asking him whether you had 
 planned his coming with it to Mrs. McLean's house at 
 that dramatic moment." 
 
 " You actually thought me capable of that ! " 
 
 " It makes me horrid to myself," she replied, wofully, 
 "but if I thought you had done that I could more 
 readily believe the rest." 
 
 " Very well, Grizel," he said, " go on thinking the 
 worst of me ; I would not deprive you of that pleasure 
 if I could." 
 
THE TEA-PAETT 161 
 
 " Oh, cruel, cruel," she could have replied ; " you know- 
 it is no pleasure ; you know it is a great pain," but she 
 did not speak. 
 
 " I have already told you that the boy's story is true," 
 he said, " and now you ask me why I did not shout it 
 from the house-tops myself. Perhaps it was for your 
 sake, Grizel. Perhaps it was to save you the distress 
 of knowing that in a momentary impulse I could so far 
 forget myself as to act the part of a man." 
 
 She pressed her hands more tightly. "I may be 
 wronging you," she answered, "I should love to think 
 so, but — you have something you want to say to Corp 
 before I see him." 
 
 " Not at all," Tommy said ; " if you still want to see 
 Corp, let us go together." 
 
 She hesitated, but she knew how clever he was. " I 
 prefer to go alone," she replied. " Forgive me if I ask 
 you to turn back." 
 
 "Don't go," he entreated her. "Grizel, I give you 
 my word of honor it is to save you acute pain that I 
 want to see Corp first." 
 
 She smiled wanly at that, for though, as we know, it 
 was true, she misunderstood him. He had to let her go 
 on alone. 
 
 11 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 IN WHICH A COMEDIAN CHALLENGES TEAGEDT TO BOWLS 
 
 When G-rizel opened the door of Corp's house she 
 found husband and wife at home, the baby in his 
 father's arms ; what is more, Gavinia was looking on 
 smiling and saying, " You bonny litlin, you 're windy 
 to have him dandling you ; and no wonder, for he 's 
 a father to be proud o'." Corp was accepting it all 
 with a complacent smirk. Oh, agreeable change since 
 last we were in this house, oh, happy picture of do- 
 mestic bliss, oh — but no, these are not the words; 
 what we meant to say was, "Gavinia, you limmer, 
 so you have got the better of that man of yours at 
 last." 
 
 How had she contrived it ? We have seen her escort- 
 ing the old lady to the Dove-cot, Corp skulking behind; 
 our next peep at them shows Gavinia back at her house, 
 Corp peering through the window and wondering 
 whether he dare venture in. Gavinia was still bothered, 
 for though she knew now the story of Tommy's heroism, 
 there was no glove in it, and it was the glove that mad- 
 dened her. 
 
 " No, I ken nothing about a glove," the old lady had 
 assured her. 
 
COMEDIAN CHALLENGES TRAGEDY TO BOWLS 163 
 
 "Not a sylup was said about a glove," maintained 
 Christina, who had given her a highly colored narrative 
 of what took place in Mrs. McLean's parlor. 
 
 " And yet there 's a glove in 't as sure as there 's a 
 quirk in 't," Gavinia kept muttering to herself. She 
 rose to have another look at the hoddy place in which 
 she had concealed the glove from her husband, and 
 as she did so she caught sight of him at the window. 
 He bobbed at once, but she hastened to the door to 
 scarify him. The clock had given only two ticks when 
 she was upon him, but in that time she had completely 
 changed her plan of action. She welcomed him with 
 smiles of pride. Thus is the nimbleness of women's wit 
 measured once and for all. They need two seconds 
 if they are to do the thing comfortably. 
 
 "Never to have telled me, and you behaved so 
 grandly ! " she cried, with adoring glances that were as 
 a carpet on which he strode pompously into the house. 
 
 "It wasna me that did it; it was him," said Corp, 
 and even then he feared that he had told too much. 
 "I kenna what you're speaking about," he added, 
 loyally. 
 
 " Corp," she answered, " you needna be so canny, for 
 the laddie is in the town, and Mr. Sandys has con- 
 fessed all." 
 
 "The whole o't?" 
 
 " Every risson." 
 
 " About the glove, too ? " 
 
164 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 " Glove and all," said wicked Gavinia, and she con- 
 tinned to feast lier eyes so admiringly on her deceived 
 husband that he passed quickly from the gratified to the 
 dictatorial. 
 
 " Let this be a lesson to you, woman," he said, sternly, 
 and Gavinia intimated with humility that she hoped to 
 profit by it. 
 
 " Having got the glove in so solemn a way," he went 
 on, " it would have been ill-done of me to blab to you 
 about it. Do you see that now, woman ? " 
 
 She said it was as clear as day to her. "And a 
 solemn way it was," she added, and then waited eagerly. 
 
 " My opinion," continued Corp, lowering his voice as 
 if this were not matter for the child, " is that it 's a love- 
 token frae some London woman." 
 
 " Behear 's ! " cried Gavinia. 
 
 "Else what," he asked, "would make him hand it to 
 me so solemn-like, and tell me to pass it on to her if he 
 was drowned ? I didna think o' that at the time, but it 
 has come to me, Gavinia ; it has come." 
 
 This was a mouthful indeed to Gavinia. So the glove 
 was the property of Mr. Sandys, and he was in love 
 with a London lady and — no, this is too slow for 
 Gavinia; she saw these things in passing, as one who 
 jumps from the top of a house may have lightning 
 glimpses through many windows on the way down. 
 What she jumped to was the vital question, who was the 
 woman ? 
 
COMEDIAN CHALLENGES TEAGBDy TO BOWLS 165 
 
 But she was too cunning to ask a leading question. 
 "Ay, she's his lady-love," she said, controlling her- 
 self, " but I forget her name. It was a very wise-like 
 thing o' you to speir the woman's name." 
 "Butldidna." 
 " You didna ! " 
 
 " He was in the water in a klink." 
 Had Gavinia been in Corp's place she would have 
 had the name out of Tommy, water or no water, but she 
 did not tell her husband what she thought of him. 
 
 " Ay, of course," she said, pleasantly. " It was after 
 you helped him out that he telled you her name." 
 "Did he say he telled me her name ? " 
 " He did." 
 
 " Well, then, I 've fair forgot it." 
 Instead of boxing his ears she begged him to reflect. 
 Kesult of reflection, that if the name had been men- 
 tioned to Corp, which he doubted, it began with M. 
 Was it Mary ? 
 That was the name. 
 Or was it Martha ? 
 It had a taste of Martha about it. 
 It was not Margaret ? 
 It might have been Margaret. 
 Or Matilda ? 
 It was fell like Matilda. 
 
 And so on. "But wi' a' your wheedling," Corp 
 reminded his wife, bantering her from aloft, "you 
 
166 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 couldna get a scraping out o' me till I was free to 
 speak." 
 
 He thought it a good opportunity for showing Gavinia 
 her place once and for all. " In small matters," he said, 
 " I gie you your ain way, for though you may be wrang, 
 thinks I to mysel' she 's but a woman ; but in important 
 things, Gavinia, if I humored you I would spoil you, so 
 let this be a telling to you that there 's no diddling a 
 determined man," to which she replied by informing 
 the baby that he had a father to be proud of. 
 
 A father to be proud of ! They were the words 
 heard by Grizel as she entered. She also saw Gavinia 
 looking admiringly at her man, and in that doleful 
 moment she thought she understood all. It was Corp 
 who had done it, and Tommy had been the looker-on. 
 He had sought to keep the incident secret because 
 though he was in it the glory had been won by another 
 (oh, how base!), and now profiting by the boy's mis- 
 take he was swaggering in that other's clothes (oh, 
 baser still ! ). Everything was revealed to her in a 
 flash, and she stooped over the baby to hide a sudden 
 tear. She did not want to hear any more. 
 
 The baby cried. Babies are aware that they can't do 
 very much, but all of them who knew Grizel were 
 almost contemptuously confident of their power over 
 her, and when this one saw (they are very sharp) that 
 in his presence she could actually think of something 
 else, he was so hurt that he cried. 
 
COMEDIAN CHALLEKGES TRAGEDY TO BOWLS 167 
 
 Was she to be blamed for thinking so meanly of 
 Tommy ? You can blame her with that tear in her eye 
 if you choose, but I can think only of the gladness that 
 came afterwards when she knew she had been unjust to 
 him. " Thank you, thank you, thank you ! " the bird 
 sang to its creator when the sun came out after rain, 
 and it was Grizel's song as she listened to Corp's story 
 of heroic Tommy ; there was no room in her exultant 
 heart for remorse, it would have shown littleness to be 
 able to think of herself at all when she could think so 
 gloriously of him. She was more than beautiful now, 
 she was radiant, and it was because Tommy was the 
 man she wanted him to be. As those who are cold hold 
 out their hands to the fire did she warm her heart at 
 what Corp had to tell, and the great joy that was lit 
 within her made her radiant. Now the baby was in her 
 lap, smiling back to her. He thought he had done it 
 all. " So you thought you could resist me ! " the baby 
 crowed. 
 
 The glove had not been mentioned yet. " The 
 sweetest thing of all to me," Grizel said, " is that he 
 did not want me to hear the story from you, Corp, 
 because he knew you would sing his praise so loudly." 
 
 " I 'm thinking," said Gavinia, archly, " he had 
 another reason for no wanting you to question Corp ; 
 maybe he didna want you to ken about the London lady 
 and her glove. Will you tell her, man, or will I ? " 
 
 They told her together, and what had been conjectures 
 
168 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 were now put forward as facts. Tommy had certainly 
 said a London lady, and as certainly he had given her 
 name, but what it was Corp could not remember. But 
 " Give her this and tell her it never left my heart," ho 
 could swear to these words. 
 
 "And no words could be stronger," Gavinia said, 
 triumphantly. She produced the glove and was about 
 to take off its paper wrapping when Grizel stopped 
 her. 
 
 "We have no right, Gavinia." 
 
 " I suppose we hinna, and I 'm thinking the pocket 
 it came out o' is feeling gey toom without it. Will you 
 take it back to him ? " 
 
 "It was very wrong of you to keep it," Grizel an- 
 swered, " but I can't take it to him, for I see now that 
 his reason for wanting me not to come here was to 
 prevent my hearing about it ; I am sorry you told me. 
 Corp must take it back." But when she saw it being 
 crushed in Corp's rough hand a pity for the helpless 
 glove came over her. She said, "After all, I do know 
 about it, so I can't pretend to him that I don't. I will 
 give it to him, Corp," and she put the little package 
 in her pocket with a brave smile. 
 
 Do you think the radiance had gone from her face 
 now ? do you think the joy that had been lit in her 
 heart was dead ? Oh, no, no, Grizel had never asked 
 that Tommy should love her, she had asked only that 
 he should be a fine man. She did not ask it for herself, 
 
COMEDIAN CHALLENGES TRAGEDY TO BOWLS 169 
 
 only for Mm ; she could not think of herself now, only 
 of him. She did not think she loved him, she thought 
 a woman should not love any man until she knew he 
 wanted her to love him. 
 
 But if Tommy had wanted it she would have been 
 very glad. She knew, oh, she knew so well, that she 
 could have helped him best. Many a noble woman has 
 known it as she stood aside. 
 
 In the meantime Tommy had gone home in several 
 states of mind — reckless, humble, sentimental, most 
 practical, defiant, apprehensive ; at one moment he was 
 crying, " Now, Grizel, now, when it is too late, you will 
 see what you have lost." At the next he quaked and 
 implored the gods to help him out of his predicament. 
 It was apprehension that, on the whole, played most 
 of the tunes, for he was by no means sure that Grizel 
 would not look upon the affair of the glove as an offer 
 of his hand and accept him. They would show her the 
 glove, and she would, of course, know it to be her own. 
 " Give her this, and tell her it never left my heart." 
 The words thumped within him now. How was Grizel 
 to understand that he had meant nothing in particular 
 by them ? 
 
 I wonder if you misread him so utterly as to believe 
 that he thought himself something of a prize. That is a 
 vulgar way of looking at things of which our fastidious 
 Tommy was incapable. As much as Grizel herself he 
 loathed the notion that women have a thirsty eye on 
 
170 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 man : when he saw them cheapening themselves before 
 the sex that should hold them beyond price he turned 
 his head and would not let his mind dwell on the sub- 
 ject. He was a sort of gentleman, was Tommy. And 
 he knew Grizel so well that had all the other women 
 in the world been of this kind, it would not have 
 persuaded him that there was a drop of such blood 
 in her. 
 
 Then, if he feared that she was willing to be his it 
 must have been because he thought she loved him? 
 Not a bit of it. As already stated, he thought he had 
 abundant reason to think otherwise. It was remorse 
 that he feared might bring her to his feet, the discovery 
 that while she had been gibing at him he had been a 
 heroic figure suffering in silence, eating his heart for 
 love of her. Undoubtedly that was how Grizel must see 
 things now ; he must seem to her to be an angel rather 
 than a mere man, and in sheer remorse she might cry, "I 
 am yours." Vain though Tommy was, the picture gave 
 him not a moment's pleasure. Alarm was what he felt. 
 
 Of course he was exaggerating Grizel's feelings. She 
 had too much self-respect and too little sentiment to be 
 willing to marry any man because she had unintention- 
 ally wronged him, but this was how Tommy would have 
 acted had he happened to be a lady. Eiemorse, pity, no 
 one was so good at them as Tommy. 
 
 In his perturbation he was also good at maidenly 
 reserve. He felt strongly that the proper course for 
 
COMEDIAN CHAIiLENGES TRAGEDY TO BOWLS 171 
 
 Grizel was not to refer to the glove, to treat that inci- 
 dent as closed unless he chose to reopen it. This was so 
 obviously the correct procedure, that he seemed to see 
 her adopting it like a sensible girl, and relief would 
 have come to him had he not remembered that Grizel 
 usually took her own way, and that it was seldom his 
 way. 
 
 There were other ways of escape. For instance, if she 
 would only let him love her hopelessly. Oh, Grizel had 
 but to tell him there was no hope, and then how finely 
 he would behave. It would bring out all that was best 
 in him. He saw himself passing through life as her 
 very perfect knight. " Is there no hope for me ? " He 
 heard himself begging for hope, and he heard also her 
 firm answer, " None." How he had always admired the 
 outspokenness of Grizel. Her -' None " was as splen- 
 didly decisive as of yore. 
 
 The conversation thus begun ran on in him. Tommy 
 doing the speaking for both (though his lips never 
 moved) and feeling the scene as vividly as if Grizel had 
 really been present and Elspeth was not. Elspeth was 
 sitting opposite him. 
 
 " At least let me wait, Grizel," he implored. " I don't 
 care for how long ; fix a time yourself and I shall keep 
 to it, and I promise never to speak one word of love to 
 you until that time comes, and then if you bid me go I 
 shall go. Give me something to live for. It binds you to 
 nothing and, oh, it would make such a difference to me." 
 
172 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 Then Grizel seemed to reply gently, but witli the 
 firmness he adored, " I tnow I cannot change, and it 
 would be mistaken kindness to do as you suggest. No, I 
 can give you no hope, but though I can never marry you, 
 I will watch your future with warm regard, for you have 
 to-day paid me the highest compliment a man can pay a 
 woman." 
 
 (How charmingly it was all working out.) 
 
 Tommy bowed with dignity and touched her hand with 
 his lips. What is it they do next in Pym and even more 
 expensive authors ? Oh, yes, " If at any time in your 
 life, dear Grizel," he said, " you are in need of a friend 
 I hope you will turn first to me. It does not matter 
 where your message reaches me I will come to you with- 
 out delay." 
 
 In his enthusiasm he saw the letter being delivered to 
 him in Central Africa, and immediately he wheeled 
 round on his way to Thrums. 
 
 "There is one other little request I should like to 
 make of you," he said, huskily. "Perhaps I ask too 
 much, but it is this, may I keep your glove ? " 
 
 She nodded her head, she was so touched that she 
 could scarcely trust herself to speak. " But you will 
 soon get over this," she said, at last ; " another glove will 
 take the place of mine; the time will come when you 
 will be glad that I said I could not marry you." 
 
 " Grizel ! " he cried, in agony. He was so carried 
 away by his feelings that he said the word aloud. 
 
COMEDIAJ!? CHALLENGES TEAGEDY TO BOWLS 173 
 
 « Where ? " asked Elspeth, looking at the window. 
 
 "Was it not she who passed just now? " he replied, 
 promptly, and they were still discussing his mistake 
 when Grizel did pass, but only to stop at the door. She 
 came in. 
 
 "My brother must have the second sight," declared 
 Elspeth, gayly, "for he saw you coming before you 
 came," and she told what had happened, while Grizel 
 looked happily at Tommy, and Tommy looked appre- 
 hensively at her. Grizel, he might have seen, was 
 not wearing the tragic face of sacrifice ; it was a face 
 shining with gladness, a girl still too happy in his nobil- 
 ity to think remorsefully of her own misdeeds. To let 
 him know that she was proud of him, that was what 
 she had come for chiefly, and she was even glad that 
 Elspeth was there to hear. It was an excuse to her 
 to repeat Corp's story, and she told it with defiant 
 looks at Tommy that said, "You are so modest, you 
 want to stop me, but Elspeth will listen ; it is nearly 
 as sweet to Elspeth as it is to me, and I shall tell her 
 every word, yes, and tell her a great deal of it twice." 
 
 It was not modesty which made Tommy so anxious 
 that she should think less of him, but naturally it had 
 that appearance. The most heroic fellows, I am told, 
 can endure being extoUed by pretty girls, but here 
 seemed to be one who could not stand it. 
 
 "You need not think it is of you we are proud," she 
 assured liim light-heartedly ; " it is really of ourselves. 
 
174 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 I am proud of being your friend. To-morrow when 
 I hear the town ringing your praises I shall not say, 
 ' Yes, is n't he wonderful ? ' I shall say, ' Talk of me ; 
 I, too, am an object of interest, for I am his friend.' " 
 
 "I have often been pointed out as his sister," said 
 Elspeth, complacently. 
 
 " He did not choose his sister," replied Grizel, " but 
 he chose his friends." 
 
 For a time he could suck no sweetness from it. She 
 avoided the glove, he was sure, only because of Elspeth's 
 presence. But anon there arrived to cheer him a fond 
 hope that she had not heard of it, and as this became 
 conviction, exit the Tommy who could not abide him- 
 self and enter another who was highly charmed there- 
 with. Tommy had a notion that certain whimsical 
 little gods protected him in return for the sport he 
 gave them, and he often kissed his hand to them 
 when they came to the rescue. He would have liked 
 to kiss it now, but gave a grateful glance instead to 
 the corner in the ceiling where they sat chuckling at 
 him. Grizel admired him at last. Tra, la, la! What 
 a dear girl she was ! Into his manner there crept a 
 certain masterfulness, and instead of resisting it she 
 beamed. Kum-ti-tum ! 
 
 " If you want to spoil me," he said, lazily, " you 
 will bring me that footstool to rest my heroic feet 
 upon." 
 
 She smiled and brought it. She even brought a 
 
COMEDIAN CHALLENGES TRAGEDY TO BOWLS 175 
 
 cushion for his heroic head. Adoring little thing that 
 she was, he must be good to her. 
 
 He was now looking forward eagerly to walking 
 home with her. I can't tell you how delicious he 
 meant to be. When she said she must go he skipped 
 upstairs for his hat, and wafted the gods their kiss. 
 But it was always the unexpected that lay in wait for 
 Tommy. He and she were no sooner out of the house 
 than Grizel said, " I did not mention the glove as I was 
 not sure whether Elspeth knew of it." 
 
 He had turned stone-cold. 
 
 "Corp and Gavinia told me," she went on quietly, 
 " before I had time to stop them. Of course I should 
 have preferred not to know until I heard it from 
 yourself." 
 
 Oh, how cold he was. 
 
 " But as I do know I want to tell you that it makes 
 me very happy." 
 
 They had stopped, for his legs would carry him no 
 farther. "Get us out of this," every bit of him was 
 crying, but not one word could Tommy say. 
 
 "I knew you would want to have it again," Grizel 
 said brightly, producing the little parcel from her 
 pocket, "so I brought it to you." 
 
 The frozen man took it and held it passively in his 
 hand. His gods had flown away. 
 
 No, they were actually giving him another chance. 
 What was this Grizel was saying ? "I have not looked 
 
176 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 at it, for to take it out of its wrapping would have 
 been profanation. Corp told me she was a London 
 girl, but I know nothing more, not even her name. You 
 are not angry with me for speaking of her, are you? 
 Surely I may wish you and her great happiness." 
 
 He was saved. The breath came back quickly to 
 him ; he filled like a released ball. Had ever a heart 
 better right to expand ? Grizel, looking so bright 
 and pleased, had snatched him from the Slugs. Surely 
 you will be nice to your preserver, Tommy ; you will not 
 be less grateful than a country boy ? 
 
 Ah, me, not even yet have we plumed his vanity. But 
 we are to do it now. He coiild not have believed it of 
 himself, but in the midst of his rejoicings he grew bitter, 
 and for no better reason than that Grizel's face was 
 bright. 
 
 " I am glad, " he said, quite stiffly, " that it is such 
 pleasant news to you." 
 
 His tone surprised her, but she was in a humble mood 
 and answered, without being offended, "It is sweet 
 news to me. How could you think otherwise ? " 
 
 So it was sweet to her to think that he was another's ! 
 He who had been modestly flattering himself a few 
 moments ago that he must take care not to go too far 
 with this admiring little girl ! woman, woman, how 
 difficult it is to know you, and how often when we think 
 we know you at last, have we to begin again at the be- 
 ginning! He had never asked an enduring love from 
 
COMEDIAN CHALLENGES TRAGEDY TO BOWLS 177 
 
 her, but surely after all that had passed between them 
 he had a right to expect a little more thau this. Was it 
 maidenly to bring the glove and hand it to him without 
 a tremor ? If she could do no more she might at least 
 have turned a little pale when Corp told her of it, and 
 then have walked quietly away. Next day she could 
 have referred to it, with just the slightest break in 
 her voice. But to come straight to him, looking de- 
 lighted 
 
 " And after all I am entitled to know first," Grizel 
 said, "for I am your oldest friend." 
 
 Friend ! He could not help repeating the word with 
 bitter emphasis. For her sake, as it seemed to him 
 now, he had flung himself into the black waters of the 
 Drumly; he had worn her glove upon his heart, it had 
 been the world to him ; and she could stand there and 
 call herself his friend. The cup was full. Tommy 
 nodded his head sorrowfully three times. 
 
 " So be it, Grizel," he said huskily, " so be it ! " Sen- 
 timent could now carry him where it willed. The reins 
 were broken. 
 
 " I don't understand." 
 
 Neither did he, but, " Why should you, what is it to 
 you ! " he cried, wildly. " Better not to understand, 
 for it might give you five minutes' pain, Grizel, a 
 whole five minutes, and I should be sorry to give you 
 that." 
 
 " What have I said, what have I done ! " 
 12 
 
178 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 "Nothing," he answered her, "nothing. You have 
 been most exemplary, you have not even got any enter- 
 tainment out of it ; the thing never struck you as pos- 
 sible, it was too ludicrous ! " 
 
 He laughed harshly at the package which was still in 
 his hand. " Poor little glove," he said, "and she did not 
 even take the trouble to look at you. Tou might have 
 looked at it, Grizel. I have looked at it a good deal ; it 
 meant something to me once upon a time when I was a 
 vain fool. Take it and look at it before you fling it 
 away, it will make you laugh." 
 
 Now she knew, and her arms rocked convulsively. 
 Joy surged to her face and she drove it back, she looked 
 at him steadfastly over the collar of her jacket, she 
 looked long as if trying to be suspicious of him for the 
 last time. Ah, Grizel, you are saying good-by to your 
 best friend. 
 
 As she looked at him thus there was a mournfulness 
 in her brave face that went to Tommy's heart and 
 almost made a man of him ; it was as if he knew that 
 she was doomed. 
 
 " Grizel," he cried, " don't look at me in that way ! " 
 and he would have taken the package from her, but she 
 pressed it to her heart. 
 
 " Don't come with me," she said almost in a whisper 
 and went away. 
 
 He did not go back to the house. He wandered into 
 the country, quite objectless when he was walking fast- 
 
COMEDIAN CHAIiLBNGBS TRAGEDY TO BOWLS 179 
 
 est, seeing nothing when he stood still and stared. 
 Elation and dread were his companions. What elation 
 whispered he could not yet believe, no, he could not 
 believe it, while he listened he knew that he must be 
 making up the words. By and by he found himself 
 among the shadows of the den. If he had loved Grizel 
 he would have known that it was here she would come, 
 to the sweet den where he and she had played as chil- 
 dred, the spot where she had loved him first. She had 
 always loved him, always, always. He did not know 
 what figure it was by the Cuttle Well until he was quite 
 close to her. She was kissing the glove passionately, 
 and on her eyes lay little wells of gladness. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 LITTLE WELLS OF GLADNESS 
 
 It was dusk, and she had not seen him. In the 
 silent den he stood motionless within a few feet of her, 
 so amazed to find that Grizel really loved him that for 
 the moment self was blotted out of his mind, he re- 
 membered he was there only when he heard his heavy 
 breathing, and then he tried to check it that he might 
 steal away undiscovered. Divers emotions fought for 
 the possession of him. He was in the meeting of many 
 waters, each capable of whirling him where it chose, 
 but two only imperious, the one the fierce joy of being 
 loved, the other an agonizing remorse. He would fain 
 have stolen away to think this tremendous thing over, 
 but it tossed him forward. "Grizel," he said, in a 
 husky whisper, " Grizel ! " 
 
 She did not start, she was scarcely surprised to hear 
 his voice ; she had been talking to him and he had 
 answered. Had he not been there she would still have 
 heard him answer. She could not see him more clearly 
 now than she had been seeing him through those little 
 wells of gladness. Her love for him was the whole 
 of her. He came to her with the opening and the shut- 
 ting of her eyes ; he was the wind that bit her and the 
 
LITTLE WELLS OF GLADNESS 181 
 
 sun that nourished her, he was the lowliest object by 
 the Cuttle Well and he was the wings on which her 
 thoughts soared to eternity; he could never leave her 
 while her mottal frame endured.. 
 
 When he whispered her name she turned her swim- 
 ming eyes to him, and a strange birth had come into 
 her face. Her eyes said so openly they were his, and 
 her mouth said it was his, her whole being went out 
 to him ; in the radiance of her face could be read 
 immortal designs, the maid kissing her farewell to in- 
 nocence was there, and the reason why it must be, and 
 the fate of the unborn; it was the first stirring for 
 weal or woe of a movement , that has no end on earth, 
 but must roll on, growing lusty on beauty or dishonor 
 till the crack of time. This birth which comes to every 
 woman at that hour is God's gift to her in exchange 
 for what he has taken away, and when he has given 
 it he stands back and watches the man. 
 
 To this man she was a woman transformed. The 
 new bloom upon her face entranced him. He knew 
 what it meant. He was looking on the face of love 
 at last, and it was love coming out smiling from its 
 hiding-place because it thought it had heard him call. 
 'The artist in him who had done this thing was en- 
 tranced, as if he had written an immortal page. 
 
 But the man was appalled. He knew that he had 
 reached the critical moment in her life and his, and 
 that if he took one step farther forward be could never 
 
182 TOMMY AND GEIZEIi 
 
 again draw back. It would be comparatively easy to 
 draw back now ; to remain a free man he had but to 
 tell her the truth, and he had a passipnate desire 
 to remain free. He heard the voices of | his little gods 
 screaming to him to draw back. But it could be done 
 only at her expense, and it seemed to him that to tell 
 this noble girl, who was waiting for him, that he did 
 not need her would be to spill forever the happiness 
 with which she overflowed, and sap the pride that 
 had been the marrow of her during her twenty years 
 of life. Not thus would Grizel have argued in his 
 place, but he could not change his nature, and it was 
 Sentimental Tommy, in an agony of remorse for having 
 brought dear Grizel to this pass, who had to decide her 
 future and his in the time you may take to walk up a 
 garden path. Either her mistake must be righted now 
 or kept hidden from her forever. He was a sentiment- 
 alist, but in that hard moment he was trying to be a 
 man. He took her in his arms and kissed her rev- 
 erently, knowing that after this there could be no 
 drawing back. In that act he gave himself loyally to 
 her as a husband. He knew he was not worthy of 
 her, but he was determined to try to be a little less 
 unworthy ; and as he drew her to him a slight quiver 
 went through her, so that for a second she seemed to 
 be holding back, for a second only, and the quiver was 
 the rustle of wings on which some part of the Grizel 
 we have known so long was taking flight from her. 
 
LITTLE WELLS OP GLADNESS 183 
 
 Then she pressed close to him passionately as if she 
 grudged that pause. I love her more than ever, far more, 
 but she is never again quite the Grizel we have known. 
 
 He was not unhappy ; in the near hereafter he might 
 be as miserable as the damned, the little gods were 
 waiting to catch him alone and terrify him, but for 
 the time, having sacrificed himself, Tommy was aglow 
 with the passion he had inspired. He so loved the 
 thing he had created that in his exultation he mis- 
 took it for her. He believed all he was saying. He 
 looked at her long and adoringly, not, as he thought 
 because he adored her, but because it was thus that 
 look should answer look ; he pressed her wet eyes rev- 
 erently because thus it was written in his delicious 
 part, his heart throbbed with hers that they might 
 beat in time, he did not love, but he was the perfect 
 lover, he was the artist trying in a mad moment to be 
 as well as to do. 
 
 Love was their theme, but how to know what was said 
 when between lovers it is only the loose change of con- 
 versation that gets into words ? The important matters 
 cannot wait so slow a messenger ; while the tongue is 
 being charged with them a look, a twitch of the mouth, a 
 movement of a finger transmits the story and the words 
 arrive, like Bltlcher, when the engagement is over. 
 
 With a sudden pretty gesture — ah, so like her 
 mother's ! — she held the glove to his lips. " It is 
 sad because you have forgotten it." 
 
184 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 "I have kissed it so often, Grizel, long before I 
 thought I should ever kiss you ! " 
 
 She pressed it to her innocent breast at that. And 
 had he really done so! and which was the first time and 
 the second and the third ? Oh, dear glove, you know so 
 much, and your partner lies at home in a drawer know- 
 ing nothing. Grizel felt sorry for the other glove. 
 She whispered to Tommy as a terrible thing, " I think I 
 love this glove even more than I love you, just a tiny 
 bit more." She could not part with it. "It told me 
 before you did," she explained, begging him to give it 
 back to her. 
 
 " If you knew what it was to me in those unhappy 
 days, Grizel ! " 
 
 " I want it to tell me," she whispered. 
 
 And did he really love her ? Yes, she knew he did, 
 but how could he ? 
 
 " Grizel, how could I help it ! " 
 
 He had to say it, for it is the best answer, but he said 
 it with a sigh, for it sounded like a quotation. 
 
 But how could she love him ? I think her reply dis- 
 appointed him. 
 
 "Because you wanted me to," she said, with shining 
 eyes. It is probably the commonest reason why women 
 love, and perhaps it is the best, but his vanity was 
 wounded, he had expected to hear that he was possessed 
 of an irresistible power. 
 
 " ifot until I wanted you to ? " 
 
LITTLE WELLS OF GLADNESS ' 185 
 
 "I think I always wanted you to want me to," she 
 replied, naively. " But I would never have let myself 
 love you," she continued, very seriously, "until I was 
 sure you loved me." 
 
 " You could have helped it, Grizel ! " He drew a 
 blank face. 
 
 " I did help it," she answered. " I was always fight- 
 ing the desire to love you, I can see that plainly, and I 
 always won. I thought God had made a sort of com- 
 pact with me that I should always he the kind of woman 
 I wanted to be if 1 resisted the desire to love you until 
 you loved me." 
 
 "But you always had the desire ! " he said, eagerly. 
 
 "Always, but it never won. You see even you did 
 not know of it. You thought I did not even like you ! 
 That was why you wanted to prevent Corp's telling me 
 about the glove, was it not? You thought it would 
 pain me only ! Do you remember what you said, ' It 
 is to save you acute pain that I want to see Corp 
 first'?" 
 All that seemed so long ago to Tommy now ! 
 
 " How could you think it would be a pain to me ! " she 
 cried. 
 
 "You concealed your feelings so well, Grizel." 
 
 " Did I not ? " she said, joyously. " Oh, I wanted to 
 be so careful, and I was careful. That is why I am 
 so happy now." Her face was glowing. She was full 
 of odd delightful fancies to-night. She kissed her hand 
 
186 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 to the gloaming, no, not to the gloaming, to the little 
 hunted, anxious girl she had been. 
 
 "She is looking at us," she said, "she is standing 
 behind that tree looking at us. She wanted so much to 
 grow into a deat good woman that she often comes and 
 looks at me eagerly. Sometimes her face is so fearful ! 
 I think she was a little alarmed when she heard you 
 were coming back." 
 
 " She never liked me, Grizel." 
 
 " Hush ! " said Grizel, in a low voice, " she always 
 liked you, she always thought you a wonder, but. she 
 would be distressed if she heard me telling you : she 
 thought it would not be safe for you to know. I must 
 tell him now, dearest, darlingest," she suddenly called 
 out boldly, to the little self she had been so quaintly 
 fond of because there was no other to love her, " I must 
 tell him everything now, for you are no longer your own, 
 you are his." 
 
 " She has gone away rocking her arms," she said to 
 Tommy. 
 
 "No," he replied, "I can hear her, she is singing 
 because you are so happy-" 
 
 " She never knew how to sing." 
 
 " She has learned suddenly. Everybody can sing who 
 has anything to sing about. And do you know what 
 she said about your dear wet eyes, Grizel ? She said 
 they were just sweet. And do you know why she left 
 us so suddenly ? She ran home gleefully to stitch and 
 
' SHE IS STANDING BEHIND THAT TREE LOOKING AT US " 
 
UTTLB WELLS OP 6LADKBSS 187 
 
 dust and beat carpets and get baths ready and look 
 after the affairs of everybody, wMch sbe is sure must 
 be going to rack and ruin because she has been away 
 for half an hour ! " 
 
 At his words there sparkled in her face the fond 
 delight with which a woman assures herself that the 
 beloved one knows her little weaknesses, for she does not 
 truly love unless she thirsts to have him understand the 
 whole of her, and to love her in spite of the foibles and 
 for them. If he does not love you a little for the foibles, 
 madam, God help you from the day of the wedding. 
 
 But though G-rizel was pleased she was not to be 
 cajoled. She wandered with him through the den, stop- 
 ping at the Lair and the Queen's Bower and many other 
 places where the little girl used to watch Tommy sus- 
 piciously, and she called half merrily, half plaintively, 
 " Are you there, you foolish girl, and are you wringing 
 your hands over me ? I believe you are jealous because 
 I love him best." 
 
 " We have loved each other so long, she and I," she 
 said apologetically to Tommy. "Ah," she said, impul- 
 sively, when he seemed to be hurt, " don't you see it is 
 because she doubts you that I am so sorry for the poor 
 thing! Dearest, darlingest," she called to the child 
 she had been, " don't think that you can come to me 
 when he is away, and whisper things against him to 
 me. Do you think I will listen to your croakings, you 
 poor wet-faced thing ! " 
 
188 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 " You child ! " said Tommy. 
 
 " Do you think me a child because I blow kisses to 
 her ? " 
 
 "Do you like me to think you one ? " he replied. 
 
 " I like you to call me child," she said, " but not to 
 think me one." 
 
 " Then I shall think you one," said he, triumphantly. 
 He was so perfect an instrument for love to play upon 
 that he let it play on and on and listened in a fever 
 of delight. How could Grizel have doubted Tommy ? 
 The god of love himself would have sworn that there 
 were a score of arrows in him. He wanted to tell 
 Elspeth and the others at once that he and Grizel 
 were engaged. I am glad to remember that it was he 
 who urged this and Grizel who insisted on its being 
 deferred. He even pretended to believe that Elspeth 
 would exult in the news, but Grizel smiled at him for 
 saying this to please her. She had never been a great 
 friend of Elspeth's, they were so dissimilar, and she 
 blamed herself for it now, and said she wanted to try 
 to make Elspeth love her before they told her. Tommy 
 begged her to let him tell his sister at once, but she 
 remained obdurate, so anxious was she that her happi- 
 ness when revealed should bring only happiness to 
 others. There had not come to Grizel yet the long- ■ 
 ing to be recognized as his by the world ; this love was 
 so beautiful and precious to her that there was an added 
 joy in sharing the dear secret with him alone ; it was 
 
LITTLE WELLS OF GLADNESS 189 
 
 a live thing that might escape if she let any one but 
 him look between the fingers that held it. 
 
 The crowning glory of loving and being loved is that 
 the pair make no real progress j however far they have 
 advanced into the enchanted land during the day they 
 must start again from the frontier next morning. Last 
 night they had dredged the lovers' lexicon for superla- 
 tives and not even blushed ; to-day is that the heavens 
 cracking or merely someone whispering " dear " ? All 
 this was very strange and wonderful to Grizel. She 
 had never been so young in the days when she was 
 a little girl. 
 
 " I can never be quite so happy again ! " she had said, 
 with a wistful smile, on the night of nights ; but early 
 morn, the time of the day that loves maidens best, 
 retold her the delicious secret as it kissed her on the 
 eyes, and her first impulse was to hurry to Tommy, 
 When joy or sorrow came to her now, her first impulse 
 was to hurry with it to him. 
 
 Was he still the same, quite the same ? She, whom 
 love had made a child of, asked it fearfully, as if to gaze 
 upon him openly just at first might be blinding, and he 
 pretended not 'to understand. "The same as what, 
 Grizel?" 
 
 " Are you still — what I think you ? " 
 
 " Ah, Grizel, not at all what you think me." 
 
 "But you do?" 
 
 " Coward J You are afraid to say the word. But I do ! " 
 
190 TOMMY AKD GRIZEL 
 
 " You don't ask whether I do ! " 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Why ? Is it because you are so sure of me ? " 
 
 He nodded, and she said it was cruel of him. 
 
 " You don't mean that, Grizel." 
 
 " Don't I ? " She was delighted that he knew it. 
 
 " No, you mean that you like me to be sure of it." 
 
 " But I want to be sure of it myself." 
 
 " You are. That was why you asked me if I loved you. 
 Had you not been sure of it you would not have asked." 
 
 " How clever you are ! " she said, gleefully, and 
 caressed a button of his velvet coat. " But you don't 
 know what that means ! It does not mean that I love 
 you, not merely that." 
 
 " No, it means that you are glad I know you so well. 
 It is an ecstasy to you, is it not, to feel that I know you 
 so well ? " 
 
 " It is sweet," she said. She asked curiously, " What 
 did you do last night after you left me ? I can't guess, 
 though I dare say you can guess what I did." 
 
 "You put the glove under your pillow, Grizel." (She 
 had got the precious glove.) 
 
 " However could you guess ! " 
 
 •'•It has often lain under my own." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Grizel, breathless. 
 
 " Could you not guess even that ? " 
 
 "I wanted to be sure. Did it do anything strange 
 when you had it there ? " 
 
MTTLE WELLS OF GLADNESS 191 
 
 " I used to hear its heart beating." 
 
 " Yes, exactly ! But this is still more remarkable. I 
 put it away at last in my sweetest drawer, and when I 
 woke in the morning it was under my pillow again. 
 You could never have guessed that." 
 
 "Easily. It often did the same thing with me." 
 
 " Story-teller ! But what did you do when you went 
 home ? " 
 
 He could not have answered that exhaustively even if 
 he would, for his actions had been as contradictory as 
 his emotions. He had feared even while he exulted, 
 and exulted when nlunged deep in fears, there had been 
 quite a procession of Tommies all through the night, 
 one of them had been a very miserable man, and the 
 only thing he had been sure of was that he must be true 
 to Grizel. But in so far as he did answer he told the 
 truth. 
 
 "I went for a stroll among the stars," he said. "I 
 don't know when I got to bed. I have found a way of 
 reaching the stars. I have to say only, ' Grizel loves 
 me,' and I am there." 
 
 "Without me!" 
 
 " I took you with me." 
 
 " What did we see ? what did we do ? " 
 
 "You spoilt everything by thinking the stars were 
 badly managed. You wanted to take the supreme con- 
 trol. They turned you out." 
 
 " And when we got back to earth ? " 
 
192 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 "Then I happened to catch sight of myself in a 
 looking-glass and I was scared. I did not see how you 
 could possibly love me. A terror came over me that in 
 the den you must have mistaken me for someone else. 
 It was a darkish night, you know." 
 
 " You are wanting me to say you are handsome." 
 
 '- JSTo, no, I am wanting you to say I am very, very 
 handsome. Tell me you love me, Grizel, because I am 
 beautiful." 
 
 "Perhaps," she replied, "I love you because your 
 book is beautiful." 
 
 " Then good-by forever," he said, sternly. 
 
 " Would riot that please you ? " 
 
 " It would break my heart." 
 
 "But I thought all authors " 
 
 " It is the commonest mistake in the world. We are 
 simple creatures, Grizel, and yearn to be loved for our 
 face alone." 
 
 " But I do love the book," she said when they became 
 more serious, " because it is part of you." 
 
 "Eather that," he told her, "than that you should 
 love me because I am part of it. But it is only a little 
 part of me, Grizel, only the best part. It is Tommy on 
 tiptoes. The other part, the part that does not deserve 
 your love, is what needs it most." 
 
 " I am so glad," she said, eagerly. " I want to think 
 you need me." 
 
 " How I need you ! " 
 
LITTLE WELLS OE GLADNESS 193 
 
 " Yes, I think you do, I am sure you do, and it makes 
 me so happy." 
 
 "Ah," he said, "now I know why Grizel loves me." 
 And perhaps he did know now. 
 
 She loved to think that she was more to him than the 
 new book, but was not always sure of it, and sometimes 
 this saddened her and again she decided that it was 
 right and fitting. She would hasten to him to say that 
 this saddened her. She would go just as impulsively to 
 say that she thought it right. 
 
 Her discoveries about herself were many. 
 
 "What is it to-day?" he would say, smiling fondly 
 at her. "I see it is something dreadful by your 
 face." 
 
 " It is something that struck me suddenly when I was 
 thinking of you, and I don't know whether to be glad 
 or sorry." 
 
 "Then be glad, you child." 
 
 " It is this. I used to think a good deal of myself, 
 the people here thought me haughty, they said I had 
 a proud walk." 
 
 "You have it still," he assured her; the vitality 
 in her as she moved was ever a delicious thing to him 
 to look upon. 
 
 "Yes, I feel I have," she admitted, "but that is only 
 because I am yours. And it used to be because I was 
 nobody's ! " 
 
 " Do you expect my face to fall at that ? " 
 13 
 
194 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 ' ' No, but I thought so much of myself once and now 
 I am nobody at all. At first it distressed me, and then 
 I was glad, for it makes you everything and me nothing. 
 Yes, T am glad, but I am just a little bit sorry that I 
 should be so glad ! " 
 
 "Poor Grizel !" said he. 
 
 "Poor Grrizel!" she echoed. "You are not angry 
 with me, are you, for being almost sorry for her, she 
 used to be so different. ' Where is your independence, 
 Grizel ? ' I say to her, and she shakes her sorrowful 
 head. The little girl I used to be need not look for me 
 any more ; if we were to meet in the den she would not 
 know me now." 
 
 Ah, if only Tommy could have loved in this way ! 
 He would have done it if he could. If we could love by 
 trying no one would ever have been more loved than 
 Grizel. "Am I to be condemned because I cannot?" 
 he sometimes said to himself in terrible anguish, for, 
 though pretty thoughts came to him to say to her when 
 she was with him, he suffered anguish for her when he 
 was alone. He knew it was tragic that such love as 
 hers should be given to him, but what more could he do 
 than he was doing ? 
 
CHAPTEE XIV 
 
 ELSPETH 
 
 EvEE since the beginning of the book we have been 
 neglecting Elspeth so pointedly that were she not the 
 most forgiving creature we should be afraid to face her 
 now. You are not angry with us, are you, Elspeth ? 
 We have been sitting with you, talking with you, think- 
 ing of you between the chapters, and the only reason 
 why you have so seldom got into them is that our pen 
 insisted on running after your fascinating brother. 
 
 (That is the way to get round her.) 
 
 Tommy, it need not be said, never neglected her. 
 The mere fact of his having an affair of his own at pres- 
 ent is a sure sign that she is comfortable, for, unless all 
 were well with Elspeth, no venture could have lured him 
 from her side. " Now I am ready for you," he said to 
 the world when Elspeth had been, figuratively speaking, 
 put to sleep; but until she was nicely tucked up, the 
 world had to wait ; he was still as in his boyhood, when 
 he had to see her with a good book in her hand before 
 he could set off on deeds of darkness. If this was but 
 the story of a brother and sister there were matter for it 
 that would make the ladies want to kiss Tommy on the 
 brow. 
 
196 TOMMT A]ST> GKIZEL 
 
 That Dr. Gemmell disliked, or at least distrusted Hm,. 
 Tommy knew before their acquaintance was an hour 
 old, yet that same evening he had said cordially to 
 Elspeth : 
 
 " This young doctor has a strong face." 
 
 She was evidently glad that Tommy had noticed it. 
 " Do you think him handsome ? " she inquired, 
 
 " Decidedly so," he replied, very handsomely, for it is 
 an indiscreet question to ask of a plain man. 
 
 There was nothing small about Tommy, was there? 
 He spoke thus magnanimously because he had seen that 
 the doctor liked Elspeth and that she liked him for lik- 
 ing her. Elspeth never spoke to him of such things, but 
 he was aware that au extra pleasure in life came to her 
 when she was admired; it gave her a little of the self- 
 confidence she so wofuUy lacked, the woman in her was 
 stirred. Take such presents as these to Elspeth, and 
 Tommy would let you cast stones at himself for the rest 
 of the day, and shake your hand warmly on parting. 
 
 In London Elspeth had always known quickly, almost 
 at the first clash of eyes, whether Tommy's friends were 
 attracted by her, but she had not known sooner than he. 
 Those acquaintanceships had seldom ripened, but per- 
 haps this was because, though he and she avoided talk- 
 ing of them, he was all the time taking such terrifying 
 care of her. She was always little Elspeth to him, for 
 whom he had done everything since the beginning of 
 her, a frail little female counterpart of himself that 
 
ELSPBTH 197 
 
 "would never have dared to grow up had he not always 
 been there to show her the way, like a stronger plant in 
 the same pot. It was even pathetic to him that Elspeth 
 should have to become a woman while he was a man, 
 and he set to, undaunted, to help her in this matter also. 
 To "be admired of men is a woman's right, and he knew 
 it gratified Elspeth, therefore he brought theiu in to 
 admire her. But beyond profound respect they could 
 not presume to go, he was watching them so vigilantly. 
 He had done everything for her so far, and it was evi- 
 dent that he was now ready to do the love-making also, 
 or at least to sift it before it reached her. Elspeth saw 
 this and perhaps it annoyed her once or twice, though on 
 the whole she was deeply touched ; and the young gen- 
 tlemen saw it also ; they saw that he would not leave 
 them alone with her for a moment, and that behind his 
 cordial manner sat a Tommy who had his eye on them. 
 
 Subjects suitable for conversation before Elspeth 
 seemed in presence of this strict brother to be limited. 
 You had just begun to tell her the plot of the new novel 
 when T. Sandys fixed you with his gleaming orb. You 
 were in the middle of the rumor about Mrs. Golightly, 
 when he let the poker fall. If the newsboys were 
 yelling the latest horror he quickly closed the window. 
 He made all visitors self-conscious. If she was not in 
 the room faw of them dared to ask if she was quite 
 well ; they paled before expressing the hope that she 
 would feel stronger to-morrow. Yet when Tommy went 
 
198 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 up to sit beside her, which was the moment the front 
 door closed, he took care to mention, incidentally, that 
 they had been inquiring after her. One of them ven- 
 tured on her birthday to bring her flowers, but could 
 not present them, Tommy looked so alarming. A still 
 more daring spirit once went the length of addressing 
 her by her Christian name. She did not start up 
 haughtily (the most timid of women are a surprise 
 at times), but the poker fell with a crash. 
 
 He knew Elspeth so well that he could tell exactly 
 how these poor young men should approach her. As 
 an artist as well as a brother he frowned when they 
 blundered; he would have liked to be the medium 
 through which they talked, so that he could give looks 
 and words their proper force ; he had thought it all out 
 so thoroughly, for Elspeth's benefit, that in an horn- 
 he could have drawn out a complete guide for her 
 admirers. 
 
 "At the first meeting look at her wistfully when she 
 does not see you. She will see you." It might have 
 been rule one. 
 
 Rule two, " Don't talk so glibly." How often that 
 was what the poker meant. 
 
 Being herself a timid creature, Elspeth showed best 
 among the timid, because her sympathetic heart imme- 
 diately desired to put them at their ease. The more 
 glibly they could talk, the less, she knew, were they 
 impressed by her; even a little boorishness was more 
 
ELSPBTH 199 
 
 complimentary than chatter. Sometimes when she 
 played on the piano, which Tommy had hired for her, 
 the visitor was so shy that he could not even mutter 
 "Thank you" to his hat; yet she might play to him 
 again and not to the gallant who remarked, briskly : 
 " How very charming ; what is that called ? " 
 
 To talk disparagingly of other women is so common 
 a way among men of penetrating into the favor of one 
 that, of course, some tried it with Elspeth. Tommy 
 could not excuse such blundering, for they were making 
 her despise them. He got them out of the house, and 
 then he and she had a long talk not about them, but 
 about men and women in general, from which she 
 gathered once again that there was nobody like Tommy. 
 
 When they bade each other good-night she would say 
 to him, " I think you are the one perfect gentleman in 
 the world." 
 
 Or he might say, " You expect so much of men, 
 Elspeth." 
 
 To which her reply : " You have taught me to do it, 
 and now I expect others to be like you." Sometimes she 
 would even say, "When I see you so fond of me and 
 taking such care of me I am ashamed. You think me 
 so much better than I am. You consider me so pure 
 and good, while I know that I am often mean and even 
 have wicked thoughts. It makes me ashamed, but 
 so proud of you, for I see that you are judging me 
 by yourself." 
 
200 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 Arid then this Tommy would put the gas out softly 
 and go to his own room, and let us hope, blush a 
 little. 
 
 One stripling had proposed to Elspeth, and on her 
 agitatedly declining him had flung out of the room in a 
 pet. It spoiled all her after-thoughts on the subject 
 and so roused her brother's indignation with the fellow. 
 If the great baby had only left all the arrangements 
 to Tommy he could so easily have made that final scene 
 one which Elspeth would remember with gratification 
 for the remainder of her days. For, of course, pride 
 in the offer could not be great unless she retained her 
 respect for the man who made it. From the tremulous 
 proposal and the manly acceptance of his fate to his 
 dignified exit (" Don't grieve for me, Miss Sandys, 
 you never gave me the least encouragement, and to have 
 loved you will always make me a better man ") , even to 
 a touching way of closing the door with one long, last, 
 lingering look, Tommy could have fitted him like 
 a tailor. 
 
 From all which it will be seen that our splendid 
 brother thought exclusively of what was best for 
 Elspeth, and was willing that the gentlemen, having 
 served their purpose, should, if it pleased them, go 
 hang. Also, though he thought out every other possible 
 move for the suitor, it never struck him to compose 
 a successful proposal, for the simple reason that he was 
 quite certain Elspeth would have none of them. Their 
 
ELSPETH 201 
 
 attentions pleased her, but exchange Tommy for one 
 of them — never. He knew it from her confessions' 
 at all stages of her life ; he had felt it from the days 
 ■when he began to be father and mother to her as well 
 as brother. In his heart he believed there was some- 
 thing of his own odd character in Elspeth which made 
 her as incapable of loving as himself, and some of his 
 devotion to her was due to this belief ; for perhaps 
 nothing touches us to the quick more than the feeling 
 that another suffers under our own curse, certainly 
 nothing draws two souls so close together in a lonely 
 comradeship. But though Tommy had reflected about 
 these things he did not trouble Elspeth with his con- 
 clusions ; he merely gave her to understand that he 
 loved her and she loved him so much that neither of 
 them had any love to give to another. It was very 
 beautiful, Elspeth thought, and a little tragic. 
 
 "You are quite sure that you mean that," she might 
 ask, timidly, " and that you are not flinging away your 
 life on me ? " 
 
 " You are all I need," he answered, cheerily, and he 
 believed it. Or if he was in another mood, he might 
 reflect that perhaps he was abstaining from love for 
 Elspeth's sake, and that made him cheery also. 
 
 And now David Gemmell was the man, and Tommy 
 genially forgaye him all else for liking Elspeth. He 
 invited the doctor, who so obviously distrusted him, to 
 drop in of an evening for a game at the dambrod (which 
 
202 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 they both abominated, but it was an easy excuse) ; he 
 asked him confidentially to come in and see Aaron, who 
 had been coughing last night ; he put on all the airs of a 
 hail-fellow-well-met, though they never became him, and 
 sat awkwardly on his face. David always seemed eager 
 to come, and tried to rise above his suspicions of 
 Tommy, as Tommy saw, and failed, as Tommy saw 
 again. Elspeth dosed the doctor with stories of her 
 brother's lovely qualities, and Tommy, the forgiving, 
 honestly pitied the poor man for having to listen to 
 them. He knew that if all went well Gemmell would 
 presently propose and find that Elspeth (tearful at hav- 
 ing to strike a blow) could not accept him, but he did 
 not look forward maliciously to this as his revenge on 
 the doctor; he was thinking merely of what was good 
 for Elspeth. 
 
 There was no open talk about David between the 
 brother and sister. Some day. Tommy presumed, she 
 would announce that the doctor had asked her to 
 marry him ; and oh, how sorry she was ; and oh, what a 
 good man he was ; and oh, Tommy knew she had never 
 encouraged him ; and oh she could never leave Tommy. 
 But until that day arrived they avoided talking directly 
 about what brought Gemmell there. That he came to see 
 Elspeth neither of them seemed to conceive as possible. 
 Did Tommy chuckle when he saw David's eyes follow- 
 ing her? No; solemn as a cat blinking at the fire; 
 noticed nothing. The most worldly ehaperone, the most 
 
ELSPETH 203 
 
 loving mother, could not have done more for Elspeth. 
 Yet it was not done to find her a husband, but quite the 
 reverse, as we have seen. On reflection Tommy must 
 smile at what he has been doing, but not while he is 
 working the figures. The artist never smiles at himself 
 until afterwards. 
 
 And now he not only wondered at times how Elspeth 
 and David were getting on, but whether she noticed how 
 he was getting on with Grizel, for in matters relating to 
 Tommy Elspeth was almost as sharp as he in matters 
 that related to her, and he knew it. When he proposed 
 to Elspeth that they should ask Gemmell to go fishing 
 with them on the morrow (" he has been overworked of 
 late and it would do him good ") he wanted to add, in a 
 careless voice, " We might invite Grizel also," but could 
 not, his lips suddenly went dry ; and when Elspeth said 
 the words that were so diflBcult to him he wondered, 
 " Did she say that because she knew I wished it ? " 
 But he decided that she did not, for she was evidently 
 looking forward to to-morrow, and he knew she would 
 be shuddering if she thought her Tommy was slipping. 
 
 " I am so glad it was she who asked me," Grizel said 
 to him when he told her. " Don't you see what it 
 means ? It means that she wants to get you out of 
 the way ! You are not everything to her now as you 
 used to be. Are you glad, glad ? " 
 
 " If I could believe it ! " Tommy said. 
 
 "What else could make her want to be alone with 
 him?" 
 
204 TOMMY AUD GEIZEL 
 
 Nothing else conld have made Grizel want to be alone 
 with him, and she must always judge others by herself. 
 But, Tommy knew that Elspeth was difEerent, and that 
 a girl with some of himself in her might want to be 
 alone with a man who admired her without wanting 
 to marry him. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 BY PKOSEN WATER 
 
 That day by the banks of Prosen water was one of 
 Grizel's beautiful memories. All the days when she 
 thought he loved her became beautiful memories. 
 
 It was the time of reds and whites, for the glory of 
 the broom had passed except at great heights, and the 
 wild roses were trooping in. When the broom is in 
 flame, there seems to be no color but yeUow, but when 
 the wild roses come we remember that the broom was 
 flaunting. It was not quite a lady, for it insisted on 
 being looked at, while these light-hearted things are 
 too innocent to know that there is anyone to look. 
 Grizel was sitting by the side of the stream adorning 
 her hat fantastically with roses red and white and some 
 that were neither. They were those that cannot decide 
 whether they look best in white or red and so waver for 
 the whole of their little lives between the two colors, 
 there are many of them and it is the pathetic thing 
 about wild roses. She did not pay much heed to her 
 handiwork. What she was saying to herself was that 
 in another minute he and she would be alone. Nothing 
 else in the world mattered very much. Every bit of 
 
206 TOMMT AST) GKIZBL 
 
 her was conscious of it as the supreme event. Her 
 fingers pressed it upon the flowers. It was in her eyes 
 as much as in her heart. He went on casting his line, 
 moving from stone to stone, dropping down the bank, 
 ascending it as if the hooking of a trout was something 
 to him. Was he feeling to his marrow that as soon as 
 those other two figures rounded the bend in the stream 
 he and she would have the world to themselves ? Ah, 
 of course he felt it, but was it quite as much to him as 
 it was to her ? 
 
 "Not quite so much," she said bravely to herself, "I 
 don't want it to be quite so much — but nearly." 
 
 And now they were alone as no two can be except 
 those who love, for when the third person leaves them 
 they have a universe to themselves, and it is closed in 
 by the heavens, and the air of it is the consciousness 
 of each other's presence. She sat motionless now, 
 trembling, exulting. She could no longer hear the talk- 
 ing of the water, but she heard his step. He was com- 
 ing slowly toward her. She did not look up, she waited, 
 and while she waited time was annihilated. 
 
 He was coming to her to treat her as if she were 
 a fond child; that she, of all women, could permit it 
 was still delicious to him and a marvel ; she had let him 
 do it yesterday, but perhaps she had regained her inde- 
 pendence in the night. As he hesitated he became 
 another person; in a flood of feeling he had a fierce 
 desire to tell her the truth about himself. But he did 
 
SHE DID NOT LOOK UP, SHE WAITED 
 
BY PROSBN WATBB 207 
 
 not know what it was. He put aside Ms rod and sat 
 down very miserably beside her. 
 
 "Grizel, I suppose I am a knave." His lips parted 
 to say it, but no words came ; she had given him an 
 adorable look that stopped them as if her dear hand 
 had been placed upon his mouth. 
 
 Was he a knave ? He wanted honestly to know. He 
 had not tried to make her love him. Had he known in 
 time he would even have warned her against it. He 
 would never have said he loved her had she not first, 
 as she thought, found it out ; to tell her the truth then 
 would have been brutal ; he had made-believe in order 
 that she might remain happy. Was it even make- 
 belief? Assuredly he did love her in his own way, 
 in the only way he was capable of. She was far more 
 to him than any other person except Elspeth ; he 
 delighted in her and would have fought till he dropped 
 rather than let any human being injure her, all his feel- 
 ings for her were pure. He was prepared to marry her, 
 but if she had not made that mistake, oh, what a delight 
 it would have been to him never to marry any one. He 
 felt keenly miserable. 
 
 " Grizel, I seem to be different from all other men ; 
 there seems to be some curse upon me that makes me 
 unable to love as they do. I want to love you, dear one, 
 you are the only woman I ever wanted to love, but 
 apparently I can't. I have decided to go on with 
 this thing because it seems best for you, but is it ? I 
 
208 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 ■would tell you all and leave the decision to you were 
 it not that I fear you would think I wanted you to 
 let me off." 
 
 It would have been an honest speech, and he might 
 have said it had he begun at once, for it was in a pas- 
 sion to be out, so desirous was he that dear Grizel should 
 not be deceived, but he tried its effect first upon him- 
 self, and as he went on the tragedy he saw mastered 
 him. He forgot that she was there, except as a figure 
 needed to complete the picture of the man who could 
 not love ; he saw himself a splendidly haggard creature 
 with burning eyes standing aside while all the world 
 rolled by in pursuit of the one thing needful ; it was a 
 river and he must stand parched on the bank for ever 
 and ever. Should he keep that sorrowful figure a man or 
 turn it into a woman ? He tried a woman. She was on 
 the bank now, her arms outstretched to the flood; ah, 
 she would be so glad to drink though she must drown. 
 
 Grizel saw how mournful he had become as he gazed 
 upon her. In his face she had been seeing all the 
 glories that can be given to mortals, thoughts had 
 come to her that drew her nearer to her Grod, her 
 trust in him stretched to eternity. All that was given 
 to her at that moment she thought was also given to 
 him. She seemed to know why with love lighting up 
 their souls to each other he could yet grow mournfuL 
 
 " Oh," she cried, with a movement that was a pas- 
 sionate caress, " do you indeed love me so much as 
 
BY PROSBN WATEK 209 
 
 that? I never wanted you to love me quite so much 
 as that ! " 
 
 It brought him back to himself, but without a start. 
 Those sudden returns to fact had ceased to bewilder 
 him ; they were grown so common that he passed 
 between dreams and reality as through tissue-paper. 
 
 " I did not mean," she said at last, in a tremor, " that 
 I wanted you to love me less, but I am almost sorry 
 that you love me quite so much." 
 
 He dared say nothing, for he did not altogether 
 understand. 
 
 " I have those fears, too, sometimes," she went on ; 
 " I have had them when I was with you, but more 
 often when I was alone ; they come to me suddenly, 
 and I have such eager longings to run to you and tell 
 you of them and ask you to drive them away. But 
 I never did it, I kept them to myself." 
 
 " You could keep something back from me, Grizel ? " 
 
 "Forgive me," she implored; "I thought they would 
 distress you, and I had such a desire to bring you noth- 
 ing but happiness. To bear them by myself seemed 
 to be helping you, and I was glad, I was proud, to feel 
 myself of use to you even to that little extent. I did not 
 know you had the same fears ; I thought that perhaps 
 they came only to women ; have you had them before ? 
 
 "Fears," she continued, so wistfully, " that it is too 
 
 beautiful to end happily ? Oh, have you heard a voice 
 
 crying ' It is too beautiful, it can never be ' ? " 
 
 14 
 
210 TOMMY AJSD GEIZEL 
 
 He saw clearly now, he saw so clearly that he was 
 torn with emotion. " It is more than I can bear," 
 he said, hoarsely. Surely he loved her. 
 
 " Did you see me die ? " she asked, in a whisper. '' I 
 have seen you die." 
 
 " Don't, Grizel ! " he cried. 
 
 But she had to go ou. "Tell me," she begged, "I 
 have told you." 
 
 "No, no, never that," he answered her. "At the 
 worst I have had only the feeling that you could never 
 be mine." 
 
 She smiled at that. " I am yours," she said, softly, 
 " nothing can take away that, nothing, nothing. I say 
 it to myself a hundred times a day, it is so sweet. 
 Nothing can separate us but death ; I have thought 
 of all the other possible things and none of them is 
 strong enough. But when I think of your dying, oh, 
 when I think of my being left without you ! " 
 
 She rocked her arms in a frenzy and called him 
 dearest darlingest. All the sweet names that had been 
 the child Grizel's and the old doctor's were Tommy's 
 now. He soothed her, ah, surely as only a lover could 
 soothe. She was his Grizel, she was his beloved. No 
 mortal could have been more impassioned than Tommy. 
 He must have loved her. It could not have been 
 merely sympathy or an exquisite delight in being the 
 man or the desire to make her happy again in the 
 quickest way, or all three combined? Whatever it 
 
BY PEOSEN WATER 211 
 
 was he did not know, all he knew was that he felt every 
 word he said, or seemed to feel it. 
 
 " It is a punishment to me," Grizel said, setting her 
 teeth, " for loving you too much, I know I love you too 
 much. I think I love you more than God." 
 
 She felt him shudder. 
 
 "But if I feel it," she said, shuddering also, yet 
 unable to deceive herself, "what difference do I make 
 by saying it ? He must know it is so whether I say it 
 or not." 
 
 There was a tremendous difference to Tommy, but not 
 of a kind he could explain, and she went on ; she must 
 tell him everything now. 
 
 " I pray every night and morning, but that is nothing, 
 everyone does it. I know I thank God sincerely, I thank 
 Him again and again and again. Do you remember how, 
 when I was a child, you used to be horrified because I 
 prayed standing? I often say little prayers standing 
 now, I am always thanking Him for giving me you. 
 But all the time it is a bargain with Him. So long as 
 you are well I love Him, but if you were to die I would 
 never pray again. I have never said it in words untU. 
 to-day, but He must know it, for it is behind all my 
 prayers. If He does not know, there cannot be a 
 God." 
 
 She was watching his face, half-wofully, half-stub- 
 bornly, as if, whatever might be the issue of those 
 words, she had to say them. She saw how pained he 
 
212 TOMMY ASD GBIZBL 
 
 was. To admit the possible non-existence of a God 
 ■when you can so easily leave the subject alone was 
 horrible to Tommy. 
 
 "I don't doubt Him," she continued, "I have be- 
 lieved in Him ever since the time when I was such a 
 lonely child that I did not know His name. I shall 
 always believe in Him so long as He does not take you 
 from me. But if He does, then I shall not believe in 
 Him any more. It maybe wrong, but that is what I 
 feel. 
 
 "It makes you care less for me!" she cried, in 
 anguish. 
 
 "Ko, no, dear." 
 
 "I don't think it makes Grod care less for me," she 
 said, very seriously. " I think He is pleased 'that I don't 
 try to cheat Him." 
 
 Somehow Tommy felt uncomfortable at that. 
 
 "There are people," he said, vaguely, Kke one who 
 thought it best to mention no names, " who would be 
 afraid to challenge God in that way." 
 
 " He would not be worth believing in," she answered, 
 " if He could be revengeful. He is too strong and too 
 loving and too pitiful for that." But she took hold of 
 Tommy as if to protect him. Had they been in physical 
 danger her first impulse would have been to get in front 
 of him to protect him. The noblest women probably al- 
 ways love in this way, and yet it is those who would 
 hide behind them that men seem to love the best. 
 
BY PROSBN WATER 213 
 
 " I always feel, oh, I never can help feeling," she said, 
 "that nothing could happen to you, that God Him- 
 self could not take you from me while I had hold of 
 you." 
 
 " Grizel ! " 
 
 " I mean only that He could not have the heart," she 
 said, hastily. "No, I don't," she had to add, " I meant 
 what you thought I meant. That is why I feel it would 
 be so sweet to be married, so that I could be close to you 
 every moment, and then no harm could come to you. I 
 would keep such grip of you, I should be such a 
 part of you that you could not die without my dying 
 also. 
 
 " Oh, do you care less for me now ? " she cried. " I 
 can't see things as clearly as you do, dearest darlingest. 
 I have not a beautiful nature like yours. I am naturally 
 rebellious. I have to struggle even to be as good as I 
 am. There are evil things in my blood. You remember 
 how we found out that ; God knew it, too, and He 
 is compassionate. I think He makes many pitying 
 allowances for me. It is not wicked, is it, to think 
 that ? " 
 
 " You used to know me too well, Grizel, to speak of 
 my beautiful nature," he said, humbly. 
 
 " I did think you vain," she replied. " How odd to 
 remember that ! " 
 
 " But I was and am." 
 
 " I love to hear you proving you are not," said she 
 
214 TOMMY AJSTD GRIZEL 
 
 beaming upon him. " Do you think," she asked, with a 
 sudden change of manner to the childish, like one trying 
 to coax a compliment out of him, " that I have improved 
 at all during those last days ? I think I am not quite 
 such a horrid girl as I used to be, and if I am not I owe it 
 to you ; I am so glad to owe it to you." She told him that 
 she was trying to make herself a tiny bit more like him 
 by studying his book. " It is not exactly the things you 
 say of women that help me, for though they are lovely I 
 am not sure that they are quite true. I almost hope 
 they are not true, for if they are, then I am not even an 
 average woman." She buried her face in his coat. 
 "You say women are naturally purer than men, but I 
 don't know. Perhaps we are more cunning only. Per- 
 haps it is not even a thing to wish, for if we were, it 
 would mean that we are good because there is less evil 
 in us to fight against. Dear, forgive me for saying that, 
 it may be all wrong ; but I think it is what nearly all 
 women feel in their hearts, though they keep it locked 
 up till they die. I don't even want you to believe me. 
 You think otherwise of us, and it is so sweet of you that 
 we try to be better than we are, to undeceive you would 
 hurt so. It is not the book that makes me a better 
 woman, it is the man I see behind it." 
 
 He was too much moved to be able to reply, too much 
 humbled. He vowed to himself that whether he could 
 love or not he would be a good husband to this dear 
 woman. 
 
BY PKOSBN WATER 215 
 
 " Ah, Grizel," he declared, by and by, " what a de- 
 licious book you are, and how I wish I had written 
 you ! With every word you say, something within me 
 is shouting, ' Am I not a wonder ! ' I warned you it 
 would be so as soon as I felt that I had done anything 
 really big, and I have. I have somehow made you 
 love me. Ladies and gentlemen," he exclaimed, ad- 
 dressing the river and the trees and the roses, " I have 
 somehow made her love me, am I not a wonder ! " 
 
 Grizel clapped her hands gayly; she was merry 
 again; she could always be what Tommy wanted her 
 to be. " Ladies and gentlemen," she cried, " how could 
 I help it ? » 
 
 David had been coming back for his fly-book, and 
 though he did not hear their words he saw a light in 
 Grizel's face that suddenly set him thinking. For the 
 rest of the day he paid little attention to Elspeth. 
 Some of his answers showed her that he was not even 
 listening to her. 
 
CHAPTEE XVI 
 
 " HOW COULD XOU HUET TOUE GEIZEL SO ! " 
 
 To concentrate on Elspeth so that he might find out 
 what was in her mind was, as we have seen, seldom 
 necessary to Tommy, for he had learned her by heart 
 long ago. Yet a time was now come when he had to 
 concentrate, and even then he was doubtful of the re- 
 sult. So often he had put that mind of hers to right 
 that it was an open box to him, or had been, until he 
 conceived the odd notion that perhaps it contained a 
 secret drawer. This would have been resented by most 
 brothers, but Tommy's chagrin was nothing compared 
 to the exhilaration with which he perceived that he 
 might be about to discover something new about woman. 
 He was like the digger whose hand is on the point of 
 closing on a diamond, a certain holiness added. 
 
 What puzded him was the state of affairs now ex- 
 isting between Elspeth and the doctor. A week had 
 elapsed since the fishing excursion and David had not 
 visited them. Too busy ? Tommy knew that it is 
 the busy people who can find time. Could it be that 
 David had proposed to her at the water-side ? 
 
 No, he could not read that in Elspeth's face. He 
 knew that she would be in distress lest her refusal 
 
" HOW COTTLD TOXJ HTJET TOXJK GRIZBL SO ! " 217 
 
 > 
 
 should darken the doctor's life for too long a time, 
 but yet (shake your fist at him, ladies, for so misunder- 
 standing you) he expected also to note in that sym- 
 pathetic face a look of subdued triumph, and as it was 
 not there David could not have proposed. 
 
 The fact of her not having told him about it at once 
 did not prove to Tommy that there had been no pro- 
 posal. His feeling was that she would consider it too 
 sacred a thing to tell even to him, but that it would 
 force its way out in a week or two. 
 
 On the other hand, she could not have resisted drop- 
 ping shyly such remarks as these, " I think Dr. Gemmell 
 is a noble man," or, " How wonderfully good Dr. Gem- 
 mell is to the poor." 
 
 Also she would sometimes have given Tommy a glance 
 that said, " I wonder if you guess." 
 
 Had they quarrelled ? Tommy smiled. If it was 
 but a quarrel he was not merely appeased, he was 
 pleased. Had he had the ordering of the affair he 
 would certainly have included a lover's quarrel in it, and 
 had it not been that he wanted to give her the pleasure 
 of finding these things out for herself, he would have 
 taken her aside and addressed her thus : " No need to 
 look tragic, Elspeth ; for to a woman this must be really 
 one of the most charming moments in the comedy. 
 You feel that he would not have quarrelled had he had 
 any real caring for you, and yet in your heart you know 
 it is a proof that he has. To a woman, I, who know, 
 
218 TOMMY AUD GBIZEL 
 
 assure you that nothing can be more delicious. Your 
 feeling for him, as you and I well know, is but a senti- 
 ment of attraction because he loves you as you are 
 unable to love him, and as you are so pained by this 
 quarrel, consider how much more painful it must be 
 to him. You think you have been slighted; that when 
 a man has seemed to like you so much you have a right 
 to be told so by him that you may help him with your 
 sympathy ; oh, Elspeth, you think yourself unhappy 
 just now when you are really in the middle of one of 
 the pleasantest bits of it. Love is a series of thriUs, 
 the one leading to the other, and as your careful guar- 
 dian I would not have you miss one of them. You wiU. 
 come to the final bang quickly enough and find it the 
 finest thrill of all, but it is soon over. When you have 
 had to tell him that you are not for him there are left 
 only the pleasures of memory, and the more of them 
 there were the more there will be to look back to. I 
 beg you, Elspeth, not to hurry ; loiter rather, smelling 
 the flowers and plucking them, for you may never be 
 this way again." 
 
 All these things he might have pointed out to Elspeth 
 had he wanted her to look at the matter rationally, 
 but he had no such wish. He wanted her to enjoy her- 
 self as the blessed do, without knowing why. No pity 
 for the man, you see, but uo ill-will to him. David was 
 having his thrills also, and though the last of them 
 would seem a staggerer to him at the time, it would 
 
"HOW COtTLD YOU HTIRT YOUB GEIZEL SO ! " 219 
 
 gradually become a sunny memory. The only tragedy 
 is not to have known love. So long as you have the 
 experiences it does not greatly matter whether your suit 
 was a failure or successful. 
 
 So Tommy decided, but he feared at the same time 
 that there had been no quarrel, that David had simply 
 drawn back. 
 
 How he saw through Elspeth's brave attempts to 
 show that she had never for a moment thought of 
 David's having any feeling for her save ordinary friend- 
 ship — yes, they were brave, but not brave enough for 
 Tommy. At times she would say something bitter 
 about life (not about the doctor, for he was never 
 mentioned), and it was painful to her brother to see 
 gentle Elspeth grown cynical. He suffered even more 
 when her manner indicated that she knew she was too 
 poor a creature to be loved by any man. Tommy was 
 in great woe about Elspeth at this time, he was think- 
 ing much more about her than about Grizel, but do 
 not blame him unreservedly for that ; the two women 
 who were his dears were pulling him different ways, and 
 he could not accompany both ; he had made up his 
 mind to be loyal to Grizel, and so all his pity could 
 go to Elspeth. On the day he had his talk with the 
 doctor therefore he had, as it were, put Grizel aside 
 only because she was happy just now and so had not 
 Elspeth's need of him. 
 
 The doctor and he had met on the hill, whence the 
 
220 TOMMY AOTJ GKIZEL 
 
 few who look may see one of the fairest views in Scot- 
 land. Tommy was stroUing up and down, and the few 
 other persons on the hill were glancing with good- 
 humored suspicion at him, as we all look at celebrated 
 characters. Had he been happy he would have known 
 that they were watching him, and perhaps have put his 
 hands behind his back to give them more for their 
 money, as the saying is, but he was miserable ; his one 
 consolation was that the blow he must strike Elspeth 
 when he told her of his engagement need not be struck 
 just yet. David could not have chosen a worse moment 
 therefore for saying so bluntly what he said : " I hear 
 you are to be married. If so, I should like to congratu- 
 late you." 
 
 Tommy winced like one charged with open cruelty to 
 his sister — charged with it, too, by the real criminal. 
 
 " It is not true ? " David asked quietly, and Tommy 
 turned from him glaring. " I am sorry I spoke of it, as 
 it is not true," the doctor said after a pause, the crow's 
 feet showing round his eyes as always when he was in 
 mental pain, and presently he went away, after giving 
 Tommy a contemptuous look. Did Tommy deserve that 
 look ? We must remember that he had wanted to make 
 the engagement public at once ; if he shrank from ad- 
 mitting it for the present, it was because of Elspeth's 
 plight. " Grizel, you might have given her a little time 
 to recover from this man's faithlessness," was what his 
 heart cried. He believed that Grizel had told David, 
 
"HOW COULD YOTJ HUET TOUB GEIZEL SO ! " 221 
 
 and for the last time in his life he was angry with her. 
 He strode down the hill savagely toward Caddam Wood, 
 where he knew he should find her. 
 
 Soon he saw her. She was on one of the many tiny 
 paths that lead the stranger into the middle of the wood 
 and then leave him there maliciously, or because they 
 dare not venture any farther themselves. They could 
 play no tricks on Grizel, however, for she knew and was 
 fond of them all. Tommy had said that she loved them 
 because they were such little paths, that they appealed 
 to her like babies, and perhaps there was something 
 in it. 
 
 She came up the path with the swing of one who was 
 gleefully happy. Some of the Thrums people, you 
 remember, said that G-rizel strutted because she was so 
 satisfied with herself, and if you like an ugly word, we 
 may say that she strutted to-day. It was her whole be- 
 ing giving utterance to the joy within her that love had 
 brought. As Grizel came up the path on that bright 
 afternoon, she could no more have helped strutting than 
 the bud to open on the appointed day. She was obeying 
 one of Nature's laws. I think I promised long ago to 
 tell you of the day when Grizel would strut no more. 
 Well, this is the day. Observe her strutting for the last 
 time. It was very strange and touching to her to 
 remember ia the after years that she had once strutted, 
 but it was still more strange and touching to Tommy. 
 
 She was like one over-filled with delight when she 
 
222 TOMMY AMD GEIZBL 
 
 saw him. How could she know that he was to strike 
 her? 
 
 He did not speak. She was not displeased. When 
 anything so tremendoiis happened as the meeting of 
 these two, how could they find words at once ? 
 
 She bent and pressed her lips to his sleeve, but he 
 drew away with a gesture that startled her. 
 
 " You are not angry ? " she said, stopping. 
 
 " Yes," he replied, doggedly. 
 
 " Not with me ? " Her hand went to her heart. 
 
 " With me ! " A wounded animal could not have 
 uttered a cry more pathetic. "Not with me!" She 
 clutched his arm. 
 
 " Have I no cause to be angry ? " he said. 
 
 She looked at him in bewilderment. Could this be 
 he ? Oh, could it be she ? 
 
 " Cause ? How could I give you cause ? " 
 
 It seemed unanswerable to her. How could Grizel do 
 anything that would give him the right to be angry with 
 her ? Oh, men, men, will you never understand how 
 absolutely all of her a woman's love can be ? If she 
 gives you everything, how can she give you more ? She 
 is not another person, she is part of you. Does one 
 finger of your hand plot against another ? 
 
 He told her sullenly of his scene with the doctor. 
 " I am very sorry," she said, but her eyes were still 
 searching for the reason why Tommy could be angry 
 with her. 
 
"HOW COULD TOTT HUET YOUK GRIZBL SOl " 223 
 
 " You made me promise to tell no one," lie said, " and 
 I have kept my promise, but you — " 
 
 The anguish that was Grizel's then ! " You can't 
 think that I told him ! " she cried, and she held out her 
 arms as if to remind him of who she was. " You can 
 believe that of your Grizel ? " 
 
 " I daresay you have not done it wittingly, but this 
 man has guessed, and he could never have guessed it 
 from a look or word of mine." 
 
 " It must have been I ! " she said, slowly. " Tell me," 
 she cried, like a suppliant, " how have I done it ? " 
 
 "Your manner, your face," he answered, "it must 
 have been that. I don't blame you, Grizel, but — yes, it 
 must have been that, and it is hard on me." 
 
 He was in misery, and these words leapt out. They 
 meant only that it was hard on him if Elspeth had to be 
 told of his engagement in the hour of her dejection. 
 He did not mean to hurt Grizel to the quick ; however 
 terrible the loss of his freedom might be to the man who 
 could not love, he always intended to be true to her. 
 But she gave the words a deeper meaning. 
 
 She stood so still she seemed to be pondering, and at 
 last she said, quietly, as if they had been discussing 
 some problem outside themselves, " Yes, I think it must 
 have been that." She looked long at him. " It is very 
 hard on you," she said. 
 
 " I feel sure it was that," she went on, and now her 
 figure was erect and again it broke, and sometimes there 
 
224 TOMMY AJSnO GBIZBL 
 
 was a noble scorn in her voice, but more often there was 
 only pitiful humility. "I feel sure it was that, for I 
 have often wondered how everybody did not know. I 
 have broken my promise. I used always to be able to 
 keep a promise ; I had every other fault, I was hard and 
 proud and intolerant, but I was true. I think I was 
 vain of that, though I see now it was only something I 
 could not help, from the moment when I had a difficulty 
 in keeping a promise I ceased to keep it. I love you so 
 much that I carry my love in my face for all to read. 
 They cannot see me meet you without knowing the 
 truth ; they cannot hear me say your name but I betray 
 myself ; I show how I love you in every movement ; I 
 am full of you ; how can anyone look at me and not see 
 you ? I should have been more careful, oh, I could have 
 been so much more careful had I loved you a little less 
 It is very hard on you." 
 
 The note of satire had died out of her voice, her every 
 look and gesture carried in it nothing but love for him, 
 but all the unhappy dog could say was something about 
 self-respect. 
 
 Her mouth opened as if for bitterness, but no sound 
 came. " How much self-respect do you think is left for 
 me after to-day ? " she said, mournfully, at last, and then 
 she quickly took a step nearer her dear one as if to 
 caress the spot where these words had struck him. But 
 she stopped, and for a moment she was the Grizel of old. 
 "Have no fear," she said, with a trembling, crooked 
 
"HOW COULD YOU HURT YOUK GEIZEL SO ! " 225 
 
 smile, " there is only one thing to be done now, and I 
 shall do it. All the blame is mine. You shall not be 
 deprived of your self-respect." 
 
 He had not been asking for his freedom, but he heard 
 it running to him now, and he knew that if he answered 
 nothing he would be whistling it back forever. A mad- 
 ness to be free at any cost swept over him ; he let go his 
 hold on self-respect, and clapped his hand on freedom. 
 
 He answered nothing, and the one thing for her to do 
 was to go, and she did it, but it was only for a moment 
 that she could be altogether the Grizel of old. She 
 turned to take a long, last look at him, but the woefulness 
 of herself was -what she saw. She cried, with infinite 
 pathos, " Oh, how could you hurt your Grizel so ! " 
 
 He controlled himself and let her go. His freedom 
 was fawning on him, licking his hands and face, and in 
 that madness he actually let Grizel go. It was not until 
 she was out of sight that he gave utterance to a harsh 
 laugh. He knew what he was at that moment as you 
 and I shall never be able to know him, eavesdrop how 
 we may. 
 
 He flung himself down in a blaeberry-bed and lay 
 there doggedly, his weak mouth tightly closed. A great 
 silence reigned; no, not a great silence, for he continued 
 to hear the cry, " Oh, how could you hurt your Grizel 
 so ! " She scarcely knew that she had said it, but to 
 him who knew what she had been and what he had 
 changed her into and for what alone she was to blame, 
 
 15 
 
226 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 there was an unconscious pathos in it that was terrible ; 
 it was the epitome of all that was Grizel, all that was 
 adorable and all that was pitiful in her ; it rang in his 
 mind like a bell of doom ; he believed its echo would not 
 be quite gone from his ears when he died. If all the 
 wise men in the world had met to consider how Grizel 
 could most effectively say farewell to Tommy they 
 could not have thought out a better sentence ; however 
 completely he had put himself emotionally in her place 
 with this same object he would have been inspired by 
 nothing quite so good. 
 
 But they were love's dying words. He knew he could 
 never again, though he tried, be to Grizel what he had 
 been. The water was spilled on the ground. She had 
 thought him all that was glorious in man ; that was 
 what her love had meant, and it was spilled. There 
 was only one way in which he could wound her more 
 cruelly than she was already hurt, and that was by dar- 
 ing to ask her to love him still. To imply that he 
 thought her pride so broken, her independence, her 
 maidenly modesty, all that make up the loveliness of a 
 girl, so lost that by entreaties he could persuade her to 
 forgive him, would destroy her altogether, it would re- 
 veal to her how low he thought her capable of falling. 
 
 I suppose we should all like to think that it would 
 have been thus with Grizel, but our wishes are of small 
 account. It was not many minutes since she left Tommy 
 to be his no more, his knife still in her heart, but she 
 
"HOW COULD YO0 HTJET TOTTE 6KIZEL SO! " 227 
 
 had not reached the end of the wood when all in front 
 of her seemed a world of goblins, and a future without 
 him not to be faced. He might beat her or scorn her, 
 but not for an hour could she exist without him. She 
 wrung her arms in woe, the horror of what she was 
 doing tore her in pieces, but not all this prevented her 
 turning back, it could not even make her go slowly ; she 
 did not walk back, she stole back in little runs ; she 
 knew it was her destruction, but her arms were out- 
 stretched to the spot where she had left him. 
 
 He was no longer there, and he saw her between the 
 firs before she could see him. As he realized what her 
 coming back meant, his frame shook with pity for her. 
 All the dignity had gone from her, she looked as 
 shamed as a dog stealing back after it had been whipped. 
 She knew she was shamed, he saw she knew it, the de- 
 spairing rocking of her arms proved it ; yet she was 
 coming back to him in little runs. 
 
 Pity, chivalry, oh, surely love itself, lifted him to his 
 feet, and all else passed out of him save an imperious 
 desire to save her as much humiliation as he could, to 
 give her back a few of those garments of pride and self- 
 respect that had fallen from her. At least she should not 
 think that she had to come all the way to him. With 
 a stifled sob he rose and ran up the path toward her. 
 
 "Grizel! It is you! My beloved! How could you 
 leave me — oh, Grizel, my love, hq^ oould you mis- 
 understand me so ! " 
 
228 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 She gave a glad cry. She sought feebly to hold him 
 at arm's length, to look at him watchfully, to read him 
 as in the old days ; but the old days were gone. He 
 strained her to him. Oh, surely it was love at last. 
 He thanked God that he loved at last. 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 HOW TOMMY SAVED THE ELAG 
 
 He loved at last, but had no time to exult just now, 
 for he eould not rejoice with Tommy while his dear one 
 drooped in shame. Ah, so well he understood that she 
 believed she had done the unpardonable thing in woman, 
 and that while she thought so she must remain a broken 
 column. It was a great task he saw before him, nothing 
 less than to make her think that what she had done was 
 not shameful but exquisite, that she had not tarnished 
 the flag of love but glorified it. Artfulness, you will 
 see, was needed, but, remember, he was now using all 
 his arts in behalf of the woman he loved. 
 
 "You were so long in coming back to me, Grizel. 
 The agony of it ! " 
 
 " Did it seem long ? " She spoke in a trembling 
 voice, hiding her face in him. She listened like one 
 anxious to seize his answer as it left his heart. 
 
 " So long," he answered, " that it seemed to me we 
 must be old when we met again. I saw a future with- 
 out you stretching before me to the grave, and I turned 
 and ran from, it." 
 
 " That is how I felt," she whispered. 
 
 " You ! " Tommy cried, in excellent amazement. 
 
230 TOMMY AJfD GEIZBL 
 
 " What else could have made me come ? " 
 
 " I thought it was pity that had brought you. Pity 
 for me, Grizel. I thought you had perhaps come back 
 to be angry with me " 
 
 " How could I be 1 " she cried. 
 
 "How could you help it, rather?" said he. "I was 
 cruel, Grizel, I spoke like a fool as well as like a dastard, 
 but it was only anxiety for Elspeth that made me do it. 
 Dear one, be angry with me as often as you choose, 
 and whether I deserve it or not, but don't go away 
 from me; never send me from you again. Anything 
 but that." 
 
 It was how she had felt again, and her hold on him 
 tightened with sudden joy. So well he knew what that 
 grip meant ! He did not tell her that he had not loved 
 her fully until now. He would have liked to tell her 
 how true love had been born in him as he saw her steal- 
 ing back to him, but it was surely best for her npt to 
 know that any transformation had been needed. "I 
 don't say that I love you more now than ever before," 
 he said, carefully, " but one thing I do know, that I 
 never admired you quite so much." 
 
 She looked up in surprise. 
 
 " I mean your character," he said, determinedly. " I 
 have always known how strong and noble it was, but I 
 never quite thought you could do anything so beautiful 
 as this." 
 
 Beautiful ! She could only echo the word. 
 
HOW TOMMY SAVED THE FLAG 231 
 
 " Many women, even of the best," he told her, " would 
 have resorted to little feminine ways of humbling such 
 a blunderer as I have been ; they would have spurned 
 him for weeks, made him come to them on his knees, 
 perhaps have thought that his brutality of a moment 
 outweighed all his love. When I saw you coming to 
 meet me half-way — Oh, Grizel, tell me that you were 
 doing that?" 
 
 " Yes, yes, yes ! " she answered, eagerly, so that she 
 might not detain him a moment. 
 
 "When I saw you I realized that you were willing 
 to forgive me, that you were coming to say so, that 
 no thought of lowering me first was in your mind, that 
 yours was a love above the littleness of ordinary people, 
 and the adorableness of it filled me with a glorious 
 joy ; I saw in that moment what woman in her highest 
 development is capable of, and that the noblest is the 
 most- womanly." 
 
 She said "Womanly?" with a little cry, it had al- 
 ways been such a sweet word to her, and she thought 
 it could never be hers again. 
 
 " It is by watching you," he replied, " that I know 
 the meaning of the word. I thought I knew long ago, 
 but every day you give it a nobler meaning." 
 
 If she could have believed it ! For a second or two 
 she tried to believe it, and then she shook her head. 
 
 " How dear of you to think that of me ! " she an- 
 swered. She looked up at him with exquisite approval 
 
232 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 in her eyes, she liad always felt that men should have 
 high ideas about women. 
 
 " But it was not to save you pain that I came back," 
 she said, bravely. There was something pathetic in 
 the way the truth had always to come out of her. " I 
 did not think you wanted me to come back, I never 
 expected you to be looking for me, and when I saw 
 you doing it my heart nearly stopped for gladness. I 
 thought you were wearied of me and would be annoyed 
 when you saw me coming back ; I said to myself ' If 
 I go back I shall be a disgrace to womanhood ; ' but 
 I came, and now do you know what my heart is saying 
 and always will be saying ? It is that pride and honor 
 and self-respect are gone. And the terrible thing is 
 that I don't seem to care, I, who used to value them so 
 much, am willing to let them go if you don't send me 
 away from you. Oh, if you can't love me any longer, let 
 me still love you. That is what I came back to say.'' 
 
 " Grizel, G-rizel ! " he cried. It was she who was 
 wielding the knife now. 
 
 " But it is true," she said. 
 
 " We could so easily pretend that it is n't." That 
 was not what he said, though it was at his heart. He 
 sat down, saying : 
 
 "This is a terrible blow, but better you should tell 
 it to me, than leave me to find it out." He was de- 
 termined to save the flag for Grizel, though he had to 
 try all the Tommy ways, one by one. 
 
HOW TOMMY SAVED THE FLAG 233 
 
 " Have I hurt you ? " she asked, anxiously ; she 
 could not bear to hurt him for a moment. " What 
 did I say?" 
 
 "It amounts to this," he replied, huskily ; "you love 
 me, but you wish you did not. That is what it means." 
 
 He expected her to be appalled by this, but she stood 
 still, thinking it over. There was something pitiful in 
 a Grizel grown undecided. 
 
 " Do I wish I did not ? " she said, helplessly. " I 
 don't know. Perhaps that is what I do wish. Ah, 
 but what are wishes ! I know now that they don't 
 matter at all." 
 
 "Yes, they matter," he assured her in*the voice 
 of one looking upon death. "If you no longer want 
 to love me, you will cease to do it soon enough." His 
 manner changed to bitterness. " So don't be cast down, 
 Grizel, for the day of your deliverance is at hand." 
 
 But again she disappointed him, and as the flag must 
 be saved at whatever cost, he said : 
 
 "It has come already, I see you no longer love me 
 as you did." Her arms rose in anguish, but he went 
 on, ruthlessly. " You will never persuade me that 
 you do; I shall never believe it again." 
 
 I suppose it was a pitiable thing about Grizel, it 
 was something he had discovered weeks ago and mar- 
 velled over, that nothing distressed her so much as 
 the implication that she could love him less. She 
 knew she could not, but that he should think it pos- 
 
234 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 sible -was tlie strangest woe to her. It seemed to her 
 to be love's only tragedy. We have seen how difficult 
 it was for Grizel to cry. When she said, " How could 
 you hurt your Grizel so ! " she had not cried, nor when 
 she knew that if she went back to him her self-respect 
 must remain behind; but a painful tear came to her 
 eyes when he said that she loved him less. It almost 
 unmanned him, but he proceeded for her good. 
 
 " I daresay you still care for me a little, as the rank 
 and file of people love. What right had I of all people 
 to expect a love so rare and beautiful as yours to last ; 
 it had to burn out like a great fire, as such love always 
 does ; the Experience of the world has proved it." 
 
 "Oh!" she cried, and her body was rocking. If he 
 did not stop, she would weep herself to death. 
 
 " Yes, it seems sad," Tommy continued, " but if ever 
 man knew that it served him right, I know it. And 
 they maintain, the wiseacres who have analyzed love, 
 that there is much to be said in favor of a calm affection. 
 The glory has gone, but the material comforts are 
 greater, and in the end " 
 
 She sank upon the ground. He was bleeding for her, 
 was Tommy, he went on his knees beside her and it was 
 terrible to him to feel that every part of her was alive 
 with anguish. He called her many sweet names and 
 she listened for them between her sobs, but still she 
 sobbed. He could bear it no longer, he cried, and 
 called upon God to smite him. She did not look up, but 
 
HOW TOMMY SAVED THE FLAG 235 
 
 her poor hands pulled him back. " You said I do not 
 love you the same," she moaned. 
 
 " Grizel ! " he answered, as if in sad reproof. " It 
 was not I who said that, it was you. I put into words 
 only what you have been telling me for the last ten 
 minutes." 
 
 " No, no," she cried, " oh, how could I ! " 
 
 He flung up his arms in despair. " Is this only pity 
 for me, Grizel," he implored, looking into her face as if 
 to learn his fate, " or is it love indeed ? " 
 
 " You know it is love — you know ! " 
 
 "But what kind of love?" he demanded, fiercely. 
 "Is it the same love that it was? Quick, »tell me, I 
 can't have less; if it is but a little less, you will 
 kill me." 
 
 The first gleam of sunshine swept across her face (and 
 oh, how he was looking for it !) " Do you want it to 
 be the same — do you really want it ? oh, it is, it is ! " 
 
 "And you would not cease to love me if you 
 could ? " 
 
 "No, no, no ! " She would have come closer to him, 
 but he held her back. 
 
 " One moment, Grizel," he said, in a hard voice that 
 filled her with apprehension. " There must be no 
 second mistake. In saying that love and love alone 
 brought you back you are admitting, are you not, that 
 you were talking wildly about loss of pride and honor ? 
 You did the loveliest thing you have ever done when 
 
236 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 you came back. If I were you my character would be 
 ruined from this hour, I should feel so proud of myself." 
 
 She smiled at that, and fondled his hand. "If you 
 think so," she said, "all is well." 
 
 But he would not leave it thus. " You must think so 
 also," he insisted; and when she still shook her head, 
 "Then I am proud of your love no longer," said he, 
 doggedly. " How proud of it I have been ! A man 
 cannot love a woman without reverencing her, without 
 being touched to the quick a score of times a day by 
 the revelations she gives of herself, revelations of such, 
 beauty and purity that he is abashed in her presence, 
 the unspoken prayers he offers up to God at those times 
 he gives to her to carry. And when such a one returns 
 his love he is proud indeed. To me you are the 
 embodiment of all that is fair in woman, and it is love 
 that has made you so, that has taken away your little 
 imperfections, love for me, ah, Grizel, I was so proud 
 to think that somehow I had done it ; but even now, in 
 the moment when your love has manifested itself most 
 splendidly, you are ashamed of it, and what I respect 
 and reverence you for most are changes that have come 
 about against your will. If your love makes you 
 sorrowful, how can I be proud of it ? Henceforth it 
 will be my greatest curse." 
 
 She started up, wringing her hands. It was some- 
 thing to have got her to her feet. 
 
 " Surely," he said, like one puzzled as well as pained 
 
HOW TOMMY SAVED THE FLAG 237 
 
 by her obtuseness, " you see clearly that it must be so. 
 True love, as I conceive it, must be something passing 
 all knowledge, irresistible, something not to be resented 
 for its power but worshipped for it, something not to 
 fight against but to glory in ; and such is your love ; but 
 you give the proof of it with shame, because your ideal 
 of love is a humdrum sort of affection. That is all you 
 would like to feel, Grizel, and because you feel some- 
 thing deeper and nobler you say you have lost your 
 self-respect. I am the man who has taken it from you, 
 can I ever be proud of your love again ? " 
 
 He paused, overcome with emotion. "What it has 
 been to me ! " he cried. " I walked among my fellows 
 as if I were a colossus, it inspired me at my work, I 
 felt that there was nothing great I was not capable of, 
 and all because Grizel loved me." 
 
 She stood trembling with delight at what he said, and 
 with apprehension at what he seemed to threaten. His 
 head being bent, he could not see her, and amid his grief 
 he wondered a little what she was doing now. 
 
 " But you spoke " — she said it timidly, as if to refer 
 to the matter at all was cruel of her — " you spoke as 
 if I was disgracing you because I could not conceal my 
 love, you said it was hard on you." She pressed her 
 hands together. "Yes, that is what you said." 
 
 This was awkward for Tommy. " She believes I 
 meant that," he cried, hoarsely. "Grizel believes that 
 of me ! I have behaved since then as if that was what 
 
238 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 I meant, have I ? I meant only that it would be hard 
 on me if Elspeth learned of our love at the very moment 
 when this man is treating her basely. I look as if I 
 had meant something worse, do I ? I know myself at 
 last ! Grizel has shown me what I am." 
 
 He covered his face with his hands. Strong man as 
 he was, he could not conceal his agony. 
 
 " Don't ! " she cried. " If I was wrong " 
 
 " If you were wrong ! " 
 
 "I was wrong, I know I was wrong. Somehow it 
 was a mistake. I don't know how it arose, but you 
 love me and you want me to love you stUl, That is aU 
 I know. I thought you did not, but you do. If you 
 wanted me to come back -" 
 
 "If I wanted it!" 
 
 "I know you wanted it now, and I am no longer, 
 ashamed to have come ; I am glad I came, and if you 
 can still be proud of my love and respect me " 
 
 " Oh, Grizel, if ! " 
 
 " Then I have got back my pride and my self-respect 
 again — I cannot reason about it, but they have come 
 back again." 
 
 It was she who was trying to comfort him by this 
 time, caressing his hair and his hands, but he would not 
 be appeased at once. It was good for her to have some- 
 thing to do. 
 
 "You are sure you are happy again, Grizel, you are 
 not pretending in order to please me ? " 
 
HOW TOMMY SAVED THE FLAG 239 
 
 " So happy." 
 
 "But your eyes are still wet." 
 
 " That is because I have hurt you so. Oh, how happy 
 I should be if I could see you smile again ! " 
 
 " How I would smUe if I saw you looking happy." 
 
 "Then smile at once, sir," she could say presently, 
 "for see how happy I am' looking; " and as she beamed 
 on him once more he smiled as well as he was able to. 
 Grizel loved him so much that she actually knew when 
 that face of his was smiling, and soon she was saying 
 gayly to his eyes, "Oh, silly eyes, that won't sparkle, 
 what is the use of you ? '"' and she pressed her own upon 
 them ; and to his mouth she said, " Mouth tiiat does not 
 know how to laugh, poor, tragic mouth." He let her do 
 nearly all the talking, she sat there crooning over him as 
 if he were her child. 
 
 And so the flag was saved. He begged her to let him 
 teU their little world of his love for her, and especially 
 was he eager to go straight with it to the doctor. But 
 she would not have this. "David and Elspeth shall 
 know in good time," she said, very nobly. "I am sure 
 they are fond of each other, and they shall know of our 
 happiness on the day when they tell us of their own." 
 And until that great day came she was not to look upon 
 herself as engaged to Tommy, and he must never kiss 
 her again until they were engaged. I think it was a 
 pleasure to her to insist on this, it was her punishment 
 to herself for ever having doubted Tommy. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 THE GIEL SHE HAD BEEN 
 
 As they sat amid the smell of rosin on that summer 
 day she told him, with a glance that said, "Now you 
 will laugh at me," what had brought her into Caddam 
 Wood. 
 
 " I came to rub something out." 
 
 He reflected. " A. memory ? " 
 
 « Yes." 
 
 « Of me ? " 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " An unhappy memory ? " 
 
 "Not to me," she replied, leaning on him. "I have 
 no memory of you I would rub out, no, not the un- 
 happiest one, for it was you, and that makes it dear. 
 All memories, however sad, of loved ones become 
 sweet, don't they, when we get far enough away from 
 them?" 
 
 "But to whom, then, is this memory painful, 
 Grizel ? " 
 
 Again she oast that glance at him. " To her," she 
 •whispered. 
 
 '"That little girl I"' 
 
THE GIRL SHE HAD BEEN 241 
 
 "Yes, the child I used to be. You see, she never 
 grew up, and so they are not distant memories to her. 
 I try to rub them out of her mind by giving her prettier 
 things to think of. I go to the places where she was 
 most unhappy and tell her sweet things about you. 
 I am not morbid, am I, in thinking of her still as some 
 one apart from myself ? You know how it began, in 
 the lonely days' when I used to look at her in mamma's 
 mirror and pity her and fancy that she was pitying me 
 and entreating me to be careful. Always when I think 
 I see her now she seems to be looking anxiously at me 
 and saying, ' Oh, do be careful,' and the sweet things I 
 tell her about you are meant to show her how careful 
 I have become ; are you laughing at me for this ? I 
 sometimes laugh at it myself." 
 
 " No, it is delicious," he answered her, speaking more 
 lightly than he felt. "What a numskull you make, 
 Grizel, of any man who presumes to write about women. 
 I am at school again, and you are Miss Ailie teaching 
 me the alphabet. But I thought you lost that serious 
 little girl on the doleful day when she heard you say 
 that you loved me best." 
 " She came back. She has no one but me." 
 ' ' And she still warns you against me ? " 
 Grizel laughed gleefully. " I am too clever for her,'' 
 she said. " I do all the talking. I allow her to listen 
 only. And you must not blame her for distrusting you, 
 I have said such things against you to her! Oh, the 
 
 16 
 
242 TOMMY AiTO GEIZBL 
 
 things I said. On the first day I saw you, for instance, 
 after you came back to Thrums. It was in church ; do 
 you remember ? " 
 
 " I should like to know what you said to her about me 
 that day." 
 
 « Would you ? " Grizel asked merrily. " Well, let 
 me see. She was not at church ; she never went there, 
 you remember, but of course she was curious to hear 
 about you, and I had no sooner got home than she came 
 to me and said, ' Was he there ? ' ' Yes,' I said. 
 ' Is he much changed ? ' she asked. ' He has a beard,' 
 I said. ' You know that is not what I really mean,' 
 she said, and then I said, ' I don't think he is so much 
 changed that it is impossible to recognize him again.' " 
 
 Tommy interrupted her. "Now what did you mean 
 by that ? " 
 
 " I meant that I thought you were a little annoyed 
 to find the congregation looking at Gavinia's baby more 
 than at you ! " 
 
 "Grizel, you are a wretch, but perhaps you were 
 right. Well, what more did the little inquisitor want 
 to know ? " 
 
 " She asked me if I felt any of my old fear of you, and 
 I said no, and then she clapped her hands with joy. 
 And she asked whether you looked at me as if you 
 were begging me to say I still thought you a wonder, 
 and I said I thought you did — " 
 
 " Grizel ! " 
 
 J ^ J J . 
 
THE GIRL SHE HAD BEEN 243 
 
 " Oh, I told her ever so many dreadful things as soon 
 as I found them out. I told her the whole story of your 
 ankle, sir, for instance." 
 
 "On my word, Grizel, you seem to have omitted 
 nothing ! " 
 
 " Ah, but I did," she cried. " I never told her how 
 much I wanted you to be admirable ; I pretended that I 
 despised you merely, and in reality I was wringing my 
 hands with woe every time you did not behave like a 
 god." 
 
 " They will be worn away, Grizel, if you go on doing 
 that." 
 
 "I don't think so," she replied, "nor can she think so 
 if she believes half of what I have told her about 
 you since. She knows how you saved the boy's life. I 
 told her that in the old lair because she had some harsh 
 memories of you there, and it was at the Cuttle Well 
 that I told her about the glove." 
 
 « And where, " asked Tommy, severely, " did you tell 
 her that you had been mistaken in thinking me jealous 
 of a baby and anxious to be considered a wonder ? " 
 
 She hid her face for a moment and then looked up 
 roguishly into his. " I have not told her that yet ! " she 
 replied. It was so audacious of her that he took her by 
 the ears. 
 
 " If I were vain," Tommy said, reflectively, " I would 
 certainly shake you now. You show a painful want of 
 tact, Grizel, in implying that I am not perfect. Nothing 
 
244 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 annoys men so much. We can stand anything except 
 that." 
 
 His merriness gladdened her. " They are only little 
 things," she said, " and I have grown to love them. I 
 know they are flaws, but I love them because " 
 
 " Say because they are mine. You owe me that." 
 
 " No, but because they are weaknesses I don't have. 
 1 have others, but not those, and it is sweet to me to 
 know that you are weak in some matters m which I am 
 strong J it makes me feel that I can be of use to you." 
 
 " Are you insinuating that there are more of them ? " 
 Tommy demanded, sitting up. 
 
 " You are not very practical," she responded, " and I 
 am." 
 
 « Go on." 
 
 "And you are — just a little — inclined to be 
 senti " 
 
 " Hush I I don't allow that word, but you may say, if 
 you choose, that I am sometimes carried away by a too 
 generous impulse." 
 
 " And that it will be my part," said she, " to seize you 
 by the arm and hold you back. Oh, you will give me a 
 great deal to do ! That is one of the things I love you 
 for. It was one of the things I loved my dear Dr. 
 McQueen for." She looked up suddenly " I have told 
 him also about you." 
 
 "Lately, Grizel?" 
 
 "Yes, in my parlor. It was his parlor, you know, 
 
" I SIT STILL BY HIS ARM-CHAIR AND TELL HIM WHAT IS HAPPENING TO HIS GRIZEL ' 
 
THIS GIRL SHE HAD BEEN 245 
 
 and I had kept nothing from him while he -was alive. 
 That is to say, he always knew what I was thinking of, 
 and I like to fancy that he knows stilL In the evenings 
 he used to sit in the armchair by the fire, and I sat talking 
 or knitting at his feet, and if I ceased to do anything 
 except sit still, looking straight before me, he knew I 
 was thinking the morbid thoughts that had troubled me 
 in the old days at Double Dykes. Without knowing it 
 I sometimes shuddered at those times, and he was dis- 
 tressed. It reminded him of my mamma." 
 
 "I understand," Tommy said, hurriedly. He meant, 
 "Let us avoid painful subjects." 
 
 "It IS years," she went on, "since those thoughts 
 have troubled me, and it was he who drove them away. 
 He was so kind, he thought so much of my future, that 
 I still sit by his arm-chair and tell him what is happen- 
 ing to his Grizel. I don't speak aloud, of course, I 
 scarcely say the words to myself even, and yet we seem 
 to have long talks together. I told him I had given you 
 his coat." 
 
 "Well, I don't think he was pleased at that, Grizel. 
 I have had a feeling for some time that the coat dislikes 
 me. It scratched my hand the first time I put it on. 
 My hand caught in the hook of the collar you will say, 
 but no, that is not what I think. In my opinion the 
 deed was maliciously done. McQueen always distrusted 
 me, you know, and I expect his coat was saying, 'Hands 
 off my Grizel.' " 
 
246 TOMMY Amy grizbl 
 
 She took it as quite a jest. " He does not distrust 
 you now," she said, smiling. "I have told him what 
 I think of you, and though he was surprised at first, 
 in the end his opinion was the same as mine." 
 
 " Ah, you saw to that, Grizel ! " 
 
 "I had nothing to do with it. I merely told him 
 everything and he had to agree with me. How could he 
 doubt when he saw that you had made me so happy! 
 Even mamma does not doubt." 
 
 " You have told her ! All this is rather eerie, Grizel." 
 
 " You are not sorry, are you ? " she asked, looking at 
 him anxiously. "Dr. McQueen wanted me to forget 
 her. He thought that would be best for me; it was 
 the only matter on which we differed. I gave up 
 speaking of her to him ; you are the only person I 
 have mentioned her to since I became a woman, but I 
 often think of her. I am sure there was a time, before 
 I was old enough to understand, when she was very 
 fond of me. I was her baby, and women can't help 
 being fond of their babies, even though they should 
 never have had them. I think she often hugged me 
 tight." 
 
 "Need we speak of this, Grizel ? " 
 
 " For this once," she entreated. " You must remem- 
 ber that mamma often looked at me with hatred and 
 said I was the cause of all her woe, but sometimes in 
 her last months she would give me such sad looks 
 that I trembled, and felt that she was picturing me 
 
THE GIEL SHE HAD BEEN 24T 
 
 growing into the kind of woman she wished so much 
 she had not become herself, and that she longed to save 
 me. That is why I have told her that a good man 
 loves me. She is so glad, my poor dear mamma, that 
 I tell her agaia and again, and she loves to hear it 
 as much as I to tell it. What she loves to hear most 
 is that you really do want to marry me ; she is so fond 
 of hearing that, because it is what my father would 
 never say to her." 
 
 Tommy was so much moved that he could not speak, 
 but in his heart he gave thanks that what Grizel said 
 of him to her mamma was true at last. 
 
 " It makes her so happy," Grizel said, " that when 1 
 seem to see her now she looks as sweet and pure as she 
 must have been in the days when she was an innocent 
 girL I think she can enter into my feelings more than 
 any other person could ever do. Is that because she 
 was my mother ? She understands how I feel just as I 
 can understand how in the end she was willing to be 
 bad because he wanted it so much." 
 
 "'No, no, Grizel," Tommy cried, passionately, "you 
 don't understand that." 
 
 She rocked her arms. " Yes, I do," she said, " I do. 
 I could never have cared for such a man, but I can 
 understand how mamma yielded to him, and I have 
 no feeling for her except pity, and I have told her so, 
 and it is what she loves to hear her daughter tell hex 
 best of alL" 
 
248 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 They put the subject from them, and she told him 
 what it was that she had come to rub out in Caddam. 
 If you have read of Tommy's boyhood you may remem- 
 ber the day it ended with his departure for the farm, 
 and that he and Elspeth walked through Caddam to 
 the cart that was to take him from her, and how to 
 comfort her he swore that he loved her with his whole 
 heart and Grizel not at all, and that Grizel was in the 
 wood and heard. And how Elspeth had promised to 
 wave to Tommy in the cart as long as it was visible, 
 but broke down and went home sobbing, and how 
 Grizel took her place and waved, pretending to be 
 Elspeth, so that he might think she was bearing up 
 bravely. Tommy had not known what Grizel did for 
 him that day, and when he heard it now for the first 
 time from her own lips he realized afresh what a 
 glorious girl she was and had always been. 
 
 "You may try to rub that memory out of little 
 Grizel's head," he declared, looking very proudly at 
 her, "but you shall never rub it out of mine." 
 
 It was by his wish that they went together to the 
 spot where she had heard him say that he loved Elspeth 
 only. "If you can find it," Tommy said, "after all these 
 years," and she smiled at his mannish words, she had 
 found it so often since. There was the very clump of 
 whin. 
 
 And here was the boy to match. Oh, who by striving 
 could make himself a boy again as Tommy could! I 
 
THE GIRL SHE HAD BEEN 249 
 
 tell you lie was always irresistible then. What is 
 genius ? It is the power to be a boy again at will. 
 When I think of him flinging off the years and whistling 
 childhood back, not to himself only, but to all who 
 heard, distributing it among them gayly, imperiously 
 calling on them to dance, dance, for they are boys and 
 girls again until they stop, when to recall him in those 
 wild moods is to myself to grasp for a moment at the 
 dear dead days that were so much the best, I cannot 
 wonder that Grizel loved him. I am his slave myself, 
 I see that all that was wrong with Tommy was that 
 he could not always be a boy. 
 
 "Hide there again, Grizel," he cried to her, little 
 Tommy cried to her. Stroke the Jacobite, her captain, 
 cried to the Lady Griselda, and he disappeared, and 
 presently marched down the path with an imaginary 
 Elspeth by his side. " I love you both, Elspeth," he 
 was going to say, " and my love for the one does 
 not make me love the other less," but he glanced at 
 Grizel and she was leaning forward to catch his words as 
 if this were no play but life or death, and he knew what 
 she longed to hear him say and he said it : "I love you 
 very much, Elspeth, but however much I love you, it 
 would be idle to pretend that I don't love Grizel 
 more." 
 
 A stifled cry of joy came from a clump of whin hard 
 by, and they were man and woman again. 
 
 "Did you not know it, Grizel ? " 
 
250 TOMMY Airo GEIZEL. 
 
 "No, no ; you never told me." 
 
 " I never dreamt it was necessary to tell you." 
 
 " Oh, if you knew how I have longed that it might 
 be so, yes, and sometimes hated Elspeth because I feared 
 it could not be. I have tried so hard to be content with 
 second place. I have thought it all out and said to 
 myself it was natural that Elspeth should be first." 
 
 " My tragic love," he said, " I can see you arguing in 
 that way, but I don't see you convincing yourself. My 
 passionate G-rizel is not the girl to accept second place 
 from any one. If I know anything of her I know that." 
 
 To his surprise she answered softly, " You are wrong. 
 I wonder at it myself, but I had made up my mind to 
 be content with second place and to be grateful for it." 
 
 " I could not have believed it ! " he cried. 
 
 " I could not have believed it myself," said she. 
 
 " Are you the Grizel " he began. 
 
 " iNo," she said, "I have changed a little," and she 
 looked pathetically at him. 
 
 "It stabs me," he said, "to see you so humble." 
 
 " I am humbler than I was," she answered huskily, 
 but she was looking at him with the fondest love. 
 
 " Don't look at me so, Grizel," he implored. " I am 
 unworthy of it. I am the man who has made you so 
 humble." 
 
 " Yes," she answered, and still she looked at him with 
 the fondest love. A film came over his eyes, and she 
 touched them softly with her handkerchief. 
 
THE GIRL SHE HAD BEEN 251 
 
 " Those eyes that but a little while ago were looking 
 so coldly at you ! " he said. 
 
 "Dear eyes," said she. 
 
 « Though I were to strike you — " he cried, raising 
 his hand. 
 
 She took the hand in hers and kissed it. 
 
 "Has it come to this ! " he said, and as she could not 
 speak she nodded. He fell upon his knees before her. 
 "I am glad you are a little sorry," she said, "I am 
 a little sorry myself." 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 OF THE CHANGE IN THOMAS 
 
 To find ways of making David propose to Elspeth, of 
 making Elspeth willing to exchange her brother for 
 David, they were heavy tasks, but Tommy yoked him- 
 self to them gallantly and tugged like an Arab steed 
 in the plough. It should be almost as pleasant to us 
 as to him to think that love was what made him do it, 
 for he was sure he loved Grizel at last, and that the 
 one longing of his heart was to marry her; the one 
 marvel to him was that he had ever longed ardently for 
 anything else. Well, as you know, she longed for it 
 also, but she was firm in her resolve that until Elspeth 
 was engaged Tommy should be a single man. She even 
 made him promise not to kiss her again so long as their 
 love had to be kept secret. " It will be so sweet to wait," 
 she said, bravely. As we shall see presently, his efi^orts 
 to put Elspeth into the hands of David were apparently 
 of no avail, but though this would have embittered 
 many men, it drew only to the surface some of Tommy's 
 noblest attributes ; as he suffered in silence he became 
 gentler, more considerate, and acquired a new command 
 over himself. To conquer self for her sake (this is in 
 
OF THE CHANGE EST THOMAS 253 
 
 the " Letters to a Young Man ") is the highest tribute 
 man can pay to a woman ; it is the only real greatness, 
 and Tommy had done it now. I could give you a score 
 of proofs. Let us take his treatment of Aaron Latta. 
 
 One day about this time Tommy .found himself alone 
 in the house with A.aron, and had he been the old 
 Tommy he would have waited but a moment to let 
 Aaron decide which of them should go elsewhere. It 
 was thus that these two, ever so uncomfortable in each 
 other's presence, contrived to keep the peace. Now 
 note the change. 
 
 "Aaron," said Tommy, in the hush that had fallen on 
 that house since quiet Elspeth left it, "I have never 
 thanked you in words for all that you have done for me 
 and Elspeth." 
 
 "Dinna do it now, then," replied the warper, 
 fidgeting. 
 
 "I must," Tommy said, cheerily, "I must," and he 
 did, while Adam scowled. 
 
 "It was never done for you," Aaron informed him, 
 " nor for the father you are the marrows o'." 
 
 " It was done for my mother," said Tommy, rever- 
 ently. 
 
 " I 'm none so sure o't," Aaron rapped out. " I think I 
 brocht you twa here as bairns that the reminder of my 
 shame should ever stand before me." 
 
 But Tommy shook his head, and sat down sympa- 
 thetically beside the warper. " You loved her, Aaron," 
 
254 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 he said, simply " It was an undying love that made you 
 adopt her orphan children." A charming thought came 
 to him. " When you brought us here," he said, with 
 some elation, "Elspeth used to cry at nights because 
 our mother's spirit did not come to us to comfort us, 
 and I invented boyish explanations to appease her. But 
 I have learned since why we did not see that spirit, for 
 though it hovered round this house its first thought was 
 not for us, but for him who succoured us." 
 
 He could have made it much better had he been able 
 to revise it, but surely it was touching, and Aaron need 
 not have said Damn, which was what he did say. 
 
 One knows how most men would have received so 
 harsh an answer to such gentle words, and we can con- 
 ceive how a very holy man, say a monk, would have 
 bowed to it. Even as the monk did Tommy submit, or 
 say, rather, with the meekness of a nun. 
 
 " I wish I could help you in any way, Aaron," he 
 said, with a sigh. 
 
 " You can," replied Aaron, promptly. " By taking 
 yourself off to London, and leaving Elspeth here wi' me. 
 I never made pretence that I wanted you except because 
 she wouldna come without you. Laddie and man, as 
 weel you ken, you were aye a scunner to me." 
 
 " And yet," said Tommy, looking at him admiringly, 
 " you fed and housed and educated us. Ah, Aaron, do you 
 not see that your dislike gives me the more reason only 
 to esteem you ? " Carried away by desire to help the 
 
or THE CHANGE IN THOMAS 265 
 
 old man, he put his hand kindly on his shoulder. " You 
 have never respected yourself," he said, "since the 
 night you and my mother parted at the Cuttle Well, and 
 my heart bleeds to think of it. Many a year ago, by your 
 kindness to two forlorn children, you expiated that sin, 
 and it is blotted out from your account. Forget it, 
 Aaron, as every other person has forgotten it, and let 
 the spirit of Jean Myles see you tranquil once again." 
 
 He patted Aaron affectionately ; he seemed to be the 
 older of the two. 
 
 " Tak' your hand off my shuther," Aaron cried, 
 fiercely. 
 
 Tommy removed his hand, but he continued to look 
 yearningly at the warper. Another beautiful thought 
 came to him. 
 
 "What are you looking so holy about?" asked Aaron, 
 with misgivings. 
 
 " Aaron," cried Tommy, suddenly inspired, " you are 
 not always the gloomy man you pass for being. Tou 
 have glorious moments still. You wake in the morning, 
 and for a second of time you are in the heyday of your 
 youth and you and Jean Myles are to walk out to-night. 
 As you sit by this fire you think you hear her hand on 
 the latch of the door, as you pass down the street you 
 seem to see her coming toward you. It is for a moment 
 only,. and then you are a gray-haired man again, and she 
 has been in her grave for many a year, but you have 
 that moment." 
 
256 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 Aaron rose, amazed and wrathful. "The de'il tak' 
 you," he cried, "how did you find out that?" 
 
 Perhaps Tommy's nose turned up rapturously in re- 
 ply, for the best of us cannot command ourselves al- 
 together at great moments , but when he spoke he was 
 modest again. 
 
 " It was sympathy that told me," he explained ; " and, 
 Aaron, if you will only believe me, it tells me also that 
 a little of the man you were still clings to you. Come 
 out of the moroseness in which you have enveloped 
 yourself so long. Think what a joy it would be to 
 Elspeth." 
 
 " It 's little she would care." 
 
 " If you want to hurt her tell her so." 
 
 " I 'm no denying but what she 's fell fond o' me." 
 
 " Then for her sake," Tommy pleaded. 
 
 But the warper turned on him with baleful eyes. 
 " She likes me," he said, in a grating voice, " and yet 
 I 'm as nothing to her ; we are all as nothing to her 
 beside you. If there hadna been you I should hae 
 become the father to her I craved to be, but you had 
 mesmerized her ; she had eyes for none but you. I 
 sent you to the herding, meaning to break your power 
 over her, and all she could think o' was my cruelty in 
 sindering you, syne you ran aff wi' her to London, 
 stealing her frae me. I was without her while she 
 was growing frae lassie to woman, the years when 
 maybe she could hae made o' me what she willed. 
 
OF THE CHANGE IN THOMAS 257 
 
 Magerful Tarn took the mother frae me, and lie lived 
 again in you to tak' the dochter." 
 
 " You really think me masterful, me I " Tommy said, 
 smiling. 
 
 "I suppose you never were ! " Aaron replied, ironically. 
 
 "Yes," Tommy admitted, frankly, "I was master- 
 ful as a boy, ah, and even quite lately. How we 
 change!" he said, musingly. 
 
 " How we dinna change ! " retorted Aaron, bitterly. 
 He had learned the truer philosophy. 
 
 "Man," he continued, looking Tommy over, "there 's 
 times when I see mair o' your mother than your father 
 in you. She was a wonder at making-believe. The 
 letters about her grandeur that she wrote to Thrums 
 when she was starving! Even you couldna hae wrote 
 them better. But she never managed to cheat hersel'. 
 That 's whaur you sail away frae her." 
 
 "I used to make believe, Aaron, as you say," Tommy 
 replied, sadly. "If you knew how I feel the folly of 
 it now, perhaps even you would wish that I felt it less." 
 
 "But we must each of us dree his own weird," he 
 proceeded, with wonderful sweetness, when Aaron did 
 not answer. "And so far at least as Elspeth is con- 
 cerned surely I have done my duty. I had the bring- 
 ing up of her from the days when she was learning to 
 speak." 
 
 " She got into the way o' letting you do everything 
 for her," the warper responded sourly. " You thought 
 
 17 
 
258 
 
 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 for her, you acted for her frae the first, you toomed 
 her and then filled her up wi' yoursel'." 
 
 " She always needed someone to lean on." 
 
 " Ay, because you had maimed her. She grew up 
 in the notion that you were all the earth and the won- 
 der o' the world." 
 
 "Could I help that?" 
 
 " Help it! Did you try ? It was the one thing yov 
 were sure o' yoursel', it was the one thing you thought 
 worth anybody's learning. You stood before her crow- 
 ing the whole day. I said the now I wished you would 
 go and leave her wi' me, but I wouldna dare to keep 
 her, she 's helpless without you ; if you took your arm 
 awa frae her now, she would tumble to the ground." 
 
 "I fear it is true, Aaron," Tommy said, with bent 
 head. "Whether she is so by nature or whether I 
 have made her so I cannot tell, but I fear that what 
 you say is true." 
 
 "It's true," said Aaron, "and yours is the wite. 
 There 's no life for her now except what you mak' ; she 
 canna see beyond you ; go on thinking yoursel' a won- 
 der if you like, but mind this, if you were to cast her 
 off frae you now she would die like an amputated 
 hand." 
 
 To Tommy it was like listening to his doom. Ah, 
 Aaron, even you could not withhold your pity did you 
 know how this man is being punished now for having 
 made Elspeth so dependent on him. Some such thought 
 
OF THE CHANGE IN THOMAS 259 
 
 passed througli Tommy's head, but he was too brave 
 to appeal for pity. "If that is so," he said, firmly, 
 "I take the responsibility for it. But I began this 
 talk, Aaron, not to intrude my troubles on you, but 
 hoping to lighten yours. If I could see you smile, 
 Aaron " 
 
 " Drop it ! " cried the warper, and then, going closer 
 to him, " You would hae seen me smile, ay, and heard 
 me laugh gin you had been here when Mrs. McLean 
 came yont to read your book to me. She fair insistit 
 on reading the terrible noble bits to me, and she grat 
 they were so sublime, but the sublimer they were 
 the mair I laughed, for I ken you, Tommy, my man, 
 I ken you." 
 
 He spoke with much vehemence, and, after all, our 
 hero was not perfect. He withdrew stiffly to the other 
 room. I think it was the use of the word Tommy 
 that enraged him. 
 
 But in a very few minutes he scorned himself and 
 was possessed by a pensive wonder that one so tragi- 
 cally fated as he could resent an old man's gibe. Aaron 
 misunderstood him. Was that any reason why he 
 should not feel sorry for Aaron ? He crossed the 
 hallan to the kitchen door and stopped there overcome 
 with pity. The warper was still crouching by the fire, 
 but his head rested on his chest ; he was a weary, 
 desolate figure, and at the other side of the hearth 
 stood an empty chair. The picture was the epitome 
 
260 TOMMY AJJD GEIZEL 
 
 of his life, or so it seemed to the sympathetic soul 
 at the door, who saw him passing from youth to old 
 age, staring at the chair that must always be empty. 
 At the same moment Tommy saw his own future, and 
 in it, too, an empty chair. Yet hard as was his own 
 case at least he knew that he was loved ; if her chair 
 must be empty the fault was as little hers as his, while 
 Aaron 
 
 A noble compassion drew him forward and he put 
 his hand determinedly on the dear old man's shoulder. 
 ' " Aaron," he said, in a tremble of pity, " I know what 
 is the real sorrow of your life, and I rejoice because 
 I can put an end to it. You think that Jean Myles 
 never cared for you, but you are strangely wrong. 
 T was with my mother to the last, Aaron, and I can 
 tell you, she asked me with her dying breath to say 
 to you that she loved you all the time." 
 
 Aaron tried to rise, but was pushed back into his 
 chair. "Love cannot die," cried Tommy, triumphantly, 
 like the fairy in the pantomime, "love is always 
 young " 
 
 He stopped in mid-career at sight of Aaron's disap 
 pointing face. "Are you done ? " the warper inquired. 
 " When j'^ou and me are alaue in this house there 's 
 no room for the both o' us, and as I'll never hae it 
 said that I made Jean Myles's bairn munt, I '11 go out 
 mysel'." 
 
 And out he went, and sat on the dyke till Elspeth 
 
OF THE CHANGE IN THOMAS 261 
 
 came home. It did not turn Tommy sulky. He nodded 
 kindly to Aaron from the window in token of forgive- 
 ness, and next day he spent a valuable hour in making 
 a cushion for the old man's chair. " He must be left 
 with the impression that you made it," Tommy ex- 
 plained to Elspeth, "for he would not take it from me." 
 
 " Oh, Tommy, how good you are ! " 
 
 "I am far from it, Elspeth." 
 
 " There is a serenity about you nowadays," she said, 
 "that I don't seem to have noticed before," and indeed 
 this was true ; it was the serenity that comes to those 
 who, having a mortal wound, can no more be troubled 
 by the pin-pricks. 
 
 " There has been nothing to cause it, has there ? " 
 Elspeth asked, timidly. 
 
 "Only the feeling that I have much to be grateful 
 for," he replied. "I have you, Elspeth." 
 
 " And I have you," she said, " and I want no more. I 
 could never care for any one as I care for you. Tommy.'' 
 
 She was speaking unselfishly. She meant to imply 
 delicately that the doctor's defection need not make 
 Tommy think her unhappy. " Are you glad ? " she 
 asked. 
 
 He said yes bravely. Elspeth, he was determined, 
 should never have the distress of knowing that for her 
 sake he was giving up the one great joy which life 
 contains. He was a grander character than most. Men 
 have often in the world's history made a splendid 
 
262 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 sacrifice for women, but if you turn up tlie annals you 
 will find that tlie woman nearly always knew of it. 
 
 He told Grizel what Aaron had said and what Elspeth 
 had said. He could keep nothing from her now; he 
 was done with the world of make-believe forever. And 
 it seemed wicked of him to hope, he declared, or to let 
 her hope. "I ought to give you up, Grizel," he said 
 with a groan. 
 
 " I won't let you," she replied, adorably. 
 
 " Gemmell has not come near us for a week. I ask 
 him in, but he avoids the house." 
 
 "I don't understand it," Grizel had to admit, "but I 
 think he is fond of her, I do indeed." 
 
 " Even if that were so I fear she would not accept 
 him. I know Elspeth so well that I feel I am deceiving 
 you if I say there is any hope." 
 
 "Nevertheless you must say it," she answered, 
 brightly, " you must say it and leave me to think it. 
 And I do think it. I believe that Elspeth, despite her 
 timidity and her dependence on you, is like other girls 
 at heart and not more difB.cult to win." 
 
 " And even if it all comes to nothing," she told him, a 
 little faintly, "I shall not be unhappy. Tou don't 
 really know me if you think I should love to be married 
 so — so much as all that." 
 
 " It is you, Grizel," he replied, " who don't see that it 
 is myself I am pitying. It is I who want to be married 
 as much as all that." 
 
OF THE CHANGE IN THOMAS 263 
 
 Her eyes shone with a soft light, for of course it was 
 what she wanted him to say. These two seemed to 
 have changed places. That people could love each 
 other, and there the end, had been his fond philosophy 
 and her torment, now it was she who argued for it and 
 Tommy who shook his head. 
 
 " They can be very, very happy." 
 
 "No," he said. 
 
 "But one of them is." 
 
 "Not the other," he insisted, and of course it was 
 again what she wanted him to say. 
 
 And he was not always despairing. He tried hard to 
 find a way of bringing David to Elspeth's feet, and once, 
 at least, the apparently reluctant suitor almost suc- 
 cumbed. Tommy had met him near Aaron's house and 
 invited him to come in and hear Elspeth singing. " I 
 did not know she sang," David said, hesitating. 
 
 "She is so shy about it," Tommy replied, lightly, 
 "that we can hear her by stealth only. Aaron and I 
 listen at the door. Come and listen at the door." 
 
 And David had yielded and listened at the door and 
 afterward gone in and remained like one who could not 
 tear himself away. What was more, he and Elspeth 
 had touched upon the subject of love in their conversa- 
 tion. Tommy sitting at the window so engrossed in a 
 letter to Pym that he seemed to hear nothing, though 
 he could repeat everything afterward to Grizel. 
 
 Elspeth had said in her shrinking way that if she 
 
264 TOMMY Am) GEIZBL 
 
 were a mau slie could love only a ■woman who was strong 
 and courageous and helpful. Such a woman as Grizel, 
 she had said. 
 
 "And yet," David replied, "women have been loved 
 who had none of those qualities." 
 
 " In spite of the want of them ? " Elspeth asked. 
 
 " Perhaps because of it," said he. 
 
 "They are noble qualities," Elspeth maintained, a 
 little sadly, and he assented. "And one of them at 
 least is essential," she said. " A woman has no right to 
 be loved who is not helpful." 
 
 "She is helpful to the man who loves her," David 
 replied. 
 
 "He would have to do for her," Elspeth said, "the 
 very things she should be doing for him." 
 
 " He may want very much to do them," said David. 
 
 "Then it is her weakness that appeals to him. Is 
 not that loving her for the wrong thing ? " 
 
 "It may be the right thing," David insisted, "for 
 him." 
 
 " And at that point," Tommy said, boyishly, to Grizel, 
 "I ceased to hear them, I was so elated, I felt that 
 everything was coming right. I could not give another 
 thought to their future, I was so busy mapping out my 
 own. I heard a hammering. Do you know what it 
 was ? It was our house going up, your house and mine. 
 Our home, Grizel I It was not here nor in London ; it 
 was near the Thames. I wanted it to be upon the bank, 
 
OF THE CHANGE IN THOMAS 265 
 
 but you said no, you were afraid of floods. I wanted to 
 superintend the building, but you conducted me con- 
 temptuously to my desk ; you intimated that I did not 
 know how to build ; that no one knew except your- 
 self; you instructed the architect and bullied the 
 workmen, and cried for more store closets. Grizel, 
 I saw the house go up, I saw you the adoration and 
 terror of your servants. I heard you singing from 
 room to room." 
 
 He was touched by this; all beautiful thoughts 
 touched him. 
 
 But as a rule, though Tommy tried to be brave for 
 her sake, it was usually she who was the comforter now 
 and he the comforted, and this was the arrangement 
 that suited Grizel best. Her one thought need no longer 
 be that she loved him too much, but how much he loved 
 her. It was not her self-respect that must be humored 
 back, but his ; if hers lagged what did it matter ? What 
 are her own troubles to a woman when there is some- 
 thing to do for the man she loves ? 
 
 " You are too anxious about the future," she said to 
 him, if he had grown gloomy again. " Can we not be 
 happy in the present and leave the future to take care 
 of itself?" How strange to know that it was Grizel 
 who said this to Tommy and not Tommy who said it to 
 Grizel. 
 
 She delighted in playing the mother to him. 
 " Now you must go- back to your desk," she would say, 
 
266 TOMMY AST) GRIZBL 
 
 masterfully. "You have three hours' work to do to- 
 night yet." 
 
 " It can wait. Let me stay a little longer with you, 
 Grizel," he answered, humbly. Ha! it was Tommy 
 who was humble now. Not so long ago he would not 
 have allowed his work to wait for any one, and Grizel 
 knew it and exulted. 
 
 " To work, sir," she ordered. " And you must put on 
 your old coat before you sit down to write, and pull up 
 your cuffs so that they don't scrape on the desk. Also, 
 you must not think too much about me." 
 
 She tried to look business-like, but she could scarce 
 resist rocking her arms with delight when she heard 
 herself saying such things to him. It was as if she had 
 the old doctor once more in her hands. 
 
 " What more, Grizel ? I like you to order me 
 about." 
 
 " Only this. Good afternoon." 
 
 " But I am to walk home with you," he entreated. 
 
 "No," she said, decisively, but she smiled. Once 
 upon a time it had been she who asked for this. 
 
 "If you are good," she said, "you shall perhaps see 
 me to-morrow." 
 
 "Perhaps only?" He was scared, but she smiled 
 happily again. It had once been she who had to beg 
 that there should be no perhaps. 
 
 "If you are good," she replied; "and you are not 
 good when you have such a long face. Smile, you silly 
 
OF THE CHANGE IN THOMAS 267 
 
 boy, smile when I order you. If you don't I shall not 
 so much as look out at my window to-morrow." 
 
 He was the man who had caused her so much agony 
 and she was looking at him with the eternally forgiving 
 smile of the mother. "Ah, Grizel," Tommy cried, 
 passionately, "how brave and unselfish and noble you 
 are, and what a glorious wife God intended you to be." 
 
 She broke from him with a little cry, but when she 
 turned round again it was to nod and smile to him. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 A LOVE-LETTBK 
 
 Some beautiful days followed, so beautiful to Grizel 
 that as they passed away she kissed her hand to them. 
 Do you see her standing on tiptoe to see the last of 
 them ? They lit a fire in the chamber of her soul which 
 is the home of all pure maids, and the fagots that 
 warmed Grizel were every fond look that had been on 
 her lover's face and every sweet word he had let fall. 
 She counted and fondled them and pretended that one 
 was lost that she might hug it more than all the others 
 when it was found. To sit by that fire was almost better 
 than having the days that lit it, sometimes she could 
 scarcely wait for the day to go. 
 
 Tommy's fond looks and sweet words! There was 
 also a letter in those days, and, now that I remember, 
 a little garnet ring, and there were a few other fagots, 
 but ';all so trifling it must seem incredible to you that 
 they could have made so great a blaze, nothing else in 
 it, on my honor, except a girl's heart added by herself 
 that the fire might burn a moment longer. 
 
 And now, what so chilly as the fire that has gone out I 
 Gone out long ago, dear Grizel, while you crouched 
 
A LOVE-LETTER 269 
 
 over it. You may put your hand in the ashes, they will 
 not burn you now. Ah, Grrizel, why do you sit there 
 in the cold? 
 
 The day of the letter I It began in dread, but ended 
 so joyfully, do you think Grizel grudged the dread ? It 
 became dear to her ; she loved to return to it and gaze 
 at the joy it glorified as one sees the sunshine from 
 a murky room. When she heard the postman's knock 
 she was not even curious ; so few letters came to her 
 she thought this must be Maggy Ann's monthly one 
 from Aberdeen and went on placidly dusting. At last 
 she lifted it from the floor, for it had been slipped 
 beneath the door, and then Grizel was standing in her 
 little lobby, panting as if at the end of a race. The 
 letter lay in both her hands, and they rose slowly until 
 they were pressed against her breast. 
 
 She uttered some faint cries; it was the only mo- 
 ment in which I have known Grizel to be hysterical, 
 and then she ran to her room and locked herself in, 
 herself and it. Do you know why that look of elation 
 had come suddenly to her face ? It was because he had 
 not even written the address in a disguised hand to 
 deceive the postmistress. So much of the old Grizel 
 was gone that the pathos of her elation over this was 
 lost to her. 
 
 Several times she almost opened it. Why did she 
 pause, why had that frightened look come into her eyes ? 
 She put the letter on her table and drew away from it. 
 
270 TOMMY AKD GEIZEIi 
 
 If she took a step nearer, her hands went behind 
 her back as if saying, " Grizel, don't ask us to open it, 
 we are afraid." 
 
 Perhaps it really did say the dear things that love 
 writes. Perhaps it was aghast at the way she was 
 treating it. Dear letter I Her mouth smiled to it, but 
 her hands remained afraid. As she stood irresolute, 
 smiling, and afraid, she was a little like her mother. 
 I have put off as long as possible saying that Grizel 
 was ever like her mother. The Painted Lady had 
 never got any letters while she was in Thrums, but 
 she looked wistfully at those of other people. " They 
 are so pretty," she had said, "but don't open them; 
 when you open them they break your heart." Grizel 
 remembered what her mother had said. 
 
 Had the old Grizel feared what might be inside, it 
 would have made her open the letter more quickly. 
 Two minds to one person were unendurable to her. But 
 she seemed to be a coward now. It was pitiable. 
 
 Perhaps it was quite a common little letter, begin- 
 ning "Dear Grizel" and saying nothing more delicious 
 or more terrible than that he wanted her to lend him 
 one of the doctor's books. She thought of a score of 
 trivialities it might be about, but the letter was still 
 unopened when David Gemmell called to talk over some 
 cases in which he required her counsel. He found her 
 sitting listlessly, something in her lap, which she at 
 once concealed. She failed to follow his arguments, and 
 
A LOVE-LETTER 271 
 
 he went away puckering his brows, some of the o]d 
 doctor's sayings about her ringing loud in his ears. 
 
 One of them was " Things will be far wrong with Grizel 
 when she is able to sit idle with her hands in her lap." 
 
 Another, "She is almost pitifully straightforward, 
 man. Everything that is in Grizel must out. She can 
 hide nothing." 
 
 Yet how cunningly she had concealed what was in 
 her hands. Cunning applied to Grizel ! David shud- 
 dered. He thought of Tommy, and shut his mouth 
 tight. He could do this easily. Tommy could not do 
 it without feeling breathless. They were types of two 
 kinds of men. 
 
 David also remembered a promise he had given 
 McQueen and wondered, as he had wondered a good 
 deal of late, whether the time had come to keep it. 
 
 But Grizel sat on with her unopened letter. She was 
 to meet Tommy presently on the croquet lawn of the 
 Dove Cot, when Ailie was to play Mr. James (the 
 champion), and she decided that she must wait till 
 then. She would know what sort of letter it was the 
 moment she saw his face. And then! She pressed 
 her hands together. 
 
 Oh, how base of her to doubt him ! She said it to 
 herself then and often afterward. She looked mourn- 
 fully in her n^ber's long mirror at this disloyal Grizel, 
 as if the capEKsity to doubt him was the saddest of all 
 the changes that had come to her. He had been so true 
 
272 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 yesterday, oh, how could she tremble to-day. Beautiful 
 yesterday ! but yesterday may seem so long ago. How 
 little a time had passed between the moment when she 
 was greeting him joyously in Caddam Wood and that cry 
 of the heart " How could you hurt your Grizel so ! " 
 No, she could not open her letter. She could kiss it, but 
 she could not open it. 
 
 Foolish fears, for before she had shaken hands with 
 Tommy in Mrs. McLean's garden she knew he loved her 
 still, and that the letter proved it. She was properly 
 punished, yet surely in excess, for when she might have 
 been reading her first love-letter she had to join in dis- 
 cussions with various ladies about Berlin wool and the 
 like, and to applaud the prowess of Mr. James with the 
 loathly croquet mallet. It seemed quite a long time 
 before Tommy could get a private word with her. 
 Then he began about the letter at once. 
 
 "You are not angry with me for writing it?" he 
 asked, anxiously. " I should not have done it, I had no 
 right, but such a desire to do it came over me I had to; 
 it was such a glory to me to say in writing what you are 
 to me." 
 
 She smiled happily. Oh, exquisite day ! " I have so 
 long wanted to have a letter from you," she said. "I 
 have almost wished you would go away for a little time 
 so that I might have a letter from you." 
 
 He had guessed this. He had written to give her 
 delight. 
 
A LOVE-LETTEB 273 
 
 " Did you like the first words of it, Grizel ? " he 
 oaked eagerly. 
 
 The lover and the artist spoke together. 
 
 Could she admit that the letter was unopened and 
 why ? Oh, the pain to him ! She nodded assent. It 
 was not really an untruth, she told herself. She did 
 like them, oh, how she liked them, though she did not 
 know what they were. 
 
 " I nearly began ' My beloved,' " he said, solemnly. 
 
 Somehow she had expected it to be this. "Why 
 did n't you ? " she asked, a little disappointed. 
 
 " I like the other so much better," he replied. " To 
 write it was so delicious to me I thought you would not 
 mind." 
 
 "I don't mind." she said, hastily. What could it 
 be? 
 
 "But you would have preferred ' beloved ' ? " 
 
 " It is such a sweet name." 
 
 " Surely not so sweet as the other, Grizel ! " 
 
 No, she said, no. Oh, what could it be ? 
 
 "Have you destroyed it ? " he asked, and the question 
 was a shock to her. Her hand rose instinctively to 
 defend something that lay near her heart. 
 
 " I could not," she whispered. 
 
 "Do you mean you wanted to ? " he asked, dolefully. 
 
 " I thought you wanted it," she murmured. 
 
 " I ! " he cried, aghast, and she was joyous again. 
 
 " Can't you guess where it is ? " she said. 
 18 
 
274 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 He understood. « Grizel 1 You carry my letter 
 there ! " 
 
 She was full of glee, but she puzzled him presently. 
 
 " Do you think I could go now ? " she inquired, 
 eagerly. 
 
 " And leave me ? " 
 
 It was dreadful of her, but she nodded. 
 
 " I want to go home." 
 
 " Is it not home, Grizel, when you are with me ?" 
 
 " I want to go away from home, then." She said it as 
 if she loved to tantalize him. 
 
 « But why ? " 
 
 " I won't tell you." She was looking wisttully at the 
 door. " I have something to do.'' 
 
 " It can wait." 
 
 "It has waited too long." He might nave heard an 
 assenting rustle from beneath her bodice. 
 
 "Do let me go," she said, coaxmgiy, as if he held 
 her. 
 
 " I can't understand — " he began and broke off. She 
 was facing him demurely but exultantly, challenging 
 him, he could see, to read her now. " Just when I am 
 flattering myself that I know everything about you, 
 Grizel," he said, with a long face, " I suddenly wonder 
 whether I know anything." 
 
 She would have liked to clap her hands. " You must 
 remember that we have changed places," she told him, 
 " it is I who understand you now." 
 
A LOVE-LETTEB 275 
 
 "And I am devoutly glad," he made answer, with 
 humble thankfulness. "And I must ask you, Grizel, 
 why you want to run away from me." 
 
 "But you think you know," she retorted, smartly. 
 " You think I want to read my letter again ! " 
 
 Her cleverness staggered him. "But I am right, am 
 I not, Grizel ? " 
 
 "No," she said, triumphantly, "you are quite wrong, 
 oh, if you knew how wrong you are ! " and having thus 
 again unhorsed him she made her excuses to Ailie and 
 slipped away. Dr. Gemmell, who was present and had 
 been watching her narrowly, misread the flush on her 
 face and her restless desire to be gone. 
 
 "Is there anything between those two, do you 
 think?" Mrs. McLean had said in a twitter to him 
 while Tommy and Grizel were talking, and he had 
 answered "No" almost sharply. 
 
 "People are beginning to think there is," she said, in 
 self-defence. 
 
 " They are mistaken," he told her curtly, and it was 
 about this time that Grizel left. David followed her 
 to her home soon afterward, and Maggy Ann, who 
 answered his summons, did not accompany him up- 
 stairs ; he was in the house daily and she left him to 
 find Grizel for himself. He opened the parlor door 
 almost as he knocked, and she was there but had not 
 heard him. He stopped short like one who had blun- 
 dered unawares on what was not for him. 
 
276 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 She was on her knees on the hearth-rug with her 
 head buried in what had been Dr, McQueen's chair ; 
 ragged had been the seat of it on the day when she first 
 went to live with him, but very early on the following 
 morning, or to be precise five minutes after daybreak, 
 he had risen to see if there were burglars in the parlor, 
 and behold, it was his grateful little maid repadding the 
 old arm-chair. How a situation repeats itself ! "With- 
 out disturbing her the old doctor had slipped away with 
 a full heart ; it was what the young doctor did now. 
 
 But the situation was not quite the same. She had 
 been bubbling over with glee then, she was sobbing 
 now. David could not know that it was a sob of joy, 
 he knew only that he had never seen her crying before 
 and that it was the letter in her hands that had brought 
 tears at last to those once tranquil and steadfast eyes. 
 
 In an odd conversation which had once taken place in 
 that room between the two doctors Gemmell had said, 
 " But the time may come without my knowing it," and 
 McQueen's reply was, "I don't think so, for she is so 
 open ; but I '11 tell you this, David, as a guide, I never 
 saw her eyes wet. It is one of the touching things 
 about her that she has the eyes of a man, to whom it is 
 a shame to cry. If you ever see her greeting, David, 
 I 'm sore doubting that the time will have come." 
 
 As David Gemmell let himself softly out of the house 
 to return to it presently, he thought the time had come. 
 What he conceived he had to do was a hard thing, but 
 
A LOVE-LETTER 277 
 
 he never thought of not doing it, he had kept himself in 
 readiness to do it for many days now, and he walked to 
 it as firmly as if he were on his professional rounds. 
 He did not know that the skin round his eyes had con- 
 tracted, giving them the look of pain which always 
 came there when he was sorry or pitiful or indignant ; 
 he was not well acquainted with his eyes, and had he 
 glanced at them now in a glass would have presumed 
 that this was their usual expression. 
 
 Grizel herself opened the door to him this time, and 
 "Maggy Ann, he is found," she cried, victoriously. 
 Evidently she had heard of his previous visit. " We 
 have searched every room in the house for you," she 
 said, gayly, " and had you disappeared for much longer 
 Maggy Ann would have had the carpets up." 
 
 He excused himself on the ground that he had for- 
 gotten something, and she chided him merrily for being 
 forgetful. As he sat with her David could have 
 groaned aloud. How vivacious she had become; but 
 she was sparkling in false colors. After what he knew 
 had been her distress of a few minutes ago it was a painted 
 face to him ; she was trying to deceive him, perhaps she 
 suspected that he had seen her crying, and now, attired 
 in all a woman's wiles, she was defying him to believe 
 his eyes. 
 
 Grizel garbed in wiles ! Alack the day I She was 
 shielding the man, and Gemmell could have driven hei 
 away roughly to get at him. But she was also standing 
 
278 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 over her own pride lest any one should see that it had 
 fallen, and do you think that David would have made 
 her budge an inch? 
 
 Of course she saw that he had something on his mind ; 
 she knew those puckered eyes so well and had so often 
 smoothed them for him. 
 
 " What is it, David ? " she asked, sympathetically. " I 
 see you have come as a patient to-night." 
 
 " As one of those patients," he rejoined, " who feel 
 better at mere sight of the doctor." 
 
 " Fear of the prescription ? " said she. 
 
 " Not if you prescribe yourself, Grizel." 
 
 " David ! " she cried. He had been paying com- 
 pliments ! 
 
 " I mean it." 
 
 " So I can see by your face. Oh, David, how stem 
 you look ! " 
 
 "Dr. McQueen and I," he retorted, "used to hold 
 private meetings after you had gone to bed at which we 
 agreed that you should no longer be allowed to make 
 fuu of us. They came to nothing, do you know why ? " 
 
 " Because I continued to do it ? " 
 
 "No, but because we missed it so much if you 
 stopped." 
 
 "You are nice to-night, David," she said, dropping 
 him a courtesy. 
 
 "We liked all your bullying ways," he went on. 
 "We were children in your masterful hands," 
 
A LOVE-LETTEE 279 
 
 "I was a tyrant, David," she said, looking properly 
 ashamed. " I wonder you did not marry, just to get rid 
 of me." 
 
 "Have you ever seriously wondered why I don't 
 marry ? " he asked, quickly. 
 
 " Oh, David," she exclaimed, " what else do you think 
 your patients and I talk of when I am trying to nurse 
 them ? It has agitated the town ever since you first 
 walked up the Marrywellbrae, and we can't get on with 
 our work for thinking of it." 
 
 " Seriously, Grizel ? " 
 
 She became grave at once. " If you could find the 
 right woman," she said, wistfully. 
 
 "I have found her," he answered, and then she 
 pressed her hands together, too excited to speak. 
 
 " If she would only care a little for me," he said. 
 
 Grizel rocked her arms. " I am sure she does," she 
 cried. "David, I am so glad." 
 
 He saw what her mistake was, but pretended not to 
 know that she had made one. "Are you really glad 
 that I love you, Grizel?" he asked. 
 
 It seemed to daze her for a moment. "Not me, 
 David," she said, softly, as if correcting him. "You 
 don't mean that it is me ? " she said, coaxingly. 
 "David," she cried, "say it is not me!" 
 
 He drooped his head, but not before he had seen all 
 the brightness die out of her face. " Is it so painful to 
 you even to hear me say it ? " he asked, gravely. 
 
280 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 Her joy had been selfish as her sorrow was. Eoi 
 nigh a minute she had been thinking of herself alone, 
 it meant so much to her, but now she jumped up and 
 took his hand in hers. 
 
 " Poor David ! " she said, making much of his hand as 
 if she had hurt it. But David Gemmell's was too simple 
 a face to oppose to her pitying eyes, and presently she 
 let his hand slip from her and stood regarding him curi- 
 ously. He had to look another way, and then she even 
 smiled, a little forlornly. 
 
 " Do you mind talking it over with me, G-rizel ? " he 
 asked. " I have always been well aware that you did not 
 care for me in that way, but nevertheless I believe you 
 might do worse." 
 
 " jN"o woman could do better," she answered, gravely. 
 " I should like you to talk it over, David, if you begin at 
 the beginning," and she sat down with her hands crossed. 
 
 " I won't say what a good thing it would be for me," 
 was his beginning, " we may take that for granted." 
 
 "I don't think we can," she remarked; "but it 
 scarcely matters at present. That is not the beginning, 
 David." 
 
 He was very anxious to make it the beginning. 
 
 " I am weary of living in lodgings," he said. " The 
 practice suffers by my not being married. Many patients 
 dislike being attended by a single man. I ought to be 
 in McQueen's house. It has been so long known as the 
 doctor's house. And you should be a doctor's wife, you 
 
A LOVK-LETTEE 281 
 
 who could almost be the doctor. It would be a shame, 
 Griizel, if you who are so much to patients were to marry 
 out of the profession. Don't you follow me ? " 
 
 "I follow you," she replied, "but what does it 
 matter ? you have not begun at the beginning." He 
 looked at her inquiringly. " You must begin," she in- 
 formed him, "by saying why you ask me to marry you 
 when you don't love me." She added in answer to 
 another look from him, "You know you don't." There 
 was a little reproach in it. " Oh, David, what made you 
 think I could be so easily taken in ! " 
 
 He looked so miserable that by and by she smiled, 
 not so tremulously as before. 
 
 " How bad at it you are, David ! " she said. 
 
 And how good at it she was, he thought, gloomily. 
 
 " Shall I help you out ? " she asked, gently, but speak- 
 ing with dignity. '<You think I am unhappy, you 
 believe I am in the position in which you placed yourself, 
 of caring for some one who does not care for me." 
 
 " Grizel, I mistrust him." 
 
 She flushed, she was not quite so gentle now. " And 
 so you offer me your hand to save me ! It was a great 
 self-sacrifice, David, but you used not to be fond of 
 doing showy things." 
 
 " I did not mean it to be showy," he answered. 
 
 She was well aware of that, but — " Oh, David,'' she 
 cried, "that you should believe I needed it! How 
 little you must think of me ! " 
 
282 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 « Does it look as if I thought little of you ? " he 
 said. 
 
 « Little of my strength, David, little of my pride." 
 
 " I think so much of them that how could I stand by 
 silently and watch them go." 
 
 " You think you have seen that ! " She was agitated 
 now. 
 
 He hesitated. " Yes," he said, courageously. 
 
 Her eyes cried, « David, how could you be so cruel ! " 
 but they did not daunt him. 
 
 " Have you not seen it yourself, Grizel ? " he said. 
 
 She pressed her hands together. "I was so happy," 
 she said, "until you came." 
 
 " Have you not seen it yourself ? " he asked again. 
 
 "There may be better things," she retorted, "^'than 
 those you rate so highly." 
 
 "Not for you," he said. 
 
 "If they are gone," she told him, with a flush of 
 resentment, " it is not you who can bring them back." 
 
 "But let me try, Grizel," said he. 
 
 "David, can I not even make you angry with me ?" 
 
 "No, Grizel, you can't. I am very sorry that I can 
 make you angry with me." 
 
 " I am not," she said, dispiritedly. " It would be 
 contemptible in me." And then eagerly, "But, David, 
 you have made a great mistake, indeed you have. Tou 
 — you are a dreadful bungler, sir! " She was trying to 
 make his face relax, with a tremulous smile from her- 
 
A LOVE-LETTER 283 
 
 self to encourage him, but the effort was not successful. 
 "You see I can't even bully you now ! " she said. "Did 
 that capacity go with the others, David ? " 
 
 "Try a little harder," he replied, "I think you will 
 find that I submit to it still." 
 
 "Very well." She forced some gayety to her aid. 
 After all, how could she let his monstrous stupidity 
 wound a heart protected by such a letter ? 
 
 "You have been a very foolish and presumptuous 
 boy," she began. She was standing up, smiling, wag- 
 ging a reproachful but nervous finger at him. " If 
 it were not that I have a weakness for seeing medical 
 men making themselves ridiculous so that I may put 
 them right, I should be very indignant with you, 
 sir." 
 
 " Put me right, Grizel," he said. He was sure she 
 was trying to blind him again. 
 
 "Know then, David, that I am not the poor-spirited, 
 humble creature you seem to have come here in search 
 of » 
 
 " But you admitted " 
 
 " How dare you interrupt me, sir ! Yes, I admit that 
 I am not quite as I was, but I glory in it. I used to 
 be ostentatiously independent, now I am only independ- 
 ent enough. My pride made me walk on air, now 1 
 walk on the earth, where there is less chance of falling. 
 I have still confidence in myself, but I begin to see that 
 ways are not necessarily right because they are my 
 
284 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 ways. In short, David, I am evidently on tlie road to 
 being a model character ! " 
 
 They were gay words, but she ended somewhat faintly. 
 
 "I was satisfied with you as you were," was the 
 doctor's comment. 
 
 " I wanted to excel ! " 
 
 "You explain nothing, Grizel," he said, reproachfully. 
 " Why have you changed so ? " 
 
 " Because I am so happy. Do you remember how 
 in the old days I sometimes danced for joy ? I could 
 do it now." 
 
 "Are you engaged to be married, Grizel ?" 
 
 She took a quiet breath. "You have no right to 
 question me in this way," she said. "I think I have 
 been very good in bearing with you so long." 
 
 But she laid aside her indignation at once, he was so 
 old a friend, the sincerity of him had been so often 
 tried. "If you must know, David," she said, with a 
 girlish frankness that became her better, "I am not 
 engaged to be married. And I must tell you nothing 
 more," she added, shutting her mouth decisively. She 
 must be faithful to her promise. 
 
 " He forbids it ? " Gemmell asked, mercilessly. 
 
 She stamped her foot, not in rage but in hopelessness, 
 " How incapable you are of doing him justice," she 
 cried. " If you only knew " 
 
 " Tell me. I want to do him justice." 
 
 She sat down again, sighing. " My attempt to regain 
 
A LOVB-LETTEB 285 
 
 my old power over you has not been very successful, 
 
 has it, David! We must not quarrel, though " 
 
 holding out her hand, which he grasped. " And you 
 won't question me any more ? " She said it appealingly. 
 
 "Never again," he answered. "I never wanted to 
 question you, Grizel. I wanted only to marry you." 
 
 " And that can't be." 
 
 "I don't see it," he said, so stoutly that she was 
 almost amused. But he would not be pushed aside. 
 He had something more to say. 
 
 "Dr. McQueen wished it," he said; "above all else 
 in the world he wished it. He often told me so." 
 
 "He never said that to me," Grizel replied, quickly. 
 
 " Because he thought that to press you was no way to 
 make you care for me. He hoped that it would come 
 about." 
 
 "It has not come about, David, with either of us," 
 she said, gently. ' * I am sure that would have been 
 sufficient answer to him." 
 
 "No, Grizel, it would not, not now." 
 
 He had risen, and his face was whiter than she had 
 ever seen it. 
 
 "I am going to hurt you, Grizel," he said, and every 
 word was a pang to him. " I see no other way. It has 
 got to be done. Dr. McQueen often talked to me about 
 the things that troubled you when you were a little 
 girl, the morbid fears you had then and that had all 
 been swept away years before I knew you. But though 
 
286 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 they had been long gone you were so much to him that 
 he tried to think of everything that might happen to 
 you in the future, and he foresaw that they might 
 possibly come back. ' If she were ever to care for 
 some false loon ! ' — he has said to me, and then, Grizel, 
 he could not go on." 
 
 Grizel beat her hands. " If he could not go on," she 
 said, " it was not because he feared what I should do." 
 
 "No, no," David answered, eagerly, " he never feared 
 for that, but for your happiness. He told me of a 
 boy who used to torment you, oh, all so long ago and 
 of such little account that he had forgotten his name. 
 But that boy has come back and you care for him, and 
 he is a false loon, Grizel." 
 
 She had risen too, and was flashing fire on David, but 
 he went on. 
 
 " ' If the time ever comes,' he said to me, ' when you 
 see her in torture from such a cause, speak to her 
 openly about it, tell her it is I who am speaking through 
 you ; it will be a hard task to you, but wrestle through 
 with it, David, in memory of any little kindness I may 
 have done you and the great love I bore my Grizel.' " 
 
 She was standing rigid now. "Is there any more, 
 David?" she said, in a low voice. 
 
 "Only this. I admired you then as I admire you 
 now. I may not love you, Grizel, but of this I am very 
 sure " — he was speaking steadily, he was forgetting no 
 one — " that you are the noblest and bravest woman I 
 
A LOVE-I^TTEB 287 
 
 have ever known, and 1 promised — he did not draw the 
 promise from me, I gave it to him — that if I was a free 
 man and could help you in any way without paining you 
 by telling you these things I would try that way first." 
 
 " And this is the way ? " 
 
 " I could think of no other. Is it of no avail ? " 
 
 She shook her head. " You have made such a dread- 
 ful mistake," she cried, miserably, " and you won't see 
 it. Oh, how you wrong him ! I am the happiest girl 
 in the world, and it is he who makes me so happy. 
 But I can't explain. You need not ask me ; I promised 
 ana i won't." 
 
 " You used not to be so lond of mystery, Grizel." 
 
 "I am not fond of it now." 
 
 "Ah, it is he," David saia, oitteriy, and he lifted his 
 hat. " Is there nothing you will let me do for you, 
 Grizel?" he cried. 
 
 " I thought you were to do so much for me when you 
 came into this room," she admitted, wistfully, " and 
 said that you were in love. I thought it was with 
 another woman." 
 
 He remembered that her face had brightened. " How 
 could that have helped you ? " he aeked. 
 
 She saw that she had but to tell him, and for her sake 
 he would do it at once. But she could not be so selfish. 
 
 "We need npt speak of that now," she said. 
 
 "We must speak of i^'' ne answered. "Grizel, it is 
 but fair to me, it may be so important to me." 
 
288 TOMMY AND GBIZBL 
 
 "You have shown that you don't care for her, David, 
 and that ends it." 
 
 " Who is it ? " He was much stirred. 
 
 " If you don't know " 
 
 " Is it Elspeth ? " 
 
 The question came out of him like a confession, and 
 hope turned Grizel giddy. 
 
 " Do you love her, David ? " she cried. 
 
 But he hesitated. " Is what you have told me true, 
 that it would help you ? " he asked, looking her full in 
 the eyes. 
 
 "'Do you love her ? " she implored, but he was deter, 
 mined to have her answer first. 
 
 "Is it, Grizel?" 
 
 " Yes, yes. Do you, David ? " 
 
 And then he admitted that he did, and she rocked her 
 arms in joy, 
 
 " But, oh, David, to say such things to me when you 
 were not a free man ! How badly you have treated 
 Elspeth to-day ! " 
 
 " She does not care for me," he said. 
 
 " Have you asked her ? " — in alarm. 
 
 " liTo, but could she ? " 
 
 " How could she help it ? " She would not tell him 
 what Tommy thought. Oh, she must do everything to 
 encourage David. 
 
 " And still," said he, puzzling, " I don't see how it 
 can affect you." 
 
A LOVE-LBTTEE 289 
 
 "And I can't tell you," she moaned. "Oh, David, 
 lo, do find out. "Why are you so blind ? " She could 
 lave shaken him. " Don't you see that once Elspeth 
 ?as willing to be taken care of by some other person — 
 ; must not tell you." 
 
 " Then he would marry you ? " 
 
 She cried in anxiety, "Have I told you, or did you 
 Indout?" 
 
 " I found out," he said. " Is it possible he is so fond 
 )f her as that ? " 
 
 "There never was such a brother," she answered. 
 She could not help adding, "But he is still fonder of 
 ne." 
 
 The doctor pulled his arm over his eyes and sat down 
 igain. Presently he was saying with a long face, "I 
 !ame here to denounce the cause of your unhappiness, 
 md I begin to see it is myself." 
 
 "Of course it is, you stupid David," she said, glee- 
 fully. She was very kind to the man who had been 
 willing to do so much for her, but as the door closed 
 m him she forgot him. She even ceased to hear the 
 srarning voice he had brought with him' from the dead. 
 She was re-reading the letter that began by calling her 
 wife. 
 
 19 
 
292 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 "Well, for instance, you might show her that you 
 have a very high opinion of him." 
 
 "Agreed. But she knows that already." 
 
 ''Then, David is an only child. Don't you think 
 you could say that men who have never had a sister 
 are peculiarly gentle and considerate to women ? " 
 
 " Oh, Grizel ! But I think I can say that." 
 
 "And — and that having been so long accustomed 
 to doing everything for themselves, they don't need 
 managing wives as men brought up among women need 
 them." 
 
 " Yes, but how cunning you are, Grizel ! Who would 
 have believed it ! " 
 
 "And then — " she hesitated. 
 
 " Go on. I see by your manner that this is to 
 be a big one." 
 
 " It would be such a help," she said, eagerly, "if you 
 could be just a little less attentive to her. I know 
 you do ever so much of the housework because she is 
 not fond of it, and if she has a headache you , ''■ with 
 her all day, and you beg her to play and sing to you, 
 though you really dislike music. Oh, there are scores 
 of things you do for her, and if you were to do them 
 a little less willingly, in such a way as to show her 
 that they interrupt your work and are a slight trial 
 to you, I — I am sure that would help ! " 
 
 "She would see through me, Grizel. Elspeth is 
 sharper than you think her." 
 
ATTEMPT TO OAEEY ELSPBTH BY NXTMBEES 293 
 
 "Not if you did it very skilfully." 
 
 " Then she would believe I had grown cold to her, and 
 it would break her heart." 
 
 "One of your failings," replied Grizel, giving him 
 her hand for a moment, as recompense for what she was 
 about to say, "is that you think women's hearts break 
 so easily. If at the slightest sign that she notices any 
 change in you, you think her heart is breaking and 
 seize her in your arms, crying, 'Elspeth, dear little 
 Elspeth — ' and that is what your first impulse would 
 be " 
 
 " How well you know me, Grizel 1 " groaned Senti- 
 mental Tommy. 
 
 "If that would be the result," she went on, "better 
 not do it at all. But if you were to restrain yourself, 
 then she could not but reflect that many of the things 
 you did for her with a sigh, David did for pleasure, and 
 she would compare him and you " 
 
 "To my disadvantage!" Tommy exclaimed, with 
 sad incredulity. "Do you really think she could, 
 Grizel?" 
 
 " Give her the chance," Grizel continued, " and if you 
 find it hard, you must remember that what you are doing 
 is for her good." 
 
 "And for ours," Tommy cried, fervently. Every 
 promise he made her at this time he fulfilled and more ; 
 he was hopeless, but all a man could do to make Elspeth 
 love David he did. 
 
294 TOMMY AlfTD GEIZEL 
 
 The doctor was quite unaware of it. "Fortunately 
 her brother had a headache yesterday and was lying 
 down," he told Grizel, with calm brutality, " so I saw her 
 alone for a few minutes." 
 
 " The fibs I have to invent," said Tommy, to the same 
 confidant, " to get myself out of their way ! " 
 
 "Luckily he does not care for music," David said, 
 " so when she is at the piano he sometimes remains in 
 the kitchen talking to Aaron." 
 
 Tommy and Aaron left together ! Tommy described 
 those scenes with much good-humor. " I was amazed, 
 at first," he said to Grizel, "to find Aaron determinedly 
 enduring me, but now I understand. He wants what we 
 want. He says not a word about it, but he is watching 
 those two courting, like a born match-maker. Aaron has 
 several reasons for hoping that Elspeth will get our 
 friend (as he would express it), one, that this would keep 
 her in Thrums ; another, that to be the wife of a doctor 
 is second only in worldly grandeur to marrying the 
 manse ; and thirdly and lastly, because he is convinced 
 that it would be such a staggerer to me. For he thinks 
 I have not a notion of what is going on, and that, if I 
 had, I would whisk her away to London." 
 
 He gave Grizel the most graphic, solemn pictures of 
 those evenings in the cottage. " Conceive the four of us, 
 gathered round the kitchen fire, three men and a maid; 
 the three men yearning to know what is in the maid's 
 mind, and each concealing his anxiety from the others. 
 
ATTEMPT TO CABKY BLSPETH BY NUMBBKS 295 
 
 Elspeth gives the doctor a look, whicli may mean much 
 or nothing, and he glares at me as if I were in the way, 
 and I glance at Aaron, and he is on tenterhooks lest I 
 have noticed anything. ISText minute, perhaps, David 
 gives utterance to a plaintive sigh, and Aaron and I 
 pounce upon Elspeth (with our eyes) to observe its effect 
 on her, and Elspeth wonders why Aaron is staring, and 
 he looks apprehensively at me, and I am gazing absent- 
 mindedly at the fender. 
 
 "Tou may smile, Grizel," Tommy would say, "and 
 now that I think of it, I can smile myself, but we are an 
 eerie quartette at the time. When the strain becomes 
 unendurable, one of us rises and mends the fire with his 
 foot, and then I think the rest of us could say, thank 
 you. We talk desperately for a little after that, but 
 soon again the awful pall creeps down," 
 
 " If I were there," cried G-rizel, " I would not have the 
 parlor standing empty all this time." 
 
 "We are coming to the parlor," Tommy replies, im- 
 pressively. "The parlor, Grizel, now begins to stir. 
 Elspeth has disappeared from the kitchen, we three men 
 know not whither : we did not notice her go ; we don't 
 even observe that she has gone. We are too busy look- 
 ing at the fire. By and by the tremulous tinkling of an 
 aged piano reaches us from an adjoining chamber, and 
 Aaron looks at me through his fingers, and I take a 
 lightning glance at Mr. David, and he uncrosses his legs, 
 and rises and sits down again. Aaron, in the most 
 
296 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 unconcerned way, proceeds to cut tobacco and rub it 
 between his fingers, and I stretch out my legs and con- 
 template them with passionate approval. While we are 
 thus occupied David has risen, and he is so thoroughly 
 at his ease that he has begun to hum. He strolls round 
 the kitchen, looking with sudden interest at the mantel- 
 piece ornaments ; he reads, for the hundredth time, the 
 sampler on the wall ; next the clock engages his atten- 
 tion; it is ticking, and that seems to impress him as 
 novel and curious ; by this time he has reached the door, 
 it opens to his touch, and in a fit of abstraction he leaves 
 the room." 
 
 " You don't follow him into the parlor ? " asks Grizel, 
 anxiously. 
 
 " Follow whom ? " Tommy replies, severely. " I 
 don't even know that he has gone to the parlor ; now 
 that I think of it, I have not even noticed that he has 
 left the kitchen. Nor has Aaron noticed it. Aaron and 
 I are not in a condition to notice such things ; we are 
 conscious only that at last we have the opportunity for 
 the quiet social chat we so much enjoy in each other's 
 company. That, at least, is Aaron's way of looking at 
 it, and he keeps me there with talk of the most varied 
 and absorbing character, one topic down, another up; 
 when very hard put to it he even questions me about 
 my next, book, as if he would like to read the proof- 
 sheets, and when I seem to be listening, a little restively, 
 for sounds from the parlor (the piano has stopped), he 
 
ATTEMPT TO CAREY ELSPETH BY NTIMBEES 297 
 
 has the face of one who would bar the door rather than 
 lose my society. Aaron appreciates me at my true 
 value at last, Grizel. I had begun to despair almost 
 of ever bringing him under my charm." 
 
 "I should be very angry with you," Grizel said warn- 
 ingly, " if I thought you teased the poor old man." 
 
 " Tease him ! The consideration I show that pocr old 
 man, Grizel, while I know all the time that he is plot- 
 ting to diddle me ! Tou should see me, when it is he 
 who is fidgeting to know why the piano has stopped. 
 He stretches his head to listen, and does something to 
 his ear that sends it another inch nearer the door ; he 
 chuckles and groans on the sly, and I — I notice nothing. 
 Oh, he is becoming quite fond of me. He thinks me an 
 idiot." 
 
 "Why not tell him tbat you want it as much as 
 he?" 
 
 "He would not believe me. Aaron is firmly con- 
 vinced that I am too jealous of Elspeth's affection to 
 give away a thimbleful of it. He blames me for pre- 
 venting her caring much even for him." 
 
 "At any rate," said Grizel, "he is on our side, and it 
 is because he sees it would be so much the best thing for 
 her." 
 
 "And at the same time such a shock to me. That 
 poor old man, Grizel ! I have seen him rubbing his 
 hands together with glee, and looking quite leery as he 
 thought of what was coming to me." 
 
298 TOMMY AlO) GEIZBIi 
 
 But Grizel could not laugh now. When Tommy saw 
 so well through Aaron and David, through everyone he 
 came in contact with, indeed, what hope could there he 
 that he was deceived in Elspeth ? 
 
 " And yet she knows what takes him there, she must 
 know it," she cried. 
 
 " A woman," Tommy said, " is never sure that a man 
 is in love with her until he proposes. She may fancy — 
 but it is never safe to fancy, as so many have dis- 
 covered." 
 
 "She has no right," declared Grizel, "to wait until 
 she is sure, if she does not care for him. If she fears 
 that he is falling in love with her, she knows how to 
 discourage him ; there are surely a hundred easy kind 
 ways of doing that." 
 
 " Fears he is falling in love with her ! " Tommy re- 
 peated. " Is any woman ever afraid of that ? " 
 
 He really bewildered her. "No woman would like 
 it," Grizel answered promptly for them all, because she 
 would not have liked it. " She must see that it would 
 result only in pain to him." 
 
 '< Still " said Tommy. 
 
 " Oh, but how dense you are," she said, in surprise. 
 "Don't you understand that she would stop him, though 
 it were for no better reasons than selfish ones. Consider 
 her shame if, in thinking it over afterward, she saw that 
 she might have stopped him sooner ! Why," she cried, 
 with a sudden smile, "it is in your book! You say. 
 
ATTEMPT TO CAEEY BLSPBTH BY NTJMBEES 299 
 
 ' Every maiden carries secretly in her heart an idea of 
 love so pure and sacred that, if by any act she is once 
 false to that conception, her punishment is that she 
 never dares to look at it again.' And this is one of the 
 acts you mean." 
 
 " I had not thought of it, though," he said, humbly. 
 He was never prouder of Grizel than at that moment. 
 " If Elspeth's outlook," he went on, " is different " 
 
 « It can't be different." 
 
 " If it is, the fault is mine ; yes, though I wrote the 
 passage that you interpret so nobly, Grizel. Shall I tell 
 you," he said, gently, " what I believe is Elspeth's out- 
 look exactly, just now ? She knows that the doctor is 
 attracted by her, and it gives her little thrills of exulta- 
 tion, but that it can be love — she puts that question in 
 such a low voice, as if to prevent herself hearing it. 
 And yet she listens, Grizel, like one who would lij^e to 
 know ! Elspeth is pitifully distrustful of anyone's 
 really loving her, and she will never admit to herself 
 that he does untU he tells her." 
 
 "And then?" 
 
 Tommy had to droop his head. 
 
 " I see you have still no hope ! " she said. 
 
 " It would be so easy to pretend I have," he replied, 
 with longing, "in order to cheer you for the moment. 
 Oh, it would even be easy to me to deceive myself, but 
 should I do it?" 
 
 "No, no," she said, "anything but that, I can bear 
 
300 TOMMY AJSTD GEIZEL 
 
 anything but that," and she shuddered. " But we seem 
 to be treating David cruelly." 
 
 "I don't think so," he assured her. "Men like to 
 have these things to look back to. But if you want it, 
 Grizel, I have to say only a word to Elspeth to bring it 
 to an end. She is as tender as she is innocent and — but 
 it would be a hard task to me," he admitted, his heart 
 suddenly going out to Elspeth ; he had never deprived 
 her of any gratification before. " Still, I am willing 
 to do it." 
 
 " No," Grizel cried, restraining him with her hand, " I 
 am a coward, I suppose, but I can't help wanting to hope 
 for a little longer, and David won't grudge it to me." 
 
 It was but a very little longer that they had to wait. 
 Tommy, returning home one day from a walk with his 
 old school-friend, Gav Dishart (now M. A.), found Aaron 
 suspiciously near the parlor key-hole. 
 
 "There's a better fire in the other end," Aaron said, 
 luring him into the kitchen. So desirous was he of 
 keeping Tommy there, fixed down on a stool, that "I'll 
 play you at the dambrod," he said, briskly. 
 
 « Anyone with Elspeth ? " 
 
 " Some womenfolk you dinna like," replied Aaron. 
 
 Tommy rose. Aaron, with a subdued snarl, got 
 between him and the door. 
 
 "I was wondering merely," Tommy said, pointing 
 pleasantly to something on the dresser, "why one of 
 them wore the doctor's hat." 
 
ATTEMPT TO CAEEY ELSPETH BY NUMBBKS 301 
 
 '' I forgot, he 's there too," Aaron said, promptly, but 
 he looked at Tommy with misgivings. They sat down 
 to their game. 
 
 "You begin," said Tommy, "you're black," and 
 Aaron opened with the Double Corner, but so preoccupied 
 was he that it became a variation of the Ayrshire lassie, 
 without his knowing. His suspicions had to find vent in 
 words. " You dinna speir wha the womenfolk are ? " 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Do you think I 'm just pretending they 're there ? " 
 Aaron asked, apprehensively. 
 
 "Not at all," said Tommy, with much politeness, 
 "but I thought you might be mistaken." He could 
 have " blown " Aaron immediately thereafter, but with 
 great consideration forbore. The old man was so 
 troubled that he could not lift a king without its falling 
 in two. His sleeve got in the way of his fingers. At 
 last he sat back in his chair. " Do you ken what is go- 
 ing on, man ? " he demanded, " or do you no ken ? I 
 can stand this doubt no longer." 
 
 A less soft-hearted person might have affected not to 
 understand, but that was not Tommy's way. " I know, 
 Aaron," he admitted. " I have known all the time." It 
 was said in the kindliest manner, but its effect on Aaron 
 was not soothing. 
 
 " Curse yon," he cried, with extraordinary vehemence, 
 " you have been playing wi' me a' the time, ay, and wi' 
 him and wi' her 1 " 
 
302 TOMMY AKD GKIZEL 
 
 What had Aaron been doing with Tommy ? But 
 Tommy did not ask that. 
 
 "I am sorry you think so badly of me," he said, 
 quietly. '' I have known all the time, Aaron, but have 
 I interfered?" 
 
 " Because you ken she winna take him. I see it plain 
 enough now, you ken your power over her ; the honest 
 man that thinks he could take her frae you, is to you 
 but a divert." 
 
 He took a step nearer Tommy. "Listen," he said. 
 " When you came back he was on the point o' spiering 
 her, I saw it in his face as she was playing the piano, 
 and she saw it, too, for her hands began to trem'le and 
 the tune wouldna play. I daursay you think I was 
 keeking, but if I was I stoppit it when the piano stoppit, 
 it was a hard thing to me to do, and it would hae been 
 an easy thing no to do, but I wouldna spy upon Elspeth 
 in her great hour." 
 
 " I like you for that, Aaron," Tommy said, but Aaron 
 waved his likes aside. 
 
 " The reason I stood at the door," he continued, "was 
 to keep you out o' that room. I offered to play you at 
 the dambrod to keep you out. Ay, you ken that with- 
 out my telling you, but do you ken what makes me tell 
 you now ? It *s to see whether you '11 go in and stop 
 him ; let 's see you do that and I '11 hae some hope yet." 
 He waited eagerly. 
 
 " You do puzzle me now," Tommy said. 
 
ATTEMPT TO CAEEY ELSPETH BY NUMBBES 303 
 
 " Ay," replied the old man, bitterly, " you 're dull in 
 the uptak when you like I I dinna ken, I suppose, and 
 you dinna ken, that if you had the least dread o' her 
 taking him you would be into that room full bend to 
 stop it, but you 're so sure o' her, you *re so michty sure 
 that you can sit here and lauch instead." 
 
 " Am I laughing, Aaron ? If you but knew, Els- 
 peth's marriage would be a far more joyful thing to me 
 than it could ever be to you." 
 
 The old warper laughed unpleasantly at that. " And 
 I 'se uphaud,"" he said, " you 're none sure but what 
 she '11 tak him ! You 're no as sure she '11 refuse him 
 as that there *s a sun in the heavens and I 'm a broken 
 man." 
 
 For a moment, sympathy nigh compelled Tommy to 
 say a hopeful thing, but he mastered himself. " It 
 would be weakness," was what he did say, " to pretend 
 that there is any hope." 
 
 Aaron gave him an ugly look, and was about to leave 
 the house, but Tommy would not have it. " If one of 
 us must go, Aaron," he said, with much gentleness, " let 
 it be me," and he went out, passing the parlor door 
 softly, so that he might not disturb poor David. The 
 warper sat on by the fire, his head sunk miserably in his 
 shoulders ; the vehemence had passed out of him ; you 
 would have hesitated to believe that such a listless, 
 shrunken man could have been vehement that same 
 year. It is a hardy proof of his faith in Tommy that 
 
304 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 he did not even think it wortli while to look up, when 
 by and by the parlor door opened and the doctor came 
 in for his hat. Elspeth was with him. 
 
 They told Aaron something. 
 
 It lifted him off his feet and bore him out at the door. 
 When he made up on himself he knew he was search- 
 ing everywhere for Tommy. . A terror seized him, lest 
 he should not be the first to convey the news. 
 
 Had he been left a fortune ? neighbors asked, amazed 
 at this unwonted sight, and he replied, as he ran, "I 
 have, and I want to share it wi' him! " 
 
 It was his only joke. People came to their doors to 
 see Aaron Latta laughing. 
 
THEY TOLD AARON SOMETHING 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 grizel's glokious hour 
 
 Elspeth was to be his wife ! David had carried 
 the wondrous promise straight to Grizel, and now he 
 . was gone, and she was alone again. 
 
 Oh, foolish Grizel, are you crying, and I thought it 
 was so hard to you to cry ! 
 
 " Me crying! Oh, no ! " 
 
 Put your hand to your cheeks, Grizel. Are they not 
 wet? 
 
 " They are wet, and I did not know it ! It is hard to 
 me to cry in sorrow, but I can cry for joy. I am crying 
 because it has all come right, and I was so much afraid 
 that it never would." 
 
 Ah, Grizel, I think you said you wanted nothing 
 else, so long as you had his love ! 
 
 "But God has let it all come right, just the same, and 
 I am thanking Him. That is why I did not know that 
 I was crying." 
 
 She was by the fireplace, on the stool that had always 
 been her favorite seat, and of course she sat very 
 straight. When Grizel walked or stood her strong 
 round figure took a hundred beautiful poses, but when 
 
 20 
 
306 TOMMY AKD GEIZEL 
 
 she sat it had but one ; the old doctor, in experimenting 
 moods, had sometimes compelled her to recline, and then 
 watched to see her body spring erect the moment he 
 released his hold. "What a dreadful patient I should 
 make 1 " she said, contritely. " I would chloroform you, 
 miss," said he. 
 
 She sat thus for a long time ; she had so much for 
 which to thank God, though not with her lips, for how 
 could they keep pace with her heart ? Her heart was 
 very full ; chiefly, I think, with the tears that rolled 
 down unknown to her. 
 
 She thanked God, in the name of the little hunted 
 girl who had not been taught how to pray, and so did it 
 standing. " I do so want to be good, oh, how sweet it 
 would be to be good!" she had said in that long ago; 
 she had said it out loud when she was alone on the 
 chance of His hearing, but she had not addressed Him 
 by name because she was not sure that He was really 
 called God. She had not even known that you should 
 end by saying "Amen," which Tommy afterward told 
 her is the most solemn part of it. 
 
 How sweet it would be to be good, but how much 
 sweeter it is to be good! The woman that girl had 
 grown into knew that she was good, and she thanked 
 God for that. She thanked Him for letting her help. 
 If He had said that she had not helped, she would have 
 rocked her arms and replied, almost hotly, " You know 
 I have." And He did know, He had seen her many 
 
geizbl's glorious houb, 307 
 
 times in the grip of inherited passions and watched her 
 fighting with them and subduing them; He had seen 
 ugly thoughts stealing upon her, as they crawl toward 
 every child of man ; ah, He had seen them leap into 
 the heart of the Painted Lady's daughter, as if a nest 
 already made for them must be there, and still she had 
 driven them away. Grizel had helped. The tears 
 came more quickly now. 
 
 She thanked God that she had never worn the ring. 
 But why had she never worn it, when she wanted so 
 much to do so, and it was hers ? Why had she watched 
 herself more carefully than ever of late, and forced hap- 
 piness to her face when it was not in her heart, and 
 denied herself, at fierce moments, the luxuries of grief 
 and despair and even of rebellion ? For she had carried 
 about with her the capacity to rebel, but she had hidden 
 it, and the reason was that she thought God was test- 
 ing her. If she fell He would not give her the thing 
 she coveted. Unworthy reason for being good, as she 
 knew, but God overlooked it, and she thanked Him for 
 that. 
 
 Her hands pressed each other impulsively, as if at the 
 shock of a sudden beautiful thought, and then perhaps 
 she was thanking God for making her the one woman 
 who could be the right wife for Tommy. She was so 
 certain that no other woman could help him as she 
 could; none knew his virtues as she knew them. Had 
 it not been for her, his showy parts only would have 
 
308 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 been loved ; the dear, quiet ones would never have heard 
 how dear they were ; the showy ones were open to all 
 the world, but the quiet ones were her private garden. 
 His faults as well as his virtues passed before her, and 
 it is strange to know that it was about this time that 
 Grizel ceased to cry and began to smile instead. I know 
 why she smiled ; it was because sentimentality was one 
 of the little monsters that came skipping into her view, 
 and Tommy was so confident that he had got rid at last 
 of it ! Grizel knew better ! But she could look at it and 
 smile. Perhaps she was not sorry that it was still there 
 with the others ; it had so long led the procession. I 
 daresay she saw herself taking the leering, distorted 
 thing in hand and making something gallant of it. She 
 thought that she was too practical, too much given to 
 seeing but one side to a question, too lacking in con- 
 sideration for others, too impatient, too relentlessly 
 just, and she humbly thanked God for all these faults, 
 because Tommy's excesses were in the opposite direc- 
 tion, and she could thus restore the balance. She was 
 full of humility whUe she saw how useful she could be 
 to him, but her face did not show this ; she had forgotten 
 her face, and elation had spread over it, witliout her 
 knowing. Perhaps God accepted the elation as part of 
 the thanks. 
 
 She thanked God for giving Tommy what he wanted 
 so much — herself. Ah, she had thanked Him for that 
 before, but she did it again. And then she went on her 
 
geizel's glorious hour 309 
 
 knees by her dear doctor's chair, and prayed that she 
 might be a good wife to Tommy. 
 
 When she rose the blood was not surging through 
 her veins. Instead of a passion of joy it was a beauti- 
 ful calm that possessed her, and on noticing this she 
 regarded herself with sudden suspicion, as we put our 
 ear to a watch to see if it has stopped. She found that 
 she was still going, but no longer either fast or slow, 
 and she saw what had happened : her old serene self 
 had come back to her. I think she thanked God for 
 that, most of ally 
 
 And then she caught sight of her face — oh ! oh ! 
 Her first practical act as an engaged woman was to 
 wash her face. 
 
 Engaged ! But was she ? Grizel laughed. It is not 
 usually a laughing matter, but she could not help that. 
 Consider her predicament. She could be engaged at 
 once, if she liked, even before she wiped the water from 
 her face, or she might postpone it, to let Tommy share. 
 The careful reader will have noticed that this problem 
 presented itself to her at an awkward moment ; she 
 laaghed, in short, while her face was still in the basin, 
 with the very proper result that she had to grope for 
 the towel with her eyes shut. 
 
 It was still a cold, damp face (Grizel was always in such 
 a hurry) when she opened her most precious drawer and 
 took from it a certain glove which was wrapped in silk 
 paper, but was not perhaps quite so conceited as it had 
 
310 TOMMT AND GEIZBL 
 
 been, for, alas and alack, it was now used as a wrapper 
 itself. The ring was inside it. If Grizel wanted to be 
 engaged, absolutely and at once, all she had to do was 
 to slip that ring upon her finger. 
 
 It had been hers for a week or more. Tommy had 
 bought it in a certain Scottish town whose merchant 
 princes are so many and have risen splendidly from 
 such small beginnings, that after you have been there 
 a short time you beg to be introduced to some one who 
 has not got on. When you look at them they slap their 
 trouser pockets. When they look at you they are won- 
 dering if you know how much they are worth. Tommy, 
 one day, roaming their streets (in which he was worth 
 incredibly little), and thinking sadly of what could 
 never be, saw the modest little garnet ring in a jewel- 
 ler's window, and attached to it was a pathetic story. 
 No other person could have seen the story, but it was 
 as plain to him as though it had been beautifully 
 written on the tag of paper which really contained the 
 price. With his hand on the door he paused, overcome 
 by that horror of entering shops without a lady to do 
 the talking, which all men of genius feel (it is the one 
 sure test), hurried away, came back, went to and fro 
 shyly, until he saw that he was yielding once more to 
 the indecision he thought he had so completely mastered, 
 whereupon he entered bravely (though it was one of 
 those detestable doors that ring a bell as they open), 
 and sternly ordered the jeweller, who could have bought 
 
geizbl's globiotjs houb 311 
 
 and sold our Tommy with one slap on the trouser leg, 
 to hand the ring over to him. 
 
 He had no intention of giving it to G-rizel. That, 
 indeed, was part of its great tragedy, for this is the story 
 Tommy read into the ring : There was once a sorrowful 
 man of twenty-three, and forty, and sixty. Ah, how gray 
 the beard has grown as we speak, how thin the looks, 
 but still we know him for the same by that garnet ring. 
 Since it became his no other eye has seen it, and yet it 
 is her engagement ring; never can he give it to her, 
 but must always carry it about with him as the piteous 
 memory of what had never been. How innocent it 
 looked in his hand, and with an innocence that never 
 wore off, not even when he had reached his threescore 
 years ; as it aged it took on another kind of innocence 
 only, it looked pitiable now, for there is but a dis- 
 honored age for a lonely little ring which can never see 
 the finger it was made to span. 
 
 A hair-shirt! Such it was to him, and he put it 
 on willingly, knowing it could be nothing else; every 
 smart it gave him pleased, even while it pained. If 
 ever his mind roamed again to the world of make-be- 
 lieve, that ring would jerk him back to facts. 
 
 Grizel remembered well her finding of it. She had 
 been in his pockets ; she loved to rifle them, to pull out 
 his watch herself, instead of asking him for the time ; 
 to exclaim Oh! at the many things she found there, 
 when they should have been neatly docketed or in the 
 
312 TOMMY AKD GEIZEL 
 
 fire, and from his waistcoat pocket she drew the ring. 
 She seemed to understand all about it at once, she was 
 far ahead while he was explaining. It seemed quite 
 strange to her that there had ever been a time when she 
 did not know of her garnet ring. 
 
 How her arms rooked ! It was delicious to her to 
 remember now with what agony her arms had rooked. 
 She kissed it ; she had not been the first to kiss it. 
 
 It was " Oh, how I wish I could have saved you this 
 pain! " 
 
 "But I love it," she cried, "and I love the pain." 
 
 It was " Am I not to see it on your finger once ? " 
 
 " 'No, no ; we must not." 
 
 "Let me, Grizel!" 
 
 "' Is it right ; oh, is it right ? " 
 
 "Only this once !" 
 
 "Very well!" 
 
 " I dare not, G-rizel, I can't ! What are we to do with 
 it now ? " 
 
 " Give it to me. It is mine. I will keep it, beside 
 my glove." 
 
 " Let me keep it, Grizel." 
 
 "No, it is mine." 
 
 " Shall I fling it away ?>' 
 
 " How can you be so cruel ? It is mine." 
 
 " Let me bury it." 
 
 " It is mine." 
 
 And of course she had got her way. Could he resist 
 
gbizel's glokiotjs hour 313 
 
 her in anything ? They had never spoken of it since, 
 it was such a sad little ring. Sad ! It was not in the 
 least little bit sad. Grizel wondered as she looked at 
 it now how she could ever have thought it sad. 
 
 The object with which she put on her hat was to go 
 to Aaron's cottage, to congratulate Elspeth. So she 
 said to herself. Oh, Grizel! 
 
 But first she opened two drawers. They were in a 
 great press and full of beautiful linen woven in Thrums, 
 that had come to Dr. McQueen as a " bad debt." " Your 
 marriage portion, young lady," he had said to Grizel, 
 then but a slip of a girl, whereupon, without waiting to 
 lengthen her frock, she rushed rapturously at her work- 
 basket. " Not at all, miss," he cried, ferociously ; "you 
 are here to look after this house, not to be preparing 
 for another, and until you are respectably bespoken by 
 . some rash crittur of a man, into the drawers with your 
 linen and down with those murderous shears." And 
 she had obeyed ; no scissors, the most relentless things 
 in nature when in Grizel' s hand, had ever cleaved their 
 way through that snowy expanse ; never a stitch had 
 she put into her linen except with her eyes, which 
 became horribly like needles as she looked at it. 
 
 And now at last she could begin ! Oh, but she was 
 anxious to begin ; it is almost a fact that, as she looked 
 at those drawers, she grudged the time that must be 
 given to-day to Tommy and his ring. 
 
 Do you see her now ready to start? She was \\ear- 
 
814 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 ing her brown jacket -witli tlie fur collar, over wMoli 
 she used to look so searchingly at Tommy. To think 
 there was a time when that serene face had to look 
 searchingly at him ! it nearly made her sad again. She 
 paused to bring out the ring and take another exultant 
 look at it. It was attached now to a ribbon round her 
 neck. Sweet ring ! She put it to her eyes. That was 
 her way of letting her eyes kiss it. Then she rubbed 
 them and it, in case the one had left a tear upon the 
 other. 
 
 And then she went out, joy surging in her heart. 
 For this was Grizel's glorious hour, the end of it. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 TOMMY LOSES GRIZEL 
 
 It was not Aaron's good fortune to find Tommy. He 
 should have looked for him in the den. 
 
 In that haunt of happier lovers than he, Tommy 
 walked slowly, pondering. He scarce noticed that he 
 had the den to himself, or that, since he was last here, 
 autumn had slipped away, leaving all her garments on 
 the ground. By this time, undoubtedly, Elspeth had 
 said her gentle Ko, but he was not railing against Fate, 
 not even for striking the final blow at him through 
 that innocent medium. He had still too much to do for 
 that — to help others. There were three of them at 
 present, and by some sort of sympathetic jugglery he 
 had an arm for each. 
 
 " Lean on me, Grizel — dear sister Elspeth, you little 
 know the harm you have done — David, old friend, 
 your hand." 
 
 Thus loaded, he bravely returned at the fitting time 
 to the cottage. His head was not even bent. 
 
 Had you asked Tommy what Elspeth would probably 
 do when she dismissed David, he might have replied 
 that she would go up to his room and lock herself into 
 
316 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 it, SO that no one should disturb her for a time. And 
 this he discovered, on returning home, was actually 
 what had happened. How well he knew her! How 
 distinctly he heard every beat of her tender heart, and 
 how easy to him to tell why it was beating ! He did 
 not go up ; he waited for little Elspeth to come to him, 
 all in her own good time. And when she came, looking 
 just as he knew she would look, he had a brave, bright 
 face for her. 
 
 She was shaking after her excitement, or perhaps she 
 had ceased to shake and begun again as she came down 
 to him. He pretended not to notice it ; he would notice 
 it, the moment he was sure she wanted him to, but per- 
 haps that would not be until she was in bed and he had 
 come to say good-night and put out her light, for, as we 
 know, she often kept her great confidences till then, 
 when she discovered that he already knew them. 
 
 " The doctor has been in." 
 
 She began almost at once, and in a quaking voice and 
 from a distance, as if in hope that the bullet might be 
 spent before it reached her brother. 
 
 "I am sorry I missed him," he replied, cautiously. 
 "What a fine fellow he is." 
 
 "You always liked him," said Elspeth, clinging 
 eagerly to that. 
 
 " No one could help liking him, Elspeth,- Se has such 
 winning ways," said Tommy, perhaps a little in the 
 voice with which at funerals we refer to the departed. 
 
TOMMY LOSES GRIZEL 317 
 
 She loved his words, but she knew she had a surprise 
 for him this time, and she tried to blurt it out. 
 
 " He said something to me. He — oh, what a high 
 opinion he has of you ! " (She really thought he had.) 
 
 " Was that the something ? " Tommy asked, with a 
 smile that helped her, as it was meant to do. 
 
 " You understand, don't you ? " she said, almost in 
 a whisper. 
 
 " Of course I do, Elspeth," he answered, reassuringly, 
 but somehow she still thought he did n't. 
 
 "No one could have been more manly and gentle and 
 humble," she said, beseechingly. 
 
 " I am sure of it," said Tommy. 
 
 " He thinks nothing of himself," she said. 
 
 " We shall always think a great deal of him," replied 
 Tommy. 
 
 " Yes, but — " Elspeth found the strangest difficulty 
 in continuing, for, though it would have surprised him 
 to be told so. Tommy was not helping her nearly as 
 much as he imagined. 
 
 "I told him," she said, shaking, "that no one could 
 be to me what you were. I told him — " and then timid 
 Elspeth altogether broke down. Tommy drew her to 
 him, as he had so often done since she was the smallest 
 child, and pressed her head against his breast, and 
 waited. So often he had waited thus upon Elspeth. 
 
 " There is nothing to cry about, dear," he said, ten- 
 derly, when the time to speak came. " You have, in- 
 
318 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 stead, the right to be proud that so good a man loves 
 you. I am very proud of it, Elspeth." 
 
 «' If I could be sure of that ! " she gasped. 
 
 " Don't you believe me, dear?" 
 
 " Yes, but — that is not what makes me cry. Tommy, 
 don't you see ? " 
 
 " Yes," he assured her, " I see. You are crying be- 
 cause you feel so sorry for him, but I don't feel sorry 
 for him, Elspeth. If I know anything at all it is this : 
 that no man needs pity, who sincerely loves; whether 
 that love be returned or not, he walks in a new and 
 more beautiful world forevermore." 
 
 She clutched his hand. "I don't understand how 
 you know those things," she whispered. 
 
 Please God, was Tommy's reflection, she should never 
 know. He saw most vividly the pathos of his case, but 
 he did not break down under it ; it helped him, rather, 
 to proceed. 
 
 " It will be the test of Gemmell," he said, " how he 
 bears this. No man, I am very sure, was ever told that 
 his dream could not come true, more kindly and tenderly 
 than you told it to him." He was in the middle of the 
 next sentence (a fine one) before her distress stopped 
 him. 
 
 "Tommy," she cried, "you don't understand. That 
 is not what I told him at all!" 
 
 It was one of the few occasions on which the expres- 
 sion on the face of T. Sandys perceptibly changed. 
 
TOMMT LOSES GEIZEL 319 
 
 " What did you tell him ? " lie asked, almost 
 sharply. 
 
 "I accepted him," she said, guiltily, backing away 
 from this alarming face. 
 
 "What!" 
 
 "If you only knew how manly and gentle and humble 
 he was," she cried, quickly, as if something dire might 
 happen if Tommy were not assured of this at 
 once. 
 
 " You — said you would marry him, Elspeth ? " 
 
 "Yes!" 
 
 " And leave me ? " 
 
 " Oh, oh ! " She flung her arms around his neck. 
 
 " Yes, but that is what you are prepared to do ! " 
 said he, and he held her away from him and stared at 
 her, as if he had never seen Elspeth before. " Were 
 you not afraid?" he exclaimed, in amazement. 
 
 "I am not the least bit afraid," she answered. " Oh, 
 Tommy, if you knew how manly — " And then she 
 remembered that she had said that already. 
 
 "You did not even say that you would — consult 
 me?" 
 
 "Oh, ohl" 
 
 " Why did n't you, Elspeth ? " 
 
 "I — I forgot!" she moaned. "Tommy, you are 
 angry ! " She hugged him, and he let her do it, but 
 all the time he was looking over her head fixedly, with 
 his mouth open. 
 
320 TOMMY Am) GEIZBIi 
 
 "And I was always so sure of you ! " were the words 
 that came to him at last, with a hard little laugh at the 
 end of them. 
 
 "Can you think it makes me love you less," she 
 sobbed, "because I love him, too! Oh, Tommy, I 
 thought you would be so glad!" 
 
 He kissed her; he put his hand fondly upon her 
 head. 
 
 "I am glad," he said, with emotion. "When that 
 which you want has come to you, Elspeth, how can I 
 but be glad ? But it takes me aback, and if for a 
 moment I felt forlorn, if, when I should have been 
 rejoicing only in your happiness, the selfish thought 
 passed through my mind, ' What is to become of me ! ' 
 I hope — I hope — " Then he sat down and buried his 
 face in the table. 
 
 And he might have been telling her about Grizel ! 
 Has the shock stunned you, Tommy? Elspeth thinks 
 it has been a shock of pain. May we lift your head to 
 show her your joyous face ? 
 
 " I am so proud," she was saying, " that at last, after 
 you have done so much for me, I can do a little thing 
 for you. Por it is something to free you, Tommy. You 
 have always pretended, for my sake, that we could not 
 do without each other, but we both knew all the time 
 that it was only I who was unable to do without you. 
 You can't deny it." 
 He might deny it, but it was true. Ah, Tommy, you 
 
TOMMY LOSES GEIZBL 821 
 
 bore with her with infinite patience, but did it never 
 strike you that she kept you to the earth ? If Elspeth 
 could be happy without you ! You were sure she could 
 not, but if she could I had that thought never made you 
 flap your wings ? 
 
 "I often had a pain at my heart," she told him, 
 "which I kept from you. It was a feeling that your 
 solicitude for me, perhaps, prevented your caring for any 
 other woman. It seemed terrible and unnatural that 
 I should be a bar to that. I felt that I was starving you, 
 and not you only, but an unknown woman as well." 
 
 " So long as I had you, Elspeth," he said, reproach- 
 fully, " was not that enough ? " 
 
 "It seemed to be enough," she answered, gravely, 
 " but even while I comforted myself with that, I knew 
 that it should not be enough, and still I feared that if it 
 was, the blame was mine. Now I am no longer in the 
 way, and I hope, so ardently, that you will fall in love, 
 like other people. If you never do, I shall always have 
 the fear that I am the cause, that you lost the capacity 
 in the days when I let you devote yourself too much to 
 me." 
 
 Oh, blind Elspeth ! Now is the time to tell her. 
 Tommy, and fill her cup of happiness to the brim. 
 
 But it is she who is speaking still, almost gayly now, 
 yet with a full heart. " What a time you have had with 
 me. Tommy 1 I told David all about it, and what he 
 has to look forward to, but he says he is not afraid. 
 
 21 
 
322 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 And when you find someone you can love," she con- 
 tinued, sweetly, though she had a sigh to stifle, " I hope 
 she will be someone quite unlike me, for oh, my dear, 
 good brother, I know you need a change." 
 
 Not a word said Tommy. 
 
 She said, timidly, that she had begun to hope of late 
 that Grizel might be the woman, and still he did not 
 speak. He drew Elspeth closer to him, that she might 
 not see his face and the horror of himself that surely sat 
 on it. To the very marrow of him he was in such cold 
 misery that I wonder his arms did not chill her. 
 
 This poor devil of a Sentimental Tommy! He had 
 wakened up in the world of facts, where he thought he 
 had been dwelling of late, to discover that he had not 
 been here for weeks, except at meal-times. During 
 those weeks he had most honestly thought that he was 
 in a passion to be married. What do you say to pitying, 
 instead of cursing him ? It is a sudden idea of mine, 
 and we must be quick, for joyous Grizel is drawing near, 
 and this, you know, is the chapter in which her heart 
 breaks. 
 
 It was Elspeth who opened the door to Grizel. "Does 
 she know?" said Elspeth to herself, before either of 
 them spoke. 
 
 " Does she know ? " It was what Grizel was saying 
 also. 
 
 « Oh, Elspeth, I am so glad ! David has told me." 
 
TOMMY LOSES GEIZEL 323 
 
 "She does know," Elspeth told herself, and she 
 thought it was kind of Grizel to come so quickly. She 
 said so. 
 
 " She does n't know I " thought Grizel, and then these 
 two kissed for the first time. It was a kiss of thanks 
 from each. 
 
 " But why does she not know ? " Grizel wondered a 
 little as they entered the parlor, where Tommy was ; he 
 had been standing with his teeth knit since he heard the 
 knock. As if in answer to the question, Elspeth said, 
 " I have just broken it to Tommy. He has been in a 
 few minutes only, and he is so surprised he can scarcely 
 speak." 
 
 Grizel laughed happily, for that explained it. Tommy 
 had not had time to tell her yet. She laughed again, at 
 Elspeth, who had thought she had so much to tell, and 
 did not know half the story. 
 
 Elspeth begged Tommy to listen to the beautiful 
 things Grizel was saying about David, but, truth to tell, 
 Grizel scarcely heard them herself. She had given 
 Tommy a shy, rapturous glance. She was wondering 
 when he would begin. What a delicious opening, when 
 he shook hands. Suppose he had kissed her instead ! 
 Or, suppose he casually addressed her as darling ! He 
 might do it at any moment now ! Just for once she 
 would not mind though he did it in public. Perhaps, as 
 soon as this new remark of Elspeth's was finished, he 
 meant to say, " You are not the only engaged person in 
 
324 TOMMY AHD GRIZBL 
 
 the room, Miss Elspeth; I think I see another two!" 
 Grizel laughed, as if she had heard him say it. And 
 then she ceased laughing suddenly, for some little duty 
 had called Elspeth into the other room, and as she went 
 out she stopped the movement of the earth. 
 
 These two were alone with their great joy. 
 
 Elspeth had said that she would be back in two 
 minutes. Was Grizel wasting a moment, when she 
 looked only at him, her eyes filmy with love, the crooked 
 smile upon her face so happy that it could not stand 
 still ? Her arms made a slight gesture toward him, her 
 hands were open, she was giving herself to him. She 
 could not see. For a fraction of time the space between 
 them seemed to be annihilated. His arms were closing 
 round her. Then she knew that neither of them had 
 moved. 
 
 " Grizel ! " 
 
 He tried to be true to her by deceiving her ; it was 
 the only way. "At last, Grizel," he cried; "at last!" 
 and he put joyousness into his voice. " It has all come 
 right, dear one ! " he cried like an ecstatic lover. Never 
 in his life had he tried so hard to deceive at the sacrifice 
 of himself. But he was fighting something as strong 
 as the instinct of self-preservation, and his usually 
 expressionless face gave the lie to his joyous words. 
 Loud above his voice his ashen face was speaking to 
 her, and she cried in terror, "What is wrong?" Even 
 then he attempted to deceive her, but suddenly she 
 knew the truth. 
 
TOMMY LOSES GBIZBL 326 
 
 " You don't want to be married ! " 
 
 I think the room swam round with her. When it was 
 steady again, " You did not say that, did you ? " she 
 asked. She was sure he had not said it ; she was smiling 
 again tremulously to show him that he had not said it. 
 
 "I want to be married above all else on earth," he 
 said, imploringly ; but his face betrayed him still, and 
 she demanded the truth, and he was forced to tell it. 
 
 A little shiver passed through her, that was all. 
 
 " Do you mean that you don't love me ? " she said. 
 " You must tell me what you mean." 
 
 "That is how others would put it, I suppose," he 
 replied. "I believe they would be wrong. I think I 
 love you in my own way, but I thought I loved you in 
 their way, and it is the only way that counts in this 
 world of theirs. It does not seem to be my world. I 
 was given wings, I think, but I am never to know that 
 I have left the earth until I come flop upon it, with an 
 arrow through them. I crawl and wriggle here, and yet " 
 — he laughed harshly — "I believe I am rather a fine 
 fellow when I am flying ! " 
 
 She nodded. " You mean you want me to let you 
 off ? " she asked. " You must tell me what you mean." 
 And as he did not answer instantly, " Because I think I 
 have some little claim upon you," she said, with a pleas- 
 ant smile. 
 
 "I am as pitiful a puzzle to myself as I can be to 
 you," he replied. " All I know is that I don't want to 
 
326 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 marry any one. And yet I am sure I could die for you, 
 Grizel." 
 
 It was quite true. A burning house and Grizel 
 among the flames, and he would have been the first 
 on the ladder. But there is no such luck for you, 
 Tommy. 
 
 " You are free," was what she said. " Don't look so 
 tragic," she added, again with the pleasant smile. " It 
 must be very distressing to you, but — you will soon fly 
 again." Her lips twitched tremulously. "I can't fly,'.* 
 she said. 
 
 She took the ring from her neck ; she took it off its 
 ribbon. 
 
 "I brought it," she said, "to let you put it on my 
 finger. I thought you would want to do that," she 
 said. 
 
 " Grizel," he cried, " can we not be as we have 
 been ? " 
 
 " No," she answered. 
 
 " It would all come right, Grizel ; I am sure it 
 would. I don't know why I am as I am, but I shall 
 try to change myself. You have borne with me since 
 we were children. Won't you bear with me for a little 
 longer ? " ■' 
 
 She shook her head, but did not trust herself to 
 speak. 
 
 " I have lost you," he said, and she nodded. 
 
 " Then I am lost indeed ! " said he, and he knew it, 
 
TOMMY LOSES GEIZBL 327 
 
 too, but with a gesture of the hand she begged him not 
 to say that. 
 
 " Without your love to help me — " he began. 
 
 " You shall always have that," she told him with shin- 
 ing eyes, " always, always." And what could he do but 
 look at her, with the wonder and the awe that come to 
 every man who, for one moment in his life, knows a 
 woman well. 
 
 " You can love me still, Grizel ! " His voice was 
 shaky. 
 
 "Just the same," she answered, and I suppose he 
 looked uplifted. " But you should be sorry," she said, 
 gravely, and it was then that Elspeth came back. She 
 had not much exceeded her two minutes. 
 
 It was always terrible to Tommy not to have the 
 feelings of a hero. At that moment he could not en- 
 dure it. In a splendid burst of self-sacrifice he suddenly 
 startled both Grizel and himself by crying, "Elspeth, 
 I love Grizel, and I have just asked her to be my 
 wife." 
 
 Yes, the nobility of it amazed himself, but bewitched 
 him, too, and he turned gloriously to Grizel, never 
 doubting but that she would have him still. 
 
 He need not have spoken so impulsively, nor looked 
 so grand. She swayed for an instant and then was erect 
 again. " You must forgive me, Elspeth," she said, " but 
 I have refused him," and that was the biggest surprise 
 Tommy ever got in his life. 
 
328 TOMMY Amy geizbl 
 
 " You don't care for him ! " Elspeth blurted out. 
 
 "Not in the way he cares for me," Grizel replied, 
 quietly, and when Elspeth would have said more she 
 begged her to desist. "The only thing for me to do 
 now, Elspeth," she said, smiling, " is to run away, but I 
 want you first to accept a little wedding gift from me. 
 I wish you and David so much happiness, you won't 
 refuse it, will you?" 
 
 Elspeth, still astounded, took the gift. It was a little 
 garnet ring. 
 
 "It will have to be cut," Grizel said. "It was meant, 
 I think, for a larger finger. I have had it some time, but 
 I never wore it." 
 
 Elspeth said she would always treasure her ring, and 
 that it was beautiful. 
 
 " I used to think it — rather sweet," Grizel admitted, 
 and then she said good-by to them both and went away. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 THE MONSTEE 
 
 Tommy's new character was that of a monster. He 
 always liked the big parts. 
 
 Concealed, as usual, in the garments that - clung so 
 oddly to him, modesty, generosity, indifference to ap- 
 plause, and all the nobler impulses, he could not strip 
 himself of them, try as he would, and so he found, to 
 his scornful amusement, that he still escaped the public 
 fury. In the two months that preceded Elspeth's mar- 
 riage there was positively scarce a soul in Thrums who 
 did not think rather well of him. " If they knew what 
 I really am," he cried, with splendid bitterness, " how 
 they would run from me ! " 
 
 Even David could no longer withhold the hand of 
 fellowship, for Grizel would tell him nothing, except 
 that, after all, and for reasons sufficient to herself, she 
 had declined to become Mrs. Sandys. He sought in vain 
 to discover how Tommy could be to blame. " And now," 
 Tommy said grimly to Grizel, " our doctor thinks you 
 have used me badly, and that I am a fine fellow to bear 
 no resentment ! Elspeth told me that he admires the 
 gentle and manly dignity with which I submit to the 
 
330 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 blow, and I have no doubt that, as soon as I heard that, 
 I made it more gentle and manly than ever ! " 
 
 "I have forbidden Elspeth," he told her, "to upbraid 
 you for not accepting me, with the result that she thinks 
 me too good to live ! Ha, ha, what do you think, 
 Grizel?" 
 
 It became known in the town that she had refused 
 him. Everybody was on Tommy's side. They said 
 she had treated him badly. Even Aaron was staggered 
 at the sight of Tommy accepting his double defeat 
 in such good part. " And all the time I am the great- 
 est cur unhung," says Tommy. " Why don't you laugh, 
 Grizel ? " 
 
 Never, they said, had there been such a generous 
 brother. The town was astir about this poor man's 
 gifts to the lucky bride. There were rumors that 
 among the articles was a silver coal-scuttle, but it proved 
 to be a sugar-bowl in that pattern. Three bandboxes 
 came for her to select from, somebody discovered who 
 was on the watch, but may I be struck dead if more than 
 one went back. Yesterday it was bonnets ; to-day she 
 is at Tilliedrum again, trying on her going-away dress. 
 And she really was to go away in it, a noticeable thing, 
 for in Thrums society, though they usually get a going- 
 away dress, they are too canny to go away in it. The 
 local shops were not ignored, but the best of the trous- 
 seau came from London. " That makes the second box 
 this week, as I 'm a living sinner, " cries the lady on the 
 
THE MONSTER 331 
 
 watch again. When boxes arrived at the station Corp 
 wheeled them up to Elspeth without so much as looking 
 at the label. 
 
 Ah, what a brother! They said it openly to their 
 own brothers, and to Tommy in the way they looked 
 at him. 
 
 "There has been nothing like it," he assured Grizel, 
 " since Eed Riding Hood and the wolf. Why can't I 
 fling off my disguise and cry, 'The better to eat you 
 with!'" 
 
 He always spoke to her now in this vein of magnifi- 
 cent bitterness, but Grizel seldom rewarded him by cry- 
 ing. Oh, oh. She might, however, give him a patient, 
 reproachful glance instead, and it had the irritating 
 effect of making him feel that perhaps he was under 
 life-size, instead of over it. 
 
 « T daresay you are right," says Tommy, savagely. 
 
 " I said nothing." 
 
 " You don't need to say it. What a grand capacity 
 you have for knocking me off my horse, Grizel." 
 
 " Are you angry with me for that ? " 
 
 "No, it is delicious to pick one's self out of the 
 mud, especially when you find it is a baby you are pick- 
 ing up, instead of a brute. Am I a baby only, Grizel ? " 
 
 " I think it is childish of you," she replied, « to say 
 you are a btute." 
 
 " There is not to be even that satisfaction left to me ! 
 You are hard on me, Grizel." 
 
332 TOMMY AJfD GEIZEIi 
 
 " I am trying to help you. How can you be angry 
 with me ? " 
 
 "The instinct of self-preservation, I suppose. I see 
 myself dwindling so rapidly under your treatment that 
 soon there will be nothing of me left." 
 
 It was said cruelly, for he knew that the one thing 
 Grizel could not bear now was the implication that she 
 saw his faults only. She always went down under that 
 blow, with pitiful surrender, showing the woman sud- 
 denly, as if under a physical knouting. 
 
 He apologized contritely. "But, after all, it proves 
 my case," he said, " for I could not hurt you in this 
 way, Grizel, if I were not a pretty well-grown specimen 
 of a monster." 
 
 "Don't," she said, but she did not seek to help him 
 by drawing him away to other subjects, which would 
 have been his way. "What is there monstrous," she 
 asked, " in your being so good to Elspeth ? It is very 
 kind of you to give her all these things." 
 
 " Especially when by rights they are yours, Grizel ! " 
 
 " No, not when you did not want to give them to me." 
 He dared say nothing to that, there were some matters 
 on which he must not contradict Grizel now. 
 
 " It is nice of you," she said, " not to complain, though 
 Elspeth is deserting you. It must have been a blow." 
 
 "You and I only know why," he answered. "But 
 for her, Grizel, I might be whining sentiment to you 
 at this moment," 
 
THE MOKSTER 333 
 
 " That," she said, " would be the monstrous thing." 
 
 "And it is not monstrous, I suppose, that I should 
 let Gemmell press my hand, under the conviction that, 
 after all, I am a trump." 
 
 "You don't pose as one." 
 
 "That makes them think the more highly of me I 
 Nothing monstrous, Grizel, in my standing quietly by 
 while you are showing Elspeth how to furnish her 
 house. I, who know why you have the subject at your 
 finger-tips." 
 
 For Grizel had given all her sweet ideas to Elspeth. 
 Heigh ho ! how she had guarded them once, confiding 
 them half reluctantly, even to Tommy ; half reluctantly, 
 that is, at the start, because they were her very own, 
 but once she was embarked on the subject talking with 
 such rapture that every minute or two he had to beg her 
 to be calm. She was the first person in that part of the 
 world to think that old furniture need not be kept in 
 the dark corners, and she knew where there was an oak 
 bedstead that was looked upon as a disgrace, and where 
 to obtain the dearest cupboards, one of them in use 
 as the retiring chamber of a rabbit-hutch, and stately 
 clocks made in the town a hundred years ago, and quaint 
 old-farrant lamps and cogeys and sand-glasses that apol- 
 ogized if you looked at them, and yet were as willing 
 to be loved again as any old lady in a mutch. You 
 will not buy them easily now, the people will not 
 chuckle at you when you bid for them now. We have 
 
334 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 become so cute in Thrums that when the fender breaks 
 we think it may have increased in value, and we pre- 
 serve any old board lest the worms have made it artistic. 
 Grizel, however, was in advance of her time. She could 
 lay her hands on all she wanted, and she did, but it was 
 for Elspeth's house. 
 
 " And the table-cloths and the towels and the sheets," 
 said Tommy. " Nothing monstrous in my letting you 
 give Elspeth them ? " 
 
 The linen, you see, was no longer in Grizel's press. 
 
 "I could not help making them," she answered, 
 " they were so longing to be made. I did not mean to 
 give them to her. I think I meant to put them back 
 in the press, but when they were made it was natural 
 that they should want to have something to do. So 
 I gave them to Elspeth." 
 
 "With how many tears on them? " 
 
 " Not many. But with some kisses." 
 
 "All which," says Tommy, "goes to prove that I 
 have nothing with which to reproach myself ! " 
 
 "No, I never said that," she told him. "You have 
 to reproach yourself with wanting me to love you." 
 
 She paused a moment to let him say, if he dared, that 
 he had not done that, when she would have replied, 
 instantly, "You know you did." He could have dis- 
 abused her, but it would have been cruel, and so on this 
 subject, as ever, he remained silent. 
 
 " But that is not what I have been trying to prove," 
 
THE MONSTER 335 
 
 she continued. " You know as well as I that the cause of 
 this unhappiness has been — what you call your wings." 
 
 He was about to thank her for her delicacy in avoid- 
 ing its real name, when she added, " I mean your senti- 
 ment," and he laughed instead. 
 
 " I flatter myself that I no longer fly, at all events," 
 he said. " I know what I am at last, Grizel." 
 
 " It is flattery only," she replied, with her old direct- 
 ness. "This .thing you are regarding with a morbid 
 satisfaction is not you at all." 
 
 He groaned. ' ' Which of them all is me, Grizel ? " 
 he asked, gloomily. 
 
 " We shall see," she said, " when we have got the 
 wings off." 
 
 " They will have to come off, a feather at a time." 
 
 "That," she declared, "is what I have been trying 
 to prove." 
 
 "It will be a weary task, Grizel." 
 
 "I won't weary at it," she said, smiling. Her cheer- 
 fulness was a continual surprise to him. ' ' You bear 
 up wonderfully well, yourself," he sometimes said 
 to her, almost reproachfully, and she never replied 
 that, perhaps, that was one of her ways of trying 
 to help him. 
 
 She is not so heart-broken, after all, you may be say- 
 ing, and I had promised to break her heart. But, hon- 
 estly, I don't know how to do it more thoroughly, and 
 you must remember that we have not seen her alone yet. 
 
336 TOMMY AKD GKIZBL 
 
 She tried to be very little alone. She helped David 
 in his work, more than ever ; not a person, for instance, 
 managed to escape the bath because Grizel's heart was 
 broken. You could never say that she was alone when 
 her needle was going, and- the linen became sheets and 
 the like, in what was probably record time. Yet they 
 could have been sewn more quickly, for at times the 
 needle stopped and she did not know it. Once, a bed- 
 ridden old woman, with whom she had been sitting 
 up, lay watching her instead of sleeping, and finally 
 said, " What makes you sit staring at a cauld fire, and 
 speaking to yoursel' ? " And there was a strange day, 
 when she had been too long in the den. When she 
 started for home she went in the direction of Double 
 Dykes, her old home, instead. 
 
 She could bear everything except doubt. She had 
 tpld him so, when he wondered at her calmness ; she 
 often said it to herself. She could tread any path, 
 however drearily it stretched before her, so long as she 
 knew whither it led, but there could be no more doubt. 
 Oh, he must never again disturb her mind with hope. 
 How clearly she showed him that, and yet they had per- 
 haps no more than parted when it seemed impossible to 
 bear for the next hour the desolation she was sentenced 
 to for life ; she lay quivering and tossing on the hearth- 
 rug of the parlor, beating it with her fists, rocking 
 her arms and calling to him to give her doubt again, 
 that she might get through the days. 
 
THE MONSTER 33T 
 
 "Let me doubt again!" Here was Grizel starting 
 to beg it of him. More than once she got half-way 
 to Aaron's house before she could turn, but she always 
 did turn, with the words unspoken ; never did Tommy 
 hear her say them, but always that she was tranquil 
 now. Was it pride that supported her in the trying 
 hour ? Oh, no, it was not pride. That is an old gar- 
 ment, which once became Grizel well, but she does 
 not wear it now ; she takes it out of the closet, perhaps, 
 at times to look at it. What gave her strength when 
 he was by was her promise to help him. It was not 
 by asking for leave to dream herself that she could 
 make him dream the less. All done for you, Tommy ! 
 It might have helped you to loosen a few of the 
 feathers. 
 
 Sometimes she thought it might not be Tommy, but 
 herself, who was so unlike other people; that it W9.s 
 not he who was unable to love, but she who could not 
 be loved. This idea did not agitate her as a terrible 
 thing; she could almost welcome it. But she did not 
 go to him with it. While it might be but a fancy, that 
 was no way to help a man who was over-full of them. 
 It was the bare truth only that she wanted him to 
 see, and so she made elaborate inquiries into herself, 
 to discover whether she was quite unlovable. I suppose 
 it would . have been quaint, had she not been quite 
 so much in earnest. She examined herself in the long 
 mirror most conscientiously, and with a determinedly 
 
 22 
 
338 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 open mind, to see whether she was too ugly for any 
 man to love. Our beautiful Grizel really did. 
 
 She had always thought that she was a nice girl, 
 but was she ? No one had ever loved her, except the 
 old doctor, and he began when she was so young that 
 perhaps he had been inveigled into it, like a father. 
 Even David had not loved her. Was it because he 
 knew her so well ? What was it in women that made 
 men love them ? She asked it of David in such a way 
 that he never knew she was putting him to the question. 
 He merely thought that he and she were having a 
 pleasant chat about Elspeth, and, as a result, she 
 decided that he loved Elspeth because she was so help- 
 less. His head sat with uncommon pride on his shoul- 
 ders while he talked of Elspeth's timidity. There 
 was a ring of boastfulness in Ms voice as he paraded 
 the large number of useful things that Elspeth could 
 not do. And yet David was a sensible and careful 
 man. 
 
 Was it helplessness that man loved in woman then ? 
 It seemed to be Elspeth's helplessness that had made 
 Tommy such a brother, and how it had always ap- 
 pealed to Aaron ! No woman could be less helpless 
 than herself, Grizel knew. She thought back and back, 
 and she could not come to a time when she was not 
 managing somebody. Women, she reflected, fell more 
 or less deeply in love with every baby they see, while 
 men, even the best of them, can look calmly at other 
 
THE MONSTER 339 
 
 people's babies. But ■when the helplessness of the child 
 is in the woman, then other women are unmoved ; but 
 the great heart of man is stirred — woman is his baby. 
 She remembered that the language of love is in two 
 sexes — for the woman superlatives, for the man dimin- 
 utives. The more she loves the bigger he grows, but 
 in an ecstasy he could put her in his pocket. Had not 
 Tommy taught her this ? His little one, his child ! 
 Perhaps he really had loved her in the days when 
 they both made believe that she was infantile,' but 
 soon she had shown with fatal clearness that she was 
 not. Instead of needing to be taken care of, she had 
 obviously wanted to take care of him; their positions 
 were reversed. Perhaps, said Grizel to herself, I should 
 have been a man. 
 
 If this was the true explanation, then, though Tommy, 
 who had tried so hard, could not love her, he might be 
 able to love — what is the phrase ? — a more womanly 
 woman, or, more popular phrase still, a very woman. 
 Some other woman might be the right wife for him. 
 She did not shrink from considering this theory, and 
 she considered so long that I, for one, cannot smile at 
 her for deciding ultimately, as she did, that there was 
 nothing in it. 
 
 The strong like to be leant upon and the weak to 
 lean, and this irrespective of sex. This was the solu- 
 tion she woke up with one morning, and it seemed to 
 explain not only David's and Elspeth's love, but her 
 
340 TOMMY AKD GKIZEL 
 
 own, so clearly, that in her desire to help she put it 
 before Tommy. It implied that she cared for him 
 because he was weak, and he drew a very long face. 
 
 " You don't know how the feathers hurt as they come 
 out," he explained. 
 
 " But so long as we do get them out ! " she said. 
 
 "Every other person who knows me thinks that 
 strength is my great characteristic," he maintained, 
 rather querulously. 
 
 " But when you know it is not," said Grizel. " You 
 do know, don't you ? " she asked, anxiously. " To 
 know the truth about one's self, that is the beginning 
 of being strong." 
 
 "You seem determined," he retorted, "to prevent my 
 loving you." 
 
 "Why?" she asked. 
 
 "You are to make me strong in spite of myself, I 
 understand. But, according to your theory, the strong 
 love the weak only. Are you to grow weak, Grizel, as 
 I grow strong ? " 
 
 She had not thought of that, and she would have 
 liked to rock her arms. But she was able to reply, 
 "I am not trying to help you in order to make you 
 love me ; you know, quite well, that all that is over and 
 done with. I am trying only to help you to be what a 
 man should be." 
 
 She could say that to him, but to herself ? Was she 
 prepared to make a man of him at the cost of his pos- 
 
THE MONSTER 841 
 
 sible love ? This faced her when she was alone with 
 her passionate nature, and she fought it, and with her 
 fists clenched she cried : "Yes, yes, yes! " 
 
 Do we know all that Grizel had to fight ? There 
 were times when Tommy's mind wandered to excuses 
 for himself ; he knew what men were, and he shuddered 
 to think of the might have been, had a girl, who could 
 love as Grizel did, loved such a man as her father. He 
 thanked his Maker, did Tommy, that he, who was made 
 as those other men, had avoided raising passions in her. 
 I wonder how he was so sure. Do we know all that 
 Grizel had to fight ? 
 
 They spoke much during those days of the coming 
 parting, and she always said that she could bear it 
 if she saw him go away more of a man than he had 
 come. 
 
 "Then anything I have suffered or may suffer," she 
 told him, " will have been done to help you, and perhaps 
 in time that will make me proud of my poor little love- 
 story. It would be rather pitiful, would it not, if I have 
 gone through so much for no end at all ? " 
 
 She spoke, he said, almost reproachfully, as if she 
 thought he might go away on his wings, after all. 
 
 "We can't be sure," she murmured, she was so eager 
 to make him watchful. 
 
 "Yes," he said, humbly but firmly, "I may be a 
 scoundrel, Grizel, I am a scoundrel, but one thing you 
 
342 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 may be sure of, I am done with sentiment." But even 
 as he said it, even as he felt that he could tear himself 
 asunder for being untrue to Grizel, a bird was singing 
 at his heart because he was free again, free to go out 
 into the world and play as if it were but a larger den. 
 Ah, if only Tommy could always have remained a boy. 
 
 Elspeth's marriage day came round, and I should like 
 to linger in it, and show you Elspeth in her wedding- 
 gown, and Tommy standing behind to catch her if she 
 fainted, and Ailie weeping, and Aaron Latta rubbing 
 his gleeful hands, and a smiling bridesmaid who had 
 once thought she might be a bride. But that was a day 
 in Elspeth's story, not in Tommy's and Grizel's. Only 
 one incident in their story crept into that happy day. 
 There were speeches at the feast, and the Kev. Mr. 
 Dishart referred to Tommy in the kindliest way, called 
 him " my young friend," quoted (inaccurately) from his 
 book, and expressed an opinion, formed, he might say, 
 when Mr. Sandys was a lad at school (cheers), that he 
 had a career before him. Tommy bore it well, all ex- 
 cept the quotation, which he was burning to correct, 
 but sighed to find that it had set the dominies on his 
 left talking about precocity. " To produce such a gray 
 beard of a book at two-and-twenty, Mr. Sandys," said 
 Cathro, " is amazing. It partakes, sir, of the nature of 
 the miraculous ; it 's onchancey, by which we mean a 
 deviation from the normal." And so on. To escape 
 this kind of flattery (he had so often heard it said by 
 
THE MONSTER 843 
 
 ladies, who could say it so much better), Tommy turned 
 to his neighbors on the right. 
 
 Oddly enough they also were discussing deviations 
 from the normal. On the table was a plant in full 
 flower, and Ailie, who had lent it, was expressing sur 
 prise that it should bloom so late in the season. 
 
 " So early in its life, I should ratherj say," the doctor 
 remarked after examining it. " It is a young plant, and 
 in the ordinary course would not have come to flower 
 before next year. But it is afraid that it will never see 
 next year. It is one of those poor little plants that 
 bloom prematurely because they are diseased." 
 
 Tommy was a little startled. He had often marvelled 
 over his own precocity, but never guessed that this 
 might be the explanation why he was in flower at 
 twenty-two. "Is that a scientific fact?" he asked. 
 
 " It is a law of nature," the doctor replied, gravely, 
 and if anything more was said on the subject our 
 Tommy did not hear it. What did he hear ? He was 
 a child again, in miserable lodgings, and it was some 
 time in the long middle of the night, and what he heard 
 from his bed was his mother coughing away her life in 
 hers. There was an angry knock, knock, knock, from 
 somewhere near, and he crept out of bed to tell his 
 mother that the people through the wall were complain- 
 ing because she would not die more quietly, but when 
 he reached her bed it was not his mother he saw lying 
 there, but himself, aged twenty-four, or thereabouts. 
 
844 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 For Tommy had inherited his mother's cough ; he had 
 known it every winter, but he remembered it as if for 
 the first time now. 
 
 Did he hear anything else ? I think he heard his 
 wings slipping to the iioor. 
 
 He asked Ailie to give him the plant, and he kept 
 it in his room, very lovingly, though he forgot to water 
 it. He sat for long periods looking at it, and his 
 thoughts were very deep, but all he actually said aloud 
 was, "There are two of us." Aaron sometimes saw 
 them together, and thought they were an odd pair, and 
 perhaps they were. 
 
 Tommy did not tell Grizel of the tragedy that was 
 hanging over him. He was determined to save her that 
 pain. He knew that most men in his position would 
 have told her, and was glad to find that he could keep 
 it so gallantly to himself. She was brave; perhaps 
 some day she would discover that he had been brave 
 also. When she talked of wings now, what he seemed 
 to see was a green grave. His eyes were moist, but he 
 held his head high. All this helped him. 
 
 Ah, well, but the world must jog along though yon 
 and I be damned. Elspeth was happily married, and 
 there came the day when Tommy and Grizel must say 
 good-by. He was returning to London. His luggage 
 was already in Corp's barrow, all but the insignificant 
 part of it, which yet made a bulky package in its 
 author's pocket, for it was his new manuscript, for 
 
THE MONSTEB 345 
 
 which he would have fought a regiment, yes, and beaten 
 them. Little cared Tommy what became of the rest of 
 his luggage so long as that palpitating package was safe. 
 
 "And little you care," Grizel said, in a moment of 
 sudden bitterness, " whom you leave behind, so long as 
 you take it with you." 
 
 He forgave her, with a sad smile. She did not know, 
 you see, that this manuscript might be his last. 
 
 And it was the only bitter thing she said. Even when 
 he looked very sorry for her, she took advantage of his 
 emotion to help him only. " Don't be too sorry for me," 
 she said, calmly ; " remember, rather, that there is one 
 episode in a woman's life to which she must always cling 
 in memory, whether it was a pride to her or a shame, and 
 that it rests with you to make mine proud or shameful." 
 
 In other words, he was to get rid of his wings. How 
 she harped on that ! 
 
 He wanted to kiss her on the brow, but she would not 
 have it. He was about to do it, not to gratify any self- 
 ish desire, but of a beautiful impulse, that if anything 
 happened, she would have this to remember as the last 
 of him. But she drew back almost angrily. Positively, 
 she was putting it down to sentiment, and he forgave 
 her even that. 
 
 But she kissed the manuscripi " Wish it luck," he 
 had begged of her, " you were always so fond of babies, 
 and this is my baby." So Grizel kissed Tommy's baby, 
 and then she turned away her face. 
 
CHAPTEK XXV 
 
 KK, I. SA^TDTS HAS KETCKXKD TO TOWS 
 
 It is disqaieting to reflect that we hare devoted so mneh 
 paper (this is the third shilling-'s worth) to telliDg what 
 a real biographer woald almost certainly have summed np 
 in a few pages. '• Caring nothing for glory, engrossed 
 in his work alone, Mr. Sandys, soon after the publication 
 of the 'Letters,' sought the peace of his mothers native 
 •dllagej and there, alike undistnrbing and nndisrorbed, 
 he gave his life, as ever, to laborious days and quiet con- 
 templation. The one vital fact, in these six laontlis of 
 loftj endeavor, is that he was making progress with the 
 new book. Fishing and other distractions were occa- 
 sionally indulged in, but merely that he might rise 
 fresher next morning to a book which absorbed," etc. 
 
 One can see exactly how it should be done, it has been 
 done so often before. And there is a deal to be said for 
 rhis method. BQs book was what he had been at daring 
 nearly the whole of that time ; comparatively speaking, 
 the fishing and "' other distractions " (a neat phrase) had 
 got an occasional hour only. But while we admire, we 
 cant do it in that way. We seem &ted to go on taking 
 it for granted that you know the " vital facts '" about 
 
ME. T. SANDYS HAS KETUENED TO TOWK 347 
 
 Tommy, and devoting our attention to the things that 
 the real biogvapher leaves out. 
 
 Tommy arrived in London with little more than ten 
 pounds in his pockets. All the rest he had spent on 
 Elspeth. 
 
 He looked for furnished chambers in a fashionable 
 quarter, and they were much too expensive. But the 
 young lady who showed them to him asked if it was the 
 Mr. Sandys, and he at once took the rooms. Her mother 
 subsequently said that she understood he wrote books, 
 and would he deposit five pounds ? 
 
 Such are the ups and downs of the literary calling. 
 
 The book, of course, was " Unrequited Love," and the 
 true story of how it was not given to the world by his 
 first publishers has never been told. They had the 
 chance, but they weighed the manuscript in their hands, 
 as if it were butter, and said it was very small. 
 
 "If you knew how much time I have spent in making 
 it smaller," replied Tommy, haughtily. 
 
 The madmen asked if he could not add a few chapters, 
 whereupon, with a shudder, he tucked baby under his 
 wing and flew away. That is how Goldie & Goldie got 
 the book. 
 
 For one who had left London a glittering star, it was 
 wonderful how little he brightened it by returning. At 
 the club they did not know that he had been away. In 
 society they seemed to have forgotten to expect him 
 back. 
 
348 TOMMY AOTD GKIZEL 
 
 He had an eye for them — with a touch of red in It ; 
 but he bided his time. It was one of the terrible things 
 about Tommy that he could bide his time. Pym was the 
 only person he called upon, he took Pym out to dinner 
 and conducted him home again. His kindness to Pym, 
 the delicacy with which he pretended not to see that 
 poor old Pym was degraded and done for — they would 
 have been pretty even in a woman, and we treat Tommy 
 unfairly in passing them by with a bow. 
 
 Pym had the manuscript to read, and you may be as 
 sure he kept sober that night as that Tommy lay awake. 
 For when literature had to be judged, who could be so 
 grim a critic as this usually lenient toper ? He could 
 forgive much, could Pym. Tou had run away without 
 paying your rent, was it ? Well, well, come in and have 
 a drink. Broken your wife's heart, have you ? Poor 
 chap, but you will soon get over it. But if it was a 
 split infinitive, "Go to the devil, sir." 
 
 " Into a cocked hat," was the verdict of Pym, mean- 
 ing thereby that thus did Tommy's second work beat 
 his first. Tommy broke down and wept. 
 
 Presently Pym waxed sentimental and confided to 
 Tommy that he too had once loved in vain. The sad 
 case of those who love in vain, you remember, is the 
 subject of the book. The saddest of autobiographies, 
 it has been called. 
 
 An odd thing this, I think. Tearing home (for the 
 more he was engrossed in mind the quicker he walked), 
 
MK. T. SANDYS HAS EETXJKKED TO TOWN 349 
 
 Tommy was not revelling in Pym's praise; lie was 
 neither blanching nor smiling at the thought that he 
 of all people had written as one who was unloved, 
 he was not wondering what Grizel would say to it, he 
 had even forgotten to sigh over his own coming dis- 
 solution (indeed about this time the flower-pot began 
 to fade from his memory) ; what made him cut his way 
 so excitedly through the streets was this : Pym had 
 questioned his use of the word untimely in chapter 
 eight. And Tommy had always been uneasy about 
 that word. 
 
 He glared at every person he passed, and ran into 
 perambulators. He rushed past his chambers, like one 
 who no longer had a home. He was in the park now, 
 and did not even notice that the Eow was empty, that 
 mighty round a deserted circus ; management, riders, 
 clowns, all the performers gone on their provincial tour. 
 Or nearly all, for a lady on horseback sees him, remem- 
 bers to some extent who he is, and gives chase. It is 
 our dear Mrs. Jerry. 
 
 "You wretch," she said, "to compel me to pursue 
 you ! Nothing could have induced me to do anything 
 so unwomanly except that you are the only man in 
 town." 
 
 She shook her whip so prettily at him that it was as 
 seductive as a smile. It was also a way of gaining time, 
 while she tried to remember what it was he was famous 
 for. 
 
350 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 " I believe you don't know me ! " she said, with a 
 little shriek, for Tommy had looked bewildered. " That 
 would be too mortifying. Please pretend you do ! " 
 
 Her look of appeal, the way in which she put her 
 plump little hands together, as if about to say her 
 prayers, brought it all back to Tommy. The one thing 
 he was not certain of was whether he had proposed to 
 her. 
 
 It was the one thing of which she was certain. 
 
 "You think I can forget so soon," he replied, re- 
 proachfully but carefully. 
 
 "Then tell me my name," said she; she thought it 
 might lead to his mentioning his own. 
 
 "I don't know what it is now. It was Mrs. Jerry 
 once." 
 
 " It is Mrs. Jerry stiU." 
 
 " Then you did not marry him, after aU. ? " 
 
 No wild joy had surged to his face, but when she 
 answered, yes, he nodded his head with gentle melan- 
 choly three times. He had not the smallest desire to 
 deceive the lady ; he was simply an actor who had got 
 his cue and liked his part. 
 
 " But my friends still call me Mrs. Jerry," she said, 
 softly. " I suppose it suits me somehow." 
 
 " You will always be Mrs. Jerry to me," he replied, 
 huskily. Ah, those meetings with old loves I 
 
 " If you minded so much," Mrs. Jerry said, a little 
 tremulously (she had the softest heart, though her 
 
BUT MY FRIENDS STILL CALL ME MRS. JERRY," SHE SAID SOFTLY 
 
ME. T. SANDYS HAS BETUENED TO TOWN 351 
 
 memory was a trifle defective), "you might have dis- 
 covered whether I had married him or not." 
 
 " Was there no reason why I should not seek to dis- 
 cover it ? " Tommy asked, with tremendous irony, but 
 not knowing in the least what he meant. It confused 
 Mrs. Jerry. They always confused her when they were 
 fierce, and yet she liked them to be fierce when she 
 re-met them, so few of them were. 
 
 But she said the proper thing. " I am glad you have 
 got over it." 
 
 Tommy maintained a masterly silence. No wonder he 
 was a power with women. 
 
 " I say I am glad you have got over it," murmured 
 Mrs. Jerry, again. Has it ever been noticed that the 
 proper remark does not always gain in propriety with 
 repetition ? 
 
 It is splendid to know that right feeling still kept 
 Tommy silent. 
 
 Yet she went on briskly, as if he had told her some- 
 thing. "Am I detaining you ? You were walking so 
 quickly that I thought you were in pursuit of some- 
 one." 
 
 It brought Tommy back to earth, and he could accept 
 her now as an old friend he was glad to meet again. 
 "You could not guess what I was in pursuit of, Mrs. 
 Jerry," he assured her, and with confidence, for words 
 are not usually chased down the Kow. 
 
 But, though he made the sound of laughter, that ter- 
 
852 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 rible face which Mrs. Jerry remembered so well, but could 
 not give a name to, took no part in the revelry ; he was 
 as puzzling to her as those irritating authors who print 
 their jokes without a note of exclamation at the end of 
 them. Poor Mrs. Jerry thought it must be a laugh of 
 horrid bitterness, and that he was referring to his dead 
 self or something dreadful of that sort, for which she 
 was responsible. 
 
 " Please don't tell me," she said, in such obvious alarm 
 that again he laughed that awful laugh. He promised, 
 with a profound sigh, to carry his secret unspoken to the 
 grave, also to come to her At Home if she sent him a 
 card. 
 
 He told her his address, but not his name, and she 
 could not send the card to " Occupier." 
 
 "Now tell me about yourself," said Mrs. Jerry, with 
 charming cunning. " Did you go away ? " 
 
 " I came back a few days ago only." 
 
 "Had you any shooting?" (They nearly always 
 threatened to make for a distant land, where there was 
 big game.) 
 
 Tommy smiled. He had never " had any shooting " 
 except once, in his boyhood when he and Corp acted as 
 beaters, and he had wept passionately over the first bird 
 killed, and harangued the murderer. 
 
 "No," he replied, "I was at work all the time." 
 
 This at least told her that his work was of a kind 
 which could be done out of London. An inventor ? 
 
ME. T. SAJJTDTS HAS RETUKNED TO TOWK 368 
 
 ■' When are we to see the result ? " asked artful Mrs. 
 Jerry. 
 
 "Very soon. Everything comes out about this time. 
 It is our season, you know." 
 
 Mrs. Jerry pondered while she said, "How too en- 
 trancing." What did come out this month ? Oh, plays ! 
 And whose season was it ? The actor's, of course I He 
 could not be an actor with that beard, but — ah, she 
 remembered now ! 
 
 "Are they really clever, this time," she asked, ro- 
 guishly, "for you must admit that they are usually 
 sticks ? " 
 
 Tommy blinked at this. "I really believe, Mrs. 
 Jerry," he said, slowly, "it is you who don't know who 
 I am ! " 
 
 "You prepare the aristocracy for the stage, don't 
 you ? " she said, plaintively. 
 
 « I ! " he thundered. 
 
 " He had a beard," she said, in self-defence. 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 "Oh, I don't know ! Please forgive me ! I do remem- 
 ber, of course, who you are — I remember too well ! " 
 said Mrs. Jerry, generously. 
 
 " What is my name ? " Tommy demanded. 
 
 She put her hands together again, beseechingly, 
 " Please, please I " she said. " I have such a dreadful 
 memory for names, but — oh, please 1 " 
 
 "What am I ? " he insisted. 
 23 
 
354 TOMMY AND GBIZEL 
 
 " You are the — the man who invents those delightful 
 thingumbobs," she cried, with an inspiration. 
 
 " I never invented anything, except two books," said 
 Tommy, looking at her reproachfully. 
 
 " I know them by heart, " she cried. 
 
 -' One of them is not published yet," he informed her. 
 
 " I am looking forward to it so excitedly," she said at 
 once. 
 
 " And my name is Sandys," said he. 
 
 " Thomas Sandys," she said, correcting him trium- 
 phantly. "How is that dear, darling little Agnes — 
 Elspeth ? " 
 
 " You have me at last," he admitted. 
 
 " ' Sandys on Woman,'" exclaimed Mrs. Jerry, all rip- 
 pling smiles once more. "Can I ever forget it ! " 
 
 " I shall never pretend to know anything about women 
 again," Tommy answered, dolefully, but with a credit- 
 able absence of vindictiveness. 
 
 " Please, please ! " said the little hands again. 
 
 " It is a nasty jar, Mrs. Jerry." 
 
 "Please!" 
 
 " Oh, that I could forget so quickly ! " 
 
 " Please ! " 
 
 " I forgive you, if that is what you want." 
 
 She waved her whip. "And you will come and see 
 me?" 
 
 " When I have got over this. It needs — a little 
 time." He really said this to please her. 
 
ME. T. SAKDYS HAS EBTURJSED TO TOWN 355 
 
 "You shall talk to me of the new book," she said, 
 confident that this would fetch him, for he was not her 
 first author. "By the way, what is it about?" 
 
 "Can you ask, Mrs. Jerry?" replied Tommy, pas- 
 sionately. "Oh, woman, woman, can you ask!" 
 
 This puzzled her at the time, but she understood what 
 he had meant when the book came out, dedicated to 
 Pym. " Goodness gracious ! " she said to herself as 
 she went from chapter to chapter, and she was very 
 self-conscious when she heard the book discussed in 
 society, which was not quite as soon as it came out, 
 for at first the ladies seemed to have forgotten their 
 Tommy. 
 
 But the journals made ample amends. He had in- 
 vented, they said, something new in literature, a story 
 that was yet not a story, told in the form of essays 
 which were no mere essays. There was no character 
 mentioned by name, there was not a line of dialogue, 
 essays only, they might say, were the net result, yet 
 a human heart was laid bare, and surely that was fiction 
 in its highest form. Fiction founded on fact, no doubt 
 (for it would be ostrich-like to deny that such a work 
 must be the outcome of a painful personal experience), 
 but in those wise and penetrating pages Mr. Sandys 
 called no one's attention to himself, his subject was an 
 experience common to humanity, to be borne this way 
 or that ; and without vain-glory he showed how it should 
 be borne, so that those looking into the deep waters of 
 
856 TOMMY AST) GEIZBL 
 
 the book (made clear by Ms pellucid style) might see 
 not the author but themselves. 
 
 A few of the critics said that if the book added 
 nothing to his reputation, it detracted nothing from it, 
 but probably their pen added this mechanically when 
 they were away. What annoyed him more, was the two 
 or three who stated that much as they liked " Unre- 
 quited Love" they liked the "Letters" still better. 
 He could not endure hearing a good word said for the 
 " Letters " now. 
 
 The great public, I believe, always preferred the 
 " Letters," but among important sections of it the new 
 book was a delight, and for various reasons. For in- 
 stance, it was no mere story. That got the thoughtful 
 public. Its style, again, got the public, which knows it 
 is the only public that counts. 
 
 Society still held aloof (there was an African traveller 
 on view that year), but otherwise everything was going 
 on well, when the bolt came, as ever from the quarter 
 whence it was least expected. It came in. a letter from 
 Grizel, so direct as to be almost as direct as this — "I 
 think it is a horrid book. The more beautifully it 
 is written the more horrid it seems. No one was ever 
 loved more truly than you. You can know nothing about 
 unrequited love. Then why do you pretend to know ? 
 I see why you always avoided telling me anything about 
 the book, even its title. It was because you knew what 
 I should say. It is nothing but sentiment. You were 
 
ME. T. SANDYS HAS BETUIiHED TO TOWN 357 
 
 on your wings all the time you were writing it. That 
 is why you could treat me as you did. Even to the last 
 moment you deceived me. I suppose you deceived 
 yourself also. Had I known what was in the manuscript 
 I would not have kissed it, I would have asked you to 
 burn it. Had you not had the strength, and you would 
 not, I should have burned it for you. It would have 
 been a proof of my love. I have ceased to care whether 
 you are a famous man or not. I want you to be a real 
 man. But you will not let me help you. I have cried 
 all day. Grizel." 
 
 Eury. Dejection. The heroic. They came in that order. 
 
 " This is too much I " he cried at first. " I can stand 
 a good deal, Grizel, but there was once a worm that 
 turned at last, you know. Take care, madam, take 
 care. Oh, but you are a charming lady ; you can decide 
 everything for everybody, can't you ! what delicious 
 letters you write, something unexpected in every one of 
 them I There are poor dogs of men, Grizel, who open 
 their letters from their loves knowing exactly what will 
 be inside. Words of cheer, words of love, of confidence, 
 of admiration, which help them as they sit into the 
 night at their work, fighting for fame that they may lay 
 it at their loved one's feet ; discouragement, obloquy, 
 scorn they get in plenty from others, but they are 
 always sure of her, do you hear, my original Grizel, 
 those other dogs are always sure of her. Hurrah ! 
 Grizel, I was happy, I was actually honored, it was 
 
358 TOMMY AND GKIZEI, 
 
 helping me to do better and better, when you quickly 
 put an end to all that, hurrah, hurrah ! " 
 
 I feel rather sorry for him. If he had not told her 
 about his book it was because she did not and never 
 could understand what compels a man to write one book, 
 instead of another. " I had no say in the matter ; the 
 thing demanded of me that I should do it and I had to 
 do it. Some must write from their own experience, 
 they can make nothing of anything else ; but it is to me 
 like a chariot that won't budge ; I have to assume a 
 character, Grizel, and then away we go. I don't attempt 
 to explain how I write, I hate to discuss it, all I know is 
 that those who know how it should be done can never 
 do it. London is overrun with such, and every one of 
 them is as cock-sure as you. You have taken everything 
 else, Grizel, surely you might leave me my books." 
 
 Yes, everything else, or nearly so. He put upon the 
 table all the feathers he had extracted since his return 
 to London, and they did make some little show, if less 
 than it seemed to him. That little adventure in the 
 park ; well, if it started wrongly, it but helped to show 
 the change in him, for he had determinedly kept away 
 from Mrs. Jerry's house. He had met her once since 
 the book came out, and she had blushed exquisitely when 
 referring to it and said, " How you have suffered, I blame 
 myself dreadfully." Yes, and there was an unoccupied 
 sofa near by, and he had not sat down on it with her and 
 continued the conversation. Was not that a feather? 
 
ME. T. SANDYS HAS RETITKNED TO TOWN 359 
 
 And there were other ladies, and, without going into 
 particulars, they were several feathers between them. 
 How doggedly, to punish himself, he had stuck to the 
 company of men, a sex that never interested him. 
 
 " But all that is nothing. I am beyond the pale. I 
 did so monstrous a thing that I must die for it. What 
 was this dreadful thing ? When I saw you with that 
 glove I knew you loved me, and that you thought I loved 
 you, and I had not the heart to dash your joy. You 
 don't know it, but that was the crime for which I must 
 be exterminated, fiend that I am ! " 
 
 Gusts of fury came at intervals all the morning. He 
 wrote her appalling letters, and destroyed them. He 
 shook his fist and snapped his fingers at her, and went 
 out for drink (having none in the house), and called a han- 
 som to take him to Mrs. Jerry's, and tore round the park 
 again and glared at everybody. He rushed on and on. 
 " But the one thing you shall never do, Grizel, is to inter- 
 fere with my work, I swear it, do you hear ? In all 
 else I am yours to mangle at your will, but touch it, and 
 I am a beast at bay." 
 
 And still saying such things, he drew near the pub- 
 lishing offices of Goldie & Goldie, and circled round 
 them, less like a beast at bay than a bird that is taking 
 a long way to its nest. And about four of the afternoon 
 what dops this odd beast or bird or fish do, but stalk 
 into Goldie & Goldie's and order "Unrequited Love" to 
 be withdrawn from circulation. 
 
360 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 " Madam, I have carried out your wishes, and the man 
 is hanged." 
 
 Not thus, but in words to that effect did Tommy 
 announce his deed to Grizel. 
 
 " I think you have done the right thing," she wrote 
 back, " and I admire you for it," but he thought she did 
 not admire him sufficiently for it, and he did not answer 
 her letter, so it was the last that passed between them. 
 
 Such is the true explanation (now first published) of 
 an affair that at the time created no small stir. " Why 
 withdraw the book ? " Goldie & Goldie asked of Tommy, 
 but he would give no reason. " Why ? " the public 
 asked of Goldie & Goldie, and they had to invent 
 several. The public inveuted the others. The silliest 
 were those you could know only by belonging to a 
 club. 
 
 I swear that Tommy had not foreseen the result. 
 Quite unwittingly the favored of the gods had found a 
 way again. The talk about his incomprehensible action 
 was the turning-point in the fortunes of the book. 
 There were already a few thousand copies in circulation, 
 and now many thousand people wanted them. Sandys, 
 Sandys, Sandys ! where had the ladies heard that name 
 before ? Society woke up, Sandys was again its hero, 
 the traveller had to go lecturing in the provinces. 
 
 The ladies ! Yes, and their friends, the men. There 
 was a Tommy society in Mayfair that winter, nearly all 
 of the members eminent or beautiful, and they teld each 
 
ME. T. SANDTB HAS EBTTTKNED TO TOWN 361 
 
 other's hands. Both sexes were eligible, married or 
 single, and the one rule was something about sympathy. 
 It afterward became the Souls, but those in the know 
 still call them the Tommies. 
 
 They blackballed Mrs. Jerry (she was rather plump), 
 but her married step-daughter, Lady Pippinworth (who 
 had been a Miss Eidge-Pulton), was one of them. 
 Indeed the Ridge-Fultons are among the thinnest fami- 
 lies in the country. 
 
 T. Sandys was invited to join the society, but declined, 
 and thus never quite knew what they did, nor can any 
 outsider know, there being a regulation among the Tom- 
 mies against telling. I believe, however, that they were 
 a brotherhood, with sisters. Tou had to pass an exami- 
 nation in unrequited love, showing how you had suffered, 
 and after that either the men or the women (I forget 
 which) dressed in white to the throat, and then each 
 got some other's old love's hand to hold, and you all sat 
 on the floor and thought hard. There may have been 
 even more in it than this, for one got to know Tommies 
 at sight by a sort of careworn halo round the brow, and 
 it is said that the House of Commons was several times 
 nearly counted out because so many of its middle-aged 
 members were holding the floor in another place. 
 
 Of course there were also the Anti-Tommies, who 
 called themselves (rather vulgarly) the Tummies. Many 
 of them w;ere that shape. They held that, though you 
 had loved in vain, it was no such mighty matter to boast 
 
362 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 of, but they were poor in argument, and their only really 
 strong card was that Mr. Sandys was stoutish himself. 
 
 Their organs in the press said that he was a man of 
 true genius, and slightly inclined to embonpoint. 
 
 This maddened him, but on the whole his return was 
 a triumph, and despite thoughts of Grizel he was very, 
 very happy, for he was at play again. He was a boy and 
 all the ladies were girls. Perhaps the lady he saw most 
 frequently was Mrs. Jerry's step-daughter. Lady Pip- 
 pinworth was a friend of Lady Eintoul, and had several 
 times visited her at the Spittal, but that was not the 
 sole reason why Tommy so frequently drank tea with 
 her. They had met first at a country house, where, one 
 night after the ladies had retired to rest. Lady Pippin- 
 worth came stealing into the smoking-room with the 
 tidings that there were burglars in the house. As she 
 approached her room she had heard whispers and then, 
 her door being ajar, she had peeped upon the miscreants. 
 She had also seen a pile of her jewelry on the table and 
 a pistol keeping guard on top of it. There were several 
 men in the house, but that pistol cowed all of them save 
 Tommy. "If we could lock them in! " some one sug- 
 gested, but the key was on the wrong side of the door. 
 " I shall put it on the right side," Tommy said, pluckily, 
 " if you others will prevent their escaping by the win- 
 dow," and with characteristic courage he set off for her 
 ladyship's room. His intention was to insert his hand, 
 whip out the key and lock the door on the outside, a 
 
ME. T. SAITOYS HAS EETUENED TO TOWN 363 
 
 sufficiently hazardous enterprise ; but what does he do 
 instead ? Locks the door on the inside, and goes for 
 the burglars with his fists ! A happy recollection of 
 Corp's famous one from the shoulder disposed at once of 
 the man who had seized the pistol ; with the other gen- 
 tleman Tommy had a stand-up fight in which both of 
 them took and gave, but when support arrived, one bur- 
 glar was senseless on the floor and T. Sandys was sitting 
 on the other. Courageous of Tommy, was it not ? but 
 observe the end. He was left in the dining-room to 
 take charge of his captives until morning, and by and by 
 he was exhorting them in such noble language to mend 
 their ways that they took the measure of him, and, so 
 touching were their family histories, that Tommy wept 
 and untied their cords and showed them out at the front 
 door and gave them ten shillings each, and the one who 
 begged for the honor of shaking hands with him also 
 took his watch. Thus did Tommy and Lady Pippin- 
 worth become friends, but it was not this that sent 
 him so often to her house to tea. She was a beautiful 
 woman, with a reputation for having broken many 
 hearts without damaging her own. He thought it an 
 interesting case. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 GSIZBL ALL ALONE 
 
 It was Tommy who was the favored of the gods, you 
 remember, not Grizel. 
 
 Elspeth wondered to see her, after the publication of 
 that book, looking much as usual. " You know how he 
 loved you now," she said, perhaps a little reproachfully. 
 
 "Yes," Grizel answered, "I know; I knew before the 
 book came out." 
 
 " You must be sorry for him ? " 
 
 Grizel nodded. 
 
 "But proud of him also," Elspetb said. "You have a 
 right to be proud." 
 
 "I am as proud," Grizel replied, "as I have a right 
 to be." 
 
 Something in her voice touched Elspeth, who was so 
 happy that she wanted every one to be happy. " I want 
 you to know, Grizel," she said, warmly, "that I don't 
 blame you for not being able to love him, we can't help 
 those things. Nor need you blame yourself too much, 
 for I have often heard him say that artists must suffer 
 in order to produce beautiful things." 
 
GRIZBL ALL ALONE 365 
 
 "But I cannot remember," Elspeth had to admit, 
 with a sigh, to David, " that she made any answer to 
 that, except Thank you." Grizel was nearly as reticent 
 to David himself ; once only did she break down for a 
 moment in his presence ; it was when he was telling her 
 that the issue of the book had been stopped. 
 
 "But I see you know already," he said, "perhaps you 
 even know why, though he has not given any sufficient 
 reason to Elspeth." 
 
 David had given his promise, she reminded him, not to 
 ask her any questions about Tommy. 
 
 "But I don't see why I should keep it," he said, 
 bluntly. 
 " Because you dislike him," she replied. 
 " Grizel," te declared, " I have tried hard to like him ; 
 I have thought and thought about it, and I can't see that 
 he has given me any just cause to dislike him." 
 
 "And that," said Grizel, "makes you dislike him 
 more than ever." 
 
 "I know that you cared for him once," David 
 persisted. "And I know that he wanted to marry 
 
 you " 
 
 But she would not let him go on. " David," she said, 
 " I want to give up my house, and I want you to take it. 
 It is the real doctor's house of Thrums, and people in 
 need of you still keep ringing me up of nights. The only 
 door to your surgery is through my passage, it is I who 
 «hould be in lodgings now." 
 
366 TOMMY AJSD GEIZEL 
 
 " Do you really think I would, Grizel ! " he cried, 
 indignantly. 
 
 "Eather than see the dear house go into another's 
 hands," she answered, steadily, "for I am determined to 
 leave it. Dr. McQueen won't feel strange, when he 
 looks down, David, if it is only you he sees moving about 
 the old rooms, instead of me." 
 
 " You are doing this for me, Grizel, and I won't have 
 it." 
 
 " I give you my word," she told him, " that I am doing 
 it for myself alone. I am tired of keeping a house, and 
 of all its worries. Men don't know what they are." 
 
 She was smiling, but his brows wrinkled in pain. 
 "Oh, Grizel ! " he said, and stopped. And then he 
 cried, " Since when has Grizel ceased to care for house- 
 keeping ? " 
 
 She did not say since when, I don't know whether she 
 knew, but it was since she and Tommy had ceased to 
 correspond. David's words showed her too suddenly 
 how she had changed, and it was then that she broke 
 down before him — because she had ceased to care for 
 housekeeping. 
 
 But she had her way, and early in the new year David 
 and his wife were established in their new home, with all 
 Grizel's furniture, except such as was needed for the 
 two rooms rented by her from Gavinia. She would have 
 liked to take away the old doctor's chair, because it was 
 the bit of him left behind when he died, and then for 
 
GEIZBL ALL ALONE 367 
 
 that yery reason she did not ; she no longer wanted hnn 
 to see her always. " I am not so nice as I ilsed to be, 
 and I want to keep it from you," she said to the chair 
 when she kissed it good-by. 
 
 Was Grizel not as nice as she used to be ? How cau 
 I answer, who love her the more only ? There is one at 
 least, Grizel, who will never desert you. 
 
 Ah, but was she ? 
 
 I seem again to hear the warning voice of Grizel, and 
 this time she is crying, " You know I was not." 
 
 She knew it so well that she could say it to herself 
 quite calmly. She knew that with whatever repugnance 
 she drove those passions away they would come back : 
 yes, and for a space be welcomed back. Why does she 
 leave Gavinia's blue hearth this evening, and seek the 
 solitary den ? She has gone to summon them, and she 
 knows it. They come thick in the den, for they know 
 the place ; it was there that her mother was wont to 
 walk with them. Have they been waiting for you in the 
 den, Grizel, all this time ? Have you found your mother's 
 legacy at last ? 
 
 Don't think that she sought them often. It was never 
 when she seemed to have anything to live for. Tommy 
 would not write to her, and so did not want her to write 
 to him, but if that bowed her head it never made her 
 rebel. She still had her many duties. Whatever she 
 suffered, so long as she could say, " I am helping him," 
 she was in heart and soul the Grizel of old. In his fits 
 
368 TOMMY AND GEIZBIi 
 
 of remorse, wbioh were many, lie tried to produce work 
 that would please her. Thus in a heroic attempt to be 
 practical he wrote a political article, in one of the 
 reviews, quite in the ordinary style, but so much worse 
 than the average of such things that they would never 
 have printed it without his name. He also contributed 
 to a magazine a short tale, he who could never write 
 tales, and he struck all the beautiful reflections out of it 
 and never referred to himself once, and the result was so 
 imbecile that kindly people said there must be another 
 writer of the same name. "Show them to Grizel," 
 Tommy wrote to Elspeth, enclosing also some of the ani- 
 madversions of the press, and he meant Grizel to see that 
 he could write in his own way only ; but she read 
 those two efforts with delight, and said to Elspeth, 
 "Tell him I am so proud of them." 
 
 Elspeth thought it very nice of Grizel to defend the 
 despised in this way (even Elspeth had fallen asleep 
 over the political paper) ; she did not understand that 
 Grizel loved them because they showed Tommy trying 
 to do without his wings. 
 
 Then another trifle by him appeared, shorter even 
 than the others, but no man in England could have 
 written it except T. Sandys. It has not been reprinted, 
 and I forget everything about it except that its subject 
 was love. " Will not the friends of the man who can 
 produce such a little masterpiece as this," the journals 
 said, " save him from wasting his time on lumber for 
 
GRIZBL ALL ALONE 369 
 
 the reviews, and drivelling tales ? " And Tommy sug- 
 gested to Elspeth that she might show Grizel this 
 exhortation also. 
 
 Grizel saw she was not helping him at all. If he 
 would not fight, why should she ? Oh, let her fall and 
 fall, it would not take her farther from him ! These 
 were the thoughts that sent her into solitude to meet with 
 worse ones. She could not face the morrow. " What 
 shall I do to-morrow ? " She never shrank from to-day, 
 it had its duties, it could be got through, but to-morrow 
 was a never-ending road. Oh, how could she get 
 through to-morrow ? 
 
 Her. great friend at this time was Corp, because he 
 still retained his faith in Tommy. She could always, 
 talk of Tommy to Corp. 
 
 How loyal Corp was ! He still referred to Tommy as 
 "Him." Gavinia, much distressed, read aloud to Corp 
 a newspaper attack on the political article, and all he 
 said was "He'll find a w'y." 
 
 "He's found it," he went upstairs to announce to 
 Grizel, when the praises of the " little masterpiece " 
 arrived. 
 
 " Yes, I know, Corp," she answered, quietly. She was 
 sitting by the window, where the plant was. Tommy 
 had asked her to take care of it, without telling her 
 why. 
 
 Something in her appearance troubled the hulking, 
 blundering man. He could not have told what it was ; 
 
370 TOMMY Airo GEIZBIi 
 
 I think it was simply this, that Grizel no longer sat 
 erect in her chair. 
 
 "I'm nain easy in my mind about Grizel," he said 
 that evening to Gavinia. "There's something queery 
 about her, though I canna bottom 't." 
 
 "Yea? " said Gavinia, with mild contempt. 
 
 He continued pulling at his pipe, grunting as if in 
 pleasant pain, which was the way Corp smoked. 
 
 " I could see she 's no pleased though he has found a 
 w'y," he said. 
 
 " What pleasure should she be able to sook out o' his 
 keeping ding-ding-danging on about that woman ? " re- 
 torted Gavinia. 
 
 " What woman ? " 
 
 " The London besom that gae him the go-by." 
 
 " Was there sic a woman ! " Corp cried. 
 
 " Of course there was, and it 's her that he 's aye writ- 
 ing about." 
 
 "Havers, Gavinia. It's Grizel he's aye writing 
 about, and it was Grizel that gae him the go-by. It's 
 town talk." 
 
 But whatever the town might say, Gavinia stuck to 
 her opinion. " Grizel 's no near so neat in her dressing 
 as she was," she informed Corp, " and her hair is no aye 
 tidy, and that bonnet she was in yesterday didna set her." 
 
 " I 've noticed it," cried Corp, " I 've noticed it this 
 while back, though I didna ken I had noticed it, 
 Gavinia ; I wonder what can be the reason ? " 
 
GEIZBL ALL ALOITE 371 
 
 " It 's because nobody cares," Gavinia replied, sadly. 
 Trust one ■woman to know another. 
 
 " We a' care," said Corp, stoutly. 
 
 "We're a' as nothing, Corp, when he doesna care. 
 She 's fond o' him, man." 
 
 " Of course she is in a w'y. Whaur 's the woman 
 that could help it ? " 
 
 " There 's many a woman that could help it," said 
 Gavinia, tartly, for the honor of her sex, " but she 's no 
 ane o' them." To be candid, Gavinia was not one of 
 them herself. " I 'm thinking she ^s terrible fond o' 
 him," she said, "and I 'm nain sure that he has treated 
 her weel." 
 
 " Woman, take care ; say a word agin him and I '11 
 mittle you!" Corp thundered, and she desisted, in 
 fear. 
 
 But he made her re-read the little essay to him in 
 instalments, and at the end he said, victoriously, " You 
 blethering crittur, there 's no sic woman. It's just 
 another o' his ploys!" 
 
 He marched upstairs to Grizel with the news, and she 
 listened kindly. " I am sure you are right," she said, 
 "you understand him better than any of them, Corp," 
 and it was true. 
 
 He thougM he had settled the whole matter. He was 
 burning to be downstairs to tell Gavinia that these 
 things needed only a man. " And so you '11 be yoursel' 
 again, Grizel," he said, with great relief. 
 
372 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 She had not seen that he -was aiming at her until now, 
 and it touched her. " Am I so different, Corp ? " 
 
 Not at all, he assured her, delicately, but she was 
 may-be no quite so neatly dressed as she used to be, and 
 her hair wasna braided back so smooth, and he didna 
 think that bonnet quite set her. 
 
 " G-avinia has been saying that to you ! " 
 
 " I noticed it mysel', Grizel ; I 'm a terrible noticber." 
 
 "Perhaps you are right," she said, reflecting, after 
 looking at herself for the first time for some days. 
 " But to think of your caring, Corp ! " 
 
 "I care most michty," he replied, with terrific 
 earnestness. 
 
 " I must try to satisfy you, then," she said, smiling. 
 "But, Corp, please don't discuss me with Gavinia." 
 
 This request embarrassed him, for soon again he did 
 not know how to act. There was Grizel's strange be- 
 havior with the child, for instance. "'So, I won't come 
 down to see him to-day, Corp," she had said ; " somehow 
 children weary me." 
 
 Such words from Grizel ! His mouth would not shut 
 and he could say nothing. " Porgive me, Corp ! " she 
 cried, remorsefully, and ran downstairs, and with many a 
 passionate caress asked forgiveness of the child. 
 
 Corp followed her and for the moment he thought he 
 must have been dreaming upstairs. " I wish I saw you 
 wi' bairns o' your ain, Grizel," he said, looking on en- 
 tranced, but she gave him such a pitiful smile that he 
 
GEIEEL AliL ALONE 373 
 
 could not get it out of his head. Deprived of Gavinia's 
 counsel, and afraid to hurt Elspeth, he sought out the 
 doctor and said bluntly to him, "How is it he never 
 writes to Grizel ? She misses him terrible." 
 
 So, David thought, Grizel's dejection is becoming 
 common talk. " Damn him ! " he said, in a gust of fury. 
 
 But this was too much for loyal Corp. " Damn you ! " 
 he roared. 
 
 But in his heart he knew that the doctor was a just 
 man, and henceforth "when he was meaning to comfort 
 Grizel, he was often seeking comfort for himself. 
 
 He did it all with elaborate cunning, to prevent 
 her guessing that he was disturbed about her; asked 
 permission to sit with her, for instance, because he was 
 dull downstairs, mentioned as a ludicrous thing that there 
 were people who believed Tommy could treat a woman 
 badly, and waited anxiously for the reply. Oh, he was 
 transparent was Corp, but you may be sure Grizel never 
 let him know that she saw through him. Tommy could 
 not be blamed, she pointed out, though he did not care 
 for some woman who perhaps cared for him. 
 
 " Exac'ly," said Corp. 
 
 " And if he seemed," Grizel went on, with momentary 
 bitterness, "to treat her badly, it could be only because 
 she had made herself cheap." 
 
 "That's it," said Corp, cheerfully. Then he added, 
 hurriedly, " No, that 's no it ava. She 's the last to mak' 
 hersel' cheap." Then he saw that this might put Grizel 
 
37-4 TOMMY AXB GBIZEL 
 
 on the scent. " Of course, there 's no sic Troman," he 
 said, artfully, "bat if there was, he would mak' it :s' 
 right She mightna see how it was to be done, but 
 kennin' what a crittur he is, she maon be sure he wcjld 
 find a way. She wonld never lose hope, GrizeL" 
 
 And then, if Grizel did not appease him instantly, he 
 wonld say, appealingly. "I canna think less o" hiia. 
 Grizel ; no, it would mak* me just terrible low. Grizel," 
 he wonld cry, sternly, " dinna tell me to think less o' 
 that laddie." 
 
 Then, when she had reassuied him, he would recall the 
 many instances in which Tommy as a boy had found a 
 way. "Did we ever ken he was finding it. Grizel, till he 
 did find it ? Many a time I says to mysel', says I^ -all 
 is over,' and syne next minnte that holy look comes ewer 
 his face and he stretches out his legs like sis if he \ras 
 riding on a horse, and all that kens him says. * He has 
 found a w'y.' If I was the woman (no that there is sic- 
 a woman) I would say to mysel', ' He was never beat,' I 
 wonld say, 'when he was a laddie, and it's no likely 
 he '11 be beat when he "s a man; ' and I wouldna sii look- 
 ing at the fire wi" my hands fanded, nor would I forget 
 to keep my haix neat, and I would wear the frock that 
 set me best, and 1 would play in my auld bonny wV wi' 
 bairns, for, says I to mysel", ' I 'm sure to hae bairns o' 
 my naiu some day. and 
 
 But Grizel cried, -Don't Corp, dont ! " 
 
 " I winna," he answered, miserably, " no^ I winna. 
 
GEIZEL ALL ALONE 375 
 
 Forgive me, Grizel, I think I '11 be stepping," and then 
 when he got as far as the door he would say, " I canna 
 do 't, Grizel, I 'm just terrible wae for the woman (if sic 
 a woman there be), but I canna think ill o' him, you 
 mauna spier it o' me." 
 
 He was much brightened by a reflection that came 
 to him one day in church. "Here have I been near 
 blaming him. for no finding a w'y, and very like he 
 doesna ken we want him to find a w'y ! " 
 
 How to inform Tommy, without letting Grizel know ? 
 She had tried twice long ago to teach him to write, but 
 he found it harder on the wrists than the heaviest lug- 
 gage. It was not safe for htm even to think of the extra 
 twirl that turned an n into an m, without first removing 
 any knick-knacks that might be about. Nevertheless, 
 he now proposed a third set-to, and Grizel acquiesced, 
 though she thought it but another of his inventions to 
 keep her from brooding. 
 
 The number of words in the English tongue excited 
 him, and he often lost all by not confining the chase to 
 one, like a dog after rabbits. Fortunately he knew 
 which words he wanted to bag. 
 
 "Change at Tilliedrum," " Tickets, show your tickets," 
 and the like, he much enjoyed meeting in the flesh, so 
 to speak. 
 
 " Let 's see ' Find a w'y,' Grizel," he would say. " Ay, 
 ay, and is that the crittur ! " and soon the sly fellow 
 could write it, or at least draw it. 
 
376 TOMMY AXD GKIZBL 
 
 He affected an ambition to wi-ite a letter to his son on 
 that gentleman's first birthday, and so " Let 's see what 
 ' I send you these few scrapes ' is like, Grizel." She 
 assured him that this is not essential in correspondence, 
 but all the letters he had ever heard read aloud began 
 thus, and he got his way. 
 
 Alien, Master Shiach was surprised and gratified to 
 receive the following epistle : " My dear sir, I send you 
 these few scrapes to tell you as you have found a way to 
 be a year of age the morn. All tickets ready in which 
 Gavinia joins so no more at present I am, sir, your 
 obed' father Corp Shiach." 
 
 The fame of this letter went abroad, but not a soul 
 knew of the next. It said : " My dear Sir, I send you 
 these few scrapes to tell you as Grizel needs cheering np. 
 Kindly oblidge by finding a way so no more at present. 
 I am sir your obed' Serv' Corp Shiach." 
 
 To his bewilderment this produced no effect, though only 
 because Tommy never got it, and he wrote again, more 
 sternly, requesting his hero to find a way immediately. 
 He was waiting restlessly for the answer, at a time when 
 Elspeth called on Grizel to tell her of something beauti- 
 ful that Tommy had done. He had been very ill for 
 nearly a fortnight, it appeared, but had kept it from her, 
 to save her anxiety. " Just think, Grizel, all the time he 
 was in bed with bronchitis he was writing me cheerful 
 letters every other day, pretending there was nothing the 
 paatter with him. He is better now. I have he^rd about 
 
GRIZEL ALL ALONE 377 
 
 it from a Mrs. Jerry, a lady whom I knew in London, 
 and who has nursed him in the kindest way. [But this 
 same Mrs. Jerry had opened Corp's letters and destroyed 
 them as of no importance.] He would never have men- 
 tioned it himself. How like him, Grizel I You remem- 
 ber, I made him promise before he went back to London, 
 that if he was ill he would let me know at once, so that 
 I could go to him, but he is so considerate, he would not 
 give me pain. He wrote those letters, Grizel, when he 
 was gasping for breath." 
 
 " But she seemed quite unmoved," Elspeth said sadly 
 to her husband afterward. 
 
 Unmoved I Yes, Grizel remained apparently unmoved 
 until Elspeth had gone, but then — the torture she 
 endured I " Oh, cruel, cruel ! " she cried, and she coulC 
 neither stand nor sit, she flung herself down before the 
 fire and rocked this way and that, in a paroxysm of woe. 
 " Oh, cruel, cruel ! " 
 
 It was Tommy who was cruel. To be ill, near to 
 dying, apparently, and not to send her word 1 She could 
 never, never, have let him go had he not made that prom- 
 ise to Elspeth ; and he kept it thus. Oh, wicked, wicked I 
 
 "You would have gone to him at once, Elspeth ! 
 You ! Who are you that talks of going to him as your 
 right ? He is not yours, I tell you, he is mine ! He is 
 mine alone, it is I who would go to him. Who is this 
 woman that dares take my place by his side when he is 
 iU!" 
 
378 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 She rose to go to him, to drive away all others, I am 
 sure that was what gave her strength to rise, but she 
 sank to the floor again, and her passion lasted for hours. 
 And through the night she was crying to God that she 
 would be brave no more. In her despair she hoped he 
 heard her. 
 
 Her mood had not changed when David came to see 
 her next morning, to admit, too, that Tommy seemed to 
 have done an unselfish thing in concealing his illness 
 from them. Grizel nodded, but he thought she was 
 looking strangely reckless. He had a message from 
 Elspeth. Tommy had asked her to let him know 
 whether the plant was flourishing, 
 
 " So you and he don't correspond now ? " David said 
 with his old, puzzled look. 
 
 "No," was all her answer to that. The plant, she 
 thought, was dead ; she had not, indeed, paid much 
 attention to it of late, but she showed it to David, and 
 he said it would revive if more carefully tended. He 
 also told her its rather pathetic history, which was new 
 to Grrizel, and of the talk at the wedding which had led 
 to Tommy's taking pity on it. "Fellow-feeling, I sup- 
 pose," he said, lightly ; " you see they both blossomed 
 prematurely." 
 
 The words were forgotten by him as soon as spoken, 
 but G-rizel sat on with them, for they were like a friend 
 — or was it an enemy ? — who had come to tell her 
 strange things. Yes, the doctor was right, Kow she 
 
GKIZEL ALL ALONE 379 
 
 knew why Tommy had loved this plant. Of the way in 
 which he would sit looking wistfully at it, almost nursing 
 it, she had been told by Aaron ; he had himself begged 
 her to tend it lovingly. Fellow-feeling! The doctor 
 was shrewder than he thought. 
 
 Well, what did it matter to her ? All that day she 
 would do nothing for the plant, but in the middle of the 
 night she rose and ran to it and hugged it, and for a 
 time she was afraid to look at it by lamplight, lest 
 Tommy was dead. Whether she had never been asleep 
 that night, or had awakened from a dream, she never 
 knew, but she ran to the plant, thinking it and Tommy 
 were as one, and that they must die together. No such 
 thought had ever crossed his mind, but it seemed to her 
 that she had been told it by him, and she lit her fire to 
 give the plant warmth, and often desisted to press it to 
 her bosom, the heat seemed to come so reluctantly from 
 the fire. This idea that his fate was bound up with 
 that of the plant took strange possession of the once 
 practical Grizel, it was as if some of Tommy's nature 
 had passed into her to help her break the terrible 
 monotony of the days. 
 
 And from that time there was no ailing child more 
 passionately tended than the plant, and as spring ad- 
 vanced it began once more to put forth new leaves. 
 
 And G-rizel also seemed glorified again. She was her 
 old self. Dark shapes still lingered for her in the den, 
 but she avoided them, and if they tried to enter into her, 
 
380 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 she straggled with them and oast them out. As she saw 
 herself able to fight and win once more, her pride re- 
 turned to her, and one day she could ask David, joy- 
 ously, to give her a present of the old doctor's chair. 
 And she could kneel by its side and say to it, " Ton can 
 watch me always ; I am just as I used to be." 
 
 Seeing her once more the incarnation of vigor and 
 content, singing gayly to his child, and as eager to be at 
 her duties betimes as a morning in May, Corp grunted 
 with delight, and was a hero for not telling her that it 
 was he who had passed Tommy the word. For of course 
 Tommy had done it all. 
 
 " Somebody has found a w'y, Grizel ! " he would say, 
 chuckling, and she smiled an agreement. 
 
 " And yet," says he, puzzled, " I 've watched, and you 
 hinna hae'n a letter frae him. It defies the face o' clay 
 to find out how he has managed it. Oh, the crittur ! Ay, 
 I suppose you dinna want to tell me what it is that has 
 lichted you up again ? " 
 
 She could not tell him, for it was a compact she had 
 made with one who did not sign it. " I shall cease to 
 be bitter and despairing and wicked, and try every 
 moment of my life to be good and do good so long as my 
 plant flourishes, but if it withers, then I shall go to him, 
 I don't care what happens, I shall go to him." 
 
 It was the middle of June when she first noticed that 
 the plant was beginning to droop. 
 
CHAPTEE XXVII 
 
 GKIZEL S JOURNEY 
 
 Nothing could have been less expected. In the be- 
 ginning of May its leaves had lost something of their 
 greenness, the plant seemed to be hesitating, but she 
 coaxed it over the hill, and since then it had scarcely 
 needed her hand, almost light-headedly it hurried into 
 its summer clothes, and new buds broke out on it, like 
 smiles, at the fascinating thought that there was to be a 
 to-morrow. Grizel's plant had never been so brave in 
 its little life, when suddenly it turned back. 
 
 That was the day on which Elspeth and David were 
 leaving for a fortnight's holiday with his relatives by 
 the sea, for Elspeth needed and was getting special de- 
 votion just now, and Grizel knew why. She was glad 
 they were going, it was well that they should not be 
 there to ask questions if she also must set forth on a 
 journey. 
 
 For more than a week she waited, and everything she 
 could do for her plant she did. She watched it so care- 
 fully that she might have deceived herself into believing 
 that it was standing still only had there been no night- 
 time. She thought she had not perhaps been sufficiently 
 
382 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 good, and she tried to be more ostentatiously satisfied 
 with her lot ; never had she forced herself to work quite 
 so hard for others as in those few days, and then when 
 she came home it had drooped a little more. 
 
 When she was quite sure that it was dying, she told 
 Corp she was going to London hy that night's train. 
 "He is ill, Corp, and I must go to him." 
 
 Ill ! But how had he let her know ? 
 
 " He has found a way," she said, with a tremulous 
 smile. He wanted her to telegraph, but no, she would 
 place no faith in telegrams. 
 
 At least she could telegraph to Elspeth and the doctor. 
 One of them would go. 
 
 " It is I who am going," she said, quietly. " I can't 
 wait any longer. It was a promise, Corp. He loves 
 me." They were the only words she said which sug- 
 gest that there was anything strange about G-rizel at this 
 time. 
 
 Corp saw how determined she was when she revealed, 
 incidentally, that she had drawn a sum of money out of 
 the bank a week ago, " to be ready." 
 
 " What will folk say ! " he cried. 
 
 "You can tell Gavinia the truth when I am gone," she 
 told him ; " she will know better than you what to say 
 to other people," and that was some comfort to him, for 
 it put the burden of invention upon his wife. So it was 
 Corp who saw Grizel off. He was in great distress him- 
 self about Tommy, but he kept a courageous face for her, 
 
geizel's jotjenet 383 
 
 and his last words flung in at the carriage-window were, 
 "Now dinna be down-hearted; I'm nain down-hearted 
 mysel, for we 're very sure he '11 find a w'y." And 
 Grizel smiled and nodded, and the train turned the bend 
 that shuts out the little town of Thrums. The town 
 vanishes quickly, but the quarry we howked it out of 
 stands grim and red, watching the train for many a mile. 
 
 Of Grizel's journey to London there are no particulars 
 to tell. She was wearing her brown jacket and fur cap 
 because Tommy had liked them, and she sat straight 
 and stiff all the way. She had never been in a train 
 since she was a baby, except two or three times to 
 Tilliedrum, and she thought this was the right way to 
 sit. Always when the train stopped, which was at long 
 intervals, she put her head out at the window and asked 
 if this was the train to London. Every station a train 
 stops at in the middle of the night is the infernal 
 regions, and she shuddered to hear lost souls clanking 
 their chains, which is what a milk-can becomes on its 
 way to the van, but still she asked if this was the train 
 to London. When fellow-passengers addressed her, she 
 was very modest and cautious in her replies. Some- 
 times a look of extraordinary happiness, of radiance, 
 passed over her face, and may have puzzled them. It 
 was part of the thought that, however ill he might be, 
 she was to see him now. 
 
 She did not see him as soon as she expected, for at the 
 door of Tommy's lodgings they told her that he had 
 
384 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 departed suddenly for the Continent about a week ago. 
 He was to send an address by and by to which letters 
 could be forwarded. Was he quite well when he went 
 away ? Grizel asked, shaking. 
 
 The landlady and her daughter thought he was rather 
 peakish, but he had not complained. 
 
 He went away for his health, Grizel informed them, 
 and he was very ill now. Oh, could they not tell her 
 where he was ! All she knew was that he was very ill. 
 " I am engaged to be married to him," she said, with 
 dignity. Without this strange certainty that Tommy 
 loved her at last, she could not have trod the road which 
 faced her now. Even when she had left the house, 
 where at their suggestion she was to call to-morrow, she 
 found herself wondering at once what he would like her 
 to do now, and she went straight to a hotel and had her 
 box sent to it from the station, and she remained there 
 all day because she thought that this was what he would 
 like her to do. She sat bolt upright on a cane-chair in 
 her bedroom, praying to God with her eyes open; she 
 was begging Him to let Tommy tell her where he was, 
 and promising to return home at once if he did not need 
 her. 
 
 Next morning they shoy^ed her, at his lodgings, two 
 lines in a newspaper, which said that he was ill with 
 bronchitis at the H6tel Krone, Bad-Platten, in Switzer- 
 land. 
 
 It may have been an answer to her prayer, as she 
 
gkizel's journey 385 
 
 thought, but we know now how the paragraph got into 
 print. On the previous evening the landlady had met 
 Mr. Pym on the ladder of an omnibus and told him, be- 
 fore they could be plucked apart, of the lady who knew 
 that Mr. Sandys was ill. It must be bronchitis again. 
 Pym was much troubled ; he knew that the Krone at Bad- 
 Platten had been Tommy's destination. He talked that 
 day, and one of the company was a reporter ; which ac- 
 counts for the paragraph. 
 
 Grizel found out how she could get to Bad-Platten. 
 She left her box behind her at the cloak-room of the 
 railway station, where I suppose it was sold years after- 
 ward. From Dover she sent a telegram to Tommy, say- 
 ing, " I am coming : Grizel." 
 
 On entering the train at Calais she had a railway 
 journey of some thirty hours, broken by two changes 
 only. She could speak a little French, but all the use 
 she made of it was to ask repeatedly if she was in the 
 right train. An English lady, who travelled with her 
 for many hours, woke up now and again to notice that 
 this quiet prim-looking girl was always sitting erect with 
 her hand on her umbrella, as if ready to leave the train 
 at any moment. The lady pointed out some of the beau- 
 ties of the scenery to her and Grizel tried to listen. "I 
 am afraid you are unhappy," her companion said, at last. 
 
 " That is not why I am crying," Grizel said, " I think 
 
 I am crying because I am so hungry." 
 
 The stranger gave her sandwiches and claret, as cold 
 26 
 
386 TOMMY A2JD 6BIZBL 
 
 as the rivers that raced the train, and Grizel told her, 
 quite frankly, why she was going to Bad-Platten. She 
 did not tell his name, only that he was ill, and that she 
 was engaged to him and he had sent for her. She be- 
 lieved it all. The lady was very sympathetic, and gave 
 her information about the diligence by which the last 
 part of Grizel's journey must be made, and also said: 
 " You must not neglect your meals, if only for his sake, 
 for how can you nurse him back to health if you arrive 
 at Bad-Platten ill yourself ? Consider his distress if he 
 were to be told that you were in the inn, but not able to 
 go to him." 
 
 " Oh," Grizel cried, rocking her arms for the first time 
 since she knew her plant was drooping. She promised 
 to be very practical henceforth, so as to have strength to 
 take her place by his side at once. It was strange that 
 she who was so good a nurse had forgotten these things, 
 so strange that it alarmed her, as if she feared that, 
 without being able to check herself, she was turning into 
 some other person. 
 
 The station where she alighted was in a hubbub of 
 life ; everyone seemed to leave the train here and to 
 resent the presence of all the others. They were mostly 
 English. The men hung back, as if now that there was 
 business to be done in some foolish tongue they had 
 better leave the ladies to do it. Many of them seemed 
 prepared if there was dissension to disown their woman- 
 kind and run for it. They looked liaughty and nervous. 
 
grizel's joxjenbt 387 
 
 Such of them as had tried to shave in the train were 
 boasting of it and holding handkerchiefs to their chins. 
 The ladies were moving about in a masterful way, carry- 
 ing bunches of keys. When they had done everything, 
 the men went and stood by their sides again. 
 
 Outside the station 'buses and carriages were innumer- 
 able and everybody was shouting, but Grizel saw that 
 nearly all her fellow-passengers were hurrying by foot or 
 conveyance to one spot, all desirous of being there first, 
 and she thought it must be the place where the diligence 
 started from, and pressed on with them. It proved to 
 be a hotel where they all wanted the best bedroom, 
 and many of them had telegraphed for it, and they 
 gathered round a man in uniform and demanded that 
 room of him, but he treated them as if they were little 
 dogs and he was not the platter, and soon they were 
 begging for a room on the fourth floor at the back, and 
 swelling with triumph if they got it. The scrimmage 
 was still going on when Grizel slipped out of the hotel, 
 having learned that the diligence would not start until 
 the following morning. It was still early in the after- 
 noon. How could she wait until to-morrow ? 
 
 Bad-Platten was forty miles away. The road was 
 pointed out to her ; it began to climb at once. She was to 
 discover that for more than thirty miles it never ceased 
 to climb. She sat down, hesitating, on a little bridge 
 that spanned a horrible rushing white stream. Poets 
 have sung the glories of that stream, but it sent a shiver 
 
388 TOMMY AlTD GRIZEL 
 
 through her. On all sides she was caged in by a ring of 
 splendid mountains, but she did not give them one ad- 
 miring glance (there is a special spot where the guide- 
 books advise you to stop for a moment to do it) ; her one 
 passionate desire was to fling out her arms and knock 
 them over. 
 
 She had often walked twenty miles in a day, in a hill 
 country too, without feeling tired, and there seemed no 
 reason why she should not set off now. There were 
 many inns on the way, she was told, where she could 
 pass the night. There she could get the diligence next 
 day. This would not bring her any sooner to him than 
 if she waited here until to-morrow, but how could she 
 sit still till to-morrow ? She must be moving, she 
 seemed to have been sitting still for an eternity. "I 
 must not do anything rash," she told herself, carefully. 
 " I must arrive at Bad-Platten able to sit down beside 
 him the moment I have taken off my jacket — oh, with- 
 out waiting to take off my jacket." She went into the 
 hotel and ate some food, just to show herself how care- 
 ful she had become. About three o'clock she set off. She 
 had a fierce desire to get away from that heartless white 
 stream and the crack of whips and the doleful pine- 
 woods, and at first she walked very quickly, but she 
 never got away from them, for they marched with her. 
 It was not that day but the next that Grizel thought 
 anything was marching with her. That day her head 
 was quite clear, and she kept her promise to herself, 
 
geizel's journey 389 
 
 and as soon as she felt tired she stopped for the night 
 at a village inn. But when she awoke very early next 
 morning she seems to have forgotten that she was to 
 travel the rest of the way by diligence, for after a 
 slight meal she started off again on foot and she was 
 walking all day. 
 
 She passed through many villages so like each other 
 that in time she thought they might be the same. 
 There was always a monster inn whence one carriage 
 was departing as another drove up, and there was a 
 great stone water-tank in which women drew their wash- 
 ing back and forward, and there was always a big yellow 
 dog that barked fiercely and then giggled, and at the 
 doors of painted houses children stood. You knew they 
 were children by their size only. The one person she 
 spoke to that day was a child who offered her a bunch 
 of wild-flowers. No one was looking and Grizel kissed 
 her and then hurried on. 
 
 The carriage passed and repassed her. There must 
 have been a hundred of them, but in time they became 
 one. Ifo sooner had it disappeared in dust in front of 
 her than she heard the crack of its whip behind. 
 
 It was a glorious day of sweltering sun, but she was 
 bewildered now and did not open the umbrella with 
 which she had shielded her head yesterday. In the 
 foreground was always the same white road, on both 
 sides the same pine wood, laughing with wild-flowers, 
 the same roaring white stream. From somewhere near 
 
390 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 came the tinkle of cow-bells. Far away on heights, if 
 she looked up, were villages made of match-boxes. She 
 saw what were surely the same villages if she looked 
 down. Or the one was the reflection of the other, in 
 the sky above or in the valley below. They stood out 
 so vividly that they might have been within arm's reach. 
 They were so small that she felt she could extinguish 
 them with her umbrella. Near them was the detestably 
 picturesque castle perched upon a bracket, everywhere 
 was that loathly waterfall, here and there were squares 
 of cultivated land that looked like door-mats flung out 
 upon the hill-sides. The huge mountains raised their 
 jagged heads through the snow and were so sharp-edged 
 that they might have been clipped out of cardboard. 
 The sky was blue, without a flaw, but lost clouds crawled 
 like snakes between heaven and earth. All day the sun 
 scorched her, but the night was nipping cold. 
 
 From early morn till evening she climbed to get away 
 from them, but they all marched with her. They waited 
 while she slept. She woke up in an inn, and could have 
 cried with delight because she saw nothing but bare 
 walls. But as soon as she reached the door, there they 
 all were, ready for her. An hour after she set off she 
 again reached that door, and she stopped at it to ask if 
 this was the inn where she had passed the night. Every- 
 thing had turned with her. Two squalls of sudden rain 
 drenched her that day, and she forced her way through 
 the first but sought a covering from the second. 
 
geizel's jotteney 391 
 
 It was then afternoon, and she was passing through 
 a village by a lake. Since Grizel's time monster hotels 
 have trampled the village to death, and the shuddering 
 lake reflects all day the most hideous of caravansaries 
 flung together as with a giant shovel in one of the 
 loveliest spots on earth. Even then some of the hotels 
 had found it out. Grizel drew near to two of them, and 
 saw wet halls full of open umbrellas which covered the 
 floor and looked like great beetles. These buildings 
 were too formidable and she dragged herself past them. 
 She came to a garden of hops and evergreens, wet chairs 
 were standing in the deserted walks, and here and there 
 was a little arbor. She went into one of these arbors 
 and sat down, and soon slid to the floor. 
 
 The place was St. Gian, some miles from Bad-Platten, 
 but one of the umbrellas she had seen was Tommy's. 
 Others belonged to Mrs. Jerry and Lady Pippinworth. 
 
CHAPTER XXVin 
 
 TWO OF XHEM 
 
 When Tommy started impulsively on what proved to 
 be his only continental trip he had expected to join Mrs. 
 Jerry and her step-daughter at Bad-Platten. They had 
 been there for a fortnight and " The place is a dream," 
 Mrs. Jerry had said in the letter pressing him to come, 
 but it was at St. Gian that she met the diligence and 
 told him to descend. Bad-Platten, she explained, was 
 a horror. 
 
 Her fuller explanation was that she was becoming 
 known there as the round lady. 
 
 " Now am I as round as all that ? " she S£dd, plaintively, 
 to Tommy. 
 
 "Mrs. Jerry," he replied, with emotion, "you must 
 not ask me what I think of you." He always treated 
 her with extraordinary respect and chivalry now, and it 
 awed her. 
 
 She had looked too, too round because she was in the 
 company of Lady Pippinworth. Everyone seemed to be 
 too round or too large by the side of that gifted lady, 
 who somehow never looked too thin. She knew her 
 power. When there were women in the room whom she 
 
TWO OF THEM 393 
 
 disliked she merely went and stood beside them. In 
 the gyrations of the dance the onlooker would momen- 
 tarily lose sight of her ; she came and went like a blink- 
 ing candle. Men could not dance with her without its 
 being said that they were getting stout. There is 
 nothing they dislike so much, yet they did dance with 
 her. Tommy, having some slight reason, was particu- 
 larly sensitive about references to his figure, yet it was 
 Lady Pippinworth who had drawn him to Switzerland. 
 What was her strange attraction ? 
 
 Calmly considered she was preposterously thin, but 
 men at least could not think merely of her thinness 
 unless, when walking with her, they became fascinated 
 by its shadow on the ground. She was tall, and had a 
 very clear pale complexion and light brown hair. Light 
 brown, too, were her heavy eyelashes, which were famous 
 for being black-tipped, as if a brush had touched them, 
 though it had not. She made play with her eyelashes 
 as with a fan, and sometimes the upper and lower 
 seemed to entangle for a moment and be in diflSculties, 
 from which you wanted to extricate them in the tender- 
 est manner. And the more you wanted to help her the 
 more disdainfully she looked at you. Yet though she 
 looked disdainful she also looked helpless. Now we 
 have the secret of her charm. 
 
 This helpless disdain was the natural expression of 
 her face, and I am sure she fell asleep with a curl of 
 the lip. Her scorn of men so maddened them that they 
 
394 TOMMI AND GEIZEL 
 
 could not keep away from her. " Damn ! " they gaid 
 under their breath, and rushed to her. If rumor ia to 
 be believed, Sir Harry Pippinworth proposed to her in 
 a fury brought on by the sneer with which she had sur- 
 veyed his family portraits. I know nothing more of Sir 
 Harry except that she called him Pips, which seems to 
 settle him. 
 
 "They will be calling me the round gentleman," 
 Tommy said, ruefully, to her that evening as he strolled 
 with her toward the lake, and indeed he was looking 
 stout. Mrs. Jerry did not accompany them, she wanted 
 to be seen with her trying step-daughter as little as pos- 
 sible, and Tommy's had been the happy proposal that 
 he should attend them alternately, " fling away my own 
 figure to save yours," he had said, gallantly to Mrs, 
 Jerry, 
 
 "Do you mind?" Lady Pippin worth asked. 
 
 " I mind nothing," he replied, " so long as I am with 
 you." 
 
 He had not meant to begin so near the point where 
 they had last left off, he had meant to begin mnch 
 farther back, but an irresistible desire came over him 
 to make sure that she really did permit him to say 
 this sort of thing. 
 
 Her only reply was a flutter of the little fans, and a 
 most contemptuous glance. 
 
 " Alice," said Tommy, in the old way. 
 
 "Well?" 
 
TWO OP THEM 395 
 
 " You don't understand what it is to me to say Alice 
 again." 
 
 " Many people call me Alice." 
 
 " But they have a right to." 
 
 " I supposed you thought you had a right to also ? " 
 
 "No," said Tommy. " That is why I do it." 
 
 She strolled on more scornful and helpless than ever. 
 Apparently it did not matter what one said to Lady 
 Pippinworth, her pout kept it within the proprieties. 
 
 There was a magnificent sunset that evening, which 
 dyed a snow-topped mountain pink. "That is what I 
 came all the way from London to see," Tommy re- 
 marked, after they had gazed at it. 
 
 " I hope you feel repaid," she said, a little tartly. 
 
 "You mistake my meaning," he replied. "I had 
 heard of these wonderful sunsets, and an intense desire 
 came over me to see you looking disdainfully at them. 
 Yes, I feel amply repaid. Did you notice, Alice, or was 
 it but a fancy of my own, that when he had seen the ex- 
 pression on your face the sun quite slunk away? " 
 
 " I wonder you don't do so also," she retorted. She 
 had no sense of humor and was rather stupid, so it is 
 no wonder that the men ran after her. 
 
 " I am more gallant than the sun," said he. " If I had 
 been up there in its place, Alice, and you had been look- 
 ing at me, I could never have set." 
 
 She pouted contemptuously, which meant, I think, 
 that she was well pleased. Yet though he seemed to 
 
396 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 be complimenting her, she was not sure of him, she had 
 never been sure of Tommy, nor, indeed, he of her, which 
 was probably why they were so interested in each other 
 still. 
 
 " Do you know," Tommy said, " what I have told you 
 is really at least half the truth ? If I did not come here 
 to see you disdaining the sun I think I .did come to see 
 you disdaining me. Odd, is it not, if true, that a man 
 should travel so far to see a lip curl up ? " 
 
 "You don't seem to know what brought you," she 
 said. 
 
 " It seems so monstrous," he replied, musing. " Oh, 
 yes, I am quite certain that the curl of the lip is respon- 
 sible for my being here, it kept sending me constant 
 telegrams ; but what I want to know is, do I come for 
 the pleasure of the thing or for the pain ? Do I like 
 your disdain, Alice, or does it make me writhe ? Am I 
 here to beg you to do it again or to defy it ? " 
 
 " Which are you doing now ? " she inquired. 
 
 "I had hoped," he said, with a sigh, "that you could 
 tell me that." 
 
 On another occasion they reached the same point in 
 this discussion and went a little beyond it. It was on a 
 wet afternoon, too, when Tommy had vowed to himself 
 to mend his ways. " That disdainful look is you," he 
 told her, " and I admire it more than anything in nature, 
 and yet, Alice, and yet " 
 
 " Well ? " she answered, coldly, but not moving, though 
 
TWO OF THEM 397 
 
 he had come suddenly too near her. They were on a 
 private veranda of the hotel, and she was lolling in a 
 wicker chair. 
 
 " And yet," he said, intensely, " I am not certain that 
 I would not give the world to have the power to drive 
 that look from your face. That, I begin to think, is 
 what brought me here." 
 
 " But you are not sure," she said, with a shrug of the 
 shoulder. 
 
 It stung him into venturing farther than he had ever 
 gone with her before. Not too gently he took her head in 
 both his hands and forced her to look up at him. She sub- 
 mitted without a protest. She was disdainful but helpless. 
 
 " Well ? " she said again. 
 
 He withdrew his hands, and she smiled, mockingly. 
 
 " If I thought " he cried with sudden passion, and 
 
 stopped. 
 
 " You think a great deal, don't you ? " she said. She 
 was going now. 
 
 " If I thought there was any blood in your veins, you 
 icy woman " 
 
 " Or in your own," said she. But she said it a little 
 fiercely, and he noticed that. 
 
 " Alice," he cried, " I know now. It is to drive that 
 look from your face that I am here." 
 
 She courtesied from the door. She was quite herself 
 again. 
 
 But for that moment she had been moved. He was 
 
398 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 convinced of it, and his first feeling was of exultation as 
 in an achievement. I don't know what you are doing 
 just now, Lady Pippinworth, but my compliments to you, 
 and T. Sandys is swelling. 
 
 There followed on this exultation another feeling as 
 sincere, devout thankfulness that he had gone no farther. 
 He drew deep breaths of relief over his escape, but knew 
 that he had not himself to thank. His friends, the little 
 sprites, had done it, in return for the amusement he 
 seemed to give them. They had stayed him in the nick 
 . of time, but not earlier ; it was quite as if they wanted 
 Tommy to have his fun first. So often they had saved 
 him from being spitted, how could he guess that the 
 great catastrophe was fixed for to-night, and that hence- 
 forth they were to sit round him counting his wriggles, 
 as if this new treatment of him tickled them even more 
 than the other ? 
 
 But he was too clever not to know that they might be 
 fattening him for some very special feast, and his thanks 
 took the form of a vow to need their help no more. To- 
 morrow he would begin to climb the mountains around 
 St. Gian; if he danced attendance on her dangerous 
 ladyship again, Mrs. Jerry should be there also, and he 
 would walk circumspectly between them like a man with 
 gyves upon his wrists. He was in the midst of all the 
 details of these reforms when suddenly he looked at him- 
 self thus occupied and laughed bitterly, he had so often 
 come upon Tommy making grand resolves. 
 
TWO OP THEM 399 
 
 He stopped operations and sat down beside them. No 
 one could have wished more heartily to be anybody else, 
 or have had less hope. He had not even the excuse of 
 being passionately drawn to this woman : he remembered 
 that she had never interested him until he heard of her 
 effect upon other men. Her reputation as a duellist, 
 whose defence none of his sex could pass, had led to his 
 wondering what they saw in her, and he had dressed 
 himself in their sentiments and so approached her. 
 There were times in her company when he forgot that 
 he was wearing borrowed garments, when he went on 
 flame, but he always knew, as now, upon reflection. 
 Nothing seemed easier at this moment than to fling 
 them aside ; with one jerk they were on the floor. Ob- 
 viously it was only vanity that had inspired him, and 
 vanity was satisfied: the easier, therefore, to stop. 
 Would you like to make the woman unhappy. Tommy ? 
 You know you would not ; you have somewhere about 
 you one of the softest hearts in the world. Then desist, 
 be satisfied that you did thaw her once and grateful that 
 she so quickly froze again. "I am, indeed I am," he 
 responds; "no one could have himself better in hand 
 for the time being than I, and if a competition in morals 
 were now going on, I should certainly take the medal, 
 but I cannot speak for myself an hour in advance ; I 
 make a vow, as I have done so often before, but it does 
 not help me to know what I may be at before the night 
 is out." 
 
400 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 When his disgust with himself was at its height he 
 suddenly felt like a little god. His new book had come 
 into view. He flicked a finger at his reflection in a mir- 
 ror. " That for you," he said, defiantly, "at least I can 
 write, I can write at last ! " 
 
 The manuscript lay almost finished at the bottom of 
 his trunk. It could not easily have been stolen for one 
 hour without his knowing. Just when he was about to 
 start on a walk with one of the ladies, he would run up- 
 stairs to make sure that it was still there ; he made sure 
 by feeling, and would turn again at the door to make 
 sure by looking. Miser never listened to the crispness 
 of bank-notes with more avidity, woman never spent 
 more time in shutting and opening her jewel-box. 
 
 " I can write at last ! " He knew that, comparatively 
 speaking, he had never been able to write before. He 
 remembered the fuss that had been made about his 
 former books. "Pooh!" he said, addressing them 
 contemptuously. 
 
 Once more he drew his beloved manuscript from its 
 hiding-place. He did not mean to read, only to fondle, 
 but his eye chancing to fall on a special passage — two 
 hours afterwards he was interrupted by the dinner-gong. 
 He returned the pages to the box and wiped his eyes. 
 While dressing hurriedly he remembered with languid 
 interest that Lady Pippinworth was staying in the same 
 hotel. 
 
 There were a hundred or more at dinner, and they 
 
TWO Of THEM 401 
 
 were all saying the same thing : " Where have you been 
 to-day ? — Eeally ! but the lower path is shadier. — Is 
 this your first visit ? — The glacier is very nice. — Were 
 you caught in the rain ? — The view from the top is very 
 nice. — After all, the rain lays the dust. — They give 
 you two sweets at Bad-Platten and an ice on Sunday. — 
 The sunset is very nice. — The poulet is very nice." 
 The hotel is open during the summer months only, but 
 probably the chairs in the dining-room and the knives 
 and forks in their basket make these remarks to each 
 other every evening throughout the winter. 
 
 Being a new-comer Tommy had not been placed beside 
 either of his friends, who sat apart, "because," Mrs. 
 Jerry said, " she calls me mamma, and I am not going to 
 stand that." For some time he gave thought to neither 
 of them ; he was engrossed in what he had been reading, 
 and it turned him into a fine and magnanimous charac- 
 ter. When gradually her ladyship began to flit among 
 his reflections it was not to disturb them, biit because 
 she harmonized. He wanted to apologize to her. The 
 apology grew in grace as the dinner progressed ; it was 
 80 charmingly composed that he was profoundly stirred 
 by it. 
 
 The opportunity came presently in the hall, where it 
 is customary after dinner to lounge or stroll if you are 
 afraid of the night-air. Or if you do not care for music, 
 you can go into the drawing-room and listen to the 
 piano. 
 
 26 
 
402 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 " I am sure mamma is looking for you everywhere," 
 Lady Pippinworth said, when Tommy took a chair 
 beside her. " It is her evening, you know." 
 
 " Surely you would not drive me away," he replied, 
 with a languishing air, and then smiled at himself, for 
 he was done with this sort of thing. "Lady Pippin- 
 worth," said he, firmly — it needs firmness when of late 
 you have been saying " Alice." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " I have been thinking " Tommy began. 
 
 " I am sure you have," she said. 
 
 " I have been thinking " he went on, deter- 
 minedly, " that I played a poor part this afternoon. I 
 had no right to say what I said to you." 
 
 " As far as I can remember," she answered, " you did 
 not say very much." 
 
 " It is like your generosity, Lady Pippinworth," he 
 said, " to make light of it, but let us be frank. I made 
 love to you." 
 
 Anyone looking at his expressionless face and her 
 lazy disdain (and there were many in the hall) would 
 have guessed that their talk was of where were you 
 to-day, and what should I do to-morrow. 
 
 " You don't really mean that ? " her ladyship said, in- 
 credulously. "Think, Mr. Sandys, before you tell me 
 anything more. Are you sure you are not confusing me 
 with mamma ? " 
 
 " I did it," said Tommy, remorsefully. 
 
TWO OF THEM 403 
 
 " In my absence ? " she asked. 
 
 " When you were with me on the veranda." 
 
 Her eyes opened to their widest, so surprised that the 
 lashes had no time for their usual play. 
 
 " Was that what you call making love, Mr. Sandys ? " 
 she inquired. 
 
 " I call a spade a spade." 
 
 " And now you are apologizing to me, I understand ? " 
 
 " If you can in the goodness of your heart forgive 
 me, Lady Pippinworth " 
 
 " Oh, I do," she said, heartily, " I do. But how stupid 
 you must have thought me, not even to know ! I feel 
 that it is I who ought to apologize. What a number of 
 ways there seem to be of making love, and yours is 
 such an odd way." 
 
 Now to apologize for playing a poor part is one 
 thing, and to put up with the charge of playing a 
 part poorly is quite another. Nevertheless he kept his 
 temper. 
 
 '•' You have discovered an excellent way of punishing 
 me," he said, manfully, " and I submit. Indeed, I ad- 
 mire you the more. So I am paying you a compliment 
 when I whisper that I know you knew." 
 
 But she would not have it. " You are so strangely 
 dense to-night," she said. " Surely, if I had known, I 
 would have stopped you. You forget that I am a mar- 
 ried woman," she added, remembering Pips rather late 
 in the day. 
 
4:04 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 " There might be other reasons why you did not stop 
 me," he replied, impulsively. 
 
 "Such as?" 
 
 "Well, you — you might have wanted me to go on." 
 
 He blurted it out. 
 
 "So/' said she, slowly, "you are apologizing to me 
 for ' not going on ' ? " 
 
 " I implore you, Lady Pippinworth," Tommy said, in 
 much distress, " not to think me capable of that. If I 
 moved you for a moment, I am far from boasting of it j 
 it makes me only the more anxious to do what is best 
 for you." 
 
 This was not the way it had shaped during dinner, 
 and Tommy would have acted wisely had he now gone 
 out to cool his head. " If you moved me ? " she re- 
 peated, interrogatively ; but with the best intentions he 
 continued to flounder. 
 
 " Believe me," he implored her, " had I known it could 
 be done, I should have checked myself. But they al- 
 ways insist that you are an iceberg, and am I so much 
 to blame if that look of hauteur deceived me with the 
 rest? Oh, dear Lady Disdain," he said, warmly, in 
 answer to one of her most freezing glances, " it de- 
 ceives me no longer. From that moment I knew you 
 had a heart, and I was shamed. As noble a heart as 
 ever beat in woman," he added. He always tended 
 to add generous bits when he found it coming out 
 well. 
 
TWO OP THEM 405 
 
 " Does the man think I am in love with him ! " was 
 Lady Disdain's inadequate reply. 
 
 " No, no, indeed," he assured her, earnestly, " I am 
 not so vain as to think that, nor so selfish as to wish it. 
 But if for a moment you were moved " 
 
 " But I was not," said she, stamping her shoe. 
 
 His dander began to rise, as they say in the north, 
 but he kept grip of politeness. 
 
 "If you were moved for a moment, Lady Pippin- 
 worth," he went on, in a slightly more determined 
 voice, "I am far from saying that it was so, but 
 if " 
 
 " But as I was not," she said. 
 
 It was no use putting things prettily to her when she 
 snapped you up in this way. 
 
 " You know you were," he said, reproachfully. 
 
 " I assure you," said she, " I don't know what you are 
 talking about, but apparently it is something dreadful, 
 so perhaps one of us ought to go away." 
 
 As he did not take this hint, she opened a tattered 
 Tauchnitz which was lying at her elbow. They are 
 always lying at your elbow in a Swiss hotel, with the 
 first pages missing. 
 
 Tommy watched her gloomily. " This is unworthy of 
 you," he said. 
 
 "What is?" 
 
 He was not quite sure, but as he sat there, misgivings 
 entered his mind and began to gnaw. Was it all a mis- 
 
406 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 take of his ? Undeniably he did think too much. After 
 all, had she not been moved ? S'death ! 
 
 His restlessness made her look up. " It must be a 
 great load off your mind," she said, with gentle laugh- 
 ter, " to know that your apology was unnecessary." 
 
 " It is," Tommy said, " it is." (S'death !) 
 
 She resumed her book. 
 
 So this was how one was rewarded for a generous 
 impulse ! He felt very bitter. " So, so," he said, 
 inwardly; also, "Very well, ve-ry well." Then he 
 turned upon himself : " Serve you right," he said, 
 brutally, "better stick to your books, Thomas, for you 
 know nothing about women." To think for one moment 
 that he had moved her ! That streak of marble moved ! 
 He fell to watching her again, as if she were some 
 troublesome sentence that needed licking into shape. 
 As she bent impertinently over her book she was an 
 insult to man. All Tommy's interest in her revived. 
 She infuriated him. 
 
 " Alice," he whispered. 
 
 " Do keep quiet till I finish this chapter," she begged, 
 lazily. 
 
 It brought him at once to the boiling point. 
 
 " Alice ! " he said, fervently. 
 
 She had noticed the change in his voice. "People are 
 looking," she said, without moving a muscle. 
 
 There was some subtle flattery to him in the warning, 
 but he could not ask for more, for just then Mrs. Jerry 
 
TWO OF THEM 407 
 
 came in. She was cloaked for the garden, and he had 
 to go with her, sulkily. At the door she observed that 
 the ground was still wet. 
 
 " Are you wearing your goloshes ? " said he, brighten- 
 ing. " You must get them, Mrs. Jerry, I insist." 
 
 She hesitated. (Her room was on the third floor.) 
 " It is very good of you to be so thoughtful of me," she 
 said, "but " 
 
 "But I have no right to try to take care of you," he 
 interposed, in a melancholy voice, " it is true. Let us 
 go." 
 
 "I sha'n't be two minutes," said Mrs. Jerry, in a 
 flutter, and went off hastily for her goloshes, while he 
 looked fondly after her. At the turn of the stair she 
 glanced back and his eyes were still begging her to 
 hurry. It was a gracious memory to her in the after 
 years, for she never saw him again. 
 
 As soon as she was gone he returned to the hall, and 
 taking from a peg a cloak with a Mother Goose hood 
 brought it to Lady Pippinworth, who had watched her 
 mamma trip upstairs. 
 
 " Did I say I was going out ? " she asked. 
 
 "Tes," said Tommy, and she rose to let him put the 
 elegant thing round her. She was one of those danger- 
 ous women who look their best when you are helping 
 them to put on their cloaks. 
 
 "Now," he instructed her, "pull the hood over your 
 head." 
 
408 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 " Is it SO cold as that ? " she said, obeying. 
 
 " I want you to wear it," he answered. What he 
 meant was that she never looked quite so impudent as 
 in her hood, and his vanity insisted that she should be 
 armed to the teeth before they resumed hostilities. 
 The red light was in his eyes as he drew her into the 
 garden where Grizel lay. 
 
CHAPTER XXIX 
 
 THE KED LIGHT 
 
 It was an evening without stars, but fair, sufficient 
 wind to make her ladyship cling haughtily to his arm as 
 they turned corners. Many of the visitors were in the 
 garden, some grouped round a quartet of gayly attired 
 minstrels, but more sitting in little arbors or prowling 
 in search of an arbor to sit in ; the night was so dark 
 that when our two passed beyond the light of the hotel 
 windows they could scarce see the shrubs they brushed 
 against ; cigars without faces behind them sauntered 
 past; several times they thought they had found an 
 unoccupied arbor at last, when they heard the clink of 
 coffee-cups. 
 
 " I believe the castle dates from the fifteenth century," 
 Tommy would then say, suddenly, though it was not of 
 castles he had been talking. 
 
 With a certain' satisfaction he noticed that she per- 
 mitted him, without comment, to bring in the castle thus 
 and to drop it the moment the emergency had passed. 
 But he had little other encouragement. Even when she 
 pressed his arm it was only as an intimation that the 
 castle was needed. 
 
410 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 "I can't even make her angry," lie said, wrathfully, 
 to himself. 
 
 " You answer not a word," he said, in great dejection, 
 to her. 
 
 " I am afraid to speak," she admitted. " I don't 
 know who may hear." 
 
 "Alice," he said, eagerly, " what would you say if you 
 were not afraid to speak ? " 
 
 They had stopped, and he thought she trembled a 
 little on his arm, but he could not be sure. He thought 
 — but he was thinking too much again, at least Lady 
 Pippin worth seemed to come to that conclusion, for with 
 a galling little laugh she moved on. He saw, with 
 amazing clearness, that he had thought sufficiently for 
 one day. 
 
 On coming into the garden with her, and for some 
 time afterward, he had been studying her so coolly, 
 watching symptoms rather than words, that there is 
 nothing to compare the man to but a doctor, who while 
 he is chatting has his finger on your pulse. But he was 
 not so calm now. Whether or not he had stirred the 
 woman, he was rapidly firing himself. 
 
 When next he saw her face by the light of a window, 
 she at the same instant turned her eyes on him, it was as 
 if each wanted to know correctly how the other had been 
 looking in the darkness, and the effect was a challenge. 
 
 Like one retreating a step, she lowered her eyes. 
 " I am tired," she said. " I shall go in," 
 
THE BED LIGHT 411 
 
 " Let US stroll round once more." 
 
 "No, I am going in." 
 
 " If you are afraid " he said, with a slight smile. 
 
 She took his arm again. " Though it is too bad of me 
 to keep you out," she said, as they went on, "for you 
 are shivering. Is it the night-air that makes you shiver ? " 
 she asked, mockingly. 
 
 But she shivered a little herself, as if with a presen- 
 timent that she might be less defiant if he were less 
 thoughtful. For a month or more she had burned 
 to teach him a lesson, but there was a time before that, 
 when, had she been sure he was in earnest, she would 
 have preferred to be the pupU. 
 
 Two ladies came out of an arbor where they had been 
 drinking coffee, and sauntered toward the hotel. It was 
 a tiny building, half concealed in hops and reached by 
 three steps, and Tommy and his companion took posses- 
 sion. He groped in the darkness for a chair for her, 
 and invited her tenderly to sit down. She said she 
 preferred to stand. She was by the open window, her 
 fingers drumming on the sill. Though he could not see 
 her face, he knew exactly how she was looking. 
 
 " Sit down," he said, rather masterfully. 
 
 " I prefer to stand," she repeated, languidly. 
 
 He had a passionate desire to take her by the shoul- 
 ders, but put his hand on hers instead, and she permitted 
 it, like one disdainful but helpless. She said something 
 unimportant about the stillness. 
 
412 TOMMY AND 6EIZBL 
 
 " Is it so still ? " lie said, in a low voice. " I seem 
 to hear a great noise. I think it must be the beating 
 of my heart." 
 
 " I fancy that is what it is," she drawled. 
 
 " Do you hear it ? " 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Did you ever hear your own heart beat, Alice ? " 
 
 "No." 
 
 He had both her hands now. " Would you like to 
 hear it ? " 
 
 She pulled away her hands sharply. "Yes," she 
 replied, with defiance. 
 
 " But you pulled away your hands first," said he. 
 
 He heard her breathe heavily for a moment, but she 
 said nothing. "Tes," he said, as if she had spoken, 
 "it is true." 
 
 "What is true?" 
 
 "What you are saying to yourself just now — that you 
 hate me." 
 
 She beat the floor with her foot. 
 
 " How you hate me, Alice ! " 
 
 "Oh, no." 
 
 "Tes, indeed you do." 
 
 "I wonder why," she said, and she trembled a little. 
 
 "I know why." He had come close to her again. 
 "Shall I tell you why?" 
 
 She said " No," hurriedly. 
 
 " I am so glad you say No." He spoke passionately 
 
THE BED LIGHT 413 
 
 and yet there was banter in his voice, or so it seemed to 
 her. " It is because you fear to be told, it is because 
 you had hoped that' I did not know." 
 
 " Tell me why I hate you ! " she cried. 
 
 " Tell me first that you do." 
 
 " Oh, I do, I do indeed ! " She said the words in a 
 white heat of hatred. 
 
 Before she could prevent him he had raised her hand 
 to his lips. 
 
 " Dear Alice ! " he said. 
 
 " Why is it ? " she demanded. 
 
 " Listen ! " he said. " Listen to your heart, Alice ; it 
 is beating now. It is telling you why. Does it need an 
 interpreter ? It is saying you hate me because you think 
 I don't love you." 
 
 " Don't you ? " she asked, fiercely. 
 
 " No," Tommy said. 
 
 Her hands were tearing each other, and she could not 
 trust herself to speak. She sat down deadly pale in the 
 chair he had offered her. 
 
 "No man ever loved you," he said, leaning over her, 
 with his hand on the back of the chair, " You are smil- 
 ing at that, I know, but it is true. Lady Disdain. They 
 may have vowed to blow their brains out, and seldom did 
 it i they may have let you walk over them and they may 
 have become your fetch-and-carry, for you were always 
 able to drive them crazy : but love does not bring men 
 so low. They tried hard to love you, and it was not that 
 
414 TOMMY AST) GKIZEL 
 
 they could not love, it was that you were unlovable. 
 That is a terrible thing to a woman. You think you let 
 them try to love you, that you might make them your 
 slaves when they succeeded, but you made them your 
 slaves because they failed. It is a power given to youi 
 cold and selfish nature in place of the capacity for being 
 able to be loved, with which women, not a hundredth 
 part as beautiful as you, are dowered, and yon have a 
 raging desire, Alice, to exercise it over me as over the 
 others, but you can't." 
 
 Had he seen her face then it might have warned him 
 to take care, but he heard her words only, and they were 
 not at all in keeping with her face. 
 
 "I see I can't," was what she cried, almost in a 
 whisper. 
 
 "It is aU true, Alice, is it not?" 
 
 "I suppose so, I don't know, I don't care." She 
 swui^ round in her chair and caught his sleeve. Her 
 hands clung to it. " Say you love me now," she said. 
 "I cannot live without your love after this. What shall 
 I do to make you love me ? Tell me, and I will do it." 
 
 He could not stop himself, for he mistrusted her stUL 
 
 " I will not be your slave," he said, through his teeth ; 
 " you shall be mine." 
 
 " Yes, yes." 
 
 "You shall submit to me in everything. If I say 
 ' come,' you shall come to wheresoever it may be, and if I 
 say ' stay ' and leave you forever you shall stay." 
 
THE EED LIGHT 415 
 
 " Very well," she said, eagerly. She would have her 
 revenge when he was her slave. 
 
 "You can continue to be the haughty Lady Disdain 
 to others, but you shall be only obedient little Alice to 
 me." 
 
 "Very well." She drew his arm toward her and 
 pressed her lips upon it. " And for that you will love 
 me a little, won't you ? you will love me at last, won't 
 you ? " she entreated. 
 
 He was a masterful man up to a certain point only. 
 Her humility now tapped him in a new place, and before 
 he knew what he was about he began to run pity. 
 
 " To humiliate you so, Alice ! I am a dastard, I am 
 not such a dastard as you think me. I wanted to know 
 that you would be willing to do all these things, but I 
 would never have let you do them." 
 
 " I am willing to do them." 
 
 "No, no." It was he who had her hands now. " It 
 was brutal, but I did it for you, Alice, for you. Don't 
 you see I was doing it only to make a woman of you ? 
 Tou were always adorable, but in a coat of mail that 
 would let love neither in nor out. I have been hammer- 
 ing at it to break it only and free my glorious Alice. 
 We had to fight and one of us had to give in, you would 
 have flung me away if I had yielded — I had to win to 
 save you." 
 
 " Now I am lost indeed," he was saying to himself 
 even as it came rushing out of him, and what appalled 
 
416 TOMJCY ASD eeiZEL 
 
 idm most -vas tbai iroise had pnnbaUy still to ccme. 
 He VZ& aaibnde two hotaeg, and both veze at the g;allop. 
 He flung ont his anu^ as if seejdng for somethii^ ta 
 cLfi^k him. 
 
 As Ke did so she had sorted to her feet, hsteBong. 
 It seemed to her that ti-ere was somecoie near ibem. 
 
 He flung out his amjs for help, and they Ml ttpca 
 Lady P^pinworth and 7er;t lomid her. He drev ha 
 to Liiru sLe <%:Llj>i hear no breadring nov but his. 
 
 "ABee, I lore 700, fw joa are lore itself ; :t is 70c I 
 hare Ij^^n ehasing sinee 6tst Yore rose like a Iwd at 1*7 
 foet; I nerer had a. foasaog faoej for aaj other Tomaa; 
 I alv^s kner that somewhrare in the world thos must 
 be 70:1 and some tiiae tLis starieas ni^it and 70a for 
 me, Yoa were faid&nbdnnd ^all- of iee; nomas had 
 passed tLen ; I brolu them doTn and lore lea^ to lofi% 
 and joti lie here, m7 beantifol, k>re in tLe arms of its 
 lorcr." 
 
 H£ -Wis in a frenzf of passion now, he meant eretj 
 word of it. and her rnieaSaau tss :c torn apon Lirs pte»- 
 »dl7 and mock him, this —S;:^ ^iti: wht^ the had beea 
 ^yii^. Oh, the i'^ri^ Haa^ abe had to say ! Bat 
 she eoold ::'.* sa7 tlt::i jet. She s-'rlA g^ve her fool 
 another moment. So she though but jLe -ra^ gi-!di:f it 
 to besB£&, and 2^ ii^e delayed •!£ was in danger of ii^tr 
 fng in his arms. 
 
 - WLa: does tie wodd Ivii like to 70B, my darling? 
 Yott are in it for tLe first trne. Ycm -s^ere bom bet a 
 
' I WOKE UP," SHE SAID 
 
THE BED LIGHT 417 
 
 moment ago. It is dark, that you may not be blinded 
 before you bave used your eyes. These are your eyes, 
 dear eyes that do not yet know their purpose ; they are 
 for looking at me, little Alice, and mine are for looking 
 into yours. I cannot see you, I have never seen the face 
 of my love — oh, my love, come into the light that I may 
 see your face." 
 
 They did not move. Her head had fallen on his 
 shoulder. She was to give it but a moment, and 
 
 then But the moment had passed and still her 
 
 hair pressed his cheek. Her eyes were closed. He 
 seemed to have found the way to woo her. Neither 
 of them spoke. Suddenly they jumped apart. Lady 
 Pippinworth stole to the door. They held their breath 
 and listened. 
 
 It was not so loud now, but it was distinctly heard. 
 It had been heavy breathing, and now she was trying to 
 check it and half succeeding, but at the cost of little 
 cries. They both knew it was a woman and that she 
 was in the arbor, on the other side of the little table. 
 She must have been there when they came in. 
 
 "Who is that?" 
 
 There was no answer to him save the checked breath- 
 ing and another broken cry. She moved, and it helped 
 him to see vaguely the outlines of a girl who seemed to 
 be drawing back from him in terror. He thought she 
 was crouching now in the farthest corner. 
 
 " Come away," he said. But Lady Pippinworth would 
 27 
 
418 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 not let him go. They must know who this woman was. 
 He remembered that a match-stand usually lay on the 
 tables of those arbors and groped until he found one. 
 
 " Who are you ? " 
 
 He struck a match. They were those Erench matches 
 that play an infernal interlude before beginning to burn. 
 While he waited he knew that she was begging him with 
 her hands and with cries that were too little to be words 
 not to turn its light on her. But he did. 
 
 Then she ceased to cower. The girlish dignity that 
 had been hers so long came running back to her. As 
 she faced him there was even a crooked smUe upon 
 her face. 
 
 " I woke up," she said, as if the words had no mean- 
 ing to herself, but might have some to him. 
 
 The match burned out before he spoke, but his face 
 was terrible. " Grizel ! " he said, appalled ; and then as 
 if the discovery was as awful to her as to him she ut- 
 tered a cry of horror and sped out into the night. He 
 called her name again and sprang after her, but the hand 
 of another woman detained him. 
 
 " Who is this girl ? " Lady Pippinworth demanded, 
 fiercely, but he did not answer; he recoiled from her 
 with a shudder that she was not likely to forget, and 
 hurried on. All that night he searched for Grizel in 
 rain. 
 
CHAPTER XXX 
 
 THE LITTLE GODS DESEKT HIM 
 
 AsD all next day he searched like a man whose eyes 
 would never close again. She had not passed the night 
 in any inn or village house of St. Gian ; of that he made 
 certain by inquiries from door to door. None of the 
 guides had seen her, though they are astir so late and so 
 early, patiently waiting at the hotel doors to be hired, 
 that there seems to be no night for them, darkness only 
 that blots them out for a time as they stand waiting. 
 At all hours there is in St. Gian the tinkle of bells, the 
 clatter of hoofs, the crack of a whip, dust in retreat, 
 but no coachman brought him news. The streets were 
 thronged with other coachmen on foot looking into every 
 face in quest of some person who wanted to return to the 
 lowlands, but none had looked into her face. 
 
 Within five minutes of the hotel she might have been 
 on any of half a dozen roads. He wandered or rushed 
 along them all for a space and came back. One of them 
 was short and ended in the lake. All through that long 
 and beautiful day this miserable man found himself 
 coming back to the road that ended in the lake. 
 
 There were moments when he cried to himself that it 
 was an apparition he had seen and hea^d. He had 
 
420 TOMMY AND 6BIZBL 
 
 avoided his friends all day; of the English-speaking 
 people in St. Gian one only knew why he was distraught, 
 and she was the last he wished to speak to ; but more 
 than once he nearly sought her to say, " Partner in my 
 shame, what did you see, what did you hear ? " In the 
 afternoon he had a letter from Elspeth telling him how 
 she was enjoying her holiday by the sea, and mention- 
 ing that David was at that moment writing to Grizel in 
 Thrums. But was it then all a dream ! he cried, nearly 
 convinced for the first time, and he went into the arbor 
 saying, determinedly, that it was a dream, and in the 
 arbor, standing primly in a corner, was Grizel's um- 
 brella ; he knew that umbrella so well. He remembered 
 once being by while she replaced one of its ribs so deftly 
 that he seemed to be looking on at a surgical operation. 
 The old doctor had given it to her, and that was why 
 she would not let it grow old before she was old herself. 
 Tommy opened it now with trembling hands and looked 
 at the little bits of Grizel on it : the beautiful stitching 
 with which she had coaxed the slits to close again ; the 
 one patch, so artful that she had clapped her hands over 
 it. And he fell on his knees and kissed these little bits 
 of Grizel and called her beloved, and cried to his gods 
 to give him one more chance. 
 
 " I woke up." It was all that she had said. It was 
 Grizel's excuse for inconveniencing him. She had said 
 it apologetically, and as if she did not quite know how 
 she came to be there herself. There was no look of 
 
THE LITTLE GODS DESERT HIM 421 
 
 reproach on her face while the match burned ; there 
 had been a pitiful smile as if she was begging him not 
 to be very angry with her, and then when he said her 
 name she gave that little cry as if she had recognized 
 herself, and stole away. He lived that moment over 
 and over again, and she never seemed to be horror- 
 stricken until he cried "Grizel," when her recognition of 
 herself made her scream. It was as if she had wakened 
 up, dazed by the terrible things that were being said, 
 and then, by the light of that one word " Grizel," sud- 
 denly knew who had been listening to them. 
 
 Did he know anything more ? He pressed his hands 
 harshly on his temples and thought. He knew that she 
 was soaking wet, that she had probably sought the arbor 
 for protection from the rain, and that if so she had been 
 there for at least four hours. She had wakened up. 
 She must have fallen asleep, knocked down by fatigue ; 
 what fatigue it must have been to make Grizel lie there 
 for hours he could guess, and he beat his brow in anguish. 
 But why she had come he could not guess. Oh, miser- 
 able man to seek for reasons, he cried passionately to 
 himself, when it is Grizel, Grizel herself, you should be 
 seeking for ! 
 
 He walked and ran the round of the lake, and it was 
 not on the bank that his staring eyes were fixed. 
 
 At last he came for a moment upon her track. The 
 people of an inn six miles from St. Gian remembered 
 being asked yesterday by an English miss walking alone 
 
422 TOMMY AND GKIZBL 
 
 how far she was from Bad-Platten. She was wearing 
 something brown, and her boots were white with dust, 
 and these people had never seen a lady look so tired 
 before ; when she stood still she had to lean against 
 the wall. They said she had red-hot eyes. 
 
 Tommy was in an einspanner now, the merry con- 
 veyance of the country and more intoxicating than its 
 wines, and he drove back through St, Gian to Bad- 
 Platten, where again he heard from Grizel, though he 
 did not find her. What he found was her telegram 
 from London, " I am coming, Grizel." Why had she 
 come ? why had she sent that telegram ? what had taken 
 her to London ? He was not losing time when he asked 
 himself distractedly these questions, for he was again in 
 his gay carriage and driving back to the wayside inn. 
 He spent the night there, afraid to go farther lest he 
 should pass her in the darkness, for he had decided that 
 if alive she was on this road. That she had walked all 
 those forty miles up-hill seemed certain, and apparently 
 the best he could hope was that she was walking back. 
 She had probably no money to enable her to take the 
 diligence ; perhaps she had no money with which to buy 
 food ; it might be that while he lay tossing in bed she 
 was somewhere near, dying for want of a franc. 
 
 He was ofE by morning light, and several times that 
 day he heard of her, twice from people who had seen 
 her pass, both going and coming, and he knew it must 
 be she when they said she rocked her arms as she walked. 
 
THE LITTLE GODS DESERT HIM 423 
 
 Oh, he knew why she rocked her arms. Once he thought 
 he had found her. He heard of an English lady who was 
 lying ill in the house of a saw-miller whose dog (we 
 know the dogs of these regions, but not the people) had 
 found her prostrate in the wood, some distance from the 
 high-road. Leaving his einspanner in a village, Tommy 
 climhed down the mountain-side to this little house, 
 which he was long in discovering. It was by the side 
 of a roaring river, and he arrived only an hour too late. 
 The lady had certainly been Grizel, but she was gone. 
 The sawyer's wife described to him how her husband 
 had brought her in and how she seemed so tired and 
 bewildered that she fell asleep while they were question- 
 ing her. She held her hands over her ears to shut out 
 the noise of the river, which seemed to terrify her. So 
 far as they could understand she told them that she was 
 running away from the river. She had been sleeping 
 there for three hours and was still asleep when the good 
 woman went off to meet her husband. But when they 
 returned she was gone. 
 
 He searched the wood for miles around, crying her 
 name. The sawyer and some of his fellow-workers left 
 the trees they were stripping of bark to help him, and 
 for hours the wood rang with " Grizel, Grizel ; " all the 
 mountains round took up the cry, but there never came 
 an answer. This long delay prevented his reaching the 
 railway terminus until noon of the following day, and 
 there he was again too late. But she had been here. 
 
424 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 He traced her to that hotel whence we saw her setting 
 forth, and the portier had got a ticket for her for Lon- 
 don. He had talked with her for some little time, and 
 advised her, as she seemed so tired, to remain there for 
 the night. But she said she must go home at once. 
 She seemed to be passionately desirous to go home and 
 had looked at him suspiciously as if fearing he might 
 try to hold her back. He had been called away and on 
 returning had seen her disappearing over the bridge. He 
 had called to her and then she ran as if afraid he was 
 pursuing her. But he had observed her afterward in 
 the train. 
 
 So she was not without money and she was on her 
 way home 1 The relief it brought him came to the sur- 
 face in great breaths, and at first every one of them was 
 a prayer of thankfulness. Yet in time they were trium- 
 phant breaths. Translated into words they said that he 
 had got o£E cheaply for the hundredth time. His little 
 gods had saved him again, as they had saved him in the 
 arbor by sending Grizel to him : he could do as he liked, 
 for they were always there to succor him, they would 
 never desert him, never. In a moment of fierce elation 
 he raised his hat to them, then seemed to see Grizel cry- 
 ing " I woke up," and in horror of himself clapped it on 
 again. It was but a momentary aberration, and is re- 
 corded only to show that, however remorseful he felt 
 afterward, there was life in our Tommy still. 
 
 The train by which he was to follow her did not leave 
 
THE LITTLE GODS DBSEET HIM 425 
 
 until evening, and through those long hours he was pic- 
 turing, with horrible vividness and pain, the progress 
 of Grizel up and down that terrible pass. Often his 
 shoulders shook in agony over what he saw, and he 
 shuddered to the teeth. He would have walked round 
 the world on his knees to save her this long anguish, 
 and then again it was less something he saw than some- 
 thing he was writing, and he altered it to make it more 
 dramatic. " I woke up ! " How awful that was, but in 
 this new scene she uttered no words. Lady Pippinworth 
 was in his arms when they heard a little cry, so faint 
 that a violin string makes as much moan when it snaps. 
 In a dread silence he lit a match, and as it flared the 
 figure of a girl was seen upon the floor. She was dead, 
 and even as he knew that she was dead he recognized 
 her. " Grizel ! " he cried. The other woman who had 
 lured him from his true love uttered a piercing scream 
 and ran toward the hotel. When she returned with men 
 and lanterns there was no one in the arbor, but there 
 were what had been a man and a girl. They lay side by 
 side. The startled on-lookers unbared their heads. A 
 solemn voice said, "In death not divided." 
 
 He was not the only occupant of the hotel reaSing- 
 room as he saw all this, and when his head fell forward 
 and he groaned the others looked up from their papers. 
 A lady asked if he was unwell. 
 
 "I have had a great shock," he replied, in a daze, 
 pulling his hand across his forehead. 
 
426 TOMMY AJST) GEIZEL 
 
 " Something you have seen in your paper ? " inquired 
 a clergyman who had been complaining that there was 
 no news. 
 
 " People I knew," said Tommy, not yet certain which 
 world he was in. 
 
 " Dead ? " the lady asked, sympathetically. 
 
 " I knew them well," he said, and staggered into the 
 fresh air. 
 
 Poor dog of a Tommy ! He had heen a total abstainer 
 from sentiment, as one may say, for sixty hours, and this 
 was his only glass. It was the nobler Tommy, sternly 
 facing facts, who by and by stepped into the train. He 
 even knew why he was going to Thrums. He was going 
 to say certain things to her, and he said them to himself 
 again and again in the train and heard her answer. The 
 words might vary, but they were always to the same 
 effect. 
 
 " Grizel, I have come back ! " 
 
 He saw himself say these words as he opened her door 
 in Gavinia's little house. And when he had said them 
 he bowed his head. 
 
 At his sudden appearance she started up. Then she 
 stood pale and firm. 
 
 " Why have you come back ? " 
 
 " Not to ask your forgiveness," he replied, hoarsely, 
 "not to attempt to excuse myself, not with any hope 
 that there remains one drop of the love you once gave 
 me so abundantly; I want only, Grizel, to put my life 
 
 V iV 
 
THE LITTLE GODS DESEET HIM 427 
 
 into your hands. I have made a sorry mess of it myself ; 
 will you take charge of what may be left of it ? You 
 always said you were ready to help me. I have come 
 back, Grizel, for your help. What you were once will- 
 ing to do for love, will you do for pity now ? " 
 
 She turned away her head, and he went nearer her. 
 "There was always something of the mother in your 
 love, Grizel ; but for that you would never have borne 
 with me so long. A mother, they say, can never quite 
 forget her boy, oh, Grizel, is it true ? I am the prodigal 
 come back. Grizel, beloved, I have sinned and I am 
 unworthy, but I am still your boy, and I have come 
 back. Am I to be sent away ? " 
 
 At the word Beloved her arras rocked impulsively. 
 "You must not call me that," she said. 
 
 " Then I am to go," he answered with a shudder, " for 
 I must always call you that ; whether I am with you or 
 away you shall always be beloved to me." 
 
 " You don't love me ! " she cried. " Oh, do you love 
 me at last! " and at that he fell upon his knees. 
 
 " Grizel, my love, my love ! " 
 
 "But you don't want to be married," she said. 
 
 " Beloved, I have come back to ask you on my knees 
 to be my wife." 
 
 " That woman " 
 
 " She was a married woman, Grizel." 
 
 "Oh, oh, ohl" 
 
 " And now you know the worst of me. It is the whole 
 
428 TOMMY AKD GRIZEL 
 
 truth at last. I don't know why you took that terrible 
 journey, dear Grizel, but I do know that you were sent 
 there to save me. Oh, my love, you have done so much, 
 will you do no more? " 
 
 And so on, till there came a time when his head was 
 on her lap and her hand caressing it, and she was 
 whispering to her boy to look up and see her crooked 
 smile again. 
 
 He passed on to the wedding. All the time between 
 seemed to be spent in his fond entreaties to hasten the 
 longed-for day. How radiant she looked in her bridal 
 gown! Oh, beautiful one, are you really mine? Oh, 
 world, pause for a moment and look at the woman who 
 has given herself to me ! 
 
 " My wife, this is my wife ! " They were in London 
 now, he was showing her to London. How he swaggered ! 
 There was a perpetual apology on her face, it begged 
 people to excuse him for looking so proudly at her. It 
 was a crooked apology, and he hurried her into dark 
 places and kissed it. 
 
 Do you see that Tommy was doing all this for Grizel 
 and pretending to her that it was for himself ? He was 
 passionately desirous of making amends, and he was to 
 do it in the most generous way. Perhaps he believed 
 when he seemed to enter her room saying, " Grizel, I 
 have come back," that she loved him still; perhaps he 
 knew that he did not love in the way he said ; perhaps 
 he saw a remorseful man making splendid atonement, 
 
THE LITTLE GODS DESERT HIM 429 
 
 but never should she know these things. Tenderly as 
 he had begun he would go on to the end. Here at last 
 is a Tommy worth looking at, and he looked. 
 
 Yet as he drew near Thrums, after almost exactly two 
 days of continuous travel, many a shiver went down his 
 back, for he could not be sure that he should find Grizel 
 here, he sometimes seemed to see her lying ill at some 
 wayside station in Switzerland, in France, everything 
 that could have happened to her he conceived, and 
 he moved restlessly in the carriage. His mouth went 
 dry 
 
 " Has she come back ? " 
 
 The train had stopped for the taking of tickets, and 
 his tremulous question checked the joy of Corp at sight 
 of him. 
 
 " She 's back," Corp answered, in an excited whisper, 
 and oh, the relief to Tommy. " She came back by the 
 afternoon train, but I had scarce a word wi' her, she was 
 so awid to be hame. ' I am going home,' she cried, and 
 hurried away up the brae. Ay, and there 's one queer 
 thing." 
 
 "What?" 
 
 " Her luggage wasna in the van." 
 
 Tommy could smile at that. "But what sent her," 
 he asked, eagerly, " on that journey ? " 
 
 Corp told him the little he knew. " But nobody kens 
 except me and Gavinia," he said. "We pretend she 
 gaed to London to see her father. We said he had 
 
430 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 wrote to her wanting her to go to him. Gavinia said it 
 would never do to let folk ken she had gaen to see you, 
 and even Elspeth doesna ken." 
 
 "IsElspethhack?" 
 
 " They came back yesterday." 
 
 Did David know the truth from Grizel? was what 
 Tommy was asking himself now as he strode up the 
 brae. But again he was in luck, for when he had ex- 
 plained away his abrupt return to Elspeth and been joy- 
 fully welcomed by her, she told him that her husband 
 had been in one of the glens all day. " He does not 
 know that Grizel has come back," she said. "Oh," she 
 exclaimed, "but you don't even know that she has been 
 away. Grizel has been in London ? " 
 
 " Corp told me," said Tommy. 
 
 " And did he tell you why she had gone ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " She came back an hour or two ago. Maggy Ann saw 
 her go past. Eancy her seeing her father at last! It 
 must have been an ordeal for her. I wonder what took 
 place." 
 
 " I think I had better go and ask her," Tommy said. 
 He was mightily relieved for Grizel's sake. No one 
 need ever know now what had called her away except 
 Corp and Gavinia, and even they thought she had merely 
 been to London. How well the little gods were manag- 
 ing the whole affair ! As he walked to Grizel's lodgings, 
 to say what he had been saying in the train, the thought 
 
THE LITTLE GODS DESBET HIM 431 
 
 came to him for a moment that as no one need ever 
 know where she had been there was less reason why he 
 should do this generous thing. But he put it from him 
 with lofty disdain. Any effect it had was to make him 
 walk more firmly to his sacrifice, as if to show all ignoble 
 impulses that they could find no home in that swelling 
 breast. He was pleased with himself, was Tommy. 
 
 " Grizel, I have come back." He said it to the night, 
 and bowed his head. He said it with head accompani- 
 ment to Grizel's lighted window. He said it to himself 
 as he reached the door. He never said it again. 
 
 Tor Gavinia's first words were " It 's you, Mr. Sandys ! 
 Wherever is she? For mercy's sake, dinna say you've 
 come without her ! " And when he blinked at this she 
 took him roughly by the arm and cried, " Wherever 's 
 Grizel ? " 
 
 " She is here, Gavinia." 
 
 " She 's no here." 
 
 " I saw her light." 
 
 " You saw my light." 
 
 "Gavinia, you are torturing me. She came back 
 to-day." 
 
 " What makes you say that ? You 're dreaming. 
 She hasna come back." 
 
 " Corp saw her come in by the afternoon train. He 
 spoke to her." 
 
 Gavinia shook her head incredulously. " You 're just 
 imagining that," she said. 
 
432 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 " He told me. Gavinia, I must see for myself," She 
 stared after him as he went up the stairs. "You are 
 very cruel, Gavinia," he said when he came down. 
 " Tell me where she is." 
 
 " May I be struck, Mr. Sandys, if I 've seen or heard 
 o' her since she left this house eight days syne." He 
 knew she was speaking the truth. He had to lean 
 against the door for support. "It canna be so bad as 
 you think," she cried in pity. " If you 're sure Corp said 
 he saw her she maun hae gone to the doctor's house." 
 
 " She is not there. But Elspeth knew she had come 
 back. Others have seen her besides Corp. My God, 
 Gavinia, what can have happened ? " 
 
 In little more than an hour he knew what had hap- 
 pened. Many besides himself, David among them 
 toward the end, were engaged in the search. And 
 strange stories began to fly about like night-birds ; you 
 will not search for a missing woman without rousing 
 them. Why had she gone off to London without telling 
 anyone ? Had Corp concocted that story about her 
 father to blind them ? Had she really been as far as 
 London. Have you seen Sandys ? He 's back. It 's 
 said Corp telegraphed to him to Switzerland that she 
 had disappeared. It's weel kent Corp telegraphed. 
 Sandys came at once. He is in a terrible state ; look 
 how white he is aneath that lamp. What garred them 
 telegraph for him ; how is it he is in sic a state ? Pond 
 o' her, was he ? Yea, yea, even after she gave him the 
 
THE LITTLE GODS DESERT HIM 433 
 
 go-by ! Then it 's a weary Sabbath for him if half they 
 
 say be true. What do they say ? They say she was 
 
 queer when she came back. Corp doesna say that. 
 
 Maybe no, but Francie Crabb does. He says he met her 
 
 on the station brae and spoke to her and she said never 
 
 a word, but put up her hands like as if she feared 
 
 he was to strike her. The Dundas lassies saw her frae 
 
 their window, and her hands were at her ears as if she 
 
 was trying to drown the sound o' something. Do you 
 
 mind o' her mother ? They say she was looking terrible 
 
 like her mother. 
 
 It was only between the station and Gavinia's house 
 
 that she had been seen, but they searched far afield. 
 
 Tommy, accompanied by Corp, even sought for her in 
 
 the den. Do you remember the long, lonely path between 
 
 two ragged little dykes that led from the den to the 
 
 house of the Painted Lady ? It was there that Grizel 
 
 had lived with her mamma. The two men went down 
 
 that path, which is oppressed with trees. Elsewhere 
 
 the night was not dark, but as they had known so well 
 
 when they were boys, it is always dark after even-fall in 
 
 the double dykes. That is the legacy of the Painted 
 
 Lady. Presently they saw the house, scarcely the house, 
 
 but a lighted window. Tommy remembered the night 
 
 when as a boy, Elspeth crouching beside him, he had 
 
 peered in fearfully at that corner window on Grizel and 
 
 her mamma, and the shuddersome things he had seen. 
 
 He shuddered at them again. 
 
 28 
 
434 TOMMY AND GKIZEL 
 
 " Who lives there now ? " he asked. 
 
 "Nobody. It's toom." 
 
 " There is a light." 
 
 "Some going ahout body. They often tak' bilbie in 
 toom houses, and that door is without a lock. It's 
 keepit close wi' slipping a stick aneath it. Do you 
 mind how feared we used to be at that house ? " 
 
 " She was never afraid of it." 
 
 "It was her hame." 
 
 He meant no more than he said, but suddenly they 
 both stopped dead. 
 
 " It 's no possible," Corp said, as if in answer to a ques- 
 tion^ " It 's no possible," he repeated, beseechingly. 
 
 " Wait for me here, Corp." 
 
 " I would rather come wi' you." 
 
 " Wait here," Tommy said, almost fiercely, and he 
 went on alone to that little window. It had needed an 
 effort to make him look in when he was here before, 
 and it needed a bigger effort now. But he looked. 
 
 What light there was came from the fire, and whether 
 she had gathered the logs or found them in the room no 
 one ever knew. A vagrant stated afterward that he had 
 been in the house some days before and left his match- 
 box in it. 
 
 By this fire Grizel was crouching. She was com- 
 paratively tidy and neat again, the dust was gone from 
 her boots even ; how she had managed to do it no one 
 knows, but you remember how she loved to be neat. 
 
" SHE NODDED AND PUT HER FINGER TO HER LIPS." 
 
THE LITTLE GODS DESERT HIM 435 
 
 Her hands were extended to the blaze, and she was busy 
 talking to herself. 
 
 His hand struck the window heavily, and she looked 
 up and saw him. She nodded and put her finger to her 
 lips as a sign that he must be cautious. She had often 
 in the long ago seen her mother signing thus to an 
 imaginary face at the window, the face of the man who 
 never came. 
 
 Tommy went into the house, and she was so pleased 
 to see him that she quite simpered. He put his arms 
 round her, and she lay there with a little giggle of 
 contentment. She was in a plot of heat. 
 
 " Grizel ! Oh, my God," he said, " why do you look at 
 me in that way ! " 
 
 She passed her hand across her eyes like one trying to 
 think. 
 
 " I woke up," she said at last. Corp appeared at the 
 window now and she pointed to him in terror. Thus 
 had she seen her mother point in the long ago at faces 
 that came there to frighten her. 
 
 " Grizel," Tommy entreated her, " you know who I 
 am, don't you ? " 
 
 She said his name at once, but her eyes were on 
 the window. "They want to take me away," she 
 whispered. 
 
 " But you must come away, Grizel. You must come 
 home." 
 
 "This is home," she said. " It is sweet." 
 
436 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 After much coaxing lie prevailed upon her to leave. 
 With his arm round her and a terrible woe on his face 
 he took her to the doctor's house. She had her hands 
 over her ears all the way; she thought the white river 
 and the mountains and the villages and the crack of 
 whips were marching with her still. 
 
CHAPTER XXXI 
 
 " THE MAK WITH THE GEEETIN' EYES " 
 
 Foe many days she lay in. a fever at the doctor's 
 house, seeming sometimes to know where she was, but 
 more often not, and night after night a man with a 
 drawn face sat watching her. They entreated, they 
 forced him to let them take his place, but from his room 
 he heard her moan or speak, or he thought he heard her, 
 or he heard a terrible stillness, and he stole back to 
 listen; they might send him away, but when they 
 opened the door he was there with his drawn face. And 
 often they were glad to see him, for there were times 
 when he alone could interpret her wild demands and 
 soothe those staring eyes. 
 
 Once a scream startled the house. Someone had 
 struck a match in the darkened chamber, and she 
 thought she was in an arbor in St. Gian. They had 
 to hold her in her bed by force at times. She had 
 such a long way to walk before night, she said. 
 
 She would struggle into a sitting posture and put her 
 hands over her ears. 
 
 Her great desire was not to sleep. " I should wake 
 up," she explained, fearfully. 
 
438 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 She took a dislike to Elspeth, and called her Alice. 
 
 These ravings, they said to each other, must have 
 reference to what happened to her when she was away, 
 and as they thought he knew no more of her wanderings 
 than they, every one marvelled at the intuition with 
 which he read her thoughts. It was he who guessed 
 that the striking of matches somehow terrified her, he 
 who discovered that it was a horrid roaring river she 
 thought she heard, and he pretended he heard it too and 
 persuaded her that if she lay very still it would run 
 past. Nothing she said or did puzzled him. He read 
 the raving of her mind, they declared admiringly, as if 
 he held the cipher to it. 
 
 " And the cipher is his love," Mrs. McLean said, with 
 wet eyes. In the excitement of those days Elspeth 
 talked much to her of Tommy's love for Grizel, and how 
 she had refused him, and it went round the town with 
 embellishments. It was generally believed now that .she 
 really had gone to London to see her father, and that 
 his heartless behavior had unhinged her mind. 
 
 By David's advice Corp and G-avinia did not contra- 
 dict this story. It was as good as another, he told them, 
 and better than the truth. 
 
 But what was the truth, they asked, greedily. 
 
 " Oh, that he is a noble fellow," David replied, grimly 
 
 " They knew that, but " 
 
 He would tell them no more, however, though he 
 knew all. Tommy had made full confession to the doc- 
 
"THE MAN WITH THE GEEETIN' EYES " 439 
 
 tor, even made himself out worse than he was, as had to 
 be his way when he was not making himself out better. 
 
 " And I am willing to proclaim it all from the market- 
 place," he said, hoarsely, " if that is your wish." 
 
 " I daresay you would almost enjoy doing that," said 
 David, rather cruelly. 
 
 " I daresay I should," Tommy said, with a gulp, and 
 went back to Grizel's side. It was not, you may be sure, 
 to screen him that David kept the secret, it was because 
 he knew what many would say of Grizel if the nature of 
 her journey were revealed. He dared not tell Elspeth 
 even, for think of the woe to her if she learned that it 
 was her wonderful brother who had brought Grizel to 
 this pass ! The Elspeths of this world always have some 
 man to devote himself to them ; if the Tommies pass 
 away the Davids spring up. For my own part I think 
 Elspeth would have found some excuse for Tommy. 
 He said so himself to the doctor, for he wanted her to 
 be told. 
 
 " Or you would find the excuse for her in time," David 
 responded. 
 
 "Very likely," Tommy said. He was humble enough 
 now, you see. David could say one thing only which 
 would rouse him, namely, that Grizel was not to die in 
 this fever, and for long it seemed impossible to say 
 that. 
 
 "Would you have her live if her mind remains 
 affected?" he asked, and Tommy said, firmly, "Yes," 
 
440 TOMMY AND 6EIZEL 
 
 " You think, I suppose, that then you would have less 
 for which to blame yourself ! " 
 
 " I suppose that is it. But don't waste time on me, 
 Gemmell, when you have her life to save if you can." 
 
 Well, her life was saved, and Torttmy's nursing had 
 more to do with it than David's skill. David admitted 
 it, the town talked of it. " I aye kent he would find a 
 way," Corp said, though he had been among the most 
 anxious. He and Aaron Latta were the first admitted 
 to see her when she was able once more to sit in a 
 chair. They had been told to ask her no questions. She 
 chatted pleasantly to them, and they thought she was 
 quite her old self. They wondered to see Tommy still 
 so sad-eyed. To Ailie she spoke freely of her illness, 
 though not of what had occasioned it, and told her 
 almost gleefully that David had promised to let her sew 
 a little next week. There was one thing only that sur- 
 prised Ailie. Grizel had said that as soon as she was a 
 little stronger she was going home. 
 
 " Does she mean to her father's house ? " Ailie asked. 
 
 This was what started the report that, touched no 
 doubt by her illness, Grizel's unknown father had after 
 all offered her a home. They discovered, however, what 
 Grizel meant by home when one afternoon she escaped, 
 unseen, from the doctor's house and was found again 
 at Double Dykes, very indignant because someone had 
 stolen the furniture. 
 
 She seemed to know all her old friends except 
 
"THE MAN WITH THE GEBETIN' EYES " 441 
 
 Elspeth, who was still Alice to her. Seldom now did 
 she put her hands over her ears or see horrible moun- 
 tains marching with her ; she no longer remembered, 
 save once or twice when she woke up, that she had ever 
 been out of Thrums. To those who saw her casually 
 she was Grizel, gone thin and pale and weak intellec- 
 tually, but still the Grizel of old except for the fixed 
 idea that Double Dykes was her home. 
 
 "You must not humor her in that delusion," David 
 said, sternly, to Tommy ; " when we cease to fight it we 
 have abandoned hope." 
 
 So the weapon he always had his hand on was taken 
 from Tommy, for he would not abandon hope. He 
 fought gallantly. It was always he who brought her 
 back from Double Dykes. She would not leave it with 
 any other person, but she came away with him. 
 
 "It's because she's so fond o' him," Corp said. 
 
 But it was not. It was because she feared him, as all 
 knew who saw them together. They were seen together 
 a great deal when she was able to go out. Driving 
 seemed to bring back the mountains to her eyes, so she 
 walked, and it was always with the help of Tommy's 
 arm. "It's a most pitiful sight," the people said. 
 They pitied him even more than her, for though she 
 might be talking gayly to him and leaning heavily on 
 him they could see that she mistrusted him. At the 
 end of a sweet smile she would give him an ugly, furtive 
 look. 
 
442 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 " She 's like a cat you 've forced into your lap," they 
 said, " and it lies quiet there, ready to jump the moment 
 you let go your grip." 
 
 They wondered would he never weary. He never 
 wearied. Day after day he was saying the same things 
 to her and the end was always as the beginning. They 
 came back to her entreaty that she should be allowed to 
 go home as certainly as they came back to the doctor's 
 house. 
 
 " It is a long time, you know, G-rizel, since you lived 
 at Double Dykes, not since you were a child." 
 
 "Not since I was a child," she said, as if she quite 
 understood. 
 
 " Then you went to live with your dear, kind doctor, 
 you remember. What was his name ? " 
 
 " Dr. McQueen ; I love him." 
 
 " But he died, and he left you his house to live in. 
 It is your home, Grizel. He would be so grieved if he 
 thought you did not make it your home." 
 
 " It is my home," she said, proudly, but when they 
 returned to it she was loth to go in; "I want to go 
 home," she begged. 
 
 One day he took her to her rooms in Corp's house, 
 thinking her old furniture would please her, and that 
 was the day when she rocked her arms joyously again. 
 But it was not the furniture that made her so happy, 
 it was Corp's baby. 
 
 "Qlil oh!" she cried in rapture, and held out ber 
 
"THE MAN WITH THE GKEETIN' EYES" 443 
 
 arms, and he ran into them, for there was still one 
 person in Thrums who had no fear of Grizel. 
 
 " It will be a damned shame," Corp said, huskily, " if 
 that woman never has no bairns o' her ain." 
 
 They watched her crooning over the child, playing 
 with him for a long time. You could not have believed 
 that she required to be watched. She told him with 
 hugs that she had come back to him at last ; it was her 
 first admission that she knew she had been away, and a 
 wild hope came to Tommy that along the road he could 
 not take her she might be drawn by this little child. 
 
 She discovered a rent in the child's pinafore and must 
 mend it at once. She ran upstairs, as a matter of course, 
 to her work-box and brought down a needle and thread. 
 It was quite as if she was at home at last. 
 
 " But you don't live here now, Grizel," Tommy said 
 when she drew back at his proposal that they should go 
 away, " you live at the doctor's house." 
 
 " Do I, Gavinia ? " she said, beseechingly. 
 
 " Is it here you want to bide ? " Corp asked, and she 
 nodded her head several times. " It would be so much 
 more convenient," she said, looking at the child. 
 
 "Would you take her back, Gavinia," Tommy asked, 
 humbly, " if she continues to want it ? " 
 
 Gavinia did not answer. 
 
 " Woman ! " cried Corp. 
 
 " I 'm mortal wae for her," Gavinia said, slowly, " but 
 she needs to be waited on hand and foot." 
 
444 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 "I would come and do the waiting on her hand and 
 foot, Gavinia," Tommy said. 
 
 And so it came about that a week afterward Grizel 
 was reinstalled in her old rooms. Every morning when 
 Tommy came to see her she asked him, icily, how Alice 
 was. She seemed to think that Alice, as she called her, 
 was his wife. He always replied, " You mean Elspeth," 
 and she assented, but only, it was obvious, because she 
 feared to contradict him. To Corp and Gavinia she 
 would still say, passionately, " I want to go home," and 
 probably add, fearfully, "Don't tell him." 
 
 Yet though this was not home to her, she seemed to 
 be less unhappy here than in the doctor's house, and 
 she found a great deal to do. All her old skill in needle- 
 work came back to her, and she sewed for the child such 
 exquisite garments that she clapped her hands over them. 
 
 One day Tommy came with a white face and asked 
 Gavinia if she knew whether a small brown parcel had 
 been among the things brought by Grizel from the doc- 
 tor's house. 
 
 " It was in the box sent after me from Switzerland," 
 he told her, "and contained papers." 
 
 Gavinia had seen no such package. 
 
 " She may have hidden it," he said, and they searched, 
 but fruitlessly. He questioned Grizel, gently, but ques- 
 tions alarmed her, and he desisted. 
 
 " It does not matter, Gavinia," he said, with a ghastly 
 smile, but on the following Sunday, when Corp called at 
 
"THE MAN WITH THE GEEETIN' EYES " 445 
 
 the doctor's house, the thought " Have they found it ? " 
 leapt in front of all thought of Grizel. This was only 
 for the time it takes to ask a question with the eyes, 
 however, for Corp was looking very miserable. 
 
 " I 'm sweer to say it," he announced to Tommy and 
 David, " but it has to be said. We canna keep her." 
 
 Evidently something had happened, and Tommy 
 rose to go to Grizel without eveu asking what it was. 
 "Wait," David said, wrinkling his eyebrows, "till Corp 
 tells us what he means by that. I knew it might come, 
 Corp. Go on." 
 
 "If it hadna been for the bairn," said Corp, "we 
 would hae tholed wi' her, however queer she was, but 
 wi' the bairn I tell you it 's no mous, you 'U hae to tak' 
 her awa'." 
 
 "Whatever she has been to others," Tommy said, 
 ".she is always an angel with the child. His own 
 mother could not be fonder of him." 
 
 "That's it," Corp replied, emphatically. "She's no 
 the mother o' him, but there 's whiles when she thinks 
 she is. We kept it frae you as long as we could." 
 
 " As long as she is so good to him — " David began. 
 
 "But at thae times she's not," said Corp. "She 
 begins to shiver most terrible, as if she saw fearsome 
 things in her mind, and syne we see her looking at him 
 like as if she wanted to do him a mischief. She says he 's 
 her brat. She thinks he 's hers, and that he hasna been 
 well come by." 
 
446 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 Tommy's hands rose in agony and then he covered his 
 face with them. 
 
 " Go on, Corp," David said, hoarsely, " we must have 
 it all." 
 
 "Sometimes," Corp went on, painfully, "she canna 
 help being fond o' him, though she thinks she shouldna 
 hae had him. I 've heard her saying, ' My brat! ' and 
 syne birsing him closer to her, as though her shame just 
 made him mair to her. Women are so queer about thae 
 things. I 've seen her sitting by his cradle, moaning to 
 hersel', 'I did so want to be good, it would be sweet to 
 be good,' and never stopping rocking the cradle, and a' 
 the time the tears were rolling down." 
 
 Tommy cried, " If there is any more to tell, Corp, be 
 quick." 
 
 " There 's what I come here to tell you. It was no 
 langer syne than jimply an hour. We thocht the bairn 
 was playing at the gavle-end and that Grizel was up the 
 stair. But they werena, and I gaed straight to Double 
 Dykes; She wasna there, but the bairn was, lying 
 greetin' on the floor. We found her in the den sitting 
 by the burn side, and she said we should never see him 
 again, for she had drowned him. We 're sweer, but 
 you'll need to tak' her awa'." 
 
 "We shall take her away," David said, and when he 
 and Tommy were left together, he asked, " Do you see 
 what it means ? " 
 
 "It means that the horrors of her early days have 
 
"THE MAN "WITH THE GREETIN' EYES " 447 
 
 come back to Her, and that she is confusing her mother 
 with herself." 
 
 David's hands were clenched. " That is not what I 
 am thinking of. We have to take her away ; they have 
 done far more than we had any right to ask of them. 
 Sandys, where are we to take her to ? " 
 
 " Do even you grow tired of her ! " Tommy cried. 
 
 David said, between his teeth, "We hope there will 
 soon be a child in this house also. God forgive me, but 
 I cannot bring her back here." 
 
 " She cannot be in a house where there is a child ! " 
 said Tommy, with a bitter laugh. "Gemmell, it is 
 Grizel we are speaking of ! Do you remember what 
 she was ? " 
 
 " I remember." 
 
 " Well, where are we to send her ? " 
 
 David turned his pained eyes full on ■Tommy. 
 
 "No," Tommy cried, vehemently. 
 
 "Sandys," said David, firmly, "that is what it has 
 come to. They will take good care of her." He sat 
 down with a groan. "Have done with heroics," he said 
 savagely when Tommy would have spoken. " I have 
 been prepared for this; there is no other way." 
 
 "I have been prepared for it too," Tommy said, con- 
 trolling himself, "but there is another way. I can 
 marry her, and I am going to do it." 
 
 "I don't know that I can countenance that," David 
 said, after a pause. "It seems an infernal shame." 
 
448 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 " Don't trouble about me," replied Tommy, hoarsely; 
 " I shall do it willingly." 
 
 And then it was the doctor's turn to laugh. " You ! " 
 he said, with a terrible scorn as he looked Tommy up 
 and down, " I was not thinking of you. All my thoughts 
 were of her. I was thinking how cruel to her if some 
 day she came to her right mind and found herself tied 
 for life to the man who had brought her to this pass." 
 
 Tommy winced and walked up and down. 
 
 " Desire to marry her gone ? " asked David, savagely. 
 
 "No," Tommy said. He sat down. "You have the 
 key to me, Gemmell," he went on quietly, " I gave it to 
 you. You know I am a man of sentiment only, but you 
 are without a scrap of it yourself, and so you wiU never 
 quite know what it is. It has its good points. We are 
 a kindly people. I was perhaps pluming myself on 
 having made an heroic proposal, and though you have 
 made me see it just now as you see it, as you see it I 
 shall probably soon be putting on the same grand airs 
 again. Lately I discovered that the children who see me 
 with Grizel call me ' The Man with the Greetin' Eyes ! ' 
 If I have greetin' eyes it was real grief that gave them 
 to me, but when I heard what I was called, it made me 
 self-conscious, and I have tried to look still more lugu- 
 brious ever since. It seems monstrous to you, but that, 
 I believe, is the kind of thing I shall always be doing. 
 But it does not mean that I feel no real remorse. They 
 were greetin' eyes betore I knew it, and though I may 
 
"THE MAN WITH THE GRBBTIN' BYES " 449 
 
 pose grotesquely as a fine fellow for finding Grizel a 
 home where there is no child and can oever be g, child, I 
 shall not cease, night nor day, from tending her. It 
 will be a grim business, Gemmell, as you know, and if I 
 am Sentimental Tommy through it all, why grudge me 
 my comic little strut ? " 
 
 David said, " You can't take her to London," 
 
 " I shall take her to wherever she wants to go." 
 
 " There is one place only she wants to go to, and that 
 is Double Dykes." 
 
 " I am prepared to take her there." 
 
 " And your work ? " 
 
 " It must take second place now. I must write. It is 
 the only thing I can do. If I could make a living at 
 anything else I would give up writing altogether." 
 
 " Why ? " 
 
 " She would be pleased if she could understand. And 
 writing is the joy of my life. Two reasons." 
 
 But the doctor smiled. 
 
 " You are right," said Tommy. " I see I was really 
 thinking what a fine picture of self-sacrifice I should 
 make, sitting in Double Dykes at a loom ! " 
 
 They talked of ways and means, and he had to admit 
 that he had little money. But the new book would 
 bring in a good deal, David supposed. 
 
 " The manuscript is lost," Tommy replied, crushing 
 
 down his agitation. 
 
 " Lost ! When ? Where ? " 
 -"20 
 
450 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 " I don't know. It was in the bag I left behind at 
 St. Gian, and I supposed it was still in it when the bag 
 was forwarded to me here. I did not look for more than 
 a month. I took credit to myself for neglecting my 
 manuscript, and when at last I looked it was not there. 
 I telegraphed and wrote to the innkeeper at St. Gian, 
 and he replied that my things had been packed at his 
 request in presence of my friends there, the two ladies 
 you know of. I wrote to them, and they replied that 
 this was so, and said they thought they remembered 
 seeing in the bottom of the bag some such parcel in 
 brown paper as I described. But it is not there now, 
 and I have given up all hope of ever seeing it again. 
 No, I have no other copy. Every page was written half 
 a dozen times, but I kept the final copy only." 
 
 " It is scarcely a thing anyone would steal." 
 
 " No, I suppose they took it out of the bag at St. Gian 
 and forgot to pack it again. It was probably flung away 
 as of no account." 
 
 " Could it have been taken out on the way here ? " 
 
 " The key was tied to the handle so that the custom 
 officials might be able to open the bag. Perhaps they 
 are fonder of English manuscripts than one would ex- 
 pect, or more careless of them." 
 
 " You can think of no other way in which it might 
 have disappeared ? " 
 
 "None," Tommy said, and then the doctor faced him 
 squarely. 
 
"THE MAN WITH THE GREETIN' EYES " 451 
 
 " Are you trying to screen Grizel ? " he asked. " Is 
 it true what people are saying ? " 
 
 " What are they saying ? " 
 
 " That she destroyed it. . I heard that yesterday, and 
 told them your manuscript was in my house, as I thought 
 it was. Was it she ? " 
 
 "No, no. Gavinia must have started that story. I 
 did look for the package among Grizel's things." 
 
 " What made you think of that ? " 
 
 " I had seen her looking into my bag one day. And 
 she used to say I loved my manuscripts too much ever 
 to love her. But I am sure she did not do it." 
 
 "Be truthful, Sandys. You know how she always 
 loved the truth." 
 
 " Well, then, I suppose it was she." 
 
 After a pause the doctor said : " It must be about as 
 bad as having a limb lopped off." 
 
 " If only I had been offered that alternative ! " Tommy 
 replied. 
 
 "And yet," David mused, better pleased with him, 
 "you have not cried out." 
 
 " Have I not ! I have rolled about in agony and in- 
 voked the gods and cursed and whimpered, only I take 
 care that no one shall see me." 
 
 " And that no one should know poor Grizel had done 
 this thing. I admire you for that, Sandys." 
 
 "But it has leaked out, you see," Tommy said, "and 
 they will all be admiring me for it at the wedding, and 
 
452 TOMMY AND 6BIZEL 
 
 no doubt I shall be cocking my greetin' eyes at them to 
 note how much they are admiring." 
 
 But when the wedding-day came he was not doitig 
 that. While he and Grizel stood up before Mr. Dishart 
 in the doctor's parlor he was thinking of her only ; his 
 eyes never left her, not even when he had to reply " I 
 do." His hand pressed hers all the time, he kept giving 
 her reassuring little nods and smiles, and it was thus 
 that he helped Grizel through. 
 
 Had Mr. Dishart understood what was in her mind he 
 would, not have married them^ To her it was no real 
 marriage ; she thought they were tricking the ministerj so 
 that she should be able to go home. They had rehearsed 
 the ceremony together many times, and oh, she was eager 
 to make no mistake. 
 
 " If they were to find out 1 " she would say, appre- 
 hensively, and then perhaps giggle at the slyness of it 
 all. Tommy had to make merry with het, as if it was 
 one of his boyish plays ; if he was overcome with the 
 pain of it she sobbed at once and wrung her hands. 
 
 She was married in gray silk. She had made the 
 dress herself j as beautifully as all her things were made. 
 Tommy remembered how once long ago she had told 
 him, as a most exquisite secret, that she had decided on 
 gray silk. 
 
 Corp and Gavinia and Ailie and Aaron Latta were 
 the only persons asked to the wedding, and when it was 
 over, they said they never saw anyone stand up by a 
 
"THE MAN WITH THE GEEETIN' EYES " 453 
 
 woman's side looking so anxious to be her man. And I 
 am sure that in this they did Tommy no more than 
 justice. 
 
 It -was a sad day to Elspeth. Could she be expected 
 to smile while her noble brother did this great deed of 
 sacrifice ? But she bore up bravely, partly for his sake, 
 partly for the sake of one unborn. 
 
 The ring was uo plain hoop of gold ; it was garnets 
 all the way round. She had seen it on Elspeth's finger, 
 and craved it so greedily that it became her wedding- 
 ring. And from the moment she had it she ceased to 
 dislike Elspeth and pitied l^er very much, as if she 
 thought happiness went with the ring. " Poor Alice ! " 
 she said when she saw Elspeth crying at the wadding, 
 and having started to go away with Tommy she cajne 
 back to say again, <' Poor, poor Alice ! " 
 
 Corp flung an old shoe after thenUi 
 
CHAPTEE XXXII 
 
 TOMMY'S BEST WOKK 
 
 And thus was begun a year and a half of as great 
 devotion as remorseful inan ever gave to woman. When 
 she was asleep and he could not write, his mind would 
 sometimes roam after abandoned things ; it sought them 
 in the night as a savage beast steals forth for water to 
 slake the thirst of many days. But if she stirred in her 
 sleep they were all dispelled; there was not a moment 
 in that eighteen months when he was twenty yards from 
 Grizel's side. 
 
 He would not let himself lose hope. All the others 
 lost it. " The only thing you can do is to humor her," 
 even David was reduced in time to saying, but Tommy 
 replied, cheerily, "Not a bit of it." Every morning he 
 had to begin at the same place as on the previous morn- 
 ing, and he was always as ready to do it, and as patient, 
 as if this were the first time. 
 
 " I think she is a little more herself to-day," he would 
 say, determinedly, till David wondered to hear him. 
 " She makes no progress, Sandys." 
 " I can at least keep her from slipping back." 
 And he did, and there is no doubt that this was what 
 saved Grizel in the end. How he strove to prevent her 
 
tommy's best "WORK 456 
 
 slipping back ! The morning was the time when she 
 was least troubled, and had he humored her then they 
 would often have been easy hours for him. But it was 
 the time when he tried, most doggedly, with a gen- 
 tleness she could not ruffle, to teach her the alphabet 
 of who she was. She coaxed him to let her off those 
 mental struggles; she turned petulant and sulky; she 
 was willing to be good and sweet if he would permit 
 her to sew or to sing to herself instead, or to sit 
 staring at the fire, but he would not yield ; he promised 
 those things as the reward, and in the end she stood 
 before him like a child at lessons. 
 
 " What is your name ? " The catechism always 
 began thus. 
 
 " Grizel," she said, obediently, if it was a day when 
 she wanted to please him. 
 
 " And my name ? " 
 
 " Tommy." Once to his great delight she said, " Sen- 
 timental Tommy." He quite bragged about this to 
 David. 
 
 " Where is your home ? " 
 
 "Here." She was never in doubt about this, and 
 it was always a pleasure to her to say it. 
 
 " Did you live here long ago ? " 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 "And then did you live for a long time somewhere 
 else ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
466 TOMMY ASTD GBIZBL 
 
 " Where was it ? " 
 
 " Here." 
 
 "No, it was with the old doctor. You were his 
 little housekeeper, don't you remember ? Try to re= 
 member, Grizel, he loved you so much." 
 
 She tried to think. Her face was very painful when 
 she tried to think. " It hurts," she said. 
 
 " Do you remember him, Grizel ? " 
 
 "Please let me sing," she begged, "such a sweet 
 song ! " 
 
 "Do you remember the old doctor who called you 
 his little housekeeper ? He used to sit in that chair." 
 
 The old chair was among Grizel's many possessions 
 that had been brought to Double Dykes, and her 
 face lit up with recollection. She ran to the chair and 
 kissed it. 
 
 " What was his name, Grizel ? " 
 
 " I should love to know his name," she said, wistfully. 
 
 He told her the name many times, and she repeated it 
 docilely. 
 
 Or perhaps she remembered her dear doctor quite well 
 to-day, and thought Tommy was some one in need of his 
 services. 
 
 " He has gone into the country," she said, as she had 
 so often said to anxious people at the door, "but he 
 won't be long, and I shall give him your message the 
 moment he comes in." 
 
 But Tommy would not pass that. He explained to 
 
tommy's best work 45'7 
 
 her agaib and again that the doctor was dead, and per. 
 haps she would rememberj or perhaps without remem- 
 bering she said she was glad he was dead. 
 
 "Why are you glad, Grizel ? " 
 
 She whispered as if frightened she might be overheard> 
 (' I don't want him to see me like this." It was one of 
 the pathetic things about her that she seemed at times 
 to have some vague understanding of her condition, and 
 then she would sob. Her teats were anguish to hinij 
 but it was at those times that she clung to him as if she 
 knew he was trying to do something for her, and that 
 encouraged him to go on. He went over, step by stepj 
 the tittle when she lived alone in the doctor's house, the 
 time of his own coming back, her love for him and his 
 treatment of her, the story of the garnet ring, her com- 
 ing to Switzerland, her terrible walk) her return ; he 
 would miss out nothing, for he was fighting for her. 
 Day after day, month by month, it went on, and to-mor- 
 row, perhaps, she would insist that the old doctor and 
 this man who asked her so many questions were one. 
 And Tommy argued with her until he had driven that 
 notion dut, to make way for another, and then he fought 
 it, and so on and on all round the circle of her delusions, 
 day by day and month by month. 
 
 She knew that he sometimes wrote while she was 
 asleep, for she might start up from hef bed or from the 
 sofa, and there he was, laying down his pen to come to 
 her. Her eyes were never open for any large fraction 
 
458 TOMMY AlTD GKIZBL 
 
 of a minute without his knowing, and immediately he 
 went to her, nodding and smiling lest she had wakened 
 with some fear upon her. Perhaps she refused to sleep 
 again unless he promised to put away those horrid papers 
 for the night, and however intoxicating a point he had 
 reached in his labors, he always promised, and kept his 
 word. He was most scrupulous in keeping any promise 
 he made her, and one great result was that she trusted 
 him implicitly. Whatever others promised, she doubted 
 them. 
 
 There were times when she seemed to be casting about 
 in her mind for something to do that would please him, 
 and then she would bring pieces of paper to him, and 
 pen and ink, and tell him to write. She though: this 
 very clever of her, and expected to be praised for it. 
 
 But she might also bring him writing materials at 
 times when she hated him very much. Then there 
 would be sly smiles, even pretended affection on her 
 face, unless she thought he was not looking, when she 
 cast him ugly glances. Her intention was to trick him 
 into forgetting her so that she might talk to herself or 
 slip out of the room to the den just as her mother had 
 done in the days when it was Grizel who had to be 
 tricked. He would not let her talk to herself until he 
 had tried endless ways of exorcising that demon, by in- 
 teresting her in some sort of work, by going out with 
 her, by talking of one thing and another, till at last a 
 subject was lit upon that made her forget to brood. 
 
tommy's best work 459 
 
 But sometimes it seemed best to let her go to the den, 
 she was in such a quiver of desire to go. She hurried 
 to it, so that he had to stride to keep up with her, and 
 he said little until they got there, for she was too excited 
 to listen. She was very like her mother again; but it 
 was not the man who never came that she went in search 
 of, it was a lost child. I have not the heart to tell of 
 the pitiful scenes in the den while Grizel searched for 
 her child. They always ended in those two walking 
 silently home, and for a day or two Grizel would be 
 ill, and Tommy tended her, so that she was soon able to 
 hasten to the den again, holding out her arms as she ran. 
 
 '■' She makes no progress," David said. 
 
 "I can keep her from slipping back," Tommy still 
 replied. The doctor marvelled, but even he did not 
 know the half of all her husband did for Grizel. None 
 could know half who was not there by night. Here at 
 least was one day ending placidly, they might say when 
 she was in a tractable mood, so tractable that she seemed 
 to be one of themselves, and Tommy assented brightly, 
 though he knew, and he alone, that you could never be 
 sure the long day had ended till the next began. 
 
 Often the happiest beginning had the most painful 
 ending. The greatest pleasure he could give her was 
 to take her to see Elspeth's baby girl or that sturdy 
 rogue, young Shiacb, who could now count with ease 
 up to seven, but swayed at eight and toppled over on 
 his way to ten ; or their mothers brought them to her, 
 
460 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 and Grizel understood quite well who her visitors were, 
 sometimes even called Elspeth by her right name, and 
 did the honors of her house irreproachably, and presided 
 at the tea-table, and was rapture personified when she 
 held the baby Jean (called after Tommy's mother), 
 and sat gayly on the floor ready to catch little Corp 
 when he would not stop at seven. But Tommy, whom 
 nothing escaped, knew with what depression she might 
 pay for her joy when they had gone. Despite all his 
 efforts she might sit talking to herself, at first of 
 pleasant things and then of things less pleasant. Or 
 she stared at her reflection in the long mirror, and 
 said, " Is n't she sweet ! " or *' She is not really sweet, 
 and she did so want to be good ! " or instead of that 
 she would suddenly go upon her knees, and say, with 
 clasped hands, the childish prayer : " Save me from 
 masterful men," which Jean Myles had told Tommy 
 to teach Elspeth. No one could have looked less mas- 
 terful at those times than Tommy, but Grizel did not 
 seem to think so. And probably they had that night 
 once more to search the den. 
 
 " The children do her harm ; she must not see them 
 again," he decided. 
 
 " They give her pleasure at the time," David said ; 
 " it lightens your task now and then." 
 
 " It is the future I am thinking of, Gemmell. If she 
 cannot progress she shall not fall back. As for me, 
 never mind me." 
 
tommy's best "woek 461 
 
 " Elspeth is in a sad state about you, though ! And 
 you can get through so little work." 
 
 " Enough for all our wants." He was writing maga- 
 zine papers only. 
 
 "The public will forget you." 
 
 " They have forgotten me." 
 
 David was openly sorry for him now. " If only your 
 manuscript had been saved.*' 
 
 " Tes, I never thought the little gods would treat me 
 so seurvily as that." 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 " Did I never tell you of my little gods ? 1 so often 
 emerged triumphant from my troubles, and so undo* 
 servedly, that I thought I Was especially looked after 
 by certain tricky spirits in return for the entertainment 
 I gave them. My little gods I called them, and we had 
 quite a bowing acquaintance. But you see at the criti- 
 cal moment they flew away, laughing." 
 
 He always knew that the lost manuscript was his 
 great work. " My seventh wave," he called it ; " and 
 though all the conditions were favorable," he said, "I 
 know that I Could run to nothing more than little waves 
 at present. As for re-writing that book, I can't. I have 
 tried." 
 
 Yet he was not asking for commiseration. "Tell 
 Elspeth not to worty about me. If I have no big ideas 
 just now I have some very passable little ones, and one 
 in particiilar that " — he drew a great breath ! " If 
 
462 TOMMY AJ!ID GEIZEL 
 
 ouly Grizel were better," that breath said, "I think 
 Tommy Sandys could find a way of making the public 
 remember him again." 
 
 So David interpreted it, and though he had been about 
 to say, " How changed you are ! " he did not say it. 
 
 And Tommy, who had been keeping an eye on her all 
 this time, returned to Grizel. As she had been through 
 that long year so she was during the first half of the 
 next, and day by day and night by night he tended 
 her, and still the same scenes were enacted in infinite 
 variety, and still he would not give in. Everything 
 seemed to change with the seasons, except Grizel, and 
 Tommy's devotion to her. 
 
 Yet you know that she recovered, ever afterward to 
 be herself again, and though it seemed to come in the 
 end as suddenly as the sight may be restored by the 
 removal of a bandage, I suppose it had been going on 
 all the time, and that her reason was given back to her 
 on the day she had strength to make use of it. Tommy 
 was the instrument of her recovery. He had fought 
 against her slipping backward so that she could not do 
 it ; it was as if he had built a wall behind her, and in 
 time her mind accepted that wall as impregnable and 
 took a forward movement. And with every step she took 
 he pushed the wall after her, so that still if she moved 
 it must be forward. Thus Grizel progressed impercep- 
 tibly as along a dark corridor toward the door that shut 
 out the light, and on a day in early spring the door fell. 
 
tommy's best work 463 
 
 Many of them had cried for a shock as her only chance. 
 But it came most quietly. She had lain down on the 
 sofa that afternoon to rest, and when she woke she was 
 G-rizel again. At first she was not surprised to find her- 
 self in that room nor to see that man nodding and smil- 
 ing reassuringly ; they had come out of the long dream 
 with her to make the awakening less abrupt. 
 
 He did not know what had happened.' When he 
 knew, a terror that this could not last seized him ; he 
 was concealing it while he answered her puzzled ques- 
 tions ; all the time he was telling her how they came to 
 be there he was watching in agony for the change. 
 
 She remembered everything up to her return to 
 Thrums ; then she walked into a mist. 
 
 " The truth," she begged of him, when he would have 
 let her off by pretending that she had been ill only. 
 Surely it was the real Grizel who begged for the truth. 
 She took his hand and held it when he told her of their 
 marriage. She cried softly because she feared that she 
 might again become as she had been, but he said that 
 was impossible, and smiled confidently, and all the time 
 he was watching in agony for the change. 
 
 " Do you forgive me, Grizel ? I have always had a 
 dread that when you recovered you would cease to care 
 for me." He knew that this would please her if she 
 was the reg,l Grizel, and he was so anxious to make her 
 happy for ever more. 
 
 She put his hand to her lips and smiled at him through 
 
464 TOMMY AND GEIZBL 
 
 her teare. Hers was a love that could never change. 
 Suddenly she sat up. " Whose baby was it ? " she 
 asked. 
 
 " I don't know what you mean, Grizel," he said, 
 uneasily. 
 
 "I remember vaguely," she told him, "a baby in white 
 whom I seemed to chase, but I could never catch her. 
 Was it a dream only ? " 
 
 "You are thinking of Elspeth's little girl perhaps. 
 She was often brought to see you." 
 
 '* Has Elspeth a baby ? " She rose to go exultantly to 
 Elspeth. 
 
 " But too small a baby, Grizel, to run from you, even 
 if she wanted to." 
 
 " What is she like ? " 
 
 " She is always laughing." 
 
 " The sweet ! " Grizel rocked her arms in rapture and 
 smiled her crooked smile at the thought of a child who 
 was always laughing. " But I don't remember her," she 
 said. " It was a sad little baby I seemed to see." 
 
CHAPTER XXXIII 
 
 THE LITTLE GODS KETUBN WITH A LADY 
 
 Gkizel's clear, searching eyes, that were always 
 asking for the truth, came back to her, and I seem to see 
 them on me now, watching lest I shirk the end. 
 
 Thus I can make no pretence (to please you) that it 
 was a new Tommy at last ; we have seen how he gave his 
 life to her during those eighteen months, but he could 
 not make himself anew. They say we can do it, so I 
 suppose he did not try hard enough. But God knows 
 how hard he tried. 
 
 He went on trying. In those first days she sometimes 
 asked him, " Did you do it out of love, or was it pity 
 only?" And he always said it was love. He said it 
 adoringly. He told her all that love meant to him, and 
 it meant everything that he thought Grizel would like it 
 to mean. When she ceased to ask this question he 
 thought it was because he had convinced her. 
 
 They had a honeymoon by the sea. He insisted upon 
 it with boyish eagerness, and as they walked on the 
 links or sat in their room he would exclaim, ecstatically, 
 " How happy I am ! I wonder if there were ever two 
 people quite so happy as you and I ! " 
 
 30 
 
466 TOMMY AND GKIZBI/ 
 
 And if he waited for an answer, as he usually did, she 
 might smile lightly and say, "Few people have gone 
 through so much." 
 
 " Is there any woman in the world, Grizel, with whom 
 you would change places ? " 
 
 "No, none," she said, at once, and when he was sure 
 of it, but never until he was sure, he would give his 
 mind a little holiday, and then, perhaps, those candid 
 eyes would rest searchingly upon him, but always with a 
 brave smile ready should he chance to look up. 
 
 And it was just the same when they returned to 
 Double Dykes, which they added to and turned into a 
 comfortable home: Tommy trying to become a lover by 
 taking thought, and Grizel not letting on that it could 
 not be done in that way. She thought it was very sweet 
 of him to try so hard ; sweeter of him than if he really had 
 loved her, though not of course quite so sweet to her. 
 He was a boy only. She knew that, despite all he had 
 gone through, he was still a boy. And boys cannot love. 
 Oh, who would be so cruel as to ask a boy to love ? 
 
 That Grizel's honeymoon should never end was his 
 grand ambition, and he took elaborate precautions 
 against becoming a matter-of-fact husband. Every 
 morning he ordered himself to gaze at her with rapture, 
 as if he had wakened to the glorious thought that she 
 was his wife. 
 
 " I can't help it, Grizel ; it comes to me every morning 
 with the same shock of delight, and I begin the day 
 
THE LITTLE GODS BETUBN WITH A LADY 467 
 
 with a song of joy. You make the world as fresh and in- 
 teresting to me as if I had just broken like a chicken 
 through the egg-shell." He rose at the earliest hours. 
 " So that I can have the longer day with you," he said, 
 
 gayiy. 
 
 If when sitting at his work he forgot her for an hour 
 or two he reproached himself for it afterward, and next 
 day he was more careful. " Grizel," he would cry, sud- 
 denly flinging down his pen, " you are my wife ! Do 
 you hear me, madam ? You hear, and yet you can sit 
 there calmly darning socks! Excuse me," he would 
 say to his work, "while I do a dance." 
 
 He rose impulsively and brought his papers nearer 
 her. With a table between them she was several feet 
 away from him, which was more, he said, than he could 
 endure. 
 
 "Sit down for a moment, Grizel, and let me look at 
 you. I want to write something most splendiferous 
 to-day, and I am sure to find it in your face. 1 have 
 ceased to be an original writer; all the purple patches 
 are cribbed from you." 
 
 He made a point of taking her head in his hands and 
 looking long at her with thoughts too deep for utterance. 
 Then he would fall on his knees and kiss the hem of her 
 dress, and so back to his book again. 
 
 And in time it was all sweet to Grizel. She could not 
 be deceived, but she loved to see him playing so kind a 
 part, and after some sadness to which she could not 
 
468 TOMMY Am) GBIZBL 
 
 help giving way she put all vain longings aside. She 
 folded them up and put them away like the beautiful 
 linen, so that she might see more clearly what was left 
 to her and how best to turn it to account. 
 
 He did not love her. "Not as I love him," she said 
 to herself. "Not as married people ought to love, but 
 in the other way he loves me dearly." By the other way 
 she meant that he loved her as he loved Elspeth, and 
 loved them both just as he had loved them when all 
 three played in the den. 
 
 "He would love me if he could." She was certain of 
 that. She decided that love does not come to all people, 
 as is the common notion ; that there are some who cannot 
 fall in love, and that he was one of them. He was com- 
 plete in himself, she decided. 
 
 '•' Is it a pity for him that he married me ? It would 
 be a pity if he could love some other woman, but I am 
 sure he could never do that. If he could love anyone it 
 would be me, we both want it so much. He does not 
 need a wife, but he needs some one to take care of him. 
 All men need that, and I can do it much better than any 
 other person. Had he not married me he never would 
 have married, but he may fall ill, and then how useful I 
 shall be to him ! He will grow old, and perhaps it won't 
 be quite so lonely to him when I am there. It would 
 have been a pity for him to marry me if I had been a 
 foolish woman, who asked for more love than he can give, 
 but I shall never do that, so I think it is not a pity. 
 
THE LITTLE GODS BETDEN WITH A LADY 469 
 
 "Is it a pity for me ? Oh, no, no, no ! 
 
 "Is he sorry he did it ? At times, is he just a weeny 
 bit sorry ? " She watched him, and decided rightly that 
 he was not sorry the weeniest bit. It was a sweet consola- 
 tion to her. "Is he really happy ? Yes, of course he is 
 happy when he is writing ; but is he quite contented at 
 other times ? I do honestly think he is. And if he is 
 happy now, how much happier I shall be able to make 
 him when I have put away all my selfish thoughts and 
 think only of him." 
 
 " The most exquisite thing in human life is to be mar- 
 ried to one who loves you as you love him." There 
 could be no doubt of that. But she saw also that the 
 next best thing was the kind of love this boy gave to her, 
 and she would always be grateful for the second best. 
 In her prayers she thanked God for giving it to her, and 
 promised Him to try to merit it, and all day and every 
 day she kept her promise. There could not have been a 
 brighter or more energetic wife than Grizel. The amount 
 of work she found to do in that small house, which his 
 devotion had made so dear to her that she could not 
 leave it ! Her gayety ! Her masterful airs when he 
 wanted something that was not good for him ! The art- 
 fulness with which she sought to help him in various 
 matters without his knowing ; her satisfaction when he 
 caught her at it, as clever Tommy was constantly doing ! 
 " What a success it has turned out ! " David would say 
 delightedly to himself, and Grizel was almost as jubilant 
 
470 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 because it was so far from being a failure. It was only 
 sometimes in the night that she lay very still with little 
 wells of water on her eyes and through them saw one, 
 the dream of woman, who she feared could never be hers. 
 That boy Tommy never knew why she did not want to 
 have a child. He thought that for the present she was 
 afraid, but the reason was that she believed it would be 
 wicked when he did not love her as she loved him. She 
 could not be sure, she had to think it all out for herself; 
 with little wells of sadness on her eyes she prayed in 
 the still night to God to tell her, but she could never 
 hear His answer. 
 
 She no longer sought to teach Tommy how he should 
 write ; that quaint desire was abandoned from the day 
 when she learned that she had destroyed his greatest 
 work. She had not destroyed it, as we shall see, but she 
 presumed she had, as Tommy thought so. He had tried 
 to conceal this from her to save her pain, but she had 
 found it out, and it seemed to Grizel, grown distrustful 
 of herself, that the man who could bear such a loss as he 
 had borne it was best left to write as he chose. 
 
 " It was not that I did not love your books," she said, 
 "but that I loved you more, and I thought they did 
 you harm." 
 
 "In the days when I had wings," he answered, and 
 she smiled. "Any feathers left, do you think, Grizel ?" 
 he asked jocularly and turned his shoulders to her 
 for examination. 
 
THE LITTLE GODS EETUEN WITH A LADY 471 
 
 "A great many, sir," she said, "and I am glad. I 
 used to want to pull them all out, but now I like to 
 know that they are still there, for it means that you 
 remain among the facts not because you can't fly, but 
 because you won't." 
 
 " I still have my little fights with myself," he blurted 
 out boyishly, though it was a thing he had never 
 meant to tell her, and Grizel pressed his hand for 
 telling her what she already knew so well. 
 
 The new book, of course, was "The Wandering 
 Child." I wonder whether any of you read it now. 
 Your fathers and mothers thought a great deal of 
 that slim volume, but it would make little stir in an 
 (^age in which all the authors are trying who can say 
 Damn loudestJ It is but a reverie about a child who 
 was lost, and his parents search for him in terror of 
 what may have befallen. But they find him in a wood 
 singing joyfully to himself because he is free ; and he 
 fears to be caged again, so runs farther from them into 
 the wood and is running still, singing to himself because 
 he is free, free, free. That is really all, but T. Sandys 
 knew how to tell it. The moment he conceived the 
 idea (we have seen him speaking of it to the doctor) 
 he knew that it was the idea for him. He forgot at 
 once that he did not really care for children. He said 
 reverently to himself, "I can pull it off," and, as was 
 always the way with him, the better he pulled it ofE the 
 more he seemed to love them. 
 
472 TOMMY AND 6RIZBL 
 
 " It is myself who is writing at last, Grizel," he said, 
 as he read it to her. 
 
 She thought (and you can guess whether she was 
 right) that it was the book he loved rather than the 
 children. She thought (and you can guess again) that 
 it was not his ideas about children that had got into the 
 book, but hers. But she did not say so. She said it 
 was the sweetest of his books to her. 
 
 I have heard of another reading he gave. This was 
 after the publication of the book. He had gone into 
 Corp's house one Sunday, and Gavinia was there read- 
 ing the work to her lord and master, while little Corp 
 disported on the floor. She read as if all the words 
 meant the same thing, and it was more than Tommy 
 could endure. He read for her, and his eyes grew 
 moist as he read, for it was the most exquisite of his 
 chapters about the lost child. You would have said that 
 no one loved children quite so much as T. Sandys. But 
 little Corp would not keep quiet, and suddenly Tommy 
 jumped up and boxed his ears. He then proceeded 
 with the reading while Gavinia glowered and Corp 
 senior scratched his head. 
 
 On the way home he saw what had happened, and 
 laughed at the humor of it, then grew depressed, then 
 laughed recklessly. " Is it. Sentimental Tommy still?" 
 he said to himself, with a groan. Seldom a week 
 passed without his being reminded in some such sud- 
 den way that it was Sentimental Tommy still. "But 
 
THE LITTLE GODS BETXJRN WITH A LADY 473 
 
 she shall never know ! " he vowed, and he continued to 
 be half a hero. 
 
 His name was once more in many mouths. "Come 
 back and be made of more than ever ! " cried that 
 society which he had once enlivened ; " come and hear 
 the pretty things we are saying about you. Come and 
 make the prettier replies that are already on the tip 
 of your tongue, for oh, Tommy, you know they are ! 
 Bring her with you if you must; but don't you think 
 that the nice, quiet country with the thingumbobs all 
 in bloom would suit her best ? It is essential that 
 you should run up to see your publisher, is it not? 
 The men have dinners for you if you want them, but 
 we know you don't ; your yearning eyes are on the ladies, 
 Tommy ; we are making up theatre-parties of the old 
 entrancing kind ; you should see our new gowns ; please 
 come back and help us to put on our cloaks, Tommy ; 
 there is a dance on Monday, come and sit it out with 
 us ; do you remember the garden-party where you said 
 — well, the laurel walk is still there ; the beauties of 
 two years ago are still here, and there are new beauties 
 and their noses are slightly tilted, but no man can 
 move them — ha, do you pull yourself together at that ! 
 We were always the reward for your labors, Tommy ; 
 your books are move one in the game of making love 
 to us j don't be afraid that we shall forget it is a game ; 
 we know it is, and that is why we suit you ; come and 
 play in London as you used to play in the den. It 
 
474 TOMMY AND GBIZBL 
 
 is all you need of women ; come and have your fill, 
 and we shall send you back refreshed. We are not 
 asking you to be disloyal to her, only to leave her 
 happy and contented and take a holiday." 
 
 He heard their seductive voices. They danced around 
 him in numbers, for they knew that the more there were 
 of them the better he would be pleased; they whis- 
 pered in his ear and then ran away looking over their 
 shoulders. But he would not budge. 
 
 There was one more dangerous than the rest. Her he 
 saw before the others came and after they had gone. 
 She was a tall, incredibly slight woman with eyelashes 
 that needed help and a most disdainful mouth and nose, 
 and she seemed to look scornfully at Tommy and then 
 stand waiting. He was in two minds about what she 
 was waiting for, and often he had a fierce desire to go to 
 London to find out. But he never went. He played the 
 lover to Grizel as before, not to intoxicate himself, 
 but always to make life sunnier to her; if she stayed 
 longer with Elspeth than the promised time, he became 
 anxious and went in search of her. " I have not been 
 away an hour ! " she said, laughing at him, holding 
 little Jean up to laugh at him. "But I cannot do with- 
 out you for an hour," he answered, ardently. He still 
 laid down his pen to gaze with rapture at her and cry, 
 "My wife!" 
 
 She wanted him to go to London for a change, and 
 without her, and his heart leaped into his mouth to 
 
HE HEARD THEIR SEDUCTIVE VOICES. THEY DANCED AROUND HIM 
 IN NUMBERS 
 
THE LITTLE GODS RETURN WITH A LADY 476 
 
 prevent his saying no. Yet lie said it, thougli in the 
 Tommy way. 
 
 "Without you ! " he exclaimed. "Oh, Gnzel, do you 
 think I could find happiness apart from you for a day ! 
 And could you let me go ! " And he looked with ago- 
 nized reproach at her, and sat down clutching his head. 
 " It would be very hard to me," she said, softly, " but 
 
 if the change did you good " 
 
 "A change from you! Oh, Grizel, Grizel ! " 
 " Or I could go with you ? " 
 
 " When you don't want to go ! " he cried, huskily. 
 "You think I could ask it of you!" 
 
 He quite broke down, and she had to comfort him. 
 She was smiling divinely at him all the time, as if sym- 
 pathy had brought her to love even the Tommy way of 
 saying things. " I thought it would be sweet to you to 
 see how great my faith in you is now,'' she said. 
 
 That was the true reason why generous Grizel had 
 proposed to him to go. She knew he was more afraid 
 than she of Sentimental Tommy, and she thought her 
 faith would be a helping hand to him, as it was. 
 
 He had no regard for Lady Pippinworth. Of all the 
 women he had dallied with she was the one he liked the 
 least, for he never liked where he could not esteem. 
 Perhaps she had some good in her, but the good in 
 her had never appealed to him, and he knew it, and 
 refused to harbor her in his thoughts now ; he cast her 
 out determinedly when she seemed to enter them un- 
 
476 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 bidden. But still he was vain. She came disdain- 
 fully and stood waiting. We have seen him wondering 
 what she waited for, but though he could not be sure, 
 and so was drawn to her, he took it as acknowledgment 
 of his prowess and so was helped to run away. 
 
 To walk away would be the more exact term, for his 
 favorite method of exorcising this lady was to rise from 
 his chair and take a long walk with Grizel. Occasion- 
 ally if she was occupied (and a number of duties our busy 
 Grizel found to hand !) he walked alone, and he would 
 not let himself brood ; someone had once walked from 
 Thrums to the top of the Law and back in three hours, 
 and Tommy made several gamesome attempts to beat 
 the record, setting out to escape that willowy woman, 
 soon walking her down and returning in a glow of 
 animal spirits. It was on one of these occasions when 
 there was nothing in his head but ambition to do the 
 fifth mile within the eleven minutes that he suddenly 
 met her ladyship face to face. 
 
 We have now come to the last fortnight of Tommy's 
 life. 
 
CHAPTER XXXIV 
 
 A WAY IS FOUND FOB TOMMY 
 
 The moment for which he had tried to prepare himself 
 was come aad Tommy gulped down his courage, which 
 had risen suddenly to his mouth, leaving his chest in 
 a panic. Outwardly he seemed unmoved, but within he 
 was beating to arms. " This is the test of us," all that 
 was good in him cried as it answered his summons. 
 
 They began by shaking hands, as is always the custom 
 in the ring. Then without any preliminary sparring. 
 Lady Pippinworth immediately knocked him down. 
 That is to say, she remarked, with a little laugh, " How 
 very stout you are getting ! " 
 
 I swear by all the gods that it was untrue. He had 
 not got very stout, though undeniably he had got stouter. 
 "How well you are looking," would have been a very 
 ladylike way of saying it, but his girth was best not 
 referred to at all. Those who liked him had learned this 
 long ago, and Grizel always shifted the buttons without 
 comment. 
 
 Her malicious ladyship had found his one weak spot 
 at once. He had a reply ready for every other opening 
 in the English tongue, but now he could writhe only. 
 
 Who would have expected to meet her here, he said 
 
478 TOMMY AJiTD GEIZEL 
 
 at last, feebly. She explained, and he had guessed it al- 
 ready, that she was again staying with the Erintonls. The 
 castle, indeed, was not half a mile from where they stood. 
 
 " But I think I really came to see you," she informed 
 him with engaging frankness. 
 
 It was very good of her, he intimated, stifB.y, but the 
 stiffness was chiefly because she was still looking in an 
 irritating way at his waist. 
 
 Suddenly she looked up. To Tommy it was as if she 
 had raised the siege. " Why are n't you nice to me ? " 
 she asked, prettily. 
 
 " I want to be," he replied. 
 
 She showed him a way. "When I saw you steaming 
 toward the castle so swiftly," she said, dropping badi- 
 nage, " the hope entered my head that you had heard of 
 my arrival." 
 
 She had come a step nearer and it was like an invita^ 
 tion to return to the arbor. " This is the test of us," aU 
 that was good in Tommy cried once more to him. 
 
 " !N"o, I had not heard," he replied, bravely if baldly. 
 "I was taking a smart walk only." 
 
 " Why so smart as that ? " 
 
 He hesitated, and her eyes left his face and travelled 
 downward. 
 
 " Were you trying to walk it off ? " she asked, sym- 
 pathetically. 
 
 He was stung, and replied, in words that were regretted 
 as soon as spoken, " I was trying to walk you off." 
 
A WAY IS FOUND FOK TOMMY 479 
 
 A smile of satisfaction crossed her impudent face. 
 
 " I succeeded," he added, sharply. 
 
 " How cruel of you to say so, when you had made me 
 so very happy ! Do you often take smart walks, Mr. 
 Sandys ? " 
 
 " Often." 
 
 " And always with me ? " 
 
 " I leave you behind." 
 
 " With Mrs. Sandys ? " 
 
 Had she seemed to be in the least affected by their 
 meeting it would have been easy to him to be a contrite 
 man at once ; any sign of shame on her part would have 
 filled him with desire to take all the blame upon him- 
 self ; had she cut him dead he would have begun to 
 respect her. But she smiled disdainfully only, and 
 stood waiting. She was still, as ever, a cold passion, 
 inviting his warm ones to leap at it. He shuddered a 
 little, but controlled himself and did not answer her. 
 
 " I suppose she is the lady of the arbor ? " Lady Pip- 
 pinworth inquired, with mild interest. 
 
 " She is the lady of my heart," Tommy replied, 
 valiantly. 
 
 "Alas!" said Lady Pippinworth, putting her hand 
 over her own. 
 
 But he felt himself more secure now, and could even 
 smile at the woman for thinking she was able to provoke 
 him. 
 
 " Look upon me," she requested, " as a deputation sent 
 north to discover why you have gone into hiding." 
 
480 TOMMY- AND GRIZEL 
 
 " I suppose a country life does seem exile to you," he 
 replied, calmly, and suddenly his bosom rose with pride 
 in what was coming. Tommy always heard his finest 
 things coming a moment before they came. " If I have 
 retired," he went on, windily, "from the insincerities 
 and glitter of life in town " — but it was not his face 
 she was looking at, it was his waist; "the reason is 
 obvious," he rapped out. 
 
 She nodded assent without raising her eyes. 
 
 Yet he still controlled himself. His waist, like some 
 fair tortured lady of romance, was calling to his knight- 
 hood for defence, but with the truer courage he affected 
 not to hear. " I am in hiding, as you call it," he said, 
 doggedly, "because my life here is such a round of 
 happiness as I never hoped to find on earth, and I 
 owe it all to my wife. If you don't believe me ask 
 Lord or Lady Kintoul, or any other person in this 
 countryside who knows her." 
 
 But her ladyship had already asked and been annoyed 
 by the answer. 
 
 She assured Tommy that she believed he was happy. 
 "I have often heard," she said, musingly, "that the 
 stout people are the happiest." 
 
 " I am not so stout," he barked. 
 
 " Now I call that brave of you," said she, admiringly. 
 "That is so much the wisest way to take it. And 
 I am sure you are right not to return to town after 
 what you were ; it would be a pity. Somehow it " — 
 
A WAY IS FOiraD FOR TOMMY 481 
 
 and agaia her eyes were on the wrong place — " it does 
 not seem to go with the books. And yet," she said, 
 philosophically, " I daresay you feel ]ust the same ? " 
 
 " I feel very much the same," he replied, warningly. 
 
 "That is the tragedy of it," said she. 
 
 She told him that the new book had brought the 
 Tommy Society to life again. " And it could not. hold 
 its meetings with the old enthusiasm, could it," she 
 asked, sweetly, " if you came back ? Oh, I think you 
 act most judiciously. Fancy how melancholy if they 
 had to announce that the society had been wound up 
 owing to the stoutness of the Master." 
 
 Tommy's mouth opened twice before any words could 
 come out. " Take care ! " he cried. 
 
 " Of what ? " said she, curling her lip. 
 
 He begged her pardon. " You don't like me, Lady 
 Pippin worth," he said, watching himself, "and I don't 
 wonder at it, and you have discovered a way of hurting 
 me of which you make rather unmerciful use. Well, 
 I don't wonder at that either. If I am — stoutish, I 
 have at least the satisfaction of knowing that it gives 
 you entertainment, and I owe you that amend and 
 more." He was really in a fury, and burning to go 
 on — "Por I did have the whiphand of you once, 
 Madam," etc., etc., but by a fine effort he held his 
 rage a prisoner, and the admiration of himself that 
 this engendered lifted him into the sublime. 
 
 "Tor I so far forgot myself," said Tommy, in a glow, 
 31 
 
482 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 "as to try to make you love me. You were beautiful 
 and cold ; no man had ever stirred you ; my one excuse 
 is that to be loved by such as you was no small am- 
 bition; my fitting punishment is that I failed." He 
 knew he had not failed and so could be magnanimous. 
 " I failed utterly," he said, with grandeur. " You were 
 laughing at me all the time ; if proof of it were needed 
 you have given it now by coming here to mock me. I 
 thought I was stronger than you, but I was ludicrously 
 mistaken, and you taught me a lesson I richly deserved ; 
 you did me good and I thank you for it. Believe me, 
 Lady Pippinworth, when I say that I admit my dis- 
 comfiture and remain your very humble and humbled 
 servant." 
 
 Now was not that good of Tommy ? You would 
 think it still better were I to tell you what part of his 
 person she was looking at while he said it. 
 
 He held out his hand generously (there was no noble 
 act he could not have performed for her just now), but, 
 whatever her ladyship wanted, it was not to say good- 
 by. " Do you mean that you never cared for me ? " 
 she asked, with the tremor that always made Tommy 
 kind, 
 
 "Never cared for you!" he exclaimed, fervently. 
 " What were you not to me in those golden days ! " 
 It was really a magnanimous cry, meant to help her 
 self-respect, nothing more, but it alarmed the good in 
 him and he said, sternly : " But of course that is all 
 
A "WAY IS FOUND FOE TOMMY 483 
 
 over now. It is only a sweet memory," lie added, to 
 make these two remarks mix. 
 
 The sentiment of this was so agreeable to him that he 
 was half thinking of raising her hand chivalrously to his 
 lips when Lady Pippinworth said : 
 
 " But if it is all over now why have you still to walk 
 me off ? " 
 
 " Have you never had to walk me off ? " said Tommy, 
 forgetting himself, and to his surprise she answered, 
 "Yes." 
 
 "But this meeting has cured me," she said, with dan- 
 gerous graciousness. 
 
 "Dear Lady Pippinworth," replied Tommy, ardently, 
 thinking that his generosity had touched her, " if any- 
 thing I have said " 
 
 " It is not so much what you have said," she answered, 
 and again she looked at the wrong part of him. 
 
 He gave way in the waist, and then drew himself ujj. 
 " If so little a thing as that helps you — " he began, 
 haughtily. 
 
 " Little ! " she cried, reproachfully. 
 
 He tried to go away. He turned. "There was a 
 time," he thundered. 
 
 " It is over," said she. 
 
 "When you were at my feet," said Tommy. 
 
 " It is over," she said. 
 
 " It could come again ! " 
 
 She laughed a contemptuous no. 
 
484 TOMMY ANB GEIZEL 
 
 " Yes ! " Tommy cried. 
 
 " Too stout,'' said she, with a drawl. 
 
 He went closer to her. She stood waiting, disdain- 
 fully, and his arms fell. 
 
 "Too stout," she repeated. 
 
 " Let us put it in that way, since it pleases you," said 
 Tommy, heavily. " I am too stout." He could not help 
 adding, "And be thankful. Lady Pippinworth, let us 
 both be thankful, that there is some reason to prevent 
 my trying." 
 
 She bowed mockingly as he raised his hat. " I wish 
 yon. well," he said, " and these are my last words to 
 you," and he retired not without distinction. He re- 
 tired, shall we say, as conscious of his waist as if it 
 were some poor soldier he was supporting from a 
 stricken field. He said many things to himself on the 
 way home and he was many Tommies, but all with the 
 same waist. It intruded on his noblest reflections, and 
 kept ringing up the worst iu him like some devil at the 
 telephone. 
 
 No one could have been more thankful that on the 
 whole he had kept his passions in check. It made 
 a strong man of him. It turned him into a joyous 
 boy and he tingled with hurrahs. Then suddenly he 
 would hear that jeering bell, clanging " Too stout, too 
 stout." " Take care ! " he roared. Oh, the vanity of 
 Tommy ! 
 
 He did not tell Grizel that he had met her ladyship. 
 
A WAT IS FOUND FOR TOMMY 485 
 
 All she knew was that he came back to her more tender 
 and kind, if that were possible, than he had gone away. 
 His eyes followed her about the room until she made 
 merry over it, and still they dwelt upon her, "How 
 much more beautiful you are than any other woman I 
 ever saw, Grizel," he said. And it was not only true, 
 but he knew it was true. What was Lady Pippinworth 
 beside this glorious woman ? what was her damnable 
 coldness compared to the love of Grizel ? Was he un- 
 forgivable, or was it some flaw in the making of him for 
 which he was not responsible ? With clenched hands 
 he asked himself these questions. This love that all his 
 books were about — what was it ? Was it a compromise 
 between afEection and passion countenanced by God for 
 the continuance of the race, made beautiful by Him 
 where the ingredients are in right proportion ; a flower 
 springing from a soil that is not all divine ? Ob, so 
 exquisite a flower, he cried, for he knew his Grizel. But 
 he could not love her. He gave her all his affection, 
 but his passion, like an outlaw, had ever to hunt, alone. 
 
 Was it that ? And if it was, did there remain in him 
 enough of humanity to give him the right to ask a little 
 sympathy of those who can love? So Tommy in his 
 despairing moods, and the question ought to find some 
 place in his epitaph, which, by the way, it is almost 
 time to write. 
 
 On the day following his meeting with Lady Pippin- 
 worth came a note from Lady Rintoul inviting Grizel 
 
486 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 and him to Imich. They had been to Eintoul once or 
 twice before, but this time Tommy said decisively, " We 
 sha'n't go ; " he guessed who had prompted the invitar 
 tion, though her name was not mentioned in it. 
 
 "Why not?" Grizel asked. She was always afraid 
 that she kept Tommy too much to herself. 
 
 "Because I object to being disturbed during the 
 honeymoon," he replied, lightly. Their honeymoon, you 
 know, was never to end. " They would separate us for 
 hours, Grizel. Think of it. But, pooh; the thing is not 
 to be thought of. Tell her ladyship courteously that she 
 must be mad." 
 
 But though he could speak thus to Grizel there came 
 to him tempestuous desires to be by the side of the 
 woman who could mock him and then stand waiting. 
 
 Had she shown any fear of him all would have 
 been well with Tommy. He could have kept away from 
 her complacently. But she had flung down the glove, 
 and laughed to see him edge away from it. He knew 
 exactly what was in her mind ; he was too clever not to 
 know that her one desire was to make him a miserable 
 Eian ; to remember how he had subdued and left her 
 would be gall to Lady Pippinworth until she achieved 
 the same triumph over him. How confident she was 
 that he could never prove the stronger of the two again ! 
 What were all her mockings but a beckoning to him to 
 come on ? " Take care ! " said Tommy, between his 
 teeth 
 
A WAT IS FOUND FOE TOMMY 487 
 
 And then again horror of himself would come to his 
 rescue. The man he had been a moment ago was vile to 
 him and all his thoughts were now heroic. Tou may 
 remember that he had once taken Grizel to a seaside 
 place ; they went there again. It was Tommy's pro- 
 posal, but he did not go to flee from temptation ; how- 
 ever his worse nature had been stirred and his vanity 
 pricked he was too determinedly Grizel's to fear that in 
 any fierce hour he might rush into danger. He wanted 
 Grizel to come away from the place where she always 
 found so much to do for him, so that there might be the 
 more for him to do for her. And that week was as the 
 time they had spent there before. All that devotion 
 which had to be planned could do for woman he did. 
 Grizel saw him planning it and never admitted that she 
 saw. In the after years it was sweet to her to recall 
 that week, and the hundred laboriously lover-like things 
 Tommy had done in it. She knew by this time that 
 Tommy had never tried to make.her love him, and that 
 it was only when her love for him revealed itself in the 
 den that desire to save her pride made him pretend to 
 be in love with her. This knowledge would have been a 
 great pain to her once, but now it had more of pleasure 
 in it, for it showed that even in those days he had 
 struggled a little for her. 
 
 We must hasten to the end. Those of you who took in 
 the newspapers a quarter of a century ago know what 
 it was, but none of you know why he climbed the wall. 
 
488 TOMMY AST) 6RIZEL 
 
 They retamed to Thrums in a week. They had 
 meant to stay longer, but suddenly Tommy wanted to go 
 back. Yes, it was Lady Pippinworth who recalled him, 
 but don't think too meanly of Tommy. It was not that 
 he yielded to one of those fierce desires to lift the gaunt- 
 let; he had got rid of them in fair fight when her letter 
 reached him, forwarded from Thrums. "Did you reaUy 
 think your manuscript was lost?" it said. That was 
 what took Tommy back. Grizel did not know the rea^- 
 son. He gave her another. He thought very little 
 about her that day. He thought still less about Lady 
 Pippinworth. How could he think of anything but it. 
 She had it, evidently she had it, she must have stolen 
 it from his bag. He could not even spare time to 
 denounce her. It was alive, his manuscript was alive, 
 and every moment brought him nearer to it He was a 
 miser, and soon his hands would be deep among the 
 gold. He was a mother whose son, mourned for dead, 
 is knocking at the doQr. He was a swain and his be- 
 loved's arms were outstretched to him. Who said that 
 Tommy could not love ? 
 
 The ecstasies that came over him and would not let 
 him sit stiU made Grizel wonder. " Is it a book ? " she 
 asked, and he said it was a book, such a book, Grizel ! 
 When he started for the castle next morning, she 
 thought he wanted to be alone to think of the book. 
 "Of it and you." he said, and having started he came 
 back to kiss her again; he never foi^ot to have an 
 
A WAY IS FOUND FOE TOMMY 489 
 
 impulse to do that. But all the way to the Spittal it 
 was of his book he thought, it was his book he was kiss- 
 ing. His heart sang within him, and the songs were 
 sonnets to his beloved. To be worthy of his beautiful 
 manuscript, he prayed for that as lovers do; that his 
 love should be his, his alone, was as wondrous to him as 
 to any of them. 
 
 But we are not noticing what proved to be the chief 
 thing. Though there was some sun the air was shrewd 
 and he was wearing the old doctor's coat. Should you 
 have taken it with you, Tommy ? It loved Grizel, for it 
 was a bit of him, and what, think you, would the old 
 doctor have cared for your manuscript had he known 
 that you were gone out to meet that woman ? It was 
 cruel, no, not cruel, but thoughtless, to wear the old doc- 
 tor's coat. 
 
 He found no one at the Spittal. The men were out 
 shooting, and the ladies had followed to lunch with 
 them on the moors. He came upon them, a gay party, 
 in the hollow of a hill where was a spring, suddenly 
 converted into a wine-cellar, and soon the men, if not 
 the ladies, were surprised to find that Tommy could be 
 the gayest of them all. He was in hilarious spirits, 
 and had a gallantly forgiving glance for the only one 
 of them who knew why his spirits were hilarious. 
 But he would not consent to remain to dinner. "The 
 wretch is so hopelessly in love with his wife," Lady 
 Jliiitoul said, flinging g, twig of heather at bini. It 
 
490 TOMMY AWD GEIZBL 
 
 was one of the many trivial things said on that occa- 
 sion and long remembered ; the only person who after- 
 ward professed her inability to remember what Tommy 
 said to her that day and she to him was Lady Pippin- 
 worth. " And yet you walked back to the castle with 
 him," they reminded her. 
 
 "If I had known that anything was to happen,'' 
 she replied, indolently, "I should have taken more 
 note of what was said. But as it was, 1 think we 
 talked of our chance of finding white heather. We were 
 looking for it, and that is why we fell behind you." 
 
 That was not why Tommy and her ladyship fell 
 behind the others, and it was not of white heather 
 that they talked. "Ton know why I am here, Alice," 
 he said, as soon as there was no one but her to hear 
 him. 
 
 She was in as great tension at that moment as he, 
 but more anxious not to show it. "Why do you call 
 me that ? " she replied, with a little laugh. 
 
 " Because I want you to know at once," he said, and 
 it was the truth, " that I have no vindictive feelings. 
 You have kept my manuscript from me all this time, 
 but severe though the punishment has been I deserved 
 it, yes, every day of it." 
 
 Lady Pippin worth smiled. "Tou took it from my 
 bag, did you not ? " said Tommy. 
 
 « Yes." 
 
 " Where is it, Alice ? Have you got it here ? " 
 
A WAY IS FOUND FOB TOMMY 491 
 
 "No." 
 
 " But you know where it is ? " 
 
 "Oh, yes," she said, graciously, and then it seemed 
 that nothing could ever disturb him again. She en- 
 joyed his boyish glee ; she walked by his side listening 
 airily to it. 
 
 " Had there been a fire in the room that day I should 
 have burned the thing, " she said, without emotion. 
 
 "It would have been no more than my deserts," 
 Tommy replied, cheerfully. 
 
 "I did burn it three months afterward," said she, 
 calmly. 
 
 He stopped, but she walked on. He sprang after 
 her. " Tou don't mean that, Alice ! " 
 
 " I do mean it." 
 
 With a gesture fierce and yet imploring he compelled 
 her to stop. " Before God is this true ? " he cried. 
 
 "Tes," she said, "it is true," and indeed it was the 
 truth about his manuscript at last. 
 
 "But you had a copy of it made first. Say you 
 had ! " 
 
 "I had not." 
 
 She seemed to have no fear of him, though his face 
 was rather terrible. "I meant to destroy it from the 
 first," she said, coldly; "but I was afraid to. I took it 
 back with me to London. One day I read in a paper 
 that your wife was supposed to have burned it while 
 she was insane. She was insane, was she not ? Ah, 
 
492 TOMMY AKD GEIZBL 
 
 well, that is not my affair, but I burned it for her 
 that afternoon." 
 
 They were moving on again. He stopped her once 
 more. 
 
 " Why have you told me this ? " he cried. " Was it 
 not enough for you that I should think she did it ! " 
 
 "No," Lady Pippinworth answered, "that was not 
 enough for me. I always wanted you to know that 
 I had done it." 
 
 "And you wrote that letter, you filled me with joy, 
 so that you should gloat over my disappointment ? " 
 
 " Horrid of me, was it not ! " said she. 
 
 " Why did you not tell me when we met the other 
 day ? " 
 
 " I bided my time, as the tragedians say." 
 
 "You would not have told me," Tommy said, staring 
 into her face, "if you had thought I cared for you. 
 Had you thought I cared for you a little jot " 
 
 "I should have waited," she confessed, "until you 
 cared for me a great deal, and then I should have told 
 you. That, I admit, was my intention." 
 
 She had returned his gaze smilingly, and as she strolled 
 on she gave him another smile over her shoulder ; it be- 
 came a protesting pout almost when she saw that he was 
 not accompanying her. Tommy stood still for some 
 minutes, his hands, his teeth, every bit of him that 
 could close, tight-clenched. When he made up on her 
 the devil was in him. She had been gathering a nose- 
 
A WAY IS FOUND FOR TOMMY 493 
 
 gay of wild-flowers. "Pretty, are they not ?" she said 
 to him. He took hold of her harshly by both wrists ; 
 she let him do it and stood waiting disdainfully, but she 
 was less unprepared for a blow than for what came. 
 
 "How you love me, Alice ! " he said, in a voice shak- 
 ing with passion. 
 
 " How I have proved it," she replied, promptly. 
 
 " Love or hate," he went on in a torrent of words, 
 " they are the same thing with you. I don't care what 
 you call it, it has made you come back to me. You tried 
 hard to stay away ; how you fought, Alice, but you had 
 to come ; I knew you would come. All this time you 
 have been longing for me to go to you ; you have 
 stamped your pretty feet because I did not go ; you 
 have cried 'He shall come!' You have vowed you 
 would not go one step of the way to meet me. I saw 
 you, I heard you, and I wanted you as much as you 
 wanted me, but I was always the stronger and I could 
 resist ; it is I who have not gone a step toward you and 
 it is my proud little Alice who has come all the way. 
 Proud little Alice, but she is to be my obedient little 
 Alice now." 
 
 His passion hurled him along and it had its effect on 
 her. She might curl her mouth as she chose, but her 
 hosom rose and fell. 
 
 " Obedient," she cried, with a laugh. 
 
 "Obedient," said Tommy, quivering with his inten- 
 sity ; ■" obedientj not because I want it, for I prefer you 
 
494 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 as you are, but because you are longing for it, my lady, 
 because it is what you came here for ; you have been a 
 virago only because you feared you were not to get it. 
 Why have you grown so quiet, Alice ? Where are the 
 words you want to torment me with ? Say them ; I 
 love to hear them from your lips ; I love the demon in 
 you, the demon that burned my book. I love you the 
 more for that; it was your love that made you do it. 
 Why don't you scratch and struggle for the last time ? 
 I am half sorry that little Alice is to scratch and struggle 
 no more." 
 
 "Go on," said little Alice, "you talk beautifully." 
 But though her tongue could mock him, all the rest of 
 her was enchained. 
 
 " Whether I shall love you when you are tamed," he 
 went on, with vehemence, " I don't know, you must take 
 the risk of that; but I love you now. We were made 
 for one another, you and I, and I love you, Alice, I 
 love you and you love me. . You love me, my peerless 
 Alice, don't you ? Say you love me ; your melting eyes 
 are saying it. How you tremble, sweet Alice; is that 
 your way of saying it ? I want to hear you say it. Tou 
 have been longing to say it for two years ; come, love, 
 say it now ! " 
 
 It was not within this woman's power to resist him. 
 She tried to draw away from him, but could not. She 
 was breathing quickly. The mocking light quivered on 
 her face only because it had been there so long; if it 
 
A "WAY IS FOUND FOR TOMMr 495 
 
 ■went out she would be helpless. He put his hands on 
 her shoulders, and she was helpless. It brought her 
 mouth nearer his. She was offering him her mouth. 
 
 "No," said Tommy, masterfully. "I won't kiss you 
 until you say it." 
 
 If there had not been a look of triumph in his eyes, 
 she would have said it. As it was she broke from him, 
 panting. She laughed next minute, and with that laugh 
 his power fell among the heather. 
 
 "Eeally," said Lady Pippinworth, "you are much too 
 stout for this kind of thing." She looked him up and 
 down with a comic sigh. " You talk as well as ever," 
 she said, condolingly, "but heigho, you don't look the 
 same. I have done the best I could for you for the sake 
 of old times, but I forgot to shut my eyes. Shall we 
 go on ? " 
 
 And they went on silently, one of them very white. 
 "I believe you are blaming me," her ladyship said, 
 making a face, just before they overtook the others, 
 " when you know it was your own fault for " — she sud- 
 denly rippled — " for not waiting until it was too dark 
 for me to see you ! " 
 
 They strolled with some others of the party to the 
 flower-garden, which was some distance from the house 
 and surrounded by a high wall studded with iron spikes 
 and glass. Lady Eiutoul cut him some flowers for 
 Grizel, but he left them on a garden-seat, accidentally 
 every one thought afterward in tne arawing-room when 
 
496 TOMMY AJSn GKIZEL 
 
 they were missed, but he had. laid them down because 
 how could those degraded hands of his carry flowers 
 again to Grizel ? There was great remorse in him, but 
 there was a shrieking vanity also, and though the one 
 told him to be gone, the other kept him lagging on. 
 They had torn him a dozen times from each other's 
 arms before he was man enough to go. 
 
 It was gloaming when he set off, waving his hat to 
 those who had come to the door with him. Lady 
 Pippinworth was not among them; he had not seen 
 her to bid her good-by nor wanted to, for the better 
 side of him had prevailed. So he thought. It was a man 
 shame-stricken and determined to kill the devil in him 
 that went down that long avenue. So he thought. 
 
 A tall, thin woman was standing some twenty yards 
 off among some holly -trees. She kissed her hand mock- 
 ingly to him and beckoned and laughed when he stood 
 irresolute. He thought he heard her cry " Too stout ! " 
 He took some fierce steps toward her. She ran on, look- 
 ing over her shoulder, and he forgot all else and fol- 
 lowed her. She darted into the flower-gasden, pulling 
 the gate to after her. It was a gate that locked when 
 it closed, and the key was gone. Lady Pippinworth 
 clapped her hands because he could not reach her. 
 When she saw that he was climbing the wall she ran 
 farther into the garden. 
 
 He climbed the wall, but, as he was descending, one of 
 the iron spikes on the top of it pierced his coat which 
 
A WAY IS FOUND FOR TOMMY 497 
 
 was buttoned to the throat, and he hung there by the 
 neck. He struggled as he choked , but he could not help 
 himself. He was unable to cry out. The collar of the 
 old doctor's coat held him fast. 
 
 They say that in such a moment a man reviews all his 
 past life. I don't know whether Tommy did that, but 
 his last reflection before he passed into unconsciousness 
 was " Serves me right ! " Perhaps it was only a little 
 bit of sentiment for the end. 
 
 Lady Disdain came back to the gate by and by to see 
 why he had not followed her. She screamed and then 
 hid in the recesses of the garden. He had been dead 
 for some time when they found him. They left the gate 
 creaking in the evening wind. After a long time a ter- 
 rified woman stole out by it. 
 
 82 
 
CHAPTER XXXV 
 
 THE PEEFECT LOTEB 
 
 Tommy has not lasted. More than once since it 
 became known that I was writing his life I hare been 
 asked whether there ever really was such a person, and I 
 am afraid to inquire for his books at the library lest they 
 are no longer there. A recent project to bring out a 
 new edition, with introductions by some other Tommy, 
 received so little support that it fell to the ground. It 
 must be admitted that, so far as the great public is con- 
 cerned, Thomas Sandys is done for. 
 
 They have even forgotten the manner of his death, 
 though probably no young writer with an eye on poster- 
 ity ever had a better send off. We really thought at the 
 time tjiat Tommy had found a way. 
 
 The surmise at Eintoul, immediately accepted by the 
 world as a fact, was that he had been climbing the wall 
 to obtain for Grizel the flowers accidentally left in the 
 garden, and it at once tipped the tragedy with gold. 
 The newspapers, which were in the middle of the dull 
 season, thanked their gods for Tommy and enthusiasti- 
 cally set to work on him. Great minds wrote criticisms 
 of what they called his life-work. The many persons 
 who had been the first to discover him said so again. 
 
THE PERFECT LOVER 499 
 
 His friends were in demand for the most trivial reminis- 
 cences. "Unhappy Pym cleared £11 10s. 
 
 Shall we quote ? It is nearly always done at this 
 stage of the biography, so now for the testimonials 
 to prove that our hero was without a flaw. A few 
 specimens will suffice if we select some that are very 
 like many of the others. It keeps Grizel waiting, but 
 Tommy, as you have seen, was always the great one; 
 she existed only that he might show how great he was. 
 "Busy among us of late," says one, "has been the grim 
 visitor who knocks with equal confidence at the doors of 
 the gifted and the ungifted, the pauper and the prince, 
 and twice in one short month has he taken from us 
 men of an eminence greater perhaps than that of Mr. 
 Sandys, but of them it could be said their work was 
 finished, while his sun sinks tragically when it is yet 
 day. Not by what his riper years might have achieved 
 can this pure spirit now be judged, and to us, we con- 
 fess, there is something infinitely pathetic in that 
 thought; we would fain shut our eyes and open them 
 again at twenty years hence with Mr. Sandys in the 
 fulness of his powers. It is not to be. What he might 
 have become is hidden from us, what he was we know. 
 He was little more than a stripling when he ' burst upon 
 the town ' to be its marvel — and to die ; a ' marvellous 
 boy ' indeed, yet how unlike in character and in the 
 nobility of his short life as in the mournful yet lovely 
 circumstances of his death, to that other Might-Have- 
 
500 TOMMY ASD GEIZEL 
 
 Been who 'perished in his pride.' Our young men of 
 letters have travelled far since the days of Chatterton. 
 Time was when a riotous life was considered part of 
 their calling, when they shunned the domestic ties and 
 actually held that the consummate artist is able to 
 love nothing but the creations of his fancy. It is such 
 men as Thomas Sandys who have exploded that perni- 
 cious fallacy. . . . 
 
 " Whether his name wiU. march down the ages is not 
 for us, his contemporaries, to determine. He had the 
 most modest opinion of his own wort, and was humbled 
 rather than elated when he heard it praised. No one 
 ever loved praise less ; to be pointed at as a man of 
 distinction was abhorrent to his shrinking nature ; he 
 seldom, indeed, knew that he was being pointed at, for 
 his eyes were ever on the ground. He set no great 
 store by the remarkable popularity of his works. 'Noth- 
 ing,' he has been heard to say to one of those gushing 
 ladies who were his aversion, ' nothing wiU so certainly 
 perish as the talk of the town.' It may be so, but if 
 so, the greater the pity that he has gone from among us 
 before he had time to put the coping-stone upon his 
 work. There is a beautiful passage in one of his own 
 books in which he sees the spirits of gallant youth who 
 died too young for immortality haunting the portals of 
 the Elysian Fields, and the great Shades come to the 
 portal and talk with them. We venture to say that 
 he is at least one of these." 
 
THE PERFECT LOVEE 601 
 
 What was the individuality behind the work ? They 
 discussed it in leading articles and in the correspond- 
 ence columns, and the man proved to be greater than 
 his books. His distaste for admiration is again and 
 again insisted on and illustrated by many characteristic 
 anecdotes. He owed much to his parents, though he 
 had the misfortune to lose them when he was but a 
 child. " Little is known of his father, but we under- 
 stand that he was a retired military officer in easy 
 circumstances. The mother was a canny Scotchwoman 
 of lowly birth, conspicuous for her devoutness even in 
 a land where it is everyone's birthright, and on their 
 marriage, which was a singularly happy one, they 
 settled in London, going little into society, the world 
 forgetting, by the world forgot, and devoting them- 
 selves to each other and to their two children. Of 
 these Thomas was the elder, and as the twig was early 
 bent so did the tree incline. From his earliest years 
 he was noted for the modesty which those who re- 
 member his boyhood in Scotland (whither the children 
 went to an uncle on the death of their parents) still 
 speak of with glistening eyes. In another column will 
 be found some interesting recollections of Mr. Sandys 
 by his old schoolmaster, Mr. David Cathro, M.A., who 
 testifies with natural pride to the industry and amia- 
 bility of his famous pupil. 'To know him,' says Mr. 
 Cathro, 'was to love him.'" 
 
 According to another authority T. Sandys got his 
 
602 TOMMY AKD GKIZEL 
 
 early modesty from his father, who was of a very sweet 
 disposition, and some instances of this modesty are 
 given ; they are all things that Elspeth did, but Tommy 
 is now represented as the person who had done them. 
 " On the other hand his strong will, singleness of pur- 
 pose, and enviable capacity for knowing what he 
 wanted to be at were a heritage from his practical and 
 sagacious mother." " I think he was a little proud of 
 his strength of will," writes the E. A. who painted 
 his portrait (now in America), "for I remember his 
 anxiety that it should be suggested in the picture." 
 But another acquaintance (a lady) replies, "He was 
 not proud of his strong will but he liked to hear it 
 spoken of, and he once told me the reason. This 
 strength of will was not, as is generally supposed, 
 inherited by him ; he was born without it and acquired 
 it by a tremendous effort. I believe I am the only 
 person to whom he confided this, for he shrank from 
 talk about himself, looking upon it as a form of that 
 sentimentality which his soul abhorred." 
 
 He seems often to have warned ladies against this 
 essentially womanish tendency to the sentimental. " It 
 is an odious onion, dear lady," he would say, holding 
 both her hands in his. If men in his presence talked 
 sentimentally to ladies he was so irritated that he soon 
 found a pretext for leaving the room. " Tet let it not 
 be thought," says One Who Knew Him Well, "that 
 because he was so sternly practical himself he was 
 
THE PERFECT LOTEK 503 
 
 intolerant of the outpourings of the sentimental. The 
 man, in short, reflected the views on this subject which 
 are so admirably phrased in his books, works that seem 
 to me to found one of their chief claims to distinction 
 on this, that at last we have a writer who can treat in- 
 timately of human love without leaving one smear of 
 the onion upon his pages." 
 
 On the whole, it may be noticed, comparatively few 
 ladies contribute to the obituary reflections, " for the 
 simple reason," says a simple man, " that he went 
 but little into female society. He who could write 
 so eloquently about women never seemed to know what 
 to say to them. Ordinary tittle-tattle from them dis- 
 appointed him. I should say that to him there was so 
 much of the divine in women that he was depressed 
 when they hid their wings." This view is supported by 
 Clubman, who notes that Tommy would never join in 
 the somewhat free talk about the other sex in which 
 many men indulge. " I remember," he says, " a man's 
 dinner at which two of those present, both persons of 
 eminence, started a theory that every man who is 
 blessed or cursed with the artistic instinct has at 
 some period of his life wanted to marry a barmaid, 
 Mr. Sandys gave them such a look that they at once 
 apologized. Trivial, perhaps, but significant. On an- 
 other occasion I was in a club smoking-room when the 
 talk was of a similar kind. Mr. Sandys was not pres- 
 ent. A member said, with a laugh, ' I wonder for how 
 
504 TOMMY AND GRIZEL 
 
 long men can be together without talking gamesomely 
 of women ? ' Before any answer could be given Mr. 
 Sandys strolled in, and immediately the atmosphere 
 cleared, as if someone had opened the windows. When 
 lie had gone the member addressed turned to him who 
 had propounded the problem and said, 'There is your 
 answer — as long as Sandys is in the room.'" 
 
 " A fitting epitaph this for Thomas Sandys," says the 
 paper that quotes it, " if we could not find a better. 
 Mr. Sandys was from first to last a man of character, 
 but why when others falter was he always so sure- 
 footed ? It is in the answer to this question that we 
 find the key to the books and to the man who was 
 greater than the books. He was the Perfect Lover. 
 As he died seeking flowers for her who had the high 
 honor to be his wife so he had always lived ; he gave 
 his afEection to her, as our correspondent Miss (or 
 Mrs.) Ailie McQueen shows, in his earliest boyhood, aud 
 from this, his one romance, he never swerved ; to the 
 moment of his death all his beautiful thoughts were 
 flowers plucked for her, his books were bunches of 
 them gathered to place at her feet. No harm now in 
 reading between the lines of his books and culling what 
 is the common knowledge of his friends in the north, 
 that he had to serve a long apprenticeship before he 
 won her. For long his attachment was unreciprocated, 
 though she was ever his loyal friend, and the volume 
 called ' Unrequited Love ' belongs to the period when he 
 
THE PERFECT LOVER 505 
 
 thought his life must be lived alone. The circumstances 
 of their marriage are at once too beautiful and too pain- 
 ful to be dwelt on here. Enough to say that, should the 
 particulars ever be given to the world, with the simple 
 story of his life, a finer memorial will have been raised 
 to him than anything in stone, such as we see a com- 
 mittee is already being formed to erect. We venture to 
 propose as a title for his biography, The Story of the 
 Perfect Lover." 
 
 Yes, that memorial committee was formed, but so 
 soon do people forget the hero of yesterday's paper 
 that only the secretary attended the first meeting, and he 
 never called another. But here, five and twenty years 
 later, is the biography, with the title changed. You 
 may wonder that I had the heart to write it. I do it, I 
 have sometimes pretended to myself, that we may all 
 laugh at the stripping of a rogue, but that was never my 
 reason. Have I been too cunning, or have you seen 
 through me all the time ? Have you discovered that I 
 was really pitying the boy who was so fond of boyhood 
 that he could not with years become a man, telling 
 nothing about him that was not true, but doing it with 
 unnecessary scorn in the hope that I might goad you 
 into crying, " Come, come, you are too hard on him." 
 
 Perhaps the manner in which he went to his death de- 
 prives him of these words. Had the castle gone on fire 
 that day while he was at tea and he perished in the flames 
 in a splendid attempt to save the life of his enemy (a very 
 
506 TOMMY AND GRIZBL 
 
 probable thing) then you might have felt a little liking 
 for him. Yet he would have been precisely the same 
 person. I don't blame you, but you are a Tommy. 
 
 Grizel knew how he died. She found Lady Pippin- 
 worth's letter to him and understood who the woman 
 was, but it was only in hopes of obtaining the lost manu- 
 script that she went to see her. Then Lady Pippin- 
 worth told her all. Are you sorry that Grizel knew ? 
 I am not sorry, I am glad. As a child, as a girl, and as 
 a wife the truth had been all she wanted, and she wanted 
 it just the same when she was a widow. We have a 
 right to know the truth, no right to ask anything else 
 from God, but the right to ask that. 
 
 And to her latest breath she went on loving Tommy 
 just the same. She thought everything out calmly for 
 herself. \ She saw that there is no great man on this 
 earth except the man who conquers self, and that in 
 some the accursed thing, which is in all of us, may be so 
 strong that to battle with it and be beaten is not alto- 
 gether to fail. It is foolish to demand complete success 
 of those we want to love ; we should rejoice when they 
 rise for a moment above themselves and sympathize with 
 them when they fall. In their heyday young lovers 
 think each other perfect, but a nobler love comes when 
 they see the failings also, and this higher love is so 
 much more worth attaining to that they need not cry 
 out though it has to be beaten into them with rods. So 
 they learn humanity's limitations, and that the accursed 
 
THE PERFECT LOVER 507 
 
 thing to me is not the accursed thing to you, but all 
 have it, and from this comes pity for those who have 
 sinned, and the desire to help each other springs, for 
 knowledge is sympathy and sympathy is love, and to 
 learn it the Son of God became a man. 
 
 And Grizel also thought anxiously about herself and 
 how from the time when she was the smallest girl she had 
 longed to be a good woman and feared that perhaps she 
 never should. And as she looked back at the road she 
 had travelled there came along it the little girl to judge 
 her. She came trembling, but determined to know the 
 truth, and she looked at Grizel until she saw into her 
 soul and then she smiled well pleased. 
 
 Grizel lived on at Double Dykes, helping David in 
 the old way. She was too strong and fine a nature to 
 succumb. Even her brightness came back to her ; they 
 sometimes wondered at the serenity of her face. Some 
 still thought her a little stand-ofBsh, for, though the 
 pride had gone from her walk, a distinction of manner 
 grew upon her and made her seem a finer lady than 
 before. There was no other noticeable change except 
 that with the years she lost her beautiful contours and 
 became a little angular; the old maid's figure I believe it 
 is sometimes called. 
 
 No one would have dared to smile at Grizel become 
 an old maid before some of the young men of 
 Thrums. They were people who would have suffered 
 much for her, and all because she had the courage to talk 
 
508 TOMMY AND GEIZEL 
 
 to them of some things before their marriage-day came 
 round. And for their young wives who had tidings to 
 whisper to her about the unborn she had the pretty idea 
 that they should live with beautiful thoughts, so that 
 these might become part of the child. 
 
 When Gavinia told this to Corp, he gulped and said, 
 " I wonder Grod could hae haen the heart." 
 
 "Life's a queerer thing," Gavinia replied, sadly 
 enough, " than we used to think it when we was bairns 
 in the den." 
 
 He spoke of it to Grizel. She let Corp speak of any- 
 thing to her because he was so loyal to Tommy. 
 
 " You 've given away a' your bonny things, Grizel," he 
 said, " one by one, and this notion is the bonniest o' 
 them a'. I 'm thinking that when it cam' into your head 
 you meant it for yoursel'." 
 
 Grizel smiled at him. 
 
 " I mind," Corp went on, "how when you was little yon 
 couldna see a bairn without rocking your arms in a wae- 
 ful kind o' a way, and we could never thole the meaning 
 o't. It just comes over me this minute as it meant that 
 when you was a woman you would like terrible to hae 
 bairns o' your ain, and you doubted you never should." 
 
 She raised her hand to stop him. "You see, I was 
 not meant to have them, Corp,'' she said. " I think that 
 when women are too fond of other people's babies they 
 never have any of their own." 
 
 But Corp shook his head. " I dinna understand it," 
 
THE PEEPECT LOVBE 509 
 
 he told her, "but I'm sure you was meant to hae them. 
 Something's gane wrang." 
 
 She was still smiling at him, but her eyes "were wet 
 now, and she drew him on to talk of the days when 
 Tommy was a boy. It was sweet to Grizel to listen 
 while Elspeth and David told her of the thousand things 
 Tommy had done for her when she was ill, but she loved 
 best to talk with Corp of the time when they were 
 all childi-en in the den. The days of childhood are 
 the best. 
 
 She lived so long after Tommy that she was almost a 
 middle-aged woman when she died. 
 
 And so the Painted Lady's daughter has found a way 
 of making Tommy's life the story of a perfect lover 
 after all. The little girl she had been comes stealing 
 back into the book and rocks her arms joyfully, and we 
 see Grizel's crooked smUe for the last time. 
 
 THE ZKD. 
 
By J. M. BARRIE 
 
 Sentimental Tommy 
 
 The Story of His Boyhood 
 
 Illustrated by W. Hatherhill 
 i2mo, 478 pages, $1.50 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS 
 
 Yet, funny though this — and much else in the book — is, it 
 is not for the fun alone, nor for that chiefly, that the book will 
 be widely read and loved — a happy fate that may be confi- 
 dently predicted for it. In the life-like presentation of what 
 has been truly and freshly observed, and in the unerring touch 
 that is only possible to the real artist in full sympathy with 
 humanity — in these things lies the charm. And good though 
 the book is, we feel that it will be — must be — followed by one 
 still better. — The Academy, London. 
 
 Those who know a piece of life when they see it, and who 
 care for the ultimate charm of a bit of pure literature, will read 
 and re-read Mr. Barrie's masterpiece. — Hamilton W. Mabie. 
 
 A work of fiction that is as original as it is fascinating. 
 Here, indeed, is life itself and all the accompaniments thereof. 
 ^JoEL Chandler Harris. 
 
 It has wonderful merits, ... in a degree almost unexampled 
 in modem literature. ... Its power is astounding. — The 
 Speaker, London. 
 
 Every phase of its hero's development is delightfully set 
 forth; and the other personages — and they are countless — 
 are all drawn with a master's hand. — New York Times. 
 
M. B A R R I E 
 
 What we have in the present volume, however, is perfect so 
 far as it goes. It is richer, fuller, more intense, and truer to 
 its creator's temperament than any other work that has come 
 from his pen. ..." Sentimental Tommy," in fine, is good 
 enough for Mr. Barrie's reputation to be going on with ; it has 
 humor that is never coarse, and pathos that never snivels, 
 and it has the rare pre-eminent graces that must be an au- 
 thor's own before they come to his pen — gentlemanliness 
 and the good heart. — The Bookman, London. 
 
 ^ 
 
 MARGARET OGILVY 
 
 BY HER SON 
 
 With etched portrait, i2mo, $1.25 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS 
 
 This little soul of a book is glorified with love. " Margaret 
 Ogilvy, by Her Son," is Mr. Barrie's most beautiful way of 
 accounting for himself. It lives in the borderland between 
 imagination and fact, and is a rare instance of the skill which 
 has enabled an artist to claim all the immunities of what might 
 have happened and all the advantages of what did, without 
 committing himself or his reader at any point. — The Critic. 
 
 The atmosphere into which we are admitted is one which it 
 is soul-uplifting for every man and woman to breathe. — The 
 Interior. 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 Publishers, 153-157 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK