m CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY Cornell University Library PR 5122.T73 1906 The trespasser.A romance of startling ev 3 1924 013 532 043 Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013532043 APPLETONS' LIBRARY OF HISTORICAL FICTION THE TRESPASSER APPLETON'S LIBRARY OF HISTORICAL FICTION The Trespasser By GILBERT PARKER A Romance of Startling Events i I I' I A.'I^., HO^WLE NEW YORK 1906 Mi f .,c./, v,^ : COPYBIQHT, 1893, By r. APPLETON AND COMPANY TO DOUGLAS ROBINSON, Esq., AND FRANK A. HILTON, Esq. My dear Douglas and Frank: I feel sure that this dedication will give you as much pleasure as it does me. It will at least be evi- dence that I do not forget good days in your com- pany here and there in the world. I take pleasure in linking your names ; for you, who have never met, meet thus in the porch of a little house that I have built. You,, my dear Douglas, will find herein scenes, times, and things familiar to you; and you, my dear Frank, reflections of hours when we camped by an idle shore, or drew about the fire of winter nights, and told tales worth more than this, for they were of the future, and it is of the past. Always sincerely yours, GILBERT '" CONTENTS. CHAFTEB PACK L — Onb in Sea&ch op a Kingdom . . . . 11 n. — In which he claihs his own .... 20 III. — Hb tells the Stobt of his Life ... 33 rV. — An HonB with his Father's Past ... 61 V. — Wheeein he finds his Eneht .... 75 VL — ^Which teli£ op Stsange Encountebs . 89 Vn. — Whbbein the Seal of his Hebitaoe is set . 103 VIII. — He answers an Awkward Question . . 131 IX. — He finds New Sponsobs 135 X — ^Hb comes to " the Waking op the Fire " . 148 XL — He hakes a Gallant Conquest . . . 160 Xn. — He stands between. Two Worlds . . .173 XI 11. — ^He joubnets afar 180 XIV. — In which the Past is repeated . . . 192 XV. — Wherein is seen the Old Adah and the Garden 214 XVL — Wherein Lote knows no Law save the Man's Will 225 XV 11. — The Man and the Woman face the Intoler- able 241 XVm.— " Ketubh, Shulamite I " 36J Tl^ THE TRESPASSER. CHAPTER I. ONE IN SBAKCH OF A KINGDOM. Why Gaston Belward left the wholesome North to journey afar, Jacques Brillon asked often in the brawl- ing streets of New York, and oftener in the fog of London as they made ready to ride to Ridley Court. There was a railway station two miles from the Court, but Belward had had enough of railways. He had brought his own horse Saracen, and Jacques' broncho also, at foolish expense, across the sea, and at a hotel near Euston Station master and man mounted and set forth, having seen their worldly goods bestowed by staring porters, to go on by rail. In murky London they attracted little notice ; but when their hired guide left them at the outskirts, and they got away upon the highway towards the Court, cottagers stood gaping. For, outside the town there was no fog, and the fresh autumn air drew the people abroad. " "What is it makes 'em stare, Jacques ? " said Bel- ward, with a humorous sidelong glance. 2 THE TRESPASSER. Jacques looked seriously at the bright pommel of his master's saddle and the shining stirrups and spurs, dug a heel into the tender skin of his broncho, and replied : " Too much silver all at once." He tossed his curling black hair, showing up the gold rings in^ his ears, and flicked the red-and-gold tassels of his boots. " You think that's it, eh ? " rejoined Belward, as he tossed a shilling to a beggar. " Maybe, too, your great Saracen to this tot of a broncho, and the grand homme to little Jacques Brillon ! " Jacques was tired and testy. The other laid his whip softly on the half-breed's shoulder. " See, my peacock : none of that. You're a spank- ing good servant, but you're in a country where it's knuckle down man to master ; and what they do here you've got to do, or quit — go back to your peasoup and caribou ! That's as true as God's in heaven, little Brillon. We're not on the buffalo trail now. You understand ? " Jacques nodded. *' Hadn't you better say it ? " The warning voice drew up the half-breed's face swiftly, and he replied : " I am to do what you please." ONE IN SEARCH OP A KINGDOM. 3 "Exactly. You've been with me six years — ever since I turned Bear Bye's moccasins to the sun ; and for that you swore you'd never leave me. Did it on a string of holy beads, didn't you, Frenchman ? " " I do it again." He drew out a rosary, and disregarding Belward's outstretched hand, said : " By the Mother of God, I will never leave you ! " There was a kind of wondering triumph in Bel- ward's eyes, though he had at first shrunk from Jacques' action, and a puzzling smile came. " Wherever I go, or whatever I do ? " " Whatever you do, or wherever you go." He put the rosary to his lips, and made the sign of the cross. His master looked at him curiously, intently. Here was a vain, naturally indolent half-breed, whose life had made for selfishness and independence, giving his neck willingly to a man's heel, serving with blind reverence, under a voluntary vow. " Well, it's like this, Jacques," Belward said pres- ently, " I want you, and I'm not going to say that you'll have a better time than you did in the North, or on the Slope ; but if you'd rather be with me than not, you'll find that I'll interest you. There's a bond between us, anyway. You're half French, and I'm one-fourth French, and more. You're half Indian, and I'm one-fourth Indian — no more. That's enough ! 4 THE TRESPASSER. So far, I haven't much advantage. But I'm one-half English — King's English, for there's been an offshoot of royalty in our family somewhere, and there's the royal difference. That's where I get my brains — and manners." " Where did you get the other ? " asked J^acques, shyly, almost furtively. "Money?" " Not money — the other ! " Belward spurred, and his horse sprang away vi- ciously. A laugh came back on Jacques, who followed as hard as he could, and it gave him a feeling of awe. They were apart for a long time, then came together again, and rode for miles without a word. At last Belward, glancing at a sign-post before an inn-door, exclaimed at the legend — " The Whisk o' Barley," — and drew rein. He regarded the place curiously for a minute. The landlord came out. , Belward had some beer brought. A half-dozen rustics stood gaping, not far away. He touched his horse with a heel. Saracen sprang towards them, and they fell back alarmed. Belward now drank his beer quietly, and asked ques- tion after question of the landlord, sometimes waiting for an answer, sometimes not — a kind of cross-exami- nation. Presently he dismounted. As he stood questioning, chiefly about Ridley Court and its people, a coach showed on the hill, and came dashihg down and past. He lifted his eyes ONE IK SEARCH OF A KINGDOM. 5 idly, though never before had he seen such a coach as swings away from Northumberland Avenue of a morn- ing. He was not idle, however ; but he had not come to England to show surprise at anything. As the coach passed his face lifted above the arm on the neck of the horse, keen, dark, strange. A man on the box- seat, attracted at first by the uncommon horses and their trappings, caught Belward's eyes. Not he alone, but Belward started then. Some vague intelligence moved the minds of both, and their attention was fixed till the coach rounded a corner and was gone. The landlord was at Belward's elbow. " The gentleman on the box-seat be from Eidley Court. That's Maister Ian Belward, sir." Gaston Belward's eyes half closed, and a sombre look came, giving his face a handsome malice. He wound his fingers in his horse's mane, and put a foot in the stirrup. " Who is ' Maister Ian ' ? " "Maister Ian be Sir William's eldest, sir. On'y one that's left, sir. On'y three to start wi' : and one be killed i' battle, and one had trouble wi' his faither and Maister Ian; and he went away and never was heard on again, sir. That's the end on him." "Oh, that's the end on Aim, eh, landlord ? And how long ago was that ? " " Becky, lass," called the landlord within the door, " wheniver was it Maister Robert turned his back on 6 THE TRESPASSER. the Court — iver so while ago? Eh, a fine lad that Maister Robert as iver I see 1 " Fat laborious Becky hobbled out, holding an apple and a knife. She blinked at her husband, and then at the strangers. " What be askin' o' the Court ? " she said. Her husband repeated the question. She gathered her apron to her eyes with an unctu- ous sob : " Doan't a' know when Maister Eobert went I He comes i' the house 'ere and says : ' Becky, gie us a taste o' the red-top — and where *b Jock ? ' He was al- ways thinkin' a deal o' my son Jock. ' Jock be gone,' I says, ' and I knows nowt o' his comin' back,' — mean- in', I was, that day. ' Good for Jock ! ' says he, ' and I'm goin' too, Becky, and I knows nowt o' my comin' back.' 'Where be goin', Maister Robert?' I says. ' To hell, Becky,' says he, and he laughs. ' From hell to hell. I'm sick to my teeth o' one, I'll try t'other,' — a way like that speaks he." Belward was impatient, and to hurry the story he made as if to start on. Becky, seeing, hastened. " Dear a' dear 1 The red-top were afore him, and I tryin' to make what be come to him. He throws arm 'round me, smacks me on the cheek, and says he : ' Tell Jock to keep the mare, Becky.' Then he flings away, and never more comes back to the Court. And that day one year my Jock smacks me on the cheek, ONE IN SEARCH OP A KINGDOM. 7 and gets on the mare ; and when I ask, ' Where be go- in' ? ' he says : ' For a hnnt i' hell wi' Maister Eobert, mither.' And from that day come back he never did, nor any word. There was trouble wi' the lad — ^wi' him and Maister Robert at the Court; but I never knowed nowt o' the truth. And it's seven-and-twen- ty years since Maister Eobert went." Oaston leaned over his horse's neck, and thrust a piece of silver into the woman's hands. " Take that, Becky Lawson, and mop your eyes no more." She gaped. " How dost know my name was Becky Lawson ? I havena been ca'd so these three-and-twenty years — ^not since a' married good man here, and put Jock's faith- er in 's grave yander." " The devil told me," he answered, with a strange laugh, and, spurring, they were quickly out of sight. They rode for a couple of miles without speaking. Jacques knew his master, and did not break the si- lence. Presently they came over a hill, and down upon a little bridge. Belward drew rein, and looked up the valley. About two miles beyond the roofs and turrets of the Court showed above the trees. A whim- sical smUe came to his lips. " Brillon," he said, " I'm in sight of home." The half-breed cocked his head. It was the first time that Belward had called him " Brillon " — he had 8 THE TRESPASSER. ever been " Jacques." This was to be a part of the new life. They were not now hunting elk, riding to " wipe out " a camp of Indians or navvies, dining the owner of a ranche or a deputation from a prairie con- stituency in searcli of a member, nor yet with a sena- tor at Washington, who served tea with canvas-back duck and tooth-picks with dessert. Once before had Jacques seen this new manner — when Belward visited Parliament House at Ottawa, and was presented to some notable English people, visitors to Canada. It had come to these notable folk that Mr. Gaston Bel- ward had relations at Kidley Court, and that of itself was enough to command courtesy. But presently, they who would be gracious for the family's sake, were gracious for the man's. He had that which compelled interest — a suggestive, personal, distin- guished air. Jacques knew his master better than anyone else .knew him; and yet he knew little, for Belward was of those who seem to give jmuch confi- dence, and yet give little — never more than he wished. " Yes, -monsieur, in sight of home," Jacques re- plied, with a dry cadence. " Say ' sir,' not ' monsieur,' Brillon ; and from the time we enter the Court yonder, look every day and every hour as you did when the judge asked you who killed Tom Daly." Jacques winced, but nodded his head. Belward continued : ONE IN SEAECH OP A KINGDOM. 9 " What you hear me tell is what you can speak of ; otherwise you are blind and dumb. You under- stand?" Jacques' face was sombre, but he said quickly : " Yes— sir." He straightened himself on his horse, as if to put himself into discipline at once — as lead to the back of a racer. Belward read the look. He drew his horse close up. Then he ran an arm over the other's shoulder. " See here, Jacques. This is a game that's got to be played up to the hilt. A cat has nine lives, and most men have two. We have. Now listen. You never knew me mess things, did you ? Well, I play for keeps in this; no monkeying. I've had the life of TJr of the Chaldees ; now for Babylon. I've lodged with the barbarian ; here are the roofs of ivory. I've had my day with my mother's people ; voiM ! for my father's. You heard what Becky Lawson said. My father was sick of it at twenty-five, and got out. We'll see what my father's son will do. . . . I'm going to say my say to you, and have done with it. As like as not there isn't another man that I'd have brought with me. You're all right. But I'm not going to rub noses. I stick when I do stick, but I know what's got to be done here ; and I've told you. You'll not have the fun out of it that I will, but you won't have the worry. Now, we start fresh. I'm to be obeyed ; 10 THE TRESPASSER. I'm Napoleon. I've got a devil, yet it needn't hurt you, and it won't. But if I make enemies here — and I'm sure to — let them look out. Give me your hand, Jacques; and don't you forget that there are two Gaston Belwards, and the one you have hunted and lived with is the one you want to remember when you get raw with the new one. For you'll hear no more slang like this from me, and you'll have to get used to lots of things." Without waiting reply, Belward urged on his horse, and at last paused on the top of a hill, and waited for Jacques. It was now dusk, and the land- scape showed soft, sleepy, and warm. "It's all of a piece," Belward said to himself, glancing from the trim hedges, the small, perfectly- tilled fields and the smooth roads, to Ridley Court itself, where many lights were burning and gates opening and shutting. There was some affair on at the Court, and he smiled to think of his own appear- ance among the guests. "It's a pity I haven't clothes with me, Brillon; they have a show going there." He had dropped again into the new form of master and man. His voice was cadenced, gentlemanly. Jacques pointed to his own saddle-bag. " No, no, they are not the things needed. I want the evening-dress which cost that cool hundred dollars in New York." ONE IN SEARCH OF A KINGDOM, H Still Jacques was silent. He did not know whether, in his new position, he was expected to sug- gest. Belward understood, and it pleased him. " If we had lost the track of a buck moose, or were nosing a cache of furs, you'd find a way, Brillon." " Voild ! " said Jacques ; " then, why not wear the buckskin vest, the red-silk sash, and the boots like these?" — ^tapping his own patent-leathers. "You look a grand seigneur so." " But I am here to look an English gentleman, not a grand seigneur, nor a company's trader on a break. — Never mind, the thing will wait till we stand in my ancestral halls," he added, with a dry laugh. They neared the Court. The village church was close by the Court-wall. It drew Belward's attention. One by one lights were springing up in it. It was a Friday evening, and the choir were come to practice. They saw buxom village girls stroll in, followed by the organist, one or two young men and a handful of boys. Presently the horsemen were seen, and a star- ing group gathered at the church-door. An idea came to Belward. " Kings used to make pilgrimages before they took their crowns, why shouldn't I ? " he said half -jestingly. Most men placed similarly would have been so en- gaged with the main event that they had never thought of this other. But Belward was not excited. He was moving deliberately, prepared for every situation- He 12 THE TRESPASSER. had a great game in hand, and he had no fear of his ability to play it. He suddenly stopped his horse, and threw the bridle to Jacques, saying : " I'll be back directly, Brillon." He entered the churchyard, and passed to the door. As he came the group under the crumbling arch fell back, and at the call of the organist went to the chan- cel. Belward came slowly up the aisle, and paused about the middle. Something in the scene gave him a new sensation. The church was old, dilapidated; but the timbered roof, the Norman and Early English arches incongruously side by side, with patches of an- cient distemper and paintings, and, more than all, the marble figures on the tombs, with hands folded so foolishly, — yet impressively too, — brought him up with a quick throb of the heart. It was his first real con- tact with England ; for he had not seen London, save at Euston Station and in the north-west district. But here he was in touch with his heritage. He rested his hand upon a tomb beside him, and looked around slowly. The choir began the psalm for the following Sun- day. At first he did not listen ; but presently the organist was heard alone, and then the choir afterwards sang: " Woe is me, that I am constrained to dwell with Mesech : And to have my habitation among the tents of Kedar." ONE IN SEARCH OP A KINGDOM. 13 Simple, dusty, ancient church, thick with effigies and tombs; with inscriptions upon pillars to virgins de- parted this life; and tablets telling of gentlemen gone from great parochial virtues : it wakened in Bel- ward's brain a fresh conception of the life he was about to live — ^he did not doubt that he would live it. He would not think of himself as inacceptable to old Sir William Belward. He glanced to the tomb under his hand. There was enough daylight yet to see the inscription on the marble. Besides, a single candle was burning just over his head. He stooped and read: OF SIR GASTON ROBERT BELWARD, BART., OF EIDtEY COURT, IN TmS PARISH OF GASTONBURY, WHO, AT THE AGE OF ONE AND FIFTY YEARS, AFTER A LIFE OF DISTINGUISHED SERVICE FOE HIS KING AND COUNTRY, AND GRAVE AND CONSTANT CAKE OF THOSE EXALTED WORKS WHICH BECOME A GENTLEMAN OF ENGLAND; HOST NOTABLE FOR HIS LOVE OF ARTS AND LETTERS; SENSIBLE IN ALL GRACES AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS; GIFTED WITH SINGULAR VIRTUES AND INTELLECTS; AND DELIGHTING AS MUCH EJ THE JOYS OF PEACE AS IN THE HEAVY DUTIES OF WAR: WAS SLAIN BY THE SIDE OF HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS, THE BELOVED AND ILLUSTRIOUS PRINCE RUPERT, AT THE BATTLE OF NASBBY, IN THE YEAR OP OUR LORD MDCXLV. "A Sojourner as all my Fathers wire." 14 THE TRESPASSBE. " ' Gaston Robert Belward ' ! " He read the name over and over, his fingers trac- ing the letters. His first glance at the recumbent figure had been hasty. . Now, however, he leaned over and examined it. It lay, hands folded, in the dress of Prince Eu- pert's cavaliers, a sword at side, and great spurs laid beside the heels. " ' Gaston Eobert Belward ' ! " As this other Gaston Eobert Belward looked at the image of his dead ancestor, a wild thought came : Had he himself not fought with Prince Eupert ? Was he not looking at himself in stone ? "Was he not here to show England how a knight of Charles' time would look upon the life of the Victorian age ? "Would not this still cold Gaston be as strange at Eidley Court as himself fresh from tightening a cinch on the belly of a broncho ? "Would he not ride from where he had been sojourning as much a stranger in his England as himself ? For a moment the idea possessed him. He was Sir Gaston Robert Belward, Baronet. He remem- bered now how, at Prince Eupert's side, he had sped on after Ireton's horse, cutting down Eoundheads as he passed, on and on, mad with conquest, yet wonder- ing that Eupert kept so long in pursuit while Charles was in danger with Cromwell : how, as the word came to wheel back, a shot tore away the pommel of his ONE IN SEARCH OF A KINGDOM. 15 saddle ; then another, and another, and with a sharp twinge in his neck he fell from his horse. He re- membered how he raised himself ou his arm and shouted " God save the King ! " How he loosed his scarf and staunched the blood at his neck, then fell back into a whirring silence, from which he was roused by feeling himself in strong arms, and hearing a voice say, " Courage, Gaston." Then came the dis- tant, very distant, thud of hoofs, and he fell asleep ; and memory was done ! He stood for a- moment oblivious to everything : the evening bird fluttering among the rafters, the song of the nightingale without, the sighing wind in the tower entry, the rustics in the doorway, the group in the choir. Presently he became conscious of the words sung : " A thousand ages in Thy sight Are like an evening gone ; Short as the watch that ends the night Before the rising sun. " Time, like an ever-rolling stream, Bears all its sons away ; They fly, forgotten, as a dream Dies at the opening day." He was himself again in an instant. He had been in a kind of dream. It seemed a long time since he had entered the church — in reality but a few mo- ments. He caught his moustache in his fingers, and turned on his heel with a musing smile. His spurs 16 THE TRESPASSER, clinked as he went down the aisle ; and, involuntarily, he tapped a boot-leg with his riding-whip. The sing- ing ceased. His spurs made the only sound. The rustics at the door fell back before him. He had to go up three steps, to reach the threshold. As he stood on the top one he paused and turned round. So, this was home : this church more so even than the Court hard by. Here his ancestors — for how long he did not know, probably since the time of Edward III. — idled time away in the dust ; here Gaston Bel- ward had been sleeping in effigy since Naseby Field. A romantic light came into his face. Again, why not? Even in the Hudson's Bay country and in the Rocky Mountains, he had been called, " Tivi : The Man of the Other." He had been counted the great- est of Medicine Men — one of the Eace : the people of the Pole, who lived in a pleasant land, gifted as none others of the race of men. Not an hour before Jacques had asked him where he got " the other." No man can live in the North for any time without getting the strain of its mystery and romance in him. Gaston waved his hand to the tomb, and said half- believingly : "Gaston Robert Belward, come again to your kingdom ! " He turned to go out, and faced the rector of the parish, — a bent, benign-looking man, — who gazed at him astonished. He had heard the strange speech. ONE IN SEARCH OP A KINGDOM. 17 His grave eyes rested on the stalwart stranger with courteous inquiry. Gaston knew who it was. Over his left brow there was a scar. He had heard of that scar before. When the venerable Archdeacon Varcoe was tutor to Ian and Robert Belward, Ian, in a fit of anger, had thrown a stick at his brother. It had struck the clergyman, leaving a scar. Gaston now raised his hat. As he passed, the rector looked after him, puzzled; the words he had heard addressed to the effigy returning. His eyes followed the young man to the gate, and presently, with a quick lifting of the shoulders, he said : " Eobert Belward ! " Then added : " Impossible ! But he is a Belward ! " He saw Gaston mount, then entered and went slowly up the aisle. He paused beside the tomb of that other Belward. His wrinkled hand rested on it. "That is it," he said at last. "He is like the picture of this Sir Gaston. Strange ! " He sighed, and unconsciously touched the scar on his brow. His dealings with the Belwards had not been all joy. Begun with youthful pride and affec- tionate interest, they had gone on into vexation, sor- row, failure, and shame. While Gaston was riding into his kingdom, Lionel Henry Varcoe was thinking how poor his life had been where he had meant it to be useful. As he stood musing and listening to the music of 18 THE TEBSPASSER. the choir, a girl came softly up the aisle, and touched him on the arm. " Grandfather, dear," she said, " aren't you going to the Court ? You have not been there to dine for 80 long ! " He fondled the hand on his arm. " My dearest, they have not asked me for a long time." " But why not to-night ? I have laid out every- thing nicely for you : your new gaiters, and your D. 0. L. coat with the pretty buttons and cord." " How can I leave you, my dear ? And they do not ask you ! " The voice tried for playfulness, but the eyes had a disturbed look. " Me ? Oh 1/ they never ask me to dinner — you know that. Tea and formal visits are enough for Lady Belward, and almost too much for me. There is yet time to dress. Oh ! say you will go. I want you to be friendly with them." The old man shook his head. " I do not care to leave you, my dearest." " Foolish old fatherkins ! Who would carry me off ? — ' Nobody, no, not I, nobody cares for me.' " Suddenly a new look shot up in her face. "Did you see that singular handsome man who came from the church — like someone out of an old painting? Not that his dress was so strange; but ONE IN SEARCH OF A KINGDOM. 19 there was something in his face — something that you would expect to find in — in a Garibaldi. Silly, am I not ? Did you see him ? " Ho looked at her gravely. " My dear," he said at last, " I think I will go after all, though I shall be a little late." " A sensible grandfather ! Come quickly, dear." He paused again. " But I fear I sent a note declining." " Ah, no, you did not. It has been lying on your table for two days." " Dear me — dear me ! I am getting very old ! " They passed out of the church. Presently, as they hurried to the rectory near by, the girl said : "But you haven't answered. Did you see the stranger? Do you know who he is ? " The rector turned, and pointed to the gate of Rid- ley Court. Gaston and Brillon were Just entering. " Alice, dear," he said, in a vague, half -troubled way, " the man is a Belward, I think." " Why, of course ! " the girl replied with a iiash of excitement. " But so dark, strange, and foreign-look- ing ! What Belward is he ? " " I do not know yet, my dear." " I shall be up when you come back. But mind, don't leave just after dinner. Stay and talk; you must tell me everything that's said and done — and about the stranger ! " CHAPTER II. IN WHICH HE CLAIMS HIS OWN, Meanwhile, without a word, Gaston had mounted, ridden to the castle, and passed through the open gates into the courtyard. Inside he paused. In the main building many lights were burning. There came a rattle of wheels behind him, and he shifted to let a carriage pass. Through the window of the brougham he could see the shimmer of satin, lace, and soft white fur, and he had an instant's glance of a pretty face. The carriage drew up to the steps, and presently three ladies and a brusque gentleman passed into the hall-way, admitted by powdered footmen. The in- cident had a manner, an air, which struck Gaston, he knew not why. Perhaps it was the easy finesse of ceremonial. He looked at Brillon. He had seen him sit arms folded like that, looking from the top of a blu£E down on an Indian village or a herd of bufiEa- loes. There was wonder, but no shyness or agitation, on his face ; rather the naive, naked look of a child. Bel ward laughed. " Come, Brillon ; we are at home." IN WHICH HE CLAIMS HIS OWN. 21 He rode up to the steps, Jacques following. A footman appeared and stared. Gaston looked down on him neutrally, and dismounted. Jacques did the same. The footman still stared. Another appeared behind. Gaston eyed the puzzled servant calmly. " Why don't you call a groom ? " he presently said. There was a cold gleam in his eye. The footman shrank. " Oh, yessir, yessir," he said confusedly, and sig- nalled. The other footman came down, and made as if to take the bridle. Gaston waved him back. None too soon, for the horse lunged at him. " A rub down, a pint of beer, and water and feed in an hour, and I'll come to see him myself late to- night." Jacques had loosened the saddle-bags and taken them ofE. Gaston spoke to the horse, patted his neck, and gave him to the groom. Then he went up the steps, followed by Jacques. He turned at the door to see the groom leading both horses off, eyeing Saracen suspiciously. He laughed noise- lessly. " Saracen '11 teach him things," he said. " I might warn him, but it's best for the horses to make their own impressions." " What name, sir ? " said a footman. "You are ?" 22 THE TRESPASSE-ft " Palby, sir." " Falby, look after my man Brillon here, and take me to Sir William." "What name, sir?" Gaston, as if with sudden thought, stepped into the light of the candles, and said in a low voice : " Falby, don't you know me ? " The footman turned a little pale, as his eyes, in spite of themselves, clung to Gaston's. A kind of fright came, and then they steadied. " Oh yes, sir," he said mechanically. " Where have you seen me ? " " In the picture on the wall, sir." " Whose picture, Falby?" " Sir Gaston Bel ward, sir." A smile lurked at the corners of Gaston's mouth. " Gaston Belward. Very well, then you know what to say to Sir William. Show me into the library." " Or the justices' room, sir?" "The justices' room will do." Gaston wondered what the justices' room was. A moment after he stood in it, and the dazed Falby had gone, trying vainly to reconcile the picture on the wall, which, now that he could think, he knew was very old, with this strange man who had sent a curious cold shiver through him. But, anyhow, he was a Belward, that was certain : voice, face, manner IN WHICH HE CLAIMS HIS OWN. 23 showed it. But with something like no Belward he had ever seen. Left to himself, Gaston looked round on a large, severe room. Its use dawned on him. This was part of the life : Sir William was a Justice of the Peace. But why had he been brought here ? Why not to the library, as himself had suggested? There would be some awkward hours for Palby in the future. Gaston had as winning a smile, as sweet a manner, as anyone in the world, so long as a straight game was on ; but to cross his will with the other ! — he had been too long a power in that wild country where his father had also been a power ! He did not quite know how long; he waited, for he was busy with plans as to his career at Ridley Court. He was roused at last by Palby's entrance. A keen, cold look shot from under his straight brows. "Well?" he said. " Will you step into the library, sir ? Sir William will see you there." Palby tried to avoid his look, but his eyes were compelled, and Gaston said : ft " Falby, you will always hate to enter this room." Palby was agitated. " I hope not, sir." " But you will, Falby, unless " "Yessir?" 24 THE TRESPASSER. "Unless you are both the serpent and the dove Falby." " Yessir." As they entered the hall, Brillon with the saddle- bags was being taken in charge, and Gaston saw what a strange figure he looked beside the other servants and in these fine surroundings. He could not think that himself was so bizarre. Nor was he. But he looked unusual; as one of high civilisation might, through long absence in primitive countries, return in uncommon clothing, and with a manner of distin- guished strangeness: the barbaric to protect the re- fined, as one has seen a bush of firs set to shelter a wheat-field from a sea-wind, or a windmill water cun- ningly-begotten flowers. As he went through the hall other visitors were entering. They passed him, making for the staircase. Ladies with the grand air looked at him curiously, and two girls glanced shyly from the jingling spurs and tasselled boots to his rare face. One of the ladies suddenly gave a little gasping cry, and catching the arm of her companion, said : " Kein6 ! how like Eobert Belward ! Who — who is he?" The other coolly put up her pince-nez. She caught Gaston's profile and the turn of his shoulder. " Yes, like,. Sophie ; but Eobert never had such a back, nor anything like the face." m WHICH HE CLAIMS HIS OWN. 25 She spoke with no attempt to modulate her voice, and it carried distinctly to Gaston. He turned and glanced at them. "He's a Belward, certainly, but like what one I don't know; and terribly eccentric, my dear! Did you see the boots and the sash? Why, bless me, if you are not shaking ! Don't be silly — shivering at the thought of Robert Belward after all these years ! " So saying, Mrs. Warren Gasgoyne tapped Lady Dargan on the arm, and then turned sharply to see if her daughters had been listening. She saw that they had; and though herself and not her sister was to blame, she said : " Sophie, you are very indiscreet ! If you had daughters of your own, you would probably be more careful — though Heaven only knows, for you were always difficult ! " With this they vanished up the staircase, Mrs. Gasgoyne's daughters, Delia and Agatha, smiling at each other and whispering of Gaston. Meanwhile the seeker after a kingdom was shown into Sir William Belward's study. No one was there. He walked to the mantelpiece, and, leaning his arm on it, looked round. Directly in front of him on the wall was the picture of a lady in middle-life, sitting in an arbour. A crutch lay against one arm of her chair, and her left hand leaned on an ebony silver- topped cane. There was something painful, haunt- 26 THE TRESPASSER. ing, in the face — a weirdness in the whole picture. The face was looking' into the sunlight, but the effect was rather of moonlight — distant, mournful. He was fascinated ; why, he could not tell. Art to him was an unknown book, but he had the instinct, and he was quick to feel. This picture struck him as being out of harmony with everything else in the room. Yet it had a strange compelling charm. Presently he started forward with an exclamation. Now he understood the yague, eerie influence. Look- ing out from behind the foliage was a face, so dim that one moment it seemed not to be there, and then suddenly to flash in — as a picture from Beyond sails, lightning-like, across the filmy eyes of the dying. It was the face of a youth, elf -like, unreal, yet he saw his father's features in it. He rubbed his eyes and looked again. It seemed very dim. Indeed, so delicately, vaguely, had the work been done that only eyes like Gaston's, trained to observe, with the sight of a hawk and a sense of the mysterious, could have seen so quickly or so distinctly. He drew slowly back to the mantel again, and mused. What did it mean? He was sure that the woman was his grandmother. At that moment the door opened, and an alert, white-haired man stepped in quickly, and stopped in the centre of the room, looking at his visitor. His deep, keen eyes gazed out with an intensity that IN WHICH HE CLAIMS HIS OWN. 27 might almost be fierceness, and the fingers of his fine hands opened and shut nervously. Though of no great stature, he had singular dignity. He was in evening-dress, and as he raised a hand to his chin quickly, as if in surprise or perplexity, Gaston noticed that he wore a large seal-ring. It is singular that while he was engaged with his great event, he was also thinking what an air of authority the ring gave. For a moment the two men stood at gaze without speaking, though Gaston stepped forward respect- fully. A bewildered, almost shrinking look came into Sir William's eyes, as the other stood full in the light of the candles. Presently the old man spoke. In spite of conven- tional smoothness, his voice had the ring of distance, which comes from having lived through and above painful things. " My servant announced you as Sir Gaston Bel- ward. There is some mistake ? " " There is a mistake," was the slow reply. " I did not give my name as Sir Gaston Belward. That was Falby's conclusion, sir. But I am Gaston Robert Bel- ward, just the same." Sir William was dazed, puzzled. He presently made a quick gesture, as if driving away some foolish thought, and, motioning to a chair, said : " Will you be seated ? " 28 THE TRESPASSER. They both sat, Sir William by his writing-table. His look was now steady and penetrating, but he met one just as firm. " You are — Gaston Kobert Belward ? May I ask for further information ? " There was furtive humour playing at Gaston's mouth. The old man's manner had been so unlike anything he had ever met, save, to an extent, in his father, that 'it interested him. He replied, with keen distinctness : " You mean, why I have come — home ? " Sir William's fingers trembled on a paper-knife. " Are you — at home ? " " I have come home to ask for my heritage — with interest compounded, sir." Sir William was now very pale. He got to his feet, came to the young man, peered into his face, then drew back to the table and steadied himself against it. Gaston rose also : his instinct of courtesy was acute — absurdly civilised — that is, primitive. He waited. " You are Kobert's son ? " " Eobert Belward was my father." "Your father is dead?" " Twelve years ago." Sir William sank back in his chair. His thin fin- gers ran back and forth along his lips. Presently he took out his handkerchief and coughed into it nerv- IN WHICH HE CLAIMS HIS OWN. 29 ously. His lips trembled. With a preoccupied air he arranged a handful of papers on the table. " Why did you not come before ? " he said at last, in a low, mechanical voice. " It was better for a man than a boy to come." "May I ask why?" " A boy doesn't always see a situation — gives up too soon — throws away his rights. My father was a hoy!" " He was twenty-five when he went away." "I am fifty!" Sir William looked up sharply, perplexed. "Fifty?" '' He only knew this life : I know the world ! " "What world?" "The great North, the South, the seas at four corners of the earth." Sir William glanced at the top-boots, the peeping sash, the strong, bronzed face. " Who was your mother? " he asked abruptly. " A woman of France." The baronet made a gesture of impatience, and looked searchingly at the young man. All at once Gaston shot his bolt, to have it over. " She had Indian blood also." He stretched himself to his full height, easily, broadly, with a touch of defiance, and leaned an arm against the mantel, awaiting Sir William's reply. 30 THE TEESPASSER. The old man shrank, then said coldly : " Have you the marriage-certificate ? " Gaston drew some papers from his pockets. " Here, sir, with a letter from my father, and one from the Hudson's Bay Company." His grandfather took them. With an effort he steadied himself, then opened and read them one hy one, his son's brief letter last — it was merely a calm farewell, with a request that justice should be done his son. At that moment Falby entered and said : " Her ladyship's compliments, and all the guests have arrived, sir." " My compliments to her ladyship, and ask her to give me five minutes yet, Palby." Turning to his grandson, there seemed to be a moment's hesitation, then he reached out his hand. " You have brought your luggage ? — Will you care to dine with us ? " Gaston took the cold outstretched fingers. " Only my saddle-bag, and I have no evening-dress with me, else I should be glad." There was another glance up and down the ath- letic figure, a half-apprehensive smile as the baronet thought of his wife, and then he said : " We must see if anything can be done." He pulled a bell-cord. A servant appeared. IN WHICH HE CLAIMS HIS OWN. 31 "Ask the housekeeper to come for a moment, please." Neither spoke till the housekeeper appeared. " Hovey," he said to the grim woman, " give Mr. Gaston the room in the north tower. Then, from the press in the same room lay out the evening-dress which you will find there. . . . They were your father's," he added, turning to the young man. " It was my wife's wish to keep them. Have they been aired lately, Hovey?" " Some days ago, sir." "That will do." The housekeeper left, agitated. " You will probably be in time for the fish," he added, as he bowed to Eobert^ " If the clothes do not fit, sir ? " " Your father was about your height and nearly as large, and fashions have not changed much ! " A few moments afterwards Gaston was in the room which his father had occupied twenty -seven years before. The taciturn housekeeper, eying him excitedly the while, put out the clothes. He did not say anything till she was about to go. Then: " Hovey, were you here in my father's time ? " " I was under-parlourmaid, sir," she said. " And you are housekeeper now — good ! " The face of the woman crimsoned, hiding her dour wrinkles. She turned away her head. 32 THE TRESPASSER. " I'd have given my right hand if he hadn't gone, sir." Gaston whistled softly, then : " So would he, I fancy, before he died. But I shall not go, so you will not need to risk a finger for me. I am going to stay, Hovey. Good-night. Look after Brillon, please." He held out his hand. Her fingers twitched in his, then grasped them nervously. " Yes, sir. Good-night, sir. It's — it's like him comin' back, sir." Then she suddenly turned and hurried from the room, a blunt figure to whom emotion was not graceful. " H'm ! " said Gaston, as he shut the door. " Par- lourmaid then, eh ? History at every turn ! Vdici le sabre de mon perp, ! " CHAPTER III. HE TELLS THE STORY OF HIS LIFE. Gaston Belwaed was not sentimental : that be- longs to the middle-class Englishman's ideal of civili- sation. But he had a civilisation akin to the highest ; incongruous, therefore, to the general as the sympa- thy between the United States and Russia. The high- est civilisation can be independent. The English aris- tocrat is at home in the lodge of a Sioux chief or the bamboo-hut of a Fijian, and makes brothers of " sav- ages," when those other formal folk, who spend their lives in keeping their dignity, would be lofty and su- perior. When Gaston looked at his father's clothes and -turned them over, he had a twinge of honest emotion; but his mind was on the dinner and his heritage, and he only said, as he frowned at the tightness of the waistband : " Never mind, we'll make 'em pay, shot and wad- ding, for what you lost, Robert Belward ; and wher- ever you are, I hope you'll see it ! " In twelve minutes from the time he entered the bedroom he was ready. He pulled the bell-cord, and 34 THE TRBSPASSEE. then passed out. A servant met him on the stairs, and in another minute he was inside the dining-room. Sir William's eyes flashed up. There was smoulder- ing excitement in his face, but one could not have guessed at anything unusual. A seat had been placed for Gaston beside him. The situation was singular and trying. It would have been easier if he had mere- ly come into the drawing-room after dinner. This was in Sir William's mind when he asked him to dine ; but it was as it was. Gaston's alert glance found the empty seat. He was about to make towards it, but he caught Sir William's eye and saw it signal him to the end of the table near him. His brain was working with celerity and clearness. He now saw the woman whose portrait had so fascinated him in the library. As his eyes fastened on her here, he almost fancied he could see the boy's — his father's — face looking over her shoulder. He instantly went to her, and said : " I am sorry to be late." His first impulse had been to offer his hand, as, naturally, he would have done in " barbaric " lands, but the instinct of this other civilisation was at work in him. He might have been a polite. casual guest, and not a grandson, bringing the remembrance, the culmination of twenty-seven years' tragedy into a home ; she might have been a hostess with whom he wished to be on terms : that was all. HE TELLS THE STORY OP HIS LIFE. 35 If the situation was trying for him, it was painful for her. She had had only a whispered announcement before Sir William led the way to dinner. Yet she was now all her husband had been, and more. Ee- pression had been her practice for unnumbered years, and the only heralds of her feelings were the restless wells of her dark eyes : the physical and mental misery she had endured lay hid under the pale composure of her face. She was now brought suddenly before the composite image of her past. Yet she merely lifted a slender hand with long, fine fingers, which, as they clasped his, all at once trembled, and then pressed them hotly, nervously. To his surprise, it sent a twinge of colour to his cheek. " It was good of you to come down after such a journey," she said. Nothing more. Then he passed on, and sat down to Sir William's courteous gesture. The situation had its difiBculties for the guests — ^perfect guests as they were. Every- one was aware of a dramatic incident, for which there had been no preparation save Sir William's remark that a grandson had arrived from the North Pole or thereabouts ; and to continue conversation and appear " casual " put their resources to some test. But they stood it well, though their eyes were busy, and the talk was cheerfully mechanical. So occupied were they with Gaston's entrance, that they did not know how near Lady Dargan came to fainting. 36 THE TRESPASSER. At the button-hole of the coat worn by Gaston hung a tiny piece of red ribbon which she had drawn from her sleeve on the terrace twenty-seven years ago, and tied there with the words : "Do you think you will wear it till we meet again ? " And the man had replied : " You'll not see me without it, pretty girl — pretty girl!" A woman is not so unaccountable after all. She has more imagination than a man ; she has not many resources to console her for disappointments, and she prizes to her last hour the swift moments when won- derful things seemed possible. That man is foolish who shows himself jealous of a woman's memories or tokens — those guarantees of her womanliness. When Lady Dargan saw the ribbon, which Gaston in his hurry had not disturbed, tied exactly as she had tied it, a weird feeling came to her, and she felt chok- ing. But her sister's eyes were on her, and Mrs. Gas- goyne's voice came across the table clearly : " Sophie, what were Fred Bideford's colours at Sandown? You always remember that kind of thing." The warning was sufficient. Lady Dargan could make no effort of memory, but she replied without hesitation — or conscience : " Yellow and brown." HE TELLS THE STORY OF HIS LIFE. 37 " There," said Mrs. Gasgoyne, " we are both wrong. Captain Maudsley ! Sophie never makes a mistake." Maudsley assented politely, but, stealing a look at Lady Dargan, wondered what the little by-play meant. Gaston was between Sir William and Mrs. Gasgoyne. He declined soup and fish, which had just been served, because he wished for time to get his bearings. He glanced at the menu as if idly interested, conscious that he was under observation. He felt that he had, somehow, the situation in his hands. Everything had gone well, and he knew that his part had been played with some aplomb — natural, instinctive. Unlike most large men, he had a mind always alert, not requiring the inspiration of unusual moments. What struck him most forcibly now was the tasteful courtesy which had made his entrance easy. He instinctively com- pared it to the courtesy in the lodge of an Indian chief, or of a Hudson's Bay factor who has not seen the outer world for half a century. It was so different, and yet it was much the same. He had seen a mis- sionary, a lay-reader, come intoxicated into a council of chiefs. The chiefs did not show that they knew his condition till he forced them to do so. Then two of the young men rose, suddenly pinned him in their arms, carried him out, and tied him in a lodge. The next morning they sent him out of their country. Gaston was no philosopher, but he could " place " a thing when he saw it : which is a kind of genius. 38 THE TRESPASSER. Presently Sir William said quietly : " Mrs. Gasgoyne, you knew Robert well ; his son ought to know you." Gaston tul-ned to Mrs. Gasgoyne, and said in his father's manner as much as possible, for now his mind ran back to how his father talked and acted, forming a standard for him : " My father once told me a tale of the Keithley Hunt— something ' away up,' as they say in the West, — and a Mrs. Warren Gasgoyne was in it." He made an instant friend of Mrs. Gasgoyne — made her so purposely. This was one of the few things from his father's talks upon his past life. He remembered the story because it was interesting, the name because it had a sound. She flushed with pleasure. That story of the Hunt was one of her sweetest recollections. For her bravery then she had been voted by the field " a good fellow," and an admiral present declared that she had a head " as long as the maintop bow-line." She loved admi- ration, though she had no foolish sentiment ; she called men silly creatures, and yet would go on her knees across country to do a deserving man-friend a service. She was fifty and over, yet she had the springing heart of a girl — mostly hid behind a brusque manner and a blunt, kindly tongue. " Your father could always tell a good story," she said. HE TELLS THE STORY OP HIS LIFE. 39 " He told me one of you : what about telling me one of him ? " Adaptable, he had at once fallen in with her direct speech, the more so because it was his natural way ; any other ways were " games," as he himself said. She flashed a glance at her sister, and smiled half- ironically. " I could tell you plenty," she said softly. " He was a startling fellow, and went far sometimes; but you look as if you could go farther." Gaston helped himself to an entree, wondering whether a knife was used with sweetbreads. " How far could he go ? " he asked. " In the hunting-field with anybody, with women endlessly, with meanness like a snail, and when his blood was up, to the most nonsensical place you can think of." Forks only for sweetbreads! Gaston picked one up. " He went there." "Who told you?" " I came from there." "Where is it?" " A few hundred miles from the Arctic circle." " Oh ! I didn't think it was that climate ! " " It never is till you arrive. You are always out in the cold there." " That sounds American." 40 THE TRESPASSER. " Every man is a sinner one way or another." "You are very clever — cleverer than your father ever was ! " " I hope so." "Why?" " He went — there ! I've come — from there ! " " And you ' think you will stay — never go back?" "He was 'out of it' for twenty years, and died. If I am 'in it' for that long, I shall have had enough." Their eyes met. The woman looked at him steadily. "You won't be," she replied, this time seriously, and in a very low voice. "No?— why?" "Because you will tire of it all — though you've started very well ! " She then answered a question of Captain Mauds- ley's, and turned again to Gaston. " What will make me tire of it ? " he inquired. She sipped her champagne musingly. " Oh, what is in you deeper than all this ; with the help of some woman probably." She looked at him searchingly, then added : "You seem strangely like and yet unlike your father to-night." " I am wearing his clothes," he said. HE TELLS THE STOEY OP HIS LIFE. 41 She had plenty of nerve, but this startled her. She shrank a little : it seemed uncanny. Now she re- membered that ribbon in the button-hole ! "Poor Sophie!" she thought. "And this one will make greater mischief here." Then, aloud to him : " Your father was a good fellow, but he did wild things." " I do not see the connection," he answered. " I am not a good man, and I shall do wilder things — is that it?" "You will do mad things," she replied hardly above a whisper, and talked once more with Captain Maudsley. Gaston now turned to his grandfather, who had heard a sentence here and there, and felt that the young man carried off the situation well enough. He then began to talk in a general way about Gaston's voyage, of the Hudson's Bay Company, and expedi- tions to the Arctic, drawing Lady Dargan into the conversation. Whatever might be said of Sir William Belward he was an excellent host. He had a cool, unmali- cious wit, but that man was unwise who offered him- self to its severity. To-night he surpassed himself in suggestive talk, until, all at once, seeing Lady Dar- gan's eyes fixed on Gaston, he went silent, sitting back in his chair abstracted. Soon, however, a warning glance from his wife brought him back and saved 42 THE TRESPASSER. Lady Dargan from collapse ; for it seemed impossible to talk alone to this ghost of her past. At this moment Gaston heard a voice near : " As like as if he'd stepped out of the picture, if it weren't for the clothes. A Gaston too ! " The speaker was Lord Dargan. He was talking to Archdeacon Varcoe. Gaston followed Lord Dargan's glance to the por- trait of that Sir Gaston Belward whose efiBgy he had seen. He found himself in form, feature, expression ; the bold vigilance of eye, the primitive activity of shoulder, the small firm foot, the nervous power of the hand. The eyes seemed looking at him. He answered to the look. There was in him the romantic strain, and something more ! In the remote parts of his be- ing there was the capacity for the phenomenal, the strange. Once again, as in the church, he saw the field of Naseby, King Charles, Ireton's men, Cromwell and his Ironsides, Prince Rupert and the swarming rush of cavalry, and the end of it all ! — Had it been a tale of his father's at camp-fires? Had he read it somewhere ? He felt his blood thump in his veins ! Another half-hour, wherein he was learning every minute, nothing escaping him, everything interesting him, — his grandfather and Mrs. Gasgoyne especially, — then the ladies retired slowly with their crippled hostess, who gave Gaston, as she rose, a look almost painfully intense. It haunted him. HE TELLS THE STORY OF HIS LIFE. 43 Now Gaston had his chance. He had no fear of what he could do with men : he had measured himself a few times with English gentlemen as he travelled, and he knew where his power lay — not in making himself agreeable, but in imposing his personality. The guests were not soon to forget the talk of that hour. It played into G-aston's hands. He pretended to nothing ; he confessed ignorance here and there with great simplicity ; but he had the gift of reducing things, as it were, to their original elements. He cut away to the core of a matter, and having simple, fixed ideas, he was able to focus the talk, which had begun with hunting stories, and ended with the morality of duelling. Gaston's hunting stories had made them breathless, his views upon duelling did not free their lung^. There were sentimentalists present ; others who, because it had become etiquette not to cross swords, thought it indecent. Archdeacon Varcoe would not be drawn into discussion, but sipped his wine, listened, and watched Gaston. The young man measured his grandfather's mind, and he drove home his points mercilessly. Captain Maudsley said something about " romantic murder." ■ " That's the trouble," Gaston said. " I don't know who killed duelling in England, but behind it must have been a woman or a shopkeeper : sentimentalism, 44 THE TEESPASSEE. timidity ; dead romance. What is patriotism but ro- mance ? — ideals is what they call it somewhere. I've lived in a land full of hard work and dangers, but also full of romance. What is the result ? — A people ofE there that you pity, and who don't need pity. Eo- mance? See: you only get square justice out of a wise autocrat, not out of your ' twelve true men ' ; and duelling is the last decent relic of autocracy. Suppose the wronged man does get killed ; that is all right : it wasn't merely blood he was after, but the right to hit a man in the eye for a wrong done. What is all this huUaballoo about saving human life ? There's as much interest — and duty — in dying as living, if you go the way your conscience tells you." A couple of hours later, Gaston, after having seen to his horse, stood alone in the drawing-room with his grandfather and grandmother. As yet Lady Bel- ward had spoken not half a dozen words to him. Sir William presently said to him : " Are you too tired to join us in the library ? " " I'm as fresh as paint, sir," was the reply. Lady Belward turned without a word, and slowly passed from the room. Gaston's eyes followed the crippled figure, which yet had a rare dignity. He had a sudden impulse. He stepped to her and said with an almost boyish simplicity : "You are very tired; let me carry you — grand- mother ! " HE TELLS THE STORY OP HIS LIFE. 45 He could hear Sir William gasp a little as he laid a quick warm hand on hers that held the cane. She looked at him gravely, sadly, and then said : " I will take your arm, if you please." He took the cane, and she put a hand towards him. He ran his strong arm round her waist with a little humouring laugh, her hand rested on his shoulder, and he timed his step to hers. Sir William was in an eddy of wonder — a strong head was " mazed." He had looked for a different reception of this uncommon kins- man. How quickly had the new-comer conquered himself ! And yet he had a slight strangeness of ac- cent — not American, but something which seemed un- usual. He did not reckon with a voice which, under cover of easy deliberation, had a convincing quality ; with a manner of old-fashioned courtesy and stateli- ness. As Mrs. Warren Gasgoyne had said to the rector, whose eyes had followed Gaston everywhere in the draw- ing-room : " My dear archdeacon, where did he get it ? Why, he has lived most of his life with savages ! " "Vandyke might have painted the man," Lord Dargan had added. " Vandyke did paint him," had put in Delia Gas- goyne from behind her mother. "How do you mean, Delia?" Mrs. Gasgoyne had added, looking curiously at her. " His picture hangs in the dining-room." 46 THE TRESPASSER. Then the picture had been discussed, and the girl's eyes had followed Gaston — ^followed him until he had caught their glance. Without an introduction, he had come and dropped into conversation with her, till her mother cleverly interrupted. Inside the library Lady Belward was comfortably placed, and looking up at Gaston, said : " You have your father's ways : I hope that you will be wiser." " If you will teach me ! " he answered gently. There came two little bright spots on her cheeks, and her hands clasped in her lap. They all sat down. Sir William spoke : " It is much to ask that you should tell us of your life now, but it is better that we should start with some knowledge of each other." At that moment Gaston's eyes caught the strange picture on the wall. " I understand," he answered. " But I would be starting in the middle of a story." " You mean that you wish to hear your father's his- tory ? Did he not tell you ? " " Trifles— that is all." " Did he ever speak of me?" asked Lady Belward with low anxiety. " Yes, when he was dying." "What did he say?" "He said: 'Tell my mother that Truth waits HE TELLS THE STORY OP HIS LIFE. 47 long, but whips hard. Tell her that I always loyed her.' " She shrank in her chair as if from a blow, and then was white and motionless. " Let us hear your story," Sir Williapa said with a sort of hauteur. " You know your own, much of your father's lies buried with him." " Very well, sir." Sir William drew a chair up beside his wife. Gas- ton sat back, and for a moment did not speak. He was looking into distance. Presently the blue of his eyes went all black, and with strange unwavering concentration he gazed straight before him. A light spread over his face, his hands felt for the chair-arms and held them firmly. He began : " I first remember swinging in a blanket from a pine-tree at a buffalo-hunt while my mother cooked the dinner. There were scores of tents, horses, and many Indians and half-breeds, and a few white men. My father was in command. I can see my mother's face as she stood over the fire. It was not darker than mine ; she always seemed more French than In- dian, and she was thought comely." Lady Belward shuddered a little, but Gaston did not notice. "I can remember the great buffalo-hunt. You heard a heavy rumbling sound ; you saw a cloud on the prairie. It heaved, a steam came from it, and 48 THE TEBSPASSBR. Bometimes you caught the flash of ten thousand eyes as the beasts tossed their heads and then bent them again to the ground and rolled on, five hundred men after them, our women shouting and laughing, and arrows and bullets flying. ... I can remember a time also when a great Indian battle happened just outside the fort, and, with my mother crying after him, my father went out with a priest to stop it. My father was wounded, and then the priest frightened them, and they gathered their dead together and buried them. We lived in a fort for a long time, and my mother died there. She was a good woman, and she loved my father. I have seen her on her knees for hours praying when he was away. — I have her rosary now. They called her Ste. H61oise. Afterwards I was always with my father. He was a good man, but he was never happy ; and only at the last would he listen to the priest, though they were always great friends. He was not a Catholic of course, but he said that didn't matter." Sir William interrupted huskily : " Why did he never come back ? " " I do not know quite, but he said to me once : ' Gaston, you'll tell them of me some day, and it will be a soft pillow for their heads ! You can mend a broken life, but the ring of it is gone ! ' I think he meant to come back when I was about fourteen ; but things happened, and he stayed." HE TELLS THE STORY OF HIS LIFE. 49 There was a pause. Gaston seemed brooding, and Lady Belward said : " Go on, please." " There isn't so very much to tell. The life was the only one I had known, and it was all right. But my father had told me of this life. He taught me himself — he and I'ather Decluse and a Morayian mis- sionary for awhile. I knew some Latin and history, a bit of mathematics, a good deal of astronomy, some French poets, and Shakespere. Shakespere is wonder- ful !.. . My father wanted me to come here at once after he died, but I knew better — I wanted to get sense Erst. So I took a place in the Company. It wasn't all fun. I had to keep my wits sharp. I was only a youngster, and I had to do with men as crafty and as silly as old Polonius. I was sent to Labrador. That was not a life for a Christian. Once a year a ship comes to the port, bringing the year's mail and news from the world. When you watch that ship go out again, and you turn round and see the filthy Esquimaux and Indians, and know that you've got to live for another year with them, — sit in their dirty tepees, eat their raw frozen meat, with an occasional glut of pemmican, and the thermometer 70 degrees below zero, — you get a lump in your throat. "Then came one winter. I had one white man, two half-breeds, and an Indian with me. There was 50 THE TRESPASSER. darkness day after day, and because the Esquimaux and Indians hadn't come up to the fort that winter, it was lonely as a tomb. One by one the men got melan- choly and then went mad, and I had to tie them up, and care for them and feed them. The Indian was all right, but he got afraid, and wanted to start to a mis- sion station three hundred miles on. It was a bad lookout for me, but I told him to go. I was left alone. I was only twenty-one, but I was steel to my toes — good for wear and tear. Well, I had one solid month all alone with my madmen. Their jabbering made me seasick sometimes. At last one day I felt I'd go staring mad myself if I didn't do something exciting to lift me, as it. were. I got a revolver, sat at the opposite end of the room from the three lunatics, and practised shooting at them. I had got it into my head that they ought to die, but it was only fair, I thought, to give them a chance. I would try hard to shoot all round them — make a halo of bullets for the head of every one, draw them in silhouettes of solid lead on the wall. " I talked to them first, and told them what I was going to do. They seemed to understand, and didn't object. I began with the silhouettes, of course. I had a box of bullets beside me. They never squealed. I sent the bullets round them as pretty as the pattern of a milliner. Then I began with their heads. I did two all right. They sat and never stirred. But when HE TELLS THE STORY OF HIS LIFE. 51 I came to the last something happened. It was Jock Lawson." Sir William interposed : " Jock Lawson ! — Jock Lawson from here ? " " Yes. His mother keeps ' The Whisk o' Barley.' " " So, that is where Jock Lawson went ? He fol- lowed your father ? " "Yes. — Jock was mad enough when I began — clean gone. But, somehow, the game I was playing cured him. ' Steady, Jock ! ' I said. ' Steady ! ' for I saw him move. I levelled for the second bead of the halo. My finger was on the trigger. ' My God ! don't shoot ! ' he called. It startled me, my hand shook, the thing went ofiE, and Jock had a bullet through his" brain I . . . Then I waked up. Perhaps I had been mad myself — I don't know. But my brain never seemed clearer than when I was playing that game. It was like a magnifying glass : and my eyes were so clear and strong that I could see the pores on their skin, and the drops of sweat breaking out on Jock's forehead when he yelled ! " A low moan came from Lady Bel wood. Her face was drawn and pale, but her eyes were on Gaston with a deep fascination. Sir William whispered to her. " No," she said, " I will stay." Gaston saw the impression he had made. " Well, I had to bury poor Jock all alone. I don't think I should have minded it so much, if it hadn't 62 THE TRESPASSER. been for the faces of those other two crazy men. One of them sat still as death, his eyes following me with one long stare, and the other kept praying all the time — he'd been a lay preacher once before he backslided, and it came back on him now naturally. Now it would be from Revelation, now out of the Psalms, and again a swinging exhortation for the Spirit to come down and convict me of sin. There was a lot of sanity in it too, for he kept saying at last : ' shut not up my soul with the sinners : nor my life with the bloodthirsty.'' I couldn't stand it, with Jock dead there before me, so I gave him a heavy dose of pare- goric out of the Company's stores. Before he took it he raised his finger and said to me, with a beastly stare : ' Tliou art the man ! '' But the paregoric put him to sleep. . . . "Then I gave the other something to eat, and dragged Jock out to bury him. I remembered then that he couldn't be buried, for the ground was too hard and the ice too thick ; so I got ropes, and, when he stifEened, slung him up into a big cedar tree, and then went up myseliand arranged the branches about him comfortably. It seemed to me that Jock was a baby and I was his father. You couldn't see any blood, and I fixed his hair so that it covered the hole in the forehead. I remember I kissed him on the cheek, and then said a prayer— one that I 'd got out of my father's prayer-book : ' That it may please HE TELLS THE STOBY OF HIS LIFE. 53 Thee to preserve all that travel by land or by water,' all women labouring of child, ally sick persons and young children j and to show Thy pity upon all pris- oners and captives.' Somebow I had got it into my head that Jock was going on a long journey, and that I was a prisoner and a captive." Gaston broke off, and said presently : " Perhaps this is all too awful to hear, but it gives you an idea of what kind of things went to make me." Lady Belward answered for both : " Tell us all — everything ! " " It is late," said Sir William, nervously. "What does it matter? It is once in a lifetime," she answered sadly. Gaston took up the thread : " Now I come to what will shock you even more, perhaps. So, be prepared. I don't know how many days went, but at last I had three visitors — in time I should think : a Moravian missionary, and an Esqui- maux and his daughter. I didn't tell the missionary about Jock — there was no use, it could do no good. They stayed four weeks, and during that time one of the crazy men died. The other got better, but had to be watched. I could do anything with him, if I got my eye on him. Somehow, I must tell you, I've got a lot of power that way. I don't know where it comes from. Well, the missionary had to go. The old Es- quimaux thought that he and his daughter would stay 54 THE TRESPASSER. on if I'd let them. I was only too glad. But it wasn't wise for the missionary to take the journey alone, — it was a bad business in any case. I urged the man that had been crazy to go, for I thought activity would do him good. He agreed, and the two left and got to the Mission Station all right, after wicked trouble. I was alpne with the Esquimaux and his daughter. You never know why certain things happen, and I can't tell why that winter was so weird ; why the old Esqui- maux should take sick one morning, and in the even- ing should call me and his daughter Lucy — she'd been given a Christian name, of course — and say that he was going to die, and he wanted me to marry her " — (Lady Belward exclaimed, Sir William's hands fin- gered the chair-arm nervously) — " there and then, so that he'd know she would be cared for. He was a heathen, but he had been primed by the missionaries about his daughter. She was a fine, clever girl, and well educated — the best product of their mission. So he called for a Bible. There wasn't one in the place, but I had my mother's Book of the Mass. I went to get it, but when I set my eyes on it, I couldn't — no, I couldn't do it, for I hadn't the least idea but what I should bid my lady good-bye when it suited, and I didn't want any swearing at all — not a bit. I didn't do any. But what happened had to be with or with- out any ring or book and ' Forasmuch as.' There had been so much funeral and sudden death, that a mar- HE TELLS THE STORY OP HIS LIFE. 55 riage would be a God-send anyhow. So the old Esqui- maux got our two hands in his, babbled away in half- English, half -Esquimaux, with the girl's eyes shining like a she-moose over a dying buck, and about the time we kissed each other, his head dropped back — and that is all there was about that ! " Gaston now kept his eyes on his listeners. He was aware that his story must sound to them as bru- tal as might be, but it was a phase of his life, and, so far as he could, he wanted to start with a clean sheet ; not out of love of confidence, for he was self- contained, but he would have enough to do to shep- herd his future without shepherding his past. He saw that Lady Belward had a sickly fear in her face, while Sir William had gone stern and hard. He went on : " It saved the situation, did that marriage ; though it was no marriage you will say. Neither was it one way, and I didn't intend at the start to stand by it an. hour longer than I wished. Bat she was more than I looked for, and it seems to me that she saved my life that winter, or my reason anyhow. There had been so much tragedy that I used to wonder every day what would happen before night : and that's not a good thing for the brain of a chap of twenty-one or two. The funny part of it is that she wasn't a pagan — not a bit ! She could read and speak English in a sweet old-fashioned way, and she used to sing to 56 THE TRESPASSER. me — such a funny, sorry little voice she had — ^hymns the Moravians had taught her, and one or two Eng- lish songs. I taught her one or two besides, ' Where the Hawthorn Tree is Blooming,' and ' Allan Water ' — the first my father had taught me, the other an old Scotch trader. It's different with a woman and a man in a place like that. Two men will go mad together, but there's a saving something in the contact of a man's brain with a woman's. I got fond of her, — any man would have, — for she had something that I never saw in any heathen, certainly in no Indian; you'll see it in women from Iceland. I determined to marry her in regular style when spring and a mission- ary came. You can't understand, maybe, how one can settle to a life where you've got companionship, and let the world go by. About that time, I thought that I'd let Kidley Court and the rest of it go as a boy's dreams go. I didn't seem to know that I was only satisfied in one set of my instincts. Spring came, so did a missionary, and for better or worse it was ! " Sir William came to his feet. " My God ! " he broke out. His wife tried to rise, but could not. "This makes everything impossible," added the baronet shortly. " Oh no, it makes nothing impossible — if you will listen." HE TELLS THE STOEY OF HIS LIFE. 67 Gaston was cool. He had begun playing for the stakes from one standpoint, and he would not turn back. He continued : "I lived with her happily; I never expect to have happiness like that again — never, — and after two years at another post in Labrador, came word from the Company that I might go to Quebec, there to be given my choice of posts. I went. By this time I had again vague ideas that sometime I should come here, but how or why I couldn't tell; I was drift- ing, and for her sake willing to drift. I was glad to take her to Quebec, for I guessed she would get ideas, and it didn't strike me that she would be out of place. So we went. But she was out of place in many ways. It did not suit at all. We were asked to good houses, for I believe I have always had enough of the Belward in me to keep my end up anywhere. The thing went on pretty well, but at last she used to beg me to go without her to excursions and parties. There were always one or two quiet women whom she liked to sit with, and because she seemed happier for me to go, I did. I was popular, and got along with women well ; but I tell you honestly I loved my wife all the time; so that when a Christian busybody poured into her ears some self-made scandal, it was a brutal, awful lie — brutal and awful, for she had never known jealousy : it did not belong to her old social 58 THE TRESPASSER. creed. But it was in the core of her somewhere, and an aboriginal passion at work naked is a thing to be remembered. I had to face it one night. . . . " I was quiet, and did what I could. After that I insisted on her going with me wherever I went, but she had changed, and I saw that, in spite of herself, the thing grew. One day we went on an excursion down the St. Lawrence. We were merry, and I was telling yarns. We were just nearing a landing-stage, when a pretty girl, with mor^ gush than sense, caught me by the arm and begged some ridiculous thing of me — an autograph, or what not. A minute after- wards I saw my wife spring from the bulwarks down on the landing-stage, and rush up the shore into the woods. . . . We were two days finding her. That settled it ! I was sick enough at heart, and I deter- mined to go back to Labrador. We did so. Evei-y- thing had gone on the rocks. My wife was not, never would be, the same again. She taunted me and wor- ried me, and because I would not quarrel, seemed to have a greater grievance — jealousy is a kind of mad- ness. One night she was most galling, and I sat still and said nothing. My life seemed gone of a heap : I was sick — sick to the teeth ; hopeless, looking forward to nothing. I imagine my hard quietness roused her. She said something hateful — something about having married her, and not a woman from Quebec. I smiled — I couldn't help it ; then I laughed, a bit wild, I HE TELLS THE STORY OV HIS LIFE. 59 suppose. I saw the flash of steel. ... I believe I laughed in her face as I fell. . When I came to she was lying with her head on my breast — dead — stone dead ! " Lady Belward sat with closed eyes, her fingers clasping and unclasping on the top of her cane ; but Sir William wore a look half-satisfied, half-excited. He now hurried his story. " I got well, and after that stayed in the North for a year. Then I passed down the continent to Mexico and South America. There I got a commission to go to New Zealand and Australia to sell a lot of horses. I did so, and spent some time in the South Sea Is- lands. Again I drifted back to the Rockies and over into the plains ; found Jacques Brillon, my servant, had a couple of years' work and play, gathered together some money, as good a horse and outfit as the North could give, and started with Brillon and his broncho, — having got both sense and experience, I hope — for Ridley Court. And here I am ! There's a lot of my life that I haven't told you of, but it doesn't matter, because it's adventure mostly, a,nd it can be told at any time ; but these are essential facts, and it is better that you should hear them. And that is all, grand- father and grandmother." After a minute Lady Belward rose, leaned on her crutch, and looked at him wistfully. Sir William said: 60 THE TRESPASSER. "Are you sure that you will suit this life, or it you?" " It is the only idea I have at present ; and, any- how, it is my rightful home, sir." " I was not thinking of your rights, but of the happiness of us all." Lady Belward limped to him, and laid a hand on his shoulder. " You have had one great tragedy, so have we : neither could bear another. Try to be worthy — of your home." Then she solemnly kissed him on the cheek. Soon afterwards they went to their rooms. CHAPTBK IV. AN HOUR WITH HIS FATHER'S PAST. In his bedroom Gaston made a discovery. He chanced to place his hand in the tail-pocket of the coat he had worn. He drew forth a letter. The ink was faded, and the lines were scrawled. It ran : " It's no good. Mr. lan's been I It's face the musik now. If you want me, say so. I'm for kicks or ha'pence — ^no diffrense. " Tours, J." He knew the writing very well — Jock Lawson's ! There had been some trouble, and Mr. Ian had "been," bringing peril. What was it? His father and Jock had kept the secret from him. He put his hand in the pocket again. There was another note — this time in a woman's handwriting : " Oh, come to me, if you would save us both ! Do not fail I God help us 1 Oh, Robert ! " It was signed " Agnes." Well, here was something of mystery ; but he did not trouble himself about that. He was not at Eid- ley Court to solve mysteries, to probe into the past, to 62 THE TRESPASSER. set his father's wrongs right ; but to serve himself, to reap for all those years wherein his father had not reaped. He enjoyed life, and he would search this one to the full of his desires. Before he retired he studied the room, handling things that lay where his father placed them so many years before. He was not without emotions in this, but he held himself firm. As he stood ready to get into bed, his eyes chanced upon a portrait of his uncle Ian. " There's where the tug comes ! " he said, nodding at it. " Shake hands, and ten paces. Uncle Ian ? " Then he blew out the candle, and in five minutes was sound asleep. He was out at six o'clock. He made for the stables, and found Jacques pacing the yard. He smiled at Jacques' dazed look. " What about the horse, Brillon ? " he said, nod- ding as he came up. " Saracen's had a slice of the stable-boy's shoulder —sir." Amusement loitered in Gaston's eyes. The " sir " had stuck in Jacques' throat. " Saracen has established himself, then ? Good ! And the broncho ? " "Bien, a trifle only. They laugh much in the kitchen-^ — -" " The hall, Brillon." AN HOUR WITH HIS FATHER'S PAST. 63 in the hall last night. That hired man over there " « That groom, Brillon." " that groom, he was a fool, and fat. He was the worst. This morning he laugh at my broncho. He say a horse like that is nothing : no pace, no travel. I say the broncho was not so Vfer' bad, and I tell him try the paces. I whisper soft, and the broncho stand like a lamb. He mount, and sneer, and grin at the high pommel, and start. For a minute it was pretty; and then I give a little soft call, and in a minute there was the broncho bucking — doubling like a hoop, and dropping same as lead. Once that — groom — come down on the pommel, then over on the ground like a ball, all muck and blood ! " The half-breed paused, looking innocently before him. Gaston's mouth quirked. "A solid success, Brillon. Teach them all the tricks you can. At ten o'clock come to my room. The campaign begins then." Jacques ran a hand through his long black hair, and fingered his sash. Gaston understood. " The hair and ear-rings may remain, Brillon ; but the beard and clothes must go — except for occasions. Come along ! " For the next two hours Gaston explored the stables and the grounds. Nothing escaped him. He gathered every incident of the surroundings, and talked to the 64 THE TRESPASSER. servants freely, softly, and easily, yet with a superior- ity, which suddenly was imposed in the case of the huntsman at the kennels — for the Whipshire hounds were here. Gaston had never ridden to hounds. It was not, however, his cue to pretend knowledge. He was strong enough to admit ignorance. He stood leaning against the door of the kennels, arms folded, eyes half-closed, with the sense of a painter, before the turning bunch of brown and white, getting the charm of distance and soft tones. His blood beat hard, for suddenly he felt as if he had been behind just such a pack one day, one clear desirable day of spring. He saw people gathering at the kennels ; saw men drink beer and eat sandwiches at the door of the huntsman's house, — a long, low dwelling, with crumbling arched doorways like those of a monastery, — watched them get away from the top of the moor, he among them ; heard the horn, the whips; and saw the fox break cover. Then came a rare run for five sweet miles — down a long valley — over quick-set hedges, with stiff- ish streams — another hill — a great combe — a lovely valley stretching out — a swerve to the right — over a gate — and the brush got at a farm-house door ! Surely, he had seen it all ; but what kink of the brain was it that the men wore flowing wigs and im- mense boot-legs, and sported lace in the hunting-field ? And why did he see within that picture another of two ladies and a gentleman hawking ? AN HOUR WITH HIS FATHER'S PAST. 66 He was roused from his dream by hearing the huntsman say in a quizzical voice : " How do you like the dogs, sir ? " To his last day Lugley, the huntsman, remembered the slow look of cold surprise, of masterful malice, scathing him from head to foot. The words that fol- lowed the look, simple as they were, drove home the naked reproof : " What is your name, my man ? " " Lugley, sir." " Lugley ! Lugley ! H'm ! Well, Lugley, I like the hounds better than I like you. Who is Master of the Hounds, Lugley ? " " Captain Maudsley, sir." "Just so. You are satisfied with your place, Lugley?" " Yes, sir," said the man in a humble voice, now cowed. The news of the arrival of the strangers had come to him late at night, and, with Whipshire stupidity, he had thought that anyone coming from the wilds of British America must be but a savage after all. "Very well; I wouldn't throw myself out of a place, if I were you." " Oh, no, sir ! Beg pardon, sir ; I " " Attend to your hounds there, Lugley." So saying, Gaston nodded Jacques away with him, leaving the huntsman sick with apprehension. 66 THE TRESPASSER. " You see how it is to be done, Brillon ? " said Gaston. Jacques' brown eyes twinkled. " You have the grand trick, sir." " I enjoy the game ; and so shall you, if you will. You've begun well. I don't know much of this life yet ; but it seems to me that they are all part of a machine, not the idea behind the machine. They have no invention. Their machine is easy to learn. Do not pretend ; but for every bit you learn show something better, something to make them dizzy now and then." He paused on a knoll and looked down. The castle, the stables, the cottages of labourers and vil- lagers lay before them. In a certain highly-cultivated field, men were working. It was cut off in squares and patches. It had an air which struck Gaston as un- usual ; why, he could not tell. But he had a strange divining instinct, or whatever it may be called. He made for the field and questioned the workmen. The field was cut up into allotment gardens. Here, at a nominal rent, the cottager could grow his vegetables ; a little spot of the great acre of England, which gave the labourer a tiny sense of ownership, of manhood. Gaston was interested. More, he was de- termined to carry that experiment further, if he ever got the chance. There was no socialism in him. The true barbarian is like the true aristocrat ; more a AN HOUR WITH HIS FATHER'S PAST. 6Y giver of gifts than a lover of co-operation ; concerning ownership by right of power and superior independ- ence, hereditary or otherwise. Gaston was both bar- barian and aristocrat. " Brillon," he said, as they walked on, " do you think they would be happier on the prairies with a hundred acres of land, horses, cows, and a pen of pigs?" " Can I be happy here all at once, sir ? " "That's just it. It's too late for them. They couldn't grasp it unless they went when they were youngsters. They'd long for ' Home and Old Eng- land ' and this grub-and-grind life. God in heaven, look at them — crumpled-up creatures ! And I'll stake my life, they were as pretty children as you'd care to see. They are out of place in the landscape, Brillon ; for it is all luxury and lush, and they are crumples — crumples ! But yet there isn't any use being sorry for them, for they don't grasp anything outside the life they are living. Can't you guess how they live ? — Look at the doors of the houses shut, and the win- dows sealed ; yet they've been up these three hours ! And they'll suck in bad air, and bad food ; and they'll get cancer, and all that ; and they'll die, and be trotted away to the graveyard for ' passun ' to hurry them into their little dark cots, in the blessed hope of ever- lasting life ! I'm going to know this thing, Brillon,, from tooth to ham-string ; and, however it goes, we'll 68 THE TRESPASSER. have lived up and down the whole scale, and that's something ! " He suddenly stopped, and then added : " I'm likely to go pretty far in this. I can't tell how or why, but it's so. Now, once more, as yester- day afternoon, for good or for bad, for long or for short, for the gods or for the devil, are you with me ? There's time to turn back even yet, and I'll say no word to your going." " Mon Dieu ! a vow is a vow. When I cannot ran I will walk, when I cannot walk I will crawl after you — comme pa .' " Lady Belward did not . appear at breakfast. Sir William and Gaston breakfasted alone at half-past nine o'clock. The talk was of the stables and the estate generally. The breakfast-room looked out on a soft lawn, stretching away into a broad park, through which a stream ran ; and beyond was a green hill-side. The quiet, the perfect order and discipline, gave a pleasant tingle to Gaston's veins. It was all so easy, and yet so admirable — elegance without weight. He felt at home. He was not certain of some trifles of etiquette ; but he and Sir William were alone, and he followed his instincts. Once hte frankly asked his grandfather of a matter of form, of which he was uncertain the evening before. The thing was done so naturally that the conventional mind of the baronet was not AN HOUR WITH HIS FATHER'S PAST. 69 disturbed. The Belwards were notable for their brains, and Sir William saw that the young man had an unusual share. He also felt that this startling in- dividuality might make a hazardous future ; but he liked the fellow, and he had a debt to pay to the son of his own dead son. Of course, if their wills came into conflict, there could be but one thing — the young man must yield ; or, if he played the fool, there must be an end. Still, he hoped the best. When break- fast was finished, he proposed going to the library. There Sir William talked of the future, asked what Gaston's ideas were, and questioned him as to his present affairs. Gaston frankly said that he wanted to live as his father would have done, and that he had no property, and no money beyond a hundred pounds, which would last him a couple of years on the prairies, but would be fleeting here. Sir William at once said that he would give him a liberal allowance, with, of course, the run of his own stables and their house in town : and when he mar^: ried acceptably, his allowance would be doubled. "And I wish to say, Gaston," he added, "that your uncle Ian, though heir to the title, does not necessarily get the property, which is not entailed. Upon that point I need hardly say more. He has dis- appointed us. Through him Robert left us. Of his character I need not speak. Of his ability the world speaks variably : he is an artist. Of his morals I need 70 THE TRESPASSER. only say that they are scarcely those of an English gentleman, though whether that is because he is an artist, I cannot say — I really cannot say. I remember meeting a painter at Lord Dunfolly's, — Dunfolly is a singular fellow, — and he struck me chiefly as harm- less, distinctly harmless. I could not understand why he was at Dunfolly's, he seemed of so little use, though Lady Malfire, who writes or something, mooned with him a good deal. I believe there was some scandal or something afterwards. I really do not know. But you are not a painter, and I believe you have character — I fancy so." " If you mean that I don't play fast and loose, sir, you are right. What I do, I do as straight as a needle." The old man sighed carefully. " You are very like Eobert, and yet there is some- thing else. I don't know, I really don't know what ! " " I ought to have more in me than the rest of the family, sir." This was somewhat startling. Sir William's fin- gers stroked his beardless cheek uncertainly. " Possibly — possibly." " I've lived a broader life, I've got wider standards, and there are three races at work in me." " Quite so, quite so ; " and Sir William fumbled among his papers nervously. " Sir," said Gaston suddenly, " I told you last AN HOUR WITH HIS FATHER'S PAST. 71 night the honest story of my life. I want to start fair and square. I want the honest story of my father's life here; how and why he left, and what these letters mean ! " He took from his pocket the notes he had found the night before, and handed them. Sir William read them with a disturbed look, and turned them over and over. Gaston told where he had found them. Sir William spoke at last. " The main story is simple enough. Robert was extravagant, and Ian was vicious and extravagant also. Both got into trouble. I was younger then, and severe. Eobert hid nothing, Ian all he could. One day things came to a climax. In his wild way, Robert — with Jock Lawson — determined to rescue a young man from the officers of justice, and to get him out of the country. There were reasons. He was the son of a gentleman; and, as we discovered afterwards, Robert had been too intimate with the wife — his one sin of the kind, I believe. Ian came to know, and prevented the rescue. Meanwhile, Rob- ert was liable to the law for the attempt. There was a bitter scene here, and I fear that my wife and I said hard things to Eobert." Gaston's eyes were on Lady Belward's portrait. " What did my grandmother say ? " There was a pause, then : 72 THE TRESPASSER. " That she would never call him son again, I be- lieve; that the shadow of his life would be hateful to her always. I tell you this because I see you look at that portrait. What I said, I think, was no less. So, Robert, after a wild burst of anger, flung away from us out of the house. His mother, suddenly re- penting, ran to follow him, but fell on the stone steps at the door, and became a cripple for life ! At first she remained bitter against Robert, and at that time Ig,n painted that portrait. It is clever, as you may see, and weird. But there came a time when she kept it as a reproach to herself, not Robert. She is a good woman — a very good woman ! I know none better, really no one ! " " What became of the arrested man ? " Gaston asked quietly, with the oblique suggestiveness of a counsel. " He died of a broken blood-vessel on the night of the intended rescue, and the matter was hushed up." " What became of the wife ? " " She died also within a year." " Were there any children ? " " One— a girl." "Whose was the child?" "You mean ?" " The husband's or the lover's ? " There was a pause. AN HOUR WITH HIS FATHER'S PAST. 73 " I cannot tell you." " Where is the girl ? " " My son, do not ask that. It can do no good — really no good." "Is it not my due?" " Do not impose your due. Believe me, I know best. If ever there is need to tell you, you shall be told. Trust me. Has not the girl her due also? " Gaston's eyes held Sir William's a moment. "You are right, sir," he said, "quite right. ■ I shall not try to know. But if " He paused. Sir William spoke : " There is but one person in the world who knows the child's father ; and I could not ask him, though I have known him long and well — indeed, no ! " "I do not ask to understand more," Gascon re- plied. " I almost wish I had known nothing. And yet I will ask one thing : Is the girl in comfort and good surroundings?" " The best — ah, yes, the very best." There was a pause, in which both sat thinking; then Sir William wrote out a cheque and offered it, with a hint of emotion. He was recalling how he had done the same with this boy's father. Gaston understood. He got up, and said : " Honestly, sir, I don't know how I shall turn out here ; for, if I don't like it, it couldn't hold me, or, if it did, I should probably make things uncomfortable. 74 THE TRESPASSER. But I think I shall like it, and I will do my best to make things go well. Good-morning, sir." With courteous attention Sir William let his grand- son out of the room. And thus did a young man begin his career as Gaston Bel ward. Gentleman. CHAPTER V. ■WHEKEI] 246 THE TEESPASSBE. Senegal. She herself had only cried four times, that she remembered ; — when her mother died ; when her father was called a thief ; when, one day, she suffered the first great shame of her life in the mountains of Auvergne ; and the night when she waked a second time to her love for Gaston.— She dared to call it love, though good Annette had called it a mortal sin. What was to be done? The other woman must suffer. The man was hers — hers for ever ! He had said it : for ever. Yet her heart had a wild hunger for that something which this girl had and she had not. But the man was hers ! She had won him away from this other. Delia came upon the quay bravely, passing through the crowd of staring fishermen, who presently gave Gaston a guttural cheer. Three of them, indeed, had been drinking his health. They embraced him and kissed him, begging him to come with them for ab- sinthe. He arranged the matter with a couple of francs. Then he wondered what now was to be done. He could not insult the Gasgoynes by asking them to come to the chateau. He proposed the H6tel de Prance to Mr. Gasgoyne, who assented. It was difificult to separate here on the quay : they must all walk to- gether to the hotel. Gaston tui-ned to speak to An- dr6e, but she was gone. She had saved the situa- tion. MAN AND WOMAN FACE THE INTOLERABLE. 247 The three spoke little, and ,then but formallj, as they walked to the hotel. Mr. Gasgoyne said that they would leave by train for Paris the next day, going to Donarnenez that eTening. They had saved nothing from the yacht. Delia did not speak. She was pale, composed now. In the hotel Mr. Gasgoyne arranged for rooms, while Gaston got some sailors together, and, in Mr. Gas- goyne's name, ofEered a price for the recovery of the yacht or of certain things in her. Then he went into the hotel to see if he could do anything furtlier. The door of the sitting-room was open, and no answer com- ing to his knock, he entered. Delia was standing in the window. Against her will her father had gone to find a doctor. Gaston would have drawn back if she had not turned round wearily to him. Perhaps it were well to get it over now ! He came forward. She made no motion. " I hope you feel better ? " he said. " It was a bad accident." " I am tired and shaken, of course," she responded. " It was very brave of you." He hesitated, then said : " We were more fortunate than brave." He was determined to haveAndr^e included. She deserved that ; the wrong to Delia was not hers. But she answered after the manner of a woman : 248 THE TRESPASSER. "The girl — ah, yes, please thank her for us. What is her name?" "She is known in Audierne — as Madame Bel- ward." The girl started. Her face had a cold, scornful pride. " The Bretons, then, haye a taste for fiction ? " " No, they speak as they are taught." " They understand, then, as little as I." How proud, how inefEaceably superior she was ! " Be ignorant for ever," he answered quietly. " I do not need the counsel, believe me." Her hand trembled, though it rested against the window — trembled with indignation : the insult of his elopement kept beating up her throat in spite of her. At that moment a servant knocked, entered, and said that a parcel had been brought for mademoiselle. It was laid upon the table. Delia, wondering, ordered it to be opened. A bundle of clothes was disclosed — Andr^e's! Gaston recognised them, and caught his breath with wonder and confusion. " Who has sent them ? " Delia said to the servant. " They come from the Chdteau Ronan, mademoi- selle." Delia dismissed the servant. " The Chateau Ronan ? " she asked of Gaston. " Where I am living." MAN AND WOMAN FACE THE INTOLERABLE. 249 "It is not necessary to speak of this?" She flushed. " Not at all. I will have them sent back. There is a little shop near by where you can get what you may need." Andree had acted according to her lights. It was not an olive-branch, but a touch of primitive hospital- ity. She was Delia's enemy at sight, but a woman must have linen. Mr. Gasgoyne entered. Gaston prepared to go. " Is there anything more that I can do ? " he said, as it were, to both. The girl replied. " Nothing at all, thank you." They did not shake hands. Mr. Gasgoyne could not think that all had neces- sarily ended. The thing might be patched up one day yet. This affair with the dompteuse was mad sail- ing, but the man might round-to suddenly and be no worse for the escapade. "We are going early in the morning," he said. " We can get along all right. Good-bye ! When do you come to England ? " The reply was prompt. " In a few weeks." He looked at both. The girl, seeing that he was going to speak further, bowed and left the room. His eyes followed her. After a moment, he said firmly : " Mr. Gasgoyne, I am going to face all." ir 250 THE TRESPASSER. " To live it down, Belward ? " " I am going to fight it down ! " "Well, there's a difference. You have made a mess of things, and shocked us all. I needn't say what more. It's done, and now you know what such things mean to a good woman — and, I hope also, to the father of a good woman." The man's voice broke a little. He added : " They used to come to swords or pistols on such points. We can't settle it in that way. Anyhow, you have handicapped us to-day." Then, with a burst of reproach, indignation, and trouble : " Great God ! as if you hadn't been the luckiest man on earth ! Delia, the estate, the Commons — all for a domp- teuse ! " " Let us say nothing more," said Gaston, choking down wrath at the reference to Andr6e, but sorrowful, and pitying Mr. Gasgoyne. Besides, the man had a right to rail. Soon after they parted courteously. Gaston went to the chateau. As he came up the stone steps he met a procession — it was the feast-day of the Virgin — of priests and people and little chil- dren, filing up from the village and the sea, singing as they came. He drew up to the wall, stood upon the stone seat, and took off his hat while the proces- sion passed. He had met the cur6, first accidentally on the shore, and afterwards in the curb's house, finding MAN AND WOMAN FACE THE INTOLERABLE. 261 much in comnton — he had known many priests in the North, knowii much good of them. The cur6 glanced up at him now as they passed, and a half-sad smile crossed his face. Gaston caught it as it passed. The cur6 read his case truly enough and gently enough too. In some wise hour he would plead with Gaston for the woman's soul and his own. Gaston did not find Andr^e at the chdteau. She had gone out alone towards the sea, Annette said, hy a route at the rear of the village. He went also, but did not find her. As he came again to the quay he saw the Kismet beating upon the rocks — the sailors had given up any idea of saving her. He stood and watched the sea breaking over her, and the whole scene flashed back on him. He thought how easily he could be sentimental over the thing. But that was not his nature. He had made his bed, but he would not lie in it — he would carry it on his back. They all said that he had gone on the rocks. He laughed. " I can turn that tide : I can make things come my way," he said. " All they want is sensation, it isn't morals that concerns them. Well, I'll give them sen- sation ! They expect me to hide, and drop out of the game. Never — so help me, God! I'll play it so they'll forget this ! " He rolled and lighted a cigarette, and went again to the chAteau. Dinner was ready — had been ready 262 THE TRESPASSER. for Bome time. He sat down, and presently Andrde came. There was a look in her face that he could not understand. They ate their dinner quietly, not men- tioning the events of the afternoon. Presently a telegram was brought to him. It read : " Come. My ofBce, Downing Street, Friday. Expect you." It was signed " Faramond." At the same time came letters: from his grandfather, from Captain Maudsley. The first was stern, imperious, reproach- ful. — Shame for those that took him in and made him, a ruined reputation, a spoiled tradition : he had been but a heathen after all ! There was only left to bid him farewell, and to enclose a cheque for two thou- sand pounds. Captain Maudsley called him a fool, and asked him what he meant to do — hoped he would give np the woman at once, and come back. He owed some- thing to his position as Master of the Hounds — a tradition that oughtn't to be messed about. There it all was : not a word about radical morality or immorality ; but the tradition of Family, the Com- mons, Master of the Hounds ! But there was another letter. He did not recog- nise the handwriting, and the envelope had a black edge. He turned it over and over, forgetting that Andr6e was watching him. Looking up, he caught her eyes, with their strange, sad look. She guessed what was in these letters. She knew English well MAN AND WOMAN FACE THE INTOLERABLE. 253 enough to understand them. He interpreted her look, and pushed them over. " You may read them, if you wish ; but I wouldn't, if I were you." She read the telegram first, and asked who " Fara- mond" was. Then she read Sir William Belward's letter, and afterwards Captain Maudsley's. " It has all come at once," she said : " the girl and these ! What will you do ? Give ' the woman ' up for the honour — of the Master of the Hounds ? " The tone was bitter, exasperating. Gaston was patient. " What do you think, Andree ? " " Oh ! it has only begun," she said. " Wait, King of Ys. Eead that other letter." Her eyes were fascinated by the black border. He opened it with a strange slowness. It began without any form of address, it had the superscription of a street in Manchester Square : " If you were not in deep trouble I would not write. But because 1 know that more hard things than kind ^ill ^ said by others, I want to say what is in my heart, which is quick to feel for you. I know that you have sinned, but I pray for you every day, and I cannot believe that Grod will not answer. Oh 1 think of the wrong that you have done : of the wrong to the girl, to her soul's good. Think of that, and right the wrong in so far as you can. Oh, Gaston, my brother ! — I need not explain why 1 write thus. My grandfather, before he died, three weeks ago, told me that you know ! — and I also have known ever since the day you saved the boy. Oh ! thiok of one who would give years of her life to see you good and noble and happy. . . ." 254 THB TEESPASSEE. Then followed a deep, sincere appeal to his man- hood, and afterwards a wish that their real relations should be made known to the world if he needed her, or if disaster came ; that she might share and comfort his life, whatever it might be. Then again : " If you love her, and she loves you, and is sorry for what she has done, marry her and save her from everlasting shame. I am staying with my grandfather's cousin, the Dean of Digh- bury, the father of the boy you saved. He is very kind, and he knows all. May God guide you aright, and may you believe that no one speaks more truthfully to you than your sorrowful and affectionate sister, Alice Wingfield." He put the letter down beside him, made a ciga- rette, and poured out some cofEe^ for them both. He was holding himself with a tight hand. This letter had touched him as nothing in his life had done since his father's death. It had nothing of noblesse oblige, but straight statement of wrong, as she saw it. And a sister without an open right to the title : the mere fidelity of blood! His father had brought this sor- rowful life into, the world and he had made it more sorrowful — poor little thing — poor girl ! " What are you going to do ? " said Andr6e. " Do yon go back — with Delia?" He winced. Yet why should he expect of her too great refinement ? She had not had a chance, she had not the stuff for it in her veins ; she had never been taught. But behind it all was her passion — her love — for him. MAN AND WOMAN FACE THE INTOLERABLE. 255 " Not with her : you know that's impossible ! " he answered. " She would not take you back." " Probably not. She has pride." " Pride — chut ! She'd jump at the chance ! " "That sounds rude, Andr6e; and it is contra- dictory." "Rude! Well, I'm only a gipsy and a domp- teuse!" « Is that all, my girl ? " " That's all, now." Then, with a sudden change and a quick sob : " But I may be — Oh, I can't say it, Gaston ! " She hid her face for a moment on his shoulder. "My God!" He got to his feet. He had not thought of that — of another besides themselves. He had drifted. A hundred ideas ran back and forth. He went to the window and stood looking out. Alice's letter was still in his fingers. She came and touched his shoulder. " Are you going to leave me, Gaston ? What does that letter say?" He looked at her kindly, with a protective tender- ness. " Read the letter, Andr6e," he said. She did so, at first slowly, then quickly, then over and over again. He stood motionless in the window, 256 THE TRESPASSER. She pushed the letter between his fingers. He did not turn. "I cannot understand everything, but what she says she means. Oh, Gaston, what a fool, what a fool you've been ! " After a moment, however, she threw her arms about him with animal-like fierceness. " But I can't give you up — I can't ! " Then, with another of those sudden changes, she added, with a wild little laugh : " I can't, I can't, Master of the Hounds!" There came a knock at the door. Annette entered with a letter. The postman had not delivered it on his rounds, because the address was not correct. It was for madame. Andr6e took it, started at the hand- writing, tore open the envelope, and read : "Zoug-Zoug congratulates you on the conquest of his nephew. Zoug-Zoug's name is not George Maar, as you knew him. Allah's blessing, with Zoug-Zoug's 1 "What fame you've got now — dompteuse, and the sweet scandal 1 " The journalist had found out Zoug-Zoug at last, and Ian Belward had talked with the manager of the menagerie. AndrSe shuddered and put the letter in her pocket. Now she understood why she had shrunk from Gaston that first night and those first days in Audierne : that strange sixth sense, divination — vague, helpless pre- MAN AND WOMAN FACE THE INTOLERABLE. 257 science. And here, suddenly, she shrank again, but with a different thought. She hurriedly left the room and went to her chamber. In a few moments he came to her. She was sitting upright in a chair, looking straight before her. Her lips were bloodless, her eyes were burning. He came and took her hands. "What is it, Andr6e?" he said. "That letter, dear!" She looked at him steadily. " You'll be sorry if you read it." But she gave it to him. He lighted a candle, put it on a little table, sat down, and read. The shock went deep ; so deep that it made no violent sign on the surface. He spread the letter out before him. The candle showed his face gone grey and knotted with misery. He could bear all the rest : fight, do all that was right to the coming mother of his child ; but this made him sick and dizzy. He felt as he did when he waked up in Labrador, with his wife's dead lips pressed to his neck. It was strange too that Andr6e was as quiet as he: no storm — misery had gone deep with her also. " Do you care to tell me about it ? " he said. She sat back in her chair, her hands over her eyes. Presently, still sitting so, she spoke. Ian Belward had painted them and their van in the hills of Auvergne, and had persuaded her to sit 25 i THE TRESPASSER. for a picture. He had treated her courteously at first. Her father was taken ill suddenly, and died. She was alone for a few days afterwards. Ian Belward came to her. Of that miserable, heart-rending, cruel time, — the life-sorrow of a defenceless girl, — Gaston heard with a hard sort of coldness. The promised marriage was a matter for the man's mirth a week later. They came across three young artists from Paris — Bagshot, Fancourt, and another — who camped one night beside them. It was then she fully real- ised the deep shame of her position. The next night she ran away and joined a travelling menagerie. The rest he knew. When she had ended there was silence for a time, broken only by one quick gasping sob from Gaston. The girl sat still as death, her eyes on him intently. " Poor Andr6e ! Poor girl ! " he said at last. She sighed — how pitifully ! " What shall we do ? " she asked. He scarcely spoke above a whisper : " There must be time to think. I will go to London." " You will come back ? " " Yes — in five days, if I live." " I believe you," she said quietly. " You never lied to me. When you return we will know what to do." Her manner was strangely quiet. "A little MAN AND "WOMAN PACE THE INTOLERABLE. 259 trading schooner goes from Donarnenez to England to-morrow morning," she went on. " There is a no- tice of it in the market-place. That would save the journey to Paris." "Yes, that will do very well. I will start for Douarnenez at once." " "WillJacques go too ? " " No." An hour later he passed Delia and her father on the road to Douarnenez. He did not recognise them, but Delia, seeing him, shrank away in a corner of the carriage, trembling. Jacques had wished to go to London with Gaston, but had been denied. He was to care for the horses. When he saw his master ride down over the place, waving a hand back towards him, he came in and said to Andr6e : " Madame, there is trouble — I do not know what. But I once said I would never leave him, wherever he go or whatever he did. "Well, I never will leave him — or you, madame — no ! " " That is right, that is right," she said earnestly ; " you must never leave him, Jacques. He is a good man ! " When Jacques had gone she shut herself up in her room. She was gathering all her life into the com- pass of an hour. She felt but one thing : the ruin of her happiness and Gaston's. 260 THE TRESPASSER, "He is a good man," she said over and over to herself. And the other — Ian Belward ? — All the bar- barian in her was alive 1 The next morning she started for Paris, saying to Jacques and Annette that she would return in four days. CHAPTER XVIII. " KBTFRN, SHULAMITE ! " Almost the first person that Gaston recognised in London was Cluny Vosse. He had been to Victoria Station to see a friend oS by the train, and as he was leaving, Gaston and he recognised each other. The lad's greeting was a little shy until he saw that Gaston was cool and composed as usual — in effect, nothing had happened ! Cluny was delighted, and opened his mind : " They'd kicked up a deuce of a row in the papers, and there'd been no end of talk ; but he didn't see what all the babble was about, and he'd said so again and again to Lady Dargan." " And Lady Dargan, Cluny ? " asked Gaston quietly. Cluny could not be dishonest, though he would try hard not to say painful things. " Well, she was a bit fierce at first — she's a woman, you know ; but afterwards she went like a baby ; cried, and wouldn't stay at Cannes any longer : so we're back 262 THE TRESPASSER. in town. We're going down to the country, though, to-morrow or next day." " Do you think I had better call, Cluny ? " Gaston ventured suggestively. " Yes, yes, of course," Cluny replied, with great eagerness, as if to justify the matter to himself. Gaston smiled, said that he might — he was only in town for a few days, — and dropped Cluny in Pall Mall. Cluny came running back. " I say, Belward, things'U come around just as they were before, won't they ? You're going to cut in, and not let 'em walk on you ? " " Yes, I'm ' going to cut in,' Cluny boy." Cluny brightened. ^' And of course it isn't all over with Delia, is it ? " He blushed. Gaston reached out and dropped a hand on Cluny's shoulder. " I'm afraid it is all over, Cluny." Cluny spoke without thinking. " I say, it's rough on her, isn't it ? " Then he was confused, hurriedly ofEered Gaston a cigarette, a hasty good-bye was said, and they parted. Gaston went first to Lord. Faramond. He encount- ered inquisition, cynical humour, flashes of sympathy, with a general flavour of reproach. The tradition of the Commons I Ah, ons way only : h« must come bask; "RETURN, SHULAMITE!" 263 alone — alone — and live it down. Fortunately, it wasn't an intrigue — no matter of divorce — a dompteuse, he believed. It must end, of course, and he would see what could be done. Such a chance — such a chance as he had had ! Make it up with his grandfather, and reverse the record — reverse the record : that was the only way. This meeting must, of course, be strictly between themselves. But he was really interested for him, for his people, and for the tradition of the Com- mons. "I am Master of the Hounds too," said Gaston dryly. Lord Faramond caught the meaning, and smiled grimly. Then came Gaston's decision — he would come back — not to live the thing down, but to hold his place as long as he could : to fight. Lord Faramond shrugged a shoulder. "Without— Aer?" " I cannot say that." " With her, I can promise nothing — ^nothing. You •cannot fight it so. No one man is stronger than massed opinion. It is merely a matter of pressure. No, no ; I can promise nothing in that case." The Premier's face had gone cold and disdainful. Why should a clever man like Belward be so infatu- ated? He rose, Gaston thanked him for the meeting, 264 THE TEESPASSBR. and was about to go, when the Prime Minister, tapping his shoulder kindly, said : " Mr. Belward, you are not playing to the rules of the game." He waved his hand towards the Chamber of the House. " It is the greatest game in the world : she must go! Do not reply. You will come back without her — good-bye ! " Then came Ridley Court. He entered on Sir Wil- liam and Lady Belward without announcement. Sir William came to his feet, austere and pale. Lady Bel- ward's fingers trembled on the lace she held. They looked many years older. Neither spoke his name, nor did they ofEer their hands. Gaston did not wince, he had expected it. He owed these old people something. They lived according to their lights, they had acted righteously as by their code, they had used him well — well always. " Will you hear the whole story?" he said. He felt that it would be best to tell them all. " Can it do any good ? " asked Sir William. He looked towards his wife. " Perhaps it is better to hear it," she murmured. She was clinging to a vague hope. Gaston told the story plainly, briefly, as he had told his earlier history. Its concision and simplicity were poignant. Prom the day he first saw Andr6e in the justice's room till the hour when she opened Ian Bel- ward's letter, his tale went. Then he paused. "RETURN, O SHULAMITEl" 265 "I remember very well," Sir "William said, with painful meditation : " a strange girl, with a remarkable face. You pleaded for her father then. Ah, yes, an unhappy case ! " " There is more ? " asked Lady Belward, leaning on her cane. She seemed very frail. Then with a terrible brevity Gaston told them of his uncle, of the letter to Andr6e : all, except that Andr^e was his wife. He had no idea of sparing Ian Belward now. A groan escaped Lady Belward. "And now — now, what will you do?" asked the baronet. "I do not know. I am going back first to An- dr6e." Sir "William's face was ashy. " Impossible ! " " I promised, and I will go back." Lady Belward's voice quivered : " Stay, oh, stay, and redeem the past. You can, oh, you can outlive it." Always the same : live it down ! « It is no use," he answered ; " I must return." Then in a few words he thanked them for all, and bade them good-bye. He did not ofEer his hand, nor did they. But at the door he heard Lady Belward say in a pleading voice — " Gaston ! " He returned. She held out her hand. 18 266 THE TRESPASSER. " You must not do as your father did," she said. " Give the woman up, and come back to us. Oh ! am I nothing to you — nothing ? " " Is there no other way ? " he asked, gravely, sor- rowfully. She did not reply. He turned to his grand- father. " There is no other way," said the old man, sternly. Then in a voice almost shrill with pain and indigna- tion, he cried out as he had never done in his life : " Nothing, nothing, nothing but disgrace ! My God in heaven ! a lion- tamer — a gipsy ! An honourable name dragged through the mire ! Go back," he said grandly ; " go back to the woman, and she to her lions — savages, savages, savages ! " " Savages after the manner of our forefathers," Gaston answered quietly. " The first Gaston showed us the way. — His wife was a strolling player's daugh- ter. Good-bye, sir." Lady Belward's face was in her hands. "Good-bye — grandmother," he said at the door, and then he was gone. At the outer door the old housekeeper stepped forward, her gloomy face most agitated. " Oh, sir ! oh, sir ! you will come back again? Oh, don't go like your father ! " He suddenly threw an arm about her shoulder, and kissed her on the cheek. "RETURN, SHtJLAMlTEl" 267 " I'll come back — yes, I'll come back here — if I can. Good-bye, Hovey." In the library Sir William and Lady Belward sat silent for a time. Presently Sir William rose, and walked up and down. He paused at last, and said, in a strange, hesitating voice, his hands chafing each other : " I forgot myself, my dear. I fear I was violent. I would like to ask his pardon. Ah, yes, yes." Then he sat down and took her hand, and held it long in the silence. " It all feels so empty — so empty ! " she said at last, as the tower-clock struck hollow on the air. The old man could not reply, but he drew her close to him, and Hovey, from the door, saw his tears dropping on her white hair. Gaston went to Manchester Square. He half dreaded a meeting with Alice, and yet he wished it. He did not find her. She had gone to Paris with her uncle, the servant said. He got their address. There was little left to do but to avoid reporters, two of whom almost forced themselves in upon him. He' was to go back to Douarnenez by the little boat that brought him, and at seven o'clock in the morning he watched the mists of England recede. He chanced to put his hand into a light overcoat which he had got at his chambers before he started. He drew out a paper, the one discovered in the bo- 268 THE TRESPASSER. licitor's office in London, It was an ancient deed of entail of the property, drawn by Sir Gaston Belward, which, through being lost, was never put into force. He was not sure that it had value. If it had, all chance of the estate was gone for him ; it would be his uncle's. Well, what did it matter ? Yes, it did matter : Andr6e ! For her ? No, not for her ! He would play straight. He would take his future as it came : he would not drop this paper into the water. He smiled bitterly, got an envelope at a public- house on the quay, wrote a few words in pencil on the document, and in a few moments it was on its way to Sir William Belward, who when he received it said : " Worthless, quite worthless ! But he has an hon- est mind — an honest mind ! " Meanwhile, Andr§e was in Paris. Leaving her bag at the Gare Montpamasse, she had gone straight to Ian Belward's house. She had lived years in the last few hours. She had had no sleep on the journey, and her mind had been strained unbearably. It had, however, a fixed idea, which shuttled in and out in a hundred shapes, but ever pointing to one end. She had determined on a painful thing — the only way. She reached the house, and was admitted. In an- swer to questions, she had an appointment with mon- sieur. He was not within. Well, she would wait. She was motioned into the studio. She was outward- "RETURN, O SHULAMITE!" 269 ly calm. The servant presently recognised her. He had been to the menagerie, and he had seen her with Gaston. His manner changed instantly. Could he do anything? No, nothing. She was left alone. For a long time she sat motionless, then a sudden restless- ness seized her. Her brain seemed a burning atmos- phere, in which every thought, every thing showed with an unbearable intensity. The terrible clearness of it all — how it made her eyes, her heart ache ! Her blood was beating hard against every pore. She felt that she would go mad if he did not come. Once she took out the stiletto she had concealed in the bosom of her cloak, and looked at it. She had always car- ried it when among the beasts at the menagerie, but had never yet used it. Time passed. She felt ill ; she became blind with pain. Presently the servant entered with a tele- gram. His master would not be back until the next morning. Very weU, she would return in the morning. She gave him money. He was not to say that she had called. In the Boulevard Montpamasse she took a cab. To the menagerie, she said to the driver. How strange it all looked : the Invalides, Notre Dame, the Tuileries Gardens, the Place de la Concorde! The innumerable lights were so near and yet so far : it was a kink of the brain, but she seemed withdrawn from them, not they from her. A woman passed with a 370 THE TRESPASSER. baby in her arms. What a pretty, sweet face it had t — the light from a kiosk fell on it as she .passed. Why did it not have a pretty, delicate Breton cap ? As she went on, that kept beating in her brain — why did not the child wear a dainty Breton cap — a white Breton cap ? The face kept peeping from behind the lights — without the dainty Breton cap ! The menagerie at last. She dismissed the cab, went to a little door at the back of the building, and knocked. She was admitted. The care-taker ex- claimed with pleasure. She wished to visit the ani- mals ? He would go with her ; and he picked up a light. No, she would go alone. How were Hector and Balzac, and Antoinette? She took the keys. How cool and pleasant they were to the touch ! The steel of the lantern too — how exquisitely soothing ! He must lie down again : she would wake him as she came out. No, no, she would go alone. She went to cage after cage. At last to that of the largest lions. There was a deep answering pun- to her soft call. As she entered, she saw a heap mov- ing in one corner — a lion lately bought. She spoke, and there was an angry growl. She wheeled to leave the cage, but her cloak caught the door, and it snapped shut. Too kte, A bbw brought her to the ground. Sh0 had made no ory, and now she lay so still ! The watchman had fallen asleep again. In the "RETURN, SHULAMITEl" 2T1 earlj morning he remembered. The greyish golden dawn was creeping in, when he found her with two lions protecting, keeping guard over her, while an- other crouched snarling in a corner. There was no mark on her face. The point of the stiletto which she had carried in her cloak had pierced her when she fell. In a hotel near the Arc de Triomphe Alice Wing- field read the news. It was she who tenderly pre- pared the body for burial, who telegraphed to Gaston at Audierne, getting a reply from Jacques that he was not yet back from London. The next day Andree was found a quiet place in the cemetery at Mont- martre. In the evening Alice and her relative started for Audierne. On board the Fleur cC Orange Gaston struggled with the problem. There was one thought ever com- ing. He shut it out at this point, and it crept in at that. He remembered when two men, old friends, discovered that one, unknowingly, had been living with the wife of the other. There was one too many — ^the situation was impossible. The men played a game of cards to see which should die. But they did not reckon with the oth6r factor. It was the woman who died. Was not his own situation far worse? With his 2t2 THE TRESPASSER. uncle living — but no, no, it was out of the question ! Yet Ian Belward had been shameless, a sensualist, who had wrecked the girl's happiness and his. He himself had done a mad thing in the eyes of the world, but it was more mad than wicked. Had this happened in the North with another man, how easy would the problem have been solved ! Go to his uncle and tell him that he must remove himself for ever from the situation? Demand it, force it ? Impossible — this was Europe. They arrived at Douranenez. The diligence had gone. A fishing-boat was starting for Audierne. He decided to go by it. Breton fishermen are usually shy of storm to foolishness, and one or two of the crew urged the drunken skipper not to start, for there were signs of a south-west wind, too friendly to the Bay des Tr6pass68. The skipper was, however, cheerfully reckless, and growled down objection. The boat came on with a sweet wind ofE the land for a time. Suddenly, when in the neighbourhood of Point du Eaz, the wind drew ahead very squally, with rain in gusts out of the south-west. The skipper put the boat on the starboard tack, close-hauled and close- reefed the sails, keeping as near the wind as possible, with the hope of weathering the rocky point at the western extremity of the Bay des Tr^pass^s. By that time there was a heavy sea running ; night came on, and the weather grew very thick. They heard the "RETURN, O SHULAMITB!" 273 breakers presently, but they could not make out the Point. Old sailor as he was, and knowing as well as any man the perilous ground, the skipper lost his drunken head this time, and presently lost his way also in the dark and murk of the storm. At eight o'clock she struck. She was thrown on her side, a heavy sea broke over her, and they were all washed off. No one raised a cry. They were busy fighting Death. Gaston was a strong swimmer. It did not occur to him that perhaps this was the easiest way out of the maze. He had ever been a fighter. The seas tossed him here and there. He saw faces about him for an instant — shaggy wild Breton faces, — but they dropped away, he knew not where. The current kept driving him inshore. As in a dream, he could hear the breakers — the pumas on their treadmill of death. How long would it last? How long before he would be beaten upon that treadmill— fondled to death by those mad paws? Presently dreams came — kind, vague, distant dreams. His brain flew like a drunk- en dove to far points of the world and back again. A moment it rested. Andree! He had made no provision for her, none at all. He must live, he must fight on for her, the homeless girl, his wife ! He fought on and on. No longer in the water, as it seemed to him. He had travelled very far. He heard the clash of sabres, the distant roar of cannon, 274 THE TRESPASSER. the beating of horses' hoofs — the thud-thud, tread- tread of an army. How reckless and wild it was! He stretched up his arm to strike — what was it? Something hard that bruised-: then his whole body was dashed against the thing. He was back again, awake. With a last effort he drew himself up on a huge rock that stands lonely in the wash of the bay. Then he cried out, " Andr6e ! " and fell senseless — safe. The storm went down. The cold, fast-travelling moon came out, saw the one living thing in that wild bay, and hurried on into the dark again ; but came and went so till morning, playing hide-and-seek with the man and his Ararat. Daylight saw him, wet, haggard, broken, looking out over the waste of shaken water. Upon the shore glared the stone of the vanished City of Ys in the warm sun, and the fierce pumas trod their grumbling way. Sea-gulls flew about the quiet set figure, in whose brooding eyes there were at once despair and salvation. He was standing between two worlds. He had had his great crisis, and his wounded soul rested for a moment ere he ventured out upon the highways again. He knew not how it was, but there had passed into him the dignity of sorrow and the joy of deliverance at the same time. He saw life's responsibilities clearer, duties swam grandly before him. It was a large "RETURN, O SHULAMITE!" 276 dream, in which, for the time, he was not conscious of those troubles which, yesterday, had clenched his hands and knotted his forehead. He had come a step higher in the way of life, and into his spirit had flowed a new and sobered power. His heart was sore, but his mind was lifted up. The fatal wrangle of the pumas there below, the sound of it, would be in his ears for ever, but he had come above it ; the searching vigour of the sun entered into his bones. He knew that he was going back to England — to ample work and strong days, but he did not know that he was going — alone. He did not know that Andre6 was gone ! that she had found her true place : in his undying memory. So intent was he, that he did not see a boat making into the bay towards him. (1) THE END. ^ ^ <^ ^^ :-:!^^^g ^^^^S?; \^m u ■••■'. ■ Oh,Gpntlp(?padpr, trf>at me a^ a Friend ! Don't doi! my ears; don't pencil my inside; Don't turn me down, nor open me too wide! Thij.Jpollr my looks andm&ker my bad to [bend. When finished, send me home, again to {lend !