CHARLES WILLIAM WASON 
 COLLECTION 
 
 CHINA AND THE CHINESE 
 
 THE GIFT OF 
 
 CHARLES WILLIAM WASON 
 
 CLASS OF 1876 
 
 1918 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PR 6045.O59H4 
 
 3 1924 024 145 488 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis bool< is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924024145488 
 
Her Celestial Husband 
 
 '^^4. 
 
Thou hast put away mine acquaintance far frotn me ; 
 ihott hast made me an abomination tmio them : I am 
 shut up, and I cannot come forth. — PsALM Ixxxviii, 8. 
 
HER 
 CELESTIAL HUSBAND 
 
 DANIEL WOODROFF]'. 
 
 COLONIAL EDITION 
 
 T . FISHER U N W I N 
 1895 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 The old years' dead hands are full of their dead flowers, 
 The old days are full of dead old loves of ours, 
 Born as a rose, and briefer born than she ; 
 Couldst thou not watch with me ? 
 
 Since thou art not as these are, go thy ways ; 
 Thou hast no part in all my nights and days. 
 Lie still, sleep on, be glad — as such things be. 
 Thou couldst not watch with me. 
 
 Swinburne. 
 
 — " I HAVE not written to you for months ; it is riot 
 because there has been nothing to tell you, but 
 because I have not been able to bring myself to 
 write. 
 
 " I am unhappy, wretchedly unhappy. How many 
 days and nights I have thought of what has at length 
 come to pass ! I was so fond of Lindsay and it is so 
 
2 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 bitter for me to have lost him. For the last few 
 months, longer even, I have seen it as something 
 inevitable, a bitter cup which the future held for me, 
 and which I must drink, and now I have drank it, 
 yes, every drop. My God, the taste is still on my 
 lips, but I have recovered sufiSciently to write about 
 it to you ; as I write I don't cry or rave, I am quite 
 calm. 
 
 " I wonder if I see things too clearly, if I am too 
 exacting ; perhaps I am, anyhow I can't help it, I 
 cannot accept a stone for bread. To many women 
 this falling off on Lindsay's part would have come as 
 a surprise, some perhaps would not have perceived it 
 at all, but I for a long while past have seen it, yet 
 there was nothing very marked ; he is to-day as kind 
 as ever, doubtless if I had not myself put a stop to 
 the engagement and insisted on his taking back his 
 freedom, we should, ere long, have become the 
 ordinary married couple, boring each other and 
 being bored, living in a villa with that halo of 
 respectability about us, which the world at large 
 seems to accept as a substitute for happiness. 
 
 " But I cannot stand this lukewarm affection ; I have 
 always wanted love, and even now, wretched as I am, 
 I believe I would sooner; have nothing, since I could 
 not have had all. I need not explain all this to you, 
 you know my nature, and you are, I think, the only 
 person in the world who does. 
 
 " After all, I am not surprised at Lindsay's getting 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 3 
 
 tired of me, for, look back at my life, you who have 
 known it all. In some book I once read, there is a 
 hideous saying that one's past is also one's future. 
 
 " Oh, Nancy, think of it, think of my past coming 
 over again ! Yet, do you know, terrible as the thought 
 is, I almost believe it to be true, for, consider my life ; 
 has not each event, each catastrophe in it been a 
 repetition of the one before ? You know when George 
 Terrence jilted me years ago, he told me that no man 
 could keep in with me, I was too exacting, and my 
 mind was too strange. Then far back there was my 
 first lover, Valesworth, you remember, he said the 
 same, almost indeed in the identical words. It has 
 always been the same story, and now again I hear it 
 from Lindsay, so it seems there's some fatal flaw in 
 me which every man perceives, and thereupon casts 
 
 me back into the water like drift-wood. 
 
 * * * * * * 
 
 " Nancy, I had thought about it for a Jong time, I 
 had watched him growing colder and colder, and as I 
 tell you, this period of awakening from happiness was 
 the more bitter to me as I had gone through it so 
 often before. At the last, however, the crisis came 
 quite suddenly, and though there has been a gulf like 
 years between that day and this, yet — sometimes it 
 seems to me that it happened only yesterday, and 
 then, Nancy — well — I feel as if I were going mad ! 
 
 " Do bear with me, for I have no one but you to 
 tell it to ; my mother has trouble enough, I cannot 
 
4 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 grieve her more, my past, present, and future are alike 
 a sorrow to her, while to every one else this- crowning 
 misfortune of my life is only 'another of Miss Conyer's 
 unfortunate love affairs.' 
 
 "Wh^t that terrible Frenchman said about other 
 people's misfortunes is quite true. People do enjoy 
 hearing of them ; I can see it in their faces. Though 
 they pretend to deplore the thing, I can see that they 
 are really not sorry in the least — glad if anything. 
 You and you alone will really feel for me, and realise 
 the disaster this thing is to me. And then again, I'm 
 feeling so ill, my head is so queer, it has such an odd 
 heavy feeling, it feels just as if it were stuffed with 
 rags, and I can't disentangle things in my mind. 
 
 " But all of this resolves itself into the one fact that 
 I've lost Lindsay! 
 
 " My mind reverts to that evening when enraged 
 by his indifference, his obvious cooling on me, I 
 turned on him and gave him back his liberty. It 
 was at a dance. I remember the foggy evening 
 through which we drove, the dances with various 
 people, and then the next thing I remember is that 
 dance with Lindsay, and afterwards the words we 
 had. I was looking at him. and wondering, in a-fury 
 at his apathy, why I had ever loved him -so passion- 
 ately and well Yes, it had come to that ; I coald 
 look at him and ask myself what there had been -to 
 love. .The gaslight showe(i me a young man neither 
 handsome nor ugly ; you see how dispassionately I 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 5 
 
 can judge him. In the time then already past, I had 
 adored him, and now, it seemed to me I sat there and 
 appraised him like an auctioneer. We had left the 
 dancing-room and gone upstairs ; the room we entered 
 contained several other couples ; we sat down' and he 
 began talking — about the weather, it had been wet 
 and cold, — he had met my cousin Jack at Charing 
 Cross, and he had told him that he should not 
 be able to come down to-night, &c., &c., all these 
 trivialities in an inert manner and without looking 
 at me. 
 
 " It was then that for the first time I asked myself 
 what there had been about Lindsay Brookes that I 
 should once have loved him ; I felt dispirited, both of 
 us I felt were changed, and I sat answering him in 
 monosyllables and thinking. 
 
 " He is a dark man, of that dark type which is now 
 so common, his eyes are very handsome, but he was 
 not looking at me. I noticed for the first time that 
 his shoulders are narrow, his features are good, but 
 there is a pallor about his face which I suppose has 
 been there all along, but which I only noticed how. 
 The waltz began, a faint sound of music canie up the 
 staircase, Lindsay looked at his programme, and then 
 for the first time at me. 
 
 " ' Shall we dance it ? ' he asked. 
 
 " As he spoke, I was watching the various couples 
 leave the room. A girl in a white dress with her 
 companion, a tall man, took my attention ; as she 
 
6 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 went out before him, he stooped down and arranged 
 the tail of her skirt. Something in this, a certain 
 tenderness and grace in the action, came into sharp 
 contrast with Lindsay's nonchalant tones and a 
 certain inertness in his attitude, and in the mood I 
 was then in, the contrast galled me. 
 
 " ' As you like, Lindsay,' said I, ' but I am tired.' 
 
 " He didn't say he was sorry, but sat still, one 
 white gloved hand on his knee, the other twirling his 
 programme by its string ; I noticed that he tried 
 to disguise a yawn. I glanced again at his face ; 
 he had stifled the yawn and his countenance was 
 expressionless once more, save for a weary, bored 
 look that it has had of late. 
 
 " He looked at me not unkindly, but still, coldly, 
 dispassionately ; he might have been looking at the 
 wall paper, for all his face showed, and said — 
 
 " ' Yes, you look tired.' 
 
 "You know that the very keynote of niy nature 
 is an intense longing for sympathy and love ; I would 
 do anything in the world for those two things, yes, 
 I think I would commit crimes for them. I have said 
 that I did not love Lindsay at that moment, but if he 
 had loved me as he did at first, I should have con- 
 tinued faithful ; it was the dying down of his fire that 
 had chilled me to the heart, but for that I should 
 have .continued to love him, of that I am certain, now 
 his tones and the coldness of his eyes made me 
 shiver. 
 
.HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 7 
 
 " It was at that moment that the loneliness I feel 
 now, began to creep over me, for I perceived that we 
 were far apart. 
 
 "'Lindsay,' I said, 'you'd be happier downstairs 
 dancing.' 
 
 " ' And how about you ? ' he asked, but without 
 denying what I had suggested. 
 
 " ' What does it matter about me ? I'll come too,' 
 I said wearily. 
 
 " ' My next,' he observed, consulting his card, ' is 
 with Miss Dynevor ; she's looking very smart to- 
 night, don't you think so ? Well, let's be moving — if 
 you like. Poor Mabel,' he added, scrutinizing my 
 face, • you're not looking at all well, or is it that 
 your dress doesn't suit you? Aren't you thinner? 
 As I catch your face in this light ' 
 
 " The sadness of heart that had been gathering for 
 some time, culminated in this speech of his. The 
 allusion to Miss Dynevor angered me, for I had got 
 it into my head that he admired her. Tears came to 
 my eyes. 
 
 '"I suppose I am,' I replied. 'I'm always up or 
 down ; when I am happy I look well enough.' 
 
 " He didn't challenge this, or appear as if he 
 attached any sighificance to my words, but laughed 
 lightly. 
 
 " ' Well, be happy then,' said' he, tucking away his 
 ball programme into his pocket, and sitting down 
 once more. 
 
8 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND.. 
 
 "'What is the matter, Mabel?' asked he after a 
 moment, but I made no reply. 
 
 " ' What a funny girl you are ! ' he observed, and 
 then suddenly I found myself speaking. 
 
 " ' Lindsay,' I said, ' I know I am,— I can't help my 
 nature. If I thought you loved me or were even 
 very fond of me, I should love you beyond everything 
 in the world ; nothing would turn me from you ; but 
 when you look coldly at me and don't seem to care, 
 all seems over and I am alone — get some one else 
 and let me go my way.' 
 
 " I stopped still, astonished at my own words, for 
 though r had for so long been thinking all these 
 things, I had never, even in my fancy, said them. 
 Even now I would have returned to him if he had 
 shown any great emotion, but the pallor of his face 
 didn't change, and he said, without a move of his 
 features, without a gesture — 
 
 " ' You don't mean this.' 
 
 " ' Yes I do,' cried I. 
 
 " ' Do you mean,' he asked, ' that you really want it 
 to be over between us ? ' And even in saying this he 
 showed, it seemed to me, as little emotion as if he had 
 been inviting an acquaintance to lunch. 
 
 " ' Well,' I returned, ' what does it amount to ? 
 You have ceased to love me, you regard me as a sort 
 of half wife, only not so dear ; it is neither your fault 
 nor mine, I suppose, but Fate's, which has thrown us 
 together so constantlj' and has staled everything. I 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. ,9 
 
 don't blame you, Lindsay ; it is all, I suppose, my 
 own fault. No man can love me for long. You know 
 my past, — you know it all ; every one wearies of me 
 or I expect too much, one or the other. If I were 
 like the ordinary girl you would have continued to 
 care, whereas now you can dissect me and see my 
 faults, and God knows I have enough of them.' 
 
 " I stopped short, crying bitterly. Though every 
 word I uttered cut me like a knife, the emotional 
 part of my nature, those unguided impulses which 
 have always been my enemies and will ruin me yet, 
 were urging me to further rash speech. Yet why call 
 it rash, what else could I have done ? 
 
 " ' I cannot think why you are saying all this,' said 
 he, with cold displeasure. ' What have I done to 
 displease you, tell me ? What a strange fit of temper, 
 and about nothing too ! Mabel, you know you are 
 an odd girl, a very odd girl, but of late you've seemed 
 stranger still. I cannot pretend to understand you ; 
 why, for instance, if you found me wanting in affection 
 did you not tell me of it ? Any other girl but you 
 would ; but instead of that, after dancing with me and 
 talking and behaving just as Usual, you suddenly, 
 apropos of nothing as it appears to me, declare that 
 you wish our engagement at an end.' 
 
 " But why write down every word of that conversa- 
 tion .' It only grieves me anew ; it is enough to say 
 that my engagement is broken off. 
 
 " Nancy, I feel so unutterably lonely, for Lindsay 
 
lo HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 after all belonged to me, and my past was so sad that 
 I was happy to be in smooth water. You should have 
 read the letter Lindsay wrote me the next day ; only 
 he, I think, could have written it. I could see so 
 plainly in every line his astonishment at my conduct, 
 and also his intense relief. It was a letter cold as his 
 eyes and heart. It is chilly writing up in my room. 
 I shall wake up to-morrow morning and when my 
 eyes fall on the roses and jasmine on my wall-paper, 
 I shall think of all this as one does at once of any 
 sad thing. 
 
 " Nancy, there's one thing more I want to tell you 
 but I hardly dare, for you'll think me mad. Well, 
 perhaps I am, yet mad or not Fate seems to be 
 drifting me to a certain end, and if I do drift there, 
 as is possible, you'll have to hear of it sooner or 
 later and then, — why, Nancy, if you've read all 
 this, and how madly, madly miserable I am, instead 
 of blaming me as the others will do, you'll only pity 
 me. 
 
 " I daresay mother in her letters to your mother has 
 mentioned a Mr. Lew-Ching who came here a short 
 while ago and was introduced to us by our friend 
 Mr. Deans, whose people knew his family in China. 
 She has described his funny Chinese way of looking 
 at things, his pigtail, his accent, and so on. There is 
 little news in a suburban place like this, so that any- 
 thing as exciting as the advent of a Chinaman in 
 one's midst would not have escaped recounting. Well, 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. n 
 
 prepare yourself, and for Heaven's sake don't collapse 
 at the news. 
 
 " I'm going to marry Lew-Ching ! 
 
 " There, the murder's out ! 
 
 " I can picture your face, but say nothing, nothing 
 will alter it. Yes, I'm to be Mrs. Lew-Ching and 
 live among the Celestials. Well, it cannot be less 
 celestial there than it has been here of late. 
 
 " Good-night. — If I could only sleep ! Oh, Nancy, 
 if only I could ever sleep again as I used ! " 
 
 Miss Conyers laid down her pen, the fire was 
 getting low, the candles on the looking-glass were 
 almost worn out. She paused for a moment, and 
 going to a wardrobe at the end of the room, took 
 from it a robe of dark blue satin worked with a 
 design of flowers and blue dragons. 
 
 She looked at it with a half repulsion, her fingers 
 strayed over the design, exquisitely worked and 
 having the appearance almost of a painting. It was 
 a Chinese robe. A curious set expression had come 
 over her face. As she looked, the candles burnt low 
 and guttered into semi-darkness. She shivered, tears 
 came into her eyes. 
 
 " Ah, no, no," she murmured, " oh, my God ! No, 
 I cannot ! " 
 
 Blowing out the candle, she crept into bed, but in 
 her sleep she saw the blue dragon ; it was a shape of 
 horror in amongst the pink roses. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 When the idea of marrying Lew-Ching first pre- 
 sented itself to Miss Conyer's mind, she had treated 
 it as a joke, after that she had considered it for a 
 moment seriously, and the next had decided that it 
 was a thought too wild to be entertained. 
 
 But she was a creature of impulse, and close on the 
 heels of this last reflection had come the thought 
 that in marrying him she would be getting away from 
 Barford, from the people who knew her history, that 
 history of failures, from the commonplaces of a 
 suburban life which, with this last and crowning mis- 
 fortune of the loss of Lindsay Brookes, she had begun 
 to hate with a concentrated hatred. 
 
 Life had become too bitter to be borne, out of this 
 existence of restricted means and blighted aims she 
 must extricate herself, but how ? That was the 
 question, since she had no aptitude for any of the 
 things that women turn to, to support themselves. 
 
 When the night-time came and Mabel was left to 
 herself in the little upstairs bedroom, where she had 
 lain awake so many nights grieving, she sought in 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 13 
 
 her mind, with an intense anxiety, for some means of 
 escape, and it was then that out of these feelings of 
 desperation and of broken love, out of the common- 
 place routine of her life, had come a reckless despair, 
 in which her curiously unbalanced, impulsive mind 
 came gradually to accept as possible what she had at 
 first shrunk from. It was exactly four months since 
 she had first met Lew-Ching, since that day when the 
 curious twistings of Fate had thrown him in her 
 path. 
 
 Lew-Ching was singularly handsome, for a China- 
 man, with polished and pleasant manners, but a 
 Chinese voice, it was at once guttural and woodeny. 
 
 He spoke English as an educated Chinaman does, 
 precisely and grammatically, but with that slight 
 struggle with the letter N, and the peculiar hiss in 
 certain words which the Chinese can never get over 
 in speaking our language. His eyes were of a tawny 
 darkness, and though obliquely set in his face, were 
 handsome, his sallow skin had the curiously stretched 
 look over the cheek bones, the yellowness, the coarse, 
 open pores, that are a racial peculiarity, his teeth 
 were white, his lips well formed, and not thickei- than 
 those of many Englishmen. It was only when he 
 was vexed that he looked ugly, for then two lines 
 came from the cheek bones, either side of the face 
 down to the chin. These lines gave him a sinister 
 appearance, but they did not very often appear. 
 
 To the young ladies of Barford, the advent of the 
 
14 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 Chinaman had been full of excitement, a nine days' 
 wonder, and the astonishing discovery that though he 
 looked so outlandish, he could talk to them in very 
 fair English, and flirt in an altogether new and, they 
 supposed, Chinese fashion, made him very popular. 
 The fact that witll the exception of Edward Deans 
 and his son, and one or two others intimate with the 
 Deans family, not a man in the place liked him was 
 another circumstance that added piquancy to their 
 intercourse with the stranger. 
 
 He was very interesting ; he was also they thought 
 wicked, and that was very delightful. He was also 
 quite new and original. And then too it was very 
 plain that he admired them, his eyes told them that 
 he considered them beautiful, as he met them rosy 
 and blooming, in their sailor hats and neat dresses, 
 walking into the town or setting out with their golf 
 sticks to play on Barford Common. 
 
 Now the Barford young mens' eyes did not express 
 admiration in any marked degree ; they had seen too 
 much of the girls. The girls had also seen too much 
 of them ; they knew them with the absolute and 
 exhaustive knowledge of young women who had 
 been brought up in the same town. They met them 
 every day in shoals as they returned from London. 
 They saw them at golf and tennis and again in the 
 evening at concerts and dances. 
 
 Nothing astonished Lew-Ching,' more than the 
 tennis and golf. He smiled benignantly as he saw 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 15 
 
 these games played on the common. " No, no, we 
 don't do this," he replied to a question, showing his 
 uneven teeth. Curiously enough his manner made 
 them feel that he was in the right, and that to be 
 running about after a ball was ridiculous and un- 
 dignified. 
 
 He was always dignified, his manner was very 
 graceful, his voice, the guttural Chinese voice, was 
 the worst part of him, but this, as they said, they 
 could forgive him since he said such pretty things in 
 it ; and besides it was uncommon. The young men 
 of th.e place were jealous of the amount of attention 
 paid to the Chinaman, one or two of them disliked 
 him very much. 
 
 They drew the attention of their women friends to 
 what they called his " snuffling " manner of speaking, 
 and to one or two peculiarities of his, they hinted 
 even at a superior knowledge of Lew-Ching's character 
 and morals, but by virtue of that curious kink in the 
 minds of the British, who cannot make enough of 
 foreigners if they are only sufficiently outlandish, the 
 Chinaman seemed to have firmly established himself 
 in Barford society. The matrons, though from the 
 fact of his being a foreigner, they necessarily knew 
 little about him, none the less liked to have him at 
 their dances and dinners ; it was rather a dull suburb 
 and it was not surprising that they should. 
 
 " He is a charming man," they said. 
 
 Lew-Ching accepted their kindness and hospitality, 
 
i6 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 and looked out on the world with his dark, half- 
 opened eyes which yet saw everything. His manner 
 to ladies, though profoundly ceremonious with the 
 ceremony of a well-bred Chinaman, yet suggested a 
 profound admiration, the more touching as it was 
 offered in distant language, and with this foreign 
 manner which charmed like the scent of a rare flower. 
 It was a change from the talk of young England, 
 garnished with the slang of business and racecourse. 
 His entertainers said he was " so natural," — but since 
 every usage of ours was different from his own, he 
 was not: on the contrary he was clever enough to 
 walk very warily. Only once had he been quite 
 natural ; then he had said things which, if these 
 ladies could have heard him, would have shocked the 
 British matrons, who are not easily disgusted, and 
 seldom in the right place. 
 
 It had been a case of " in vino Veritas^' only the 
 wine in this case had been whiskey, which, at first 
 accustomed to his own wines, he had not understood. 
 The mistake had been in drinking whiskey after 
 much champagne at a ball, and had resulted in Lew- 
 Ching's standing some time by the ball-room door 
 and then returning to Mr. Vaughan, the man who 
 supplied him with the whiskey, and giving him a 
 sketch of his impressions of English society and 
 English morals. 
 
 Lew-Ching's views of society after whiskey were 
 singularly coarse and vile ; he expressed himself with 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 17 
 
 a beastial directness and in a mixture of very good 
 English and the best Chinese. This was when he 
 had first come to Barford and before he had met Miss 
 Conyers. A slight flush had come under his yellow 
 skin and had mounted up to the cheek bones, where 
 the skin was so tightly stretched, his eyes had leered 
 and glinted evilly as he spoke, his voice was more 
 guttural than ever, gestures that had been dignified 
 had become more rapid. Owing to the mixture of 
 Chinese and English, one or two of. the expressions 
 he used had been lost on his companion. 
 
 Mr. Vaughan was not very refined himself, also he 
 happened to be a London man and not a native of 
 the place, thus it was that the Chinaman's sentiments, 
 though they startled the recipient, never got further 
 than that gentleman. 
 
 Lew-Ching never again erred ; he was never again 
 " natural " ; in future he knew what to drink and how 
 to drink it. He returned to his solemnity and cere- 
 mony. He treated the women he had besmirched, as 
 if they were princesses, he once more looked calmly 
 and coolly out of his dark eyes. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 It was curious that Lew-Ching should enter the 
 girl's life just at this crisis of unhappiness, but 
 Fate, which can make or mar our lives and wreck 
 our souls, had thrown him in the girl's path at this 
 precise moment. 
 
 She had met him in the house of a Mrs. Deans, 
 an old friend of theirs, he had helped her to tea, and 
 had talked to her, sitting near her .in the firelight. 
 
 In the fashionable dimness of shaded lamps she 
 could not see his features very distinctly, but she 
 thought that he was very good-looking for a China- 
 man, yet she didn't like his face. That was her first 
 impression. His moUth, as she saw it by this shaded 
 light, had given her, she long afterwards remembered, 
 a species of horror, and the glint of his eyes, what did 
 this mean ? or did all Chinamen look at one with this 
 peculiar glint ? 
 
 Yes, the eyes attracted her ; she couldn't help 
 looking at them, the iris was a dark, golden brown 
 shot with little rays or specks of an orange colour ; 
 on one of the eyes there was a dark blotch near the 
 
 i8 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 19 
 
 pupil ; she found herself looking at this mark and 
 wondering what colour it was. 
 
 The same subdued light that showed his face and 
 silken robes to her eyes, had fallen on the exquisite 
 fairness of her skin, that wonderful fairness that 
 goes with red hair, and Lew-Ching had noted the 
 white and red of her face and lips. In the intervals 
 of decorous phrases he had sat in a curiously alert 
 silence, looking at Mabel as often as he dared. 
 
 Her face had once been too full ; her enemies had 
 compared it to a dairymaid's ; now grief had wrecked 
 the merely animal beauty of it, had planted a 
 suspicion of hollow in the cheeks, and had saddened 
 her eyes. These changes had given passion to her 
 face and piquancy, and it chanced to please Lew- 
 Ching's eyes. 
 
 MeanwhilCjin the distance, their hostess was telling 
 Mabel's mother about her guest. He was, she said, 
 a merchant in Hankow. Her nephew, years ago in 
 China, had been befriended by Lew-Ching's father, 
 and now the son had come to England before settling 
 down. Her nephew had merely known Lew-Ching's 
 father, so that what they really knew of the China- 
 man himself was not very much. 
 
 " But he's really very nice," concluded the hostess 
 to Mrs. Conyers. 
 
 " I don't think I've ever seen a Chinaman before," 
 observed Mrs. Conyers. " Both appearance and dress 
 are so foreign to us, aren't they ? " 
 
20 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 "That's the worst of it," laughed Mrs. Deans ; 
 " people who meet him about the streets are quite 
 unprepared for him, and quite startled. He's the 
 observed of all, poor man ; sometimes I've quite 
 pitied him. I need not," she added with a chuckle, 
 for nothing on earth disturbs him ; I really think 
 he's the coolest-headed person I ever met. I must 
 tell you," continued she, "that he's a. great favourite 
 already with people we've introduced him to. My 
 girls think him very amusing ; he can make him- 
 self perfectly charming when he likes, and then, 
 you see, all his funny little foreign ways<and his not 
 quite understanding our customs, make him niost 
 interesting. My dear, he's a change, and that's what 
 we all like," and— she laughed again, a comfortable 
 laugh. 
 
 At this moment, as they looked towards the couple, 
 Mr. Lew-Ching was holding Mabel's white hand and 
 examining a ring. There was an appearance of 
 intimacy and devotion in the action, and Mrs. 
 Conyers, as she observed it, was conscious of a feeling 
 of distaste that this man with the yellow skin and 
 strange eyes should touch her daughter'^ hand. 
 
 Mrs. Conyer's heart had never been very strong. 
 Poor Mabel's mishaps had worn her rather more than 
 they had worn her daughter ; now, as she looked, 
 her heart gave a little flutter, and she felt a pain 
 about it. 
 
 She avoided Mrs. Deans' eye, and almost 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 2i 
 
 immediately got up to go. The couple were so 
 occupied that they did not at once notice this move- 
 ment on her part, but when the Chinaman rose, Mrs. 
 Conyers could not avoid the reflection that, though 
 she felt a repulsion to him, he was a handsome 
 man. 
 
 " Come, Mabel," said she. 
 
 As he pressed the girl's hand she heard him say — 
 
 " Then ■! may do myself the honour ? " 
 
 Mrs. Conyers disliked the voice and wondered 
 whether Mabel did too ; it was so horribly woodeny. 
 
 The girl looked back in his face, and then looked, 
 at her mother with the curiously reckless expression 
 she had worn of late, and then glanced again at her 
 companion. 
 
 " Yes," she said, " I hope you'll come." 
 
 Lew-Ching crossed his hands in front with an odd 
 little gesture and bowed. 
 
 " What was the Chinaman proposing ? " asked Mrs. 
 Conyers as' they walked home. 
 
 " Only to come and see us." 
 
 " I wish you could have got out of it," said her 
 mother. " Why did you let it come to that .' " 
 
 " I'm not aware that I've ' let it come ' to anything," 
 said the girl. " If I have, all the better ; I'm so sick . 
 of life as it is. No, don't be grieved, mother ; Vm 
 so wretched that you ought to be pleased to see me 
 taken away from myself and amused for a few 
 moments as I was this afternoon. You know^ 
 
22 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 mother, you're all right ; you've not made a mess of 
 your life ; you are happier than I." 
 
 Mrs. Conyers stopped a moment in her walk, her 
 heart was making itself felt. Her knowledge of her 
 daughter's waywardness and her present condition 
 of recklessness and despair troubled and excited her, 
 her fears took no tangible form, but she had an 
 indefinite idea of some catastrophe that should result 
 from this, some new wild thing that Mabel might be 
 guilty of in the mood she was now in ; she tried, how- 
 ever, to shake off the feeling. 
 
 " Well, my dear, I don't suppose you could help 
 the heathen Chinee asking to call," she replied, with 
 a worn smile. " By the way, Mrs. Deans tells me 
 
 that becomes from Hankow, where Lindsay ■= " 
 
 She stopped short. 
 
 " Go on," said her daughter with a hard smile — 
 " what about Lindsay .■' " 
 
 " Where Lindsay was, and is going again, so they 
 say." 
 
 " Going out again ! Have you heard that he is 
 going out again ? " cried the girl with dismay in her 
 voice. " Leaving Barford ! " And then, " And — and 
 what may Mr. Lew-Ching's occupation be in Hankow ? " 
 she asked with an appearance of calmness. 
 
 " He is the head of a great tea firm out there, so 
 Mrs. Deans says, but what a strange thing that he 
 should live in this place that Lindsay is going to." 
 She paused a moment, and then added, " All I meant 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 23 
 
 was, that he has probably met him here by this 
 time, and if he knows him and mentions that he is 
 coming to see you, Lindsay might think " 
 
 " What do I care ? " broke in the girl, " what he 
 thinks ? What is it to me ? You saw how he 
 starved my heart out and yet you seem to fancy he 
 has a right to feel injured by what I do now.'' 
 
 " It's only this, dear, that though Mrs. Deans for 
 family reasons may make much of him. Englishmen 
 who've been out in China, have a prejudice against 
 their women folk mixing with them." 
 
 " My dear, simple mother," said Mabel, " all that 
 you've been saying makes me wish to see more of 
 him. I don't, I need not tell you, care one straw for 
 his own sake whether I see him again or not, but 
 once convince me that an acquaintance with this 
 Chinaman would in the least disgust Lindsay, and I 
 am ready to cultivate him to any extent." 
 
 Mrs. Conyers sighed. She was used to this sort of 
 thing ; she had had a good deal of it first and last, 
 and yet the girl was so fond of her and so lovable, it 
 was impossible for her to feel anything else but bitter 
 grief for her ; she would always have done anything 
 in the world to have helped her, but what could she 
 do? It had not been poor Mabel's fault, she was 
 only wretchedly unlucky ; but hers had been a 
 species of ill-luck that no one could guard her 
 against or compensate her for. 
 
 Tears came to her eyes as she remembered how 
 
U HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 happy and bright poor Mabel had been a year ago 
 when things had been going well with her, and how 
 kind she had been to her mother and sister ; she 
 made allowance for the sufferings that had embittered 
 her. 
 
 " Well, darling," said she tenderly, " we need 
 not think . of it ; it doesn't matter, and I don't 
 suppose he will trouble you more than once or twice, 
 if he comes so often." 
 
 They had reached the little house in Vale Park 
 where Mrs. Conyers had taken up her abode with her 
 two daughters seven years ago, when she was first 
 widowed. It was semi-detached, one of a row of 
 yellow brick houses standing opposite each other in 
 couples and having that uninteresting air peculiar to 
 the suburban residence. Every brick in its face, 
 every window and pvery door in it had become 
 associated in Mabel's mind with unhappiness. Up 
 behind the little top window was the bedroom where 
 she had cried and suffered, so that the very roses 
 and jasmine on the wall-paper of the room reminded 
 her of early mornings and of nights when life had 
 seem.ed -pnly an insupportable series of episodes, each 
 one sadder than the last. 
 
 Mabel and her mother entered and went into the 
 dining-room ; the lamp was lighted, and Mabel's 
 sister sat at the table studying her lessons. She was 
 a pleasing-looking but ugly girl of sixteen, with the 
 stooping carriage of the High School girl ; her hair 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 25 
 
 was red like Mabel's, but she had not the beautiful 
 red and white skin of her sister ; it was thick and 
 pale, but her eyes were fine like her sister's and had 
 more expression. 
 
 She threw aside her books at once, glad of the 
 excuse their entrance gave, for she had none of the 
 unhealthy thirst for knowledge that characterises the 
 modern school girl. She regarded study merely as a 
 disagreeable phase that had to be gone through with 
 before she could come out and enjoy herself ; part 
 and parcel of her work-a-day school clothes and 
 unbecoming hat and jacket. 
 
 " Where have you been ? " asked she, smilingly 
 taking Mabel by the arm. 
 " Calling on Mrs. Deans," replied the other. 
 " On Mrs. Deans ! Then, oh, Mabel, did you see 
 this wonderful Chinaman that they are all talking 
 about ? He spends most of his time at Mrs. Deans. 
 Do you know, they say that he is in love with Kitty 
 Wears ? I caught sight of him to-day as I went to 
 school, and thought I should simply love to speak to 
 him and hear how he talks. Was he there ? Yes, I 
 know by your face he was, and now, like an angel, tell 
 me all he said. Does he sit on his pigtail, or does he 
 let it fall over the back of his chair ? If he does, what 
 a temptation to pin it to the back ! Does he speak 
 like the Chinaman in the story books and say, ' Me 
 no likee muchee plenty foolee tea party," or does he 
 drink his tea like a man ? -Are you going up to take 
 
26 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 off your things, Mabel ; I'll come with you, may I ? " 
 She clung tocher sister as she spoke, and wound a 
 substantial arm round her. 
 
 Mabel laughed. "If you are good you shall see 
 the Chinaman," said she; "he's coming here, and if 
 you behave well you may even be at a tea party with 
 him yourself and see for yourself how he manages 
 his back hair. I wish some one would carry me up- 
 stairs ; I'm dead, dead tired. That's right, push me, 
 there's a good girl. Oh, Nellie, how nice and strong 
 you are ! I wish, I wish I were you." 
 
 " Do you ? " laughed the other. " Well, I wish I 
 weren't. Up you go," and clasping her round the 
 waist she half pushed and half carried her to the 
 landing outside her room. "Mabel, you've become 
 a mere shadow, a feather ; and do you know it 
 suits you ; you are ever so much prettier than when 
 you were stouter and stronger. Laura Wears said 
 yesterday that you were looking handsomer than 
 ever and you know she wastes no compliments. 
 I should like to know what the Chinaman thought of 
 you after his wretched collection of wives that he's 
 left behind, all a good lively yellow, and with eyes 
 squinting in every direction." 
 
 " Nellie ! " 
 
 "Well, he naturally would admire you after that. 
 I daresay even I am good-looking beside what's he's 
 been used to. You know, Laura Wears' sister, Kitty, 
 knows him ; he's tremendously wealthy and as I told 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 27 
 
 you, they say he is madly in love with Kitty. How- 
 ever, in this place if a man hands you a cup of tea, 
 he's said to be madly in love, whereas, as a fact, they 
 never, never are, except with you, dear. No, they die 
 but never surrender ! Anyhow, was Kitty there ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " I'm surprised, for you know what a matchmaker 
 Mrs. Deans is, but perhaps he's going to be engaged 
 to one of her own daughters.'' 
 
 " Engaged ! What nonsense.'' 
 
 " Mabel. . . . Are you listening, Mabel, or are you 
 fallen asleep ? You always seem so queer now ; your 
 manner is so odd. Well, don't look so utterly dejected, 
 brighten up and listen to what I would do if I were 
 one half as beautiful as you. I'd cut out Kitty, that 
 I would, and by the power of my own resplendent 
 loveliness I'd make Uing-Ching propose to me !" 
 
 " Lew-Ching," corrected her sister. " Well, and 
 what then .? " 
 
 " Nothing, except that you'd have scored off Kitty, 
 and she's so hideously conceited." 
 
 " And do you want me to join the collection of 
 wives you describe just for the purpose of cutting out 
 Kitty?" 
 
 " Not I. You don't see my plan ; I shouldn't 
 dream of accepting him, but I should take care that 
 Kitty heard of it. No, when he proposed I should 
 be very much astonished, as they are in the novels. 
 I should say, in a sad voice, ' This is quite unexpected ; 
 
28 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 no, Ching, it is quite impossible, though,' I should 
 add, ' I shall ever remember the honour you have 
 done me and shall think of you ias a dear, dear 
 brother." 
 
 " Nellie, what a lunatic you are ! " 
 
 " Then he would plead with me. He'd go on his 
 knees begging and praying me to think better of it ; 
 but no, not a bit. ' Ching, it is impossible,' I should 
 repeat sadly." 
 
 " ' Why you makee muchee foolee Chinee ? ' he'd 
 ask me at last. ' Why not can marry Chinee ? ' 
 
 " ' Our customs are so widely different, Mr. Ching,' 
 I should reply, and so delicately lead up to the 
 subject of his matrimonial entanglements," 
 
 " And then ? " asked Mabel. 
 
 " Then," said the girl, speaking for the first time 
 gravely, and resting her searching eyes on her sister's 
 face — " then, Mabel, if I looked as beautiful as you do, 
 as I am of course all along suppofeing, he would 
 swear by his right hand and by his pigtail, to scatter 
 the whole bag of them to the winds rather than lose 
 me." 
 
 " And then ? " 
 
 " Pooh ! Hurry off your jacket, there's the dinner 
 bell. Then ? Why, nothing, except that he would 
 join the army of brothers that I should have collected 
 and Kitty would be awfully annoyed. That's always 
 nourishing." 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 For the last few months Mabel had been feeling very- 
 strange, but she had been too sad to complain about 
 it ; she had taken it as part of the misfortunes of her 
 life ; in the general misery and depression she was 
 experiencing, she took no great heed of it, but now of 
 late it had obtruded itself on her as something that 
 insisted on being noticed. Her head felt strangely, 
 she was depressed, restless, a distaste of life had taken 
 her ; sleep at night was broken by a choking sensa- 
 tion, and during the day something impelled her to a 
 curious restlessness ; during the day, too, she was 
 worried by the thought that she had much to do and 
 no time to do it in — this impression had taken hold 
 of her mind. The hours seemed to fly, yet there was 
 a curiously unfinished appearance about all she did ; 
 the smallest occupation was a burden to her mind, 
 yet she was impelled to work, to be doing some- 
 thing, lest the days should be like her nights. 
 
 Yes, if the days had been as terrible as the nights, 
 she could not have borne them ; how she dreaded 
 them, she who had once slept the healthy sleep of an 
 
 29 
 
30 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 animal ; the maddening thoughts flying through her 
 mind, one thought suggesting another, to be in turn 
 chased by some new idea. Before sleeping her mind 
 was full of small thoughts, impressions of small actions 
 or speeches, none of much account but wearing down 
 her brain, Mabel felt, like the action of sand shaken in 
 a glass. Before sleep these thoughts changed like a 
 kaleidoscope, but once she slept all was altered ; it 
 was then one single thought, some action of hers, or 
 of another's, some often trivial scene she had witnessed, 
 which gained gigantic proportions as if seen through- 
 a microscope ; in her dreams she found herself 
 for ever speaking some trivial words, listening to 
 so'me trivial speech ; every look, every word the same 
 endlessly, till she started from this unnatural sleep 
 and waited awake, forlorn and miserable, for the 
 morning light. 
 
 What was the matter ? she sometimes asked her- 
 self, hopelessly and pitifully ; this seemed some 
 physical disorder, yet surely one didn't get ill just 
 because one was unhappy 1 
 
 Why was her brain so tired, so hopelessly confused 
 when she tried to think during the day, yet so terribly, 
 so pitilessly alert at night ? Why did incidents about 
 which she cared nothing, less than nothing, force them- 
 selves on her mind ? if they had been of any impor- 
 tance she would not have wondered, but such small 
 things. A doctor could have told the unhappy girl 
 why this was, but she confided in no one ; neither 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 31 
 
 she nor her sister had ever needed a doctor, Mrs. 
 Conyers was the only invalid and her weakness, as 
 she well knew, was outside a doctor's help. 
 
 Mabel's health had been splendid, and now though it 
 had given way, it took many, many days and nights of 
 illness to break down the outward mask of well-being, 
 and Mabel, partly to save Mrs. Conyers pain, for she 
 did try to save her pain when she gave herself time 
 for reflection, and partly by the instinct born of her 
 disorder, never told her mother and sister about it. 
 They noticed her moodiness and irritation, a desire 
 to quarrel, her restlessness, but the only clue they had 
 to this was the only fact they were in possession of, 
 the broken engagement with Lindsay ; this coming 
 after the other unfortunate love affairs seemed reason 
 enough. The vitality, the buoyant health of so 
 many years were standing round her now as a 
 physical screen ; no one saw behind them to the 
 misery and disorder that for some time past had 
 been creeping on, and Mabel, to the outer world, was 
 very much the same as she had always been. 
 
 Lew-Ching had called the day following their 
 meeting and had come to the house on many, many 
 occasions after ; there was always some new excuse 
 to bring him ; his visits were an excitement to the 
 inmates of the houses in Park Vale, but the maid at 
 Mrs. Conyers' had soon ceased to wonder at his dress 
 and appearance and now knew his ring. He came 
 in always with the same calm and imperturbable face. 
 
32 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 and asked for Miss Conyers ; the maid had never seen 
 any change in his expression. When Miss Mabel 
 was not at home he merely bowed his head and 
 departed, after having handed in a huge visiting 
 card. On going he would gravely put money into 
 her hand ; this was a curious Chinese' custom, she 
 supposed ; it was one that she greatly appreciated. 
 
 One reason why Mabel liked him was, that his very 
 outlandishness made her feel-she was no longer in 
 Barford, for she had taken an intense dislike to the 
 place. His appearance in their house seemed to alter 
 it, everything he said was new, and then he was a 
 stranger to the place and, she thought, was in 
 ignorance of the details of the past. 
 
 Another feeling had arisen, though this Mabel had 
 only dimly realised, the Chinaman exercised an 
 influence over her, such an influence as in a greater 
 degree a mesmerist has over his subjects, she felt 
 at once a fascination for him and a repulsion ; there 
 was in his attitude from the first, a curious expression 
 of waiting, the quietness of a cat or a snake, still but 
 alert, certain of its power over some weaker animal. 
 
 This feeling, once she perceived it, got on her 
 nerves ; it was so indefinite, and what was he waiting 
 for? For her? Never! . . . It was only occasionally 
 that Lew-Ching allowed her to feel this ; it seemed 
 almost as if he knew of the girl's half-repulsion to 
 him and he was very careful. 
 
 When he was speaking to her, his subtle eyes 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. H 
 
 resting on her face took in every change ; he Ippked 
 into her very soul. He was infinitely patient ; if he 
 had gone too far he would hark back and it would 
 be days before he would offend again by any sugges- 
 tion of love. 
 
 But he remained there untired and ' immutable ; 
 nothing could discourage him ; he was waiting and 
 meant to possess the girl ; he knew the influence he 
 had over her and why he had it, and was certain ot 
 succeeding at last. That this beautiful girl should 
 go back to China with him as his wife he was as 
 certain of as of his existence ; nothing should save 
 her from him. He had lulled her into a mental 
 attitude of quietude, he was gradually subjugating 
 her will to his own ; so gradually that she scarcely 
 knew what was befalling her. 
 
 At times she would wake up into a sense of her 
 position, of what was happening, wake up with a terror 
 and see things as they were. Some glint of the China- 
 man's eye would shock her back into her normal 
 state, — suddenly she would see him just as he was, 
 just as she would have seen him a year ago had she 
 met him ; merely a Chinaman with coarse, yellow 
 skin and brown, yellow eyes, who had chanced to be 
 smitten with her red and white skin. 
 
 On the .occasions of these few awakenings of her 
 soul, Mabel showed to Lew-Ching the flashes of 
 temper that she so constantly displayed to her 
 mother and sister. It was as if she had detected him 
 
 4 
 
^4 HER CELESTIAL HrUSJBAND. 
 
 in the act of setting a trap for her, and she would 
 show an intense irritation and peevishness ; never 
 anything more, for the influence he had over her had 
 become too strong to rebel against ; she could only 
 occasionally struggle in a weak way. 
 
 At length, it came to be an established fact between 
 the two that Mabel was to marry him. No proposal 
 or acceptance had been made, but the girl half 
 fascinated, half shocked, had listened so often to those 
 subtle speeches of his in which her ultimate marriage 
 with him seemed to be a thing understood, that at 
 last she had ceased to rebel and was allowing herself 
 to drift. The very strangeness of the idea had for 
 her a certain fascination, she longed and yet dreaded 
 to hear of that country beyond the seas. 
 
 " What are your Chinese ladies like ? " asked Mabel 
 of him one day. 
 
 "I suppose like ladies in other countries," he re- 
 plied ; " a woman is always the same : one has a black 
 skin, another one is white, one has hair like yours, 
 the most beautiful colour in the world ; another's hair 
 is like flax ; some women are brown, some have' a 
 colour like the mOst beautiful roses, but whether they 
 are red or fair, whatever country they come from, 
 a woman is the same. If you had been trained like 
 one of our women, you would be the' same as they, 
 you would think as they." 
 
 " I would rather be an English woman." 
 
 " And you are mistaken. Women are valued with 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 35 
 
 US ; clothed in soft silks, perfumed, it is they who 
 wield the power, they are at the right hand of the 
 Emperor and of the Mandarins ; when none else can 
 approach, they whisper their intrigues in their ear, the 
 judges go into the courts, the merchants to their 
 ofifices ; the work of the world is done by men, but it 
 is a woman always who pulls the strings. In the 
 great court intrigues ending in disaster and blood, it 
 is they who have brought the trouble about, men 
 suffer and are killed, ships are freighted, it is for them. 
 They are carried through the great cities in their 
 chairs, their beautiful faces appear for a moment at 
 the windows ; they see their power and their handi- 
 work everywhere, nothing can be done that they do 
 not know of ; through a great city like Shanghai or 
 in a place like Hankow, though they have not the 
 liberty of your ladies here, news travels so fast that 
 the women know M.t once all the inner workings of 
 the city." 
 
 He paused for a moment, she was watching the 
 two lines each side Cif his mouth. It was not often 
 that he spoke with so much excitement. 
 
 " Mabel," said he, " I should like to show you that 
 life." 
 
 In speaking he had risen and was standing by her ; 
 he laid the tips of his fingers on hers, she had as he 
 spoke been listening to him in a sort of dream, at the 
 touch of his hand she was recalled to herself, she 
 .drew her arm away almost peevishly, but her eyes 
 
36 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 remained riveted on his. face. She was looking at 
 his glinting eyes, and at some new expression in their 
 depths. 
 
 The Chinaman looked back at her, recapturing her 
 hands in an imperturbable way. As he did so, she 
 gazed into his face uneasily. 
 
 " Poor Mabel," murmured he, " unhappy Mabel, 
 your eyes shine like flowers in moonlight, but there 
 is no pleasure in them, and there is none in your 
 heart. Never mind ; I do not ask it now, but re- 
 member ; when I go from here it will not be alone. 
 Hate me now but love me at last ; I say hate me 
 now, for so Lsee Fate has arranged it. At a man's 
 birth these things are written and no man can avoid 
 his fate ? " 
 
 " You are superstitious," said Mabel. 
 
 " No," he replied, " I am not ; if I were I should be 
 most uneasy at my fortune that was told." 
 
 " At your fortune ? Had you your fortune told 
 then ? Was it here ? " 
 
 " No, in China, before I came here, and that is why 
 I tell you I am not superstitious. Truly I believe in 
 Fate, but I do not believe that any man can interpret 
 that fate for men, they alone must meet it." ... 
 
 " I will tell you about it," continued Lew-Ching. 
 " It was at a poor little shop in Hankow where never- 
 theless the people come from far and near, for Kwan- 
 li the fortune-teller ha^ a strange reputation. I de- 
 scended from my chair at a distance of some streets, 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 37 
 
 and proceeded unaccompanied to his house, that by 
 my following he might gain no knowledge of my 
 rank or position. An old woman admitted me. At 
 first I thought we were alone, but lying on a piece of 
 matting in a deep sleep in the corner of that common 
 and poor house, I perceived a man. 
 
 " When I entered the woman motioned me to a seat 
 and made a gesture of silence, and I remained seated 
 without speaking. At length when I had begun to 
 be impatient, he stirred in his sleep and awoke. The 
 old woman seemed afraid to speak to him and made 
 no sign, but rousing himself he came forward and 
 stood beside me, an old man worn and ill-looking, in 
 threadbare garments. 
 
 " ' And what do you do in this unworthy house ? ' 
 he asked, and I told him. 
 
 " ' Be it so,' said he. ' Attend and do as I require 
 you, but first wash your hands that no stain attaches 
 to them,' and he brought me a basin of liquid 
 possessing a pungent, aromatic scent. 
 
 " He then disappeared into another room for a 
 space of time, and presently returned with another 
 bowl, containing water, on the surface of which floated 
 a number of blossoms and leaves. Sisiphus leaves 
 and the leaves of the Snake flower were there, the 
 flowers and leaves of a plant we call Maratse and of 
 the white Hellebore, and the small blossoms of a 
 species of Nightshade. These were the only ones 
 whose names I knew, but there were many others. 
 
38 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 They floated so thickly that I could scarcely perceive 
 the water, beneath. 
 
 " ' Plunge your hands in this bowl,' said he, and 
 I did so. 
 
 " He bid me withdraw them. Obeying him I held 
 them up dripping. The old woman had drawn near, 
 and both regarded me in astonishment. 
 
 "-'And now, father,' said I, 'give me a napkin to 
 wipe my fingers.' 
 
 " They continued to regard me in silence, and then 
 the old man spoke. 
 
 " ' The cloth is not yet woven that can wipe away 
 such things as are on your hand. Look, do you 
 yourself see nothing ? ' 
 
 " I gazed in turn into the bowl and at my fingers, 
 and shook my head. 
 
 " ' I perceive nothing to alarm me,' I replied. 
 
 " ' Do you not notice, that though the bowl is full of 
 many kinds of leaves and blossoms, that only two 
 kinds have stuck to your hands ? — look, your palms 
 and fingers are thickly covered with them and with 
 them alone, no other flower or leaf remains on 
 them.' 
 
 "' It is an accident,' I replied. 
 
 " ' If you think so put them in the water once more.' 
 
 " I did so, but strangely enough the same thing 
 happened, and yet again. 
 
 '"Without doubt it is so, Kwan-li,' I answered, 
 ' and it is for you to explain so strange a thing, or," 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 39 
 
 said I, having a suspicion that it was a clever trick, 
 " to tell me how you bring this about.' 
 
 " ' I can do many things,' he replied, ' but not this ; 
 you yourself bring about your fate, and just as you 
 plunge your hands in this basin, and bear forth froni 
 it yourself the flowers of death and dishonour, so will 
 you do in the future.' 
 
 " The old woman now began muttering something 
 but was at once silenced. 
 
 " ' No man may escape his fate,' said the old man 
 testily, ' and besides, did you not hear him telling me 
 that it was a trick .' ' 
 
 "'The stranger jested only,' murmured the woman, 
 ' bid him beware ; tell him the meaning of your 
 divination that he may take heed.' 
 
 " As she spoke I had dipped my fingers once more 
 in the water, and was watching how the green spear- 
 shaped leaves and the red blossoms like drops of 
 blood, came on my fingers, they and no others. 
 How is the trick done ? thought I, for though I was 
 familiar with our cleverest conjurors, I had never seen 
 this thing before. 
 
 "' Listen,' whispered the old woman, approaching 
 me. ' The spear-shaped leaves are leaves of life ; 
 count the number, for so many are your years on 
 earth. The flowers are called Shaon-li and have an 
 evil signification.' 
 
 " ' What may this signification be ?' I asked, but 
 she shook her head, 
 
40 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 . " ' Do you see,' said Kwan-li, ' how he plays with 
 Fate, and how fearlessly and carelessly he thrusts his 
 hands among the leaves of life? In coming to me he 
 merely gets rid of a few idle hours, but when the 
 petals of the Golden Lily are stained with blood, 
 when liis house and the houses of his kinsfolk are put 
 to shame, he will perhaps believe, but not till that 
 day. Then to such a man, what good are any words 
 of mine ? As well may I remain silent' 
 
 " ' Yqu are right, father,' I replied, smiling, ' I do 
 not blame you ; in doing what you do, you carry out 
 your profession : in doing what I do I prove myself 
 a person of mind ; thus both are right ; but do not 
 try to. frighten me. I will come here in a few years 
 and show you that though you were a clever conjuror 
 your auguries are not true.' 
 
 " ' Come quickly then, my son,' said he with a 
 smile, ' for the time is at hand and dead men cannot 
 enter here,' and so I left him. Do I believe in it ? 
 No, Mabel, how should an educated man believe in 
 such-things ; it was merely a clever trick, I know no 
 more how it was performed than I knew of other 
 amazing things our conjurors do, but because I 
 cannot perform this trick, I do not on that account 
 believe that he who can do so is what you call a wise 
 man." 
 
 " What did he mean by the Golden Lily ? " asked 
 Mabel. "The Golden Lily whose petals are to be 
 stained with blood ? " 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 41 
 
 Lew-Ching shrugged his shoulders. " A Golden 
 Lily is with us a fair woman," said he ; " it is — what do 
 you call it ? — a poetical expression, what the rest means 
 I do not know. Augurers are greatly consulted by 
 us, yes, even among the educated, and I think they 
 get up a number of phrases which may mean much 
 or little." 
 
 " Have you been to show yourself to him yet ? " 
 
 " Not yet, I will let a year pass first. . I hurry 
 nothing, I "find by standing still all things come to 
 me." 
 
 " All things ? " 
 
 " All things," said the Chinaman. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 It was characteristic of poor Mabel's mental condition 
 that small things made a strong impression on her. 
 It was at this time that she accidently met Lindsay 
 Brookes walking up from the station with Miss 
 Dynevor. Her face turned white, she was dizzy and 
 blind for a moment and could scarcely get home ; 
 she had heard rumours of his attentions to Miss 
 Dynevor, she remembered that in the past, even, he 
 had admired her ; this chance meeting caused her as 
 much heartbreak as she had felt months ago. 
 
 She went home; thoughts chased through her 
 mind almost as they did in those terrible nights of 
 hers. She must get away from the place before the 
 engagement was announced, for that he would marry 
 her she had not a doubt, she would go mad if she 
 stayed here till then, to have the people pitying her, 
 to have to listen and keep from crying when the 
 marriage was spoken of 
 
 She was beginning to realise that her control over 
 herself was going; at first it had only been at night 
 that she had wandered in her mind; but latterly when 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 43 
 
 the maid came into her room in the morning with her 
 cup of tea, it was only by a desperate effort that she 
 could pull herself together and get her thoughts dis- 
 entangled sufficiently to reply to the servant when 
 she addressed her. 
 
 The tea cleared her head and the cold water in her 
 bath pulled her together; when she got down she 
 always seemed all right, but a dread had seized her 
 lest some morning she should not be able to clear 
 her brain of the tormenting dreams of the night, and 
 her mother and Nellie should perceive anything. 
 Yes, a change must be made ; this life was intoler- 
 able ; she perceived that Mrs. Conyers was beginning 
 to watch her anxiously. 
 
 Well, she would do the best that remained to do 
 with the tangled skein of her life ; leave Barford 
 behind with its reminiscences, and this new dreadful 
 thing which was rising up to torment her ; she would 
 go away from England with Lew-Ching. 
 
 On the night of the day in which she had met her 
 once lover, the Chinaman came in, as he so often did. 
 He had a liking for burlesque plays and had brought 
 tickets for the Gaiety Theatre next evening, for the 
 three ladies and himself. Mabel had been crying, 
 but had imagined she had washed away all traces of 
 tears and appeared as usual, but he saw at once 
 something had occurred, and that this occurrence, 
 whatever it was, had disposed Mabel more kindly 
 towards him. 
 
44 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 She seemed pleased at the idea of the play, his 
 having included her sister in the invitation delighted 
 her. Her young sister had spoken before him of the 
 piece and had expressed a wish to go. Kindness 
 and love coming on the soreness and bitterness of 
 her heart were intensely comforting. The China- 
 man stayed till eleven o'clocJ< chatting with them. ■ 
 
 Mrs. Conyers having almost lost her dread of 
 Mabel marrying him, rather liked his company than 
 not ; he was always kind and amusing, and it is 
 difficult to keep up a dislike to one as uniformly 
 polite as this man. She had nothing against him 
 but his nationality, and that, since she saw him so 
 often, she was beginning to lose sight of. 
 
 The Chinaman was very clever ;. he knew by the 
 girl's manner that something had occurred. But 
 what ? He watched her that evening carefully, noted 
 everything, the frizzy haif out of curl, the traces of 
 tears, her tenderness and clinging to her young sister 
 and mother, the emotion she showed at Nellie's joy 
 at the prospect of the theatre. His glinting quiet 
 eyes were looking into Mabel's soul, and he guessed 
 the truth. But he made no sign just then ; it was 
 days afterwards that he urged on Mabel to marry 
 him, and drew from her a half acceptance. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 It was a bad half hour for Mabel when she told 
 Mrs. Conyers. 
 
 " Oh, Mabel, how awful, how awful ! " she moaned. 
 "Oh, Mabel, I've thought of this as a sort of night- 
 mare, something too terrible to come true," and she 
 stopped short, sobbing. 
 
 "There's nothing terrible in it," said the girl, 
 ooking at her mother with the reckless look she 
 now knew so well. 
 
 " But, Mabel," cried the unhappy woman, " think of 
 it, think of what people will say; they will, and 
 justly too, consider your conduct outrageous, and. you 
 an outcast — yes, that is the only word ; a person cut 
 off from decent people." 
 
 " Why should they do so ? " demanded her daughter. 
 " Lew-Ching is a gentlemen by birth and a man 
 whom every one here has received." 
 
 Mrs. Conyers sighed hopelessly. 
 
 "They have received him, but only as a sort of 
 novelty ; the idea of his marrying any one of their 
 
46 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 daughters would never have been entertained — 
 never in this world. You know that quite well, 
 Mabel." 
 
 "You own," cried the girl, "that he is a gentleman 
 in manner and position and yet, because he was born 
 in China, instead of in England, he is to be treated 
 as an outcast, and I too, if I chose to link myself 
 with him. I think you are unfair." 
 
 " Mabel, Mabel ! " moaned Mrs. Conyers, " what 
 wretched kink, what crooked turn is in your mind, 
 that you cannot see what any one else can see so 
 plainly ? Do you think that any other decent woman 
 in the place, high or low, would contemplate for a 
 moment anything so wild, so atrocious, and why then 
 should my daughter? Why should this thing happen to 
 me, what have I done in God's name to deserve this ? 
 I have been so sorry for you, all your troubles have 
 fallen as heavily on me as on yourself ; have I ever 
 been unsympathetic ? You have had trouble, I'll 
 own, but do you suppose other girls haven't any, and 
 do you think you'll mend matters by this desperate, 
 this disgusting stroke? Yes, I don't care what you 
 say, it is disgusting." 
 
 " Have' it so," said Mabel, " call it what you like. 
 As for what you say, I don't suppose I shall mend 
 my wretched life, but I'll alter it ; that I cannot fail 
 to do, and that's what I want. Do you think, mother, 
 that I've come suddenly to such a strange determi- 
 nation ? No, no — I've been thinking it over for some 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 47 
 
 time — I've been thinking it over for some time," she 
 repeated. 
 
 Mrs. Conyers had been sitting in an armchair in 
 her bedroom, reading c^nd resting, as she was in the 
 habit of doing in the afternoons, when the girl had 
 first entered the room, and began this hateful talk, 
 which was stopping her heart like a cold hand. 
 During the conversation her little upright figure had 
 seemed to lose its expression of alertness, and she 
 had sat crouched in the large chair listening and 
 shivering, her small thin hands still holding the 
 novel which she had been reading when her daughter 
 came in. 
 
 At Mabel's last words she looked up. Something 
 unusual in her voice as she repeated that sentence 
 struck her ; all the sadness of the world seemed to 
 speak in it. Mabel was looking at her, there was an 
 expression in her eyes, a curious look that Mrs. 
 Conyers had noticed once before, an expression 
 that she could hardly define, but which gave her a 
 feeling of uneasiness. The eyes seemed glazed and 
 changed from Mabel's beautiful eyes, the pupils 
 looked odd, the. hollows in the cheeks were more 
 apparent, other changes there were, too, but Mrs. 
 Conyers' regard turned again to the eyes. Was it 
 temper and excitement that made them so bright, so 
 glazed, so shifty ? 
 
 As she looked at her, Mabel looked away, her 
 lips moving, muttering something under her 
 breath 
 
48 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 The novel fell from Mrs. Conyers' harids,. she rose 
 and approached the girl, scanning her face narrowly 
 and with a great anxiety. 
 
 " You are not well, Mabel," she cried, " you're 
 changed and strange. Oh, my darling, darling, tell 
 me what is the matter ? Oh, I will do anything for 
 you to help you, to make your life happier, only tell 
 me, confide in me. You know that since poor papa 
 died I've had no one but you and Nellie to think 
 for and love, arid you especially, for Nellie of course 
 is not the companion to me that you are, and now 
 you want to leave me and go away where you'll never 
 see me again, with this man, this barbarian 1 Oh, it's 
 hard, it's very cruelly hard. Mabel, for God's sake, 
 don't break my heart this way ; tell me that you'll 
 never see Lew-Ching again ; let me think of it only 
 as a bad dream and we'll be so happy yet. I'll take 
 you away to wherever you'd like to go? we'll get 
 some one to take Nellie in, and leave here for three 
 months right away, anywhere you'd like — anywhere. 
 I daresay you are tired of life here ; for that matter 
 if you wished it we would never set foot in Barford 
 again. I understand you're hating the place. Come, 
 dear, if you like we will go and never, never-j:eturn. 
 Will you do that, Mabel, for my sake ? " 
 
 She wound her arms round her as she spoke 
 and looked up iti her face appealingly. Now she 
 looked closer, there was certainly something 
 strange in her eyes. Poor, poor child, all this 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 49 
 
 trouble had tired and changed her ; could she expect 
 that she would be just the same as when, a beautiful 
 girl of eighteen, her mother had taken a delight in 
 her happiness ? 
 
 " You will do it for my sake and your sister's sake, 
 won't you, dearest ? " she repeated. 
 
 But the eyes looked back at her, and Mrs. Conyers 
 could see there was a settled determination in 
 them. 
 
 " Don't try to mov^ me," she replied, " It is too 
 late, I've given my word to him. Besides, don't you 
 see if I don't go through with this- it will be the 
 fourth affair I've come to grief in. Yes; people will 
 say this is another of Miss Conyers' unfortunate love 
 affairs." 
 
 " Let them say it. What can they say in compari- 
 son to what will be said if you marry him .■"" 
 
 " Ah, but I shall be away, I shall have escaped, and 
 what shall I care? No, mother, I've thought and 
 thought ; believe me it will be best." 
 
 " Do you mean to tell me jou love this China- 
 man ? " 
 
 Mabel paused before replying, and a tired, pitiful 
 expression flitted over her face. 
 
 " I love no one now," said she, " but he has a 
 certain fascination for me ; he's quite new, and every- 
 thing else seems quite old tome, including myself; I 
 feel so old, I feel ill and broken down, my heart is 
 broken ; it broke years ago, I think, and I want my 
 
 5 
 
50 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 body taken away, that is all, mother," she concluded, 
 with a dry sob. " I'm going away, that's all. For- 
 give me. — Do without me ; indeed I must go." 
 
 Mrs. Conyers had withdrawn her arm from round 
 her daughter ; her face had grown white all in a 
 moment, as at some sudden shock. 
 
 " You are mad to speak like this," she cried ; " these 
 are not the words, of a sane person ; your words 
 shock me — they terrify me beyond expression. That 
 I should live to hear a daughter of mine saying such 
 things ! Planning anything so degrading as what 
 you contemplate! What terrible blight can have 
 fallen on your mind that was once so pure. Why, 
 the man is almost as different from us as a cat or dog. 
 An English bricklayer would be a better match." 
 
 Mrs. Conyers had fallen back into the armchair, 
 and was crying pitifully and hysterically ; but Mabel's 
 eyes did not soften, she looked for a moment in her 
 direction, and walked towards the door. 
 
 She had arrived at that state of mind when nothing 
 can grieve. She had cried so much that the sight of 
 her mother's tears only affected her momentarily. 
 She had suffered, and her mother was suffering now, 
 that was all ; her mother's last words, too, had 
 hardened her. 
 
 Mabel's mind was in a curious state, she felt that 
 she was looking at herself and her mother from a 
 distance. She had to ask her mind whether it was 
 she whom Mrs. Conyers had addressed these words 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 51 
 
 to ; was it she who was going to marry the China- 
 man ? Could it be herself ? 
 
 She remained there, looking at the weeping, grief- 
 stricken woman ; all this grief, all these words were 
 because Mabel Conyers, the girl who stood there, was 
 going to marry a Chinaman ! 
 
 She seemed to see herself plainly, as she had so 
 often seen herself in the glass — a frivolous-looking, 
 beautiful girl. She had always been beautiful ; she 
 was far more beautiful now. She saw the charming 
 tendrils of red hair, the full eyes, the whiteness of 
 skin, the delicate shape of her hands. This was 
 Mabel Conyers. What good were all these things to 
 her, what good had they been in the past ? The 
 whiteness of her skin, the red of her mouth had not 
 kept the love of the three men who had once professed 
 to love her, so let it go. 
 
 She thought then, still as an onlooker, but as an 
 onlooker with a terrible insight, about Mabel. 
 Would she. be happier ? Would she leave the horrible 
 dreams behind in the little upstairs room papered 
 with roses and jasmine? Would she leave behind 
 her that vague dread ? 
 
 The little, terrible bedroom was surely full of 
 dreams ; they entangled her mind ; like snakes, all so 
 trivial, and yet one or the other always twisting in 
 
52 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 and out, writhing the whole night through. For 
 weeks now she had not had a fair night's rest, and 
 she was so tired. She was afraid to go to sleep 
 every night, every night the same. Yes, it was the 
 room, it was full of misery and of dreams ; she would 
 escape from it, and from Mrs. Conyers' eyes. There 
 had been an expression in them just now, a dawning 
 intelligence that frightened her ; but she, Mabel, 
 would carry matters with a high hand ; she would not 
 be bound down to this place of torture. A smile 
 came to her red lips as she left the room. 
 
 On the landing outside she met Nellie, poor Nellie, 
 good-natured, merry and untidy, returned from 
 school ; she linked her arm in hers and they went 
 upstairs together. As they went Mabel was seized 
 with an uncontrollable fit of laughter, loud and 
 mirthless. 
 
 " This is something new to hear you laughing," 
 observed her sister. " What is the joke, pray ? " 
 
 Mrs. Conyers heard the sound, though the door 
 was closed, and opening it stood listening ; it ended, 
 and then began again, mirthless and discordant. 
 
 Mabel very seldom laughed loudly, and never this 
 uncontrolled, vulgar laughter. Yes, it really sounded 
 vulgar ; the undisciplined laughter of an ill-bred 
 person, yet it assuredly seemed to be Mabel's 
 voice. 
 
 * " Nellie, my dear, is that you making all that 
 noise ? " asked Mrs. Conyers. 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 53 
 
 Nellie's face looked over the bannisters. 
 
 " No, mother, it's Mabel, and I don't know what 
 it's about — is it something you've been telling 
 her?" 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 In spite of all Mrs. Conyers' precautions the story of 
 Mabel's engagement crept out. 
 
 The poor woman was quite powerless in the 
 matter ; her daughter was of age and able to ar- 
 range her life as she pleased ; she had always been 
 wilful and was more wilful now than ever. If she 
 chose to give out that she was engaged to marry this 
 man, she had a perfect right to do so, and also a 
 perfect right to carry out that engagement. It was 
 no use Mrs. Conyers saying that it was not an en- 
 gagement, and that she refused her consent, though 
 she did say so all the same. 
 
 During her husband's lifetime he had arranged and 
 managed everything for her ; she was unused to as- 
 serting authority or judging for herself. She was an 
 affectionate woman and a woman of considerable 
 shrewdness, by no means a fool, but on the contrary 
 possessing a good share of common sense. It was 
 because of this that her first view of any subject, 
 arrived at by her own unaided intelligence, was gene- 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. S5 
 
 rally the right one; afterwards she was apt to be 
 biased by what other people said. Her first judgment 
 on what her daughter had told her had been the true 
 one, and had been delivered truly and unflinchingly 
 from her heart. This judgment was never materially 
 altered ; its issues were too grave, but the expression 
 of other people's views softened it in a measure. 
 
 Some of Mrs. Conyers' friends, to her face, made 
 light of the matter : they were people whom it did 
 not affect, and so, for the .sake of politeness and 
 because they didn't care, they said everything that 
 was pleasant and false. Mrs. Conyers had given over 
 struggling with Mabel, and now seeing the marriage 
 was inevitable took a miserable comfort in the 
 thought that other people didn't consider it quite 
 so dreadful, and that, perhaps, she was allowing her 
 love for her daughter to make her unnecessarily 
 anxious. 
 
 Mrs. Deans' opinion, in particular, was a great 
 comfort to her ; Mrs. Deans had expressed the 
 greatest pleasure at the engagement, but it had 
 been Mabel who had announced it to her, and who, 
 with some diplomacy, had called on her alone for 
 the purpose of doing so. Mrs. Deans' good-natured, 
 matronly face had looked utterly astonished and 
 horrified ; she was an inveterate matchmaker, but, 
 this she had not contemplated — this at least she had 
 not dreamt of ; she had heard rumours, but had put 
 them aside as, mere gossip ; now face -to face with 
 
56 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 this strange thing she was a few minutes befor? 
 she could grasp it. 
 
 She was, however, a woman of the world : she 
 realised at once that it was inevitable, and made 
 the best of it. She had congratulated Mabel and 
 had driven over the same afternoon to see Mrs. 
 Conyers. For one moment only was she nonplussed, 
 and then only for a moment. It was when poor 
 Mrs. Conyers asked her whether she would have 
 liked a child of her own to make such a match. 
 
 " Well," said Mrs. Deans, " I don't care about 
 foreign matches, but numbers of English girls marry 
 foreigners and I can't see that a well-educated, well- 
 bred Chinaman should be considered more undesirable 
 than a Frenchman or a German. He is a man of 
 good character and of good position and is also; — 
 so I understand — a rich man. Of course, dear Mrs. 
 Conyers," she added, " I am most sorry that Mabel 
 should have met him in my house, since you so much 
 dislike the thing ; but I need not tell you, such an 
 idea as his making love to Mabel never entered my 
 head ! How should it ? " 
 
 " That's just it," sighed Mrs. Conyers ; " that's the 
 dreadful part of it — you've just expressed it. No one 
 would have thought of such a thing." 
 
 Mrs. Deans was conscious of having said too much. 
 
 " Well, of course," she observed, " Chinamen are 
 such a rarity in England that we are naturally not 
 used to the idea of our girls marrying them, but 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 57 
 
 what I want you to see is that, though it's unusual, 
 it's not necessarily dreadful." 
 
 Mrs. Conyers shook her head. 
 
 " Mabel," continued Mrs. Deans, '' seems more her- 
 self — she seems to be happy in the engagement, from 
 what she said to me, and that's what nine-tenths of 
 the girls are not ; they seem to marry for anything 
 but love. Now in this case, there must be love, and 
 that, after all, is the only thing worth considering, — 
 after a man's position and means," she added naifvely. 
 
 Mrs. Conyers was silent ; she was thinking of other 
 things than love that were driving the girl to this, to 
 her, terrible alliance. 
 
 " I know," continued the other, after a moment, 
 " that I shall have any blame attaching to the affair : 
 I've got the name of a matchmaker, and so everything 
 happening among my acquaintance for miles round 
 is put down to me. Give a dog a bad name and 
 hang him — you know the old proverb. I had all the 
 odium of that Jackson-Withers engagement, though 
 I hated the idea fully as much as the wretched young 
 man's parents could possibly do. — ^I've thought that I 
 shall really have to give up having any but married 
 people at my house ; but, dear Mrs. Conyers, even 
 with married people one's not safe. Married women 
 behave so queerly now — do you remember how 
 stupidly that pretty little Mrs. Paton used to carry 
 on with young Bryson at my house ? and of course 
 all the time it was no fault of mine. The world is so 
 
S8 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 censorious," she added vaguely, though whether she 
 alluded to its criticisms on herself, or on Mrs. Paton 
 was not evident. 
 
 Soon after this Mrs. Deans had made use of the 
 usual stock phrase as to the length of visit she had 
 made, and had said good-bye. The fact was that, 
 though on this occasion she had been quite innocent 
 and felt so, she was at the bottom of her good heart 
 troubled and upset by the sight of Mrs. Conyers' 
 distress, and it was a relief to get away from the 
 house. 
 
 There was only one person in the world who could 
 have put a stop to the engagement, and this person 
 was Lindsay ; curiously enough, although Mabel had 
 declared to her mother and to Mrs. Deans that 
 nothing would shake her determination, to Lew- 
 Ching himself she had only given a half-promise, so 
 that there was yet a loophole for escape. She longed 
 for an opportunity of seeing and speaking to Lindsay 
 Brookes and cherished a mad thought that he would 
 intercede to save her ; that he would recognise the 
 love and despair that had driven her to this thing, 
 and would ask her to come back. Perhaps he really 
 did love her after all ; could she have been mistaken ? 
 She had kept, with his first love-letters, that last 
 letter which he had written the day following that 
 on which she had given him up ; she read constantly 
 its cold and reproachful phrases, trying to read into 
 them some love, but vainly. 
 
HER' CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 59 
 
 Still across her brain came constantly the thought 
 that there might after all be some chance that she 
 had misjudged Lindsay, that he loved her still and 
 had always loved her, and that the lukewarmness of 
 his manner and of this last letter of his might have 
 been due to outside causes. What did he think of 
 her now ? He had of course heard of the projected 
 engagement. Surely he would be sorry — if he had 
 ever cared for her at all, he must be sorry. Anyhow, 
 he would be startled — that was one thing ; it would 
 rouse him from the cold-hearted apathy that had 
 wounded her and had forced her to give him up. 
 
 To meet Lindsay was now a difficult thing, but 
 at last came the opportunity, and by some strange 
 chance, now, as when she had renounced him, it was 
 at a dance. 
 
 Her ex-lover of late had refused all invitations, but 
 on this occasion, his was the first face she saw on 
 alighting. 
 
 He was standing with a group of men in the hall. 
 She thought that there was an expectant look in his 
 eyes, or could this be fancy ? 
 
 Close behind her mother and herself came- Lew- 
 Ching, handsome and picturesque ; imperturbable and 
 grave ; carrying Mabel's huge bouquet of stephanotis, 
 almost like a wedding bouquet, looking neither to 
 left nor right, but with his sleepy, glinting eyes fixed 
 on the girl as she made her way through the little 
 crowd. 
 
6o HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 A curious expression passed over the men's faces 
 on the entrance of the trio. Mabel had seen this 
 expression scores of times, and was used to it ; she 
 simply didn't care — she took a delight now in brazen- 
 ing it out ; she was glad with an angry gladness that 
 Lindsay should be here and should see the good-look- 
 ing Chinaman in his outlandish blue robes, and the 
 huge nosegay he had bought for her — should witness 
 his evident devotion. She was glad; too, that she was 
 looking so beautiful — fair as a flower in the white 
 dress whose train Lew-Ching walked behind. 
 
 As she came in, she held her head and her beautiful 
 shoulders erect ; the scarlet roses in her cheeks were 
 like rouge with unsoftened edges, imparting a strange 
 brilliancy to the eyes with dilated pupils — those eyes 
 whose regard had a look of mingled misery and 
 triumph. 
 
 Yes, Lindsay was here at last ; Lindsay was look- 
 ing, seeing how beautiful she was, wondering about 
 her no doubt and about Lew-Ching. Now to have 
 a word with him, to tear from him what he thought, 
 to make him show some little emotion.. 
 
 A curious excitement had taken possession of her, 
 showing in her eyes and in the colouring of her face, 
 but she had grown so used to the necessity for re- 
 straint that her manner was perfectly calm. 
 
 She bowed to the various men she "knew, shaking 
 hands with some, smiling at others, replying to their 
 greetings, then she passed on upstairs to the cloak-room 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 6i 
 
 with her mother. There was a Httle crush, and when 
 she came down again the hall was clear save for two 
 people ; one was her Chinese lover, standing awaiting 
 them with the lovely bouquet, and the other was 
 Mr. Brookes.. 
 
 Mr. Brookes' face was very stern, but the China- 
 man's wore its usual impenetrable calm. It was 
 quite obvious that Lindsay was waiting for her, and 
 that it was she who had called that forbidding ex- 
 pression on to his face. — A miserable joy took pos- 
 session of her, and yet not a joy, for she knew by 
 a sort of prescience that there was no more happiness 
 for her ; yet she had a curiosity to know what Lind- 
 say would say and do. 
 
 He came forward, shook hands gravely and asked 
 for a dance. 
 
 She thought the stolid, common-sense manner was 
 so like J^indsay ; she was dying and burning for him 
 to make some sign, to say something, but here he 
 was asking for a place in her programme in precisely 
 the same terms that any other young man would use. 
 The dance she-had given him was not to come off till 
 later, and he left her with a bow. 
 
 Lew-Ching had been standing motionless and ex- 
 pressionless with the bouquet, expressionless save for 
 that attitude of waiting which she always felt and 
 recognised. Yes, he was waiting for her like Fate or 
 like Death-^she could never, never get away. 
 
 The only thing English or commonplace about 
 
62 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 him was his gloves — he was engaged in stroking 
 them into shape ; they looked curious in conjunction 
 with the pale-blue robe with its pink and silver em- 
 broidery and the curious felt-soled shoes. 
 
 He made no move to enter the ball-room, but 
 stood in silence with his eyes resting on her, and 
 then he began speaking slowly in his odd, woodeny 
 tones. 
 
 " I wish," said he, " that I were an Englishman, 
 Yes, Mabel, when you look as you do to-night I wish 
 I were the meanest Englishman rather than Chinese, 
 for I should be nearer you. Your eyes are so beautiful 
 they take my breath away ; you seem like some one 
 from another world — and so you are ; — every thought, 
 every word of yours is unfamiliar to me, I have still to 
 learn you, and yet I know well I never shall, whereas 
 there is not a man here to-night, there is not a beggar 
 we have passed in the streets who does not know you 
 better than I." 
 
 Mrs. Conyers had passed on into the dancing-room, 
 but Mabel stood listening to him in the hall. The 
 rencontre with Lindsay had set her heart beating 
 wildly, had accentuated the vivid colouring in her 
 face ; the white dress was not more fairly white than 
 the colour of her shoulders and arms ; never, never 
 in the old days of happiness had she looked so 
 supremely beautiful as now. 
 
 Lew-Ching's eyes wandered from her face to her 
 white throat and shoulders — a sudden iit of trembling 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 63 
 
 had taken him, and when he began speaking to her 
 he stammered, the flowers in his hand shook ; each 
 blossom wired and bemossed was giving out its 
 poignant scent, a moisture lay in the waxen petals of 
 the stephanotis : the air was thick with its perfume. 
 
 Under the yellow of his cheek, a colour had come, 
 his eyes had still that motionless air of waiting, but a 
 fire burnt in them, and when he tried to speak some- 
 thing seemed to lie on his tongue like a leaden 
 weight. 
 
 " Take these flowers," said he at last, " they are 
 white as you, but not so beautiful. Nothing can be 
 more beautiful than you are, there is nothing — there 
 is nothing. . . . Mabel, this low dress in which your 
 shoulders look so like warm snow, why do you wear 
 it?" He paused, stammering. — "What a terrible 
 custom that what one man only should see, the whole 
 world may gloat on, — the very man who admitted 
 us, — the common fellows who drive the carriages, all 
 have seen it. And then this group of gentlemen, 
 your friends who take you in their arms — when it 
 should be death to look at you." He murmured the 
 last words in an undertone. 
 
 Mabel took the flowers, their heavy scent and the 
 excitement of her thoughts gave her a feeling of 
 weariness, almost of sickness. " How funny of you 
 Jto think in this way," she said, with a weary smile. 
 " Men here," she added after a moment, " don't look 
 at things like that ; they are used to our shoulders. 
 
64 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 they don't care. Everything here is so stale, — but 
 your view is amusing all the same." 
 
 Lew-Ching shrugged his shoulders. " Your men ! — 
 They are as cold as mountain snow," he said, " but 
 come, — where is our hostess ? I keep you too long ; 
 let us show ourselves, come, my beautiful one, are the 
 flowers too heavy for your arms to carry ? then I will 
 carry them for you. — How your English gentlemen 
 friends look at me, and at you to-night," he added 
 in a guttural undertone, and with a half laugh. 
 
 He paused to shake hands with Mrs. Newcome, 
 their hostess, doing it very awkwardly, and holding 
 his hand rigidly, then he stood beside Mabel while 
 she made her programme. The fire still burnt in his 
 eyes, but his manner was once more assured and 
 calm. The novelty was not yet worn off these English 
 dances, though he had been to several now, the 
 manners and customs of the people were a never- 
 failing source of interest to him ; they had always 
 been since that first evening when he had expressed 
 himself so freely to Mr. Vaughan. 
 
 He was never bored ; there were generally one or 
 two ladies whom he knew well enough to ask to sit 
 Out an occasional dance with him, in the intervals he 
 stood about watching the dancers, his bright-hued 
 robes contrasting with the black uniform evening 
 dress of the men. There was a dignity about his 
 bearing that was unlike that of the men surrounding 
 him, there was a certain bizarre charm in hjs face, — 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 65 
 
 it was handsome with its Tartar cheekbones and 
 sleepy, quiet eyes. 
 
 Once or twice when Lindsay Brookes was standing 
 near him, Mabel found herself comparing them, but 
 always as if in a dream. What was this handsome, 
 strange-looking man to her, handsome and strangely 
 brutal looking ? Her mother had been right, he was as 
 different from her as a cat or a dog, yet he loved her, 
 and Lindsay Brookes, commonplace Lindsay Brookes 
 whom she loved, didn't care for her at all. She caught 
 snatches of his conversation with his partners. — She 
 knew that Lew-Ching could never talk these common- 
 places, that was one blessing. 
 
 Then as she looked round the room, the faces of 
 the people, faces so familiar to her, reminded her 
 again of those miserable past love affairs. In this 
 little community every one was so mixed up one with 
 another ; for instance, standing close beside her were 
 two of the sisters of her first lover, Valesworth. He 
 had married and gone away a year ago, but here 
 were those two girls reminding her of that bit of the 
 past. 
 
 She was surrounded by people who knew her 
 history and the miserable muddle she had made of 
 her life. They were probably, she thought, wondering 
 now what new development was to come. Well, it 
 would depend on this evening ; she was feverishly 
 awaiting this dance with her ex-lover, she would put 
 it to the test. If only Lindsay loved her a little she 
 
 6 
 
66 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 would return to him, she would try to, yes, try to, for 
 she knew the power the Chinaman had over her, but 
 she would return to Lindsay if he wanted her to come 
 back. 
 
 Lew-Ching, as he stood with his motionless eyes 
 resting on her, saw her excitement, it prevented her 
 talking to her partners ; she was looking about the 
 room replying to their conversation in an absent 
 manner, there was a dazed and anxious expression 
 in her eyes. — He knew that there was danger in 
 Lindsay's presence here this evening and that Mabel 
 was trying to escape from him, that they were on the 
 eve of some crisis. 
 
 But when he looked at Mr. Brookes, he was re- 
 assured. He had a contempt for him ; he scanned 
 his pale, good-looking, lack-lustre face : he would 
 never allow this beautiful girl to be taken from him 
 by such a man as this — all the Englishmen seemed 
 ugly to him, but he disliked Lindsay particularly ; — 
 he had a contempt for this man who might have 
 possessed Mabel and had let her go. 
 
 When Lindsay Brookes came up for his dance 
 she looked round the room for the Chinaman. She 
 caught sight of his pigtail in the distance, his back 
 was turned and he was bending forward talking to 
 a lady who was sitting down. She laid her hand 
 on Lindsay's arm, and remembered that the last time 
 she had done so was at that dance where they had 
 quarrelled. She looked sideways at his face ; he was 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 67 
 
 tired looking and had an ugly, grave expression ; 
 there was no tenderness in it ; her heart sank, she 
 had treasured a faint hope that his asking her for 
 this dance had meant that he had forgiven her, but 
 this was anything but a lover-like look. 
 
 Then they went upstairs. She swept up the stair- 
 case beside him in a dream, a deadly excitement 
 possessed her, it seemed that though she walked so 
 quietly beside him, she was in reality struggling for 
 her life. 
 
 Where was Lindsay taking her to ? Her lips, 
 burnt red with excitement, were too dry to ask ; her 
 head ached, she had had a little champagne ; this, 
 perhaps, was why she felt she was losing restraint 
 over herself, and if she once were to lose it, she should 
 break down into tears. 
 
 They were on the landing of the first floor, — it was 
 so thickly carpeted that she could not hear the sound 
 of their feet. Lindsay paused and drew aside a 
 portiere on their left, and she heard the rustle of her 
 dress as she passed into the room behind it. No one 
 was there, and he dropped the portiere and stood for a 
 moment looking at her. 
 
 In the half-light there was no difference in colour 
 between her satin skirt and her shoulders and the 
 bunch of starry stephanotis : her arms were weary 
 with the weight of the bouquet, she put it down with 
 a sigh and remained standing as if for sentence. 
 Even in the excitement that was burning her, she 
 
68 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 noticed the want of energy and force in his attitude 
 as he stood regarding her. 
 
 " Is what I hear true ? " asked he at last. 
 
 " Is what true ? " 
 
 " Oh," said he, " you know what I mean, Mabel, 
 you're not going to marry this Chinaman, are you ? — 
 no, surely not ! " 
 
 " And why," asked she, desperately, "why shouldn't 
 I.?" 
 
 " Why shouldn't you ? " he repeated after her with 
 emphasis, " and can you ask ? — Why," cried he, with 
 a face on which astonishment and disgust fought 
 together, " on the face of it it's a terrible idea. — Don't 
 
 you see for yourself? Can you possibly ? Oh 
 
 Mabel ! " — He paused, looking at her searchingly ; his 
 eyes had become accustomed to the half-light of the 
 dim room and took in her face in every detail. 
 
 " I am not saying this with any object but your 
 good," he continued after a pause ; " indeed, I ask it 
 more out of curiosity to know if the rumours I have 
 heard can possibly be correct, if they are, if that is 
 indeed possible, I ask you out of regard to your 
 family, out of regard to yourself, to pause. — You will 
 see that my counsel must needs be quite disinterested ; 
 for you are now of course no more to me." 
 
 The cold words whipped her like a flail. 
 
 " I do not see any terrors in the situation," said she, 
 and laughed ; it was not like Mabel's laugh, it was 
 discordant and strange, as she heard it, she herself 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 69 
 
 wondered. — Though her heart was breaking, though 
 she had not a pleasant, an endurable thought in her 
 whole body, she found she could not refrain from this 
 laughter. 
 
 It was the champagne, she told herself, — why had 
 she been such a fool as to drink it, when her head felt 
 so bad, — when she felt so ill altogether ? 
 
 The laugh seemed to infuriate the man beside her ; 
 for the first time for a long while she saw Lindsay 
 moved. At his last words he had taken hold of her 
 two hands, he now threw them violently from him. 
 Curiously enough though the gesture implied almost 
 loathing for her, she admired him now more than she 
 had ever done, since that lovely month when they had 
 first known each other. 
 
 He stood still glowering at her. How late in the 
 day this emotion was ; if only he had shown it before ! 
 
 Yet it was something to see that Lindsay could 
 feel. Even now, as he had been so careful to explain, 
 it was neither love nor jealousy moving him, but a 
 conventional disgust at what he considered an outrage 
 on Mrs. Grundy. 
 
 " What made }'ou do this devil's work, Mabel ? — 
 there were so many things to do but this, I could 
 scarcely believe it — even now — ! Surely I must be 
 dreaming. That was always your weak point," he 
 went on, " this eccentricity. Surely only you out of 
 the whole- world would have done this. Nobody 
 really believes it," he added. 
 
70 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 "Nobody believes it," she repeated. "And pray- 
 why don't they ? But they do ; they have congratu- 
 lated me." 
 
 At this he laughed outright, a joyless and hollow 
 laugh. 
 
 " What Judases they must be ! Listen, you tell me 
 they say this and that to your face, but behind your 
 back they say very curious things." He paused. 
 
 " Yes, go on." 
 
 " They say " He broke off. " No, what is the 
 
 use, in Heaven's name, what is the use i" — nothing 
 will, I suppose, deter you." 
 
 " But what do they say ? " 
 
 "Mabel," he asked, without answering this, "are 
 you doing this of your own free will, or has some 
 pressure been put upon you ? What influence has 
 this man employed ? For surely you cannot be doing 
 this of your own accord, — your wishes cannot lie in 
 such a direction. At one time you professed to love 
 me ; you are very catholic in your tastes, I must 
 say." 
 
 " Look here, Lindsay," she replied, stung by the 
 sneer, "why do you say this, you who could never 
 really have cared — and as for what the people say : 
 you are right ; — the gossip of a suburban place will 
 certainly not deter me. What do I care : I am sick 
 of the place — and of the people, utterly sick, I've 
 suffered so much in these last few months, — so much." 
 
 " Poor Mabel," he said with for the first time, some- 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 71 
 
 thing of pity in his voice, "you'll be sicker far of 
 Hankow. I suppose you think it's roih antic, but where 
 does the romance come in ? A wretched barbarian I 
 It's bad enough when a girl marries a Frenchman, or 
 a German — but hang it ajl, a Chinaman ! Why, what 
 will your life be out there ? It's true the chap speaks 
 English, but he looks as if he came off a teacup all 
 the while." 
 
 " The Chinese have an older civilisation than ours," 
 she was beginning when he broke in. 
 
 " Ah, don't talk like that, what's the good ?— don't 
 I know the people and the life, wasn't I stewing out 
 there a few j'ears ago? — I had only just returned from 
 the place when I met you, Mabel.'' 
 
 "You never told me you disliked it." 
 
 " But I did, I Jiated it ; it wasn't merely my 
 engagement with you that made me throw up the 
 idea of going out again ; long before I met you it 
 was settled that I would rather do anything in 
 England and that Gerald, who likes that sort of 
 thing, was to go instead ; now poor Gerald, after this 
 shy out of the dog-cart, is not well enough to stand 
 the climate: the mater won't let him leav^ England, 
 and so I have to throw up my secretaryship and go 
 out again, worse luck." 
 
 Mabel gave a deep sigh. " Your telling me all this 
 makes it seem so long since our engagement was 
 broken off," she said, wearily. " So many, many, 
 many things have been happening." 
 
72 HER. CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 " But you have heard, surely every one knows that 
 I had decided to abandon my post here and go out 
 again ; that news is common property." 
 
 " Oh, yes, I've heard that ; Mrs. Deans told us. 
 Gossip spreads very quickly in this hateful place. 
 All I meant was that in the days now gone, I learnt 
 your doings from yourself, and not from strangers, — 
 and I've not yet got used to the new order of things. 
 How very strange," continued she, " that your lot 
 should be cast in the very spot where he comes 
 from." 
 
 The young man made a gesture of repugnance. 
 '' It is unfortunate," he said, " but not strange ; — my 
 people got into the business through the Deans', who 
 had connections out in the same place, and through 
 those connections this fellow came here ; it's natural 
 enough — and confoundedly unpleasant," he added. 
 
 " Do you ever remember meeting Mr. Lew-Ching 
 out there ? " 
 
 " Never ; forgive my frankness, but, I'm not fond 
 of the Heathen Chinee in any shape or form, and 
 don't cultivate their acquaintance." 
 
 " He doesn't remember your face either." 
 " I daresay not," remarked Lindsay grimly. " It's 
 a large place." 
 
 " He tells me that there are many English there, 
 
 and that life will be pleasant " 
 
 " Then he lies," cried the young man interrupting, 
 " he lies and he knows it's, a lie ! Oh, Mabel, are you 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 73 
 
 mad, — can you be in, your senses ! — Take my word 
 for it you will be an outcast there ; you will be more 
 wretched than I can tell you. Why can't you take 
 heed to what I say ? Tell me," he said, coming so 
 close to her that his coat sleeve touched her white 
 arm. " Have I had anything to say to this ? for 
 
 sometimes I think " 
 
 " Sometimes you think I am doing it on your 
 account ; well, so I am in a way, but it's too late to 
 undo what's done. This act of mine has had one 
 good result ; it's waked you up a little. Dear me, if 
 
 you'd been like this all along " 
 
 " Well ? " 
 
 " Well. There'd have been no case of China. I 
 should have loved you always, yes, always." 
 
 Lindsay smiled, a bitter smile. " May I ask," he 
 inquired, " why you did leave me ? for remember 
 you've never told me. No, — don't be afraid that I 
 shall ask you to come back. I don't want you back, 
 — I should never want you after this. No, one doesn't 
 fancy a peach when some creature has been crawling 
 over it. But why did you leave me ? — Indirectly I 
 have heard that you thought I didn't show enough 
 affection for you. — You judge ev^ery one by yourself, 
 and if they are not at high pressure, you complain. 
 We'd been engaged some time and I suppose the 
 affair had naturally settled down into something less 
 effervescent than it was at first, but all the same, I 
 was working for you and doing my best, when 
 
74 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 suddenly one evening, as it seemed to me, apropos of 
 nothing at all, you chucked me over, like throwing 
 away an old glove. — You never even replied" to my 
 letter, a kind letter considering all things." 
 
 As he spoke a curiously lost feeling was creeping 
 over the girl. Forlorn, wretched, she felt heart- 
 broken. So, was it true ! This was a new view of 
 things I 
 
 A curious feeling was coming over her brain, this 
 feeling that she must break out, she could not now 
 take the dimensions of facts placed before her. Like 
 those dreadful dreams that came to her at night, 
 small things took gigantic proportions, thus it was 
 that she now saw herself as one who had voluntarily 
 severed herself from this man who had loved her and 
 whom she had loved. 
 
 And where was she going? — away from people, 
 friends, every one. — A bitter regret took her and a 
 terror. The feeling of half fascination she had had 
 for her Chinese lover died out ; she saw him as he 
 was, his subtle manner, his glinting eyes were before 
 her. . . . 
 
 " Oh, Lindsay, Lindsay," crie'd she, bursting into a 
 passion of tears. " How wretched life is 1 Forgive 
 me. — Let me come back. — I'll give up Lew-Ching. 
 Do forget it all. Oh, save me ! " 
 
 " Do you mean renew our engagement ? " asked 
 Lindsay, in a commonplace manner. "You are 
 asking me now to make myself the laughing-stock of 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 75 
 
 Barford. I suppose it's unchristian, but I can't do 
 it. Besides, what would be the good ? With your 
 nature you'd probably change your mind in the cab 
 going home to-night, or elope at the last moment 
 with Lew-Ching. No, Mabel ; I can't think of you 
 as I once did : — it's my nature not to, just as it seems 
 to be yours to be so extraordinarily flighty, but I love 
 you well" enough still to wish you well. Take my 
 advice, return to sanity, throw aside this idea, — in 
 doing this madness you punish me far more than you 
 do in your desertion of me, for I see in it your ruin." 
 
 " My ruin ? " 
 
 " Oh, Mabel, poor lost Mabel, don't you see i" — 
 Can't I make you see ? I suppose I do wrong to tell 
 you that, for now you know how it hurts me you will 
 do it all the more, — that's your nature. If this chap 
 had been an ordinary Englishman I doubt if you'd 
 have accepted him in such a short while, even to 
 spite me, but seeing you could annoy me and do 
 something outrageous at the same time was too great 
 a temptation for you to resist. Oh, yes, I know just 
 how it was." 
 
 " Take me back, then, if you care to save me," she 
 sobbed. " Oh, how cold-hearted you are ! — all you 
 say is true, but it's not all been my fault, — you've 
 been so ^maddening — you haven't understood me; 
 iny soul has always been full of fire, and yours so 
 cold and grey. I've cried myself nearly blind, — one 
 word and I will return ! Lindsay " she was 
 
76 , HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 beginning when she noticed a change of expression 
 on her companion's face. 
 
 Lew-Ching had entered the room and was standing 
 behind her. 
 
 She rose from her chair in an abandonment of con- 
 fusion, she was quite speechless. 
 
 The Chinaman was standing there, imperturbably 
 calm, looking with narrowed eyelids at her tear- 
 stained face, her tell-tale face. 
 
 Then her once lover began speaking. " I have been 
 tallying over old times with Miss Conyers," said he, 
 " and it is my fault that she is so much disturbed ; 
 one cannot always be wise." 
 
 " Ah, yes, old times," said Lew-Ching, in the 
 curious wooden tones and showing as he smiled the 
 uneven white teeth. " The old times," and here 
 he stopped as if the subject were ended, but his eyes 
 motionless, absolutely still, remained on her face 
 taking in its frantic disorder, the grief, the redness of 
 eyelid. But he said nothing more, he knew that the 
 girl was still his, — if he had not known it, Lindsay's 
 next words would have told him. 
 
 " What do you wish .'' " asked Mr. Brookes, cere- 
 moniously addressing her, " shall I leave you here or 
 take you downstairs .' " 
 
 " I will stay here." 
 
 At this the Chinaman gave his curious bow in the 
 direction of Lindsay ; it was a bow of dismissal. 
 
 " Lew-Ching," said the girl, directly they were 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. ^^ 
 
 alone, " you have heard part of our conversation, — do 
 you still want to marry me ? " 
 
 " Yes, I still wish it," replied the guttural woodeny 
 tones ; " all that is nothing to me, — I do not throw 
 away a precious stone because it contains a flaw. 
 When one discovers that," he added slowly, "one 
 must alter one's design, one must shape it so that the 
 flaw can be removed." 
 
 From the moment the Chinaman had entered the 
 room his old power over her had returned — a certain 
 fascination, but now something in his words struck 
 the girl. — The words subtle, and softly spoken seemed 
 to contain a menace. She approached him, looking 
 at him searchingly. 
 
 " Lew-Ching. What do you mean ? Tell me, shall 
 I be happy ; shall you be kind to me i* — you know it 
 is a distant, distant land among strangers, my own 
 people lost to me — gone ! " 
 
 " You shall be happy," he replied, " all this 
 strangeness will wear off, a strangeness because 
 I don't know your customs, nor you mine. But 
 I think I prove to you that I love you : — I 
 come to this door. I am not listening, but as I 
 enter I hear your voice. You say, ' Take me back, 
 one word and I return to you, Lindsay.' You sob 
 and cry, your fine eyes shine with tears, — in an aban- 
 donment of grief you were about to prostrate your- 
 self at his feet, begging to be received back, like a 
 discarded servant. His heart is as cold as mountain 
 
78 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 snow, — it is like last night's fire. If you were to ask 
 him for ever he would never put you in his heart, 
 where you are in mine. There is no sentiment in 
 your love here ; you forget that one longs for what is 
 cloaked, for round that the imagination can play. 
 Your men and women make love in the open, — it is 
 like eating a dinner in theopen ; the wind cools it at 
 once. Mabel, don't think of leaving me ; — you shall 
 not get away, for even if you loved this Englishman 
 you should still marry me. — I could not lose you ; I 
 could not throw aside a jewel as the men do here it 
 appears." 
 
 He put out his hands before him with a fine gesture 
 of dignity and command. 
 
 " What matter," continued he, " what has gone 
 before, think of it no more, — you are mine now. 
 Mine," he repeated, with a curious intonation. " No, 
 it is quite settled. Dry your eyes, put your hair 
 straight, — don't let these men downstairs' see .all that 
 you feel and have felt. Below they are dancing and 
 making love to each other's wives, all in the manner 
 of your country. I watched them for some time and 
 then came up here. You English provide something 
 dramatic for one everywhere ; — no sooner had I 
 ceased to hear the curious beating of your music, and 
 left behind me a scene that is permissible here it 
 seems than I find another scene awaiting me, in 
 which you take a first part," he smiled. 
 
 As she looked at him, the smile again seemed to 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 79 
 
 CQver a menace which had flitted over his features 
 and was gone. 
 
 Then the Chinaman's eyes were bent on her with 
 that look that always calmed her, that stilled her 
 heart and made her do what he willed. 
 
 He stretched out an arm towards her and held her 
 by the hand. The pink and silver flowers on his 
 sleeve quivered for a moment as he lifted aside the 
 portiere. 
 
 Outside, the lamps threw a pink shade like fairy- 
 land. Oleanders, with blossoms rosy and snow 
 white, perfumed the air, the light fell on the China- 
 man's commanding figure, touching the exquisite 
 pale blue shades of his silken robes into a faint lilac. 
 His dark eyes were fixed on the girl with a look of 
 worship. In the dim room they had left, her ex- 
 ceeding fairness had been hidden, now the whiteness 
 of her shoulders appealed to him anew. 
 
 The landing was empty save for themselves ; a 
 low murmur of conversation ascended from the ball- 
 room below, a waltz was beginning, a curiously sad 
 and wandering movement, restless and unsatisfied, — 
 the sobbing phrases of the Morgenblatter. 
 
 It was at that moment that the girl's unbalanced 
 mind settled the question of her life. 
 
 " I am yours, Lew-Ching," said she. 
 
 He drew her towards him and would have kissed 
 her, but she trembled and drew back ; the racial 
 feeling had arisen in her at the nearness of his lips 
 and eyes. 
 
8o HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 He saw instantly that he had blundered, and 
 released her hand at once. 
 
 "Later on you will," said he. "Till then I can 
 wait." 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Mabel was better ; she had faced life ; she had not 
 got rid of her misery, but she had taken it in her 
 hands, examined it and turned it this way and that, 
 and - having abandoned all hope of life under its 
 present conditions being bearable, had leapt into the • 
 unknown thing that stretched out for her beyond the 
 seas. It was the reaction from the state of indecision 
 that had made her comparatively happy ; by an effort 
 of will she had paralysed her mind into this calm, 
 she even appeared happy to Mrs. Conyers' searching 
 eyes. 
 
 Then came the letters from various members of 
 her family, astonished kinsfolk in the shape of uncles 
 and aunts, and an enraged grandfather who, in answer 
 to Mrs. Conyers' apologetic letter announcing the 
 approaching alliance, wrote replies in various strains, 
 ranging from feigned pleasure to astonishment, incre- 
 dulity, and anger. 
 
 Mrs. Conyers was alternately grieved and pleased 
 by these letters, but Mabel didn't care ; she had put 
 on now, metaphorically speaking, a species of blinkers 
 
 7 8i 
 
82 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 and looked straight ahead at nothing but the prospect 
 of going away. NeUie alternated between grief at the 
 nature of her sister's alliance, and amusement at it, 
 and at the thought that at least her sister had cut out 
 Kitty Wears. 
 
 There was no doubt that Lew-Ching's eyes had; 
 before he met Mabel, been entrapped by Kitty's 
 dark beauty, and there had also been no doubt that 
 the Chinaman had had a certain fascination for her ; 
 it was, however, by no means so sure that Kitty had 
 ever thought of it as anything but a joke, though 
 Nellie, to allay the doubts that arose in her wise, if 
 frivolous little mind and as a melancholy satisfaction 
 to herself, tried to think of her as one worsted in an 
 encounter. Kitty had given some slight colour to 
 this picture of herself as a disappointed young woman, 
 by suddenly and quite unexpectedly becoming en- 
 gaged to one of the ugliest and most insignificant of 
 curates of St. James', where they, in common with the 
 Conyers, worshipped. 
 
 Nellie, fresh from the High School, where it would 
 appear every subject under heaven was discussed, 
 burst triumphantly in on her sister one afternoon to 
 announce the fact. 
 
 " Kitty Wears is engaged to Mr. Bowls ! Isn't it 
 awful ! A man who is good, insignificant, plain, 
 wears his trousers well up to his ankles, and is 
 moderately well off; he has, in fact, every vice — 
 nothing could be worse ! — Well, they needn't pretend 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 83 
 
 to sneer at your match after that. You are at least 
 doing something quite imprudent and quite original 
 and that's always nourishing. You'll send for me, 
 dear, won't you, as soon as I get free from these 
 lessons ? — For that matter I might come at once for 
 all the good they are to me." 
 
 "Nonsense, Nellie, you must learn something," 
 said her sister. 
 
 " Ah, but I don't learn, — they go out of my head at 
 once. I can pass no exams, unless I keep my cuffs 
 and finger nails simply saturated, smothered in dates 
 and geography and even then I only scratch in about 
 a hundred and fiftieth. Neither you nor I have any 
 head, I'm afraid — and," with a pleased chuckle, "from 
 what I can gather I believe that's just what they like 
 in China. Lew-Ching tells me they have a proverb : 
 ' A wise man builds a city ; a wise woman pulls it 
 down.' — I told him that in case of my coming out to 
 Hankow they need not be alarmed — the cities would 
 be all right. I might have said the same of you," she 
 added, throwing off the frivolous tones and looking 
 sadly and searchingly at her sister. 
 
 " You might indeed." 
 
 " He's very lovely on the subject of Chinese 
 manners and customs, whenever I can get him to 
 talk about them at all. Do you know that's all rot 
 about Chinese gentlemen taking their birds out 
 walking? You know that book we have upstairs, 
 ' Side-lights on the Celestials,' where there's a picture 
 
84 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 of four gentlemen walking out each with a birdcage 
 with a stoutish bird in it. The wood-cut is labelled 
 ' Amusements of the Chinese.' I showed him that, 
 and he came the nearest thing to laughing that I've 
 ever seen him. He said as much as that he didn't 
 see where the amusement came in. He says these 
 are travellers' tales, and I was glad to hear it, for I 
 hope now that all the other things I've read about 
 them are false too." 
 
 " I daresay they are," murmured her sister absently. 
 
 " No doubt of it. I believe the marriage will be a 
 good thing ; I believe you'll make quite a Christian 
 of him. You'll have a lot of nice . English friends, 
 and no doubt, as time wears on, you'll be able to 
 influence him into a stove-pipe hat and trousers; 
 then when you do return here with him he won't 
 create such a flare as he does at present. — Mabel ! " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Do wake up, there's a good girl, — you're always 
 in a sort of doldrum. Do you know, among other 
 things, I've been trying to get him to. give me some 
 •description of what your life will be out there; just 
 to tell me a few things so that mamma and I can 
 picture it, but I really believe that he thinks that I • 
 am making fun of him, for he always seems to elude 
 my questions, or says, ' Life there is much as life 
 here,' or some such thing. Sometimes he simply 
 smiles and says, 'She will see what the life is like in 
 China.' It's stupid of him.^-Now, if a foreigner were 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 85 
 
 to ask me about our doings here I could give him a 
 fair idea of them, and why can't he ? Why should he 
 be so reticent ? — Mabel, oh, Mabel, what's the matter ? 
 Why do you sit there as if you were asleep or dead ? 
 Your face is quite white, but for those splashes of 
 colour. — You frighten me ! — Mabel ! " 
 
 Mabel had been sitting staring before her with 
 wide 9pen eyes and a white face ; she seemed as if 
 she were looking at something her sister could not 
 see. Was it the far-off life, that life that the Chinaman 
 had been so reticent about? Was she looking out 
 into space over the seas she must traverse to the land 
 beyond, unknown and strange ? 
 
 Whatever thought it was that lay in her soul had 
 strained the red from her lips and face, leaving only 
 those two spots of colour on the cheekbones near her 
 eyes. 
 
 At her sister's voice she roused herself, with that 
 obvious effort with which she always had to pull 
 herself together now. 
 
 " What is the matter ? " she inquired crossly. — 
 " Can't I sit quietly listening without your imagining 
 that I'm dead ? Let me alone, — you're like those 
 people who dig up seeds to see if they are growing. — 
 I've heard all you've been saying, every word. — I'm 
 not deaf, child. — No, no, Nellie," as she saw the tears 
 coming to her sister's eyes. " For goodness sake don't 
 cry — there's nothing worth crying for in this world ; 
 you'll understand that some day ; you know I don't 
 
86 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 mean to be cross, only I get vexed so quickly 
 now." 
 
 " Yes, but there was nothing to vex or grieve you 
 in what I said, — I was trying to be nice, only now, 
 Mabel, you're so r" 
 
 " What am I, pray ? " 
 
 "Well, you're so queer, that's the only word for it ; 
 I can't make you out, and you looked so dreadful 
 just then that you frightened me. — I'm the only one 
 in. the house that's at all human now; mamma's 
 awful to be with, and when I try and cheer you up 
 you — — " 
 
 " My dear child, don't cry, dry- your eyes : I hate 
 to see crying ; — I've done enough of it for the whole 
 world and I know how painful it is. As for China, 
 don't bother about -Lew-Ching— I'll know all soon 
 enough, and then you shall hear too, — you shall 
 
 know." 
 
 ****** 
 
 This was a week before the wedding ; then had 
 come the actual day, the marriage before the regis- 
 trar, then afterwards at the church. This latter had 
 been insisted on by Mabel's grandfather, Mr. Bram- 
 ston. He had come up from Norfolk a fortnight 
 before the wedding. Having from the first an intense 
 dislike to the proposed marriage, he had arrived in a 
 state of extreme irritability -of mind which had become 
 something very like mental collapse, when he had 
 been presented to Mr, Lew-Ching, and had quite 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 87 
 
 realised how very Chinese and how very different 
 from the Norfolk young man he was. 
 
 A lawyer in Norwich, he had left his work, as he 
 told every one, at extreme inconvenience and loss to 
 himself, to see what could be done for his poor 
 daughter, Mrs. Conyers, and her refractory child- 
 He had sat in the carriage all the way up to London, 
 a white-haired figure, a type of the intensely respon- 
 sible family lawyer, pondering on the extraordinary 
 freaks of human nature and wondering, as poor Mrs. 
 Conyers had done, why this appalling thing had hap- 
 pened in his family of all in England. 
 
 Mrs. Conyers had met him in town for a chat 
 before bringing him to Barford, and on the way home 
 had tried to put the aspects of the situation before 
 him in a better light, but the gravity of his stern 
 features had not relaxed ; his mouth remained set 
 and grave, and it was evident that he had come not 
 to bless the wedding feast, but, since the thing was 
 inevitable, to guard his relatives from imposture and 
 further shame. 
 
 He was shocked and disgusted with the whole 
 thing, but since the marriage was not to be prevented, 
 he now wished to circumvent the wiles of foreigners 
 whom, he seemed to suggest, almost invariably repu- 
 diated their marriage with English women if possible. 
 For a short while he even entertained the idea that, 
 as a precaution, they should be married according to 
 the rites of China. 
 
88 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 The Chinaman later on listened to this scheme 
 with his usual imperturbable calm. As Mr. Bramston 
 talked, he showed his irregular teeth in a placid smile ; 
 it was quite evident that he was willing to be married 
 anywhere on earth or according to any rites that 
 could be suggested to him. 
 
 It was in fact rather disappointing to Mr. Bramston 
 to find him so amenable to reason, for, in his state of 
 anger at the circumstances and at having to leave his 
 business to come up to Barford, he was rather hoping 
 to find him bent on evading his responsibilities, so 
 that he could have fair reason for a quarrel. 
 
 Instead of this, he agreed with almost unnatural 
 alacrity, to every suggestion as to either money, 
 settlements, or marriage, — anything to get Mabel. 
 After that the deluge, was in fact what his manner 
 rather suggested to the bystander. 
 
 " What are your marriages like in China ? " asked 
 the lawyer. " Could you be married in England 
 according to your rites ? " 
 
 " I think you cannot," observed Lew-Ching, sitting 
 placidly, with the toes of his felt shoes together, and 
 his oblique, golden-brown eyes fixed on the old 
 lawyer — " Just like those figures you see on the 
 mantelpiece," as the latter afterwards observed to 
 his wife. " I think you cannot : — there are wanted 
 our Priests, our Church, — understand it is not that 
 I will not," and a gleam of amusement appeared for 
 an instant in his eyes. "But what are your cere- 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 89 
 
 monies ? " the lawyer had inquired, and Lew-Ching 
 had begun describing the details of a Chinese mar- 
 riage. 
 
 Mr. Bramston had listened intently in fresh horror 
 at this barbarian ; he was almost on the point of 
 saying something to that effect, but he checked 
 himself and observed instead — - 
 
 "Ah, yes, yes, I see. You need not tell me any 
 more about your native customs, Mr. Lew-Ching : — 
 they would be impossible in England." He said it 
 with an air of pride. " We should have the whole 
 town round about us," he observed, in a mental aside, 
 " and look more damned foolish than we do already. 
 No, no, — the church just for respectability's sake, 
 after that I wash my hands of the girl, — one can't 
 help people who are bent on ruining themselves." 
 
 And so they had been married at St. James' by 
 the rector, assisted by that same ugly curate that 
 Kitty Wears had engaged herself to. The only hitch 
 that occurred that day was in the form of a telegram 
 from Mabel's friend Nancy,saying that illness prevented 
 her travelling up to the wedding. Curiously enough 
 this news gave her a sense of relief The bridegroom 
 had behaved admirably during the ceremony, and 
 Mabel had looked beautiful, —the whole thing had 
 gone off better than poor Mrs. Conyers had hoped. 
 People had been very kind, she said. Mrs. Deans at 
 the wedding was resplendent, gay, and talking to 
 every one. Mrs. Conyers' father had returned to his 
 
go HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 work and was not present, but the other relatives of 
 the family were all there, attracted by various motives, 
 ranging from mere curiosity to an honest desire to 
 support Mrs. Conyers in this trying position. 
 
 It was a wedding such as had never been seen in 
 Barford ; the very street outside the house was lined 
 with people. Mrs. Conyers ran out through the crowd 
 of their own friends, who had been throwing rice and 
 slippers, to see the last of the girl as she drove away ; 
 she folded her arms about her, sobbing. 
 
 " Mabel, darling, you'll come home again ? " cried 
 she. " Lew-Ching, you will bring her home before 
 long?" 
 
 Lew-Ching had agreed to this, as to all else. 
 
 " Yes, she will return," he answered in his woodeny 
 voice. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 As it happened Mabel had never before been with 
 Lew-Ching at any such public place as a railway 
 station, open to the common herd, except on such 
 occasions as when they had been to the theatre. 
 Then it had been night and the Chinaman had been 
 very little noticed. She had never been out walking 
 with him but twice and then their walk had been in 
 the neighbourhood of her own house, in the quiet 
 streets of suburban residences where there were very 
 few people to mark the outlandish appearance and 
 dress of her companion. She had met him chiefly at 
 the houses of friends, and in her own home, in the 
 company of people who were too well bred to stare or 
 show astonishment, and who took Lew-Ching as a 
 matter of course. 
 
 Now their appearance together at the Barford 
 station caused a profound sensation, and not, Mabel 
 felt, a sensation that was complimentary. Every one 
 stared, including the ticket collector. Street urchins 
 with the terrible facility boys have, for seemingly 
 springing out of space to gather round anything 
 
92 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 unusual, collected about them. A trio of servant 
 girls out for a holiday stood close beside them, and 
 when they had realised the scene before them, burst 
 into rude laughter. 
 
 It was quite a relief to get on to the platform 
 downstairs and leave behind them the people who 
 had swarmed into the station from the street, but as 
 she and her husband stood by the door, having their 
 tickets clipped, some one brushed against her dress, 
 and some rice fell out. The ticket collector noticed 
 it, and looked at Lew-Ching and herself, and again 
 Mabel knew that the look was not complimentary. 
 
 There was a lurking insolence in the man's glance ; 
 she felt an intense longing to be quit of Barford and 
 its people, to be in some place where she was not 
 known as she was here, where every eye would not 
 say to her " How strange ! " She hated the rice for 
 falling down and betraying her, for she tried to 
 persuade herself that it was this that the people 
 stared at.' It was an idiotic custom w'orthy of 
 savages, this throwing of rice ; she felt irritable. 
 
 Lew-Ching had been married in a most exquisite 
 robe of a dull shade of pink, but he had put on for 
 the journey an old and shabby, coarse silk dress of 
 dark blue edged with black gimp, which had become 
 brown and threadbare with use. The loose dark 
 garment gave him a slovenly, dingy appearance, and 
 brought out the sallowness of his skin. As a fact it 
 was the dress he had worn on the voyage from China. 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 93 
 
 Somehow in putting off his gay-coloured and delicate 
 robes, he had lost the romantic look which had taken 
 the girl's eye, and had been one of the many factors 
 leading her to this end ; he now no longer had the 
 princely and dignified air, that subtle charm of 
 mystery which together with his foreign ways had 
 distinguished him from the Englishmen, arid had 
 lent a false charm to him, in the mind of this girl, 
 that ill-regulated mind of hers. 
 
 As he took the tickets and stood beside her, he 
 looked merely a yellow-faced Chinaman ; all charm 
 was gone, — his very expression was less pleasing. If 
 he had looked as handsome as he had sometimes 
 done, she might have forgiven the sensation he was 
 creating, in pride at his appearance; the sort of 
 angry pride she had felt that night at Mrs. 
 Newcomes' when he had stood beside her in his 
 exquisite foreign dress carrying the stephanotis — 
 but here he was simply a Chinaman and nothing 
 more. 
 
 But she stifled her irritation, that intense desire to 
 quarrel which she had felt so often lately, and made 
 herself very pleasant to him. 
 
 At Charing Cross, she thought, there would be less 
 notice taken, no one, she told herself, minded any 
 one's else concerns in great cities like London or 
 Paris. Whenever she had been in town she had, she 
 remembered, seen some strange or foreign sight, some 
 poor .distraught woman chattering to herself as she 
 
94 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 hurried through the streets, some foreigner in the 
 dress of his country, a Brazilian Gancho in his huge 
 hat and leathern leggings, or a Japanese lady, and 
 these people she remembered she had met in Regent 
 Street and other places teeming with life, in the very 
 arteries of the vast city, and no one seemed to care, 
 or to feel enough interest to turn round and look at 
 them. 
 
 But when the train drew up at the station and she 
 and her husband alighted, there was exactly the same 
 interest created, and again Mabel noticed that the 
 looks bent on her were not merely looks of astonish- 
 ment. 
 
 They secured their luggage and passed through the 
 barrier. The space by Smith's bookstall was as usual 
 fully occupied by the crowd of men to be found there 
 any hour of any day, passing, repassing, reading, 
 lounging, smoking. 
 
 The spectacle of a pig-tailed Chinaman in the 
 company of an extremely good-looking and fashion- 
 ably , dressed English girl, who evidently and un- 
 mistakably belonged to the better classes, took every 
 eye. Some of the commoner of the men stared at 
 her with looks of familiarity and of insolence. 
 Presently Lew-Ching went away to get the tickets,- 
 and as she remained by their luggage a cad stood 
 beside her, pipe in mouth, and smiled in her face. 
 
 This smile was the most horrible thing that had 
 yet befallen her in connection with Lew-Ching. It" 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 95 
 
 frightened her. The expression on the face of this 
 low-class man had more effect on her than all her 
 mother's words and more than all the entreaties of 
 Lindsay, or than any comment he had made on the 
 Chinaman ! 
 
 What had she fallen to, that this atom of the scum 
 of the city should smile contemptuously on her, as on 
 some low and outcast woman ? 
 
 Outcast! — ah yes — had she not heard that 
 dreadful word from both Lindsay Brookes and her 
 mother ? 
 
 If only her veil were thicker ! She looked down at 
 her feet, cased in pretty patent leather shoes, the feet 
 that Lew-Ching had told her were nearly as small as 
 those of his own women, the modish waistcoat of her 
 smart travelling dress, cut with the fascinating affecta- 
 tion of mannishness that suited her so well. Oh, to 
 look dowdy and unnoticeable ! 
 
 She was seized by a sudden resolution : going into 
 the ladies' cloak-room she unrolled a wrap she had 
 carried in her hand for the boat, and put it on, 
 enveloping herself completely. She tore the golden 
 aigrettes from the smart hat and, with shaking fingers, 
 bent the straw so that it should overshadow her face. 
 
 The room was occupied by the usual crowd : the 
 dowdy ladies up from the country who consider it the 
 right thing to wait in the ladies' room rather than risk 
 the terrible adventures that they imagine would befal 
 them if they were to remain in a mixed company, the 
 
96 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 inevitable lady, nurse, and baby on their travels, the 
 two or three women also inevitable, who had come in 
 to remake their complexions. But Mabel didn't see 
 any of these, she only saw in the glass her own face 
 and eyes and the patch of colour in her cheeks, and 
 the trembling white hand that was dragging the 
 covering over the smart dress. 
 
 In tearing out the aigrette some of the ribbon and 
 lace came away too, she threw it all down on the 
 ground. A woman who was powdering her face 
 caught sight of Mabel's reflection in the glass and 
 paused for a moment watching her. One of the 
 ladies from the country nudged the other and said in 
 an undertone, "Just look, she must be mad ! " 
 
 Her companion nodded assent. " Or else one of 
 those dreadful women one hears about in the Divorce 
 Court, whose husband is having her watched, and who 
 has rushed in here to disguise herself," she said ; "you 
 know, James always tells me Charing Cross is an, 
 awful place." 
 
 And then Mabel had stood at the glass swing-door 
 watching, unwilling to venture forth till the last 
 minute. She saw her husband return and stand by 
 the luggage, he was, she noticed, looking everywhere 
 for her, and there was a disturbed, excited expression 
 in his yellow face as he alternately glanced up at the 
 station clock and then gazed in all directions for her. 
 
 Something in his eyes made her think suddenly 
 that he was afraid she had escaped and would not 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 97 
 
 return. She had never before seen him looking 
 anxious, then she thought how easily, had she wished 
 it, she could have gone away into that city, whose 
 roar was in her ears, and never, never have seen 
 again this man who half fascinated and half repulsed 
 her. It would have been no use to rush away with- 
 out a shilling in her pocket, as she was now, but if 
 she had been a rich woman, she could have done it, 
 there would have been a little hue and cry and then 
 she would have been forgotten by every one but her 
 mother and sister and might live in London in peace." 
 It was the look on the cad's face that had put these 
 thoughts in her mind, that disordei'ed mind, a medley 
 of hopes, fears, and anticipations. She forgot that 
 this very situation that she found herself in had been 
 placed before her by Lindsay and her mother, and 
 that she had not heeded it, and that poor Mrs. 
 Conyers had offered her this very thing as an 
 alternative ; to go away and never set foot in 
 Barford again. Yes, it was the old story ; mere 
 trifles influenced her now. 
 
 Then struck her, the pathos of the Chinese figure 
 waitirig by the boxes, and she ran out to him. She 
 was somehow thankful to notice how his face 
 brightened, — the look of relief. — He did love her, 
 thank God ! 
 
 He addressed her, stammering, a trick he had 
 when excited. " I could find you nowhere, — I was 
 afraid. — It is time almost for the Continental train," 
 
98 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 he said. " Come, let us be going." He looked 
 critically at her change of dress, but said nothing. 
 
 There was one good thing ; now she had made her- 
 self look as plain as possible in the waterproof and the 
 altered hat, the people didn't stare so much, in fact, 
 they hardly looked at all, and in her usual impulsive 
 way, she lost her irritation, and was immediately in 
 a very good humour. She no longer thought of 
 running away. The first class carriage they got into 
 was filled with passengers. Perhaps because they 
 were well-bred people, or perhaps because Mabel 
 had become so dowdy, they didn't stare. Lew-Ching, 
 taken away from the platform and its common sur- 
 roundings, and leaning back in this luxurious 
 carriage, with its white-covered cushions, seemed 
 to have once more that mysterious and princely 
 air with which her imagination had from the first 
 endowed him. Still, appearing in public with him 
 had been extremely embarrassing and, whether they 
 were in London which they had left, Paris whither 
 they were bent, or Hankow their ultimate destina- 
 tion, she could not live in the hideous disguise of 
 a waterproof and a battered hat, looking like a ladies' 
 maid out of employment. As she caught sight of 
 herself in the glass of the carriage she realised how 
 acutely she must have suffered before she had marred 
 her appearance thus. 
 
 No, there would be no pleasure in life, her frivolous 
 mind had always loved her beauty and had loved the 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 99 
 
 dress that set it off so well ; besides, what was to 
 become of all those pretty gowns of hers in the huge 
 Saratoga trunk? No, no, Lew-Ching must change 
 from this outlandish Chinese dress, and if he loved 
 her, as he most surely did, there would be no diffi- 
 culty in getting him to see reason. 
 
 The train had started, the other passengers had 
 disposed of their rugs, and having produced their 
 books and newspapers had settled down for the 
 journey ; Lew-Ching was sitting beside her leaning 
 back against the cushions ; she leant over the divi- 
 sion of the carriage and began speaking to him. 
 The annoyance she had gone through, though for the 
 moment dispelled, had been too poignant not to 
 remain on her mind, besides, it would be a recurring 
 evil if it were not put a stop to, and on her husband's 
 part it would be so very, very easy. She determined 
 to speak at once. 
 
 " Lew-Ching, wouldn't it be better for you to wear, 
 European dress ? " she said. 
 
 " European dress ! " he repeated after her with 
 surprise. 
 
 " Yes," she went on, " I admire your Chinese robes, 
 you know, but they make one so noticed." 
 
 He altered his position and turned round to look 
 at her the better. 
 
 " Oh, no," he replied, " I couldn't change it." He 
 spoke with an amused smile. " Do you really think 
 I would change my beautiful dress for the ugly dress 
 
loo HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 of your men ? " He thought for a moment and then 
 said, " Will you change to Chinese dress when we 
 arrive at home ? " 
 
 "Home?" 
 
 " Yes, home ; China, my home, — and yours," he 
 added. 
 
 " Oh, no," said she quickly,—" I couldn't." 
 
 He bowed, as if he had expected this answer. 
 " Then how do you expect me ? " he asked. " It is 
 more likely for you than for me : we never change : 
 you do ; you adapt yourselves to any people, your 
 travellers throw in their lot with many different 
 nations, unlike the French, unlike almost every other 
 nation, but a Chinaman never alters. As I am now, 
 I shall always be. Yes, Mabel, you will sooner 
 change than I, — you must not ask me to 
 change." 
 
 His face was partly in shadow, the lamp of the 
 railway carriage threw a light on the shiny forehead 
 beneath his cap. She was watching his face, the two 
 lines on either side of his cheek had appeared, giving 
 a disagreeable expression to the mouth, a curious 
 grin destroyed the handsomeness of his face. 
 
 "What are you thinking of? " asked she. 
 
 He hesitated a moment before replying. "Only 
 this, in proof of what I say, that you can adapt 
 yourself In marrying me, you prove that you can 
 change." No rebuke was intended by her husband, 
 he merely meant to convey to her a truth, but had 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. loi 
 
 conveyed it awkwardly, but his speech jarred on her, 
 sounding almost like a reproach. 
 
 Mabel was silent, thinking, a depression had fallen 
 on her at his words, expressing to her an attitude of 
 mind immutable, unswerving. She recognised now 
 this quality in him, just as in the past she had 
 recognised that other attitude of waiting ; the patient 
 waiting of an animal for some lesser prey. She 
 dimly realised that she could never alter this man or 
 bend him to her will ; as he was now he would ever 
 be, a Chinaman to the heart, with the conservatism 
 of the Chinese in his very blood, never to be eradi- 
 cated. 
 
 She thought all this vaguely, not as a question 
 to be considered, but as an impression on a mind too 
 tired to think, then she caught the expression in 
 Lew-Ching's eyes, the look of rapt devotion. He loved 
 her ; what after all did it matter whether the people 
 stared or not, what they^ thought of her, whether 
 Lew-Ching wore this dress or that, what did it all 
 matter ? She even began to feel a respect for his 
 calmness, his holding to the old usages, the old 
 customs, as he had said the Chinese did, and would 
 always do, his resistance to her in this matter was 
 surely a thing wholly apart from his love for her, 
 there was no cause for a quarrel in it. 
 
 Then she looked down at the waterproof and re- 
 membered with what anxiety she had effected this 
 disguise just because a cad had smiled at her. Then 
 
102 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 came home to her the truth of Lew-Ching's words as 
 to her changing sooner than he. Yes, it was true, — 
 but for all that she didn't unloosen the waterproof, 
 but sat with it huddled around her. 
 
 Occasionally the lady seated opposite to her would 
 look up from her book and glance at her and her 
 companion ; thus they sped on. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 It was on board ship after the honeymoon that the 
 iron first began to enter the girl's soul. 
 
 The fortnight in Paris had been a time of com- 
 parative happiness ; the Hfe they had spent there had 
 been what Mabel loved ; a life of theatres, the opera 
 of shops. With the strange mixture of depth and 
 triviality, of ignorance and cleverness, that were 
 characteristic of her, she spent the time pleasantly 
 enough and her husband's manner to her was kind- 
 ness itself. 
 
 The girl had a curious facility in putting aside 
 deeper reflections, those thoughts of the future that 
 tried to obtrude themselves on her, now she 
 thought merely of the superb streets, the diamond 
 shops, the cafh where they dined. She had never 
 left England before, and Paris, with all its opulence, 
 its artistic luxury and its charm, seemed like an 
 enchanted city ; it pleased her with its gaiety, its 
 endless variety, and kept her- from thinking too 
 
 painfully. 
 
 103 
 
104 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 Lew-Ching was not ungenerous and was anxious 
 for her to see all. They were endlessly driving 
 about, she sitting alert and upright, watching, with 
 her large beautiful eyes the kaleidoscope of splendid 
 forms, that went to make up this princely city, he 
 leaning back, proud of her beauty, pleased with her 
 pleasure, but showing no emotion, with no expression 
 on his face to show that any of these things appealed 
 to him. 
 
 Everywhere the contrast between them created a 
 sensation, and now Mabel began to notice that, 
 mixed with his admiration for her, was a jealousy 
 that he did not attempt to conceal. Though he 
 accepted it as inevitable, he yet hated in his heart 
 that men should look on this handsome woman, who 
 was his. It was an inherited race feeling and in his 
 very blood ; handed down to him from many genera- 
 tions of Chinamen, who had secluded their female 
 possessions in the women's compartments of their 
 yamuns. 
 
 Then, too, beyond protestations of love, beyond 
 the mere surface knowledge of things acquired 
 during his brief stay in Europe, he could not talk 
 to her, they had no thought in common, thus when, 
 their honeymoon over, they went aboard the Orestes 
 bound for China, she saw with pleasure the English 
 faces on its deck. 
 
 She was at first too ill to leave her cabin, and it 
 was only on the second day that she summoned 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 105 
 
 strength and resolution to get out and take some 
 fresh air. 
 
 Her husband had loolced after her, he had brought 
 her food from every meal, but she noticed he had not 
 endeavoured to make her rouse herself and get out, 
 as an Englishman would have done ; he had seemed 
 to take it as a matter of course that she should suffer 
 and be ill and remain in the close cabin, and had not 
 seemed to consider that the longer she stayed below, 
 the worse she would be. It was the stewardess who 
 had assisted her to coil her beautiful hair in a knot, 
 who had helped her to dress and had got her into her 
 reefer jacket and persuaded her to get up on deck. 
 She had led a very open air life ; the seclusion and 
 bad air of the cabin had made her faint and weak ; 
 she crept up the companion ladder on to the 
 deck. 
 
 It was bitterly cold ; a north-east wind was driving 
 over it, the sort of wind that brings blue into the face 
 instead of red, deck chairs stood about on which sat 
 one or two people wrapped in rugs, but most of the 
 passengers were walking about in twos and threes 
 or were standing about talking. They were the 
 usual people to be met with on a China bound ship. 
 The officials returning after leave, during which they 
 had endeavoured to get out of their bones all that 
 China had put there ; the women, for the most part, 
 with complexions spoilt and withered by foreign food 
 and foreign heat and fever, and dressed in the hideous 
 
io6 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 style that the travelled English women of a certain 
 age consider suitable for board ship. A heavy swell 
 was on, it was difficult to stand, and the girl stood 
 there looking for her husband. He was not among 
 the various groups who stood about talking. 
 
 Then suddenly she caught sight of two Chinamen 
 standing side by side at the lee of the ship, no one 
 was near them, they were alone, one of them was 
 Lew-Ching. 
 
 He had not told her that he had a compatriot on 
 board ; while she had been below she had pictured 
 him with the other passengers, she had thought to 
 find him chatting with some lady, as he had been so 
 fond of doing in Barford. 
 
 She went up to them, her husband's back was 
 turned towards" her, but his companion was facing 
 her. He was an ordinary type of Chinaman, a far 
 more common type than Lew-Ching, his eyes were 
 more obliquely set, his nose smaller, the Chinese 
 peculiarity of the high cheek bones and the flatness 
 of face were more accentuated. He stared at the 
 beautiful English woman when she approached his 
 companion and spoke to him. 
 
 Lew-Ching turned round, he had not expected to 
 see her on deck; he had no objection to her ap- 
 pearing there, but, with his Chinese ideas of seclusion 
 for women, he had not, on the other hand, thought 
 of it as anything dreadful that she should remain 
 below. He had not imagined that life with the sole 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 107 
 
 and, even then, only occasional companionship of the 
 stewardess, need necessarily be irksome to a woman ; 
 his ideas were purely Asiatic, he had only a thin 
 veneer of European manners that he had acquired 
 on the voyage out and afterwards during his sojourn 
 in Barford, these he had picked up as a parrot does, 
 .without knowing their meaning. What he had said 
 to Mabel that night at Mrs. Newcome's was quite true, 
 there was not a beggar in the streets of England who 
 did not know her better than he; he could never 
 know her, race separated them. 
 
 " Well, Mabel," he said, in his guttural tones, and 
 with no change of face, " you are better, — you come 
 on deck." He made no attempt to introduce her to 
 his companion, and after a second look at her the 
 man left them, but Mabel noticed he did not join the 
 other passengers, but walked away, a solitary figure, 
 and remained alternately looking over the side of the 
 ship and at herself. 
 
 " Who is your friend," asked Mabel. 
 
 " Oh,— he is Mr. T'seng." 
 
 " And mayn't I know him ? " asked the girl 
 smilingly. 
 
 " I did not introduce you," said her husband, 
 " because it is not usual with us to introduce men to 
 our wives ; it is not our way ; — he would have been 
 astonished." 
 
 " It is not your way ? " echoed Mabel. 
 
 Lew-Ching paused before replying and then he 
 
io8 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 said, " Look, this is it ; I act instinctively in the 
 manner of my country, as you do in the way of 
 yours. Yet it is mere instinct with me, for when I 
 reflect, I see that I am wrong; — I cannot behave as if 
 you were one of my own women, and that, doubtless, 
 will be understood when I act otherwise than is the 
 custom with us." 
 
 " Are the other people nice ? " asked the girl 
 wistfully, 
 
 " Oh, as for that," replied he, " I have not seen 
 much of them — they are English." 
 
 " You prefer your Chinese friend .' " she suggested, 
 glancing again at the figure in the distance. 
 
 " Well, he is not my friend ; he is merely a fellow- 
 passenger, but countrymen are more to each other 
 than foreigners — that is natural." 
 
 The word foreigners as applied to English people 
 struck on the girl with a chill, yet it was quite true. 
 She looked over towards the groups of people stand- 
 ing about together talking, her back had been turned 
 to them and, when she faced round, she saw that 
 all were looking in the direction of Lew-Ching and 
 herself; she and her husband were evidently the 
 subject of conversation. 
 
 "I wonder who they all are," she murmured with a 
 wistful intonation. 
 
 He shrugged his shoulders and clasping his hands 
 before him, looked placidly and uninterestedly at the 
 people. They were nothing to him. 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 109 
 
 " I wonder if any of them are going to Hankow," 
 she continued. 
 
 "Yes, there are a couple on board who come from 
 there, Mr. and Mrs. Norton." 
 
 " You know them," timidly. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Norton, I know, — I have met him in 
 business." 
 
 " And his wife ? " 
 
 " No, not his wife." 
 
 She was silent for a moment, still looking over 
 towards the people, then she turned aside from the 
 sight and her lips trembled. 
 
 " Oh, it has been so wretched down there," she 
 murmured, "such a misery of sickness and then so 
 dull too, — I felt I must get out of it, but I never 
 should have had the spirit but for the stewardess, she 
 dressed me, and did my hair and got this thick 
 jacket out of my box, and brought me half way up 
 the steps to come on deck. She said I should be 
 seriously ill if I stayed there.'' 
 
 " Oh, seriously ill," said her husband. " I think she 
 exaggerates, — but of course, truly, it is better up here." 
 
 " Oh, yes, although it is so cold. Never mind, so 
 long as I have left that prison below and we are 
 together again — I have such a horror of being alone, 
 — I get the dismals. And then the stewardess, good 
 as she is, is such dull company ; she is very kind, 
 but she does nothing but stare at me, and she can 
 say nothing to cheer me up " 
 
no HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 The Chinaman looked at her in astonishment. 
 " But, Mabel, you do not want to be cheered," said 
 he ; " what makes you sad ? — there is nothing." 
 
 " No, only I was alone down there, and I kept on 
 thinking of this new life and wondering how I should 
 like it — and how things would turn out " (with the 
 ghost of a smile), " it's such a new departure, you 
 see " 
 
 " Yes, yes, I see." The eyes were regarding her 
 now with a curious expression in their depths. 
 
 She was silent for a moment and then began 
 speaking again in a rapid undertone — 
 
 " Yes, and then, you know, there's something very 
 odd about my head, — I've felt it for some time past ; 
 I'm all right when I'm with people, but when I'm left 
 alone I keep on thinking and thinking till I'm tired, 
 and I never get at anything by this thought — that" s 
 the horrid part of it, — the thought, whatever it is, 
 goes on till it seems to be stopped by some thick 
 thing, something it gets into like a sponge and then 
 
 I have to begin all over again ." She stopped 
 
 short with a piteous expression. 
 
 " Mabel, it is only your being sick and tired." 
 
 " Oh, no, it's not that ; I've only not had it lately 
 because I've never been alone, and there's been some- 
 thing fresh each day, and Paris was so lovely ; but 
 my head has felt so tired ever since — oh, ever since 
 some time before I met you, — and then down in that 
 cabin with no one to speak to but the woman " 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. in 
 
 " I did not think of all this, Mabel." 
 
 " Oh, no," cried she quickly, " don't think that ; I 
 don't mean it reproachfully, — I should never reproach 
 you even if you were bad to me " 
 
 " Dear Mabel " 
 
 " I've learnt there's no good in reproaches . . . 
 But what I mean is, that I should always make the 
 best of things and hold to you, — whom have I 
 besides ? I'm just as if I were on a raft with you — 
 no, no. I don't suppose I should have minded it if 
 it had been the old days, — I should have taken up a 
 nice amusing novel, and read and been quite happy 
 and I should have slept. A year ago I used to sleep 
 like a top, just fancy . . . Let's walk about, I feel 
 cold even through this jacket. Yes, I must say that 
 dear old person below is depressing, she's been a 
 lady's maid in Shanghai, but she wouldn't tell me 
 anything about the place or about the life, — would 
 only stare at me." 
 
 " Pooh — it was because she had nothing to tell ; — 
 the English only know their own life there, not ours." 
 
 " Why not ? " 
 
 " Oh, — we do not mix in society with foreigners, 
 we have our own.'' 
 
 The girl stopped short in her walk, staring at him. 
 
 "But you will now you've been to England and 
 know all about us ? " 
 
 The Chinaman smiled a curious smile, almost a 
 grin, the unpleasant lines appeared in his face. 
 
112 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 " As to that we shall see," he replied ; " of course 
 you must understand that our life is not the life you 
 have led. — I cannot give you the English life any 
 more than you in Barford could give me my Chinese 
 life, but you shall have the best I can afford of luxury, 
 I will do all I can, — my mother will receive you into 
 her house as a daughter." 
 
 " Into her house," the girl repeated ; " but you 
 have a house surely?" 
 
 " Yes, but it is my privilege to have my mother 
 with me. I know you do not find it so in England, 
 but, with us we value it." 
 
 Mabel made no reply. What she had said to him 
 was true ; in the present mood of loneliness and 
 longing for love she would keep in with him what- 
 ever happened, whatever she conceived to be for her 
 in the future ; she, who had once been so wayward, 
 was willing to accept anything, she was beginning to 
 be starved with the loneliness of her position. She 
 thought for a moment and then murmured some 
 platitude about the virtues of being good to one's 
 parents, and then she said she was tired, she would 
 go and sit down. 
 
 Lew-Ching walked with her to a little group of 
 chairs in a sheltered spot, and when she had seated 
 herself walked away. She lost sight of him, but 
 presently he passed in sight and then she saw that 
 he had regained his companion. They were deep in 
 conversation, she had never seen her husband look so 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 113 
 
 Chinese : the peculiarities of his face were exag- 
 gerated by the proximity of this other ugly Chinese 
 face. The other had on a hideous wadded quilted 
 robe, no doubt in view of the pinching north-east 
 wind. Lew-Ching, however, wore the ugly, blue robe 
 that he had travelled in, his face looked very cold, he 
 had tucked either hand into his voluminous sleeves. 
 Mabel noticed for the first time that he turned his 
 toes in, and that the Chinese shoe is the most clumsy 
 foot covering in the world. Owing to its being so 
 thickly wadded, the upper dress of the other man 
 stood out like an extinguisher, but the wind whistled 
 in her husband's old, blue silk robe. 
 
 As she saw the two together and apart from other 
 people, a dreadful sense of isolation crept over her ; 
 she too must share this isolation. 
 
 A choking feeling came in her throat, she looked 
 at the people about her ; if only some one would be 
 kind to her. Sitting close to her were two ladies at 
 work, and an elderly gentleman wrapped in a shawl ; 
 the gentleman presently got up and saying it was 
 too cold to sit still long, began perambulating the 
 deck. The two ladies had been staring at Mabel, as 
 much as they could without actual rudeness. One 
 was a fair, washed-out looking woman of about 
 thirty-five, with untidy, frizzly, reddish hair ; the 
 other was small and dark, with a short face, rather 
 square jaws and coarse, smooth black hair, parted 
 accurately down the middle, and plastered down on 
 
 9 
 
114 HER eELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 either side.- She; was about ten years older than her 
 companion; and was knitting industriously at a sock 
 in heather-rbloured Scotch fingering. Mabel saw a 
 good deal of that sock before the voyage was over ; 
 Mrs. Beecher was engaged on it when she first saw 
 her, and that same sock, or one exactly like it, was 
 being hurried on with, as they entered Hong Kong 
 harbour. Both ladies had the appearance that comes 
 from long sojourn in foreign places, a look that is 
 sometimes very becoming to men, but never to 
 women. The elder lady had a grey homespun 
 costume, and a Norfolk jacket, fastened at the throat 
 with an old-fashioned gold brooch, and wore a 
 hideous grey, boat-shaped hat. The other had a 
 maroon-coloured, fur-lined cloak, and the frizzly hair 
 was crowned by a pith helmet. 
 
 They had been busily engaged talking about 
 Mabel ever since she had appeared above the com- 
 panion ladder. In China, far more than any other 
 place in the world, English women get into the habit 
 of gossiping, there is so little else to do, and in a 
 limited society of English, the friendship is more 
 intimate and centred than when as at home, nationality 
 at once makes a bond. Any one who has lived in 
 China will know the truth of this and that no " Gup " 
 in India is anything compared with what it is in 
 Shanghai or Pekin. The two ladies had been 
 gossiping ever since they came aboard ; they had 
 discussed everything, beginning with the indolence 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 115 
 
 and stupidity of their respective amahs, to the 
 characters, and more particularly the want of 
 characters, of the various other passengers aboard, 
 some of whom, in various other parts of the ship, 
 were probably doing the same thing. 
 
 Though this was the poor girl's first appearance, 
 they had learnt from the stewardess that one of the 
 Chinamen had a young English wife aboard, and 
 already knew as much about her as the woman 
 herself knew and could tell them, therefore it was 
 with excitement that they had marked her as she 
 came up the steps. 
 
 It is true that our lives hang on small things, are 
 made or marred by trifles slight as the drifting of a 
 straw across the road. Poor Mabel had not had the 
 energy to curl her fringe of hair ; it hung down in its 
 brilliant colouring over her forehead nearly to her 
 eyebrows, she had felt too sick and dispirited to look 
 in the glass ; then, too, the knot of hair behind, 
 dressed by the unskilful hand of the stewardess, had 
 a look of abandon about it that was far from being in 
 unison with either the girl's character or feeling ; it 
 hung low on her neck in a manner that, in conjunc- 
 tion with its striking colour and the thick fringe of 
 beautiful hair worn down on to the eyes, looked fast. 
 Her complexion and lips, in spite of her sufferings, 
 were brilliant, and under her pilot coat she wore a 
 dress trimmed with gold braid, that Lew-Ching, with 
 the fondness of an Asiatic for bright things and 
 
ii6 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 tinsel, had taken a fancy to in Paris, and bought for 
 her to wear on the voyage, and which he had 
 specially commended for its becomingness. These 
 things had been marked with disfavour, taken in 
 conjunction with her striking beauty and the fact 
 that she had married a Chinaman. 
 
 " My dear, just look at the get-up for board ship, 
 and do look at that lump of dyed hair down her 
 back, — what a style ! " 
 
 And the other lady had replied, " How little one 
 can gather from what the people of the lower classes 
 tell you ; they don't know any distinctions between 
 people. Mrs. Brown made out that she was a nice, 
 ladylike girl, and I felt quite sorry for her, but now 
 there appears this loud-looking young person with 
 the gold braid and the fringe of hair! However, 
 what can one expect ; — no decent, nice girl would 
 marry a Chinaman, though this man is a gentleman, 
 I hear." 
 
 " She's certainly very funny, — she ■ doesn't pre- 
 possess one," remarked her companion. 
 
 Poor Mabel was out of sight for awhile : it was the 
 moment when she had gone up to the Chinamen, and 
 now that she was no longer to be seen the two ladies 
 began discussing Lew-Ching. 
 
 " He's good-looking as Chinamen go," drawled 
 Mrs. Sandilands, the fair woman, languidly, " different 
 from his awful friend with the squab nose, but 
 gracious heavens, — to marry one of the wretches ! — 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. ii7 
 
 What a death in life ! What can have possessed an 
 English girl ! What could her relations have been 
 thinking of, — a handsome girl like that too." 
 
 But Mrs. Beecher belonged to the type of woman 
 who cannot bear to hear another woman commended. 
 
 " Handsome ! Do you think so ? " she responded 
 coldly. " I can't bear her face, I don't think she 
 looks nice — but of course it goes without saying 
 
 she can't be. I wonder " she paused, " I wonder 
 
 now if she really is married to him. I shouldn't be 
 in the least surprised if she were not, she looks Just 
 that sort of person." 
 
 And then Mrs. Sandilands in the helmet had 
 ejaculated, " My dear ! " not, however, without a 
 feeling, not altogether unpleasurable, at the prospect 
 of some exciting scandal to break the monotony of 
 board ship. 
 
 To have with one a young English lady married to 
 a Chinese gentleman, was exciting enough, but to have 
 on board the same young woman not married to the 
 Chinese gentleman was even more so and suggested 
 infinite possibilities of Gup. They had started, bdth 
 of these women, with the average amount of goodness, 
 but their life, and the fact t]jat neither of them had 
 any interests or hobby to keep their mind occupied, 
 had made them what they were. Even now they 
 were gossiping about Mabel with no deliberate inten- 
 tion of injuring her, and were only saying what they 
 believed to be the truth. 
 
ii8 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 " Here she comes ! " Mrs. Beecher had whispered smd 
 then the two had had a good look at her, a look that 
 unfortunately rather confirmed them in the gloomy 
 view they had taken as to her style and morals. 
 Poor Mabel was longing for a little kindness, but she 
 had noted that these women looked at. her doubtfully, 
 and though she little suspected the full extent of their 
 distrust of her, she at once recognised that it was 
 because of her connection with Lew-Ching that they 
 treated her thus. The irritation that was always now 
 so near the surface came up ; she looked them in the 
 face with a look that was more cold than their own. 
 
 " Just the brazen stare that one would expect from 
 such a creature," as Mrs. Beecher confided afterwards 
 to a group of ladies. After sitting beside them in an 
 awkward and uncomfortable silence, broken only by 
 the resolute sound of Mrs. Beecher's knitting-needles, 
 she rose and walked away. 
 
 Again Fate was against her. Her idea had been 
 to regain her husband, and with a heart like lead she, 
 looked about for him ; she could iBee him nowhere, 
 she felt too shy to search for him ; the stare of the 
 two gossiping women had spoilt her nerve. 
 
 She was undecided, ^and standing in a wretched, 
 shy hesitation by the companion ladder, wondering 
 Avhether the loneliness of the cabin below, was not 
 preferable to what she was going through now, when 
 she noticed seated in a sheltered spot, an elderly lady 
 whose face, in its thinness and its sweet expression 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 119 
 
 somehow recalled to her her' mother ; that mother 
 whom she had alternately charmed with her sweet- 
 ness, and tormented and made miserable with her 
 vagaries and her discontent with life^-a . discontent 
 that had led to this last escapade, which she was now 
 expiating. 
 
 A sudden impulse took her ; she moved away 
 from the companion ladder and seated herself near 
 the lady. 
 
 Fate was against poor Mabel once more — as she 
 sat down the lady rose and moved away^ Her doing 
 so was purely accidental and had no bearing on the 
 girl's presence, but her action at this moment was the 
 last straw. The colour left the girl's, face, as it did 
 always when she was greatly moved, leaving only red 
 patches in either cheek, a fire blazed in her eyes ; 
 there was in her heart a hatred for these people whom 
 she conceived were insulting her. She drew herself 
 upright, — then the hatred died out, leaving only a 
 woman who somehow felt debased, — yes, she felt the 
 creature they imagined her to be. Looking neither 
 to left nor right that she might meet no eye, she 
 walked with bent head and eyes, and holding by the 
 brass balustrades made her way down into the saloon 
 and into her cabin. 
 
 The close air revived the feeling of nausea. Once 
 there she threw herself down on the 0por^ and 
 remained motionless for an hour. '.aii>" 
 
 And there Lew-Ching found her. — Her back was 
 
120 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 turned to him and at first he imagined she was merely 
 ill, he didn't think he had neglected her in leaving her, 
 in not before this seeing whether she was on deck, he 
 had no thought of being unkind. To his Asiatic 
 ideas there was nothing strange in her seeking her 
 cabin and remaining there, or in a husband remaining 
 apart from his wife, but when she made no sign at his 
 entrance he stooped down and, addressing her, lifted 
 her up, not ungently; 
 
 He was struck then by the expression on this face, 
 with its abandoned golden hair. Mabel had been 
 thinner ever since he had seen her, but in spite of 
 a slight diminution of flesh, she had always belonged 
 to the chubby, round-cheeked order of beauty. There 
 was no chubbiness about the face that rested on his 
 arm and looked up in his eyes. 
 
 She made no excuse for lying there, made no com- 
 plaint about the desolation she felt ; no, it would 
 only annoy her husband, she thought, perhaps set him 
 against her, — and he was the only person left now, — 
 the only one, — the last, — she would put this restraint 
 upon herself — to keep from complaints and tears, — but 
 she looked at him with eyes that were heartbroken. 
 
 " Mabel, how you must have suffered," he cried, 
 shocked at her changed face, " and the worst of it is 
 that there is no help for it. What can I do ? " 
 
 " No, there is no help for it ; — you can do nothing," 
 she murmured with a grey face. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 To the crew and passengers of the Orestes, Mabel's 
 presence was a great boon, for, thanks to her presence, 
 there was no such thing as dulness on board ; she 
 was the subject of endless talk. The usual themes of 
 conversation, such as the scantiness or bad quality of 
 the food, the sameness of the inevitable fowl that was 
 served to them punctually twice a day, were neglected 
 in favour of this new excitement. They even forgot 
 to quarrel with each other, they no longer cared who 
 sat next the captain, or whether the wife of Sir George 
 Flojd, who was on board, on her way to Hong Kong, 
 was giving herself more airs than usual. This lady 
 had, they imagined, during the first two days tried 
 to show her superiority by having her chair brought 
 up on to the poop and sitting away from them there ; 
 now she might have sat on the funnel or climbed the 
 main mast without much comment. Mabel's beauty, 
 her strangeness of manner coupled with the still 
 more strange nature of the alliance she had made, 
 were the talk of the ship. 
 
 Endless were the surmises as to her life in the 
 
122 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 future : some had spoken to her, some had not, but 
 all had something to contribute towards the discus- 
 sion. The lady who occupied the next cabin persisted 
 in it, that, through the light partition separating her 
 cabin from theirs, she had heard one night the sound 
 of tears, and a voice saying, " Oh, Lindsay, Lindsay, — 
 why did you let me go ? " 
 
 Another lady wondered why she had married the 
 man, since every look showed that she didn't care 
 for him. The men listened to what the ladies had 
 to say, and as usual took their view more or less. 
 Thus it happened that not only the women, but 
 the male half of the passengers avoided her. 
 Though Mabel was such a pretty woman the 
 officers of the Orestes and the other gentlemen on 
 board were very shy of offering her such civilities 
 as they would have been quite ready with had the 
 circumstances been different. From the facts of 
 her position they were biassed against her, a feeling 
 which Mrs. Sandilands and Mrs. Beecher had greatly 
 fostered by what they said of her. None the less, 
 whatever her character, some of them would have 
 been- quite ready to sun themselves in the company 
 of this pretty woman if it had not been that they were 
 afraid of what Lew-Ching's.ideas might be with regard 
 to his beautiful bride, and were aware that in making 
 themselves agreeable to the wife of an Asiatic, they 
 would possibly be incurring his jealousy or at least 
 his displeasure. They knew the Chinese traditions. 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 123 
 
 the Chinese character, too well, and moreover, there 
 was something in the glint of Lew-Ching's eyes, in 
 the expression of his face, that made them, in this 
 case, especially disinclined for the enterprise. 
 
 But Mabel did not think of this second reason. — 
 She compared the conduct of these men to the 
 homage she had been used to, and found in it only 
 another insult, only another sign that she was not 
 considered on a level with these other people now 
 that she was Lew-Ching's wife. 
 
 And once this was established in her brain, she 
 returned coldness for coldness. She felt the same 
 spirit of defiance that she had felt at Mrs. Newcome's 
 ball when she had entered the house with her mother 
 and the Chinaman and had marked the disapproving 
 looks of the men. It was unfortunate that her first 
 experiences should have been of the two ladies, Mrs. 
 Beecher and Mrs. Sandilands, for one or two of the 
 others pitied her position and would have been friendly, 
 but she was now suspicious and distrustful, suspecting 
 patronage. No, no, she would have none of them 
 now — the time was past, — she didn't want them. She 
 snubbed one or two of the ladies who meant well, but 
 whose method of questioning her as to her future she 
 considered offensive. She. snubbed Mr. Vale-Smith, 
 a favourite jackall of Mrs. Sandilands, who had, 
 indeed, been commissioned by the owner of the frizzly 
 hair and the helmet, to make himself agreeable to 
 Mrs. Lew-Ching and " find out all about her." 
 
124 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 With her unerring instinct, with the same intuition 
 that had told her at once when Lindsay's love had 
 waned, she guessed immediately the young fellow's 
 mission, and returned him to Mrs. Sandilands empty 
 of any information concerning herself or her husband. 
 
 At last hardly any one but the Captain spoke to 
 her: he always made a point of being kind to the 
 girl, for he imagined that she was unhappy. Even to 
 him she confided nothing of her history, nothing of 
 the past, he didn't learn from her any answer to the 
 numerous questions she gave rise to, nor did he 
 question her; he was quite satisfied simply to be 
 kind to her as far as lay in his power. 
 
 At mealtime she sat far apart at the other table, 
 but from where he was, he could see her beside her 
 husband and Mr. T'seng, with on the other side of 
 her an American lady who only occasionally spoke to 
 her. 
 
 Mr. T'seng, with true Chinese politeness, never 
 addressed his friend's wife, but the two compatriots 
 conversed in Chinese, while Mabel's beautiful, hopeless 
 eyes stared about her at the unfriendly faces of those 
 people who " passed by on the other side." 
 
 She fancied she was getting to care less ; she was 
 used to it, but what she noticed now was, that, as they 
 neared China, Lew-Ching seemed to lose that English 
 veneer of manners that he had acquired in Barford. 
 Yes, he was becoming distinctly more Chinese, he 
 even spoke English less correctly than he had done. 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 125 
 
 he was always talking to the other Chinaman — she 
 could catch their woodeny tones, the inflections of their 
 voices. These tones began to disgust her, and then 
 the hideous, typical Chinese face of the other Asiatic 
 seemed to exaggerate the peculiarities of her husband's 
 features. 
 
 In speaking to her a Chinese word would creep in 
 here and there and she would stare at him astonished 
 then he would smile and say — 
 
 "You will learn in time ;— soon you will speak 
 Chinese as I do." 
 
 She was beginning to understand the wide differ- 
 ence between her husband's views of life and her 
 own. 
 
 One day, struck by a feeling of loneliness, she 
 went up to him on deck where he- stood talking to 
 one of the passengers and put her arm through his 
 own. He at once withdrew his arm, and then seeing 
 that she looked hurt, said — 
 
 " I only mean, Mabel, that this is not the custom 
 with us." 
 
 "Not the custom?" 
 
 " No ; — with us husbands and wives " He 
 
 hesitated, at a loss for a word. " It is so very different," 
 he proceeded. "If a Chinaman, my friend Mr. T'seng, 
 for instance, were to see this he would consider it the 
 height of impropriety. Yes, he would consider you 
 a common woman, you know it is not the custom 
 with us to make merry with our wives in public." 
 
126 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 " But it is ours," she replied, " and we are among 
 my people now, not yours." 
 
 A curious glint came into the husband's eyes, it 
 was the expression he had worn when he had talked 
 to Mr. Vaughan about English people that night at 
 the ball, but he replied — 
 
 " I am only telling you these things because, living 
 with us, it is necessary for you to learn them, — for no 
 other reason. Everything you do is good in my eyes, 
 but my eyes are not the only ones which will judge 
 you, — soon you will be among my race. I have 
 married an English woman ; yes, well, my pretty 
 Mabel, remain so, except in such outward things as 
 would in our future life bring me into contempt, and, 
 in conforming to the few things I ask, remember that 
 our manners and our conventionalities are worthy of 
 your respect on other grounds than those I put 
 forward, since they are the outcome of a civilisation 
 far older than yours." 
 
 " I often wonder why you wanted to marry me," 
 said the girl forlornly, — "I must be so utterly differ- 
 ent from your women." 
 
 " That perha;ps is the secret of why I loved you," 
 replied he, " and I married you because I loved you ; 
 I don't know why, but far more than I can love any 
 of our women, perhaps because you are so much more 
 beautiful, — it is you I love, not anything you say or 
 do." 
 
 But the words and the expression of his eyes 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 127 
 
 though they comforted her, had no longer any power 
 to stir the girl's heart. 
 
 Perhaps it was that, standing there in his old blue 
 robe, he looked so different from the handsome China- 
 man whom she had once persuaded herself to love. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 There was a terrible monotony about the voyage, 
 but in spite of its drawbacks it did Mabel good. 
 She had undoubtedly steeled herself in a manner to 
 the daily disagreeables of it, her mind was not able, 
 moreover, to think for long. She had always to 
 abandon thought, it was too painful, her head felt 
 , muddled by it, but her head now was the only thing 
 that gave her trouble, as, apart from mental annoyance, 
 her health was good and she had a good appetite. 
 
 Then came the Suez Canal. At night, standing 
 beside Lew-Ching and looking -over the side of the 
 ship, she saw the grey, forlorn-looking banks and felt 
 depressed to the very heart. The terrible heat undid 
 much of the good of the voyage : she could not sleep 
 at all at night except for a few minutes, but lay 
 dreaming those confused waking dreams in which 
 she was always doing something which never, never 
 ended. 
 
 The voyage seemed very long, but at last came 
 the landing — the going aboard the river boat. This 
 
 128 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 129 
 
 part seemed to her like a dream, but, when they 
 were ashore, and were being carried in chairs, the 
 river voyage being ended, she remembered that, as 
 she had left the Orestes, she had heard one of the 
 gentlemen on board saying to his wife — 
 
 " Poor girl, poor wretched girl ! " 
 
 This sentence, which she at once understood applied 
 to herself, she kept on repeating mechanically, it kept 
 time to the shuffle of the coolies' feet as they carried 
 her. One or two people had shaken hands with her ; 
 those whom she had not snubbed and shaken off in 
 that burst of wounded feeling following the conduct 
 towards herself of those two mischievous women, 
 Mrs. Beecher and Mrs. Sandilands. 
 
 This journey by land was a relief after the boats. 
 They had gone some little distance and Mabel had 
 fallen asleep. The girl was awakened by the chair 
 stopping and the sound of voices. 
 
 She roused herself and looked out. 
 
 It was clear moonlight, so clear that she could see 
 every stone in the road distinct with its shadow.- 
 She noticed her own shadow as she leaned out ; just 
 near it were the grotesque, silhouettes of the coolies 
 who carried her chair, she gazed at the men, 
 noting their pigtails and their backs, which seemed 
 to her to have the same tireless expression of waiting 
 which she had always thought Lew-Ching had. 
 
 They were standing stock still without a movement, 
 lethargic and infinitely patient. To left and right 
 
 lO 
 
130 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 were houses and before her a blank wall, standing 
 grey and tall against the star-powdered sky. 
 
 She stared at it, fascinated. 
 
 Lew-Ching's chair was a few paces in front of hers 
 and he was talking to some men. Her observant 
 ears took in every shade of expression of the voices 
 and noted that the men treated him with respect. 
 
 Suddenly a door in the wall was thrown open and 
 through this opening she could see the gleam of 
 lanterns and lights on the other side. 
 
 "Is this the wall of China?" Mabel asked herself, 
 and then noiselessly their chairs moved on, they were 
 approaching the door, now they were going through 
 an archway ! 
 
 Then suddenly they seemed to be in something 
 like Hell ! She heard the gate shut behind them ! 
 Was it a terrible nightmare ? What were these fjices, 
 livid, distinct in the moonlight, that swarmed beside 
 her chair and looked in ? what Walpurgis night was 
 this that was being enacted for her home-coming ? 
 
 These living things were in the form of men and 
 women, the hobbled creatures in the semblance of 
 women, in rags and with faces of the lower type of 
 Chinese and further distorted by disease and want, 
 seemed to be stumbling along on hoofs beside her, 
 screaming to each other. It was the rabble of the 
 Chinese quarter. 
 
 The place was a mass of small lanes, infinitely 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 131 
 
 unsavoury, smelling of accumulated filth, oil, cooking, 
 garbage and of the reeking and terrible humanity 
 peopling it, who now were crowding round about 
 Mabel's chair, and leering in, addressing the occupant 
 in accents which reminded her terribly of Lew- 
 Ching's. 
 
 The sides of the houses forming these streets were 
 of wood, their overhanging roofs almost shut out the 
 sky. 
 
 They appeared to be rotten in places, sodden 
 with wet and dirt, lights gleamed here and there in 
 them, and their fearful occupants, these people who 
 were terrifying Mabel, were taking the fetid air of 
 this inferno before retiring for the night. 
 
 One man kept walking beside her, holding on by 
 his filthy hands to the side of the chair, the street 
 was just wide enough for the chair and him to go 
 abreast, the centre of the street was full of evil- 
 smelling water, thick with various abominations ! 
 
 Mabel sat back in the chair ; she had screamed 
 once or twice, but the coolies, possibly knowing that 
 they could not help the matter, or else having a 
 Chinese disregard of suffering, had taken no notice ; 
 perhaps they had not heard through this ungodly din 
 the scream the English woman had given. 
 
 She looked out, — she could no longer see the grey 
 wall that shut in this inferno, nothing but these 
 wooden shelters, — they seemed open to the street, 
 she could see people sleeping on the floors. 
 
132 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 She leaned far out one side, because of the China- 
 , man who peered in the other so closely that she 
 feared this terrible being would touch her. Some- 
 times the lane would twist suddenly and she would 
 lose sight of her husband's chair and coolies ; then 
 she would suffer in the thought that in this maze of 
 infamous dwellings her bearers could so easily make 
 away with her, — this powerful Chinaman could drag 
 her from her chair had he a mind. 
 
 But the thought that had most horror for her was 
 that Lew-Ching, in delivering her up to these terrors, 
 had either an indifference to her sufferings or else did 
 not consider that these things were terrible, and so 
 had said no word of warning. Was he indeed so 
 used to these sights and smells, that he imagined an 
 English girl, fresh from the cleanliness and decency 
 of an English home, could go unmoved through them ? 
 
 When she looked up again the Chinese beggar had 
 ceased to stare in at her and she was alone with the 
 coolies, then her fright abated a little ; she told her- 
 self that after all she was safe with these men into 
 whose charge her husband had given her. 
 
 The streets had begun to get a. little wider, the 
 houses beside her seemed to be less rotten and filthy 
 than those of the by-lanes just traversed ; they had 
 coloured boards, like signs, jutting from their fronts 
 and in the bright moonlight she could discern their 
 colouring of blue and of red and of emerald green. 
 There were fewer people and of a more respectable 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 133 
 
 sort, and here Lew-Ching signed to his bearers to 
 stop, and waited till Mabel's chair came abreast, he 
 looked smilingly round at her, as she came up with 
 him ; it was very evident that he had no thought of 
 the disgust and fright she had been enduring, — the 
 fury against him she had felt at being left alone, as it 
 were, in this Chinese slum. 
 
 The poor girl made no sign of the indignation she 
 had felt, but smiled in his face, a pathetic smile. 
 What was the use of tears, — of reproaches? — what 
 had befallen her was part of the life she had entered 
 and from which, she recognised, there was no turning 
 back. All she tried to do now was to keep what love 
 for her her Chinese husband possessed, so she smiled 
 back at him. 
 
 But Lew-Ching perceived, even in the moonlight, 
 the pallor of her beautiful face. 
 
 " How white you are, my dear," he said. 
 
 " It was the horror of your streets," she replied, 
 " they frightened me, and I kept on screaming, and 
 the bearers did not hear, and what makes everything 
 here smell so dreadfully, — I feel so sick from it, and I 
 have such a horrid taste on my lips, — haven't you ? " 
 
 He looked at her calmly as a doctor might regard 
 an hysterical patient. 
 
 " Oh, no, of course not, — this is fancy," he said. 
 " And why should you be frightened ? — -you had men 
 to protect you. Of course these poor streets by the 
 river are not very nice, but that cannot be helped. 
 
134 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 This is better and here we can go together and you 
 will not be frightened any longer.'' 
 
 It was evident that Lew-Ching's nose was insen- 
 sible to the terrible stench of the street they were 
 going through, and Mabel said no more, she felt 
 deadly sick and lay back in her chair. 
 
 Then the thoroughfare widened ; a few trees ap- 
 peared, they seemed to have reached the outskirts of 
 the town, and here the coolies stopped to rest. They 
 had put the chairs down at the side of a broad road, 
 thickly planted with trees on either side, it might 
 almost have been a country road in England. The 
 air was fresh and pure and revived the girl, she asked 
 her husband if she might not get out. The men had 
 squatted down by the side of a hedge, and Lew-Ching 
 and she wandered a few paces away up the moonlit 
 road. 
 
 It seemed a flat country ; far away she could see 
 field after field, plantation after plantation of some 
 greyish green, low-growing plant, with groups of 
 houses dotted here and there, she could smell the 
 scent of leaves and flowers, and could see that in 
 some of the hedges gleamed blossoms shaped like a 
 convolvulus. Her'shadow, trim waisted and with a 
 sailor hat, and Lew-Ching's Chinese shadow, accu- 
 rately cast as if cut out of black paper, walked before 
 them. 
 
 She plucked the sweet-scented flowers, and those 
 which were beyond her reach her husband gathered 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 135 
 
 for her. They might have been an English girl and 
 man on an English country road. 
 
 " Have we much farther to be carried ? " she asked. 
 
 " No, no," he answered, — " my house is not far from 
 the town, but the men have come some distance and 
 it is better for them to rest here than in the streets." 
 
 " Oh, what a relief to be in this country air," she 
 cried, — I keep on thinking that we are in England 
 again," but she tried to stifle the sigh that accom- 
 panied the words. 
 
 A lane stretched away to their right, and at a 
 corner of this the girl perceived growing, quantities 
 of these beautiful, white night flowers which seemed 
 to keep awake while every other thing slept. She 
 wandered up the lane picking them as she went, they 
 grew high, and she ascended a little hillock by the 
 wayside the better to reach tliem. 
 
 The subtle scents the grasses and leaves gave up 
 to the night, reminded her of England. — How often 
 in the country she had smelt these indistinct, 
 aromatic perfumes which the wayside flowers and 
 leaves had refused to give to the sun, but had 
 rendered up to the moon's rays. She was so thank- 
 ful that the flowers and hedges were so like England. 
 Heartsick and full of sad forebodings, she caught 
 with pleasure at the one thing which seemed pure 
 and homelike, then she recalled to mind what her ex- 
 pectations of life had been, and tried to think that 
 very possibly this life might realise those expectations. 
 
136 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 Her husband broke in on her reverie. 
 
 " The men must be rested now," said he ; " come, 
 Mabel, if we go farther we shall get to Yensi." 
 
 He reached her his hand to help her down the 
 little hillock, and he retained it fondly till they 
 regained their chairs — then they set out once more 
 through the moonlight. 
 
 The time did not seem very long before they were 
 set down before their destination. 
 
 Standing back from the road Mabel could see a 
 house which might very well be English, built of what 
 looked in this light of grey brick, and with white 
 eaves ; it seemed surrounded by mimosa-trees, the 
 air was full of the exquisite scent, and the little fuzzy 
 yellow balls of their blossoms gleamed through the 
 leaves. 
 
 The inmates were expecting them, for the outer 
 door was thrown open, they were now standing in a 
 courtyard dimly lighted by a couple of lanter/is hung 
 over a carved archway facing them. Boxes of rather 
 sickly looking Oleanders stood at the side of the wall 
 together with some Cacti. The place, to Mabel's 
 eyes, looked bare and uninviting ; a Chinawoman 
 had admitted them, and Lew-Ching addressed her in 
 his own language. Though his wife could not under- 
 stand the words, she knew that the tone was one of 
 disappointment or complaint. 
 
 Then, in the archway before them, appeared the 
 figure of an old Chinawoman hobbling along, leaning 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. I37 
 
 partly on the shoulder of an attendant and partly on 
 a walking-stick, almost like a crutch in thickness. 
 
 To Mabel's eyes she was a hideous vision, blear- 
 eyed and with wrinkled yellow skin, her hair was 
 thin, but was elaborately dressed and fastened with 
 ornaments. 
 
 " It is my mother," said Lew-Ching. 
 
 She came forward unsmilingly and greeted her son, 
 who returned the greeting with respect, then she 
 turned her head to the girl beside him and surveyed 
 her. Her ugly brown eyes looked from beneath their 
 drooping lids at the beautiful English woman, but 
 there was no expression in them beyond that of a 
 passive dislike. All three women, the mistress and 
 the two others, stared at the girl, and then the old 
 woman with a gesture, made her son* walk beside 
 her. She put her old hand, so much like a bird's claw, 
 on his shoulder and still leaning on the stick, led the 
 way, her English daughter-in-law and the China- 
 women following. 
 
 Once more Mabel felt that curious sensation of 
 being outside herself,, of looking at herself from a 
 distance. Her sensations were a mixture of rage at 
 her position and at the insolence of her husband's 
 mother, and anger against Lew-Ching himself, for all 
 the slights and humiliations she had suffered since 
 she had left home. The same rage which she had 
 felt against him at being left alone with the coolies 
 in the Chinese quarter, she felt at this moment. 
 
138 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 Why could he not be more human ? — What she was 
 feeh'ng was a rage against life, and against her 
 husband for having entrapped her. She no longer 
 felt even that desire to conciliate him, to stand well 
 with him, that she had had, — this last action of his, 
 in which he appeared to discard her at his mother's 
 bidding, made her more angry than anything she had 
 suffered since leaving home. Then she reflected that 
 in the old days she had never felt these consuming, 
 overmastering rages which so often swept over her 
 now, and then suddenly she remembered that it was 
 in one of these passions that she had taken the 
 irrevocable step that had led to this. 
 
 " As different from you as a cat or a dog." As her 
 eyes fell on the old crippled woman leaning on her 
 husband's arfn, Mrs. Conyers' words recurred to her. 
 
 The house after the fresh air had a clammy smell 
 of damp, mimosa, and lacquer work. They had 
 entered a large room partitioned off in places with 
 carved screens, painted white, but from which the 
 white was peeling, the furniture of the room was 
 nondescript, partly French and partly Chinese and 
 very shabby, and again Mabel was struck by the 
 want of comfort. The ceiling was of white-washed 
 canvas, slightly raised in the centre like a tent, round 
 the walls were Chinese pictures, and amongst them 
 one which looked as much out of keeping with the 
 surroundings as the stuffed and buttoned French 
 chfiirs were with the rest of th^ furniture. It was a 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 139 
 
 common, French print of a woman who was very 
 much like Mabel Conyers had been, the same 
 exuberant and fleshy type, the same colouring of 
 hair and eyes, but it had been the work of a low 
 French artist, who had painted his own vulgarity into 
 the face of this half-clothed woman kissing a dove. 
 This then was probably a picture which Lew-Ching 
 had bought and hung in his room as the type of 
 loveliness which most appealed to him. 
 
 A French window opened into a verandah, and 
 outside Mabel could see a table set for some meal. 
 
 As the girl followed in the train of these Chinese 
 people, the humiliation she felt, exceeded anything 
 she had suffered before. To be contemned by the 
 people, her own countrymen and women on board 
 the Orestes, had been bad enough, but she had, as it 
 were, come on it gradually ; she had been warned, and 
 if she had not at the time of her marriage realised the 
 truth of what her mother and Lindsay said, the pos- 
 sibility of adverse public opinion had been at least 
 placed before her, and even in Barford she had seen 
 for herself that people condemned her action. But 
 to be slighted, treated with cruel rudeness by this 
 hideous old Chinawoman, — an old barbarian as she 
 mentally called her, this was insufferable. 
 
 The race feeling came up, stronger in this girl than 
 in many others because she had seen so little of 
 foreigners and foreign countries, and until the infatu- 
 ation for this handsome Chinaman, had had a con- 
 
I40 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 tempt for all things not English. The dislike she 
 had for Mrs. Beecher and Mrs. Sandilands, paled 
 before the white glow of the passion of anger she 
 felt now, — a rage coupled with remorse for having 
 put herself in such a position, that this hateful and 
 insolent old woman could trample on her. 
 
 It was the same racial feeling which leads to 
 lynching, and which in some countries makes it a 
 crime punished by death, for a black man to strike a 
 white. 
 
 If the old woman, as she hobbled in front, on her 
 son's arm, could have seen into the heart of the white- 
 faced English girl, she would have seen some dread- 
 ful things written there. — This girl, once placid tem- 
 pered and sweet, and possessing neither more nor less 
 than the ordinary temper of a well brought up young 
 lady, had in the last few months developed passions, 
 which she had, till now, forced herself to control, but 
 which might at any moment become absolutely 
 terrible. 
 
 But the Chinawoman's back, with its lump of 
 gummed black hair with its gold ornament, which 
 shook as she walked, were turned to her new 
 daughter-in-law, and out of earshot of the servants 
 she was talking about her with the contempt in words 
 which she had shown by her conduct. LewrChing's 
 manner was a little angry, but also deprecating, as 
 one who feared to offend. 
 
 " I explained all to you," he was saying, " and I 
 
HER CELElSTIAL HUSBAND. 141 
 
 hoped that by this time you would have forgiven me, 
 and received my wife more kindly — she at least has 
 done you no wrong." 
 
 " I think you have nothing to complain of," the old 
 lady returned, " I told you I would receive the English 
 girl, but not as your wife, and I have kept my word. 
 Keep her here under our roof, if you will, but don't 
 insult me by pretending that you have brought me 
 her as a daughter-in-law." 
 
 " Nevertheless she is my wife," answered the China- 
 man, "treat her well, I beg you,— you will think 
 better of this, mother." 
 
 But the Chinese " no " had followed, uttered with a 
 sharp, deliberate intonation. 
 
 Then the old lady had turned to look at this un- 
 welcome English woman whom she looked on as a 
 mere adventuress who had enticed her son into a 
 marriage, or at least into what he was good enough 
 to consider a marriage, but which she would never 
 accept as one. 
 
 No, — this was her only son, and that his prospects 
 should thus be blighted was infinitely galling to her 
 pride and affection both. The letter he had written 
 her telling her of his entanglement had struck con- 
 sternation into her, but after the first fright she had 
 never allowed herself to think of this girl as his wife. 
 She had, though for other reasons, fully as much con- 
 tempt for the woman who could marry a Chinaman 
 as Mrs. Beecher and Mrs. Sandilands could have, and 
 
142 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 what she felt at her son's marrying an Engh'shwoman 
 was quite as poignant as what Mrs. Conyers had felt 
 when her daughter had announced her engagement. 
 She had talked the matter over with all her old 
 gossips, and all had agreed that if it were really a 
 marriage, Lew-Ching had indeed made a most 
 degrading — a most ruinous step, but they had further 
 agreed with the old lady that it could not be quite as 
 serious as that, — this adventuring brazen English 
 woman could not possibly consider herself legally 
 married, and could easily be relegated to some 
 inferior position in the household. How could it 
 be a marriage ? the old ladies asked. And oh, what 
 a misfortune when a young man forgot his family, 
 the traditions of his race, — worse than all, his duty to 
 mother, and got himself into a low entanglement like 
 this, with a foreigner ! — a creature as opposite to him 
 as any living thing could be, — one of these ugly 
 English women ! 
 
 Outside, the coolies had waited squatted in the 
 shade of the mimosas while these harangues were 
 going on, but they knew within a little why Mrs. 
 Wang Kwei called so often at this house in the 
 mimosa garden and kept her chair waiting sometimes 
 for a whole hour. — Yes, all Hankow knew of this 
 mad marriage with the Englishwoman. 
 
 When Mabel had first entered, she had worn an 
 expression of not unpleasurable anticipation, but 
 when on entering the second room, the old woman 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 143 
 
 looked in her eyes, the expression on Mabel's face 
 gave her a momentary turn and almost suggested to 
 her that although her son had told her this English- 
 woman knew no word of Chinese, the girl must have 
 heard and understood that short colloquy. 
 
 Mabel gave her a contemptuous glance, a look that 
 ignored her completely, and spoke with suppressed 
 anger and an icy smile to her husband. 
 
 " Suppose we have something to eat," she said ; 
 " will you ask them to give us something, — I'm tired 
 and hungry;" and then she seated herself in one of 
 the shabby French buttoned chairs and looked about 
 her, at the furniture, the pictures, and at the matting 
 of the room, which was worn in places, and covered 
 in those places with hearthrugs of old-fashioned 
 Brussels make. 
 
 There was a good deal of shabby bamboo furniture 
 in the room, and an old and very handsome cabinet 
 in buhl with gilt claw feet. She looked again at the 
 old lady, with the same blank stare and then smiled 
 pleasantly at her husband, a smile hiding much 
 bitterness of heart. Then her mother-in-law said some- 
 thing sharply in Chinese, to her son, the two women 
 came forward and, leaning on both their shoulders, 
 she tottered from the room. 
 
 Both kept silence for a minute, he was looking 
 down with an expression of concern and of anger, 
 and she was staring at the carpet with a disagreeable 
 smile. Then Lew-Ching spoke. 
 
144 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 " I am very sorry," said he, " that my mother was 
 not more polite to you, but remember she is old." 
 
 "Well, ho, she wasn't particularly kind," she 
 returned bitterly; " why should she be like this ? " she 
 asked, " what has she against me ? " 
 
 ',' It is like your own people," Lew-Ching replied ; 
 — " she is jealous of some one who takes her son." 
 
 He was standing looking, with a displeased, sullen 
 stare, alternately at her and at the furniture and 
 surroundings of the room. 
 
 " Nothing is as I wished it," he said, and murmured 
 something in Chinese that Mabel could not under- 
 stand, and then he went up to her and raised her up 
 from the chair on to her feet. 
 
 " Come, Mabel, this room and the rooms leading 
 from it are ours, — you are at home. Forget my 
 mother, — she will alter, she is only like all mothers. 
 Come, supper is set for us outside in the cool, 
 come and eat." 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Next morning Mabel could scarcely see out of her 
 eyes, the evil streets of the Chinese quarter, those 
 low-lying streets by the river, had given her a kind 
 of ophthalmia, and then she had cried so much ; she 
 had fallen asleep crying, wearied out. She had slept 
 with the window open, trying to get in the pure 
 country air, to take out of her mouth and nostrils 
 the smell which her feverish imagination was per- 
 petually conjuring up ; — everything seemed tainted 
 with it, the lacquer work in her own room seemed to 
 smell like those streets, — the mimosas, even smelt 
 sickly. 
 
 More than ever that night she had been conscious 
 of the curious restlessness of her brain, and the pain 
 in her head, so different from the ordinary headaches. 
 Then when the morning light crept in, she had 
 started awake and found herself lying in her dressing- 
 gown on a sort of rattan stretcher with a light silk 
 quilt thrown over her. 
 
 She felt unrefreshed, stiff, it had been raining, the air 
 in the room was cold. She remembered now every- 
 
 II 145 
 
146 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 thing of the night before, her impressions of the 
 discomfort of the arrangements of this dwelHng, the 
 sense of being lost that had crept over her from the 
 first moment of her entry into the hall of this house, * 
 with its air of a poorly kept-up greenhouse. 
 
 Then this bedroom with its apology for a bed. 
 The quilt had fallen off many times in the night, and 
 in her half delirious sleep, she had wrapped it round her 
 again. Could it be the early morning cold that made 
 her eyes so sore ? She rose and crept up to a glass 
 hanging against the wall, — her eyelids were red all 
 round, her face puffy and white but for the patch of 
 colour, her hair just as she had left it the night before, 
 — dull and unbrushed. 
 
 " I look hideous," she murmured, " hideous ! — My 
 beauty is leaving me with everything else.'' 
 
 Then she began thinking over, in a puzzled way, 
 the events of the last few months, the wedding, the 
 life in Paris, the wretched experiences on board the 
 Orestes, ending with last night's arrival at this Chinese 
 house. The humiliation of this last incident had 
 remained even in her dreams. — She had waked to 
 think of it. She recalled how Lew-Ching had apolo- 
 gised for the shabby furniture and for that very 
 rattan stretcher upon which she had slept ; he had, 
 he explained, given his mother instructions to have 
 the rooms done up in European style, with new 
 furniture ; — all these old things which he remembered 
 from early childhood were to be done away with, yet 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 147 
 
 here were the old crazy-looking lacquer work cabinets, 
 the bamboo flower stands, the well-worn matting, and 
 the common French furniture. 
 
 As she stood there thinking, the door opened and 
 her husband entered. He was in the old dark robe 
 he had first put on for board ship, it seemed to her 
 that with this blue robe some change had come over 
 his nature ; he was quite different from the man she 
 had married, he no longer cared to fascinate her, to 
 please her eye ; the old worn-looking dress seemed 
 to her always a token that he had returned to his old 
 ways and, having secured her, no longer cared to 
 please. 
 
 Ill, and further rendered feeble by the feverish 
 night she had passed, his appearance irritated her 
 strangely ; the irritation showed on her face. 
 
 " Are you not well, what is the matter, Mabel ? " 
 asked Lew-Ching. 
 
 She kept silence for a moment, and then said — 
 
 " I feel wretched, I am quite wretched, I have not 
 slept, my head is so bad," she paused, noting his 
 astonished face. " Don't you understand," she mur- 
 mured, " I feel quite, quite lost, I feel as if I were a 
 prisoner, — as if I should never get home again. No, 
 I shall never get home." 
 
 " How foolishly you talk," replied the Chinaman ; 
 •'you are annoyed with my mother and then the 
 night has been close and you were tired." He looked 
 about the room. " Tell me," he asked, " have you had 
 
148 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 some tea ? — I ordered the servant last night to bring 
 you some." 
 
 She shook her head. " I have had none — but what 
 does it matter — I don't want any." 
 
 " All the same it was my order, — I suppose then 
 my mother has countermanded that order." He paused. 
 " Well, it is her house, we cannot help it. Ma.bel," he 
 continued, " try to win my mother's liking, for with 
 us a mother is all-powerful, she is jealous of you now, 
 but if you show her respect in time all that will go, — 
 she will like you in time and treat you differently." 
 
 " And what then .' " asked the girl, " what will my 
 life be then ? " 
 
 A disagreeable expression flitted across the China- 
 man's face. 
 
 " It will be the life that our wives live in this 
 country and are very well content with ; you will 
 help my mother and the servants in the house, see 
 that all is well done, you will visit among my mother's 
 friends and will receive them here in return, — what 
 more does a wife require ? " 
 
 She was silent with a horror-stricken face. 
 
 " What is there that a faithful wife requires more 
 than that?" he repeated. 
 
 " Do you intend, then, that I shall lead a sort of 
 seraglio life, excluded from every one but your rela- 
 tives, taken through the streets in a chair, hidden 
 from every .eye, my occupation seeing to your 
 servants, and my sole amusement talking to one or 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 149 
 
 two ladies of your mother's acquaintance ? Is tliis 
 possible ? " 
 
 " You have described it very disagreeably, but, in 
 effect, that is what it will be," he replied. 
 
 "It will not, it shall not, — I will never, never 
 submit, I cannot. No, I must and shall mix with my 
 own people, yes, — even to be amongst them the out- 
 cast they consider me — and that I am, even to have 
 over again the insults, the humiliations that I suffered 
 on that wretched, wretched voyage ! " She stopped 
 short, throwing back from her eyes the uncurled fringe 
 of beautiful hair. 
 
 " What insults ? " asked her husband. 
 
 "Ah, no," she went on passionately, "you didn't 
 see them, — you didn't know how I was being tortured, 
 how I winced at every look expressing the contempt 
 they felt for me." 
 
 " Why should they have a contempt ? " 
 
 " Do not ask me, — they have." 
 
 " Mabel," said the Chinaman, with a disagreeable 
 smile, "your friends on the Orestes are not the only 
 persons, it seems, who can insult, your meaning is 
 plain enough ; I understand you and shall not forget, 
 but remember this : I am speaking for your own 
 good, for your own comfort as well as my own when 
 I ask you to submit with as much grace as you can 
 to the life which stretches before you, — you are 
 young and doubtless you will have a long, long life." 
 
 " No, no, no.'' 
 
IS<5 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 " But yes," said the Chinaman, " for the next fifty 
 years you will probably be living here, and, if yoii 
 are wise, long ere that time you will have adapted 
 yourself to our usages,— you will have become a 
 Chinawoman in everything but your appearance." 
 
 " Never ! " 
 
 " Never ? And what, I ask, is so dreadful in the 
 life I offer ? Is it that you want the licence of a 
 married woman's life in England ? I saw enough at 
 Barford to see what the Englishwoman's freedom 
 leads to. No, — we know better than that here ; our 
 system of seclusion has this advantage : we have no 
 scandals, our wives must behave well — nothing else 
 is possible. Mabel, be sensible, dress yourself and 
 leave this room. I will go and tell my mother you 
 are ready to present yourself to her, she speaks very 
 little English, but talk to her, forget your anger and 
 speak dutifully, she will on her side soon cease to 
 think of you as an alien and we may yet be very 
 happy, you and I." 
 
 " I am not going to your mother," replied the girl, 
 " she must, if she wishes to see me, come to me. She 
 had an opportunity of welcoming me and she was 
 not even civil, — I ta,ke no further interest in your 
 mother and any advance must be on her side." 
 
 " Do you mean this .' " 
 
 " I do mean it. Don't you know that if I say I'll 
 do a thing I'll do it in the face of the whole world's 
 disapproval. Leave me alone now, above all do not 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. iji 
 
 try to force me into your mother's presence or I may 
 say something better unsaid ; if you are wise let me 
 recover from last night." 
 
 " What has come over you ? " 
 
 " Nothing much that is new to me, only I think 
 more bitterly of it now, because I am ill from misery, 
 and want of sleep ; that dreadful voyage haunts me ; 
 — it was like a bad, bad dream, then the journey last 
 night, I was so frightened in your streets. All that I 
 might have forgotten, or at least tried to forget, if I 
 had been kindly treated here, but here I found fresh 
 insults awaiting me, and in none of these things have 
 you ever interfered to save me a single humiliation, 
 a single grief " 
 
 " Mabel ! " 
 
 " You have always treated me like the wax figure 
 of a woman you had bought and having bought 
 
 considered your property r " She stopped short. 
 
 " Why did you goad me on to say all this ? I warned 
 you not to, — I have thought it a thousand times, but I 
 would never have said it, for what is the good, what 
 is the good ? " 
 
 "Very little good," said the Chinaman in the 
 woodeny tones Mabel knew so well, and with a face 
 that from showing a slight surprise, had settled down 
 into its usual calm expression, " very little good, 
 Mabel." 
 
 At the hard voice, which, without realising it, she 
 had almost began to hate, she shivered. 
 
153 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 " Yes, yes, it was my fault, my blunder, it's no use 
 blaming you," she murmured. 
 
 " But you do blame me, and forwhat ?" 
 
 " For nothing. You are right ; there is nothing to 
 reproach you with ; it is merely that you are utterly 
 different from me — and that I ought to have known. 
 I did, only I couldn't realise Aow unlike you 
 would be, and everything else, — the life, the whole 
 thing." 
 
 " You speak very soon, before you have had time 
 to judge." 
 
 She threw herself, face downwards, on the rattan 
 stretcher and began crying. " No time ! " she said, 
 " I seem to have been in this house for weeks. I 
 seem to know what it will be like, and, oh! I can't 
 bear it ; it's not your fault, but everything is so 
 strange. I didn't imagine that any one could be so 
 unlike ourselves as you and your people are ; I 
 knew there'd be some difference, I never thought of 
 this. Oh, what am I to do ? — I can't bear it, I want 
 to go home." 
 
 " To go honie ? " asked the Chinaman, — " perhaps 
 in three years, not before, till then you must content 
 yourself with my society, I fear. But, Mabel, since 
 you say you want the company of English people, 
 who is it that you want, which of those on board the 
 Orestes are you anxious to meet again, you who tell 
 me that they insulted you ? " 
 
 The girl was silent ; in her unbalanced mind for a 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 153 
 
 long while now, all sorts of schemes and plans had 
 been revolving, and these schemes had had for their; 
 subject some possible way of correcting, of stepping 
 back from the hideous mistake she had made in 
 marrying this Chinaman. She had never quite 
 realised till now that almost ever since the marriage 
 she had been planning some way out of this wild 
 blunder that she had made, a blunder resulting from 
 despair and ennui, and which she now understood 
 was the maddest of all the mad things she had ever 
 done. 
 
 Yes, once the glamour was off, she had been think- 
 ing of what she should do. In the long nights on 
 board the Orestes she had lain in the berth, imagining 
 how she could act to mend this awful mistake. 
 
 The voyage had set her up in health, and with that 
 health had come a longing for happiness and for life, 
 the sort of life she would have liked, and which, long 
 before they had reached Hong Kong harbour, she 
 had realised would be an impossibility for her in 
 China, as a Chinaman's wife. When Lew-Ching's' 
 mother had treated her with so much unkindness, she 
 had been hurt arid angry, but above that feeling had 
 been the reflection that this conduct would form an 
 excuse for going away, for leaving her husband, or for 
 getting him to live in England, for it was not her 
 husband, but the life and circumstances in connection 
 with him, that she abhorred. 
 
 There was nothing definite in her thoughts but the 
 
IS4 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 feeling that it was impossible that she could continue 
 thus, — some way must be opened ; it was impossible 
 that she was to be a prisoner in this Chinese house, 
 and spend the, possibly, long life before her in a 
 way so abhorrent. 
 
 Lew-Ching took her silence in good part ; he 
 thought he understood by it that she was giving in. 
 
 " Come, Mabel," said he in his hard voice, " since 
 you will not visit my mother, I will see if I cannot 
 bring her to you. . All will be well yet. I daresay, if 
 I tell her you are ill, she will put ceremony aside and 
 come to you, and, Mabel, do the best you can with 
 her, for I have to go now, my chair is waiting for 
 me. I am going to business, — I cannot be back till 
 late." 
 
 " Oh, you are surely not going to leave me here all 
 alone," cried the girl. " Oh, take me with you." 
 
 " Mabel," said her husband, not unkindly, " don't 
 be foolish. How can I take you into a tea hong 
 with my partner and other men there ? Why, even 
 in England you don't do that. No, make friends 
 with my mother, so that whilst I am away you may 
 always have a companion. Come, say good-bye, 
 dear, — I will send her to you, if possible ; and if not, 
 then be content till I return. I am late now, I 
 must go." 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 When Mabel was left alone she made no effort to 
 dress herself, she lay there as he had left her, in the 
 position she had fallen into during that terrible fit of 
 crying. 
 
 No one came near her. From the courtyard below 
 arose a smell of cooking, and an occasional rattle of 
 pots and pans. She wondered where her mother-in- 
 law was, that hideous old Chinawoman who had had 
 the insolence to dislike her ; she was feeling happier 
 now after that outburst of tears, and the fact that 
 Lew-Ching had not been particularly kind to her or 
 sympathetic, strengthened her in the resolve to get 
 away from China and this life at any cost. If he 
 had folded her in his arms or shown any love for her 
 it would have made the situation far more difficult. 
 She felt certain in her own mind that she would be 
 able to get away. Yes, this was only an evil dream ; 
 Yes, Lew-Ching, if he wanted her, must live in 
 England. 
 
 She rose, and listlessly wandered about .the room, 
 
IS6 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 dressing as she walked about. How poor everything 
 was — the matting in holes, the old silk quilt that had 
 been her only covering, threadbare in places, a large 
 bath, but no hand basin, a common lacquer-work chest 
 of drawers. Was all this a sign of dire poverty ? It 
 would be in England, or were these ramshackle 
 arrangements a peculiarity of Chinese house- 
 keeping ? 
 
 " It will do to sleep on while I'm here," she 
 reflected, looking at the stretcher ; then she did her 
 hair, and, being dressed, wondered how she should 
 employ her time. 
 
 From her window she could see the courtyard 
 below, surrounded by<the garden with its mimosa- 
 trees. It was paved with stone, there was a little 
 table out there at which stood a young Chinawoman 
 chopping up vegetables. Some basins and plates 
 were on the table, another elder woman appeared 
 from time to time. Mabel could hear their voices ; 
 there was something hateful to her now in the Chinese 
 voice, its strange modulations, its effect of being in 
 octaves. She thought the women hideous with their 
 coarse yellow faces and. black, shining hair. Were 
 they preparing breakfast, she wondered ? Well, she 
 would forget her resolve not to go to the old lady, 
 she would descend and see how things looked by 
 daylight ; perhaps the old dame would be in a better 
 mood, she would at least present herself, and offer to 
 take breakfast with her. 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 157 
 
 She opened the door and found herself in a passage 
 outside, leading to a staircase ; the balustrades were 
 old and handsomely carved, and painted or enamelled 
 white, but the white was peeling off in parts ; the 
 walls were painted a curiously bright green. At the 
 bottom of the stairs she found herself in the entrance 
 hall. Yes, there wei^e the straggling, weedy oleanders, 
 and the carved archway under which Lew-Ching's 
 mother had appeared last night, but if the place had 
 at first impressed her with its air of poverty, how 
 much poorer it appeared by morning light, when a 
 glaring sun showed up its defects. 
 
 The girl sighed as she looked about, and then she 
 was conscious of a feeling of combativeness, of angei- 
 even, She had been tricked, trapped. What could 
 be the status of people living in such a manner? 
 What sort of death in life would a residence here 
 mean ? 
 
 The sordid details of this manage tore from the 
 extraordinary match she had made, the last remnant 
 of romance. She saw clearly now that only a 
 delusion had made this strange step possible to her, 
 and what romance was there Jiere? She had stepped 
 into the bourgeois house of a Chinaman, a house 
 where she was unwelcome — a house, moreover, where 
 she was not the mistress, and where she would be 
 subservient to her husband's mother. 
 
 She turned away and entered the apartment where 
 she had gone with her husband the night before. 
 
158 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 The jalousies were down, a sickly smell of lacquer 
 work and of mimosa was in the air. 
 
 Even in this dim light she could observe the 
 poverty of this room, the shabby, cheap French 
 furniture, the worn Brussels mats that were laid here 
 and there over the old faded matting. On a table 
 were dirty plates, and a dish of small chips of pork, 
 the remains of the feast which, she remembered, she 
 had eaten with a half disgust last night, but which 
 Lew-Ching had, to her astonishment, seemed to enjoy. 
 Facing the window was something in shape like an 
 altar, built of stone and iron. It was a stove, but the 
 iron was red with rust. From this room she 
 wandered out again into the entrance ; there was a 
 little door before unnoticed, and opening this she 
 found herself in a dark passage. 
 
 The sound of voices brought her to a room at the 
 end, damp-looking and cheerless, fitted with a cooking 
 stove. From the windows of this room she saw into 
 that courtyard which she had noticed from her bed- 
 room. 
 
 The young woman was still busy at the table ; she 
 seemed to be stirring up something in a basin. Her 
 hair, black and shiny, was pulled back off her face, 
 her arms were bare, the sleeves of the large-patterned 
 wrapper she wore, being pinned up on the shoulder, 
 her feet were moderately small, but not so cramped 
 as those of the old Chinawoman. Mabel watched 
 her with curiosity for some moments, and then 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 159 
 
 wondered if she might not ask her the whereabouts 
 of her mother-in-law. With that intention she 
 addressed her in English. The result astonished her. 
 
 The woman did not hear at once, but when Mabel 
 had attracted her attention she broke into a torrent 
 of excited and what seemed angry talk. Coming 
 close to the window she leant in with her hand on 
 the sill, and indulged in what seemed a torrent of 
 abuse, though the English woman knew nothing of 
 Chinese. 
 
 This excited, ugly, Chinese face so close to her 
 own, terrified and startled the girl, and then she was 
 sensible that some one else was standing beside her ; 
 Lew-Ching's mother, more hideous still by daylight, 
 tottering on little deformed feet and a crutch, with 
 hair hanging about her yellow, wrinkled face, stood 
 beside her. 
 
 The other Chinawoman immediately became silent, 
 as before a superior. 
 
 The old woman said no word to Mabel, but 
 pointed furiously and angrily to the door. 
 
 At the gesture the colour died out of Mabel's face, 
 leaving it white. " How dare you treat me so," she 
 cried, " andhow dare you permit your servant to be 
 so insolent ; bid her get me food at once, — I am 
 starving in your horrible Chinese house." 
 
 " You have no right to be here," cried the old 
 woman in shrill tones ; " it is you who have no right ; 
 she is my son's wife, an honourable woman, you are 
 
i6o HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 not a wife, no, no, you English, go away, you are not 
 to be here." 
 
 At these words a change came over Mabel's face 
 it seemed to shrink and alter, and the eyes avoided 
 the furious face of the old woman who confronted 
 her. In silence, she passed out through the door and 
 upstairs ; she no longer felt hungry, her brain was 
 too active, something seemed to have given way in 
 her head, she was dreadfully, horribly shocked, the 
 old woman's face had terrified her. She hated the 
 two Chinawomen with a murderous hatred; she 
 would make Lew-Ching take her away from the 
 house, or if he would not promise that, she would 
 escape from it and throw herself on the mercy of 
 the first English person she met. 
 
 Then she remembered that her husband had told 
 her that in this native quarter of Hankow there were 
 no English. To meet with English she must once 
 more pass through those horrible, horrible streets, 
 and get- through the doorway in the grey wall they 
 had passed through last night ! 
 
 Then she realised that unless she could prevail on 
 her husband to take her away from this house, to a 
 house in the English quarter, she could never, never 
 in all her life get away. The idea was so shocking 
 that, from lying face downwards on the stretcher, she 
 suddenly sat up holding her breath. 
 
 The malady which had been creeping over her 
 brain for so long, had established itself ; at this last 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. l6i 
 
 shock it had seated itself there never to be put away. 
 Mabel knew it perfectly well, but with madness had 
 been born the cunning that goes with it. Strangely 
 enough she felt a perfect confidence that she could 
 get away, and outwit them all. She sat there on the 
 side of the stretcher thinking how cleverly she could 
 do it ; she would deceive Lew-Ching and the others 
 too, and get back home to 'England, — they should 
 see afterwards how clever she had been.. She was 
 taken with a fit of laughter, the same uncontrollable 
 laughter that had seized her that day when she 
 had broken the fact of her engagement to Mrs. 
 Conyers. 
 
 Presently a rap sounded at her door. Going to it 
 she found a cup of tea and a plate of rice, with chips 
 of cold meat in it, looking like soup meat. She took 
 it in and began eating the rice and drinking the tea. 
 The flavour of the meat was horrible, — she tried a 
 piece and spat it out. 
 
 Having finished she put aside the plate and began 
 thinking again. Was it true that the young China- 
 woman who had abused her, was Lew-Ching's wife ? 
 It had, at the moment, horrified her to think so, but 
 now she didn't much care. What did it matter ? Her 
 one thought was to get away ! — Once the other side 
 of the grey wall and she would defy Lew-Ching. — 
 But to get there she must keep in with him and so 
 get his help. — How should she persuade him to take 
 her to live the other side of that wall ? 
 
l62 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 , The expression in her eyes was pitiable, as she sat 
 there ; it was the old story ; she could think to a 
 certain point and then the thought was stopped, 
 seemed to get entangled in something like flannel, 
 and she had to begin over again. 
 
 She seemed always stopped by that funny, stuffy 
 sensation in her head, but now, on imagination, 
 the obstacle seemed to her to assume the propor- 
 tions of the grey wall which divided her from life 
 and friends. She seemed to see it towering above 
 her towards the starlit sky, just as she remembered 
 it last night, when entering the slum of low streets 
 she had looked back at its darkness and height. Her 
 thoughts seemed to be stopped by that terrible, grey 
 wall, just as before they had got entangled so strangely 
 in her head. 
 
 She longed for Lew-Ching to come home, though 
 she had an indistinct idea that she must be very 
 careful what she said to him, very careful, that is, not 
 to annoy him. She would affect to love him very 
 much, but she would repeat to him what his mother 
 had said, she would show him that it was impossible 
 for her to live here with these women. 
 
 Motionless, she sat there thinking. Time wore 
 on to the accompaniment of the shrill tones of 
 the women in the courtyard and the rattle of their 
 plates and dishes. She sat there till sundown ! She 
 didn't know how late it was, but she heard the outer 
 gate open and shut, and looking out of the window 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 163 
 
 saw her husband's chair winding its way towards 
 the house through the path lined by mimosas. He 
 alighted from it and came straight upstairs to her 
 room. 
 
 She went forward- to greet him, folding her arms 
 about him with apparent affection, but there was 
 none in her eyes, which had a curious, glazed look. 
 But Lew-Ching saw only that his beautiful wife had 
 missed him and was glad at his return. 
 
 " And what have you been doing, my lovely 
 Mabel ? " he askedj fondly stroking back from her 
 face the red-gold hair. " Why are you here alone ? 
 Has my mother " 
 
 He stopped short, inquiringly, and Mabel began 
 speaking. She had thought over and over again of 
 what she would say, but now he was here she was so 
 afraid that her madness would appear. She found a 
 difficulty in saying what she had to say in a manner 
 that would not make Lew-Ching suspect what was 
 the matter, — she couldn't help repeating herself and 
 harping on trifles, and though she was so much in 
 earnest she couldn't refrain from laughter. 
 
 She told her husband what had happened in a 
 strangely rambling fashion, but he ascribed her 
 oddness of manner to excitement and annoyance. 
 
 When she asked him if it was true that the other 
 woman was his wife, he didn't reply at once, and she 
 began laughing — she couldn't refrain from it. Lew- 
 Ching stared at her for a moment, but the next 
 
l64 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 moment he had made up his mind that this was only 
 another eccentricity of an Englishwoman's character, 
 or that it was because she was excited ; but he replied 
 gravely and as if the fact was one he need not be 
 ashamed of. 
 
 " She was my wife at one time, but not now ; you 
 are my wife, Mabel, I want no other. All that my 
 mother said was womanly spite because she knows 
 you are dear to me. If I did not tell you all this 
 it was because you English I know are prejudiced 
 against our ways, and there was, I thought, no 
 occasion. 
 
 He might have observed in her manner that she 
 was indifferent to his reply, and was thinking of 
 something else ; but he didn't realise the strangeness 
 of an English wife taking such news as this so 
 calmly. 
 
 She began speaking again. " Then if you are so 
 fond of me," she murmured, "you will do as I ask 
 you." 
 
 " And what do you ask ? " he replied. 
 
 " Lew-Ching, I must get to the other side of the 
 grey wall." 
 
 He stared at her for a moment ; there was a 
 curious expression in her eyes. 
 
 " What ! " he asked. 
 
 " Yes, I must get to the other side, because there 
 are English people there and I cannot, cannot do 
 without them. Yes, much as I love you. If you 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 165 
 
 were to be with me all day, it would be different, but 
 without you ! Think what a life ! not knowing the 
 language! I must be where I can at least see my 
 own people, even if I cannot speak to them. 
 
 " But, Mabel, how do you mean .-• " 
 
 " I mean," she said quickly, " that you must leave 
 this house and take another in the English Conces- 
 sion of which you have told me, the other side of 
 the wall. I mean that I cannot, cannot live here, I 
 
 should " She was about to say "I should go 
 
 mad," but she stopped short, and looked imploringly 
 in his face. 
 
 His expression had altered and the lines had come 
 either side of his face. 
 
 " What you ask," said he, " is not possible, not 
 possible. I cannot give you what you ask." 
 
 " And why not ? " 
 
 "Well, this is my house ; I cannot keep two houses, 
 and besides my mother chooses to live here. You 
 see, Mabel, I have just lately spent much money on 
 my trip to Europe and on the business both, and 
 then you ask me to live away from that business — 
 well, it is not possible, that is certain. — No, dear, you 
 cannot ask me that." 
 
 She did not importune him again ; she knew by 
 instinct that it was no use ; she gave in sulkily. He 
 saw that she was sullen, but he did not know the wild 
 fury of hatred, the fury of a trapped animal, that 
 raged within her ; she couldn't look at him, she felt 
 
i66 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 that he would see in her" eyes the thoughts that lay 
 behind them. 
 
 " Come, Mabel," he said, " try and be content with 
 things as they are." 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 It was a curious life that the Englishwoman lived in 
 the Chinese household ; she did nothing. The old 
 Chinawoman avoided her, they only met occasion- 
 ally. She had been present once at one of the old 
 lady's parties ; she had been invited, and Lew-Ching 
 had begged her to go — she had gone just for the 
 excitement of the thing, just to relieve the monotony 
 of her life, and out of a curiosity to know what an 
 assemblage of Chinawomen would be like. 
 
 They arrived in the early afternoon, in the bravery 
 of their visiting dresses, and with faces thickly painted 
 a vivid white and red. They were full of ceremony, 
 and some of them had graceful manners. Their harsh 
 chatter irritated the girl. One of them conversed with 
 her in broken English. 
 
 This woman Mabel thought almost pretty, round- 
 faced, and with soft eyes. After much polite pre- 
 amble she hobbled across the room and seating 
 herself on the divan beside her, talked. But every- 
 thing she said was merely conventional, as artificial 
 
 167 
 
i68 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 as her face and the beautiful visiting dress which 
 made her resemble less a woman than a doll. 
 
 At a signal, cakes were produced, hard pastry with 
 an interior of sickly-sweet fruit paste tasting of 
 almond — others flavoured with ginseng — a mild 
 mixture of tea was handed round. 
 
 A guitar was brought out and one of the ladies 
 sang to it, thrumming it with her pale, short fingers. 
 It seemed a monotonous chant with constant pauses 
 filled in by- recitative. The voice was harsh and 
 unlovely. Though the girl was beginning to know 
 a few words of Chinese she could not understand the 
 song, but could see, from the expression and gestures 
 of the singer, that some melancholy incident was the 
 subject of it. She felt inclined to laugh, for the faces 
 of the women were so apathetic beneath their paint, 
 a cosmetic thicker and more obvious than the grease 
 paint worn on the stage by actresses. 
 
 During the song they stared about them. Mabel 
 felt that every one of those women's twinkling black 
 eyes were examining her, and that she was as much 
 the object of the tea-party as a beautiful dress is the 
 object of a drawing-room tea ; they were met to 
 examine into her merits. If she could have under- 
 stQod their speech she would have heard that beyond 
 her skin, she had no good point whatever ; she was 
 "absolutely hideous," and how Lew-Ching could 
 have found her good-looking, as they supposed he did, 
 was impossible to imagine. 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 169 
 
 The one thing at this time that she took an interest 
 in, was the garden. In the middle of the vista of 
 mimosa-trees not far from the house was a round, 
 paved court, on which were set about all sorts of 
 strange, stunted trees in pots and vases. Some of 
 these trees were cut into curious shapes, much as 
 used to be the fashion in England with yews and 
 box ; thus some were in the form of globes, others 
 had their branches so trained and pruned as to grow 
 in crescent shape ; one with tiny, pink, sweet-smelling 
 flowers, was in the form of an open hand, five care- 
 fully trained shoots being the fingers. Surrounding 
 this quaint and artificial garden, was a low hedge of 
 yew, about a foot and half high, cut into battlements. 
 In the centre of the court was a well, round the 
 mouth of which, and drooping into it, grew maiden- 
 hair ferns, cool and covered with dew. 
 
 The place had a fascination for Mabel ; it was 
 away from the house. Seated here she was out of 
 earshot of the eternal rattling of pots and pans, and 
 the shrill, Chinese speech of her mother-in-law and 
 her women. Away here with these curious trees and 
 flowers she could forget the sordid details of the 
 house — details that affected not merely her mind, but 
 her health. 
 
 It was a month and a half since she had arrived in 
 China, and during that time she had not eaten a single 
 meal with enjoyment ; the meals were to her dead 
 sea-fruit ; at first she had gone to them expecting 
 
I/O HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 each time something eatable was in these dishes, bjit 
 at last she knew every Chinese method of preparing 
 the skinny fowls and the inevitable pork — she knew 
 the strange, acrid flavouring of the sauce that covered 
 the spatchcock, the flavour of coriander seed that 
 sickened her when the lean mutton, tasting like goat, 
 came to table. She had once been so sick after 
 tasting some green vegetables, which had been grown 
 in Chiriese fashion, that since that occasion she had 
 never touched them. 
 
 She had become very altered of late, the shadow 
 of herself, with haggard face and eyes bent always 
 on the ground ; she had become thinner and she 
 stooped ; she no longer cared for her appearance ; 
 once she had guarded her skin from the sun, now, 
 sitting hour after hour in the open court, her face had 
 coarsened and become freckled in yellow patches ; 
 her hair no longer shone, — its colour «ven appeared 
 to have altered. 
 
 Lew-Ching, though he had the conservatism with- 
 out which he could not have been a Chinaman, made, 
 a great departure in his treatment of his wife. Of an 
 evening he would walk with her along the country 
 roads, unmindful of the talk that such a departure as 
 appearing in public with a woman, must create, or if 
 the distance was long they would go in chairs ; these 
 excursions were the only pleasant things that came 
 in Mabel's way. By the shocked anger of the old 
 lady, who saw them depart on these expeditions and 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 171 
 
 the consequent explanations of her husband, the girl 
 perceived that he was going out of his way to procure 
 her an amusement, and she felt grateful to him. Yet 
 even this small recreation was robbed of its enjoy- 
 ment by an incident that happened three weeks 
 after her arrival, and which, in the poor girl's mental 
 condition, made a terrible impression on her. 
 
 They had been out and were returning late in the 
 evening, when Mabel seated herself to rest, on a little 
 hillock by a cotton plantation. Neither she nor 
 Lew-Ching noticed anything as to the spot she had 
 selected, when suddenly she perceived close to her 
 side and projecting from a raised mound, the face 
 of a dead man ! It had, from its appearance, been 
 buried some days ; it had been interred very near 
 the surface and presented a ghastly appearance, for 
 the recent violent rains had washed the earth from 
 its head. The girl was first speechless and paralysed 
 from horror, and then had become hysterical, but 
 that was not the end of the mischief — the remem- 
 brance had haunted her ; she saw the face of the 
 dead Chinaman all that night, and it was afterwards 
 constantly in her mind ; she took a dislike to walk- 
 ing and was now always carried, and as she had 
 always led an active life in Barford, this too began 
 to tell on her health. 
 
 The frequent letters from Mrs. Conyers and Nellie 
 were bright spots in her life, but these she had to 
 
172 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 answer with the greatest care to hide two things — the 
 absolute misery of her existence, and the blight that 
 had gathered over her mind. It was very, very diffi- 
 culty in answer to these fond and questioning letters, 
 to make replies that would betray neither of these 
 two things, but she succeeded ; her replies were 
 curiously couched — they were odd and she repeated 
 herself in them, but there was nothing definite to set 
 Mrs. Conyers and Nellie wondering : — she had never 
 been a good letter-writer. But when poor Mabel 
 composed these pitiable letters, it was only by an 
 effort that she could refrain from putting on paper 
 the misery and wretchedness that were her daily life. 
 The girl could always, when she had time for reflec- 
 tion, refrain from grieving her mother ; it was only 
 when she was with her, that she had wounded her 
 by her pettishness and discontent. Now seeing that 
 poor Mrs. Conyers had neither the means nor the 
 power to help her, the nobler part of her daughter's 
 character asserted itself and she refrained from 
 writing anything that would trouble them at home. 
 
 But one day she received a letter from her mother 
 that set her heart beating, throbbing wildly. She 
 was sitting out in the odd-paved garden where she 
 spent her time, when Luh, the old servant, came out 
 through the mimosas and put it in her hand. When 
 she had mastered its contents she sat down in a dazed 
 way still looking at the writing. 
 
 " By the time you get this," her mother had written. 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 173 
 
 "Lindsay will be out in Hankow. . . . I tell you 
 this, dear, because I am sure that by this time new 
 associations will have swept away all the sad thoughts 
 of the past ; you will be able to meet Lindsay as a 
 friend, and be pleased to welcome him as one who 
 has so lately been in our part of the world, and can 
 tell you more than these letters can about us all." 
 
 She read the letter and at once slipped it into her 
 pocket. In the excitement that possessed her she 
 had a fixed idea : she must keep this information 
 from Lew-Ching, — he was within the house now. Her 
 letters were always addressed to her husband's place 
 of business, and he brought them to her on his return. 
 He must therefore have arrived home, and having 
 something else to do had sent out the missive to her 
 by the servant. 
 
 By an effort she calmed her mind, but her eyes 
 gleamed as she walked back towards the house 
 and up to that part that was hers and her husband's. 
 
 Their nine o'clock evening meal, the Shao-ye, was 
 being laid in the balcony where it had been that first 
 night of her arrival ; everything was just the same 
 except herself. She looked round the room for her 
 husband, he was not there, but he emerged presently 
 from his room. 
 
 Was it her guilty conscience, or did he look search- 
 ingly at her? there was something out of the common 
 in the expression of his' brown eyes as he turned 
 them on her, something that startled and confused her. 
 
174 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 If such a thing had been within the bounds of 
 possibility she would almost have imagined that her 
 husband was in possession of the contents of that 
 letter in her pocket, and knew of the desperate unrest 
 its information had caused her. The lines were either 
 side of his face, those lines that always meant deter- 
 mination. But she decided that this must be fancy ; 
 the envelope could not have been opened without her 
 knowing it ; besides, the idea was absurd. Why should 
 Lew-Ching trouble himself to open this particular 
 letter. He didn't address her, but speaking to Luh 
 bade her put cushions on the couch. 
 
 This, Mabel knew, was the signal for a long opium 
 smoke, for although he was not addicted to the drug, 
 he always flew to it when annoyed or angry. The 
 old servant obeyed without speaking, setting the tiny 
 opium lamp and the pipe and the small case contain- 
 ing the opium beside it. 
 
 Again that horrid feeling of uneasiness crept over 
 the girl, yet why should she feel thus, she asked 
 herself Yes, even if he had read it, there was 
 nothing in the letter to offend her husband with 
 her; she was not responsible for the news it con- 
 tained. She told herself this, but in her heart she 
 knew that not the letter itself, but the thoughts, the 
 determination the news had raised in her soul, were the 
 reason for the guilty feeling. Why else should she 
 wish to hide this news from Lew-Ching? 
 
 But the uncomfortable feeling left her when he 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 175 
 
 turned to her kindly and bade her come to supper. 
 She sat down before him and ate with more relish 
 than she had done for a long while — there seemed 
 something to look forward to now. 
 
 Even to have Lindsay so near without seeing him 
 would be something, — but she would see him, — she 
 would manoeuvre till she did, she would see him if 
 she died in doing so, she would tell him what an awful 
 life this was that she had bound herself to, she would 
 appeal to any vestige that remained of his old love for 
 her ; if he had any pity he would rescue her. How 
 he was to do this, her poor, distraught mind did not 
 inquire, but in the coming of Lindsay she saw an 
 escape. 
 
 She looked at the Chinese face opposite her, at the 
 yellow hands employed with the chopsticks. Since 
 this letter she felt more hatred than ever of China 
 and the Chinese. He was drinking hot wine from a 
 cup ; his very way of holding the cup disgusted her, 
 but she smiled on him. 
 
 He pressed her to drink wine and she drank some. 
 His next words showed the reason of his depression 
 and quite disarmed her suspicion that he knew of 
 Lindsay's coming and was jealous ; he began telling 
 her of the treachery and double-dealing of a com- 
 prador employed by his firm, a man who had been 
 cheating them right and left and for bribes playing 
 into the hands of a rival hong. It was particularly 
 annoying, he said, that it should happen at this time 
 
176 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 when he had just been at such expense, and there 
 was no knowing where the mischief he had done 
 would end, now he must be at all the trouble of 
 finding another man. He was left without a com- 
 prador just at the time when the firm was busiest, 
 &c., &c. 
 
 Mabel felt an intense relief at his words, showing 
 that her suspicions were unfounded, her spirits rose ; 
 she felt really sorry for his annoyance. 
 
 " How very unfortunate," she cried, with apparent 
 sympathy ; "' do you know of any one to replace 
 him ? " 
 
 " No one," he replied, with the Chinese equivalent 
 to a shrug. " All are dishonest — the question is to 
 find a man who is less so than his fellows. Ye.s, who 
 is there one can trust ? " 
 
 He looked at Mabel as he said this and then, 
 having concluded supper, he dipped a napkin in 
 water and carefully wiped his face with the damp 
 cloth. / 
 
 " Yes," he demanded again, '"whom can one trust?" 
 
 Again Mabel was conscious of the letter in her 
 pocket. As she made some trite remark she felt he 
 was observing her. Presently he again took up the 
 damp cloth and wiped his face and neck. 
 
 This was one of the Chinese customs that had 
 always revolted the girl, and now, in her unstrung 
 and nervous condition, she made a movement of 
 disgust and impatience. 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 177 
 
 " What is the matter, Mabel ? " asked he, and then 
 when she made no reply, " How are your mother and 
 sister, and what news did your letter contain ? " 
 
 " They are very well," replied the girl, half sullenly, 
 ignoring the latter part of the question. 
 
 " And there is no news ? " 
 
 " Nothing of itliportance." 
 
 " Ah, that is well ; there is a saying that if there 
 is nothing there is at least nothing bad, but neverthe- 
 less, Mabel, what one person may not consider of 
 importance, others may find so." 
 
 " Yes." She was looking at him now, and at a 
 certain expression in his eyes, but the next moment 
 her suspicions had been again dispelled by his 
 manner. 
 
 " Come, pretty Mabel," he said, " sit beside me 
 while I smoke and dream.'' 
 
 He threw himself down on the couch, and leaning 
 over lighted the small lamp, held the tiny plug of 
 opium on a needle's point over the flame, and when 
 it was ready put it in the pipe and commenced 
 smoking. He put out his arm and held the girl's 
 white hand in his own. 
 
 " Mabel," he said, " this hand is getting thin ; tell 
 me why this is. Tell me, are you less happy than 
 when you first married me ? Tell me, do you regret 
 marrying a Chinaman ? " 
 
 " Why do you ask me all this ? " she murmured, 
 with an attempt at a smile. 
 
 13 
 
178 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND; 
 
 " Because it is of moment to me ; I do what i can 
 for you, yet I seem still to fail in pleasing you. It is 
 not me, I fancy, but the life that you dislike. Yet, 
 if I have denied you anything it has been because it 
 was far beyond my means. Listen, dear one, my 
 mother is old, she is not immortal, therefore you will 
 not so very much longer be troubled with one in 
 authority over you, so different as you say to your 
 English married life. Tell me, is it not that which 
 saddens you so often ? " 
 
 " It is one of the things," replied the girl, " but 
 that I could- very well bear if I might, only see and 
 speak to English people occasionally, it is that, 
 Lew-Ching, yes it is the isolation. Think of my 
 past life, and then of this, what . interest have I in 
 life ? None, but to watch your comings and goings, 
 — you who are the only creature here who cares for. 
 me. Consider ; — your own women have at least their 
 servants to talk to during the day-r — " 
 
 " Mabel," interrupted the Chinaman, " tell me one 
 thing. Is this all that has changed you, for you are 
 changed. Tell me one thing and swear it to me by 
 all that you English reverence and T will believe you. 
 Do you love me still? If you had opportunities of 
 meeting Englishmen would you remain faithful to 
 me, and. this not because you feared to do otherwise, . 
 but because you loved me? Now, think well and 
 swear solemnly. I have never found you untruthful 
 and I will believe you." 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 179 
 
 " I should of course remain faithful." 
 
 " Ah, Mabel," cried the Chinaman, " but that is 
 merely your word, I want something more. Will 
 you swear to me, not by the word of an English- 
 woman but by something that you English hold 
 sacred ? You believe in Christ, swear then by "Him." 
 
 A look of misery crossed the wretched girl's face, 
 her lips trembled. 
 
 " I dare not swear by that sacred name," she 
 murmured, " our religion forbids it." 
 
 " Your religion forbids it ! When they swear in 
 ■ every court ! " 
 
 " Ah, no, not like that ! I could not, I dare not — I 
 can only give you my word ; if that will not suffice 
 you must only continue to keep me in prison — I am 
 helpless in your hands." 
 
 " To keep you in prison ! are you in prison ? " 
 
 She began to cry hysterically. "So it seems, 
 when to get a few hours' liberty I must swear these 
 terrible oaths." 
 
 The Chinaman's face altered. " Mabel," he said, 
 " I shall not ask you to swear. Listen ; I cannot 
 at once go and live in the English Concession, though, 
 dearest one, I may later on. Whether I ever take 
 you there to live will depend on a matter we will not 
 speak of now. But you are not a prisoner, no, 
 attend ; you shall have your way, you shall go 
 beyond the wall and into the English quarter, I will 
 provide you with a chair and with coolies, they will 
 
l$o HER CELEStlAL HUSBAND. 
 
 be in charge of you and protect you, you will be' at 
 liberty to go' where you will, you will start in the 
 early morning and return to my house in the evening. 
 That you may be quite free I shall not accompany 
 you. In a few days' time you shall go ; do not say 
 now that you are a prisoner." 
 
 There was something in the expression of Lew- 
 Ching's face that made her feel uneasy, a lurking 
 smile on the Chinaman's mouth, but she put aside 
 her uneasy feeling and tried to feel only happiness 
 at the chance afforded her by this permission. 
 
 A desperate joy surged through her ; she had no 
 definite plan, her head had been too confused to 
 think anything out in detail, but ever since she had 
 been in this Chinese house she had felt that once 
 beyond the wall she could certainly escape, it seemed 
 impossible that it should be otherwise, that because 
 of this one deadly blunder she had made she was, to 
 be incarcerated for the rest of her existence, living 
 a life that, to an Englishwoman, was worse than that 
 of any beggar in the. English streets. 
 
 When she glanced once more at Lew-Ching he was 
 not looking at her, he was smoking calmly, the smile 
 had left his mouth, a drowsy expression had settled 
 on it ; it seemed as if he had been transported to 
 another region, he turned over on his , other side and 
 steadily smoked. The expression in the brown eyes 
 was one of contentment, like the look in a cat's eye 
 when it purrs. 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 It was a hot, drowsy morning when Mabel started 
 for the English Concession ; all night she had not 
 slept, for she had been planning what she should 
 do on the morrow. The window had been open, and 
 once in the small hours she had stolen to it and 
 looked out. 
 
 This she hoped would be the last night she would 
 ever see these mimosa-trees and smell their sickly 
 scent. Sitting at the window she endeavoured to 
 think out what she should do. She would get to 
 Lindsay, she would appeal to him ; she would refuse 
 to return ; he would surely take pity on her, seeing 
 how ill and changed she was. Then she went back 
 to the rattan couch and contrived to get a little 
 sleep ; it was restless and unsatisfying, and in the 
 early morning at six o'clock she was awakened by 
 the presence of her husband in the room. 
 
 She was struck by a change in his face, he looked 
 worn and old as if he had not slept ; she was touched 
 piomeritarily, after all he had been kind as far as h? 
 
l82 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 could ; it was the life that was so dreadful and that 
 was not his fault. Then she reflected that it was not 
 him that she was flying from, but merely his sur- 
 roundings. But then she reflected again, he might 
 so easily have taken her to live among the English 
 had he chosen, but instead he preferred the will of 
 his mother. Well then, since he had not interfered 
 to prevent life being so unendurable to her, she was 
 driven to take desperate steps : she was not to blame, 
 thus she excused herself. 
 
 " You must hurry, Mabel," said his voice, breaking 
 in on this reverie, " the men will soon be here. Dress 
 coolly, it will be a very hot day and you will not be 
 back till nightfall, look how the mist hangs to the 
 trees. It is a bad, hot day for your journey," he 
 repeated as he left the room. 
 
 She hesitated as to what dress she should put on ; 
 she wanted to wear one of her pretty trousseau 
 dresses, she took it out and looked at it, but returned 
 it to the box, she had a terror of rousing her 
 husband's suspicion, she put on instead the dress 
 she had worn every day since she had left Paris, the 
 blue serge trimmed with gold braid which Lew-Ching 
 had bought for her. By this she thought to disarm 
 any suspicion he might entertain. 
 
 She would have found it difficult to explain why 
 she felt so uneasy about her husband, why she was 
 so anxious to propitiate him. 
 
 When ghe ?am? down ready dressed, she was 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 183 
 
 sensible that he was pleased or relieved, he put her 
 into the chair and spoke kindly to her. 
 
 "The men have instructions to carry you where 
 you will. There are provisions in the basket, for 
 being alone you cannot well go to a tea-shop or 
 to an hotel. Good-bye; Mabel, you see I give you 
 liberty, use it well, dear one." 
 
 At the kindness of his words and at a certain 
 pathos in the figure of the man standing there in 
 liis shabby blue dress, the man whom she hoped not 
 to return to, whom she was planning to desert, a 
 lump came in her throat and she felt strangely 
 touched, then she perceived that the Chinaman's face 
 was more moved than she had seen it before, and 
 that tears were in his eyes. As she went off in 
 the chair she looked back at him and waved her 
 hand, then the coolies started with their peculiar 
 tread over the country roads. It was a marvellously 
 easy motion and she leant back with a feeling of 
 perfect ease, once she leaned out and looked back 
 at the house ; her husband still stood out in the road 
 where she had left him. 
 
 She knew the country round very well, for Lew- 
 Ching and she had often gone out of an evening. 
 \^^hen they had got about a mile away she recognised 
 with a shudder the road to Kouechou, where she had 
 stumbled that night on the body of the half-buried 
 Chinaman. 
 
 When she saw that the coolies were making ia that 
 
j84 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 direction, she sat up in the chair and begged them 
 to take her any way but that, but one of the men 
 acting as spokesman, replied in pidgin English that 
 this was the way they must travel to reach the town 
 and she was obliged to be content. 
 
 She could not, however, refrain from looking out 
 with a terrible, morbid curiosity, to see the grave. 
 Yes, there it was on the little hillock ; she could see 
 the outline of the body : just there at the end was 
 the opening where that terrible, frightful face had 
 looked out, she felt sick at the remembrance. There 
 was one thing, she would never again traverse this 
 road, this was the last time. 
 
 Then they went onwards towards the town. She 
 was a light weight, and the men seemed unwearied, 
 in the middle of the day they had entered the city 
 and were approaching the river. Yes, the streets 
 were getting narrower and dirtier and she began 
 to smell again the nauseating, acrid smell, but she 
 was no longer so shocked at the sights that met her 
 eye, no longer so terrified, and besides, she was 
 buoyed up^with the hope that she would never again 
 pass through this deplorable labyrinth. 
 
 Before, it had been night, but now in daylight 
 the shops were open, she could see what manner 
 of place was this Chinese town, and could note the 
 strange way the shops were grouped ; one tiny close 
 street being full of eating-houses, another of silk 
 mercers, another yet of coffins, 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 185 
 
 It seemed like a dream as they wound their way 
 through these horrible streets, with their reeking 
 humanity, and came once more before the city wall. 
 The terrible grey wall which, ever since she had 
 first seen it had oppressed her like a nightmare, — 
 yes, it was just as she had imagined it so often since, 
 just as it had come to her in those terrible confused 
 dreams, — a shape that appalled her. 
 
 She sat trembling in the chair ; would she ever 
 see the gate open to let her through ? What was 
 the delay? She felt she must scream or cry, it 
 seemed as if she had been waiting years for this 
 moment. The coolies were speaking to the Sikh 
 policeman ! — Then at last the door was opened and 
 she was carried through ! 
 
 She trembled with emotion ! The one English- 
 speaking coolie pointed out to her a low-lying 
 collection of buildings with flat roofs by the river 
 side, which he said was the English Concession. 
 Standing where she was it seemed to lie quite in 
 a hollow, and looked dull and grey and quite unlike 
 the place she had pictured to herself It was 
 singularly unprepossessing ; a barren-looking stretch 
 of flat-tiled roofs with an occasional tall chimney 
 in their midst, and enclosing it the sails and rigging 
 of the river craft, scarcely a tree was to be seen. 
 
 And here for half an hour they rested before they 
 went on. 
 
 The fringe of this English quarter was much like 
 
i86 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 the place she had left, but when they had proceeded 
 on their way and had gone some distance, the streets 
 became broader and handsomer. Mabel had ex- 
 pected to find them more English-looking, but 
 instead here were the long signs down the side 
 of the houses, the gaily painted dragons and hiero- 
 glyphics. 
 
 She met an occasional Englishman. When she 
 did so she leant out of her seat and stared, open- 
 eyed. One man seeing the worn, beautiful face 
 looking from the chair, hesitated and glanced back 
 at it, a sudden impulse moved the girl to stop the 
 coolies and speak to him. He doffed his helmet 
 and approached the chair, a handsome young English- 
 man with bronzed face and neck, and stood looking 
 admiringly at this beautiful girl, this fair, tired face 
 was the prettiest he had ever seen in China. He 
 knew the face of every Englishwoman in Hankow 
 where then did she come from? By the fact of her 
 having no English husband or father with her he 
 judged her to be a resident. 
 
 She had the charm of mystery, and when she 
 began speaking to him he noticed, what Lew-Ching, 
 had he been English, would have seen, that her 
 manner was very curious, it was strangely confused, 
 and she didn't look at him, the beautiful eyes only 
 met his occasionally, glancing at him and turning 
 away, yet there was no coquetry in the glahce. 
 The young fellow felt more than curiosity to know 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 187 
 
 who this lovely unknown woman was, and stood 
 looking admiringly into her face. 
 
 " Can you direct me to Messrs. Glynn's office ? " 
 she asked him. 
 
 " Certainly," he replied, " it is in Sih Yang Street, 
 not far from here, the principal business street. Shall 
 I direct your coolies there ? " 
 
 She murmured an assent and then sank back 
 in the chair ; she didn't thank him or take any 
 further iiotice, but crouched back in her seat. He 
 stood looking after her and wondering ; he thought 
 again that she was very mysterious and that there 
 was something very unusual in her appearance and 
 manner and, in the fact that a lady, who was so 
 evidently a stranger, should be unaccompanied. 
 
 But Mabel's chair had passed on. 
 
 The coolies stopped presently before a house, 
 painted cream colour and with sun blinds at all the 
 windows, and the English-speaking coolie told her 
 that this was where the Englishman had directed 
 them. 
 
 A Chinaman was just leaving the door and seeing 
 the chair stop came forward and bowed to Mabel. 
 He looked, \ho\vever, astonished when she alighted 
 and came hurriedly into the passage, bidding the 
 coolies wait. 
 
 He asked her, in good English, what he could do 
 for her. 
 
 She looked round her, furtively; to see that her 
 
i88 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 coolies were out of hearing and then said, " Is Mr. 
 Lindsay Brookes here ? — I wish to see him." 
 
 " He is here," said the Chinaman. 
 
 " Do not give my name," said the girl, " but tell 
 him some One wants to see him on important busi- 
 ness." 
 
 " I think I cannot give your name, — I do not 
 know it," observed the nian, but he went upstairs and 
 presently signed to Mabel that she was to come up. 
 
 Then the girl found herself in a dimly lighted room 
 face to face and alone with her once lover. 
 
 He had been writing, but he rose and looked at 
 her in astonishment, there was also, she was quick 
 to see, another expression in his face ; she suddenly 
 realised that this other expression was annoyance. 
 
 But it flitted away giving place to a polite look of 
 welcome, almost more cruel than the first look, for 
 that at least had been natural and might have 
 existed with love, whilst this artificial air of gladness 
 froze her to the heart. 
 
 He didn't look quite the same as she remenibered 
 him ; the voyage had given a sunburnt, fresh look 
 to his face and he had, she noted, grown stouter, he 
 had, she also observed, a look of entire well-being ; 
 the free-and-easy dress he wore suited him, the 
 white linen coat, and the wide crimson silk cummer- 
 bund took away the conventional, prim look he had 
 had before. Lindsay Brookes was looking very 
 handsome, All this she noticed with jealous eyes, 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 189 
 
 asking herself why he should seem so prosperous and 
 happy when he had professed to love her, and to be 
 hurt by her falling away from him. Why was it 
 that she should always be the sufferer, and that all 
 things she did should fail ? 
 
 His handsome, changed face struck her as no 
 words of his could have done ; why was it that she 
 who could so easily win men's love with her looks 
 and her ways, could never keep their love, while 
 plainer and less fascinating women could do so ? 
 
 " Oh, Lindsay,'' she murmured, breaking the 
 
 silence, " how well you look, whilst I . Aren't 
 
 you at all pleased to see me ? " 
 
 "Of course I am, Mabel," said he, " but I am so 
 astonished to see you. How do you come to be 
 here ? — Surely not with Mr. Lew-Ching's knowledge, 
 -^and if not^ — " He paused, with a slight frown. 
 
 "Never mind how I am here," cried the girl. 
 " Oh, how like ' you this is ; yes, your face has 
 altered, but not yourself; I see you are the same, 
 careful and cold as ever." 
 
 He stood still, regarding her with a vexed, 
 anxious look. " And you also are the same," he said, 
 " or you, would see that what I am saying is for your 
 good. Surely, Mabel " 
 
 " Oh, say nothing more," she cried, " don't lecture 
 me as you used, don't be severe any more, I'm 
 past.it. Yes, that's why I'm here, because life is 
 unendurable, yes, it's just as you said, — a hell, and if I 
 
190 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 were well I might stand it, but I'm ill and I can't 
 Oh, I'm so ill." 
 
 " Mabel ! " 
 
 " Ah, yes, I see you are not altered except in looks, 
 but can't you make an effort and pity me a little ? — 
 seeing how wretched I am, — how I've been punished, 
 for it all. Oh, Lindsay, just think ; till to-day I have 
 spoken to no English person since I landed in China. 
 We don't live here, but far away in the Chinese 
 settlement, a house in the country where day by day 
 I see no one but Chinese. If we lived where I could 
 even catch sight of English people it might not be* 
 so cruel, but to be quite alone ! You warned me, 
 yes, I know, but I could not imagine what the 
 reality would be like." 
 
 " Is it so bad, Mabel ? — I cannot say that I am 
 astonished, but I am so sorry for you, so very 
 sorry." 
 
 " Are you sorry, really and truly .' " 
 
 " How can I help being so ? But, Mabel, tell me 
 how, if you live in the Chinese settlement, did you 
 get here all alone to visit me ? Does your husband 
 know of this visit to my office, did you tell him you 
 were coming ? — And if you haven't " 
 
 " My husband knows nothing." 
 
 " Good heavens ! " ejaculated the young man, " but 
 he will ! What madness led you to come here ? 
 How have you got away ? — tell me that. How do 
 you hope to keep this visit from him ? " 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 191 
 
 The girl had been standing, but now she sat down- 
 in a chair beside the table and looked at Lindsay 
 with a curious smile, he had never seen this smile 
 before, it was quite unlike Mabel. 
 
 " I don't care whether he knows of it or not," 
 she said, " I was desperate — and, — I have come away 
 to you." 
 
 '^To me!" 
 
 " To ybu. Lindsay," she went on, " to whom else 
 should I go .' I want you to save me and you can 
 easily dp so, fny life is much worse than death." 
 
 " But what do you want me to do ? " 
 
 " Shelter me here," cried the girl, '" protect me, 
 and when you return to England, let me go with 
 you."- 
 
 " Good God ! " 
 
 "Ah, yes, I know — I know all you are going to 
 say, but — you cannot have the heart to send nie back. 
 I can't go back, I dare not ; surely what you have to 
 do is very easy." 
 
 " Mabel, you've ruined yourself ! " 
 
 " Oh, no. . Lindsay, the thing is quite easy, only 
 let me stay with you, under your protection, — that's 
 all I ask. Is it possible thatjyou have no spark of 
 love remaining, you who pretended to love me ? 
 Shelter me how, for God's sake do," she^added in 
 a lower voice. " You must, I will never leave you 
 now. I will never go back to that house." 
 
 " Mabel," said the young man, " I am shocked by 
 
192 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 what you tell me. Collect yourself, be reasonable, 
 I have a very great regard for you, you know I have, 
 in spite of all ; but what can I do for you ? You 
 have put it out of my power to do anything, just 
 think ! " 
 
 " I only ask you to let me remain here, I mean 
 wherever you live." 
 
 " You ask me to take another man's wife into my 
 house ! Are you mad ? No, no, Mabel, I am 
 utterly sorry for you, but you must not talk like 
 this. You ask me to take away a Chinaman's wife 
 from him 1 Why, my life would not be safe in the 
 place ! But even putting aside that, I could not — 
 let me only say that, since we parted, things have 
 happened that make it quite impossible for me 
 to do what you ask ; I have other people but 
 myself to consider, and I can do nothiftg but harm 
 to you in your present position. Oh, Mabel, do be 
 reasonable and go home, and trust to luck that your 
 husband never hears of this." 
 
 The young man went over to the window, looked 
 out and then returned to the weeping girl. 
 
 " Mabel," he said, raising her from her chair and 
 setting her hat straight, "your men have been waiting 
 a long while ; the longer you stay the more danger- 
 ous for you and for me, take my advice, my poor 
 Mabel, go home at once ; I will try and think of 
 some way of helping you, I absolutely cannot do 
 what you ask, it would ruin me in every way, — 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 19S 
 
 why, I should be an outlaw in the place if I did 
 such a thing." 
 
 But she refused to go. 
 
 " No," murmured she. " I shall not leave this 
 room ; if I am hurting you by staying here, I cannot 
 help it. Once," she added with a vacuous smile, "you 
 would have begged and prayed me to stay." 
 
 His face looked astonished and stern. " I should 
 never have asked you to compromise yourself as you 
 are doing now." 
 
 She suddenly burst out into laughter, so harsh and 
 mirthless that he stood looking at her. 
 
 " No, Lindsay, that's spoken like yourself, you 
 would never have been anything but conventional, — 
 you would be that even on your deathbed — or at any 
 one's else. But now consider that this is mine, and 
 that I'm entreating you to save me from death; Do 
 you still refuse ? " 
 
 " There's nothing else for it. I must." 
 
 " Then, Lindsay, you've torn one last regret from 
 me ! My God ! — What a heart you must have. 
 Wretched and ruined as I am, I'm glad I'm not 
 your wife." 
 
 " You don't understand— — " 
 
 She broke into a torrent of wild words. 
 
 " Mabel," he interrupted, " listen to what I'm going 
 to say, you have left me no alternative but to tell you 
 something, though you seem so strange that I can 
 scarcely hope that what I am about to say will make 
 
 14 
 
194 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 any difference in the extraordinary resolves you have 
 taken. I suffered horribly when you left me, but I 
 am not suffering now : I brought reason to my aid 
 and convinced myself that a woman who could treat 
 me so ill was not worth troubling over. I saw no 
 reason in being miserable about it, and when in 
 addition to throwing me over, you chose to degrade 
 yourself by a marriage that I believe scarcely any 
 woman in England but yourself would have made 
 — well — I washed my hands of you. I was then only 
 ashamed that we had ever been to each other what 
 we were. Since that time I have formed other ties, 
 and for this reason, if for no other, I cannot do what 
 you ask." 
 
 A dead silence followed this speech, a contortion 
 altered the girl's face, which had become deadly 
 white. 
 
 " Oh, Lindsay " she murmured, " I see, I see. If 
 anything could make me more wretched than before 
 it was this." She burst into tears. " So soon to be 
 forgotten ! So soon. And now you and she will be 
 
 happy, whilst I Ah, yes, I will go now, I'll go 
 
 now ; say no more, I'll go back to my prison." 
 
 " Don't call it that." 
 
 " Yes, but it is that. Do you know that this is my 
 last hope, my last attempt to re-instate myself, to 
 grasp at happiness ? I shall not make another, I shall 
 not care now — — " 
 
 " Don't say such wild things." 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 195 
 
 " Lindsay, don't interrupt me, but listen. It seems 
 lilce years that I have been in that Chinese house ; I 
 have had nothing to do there but to think and think 
 continually, and all my thought has been of getting 
 away — anywhere, so that I might be away and free ; 
 but in all my dreams you have been helping me. 
 I've seen myself scaling that dreadful grey wall ; it was 
 your hand that was holding mine; — now all that is 
 shattered — I must return. But, Lindsay, never let 
 my people know that I suffered, — that I came here 
 to you and begged so hard, don't say that you have 
 seen me even, for once I return no one else ever will. 
 — I go out of sight for ever, so good-bye to life, and 
 you." 
 
 She was no longer crying, there was a stony white- 
 ness on her face — it was white to the very lips. 
 
 " Good-bye, Lindsay," she repeated with a smile. 
 " If I've ever hurt you, you are more than avenged 
 now. So many men have told me that I have 
 tormented them with my waywardness. If I have, 
 all are avenged, for I am going back to my punish- 
 ment now." 
 
 She laid her hand on the door and in another 
 instant was gone. He could hear her step retreating 
 down the staircase. The young man had come 
 forward to shake hands with her, but she had not 
 appeared to see the hand held out, she seemed as 
 if in a trance. 
 
 Lindsay looked out of the office window, he saw 
 
196 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 the coolies who had been squatting outside rising 
 to their feet, evidently at their mistress's appearance. 
 Several people had collected round the door ; passers- 
 by looked with some attention at the house. He 
 expected from his window to see Mabel get into 
 the chair, but she did not. 
 
 If there was one thing more than another that 
 the young man hated it was a scene, anything that 
 could bring him into men's mouths. What, he 
 wondered, was Mabel doing down below that the 
 people stared so ; he pitied her, but first and last 
 she had been so much annoyance, that he wished 
 she would go, and besides this he honestly feared 
 for her in the event of discovery. Why, having 
 tried once to blight his life, should she come here 
 when he had recovered and was beginning afresh, 
 and do her very best to ruin him ? 
 
 He leaned as far out of the window as he could 
 without being observed. The coolies had put down 
 the chair again and were staring at some one or 
 something in his doorway. 
 
 Then Lindsay heard the sound of a slow footstep 
 and of violent and uncontrollable laughter, harsh 
 and discordant, and Mabel re-entered the room. There 
 was no smile on her face, but this terrible laughter 
 proceeded from her lips. The expression in her 
 eyes struck him with horrot ; madness was so plainly 
 written there. He stood before her speechless. 
 
 " I'm going back to hell," she said, " I've come to 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 197 
 
 bid you good-bye." Then she turned away once more 
 down the staircase, got into her chair and was carried 
 away. 
 
 It was nightfall when the chair reached the house 
 in amongst the mimosas, a lantern flitted on the path 
 between the trees and stopped at the outer gate. 
 
 It was carried by Lew-Ching, the light gave a 
 livid look to his face, but Mabel stared straight 
 before her without noticing it. She shivered when 
 he helped her to alight, and he noticed the shiver 
 and looked closer at her face. 
 
 " These nights are damp," he said, " and chilly. 
 I should have warned you to bring a shawl, but 
 Mabel, dear one, you have returned rather earlier 
 than I expected. I thought you would not leave 
 the English settlement till late. Why is this?" 
 
 The girl shook her head. " There was no use 
 in staying," she said. 
 
 " You were disappointed in the place ? " 
 
 " Yes," murmured she, "I suppose that was it." 
 
 He gave a little ejaculation that he always made 
 when pleased. 
 
 " Ah, that was so," he said, rubbing his hands 
 together. " Come, Mabel, you are tired and chilly, go 
 up to our rooms whilst I pay the men ; since you 
 are cold I will .order the Shao-ye to be laid within 
 the house and not on the balcony, and you shall 
 drink a glass of hot wine — it will do you good." 
 
 As Mabel ascended the stairs she met Lew- 
 
198 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 Ching's mother, she was hobbling along on sticks 
 as usual and scanned the girl's face with a searching 
 glance, but Mabel turned her head away and went 
 towards that part of the house that had been put 
 aside for her husband and herself, and entered once 
 more the rooms in which she had suffered so much. 
 As she did so she heard a step behind her. 
 
 It was her husband. He came forward into the 
 room, securing, the door behind him. 
 
 She was sitting on the rattan couch, and glancing 
 at his face knew at once what had transpired in those 
 few minutes since she had left him downstairs. 
 
 " Oh yes, I know it all," she cried, " you need say 
 nothing." 
 
 He was silent for a moment, during which his 
 brown eyes seemed to burn into her heart. Then 
 she realised that she hated him ; it was more hatred 
 than fear that she felt of him, a hatred of him and of 
 his race, he revolted her. 
 
 " Mabel," he said, " you shall never again disgrace 
 me, for you shall never again leave this house." 
 
 " Never again ! " 
 
 " Never again. Here you will live and here die. 
 When death comes you will be taken out of these 
 doors, but never till then. Yes, even an English 
 wife may be trusted when she is dead." 
 
 " But," she whispered, " you dare not do this." 
 
 He smiled. " It is not a question of daring : — you 
 are criminal." 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. I99 
 
 "Then if you think so, divorce me." 
 
 " No, Mabel, I shall not. I shall make no scene at 
 which every one will laugh at the husband, as is your 
 indecent way in England. Do not appeal to me nor 
 yet cry, I have no pity for you.'' 
 
 " But I am an English woman, you dare not treat 
 me as you say." 
 
 " You are also my wife." 
 
 " Lew-Ching," said she, " what pleasure can it do 
 you to torture me? You have married an English 
 wife, she has disappointed you, very well, let me 
 return to my own people." 
 
 " And to your lover. No, I think not." 
 
 "Mr. Brookes is no longer my lover, — I went 
 because he is an Englishman and has an English 
 face." 
 
 " You lie," cried Lew-Ching, " you lie. What were 
 you doing in the young man's rooms ? and in the 
 streets of Hankow you stopped the chair to accost 
 another of the white devils ! He you would have had 
 for your lover too. You see I know it all." 
 
 "Lew-Ching," she said after a moment, and with 
 an intense contempt, " let me go, you can get any 
 number of wives according to your religion, and 
 what is one more or less ? " 
 
 " It is like the manners of you English to deride 
 and spit at what you are so inferior to us in," 
 answered the Chinaman, " but I can answer you. 
 Your religion ! Your customs ! — I had opportunities 
 
300 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 of studying both ; as a nation you have no morals, 
 no manners, the most rude and unpolite nation under 
 the sun. In your Engh'sh society there runs a sewer 
 more poisonous than any refuse in the streets of 
 Hankow. What are your women ? . . . Here we 
 divide them so that a man may know, but there 
 good and bad are alike in men's eyes . . . and you 
 are like them, a low woman, and I have brought 
 shame and scandal on my house." 
 
 He paused with a pallid face. 
 
 And then once more an uncontrollable fit of 
 laughter seized the wretched girl ; she leant forward 
 shaking with it, and Lew-Ching came towards her 
 and seized her by the shoulder looking with furious 
 eyes into her face. It was like this shameless woman 
 to laugh at the disgrace she had brought on' him. 
 At that moment he could have killed her, but he 
 only shook her roughly and ,threw her from him. 
 She fell forward on the. rattan stretcher, and lay 
 motionless there. 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 The moment Mabel had left Lindsay Brookes' 
 office and he had, with a feeling of mingled horror 
 and concern, seen her carried away in the chair, he 
 had set himself to the task of writing to her people, 
 undeterred by the fact that she had begged him 
 not to. 
 
 It was a difficult and most painful letter to write ; 
 Lindsay as he sat there searched his brain for some 
 words which should inform poor Mrs. Conyers of 
 this last unexpected bloWj and yet soften the infor- 
 mation in such a way as to make it less startling 
 and more possible to be borne by the poor woman. 
 
 The young man to his credit, never for a moment 
 thought of doing otherwise than telling Mabel's 
 family of what had happened, he had a great 
 idea of doing his duty, and in this case he had a 
 task before him that appalled him. Something 
 must be done for poor Mabel. He reflected on that 
 strange crook of mind, that strange waywardness, 
 that was apparent even through her madness, and 
 
202 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 had led her to appeal to him, the one person in the 
 world who could not possibly help her. 
 
 He wrote several letters and tore them up ; 
 Lindsay's letters had always been rather precise 
 and business-like, and though his appearance had 
 changed, his mind, as poor Mabel had discovered, 
 had remained the same. Even to him the letters 
 seemed too precisely and pripily couched under 
 the circumstances, which he realised were terrible. 
 He wished that he could have written something 
 different and tried again. At last he contrived a 
 letter that he hoped would break to poor Mrs. 
 Conyers the extent of this last affliction that had 
 befallen her. It was a kind letter, for though he 
 had an intensely commonplace mind, he had a good 
 heart. The letter left by next mail. Then Xindsay 
 hesitated for a moment as to whether he ought not 
 to write to Lew-Ching to tell him what he had done, 
 and to place before him Mabel's mental state, which 
 he was not certain that he knew, but Lindsay turned 
 from this last as an impossible task, a thing better 
 left alone. The very name of the Chinaman, when 
 he wrote it on paper, the very thought of him re- 
 volted him, he could not mix himself in his concerns ; 
 it was this thought rather than the danger to himself 
 of doing so, that kept him from giving Lew-Ching 
 an account of the visit. 
 
 ****** 
 
 In the house, among the mimosas, there was a 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 203 
 
 great deal of talking that night, shrill high-pitched 
 arguments between Lew-Ching and his mother ; the 
 old woman had heard all, Luh Akwong, the old 
 servant had had it from the chair-bearers, and had 
 immediately informed the mistress. 
 
 The old woman was wild against her son's English 
 wife, who had made them the scandal and byword 
 of Hankow. She hated her with malignance. Why 
 did her son receive the creature back into his 
 house ? Why did he insist on calling her his wife ? 
 She was no wife, nor had ever been. The wisest 
 course would be to give her a little money, and to- 
 morrow morning to send her into the English 
 Concession, among the other English, let her get 
 back to England where she could no more disgrace 
 them. 
 
 Then, when Lew-Ching would not consent to this, 
 she upbraided him with his foolish passion for this 
 wretched English woman. Any one, she said, could 
 see that she was the dearest in the world to him, 
 and any one also could see that the English woman 
 hated him — how did she show afifection for him ? In 
 what way ? Her eyes were as cold as well water,— 
 all had seen this but himself. 
 
 Then Lew-Ching explained that he could not 
 send her to Hankow, and thus return her to her 
 lover, which again enraged the old lady, who sus- 
 pected, and with reason, that passion for the beautiful 
 English woman, and not a desire to punish her, was 
 
204 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 at the root of this intention of his to keep her with 
 him still. She raged at him for an undutiful son, 
 nothing had been well since the English woman had 
 snared him, his mother, his religion, all had been put 
 aside and this was the return she made. 
 
 The Chinaman had none of the despair that a man 
 of another race would feel at discovering his wife's 
 unfaithfulness ; he had the Asiatic idea of a wife 
 being his own possession ; what her sentiments were 
 with regard to himself did not so muchmatter so 
 long as he could possess her ; therefore, thoygh he 
 was enraged, he considered that by keeping Mabel 
 prisoner as it were, and giving her no more 
 opportunity of meeting other men, all would be 
 well. This example, he reflected, only showed the 
 superior wisdom of the Chinese to the English 
 married customs. He had yielded to her wish by 
 giving her the liberty of the English ; now he would 
 withhold that freedom and would treat her in the 
 wise way wives were managed, here. The house 
 and garden would in future afford her all the recrea- 
 tion she needed, then, no doubt, in time she would 
 love him, she would forget this Englishman whom, 
 he supposed, she cared for still. 
 
 But as the days wore on, he saw that all was not 
 so easily arranged. Mabel's temper alternated be- 
 tween violence and suUenness, she lived in her bed- 
 room, only leaving it for meals, which she partook 
 of sitting sullenly opposite to him. Sometimes she 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 205 
 
 would not eat, and then he would put aside part of 
 the food on a plate and leave it where she could 
 find it. When he was gone she would devour it with 
 a ravenous appetite. 
 
 He imagined that she was merely sulking. Some- 
 times her words and actions would astonish him, 
 but because of the racial gulf which separated them 
 he was still far from guessing the truth, which 
 the Englishman, even in that short interview, had 
 discovered. 
 
 Mabel now very rarely slept at night, her brain 
 had become so active, she was thinking, thinking 
 perpetually. Curiously enough the interview with 
 Lindsay was quite forgotten, she had returned to 
 her old attitude of mind, an intense desire to escape 
 from this Chinese house and get to England. In 
 these dreams, confused and terrible, she was always 
 on the point of escape and always stopped by 
 Lew-Ching. Thus she hated him, she could not 
 conceal her loathing for him, the very sight of him 
 made her shiver, her mind was so occupied that she 
 read her letters from home with very little interest, 
 she put them aside in her pocket, but she never 
 answered them. Her reason for this was that she 
 felt that she was going home by the next ship, 
 the ship that would carry the letter, and, therefore, 
 it would be foolish to write. 
 
 Her husband was astonished at her not writing, 
 for he had always carried her. letters away with him 
 
2o6 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 to business. Once he asked her why, and she 
 replied, with a smile, " You will know why some day." 
 
 It was this conduct of hers that made him at 
 last suspect something near the truth, though he 
 still did not dream of the extent of the mischief 
 
 He brought home with him once a native doctor, 
 but the old man did no good. Lew-Ching was wise 
 enough to know the ignorance of the Chinese doctors, 
 and that summoning this man was almost a mere 
 form, but nevertheless he would not call in an 
 English one. The Chinaman left certain drugs for 
 Mabel to take — the drugs remained on the table 
 where he had left them, and no persuasion could get 
 the girl to touch them. 
 
 On returning from business he would at once 
 go up to their rooms, he saw always the same sight, 
 Mabel sitting motionless with her white hands 
 before her, gazing out into space. His mother would 
 sometimes in his absence go up to the girl's room 
 and look in on her, but never addressed her, she 
 hated her too much, she longed to be able to break 
 down her son's foolish resolve to keep this English 
 woman in the house ; her action had, she thought, 
 made it so easy for him to send her away, and why 
 would he not do it ? 
 
 If this English woman had even been a good wife, 
 with this difference of nationalities, it could never have 
 been a happy or fortunate union, yet now that he had 
 an excuse for getting rid of her openly, and in no 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 207 
 
 underhand fashion, he would not take it. It was 
 the cause of endless quarrels between mother and 
 son, but the Chinaman was obstinate in his resolve. 
 
 He was looking very worn of late, business was 
 going badly, he had not yet replaced the comprador, 
 and rival hongs were competing keenly with him ; 
 then when he returned it was to find himself on ill 
 terms with his household, no one but Luh, the old 
 servant, had a cheery word, for the other two were 
 openly with their mistress and against the intruding 
 English woman. In addition to this, the story of 
 his wife's visit to the Englishman was known through- 
 out Hankow, and he was, by all, censured as a 
 person of libertine views to insist on keeping this 
 loose English woman in his mother's house : — never 
 had there been such scandalous conduct ; it was 
 enough to make his father rise from his grave. 
 
 Mabel did not observe her husband's depression, 
 she was past that, she only noticed his presence 
 by the loathing it occasioned her, such a sensation 
 as some people feel at the sight of some object such 
 as a lizard or a snake. 
 
 Through the long night hours she would only 
 sleep occasionally, and then would wake up to think 
 of some plan by which she could get rid of Lew- 
 Ching, revenge herself oh him for the wrong he 
 had done her ; he was to her distraught mind, the 
 one obstacle to a new life ; it was he who prevented 
 her climbing the wall, on the other side of which the 
 
2o8 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 ship was waiting to carry her back to England, it 
 was he who iinprisoned her here in this house which 
 was so full of horrible dreams, that they even got 
 into her head, so that it felt like lead. Again, it 
 was he who had set over her these wicked tartar- 
 faced women, so that she could not get free. 
 
 By the mail following that on which Lindsay had 
 written, Lew-Ching wrote to Mrs. Conyers ; the 
 letter contained the same news that Lindsay's had 
 contained. It found Mrs. Conyers very ill. She 
 had suspected something from the fact of her 
 daughter's silence. Then had come Lindsay's epistle 
 confirming her terrible suspicions, and now this 
 precisely worded but mysterious letter from her 
 Chinese son-in-law completed her misery ; she would 
 have set out for Hankow at once, but her health 
 made such a thing impossible. 
 
 Lew-Ching felt as much pity for his wife as it 
 was possible for his nature to feel, but the annoy- 
 ance of the present and past was telling on him, 
 the position of things with an English wife had 
 been from the commencement an impossible one, 
 and when he had realised this he became impatient 
 of all this trouble. Every one was against him, 
 and this woman for whom he had sacrificed so much, 
 it was quite plain, abhorrtd him. To go on living 
 with her thus was impossible. It would be better 
 to send her home. Yes, he had now begun to feel 
 that he must abandon his scheme of keeping her 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 209 
 
 with him. It was strange what ill luck he had had 
 since meeting with this girl. 
 
 Then one night the words of the soothsayer's 
 prediction came into his mind, he tried to dismiss the 
 thought, but in spite of what he had told Mabel, he 
 was superstitious, and the prophecy, with its enigma- 
 tical suggestion of evil in connection with a woman, 
 influenced his mind. Mabel's conduct disturbed him, 
 she had become a trouble to him. Why did she so 
 often steal to his door in the night, many times he 
 had listened to that stealthy footstep pausing out- 
 side. Once he had thrown open the door and con- 
 fronted her, when she had crept away into the 
 darkness again without a word. 
 
 The state of things altogether was distinctly un- 
 comfortable, even impossible, meanwhile he found 
 his business less flourishing than it had been. He 
 wished now that he knew some English woman who 
 would come and see his wife. Such a thing would 
 anger his mother greatly, for she hated the English, 
 but it would relieve his mind ; anything was better 
 than this. 
 
 He thought this scheme over for some days, and 
 one night arrived home bringing with him the wife 
 of an English missionary. It had been late in the 
 afternoon when he had decided on the project, and 
 it was nightfall when Mrs. Frean and he arrived in 
 their chairs opposite the house. The reason of his 
 sudden determination had been Mabel's appearance 
 
 15 
 
210 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 and manner that morning ; she had not risen from 
 the couch and had not dressed, her hands were hot 
 and dry and feverish, and her eyes brilliant. Per- 
 haps but for what had gone before Lew-Ching would 
 have sent for an English doctor, for he well knew 
 that her one chance lay in skilled advice such as no 
 native doctor could give, but his jealous mind could 
 not bring itself to that, and the introduction of this 
 missionary lady to his household was the best he 
 could bring himself to do. 
 
 Poor Mabel was talking oddly when he left, and 
 he had given instructions to old Luh to see that 
 she had herb-tea and other preparations good for 
 reducing fever. The lady, Mrs. Frean, lived a couple 
 of miles from his office and there had been some 
 little delay before she could send a message to her 
 husband by the native Catechist and set out. She 
 had gone willingly, as she did every good work, and 
 on the journey had elicited the whole story from 
 Lew-Ching, that is to say, the bare facts of it, for it 
 was obvious that he did not, and never could, appre- 
 ciate the tragedy of it, but this plain, ill-dressed 
 woman in the chair beside him filled in, in imagina- 
 tion, what he left untold, and was full of pity. If 
 only she had known of this poor countrywoman of 
 hers before, how glad she would have been to come 
 to her. The Chinese Mission had been a dream of 
 the English woman, but though she had laboured on 
 for eight years, she had enough common sense to 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 211 
 
 perceive how few and far between were the good 
 results of this toil. Here, however, was actual kind- 
 ness which she could do, and she rejoiced at the 
 opportunity afforded. 
 
 Luh opened the door, she was admitted into 4:he 
 house, and Lew-Ching asked her to follow him 
 upstairs. 
 
 At the door of their apartments, he paused un- 
 decided ; during the journey he had been so occupied 
 answering the missionary lady's questions that he 
 had not thought of how he should introduce her to 
 his wife, he was suddenly struck by the idea that to 
 give her full freedom of speech with this country- 
 woman of hers would be best ; then his native cun- 
 ning asserted itself and told him that it was unwise 
 to allow his wife to talk and make complaints to this 
 woman who was probably like all women, a gossip, 
 and might spread about Hankow tales which would 
 discredit him, more even than he was already dis- 
 credited. Having thought this out he passed into 
 Mabel's room followed by Mrs. Frean. 
 
 As they entered they could hear a voice speaking, 
 but Mabel was alone. The room was lighted by a 
 tiny oil lamp, but was full of shadows, the window 
 was open and the night breeze rustled the leaves of 
 the mimosas with a crisp sound. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII, 
 
 Letter from Mrs. Frean of the Chinese Mission to 
 Mrs. Conyers. 
 
 KiH Chao Mission House, Hankow, 
 
 August 2nd. 
 
 " Dear Mrs. Conyers, — I feel that I have a difficult 
 task before me and that this letter must needs be 
 the saddest that it has ever been my lot to write, 
 nevertheless, as I believe I am the only English- 
 woman who has spoken to your daughter since her 
 arrival in this place, five months ago, and am, indeed, 
 so far as I know, the only other of her country- 
 women in this native settlement of Hankow, I feel 
 that it devolves on me to tell you openly and faith- 
 fully all I know about her and of the details of the 
 last week. This letter must needs contain news that 
 will be very hard for you to bear, but which I fancy 
 from what Mr. Lew-Ching informed me, when he 
 asked me to visit his house, will not be quite un- 
 expected. I will write down then everything in order 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 213 
 
 as it happened, from the time your son-in-law called 
 at the Mission House to see me, till now. 
 
 " I was at the mission room on the 28th of July, 
 when the Catechist informed me that a Chinese 
 merchant of the place wished to speak with me, and 
 almost immediately afterwards Mr. Lew-Ching came 
 in. He seemed, for a Chinaman, moved as he 
 described your daughter's illness, and urged on me 
 to go and see her. You can imagine I needed little 
 persuasion, my only regret being that though I lived 
 in the native quarter of Hankow, not more than two 
 miles from this other English woman I had never 
 known of her existence, and thus, though . she has 
 been there for months, had had no opportunity of 
 visiting her. Your son-in-law, however, was well 
 aware of my existence, and I can only imagine that 
 his reticence on the subject of his wife mUst have 
 arisen from that curious jealousy of English people 
 which is a peculiarity of the Chinese. 
 
 " My husband, on being consulted, agreed that I 
 should go at once, and I set out there and then, Mr. 
 Lew-Ching telling me some details about his wife as 
 we went along. The house is one standing alone, in 
 the midst of plantations of cotton and surrounded by 
 mimosa-trees. It was dark when we got there, for 
 asking me to come had evidently been a sudden and 
 unpremeditated resolve on the part of this Chinese 
 gentleman, and it had been late in the evening when 
 he had called at the Mission House. I saw no one 
 
214 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 but an old Chinese servant who admitted us, and 
 your son-in-law conducted me at once upstairs and 
 into your daughter's presence. 
 
 " Mr. Lew-Ching had told me he was very anxious 
 about her health, but I had imagined that what ailed 
 her was most likely some ordinary disorder, such as 
 the malarial fever, which I have had very often in my 
 eight years' experience of this place, and which every 
 one must expect. I was therefore quite unprepared 
 for what I found. I perceived at once that your poor 
 daughter was very, very ill, suffering I believed, from 
 fever, and from that or some other cause, quite out of 
 her mind. 
 
 " I at once demanded of your son, why as well as 
 asking me to come, he had not called in a doctor, to 
 which he replied that he had already had a doctor 
 to see his wife and he had done no good. It after- 
 wards transpired, however, that it was a native doctor, 
 and on that I insisted on his there and then sending 
 a messenger into the British Concession for an English 
 one. Your poor daughter, I must tell you, took very 
 little notice of me beyond asking me once who I was, 
 but she seemed to recognise, and to have an actual 
 loathing and horror of her husband ; this I noticed at 
 once. When we entered she was sitting on a couch 
 wrapped up in a silk quilt and shivering, the room 
 just barely lighted by a Chinese oil lamp. A damp, 
 cold wind blew in at the open window. 
 
 " I demanded of Mr. Lew-Ching, why there was no 
 
^ HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 215 
 
 one with his wife to take care of her, whereupon he 
 informed me that his wife hated every one in the 
 house and was not amenable to advice. She, how- 
 ever, did all I asked her like a child, she was in a 
 fever I could see and talked wildly. I covered her 
 up on the couch with any warm wraps I could find, 
 and gave her some remedies that I had brought 
 with me. 
 
 "There was no chance of the doctor arriving till 
 the morning, and I of course decided to remain there 
 for the night. I announced my intention to Mr. 
 Lew-Ching, and could not quite make out from his 
 manner whether he was pleased or not. I also 
 asked him how long his wife had been delirious, for 
 the Chinese doctors though unskilled in surgery 
 understand fevers. 
 
 " He replied in Chinese, that this random talk of 
 hers was not all due to the fever, but that she had 
 said strange things in her tempers lately, that she 
 had been moody and sullen and that the doctor 
 could not understand what ailed her. I asked again 
 why he had not called in an Englishman, whereupon 
 he shrugged his shoulders and said : ' You who have 
 lived here so long know our customs. — Why ask me ? 
 Already I have set aside so many of our rules for 
 her. Now you come in and send for an Englishman, 
 — well, have it so. I care very little now, and if he 
 can save her I hope' he will.' 
 
 " Your daughter's manner struck me as being very 
 
2i6 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 curious and gave colouring to the not very definite 
 suggestion of her husband, but still there was enough 
 fever about her to account for any wildness of speech, 
 and this fact closed my eyes in a measure to the real 
 nature of her disease. At eleven o'clock your son- 
 in-law, after thanking me profusely for what he called 
 my ' benevolence,' retired to rest and I did the same, 
 that is, I wrapped a shawl around me and put my 
 feet up on the couch I had arranged. 
 
 "But your daughter was terribly restless, she 
 would insist on sitting up in bed and throwing off 
 from herself the quilt and the other things I had 
 covered her with, and talked to me incessantly, so 
 that I gave over the idea of rest and sat down beside 
 her. She seemed excited and anxious and spoke 
 endlessly of some journey which she was to go, she 
 was planning how she would hire men to carry her 
 into the English settlement, and spoke of the ship 
 which was waiting there to take her back to England. 
 In her delirium she addressed me sometimes by one 
 name sometimes by another, but the subject of these 
 wanderings was always the same ; she was escaping 
 from China — she was going on board the ship which 
 was to bear her to England and happiness, yet some- 
 thing stood always in the way. Now, her chair had 
 broken down, and at another time she was standing 
 before the wall of Hankow unable to scale its height, 
 or her husband had stopped her on the road. 
 
 " ' Lindsay,' she said, ' you'll be waiting there, won't 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 217 
 
 you ? though I've been away so long you won't have 
 forgotten, and now seeing how I've suffered you will 
 forgive. . . . I'll give up Lew-Ching — then you'll take 
 me back, won't you ? — but first the grey wall and 
 so many days' climbing ; there's no foothold and a 
 weary way to pass. . . . The guard won't let me 
 through.' . . . 
 
 " She lay quiet for awhile and when I moved from 
 her bedside to go back to my chair, she suddenly 
 started up and by the dim light of the room looked 
 earnestly into my face, seeming to recognise in my 
 features some person she knew. 
 
 " ' Oh, Nancy,' she cried, ' fancy you being here ! 
 I can hardly believe it, now we can travel home 
 together. Won't it be nice, yes, we shall be together 
 and I shall not be miserable as I was coming here, 
 I told you, didn't I, how wretched they made me 
 feel, so wretched . . . you couldn't come to my 
 wedding, but it didn't matter ; it was all a mistake, 
 quite a mistake.' Seeing how excited she was I 
 tried to soothe her and begged her to try and 
 rest. 
 
 " ' Ah, yes, of course I'll rest,' she murmured, ' but I 
 want first to tell you something. Do you remember 
 the way we went that night ? Listen, far out on the 
 road to Kouechou there are two graves. There's a 
 dead man in one, a terrible dead Chinaman, and the 
 other is waiting — but not for me. Oh, no, I should 
 never kill myself, for you see this place is so out of 
 
2i8 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 the world that if I died here my soul would certainly 
 be lost ; no, if I die it will be the stench of the streets 
 that has killed me, or that blue dragon that's always 
 creeping up into my room.' 
 
 " She started up looking about her in terror, I had 
 some work to persuade her that we were alone, and 
 then when I had done so she began rambling again. . 
 
 " ' The grave,' she went on, ' is for Lew-Ching, he 
 must die, for when he dies I shall be free, but, 
 whisper, how can I get him there ? — the road is 
 miles out and a weary way, and moonlight shows 
 every stone, that's why I saw the dead man so clearly 
 that night. Oh, I've never forgotten it, Nancy, it 
 was so dreadful, Lew-Ching would have been there 
 long ago but for that, and I should have been free.' 
 
 " I begged her not to say such terrible things 
 which she could not mean. 
 
 "But she only began moaning and saying, 'Ah, 
 but you don't know how I hate him, I hate him with 
 all my soul. He is part of the country, part of my 
 loneliness and ruin. I hate him because he is 
 Chinese and to look on a Chinese face makes my 
 flesh creep.' 
 
 " I took no notice of this mad speech but bent for- 
 ward and tried again to adjust the covering over her. 
 ' How hot and feverish your hands are,' I said, ' and 
 your head is burning : do keep the shawls over you.' 
 
 " But she threw them off. ' No, no,' she said, ' I 
 want to go home to England, — I shall not stay here,' 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 219 
 
 and she sat up in excitement as if she were about to 
 start. 
 
 " ' What a number of boats,' she murmured, ' the 
 river is thick with them, Frencli, English, Dutch. . . . 
 Be careful, Lindsay, not to go aboard a Chinese 
 vessel. . . . Ah, Heaven ! the boat is not going down 
 the river ; — it takes us' back, it takes us back ! 
 There's a Chinaman at the helm. — The water is 
 smooth, sure as death we're making for the land . . . 
 don't you see the lights of the English settlement 
 coming in sight once more ? What misery,' she 
 sobbed, 'what misery. Lindsay, am I never to get 
 free ! Is it possible ? ' 
 
 " ' You shall go home,' I answered, ' if only you'll 
 keep warm and do as I tell you.' 
 
 " Then she began complaining of the light. 
 
 " ' I could sleep,' she said, ' but for that light, it 
 watches me like an eye, why don't you put it out? 
 — I'm so tired.' 
 
 " The light was a tiny single wick lamp that sent 
 mere glimmer over the room. As I had matches to 
 light it again if required, and as it was not a very 
 dark night, I thought I would humour her and com- 
 plied with her request. 
 
 " ' There,' I said, ' try now and sleep.' 
 
 " She promised to, but presently she started up 
 with a cry. It seemed to me that she was in her 
 own imagination back on that endless road to 
 England. 
 
220 HER • CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 " ' Nancy,' she said, ' how dark it is, we are in Sih 
 Yang Street, keep by me, the stench is fearful, I am 
 so frightened ! I can never, never find my way back. 
 Think of that ! Never go back ! What a horrible 
 thing, it means all my life, but, Nancy, when I die of 
 wandering don't let me be buried here. ... If I 
 could only creep into an English grave — under that 
 yew-tree there's one and if I could lift the stone I 
 could get in, — but not on the hillside where the 
 Chinese can come. Ah, no, promise me, for theire 1 
 can't go. I should never rest, I sjiould grieve till the 
 Judgment Day.' . . . 
 
 " She suddenly threw herself forward on the pillow 
 and covered her face with her hands. ' Oh, Lindsay, 
 Lindsay,' she sobbed, ' heartless, heartless ; I could 
 never have been so wretched but for you, and even 
 now you sit there so still and strange. Yes, it's like 
 you not to mind my grief, for, Lindsay, you never 
 really cared, — you never cared,' and she cried as if 
 her heart was broken. 
 
 " I was shocked by this outburst of weeping and 
 sat down beside her soothing her, and with her head 
 on my shoulder she sobbed out her grief It seemed 
 to relieve her mind and she appeared to recover 
 her senses a little and talked more quietly and 
 rationally. 
 
 " ' What a trouble I am to you,' she said, ' why 
 won't you rest .' do rest and I'll go to sleep ; you see 
 we can't start till to-morrow.' She lay down, pulled 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 221 
 
 the quilt round her and in the dim moonlight I could 
 see she had closed her eyes. 
 
 " I sat there for some time, it was one o'clock. 
 She seemed to me to be asleep, the careworn ex- 
 pression had left her face, I stole back to my chair to 
 rest. 
 
 " I dropped off to sleep, and woke an hour after- 
 wards to find the room almost light and to find, by 
 that light, that I was alone. 
 
 " The couch was empty, and the shawls and quilt 
 that had covered her were lying about on the floor 
 beside it. I jumped up in alarm and was just going 
 towards the door to seek your daughter, when I 
 heard the handle turn and she entered the room. 
 She did not appear at all embarrassed or startled at 
 finding me standing there, but commenced speaking 
 hurriedly. 
 
 " ' It's all right now, Nancy,' she said ' we can 
 get away in the morning, — the men will come, my 
 box is ready packed, I can't believe that to-morrow 
 I shall really get away, but now' (she paused) 'we 
 can't be stopped.' 
 
 "'Of course we can't,' I replied, 'but how silly 
 of you to wander about with bare feet ; if you get 
 worse it will delay your going. Where have you 
 been?' I asked. 
 
 " ' Oh, only into the next room for a minute,' 
 she replied, 'I was thirsty and wanted some fruit.' 
 
 " I pretended to be cross with her, I was very, 
 
222 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 very anxious for the doctor to come, her manner 
 frightened me, there was something about it that 
 I could not understand, eventually I persuaded her 
 to get back to her couch. There was, however, no 
 more sleep for me, I sat down beside her and she 
 lay there with wide eyes and rambled on about 
 England and what she should do when she got 
 there. 
 
 " ' It's all finished and done with now, Lindsay,' 
 she said, 'there's nothing more in our way, — once 
 through the grey wall I shall meet you.' 
 
 "'What do you mean by saying it's all finished 
 and done with ? ' I asked, struck by her having 
 used this expression once or twice lately. But 
 she shook her head and would not reply. There 
 was a terrible monotony about her ravings ; it was 
 always the same thing. Sometimes I answered her 
 or tried to reassure her, but she always returned to 
 the same idea ; — she was escaping from this Chinese 
 house, — the ship awaited her, — she would get back to 
 England. 
 
 " At five o'clock I could hear the household 
 stirring, and some time afterwards an old servant 
 came in with tea and inquired, how we had spent 
 the night. She did not, however, give the inquiry 
 as from her mistress, of whom she. had spoken to 
 me, or from any other member of the household, 
 and used as I was to the Chinese character I 
 could not help musing on the phlegmatic nature 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 223 
 
 that could leave a sick person in the hands of an 
 entire stranger. It seemed to me particularly 
 strange that Mr. Lew-Ching should not come him- 
 self to inquire, since he had had no news of his 
 wife since last night. 
 
 " It is my unhappy duty to tell you the events 
 of that time just as they occurred, and I beg you 
 to forgive me the pain I must needs inflict. You 
 cannot have read thus far without seeing that your 
 daughter was not in the slightest degree responsible 
 for her actions that night, and I beg you to let 
 that lessen the horror of what I am about to 
 write. 
 
 " At six o'clock that morning there broke on my 
 ears a piecing shriek, followed by hurried footsteps. 
 I went to the door and met the old servant in 
 the passage. She was screaming at the top of 
 her voice and in Chinese. ' My master has been 
 murdered, they have stabbed my master ! ' 
 
 " In a moment two other women appeared and 
 a commotion prevailed. It was in the midst of this 
 tumult that your unhappy daughter came out of the 
 room behind me smiling. 
 
 " ' Have you found him ? ' she asked ; ' he's quite 
 dead, I have killed him, and now I can go, I tell 
 you, I need not stay ' 
 
 " Your daughter had found her way into her 
 husband's room in the early morning and had 
 killed him in his sleep. It was from this deed 
 
224 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 she was returning when I awoke and saw her 
 entering the room. 
 
 " I need not horrify you with any account of what 
 took place in that house with the three women, I 
 contrived to protect the poor girl from their violence. 
 It was not long before the English doctor arrived, 
 and soon after that your unhappy daughter was 
 arrested. She has, however, an English nurse with 
 her, and the English doctor and myself are allowed 
 to visit her, our Consul having intervened to enable 
 her to be treated as well as possible under the cir- 
 cumstances. There is also an English gentleman 
 here, a Mr. Lindsay Brookes, whose name^ is con- 
 stantly on your daughter's lips, and who is doing 
 all he cart to lessen the sadness of her position and 
 who has, since her arrest, been with- her constantly. 
 Thus she is with those who are doing all that is 
 possible under the terrible circumstances that exist. 
 It may give you a melancholy satisfaction to know 
 that from the time of that dreadful deed, her mad- 
 ness seems to have taken another and a more 
 peaceful form ; it would seem now that she is 
 living again in the scenes of a happier youth, in 
 a land where the Chinese cannot come. She speaks 
 tenderly of you and of her sister, of the details of 
 home life, and of happiness and peace which is in 
 store for her, and though these things are the 
 delusion of a mind deranged, they are none the 
 
HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 225 
 
 less comforting to her. Since I am sure that on 
 reading this it will be your first impulse to journey 
 out here, I must tell you, that such a course would 
 be undergoing the pain and fatigue of a long 
 journey for nothing. It is evident to us all that 
 your poor daughter has not long to live, I think 
 that even could you be transported here in a day 
 and see her before she is released by death, the 
 meeting could only be one of the most extreme 
 anguish to you. You may rely on it that all that 
 human power and kindness can do is being done, 
 and that not even yourself could do more. 
 
 " August 6th. 
 
 " I had written this three days before mail. 
 In that interval of time has happened that sad 
 event, which, however, is not really sad. On the 
 4th your daughter was rapidly sinking, and yes- 
 terday I felt that the end was at hand and 
 so remained with her all day. Her face seemed 
 altered, there was a bright, even a happy expression 
 on it, so much so that but for the warning of the 
 doctor, I might have felt that she had taken a turn 
 for the better. 
 
 " We had contrived that in spite of her being 
 in a native prison no Chinese should approach 
 her, for the very sight of the natives seemed to 
 occasion her a loathing and terror. Thus she was 
 
 16 
 
326 HER CELESTIAL HUSBAND. 
 
 surrounded only by English faces : Miss Simmonds, 
 the nurse, Mr. Lindsay Brookes, Dr. Collins, and 
 myself. At about seven o'clock that evening I 
 could see that the end was near, and sent a mes- 
 senger for Mr. Brookes, who had been with us all 
 through the day, but had just half an hour before 
 gone away for a while. He came in at once. Your 
 daughter turned on her bed as he entered and 
 seemed in great delight at his arrival. Weak as 
 she was she sat up and he came forward and put 
 his arms about her. She turned to me and said — 
 
 " ' Oh, Nancy, we've had such a pleasant, happy 
 time in Paris, and now Lindsay and I are going 
 home.' 
 
 " It was while saying these words that she turned 
 over on her pillow and died. Thus you see her end 
 was happiness and peace." * * * * 
 
 THE END. 
 
UNWIN BROTHERS, 
 CHILWORTH AND LONDON.