A NOVE 
 
 X7T 
 
CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 Joseph Whitmore Barry 
 dramatic library 
 
 THE GIFT OF 
 TWO ^FRIENDS 
 
 OF Cornell University 
 
 1934 
 
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/cu31924022149128 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PS 2429.M4W8 
 
 Without 5in,a novel by Martfn J. Pritcha 
 
 3 1924 022 149 128 
 
 WITHOUT SIN 
 
WITHOUT SIN 
 
 A NOVEL 
 
 BY 
 
 MARTIN J. PRITCHARD -j>se,vj<i:3 
 
 CHICAGO 
 HERBERT S. STONE & COMPANY 
 
 MDCCCXCVI 
 
 F 
 
COPYRIGHT, l8g6, BY 
 WILLIAM HEINEMANN 
 COPYRIGHT, l8g6, BY 
 HERBERT S. STONE & CO. 
 
To A. M. 
 
 Beeatiae all riches that I have you gam, 
 
 Because yow heart and soul my toys Tume been. 
 
 Because you say the things I only mean, 
 J choose the better lover's part of slave; 
 Because I've given you all things you crave : 
 
 The foolish head you eroien with gold and green. 
 
 The lips that for your loving kisses lean. 
 The soul that you alone have power to sane — 
 
 I found, through honing given all, that yet 
 Much more than I could e'er repay was due,' 
 So, knowing 'twould increase while we two Uve, 
 
 I made this book to give you for my debt — 
 However good — too poor it were for yam I 
 Eoieeeer bad~-you'll kiss ms and forgive I 
 
 M. J. P. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 
 
 CHAPTEE I 
 
 It was the moment of dawn, and London for a brief space 
 lay empty and silent beneath an opalescent sky. Out in 
 the Green Park the ruffled birds, roused from their brief 
 summer night's sleep, stretched their wings and preened 
 themselves in the warm flood of pink light that filtered 
 through the broad leafage of the plane trees. But in the 
 streets off Piccadilly, narrow and hemmed with tall houses, 
 the pale dusk still lingered. 
 
 A shower had fallen about midnight, and the gas-lamps 
 were mirrored in the wet pavement as the man whose duty 
 it was to extinguish them passed down Bond Street towards 
 Piccadilly. He walked mainly in the road, crossing from 
 side to side as he came upon each lamp. The damp ground 
 deadened the ring of his footsteps, till they scarcely struck 
 an echo from the sleepy houses. 
 
 When he reached the last lamp and turned into Picca- 
 dilly, Bond Street ky grey and dead and empty. A few 
 of the upper windows presently caught the growing light, 
 and stared with a startling blankness at the shadowy out- 
 line of a policeman who lounged within a deep doorway, 
 and at a cat which, with lowered tail and stealthy tread, 
 was slinking homewards. 
 
 Halfway down Old Bond Street, the heavy iron shutters, 
 painted a light starch blue, of Ephraim Levinge's Art Gal- 
 leries, made a clear and bright patch in the morning's dusk, 
 
Z WITHOUT SIN 
 
 but the gold lettering which crossed the shop front was still 
 blurred and indistinct. Behind the shutters, in that por- 
 tion of the shop which was reached directly from the street, 
 some tall carved cabinets filled with china, and a colossal 
 pair of marble figures were enshrouded in grey gloom, but 
 beyond, in the great gallery, the glass roof of which was 
 shadowed by no high buildings, the day grew quickly and 
 lustily, until the two small gas-jets which burnt all night 
 for safety's sake flickered and faded like dying candles. 
 
 Here within the four walls, papered in a soft, rich shade 
 of crimson flock, were collected the fruits of a hundred la- 
 bouring minds, the works of a thousand toiling hands, the 
 world's art of five hundred years. Tapestries stitched by 
 the slim fingers of royal dames and damosels, whose lords 
 and lovers were fighting for their faith's sake in far Pales- 
 tine, made misty backgrounds for delicate cabinets of Ver- 
 nis Martin microscopically clear. Tulip-wood commodes, 
 overlaid with fine marqueterie and mounted with chased 
 or-molu, bulged among slender Sheraton chef-d' aeuvres and 
 the mannered simplicity of Empire escritoires. The Dubar- 
 ry's toilet-table and mirror reflected the coarse features of 
 a pictured Marat. Limoges enamels and Cosway's minia- 
 tured beauties filled the ebony recesses of an old Italian 
 cabinet which gleamed with the scarlet and amber of clear 
 cornelians and the milky whiteness of rare onyxes. The 
 tortured limbs of an ivory Christ, torn in war-tiriie from 
 the shrine of some peasant's church among the southern 
 vineyards and yellowed with the passing of centuries, sepa- 
 rated the round eyes and bare bosom of a Dutch beauty as 
 painted by Jan Van Eyck from a corner of farmyard life 
 in Morland's best style. 
 
 Beneath the glass tops of the show-tables, jewelled 
 watches and daggers, rings and rare scraps of the old Vene- 
 tian goldsmith's work, sparkled amid the filmy web of laces 
 
WITHOUT SIN 3 
 
 which still savoured of the incense that had smoked about 
 the altars of Spain, or had decked the feast-day robes of 
 some waxen-faced saint. 
 
 Beneath the apex of the clear glass roof gleamed the cold 
 perfections of half a score of statues, the crude whiteness 
 of their limbs heightened by the brilliant hues of many tall 
 vases which had once blazed in the Imperial apartments of 
 the Pekin Palace. 
 
 Bare crackle and priceless blue, jewelled Sevres and flore- 
 ated Dresden shone from behind the glazed doors of the rose- 
 wood cabinets on which Chippendale himself had worked. 
 The cabinets stood either side of the fireplace, the polished 
 steel grate of which, together with a plain mahogany writ- 
 ing-table placed at right angles, looked startlingly modern 
 and utilitarian among the vanities and glories of dead ages. 
 
 A sun-ray, flung back in cold reflection from an upper 
 window, struck down through the glass roof. It glowed 
 redly on a faded strip of arras, hanging from a brass rod 
 across a small door which gave access to the rooms above 
 the shop. 
 
 Suddenly through the stillness of the dead past came the 
 soft footsteps of a living present, and the sound of a care- 
 fully drawn bolt only by a second preceded the stirring of 
 the blurred figures on the worn arras into a quivering life. 
 A hand, tiny and white and dimpled as that of a marble 
 Amorini, pushed aside the heavy folds, and into the midst 
 of the art of the world, among the treasures of gone kings 
 and queens, the relics of the ravishing fripperies of famous, 
 light-o'-loves, glided a girl-child. 
 
 She was little for her ten years, with the slender limbs 
 and narrow, arched feet tradition claims for long lineage 
 and blue blood. In colouring she was fair, and for a child 
 a thought too pale, but the fresh ripeness of her bow-shaped 
 mouth dispelled the idea of ill-health. Her hair, which 
 
4 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 rolled in heavy tangled curls below her waist, was of a very- 
 light gold where it fluffed in loose disorder about her face, 
 and it only suggested a fuller tint of red in the shadows of" 
 the mass. Her forehead was white and round, and crossed 
 by thin, slightly arched brows of the suggested pale-red 
 tint. The nose was perfect, small, and straight, and but 
 slightly widened where the thin, sensitive nostrils melted 
 into the smooth curves of the cheeks. The chin was short 
 and round, and creased with one slight dimple, but it was 
 too small for strength, thereby belying the clear-cut and 
 firm lines of the mouth. 
 
 So far the features were those of a singularly pretty 
 child, a little too pensive, and formed perhaps for ideal 
 youth, but possessing, despite that, a quaint charm. Yet 
 it was the eyes, with all their defects of colour and shape, 
 which made at once the peculiarity and fascination of the 
 face. They were set rather far apart, and were of a de- 
 cided almond shape, the effect of which was enhanced by 
 the thick white eyelids, which seemed depressed by the 
 singular fulness below the arch of the brow. In colour- 
 they were rather a light grey, saved from shallowness, cold- 
 ness, and insincerity, by the intense blackness of the fine 
 lashes. They had an unfathomable depth, a vague sugges- 
 tion of mysterious introspection, an expression that was so 
 absolutely unmundane, that they lent to the child's whole 
 personality an atmosphere of etherealism. 
 
 She was clad in a frock of pink cotton, which, as she had 
 dressed herself, remained frankly unbuttoned at the back 
 where her small fingers could not reach. Nothing daunted 
 by the strange effect of the new morning light on the oddly 
 mingled contents of the Art Gallery, the little girl dropped 
 the arrafi behind her and advanced. With light, leisurely 
 steps she threaded her way among the polished inlaid tables 
 burdened with rare porcelain and the huge Oriental vases 
 
WITHOUT SIN 5 
 
 ■which would have crushed her had they fallen. Now and 
 then she paused in her passage to lay her warm baby hands 
 on the satin of a chair or the heavy bosses of a carven chest. 
 
 "I've come to say good-bye, I've come to say good-bye," 
 she murmured, as though she desired to justify herself in 
 the nursery crime of breaking the bounds of the upper part 
 of the house, by stealing downstairs to the forbidden ground 
 of the " Big Eoom," as she had called the gallery ever since 
 she could remember. With a childish sense of fairness she 
 noticed each object in her path, until she came to the east- 
 ern end of the gallery where the deep bay of the ceiling 
 still cast a blue shadow. 
 
 Into the dimmest comer she crept with infinite care, 
 wedging her slender body between a heavy gilt chair and 
 a high carved pedestal of ebony and ivory. 
 
 "I've come to say good-bye." 
 
 A faint note of regret threaded her childish treble, and a 
 pucker of pain drew her brows together. 
 
 She stood before a small picture of the Madonna, painted 
 on a panel in the style of the early Italian school. From a 
 background of transparent cobalt, the fair face of the Vir- 
 gin shone like a jewel, transcendently holy, humanly piti- 
 ful. From beneath the gauze drapery which veiled the hair 
 of palest corn-colour, the tender eyes, half -hidden by the 
 lowered white eyelids, gazed with divine benignity at tha 
 child. As the day grew to fuller glory, the thin thread of 
 gold above the saint's head, and the great graven clasp 
 which held a royal cloak of worked green velvet across an 
 underdress of pink, shone brightly, and in the quiver of 
 the reflected light, the silent sad mouth seemed to the child 
 to smile. In response she crept closer to the picture, and 
 laid her lips against the glass which covered the panel. 
 
 "I'm going away to-day to school, and I am not coming 
 back till I am quite a big girl. But I shall never forget 
 
6 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 you, for grandfather says I am like you, so does Martin. 
 Oh, I hope I am! I would like to be." 
 
 With one dimpled finger she traced the outline of the 
 pictured face, then passed her hand about her own cheeks, 
 whispering, as she did so: 
 
 "Martin always says that you were good, the goodest 
 woman that ever lived. If I look like you, perhaps I shall 
 be as good as you — one day — when I am grown up." 
 
 Presently, with the natural unrest of a child, she slipped 
 from her cramped place and continued her wanderings. On 
 a shelf near by stood a tiny Dresden shepherdess. It was 
 to be hers one day if she were a good girl, and she looked 
 at it now with a smile of prospective possession. On the 
 ground beneath the shelf was a heap of stufiEs : old brocades 
 smelling of camphor chests, embroidered muslins faintly 
 sweet of dead roses, and strips of finely drawn lawn, the 
 work of patient German fingers. 
 
 The little girl dragged the scented pile into the light, 
 which now flooded the gallery in a golden haze of sunshine 
 from end to end. Her tiny hands turned over and sorted 
 the stuffs, while her budding femininity saw a use for the 
 smallest scraps. How sweet her best doll, Mabella, would 
 look in this bit of scarlet and gold, and if only her grand- 
 father would give her that piece of blue brocade, Martin could 
 re-cover the drawing-room furniture in her doll's house. 
 
 "I wonder if he will give it me," she said to herself. 
 " He cannot want a tiny bit like that. I must beg — I must 
 coax." She raised her eyes, already in imaginary supplica- 
 tion. They fell upon the picture in the corner. The pure 
 sweet face, to the child's imagination, always responsive to 
 every emotion, was sad, and seemed to express reproof. 
 As though caught in an act of naughtiness, she flushed scar- 
 let. "I forgot you," she said; "I am sorry." 
 
 With her innocent heart filled with a desire for forgive- 
 
WITHOUT SIN 7 
 
 ness, and unable to plead her cause in words, she gravely 
 and in perfect faith smoothed out a strip of the cobwebby 
 lawn and placed it scarf -wise on her head. That done, she 
 pulled a stiff piece of worked brocade about her shoulders, 
 and, trailing the rustling folds behind her, stepped towards 
 the sacred picture. 
 
 " Tell me how to be good," she pleaded, as she scrambled 
 up into the gilt chair, from between the bowed arms of 
 which the Pompadour had ruled France. Curled in the 
 satiny depths the child lay quiet and still, till from very 
 inaction and the hothouse warmth of the gallery the heavy 
 lids drooped, the baby lips parted, and the little maid slept. 
 
 Outside, in the sunny streets, the first low roar of awak- 
 ened London throbbed skywards. The lumber of waggons 
 was punctuated by the shrill jingle of milk carts, and the 
 buoyant rattle of light, home-going hansoms. The first 
 'buses, laden with heavy-eyed work -girls and sallow young 
 clerks, snatching a brief smoke before business hours, and 
 reading flimsy halfpenny papers, rolled down Bond Street. 
 A sudden crop of dust-pails sprang mushroom-like from the 
 kerbstones, and the opening shops gave up a stuffy, close 
 odour to the fresh summer air. 
 
 The postman walked briskly down the street, nodding 
 " good-morning" to the servants and cleaners at the shop 
 doors. As he neared the pale-blue, blank front of Ephraim 
 Levinge's art gallery, a small door in the iron shutter was 
 opened from within, and a touzled-headed yo^th in rather 
 dirty shirt-sleeves and a green baize apron stepped yawning 
 into the brilliant sunlight. 
 
 " Oh ! lor, " he cried, as the postman came within ear- 
 shot, "you don't mean to tell me as it's eight o'clock?" 
 
 " Seven minutes past, young man ; I began at the end of 
 the street on the stroke of the hour," said the postman 
 sharply. 
 
8 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 With a smothered groan, the boy clutched the proffered 
 bundle of correspondence and then dived into the twilight 
 of the shop, from whence, in another moment, issued the 
 creaking of an ill-oiled winch, as he began to slowly wind 
 up the revolving shutter. 
 
 The flood of garish light which poured in from the street 
 roused the dreaming child. She slid from her silken throne 
 and stood in all the quaintness of her gorgeous draperies 
 before her beloved picture. 
 
 "Good-bye! good-bye!" she whispered, her upturned 
 mouth momentarily misting the clearness of the glass over 
 the panel. 
 
 "I've caught you, Miss Mary, have I? A nice fright 
 you give me when I found your bed empty. Oh! you 
 naughty girl!" And the frightened maid shook the child 
 until the clear lawn scarf slipped sideways over her curls 
 and the single button of her frock gave way. 
 
 " Bessie ! What has Miss Mary been doing ? Mr. Le vinge 
 would be very angry if he saw you shake her like that." 
 
 The voice came from the outer shop, where, outlined 
 black against the dazzling sunshine, a man stood. So in- 
 tense was the contrast between the dim light of indoors and 
 the white glare of the street that it was impossible to see 
 his face. But one glance at the silhouetted form showed 
 him to be tall and spare, with sloping shoulders slightly bent, 
 and a long narrow head craning forward from between them. 
 
 The little girl sprang forward as he spoke. 
 
 "Oh! Martin, I am not naughty, indeed I'm not; I only 
 came to say good-bye to Our Lady." 
 
 " And what time did you set about doing it, I should like 
 to know, miss?" snapped the servant, whose wrath against 
 her charge did not dare to do more than smoulder in the 
 presence of Mr. Baird, the business manager and right hand 
 to Ephraim Levinge. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 9 
 
 "I came down before the birds began to sing," answered 
 the child directly. 
 
 "Then p'raps you'll just come upstairs and be decently 
 dressed," said Bessie, stripping little Mary's royal brocade 
 and transparent veil from her and tossing them on a chair 
 with all a true-born Philistine's contempt for old "rags." 
 
 "I'll come, Bessie," replied the child gently. "You'll 
 see me off, won't you, Martin?" she added, putting out her 
 little hand to the silent figure before her. "I go away to 
 school to-day." 
 
 "I shall see you before you start, certainly," replied Mar- 
 tin Baird, turning towards the ample writing-table in the 
 front shop at which the intricate accounts of Ephraim Le- 
 vinge's vast business were kept. As he took off his hat, 
 which was of silk and scrupulously glossy, though scarcely 
 of the latest fashion, and turned to hang it on its usual peg 
 above the iron safe, the light fell full upon his face. 
 
 Martin Baird was a Scotchman, and showed his national- 
 ity in every line of the high forehead, from which already 
 the grizzled hair was in rapid retreat; in the deep-set, small, 
 grey eyes, the close-shaven long upper-lip, which shut like 
 a trap upon the softer lines of its fellow, and in the broad 
 rugged jaw and square chin. He was but forty -five, but 
 early sorrows and a certain grim defiance of fate had written 
 another decade across his brow. 
 
 Those who had business transactions with him said they 
 had sooner far trafiSc with old Levinge himself, for there 
 was always a faint chance of a good deal with the Jew, but 
 with the Scotchman never. 
 
 Men and women were nothing to him. Neither the mil- 
 lionaires who clattered up to his employer's door in all the 
 pomp and circumstance of Barker-built broughams and 
 matched blood horses, nor the fair women who left the per- 
 fume of their silken skirts and the ring of their light laughter 
 
10 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 behind them. Neither for those who came to sell or to 
 buy, nor Jew nor Gentile ; neither the honest soul who had 
 come to misfortune's direst straits, nor the acknowledged 
 " fence. " iFor they were but atoms in that gigantic social 
 system which had left his mother to die a drab's death in a 
 ditch, and had chained him through his childhood, youth, 
 and the best days of his man's estate to the worst horrors 
 of beggary and starvation. 
 
 But for his employer, who had picked him out of the ig- 
 nominy of an old-clothes store in the New Cut — the shrewd 
 old Jew who had scented acumen beneath his rags and had 
 read honesty in his hungry, sunken face, who had trained 
 his broad bony hands to tell a piece of pate tendre in the 
 dark, and his keen, small eyes to settle the painter of a 
 doubtful picture at a glance, for the man who had fed and 
 clothed and saved him from worse than death, for his master 
 and his friend, Baird would have died to express sufficient 
 gratitude and devotion. And the little child? She with 
 floss-gold hair, that only glowed with richer tints in the 
 shades of its meshes ; she with the eyes that saw beyond 
 the edges of the world ; she with the plaintive bow-shaped 
 mouth that seemed meet for the kisses of Sorrow? All the 
 crushed affection and despised sentiment of the man's love- 
 less life revived and fed on the fair innocence, the flower- 
 like purity of Ephraim Levingei's grand-daughter, Mary. 
 Prom the first hour, when from amid the wealth of conti- 
 nents she had toddled to greet him, an outcast and a starve- 
 ling, the reverence which lies in the hearts of all men for 
 the pure and spotless had gathered in a halo of worship 
 about the tiny creature. 
 
 Martin Baird was not a religious man. The grand belief 
 of a blind faith which accepts the axiom " whatever is is 
 right" had been killed within him by a cruel boyhood, and a 
 youth spent in the sordid struggle for mere existence! The 
 
WITHOUT SIN 11 
 
 desperate animalism of the body had ousted the faith of the 
 soul. But when the child's faltering footsteps grew firmer, 
 the baby lisp more distinct, and the precociously forming 
 face and colouring of the little girl repeated in flesh the 
 vague outlines of a dingy little panel picture of the Madonna 
 which hung in a dark corner of the shop, vague stories and 
 forgotten lessons stirred ill Baird's heart. The seeds of a 
 dead faith quickened into life, and fostered by the mysticism 
 of a restrained Northern temperament, grew to a strange 
 idea, half chimerical, half real, yet wholly fantastic. 
 
 For three years he had justified the art dealer's faith in 
 him, and had so assisted the old Jew in his business that 
 the building of the great gallery at the back of the shop 
 became a necessity. Then Baird gave his quaint fancy 
 reins, and he boldly hung the unnamed picture, now re- 
 stored and set in a frame of old Italian carving, among the 
 works by the masters of the world. 
 
 "What's that rubbish doing here?" had cried Levinge in 
 his gutteral English. " I won't have that in my fine new 
 gallery. Everything here is signed and authentic. Turn 
 it out! Turn it out, I say, at once!" 
 
 "I shouldn't do that, if I were you, Mr. Levinge," had 
 answered Baird in his deliberately thoughtful fashion. 
 " It's true there is not a mark to show who painted the pic- 
 ture. But you can see it's of the grand Umbrian school — 
 the greatest school of Italy. The painting is exquisite — 
 and now that it is cleaned, it glows like a jewel." 
 
 "Well enough— well enough," returned the other, peer- 
 ing under his heavy grey eyebrows at the work. " But my 
 patrons like pedigree. People who don't know anything 
 about what they are buying, want to feel sure they are not 
 being made fools of. That's why people come to me; I 
 always give 'em a good name, and the real article for their 
 money." 
 
12 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " Bat you are not obliged to sell that picture," said Baird 
 very slowly. 
 
 "Not sell that picture," almost screamed the old man, 
 all the Semitic instinct in revolt against the idea of keeping 
 something which would not fetch a price. " What would 
 you have me do with it? Give it away?" 
 
 " No, keep it. Why, sir, don't you see who it is exactly 
 like?" 
 
 Ephraim Levinge thrust his gold-rimmed spectacles across 
 his large bony nose, and looked long and closely at the 
 painting. 
 
 " It's exactly like little Miss Mary ; the mouth, the hair, 
 even the shape of the brows, which are so high above the 
 eyes. I should not part with it, sir." 
 
 And through the years the beautiful Madonna — " Mary's 
 picture" — as the family called it, with the tender, meek look, 
 scarcely fitting the royal raiment clasped about her, hung 
 like a luminous gem in Ephraim Levinge' s Art Gallery. 
 
 And in the twilight of the summer evenings when busi- 
 ness hours were over, and the pale-blue iron curtain shut out 
 Bond Street and the world, Mary would creep downstairs 
 as lightly as a spirit child, to Martin Baird, who would take 
 the little Jewish maiden on his knee, and weave from slum- 
 bering memories stories of the Holy Virgin and of the 
 martyred Saints, that being forbidden were sweet with 
 mystery and the pleasures of a secret to the child. 
 
 And every night as she reluctantly left her strangely 
 chosen friend, and glided away to her little bedroom, she 
 would smile up at the picture and whisper : 
 
 "I am glad my name is Mary, and that I look like her." 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 It was a summer's day in mid-season, five years later. 
 
 The long line of carriages -which filled King Street from 
 end to end, the crowd of servants which lounged and gos- 
 siped round the heavy porch of Christie's, and the never- 
 ending stream of people which flowed through the wide 
 swing doors, betokened that one of the great sales of the 
 season was going on within. 
 
 The accumulated treasures of Simeon V. Dexter, Esq., 
 of Kew York, Chicago, and London, bankrupt, millionaire, 
 and bankrupt again, had a world-wide reputation, and for 
 three days all society, in its prettiest summer frock and glos- 
 siest silk hat, had assisted at the sale of the tables at which 
 it had dined and supped, the lounges on which it had flirted 
 and giggled, and the rare curios which it had envied scarce- 
 ly six months ago. And as each lot was put up, a thousaud 
 piquant reminiscences bubbled from the prettiest lips of 
 London. 
 
 To-day the pictures and the china were to be sold, and a 
 strong element of art collectors leavened the merely fash- 
 ionable throng. By the time Mr. Wood, in severe morning 
 dress, and with his pink face glowing behind his gold-rimmed 
 glasses from the heat, had stepped into the rostrum, the 
 East Eoom was nearly full. The green walls, barred across 
 with stout strips of wood, were hidden almost from the floor 
 to the deep bay of the ceiling by the pictures which hung 
 in long lines under the strong top light. 
 
 The narrow cane-seated benches placed by the double line 
 of baize-covered tables were filled by the Jew dealers. Im- 
 
14 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 maculately dressed, perfectly groomed, and most of them 
 wearing flowers in their buttonholes, their full dark eyes 
 were everywhere, and their fingers, thick and beringed, 
 scratched perpetual notes on the margins of their catalogues. 
 The chief characteristic of the dealer permeated every feature 
 of their eager faces. There were bargains to be made, com- 
 missions to be charged, buying and selling to be done, and 
 the biggest swell among them forgot for the moment his 
 Saturdays at Hurst Park and Kempton, and his Sundays at 
 Maidenhead, to wonder how the prices would run, and 
 whether a "good thing" could be picked up cheap. 
 
 Behind them pressed and surged, in waves of many 
 colours, a deep line of women, their light laces and flower- 
 trimmed hats catching an extra bloom of freshness by con- 
 trast with the black frock coats of the men. Bound the 
 outer edge of all, ebbed and flowed a tide of society men. 
 The dealers at the green tables were better dressed than they 
 were, but they lacked the supple length of limb and high- 
 bred air of insouciant ease, which characterised these leis- 
 ured idlers. 
 
 The sale began, and amid the dull bidding for the first 
 dozen pictures, people settled down to attention and by de- 
 grees stopped talking. An exquisite landscape by Crome, 
 with luminous mellow distances, and the foreground bathed 
 in clear sunlight, first roused the rather languid competi- 
 tion. Both Birmingham and Manchester wanted the pic- 
 ture, and the bidding rose from hundreds to thousands by 
 leaps and bounds. As the price rose, the flowery head- 
 pieces of the women ceased to oscillate, and the dark eastern 
 faces of the dealers grew eager, and their eyes bright. A 
 gasp of belief and wonder followed the tap from the rostrum 
 which announced a Brummagem victory. Mr. "Wood smiled 
 inscrutably at his intimates; the buyers had tasted blbod, 
 and the day's sale would be a good one. - * 
 
WITHOUT SIN 15 
 
 While shrewd eyes were glancing at the next lot, there 
 was a slight stir near the door, where a small, spare man, 
 long past the middle age, was elbowing his way though the 
 crowd. He was tightly buttoned in a well-worn frock coat, 
 and his collar, which was encircled by a bird's-eye hand- 
 kerchief, scraped his shaven chin. The sallow face and 
 high-bridged nose were drawn and immobile, but the eyes 
 were a bright, clear hazel and never at rest. Side-whiskers, 
 dyed snufE-brown and tightly curled down either cheek, gave 
 the last touch of old-world aristocracy to the millionaire 
 Duke of Grandchester. 
 
 In his wake was his artistic Jides Achates, Ephraim Le- 
 vinge. The great art dealer's rusty hat and long greasy 
 overcoat, which in cut was very like a gaberdine, set the 
 old man as far apart from his curled and scented compatriots, 
 as his squat body rolling on short thick legs and his large 
 fleshy features proclaimed him of a different race from the 
 well-built, clear-skinned Englishmen. Yet three dames of 
 high degree waylaid and took counsel of the old man as he 
 pushed by them, and the dog's-eared pocket-book he carried 
 contained more commissions than any half-dozen of the 
 other dealers could muster between them. He and the Duke 
 soon reached the top of the room, where a seat was quickly 
 found for Levinge. "Nine hundred — and twenty — and 
 thirty — fifty— seventy-five, " said Mr. Wood as quietly as 
 though he were sitting in his own private room. 
 
 A little woman, standing at the other side of the tables, 
 with an absurd nose, a mouth of extraordinary dimensions 
 and marvellous humour, and a pair of large grey eyes which 
 would have redeemed the face of a Gorgon, turned to a lady 
 at her side and said in a stage whisper : 
 
 "Heavens! There's papa, and with Levinge too. I 
 should like to know where my next quarter's allowance will 
 come from." 
 
16 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 She spoke with, such frankness, that a titter ran through 
 the group about her. 
 
 "Don't speak so loud, Theo," murmured her companion. 
 " You know the Duke always likes to run in here. I don't 
 suppose he'll buy much." 
 
 " Oh ! won't he. I know papa better than you do, re- 
 member," answered the first speaker, shaking her small 
 brown head till the sheaf of poppies and cornflowers which 
 nodded atop of her hat became positively prismatic in the 
 sunlight. " Why was he in such a hurry to come back from 
 Paris, where he always enjoys himself, if it wasn't to have 
 a fling at this sale? I wish I could get at Levinge, I'd 
 positively forbid him to bid for papa." And with a toss of 
 her well-dressed head and a twist of her pretty shoulders, 
 the aggrieved dame took to alternately frowning at Ephraim 
 Levinge and shaking her head at the Duke of Grandchester. 
 " Pour hundred — and five — and ten" intoned the auctioneer. 
 
 " Who is the ugly woman over there who is making such 
 an exhibition of herself; she's quite too vulgar for any- 
 thing." 
 
 It was a typical daughter of Judah who spoke in high, 
 nasal tones. Tall and thin to attenuation, the large, prom- 
 inent bones of her shoulders and hips gave her a square, 
 box-like appearance, which was in no way mitigated by the 
 extravagantly fashionable make of her white crepon gown. 
 Her skin was thick and sallow. Her hair, of a pale ash 
 colour, was dressed in precise curls across her high fore- 
 head, and cast no softening shadow above the cold expres- 
 sionless eyes of slate blue, and the long, thin nose, which 
 was distinguished as far as the tip, where it became fleshy 
 and pendulous. The mouth matched the hard eyes and the 
 peevish voice. It was thin, bloodless and down-drawn at 
 the corners, the mouth of a woman who is either a sufferer 
 or a shrew. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 17 
 
 The young man to whom she spoke turned towards her a 
 pink, clean-shaven countenance, the natural vacuousness of 
 which was momentarily relieved by an expression of intense 
 alarm. 
 
 "Dear Mrs. Mossenthal, what are you saying? That's 
 Lady Thee Ballestier, quite a 'smartie,' and next you---for 
 goodness sake don't turn round just now — is her aunt, 
 Sybilla, Countess of "Windover." A gentle tap from the 
 ivory hammer announced a sale. 
 
 "Mr. Treuberg, Frankfort," murmured Mr. Wood, not- 
 ing down the address of the buyer. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal never flushed, her skin was too thick, 
 but as Mr. Chant spoke she tightened her lips into an 
 ominously thick line and glared ostentatiously, to convey 
 the impression that the derogatory remark had emanated 
 from some one in her vicinity. 
 
 Bidding now became brisk. Mr. Wood's keen eyes 
 glanced from side to side, catching the slightest nods and 
 movements of the well-known buyers. The heat became 
 intense, and only the crackle of waving fans rose from the 
 weary crowd. The dust hung in a golden haze under the 
 skylight and mingled flatly with the rising odour of a hun- 
 dred perfumes. The blue roses and red poppies which 
 flourished from every feminine coiffure flashed indefinite 
 rainbow combinations; the real blossoms in the men's coats 
 grew faint and brown. 
 
 As the afternoon grew older and the gems of the collec- 
 tion fell before the inexorable hammer, many of the onlookers 
 forced their way towards the door. The cooler air blowing 
 up the wide stairs from the street and the dimmer light of 
 the vestibule were delicious after the stifling atmosphere of 
 the sale-room. 
 
 "Ouf !" said Lady Theo Bellastier, taking a huge breath 
 of fresh air and shaking out her skirts as she emerged from 
 2 
 
18 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 the doorway. " What a wicked atmosphere. Is it the pic- 
 tures or the people who make it so intolerably stuffy? I 
 feel positively cooked, and I'm sure for the last half-hour 
 papa has looked as if he were going off into a fit. However 
 do you manage to keep so cool, Adela?" She glanced from 
 her inferior height to Lady St. Cyprien, a woman more than 
 common tall, her stately carriage of both head and shoulders 
 rendering her even more imposing. Dark eyes, which could 
 flash in anger or melt in tenderness, were set deep beneath 
 straight black brows. The nose was rather high and thin. 
 The mouth and chin strong as those of a man. Her clear 
 olive skin was lightly touched with rouge on the cheeks, but 
 neither dye nor powder marred the perfection of her snow- 
 white hair, which at the age of fifty-five had transformed 
 Lady St. Cyprian from a plain woman into an acknowledged 
 beauty. 
 
 She looked down now from her superior inches and 
 showing a fine set of white teeth, said : 
 
 " You fidget yourself into a fever, Theo. Ah ! here comes 
 Mrs. Van der Hoyte." 
 
 A little American, with her sharp face a-beam with smiles 
 and diffusing an atmosphere of Worth and Streeter about 
 her, minced up to the two ladies. She had only been in 
 London three months and was making her way in society 
 with very fair success — and boundless expenditure. 
 
 " How d'you do. Lady St. Cyprien?" she twanged as she 
 approached. "Sakes! wasn't it warm in there, and — oh 
 my ! some of the pictures ! If Dexter's mother could have 
 seen them she would have died of shame. What Mr. Van 
 der Hoyte will say when he finds I've bought that Teniers, 
 I don't know." 
 
 But Lady Theo Bellastier, having small patience with the 
 vulgarity of false modesty, turned away to chatter with a 
 yery loyely woman, whose misty blue eyes and delicate 
 
WITHOUT SIN 19 
 
 flower face gleamed from among the sparkle of diamonds 
 and a cloud of perfumed laces. 
 
 "My! does Lady Theo know that woman?" hissed Mrs. 
 Van der Hoyte in a loud whisper. " She was hired girl to 
 my mother out in Buffalo ten years ago." 
 
 "Myra Clyde is teaching me 'Lu! La! Lay!' and that 
 jolly dance of hers," said Lady Theo, as the popular star 
 nodded her "good-day," and ran down to her carriage. 
 " I'm getting to do that queer little kick perfectly. You 
 shall all see it at the Westlake's next Sunday," 
 
 Mrs. Van der Hoyte was gauche enough to look shocked. 
 
 "But do you know what Myra Clyde's position was!" 
 
 "Perfectly," answered Lady Theo, drawing her slender 
 figure up with considerable dignity. "And I also know 
 what my position is. Adela, if you want to go up to Le- 
 vinge's about those Chelsea figures, I can drop you. I'm 
 going up Bond Street." 
 
 Her little ladyship gave the American the chilliest of 
 bows, and with Lady St. Cyprien was half way down the 
 stairs, when a high-pitched, plaintive voice arrested her. 
 
 " Dearest ladies, for heaven's sake don't run away like 
 that. How on earth is a poor male thing to know what 
 you've got on without having even a glimpse of you." 
 
 The sleek-headed, pink-faced youth, who had been stand- 
 ing next Mrs. Mossenthal in the sale-room, came, with much 
 waving of his glossy hat and well-gloved hands, down the 
 stairs. 
 
 He called himself a society journalist — one of those nebu- 
 lous beings who flash and flutter for a few years about the 
 skirts of women ; who spring from nowhere, and speedily 
 sink into nothingness ; who dine and visit in a middle-class 
 set, the doings of which they do not care to chronicle, and 
 who track down and scribble about people into whose houses 
 they would never be admitted. 
 
20 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 But Lady Theo was democratic and good-humoured, and 
 she cried, with one of her wide smiles : 
 
 " Well, you may have one peep. But you don't deserve 
 it, Mr. Chant, you really don't," and she shook a slim 
 finger at him. 
 
 Mr. Bertie Chant's smooth round cheeks turned from 
 pink to red, and he shrugged his shoulders deprecat- 
 ingly. 
 
 " The lady with me, you mean?" 
 
 Lady Theo nodded. 
 
 "My dear creature," he piped, "if ever you know her — 
 she's a Mrs. Mossenthal — you'll find out she's a woman 
 with an iron will — positively iron, I do assure you. She 
 quite ordered me to bring her here to-day, because she had 
 heaid all you smart folk were coming, and " 
 
 " i&.nd she gave you a perfect luncheon cooked by that 
 chef of hers first, I'll be bound, and drove you down here 
 in her new victoria. You see I know all about her. 
 Women don't go to the same dressmaker for nothing. But 
 why can't you be content to eat her dinners and win her 
 money at 'bac' — I hear they play high at her house — 
 without being seen in public with her? She's so shockingly 
 tribal." 
 
 Mr. Chant so far forget his manners as to remind Lady 
 Theo that she herself not infrequently dined at Jews* 
 houses. 
 
 " My dear boy, tu quoque is no argument. Of course I 
 dine with the chosen when I choose. Their cooks are gener- 
 ally twenty times better than my own, and they don't mind 
 losing their money to one of us, and they always pay up at 
 once; But all the same, I shouldn't think of driving round 
 the Park with a woman like that, and speaking to her under 
 the noses of my own set. So don't go and say in one of 
 your papers that 'you noticed Lady Theo Bellastier in pink 
 
WITHOUT SIN 21 
 
 chatting to Mrs. Mossenthal in blue,' because if you do, I'll 
 never speak to you again." 
 
 "What a queer woman you are, Theo," said Lady St. 
 Cyprien, as their carriage turned into St. James's Street. 
 
 "What have I been doing now?" 
 " You don't mind who sees you talking to that dreadful 
 music-hall creature, Myra Clyde, who is quite the most 
 notorious woman in town just now, and yet you would not 
 have your father see you bowing to a Mrs. Mossenthal. I 
 really don't understand." 
 
 "Oh, yes, you do, Adela," said Lady Theo, with a light 
 laugh. " To know a Myra Clyde is merely an eccentricity. 
 Such people as she are so entirely apart from one's life that 
 one can pick them up and throw them away again like a 
 pair of gloves. Besides, Myra is so awfully amusing. But 
 the type of the wealthy Jewess is very different. Her 
 money and her social ambition render her a factor with which 
 one has to reckon. Mrs. Mossenthal could probably buy me 
 up to-morrow, and she knows it; but all the same, she'd 
 give her little finger to get me to her house. No, I won't 
 come into Levinge's, thanks. I always buy such a lot of 
 things there, and I'm harder up than ever just now. Be- 
 sides, I see Aunt Sybilla's carriage at the door, and I ex- 
 pect she and papa are inside. If they catch me, they'll 
 read me such a jeremiad about Ellis Vyvyan's poker party 
 last Wednesday. It was an awful evening. I lost every- 
 thing, and Lady Carstairs was furious because I didn't pay 
 at once, and said she should speak to papa or my husband. 
 Ugh! How I hate a spiteful woman. Au revoir." 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 As Lady St. Cyprien entered the cool dusk of Ephraim 
 Levinge's shop, Martin Baird, in his severely cut frock coat, 
 and with his grizzled hair brushed in a hard line across his. 
 forehead, came forward from the large gallery beyond. 
 
 " Mr. Levinge will be back in a few minutes if you wish 
 to see him." 
 
 "Of course Lady St. Cyprien will wait, milady," said a 
 loud masculine voice behind him. " Come in here, Adela, 
 and help me choose Maria Vane a wedding present. Grand- 
 Chester has got his nose into a bundle of old prints, and is 
 no good at all." 
 
 Sybilla, Countess of Windover, had the voice and gait of 
 a man in petticoats, and cultivated, even in the uncompro- 
 mising rigidity of her side curls, the extraordinary likeness 
 she bore her brother, the Duke of Grandchester. She had 
 a strong harsh voice, and affected a blunt speech and brusque 
 manner which made her more feared than loved in her own 
 circle. 
 
 "Yes!" the Dowager proclaimed in her strident tones, 
 as her kinswoman, Lady St. Cyprien, joined her, " I am 
 going to give Levinge one more chance, though I vowed. I 
 would never come near his place again when I found he 
 had charged me twenty-five guineas for that beau-pot affair 
 I gave the Princess on her last birthday. An absurd price, 
 and I told him so." The old lady, who was the widow of 
 three wealthy peers, thumped the floor with her gold-headed 
 cane, then raised it and pointed at Baird. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 23 
 
 "But I've been telling Baird that if I give this place 
 another trial I must have something that's cheap. These 
 girls and their wedding presents are a perfect nuisance." 
 
 " Then why give her anything at all, cousin Sybilla?" 
 said Lady St. Cyprien in her soft, gentle voice. 
 
 " Bless me !" cried Lady Windover, lowering her stick to 
 the ground again and vigorously punctuating her sen- 
 tences with the ferruled end. "Bless me, Adela, how 
 dense you are ! Maria Vane is marrying twenty-five thou- 
 sand a year, the finest place in the Highlands, and a steam 
 yacht. I'm going to spend a month with her in Scotland 
 next autumn. Ah! here's Levinge at last. Now, Levinge, 
 I want something for a present, but I won' t pay more than 
 ten pounds." 
 
 Ephraim Levinge shuffled slowly into the gallery, which, 
 with its pictures and tapestries, made a warm background 
 to the sculptured nymphs and cupids. The exquisite tints 
 of the china, the polished inlay, the flower-strewn silks, 
 and old-world timepieces looked very pretty in the yellow 
 light filtering through the linen blinds which were drawn 
 across the glass roof. Into the little group of English aris- 
 tocrats came the Polish Jew, his coarse strong face, in 
 which every characteristic feature of his tribe was exag- 
 gerated, his short ungainly figure and big-boned hands 
 contrasting strangely with the finer lines and gracious bear- 
 ing of his customers. He looked sharply at the Countess over 
 his gold-rimmed spectacles, and said, in his thick speech : 
 
 "Good-day, milady. So you've come back to me. 
 Didn't Phillips down the street serve you so well? I saw 
 your ladyship's carriage outside his place for an hour last 
 Friday." The Countess of Windover flushed through her 
 frankly laid-on rouge. She was angry at being reminded 
 of that visit to the rival dealer's, which had resulted in her 
 spending a lot of money on something she did not want. 
 
24 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " I only come back to you, Levinge, because Phillips's 
 prices are worse than yours," she said bluntly. "But this 
 time I won't give much. Ten guineas is the limit, Levinge, 
 ten guineas. Now, what about that, eh?" and the awful 
 stick was thrust into the midst of a priceless service of egg- 
 shell china, with a pedigree which proved that the fair Fitz- 
 Herbert and the Tirst Gentleman in Europe had sipped 
 green tea from the tiny cups in the Brighton Square of old 
 Steyne. 
 
 "I don't think that would suit your ladyship at all," 
 said the old man without flinching. He knew the parsi- 
 mony of his customer too well to be even a little anxious 
 lest she should so much as crack one of those fragile gew- 
 
 The Duke of Grandchester, having finished with the 
 prints, had started on a tour of inspection round the gallery, 
 and, as was his wont, pulled up in front of the unsigned 
 picture. 
 
 "That's still here, I see," he said over his shoulder to 
 Baird. 
 
 " I do not think Mr. Levinge wishes to part with it, your 
 Grace." 
 
 The Duke fixed his sharp hazel eyes on the sweet grave 
 face. 
 
 " Well, if ever he wants the room it takes, let me know. 
 I'd give a good deal to have it." 
 
 " What's that?" cried Lady Windover. " Going to buy 
 another picture? Where will you hang it? Chester Castle 
 is lined with them from garret to basement." 
 
 "There's always room for a gem like this," said the 
 Duke. 
 
 " Why, who is the thing by?" snapped the old lady. 
 
 "It is unsigned, milady," said Baird. "But either 
 Crivelli or Botticelli." 
 
WITHOUT SIN 25 
 
 "Crivelli! Botticelli! fiddlesticks! The thing looks as 
 though it had been painted yesterday," and she lunged at 
 the panel with her cane. 
 
 "Yesterday was Sunday, milady," said old Levinge with 
 a malicious twinkle in his bleared eyes. 
 
 Sybilla, Countess of Windover, sniffed, and pretending to 
 take no notice of her brother's amusement, passed on. 
 
 " What a charming little piece, " said Lady St. Cyprien, 
 over the Duke's shoulder. 
 
 "Ah! here is Mr. Mayne; perhaps he can decide the 
 artist's name." 
 
 A man, square built and of middle height, had joined the 
 group, and with hand-shakes and nods betokened his intim- 
 acy with each member of it. The first glance betrayed him 
 for an artist. The brown hair clustering closely about his 
 ears, the flamboyant tie of soft silk run through a cameo- 
 ring, the ornately carved piece of amber that headed his 
 walking-stick, were all patent indications of Eliot Mayne' s 
 profession. The second glance ameliorated the first impres- 
 sion. His clothes were of the latest cut and fashion, his 
 short beard of strong reddish-brown hair, trimmed to per- 
 fection; his hat, gloves, and boots — ever the stumbling- 
 blocks of the exponents of art — were immaculate. He had 
 rather the air and manner of an amateur, or of a man who 
 seeks to cloak some one strong personal characteristic by the 
 assumption of another. 
 
 In his world, which as worlds go was suflSciently eclectic, 
 he had made both reputation and fortune as a painter of 
 biblical and religious subjects. He had a great following, 
 and many of his patrons compared him indifferently with 
 Perugino and Bellini, much to his own amusement, for he 
 was a man of humour and had a certain superficial feeling 
 for art. 
 
 Out of his studio he posed for a gentleman, and that de- 
 
26 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 spite an uneasy doubt that there were flaws in his armour. 
 Women liked him much, men but a little, and his character 
 fluctuated according to whether the chat was held in the 
 boudoir or smoking-room. He came forward, hat in hand, 
 prepared to give his opinion, which he did with a judicious 
 admixture of technicalities. 
 
 Lady St, Cyprien's undisguised smile at last checked his 
 flow of words. 
 
 "Thanks so much, Mr. Mayne. It's very interesting. 
 But I am sufficiently Philistine not to care in the least who 
 could have painted the picture. I only know the face is the 
 highest ideal of innocent saintliness I have ever seen." 
 
 She raised her tortoiseshell-handled glasses and looked 
 long at the picture. " The face is almost too spiritual even 
 for the mother of the Christ." 
 
 The Duke nodded a grave acquiescence. 
 
 " It is the face of a girl child who is still too young, too 
 pure to know that even virginity exists." Lady St. Cyprien 
 sank into a low chair and looked again at the picture. 
 
 " Grandchester, where could I ever have seen a face like 
 that?" 
 
 His Grace shrugged his lean shoulders and smiled 
 sardonically. 
 
 "My dear Adela, only in the National Gallery. The 
 great Botticelli there is almost identical in feature and 
 expression." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien shook her head. 
 
 "No, Grandchester, I have seen that face, living, and 
 smiling — for such a mouth and eyes could never laugh — 
 with red blood flushing the round cheeks, and little sparkles 
 of childlike, innocent amusement coming and going in those 
 serene eyes." She puckered her pencilled brows in an effort 
 of recollection. "Where did I see that face? It was but , 
 a few days ago." 
 
WITHOUT SIN 37 
 
 The Duke, with a gallant air which conceded much to the 
 fair sex, shook his head. 
 
 " You have been deceived by a mere outline, a chance 
 scheme of colouring, my dear Adela. The women of the 
 end of the century are beautiful, no doubt— but saints — " and 
 Lady St. Cyprien being a married woman and a relation, 
 the old Duke winked one eye at Eliot Mayne and chuckled. 
 
 "Is grandfather back yet, Martin? I want to show him 
 — Oh ! I beg your pardon. " The clear fluty voice of a young 
 girl had spoken from the outer shop, and only died in an 
 inarticulate murmur at the entrance of the gallery. 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien turned sharply round and found a tall, 
 slight figure, that of a half -grown girl of about fifteen, 
 standing almost at her elbow. The child wore a simple 
 gown of fine white wool, shirred at the throat and wrists 
 and falling in straight folds over the budding bosom and 
 slender hips almost to the ancles. A fiat hat of golden- 
 hued Leghorn straw was tilted back from her face and per- 
 mitted the sinking sun to fiing fierce rays across the flawless 
 velvet of her fair skin and the pale yellow locks that curled 
 about her long throat. In her hands was clasped a loose 
 bunch of wine-coloured roses which half in shy doubt she 
 still held out towards her grandfather. 
 
 "Ach! it is you, my child," said the old man, scarcely 
 turning his head. " Go upstairs, my dear, I am busy." 
 
 With a simple little curtsey the young girl was about to 
 obey, when Lady St. Cyprien dropped her long eye-glasses 
 with a sharp clatter and said : 
 
 " Surely that is little Mary Levinge. Come and shake 
 hands, my dear. Why, how you have grown since I last 
 saw you, which was just before you went away to school." 
 
 " I remember you quite well. You are Lady St. Cyprien. " 
 The young girl spoke with directness and modesty, but the 
 instinct of self-humiliation which centuries of persecution 
 
28 WITHOUT Sm 
 
 have engendered in her race was entirely absent from her 
 manner. She held out her hand with charming candour to 
 the great lady, who on her part clasped it warmly. 
 
 "Yes, I am Lady St. Cyprien. Ah! Duke, you would 
 like to know this young lady. This is the Duke of 
 Grandchester, my dear." 
 
 The old gentleman bowed before the little Jewish maiden 
 as though she had been a princess. Then he touched Lady 
 St. Cyprien's arm and whispered : 
 
 " There is your Virgin's face— the likeness is extraordi- 
 nary." 
 
 " Of course ; I passed the child in the street the other day. 
 Besides, I remember noticing the strange resemblance when 
 she was quite a little thing." 
 
 " Your ladyship sees how like the child is to the picture?" 
 
 It was old Levinge who spoke. Sybilla, Countess of 
 Windover, having bought for her own price an exquisite 
 Sevres cup worth twenty-five guineas, was in a charming 
 humour and only too ready to praise evei-ything. 
 
 " La! what a lovely child!" she cried in her most mascu- 
 line tones; and then added in a loud whisper: "Gracious! 
 Adela. What a peculiar likeness. 'Pon my word, I never 
 saw anything so remarkable." 
 
 Vexed as he was that his patrons should lay such empha- 
 sis on the strange resemblance which existed between his 
 grand-daughter and the imaginary portrait of a woman who 
 is less than nothing in the eyes of a good Jew, old Levinge 
 could no more resist the temptation of showing ofE the child's 
 undeniable beauty than he would have stayed himself from 
 reciting the attractions of anything in his shop. 
 
 " Take your hat off, Mary, and let the ladies see what 
 pretty hair you' ve got. " 
 
 Without a blush of embarrassment Mary removed her 
 hat, and lifting her hands, which had the long, slightly 
 
WITHOUT SIN 39 
 
 turned'back finger-tips and narrow almond nails Crivelli 
 loved to paint, held them finger to finger and palm to 
 palm across her breast as did the pictured saint at her 
 shoulder. 
 
 "Divine I" murmured Mayne, his brown eyes ablaze with 
 undisguised admiration. 
 
 "The picture is a Botticelli," cried the Duke, with his 
 eyes fixed on Mary. " Your grand-daughter might have sat 
 to him." 
 
 " Yet Botticelli never painted it, your grace. Everything 
 goes to prove that the picture is a mystery." 
 
 "And the likeness wonderful," said Sybilla, Countess of 
 Windover, shutting her gold lorgnette and preparing to go. 
 " Grandchester, Adela, are you coming? Good-bye, Mr. 
 Mayne." 
 
 A moment later the gallery was empty save for the child, 
 with her long eyes narrowed beneath her drooping lids, her 
 plaintive hands and her mouth full and dewy as that of an 
 infant, yet sad and set as that of a woman, stood there, a 
 pale wraith in the gathering summer twilight. 
 
 The return of her grandfather and the switching on of the 
 electric light roused her from her dream. The old man drew 
 a greasy black skull-cap from his pocket and putting it on 
 began to mumble in Hebrew his evening prayers, now and 
 then pausing in his devotions to fling curt instructions to 
 Martin Baird, who, with the door of the safe yawning wide 
 behind him, was making up the day's accounts. 
 
 "Mary, go upstairs and tell your aunt I am coming up," 
 Ephraim said presently. 
 
 Mary picked up her hat and her roses, then crossed to 
 where the grey-haired manager sat before a pile of books. 
 
 "Good -night, Martin," she said. "Would you like a 
 rose?" She stooped to lay one on his desk. "Martin," 
 she whispered, " did you hear what Lady St. Cyprien and 
 
30 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 the others said about me? It must be true if strangers notice 
 it. Good-night." 
 
 With a nod and one of her vague smiles she flitted across 
 the gallery and disappeared through the door behind the 
 arras. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 The rooms above the art shop, where Ephraim Levinge 
 lived with his widowed daughter Judith Marx and his 
 grand-daughter Mary Levinge, were small, and extraordi- 
 narily suggestive of the business carried on downstairs. 
 The sitting-room, which was on the first floor and looked 
 on to Bond Street, and old Ephraim' s bed-room behind it, 
 seemed as though they had been caught in periodical high 
 tide of ohjets d'aHs, which on receding into their proper 
 channels had left behind them, while sweeping away 
 familiar friends, sundry relics of the overflow. 
 
 As far back in her fifteen years of life as Mary could 
 remember, the rather shabby furniture of her home had a 
 queer trick of being supplemented and overwhelmed by fine 
 silken-coloured chairs and polished tables she scarcely dared 
 to touch. The Japanese bronzes on the mantelpiece would 
 be transformed in a single night into huge Worcester vases 
 of royal blue, besprent with roses and peacocks. Some- 
 times Aunt Judith would loll at her ease in her dirty plush 
 tea-gown on a grand French chair with gUt arms, and a 
 week later would be forced to seek repose on a narrow- 
 seated, straight-backed empire sofa. 
 
 At first the child, with the " homing" instinct which all 
 young animals possess, was troubled by the perpetual 
 alteration in her surroundings, and though the bedroom 
 she shared with her aunt was seldom if ever molested, it 
 frightened and troubled her to see the familiar landmarks 
 of her baby days forever changing. 
 
32 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 She was five before she connected the visits of her grand- 
 father's friends with the sacrificing of her own household 
 gods. 
 
 "Now that's a nice couch, a very nice couch," had said 
 a burly son of the priestly tribe of Cohen one day, when 
 calling on Ephraim Levinge. 
 
 "Yes, it's a good sound thing that — rosewood, stuffed 
 with the best hair you ever saw — and the brocade! Well, 
 just feel it." 
 
 This Mr. Cohen proceeded to do, and then to the child's 
 astonishment opened a long and keenly fought argument 
 touching the price. At the end of a quarter of an hour 
 both men wiped their foreheads. 
 
 "I send the money and a cart to-night," said Mr. Cohen. 
 
 " But you mustn't send that away, " had cried the child, 
 springing from the floor and dropping her toys. " That's 
 Aunt Judith's favourite sofa." 
 
 The two Jews laughed — but by next morning the sofa 
 had gone, and Aunt Judith was reduced for some time 
 afterwards to a fifteenth century oak settle. 
 
 From that day Mary discovered that everything had a 
 price. Modern or antique, whole or broken, there was 
 nothing which was not to be bought — and sold. Thor- 
 oughbred Semite as she was, born of a long line of Polish 
 hucksters, who had chaffered and bargained in every town 
 of central Europe, her nature was streaked with a peculiar 
 distaste for the taint of the mart. She had an innate 
 reverence for the things of dead great men and forgotten 
 lovely women. Her temperament was of too highly 
 organised and neurotic a type, her imagination too much 
 thrown back on itself by lack of sympathy and companion- 
 ship, not to seek their favourite food amid the thousand 
 objects of value and interest around her. Where a 
 healthier-minded child would have found infinite joy in 
 
WITHOUT sm 33 
 
 dismembering a box of toys, little Mary Levinge would curl 
 up on the floor at the foot of a great bureau or ample chair, 
 and would weave a thousand vague romances about the man 
 or woman who might have owned it. With the acquisitive 
 faculty of her race, she very quickly picked up the essential 
 points of periods, and marks of furniture, pictures and china. 
 
 Knowing little of her own great faith beyond the merest 
 outward forms, her receptive brain had absorbed to the full 
 the strange jumble of the world's legends, which she had 
 gathered either from the lips of Martin Baird — himself a 
 man of dreams — or from the vastly indiscriminate reading 
 with which he had supplied her. Perhaps with a vague 
 idea of some day converting her to Christianity, he had 
 taught her to read out of the two Testaments ; an exercise 
 which, being strictly forbidden, the child intuitively loved, 
 even as she grew to cherish the wonderful story of that 
 pure woman, whose name was unmentionable in Levinge's 
 house, beyond the threshold of the Art Gallery, where 
 Holy Virgins were relegated to the merely commercial level 
 along with Lancret's Frenchified madames and Lely's loose- 
 vestured and lax-moraled beauties. Always with a view 
 of amusing the lonely little girl, Baird had told her a 
 thousand times the old Norse and German legends; the 
 gipsy stories of Hungary; the lives of the saints; the 
 glowing tales of the East, till the child evolved her heroes 
 and heroines from a confused tangle of yellow-haired sons 
 of Odin and ivory-skinned princesses of Italy, of Koman 
 maidens martyred at the stake for a new faith's sake and 
 gallant Paladins. 
 
 Mary's aunt, Mrs. Judith Marx, whose youthful days 
 had been passed in hawking cheap jewellery through the 
 Ghettos of old German towns, was, in her later years of 
 ease and comfort, too utterly given over to a sloth, which 
 only partially disappeared at meal-times, to know or care 
 3 
 
34 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 how the little girl was to be educated. So long as Baird 
 or a servant would keep the child amused and quiet, Mrs. 
 Marx was content. The only offspring of a long-dead 
 scapegrace son, the baby Mary had almost been flung into 
 the arms of Ephraim Levinge at that moment in his career 
 when he was shaking the dust of a nomad life from his 
 feet, and settling down as a wood-carver and maker of 
 antique oak in a slummy alley off Petticoat Lane. Per- 
 haps the frail waif with the sweet, serious eyes, and set 
 full mouth that never cried, who had been despised because 
 she was born a woman, brought some measure of luck to 
 the old man. Life had been bitter with him ; the hands of 
 many had been against him, and his hand against all; but 
 the Jew is generally good to his own, for the ties of blood 
 are with him his single bond with the rest of humanity. 
 
 So Ephraim Levinge, terribly poor as he was in those days, 
 was kind in his hard, narrow way to the child, and, as she 
 grew older, and his business improved, he was not without 
 ambition for her. When she could talk, he moved from 
 the squalid nest of his compatriots into more decent quarters 
 in North London. He revised to vanishing point Mrs. 
 Marx's list of acquaintances, and forbade that garrulous 
 slut to let his grand-daughter run the streets or mix with 
 the child-life she would meet there. 
 
 Then came a lucky deal or two. A rage set in for old 
 oak, and with a courage which astonished himself, Ephraim 
 took a small shop in Bond Street, letting out the upper part ■ 
 and still living at Islington. The carved settles and chests 
 soon led to investments in old masters of nebulous origin, 
 and little bits of china from the neighbourhood of Frank- 
 fort, and by the time Mary was five, the dark shop had 
 blossomed into the " Art Gallery" and " Ephraim Levinge, 
 Art Dealer," was painted in gold above the huge plate-glass 
 window. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 35 
 
 The marvellous instinct for art which is co-equal in the 
 Jew with the capacity for trading, soon taught him to know 
 the real thing from the false, and where to place it, and 
 when once he had grasped the advantages of honesty, he 
 became the acknowledged art dealer of the great world. 
 The sale-rooms of London and Paris became familiar with 
 his squat, awkward figure and hawk-like face. He trailed 
 his frowsy coat and incomprehensible lingo alike through 
 royal palaces and the boudoirs of les petites dames, buying 
 and selling everywhere. The sums of money he frequently 
 risked were enormous, and sometimes frightened this man 
 who had begged his way across Europe ; but they always 
 came back, the golden sovereigns and the rustling bank- 
 notes, bringing more with them. 
 
 His galleries, filled with the masterpieces of centuries, 
 became the rendezvous of the fashionable world. Art 
 collectors hobnobbed with Levinge; critics consulted 
 Levinge; authorities required confirmation from Levinge; 
 duchesses gossiped away their mornings with Levinge ; and 
 their lords considered ways and means with him. 
 
 Wealth flowed in fast, but the old days, when he had 
 tramped pack on back across the Polish snowfields, or 
 starved beneath the Italian summer suns, or lain drenched 
 through with tropical showers behind a stone wall or hedge 
 of vines, had left their traces on his sturdy frame and were 
 recalled in the achings of his big bones. And so when the 
 day's business was done, and the heavy iron shutters had 
 been lowered over the plate-glass windows, when the cata- 
 logues of approaching sales had been marked, and the thick 
 green-backed ledgers had been posted up by Baird, 
 Ephraim Levinge was glad to go upstairs and wash his 
 hands and eat, and then, with his hat on his head and his 
 praying shawl about him, mumble a few prayers in his 
 corrupt Hebrew before going to bed. 
 
36 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 During these years, when her grandfather was scraping 
 his fortune together, and teaching the rudiments of art to 
 wealthy brewers and globe-trotting AmericanSj little Mary 
 spent those hours which were not passed in Martin Baird's 
 delightful company, with a Scotch servant, who considered 
 that in keeping the child quiet she was doing her duty. 
 Sometimes, but this very seldom, Mary would be sent to 
 spend the afternoon with the children of her grandfather's 
 business friends, but she was too reserved and thoughtful 
 to care for their noise and rough play, and after a time the 
 nurseries of Maida Vale and Notting Hill knew her no 
 more. 
 
 So the earlier years of her childhood went by, leaving 
 her nervous, imaginative, and extraordinarily ignorant of 
 everything save a tangle of fanciful tales and a superficial 
 knowledge of idly gleaned facts. Wonderful dreams of 
 knight-errantry were weaved by the little brain which did 
 not know that two and two made four, and the strange 
 names and legends of Eastern gods fell from lips that could 
 scarcely say the alphabet. 
 
 But when she was ten, by accident Ephraim Levinge dis- 
 covered the child's absolute ignorance. At first it made 
 but little impression upon him. Neither his mother nor 
 the wife of his early manhood had been able to read, they 
 had said their prayers by rote, and it had been good enough 
 for them. His widowed daughter, Judith Marx, took 
 months to spell through the greasy, dogs'-eared novels in 
 Yiddish, which she surreptitiously borrowed from a small 
 Jews' lending library in Whitechapel. What did the child 
 want with learning? Yet through his self -persuasion crept 
 the knowledge that since his young days, spent in the 
 Ghettos of Poland, a great change had come over his race, 
 and especially over the women. The streak of Orientalism 
 and the Jew's inbred contempt for all that is feminine was 
 
WITHOUT SIN 37 
 
 strong within him, and in his daily prayers he always 
 thanked the God who had made him a man. Yet he was 
 not blind. He had wide eyes and open ears for the 
 present, and the instinct of prophecy for the future. 
 Woman, the scorned and the inferior, was waking from a 
 slumber which had lasted through the ages; why should 
 his grand-daughter, the last of his line, the heiress to his 
 great business and his ever-growing fortune, sleep on in 
 ignorance? 
 
 She must be educated by a proper and responsible gover- 
 ness, so Ephraim Levinge announced to Mrs. Marx one 
 morning as he quitted the living-room for the shop below. 
 
 Mary was already downstairs, for at the first words deal- 
 ing with her own future, her shrinking timidity had urged 
 her to fiy to the more impersonal company of Martin Baird. 
 
 For a moment, after her father's heavy tread had died 
 on the staircase, Mrs. Marx sat as if transfixed in her 
 chair. Then for the first and last time in her life, her slow- 
 working brain, fired with ignorant hatred of the enemies of 
 her people, the unbelievers in the law, roused her indolent 
 body from its normal lethargy, and she went downstairs 
 after her father. 
 
 With her black wig askew and her fat, yellow face 
 quivering, Mrs. Marx burst into the Art Gallery. 
 
 Levinge was arranging some Chelsea figures in a tall 
 cabinet. Baird was sitting at the writing-table rapidly 
 answering a large pile of letters; Mary, with her hands 
 clasped loosely across her white pinafore, was gazing with 
 reverent eyes at the small picture of the Holy Virign. In 
 the outer shop, the two assistants were cleaning and put- 
 ting together a beautiful girandole of old cut crystal. 
 
 Martin Baird first caught sight of the angry woman. 
 Her disturbed manner as well as her appearance in the 
 Art Gallery warned him that something was amiss. He 
 
38 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 rose quickly and closed the big glass doors wMck separated 
 the shop from the larger show-room. 
 
 His action drew on him the first outpourings of Mrs. 
 Marx's wrath. 
 
 " Oh, Gentile and eater of unclean things, you had need 
 leave my presence. If I were master here I would not 
 have your shadow cross my threshold. It is owing to you 
 that this last insult has been put upon me and Heaven's 
 lightnings have been called upon this house." 
 
 She spoke in Jargon wjiich Baird understood well, and 
 it was in Jargon — which he seldom now used — that Levinge 
 bade his daughter hold her peace. 
 
 "Peace! Name no peace to me who see myself driven 
 from my father's house," cried Mrs. Marx turning on 
 Ephraim. "What have I done to thee, my father, that 
 thou shouldst force me toleave thy roof? Where have I 
 failed in my duty to thee and to the memory of my mother 
 — peace be upon her — ? Have I not kept for thee a 
 Kosher house? Have I ever failed to light the lamps for 
 Shdbbos ? Have I not observed the fasts and prepared for 
 every feast? Who but I have burnt the leaven at the 
 Passover, and cleansed the knives by fire? Is not the 
 Borsch I make thee good and the almond pudding light? 
 Ah! woe is me!" She flung up her fat hands in a gesture 
 of despair. . *' You would bring a Goya into this houSe, 
 who would drink milk with the meat and mix the plates." 
 
 She paused to take breath, and in the interval her father 
 turned again to his occupation of arranging his dainty china 
 figures. The action was significant of contempt and lashed 
 Mrs. Marx to greater fury. 
 
 Her eyes fell upon Mary, who stood shoulder to shoulder 
 with her favourite picture, staring at her aunt. The child 
 could not speak Yiddish at all,, but she understood enough 
 to gather that Mrs. Marx's wrath had been roused by the 
 
WITHOUT SIN 39 
 
 prospective advent of a governess — who in all probability 
 might be a Christian. 
 
 "Ha! thou foolish one," began Mrs. Marx, turning on 
 her niece with renewed vigour, " is it not enough that I 
 should see thy father's daughter reading the New Testa- 
 ment" — and she spat out with scorn — " that thou shouldst 
 not speak the tongue of thy own mother, but only the talk 
 of this accursed country, and that thou shouldst worship 
 false gods?" 
 
 A pointing finger indicated the sweet face of the Holy 
 Virgin and drove home the incomprehensible Jargon to 
 Mary's understanding. 
 
 "I come not down here much, the Christian and those 
 who are reformed make the place unfit, but I know where 
 thou spendest thy time. Thou adorest the image of one 
 who was a cheat — a mother of lies ! Ha! ha!" she snorted 
 scornfully, " those who call her the mother of the Messiah 
 are fool-men — she was the mother of lies." 
 
 "Aunt Judith!" screamed the child, her face grown 
 whiter than her frock and her little hands outstretched as 
 though to stay the torrent of abuse. 
 
 Baird sprang to his feet at Mary's piteous cry, but Mrs. 
 Marx, with knuckled hands upon her hips, was revelling in 
 the reminiscent abuse of the "Lane" and was not to be 
 stayed. 
 
 " Knowest thou not that the Messiah is not yet? That 
 only a true daughter of Judah shall be meet to give him to 
 his people as a redeemer and lawgiver? Hast thou no 
 knowledge of the prophets who have said, 'Behold, a 
 virgin shall conceive, and shall bear a son, and shall call 
 his name Immanuel?' Look at that face. Thou callest 
 that a picture of the Holy Virgin? Pah!" she spat again, 
 "she was no better than a wretched drab!" 
 
 " Silence ! Go to thy own chamber, " thundered Ephraim 
 
40 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Levinge, while Mary, white with horror and shaking with 
 grief, sank almost fainting into a chair. 
 
 So began and ended Mrs. Marx's first and last inter- 
 ference with her father's plans for Mary's future, for 
 Ephraim Levinge had not made half a million of money by 
 listening to the foolish talk of women. Mary would be 
 rich, Mary should be clever enough to keep her riches. 
 She should be educated and — the ambition came to the old 
 Pole in a flash — she should be a lady. He looked at his 
 fat, loose-fleshed daughter. Her flabby, ill-kept skui, her 
 dirty finery filled him with a vague disgust, which merged 
 in a fierce determination that his little grandchild with 
 her golden hair and roseleaf complexion should never 
 degenerate into the typical Pullaok woman of his people. 
 
 He wondered a little at his new purpose, but he never 
 swerved from it. Mary should be taught the ways of 
 superlative order, the perfect pride of person, the exquisite 
 grace and ease of manner, the low clear charm of speech 
 which his natural shrewdness showed him were the hall 
 marks of an English lady. 
 
 The handsomest and richest daughter of commerce who 
 ever rustled and jingled into his shop was but an over- 
 dressed mass of vulgarity beside old Sybilla, Countess of 
 Windover, whose gold-headed walking-cane, stiffly rolled 
 side-curls, and shabby black gown had a subtle air of dis- 
 tinction which to the Jew was at once indefinable and 
 desirable. 
 
 His commercial theory that everything, even the air and 
 manners of a grande dame, had a price, and Mrs. Marx's 
 iterated horror of a governess in the house resulted in Mary 
 being sent to a first-class school, where her gentleness and 
 beauty at once placed her on a level with the sprigs of 
 English and foreign Jewish aristocracy who were being 
 educated there. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 41 
 
 If education and companionship quite failed to cure Mary 
 of the habit of indiscriminate day-dreaming, it served in 
 some slight measure to regulate and formulate her baby- 
 ideals, which one by one dropped from her, as premature 
 blossoms fall from an undeveloped tree. Yet some re- 
 mained with her, and one before all, set to a fruit, and 
 grew with her growth till it became a very part of her. 
 
 The religion of the Holy Virgin, that undefiled House of 
 Gold, that unbroken Vessel of Honour, that Queen of 
 Virgins whose light was the Morning Star, whose ensign 
 was a Lily that had led the fiercest war and carried the 
 sweetest peace among all nations, was to the little Jewess 
 even more than a beloved fairy-tale of the nursery. 
 
 For, despite the fact that the articles of her ancient 
 faith, the grand prayers in the sonorous Hebrew tongue, 
 and the magnificent ritual of her Church were taught her, 
 that forbidden story, that savoured all the sweeter in that 
 she might not taste, grew yet more dominant in her, until 
 it possessed her like her soul. 
 
 That the Madonna's Child, born nearly nineteen hundred 
 years ago, was that Eedeemer the prophets of old had 
 promised to the Jews, every tenet of her own vaguely 
 understood religion forbade her to believe, but that such a 
 Eedeemer should arise from among the scattered tribes of 
 Israel who should lead them to the Land of Promise, and 
 make of the units one grand nation, was with her an estab- 
 lished article of sincerest faith. 
 
 Had not even Aunt Judith told her of that humble 
 Jewish family, living out their dull peasants' lives in the 
 heart of the dim Hungarian forests, a woman of which the 
 faithful Jews of Eastern Europe say will be chosen as a 
 meet mother for the expected Saviour? 
 
 Over her lessons, and in the midst of her play in the 
 shady school garden where the tall white lilies grew in 
 
42 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 silver lines against the old wall, Mary would wonder smd 
 dream about that poor peasant woman who was to be so blest. 
 
 She saw one day some gipsy girls, swarthy, black-browed 
 wenches with tangled ebon locks tumbling into their big 
 bold eyes, and thick brass rings set with coloured glass 
 dangling from their ears at either side of their bare brown 
 throats. The Eomanys whined and begged about the gar- 
 den gate, cringing with outstretched dirty claws to the girls 
 in their neat school dresses. 
 
 A governess told the girls the women were gipsies who 
 had wandered across Europe from beyond the forests of 
 Hungary and Bulgaria. " Some people believe the gipsies 
 are really the ten lost tribes of Israel, " she told her pupils. 
 
 The memory of the coarse beauty and degraded bearing 
 of these outcasts of her own race filled Mary with a vague 
 disquietude. All unconsciously she had built her unformed 
 faith in a redeemed future round the picture of the paJe- 
 haired maiden which hung in her grandfather's Art Gallery 
 at home. It was a childish inconsequential thing to have 
 done, but it had grown to be a part of her being for so long 
 that she could only think that such a woman, with such 
 calm brows, such serene meek eyes, and a mouth formed 
 for the expression of many sufferings, could alone be hailed 
 as "Mother" by the child who was one day coming to 
 redeem her people. 
 
 Mary did not voice her beliefs to her teachers. She 
 could not have done so, for, with all her brooding, they 
 were so intangible, so vague, so essentially prohibited, 
 that she could not put them into words even to herself. 
 Only when she closed her eyes, as in a cloudy vision, the 
 past as she had understood it, the future as she imagined it, 
 swept across her brain. In words the child's ideas would 
 have been grotesque ; and perhaps it was an undefined fear 
 that she would be laughed at, which kept her silent. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 43 
 
 For five years she lived her quiet school life, never once 
 returning home. Too dreamy to be really clever, said her 
 teachers ; too delicate to work very hard, said the doctors. 
 Then her grandfather had her home again. Epbraim 
 Levinge was growing very old; his sturdy peasant frame 
 was giving signs that soft lying and good living in later 
 years could not wipe out the traces of starvation and 
 hedgerow beds ; and he longed with all the softness of his 
 hard old heart for the nearer presence of the last of his kin. 
 So at the most critical moment of her life, when the soul of 
 a young girl first stirs to waking in her still childish body, 
 when the heart sickens at a doll and the brain cries out for 
 more light, Mary came back to the great Art Gallery and 
 the crowded upper rooms, which were so filled with the 
 relics of a buried past that there seemed no place for the 
 creation of a fair future. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 The shop and Art Gallery had been shut for over an 
 hour, and already the sitting-room upstairs was close with 
 the odours of antiquity, drawn from a full suite of oak and 
 tapestry furniture by a couple of oil lamps. The glare of 
 the lights, scarcely subdued by two cheap ground-glass 
 globes, tilled the small room, and mercilessly showed up 
 the rents in the tapestry, the scratches in the oak, and the 
 faded gilding of a broad-faced empire clock which ticked 
 solemnly in the corner. 
 
 It was late one Saturday afternoon, the Sabbath was 
 over, and Levinge, wearing his shabby tall hat, and with 
 his Talith hitched round his shoulders, was seated in a dis- 
 tant corner mumbling his prayers. 
 
 Stretched in animal ease on the tapestry sofa was Mrs. 
 Marx, her large flabby form draped in the usual untidy tea- 
 gown, her black wig profusely greased and tousled into 
 stringy curls above her low forehead, and her fat hands 
 laden with rings and tipped with dirt. One of her ever- 
 lasting cheap Jargon story-books poked a dog's-eared 
 corner from beneath the cushion where she had hastily 
 thrust it on her father's entrance. She only obtained these 
 Ijooks on such rare occasions as she was able to slip away 
 and spend a few hours among her old-time friends at 
 Whitechapel, for Judith Marx had the intelligence of a 
 child, the instincts of an animal, and was never so happy 
 as when she was jabbering her barbarous lingo to a score of 
 her compatriots, and eating fried fish or Crepleh, the rich 
 
WITHOUT SIN 45 
 
 meat pasties, with her jewelled fingers. Of her old father, 
 with his ambitions, his marvellous trading powers, his (to 
 her mind) reckless trafficking with Christians, she was 
 proud, but very much afraid. She still obeyed him as an 
 inferior bows to a higher power, and if she was dirty, 
 greedy, and lazy, it was merely because he had ceased to 
 correct her on these points. 
 
 Her feelings towards Mary were more complex, if such a 
 mass of insipidity can be accredited with either feelings or 
 complexity. As regarded her niece's silent moods, her 
 strange flights of fancy and mysticism, and even the more 
 solid foundation of her expensive education, Mrs. Marx 
 frankly said she could not understand her. She viewed 
 with horror the unfettered license of literature which 
 Martin Baird engendered in the child, and which Ephraini 
 Levinge had never checked. She could never fathom her 
 father's motives with respect to Mary, for her own girlhood 
 had been passed in almost Oriental particularity. Tet she 
 saw little Mary, on whom she knew the old man doted, 
 brought up with an exceptional freedom of speech and 
 action. 
 
 Another, who for all his knowledge of Ephraim Levinge's 
 character and ambitions, could not quite grasp his inten- 
 tions with regai'd to the child's future, was Martin Baird. 
 He not infrequently spent Saturday afternoon and evening 
 with the Levinges, sometimes in the over-furnished sitting- 
 room, but more often at his desk downstairs, going over the 
 green-backed ledgers, marking catalogues, or valuing stock 
 with his employer. To-night, however, Ephraim was 
 expecting a few friends to play cards after the evening 
 meal, and the iron safe had been locked for good at four 
 o'clock that day. 
 
 The unshaded light was very merciless to Baird. It 
 made every white hair on his temples and just above the 
 
46 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 ears shine like silver. It insisted upon every wrinkle on, 
 his pale face, it robbed his secretive lips of the red of life 
 aud touched them with the bloodless hue of asceticism. 
 His toil-worn hands were like wax against the dark plush 
 table cover, and in the stillness of the close room, he sat so 
 silent and bowed that old Ephraim, as he took ofE his hat 
 and "Four Corners," and peered over the gold frames of 
 his spectacles, thought that Martin looked old — very old. 
 
 " Where is Mary?" he inquired, putting his hat on a 
 Boule table. 
 
 " She is with the Montagus," said Mrs. Marx in Yiddish. 
 "Rose Montagu came with her maid this afternoon, and 
 asked if she might go to Portland Place. Her father and 
 mother will bring her home this evening." 
 
 Mrs. Marx arranged and slopped our her words in the 
 same untidy fashion as she put on her clothes. Her thick 
 tongue and guttural enunciation became more pronounced 
 when she spoke English, which she hated having to do, 
 but which, since his grand-daughter had returned from 
 school, old Levinge had instituted as the home language. 
 
 Ephraim Levinge evolved the meaning of Judith's vague 
 speech, and nodded his head. He was sparing of words, 
 for he knew the value — and the cost — of an fndiscreet 
 phrase, but he allowed a gratified smile to wrinkle his 
 mouth. 
 
 He was pleased that the Montagus should have taken 
 notice of the child. Benjamin Montagu was the wire-puller 
 of the money-lending business. Every man — and many 
 women too — of the English aristocracy had climbed the 
 stairs to Ben Montagu's little office in Pall Mall. He held 
 the fate of a hundred great families in his podgy white 
 hands, he could drag princes from their pedestals if he 
 chose, and mar more marriages than ever are made in a 
 season. But Ben Montagu was a good-natured fellow in 
 
WITHOUT SIN 47 
 
 the main; as he was strong he was merciful, and much 
 would be forgiven to the " smart" young man who would 
 dine in Portland Place once in a way, or consent to be seen 
 with his handsome wife and daughters in their box at the 
 opera. 
 
 Ephraim Levinge was perfectly well acquainted with the 
 anterior history of Benjamin Montagu. He knew just how 
 clean his hands were, and what sort of documents he pre- 
 ferred to have in his enormous iron safe. He knew that 
 Benjamin Montagu was more than anxious to acquire another 
 fortune by marrying his twenty-year-old son, Lionel, who 
 was one degree removed from a congenital idiot. But he 
 also knew that a number of very good people ate Mrs. Mon- 
 tagu's dinners and drank Mr. Montagu's wine, and that his 
 pretty grand-daughter would meet on equal ground, at their 
 house, many of the best men in London, and also the pink 
 of Jewish aristocracy, such as the sons of the great Frank- 
 fort bankers. Van Praag, and the co-heirs of Lucas Israels, 
 the thrice millionaire of Amsterdam. Young Eugene Cohen 
 was another frequenter of the Montagu household. There 
 had been gossip about Mrs. Montagu and Eugene at one 
 time, but now Eoge and Linda were coming out, and Mrs. 
 Cohen, Eugene's mother, was known to be on the lookout 
 for a wife for her soldier son. So with the certainty that 
 at the Montagus', or among their wealthy friends, Mary 
 would meet a suitor worthy of her beauty and her fortune, 
 the old man nodded his head and wrinkled up his mouth 
 into a smile once more. 
 
 Nine struck from the gilt empire clock. 
 
 "Get the card-tables ready, Judith," said Levinge. 
 
 A game of cards was, with the exception of food, the only 
 thing that ever roused Mrs. Marx into a semblance of activ- 
 ity. She slowly rolled her bulky form off the sofa, and, 
 assisted by Baird, drew out and prepared a table, passing 
 
48 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 her fat hands lovingly over the cards, and letting the carved 
 pearl counters drop one by one with a subdued tinkle from 
 her fingers. 
 
 Once a month it was EphraimLevinge's custom to receive 
 a few friends for cards and a quiet chat. The evenings were 
 generally intolerably dull, especially for the ladies ; but the 
 men who came usually transacted a little private business, 
 or passed among themselves scraps of information which it 
 would have been indiscreet to write. Since Mary had been 
 back from school, a new element of interest had pervaded 
 the gatherings. There was not a Jew in the community 
 who did not know that Ephraim had built up a large for- 
 tune, and that beyond an annuity to Mrs. Marx, the whole 
 of it was willed to his grand-daughter ; and though most of 
 Levinge's guests would not have paraded the card parties 
 in Bond Street among their social engagements) there was 
 not one of them who would have demurred at fingering — by 
 marriage — his fortune. 
 
 The Montagus, bringing Mary with them, were the first 
 to arrive. Mr. Benjamin Montagu was sanguine of com- 
 plexion and red of hair. He was short and prosperously fat. 
 His thick gold watch-chain proclaimed that beneath it re- 
 posed an excellent dinner. A short moustache alone re- 
 lieved his face from a likeness to a trumpet-blowing cherub. 
 He wore a constant smile, even in business hours ; and his 
 one weak point was an undue partiality for the fair sex. 
 
 Mrs. Montagu was dark and very pretty, with the clear 
 olive skin and blue-black rippling hair which belongs to 
 Portuguese women. Her features were delicate and fine, 
 and, unlike most women who have grown-up families, she 
 had preserved the svelte figure of a young girl. As a beauty, 
 she permitted herself a few affectations, the chief of which 
 was a marked lisp, which she had exaggerated with the idea 
 of hiding a very common tribal defect of speech. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 49 
 
 She came into the room with her most gracious manner. 
 
 "Ah, how-de-do, Mithter Levinge. Tho thweet of 
 Mitheth Marx to let dear Mary come to uth. My girlth 
 are tho fond of her, whUe ath to " 
 
 Ephraim Levinge looked upon all women as uidisoreet,i and 
 did not allow Mrs. Montagu to commit herself and her 
 family by finishing her sentence. 
 
 "Good-evening, Ben!" he said to Mr. Montagu, who 
 smiled a cordial greeting, while he winced at the familiarity. 
 
 Mary glided into the room after the Montagus, and 
 slipped over to Baird. She did not like Mr. Montagu at 
 all; he either chaffed her or paid her compliments, neither 
 of which popular methods of ingratiation she very well 
 understood. 
 
 "Martin, let me sit by you all the evening. You don't 
 want to play cards, do you?" she whispered, pulling a chair 
 close to his and sitting down. " Because, " she went on, " I 
 want you to tell me all about the great Catherine of Eussia, 
 to whom that Sevres tea-service, that grandfather bought 
 yesterday, belonged. We never learnt much Eussian his- 
 tory at school, so I want you to tell me something about it. " 
 
 The idea of letting the mind of a young girl run riot 
 among the details of a history of Eussia and its Imperial 
 family curved Baird' s pale face into a rare smile. 
 
 " Mr. Isaac Mossenthal, " announced the servant. 
 
 Mr. Isaac Mossenthal was a man of middle age. A lofty 
 square brow from which the grizzled dark hair was brushed 
 straight back surmounted a pair of small keen eyes. The 
 nose was thick, and the mouth, which was half buried in a 
 black beard, was fleshy, though not unduly so. The char- 
 acteristic love of jewellery and new clothes was undevelaped 
 in him. In the City he was known as a successful importer 
 of articles " made in Germany, " though one of his best spec- 
 ulations had consisted of vast consignments of bath slippers 
 
50 WITBOVT SIN 
 
 made in South Africa from dried grass. In Bayswater and 
 semi-Bohemian circles he was known as Mrs. Mossenthal's 
 husband. He had a heart of gold, the temper of an angel, 
 and the manners of a boor. . 
 
 It was characteristic of 'Sac Mossenthal that once a 
 month he should spend an evening with old Levinge, and 
 typical of Mrs. Mossenthal that on such occasions she should 
 go to bed with a headache. Between the men there existed 
 a slight tie of blood and a strong bond of business. Between 
 Mrs. Mossenthal, who gave Sunday parties at her house in 
 Cleveland Square that included the manager of the Grown 
 Theatre, and the art dealer who lived over his own shop, 
 and who only knew Christians in the way of trade, there 
 could not be even an acquaintance. 
 
 Mr. Mossenthal swung into the room with a rolling gait in- 
 dicative of genial good-nature peculiarly his own, shook his 
 kinsman by the hand cordially, nodded to Baird, professed 
 himself proud to meet Mr. Montagu, touched the slim finger- 
 tips of Mrs. Montagu, who except in Levinge's rooms did 
 not know 'Sac Mossenthal at all, and after patting Mary's 
 smooth cheek, plumped himself down alongside Mrs. Marx, 
 to whom he addressed sundry jocosities in a mixture of 
 German and Yiddish fitted to her intelligence. 
 
 The talk was general among the company for a few min- 
 utes. Their faces, so different in colouring and expression, 
 yet so markedly similar in feature, grew puffed and shiny 
 in the hot room. Now and then Baird's deep voice rang 
 with bell-like clearness across their thick tones, or Mrs. 
 Montagu's exaggerated lisp was heard. Mrs. Marx and 
 Mary spoke not at all. 
 
 But 'Sac Mossenthal had not come out to talk about the 
 financial state of the Free Schools, or the opposition to the 
 proposed new synagogue in Maida Vale. His nervous 
 energy, which found constant recuperation in frequent 
 
WITHOVT SIN 51 
 
 snatches of heavy sleep, demanded a perpetual variation of 
 amusement and occupation. 
 
 " Here, I say, ain't we going to have some cards? Mrs. 
 Montagu," and he bowed with clumsy gallantry in her 
 direction, "owes us all a revenge. She walked ofE with 
 everything last time." 
 
 Mrs. Montagu acknowledged the compliment to her clever- 
 ness with a delightfully infantile giggle, which only half 
 concealed her impatience to begin play at once. 
 
 "We must wait for Mrs. Cohen," said Ephraim Levinge. 
 "It's only fair, for she lost so much before." 
 
 As he spoke a large Jewess of the most markedly hand- 
 some type sailed into the room, and by her presence at oncer 
 made every one else feel overcrowded. Although she was 
 the mother of a married daughter and a marriageable son, 
 the raven blackness of her elaborately dressed hair was un- 
 marred by a single silver thread. Her heavy features and 
 ivory-tinted skin were lit up by a pair of eyes which still 
 retained their fire, and which in her youth must have been 
 exquisitely expressive and melting. Her huge figure, still 
 heaving with the exertion of mounting the stairs, was em- 
 phasised by a light-blue satin bodice fussed over with lace 
 and ribbon, which made Mrs. Montagu's plain black silk 
 look quite dowdy, and Mrs. Marx's purple plush tea-gown 
 atrociously vulgar. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen was greeted with considerable empressement. 
 She was the queen of the Bayswater and Notting Hill sets, 
 and was the acknowledged link between them and Portland 
 Place and Park Street. She could dine with the Mossen- 
 thals and go on to a reception at the Montagus, which cir- 
 cumstance argued a distinctly strong social position. She 
 disapproved of Christians except, perhaps, to help to ro»ke 
 a crowd at a dance, and to admit them to the intimacy of 
 the home circle was in her eyes unnecessary, injudicious. 
 
53 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 and unorthodox. She tolerated Martin Baird as she might, 
 a servant, but would never take a hand at cards if he were 
 included in the game. 
 
 "Now we can play," cried 'Sac Mossenthal, taking a place 
 at the table and shuffling the cards with his supple fingers. 
 "What's it to be? Nap, poker — now, Mrs. Montagu, what 
 do you say?" 
 
 "i thay Nap," said Mrs. Montagu, forgetting all social 
 distinctions, and dropping into the chair next Mossenthal. 
 
 "Now,' Mrs. Marx! now, Levinge! come on," said 'Sac, 
 thoroughly in his element, and diving his hand into the 
 pocket of his rather shabby trousers to pull out a handful 
 of gold and silver. "Now Mrs. Montagu, there's a nice 
 little pile for you to win," and he laughed in a wide-mouthed 
 fashion that made the crystal drops of an elaborate George 
 IV. girandole quiver and tinkle. 
 
 M& the first round of cards was dealt, Mary slipped her 
 small tool hand into Baird' s broad palm. 
 
 " Talk a little to me, Martin. Tell me something pretty. 
 You have not told me anything for quite a week." She 
 pleaded as a child might plead for a fairy tale, tilting up 
 her small fruit-shaped chin and smiling in his faccw 
 
 " What shall I tell you about?" 
 ■ " Tell me — tell me — " she thought a moment, knitting her 
 brows. Then suddenly she flashed her eyes upon him.- 
 " Tell me why I do not like going to the Montagus' ? They 
 are so kind, and always seem to want to have me with them, 
 but I wish grandfather would let me stay at home. I am 
 so happy here with my books and my stories ; those I make 
 myself, you know, out of what you have told me." 
 
 Baird looked down at the wistful face fast growing so 
 womanly in its outline. 
 
 " How old are you?" 
 
 "Sixteen! Why, Martin, you know that." 
 
WITHOUT SIN 53 
 
 "Sixteen! How time flies. Then if you are sixteen, 
 you are too old to listen to an old man's fairy tales. You 
 must forget such things." 
 
 "Fairytales! Forget! Oh, Martin! Would you have 
 me forget the chivalry of Arthur and Galahad, the Cru- 
 saders who fought for their faith's sake, the martyr Maid 
 of Orleans? Must I cease dreaming of the dusky Moors 
 who ruled a kingdom from the Courts of the Alhambra, or 
 of those mighty Teutons who lived among the fastnesses of 
 the Ehine and carved rich kingdoms for themselves out of 
 nothingness? Martin, the stories of art and music are not 
 fairy tales, they are the stories of many of my own people. 
 Great kings, great warriors, great saints, were real. May 
 I not think of them, of their wondrous lives — of their 
 glorious deaths?" 
 
 She dropped her voice to a faint whisper, a look of awe 
 filled her eyes. 
 
 " Martin, the story of the Virgin is no fairy tale. Would 
 you have me forget that?" 
 
 "Mary, my dear, it is time you went to bed," said 
 Ephraim Levinge, without raising his eyes from his cards. 
 
 "Good-night, Martin," Mary said, as she left him, and 
 gave a general " good-night" to the card players. She bent 
 her head for her grandfather's blessing, then quietly quitted 
 the room. 
 
 "How that child grows!" said Mrs. Cohen, laying down 
 her cards, and with her big ox-eyes noting every swelling 
 line of the young girl's figure as she crossed the room. 
 
 Mrs. Montagu grasped the situation at once, and though 
 she was winning, dropped her cards on the table and turned 
 to old Levinge. 
 
 " I thuppoth, Mr. Levinge, that you will be looking for 
 a huthbande for Mary thoon?" 
 
 "Oh, surely not yet!" cried Mrs. Cohen, pulling herself 
 
54 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 together, and guessing at the motive which had induced Mrs. 
 Montagu to come out in the dowdy black gown. 
 
 "Mary is more than sixteen," interposed Ben Montagu, 
 ranging himself on the side of his wife and prepared to fight 
 for his own. " I married Mrs. Montagu on her sixteenth 
 birthday." 
 
 Mrs. Montagu grew scarlet, Mr. Montagu purple, and 
 Mrs. Cohen sailed in triumphantly. 
 
 " Ah, but you forget in England such things are not done. 
 Seventeen is quite soon enough for a girl to be married." 
 
 The hit at Mrs. Montagu's suspicious origin was palpable. 
 Mrs. Cohen pursued her advantage. 
 
 " And twenty -five for a man. Now my Eugene will be 
 twenty-five next January. Come, Mr. Levinge, why not 
 make a match between the young people?" 
 
 Mrs. Cohen brought the full battery of her fine eyes to 
 bear on the old man, who glanced sharply at her from 
 between his gold-rimmed spectacles and his heavy brows. 
 
 " But I do not think that Mary hath ever theen your thon, 
 Mrs. Cohen," cried Mrs. Montagu, determined to die hard. 
 
 "Young people should be allowed a certain latitude," 
 added Ben Montagu, following his wife's lead. 
 
 "Now our thon Lionel thimply doath on Mary. He 
 callth her hith little friend ; it'th quite too thweet to thee 
 them together," gushed Mrs. Montagu, lisping more than 
 ever. 
 
 " Mary is a good girl. I dare say she is kind to the poor 
 lad," said Mrs. Cohen, firing another shaft into the Port- 
 land Place camp. 
 
 This reference to the Montagu's afflicted son was a cruel 
 cut ; and old Levinge, who saw signs of a serious difference 
 between his guests, thought it was time to interfere. 
 
 " My grand-daughter won't be able to marry until she is 
 eighteen. I have willed it so. Mrs. Cohen, what do you go?" 
 
WITHOUT SIN 55 
 
 'Sac Mossenthal, who during the pause in the game had 
 snatched a refreshing sleep, started up in his chair, glanced 
 at his cards, and cried : 
 
 "I go Nap." 
 
 The game went on. 
 
 Baird, with his big lean Iiands shielding his eyes from the 
 lamplight, stared across to where the card players sat. He 
 noted how bent and old and feeble was Levinge, the grey 
 shadows about his mouth, the palsied tremble of his knotted 
 hands. He saw the animal indifference of Judith Marx, 
 her gross face only waking to life as the coin piled before 
 her grew or melted. He guessed the plans which were 
 weaving in the brains of the two women. Mrs. Cohen would 
 deem any girl fortunate who could call her handsome scape- 
 grace son, husband ; and Mrs. Montagu, who longed for a 
 rich daughter-in-law to support her social claims, her girlish 
 prettiness being somewhat shadowed by an idiot son, and 
 the unbusinesslike extravagance of a faithless spouse. 
 
 Then Baird thought of Mary — Mary with her child's 
 heart and her white soul, with the halo of absolute innocence 
 about her brows, and the visions of dead centuries in her 
 calm eyes. He thought of the shadow of great wealth 
 which hung above her, and of the snares her own people 
 would set for her feet, and he sighed. 
 
 Downstairs in the dimly lighted Art Gallery, Mary stood 
 before the Virgin's picture. 
 
 "He told me to forget," she cried. "To forget every- 
 thing, to forget you, dear lady. Some memories might 
 fade, but your story — ah, how could that? Whenever I 
 look in the glass I see you. Every time they call me they 
 speak your name. When strangers see me here, they look 
 and whisper and point at you. God took my mother from 
 me, but you — the mother of one whom some men call God 
 are here. Guard me, keep me, love me with the mother 
 
56 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 love I lack; teach me to be like you, let my life be as yours. 
 Oh, mother — mother!" 
 
 In an access of hysterical passion the girl flung herself on 
 her knees before the picture. Her straining eyes, piercing 
 the ever-moving shadows, fancied the sweet mouth smiled, 
 and the pale hands reached down and blessed her. With a 
 strangled sob of ecstasy she fell forward in a swoon. 
 
CHAPTEE VI 
 
 Dk. Noel Mabeablb's waiting-rooms were always crowded 
 between the hours of ten and two. His patients were prin- 
 cipally women, who fluttered and rustled as they clicked 
 their Trench heels across the broad tessellated hall of the 
 old-fashioned house in Harley Street, and left fragrant 
 memories of their presence in waiting or consulting rooms. 
 
 The women who waited with such wonderful patience in 
 the low panelled rooms, with little beyond a fashion paper 
 or a whispered chat to pass the time, were mostly young, 
 and nearly all pretty. Even the plain ones assumed an air 
 of coquettish grace and their freshest millinery when visiting 
 the most fashionable doctor of the day. 
 
 Dr. Noel Marrable's fame and fortune had been made five 
 years back, when he had flatly refused to again attend the 
 Duchess of Melton, who had received him on his first visit 
 in a soiled peignoir and without her wig. From that hour, 
 to be a patient of Dr. Marrable's was, in the eyes of women- 
 kind, a patent of beauty, fashion, and smartness. 
 
 A few great ladies patronised him because he was really 
 a clever physician, but the majority of his admirers flocked 
 to his consulting-room and paid their two guineas for five 
 minutes' chat, because it was the thing to do, and without 
 in the least caring whether he prescribed for their symptoms 
 
 or not. 
 
 Dr. Marrable was the type of man after whom, with the 
 slightest encouragement, women will run. Tall and spare 
 of figure, grave and rather forbidding of face, he yet ex- 
 
58 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 haled a strong sense of virility. His hands, white, smooth 
 and firm of touch, were essentially the hands of a man first, 
 and a surgeon afterwards. His manner was sufficiently 
 courtly, but never servile. His features, which, were hard, 
 more from a habit of strong self -repression than by nature, 
 were rugged and large, the short upper lip was generally 
 pressed closely upon its fellow, and his eyes, quick and 
 dark, looked out with an ostentatiously professional glance 
 upon the world. The delicate arch of the high brows and 
 the tender modelling of the full round chin, which like the 
 rest of his face, was clean-shaven, were indicative of pas- 
 sions which required the constant guard of the hard mouth 
 and cold eyes. But saint or sinner, harshly indifferent or 
 professionally sympathetic, Dr. Marrable was an adored 
 personality among women. He was odd — he was the fash- 
 ion — he was stoically unmoved by the veriest coquette who 
 ever carried her frills and fascinations across his threshold, 
 and that despite the crowning fact that he was unmarried. 
 
 Scores of most beautiful women, whose names figured in 
 Debrett or The Era or whose millions were quoted on Wall 
 Street, wives, widows, and maids had entered his small, 
 flower-scented sanctum, where the sun shone through panes 
 of old cathedral glass, and the firelight flickered on a hun- 
 dred rare toys of ivory and silver, had determined to bring 
 this latter-day St. Anthony to their feet. But the loveliest 
 eyes, dewy with an unexpressed desire, the whitest, most 
 dimpled wrist throbbing with a hidden passion, mutely ap- 
 pealed in vain. Yet continued failure served to add zest to 
 the chase, and every week found the crush round his doors 
 growing greater. 
 
 " Take my card to Dr. Marrable, and I'll wait in the little 
 ante-room." 
 
 The servant bowed low as Lady St. Cyprien spoke, and 
 at once opened for her an invisible door cut in the oak panel- 
 
WITHOUT SIN 59 
 
 ling of the hall, which gave entrance to a wedge-shaped 
 passage next the consulting-room. 
 
 "Tell the doctor I shall not keep him a moment," saia 
 Lady St. Cyprien, sinking into a chair. 
 
 But she had hardly spoken when a door at the far end of 
 the room opened, and Dr. Noel Marrable entered. The 
 clear light from a window in the ceiling showed the silver 
 which at thirty-five already sprinkled his dark hair and the 
 clustering lines about his deep eyes, but a rare smile curved 
 his hard mouth, as he advanced to Lady St. Cyprien. 
 
 "I thought it was your voice," he said brightly, "and 
 Stansdale, who is here, wasting my time over imaginary com- 
 plaints, confirmed my suspicions — said that not another 
 woman in the world has a voice like his Aunt Adela." 
 
 "Stansdale! is he with you?" Then as she caught sight 
 of the tall young soldier who stood before the fire, she said 
 anxiously, "My dear boy, why are you here? Are you ill?" 
 
 Lord Stansdale, straight as a young fir-tree, fair and de- 
 bonair as an Englishman should be, made a reverence to 
 his aunt. 
 
 "My dear aunt, why are you here? Are you ill?" 
 
 " Nonsense, Stansdale, I have only come to consult Dr. 
 Marrable — oh! you needn't run away — it's nothing about, 
 myself." 
 
 But Dr. Marrable looked at the clock and said : 
 
 "You must go now, my dear fellow. It's nearly eleven, 
 and Collins said half an hour ago that the waiting-rooms 
 were full. I'll meet you this evening at the club." 
 
 "Collins is quite right," said Lady St. Cyprien. "You 
 have a week's patients in the house. That dreadful Mrs. 
 Mossenthal drove up just in front of me. I interrupted her 
 suborning Collins to give her an early turn. Stansdale, 
 wait outside for me, the victoria is there." 
 
 Alone, Dr. Marrable at once dropped the warmer manner 
 
60 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 with wMcli he had greeted Lady St. Cyprien. Drawing 
 apart the skirts of his severely cut frock coat, he sat down 
 in a wide carved oak chair, and turned his face towards his 
 visitor. 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien laughed. 
 
 " You needn't put on the professional mask just yet, 
 Noel. "Will you never remember that your mother was my 
 girlhood's friend, and that I have dandled you — ay, and 
 scolded you too, a hundred times!" she cried. "I am all 
 right — thanks to you of course — but I want to bring a little 
 friend of mine to see you. " 
 
 "Certainly," said Marrable, drawing an ivory tablet 
 towards him and preparing to write down the name of his 
 prospective patient. 
 
 " Or better still, come in to tea with me one afternoon and 
 meet her. She is the daughter of old Levinge, the art dealer 
 in Bond Street. I take some interest in the child. She is 
 peculiarly lonely in her home life, really striking in appear- 
 ance, and singularly free from racial attributes." 
 
 "And why cannot she come to me?" said Marrable. 
 
 " Because I do not think she would. I call her a child, 
 but she is past sixteen, and although lovable and almost 
 weak where her affections are concerned, she has a consider- 
 able strain of her grandfather's will power. Also she is 
 shy and nervous — she would not speak to you or tell you 
 anything if I brought her here." 
 
 "Her complaint?" said Marrable, laconic and on the 
 verge of boredom. 
 
 "My dear man, if I knew I shouldn't trouble you. The 
 girl is full of fancies — but not whimsical, you understand. 
 She is too sweet-natured for that. She has a trick of faint- 
 ing too, and is also prone to introspective musings. li she 
 had a mother I should not trouble about her, but she is at a 
 critical age, when the woman is evolved from the girl, and 
 
WITHOUT SIN 61 
 
 it would be a pity if she grew up as neurotic and mentally 
 undisciplined as so many of the present-day young women." 
 
 Dr. Marrable rose before he spoke. 
 
 " I dare say Miss Levinge — if that is her name — is merely 
 a little anaemic and hysterical. It's extraordinary how 
 highly strung some of these Jews are ; many of them are 
 literally at snapping-point. Why, those waiting-rooms of 
 mine are half full of the 'chosen people' at this moment." 
 
 "Doctor, I'll take your hint, and leave you to your 
 patients. When will you come to see your new one?" 
 
 "Next Wednesday at five. Good-morning." 
 
 !Five minutes later Lady St. Cyprien with Lord Stansdale 
 wa» bowling across Cavendish Square. 
 
 ■'How is my uncle?" began the young guardsman. 
 
 "Very well indeed, and anxious to congratulate you on 
 yoiir captaincy. Won't you come in to luncheon to-day?" 
 
 '"Thanks, I shall be delighted." Then after a pause he 
 said, "Aunt Adela, who is that pretty child who drives 
 widh you sometimes? A very fair girl, with charming 
 eyes?" 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien smiled. 
 
 "Oh! so you' ve noticed her, have you?" 
 
 "No one could help it, there's something awfully 
 striking in her appearance." 
 
 " You are right. Mary is pretty, very pretty, with just 
 that air of appealing helplessness, which, if women only 
 knew it, has the most irresistible attraction for men — who 
 are men. But, my dear boy, she has another charm, besides 
 her yellow hair and sweet eyes. She is — or will be — 
 enormously wealthy." 
 
 Lord Stansdale laughed. 
 
 "And where did you find her? No one I ever come 
 across can even guess at who she is. Don't say she is an 
 American, and that you are going to 'exploit' her." 
 
62 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 "Good heaven! no. St. Cyprien would never hear of 
 such a thing. The little girl is the grand-daughter of 
 Ephraim Levinge." 
 
 Lord Stansdale turned round in the carriage, and regard- 
 less of manners stared in Lady St. Cyprien' s face. 
 
 "Ephraim Levinge!" he cried. "Then the girl belongs 
 to a shop and is a Jewess." 
 
 "Certainly," replied Lady St. Cyprien very quietly. 
 "Now, my dear Stansdale, it is no use year looking 
 shocked. I and your uncle have known Levinge for fifteen 
 years, first as a clever workman, then as that still rarer 
 thing, an honest art dealer. It was Levinge who saved St. 
 Cyprien from making a fool of himself over that forged 
 piece of Henri II. ware, and it has been entirely under 
 Levinge' s guidance that our art collection has been made. 
 Of course he is a Jew — the most despised of his race, a Po- 
 lish Jew. No one knows his real name, or even whether he 
 has one, but he has always dealt fairly by us, and saved us 
 from being swindled by others of his class." 
 
 " He may be a good tradesman, and all that — probably 
 is," said Stansdale, his handsome, fair face expressing in- 
 voluntary disgust — "but I don't see that even that justifies 
 you in taking the child, pretty though she be, about with 
 you." 
 
 "Your uncle is the best judge of that," said Lady St. 
 Cyprien, drawing herself up with dignity. Then her face 
 softened, and she gently laid a hand on one of the young 
 man's. 
 
 "Ah! my dear, cannot you understand what it means to 
 St. Cyprien and myself to be childless? You have been 
 his ward, you will be his heir, but you are not our own Son. 
 We are not young any longer, and we want a daughter 
 about us, some one with a sunny smile, a sweet low voice, 
 a light footstep. One day, Stansdale, you will marry, and 
 
WITHOUT SIN 63 
 
 your wife and your children will be half ours. Till then, 
 you must let me keep my little girl, as I call her." 
 
 SUence fell between the two, as the carriage swept down 
 Great Cumberland Place and into the Park. Only Stans- 
 dale pressed the hand of this woman, whom he had known 
 since his babyhood as a great leader of society, whose word 
 was law, whose favour was accounted almost royal, and 
 yet whose loveless heart yearned over a girl child of an 
 alien people, whose empty arms clung round the frail sup- 
 port of an old Jew's grand-daughter. Presently Lady St. 
 Cy prion spoke again. 
 
 "No doubt you wonder, Stansdale, why I have never 
 adopted as a daughter one of the many well-born yet poor 
 girls of my own set. But so doing would have entailed the 
 anxieties of chaperonage— a thankless task in these days — 
 and have raised expectancies of settlements and dowries St. 
 Cyprien might not feel inclined to fulfil. With Mary 
 Levinge it is quite different. The child has a beautiful 
 disposition, which has not been spoiled by over-education. 
 Old Levinge, who is immensely proud of her, has made her 
 his heiress, and has even bought the house in which she 
 will live after his death. She wears little cotton gowns 
 and goes afoot unless I take her driving, at present, but 
 that is Levinge' s way. When he dies, she will be mistress 
 of herself and half a million of money. Her fortune and 
 her beauty must make her a personage in any society she 
 may drift into. Her own people will be certain to try and 
 catch her and her heritage, but she is too good for them. 
 She should move in higher circles than those of what is 
 called Hyde Park. She should marry a great artist or poet, 
 some one who could understand her idyllic nature — or — 
 even a man of old family — for in these days the shop is so 
 quickly forgotten, and money gets fumigated in passing 
 through the bank. One day I'll introduce you to Mary. 
 
64 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 She will not talk to you much, but she will look at you 
 with those eyes of hers, that always seem to see through 
 and beyond you, and she will probably invest you with the 
 attributes of a Galahad or Lohengrin. She is a very 
 strange child." 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 / 
 
 After Lady St. Cyprien's explanation, Lord Stansdale 
 ceased to be astonished when he saw Mary Levinge seated 
 in the high-hung family barouche, and gave up his time to 
 thinking what a pretty child she was. One day he noticed 
 — with the trained eye for femininities which is part and 
 parcel of a young man in society — that the child's flowing 
 hair was bound into a soft knot at the back of her head, 
 and that as she followed Ladj' St. Cyprien from the car- 
 riage her slender feet were no longer visible. She was in 
 long gowns, she was grown up, and in the light of that fact 
 Lord Stansdale began to look upon her with a difference. 
 
 As Mary grew and blossomed into womanhood the lamp 
 of Ephraim Levinge' s life began to burn very low. For 
 two years past the business had practically been managed 
 by Martin Baird, the old man only seeing his most valued 
 patrons. All during the winter he had huddled, a breath- 
 ing mummy, before a big fire in the upstairs room over- 
 looking Bond Street. His bedroom was both warmer and 
 quieter, but he preferred the front room, for from there he 
 could hear the Pactolus tide of London — the river out of 
 which he had drawn his fortune — roar, day by day, and 
 could distinguish the abrupt clatter with which carriages 
 drew up before his own door. 
 
 As the spring came he moved to the window, but he 
 
 never got downstairs. During those times Martin Baird 
 
 came to be like one of the family, for every night he 
 
 brought up the details of the daily work. Mary, too, was 
 
 6 
 
66 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 wakened from her dreams. Faced with practical business, 
 as evening after evening the big centre-table was spread 
 with ledgers^ letter-books, and price lists, the dormant 
 acumen of her race was roused, and the young girl, with 
 puckered brows and pursed lips, would wade down columns 
 of figures and pages of valuations. One night, Baird, dis- 
 tressed by her efforts to grasp an unusually intricate 
 account, tried to draw the book from her, but the old Jew 
 laid his claw-like bloodless hand upon his arm. 
 
 " It is full time she should learn, Martin. She will want 
 the knowledge — very soon now." 
 
 But he rallied as May fulfilled its promise of warm soft 
 airs and lengthening perfumed days. In May fell Mary's 
 birthday — the day that completed her eighteen years. 
 Friends were expected that evening in honour of the event; 
 not grand people, such as the Montagus or Cohens, but 
 quiet folk, who spoke a garbled tongue which Mary did not 
 understand and who put their hats on for grace. They 
 were toilers from the other side of the city, Eussians, 
 Poles, and Germans. They had known Ephraim Levinge 
 in his huckstering and starving days, before ever he took 
 the little child to be his own, and her birthday was the one 
 occasion in each twelve months when Levinge shook hands 
 with the past. 
 
 Mrs. Marx, roused from her apathy by the prospect of 
 meeting friends after her own heart, had donned a faded 
 bed-gown, and was busy in the kitchen, recalling the 
 primitive cookery of her youth. 
 
 Mary, in the white frock it was her fancy to always 
 wear, was seated with her grandfather, showing him with 
 natural girlish pleasure the gifts she had received. 
 
 "See, grandfather, what a lovely ring from the Mon- 
 tagus, and such a pretty fan from Eose. Mrs. Cohen 
 sends me this — she slipped a heavy gold bangle over her 
 
WITHOUT SIN 67 
 
 white wrist — " and from her son a scent bottle. I don't 
 know why, for I hardly know him. This — oh! this silver 
 box is from dear Mr. Mossenthal — it was kind of him to 
 remember. The LOwes gave me books, and the Symons a 
 sachet, and Martin — dear old Martin — some lilies." 
 
 She dropped her voice and passed her fingers reverently 
 over the great sheaf of Mary lilies she held in her 
 hands. 
 
 "What a lot of friends I have, grandfather; how kind 
 every one is to give me presents." 
 
 The old man thrust his grand-daughter's little treasures 
 away with a sweep of his shrunken arm. 
 
 " Friends ! Presents !" he cried, in his quavering voice. 
 "Eubbish, my dear, rubbish. Wait and see what your 
 grandfather gives you before the day is out." 
 
 His head sank on his breast again, and he closed his eyes 
 for a moment. 
 
 " Please sir. Lady St. Cyprien would like to know how 
 you are to-day, and can she see Miss Mary." 
 
 "Go! my dear, go!" said Levinge, rousing himself ; and 
 Mary left the room still holding the scented lilies against 
 her heart. 
 
 It was early yet, barely eleven o'clock, and the Art 
 Gallery was empty save for Lady St. Cyprien, wearing a 
 gown the silvery tints of which matched her hair. 
 
 "I remembered this was your birthday, my child," she 
 said in her soft clear voice. " And as you are quite grown 
 up now, I have brought you what all young ladies should 
 number among their first jewels." She opened a case con- 
 taining a string of pearls. "Now, no thanks, my dear. 
 Girls wear diamonds nowadays while they are still in short 
 frocks. But I am old-fashioned enough to think that 
 a pretty skin and bright eyes need no such setting. 
 Diamonds should come only after marriage, so till that day 
 
68 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 arrives, my dear child, wear the pearls with all my love 
 and blessings." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien drew the girl towards her and kissed 
 her forehead, then cried in a gayer tone, "What lovely 
 ilowers!" 
 
 " Martin Baird gave them to me, " Mary replied simply. 
 "They are Mary's lilies, you know. And as my name is 
 Mary, and I was born in Mary's month, he thought I 
 should like them." 
 
 Against her will. Lady St. Cyprien glanced from Mary 
 to the pure pictured face which still held one small corner 
 of the Gallery. The girl followed her eyes. 
 
 " I am still like her, you see. Lady St. Cyprien. Some- 
 times when I look in the glass, it almost frightens me, it is 
 as though the painted face had come between me and my 
 reflection." She stood alongside the picture, as she had 
 done before, and Lady St. Cyprien looked, striving not to 
 see the marvellous resemblance. 
 
 Tint for tint, line for line, the faces were alike, and both 
 — the real and the sham — carried the mark of Tate, the 
 premonition of Destiny, the shadow of coming Sorrow. 
 With a little laugh that was almost hysterical, it was so 
 strained. Lady St. Cyprien cried : 
 
 " No doubt, my dear, the likeness is there, but you must 
 remember it is merely a chance. There are thousands of 
 pictures of the Virgin in the world to which you do not 
 bear the faintest resemblance. You are too old now to 
 encourage childish fancies, and will have other things to 
 think about. You are very pretty, and will be a young 
 woman of importance. The next few years should be your 
 happiest, and I, my dear child, intend to try and make 
 them so." 
 
 Mary scarcely smiled as she answered : 
 
 " You are more than kind to me, Lady St. Cyprien, but 
 
WITHOUT SIN 69 
 
 you must not think I am ungrateful if I say that I feel 
 sorrow is not far from me now." 
 
 She half turned towards the picture and spoke as though 
 addressing it. " I do not think I shall have a very happy 
 life." 
 
 Scarcely had the words left her lips when a wild cry — 
 the wail which the untaught woman gives in the presence 
 of death — rang through the house. 
 
 Baird dashed across the Gallery and through the private 
 door upstairs. Lady St. Cyprien, with the girl's mournful 
 words still sighing in her ears, turned very pale. Mary 
 stood like stone, only she let her flowers slip in a fragrant 
 silver heap to the floor. 
 
 The awful cry was once again repeated, then Baird' s voice 
 broke the silence. 
 
 "Miss Levinge, your grandfather is dead!" 
 
 With unconventional consideration Lady St. Cyprien 
 softly turned away and passed into the street. 
 
 The click of the closing door roused Mary from her 
 shocked stupor. She drew herself up, and with the uncon- 
 scious dignity of a new responsibility, said : 
 
 "Lower the shutters at once, Martin," Then she went 
 slowly upstairs, for the weight of her grandfather's birth- 
 day gift was very heavy upon her. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 Mes. Isaac Mossenthal's drawing-room in Cleveland 
 Square was the very perfection of the decorator's art, as 
 embodied by quantities of machine-turned white enamelled 
 woodwork arranged at inconvenient angles, and fragments 
 of limp silk hung from brass rods over unnecessary aper- 
 tures. Mrs. Mossenthal's reception gown of shot mauve 
 and blue silk was as fashionable as the "period" of her 
 drawing-room, and both were equally unbecoming to the 
 lady, who sat in a precise attitude awaiting her visitors. 
 
 It was Mrs. Mossenthal's "At-Home" day, a function 
 which she observed with the important punctiliousness 
 which characterised all her actions. Mrs. Mossenthal was 
 a woman who harboured an idea that in her own world she 
 was a person of considerable importance and power. A 
 fair income, spent with extreme care and study of external 
 show, and a wonderful knack of getting things out of 
 people, had gained for her a reputation for having wealth, 
 and of lavishly spending it. A fine contempt for all of her 
 husband's and most of her own relations had further 
 enhanced her social status in Bayswater. 
 
 " She's a Jewess, of course, but you never meet Jews at 
 her parties," was frequently said of Mrs. Mossenthal, and 
 she prided herself on deserving the encomium, for her 
 dinner lists were compiled with a view to keeping the races 
 as distinct as possible, and she openly boasted that she did 
 not keep a Kosher house. 
 
 Punctually at half-past three a lady of enormous propor- 
 
WITHOUT SIN 71 
 
 tions was announced. She was an aunt of Mrs. Mossen- 
 thal's, and considered that she would be outraging tradi- 
 tional family affection by not paying her respects to her 
 fashionable niece once a month. She lived in Islington 
 and was frankly provincial. 
 
 For a quarter of an hour she cross-questioned Mrs. 
 Mossenthal on family affairs, and then, refusing tea which 
 was tentatively offered her, lumbered heavily away. 
 
 "Thank goodness! no one came while she was here," 
 said Eachel Mossenthal to herself. " She is the most hate- 
 ful old wretch in creation." 
 
 Having relieved her feelings, Mrs. Mossenthal again 
 settled her high shoulders squarely against the back of a 
 chair and awaited the next comers. She did not read. 
 She considered it waste of time to read novels, and library 
 subscriptions cost money and made no show. Newspapers 
 were untidy, and moreover she thought it a confession of 
 weakness to study the papers much. A woman with any 
 wits could keep sufficiently au courant with the world's 
 affairs by listening to what other people said. The Times 
 was left at the house every morning for an hour, and the 
 head-lines were rattled through aloud to Mrs. Mossenthal 
 by an indigent ex-governess who wrote notes, sent out 
 invitations, and executed other odd jobs which were outside 
 the range of a servant's duties. 
 
 Instead of reading, therefore, Eachel Mossenthal in- 
 dulged in thought. With her this was not a mental exercise 
 of a very lofty order. It ranged between a scheme for 
 getting tickets for the opera on Saturday for nothing, to 
 what advantage she could sell the bay cob which had taken 
 to kicking dreadfully, whether her next dinner-party 
 should include the Tauntons, about whose position in the 
 City there were unpleasant rumours, and a little more to the 
 like purpose. 
 
72 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Scarcely were these knotty points settled when callers 
 began to arrive, and the tiny tea-cups, jam sandwiches, and 
 sugared cakes were speedily in circulation. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal's "celebrities," as she called her the- 
 atrical and artistic acquaintances, seldom if ever troubled 
 her on "at-home" days, and the talk that meandered 
 among the pseudo-Eastern cosy corners and early English 
 chimney seats was limited to puerilities. 
 
 It was past five before a breath of the outer world entered 
 in the embodiment of Mr. Bertie Chant. He fluttered into 
 the room in a more than usually exuberant and expansive 
 state. His cherubic face glowed with a crude redness 
 which he would have termed "so rudely healthy," but his 
 voluminous scarf and the fresh buttonhole were above 
 reproach. 
 
 He held his hat, stick, and one glove ' shoulder high as 
 he entered. 
 
 " Dear lady !" he cried, tripping across the polished floor 
 to Mrs. Mossenthal, who received his elaborate greeting 
 with the mechanical action of the muscles of her hard 
 mouth, which did duty for a smile. 
 
 "And Mrs. Cohen, and your daughter. Miss Julia, I 
 declare, looking charming in that toilet," went on Mr. 
 Chant, executing a species of chassee croissee over to where 
 Mrs. Cohen and a pretty, young girl, with melting dark 
 eyes and a clear olive skin, sat eating jam sandwiches. 
 
 His respects paid, he looked around at the half-dozen 
 ladies who were sitting about. 
 
 " Quite a reception, I declare, but then we all love dear 
 Mrs. Mossenthal. But — " here he carefully laid his hat, 
 stick, and glove aside and began to remove his second 
 glove. "You have not heard the news." 
 
 "News! what news," said Mrs. Mossenthal, while si- 
 lence fell upon the room. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 73 
 
 Filled -with a sense of importance, Mr. Chant's round 
 smooth face expanded into a wide smile, which, as he 
 suddenly remembered the nature of the intelligence he 
 had to convey, reduced itself into an appropriate air of 
 gloom. 
 
 "It's about old Ephraim Levinge, the celebrated Bond 
 Street art dealer you know " 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal's face changed. Her sallow skin 
 turned green, her bloodless lips tightened to a slit. Any 
 mention of her husband's relationship to old Ephraim 
 Levinge — a man who kept a shop — a man who once had 
 the effrontery to tell her that everything "old" in her 
 house was new and in the worst taste — put her in a temper. 
 She made up her mind that if Bertie Chant mentioned the 
 connection, she would never ask him to one of her Sunday 
 dinner-parties again. 
 
 "Yes?" exclaimed Mrs. Cohen, setting down her cup. 
 "What about him?" 
 
 But Mr. Bertie Chant had his own way of telling a story. 
 He began by putting on a pair of gold-mounted pince-nez, 
 which he considered gave him an air of distinction. 
 
 " Well, it is quite a paragraph for the society papers. I 
 shall send it to three to-night. You must know that to-day 
 being the private view at the Decadents' Gallery, I was 
 going, all in my best, you know, down Bond Street, about 
 mid-day. All the 'smarties' go to these shows before 
 
 luncheon now. The show folk and J ," he swallowed a 
 
 word and grew alarmingly red, " suburban people make up 
 the crowd in the afternoon. Well, I had just parted from 
 Lord Arthur Carr — such a delightful fellow, we sup to- 
 gether at the Savoy to-night — when I fell, yes, wasn't it 
 shocking? positively fell up against that dear Lady St. 
 Cyprien." 
 
 The listening faces grew more attentive, and Julia 
 
74 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Cohen, who had been quietly masticating a sweet biscuit, 
 suddenly became immobile. 
 
 "I apologised, of course, and her la' ship, who is quite 
 the most delightful woman in London, was as charming as 
 ever. But when she had received my apologies, she told me 
 — poor dear, quite with tears in her eyes — that she was most 
 upset — she had just been present at old Levinge's death." 
 
 "Ephraim Levinge dead!" 
 
 "Lady St. Cyprien with him when he died." 
 
 " Lnpossible !" 
 
 The last remark fell from Mrs. Mossenthal, who could 
 not resist an incredulous sneer at the expense of the dead 
 art dealer. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen noted the expression, and assumed her most 
 Junoesque air. She only tolerated Mrs. Mossenthal on 
 sufferance, and had long ago made up her mind that once 
 her son Eugene was married to Mary Levinge, the Mossen- 
 thals should not be included in the visiting list of the young 
 people. 
 
 "Not impossible at all, Mrs. Mossenthal," she exclaimed 
 severely. "Ephraim Levinge was much respected among 
 the aristocracy, and I know for a fact that Lord and Lady 
 St. Cyprien held him in high regard." 
 
 The reflected glory of a peeress's patronage of a dying 
 Jew was already irradiating the faces of the assembled 
 ladies, when Mr. Chant again spoke. 
 
 " Well, I won't quite declare that she was in the room, 
 but any way she was in the house or shop, or somewhere. 
 So sweet of her, wasn't it?" 
 
 A drawling voice with a strong twang through it spoke 
 from the vicinity of the tea-table. 
 
 " Hasn't Levinge left a grand-daughter, or is there only 
 the rag-bag woman Marx, who can't speak English, left to 
 look after the shop?" 
 
WITHOUT SIN 75 
 
 The speaker was a little woman with a long nose, black 
 hair, cut short and curled, and the reputation of being a 
 great wit. She had once written an article for a weekly 
 paper, which after considerable manipulation by the editor 
 had appeared in print. This had given her a great reputa- 
 tion in Hyde Park and South Kensington society, which 
 had been further enhanced by the daring with which she 
 discussed unpleasant topics, under the plea of cultivating 
 what she called "higher philosophy." 
 
 A general giggle at Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt's sally re- 
 lieved the tension of silence. 
 
 "Oh, Mrs. Dan!" laughed Mr. Chant. "What a way 
 you have of putting things! Of course there's a grand- 
 daughter, eighteen, and beautiful to boot — quite the mar- 
 riageable damsel, I assure you. Lady St. Cyprien tells me 
 that she has all Levinge's savings and the business, and 
 will be worth every penny of " 
 
 Mrs. Cohen hastily rose. She had no intention of allow- 
 ing Mary Levinge's monetary value to become the tea-table 
 talk of the community, before she had had time to make 
 plans for an immediate onslaught on such a desirable partie. 
 
 "Ah, yes, there's Mary — poor child, she must be in 
 great grief — and she will get no help or comfort from that 
 aunt of hers." 
 
 "Lady St. Cyprien said the aunt was howling like a 
 Dervish when she came away," said Bertie Chant, "but 
 that Miss Levinge seemed quite controlled." 
 
 "She has such a grand character," sighed Mrs. Cohen. 
 " She is a girl for whom I have a very deep and sincere 
 affection. Julia, my love, we must go to Bond Street at 
 once, and if necessary bring Mary away to stay with us, 
 until some arrangement can be made for her." 
 
 "But Miss Levinge has a home of her own," said Bertie 
 Chant. 
 
76 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 "La, isn't she going to serve in the shop?" twanged 
 Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt. 
 
 "You dreadful person!" cried Bertie, flapping his glove 
 at her. "Good gracious, no! Levinge bought and fur- 
 nished a big house in Regent's Park for her nearly two 
 years ago. She'll move there almost directly, I expect. 
 Oh, it's quite a delightful story for the papers!" 
 
 "And play at being the great lady, I suppose," said Mrs. 
 Mossenthal spitefully. 
 
 "My dear Mrs. Mossenthal," said Mrs. Cohen, in her 
 most regal manner. "You must remember, we must all 
 remember, that if Miss Levinge — Mary, as I call her, for I 
 have known her since she was a child — makes anything of 
 a marriage, she will not have to play at being a great lady — 
 she will be a great lady. I have reason to believe— poor 
 Mr. Levinge had no secrets from me — that Mary's fortune 
 will be a very large one. Now, Julia, my child — Good- 
 bye, Mrs. Mossenthal — shall you wear mourning?" 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal rose stiffly from her chair. She was 
 too rawboned a woman to move with any grace. 
 
 "I beg your pardon, Mrs. Cohen," she said in her cold, 
 high voice, and with her light eyes glistening ominously; 
 " but if Mary Levinge is to go anywhere between now and 
 the time she moves into her new house, she should come 
 here. We are her relations." 
 
 Mrs. Cohen was only momentarily baffled. 
 
 "But you do not know her, Mrs. Mossenthal, and at 
 such a time a stranger's face " 
 
 "'Sac has known her since she was a child," retorted 
 Mrs. Mossenthal, who was not going to lose the chance of 
 laying the heiress under obligations without a struggle. 
 
 " The child will yearn for womanly sympathy, " began 
 Mrs. Cohen again. 
 
 Then Bertie Chant, who had been discussing the " higher 
 
WITHOUT SIN 77 
 
 philosophy," as applied to a recent nasty divorce case, with 
 Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, turned round and said : 
 
 " What's that about motherly sympathy? Miss Levinge 
 will get plenty of that. Lady St. Cyprien meant to fetch 
 Miss Levinge away from Bond Street this afternoon and 
 keep her at Lowndes Square till after the funeral, and her 
 own house is ready for her." 
 
 Full of the news they had gathered, Mrs. Mossenthal's 
 guests went away, leaving only Mrs. Cohen to face her 
 hostess in the sham artistic drawing-room. 
 
 Both women forgot for a moment their manners in 
 thought. Mrs Cohen, with the tribal passion for accumu- 
 lating wealth through good marriages burning in her veins, 
 was wondering what reason Lady St. Cyprien, whom she 
 knew to be childless, had for putting herself out sufficiently 
 to take the mourning girl into her house. Mrs. Mossenthal, 
 with envious discontent, was marvelling what advantage 
 a wealthy leader of society could get out of the grand- 
 daughter of an art dealer. 
 
 One thing they instinctively felt must be done. Their 
 sentiments of affection and love must be conveyed to Mary 
 Levinge at once. Mrs. Cohen wanted her for her son, 
 Mrs. Mossenthal for her own personal glorification. Their 
 claims must be made without delay. Besides, the chance 
 of calling at a countess's house, and perhaps making her 
 acquaintance, was not to be lost. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal was the less patient of the two, and 
 broke silence first. 
 
 "'Sac will insist upon my calling to see Mary to- 
 morrow. " 
 
 " Shall you go to Lady St. Cyprien's?" said Mrs. Cohen, 
 advancing cautiously and almost smothering the surprise in 
 
 her voice. 
 
 " Certainly," replied the other, tightening all her features 
 
78 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 as she spoke. " Bertie said that Mary was to leave Bond 
 Street to-day." 
 
 "Yes! it will be the best plan," said Mrs. Cohen in 
 reflective tones, as though she were confirming a suggestion 
 made by herself. " About when shall you go?" 
 
 " To-morrow. I think it looks more friendly to go soon." 
 
 " Yes ! I dare say it does. I never have my horses out in 
 the morning though." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal never had hers out before luncheon 
 either, but to ingratiate herself with Mrs. Cohen, she 
 would have ordered them out at midnight. 
 
 " I will drive you down to Lowndes Square with pleasure, 
 if you like. Besides, as you say, I do not know much of 
 Miss Levinge, and it would be pleasanter to go with you." 
 
 Graciously accepting Mrs. Mossenthal's deference as her 
 rightful due, Mrs. Cohen made the appointment for the 
 morrow, and swept downstairs to where Julia was waiting 
 in a charmingly artistic pose on a "Chippendale" hall 
 chair of aggressively modern workmanship. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen's first act on getting home was to find out 
 from the pages of Debrett the quantity and quality of Lady 
 St. Cyprien's male belongings. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal denied herself to any more callers, and 
 spent the rest of thp afternoon grubbing out from her ward- 
 robe some " black" in which to pay her condolence visit the 
 following day. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 Twice only, according to Judaic law, did the sun set on 
 Ephraim Levinge' s dead body, which almost before the breath 
 had left it was laid before an open window. Then when 
 the bath and slab of zinc, brought from the Synagogue, had 
 been used by those near friends whose duty it was to perform 
 the last offices, and when the yolk of an egg had been broken 
 over the quiet old face, a rough deal box half filled with saw- 
 dust and scantily covered by a meagre strip of black cloth 
 was carried into the house. After the fashion of the poor- 
 est of his compatriots was the millionaire art-dealer encof- 
 fined and borne down the ash-strewn staircase away to that 
 vast resting-place of his race, which lies beyond the purlieus 
 of the Ghetto. With rents in every garment and crape upon 
 her head, Mrs. Marx sat Shivah and wailed for a week, only 
 staying her noisy grief to eat largely of the food which cus- 
 tom ordains that friends must supply to a house of mourning. 
 
 When the eight days were over, life flowed once more into 
 accustomed channels. The pictures which had been turned 
 against the walls were restored to their usual positions, and 
 the mirrors, into which no face may look when the pale 
 angel Azrael has passed through a house, once more reflected 
 the light of day. The great business rolled on again, and 
 it was as though Ephraim Levinge had never been. 
 
 Just when autumn's fingers were streaking the great trees 
 in the Regent's Park with orange and gold, Mary Levinge 
 settled into her new abode. 
 
 Holmhurst was a big house in the Inner Circle, and all 
 
80 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 the summer through, the perfume of a thousand tropical 
 blooms floated across from the Botanical Gardens into the 
 windows. A great suite of imposing reception-rooms swept 
 in a circle round the marble centre hall. Upstairs were 
 Mary's rooms, her bedroom and a boudoir, and the two 
 apartments to which Mrs. Marx on arrival at once betook 
 herself, and from which she seldom emerged. 
 
 The house was beautifully furnished, with more taste and 
 restraint than is generally found in the homes of self-made 
 men. The sense of living in a bric-a-brac shop which was 
 so evident in Bond Street was wanting at Holmhurst, and 
 though the rooms were filled with priceless marquetries, 
 pictures, carvings, and statues, they were obviously for 
 utility or decoration and not for sale. 
 
 At first, Mary, accustomed to the enforced company which 
 is an outcome of living in small rooms, wandered, solitary 
 and lost, through the stately apartments of her new home. 
 She had deemed herself unaffected by the constant " drop- 
 ping-in" of clients, business men, and old friends of her 
 grandfather, but now she missed the va et vient, the scraps 
 of art talk, the town gossip which went on so continuously 
 in the overcrowded Bond Street sitting-room. 
 
 Her aunt Judith, freed from parental restraint, now spent 
 her days in a half-clothed, somnolent state. She increased 
 her subscription to the Yiddisher library in Whitechapel, 
 distracted the cook by the eccentricities of her food, and 
 received a small but constant stream of visitors, who pre- 
 ferred to leave by the back door. 
 
 Of her childhood's friend, Martin Baird, Mary saw but 
 little. He had been left in the onerous position of manager 
 of the Art Gallery, and felt that no amount of hard work 
 could ever convey the full sense of his responsibilities. 
 Sometimes on Friday evenings, the beginning of the Jewish 
 Sabbath, he would leave his beloved ledgers and correspond- 
 
WITHOUT SIN 81 
 
 enf.e to dine with Mary. It had been a custom in the days 
 of her grandfather, and with the tribal clinging to old ways, 
 the girl still wished the habit observed. But do what she 
 would with the outward observance of the Friday evenings, 
 they were never the same as of old. There were no weav- 
 ings of delightful legends, no scraps of unwritten history, 
 no marvellous stories of missing jewels or unearthed pic- 
 tures. After dinner, Baird, with his ascetic's face and 
 strong hands, would spread out piles of accounts and sheaves 
 of papers. 
 
 " Such and such business had been transacted during the 
 past week. It was advisable that so-and-so should be done 
 during that to come. He had consulted Mr. Montagu and 
 Mr. Mossenthal, the trustees, about this, that, and the 
 otiier," he would say. 
 
 And Mary, with her delicate eyebrows drawn together 
 abjve her heavy-lidded eyes, and the bow of her mouth 
 pressed to a straight line, listened and questioned, and, as 
 tho details became more familiar, ventured to give direc- 
 tions. She was not without the true business capacity of 
 her people, which had only lain dormant for want of exer- 
 cise. Her slender finger, quaintly ringed with the beaten 
 gold band her grandfather had worn for years, traced a way 
 with incredible swiftness through endless mazes of accounts, 
 and Baird quickly took to relying on her cultivated taste in 
 art with respect to the purchases "Levinge's" was so often 
 expected to make. 
 
 If her social responsibilities had shaped themselves as 
 easily as those of business, Mary Levinge would have been 
 quite happy. But here her position was rendered difficult by 
 the absolute uselessness of Mrs. Marx as either an adviser or 
 a chaperon, and by the overwhelming eagerness of some of 
 her grandfather's old friends to fill such positions. Almost 
 in the first days of her mourning Mrs. Montagu and Mrs. 
 6 
 
82 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Cohen had displayed unaccountable temper — in Mary's eyes 
 — at the kindly hospitality extended to the heiress by Lady 
 St. Cyprien. The conversation which had taken place in 
 Mrs. Montagu's astonishing blue-and-gold drawing-room in 
 Portland Place, before Mary, who had been invited to 
 " spend the day" there, finally wound up in a covert dispute 
 between the matrons as to which of them should godmother 
 Mary into society after Lady St. Cyprien had done with 
 her. 
 
 " But I do not want to go into any society," had said the 
 girl, turning her gentle eyes from Mrs. Cohen's inflamed 
 and angry countenance to Mrs. Montagu's still pretty 
 features. 
 
 "Nonsense! my dear," retorted Mrs. Cohen. "A girl 
 with your fortune cannot help herself. I must see if, in 
 consideration of that, you cannot be presented next year. 
 I should be only too delighted to launch you in that respect." 
 
 This was a home thrust at Mrs. Montagu, who in spite 
 of her acquaintances among the peerage and her undoubted 
 beauty, had never succeeded in getting to Court. 
 
 " I do not thee that any girl need be prethented till after 
 her marriage," Mrs. Montagu lisped. "The nethethity 
 ought to depend on her huthband's pothition." 
 
 "I quite agree with you," said Mrs. Cohen, with inten- 
 tion ; then, as though it were an after-thought, she added, 
 " but till that time Mary must have some one to take her 
 about." 
 
 Mrs. Montagu was the nearest to Miss Levinge, and 
 taking one of her hands, began to pat it. 
 
 " I hope she will never forget that Eothe and Linda are 
 her oldeth friendth and that ath their mother I thall 
 alwayth be ready to chaperon her ath one of my own 
 girlth." 
 r "Ah! my dear," said Mrs. Cohen, with a disagi-eeable 
 
WITHOUT SIN 83 
 
 laugh, "I think you will find two girls quite enough to 
 marry off at a time. You had better leave Mary to me." 
 
 In a quieter but even more dogged fashion Mrs. Mossen- 
 thal had made a bid for the social parentage of the wealthy 
 and beautiful Miss Levinge. She pestered the girl to visit 
 her at The Kosary, a little place the Mossenthals had among 
 the North London hills, and when she refused, paid her long 
 calls in Regent's Park, and harangued her on the ethics of 
 housekeeping and sociology as practised by herself. 
 
 The summer and early autumn brought Mary peace, and 
 she was free to take solitary drives out to Hampstead, or 
 dream the long days away in the fragrant shades of her own 
 quiet garden. Only Martin Baird ever disturbed her soli- 
 tude, for Lady St. Cyprien was away at Homburg. 
 
 One day in mid-September, when even the pulses of Lon- 
 don were still, and the voices of the children playing in the 
 Park came languidly through the heavy air, Mary, weary, of 
 her own grounds, and with a vague unrest, strolled out into 
 the Inner Circle and down the road towards the Botanical 
 Gardens. She went slowly, and her peculiarly graceful 
 walk made her look as though she were gliding along. 
 
 With her grey eyes narrowed to an almond shape between 
 her thick white lids, and her mind filled with an old German 
 tale she had deciphered that morning from a rare black- 
 letter book Baird had brought her the previous evening, she 
 wandered on, till a voice at her side said : 
 
 " I thought it must be you. Miss Levinge, for I had heard 
 from Lady St. Cyprien that you lived about here; and be- 
 sides — nobody moves quite as you do — and yet — I was not 
 sure. " 
 
 It was Dr. Marrable who stood before her, with his glance 
 wandering in undisguised surprise over the spotless freshness 
 of her white gown. 
 
 « I do not like black," she said, reading with quick intui- 
 
84 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 tion the wonder in his eyes. Then went on : " But what 
 are you doing in London, Dr. Marrable? I thought the 
 whole world was at the sea, or abroad. Were you not 
 staying with the St. Cypriens before they went to Hom- 
 burg?" 
 
 " Yes ! and that is the root of the reason which brings me 
 into the wilds of Eegent's Park to-day. When I left The 
 Towers last week I promised Lady St. Cyprien I would 
 come and see how you were. She was really disappointed 
 at your persistent refusal to go down to her, and has small 
 faith in young ladies' reports of themselves," he added, 
 with a rare smile. 
 
 " And you have come here just to see me? And you look 
 very tired too," said Mary. "Will you not come in with 
 me and have tea in my garden?" 
 
 The invitation was sufficiently unconventional, coming 
 from a young girl to a man she scarcely knew, to be start- 
 ling; only that Mary, with her pure gaze and child's mouth, 
 could neither be unconventional nor otherwise. 
 
 As Dr. Marrable followed her too slender, white-clad f cam 
 on to the sweeping lawn at the back of Holmhurst, and noted 
 the manner in which she gave her orders, and the intelli- 
 gence, if not brilliancy, with which she talked to him for 
 the next half -hour, he was vaguely conscious that she was 
 different from all other women he had met. 
 
 He had known women more beautiful, for, although in 
 shape Mary's face was perfect and free from the rather 
 marked peculiarities of her race, the strange fullness above 
 the eyes and the undecided colouring of hair and skin were 
 undoubted defects. He had known women cleverer, for 
 Mary had neither the gift of society small talk nor the trick 
 of babbling superficial philosophy. But she had a voice like 
 liquid gold, and a mouth that in every curve, expression, 
 and slow shy smile was like that of an angel. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 85 
 
 When he left, and stepped briskly into the cool of the 
 evening down the quiet road, he thought much of her. 
 
 "She's like none of them," he muttered to himself. 
 " Neither physically nor mentally. But whether she has a 
 child's soul in a woman's body, or whether her intellect has 
 solved a mystery we grosser mortals cannot fathom, I do not 
 know. She is neurotic, of course; that seems inevitable 
 with a large proportion of the girls of the present generation. 
 She is very delicate. But is that all? I hardly know. 
 She exhales an atmosphere which attracts and yet repels. 
 Her mouth — she has a very lovely mouth — invites anything, 
 everything. Her eyes — they are inscrutable eyes — gaze 
 beyond you into the unseen. Lady St. Cyprien — bless her 
 practical heart — always says the girl is dreaming and a little 
 too absorbed in her own sensations and emotions, and that, 
 once give her a husband, she will develop into the common- 
 sense shrewd woman of her own people." 
 
 Dr. Marrable's thoughts had accompanied him as far as 
 his own neat doorstep in Harley Street. He drew his latch- 
 key from his pocket and inserted it slowly in the keyhole. 
 
 " That would be a pity. Mary Levinge as she is, is a 
 very interesting person." 
 
 He entered his house briskly and shut the door with a 
 bang. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 The electric light blazed with unwinking brilliancy from 
 the front windows of Mrs. Mossenthal's house in Cleveland 
 Square. A slight sprinkling of snow chilled the air out- 
 side, but within, the fires and lights diffused a heat which 
 drew out the acrid odour of the chrysanthemums on the 
 mantelpieces and side tables, and intensified the smell of 
 rich sauces and soups which rose in steamy wafts from the 
 basement. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal, gowned in white satin which looked 
 harshly clear against her sallow skin, was standing in the 
 middle of her drawing-room buttoning her bony hands and 
 heavy rings into her long suede gloves and lecturing her 
 husband, who, wearied out with a long day's golfing in 
 Essex, was already showing signs of dropping to sleep 
 before the fire. 
 
 Under ordinary circumstances Mrs. Mossenthal treated 
 her husband's idiosyncrasies with an overt sneer or two, 
 but to-night was the occasion of one of her grand Sunday 
 dinner-parties, and 'Sac could not be permitted to rumple 
 his shirt-front and disarrange his tie so early in the evening. 
 
 "Now 'Sac, for goodness sake, try and keep awake for 
 once," she said in her peevish nasal voice, and wrenching 
 viciously at her glove buttons. " We've got a very grand 
 party to-night, and I've ordered a lovely dinner." 
 
 "What's there to eat?" said 'Sac, rousing a little and 
 twitching at his collar, which galled him after the day spent 
 in the keen December air. 
 
WITHOUT Sm 87 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal recited the menu, and then said, " Don't 
 you want to know who are coming?" 
 
 "Well?" was 'Sac's indifferent query. 
 
 " All the best people," returned this wife. " Mrs. Cohen 
 will be wild when she hears about it. I would have asked 
 her if she hadn't said once that she thought actors were out 
 of place in society. The idea of society without actors and 
 celebrities like that." And quite appalled at the thought 
 of such a contingency, she sank — with due regard to her 
 skirts — on the edge of a chair. " But she'll be sorry when 
 she hears that Lady Theo Bellastier is coming." Mrs. 
 Mossenthal glared with her eyes and gave a spasmodic smile 
 with her mouth at the prospect of Mrs. Cohen's discomfiture. 
 
 Mr. Mossenthal started from his slumbrous attitude. 
 
 "Lady Theo Bellastier! Why, how did you get hold of 
 her?" 
 
 "What a disgusting way you have of putting things," 
 sneered his wife. "I didn't get hold of her; I invited her. 
 It was the other day when I went to see Mary Levigne, to 
 try and persuade her to come to-night; Lady Theo Bellas- 
 tier was there, and quite backed me up when I told Mary 
 she ought to begin to go out now, and that certainly she 
 could come to her own relations. Then, as I had talked so 
 much of our dinner-party before Lady Theo, I thought she 
 would be hurt if I did not invite her to come. She accepted 
 directly, and seemed quite pleased — but, 'Sac, mind you 
 make up a card-party after dinner. Lady Theo always ex- 
 pects that, wherever she goes ; and you might see that she 
 wins— as it's her first visit. And 'Sac— are you listening? 
 You will have to take her down to dinner, and mind you 
 don't call her Lady Bellastier without the Theo; remember, 
 she's the daughter of a duke." 
 
 "All right," said 'Sac good-naturedly. "But who else 
 is coming? Is Mary?" 
 
88 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " Yes ! I gave her no peace till she consented. Then, 
 there's Aubrey Delamere, and the Dick Vanes. I hate that 
 Mrs. Vane, she's the most insolent creature, but ever since 
 she found the money for Delamere to take the Frivolity 
 Theatre, she insists on seeing all his letters and overlooking 
 his engagement list, so one can't have him without her. 
 Then there are the Carlton "Wests." 
 
 "Phew! You've made a mistake there, Eay," said Mr. 
 Mossenthal. "Carlton West hates Delamere; he said at 
 the Green Room Club last week he loathed other actors." 
 
 " Oh! but he likes swells and I've put him the other side 
 of Lady Theo, and mind you let him get plenty of chat 
 with. her. Delamere will sit next me, so they can't quarrel 
 much during dinner. Mrs. West will have Dr. Marrable." 
 
 "That man coming?" cried 'Sac. "I don't like hjiu. 
 Can't quite make him out. He doesn't play golf, and 
 always seems to be dangling at the skirts of you women." 
 
 "Dr. Marrable is not a Jew," flashed Mrs. Mossenthal 
 passionately. " He knows how to treat ladies properly and 
 with consideration. Besides, he goes everywhere now, he's 
 got the biggest practice in London. Please don't expose 
 your ridiculous ideas before other people, or you will only 
 be laughed at." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal was lashing herself into one of her tem- 
 pers, so 'Sac deemed it best to waive his objections — which 
 were really quite mild — to Dr. Marrable, and profess 
 interest in the remainder of his guests. 
 
 "Well! Who else?" 
 
 " The Tauntons. We owe them a dinner, you know, and 
 she always looks smart, though goodness knows how she 
 pays for those gowns of her. The Leonard Greenfields, 
 they're going to have a house at Maidenhead next summer, 
 and I want to be asked there. Claude and Oscar Vanstone, 
 one must have plenty of men, you know — and " for the 
 
WITHOUT SIN 89 
 
 first time Mrs. Mossenthal paused in her high-voiced chatter 
 and glanced sideways at her husband. 
 
 " Miss Vere Marindin— " 
 
 "What!" cried Mossenthal, springing from his chair and 
 pulling his squat form into some semblance of dignity. 
 
 "Oh! you needn't fly in a rage," said Mrs. Mossenthal, 
 in her iciest manner, and preparing for war. " I know you 
 don't like the girl, because that old gossip, Levi Simmons, 
 told you something against her." 
 
 "She's a horrid woman. Smokes cigarettes before the 
 servants, and tells stories — stories like a man." 
 
 "More shame for the men then," snapped Mrs. Mossen- 
 thal, with a fine, if somewhat inconsequential scorn. " But 
 Vere Marindin is a celebrity. She paints lovely pictures, 
 I'm sure, and I know Lady Theo Bellastier will like her 
 immensely." 
 
 "Well, I won't have her introduced to Mary, mind that." 
 For once 'Sac Mossenthal spoke with decision. Good- 
 natured and easy-going to a fault, he yet had all the Jew's 
 strict notions with regard to his own womankind. Women 
 were of course inferior beings, born for the service and the 
 pleasure of man, but always to be shielded from harm, even 
 as a valuable chattel should be preserved from injury. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal muttered something about " the fuss that 
 every one made of Mary," but knew from experience that 
 her husband's foot was down. 
 
 " Bertie Chant is coming of course. It will be such a 
 grand party for him to write about in the papers." 
 
 And then, with her artificial smile and stiff -jointed walk, 
 she moved forward to greet the first of her guests. 
 
 The dinnner went off charmingly. Mr. Delamere and 
 Mr. Carlton West — whom no woman with a shadow of tact 
 would have ever invited to sit at the same table — were con- 
 tent with mutually glaring at one another; Miss Vere Ma- 
 
90 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 rindin confined her pungent conversation to her immediate 
 neighbours; Mrs. Dick Vane did not audibly criticise the 
 decorations, the guests, or the dinner, and ' Sac Mossenthal 
 did not go to sleep once. 
 
 When finally Mrs. Mossenthal caught Lady Theo Bellas- 
 tier's eye, and the ladies rustled and fluttered upstairs, she 
 felt all the elation of success, which was, however a little 
 damped by the true mauvais quart d'heure of a hostess's 
 evening, namely the period which marks the social sepa- 
 ation of the sexes. 
 
 Mrs. Dick Vane, smarting under the sense that Aubrey 
 Delamere had been placed next Mary Levinge, and had 
 payed her effusive attention all during dinner, crumpled the 
 first rose-leaf, by remarking aloud on the somewhat vague 
 style of art which prevailed in her hostess's drawing-room. 
 Mrs. Carlton West and Mrs. Taunton at first joined issue in 
 decrying the taste of modern decorators in general, and the 
 tradesman who had designed Mrs. Mossenthal's rooms in 
 particular, until they started a difference of their own con- 
 cerning the merits of their respective dressmakers. Miss 
 Vere Marindin introduced herself to Mary Levinge, while 
 Lady Theo Bellastier betook herself to the open card-table, 
 and set herself a solitary and intricate game of patience. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal's annoyance was making itself unpleas- 
 antly visible round her thin mouth and hard eyes, when, 
 with the subdued roar of many voices, the big white folding 
 doors were flung open and the tobacco-scented, black-coated 
 flood of men poured into the room. 
 
 The women, with charming smiles on their faces, drew 
 their skirts into a smaller space and revealed unknown pos- 
 sibilities in the shape of seating accommodation. 
 
 In the general movement that filled the large room for 
 some minutes. Dr. Marrable found himself standing by 
 Mary Levinge, and looked down at her. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 91 
 
 She was as usual in a white gown untouched by any 
 colour — the spotless white of deep mourning. Where it 
 was cut away from her throat and arms it showed the trans- 
 parent, fine skin of a child, but with the modesty which is 
 so developed in some Jewesses, her bodice was not low, and 
 the birth of her breasts was hidden beneath the jealous silk. 
 The thick strands of her hair gleamed like pale gold under 
 the raw electric light, but her face was pale and bistre 
 shadows ringed her eyes. 
 
 "You are not well to-night," said Marrable, after gazing 
 at her for a moment. " You look quite changed from what 
 you did when I saw you last — in September, was it not?" 
 
 "I think I am quite well. Dr. Marrable," answered Mary 
 with directness. 
 
 " And I think you are not. Miss Levinge," said Marrable. 
 She smiled faintly. 
 
 " This is the first time I have been out since — my mourn- 
 ing. I did not want to come, but Mrs. Mossenthal seemed 
 to wish it so particularly, and Lady Theo said I ought to 
 
 — ^and — so " 
 
 It struck Marrable how full of self-abnegation her simple 
 words were, and he wondered if she differed from others of 
 her sex in their supreme devotion to themselves. 
 
 " And how do you like us all now you have come out of 
 your shell?" he said, half teasingly. 
 
 Mary shot him a little glance, but did not speak. 
 Marrablfe looked round the room to find her true answer. 
 'Sac Mossenthal, his good-natured swarthy face greasy with 
 heat and flushed with wine, was leering boorishly at Lady 
 Theo, who, with the delicious whiteness of her beautiful 
 figure lavishly displayed, was sprawling half across the card- 
 table, and with her gramme's mouth wide open was scream- 
 ing at some pungent witticism of Miss Vere Marindin's. 
 Mrs. Dickie Vane, with tears of rage in her eyes and anger 
 
93 WJTSOUT SIN 
 
 quivering in her voice, was alternately muttering commands 
 and entreaties to Mr. Aubrey Delamere on the subject of 
 his leading lady, 
 
 Mr. Carlton West was expounding the subtleties of his 
 own reading of Hamlet to little Mrs. Taunton, who openly 
 yawned in his face and said " Yes" and " No" in the wrong 
 place, while she wondered whether her husband would re- 
 member to be polite to the Greenfields, who were big City 
 people. 
 
 "I am afraid you won't like us — much," said Marrable, 
 as a burst of noisy laughter broke from the " cosy corner" 
 where Mrs. West, Mrs. Mossenthal, and Bertie Chant had 
 their heads very close together. 
 
 " It is my fault, " answered the girl, a little wearily. " I 
 am not used to society yet. I dare say I shall like it one 
 day." 
 
 Marrable glanced to where Lady Theo's naked shoulders 
 gleamed like polished ivory beneath the wicked eyes of 
 Vere Marindin ; to where Mrs. Vane, her point gained with 
 her protege, grinned and grimaced with the sense of grati- 
 fied power; to where Mrs. Mossenthal, her sallow, cold 
 face quick with malice, retailed salacious gossip to the group 
 gathered round her. 
 
 " Does Lady St. Cyprien know you are here to-night?" 
 asked Marrable presently. He had sunk into the lounge at 
 Mary's side, and was too physically comfortable to move 
 away from the silent girl in search of a more amusing 
 companion. 
 
 "Oh, yes; I tell her everything. She is my dearest — 
 almost my dearest friend." 
 
 " So I always understood. But may I ask, Miss Levinge, 
 with the privilege of an old friend of almost your dearest 
 friend, who stands before Lady St. Cyprien in your 
 affections?" 
 
WITHOUT SIN 93 
 
 Mary blushed a little, as a child does who guards a 
 precious secret. 
 
 " I would rather not tell you, Dr. Marrable ; you would 
 only laugh at me." 
 
 " Now, Lady Bellastier," cried 'Sac Mossenthal, forgetting 
 his lesson on social etiquette in the exuberant prospect of a 
 game of cards; "what's it to be? Nap, chemin defer, or 
 real baccarat?" 
 
 " Baccarat's good enough for me," said her ladyship, pull- 
 ing her chair up to the table and preparing for action. 
 
 "Come on, you fellows! Come, Marrable, and have a 
 flutter. Greenfield, put up the bank. Now, Taunton. 
 Come on, Delamere; the ladies can talk to each other." 
 
 But Mr. Mossenthal got such a furious look from his wife 
 that he hastened to amend such an Oriental sentiment, and 
 added roughly : 
 
 "Except those who want to play, of course." 
 
 Three minutes later Mary was alone. Every one save 
 Mrs. Mossenthal and Mrs. Vane, who had united in abusing 
 a mutual friend, was gathered round the card-table. The 
 girl felt frightfully lonely in the big white drawing-room 
 with its score of electric lamps that stared like big yellow 
 eyes. Every burst of laughter from the noisy card-players 
 seemed to thrust her further away. 
 
 Why had they invited her here only to exile her, like some 
 naughty child, to a corner? Why had they not left her in 
 her home, which she was growing to love so well, where she 
 spent such happy evenings with her books and her thoughts, 
 and always the unfathomable sweet eyes of her dear picture? 
 
 A childish anger against these people who would not 
 leave her in peace, and who openly neglected her when they 
 had gained their ends, filled her heart. The garish room, 
 with its distant, motley group, was blotted and blurred by 
 the hot tears which forced themselves into her eyes. The 
 
94 WITHOUT sm 
 
 chink of money and the babble of noisy laughter grew like 
 the thick sound of muffled waves in her ears. Only Vere 
 Marindin's fluty voice asking Bertie Chant for a light struck 
 sharply through the confused roar. She tried to move, but 
 something swayed beneath her feet; she tried to cry aloud, 
 but a knot in her throat strangled her. 
 
 "Mary, come upstairs with me." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal's large cool hand and thin, icy voice 
 roused her, and she struggled to her feet and followed her 
 hostess from the room. 
 
 Once upstairs, Mrs. Mossenthal rang for her maid, and 
 sent downstairs for Dr. Marrable. 
 
 " Miss Levinge is a little faint. I suppose the room was 
 too hot," said Mrs. Mossenthal, as Dr. Marrable entered 
 her bedroom, where, in a large armchair, Mary lay white 
 and silent. Then she whispered, in a stage aside : " Not 
 too much sympathy ; she is subject to these attacks, I fancy, 
 and one has to be so firm with young girls." 
 
 Marrable nodded and passed her. Then took the girl's 
 hand and laid his firm fingers on her wrist. 
 
 " Miss Levinge is merely a little overdone. She had better 
 go home ; in fact, I will take her and knock up a chemist 
 en route." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal's brows frowned ominously. She did 
 not care to have one of her principal guests carried off by a 
 chit of a girl, even though she was a big heiress. But Mar- 
 rable, with his infinite knowledge of the eternal feminine, 
 smoothed matters over by saying : 
 
 " I will just give Miss Levinge into the care of her maid, 
 and shall be back here in half-an-hour. " Then, as he passed 
 out with Mary on his arm, he said to his hostess : " I must 
 come back; I have had no chat with you yet." 
 
 The distance from Cleveland Square to Regent's Park 
 was not great; but the cool air and cushioned quietness of 
 
WITHOUT SIN 95 
 
 her brougham quickly restored Mary, and she was almost 
 herself as she descended at her own door and gave Marrable 
 her hand. 
 
 " Thank you for taking so much trouble, Dr. Marrable, 
 and I will take the draught at once, and go to see you to- 
 morrow morning. Make my apologies to Lady Theo for 
 being so stupid — and, again, thank you." 
 
 Then the heavy door shut on her pale face, and sad, heavy 
 eyes, and Marrable drove back in her carriage, as she had 
 wished, to Cleveland Square. 
 
 It was the chill December dawn before the sleepy cabmen 
 ranked in front of the Mossenthal's door were hailed by 
 their fares. Lady Theo, ugly with fatigue and jubilant 
 with success, was the first to go. 
 
 "Ask me again soon," she screamed out of the darkness, 
 as her hansom turned the corner of the Square. 
 
 Marrable and Bertie Chant left the last, and Mrs. Mos- 
 senthal, with her white feather fan outspread upon her 
 chest, stood on the doorstep to bid them good-bye. 
 
 "Then it's quite settled that Bertie and Vere Marin din 
 and I dine with you to-morrow, doctor, and go to a play 
 afterwards? Good-night," she called, iuto the cold dawn. 
 
 "What a charming party it has been," said Mrs. 
 Mossenthal, as she unpinned her back hair. 
 
 "Why? Because you've got a dinner and a play out 
 of it for nothing?" said Mr. Mossenthal with brutal frank- 
 ness, as he rolled into bed and turned on one side. 
 
 "'Sac, you are a brute," retorted Mrs. Mosenthal. 
 
CHAPTEE XI 
 
 FouE persons were gathered in Lady St. Cyprian's bou- 
 doir in Lowndes Square. The dusk of the winter after- 
 noon was falling fast, but the fire flames dancing on the 
 wide hearth struck a thousand sparkling reflections from the 
 quaint blue Dutch tiles and polished brass dogs. 
 
 "Ah, it is good to be here," sighed Dr. Marrable, who, 
 with an unusual air of self-indulgence, was lounging in the 
 full warmth of the hot red logs. " But, Lady St. Cyprien, 
 promise to turn me out at five. It is a great nuisance, only 
 I have such a string of people to see between then and 
 dinner-time." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien lifted her dark eyes from the fleecy 
 work which occupied her fingers, and smiled across at 
 Marrable. 
 
 "You are no better than the rest of us, then?" she said, 
 with a quiet smile. "Soses and raptures have some 
 attraction for you after all, anchorite though you profess 
 to be." 
 
 "Nonsense!" broke in Lady Theo Bellastier, who was 
 making a remarkable display of scarlet silk flounces and 
 very dainty bottines to the fire. "Noel is no anchorite. 
 Are you, my friend? Those who judge you so see only the 
 surface, the consulting-room and sick-bedside view. Now 
 I have known you — for how long?" 
 
 She lazily turned her head in the depths of a huge down 
 pillow, and looked at him saucily from under her lashes. 
 
 " Your ladyship was just fourteen when I first attended 
 
WITHOUT SIN 97 
 
 your mother, the Duchess," said Marrable with exaggerated 
 politeness. 
 
 " So I was, and riding the gees barebacked in the pad- 
 dock, and setting booby-traps for all my father' s guests. Do 
 you remember what particular form yours took?" 
 
 "A boot-jack." 
 
 " Ah ha !" pealed Lady Theo, at the recollection. " And 
 you threatened to catch and kiss me if I ever played you 
 such a trick again. Oh, dear, what idiots some women — 
 your patients — are, not to suspect that somewhere about you 
 there are hidden depths. Shall I enlighten them, Koel?" 
 
 With the grin of a mischievous child. Lady Theo tossed 
 her smoked-out cigarette into the heart of the fire. 
 
 " Shall I tell them," she went on in a teasing way, " that 
 you are a man who ?" 
 
 "For heaven's sake, don't," broke in Lord Stansdale, 
 who till then had been content to listen to the ripple of 
 chat and the whisper of the fluttering flames, from the 
 depths of his armchair next to Lady St. Cyprien. " Why, 
 if every woman did not think that she were destined to 
 play the all-conquering Delilah to this invincible Samson, 
 where would his practice be?" 
 
 Marrable laughed as he said: "Thanks, Stansdale, for 
 your tribute to my professional skill." 
 
 "But, seriously, Noel," said the Countess, "do you not 
 know that among the scores of women who fill your wait- 
 ing-rooms every morning, there is always an air, intangible, 
 vague, imperceptible, save to other women, of expectation? 
 Every woman as she is shown into your waiting-room is 
 regarded by those already there as a possible rival." 
 
 " A rival ! In what?" cried Marrable, crossing Lady St. 
 Cyprien's gentle voice with his own suave tones. 
 
 " In your affections, " said Lady St. Cyprien, laying aside 
 her work and preparing to face the situation. 
 7 
 
98 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " My affections ! Good heavens ! What on earth do the 
 women want with a man like me? I am very plain." 
 Marrable spoke with a brutal frankness, which commended 
 itself to Lady Theo, for she said in her most decisive 
 manner : 
 
 "So am I. Quite ugly, in fact; but that has never 
 prevented me from having plenty of admirers. Now, you 
 are ugly too, my dear doctor, • but you are a bachelor, 
 reported rich, and an accredited misogynist. Don't you 
 know that such a reputation is sufficient to make my 
 impressionable sex wild to catch you?" 
 
 "Theo, please don't interrupt," said Lady St. Cyprien. 
 "We are discussing Noel and his would-be admirers. 
 Now, I mean to lecture him on a side issue of the ques- 
 tion." She faced round towards Marrable. 
 
 "Noel, why don't you marry?" 
 
 "Marry!" he cried, while every one laughed at the 
 intensity with which he had been addressed. 
 
 "Stansdale answered your question before it was asked, 
 my dear Lady St. Cyprien. What would become of my 
 practice?'' 
 
 " But you would enlarge it among families who now do 
 not go to you because you are a bachelor. So many people 
 hold that a doctor should be a married man." 
 
 Marrable shook his head. 
 
 " My dear Lady St. Cyprien, my patients, to let you into 
 a secret, are mainly women with money to spare and time 
 to waste. It amuses them to pass the morning in my 
 waiting-rooms. Now I will tell you something. You and 
 the women of your order who come to me are my genuine 
 patients. You come for certain reasons, and are not likely 
 to have ulterior motives." 
 
 Here Lady Theo shrugged her expressive shoulders and 
 made a face. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 99 
 
 " Oh ! I am not going to preach the righteousness of the 
 upper classes, Lady Theo. I am simply not the kind of 
 man they notice. If I married to-morrow not one of my 
 'swell' patients would leave me; for, though as a doctor I 
 may be fashionable, as a man I am not worthy of a second 
 thought." 
 
 He implied no sneer in his manner of speech. He knew 
 the women of his age too well to do more than comment on 
 their foibles. 
 
 "But the difference would be in that great wealthy, 
 virtuous middle class." 
 
 He turned to Lady Theo. 
 
 "You were at Mrs. Mossenthal's on Sunday night. You 
 saw the women who were there, the wives and daughters 
 of professional and business men. They are all patients of 
 mine, and they come to me for two reasons — first, because 
 they can rub shoulders with you and your order in my 
 rooms and on my staircase. It is the same instinct which 
 takes these Bay swater and Kensington maids and matrons, 
 and vulgar City folk to Hurlingham and Sandown, to Ascot 
 and the Park on Sunday. They flock in shoals to fashion- 
 able weddings and such semi-public functions, that they 
 may gossip afterwards of a countess's gowns or a duchess's 
 diamonds." 
 
 " How pleased Mrs. Mossenthal would be if she could 
 hear you," murmured Lady Theo. 
 
 "Mrs. Mossenthal is of the type I mean. Vain, selfish, 
 and silly; satisfied in her ignorant craving for smart society 
 if she can boast that she has recognised Lady St. Oyprien 
 in the Park, or has lost her money to you. Lady Theo, over 
 the card-table; gratified still more in her vanity, if I— or 
 any other man, for that matter— look into her eyes or hold 
 her hand for one second longer than ia necessary. Mrs. 
 Mossenthal, and scores of women of her mental calibre and 
 
100 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 social standing, would take her megrims and her guineas 
 elsewhere to-morrow if I married." 
 
 "Of course Mrs. Mossenthal is a very commonplace 
 person; and I do not think, dear Theo, you should go to 
 her house; but from what I have seen of her — in your 
 rooms, Noel, and at Mary's sometimes — I should at least 
 have given her the credit of being rather a strict person. 
 She has such a stiff, cold air about her." 
 
 Marrable laughed. 
 
 "My dear Lady St. Cyprien, the painful stiffness and 
 gauche shyness of so many women of the Mossenthal type 
 come merely from their inborn provincialism, and from the 
 fact that in past generations the strict middle-class men 
 prevented their womankind from mixing with the world at 
 all. But that coldness you find, characterises their inter- 
 course with both sexes, and is not therefore the result of 
 excessive modesty — it is merely superficial. The women 
 of the wealthy middle classes are immoral to a degree, and, 
 as a rule, without the excuse of either passion or affection. 
 They will permit and join in conversation of the coarsest 
 kind, and the bulk of them are illiterate and ignorant, 
 although you of other ranks have an idle trick of attribut- 
 ing all the virtues and accomplishments to them. No one 
 can deny, or wishes to deny, that most of the world's art 
 since the beginning of the Christian era has sprung from 
 the brains of the great Jewish race of the lower orders; 
 but such cases are mere psychological phenomena, other 
 forms of the neurosis which is slowly but surely sapping all 
 civilised humanity." 
 
 Five chimed from a silver clock. 
 
 " Ah ! I must be going, " said Marrable, drawing himself 
 from the depths of his chair. " I have to see Miss Levinga 
 first. Your little protegee is a charming child ; but it's a pity 
 she has not more nervous self-control — more moral fibre." 
 
WITHOUT SIN 101 
 
 " Surely, Noel," said Lady St. Cyprian, warmly. " You 
 would not class Mary Levinge among the Mrs. Mossenthals, 
 and such people." 
 
 "There are exceptions to every rule," he said, gravely, 
 as he bent over her hand. 
 
 Tea and the lights came as Dr. Marrable left the room, 
 and silence reigned while the servants were present. 
 When the three were alone once more Lord Stansdale was 
 the first to break the silence. 
 
 " Is Miss Levinge really very delicate, Aunt Adela?" 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien shot a keen glance from her dark eyes 
 at her nephew before she answered. 
 
 " No, my dear boy, not more so than hundreds of girls of 
 her age. She is rather nervous, and fanciful, and ansemic. 
 I shall take her to Eoyat-les-Bains next July, think." 
 
 "Unless " drawled Lady Theo, with a suggestive 
 
 little Tnoue. 
 
 " Unless she should be married, you mean?" 
 
 Lady Theo had her mouth full of mufQn, so nodded an 
 assent. 
 
 "I do not think that Mary is in any hurry to marry," 
 said Lady St. Cyprien, speaking very quietly and with 
 some emphasis. "She has already, I believe, definitely 
 refused the son of some people called Montagu, who live in 
 Portland Place." 
 
 Stansdale flushed indignantly all over his handsome 
 young face. 
 
 "You don't mean to say that that idiot, Lionel Montagu, 
 the son of Ben Montagu, the money-lender, has dared to 
 propose to the girl?" he cried, with heat. 
 
 " I don't know if the young man spoke to Mary himself, 
 for she is very shy of talking of such things. But she told 
 me she could go to the Montagus' no more, because they 
 were vexed with her, and I gathered the rest." 
 
102 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Lady Theo's sharp eyes had wandered from Lady St. 
 Cyprien's face to Lord Stansdale and back again. Sud- 
 denly she set down her tea-cup with a decided clatter, and 
 said, with an apparently indifferent air : 
 
 " And, pray, is not a young Jew good enough for Mary 
 Levinge to marry?" 
 
 "Not a Lionel Montagu," cried Stansdaie, indignantly, 
 "he is three parts crazy." 
 
 "Besides, I feel sure that in her choice of a husband 
 Mary will be guided by her own heart," said the Countess, 
 quietly. 
 
 An hour later, Lady Theo said, with many yawns and 
 stretchings of her limbs, that she must be going. 
 
 "Theo," said Lady St. Cyprien, as she kissed her at the 
 head of the stairs, " don't tease about Mary Levinge before 
 Stansdale. You know he is deeply attached to her." 
 
 "Not really?" cried Lady Theo, with well-affected sur- 
 prise. " But do you— would Lord St. Cyprien ?" 
 
 " We should be delighted. Stansdale is not rich, as you 
 know, and Mary's money would be useful; but, apart from 
 that, her beautiful nature, her modest ways, her sweetness 
 and purity, have endeared her to us inexpressibly. Of 
 course I know there will be an outcry in society; but 1 
 intend to have her with me a good deal now, and people so 
 soon forget things. Besides, Stansdale is rather old- 
 fashioned in his ideas, and will never marry a girl from 
 among our own set, who has had her affaires de cceur, her 
 lovers' quarrels and reconciliations, and endless escapades, 
 from the time she was in short frocks." 
 
 Little Lady Theo, with her fascinatingly ugly face and 
 her pretty figure, winked with both her eyes as she tripped 
 downstairs, and thought of her own girlhood. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 The spring was early and the Park in March had quite 
 an air of first summer days. Even Mrs. Marx, chilly and 
 slow-blooded from sheer inanition, loosened the heavy furs 
 about her throat and said to Mary, as the victoria dashed 
 down the wide road that leads from the Marble Arch to 
 Piccadilly, "It is a fine day!" 
 
 Mary nodded. She was looking unusually pretty. The 
 wooing breaths of the new-born season had urged her 
 virgin blood to a warmer course, and touched the pale oval 
 of her face with a flush of love for life. Even the calm 
 depths of her light almond eyes were stirred, and danced 
 with the baby leaves upon the trees. Nature's great heart 
 throbbed in her veins and almost woke her from her life- 
 long Galatea sleep. 
 
 "There's Miss Levinge's carriage," said Eugene Cohen 
 to his mother as Mary's smart equipage pulled up in the 
 sunshine at the end of the Eow. " How well she looks to- 
 day ! I never saw anybody vary so much. Sometimes she 
 would pass for an ugly girl if it weren't that her features 
 were so good.'' 
 
 "Young girls never look alike two days together," said 
 Mrs. Cohen, whose pronounced appearance presented as 
 little variation from month to month as the surface of a 
 stone wall. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen and her son occupied two chairs in the front 
 of the morning parade ground. Eugene did not often 
 escort his mother into public, and in honour of such an 
 
104 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 event she had arrayed herself in an elaborate and very tight 
 costume of black velvet, in which she was already too 
 warm. 
 
 Eugene Cohen was an accurate type of the young Jew 
 who goes into "Society." His black hair, which was kept 
 scrupulously short at the back, still retained, despite 
 cosmetics and continued brushing, a strong "kink" above 
 the forehead and at the sides. His dark skin was brightly 
 touched with red on the cheeks and lips. His eyes, like 
 his mother's, were full and handsome, but the coarse nose 
 and unmistakable twang in the speech discounted his better 
 features. His clothes, of which he seemed to have an ever- 
 varying wardrobe, were always too new, the tailor's folds 
 were too conspicuous, and the padding on the shoulders too 
 obvious. He never wore a pair of gloves twice, and dis- 
 carded his boots and ties wholesale. Of Bohemian clubs 
 and theatrical dances he was an acknowledged supporter. 
 Without his presence on Saturday at supper or Sunday at 
 dinner, the Savoy restaurant would scarcely have known 
 itself. He had a complete "by sight" acquaintance with 
 the entire peerage, had raced a little, gambled a good deal, 
 and was now lying fallow preparatory to making a good 
 marriage. 
 
 His little gallantries with Mrs. Montagu had effectually 
 spoiled his chances with the daughters of the house of 
 Eaffstein — the aristocrats of the London Jews — and an 
 ordinary Bayswater heiress would scarcely have suited 
 either him or his mother. Mary Levinge had been impos- 
 sible so long as her grandfather had been alive, but with 
 the old man dead, and his money-bags bequeathed to the 
 girl, the match seemed commendable to Eugene. So much 
 was it in his thoughts that almost unconsciously he said, 
 "If she were my wife I should have Baird's name put over 
 the place in Bond Street, take her away to Paris for a year 
 
WITHOUT SIN 105 
 
 to give her style, then have her presented at Court, live in 
 Mayfair, and cut every Jew in London." 
 
 Mr. Eugene Cohen smiled broadly and boastfully as he 
 spoke of the parent race. He was one of the renegade 
 Hebrews, who in their hearts loathe their own people, who 
 are more anti-Jewish than the most fanatical Christian, 
 who would change their names with their coats, and would 
 give of their beloved gold to rid themselves of their tribal 
 attributes. If there was one more potent charm about 
 Mary Levinge, in Mr. Cohen's fine dark eyes, than her 
 wealth, it was her singular dissimilarity to the Jewish race. 
 She would pass anywhere for a thoroughbred Gentile. 
 
 "Mary does look quite sweet to-day," Mrs. Cohen said 
 presently, with a side-glance fixed on Eugene's face. " I'm 
 not sure that habit of hers of always wearing white is nob 
 rather distinguished." 
 
 "It's peculiar enough, if that's what you mean, but not 
 at all good form. You never heard of one of the really 
 great ladies sticking to one particulai- colour or style ; they 
 wear anything and everything. It is a rather provincial 
 taste in Mary, being what she is. Of course if she were 
 another kind of person it would be all right. She'd be 
 called La Dame Blanche, and be quite a celebrity on the 
 strength of the fad." 
 
 Mrs. Cohen smiled approvingly. Queen of Bayswater 
 though she was, her kingdom was bounded by Portland 
 Place, and she always — in private — gave her son the pas in 
 matters of sociology. 
 
 "Don't you think you had better go and speak to her? 
 There, she is looking this way and sees us. "Wait a 
 minute, Eugene, not so fast; I think I will come with 
 you." 
 
 "What a perfect day!" said Mary presently, look- 
 ing with longing eyes down the pale green alleys of the 
 
106 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Park. " Aunt Judith, do come for a stroll. It will do you 
 good." 
 
 But Aunt Judith rolled out a guttural protest, and 
 Mary's face fell. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen felt that the psychological moment had 
 arrived. "Eugene, take Miss Levinge for a little walk. I 
 will stay and talk to Mrs. Marx till you come back." 
 
 With elaobrate politeness and much bowing of Mr. 
 Eugene Cohen's full-grown body upon his iindersized legs 
 — for he did not only favour his people in his face and 
 speech — Mary was handed from her carriage, and her place 
 filled with Mrs. Cohen's massive frame. 
 
 When she had once seen the young people started on 
 their stroll down the Eow, Mrs. Cohen raised her parasol, 
 offered up a prayer that none of her friends would see her 
 sitting alongside Mrs. Marx, and knowing that her com- 
 panion was no conversationalist, prepared to go to sleep 
 with her eyes open. 
 
 "That's the Duke of Grandchester on that chestnut over 
 there; and Lord Poulteneyj with Lady Betty Wexford, 
 whom he's going to marry next week, are with him," began 
 Eugene in his best manner. 
 
 "Oh, yes!" said Mary, nodding and smiling at the 
 group, who returned her salute. "I know them quite 
 well." Then seeing a momentary astonishment creep over 
 Eugene's face, she added very simply, "They came to the 
 Art Gallery, you know. The Duke was my grandfather's 
 first customer, and they became great friends. As to Lady 
 Betty, she came one day when she was about ten, with her 
 mother, the Countess of Bray, and began playing about till 
 she broke a Dresden vase, one of a pair. I remember how 
 angry grandfather was, and the Countess boxed Lady 
 Betty's ears. She and I were laughing about it all, the 
 other day, at Lady St. Cyprien's." 
 
WITHOUT SIN 107 
 
 Mary spoke with such straightforward candour that it 
 was impossible to believe she was making any display of her 
 acquaintanceship with the salt of the earth. Eugene, how- 
 ever, considered it better for the moment to cease pointing 
 out smart people to his companion, but rather to assume the 
 knowledge she evidently possessed. 
 
 "You see a great deal of Lady St. Cyprien, don't you?" 
 he asked, settling his shoulders in the padding of his coat, 
 and trying to set his short rolling gait to the girl's gliding 
 walk. "She's an awfully nice sort of woman." 
 
 "Do you know her?" queried Mary, raising her arched 
 brows in astonishment. 
 
 " Oh, no, I don't know her, but — I know a lot of fellows 
 who do, and they all say she's awfully jolly." 
 
 " I think your friends must be thinking of some one else. 
 Lady St. Cyprien is the dearest, most perfectly sympathetic 
 woman in the world, but she is not what most people would 
 call 'jolly.'" 
 
 "Oh! well, you know what I mean. Miss Levinge," said 
 Eugene, thinking that he would have to correct this tendency 
 to hyper-precision in his wife. " We all know what we 
 mean, but gentlemen can't always express thelnselves with 
 the same particularity as you ladies." 
 
 Eugene Cohen, in spite of his knowledge of manners and 
 things, had never overcome the vulgarity which lies in the 
 misuse of the words "gentleman" and "lady." 
 
 "That seems rather a pity," said Mary, and then the con- 
 versation, which had been but a poor thing at the beginning, 
 languished and died. 
 
 Mary's lithe young limbs moved quickly, and already the 
 far end of the Eow, where a great bosquet of budding lilacs 
 and laburnums hid Kensington Gardens from view, was in 
 sight. 
 
 Eugene Cohen knew perfectly well the task he had to 
 
108 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 accomplish before he and Mary returned to the carriage. 
 It was not a light one, for the girl gave him no encourage- 
 ment; in fact, she seemed oblivious of his presence. 
 
 She had lowered her parasol and was swinging it lightly 
 from two fingers as she paced along. Her gaze Was fixed 
 on the distant clump of bushes, her slightly parted lips 
 indicated deep thought. 
 
 "Are you going to the Montagu's dance next week?" he 
 said, suddenly determined to break the silence and trust to 
 chance to give him a lead. 
 
 To his astonishment a swift blush stained the pale fair- 
 ness of her skin. Then he thought he saw his mistake. 
 
 "I beg your pardon, I am sure/' he said, twanging his 
 words a little more than usual in his confusion. " I forgot 
 your mourning. Seeing you always in white, one forgets." 
 
 "It is not that," said Mary, turning honest, clear eyes 
 towards him, though the blush still lingered in her cheeks. 
 "Mrs. Montagu has not invited me. She is very angry 
 with me." 
 
 It was Eugene's turn to change colour now. A red light 
 flashed into his bright brown eyes, and his straight white 
 teeth set on his lower lip. 
 
 Was it possible that Mrs. Montagu was going to play the 
 jealous mistress; was going to interfere with his settlement 
 in life, because of half-a-dozen stolen meetings, and a few 
 furtive hand-clasps? This slip of a woman, with her bounc- 
 ing grown-up daughters, could not hope to retain for ever 
 the greenhorn admiration of a man young enough to be her 
 son-in-law. She must surely be mad, to risk a scandal 
 after so many years, by making an open rupture with the 
 girl who was for the moment tile acknowledged catch of the 
 Jewish community. If the affair leaked out, how furious 
 his mother would be ! It would end in society — their society> 
 dividing into two camps — and then how the Christians would 
 
WITHOUT SIN 109 
 
 laugh — aud at the thought of affording amusement to the 
 Christian, the Jew-hater writhed. 
 
 " Yes! Mrs. Montagu is dreadfully cross with me," went 
 on Mary, in a slightly tremulous voice. " She has even 
 forbidden Eose aud Linda to come to see me." 
 
 She walked precisely to the railing at the end of the Eow, 
 touched it with her hand as a child playing a game might 
 have done, then turned to walk back. 
 
 "Do you know — do you guess any reason?" mumbled 
 Eugene, still very red in the face. 
 
 "I — I — think — I think, I am almost sure I do," said 
 Mary, lowering her long dark lashes and slackening her 
 swift steps. 
 
 " What is it?" cried Eugene, forgetting his veneer of fine 
 manners in his anxiety to know the worst. 
 
 "I don't think I ought to tell you," said Mary, blushing 
 again, and looking very pretty and very shy. 
 
 " It must be something to do with me, or the girl would 
 never look like that. Damn Mrs. Montagu and her spite- 
 ful Portugee ways," thought Eugene to himself. Then, 
 feeling that nothing but a brave front would avert a world 
 of troubles, he cried, with a fervour that savoured of the 
 theatrical : 
 
 "Then you believe the calumny, Miss Levinge. You 
 lend your ears to eveiy idle tale that an envious, tattling 
 world brings to your door. Because, for some silly whim, 
 a woman such as Mrs. Montagu does not ask you to her 
 house, you accept, without a word, insinuations against me?" 
 
 Mary stopped short in the centre of the path. 
 
 "Mr. Cohen! what are you talking about? How can it 
 concern you, or your good name, whether I am invited to 
 Mrs. Montagu's house or not ? Since you have elected to 
 make a mountain out of a molehill, I may tell you that I 
 believe she is vexed because " 
 
110 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 "Because ?" 
 
 " Because, some months ago, when Mrs. Montagu did me 
 the honour to wish me to be her daughter-in-law, I de- 
 clined." 
 
 "You declined?" cried Eugene, between one gasp of 
 relief and another of hope. 
 
 Mary saw no reason to repeat her words and walked on. 
 
 "May I — Miss Levinge — may I ask why?" murmured 
 Eugene in her ear, for the danger being overpast, he 
 assumed once more his most impressive society air. 
 
 " I do not like Lionel Montagu," said Mary, walking very 
 quickly towards the upper end of the Row, whence already 
 the crowd of promenaders was dispersing itself in black 
 patches, which marred the fresh young green of the springing 
 grass. 
 
 "No other reason at all? Are you sure?" persisted 
 Eugene. 
 
 " What other reason could I have? Surely, Mr. Lionel 
 Montagu is reason enough in himself, " said Mary tersely. 
 
 " There was no whisper of love in your heart for another?" 
 
 Eugene quoted from a play in which he had recently 
 performed the amorous hero. 
 
 "I don't understand you, Mr. Cohen," said Mary, in 
 rather a nervous way. The purest and most innocent of 
 woman have the instinct of sex prudery aroused by a 
 threatened proposal. 
 
 " Have you ever cared for any one else?" whispered her 
 persistent wooer. 
 
 The girl's pride drove the blood into her cheeks. 
 
 " Mr. Cohen, I am not a woman who will ever give her 
 heart unsought." 
 
 Eugene smiled, such a conventional beginning must 
 surely argue the desired ending. 
 
 " But if I sought your heart?" he asked hurriedly, for 
 
WITHOUT SIN m 
 
 they were rapidly nearing Albert Gate, and to propose amid 
 a grating of chairs and crowds of shifting people would only 
 be absurd. " If I told you that I loved you, have loved you 
 for some time past, would you give me your heart then?" 
 
 Mary had turned very pale, almost livid, beneath the 
 shadow of her hat. She did not speak, but shook her head. 
 
 " Of course I mean, would you be my wife?" said Eugene, 
 sticking with characteristic tenacity to his purpose. " My 
 mother will welcome you as a daughter; you know how fond 
 she is of you. Miss Levinge — do not walk so fast — I want 
 to tell you that I love you, more than I ever thought I 
 should. I " 
 
 "I am much obliged, but I cannot possibly marry you," 
 came from beneath Mary's sunshade. 
 
 " But surely this is not final. Let me call and plead my 
 cause." 
 
 "Nothing will make me alter my mind." 
 
 And then Miss Levinge did an undignified thing. She 
 positively ran the last hundred yards of the Eow and pre- 
 sented herself pale, agitated, and breathless before her Aunt 
 Judith and Mrs. Cohen. 
 
 The latter saw at a glance that her son's suit had not 
 prospered, but she, too, never knew when she was beaten. 
 
 " I shall drive round to see you this afternoon at three, " 
 she said icily, as Eugene came up with a sullen look on his 
 handsome face and lent his aid while she descended from 
 the victoria. 
 
 " But — I — " protested Mary falteringly. 
 
 "At three," repeated Mrs. Cohen, with a stiff bow. 
 "Eugene, we will go that way and pick up a cab." 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 But when Mrs. Cohen in her high-hung claret-coloured 
 barouche swept up the short drive to the door of Holmhurst, 
 on the very stroke of three, she was informed by the suave 
 butler that Miss Levinge had gone out in a hansom directly 
 after luncheon, and he could not say when she would be 
 back. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen thereupon contented herself by delivering a 
 long discourse on her son's devotion and Mary's foolish 
 flippancy to Mrs. Marx, who, having lunched more freely 
 than usual on cold fish, pickled cucumbers, and almond pud- 
 ding, was in a somnolent condition, and only hoped that a 
 lack of argument would bring the interview to a speedy 
 termination, and so give her time for a good sleep before 
 tea. 
 
 Mary, meanwhile, alone and utterly friendless in her 
 great luxurious house, had flown to Lady St. Cyprien. 
 This second proposal, this personal avowal of love from a 
 man, troubled and frightened her. When Mrs. Montagu 
 had urged reasons why Mary should permit herself to be 
 engaged to Lionel, the idea of marriage had seemed so re- 
 mote, so vague, that she had scarcely realised that she had 
 refused. Her only memory of the interview rested on Mrs. 
 Montagu's outspoken expressions of anger and disappoint- 
 ment. 
 
 But this second offer, from a man she had but slightly 
 known, and of whom she had never thought, this love suit 
 pressed upon her with hot breath that fanned her cheek and 
 
WITHOUT SIN 113 
 
 passionate eyes that sought her own, had alarmed her. If 
 Eugene Cohen had had another five minutes to plead his 
 cause, his object might have been gained, for it is often the 
 most timid bird that will, from fascinated fear, return to the 
 lure, but fortune had not favoured him. 
 
 Mary was alarmed, and, virginally, a little disgusted; 
 but no instincts had been roused within her, and it was the 
 dreaded annoyance of a repetition of the proposal through 
 Mrs. Cohen that drove her for refuge to Lowndes Square, 
 rather than a girlish desire to confess the first flutterings of 
 an awakened heart. 
 
 "Take off your hat, child, and sit down," said Lady St. 
 Cyprien, when Mary was announced. " A little bird told 
 me you were looking charming in the Park this morning — 
 but — " and her keen kind eyes took in every faint token of 
 diutress on the girl's face — "what has happened to worry 
 you, my dear?" 
 
 "You guess I am worried then?" said Mary, forcing a 
 faint smile to her mouth. 
 
 For answer the Countess lifted a hand-mirror, quaintly 
 set in old beaten silver, from a table and held it up to Mary's 
 face, reflecting her heavy-lidded eyes, humid with unshed 
 tears, her pale cheeks and down-drawn mouth. 
 
 "Look at yourself," said Lady St. Cyprien, "then tell 
 me what has happened." 
 
 She put the mirror down, then laid her hands — such 
 strong, firm hands — on Mary's slender, gloved fingers. 
 
 " Mary, my child, be your trouble trivial or great, real or 
 merely a fancy, tell it — not of necessity to me — but to some 
 one, any one. You always kept your baby woes, your 
 childish confidences, locked in your own heart. But, my 
 dear, the trials, the griefs, the joys of womanhood must be 
 yours now, and there will be no room for them. Or if you 
 nurse them too long, and clasp them too closely, they will 
 8 
 
114 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 stifle you, and kill your sweet nature as ivy kills the noblest 
 tree. I know your childhood has been lonely ; you have 
 had neither wise advisers nor friends; you have fed your 
 soul and your imagination on the musty remnants of the 
 past, but now you must give your heart wholesome food, or 
 it will lie like a stone within your bosom." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien paused a moment, then in a lighter tone 
 said: 
 
 " Well, Mary, am I to be your confidante ?" 
 
 Mary slipped along the sofa that held them both till her 
 shoulder touched Lady St. Cyprien. 
 
 "If you please 1" she answered simply. 
 
 Then she related almost word for word Eugene Cohen's 
 proposal. She did not blush as she repeated what her 
 would-be lover had said ; only her eyes involuntarily widened 
 as though she spoke of something disagreeable to her. 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien let her finish even so far as her confes- 
 sion that she had fled before the threatened invasion of 
 Mrs. Cohen. Then she spoke. 
 
 " But, my dear, this marriage is very different from the 
 Montagu affair. Surely Mr. Cohen is a nice person, well 
 off — though that need not affect you — good-looking, and a 
 suitable age. It is true, there have been, I believe " 
 
 Here the Countess stopped. Her sense of honour urged 
 her to place such a marriage in the most favourable light 
 before Mary, though her desire that the girl should one day 
 become Lord Stansdale's wife tempted her with the feminine 
 bait of retailing gossip about the wooer of that morning. 
 But one glance at Mary's face stayed her. It would be 
 mere wanton wickedness to raise by one inch the veil of pu- 
 rity which clung about the girl's white soul. So Lady St. 
 Cyprien put the curb on her tongue, and continued, with 
 heroic abnegation: 
 
 " You must not decide so important an event without due 
 
WITHOUT SIN 115 
 
 thought. I think you should give this Mr. Cohen, who 
 would appear to be really fond of you, another chance." 
 
 " I could not do that," said Mary, in her firmest manner, 
 and shaking her head. 
 
 " Do you not like him, then?" 
 
 " I shall never marry," said the girl, evading the quibble, 
 and with characteristic honesty speaking the truth. 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien's dark face assumed a mingled look of 
 quiet delight and shrewd prescience. She knew that Mary 
 Levinge was both proud and shy, and she felt sure that the 
 girl was making a dignified assertion, in case some man 
 whom she loved should never propose to her. 
 
 " All girls say that, my dear, and to a certain extent it is 
 maidenly and right that they should. The young girl who, 
 for whatever reason, openly hunts a man into matrimonial 
 bondage is contemptible; but I hope, and indeed feel sure, 
 that you will marry some day, my love, for a woman un- 
 married is a woman marred, to misquote the old proverb. 
 At present you are very young to bind yourself. You must 
 see the world a little, and learn the ways of all men, before 
 you choose one. And this brings me to a subject which is 
 very near my heart." 
 
 Lady St. Gyprien dropped her voice a little. ' She was 
 going to refer to the one grief of her life, her childlessness. 
 It was a sorrow which had remained green, and which she 
 had never been able to put from her. 
 
 " I want to ask a favour of you, for myself and for Lord 
 St. Cyprien, my dear. Ah! you look surprised, and you 
 are wondering what you can do for us. Mary, you can give 
 us yourself for a while, until some one worthy of your love 
 and yourself claims you. Stay, don't speak; let me finish. 
 We, St. Cyprien and I, have been married nearly twenty 
 years ; if God had been good to us we might have had a 
 daughter of your age. But we never had any children. 
 
116 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Will you be our daughter? I do not ask you to leave Holm- 
 hurst. It is only right that you should bear the responsi- 
 bilities of your wealth, but will you be with us as much as 
 possible? You are worthy of better things than can fall to 
 your share if you are left to such people as the Montagus 
 and Cohens. With me, you would go to the best houses in 
 the kingdom, and could count among your friends the high- 
 est, cleverest, most exclusive of men and women. From 
 among them I hope you will one day choose a husband, and 
 so find a very happy life." 
 
 Mary was silent for a while, but the slight twitching of 
 her mouth and the restless twisting of her hands showed fihe 
 was struggling to voice some of the thoughts and dreams 
 which had been hers for so long. 
 
 "Lady St. Cyprien, how can I thank you?" she said, 
 presently, her lips trembling with emotion and her eyes 
 brilliant with gathering tears. " Ah ! I know, you ask no 
 thanks, but it eases me to give them. If I may be with 
 you sometimes, I shall be grateful ; you have been my best 
 and truest friend, and I feel you love me. But," she lifted 
 one hand slightly, then let it fall heavily on her knee again, 
 "I cannot be as your daughter." 
 
 She shook her head, round which the loose tendrils of 
 her fair hair cast a pallid halo. Two heavy tears dropped 
 from her lashes and rolled swiftly down her cheeks. 
 
 " N"o thought, no persuasion, can change me. All your 
 sweet tenderness, all my deep gratitude, cannot bring us 
 quite together, can never bind us as mother and daughter 
 should be bound. We are of a different people. I come of 
 an accursed race, who yet have laboured through long 
 centuries with but one hope — redemption. Your people 
 have persecuted mine through the centuries. The old feud 
 is dying now, I think, but not so easily or so quickly that 
 you and I can be as of one flesh." 
 
WITHOUT SIN 117 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien sighed a little. Deep and sincere as 
 was her personal affection for this charming Jewish girl, 
 much as she desired her gentle companionship, highly as 
 she valued her sweet affection, her own heart, versed in 
 knowledge of the world and the ways of men, admitted with 
 most characteristic honesty the absolute justice of Mary's 
 words. To hear the truth grieved her all the more in that 
 she fully grasped the sincerity of the girl's meaning. 
 
 She might advise and befriend Mary, who in turn might 
 confide in and consult her; the perfection of unbounded 
 friendship and trust might exist between them, but, sooner 
 or later, the difference that lies immutably between the 
 people of the East and West must arise. It might be 
 trif ial or unsurmountable ; a question of sociology or a mat- 
 ter of religious ethics, or it might range from the cut of a 
 gown to the choice of a husband. 
 
 But what ever it might be about, the difference would 
 come, and love and friendship would break down before a 
 habit of body or trick of thought engendered in either, 
 through scores of ancestors. Lady St. Cyprien felt instinc- 
 tively that not yet were the Jew and the Gentile to be as 
 one, and again she sighed. 
 
 Her evident disappointment wrung Mary's heart. She 
 turned her swimming eyes on her friend and held out one 
 slender hand. 
 
 " Yes, I will be with you, " she said softly, " when and 
 where you wish — but my life will not be lived in ballrooms, 
 my destiny will not be fulfilled — in society. May I go home 
 now?" 
 
 Meekly, and like a little child, she held her sweet mouth 
 to Lady St. Cyprien to kiss, then she left the house. 
 
 " That girl is terribly nervous, " said Lady St. Cyprien 
 aloud in an effort to steady her stirred emotions, as she 
 heard the front door close behind Mary. "Noel Marrable 
 
118 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 was quite right when he said sometime ago that she lacked 
 mental self-control. I cannot but wish that she weye less 
 fanciful, less imaginative. These strange ideas she has are 
 hardly healthy. But — she is very young — and impressions 
 fade so quickly from girl's minds. I must take her to 
 Mason's next week, and interest her about her gowns for 
 the season, and Stansdale must be a little attentive. This 
 young Jew has evidently rushed at his fences and fallen at 
 the first. Stansdale will manage his wooing better than 
 that, and try and bring her to a more natural state of mind." 
 
 When Mary reached home the lovely March day was draw- 
 ing to a close. It was a Friday, and within an hour, when 
 the sun would have set, the Sabbath would begin. 
 
 As usual, Martin Baird was expected to dinner, and Mary 
 went straight to her room to change her white cloth frock 
 for a soft, flowing gown of snowy China silk, She was just 
 dressed when a fluttering knock at the door heralded Mrs. 
 Marx. She so seldom left her own apartments, that Mary 
 instinctively felt that this incursion boded no good. 
 
 It was, however, short-lived, for Mrs. Marx was neither 
 an adept at arranging her ideas, nor at giving them utter- 
 ance. Her brief visit resolved itself into a whining com- 
 plaint, spoken in a barbarous mixture of Polish, English, 
 and Yiddish, concerning Mary's wickedness in refusing to 
 become the wife of Eugene Cohen, of Mrs. Cohen's disap- 
 pointment, of Ephraim Levinge's anger — for she seemed to 
 be oblivious of his death— and of the wrath which the 
 Judaioal authorities would pour on Mary's head when, they 
 learnt that she chose her friends from among an alien race. 
 Her muddled remonstrances given forth, Mrs. Marx retired, 
 quite satisfied, to her own rooms. 
 
 The protest had been ridiculous, but it wearied, Mary 
 who was already unstrung by the emotions of the day. She 
 looked tired and worn as she faced Baird at d^iiner that night ; 
 
WITHOUT SIN 119 
 
 and he, with the ever-present consciousness of her heaiti 
 loneliness, was deeply moved by the mournful expression 
 of her pale face. 
 
 He spoke of her weary mien, and then she made an effort 
 to be brighter. 
 
 " I am only tired," she said,, with a faint smile. " Tired 
 of doing nothing, I expect. After dinner we will have a 
 long turn at the books. I shall be a yery stem mistress 
 this evening, and shall complain of every tlj.iug." 
 
 But the books were never looked at after aU, for at the 
 end of dinner she overset, a glass, which broke as it fell, 
 and cut her across the wrist. 
 
 The pain was trifling, but the bleeding was severe for a 
 few minutes, and gave her a headache. She spent the even- 
 ing lying, white; and weary, on the sofa,, which stood beneath 
 the old panel picture of the Madonna. 
 
 Baird remarked how the likeness between the painted 
 face and the living girl had deepBned, but added, with his 
 rare smile : 
 
 "If you grow so pale. Miss Levinge, there will be but 
 little resemblance left," 
 
 She shook her head. , ,' 
 
 "You must not say that, Martin., I have been like her 
 ever since I was a child. I am like her still — I, shall be 
 like her in the future." 
 
 Then she fell into thought,, with her eyes closed against 
 the world, and the corners of her full, curved mouth 
 pressed together. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 Next morning Mary rose with a fuller, happier sense of 
 life than she had felt yesterday. The young cannot always 
 fix their eyes upon the future, and the present was fair for 
 her and not without interest. As she dressed, the memory 
 came to her that she was to lunch that day with Lady Theo 
 Bellastier, and she chose her prettiest white gown to honour 
 the occasion. 
 
 Lady Theo Bellastier's drawing-room in Wilton Place 
 was a reflex of herself. Furniture of extraordinary ugli- 
 ness — bought in the long ago by the worthy old country 
 gentleman whom Lady Theo called "husband" when she 
 noticed him at all — formed a lumbering background to the 
 thousand prettinesses and impertinences which formed her 
 ladyship's idea of decoration. 
 
 A huge console table of gloomy mahogany and bilious 
 Sienna marble was covered with half-a-dozen outrageous 
 little statuettes in clear Parian china and many bowls of 
 sweet-scented flowers. 
 
 Bertie Chant had said one day that the clumsy table with 
 its airy burden of pert figures and exquisite flowers reminded 
 him of Lady Theo's face, with her wide mouth, vulgar nose, 
 and divine eyes, and the simile was not ill-thought out — for 
 Bertie Chant. 
 
 Lady Theo was telling her assembled guests this personal 
 joke, of which she was rather proud, as Mary Levinge was 
 announced. 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien was seated in the window, discussing 
 
WITHOUT SIN 121 
 
 a new altar-piece for her country parish church with Eliot 
 Mayue, the artist, who was more than usually picturesque 
 in chevelure and Philistine in garments. She paused in her 
 talk as Mary was announced, and noted with some degree 
 of pleasure with what self-possession the girl entered the 
 room. Mary greeted those she knew with quiet ease, and 
 acknowledged two or three introductions with a charming 
 smile. 
 
 " It is marvellous to think that such manners ever came 
 out of a Ghetto," murmured Lady St. Cyprien. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, " said Eliot Mayne. " I do not un- 
 derstand." 
 
 "I was guilty of thinking aloud, Mr. Mayne," laughed 
 Lady St. Cyprien, and at the same time nodding across the 
 room to Mary. 
 
 " Who is that girl in white who has just come in?" asked 
 the artist. "She is pretty, of course; but somehow that 
 seems scarcely the word to describe her. Every woman is 
 pretty in her own particular line nowadays ; but that face 
 is neither of our century nor of our standard of beauty." 
 
 He drew his brows together above his keen dark eyes, as 
 though a dead memory were struggling to live again. 
 
 " It is a strange thing, Lady St. Cyprien, but in an odd 
 way that face gives one the impression of scarcely being of 
 this world at all." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien started, and a shade of annoyance 
 clouded her face. Eliot Mayne's words recalled too vividly 
 the conversation of yesterday, words she wished and pur- 
 posed putting away from her memory for ever. 
 
 "Please do not say anything so uncanny," she cried, in 
 her most downright manner; "particularly before Miss Le- 
 vinge herself. She is a most sweet girl, but rather full of 
 fancies." 
 
 "Is that Miss Levinge?" cried Mayne, a vivid interest 
 
122 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 growing in his voice. "Is that the child with the yellow 
 hair and the long taper hands I used to see years ago at old 
 Levinge's place in Bond Street? How singularly beautiful 
 she has grown." 
 
 With the gaucherie an indulgent society fosters in the 
 " artistic" temperament, he rose slowly from Lady St; Cyp- 
 rien's side, and, crossing the room, made himself known 
 to Mary. 
 
 The luncheon was a great success. Lady Theo, who 
 believed in the sociability of around table and an indis- 
 criminate "salad" of people, laughed and chattered between 
 a music-hall singer famous for delineations of inebriety and 
 a pushing politician who had hopes of a seat in the Cabinet 
 before the week was out. 
 
 Mary was next Lord Stansdale. The nervous tears of 
 the previous day had acted as a storm which had cleared 
 the; air, and she was brighter and more animated than 
 usual. . 
 
 "Now tell me who everybody is," she said, when the 
 first two courses had been duly discussed. 
 
 "That's not so easy," laughed Stansdale. "Lady Theo 
 ought always to issue biographical sketches of her guests. 
 0ne is always sure that everybody here is somebody — after 
 a fashion,: though it is, not always easy to fix them." 
 
 "Well, tell me about those whom you can fix," persisted 
 , Mary. " Now, what is the man doing here who is sittmg 
 between Lady St. Gyprien and Dr. Marrable? He looks 
 like a labourer and workman of some sort." 
 
 "Wrong the., first time, Miss Levinge. That man 
 couldn't work to save his life, and wouldn't if he could." 
 
 "Then who is he? He's got on a. flannel shirt." 
 
 "He is an Anarchist of the leather-lunged order. He 
 has a fine though somewhat broad flow of language, which 
 he pours forth at East End Radical Clubs three days a week 
 
WITHOUT SIN 123 
 
 and on Sundays in Hyde Park. He quails like a cur every 
 time one of Lady Theo's big footmen goes near him, and he 
 has up to now gone through every course with determina- 
 tion and one knife and fork. He will drink all he can get, 
 and to-morrow will denounce the aristocracy and their de- 
 grading luxury in more full-flavoured language than ever." 
 
 "And who is the queer-looking woman on Dr. Marrable's 
 left?" 
 
 "Mrs. Susan Gordon. She's a New Woman, you know. 
 Didn't you catch sight of her — extremities upstairs? She 
 is attired in canvas shoes, ribbed woollen stockings) and 
 breeches. She arrived here on a bicycle. She holds an- 
 tique and worn-out theories concerning the superiority of 
 women." ' 
 
 " Is she married?" 
 
 " Yes, to a rather nice little fellow. He hunts with the 
 Quorn all the winter, then goes and fishes in Norway till 
 the cubbing begins. His name is Dick Massingham." 
 
 " Massingham ! But you called her Gordon — Mrs. Siisan 
 Gordon — just now." 
 
 " Oh ! that's one of her theories. She thinks that the 
 adoption of a husband's name on marriage is an outward 
 and visible sign of a moral and physical degradation. Nice 
 woman, isn't she?" 
 
 "I am afraid I think her horrid; but then, you see, the 
 women of my people have not yet outgrown the Orientalism 
 of centuries," said Mary frankly. 
 
 Lord Stansdale was silent. He was honestly and truly 
 in love with Mary. His was not perhaps a very grand 
 passion, but then the high-born English temperament does 
 not readily lend itself to ecstatics about anything. He 
 only knew that he found her the prettiest girl in London, 
 that her "form" was perfectly unimpeachable, and that if 
 he should win her for his wife, he would make her a very 
 
124 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 affectionate and faithful husband. Of her money he 
 thought but little, of her family not at all. One thing only 
 distressed him at times. Stansdale felt for Jews all the 
 contempt with which a triumphant nation regards the con- 
 quered. With the glorious traditions of an ancestry of 
 warriors behind him, he could feel nothing but supreme 
 disdain for a race which had only kept a place among 
 nations by huckstering and intriguing. It galled his pride 
 and wounded his vanity to know that^ the woman he loved 
 and respected was sprung from a people he despised, and 
 he was annoyed that she should seek to remind him of the 
 fact. 
 
 " That is Eliot Mayne, is it not?" went on Mary, inno- 
 cent of having vexed her neighbour. " I often saw him at 
 the Galleries in my grandfather's lifetime. But who is 
 the odd man next to him? The one with the ring on his 
 thumb and the stiff round collar." 
 
 "Don't you know Erastus Bawdon, Miss Levinge? 
 Why, he is the greatest dilettante in religion and amateur 
 ecclesiastical art of our day. He has professed all faiths 
 in his time, even your own, but he is just now a Iloman 
 Catholic. He is enormously rich, and is building an 
 exquisite church in the grounds of his house in Berkshire. 
 He has been scouring Europe for carvings, pictures, and 
 statues. He considers that the true crux of religion lies in 
 art, and he attributes the diminished power of the Pope in 
 England to the fact that the pictures in Eoman Catholic 
 places of worship are vilely drawn and horribly coloured, 
 and that the statues are faulty in modelling and lacking 
 in intention." 
 
 Mary looked across at Mr. Bawdon. He was a big, heavy 
 man, with a coarse mouth and a square jaw, closely shaven. 
 His short black hair, which was very thick on the temples, 
 was brushed forward on to his forehead in a manner sug- 
 
WITHOUT sm 125^ 
 
 gesting a tonsure on the crown. His attire was severe, and 
 of a priestly cut, his only ornament being a magnificent 
 thumb-ring set with a carved emerald. In a voice both 
 sonorous and deep he was laying down the law to Eliot 
 Mayne, who, replete with the products of Lady Theo's chef, 
 was nodding his artistically arranged head in comfortable 
 acquiescence. 
 
 " I maintain that even the greatest masters erred in this 
 matter. They saw their Marys and other holy women with 
 the eyes of a lover, or at best a husband. The same model 
 would sit for the Holy Mother and the Magdalen. Look 
 at the fat German /raws, the lovely, loose-living Venetians, 
 the blowsy Mamandes, who posed through centuries for 
 saints, and gave religion its ideal Virgin Marys. It was 
 nothing short of blasphemy, and bad art into the bargain." 
 
 His voice rose, and his emphatic words and ponderous 
 gestures stilled the tattle of the table. 
 
 " Latter-day church art is even worse, for it is founded 
 on the most debased traditions. Noel Baton's pictures 
 could not inspire a single spark of religious sentiment. I 
 would sooner far hang Watts's "Love and Life" above an 
 altar than " The Good Shepherd." As for my own church, 
 I am determined it shall go bare of pictures and sculptured 
 art till I can find something which will aid religion. My 
 Lady Chapel shall have no image of the Virgin until I see 
 a face which suggests by its beauty and innocence the 
 Mother of " 
 
 Mr. Bawdon lifted his glass in his big hairy hand, 
 intending to drink when he had finished speaking. His 
 eyes met those of Mary. She sat just opposite to him, and 
 as silence fell upon the rest of the party, her whole atten- 
 tion had been given to him. With a faint flush staining 
 the fair pallor of her cheeks, her wax-white lids half 
 lowered over her eyes, the slender thread of her brows 
 
136 WitHOXJT SIN 
 
 crossing the round full i^orehead, and her mouth slightly 
 relaxecl from its usual com pressioh,' she' looked ' across thfe 
 table at the big ugly man, with the didactic mariner and 
 the square, blue chin. 
 
 , For one long silent minute Mr. Bawdoii stared at Mary 
 in the same way as he would have scrutinised a' picture'. 
 Then Lady Theo proposed cigarettes and coif ee upstairs; 
 the women fluttered from the room, with thie men in a com- 
 pact mass at their heels. 
 
 Once upstairs the stemmed tide of chatter broke out 
 again. The Anarchist', with a fine cigar between his lips, 
 and black coffee and liqueur at his side, was blinking in 
 muddled astonishment at a wonderfully gowned American, 
 who had introduced herself to him, and began the conver- 
 sation by tejling him he Was "just too sweet for anything." 
 
 Mrs. Susan Gordon tackled Dr. Marrable on a " nice" 
 point concerning sex relationship, Lady Theo wandered to 
 the piano with a long-locked Italian musician who had come 
 to London to make his fortune. Mary slipped jhto a low 
 seat at Lady St. Cyprien's side, while Lord Stansdale and' 
 Bertie Chant joined Eliot Mayne and Mr. Bawdoh, at the 
 further end of the rooin, where a card-table was set out. 
 
 "My dear," began Lady St. Cyprien. "If you always 
 look, as pretty as you do this afternoon, I shall have the 
 responsibility of a beauty as well as an heiress on my 
 shoulders all the season." 
 
 "Ah! but I never promised." 
 
 "I know you didn't, but all the same you cannot go 
 about even a little by yourself. I will let you off balls and 
 races, till you beg me to take you to them, but you are too 
 fond of music not to wish to go to the Opera sometimes. 
 And you must drive every day, and go to a few really good 
 houses with me. Why, you already are all the better for 
 coming out to-day." 
 
WITHOUt Slli 127 
 
 ' WMch I was neatly not able to do — I hurt my hand last 
 night at dinner. I intended to show it to Dr. Marrable this 
 morning, but was afraid he would forbid me to come here." 
 
 She smiled across to where he was suffering torments at 
 the tongue of Mrs. Susan Gordon. 
 
 "Oh! my dear, Noel Marrable's patients are all women, 
 and he haS learnt the art of humouring them. That is the 
 true secret of his success." 
 
 Bertie Chant, red-faced and smiling above the newest 
 and most startling thing in cravats, ambled towards them. 
 
 "Miss Mary Levinge, the new beauty, looked quite 
 charming in white," he quoted from a prospective para- 
 graph, which he intended to write on his return home. 
 " Ifady St. Cyprien, both Mr. Eliot Mayne and Mr. Bawdon 
 ha're a great favour to ask of your fair charge, and want to 
 get you on their side. I told them that you were a shock- 
 ing dragon, and that a lot of intercession was necessary." 
 
 He put his sleek head on one side and looked waggish. 
 Tea minutes later it travelled round the room that at the 
 reo/uest of Mr. Erastus Bawdon, Miss Levinge had con- 
 sented to give sittings to Mr. Mayne for a picture of the 
 Blessed Virgin, which would ultimately be placed above 
 the altar in his new church. 
 
 Every one was enraptured : Lady Theo, that such an 
 artistic event should have occurred in her Philistine abode; 
 Bertie Chant, because he foresaw whole columns of smart, 
 suggestive copy; Lord Stansdale, because it was a fitting 
 tribute to the beauty and purity of the girl he admired. 
 The little American, frantic to be "in the know," left her 
 anarchist and frankly stared at Mary with a view to copy- 
 ing her style; Mrs. Susan Gordon regarded the affair as a 
 vindication of the sex. Only Lady St. Cyprien felt a 
 vague dislike to the scheme, which she could neither for- 
 mulate nor voice. 
 
138 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Mary stood among them all, pale and moved. An, 
 ineffable joy that she was deemed worthy to pose as a 
 model for her ideal, thrilled her, and made her blind and 
 deaf to her surroundings. A rapt look crept over her 
 face — she was fast drifting into a dream of perfect beati- 
 tude when Dr. Marrable touched her arm. 
 
 " You are looking tired, Miss Levinge, you had better let 
 me see you to your carriage." 
 
 He took her from the room, and placing her in her 
 brougham, ordered her to drive home and to lie down. 
 
CHAPTEE XV 
 
 "Can't I take a rest? I feel like dropping." 
 
 Eliot Mayne shot a keen glance from the canvas on which 
 he was working at the tired model, and then back again to. 
 the picture. 
 
 "I shan't keep you long now, Eosie," he said, "but I 
 want to get the pose perfectly right this morning, and if 
 you can stand still for a few minutes longer without faint- 
 ing, you can rest as long as you like — and I promise not to 
 mind if you charge me double this time!" 
 
 "Will you promise me something else?" asked the girl a 
 minute later. " Will you promise not to get somebody else 
 to sit for the hands?" 
 
 "Why?" he remarked indifferently. 
 
 The girl almost moved in her eagerness. 
 
 " Because if I can say I've sat to you for hands as well 
 as bust and figure, lots of others will be certain to take 
 me." 
 
 "Very well, I'll see what I can do." 
 
 "But I want you to promise," insisted the model. 
 
 " All right then, I promise. Now, another five minutes. " 
 
 With a slight sigh the model resigned herself to the 
 inevitable, while the artist, with bent brows and swiftly 
 moving brush, worked intently at the exquisite nude figure 
 which he intended to make the chief interest in his latest 
 version of St. Anthony's Temptation, which was as nearly 
 a sacred subject as Mayne' s fleshly instincts could combine 
 9 
 
130 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 with religious art without offending his own particular 
 patrons. He worked rapidly, and already the canvas 
 throbbed with actualities. 
 
 The model's throne was drawn into the very heart of the 
 flood of sharp white light that flowed like an unrelenting 
 sea through the great north window. Behind it was slung 
 from the ceiling a curtain of canvas, quaintly coloured in 
 faded distemper work. It looked like dull shot velvet in 
 the morning radiance/ and its dim shadows threw up in 
 crude contrast the intense fairness of the model who, with 
 airy pose and alluring gesture, represented the very crown 
 of man's temptation — ^young and exquisitely beautiful 
 womanhood. Scarcely draped by the cloud-like gauze scarf 
 that lost its substance against the nacreous gleam of her 
 flawless skin, the girl stood all unabashed by the exposed 
 perfection of line and limb in the pitiless glare of the cold 
 reflected light. Airily poised on one slender foot, she held 
 out a beckoning hand. 
 
 "There!" said Mayne, suddenly rising; "That pose is 
 perfect, but it's a strain I know. Now you may rest;" 
 
 The] naked girl stepped from the throne and stretched 
 her stiffened muscles- before dropping into a deep carved 
 chair, over which a black bearskin was flung. 
 
 "Yes! it is d, bit of a twister, that attitude, but you 
 know I always like to go one better than the others, and 
 this beats the Solomon girl." 
 
 "You mean 'Salome,' Eosie." 
 
 "Perhaps I do, but anyway they'll all know who sat for 
 the temptress party, at the first glance. Eosie Graves all 
 over! they'll say, and won't I have a crow over the other 
 models at the Academy private view?" 
 
 "Well, they won't be far out, will they?" said Mayne, 
 with a light laugh at the girl's social ambition, glancing 
 from the figure on the canvas to the form of the girl in the 
 
WITHOUT SIN 131 
 
 chair. With a tardy sense that she was not at work, Kosie 
 drew the folds of the fur about her. 
 
 Mayne with light touches worked on the dark background 
 as she sat and chattered. 
 
 " For goodness' sake give me a cigarette, or smoke your- 
 self," said Eosie Graves suddenly. "This place of yours 
 is beastly close this morning." 
 
 Mayne laid down his brushes, ajid drawing out a small 
 silver cigarette case from his pocket, tossed it to the model. 
 
 "What rubbishy little things!" she cried with contempt, 
 helping herself. 
 
 " Yes, they are small, and you're only going to get one 
 of them to-day." 
 
 "Why so stingy?" 
 
 "I'm not stingy, my dear; you can take them all, but 
 you mustn't smoke more than one here. A lady is coming 
 to sit presently, and I don't suppose she'd care to find the 
 studio reeking of smoke," replied Mayne. 
 
 A malicious gleam crept into the depths of Eosie Graves' 
 velvety brown eyes, and the corners of her full scarlet 
 mouth curled with glee. 
 
 "Ha! ha! that's why the place is all fixed up with flow- 
 ers ; I thought you hadn't been out buying lilies for me." 
 
 " I buy flowers for no one, Eosie, and you know it," said 
 Mayne, assuming the austerity of the pictured saint before 
 him. 
 
 "Oh! what about big Lisa?" cried Eosie, teasingly, as 
 she blew a ring into the air, and slipped one pink-tipped 
 finger through the filmy circlet. " She always brought no 
 end of a bunch from here that time she and I and Emmie 
 Smith wpre sitting to old Arundel for his 'Judgment of 
 Paris.' She always came from you to him, and I used to 
 see 'em. When she was in a good temper, we each got a 
 flower." 
 
132 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Eliot Mayne laughed the curious little laugh that always 
 implies admission to an impeachment of gallantry. 
 
 "Heavens! what an ideal Magdalen that woman was." 
 
 "Yes, for she always gave your flowers to young 
 Marshall." 
 
 "Did she?" 
 
 "Rather." 
 
 "What's become of her?" 
 
 Eosie simpered with affected reticence before she spoke. 
 " After she followed Bertie Vernon to New York and he 
 threw her over, she joined some burlesque show out there. 
 Teddy Cobbe — you know that scrubby little chap who's 
 just joined the Newlyu lot — saw her with an awful snide 
 crowd when he was in the States last summer. He said 
 she'd dyed her hair yellow and gone fat, and she had come 
 down to sitting to photographers and for 'living pictures.' 
 Love and drink spoils 'em all," said Eosie, taking advan- 
 tage of Mayne' s abstraction to let her tongue run on, 
 "Why, look at me, I've had my temptations as well as 
 most of 'em, and I like a glass of fizz as much as anybody 
 and had more chances of getting it, but I don't touch it, 
 not me ! I know better. " 
 
 With the pride of a dealer who ofEers his best wares to a 
 privileged customer, she shook the white beauties of her 
 perfect body free from the soft fur covering and, drawing 
 herself up to her full height, glanced lovingly at the 
 delicious curves which swept in harmonious lines from her 
 firm, rounded bosom to the slender ankles and blue-veined 
 marble of her delicately arched feet. 
 
 "What's the result? They're falling over each other to. 
 get me to go to Paris, but as long as the pay keeps good 
 and I haven't to go touting round Campden Hill and St. 
 John's Wood for work, London's good enough for me. 
 I'm saving a bit of money, and when I'm sick of the life, I 
 
WITHOUT SIJ^ 133 
 
 can marry an old Academician and sit to him. No models 
 inside my house. Not me!" 
 
 But to his model's diatribes on the failings and ambitions 
 of her profession, Mayne was deaf. Sunk in the luxurious 
 depths of his great chair hung with old Spanish leather, he 
 slipped into a waking dream, in which the rare bit of 
 womanhood at his side had no entity. Through the faint 
 blue wreaths of the curling smoke he sent his eyes travel- 
 ling from the misty distance of the open oak roof, crossed 
 and recrossed with straight square-cut beams, to the high 
 level where the wood-work ended, and the plaster walls, 
 painted a cold stone grey, began. In the first ardour of 
 ascetic eestheticism, when he had nailed his metier to the 
 painting of pale martyrs and repentant Magdalens, Mayne 
 had thought that monastic surroundings and uncompromis- 
 ing outlines would blossom into radiant colour and never- 
 fading beauty, as in the golden age of art. 
 
 In that early enthusiasm he had built his studio in the 
 guise of those chill chapels where the pursuit of the divine 
 is carried on under a form of penance for the human. But 
 he found too soon that no monkish fire of faith touched his 
 pencil, that he could not snatch inspiration from mere 
 dreams of fair faces, of pure virgins, and of slaughtered 
 saints. So by degrees the hard grey walls were lined with 
 Eastern silks, strips of rare leathers, with fine panels of old 
 carvings, and faces from the long-since dead hands of the 
 great masters. In every degree of resignation, in every 
 phase of torture, the saints and martyrs, the Christs and 
 Virgins, and fair, frail Magdalens looked back at him with 
 their meek eyes. Perhaps it was the recollection of the 
 lost Lisa that made him appreciate, with a shadowy smile 
 of self- scorn creeping round his bearded lips, that fi'om the 
 creations of his own brain and hands there emanated a 
 subtle, indefinable suggestion of mockery, for his apostles 
 
lU WITHOUT SIN 
 
 were merely satyrSj his Magdalpcis wnrepentant. He had 
 noticed it before, and the knowledge • of the flessh that 
 thrilled him at such times again angered him and spurred 
 him from his purposeless thoughts. 
 
 "A quarter to eleven!" he crijed suddenly, "Epsie^ jI'U 
 give you ten minutes to get out of this. Huryy,. therj^'/a a 
 good girl." 
 
 With a shrug of her shapely; shoulders Eosie (jrrafes 
 passed leisurely down the length of the great studio, to 
 where a heavy screen of carved black oak marked the 
 entrance to a tiny dressing-room. Among the devout old 
 pictures and rich church hangings, which bore ecclesiastical 
 emblems in every rich fold, through the picturesque con- 
 fusion of inlaid chairs and old church coffers, she carr led 
 the glory of the world and the epitome of heaven, a wo- 
 man's perfect beauty. 
 
 Even the brightness of the morning .faded a little as she 
 picked up her clotheSj and the gleaming whi,teness of ker 
 body was lost behind the dusky shadows of the black Bak 
 screen; yet Eliot Mayne breathed. freer as she went, and in 
 the breathing savoured the odour of tobacco, and of the 
 strong perfume that the girl .affected. i 
 
 With fastidious haste he lit at tbe small glowing fir<i a 
 score of scented joss-sticks, which he thrust in the pierced 
 silver cover of an old thurible, swinging on finely chased 
 silver chains from a bracket that Cellini might have cliis- 
 elled. As the .diaphanous blue smoke curled gently, up- 
 wards, and mingled its pungent fragrance with the sweeter 
 scent of the flowers,, he murmureid;: 
 
 " That will get rid of the smell of tobacco," ,, 
 
 He moved, about,, slowly re-arranging the white lilies 
 which stood erect in vases of JTapanesp brpn^e ,in every 
 corner of the studio. From among the dim shadows, cast all 
 about the wide fiyeplace by a balijaotiino of early Italian inlay 
 
WITHOUT SIN 135 
 
 ■work, the flowers gleamed out like great shining stars, while 
 beneath the big north window they had been arranged with 
 mediaeval stiffness, in a long row of single blossoms, that 
 looked creamily transparent against the brilliant light 
 
 "How strong they are. They've given me a headache 
 already," he cried, and stretched his hand out to touch the 
 cool white flowers, whose yellow tongues gave them the 
 appearance of swans that had thrust up their heads from 
 the reeds to be caressed. 
 
 A touch on his arm made him turn. Eosie, dressed for 
 the street in a smart little frock of pale blue, stood at his 
 elbow and smiled deliciously at him from under the wide 
 brim of her hat. 
 
 "Give me a kiss for being such a good girl," she said 
 prettily, and sliding up to him. " When are you going to 
 take me out again?" she wheedled. 
 
 He laughed a little as he picked out her morning's wage 
 from a handful of coin. 
 
 " You're an awful baby still, Eosie, though you are the 
 best-made woman in London. There's your money and 
 there's your kiss," and he lightly brushed her cheek with 
 his lips. " Now, where do you want to go to-night?" 
 
 " Anywhere that's bright and jolly — one of the music- 
 halls — and supper afterwards?" persisted the model. 
 
 "If you like." 
 
 "But no champagne, you know," she laughed. 
 
 "As you please, my girl." 
 
 Eosie Graves began to draw a pair of lemon-coloured 
 gloves over her shapely hands. 
 
 "Who's the lady all the flowers are for?" she said sud- 
 denly, looking at Mayne through her lowered lashes. 
 
 " Merely a young lady who " 
 
 " Is not going to sit for the temptress?" and Eosie nod- 
 ded towiards the St. Anthony. 
 
136 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 "Good heavens, no!" cried Mayne vehemently. 
 
 "Not even the hands?" teased the girl. 
 
 " Of course not. Didn't I promise you ?" 
 
 "And she don't like tobacco?" 
 
 "Many young ladies don't." 
 
 Eosie tittered ostentatiously, and tossed her feathered 
 hat. 
 
 "Then if she's so mighty particular about smells I ad- 
 vise you to open a window, for those burning things and all 
 these flowers are enough to turn anybody faint. " 
 
 "What nonsense. You're as fussy as a fine lady your- 
 self. Now off you go!" 
 
 Raising herself on tiptoe to reach his superior height, 
 she kissed him on the mouth, then ran laughing down the 
 studio. 
 
 "Miss Levinge," announced the servant, and, as Kosie 
 Graves whisked her pale-blue skirts through a side door, 
 Eliot Mayne advanced to meet his sitter. 
 
 Mary, jn a cool white linen gown and simple, broad- 
 leaved hat, entered alone, bringing into the bizarre affecta- 
 tions and false art of the studio, now heavy with the ming- 
 ling odours of lilies and the aromatic vapour of the burning 
 incense, a delicious atmosphere of pure morning freshness. 
 
 " You are still determined to pose for the whole picture, 
 Miss Levinge?" said Mayne, turning the just begun portrait 
 of Mary, as the Holy Virgin, towards the light. 
 
 " Yes, if you please, Mr. Mayne. I should like the whole 
 picture to be really me. I think Mr. Bawdon would wish 
 it too, and I shall not at all mind sitting." 
 
 " I will make it as easy for you as possible. We will 
 begin as soon as you have changed your dress for the one 
 which you will find in this room. " 
 
 A little later Mary came out of the dressing-room trans- 
 formed from the young lady of to-day into a mediaeval 
 
WITHOUT SIN 137 
 
 maiden. Her unbound hair hung like a curtain of spun 
 silk about her bare shoulders and open throat, where it 
 made corn-coloured shadows. She wore a straight gown of 
 soft white woollen, that fell in simple pleats from the low- 
 cut round neckband to her sandalled feet. A high-backed 
 chair was her seat upon the artist's throne. Across her 
 knees, so delicately outlined by the draperies, Mayne laid 
 a great sheaf of the heavy scented lilies, and round her feet 
 they were clustered with such art that she herself seemed 
 one of them, growing upwards in a very cloud of perfume. 
 In her right hand she held sceptre-wise a tall green rod, 
 crowned only with one blossom. It gleamed against the 
 pale gold threads of her hair like frosted silver, and the 
 petals brushed the pure outline of her cheek. 
 
 "It is lucky that Bawdon cannot see you now, Miss 
 Levinge," said Mayne, as with his freshly set palette he 
 took his place before the easel and began to paint. 
 
 " Why?" said Mary innocently. 
 
 "Oh! because he then would never be satisfied with my 
 picture." 
 
 But Mary did not answer him. Already the fervour of 
 reverence had fallen on her, and the world had drifted by, 
 leaving her alone with the rapture of purity, and innocence 
 of all save the joy of at last figuring in resemblance to the 
 beloved picture of her early days, round which Martin 
 Baird had wound so many beautiful legends. With her 
 grey eyes fixed all unseeing before her, with her ears deaf 
 to aught save singing angels and the formless suggestions 
 of her own imagination, she sat, statue-like in stillness, and 
 statue-like in white purity. 
 
 Her silence annoyed Mayne singularly. That a pretty 
 woman should flout one of his compliments he was neither 
 fool nor coxcomb enough to mind — as a general rule. But 
 to-day he was nervous and vaguely irritable. The heavy 
 
138 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 perfume of the flowers, the sickly odour of the incense, and 
 the sweet spring air which made the birds build, and the 
 leaves and blossoms break, warmed the blood in his veins, 
 till his hand grew restless and his brain fantastic. The 
 charm of the temptress he had been painting was over him, 
 and between the Virgin on which he worked, and the sitter 
 there floated the large, luscious red lips of the Lisa of long 
 ago, and the smooth, warm, pink skin and ideal outlines 
 of Rose. A hundred times he only cleared his throbbing 
 brain by resting his burning eyes on the incarnation of 
 young girlhood before him, but a hundred times Lisa and 
 Eose mocked at him from the picture. 
 
 Once as he looked up he caught sight of the St. Anthony's 
 Temptation, on which he had been working an hour back. 
 It was so turned that only he could see it, and the flesh 
 tints of the temptress gleamed from the misty background 
 like a living woman. 
 
 Again he looked at his sitter. She was still enwrapt in 
 her own thoughts and so immovable that the drapery over 
 her bosom did not stir. How sweet in expression she was, 
 how plaintive, and how like a child's was the sad droop of 
 her mouth; and yet how exquisitely womanly, how desir- 
 able was that full line of her throat and the nascent curve 
 of her bosom. How false, he thought, was his art compared 
 to nature, as he realised that it is purity that is the tempter. 
 
 Sharply he turned his gaze away, to see Eose smiling at 
 him from that other canvas, while her outstretched dimpled 
 hands seemed to point at Mary and force his eyes back to 
 her. 
 
 How fine and delicate were the fingers that held the lily 
 wand, her sceptre of virginity, and how he envied the jeal- 
 ous sleeve that fell too low upon her arm. His eyes grew 
 dark as he gazed and gazed again at her, as though he would 
 have forced his thoughts upon her, and never at the picture 
 
WITHOUT SIN 139 
 
 before him. Yet he was conscious of painting all the time, 
 until that consciousness grew to artistic instinct, and for 
 one moment dominated the man. He glanced at the canvas, 
 then flushed with shame at the mocking outrage he had done 
 the young girl by even alloTifing his brush to run riot in 
 bosomfuls of warm light and cool shadows that only his 
 mind's eye saw. With a hasty gesture he smudged his fin- 
 gers across the still fresh paint, and in the act of doing so 
 looked once more at Mary. 
 
 Was she asleep? Her head lay against the tall back of 
 the chair, the pallor of her cheek was shadowed only by her 
 lowered lashes. The hand that but a moment since had held 
 the sceptre of maidenhood hung nerveless at her side, and 
 the lilies had fallen from her knees all bruised to the floor. 
 
 Half-curious, half-frightened, he advanced and touched 
 her shoulder gently, as though to waken her, but she did not 
 move. He raised her soft fingers, but no pulse answered 
 to his own. He laid one hand above her heart, almost fear- 
 ful that it had ceased to beat ; but it throbbed feebly under 
 his lingering touch, and he knew then that she had swooned. 
 The cloying sweetness of her much-loved flowers had 
 strangled her and blanched her lips and cheeks to their own 
 stainless pallor. He raised her in his arms and carried her 
 to the couch in the alcove. As he laid her down her gold 
 hair made an aureole of faint light about the whiteness of 
 her face. A spray of lilies he had caught up with her fell 
 crushed and dying to the ground. 
 
 She did not move, and scarcely seemed to breathe. He 
 went hastily to the door, intent on summoning aid. He 
 hesitated. " Would there be gossip and talk if he called?" 
 he asked himself. His fingers, made nerveless by indeci- 
 sion, fell upon the key instead of the handle he had sought. 
 Once again he paused, then slowly turned the key, and 
 went back on tiptoe to where she lay, white among the 
 
140 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 cushions as a drift of pure snow in the purple hollows oE 
 the hills. 
 
 He gazed on her till the impulse grew too strong, and, 
 bending down, he caught the fair face between his two hot 
 palms and kissed the girl long and passionately on the lips. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 The next day was Sunday. 
 
 The March morning had broken grey and cold. An easter- 
 ly wind had sprung up in the night, and now drove a dirty 
 scud from the North Sea across the drab hued heavens. 
 The mating birds piped dolefully to each other in the sparse- 
 ly foliaged trees, and the early flowering lilacs in the 
 sheltered garden of Holmhurst showered down a mauve rain 
 of shattered blossoms as each stormy gust passed by. 
 
 Mary was in her sitting-room, a dainty nest with windows 
 looking to the south and west. The furniture and hangings 
 were pale in colour and showed a vague opalescence of silver 
 greys and shaded greens and pinks against the white walls. 
 Giant palms and flowers in gorgeous masses lent to the room 
 a sensation of space and atmosphere, which was enhanced 
 by the cloud-flecked painted blue ceiling, across which a 
 flight of swallows trailed, and a branch of rosy fruit blossom 
 swayed airily. On the white walls hung a few pictures : a 
 perfect Corot, a Turner which palpitated with the crimson 
 and golden glow of a setting sun, a scrap of Norfolk as seeu 
 by Gainsborough's eyes, all pearl-grey and willow-green, 
 and such other landscapes as had caught the girl's fancy or 
 appealed to her taste. 
 
 Set in a shallow niche between two silver vases filled 
 with white roses and shadowed by the interlacing branches 
 of two tall palms was the little picture of the Madonna, 
 which had been taken from the art gallery when Mary moved 
 into b§r new hoine, A prie-Dieu, carved by an Italian 
 
142 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 master hand, and a narrow shelf edged with a lace that once 
 had trimmed a Cardinal's robe, were before the picture. A 
 single Eucharist lily, spotless and waxen, and a golden cru- 
 cifix lay on the shelf. From beneath the verdant arch of 
 towering palms the fair face, meekly beautiful, and framed 
 by the veil of cunnin^y painted gailzd, gleamed like a living 
 thing, while the watery sun-rays, fighting through the 
 hurrying cloud-rack, struck faint glints of light from the 
 roughly chased clasp on the girlish breast. ' 
 
 Kneeling on the low praying-chair, with her head pressed 
 close against the glass, as in her most childish days, was 
 Mary. The tender light, filtering through the broad leaves, 
 cast the same reflection across the picture and girl, and em- 
 braced both in an atmosphere of mysticism. Mary was very 
 pale, colourless as wax, save for the soft velvety shadow 
 cast by her long lashes, and the faint tracery of her delicate 
 eyebrows. In the shifting light of the chill March day the 
 waved masses of her hair, coiled low in the hollow of her 
 neck, lost their sanguine, auburn tints, and looked white as 
 bleached flax against the green pallor of her skin. 
 
 Her eyes, darkened almost to a sapphire-blue beneath 
 their full lids, were as the eyes of one who had gazed beyondi 
 the limits of a fleshly world and had seen the invisible, i ; As 
 with rapt, upturned look she strove to pierce the calm depths 
 of the mild pictured face, to force the truth and the secret, 
 from the sweet, mute mouth, her own pale features were 
 transfigured with a great hope and a mighty feary a pre- 
 monition of fulfilment, and the anticipation of a realised 
 desire. 
 
 The room was very still, for the fire had burned .itself into 
 a pulsating mass, while from the girl's lips, which moved 
 from time to time, no sound came to mar the silence of the 
 warm, flower-scented atmosphere. 
 
 In fragrant quietude the morning hours melted into noon, 
 
WITHOVT SIN 143 
 
 and Mary knelt on, so statue-still in her t?hite gown beaeath 
 the green shadow of the branching palms, that even the 
 striking of mid-day and the sharp roll of a carriage beneath 
 the windows failed to rouse her from her reverie. 
 
 "Lady St. Cyprien — Lady Theo Bellastier," announced 
 a servant, and amid a rustle of silken skirts the ladies swept 
 into the room. 
 
 With a violent start and a hot flush staining her fair skin, 
 Mary sprang to her feet with the look and motion of a child 
 caught in an act of disobedience. 
 
 "I hope you got my note yesterday, dear," cried Lady 
 St. Cyprien, as she picked her way among the flower-laden 
 tables and broad low chairs towards Mary, who stood in the 
 shadows like a pale lily tinged with a golden-green. " St. 
 Cyprien was not well, and I could not leave him, even to 
 take you to Mr. Mayne's studio. But are you not ready 
 for the Park? It's much nicer out than it looks, but — 
 what is the matter?" 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien gazed with loving, anxious eyes at 
 Mary, who, as the startled blush died from her face, grew 
 as white as her gown. 
 
 " Have you a headache, Mary ? You are so pale, and your 
 hands and lips bum like fire." 
 
 Lady Theo, who had been winning heavily at the card- 
 table till five in the morning, and felt horribly seedy and 
 plain, involuntarily wondered if Mary, too, had kept late 
 hours. 
 
 " I am not ill, dear Lady St. Cyprien, but — I cannot go 
 to the Park this morning, " said Mary in a low, constrained 
 manner. 
 
 "Just as you please, my dear," said Lady St. Cyprien 
 with admirable good humour and tact, for her eyes and ears 
 had caught at once the signs of overstrained nerves in the 
 bearing of the girl. " We will give up the Park for to-day. 
 
144 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 In fact, I think you show very commendable discretion, 
 Mary, in not draining dry at the very commencement of the 
 season the rather over-estimated delights of church parade. 
 Few girls of your age have any sense of restraint. But as 
 you must have some air, we'll forsake the haunts of fash- 
 ionable man and woman, and go north and make an explor- 
 ation of Hampstead." 
 
 Lady Theo was looking as yellow as a duck's foot, and 
 the glory of her fine eyes was for the time so hopelessly 
 dimmed by late hours, bad air, and excitement, that she in 
 her heart desired nothing better than to temporarily avoid 
 her fellow-kind, and she endorsed Lady St. Cyprien's sug- 
 gestion at the top of her high-pitched voice. 
 
 But Mary shook her blond head. 
 
 " I cannot drive to-day, thank you. I do not wish to 
 leave the house." 
 
 The little catch of smothered emotion in her voice as she 
 spoke, and the twisting and untwisting of her slender fingers 
 among the folds of her white crgpe gown, warned the 
 Countess that an hysterical outbreak was threatening. 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien's dark eyes peered in vain beneath the 
 shadow of the broad palm leaves. She could only catch the 
 oval outline of the pale face and the scarcely suppressed 
 twitch of the childish mouth. 
 
 Suddenly a great splash of brilliant sunshine, all the 
 more harshly intense by contrast with the rolling purple 
 clouds, flooded the room and bathed the girl from head to 
 foot in a very sea of golden glory. 
 
 With the rending of the veil of merciful verdant twilight, 
 the last remnant of Mary's self-control fell from her, and 
 Lady St. Cyprien was shocked to see the convulsed face and 
 trembling form rocking and heaving before her in all the 
 pitiless glare of the sharp, high light. 
 
 To continue to feign an ignorance of Mary's hysterical 
 
WITHOUT SIN 145 
 
 condition was impossible ; but the shocked surprise of Lady 
 St. Cyprien's face gave the girl an impression that her 
 friend still purposed to make her go out for a drive. 
 
 "I cannot leave home to-day," she gasped, in a strangled 
 voice. " I dare not go — the Angel — the Vision — it might 
 appear again — I " 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien drew herself up to the full extent of 
 her stately height, and set her gentle voice to its sternest 
 key. 
 
 " Mary, you are giving way to absurd ideas, and encour- 
 aging yourself in ridiculous fancies. Theo, fetch the salts 
 from Mary's room ; they are always on her dressing-table. 
 Angels! Visions! Do you know, my dear, you are talking 
 nonsense — and quite wicked nonsense into the bargain? 
 Now, don't let me hear any more about such rubbish," 
 
 It hurt her intensely to speak sharply to her protegee; 
 but the principle which actuates every woman of the world 
 to cling in life or death to her fetish, " self-control," and an 
 earnest desire to combat the girl's neurotic tendencies, 
 urged her to such ungracious speech. 
 
 With a supreme effort of will Mary forced her face into 
 some semblance of quiescence, but the heavy tears gathered 
 in her eyes, and she held two fluttering little hands out to 
 her friends. 
 
 " Don't be angry with me. You would not if you only 
 knew. It is no fancy that has come to me — no dream or 
 vain imagining. The truth is no chimera, a promise is not 
 to be broken ; and the truth and the promise were given me 
 to-day at the moment of the dawn." 
 
 The shed tears glistened on her cheeks and the laces at 
 her throat like diamonds. The outstretched hands ceased 
 to fluttering meek supplication, her voice grew steady aa 
 with a great purpose. 
 
 " Let me tell you, my dearest friend — my almost mother 
 10 
 
146 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 — of the wonderful thing which has come to me : a thing so 
 marvellous, that I am joyful; a thing so mysteiious, that I 
 am frightened. Sit, Lady Theo, sit, and I will tell you." 
 
 A fever burned brightly in her cheeks; her eyes, gener- 
 ally so placid and gikre, shone like twin stars. In the 
 clear sunlight she stood, with her hands folded before her, 
 and in low tones, like one who talks in dreams, she spoke. 
 
 "I had slept, oh! so soundly, all the night through. I 
 had not dreamt; X do not think I had stirred. Yet I awoke 
 very suddenly, as though a voice or a touch had startled 
 me. I did not move — and I did not even wonder why I 
 woke. The soft grey of daybreak was gleaming in faint 
 silver lines about the edges of the curtains. It was quite 
 early, and all the world seemed to be waiting and watching 
 with me. A soulful peace, an intense stillness ■ of antici- 
 pation filled my whole being. Time and the sense of living 
 slipped from me. I could have waited through eternity. 
 Then as the day-dawn flushed to a fuller strength, and filled 
 my room with pearly gleams and shifting shadows, the 
 Message came." 
 
 She closed her eyes and sighed in the intensity of her 
 beatitude. A smile of divinest happiness curved her mouth, 
 and her lips stirred in inaudible thanksgiving. 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien would have started from her chair but 
 that Lady Theo, wide-eyed and a little awestruck, laid one 
 hand on her arm. 
 
 "Hush, Adela! let Mary finish." 
 
 Mary spoke again, always in low, short sentences and 
 with closed eyes as though she saw again the Vision of the 
 Dawn. 
 
 " They grew, those two figures, from mere nothingness. 
 I looked, and they were not there ; I looked again, and they 
 were there. One knelt, with low-bowed head and meek 
 crossed hands. The hair was very fair, and glinted like 
 
WITHOUT SIN 147 
 
 pale gold where the light caught it. It knelt on, and prayed. 
 Like the sigh of a summer breeze, the prayer swept to my 
 ears. It was a prayer for forgiveness, for mercy, for re- 
 demption. It was the prayer of millions of sinners, the 
 prayer of a lost nation., the prayer of one weak girl. It 
 throbbed, and rose, and fell like the murmur of a sea, till 
 it filled the whole room, and beat in saddest supplication 
 against my very heart." 
 
 From beneath her lowered lashes two tears slipped down 
 her cheeks. 
 
 " Yet the figure never moved. It prayed on and on' — 
 always for mercy and for redemption — and as I heard and 
 watched, the dawn grew brighter. Then a great Presence 
 came, grand, awful, yet formless. The light of all the stars 
 shone about it, the odours of white lilies filled the air, and 
 from the lilies and the light came a voice. 'Hail!' it cried 
 like a silver bell. 'Hail! thou to whom the messenger of 
 mercy is sent. Blessed art thou among women. ' Then — 
 ah! then the most wonderful thing of all happened — she 
 who had prayed and importuned so long, did lift her face 
 up towards the angel — and — and — the face was that of the 
 picture — it was the face of — myself." 
 
 The girl's voice had grown shrill with nervous excite- 
 ment as she, finished,, and she staggered forward into Lady 
 St. Cyprien's arms. Utterly overcome trith emotion. 
 
 "Open the window, Thep — get some water." 
 
 Lady Theo, with her pert face preternaturally grave, 
 obeyed, and in a few minutes Mary roused from her exhaus- 
 tion and smiled wanly. Then Lady St. Cyprien walked 
 across to the dying, fire and stared with sombre eyes into 
 the cooling ashes. She was more moved than she chose to- 
 admit^-even to her common-sense self — by the girl's story. 
 Not that she believed in it for one moment, but she noted 
 the conviction with which Mary regarded it, and the hold 
 
H8 WITHOUT SJJV 
 
 which the self -imagined idea had taken of her. Despite her 
 own peculiarly unimaginative temperament, and practical 
 worldliness, she had sufficient sympathy with youth to 
 make all allowance for the heart fancies and soulful ambi- 
 tions of the young people of her acquaintance. That a 
 young man should desire a maiden for the colour of her hair, 
 or the shape of her mouth, she could understand ; that a 
 girl shoud flout a coronet and diamonds for the beaux yeux 
 of a soldier or the suave tongue and empty pockets of a 
 barrister, was foolish — but natural, and oh ! so very easily 
 cured and so easily understood. 
 
 But the mystical yearnings, the vaguely voiced desires of 
 this beautiful Jewish girl, were strange and almost un- 
 canny. Lady St. Cyprian had the sincerest, deepest love 
 for Mary Levinge, but her origin and the race from which 
 she sprang had no part in that love, and the indefinite de- 
 sires which Mary sometimes evinced for the welfare of her 
 own people, were in the Countess's eyes mere girlish 
 sentimentalities, which should be quickly eradicated. 
 
 That Mary was still clinging to her childish fancies ' was 
 vexatious. Hysteria was bad for the health, and neurotic 
 whims fatal to the appearance and temper of a young lady. 
 Lady St. Cyprien had always hoped for a happy girlhood 
 and delightful marriage for her favourite. How could 
 either be accomplished under existing circumstances? 
 
 And now there was Theo, who was always excitable, 
 overstrung and feverishly on the lookout for new sensations, 
 questioning Mary. 
 
 " Where did this Manifestation take place?" she was ask- 
 ing in an awestruck voice. " Show me the exact spot. It 
 may appear again." 
 
 Mary rose quickly, her eyes alight with fervour, her 
 whole body quivering with responsive excitement. 
 
 " Theo, I am ashamed of you, " cried Lady St. Cyprien 
 
WITHOUT SIN 149 
 
 sharply, turning from the fire. " You should know better 
 than to encourage Mary. She is not well, and this picture 
 of Bawdon's and all the talk she hears at the studio about 
 art and religion upset her." 
 
 Then she turned again to Mary, and with firm, kindly 
 hands tried to force her back into her chair. 
 
 " How can you be fit to continue your sittings to Mr. 
 Mayne, if you permit yourself such disturbing fancies? 
 Eemember, my dear, that a nervous, highly wrought model 
 will not at all fulfil Mr. Bawdon's notion of the fitness of 
 things." 
 
 But her words fell on deaf ears. Mary, with her eyes 
 ablaze with excitement and followed by Lady Theo, whose 
 sallow cheeks were quite scarlet, slipped from the Countess's 
 restraining hands and went into the bedroom and with rever- 
 ence indicated the very spot where the Vision had been. 
 
 Lady Theo stared hard as though she expected the Mani- 
 festation to appear again. 
 
 "Ah! Mary!" she cried ecstatically, clasping her small, 
 well-gloved hands. " I think it must be coming again. I 
 can smell the scent of the lilies." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien's face grew very hard and stern, and 
 nothing but the enraptured look in Mary's eyes stayed the 
 angry words that rose to her lips. 
 
 Suddenly her eyes caught a crushed spray of lilies of the 
 valley on the edge of the dressing-table. 
 
 " Here are your lilies, Theo, " she cried, catching up the 
 sickly smelling blossoms. "A bunch of dead rubbish. 
 Mary, my dear girl, the thoughts of your portrait, the glit- 
 ter of the dawn on your cut glass scent-bottles, and a few 
 faded flowers are at the bottom of your vision. Don't let me 
 hear any more about it. Come along Theo, I will drive you 
 home — and Mary, keep quiet this afternoon and try to sleep. 
 You will not be fit for anything all the week, if you do not." 
 
150 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 But once in the carriage the Countess lapsed into thought- 
 ful silence, and Lady Theo addressed her twice before she 
 could get a reply. 
 
 "Well, my dear, well! What is it you want to 
 know?" 
 
 "About Mary," said Lady Theo, in a rather subdued 
 manner. " Is she — ris she quite right, do you think?" 
 
 Ls^dy St. Cyprien turned sharply on her companion. 
 
 "Theo, never suggest — never even insinuate anything 
 against Mary Levinge. The girl is as pure as an angel, and 
 as good as gold. Her lonely and uncongenial surroundings 
 have encouraged her rather in this fancy about the Madonna, 
 and the business of this picture, which I do not like at all, 
 have reawakened a childish whimsey. But once give her 
 healthy objects in life, an affectionate husband — -and, please 
 God — a little child, and Mary will be the happiest and 
 sanest woman in England." 
 
 A serious expression was the most unbecoming thing in 
 the world to Lady Theo Bellastier, and she knew it, but for 
 the life of her she could not force a smile to her lips as she 
 said timidly : 
 
 " But, Adela, suppose Mary should not be fanciful at all. 
 You needn't look so cross about it; but you know that the 
 Jews consider the prophecy about the coming of a Bedeemer 
 has yet to be fulfilled. If such a child is to be born, some 
 one must be its mother, you know ; and Mary " 
 
 "I insist, Theo, that you shall not pursue this crazy 
 notion, any further. Besides, who ever heard of a miracle 
 nowadays?" 
 
 "It djOes. not follow that there should not be one," was 
 Lady Theo' 3. parting shot as she alighted at her door in 
 Wilton Place. 
 
 That same afternoon Martin Baird called to see Mary. 
 
 The gloaming shadows filled the great house as he passed 
 
WITHOUT SIN 151 
 
 unattended up the stairs, and softly tapped at the door of 
 her sitting-room. 
 
 It was opened from within. Tall, and like a pale spirit, 
 the girl stood against the dim, rich background. 
 
 " I cannot speak with you to-night. I must be alone. 
 Only, Martin, pray for me!" 
 
 The sweet low voice floated out, and a white hand fluttered 
 towards him through the gloom. Then tht door was gently 
 closed and he stood a lonely figure in the dark corridor. 
 
 And she went back to her vigil in the dim room, where 
 only the pale twin faces of herself and the picture gleamed 
 whitely. 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 Early in July Mary Levinge gave her last sitting to 
 Eliot Mayne for the picture of the Immaculate Conception. 
 As a portrait the work was perfectly faithful, as a picture 
 Mr. Erastus Bawdon and the leading art critics pronounced 
 it a masterpiece of realism in art and fulfilment. 
 
 Following the traditions of the pre-Raphaelite school 
 Mayne had not robed his Virgin in costly embroideries and 
 heavy velvets, nor posed her in a marble court amid carven 
 pillars. In the middle of a small bare room, in the very 
 heart of a river of sunshine, which poured through a narrow 
 slit in the rough clay wall, sat the girl, her long, slim limbs 
 clad only in a shapeless garment of white woollen. The 
 brilliant sunlight shone like molten gold through the waxen 
 lilies that surrounded her, and glowed rose-red across the 
 delicately arched bare feet. Her unbound hair, pale yellow 
 about the temples and ruddy auburn in the shadows, fell 
 round her shoulders. Translucent and intangible, the angel 
 Gabriel floated in the sunlight. A white dove hung on out- 
 spread wings between the angel and the Virgin. 
 
 As time had passed Mary had approached each sitting in 
 a spirit of extraordinary reverence, which Eliot Mayne had 
 at first been inclined to consider as nothing more than the 
 affected pose of a rather hysterical girl. But as the weeks 
 went by his opinion changed, and the more spiritual side of 
 his unstable nature caught the infection of her fervour. 
 
 " The picture had need be good, " he said one evening to 
 Mr. Erastus Bawdon, as the artist, smoking an uncompromis- 
 
WITHOUT SIN 153 
 
 ing pipe and the dilettante amateur a dainty, gold-tipped 
 cigarette, stood before the easel. " The picture had need 
 be good, for I have painted my very soul into it. Miss 
 Levinge's individuality is very strong, and she has endowed 
 the subject with a peculiar reality, which I don't mind con- 
 fessing to you now, Bawdon, it never held for me before." 
 
 Mr. Erastus Bawdon's heavy face assumed a somewhat 
 shocked expression. 
 
 " I mean no irreverence to the foundation of the Christian 
 belief, but simply that, except from a purely artistic point 
 of view, the motive of the Annunciation never appealed to 
 me at all. It always was limited in my eyes to a mere 
 allegory." 
 
 The artist flung himself into his favourite chair, and with 
 his eyes still fixed on the picture said presently : 
 
 "Tell me, Bawdon, what made you settle upon Miss 
 Levinge as a true type for your Virgin? Lady Theo Bellas- 
 tier is a charming little woman, and her parties are fairly 
 good fun, as parties go nowadays, but hers is scarcely the 
 house in which one would expect to find a saint." 
 
 Erastus Bawdon slowly took a seat before he answered. 
 
 "Initially the girl's face attracted me," he began, in his 
 deep, rolling tones. "Without being either classically 
 beautiful or insipidly pretty, it is extraordinarily attractive, 
 being pure in outline and charming in colouring, if somewhat 
 pale. But it was not until I looked at her a second time 
 that I saw beneath the delicate formation of nose and the 
 striking width of brow the spirit which dominated her lite 
 and set her apart from other women, as being worthy to be 
 the model for the Mary. I felt that the martyred saints 
 had thought her thoughts, and had looked at the world with 
 such eyes as hers." 
 
 " Her features are wonderfully like those of Botticelli's 
 Holy Virgin in the National Gallery, but Miss Levinge has 
 
154 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 at times more strength of expression than one can ever find 
 in that lovely face. She told me the other day, though, 
 that she has always been considered very like a small pic- 
 ture in Botticelli's earlier manner, which came into her 
 grandfather's possession, and which she now has, and seems 
 to prize beyond everything." 
 
 "I have seen the picture," said Bawdon. "It is a very 
 beautiful, though entirely unsigned bit of work. The like- 
 ness Miss Levigne speaks of is quite remarkable — or rather 
 was. Miss Levinge has not looked well lately." 
 
 Mayne knocked the ashes out of his pipe, and drew a 
 cloth over the picture before he answered. 
 
 " I am not surprised, " he said. " If you could only see 
 her sometimes when she is posing, you would wonder that 
 she is not really ill. She will sit immovable upon that stage 
 of mine with her loosened hair, and her flower-filled hands, 
 and those peculiarly shaped eyes of hers fixed wherever I 
 tell her. Then after a time her whole face becomes trans- 
 figured. She seems as though she were entranced, and were 
 herself in truth beholding a vision and enduring the suffer- 
 ings of the Virgin Mother. More than once I have had to 
 touch her to rouse her from her condition of intense feeling. 
 Sometimes it has been as though I were gazing at the first 
 scene of the World's Tragedy. No wonder the girl looks 
 worn and ill — I know that I myself am exhausted after 
 the sittings. I shall not be sorry when the picture is 
 finished." 
 
 Mr. Erastus Bawdpn lifted the veil and took one more 
 look at the canvas. , . 
 
 "I think," he said reflectively, "that Miss Levinge will 
 one day become converted to the true faith. It would be a 
 triumph. She shall be received in my church." 
 
 Then he left. 
 
 And now the last sitting, a very short one, was ended, 
 
WITHOUT SrN 155 
 
 and Mary Levinge stood before the picture which mingled 
 art and fervour bad evolved. 
 
 " It is very beautiful. It touches me to the soul, " she 
 said quietly. "But, Mr. Mayne, am 1 really like that? I 
 have always thought of myself as being like that other pic- 
 ture of which I have told you. But this face seems strangely 
 unfamiliar. Am Hike that?" 
 
 Eliot Mayne looked from the picture to the white-robed 
 girl who stood before it. 
 
 "Yes," he said presently. "You are like this. Yet, 
 now I come to think of it, I have touched the face often 
 lately. Your expression is more etherealized than when you 
 first sat, four months a'go. It is as if you had so absorbed 
 the sensations of the Virgin Mary into your own being, that 
 the shadows and lines of approaching sorrow had painted 
 themselves about your eyes and mouth." 
 
 The girl's lips began to work nervously, and her eyes to 
 fill with tears. 
 
 "My dear child!" said Mayne, unaffectedly moved by 
 her emotion and laying a gentle hand on Mary's shoulder. 
 " You have taken this picture too much to heart, and over- 
 strained yourself during the sittings. Your artistic anxie- 
 ties to help me in my work have told on your nerves." 
 
 Then he gave her a kindly smile, and went on in a brighter 
 tone: 
 
 " Besides, you are not saying good-bye to the picture for 
 ever, you know. Mr. Bawdon hopes you will see it often 
 in the future. He has great dreams of converting you — 
 ah, that makes you smile. That's right, that's right. 
 Mouths like yours are made for laughter, " he said lightly, 
 returning to his rather artificial manner. "Grief on a 
 young face looks out of place." 
 
 So Mary, with a wan smile about her mouth, and her 
 tears forced back in their channels, left with her maid Eliot 
 
156 WITHOUT Sm 
 
 Mayne's dim, cool house on Campden Hill and drove through 
 the fret and steam and heat of the July noon, by the crowded 
 Kensington High Street and through the already parched 
 alleys of the Park, to Knightsbridge and Lowndes Square. 
 
 "Her ladyship will be in to luncheon at two," said Lady 
 St. Cyprien's butler, as he ushered Mary into the perfumed 
 dusk of the boudoir, which lay at the back of the big 
 drawing-rooms. 
 
 The windows were so closely darkened, and so great was 
 the contrast to the glaring streets, that had she not known 
 the room well, Mary must have felt her way among the 
 furniture. As it was, she crept softly into the depths of a 
 cool, chintz-covered chair. A great weariness of body fell 
 on her as she half sat, half lay among the cushions, and 
 again the unaccountable desire to cry, which had almost 
 choked her in the studio, swept over her. With a scarcely 
 suppressed sob, she bowed her face among the cold, velvety 
 petals of a bowl of yellow roses which stood next her chair. 
 Two tears, that scorched her eyelids as they came, fell on 
 the dew-laden blossoms. 
 
 She was on the verge of a burst of weeping, when the 
 firm, quick steps of a man rang through the empty drawing- 
 rooms. 
 
 " Miss Levinge, where have you hidden yourself in this 
 Cimmerian gloom?" cried Lord Stansdale's cheery voice 
 from the curtained doorway. " Ford told me you were up 
 here, but I certainly can't see you." 
 
 Mary brushed her handkerchief across her burning eyes, 
 and after a moment said in a faint voice : 
 
 "I am here, Lord Stansdale." 
 
 "Ah! I can guess your whereabouts now — you are in 
 Aunt Adela's big chair by the piano. Well, I will come 
 over to you — if I can." 
 
 But whether by accident or design. Lord Stansdale moved 
 
WITHOUT SIN 157 
 
 in the direction of the windows, and suddenly raising an 
 outer blind, let in a flood of hot, white light. 
 
 Mary gave a little cry, and placed her hands before her 
 eyes. 
 
 "Too much glare, eh?" said Stansdale. "Well, I'll try 
 half measures. " He quickly lowered the blinds till a tender 
 twilight filled the little room. Then he went over to Mary 
 and sat down. 
 
 He was sincerely in love with her, and for a moment was 
 content to gaze at her. 
 
 She had pulled off her hat on entering the room, and it 
 lay, a dainty mass of white tulle and filmy lace, in her lap. 
 Her hair was a little rufSed, and had fluffed itself into a 
 cloud of disorderly pale-gold curls about her brows and ears. 
 The uncertain light hid, even from love's eyes, all traces of 
 emotion. 
 
 Stansdale thought she looked very sweet, and the phlegm 
 of his English nature was stirred. He felt the necessity of 
 urging his suit bubbling to his lips. 
 
 "Let me put your hat down somewhere. Miss Levinge," 
 he began, taking it from her lap. " How some women con- 
 trive to impress their personality on the things they wear! 
 Do you know, I could never bear white until I saw you in 
 it? It aJ ways seems too cold and expressionless for ordinary 
 women, but for you " 
 
 He paused. Sincere compliments did not trip easily from 
 his reticent tongue. 
 
 "I cannot imagine you in anything else." 
 
 Mary uttered an idly interrogative " No?" 
 
 She entertained a genuine friendship for Lady St. 
 Cyprian's handsome nephew. She liked his company, and 
 looked for his attendance at dances, the Opera, and in the 
 Park. That he regarded her with feelings any different 
 from her own had never seriously occurred to her, though 
 
158 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 more than once she had deprecated the Countess's hints 
 that Lord Stansdale would make her a suitable husband. 
 
 So, with never a flutter at her heart, or a quickening' flush 
 in her cheeks, she lay back in Lady St. Cyprien's chair, 
 with half-closed eyes and wandering thoughts. A touch on 
 her hand, anew, a deeper tone in her companion's voice 
 roused her to a sense of what was coming. 
 
 " Miss Levinge — Mary — I have for so long admired you — 
 latterly I have learned to love. Your sweetness and your 
 beauty make you worthy of any position the world can offer 
 you. Will you take the one that I can give you? Will 
 you be my wife?" 
 
 Lord Stansdale spoke awkwardly. The inherent shyness 
 of his race and cultivated reserve of his class tied his tongue. 
 True love surged from his heart to his throat, but could get 
 no further. Yet feebly as his desires were conveyed Mary 
 understood him. He wished to marry her. The physical 
 disgust she had felt at Eugene Cohen's proposal did not over- 
 take her now. She was overwhelmed with a great wave 
 of pity — for herself and for him — that she could not bring 
 her lips to frame a " Yes!" or her hands to return his clasp. 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " I cannot marry you, although, believe me, Lord Stans- 
 dale, I am sensible of the honour you are doing me." 
 
 " You do not love me, then !" he cried, his passion rising 
 at the check. " But do not refuse me now. Let me love 
 you for a little time, let me be your servant, your slave, till 
 one day you will care for me, and your regard grows to love. 
 Then I will ask you again for your hand and for your heart, 
 and you will be mine." 
 
 He essayed to clasp her hands, but she rose and for a 
 moment eluded him. 
 
 "Ah! Lord Stansdale, if I could choose a husband from 
 among all men, I would have you." 
 
Without ^tN 159 
 
 He sprang towards Ber, but she slij)j)ed frOm hitn' again. 
 
 " But I entreat yoii not to wait, Hot to hojie." 
 
 She spoke in a broken voice. If she could only put her 
 fears and Iohging;s and doubts from her, if she could only 
 give herself and Her future to this debonair gentleman, with 
 his frank, blue eyes and strong, kind hands. The fierce 
 longing for happiness which comes to all young things over- 
 whelmed, her for a, moment. 
 
 Unconsciously; and with ialf -closed eyes, she surged like 
 a breaking lily towards him. With a cry of joy, he caught 
 her to his heart, and rained a hundred kisses on her pale 
 face. 
 
 "Oh! no! no! you mistake — leave me — I — " came in 
 gasps from the girl's lips. 
 
 With frail hands set against his breast she tried to free 
 herself from his embrace. 
 
 '"My love! my sweetest love! my wife!" murmured 
 Staasdale passionately in her reluctant ears. 
 
 Then childish tears cdme, and he was about to loose her 
 whvan Lady St. Cyprien entered quickly. Her woman's wit, 
 and the knowledge of Mary LeviHge's cOy aversion to mar- 
 riage, gave her the key to the situation. 
 
 "Stansdale and Mary," she cried. "My dear boy — a 
 thousand congratulations. Your uncle will be delighted. 
 
 Mary " she took the girl from Stansdale' s arms and, 
 
 clasping her to her own heart, kissed her very tenderly — 
 " Mary, my dearest, dearest child — you. have made me the 
 happiest woman in London," 
 
 There were tears in her voice and in her dark eyes as she 
 placed the girl in a chair and began to soothe her. 
 
 " Now my dear, do not talk — I can guess all you would 
 say. Stansdale has loved you for months but has feared to 
 speak. Now I am glad the secret is told. He will have 
 the loveliest and the best wife in the world, and you will 
 
160 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 find what you deserve — a loyal heart, a true friend — ^^and 
 that best of all blessings for a woman — an affectionate 
 husband." 
 
 For a moment Mary looked from Lady St. Gyprien to 
 Lord Stansdale. Then with a faint sigh, half of weariness, 
 half of happiness, she let her hands fall in her lap. Per- 
 haps marriage with a good man was her destiny after all. 
 Perhaps all the rest was but futile longing. 
 
 She sighed again, a long sobbing sigh, that shook her 
 frame. Her lifetime's dreams were shattered, dispelled, 
 gone. She turned her face to Lady St. Cyprien to be 
 kissed, and then held out one hand to her lorer. 
 
 The rest of the day was passed in a whirl. Lady St. 
 Cyprien, who plumed herself on having turned the scale of 
 Mary's wandering decision, for the girl's ultimate benefit, 
 felt that the next best thing was to give her no time for 
 reflection. With the kindest motives therefore she drove 
 her out during the afternoon, sent for her maid and an 
 evening gown from Holmhurst to Lowndes Square, super- 
 intended her toilette, took her to the opera and a couple of 
 crushes, and only left her at her own door, numbed with 
 bewilderment and aching with fatigue, at two o'clock the 
 next morniag. 
 
CHAPTEE XVIII 
 
 It was late when Mary awoke in the morning. The 
 flame which burnt beneath the chocolate pot at her bedside 
 had flickered out long ago, and the jug for hot milk when 
 she touched it was stone cold. 
 
 She rang her bell sharply and then dropped back among 
 her pillows. In spite of her hours of heavy, dreamless 
 sleep, she ached dully in all her limbs, and her eyes and 
 head were heavy and hot. Too tired to remember, too 
 physically weary to think of aught but her own discomfort, 
 she did not move till the maid brought in some fresh choco- 
 late, and after having poured it oat, laid the morning's post 
 and newspapers on the bed. 
 
 Sipping at the chocolate, Mary with idle fingers turned 
 over her letters. None were of interest till the sixth and 
 last. As she caught sight of the crest and coronet, and the 
 bold, square superscription on the cover, she put down her 
 cup with a clatter, and with dilated eyes and burning cheeks 
 stared at the thick cream-tinted envelope. 
 
 Then it all came back to her; that scene in the shaded, 
 cool boudoir, where among the roses and the old-fashioned 
 chintzes. Lord Stansdale had wooed her and clasped her 
 hands and kissed her lips. She dashed angry, quivering 
 fingers across her mouth at the recollection. 
 
 And then Lady St. Cyprien had come in, and in another 
 moment, almost without her knowledge, all had been settled. 
 
 " They mean it for the best, but are they right? Am I 
 wrong?" she sighed. 
 11 
 
162 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 With weary indifference she opened her other letters, but 
 the seal of Lord Stansdale's envelope remained unbroken. 
 Perhaps it was a last faint hope that her engagement might 
 not be irrevocably binding that prevented her, in honour, 
 from reading the love vows of a man she might after all 
 not marry. ' 
 
 With equal lack of interest she turned to the Morning 
 Post and glanced down the columns of the centre page. 
 The two big parties she had attended the previous evening 
 were mentioned, and the fixtures for the coming day were 
 duly set forth with formal particularity. Then came a 
 separate paragraph, in the leaded type which is generally 
 reserved for special news. 
 
 "We are authorised to state that a marriage has been 
 arranged, and will shortly take place> between Viscount 
 Stansdale, of 99 Curzon Street, and The Dales, Yorkshire, 
 and Miss Mary Levinge, of Holnihurst, Kegent's Park." 
 
 She read the announcement through three times, very 
 slowly. It did not strike her to question who had sent it 
 to the paper, or even to cavil at its being there. It was 
 made, that was enough. 
 
 Quite quietly, and with no shadow of emotion, no signs 
 of maidenly modesty, or joy, or grief marring the pale 
 tranquillity of her face, she laid the paper aside and took 
 up Lord Stansdale's letter. 
 
 He was to be her husband, she was to be his wife— the 
 affair was settled. Now she might read what he had to 
 say. 
 
 It was a chivalrous, manly letter, breathing as much 
 gratitude as love, and more sincere devotion than either. 
 It was very short and simple. Most girls whose heads are 
 filled with idealisms would have called it bald and cold, 
 
WITHOUT SIN 163 
 
 but for Mary it was sufficient. The very simplicity and 
 straightforwardness of expression appealed to her and 
 touched her more than a thousand fulsome compliments 
 and passionate asseverations would ever have done. 
 
 With Stansdale's letter in her hand Mary Levinge 
 dropped the curtain on the past. The vague aspirations of 
 her childhood's days, dreamed amid the relics of all time in 
 the Art Gallery, the more fully formulated desires of later 
 years, she put behind her with hands that trembled though 
 they never faltered. 
 
 With her lover's words of truth and loyalty before her, 
 she faced the future. She would strive to be a wife worthy 
 of his station and affection. 
 
 "Pray God give me strength!" she murmured with 
 clasped hands. 
 
 Then she rose, and thrusting her little feet into soft 
 white slippers, she crossed the room. 
 
 Suddenly a great shock thrilled her from head to foot. 
 
 An irrepressible cry of terror broke from her lips, her 
 face was distorted with a mighty fear. 
 
 Again — and yet once again! 
 
 .Then all grew dark, and with pale hands fighting the 
 overwhelming waters of her fate, she fell on her knees and 
 prayed. 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Lady St. Ctpbien and her maid were half-way through 
 that careful toilette which made the former pre-eminent 
 among the best-dressed women of the day, when a pencilled 
 note was brought into her dressing-room. 
 
 "I must see you at once. — Mart." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien smiled a little as she read the hastily 
 scribbled words. 
 
 " She's seen the announcement in the Post, of course, and 
 is a little put out, I dare say. It was sharp practice on my 
 part, I admit, but she is such an undecided creature that 
 she wants some one to make up her mind for her. How 
 she'll bless me by the time she's been six months married." 
 
 Then she turned to the waiting servant. 
 
 " Tell Miss Levinge's messenger I will be at Holmhurst 
 in less than an hour. And order the victoria round as 
 quickly as possible." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien was fully prepared to cope with Mary's 
 girlish arguments against the publicly announced engage- 
 ment and a speedy marriage. She intended to treat all 
 scruples as mere caprice, which a little affectionate firmness 
 would quickly override. She was therefore rather put out 
 to hear from the servant who admitted her that Miss 
 Levinge was still in her room. 
 
 "Miss Levinge is not ill, I hope," she said anxiously. 
 
 " I do not know, milady. Nobody has seen Miss Levinga 
 this morning but her maid, Carter." 
 
WITHOUT SIN 165 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien passed quickly up the broad shallow 
 stairs, and a moment later was standing in Mary's bedroom. 
 
 With her hair still unbrashed and tossed in flaxen masses 
 about her shoulders, her feet bare, and only a loose white 
 wrapper pulled round her, Mary sat pale and mute in a 
 deep chair. 
 
 She gave a long sigh of satisfaction as Lady St. Cyprien 
 entered, but neither spokle nor moved, and it was her visitor 
 who first broke the silence. 
 
 " My dearest child, you sent for me, and I have come. 
 What is the matter? Are you vexed about the announce- 
 ment in the papers? You know such news is always put 
 about at once. People like to hear it." 
 
 But no word came from the silent, seated figure. 
 
 Certainly she must be ill. Lady St. Cyprien looked at 
 her and gradually became filled with the consciousness of 
 some subtle sudden change in the girl's face and bearing. 
 The well-cut features, the pure eyes, the sweet expression 
 were unaltered, yet there was a difference since yesterday. 
 
 "Are you not well? Is anything the matter? Speak, 
 Mary." 
 
 A growing fear that the girl was mentally, if not physi- 
 cally, ill, lent a unusual sharpness to Lady St. Cyprien' s 
 voice. 
 
 Mary rose slowly, lifting herself by pressing her hands 
 upon the arms of the chair, as though a great weakness or 
 a new fragility had come upon her. 
 
 "I cannot marry Lord Stansdale." 
 
 She spoke very quietly, permitting herself neither any 
 gesture nor display of emotion. Her arms hung straightly 
 at her sides, but her head was proudly set, and she looked 
 at the Countess with eyes that never faltered or quailed. 
 
 "Mary, I do not understand; I cannot permit you, for a 
 mere whim, to wreck- " 
 
166 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " I. cannot marry Lprd Stansdale." 
 
 Low and steady the jgirl's incisive words cut across the 
 other's agitated tones. 
 
 LadySt. Cyprien drew nearer, her keen daj^k eyes search- 
 ing every feature of Mary's impassive face, every outline 
 of her slender form, as though she would force her reasons 
 from her. , ., 
 
 Suddenly she drew back. Knowledge came to her, aiid 
 she understood. 
 
 A look of diyinest pity— the putest , sympathy that, one 
 woman can feej for another — swept over her, face, She 
 opened her arras wide. 
 
 " Mary, my darling, my poor, poor chili^," she cried. , 
 
 Ani Mary, with a little sob, crept like a tired child, to 
 her heart, and the. two women wept together. 
 
 Mary was the first to repress her emotion. With a 
 dignity that was pathetic in its forced self-control she witji- 
 drew herself frpm Lady Slj. Cyprien's arms, and, brushing 
 the last tears from her lashes, said, for the third time, " I 
 cannot marry Lord Stansdale." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien in her turn dried her eyes, but, though 
 all outward signs of grief were suppressed, ,l\er fac^ was 
 aged and .drawn with a lools. qi infinite sorrow as she led 
 Mary back to her chair and seated herself beside her. 
 
 And in truth L^dy St. CyprjePj Jiad cause enough to 
 grieve, though after the first moment she d,welt no longer 
 on the disappointment the broken engagement would be to 
 Stansdale, Lord St. Cyprien, apd; herself . Momentarily.it 
 was bitter in her mouth, then it was forgotten for ever, 
 swallowed up in the grea,ter shock of her discovery. 
 
 Kind-hearted., gentie-souled though she was, Lady St. 
 Cyprien h^d small faith in the virtue of her, own cl^a^l 
 The knowledge had been forced upon her, despite heyself,' 
 ever since the days when she had m^de her debiit into 
 
WITHOUT SIN 167 
 
 society. But she was herself essentially too clean-minded 
 and charitable a woman to gloat over the weaknesses of her 
 order. It was sad enough and bad enough to know that all 
 ^ives were not faithful, all dartghters pure. 
 
 But in the truth, the modesty and goodness of Mary 
 I^evinge, sprung from another race, born in another sphere 
 of life, she had always believed, and still must do so. 
 That _ Mary, with her high ideals, her slightly fantastic 
 potions of purity, should have stooped to an intrigue, Lady 
 St. Cyprien felt to be absolutely out of all question. That 
 the girl had been trapped seemed equally absurd, for what 
 man could be so brute-low as to bring such shame upon so 
 sweet a saint? Involuntarily as Lady St. Cyprien realised 
 the extent and consequences of so cruel aii outrage, she 
 clenched her white fingers till the blood started from her 
 palms. 
 
 It was the .clinging touch of Mary's small hands that first 
 roused her from her agony of rage and grief. 
 
 "Dearest, best of friends. You must not grieve." 
 
 "But the cruetlty of it all. Oh! my poor. child, when I 
 think of all that is yet to come," and Lady St. Cyprieji, 
 growing incoherent in her anger and sorrow, lost the last 
 remnant of calm frigidity and wrung her hands. 
 
 "When-r-when did you realise this thing?" she said 
 presently when she could find words. 
 
 "About two hours ago. At first — at first I thought I 
 should have died — ^with joy." 
 
 Heedless of the horror and alarm which grew in Lady St. 
 Cyprien's dark eyes, Mary went on speaking. 
 
 "For I knew the sign had been vouchsafed to me ; that 
 alj fears and doubts were dispelled for ever; that a nation's 
 supplications were to be answered in God's good time." 
 
 She spoke very gently,, the words dropping so slowly 
 from her parting lips that she might have been in dreamland. 
 
168 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien's voice was husky and rough, and she 
 had to clear her throat twice before she could whisper: 
 
 "What do you mean, Mary?" 
 
 The girl rose to her feet. Her form dilated, her face 
 glowed as from an inner fire, her eyes grew mystic as 
 though they had gazed into the very heart of heaven itself. 
 
 " I mean that the God of my forefathers has been good 
 and merciful; that he has hearkened to the prayers of my 
 outcast people; that he has vouchsafed the desire of a 
 despised race, and that henceforth the love of man is not 
 for me. For I am that woman of whom the prophet Isaiah 
 has spoken." 
 
 She raised her round white arms to heaven, and as her 
 loose, full sleeves fell back, they gleamed like carven ivory 
 in the sunshine. 
 
 " I am that maiden who is to be the human link between 
 God and man. The miracle of miracles has come to pass. 
 A virgin has conceived, and shall bear a son, and shall call 
 his name, linmanuel." 
 
 With wonder and pity filling her heart. Lady St. Cyprien 
 left Holmhurst. It was no use to argue. 
 
 That a marriage with her nephew, Stansdale, was out of 
 the question she was convinced; but how far Mary's wild 
 words were the chimera of a brain disordered by the terrible 
 discovery of the morning, she dared not think. Only of 
 one thing was she convinced, on one certainty she would 
 stake her very life, Mary herself had not sinned. Of noth- 
 ing else was she sure. The whole foundation of her faith 
 in virtue and in truth was shaken, though it still stood. 
 
 Absorbed in doubts of past actions, and filled with fears 
 for the future, Lady St. Cyprien was driven through the 
 close July-parched streets and into the dusty Park. Her 
 newest trouble was poor Stansdale. He was to lunch that 
 day in Lowndes Square, to meet his betrothed; and in the 
 
WITHOUT SIN 169 
 
 chintz-hung boudoir they would have talked of the wedding 
 and the honeymoon, the gowns and the jewels, which are 
 the glory of matrimony to a young girl. Now that was all 
 over, and Lady St. Cyprien sighed very heavily as she 
 thought of the blow she had to aim at the heart of the boy 
 whom she loved as she would have loved a son, had God 
 sent her one. 
 
 "Hallo! Adela. What are you dreaming about? The 
 cut of Mary's wedding gown, or which house in your neigh- 
 bourhood you intend the young couple to occupy?" 
 
 Lady Theo's loud voice rang out from the driver's seat 
 of a smart mail phaeton, which she had pulled up in an 
 alarming, if daring fashion, right across the noses of Lady 
 St. Cyprien's horses. 
 
 "A thousand congratulations, dear," screamed Lady 
 Theo, hauling at the mouths of the chestnut cobs she was 
 driving, and making them dance, till every link and buckle 
 in their harness jingled a silver chorus. " I had meant to 
 turn in at Lady Holgate's last night, and then I suppose, I 
 should have heard the news. Only I got stuck up at Kitty 
 Vyvyan's card-table, and I won a bit; so of course I 
 couldn't break my luck. But I saw it in the Post this 
 morning. It's a perfect match." 
 
 And having screamed in an ascending key till she had 
 reached the limits of even her flexible voice. Lady Theo 
 subsided, and waited for an answer. It rather astonished 
 her when it came. 
 
 " Let your man take the cobs home, Theo, and come for 
 a walk with me. There's plenty of time before luncheon. 
 It's not one o'clock yet." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien had kept her sunshade so low over her 
 head that, beyond catching a rather weary note in her 
 always subdued voice, Lady Theo did not guess that any- 
 thing was amiss. 
 
170 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 But when the two ladies had wandered a little way up 
 one of the narrower walks, where the burnt trees flung 
 heavy shadows on the cracked, brown earth, Lady St. 
 Cyprien lowered her parasol and dropped heavily on to a 
 
 "Heavens! Adela," cried Lady Theo, with genuine con- 
 cern. "Are you not well? There! and my flask is in the 
 phaeton. I get so faint myself sometimes, I generally like 
 to keep a chasse handy." 
 
 Lady Theo bounded forward, as though she would have 
 pursued her carriage, but Lady St. Cyprien held out a 
 detaining hand. 
 
 "Don't go, Theo," she cried, weakly. "I am not ill, 
 but in great grief. A terrible thing has happened." 
 
 "I am so sorry, Adela. What is it? Any one ill? St. 
 Cyprien, or Stansdale, or Mary? But they were with you 
 last night at Holgate House; it can't be either — ;— " 
 
 "It is Mary." 
 
 "Mary ill! How very sad!" 
 
 But Lady Theo's rather conventional platitudes of sym- 
 pathy were stayed on her lips by the expression of intense 
 sorrow on the older woman's face. 
 
 " She — Mary is not dead?" she asked in a low voice. 
 
 " It is worse than that. It is the worst thing that can 
 come to a girl." 
 
 "Mary like that? Oh! Adela, impossible. You must 
 be mad to even suggest such a thing." 
 
 Lady Theo's views of life, which, like those of most 
 people, were principally governed by personal experiences, 
 were scarcely of a charitable order. Her pert nose was a 
 very bloodhound's for scenting out a scandal, and her wide 
 mouth and shrill voice made the most of every good story 
 that came her way. But the finer depths of her being, 
 which she had done her best to stultify, had always re- 
 
WITHOUT SIN 171 
 
 sponded to Mary's purer, higher views. She admired traits 
 in the girl's character which she would have crushed be- 
 neath a scornful heel in her own, while the strong strain of 
 ignorant superstition in her nature had always been touched 
 by the mystic atmosphere of idealism with which Mary 
 sometimes surrounded herself. 
 
 That this pure girl could have fallen as other women of 
 all classes had fallen, she believed was impossible, and her 
 disclaimer to Adela St. Cyprien was at once hurt and indig- 
 nant. 
 
 " I do not say the child has sinned ; God forbid that I or 
 any one should cast so heaVy a stone at her. Yet it is as 
 I have told you. The marriage cannot take place." 
 
 The Countess's stately form, which none of her great 
 circle had ever known to bend, now bowed and swayed in 
 her excess of grief. 
 
 Lady Theo only sat with her big, beautiful eyes fixed on 
 the sun-baked ground, and her ugly mouth twisted into an 
 inscrutable curve. 
 
 "Adela! Adela! Does Mary account for — explain — ex- 
 cuse ?" 
 
 " I fear the terrible shock of discovery and confession has 
 for the time absolutely destroyed her nerves. She made no 
 scene; in fact, her quietude and self-assurance, after the 
 first breakdown, were inexpressibly painful." 
 
 " She did not admit anything?" said Lady Theo^ with 
 eyes still fixed and mouth still contracted. 
 
 "Nothing! She was too full, poor child, of those dreams 
 and notions which she has fostered till they have grown to 
 be a part of her." 
 
 " Those ideas about— about the Virgin Mary, the picture, 
 and all that?" 
 
 Adela St. Cyprien nodded. 
 
 The colour crept slowly from Lady Theo's cheeks, leav- 
 
173 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 ing her sallow and plain: her mouth twitched nervously, 
 and her voice shook so that she could scarcely speak. 
 
 "Adela — Adela," she hissed out between her labouring 
 breaths. " Do you remember what Mary told us that Sun- 
 day morning in March? About a vision which she had." 
 
 "I remember that. But, Theo, surely you — don't think 
 — you cannot connect " 
 
 Lady Theo caught her friend's hand. 
 
 " I think, Adela, that a great miracle is going to happen. 
 Perhaps the end of the world. Doesn't the Bible say some- 
 thing about it happening when the second Redeemer comes? 
 Ah! Adela, you've been a good woman — and Mary is a 
 saint, and worthy to be what she is. But I — I've been 
 bad. I've told lies, and betted, and snubbed poor Tom 
 shamefully — and I play cards — and once — once — it's three 
 years ago now — I cheated awfully. I've been a very 
 wicked woman, and now the time of punishment is coming." 
 
 Her eyes were dilated with terror, as though the eternal 
 fires themselves were bursting forth at her feet. She shook 
 like a leaf from head to foot. 
 
 "Theo, don't say such dreadful things," cried Lady St. 
 Cyprien, roused to the necessity of action by the other's 
 condition, which was fast becoming hysterical. " You must 
 come home at once with me. The matter must be faced 
 bravely and quietly — for Mary's sake. It will be all over 
 the town in a few days, and God help her then, if some of 
 the friends of her childhood do not stand by her." 
 
 The Eow was empty as they crossed to Albert Gate, but 
 Lady Belinda Harvey, who drove past them at the corner 
 by the French Embassy, on her way to a big luncheon at 
 the Bachelors' Club, told fifty people that afternoon that 
 Lady St. Cyprien did not look a bit pleased at her nephew's 
 engagement. 
 
AN INTERMEZZO 
 
 Lambs wandering through the bushes leave white wool 
 upon the thorns. The seagull drops white feathers on the 
 darkest furrows. The snowflakes fall in white sheets over 
 the Holy Season. The break of hawthorn buds blanch the 
 trees: the snowdrops spangle the woods; the cherry and 
 pear blossoms crown the gardens when the month of maidens 
 is at hand. Even as these, the immaculate soul of Mary, 
 ignorant of all but its own purity, made all things white 
 about her in the house in which she lived, and weaved and 
 wrought, like an angel in the moonlight, placing lilies and 
 wax candles in a chapel of alabaster. An atmosphere cleai* 
 as moonlight on sea-foam, white as lilies laid against 
 marble, grew about the life of Mary, and filled every corner 
 of her heart and home. It was as the halo of her virginity, 
 which widened and spread in trembling silver rays that 
 reached to the edges of her own domain, and made for her 
 a very world of whiteness. 
 
 The velvet hangings, wrought with huge flowers in col- 
 oured silks and touched with metal threads, were folded 
 aside. Oriental rugs of gaudy hues, and the tawny tiger 
 skins were, with the golden bowls and flagons of repousse 
 work, put out of sight. As the days went by her fancy 
 strengthened, till the flare of a colour jarred on her super- 
 sensitive nature, and the sound of a rough voice or heavy 
 step thrilled her as the blare of brass among the melody of 
 strings and wood instruments. 
 
 As the impress of her own purity grew about her, 
 
174 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 obedient to her impression, Mary surrounded herself only 
 with women servants, who, like herself, were dressed iu 
 white, and, as the ideality of her personality strengthened 
 about them day by day, her house became more and more 
 like a beautiful nunnery, where the footfalls were always 
 light and soft, and the voices sbunded low and sweet. It 
 became like a quiet, retired place, where the reek of sordid 
 sin and common clay never drifted across the threshold. 
 
 When the pale spirit of a new-born day descended upon 
 the house, it drifted like a pale ghost into the great white 
 hall, where a marble nymph, with a pulseless bosom of 
 driven snow, lay in perpetual slumber. Dimly the stair- 
 case, all of colourless stone, and balustraded with slender 
 columns of silver, rose in white steps up into the shadows 
 of the upper floors. In every chamber of the house a w'hite 
 avalanche of snowy muslin curtains fell in transparent fblds 
 before the windows. 
 
 Mary woke amid the pearly shadows of lace hangings, 
 the embroidered lilies on which were worked in thick white 
 silk. They swung in scentless wreaths above the white 
 face the innocent, meek eyes, and pale gold head, which 
 lay so motionless amcmg the bleached down pillows and 
 foamy laces of the bed. 
 
 The young girl rose at dawn to pray, and walked with 
 arched, bare feet, which passed like wind-blown petals bf a 
 white rose over the warm fleeces of the sheepskin rugs: 
 With unbound hair, and her lawn tiightdress fallfng about 
 her in straight pleats, she knelt in the rays of the rising 
 sun before the picture of the Virgin, so strangely like her- 
 self. 
 
 She kneeled on the steps of white marble, carved at the 
 comers with the heads of cherubim, and railed within slight 
 pillars of clear agate, through which the sun shot shafts of 
 opalescent light. Silver-edged was the altar and three 
 
WITHOUT SIN 175 
 
 great carved turquoises of virginal blue were set below the 
 flounce of lace that decked the narrow cloth of shining 
 silver. The sconces which held the ever-burning candles 
 of pure wax sparkled like cut ice. All the room was pale 
 and colourless as Chastity herself, save where the giant 
 palms flung verdant shadows above the sheaves of Eucharist 
 and Mary lilies, and the tiny bells of the valley blossoms, 
 which filled the atmosphere with a white mist of per- 
 fume. 
 
 Voicelessly and in no set form she prayed ; then, rising 
 to her feet with the sweet humility of a handmaiden, she 
 went to her toilette. The walls of her bath-room were tiled 
 with ware of so fine a glaze that they glittered like mother- 
 of-pearl shells and dulled the silver fittings, from whence 
 rose, like burning incense, perfumed steam, which warmed 
 the cooler air, and clung in glittering dew-drops to the sun- 
 lit window-panes. 
 
 From her satin shoulders she slipped her simple gown, 
 and gave up all the whiteness of her fair body to the em- 
 braces of the milky bath, splashing the water over herself 
 like a silver statue in a fountain, while the reflected sun 
 rays danced like golden fairies upon the polished walls. 
 
 Her bath finished, she hid the more perfect whiteness of 
 her skin with clean lavender-perfumed linen, on which the 
 little tucks and tiny hems, the pearl, the feather, and the 
 coral stitches had all been set by the toil-worn fingers of 
 nuns, who prayed as they worked in the garden of a con- 
 vent. She brushed her fair hair long and arduously, wav- 
 ing the marvellous whiteness of her slender arms, until it 
 hung like a great fleece of virgin gold about her shoulders. 
 She sat before her dressing table, strewn with clear-cut 
 crystal bottles, boxes, and toilet toys of carved ivory. 
 Twisting her hair loosely about her head, she bound it with 
 a fillet of white riband, in such a fashion that it was as 
 
176 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 though a nebulous aureole had been spun out of the sun's 
 gold threads above the strange fairness of her pale face. 
 
 A simple dress of white woollen, ungirdled at the waist, 
 like those she had worn when a school-girl, made her look 
 tall and slight as a swaying lily. 
 
 Still fasting, she prayed again for a few moments, then 
 rose and went to her humble first meal of milk and white 
 bread. Napery of old Flemish work, drawn and stitched 
 into severely stiff designs, and bleached in the dyked grass- 
 lands of quaint Holland, set the table. In the centre was 
 placed a silver bowl, brimming with scented plumes of 
 white lilac. At the four corners, in trumpet-shaped glasses 
 of the clearest crystal, were branches of white roses. They 
 almost met above her head as she took her place. The 
 ware was white, soft as velvet to the touch, feather light, 
 graceful in form, but guileless of all ornament, and simple 
 as that which serves a peasant's table. 
 
 Thence went she to her business about the house, which 
 hourly grew in whiteness, as though she were some spirit 
 whose passage blanched all things with its wings. 
 
 Once, as she crossed the hall, herself so pale she scarcely 
 had a being among the hewn marbles and white hangings, 
 the crimson stain of scattered rose-leaves on the stairs 
 caught her eyes. She started as though she had seen blood, 
 and the shadow of a vague horror clouded her face. And 
 yet she spoke very gently, as was her way, to the woman 
 who had brought the coloured blossoms across her threshold. 
 
 She spent much time among her linen chests, which 
 exhaled the fresh odour of newly dried lavender, and 
 satiated her craving for immaculate purity. Her fevered 
 fingers passed with lingering touch among the exquisite 
 cool cloths of double damask, her long arms dived among 
 the table linen from Germany, of fine bleached linen, cut 
 away to admit of entre-deux of exquisite old lace, or rare 
 
WITHOUT SIN 177 
 
 strips of embroidery. She turned over the Flemish drawn- 
 work and the dainty embroideries on the cloths that came 
 from Paris, but some fripperies for the tea-table, all frills 
 and gaily coloured bows and strips of bright satin, she 
 ordered to be taken away. 
 
 When she had strength she moved from shelf to shelf 
 the mighty masses of sheets, all of finest Irish linen and 
 bordered with hem-stitching, and often edged with lace, 
 and she loved to lay her burning cheeks against the prmcely 
 goffered, frilled pillow-cases, and the muslin embroidered 
 bolster slips she laid on either side. 
 
 Of flounced and embroidered bedspreads, quilts, pillow 
 shams, toilet covers edged with heavy guipure, and un- 
 wieldy piles of creamy white blankets, soft and warm to 
 the touch as the backs of young lambs, she had endless 
 stores. 
 
 One corner was, set sacredly apart, and in it, among some 
 fresh-gathered lavender and a few sweet leaves of lemon 
 verbena a pile of little things grew day by day : sheets and 
 blankets of such fairy lightness, lawn like a cobweb, lace 
 like a film. She scarcely dared to touch them, they were 
 so fine and small, and sometimes as she stood before them 
 her eyes filled with happy tears. Then with brain that 
 ached from the blinding whiteness of the linen, and nostrils 
 satiated with the odour of new-mown hay and green hedges, 
 among which it had been bleached, her soul sickened for 
 more whiteness, for further evidence of purity, for multi- 
 plied proofs of innocence, and she wandered out into her 
 garden, where all that was stainless of colour in Nature had 
 been gathered. 
 
 From her favourite seat she could see and scent the 
 
 flowers she loved the best. The lilies grew in ranks and 
 
 swayed in the breeze like the heads of snowy-hooded nuns 
 
 against the dim grey-green of the clipped yew hedge, above 
 
 12 
 
178 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 whicli a guelder rose tossed its balls of snow in tie light 
 summer air. Down by the little pond some white irises, 
 graceful as curving swan's necks, heralded the blooming of 
 the water-lilies. Two may-trees, like young maidens in 
 their first-communion dresses, lavished their sweetest per- 
 fume, which was crossed by the acrid odour of the wide- 
 eyed marguerites, growing in low tazza-shaped vases along 
 the south terrace of the house. The syringa bushes were 
 sickly and cloying, with a myriad white buds. The flower- 
 beds were virginal with white geraniums, anemones, and 
 verbenas. The hedge of homely sweet-peas which hid the 
 kitchen garden was sprinkled as though with snow, and an 
 arch, close to the shelter of the drawing-room windows, 
 which was overgrown with jasmine and myrtle, was like a 
 strip of heaven itself, so thick were the starry blossoms. 
 
 A pair of white hydrangeas, laden with heavy-headed 
 blooms, guarded a walk where simple cottage flowers, holly- 
 hocks and foxgloves, flox and tall spear-heaids of gladioli, 
 grew in one drift of snowy beauty. There, too, were tiny 
 white pansies, lifting their dainty cat-faces to the sun. Of 
 roses there were many, yet all were pure of colour, and 
 when they died, white dahlias, pale moon-flowers, and the 
 delicate Michaelmas daisy blew in their place. 
 
 In the hothouses hung great bunches of waxen steph- 
 anotis, mocking with their exquisite perfume the camellias, 
 expressionless and scentless as though carved from frozen 
 snow. The azaleas, dazzling in their whiteness and deli- 
 cacy, as a girl at her first ball, yet were foiled by the fair- 
 ness of a glossy-leaved gardenia, covered with a hundred 
 scented blooms. A white heliotrope put forth frail, sweet 
 clusters against the wall, and feathery spireas waved their 
 clustering cones, while over all, like a huge cup of ivory, 
 hung a glorious magnolia, pouring from its inexhaustible 
 bowl a mighty flood of matchless fragrance. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 179 
 
 Among her flowers, whiter than them all, as fair and as 
 innocent and pure as any, Mary walked or sat, clasping in 
 her hands, and sometimes reading one of the few books she 
 chose to have about her. They were very simple works, 
 for the most part old, and telling in quaint language of 
 brave deeds done in silence; of sorrows borne with forti- 
 tude; and of the lives of those who had been good men and 
 women through all the ages of all the world. They were 
 mostly bound in white velvet, and clasped with old silver. 
 But among them all she liked best the little Old Testament 
 in crabbed Hebrew characters and a shabby leather binding, 
 which ^ad belonged to the mother she had never known. 
 When she used it, the worn leaves always fell apart at the 
 prophecies of Isaiah. A rare casket of carved white jade 
 held the worn volume of the poor Jewish woman, when 
 Mary had it not between her hands. 
 
 But sometimes, when she was among the white flowers, 
 touching their dainty faces with her slender fingers, and 
 accepting to the full their sweet incense, the spirit of a 
 vague unrest moved her, and urged her feet across the pad- 
 dock, where in those days only white cows grazed, towards 
 the little dairy, standing in the friendly shadow of an ever- 
 green oak. 
 
 About the porched doorway a white clematis had wreathed 
 its lithe limbs, and hung out a great banner of silver stars. 
 Eound the deepest windows climbed a pale passion-flower, 
 with only the shadow of the cross to mar the snow of its 
 rounded petals. Within the small building all was neat 
 and clean and radiantly white, untouched by colour, save 
 when the reflection of the blue skies filtered through the 
 oak branches. A tiled dado lined the walls breast-high, 
 whence rose squares of half -transparent onyx as far as the 
 open ceiling, which was of white wood beams, and sup- 
 ported a lantern roof of clear glass. Small tiles of a pale 
 
180 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 cream hue, and set in a herring-bone pattern, formed the 
 stainless floor, across which, in a trough of white marble, 
 ran a Stream of water, that fell with a sound of tinkling 
 bells from a group of young loves and swans of fine Parian 
 china. 
 
 Around the walls, on low tables of white wood, stood 
 the pans, white as the rich milk that filled them. The 
 cream, tinged a slight yellow, stood apart in graceful bowls 
 with double handles. The churn and skimmers, with the 
 pails, glistened like burnished silver from an alcove, the 
 wooden butter moulds and pats, scoured white as wool, 
 made a pleasant display on an adjacent shelf. 
 
 Behind the glass doors of a quaint cupboard, inlaid with 
 leaves and flowers of mother-o'-pearl, stood some cups and 
 dishes of rare old Leeds ware, glazed a deep cream colour. 
 She loved to dip a cup in a brimming pan, and watch with 
 childish pleasure the milky drops slide down the smooth 
 sides of the drinking-veSsel, as she raised it to her lips. 
 
 A white goat she had bought and taught to follow her 
 about, accompanied her to the dairy, and sniffed with its 
 innocent nose at pans and pails alike. 
 
 As the days drew in, and the soft summer mists, like 
 tufted wool, floated across the open spaces of her world, 
 she left the gardens, where the flowers lay in argent glory 
 under the white radiance of a broad moon, and spent the 
 evening hours in the snowy nest she had made for herself. 
 The electric lights and tall candles shone starlike among 
 the clouds of muslin and of lace, and cast light rays on her 
 own pale beauty. 
 
 At night, before she prayed, she bathed again, lest any 
 stain of earth should mar the fairness of that body with 
 which she thanked her God. 
 
 Even as " an angel-watered lily that near God grows and 
 is quiet," holding herself in absolute hope and trust and 
 
WITHOUT SIN 181 
 
 perfect faith for the future, Mary spent her days from the 
 beginning even unto the end, and the white moon which 
 shone in at her window, and the sparkle of the silver foun- 
 tain which babbled in the still blueness of the night, were 
 not more innocent of a fleck upon their purity than was the 
 little white girl who lay in the big white bed, and dreamed 
 of the child who was to know no man for a father. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 Fob a week Mary did not leave her house. But, the 
 first waves of womanly fear and religious emotion past, the 
 mantle of ineffable confidence and happy peace enwrapped 
 her. 
 
 Her secret was as yet unknown, save, perhaps, in the 
 seething workshops and tawdry parlours of the great East 
 End Ghetto, where there hummed awestruck mutterings of 
 a mighty miracle, and veiled hints of a prophecy to be ful- 
 filled — even in the lifetime of those who spoke. 
 
 But even such mysterious whispers died into speedy 
 oblivion. The vague pronouncements of Mrs. Marx, mum- 
 bled incoherently between large mouthfuls of sweet pickles, 
 were scarcely worthy of even the passing notice of her 
 sweated and starved compatriots. 
 
 Eor Mrs. Marx knew, or at least retained in her mind, 
 what nebulous assumptions she had gleaned during a short 
 visit her niece had paid her in her own apartments. The 
 conversation on the occasion fell entirely to Mary, who, in 
 very few and simple words, told her aunt that she was the 
 chosen instrument for a marvellous manifestation. 
 
 Mrs. Marx, who was eating huge pieces of "Turkish 
 delight" from a paper bag, cramming the rose-scented, 
 sticky dainty into her mouth with fat-beringed fingers, and 
 covering her coarse lips and double chin with powdered 
 sugar, heard Mary's news without one quiver of emotion. 
 
 No womanly anxiety for the girl's physical well-being, 
 
WITHOUT SIN 183 
 
 no sympathy with the awful ordeal which lay before her, 
 not even vulgar curiosity or unreasoning anger pulsed in 
 the old Jewess's selfish heart, or spoke from her honey- 
 filled chewing mouth. 
 
 Mary, who had struggled long before she could bring 
 herself to fulfil the Judaic law of honour and duty to those 
 of her own family, and who had instinctively fought against 
 betraying her sacred secret to the last woman in the world 
 whom she could ever hold in love and reverence, was stung 
 to the quick by Mrs. Marx's callous indifference. Was it 
 thus that the race which was to be redeemed through her 
 child would receive the manifestation of God's clemency 
 and forgiveness? Would the prospect of being once more 
 a nation among nations, honoured, reputed, and feared, be 
 thus thrust aside without one prayer of gratitude or one 
 song of praise? 
 
 Fop the moment, Mrs. Marx, with her brutish ignorance, 
 her coarse instincts, her sensual indulgences, her narrow, 
 self-centred ambitions, seemed to Mary the type of her 
 people, and at the thought the girl's meek spirit rebelled 
 and a great cry rose up in her heart that there might be no 
 future. 
 
 "They are not worthy!" her wounded spirit wailed. 
 
 But when she was back in her own boudoir, where the 
 sweet summer airs fluttered all day long under the striped 
 awnings and sighed amid the big bowls of fresh roses, and 
 where the sunlight, filtering through chestnuts and elms, 
 cast a tender veil of golden green on the quaint commodes 
 and cabinets, the shining silver, and rare china, and lent a 
 new mysterious charm to the dove-eyed Madonna, who, 
 with joined fingers and sweet childish mouth, smiled above 
 a big vase filled with white lilies, resignation came to her. 
 
 Here, amid the surroundings she loved, and before the 
 picture she reverenced, courage and hope strengthened and 
 
184 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 grew in her sad heart, and her faith in her God, in her 
 future, and in herself, flowed back into its old channels. 
 
 During that week of introspection and self-communion, 
 Lady St. Cyprien came to see Mary each day. 
 
 Of Stansdale's genuine grief and manly sorrow at his 
 broken engagement. Lady St. Cyprien said little. Her love 
 and her discretion warned her that to harp on the inevitable 
 would be both ineffectual and cruel. She was a woman 
 who had never indulged in idle tears. 
 
 "His regret is profound, for he loves you very dearly. 
 But his faith in you, like mine, is unalterable, and will 
 endure till the end," Lady St. Cyprien had said, and then 
 the engagement was as though it had never been. 
 
 At the end of the week, when Lady St. Cyprien arrived 
 as usual at Holmhurst, she was told that, the day being 
 fine. Miss Levinge and Mrs. Marx had started for a long 
 drive into the country, and were not expected back till late. 
 
 That same evening Mr. Erastus Bawdon had a "little 
 music" at his flat in Victoria Street. His entertainments 
 were sufficiently out of the way to attract even the most 
 blase of his circle. 
 
 " You see, one never knows what Erastus is going to let 
 one in for. He gives regular 'surprise' parties," had 
 shrilled Lady Theo across the railings in the Park that 
 afternoon. " One night he had cards and grilled bones till 
 breakfast time. Another it was a reformed drunkard, who 
 gave us a lecture on D. T. ; lemonade was served and lights 
 were out at eleven. He made up for it by a very tidy prize 
 fight the following week. I never miss a party at Baw- 
 don's." 
 
 So about midnight the thirty guests whom Mr. Bawdon 
 had favoured with invitations were assembled in his draw- 
 ing-room, which was gorgeously decorated in sufficiently 
 divergent styles as to remind a new-comer of a pagan 
 
WITHOUT SIN 185 
 
 temple in the East and a side chapel in a Catholic church. 
 The decors of his flat varied with his religions, and at 
 present the suggestion of a chapel was in the ascendant. 
 
 The " little music" — which had been supplied by a dubi- 
 ously clean band of howling drum-beating Orientals, and a 
 fat Circassian woman, who had danced the dance|]of sug- 
 gestion rather than intention — was over. The performers 
 were removed by Mr. Bawdon's Hindoo servant, and the 
 guests, who had been seated, rose and wandered rather 
 aimlessly about. The night was intensely hot and languid, 
 and the dreary monotony of the Eastern music and the la2y 
 movements of the fat dancer had depressed everybody. 
 
 In the first movement at least a dozen guests slipped 
 away, the men to their clubs, the women to the compara- 
 tive coolness of their lawn nightdresses and darkened bed- 
 rooms. Those who remained obviously wondered why they 
 did so. 
 
 But Mr. Bawdon was a man of resource. It was his last 
 party of the season, and he did not intend it to be an entire 
 failure. 
 
 "A score of us left, and all good for a flutter," he said 
 in his massive tones. " Just enough for a little game." 
 
 He pulled back an arras, made from a wonderfully 
 wrought carpet which he had acquired in India during his 
 profession of Buddhism. A charming card-room, perfectly 
 arranged and outrageously Philistine in decoration and 
 colour, lay beyond. It was a relic of his Agnostic days, 
 which even in his most fervent throes of emotional religion 
 he had lacked the strength of mind to obliterate, though 
 he had been known to effect a compromise by shutting 
 it up. 
 
 His guests moved toward the card-room. It looked cool 
 and pleasantly commonplace after the heavily scented, over- 
 elaborate, tiresome complexity of the drawing-room, and on 
 
186 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 a buffet, laid amid clear crystals of ice, were gold-tipped 
 bottles flanked by glittering cut glasses and many dishes 
 of tempting sandwiches. 
 
 Lady Theo was first across the room, her face, which 
 had looked very worn and haggard all the evening, per- 
 ceptibly brightening at the prospect of a gamble. Suddenly 
 she stopped, and, facing round, cried to those who were 
 following her, "No! No! We mustn't go in there. We 
 mustn't play cards — above all, for money." 
 
 "What's the joke, dear lady? Pray explain," drawled 
 Bertie Chant, who, very flaccid and weary after the hard 
 work of the season, strolled past her and dropped into a 
 chair by the card-table. 
 
 "Bertie, come away!" cried Lady Theo, working herself 
 up, as women will, for a scene. "Mr. Bawdon, I beg of 
 you to shut your card-room. At such a moment — to 
 gamble and bet — when the time is already too short — only 
 a few more months of preparation ;" 
 
 "Bravo! Bravo!" applauded Bertie Chant, patting his 
 hands softly together as he returned to the drawing-room, 
 and whispered in Dr. Noel Marrable's ear that this was 
 another of Bawdon's surprises. 
 
 "Preparation! what in heaven's name have we got to 
 prepare for?" asked Dr. Marrable, thinking to give Lady 
 Theo a friendly hand in a got-up scene. 
 
 "For the regeneration, or for the annihilation of the 
 world. It may be a few weeks only before we are called to 
 our last account." 
 
 "What a quite too awful idea,' Lady Theo," tittered a 
 pretty woman with an outrageously decollete gown and 
 obviously dyed hair. 
 
 "Oh! shocking! But who on earth is going to do such a 
 very uncomfortable thing?" babbled Bertie Chant in his 
 most insipid tones. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 187 
 
 "He who is to come!" cried Lady Theo, her face very 
 white and her eyes very brilliant. " The second Manifes- 
 tation of the divine mercy is at hand " 
 
 "For God's sake stop her, Aunt Adela," whispered Lord 
 Stansdale, slipping round the little crowd to Lady St. 
 Cyprien's side. " She'll throw Mary's name to these gap- 
 ing fools in another moment, and then " 
 
 "A Kedeemer is coming among us for a second time. 
 How shall we who have wasted our lives in selfish pleasures 
 and the gratification of the flesh, live in his sacred pres- 
 ence?" went on Lady Theo in her loud, clear voice. 
 
 Mr. Erastus Bawdon's large face grew ominously grave. 
 Lady Theo was curiously vulgar, piquantly plain, she was 
 a privileged person in high circles, and he himself had had, 
 in other and mors material days, a considerable weakness 
 for her. But his cultured sense had always revolted at 
 anything that savoured of blasphemy, as being devoid of 
 proportion and lacking in beauty, and at the present 
 moment he felt fearful as to how far Lady Theo's rather 
 deficient sense of art might carry her. 
 
 "Dear Lady Theo," he began sonorously. "A joke is 
 always charming, but surely on such a subject " 
 
 " Oh ! don't stop her, " cried she of the bust and shoulders. 
 " She's quite too funny." 
 
 "So fresh!" sighed Bertie. "Quite original! Lady 
 Theo as a preacher would draw all London. Where's it to 
 be? Have you engaged the Abbey or St. Paul's?" 
 
 " I cannot preach to you," cried Lady Theo, with desper- 
 ation. " I am not worthy. I am only fitted to warn you. 
 He who will tell you the truth, who will show you the way 
 to salvation, is to come, and is at hand." 
 
 "Theo! Theo, dear, don't you see they're laughing at 
 you?" whispered Lady St. Cyprien, who, with a frightened 
 look on her stately face, had come close to the other's side. 
 
188 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " They think you are in fun. Let us go away. I will take 
 you home." 
 
 "Oh! dear Lady St. Cyprien, don't interrupt. I believe 
 Lady Theo has joined the Salvation Army, " giggled Bertie 
 Chant flippantly. 
 
 "Ah! you may all laugh now," cried Lady Theo with 
 emotional defiance. " But wait till you hear that the 
 prophecy — surely you read your Bibles once — is fulfilled. 
 "Wait till the news goes that a holy child is born of a holy 
 virgin." 
 
 A burst of noisy laughter rang through the room. Dr. 
 Marrable, who had been leaning against the carved mantel, 
 suddenly stiffened himself and listened intently^ to the ebb 
 and flow of words. 
 
 Only Lady St. Cyprien and Lord Stansdale were silent, 
 while Erastus Bawdon scowled heavily. 
 
 "Oh! you may laugh, you may sneer," said Lady Theo, 
 tossing her head. " You think the age of miracles is past. 
 But I know that there is yet one to come. I know that 
 there is one who is a saint, an angel on earth; one who 
 alone is fitted to be the instrument of this wicked world's 
 salvation." 
 
 "Name! Name! Fame!" shouted half a dozen laughing 
 voices. 
 
 Stansdale caught his breath hard and waited for the blow 
 he was powerless to avert. 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien' s right hand flashed whitely towards 
 Lady Theo's parted lips, but she was too late. 
 
 "Mary Levinge!" 
 
 The two words dropped, but were caught and echoed in 
 twenty different tones. 
 
 Stansdale turned deadly white, and Marrable, standing 
 apart in the shadows, staggered as though he had been 
 struck. 
 
WITBOUT SIN 189 
 
 Was the vague suspicion that he had silenced a hundred 
 times lately in his own mind a fact? Was the shadow 
 going to take substance and crush his own heart and her 
 fair name in one hideous ruin? At Lady Theo's words 
 memory opened as a book, and he recalled how during the 
 past few months every look, every act, every symptom had 
 pointed accusing fingers of doubt and suspicion at the one 
 woman in the world for whom he had ever had profound 
 faith and reverence, and for whom he had ever felt the 
 pulses of love. The experience of the doctor was wide, but 
 the afEection and belief that filled the man's heart fought 
 hard with his brain. His common-sense said, "It is!" 
 His soul cried, "It cjinnot be!" Every one, he told him- 
 self, had made mistakes. Good women had been slandered 
 before now, and only death had proved their innocence. 
 
 And now the name of the girl in whose sinlessness he 
 believed, on whose innocence he would have staked his 
 soul's salvation, was to be made a bye- word, and he — ^he 
 dared not defend her. 
 
 "Mary Levinge! Impossible!" exclaimed Bawdon, 
 loudly. "Why, she is coming here to-night. I had a 
 note from her only this morning, saying that she was going- 
 to pass the day in the country, and should be late." 
 
 "Oh! she'll never dare come!" cried the decollete dame, 
 with outraged virtue glowing from every inch of her bare 
 skin. 
 
 " What shall we do if she does?" 
 
 "I shall see how things go." 
 
 "I think I shall leave at once," murmured the other 
 fluttering femininities. The hubbub was at its height. 
 Society, with a new victim flung on its mercy, cast away 
 its veneer, and whetted its fangs and sharpened its claws, 
 preparatory to the rending and devouring of the fair repu- 
 tation of a young and beautiful woman. 
 
190 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 With shrill voices and cruel eyes they fought and 
 wrangled over the possibilities and probabilities. The 
 ■women's shoulders shrugged right out of their gowns, the 
 men's eyes grew warm and theit lips moist and loose, as 
 they hazarded a hundred guesses, or affirmed a score of 
 facts. 
 
 Only Lady St. Cyprien stood sternly apart, her handsome 
 face set in the effort to keep back her tears, and Stansdale, 
 sunk in a chair, covered his face with his hands. 
 
 "Miss Levinge." 
 
 The soft voice of the Indian servant was heard above the 
 babel, and carried a dead silence through the room. 
 
 Mary entered^ her tall, slender form gowned, in soft 
 white silk, which fell in ungirdled folds straight to her 
 feet from a wide throatlet of worked silver and great tur- 
 quoises. Her gold hair was drawn simply from her fore- 
 head, on which played a light mesh of soft, loose curls. 
 She was not paler than usual, but her expression was inten- 
 sified in its sweetness, and her eyes set in her slightly 
 sharpened face, seemed larger and of greater depth; Tor 
 an appreciable space of time no one spoke, and she stood in 
 the amber shaded light, a fair picture of sainthood outlined 
 against the dim tapestries, which told in uncouth colourings 
 and faded outlines some mythical adventure of the old 
 Greek gods. 
 
 It was Lady St. Cyprien who broke the spell which mock 
 morality and false virtue were casting over Mr. Bawdon's 
 guests. 
 
 She swept past the suspicious women and doubting men, 
 and with outstretched hands of welcome, cried : 
 
 "My dear, how late you are; but we are all so pleased 
 to see you." 
 
 Then she kissed her on the brow, and, flinging one arm 
 round the girl, she led her through them all to a low seat. 
 
WITHOUT SIN' 191 
 
 With shy handshakes and awkward salutations they 
 greeted Mary, but Lady Theo, with a quaint admixture of 
 religious fervour and the deference she would pay to a royal 
 personage, swept a low curtsey as she passed by. 
 
 Then Mr. Erastus Bawdon, conscious that the Rubicon 
 was crossed, gave her a warm yet reverential greeting. 
 Lord Stansdale, the one man she had dreaded meeting, 
 spoke to her almost at once, and the strain of publicly 
 addressing her once over, took a seat by her side. 
 
 Marrable was the very last to go near her. He was pale 
 as ashes, and looked drawn and old in the bright light. He 
 merely extended a cool, formal hand, after taking leave of 
 Lady St. Cyprien. 
 
 "I doubt our meeting again before the autumn," he said 
 to Lady St. Cyprien. "I start for Norway to-morrow." 
 
 "And we shall be settled in Scotland before you are 
 back. Won't you spare a week to the grouse? I can offer 
 plenty of them — and, perhaps. Miss Levinge as attractions. 
 Otherwise, we shall be very quiet there this year." 
 
 He fixed his keen dark eyes on Mary's face for a moment, 
 and paused before replying. 
 
 Was he waiting for a sign from her? If so, he was 
 ungratified, for no shadow of interest in him or conscious- 
 ness of his gaze touched her unclouded eyes or sweet, 
 curved lips. 
 
 "I am fixed to Norway for as long as I can be away; 
 but thanks very much, all the same. Good-night — and 
 good-bye." 
 
 The curtains were dropped over the card-room, and till 
 the rosy summer dawn paled the electric lights beneath 
 their shades of amber silk to a sickly yellow, Mary sat amid 
 the few who stayed. 
 
 Again her gentle voice told of her vision, and of the later 
 revelation which had come to her. Her words were very 
 
192 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 few, but the simplicity of truth spoke with hei mouth, the 
 light of fervent faith shone in her dreamy eyes. 
 
 Erastus Bawdon was delighted. A new cult had been 
 started in his drawing-rooms; the first scenes of a fresh 
 dnvelopment of the world's history were acted there. 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 Business was over for the day. The ponderous iron 
 shutters had slowly veiled from late passers-by the delicate 
 china and gemlike pictures set forth behind the plate glass 
 windows of Levinge's Art Gallery. The purple twilight 
 lay thick and heavy in the front shop, where a couple of 
 assistants, with liquid dark eyes and markedly Jewish 
 faces, were quietly checking the rare contents of a large 
 case which had come up from Christie's salesrooms an hour 
 ago.. 
 
 In the Gallery itself it was lighter, and Martin Baird 
 could still see to mark a bulky catalogue. Presently the 
 young clerks — sent to Levinge's to learn the business — 
 announced their task as fulfilled, and took their leave. 
 The boy in a green baize apron, who only appears in West 
 End emporiums in the early morning or at closing time, let 
 them out at the narrow wicket cut in the shutter and then 
 came to his master. 
 
 " Papers, sir. Anything more, sir?" 
 
 " Only these letters for the post — and drop that into the 
 box at Joshua's as you go down the street. Good-night." 
 
 "Good-night, sir." 
 
 The rattle of a closing door announced the boy's [de- 
 parture. 
 
 Baird wrote on in the fast fading light, working at his 
 catalogues, noting instructions from customers, and jotting 
 down prices till the last gleams faded, and he dropped the 
 papers on his knees. 
 13 
 
194 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 The pictures had lost all colour with the dying day, but 
 the statuary loomed vaguely white ; and a suit of armour, 
 worked in delicate chased tracery that was fine as cobweb 
 lace, shone with pale, reflected beams from a distant 
 corner. 
 
 Baird sat very still, his bowed' figure and lean grey head 
 absorbed in the shadowy depths of the great chair of quaint 
 Italian carving he occupied. He loved the Gallery, as a 
 man with a lonely heart is forced to love the inanimate 
 background whence his friends had faded. He would often 
 spend long hours th^re, oblivious of the fair objects which 
 hemmed him close on every side, remembering only that 
 amidst the ever-changing surroundings he had been very 
 happy. His squalid boyhood, his disaj^ointed youth, 
 faded to forgetfulnesS, and he only remembered the years 
 he had spent in the Bond Street shop. 
 
 ' In fancy he saw old Ephraim-Levinge, .shabby ; andi bent, 
 with his big clever head surmounted by a skulUcap, passing 
 to and fro among the relics of a score of countries, mutter- 
 ing his long praiyers in the soft oily tongue of a dead nation. 
 Again he saw the large coarse fingers handling with ten- 
 derest touch and practised surety the eggTshell wonders of 
 a tiny cup or the fragile weft of some priceless tapestry. 
 He remembered the look of cunning over a bargain, the 
 calm determination in face of a heavy and . risky outlay. 
 He recalled the instinctive sympathy with the fad of' the 
 moment, and the almost prophetic foresight as to future 
 fashionable fancies, which are such attributes of the Jewish 
 people) and which enable themji and them: alone, to build 
 large fortunes from the dispersal of other men's homes. 
 
 Then the waking dream changed.! Bound the door 
 peeped a child's flaxen head, and among the giant vases 
 and :tall carved cabinets a little white^robed figure walked 
 sedately. 
 
WITHOUT aiN 195 
 
 "Martin, tell me a story." 
 
 And a thousand legends of fancy and of fact thronged 
 back on Baird. How she had questioned and wondered — 
 and believed ! 
 
 Instinctively he raised his eyes, and peered through the 
 blue dusk to where the painted panel of the angel-faced 
 Madonna had hung for so many years. One of Charles II. ' s 
 buxom beauties in all the conventional disarray of Lely's 
 composition, with bold round eyes and bare round breasts, 
 hung there now. A quaint fancy that the picture, with its 
 tawdry affectation of simplicity, desecrated the past, fell 
 upon him and he determined to have it moved elsewhere on 
 the morrow. 
 
 "Sir! ' Are you there?" asked a woman's voice. 
 
 " Yes, Mrs. Wills. I am tired, and am resting in the 
 dark." 
 
 "Your supper is ready, sir." 
 
 "Very well. Serve it. I shall be upstairs in five 
 minutes." 
 
 The housekeeper's footsteps died away, and Baird, with- 
 out rising, switched on the electric light, preparatory ta 
 putting away his papers and seeing all was safe for the 
 night. 'He blinked a moment in the strong glare, then his 
 eyes, as they cleared, caught sight of the evening papers the 
 boy had placed at his side before leaving. Idly he opened 
 The Piccadilly Gazette, ' glancing at the clearly printed 
 columns as he slowly paced across the Gallery. 
 
 Suddenly he stopped. The ascetic lines of' his rugged 
 face stiffened. He read and 're-read a short paragraph, 
 then let the journal flutter to his feet. 
 
 "Miss Mary! Oh, God!" he cried aloud. "It can't 
 be true. The man who Wrote such words is a' liar and a 
 coward,' so to traduce a saint like that." 
 
 All the chivalry latent in his cold Scottish nature was 
 
196 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 aroused, and a fierce unrest seized upon him to go out and 
 thrash the unknown writer of lies. 
 
 But first of all, he must know the truth. He despised 
 himself for the doubt that such a desire implied, but he 
 could not bring her fair name into a brawl without seeing 
 her. One glance at her pure face, one word of her sweet 
 voice, would nerve him to his task of avenger. 
 
 It was ten o'clock before he rang the bell at Holmhurst, 
 but the servants knew his position with regard to their mis- 
 tress, and he was admitted and at once taken to her boudoir. 
 
 "Martin! how kind of you to come," was her greeting. 
 " But — surely you've brought no bad news — there is noth- 
 ing wrong, I hope." 
 
 " Nothing is wrong. Miss Levinge — except — this shame- 
 ful thing " 
 
 He had not touched her proffered hand, for he had 
 doubted, and was not worthy. But he held out towards 
 her the newspaper, and pointed to the paragraph. 
 
 She took it from him, glanced over the lines, and then 
 laid the paper quietly down. 
 
 " It is quite true, " she sa^d simply. 
 
 Martin reeled as though he had been struck. 
 
 "True! True! That you are"— ^his lips refused to 
 frame the accusing words. 
 
 " It is true that I am elect among all women, and that, 
 in the fulness of time, the one for whom my people have 
 looked and prayed through the centuries is to come." 
 
 Martin Baird looked at her, as she stood there, tall and 
 fair, and pure as one of her own name flowers. Was she 
 mad, or was it all true? 
 
 He knew vaguely the faith of the Jews — that a prophecy 
 was yet to be verified — that a redeemer had yet to come. 
 But that she, so tender, so young, should be set apart;, 
 seemed to him too fearful-^too wonderful. 
 
WITBOUT SIN 197 
 
 Yet as he looked at her, the consciousness of a marvel- 
 lous change in her came to him. An expression of saintly 
 beatitude irrradiated from her face, she seemed hedged 
 about with a more than earthly dignity, the glory of an 
 overwhelming purity shone above her head. 
 
 And yet— and yet— there was that hateful print— and 
 surely the age of miracles was past. Filled with fears for 
 her well-being, racked with doubts for her happiness, the 
 faithful servant stood before the girl, who was at once his 
 mistress and his greatest charge. 
 
 "Miss Mary! Miss Mary!" he cried, holding out hands 
 which grief had enfeebled and made trembling. "Can 
 nothing be done?" 
 
 "There is nothing to do but to wait the Lord's good 
 time." 
 
 "But people— the world — your world. Ah! my dear, 
 my dear, how they will scoff at you." 
 
 She drew herself up and answered fervently : 
 
 " Let them. God knows that I am pure." 
 
 Martin Baird's hands dropped abashed, as though she 
 had reproved him with a lack of faith. He stood before 
 her, his face puckered in acute thought, his stern, thin 
 mouth working with emotion. 
 
 When he spoke again his voice was thick and husky, and 
 he did not look at her. 
 
 "Miss Mary, often before your grandfather died, he 
 made me promise that I would give my life in your service. 
 It was the one price he asked in payment for all that he 
 had done for me. I swore — not once, but many times, 
 that so long as I had breath I would stand between you and 
 sorrow. Miss Mary, I've known you as a little child — 
 I've watched you as a girl — I've prayed that I might see 
 you a happy wife. All these years you've had no need of 
 me, but now — now I may be of some use to you." 
 
198 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 He drew nearer to her, his whole body trembling with 
 excess of pity — and of fear. 
 
 "Miss Mary — let me marry you." 
 
 "Martin! you are mad!" cried the girl starting back. 
 
 "No, I am not; only! hear me out. Let me marry you, 
 I beseech. No one need ever know, for I-at least will keep 
 silence. Only in case they make it too hard for you at any 
 time — in case they are too cruel — then I will speak." 
 
 The girl's eyes filled with, tears. The man's intense 
 devotion — his love for her — holy and selfless as that of St. 
 Joseph — touched her to deepest gratitude. 
 
 She laid both hands,! so long and white and fast growing 
 thin to transparency, upon his two shoulders. 
 
 "Faithful servant, dear friend. You move me to my 
 very soul. But — I am in higher hands. My destiny is 
 written. The world cannot harm me ; the ' wo^ld cannot 
 help me." 
 
 She spoke but little more, for one of her moods of silent 
 ecstasy fell upon her. But Martin Baird understood. For, 
 as broken-hearted he left her white presence, he knew that 
 no man should ever call her^wife. 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 Mks. Mossenthal always spent the hour between break- 
 fast and her morning walk in her dining-room. The trees 
 in the Square garden were already shedding their sunburnt, 
 smoke-dried leaves, which lay in untidy heaps in the gut- 
 ters and roadway. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal, whose colourless eyes and long nose 
 peered above the flower-boxes on the window sill, frowned 
 as a puff of summer air whirled a barrow full of dust and 
 leaves across the freshly cleaned front doorsteps of her house 
 and down the area. 
 
 It was a very hot morning, but Mrs. Mossenthal was 
 characteristically gowned in a dark grey, tightly fitting 
 tweed, with an abnormally high collar. Her ash-coloured 
 hair looked more than ever as if it were painted against 
 her sallow face, and with her nipped, flat waist and stiff 
 shoulders, she had all the appearance of a Dutch doll. The 
 dining-room, handsomely as it was furnished, was as un- 
 compromisingly precise and wooden as herself. 
 
 No cheery litter of morning papers or correspondence 
 met the eye. Mrs. Mossenthal' s letters were destroyed as 
 soon as answered, and the place for the Ladies' Pictorial 
 was the lowest shelf of the dinner waggon, where it did not 
 look "untidy." 
 
 Having scowled sufficiently at the flying leaves, she rang 
 the dining-room bell sharply three times. A moment later 
 her maid, who always waited outside the door in anticipa- 
 tion of the summons, entered. 
 
300 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 "Put on my boots, Bates, at once, and tell me what I've 
 got to do to-day." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal knew perfectly well what her day's 
 engagements were, but she enjoyed the sensation of domi- 
 nating the mind of another, even a servant, with her own 
 petty desires and requirements. It gave her a sense of 
 power, which, being of a tyrannical nature, she loved to 
 exercise. 
 
 "Well, ma'am," began Bates, in a sing-song voice, as 
 she laced a pair of well-made boots on her mistress's large 
 feet. " You've got to give the orders and go to the mani- 
 cures now, and at half -past twelve Madame Sophie expects 
 you to try on your dresses. Mrs. Bellamy comes to 
 lunch — — " 
 
 " And mind I wear that pink crgpon. Now, don't for- 
 get. Mrs. Bellamy's not seen that yet." snapped Mrs. 
 Mossenthal, with that petulant vigour she put into every- 
 thing which concerned herself. 
 
 "Very well, ma'am. Then you've ordered the carriage 
 at three, and there are nineteen sets of cards to be left in 
 South Kensington. At five Mrs. Norton will be here to 
 massage you, and at six Jules is coming to shampoo your 
 hair ftnd dress it." 
 
 "And mind you have plenty of hot towels this time. 
 You know I have to be ready to go out at eight, and Mr. 
 Mossenthal hates to be kept waiting. Now go and put my 
 things out : the grey hat and gloves, and the veil I' wore 
 yesterday." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal's thin mouth widened in a smile as she 
 once again went through to herself her engagements for the 
 coming day. She thanked God that no one could accuse her 
 of indolence. She did not waste her time romping with a 
 nursery full of children, or lazing over the papers ; she did 
 not interfere in drawing-room meetings or worry her friends 
 
WITHOUT SIN 201 
 
 to subscribe to charities they cared nothing about; no one 
 could quote an instance of her intruding on bitter grief or 
 bothering in sick-rooms. No! she spent her time, her 
 thoughts, and her money on herself. 
 
 "And," she said aloud, as she rose from her chair, "if 
 every one else did the same, it would be a very good thing 
 for the world in general." 
 
 A sharp ring at the door bell arrested her thoughts, and 
 she hurried with her ungainly walk across the room. 
 
 ''&ames!" she hissed in a loud whisper through the din- 
 ing-room door, to the advancing footman. "James! I 
 can't see anybody." I'm just going out, and I've got all 
 the orders to give and my nails to be polished between 
 now and twelve. I've no time to waste on callers." 
 
 The visitor seemed to be in as great a hurry as Mrs. 
 Mossenthal, for before the footman, who was struggling 
 into his jacket while his mistress addressed him, could 
 reach the door, the bell rang again loudly. 
 
 " Be quick, James! and say 'Not at home.' " 
 
 Curious to ascertain who would so far trespass the rigid 
 rules of Bayswater etiquette as to pay a call at ten in the 
 morning, Mrs. Mossenthal laid her ear against the crack of 
 the dining-room door, which she held ajar. 
 
 "Not at home! Are you quite sure?" said a voice with 
 the well-known tribal twang running through it. " Mrs. 
 Mossenthal does not go out before ten as a rule, does she?" 
 
 Kecognising Mrs. Cohen's voice, and fearing that under 
 a strict cross-examination James would break down, Mrs. 
 Mossenthal deemed it best to advance with what cordiality 
 she could into the hall, and invite her visitor in. 
 
 "Oh! I thought that boy of yours was not telling the 
 truth,", cried Mrs. Cohen, squeezing her vast bulk past 
 the footman. " I was certain you would be in to me." 
 
 But Mrs. Mossenthal' s greeting was scarcely cordial. 
 
202 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Her sour face did not even relax into a Society smile, and 
 she did not offer Mrs. Cohen a seat, but with a cold hand- 
 shake stood upright just within the door. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen was not to be deterred, however, by such 
 trifles. She pushed into the dining-room, and sitting 
 heavily in a chair, began to fan herself with a large green 
 paper fan which was slung round her on a black ribbon. 
 
 " My dear!" she began, gasping heavily under her moun- 
 tainous busty which, unrestrained by the blouse of' soiled 
 light silk which she wbrCj assumed astonishing proportions. 
 " What a fearful thing this is. My poor Eugene — what an 
 escape." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal tightened her mouth till it looked like 
 a straight gash 'in her yellow face, but otherwise evinced 
 no emotion. The fact that Eugene Cohen had nevershowu 
 the slightest interest in herself was quite sufficient to make 
 her dislike the young man. 
 
 " Surely you have heard? Isn't your husband shocked?" 
 went on Mrs. Cohen, now a little nettled at the coolness with 
 which she and her prospective bombshell 'were being re- 
 ceived,' and rattling her green fan till it creaked. 
 
 "I've heard nothing^ and 'Sac always* takes the paper 
 away with him," answered Mrs. Mossenthal, with an indif- 
 ference which veiled admirably a growing curiosity- as to 
 why the Queen of Bayswater should have come round so 
 early in the morning. • 
 
 "If' you wait to read it in the papers you'll never know 
 about it," said Mrs. Cohen contemptuously. "^Though I 
 hear there ' was a hinting sort of paragraph without names 
 in The Piccadilly Gazette a night or two ago. But the scan- 
 dal is all over the town. It's — about — Mary-^Levmgif 
 
 Mrs. Cohen said the words slowly, and with an intention 
 not devoid of malice, for' she knew that the "Mossenthals 
 boasted among their own set of their kinship with the great 
 
WITHOUT SIN 203 
 
 heiress, and she had never forgiven Marjr for refusing to 
 marry her son. Her datk eyes, alight with triumph; 
 watched Mrs; Mossenthal grow green, which, was her blood- 
 less equivalent! for flushing., She noted how she glanced 
 into the hall and passage before closing the dining-room 
 door, and coming slowly over to the table. 
 
 "About Mary Levinge! What's she been doing?" 
 
 Mrs. Cohen laid one fat hand in a stained glove on Mrs. 
 Mossenthal' s arm, and drawing her down, whispered some- 
 thing in her ear. 
 
 "How horrible! Ah! the wretched girl," cried Mrs. 
 Mossenthal, all the savage fury of a woman who is en- 
 forcedly chaste by reason of her want of attraction, embit- 
 tering her thin high voice. "That's what comes of being 
 too fine to live decently among her own people. We were 
 not good enough for her." 
 
 Mrs. Cohen nodded her handsome head sympathetically. 
 
 "I always said that after old Ephraim's death Mary 
 Levingefs place was with you, her only relations — until she 
 married." 
 
 She had never said anything of the kind, but it suited 
 her now to avenge herself on the girl with the first instru- 
 ment that came to hand. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal pulled a chair close to Mrs. Cohen and 
 sat down. 
 
 " Tell me really what you have heard — what people are 
 sayingr" 
 
 And the two women, with interjections of sham disgust 
 and affected horror, talked and turned and twisted the tale 
 which was ringing through the drawing-rooms of London. 
 They snorted scornfully at the strange belief whispered by 
 Mary's friends, and discussed with noisy indignation and 
 smothered giggles every salacious suggestion and coarse 
 innuendo. 
 
204 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " And you say the girl is still going about?" ■ said Mrs. 
 Mossenthal, sitting back in her chair at last. 
 
 "Indeed, yes. I hear the scene at that Mr. Erastus 
 Bawdon's was disgraceful. One would think the girl had 
 done something marvellous; they're making a regular cult 
 of her." 
 
 Mrs. Cohen creaked the green fan again and sniffed ag- 
 gressively, but Mrs. Mossenthal was silent. Mechf^ically 
 her glassy eyes wandered to the clock; it was past eleven,- 
 and she had missed her appointment with the manicure at 
 Whiteley's. Tor once that did not trouble her. With all 
 her narrow ignorance and self-centred stupidity, Mrs. Mos- 
 senthal had the racial eye for a " good thing." 
 
 "They're making a regular cult of her!" 
 
 That meant that Lady St. Cyprien and her set, all of 
 the great world, people who were above the jibes and jeers 
 of the smaller fry, intended to stand by Mary. It' might 
 end in the lover — for, of course, there must be a lover, and 
 one who was probably a very big " swell" — coming forward 
 and marrying her. Perhaps it would be as well to " hedge" a 
 little, though not of course to take open sides. 'Sac would 
 never countenance that, for he had old-fashioned ideas 
 about the virtue of the women of his people. But a little 
 sympathetic kindness could do no harm, and if there was any 
 social notoriety attaching to the business Mrs. Mossenthal 
 saw no reason why she should not shine in the reflected light. 
 
 "Perhaps the poor girl can't help it," she said presently, 
 in a reflective manner. 
 
 "Can't help what?" 
 
 " Going about and not keeping people out of Holmhurst. 
 I should think she would be very glad to get away to some 
 quiet, retired spot." 
 
 Mrs. Cohen stopped the noisy waving of her fan. She 
 waited for what was to come. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 205 
 
 "I think I shall advise 'Sac to lend her our little place 
 in Essex for the autumn, or till it's all over, if she likes to 
 stay on there. 'The Nest' is very quiet." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal did not look at Mrs. Cohen while she 
 was speaking, and it was intuition more than ocular knowl- 
 edge which warned her that the fierce light of suspicion 
 was growing in that lady's fine eyes. 
 
 "We do not intend to go there this year ourselves. 
 Sac is ordered to Carlsbad, and then we shall spend the 
 autumn in Italy." 
 
 The words were in due season, and Mrs. Cohen's rising 
 wrath was somewhat appeased, though she could not resist 
 saying: 
 
 " You must do as you please about that, of course. Mary 
 is your relative, and I thank heaven heartily that I've 
 nothing to do with her." 
 
 Then Mrs. Cohen felt better and began to devise a means 
 by which she could herself see the girl. 
 
 " All the same, I think that immediate steps should be 
 taken to expostulate with Mary as to her conduct in still 
 going about. It brings tcs into contempt with the Chris- 
 tian set." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal rode for a fall. 
 
 "It will be my duty to see her at once," she said. 
 
 "But she won't see you," cried Mrs. Cohen bluntly. 
 "I'm told no one is admitted to Holmhurst without express 
 orders — and, besides, my dear — ^you scarcely know her, do 
 you?" 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal' s face hardened. 
 
 " She's dined here." 
 
 "Once!" interposed the other calmly. "And I don't 
 remember that you ever dined with her at her house." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal waived the degree of intimacy, and 
 asked who -yv^s to speak to Mary with regard to her conduct. 
 
206 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 It was on the tip of Mrs. Cohen's tongue to claim the 
 privilege, but a glance at her hostess's sullen face warned 
 her to be careful. 
 
 "I'll tell you what we'll do, we'll all speak to her." 
 She snapped her. fan twice in triumph. " I will write to 
 Mary this very, day, a kind letter of course, and just ask 
 her to come to tea one afternoon. You can drop in — 
 and shall we say next Thursday?" 
 
 "And where shall this meeting, be held?" asked Mrs. 
 Mossenthal. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen rose, smoothed down the tumbled front pleats 
 of her blouse, walked to the door and opened it before she 
 answered. 
 
 "At my house, of course, four o'clock." 
 
 As Mrs. Mossenthal followed her through the hall she 
 felt that she could yield that last point, for of course Mary 
 would accept the offer of "The Nest," and perhaps that 
 stuck-up Lady St. Cyprien would go there with her. 
 
 "Very well," she said, with a fair grace, as she drew 
 back the latch of the front door. "Four on Thursday." 
 
 A railway van pulled up at the house, and a large ham- 
 per was handed down. 
 
 "Oh I there's the weekly hamper from 'The Nest.' I 
 have no more time to chat, Mrs. Cohen; I must go down- 
 stairs and see the vegetables weighed. Servants are so 
 dishonest." 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 Fbom a social standpoint Mrs. Isaac Mossenthal detested 
 her own people. It was not to rub shoulders with her kind 
 that she haunted Kempton and struggled for invitations to 
 Hurlingham. Her flaunting Worth gowns and exaggerated 
 Virot bonnets, expressly built for the English market and 
 hopelessly un-Parisian, which she picked up as "marked 
 down" models at sales in second-rate Eegent Street show- 
 rooms, seldom graced the tawdry drawing-rooms of Maida 
 Vale and Kensington. 
 
 Eather did she prefer to play Maecenas in petticoats in 
 dingy studios at the back of Campden Hill, or in the more 
 dbubtful side-streets of Fulham. There> among unshorn 
 daubers and unshaved mummers, half-a-dozen lady scrib- 
 blers on " fashions" in smart bonnets and doubtful boots — a 
 few young women who, on the plea of a desire for inde' 
 pendence or irrepressible artistic yearnings, had left their 
 parents' roofs and were living, no one knew how or where; 
 amidst this idle crowd of conceited fribbles, who talked 
 bad art and professed the cult of " Self" — Mrs. Mossenthal 
 felt that she was in the "movement." 
 
 "I hate Jewesses; they can never talk of anything but 
 babies and servants," she would say in high nasal tones. 
 "Celebrities are quite different, they're so interesting." 
 
 And so she would garb herself in many-hued raiment 
 and walk stiffly to her brougham and go off to listen to the 
 latest scandal concerning Mrs. Larousse the pastellist and 
 young Horton, who did those wonderful fog studies, and 
 
208 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 how Maudie Taunton, the daughter of an old Indian officer, 
 had dyed her hair orange and gone in for leg parts, and 
 that Miss Templemore, the stuck-up girl with the white 
 face, who sculpted, and who had boxed Tommie Biddulph's 
 ears when he tried to kiss her at Lottie Vere's birthday 
 supper, had gone into the country— Cumberland or Corn- 
 wall — for six months, and tiiat old Lord Midas was going 
 to pay expenses. 
 
 Nothing but the idea that for once a Jewish drawing- 
 room could supply her with even a greater novelty in the 
 way of "talk" than the Bohemian purlieus of St. John's 
 Wood and HoUand Park, fortified Mrs. Mossenthal in her 
 intention of going to Mrs. Cohen's on the Thursday follow- 
 ing that lady's awful revelations. Besides, she still enter- 
 tained the idea of offering "The Nest" to Mary as an 
 autumn domicile. Yet, for all that, she was torn another 
 way too. 
 
 Mr, Lancelot Tremayne had just had a first piece pro- 
 duced at the St. George's Theatre, and was going to cele- 
 brate his accession to the ranks of the celebrities that very 
 afternoon with a tea-party at his house in Bedford Park. 
 Quite a number of actors and actresses would be there and 
 all the lady reporters for the fashion papers, and the gather- 
 ing would have been delightful. Now, alas! that new 
 frock — seven and a half guineas at an Oxford Street sale^ 
 and that bonnet with the wings in front, the bows at the 
 back, and the roses and tulips on the crown, would remain 
 unrecorded among the toilettes of the year, for was not the 
 Tremayne' s tea the last party of the season? 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal turned quite livid with annoyance at 
 the thought, while she ate her lunch, cutting up her food 
 into minute and precise scraps and slipping them sideways 
 into her tight mouth in a manner peculiarly her own. 
 
 At four precisely she ^stepped across the threshold of 
 
WITHOUT SIN 209 
 
 Mrs. Cohen's house in Westbourne Terrace. Gilt cornices, 
 showy bead curtains, stuffy plush draperies, and gaudy 
 pottery were dominant notes in the scheme of the decora- 
 tion of both entrance and staircase. 
 
 The drawing-room had a golden ceiling, which, by rea- 
 son of its heavy, lowering effect, gave the visitor a head- 
 ache, and the walls were covered in silk of peacock-green 
 and gold. At least three pairs of curtains were hung and 
 draped and tied across each window. Some figures of black 
 boys, swathed in stiff red and blue drapery, stood either 
 side of the fireplace. Large vases of Oriental warcj and 
 small tables laden with toys of modern Dutch silver, were 
 everywhere. The chairs and sofas were large, and on this 
 hot afternoon appeared intolerably warm. All the win- 
 dows were closed, and the general effect of the room was 
 that of vulgar taste, unlimited expenditure, and considerable 
 dirt. 
 
 "Ah! my dear, punctuality was always your virtue," 
 cried Mrs. Cohen effusively, as she greeted Mrs. Mos- 
 senthal. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen was en grande tenue, which, as usual, con- 
 sisted of a dark gown of silk, made exceedingly tight and 
 covered with heavy masses of twinkling jet. She looked 
 as though she were on the verge of strangulation, and fanned 
 herself perpetually. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal returned the greeting frigidly. She 
 was still yearning after the flesh-pots of the Bedford Park 
 tea-party, and had hoped to attain them if the little affair 
 at Mrs. Cohen's came off punctually. But every moment 
 that ticked from the French clock edged with large paste 
 diamonds put the celebrated Tremayne and his society 
 gathering further away from attainment. 
 
 The clock had chimed the first quarter before the aggres- 
 sive clanging of the bell heralded another member of the 
 14 
 
310 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 feminine Velimgerioht. The arrival was Mrs. Sam Abra- 
 hams, a tall woman with a red face and black eyes. She 
 wore a pink muslin frock and a Leghorn hat garnished with 
 boughs of apple blossom- She was forty-fivej but dressed 
 youthfully on account of her waist and hips, which were 
 small and girlish. Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon, who followed, 
 had no romances left either about her age or appearance. 
 The same greasy brown silk which she had worn on great 
 occasions for three years past was drawn in worn puckers 
 and folds about her fat^ stayless body^ She was very poor 
 and was generally ignored by the Bayswater Jewesses, who 
 long ago decided that Highbury was beyond the radius of 
 an afternoon call. But she claimed a distant cousinship 
 wil^ 'Sac Mossenthal, and Mrs. Cohen had bidden her on 
 this occasion with her two newly married daughters — large 
 blowsy young women with beautiful eyes and loose masses 
 of dark hair — with a view to keeping Mrs. Mossenthal's 
 self-importance in wholesome check. 
 
 That lady was quick to note the move, and adroitly de- 
 termined to play Mrs. Cohen at her own game. Forcing 
 an expansive smile to her pinched mouth, she rose from her 
 chair and bestowed a cordial greeting on Mrs. Nathaniel 
 Lemon, inquiring with effusion after "Nattie," and con- 
 gratulating the brides, Mrs. Issachar and Mrs. Lionel 
 Josefs, on their marriages. She hoped, in a loud voice, to 
 see more of them in the autumn when she came back from 
 the Continent, and then walked in triumph back to her seat. 
 Mrs. Cohen, who had hoped to suppress Mrs. Mossenthal 
 by the introduction of 'Sac's vulgar relations, was rather 
 nonplussed. Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt's entrance diverted 
 all the ladies. With her ijuick, bird-like movements and 
 scarcely veiled coarse innuendos, she came as a revelation 
 of a rather shocking sort to the party from Highbury. 
 
 " Oould'nt get here before," she chirped. "I hope the 
 
WITHOUT SIN 211 
 
 fair Mary has not been, and gone. But I've been lunch- 
 ing at the Savoy with old Tompkins, of Flying Moments. 
 We've been talking the higher philosophy, till really I 
 don't know where I am. Do you know, Mrs. Abrahams, 
 I often wonder how the world got on before that expres- 
 sion, 'Don't know where you are,' came to be invented. 
 It's so intensely full of meaning, and comes in at all sorts 
 of odd moments." 
 
 " And I hope Mr. Tompkins is going to give us some- 
 thing of yours in Flying Moments — a little story — or poem, " 
 said Mrs. Cohen, by way of making conversation. She did 
 not care for Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, and had been more 
 than a little vexed that morning at : hearing from her that 
 she intended to look in that afternoon to " see the fun. " 
 
 "A story! a poem!" screamed Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, 
 shrilly, holding up in affected horror a pair of beautifully 
 gloved little hands. "Heavens! I leave such twaddle to 
 the misses who scribble a bit to add to their pocket-money. 
 No. I believe in facing truths, calling a spade a ' spade. 
 Why, the Park Magazine was turned off all the bookstalls 
 last month because of my paper, 'Sex Studies.' Pieople 
 are so paltry, they like to talk about — well) about philoso- 
 phy and water. I prefer the genuine thing. Now, I've 
 promised Tompkins a paper on this business of Mary Lev- 
 inge's. That's why I invited myself this afternoon. 
 
 Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon and her daughters grew red. 
 They were very proper, and nothing but a strict sense of 
 the duty they owed to the family had induced them to risk 
 meeting any one so dreadful as Mary Levinge that after- 
 noon. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen, too, looked hot and angry. She considered 
 Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt a disgrace to a race which poses 
 to claim both purity and virtue for its women. 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal, on the contrary, let a cold smile creep 
 
212 WITHOUT 8IN 
 
 over her hard face. She felt that the unspeakable phases 
 of life, as served up according to Mrs. Goldschmidt's por- 
 nographic tastes, might prove interesting, and ammsing, and 
 perhaps compensate for that lost society function. 
 
 Mrs. Montagu was announced. Her figure was still as 
 charming as ever, though the roots of her carefully dark- 
 ened hair gleamed silver- white under a fascinating bonnet. 
 She and Mrs. Cohen had never been friends, for it was to 
 the gossip concerning Mrs. Montagu and Eugene that Mrs. 
 Cohen still attributed the failure of her son's suit with 
 Mary. 
 
 But on such an occasion the two mothers made common 
 cause ; either one of them might have had the misfortune 
 to have been connected by marriage with that abandoned 
 girl, who, mercifully for them, had preferred the company 
 and houses and immoralities of the Gentiles to an honoured 
 and becoming alliance among her own people. 
 
 They were still condoling and congratulating one another, 
 when for the last time the folding doors, panelled with 
 mirrors and decked with gilt carvings, were flung open, 
 and Mary Levinge was ushered in. 
 
 The face of every woman present froze into an expres- 
 sion of virtuous horror, as Mary advanced towards Mrs. 
 Cohen, and said with her pretty smile : 
 
 " How kind of you to let me know that you would be at 
 home to-day." 
 
 Mrs. Cohen gave her a flabby hand-shake, Mrs. Mossen- 
 thal a firmer grasp, for she intended to advance her country 
 house at once. Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt stood on the tips of 
 her tiny toes and kissed the girl ; she did it to shock the 
 rest. Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon bowed, her daughters peeped 
 beneath their lowered lids at the first "wicked woman" 
 they had ever seen, as though she were an object of fearful 
 curiosity. Mrs. Montagu bent ostentatiously over the tea 
 
WITHOUT SIN 213 
 
 table, and began to lisp in a high-pitched drawl to Mrs. 
 Abrahams, who, in her efforts to bow to Mary without 
 incurring the great Mrs. Montagu's notice and consequent 
 displeasure, became purple in the face. 
 
 Accepting a chair by Mrs. Mossenthal, and a cup of tea, 
 Mary sat down amid a silence which deepened moment by 
 moment. 
 
 The Lemon contingent had not spoken at all, Mrs. Mon- 
 tagu's lisp was extinguished under a large mouthful of 
 almond cake, and even Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt's purposeless 
 chatter died in a nervous giggle. 
 
 " How hot town has been this last week, and how glad 
 every one will be to flit to clearer air," said Mary, rather 
 wearily, and sipping her tea. 
 
 She looked indeed as though the heat had dragged her 
 terribly. Heavy bistre lines circled her gentle eyes, the 
 pale hair lay dull and lustreless beneath the shadow of her 
 wide white hat, and her mouth was drawn from a curving 
 bow into a pitifully tired droop. Her right hand, from 
 which she had pulled the long suede glove, was slender to 
 transparency, and the tiny jingle of the big flashing rings 
 upon her too slight fingers, touched a chord of womanly 
 sympathy in Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon's commonplace, 
 motherly heart. 
 
 " It will indeed be pleasant to get away, " said Mrs. Cohen, 
 opening the attack on the unsuspecting girl cautiously. 
 " London has not Ijeen a very congenial place of abode to 
 some of us just lately." 
 
 " I think it ith a pity the theathon didn't end a month 
 ago," lisped Mrs. Montagu, through another mouthful of 
 cake. 
 
 " Or that some people didn't go away before this," feebly 
 mumbled Mrs. Abrahams, in support of her social superior. 
 
 Now was Mrs. Mossenthal' s chance. 
 
214 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " Perhaps, Mary, you have nowhere to go that you care 
 about. But ' Sac and I are ordered abroad for the autumn, 
 and then meant to come straight back to Cleveland Square, 
 and we shall be pleased if you will go to 'The Nest,' our 
 place in Essex, and stay there as long as you like." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal's angular form heaved and swelled with 
 pride as she made the offer. Neither Mrs. Cohen nor Mrs. 
 Montagu, with all their money and airs, had a country 
 house to lend any one. 
 
 " Thanks very much, you and Mr. Mossenthal are most 
 kind," said Mary, turning shining eyes of gratitude on Mrs. 
 Mossenthal. " Another time I shall be delighted, for every 
 one says 'The Nest' is charming. But although Lady St. 
 Cyprien has pressed me to spend the next two months with 
 her in Scotland, I have decided to stay on in town." 
 
 "To stay?" asked Mrs. Cohen. 
 
 "Certainly to stay, at any rate for a few months." 
 Unwittingly, Mary had thrown down the gauntlet. Amid 
 a dead silence, Mrs. Cohen and Mrs. Mossenthal exchanged 
 glances. Who was going to pick it up? Who would be 
 the first to point out to this girl the scandal she was about 
 to bring upon the community? 
 
 The air in the hot, vulgar drawing-room grew heavy. 
 No one moved but Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, who settled her- 
 self in her chair, prepared to thoroughly enjoy something 
 which would be even better fun than higher philosophy. 
 
 Mrs. Cohen shut her fan, cleared her throat and began : 
 
 " My dear Mary, we were all friends of your poor, dear 
 grandfather's, and since his death we have taken consider- 
 able interest in you and much thought for your welfare, 
 though you have so openly cut yourself adrift from us all, 
 and have shown an undue preference for the society of those 
 who are not of our ancient faith." 
 
 Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon, who considered all Christians 
 
WITHOUT SIN 21 5 
 
 outcasts, sighed piously. Mrs. Goldschmidt sniggered into 
 her handkerchief. 
 
 Mary coloured slightly. 
 
 "Lord and Lady St. Cyprien were faithful patrons of 
 my grandfather, and have been kind to me since my child- 
 hood." 
 
 " Their friendship does not seem to have done you much 
 good lately," said Mrs. Mossenthal sourly. 
 
 The coarse insinuation struck home — Mary flushed scar- 
 let, and putting down her tea-cup, attempted to rise, but 
 Mrs. Cohen laid a hot, heavy hand on her arm and kept her 
 in her seat. 
 
 " Now, Mary, you are not going to leave this house before 
 we, who are all old family friends, have pointed out to you 
 the disrepute and scandal you are bringing upon your 
 people. Oh! my dear — you needn't look as though you 
 didn't understand what I meant. We all know what has 
 happened, and what is going to happen." 
 
 It was curious to watch the women's dark Eastern faces, 
 as they gathered round their prey, shed every shadow of 
 the veneer of Western civilization, acquired with such pains 
 through the long centuries. They were suddenly trans- 
 formed into the hawk-nosed, cruel, brainless animals who 
 peep from the latticed windows, or lurk in the dusky door- 
 ways of Syrian townships and Mauresque hamlets. 
 
 Even the fat features of the Highbury party hardened in 
 the lust for vengeance on the woman who had fallen. 
 
 "We know that misfortunes will arise," went on Mrs. 
 Cohen, her society manner disappearing so fast that no one 
 would have been surprised to see her put her arms akimbo. 
 " God forbid that we should be hard judges upon those who 
 are so overtaken. We are all married women. " She looked 
 around her as though to reassure herself on that point, 
 "and are thankful for our husbands and our children." 
 
216 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 The two brides blushed deeply ; and Mrs. Mossenthal, who 
 was childless, and held 'Sac in contempt, frowned. "But 
 such mercies should never blind us to the failings of others 
 — whom we should pity — if they deserve it." 
 
 She snorted and stared straight at Mary, who, entirely 
 bewildered at the sudden attack made on her, sat transfixed 
 with amazement. 
 
 " But when people do not deserve it " continued Mrs. 
 
 Cohen, who was growing intoxicated with the sound of her 
 own voice. 
 
 " When they flaunt about without shame among Gentiles," 
 said Mrs. Abrahams, from beneath her juvenile hat. 
 
 "And refuthe fine marriageth ath though they didn't 
 care about living rethpectably among their own people," 
 spluttered Mrs. Montagu. 
 
 " When the well-meant offers of their own relations to 
 give them a chance of going into retirement for a time are 
 treated with scorn," cried Mrs. Mossenthal spitefully. 
 
 " Then there can be no pity or forgiveness, and we feel 
 bound to tell you that we cannot continue to know you or 
 visit you," perorated Mrs. Cohen, unfurling her fan and 
 resuming her society air. 
 
 Mary looked from one woman to another as each spoke, 
 with childish, frightened eyes. She had a vague idea that 
 they were vexed with her for preferring Lady St. Cyprien's 
 society and set to their own circle; but her gentle nature 
 could not conceive that she had been trapped into Mrs. 
 Cohen's house to be browbeaten and scolded by these women, 
 to whom she yielded neither submission nor affection. 
 
 A plea for some explanation was rising to her lips, when 
 Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, flinging one leg over the other, and 
 flicking a crumb from her skirt, cried in her most airy 
 manner : 
 
 "Who's the man, Mary?" 
 
WITHOUT SIN 217 
 
 Pure and sinless as the girl was, the insolent insinuation 
 dragged aside for ever the veil of immaculate innocence 
 behind which her intelligence had lain hidden. 
 
 Those words, coarse and base, uttered by a woman of the 
 lowest moral grade, let in that awful light, " the opinion of 
 the world," upon her soul. 
 
 Amongst those other friends of hers, friends who were 
 foreign to her race, alien to her belief, whatever of doubt, 
 of wonder, of sorrow there might be, no words save those 
 of love and faith had been spoken in her presence. It had 
 remained for her own people, whom she still hoped to 
 redeem and restore, to cast the first stone at her. 
 
 With the blood rushing to her face as though she had 
 been struck, she rose to her feet, looking so grandly tall in 
 her slender height, so royally simple in her straight white 
 robe, among these large-boned, over-dressed Jewesses. 
 
 "What man, you say? You believe I have a lover — 
 because I am going to give to the world the earthly embodi- 
 ment of a spirit? Are you so forgetful of our old beliefs, 
 so ignorant of the tenets of our grand religion, that you 
 will not understand? Have the prophets taught in vain, 
 and the books they have written been read to deaf ears? 
 You are Jewesses — daughters of an outcast race — a scat- 
 tered nation. Have you no credence in the promise of our 
 God, who has sworn to lead us to our own again? Have 
 you no pride of birth that makes you yearn for the countries 
 and the cities which once were yours by right of conquest? 
 Do you none of you desire to behold your children's chil- 
 dren numbered and honoured among the nations of the 
 world? Ah! you are wilfully blind, in that you will not 
 see that the great fulfilment of the prophet's words is at 
 hand. You are obstinately deaf when you will not hear 
 that our God and the God of our fathers is about to redeem 
 the promise made to us, in the hour of our most just 
 
318 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 punishment — and that I — I who speak to you now — have 
 been chosen as the poor instrument for your salvation." 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal shrugged her high shoulders scornfully, 
 and Mrs. Montagu sneered all over her pretty, Southern face. 
 
 Mary looked round at her tormentors, and the chaste dis- 
 dain of the maid for the matron rose in her throat. 
 
 "Ah! you women, who boast of your virtue in that you 
 have borne children to your husbands. Where is your con- 
 tinence of body, your purity of soul ; you who have lain in 
 the arms of men and been subject to them? What is your 
 love but lust, what are your marriage vows but the gratifi- 
 cation of base desires? Yet you scorn me, who am soilless 
 from the touch of man, virgin even of his kisses. You 
 dare to tell me that you will not know me, that I have 
 sinned, and am fit only to be cast out from among the com- 
 pany of honest women. Honest! Why, it is you, the wives 
 of men, the mothers of the offspring of men, who are 
 unclean! It is you who are not worthy^7except to beat, 
 your breasts and pray to our God for mercy. Pray to my 
 chUd — conceived of no mortal — who is to be born of a pure 
 virgin — pray that he will teach you charity and meekness 
 of spirit." 
 
 Torn by the passion of her outraged womanhood, lashed 
 by the coarse tongues and coldly contemptuous eyes of the 
 women about her^ Mary Levinge poured forth her indict- 
 ment and her justification till her flesh failed; then, white 
 as her gown and shaking like a leaf, she sank, sick and 
 faint, upon her knees. 
 
 The dead silence about her roused her as no words could 
 have done, and with the subsidence of her passion the sweet 
 spirit of gentleness and humility possessed her once again. 
 With feeble, outstretched ha^nds, and a voice which emotion 
 had rendered flat and almost inaudible, she pleaded to the 
 women about her. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 219 
 
 " Pardon me, I pray, and may God forgive me to for ray 
 harsh words. What you have said to me to-day is but a 
 test of my strength, a tithe of my probation, and I was 
 weak and have failed. I am sorry." 
 
 She rose, and with bowed head and slow steps, even as 
 though she were indeed the sinner the women would fain 
 have branded her, Mary quitted the room. 
 
 Mrs. Issachar Josefs, who was already in delicate health, 
 broke the silence which followed Mary's exit with a noisy 
 sob, and was at once removed by her mother in a cab. The 
 others drifted away in various stages of scepticism and 
 amusement. 
 
 As Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt went downstairs with Mrs. 
 Mossenthal, she said : 
 
 " Well, I don't think she should have insulted us about 
 the men like that, do you?" 
 
 Mrs. Mossenthal, who always admitted the impeachment 
 of lovers, smiled palely as she entered her brougham. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 A November fog hung over London. In Oxford Street 
 and in the West End it was yellow, and acrid with sulphur 
 in the mouth. The gas-lamps burned with a pallid flicker, 
 and the fiery red eyes of the swiftly rolling hansoms looked 
 bleared as they flashed noiselessly by. 
 
 Up on the higher plane of Regent's Park the fog was 
 white and soft as carded wool. It lay in billowy waves 
 over the black hollow of the ornamental lake, and hid in 
 fleecy folds the sleeping water-fowl from every sense save 
 that of sound. 
 
 Now and again a chill sad wind passed mourning through 
 the gaunt bare trees, and then the white mist rose and fell, 
 swirled and heaved like an intangible, silent sea. 
 
 It was late; past midnight, and the faint lights which 
 had jewelled the many windows of the houses in the Outer 
 and Inner Circles had died out one by one. 
 
 But through the thick belt of trees that grew round Holm- 
 hurst a few points of light glittered, while the sharp 
 crunching of wheels on the gravel drive or the impatient 
 rattle of a champed bit, showed that even at that time of 
 night there were visitors at Mary Levinge's home. 
 
 The great drawing-room, with the elaborately gilt and 
 painted ceiling, the walls of white silk, gleaming statuary, 
 and massed palms, looked very empty and desolate in the 
 radiance of the electric light, which, from beneath eream- 
 hued shades of fluted silk, gemmed the room with points of 
 flame. A big fire of beech logs crackled and sputtered on 
 
WITHOUT SIN 221 
 
 the wide hearth, and fought the chill, thick fog back to the 
 deep bays of the ceiling. A moon-faced clock in a richly 
 carved case ticked slumbrously from a far corner, and with 
 the restless fluttering of some caged birds, awakened by the 
 light, alone stirred the heavy silence of the room. 
 
 Two people, a man and a woman, broke with their still, 
 stiff figures and plain black clothes the garish splendour of 
 the drawing-room. Both were there for the same reason, 
 the hopes of both were fixed on the same goal, the ears of 
 both were straining for the same cry, and yet Lady Theo 
 Bellastier, the frivolous society woman, and Martin Baird, 
 the manager of a Bond Street art shop and the paid servant 
 of Mary Levinge, had never been so far apart. 
 
 Lady Theo, with all the chilly instincts of her sex and 
 order, was curled in a wide chair close to the hearth. Her 
 gowii of black stuff was ostentatiously simple, and the 
 rebellion of her bright curling hair was hidden beneath the 
 prim, hard edges of a little flat straw bonnet. Her hands 
 and ears were bare of all jewellery, but her femininity and 
 love of finery cried aloud from the coils of a rare rosary and 
 cross of niello work which hung from her slender waist to 
 the floor. 
 
 Her face was set in grave lines, and her big grey eyes 
 glistened in the fire-flames with unaccustomed tears. 
 Mingled with her feverish religious fervours, the formula 
 for which she had made for herself from half a dozen faiths, 
 was the remembrance of those dark hours ia her own bril- 
 liant life, when she, too, had striven in mortal agony 
 through the Valley of the Dark Shadow, and with it, and 
 the memory of the tiny dead creature they had told her was 
 her child, came the regret for wasted years and the pitiful 
 wonderment whether all might have been different had her 
 daughter lived. 
 
 When she danced and flirted, drove her blood horses in the 
 
322 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Park, or gabbled and grinned through the smoke-wreaths 
 and wine fumes across a card-table, the memory of that 
 time seemed beyond recall, but in moments of solitude, 
 when she went to chitfch, or in the grey dawn counted her 
 losses, or when she watched and waited in silence as she 
 was now doing, the vision of a wee, waxen face slipped 
 between her and all the world. 
 
 And what of Martin Baird, sitting stiffty on a couch by 
 the door, his large hands clasped patiently on his knees, 
 and his grey head and thin face bowed upon his breast? 
 Neither the desire for a new religion nor the memory of a 
 dead past filled his aching heart. There, there was no 
 room for ought else beyond an ardent anxiety for the grand- 
 daughter of the man who had saved him from starvation — 
 and worse; a heavy grief for that little one whom he had 
 known and loved, carried and caressed since the first hour 
 she had run, the one fresh, young thing among a crowd of 
 antiquities, to greet him. His faithful heart ached and his 
 man's soul sickened to know that she so pure, so innocent, 
 so craving of the world's protection, was crossing, with 
 infinite anguish, that awful path which divides for ever 
 girlhood from womanhood, and that the passage was being 
 made with never a mother's voice, or the touch of a hus- 
 band's hand, to aid and to encourage. 
 
 The sound of swiftly descending feet roused Lady Theo 
 from her dreams, in which miracles and manifestations in 
 the near future mingled with her personal past. She had 
 scarcely time to brush the tears from her lashes — she would 
 blush less to be caught cheating at Cards than crying — when 
 the door was flung wide and Noel Marrable entered. 
 
 " Is it over?" she cried, springing to her feet. 
 
 "Not yet, but I don't believe in too many doctors," he 
 answered, almost roughly. 
 
 He put her out of his path and went over to where a 
 
WITHOUT SIN 233 
 
 small table stood, glittering with cut^lass decanters and 
 silver dishes. 
 
 He looked Tery pale^ and Lady Theo, as she watched Mm 
 pour out a liqaeur of brandy, thought she had never till 
 now noticed how much he had changed of late. 
 
 He did not speak again, and Lady Theo crept back to 
 her chair. The fire was burning low and the heavy fog 
 was wreathing round the bright lamps and misting the clear 
 outlines of the pictures. 
 
 It grew very cold in the great gorgeous room. Lady 
 Theo fell into a light doze and awoke shivering from a 
 dream that she was walking through a biting snowstorm. 
 Baird was so still that he, too, might have slept. But 
 Marrable — perhaps to keep warm — paced to and fro, an 
 ever-restless, gliding figure. Only he walked with a 
 strangely light footfall, which unconsciously slackened 
 every time he passed the door, as though he feared to miss 
 some sound from above — the groan of a woman in direst 
 pain, or perhaps the first feeble wail of a new-born child. 
 
 The logs had died into white dust between the polished 
 silver fire-dogs, and the new November day was three hours 
 old before the strained ears of those who waited caught a 
 swift footfall on the stairs. 
 
 Marrable sprang to the door, and opened it, while Baird 
 rose gaunt and grey from his seat as Lady St. Cyprian 
 entered. Anxiety and pity had scored deep furrows on her 
 face, but the tears which filled her dark eyes were of thank- 
 fulness and joy. 
 
 "It is as she said. Mary has a son," she cried, catching 
 at Lady Theo's outstretched hands and kissing her in an 
 uncontrollable access of womanly emotion. 
 
 " A miracle ! A miracle is accomplished ! The prophecy 
 is fulfilled!" cried Lady Theo, flinging herself on her knees 
 in a frenzy of religious fervour, and bursting into tears. 
 
224 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 "A son! Can such things be?" said Baird, Trith wonder 
 and sorrow. 
 
 Marrable's dark face grew grey in the amber light, and 
 a stifled sob caught his throat. Yet it was with his most 
 impassive air that he crossed the room and tang the bell 
 ■sharply. 
 ■ "It is very cold here and the fire is out. Have it 
 relighted at once," he ordered the servant who answered 
 the summons. " And bring some tea. These ladies must 
 hav6 something before they go home." 
 
CHAPTER XXV 
 
 Mary's son was a fine, handsome child, perfect in form, 
 and limb, and marvellously like his mother in the gentle- 
 ness and serenity of his disposition. 
 
 "He is a little angel," said the nurse every day, when 
 she laid the lovely babe, robed in cobweb lawn and filmy 
 lace, beside Mary's pillow. 
 
 The faces which pressed for hours so close together, one 
 pale and delicate, almost to ideality, with suffering and 
 weakness, the other small and round, full and pink, with a 
 life that throbbed stronger every day, were wonderfully simi- 
 lar. The baby had the same low broad forehead crossed 
 by pale pencilled brows and shaded by floss-like rings of 
 hair ; thick white lids lifted above the elongated grey eyes, 
 and when the wee mouth broke into fleeting smiles, the re- 
 semblance was complete. 
 
 Sometimes,' Lady St. Cyprien unconsciously looked for 
 the impress of some other personality on the child's delicate 
 feature and fair colouring, but always in vain. She hated 
 herself for doing so, and breathed a prayer of thankfulness 
 that she could not discover that which ■ she sought, but 
 feared to find. Yet she was human and a woman, and 
 doubts and wonderings would come unbidden, till again she 
 caught herself gazing on the innocent, and 'seeking for 
 traces of the guilty. 
 
 During the first weeks of her illness, Mary, Whose moral 
 fibre had weakened with her tortured body, had yielded a 
 complete submission to the great wave of maternity which 
 15 
 
236 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 at the first wail of her infant had arisen from unseen depths 
 and overwhelmed her. Without a struggle, she had bowed 
 her head before the waters of human instinct, and with 
 scarcely a memory of past dreams, or a flutter of future 
 hopes, she abandoned herself resistlessly to the animal 
 passion of the great mother-love. 
 
 With a crushing weakness numbing her limbs within the 
 downy depths of her luxurious bed, and her brain feather- 
 light from fever and pain, she could yet thrill hotly at the 
 first sound of the babbling "coo" of h«r baby boy. The 
 touch of the warm round cheek against her own bloodless 
 face, the groping paddle of the tiny, pink-palmed hands in 
 the satiny curves of her throat and bosom, filled her with 
 an ecstasy that throbbed like pain. 
 
 She forgot to praise her God according to her lifelong 
 belief that He had sent her people a redeemer, but she 
 hourly thanked the Providence that had given her a 
 child. 
 
 Her convalescence was very slow, and she — perhaps with 
 a prophetic fear that with returning health, the ideal would 
 edge about the real — showed an almost morbid dislike 'to 
 leaving her room. She would be moved to a sofa some- 
 itimes, and with the sleeping child held in the. warm hollow 
 of her ai-m would bask the winter after'Hoon through befiore 
 the «ratfkling logs and leaping flames. 
 
 , It was before the cheerful fire, too, that her slender haods 
 found strength enough to perform a hundred offices for her 
 most dear infant. With soft twittering sounds and little 
 smileis and nods that come so naturally to a mother, she 
 would lay the cooing haby on her knees, and one by one, 
 lingering with infinite tenderness over each dainty fasten- 
 ing, she would loose the round dimpled limbs from all 
 swathings and let him kick and leap as young things love to 
 do. Then would her pale, sad mouth part in happy laughter 
 
WITHOUT SIN 327 
 
 and her tear- trashed eyes dauce with delight over each tiny 
 dimple and every delicious curve. 
 
 It was her greatest glory, too, to bathe the child, gravely 
 testing with her unringed hands the water's heat, and 
 smiling back in her baby's face as he caught at the sponge 
 and crowed at the fluffy perfumed powder-puffi. 
 
 Those were the days when she Jealously concerned her- 
 self with every detail of the child's life, when his wakingi 
 eyes were reflected in her watching ones, and when he 
 nestled to sleep above her full heart; when every little cry 
 was a torture, but every dimpling smile or feeble finger- 
 clutch of recognition was an agony of delight. 
 
 Yet among these fair days, filled to the brim with the 
 stainless love of maternity, came unbidden hours of dread 
 of that great and awful future which was to raisethe barrier 
 of divinity between herself and her child. The marvellous 
 fiiliB'lment of her girlish dreams, the prophecy concerning 
 her riice's redefiiption, which she was confident had been 
 realised through her own person^ overwhelmed her with 
 vague terrors. She was a woman, with a woman's heart 
 and frail body, human to the core, and with the first love 
 of her life growing hourly stronger within her. But her 
 child — 'her little baby — her one darling, was beyond 
 humanity, and beyond everything but reverential wor- 
 ship. 
 
 When those dark days came upon her, a very savagery of 
 mGth6r-love would seize her. She could not be induced to 
 leave her bed, or to admit any one beyond her attendants, 
 to her room. Not for one moment would she permit any 
 one to touch the child, but, with the infant clasped closely 
 to her breast, would fence him within her arms, as a dumb 
 creature in the face of a coming danger essays to shelter its 
 offspring with its poor body. It was as though she felt 
 that in tha inviolable privacy of her down pillows and 
 
228 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 silken coverings there lay the great safety and peace of her 
 life to come. 
 
 During those happy but too short weeks every sentiment 
 of a woman's nature which should be dedicated to the 
 glories of love were concentrated by Mary on her child. 
 The image of no man had ever shadowed her virgin mind, 
 the voice of no lover had ever stirred the slumbering echoes 
 of her pure heart. There had been no husband with pas- 
 sion's touch to fire her maiden's soul ; there was only the 
 child. And the child who had awakened the lover received 
 it all. But with reviving forces the past came back, and 
 the future filled the horizon, and on the last day of the 
 dying year the first act of the sacrifice of the flesh to the 
 spirit was faced and consummated. Mary moved into the 
 boudoir, which adjoined her bedroom. 
 
 Outside, the great stretches of the Park lay gaunt and 
 drab under the wet embraces of a dripping f pg, but within 
 there was the scent of hot-house flowers ^nd the shaded 
 glow of lamps, low voices and soft footsteps, and the 
 musieal tinkle of rare china and old silver from the tea- 
 table. 
 
 Wrapped in a costly gown of velvet and fine furs, Mary 
 sat in a deep chair before the fire. Her eyes, looking 
 larger than usual in her pale face, were fixed upon the glow- 
 ing mass; her hands, palms upwards, lay inert and nerve- 
 less on her knees. Outwardly calm and cold as a statue, a 
 very tempest of doubt and misery was tearing at her heart, 
 where the love of the mother and the adoration of ;the wor- 
 shipper were holding mighty battle. 
 
 The whole drift of her previous life, the very strength of 
 her present belief, rendered it impossible that she should 
 love her child as her child, indulge all the tender familiari- 
 ties and the sweet homely intercourse, or revel in the, dar- 
 ling delights of maternity which were granted to the poorest 
 
WITHOUT SIN 229 
 
 and meanest of womankind. She had given birth to one 
 who was not of her soul, though he was of her body ; who> 
 where she must die, would live; where she might fail, 
 must redeem. 
 
 Her love must be tempered with reverence, her adoration 
 must be touched by fear. The mother must be absorbed in 
 the mere instrument of a divine clemency; the queen of the 
 child must be the subject of the deity. 
 
 So with her own hands she had put her sleeping baby 
 away from her bleeding heart, and, with arms that ached 
 to snatch him back again, had voluntarily and for the first 
 time laid him in a cradle. 
 
 And as the child slept on amid the dim rosy shadow of 
 the silken curtains, Mary stared blindly into the fire and 
 prayed as she had never prayed before for strength; 
 strength to strangle the passion of motherhood; strength to 
 build up a fit temple in her heart for the worship of him 
 who one day would lead her people back to their own; 
 strength to reduce all her love and yearnings within the 
 limits of a wise guidance and a sweet friendship ; strength 
 to fulfil to the end her mission, which had but just beg^n. 
 
 Yet for all her high beliefs and stern purpose, the pros- 
 pect before her was a dreary one; but, once she had set 
 her face, the quiet courage and determination of her nature 
 helped her feet down the road, though her heart-strings 
 snapped in agony at every step. 
 
 With her beautiful angel's face set like a mask and her 
 empty hands before her, she prayed — and prayed again, 
 and as the storm died down within her she thought that the 
 answer, and strength, had come to her. 
 
 But the child stirred in his cradle and wailed fretfully, 
 and Mary, with her heart in her throat and the blood flying 
 to her pale brow, with outstretched hands and cooing lips, 
 was at his side. Then remembrance, sharp and stabbing. 
 
230 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 struck. Thfi first lesson both for herself and her son had 
 to he taught and learnt at once. She turned, and pulled 
 tie bell lotidly. 
 
 " Take up the child; he is crying!" she said to the nurse 
 'mho came. Sl^e was shaking like a leaf as she spoke,, but 
 her voice was low and almost cold. 
 
 When Lady St. Cyprien called an hour later, Mary was 
 sitting a little distance, from the cradle, watching — poor 
 self -starved soulr-:-with, wide, hungry eyes, the. baby, who 
 was awake, and. babbling to himself and his tasselled cur- 
 tains, those sweet, strange in^xjtictiiilations which are heaven's 
 own music to a mother's ears. 
 
 "Not nursing the baby, Mary?" cried Lady St. Cyprien, 
 as she kissed . the girl. " Why, what revolution have we 
 here? Or is it that, the young man already scorns to be 
 nursed?" , She bent, over the cradle,, and chirrupped and 
 nodded at the baby, who chjuekled back at her. "You 
 bpnny boy, are you going to throw aside your mother's Ipvei 
 already?" 
 
 Mary drew her from the cradle. 
 
 " You forget, " sl^e said, very sadly. " I am his mother ; 
 but he is not my son. He is a great trust confided to me 
 for a time, only. But we must not set top gjreat a store on 
 that which is not our own." 
 
 The weariness of the flesh and the lowliness of the spirit 
 filled for a moment her eyes with heavy tears, and caught 
 her voice in a thick sob; but she conquered again as she 
 had conquered before, and a little later said, quietly : 
 
 " Sit here and watch him playing with those tassels. He 
 is so happy. He needs no mother." 
 
 This was indeed, to be The Mother of Sorrows. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 The New Year waa born amid clear, bright days and 
 brilliant, frosty nights. Mary gained strength daily, and 
 the faint rose-bloom, which had been one of her girlish 
 charms, again touched the pure pallor of her face with 
 colour. 
 
 It was then that Mrs. Marx emerged from the exotic 
 atmosphere of her own apartments, and, after a feeble 
 attempt at compressing her tawdry finery within the limits 
 of a cab-load of luggage, cast from off heu feet the dust of 
 Holmhurst. 
 
 A young Jewish preacher* in the East End had convinced 
 her that by living under Mary's roof she was jeopardising! 
 her soul's welfare, and so an incoherent explanajtion with 
 Mary, followed by an effusive farewell, cut for ever the 
 frail tie which had existed between aunt and niece. 
 
 To Mary the severance was almost unfelt^ Even in the 
 days when the family had all lived over the Art Gallery in 
 Bond Street, Mrs. Marx had been little more in the child's 
 life than a, tangible nonentity. Since the death of Ephraim 
 Levinge she had faded into a vague presence, who was 
 unseen and unheard in the Holmhurst household for month 
 after month. The link of sex sympathy had never been 
 forged between them, and, deapite Mrs. Marx's strong 
 Judaism, the bond of blood had proved but weak with her. 
 
 But now she had gone, and Mary, though she never 
 missed her, thought a little sadly there was one less soul in 
 the world she might think of as a friend. 
 
232 WITSOUT SIN 
 
 For in those days Mary Levinge, the great heiress and 
 the beauty of a season, was very much alone. The Jews 
 had cast her and her great faith from them, for though the 
 very root of their religion lies in the belief that he "who 
 shall redeem them shall be borne of a pure virgin, the 
 scepticism of the West had long ago overgrown the simpler 
 Oriental faiths. The prophet's words were often read 
 to them, and were an article of their belief, and perhaps 
 deep in some hearts were retained as a promise of the 
 great future: but before the world they sneered and 
 laughed, as at the idea of the fulfilment of a fallacy, the 
 men holding her a ninny for so trumpeting her shame 
 abroad, the women openly shoulder-shrugging and rejoic- 
 ing at her social downfall. 
 
 But Lady St. Gyprien and Lady Theo Ballastier remained 
 her staunch and true friends. Lady Theo firmly and 
 frankly believed that Mary was a virgin mother, and her 
 child of no fearthly parentage. Her jaded palate and dulled 
 sensibilitiesj S^a.'ies of every flavour in the world's menu of 
 pleasures or excitement, had caught and clung to the one 
 really fresh element which had ever touched her life. A 
 thoughtless superstition, which passed for religion and a 
 certain weariness of the flesh, which did duty very well 
 for a desire to give up the world and its vanities, led her 
 day by day to Holmhiirst, where she would sit in Mary's 
 boudoir, gazing enraptured at the child, or work herself 
 into a violent ecstasy of prayer before the Madonna's por- 
 trait. Mary had all unwittingly provided Lady Theo with 
 a fresh sensation, and opened a new offshoot from fashion's 
 monotonous pathway. To wear a black stuff gown from 
 morning to night, and a plain bonnet; to sedulously banish 
 all the ripples and curls from her golden head ; to give up 
 cards and betting, champagne suppers and rowdy Sunday 
 dinners, entailed sacrifices which were, in Lady Theo's 
 
WITHOUT SIN 233 
 
 eyes, redolent of atonement for the past and prophetic of 
 yirtue's rewards in- the future. A vag^e personal gratitude 
 towards the woman and the circumstances who had stirred 
 her soul to an awakening, mingled strangely with her ill'- 
 regulated religious aspirations. 
 
 But with Lady St. Cyprien it was neither the cult of a 
 new mania nor the idle pursuit of a novel sensation which 
 led her most afternoons of the week into the scented 
 warmth and gracious surroundings of Mary's favourite sit- 
 ting-room. The first intensity, of her sorrow for the girl's 
 condition, and the bitterness of disappointment that her 
 nephew's marriage was rendered impossible, had, even be- 
 fore the birth of the little one, died in the tenderest pity. 
 And with that pity, which was as the heart-broken sym- 
 pathy of a loving mother with an erring child, grew a 
 sincere respect for a woman who in her hours of direst 
 anguish and mortal pain could so preserve her own counsel. 
 
 For, worldly-wise and yet not world-hardened, Lady St. 
 Cyprien could but regard the birth of Mary's child as the 
 natural sequel of Mary' s fall. Never a fanciful or imagina- 
 tive woman, she could believe with a sound orthodox belief 
 in the miracle of eighteen hundred years ago. It was her 
 creed, and had been the faith of her family for generations. 
 But that such a manifestation was to be, or could be, re- 
 peated, never struck her. The girl's wild talk in the past 
 had never meant more to her evenly balanced mind than 
 the rather fanciful dreamings of a neurotic girl finding vent 
 in speech. The vision which Mary claimed to have seen 
 had been to her merely a more determined effort of a ner- 
 vous, highly strung : imagination, and she had trusted all 
 along to the strength and tenderness of Stansdale as a hus- 
 band to divert the girl's mind into healthier and wider 
 channels. 
 
 But now, wiiih the tangible presence of the beautiful, 
 
334 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 sleeping baby before her, witli tlie trembling adoration <^ 
 a saint, and the holy love of maternity shining from Mary's 
 soft eyes, how was she to r^ard that past? SuTely not as 
 the vague vision of an excitable child, bred in solitude and 
 brought up on the weavings of a dreamy Scotchman's tales. 
 To believe in an Immaculate Conception was, with Lady 
 St. Cyprian, full of sturdy common-sense and intense prao- 
 tibility, beyond all her powers of desira or will. But the 
 same flash of thought which dismissed the idea as absurd, 
 put aside with equal decision the suspicion that Mary Le- 
 vinge had deliberately sinned. 
 
 But that supposition brought Lady St. Cyprien face to 
 face with a dead wall, and drove her back again, on the 
 incredible problem of Mary's purity and Mary's mother- 
 hood. The two things were irreeoncilable, but Lady St. 
 Cyprien was not a woman to be beaten. She contented, her 
 large heart with loyalty to and love for the girl, andi forced 
 her sense of wonderment to rest. One day the truth, 
 whether it were for good or for ill, would be revealed. 
 Time, or accident, would supply the missing clue. 
 
 For the moment there was nothing to do but to visit 
 Mary, cheer her long days, help her with tender solicitude 
 through the wearinesses of a fluctuating convalescence, and 
 sometimes fight her battles out in the world. 
 
 Not that Mary was much missed, or even regretted in the 
 drawing-rooms through which she had. flashed as an heiress 
 and a lovely girl for a few months. A few wise mothers 
 preached to rebellious daughters from the text, "Thou 
 shalt not be found out," and cited the dead art dealer's 
 granddaughter as an awful example. But Mary had never 
 cheapened herself to that low level which, in Society, means 
 popularity. She had never panted, haLf-naked, in the 
 arms of strange men, in the riotous delights of an afteE- 
 supper "Barn" dance. Her curved lips had neveir babbled 
 
WITBOUT Sm 235 
 
 uncleanness with all the added salafiious charm >df affected 
 ignorance. She had never professed <the knonirledge cf the 
 matron, xi^ile posing as a maid. !No man could claim to 
 have " stood her a dinner" sans chaperon at a smart restau- 
 rant. She had neither smoked nor betted. She had merely 
 been pretty and dull, rich and proper. Why should Society 
 trouble its frivolous head and shallow heart about her? 
 She was gone; there were plenty more of the same sort to 
 take her place. Among the Israelitish circles of Bayswater 
 and Portland Place she lived a little longer in the Chroniques 
 Scandaleuses of stuffy, over-decorated drawing-rooms, until 
 about the middle of January when a distaibance arose in 
 the Mossenthal menage. It was not mentionable among 
 young people, and Mary and her comparatively common- 
 place lapse were shelved in favour of a spicier and more 
 ticklesome dish of gossip. 
 
 Once a week Martin Baird called at Holmhurst, and as 
 Mary grew stronger, the little quiet dinners on Friday even- 
 ings and sometimes a chat about the Bond Street business 
 followed. He was always bright and cheerful with Mary, 
 and cooed and clucked at the laughing child as though to 
 the manner born ; but when the great front door swung to 
 behind him, and he set out to walk down the lonely tree- 
 fringed roadway of the Inner Circle, his grey head fell 
 upon his chest, and his rough, hard face would soften with 
 dead reminiscences when the mother he had just left was 
 herself a child, treading with airy feet and floating pale 
 gold hair, among the carved oak and rare porcelain, the 
 tapestries and pictures, and old gilt furniture in the Art 
 Gallery. The past, filled with legends and stories, frag- 
 ments of the world's history, and the weaved imaginings 
 of dreamers' brains, rose up and reproached him. How 
 far the present was born of that past he could not know, 
 only at times a great regret and self-reproach filled his 
 
236 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 heart. Perhaps it had all been his fault, and — yet he had 
 al-vrays been so fond of her. 
 
 Once Mi. Beitie Chant had called and left a card at Holm- 
 hurst. He had thought the matter over, and determined 
 that though for the moment it might imperil his position in 
 society, he would " run" Mary Levinge and the new cult 
 in The Piccadilly Gazette. If the subject were smartiy 
 treated, he felt confident that in common gratitude she 
 would make it worth his while. But two days later, while 
 his scheme for pushing her was still in embryo, he was sent 
 for by Mr. Corney Prankheimer, the latest and vulgarest 
 thing in Cape millionaires. Mr Frankheimer desired a big 
 house, a racing stud, a large visiting list, and advertise- 
 ment. Mr. Bertie Chant thought that all these ambitions 
 could be gratified — at a price — and so called no more at 
 Holmhurst. 
 
 Tor the rest, Mr. Erastus Bawdon, loud-voiced and rever- 
 ential, and Dr. Marrable, quiet and coldly professional, 
 were sometimes seen in Mary's boudoir about the hour 
 when the wintry dusk swept like a wave across the deserted 
 Park, and when the silver and china of the tea-table glit- 
 tered and jingled in the firelight. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 Fbbeuaey's afternoons were already fringing the dreary 
 winter days with glorious sunsets of crimson and gold, but 
 in spite of the lingering light outside, Mary still persisted 
 in having her lamps of wrought silver and rare bronze lit 
 quite early in the afternoons. She had all the instinctive 
 love for light and colour and warmth of her people, and 
 her quietest hours — hours of bodily rest and mental peace — 
 were those she passed among the rose and amber aureoles 
 of the lamps, while the day died a mysterious death across 
 the rain-soaked reaches of the Park. 
 
 Beyond touch of her hand, and beyond the reach of her 
 loving lips, the child lay in a nest of soft laces and silken 
 ribbons, asleep. His swinging cradle of satinwood and in- 
 lay of tinted pearl was always placed a certain distance 
 from her chair; near enough for worship and adoration, 
 yet just too far for the gay tenderness, the chirping of 
 pursed lips, the fondling of white hands, and all the thou- 
 sand sweet familiarities which are the visible signs of a 
 heart-hidden mother love. 
 
 To Mary, such a sacrifice of desire and instinct could 
 never cease to be an agony, but she bore it, with the same 
 outwardly calm conviction of her position towards the in- 
 fant which had filled her whole being from that decisive 
 moment when she had seen the vision of the Immaculate 
 Conception. 
 
 So she sat, one day, warmly embraced by the deep, soft 
 cushions of her chair. A book in a sombre binding lay 
 
238 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 face downwards on her knees. It told of the lives and 
 deaths of those sainted women whose martyrdom has earned 
 for them eternal life in the memory of the world. She 
 loved to read of them, for though every fibre of her own 
 being revolted stubbornly against the faith for which they 
 sufEered, the recital in qiiaint,' rude language of their 
 agonies helped her through mere sympathy to bear her 
 own. 
 
 But now for the moment she was nOt reading. Her 
 slender fingers, small and pointed, were laced across the 
 open volume, and her eyes, large and dark with the pas- 
 sion of maternity, were bent on her baby, who, with his 
 pale yellow curls tossed above his low round foreihead, and 
 his wee fists clenching the rare lace on his coverlet, slept 
 like a rosy angel on a sun-kissed cloudlet. 
 
 And as she looked a great wave of unsatisfied love 
 throbbed up from her heart, and drove a sudden mist of 
 scorching tears to her >eye8. A sob, bom of an overwhelm- 
 ing self-pity, caught her by the throat, and sent the blood 
 surgir^ in her ears. 
 
 But the weakness of the mortal passed, driven back to 
 its source by her indomitable faith in the immortal. As 
 she brushed the tears from her lashes, she found that Dr. 
 Marrable stood before her. She rose at once to greet him, 
 letting her book slip unheeded to the ground. 
 
 " I did not hear you announced, " she said in tones which 
 all her self -command could not steady. " I was " 
 
 "Dreaming over the fire? Besides, all your carpets are 
 so thick, that one can walk like a eat in your bouse," re- 
 plied Maxrable, loUowing her to the glowing environment 
 of the ^arth, and taking the low chair, which by the acci- 
 dent of habit he generally occupied. He looked at her a 
 little anxiously as she sank once more among her cushions ; 
 he had caught the echo of that smothered sob as he had 
 
WITHOUT SIN 339 
 
 entered, and even now & shed teai shimmered like a dia- 
 mond on the band of' soft white fur which crossed her breast. 
 An impulse to oonsole> to sympathise, seizedl him, buife he 
 put it from him. 
 
 He affected not to notice her condition, and with, his usual 
 cold professionalism crushing down the last traces of her 
 emotion and his own involuntary sympathy, he proceeded 
 to inquire after her health. 
 
 Half-a-dozen questions and answers exhausted the sub- 
 ject, and then he rose and walked over to the cot. 
 
 "How the child grows! There is no need to ask if he 
 is well." 
 
 He bent his stern, cold face down over the sleeping child 
 until his lips, set in a hard line, almost brushed the tossed 
 floss-like curls. With one finger he stroked the baby fist, 
 which in sleepy unconsciousness unclosed and stretched to 
 its full dimpled size, then shut tenaciously round the dis- 
 turbing element. 
 
 At that sweet contact, so warmly velvety, so weakly 
 strong, the whole ice of Marrable's facet broke up, and 
 Mary, watching from her chair, saw the red blood rise and 
 ebb beneath the swarthy skin, and smiles — real, invol- 
 untary — flow from both mouth and eyes. 
 
 "You tooj see that he grows?" she cried^ a happy ring 
 dominating the last faint trembling in her voice. 
 
 Marrable raised his head from above the child's face 
 and looked across at Mary sitting in the golden firelight. 
 
 " He grows stronger and more beautiful every day. He 
 is so like you." 
 
 The compliment — if indeed it were meant for one— fell 
 almost reluctantly from him, but both it amd its method of 
 delivery were lost upoB her. She only heard that her son 
 was well and strong and beautiful. That he should carry 
 her stsunp upon his features seemed only natural; fc»! how 
 
240 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 could he bear a likeness wMch man could presume to trace 
 to that great Entity whom man had never seen? 
 
 Then she drifted back to her old dreams once more, and 
 Marrable, gently and reluctantly forcing his finger from 
 that persistent clinging clasp, came again to his low seat 
 by the fire. But all the quiet familiarity of his surround- 
 ings, the pure-faced, silent woman, the soft, regular breath- 
 ing of the little child, failed to still the tumult which the 
 frail touch of her baby's fingers had stirred in blood and 
 brain. 
 
 His keen eyes shifted from the infant's cot to its mother's 
 chair. To and fro, without a movement of his dark, griz- 
 zled head, his glance travelled — only it always rested longer 
 on the snow-hued velvet gown and fair, golden head of 
 Mary and left them more slowly for the cot. 
 
 Twice his tongue stirred to break the silence, but old 
 habits of restraint held him in an iron grip that even love 
 was powerless to relax. At the bare notion of speaking 
 love words, a grim smile grew at the corners of his mouth. 
 What could he plead but his loneliness and Mary's invidious 
 condition as reasons for marriage? 
 
 The word formed involuntarily in his mind. His whole 
 brain reeled at the idea. His spirit — independent and 
 entirely xmused to bow to wishes and opinions other than 
 his own — had for years revolted at the thought of submis- 
 sion to a mere whimsical woman. 
 
 And the momentary silence had grown to a quarter of an 
 hour, and still he could not speak. Man of the world 
 though he was, the very intensity of his longing stayed 
 his tongue. 
 
 The clock — a Louis XV. toy with a swinging pendulum 
 of enamel and brilliants — chimed four. Then Noel Mar- 
 rable cleared his throat and spoke. 
 
 "Only four o'clock. How the days are drawing out. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 341 
 
 Though in here your fire and lamps point at midwinter. Is 
 not Lady St. Cyprien coming to-day?" 
 
 " No !" said Mary in dreamy tones. " She has taken Lord 
 St. Cyprien to Brighton for a few days. He had not been 
 well." 
 
 "And Lady Theo?" 
 
 " I do not expect Lady Theo. She is a little vexed with 
 me, I think, just now. She wishes so much to found a sect 
 at once; to make a cult of — of the child. She has not the 
 patience to wait until such time as he himself can teach us 
 what is right for us to know." 
 
 The fervent faith and quiet certainty of her words, uttered 
 with the assurance of true belief, jarred unaccountably on 
 Marrable's nerves. He turned abruptly as she spoke, and 
 cut across her speech almost before it had left her mouth. 
 
 "Your life must be sadly solitary just now." 
 
 The words were sympathetic, but the tone was harsh and 
 rough, as though he wished to force her thoughts from the 
 intangible future, to the present — and to her own per- 
 sonality. 
 
 "Socially perhaps I am a little lonely — but — some 
 day " 
 
 Again Marrable stayed her from drifting back to her 
 faith in the future, her content with the present. 
 
 " But has it never struck you that there are other lives to 
 consider; the happiness of others to confirm, beside your 
 own — and the child's?" 
 
 " The little one will bring happiness to all the world — 
 some day," she answered, with her shining eyes fixed on 
 her baby's face. 
 
 " But meanwhile — until then?" cried Marrable. " What 
 will you do with yourself and your life until then?" 
 
 She shifted her calm, passionless eyes from the cradle to 
 his face. 
 16 
 
242 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 "I can wait!" she said simply, yet with a whole world 
 of patience and abnegation in the t^ree small woids. 
 
 Mailable rose from his chair and, passing before the' fire, 
 came over to where she sat. Her hand, white as milk and 
 smooth as satin, gleamed from among the deep hues of her 
 silken cushions like carven ivory. He bent down and took 
 the slender fingers in his own strong palm. 
 
 " Mary, will you marry me?" 
 
 . Across his face, lowered so closely to her own, the per- 
 fume of her hair was wafted. His words were spoken 
 almost in her ear, his hand clasped hers. Both his speech 
 and manner were calm to coldness, but within, his heart 
 was alive with the flame of love. 
 
 And Mary — whom neither the passion of Eugene Cohen 
 nor the chivalry of Lord Stansdale had stirred from her 
 virginal iciness — endured at this man's touch, at this man's 
 proposal, one grand thrill of desire. For one brief moment 
 all the womanhood in her young body and blood cried aloud 
 for a mate. 
 
 The sensation shocked her. A vague horror of herself, 
 an undefined fear of the man who could so move her nature, 
 filled her, and with the white chasing the red from her 
 shamed cheeks, she drew herself away from all contact with 
 her wooer. 
 
 " BCi my wife, Mary ; let my true love protect you from 
 the world's cruel sneers." 
 
 His sensitive fingers had felt and read that overwhelm^ 
 ing thrill of sex, and now he put forth his arms and 
 tried to clasp her to him, but she, with every instinct 
 aroused by fear, slipped past him, and, running to the cot, 
 fenced herself behind the frail body of her baby son. 
 
 The involuntary act was the very triumph of her belief 
 in the divine power of her offspring, to protect his mother, 
 and Marrable could but yield before such a manifestation 
 
WITHOUT SIN 243 
 
 of faith. He did not attempt to follow her, for to do so 
 would have been an insult, but with the cot and with the 
 child between them, so near together and yet divided by 
 the faith of a whole people, Marrable pleaded with Mary. 
 
 Instinct warned him to make but few protestations of 
 love, but respect, faithfulness and protection he dared and 
 did offer her. He even pointed out to her the loneliness 
 of her life, and the ostracism of herself; almost he would 
 have spoken of the stain, upon her name ; but that man- 
 hood and her own innocence fettered his tongue. 
 
 " Do not ask— do not urge — " was all her answer. " You 
 have been my friend. I have so few friends now, as you 
 yourself tell me; do not lose me one of them. Let me still 
 go to you in trouble or sickness ; do not rob me of yourself. " 
 
 Sure of herself once more, she stretched out one hand 
 above the crowing babe, and laid it lightly on his arm. 
 
 " My friend, I shall never marry !" 
 
 Her face, with its soft, dovelike eyes, and tender, child- 
 ish mouth, was filled with the strength of her purpose, and 
 he felt that to fight further was useless. Yet there was 
 one thing more he could not help saying : 
 
 " But have you fully considered the difficulties of bring- 
 ing up the child? A boy requires a father's guidance." 
 
 Swiftly her fingers fluttered from his arm and were laid, 
 across his mouth, which had dared so to blaspheme. 
 
 " Hush !" she said, in an awe-stricken whisper. " Hush ! 
 The father will surely look after his child." 
 
 Marrable turned away abruptly, and taking up his hat, 
 walked silently towards the door. 
 
 With it open in his hand he looked once more towards 
 Mary and her son. 
 
 Already she seemed to have forgotten his presence. With 
 her hands held above her heart, she stood in an attitude of 
 reverential adoration before the cradle. Shoulder high and 
 
244 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 close behind her hung the Madonna's picture, lit by a small 
 lamp. In pose, in colour, in expression, the similitude 
 was marvellous, and to Marrable the one saintly face 
 seemed as unearthly as the other. 
 
 She was right ; no woman with such a face and such a 
 faith should marry. 
 
 "One word more!" Marrable spoke froin the doorway. 
 " Forget what has passed, and forgive me. Let us always 
 be friends. Only make me one promise. Should you ever 
 want aid, will you send for me?" 
 
 She bowed her head in mute assent, and he left, closing 
 the door quietly behind him, on her and on his love. 
 
CHAPTER XXVin 
 
 Mabt's first instinct with regard to Noel Marrable's offer 
 of marriage was to write the circumstances to Lady St. 
 Cyprien, from whom now, in her loneliness, she had no 
 secrets. But even as she sat, pen in hand, and laid against 
 the paper to trace the first words, she hesitated. A faint 
 reflex of the passionate awakening of the flesh which his 
 touch had aroused in her, sent the hot blood to her cheeks, 
 and bowed her head in maidenly shame. The pen dropped 
 from her fingers, and she pushed the paper from her. 
 
 "Perhaps, one day, when we are alone, I will tell her," 
 she thought, turning from the writing-table. 
 
 But what is hard to write is harder still to speak, and 
 neither Lady St. Cyprien nor any one else ever knew that 
 Marrable had proposed and Mary refused. Meanwhile, 
 the year grew through spring to summer, and the child 
 grew with it. As the days lengthened and became warmer, 
 Mary resumed the ordinary habits of her life, though society 
 knew her no more. She was, however, seen in the Eow in 
 the morning, and driving every afternoon, and people said 
 she was lovelier than ever. 
 
 A few who craved for reflected notoriety tried to know 
 her ; but she did not choose to be so known. Her feminin- 
 ity and natural reserve took fright at once at the first at- 
 tempts to lionise her, and she refused invitations to every 
 house where she apprehended being stared at or treated as 
 a celebrity. Mr. Bertie Chant's essay to interview her for 
 a new church and stage journal ended in failure, and a 
 
246 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 half -mad, wholly blackmailing Eabbi who offered to preach 
 a crusade about the new redeemer — for a consideration — 
 was removed from her house by her servants. 
 
 Mrs. Mosseuthal, with her long thin nose always a-quiver 
 after notoriety, regularly left cards at Holmhurst once a 
 month, and assiduously bowed and nodded to Mary, as they 
 passed in the whirl of the West End streets. 
 
 "The girl is probably mad," she would say to hersfelf, 
 after such an elaborate display of friendship. " But sup- 
 pose she should turn out to be right after all, how silly 
 every one will look who is cutting her now. Besides, 'Sao 
 is her relation, and it is my duty not to turn my back on 
 her." 
 
 But Mrs. Cohen, the "Queen of Bayswater," refused so 
 to trim her sails. She wanted no reflected glory, and no 
 divided allegiance among her followers. In her heart she 
 still hated Maiy for refusing her handsome Eugene, whose 
 latest escapade included an actress of extraordinarily ill re- 
 pute, and an extravagant and rowdy menage up the river. 
 So Mi's. Cohen, who, like all her sex, lovfed to find a reason 
 for everything, believed that her son's evil courses were 
 caused by Mary's heartless conduct, and preached open 
 war against her accordingly. 
 
 Mary at this time found her chiefest honour at Mr. 
 Erastus Bawdon's flat. His Boman Catholicism was now 
 largely tinged with Judaism, and he was forever seeking and 
 finding analogies between the two religions. He frequently 
 discussed the possibility of converting his new church in 
 Berkshire into a Synagogue. In the interval of making 
 up his mind on this distracting point, he commenced build- 
 ing a small convent, which with its tiny chapel would, 
 when completed, enhance and perfect the beauties of the 
 church. 
 
 For the fit decoration of this retreat, which was to be 
 
WITHOUT SIN 247 
 
 dedicated to the Holy Mother, Mary sat to a new artist, 
 though not as a maiden with empty folded hands, and eyes 
 that wondered what the world might be, but as the Virgin 
 Mother, with the fulfilment of maternity glowing in her face, 
 and the veil across her bosom clutched by pink baby fingers. 
 A statue, too, in purest white marble, was modelled in her 
 likeness, for the further beautifying of the little chapel, 
 which Erastus Bawdon desired to make a gem among the 
 fairest prayer-houses of the world. 
 
 Yet, though at Mr. Bawdon's rooms the talk often turned 
 on the future, and the methods by which the human race 
 were to learn of the new faith, and of the birth of a virgin's 
 son, Mary stedfastly drew the line at propagandaism. 
 
 "iNeither you, nor I, nor any one can know what the 
 true message is," she would say, with her fervent eyes 
 fixed on the little one, who kicked and laughed so glee- 
 fully at her feet. " The world is full enough of false faiths ; 
 let us not add one more to the number. In good time he 
 will speak." 
 
 As the child grew in intelligence, so Mary fought with 
 her love and her instinct. The sacrifice of motherhood was 
 daily made, and custom could not rob it of one pang. The 
 babe had a beautiful character, loving and sweet. He was 
 a child whom the least instinctively mother-woman must 
 have adored, and Mary, whose every fibre was enwrapped 
 in her son, was the embodiment of worship before him. 
 
 But always at a distance. Even when he held out his 
 wee hands to her, and leaped in his longing to be near her; 
 even when his fresh, dewy mouth puckered into a wail of 
 disappointment; even when his eyes laughed into hers 
 with joy at sight of het, she withstood the temptation to 
 clasp him to her breast, to kiss and tickle his white warm 
 little body, to t<Dss him in mid-air, and roll him in mimic 
 wrath among the downy pillows. 
 
348 WITHOXJT SIN 
 
 Only, sometimes, when she had the baby to herself, she 
 would kneel in humble reverence^ and clasp the restless, 
 rosy feet and pray for future mercy for herself and on the 
 world. For the very sweetness of the child's disposition 
 was as a wall between the mother and her son, and every 
 smile and coo were as the lashes of a torturing whip upon 
 her naked heart. 
 
 It was late autumn before Mary met Dr. Marrable again. 
 Design on his hand had kept them apart, but on Mary's 
 side it had been merely chance. Her life was too intensely 
 strained towards the future, too painful in the present, to 
 retain more than a shadowy memory of the past, and ex- 
 cept that now and then she heard his name from Lady St. 
 Cyprien or La.dy Theo Bellastier, she might almost have 
 forgotten his existence. 
 
 It was in Bond Street that they met. The winter's day 
 had died in the arms of evening, and Mary, crossing the 
 pavement quickly from a brilliantly lit shop to her carriage, 
 ran right into the arms of an advancing figure. 
 
 Mutual apologies revealed their identities. 
 
 " I have not seen you for an age. How have you been?" 
 asked Marrable, standing between Mary and the carriage. 
 
 "Very well indeed." 
 
 "And the little one — the boy; is he well?" 
 
 A grave reproach filled her eyes, and drew her mouth into 
 a sweetly stern expression. 
 
 "Well? How can you ask? How can he ail?" 
 
 "I beg your pardon," he said, quite humbly for so proud 
 and stiff a man. "I did not remember." 
 
 Mary drew forth one hand, all warm and scented, from 
 her muff, and held it out, a charming peace ofEering, to Noel 
 Marrable. 
 
 "Please don't apologise. But, indeed, he has never suf- 
 fered one moment. Ah! if you knew how worthy he is, in 
 
WITHOUT SIN 249 
 
 body and soul, how he bears in every feature a stamp that 
 is all immortal. But will you not come and see him one 
 day? You will understand then what I mean. I can feel 
 in my heart all that he is and will bej but," she smiled in 
 a deprecating fashion, and shook her fair head, " I never 
 could talk cleverly or well. I cannot express to you quite 
 what I would say. But do come — come to-morrow. It is 
 his birthday." 
 
 Then she entered her carriage, and was driven down the 
 glittering streets of gaily lit shops to the Art Gallery, where 
 for an hour she discussed business with Martin Baird. 
 
 As she rose to go, she said to Baird : 
 
 " Who do you think I met on my way here, Martin? Dr. 
 Marrable, whom I have not seen for a long time. You 
 remember him, of course?" 
 
 Baird looked keenly at his mistress from under his shaggy 
 brows. 
 
 " I know him well. Miss Levinge. He is in here at least 
 once a week." 
 
 "Here!" cried Mary, "What does Dr. Marrable come 
 here for?" 
 
 "He is quite a china maniac in a small way," answered 
 the old man, with his eyes still fixed on the girl's face, as she 
 bent over the fire. " He drops in and looks round and buys 
 something every few days, and always has a chat with me." 
 
 A question trembled on the tip of Mary's tongue, a 
 question that must have occurred to every woman under 
 like circumstances. She blushed at the idea it suggested, 
 then blushed again, as her sex and curiosity conquered. 
 
 " When did Dr. Marrable first take to buying old china, 
 Martin?" 
 
 "About last February; and when he comes he always 
 asks after you — and the child," said Baird, in his most 
 ungracious manner. 
 
250 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 He had noted the hesitation, and caught sight of the 
 burning blush, and it hurt his faithful soul that Mary- 
 should have kept a heart-secret from so old and true a 
 friend as himself. 
 
 No further words passed between mistress and man. 
 Mary mused by the fire, as she slowly buttoned her gloves; 
 Martin Baird busied himself in putting away in the safe 
 the ledgers and letter-books which had been taken out for 
 inspection. 
 
 Presently she turned from the fire, and held out a hand 
 in farewell. 
 
 " Mind you come to-morrow ; it is the child's birthday ; 
 besides, Mr. Bawdon wants to speak to you about a Carlo 
 Dolci he has been offered. And, Martin, unless you are 
 sure of a speedy market, I don't think we had ^better have 
 that Raphael from Glydesmere Castle. Eleven thousand 
 pounds is a good deal to sink for an indefinite time ; and 
 some day, it may not be very far off, all the money I can 
 find may be wanted to help him." 
 
 As she drove northwards to the Kegent's Park, the 
 memory of Noel Marrable forced itself upon her. 
 
 "So he does have news of me sometimes," she mused. 
 " How grey and aged he looked by the lamplight outside 
 Kedfern's." 
 
CHAPTER XXIX 
 
 Thbkb was to be a little tea-party at Holmhurst. Lady 
 St. Cyprien, who had been out of health for some time and 
 was on the eve of leaving England for the south, was com- 
 ing, and a few mutual fiiends were expected to bid her 
 "Good-bye." 
 
 Intent on seeing Mary alone, Lady St. Cyprien arrived 
 early, only to find she had to wait a while for her hostess. 
 As she sat before the fire this dull January afternoon, she 
 wondered a little sadly if there would be any gaps in the 
 ranks of those she loved when she returned next summer. 
 
 Mr. Erastus Bawdon's sonorous, oily tones interrupted 
 her reverie. He was larger and more overwhelming in 
 presence than ever and more pronouncedly ecclesiastical in 
 his garb. But his conversation was eminently worldly, and 
 he chattered of theatres and shooting-parties, the latest 
 scandal in hunting circles, and the newest liaison of a 
 favourite dancer with infinite appreciation. 
 
 By the time he had exhausted his leading themes he gave 
 his voice a rest, only inquiring if the Countess had any 
 gossip to retail. 
 
 " None of very great general interest, I'm afraid, " said 
 Lady St. Cyprien, in her gentle, quiet way. " Though St. 
 Cyprien and I were very pleased at a little bit of family 
 news we heard this morning. Stansdale is going to be 
 married." 
 
 "Eeally!" exclaimed Mr. Bawdon. "Why, t always 
 thought " And he glanced about him. 
 
252 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 "That his love for Mary Levinge was incurable. Yes; 
 so did we all. Indeed, for a time I think he half hoped to 
 ■win her for his wife. But he now sees the uselessness of 
 it; and he is a man who appreciates his future responsi- 
 bilities. He knows, too, how much we — St. Cyprien and 
 I — long to see the old line firmly re-established before we 
 go ; and so he is going to marry early in the spring. She 
 is a charming girl — Lord Dulverton's second daughter — 
 very bright, and will have money when her grandmother 
 
 the Dowager dies. It's a good match, but — I wish " 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien finished her sentence with a sigh, which 
 changed to a smile as the door was flung wide, and a patter 
 of tiny feet and the ring of a baby voice announced Mary 
 and her little son. 
 
 The little boy, who was tall and slender for his three 
 years, rushed impetuously into Lady St. Cyprien's arms, 
 with his fleecy, golden curls a-flying and his scarlet mouth 
 puckered like a rosebud, for a kiss. 
 
 Mary, who with the child had just returned from her 
 drive, and into whose cheeks the keen, damp air had 
 whipped a rich colour, until her face glowed like a jewel 
 above the setting of her snowy furs, excused her lateness 
 on the plea that the fog outside was growing thicker, and 
 that her coachman had lost his way. 
 
 It was on the tip of the Countess's tongue to say that the 
 child should not have been out on such a stormy afternoon, 
 but the custom of the past few years had taught her to 
 maintain silence on the question of the little one's well- 
 being. 
 
 "In the corner behind the screen are some toys," she said 
 lovingly to the little boy. 
 
 Mary busied herself in removing the child's thick white 
 coat and soft fur cap. She touched him very gently, yet 
 always with an air of restraint and humility which had 
 
WITHOUT SIN 253 
 
 now become habitual with her in her relations with her 
 child. 
 
 "Is he not beautiful?" she said in Ioyt tones to Mr. 
 Bawdon, as the baby, shaking himself free from her tender 
 clasp, trotted away in search of the new toys. 
 
 "His beauty ia not of this world," murmured Erastus 
 Bawdon, in his most clerical manner. "It is godlike." 
 
 Mary quivered and smiled in one breath. Words such as 
 these were mingled gall and honey to her. At once they 
 emphasised the difference which lay between herself and 
 her son, and confirmed her own great faith in him. She 
 clasped her hands almost convulsively as she whispered 
 back: 
 
 "Yes, you are right; he is godlike!" 
 
 And then she permitted herself to taste her one drop of 
 maternal pleasure. She sat and watched her baby as he 
 played before the fire at Lady St. Cyprien's feet. His 
 new treasure was a train, with a fine large engine and a 
 long string of carriages, all of gaily painted tin. His 
 delicate hands, long and narrow like his mother's, and with 
 the same curved finger-tips, his graceful body and his 
 tongue just learning to express intelligent joy or sorrow, 
 were never still for one second. Pair and fragile as he 
 looked, there seemed an everlasting fund of vitality and 
 energy in the little form and budding brain. 
 
 And as the mother watched, she saw from beneath her 
 lowered lids, as in a beatific vision, her child still fair and 
 slender and crowned with the pale halo of his amber curls, 
 standing as a preacher amid crowds of disciples, marching 
 at the head of vast armies of reclaimed souls, a divine ruler 
 in that great city which would rise at his command and be 
 the capital of her people's new kingdom. Then would her 
 son, and the son of one greater than she, stoop from his 
 throne, and take her by the hand and show her to all the 
 
254 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 world as that chosen one from whom.thg world's redemption 
 had sprung. 
 
 "Mary, Mary, my dear!" whi&pered Lady St. Cyprien. 
 " There is something I want to tell you. Some one may 
 come in presently and mention it, and I think you would 
 rather hear it from me." 
 
 Mary roused herself from her reverie and went over to 
 the couch, while Mr. Bawdon struggled down on toi his 
 knees beside the child, and asked to be initiated into the 
 mysteries of "trains." 
 
 "Sit down, dear," said Lady St. Cyprien, possessing her- 
 self of one of Mary's hands as the girl sank on to a low 
 stool. " I want to tell you that Stansdale is going to be 
 married. You know where our wishes have lain in the 
 past, but ?" 
 
 The Countess paused; for the moment her usual sang 
 froid deserted her, and she sought in vain for a few kindly 
 words to complete her sentence. 
 
 The child shouted merrily to ker from the rug, and she 
 smiled back at him. 
 
 Mary smiled too, and pressed Lady St. Cyprien' s fingers 
 in her own. 
 
 " It was not to bej dear friend. But I am so glad Lord 
 Stansdale is going to marry. I hope he will have a good 
 wife ; he deserves one. Will you tell him from me that I 
 congratulate him, and wish him every happiness from the 
 bottom of my heart?" 
 
 When tea was brought Mr. Bawdon rose, red and hot, 
 from his knees, handed the cups, and turned the conversa- 
 tion to the little convent near his church, which was com- 
 pleted, and was shortly to be occupied. From the convent 
 to church music and ecclesiastical art the chat drifted on, 
 rising and falling like a tossed ball in the warm luxury of 
 the drawing-room, while the child played quietly on the floor. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 255 
 
 So the friends might have talked for hours, but that the 
 entrance of Dr. Marrable broke up the circle, and brought 
 a whiff of the dank air of the winter evening into the 
 room, 
 
 " Ah, do not let me drive you away, " he cried, as Mr. 
 Bawdon rose from his chair. 
 
 He held out a big strong hand to Mary's son, who, 
 wearied by play, sat among the wreckage of the brightly 
 coloured train. The little one, with sweet confidence, 
 slipped his baby palm into Marrable's. 
 
 " Miss Levinge, " he siaid, as he clasped the tiny fingers. 
 " Tour room is too hot. This little hand is like a coal." 
 
 " He has been playing before the fire for some time. He 
 is quite well," cried Mary quickly, moving her chair back 
 from the blaze, and drawing the child towards her till he 
 leaned against her knee. Marrable took his tea and sipped 
 it almost in silence. His presence seemed to have cast a 
 chill upon the party. Grim and stern, he sat upright in 
 his chair, forcing a remark from his lips now and then. 
 
 " Tired, Noel?" asked Lady St. Cyprien presently, more 
 to break the silence which was growing oppressive than for 
 any wish for an answer. 
 
 " Yes, I am rather, " he said. " I've not been to bed for 
 three nights, and though I'm pretty strong, there were cir- 
 cumstances connected with the case, which " 
 
 He set down his cup and left the sentence unfinished. 
 
 "Was it a very bad case?" said Mary gently. 
 
 " It was inflammation — a — little child — the only one. It 
 died this morning at seven." 
 
 The words dropped from his set mouth abruptly, and 
 his face turned grey in the sparkling firelight. 
 
 "The little child is at peace," said Mary very quietly. 
 " But the mother — the poor broken-hearted mother — how 
 terrible for her!" 
 
256 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 There was an intense pity in her voice, but the faint 
 smile which curved her mouth was the smile of perfect 
 happiness. At least, if the common joys of motherhood 
 were denied her, the commoner sorrows of sickness and of 
 death might not come near her. 
 
 Still with the smile on her face, she turned moist eyes of 
 sincerest sympathy on Marrable. The strange attraction 
 that sometimes lies between two people drew his eyes 
 towards her at the same moment. 
 
 In another second he was leaning forward in his chair, 
 one hand stretched down to the child who had, as though 
 tired out, slipped to the floor at Mary's feet, and pillowed 
 his head in the folds of her gown. 
 
 " I do not think — I am afraid — that your little boy " 
 
 "Nonsense Marrable," cried Mr. Bawdon in reproving 
 tones. " You are tired and have got sick children on the 
 brain." 
 
 "He's a little flushed and sleepy, that's all," said Lady 
 St. Cyprien from her arm-chair. " Mary, dearest, I hate to 
 lose him, but the wee one is so worn out it would be only 
 kind to send him to bed." 
 
 The smile of faith was on Mary's mouth, though the 
 mother-love and mother-fear had dilated her eyes, as she 
 stooped to raise the curled-up form nestling so warmly 
 against her feet. 
 
 The child wailed fretfully as she touched him. 
 
 "Allow me!" 
 
 Marrable had been quicker than she, and now held the 
 drowsy baby in his arms. 
 
 Por one swift second the instinct of maternity had Mary 
 at its mercy and her eager mouth brushed across the little 
 hot face. But she drew back before the kiss was complete, 
 and the great faith that was in her quelled the anguish in 
 her widwed eyes. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 257 
 
 " Wants to go to bed, I'se tired, " murmured the child, 
 twisting restlessly in Marrable's arms. 
 
 "I will carry him upstairs," said Marrable. 
 
 In the hall he faced Mary, still with the baby in his 
 arms. 
 
 " Miss Levinge, the child is very feverish. I fear he has 
 contracted a severe chill." 
 
 Mary caught her breath, but her face was set and her 
 voice steady. 
 
 " I think not. Dr. Marrable. The drawing-room is very 
 hot, that is all. Why, you might as well say that I am 
 feverish." 
 
 She laid one burning hand, which, despite her self-con- 
 trol, shook like a leaf, on his cool fingers. 
 
 "I am sorry I cannot agree with you. Miss Levinge," 
 answered Marrable curtly, moving towards the staircase. 
 
 As he gave up the little one at the nurSery door, he spoke 
 again, almost entreatingly. 
 
 " If he becomes worse, promise me you will send for me." 
 
 In the light that gleamed from the open door he saw her 
 look at him. A supreme pity for his lack of faith, and a 
 boundless belief, shone in her eyes. 
 
 "You are very kind. Dr. Marrable, but you do not under- 
 stand. All will be well with the child." 
 17 
 
CHAPTER XXX 
 
 " AiL will be well with the chUd!" 
 
 Mary's simple words seemed prophetic, for when the next 
 morning her little son came into her room he looked almost 
 as fresh and sweet as the bunch of white violets he brougjst 
 her as an offering. Only the merest shadow beneath his 
 blue eyes gave faint evidence of the feverish attack of the 
 previous day. 
 
 "Muvva," he cried, lifting himself on tiptoe and laying 
 his perfumed present on Mary's pillow, "Here's some pitty 
 flowers for 'oo." He looked gravely at her as she lay, fair 
 and white among the rich laces of her bed. 
 
 Mary lifted one of her son's wee hands and kissed the 
 rosy little fingers reverently. 
 
 " You are well to-day, my child?" she asked. 
 
 "Es! I fink so. May I go a ride vis morning?" 
 
 Mary rose, and, drawing a dressing-gown round her, 
 went to the window'. Autumn mists were hanging among 
 the trees, but a pale sun was already fighting for a glimpse 
 of earth, and the day promised fair. 
 
 "In an hour, dear, you may go. See, let us ring and 
 order Wliite Hose for ten o'clock." 
 
 The child listened while his mother gave the order for 
 his donkey to be saddled, then, as she crossed to the fire to 
 sip her chocolate in the circle of its warmth before dressing, 
 he came to her side and chatted his bright baby talk till she 
 laughed. 
 
 And when he left her to be dressed for his ride, she 
 
WITHOUT SIN 259 
 
 smiled again at the recollection of Lady St. Cyprien's 
 foolish fears and Marrable's prognostication of illness. 
 
 Household duties — for in those quiet times she was much 
 among her women — her drive, and business with Baird at 
 the Art Gallery occupied her day until the wintry dusk had 
 fallen and a bitter wind cut fiercely down the wider streets. 
 As she stepped from her carriage into the white warmth of 
 the splendid house, a thrill of physical pleasure in the 
 beauty and comfort and perfumed luxury of her surround- 
 ings passed through her. 
 
 " How happy — how blest I am !" 
 
 The words left her lips involuntarily as she began to 
 mount the wide stairs towards her own room. 
 
 "If you please, ma'am, Nurse would like you to go to the 
 nursery." 
 
 Her own maid. Carter, met her at her bedroom door with 
 the message, and, though Mary did not notice the circum- 
 stance, did not even offer to delay her by removing her 
 outer wraps. 
 
 With the costly white velvet and heavy fur of her pelisse 
 still clasped about her, Mary mounted the next flight of 
 stairs and ran with swift feet to the nursery. 
 
 At the doorway she paused, reproaching herself for such 
 unnecessary haste, and as angry as her gentle nature could 
 be with the fanciful and over-anxious servant. 
 
 With a smile on her lips, though her breath still came 
 fast from her run, she opened the door and went in. 
 
 The nursery was a large room, lit by three windows^ 
 which, in summer-time, gave charming views across the 
 lawns and tree-tops. Now they were curtained close with 
 warm draperies of white stuff, on which loving fingers had 
 worked in gay wools a thousand quaint images drawn from 
 children's lore. 
 
 A swinging lamp made a bright circle over the table, now 
 
360 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 spread for tea, but the room was not so light that a large 
 fire dancing behind the high guard did not fling merry rays 
 and leaping shadows into the further end, where stood the 
 nurse's bed and the little white and silver cot of the child. 
 A wardrobe and a cupboard sacred to toys, flanked the 
 bright fire, before which was Mary's favourite low seat, and 
 the fanciful little basket chair given the child on his last 
 birthday. The two chests of drawers and the wash-hand- 
 stand and toilet table stood in a small dressing-room lead- 
 ing from the nursery, where also burned a cheerful fire. 
 Pictures — principally of animals — adorned the walls, and a 
 tall clock that chimed at each quarter, stood between two 
 of the windows. 
 
 The room was delightfully warm, bright, and comfortable, 
 yet even as she set her foot upon the threshold, the instinct 
 of the mother warned Mary that all was not well. 
 
 " What is the matter? Why do you send for me?" she 
 said quickly, closing the door behind her and advancing into 
 the room. 
 
 Between the tea-table and the bright, high guard of steel, 
 was a great strew of toys — a sure sign in a well-ordered 
 nursery of discontent or illness. Noah's animals were 
 jumbled with the wreckage of a ship and the scattered build- 
 ings of a farmstead; wooden bricks and letter blocks, 
 picture puzzles and railway cars, were diref ully commingled. 
 A broken drum and battered trumpet reposed amid the 
 ruins of a camp and the remnants of a leaden army. A 
 mechanical bear lay on its side, still moving its legs and 
 head slowly. A hundred picture-books, in every state of 
 dismemberment, lay like wind-blown leaves, and the scrap- 
 book's back was broken past repair. 
 
 The child sat in his own little basket chair. The bril- 
 liant cretonne-covered cushion which belonged to it was 
 pulled up behind his head. His cheeks were like scarlet 
 
WITHOUT SIN 261 
 
 peonies, and his eyes like stars — glowing from behind a 
 veil of mist. His tiny hands were plucking idly at the ring 
 of stiff black hair that toy-makers by tradition ascribe to 
 Japanese dolls. 
 
 "Why, my child, all your toys out, and thrown aside? 
 Are you so tired of them?" said Mary, forcing a smile to 
 her lips. 
 
 The child looked at her, then, without speaking, turned 
 his attention again to the doll's head. 
 
 " I think he is ill, ma'am!" interposed the nurse. "He 
 enjoyed his ride this morning, but would not eat his dinner, 
 and this afternoon nothing has suited him. He won't touch 
 his tea, and he's so cross that I " 
 
 Mary stopped the flow of words with a gesture, while 
 her straight brows drew together in displeasure. 
 
 "The child ill! The child cross!" How could such 
 words be said to her? 
 
 She pulled the glove from her right hand, and laid it, still 
 cold from the outer air, tentatively, and as though she were 
 committing a liberty, against the child's hot face. 
 
 "Oh! how lovely. You is so cold — and I' se so hot — so 
 hot." 
 
 With little palms that scorched like living flames, he 
 drew her slim fingers across his burning mouth, and 
 mumbled them as though ' he would draw coolness from 
 them. 
 
 Mary knelt by her son and yielded both her hands to his 
 hot, clinging clasp. She spoke to the nurse over her 
 shoulder. 
 
 " The child is over-heated. How high is the thermometer 
 here? Over seventy? I thought so. Open the door at 
 once and take some of that fire off. Light candles and 
 lower the gas. This room is far too warm. " 
 
 Presently the child grew cooler and drowsed in his chair, 
 
262 WITHOUT Sm 
 
 with his mother still kneeling by his side and holding the 
 gentle coolness of her palms on his baby face. 
 
 Outwardly she was quite calm, for the nameless fear of 
 yesterday had not come to her again, but in its place was 
 an overwhelming sensation of annoyance — against whom? 
 
 Was she vexed with Lady St. Cyprien, who had said the 
 child was over-tired? Was she angry with Dr. Marrable, 
 who had foretold with such insistance a prospective illness? 
 Or was she merely annoyed at the foolish whims of a fussy, 
 ignorant domestic? 
 
 She did not know. Only her usually meek spirit was 
 roused to revolt against these unbelievers, who would not 
 grasp the truth before them ; these scoffers, whose eyes and 
 ears were blind and deaf to all they did not choose to 
 understand. 
 
 Of her own humanity she doubted not. She was the 
 offspring of a man and of a woman, and must suffer in the 
 flesh and perish as all such offsprings do; But her son 
 was not such as these. His coming was a miracle; his 
 invulnerability and infallibility were certain. And she had 
 proof if she had desired it, for during the brief years he 
 had lived on earth among the people he had been born to 
 redeem and save, no common pang of childhood had come 
 to him. His health had been as perfect as his body. 
 
 And so Mary, with her scorn of poor mortals over-riding 
 for once her gentleness, soothed her child into a doze, and 
 then turned triumphantly to the nurse. 
 
 " You see, now that the room is cooler, baby is perfectly 
 well, the fever has quite left him. Put him to bed now, 
 he will be asleep in a moment." 
 
 She rose to her feet and brushed her fingers once more 
 across the child's forehead. 
 
 " He is quite well ; quite well !" 
 
 Mary spent the evening in praying at her white altar for 
 
WITHOUT SIN 263 
 
 forgiveness of her heart-sin. How could she expect the 
 people of the world — even those who knew the truth — to 
 yet awaken from the sleep of indifference, selfishness, and 
 unbelief, which had enwrapt them for all ages? It was not 
 for her to chide or to preach. He who was promised in a 
 vision, and made manifest by a miracle, would rouse the 
 souls of men and warm their hearts of stone in his own 
 good time. And with repentance in her heart and hope for 
 the future in her eyes, Mary lay down to rest, after thank- 
 ing God for His mercy to herself and to her people. 
 
 She never knew how long she had slept, when the touch 
 of a hand on her arm, the flare of a light in her eyes, and 
 a frightened voice crying incoherently in her ear, woke her 
 with a violent start. 
 
 "Ma'am, come at once! Baby is very ill! Come to 
 him!" 
 
 Mary leapt from the bed. Pushing the tangles of her 
 hair from her sleep-laden eyes, she stared about her. The 
 rose-shaded night lamp showed her that she was alone, but 
 the open door and the sound of footsteps in rapid retreat, 
 forbade the hope that voice and touch had been a dream. 
 
 Dashing a little water across her face and catching up a 
 wrapper, Mary sped towards the nursery. 
 
 But as she neared it, she paused; her feet, her very 
 breath stilled by a monotonous sound of a low ceaseless 
 moan. Inai-ticulate as the cry of a dumb animal, it struck 
 her with an awful sense of fear and impotence. Surely it 
 was mortal pain and suffering that found voice in such a 
 wail. 
 
 With her knees trembling imder her, and her heart 
 thumping against her side, Mary staggered, rather than 
 walked into the nursery. 
 
 "Oh, ma'am, thank heaven you've come. The poor 
 lamb! See how he suffers!" 
 
264 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Mary put the weeping woman aside with a very gentle 
 touch and walked to the child's cot. 
 
 During one moment that seemed an eternity of suffering, 
 the whole edifice of her faith was shaken. She clutched 
 the silver cot rail, as though body and soul were tottering 
 to their everlasting fall. 
 
 Lying amid the tossed bed-clothes, the rare beauty of his 
 face marred by a deep flush, and his eyes, twin lakes of 
 blue, upturned beneath the puffed eyelids, lay her child. 
 
 With untiring restlessness, his head turned from side to 
 side on the pillow, and always that helpless moan broke in 
 gusts from the hot mouth. 
 
 For a moment his mother's presence seemed to soothe 
 him, a startled stare of recognition crept into the uncon- 
 scious eyes, and there came a pause in the ceaseless mutter. 
 Mary checked the cry to heaven for help that rose to her 
 own dry lips. 
 
 The swift passing of time that stayed the flow of the 
 delirious words, and gave the child over once more to the 
 awful clutches of the ravaging brain fever, restored to Mary 
 her strength and steadfast faith. 
 
 Like balm the flood of her whole life's beautiful ideal 
 swept across her trembling heart. A divine confidence 
 shone in purest radiance from her eyes, which still rained 
 tears of love and motherhood ; the pitiful smile of one who 
 will not be denied peace curved the corner' s of her sad mouth. 
 
 She turned very quietly to the excited nurse. 
 
 " You did well to call me ; but there is nothing to fear. 
 The child has a feverish cold, and talks in his sleep. 
 Give me a chair, please. Since you are afraid, I will stay 
 here and watch with you." 
 
 And as she took the seat offered her, there came the sound 
 of baby prattle from the bed, which said pathetically, oh! 
 so pathetically : 
 
WITHOUT SIN 365 
 
 "Kiss me, and say good-bye." 
 
 She leaned over the rail of the cot and placed her cold 
 white cheek against the burning face of her child. 
 
 " I'se going for a long ride, such a long ride. Kiss me 
 and say good-bye." 
 
 From the other end of the room came the sobs of the 
 nurse, and Mary had not the heart to reprove her. 
 
CHAPTER XXXI 
 
 " The little boy is very ill, sir. Nurse said he was awful 
 bad last night, and my mistress ordered her out of the nur- 
 sery for saying so. My mistress is up there now. Will 
 you like to go up, sir, or shall I say ?" 
 
 " You need not trouble. I will go upstairs. I know the 
 Way." 
 
 Dr. Marrable strode from the chill outer darkness of the 
 winter evening into the warm luxury of the hall at Holm- 
 hurst, where the carven oak panel, touched with light lines 
 of dead gold, were draped with priceless tapestries, where 
 the tread of feet across the floor of white marbles was 
 deadened with soft-hued Eastern rugs. He gave his hat 
 and coat to the servant, and then with more than usual 
 deliberation started to mount the low, wide stairs. 
 
 A marble nymph, with perfectly modelled form and 
 taper beckoning finger, laughed and leered at the head of 
 the first flight, but her fascinations were without avail, 
 even though the glow of pink-shaded lamps turned her 
 snow-cold charms to the palpitating semblance of the fairest 
 flesh and blood. 
 
 Slower and slower lagged his heavy footsteps, and the 
 servant who stood below watching him, thought " the doctor 
 must have had a mortal hard day's work, to be so tired." 
 
 But once the turn in the stairs hid him from prying eyes, 
 Marrable ran like a boy to the second floor and hurried on 
 stealthy light feet down the long corridor to the heavily 
 curtained doorway, behind which he knew the nurseries lay. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 267 
 
 Within, a frail little body was fighting the great battle 
 of life and death, and a woman, with eyes that ached to 
 weep, and a heart that fainted as the wejiry hours went by, 
 was fighting too — the awful fight of faith and fear. 
 
 For Mary, despite her grand belief in her God, her child, 
 and herself, was racked with all the terrors and anxieties 
 which are the entail of maternity. Every twist of the tiny 
 tortured limbs, every movement on the pillows of the crim- 
 soned baby facie, every wail from the fever-parched mouth, 
 wrung a responsive cry of pain from her lips, while cruel 
 doubts and mad desires to question truth, hammered at her 
 heait's citadel of faith. 
 
 For forty-eight hours she had watched by the side of her 
 child's crib, and twenty -four of them she had passed alone 
 with' him. For when the frightened nurse had begged f on 
 medical aid, Mary had thrust her from the room, and kept 
 her vigil alone. 
 
 From that supreme moment, when Mary had vowed her- 
 self the mother of hfer child in little more than name, and 
 had forced a distant adoration to suffice her for all outward 
 manifestations of maternal affection, she had suffered as 
 only mothers can, and endured as only martyrs could. But 
 her sense of certainty and security in the strange position 
 she had taken up, helped her to stand as she had done for 
 three years, a humble worshipper, a meek and willing slave, 
 at the foot of the throne of the redeemer and savior of her 
 people. 
 
 Her calm and steadfast temperament, which lacked the 
 wavering weaknesses and wind-tossed fancies of her sex, 
 aided her in her great resolve of abnegation and humility, 
 while every deadened desire for the soft touch of her baby's 
 lips, the sweet clinging of his ditripled hands, only went to 
 feed the fires of her immutable faith. 
 
 But now this sudden illness of her life's idol had strained 
 
268 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 her self-control and her powers of belief to cracking point. 
 That the child might die did not occur to her, even in her 
 moments of deepest fear and grief; but that he suffered as 
 other poor mortals suffer, was suflBcient trial to her. 
 
 Yet she would do nothing. Above the mother's love for 
 the child of her body towered the soul's worship of the 
 spirit. To seek for human aid would be to outrage a power 
 mightier than her own belief. She did not, dared not, even 
 pray for her son's welfare, for to do so would imply a stain 
 upon herself, the chosen instrument of a divine clemency, 
 and would cast the shameful shadow of weak doubt upon 
 the radiant glory of the beautiful future. So she had passed 
 the hours in watching and in suffering,, moving from her 
 knees only to give the unconscious child a few drops of 
 milk, or to smooth the tumbled pillows beneath the tossed 
 yellow curls of the ever-restless little head. 
 
 Marrable found her so, as he parted the curtains and 
 quietly opened the door. The child was moaning heavily, 
 her ears were throbbing responsive to the ceaseless cry, and 
 the slow hot tears were dropping one by one on her clasped 
 hands. She did not hear him enter, nor did she note his 
 presence till he emerged from the shadows into the ring of 
 amber light which fell from the lamp in the centre of the 
 room. 
 
 As though his coming portended some new evil, she 
 started to her feet, as a frightened hind leaps from the brake. 
 Her eyes dilated and grew dark with terror ; her outstretched 
 hands beat the air as though to drive him from the room. 
 
 " Why are you here? What have you come for?" 
 
 She had not spoken for hours, and her voice sounded 
 sharp and shrill. 
 
 "Why have you come?" she cried again. 
 
 She left the bedside, and, advancing into the circle of the 
 clear light, stood close before him. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 369 
 
 Words came not to him at first. His quick run up the 
 stairs, the close warmth of the nursery atmosphere, the 
 faint, ceaseless moaning from the little bed, and the agony 
 of the woman he loved, strangled the voice in his throat. 
 
 He merely looked at her, and with his gaze grew the 
 knowledge of a great change — the change which, in a few 
 short spaces of time, evolves a woman from a girl. 
 
 He saw a slight, loose garment of white silk with wide 
 sleeves, swathed and twisted round her slender body with 
 so little care that it had parted at the throat, and let a long 
 coil of loosened hair curl like a golden snake into the white- 
 ness of her bosom. About her face, the pale locks, ruffled 
 into an ambient cloud, gleamed in the lamp-light like the 
 faint reflex of a glory. 
 
 He saw the cold purity, the exclusive atmosphere of im- 
 maculate virginity broken up, shattered for ever by the 
 common anguish of all womankind. The sharp, fine lines 
 of maidenhood were gone from face and form, lost in the 
 fuller amplitude of an anguished maternity that was tor- 
 tured with fear, and only able to cry with the shrill, impa- 
 tient iteration of nervous suspense : 
 
 "Why have you come?" 
 
 Noel Marrable saw and read as in a book her mother's 
 heart and mother's fears,, her virgin's soul and mighty 
 faith. He saw the awful struggle between the mother- 
 hoods of God and man. And as the tragedies of her past, 
 her present, and her future were laid bare before him, his 
 heart, that had suffered neither mercy nor love for any 
 woman, bled for her and for her sex. 
 
 " The servants sent for me. They said the child was Ul, 
 and I have come to help you — if I may." 
 
 He put her aside and walked to the crib, where the 
 golden head was still rolling to and fro. 
 
 Mary follo'vred bim slowly. Her womanly dignity and 
 
270 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 self-control left her for a moment, and she cried fretfully, 
 like a child who is over-tired: 
 
 "111! They said the child was ill! They do not under- 
 stand; I cannot get them to believe me that he only has a 
 cold — a feverish cold. Any one might get that this weather. 
 He is flushed and restless now. Nurse kept the room so hot, 
 and then told me that some one should be sent for. But 
 it's not so warm now. I have only kept a small fire all 
 day. Of course the evening is always a more feverish 
 time ; I remember my nurses told me that when I was Ul 
 myself." 
 
 In staccato sentences, broken by short, nervous sobs, she 
 rambled on, following aloud an endless train of self -delu- 
 sive talk, and finding — poor, hungry soul — a crumb of com- 
 fort in that Marrable did not contradict her. 
 
 He did not hear or heed. One glance had revealed to 
 him the swift-coming end, one touch of his firm fingers 
 upon the scorching skin of the quickly pulsing wrist had 
 shot the bolt which struck him to the heart. Every effort 
 of his will, every tutored power of self-control were called 
 forth to help him bear the truth, and keep silence, for her 
 sake. 
 
 Mary laid light fingers on his arm. 
 
 "I think he's quieter now, Dr. Marrable. Won't he fall 
 asleep soon?" 
 
 Then he spoke tenderly, soothingly, as though he were 
 humoring a fractious child. 
 
 "Yes, yes; he will fall asleep very soon now." 
 
 Mary was but a woman, and the words of a man with 
 the strong personality of the sex which every instinct of 
 the Jewess is bred to acknowledge as her superior, eased 
 the tension of her nerves. With a little, hard sob she sank 
 once more to her knees. Her first displeasure at his pres- 
 ence had yielded to a vague sense of comfort and confidence; 
 
WITHOUT SIN 271 
 
 and as she knelt she raised her eyes from time to time from 
 her child's face and let them rest on Marrable's dark, stern 
 features as he sat in the shadow on the other side of the 
 silken-curtained crib. 
 
 The hours slipped by in the dim nursery, where, between 
 the man and the woman, the little one lay in a torpor, 
 which even pain was powerless to disperse. Mary thought 
 he slept, but the baby life-fuel was consuming fast in the 
 fever's furnace, and the hoarse moan which broke at in- 
 tervals from the swollen mouth grew feebler as the night 
 wore on. 
 
 Twice Marrable made up the fire and twice he had laid a 
 finger on the fluttering pulse, but Mary watched in silence. 
 
 The big house, with its brightly lit corridors and lofty 
 rooms, where the neglected fires died to grey ashes on the 
 hearths, was silent as the grave. If the servants watched, 
 they did so in their own quarters, to the accompauiment of 
 whispeted confidences of blame and pity. Outside, the 
 night was very still, and twelve booming from the church 
 in the Marylebone Boad rolled in resonant waves of clear 
 sound over the Park. 
 
 The throbbing of the metal tongue roused the child to a 
 fuller consciousness. He drew his tiny pain-racked limbs 
 together under the clothes, and began once more the weary 
 turning of his head upon the hot pillows. 
 
 " I'se so fursty," he muttered presently in a thick, hoarse 
 voice. Marrable was on his feet at once, and with one arm 
 raised the fragile little creature. 
 
 "Quick, some milk at once, and put some brandy in it," 
 he cried imperatively, as Mary, stiff and sore, rose from 
 her knees and fetched what he required. 
 
 A few drops were placed between the parched, dry lips, 
 and then Marrable motioned the spoon away. 
 
 "Tank oo," the poor, worn mite whispered gratefully, 
 
27a WITHOUT SIN 
 
 and with a supreme effort lifted Ms heavy eyelids and 
 smiled frith his dimmed blue eyes at the two faces — one so 
 dark and one so fair — which, cheek against cheek, hung 
 over the bed. 
 
 As the brandy quickened the labouring heart and feeble 
 pulses, a vague remembrance of some favourite toy stirred 
 the aching brain. 
 
 "Where's my so'jer? My dear 'ickle so'jer," he cried, 
 in a voice which bitter pain and fierce fever had roughened 
 and made weak. 
 
 "What does he want?" murmured Marrable, his eyes 
 fixed on the child, intent on catching the sense of the baby 
 words. 
 
 "1 think he means a soldier," said Mary bending lower 
 over the cot. " Is it a soldier, my son, one of your toys 
 that you want?" 
 
 The child did not answer her directly, but his' wasted 
 hands wandered like fluttered lily petals over the bed 
 clothes, and a hoarse wail broke from his fever-parched 
 throat. 
 
 "Fetch it! Find it!" commanded Marrable. 
 
 With tears blinding her sight and falling in scalding 
 drops upon her hands, Mary went obediently to the roomy 
 cupboard where the toys were kept. Unseeing in her grief, 
 she sought for a soldier, and presently took one, all gay 
 paint and shining varnish, back to the cot, 
 
 "Here is a soldier, such a fine one." 
 
 But the sick child turned his heavy eyes away, and cried 
 again peevishly. 
 
 Again she sought, groping amid the scores of bright play- 
 things. A leaden hussar mounted on a prancing steed and 
 waving a pennon, rewarded her search. 
 
 "See, dear!" she cried, hastening to the child, "there 
 he is. Shall he talk to you now?" 
 
WITHOUT SIN 273 
 
 She held the toy close to the little one, who, scarcely 
 seeing it, weakly lifted one burning hand, and touched it 
 with frail, sensitive fingers. 
 
 A fretful cry of disappointment broke from him, and 
 Mary, sick with despair at the sound, dropped it on the 
 floor, and shook her head in helpless agony. 
 
 "Nannie! Give me my so' jer." 
 
 Stung by the unconscious appeal to the absent nurse, 
 Mary, with bitter tears pouring down her white cheeks, 
 stumbled once more to the toy-cupboard, and with infinite 
 patience, born of an insupportable pain, sought again for 
 the little broken toy. 
 
 And if she faltered, even to brush the hot tears from her 
 aching eyes, the fretful voice from the bed,, calling ever on 
 " Nannie" to find the soldier, urged her on like a thonged 
 whip. 
 
 Far back in the cupboard, amid a whole pile of hastily 
 put-away playthings, she found a tiny soldier, battered, 
 bereft of all paint, and headless. She sprang to her feet 
 and flew across the room. 
 
 "Here it is at last. Mother has found it." 
 
 The child opened his eyes wide, and, stretching out his 
 baby fingers, clutched at the treasure quickly. 
 
 That was her dearest reward, and she smiled through her 
 grief at Marrable across the bed. 
 
 Her son, gazing in her face, smiled too, first following 
 the direction of her eyes, and then turning a long look on 
 her own face. 
 
 But even as he looked, all the sweet baby love died, 
 killed by a throb of pain, and the eyelids drooped once more 
 over the dull, blue eyes. 
 
 "Nurse me, nurse me. I'se so tired," he wailed, as he 
 drifted out once more on to the cruel, dark sea of black 
 unconsciousness. 
 18 
 
274 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Without one word, Marrable had stood by the bed, 
 immovable and cold as stone, save that the blood leaped and 
 throbbed through the knotted veins of his clenched hands. 
 
 "Nurse me," murmured the child, tossing his head upon 
 the pillows. 
 
 Still without a word Marrable lifted the little one from 
 the crib, and held him towards Mary. 
 
 The love of the mother leapt within her heart, but' the 
 iron fetters of humility and restraint chained her limbs, 
 and her arms hung down, flaccid and motionless among the 
 crushed folds of her gown. 
 
 "Great God!" cried Marrable, in a voice that rang with 
 wonder, " are you not woman and mother enough to take 
 your own child?" 
 
 The fetters were struck off, the barriers were broken 
 down, the floodtide of maternity filled her being. With 
 an inarticulate cry, Mary caught her, son to her breast, and 
 with the instinct of the animal who has recovered a lost 
 whelp, carried him away to the further end of the room, 
 where she hushed him on her breast and wept quietly. 
 
 It was the morning, pallid and yellow with a lowering 
 fog, before she spoke again. Then she lifted her face, grey 
 and worn with her vigil, and looked across to where Mar- 
 rable, the silver in his dark hair shining whitely in the 
 circle of the lamp-light, had been sitting through the long 
 hours, with one hand over his eyes, thinking the bitter 
 thoughts of wasted opportunities and lost loves, which come 
 to all men once in a lifetime. 
 
 Mary hoped he slept, and with her quiet burden crept 
 slowly over the floor. He started as she brushed by him, 
 and, dropping his hand, raised to her aching eyes a face 
 which one weary night of regret had aged by ten years. 
 She bent so closely over him, that the child on her breast 
 rested also on his heart. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 375 
 
 "See!" she whispered, "I was right; he was not very 
 ill. See how quiet and cool he is. He is quite well." 
 
 Without answering her, Marrable turned his haggard 
 eyes from her face to the still, pale features of the child, 
 which looked grey and pinched against the full whiteness 
 of her bosom. Silently he rose and followed her to the cot, 
 wherein she gently laid the tiny form. 
 
 The little hand, still clutching at the broken toy, was 
 laid on the child's breast. His breath came in long, slow 
 cadences that rattled faintly at the end^ 
 
 In the supreme faith that her son was resting, Mary put 
 him from her, withdrawing her arms slowly from beneath 
 him. 
 
 The movement, slight as it was, stirred the last flicker of 
 the mortal flame. His lips moved, his eyelids lifted their 
 golden fringe from the sunken cheeks. 
 
 He passed one hand very gently over his mother's white 
 face, and when he drew his fingers away, a tear glistened 
 on one of them. 
 
 He looked with weak curiosity at the crystal drop, and 
 tried to speak, but no sound came; only the glazing eyes 
 expressed his childish wish. 
 
 He laid his tear-wet hand against Marrable' s dry, set 
 lips, and, as the man savoured of the bitterness of Mary's 
 sorrow, it filled his whole being, even to his soul. 
 
 Once — twice — from one mouth to the other the tiny 
 fingers passed; then, scarcely brushing his mother's lips, 
 they fluttered slowly — gently — down — down — down — till 
 they fell, snowflake-light, above the broken tin soldier and 
 the still heart. 
 
 Marrable laid the child down, and taking Mary very 
 gently by the shoulders, led her a few steps away. With 
 all the tenderness of a strong hard man who is softened by 
 his pity for the woman he loves, he said in a whisper : 
 
276 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " God has given and God has taken away. Your little 
 child is in 'heaven !" In one moment all the peat-up reserve 
 of the Mother and all the faith of the virgin were gone. 
 She remembered nothing. She was only a woman and she 
 was frightened, and out of the fulness of her heart she cried 
 aloud : 
 
 "Father! Father! why hast thou forsaken me?" 
 
 Twice the hysteria of her frantic grief nearly broke from 
 her, and twice she beat it back to her breaking heart. 
 
 Then the mercy of tears was vouchsafed to her, and with 
 wet cheeks and blinded eyes she groped her way to her dead 
 cliild; 
 
 " Ah! my baby ! My little darling son," she sobbed, and 
 in a very ecstasy of womanly grief, dropped on her knees 
 beside the crib. 
 
CHAPTER XXXII 
 
 Mart was not conscious of the precise moment when the 
 acute poignancy of her grief was allayed by the healing 
 balm of Confidence, or when the pale, self-sown flowers of 
 Hope first blossomed on the storm-swept waste of her 
 bruised heart. 
 
 She was alone at the time, and with the relief of a calm 
 there evolved the vague remembrance that people had come 
 and gone in the nursery. There had been soft footsteps 
 and quiet whisperings, and she remembered vaguely that 
 the child's nurse had come in and been led away again cry- 
 ing noisily. 
 
 Now the room was tidy and fresh, the curtains were 
 looped into precise folds, and the blinds three parts lowered, 
 but above the window sills the pale rays of the November 
 sun filtered on to the floor. A sweet fragrance of lilies 
 floated from a vase, which loving hands had set upon the 
 table. 
 
 Only the cot had not been touched. No one had dared, 
 as yet, to disturb the sacred sorrow of the bereaved mother. 
 
 She raised her face from where for hours it had laid 
 buried in the pillows close to the wax-white, baby form. 
 The tempest which had swept over her had been too fierce 
 in its passage not to leave traces for all time, but the look 
 of terror had gone from her eyes, and the rictus of agony 
 from her mouth.' Only the ineffable sadness which lives in 
 the fkce of the Mother of Sorrows was painted there instead, 
 but the resignation of the Madonna, which is the glory of 
 
278 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 all womanhood, was wanting. For in the sunken depths of 
 her weary, tear-washed eyes, flickered and grew and 
 strengthened to a great flame moment by moment the flre 
 of an unquenchable Faith, which only shone the brighter for 
 the healing gush of quiet weeping which broke from her 
 when her gaze first fell upon the still face of her little child. 
 
 Her gentle weeping finished, she rose to her feet, and 
 with an almost feverish haste fetched fresh linen, perfumed 
 with violets and edged with fine soft lace. She spread it 
 on the bed, then gowned the tiny clay-oold body in a fresh 
 night-dress of snowy lawn. But swiftly as she worked, 
 every action was touched with that same humble reverence 
 which had been the enforced measure of all her past inter- 
 course between the child and herself. 
 
 As she straightened the little limbs and smoothed the 
 tangled curls, an intense peace quivered about her drooping 
 mouth. As she moved about the room, her sorrow seemed 
 to fall from her like u garment, and she looked as though 
 preparing for a. fete instead of for a funeral. 
 
 When all was complete, she took one lily, tall, spotless 
 and sweet, and laid it, a fitting emblem, beside the dead 
 child. Flower-face kissed flower-face on the pillow, and 
 neither was more fair nor stainless than the other. 
 
 Her task done, she turned aside and bathed her own 
 face and hands in fresh water, bound the disordered coils 
 of her heavy hair about her head and re-arranged her gown. 
 When she deemed herself fit, she knelt at the foot of the 
 little bed, though not too intimately near, and adored— as 
 poor sinners worship at saints' shrines. 
 
 So Iia,dy St. Cyprien and Lady Theo Bellastier found 
 her, wrapped in a mantle of divinest Faith and lifted by 
 Hope above all eai-thly grief, when, in response to a message 
 from Marrable, they came to weep with her for the death 
 of her son. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 279 
 
 It was with uplifted finger and a sad, reproachful smile 
 Mary moved to greet them. 
 
 " Dearest Lady St. Cyprien, how kind to come ; but I do 
 not want you to grieve for me, or for the little one. He 
 must be so happy — and I — I can rejoice with him. Oh, do 
 not cry. I entreat you not to cry. I did at first ; for hours 
 my belief in the Father's goodness was weakened, and I 
 mourned as mothers mourn. But now !" 
 
 A great wave of rapture swept over her white face, and 
 her lips moved silently as though a transport of unspeak- 
 able joy thrilled her. 
 
 To the two sorrowing women who had come, sad and 
 heavy-hearted, to offer what they could of consolation, her 
 words conveyed nothing, while her very self-control seemed 
 an expression of despair. 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien, her delicate face quivering with an 
 emotion which, for the girl's sake, she endeavoured to con- 
 ceal, clasped Mary in her arms, and rocked her there as one 
 would rock a sorrowful child. The soothing voice, the 
 sweet womanly clasp, touched the vein of self-pity which is 
 in us all, and for a time the two wept softly in a luxury of 
 grief together. 
 
 But through her tears and the tears of her dear friend, 
 her strained senses awoke to the consciousness of another 
 sound. It rose from her bedside and had the drone of 
 mumbled prayers. 
 
 Mary raised her head from above Lady St. Cyprien' s 
 heart and, turning, saw Lady Theo kneeling by the crib 
 swaying her black-gowned body to and fro. Her small un- 
 gloved hands fingered restlessly at a big rosary, her eyes 
 were turned upwards in her head, her lips muttered a jar- 
 gon of Catholic and Protestant supplications. She was fast 
 working herself into a state of religious frenzy, when Mary's 
 voice, bard and tense, struck across her devotions. 
 
280 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 " What are you doing' there?" 
 
 "Praying, dearest Mary, for the dead!" 
 
 " For the dead ! There is no dead here !" 
 
 Lady Theo dropped her rosary with a clatter, and Lady 
 St. Cyprien stretched out supplicating hands to the girl, 
 who, with flashing eyes and quivering body, stood by the 
 bedside. 
 
 "Mary, my poor, darling child!" she cried, plucking at 
 Mary's gown. ' 
 
 But Mary, with deaf ears and eyes that saw nothing, let 
 the stemmed passion of Belief creep through heart and 
 brain, body arid soul. 
 
 "Dead! You think the child is dead?" she cried aloud. 
 "How dare you so mock at God— and at me?" 
 
 She stooped over Lady Theo, who crouched half fright- 
 ened on her knees, and, taking her by the shoulder, dragged 
 her to her feet and thrust her back from the bed: 
 
 " Where is your boasted trust? Where is ydur vaunted 
 faith? You who for so long have professed belief in the 
 great miracle that has been, and the grand mercy of for- 
 giveness and redemption that is to be ; you who have prayed 
 to be among those who shall in the course of years he^i' and 
 learn the divine truth; you who have been witness to the 
 manifestation of which I have been the poor medium; are 
 you so little worthy to be tried, so blind, so stubborn^ that 
 you cannot— will not — see?" 
 
 Lady Theo, her eyes wide with terror, clung to Lady St. 
 Cyprien,' whose pale face waS bathed in tears of pity and 
 grief. 
 
 But Mary, straight and tall, with her arms> from whieli 
 the full silken sleeves had rustled to the shoulder, raised 
 atove her head, stood like a prophetess' of old. The fire of 
 the future burnt in her half-closed eyea, and from her 
 mouth, which scarcely moved, she spoke in trumpet tones. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 281 
 
 " Do you not know, you of coward belief and weakest 
 confidence, that the child is not dead? He was not born 
 into the world to die, but to live — live for ever! Do you 
 not understand that it is my faith and the faith of those 
 who are strong enough to believe with me that is being 
 tried? God has sent this great temptation to strengthen 
 and confirm, not to kill, our poor mortal hopes. Have not 
 the prophets said that he who should be born of a pure 
 virgin shall never die, but shall live — to redeem his people?" 
 
 Her voice rose higher, and she shook like one in whom 
 an inward spirit stirs. 
 
 " The ordeal of my soul, the proof of the prophecy, lies 
 here before me and before you, who have been chosen as 
 witnesses of the truth. My son is not dead, for the attri- 
 bute of immortality is his. He is for a brief space in 
 heaven, but he shall come again — on the Third Day !" 
 
CHAPTER XXXIII 
 
 Tee morning of the third day crept like a grey ghost 
 through the land. Its pale presence woke the country side 
 to a dreary life. In London, where for twenty-four hours 
 a sweeping rain had fallen, it struck wan reflections from 
 the watery roads and dripping roofs. 
 
 One by one the sightless eyes of the houses were opened 
 to the day, but at Holmhurst the blinds remained lowered, 
 and a dim artificial light filled all the rooms. Only in the 
 nursery it was gay and bright. There were no sounds pt 
 mourning, there were no signs of grief. A dozen tall 
 candles, set in chased silver, shed a fair light over the 
 flowers, which stood everywhere in gay vases, and about 
 the toys which were scattered on all sides, as though the 
 still little figure on the snowy bed had just turned from his 
 childish games to sleep, and would soon awake to play 
 again. 
 
 But the brilliant flowers bloomed and the wax candles 
 sparkled as though they mocked by their life and brilliancy 
 the dead quietude of the room. For he on the bed slept in 
 silence, and she who watched was as still. 
 
 The heavy rumble of a passing cart labouring over the 
 sodden road roused her from the conscious coma which in 
 the morning hours creeps over those who have kept a vigil 
 all the night. She rose from her chair, and, walking to the 
 window, raised the blind. 
 
 "The day has come!" she murmured, and, opening the 
 window, leaned out to greet the mormng. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 383 
 
 She was much changed. The cruel, hard light showed 
 that the gleam of red gold had faded from her hair, and 
 that the pulses of young blood had stagnated in her cheek. 
 Her eyes, sunken deep and bistre-circleid, were washed 
 quite colourless by weeping and by watching. Her little 
 nose, so fine and delicate, stood sharply out from her drawn, 
 livid face. Her mouth, with the bow-like curves and cherry 
 ripeness which have been the despair and delight of all 
 painteiB since the beginning of art, was white and dry and 
 set in a straight line. 
 
 It was the face of a woman who had suffered to the full, 
 and yet it was the face of a woman who hoped. For as she 
 turned her worn features to the sulky skies she said, " The 
 day has come, aind he will come too!" 
 
 Leaving the window, she turned to the bed, and gazed 
 one moment on the tiny form which three days back she 
 had with reverential fingers veiled beneath a great square 
 of fine lace. ' She did not raise the covering, for in her sight 
 it seemed a desecration that merely mortal hands should 
 touch that which was immortal. 
 
 She was content to stand with bowed head and mute 
 mouth at the bedside, and savour the sweet, faint scent of 
 the lily which still lay upon the pillow beside the veiled face. 
 
 After a little she sat again in the wide, deep chair, and 
 as she leant back among the pillows sleep fell upon her. 
 
 And as she slept a dream came to her. 
 
 She dreamed she was standing in the centre of a great 
 waste, and that nothing was above her but the inverted 
 hollow of the Heavens, which, clip-like, touched the edges 
 of the world. She stood, a lonely figure in the vast empti- 
 ness, and her senses seemed as void and purposeless as the 
 surroundings of her dream. 
 
 Cycles rolled by, and Time expired in the arms of 
 Eternity, while she stood — and waited. 
 
284 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Then the dead air quivered and stirred and dimpled into 
 Life, as a stagnant pool is troubled by the passing whirr of 
 a bird's wings. What was first a flutter grew to a sigh, 
 and then to a distant groan. And to the accompanying 
 trample of myriads of feet, and the roar of generations of 
 tongues, the Wanderers of the World, the chosen People of 
 God, the outcast races of men, trooped over the edges of 
 the great plain, and flowed like a mighty flood towards that 
 lonely woman. 
 
 They came around her and lapped her very feet as the 
 waves of the rising tide lap the rocks. They lifted their 
 faces, old and young, rich and poor, fair and dark, yet all 
 alike stained with Sin and Death, to her benign counte- 
 nance, and every face was hungry for Redemption, and 
 every eye yearned for the Promised Land. They called 
 aloud in the Tongues of all Time and of all Nations, but to 
 her who dreamed each one cried the same : 
 
 "Oh! Blessed among Women! Chosen of God! where 
 is that Mighty One, the offspring of thy pure body, who 
 shall come and lead us from among strange people, and 
 lands that we know not, back to our own country, to that 
 fair pity — the New Jerusalem, where we would be?" 
 
 And they fell like mown corn about, her, beating their 
 breasts in supplication, and wailing: 
 
 "Oh! Mary! Mary! where is thy Son?" 
 
 And she dreamed that she raised her eyes, weary with 
 the restless rocking of the human sea, and gazed into the 
 vast heart of Heaven. 
 
 The skies above her melted into effulgent mists of azure 
 and rose and gold, and parted like shattered cobwebs on a 
 morning breeze. And down, down, down, floated a wide 
 circle of choiring Angels, which wreathed and twined, 
 expanded and clustered close again about a majestic Figure, 
 which was clothed in white and crowned with flaming gold, 
 
WITHOUT SIN 285 
 
 and carried a stainless lily — the emblem of Purity — in his 
 outstretched hand. , , 
 
 Behind the Figure rolled away among the gauzy mists a 
 very fair country, cut with great rivers and set with white 
 cities and gleaming palaces. 
 
 "Behold!" said a mighty Voice, which shook the opened 
 Heavens from end to end. " Behold ! my People, you called 
 for, the Son of Mary, and I am here!" 
 
 And Mary looked in the face of the Figure, and it was 
 the face of her Son, ,only : gramder, nobler, fairer than she 
 had ever seen it. i , , , : 
 
 The People looked up too and cried out: 
 
 "Our Eedeemer is come! Blessed is He, and blessed is 
 the Woman who bore him!" 
 
 Then she dreamed that they brought a great throne of 
 gold and set:her upon it, and it was so high that she too was 
 exalted to the Heavens, and the People — that grand race 
 which had been since the world began, and which she had so 
 suffered to save — worshipped her Son and herself together. 
 
 And the adoration went on and on through the endless 
 cycles of Eternity until that too died, .and the psean? were 
 all ended. Then with an awful roar the Heavens rolled 
 together in the blackness of night everlasting, and with a 
 mighty crash the golden throne of her glory and exaltation 
 crumbled into nothingness, and she was hurled into the 
 bottomless abyss of space amid the mocking cries of a 
 million devil voices. 
 
 Then came oblivion, and she slept the death-like sleep of 
 intense exhaustion. 
 
 The hours stole by in soft-footed silence. Outsidcj a 
 curtain of grey drizzle hid heaven's face and cast a dreary 
 shadow on the world. At half -past three it was almost 
 dark, even in the nursery where the drawn-up blinds let 
 in the last rays of the day. 
 
286 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 Once the njaid stole in. She was a faithful creature who 
 loved her mistress, and she was pleased that the sleepless 
 vigil of five days and nights was ended and that Mary 
 slept at last. 
 
 With quiet thoughtfulness set set fresh candles in the 
 silver sconces, and wherever a flower drooped repioved it 
 before she left the room. 
 
 It was late when Mary woke with a violent start. The 
 windows were black dark and the newly lit candles winked 
 at her through the gloom. With a low cry she leaped to 
 her feet laying her hands over her heart, which was flut- 
 tering like a frightened bird in her bosom. 
 ' How long had she slept — how much had she dreamed? 
 Had the dawning of the third day been real, or was it; yet 
 to come? 
 
 She turned her eyes towards the bed. There all was 
 ^till, and she sighed with relief. The grey chill dawn, the 
 glorious redemption had alike been dreams. The miracle 
 still remained to be performed. 
 
 Just then it seemed to her as though she dreamed again, 
 for the swing of muffled footsteps, the hum of whispering 
 voices rippled to her ears, and, as in her dream, grew 
 louder and came nearer. 
 
 The inability of her tired brain to distinguish between 
 the real and the unreal impelled her towards the door, 
 which was ajar. With her hand upon the heavy curtain 
 and her face thrust forward into the bright corridor she 
 listened, striving with all her senses to hear more clearly 
 and to understand. 
 
 Drawn by desire, she slipped out of the room, and, cross- 
 ing the corridor, leaned over the gallery and looked into 
 the big hall below. At first her eyes, still filled with sleep 
 and the subdued light of the nursery, saw nothing, for the 
 big electric chandelier blazed between the floor and herself. 
 
WITHOUT SIN 287 
 
 Then by degrees the details of the scene were unfolded, and 
 the dark inchoate masses scattered on the marble pavement 
 took form and shape. 
 
 In the doorway of the drawing-room stood Lady St. 
 Cyprien, with Dr. Marrable, Mr. Erastus Bawdon and 
 Martin Baird, whose white head was bowed upon his 
 breast. Away to the left were all the women servants, 
 their white caps and aprons painfully sharp in the strong 
 light. In the centre stood a group of men, all in deep 
 black. They were bareheaded; their greasy hats dotted 
 the console tables. One of them carried something under 
 his arm which shone and twinkled like silver as the light 
 caught it here and there. As Mary looked with eyes that 
 widened in her blanched face, the voices and the shuffling 
 steps became accordant, and, as in her dream, the river of 
 humanity rose up and flowed towards her. 
 
 Up the wide staircase it rolled quietly, stealthily, but 
 oh I so surely. For its tide was set upwards and towards 
 her child. 
 
 Yet there was more of anger than of fear in her heart, 
 as she ran back to the nursery and stood before the bed. 
 
 "Who are you? What have you come for?" she said in 
 a low voice, laying her hand on the edge of the frilled pil- 
 low, and firmly facing the little crowd, which surged 
 through the doorway and seemed to fill the room. 
 
 For a moment no one answered. The hired servants of 
 death were there merely to perform their duty, not to ex- 
 plain their presence. The others, her friends, those who 
 knew the dear faiths and the fond beliefs which were 
 rooted in the very foundations of her being, hesitated 
 among themselves as to who should strike the blow which 
 was to shatter the fabric of her life. 
 
 "Tell her, Noel," whispered Lady St. Cyprien, among 
 her sobs. "It will be less hard for you." 
 
288 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 A faint smile of bitterest irony crossed his face, which 
 appeared very grey in the candlelight. But he made no 
 demur, nor did he falter, as he strode to Mary's' side and 
 said: 
 
 "They have come for the child. It is time." 
 
 " Come for the child? Time?" she repeated, in a vacant 
 manner, and staring in his face, where something in his 
 sympathetic eyes seemed to rouse a faint fear in her own. 
 Then, with a courage born of a sickening despair, she 
 passed one hand across her damp forehead, and cried, in 
 louder tones: ''Time! Yes! it is time! Time for the 
 great God to show ' His unbelieving people that He still 
 loves them — and will forgive. It is time for the saviour 
 of the world to manifest the truth, and to justify his 
 mother. Behold! The golden throne is set for my son and 
 for me. You who are here shall see the miracle ! Believe 
 — and adore!" 
 
 She turned, and before Marrable could catch her white 
 hands, she had torn the merciful veil from the bed. 
 
 The cry of gladness with which she stooped over the 
 pillows changed to a moan of horror as she gazed, for the 
 fingers of corruption had already marked the little one for 
 its own, and the fading lily was fairer to see than the dead 
 child. 
 
 Marrable dared hot look down at the bed; his eyes were 
 fixed on Mary, who could only stare and stare at the poor 
 morsel of humanity, as though she saw it not, or seeing, 
 did not understand. 
 
 The rich lace dropped from her fingers, and she stepped 
 back from the bedside. With the far-away look of her 
 girlhood's days growing in her face, she stood, rigid and 
 voiceless as a stone, while her baby was hidden away for 
 ever. 
 
 No word nor gesture came from her even when all was 
 
WITHOUT SIN 289 
 
 oveir; and, amid the sobs of the women, the men shouldered 
 their light burden, and the procession filed: from the room. 
 
 Only Marrable remained with her, for he could not go. 
 All the reserve of' a lifetime was broken down; the im- 
 passive mask of his face, scored by deep lines of study and 
 self-control, was torn and convulsed by a thousand agonies; 
 the suppliant hands he stretched out across the little empty 
 bed trembled with the tearing tide of emotion. 
 
 " Mary !" he cried, and the long-stemmed passion of love, 
 the yearning to comfort, made his voice hoarse and sharper. 
 
 It should have told her all, but it struck deaf ears, and 
 a dead heart. 
 
 "Mary!" he cried again and essayed to touch but One 
 fold of hfer gown. 
 
 "Leave me." 
 
 The music of her voice had gone. She spoke dully, as 
 one who talks in sleep, and wrestles with the horror of 
 some awful dream. For the last time he looked upon her 
 face, then turned and left her.' 
 
 She stood alone — in the centre of the' room where the 
 glory of her maidenhood had passed three happy years of 
 life — in the room whence the shame of her womanhood had 
 just been carried in all the corruption of death. 
 
 Amid infinite agony, the scales of innocence and igno- 
 rance were falling from her eyes, the veil of purity was 
 being torn from her soul. The cruel light of a never-dying 
 day of dishonour was breaking slowly but ruthlessly in 
 upon her ; for the child who had come to her out of immor- 
 tality was mortal, and, oh, God! the Son of man! 
 
 He who had been her crown of honour among all women 
 was but the brand of her shame. The boast of her imma- 
 culate virginity had been the defilement of her sex. 
 
 Her child, born to redeem, and to immortality, had been 
 conceived in shame, had died in sin! 
 19 
 
290 WITHOUT BIN 
 
 Transfixed with physical horror, and self-loathing, Mary 
 raised her hands to her face, as though she could have rent 
 the beauty which had been her own undoing. 
 
 "What man — what devil — dragged me to this hideous 
 shame, and made my darling my disgrace?" she cried, to 
 the empty air. 
 
 Then the outraged virgin was lost in the broken-hearted 
 mother, and as she recalled the repressed love, the rever- 
 ence which had stayed every caress, the awe which had 
 killed every kiss, the floodgates of her starved maternity 
 were opened, and the storm swept over her soul. 
 
 Her shattered faith, her stained purity, were forgotten in 
 ojie overwhelming remembrance. Her little child, her 
 darling baby was dead — and taken from her — and she had 
 been cheated of that last kiss of an eternal farewell. 
 
 A great agony caught her by the throat and at the heart. 
 She slipped her clenched hands from her distorted face to 
 her breast. The pain tore at her like a wolf. 
 
 Then Grod had mercy on her, and she crashed uncon- 
 scious to the floor. 
 
CHAPTEE XXXIV 
 
 The green-tipped branches of the elms on either side of 
 the lane leaned together as though supporting the blue 
 canopy of heaven above the slowly moving figures of Lady 
 St. Cyprien and Noel Marrable. The sunlight filtering 
 through the foliage made bright pool of shimmering gold 
 on the roadway and the wide grass borders alike. Save 
 for those two, and for some rooks which wheeled and cawed 
 above the swinging tree-tops, the whole countryside was 
 devoid of life as a desert. 
 
 The first signs of habitation came from a neatly trimmed 
 growth of laurels which grew under the shelter of a red-brick 
 wall as far as a cupola above a low porch, up which the 
 young ivy was running like a lizard. 
 
 " Will you call for me in about two hours?" said Lady 
 St. Cyprien, pausing as she reached this door. 
 
 Marrable bowed gravely in assent, and then turned slowly 
 away down the shady road the two had just traversed. 
 
 The Countess sighed a little as she watched him go, and 
 noted the slow precision of his heavy footsteps and the too 
 obvious stoop of his square-built shoulders. 
 
 "How cruel the past three years have been to him," she 
 murmured to herself. " Who would have thought he would 
 have felt so keenly?" 
 
 "The Eeverend Mother will see your ladyship in the 
 garden. Will you come this way?" 
 
 The narrow oak door beneath the cupola was open, and 
 an elderly woman, whose plain face was rendered attractive 
 
292 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 by the white coif and ample grey veil of a nun's habit, 
 stood just within, and invited entrance to the convent 
 precincts. 
 
 With softly pattering steps, the porteress led the way 
 across a small flagged court, then opening a gate set in an 
 inner wall of warmj red brick, ushered' the Countess into 
 a great garden, which seemed to nestle about the sides of a 
 rambling house. 
 
 " The Eeverend Mother will come to you here, " said the 
 nun, as she closed the grille behind her, and trotted away 
 across the paved yard. 
 
 Left for a moment alone. Lady St. Cyprien looked curi- 
 ously round the haven of refuge for broken hearts that 
 Erastus Bawdon's dilettante fancy had founded as a safe 
 shelter for such poor tempest-tossed doves as feared, after 
 one storm, to encounter again even the most favourable of 
 the world's winds. All was very peaceful and still. The 
 thick green yew hedges that lined the paths gave to the 
 garden a very cool and shadowy effect. Up in the blue 
 sky great round white clouds ran races, but nothing harsher 
 than the drowsy twitter of a bird, lazily dozing through 
 the hot summer afternoon, broke the scented silence of- the 
 enclosure; • : . , , 
 
 Heavy-headed carnations and roses of cream and red, 
 purple Velvet pansies and lilies of argentine whiteness, 
 seemed to be queens of this quite realm, so proudly did 
 they flaunt their beauties before the sun and radiant sky. 
 Among them, singly or in pairs, came and went the nuns, 
 who read in silence or mumbled over their beads, or even 
 when they talked spoke as do those who fear to wake a 
 sleeping child. 
 
 Grey-gowned and with their long gauze vfeils floating 
 about themj they- seemed to glide like indefinite shadows 
 over the widej shaven lawns or among the dusky bosquets, 
 
WITHOUT SIN 293 
 
 as might the pale ghosts in the Garden of Proserpine. As 
 Lady St. Cyprien looked upon their faces, all levelled to a 
 certain similitude of innocence and beatitude by the encir- 
 cling bands of stiffened white linen, she wondered vaguely 
 if they had even lived at all. 
 
 The waiting moments lengthened, and Lady St. Cyprien 
 was fast becoming saturated with the subtle mystery of the 
 place, when the light laugh of a young girl rang through 
 the air. It almost jarred, it was so intensely full of the 
 ]oy of life. It brought movement, brisk and quick, with 
 it, for at the far end of a broad terraced walk, along which 
 quaintly cut figures of clipped box kept grim sentinelship, 
 appeared a group of girls wearing white dresses and with 
 unbound locks curling about their slim, unformed figures. 
 They were talking eagerly, and were clustered like wind- 
 tossed white flowers about a tall figure, robed in vague dove- 
 grey, who walked among them. 
 
 Tears sprang hotly into Lady St. Cyprien's eyes, and 
 blurred the face of the advancing Mother Superior. But 
 the loving heart and faithful memory recognised through the 
 new habit the peculiarly gliding walk, the meekly gracious 
 carriage of the head, and the slender beauty of the limbs, 
 that neither veil nor coarse serge could wholly conceal. 
 
 At the end of the terrace the Eeverend Mother dismissed 
 the children about her, and with slightly hastened steps 
 came towards the Countess, whose outstretched hands and 
 quivering mouth gave a voiceless welcome even before the 
 two weeping women clasped one another and sobbed out 
 their joy at meeting and their sorrow for the past, which 
 was buried in a grave that was nameless, yet would be for 
 ever green. 
 
 The nun was the first to dry her tears, and, with the long 
 delicate hands Lady St. Cyprien remembered so well, she 
 drew the elder woman back to a seat. 
 
294 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 "Dear friend^ it is so good, so like yourself, to jour- 
 ney here to see me," she said presently, as both grew 
 calmer. 
 
 " Dearest child, my one wish all the time I was abroad 
 was to meet you again ; my one effort since I arrived home 
 has been to come here." 
 
 "I heard you were so ill two years ago in Eome. You 
 are still weak?" The Mother Superior's slender fingers 
 rested for a moment on the stout cane which Lady St. 
 Cyprien held in one hand. 
 
 " My doctors say so," she said, with a faint smile. " But 
 for once I know better; it is age — advancing age. I am 
 quite an old woman now." 
 
 She heaved the little sigh of regret with which woman 
 yields tribute to the past, but a moment later said, more 
 cheerfully, "And you! How is time dealing with you? 
 Let me see!" 
 
 With the same simplicity and lack of self-conscious em- 
 barrassment that years ago had made Mary Levinge, the 
 child, display her beauty to her grandfather's aristocratic 
 patrons in the Art Gallery, Mary Levinge, the woman, 
 offered her face now to her friend's scrutiny. In outline it 
 seemed unaltered, and the habitual gravity of expression 
 had defied the passage of sorrow and years. Only the fair, 
 clear skin had taken on a waxen whiteness, and the in- 
 scrutable eyes sometimes looked as though they had seen 
 into the great " Beyond." 
 
 "You look as beautiful as ever," said Lady St. Cyprien, 
 after long gazing. " And — you seem to have found peace 
 and happiness." 
 
 For one brief moment a silence fell. The fluttered 
 leaves, the birds, the very air forbore to stir. A great 
 wave of emotion passed over Mary Levinge' s face, and the 
 piteous droop, the sweetly weak quiver of coming tears 
 
WITHOUT SIN 295 
 
 touched her lips as of old. Then she smiled bravely, and, 
 lifting her clear, unclouded eyes, she said composedly : 
 
 " Yes ! I have found peace. This is my little Peace Pool, 
 and perfect quiet and faith dwell here with me. But you 
 are happy, too, I hope. Here, though we are not in the 
 world we are of it, and news of dear friends comes to us 
 sometimes — through our pupils. And so I have heard 
 that Lord Stansdale has married and given you a boy to 
 take the place of the little girl you were once a mother to." 
 
 " I am glad that you, too, have children about you, Mary 
 — Eeverend Mother!" said the Countess. 
 
 Mary smiled at the mistake, and the precision of the 
 correction, and said softly : 
 
 " Yes ! to have children about one is a great blessing — 
 sometimes." 
 
 The last word slipped from her involuntarily; and as 
 though wishing to avoid past memories, she rose hastily 
 
 and said : 
 
 " But will you not come and see the convent, and the 
 
 children's quarters?" 
 
 Side by side the two women crossed the velvet lawn and 
 passed through a glass door into the convent parlour, and 
 then to the wide corridor, from which opened the school- 
 rooms and refectories. 
 
 " If it were wet, these great silent rooms would ring with 
 the children's voices, but this summer has been so fine, they 
 even have their classes in the lower garden." 
 
 As Mary led Lady St. Cyprien through the white-panelled 
 convent rooms and described the purpose of each, so did 
 she tell of the daily history of her quiet life. Here did 
 she pass the morning hours in meditation, there did she 
 speak out of her faith to those who wavered and doubted. 
 
 This room she loved; for of an evening she read here to 
 the children. Then she led the way up the low stairs ta 
 
296 WITHOVT SIN 
 
 ■where, in snow-white dormitories, the young girls slept at 
 night beneath the calm eyes of pictured saints. 
 
 "They look so pretty when they are asleep," she said, in 
 a voice that shodk a little. " But they lie so peacefully, 
 that I am afraid sometimes they may be dead, and I come 
 back each night again to assure myself that all is well 
 before going to the chapel." 
 
 From long corridors Lady St. Cyprien caught glimpses 
 of the narrow cells where the sisters themselves snatched 
 rest between the nightly services. Mary's own room was 
 but little larger and very simply furnished. Yet Lady St. 
 Cyprien noted how happy she seemed in the possession of 
 the poor little place, and how she gloried in the peep of 
 flower and sky and tree she had from the narrow window. 
 
 A door cut in the wall, led on a small staircase which 
 Mary said led to the chapel. " You will come with me 
 there, won't you?" she asked, with something of her old 
 pleading way. " It is very beautiful, " she said. "All that 
 I ever learnt from my grandfather and from Martin Baird 
 I have remembered and utilised for it." 
 
 Small though the convent chapel was, it was a very 
 treasure-house of art. One small side altar was especially 
 fair with rare lace and White flowers, and set among the 
 tapers and the blossoms was the little picture of the 
 Madonna which Lady St. Cyprien had first seen hanging 
 in the Bond Street shop. 
 
 "Still faithful to that picture?" she queried, as Mary 
 rose from where she had knelt in silent prayer on first 
 entering the chapel. 
 
 " Yes! I could not part with it," answeredMary gravely. 
 "For it brought me my joy and my sorrow — and my 
 religion." 
 
 A bell rang out a clear note on the afternoon air, and 
 throbbed harmoniously through the chapel, into which the 
 
WITHOUT SIN 297 
 
 setting sun was pouring rich rays through the stained glass 
 windows. 
 
 "It is thehbut fbrBehe/diction," said Mary in a whisper, 
 as one by one the grey-veiled Sisters glided into the chapel, 
 and, after genuflecting to the radiant high altar, slipped 
 into their pkees. " Will you wait for me a little while? 
 Sister Angela shall show you the way." 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien followed a silent figure which, after 
 leaving her at tlie door of the visitors' waiting-room, re- 
 turned hastily towards the chapel. 
 
 Outlined against the windbw stood INoelMarrable. 
 
 " Are the two hours already gone?" cried Lady St. Cyp- 
 rien. "How quickly the time has passed." 
 
 "Have you seen her! Is she well?" asked Marrable 
 abruptly. 
 
 " Quite well, and more beautiful than she used to be, I 
 think!' and she is happy too— that is a great thing." 
 
 " Has she forgotten, do you think?" 
 
 Lady St. Cyprien shook her head sadly. 
 
 "Noel, women never forget such things. No scars of 
 such tragedies may mar a face, but the hearts of women 
 who have suffered in sprit and in body as she has done 
 must carry the marks of the wounds for all time." 
 
 Marrable said nothing, but presently raising his eyes, 
 caught sight of the picture of the Annunciation that Eliot 
 Mayne had once painted of Mary as the Holy Maiden. 
 
 " Why is that here?" he cried sharply, nodding towards 
 where the picture hung above the mantelshelf. " I thought 
 it was painted for the little church here." 
 
 " Mary told me this afternoon that she had it moved from 
 there when she came. She says she has taken a dislike to 
 the picture." 
 
 A burst of music from the open chapel window floated 
 across the garden, now more peaceful than ever, in the rays 
 
298 WITHOUT SIN 
 
 of the slowly declining sun. The nuns were singing the 
 Litany of the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 With the odours of incense and of flowers clinging about 
 her serge robe, and the fervour of ardent worship still in 
 her grey eyes, Mary came quietly from the lawn through 
 the French windows into the room, and Noel Marrable, 
 afraid of his own emotions, with bowed head left the two 
 women alone to their farewells. 
 
 It was only when Lady St. Cyprien joined him in the 
 shadows of the porch, that he saw Mary again, standing 
 with her pale, sweet face framed in tiie white coif, and the 
 vague folds of the grey gauze veil. 
 
 She smiled once very sadly and said : 
 
 " Farewell, dear friends, farewell. Pray for me, as I do 
 for you." 
 
 He fell upon his knees reverently, and kissed her white 
 hand; then as he rose, the heavy oak door swung to, and 
 Mary was no more seen. 
 
PRINTED BY R. R. DONNELLEY 
 & SONS CO. AT THE LAKESIDE 
 PRESS, CHICAGO, FOR HERBERT 
 S. STONE AND CO. PUBLISHERS 
 MDCCCXCVI