CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 tlie Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013482884 
 
THE HOUSE 
 
NEW NOVELS 
 
 THE VALLEY OF INDECISION 
 
 MAJOR CHRISTOPHER STONE, 
 
 FORGOTTEN REALMS 
 
 BOHUN LYNCH 
 
 THE LAST FORTNIGHT 
 
 MARY AGNES HAMILTON 
 
 A GIFT OF THE DUSK 
 
 R. O. PROWSE 
 
 THE ADVENTUROUS LADY 
 
 J. C. SNAITH 
 
 MAINWARING 
 
 MAURICE HEWLETT 
 
THE HOUSE 
 
 by 
 KATHARINE TYNAN 
 
 Author of 'Denys the Dreamer,' ' The Man from 
 Australia,' etc. 
 
 LONDON: 48 PALL MALL 
 
 W. COLLINS SONS & CO. LTD. 
 
 GLASGOW MELBOURNE AUCKLAND 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CBAP PAOa 
 
 I. THE HEIR I 
 
 II. THE MAKING OF A SOCIALIST I3 
 
 III. THE SICK SOUL ' 22 
 
 IV. SWEETWATER FARM 3I 
 V. THE MINISTERING WOMAN 42 
 
 VI. THE HUMAN BEAST 53 
 
 VII. THE SHEPHERDESS 65 
 
 VIII. AT THE WINDOW ']'] 
 
 IX. PICKING RASPBERRIES i,'] 
 
 X. THE ONE WOMAN 97 
 
 XI. 'ONLY MY love's AWAY' I09 
 
 XII. LOVE WORKS WONDERS 120 
 
 XIII. TWO WOMEN AND A MAN 1 29 
 
 XIV. IRENE 140 
 XV. THE JEALOUS SWAIN 150 
 
 XVI. FRIENDS IN COUNCIL 161 
 
 XVII. 'WHAT MADE THE TOWN SO FINE' I72 
 
 V 
 
vi CONTENTS 
 
 CHAP. PACE 
 
 XVIII. THE LOVERS 183 
 
 XIX. THE AGITATOR 194 
 
 XX. THE BOMBSHELL 205 
 
 XXI. MY LADY MACHIAVELLI 215 
 
 XXII. CROSSED IN LOVE 226 
 
 XXIII. LADY BEAUVAIS HAS HER WILL 238 
 
 XXIV. THE BROTHERS 248 
 XXV. THE MOTHER TRIUMPHS 258 
 
 XXVI. HAPPY ENDING 268 
 
CHAPTER I 
 
 THE HEIR 
 
 Julian Victor George Quintin St Maur, 
 Viscount Amory, had first opened his eyes on the 
 shining woods and waters of Cressey. His father 
 had carried him to the window so that the marvel 
 of woods stirred by a spring wind should perhaps 
 strike the baby's wandering gaze. 
 
 His Nannie had stood by, disapproving. 
 
 ' 'E don't see, my lord ! ' she said. ' At that age 
 — ^why the precious lamb's not six weeks yet — 
 they see nought. 'E do look from my face to her 
 ladyship's as though 'e saw a bit. But them there 
 woods and that there glarin' sun — bless your 'eart, 
 your lordship, 'tis only tryin' on 'is little eyes, all 
 that there is. 'E sees nought.' 
 
 Lord Beauvais — there had been a Beauvais at 
 Cr&y who was knighted on the field : hence the 
 name of the house — ^handed back the child to the 
 comfortable arms stretched to receive it. 
 
 ' I know it is common with nurses to believe that 
 children can't see at that age : but JuHan saw — I am 
 certain of it. He is still smiling. Cressey has made 
 its own of him already as it has made of all of us. 
 He will be the slave of Cressey.' 
 
2 THE HOUSE 
 
 Lord Beauvais said it in a way that often puzzled 
 people, as though there was some meaning in the 
 words beyond what they purported to have. 
 
 The nurse went off to the nursery, not troubling 
 to think what his lordship's speech meant. He 
 was often unintelligible to her when he talked to 
 her ladyship in the nursery, gloating over his 
 first-born with parental passion in his eyes. Her 
 placidity made her a perfect nurse, as Lady Beauvais' 
 large, calm ways made her a perfect mother. Lord 
 and Lady Beauvais were an ideally handsome 
 couple, and ideally well-suited to each other, said 
 all their world : so the baby had everything in his 
 favour. 
 
 As the years passed the nurseries filled. Three 
 girls followed the son, and then came two other 
 boys. They were all fair children, taking after 
 their father and mother, who were both fair, 
 excepting Julian, Lord Amory, and the eldest of 
 the three girls, Joy. These two changelings were 
 dark and eager. They took things to heart. Their 
 dark heads were smooth as a bird's, covered thickly 
 with soft hair, layer on layer like plumage. They 
 had a swift, upward way of glancing at whatever 
 interested them. They were thinner as children 
 than they should have been, while their brothers 
 and sisters were fat and well-liking : Lady Beauvais 
 liked to see her children consuming cream and 
 butter and sugar, and they did credit to their 
 feeding. Only Julian and Joy were the exceptions. 
 They ate sparingly, always eager to be gone from 
 
THE HEIR 3 
 
 the table, as though there were many things in 
 the world better worth doing than eating. Lady 
 Beauvais was sure they never had enough to eat, 
 and fretted gently over their thinness, yet they 
 got through their childish iUnesses much better 
 than the other children, and were out in the sun 
 and wind while the others lay on their pillows, 
 white and flabby, lacking energy to get back to 
 the ordinary way of Hving. 
 
 Lord Beauvais attributed the unlikeness of these 
 two to the rest of the family to an Irish grand- 
 mother. The Irish grandmother came of a family 
 which had had a Spanish ancestress. That accounted 
 for the darkness and the queer little solemn dignity 
 of Julian in childhood and youth. Joy was the 
 livelier of the two : she danced where Juhan 
 walked : but both were imaginative children. If 
 they were only out by the lake or down one of the 
 woodland rides, quite near the house, they met 
 with most surprising adventures, or so they said. 
 When they told them before their mother — ^it was 
 usually Joy who told, her small breast heaving, 
 her gray eyes, with little spots of brown on the iris, 
 dilating, her colour coming and going — Lady 
 Beauvais was bewildered. 
 
 'You are sure that happened, ^iarlin',' she would 
 say — ^the light of her large blue eyes glowing on the 
 children. 'Quite sure?' 
 
 'Yes, quite, quite sure,' Joy would answer eagerly; 
 while Julian corroborated. 
 
 That, of course, was in quite early days, and the 
 
4 THE HOUSE 
 
 'imaginations,' as the children called them — ^Lady 
 Beauvais would never have mentioned the word 
 'lying,' as some harsher critic had done — ^passed 
 away with their growth. Lord Beauvais had 
 always said they would, comforting the wife he 
 adored for the children's contumacy in refusing to 
 acknowledge that the strange adventures were 
 invention. The children believed in them; that 
 was enough. As they grew up they still saw visions 
 and dreamed dreams, this dark, keen pair, so 
 unlike the white and golden flock. But spirits no 
 longer came out of the woods and talked with 
 them : the dryad kept her tree : there were no 
 giants on the hill. 
 
 JuUan grew more like other boys as he went 
 through his years at the Prep.-School and at Eton. 
 Joy was not very perceptibly unlike other girls 
 except that she was unusually gifted. She could 
 do most things she wanted to do, and she talked 
 with a vocabulary and a knowledge of her subjects 
 that made her parents stare at each other, as 
 though they wondered whence she was sprung. 
 She read a great deal and sucked up knowledge 
 from what she read as a sponge sucks up water. 
 She was always distancing her sisters, the governesses 
 complained. When Julian came home from the 
 hoUdays, with a holiday tutor, she read with him. 
 Her mother looked on at the studious mornings in 
 benign bewilderment. She really could not see 
 what Joy wanted with Latin and Greek. Perhaps 
 Joy did not know herself, only she must always be 
 
THE HEIR 5 
 
 doing something. She was not content to take her 
 future for granted, the well-assured future : and 
 then she adored Julian and would do what he 
 did. 
 
 'You would think,' Lady Beauvais said to her 
 husband, in the voice that had the comfortable 
 plaintiveness of the wood-dove in it, 'that darUn' 
 Joy was to earn her bread.' 
 
 That contingency seemed extremely remote in 
 those days, as remote as anything could be in this 
 world of chances and changes. Round Cressey 
 the park and pasture lands spread for miles. The 
 children need never go outside their own gates for 
 walking or riding. You could ride a dozen miles 
 through the woodland avenues which enclosed the 
 park. Beyond that were as many mUes of agri- 
 cultural land, let to thriving and happy tenants. 
 Lord Beauvais was a very good landlord. People 
 sometimes used him as an argument in favour of 
 landlordism. He lived up to the saying : ' Property 
 has its duties as well as its rights' : he observed 
 his duties and had very little need to enforce his 
 rights. He was more than a good landlord : he was 
 an indulgent one. Other landlords grumbled at 
 the relations between Lord Beauvais and his 
 tenantry, asking how they were to live up to them. 
 Beauvais spoilt his tenants and they waxed fat 
 but kicked not, while other, people's waxed less 
 fat and kicked. Lord Beauvais often puzzled his 
 fellows as he puzzled his wife. He had an extreme 
 tolerance for all manner of opinions. When people 
 
6 THE HOUSE 
 
 discussed hotly the growing insolence of the lower 
 classes he only smUed inscrutably. It was as though 
 he were set above other men's anxieties. 
 
 Cressey is one of the show-places of England : 
 as you look at it across the park it presents a 
 bewildering number of windows stretching along 
 a three-storied side, the middle of the house, 
 elevated above a classic portico which encloses 
 fine doors opening on to a stately hall, the wings 
 a story lower. Lord Beauvais himself could not 
 have told how many rooms there were at Cressey. 
 He had answered vaguely to one inquirer that it 
 had given hospitahty to a hundred at a time : 
 beyond that he did not know. 
 
 Cressey was a thing to be worshipped by every 
 St Maur. It had never lacked anything, the great 
 house, the kind, warm mother of many children, all 
 honourable, some eminent, one or two great; 
 soldiers, sailors, churchmen, politicians, courtiers, 
 simple gentlemen : now and again a philanthropist. 
 There was the Lord Beauvais who had helped to 
 cleanse the prisons in the eighteenth century, 
 giving his wealth and influence to help Ehzabeth 
 Fry, the friend of Wesley and the Countess of 
 Huntingdon, although he had set his face stead- 
 fastly against leaving the church of his forefathers. 
 His portrait in the pictiire gaUery had an air of 
 benign good sense. Some people discovered a 
 certain hkeness in the present Lord Beauvais to his 
 philanthropic great-grandfather. 
 
 Some imaginative person had said that Cressey 
 
THE HEIR 7 
 
 wore a look of self-satisfaction that was almost 
 smug. Well the great house might, since so many 
 had offered it tribute. It was beautiful within and 
 without. The imaginative person had said again, 
 to Lady Beauvais' bewilderment, that he wished 
 he could find something in Cressey which had cost 
 but the nimble shilling, which was a way of saying 
 that the precious things- cloyed. You could not 
 get away from them. Not only a priceless library — 
 Lord Beauvais was hardly a bookish man, but it 
 had fretted him that men should sell their libraries 
 — not only precious tapestries on the walls and 
 great pictures, not only the finest pieces of the 
 greatest periods in furniture, carpets, from France 
 and the East, which only grew more beautiful 
 with time — ^but every bibelot was precious. In 
 the bedrooms one washed in basins and from ewers 
 of cut glass and fine china. Your candlesticks 
 might be Battersea. Everything at Cressey was 
 of the best : it had accumulated the best from all 
 the periods. Its owners were hardly consciously 
 aware of the fact. They were certainly not con- 
 sciously proud of it. Cressey was unique, and it 
 was right that it should be so : that was about 
 all. 
 
 The present Lord Beauvais was a man of very 
 simple tastes. If the imaginative visitor had been 
 able to penetrate to his most private room there 
 would have been something to satisfy the thirst for 
 plainness. Lord Beauvais slept in a camp bed, 
 which was a relic of his soldiering days, and slept 
 
8 THE HOUSE 
 
 well; his personal belongings were of the simplest. 
 Some of his intimates who knew these simplicities 
 smiled over them, mimaUciously. Beauvais had 
 done his period of soldiering like the other smart 
 young men of his day. As it happened, there had 
 been a war and he had seen service. He had not 
 been a brilliant soldier but he had been a brave one, 
 and he loved the memory of those days. He had 
 acknowledged simply that he was proud of having 
 earned a soldier's pay. Friends might smile at 
 the austerity of his sleeping-apartment amid all 
 the luxury of the house. Lady Beauvais fluttered 
 uncomfortably over Hugo's lumpy bed and the 
 plain discomfort of his camp-kit : but her husband 
 was happy in his surroundings. Perhaps in him 
 was the germ of the strange ideas that came to 
 his son quite early in Ufe — that persisted and grew 
 with his growth. 
 
 Lady Beauvais loved all her children devotedly 
 ahd mothered them in a way which the imaginative 
 person said reminded him of a beautiful golden 
 Wyandotte with chickens. He corrected himself 
 to say that the golden wyandotte should be built 
 like a dorking. Lady Beauvais was so dehciously 
 ample. She had a simple admiration of her children, 
 not unmixed with a bewilderment that grew as 
 the two elder grew : the younger ones were easier 
 to understand. 
 
 JuUan was home for the summer vacation from 
 Eton and had been practising boxing in the 
 gjTnnasium, which was one of the features of 
 
THE HEIR 9 
 
 Cressey : the whole place was so well appointed. 
 He and his next brother, Dick, had been having 
 a bout. Julian had infected Dick, who was to be 
 a sailor, with something of his own love for games, 
 his passion for fitness. 
 
 'Darlin' Dick,' reported Lady Beauvais, 'is 
 really in a shockin' state, Hugo. One eye is 
 closed and his darlin' nose is double its usual 
 size.' 
 
 'Very good for him,' said his father, looking up 
 from the Morning Post. 'Dick is inclined to be 
 too soft.' 
 
 'Oh, Hugo ! The poor darlin' ! I don't see why 
 boys should hurt each other in order to be manly. 
 Joy was standin' by with a basin and sponge ready 
 to wipe off the blood if there was anyl Such an 
 odd thing for a girl! I did not know if I should 
 have sent her away. She is such a darlin', and 
 always obeys me, no matter what it costs 
 her.' 
 
 'I'd let her be,' said Lord Beauvais. 'She's all 
 right. Your young ruffians will be a nice sight for 
 the garden party at Dyke. And the princess is to 
 be there, too ! ' 
 
 'They'll have to stay at home,' Lady Beauvais 
 said hastily. 'Florence would be so annoyed if the 
 darlin's came with black eyes. The princess 
 wouldn't mind. You remember the story about 
 Prince Walter and the coster ! They are very 
 queer things, boys.' 
 
 She went half-way to the door and C9.me back. 
 
10 THE HOUSE 
 
 'The children have such strange ideas, Hugo,' 
 she said, and suddenly she blushed as though for 
 something she was ashamed of. 'Monica's been 
 tellin' me that JuUan says of Cressey that it is an 
 old idol to which too much has been sacrificed. 
 Cressey ! An idol I JuUan was always so fond of 
 Cressey ! ' 
 
 Her husband looked up at her with interest and 
 humour in his expression. 
 
 "An idol ! That's a new idea, Rachel. I don't 
 know what's coming to the young people,' and he 
 chuckled softly to himself. 
 
 'I don't know, indeed. I believe darlin' Julian 
 talks in the oddest way to the children.' 
 
 'He always will to an audience,' said the father, 
 with an air of amused tolerance. 'I don't know 
 where he has got so much talk from. It must be 
 from you, Rachel. I am a silent man, naturally.' 
 
 Lady Beauvais patted his cheek as though he 
 were another child. 
 
 'Darlin' Hugo!' she said, and proceeded with 
 the strange tale of Julian's talk. 
 
 'The darUn' boy says he wants a hard life. His 
 idea, which is shared by Joy, is to go out to the 
 North-West of Canada or some such place, to cut 
 down trees, and hve in huts, with the skins of beasts 
 to keep them warm. Imagine the poor darlin's ! 
 You remember how I brought up darlin' Juhan on 
 cream and maltine ? ' 
 
 'Till he struck,' her husband said quietly. 
 
 'Such odd talk, Hugo. Darlin' Julian is to 
 
THE HEIR II 
 
 marry a squaw and have papooses. I don't know 
 if Joy intended to ntiarry whatever is male for 
 squaw. I don't think so. She would look after 
 Julian's papooses. He would go out and hunt for 
 food, the squaw would cook it, and in winter they 
 would have warm huts and great fires to keep them 
 warm. He has made the nursery quite excited 
 about it. Poor darhn's ! Imagine them Uvin' in 
 the snow-clad forests.' 
 
 'I'm not sure it isn't a good ideal,' said Lord 
 Beauvais, something of vision coming clearer in 
 his eyes. 'Only, what's to become of Cressey?' 
 
 ' Oh, that isn't all. Darlin' Julian talks Socialism 
 to the children. He says the people will want 
 Cressey and they'll have to get it, in time. JuUan 
 does not want to keep an idol like Cressey. He 
 wants to share it with other men.' 
 
 'Oh, that's going fast,' Lord Beauvais said 
 with his air of genial enjoyment. 'Poor Cressey ! 
 Julian's been hstening to his friend, Malise South- 
 well. All very weU for little Southwell, who won't 
 have a penny to bless himself with. I don't know 
 how his mother scraped up the money for Eton, 
 brave little woman ! I hope the boy wiU be good 
 to her. I wonder how much Malise beUeves of his 
 own theories.' 
 
 'I hope he doesn't believe them all, though he 
 thinks he does,' said Lady Beauvais. ' Malise is 
 rather a darlin'. Such a brilliant boy, and Julian 
 and Joy simply worship him.' 
 
 'I wouldn't worry,' Lord Beauvais said. 'Youth 
 
 T.H. B 
 
12 THE HOUSE 
 
 passes. Julian will probably settle down to a 
 steady Conservatism, and Malise will sow his 
 intellectual wild oats and settle down to having a 
 good time. He adores his mother : that's in his 
 favour. As for Joy — she is Julian in petticoats. 
 I don't think Joy will give us much trouble.' 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THE MAKING OF A SOCIALIST 
 
 These heretical opinions fostered by a friendship 
 did not prevent Julian's parents extending a warm 
 welcome to Malise Southwell when he came to 
 spend part of the hohdays at Cressey. Lord 
 Beauvais might strive half-humorously to snub 
 Malise, whose ideas were ventilated in and out of 
 season, but the attempts were only half-hearted. 
 There was something so essentially sunny and 
 sweet-natured about the tall, broad-shouldered 
 boy, with dark blue eyes and a beautifully-shaped 
 head which would have been curly if the curls were 
 not so sternly discouraged, hair of a ripe corn- 
 colour, the edges of the golden ripples touched to 
 brown. 
 
 Mahse was three years older than Julian and had 
 protected him through his early days at Eton, 
 claiming him, as his fag, from a vulgar young bully 
 who had laid hands on him, the better to protect 
 him. In return JuUan had adored the Sixth Form 
 boy who excelled in all games and was brilliant 
 at his school work as well. Mahse had often 
 demonstrated to his fag the necessity of his being 
 a working member of society as soon as possible, 
 
 13 
 
14 THE HOUSE 
 
 since he was poor, the son of a widowed mother, 
 who had strained her resources to send him to 
 Eton in accordance with family traditions, Malise 
 was very tender when he talked of his mother. 
 She was a Uttle woman with a pathetic face. No 
 one could say she dressed well when she came to 
 Cressey. Malise had almost got his head punched 
 in his first term at Eton for walking through the 
 School Yard hand in hand with his mother, but the 
 Provost, who had been aware of the simple sight, had 
 actually said to some one, through whom it reached 
 the school, that it betokened a manly courage in 
 the boy of thirteen which spoke well for his future. 
 
 Malise had always talked freely to his fag. Some- 
 times the talk was above Julian's head, but that 
 did not matter : he was eager to understand. 
 There were queer confidences sometimes, considering 
 the nature of the public schoolboy, with all his 
 encrusted formulas. 
 
 'I'm not sorry she sent me here,' MaUse had said, 
 'though it pinched her, poor sweet. I'm as sensible 
 to the charm of Eton as though I saw it from the 
 other side of the world, or from old age. Those 
 young cubs over there' — ^he indicated a languidly- 
 strolling group — 'have no idea of what luck they're 
 in. They won't know it till they're sixty — if they 
 do then.' 
 
 'What are you going to do in Ufe? ' little Juhan 
 had asked, his pulses fluttering because his hero 
 was taking him into his intimacy. The eager 
 darkness of his face, his gray eyes black-lashed, 
 
THE MAKING OF A SOCIALIST 15 
 
 made a picture taken in conjunction with the older 
 boy's height and golden fairness. Malise had made 
 the strange statement to a circle which did not 
 understand it that Julian was as bright as a sword 
 and as keen. The Eton schoolboys could make 
 nothing of it. 
 
 'Politics,' said Malise shortly. 'Newspaper work 
 while I wait. My godfather is editor of The Day. 
 He's promised me my chance. The Day will do 
 very well for a jumping-off place.' 
 
 Julian's eyes bulged at him. How magnificent 
 was this Malise who could talk of such a pillar of 
 the British Constitution as The Day as a jumping- 
 off place ! 
 
 'But . . . Southwell, how splendid !' he gasped. 
 'I didn't think any one young ever wrote in for 
 The Day: 
 
 'They don't. That's why the paper wants me. 
 I'd ratlaer it was the Morning. It would be more 
 permanent. The Day's bound to chuck me pretty 
 soon. I am not one to dissemble. But while I am 
 there youth shall have a chance against the fogies.' 
 He flung his head batk with an effect as though 
 his hair flamed on the wind hke a banner. 
 
 'I'm a Socialist, JuUan,' he said. 'Not only 
 playing at it like lots of feUows. I'm here to knock 
 young plutocrats hke you out. By right you should 
 regard me as your enemy, not yotir friend. By 
 right, yom- pater should politely ask the footman 
 to show me the way out, instead of being perfectly 
 charming to me when I come to Cressey. Your 
 
i6 THE HOUSE 
 
 pater is an obstacle to men like me. He's so 
 deucedly good to his people. He's in the way, I 
 tell you, in the way. The weak-kneed ones will say 
 with tears that they don't want to give up being 
 his slaves, his serfs. The benevolent and thoroughly 
 trustworthy slaveholders are our worst enemies.' 
 
 Julian forgot to be indignant at his indulgent 
 father's being called a slave owner. He was too 
 eager to get out what he had to say. If Malise had 
 a fault — ^he had none in the eyes of the young 
 disciple — it was that he did not allow much time 
 for Julian to speak. His fine periods came in an 
 irresistible flow. Even now, when Julian, greatly 
 bold, pushed in — stammering in his eagernesss, a 
 smile grew in MaUse's blue eyes. 
 
 'But, Southwell,' said Julian, 'I'm a Socialist, 
 too.' 
 
 'You know nothing about it, kid. You'll be 
 the young man with great possessions who went 
 away sorrowful.' 
 
 'I hate my possessions,' Juhan said, almost 
 tearfully. 'I mean it, Southwell. I haven't begun 
 learning it from you, though, of course, I've learnt 
 so much from you. No one ever knew' — ^his face 
 grew red as he made the confession — 'but I and 
 my little sister, Joy — ^we discovered it for ourselves. 
 We used to wonder why we should have so much 
 and other people so little — I remember that Joy 
 suggested we should give away our ponies to the 
 village children because we loved our ponies best of 
 all. Then one day there was a lady at lunch — 
 
THE MAKING OF A SOCIALIST 17 
 
 such a pretty lady. Her name was Miss Murgatroyd. 
 I know now she was immensely rich. They were 
 talking about some one they called a Socialist who 
 was going to make every one very uncomfortable. 
 Lady Mereweather said that he ought to be im- 
 prisoned for Hfe, that he was making the working- 
 classes turn against their superiors, and that it 
 was an impossible world when the lower classes 
 did not know how to behave themselves. We did 
 not mind Lady Mereweather. Even mummie, 
 who never says anything unkind of any one, says 
 that Lady Mereweather is a tough proposition. 
 But Miss Murgatroyd said what a pity it was that 
 the man they were talking about — Tom Bates — 
 should have seen his wife die on the road when 
 they were turned out by a cruel landlord. 
 " Because," she said, " it has made him bitter and 
 he is a serious menace to us." Joy was only nine 
 then, but she noticed that Miss Murgatroyd had 
 not been sorry for Tom Bates and his wife, and the 
 baby — yes, there was a baby — but only because it 
 had made him bitter and troublesome. She had such 
 a soft voice and she looked quite lovely. Mummie 
 said her furs were worth a thousand guineas.' 
 
 By the time Julian had finished this recital his 
 cheeks were burning bright and his eyes dilated. 
 
 ' By Jove ! ' MaUse said, staring at the boy. ' You 
 are a queer kid to come out of Cressey. And httle 
 Joy, too. Tom Bates will be interested.' 
 
 'You know him?' 
 
 Again JuUan's eyes leaped and his cheeks were 
 
i8 THE HOUSE 
 
 like cressets in the wind. He had certainly a 
 bright, clear look, like a sword, as Malise had said. 
 
 'I've spoken to him. As a matter of fact — ^it 
 would be the ruin of me if it got out — I look on 
 Tom Bates as my political leader. I cannot join 
 him just yet. I must get through this place first 
 and feel my feet. For the mater's sake I must be 
 prudent. But I shall stand beside him yet. A man 
 of the most marvellous personal magnetism. By 
 the way, the baby didn't die. I've seen her: a 
 big, placid girl with a look of the country about 
 her : I can't express it better than by saying 
 that there is a suggestion of a ruminating cow 
 in a summer pasture, though that doesn't do her 
 brains justice. Beautiful, but on the massive side, 
 or promising to be. She is very young, not more 
 than sixteen.' 
 
 Juhan sighed enviously, yet with pride in his 
 friend. 
 
 'What chances you have, Southwell ! Every 
 one I meet seems to be tr5dng only to have a good 
 time — except my father and mother,, who can't help 
 having a good time, yet are conscientious. My 
 mother gets a deal of pleasure out of her prayers. 
 She has that look about her. They har^y ever 
 leave Cressey : that is why they have let the town 
 house for a number of years.' 
 
 'That " having a good time,'" said Malise cheer- 
 fully, 'means a fall sooner or later. The historical 
 parallels all show it; the luxury lovers will come 
 down with a crash, and pull down the whole fabric 
 
THE MAKING OF A SOCIALIST 19 
 
 with them, including the good ones, like your 
 people. It may come sooner than we anticipate. 
 Your father is a hale man. Quite probably you'll 
 never succeed, Juhan.' 
 
 'As long as the pater has a good run I don't mind,' 
 said JuUan humbly. 
 
 JuMan brought his hero to Cressey and introduced 
 him to his parents with a swelling bosom of pride. 
 -Mahse seemed to amuse Lord Beauvais. Lady 
 Beauvais hstened to his heresies with a placid 
 surprise that had hardly begun to be apprehension. 
 
 'He is so charmin', Beauvais,' she said; 'such 
 a beautiful boy that things which would sound 
 alarmin' from any one else are attractive in him. 
 I don't suppose the dear boy really wants to pull 
 down the Constitution, do you think?' 
 
 'He thinks he wants to pull down people Uke 
 you and me, Rachel,' her husband rephed. 'It is 
 rather Uke the old fellow on Deeside, years ago, 
 who demohshed the Land Nationahsation man 
 with a sentence or two. You remember? Old 
 Tom Logie. He was a tenant of your father's.' 
 
 'I think I do remember, a dear old man with 
 such blue eyes — charmin'. What did he say, 
 Beauvais?' 
 
 Lady Beauvais had a way of forgetting her 
 husband's stories which some people thought 
 came from a sense of her wifely duty. 
 
 'Oh, well, the man had got the meeting on his 
 side — ^tremendous enthusiasm — ^when Tom got up. 
 "Hae ye ony land o' yer ain? " " Thank Heaven, 
 
20 THE HOUSE 
 
 no." " I thocht it." The meeting broke up 
 sadly.' 
 
 Lady Beauvais made a good appearance of the 
 story being new to her. 
 
 'I don't think the dear boy would be consciously 
 affected by having no property of his own,' she said. 
 'I've been thinkin', Beauvais — shall I write and ask 
 his mamma to join our party. Joy's been telUn' 
 me the poor dear is in London. The children 
 suspect she can't give herself a hohday.' 
 
 ' Certainly, Ray ' — Lord Beauvais rang the changes 
 on his wife's name — 'it is Uke you to think of it.' 
 
 'It would be such a pleasure to that charmin' 
 boy,' said Lady Beauvais, cooing like the ring- 
 dove. 'It would be such a pretty plan for her to 
 come without Malise expectin' her.' 
 
 She picked up Fifine, the little Maltese, which 
 was at her skirts when not in her arms, and with 
 her hand on the door paused and looked back 
 
 '"You're not afraid of his ideas for the children?' 
 she said. 'He's very attractive — ^Joy, as well as 
 Julian, is devoted to him. The poor darlin's ! ' 
 
 She looked at her lord with the fluttering eyes 
 that said he was all wisdom and waited for his 
 pronouncement. When it came it was something 
 unexpected. 
 
 'A bit of SociaUsm won't be a bad thing in time 
 to come,' he said. 'The old crusted ideas are not 
 going to meet the situation that is coming. Julian 
 will handle it better than Dick or Ralph or Francis 
 ever would.' 
 
THE MAKING OF A SOCIALIST 21 
 
 'Poor darlin's!' said Lady Beauvais of her 
 younger sons. 'They are exactly Uke papa in their 
 ideas about property. DarMn' Francis made me 
 smile the other day when Morris told him the 
 rabbits were bein' poached. " Why not shoot the 
 poachers? " he asked. Poor, innocent darlin' !* 
 
 ' So exactly hke your father when he used to fire 
 at the beaters' legs if they didn't come up fast 
 enough. He'd be in Queer Street if he did it now ! ' 
 
 'Yes, I suppose so,' Lady Beauvais said softly. 
 ' Yet he never meant to hurt them : he was so 
 kind : only just a little peppery, poor darUn.' 
 He was really very fond of the people.' 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE SICK SOUL 
 
 Julian was at Sandhurst when the war broke out, 
 in his second year. Malise Southwell was at Oxford, 
 where he had not intended to go. His godfather 
 on The Day had suddenly remembered that he 
 was a godfather and had planked down the money 
 for the university. 
 
 Malise, although he had been eager for the plunge 
 into life, real hfe, had accepted the revised plan 
 with equanimity, if without enthusiasm. He had 
 been talking of Life with a capital letter, a deal 
 before the offer came from Henry Quillinan. As 
 it happened he and Julian were together at the 
 moment Mr Quillinan's letter came into his hand. 
 He had been talking of Life with the motion of the 
 diver. Julian, watching him, fascinated as usual, 
 had had an illusion of a white and gold creature, 
 finger-tips lightly touching, making the swift 
 downward plunge. 
 
 Then the letter had come. Malise had already 
 acquired chambers in Clifford's Inn. He had gone 
 to the outer door to receive the letter, and 
 had come back with it, laying it down on the 
 table. 
 
THE SICK SOUL 23 
 
 'A proof," he said carelessly. He had for some 
 time been contributing to The Day. 
 
 He went on with what he had been sajdng. He 
 had seen Tom Bates, whom he called Mr Bates, 
 and had imparted to him his ideas for a new evening 
 paper to be run on Socialist Unes. The wild man, 
 as people, respectable people, yet considered Tom 
 Bates to be, had Ustened to him with interest but 
 without immediate encouragement. 
 
 'No money for a newspaper just yet, my lad,' 
 he had said, 'we're a poor party. Wait a while 
 and the rich men will be tumbling over each other 
 to join us. I'm off to America next week.' 
 
 ' Take care America doesn't chuck you out,' MaHse 
 had said. 
 
 'She daren't. She's too big. Why do I talk of 
 her as though she belonged to the masters? She 
 doesn't. Her workers count thousands to one. 
 I'm wanted — ^at Pittsburg — at Chicago — all over 
 the place. The masters won't like my torch nor 
 the sparks that fly and catch : but they'll have to 
 put up with me, damn them ! ' 
 
 'And after America? When the conflagration 
 is neatly started?' 
 
 'Showing a Hght and well alight as the firemen 
 say,' Tom Bates had answered, showing his white 
 teeth, which, with his ruddy complexion, his eyes, 
 brown as mountain water and quiet when he was not 
 angry, made a pleasant impression. 'When that's 
 done there'll be other places. My father, when I 
 was done with the Board School, at the age of 
 
24 THE HOUSE 
 
 fourteen, presented me, as he had done my brothers, 
 with a map of the world, a pocket-knife, a loaf of 
 bread, and the open door for my patrimony. There 
 was imagination for you ! There spoke the Irish- 
 man. No Englishman would have had the sense of 
 drama.' 
 
 All this Malise imparted to Juhan while the 
 fateful letter lay on the green-stained table, amid 
 the heaps of hterary stuff of one kind or another 
 which had a fine air of having come there by 
 accident that imposed on Julian and others of 
 MaUse's young visitors. 
 
 He went on to say that Tom Bates's brothers 
 had made some use of their map of the world. 
 Billy was high in the Indian Civil Service, Pat was 
 a missionary to a leper colony in the Pacific, Joe 
 had built up a big business in Alaska, trading furs. 
 A remarkable family, truly. Only Tom Bates had 
 remained of the working classes, the same passion 
 for humanity which had taken his brother to the 
 leper colony supporting him and inflaming him; 
 perhaps, too, a love of power and the capacity for 
 administration which had brought another brother 
 well on the way to be the virtual ruler of an Indian 
 province. 
 
 Languidly at last Malise took up the letter and 
 opened it, with a polite apology to his friend. Malise 
 had always perfect manners, which no amount of 
 intimacy made him forget. He read the letter 
 calmly to the end and then laid it back on the 
 table. 
 
THE SICK SOUL 25 
 
 'H'm !' he said. 'Old Quill offers me three years 
 at Oxford. It is a bolt from the blue. Very decent 
 of old Quill. But I haven't been thinking of Oxford. 
 The mater would have liked it, but I was not going 
 to have her pinch her -httle dear self any more than 
 she has done for a hulking brute hke me.* 
 
 His golden head showed bright against the 
 window which was filled in with the green silk of 
 the young leaves. There was a curious grace in 
 the way his head sat his shoulders, due to a longer 
 neck than usually befalls the male. Anything less 
 like a hulking birute could not well be imagined. 
 
 ' Three years ! ' said Julian. ' You'll say No ? 
 They would be three lost years, seeing what you've 
 made up your mind to do : you'll refuse ? ' 
 
 ' I'm not so sure,' MaUse said slowly. ' Knowledge 
 is power. If I go to Oxford I go to work. I know 
 it's a put-up job of old Q's. He wants to detach 
 me from what he calls my Anarchist leanings. I'm 
 not sure my little mamma's not in it too.' 
 
 'It postpones a good many things,' said Julian 
 doubtfully. 
 
 'Never mind ! You'll be getting through Sand- 
 hurst while I'm getting through Oxford. As a 
 matter of fact, Tom Bates thought I was too young. 
 He'll be surer of me in three years' time.' 
 
 So Malise went to Oxford — to BaUiol, which he 
 had selected with the approval of his godfather 
 and to the almost tearful happiness of his mother. 
 And Julian went to Sandhurst in the autumn of 
 1913- 
 
26 THE HOUSE 
 
 A year later came the war. Julian, nineteen 
 years old by this time, was gazetted to the Cold- 
 stream, wounded at the first battle of Ypres, 
 brought home and nursed back to efficiency, went 
 out again, was wounded at the Somme, and had 
 received the Military Cross. 
 
 From time to time he heard of and from Malise, 
 who had joined up at once. Apparently Malise 
 was being spared nothing of the hard fighting. He 
 was in the 29th Division in the 2nd battalion of a 
 famous Irish regiment. He reported that he liked 
 the fighting spirit and the cheerfulness of the men. 
 They loved the sheer fighting. One of his brother 
 officers had told him a story, which fascinated him, 
 of an Irishman in New York coming upon a street 
 fight and asking politely, 'Is this a private row, or 
 may any one come in?' 
 
 Despite his Socialism MaUse had plenty of gaiety, 
 and enjoyed whatever frivolity came his way. In 
 his Oxford year he had learnt dancing and grown 
 very fond of it. Apparently his Anarchist views 
 were only an added charm for the girls. 
 
 If he complained of anything in France it was 
 that he did not get a chance of dancing. He wrote 
 to Julian of his new friends. There was one, Mick 
 O'KeUy by name, of whom Julian was jealous. 
 He had done incredibly brave things with a cool 
 and contemptuous daring. 
 
 'O'Kelly's a glorious chap,' Mahse wrote, 'and 
 very fascinating when he hkes you. If he doesn't 
 like you, by Jove, he can make you feel small. Not 
 
THE SICK SOUL 27 
 
 like the ordinary Irishman at all — ^rather chilly 
 in his manner and with a coldly handsome face. 
 You'd say he was cruel, to look at him. Can you 
 see him, Julian? He shot a Boche with his hands 
 up in a swamp the other day. I asked him how he 
 had the stomach to do it, and he said that he was 
 the enemy. Otherwise he'd no grudge against him. 
 I never saw a man as much in love with war. There 
 was a macabre incident before we went over last 
 week. An of&cer suddenly tumbled into the dug- 
 out — a man old enough to be O'Kelly's father. 
 " Here, give me something to drink, for God's 
 sake," he said. " I've just had a man shot beside 
 me. His brains are aU over me." " Here's some 
 tea for you," said O'Kelly, " it's all we have." 
 The poor devil kept looking at his hands as though 
 he were Lady Macbeth. He took the tea but spilt 
 it over himself. He was like a man in an ague fit. 
 AU the time O'Kelly's eyes were upon him with an 
 indescribable cold curiosity in them. It should 
 have steadied any man. 
 
 '"What's the matter? Why don't you drink 
 your tea? " he asked icily; 
 
 '"I can't," said the unfortunate fellow, his 
 teeth chattering. " I can tell you — ^his brains went 
 aU over me. Ugh ! They are on my tunic." 
 O'Kelly looked a little closer. " Tea-leaves," he 
 said. They were tea-leaves. The poor chap's 
 nerve was all gone. By Jove, I wish you could 
 have heard O'Kelly say " Tea-leaves I " All the 
 ice of the North Pole was in it.' 
 
 T.H. c 
 
28 THE HOUSE 
 
 Julian accused his friend of militarism because his 
 letters were full of such stories. There was very 
 little of the old dreams in Malise's letters : and the 
 two friends never met. After a time Malise 
 went off with the Great Division to Gallipoli. He 
 was in Serbia and the Serbian retreat : finally 
 back in France again. He had won the M.C. with 
 two bars and D.S.O. by the fourth year of the war, 
 and he was practically a whole man. There was 
 plenty of promotion going, for the officers constantly 
 got knocked out, but not much of it came Malise's 
 way, though he was in command more than once 
 when a senior officer had been knocked out and 
 O'Kelly wounded. There was a season when, to 
 the joy of the subalterns, O'Kelly was in command 
 and promoted his pals to all the responsible positions. 
 While it lasted it was a glorious reign of youth : 
 but, alas, it came to an end with the arrival of a 
 dugout colonel from England, who promptly put 
 the young men back in their proper places. 
 
 In October, 1918, just before the war ended, a 
 shell burst in the trench in which Julian sat, 
 reading by the light of a little pocket-lamp. The 
 Last Days of Fort Vaux, by Henri Bordeaux. By 
 all the rules he should have been blown to bits as 
 was Seton-Crawshay, who was shaving close by. 
 As it was, having lain for dead for several minutes, 
 he began to realise that he was alive though Seton- 
 Crawshay was dead. 
 
 His leave was due and he was sent home almost 
 at once. He arrived at Cressey in a mood very 
 
THE SICK SOUL 29 
 
 different from that which he had imagined for his 
 home-coming. He was nervous and abstracted : 
 silent, even with Joy, to whom he had so much to 
 tell — ^and he slept ill. 
 
 Lady Beauvais carried him off to Harley Street 
 as soon as it was apparent that there was more 
 wrong with the boy than fatigue and long strain. 
 
 'To be svire, my dear lady,' said Sir John Dunstan, 
 without troubling to conceal anything from the 
 patient, 'this young man ought to be suffering 
 from shell-shock, by all the rules. That he is not, 
 or is, in only a mild degree, is a tribute to his 
 excellent mental balance. If my prescription were 
 to be followed I should say, let him go off to a 
 farm-house for six months and work on the land 
 — ^really work. The sleep that will come to him 
 from a working-man's day wiU rest him more than 
 all the coddling in cotton-wool a fond mother 
 could give him. Let him go quite away from 
 Cressey — ^to a place where he is not known. He 
 can wear his soldier clothes. A bit of a masquerade 
 would be best. Let the people think of him as 
 belonging as nearly as possible to their class.' 
 
 Julian looked up with an eye which had been 
 lack-lustre when he came in. 
 
 'I should like that,' he said. 
 
 'Oh, darlin',' cried Lady Beauvais, 'and you 
 only just come home ! And we were all lookin' 
 forward to makin' so much of you that you should 
 forget these dreadful things. And Joy — poor 
 darUn' ! She was so lookin' forward to havin' her 
 
30 THE HOUSE 
 
 darlin' brother with her. But, of course, if we 
 must . . .' 
 
 'The longest way is often the shortest way,' 
 said Sir John epigrammatically. 'I know the 
 exact place for him. Lady Beauvais. I came on 
 it when I was tramping Sussex last year. It would 
 be better for you not to intervene. Sweetwater 
 Farm, Oxborough, right under Oxborough Down. 
 Lord Amory will come back to you his own man. 
 He ought to go as soon as possible — the sooner the 
 better. There will be no difficulty about an 
 extension of sick leave.' 
 
 ' I want to get rid of my headaches,' said Julian 
 in a childish way. 'They are a nuisance. Some- 
 times one can hardly hear what other people are 
 saying.' 
 
 'Sweetwater Farm will make that all right,' Sir 
 John Dunstan said, with a keen glance at the 
 young, lined face. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 SWEETWATER FARM 
 
 It was the first evening at Sweetwater Farm, and 
 Julian sat at supper in the farm-house kitchen, a 
 very beautiful apartment. The farm-house had 
 been an old manor-house, and plainly had had 
 once a monastic derivation. The kitchen must 
 have been the monks' refectory. It was a long 
 room with deeply-set windows and a splendid 
 fireplace. On either side of the fireplace were stacked 
 great logs of wood, divided from the fire by a 
 brickwork waU. The fire roared and burned on 
 a stone hearth. From the great hooded chimney 
 above swung a chain, a huge hook at the end of it 
 by which to suspend a pot. From other hooks 
 hanging from the chimney dangled flitches of 
 bacon, strings of onions, and bunches of herbs in 
 bags. At the back of the fireplace were little iron 
 doors which concealed receptacles for snuff and 
 tobacco, while on either side were racks for spurs 
 and bridles and bits. 
 
 There was a great wooden screen hanging by 
 the door, which would yield to a finger-tip, so 
 delicately it was poised. The deep window-sills 
 
 31 
 
32 THE HOUSE 
 
 were full of geraniums in bloom. The long, dark 
 oa,k tables ran round two sides of the wall. A 
 coarse, clean cloth covered the middle of each 
 table, the wood of which was polished to dark 
 lustrousness by the elbows of centuries of men. 
 
 Julian sat with Mrs and Mr Pinkerton at the 
 narrower table which ran the short length of wall 
 at the farthest end of the room from the door. 
 Mrs Pinkerton sat at the end : William Pinkerton 
 at the top, in front of him a huge, home-cured ham 
 which he was about to carve. Preparatory to this 
 task he was sharpening his carving-knife with 
 great energy. Before Mrs Pinkerton lay a cold 
 rabbit-pie. There was an immense bowl of salad 
 midway of the table, with stacks of bread cut in 
 large chunks, while a cold apple-tart and Devon- 
 shire cream in wine-glasses awaited the end of the 
 meat-course. 
 
 The men and women employed on the farm and 
 in the house came crowding in with a clatter of 
 heavy boots and a smell of their various occupations. 
 They took their seats at the longer table. There 
 might have been ten or twelve of them. Then the 
 Pinkerton children of all ages, from four years old 
 up to twelve, came flocking in and cUmbed on to 
 the long seats of what Julian now perceived to be the 
 table of consideration. Four-years old, who had 
 a face hke a plum-pudding, hard, red cheeks and 
 eyes black as sloes, with a delicious button of a 
 nose, sat between JuHan and his mother. Julian 
 was introduced to him as John Willum. A little 
 
SWEETWATER FARM 33 
 
 girl, equally black-eyed and red-cheeked, whose 
 name was Ivy, fought with an elder sister for the 
 other place by JuUan, and won. There were three 
 boys and two girls in all : 'and four at boardin' 
 school,' Mrs Pinker ton added, having introduced 
 Ethel Jane and Samuel and Ernest. 
 
 'Boardin' school! Learnin' to be good for 
 nothink,' said Mr Pinkerton, in a tremendous, 
 growling voice. 'That's wot's the matter with the 
 boys nowadays — too much schoolin'.' 
 
 'And one as lays at Wipers,' said Mrs Pinkerton, 
 with a dimming of her frosty blue eyes. She had 
 the colours of frost, bright cheeks, hair just lightly 
 touched with silver; steel-blue eyes. 
 
 "E were the best of them,' said Mr Pinkerton. 
 ' 'Er boy ! — She were proud to see 'im go.' 
 
 There was silence which could be felt for a 
 minute or two, during which Mr Pinkerton slashed 
 away at the great ham. Plainly rationing was not 
 too severe at Sweetwater Farm. The people at 
 the other table were very laconic. Each came and 
 took his or her plate as it was filled and returned to 
 his or her place. There was a smell of apples 
 conflicting with the smell of stables and bsnres and 
 the earth and people's old clothes, and bacon and 
 onions, and strong tobacco which Julian did not 
 find intolerable, as he would have before the war. 
 They were living smells. Oddly impregnating 
 them was the smell of pinks, wall-flowers, and night- 
 scented stocks, from an open window above his 
 head. 
 
34 THE HOUSE 
 
 William John thrust his bullet head under 
 Julian's arm and spoke in a great voice. 
 
 'What be your name?' he asked, 'an' be ye 
 coom to stay?' 
 
 'Oh, I hope so,' said Julian, 'at least for some 
 time.' 
 
 'Don't say " be," William John,' Mrs Pinkerton 
 put in, "say are.' 
 
 'Wot are your name?' William John asked, 
 with a placid acceptance of the correction. 
 
 Julian was trying to sort out the different smells 
 in the room. There was a milky smell now; no, 
 it was cream — the clotted cream on the table 
 before him. For the moment it blotted out all 
 the other smells. 
 
 Then he saw that a girl had come into the kitchen. 
 She had taken the seat between Samuel and Ethel 
 Jane, by the simple process of stepping across the 
 wooden bench. Ethel Jane was lolhng out her 
 tongue in triumphant derision at Ivy, who had 
 prevented her in the matter of sitting beside 
 Julian. 
 
 'You be'ave, Ethel Jane, or else your father 
 will be after you,' said Mrs Pinkerton. 
 
 'I want to sit by Mary,' wailed Ivy. 
 
 'Who the rabbits is amaking of a row 'ere?' 
 growled Mr Pinkerton, his face uncontrollably 
 amiable. He would have been an ugly man if it 
 had not been for the blueness of his eyes, a much 
 deeper blue than his wife's, looking from his 
 mahogany-coloured face set in a fringe of red 
 
SWEETWATER FARM 35 
 
 whisker : his teeth, too. showed white as he parted 
 his hps in a slow smile. 
 
 'You just wait, Ethel Jane, till your granny 
 comes,' said Mrs Pinkerton, with a sternness she 
 obviously knew to be futile. 
 
 Ivy thrust out an answering tongue of defiance 
 at Ethel Jane. 
 
 'I never did,' said Mr Pinkerton with a flabber- 
 gasted air. 'Plain to see you're spilt; a stocky, 
 wilful lass you be.' 
 
 'I wish granny would come,' said Ivy, beginning 
 to howl, while Ethel Jane put out her tongue several 
 times with great rapidity. Ernest and Samuel 
 were plodding through their ham, while grinning 
 at each other with much enjojTment of the scene. 
 
 Julian had only half followed what was going on. 
 He had moments in which the things that were 
 passing had no concern for him. He came back 
 as one comes back painfully out of a heavy sleep. 
 The children were stiU quarrelling : the parents 
 stiU protesting : the girl they had called Mary 
 was sitting opposite to him, a picture of peace, 
 looking benignly from one to the other of the 
 combatants and non-combatants. 
 
 It was she who had brought in with her the 
 milky sweetness and fragrance : he was sure of it. 
 She was wearing a blue smock, open at the throat. 
 Her skin was milky white. She had very luxuriant 
 hair, something between Hght brown and fair, 
 with deep chestnut shades in it. She was a big 
 girl, built in proportion to her height. Even 
 
36 . THE HOUSE 
 
 sitting, he could see how ample she was, yet it was 
 not a mature amplitude. He murmured something 
 to himself about a goddess : she was built like a 
 young goddess. Her lips parted over small and 
 even teeth in a smile. He said to himself that her 
 mouth would not shut : her upper lip was a. little 
 too short. Lucky that she had such pretty teeth, 
 and such an engaging innocence and freshness 
 when she smiled. 
 
 'You keep quiet. Ivy,' she said. Already she 
 had laid a hand on Ethel Jane's head : " else you 
 shan't come to Shornham with me on Tuesday.' 
 
 'You'll take me, Mary,' cried Ethel Jane, 
 wriggling under the large, well-shaped hand which 
 rested on her curls. 
 
 'I'll take you both if you're good little girls. 
 There, William John, you too. And you shall have 
 gingerbread.' 
 
 Peace was restored. Ethel Jane and Ivy forgot 
 their animosity in appealing to their mother to help 
 them first as she took the pastry cover off the 
 rabbit pie. 
 
 'Got your cows milked, Mary?' asked Mr 
 Pinkerton, settling to his own food. He had been 
 distributing the food impartially while his offspring 
 squabbled. 
 
 'Yes, I have finished,' answered the girl in a slow, 
 quiet voice. ' Daisy was troublesome; I don't know 
 what came to her to-night. She would not stand 
 to be milked.' 
 
 Julian felt a sense of relief that her speech was not 
 
SWEETWATER FARM 37 
 
 common. There was something about it, an accent, 
 which he did not recognise. It had an honest, 
 clear suggestion as of wild fruit : but the voice 
 itself was rich and soft — like cream, he said to 
 himself. It would have been dreadful if she had 
 spoken commonly, with that face. 
 
 So she milked cows, this young goddess, who 
 spoke like an educated person where no one else 
 did ! He glanced at her hands fastidiously. They 
 were clean and well-kept. He was conscious again 
 of a feeUng of relief. He could not have endured it 
 if her nails had been dirty. 
 
 ' Jenkins'U be sorry when you go back to Lunnon, 
 Mary,' said Mr Pinkerton. 'Drat all schools ! 
 say I. What use is schoolin' to a girl like you that 
 can milk more cows to th' hour than any man I 
 can find? 
 
 'I do very well at the school, too,' said Mary 
 simply. 
 
 'You should have heard Jenkins when last you 
 went back, to Lunnon. " Drat that there Mary," 
 he says. " If she hadn't got me used to her, what 
 matter? I never see such a hand with a beast," 
 he says. Didn't you, Mr Jenkins, now?' 
 
 Mr Jenkins at the long table waved his knife 
 and fork in the air by way of assent. Apparently 
 his mouth was too full to speak. 
 
 Julian was recalled from his reverie about Mary 
 by Ethel Jane asking him point-blank across the 
 table — 
 
 'Be you a clurk, Mr Saymore?' 
 
38 THE HOUSE 
 
 Julian had elected to be known as Mr St Maur. 
 
 'There !' said Mrs Pinkerton, 'if that child ain't 
 as sharp as a needle. You'll excuse her, Mr Saymore. 
 She wants to know if you was a clurk before you 
 went for a sodger.' 
 
 'He weren't a butcher hke Mr 'Ollings, nor a 
 hedger and ditcher hke Nat Goodman,' said Ethel 
 Jane with an exhilarated air. ' Whatever were you, 
 Mr Sa37more ? ' 
 
 'You must guess,' said JuUan, with an attempt 
 at facetiousness. Privately, he wanted to be let 
 alone. He wished ithe children were gone to bed, 
 for he was still easily fatigued. But he was sorry 
 he had spoken when all the young Pinkertons broke 
 out in a voluble string of professions and employ- 
 ments. He only shook his head as the most unlikely 
 occupations were presented to him. Ethel Jane 
 still stood by a clurk, till Samuel, having swallowed 
 a mouthful of ham, rumbled out 'hairdresser,' 
 when she abandoned her choice, which had become 
 indeed monotonous by constant and shrill repetition. 
 
 'Hairdresser has it,' she cried, clapping her 
 hands. ' You's the very image of a lovely young man 
 thet curls the ladies' hair in Shornham.' 
 
 ' Hairdresser ! Hairdresser ! ' called out William 
 John, jumping up and down on his chair. 
 
 'Oh !' said Juhan, ruefully, 'I think I'd rather 
 be a clerk.' 
 
 ' If Ethel Jane isn't as sharp as a needle ! ' said 
 Mrs Pinkerton admiringly. 
 
 ' If you're quite done noratin',' put in Mr Pinkerton 
 
SWEETWATER FARM 39 
 
 with polite sarcasm, addressed to his family, 'you 
 might be relievin' us of your presence. Who 
 goes hay-makin' to-morrow mornin'? Don't 
 speak all at once.' 
 
 A little later peace had descended on Sweetwater 
 Farm. Before they turned in Mr Pinkerton and 
 Julian had smoked a pipe together, sitting out of 
 doors in the sheltered corner formed by a wing of 
 the farm-house going off at right angles. The 
 house windows were behind them: in front the 
 soft obscurity of the fields. Somewhere in the 
 distance the owls were hooting. Not another 
 sound but the peaceful deep breathing of the grazing 
 cattle beyond the hedge. 
 
 Overhead the childrfen had fallen asleep. For a 
 while there had been a soft, low voice talking to 
 WiUiam John and Ivy, and the replies of the 
 children. The voices ceased, but still the slow, 
 gentle foot went to and fro upstairs as though 
 some one was tidying and putting away. Then 
 the square of hght on the grass, which was the 
 reflection of the lit window, suddenly went out : 
 a door closed softly and footsteps came down the 
 uncarpeted stairs. 
 
 'That there Mary,' commented Mr Pinkerton. 
 'she have a way with young things. Willum John 
 and Ivy, you couldn't get them asleep : their ma 
 couldn't. She were always a-calhn' of me to come 
 up and spank 'em, or else threatenin' their old 
 granny, who spiles 'em more'n their ma. They 
 know, those childring. They know that though 
 
40 THE HOUSE 
 
 my bark's gruff my heart's haun harder than their 
 ma's nor their granny's. 'Tis the same with the 
 calves or the pigs or the chickings, or the young 
 lambs. She have a way with her, that one. What- 
 ever right has she to go wasting of herself on 
 schoolin'? Sort o' medical schooUn' it be. As I 
 says to Mary, there's many can doctor, but few 
 milk a kickin' cow.' 
 
 From somewhere in the house came a sound of 
 the washing up of crockery. JuUan imagined 
 Mary at that task, doing it with a patient deftness, 
 her sleeves pulled up above her white arms. 
 
 The night was dehcious. The roses had begun 
 to open on the treUis that covered the house-wall. 
 Still, the pinks and wallflowers were not over, 
 and in the colourlessness of all things under the night 
 Julian conjectured a wide sheet of forget-me-nots 
 under a little apple-tree which had clad itself 
 deUciously in pink. The moon was just rising 
 above a belt of woodland across the field where 
 the cattle were grazing. 
 
 He drew a long breath. How peaceful it was, 
 how simple, how natural ! Suddenly it came to 
 him that Cressey was not a home, could not be 
 a home. The dead hand of all the generations 
 was upon it. Even his father and mother, dear 
 and loving as they were, could not make a home 
 of anything so great. And then there was the house 
 in Portman Square. There was the castle in the 
 Highlands : there was the fishing lodge in the West 
 of Ireland. The human soul which is so closely 
 
SWEETWATER FARM 41 
 
 housed in the smallest of habitations cried out 
 against such immense, yet such confined spaces 
 for its housing. 
 
 'I can hardly touch anything that is mine,' he 
 fretted silently. 'Beyond my mere personal 
 belongings, the things that clothe me, my pipe, 
 my walking-stick, my horse, my dog; nothing is 
 mine.' 
 
 He went back to that rare dream of his boyhood. 
 Was it MaMse's implanted on him, or was it his 
 own, of a lodge in a vast wilderness, the return to 
 Nature, he, with his wife and children about him, 
 kiUing what they should eat, carrying firewood and 
 water for them, sowing crops for them, wrapping 
 them in the skins of the beasts he had killed, 
 his wife helping him, most truly his mate. 
 
 The vision absorbed him. For a few moments 
 he was lost. He came back to the sounds of a 
 cow lowing and Mr Pinkerton knocking out the 
 ashes of his pipe against a stone. 
 
 'That poor girl out there'll be near her time,' 
 said Mr Pinkerton. 'I'll give Jenkins the word to 
 have a look at her now an' again durin' the night.' 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE MINISTERING WOMAN 
 
 Julian went up by the winding stairs, the candle 
 he carried casting grotesque shadows behind him, 
 to a little room which was entered by pulling down 
 a bobbin that Ufted the latch, as it was in Red- 
 Riding-Hood's days. The room was clean and 
 fragrant, full of the scent and dew of the night, 
 which came in by the open windows. The walls 
 were whitewashed and adorned with a few coloured 
 pictures from the Christmas numbers of illustrated 
 papers. The furnishing was of the simplest. His 
 bed was hard and un5delding, but the coarse linen 
 sheets smelt of lavender. It was luxury compared 
 with what he had known in France, and, his strange 
 new loathing of softness and comfort upon him, 
 he turned to the austerity with a sigh of content. 
 What more did a man want, he asked himself, 
 than this strait little room, fuU of the murmurs of 
 the night and the smell of flowers and grasses, clad 
 in silver by the moonlight? 
 
 As he lay in bed the moonlight was all about 
 him and over him, criss-crossed by the shadows of 
 the trees. He fell asleep to the first call of the 
 
 42 
 
THE MINISTERING WOMAN 43 
 
 nightingale, easily, as he had not slept since the 
 time before the horrors. 
 
 His last confused thoughts were of Mary and of 
 Malise Southwell. He had not heard from Malise 
 for some time; it was his own fault. He had been 
 too sick of it all to do the things he ought to have 
 done. But Malise was an inspiring, a heartening 
 friend. They had gone over together in the last 
 show. JuUan's wavering thoughts recalled the 
 railway station in Northern France at the zero 
 hour in the gray October morning, the men standing 
 in the rain of shells andhigh explosives that seemed 
 to be concentrated on the little village. He re- 
 membered the white faces of the men. Mahse had 
 come up to him and put an arm about his neck, 
 brotherly. 'Always remember it is worth it,' he 
 had said. A minute later he was staggering blind 
 and deaf through the smoke of the barrage. 
 
 Dear Malise ! He must write to him. The last 
 he had seen of him was binding up the wounded 
 on the httle hillock upon which the German guns 
 were firing point-blank. Malise had come out of 
 it riddled with wounds, but he had made a splendid 
 recovery. It was due largely to him that Julian 
 had been decorated, a decoration which made the 
 recipient feel half-ashamed because so many other 
 men had deserved the honour better : but, of course, 
 it had pleased the parents inordinately. 
 
 He slid suddenly into sleep, his thoughts growing 
 faint and inchoate. Not since that last going- 
 over had he slept so easily. The songs of the 
 
 T.H. D 
 
44 THE HOUSE 
 
 nightingales were in his dreams, and the moonlight 
 and the sharp smell of the pinks, and — ^but that 
 was much later on — something uncomfortable, 
 something that had pain in it. It was that sensi- 
 tiveness about the suffering of others which had 
 contributed to his breakdown. The mournful 
 cry of pain was in his dreams for a long time, he 
 thought. At last it forced him awake. The gray 
 dawn was in the room. It was the lowing of the 
 cow he had heard. There it was again, but quieter, 
 he thought, than it had been through his sleep. 
 
 He remembered Mr Pinkerton last night : 'That 
 poor girl out there will be near her time.' The 
 tenderness of the phrase had touched him. It was 
 Jenkins's business to be with the cow. Was Jenkins 
 awake? Had he heard? 
 
 Julian got out of bed, swearing at his own lack 
 of efficiency. He would not know what to do for 
 the poor thing in her trouble. He stumbled about, 
 feeling for his garments. He was yet heavy with 
 a sleep that had begun to pay off many arrears. 
 
 He found something at last and clad himself. 
 The dawn had begun. He wondered if he 
 could discover Mr Pinkerton's room and waken 
 him without wakening the house. Somewhere 
 in the distance a church clock struck four 
 o'clock. The house would hardly be about yet, 
 although he knew that life at the farm began early. 
 
 While he fumbled with his garments he noticed 
 suddenly that the lowing of the cow had ceased. 
 So it was over, poor beast. He felt a sense of 
 
THE MINISTERING WOMAN 45 
 
 acute ph3rsical relief as though a burden had been 
 rolled away which had been oppressing his body. 
 Poor creature ! it was hard that such simple things 
 should have to suffer. 
 
 Before he could make his way to the door he 
 heard the cUck of a gate. The gray dawn was 
 brightening in the east, although the shadows 
 yet lingered on the western side of the house. 
 Looking out, he saw that it was Mary who came 
 through from the field. She came wearily. 
 She looked towards the house. It almost seemed 
 to him that she looked at him. But no; she 
 was walking as one who does not see. The first 
 light fell coldly on her face and hair. She seemed 
 dead tired. 
 
 It was his first clear vision of her standing up. 
 Despite her air of an intense fatigue she seemed 
 to him physically splendid — ^so tall, so splendidly 
 formed. Her face pleased him — ^the broad, calm 
 forehead, the width between the eyes, the brooding 
 quietness and patience of her expression. There 
 was something beneficent about her, motherly. 
 He supposed it was that which had led to her 
 studying for the profession of medicine. She had 
 looked younger last night. Now she looked the 
 twenty years which Mr Pinkerton had given 
 her. 
 
 Holding the door a Uttle ajar he heard her come 
 into the house and ascend the stairs : then the 
 closing of a door : she had gone to her room : to 
 sleep, he hoped. What a thing it was she had 
 
46 THE HOUSE 
 
 done! How had she known how to do it? It 
 was strange knowledge for a girl, even a girl who 
 looked forward to being a doctor. 
 
 He did not feel inclined to sleep again. His 
 window was only a few feet from the ground. 
 His slendemess allowed him to get through the 
 half of it that opened. He held the sill for a second 
 and dropped easily on the grass below the window. 
 
 How beautiful the morning was with its air of 
 still Ufe ! It was a painted picture, not something 
 actual and living. The immense repose of it touched 
 him strangely. He let his senses sink into it as 
 though it was a bed. 
 
 The dew was heavy in the long grass as he walked 
 through it. When he had gone a little way he 
 stood and looked back. Every window was bhnd : 
 the farm stiU slept : but soon the milkers would 
 be up and stirring — milking began at half-past 
 four. 
 
 He went as though on a thief's errand. He 
 wanted to be sure of what work of mercy the girl 
 called Mary had been busy about. It was easy 
 enough to discover. Under a spreading elm-tree 
 he found a cow licking her new-born calf. The 
 little creature was already striving to get up, while 
 the mother hcked away placidly. The sun broke 
 over them as he stood by watching. The other 
 cattle were grazing quietly in the morning mists 
 that were rolling away off the grass. They looked 
 gigantic, hke mountains feeding, where the field 
 sloped sharply upwards. The little cow, at peace 
 
THE MINISTERING WOMAN 47 
 
 vsdth all the world, showed no alarm at his presence. 
 While he watched them the calf lurched unsteadily 
 to its feet. 
 
 He went back to the house, took his bath-towel, 
 and proceeded to a spot where the river made a 
 small waterfall, which he had discovered for himself 
 the day before. He noticed discontentedly that 
 the bath-towel had a coronet embroidered in one 
 corner above an entwined monogram. They had 
 given him one of the house-towels. He had taken 
 nothing for luxury, carrjdng only what he required 
 for use in his soldier's vaUse : and some one had 
 stupidly packed this tell-tale thing. His mother 
 had worked the coronet with her own hands. 
 Nevertheless, it must be cut or picked out. Then 
 he reminded himself with a laugh that these simple 
 people would hardly know what a coronet meant. 
 If they did, they must think he came by it by 
 accident. He had been very careful that he should 
 come to the farm as plain Mr St Maur. Mr and Mrs 
 Pinkerton had not even suspected him of being an 
 officer. Mr Pinkerton had remarked carelessly 
 that there were lots of genteel young fellers in 
 the ranks now. 'Might pass for a toff easy,' he 
 had said, his head on one side while he inspected 
 Julian — 'that is, to them as didn't know.' 
 
 The sun was on the httle waterfall when he 
 reached it, but the water was dehciously cool. 
 He plunged in, flinging the cold water over his 
 face and hair, and came out with a sense of 
 rejuvenation, shaking the drops from his head. 
 
48 THE HOUSE 
 
 He was going back to have a shave and change of 
 clothing. There had been times lately when he 
 had found it almost intolerably difficult to go 
 through his toilet, yet he had clung to the decencies 
 of life, desperately, as though they were his last 
 stronghold against the creeping tide. This morning 
 he felt equal to the performance. He was conscious 
 of a new interest in life, a new energy and a looking- 
 forward to the events of the day. 
 
 As he came back through the field the cow was 
 still Ipng where he had left her, the calf by her 
 side. Her eyes were dewy, and the thin smoke of 
 her breathing rose from her velvety muzzle. 
 She was a pretty thing, part Alderney, with the 
 look of a pet animal : but her coat still stared, as 
 though the effects of the suffering were not gone by. 
 
 He met Jenkins as he passed through the yard 
 to the house-door. Some one was awake in the 
 house, for the blue smoke ascended in a delicate 
 spiral from the chimney. 
 
 'Been a-walkin' early in the mornin*?' said 
 Jenkins, in a voice Uke a hand-saw. 'My! you 
 do look spry I Been a-washin' of yourself, hey?' 
 
 'I've had a dip in the river.' 
 
 'Oh! you've had? I'd advise you agin it. Cold 
 water's bad inside or out. Give me beer. I haven't 
 more than washed my face of a Sunday for forty 
 year. You be a nice one to have your head in the 
 side of a cow. You'd give her a cold. Got an old 
 cap you can wear? If not — take mine.' 
 
 Julian glanced at Jenkins's cap and declined 
 
THE MINISTERING WOMAN 49 
 
 politely, sapng that he had a soft cap he could 
 wear for milking purposes. 
 
 ' You'd better make haste then to th' ox-steddle,' 
 said Jenkins. ' That there Mary lies late this mornin'. 
 Not that I suppose you'll be much good. Too much 
 of a gentleman you be — that is to say — ^mock 
 gentleman. I don't suppose you was ever brought 
 up to be useful.' 
 
 'I don't suppose I was,' said Julian humbly. 
 'Qh, by the way,' he went on, 'one of your cows 
 has calved. She's all right, lying out in the field 
 with her calf.' 
 
 Jenkins stared at him. 
 
 'I've slep' through it,' he said. 'That's one of 
 the best cows at Sweetwater Farm. I'U see to her 
 now, hopin' she's none the worse. Thank you for 
 tellin' me. I did lie down in my clothes, thinkin' 
 she'd want me. I'll go and give her a bran-mash. 
 You didn't notice if the calf was healthy, did you? 
 Not that you'd know aught about it, you being 
 a reg'lar town-gent.' 
 
 ' The calf looked very healthy to me,' said Julian. 
 
 He returned a little later for his first lesson in 
 milking, wearing the kind of cap which is known 
 in the army as a 'Gore Blimy.' The svm was fully 
 up by the time he got back, and before he reached 
 the gate leading into the field where the cows were 
 driven into a comer for the purpose of being 
 milked, he heard the swishing of milk into the pail. 
 
 Passing through the gate he came upon Mary — 
 he did not know any other name for her — ^her head 
 
50 THE HOUSE 
 
 buried in the side of a cow, milking. She was 
 wearing a blue sunbonnet over her hair. While he 
 watched her she drew the last drops of the milk from 
 the udder, stood up to move to another cow, and 
 saw him. Mechanically he took the milking- 
 stool from her hand and reached out for the pail. 
 
 She coloured a little and smiled. 'We are not 
 accustomed to such attentions at Sweetwater 
 Farm,' she said. 
 
 Then she became businesslike. 
 
 'Jenkins is looking after a cow that calved in 
 the night,' she said. 'I am to give you your first 
 lesson in milking. I hope you will be decently 
 proficient before I go away. Now, you carry the 
 pail of milk to the dairy to be strained. I have an 
 empty pail here. When you've handed in the 
 milk to Rose Buckett come back here and I'll show 
 you how milking is done.' 
 
 He had to break away from Rose Buckett, who, 
 with her pink bodice low at the neck and her sleeves 
 rolled up above her elbows, was presiding in the 
 dairy, straining the warm milk into shallow pans, 
 that stood in long troughs filled as high as the 
 pans with flowing water. The dairy was a dehcious 
 place, smelling of cream and coolness, and Rose, 
 a creature of a radiant complexion and red-gold 
 hair, was very willing to flirt with him, bi^t, 
 murmuring that he had to get back to the milking, 
 he left the disappointed young lady to a very low 
 opinion of him as a young man, and returned to the 
 field. 
 
THE MINISTERING WOMAN 51 
 
 Mary selected one of the gentlest of the cows 
 for him to experiment upon, explaining that Clover 
 knew the difference between her hands and his, 
 but was too reasonable to show resentment. Indeed, 
 Clover bore with his awkwardness most patiently, 
 standing in a philosophical way chewing the cud, 
 now and again blowing out clouds from her nostrils, 
 while she turned round to see what was happen- 
 ing. But for that morning Juhan's labours 
 were mainly confined to watching Mary as she 
 drew the long, thin spirts of milk from the udders, 
 sometimes looking back over her shoulders to 
 make a remark to him. 
 
 'Please,' he said after a time, 'may I know your 
 name? I only know you as Mary.' 
 
 'You mustn't call me miss here,' she said, and 
 laughed. 'We have no class distinctions. My 
 name is Mary Bates. You must please call me Mary.' 
 
 'It seems so presumptuous,' he said, groping in 
 his mind for some memory connected with the 
 name, Mary Bates, without finding it. He had 
 been forgetting things quite a lot since the war, 
 and it wearied him to try to remember, so he 
 desisted. 
 
 'Never mind,' she said, 'you must do it here. 
 And your name? I noticed they called you Mr St 
 Maur. They won't go on doing it.' 
 
 'My name is Juhan,' 
 
 'Ah, Juhan. They will expect Bert or Fred.' 
 
 'I'm afraid I can't pretend to be Bert or Fred,' 
 he said, a little stiffly. 
 
52 THE HOUSE 
 
 She looked up at him and laughter flashed in the 
 calm depths of her eyes. He was glad she had 
 humour. Sometimes those placid people lacked 
 the blessed sense. 
 
 'I could give them a choice of names, if they 
 liked,' he said, and laughed with her. 
 
 'You'd better not. Perhaps they won't mind 
 Julian. They already think you are rather a 
 superior person.' 
 
 'I know,' he said. 'A hairdresser — or a clurk.' 
 
 He caught the children's intonation. He was 
 rather a good mimic. 
 
 Her voice suddenly became professional. Jenkins 
 was approaching. 
 
 'Susie has as fine a calf as ever I see,' he said. 
 'Lucky we didn't lose 'er through me sleepin' like 
 a hog.' 
 
 Mary said nothing : but later on in the day 
 Jenkins came open-mouthed. 
 
 'That there Mary,' he said; 'she was up wi' the 
 cow all night. I never see such a girl. She were 
 born to it. You won't be much good to me when 
 she goes back to that there dratted doctorin' of 
 hers. Waste, I calls it.' 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE HUMAN BEAST 
 
 Life went by peacefully at the farm. It was an 
 early hay-saving, and Juhan was in the haj^eld 
 from dewy mom tiU dewy night, so he saw Httle of 
 Mary Bates, who preferred to work among the 
 animals. Night after night he slept the sleep, 
 sweet and deep, of the labouring man. He said 
 to himself that if he went on like this his cure 
 would not be long in the working. Very seldom 
 now were his dreams visited by the horrors he had 
 known. The simple life and the country peace, the 
 long hours of work in the open air, were doing all 
 for him Sir John could have hoped, and more. 
 
 He wrote cheerful reports to his mother, and 
 walked to a distant post office to drop them in the 
 box. She wrote to him, but he had forbidden the 
 envelope with a coronet. Some one might have 
 understood : one could not be too carefiil or depend 
 too much on the simpUcity of the people at the 
 farm. 
 
 Lady Beauvais read his letters aloud at the 
 breakfast table. 
 
 'I am becoming my own man and thoroughly 
 enjo5niig the Ufe. It suits me down to the ground. 
 
 53 
 
54 THE HOUSE 
 
 I could never have endured a peace-time army. 
 The other was good till that shell knocked me 
 over. Of course, I want to see you and father, 
 darUng, but I have no wish for the life of Cressey 
 or any other big house where every day is a process 
 of killing time. Here we are doing something with 
 our lives. One of these days I shall walk in upon 
 you when Mr Pinkerton can spare me, l)ut I shall 
 not stay. This place suits me too well.' 
 
 'Poor darlin' !' said Lady Beauvais, laying down 
 the letter. 'He can't go on always bein' a farm- 
 pupil with those rough, good people.' 
 
 'I should let him alone for the present, at all 
 events,' Lord Beauvais said, from his end of the 
 table. 'He is learning something useful.' 
 
 'I don't suppose the poor darlin' will need that 
 kind of knowledge,' Lady Beauvais went on, 
 turning over her other letters. ' It won't help him 
 in administering the property — nor as a representa- 
 tive peer.' 
 
 'I wonder how long such things will last,' Lord 
 Beauvais said unexpectedly. 
 
 ' Oh, Hugo ! ' exclaimed Lady Beauvais, ' you do 
 say such odd things ! ' 
 
 ' Dad's a Bolshevik ! ' said Dick, who was at 
 Osborne and very gloomy over having just missed 
 It. 'That's where Julian gets his queer ideas.' 
 
 'We always thought it was from your grand- 
 mother Loughrea,' his mother said; 'you used not 
 to talk Hke that, Hugo — so strange of you before 
 the servants and the children.' 
 
THE HUMAN BEAST 55 
 
 'I believe I was always a Bolshevik,' said Lord 
 Beauvais amazingly. 'We haven't lived up to the 
 job, most of us. Even if we had, it's time for some 
 one else to have a turn. They may have Cressey 
 as soon as they Uke. I've got money enough to 
 ensure your comforts, Ray, and your children's, and, 
 thank Heaven, I've invested outside this country.' 
 
 ' Oh, papa ! — ^not Cressey ! ' broke simultaneously 
 from Dick and the others — 'what would the people 
 do with Cressey — and all the beautiful things ! ' 
 
 'I'll have to get rid of a few more gardeners,' 
 Lord Beauvais said wearily. 'They have fifty-two 
 shillings a week. They ask for sixty. " Very well," 
 I said, " I'll give you sixty, but I shall have to 
 reduce the number. I'm entirely with you — fifty- 
 two shillings a week is only worth about twenty-two 
 shillings before the war. No man ought to be 
 asked to rear a family on twenty-two shillings. 
 None of them wanted to go, but if they are worth 
 sixty shillings and I can only give them fifty-two 
 the thing won't work.' 
 
 'Brutes,' said Dick, 'I'd like to turn a machine- 
 gun on to them. You've spoilt them, father, and 
 mother, too, always doing things for them and 
 their children. They know you're too sjmipathetic 
 — that's what it is.' 
 
 'They are too extravagant,' said Rosamund, a 
 fat, fair, little girl, very like her mother but less 
 amiable. 'Tubman's daughter, Maggie, has a 
 silk sports coat from Gorringe's, and high boots, 
 much smarter than mine.' 
 
56 THE HOUSE 
 
 'The village girls won't come to play hockey 
 with us,' put in Dorothy, "at least, only the younger 
 ones came. The big girls came once, but never 
 any more.' 
 
 'Ah, the day has passed, my dear, when it was 
 an honour to play with you,' said Lord Beauvais, 
 putting out his hand to caress Dorothy's fair curls. 
 She was a peculiarly solemn-looking child. 
 
 'And what has Joy to say for herself? ' he asked. 
 
 Joy was now nineteen and still lived a good deal 
 apart from the rest of her family as to her thoughts 
 and aspirations. 
 
 'I want to learn dairy-work and cheese-making 
 at Julian's farm, as soon as you and mummie will 
 give me leave,' she said unexpectedly. 
 
 Lady Beauvais was overwhelmed. She had 
 never gone anjrwhere unaccompanied up to the 
 time of her marriage. Beauvais had a tale of how 
 a short time after her marriage she had asked him 
 pleadingly to go with her to Jay's. 
 
 ' Not into the shop, my dear ! ' he had answered. 
 'I know some men who don't mind looking on at 
 their wives' shopping. I should hate it.' 
 
 The bride's face had clouded sadly. 'Oh, then,' 
 she had said, with resignation, 'I suppose I must 
 take my maid ! ' 
 
 'Take your maid ! Why? Can't you go by 
 yourself? ' 
 
 'Oh, Hugo, darlin' !' In the immensity of her 
 pleasure she had flung her arms about his neck — 
 'You think I really may? Of course, it does make 
 
THE HUMAN BEAST 57 
 
 a difference being married. It has been so dull, 
 always with a maid at one's heels, and Jarratt is 
 so stupid. She can say nothing but " Yes, my 
 lady," and "No, my lady.'" 
 
 That was the story as Lord Beauvais often told 
 it. But Lady Beauvais had imposed the yoke of 
 the maid on her own children. She had Ustened 
 placidly to her husband when he had talked of the 
 girls learning how to be useful in the world. They 
 were useful, poor darlin's, Dorothy had taken 
 off her hands the sending out of The Parish Magazine 
 and the accounts of the Girls' Friendly. And 
 Rosamund was interested in poultry. Her Mttle 
 white Wyandotte had sat this year and actually 
 brought out one chicken. James, the estate- 
 carpenter, had made such a lovely run for the 
 chicken, and hatching-boxes and coops, and all 
 sorts of things, for there would be more chickens 
 next time. Lady Beauvais thought it very clever 
 of Rosamund to have managed that one small bird. 
 
 'There wiU be time enough for you to talk about 
 learning dairy-work next year, darUn',' she said, 
 looking fondly at the one of her daughters who 
 perplexed lier. 'That is if you have time. Next 
 year there will be the question of comin' out. I 
 suppose the dear King and Queen will be holdin' 
 their Courts as usual.' 
 
 'I don't want to come out,' said Joy. 'I want 
 to learn dairjdng at Sweetwater Farm.' 
 
 'Oh, dear Joy, what a child you are for always 
 wantin' to do somethin' ! It was languages last 
 
58 THE HOUSE 
 
 year. Next year we'll be able to go abroad. That's 
 the way to get languages. I did take such trouble 
 about your havin' a Fraiulein when you were 
 children for the sake of the language, and now that's 
 wiped out, for I don't suppose any one will ever 
 want German any more. Fraulein was so very 
 greedy, too : it was quite painful to have her. 
 And the various Mademoiselles. I'm sure no one 
 could say I didn't do my best for you, darlin', and 
 all my children.' 
 
 'Why not let Joy go while JuUan is there?' 
 Lord Beauvais put in, unexpectedly. 'I think 
 she's right. Girls are going to need something 
 more of equipment for the world than a smatter 
 of languages and a capacity for addressing parish 
 magazines. I wish that I'd learnt practical farming 
 and all sorts of other things. I'd have a pull with 
 my men now. They'd respect me more for knowing 
 their work. They know my money falls into my 
 lap without my earning it. I should have learnt 
 to work with my hands.' 
 
 'Oh, Hugo, I'm sure no one works harder!' 
 cried Lady Beauvais, aghast. 'Just think of all 
 the things you did that I was so proud of : your 
 cricket, your polo, your fishin' and rowin'. You 
 know you are a splendid horseman, and a good shot.' 
 
 'Mere play,' said Lord Beauvais, getting very 
 red. ' I always wanted to work, only circumstances 
 were too strong for me. I nearly became a pro- 
 fessional soldier. I nearly went in for diplomacy 
 as a profession. Cressey was always hung round 
 
THE HUMAN BEAST 59 
 
 my neck— Cressey and a hundred thousand a year. 
 It goes pretty fast now. Look at the land-tax 1 
 It will be higher next year ! ' 
 
 'What did the Duke mean by calling daddy an 
 optimist?' asked Dorothy. 'He said such funny 
 things : " You ought to be sent round to the country 
 houses to put up their spirits, BeauVais. You're 
 so cock-a-hoop. You're a bloomin' tonic, a pick-me- 
 up, that's what you are." What a funny thing to 
 say, papa ! ' 
 
 'The Duke is very amusin',' said Lady Beauvais, 
 without seeming amused. 
 
 Afterwards husband and wife had a discussion 
 as to Joy's future. Lady Beauvais thought the 
 war had told on Joy as it had told on every one. 
 She was very thin, poor darhn', and she missed 
 Julian. 
 
 'She was always one of the lean kine,' said Lord 
 Beauvais. 'Neither she nor Jvilian will ever be fat. 
 They are too keen. With JuUan there to look after 
 her the farm would be quite all right — Mr and Mrs 
 Pinkerton bear the best of reputations.' 
 
 'It is all very strange to me,' said Lady Beauvais. 
 'Of course, as you say, dear Julian will be there to 
 look after the darhn'. She has been lookin' a 
 httle fretted.' 
 
 Meanwhile, the hay being saved, Julian was 
 learning to know more of Mary Bates. He discovered 
 that when she was not otherwise employed she 
 went to meet the Pinkerton children coming home 
 from Rudham school, to which they were carried 
 
 T.H. E 
 
6o THE HOUSE 
 
 every morning by a carrier's cart going that way. 
 It was too busy a time of year to send for them, 
 and since the children had been frightened by a 
 tramp, whom Willum John had bidden courageously 
 to 'chuck it!' some one had gone to meet them 
 every day. 
 
 It was certainly a very lonely road to Rudham 
 School, which lay in a backwater of hfe, well away 
 from main roads. Julian had sometimes walked 
 that way on a Sunday afternoon when the males 
 at the farm slept and snored, and Mrs Pinkerton 
 had taken Mary and the children to see Granny 
 Pinkerton, in the old wagonette that lay dusty 
 through the weeks in an outhouse. The hay being 
 now made up into cocks, she was allowed to 
 drive Sukey, the one of the cart-horses which had 
 a bit of a trapper in her and moved less like a 
 mountain than the others. 
 
 Julian had been amazed at the loneUness of the 
 roads. In three miles there was not a cottage. 
 Lord Ashbury had been cutting down his timber 
 and the wood was built up in great stacks either 
 side of the road which ran through the woodland 
 and by heath for the whole three miles. 
 
 He had come in one day from washing sheep 
 to hear a story which had greatly excited 
 Mrs Pinkerton. Mr Pinkerton was at tie market 
 that day, driving Sukey : the other horses had 
 been turned out for a rest after the ha5anaking. 
 
 It seemed that a prisoner had escaped from the 
 County Jail, a thoroughly bad lot, one of those 
 
THE HUMAN BEAST 6i 
 
 pests of the country-side who waylay women and 
 children. Young Jenkins had heard the news in 
 the town. He was a greengrocer's young man and 
 came for supplies to Sweetwater Farm. It was 
 said to be in the newspapers, but young Jenkins 
 had not been able to procure the paper. 
 
 'Don' believe more than half what you hear,' 
 said the elder Jenkins, stuffing himself with a cold 
 pasty. 'And least of all what's in the papers. 
 Papers Uve by lies. It's their trade.' 
 
 'Has Mary gone to meet the children?' asked 
 Julian, forgetting that he was very hungry. 
 
 'She started nigh half an hour ago. I heard 
 Windledene Church clock strike one soon after she 
 went. She'll be well on her way by this,' Mrs 
 Pinkerton answered. She looked at Julian with 
 an insinuating manner which covered real 
 anxiety. 
 
 'Was you thinkin' of follerin' 'er? If Pinkerton 
 was but home ye could have Sukey. I won't have 
 another winter of sending those precious lambs to 
 Rudham, not unless Pinkerton was to give me a 
 governess cart and pony. 
 
 Julian did not hear the conclusion of this speech. 
 He had gone out, old Bobs, the Airedale, at his 
 heels. In the haU he picked up his blackthorn, a 
 souvenir of MaUse's time in the Dublin Fusiliers, 
 which he had presented to his friend. 
 
 It was a gray afternoon, with a sagging sky; 
 over the downs a broad band of yellow light showing 
 — one of the days when the world is suddenly 
 
64 THE HOUSE 
 
 growled very low and threateningly. Julian began 
 to run, forgetting the sickness that had come on 
 with his headache. 
 
 He saw the creature who had had power to 
 terrify her — ^the human beast, the broad arrow 
 showing on his dirty and mud-stained clothing — 
 rushing upon her with a fury Uke a btill's — the 
 huge neck, the big, closely-cropped head, the hairy 
 hands ready for clutching. 
 
 Mary had put up no fight. She seemed paralysed 
 beyond the power of flight. She had been so fear- 
 less. Would she ever be as fearless again? It was 
 one of the counts in Julian's rage against the brute 
 who had so terrified her. He saw red. Bobs had 
 bounded away before him. The human brute saw 
 nothing of what was coming; but suddenly Mary 
 opened her eyes. She had just time to step aside 
 from her assailant's path. The curse beginning on 
 his lips were never finished. Down came Julian's 
 blackthorn crashing on his head. Bobs had flown 
 at his throat. He went over heavily into the deep 
 bracken. 
 
 Then they heard the voices of the children, 
 laughing and singing in the distance : and suddenly 
 Julian reeled as though something had broken in 
 his brain. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE SHEPHERDESS 
 
 It was some time before he knew what had happened. 
 The sun was sinking low when he awoke to Mr 
 Pinkerton beside his bed, the red sun in his hair 
 and whiskers. 
 
 'All right now, hey? ' said the good man, with a 
 genial roar, which he tried in vain to modulate. 
 'I were for hevin' the doctor, but the missus she 
 were agen it. Mary told us what a fright she'd 
 hed. I drove there fast as the little horse could 
 take me. There was no sign o' that rascal. Might 
 heve been a dream o' Mary's.' 
 
 'He was gone? I thought I might have killed 
 him. I meant to.' 
 
 'No blame to you. He'd left signs behind to 
 show w'ere he'd laid. You couldn't kill rascals 
 like him, worse luck ! ' 
 
 'I suppose we ought to let the police know?' 
 Julian said wearily. He was conscious of the 
 utmost distaste for letting the police know. He 
 hated the publicity for Mary — ^in a less degree for 
 himself. He imagined the newspaper paragraphs 
 and shuddered. 
 
 65 
 
66 THE HOUSE 
 
 'Time enough, lad,' said Mr Pinkerton. I don't 
 suppose he'll get very far — ^not with a bloody 'ead. 
 Seein' the sort o' blackguard he is, I'd rather keep 
 Mary out of it. I'm grateful to that girl for keepin' 
 it from the childring. Let's wait a biddle.' 
 
 The homely counsel was an immense reUef to 
 JuUan. He would hardly have dared to decide 
 for himself. 
 
 ' I've little maids of my own ! ' said Mr Pinkerton : 
 and Julian recognised the unexpected delicacy, 
 and loved him for it. 
 
 The next day he was sufficiently recovered, 
 although still with the dregs of his headache, to 
 run up to town. He met one or two acquaintances 
 whom he would have avoided if he could. But 
 while he hailed a taxi at Piccadilly to take him to 
 Charing Cross he ran into MaUse Southwell, who 
 had just walked across from the Green Park — 
 Malise, the ideal fldneur, extremely well-dressed, 
 and looking a Uly of the field. 
 
 He smiled when JuUan flushed with the pleasure 
 of the meeting. He still had the old fascination 
 for JuUan of his school days. 
 
 'Hallo, Malise ! This is good !' he said fervently. 
 
 'Where are you off to? And what have you 
 been doing with yourself? It's years since we met. 
 Is this your taxi?' 
 
 'Yes, I was going back to Sussex — five-seven at 
 Charing Cross. You know I'm in Arcadia, by the 
 doctor's orders?' 
 
 'Yes, I know. Your general get-up betrays it. 
 
THE SHEPHERDESS 67 
 
 and still you don't look as if it was doing you very 
 much good. Why don't you write to me, you 
 slacker? I only got your news from your people. 
 I ran down to Cressey last week-end.' 
 
 'Oh, how are they all?' Julian asked, with an 
 aloof detachment which made Malise smile again. 
 The hot day in London had brought back Julian's 
 headache. He simply longed for the greenness and 
 freshness of Sweetwater Farm. 
 
 'Nothing to complain of. Your mother was as 
 kind and patient with me as usual. It must have 
 been more difficult since your father agreed with 
 so many of my heresies.' 
 
 'I believe father will end as a Labour man,' said 
 Julian. 
 
 ' That's where you get it. May I ask if you've had 
 any lunch?' 
 
 He asked the question abruptly. Julian was 
 looking very black about the eyes and his lips had 
 a pinched look. 
 
 'Now you mention it, I don't believe I had,' 
 JuHan said meekly. 'I forgot all about it.' 
 
 'I thought so. You're going to be fed. I've a 
 room not far from here. Editorial offices of the 
 Country. You've heard of the Country} It's not 
 exactly a Socialistic organ, but it's advanced. 
 And very literary. Why should the die-hards have 
 all the literature? I'm the editor, you know.' 
 
 'I didn't know,' said Julian, getting into the 
 taxi gladly. 
 
 The offices of the Country were on a second 
 
68 THE HOUSE 
 
 floor in Regent Street, very comfortable and well- 
 furnished, with every suggestion of prosperity 
 about them. Malise rang a bell and a man-servant 
 came in answer. 
 
 ' I want a meal at once for Lord Amory, who has 
 been in town all day without food. Don't wait to 
 cook it. You know where to get it and what to 
 get. Have a whisky and soda, Juhan.' 
 
 JuUan accepted the whisky and soda gratefully. 
 
 A little later the meal arrived, a meal which did 
 every credit to Pierre's judgment. Pierre was a 
 new acquisition, a treasure recommended to Malise 
 by a certain beautiful French duchess. His 
 movements were quick and soundless. He served 
 the meal beautifully. Fresh from the simpUcities 
 of the farm-house life, Julian could appreciate the 
 beautiful white cloth, the glasses, the silver, the 
 flowers, all of the best, with which Pierre had 
 presented the meal. 
 
 'This looks flourishing,' said Julian, beginning 
 to recover after the soup and the deUcate morsel 
 of fish. 
 
 'The Country is booming. Haven't you seen it 
 on the railway bookstalls? I've got a capitalist. 
 He never squirmed at the preliminary expenses, 
 which were enormous. He had faith in me. Now, 
 look ! . . .' 
 
 He fetched a copy of the Country from an 
 adjoining table where it lay amid a litter of many 
 things. 
 
 ' We call it an illustrated review,' he said. ' There's 
 
THE SHEPHERDESS 69 
 
 nothing quite like it. We had to make room for 
 the advertisements.' 
 
 There was elation in his voice as he turned over 
 with apparent carelessness the advertisement 
 pages. 
 
 'There yoil are ! Everything for the country, 
 from pig-troughs to motor-cars. We didn't quite 
 mean that sort of country when we began, but we 
 had to give it a bucolic tinge to please the advertisers. 
 I've the most persuasive canvasser in London : 
 honey's not in it with his tongue. I'm afraid he's 
 told Ues about the paper. I acknowledge to you, 
 privately, Juhan, that he queered my pitch a bit.' 
 
 'I thought it looked as though there was more 
 Capital than Labour about it.' 
 
 'You are unquestionably right. The other man, 
 Sidney Mortimer, who refused Capital for his 
 Labour paper, has gone to the wall. Anyhow — a 
 lot of these are American advertisements. When 
 I can get my capitalist up to it I shall run a real 
 Labour review on the profits of this.' 
 
 JuHan smiled. MaUse always amused him, and 
 by this time he was equal to smiling. He recognised 
 that he had been exhausted from want of food. 
 
 'By the way, your Httle sister, Joy, has been 
 sending me poetry, and very good poetry. I was 
 able to reassure your mother, who was afraid that 
 Lady Joyce was being led into revolutionary ways. 
 She recognised that poetry which is paid for must 
 have a certain stability.' 
 
 'If I went out with the Red Flag Joy would 
 
70 THE HOUSE 
 
 follow me,' said Julian, 'She is the most intrepid 
 thing alive.' 
 
 'Yes, I know,' said Malise, suddenly earnest. 
 Then he added, with a return of his gaiety, 'It is 
 really very hard on Lady Beauvais.' 
 
 He wanted JuUan to stay for the night. While 
 he urged him he glanced carelessly at the many 
 invitation cards which stood on his mantelpiece. 
 
 'I ought to go to three dances to-night,' he said, 
 'but I needn't go. Urgent private business must 
 be enough for my hostesses.' 
 
 'Not on my account,' Julian said, standing up. 
 ' I must get back to the farm to-night. In any case 
 I could not be the cause of your disappointing 
 so many ladies.' 
 
 'Sweet things! I adore the fair sex,' Malise 
 said gaily. 'I'm always in love — with a dozen. 
 I don't deceive them. The male flirt is a poor 
 thing. They know I can't afford to marry, 
 and even the mammas regard me as a harmless 
 detrimental.' 
 
 'You'll be able to afford it presently,' said Julian, 
 picking up the blackthorn Malise had given him, 
 which had served him in such good stead only 
 yesterday. Why, he had had tc) wash the brute's 
 blood and hair from it ! 
 
 'There's the mother to think of,' Malise answered. 
 'I can't think of myself till I've insured her old 
 age. It was my first thought when I got hit at 
 Vimy, that there were only a few hundreds for 
 her if I was going to peg out.' 
 
THE SHEPHERDESS 71 
 
 'Well, good-bye, old chap ! I shall have to 
 catch my train. You've been a good doctor. I 
 feel wonderfully better.' 
 
 They went towards the door. 
 
 'I'll come to see you in Arcadia,' said MaUse. 
 
 'Don't !' said JuUan. 'I don't know how long 
 I'll be there. By the way — do you ever see Tom 
 Bates now? You used to have such an admiration 
 for him.' 
 
 ' I'm still his disciple. He's the most tolerant fellow. 
 You can't imagine the wisdom and humour of his 
 face when he says, " You'll settle down. Dance 
 off the memory of it, lad. You'll be none the 
 worse man after. . . ."' 
 
 'Did you say,' Julian asked, his hand on the 
 door-handle, 'that he had a daughter?' 
 
 'Yes : she's at college somewhere. Shaping to 
 be a doctor, I believe. I haven't seen her for a 
 long time. She promised to be a splendid creature.' 
 
 All — so the thing Julian had lost, had been 
 fumbling about in his brains for, had come to 
 light. Mr Pinkerton had referred to Mary's father 
 as " one o' them there agitators wot makes people 
 discontented." Mary was Tom Bates's daughter, 
 the child who had been bom when her mother was 
 turned out on the roadside to die. — 
 
 He was very careful with the packet he carried, 
 handling it as though he liked the feel of it, while 
 he went down the long stairs, laughing at Malise 
 who was protesting against Julian's shabby khaki, 
 and imploring him to have a hair-cut before leaving 
 
72 THE HOUSE 
 
 town. 'Think of old Considine's face if he saw that 
 head of hair ! ' he said, Considine had been Julian's 
 colonel and a stickler for military neatness. There 
 was a story that Considine had shaved every day, 
 during the Gaza show, when every man was 
 restricted to a pint of water for all purposes in the 
 torrid weather. 
 
 The meeting had done Julian good. The old 
 affection and devotion to MaUse still remained 
 strong in him, and he was amused and exhilarated 
 as he had not been for long. Malise had given liim 
 something to think of, too, in what he had told 
 him about Mary Bates. Mary Bates ! He was 
 glad her name was Mary. No other name would 
 have suited her softness, her fullness, the mild 
 beneficence of her gaze. He said the name 
 over softly to himself. 'Mary Bates, daughter of 
 Tom Bates.' It smacked unmistakably of the 
 people, but that did not matter to Julian. And — 
 she was going to be a doctor. That explained 
 things, the curious pity in her gaze, so unlike what 
 one would expect in a young girl : the incident of 
 the little cow, her way with children and animals 
 — a. ministering, mothering way. 
 
 He found Mr Pinkerton, on his arrival at the 
 farm, sitting in his favourite seat in the corner 
 formed by the two sides of the house, smoking his 
 pipe, and was welcomed as though he had been 
 absent for long. 
 
 'Mother, mother,' Mr Pinkerton bellowed over 
 his shoulder without looking round, 'here be Julian 
 
THE SHEPHERDESS 73 
 
 home from London and fair starved. Get on wi' 
 supper.' 
 
 'I'm not so hungry/ said Julian. 'I had a good 
 meal at half -past four.' 
 
 'You'll be ready for another, lad,' said Mr 
 Pinkerton benevolently. They had taken Julian 
 to their hearts as a good lad who needed feeding 
 up and plenty of it, one who did his best and never 
 complained. 'A bit clumsy,' said Mr Pinkerton, 
 'but wilUn'.' 
 
 'D'you see any dust along yander road?' Mr 
 Pinkerton asked, inditating with a stubby fore- 
 finger a strip of road that climbed the. Down. 'It 
 will be Mary comin' with her sheep if there be any 
 dust. She's overdue.' 
 
 'Mary — ^with her sheep?' 
 
 'She went at three o'clock. I thought she'd be 
 back by six. What d'ye make it? It's half -past 
 eight by my watch.' 
 
 'Is that the way she will come?' Julian asked 
 in a very quiet voice, taking up his hat and stick 
 and the parcel he had been carrjdng, which lay at 
 his feet. 
 
 'She'll come over Shottery Down. Don't you 
 be scared, lad. Sheep are ticklish things to drive. 
 She hae Jenkins's Whiteface with her — the best 
 sheep-dog I ever knew. He'd get her along. Hi ! 
 where be you goin'?' 
 
 'Going to meet her,' said Julian. 'I'll borrow a 
 bicycle if I may. It will get me along quicker. No, 
 old chap'— to the Airedale — 'you can't come. 
 
72 THE HOUSE 
 
 town. 'Think of old Considine's face if he saw that 
 head of hair ! ' he said. Considine had been JuUan's 
 colonel and a stickler for military neatness. There 
 was a story that Considine had shaved every day, 
 during the Gaza show, when every man was 
 restricted to a pint of water for all purposes in the 
 torrid weather. 
 
 The meeting had done Julian good. The old 
 affection and devotion to Malise still remained 
 strong in him, and he was amused and exhilarated 
 as he had not been for long. Malise had given him 
 something to think of, too, in what he had told 
 him about Mary Bates. Mary Bates ! He was 
 glad her name was Mary. No other name would 
 have suited her softness, her fullness, the mild 
 beneficence of her gaze. He said the name 
 over softly to himself. 'Mary Bates, daughter of 
 Tom Bates.' It smacked unmistakably of the 
 people, but that did not matter to Julian. And — 
 she was going to be a doctor. That explained 
 things, the curious pity in her gaze, so unUke what 
 one would expect in a young girl : the incident of 
 the little cow, her way with children and animals 
 — a. ministering, mothering way. 
 
 He found Mr Pinkerton, on his arrival at the 
 farm, sitting in his favourite seat in the corner 
 formed by the two sides of the house, smoking his 
 pipe, and was welcomed as though he had been 
 absent for long. 
 
 'Mother, mother,' Mr Pinkerton bellowed over 
 his shoulder without looking round, 'here be Julian 
 
THE SHEPHERDESS 73 
 
 home from London and fair starved. Get on wi' 
 supper.' 
 
 ' I'm not so hungry,' said Julian. ' I had a good 
 meal at half-past four.' 
 
 'You'll be ready for another, lad,' said Mr 
 Pinkerton benevolently. They had taken Julian 
 to their hearts as a good lad who needed feeding 
 up and plenty of it, one who did his best and never 
 complained. 'A bit clumsy,' said Mr Pinkerton, 
 'but willin'.' 
 
 'D'you see any dust along yander road?' Mr 
 Pinkerton asked, indicating with a stubby fore- 
 finger a strip of road that climbed the. Down. 'It 
 will be Mary comin' with her sheep if there be any 
 dust. She's overdue.' 
 
 'Mary — ^with her sheep?' 
 
 'She went at three o'clock. I thought she'd be 
 back by six. What d'ye make it? It's half-past 
 eight by my watch.' 
 
 'Is that the way she will come?' Juhan asked 
 in a very quiet voice, taking up his hat and stick 
 and the parcel he had been carrying, which lay at 
 his feet. 
 
 'She'll come over Shottery Down. Don't you 
 be scared, lad. Sheep are ticklish things to drive. 
 She hae Jenkins's Whiteface with her — the best 
 sheep-dog I ever knew. He'd get her along. Hi ! 
 where be you goin'?' 
 
 'Going to meet her,' said JuUan. 'I'll borrow a 
 bicycle if I may. It will get me along quicker. No, 
 old chap' — ^to the Airedale — 'you can't come. 
 
74 THE HOUSE 
 
 It's too hot to follow a bicycle, and Whiteface 
 wouldn't like it.' 
 
 'She would goo,' said Mr Pinkerton defensively. 
 ' Sam Grayson brought word there was no grass for 
 the sheep. We want rain badly. She went ofi 
 before ever a man could stop her. Hi ! You're 
 not gooin' without supper?' 
 
 ' I dare say I shall be back soon,' said Julian, and 
 went off to look for the bicycle. 
 
 The country under the Downs was very quiet 
 and dark, for the masses of bracken and the 
 overhanging woods, as he passed through it. The 
 road led by the scene of yesterday's encounter, 
 past Rudham School, where the schoolmistress. 
 Miss Stubbs, and her assistant lived in a fearless 
 loneliness. Mary must have counted on getting 
 back by daylight when she went to fetch 
 the sheep. She must have intended to take 
 the lighter, brighter road that skirted the 
 wood, where at least one could see what was 
 coming. 
 
 As he went on, with no sign or sound of her and 
 the sheep, he began to have sharp variations from 
 agonised conjecture to savage rage at her being 
 out alone that time of the night, in lonely country, 
 where she might encounter the villain from whom 
 he had saved her yesterday, or some one as evil. 
 He wondered if the sheep-dog could be trusted to 
 defend her if the need arose. He said to himself 
 that the country was no place for her; she was too 
 fearless. He objurcated the Pinkertons for allowing 
 
THE vSHEPHERDESS 75 
 
 her to do such mad things. He sweated and he was 
 cold. 
 
 Then, turning a sharp corner, he beheld her, or 
 perhaps he only divined her in the Uttle cloud of 
 dust that rose above the plodding sheep. In a 
 second he was ofi his bicycle and meeting her. 
 
 'It is too late for you to be out,' he said, almost 
 roughly. 
 
 'I am so sorry,' she said meekly. 'One of the 
 sheep was lame. I had to let her rest and travel 
 by easy stages.' 
 
 'Were you not afraid?' he asked. 
 
 'I thought I could trust Whiteface. He is a 
 very wise dog. You are not to be afraid for me. 
 This country is peaceful. Yesterday's happening 
 would not come again in many years. I did not 
 dare give way to being afraid. And the sheep had 
 eaten the pasture bare as your hand. There was 
 no one else to send.' 
 
 'You should not have gone,' he said, sullen with 
 the remembrance of what he had endured for her 
 sake. 'You are not to go again.' 
 
 'Oh!' she said, with sudden pity. She might 
 have been thirty for the motherUness of her gaze. 
 'I have frightened you. You have been suffering 
 for me. Why did you go to London to-day? You 
 were not fit for it — and now this fright.' 
 
 They moved on, side by side, in what was fast 
 becoming twilight. 
 
 ' See how capable Whiteface is ! ' she said. ' I 
 should have to wait for moonrise if he were not so 
 
 T.H. F 
 
76 THE HOUSE 
 
 clever. It would be so easy to lose a sheep or two 
 in this dusk.' 
 
 'I went to town to buy you something, Mary,' 
 he said. ' Here it is ! You can feel it if you cannot 
 see it. If you do not know the use of it I will teach 
 you.' 
 
 'What is it?' she asked, feeling over the packet. 
 
 'It is the prettiest and the surest miniature 
 revolver I could find. If you will make these 
 expeditions you must have means of defence. 
 Be careful of it. You are not the girl to go firing 
 it off for anything and everything.' 
 
 'I know nothing about a revolver,' she said, 
 'but I am a good rifle shot. I learnt during the 
 war. Father always says: "Learn anything you 
 can, my girl. Knowledge is power." Thank you 
 for giving me this. I shall feel safe having it. It 
 is so small and so easy to carry.' 
 
 He saw her put it into the pocket of the smock 
 she wore. They went the quickest way home — 
 through the dark wood which was the scene of 
 yesterday's adventure. As she passed the spot 
 where she had been so terrified she crept a little 
 closer to him. He saw it and he was glad. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 AT THE WINDOW 
 
 Joy came a little later to Sweetwater Farm, as 
 Julian's sister, Joy Saymore, as they reproduced 
 St Maur — a most republican simplicity ruled at 
 the farm — ^not as Lady Joyce St Maur. She was 
 Joy to the good Pinkertons before she had been 
 half an hour imder their roof, and Joy to Rose 
 Buckett of the brilliant cheeks and flaming hair 
 after a very brief period of being Miss Sa3niiore, 
 when she was not 'Dear.' 'Dear' was said with 
 the peculiar, caressing intonation which involves 
 the rolling of eyes and general display of dramatic 
 action that accompany the use of the epithet by 
 young ladies like Rose. 
 
 Miss Buckett was indeed embarrassingly friendly 
 to Joy, and Joy had to flee from her confidences, 
 half terrified, to Mary Bates. 
 
 'What do you suppose she means,' asked Joy, 
 'when, having told me numerous stories of the 
 respectable young men she has turned down, she 
 says : " There ! I little thought what was coomin' 
 my way. Not but what a gipsy woman did once 
 tell my fortune that I was to marry a gentleman — 
 and a dark one."' 
 
 77 
 
78 THE HOUSE 
 
 'I should say,' said Mary, with her grave smile, 
 ' that Rose fancies herself in love with a gentleman ! ' 
 
 ' But who ? ' asked Joy, wide-eyed. ' You wouldn't 
 think gentlemen could come her way. I said I 
 hoped she would marry some one very nice, and 
 she said : " You go h'on. Don't pertend as 'ow 
 you don't know."' 
 
 'Rose is a very silly girl,' said Mary; and for 
 some reason her colour deepened. 'Jenkins has 
 a son, a very good young man who is employed 
 at a greengrocer's at Shornham, and hopes one day 
 to have a shop of his own. I thought Rose was going 
 to marry him. He is very much in love with her. 
 I'm afraid she's rather cruel and stupid about it. 
 I met him on the road the other day and he poured 
 out all his griefs to me. He really cried, poor boy ! 
 Such a nice, pink-cheeked, clean boy ! Don't 
 encourage her, Joy, by listening to her nonsense.' 
 
 'Oh,' said Joy ruefully, 'I don't encourage her, 
 but I'm afraid she will go on being very silly without 
 any encouragement from me.' 
 
 However, despite Rose's folly as regarded young 
 men, she was a very competent butter-and-cheese- 
 maker, and Joy was handed over to her with 
 confidence by Mrs Pinkerton to be instructed in 
 these arts. 
 
 It was all very delightful to Joy, this pastoral 
 life, after the Ufe at Cressey, where she had found 
 it very easy to be bored without Julian, for her 
 father and mother were all in all to each other, 
 somewhat shutting out their beloved and loving 
 
AT THE WINDOW 79 
 
 children. She was up in the morning early learning 
 to milk the cows, looking as pretty as possible in 
 the blue and pink prints Lady Beauvais had provided 
 for her eccentric child. Her ladyship had aimed 
 at absolute simplicity, such an outfit as might 
 excite no surprise at Sweetwater Farm; but either 
 she had no idea of how people dressed at a farm or 
 her heart failed her when it was a questioil of 
 giving 'the poor darUn' entirely plain clothing. 
 The fact was that Joy, simply attired as to the 
 outside wear, had dehcate undergarments of fine 
 linen, tucked and veined and trimmed with Uttle 
 tuckers of real lace. 
 
 ' My word, you do look a gurt toff ! ' cried Rose, 
 having come to Joy's bedroom one night on a 
 pretext of asking the time, so as to set her alarm- 
 clock for the morning. 'Easy to see you ain't no 
 coromon girl ! That there lace — w'y I wouldn't be 
 surprised now if it 'ad stood you in a shiUin' a yard. 
 Silver-'air brushes, too : an', rabbit me, what a 
 beauty of a dressin'-gownd ! You don't say as you 
 wears the Ukes o' them every day ! ' 
 
 'I didn't know there was anything remarkable 
 about them,' answered Joy, with an abashed air. 
 
 'My aunt, you don't : you must 'ave a spendin' 
 maw. That your watch? Say — it is pretty!' 
 
 It was a httle platinum watch with a monogram 
 in turquoise and pearls. Rose gloated over it, 
 turning it about with many exclamations of rapturci 
 
 'I call it real refined,' she said. 'Quiet, yet rich. 
 Some one had taste that bought that watch ! ' 
 
8o THE HOUSE 
 
 'My mother gave it to me,' said Joy, She had 
 aheady given Rose various small articles, which 
 she had admired enthusiastically. The children 
 at Cressey had always been told that they must 
 share with those less fortunately placed than 
 themselves, and Joy had received the teaching 
 with a fullness of interpretation that had sometimes 
 taken away her mother's breath. 
 
 She was a little afraid of Rose's designs on the 
 watch, so she hastily said that it was her mother's 
 gift. 
 
 'Go h'on !' said Rose archly. 'It were a feller. 
 Not that I'd take it from you — bless yer 'eart, no. 
 Were it a valentine?' 
 
 'Oh, no,' said Joy, 'it was for my eighteenth 
 birthday.' 
 
 She was standing in her nightdress all this time, 
 longing for Rose to be gone that she might say her 
 prayers and creep into bed. She was tired from 
 her early rising and her industrious day. To-morrow 
 Mr Pinkerton had promised to show her how to 
 take a swarm of bees. One had been discovered 
 hanging on the trailing branch of a very ancient 
 apple-tree in the garden. None of his offspring 
 was allowed to approach the swarm since an 
 occasion when the queen bee had all but settled 
 in Ethel Jane's hair. 
 
 'Hadn't you better go to bed. Rose?' she said, 
 and yawned. 'It is nearly ten o'clock. There is 
 the moon beginning to look through the apple- 
 boughs. I am very sleepy.' 
 
AT THE WINDOW 8i 
 
 'Imperence !' said Rose, tossing her head. 'You 
 didn't pay a penny for your manners ! ' 
 
 She made a sudden pounce at a photograph of 
 Julian on the mantelpiece. 
 
 'My Hevings, it is Uke,' she said, with a rapturoiK 
 squeak. 'Say, Joy, your brother's a lovely 
 young man. What d'ye thenk o' that there 
 Mary, now? Settin' 'er cap — ^hey? I wouldn't 
 be one to spile sport. She isn't what I'd call a 
 stock-figger. Too much on the large side, I call 
 her.' 
 
 With this gibe at Mary's beautiful ampUtude 
 she departed, only to put in her head again and 
 say in a chuckUng voice — 
 
 'Don't you Uke talkin' of your young men? 
 You are a secret one, but I expeck you've got a 
 mort of 'em. I would hke to set up all night an' 
 'ear about 'em. W'en I were to London — I lived 
 to London most of the time; thet's w'y I speak 
 different from these yere Sussex folk, I'd imdreds o' 
 fellers. Come h'on now, an' tell me about your feUers.' 
 
 'I haven't got such a thing,' said Joy hastily: 
 and received unexpected support from Mrs Pinkerton 
 who called out from somewhere or other that the 
 girls were to go to sleep and not keep each other 
 awake talking. 
 
 'Meddlesome cat!' said Rose, putting out her 
 tongue at an imaginary Mrs Pinkerton. 'I'll 'ave 
 to go, Joy. Never mind, I'll get 'is nime out of you 
 
 yet." 
 
 Joy blew out her candle, glad to be left alone. 
 
82 THE HOUSE 
 
 She said her simple prayers, praying for all those 
 she loved, for her country, for all the sufferers of 
 the war, for the dead and the hving. Lord Beauvais 
 was a High Churchman, and the services at his 
 parish church were, to the minds of the simple 
 people, Papistical. But religion had been in the 
 atmosphere of Cressey. The children had grown 
 up to it. Some one had said that it made a light, 
 bright atmosphere in the stately rooms. 
 
 As she rose from her knees, the moon in the angle 
 of the apple-boughs cast a tracery of shadows on 
 her white nightgown. There was a little wind, 
 which moved the apple branches so that they made 
 a moving shadow on the whitewashed walls, 
 where Joyce had already hung up a few well-loved 
 pictures she had brought with her. On a little 
 shelf by her bed was a statue of the Madonna, the 
 Child hiding its little face in the Mother's neck. 
 There was scarcely a room at Cressey in which 
 Lady Beauvais had not set the statue of the Mother 
 and Child. To go out into the world without that 
 reminder of Bethlehem and Nazareth would have 
 seemed to her an unprotected outgoing for a child 
 of hers, especially a woman-child. 
 
 The moonlight fell on the peaceful figures. Joy 
 had a sudden thought that she might have had 
 to hear Rose's comments on that beloved image. 
 Luckily, Rose had not noticed it. 
 
 It was a beautiful night, heavy with dews and 
 scents. The pinks and wallflowers were over, the 
 syringa just departed, but as yet honeysuckle and 
 
AT THE WINDOW 83 
 
 roses wreathed the window and the smell of clover 
 came in on the soft wind. 
 
 She was drawn to the window to look out by the 
 beauty of the night. Somewhere far off, near the 
 woods, a night-jar whirred. She could hear the 
 chattering of water from a stream which ran 
 in a ditch at the end of the garden and made its 
 way finally to the little river of the waterfall. 
 
 The place was quiet save for the sounds made 
 by the grazing beasts. Now and again one threw 
 up his head and exhaled long breaths into the 
 night. She loved Sweetwater Farm. The little 
 rooms were so homehke. Cressey, which had the 
 dead hand on every inch of it, which' had been made 
 and adorned by past generations, had been too 
 big and too Uttle personal to be really homelike, 
 even though they had taken to living in a corner 
 of it. She had often had a conscious idea that if 
 she touched one of the beautiful things some voice 
 out of the past would say, 'It is mine.' 
 
 In the upper corridors of Cressey, in glass cases, 
 not to be touched, there was a collection of such 
 things as children love : the most dehcate toy tea 
 and dinner services, miniature furniture, tiny 
 animals of aU sorts sacred to the childhood of Dame 
 Elizabeth St Maur who died in 1830. There was a 
 most delicious doll's house, with all kind of ingenui- 
 ties. There was a wonderful collection of dolls of 
 all ages, with a great variety of wardrobes, and 
 all such accessories of the toilet as belong to the 
 young lady of consideration. One doU represented 
 
84 THE HOUSE 
 
 Queen Elizabeth; and if she had not the hundreds 
 of dresses which tradition attributes to the queen's 
 wardrobe, there were still miniature wardrobes 
 full of her finery : ruffs and farthingales, pearl- 
 sewn stomachers, shoes of all kinds, fans, gloves. 
 That upper corridor, with a red rope between the 
 cases that held the wonderful collection and the 
 children, had always said, ' Hands off ! ' because 
 Dame Elizabeth's son had prayed that her descend- 
 ants should keep everything as she had left it. 
 
 Lady Beauvais had been revolutionary in the 
 matter. 
 
 'The poor darlin's are always longin' to play 
 with those allurin' things, Hugo,' she had said. ' You 
 should see Joy's face as she looks at the doll's 
 house behind the wretched red rope. She's just 
 a picture of longin'. What harm could it do if 
 she was to creep in there? You know how careful 
 she is.' 
 
 'It was my father's desire that his mother's 
 collection should remain undisturbed,' Lord Beauvais 
 said. 'Whatever we feel about it personally, we 
 are in honour bound to respect his wish.' 
 
 So Lady Beauvais said no more, beyond 
 murmuring that if Dame Elizabeth had not died 
 so young, but had lived to be a real granny, the 
 things would never have been locked away. 
 
 Perhaps it was that collection, as much as any- 
 thing else, that had given Joy her feeUng about 
 the dead hand which pushed her away from personal 
 ownership at Cressey. 
 
AT THE WINDOW 85 
 
 Her hair was about her shoulders as she leant 
 upon the open window, drinking in the beauty of 
 the quiet night. There was a smell of milk and 
 honey from the barred windows of the dairy, 
 below where she was standing, in the wing of the 
 farm-house that ran off at right angles from the 
 main building containing the Uving and bedrooms. 
 She had propped her cheeks in her hands. The 
 loose sleeves of her nightgown fell away from her 
 slender arms. She began to repeat poetry softly 
 to herself, forgetting that she might be overheard — 
 
 When all her brothers in the house 
 
 Were lying asleep, my Love 
 Ran before me under the bend of boughs, 
 
 TiU we looked down from above. 
 On the lone lough, on the long lough. 
 
 On the brown lough under Killery. 
 
 My grief it is ever that thou and I 
 Must part Uke the swans of the flood, 
 
 That rise up sorrowful into the sky. 
 For one goes over the wood 
 
 And one over sea, and one over sea. 
 And one over sea from Killery. 
 
 A rude laugh close at hand broke into her dreams. 
 
 'Whatever are you boomin' an' boomin' to 
 yourself, Joy, lookin' out o' yer winder to see if a 
 young man's abaht.' 
 
 It was Rose's voice, and it sounded as though 
 the speaker was half-suffocated by laughter. 
 
86 THE HOUSE 
 
 'You'll 'ave old Pinkerton after you if you 
 don't look out, Joy. This yere's a respectable 
 'ouse.' 
 
 Joy drew back, feeling oddly shocked and jarred. 
 But, as she did it, she was suddenly aware that 
 some one besides Rose had seen and heard her. 
 There was a figure, a man's figure, standing by 
 the gate that led to the field, fortunately out of 
 sight of Rose's window. The discovery set Joy's 
 heart to beating with absolute terror. Who could 
 have been standing there watching her window? 
 
 She went stealthily, while the blood throbbed 
 in her temples like two little hammers and she 
 felt frightfully ashamed as well as frightened, to 
 the door, to see if it was bolted. It would be just 
 like Rose to follow up her unfortunate espionage 
 by bursting in, in roars of laughter, to cover poor 
 Joy with coarse raillery. The door was bolted. 
 That was something to be grateful for. The stout 
 wooden bolt would resist all efforts to open it once 
 it was drawn. 
 
 Secure on that point she stole back and peered 
 through the curtains. While she stood there was 
 a sharp, sudden sound — the striking of a match. 
 The watcher was Ughting his pipe. He shaded the 
 match carefully with his hand while the little 
 flame rose up. The mere glimmer of a lip and a 
 straight, well-formed nose, which she had ca,ught 
 before the match went into the pipe, had a curious 
 suggestion for her of some one she had known 
 before, some one familiar. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 PICKING RASPBERRIES 
 
 The mystery was solved for Joy next day when 
 she was picking raspberries for the jam-making: 
 Mrs Pinkerton often put her to such easy and 
 congenial tasks instead of to rough work with an 
 unexpected delicacy of understanding. 
 
 'There, my dear,' she would say, 'Rose Buckett 
 is not a bad girl, though she do let her tongue run 
 away with her, but a better butter-maker I never 
 had. It's her gift. Yet butter-makin's not every- 
 thing, an' it's plain to see you're different. You 
 run away into the garding with a basket an' fetch 
 as many ripe rasps as you can find. Rose do talk 
 you deaf an' blind, if you have not got the way 
 to put her down — ^which it isn't hkely you'd 
 have.' 
 
 The garden gate clanged while Joy was at her 
 task and she glanced up in alarm, half expecting 
 to see Rose. Rose's fondness for her society was a 
 troubling and distressing thing to Joy. Rose's 
 secrets, half-whispered in her ear, with a disguising 
 mass of hints and jocularity, rather frightened 
 Joy. She never knew what Rose might say next, 
 
 87 
 
88 THE HOUSE 
 
 It was her brother who came. Hardly had the 
 relief begun to sink into her mind before she was 
 aware that he was not alone. There was some one 
 with him. Why, it was Malise Southwell, bronzed, 
 a httle dusty over his gray clothes and his shoes, 
 bare-headed. 
 
 She remembered the darkness of gold, as of ripe 
 oats, where his hair rippled. 
 
 'This fellow has found us out, Joy,' said Julian, 
 in a pretendedly discontented voice, which could 
 not restrain its pleasure. The familiar beam, 
 which only pretended to be held in check, of 
 Julian's face when he came in contact with the 
 people he loved best blotted out all the lines of 
 care which had been disappearing, growing fainter 
 since he had been at the farm. 'I've told him 
 there are to be no titles — just plain Joy and 
 Julian.' 
 
 'Plain Julian, if you hke, old fellow,' interjected 
 Malise in the velvety voice that was like a caress. 
 His sleepy eyes rested on Joy for a moment and 
 were withdrawn. 
 
 Fortunately the pink sunbonnet she was wearing 
 hid her confusion. How stupid she had been ! 
 Or had she been? Had she not known that the 
 man who watched her last night was Malise, 
 incredible as it seemed? She bent over the rasp- 
 berries, while, under the frill of the pink sunbonnet, 
 the wave of colour flooded to the nape of her little 
 neck. 
 
 'I will leave you to look after Malise,' Julian 
 
PICKING RASPBERRIES 89 
 
 went on. 'We can't turn him out, worse luck ! He 
 ought to go back to the Hand and Crown by aU rights 
 and precedents. Mrs Wilcox is not much worse 
 than a slattern and he need be no more uncomfort- 
 able than plenty of good fellows before him. Eh, 
 Malise? But Mrs Pinkerton won't hear of it. I've 
 left her getting out the best hnen sheets and 
 wool blankets. You'll sleep like a king to-night, 
 SouthweU!' 
 
 ' Like a king who has lost his head,' said Southwell 
 Ughtly. ' I never remember mine from the time it 
 touches the piUow. I've been tramping through 
 the country and am healthily tired. It is jolly 
 good after London, I can tell you. But, by Jove, 
 the moon troubles me. Last night I could not 
 sleep.' 
 
 'There'll be tea at five, Malise, in the farm-house 
 kitchen. You'll rave about the kitchen — and the 
 tea, if you're anj^hing of a connoisseur in teas. 
 Can you look after him, Joy? You used to be 
 able to talk endlessly — or at least he talked and 
 you Ustened.' 
 
 'Where are you off to?' asked Malise curiously. 
 'Is this the way you treat your old friends? I've 
 only just got here.' 
 
 JuUan coloured Hke a girl. 
 
 'You're not going at once, you know, old thing,' 
 he said apologetically. 
 
 Joy hfted her face from the close contemplation 
 of the raspberry bushes. The little dark, bright 
 face framed m the pink sunbonnet was charming. 
 
90 THE HOUSE 
 
 How good the chiWs eyes were, Malise thought 
 to himself. Tlieir gray might have been hard like 
 an agate, but just missed it. They were : — 
 
 'Steel-true and blade-straight.' 
 
 'You are going to meet Mary,' she said, 'She is 
 bringing home a horse from Tor Down — a young 
 horse. I thought you would go.' 
 
 'She should have told me she was going,' said 
 Julian discontentedly. 'It is ten miles from Tor 
 Do^vn. She will do every one's work. Mr Pinkerton 
 did not wish it. The stableman should have 
 gone but he was called home to a suddenly- 
 sick wife.' 
 
 ' I know. I heard Mary say she would go for the 
 horse, that he need not trouble. Have you had some 
 food, Julian?' 
 
 'Mr Pinkerton and I had something after the 
 market. I am quite all right till supper-time, even 
 if I miss tea.' 
 
 Malise looked curiously from one to the other. 
 
 'I presume it is Miss Bates you are discussing?' 
 he said. 
 
 'Yes, it is Mary Bates,' Julian answered. 
 
 'She must be a hefty young woman to go ten 
 miles to fetch home a horse,' Malise said, in a 
 voice as though the topic had lost interest for him. 
 'I suppose she'll ride him back.' 
 
 'He's unbroken,' said Julian moodily. 
 
 'Oh, that means twenty miles and puUing along 
 
PICKING RASPBERRIES 91 
 
 a resisting force for half of it. What an Amazon 
 she must be ! ' 
 
 'The word hardly suits Mary Bates,' said Julian : 
 and then with a would-be-careless wave of his 
 hand he departed. 
 
 ' Julian was always a Quixotic fellow,' Malise 
 said, looking after the slender young figure, elegant 
 even in the farming smock, till it disappeared 
 through a low arch in the red-brick wall. 'He'll 
 run when he's out of our sight. He was peppering 
 to be gone while he talked to us. Fancy his dumping 
 me on you Uke this ! What are you going to do 
 with me?' 
 
 'What would you Uke me to do?' Joy asked, 
 straightening herself and looking at her hands, 
 stained with the fruit, instead of at him. He was 
 secretly pleased that she did not look at him. 
 
 'We used never have any trouble as to what to do 
 when we were together,' he said, and there was 
 something thrilling to Joy in the words and his 
 voice. 'You and I and Julian. Do you remember 
 that time when we walked to Summer Green 
 forgetting how far it was because we were talking 
 — I mean I was talking, and you and Julian hstening; 
 you were such dear, good listeners — ^when your 
 poor httle feet were blistered and you were almost 
 ready to drop from fatigue, yet never said a word 
 till we discovered you were lame? It was the 
 only time your dear, delightful mamma looked at 
 me reproachfully.' 
 
 ' I can smell the hay I sat on in the donkey-cart 
 
 T.H. G 
 
92 THE HOUSE 
 
 you commandeered,' said Joy, with a light brighten- 
 ing and darkening in her eyes. 
 
 He took up one of her hands, then the other, 
 and held them to his lips. 
 
 'They smell so dehciously,' he said. 'Let us go 
 on picking raspberries. I believe I could pick them 
 for ever — ^with you. Mrs Pinkerton, I presume, 
 expects this basket to be filled. I don't see any 
 raspberries. Have you picked them all? Is there 
 any other place where they grow?' 
 
 He spoke with a careless air that enabled Joy 
 to get over the confusion he had caused her. She 
 had discovered when he last visited at Cressey 
 that he had that power of making her shy : the 
 strange, thrilled shyness which was at least as 
 much pleasure as pain. 
 
 'The raspberries hide under the leaves,' she said. 
 ' See ! You must not expect to find them on top 
 of the leaves.' She lifted a traihng branch and 
 showed him where the red berries clustered under 
 the leaves. 'There are white ones, too, if you like 
 them better. Mrs Pinkerton will give us a delicious 
 dish of them with whipped cream on top. You 
 will have them in the form of jam at tea. So you 
 must be diligent.' 
 
 'Why should you suppose I should not be 
 diligent ? ' he asked, putting a few raspberries into 
 his mouth. 
 
 'You are not going the right way about it,' she 
 answered. 
 
 'I keep all the time wanting to kiss your hands 
 
PICKING RASPBERRIES 93 
 
 again,' he said, lazily. 'I had no idea that fruit- 
 picking made such sweet hands. Now that I think 
 of it, you gave me a rose at Cressey in June — you 
 remember the evening after the thunderstorm 
 when the gardens were drenched? and when you 
 picked me the rose it sent a shower of rain-drops 
 over you. I smelt your hands as you gave me 
 the rose. They were wet and a little cold and 
 they smelt of roses.' Then he was suddenly off on 
 another topic. 
 
 'Is Julian in love with Mary Bates?' he asked. 
 
 'I do not know,' Joy answered, looking up at 
 him, startled. Her sunbonnet had fallen in the 
 sudden jerk of her head. It hung by the strings. 
 Her small head of a satin blackness emerged 
 beautifully from its sheath of vivid pink. 
 
 'She is very beautiful,' she went on. 'Such a 
 lovely way with young things. You should see 
 her feeding the calves. When she goes to them 
 their Httle silken muzzles go moving over her 
 hands so softly. But she can't bear any of the 
 creatures to be killed. It amuses them here. She 
 goes away when she knows anything is going to be 
 killed and does not come back till it is all over. 
 That is the drawback of life on the farm — ^that 
 they kill things.' 
 
 'We have to eat, you know, Joy,' he said, feeUng 
 about for the raspberries. 
 
 'I wish we needn't kill to eat,' she said discon- 
 solately. 'Mamma would never know her poultry- 
 yard personally. She said she couldn't bear to 
 
94 THE HOUSE 
 
 have her friends and acquaintances killed for her 
 to eat. She only really knows Rosamimd's chicken, 
 which is called Bridget, and is never going to be 
 kiUed.' 
 
 He smiled over this reminiscence of Lady Beauvais. 
 
 'Oh, well, I suppose the things can always be 
 killed out of sight and hearing,' he said comfortably. 
 
 'Not pigs,' she returned, looking at him with 
 wide eyes of disgust. 'They killed a pig last week. 
 Ugh ! Julian told me to go away right away into the 
 wood. But though I ran I heard it all the time. 
 And afterwards — ^there seemed to be blood every- 
 where. Mary was away that day, but Mrs Pinkerton 
 hated it too. She said she always tried to get out of 
 the way when it happened, and, anyhow, they're 
 not going to kill any more pigs this year. It was 
 such a nice pink thing and quite a pet.' 
 
 'Poor little girl,' he said compassionately; and 
 somehow his hand touched hers. 
 
 'There was a girl here once before Rose, as 
 dairymaid. She held the calves to be killed,' said 
 Joy with a curious intonation of horror in her 
 voice. 'But Rose, when she came, wouldn't kill 
 a chicken, although her father was a butcher. 
 " My," she said" to Mrs Pinkerton, " I should 'ave 
 a 'ard 'eart ! " Mrs Pinkerton said it to me just 
 like that ! So now Jenkins has to kill a chicken 
 when it must be done.' 
 
 'Don't think about it, Joy,' Mahse said, coming 
 a little nearer. 'I'm afraid we belong to a brutal 
 world, but there's a lot of happiness, too.' 
 
PICKING RASPBERRIES 95 
 
 'The country is so beautiful,' she said. 'It is a 
 pity one has to think of cruelties. Did you ever 
 hear a rabbit crying in a trap? I heard one the 
 other night in my sleep. I got up and ran to the 
 window; I felt like something demented. I cried 
 out : " Be quiet, httle one, and I shall let you out." 
 I never thought how silly it was. It went on crsdng 
 so dreadfully. I ran to Mary's room. She had heard 
 it, too, and was just going downstairs. I am not 
 brave hke her. I was sitting on her bed with my 
 fingers in my ears when she came back. She was 
 carrying a lantern and I saw that she looked very 
 pale. " You won't hear it any more, Joy," she 
 said, "I've kiUed it.'" 
 
 'I was afraid Mary Bates was going to make a 
 genius of a farmer,' he said. 'I'm glad something 
 has intervened. Doctoring will be better. I am 
 curious to see her. She was very young when last 
 we met.' 
 
 They had been forgetting the raspberries while 
 they talked. Suddenly a jarring voice broke in on 
 their discussion. Rose had contrived to find and 
 to come up with them noiselessly. 
 
 She was staring at them unabashed, with her 
 reddish-brown eyes, set in the beautiful wild-rose 
 colour of her cheeks. When she spoke her voice and 
 words were in startling contrast to her beauty. 
 
 'Well, if this isn't doin' the dirty on your poor 
 friend, Joy ! ' she said, gurgling with laughter. 
 ' 'Ere I finds you with your young man a-serenadin' 
 in the garding, an' me sweatin' over that there 
 
96 THE HOUSE 
 
 churn the 'ole bloomin' afternoon ! Not but wot 
 I've a feller-feeUn'. Interduce me, if you don't 
 want to keep 'im all to yourself.' 
 
 Joy was an image of distress. Malise Southwell, 
 without looking at her, turned to Rose. 
 
 'Miss St Maur has been telling me about you,' 
 he said. ' I am glad to have the pleasiure . . .' 
 
 'Go h'on,' responded Miss Buckett. 'You are a 
 one. You'd better get on with them rasps, Joy, 
 else you'll 'ave old Maw Pinkerton after you. Sorry 
 I intruded,' and she went off, a hand clapped over 
 her mouth with a pretence of concealing her 
 laughter. But her joyful squeaks reached their 
 ears for some time after she was lost to sight. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 THE ONE WOMAN 
 
 Julian lifted his hand to shade his eyes after 
 he had emerged from the woods into the 
 blazing afternoon sunshine that lay upon the 
 steaming country, giving the distant downs a size 
 and grandeur which were hardly theirs in a clearer 
 atmosphere. The broom-pods crackled and burst 
 in the heat as he plodded along the gorse and 
 heather common-land, with here and there a 
 flaming bush of the broom, through which ran the 
 long white ribbon of road that led to Tor Down. 
 
 He had not seen any one since he passed the 
 schoolmistress's httle house at Rudham, where 
 she lived with a girl younger than herself and 
 a dog. Wonderful that she should not be 
 afraid, that they should not be afraid, in the 
 lonehness ! Miss Stubbs was working in her Httle 
 garden as he passed by, and straightened herself 
 to bid him good-afternoon. She was a pretty 
 woman, of soft, indeterminate tints and contours, 
 her hair between brown and fair, her skin fair and 
 pale, with an underlying tint of brownness, her 
 eyes Ught brown and a httle mysterious in expression. 
 Her features were nothing, and the figure was so 
 
 97 
 
98 THE HOUSE 
 
 swathed in a big overall of blue cotton that it was 
 hardly possible to guess at what it was like. 
 
 She had offered him a cup of tea. Miss Cheeseman, 
 her assistant and house-mate, was just making 
 the tea. He knew the two girls through Mary 
 Bates, and had lent them books. Miss Stubbs 
 had an educated taste in reading, and preferred 
 Galsworthy and Conrad to the popular authors of 
 such thrilling romances as 'Pansy-Eyes,' and 'The 
 Love that Made him Mad,' whom Miss Cheeseman 
 greatly admired. 
 
 He had refused the tea, sajdng simply that he 
 was on his way to meet Mary Bates, and that if 
 he met her soon they might return for tea. 
 
 ' I hope she won't pull down my gate-post,' said Miss 
 Stubbs, ' as she did in the spring fastening a wicked 
 ram to it. Not Mr Pinkerton's either, but one she 
 found on the road terrifying the school-children. She 
 went back to Moon's Farm for a rope, lassoed the 
 ram at the first attempt, and tied him up here 
 while she went in search of his owners. Job Perrott 
 was kiUed in the war. There's nobody else can 
 do mason's work — so there's my gate-post still, 
 a disgrace to Rudham School. How can I tell the 
 children to be orderly with that standing there? 
 I'll have to try my hand at mason work myself.' 
 
 If he could have seen the wistfulness of her face 
 as she watched him down the road he would have 
 been sorry for her loneliness that made his refusal 
 such a disappointment. 
 
 Again there was the pillar of dust travelling 
 
THE ONE WOMAN 99 
 
 towards him as it had travelled that day some 
 weeks ago now, when Mary had brought home the 
 sheep. Nearer it came down the long road, the 
 particles of dust scintillating in the brilliant sun. 
 
 As he had expected, Mary was riding the half- 
 broken colt. 
 
 'He has nearly pulled the arms out of me,' she 
 said, and laughed down at him. 
 
 ' You rode him^ barebacked ? ' 
 
 'He wouldn't take it any other way. There was 
 an old military saddle I could have had; it would 
 have been very uncomfortable, so I borrowed a 
 sack for a saddle. He was very good considering 
 that he's a raw colt.' 
 
 ' You've taken it out of him, Mary ! ' 
 
 The horse was standing quite quietly, sweating 
 profusely, and turning a fearful eye across his 
 shoulders at Juhan. 
 
 ' I had to take it out of him. He struggled a lot 
 before he would see the sense of it. It is frightfully 
 hot and he is soft, but it was the only way to get 
 him home. I have a way with a horse.' 
 
 'You have with most things. But I don't Uke 
 your doing such things, Mary. He might have 
 thrown you.' 
 
 'He did several times before he gave in,' she said, 
 and leant forward to caress the sleek, sweating 
 neck. 'Isn't he a sweet thing?' 
 
 'I wish you would not do it,' he said again. 
 
 Suddenly he looked up at her and for a second 
 he laid his cheek against her knee. 
 
loo THE HOUSE 
 
 'Don't you know,' he said, 'that if anything 
 happened to you my world would be in ruins?' 
 
 'Would it?' she asked softly. 
 
 'You are always doing wild and dangerous 
 things. I am not going to allow it. Do you hear, 
 Mary? ' He was not above pressing his advantage. 
 
 For a second feeling was tense. In another 
 moment he would have had his arms about her. 
 They had forgotten the world. But suddenly 
 there came the raucous scream of a motor-horn 
 and the httle horse quivered from head to foot, 
 putting back his ears. 
 
 'I'm off,' she said. 'He can't stand a motor, 
 poor darhng.' 
 
 She turned the horse, who seemed to understand 
 what she wanted him to do, on to the common. 
 The motof-car rushed by, covering him with dust. 
 When the dust had died down there was no sign of 
 her. There was nothing for it but to turn and 
 walk back the way he had come, fuming at the 
 motor-car, the horse, Mary's rashness, and the 
 world generally, yet with a glow of radiant happi- 
 ness at the back of his mind that laughed at the 
 anger. 
 
 He had had time to reaUse that he was hungry 
 before he reached Miss Stubbs's cottage. She was 
 standing by the gate, apparently waiting for him. 
 
 'Mary went by a long time ago,* she said. 'She 
 was going hke a big choppy wind. She and her 
 steed understand each other. She went by the 
 footpath, which was very wise, if she must ride a 
 
THE ONE WOMAN loi 
 
 half-broken or unbroken young horse. She said 
 I was to give you some food, that you looked 
 tired.' 
 
 What could he do but accept the hospitality. 
 It was comfortable to think that she had noticed his 
 looks. He was tired. He had been up very early 
 in the morning to send the cattle off to market and 
 he had eaten little or nothing. So he went in 
 gratefully to the cool little room, Uttered with 
 books and children's exercises, and feminine belong- 
 ings of one kind or another, and sat down. Miss 
 Cheeseman was knitting what she told him was a 
 woollen jumper, and blushed very brightly when 
 he pretended an interest in it. She had an open 
 newspaper on her knee in which she was reading 
 the serial while she knitted. It was called 'Peggy 
 the Peeress,' and was by the same author as 'The 
 Love that Made Him Mad.' 
 
 'I suppose they are always love stories?' Julian 
 asked innocently. 'You wouldn't care for any 
 others.' 
 
 Miss Cheeseman got up in a great hurry, dropping 
 her knitting and her ball of wool, and said she 
 must go and help Hetty with the tea. Apparently 
 they had postponed the meal on the chance of his 
 return. 
 
 Stooping at the same time to pick up the jumper 
 and the ball of wool, which had been seized on by 
 a playful kitten that seemed very much at home 
 with the dog, their hands collided and got 
 entangled in the wool. Miss Cheeseman came up 
 
102 THE HOUSE 
 
 redder than a rose. She was a plump, good- 
 humoured looking girl, rather stout and short, 
 whom no one would have suspected of the ultra- 
 romantic nature evinced by her choice of literature. 
 She disappeared in a flustered way, and the dog, a 
 bull-terrier, who was called Foch, came and laid 
 his heavy head on Julian's knee and began the 
 converse of the eyes which a dog is able to carry 
 on so brilliantly. 
 
 Presently came the tea, to which had been added 
 a couple of boiled eggs and a large plate of buttered 
 toast. 
 
 'Now, you are to eat every bit of the toast; and 
 the eggs are for you,' Miss Stubbs said. 'Margery 
 and I like plain bread and butter with our tea. 
 No, Foch, you are not to beg ! That would be a 
 disgraceful thing in a dog of your name and breeding. 
 I've given you a big cup, Mr St Maur. Gentlemen 
 always like big cups, don't they?' 
 
 She carried on a gentle flow of talk while Julian 
 made a good meal; just the tactful talk which 
 required only yes and no for answer from the 
 hungry man. Miss Cheeseman knitted in the 
 intervals of her tea-drinking, with her eyes on 
 the knitting, and when she took courage to look 
 up, blushed again if her gaze fell upon Julian. 
 
 Miss Stubbs observed her friend with a quietly 
 humorous air, which was not too apparent. She 
 had been talking about Masefield's Dauber — one of 
 the books Juhan had lent her — in a discursive 
 tone. She turned to something else when 
 
THE ONE WOMAN 103 
 
 she saw that he was really ready for some con- 
 versation. 
 
 'By the way, Mr St Maur, you have a visitor at 
 Sweetwater Farm. Margery directed him on his 
 way to you the other day. We were tremendously 
 thrilled by him — ^you know, we see very few 
 strangers. Margery thought him very much like 
 the hero of " The Love that Made Him Mad," 
 who is referred to in the story as Lieutenant de 
 Montmorency, though he turned out to be a peer 
 of the realm who had enlisted as a private in the 
 Guards and risen to a commission.' 
 
 'Oh, Hetty, you are awful,' said Miss Cheeseman, 
 with a new access of colour. 'You don't know 
 about my books. You never read them.' 
 
 Julian had a misgiving. 
 
 ' Did he say he was coming to see me ? ' he asked, 
 wondering if MaHse had given him away. 
 
 'I believe Margery only understood that he 
 wanted Sweetwater Farm. We felt that he must 
 be your visitor.' 
 
 Julian was relieved. He might have trusted 
 Mahse's good sense. 
 
 'He is a friend of mine — Malise Southwell. We 
 were at school together,' he said. 'I have left him 
 in the garden helping my little sister to pick rasp- 
 berries. She would not call herself little, by the 
 way. She is nearly nineteen. I hope I may bring 
 her to see you one day. Malise, too, if he stays 
 long enough.' 
 
 'That would be very nice,' said Miss Stubbs, 
 
104 THE HOUSE 
 
 while Miss Cheeseman looked up with a brightening 
 colour. 
 
 'You won't tell him what Hetty said,' she put 
 in consciously. 'You know — that he was like 
 Lieutenant de Montmorency. He might think it 
 silly of me. He really is rather like the description 
 Joan Penn gives of her hero. If he knows Joan 
 Penn's books, as he is sure to, he wouldn't mind. 
 But still, he might think . . .' 
 
 She broke off in cofifusion, while Julian assured 
 her that he would say nothing to his friend about 
 the likeness she had found in him to her favourite 
 hero. 
 
 The two young women came to the gate to say 
 good-bye, and stood looking after him the way he 
 went. Turning to look back just before the road 
 wound he saw that they were still there ; since 
 he was hatless he waved his hand to them ; the 
 loneliness of the place once again struck him. 
 
 He walked back to the farm at a great pace. 
 He had been realising of late that he was almost 
 his own man again. He had been three months 
 at the farm. The doctor had said a year would 
 not be too much. He was not inclined to shorten 
 the term. He felt that he was only beginning to 
 learn things . He did not yet know what he was going 
 to do with himself and his life when the year was up. 
 The things which had seemed possible before the 
 war were less attractive now. It was reaction, 
 he supposed, from the excitement of the war. He 
 remembered when he had been keen about many 
 
THE ONE WOMAN 105 
 
 things which now had no appeal for him. There 
 had been careers he had considered possible which 
 were now impossible. He looked back to the 
 intolerable boredom which had fallen upon him 
 at Cressey after the war. It had been one of the 
 sjmiptoms of his trouble. 'I wonder I didn't take 
 to drink or drugs,' he muttered to himself. 
 
 Then, with a sudden uphfting as of great joy 
 he realised that the aching, intolerable boredom 
 was gone. He had never been bored since he came 
 to the farm. Physically he had grown strong. He 
 had acquired a new energy. 
 
 'Ah,' he said, striding across the Common, 
 which was high enough to catch a cool breeze from 
 the sea, 'I've found my vocation. I was born to 
 be a farmer,' and he remembered the old dream 
 he and Malise and Joy had dreamt together of a 
 clearing in the forest, the fire of wood, they two males 
 coming home, mighty hunters, with the animals 
 they had killed, for the squaws to cook, so that 
 they and the papooses should be fed. The dream 
 had been so vivid that he had often seen the night- 
 sky and the stars and smelt the resinous odour of 
 the forest, and, closing his eyes, had imagined 
 himself wrapped in the skins of beasts, lying close 
 to the fire. 
 
 'In those days,' he said, and smiled, 'I did not 
 know there was such a creature as Mary Bates 
 in the world. She should have been in the 
 dream.' 
 
 When he got to the farm he found Malise smoking 
 
io6 THE HOUSE 
 
 and lounging in front of the house. There was no 
 sign of Joy. 
 
 Julian, held by Malise, looked towards the house 
 in impatient expectation. He wanted to know 
 that Mary had got back all right, but there was 
 no sign of a face at the windows. A htter of little 
 pigs had escaped from the old sow in the orchard 
 by squeezing through the gate where she could not 
 foUow them, and were grunting and grazing 
 ecstatically in the grass. 
 
 'Your friend, Miss Bates, was hugging one of 
 those httle beasts a few minutes ago,' Malise said. 
 ' They are like rather humorous babies. Terrible to 
 think they should ever resemble mamma ! ' 
 
 'Oh, she got back aU right, then?' 
 
 'Of course she did. What a silly old dear of a 
 Quixote you are to go trapesin' the country after 
 a girl who is perfectly well able to take care of 
 herself ! vShe wasn't much the worse of her 
 Mazeppa ride, and went off quite cheerfully to her 
 milking.' 
 
 'Where is Joy?' 
 
 ' I saw her a few moments ago carrying a pail of 
 milk to the dairy. She had the assistance of the 
 savage and beautiful young lady who, I believe, 
 controls the destinies of the dairy, else I should 
 not have allowed her to carry it. Miss Buckett 
 is the type of young lady whose violent coquetry 
 over such a matter as carr5ang the milk-pail would 
 probably result in spilUng the milk, and that would 
 be a thousand pities. I say, JuHan, there isn't 
 
THE ONE WOMAN 107 
 
 much rationing here. It's a land flowing with 
 milk and honey — after London.' 
 
 'London grows money. Sussex grows milk and 
 honey. We are at liberty to eat what we produce? ' 
 
 'What are you qualifjdng for, Julian? Land- 
 lordism?' 
 
 'There won't be much landlordism in the future, 
 not of the old kind, at all events.' 
 
 'Ah, it will be a thousand pities when men like 
 your father have to go.' 
 
 , ' Mahse, where are your Socialist principles 
 gone to?' 
 
 'They are here still. But I'm not blind. If we 
 pull down men like your father, as we are going to, 
 shall we have anything as good to set up in their 
 place?' 
 
 'It will be as well for them. Pulling down in 
 my father's case would mean that he can go and 
 have a good time somewhere — ^much better than 
 
 Cressey would ever afford him. Ah, thanks ' 
 
 He took the proffered cigarette and ht it. 'There 
 isn't much a big estate can give my father except 
 worry. He has such simple tastes. So has my 
 mother, though she might miss her footmen for a 
 while. He feels it when the people ask why they 
 shouldn't have his land. He beheves he has done 
 the best he could for them. We are paying fourteen 
 and six in the pound taxation, and we are Uving 
 in a corner of Cressey, without coal enough to keep 
 the house dry next winter.' 
 
 'The obvious thing is to get rid of the gardeners 
 
 T.H. H 
 
io8 THE HOUSE 
 
 and the gardens and the servants and all the other 
 expenses. I said something of that kind to Lady 
 Beauvais when I was at Cressey.' 
 
 'And my mother?' 
 
 'Took it so calmly that I thought your father 
 must have been breaking her to it. All she said was 
 that she wouldn't really mind if it wasn't for the 
 poor children, meaning you.' 
 
 'Oh, I'm sick of it; of the house standing there 
 with its hypocritical pretence of benevolence, 
 exacting tribute. That is what it has done through 
 all the ages. Men and women have suffered that 
 houses like Cressey should have their due, great 
 barracks of places of which not even women Uke 
 my mother can make home.' 
 
 A giggle reached them. It was Rose going by, 
 carrjdng a pail of milk, and sending bold glances 
 towards them as she passed. 
 
 The young men turned and strolled away. 
 
 'There goes a child of nature,' said Mahse. 'The 
 beautiful Miss Buckett is there to prove that there 
 are differences other than accidental. She belongs 
 to a class. There is only one Mary Bates, who 
 cannot be labelled or classified.' 
 
 Then Julian broke away. What was all this 
 talk about houses when he wanted to see, to speak 
 with, to be near Mary Bates? 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 'Only my Love's away, 
 I'd as lief the blue were gray.' 
 
 Julian overslept himself the next morning. He 
 awoke to a heavy day, one of those summer days 
 on which the beauty of the world is suddenly 
 dowdy and dusty. It was eight o'clock. Some one 
 should have called him. Seven o'clock was break- 
 fast hour at Sweetwater Farm. Breakfast would 
 be over and done with and the workers scattered 
 again to their work. 
 
 He got up in a mood of discontent and went 
 forth to his morning bath in the stream. He noticed 
 for the first time that the long drought had brought 
 a premature autumn. The trees had turned, without 
 the gorgeousness of autumn. Shrivelled dead leaves 
 crackled under his feet. The gorse bushes were 
 dry and dusty, the hedges shabby : there was 
 very Uttle grass and he could see the dried-up roots 
 of it under the sparse growth. There was hardly 
 enough water for his bath between the stones of the 
 little river-bed. 
 
 He wondered who had taken his work. He had 
 ten cows to milk of a morning. He supposed, with 
 
 log 
 
110 THE nuubn 
 
 vexation, that they would have shoved on a lot of 
 it to Mary, who was always so willing. 
 
 As he went back to the house, his towel over his 
 shoulders, he heard Rose Buckett splashing about 
 in the dairy, apparently washing her cans. He 
 hastened past the door, feehng more disinclined 
 than usual for Rose's bold badinage. But she 
 came oxit and called after him that he'd have a 
 cold breakfast if no one saw to it for him, as Mrs 
 Pinkerton had driven the children to school and 
 was not yet returned. 
 
 His mood of discontent was not helped by the 
 sight of the breakfast table, with its unwashed 
 cups and saucers, a cold teapot, bacon congealed 
 in its own fatness, all the debris which makes 
 hideous a table at which people have had their 
 meals. It disgusted him in his mood, and he 
 would have gone off fasting, if Rose Buckett had 
 not followed him into the kitchen. For once she 
 was not noisy. 
 
 'My word,' she said. 'It do take the 'unger off 
 to look at such piggishnesses. Tea all over the cloth, 
 too. I never did. Supposin' you was to step 
 outside I could bring you your food there to the 
 green table.' 
 
 'Oh, thanks,' JuUan replied, trying to be as 
 little ungracious as possible. 'I really don't feel 
 hungry.' 
 
 'You'll feel 'ungry before you've 'ed your dinner. 
 Stummicks don't bear bein' 'andled Uke thet. 
 You go out there 'an wait. The fresh air will 
 
'ONLY MY LOVE'S AWAY' in 
 
 do you good. Stummick unsettled, I shouldn't 
 wonder.' 
 
 'Where is my sister?' Julian asked, feeling very 
 ungrateful. 
 
 'On the gad too, I shouldn't be surprised. That 
 there young men thet coom yesterday 'as upset 
 her. I see 'em walkin' down to the wood not so 
 long ago. She can be spared : she 'asn't learnt to 
 be any use yet, not but that she's willin' ! That 
 there young man ! 'e'U disturb 'er mind fast 
 enough ! Goo' lumme, yes : that 'e will. I doant 
 see what folks want wi' love.' The coquettish 
 glance which accompanied the ending of this speech 
 failed of its mark. 
 
 Julian had not long to wait for his breakfast. 
 He rated himself as an ill-conditioned fellow when 
 Rose appeared and laid a clean cloth on the green- 
 painted table under the apple-tree, following that 
 by rapid disappearance and reappearances with 
 one thing and another necessary for breakfast. 
 In a very short time she had brought him a pot of 
 hot tea and a dish of bacon and eggs, piping hot. 
 
 'You're young,' she said. 'I've give you two 
 eggs. She 'asn't took the key of her pantry.' 
 
 'Oh, I think one would have been enough.' 
 
 Rose struck him a whack on the back and bade 
 him begin, and not to go plajdng about with his food. 
 
 'I've brought you some toast, my dear,' she 
 said, as though she were speaking to a child. ' You 
 eat it all up.' 
 
 She was a good creature, though her playfulness 
 
112 THE HOUSE 
 
 was elephantine. He was hardly conscious of her 
 startUng beauty and only grateful that she did not 
 bother him too much. After she had left him the 
 toast she went off back to her dairy, bidding him 
 call her when he wanted fresh tea. 
 
 Close to where he was sitting there was the track 
 of the old pony's feet, round and round in a circle, 
 where it had been used to do a large churning before 
 Sweetwater Farm had got the modern method of 
 churning. Docks were growing in that corner 
 between the wings of the farm-house now, and 
 presently the trodden path of the feet would be 
 obliterated. In spring it was a pleasant corner, 
 with a Ulac-bush and a bush of pink may as well 
 as the gnarled apple-tree under which he was 
 sitting. This hot morning the shade from the house- 
 wall and the apple-tree, the coolness of the docks 
 round his feet were agreeable enough, if he had 
 only been in a better mood to enjoy them. He was 
 ill at ease. Why, he could not have told. 
 
 Rose was singing in the dairy, a dolorous song, 
 with a refrain of : — 
 
 'He 'anged himself for love. 
 He 'anged himself for love, 
 An' she laid down on his gravestone, 
 For she couldn't live alone, alone, 
 'An died for love, for love.' 
 
 He heard the absurd words to the accompaniment 
 of the splashing of water, and he was dimly aware 
 
'ONLY MY LOVE'S AWAY' 113 
 
 that Rose had a pleasant voice, as he was 
 aware that the ddcolUUe of her working print gown 
 showed a skin white as milk and lightly dotted 
 over with freckles, that her complexion was flawless, 
 that her hair was magnificent, that the beauty 
 of her teeth mitigated the annoyance of her constant 
 laughter. 
 
 He enjoyed the breakfast she had made for him. 
 Usually, with so many to be served, the breakfast 
 was only half-hot at Sweetwater Farm. This 
 piping-hot, soHtary meal had its advantages. 
 While he sat he was watching and listening for 
 some sign of Mary. She was tisually back about 
 this hour from driving the children to school. 
 
 Then he remembered Rose to have said that Mrs 
 Pinkerton had driven the children that morning. 
 Why? It was Wednesday morning, and, by all 
 the rules, Mrs Pinkerton should have been ironing 
 the weekly linen in the back kitchen, the window 
 of which opened just over his head. No sound of 
 employment, no pleasant smell of the hot iron 
 on hot, clean linen came out to him. Jenkins was 
 grumbling somewhere. Miss Buckett's song ended 
 in a final lament and he was aware of what Jenkins 
 was saying, or some of it. The old fellow's grumbling 
 voice was very harsh. That and the straight, 
 stubby beard, the upstanding, coarse hair, seemed 
 to go oddly well together. 
 
 'That there Mary!' 
 
 So it was a complaint of Mary. What had she 
 been doing? While he hesitated to ask— he rather 
 
114 THE HOUSE 
 
 shrank from marching into the dairy and demanding 
 what Mary had done or left undone — Mrs Pinkerton, 
 behind the old pony, trundled up to the gate. 
 He went to open it for her, with the courtesy 
 which endeared him to women, and taking the 
 pony by the mouth-piece he led it into the 
 stable-yard. 
 
 'I do hope you've 'ad some breakfast,' Mrs 
 Pinkerton said. 'This marnin' the confusion was 
 most confoundin'. I never did see the like. What 
 with Mary's telegram that give me a turn — I never 
 can bear the sight of them envelopes, since that 
 one comed to me from the War Office three years 
 coom Christmas. There, look at that dog, if he 
 don't seem to miss 'er something tarrible.' 
 
 To miss whom? Julian stared at the dog, who 
 was l3dng with his nose on his paws, now and again 
 shivering and sighing wearily. Julian remembered 
 now that he had been going to and fro between the 
 corner where he had sat and the gate leading on to 
 the road, going with a sudden new hope, only to 
 return with a crestfallen and disappointed air. 
 
 ' Where is Miss Bates ? ' he asked, and put down 
 his hand to caress the dog, who looked up at him 
 with a cold and disconsolate eye. 
 
 But before Mrs Pinkerton could answer he knew. 
 Mary was gone away. He had wakened to the 
 knowledge that the place was empty of her. Life 
 was cold. That was why he had felt so inexplicably 
 sad — why the summer had suddenly died. 
 
 'She had a telegram from her paw, fust thing 
 
'ONLY MY LOVE'S AWAY' 115 
 
 this marnin',' Mrs Pinkerton went on, as he helped 
 her down from the little tub-cart as he might have 
 helped his mother. ' So sudding ! He's off to 
 Cenada, an' she's to go along with him. 'Tis just 
 like a man ; he don't know nor yet care wot a 
 mort 0' trouble he may cause. It's want it an' 
 heve it, as I often say to Pinkerton. There — 
 don't you trouble ! Old Job Clutterbuck will see to 
 the pony. I am sorry for Mary. An' now I don't 
 suppose we'll see her this side o' Christmas. But 
 there — Ufe's all upses an' downses, as the sayin' 
 is, an' here to-day an' gone to-maxrow. Well, if 
 you must, but Job Clutterbuck'll do it.' 
 
 So she was gone, and the salt and savour were 
 gone out of life. Julian had been happy at 
 Sweetwater Farm, and had not realised how much 
 of the happiness had been derived from Mary's 
 presence. The glowing, sweet-scented days, the 
 balmy nights of dew and sleep, the freshness of 
 the mornings, the cool, dehcious star-hung eve; 
 they were all because of her. Suddenly he perceived 
 that the big kitchen was stuffy and smelt of the 
 labouring man's clothes, that the talk set his teeth 
 on edge, that the food was sometimes greasy and 
 too plentiful, that the children were noisy and 
 vulgar. 
 
 As he crossed the yard he ran into Jenkins, who 
 still kept up his monotonous complaint of 'that 
 there Mary.' 
 
 'She's grown tired of it, I expect,' Juhan said 
 with a sudden rage which he tried to control. 'I 
 
ii6 THE HOUSE 
 
 don't suppose milking cows and driving sheep and 
 feeding calves would satisfy any one for very long. 
 It was a hard life. I don't know why she ever 
 did it.' 
 
 'It were her natural bent an' likin',' said Jenkins 
 solemnly. 'Old Mr Green, our Rector, he used to 
 say to my old dad, " You look 'ere, Mr Jenkins, 
 an' I'll give you a word of advice'U be worth one 
 hundred suverings to you whenever you applies it 
 — you never put any o' them boys o' yours — nor 
 gels — to what they've got noan bent to — or else 
 they'll do it ill and they'll do it agen the grain. 
 There's your boy," he says — ^meanin' me — " I see 
 him a-'erding beastses on the Common, an' 
 I say to myself, 'There, if that boy isn't barn 
 for beastses.' I'm never out o' patience with 
 them, even if they be contrairy. Folks is contrairy 
 too. I says to Mr Pinkerton when I takes longer 
 to move the cows from place to place than another 
 man : " Bless your 'eart," I says, " I 'umours 
 'em. If they wants to stand an' look about 'em, 
 if they wants to walk thro' water or beat the flies 
 off with their tails, ain't we got our liddle fancies 
 too? " Same wi' shi'p. I lets 'em take their own 
 way so long as they ki'ps to the road. I'll sit down 
 an' wait for 'em. You don't find no lame shi'p 
 among my lot. Not as I calls myself a shepherd, 
 but only to help a bit when hands are few an' plenty 
 to be done.' 
 
 He went on a Uttle way and came back to say 
 sadly ; ' That there Mary 1 she had a way with 
 
•ONLY MY LOVE'S AWAY' 117 
 
 the beastses. It warn't so bad befoore, when she 
 were in this country an' could coome at any minit 
 when tired o' plajdn' about. But Cenada — Goo' 
 Lor ! Cenada I Why, I don't expec' to see her 
 likes again. 'Tis well Daisy don't know what's 
 happened — nor yet the Clover cow. Daisy'd hold 
 up her milk, an' the Clover cow would put her foot 
 in the bucket an' foul what she didn't spill. I 
 expec' there'U be a mort o' trouble with them as 
 soon as they rekonise she's gone. The female sec' 
 is hard to manage.' 
 
 JuUan would have enjoyed this conversation 
 better at another moment. As it was, the blank 
 disappointment of Mary's absence lay over him 
 Uke a cloud. He cotild have echoed Jenkins with : 
 'But Cenada ! Goo' Lor ! Cenada/ ' 
 
 He was still in the dark as to why she had gone. 
 But presently Malise, coming back from the walk 
 with Joy, enlightened him. They had walked to 
 the railway station and procured a copy of the 
 Daily Herald, without which, MaHse declared, 
 it was impossible to Mve another day. He had 
 a story of a man who had come out of a small 
 cottage gate, and seeing him reading the paper 
 had rushed to shake hands with him, crying : 
 'You're a pioneer, sir, a pioneer. You and 
 I are the only men who read the Daily Herald 
 in the Stygian depths of this benighted 
 village.' 
 
 He handed the paper to Julian, indicating a 
 headline : — 
 
ii8 THE HOUSE 
 
 'Mr Tom Bates goes to Canada. 
 Labour Leader's Mission.' 
 
 'Ah,' said Malise, and laughed. 'The Stormy 
 Petrel ! I wonder the Canadian Government 
 lets him in. I'm afraid I shall have to postpone 
 my introduction of you to him. You already know 
 his daughter.' 
 
 Julian was looking very melancholy. 
 
 ' I think I'll go back to the flesh-pots for a while,' 
 he said. 'If I go, Joy, you will have to come with 
 me. Do you think Mrs Pinkerton could spare us 
 both for a while.' 
 
 'I'll stay,' said Joy, suddenly obstinate. She 
 had always given in to Julian before. 'Perhaps if 
 I went home I should not get leave to return. 
 It was hard won. Only for daddy I should 
 not have had a chance. Mummie doesn't 
 really know what has happened to the world 
 during the last few years. If she heard the people 
 wanted for bread she would say : " Give them 
 cake." ' 
 
 'She does not see you saving the family fortunes 
 by the excellence of your cheese-making,' Malise 
 said humorously. "AH the same, I think you do 
 less than justice to your mother. She will surprise 
 you all one of those days.' 
 
 'Then I shall stay too,' Julian said, 'till you feel 
 you've deserved a holiday, Joy. I don't see myself 
 presenting an appearance to mother with you left 
 behind at the farm. Of course, you would be quite 
 
v-»i>jui ivii i-uvjC/3 AWAY' irg 
 
 all-right with the Pinkertons, but mother would be 
 alarmed.' 
 
 'Lady Beauvais is in many ways an adorable 
 Victorian,' said Malise. 'She may not be aware of 
 what has happened. Our people make the revolution 
 so quietly that few suspect what is happening. 
 Still, I have an idea that when she knows she will 
 rise to it. I stick to it that she is rather a mystery 
 to her family.' 
 
 'Father has risen to it,' Julian said. 
 
 'Your father is a perpetual surprise to me. He 
 came down from the barons, didn't he. A Norman 
 family. There was a Beauvais at the Siege of Acre 
 and at Agincourt. Do you know, Julian, that I 
 think your father, almost alone of his class, 
 appreciates what is happening and looks at it 
 greatly.' 
 
 'As though any one could be content to Jazz 
 in these days,' said Joy with infinite contempt. 
 'Mummie doesn't like the modern ball-room. 
 That is something to be grateful for.' 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 LOVE WORKS WONDERS 
 
 During those summer months something very 
 strange was happening to Rose Buckett. One 
 could hardly have said when or how the change 
 began to be. Mrs Pinkerton discovered it all of a 
 sudden and was afraid Rose was going into a 
 decUne. She was no longer the vulgar, cheerful 
 girl she had been. No one could say that she 
 neglected her dairy-work, that her butter and 
 cheese were less good than they had been. But 
 she was certainly wonderfully subdued for Rose, 
 and for that one — or two — of those who associated 
 with her were very thankful. 
 
 For the new Rose Joy began to have a Uttle 
 liking. Rose had indeed always done her best 
 for her pupil, had helped her at every stage of her 
 progress, had been proud that she showed a 
 capacity for learning. Joy's first cream-cheese, 
 turned out by her own hand, had appeared on the 
 luncheon table at Cressey and had been much 
 approved. Lady Beauvais saying, with an air of 
 relief, that now darlin' Joy had learned the whole 
 art of cheese makin' she had better come home 
 before the shootin' began. 
 
 120 
 
LOVE WORKS WONDERS 121 
 
 'She will want her wardrobe attended to/ said 
 Lady Beauvais. 'Next year she wiU come out. It 
 will be so interestin' for the poor darlin' to think 
 of her frocks. I only wish life was less vulgar than 
 it is now : but I can trust my girl.' 
 
 Sweetwater Farm had done more for Juhan than 
 he or any one else had hoped. After Mary's going 
 he had flung himself into the work as though his 
 Hfe depended on his acquisition of the utmost 
 knowledge of practical farming to be obtained 
 within a hmited period. He wished he had been 
 born to it, for it was a Hfe he could have loved. He 
 had endeared himself to the Pinkertons. - The 
 youngest children still fought for the place beside him 
 at meals until Mrs Pinkerton met a difficult situation 
 by placing herself between the two, but even that 
 did not altogether succeed. Willum John had 
 missed Mary, and roared for her at every meal till 
 he forgot her. There were moments when Julian 
 felt he could have howled as well. 
 
 Rose's songs now were all of blighted love. 
 'Cruel Barbara AUan' was perhaps her favourite, 
 but there were many less classical. She had a really 
 sweet voice with deep, plaintive notes in it, and the 
 sounds coming through the dairy window as Juhan 
 went to and fro about his work were no longer 
 terrifying. 
 
 A curious thing, which no one, perhaps, except 
 Joy, noticed, was that Rose had given up the 
 excessive ddcolletde of her bodice, which in the warm 
 sununer weather had made more for coolness than 
 
122 THE HOUSE 
 
 concealment. She had begun to do her hair 
 differently. The blue ribbon conlining it in the 
 manner of Joy's coiffure was an immense improve- 
 ment on the 'frame' which had bulged around 
 her face when she was dressed in her best. She 
 had begun to take care of her hands, after 
 much interrogation of Joy's methods of manicure. 
 Strangest of all, she made some attempt at 
 improving her speech. 
 
 It was bewildering and pathetic to Joy, who, 
 somewhat against her will, was beginning to see 
 the end of her dair5dng course. Julian had decided 
 to stay on for the winter. He went out now with 
 the shepherd on the downs and learnt much that 
 did not altogether belong to farming from his 
 conversation. A man leading that solitary hfe, 
 alone under the sun and stars, is apt to observe 
 and to learn more than comes to the townsman or 
 him who is much with his fellows. 
 
 But a summer of farming is not everything, 
 though it is the pleasantest part. There was the 
 winter coming, when the cattle and sheep would 
 have to be fed and gathered in from the storms 
 and the weather, and presently would be the 
 lambing season, and the ploughing of the land and 
 the sowing of the crops and all the rotation of the 
 year's work. 
 
 'I wiU stay a year if you will have me,' JuUan 
 said to Mr Pinkerton. 
 
 'You stay!' the good man responded heartily. 
 'We've never taken wot you'd call pupils at 
 
LOVE WORKS WONDERS 123 
 
 Sweetwater Farm, not leastways, till you coom. 
 We thought, me and the missus, that you'd be 
 more trouble than you was worth. You've turned 
 out better'n we hoped. Mrs Pinkerton was sayin' 
 to me last night as ever was, that you was a well- 
 conducted young feller, that your paw'n maw 
 must ha' brought you up well. No trouble with 
 the girls, no complaints, no layin' in bed 6' mornin's, 
 no gaddin'. I'll tell 'ee wot, Julian, I'll give you a 
 character wherever you want to go as will keep 
 you your place. As I said to the missus, " You 
 trust them childring : childring, like dogs, knows 
 when they've got a bit of all right."' 
 
 'Thank you very much, Mr Pinkerton,' said 
 Julian heartily. 'I like to think that you and 
 Mrs Pinkerton think weU of me. I'm very happy 
 here, and the place has done wonders for 
 me.' 
 
 'You was a sick boy fust time you coom -to the 
 farm,' said Mr Pinkerton, 'but you was sensible. 
 Go to Natur' and Natur' will cure you. Not but 
 Wot you lent a hand, bein' what you are.' 
 
 So Joy was to go home and refurbish her ward- 
 robe. She was still at the age of growing out of 
 eveirjTthing; and during her three months at the 
 farm she had shot up like a young tree, her overalls 
 and the frocks she had brought with her creeping 
 perceptibly up from her ankles to her knees. 
 
 'I wonder if you will be able to do anything 
 with these. Rose,' she said, inspecting a row of 
 garments laid neatly side by side on her bed. 
 
 T.H, I 
 
124 THE HOUSE 
 
 'There may be something you would like, and the 
 other girls might Hke what you don't want. 
 I'm sorry they're not prettier : but this green 
 would go well with your hair : and I can give you 
 a ribbon to match. Blue and green are your 
 colours, I think : not pink and not purple, I 
 should give the pink and purple things away, if I 
 were you.' 
 
 'AH this for me to pick from?' said Rose, with 
 blazing cheeks of pleasure. 'I say, Joy — ^won't 
 your maw be vexed? But you've only to arsk and 
 I'll return all. Don't you go gettin' into trouble 
 for me. She must be well off if she don't give it 
 you 'ot.' 
 
 When she had dropped the aspirate she clapped 
 her hand over her mouth. 
 
 ' There ! ' she said despairingly. ' It will go pop 
 hke that ! I don't suppose I'd ever get it much 
 different. No matter how I watch, it just pops 
 h'out — ow ! there's another. Do you suppose 
 it's any use my tryin'?' 
 
 'I should go on trjdng,' said Joy kindly. 'I 
 think you've improved wonderfully.' 
 
 'It's very hard,' said Rose with a profound sigh. 
 'I don't suppose I'd be able to keep it up, 'specially 
 if it was to be no use. Tell me, Joy, 'ow . . . 
 hovf' with a great emphasis on the aspirate — 'did 
 you learn to be like a lady? No one — ^leastways 
 as didn't know — ^would know you wasn't one as 
 good as Miss Irene Chatterton that you've maybe 
 seen ridin' her 'oss. As for Julian . . .' 
 
LOVE WORKS WONDERS 125 
 
 Rose had an access of agitation which kept her 
 silent for a few seconds. 
 
 ' What are your folk, Joy ? They must be superior ? 
 Tradespeople, or got to do with land? ' 
 
 'They've got to do with land.' 
 
 'Why didn't you and Julian stay at 'ome then 
 an' 'elp your paw?' 
 
 Before the question could be answered she 
 reaUsed her lapses and groaned. 
 
 'There's two on 'em in a mouthful,' she said. 
 'I don't suppose it's no manner of use tryin'.' 
 
 She had forgotten for the moment her searching 
 inquiry into Joy's antecedents, but presently she 
 recurred to them. 
 
 'I saw your maw's photo in Julian's room,' she 
 said. 'She do look kind — an' smilin' — ^smiUng, I 
 mean. I like 'em fat at that age. Personable, I 
 call it. I were helpin' — I didn't say 'elp, Joy — 
 Mrs Pinkerton to make 'is bed. There ! I don't 
 suppose I could keep it up — not if I was to get 
 excited.* 
 
 Whether it was from the struggle to keep the 
 h's in their proper places or not. Rose had certainly 
 become thinner. It had an effect of fining down, 
 and made it possible for her to wear Joy's overalls 
 and other garments which had been distributed 
 with a lavish profusion. With the exception of 
 one or two delicately pretty things, which could 
 be cut down for Ethel Jane and Ivy, Joy had left 
 the distribution to Rose, and Rose had been just, 
 and even generous in carrying out her trust. Her 
 
126 THE HOUSE 
 
 own increased wardrobe seemed to be something 
 of a fearful joy to her. 
 
 'I don't suppose I'll even wear 'em all,' she said. 
 'An' I'm afraid you'll have trouble with your maw. 
 Goin' home like that with an empty trunk. I'm 
 takin' your word for it that it don't matter noan, 
 but it must be a big farm for you to give away 
 open-'anded like this, and I only 'ope — ^hope — 
 you won't Uve to regret it; but, as I was sayin', 
 you can have 'em back an' Vvelcome, if you'll just 
 send a line.' 
 
 ' They wouldn't be any use to me, Rose : they 
 are too short.' 
 
 'Not to cut down for your younger sister?' 
 Rose asked anxiously. 
 
 Joy was gone and there was a haunting memory 
 of her about the place in Rose wearing her clothes, 
 and still a trifle broad for them. JuUan, meeting her 
 one day in the green smock and wearingthegreen hair- 
 ribbon, which he did not recognise for Joy's, said 
 — as he would not have said three months ago : 
 ' Why, how pretty you look. Rose ! ' and was amazed 
 at Rose's flush and her unreadiness to acknowledge 
 the compliment. 
 
 About this time Rose bought a bicycle. Mrs 
 Pinkerton had nothing to say to that. They all 
 had their bicycles nowadays, and despite her 
 roughness Rose had really been very steady at her 
 work, and was, in Mrs Pinkerton's experience of her, 
 a good girl. But it was a disquietiiig thing when 
 Rose began to go off after her work on the bicycle, 
 
LOVE WORKS WONDERS 127 
 
 not coining back till late. The evenings were 
 drawing in by this time. 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton was troubled. The new freedom 
 had hardly reached Sweetwater Farm. After a 
 time she took Rose to task. 
 
 Rose flushed and looked mutinous for a second. 
 Mrs Pinkerton had time to reflect that there was 
 a great change in Rose, whom even she had found 
 overpowering before the change. Then the sudden 
 colour died down. 
 
 'You've a right to ask me,' said Rose, 'seein' as 
 you stand in the place of my maw, and I'll answer 
 you, Mrs Pinkerton. I've done nothink — nothing, I 
 mean — for a girl to be ashamed of . It's only that . • .' 
 
 Out came the surprising statement. 
 
 'It's only that Miss Stubbs said I might come 
 for schoolin' to her. It stands to reason I didn't 
 get much, bein' eldest o' twelve. She said to me 
 only last night that if you could spare me a bit 
 earlier, I might make up afterwards. She don't 
 like me bein' abroad in the dark.' 
 
 ' Wotever put it in your head to improve yourself, 
 Rose Buckett?' askfed Mrs Pinkerton. 'I will say 
 you have improved. Seems like as if Joy had 
 improved you. You was rough, you know; a 
 good girl, but rough.' 
 
 'I know it,' said Rose, in a voice of despair. 'I 
 was a terrible girl. I 'ate to think of myself. It 
 were Joy, an' her soft, pretty ways.' 
 
 Then she became sorrowful, for she realised that 
 she had lapsed again. 
 
128 THE HOUSE 
 
 'I don't suppose it's any use, anyhow,' she said 
 gloomily. 'Still, I go on tr3dn'.' 
 
 'Look here. Rose,' said Mrs Pinkerton heartily. 
 'I should go on improvin'. You 'ave improved — 
 wonderful, I should say.* 
 
 Later on Mrs Pinkerton imparted this strange 
 tale of Rose Buckett to her husband. 
 
 'Wot do you make of it, Pinkerton?' she 
 asked. 
 
 Pinkerton only scratched his head and looked, 
 as his wife expressed it, like a devil-in-a-briar-bush, 
 which only meant the love-in-a-mist of more 
 poetical people. 
 
 'Would she be goin' off her 'ead?' he asked, 
 seeing that he was expected to say something. 
 
 'You go and bile your 'ead,' Mrs Pinkerton said 
 rudely, but with so soft an air and voice that it 
 sounded like a tender compliment. 'The maid's 
 in love.' 
 
 'Not Ernest Jenkins? He would never expec' 
 the hke of his girl : not but what it would be hendy 
 to be able to do some figurin' when he gets a shop 
 of his own, if ever he do.' 
 
 'Ernest Jenkins!' repeated Mrs Pinkerton in 
 what would have been a voice of unbounded 
 contempt if only she could have managed it. ' Well, 
 I never ! You don't see wot's under your nose, 
 Pinkerton. My ! you are a thick-'ead ! ' 
 
 'Danged if I know wot you're a-drivin' at,' said 
 Mr Pinkerton, and scratched his head to a wilder 
 confusion than before. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 TWO WOMEN AND A MAN 
 
 Julian had noticed but vaguely the change in 
 Rose Buckett. It was a negative kind of notice, 
 rather the relief when something that jarred and 
 fretted has ceased than anything more definite. 
 Despite his compUment to her, despite the gentle- 
 ness with which he interfered to help her if he saw 
 her carrying something beyond her strength, 
 despite the way he had of opening a door or placing 
 a chair for her, pohteness which, at one time, had 
 excited Rose's boisterous laughter, she was not 
 deceived. 
 
 'I'm no more to him than that there churn,' she 
 said bitterly to herself, and had a queer, wistful 
 vision for a moment of a world in which women 
 were gently treated because they were women — 
 a thing that would have filled her with contempt 
 six months earUer. 
 
 "Tis that there Mary,' she whispered to her own 
 heart, which in these days she found was capable 
 of an immense rage and pain of jealousy. It was 
 no wonder she grew thin almost to attenuation 
 and that Joy's pretty garments stretched no longer 
 
 129 
 
130 THE HOUSE 
 
 on a frame broader than they had been accustomed 
 to. 
 
 Yet the raging and hungry certainty that some 
 one was preferred before her did not move her 
 from her dogged determination to 'improve' herself. 
 It rather troubled Miss Stubbs, this case of Rose 
 Buckett, which at first had only appealed to her 
 interest and sympathy. Rose, sitting before her at 
 a table, with a painful perplexity in her gaze, 
 trying desperately hard to understand, as though 
 her very life depended on it, puzzled and grieved 
 the schoolmistress who had a whole fountain of 
 romance in her heart. Miss Cheeseman was rather 
 contemptuous about it. 
 
 'You'll never make anything of her, Hetty,' she 
 said. 'She's begun too late, and she has the 
 cockneyisms which don't belong here. I always 
 thought her such a coarse girl, though very pretty. 
 I will say she has improved and is much gentler, 
 but I don't know that it's a change for her own 
 happiness. She has such a fixed look at times. 
 Do you think she is quite right in her 
 head?' 
 
 ' I don't think it's a question of her head : it's 
 a question of her heart. The situation might be 
 treated by the writers you love, but it would take 
 the writers I love to do justice to it.' 
 
 'You think . . . she's in love? . . .' gasped 
 Miss Cheeseman. 'Not ... Mr St Maur?' 
 
 'I think we're all more or less in love with Mr 
 St Maur,' said Miss Stubbs. 'I should be sorry 
 
TWO WOMEN AND A MAN 131 
 
 for poor Rose if it were that. Let us hope it's some 
 one nearer her own class.' 
 
 It was sheer interest in the case, almost a literary 
 interest, but something also kindly human, that 
 kept her at her patient task of trying to make 
 something of Rose. It was not easy to teach her; 
 and she had a conviction that Rose would lapse 
 as soon as the driving force of passion had ceased. 
 Miss Stubbs's experience was chiefly gained from 
 books. She found herself sometimes looking at 
 Rose as though she watched the unfolding of a 
 novel or a play. It was tragic : but she felt power- 
 less to do anything but help the girl as best she 
 might in the wellnigh impossible thing she had 
 set herself to do. There were moments when Rose 
 frightened her : the flame in her cheeks, the 
 brightness of her eyes : again the languor and the 
 pallor : the girl appeared to be burning herself 
 out in whatever passion had come upon her. 
 
 In her own mind Miss Stubbs had no doubt that 
 Rose was in love with Julian St Maur, and at the 
 'back of her mind there was a secret sense of joy 
 because obviously Julian was unaware of, and 
 indifferent to, the passion he had aroused. It would 
 have been impossible that he should be anything 
 else, unless he were to drop far below the ideal the 
 schoolmistress entertained of him. She knew little 
 about young men beyond what she had gathered 
 from her reading, but she was sure that Julian had 
 done nothing to awaken the unhappy passion. 
 She tried to persuade herself that she was glad 
 
132 THE HOUSE 
 
 only on high moral grounds, but she was no great 
 adept at self-deceit, and she was really quite well 
 aware that she was glad on other grounds that 
 JuUan had no use for poor Rose. He seemed hardly 
 aware even of her remarkable good looks. 
 
 The evening seances had hitherto been strictly 
 professional; but there came an evening when 
 Miss Cheeseman had retired to bed early, and at 
 the conclusion of the lessons, Rose, instead of 
 getting up and going, suddenly put her head down 
 on her folded arms and burst into tears. It was 
 something Miss Stubbs had been dreading. She 
 wished miserably that Miss Cheeseman had been 
 there to protect her, while she sat looking at Rose's 
 bowed head, with a mingled pity and repulsion. 
 Rose cried noisily. She sniffed and gurgled into 
 her handkerchief, which was quite insufficient for 
 her needs, being dainty and filmy, one of those Joy 
 had left to her. Miss Stubbs did not know what to 
 do. She had no inclination to offer comfort. Her 
 heart was cold and hard and disdainful within her. 
 Only Foch got up from his place on the hearthrug 
 and laid his head with an enormous sigh on Rose's 
 knee. 
 
 The dog's sympathy seemed to reach her. She 
 lifted her head, making no attempt to stem the 
 big tears that were running down her face. 
 
 ' It do do you good to 'ave a good cry ! ' she said, 
 'You'll excuse me 'owling. Oh, dear me, there I 
 go again. It do come over me at times that it ain't 
 worth while. He'll never think o' me; not if he 
 
TWO WOMEN AND A MAN 133 
 
 was to see me in a picture show up in London. 
 There was a painter gentleman stopped me the 
 other day an' asked to paint me. 'E wanted me 
 for 'Eeb, he said. I said I didn't know nothink 
 about 'Eeb, not if it was a flower or a girl. He said 
 it were both.' 
 
 She blinked at Miss Stubbs with her miserable, 
 wet eyes, and the schoolmistress found nothing to 
 say. But Foch pushed his head in further and 
 harder, clamouring for his S37mpathy to be heard 
 and accepted. 
 
 'There, you are a dear dog,' said Rose. 'I don't 
 know why dogs are so much kinder than 'umans.' 
 
 Miss Stubbs forced herself with loathing to say 
 that she was sorry. It was enough for Rose, who 
 evidently needed the further relief of speech. 
 
 'I know I'm a bloomin' fool,' she said. 'I know 
 he 'eeds me noan more than the dust under his 
 feet.' 
 
 It was a horribly humiliating attitude of mind 
 to Miss Stubbs, who had long been a Feminist and 
 Suffragist, but she listened with a curiosity that 
 she detested in herself. She wanted to know more 
 of how a girl like Rose felt. She prepared herself 
 for possible shocks to her delicacy — ^girls Uke Rose 
 were apt in the stress of strong emotion to have 
 a Biblical plainness of speech — ^but nothing of the 
 sort came. 
 
 "Tis all that there Mary,' said Rose. "E loves 
 the ground she walks on, and she just a common 
 girl with a dad wot makes strikes. He doesn't 
 
134 THE HOUSE 
 
 know that you nor me walks this earth, not even 
 when he's lookin' at us.' 
 
 'Oh, please, leave me out of it ! ' cried Miss Stubbs, 
 with sharp irritation. 
 
 'No offence meant,' said Rose humbly, 'Of 
 course, you never was in it. There was never but 
 her an' me, an' since he took 'er an' left me there 
 isn't me in it neither.' 
 
 Miss Stubbs had a sudden thought that girls 
 like Rose had a distinct advantage over others in 
 that they could, without shame, howl and behave 
 in an uncivilised manner, so relieving the pain 
 within. She felt singularly hard towards Rose, 
 all the same, and when she spoke it was in what 
 she felt to be a harsh voice. 
 
 ' I hope you don't display your feehngs in this way 
 to Mr St Maur — for I suppose it is Mr St Maur.' 
 
 'Did you think it were Jenkins — or Ernest 
 Jenkins — or the young man wot's come to run our 
 sawmill, or old Clutterbuck? ' Rose asked rhetori- 
 cally. 'As for displayin' my feelin's — ^well.'I asks 
 you what would be the good o' that, seein' how 
 he thinks only o' that Mary, an' me but the dirt 
 under his feet.' 
 
 Miss Stubbs felt afterwards that she had failed 
 of her ideals. She ought to have done something 
 to comfort and upUft the poor girl. She thought 
 how Hardy would have treated Rose — ^how im- 
 pressive, how tragic a figure he would have made 
 of her : and she had only had that aloof disgust 
 for Rose, she, the superior person ! 
 
TWO WOMEN AND A MAN 135 
 
 rt was quite true that, except when his eyes 
 chanced to fall on her, Julian was unaware of Rose. 
 He was away a good deal with the shepherd, 
 sleeping at his hut on the Downs. The first lambs 
 had begun to arrive : fortunately the weather was 
 not cold. In those parts the winter seldom made 
 itself felt before Christmas. 
 
 'Coom January,' said the shepherd, 'we'll be 
 diggin' of 'em out of the drifts if we ain't lucky. 
 These yere barns an' buildin's are a blessin' coom 
 winter an' lambin'-time.' 
 
 Julian, returning to Sweetwater Farm, came now 
 with a hopeful anticipation of news from Mary. 
 It was irrational, but there it was. Jenkins, as 
 though he knew what was going on in the young 
 man's mind, or perhaps only because he needed 
 sympathy in the loss of his best milker, would say 
 over and over again — 
 
 'That there Mary, she'll be coomin' back. The 
 way of her is this. Some marning or evenin' when 
 you're not thinkin' on her there she'll be. 'Twill 
 happen again. Maybe not this week or next week 
 nor Week after. But you mark my words, Mr 
 SajTmore, there she'll be. I wouldn't care if 'twere 
 to-marrer. No more would Daisj', nar the Clover 
 cow.' 
 
 Of course, it couldn't happen, not yet. It might, 
 perhaps, about the time the daffodils came and 
 the ^mroses, when the primulas were shaking 
 out their little frilly frocks, and the first wallflower 
 began to burst its sheath. Perhaps not even then. 
 
136 THE HOUSE 
 
 not till Easter was past and the thorn-trees in full 
 bloom. Tom Bates, he knew from the newspapers, 
 had done what he went to do in directing the strike 
 of Canadian miners. ^The noise and trouble of it 
 had not yet died down. It had not come to the 
 point of settlement. It was not likely they would 
 come home before the spring. But still the 
 irrational hope was there. Coming down in the 
 dark of a winter morning, with fires yet unlit, he 
 would think to himself what a sudden glory would 
 irradiate the dark and frozen world if, by some 
 wonderful happening, 'that there Mary' had 
 come back. 
 
 'She'll come walkin' in to my ox-steddle'/ 
 Jenkins would say, 'when least expected, an' 
 she'll pull over the milkin' stool, take a pail, an' 
 start milkin'. Then I'll feel I am satisfied that the 
 cows'U be milked proper, not the milk turned bad 
 in 'em, as some I know has done.' 
 
 It was perhaps what kept Julian content through 
 the days of winter. Sometime in the spring or 
 early summer she would surely come back. 
 
 He was to go home for Christmas. He had not 
 seen his family since May, and his mother's letters 
 were gently reproachful. He had refused a visit 
 from her at Sweetwater Farm, since she could not 
 appear incognita. 
 
 When the time came he was almost sorry to go 
 away. It had been so peaceful and there was always 
 the hope and expectation of Mary's return. He 
 was grateful to the place where he had met her 
 
TWO WOMEN AND A MAN 137 
 
 and where he had found so much healing, for he 
 was fit again. But, after all, it was delightful to 
 go home again, and as he saw the distant hghts of 
 Cressey from the luxurious Rolls-Royce in which 
 he sat by his mother in a soft and scented obscurity, 
 his heart went out to the old House in which his 
 childhood had been so happy. He forgot how he 
 had sat in judgment upon Cressey. 
 
 'It all seems as though there had never been a 
 war,' he said. 'You must be patient with me, 
 mother. I have been Uving in the natural state. 
 I'm afraid you will find me rather a savage.' 
 
 'Oh, darlin' — ^Lady Beauvais laughed her soft, 
 comfortable laugh. 'You couldn't be savage if 
 you tried, nor even pretend to be.' 
 
 'I don't know,' said Julian, and for a second 
 his mind was dark. 'A lot of us got dangerously 
 near to it at one time. Don't let us talk of it. 
 Tell me about father. What does he think of the 
 situation?' 
 'The Labour situation? Russia?' 
 'Ireland, India, America, ever3d:hing.' 
 'Oh, need we think of that just yet, darlin', 
 now you've only just come home? Everything 
 is very disagreeable, but the walls of Cressey are 
 thick enough to shut it out. We don't feel the 
 rationin' because we produce so much, so you 
 won't be starved. Of course, we can't get half the 
 amount of coal the House needs, but we do our 
 best to make up with wood. The poor House will 
 have to suffer, I'm afraid, but we needn't be cold.' 
 
138 THE HOUSE 
 
 'The House has had it all its own way for so 
 long that it can afford to suffer.' 
 
 'Oh, but darlin', the poor House — and all the 
 precious, beautiful things that must suffer from 
 the damp !' 
 
 Julian took up her soft, be-ringed hand and 
 kissed it like a lover. 
 
 'Never mind, darling,' he said. 'I don't suppose 
 the House will suffer much.' 
 
 It was no use puzzling and fretting her, he thought. 
 She was always so good to every one, so sweet and 
 warm and kind. If it depended on her no one 
 would ever go cold and uncomforted. 
 
 Almost the first thing his father said at the 
 dinner-table, after Julian had had a triumphal 
 progress of being made much of by the family : 
 all of whom were at home : of greeting and being 
 greeted by the servants and the dogs — was : — 
 
 'Hallo, Julian, we'll have trouble with the miners. 
 They're out for direct action, and Tom Bates is 
 coming home, after engineering the biggest strike 
 Canada has ever seen, to help Mr Smillie to make 
 us all very uncomfortable. Not much peace 
 or good-will this Christmas ! ' The land is bad 
 enough. They are taxing us out of existence, 
 and I can't keep up the place as it should be 
 kept up. But that's an old story I needn't 
 bother you with, lad.' 
 
 'I hate big houses like this,' said Julian. 'No 
 one should have a house bigger than he can live in.' 
 
 'Oh, darlin', hate Cressey!' said his mother in 
 
iWU WOMEN AND A MAN 139 
 
 a wounded voice. 'Dear Cressey, that we are all 
 so proud and fond of.' 
 
 'Not Cressey, exactly — all big houses. They 
 give such a sense of futility. What's the good of 
 building a house so big that your descendants can 
 only afford to live in a corner of it?' 
 
 'I say, old thing,' grumbled Dick, who had just 
 got his ship, 'you'd better join the Labour Party, 
 renounce all claims to the succession to Cressey 
 and leave it to me to carry on the family.' 
 
 Lord Beauvais smiled over this discussion with 
 an air as though it did not concern him. 
 
 T.H. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 IRENE 
 
 Julian went up to town just before Christmas 
 and bought a fairing for every one at the farm : 
 for Mr Pmkerton a case of pipes, for Mrs Pinkerton 
 and the family appropriate trifles of jewellery, for 
 Jenkins a good time-keeping watch. A despatch- 
 case was for Miss Stubbs, and a big bottle of Eau de 
 Cologne for Miss Cheeseman : for old Silas Keys, 
 the shepherd, a warm, fleecy cardigan and enough 
 tobacco to keep him going for three months. He 
 forgot no one, and spent some time and thought 
 in choosing acceptable gifts. 
 
 Besides these things he went presently buying 
 for his own family — and that involved secrecy. 
 Only Joy was to be trusted with all his secrets 
 except one, and she might have accompanied him 
 on his journey round the West End shops if she had 
 riot caught an influenza cold just then which kept 
 her in bed for a few days. 
 
 He had always been a giving person, with a 
 great pleasure in the bestowal of gifts. Over a 
 gift for Rose Buckett he hesitated. There had 
 been a time when he had disliked her. Of late 
 his feelings towards her had changed. He had 
 
 140 
 
come to have a liking for her plaintive voice singing 
 sad old airs as she worked in the dairy. He had 
 noticed that she looked unhappy and been sorry 
 for her, without curiosity as to what had made the 
 change in her. He was too absorbed in his own 
 feeling for Mary Bates to be much more than 
 conscious of Rose. Perhaps he was only grateful 
 to her for being so much less objectionable than 
 she had been in the early days at the farm. Anyhow, 
 he felt he would Uke to give her something. He 
 hoped her face would brighten at his gift. It must 
 be a trinket of some kind or other. While he 
 hesitated, the jeweller's assistant, accustomed to 
 help out a hesitating customer, pushed a tray of 
 brooches towards him. 
 
 ' Now here is a pretty thing for a gift to a young 
 lady,' he said. 
 
 It was a Httle bow brooch of pearls. If Joy had 
 been there she would have forbidden it : but Julian 
 was grateful to have the work of selection done 
 for him. He was weary of much purchasing. 
 
 He went back to Cressey, having despatched his 
 gifts to Sweetwater Farm. The gifts for his own 
 family were to follow him; but in an inner pocket 
 he carried something he had not been able to 
 resist buying. It was an antique ring set round 
 about with whole pearls of considerable size and 
 beauty. Beside it the modern trinkets were vulgar. 
 
 He would not acknowledge to himself that it 
 was intended for anybody. He had bought it 
 because it was so beautiful that he coveted it. 
 
142 THE HOUSE 
 
 He could not in the least have anticipated the 
 effect of his gifts at Sweetwater Farm. Mrs 
 Pinkerton wrote to him the week after Christmas, 
 reproaching him for his extravagance and telling 
 him that he ought to put by his money, so as to 
 be able to buy a farm for himself when the time 
 came. Of course, they were all delighted with his 
 kind presents. The elder children wrote large, 
 scrawly letters. Miss Stubbs was apparently 
 overwhelmed with the pleasure of owning a 
 beautifuUy-fitted despatch-case, and thought it 
 might inspire her to start on the literary career 
 she had so long desired. From Rose, nothing. He 
 hardly noticed that there was nothing : if he 
 had considered the matter at all he would have 
 concluded that Rose was too indifferent a pen- 
 woman to commit her thanks to paper. 
 
 At New Year a certain Irene Chatterton was to 
 visit Cressey. The family had met her in Scotland 
 the preceding summer, and apparently she had 
 made a conquest of them all : even Lord Beauvais, 
 who was not impulsive in his judgments, had said 
 with emphasis that he liked Irene. The rest of the 
 family had been more enthusiastic in speech, but 
 they did not mean more. 
 
 Juhan recognised the name. The family had 
 a place in Sussex, not far from Sweetwater 
 Farm, and the Pinkerton's held some land from 
 them. 
 
 Ever3rwhere in Sussex they had been cutting 
 down the woods, or thinning them, and a new 
 
IRENE 143 
 
 activity at Sweetwater Farm had been a saw-mill 
 which had started working in the preceding autumn. 
 Julian had learnt the work of the saw-mill from 
 one, William Dobbs, who had the management of 
 it. He had been busy one very hot day superin- 
 tending the cutting up of timber when he noticed 
 that an elderly and a young lady had paused outside 
 the gate that led to the saw-mill, evidently in some 
 difficulty. He had gone over to them and asked 
 if he could do anything to assist them, feehng the 
 while rather shy of the appearance he must present, 
 for he had been working without his coat, his shirt- 
 sleeves were rolled up to his shoulders : the sawdust 
 had powdered him pretty thickly, and the sweat 
 was on his forehead and his flushed face. 
 
 ' What a ruffian I must look,' had been his thought 
 when he interviewed the two ladies, who might 
 have come out of Cressey. 
 
 They wanted a certain view over the Weald, 
 which was reached by a path through the woods, 
 and they had taken the wrong turn. Could he 
 direct them? 
 
 It was the old lady who spoke to him, but the 
 young lady had put in a word, keeping her frank, 
 vivacious blue eyes fixed upon him with obvious 
 interest. She was a very attractive girl, fair 
 and bright-looking, with a wholesome, honest 
 expression, and her voice was alluringly pleasant. 
 
 'I'm ashamed of myself as a Sussex woman,' 
 she said. 'I used to know the turn perfectly well, 
 but they've been doing such horrible things with 
 
144 THE HOUSE 
 
 those woods that they present an absolutely new 
 face to me.' 
 
 She had turned to the elder lady with a very 
 winning smile. 
 
 'You'll never trust yourself to me again, darling,' 
 she said. 
 
 JuUan opened the gate and came out with them 
 into the road. 
 
 'Permit me,' he had said. 'The roads here are 
 so many that it is no wonder you are puzzled. 
 I will show you the way, if you will excuse my 
 working clothes. 
 
 In spite of their conventioned protests he went 
 a httle farther with them to the gate which opened 
 on to the famous view. As he held it open for 
 them he made as though to lift his hat, remembered 
 he had no hat, and let his hand fall again. 
 
 The ladies had no idea of how their voices 
 carried. The young lady had a very clear, singing, 
 birdUke voice, and the elder lady's was no less 
 penetrating. 
 
 ' What a nice boy ! ' said the young lady. ' Of 
 course, he is a gentleman.' 
 
 'Obviously, my dear Irene,' said the elder lady. 
 'Gentlemen are learning all manner of things 
 nowadays. This one is evidently learning how to 
 run a saw-mill.' 
 
 'Farming, too, I expect,' the younger lady said. 
 'That place where they have started the saw-mill 
 is Sweetwater Farm. They are very good people, 
 I believe, the Pinkertons.' 
 
xis.x2,iM::. 145 
 
 Julian had not intended to eavesdrop, and he 
 had gone on his way without hearing further. 
 Now, he wondered if the blue-eyed, clear-skinned 
 girl could have been Miss Chatterton, who had 
 apparently captured his family, big and little. 
 
 She eame on New Year's Eve, and he went with 
 his mother to meet her at the station. It was 
 raining and very cold, and, leaving his mother in 
 the motor he waited alone on the platform for the 
 train, which was almost due. 
 
 He recognised Miss Chatterton as soon as 
 she appeared, brighter than ever in her dark 
 furs. The station was ill-Ht and the oil-lamps 
 flared in the high wind, but even by the villainous 
 light he caught the gold gleam of her pale hair and 
 the fresh rose and white of her complexion. 
 
 'Miss Chatterton?' he said, going up to her. 
 'I am Julian Amory.' 
 
 She leant towards him with a puzzled expression 
 and gave his hand a soft, warm clasp, drawing her 
 hand from the interior of her muff. 
 
 'Yes, I am Irene Chatterton,' she said. 'How 
 good of you to come to meet me ! I hope you 
 have not been waiting long.' 
 
 Quite simple words, but into them Miss Chatterton 
 contrived to get a friendHness which was delightful. 
 He began to understand at once how she was 
 persona grata with the family. 
 
 Some one had said of Irene Chatterton that she 
 had a genius for making friends. Certainly, she 
 was a most attractive person. JuUan noticed 
 
146 THE HOUSE 
 
 that there was something warmly affectionate 
 in his mother's manner to Miss Chatterton beyond 
 her usual soft way with the world in general. It 
 was the manner Lady Beauvais kept for her own 
 children, with something of admiration added. 
 The whole family was in the hall to welcome her 
 when she arrived. Lord Beauvais came out of his 
 private room, where he managed the affairs of the 
 estate. Dick forgot to be hlasd. He was really a 
 jolly, laughing boy, and the conventional bored 
 air was very often forgotten. The younger children 
 flocked about Irene with a certainty that she 
 wanted them : the dogs, who had not been intro- 
 duced, stood round in a friendly group wagging 
 their tails. Only Joy, who had not been in Scotland 
 in the summer, stood shyly apart till her mother 
 brought her forward, when she, too, seemed to 
 be drawn within the sphere of Irene's fascinations. 
 
 Julian did not go long unrecognised. She looked 
 up at him as he handed her tea. 
 
 'Ah,' she said. 'I have been trying to make you 
 out. You are the young man of tlje saw-mill.' 
 
 'I, of course, recognised you at once,' he said, 
 with a sense of pleasure because she remembered 
 him. 
 
 'I, of course, was not in disguise,' she said, and 
 laughed. 
 
 Lady Beauvais had to be made aware of the 
 curious coincidence, and was, as Irene said, im- 
 mensely 'intrigued' with it. She wanted to tell 
 Irene the whole story of how darlin' Juhan had 
 
IRENE 147 
 
 worked so hard at the farm and how keen he was 
 to return there : but Irene's attention was claimed 
 by every one at once, so that Lady Beauvais, 
 laughing, postponed the tale to a quieter hour. 
 
 She was certainly a very charming girl, not in 
 the loose way in which the word is often used. 
 There never was any one more ready to adapt herself 
 to the moods and wishes of other people. After 
 romping with the children, she was ready to play 
 Chopin and Grieg and the latest Russian composers, 
 for she was an accomplished musician. She would 
 sing in a light, sweet voice, and made no difficulty 
 about doing it, and she had so many devices to 
 amuse the children that it was with difficulty they 
 could be persuaded to go to bed. 
 
 'It seems to me,' said Julian, coming into Joy's 
 room on his way to dress for dinner, 'that the 
 whole family has agreed to worship Miss Chatterton. 
 
 ' I was a little jealous of the way mummie talked 
 about her,' said Joy, shaking down her long hair 
 till it hung about her like a cloak; 'but she really 
 is a darling, Julian, isn't she ? ' 
 
 'She is very attractive,' said Julian, with a 
 wistful air. 
 
 Then he turned to admiring his sister's hair. 
 
 'What jolly hair you have, Joy; so long and 
 thick. I didn't know it was nearly so long.' 
 
 'Oh, you haven't seen it down for a good while,' 
 said Joy, vigorously brushing the silken masses. 
 
 Friends were accustomed to smile, and enemies 
 to mock at the simple admiration the Beauvais 
 
148 THE HOUSE 
 
 family had for aach other. It was so far rembved 
 from anything hke conceit that it was very easy 
 to excuse, even to admire. 
 
 'I'm sure Irene'^s hair is lovely down,' said Joy. 
 'I love golden hair; don't you, JuUan?' 
 
 'I think I like brown hair better,' said Juhan 
 without hesitation. 
 
 He went half-way to the door, then paused and 
 looked back. 
 
 'Do you think Miss Chatterton as beautiful as 
 Mary?' he asked. 'You used to think Mary so 
 beautiful.' 
 
 'What a baby you are, Juhan ! There is 
 no comparison. Irene is so beautifully dressed. 
 Dorothy told me she always wore creations in 
 Scotland. Think of Mary in her blue smock I 
 Irene is like a young rose. Her face is just exactly 
 like a rose, don't you think?' 
 
 'I suppose it is,' said Juhan, only faintly 
 interested. He had a feeling as though Joy had 
 disappointed him, had somehow deserted Mary 
 Bates. 
 
 But as time went by the charm of Irene grew. 
 One day it flashed upon him what Joy had meant 
 in comparing her to a rose. Her yoimg head had 
 a curious grace. Her face was indeed the colour 
 of a rose, a Dorothy Perkins rose, and her golden 
 head rippled over in sunny curls. Perhaps she 
 was more like a rambler than any garden rose. 
 She stepped and stood with an airy grace. There 
 was nothing formal about the young figure and 
 
IRENE 149 
 
 face. Her voice, light and soft, was like a robin's 
 song. And she liked Juhan. It was perfectly 
 obvious that she liked him very much. He would 
 have been less or more than human if he had not 
 responded. 
 
 They went riding together, galloping on the 
 Downs for miles. One day, galloping under trees, 
 her horse just missed stepping into a rabbit-hole. 
 Juhan was overwhelmed by the vision of what 
 might have been; he saw the rose down in the 
 dust, broken, bleeding, marred. He was so alarmed 
 that she had to comfort him. She herself had 
 only laughed and called upon him to admire Patsy's 
 cleverness, which had just saved her and himself. 
 
 She was almost tender while she rallied him 
 about his concern for her. If there had not been 
 Mary, he must have been in love with her. He 
 thought about her beautiful colour. He had never 
 seen colorn: as beautiful — but, yes, he had. Rose 
 Buckett at the farm rivalled her. He turned 
 away from the thought of the beautiful colouring 
 of Irene Chatterton, of Rose Buckett. He liked 
 better a soft, warm paleness. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE JEALOUS SWAIN 
 
 Julian went back to Sweetwater Farm on a cold, 
 sleety day of January. At the last his mother had, 
 unexpectedly, tried to prevent his return, not by 
 opposition — ^that was not Lady Beauvais' way — 
 but by coaxing. 
 
 'We want you with us, darlin*,' she said. 'The 
 farm has done all it could do for you. I am very 
 grateful to those charmin' people. You must 
 advise me what presents I shall send them. But — 
 need you go -back? You should be helpin' your 
 father with the management of the property. He 
 works too hard, poor darlin', and there seems to 
 be so much trouble comin'. It will settle down, 
 of course, but your father will be troubled while it 
 lasts.' 
 
 'I must go back,' said Julian definitely. His 
 mother remembered how as a child he had always 
 known when he wanted a thing and meant to have 
 it, although about unessential things he had been 
 sweetly willing to yield. 
 
 'I must go back,' he said. 'They are counting 
 on me for the spring work They are rather 
 short-handed. Labour is scarce and very dear.' 
 
 150 
 
THE JEALOUS SWAIN 151 
 
 'Oh, well, if you must, darlin' ! But isn't it 
 dull sometimes? No amusement, and just peasant 
 society, which, of course, is charmin' for a change, 
 but not for always.' 
 
 'I am very well content,' said Julian. 'And I 
 think I am doing more useful work than learning 
 the management of an estate ! How long more 
 are estates going to last ? ' 
 
 'I should think for ever,' Lady Beauvais 
 answered. Her husband had said of her that her 
 mind would never change. He often wondered 
 how she had arrived at her opinions, whether there 
 had been any process, or if she had been born with 
 them. Anyhow, they were immovable, and the 
 most immovable of all was that those who were 
 the ruling classes, by the will of Heaven and their 
 own deserts, would remain so. If she had ever 
 heard of a revolution she had refused to apply her 
 knowledge. She would have said that such things 
 did not happen in England : and she had almost 
 a contempt for all, however highly-placed, who 
 were not English. 
 
 Her son smiled. He knew better than to argue 
 with her. 
 
 'Anyhow, dear,' he said, 'they have my word 
 that I shall return.' 
 
 He knew the argument that would avail with 
 her. 
 
 'Very well, darlin',' she said. 'Of course that 
 settles it. But finish your year at Easter and 
 come home. We really want you.' 
 
153 THE HOUSE 
 
 To her own mind she said that she would not 
 have sped him so cheerfully if that strange creature, 
 the daughter of the agitator, had still been there. 
 Ingenuous Joy had given her mother an excellent 
 picture of hfe at the farm, and had told her a good 
 many more things than she was aware of having 
 told. The farm-house scheme had not been of her 
 choosing : she had not appreciated the republican 
 simpUcity of it, although she had brought up her 
 children very simply. She was glad to have 
 retrieved Joy, and, with that odd, attractive 
 creature across the seas, she might hope for Juhan's 
 immunity from any danger. He had been very 
 frank about the farm-house people, about Miss 
 Stubbs and Miss Cheeseman; she had noticed 
 that he said very httle about Mary Bates. 
 
 He left Cressey on the edge of a hard frost which 
 promised plenty of skating. Miss Chatterton 
 had remained on, while protesting that she should 
 be elsewhere; and she was more beautiful in her 
 velvets and furs than in the wonderfully-coloured 
 and textured things she wore of evenings. She 
 seemed to like being absorbed into the Beauvais 
 family as she had been absorbed, taken to its 
 collective breast; and there appeared to be a special 
 attachment between her and Lady Beauvais. 
 
 It was a change from Cressey to the uncomfort- 
 able third-class carriage in which Julian travelled 
 on principle. At Greenwood Junction he changed 
 into a carriage full of working-men, where he was 
 uncomfortably congested between the men and 
 
THE JEALOUS SWAIN 153 
 
 their belongings. A bag of tools slipped off the 
 rack and narrowly escaped his head. 
 
 'Never mind, guv'nor,' said the man to whom the 
 bag belonged. 'It's cheap an' nasty in the third- 
 class. You should go first.' 
 
 'I always travel third,' said Julian, with a sense 
 of annoyance. 
 
 'For the company or the cheapness?' asked the 
 man, with a grin, which Juhan saw. 
 
 'For the company.' 
 
 'Now, that's kind of the gentleman,' said the 
 man, who was evidently a wag, winking at his 
 fellows. 'I do think as how we should pass him 
 a vote o' thanks.' 
 
 They were quite friendly and civil, but they 
 simply would not take Juhan as he desired to be 
 taken. He tried to discuss labour questions with 
 them, and they answered him civilly, as one who 
 could have no more than an academic interest. 
 Boyishly, he tried to impress them with his know- 
 ledge of practical farming, and they refused to be 
 impressed, as they refused his offer of tobacco, 
 preferring their own coarser kind. Plainly, they 
 thought him a Uly of the field, to his intense 
 annoyance. 
 
 It was a difficult cross-country journey, and it 
 was good, as he walked down the hill, to see the 
 fight from the kitchen of Sweetwater Farm burning 
 in the darkness which had come down upon the 
 world in a ruddy glow. He was carrying his bag, 
 which he shifted from one hand to the other as he 
 
154 THE HOUSE 
 
 went down the last steep hill, stumbling over the 
 deep ruts made by the removal of the timber in the 
 spring. He was very hungry, and he had not yet 
 got over the cold of his journey, although his 
 blood was beginning to circulate : but, somehow, 
 as he looked towards the Ught, a sudden, irrational 
 hope glowed within him, as bright as the ruddy 
 reflection of the fire. It was as though Mary herself 
 awaited him down there in the warm house. He 
 knew how vain a hope it was. People' did not cross 
 the Atlantic this time of year, unless they were 
 hard put to it, and the newspapers had said that 
 Tom Bates, who had carried his fiery torch into 
 the United States, would not return before Easter. 
 But so strong was the imagination that, despite 
 the weight of the bag, at the last lap he began to 
 run, his jubilant heart carrying him along, even 
 while he chided himself as a fool. 
 
 Suddenly, at an opening where there was a gate, 
 some one who had apparently been standing by 
 the gate slipped out into the road, as though he 
 had been waiting for him. 
 
 'You're in a great big hurry to finish your bad 
 work,' said the man, or rather the boy, for a watery, 
 yellow gleam from the west suddenly brightened 
 the heavy sky behind and fell upon the face of the 
 one who had intercepted him. 
 
 'It was Jenkins's son, Ernest, the young green- 
 grocer, of whom Julian had heard vaguely that he 
 was in love with Rose Buckett. He was an absurd 
 youth, with a simple, rosy face, and a shock of 
 
THE JEALOUS SWAIN 155 
 
 hay-coloured hair. That yellow gleam, soon 
 extinguished by the coming night, had revealed 
 the fact that Ernest Jenkins's eyes, of a milky 
 blue, were full of tears. 
 
 'What the devil do you mean?' JuUan demanded 
 angrily. 'Are you mad or drunk?' 
 
 'Nayther,' said Ernest Jenkins, suddenly sulky. 
 'Wot I wants to know is — do you mean fair by 
 Rose? Are you gooin' to marry her?' 
 
 'Good Heavens, no ! said JuHan. 'What put 
 that into your head? I thought she was going to 
 marry you.' 
 
 'She wouldn't look at me. Not if there wasn't 
 another man on the yearth. Many's the time she's 
 told me so. But I'll see justice done to her. I 
 won't heve my Rose plucked like a posy an' cast 
 away to be trampled under foot like a weed thet's 
 laid abroad in the road.' 
 
 'Look here, Jenkins,' said Julian, 'if you're not 
 mad or drunk you're a damned fool. I've hardly 
 ever spoken to Rose Buckett.' 
 
 He suddenly began to laugh at the image of 
 himself as a Don Juan. How amused Mahse wo\ald 
 be— Malise who, of late, had been wont to say of him- 
 self that his only books were woman's looks ! And 
 Rose Buckett — poor Rose ! It was a mad world ! 
 
 'If you laugh Uke that I'll shoot you,' said 
 Ernest Jenkins, with sudden fury. 'It may be 
 laughin' matter to you : but it's kiUin' to me. 
 Not that I've a gun to do it wi', but I could barrer 
 one.' 
 
 T.H. L 
 
156 THE HOUSE 
 
 'Oh, don't borrow it for me/ said Julian, with 
 sudden haughtiness. 'As I've told you, I've hardly 
 ever spoken to Miss Buckett, and I'm quite sure 
 she's as little concerned with me as I am with 
 her.' 
 
 'That's all very fine, mester,' said Ernest Jenkins, 
 and suddenly reached up to Julian's shoulder and 
 shook him ; he had to reach up to perform the feat, 
 and on Julian it had the same effect as though 
 one of the sheep from the blurred pasture-land 
 out there under the night had taken and shaken 
 him. But behind his sense of the absurdity there 
 was also annoyance. 
 
 'Look here,' he said, 'don't try that on again, 
 else I might hurt you.' 
 
 Then he was sorry, through all his sense of the 
 ridiculousness of the situation, for Ernest Jenkins, 
 as though the violence had exhausted him, went 
 over to the gate and leant upon it, his head on his 
 arms. Juhan conjectured rather than saw the 
 heaving of his shoulders. That Ernest Jenkins 
 should be in tears for his supposed love-affair 
 with Rose Buckett — he, to whom Mary was the 
 one woman — annoyed and yet touched him : it 
 was pitiful. It was a thoroughly unpleasant business, 
 he thought, hardening himself. What on earth 
 grounds had this lunatic for his preposterous 
 belief? 
 
 He went over and touched 'the lunatic' on the 
 shoulder. 
 
 'Look here,' he said, 'be a man — don't be a 
 
THE JEALOUS SWAIN 157 
 
 damned fool ! What would Miss Buckett think 
 of you if she could see you now?' 
 
 A woebegone voice answered him. 
 
 'She thinks nought of me ever. She said I were 
 like a bee in a fuzz bush last time I seen her, because 
 I'd been brushin' up my hair to please her. All 
 the same, if she ain't for me, she ain't for you, 
 for I don't suppose you'd mean her noan 
 good.' 
 
 The suggestion enraged Julian. 
 
 'Look here, you damned fool,' he said, 'what do 
 you mean by insulting me as well as the girl you 
 say you are fond of? What bee have you got in 
 your bonnet? It is a lunatic asylum j'ou ought to 
 be in.' 
 
 'Maybe aye, maybe no,' said Ernest Jenkins 
 shakily. 'I've knowed for a long time as she 
 fancied you. W'en she growed so thin 'twere for 
 the love o' you. Now she be fat an' well-favoured, 
 or gooin' that way, all because you sent her a 
 true-love brooch at Christmas. I bought her a 
 string of beautiful big beads, an' she whacked my 
 face wi' 'em. It's sore still.' 
 
 'A true-love brooch !' 
 
 Julian was suddenly alarmed. What had he 
 done? He remembered the little bow brooch of 
 pearls that had seemed so harmless and simple a 
 gift. Was it possible — ^he all but groaned aloud 
 at the thought — ^that in aU ignorance he had chosen 
 a true-lover's knot, that Rose Buckett had placed 
 her own interpretation on the gift? 
 
158 THE HOUSE 
 
 'Yes,, a true-love brooch : you can't deny it, 
 not unless you was to be a liar.' 
 
 'I'm frightfully sorry,' said Julian. 'It never 
 occurred to me that it was a true-love brooch, if 
 that is what you caU it. I thought it was just madfe 
 in the shape of a bow.' 
 
 ' Tell that to your gram'mer,' said Ernest Jenkins, 
 taking courage from Julian's sudden abasement. 
 ' You've been playin' fast-an'-loose atween my Rose 
 and that maid, Mary.' 
 
 'If you say that again,' said Julian ominously, 
 'I'll be obhged to knock you down, and I don't 
 want to do that.' 
 
 'You cam knock me down if you want to,' Ernest 
 Jenkins said, miserably. 'I don't care. Rose will 
 never be mine. Yoii've taken her heart from me : 
 and I were doin' well an' puttin' by, hopin' for a 
 little business of our own, me takin' round cart 
 an' she sellin' in shop.' 
 
 'I hope all that will come true yet.' 
 
 Julian was at his wit's end how to deal with this 
 ridiculous situation. But he could not act as he 
 would. He must quiet this poor fool, and then, 
 if he really had committed so appalling a blunder, 
 and if the girl thought herself in love with him, he 
 must undeceive her. He could not put his tail 
 down and run like a dog who would not face a 
 fight. He had to face the situation fair and square 
 — ^grasp his nettle. He remembered somebody's 
 saying, 'No one ever got lost on a straight road.' 
 He had never walked a crooked road yet. Please 
 
THE JEALOUS SWAIN 159 
 
 God, he never would. One had just to walk up to 
 such a wretched misunderstanding and tear the 
 network of it asunder. He did not know how he 
 was going to do it, but he would do it. 
 
 'You may say that now,' said Ernest Jenkins, 
 'but how is it a-coomin' to parss? She's above me 
 — that's what she is. She've been a-eddicatin' of 
 herself to be up to you. I'd heve hed a chance, 
 maybe, though many's the buffet she gived me for 
 my ugly moog, if you hedn't come along wi' your 
 towny ways an' took her from me.' 
 
 'I'll explain to her that it was a mistake about 
 the brooch ' — (He said to himself, ' Confound it ! 
 it is not going to be a pretty undertaking !) — 'Believe 
 me,' he went on earnestly, 'that I never, by word 
 or look or deed, led Miss Buckett to think I was in 
 love with her. If it is as you say — I still hope it is 
 not — I must only let her know that I never thought 
 of such a thing.' 
 
 He hated himself as he said it. To be obliged 
 to put a girl out of love with him ! What a coxcomb 
 he must sound to any one more critical than poor 
 Ernest Jenkins ! All the time proofs were coming 
 thick and fast to bis mind — Uttle things he had 
 never noticed at the time — that Ernest was not 
 the lunatic he had seemed to be at first. 
 
 It was something that he must get out of his 
 way before Mary came back. Innocent as he had 
 been in the matter he could not bear to think of 
 even the suggestion reaching her that he had flirted 
 with Rose Buckett. That irrational hope of his. 
 
i6o THE HOUSE 
 
 that she might be awaiting him in the lit farm-house 
 kitchen, seemed worlds away from his present 
 mood. He was glad the Atlantic divided them 
 till this thing could be cleared up. 
 
 'I believe you/ said Ernest Jenkins slowly. 
 'You'll tell Rose you're not for her, an' then 
 you'll clear out of it. You'll heve to do it, else 
 Rose'U keep on thinkin' on you. 'Tisn't likely Mrs 
 Pinkerton would let her go neither, she bein' such 
 a hand at butter 'n cheese, an' you but a 'prentice.' 
 
 'I see I shall have to go,' said Julian sorrowfully. 
 He hated to think of leaving Sweetwater Farm. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 FRIENDS IN COUNCIL 
 
 In the farm-house kitchen when he entered there 
 was no Rose, only the fire burning brightly, and the 
 children and the dogs sitting about the hearth. 
 Ethel Jane was reading a book by the firelight; 
 William John and Ivy were rolUng over like 
 puppies in one of their wild games which were 
 seldom noisy; Samuel was whittUng an ash-plant 
 into shape with a pen-knife, and Ernest was 
 playing with the dogs. 
 
 The tables were spread for supper and there was 
 a savoury smell from the back-kitchen, where 
 Mrs Pinkerton was preparing the evening meal. 
 
 The dogs barked a joyous welcome and the 
 children jumped up from their respective occupations 
 and joined in the greeting. Mrs Pinkerton appeared 
 in the doorway and said : 'Well, if you aren't as 
 welcome as the flowers in May ! ' 
 
 The return to the farm was good, despite Mary's 
 absence, if only the ridiculous business about Rose 
 had not spoilt the occasion. He had grown to like 
 the life with all its occupations, and the kind, 
 simple people. 
 
 He had not eaten nor slept at Cressey as he had at 
 
 i6i 
 
i62 THE HOUSE 
 
 Sweetwater Farm. The place which had restored 
 him health and energy and banished the creeping 
 phantoms from his mind must be always a beloved 
 place. 
 
 A blessed respite awaited him while he still 
 watched the door fearfully for Rose. Mrs Pinkerton 
 went on to add to her greeting, — 
 
 'There's a mort o' things for you to do. If that 
 there Rose's mother over to Storrington ain't 
 gone an' took ill. We're short-hended an' no 
 mistake.' 
 
 'Oh !' said Julian, an immense relief lifting his 
 heart. 'I'm sorry. When did she go? ' 
 
 'Not two hours agone. You might ha' met 'em 
 on the road to the station. Pinkerton drove her 
 over. He won't be back till late. He have business 
 to Storrington.' 
 
 Julian had an idea that the good woman looked 
 at him with some significance, but he hardly minded 
 that in the plentitude of even temporary relief. 
 He had imagined Rose coming to meet him, blushing 
 and bridling. Her absence gave him time to begin 
 to get out of that horrid blunder about the brooch. 
 
 The other workers came in to supper, and every 
 one was happy to see Julian back again; and after 
 supper Mrs Pinkerton swept the children away to 
 bed and the others departed one by one. Jenkins 
 had a cottage of his own where the men smoked 
 and talked at night till they went to bed, and the 
 women servants sat in the outside kitchen, leaving 
 the big, beautiful kitchen to the family and privileged 
 
FRIENDS IN COUNCIL 163 
 
 persons. Julian, left to the company of the dogs, 
 lay back in his chair before the roaring fire and 
 smoked his pipe in a peaceful contentment. For 
 to-night he would not worry about anything. He 
 had been hungry and he was fed : he had been 
 tired and he was resting deliciously. What need 
 then to worry? When the need came he would 
 find the way out. It must be before Rose came 
 back to Sweetwater Farm. A letter would perhaps 
 be less brutal than words. He drifted off into sleep 
 with the comforting thought that her absence had 
 smoothed the way for him. 
 
 He awoke, feeling quite refreshed, to the homely 
 spectacle of Mrs Pinkerton sitting the other side of 
 the great fireplace, mending stockings. She seemed 
 always to be mending stockings. The fire still 
 roared. A fresh log had been put on and the 
 room was full of the resinous smell. Mrs 
 Pinkerton's rosy face beaming upon him completed 
 the impression of comfort. 
 
 'You've 'ad a nice sleep,' she said; 'best part 
 of a hower. How be you a-feelin' now?' 
 
 Julian saw the time and the occasion. He sat 
 up in his chair and his eyes roamed round the 
 pleasant room. 
 
 'It is very good to be here,' he said. 
 
 'Now, that's kind,' said Mrs Pinkerton, well- 
 pleased, 'for you've been to finer places, I makes 
 no doubt.' 
 
 'Nothing better than Sweetwater Farm,' he 
 answered with sincerity. 
 
i64 THE HOUSE 
 
 'You'll heve a cup of tea — always grateful at 
 wakin' up, I think. A cup o' tea's never amiss. 
 Many's the troubled heart I've seen uplifted by it.' 
 
 There was a tea-tray on the table and a kettle 
 with a Ut spirit-lamp. 
 
 'It's just on the boil,' said Mrs Pinkerton. 'I 
 like a cup at this hower myself. Pinkerton, he 
 won't be in before eleven. You'll be wantin' to go 
 to your bed before that, Julian?' 
 
 She looked at him hopefully. 
 
 'I am very happy here, if I'm not in your way,' 
 he said. 
 
 'I call that real kind of you,' she returned, 
 gratified. "Tis loanesome sittin' up by yourself. 
 Time was when we was first married, I used to sit 
 here when Pinkerton was out, dreadin' what might 
 befall him. Nothink ever did — wonderful the 
 trouble we give ourselves for things that don't 
 coom.' 
 
 She made the tea and gave Julian a cup, hot, 
 strong, and sweet, as he liked it. He loved the 
 simphcity of hfe at the farm. He had a momentary 
 vision of his mother, with Beau, the Maltese, under 
 her. arm, and a couple of footmen coming with 
 Uttle saucers of food : he heard her dear, soft voice 
 saying, 'Now, that is so kind of you, to have brought 
 Beau just what he likes.' 
 
 His mother could never be in that vision of his 
 — ^he must have got it from some book or other he 
 had read as a child — of the simple life in some 
 wild, untrodden places — the return to Nature. 
 
FRIENDS IN COUNCIL 165 
 
 She could not come into it. He remembered that 
 she wore high-heeled shoes with pretty buckles. 
 He saw her deUcate, dimpled hands with a few 
 beautiful rings on the fingers. One could not 
 associate such hands and feet with the wilderness 
 and the return to Nature. He said to himself that 
 Cressey was for such as she. His father was another 
 matter. He had felt in the days before the breaking- 
 up of the world what JuUan felt, the shackles of the 
 luxurious life, the stifling pressure of the dead 
 hand, although he had kept his thoughts to himself. 
 But he had not known the way of escape, so he 
 had done as his fathers had done before him. 
 Things were going to be very different now. 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton had been watching him while he 
 went off in his dreams and visions. As she handed 
 him a cup of tea she smiled at him, a smile which 
 had something maternal in it. 
 
 'I'm rare glad to have you to myself, Julian,' 
 she said. ' I want a talk with you. "lis about that 
 foolish girl, Rose. You've no intentions her way, 
 now, heve you?' 
 
 'None,' said Julian, answering her eagerly. 'As 
 a matter of fact, Mrs Pinkerton, it is awfully good 
 of you to be interested. I seem to be in a nasty 
 corner, through no fault of my own. I want your 
 advice.' 
 
 'Ho, you do?' 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton put down the stocking she was 
 mending and looked hard at Julian, as though the 
 matter required all her attention. 
 
i66 THE HOUSE 
 
 'Tell me first,' she said. 'You heven't been 
 pla5dn' the giddy goat with the maid — no kissin' 
 an' sweet looks behind-backs. Noan deceivin' of 
 her.' 
 
 'None,' said Julian, getting very red. 'I have 
 hardly spoken to her. Once, I think, I did pay 
 her a compUment. She was looking pretty and I 
 said so.' 
 
 'Quite enough with one hke her to set her in a 
 flame, I should say,' commented Mrs Pinkerton. 
 'Nothink beside?' 
 
 'Nothing, upon my honoiu:.' 
 
 'I -thought not. She weren't your style. I 
 thought you favoured Mary. What on earth did 
 you ever goo for to send Rose Buckett a true- 
 love-knot brooch?' 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton drew out this question, elongating 
 it with pauses between the words. 
 
 "Tis quite enough for the likes of her to build 
 on, an' she's been a-buildin' — a-buildin' proper. 
 Learnin' from Miss Stubbs over to Rudham she've 
 been, an' gettin' that slender that as Uke as not 
 she'll drop in a decline. All for the love o' you, 
 young man.' 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton got aU this out without giving 
 him a chance to reply. When she paused for breath 
 he said humbly, — 
 
 'I am so sorry about the wretched brooch. You 
 see, I didn't know it was a true-lover's-knot. I 
 thought it was a pretty design.' 
 
 'You shouldn't heve sent it. As for not knowin'. 
 
FRIENDS IN COUNCIL i6^ 
 
 I believe you. You shouldn't heve gone Buyin' 
 without a woman to look after you. Wotever 
 was Joy about? Not but what you choose some- 
 think lovely for all, if anythink, too good for the 
 likes of us. You never see anythink like that 
 poor Rose over her present. She were smilin', 
 in 'Eving-like, for days after. I will say for her she 
 didn't neglect her work.' 
 
 'I'm so sorry,' was all Julian could say, and he 
 felt the futihty of the repetition. 
 
 'Well, I don't see as it's your fault. I wouldn't 
 take it too much to 'eart. The foolish girl shouldn't 
 be lookin' at 'er superiors. I don't know what 
 Hne your paw is in, but 'tis plain to see Rose couldn't 
 be takin' tea with your family. She heve to get 
 oyer it, as many a girl before her. We've all hed 
 our Uttle fancies.' Mrs Pinkerton sighed. 'She 
 may be thankful to heve Ernest Jenkins mad to 
 marry her. Men is scarce. He'll be steady, if he is 
 a softy, an' green-grocerin' is a good business, if 
 properly looked after an' judgmeint in the bupn'. 
 She'll be thankful some day, maybe, that she didn't 
 get you, though she's mad for you now. 'Twould 
 be a cat-an'-dog life, sure enough. She, a common 
 girl, though not so bad, as girls go in these days, 
 for all she hes lived in London she hesn't wore 
 trousis yet— an' you hevin' that way with you 
 that you'd pass for a gentleman easy.' 
 
 'Oh, thank you, Mrs Pinkerton,' Julian said 
 absent-mindedly. He was thinking of what she 
 had said about Rose, that she had not worn trousers. 
 
i68 THE HOUSE 
 
 He wondered if she meant Mary. Mary, who was 
 so much more modest in her breeches and smock 
 than the fine ladies who came and went at Cressey, 
 about whose evening gowns, or the absence of 
 them, he hardly cared to think. The bare-backed 
 ladies he had danced with at Christmas recurred 
 to his mind : he had felt ashamed of such an 
 excessive expanse of flesh under his hand, yet they 
 had been respectable ladies : none other would 
 have been tolerated at Cressey. 
 
 He thought of Mary against the background of 
 fields and trees, the calm of her face contradicted 
 somewhat by the distant and often sad expression 
 of her eyes: Mary among her flocks and herds, 
 like a spirit of the woods and fields. He found a 
 phrase for her eyes. 
 
 'Careful for a whole world of sin and pain.* 
 
 Yet he had heard her laugh with the children, 
 herself a child : she had a frank, delightful laugh : 
 and he had seen her romp with the children : 
 and there had been times when there was a 
 shadow in her eyes, though they had looked frankly 
 outward like the eyes of a child. 
 
 He wondered about the shadow — ^was it a heritage 
 from the tragedy of her mother's death ? Or was it 
 because she had learnt too young the tragedies of 
 the people amongst whom she had grown up? 
 He waiited the shadow to pass. She might be as 
 careful and as tender for helpless and suffering 
 
FRIENDS IN COUNCIL 169 
 
 things as she would, but he would not have her sad. 
 He would take her away from this old Old World 
 with all its problems, made a thousand times 
 more acute by the war. They would go back to 
 Nature, and Nature would give them her own store 
 of beneficence and joy. 
 
 He looked up, his eyes full of dreams, at Mrs 
 Pinkerton, trying to get back to the matter in hand. 
 
 ' What ought I to do ?' he asked, as simply as a 
 child. 'How am I to do it?' 
 
 'I thought you was puzzlin' it out for yourself 
 when your wits was wool-gatherin', as appeared 
 plain in your eyes. You've just to tell her as you 
 made a mistake in sendin' that brooch. Treat it 
 as though you took a liberty in sendin' it, accordin' 
 to her notions. It might make it easier as well as 
 doin' a kindness to that softy, Ernest Jenkins, if 
 you was to take it as 'ow they was walkin' out if 
 not engaged.' 
 
 'Write it?' 
 
 'Yes, write it. It'll be all sprung on her sudden- 
 like. So much the better. If you was to set out 
 to teU 'er, she might think you was proposin' an' be 
 on your buzzom before you could get it out 'twas 
 all a mistake.' 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton had got quite heated by the time 
 she had evolved this plan of campaign. Her 
 emotions of pride and satisfaction with herself 
 were fed by the intensity of JuUan's gaze upon her 
 and the growing hope and relief in its expression. 
 
 'I should so hate to hurt her,' he said, 'through 
 
170 THE HOUSE 
 
 my stupid blunder : yes, yes : you are quite right. 
 It will be so much easier to write. Perhaps if she 
 would marry that poor fellow who is in love with 
 her I might be able to do something to smooth the 
 way for them, to set them up in a shop perhaps.' 
 
 'You go easy, me lord,' said Mrs Pinkerton, 
 making Julian stare at her in stupefaction. Had 
 she discovered his rank, and how? 
 
 Her next words disabused him of that idea, and 
 proved that the use of the title was a mere flower 
 of speech. 
 
 ' You don't goo poking your nose in wheer you're 
 not wanted. You'll need what you've got if so be 
 you think o' turnin' farmer. I 'ope you're not a 
 spendthrift, Julian. If you was thinkin' of marryin' 
 Mary, you'd better saVe your money for the 'ome. 
 As for Rose Buckett, she won't die of love. Bless 
 your heart, no. Time was, before this yere war, 
 when maids as was crossed in love went into a 
 dechne soon as look at you. They're a harder 
 sort now : not so much took up wi' love, there 
 bein' fewer men to go round, an' the key of the 
 world for the takin'. Rose hes hed her fling. She'll 
 settle down. She won't set up Stanley on high an' 
 make an 'ero of him as girls would ha' done in my 
 day. They don't make idols o' stocks an' stones 
 in these yere days. I've knowed a girl what was 
 sayin' she'd rather die than marry a sensible man 
 as could keep her, to-day, an' to-marrer she was 
 makin' out to herself as he were the man she were 
 always hopin' for. They don't do that nowadays. 
 
FRIENDS IN COUNCIL 171 
 
 They're too hard-hearted, an' hard-eyed, an' they've 
 took to trousis.' 
 
 She stopped and panted after this long speech. 
 
 ' I'm glad anyhow that me an' Pinkerton married 
 romantic, even though 'e weren't the first,' she 
 said, and sighed comfortably. 
 
 T.H. M 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 'WHAT MADE THE TOWN SO FINE?' 
 
 He waited to hear that Rose's mother was mending 
 before he wrote his letter, which, after all, turned 
 out to be a much simpler performance than he had 
 imagined. He was still in a state of wondering 
 admiration of Mrs Pinkerton's Machiavellian guile 
 when he wrote : — 
 
 'Sweetwater Farm, 
 
 'January 19th. 
 'Dear Miss Buckett, — I find that I did some- 
 thing very stupid in reference to the little gift 
 which I offered for your acceptance at Christmas. 
 I learn from Mrs Pinkerton that the brooch I 
 selected was what is commonly known as a true- 
 lover's knot. I did not know it was called that or 
 meant that design. I beg to assure you that I 
 would not do anything so impertinent as to send 
 you a trinket which might excite comment among 
 those who saw it, especially as I understood there 
 is some one who might have a right to resent it. If 
 I can be of service to you or him, and I may be, 
 nothing could give me greater pleasure. 
 'With very deep regret, 
 'Yours sincerely, 
 
 'Julian Amory.' 
 172 
 
•WHAT MADE THE TOWN SO FINE?' ^73 
 
 The last paragraphs had not received Mrs 
 Pinkerton's approval. She had advised something 
 much more direct. 
 
 'You say as 'ow you've heard she were engaged 
 to Ernest Jenkins, an' you congratulate her an' 
 hope she'll ki'p the brooch as a token of good- 
 will.' 
 
 But Juhan could not bring himself to write more 
 explicitly. 
 
 The letter was despatched, and he breathed 
 more freely. 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton had found a temporary dair5miaid 
 who filled Rose's place very satisfactorily, a quiet, 
 plodding creature who got through her work more 
 slowly than Rose, but was, as Mrs Pinkerton put 
 it, 'more than wiUin'.' 
 
 The days and nights were very cold. The 
 lambing season was now in fuU swing, and Juhan 
 was out most nights with the shepherd, coming back 
 in the dark of the morning for a few hours' sleep 
 in a more comfortable bed than the shepherd's 
 hut afforded him. It was a hard hfe but he Uked 
 it. The fold at night under the stars stirred the 
 poetry in him, and in the pastoral life he learnt 
 many things as the days and the nights passed by. 
 He was often touched and amazed by the mystery 
 of Creation : so that he wondered no longer at the 
 shepherd's wisdom. 
 
 He had a bicycle now on which he rode to and 
 from the low down where the sheep were pastured. 
 Many a morning coming home in the cold dawn 
 
174 THE HOUSE 
 
 he had a lamb in his carrier, orphaned or too deUcate 
 for the hfe of the fields, brought in to be fed from 
 a bottle Uke a baby till it was strong enough to 
 drink the milk from a pail. 
 
 He came home cold and weary indeed but with the 
 appetite of a hunter, and so healthy a fatigue 
 upon him that he had but to creep into bed and 
 fall into a deep, sweet, dreamless sleep. 
 
 He loved the life : day by day he grew more at 
 peace with himself and the world. He had found 
 the panacea. His Umbs were full of energy: he 
 filled in and broadened; the wholesome colour 
 came to his cheeks. Old Clutterbuck said of him 
 admiringly, 'That there Julian, he looks a toff, 
 but there's more wark in him than any of they 
 boys spilt by the schules. He can't help his looking 
 useless, he can't.' 
 
 As the day lengthens the cold strengthens — 
 and the third week of January brought a piercing 
 wind and a sky promising snow. The lambing 
 was by this time well advanced, and there was 
 cover for the flocks on the Little Down, so that 
 owner and shepherd were comparatively free from 
 anxieties. But the coldest morning of all brought 
 Julian back to the farm for breakfast with two 
 perished lambs in the carrier, and a mysterious 
 sense of light and warmth. He felt it long before 
 the glowing logs of the great kitchen fireplace 
 welcomed him and the lambs. 
 
 He had attended to the lambs, and was washing 
 at the pump in the back kitchen preparatory to 
 
'WHAT MADE THE TOWN SO FINE?' 175 
 
 getting out of his working clothes before he should 
 feed. There was ice on the pump, and the water 
 came in a small trickle, so that it was quite a time 
 before he collected sufficient to plunge his head 
 into the tub, from which he emerged red- 
 faced and glowing. There was only the gray dawn 
 in the back-kitchen, a place of stone pillars and a 
 heavy groined roof, which was cold on the warmest 
 day and should be piercing cold this coldest day 
 of the year; but, somehow, he was not cold — ^he 
 was glowing from head to foot. He had a sensation 
 as though the light, growing stronger through the 
 darkness, was hke a rose. 
 
 Then in came old Jenkins and he was enlightened. 
 
 'The wind 'ud freeze the feathers on the robin,' 
 said the cowman. 'It were rare cold work milkin' 
 this marnin'. The milk froze on my 'ands.' 
 
 Following the picturesque statement came 
 something which leaped at Julian as though letters 
 of hght had come out of the gray darkness. 
 
 ' That there Mary's coom back ! ' 
 
 Incredible ! The whole winter world began to 
 burgeon and bloom. The birds were singing — 
 the bitter wind might have blown from the spice 
 islands : the torpidity which had lain upon every- 
 thing since Mary went away gave place to the 
 running of streams and the grateful breath of 
 grass and flowers released from the prison of the 
 frost. 
 
 He had known all the time that she had come 
 back. 
 
176 THE HOUSE 
 
 'She walked in last night same as she had never 
 gone,' Jenkins went on. 'First I knew of it was 
 when she coomed in wi' her pail in the dark o' the 
 marnin' an' began for to milk.' 
 
 JuUan's heart leaped and sang. She had come 
 back. 
 
 He made a much more careful toilet than usual, 
 singing as he plunged into his icy bath — since the 
 cold weather had come he had removed to his room 
 an old bath which lay rusting with other things 
 in the stable-yard. Mrs Pinkerton was horrified 
 at his Spartan habits, and had implored him to 
 allow her at least to take the chill off, but he had 
 refused, laughing when she had expressed a doubt 
 of his sanity. 
 
 He came down looking so bonny that Mrs 
 Pinkerton, glancing up from her place behind the 
 tea-urn, remarked, — 
 
 'Well, you do remind me of the childring's old 
 jingle :— 
 
 " Down she came as soft as silk, 
 A rose in her buzzum as white as milk." 
 
 Turnin' it other way about, to be sure.' 
 
 And there was Mary smiling at him. It was no 
 wonder the world was transfigured. He had 
 sometimes asked himself if, when she came at last, 
 it would be quite such a wonder as he anticipated. 
 Now, there was no doubt. He was heady with 
 passionate delight in her presence. 
 
"WHAT MADE THE TOWN SO FINE?' 177 
 
 'What a pretty compliment!' she said, and 
 laughed. 
 
 Oh, there was no one like her ! The tumult of 
 feeling into which her presence oast him had 
 nothing painful or disturbing. It was all sweetness 
 and pure joy. He had known men in love who 
 hardly knew whether they loved or hated — were 
 as often miserable as uplifted, had exaltations 
 and despairs, took love like a fever and were 
 exhausted at moments. Such pangs and fevered 
 joys could not have lived in Mary's presence. 
 When he had gone round to shake hands with 
 her, and returned to his place opposite hers at 
 table, he felt the waves of her benignity flowing 
 over, wrapping him in happy rest. 
 
 The children, of course, were quarrelling over 
 Mary, fighting to be near her, while she kept the 
 peace between them with an equaHty of loving 
 words and caresses. She had already got into 
 her blue smock, which, to his mind, seemed the 
 most delightful of garments. He could see her 
 now as he had often seen her, with her strange air 
 of loneliness and detachment, standing in a field 
 or by the roadside. How motherly she was for 
 so young a girl ! When Mrs Pinkerton threatened 
 the children with their father and their granny, 
 alternately, to the derision of her flock, Mary 
 quieted them with laughter and loving words. 
 And presently they went off to their books and 
 play by the fireplace while Mary helped Mrs 
 Pinkerton to clear away and wash up. 
 
178 THE HOUSE 
 
 It was time for Julian to sleep; he had been up 
 all night : but instead of tumbling off into happy 
 unconsciousness he found that sleep would not 
 visit him. He was too happily excited; sleep 
 seemed a dull thing to him now that Mary had 
 come back, and the time wasted in which he could 
 not hsten to her and look at her. 
 
 But when at last he slept, he slept soundly. 
 Looking at his watch when he awoke he found it 
 was three o'clock and the gray dusk already in the 
 room. It was very cold. The wind through his 
 open window cut hke a knife, and he was cold 
 under the bed-clothes. He lay half-asleep, wonder- 
 ing if he had dreamt that Mary had come back, 
 till he suddenly reaUsed that it was true, whereupon 
 he sprang out of bed and began to dress with great 
 rapidity. 
 
 How had he come to oversleep himself? The 
 dinner would be over an hour ago. Mrs Pinkerton 
 would have kept him something hot between two 
 plates in the oven; and he was hungry, as though 
 love and joy required to be fed. 
 
 As he stood before the low window, brushing 
 his hair, he saw that the snow had already begun. 
 There was a low, yellow Ught on the horizon below 
 the masses of dun-coloured cloud. The Down 
 that looked in at his window was already blotted 
 out by the snow. They were fine flakes, falling 
 with a steady persistence. He said to himself 
 that the snow was come to stay. 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton welcomed him in the kitchen 
 
'WHAT MADE THE TOWN SO FINE?' 179 
 
 with an assurance that if his long fast didn't hurt 
 him his early rising would not — after which sally 
 she patted him on the shoulder and said the young 
 folk needed sleep, and that she had looked in at 
 him several times during the morning without 
 having the heart to waken him. 
 
 Mr Pinkerton was sitting by the fire with an 
 unbraced and comfortable air; his pipe was between 
 his teeth, the Kent and Sussex Courier open on his 
 knee, spectacles on his nose; altogether he looked 
 a man done with work for the day. 
 
 The fragrance of Mary yet hngered about the 
 pleasant apartment, although she was absent. 
 There was a blue pitcher on the table full of flowering 
 laurestinus and yellow winter jessamine. Only 
 Mary could have placed it there. A book lay in one 
 of the deep window-sills with a little work-basket 
 which he recognised for Mary's. Half-open, it 
 showed a scrap of pink ribbon, a bit of silk. She 
 did not disdain pretty clothes, although she 
 appealed to him most in her blue smock : after 
 work was over she was back in feminine 
 garments once more, pretty things, in soft, 
 subdued colours, not too fine for the farm-house 
 kitchen. 
 
 Apparently the United States Government had 
 sent Tom Bates home. It explained their travelling 
 in the middle of the winter. He had engineered 
 the great Canadian strike too skilfully, and his 
 fiery oratory had begun to alarm the champions 
 of Things as They Are; so he had been asked to 
 
i8o THE HOUSE 
 
 remove himself or be removed, and he had chosen 
 the former course. 
 
 'A scallywag, I calls 'im,' said Mr Pinkerton, 
 'but that there Mary's a good lass. I never saw 
 better with a beast — young ones special. That girl 
 'ud rear anything that wasn't dead already. 
 Calves ! Lambs ! Chickings ! Pigs ! I see her 
 a-huggin' a little pig once, what the sow hed hurt 
 — ^wonderful ! ' 
 
 'My friend, Southwell, who was here in the 
 autumn — ^you remember? . . .' 
 
 'Him as was sweet on Joy. . . .' 
 
 'Said' — ^Julian went on without a break — 'that 
 Tom Bates, to his mind, was a prophet.' 
 
 'His profit, h'our loss !' put in Mr Pinkerton, at 
 which sally his wife remarked that Pinkerton was 
 a one for his jokes. 
 
 "A prophet,' went on Juhan, not to be turned 
 aside, 'you read your Bible, Mr Pinkerton. You 
 don't expect the Prophet Ezekiel to be mealy- 
 mouthed in his phrases. I dare say he was put 
 down as a scalljnvag, or something equivalent in 
 his day. Southwell caUed Tom Bates the new 
 Ezekiel.' 
 
 ' I hope they'll sarve him the same here as what 
 he got sarved in America,' Mr Pinkerton went on 
 unmoved. ' I'd prophet him ! Settin' man again 
 man, an' my labourers, wot used never to hev 
 a grievingce, up agin me for increase of wage.' 
 
 'Pinkerton, you beware of losing your temper,' 
 said Mrs Pinkerton warningly. 'You know wot 
 
'WHAT MADE THE TOWN SO FINE?' i8i 
 
 you is w'en roused. There's noan knowin' wot 
 you might do if you was to give way to anger. I 
 can't see as Tom Bates has done you noan harm, 
 seein' as he was in the Noo World, as the sayin' 
 is, w'en your men asked for more wages. Can't 
 Julian call him Ezekiel if he likes, leastways thet 
 Imndsome Mr Southwell, an' no harm done. I'm 
 sure I like to hear Julian makin' a noration even 
 if it hes no sense; he do use such pretty 
 language.' 
 
 The farmer, as though he was tired of the subject, 
 glanced towards the darkening window-pane. 
 
 'Time for Mary to be gettin' back with the 
 childring,' he said. 'We are in for a downright 
 bad fall. Glad the shi'p are in the fold.' 
 
 'Where is Mary?' asked Juhan. 
 
 'She took the childring to school after you'd 
 gone to bed this marnin'. Wouldn't ki'p quiet 
 they wouldn't noan, an' that Ethel Jane whimperin' 
 as how the other childring would get before her 
 if she was to stay to home. So Mary runned them 
 across to Hadham. Then she went to fetch 'em, 
 takin' a load o' hay in the cart for the shi'p. 'Twere 
 no more'n two when she started. She've hed time 
 to get back. I do hope as how she'll have saved 
 enough hay for to ki'p the childring warm.' 
 
 'I'd better go and meet her,' Julian said, going 
 in search of his heavy boots. 'It will be nasty 
 travelling, and old Simon — if she took Simon — ^is 
 none too sure-footed.' 
 
 "Twere Simon she hed,' said Mrs Pinkerton 
 
i82 THE HOUSE 
 
 laconically. ' I'd take a lantern, if I was you. The 
 dark cooms quick.' 
 
 'You should have called me to go with the hay,' 
 Julian said, with a sharp anger because so many 
 burdens must faU on Mary. What would have 
 happened these many times if he had not been 
 there to help her? 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 TI-IE LOVERS 
 
 Julian had walked a long way over the snow, 
 which seemed to be freezing on the hard earth, 
 before he found any trace of Mary and her charges. 
 At last he walked out of the falling veil straight 
 upon her; Simon was down in the road. He had 
 feared as much. The cart rested on its shafts : 
 it was a big, heavy farm-cart, with high tilths. 
 Over the edges peered the faces of the children, 
 staring, bright-eyed and eager in the lantern- 
 light. 
 
 'How long have you been here?' he asked. 
 
 'About three-quarters of an hour. I did not 
 Uke to leave the children to go for assistance, and 
 no one passed the way. I thought you would 
 come.' 
 
 'I would come through fire and water, Mary,' 
 he said, and saw by her face in the glimmering 
 Ught that the thrill in his blood was answered in 
 hers. 
 
 'The children are quite safe and warm,' she 
 said, not looking at him. 'I kept plenty of hay 
 for them, and there are sacks over the hay. They 
 
 183 
 
i84 THE HOUSE 
 
 are as comfortable as though they were in bed, 
 and are enjoying themselves immensely.' 
 
 'Mary wouldn't let me help noan,' cried William 
 John from tinder the sacking. 'I'm a boy and 
 she's only a girl, and she couldn't get the cart 
 right back.' 
 
 'He ought to get up,' Julian said, looking down 
 at the prostrate Simon, who wasn't even attempting 
 to lift his head. 
 
 ' He is not quite free of the cart. Poor old chap ! 
 I'm glad he doesn't struggle. I got the harness 
 off but the cart had stuck in a rut. I could not 
 move it.' 
 
 'We can move it together, Mary,' he said, and 
 caught her cold hand in his, holding it against 
 his leaping he^rt for a second before letting it 
 
 go- 
 
 'I suppose we'd better not have them out?' he 
 said, recovering himself and indicating the 
 children. 
 
 'It would be a pity. I have kept them so 
 beautifully warm, and Ivy has a tendency to 
 croup.' 
 
 'Very well, then. I should like to forbid your 
 helping me; but I fear I could not do it alone.' 
 
 'I am not a fine lady,' she said, taking the lantern 
 from him and putting it down by the side of the 
 road. 
 
 'No, Mary,' he said. 'You are a helpmate.' 
 
 He said to himself that many a time yet they 
 should lift a burden together. He was amazed. 
 
THE LOVERS 185 
 
 incredulous, at how easily the understanding had 
 come between them. He had never dared to 
 think that she loved him. But her hand had 
 trembled in his; he had all but felt the flutter of 
 her heart. If it had not been for the curious, 
 watching children, looking out from their nest of 
 hay Hke bright-eyed birds, he would have caught 
 her into his arms. 
 
 Without very much effort they were able to 
 push back the cart. Simon got up after one or 
 two efforts and stood to be re-harnessed. They 
 put on the harness, one on each side of the big 
 horse. 
 
 ' I have a mind to put you in with the children,' 
 Julian said. 'Only I'm afraid the snow would 
 melt into your garments. You are Uke a 
 snow woman. You are not too tired for 
 walking? ' 
 
 'You forget that I am a working woman,' she 
 said. 
 
 They trudged along by Simon's side, through 
 the dusk, thicker and thicker with the falling 
 snow. Juhan led the horse, while she carried the 
 lantern : and in the darkness their hands met and 
 clasped. They might have been walking through 
 a paradise of roses under heavenly skies rather 
 than in a bUnding snowstorm. 
 
 He could hardly believe his happiness that she 
 had yielded so sweetly and readily. He had 
 had none of the pangs of fear, of suspense. He 
 remembered the poem. 
 
i86 THE HOUSE 
 
 'The winds that in the garden toss 
 The guelder-roses give me pain. 
 
 Alarm me with the dread of loss, 
 Exhaust me with the hope of gain.' 
 
 He had neither fear nor exhaustion to dread; 
 it was like her not to have kept him in suspense. 
 
 He was free of the House, he thought exultantly. 
 Dick should have it. It should not cast its shadow 
 over his young leaping happiness. He remembered 
 the history of the House, how it had been built up 
 by the marriages of its sons. The long hne of his 
 ancestors had repeated with deadly monotony : 
 'Married — daughter and heiress of So-and-So.' 
 His father, who had been fortunate in marrjdng 
 for love, with riches thrown in by accident, had 
 drawn Julian's attention to this feature of the 
 family tree. 
 
 ' We have always shown the most filiant affection 
 towards the House,' he had said, with the faint, 
 ironic smile which was characteristic of him. 
 'So, we built her up. I wonder, JuHan, how many 
 of these marriages were love-marriages, how many 
 marriages for the sake of the House. Not all our 
 forbears can have been lucky enough to find money 
 where they loved. The House has grown fat on 
 those offerings. There is not a more beautiful 
 house in England.' 
 
 He would be an unworthy son of the House. 
 They would write him down in future chronicles, 
 if they were any future chronicles : ' Married Mary, 
 
THE LOVERS 187 
 
 daughter of Thomas Bates, Esq. Sticceeded by 
 the next heir, his brother, Richard Algernon 
 Montacnte.' 
 
 He would renounce the succession for himself 
 and his children. He would be free of the shackles 
 of the House. His mother — ^the thought of her 
 was like a cold dash on his rosy dreams — ^would 
 think that he had never recovered the effects of 
 the war. He hoped she would not cut him off 
 from her affections, for he loved his mother. 
 His father would scarcely be angry. He was a 
 philosopher by nature. He would even understand. 
 And — they had yet to see Mary! He consoled 
 himself with the thought of his Love for all excuse, 
 as many a foolish young man had done before 
 him, as though all eyes should see Mary as he did. 
 
 They got back without mishap to Sweetwater 
 Farm, where Mrs Pinkerton stood in the house- 
 door, waiting to see them come. She received the 
 children one by one into her comfortable arms, 
 kissing each of them before she set them down, 
 and bidding them get in to the warm fire and the 
 hot food. 
 
 Julian went off with Simon to the stable, swinging 
 his lantern in one hand. For once Mary did not 
 offer to help him. She went submissively when 
 Mrs Pinkerton bade her get upstairs and change; 
 she was soaked through with the snow. 
 
 Julian, with the assistance of Jenkins, got Simon 
 out of the cart and saw to it that he was warmly 
 bedded and fed. Afterwards, as he came back 
 
 T.H. N 
 
i88 THE HOUSE 
 
 across the stable-yard to tiie house, tbe vxxm 
 had lisoi bdiiiid the atow. It was leaBf fall 
 moon, bat the h^ hardly turned tiaoa^ the 
 falling snow. 
 
 Later on he was goii^ back to the litde Down 
 to help with the she^. He w-::r:.l.d pat oa his 
 ovexaH, l«^gri^, and tc^vboots, aad go cS. to the 
 asastance of the sbepbad, hat ihae were a few 
 hours befcHre he need think ci Utat. 
 
 He stood before the fire, his dothes steaming, 
 wiule Mis Pinkerton warned him that he oa^iA to 
 change, to \diidi he leplied that the aiow had 
 only lain on the outside of his clothes. Present^ 
 Mary came into the kitdien, weanng a white wotdlen 
 dress, on which was an embrcRdery of green lea:ve5. 
 Her diken hair was coiled aioand faer head in 
 great soft masses, and confined by a green libban. 
 
 He turned and stared at her as ^le came toFwaids 
 the fireplace. 
 
 'Do you know that it is the first time I have 
 seen you wear an3rthing but the vray plainest 
 garments?' he said, as though they were alone 
 together. 
 
 'Dearie me !' put in Mrs Pinkerton. 'I blieve 
 you thought, Julian, that Mary had noan natural 
 love of clothes, because she wore trowsis. She 
 hes rare pretty thiags thet she makes and Tjroiders 
 herself. Coom over here, Ethel Jane, and show 
 Julian the frock Mary made you last winter.' 
 
 It was a new manifestation of Mary, he thou^t, 
 as he looked at the roses of Mary's embroidering 
 
THE LOVERS 189 
 
 on Ethel Jane's smock. She had seemed so austere. 
 How much more had he to learn? The thought of 
 discoveries to come overwhelmed him with an 
 intoxicating delight. 
 
 Her dress had a fresh simplicity. Short and 
 straight, yet flowing, it would not be amiss in the 
 wilderness, in the cold, starry evenings when the 
 children were gone to bed, and the beasts were 
 bedded and fed, and they were shut up together 
 in their wooden house. It was the dream of a 
 boy — ^the boy died hard in Julian. They should 
 have a piano. Mary would sing to him. He did 
 not know that she sang, but her full, white throat 
 suggested a singing voice. There was so much 
 about her he did not know. 
 
 The snow lasted for two full days and nights. 
 It was a record fall for the time, and once Julian 
 had arrived at the shepherd's hut there was no 
 chance of his getting back again to Sweetwater 
 Farm till the fall was over. It was adventurous 
 and even dangerous work seeking on the hill-sides 
 the few sheep that had strayed in the first hours 
 of the snow, dragging them from the drifts with 
 the aid of the long shepherd's crook and getting 
 them into shelter; and during the snow many 
 lambs were bom and had to be sheltered and fed 
 in the big bare bam on the Little Down. 
 
 They had anticipated a long frost, but the third 
 day after the snow the sun rose bright and 
 warm and the snows began to melt, the trees to 
 drip, and in a short time the glittering roads were 
 
igo THE HOUSE 
 
 full of little runnels of water. All that day till 
 evening the snow melted and the moon was over- 
 clouded at night with a promise of rain. Still, a 
 south wind blew, and Juhan, very dirty and 
 de-civihsed, as he put it to himself, went back to 
 Sweetwater Farm. 
 
 He arrived in time for supper and bed. Very 
 little sleep had fallen to his lot during the days 
 and nights of the snow, and he was longing for 
 sleep, but before he sat down to supper he shaved 
 and changed, and came to the supper-table looking 
 a civilised man once more. 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton cried out upon the trouble he had 
 taken. 
 
 'You should hev gone to your bed,' she said, 
 ■ and I'd hev carried up your supper. Not but wot 
 you look a better man than you did an hour ago.' 
 
 He noticed that Mary had put on a long smock 
 of blue woollen, clasped with a silver belt. It was 
 to her feet. She wore it for him, he was sure. 
 He had a sudden dehghtful intuition that with 
 love she was shy of her mascuHne attire. 
 
 Yet the next morning she was in the long coat 
 and breeches again, with the serviceable boots 
 and gaiters. 
 
 He was at the saw-mill a day or two later. There 
 was a bright sun, and a brisk, cold wind was blowing : 
 nothing remained of the snow but patches of it in 
 sheltered spots under- the hedges, in the woods and 
 shrubberies. The thrushes had begun, and every 
 day there were more songs added to the choir. 
 
THE LOVERS 191 
 
 February, with its dappled skies and snowdrops, 
 was close at hand. Julian was whistling like the 
 thrushes for sheer joy while he fed the mill, when 
 suddenly his name was called. 
 
 It was Mrs Pinkerton, very red in the face. 
 
 'Some folk to see you, Juhan,' she said. 
 'Awaitin' of you in the parlour. I'll bring 
 tay.' 
 
 Juhan went in, the sawdust on his hair and 
 overalls, his face powdered with dust. He wondered 
 who his visitors could be. Mrs Pinkerton had 
 scuttled off hke a rabbit, vouchsafing no answer 
 to his questions. 
 
 He wondered if by any possibility it could be 
 his mother. His father had understood his desire 
 to remain incognito and had entered into the plan 
 of addressing his letters to Juhan Amory, Esq., 
 saying, with his slow smile, 'I wonder how long 
 we shall be allowed to keep the Esquire, which 
 might have some meaning in our case.' 
 
 Lady Beauvais had been restive since it had 
 become manifest that the farm had done more for 
 Juhan than any one could have hoped. Perhaps 
 she came to see what kept him there, with a 
 hope of prevailing on him to go back to Cressey. 
 
 It was not Lady Beauvais who awaited him. 
 A groom was leading a couple of horses up and 
 down outside the gate. His visitors were Sir Peter 
 and Miss Chatterton : he, frosty, alert, lean, an old 
 cavalry man : she, a httle bit of a woman, rosy 
 and pleasant — Irene's uncle and aunt. 
 
192 THE HOUSE 
 
 'Irene told us you were here,' Sir Peter began. 
 'So sorry not to have known earUer. It must be 
 dull for you here.' 
 
 'Dear Irene said he loved the life, Peter,' put in 
 Miss Chatterton. 'There isn't time to be dull on a 
 farm — is there, Lord Amory? And such a charming 
 one ! Such nice, good people, too ! ' 
 
 Julian looked about uneasily at the sound of his 
 title. Fortunately Mrs Pinker ton was not in the 
 room. 
 
 'I do a bit of farming myself,' said Sir Peter. 
 'Farming and cattle breeding. You must come 
 over to the Folly and see my shorthorns. I've 
 the finest heifer in England, Folly Vixen. Not that 
 the name represents her, pretty creature ! I could 
 sell her for four figures to America, but they shan't 
 have her. Now, when will you come?' 
 
 'I'm afraid I'm not very free,' said Julian, 
 'unless on Sundays. We're rather busy just now.' 
 
 'Ah, I see you are working your saw-mill. It 
 will pay now that timber's so scarce and dear. 
 They'll have to begin building houses again soon. 
 You were wise to come here if you wanted to learn 
 practical farming. We shall all have to do some- 
 thing to justify ourselves these days when the 
 rascally people are making themselves and us so 
 deucedly uncomfortable.' 
 
 'There is a good deal to be said for the people,' 
 said JuUan calmly. 
 
 Sir Peter stared. 
 
 'You're bitten with the new ideas. You'll get 
 
THE LOVERS 193 
 
 over that. We've got to stand shoulder to shoulder 
 and back to back. That man. Bates, now; a 
 pestilential fellow. The Government should not 
 have allowed him to land. They should have kept 
 him sailing on the sea for ever, like the Flying 
 Dutchman. Wretched fellow, Lloyd George : runs 
 with the hare and hunts with the hounds, eh?' 
 
 'You've got to go with the times, Peter,' his 
 sister reminded him. 'You'll have to Uve by grace 
 of the people; they won't work for you unless 
 you're civil, perhaps not even then.' 
 
 'Oh, I'm hanged if I'm going to toady them. 
 Did you see that fellow Newwood has joined the 
 Socialist Party. I wish them joy of him. He's a 
 disgrace to his breeding. If I had my way I'd hang 
 Tom Bates high as heaven and Lord Newwood 
 with him. 
 
 Before Jxilian could say anything more, Mrs 
 Pinkerton came in, smart and smiling, bringing a 
 most elaborate tea. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 THE AGITATOR 
 
 Julian was furious with the visitors for betraying 
 him, not the less furious because he had been 
 feeling for some time that the position was untenable, 
 in so far, at least, as regarded Mary. He would have 
 to teU her who and what he was. What would she 
 think of his masquerade? The daughter of Tom 
 Bates might well look at him askance. He had 
 been waiting for a moment to tell her when he 
 might in the same breath assure her that he was a 
 true Democrat; and the moment had not arrived; 
 except for stolen seconds they had not been alone 
 since the night of the snow-storm. 
 
 It was the measure of Julian's simplicity, over 
 which MaUse Southwell had laughed so often, that 
 he had no thought that Mary Bates might be elated 
 by his rank. He had always taken things at their 
 face value when he trusted people; believed what 
 people said; and Tom Bates had denounced 
 aristocracy as the enemy with as heady an eloquence 
 as that of Mirabeau and Danton. 
 
 Mrs Pinkerton had been all nods and becks and 
 wreathed smiles after the visitors had departed. 
 She had met Julian with a curtsey, and 'Oh, me 
 
 194 
 
THE AGITATOR 195 
 
 lord, you should not hev so deceived ! ' and Julian 
 had turned as red as though he had been accused 
 of picking pockets. 
 
 'I'm, awfully sorry,' he said, humbly. 'But, 
 you see, I couldn't help it. You mightn't 
 have let me come otherwise. I've been so happy. 
 Please, Mrs Pinkerton, would you say nothing 
 about it, else I shall have to go?' 
 
 'Noan but to Pinkerton,' Mrs Pinkerton said 
 determinedly. ' Me an' Pinkerton hev been married 
 seventeen years and never a secret atween us. 
 Pinkerton, he never talks. Often I hev wished 'ed 
 more of a tongue in his 'ead.' 
 
 'I consider a title a most ridiculous thing and 
 quite out of date,' Julian went on eagerly. ' It is 
 a much finer thing to be a good farmer Uke Mr 
 Pinkerton, for he is valuable to the world. . . .' 
 
 'Lor, no,* said Mrs Pinkerton. 'I likes a title. 
 Wotever would the stories be Hke if there wasn't 
 lords aud ladies? Many's the story I've cried over 
 with a h'earl for 'ero.' 
 
 'You see, it would be so ridiculous if they were 
 to call me Lord Amory — Jenkins and Clutterbuck 
 and the rest of them — ^when we are at work 
 together. Please do keep silent about it for the 
 present at all events ! If I thought you wouldn't 
 I should just pack and go.' 
 
 'Mum's the word, me lord,' said Mrs Pinkerton. 
 'Not that I'd ever hev thought it of you. A nice 
 young man, and affable. Lor ! w'en I think 0' 
 the imperence o' that there Rose Buckett ! ' 
 
196 THE HOUSE 
 
 'If Mr Pinker ton can spare me I'm going up to 
 town to-morrow,' said Julian, with a mind to 
 interview Mr Bates. The idea had come to him in 
 a blinding flash of inspiration. With Mr Bates on 
 his side he need have no fear of Mary : but the 
 question was, how was that Republican going to 
 receive him ? He would not think of that. Perhaps 
 Southwell's name would help him. 
 
 He was off in the small hours of the morning 
 almost as soon as the house was awake. He had 
 left a little packet over night with Mrs Pinkerton 
 to be given to Mary. It contained the pearl ring 
 he had bought for her at Christmas. Perhaps 
 when he came back he would find her wearing the 
 ring. Her dear hands ! It smote him to think 
 that they were roughened and reddened by hard 
 work, but, after all, was not work honourable? 
 Was it not his hope and faith that he and she should 
 work together? It was the old leaven working in 
 him that made him want his wife to be white- 
 handed. 
 
 He tracked Tom Bates with some difficulty 
 through the offices of two or three Trades Unions, 
 till he ran him to earth at last in a large room, 
 furnished sparsely, like an office, of an old house 
 at Battersea which looked upon the river. He 
 had not sent in his card, but merely his name 
 without the title. He went in full of alarm, but he 
 need not have been afraid. His reception was 
 unexpectedly friendly. 
 
 'I have heard of you from my girl, Mr Amory,' 
 
THE AGITATOR 197 
 
 said Tom Bates. 'From what she says of you, 
 you are a man and a brother.' Was this Tom 
 Bates? the firebrand, the disturber of social order, 
 the sower of discord, the menace to a world that 
 longed to be at peace ! Julian could only stare : 
 it was incredible. 
 
 The man who had risen up from the office-chair, 
 facing a table heaped with papers of all sorts, was, 
 without exception, the most benign person Julian 
 had ever seen. Malise had not prepared him for 
 this surprising apparition, although he had said 
 that Tom Bates was lovable, his very errors 
 those of a man consumed with love of his fellow- 
 creatures and hatred of injustice and oppression. 
 The demagogue had a mass of waving brown 
 hair, or rather chestnut, now thickly sprinkled 
 with gray^ He had mild brown eyes from which a 
 beneficent light flowed. His beard, long and thick, 
 was the same colour as his hair, and his shoulders 
 were bowed as though he was much of a student. 
 
 This, the notorious agitator, the disorderly 
 firebrand, the Bolshevik and stirrer-up of strife, 
 whose doings had goaded comfortable citizens in 
 the estabhshed communities to calling for his head 
 or his expulsion ! 
 
 'You are very unlike what I imagined you to be, 
 Mr Bates,' said Julian simply. 
 
 'I wonder how you imagined me,' said Tom 
 Bates, while his face was oddly, delightfully 
 humorous. "A scallywag— eh?' 
 
 'Not that,' replied Julian. After all, why should 
 
igS THE HOUSE 
 
 he be so surprised? — ^he, Mary's lover! She was 
 very like her father. The quiet eyes and the 
 benign expression were common to both. 
 
 'Won't you sit down, Mr Amory? I can spare 
 you a quarter of an hour, if you want so much time. 
 There is an early sitting of the House, and I have 
 an appointment in the Lobby at half-past two. 
 Not much use my going there, but I never shut a 
 door in the face of possible reform. Well — do you 
 want to join the Labour Party? You'll find a 
 good many of your sort with us.' 
 
 'I am a Socialist,' said Julian. 
 
 'Ah, that's better. Why, so am I — and a 
 Bolshevik to boot, and anything else that is going, 
 according to the newspapers. Maybe they're 
 right. I'm a bit fed up with aristocratic Socialists. 
 If they sold all they had and gave to the poor I 
 should begin to believe in them.' 
 
 He spoke with perfect correctness though with 
 a broad Northumbrian burr. 
 
 Julian sat down in the chair indicated and turned 
 his hat about in his hands, while Tom Bates 
 regarded him with a humorous eye. 
 
 'One minute of the fifteen gone,' he said. 'Out 
 with it ! ' 
 
 'Mr Bates, I want to marry your daughter.' 
 
 'Does my daughter want to marry you?' 
 
 'I hope so; I think so.' 
 
 'Have you spoken to her?' 
 
 'I think we understand each other.' 
 
 'Mr Amory, you rendered my girl a very great 
 
THE AGITATOR 199 
 
 service once. I have wanted to thank you, and I 
 do with all my heart.' 
 
 He shot out a big hand, and Julian, taking it, 
 had his almost mangled in the big grip. 
 
 'If Mary and you have settled it there is not 
 very much for me to say,' said Toni Bates. 
 
 'Ah' — but I wanted you on my side,' said Juhan, 
 with his ingenuous air. ' I have not told her every- 
 thing. I wanted you to know first. . . .' 
 
 'You don't look as though you have a very 
 serious past,' Tom Bates said quizzically. 'I don't 
 think my Mary will be harsh with you. What a 
 lot of trouble you've given yourself hunting me up 
 like this ! As a matter of fact Mary is a perfectly 
 free agent. She won't make a fool of herself : I 
 can answer for that.' 
 
 'Without meaning to I have been deceiving her. 
 I want to be able to tell her that you know and do 
 not mind.' 
 
 'As long as it's not another wife. You don't 
 look old enough for that.' 
 
 'As a matter of fact I'm the unfortunate 
 possessor of a title,' said Julian with a red face 
 and an air of blurting it out. ' I am that ridiculous 
 thing, a lord. My father is Lord Beauvais.' 
 
 'You can't help that,' said Tom Bates, his eyes 
 twinkhng in. their quiet depths. 'Mary won't be 
 so unjust as to visit the sins of your ancestors 
 upon your head. I don't see a girl of mine Lady 
 anybody^— woman is good enough for me. How 
 will it work with your people?' 
 
200 THE HOUSE 
 
 Julian's face fell a little. 
 
 'My father will be — I think amused. He is 
 amused at so many things, but he will understand, 
 too. I believe I got it from him. I mean to step 
 down and out. Farming in Canada is my idea of 
 life, with Mary beside me; I used to dream of it 
 from the time I was a kid, but I could not see the 
 face of my helpmate. I don't know where I got 
 the idea — from some book possibly. I and my 
 little sister, Joy, were omnivorous readers and 
 dreamers.' 
 
 'She on for the natural life, too? ' 
 
 'She would really be very useful on a farm. She 
 knows how to do all manner of things. She wanted 
 to drive a motor in the last years of the war, but 
 my mother would not hear of it.' 
 
 'I'm glad she wouldn't. I've heard of Joy, too, 
 from Mary. But — about that stepping down and 
 out, it won't do according to English law. As long 
 as titles are not abolished — that may come — ^you'U 
 be Lord Amory in the sight of the law, and in time 
 — I hope it may be a long time off — ^you'll be Earl 
 Beauvais, and my girl will be a countess. It is a 
 mad world.' 
 
 'Long before that,' said Julian eagerly, 'titles 
 will be abolished. My father believes that I shall 
 not succeed. I have heard him say it.' 
 
 'Well, you'd better go and talk to your people 
 about it. They've been good parents to you, and 
 it's no more than they deserve from you. I don't 
 suppose they'll approve. It'll be a nasty blow to 
 
THE AGITATOR 201 
 
 them, especially as — I conceal nothing from you 
 — ^my next objective is to stir up the people down 
 your way. They want help as well as any one. 
 Look at how they hve, the whited sepulchres they 
 live in : pretty outside, inside everything that is 
 poisonous. You have a row of almshouses there 
 on the banks of the river, I understand — or rather 
 the backwater of a river. Swans, reeds and rushes, 
 water-UUes, all manner of pretty things outside : 
 inside all rottenness, damp, and rats. I'm going 
 to make the people discontented : there's never 
 any reform till you've achieved that. They shall 
 go out of their houses or almshouses and demand 
 decent houses and a living wage, and the right to 
 live as human beings should live. 
 
 'It is Eversley End you describe, not Cressey 
 property,' said Juhan. 'I agree with you. There is 
 a deal in the condition of such people that calls to 
 heaven for vengeance. But you must acquit 
 Cressey, Father saw to that. Cressey is a model 
 village.' 
 
 'The fifteen minutes is up,' Tom Bates said, 
 rising to his feet. His clothes were too big for 
 him, and they were ill-cut. The flowing ends of 
 his sky-blue tie might have concealed dingy hnen. 
 His hands were uncared for, the hands of a hard 
 manual worker : but the man and the figure were 
 fuU of dignity. 
 
 'You should go straight home and tell your father 
 and mother,' he said again. 'If they'll have none 
 of my Mary it's a question for you and her how 
 
202 THE HOUSE 
 
 far you'll disregard that. They'd better hear it 
 from you than another.' 
 
 He walked with Julian into the street, where a 
 little crowd of men set up a cheer, boarded a tram 
 bound for Westminster Bridge, and sat down 
 squarely to find that Julian had followed 
 him. 
 
 'I shan't get a train till five o'clock,' Juhan 
 explained. 'I've just discovered that I'm hungry, 
 and after I've lunched I shall go and see my friend 
 Southwell, who is editing the Country.' 
 
 ' Wasting himself on prettiness and the privileged 
 classes when he should be lending a hand,' 
 commented Tom Bates, and then apologised for 
 not asking Julian to lunch. 
 
 'I lunch on a biscuit and a glass of water,' he 
 said, 'I never eat a square meal as long as there's 
 the need to keep my head perfectly clear. Give my 
 love to Southwell. His heart's all right, but youth 
 will have its fling. I hear he goes to all the smart 
 dances in London. But we'll have him when we 
 want him.' 
 
 Julian went to lunch by way of Piccadilly, 
 calling at the ofifices of the Country lest he should 
 miss Malise, to find him seated by a roaring fire 
 reading his proofs. At sight of his visitor Mahse 
 jumped up and flung an arm impulsively about 
 Julian's neck. 
 
 'It's good for sore eyes to see you, as my Irish 
 grandmother used to say,' he said. 'When did 
 you come up?' 
 
THE AGITATOR 203 
 
 'I've been in town all day and I'm starving — 
 come to lunch with me.' 
 
 'I've had my limch, and I won't take you to my 
 club where people would be coming to talk to me 
 all the time. My invaluable Pierre shall see to 
 you.' He paused to touch -the bell and went on 
 again — 
 
 'Damned duU places, clubs. The man who 
 invented clubs was a misog3mist. I don't Uke 
 places where ladies can't come. I'll get lunch in. 
 Do you remember the last time I fed you? When 
 wiU you give up the reprehensible habit of neglecting 
 your food?' 
 
 He turned about without getting up to tell 
 Pierre, who came in, efficient and smiling, to get 
 lunch for Lord Amory. 
 
 'Now talk !' he said to JuHan — 'talk ! I'm ready. 
 How are they all at Cressey? Your sister Joy has 
 sent me a deUcious poem; it goes in this week. 
 I'm just thinking of running down there. London 
 is miserable in this weather. To live I think on 
 Cressey and your mother. And Sweetwater Farm ! 
 How are they aU?' 
 
 'It is a long story,' said Julian, colouring to the 
 forehead. 
 
 Mr Southwell smiled at the row of charming 
 photographs of ladies which looked down on him 
 from his chimney-piece. There was a dying 
 carnation in a glass and a lady's glove lay amid 
 the Utter of invitation cards and bibelots of one 
 kind or another. 
 
 T.H. o 
 
204 THE HOUSE 
 
 'Fire away, my child,' he said. 'Perhaps you 
 would Uke this to hide your blushes.' 
 
 He handed him the photograph of the prettiest 
 of the ladies, which was inscribed 'To Malise from 
 Cou Cou. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 THE BOMBSHELL 
 
 Over lunch Julian unfolded his tale to his friend. 
 
 Malise listened with serious interest. 
 
 'I thought Mary Bates was going to grow up to 
 something remarkable,' he said. 'She was a child 
 when I saw her last. Tom has kept her. at school; 
 to be sure, he couldn't have dragged her with him 
 on his Fiery Cross progresses. She must be twenty, 
 I suppose, or near it.' 
 
 'She will be twenty in June.' 
 
 'She was going for medicine, wasn't she? Has 
 she given that up? The farm used to be an inter- 
 lude, a holiday pastime. I suppose it is due to you 
 that she went back there directly after loom's 
 return from America? By the way, I hear from 
 a correspondent that she made a bit of a stir there. 
 They got her on to the movies : and she had head- 
 lines all to herself in the newspapers. " Demagogue's 
 Diana-like Daughter." " Bates's Beautiful Bud," 
 and so on. Introductions to her were eagerly 
 sought after, I believe.' 
 
 'Dash their cheek!' said Juhan furiously, and 
 Nvent on to make use of some very strong epithets. 
 
 'You may trust Tom for turning them down 
 205 
 
2o8 THE HOUSE 
 
 gracious habit she had to welcome the coming 
 guest. She received JuUan with an effusion of 
 affection. Only a very observant person would have 
 detected in her reception of MaUse Southwell the 
 slightest lack of warmth. Lord Beauvais had said 
 that his wife never followed MaMse in his quips 
 and cranks, was always a Httle bewildered by them. 
 Perhaps she resented MaUse's jesting sub-consciously, 
 but it was not in her to be cold to an old friend. 
 
 'Julian would drag me from my desk, Lady 
 Beauvais,' said MaUse. 'Otherwise I should not 
 have had the cheek. ... So soon, too.' 
 
 'Quite right ! I am sure you work much too 
 hard,' purred Lady Beauvais. ' It must be 
 such hard work, although fascinatin' — editin' a 
 paper. I rather envy you, MaliSe.' 
 
 She was wondering about Julian's sudden return 
 home, hoping he had changed his mind and had 
 said good-bye to Sweetwater Farm, as her next 
 words showed. 
 
 'You are goin' to stay with us now, darhn' 
 Juhan,' she said. 'Have you brought much 
 luggage? I didn't notice.' 
 
 ' Only a bag. When I came up yesterday morning 
 I did not contemplate a visit to Cressey.' 
 
 'Oh!' with a falling inflection in her voice. 
 'Then you are not goin' to stay.' 
 
 'I have things to talk to you and father about,' 
 said Juhan evasively, 'so I came.' 
 
 'I hoped you were goin' to stay. None of the 
 boys seem to want to stay now the war is over. 
 
THE BOMBSHELL 209 
 
 An the mothers are complainin'. I saw Lady 
 Minchinhampton yesterday; and her boy has 
 volunteered for the Black Sea. David Urquhart 
 — ^you know they always meant him for business, 
 havin' those ironworks? — ^was a long time about 
 gettin' demobbed. When he came home he said 
 he was wilUn' to take up business, as they were 
 keen on it, but he wanted to go somewhere there'd 
 be a revolution every mornin', where he'd get 
 sniped on his way to breakfast. I don't know what 
 has come to you boys.' 
 
 'It is only that we haven't got used to the ways 
 of peace,' said Malise, and added: 'Nor used to 
 the new ways of war.' 
 
 'It is all very uncomfortable,' sighed Lady 
 Beauvais, making no attempt to follow MaUse. 
 'Your father has heard that we are to have Bates 
 down here, Julian. Bates ! ' She spoke the name as 
 though it was something noxious. 'He wiU set all 
 the country by the ears. Your father has no reason 
 to be afraid of any one. He is payin' fourteen and 
 sixpence in the pound taxation, poor darUn', yet 
 they expect him to go on keepin' up the place as 
 usual. We gave the annual dinner and dance to 
 the tenantry, just after you left us, Julian; and 
 Carter — ^you remember Carter of Cloverhill — ^well. 
 Carter said to Mr Black that he didn't see why 
 your father should be invitin' him to dinner, 
 that he had as good a right to invite your 
 father.' 
 
 'That was very amusing,' said Malise, making 
 
212 THE HOUSE 
 
 in the crowd answered that Mr Bates was mside 
 at a meeting, and they were waiting to see him 
 come out. It was a very quiet, respectable crowd. 
 I said I had never seen Tom Bates and should like 
 to see him, and the man answered, still very civilly, 
 that he was sure Mr Bates would be very glad to 
 see me. I noticed that " Mr " Bates. I dare say 
 I shall have abundant opportunity of seeing him,' 
 
 He ended up on a note of resigned amusement. 
 
 In the drawing-room Julian was restive. His 
 mother tried to keep him by her. She was knitting 
 an article which Julian knew was called a jumper. 
 He remembered that Irene Chatterton had been at 
 the same work when he had been last at home. 
 He held the silk for his mother to wind it, waiting 
 with some impatience for an opportunity to follow 
 his father. The younger members of the family 
 had disappeared. Joy was playing desultory 
 music at the piano, which was in a recess. Malise 
 was sitting beside her, his handsome head drooped 
 forward a little, his finger-tips touching. The 
 candle-light shone downward on his rippled hair. 
 He was apparently talking, though what he said 
 did not reach them through the music. Now and 
 again Julian noticed that his mother glanced 
 uneasily in the direction of the recess. 
 
 'You know, darUn' Dick had a few days' leave 
 from the ship,' she said. She must have been 
 saying something that led up to this remark, though 
 Julian had not heard it. 'He and Irene travelled 
 up to town together. They seemed great friends. 
 
THE BOMBSHELL 213 
 
 and Dick escorted her to a theatre. It wouldn't 
 have been allowed in my young days, but times 
 have altered. Up to the time I was married I was 
 never allowed to go anywhere without an escort.' 
 She paused, and then resumed irritably. 'How 
 can Joy play with that yotmg man talkin' all the 
 time — Grieg, isn't it?' 
 
 He wondered how long it would be before his 
 mother would cross over to the piano and interrupt 
 the conversation. He had not to wait very long. 
 The silk for the jumper had taken the form of a ball. 
 A footman came in with tea, for which Lady 
 Beauvais had a fancy at nine o'clock every night. 
 
 'You might tell your father tea is in, JuHan,' she 
 said, and went over to the piano, the satin fish-tail 
 train of her gold-shot evening gown twisting after 
 her across the carpet. 
 
 It was the desired opportunity. Julian had 
 longed to say at the dinner-table when Tom Bates 
 was under discussion : ' I hope that he will one of 
 these days be my father-in-law.' He had hated 
 to keep silence, but he could not speak before so 
 many, with the servants coming and going. 
 
 His father looked up as he came into the alcove 
 of the Hbrary in which he was sitting. Sub- 
 consciously Julian noticed the beauty of the 
 furniture, the block of crystal that was the ink- 
 bottle, theiable of buhl with the fine brass railing, 
 the tortoiseshell and silver blotter. His father 
 was the simplest of men : presumably he would 
 have been happier among austere things, as in the 
 
2i6 THE HOU^E 
 
 she goes about in trousers; poor darliii' Joy wanted 
 to do the same thing — ^will be the Countess of 
 Beauvais ? ' 
 
 'The position is not vacated yet,' said Lord 
 Beauvais, stooping to kiss his wife's hair, "and will 
 not be, I hope, for many and many a long day. 
 When that comes it will no longer be any concern 
 of yours and mine, darhng.' 
 
 'How do you know so much about her?' Lady 
 Beauvais asked with sudden curiosity, which was 
 almost suspicion. Had Beauvais capitulated to 
 this dreadful marriage? 
 
 'We talked after you went to bed. Poor JuUan 
 thought we had only to see her — what lovers have 
 thought since lovers began. You forget, too, that 
 your daughter and she were domiciled together, 
 and I had heard of the young lady before now. 
 I was interested in her from what Joy told me.' 
 
 'I could never attain to your philosophy,' wept 
 Lady Beauvais, departing for a moment from her 
 usual soft placidity. 'I had so wanted Irene for 
 a daughter-in-law; and her money would have 
 been so useful — so useful.' 
 
 'I never thought that you were worldly-minded,' 
 said Lord Beauvais, smiling a Httle above the 
 down-bent head. 'We made a love marriage. 
 You couldn't wish the boy less — or more.' 
 
 ' I believe you are acceptin' it,' said Lady Beauvais, 
 staring at her husband.' 
 
 'I have no choice,' he answered. 'I don't think 
 she'll give Julian the opportunity to divorce her 
 
MY LADY MACHIAVELLI 217 
 
 in six months as Lady Wythe has given Wythe^ 
 Nor will she go off with a man picked up in a 
 railway-carriage Uke young Loritnore's wife that 
 was. She's a good girl. It counts for something 
 nowadays.' 
 
 'Julian would never have married any of those 
 dreadful creatures,' said Lady Beauvais, refusing 
 to be comforted. ' I suppose it will end in Cressey 
 goin' to the hammer. I looked to Irene's money 
 for savin' Cressey. And there is poor Joy irifatuated 
 with Malise, who hasn't a penny ! So unfortunate ! 
 I wish I'd never encouraged him to come here. 
 He was always so amusin'.' 
 
 ' Poor Rachel ! ' Lord Beauvais said fondly. 
 'These troublesome children ! I wouldn't bother 
 about MaUse. You should have heard Lord 
 Roseveare talk about him. " He is a brilliant fellow 
 and a good son, a good son." Roseveare said : " He 
 plays about in drawing-rooms, and the women 
 would do anything for him : and he wears an 
 eyeglass and he has always been rather cheeky, 
 and he pretends that he can't pronounce his 'r's,' 
 but he has more brains than any man in the ministry. 
 He'll come out on top — mark my words, he'll 
 come out on top." That is what Roseveare thinks. 
 He is a good judge of men.' 
 
 'What are we to do about Juhan? ' Lady Beauvais 
 asked, turning away from the minor calamity. 
 
 'Ask the girl to come here.' 
 
 'It would be a pretty situation. Her father 
 stirrin' up your people against you, and she ah 
 
220 THE HOUSE 
 
 They were all off before daybreak and she break- 
 fasted alone. She was in a hurry to act on her 
 husband's suggestion of inviting Mary Bates to 
 Cressey. She wanted to see the girl for herself. 
 And then — one of many things might happen. 
 Mary Bates at Cressey might, even to an infatuated 
 young man, present a different aspect from Mary 
 Bates at Sweetwater Farm. Would she be awkward ? 
 commit solecisms? be overwhelmed by the splen- 
 dour and dignity of the House? Would Julian 
 see it if she was in the wrong setting and be dis- 
 illusioned? Would he compare Mary Bates with 
 Irene Chatterton? Young men had been known to 
 do such things. Not Juhan, perhaps — ^but — it was 
 just possible. It was almost too good to hope 
 that Mary might put her knife into her mouth and 
 drink from her finger-bowl. Still — ^it was just 
 possible that she might be awkward. 
 
 Lady Beauvais was in a hurry to get to her 
 writing-table, to have the letter written and posted. 
 That once done her mind would be easier. She 
 hesitated a Uttle over the form of the letter, though 
 she was a fluent and voluminous letter-writer. 
 Finally she wrote : — 
 
 'Dear Miss Bates, — I understand that you 
 are a very great friend of my boy, Amory, and of 
 my daughter, Joy. They give me such reports of 
 you as to make me wish for the pleasure of knowing 
 you. Will you come and pay us a Httle visit here? 
 I imderstand your father is going to be in this 
 
MY LADY MACHIAVELLI 221 
 
 neighbourhood shortly. It would be a good oppor- 
 tunity for you to meet, and if you can come I hope 
 he will give us the pleasure of lunching with us 
 one day. Could you come about the 3rd February 
 and stay till the 9th? I hope you can. 
 
 'Very sincerely yours, 
 
 'Rachel Beauvais.' 
 
 She had very nearly added to the invitation to 
 Tom Bates, 'and see for himself that we are not as 
 black as we are painted,' but she refrained from 
 that bitterness. 
 
 She dropped the letter into the box in the hall, 
 which was cleared at noon. It was ten minutes to 
 that time when she posted it, and having visited 
 her kitchen, as she did every day Uke any good 
 middle-class housekeeper, before writing, she felt 
 free to sit down and glance at the Queen, which 
 had come by last night's post. Lady Beauvais 
 had given up reading daily papers since the 
 Armistice, and usually asked the news of her 
 husband. She found the Russians, the Poles, 
 the Czecho-Slovaks, the ItaUans, the Irish, the 
 Americans, all too depressing and too annoying 
 for words. Why could they not behave like English 
 people? Lady Beauvais really pitied those who 
 had not the good fortune to be born English and 
 to know how to behave like English people. 
 
 She had no misgivings about what she had done. 
 She even said to herself, 'Dariin' Julian will be so 
 pleased,' and felt a glow of benevolence about her 
 
224 THE HOUSE 
 
 eyes praised her as he looked at her, while Julian 
 took up a fold of the silk she was wearing, which 
 was of the shade known as night-sky blue, and 
 fingered it, asking what the beautiful stuff was. 
 Malise looked down at her and said that she should 
 be painted by Charles Shannon — ^her portrait by 
 Lavery hung in the room that was called the 
 Yellow Saloon. 
 
 She poured out the tea for the party — ^well pleased 
 with their compliments — and they did justice to 
 the cream and honey and butter, the deHcious 
 sandwiches and cakes and home-made bread, which 
 forbade the idea that there could be a scarcity of 
 food anjnvhere. 
 
 But she did not get an opportunity to speak to 
 Julian till the dressing-bell rang, and the others 
 of the party went off, leaving her alone with her 
 son. 
 
 'Don't go for a minute, darlin',' she said. 'There 
 is plenty of time. I want to tell you what I have 
 been doin' to-day.' 
 
 She guessed that he was watching her with a 
 certain anxiety, wondering if his father had broken 
 the disturbing news to her, with a misgiving, perhaps, 
 that she could not know, since her plaei^ty was so 
 unshaken. 
 
 She went to his side and slipped an arm about 
 his neck where he lounged in the chair, a Uttle 
 crumple of anxiety in his young forehead. 
 
 'I've written to your friend. Miss Bates, and 
 asked her to come to stay with us.' 
 
MY LADY MACHIAVELLI 225 
 
 'Oh, mother — you are splendid ! You know 
 then?' 
 
 He seized and kissed her hand. 
 
 'Father was — just father — about it. I was so 
 afraid of you. How angelic of you ! ' 
 
 'You shouldn't be afraid of me, dear thing,' 
 said Lady Beauvais, and felt as though she had 
 really deserved his loving praise, while she bent 
 and kissed the little division in his sleek, young, 
 dark head. She was passionately fond of her 
 children. 
 
 Only as she sat once again under Miss Jones's 
 hands did she realise that she had been deceiving 
 her boy. She comforted herself with the assurance 
 that there was nothing she would not do for 
 "darlin* Julian' or any of them, and that she was 
 acting for the best. 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 CROSSED IN LOVE 
 
 'Dear Lady Beauvais,' ran the answering letter, 
 'it is extremely kind of you to ask me to Cressey; 
 but at the present moment I fear it is impossible. 
 I am sure you will understand. — Yours very 
 sincerely, Mary Bates.' 
 
 Lady Beauvais read through this laconic epistle 
 which had come to her with her morning tea. She 
 hardly knew whether to be reUeved or sorry. She 
 decided that, on the whole, she was relieved. She 
 had not been very happy about that hope of hers 
 that Mary might show to such disadvantage at 
 Cressey that Julian's passion would be cooled. 
 She was quit of that, at all events. 
 
 The letter was a dignified letter and the hand- 
 writing promised interest. There are handwritings 
 which assure you of dullness in the writers at first 
 sight and do not disappoint : there are handwritings 
 which, like the print of a book, assure you before- 
 hand of good entertainment. There could be 
 nothing common, she thought, about the writer 
 of that letter. 
 
 She wished Mary had been more exphcit. The 
 impossibility — ^was it due to her father's campaign, 
 
 226 
 
CKUbbitJL» IN LOVE 227 
 
 or was it because of Julian's infatuation? Was it 
 possible that the wise creature saw the impossibility, 
 or at least the undesirabUity of a marriage between 
 herself and Lord Beauvais' eldest -son and heir? 
 Poor Juhan ! She could have cried out on herself 
 because the prospect loomed so bright before her 
 eyes of his being refused. He would suffer, and 
 she hated to think of his suffering : but it would 
 be best in the long run if the girl had the good 
 sense to see the unsuitability. That bright vision 
 of dear Irene as Lady Amory came back, having 
 receded into dim distance. 
 
 Luckily, Julian had gone up to town with his 
 father. He had had a long spell of leave. His 
 father was anxious that he should not resign now 
 that he was fit, that he should rejoin his battahon 
 at Caterham and finish up the period of soldiering 
 he had planned out for himself, arguing that he 
 was yet too young for finahties. 
 
 'There will be plenty of time for the wilderness,' 
 Lord Beauyais had said. 'You are only twenty- 
 three. I should hke you to go back to the 
 regiment.' 
 
 Juhan had assented, although a Httle gloomily. 
 
 That gave time. In the immensity of her reUef 
 at the time gained Lady Beauvais forgot to worry 
 about Joy and Malise, who had calmly announced 
 their engagement one evening in the drawing- 
 room. Malise had another announcement to make. 
 He had been offered and accepted the editorship 
 of the new Labour daily. The Daily Democrat. 
 
228 THE HOUSE 
 
 Labour was doing him well, giving him a salary 
 of two thousand a year — enough for a man to 
 marry on. The Daily Democrat was a bitter pill 
 to Lady Beauvais. Still, the salary was something, 
 and if Joy's husband had a briUiant career before 
 him as a Labour leader it was better than having 
 no career at all as an orthodox politician. She 
 even conceded that Joy would be an ideal wife 
 for a man who had cast in his lot with Labour as 
 Malise was about to do. The dear thing had a 
 genuine flair for politics, and she was already 
 writing poems and articles for The Daily Democrat 
 with intense enthusiasm. 
 
 Spending a morning alone. Lady Beauvais' 
 mind worked and worked. She did not see the 
 disinheriting of her first-born. Darlin' Julian 
 must be made to Usten to reason. She did not 
 quite know how he was to be made, but she had 
 faith. If Mary Bates would have nothing to do 
 with him — a very sensible, right-minded young 
 woman she appeared to be — surely Julian would 
 be thrown back on those who were kinder. If not 
 Irene, then another. Lady Beauvais had a common- 
 sensible disbelief in the lasting quality of unrequited 
 love : that belonged to the poetry books, in her 
 opinion. It ought to be Irene, of course; in all 
 the circle of her acquaintance there was not another 
 such dear thing as Irene. But Lady Beauvais 
 remembered how quickly Dick and Irene had 
 made friends. In the event of such a catastrophe 
 as Julian's marriage with Mary Bates it would be a 
 
CROSSED IN LOVE 229 
 
 comfort anyhow if Irene and her money should 
 stay in the family. 
 
 Lady Beauvais suddenly resolved on an expedition. 
 She would run up to town, sleep in the town house 
 at Clarges Street — Julian and his father preferred 
 a hotel to the gloomy stateliness of Clarges Street 
 — she could run down to Pulborough by an early 
 train, see for herself what manner of person Mary 
 Bates really was, find out exactly how much was 
 to be feared from her, and return the next day. 
 How fortunate that Joy had gone to Mrs Southwell for 
 a few days. There was absolutely nothing in the way. 
 
 She had to wait for an afternoon train, so she 
 ordered lunch a little earlier than usual, and the 
 car to take her to the station. She interviewed 
 her housekeeper : she had in Mr Brown, Lord 
 Beauvais' agent and factor, and gave him a few 
 general instructions. 
 
 Miss Jones was surprised at being told that she 
 was to pack just a few things for the night for her 
 mistress. 
 
 'I don't see how you're goin' to do without me, 
 m'lady,' he said huffily. 
 
 'I shall do very badly,' Lady Beauvais replied 
 graciously. 'But as I shall be away such a short 
 time and on business, I don't think I'll take you 
 up with me in this cold weather. I've noticed 
 that you have a little cough.' 
 
 So did Lady Beauvais endear herself to her 
 dependants. 
 
 She had everything in train for her journey and 
 
230 THE HOUSE 
 
 was writing some letters when the butler announced 
 that a young person wished to see her ladyship, 
 and was waiting in the hall. 
 
 'What kind of a young person, Simpson?' she 
 asked, without looking up. 
 
 'Oh, well, a young person, m'lady. A stranger 
 to these parts, I should say. She might have come 
 from some distance. She looks delicate, m'lady, 
 and tired.' 
 
 'Show her in here.' 
 
 The girl who came in immediately attracted 
 Lady Beauvais' admiration. She had a great 
 love of beauty, and the girl was startlingly hand- 
 some, althoiigh she looked ill and tired. She had 
 the beautiful complexion that went with her red 
 hair, but the flares in her cheeks when she entered 
 began to die away under Lady Beauvais' gaze. 
 Her eyes were feverishly bright. She was dressed 
 deplorably, in cheap and flashy garments — two 
 or three strings of vari-coloured beads about her 
 neck. Cotton gloves, very short skirts, which 
 revealed artificial silk stockings, much too trans- 
 parent, of a bright blue, that went badly with 
 ill-cut brown shoes. 
 
 'Sit down,' said Lady Beauvais; 'here, by the 
 fire ! Have you come a long way to see me ? You 
 look tired. Will you please tell me your business, 
 and then yeu must have some food and a rest before 
 you go away again. If you are going Greenwood 
 way, there will be a motor for the 3.30 train. You 
 could have a lift.' 
 
CROSSED IN LOVE 231 
 
 During the war and since she had been the centre 
 of many activities. The girl had probably come 
 on the matter of a pension, for help of one kind 
 or another. Lady Beauvais had always been 
 accustomed to take up her neighbours, gentle or 
 simple, who were going her way when she motored, 
 a good Samaritanism which had earned for the 
 big Rolls-Royce car the nickname of 'the 
 bus.' 
 
 'Oh, I, couldn't, m'lady,' said the girl, her eyes 
 roaming hither and thither with the expression of 
 a rabbit's when he sees no hole to get into. ' I wish 
 I 'adn't coom. I think I'll be goin' now if your 
 ladyship will excuse me.' 
 
 She stood up and clutched at the arm of her 
 chair. All the colour had ebbed away from her 
 face and she was deadly pale and looked immensely 
 weary. 
 
 Lady Beauvais touched the bell. She ordered 
 some soup, wine, and biscuits, quickly. 
 
 ' Now, please, sit down there again and get 
 warm,' she said kindly — 'why, you are blue with 
 cold.' 
 
 She stirred the fire to a blaze and drew the visitor's 
 chair nearer to it. No one could say she was not 
 kind. The servant came, with the hot soup, the 
 wine and biscuits. The girl shivered so that Lady 
 Beauvais was obliged to hold the glass of wine to 
 her Ups. 
 
 'I'm only just out of 'orspital,' the girl said, 
 looking up at her gratefully. ' Nursin' my mother by 
 
232 THE HOUSE 
 
 night an' day till she were called. Then a 
 shock.' 
 
 She opened her reddish-brown eyes on Lady 
 Beauvais and said with a curious innocence, — 
 
 'I were crossed in love.' 
 
 If it were not for the tragic intensity of her gaze 
 Lady Beauvais felt she must have smiled. As it 
 was she patted the girl gently on the shoulder and 
 told her to go on with her soup : when she had taken 
 it she could talk. She was accustomed to visitors 
 from whom their business was difficult to extract. 
 The poor thing ! Jones must find her some warm 
 clothes before she went out again in the piercing 
 wind. That indecent blouse and those stockings — 
 enough to give her pneumonia. 
 
 The girl lifted the bowl of soup to her lips and, 
 having laid the spoon aside as of no use, drank 
 noisily. 
 
 'It's 'good stuff,' she said, the soup adhering to 
 her lips. ' It do put the hfe in you.' 
 
 'You can wipe your mouth with this,' Lady 
 Beauvais said, unfolding the table-napkin which 
 had accompanied the tray. 
 
 'I wouldn't be muckin' a beautiful cloth like 
 that,' the girl said, 'my han'kercher'U do.' 
 
 She pulled out a handkerchief, not over-clean, 
 on which was a design of running rabbits. With it 
 came a silk handkerchief, emerald green, which 
 dropped on to the floor. Lady Beauvais picked it 
 up and looked at it in amazement. She recognised 
 it as one of a dozen she had given Julian. If there 
 
CROSSED IN LOVE 233 
 
 had been any doubt it was set at rest by the Uttle 
 monogram she herself had embroidered in the 
 corner. 
 
 'How do you come by this?' she asked. The 
 girl had made a furtive movement as though to 
 recover it. 'It is a handkerchief belonging to my 
 son.' 
 
 'I picked it up one day when he'd dropped it/ 
 the girl said, with a disarming humihty. 'I didn't 
 go for to steal it. It had a lovely smell of him, of 
 his tobacco an' such-hke. I couldn't a-bear to be 
 parted from it. It doan't hev that smell, not so 
 strong now.' 
 
 For a second Lady Beauvais looked with a 
 sickening suspicion at the girl in the arm-chair. 
 The wraith of Rose Buckett had still uncommon 
 beauty. Was it possible that JuUan — the child 
 of many prayers — ^had — ^Uke other young men 
 she knew, and, knowing, had thanked God that her 
 boys were different — ^was it possible? 
 
 'What do you know of my son?' she asked, 
 with an icy sternness that" immediately brought 
 the tears gushing from Rose Buckett's eyes. 
 
 'I did not mean to frighten you,' she said more 
 gently. 'Dry your eyes and finish the soup. Then 
 we can talk intelligently.' 
 
 The running rabbits were so inadequate to sop 
 up Rose's immense tears that she was constrained 
 to hand over JuUan's emerald-silk gift from herself. 
 The first hateful fear had passed. She should not 
 have wronged the boy. Julian had never given 
 
234 THE HOUSE 
 
 them any trouble — that way or any other, beyond 
 his strange Radical leanings, which made him as a 
 white blackbird in a family of such traditions as 
 his. 
 
 She waited for Rose to gulp the rest of the soup, 
 which Rose did as though there were large balls 
 in her throat. 
 
 'Now, go on and tell me,' Lady Beauvais said, 
 with the quiet air of command she had found useful 
 before in dealing with nervy people, 'why you 
 have come here and your name.' 
 
 ' You heven't 'eard it from him ? ' 
 
 Rose was forgetting her painfully-acquired 
 watchfulness over the aspirates. 
 
 'You heven't 'eard it from him.' The faint hope 
 flickered out in her eyes. 'I don't suppose 'e'd 
 be talkin' of me. Yet, if she hedn't come back — 
 who knows? He did send me a true-love brooch.' 
 
 'Who sent you a true-love brooch? And who 
 was it came back? And, please, what is your 
 name? ' Lady Beauvais asked with her air of weary 
 kindness. 
 
 'I'm a-tellin' you,' said Rose, mopping her eyes. 
 'My name is Rose Buckett. I were dairymaid to 
 Sweetwater Farm. I knowed your Joy. Sh6 give 
 me lovely things as were her cast-offs. I thought 
 he were a lovely young man from the first time 
 I laid eyes upon him. He knew how to treat a 
 girl, same as if she were a lady. I couldn't a-bear 
 to think that Ernest Jenkins wanted me. I 'ateii 
 the sight of him after I'd seen 'im. An' I began 
 
CROSSED IN LOVE 235 
 
 to try to be a lady for his sake. Miss Stubbs, the 
 teacher over to Hadham, was sorry for me an' 
 helped. Oh, dear ! ' She had remembered, with 
 the mention of Miss Stubbs. 'They're all gone, 
 an3nvay, now, them haitches, an' I really did try. 
 Miss Stubbs said as 'ow I were willin'. All gone, 
 them haitches ! ' 
 
 With a dramatic gesture she indicated the air 
 as though it were full of flying gnats. 
 
 'Then I grew thin frettin' for love, and them 
 cast-offs, w'ich were fresh as fresh, fitted lovely on 
 me. I'm not a bad-lookin' girl.' She glanced 
 timidly to Lady Beauvais for an assent, which 
 was not given. 'Then he looked at me as though 
 he liked my looks. He would never have looked 
 at the girl I used to be, bustin' with laughture, and 
 inclined to be fat. Wen 'e went away 'e sent me 
 the true-love knot. Then she coomed back an' he 
 wrote me as the true-love knot meaned nothink; 
 'twere only sent in friendship. Then my mother 
 died and I went to 'orspital, bein' crossed in love, 
 an' when I were up an' about I went back to 
 Pinkerton's. She were always kind an' I suited 'er. 
 She thought to ha' kep' me. " Lord Amory won't 
 return no more," she says. " I feels it h'in my 
 bones." You could ha' knocked me down with a 
 feather when I 'eard her say Lord Amory. 'Twere 
 the first I heard on it. If I'd knowed it in time I 
 mightn't ha' thought on 'im — ^maybe ay, maybe 
 no. Mrs Pinkerton, she says mother-like : " Coom 
 back 'ere. Rose. We've always room for her that 
 
 T.H. Q 
 
236 THE HOUSE 
 
 'as a 'and over butter an' cheese like what you hes. 
 Too few, they are. An' maybe in time," fehe says, 
 " you'll get reckingciled to the idea o' marryin' 
 Ernest an' 'im so steady. If 'e was to 'ave a nice 
 little shop of 'is own now ! " "I couldn't," says 
 I. " Never." She weren't there — I mean that 
 there Mary.' 
 
 'You haven't yet told me why you came to me,' 
 Lady Beauvais reminded her. 
 
 'I were all but forgettin' it. This 'ouse' — she 
 glanced about the beautiful room — 'hev put it out 
 o' my 'ead that 'e'd ever hev looked at me. I 
 thought I'd seek out 'is mother an' warn her of 
 that there Mary. She've been a-settin' of 'er cap 
 at 'im proper. I did think if she weren't there 'e 
 might think o' me. Now I know better. Maybe 
 'e won't think of 'er. Then she'd be in the same 
 boat with me. Both of us crossed in love. I think 
 I'll be goin'. I've been a trouble to you too long. 
 Thenks for all kindness. It were lovely soup.' 
 
 'No; wait. I'll take you down to Sweetwater 
 Farm myself. You'd better stay on there and 
 forget my son. He is not likely to return there.' 
 
 Lady Beauvais left nothing to chance. She 
 herself selected the warm clothes which were to 
 protect Rose against the bitter winds. She was 
 not going to have Rose talking to Miss Jones. She 
 herself kept watch and ward over the dressing- 
 room in which Rose changed into those substantial 
 garments. Rose stayed the night at Clarges Street 
 in a little room adjoining her ladyship's own. 
 
CROSSED IN LOVE 237 
 
 Lady Beauvais never let Rose out of sight till they 
 went down the next day to Sweetwater Farm. 
 
 On the last stage of the journey, when they had 
 the carriage to themselves, she shot her bolt. 
 
 'I'll give you two hundred pounds the day you 
 marry the greengrocer young man,' she said. 
 
 For a moment excitement ht up Rose's face. 
 Her ladyship conceded that Rose's colour was 
 dazzling. Then the Hght and the fire ebbed away. 
 
 ' 'Im ! ' said Rose, with scathing contempt. ' 'Tis 
 the churchyard'U be my bride-bed, an' they'll 
 write on my stone as 'ow I died for love.' 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 LADY BEAUVAIS HAS HER WILL 
 
 Mary went into the little sitting-room at Sweetwater 
 Farm where Lady Beauvais awaited her. It was a 
 room of green dimness, its windows being swathed 
 in winter jessamine out in flower already. A trail 
 of the jessamine had somehow crept through the 
 window frame and had been trained prettily upon 
 the inner wall. A long, low glass over the chimney- 
 piece reflected the greenness. Either side the 
 fire-place were cupboards which had been built 
 outside the original windows. The windows were 
 still there, and you pushed them up when you 
 would have access to the stores of china and glass 
 and silver which sent forth rays of hght from the 
 interior of the dark cupboard, as the firehght fell 
 on them. 
 
 Mary went forward quickly and, pausing a little 
 way off, stood looking down at Lady Beauvais. 
 She was wearing her blue smock and breeches and 
 she brought a faint milky smell with her. She was 
 oddly in contrast with Lady Beauvais, wrapped in 
 fur from head to foot, smelling of violets, obviously 
 one accustomed to luxury and the soft ways of 
 life. The wintry sun, already getting low on the 
 
 238 
 
Lady beauvais has her will 239 
 
 horizon, sent one long, pale shaft through the 
 window which fell on Mary's down-bent head, 
 leaving her face in shadow, with an effect of austerity 
 and sadness. 
 
 'You wish to see me, Lady Beauvais?' she said. 
 
 Lady Beauvais was a just woman. She conceded 
 Mary's charm, her dignity. She could see now 
 the strange benignity of the young face, the wide 
 forehead and steady gray eyes. The girl's figure 
 revealed itself through the folds of the smock. 
 It was a gracious figure, with a suggestion of 
 motherhness. A charming creature. Lady Beauvais 
 conceded, and perfectly modest despite the breeches 
 and gaiters that showed under the smock. Very 
 different from the young ladies she had been 
 meeting in the houses of her friends. She had 
 glanced with disgust at the half-naked ladies of the 
 ball-rooms, dancing their savage dances to savage 
 music. She had averted her eyes from the short- 
 skirted ladies of all ages who lolled in chairs reveaUng 
 their undergarments above the knees. The subtler 
 immodesty of some chnging garments, half-revealing, 
 half-suggesting, had not escaped her. She had 
 been accused of old-fashioned dressing as regarded 
 herself and Joy, and she had acknowledged with 
 pride that she was old-fashioned. 
 
 Lady Beauvais was an honest woman with 
 herself, and she acknowledged that this breeched 
 girl might have been set as a pattern of modesty 
 to the baU-room and the drawing-room, to say 
 nothing of pubUc places. 
 
240 THE HOUSE 
 
 In a mood of softened admiration she answered 
 Mary Bates as she had not meant to answer 
 her. 
 
 'I came to see the girl my son has fallen in love 
 with/ she said. 
 
 A faint colour sprang into Mary Bates's clear, 
 pale cheeks. 
 
 'Lord Amory is very young,' she said. 'It will 
 pass.' 
 
 ' Oh ! ' Lady Beauvais was bewildered. ' You 
 mean it to pass then?' 
 
 'What have I to do with lords and ladies? ' Mary 
 Bates answered her, looking down unsmilingly at 
 Lady Beauvais. 'He should have told me before 
 I began to think of him. You came to ask 
 me to give him up. I felt when you invited me to 
 your house that there could hardly be a real welcome 
 there for me. You would all be against me — Tom 
 Bates's daughter — agoing into a family like yours ! 
 It is not surprising. If you do not hate my father 
 now you will hate him in a little while.' 
 
 ' You don't mean to say that you refuse my son ! ' 
 Lady Beauvais said, staring at her incredulously, 
 
 'He has not yet asked me in so many words. If 
 he does I shall refuse him. I am not prepared to 
 take up his way of life. He is too young to choose 
 my way definitely, without any fear of regrets. 
 I know what he thinks, the hfe he has planned out. 
 I wonder if he would not come to miss you and all 
 the things he has been accustomed to? It is too 
 big a sacrifice, and he is too young to make it.' 
 
LADY BEAUVAIS HAS HER WILL 241 
 
 'Darlin' Julian has always known his own mind,' 
 said Lady Beauvais with a little air of offence. 
 
 'I might be too great a price to pay,' Mary 
 Bates said uncompromisingly. 
 
 Lady Beauvais felt suddenly as though a weight 
 had been hfted from her heart. She did not perhaps 
 know her son as well as she thought she did. For 
 a moment a vision swam into her ken of Julian 
 rangi, accepting the lovely fate of marrying Irene 
 Chatterton with her pots of money. Lady Beauvais 
 would never have used the phrase. She tried not 
 to think of Irene's money too much in connection 
 with the marriage she desired. That Dear Thing 
 needed no gilding. But, after all, the money was 
 a comfortable fact. It would mean so much to 
 the House. Lady Beauvais made up in devotion 
 to the House whatever was lacking in her husband. 
 It was bitter to her that they must Uve in a corner 
 of it, as all their friends were living, economising 
 coal and service. Aheady the gardens had begun 
 to be neglected. The staff of twenty gardeners 
 required to keep them as they should be had been 
 cut down by one half — and they were pa37ing 
 eight hundred a year for the wages of the ten. 
 Only yesterday she had noticed signs of the change. 
 The yew hedges of the Dutch Garden, which were 
 her delight, with their saihng swans, their ships, 
 their poodle dogs, all their quaintnesses had begun 
 to be overgrown and shapeless. The gardener 
 whose business it had been to keep them had gone 
 somewhere for a higher wage. Between the red 
 
242 THE HOUSE 
 
 tiles of the garden-paths that radiated, like the 
 spokes of a wheel, from the dial at the centre of 
 My Lady's Garden, grass had thrust up impudently 
 here and there. She thought with a sharp pang 
 of the most beautiful rooms of the House closed 
 up, and the furniture sheeted and hidden away. 
 Only the other day Lord Beauvais had said that 
 one of the great London dealers had offered him a 
 thousand pounds for a Hepplewhite sofa, and she 
 had cried out at the man's insolence. But Lord 
 Beauvais had shrugged his shoulders and gone on 
 to say that the furniture of the house, exclusive of 
 heirlooms, pictiu-es and silver, would bring two 
 hundred thousand pounds. 'There will never be 
 such a moment for selling again,' he had said. 
 'They might come under the hammer in another 
 sense than the auctioneer's in the times that is 
 coming.' 
 
 If Lady Beauvais could have felt alienated from 
 her lord it would have been then. Why was he 
 always peering into the night of the future and 
 seeing only dark things there? In her own mind 
 Lady Beauvais was persuaded that what had been 
 would be. A certain section of the working-classes 
 had grown troublesome and insolent. It was the 
 reaction after the war and the mischief-making of 
 persons hke Lloyd George, to say nothing of all 
 those other wicked demagogues. Things would settle 
 down again. There would always be noisy agitators 
 and ungrateful, stupid people : but the House 
 would stand, and the upper classes would continue 
 
LADY BEAUVAIS HAS HER WILL 243 
 
 to rule. Lady Beauvais believed in the Right 
 Divine of the upper classes to rule. 
 
 She had been making a long excursion in her 
 thoughts; but the minute-hand of the clock had 
 hardly moved an appreciable distance before she 
 was aware again of Mary Bates's face and the 
 patient tolerance of the eyes. There was a mature 
 wisdom in the face that was still youthfully round 
 and soft, and the pale, clear skin untouched by 
 time. It was as though this girl had known 
 suffering, or the knowledge of it had been trans- 
 mitted to her. 
 
 'He is too young to give up so much,' she said, 
 as though she had been waiting for Lady Beauvais' 
 attention to come back to her. 
 
 'My dear,' said Lady Beauvais, impulsively, 
 'you are wise beyond your years, and you are very 
 charmin'. I can feel for my son. But — there is so 
 much to be considered. We have claims on us we 
 cannot disregard. I wish you had come to Cressey. 
 You would understand better from seein' the place 
 than I can tell you. Cressey has always had all 
 the devotion her children can give her. She is 
 unique. Every child born of her loves and praises 
 her. Such as she only exist because their children 
 have been willin- to make sacrifices for them.' 
 
 'You talk as though the House was a woman,' 
 MBxy Bates said, a httle coldly. 
 
 'She has been loved better than a woman,' Lady 
 Beauvais went on, not to be checked in her flow 
 of eloquence. 'If you were to read back in the 
 
244 THE HOUSE 
 
 history of the family — the first St Maur appears 
 as a Squire of E(iwaM4he First. He was just an 
 Esquire. It meant more then than it means to-day. 
 He married a fortune. Cressey was then only a 
 naked tower. The House grew. It grew from a 
 tower of gray stone to what it is^-one of the most 
 beautiful houses in England, adored by its children. 
 Such a house as Cressey demands and receives a 
 loyalty which may cost its children their dearest 
 inclinations.' 
 
 "The House sounds hke a vampire to me — 
 something that has eaten its children,' said Mary 
 Bates icily. 
 
 Lady Beauvais tumbled down from her exaltation 
 in which she had had an absurd feehng that her 
 listener must see the House, somewhat as she saw 
 it, albeit from a long way off. She had been carried 
 away by her own eloquence. She was not sure, 
 by the way, if it was her own or something 
 she remembered. 
 
 ' Oh ! ' she said, with a sound like a gasp, ' of 
 course I- could not expect you to understand. I am 
 sorry.' 
 
 'If he was not so young, if I was sure — perhaps 
 I am not sure of myself — I would not let the House 
 stand between us,' said Mary Bates. 
 
 ' Not sure of yourself ! ' repeated Lady Beauvais, 
 with an air of stupefaction. 'Do you mean that 
 you do not care for my son ? ' 
 
 'He is very lovable. Do you think I do not 
 feel that? But — there is my father — I am his only 
 
LADY BEAUVAIS HAS HER WILL 245 
 
 child. What place would there be for him in the 
 wilderness? Perhaps we would both fret. I may 
 be too much interested in my kind — I am my 
 father's daughter — to be satisfied with some lodge 
 in a vast wilderness.' 
 
 'What I cannot understand,' said Lady Beauvais, 
 so simply that the words were robbed of any possible 
 oifence, 'is that you could give up my son.' 
 
 'I do not give him up. It may be for him to 
 give me up. On the other hand there would be 
 so much I should have to give up for him. My 
 dreams are of people to work for as well as animals. 
 I am not sure yet that the wilderness would satisfy 
 me, even with your son. It is what you want, is it 
 not? that I should go out of his life — till we are 
 both older, at least. I tell you I am not sure, even 
 of myself. If I were sure for both I should make a 
 fight for my own.' 
 
 She smiled, and there was something a httle 
 piteous about her smile. 
 
 ' Dear thing ! ' said Lady Beauvais, ' you are sure 
 it will not make you unhappy?' 
 
 A queer gUnt of humour came into the sadness 
 of Mary's eyes. 
 
 'People Uke me have no time to be unhappy,' 
 she answered. 
 
 Lady Beauvais stood up and drew the magnificent 
 sable cloak she was wearing about her shoulders. 
 She had thrown it back when she sat down, revealing 
 the beautiful lining of rose-pink satin. 
 
 'What will you do?' she asked curiously. 
 
246 THE HOUSE 
 
 'I am leaving the faiin. Wait, please — ^there is 
 something I want you to give to your son.' 
 
 'Oh, no, no, please, not by me,' Lady Beauvais 
 said, in terror. 'He must not know I came. He 
 would think I had influenced you, and he would 
 be angry with me. He was the dearest Uttle boy, 
 but very difi&cult to detach from a grievance. . . .' 
 
 'He would forgive you if there was an5H;hing to 
 forgive,' Mary Bates said gently. 'But I shall let 
 him know that I am not sure of myself. I shall 
 send back his ring : he left it here for me when he 
 went away. He will be hurt and angry, but he may 
 forget very soon, because I am not sure of myself. 
 He has so much to give from his point of view. 
 Or perhaps he hasn't — ^he is very simple.' 
 
 Again her face quivered and Lady Beauvais 
 made as though she would embrace her. Ladies 
 of the aristocracy have a fashion of kissing. But 
 Mary Bates eluded her without seeming to do it. 
 
 ' There is another reason why he should not come 
 here,' she said, 'and why I should go away. You 
 have brought back Rose Buckett. I hope she has 
 not been troubling you. Unrequited love is out of 
 fashion, but poor Rose is primitive.' 
 
 Lady Beauvais, shaking herself out with a soft 
 sound of silks and satins, suddenly blushed and 
 looked furtive, very unlike her fresh, innocent self. 
 
 'The girl is very pretty,' she said in a low voice. 
 'She cannot have attracted my son?' 
 
 ' No,' said Mary Bates; " did you think it possible ? ' 
 
 There was a tap at the door and Mrs Pinkerton 
 
LADY BEAUVAIS HAS HER WILL 247 
 
 came in on hospitable thoughts intent. Her lady- 
 ship must have something to eat before it was time 
 for the train. She hoped she was not intruding, 
 but she was afraid time was growing short. While 
 she talked she was spreading a cloth of fine damask, 
 darned in many places, on the table. There was 
 no more occasion for private conversation with 
 Mary Bates, who went away and left Lady Beauvais 
 to be entertained by Mrs Pinkerton. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 THE BROTHERS 
 
 Lady Beauvais, back again at Cressey, was so 
 perturbed at the things which had happened, and 
 the things which might happen when Juhan returned, 
 that she had to place her confidence in and 
 seek comfort from her daughter. 
 
 Joy proved unexpectedly comfortable, for of 
 late she had travelled a long way from the dream 
 she had shared with Julian, in their childish years, 
 of the simple life in the uncrowded country, while 
 it had remained and perhaps deepened with Julian. 
 
 'He won't go by himself, mummie,' she assured 
 Lady Beauvais. 'There was always a squaw in 
 Julian's dreams. I used to think it rather rude, 
 I remember : but since Julian said it I persuaded 
 myself that it must be right. Malise thinks it 
 would be much better for Julian to stay at home 
 and join the Labour Party openly and work with 
 it. He might go into Parliament. He might 
 become a Labour leader and smoke a large cigar 
 like an American. The Canadian idea is, I think, 
 really rather selfish. There is so much to be done 
 at home.' 
 
 'You think he might settle down if that fair 
 248 
 
THE BROTHERS 249 
 
 creature refuses him, Joy darlin'?' asked the 
 mother hopefully. The idea of Julian's deserting 
 them for that ancient, and, to her, most unattractive 
 dream, had hurt her sorely in the maternal heart 
 which would have kept its children always near. 
 
 'Very probably. Of course, he might marry Mary 
 later on. Malise thinks that a family tie with Tom 
 Bates would be of immense service in the days that 
 are coming.' 
 
 ' But what nonsense, dear thing ! An alliance 
 with Irene would be useful if you like. Think of 
 what her money could do for the House. And she 
 is a charmin' creature. But for that unfortunate 
 plan of recuperation at Sweetwater Farm, and 
 JuUan's subsequent infatuation, he could not 
 have resisted Irene.' 
 
 'Oh, Irene's a darhng, of course,' assented Joy 
 heartily. ' I don't know that I'd like any one better 
 for a sister-in-law. Of course, I love Mary. If I 
 was only sure she'd keep Julian at home ! But as 
 for the House, mummie, MaUse says all houses 
 like ours are doomed. It is only a question of time. 
 What is the good of keeping up a house when you 
 can only live in a corner of it ? ' 
 
 'I do not expect Malise to understand,' Lady 
 Beauvais said with an air of offence. 'It is only 
 the owners of houses hke this who know. It is a 
 case of noblesse oblige. The House in a way stands 
 for the family. We, who have the privilege of 
 possessing such houses, ought to be ready to suffer 
 and make sacrifices rather than that the House 
 
250 THE HOUSE 
 
 should not receive its due. Of course, Malise would 
 not know. He belongs to the class that looks upon 
 a house just as a cover. He may have lived in 
 half a dozen houses. I pity that class of no associa- 
 tions, no memories. One might as well be a gipsy 
 at once, in fact the advantage would be with the 
 
 gipsy-' 
 
 Again she was terrified of JuMan's possible anger 
 if he discovered that she had visited Sweetwater 
 Farm. He would not beheve, seeing the result, 
 that she had played fair. She was quite satisfied 
 in her own mind that she had played fair : but the 
 sight of a tiny registered packet addressed to Julian 
 in the post-bag next morning filled her with a new 
 terror. 
 
 'Do you think Julian will take it very badly, 
 Joy?' she asked when she found herself alone with 
 her eldest daughter. 'What does a young man do 
 in such circumstances? Will he take her at her 
 word? Will he follow her, wherever she may be? 
 Will he be furiously angry or only acutely miserable? 
 Is it hkely he wiU want to put the blame on some- 
 body — ^me, for instance ? ' 
 
 'Very probably, to the last question',* answered 
 Joy. 'He being a man. Every man wants to put 
 the blame on somebody or something. It came in 
 with Adam. Daddy is an exception, and I hope 
 MaUse may be.' 
 
 Another carking anxiety had to be revealed and 
 reassurance given. 
 
 'I haven't been sleepin' well, dear thing,' said 
 
THE BROTHERS 251 
 
 the mother plaintively, "and such queer things 
 came into my head. You wouldn't believe what 
 came to me last night while I lay awake.' 
 
 ' You should caU your daughter to talk to you if 
 you are wakeful, darUng. I know I sleep like a pig.' 
 
 "As though I should, darUn'.' Lady Beauvais 
 forgot to rebuke her daughter's language. 'Malise 
 would be very little obliged to me if you had a 
 headache and dark rings round your eyes. It was 
 this that kept me awake. You said that Julian 
 would not go to Canada without a squaw. There 
 was always a squaw in the picture. Now, do you 
 think — I know it is ridiculous, but I do want you 
 to say it is impossible. There is that girl at the 
 farm — Rose Buckett— what an uncouth name ! 
 Do you think that Julian, if he was desperate, 
 might turn to her ? ' 
 
 'What do you know of Rose Buckett? You are 
 becoming a very mysterious mother, very secretive. 
 I thought she had left Sweetwater Farm. Of course, 
 Julian would not be attracted by her — a coarse 
 girl hke Rose ! You wrong Julian, mummie.' 
 
 'I am so glad you think I do. But the girl had 
 beauty. As a matter of fact she came here the 
 day you were all out and had that glorious find in 
 Four Corners Wood, when you came home to find 
 me gone. I took her back to Sweetwater Farm 
 and left her there. Poor thing, she had no feehn' 
 for her own dignity. She is apparently in love 
 with Juhan and thinks he would be in love with 
 her if Mary Bates had not intervened. You don't 
 
 T.H. K 
 
252 THE HOUSE 
 
 think it likely, Joy, that he might think of her if 
 he was angry and disappointed about the other 
 young woman.' 
 
 'I think you may trust Julian.' 
 
 'Oh, thank you, darlin'. That is just what I 
 needed. What a wise child you are, Joy ! Such a 
 help to your poor mummie, darlin' ! ' 
 
 JuUan came home a couple of days later. Meeting 
 him in the hall she saMV with misgiving that even 
 while he embraced her his eye roamed to the pile 
 of letters awaiting him. She felt in herself the 
 swift fall of his heart when he discovered the 
 ominous packet. He took it from the table and 
 went upstairs with it in his hand. 
 
 Her husband claimed her attention. Even the 
 children never came between the devoted couple. 
 They could be all in all to and enough for each 
 other. 
 
 Lord Beauvais had a tale to surprise his wife with. 
 He and Julian had attended a crowded meeting 
 at which Tom Bates had spoken. They had come 
 down the night before and stayed at Danvers and 
 driven over to Chilton to hear the demagogue 
 speak. Obviously Lord Beauvais had been im- 
 pressed. ' He is the very reverse of what I imagined,' 
 he said. ' I stood up and asked him some questions 
 after he had spoken and he suggested that I should 
 come on to the platform and present my side of 
 the question to the audience.' 
 
 'On a platform with Tom Bates? Preposterous ! 
 Of course you didn't ! ' 
 
THE BROTHERS 253 
 
 'I did, Rachel. The crowd was very polite and 
 gave me a faint little cheer, a poor thing compared 
 with its uproarious applause of Mr Bates. Who 
 said that the English were an undemonstrative 
 people? Of course I knew that I had no chance 
 against him. My convictions are too weak : I 
 suffer from seeing the point of view of other people.' 
 
 'I foresee the time,' said Lady Beauvais tragically, 
 almost tearfully, 'when I — and I alone, — will 
 stand for the House.' 
 
 She glanced at Juhan fearfully as he came down 
 the wide stairs into the hall. He looked grim and 
 rather unhappy and her heart ached for him. He 
 was haggard, and the debonair and elegant look 
 which was so attractive in him had disappeared. 
 For the moment he was a pale, dark, somewhat 
 gloomy-looking young gentleman, who was deaf 
 to the family chatter, and, after tea, took a review 
 and went off to his own room. 
 
 'What is the matter with Juhan?' asked the 
 father. 'He was in high spirits coming down.' 
 
 ' I'm afraid Miss Bates has returned him his ring, 
 poor darhn'. I saw something that looked very 
 like it, and he seized upon it from amid his heap of 
 letters and went upstairs with it. The other letters 
 are there still. He has forgotten them.' 
 
 'How did you know it was a ring, and from Miss 
 Bates ? ' Lord Beauvais asked curiously. 
 
 Thus questioned Lady Beauvais poured out the 
 whole business of her visit to Sweetwater Farm. 
 
 'I won't say I hadn't some wild idea of asking 
 
254 THE HOUSE 
 
 her not to marry Julian,' she said. 'The mother 
 in the novels always does that. But it was taken 
 out of my hands.' 
 
 'You'd better have left the boy to manage his 
 own affairs, Rachel. Remember that Julian will 
 be twenty-three next April. He would object to 
 interference — and quite rightly.' 
 
 'I had nothing to do with her decision,' Lady 
 Beauvais protested, a cloud of vexation on her 
 eyes and her fair face. 
 
 'Perhaps you had more than you know. I hope 
 Juhan won't take it into his head to fling himself 
 off to Canada. You like the prospect of losing our 
 eldest son as little as I do. Mary Bates might keep 
 him at home.' 
 
 ' Oh ! ' cried Lady Beauvais, ' I never thought of 
 that!' 
 
 The night post brought Lady Beauvais a letter 
 which she laid aside till she had time to look at it. 
 The handwriting was, if not exactly illiterate, the 
 writing of some one little accustomed to the pen. 
 She received many such letters, from all sorts of 
 people who needed help. 
 
 She took a heap of her correspondence up to bed 
 with her, and after Miss Jones had finished and 
 gone downstairs, she sat by her bedroom fire and 
 read through it. While she opened the envelopes 
 daintily with a little knife of tortoiseshell and 
 silver she could hear her husband stirring about in 
 the adjoining room. He was to be up early for 
 hunting, and she had closed the door between them. 
 
THE BROTHERS 255 
 
 so as not. to disturb him if she sat and read late, as 
 she often did. 
 
 But suddenly she opened the door and called him. 
 Obviously she was agitated. He had a thought of 
 how young she looked, the two long fair plaits down 
 either side her face falUng over her shoulders, to be 
 the mother of grown children. She had on a long 
 gown of white woollen material, with a band of fur 
 at the neck and wrists. He remembered that 
 when he had first seen her a child of sixteen, 
 shyly pressing close to her mother, the pious 
 Lady Orchester, he had thought her like a 
 picture by Albrecht Diirer of the Blessed Mary in 
 the Temple. 
 
 'I've found a horrid thing among my letters,' 
 she said, and looked as though a loathsome creature 
 had stung her. 
 
 'What is it?' 
 
 He held out his hand for it and she gave it to 
 him, gingerly holding it by the extreme outside 
 edge. 
 
 'To THE Countess of Beauvais, — Maddam, — 
 This is to warn you that your son has been brakin' 
 a poer girl's hart. There is one that loves her 
 and would act rite by her if your son would let her 
 bee. Keep him away from Sweetwater Farm, 
 where he have played fast and loose with two 
 maids. Let him keep to his own stashun in life or 
 worse may befall. 
 
 'A Well- Wisher,' 
 
256 THE HOUSE 
 
 'What is the meaning of it?' he asked, having 
 read the precious epistle. 'It is a he, of 
 course.' 
 
 'Absolutely, as affects Julian, of course V she 
 said proudly. 
 
 'It is written by the romantic dairymaid, I 
 presume.' 
 
 'I think not. There was a swain, a greengrocer. 
 I think he wrote it. She wouldn't look at him after 
 seein' Julian.' 
 
 ' What a perverted taste I She might reconsider 
 in time. I am sure the boy has done nothing to 
 make her remember him. And he was — ^is — ^in 
 love with the other girl.' 
 
 'Mrs Pinkerton told me something about the 
 young man. He seems an estimable young man, 
 if " a bit of a softy," as she described him, and he 
 is devoted to the girl, who has never given him 
 any encouragement. Do you think we might give 
 the poor young man just a start in life? ' 
 
 ' I would let them be, my dear. Better not meddle 
 too much. I confess that apart from the vague 
 threat at the end I find something touching about 
 the letter. I should burn it if I were you. Julian 
 would not be pleased at the inference that might 
 be drawn from it.' 
 
 'Poor darlin' !' sighed Lady Beauvais. 'He has 
 never given us cause for anxiety. 
 
 'Your son would not. You had better marry 
 Dick to Irene. At least you will have her in the 
 family.' 
 
THE BROTHERS 257 
 
 Lady Beauvais lifted her large eyes to her 
 husband's face. 
 
 'That is what I hope for — to have the dear thing 
 for my daughter.' 
 
 'I am rather curious about Mary Bates,' said 
 Lord Beauvais. 'I hope I shall have a chance of 
 seeing her before I reject her as a daughter-in-law. 
 If her personahty is anything Hke as interesting as 
 her father's she should be worth knowing.' 
 
 Lady Beauvais' face was a picture of amazement. 
 Had she ever really known the man who was her 
 husband? ' 
 
 'There, don't worry, darling,' he said, and kissed 
 her forehead in which was a pucker that brought 
 out an unsuspected likeness to Julian. 'You, 
 with your rehgious beliefs, should be satisfied that 
 it will come all right.' 
 
 'I don't want to lose my Mttle first-born,' she 
 said, with an unexpected passion, and then she 
 went back to her own room and closed the door. 
 
CHAPTER XXV 
 
 THE MOTHER TRIUMPHS 
 
 Lord Beauvais went off in the dark of the morning 
 without disturbing his wife, who was usually down- 
 stairs to pour out his coffee and see that his flask 
 and his sandwich-case were filled. He spared to 
 waken her, feeUng that she had probably lain 
 awake for a good while, which was nothing more 
 than the truth. Joy \yas riding too, and under- 
 studied her mother in her carefulness for him in a 
 way that made him smile. How quickly love 
 developed the mother in a child hke Joy ! 
 
 In the semi-darkness, over the coffee and cold 
 ham and boiled eggs, he led Joy to talk of Mary 
 Bates, easily, by describing Tom Bates. Joy had, 
 of course, the literary qualities. She poured out 
 an impassioned eulogium of Mary Bates, which he 
 took in, letting her talk, except for now and again 
 a leading question or an expression of interest. 
 He got a clear impression of a very beautiful 
 character, he assured himself with satisfaction. 
 Had Joy a drawing of Mary Bates, or a photograph, 
 by any chance? Joy had a pencil sketch which he 
 should see as soon as it could come out of the chaos 
 of her belongings. He and this girl of his had been 
 
 258 
 
THE MOTHER TRIUMPHS 259 
 
 on terms of special intimacy. He had been good 
 to all his children without spoiling them. 
 
 As they went out to the waiting horses Joy said, 
 with a Httle squeeze of his arm, — 
 
 'You know, daddy, that Julian will not easily 
 give up Mary. She is unique.' 
 
 There were three horses being led up and down. 
 'Lord Amory is not hunting,' Lord Beauvais said 
 to the groom who led the third horse. He wondered 
 if Juhan had stayed behind to talk over things 
 with his mother. He hoped the boy would not be 
 too hard on her if she confessed her intervention. 
 
 Lady Beauvais rose leisurely, having announced 
 her intention of breakfasting downstairs. No one 
 had told her that Julian was not hunting, and she 
 was surprised to find a place set opposite hers at 
 the round table, a pile of letters by the plate. 
 Before she had time to be alarmed Julian made his 
 appearance. His dog, a black spaniel, named 
 Peggy, who had been with him through some of 
 his campaigns, followed at his heels, and sat down 
 by him when he sat down, leaning a shining head 
 on his knee. Peggy had missed him when he was 
 at Sweetwater Farm, and watched him closely, 
 lest she should lose him again. 
 
 The boy looked ill, she thought, with a sinking 
 of her heart. She was always troubled if but a 
 finger ached of her beloved brood. He had touched 
 her cheek with chilly young Mps before he sat down 
 opposite to her, and turned over his letters without 
 opening them. They waited on themselves at 
 
26o THE HOUSE 
 
 breakfast. She got up and went to the dishes 
 which stood over spirit lamps to be kept hot, and, 
 lifting one cover after another, she mentioned their 
 contents, asking JuUan which she should help 
 him to. 
 
 'You must not wait on me, mother,' he said, 
 almost roughly, and coming over he selected his 
 food for himself. 
 
 Her heart sank while he sat opposite to her, 
 eating in silence, with apparently little enjoyment 
 of his food. He barely turned the food about 
 on his plate before pushing it from him. 
 
 'Are you not well, darlin'?' she asked at last. 
 
 He looked up at her gloomily. 
 
 'I have been trying to make up my mind to ask 
 you a question, mother,' he answered : and she 
 was afraid of his eyes. It was so sad and strange 
 that her little boy should look at her, so aloof and 
 so suspicious. She felt suddenly cold and forlorn. 
 
 'Ask it,' she said, with a brevity necessitated 
 by her dread of tears. 
 
 'The girl I love has turned me down. I could 
 have sworn she loved me. She has given me no 
 adequate reason. Do you know why she has 
 done it?' 
 
 The colour rushed to her face. 
 
 'I did not do anything, Julian,' she said piteously. 
 'I asked her to come here that we might know her.' 
 Palpable guilt was in her face as she said it. ' When 
 she would not come I went to see her. I wanted to 
 see the girl you had chosen. She was charmin', a 
 
THE MOTHER TRIUMPHS 261 
 
 beautiful creature '—for a second the gloom of his 
 face lightened— ; I did not say anything to her to 
 make her come to such a decision.' 
 
 'You conveyed it,' he said ruthlessly. 'It is very 
 easy for a woman hke you to convey to her that you 
 did not think her good enough for me — ^good God ! 
 good enough for me! It is I who am not good 
 enough for her, God knows.' 
 
 'Oh, I didn't, Julian, I didn't,' said the poor 
 lady; and the tears came. 
 
 He looked at her miserably and distastefully, at 
 her heaving shoulders and her face buried in her 
 handkerchief. 
 
 'I wish you wouldn't, mother,' he said. 'You 
 make me feel such a brute. And, supposing one 
 of the servants should come in.' 
 
 She got up from the table, went to the window, 
 and, with her back to the room, dabbed at her 
 eyes. The dog followed her and Ucked her hanging 
 hand. 
 
 'I'm sorry, mother,' said Juhan, making no 
 effort to comfort her. 
 
 The iciness of his voice acted hke a tonic. He 
 had always been so fond of her. She would have 
 Wept profusely if he had been kind. She spoke, 
 looking not at him, but out of the window, at the 
 beds where the snowdrops were out, and the crocuses 
 sending up their tiny spears. 
 
 'I cannot remember that I said anything to 
 influence her, or implied anything. I am very 
 sorry I went. She seemed to think she had a 
 
262 THE HOUSE 
 
 divided duty — ^between her father and you. She 
 talked of her profession . . .' 
 
 'Stuff !' said Julian rudely. 'A woman in love 
 does not think of her profession. I believe you 
 beUeve you are telling the truth, mother. But — 
 you have a guilty sense towards me. I saw it in 
 your face when I began. If I have been a boor to 
 you it is because I hated to see it there.' 
 
 Lady Beauvais turned about, the tears still wet 
 on her cheeks. The implied condemnation in his 
 words had braced her like the chill impact of ice- 
 cold water. She did not reproach him as many a 
 woman would have done, carrying the war into 
 the enemy's camp. 
 
 'The guilt was only for my thoughts, Julian. 
 To a woman like me it is bitter to think of your 
 marryin' a demagogue's daughter. I confess I 
 was amazed and impressed by her, but not to the 
 extent of wishin' for her as a daughter-in-law.' 
 
 'You would have prevented it if you could.' 
 
 'In my thoughts, yes.' 
 
 'Mary would read your thoughts. You are not 
 a very subtle or a very complicated woman; and 
 she is highly sensitive and very delicate.' 
 
 The speech made her angry, as though he had 
 insulted her. Suddenly she spoke and the tears 
 were all gone. 
 
 'You have not been very good to us, Julian. 
 You have gone your own way. You have desired 
 your own way. We have been a tender father and 
 mother to you. Your scheme for the simple Ufe, 
 
THE MOTHER TRIUMPHS 263 
 
 even when you were a little boy, took no account 
 of us. . . .' 
 
 He looked at her, somewhat taken aback. 
 
 'There would be no place in it for you, mother. 
 You belong to the feudal nobles. No one could 
 expect you to rough it.' 
 
 'Things will go on the same long after you are dead,' 
 she said, with a sudden scorn. 'AH your fine 
 dreams have been dreamt over and over again in 
 the world's history. This Revolution will be no 
 more lastin' than other Revolutions. Those who 
 are fit to rule will come back and rule when this 
 hurly-burly is over.' 
 
 He was amazed. She had been so silent when 
 they talked what it was the fashion of the day to 
 call Bolshevism. It came to him suddenly that 
 they had oppressed her. His father's curious 
 tolerance and capacity for seeing every side of a 
 question had misled him. 
 
 ' Poor mother ! ' he said, and his voice was suddenly 
 gentle; 'I'm afraid I've been a great trial to you.' 
 
 She was not softened. She was in the mood of 
 revolt which comes at moments to placid and 
 conciliatory women. 
 
 'You have only thought of yourself,' she said. 
 'You are no worse than other sons. Our sons 
 belong to us when they are little. As soon as they 
 grow up they are ready to put the world between 
 us and them. Did you ever think that this plan 
 of yours meant the complete cuttin'-off of your 
 father and me? If things are as you say, if the 
 
264 THE HOUSE 
 
 world is to be worse than it is now — I don't see 
 how it can be — are you not leavin' us, no longer 
 young, to bear it? Your father would never 
 complain, but he has felt it. I do not think so 
 much of your dream. If it came to pass it would 
 be a shirkin', a runnin' away, even from the cause 
 you profess to have at heart. While the world is 
 broken to pieces you will, if you have your way, 
 be enjoj^n' a family picnic somewhere where the 
 noise of it will never reach you, where you can 
 satisfy your tastes for outdoor life and sport and 
 let the world and all of us go hang.' 
 
 Julian had turned red and white while she spoke. 
 When she had finished, he said, in an incredulous 
 voice — 
 
 'I believe I never knew you before, mother. I 
 am sorry. I must have been grieving you all the 
 time.' 
 
 Her mood changed suddenly. 
 
 'Never mind,' she said, 'you were always a good 
 boy. Only, why would j^ou be leavin' us? Isn't 
 England big enough ? ' 
 
 He looked up at her with a new thought, a new 
 hope in his eyes. 
 
 'Mother,' he said, 'would you be willing to accept 
 Mary as a daughter-in-law — to allow me to follow 
 my bent — if we were to stay in England? ' 
 
 'You mean — that you should throw in your 
 cause with your Labour friends?' she asked, the 
 colour coming to her face. 
 
 'That — and even more.' He laughed bojdshly. 
 
THE MOTHER TRIUMPHS 265 
 
 'I should become plain Citizen Amory. " I am 
 sick of these toyes," as old Francis Bacon, Lord 
 Verulam, said. I am willing to abjure all rights 
 and titles in favour of Dick, who wiU carry on 
 with much more credit than I ever should.' 
 
 'You will be sorry some day' — for your children,' 
 she said. 
 
 He coloured ingenuously. 
 
 'I am afraid it is only a sham sacrifice,' he said. 
 'We are too sensible a people to go on with " these 
 toyes." I know you do not agree with me. You 
 say the Anglo-Saxon can never make the true 
 RepubUcan, like the Latin peoples. Time will tell. 
 I think I can answer for Mary that she will have 
 no hankering after a title. God has made her 
 noble.' 
 
 'Don't do anything rash, Julian. Dick won't 
 want his brother's birthright. Can't you be a 
 Repubhcan and keep the name you were born to? 
 These somewhat theatrical changes are for the 
 Latin or Celtic, not the Anglo-Saxon people.' 
 
 She was amazing him more and more. 'I beUeve 
 you feel the emancipation of the women stirring in 
 you, mother,' he said. 
 
 'I never wanted a vote,' she repUed. 'I do not 
 say I shall not exercise my right of votin' : it might 
 be a duty.' 
 
 'Malise told me the other day that at the height 
 of the Suffrage agitation — the day of the militant 
 Suffragettes — the nuns in their convents were 
 strangely fluttered.' 
 
266 THE HOUSE 
 
 She turned to him with an unclouded face. 
 
 'So long as you do not leave us I shall accept 
 anything else you choose to do. You will never 
 do anything to disgrace us.' 
 
 'Will you go to Mary and tell her that you 
 welcome her, that you desire her for a daughter? 
 I am so sure she loves me that I may ask this of 
 you. If you consciously or unconsciously wounded 
 her pride you must undo it. You have bewildered 
 me, mother. I feel as though I must begin to 
 learn you all over again — but Mary must have 
 seen that you did not want her : she must have 
 felt that she would separate us. . . .' 
 
 'She said you would pay too heavy a price for 
 her.' 
 
 He smiled — the lover's smile of triumph and 
 tenderness. 
 
 'If I had Mary,' he said, 'nothing else matters. 
 I do not mean you and father. Perhaps I 
 might have come back from Canada, after all. 
 Do you remember how I used to follow at your 
 skirts when I was a little boy? ' 
 
 Her eyes were misty. 
 
 'The rustle of your dress as you came along the 
 nursery corridor used to set my heart beating,' 
 he went on. 
 
 The mother melted suddenly. Lady Beauvais 
 was herself again. 'You remember when you 
 came home at Christmas, from your first prep, 
 school, and when I went to tuck you in the last 
 thing at night, you flung both your arms round 
 
THE MOTHER TRIUMPHS 267 
 
 my neck and whispered, " Darlin', I can never 
 leave you again ! '" 
 
 He went over to her and kissed her tenderly. 
 
 'I meant to make conditions with you. I meant 
 to have said, " Give me Mary and I will stay." 
 Now, I make no conditions. " DarUng, I can 
 never leave you ! " ' 
 
 So Lady Beauvais had her hour .of triumph. 
 
 T.H. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 HAPPY ENDING 
 
 Lady Beauvais overwhelmed her husband that 
 evening, coining into the dressing-room where he 
 had been getting out of his wet and muddied 
 hunting-clothes, with a shining face. She sat down 
 beside the cheerful fire and watched him brushing 
 his hair in front of the glass. It had been a good 
 day, and he and Joy had come home pleasantly 
 tired and full of the ecstasy of hard riding in the 
 teeth of the wind and rain. 
 
 'Have you and Juhan been making it up, Rachel? ' 
 he asked. 
 
 'How did you know?' 
 
 'Do you think I can't read your face after all 
 our years together? And the boy has emerged 
 from his gloom.' 
 
 ' He is not goin' to Canada ! ' 
 
 'What?' 
 
 Lord Beauvais turned to stare at her, the hair- 
 brushes stiU in his hands. 
 
 'What magic have you used, Rachel? It was a 
 dream that grew with his growth.' 
 
 'He consents to stay in England. If he wants 
 the simple life there are those dereUct lands of yours 
 
 268 
 
HAPPY ENDING 269 
 
 in Essex. Beautiful country, well in from the sea- 
 swamps; and an easy motor-run to London; for 
 I see that his career will be poUtical.' 
 
 'What about the young lady?' 
 
 "Ah 1 — I have to ask the young lady to change 
 her mind and accept our boy. He swears she 
 loves him.' 
 
 'He ought to know.' 
 
 'I'm afraid I did mischief. I must have let her 
 see that I did not want her. She is not the sort to 
 give up Julian for that; but she must have felt 
 that he was prepared to give up a good deal for her. 
 She must have feared that some day he might 
 repent. The poor darhn's very young. I don't 
 think she ever took to the wilderness idea. Her 
 dreams are of human bein's, not of forests. She 
 will not give up her profession even for Julian.' 
 
 'She has her Mght to follow too. What do you 
 propose to do, Rachel.' 
 
 'I am goin' to run the young lady to earth 
 to-morrow. She has left Sweetwater Farm. It 
 ought to be easy to learn from the newspapers 
 where Mr Bates is. I shall have to accept Mr 
 Bates, I foresee. I think the girl's dreams did not 
 include partin' with her father.' 
 
 It was her one comment on Julian's plans which 
 had any bitterness. 
 
 'I look to Malise to steady JuKan,' she went on. 
 'Malise will go into Parliament as a Labour candi- 
 date. He will be moderate.' 
 
 'His sense of humour will keep him moderate,' 
 
270 THE HOUSE 
 
 Lord Beauvais commented. 'We shall live to see 
 Malise a Conservative yet, as Conservatism will 
 be in the strange new world. I see him a sort of 
 Disraeli, adored by fine ladies. A most amusing 
 person, Malise. A very witty man has seldom 
 strong convictions. Malise will delight drawing- 
 rooms in his middle and elder age, if there are 
 drawing-rooms to delight. Do not look so alarmed, 
 my dear. He will be good to your daughter. By 
 the way, you will probably find Miss Bates with 
 her father at The Swan at Danvers. Poor Rachel, 
 I don't like the idea of your eating humble 
 pie.' 
 
 'I would eat a very large pie to keep Julian at 
 home,' she said : and then the dinner-bell rang. 
 
 Danvers was a comparatively easy motor-drive 
 from Cressey. In pre-motor days Lady Beauvais 
 had not discovered for herself that charming village, 
 set round a beautiful village green, the Downs 
 rising in a soft sweep behind the trees of the Squire's 
 park and his twisted chimney-stacks. 
 
 The Swan lay back from the road and looked 
 towards a rushing stream, with a green between, 
 on which a flock of geese, splendidly white and 
 golden, cackled and hissed as the motor ran up to 
 the open door of the inn. It was a pretty place, 
 with a steep roof and dormer windows, gabled and 
 criss-crossed over its whiteness with ancient oak 
 beams. Looking through the open door she saw 
 a pleasant hall, hung with old coloured engravings, 
 a stuffed fox in a glass case, a fine trout similarly 
 
HAPPY ENDING 271 
 
 encased, an ancient grandfather clock. A com- 
 fortable woman was in a kitchen beyond washing 
 up pewter and glasses. As Lady Beauvais stood 
 at the door looking in, a particularly fine Clumber 
 spaniel, his sides shining like grebe, got up from 
 where he had been lying under the table and came 
 to meet her, wagging his tail and sniffing as though 
 he recognised her. 
 
 'Come here, Dash,' said the comfortable woman, 
 turning around. 'Don't be afraid of him, ma'am. 
 He won't bite. That dog knows who to bite and 
 who not to.' 
 
 Yes, Mr Bates and Miss Bates were just come in 
 with Dash. M'lord had got so proud with people 
 noticing him that he wouldn't take no notice of 
 them what he belonged to. Mrs Pratt had just 
 had a tussle of wills with him, because he came in 
 muddy from walking with them there Bateses and 
 wanted to follow them upstairs and lay on the 
 carpet. 
 
 "E's downright supercilious, that dog,' said 
 Mrs Pratt. ' 'E don't 'arf like belonging to an inn. 
 My word, 'e can't look down on you with a scornful 
 glance of 'is eye — not arf ! Seems as though he'd 
 know'd you an' thought httle on you aU his life. 
 A queer thing, now you come to think on it, that 
 a dog, 'aughty as 'im, should be took up with 
 Bateses.' 
 
 While she talked she was removing layers of 
 aprons tiU she discovered a black one, with a bunch 
 of thistles embroidered in one corner, which was 
 
272 THE HOUSE 
 
 apparently the one proper to the occasion of 
 showing Lady Beauvais up to the room occupied 
 by the Labour leader and his daughter. 
 
 At the head of the first flight of exquisitely 
 clean, crimson-carpeted stairs, Mrs Pratt knocked 
 with her knuckles at a door, at the same time 
 asking, 'Wot name, please?' 
 
 'Lady Beauvais.' 
 
 Mrs Pratt dropped a profound curtsey, ushered 
 in the distinguished visitor, announcing the name 
 in a loud voice, and fled away downstairs to 
 find some one with whom to discuss the oddity 
 of Lady Beauvais 's visiting 'Them there 
 Bateses.' 
 
 The room into which Lady Beauvais stepped was 
 much what the sitting-room of an English country 
 inn usually is. Apart from the charming dormer- 
 window and the view across the Green to the park 
 and the swelling Downs it had nothing to distinguish 
 it from a hundred others. There was the same Uttle 
 blotched mirror over the mantelpiece; the same 
 crockery dogs with gilt chains on their necks, the 
 same woollen mats and crewel-work antimacassars, 
 the same corner 'what-not' filled with a succession 
 of worthless bits of china from various holiday 
 resorts. The Princess Charlotte's Funeral and 
 the Duke of Wellington's Funeral looked from the 
 walls; and a modern touch was given by the 
 photographs on the mantelpiece of French and 
 Kitchener, with I-ord Haig, most unexpectedly, 
 standing between them. Also a couple of 
 
HAPPY ENDING 273 
 
 khaki-clad lads, one of which had a little bow of 
 dingy crape twisted about it. 
 
 As the lady came in, Tom Bates stood up from 
 the table at which he had been sitting, and bowed, 
 handing her a chair. There had been a chcking 
 sound when she entered, the sound of the type- 
 writing machine behind which sat Mary Bates, 
 who came forward and took the hand Lady Beauvais 
 extended to her, the colour rushing over her face 
 as the hand pressed hers warmly. 
 
 No one could be more agreeable than Lady 
 Beauvais when she chose. She took the chair Mr 
 Bates offered, and with a murmured apology threw 
 back her fur wrap. She was simply dressed and in 
 black, but beautiful pearl ear-rings swung in her 
 ears, and a milky string of pearls fell about her 
 neck and down into her lap. The face under the 
 feathered hat was a charming picture of matronly 
 beauty. 
 
 'I am so pleased to meet you, Mr Bates,' she 
 said with empressmeni. 'I have had such allurin' 
 accounts of you from my husband and my boy.' 
 
 'That's very handsome of Lord Beauvais, seeing 
 what I'm here for,' said Tom Bates, and smiled. 
 'As for your son, he's a splendid young fellow. 
 I congratulate you on your son, Lady Beauvais.' 
 
 Her first thought had been of annoyance that 
 Tom Bates was there. She was hot to undo what 
 had been done, for which, perhaps, she was partly 
 responsible; to eat that unfamiHar dish, humble 
 pie, if needs be; to plead her son's cause if needs 
 
274 THE HOUSE 
 
 be; and here was Tom Bates, standing up on tld 
 hearthrug, looking down at her benignly over his 
 flowing beard. 
 
 'If you wanted to talk to my girl,' said Tom 
 Bates, as if he had discovered that first disappoint- 
 ment of hers, 'I'll make myself scarce. It'll be the 
 men's dinner-hour and one or another may come 
 in for his beer. There's always some one worth 
 talking to in the bar-parlour besides Mrs Pratt 
 herself. Good beer too, honest beer, at The Swan 
 of Danvers. There's no PussjTfootin' about me, 
 your ladyship. I say, if you take away the working- 
 man's beer give him a beefsteak.' 
 
 He made as though to go, and she had a sudden 
 inspiration. 
 
 'No, please stay, Mr Bates,' she said. 'I want 
 you to help me. My son is very unhappy because 
 your daughter will have nothing to say to him. 
 I have come to plead his cause. He will concede 
 anything that may have been a difficulty. He 
 will stay here in England and work for your cause, 
 Mr Bates. His father and I wiU raise no difficulties. 
 It is in his mind to give up his title. I hope he 
 will reconsider that. It is an honourable title. 
 We have never been oppressors of the poor. Perhaps 
 he cannot do it legally, though he may refuse to 
 use it.' 
 
 Tom Bates stared at her. 
 
 'D'ye understand, ma'am, that we're up against 
 your husband and against you? If you give us 
 your son he would be up against his own class. 
 
HAPPY ENDING 275 
 
 Upon my word, ma'am, I'm not sure that it wouldn't 
 be easier to let him go to Canada.' 
 
 Lady Beauvais' eyes filled with tears. 
 
 'With God is the future,' she said. 'I only pray 
 that the best interests of the country may be 
 served, no matter what happens.' 
 
 Tom Bates looked at her with a certain tender 
 admiration. 
 
 'I say Amen to that, ma'am,' he said. 
 
 Then he turned to his daughter. 
 
 'What have you got to say, Mary?' he asked. 
 
 Lady Beauvais took from the handbag she 
 carried a little package. It was a ring-case. She 
 opened it and laid it on the table. It contained 
 the old ring set about with pearls which Julian 
 had selected for Mary Bates, which she had returned 
 to him. 
 
 'My son Is heartbroken because you gave him 
 back this,' said she. 'I pray of you to put it on.' 
 
 Without a word Mary Bates put on the ring. 
 There was nothing more to be said. 
 
 The wedding was a tremendously fashionable 
 function. Of course. Society rushed to it : the 
 poUticians were there : the Army : the Press and 
 Literature. The most charming, man in England, 
 who happened to be a Scotsman, whispered in 
 Lady Beauvais' ear as they came out of the church 
 together, 'We are aU SociaUsts now. Your boy 
 comes in on the flowing tide.' Tom Bates's political 
 colleagues were ^there; and it had been Lady 
 
276 THE HOUSE 
 
 Beauvais's idea to leave a large portion of the 
 church unreserved for the People — with a big P — 
 who filled it to overflowing. 
 
 Everything went off with 6clat. When the great 
 day was over and Lord and Lady Beauvais were 
 alone, in the companionship which was all-sufficing, 
 Lady Beauvais said, — 
 
 'Well — all's well that ends well. Our Julian is 
 happy. I am not surprised the girls fell in love 
 with him. There is only now for that poor Rose 
 Buckett to turn round and marry her greengrocer. 
 I don't believe she will go on crjdn' for the moon. 
 We must see what we can do, Beauvais, to make 
 the greengrocer attractive. And that nice creature. 
 Miss Stubbs, who took such an interest in Julian. 
 We must help her about her Uttle writin's. If she 
 was to come here as your secretary ! There would 
 be very little to do and she would have time for 
 her writin's and be comfortable and happy. Wasn't 
 it kind of Mrs Pinkerton to send those old ale- 
 glasses? So charmin'. I should like this happy 
 endin* or beginnin' of our JuUan's romance to be 
 happy for everybody.' 
 
 She paused and added — 
 
 'Dear Irene looked so sweet — and — did you 
 notice, Beauvais, how darhn' Dick looked at her 
 through his eyeglass? They are cut out for each 
 other,' 
 
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