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THE PICCADILLY NOVELS. 
 
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 Many of them Illustrated. Crown 8vo., cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. 
 
 By MRS. ALEXANDER. 
 
 Maid, Wife, or Widow? 
 
 By WALTER BESANT & JAMES RICE. 
 
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 tiboy. 
 
 My Little Girl. 
 
 Case of Mr. Lucraft. 
 This Son of Vulcan. 
 With Harp & Crown. 
 The GoldenButterfly. 
 
 By Celia’s Arhour. 
 Monks of Thelema. 
 ’Twas in Trafalgar’s 
 Bay. 
 
 The Seamy Side. 
 
 Ten Years’ Tenant. 
 Chaplain of the Fleet 
 
 By WALTER BESANT. 
 
 All Sorts and Conditions of Men. 
 
 The Captains’ Room. 
 
 By ROBERT BUCHANAN. 
 
 A Child of Nature. I Martyrdom of Made- 
 God and the Man. line. 
 
 Shadow of the Sword | Love Me for Ever. 
 
 By MRS. LOVETT CAMERON. 
 Deceivers Ever. | Juliet’s Guardian. 
 
 By MORTIMER COLLINS. 
 
 Sweet Anne Page. | Transmigration. 
 From Midnight to Midnight. 
 
 By MORTIMER & FRANCES COLLINS. 
 Blacksmith and Scholar. 
 
 The Village Comedy. 
 
 You Play Me False. 
 
 By WILKIE COLLINS. 
 
 Antonina. 
 
 Basil. 
 
 Hide and Seek. 
 
 The Dead Secret. 
 
 The Queen of Hearts. 
 My Miscellanies. 
 
 The Woman in White 
 The Moonstone. 
 
 Man and Wife. 
 
 Poor Miss Finch. 
 
 Miss or Mrs. ? 
 
 The New Magdalen. 
 The Frozen Deep. 
 The Law and the 
 Lady. 
 
 The Two Destinies. 
 The Haunted Hotel. 
 The Fallen Leaves. 
 Jezebel’s Daughter. 
 The Black Robe. 
 
 Heart and Science. 
 
 By DUTTON COOK. 
 Paul Foster’s Daughter. 
 
 By WILLIAM CYPLES. 
 Hearts of Gold. 
 
 By ALPHONSE DAUDET. 
 Port Salvation. 
 
 By JAMES DE MILLE. 
 
 A Castle in Spain. 
 
 By J. LEITH DERWENT. 
 
 Our Lady of Tears. | Circe’s Lovers. 
 
 By M. BETHAM-EDWARDS. 
 Felicia. | Kitty. 
 
 By MRS. ANNIE EDWARDES. 
 Archie Lovell. 
 
 By R. E. FRANCILLON. 
 Olympia. | Queen Cophetua. 
 
 One by One. 
 
 Prefaced by SIR BARTLE FRERE. 
 Pandurang Hari. 
 
 By EDWARD GARRETT. 
 
 The Capel Girls. 
 
 By CHARLES GIBBON. 
 
 Robin Gray. 
 
 For Lack of Gold. 
 
 In Love and War. 
 What willWorld say? 
 For the King. 
 
 In Honour Bound. 
 
 Queen of the Meadow 
 In Pastures Green. 
 Flower of the Forest. 
 A Heart’s Problem. 
 The Braes of Yarrow. 
 The Golden Shaft 
 
 Of High Degree. 
 
 Bv THOMAS HARDY. 
 
 Under the Greenwood Tree. 
 
 By JULIAN HAWTHORNE. 
 Garth. I Sebastian Strome. 
 
 Ellice Quentin. ] Prince Saroni’s Wife 
 
 Dust 
 
 By SIR ARTHUR HELPS. 
 
 Ivan de Biron. 
 
 By MRS. ALFRED HUNT. 
 Thornicroft’s Model. | The Leaden Casket. 
 Self-Condemned. 
 
 By JEAN INGELOW. 
 
 Fated to be Free. 
 
 By HENRY JAMES, Jun. 
 Confidence. 
 
 By HARRIETT JAY 
 Queen of Connaught. | The Dark Colleen. 
 
 By HENRY KINGSLEY. 
 
 Number Seventeen. | Oakshott Castle. 
 
 CHATTO AND WIN DUS, PICCADILLY, IV. 
 
 r* 
 
THE PICCADILLY NOVELS — continued. 
 
 Crown 8vo., cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. 
 
 By E. LYNN LINTON. 
 
 Patricia Kemball. 
 The Atonement of 
 Leam Dundas. 
 
 The World Well Lost 
 
 Under Which Lord? 
 With a Silken Thread 
 Rebel of the Family. 
 
 1 My Love !’ 
 
 By HENRY W. LUCY. 
 Gideon Fleyce. 
 
 By justin McCarthy. 
 
 Waterdale Neigh- 
 bours. 
 
 My Enemy’s Daugh- 
 ter. 
 
 Linley Rochford. 
 
 A Fair Saxon. 
 
 Dear Lady Disdain. 
 Miss Misanthrope. 
 Donna Quixote. 
 Comet of a Season. 
 
 By CHARLES READE. 
 
 It is Never Too Late 
 to Mend. 
 
 Hard Cash. 
 
 Peg Woffington. 
 Christie Johnstone. 
 Griffith Gaunt. 
 
 The Double Marriage 
 Love Me Little, Love 
 Me Long. 
 
 Foul Play. 
 
 Cloister and Hearth. 
 
 The Course of True 
 Love. 
 
 The Autobiography 
 of a Thief. 
 
 Put Yourself in His 
 Place. 
 
 Terrible Temptation 
 The Wandering Heir. 
 A Simpleton. 
 
 A Woman-Hater. 
 Readiana. 
 
 By MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 Her Mother’s Darling. 
 
 The Prince of Wales’s Garden Party. 
 
 By GEORGE MACDONALD, LL.D. 
 Paul Faber, Surgeon. 
 
 Thomas Wingfold, Curate. 
 
 By MRS. MACDONELL. 
 Quaker Cousins. 
 
 By KATHARINE S. MACQUOID. 
 Lost Rose. | The Evil Eye. 
 
 By FLORENCE MARRY AT. 
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 By F. W. ROBINSON. 
 
 Women are Strange | The Hands of Justice. 
 
 By JOHN SAUNDERS. 
 
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 One Against the | The Lion in the Path. 
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 By T. W. SPEIGHT. 
 
 The Mysteries of Heron Dyke. 
 
 By R. A. STERNDALE. 
 
 The Afghan Knife. 
 
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 Touch and Go. 
 
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 A Life’s Atonement. I Coals of Fire. 
 Joseph’s Coat. A Model Father. 
 
 Val Strange. | Hearts. 
 
 By the Gate of the Sea. 
 
 By MRS. OLIPHANT. 
 Whiteladies. 
 
 By MARGARET A. PAUL. 
 Gentle and Simple. 
 
 By JAMES PAYN. 
 
 Lost Sir Massingberd 
 The Best of Husbands 
 Fallen Fortunes. 
 Halves. 
 
 Walter’s Word. 
 What He Cost Her. 
 Less Black than 
 we’re Painted. 
 
 Kit : a Memory. 
 
 By Proxy. 
 
 High Spirits. 
 
 Under One Roof. 
 Carlyon’s Year. 
 
 A Confidential Agent 
 From Exile. 
 
 A Grape f roma Thorn 
 For Cash Only. 
 
 By E. C. PRICE. 
 Valentina. 
 
 By BERTHA THOMAS. 
 
 Proud Maisie. | The Violin-player. 
 Cressida. 
 
 By ANTHONY TROLLOPE. 
 
 The Way We Live 
 Now. 
 
 American Senator. 
 Kept in the Dark. 
 
 Frau Frohmann. 
 Marion Fay. 
 
 Mr. Scarborough’s 
 Family. 
 
 By FRANCES E. TROLLOPE. 
 
 Mabel’s Progress. I Anne Furness. 
 
 Like Ships upon the Sea. 
 
 By T. ADOLPHUS TROLLOPE. 
 Diamond Cut Diamond. 
 
 By IVAN TURGENIEFF, and Others. 
 Stories from Foreign Novelists. 
 
 By SARAH TYTLER. 
 
 What She Came Through. 
 
 The Bride’s Pass. 
 
 By J. S. WINTER. 
 Cavalry Life. 
 Regimental Legends. 
 
 2] CHATTO AND WIND US, PICCADILLY, W. 
 
I O N E 
 
 BY 
 
 E. LYNN LINTON 
 
 AUTHOR OF ‘PATRICIA KF.MBALL ’ ‘ THE ATONEMENT OF LEAM DUNDAS ’ 
 ‘UNDER WHICH LORD?' ‘my love' ETC. 
 
 A NEW EDITION 
 
 bonbon 
 
 CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY 
 
 1884 
 
 [All rights reserved ] 
 
LONDON : PRINTED BY 
 
 SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE 
 AND PARLIAMENT STREET 
 
L(>58^ 
 
 1884 
 
 My dear Mr Swinburne, 
 
 One of my earliest novels was dedicated to my 
 beloved ‘ Father , 9 Walter Savage Landor. This , which must of 
 necessity be among my latest, I dedicate to you, his faithful 
 and loyal friend — as indeed you are the faithful and loyal 
 friend of all to ivhom you have once given your trust and 
 affection . I deeply feel the honour you do me in classing 
 me among the number of those in whose sincerity you believe 
 and whose friendship you return . Our original bond of 
 union lies in the constant love and enduring thought we both 
 have for our revered old Master ; but we have others in our 
 devotion to liberty, our belief in progress, our faith in 
 humanity, and our want of fear . I am presumptuous in 
 thus bracketing myself with you . You are one of the Captains 
 of Thought, and I am only a humble foot soldier serving 
 in the ranks . But just as captain and private follow the 
 same banner and fight for the same good cause, so I dare to 
 place myself by your side because of our common affection 
 and our common aims . And you will forgive me that I thus 
 link myself to immortality by coupling my name with yours . 
 
 '-U- 
 
 <r~ 
 
 Your sincere friend, 
 
 E. Lynn Linton . 
 
 < 5 ? 
 
 November 1883 . 
 

CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER TAGS 
 
 I. THE NEW DOCTOR • 
 
 II. AT THE DOWER HOUSE . ...... 12 
 
 III. OYER THE WOOD-WORK 19 
 
 IV. THE PAST AND PRESENT , . 26 
 
 Y. MAKING HIS WAY 37 
 
 VI. A STEP ONWARD 45 
 
 VII. UNDERSTOOD 55 
 
 VIII. THE OAKHURST INVALID ...... 65 
 
 IX. BROKEN DOWN 75 
 
 X. IN THE SUNNY SOUTH 89 
 
 XI. BY NATURE AND BY ADOPTION 88 
 
 XII. VILLA CLARISSA . . 95 
 
 XIII. ‘ WHAT THEY INFLICT THEY FEEL * 104 
 
 XIV. DOMESTICATED 114 
 
 XV. WHICH 1 OR EITHER ? 121 
 
 XVI. A DAY WITH THE GODS .13) 
 
 XVII. REVELATIONS ..131 
 
 XVIII, PLAYING WITH FIRE 143 
 
 XIX. AT LAST ! 153 
 
 XX. IN THE TOILS . 162 
 
 XXI. FOR ALL TIME ......... 170 
 
 XXII. ACROSS THE AISLE 177 
 
 XXIII. THE OAKHURST BRIDE . 187 
 
 XXIV. FACE TO FACE . . 199 
 
 XXV. IN THE WOOD . 207 
 
 XXVI. AFTERNOON TEA 217 
 
IV 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 HER husband’s FRIEND . 
 
 • • 
 
 • • 
 
 • 
 
 227 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 THE FIRST STRUGGLE . 
 
 • • 
 
 • 
 
 
 237 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 THE STIRRING OF THE WATERS 
 
 • • 
 
 • • 
 
 
 216 
 
 XXX. 
 
 UNDER PRESSURE . . . 
 
 
 
 
 254 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 THE NEW ARRIVAL . 
 
 • i 
 
 • • 
 
 
 2(1 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS . 
 
 • • 
 
 • • 
 
 
 268 
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 MAKING FOR THE ROCKS . . 
 
 • • 
 
 • • 
 
 
 280 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 AT THE FLOWER-SHOW • 
 
 • • 
 
 • • 
 
 
 287 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 IN HER MADNESS . , 
 
 
 
 
 297 
 
 XXXVI. 
 
 INTO THE DEPTHS • • • 
 
 
 
 
 305 
 
I O N E. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE HEW DOCTOR. 
 
 Oafherst had only one fault to find with its new doctor : — he 
 was too handsome. It was barely decent, as Miss Wintergreen 
 said with that upward jerk of her head which went for so much. 
 But Miss Maria Crosby simpered a little consciously, as one who 
 knew, and said she did not quite agree with her dear Jane 
 Wintergreen. And if she, a confirmed invalid and, in a manner, 
 part owner of the local doctor, did not object to the young man’s 
 good looks, she was sure no one else need. Especially need not her 
 dear Jane, who had never had a day’s illness in her life, and who 
 made it her boast that no medical man in England had ever been 
 the richer by a pound of her money. 
 
 Miss Rachel Major, Maria’s thirty-year-old niece and nurse, 
 followed the lead of their friend Jane Wintergreen, and agreed 
 with her that this new-comer, this Dr. St. Claire, was certainly too 
 handsome for his work and the place. It was inconvenient ; if no 
 w’orse. It would have been better to have had some one more like 
 that poor dear Dr. Brown who was dead and gone — some good 
 respectable father of a family without romance or a waist, and as 
 destitute of elegance as a twopenny pipkin. But this young Dr. St. 
 Claire — ‘ Armine St. Claire ; what a name for the parish doctor of 
 a dull country town like this mopy old Oakhurst ! ’ put in Rachel, 
 parenthetically — was more like an artist, or a poet, or a disguised 
 prince in a play, than a useful, hard-working apothecary: — 
 which was all they wanted here. And she must say, for her own 
 part, knowing what people were, she was sorry. 
 
 And when she said this she glanced with gentle malevolence 
 at her aunt Maria, the invalid. 
 
 Maria pulled her lace ruffles well over her hands, smoothed the 
 bright rose-coloured coverlet of her couch, and made a feint to put 
 
 B 
 
2 
 
 JONE. 
 
 back her feathery ringlets with the tips of her taper fingers, in the 
 elegant way for which she was famous. 
 
 4 To hear you talk, Rachel, one would think that good looks 
 were a crime ! ’ she said with a shrill little laugh. 
 
 4 They are often a snare, aunt Maria/ said Rachel demurely. 
 
 6 A snare I fancy most people would rather have than not, and 
 only those despise who have not got/ said aunt Maria, as demurely. 
 
 4 As none of us three can boast of good looks, we need not 
 discuss that part of the business/ said Jane Wintergreen sharply. 
 
 Jane stood as the embodiment of common sense in Oakhurst; 
 as the embodiment also of that kind of honesty which does not 
 shrink from saying disagreeable things, and which has about as 
 much tenderness of touch as a file or a saw. And she never lost 
 an opportunity for giving her dear friend Maria a scrape when she 
 could. 
 
 4 Who said we were speaking of ourselves, Jane ? ’ said Miss 
 Maria, with plaintive deprecation. 4 1 am sure I am not ! I know 
 that I am a horrid fright now : but if I am, Rachel is no better, 
 though she is a few years younger. People follow their childhood, 
 and we go on as we have begun. And I may say this, that when 
 I was a child I was as fair as a lily ; for I have heard my poor 
 mamma say so twenty times. I was quite a little angel, she used 
 to say, and people would stop me in the streets to kiss me. But 
 Rachel favoured her father, not us, and was always a little black 
 thing — just like a little monkey. I remember when you could put 
 her in a quart-pot, and she was the colour of a coffee-berry. And 
 she has not changed since she grew up. She cannot wear light- 
 blue or rose-pink for the life of her ; and those are my colours now, 
 as they have always been. I can wear nothing that becomes me 
 half so well ; but Rachel has to put up with purple and dark navy- 
 hlue, if she wants to be any way decent.’ 
 
 4 Rachel is well enough/ said Jane Wintergreen tartly. 4 If 
 she has no complexion to speak of, she has a handsome nose and a 
 good hand and foot ; and I once heard our late rector say that a 
 woman with a handsome nose and a good hand and foot had not 
 far to go for a husband. And I am not so sure but that he meant 
 Rachel Major ; only his sister was in the way and would not have it.’ 
 
 4 At all events, Rachel has not gone far enough for her husband, 
 for all her hand and foot/ said Miss Maria, with a little laugh. 
 
 4 1 had a hand once, but I have spoiled it now. Rubbing for 
 hours every day takes all the shape out of a hand/ said Rachel, 
 with reproachful stoicism. 
 
 4 Better spoil your hand, Rachel, by doing your duty, than 
 harden your heart by leaving it undone,’ said aunt Maria. 
 
 4 Don’t I say so, aunt P and don’t I do as I say ? ’ retorted Rachel. 
 
 4 Let me look at your hand, Rachel/ said Jane Wintergreen. 
 
 Mercy me! how can you call it spoilt ? 1 never saw such a girl 
 
THE NEW DOCTOR . 
 
 as you are for running yourself down ! You are very nice, I’m sure, 
 if only you would think so.’ 
 
 ‘ 1 have been brought up to run myself down, and to hear 
 others run me down as well/ said Rachel, beginning to cry. ‘Aunt 
 Maria had a complexion and I had not ; and neither she nor my 
 poor mamma thought anything of me because I was small and 
 dark. And as for my poor grandmamma, she used to declare that 
 my poor papa must have been a Hottentot once on a time. And I 
 could not help being ugly. No one would be ugly if they could 
 help it/ she added with undeniable reason and a fresh supply 
 of tears. 
 
 ‘ Now, Rachel, you have cried — and it all began about this 
 young Dr. St. Claire/ said Maria, solemnly. ‘A nd it is a bad omen. 
 I have seen it all my life — begin a thing with a cry and it ends 
 with a cry. And you do not think of my poor nerves, and how all 
 these scenes try me. No one ever does think of me and my nerves ! 9 
 she added petulantly. 
 
 ‘Maria Crosby! how ever can you say such a thing ? 9 cried 
 Jane Wintergreen. ‘ You, of all people, have no right to say that 
 you are not considered. Who is, if you are nor,? My word, 
 what next ! Rachel is just given up to you; and you are made 
 more fuss with than enough ! It is flat ingratitude to say you 
 are not thought of ; and so now r ! And you need not make your- 
 self ill by crying. You want the truth spoken to you sometimes, 
 Maria, as we all do ; and you shall have it from me, I promise you ! 9 
 
 ‘You are very cruel to me — you always were, Jane/ Maria 
 exclaimed with hysterical excitement. ‘You are all jealous of me 
 because I am a favourite in the place — that is just where it is No, 
 Rachel, you need not! — don’t touch me!’ she said angrily, while 
 still sobbing, as her niece, having finished her own crying, went up 
 to the couch penitent and wistful, according to her wont when her 
 aunt ‘ gave way 9 and ‘ was upset.’ ‘You know in your heart that 
 you wish me dead and gone, and then you would be free to do as 
 you liked. You know it, and I know it too. Poor me ! In 
 ill-health, confined to my couch, and my own niece wishing me 
 dead! — oh, dear me! oh, dear me! w T h at will become of me ? ’ 
 
 On which her hysterical tears culminated in hysterical screams, 
 and it took a great deal of soothing and hot brandy and water, 
 made strong and sweet, before she would consent to come round 
 again. But Jane Wintergreen, who had suggested cold water 
 thrown into her face, and her hands well slapped for counter- 
 irritation, was angry with Rachel for administering a remedy 
 which she began to suspect Maria was almost too ready to receive. 
 
 The invalid led her niece a hard life ; and of all in Oakhurst 
 and the neighbourhood, Rachel Major was the one most to be 
 pitied. It was a restricted and uninteresting kind of existence 
 for every one; but hers w r as the most restricted and the most 
 
 23 2 
 
4 
 
 IOXE. 
 
 
 uninteresting. And as Rachel knew that the malady to which her 
 youth and all its natural liberties and enjoyments were sacri- 
 ficed was, the one part vanity and the other self-indulgence, she 
 felt the s 1 a very that resulted doubly hard to bear. No doctor 
 could precisely make out Miss Maria Crosby’s disease. Some said 
 that it was the spine and some that it was the heart ; one 
 specialist fell foul of the mucous membrane and the other made 
 his camel of the sympathetic nerve. But all. left her as they 
 found her — lying on her invalid couch, kept up by beef-tea, strong 
 jellies and much brandy ; and unable, so she said, to put her feet 
 to the ground. Had she tried, she would have found that she had 
 as serviceable muscles as the rest, and that she might have been as 
 well as she would. Wisely for herself, looking at things from 
 her point of view, she decided that she would not. She knew her 
 distinction to lie in her invalid couch, her dainty work, her pretty 
 flowers, her cages full of birds, her pensive smile, her waxen skin, 
 ner low, sweet, studied voice, and the saintly patience with which she 
 bore her mysterious malady. If she were to get up and go about 
 like other people, what would she be P Just an old maid with a 
 limited income and no claims to consideration — a faded beauty 
 whose star had set — one of the herd of feminine failures — no more. 
 Now she was a personage — the invalid par excellence of the little 
 town — a creature exempt from duty and entitled to privileges — a 
 kind of votive shrine, where those who ministered by way of flowers, 
 sweet cakes, and frequent visits to ‘that poor Maria Crosby,’ 
 deserved well of Heaven, and brought peace to their own con- 
 sciences. 
 
 Wherefore she held by her role, and for the last ten years had 
 been the soft-spoken and delicately-cared-for Moloch who had 
 ’passed her young niece Rachel through the fire as her victim ; who 
 had also mdde her medical attendant the object of her adoration — 
 not always discreetly tendered. So that Rachel was justified, if, 
 seeing what had been said and done in the very dry tree of old Dr. 
 Brown and his like, she feared an increase of folly in the green and 
 flowery growth of the young and handsome Armine St. Claire. 
 
 Others besides Jane Wintergreen and Rachel Major thought 
 the new-comer both too young and too handsome for the place. 
 Mrs. Barrington — old Mrs. Barrington as she w r as called — who lived 
 with her daughter Monica in the Dower House, about a mile out 
 of Oakhurst, she too said it was a pity that Dr. Brown’s successor 
 should be so young and good-looking, and that she should feel 
 quite uncomfortable if she had to speak to him, and scarcely confi- 
 dent of his skill. Though, what a man’s professional skill has to 
 do with a pair of large soft eyes, a mass of blue-black curling hair, 
 a skin as white as ivory and as smooth as silk, a dainty little 
 moustache, and hands and feet no larger than a woman’s, it would 
 be difficult to say. Still, beauty and brains are not generally 
 
THE NEW DOCTOR. 5 
 
 supposed to go together ; and the prejudice, though unjust, is 
 popular. 
 
 Monica, who seldom thought at cross-corners with her mother, 
 quite agreed with her on this ; and said, in her soft, sweet way : 
 Yes, it was a great pity that the new man was so young, and she 
 hoped indeed they should not want him at the Dower House. It 
 would he too embarrassing to have to speak to him. 
 
 As for Anthony Barrington, the son and brother who lived at 
 the Manor, he, as autocrat of the Oakhurst world, almost took it 
 on himself to shoulder the law as his own private club, and turn 
 the new doctor ‘ vi et armis ’ out of the place. But his wife put up 
 her airy buckler and protected the handsome St. Claire, as she had 
 protected some others before now. She ruled her husband as 
 pretty women with nice little ways, lively manners, a sharp kind of 
 wit, and neither heart nor conscience to speak of, often do rule 
 men whose gravity trenches on moroseness, and whose pride is 
 only equalled by their spirit of domination. She ruled him 
 without showing the shadow of her sceptre, and while leaving 
 him the belief that he was absolute and supreme. She ruled him 
 in the way best expressed by ‘ twisting him round her little 
 linger ’ — that is, by making him soft by her caresses and -pliant 
 by her playfulness, then clinching all at the right moment by 
 pretty alluring little pouts, mingled with the frank impertinence 
 and amusing wilfulness of a vivacious and rather self-willed child. 
 
 ‘ You dear old thing ! ’ she said with a laugh, lifting up her 
 arched eyebrows with as much fun as astonishment when Anthony 
 had thundered against the new-comer. ‘ What can it signify to 
 any one whether a doctor is a fright or an Adonis ? You might 
 as well find fault with a good-looking grave-digger. They are ‘ 
 brothers, you know/ 
 
 ‘ Theo ! what an absurd child you are ! ’ said Anthony, pre- 
 tending displeasure and inwardly diverted. 
 
 ‘ Well, so they are/ said Theo, quite seriously. ‘ And you might 
 as well say that the poor dear ghosts should have a nice grave 
 respectable old sexton to potter about them, as that a doctor ought 
 to be old and ugly. What can it signify P Who cares for a 
 doctor?’ with a contemptuous little accent and a saucy toss of her 
 small head. 
 
 ‘ Doctors are men/ said Anthony, rather slowly. 
 
 ‘ Oh no, they are not ! ’ said Theodosia ; ‘ they are prescriptions. 
 Men! my goodness, no! they are only medicine spoons ! And I 
 •am sure it does not signify whether one’s medicine spoon is pretty 
 to look at or hideous. It is horrid, whichever it is.’ 
 
 ‘ Well, perhaps you are right, Theo/ said Anthony. 
 
 ‘Perhaps? I am!’ was her reply. ‘And if I w'ere you, 
 Anthony, I would not pay this new man, this Dr. St. Claire, such 
 a compliment as to object to him because he is }Oung and hand- 
 
6 
 
 IONE. 
 
 some. After all, he is not so very good-looking — not like my 
 handsome old Bear! And even if he were, what on earth would 
 it signify P ’ 
 
 * Nothing,’ said Anthony. 
 
 And from this moment the Master of the Manor changed front 
 and agreed with Theodosia that it was foolish for people to make 
 such a fuss about the young man’s good looks. He was only a 
 doctor as she said, and what could it possibly signify to any human 
 being if a mere doctor were handsome or the reverse ? Besides, 
 it was only English to let him have a fair trial, and to take the 
 trouble of opposing him was both to pay him too great a compli- 
 ment and to do themselves injustice. 
 
 What Anthony Barrington passed, his friend and territorial 
 neighbour, Edward Formby of Hillside, was sure to back; throw- 
 ing such weight as came from his broad acres and the unrooted 
 possibilities of his bachelorhood into the same scale as that in which 
 Anthony had thrown his broad acres and the settled influence of 
 his married state. Hence, young Dr. St. Claire was allowed to 
 settle peaceably at Oakliurst, and to show of what stuff he was 
 made, unhindered by malevolence or opposition; and the unfriendly 
 stir which had been made in the waters on his first appearance, 
 after a time ran itself clear, depositing its ugly sediment by 
 the way. 
 
 He proved to be made of very fair stuff indeed. Even Anthony 
 himself, Brahmin of the Brahmins as he was, even he was forced 
 to admit that the young man knew how to behave and was not 
 such a puppy as he looked. He said this one day at the Town 
 Hall, where the local magistracy assembled on Saturdays to 
 apportion justice to the evil-doers, though they sometimes forgot 
 to award equity to the oppressed. And he said it with Anthony 
 Barrington’s well-known manner of patronage, which was vastly 
 more offensive than his disfavour. It was a manner which 
 asserted his own superiority by the contemptuous kind of gene- 
 rosity with which he spoke of his inferiors. It was tossing a 
 few crumbs to deserving dogs while keeping the loaf as his own 
 rightful share. 
 
 Edward Formby, both more good-natured and less careful of 
 local proprieties than his friend, went a step beyond, and trans- 
 lated Anthony’s comparative permission into positive acceptance ; 
 and, thus marshalled, the rank and file pressed forward altogether. 
 Jane Wintergreen was the only one who stood out against the 
 general verdict ; but then Jane Wintergreen was notorious for 
 narrowness and bitterness, so that her prejudices were harmless 
 because they were universal. 
 
 All the women, save herself and perhaps Bach el Major, were 
 confessedly on the handsome young doctor’s side. He was the 
 kind of man whom women love and of whom men are contemp- 
 
THE NEW DOCTOR. 7 
 
 tuous and jealous in one: — ‘The kind of tiling that fools admire,’ 
 said Jane Wintergreen with a jerk. 
 
 To which Anthony Barrington reply coldly, lifting his thin lips 
 on one side and showing his long eye-tooth : i Think so ? I pity 
 their tastes ! ’ 
 
 Di\ St. Claire was young, slight, a little delicate in health, and 
 very affectionate in temper. He adored women, loved children, and 
 delighted in dogs — hut he liked the smaller kind better than the 
 bigger. He was full of graceful accomplishments and small help- 
 ful capacities; naturally handy; evidently domestic; extremely 
 obliging. He was ready to do anything that he was asked and he 
 could do everything that was required. He could tune a piano ; 
 humour a sewing machine ; make boats and fans and caps and 
 puzzles for the children out of old newspapers ; play chess with 
 refined ladies who prided themselves on their gambits, and whist 
 with short-tempered men inexorable as to the call, and the need of 
 getting out trumps with a long suit to bring in. He was a capital 
 tennis-player and a patient listener to dull stories ; he had a pure 
 tender voice, and he sang pretty little French romances to perfection. 
 Of this last accomplishment, however, he w^as exceedingly chary. 
 As he was in deep mourning, it was perhaps natural that he should 
 not do much in the way of light little songs ; and his disinclination 
 to sing these graceful trifles, of which the whole value lies in the 
 method, to people who understood neither their art nor their mean- 
 ing, passed as respect for his unknown but manifestly heavy loss. 
 
 Charming all through, his manners were perhaps his strongest 
 point. Though not a flatterer, he was more courteous, more at- 
 tentive in minor matters, more graceful in speech and more quick 
 to understand half-tones, than is the average Englishman ; and he 
 had a way of idealising characters which left a very rounded and 
 statuesque impression on the mind. He acted on the theory, 
 which with him was a principle, that every woman thinks herself' 
 misunderstood, and that if you wish to please the sex all round,, 
 you must throw your plummet into unfathomed depths and stock 
 all pond^ with gold and silver fish. It was both the safest and the- 
 pleasantest plan, and kept him in the sunshine on high levels, out 
 of the way of whirlwinds and waterspouts. 
 
 His suspected delicacy of health, his isolation and his sweet 
 ways, appealed to the maternal instinct of Oakhurst with wonder- 
 ful strength. Even young girls felt that he was something precious 
 to whom it would be lovely to minister; while middle-aged women, 
 both married and single, professed to feel for him as for a son ; and 
 the popular feminine phrase with which discussions were for the 
 most part ended was : ‘ And he is so pure ! 5 
 
 Certainly he was notably circumspect in his conduct, so that he 
 was trusted as if he had been an older man — and perhaps with 
 more reason. 
 
8 
 
 IONE. 
 
 For all this, he was out of place as a country doctor, making 
 his living by such a practice as that of Oakhurst. He looked as if 
 he had been born for courts rather than to go across moors oil 
 windy winter nights to see some old farmer who had made himself 
 ill by a prolonged drinking-bout — as if it were his right to spend 
 the balmy summer evenings in some jasmine-covered bower at the 
 feet of fair patricians graciously accepting his homage, rather than 
 by the bedside of some silly milliner who had lowered her system by 
 tight-lacing and inordinate tea. Still, here he was and here he 
 must remain — failing that problematical turn in the wheel which 
 should give him an income without a capital, or a lucrative post in 
 the official world without apprenticeship or patronage. 
 
 He had now been a year at Oakhurst, and, all things con- 
 sidered, his flag flew under a shining sky and his sails were set to 
 a fair wind. The Anthony Barringtons had asked him to the 
 Manor when they had had one of their second-set duty dinners ; 
 and old Mrs. Barrington had invited him to afternoon tea with the 
 curate, the local lawyer, and the Oakhurst organist. Edward 
 Formby had had him at a really well-conditioned luncheon, where 
 the other men invited had certainly stared when the new guest 
 was announced, but where he had held his own with so much tact 
 and judgment as to sink his profession and float his personality 
 before the meal was half over; and all the smaller people — espe- 
 cially those with marriageable daughters — had vied one with the 
 other which should show him most favour. He had been married 
 by common report to every girl in the place ; and every girl in the 
 place had wished that common report were true. But he had 
 never hinted what could be construed into preference, not to speak 
 of love, and he seemed to have an almost supernatural ‘ flair ’ 
 for man-traps. He did his duty and attended to all alike with 
 professional punctuality and personal impartiality; and he was 
 not to blame if each young lady thought those handsome eyes 
 of his meant more than he said, or that his fingers, when he felt 
 her pulse, pressed her wrist with peculiar emphasis. In each 
 case the wish was father to the thought, and the child was none of 
 his. 
 
 It was odd, how often the girlhood of Oakhurst was ailing at 
 this time. Hitherto, the place had been considered remarkably 
 healthy ; but now the elders were in better case than they had 
 been in comfortable, gossipy, old Dr. Brown’s time, while most of 
 the girls, who then never had a day's ill-health, had now fallen 
 into mysterious maladies which demanded a great deal of medical 
 attendance. Many seemed threatened with consumption ; a few 
 had spells of low fever ; all lost their gaiety, their appetite, their 
 sleep ; so that young Dr. St. Claire was fully occupied and somewhat 
 exercised in his mind as to cause and treatment. 
 
 He had rather a difficult part to play ; for more than one of 
 
THE NEW DOCTOR. 
 
 9 
 
 the parents in the e second-set ’ resented his indifference, and thought 
 he might do worse than ally himself to some respectable family 
 who would help to make his standing sure, and who would give 
 him the home he wanted. There was Flora Farley, the daughter 
 of Captain Farley, now owner and once captain of a small vessel 
 trading between Whitehaven and Hull — why would not she do ? 
 The eldest of six, and such a notable body as she was, she would 
 save him more by her management than she would cost him for 
 her keep. Or there was Madge Langliorne, the lawyer s daughter, 
 and the youngest of nine — she was a real sunbeam in the house, 
 and would make him such a pleasant companion in the winter 
 evenings when his work was done and he came home to his own 
 fireside ! Or there was Rose Chesson, the one ewe lamb with no 
 sister to divide nor interfere. Rose Chesson was the very thing. 
 Her father, the retired cheesemonger, might be a trifle rough, and 
 the mother was a little too fond of scarlet and gold, but Rose had 
 had a good education, and with her piano and her pencil and her 
 nice little sura in the Three per Cents., she might find a welcome 
 to any man’s home and heart. And what the deuce did the young 
 fellow want that he should not be satisfied with what he could have ? 
 Were none of them good enough for him P Was he looking after 
 Miss Barrington herself ? or perhaps the Duke’s daughter was not 
 beyond him ? 
 
 His persistent celibacy and cautious avoidance of all - these 
 patent man-traps, went near to injure the young doctor’s popularity 
 and curtail his fees in more households than one. But he held on 
 his way, never heeding the broad hints here nor the cold shoulders 
 there — a male Diana without ever a female Endymion in the un- 
 suspected shadows of an undiscovered Latmos ; and the maiden- 
 hood of Oakhurst got pale, had mysterious ailments, and took 
 unpleasant draughts with secret weeping in vain. 
 
 One day young Mrs. Barrington took it on herself to touch 
 openly the question which all were handling in secret. She was 
 one of those irrepressible little women who put their busy white 
 fingers into all the pies within range ; and as there is a great deal 
 of indolence, some cowardice and more good-nature in the world, 
 she was allowed to stir to the depths what others were not suffered 
 even to skim. 
 
 i Dr. St. Claire, you ought to marry,’ she said suddenly, h 
 propos of nothing. ‘ It is so much nicer when one’s medical man 
 is married.’ 
 
 ‘I cannot afford to marry on Oakhurst practice,’ answered 
 Armine, lightly. ‘ I must wait until I am a fashionable physician 
 in London.’ 
 
 i There are many nice girls here who would make excellent 
 wives ; and the neighbourhood would like it better,’ she returned, 
 in that half-impertinent way of a great person talking to a little 
 
 u. of ill us, 
 
10 
 
 IONE. 
 
 one, ignoring all answers, reasonings, disclaimers, and pressing the 
 original point as if nothing had been said to contravene it. 
 
 He lifted his eyebrows and shrugged his shoulders in his pretty 
 un-English way. 
 
 6 Mr. Barrington says so/ she persisted. <He says that all 
 medical men ought to marry. I do not know why, but that is 
 what he says. lie says that it is very much against you that you 
 are a single man/ 
 
 St. Claire raised his eyes full into hers. What beautiful eyes 
 they were ! — far too beautiful for a man ; too soft and darkly blue ; 
 with lashes too long and curling ; with an expression too loving 
 and pleading. 
 
 4 1 should be very glad to take your advice, Mrs. Barrington. 
 I wish from my heart that I could ! ’ he said emphatically. 4 But 
 what can a man do when the stars in their courses light against 
 him P ’ 
 
 He spoke with emphasis for the first part, with a certain sub- 
 dued pathos for the second. 
 
 4 1 do not believe that the stars ever do fight in their courses 
 against us. How can they ? ? answered Theodosia, with that queer 
 literalness which those who liked her called naive and quaint, and 
 those who did not, silly and affected. 4 1 believe in a man’s 
 doing what he chooses to do/ 
 
 4 Do you believe that he can overcome all obstacles by the sim- 
 ple power of his will? that in truth “Vouloir c’est pouvoir ” ? ’ 
 asked Armine, with a sad little smile. 
 
 4 Some things are impossible, of course/ she answered, as if 
 arguing the question on its merits. 4 We cannot fly up to the 
 moon for instance ; though Jules Verne says we can. But we can 
 do a great deal when we like/ 
 
 4 Just so/ he said, that sad little smile still about his lips. 4 But 
 when we want the moon, you see, we have to submit to necessity 
 and go without/ 
 
 4 But it is so silly to want the moon ! ’ said Theodosia, gravely. 
 4 Only babies do that. And I do not think you can call Miss Bose 
 Chesson, or Miss Flora Farley, or Miss Madge Langhorne, or any 
 other young lady in Oakhurst, the moon or stars either ! ’ she 
 added with a little laugh. 
 
 A flush came into his face, and his eyes gleamed with something 
 that was not quite pleasure, as he seemed to straighten his back 
 and lift his head with involuntary pride. 
 
 4 1 did not know that I wae speaking of any of these young 
 ladies — for whom, however, I have the greatest respect/ he said 
 coldly. 
 
 4 Oh ! if you have some secret adoration, some grande passion 
 in the past, I have no more to say/ she cried, looking at him with 
 an arch smile. 
 
THE NEW DOCTOR , . 
 
 ii 
 
 ‘ No ! nor did I say this/ he answered, returning lier smile 
 with one as full of meaning, if not so arch. 
 
 As full of meaning — yes ; hut what did that smile mean? He 
 looked right into her eyes as he spoke ; right into her very soul, as 
 it seemed to her. What did he want her to understand ? What 
 did he seek to discover ? 
 
 ‘ Then it must he the moon P ’ she said with a shrill little laugh, 
 patently artificial. 
 
 ‘ Perhaps it is/ he replied. ‘If it is, I must, as you say, con- 
 tent myself with disappointment, aud go without.’ 
 
 Here the conversation dropped. But that sad sweet smile, 
 and the way in which Dr. St. Claire had raised his beautiful eyes 
 to hers, haunted young Mrs. Barrington for days after. Could he 
 have meant her ? It seemed madness to suppose it ; hut could he? 
 Was she the moon unattainable for all his longing ? was her pre- 
 vious marriage with Anthony the stars which had fought in their 
 courses against him ? She hoped not ! Men are such unmanage- 
 able creatures at the best; but men who are not real gentlemen 
 are worse than all ! They are awful ; and think nothing of making 
 a scandal if the whim takes them. Indeed, they are rather proud, 
 than not, to compromise those who are superior to them in station; 
 and of course Dr. St. Claire was immeasurably her inferior; and it 
 would be such a wicked thing if he were to think other other than 
 as a saint, a spirit, a fairy, a queen. It would be so foolish and so 
 dangerous ! She sincerely hoped not, she said to herself a dozen 
 times a day ; for if Anthony found it out, he would forbid St. 
 Claire the house, and then Mamma — Anthony’s mother — would 
 blame her when she did not deserve it. For she was sure she had 
 done nothing to encourage him — nothing ! No, she would not 
 think of it ; it was so very wrong, so silly, and so useless. It was, 
 indeed, like crying for the moon ! And what folly that is ! 
 
 Nevertheless, ever from that day, Theodosia Barrington, An- 
 thony’s pretty little feather-headed wife, cherished a certain secret 
 kindness for Dr. Armine St. Claire which made her speak of 
 him . with interest, and often say, with a tender kind of com- 
 passion : * Poor young man ! After all, he is to be pitied ! ’ 
 
12 
 
 IONE. 
 
 $ 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 AT THE DOWER HOUSE. 
 
 i Poor young man ! After all, he is to he pitied ! 9 
 
 They were discussing the young doctor at the Dower House. 
 They often discussed him, both here and elsewhere. Beside his 
 good looks and good manners, and the wonderful cures which 
 were every now and then reported of him, there was an element 
 of the unknown in his history which made him interesting and 
 dramatic. He was not like one of themselves, horn and bred in 
 the place, of whom nothing unexpected could be discovered and 
 by whom nothing unusual could be done. For all his year’s 
 sojourn and good conduct, Dr. St. Claire was still essentially a 
 i dark 9 member of the community ; and though no one knew 
 anything to his disadvantage, no one could swear there was 
 nothing to know, or stake so much as a fraction of credit on the 
 assurance that the young man’s moral bill of health was clean all 
 through. A tragedy in the past was by no means improbable; 
 and English county families of assured respectability, whose 
 social ledgers written on virgin parchment are public property to 
 be read by all, regard a tragedy in a man’s history as cousin- 
 german to a crime. A maniacal father, a murdered mother, 
 even a brother hanged in war-time by mistake for a spy— such 
 things as these throw a certain blight over the family-tree which 
 touches the little twigs as well as the parent bole. And who could 
 be quite sure that some such fatal blemish did not mar the perfect 
 respectability of the St. Claire records P It was a possibility and 
 a doubt ; and the young doctor had the benefit, crosswise delivered. 
 
 Moved by this element of the unknown, Theodosia Barrington 
 had always been fond of talking of him. She was fond of talking 
 on all subjects, having that facility of speech which is like nothing 
 so much as the incessant trickle of a leaking spout. And of late, 
 having in remembrance those stars in their courses which had 
 fought against his peace, and the yearning look in his eyes that 
 had emphasized his sad little smile — believing that the handsome 
 young doctor suffered from a secret wound of which she was the 
 cause and of which she alone knew the existence — she spoke of him 
 more than ever, and always with a curious undertone of tenderness 
 breaking through her words, as if she had gathered him under the 
 edges of her lace lappet for shelter and protection. So now, 
 when sitting with her sister and mother-in-law, she said with a 
 half-conseious little smile : 
 
 ‘ Poor young man ! After all, he is to be pitied ! 9 
 
 i Why is he to be pitied ? 9 asked Monica. 
 
AT THE DOWER HOUSE . 
 
 13 
 
 She was bending over her wood-work, but she straightened 
 herself in her chair, and raised her soft, grey, dreamy eyes with 
 frank astonishment in their look as she said again : 4 Why, Theo ? ’ 
 
 ‘ He is so much better than his station —so much beyond his 
 natural associates,’ said Theodosia, rather primly. 
 
 ‘ Yes, indeed,’ chimed in Mrs. Barrington, for one of the rare 
 times in her life agreeing with her daughter-in-law. ‘ He might 
 almost be a real gentleman for manners and appearance. It is a 
 pity that he should look so much like a man of family and fortune 
 and so little like what he is. He is nothing now — neither a 
 gentleman nor a merely professional man. It is really a great pity ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Is he not a gentleman, mother?’ asked Monica. 
 
 She was once more bending over her wood-work ; and this time 
 she neither straightened herself nor looked up. 
 
 ‘Not what we mean by the word, my dear,’ answered Mrs. 
 Barrington, with the calm simplicity of confessed superiority. 
 ‘Not a gentleman like your brother or Edward Formby.’ 
 
 Theodosia gave a short laugh. 
 
 ‘ Well, no, not exactly ! ’ she said, with a proud little toss of 
 her small smooth head. Immediately after, she softened. ‘ Still, 
 he is to be pitied,’ she said in a compassionate voice ; and this time 
 Monica did not ask Why ? 
 
 But Mrs. Barrington, looking at her daughter-in-law — 
 ‘Anthony’s wife,’ as she generally called her — said in deprecation : 
 
 ‘ I do not see why, Theodosia. On the contrary, I think he 
 has got on here exceedingly well, and has done far better than 
 might have been expected. Very few young men would have 
 done so well, coming as he did without letters of introduction 
 or personal patronage of any kind —as if he had dropped from the 
 clouds. Why do you say he is to be pitied, my dear ? You 
 know that I disapprove of all false sentiment ; and surely this is 
 very false sentiment indeed ! ’ 
 
 ‘We do not know all his private life; and he often looks 
 very sad,’ said Theodosia, in the same prim way as before. It was a 
 way she had when she wanted to exasperate her husband’s mother. 
 
 Again Monica looked up, with the same astonishment in her 
 eyes as before, but she did not speak. 
 
 ‘ You seem to have studied him very closely, my dear,’ said 
 Mrs. Barrington, with slight but evident displeasure. 
 
 ‘ I am fond of watching people,’ returned Theodosia, carelessly; 
 ‘ and I have watched Dr. St. Claire sometimes. And I always 
 fancy that he has had some great sorrow in his life. In fact, I am 
 sure of it ! ’ 
 
 ‘ My dear ! ’ remonstrated Mrs. Barrington, always slightly but 
 certainly displeased. 
 
 ‘ What kind of sorrow ? ’ asked Monica, changing her tool. 
 
 ‘ Perhaps he has loved above himself — loved hopelessly, 
 
14 
 
 IOiVE. 
 
 returned Theodosia, with a half-breathed and wholly compassionate 
 sigh. 
 
 ( My dear Theodosia, what extraordinary ideas you have ! ’ 
 again remonstrated Mrs. Barrington, this time almost angrily ; 
 certainly with a briskness of disfavour rare from her to all the 
 world save Anthony's wife, but by no means rare to her. ‘ I should 
 hope that Dr. St. Claire is far too well principled a young man 
 to permit himself such a folly. What very remarkable fancies you 
 have, my dear child ! It is a pity you encourage them as you do.' 
 
 ‘One cannot help one’s thoughts, mamma/ said Theodosia 
 sharply. 6 1 always thought one’s mind at least was free ! And I 
 do not see the good of brains at all if one may not use them.’ 
 
 ‘ Use them, yes ; but in a proper manner/ returned Mrs. 
 Barrington. 
 
 ‘ Is thinking that a young man may have had an unfortunate 
 love-affair, because he looks unhappy, such an improper manner P 1 
 said Theodosia pertly. ‘ I think it very natural ! ’ 
 
 ‘ And I, on the contrary, think it a little indelicate in a young 
 woman like you to indulge in such ideas at all/ said Mrs. Barrington, 
 coldly. 
 
 She was naturally a sweet-tempered and patient kind of woman, 
 but nothing tried her so much as this want of solidity, this 
 flightiness of Anthony’s wife, who was always pursuing some 
 phantom or running away from some shadow. Now she was crazed 
 with the dread of infection, when she insisted on the purification 
 of the whole neighbourhood by such floods of carbolic acid that an 
 Oakhurstian might be known half a mile off. Now she could not 
 sleep at night for fear of burglars, when every door and window 
 at the Manor had to be fitted up with pistols and alarm-bells, while 
 savage dogs roamed loose about the premises at night, and frightened 
 the labourers and house-servants nearly out of their senses in the 
 morning. Now she took up the cause of the Continental poor, and 
 advocated Communistic doctrines and peasant proprietorship for 
 every county but her own ; and now she violently patronised some 
 local duck, who, she was determined, should prove a swan in the 
 ugly stage, presently to manifest his inherited royalty by some 
 grand flight heavenwards — which was like insisting that a fire- 
 balloon was a star. Now it was art and now it was charity. 
 * Mind ’ was once her favourite hobby, and reading societies, essay 
 societies, pen and pencil societies were its trappings ; and then she 
 grew tired of intellect and went into the most prosaic actuality — 
 to learning how to cook potatoes and scour saucepans, how to clean 
 grates and how to trim lamps. But nothing lasted long ; so that 
 she was really as fatiguing to consecutive people as if she had been 
 a Will-o’-the-wisp dancing before them. And especially was she 
 fatiguing to old Mrs. Barrington, who could not bear much mental 
 unrest, and whose brain had long ceased to receive new impressions 
 
AT THE HO WEE HOUSE, 
 
 15 
 
 and to travel along untrodden paths of thought. If she had had 
 children, thought her mother-in-law, she would have been far 
 wiser and steadier than she was now 5 and it was a thousand pities 
 that she had had none. But though Mrs. Barrington said euphe- 
 mistically that it was unfortunate, in her heart she held it as 
 blameable ; and her regret that Theodosia had not done her duty 
 to the family and the estate by giving Anthony an heir, wa& 
 undeniably as much resentment as sorrow. She thought her 
 daughter-in-law as lightminded and unpractical here as in other 
 things ; and her childlessness was less a misfortune than a fault. 
 Mrs. Barrington was not the only good woman who has fallen foul 
 of nature as if it were a crime. 
 
 i Indelicate, mamma ! ’ retorted Theodosia. ‘ If it is indelicate to 
 fall in love, what was I when I married your son ? and what were 
 you and my own mother P How can it be indelicate when every- 
 body does it ? ’ 
 
 ‘ See how well I am getting on with my frame, Theo,’ said 
 Monica in the sudden way of a person who, absorbed in her own 
 pursuit, has heard nothing of the conversation eddying round her. 
 ‘ I have almost finished it now. Is it not pretty ? ’ 
 
 ‘ No,’ said Theodosia shortly. 6 The acorns are too big and the 
 leaves are too stiff.’ 
 
 * Are they ? ’ said Monica, holding the frame at a little distance 
 and looking as if she thought her sister’s criticism serious and worth 
 consideration. 
 
 With no pretension to beauty nor genius in any supreme 
 degree, Monica was a girl whom half the world called sweet and 
 the other half clever. She had never been known to say an unkind 
 thing nor to do a foolish one, and she was always ready to give 
 help of a gentle and feminine kind to those who needed it. But 
 she was not one of the active members of society, and she waited 
 to be sought rather than went forward to seek. Since her father’s 
 death and their removal to the Dower House, two years ago, she 
 and her mother had lived very retired lives, mainly devoted to 
 graceful little industries, local charities, and each other. They let 
 the busy world rush by them unheeded, and shared in none of its 
 follies and but few of its pleasures. People said it was a pity 
 that poor Miss Barrington did not go out more ; and their com- 
 passion was genuine. To judge by appearances, however, it was 
 a waste of force ; for Monica seemed to be entirely content with 
 life as she found it made for her by duty and her mother’s will. 
 And human nature having the beneficent power of falling into 
 habits which satisfy by repetition, as well as revolting against 
 those which pall by monotony, she had fallen into the habit of 
 quiet domesticity and daughterly devotion, and wanted no more 
 than what she had. 
 
 There was a curiously still and gentle atmosphere about 
 
i6 
 
 IOXE. 
 
 these ladies — a kind of moral perfume which reminded one of 
 the faint sweet scent of dried rose-leaves. They had a subtle 
 charm of which no one could precisely define the cause, yet of 
 which all were conscious. It was not only in Mrs. Barrington’s 
 pale, pure, passionless face, which had once been beautiful and 
 was still lovely in its own sad gentle way ; not only in her 
 smooth white hair, like a silver line beneath her widow’s cap ; 
 nor in her gentle smile ; nor yet in that air of sympathy 
 matched with purity which made so many tell her their sorrows, 
 but none their sins. It was not only in Monica’s soft grey 
 eyes full of that thought which is' not born of observation ; 
 of those dreams which are unspoken desires ; of those aspirations 
 which are impossible as hopes and not sufficiently substantial 
 to be regrets — those dreams, those aspirations that belong to 
 women whose experience is limited and who imagine what they 
 have neither seen nor felt — not even in the soft and melodious 
 voice which each had alike, nor in the gentle courtesies which also 
 each had alike. It was not only in their patent purity which 
 libertines would have respected and saints would have honoured. 
 It was not in one thing nor yet in another, but in all — like that 
 perfume of dried rose-leaves mixed with aromatic herbs and 
 odoriferous gums which diffused itself over the whole house — 
 faint, delicate, subtle and uncatalogued, but interpenetrating and 
 characteristic. Some called them ladylike, not knowing how else 
 to qualify them ; and some called them old-fashioned, where the 
 epithet was for praise not reproach ; some said they were ‘ so 
 good,’ which was a wide sweep, and some ‘ so quiet,’ which was a 
 narrow range, but all agreed that no fault could be found with 
 them, save such as was contained in that regretful protest from the 
 lively and energetic : 1 It was a pity poor Miss Barrington did not 
 go out more, and that her mother held her so close.’ 
 
 Perhaps too, there was the faintest echo of dissatisfaction in 
 the question which for the last three years people had been asking 
 of each other : ‘ When was Miss Barrington going to marry P ’ 
 
 She was twenty-three now, and at twenty-three a girl ought to be 
 thinking of getting settled if she is to settle at all. It is not good 
 to marry too early, according to English notions ; but it was not 
 wise to wait too long ; and Monica had waited quite long enough. 
 
 She ought to make up her mind and take Mr. Edward Formby 
 of Hillside. He was the husband manifestly designed for her by 
 Providence. Age, station, rent-roll, the lay of the land and her 
 brother Anthony’s desire, were all in his favour, and they should 
 influence her decision. The alliance had been arranged by the 
 public, speaking as one man, ever since the birth of the little lady 
 at the Manor had followed by seven years that of the heir of 
 Hillside. But at twenty-three and thirty respectively, the two 
 were still uncoupled ; and people could not make out who 3 fault 
 
AT THE DOWER HOUSE . 
 
 17 
 
 it was, nor why. Anthony, who was twelve years older than his 
 sister, had been married for the last nine; but, as has been said, 
 his wife was childless, which made it all the more incumbent on 
 Monica to continue the family and frustrate the hopes of a certain 
 Major James Barrington of the Artillery, an obnoxious cousin now 
 out in India with his battery. Being the heir, the Major was 
 naturally looked on as a robber and an enemy ; and, though a fine 
 fellow enough to his family and friends, his future occupancy of the 
 estates was regarded as one of the direst misfortunes that could 
 befall Oakliurst, the Manor, or the Barringtons. Far better one 
 of their immediate own,. though only on the spindle side — far better 
 a Formby-Barrington than an uncle’s son born on the outside of 
 the groove and brought up with a different shibboleth ! But, in 
 spite of all this strong lateral pressure, the thing had not come off 
 as it should have done, and speculation exhausted itself in vain. 
 
 It must be confessed that Edward Formby, though by no 
 means a cold man, was not a very ardent wooer. He liked Monica 
 Barrington far away the best of all the girls he knew ; and when- 
 ever he said, as he sometimes did, that he wished he had had a 
 sister, he thought of her. But when he pictured the women for 
 whom the world had gone mad — the Helens, the Aspasias, the 
 Cleopatras of men’s love — he did not give them a line nor a hue 
 from her. He knew that he was designed by Providence and the 
 fitness of things to take her to Hillside as his wife; but his state 
 w'as one of philosophic waiting on the clearing of events and the 
 ordering of days, rather than of active desire or eager endeavour ; 
 and, provided he married in reasonable time to have heirs so as to 
 secure the family succession, he was contented to abide in patience, 
 neither consumed with desire nor tormented by the delay. 
 
 So there the two stood, looking at each other across that 
 narrow strip of silence which a hint from her or a word from 
 him would have bridged over ; while Anthony wondered and 
 fumed at this long adjournment and Oakhurst speculated and ante- 
 dated at its pleasure. 
 
 Pending the final arrangement of things, Edward Formby 
 often went to London; perfected himself in billiards and in whist; 
 bred a few horses for the turf, and ran as straight as he rode; drove 
 a spanking team of chestnuts and the neatest drag in the country ; 
 was devoted to polo, pigeon-shooting, and pure breeds all round ; 
 was a keen sportsman and a lenient magistrate, as well as the most 
 generous of all the guardians on the Board; was acknowledged to 
 be a good judge of jockeys but a bad one of men ; had a refined 
 taste in wine and a catholic one in women; was a man of his 
 hands in all ways, and the best-tempered and kindest-hearted 
 gentleman in the district. Such as he was, with the figure of an 
 athlete and the face of a faun, with his clever hands and his 
 unstored head, his faults and his virtues, his worldly possessions 
 
IOXE. 
 
 IS 
 
 and his mental lack, lie managed to exist and be glad in bis 
 own way, waiting for the dawn of that undesignated day when 
 he should take Monica Barrington to Hillside as its mistress, and 
 then and there sow with a sigh the last of those wild oats which 
 men find it so pleasant to plant. 
 
 This, then, was how matters stood with respect to Monica and 
 her marriage. Not formally betrothed, she was yet in a certain 
 sense engaged ; and not even for the Duke himself would her 
 brother have allowed her to fling over Edward Formby, nor would 
 her mother have consented to any other alliance. And though 
 English girls are free to marry where they list when once the 
 magic age of twenty-one has been reached, yet legal freedom does 
 not always tear asunder domestic bonds, and parents and elder 
 brothers have quite as much power as the Master of the Bolls or 
 the Lord Chancellor. With Monica Barrington disobedience to 
 her natural heads would have been as impossible as political 
 rebellion to the Princess Beatrice. 
 
 Her mother washer life, the object of her deepest devotion, her 
 daily care, her hourly thought and love. Anthony was in the 
 place of her father — the appointed ruler of her destinies as head of 
 the House whereof she was but a minor member. Between them 
 both she had neither the wish for nor the possibility of freedom ; 
 and she did not regret what she did not desire. She made her 
 own private world of dreams. For her outward life she ministered 
 to her mother ; for her inward, she lived in an ideal land where she 
 wrote poetry and conquered the world’s praise like Corinne — 
 where she was now a heroine and now a saint — where she loved 
 and was beloved by some beautiful being who had nothing of earth 
 but its material restrictions — who was a man in form and a spirit in 
 substance. Music and poetry, painting and lofty thought would 
 be the speech of their love and the bond of their union. They 
 would live where the sun ever shone, and the earth was ever 
 green ; where the starry night was as the silver lining to the golden 
 robe of day ; where the sun did not scorch nor the north-wind 
 chill ; and where, to sit hand in hand among the flowers, would 
 be the consummation of their bliss. 
 
 This habit of dreaming made Monica in some sense indifferent 
 to the facts of ter daily life, always excepting her care for her 
 mother. She created her own happiness, and reigned as queen in 
 her own domain. No one could take her treasures from her. No 
 one could destroy her gods, nor desolate her shrines, nor desecrate 
 her holy places. She admitted no one into her confidence ; and 
 not even her mother guessed at the form of that veiled Isis to 
 whom those long spells of silence were consecrated. When the 
 snow fell and the bitter east-wind blew, Monica was safe in that 
 island of Atalantis, where the blue sea lapped the shining sand, 
 and the south breeze brought the scents of flowers and the far-off 
 
AT THE DOWER HOUSE . 
 
 *9 
 
 songs of "birds. When all Oaldiurst was convulsed over some 
 petty dispute in the vestry, some misunderstanding at the Board 
 of Guardians and the like, Mrs. Barrington’s daughter was mentally 
 writing poetry that should stir the world, painting pictures that 
 should elevate the race, making music that should realise the 
 fable of Amphion and the might of Orpheus. What had she to 
 do with the sordid world of prosaic fact, or what had it to do 
 with her? Isolated on her pure heights she lived above and 
 beyond her surroundings, and possessed her soul in peace. But 
 her ideal life was rendering her unfit for practical existence ; and 
 she was running into dangers of which she knew neither the name 
 nor the extent. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 OVER THE WOOD-WORK'. 
 
 While Theodosia was appearing to criticise Monica’s work with 
 judgment, and Monica was appearing to think her words worthy 
 of attention, the young doctor was seen driving up the sweep 
 before rounding the angle to halt at the hall-door. 
 
 1 Why, here is Dr. St. Claire ! ’ said young Mrs. Barrington,, 
 with more than usual animation. 6 Why has he come, mamma P 
 Is any one ill P ’ 
 
 6 Grace has a cough and a pain in her side,’ was the elder lady’s ; 
 reply. ( I must see him before he goes, Monica,’ she added,, 
 turning to her daughter. 6 Ring the bell, my dear. They must 
 not let him go before I see him.’ 
 
 ‘ I hope Grace is not really ill — she is such a good servant/ 
 said Theodosia, with unwonted amiability. 
 
 ‘ I did not think you had ever noticed her/ returned Mrs. 
 Barrington, with a gratified smile. 
 
 The arrogance of her manner to servants, and the indifference 
 of Anthony’s wife to all the humane side of mistresshood, had 
 always pained her mother-in-law ; and Mrs. Barrington was glad 
 to see what she took to be the sign of better things. To her, 
 servants were beings of a lower race, destined by Divine wisdom 
 to subordination and ignorance, incapable of right judgment or 
 true morality unless led, or if need be coerced, by their betters — 
 but coerced with as much gentleness as strictness — dominated for 
 their own good and the glory of God in the setting forth of 
 discipline. Simple in her own tastes, she looked on fashionable 
 array in her female servants as both indecorous and sinful ; and the 
 man who should have smoked a cigar when in her service would 
 have been warned for the first offence and discharged for the 
 
20 
 
 I ONE. 
 
 second. Slie liked best* those maids who could neither read nor 
 write, and those men who abjured newspapers and knew nothing 
 of politics. She translated the famous division of ‘ men, women, 
 and the Harveys,’ into ‘ men, women, and domestic servants; ’ but 
 if they were ill she had them carefully nursed; if they were in 
 sorrow she comforted them by telling them how good it was for 
 them to suffer, and how great a sign of Divine favour was affliction ; 
 when they grew old she pensioned them ; when they married she 
 set them up in blankets, crockery and a copper kettle ; she never 
 scolded, even when displeased, and she rewarded them for well- 
 doing liberally. For all that, this gentlewoman who reminded 
 one of some faint and exquisite perfume, like dried rose-leaves still 
 sweet even in their decay, thought the humanity of the lower class 
 something different from her own, and looked on the endeavour 
 to educate them as the beginning of social strife, the starting-point 
 of revolution, and flying in the face of Providence in a wild and 
 wilful way. 
 
 ‘Oh, I know that you think me a horrid hard-hearted little 
 monster ! 9 laughed Theodosia, gaily. ‘ But you see I am not so 
 bad as you make out ; and I have always liked poor Grace.’ 
 
 ‘ I am glad of it, my dear,’ said Mrs. Barrington, kindly. ‘ And 
 Grace is a good girl, poor thing, and does her work very creditably/ 
 
 ‘Yes, she is very nice,’ said Theodosia; and Mrs. Barrington 
 looked pleased. 
 
 All the same it was fortunate she did not put any leading 
 questions. Had she done so, she would have found that Theodosia 
 did not know whether the girl, whose efficient service she had 
 commended, were the house-maid or the lady’s-maid. 
 
 Presently Dr. St. Claire came into the room. With that easy 
 grace of his which seemed to assert and claim absolute equality 
 even with the proudest, he came up to where the three ladies 
 w^ere sitting, and offered his hand as if he had been Edward 
 Formby himself. Mrs. Barrington would have liked it better if 
 he had not. But when her sense of station and her sweetness of 
 nature came into collision, the latter always won the day, and she 
 was sure to forgive what she did not approve. People do not 
 mean to do wrong, she argued. They sin chiefly from ignorance. 
 And at the worst it is right to forgive. 
 
 ‘ How do you find poor Grace ? ’ she asked with kindly anxiety. 
 
 ‘ She is very ill,’ said Dr. St. Claire. ‘ She has double 
 pneumonia, and her state is critical.’ 
 
 Mrs. Barrington’s mild face grew anxious. 
 
 ‘ Poor thing ! ’ she said passionately. ‘ I am indeed grieved to 
 Fear this ; but I was afraid she was very ill.’ 
 
 ‘ I am so sorry ! Poor Grace ! ’ said Monica, looking up with 
 her whole heart of compassion in her eyes. 
 
 ‘ Is it catching ? ’ asked Theodosia, her cheeks dyed crimson 
 
OVER THE WOOD-WORK. 
 
 21 
 
 for fear. 1 Mamma!’ she added excitedly; 4 do be careful! do 
 mind what you are about ! 9 
 
 4 No, it is not infectious/ said Armine, reassuringly. ( I would 
 not allow you to remain here if it were ! 9 
 
 4 How nice of him to say that ! ’ thought Anthony’s wife, 
 taking the pronoun to herself, and sending for acknowledgment a 
 pretty half-grateful half-roguish look to the thoughtful and clever 
 young doctor who took such especial care of her safety. 
 
 He, on his part, glanced at Monica, then fixed his eyes steadily 
 on her mother. Young Mrs. Barrington had not been in his 
 thoughts. 
 
 4 1 should urge her removal from the Dower House if there 
 were risk to you in her remaining/ he continued. 4 But you need 
 have no fear. The illness is severe and will he long ; but it is not 
 dangerous to others. Only, she will require good nursing and great 
 care/ 
 
 4 My servants are always well looked after when they are ill/ 
 said Mrs. Barrington, a trifle stiffly. 4 Tell me what has to be done 
 and your orders will be obeyed to the letter/ 
 
 He told her the usual routine of equable temperature, and the 
 like, adding : 4 I gave all these instructions upstairs, to the— houses 
 keeper P — the person they called Mrs. James/ 
 
 4 My maid. But I would rather go and see for myself personally/ 
 answered Mrs. Barrington, rising. 
 
 She expected the young doctor to leave the room with her. 
 Instead of which he simply went to the door, opened it for her to 
 pass through, then came back to where Monica was sitting, still 
 with her wood-work in her hand. 
 
 ‘This is pretty/ he said, taking it from her in the most natural 
 way of equal comradeship imaginable ; 4 and well done. Would 
 you like me to lend you some patterns, Miss Barrington? I have 
 some good designs which have not been published and are therefore 
 quite fresh. Shall I bring them up with me this evening when 
 I come to see the servant ? 9 
 
 4 Thank you, yes, I shall be glad to have some new patterns. I 
 did not know that you carved/ said Monica, pleasantly smiling as 
 she spoke. 
 
 ‘A little. I do a little of many things/ he answered, also 
 smiling and speaking pleasantly. 
 
 4 1 am glad you carve, for then we can exchange our patterns. 
 One gets so tired of things, looking at them so long before one begins 
 to work on them ! They seem to lose all their freshness and 
 interest by being looked at/ said Monica. 
 
 4 Do you soon get tired of things, Miss Barrington ? 9 asked 
 Dr. St. Claire. 
 
 He was looking intently at the acorns on the frame, and he 
 spoke in the indifferent way of a man asking a half-foolish and 
 
22 
 
 IONE . 
 
 totally unimportant question. But his voice had a curious little 
 tremor in it, and his iDreatli came just a trifle checked and hard. 
 
 4 1 do of wood- work patterns, when I have them a long time 
 before beginning to work on them,’ said Monica, with simple literal- 
 ness. 4 But in general I do not soon tire of things/ 
 
 4 Of people P ’ asked Armine, with the same strange undercur- 
 rent of emotion beneath an exterior as calm as if he were making a 
 professional diagnosis. 
 
 4 Of people, never ! ’ she answered emphatically, thinking of her 
 mother. 
 
 4 No ; there is a good reason for that/ said Theodosia, with her 
 shrill laugh. 4 As you care nothing for anybody, I do not see 
 how you can get tired. You must have, Monica, before you 
 can lose/ 
 
 St. Claire raised his eyes to Monica and as suddenly let them 
 fall. Hers were turned on him in the fixed way of one whose mind 
 is preoccupied. She was thinking of his question, and her answer, 
 and now of Theodosia’s commentary ; she was not thinking of him 
 personally. But when their eyes met, hers dropped as suddenly as 
 his. Something seemed to have passed between them which made 
 her abashed and him afraid — she abashed by what she saw, he afraid 
 of what he felt and what he knew that she had seen. Fortunately 
 at that moment young Mrs. Barrington was looking at herself in 
 the hand-glass by which Monica judged the better of her work by 
 reflection, and thus saw nothing of that look which had told so much. 
 When she looked again at St. Claire there was nothing to see. 
 The young doctor was a man of self-control and a quick recovery. 
 
 4 Do you carve, Mrs. Barrington ? 9 he asked in quite his usual 
 manner — that manner which was so sweet and tender, so almost 
 caressing in its tones and gestures. 
 
 4 No. I do not care for making clumsy knobs or cutting little 
 holes in bits of wood. It seems so silly ! 9 Theo answered with a 
 laugh. 4 It is no better than that ridiculous open-work embroidery 
 which ladies used to he mad about a few years ago — cutting holes 
 in a piece of cambric and then sewing them up again ! I think all 
 that kind of thing so intensely stupid. I like lawn-tennis and 
 billiards and quick riding so much better. I hate all missy things/ 
 
 And at this she laughed again, and looked at Monica as the 
 point of her aim. 
 
 4 It’s a pity you do not carve ; you would find it very interesting. 
 And it is not difficult ; in fact it is wonderfully easy in proportion to 
 the results/ answered Armine, passing over the items of her 
 disclaimer and going back on the central fact. 
 
 4 Should I ? As you recommend it so strongly, Dr. St. Claire, 
 I think I will try it. Your advice is like a prescription/ she added 
 with a naughty smile ; 4 a prescription which somehow one must 
 obey/ 
 
OVER THE WOOD-WORK. 
 
 2 3 
 
 She meant to please the young man by this flattering attention 
 to his wishes, poor fellow ! And when she had pleased him, what 
 then? Chi lo sa? She was one of those women who put their 
 foolish heads into bags and run among the quicksands, never 
 looking to their feet. 
 
 * Will you teach me, Monica ? ’ she continued, looking at 
 St. Claire as if she wished him to take up the offer. 
 
 ‘ Yes, with pleasure,’ answered Monica. 
 
 Armine said nothing. 
 
 i And perhaps you will lend me some patterns, too P 9 continued 
 Theodosia, turning to him. ‘I know all Monica’s by heart, and I 
 am tired of them.’ 
 
 ‘ Willingly,’ lie answered, with his best air of a disguised 
 prince. 
 
 And yet he would rather that she had not asked him, and that 
 Monica had been the only one to profit by his store. He was a 
 generous young fellow by nature, with a hand as open as if he 
 counted his fortune by pounds where he reckoned it by pence. All 
 the same, in this matter he felt mean and churlish, and wished that 
 young Mrs. Barrington had not asked him for the loan of a few 
 patterns of wood-carving. « 
 
 i And yet it is better,’ he said to himself. 
 
 But why should it be better ? flow could there be two sides — * 
 a better or a worse — to such a simple thing P 
 
 Soon after this Mrs. Barrington returned, and they had a little 
 talk about the sick girl and her condition ; and when this was over, 
 the doctor’s visit was also necessarily at an end, and he took his 
 leave, as he ought to have done a quarter of an hour ago. 
 
 ‘ I will bring up the patterns this evening,’ he said as he was 
 shaking hands with Monica. 
 
 If you speak while you are shaking hands, it seems only natural 
 to hold the hand for as long as the speech lasts. There was 
 nothing unseemly, then, in Hr. St. Claire’s holding Miss Barrington’s 
 hand while he said this ; but Monica’s face, usually so colourless, 
 flushed crimson ; yet she did not withdraw her hand. If her blush 
 betokened vexation, would she not have done so ? he thought. He 
 forgot that other explanation of a girl’s passivity — her reluctance to 
 show that she has seen, felt, or understood. 
 
 ‘ Of what patterns was Hr. St. Claire speaking, my dear ? ’ asked 
 Mrs. Barrington, when he had gone. 
 
 Monica told her mother what, after all, was not much to tell — - 
 simply the loan of a few quasi-artistic designs. 
 
 6 Is not this rather a familiarity ? ’ asked Mrs. Barrington, her 
 feelings of caste breaking through her Christian kindness in the odd 
 contradictory way characteristic of her. ‘ Remember,* my dear, 
 though he is a very creditably conducted young man by all accounts, 
 and, 1 believe, really skilful in his profession, he is not a gentleman, 
 
TONE. 
 
 24 
 
 And we know nothing of him. lie must not he encouraged to for- 
 get his place and to act as if he were our equal.’ 
 
 ‘ I could scarcely refuse, dear mother, could I P ’ returned Mo- 
 nica. 6 He made the offer very naturally and kindly. I think I 
 could scarcely have refused it.’ 
 
 Soul of honour as she was, she said nothing of the look which 
 had made her cower down and had made him tremble. Looks are 
 pot evidence like words or deeds, and they are always liable to 
 misinterpretation. 
 
 i Perhaps not, my dear,’ answered Mrs. Barrington. ‘ You could 
 not he rude at any time. But it was rather forw ard on his part, 
 and I am sorry for it.’ 
 
 Monica looked troubled. It was so seldom that her mother 
 had to take a reproving tone where she was concerned, that she 
 scarcely knew herself now when, if St. Claire were to blame for 
 proposing this little interchange of friendly courtesies, she was 
 also to blame for accepting it. Iler face showed her trouble so 
 plainly, that her mother's heart softened and her mild annoyance 
 passed like the mist of a summer morning. 
 
 i I dare say I am a little too particular,’ she said tenderly and 
 with a reassuring smile. ‘ I am old-fashioned, you know ! Of course 
 lie meant it kindly, poor young man 5 and we ought to take things 
 as they are meant.’ 
 
 ‘ I was here all the time, and I saw nothing forward in it,’ said 
 Theodosia, rather sharply. 
 
 She was displeased that her mother-in-law should make so 
 much of Monica’s share in the matter. It overshadowed her own. 
 
 6 No ? ’ returned Mrs. Barrington. ‘ Then I dare say I am wrong.’ 
 
 ( And he is going to lend me some patterns as well ; so it was 
 not only Monica of whom he thought,’ continued this young woman 
 hardily. 
 
 ‘ Yes ? ’ said Mrs. Barrington. * It is all right, I make no doubt 
 my dear. But, if I were you, I would be a little careful how you 
 encourage anything like an intimacy with the young man. I know 
 my son, and I know his extreme particularity.’ 
 
 ‘ And I know my husband, mamma,’ retorted Theodosia. c An- 
 thony is not such a goose as to object to such a lit tie thing as this. 
 We are not so many Grand Lamas and poor Dr. St. Claire a mere 
 crossing-sweeper.’ 
 
 ‘My dear Theodosia, it is really impossible to talk to you! ’ 
 said Mrs. Barrington, with the irritabilit} 7 which her daughter-in- 
 law alone, but she so often, aroused in her. ‘ You have allowed 
 yourself to get into such a disastrous habit of exaggeration, it is 
 really impossible to discuss anything with you on reasonable 
 grounds ! Grand Lamas ! Crossing-sweepers ! What a tone to 
 take ! It is not worthy of you, nor of me, Theodosia ! ’ 
 
 ‘ I wonder what you would do, mamma, if you had not me to 
 find fault with!’ said Theodosia. ‘ I declare I do not think you 
 
OVER THE WOOD-WORK. 
 
 25 
 
 see an inch of good in me from my head to my feet. Poor An- 
 thony ! how you must pity him ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Theo, come and see the new kittens/ said Monica, suddenly. 
 
 ‘ They are such dear little mites, and have such a nice bed in the 
 library. Will you come? The mother looks just like the White 
 Cat/ 
 
 ‘Yes, and I will not come back here again, mamma/ said 
 Theodosia, rising. ‘ So good-bye ; and try to think a little less 
 badly of me if you can — for Anthony’s sake, if not for my own. I 
 know, of course, that I am nothing to you; but as Anthony’s 
 mother, it would be more convenient if you thought his wife less of 
 a monster than you do.’ 
 
 ‘ I was not aware that I thought you a monster, Theodosia/ 
 said Mrs. Barrington, coldly. 
 
 ‘ Oh yes, you do, mamma ! You think me a toad, or a frog, or 
 something horrid, I know — perhaps a cockatrice ! ’ she added as her 
 latest shaft, following Monica briskly out of the room. 
 
 ‘ My dear,’ said Mrs. Barrington, when Theodosia had gone and 
 Monica had returned ; ‘ that poor girl becomes more and more in- 
 tolerable every day of her life ! I really sometimes fear that she is 
 not quite right in her mind — she has such extraordinary crazes, 
 now on one thing, and now on another.’ 
 
 ‘ She is very volatile/ said Monica, thinking it less rasping and 
 more soothing to agree in part than to deny wholly. 
 
 ‘ Volatile ! She is indeed that, and more/ said her mother. 
 
 If she is going to make herself as ridiculous by her patronage of 
 this young man as she has of others, I do not know what we shall 
 do nor what will happen. Indulgent as your brother is to her ’ — 
 ‘weak ’ she would have said had she spoken as she felt ; as every 
 woman would say of her male relation whose wife she does not 
 like and v T hom he does not desert — ‘ indulgent and generous to a 
 fault/ she repeated, ‘ I do not think he will approve of her taking 
 up this young man, and making him her latest pet, as she did with 
 James Solly’s son. It is really too distressing to see her so silly 
 and thoughtless ! ’ 
 
 ‘ I do not think she means to do wrong, but she is, as you say, 
 dear mother, very thoughtless/ returned Monica. ‘ I do not think 
 that you need worry yourself, however, about Dr. St. Claire/ she 
 added. 
 
 ‘ Why should I not, when I see such folly P ’ returned her 
 mother. ‘ How can I help worrying myself ? ’ 
 
 ‘ But he is too good and wise to be drawn into anything ques- 
 tionable/ answered Monica. ‘And it would be very questionable 
 if he allowed Theodosia to befriend him more than Anthony would 
 like. In things of this kind husband and wife must go together/ 
 she added sagely. 
 
 ‘ As for that, your brother sees only with her eyes/ returned 
 Mrs. Barrington. ‘ She can do what she likes with him. lie 
 
26 
 
 IONE. 
 
 seems to be really — what shall I say ? — besotted — under a spell — 
 with respect to her.’ 
 
 ‘ He certainly does love her very much,’ said Monica. 1 So I 
 suppose she shows the best of herself to him. You see, mother, 
 she must have a best to show.’ 
 
 ‘ Well, there is no use in looking at things from the dark side 
 only/ said Mrs. Barrington, with a gentle kind of sigh, her irritation 
 passed and her sweeter nature once more regnant. i She is very 
 light-minded, and not the person I should have chosen for your 
 dear brother’s wife had I been allowed a voice in the matter. But 
 time works wonders, and I hope time will make her a little more 
 wise and staid than she is now.’ 
 
 ‘ Yes, I hope so too. She is very good-natured,’ said Monica. 
 
 ‘ And very foolish,’ returned her mother. ‘ But she means no 
 harm, I dare say.’ 
 
 ‘ I am sure she does not,’ said Monica, sure of nothing of the 
 kind, but glad to throw oil on all disturbed waters and to brood, 
 dove-like, over all eggs of peace. 
 
 ‘ My good child ! ’ said Mrs. Barrington, fondly. ‘Always my 
 sweet peace-maker ! Ah, Monica, what should I do without you P 
 The day when you leave me will be the saddest of my life — the day 
 when you disappointed me would be my day of doom ! I could 
 never outlive a sorrow from you.’ 
 
 ‘You shall never have one, that lean help, mother,’ said her 
 daughter, going over to her, and kissing her. ‘ You are my first 
 care and my only love. I live only for you — and shall to the end.’ 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE PAST AND PRESENT. 
 
 Mrs. Barrington was right: — they knew very little about the 
 young doctor who had settled among them. Though his manner 
 was perfect, his skill unquestionable, and his year’s conduct blame- 
 less, yet these were his sole credentials. And British respectability 
 in high places likes to have something more solid in the retrospect 
 before it commits itself to the freemasonry of adoption and equality. 
 Perhaps had it known all it would have given the sign and pass- 
 word to Armine ; perhaps not. Social Brahminism is a capricious 
 foster-mother, and nourishes one outlying member while it starves 
 another with bewildering injustice. 
 
 There was not much chance, however, that it would be called 
 on to exercise judgment in the case of St. Claire. For though he 
 sometimes spoke of his father, more frequently of his mother, and 
 
THE PAST AND PRESENT. 
 
 27 
 
 often of the time when he lived in France, he spoke only in general, 
 and always changed the conversation when it drifted too near to de- 
 tails. Hence he gave no one the power of choosing between what 
 had been in the past and what was in the present — nor of deciding 
 whether they would receive him for the sake of the former or ex- 
 clude him because of the latter. Oakhurst judged of him only by 
 things as they -were, and things as they had been did not enter into 
 its calculations. 
 
 Yet its story, secret as he kept it, had nothing in it dishonour- 
 ing to his name if much that was grievous to his feelings. Never- 
 theless it was scarcely one he cared to tell, and it was only natural 
 that he should hide it with such care as of itself to cause suspicion. 
 
 The St. Claires had been rich men in England for the last three 
 generations. The founder of the family in Perfidious Albion, M. 
 le Marquis de Sainte Claire, a royalist exile of ’92, had been for 
 one while poor enough. Ultimately he married an heiress to whom 
 he had given French lessons, whereby he made his own fortune, 
 and, gentleman ‘ de la vieille roche ’ as he was, did not mar hers. 
 His son succeeded to the property ; cultivated English sympathies ; 
 dropped both the Marquis and the De which his father had re- 
 tained ; called himself plain John Clare, Esq. ; was proud of his 
 maternal ancestry ; and tried to forget that he had inherited French 
 blood from his father. He was more ‘ John Bull ’ than many who 
 ethnologically are all Bull, and those stood best with him who com- 
 plimented him with most unction on his thoroughly English cha- 
 racteristics, and the fine patriotism of his politics. 
 
 His son again, Armine’s father, w^ent back to the Gallic strain ; 
 took up his marquisate ; liked nothing so well as to call himself 
 French ; and blasphemed the British intermixture in his veins as 
 if it had been so much muddy water poured into wine. He repudi- 
 ated all connection with that unpatriotic Clare ; married a Paris- 
 ienne pur sang and went in for the right thing and philological 
 exactness. He was the Marquis de Sainte Claire; and he was 
 fond of saying with a broad British accent : ‘ Nous autres,’ and 
 ‘Nous Fran$ais.’ * He had no pride in his position as an English 
 landowner, but coveted that estate at Tours which had been his 
 forefathers’ in the days before the assembling of the States General. 
 When therefore the railroad was taken through an outlying portion 
 of his property, he sold the whole thing out of hand, and went olf 
 to Tours, as a Mohammedan might have gone to Mecca. Here his 
 wife died, and the star of hi3 prosperity set. 
 
 At this time young Armine was about sixteen, as beautiful and 
 tender as the Apollo Sauroctonos. His mother's death nearly broke 
 his heart, and did slightly disturb his father’s brain. The poor 
 widower tried to overcome his sorrow by excitement, and took to 
 gambling on the Bourse according to the prevailing madness of the 
 time. Eager and extreme as he was by nature he followed the 
 
28 
 
 10NE, 
 
 crowd with a swift step and an unsteady head. At first he did well. 
 The demon who watches over gamblers baited his hook with a 
 florid fly, and at one moment the Marquis de Saint e Claire had 
 doubled, and at another trebled, his original capital. But he played 
 the game too long and followed the fly too far. He drifted on to 
 the rapids ; and then he shot Niagara. One morning he woke to 
 find himself in the boiling surf below, hopelessly ruined. Out of 
 the wreck of his fortune he managed to save just enough to start 
 his son in a profession and provide himself with a decent funeral. 
 
 The fancy of the lad, at a time when costly fancies were the 
 legitimate outfalls of his wealth, had gone to science and the micro- 
 scope. For all his beauty he had some sterling stuff* beneath 
 his clustering curls ; and for all his manner and what would seem 
 to be his natural role of carpet-knight and lady-killer, he had aspi- 
 rations and ideals like men of fewer temptations. He was in the 
 phase of humanitarianism and the worship of science when this 
 ruin came upon him. When he realised the fact that he had to 
 till his own field and work his own mine, he turned what had 
 been an intellectual pleasure to practical account, and entered him- 
 self as a student of medicine in Paris and afterwards in London. 
 
 When his last examination was passed and his hand was ready 
 for the plough, the money saved from the wreck had run out and 
 his father’s work was done. One morning the poor ruined Marquis 
 was found lying peacefully asleep in his narrow bed — that sleep 
 which knows no waking. A small bottle of cyanide of potassium 
 was lying empty on the floor, and the manner of that sudden death 
 — the reason of the froth hanging about those pale lips — was too 
 patent to be denied. 
 
 This then was the reason why Armine spoke so seldom of his 
 past and gave so few particulars of his family. Pecuniary ruin and 
 paternal suicide are not pleasant supporters for a coat-of-arms ; 
 and between sacredness and sorrow he felt that reticence was 
 better than confidence. He had nothing to hide if need be that 
 he should confess ; but also he had much that he did not wish to 
 disclose voluntarily and unnecessarily. Hence he held his peace 
 and kept his family history like a book closely sealed from prying 
 eyes ; and the world speculated on the secret writing in vain. 
 
 It was not long after his father’s death that St. Claire, who had 
 come over to England, heard of this modest practice at Oakhurst, 
 which had become vacant by the death of Hr. Brown. He went 
 down ; paid a small sum for fixtures, goodwill and lease ; took up 
 his quarters in the deceased doctor’s house ; added his own door- 
 plate; re-papered the surgery ; laid in a stock of new instruments ; 
 and stepped into the lapsed practice like so much inherited plate 
 and linen. Miss Maria Crosby, the paupers, the ‘ second set,’ and 
 the servants at the grand houses, all fell into his hands; and there 
 was no one to oppose him. The only word said in his disfavour 
 
THE PAST AND PRESENT. 
 
 29 
 
 was Ihat he was too young and too handsome for the requirements 
 of the place. As time went on, these two objections fell by fami- 
 liarity into the background, and then the pegs of dissatisfaction 
 were to be found in these questions : Who is he P Where does he 
 come from ? What is his family and what are his antecedents ? 
 Why does he never tell us anything about himself? Why has he 
 no visible friends nor relations in England P Why is he so sad and 
 reserved? And, how does he, a mere country doctor as he is, 
 without private fortune, manage to be so like a young pilnce in 
 disguise and to have all those accomplishments which only rich 
 men can give their sons ? 
 
 His history, had it been known, would have answered all these 
 questions. The luxurious education of his well-found youth had 
 made him the accomplished gentleman he was. His mother’s 
 untimely death, his loss of fortune, his fathers tragic end, had 
 thrown that air of melancholy about him which so strangely moved 
 the world of women, besides making him discreet and reserved as 
 to all the rest. He could not speak of his past, partly because he 
 would not run the risk of looking like a snob by boasting of his 
 former vanished grandeur ; partly because he did not choose to set 
 the social sleuth-hounds on his trail. But neither would he be 
 drawn into close friendships with people on a par with his present, 
 but below the line of his former, place. If he might not dwell on 
 his own inherited level he would not build below it. Hence, among 
 other disagreeables he was the veritable flying-fish of the com- 
 munity — not accepted as an equal by his natural peers and not 
 choosing to make himself the comrade of his present equals. It 
 was an unpleasant position; but he could not improve it. But 
 though he was not a strong man he was both reasonable and sweet- 
 tempered. And these make a moral amalgam as serviceable in it3 
 own way as that more fibrous quality known as force of character. 
 
 Grace at the Dower House continued seriously ill. Double 
 pneumonia is not a trifling ailment anywhere, but when it comes 
 during the harsh spring winds of England, the risk to life is naturally 
 increased, and the necessity for constant medical attendance more 
 and more urgent. It was in the received order of things, then, 
 that young Dr. St. Claire should go every day, and in the beginning 
 twice a day, to the Dower House; and that when he went, he 
 should see Mrs. Barrington in the drawing-room to make a more 
 accurate report than even the trained nurse could do. This was his 
 duty as also her desire; and had it been even against his own 
 wishes he would have been bound to fulfil the one and gratify the 
 other. As things were, it was not against his wishes ; and in this 
 manner at least his duty ran curricle with his pleasure. 
 
 He was thus thrown much with Monica in these later times ; 
 and if Mrs. Barrington never forgot that this well-bred, pleasing, 
 handsome young man was only the country doctor, her daughter 
 
30 
 
 IONE. 
 
 sometimes did, and Armine himself, always. He had established 
 a community of pursuits and tastes between Monica and himself 
 which had both its charm and danger. lie not only lent her 
 designs for her wood-carving — often made by himself — and gave 
 her a few extra dodges, as he called his deft manipulation of tools, 
 but he also brought up his favourite books — for the most part 
 poems with passages vigorously under-scored, and cognate passages 
 in other poets jotted down in the margin like Variorum readings. 
 As he always acted openly and straightforwardly, and offered his 
 loans, while he discussed their merits, in Mrs. Barrington’s presence, 
 that gentle woman, whose creed of caste was so diametrically 
 opposed to her daily practice and Christian philosophy, never found 
 the time nor occasion when to interfere or deny. It would have 
 been too ill-bred to have refused these little attentions; which, 
 after all, she thought, meant nothing so much as the young man’s 
 own intellectual relief. It must be very dull for him at Oakhurst, 
 as she said more than once to Monica. Among his own class who 
 could possibly be a congenial companion for him, so highly edu- 
 cated as he was, and with so much native refinement as to make 
 him almost like a real gentleman ! It must therefore be pleasant 
 to him to talk on the subjects which interested him to people like 
 themselves, who could understand him ; and it was only right to 
 help young men to keep themselves select and out of low company. 
 It all showed a very nice taste in him ; and as it committed them- 
 selves to nothing doubtful she was not sorry to lend that helping 
 hand to masculine virtue which good women think they give to 
 young men, when, at five o’clock, they hand them cups of tepid 
 tea and nice little slices of thin brown bread and butter. 
 
 * It gives him something to look forward to, poor young man,’ 
 dear Mrs. Barrington used to say with gentle benevolence, making 
 a kind of self-excuse for a practical democracy not naturally in her 
 line. 
 
 6 Yes,’ said Monica. 
 
 6 And keeps him out of low company,’ said Mrs. Barrington. 
 
 c Yes,’ answered Monica again. 
 
 1 So many country doctors take to drinking habits, it is only 
 right to do what one can to save this poor young man from such a 
 fate ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ said Monica, again ; this time with a certain hesitation 
 and a sudden feeling of revulsion. 
 
 In her heart she thought it not very likely that Armine St. 
 Claire would fall into drinking habits or take to low company with 
 or without their five o’clock cups of tea. But she did not say so. 
 She had an idea that it was the best policy not to make herself too 
 decidedly the young man's champion. 
 
 ‘ What books did he bring you this morning, my dear P ’ Mrs. 
 Barrington went on to ask. 
 
THE PAST AND PRESENT. 
 
 31 
 
 Monica laid her long white hand on two hooks beside her. 
 
 ‘ One of Matthew Arnold’s, and one of De Musset’s,’ she replied. 
 
 ‘ And you lent him — P ’ 
 
 6 Adelaide Proctor and Jean Ingelow.’ 
 
 ‘ These are sweet and harmless, being written by women,’ said 
 Mrs. Barrington. 4 1 am not so sure of his choice. French litera- 
 ture is always doubtful — and who was this De Musset ? ’ 
 
 ‘ 1 have not read him yet,’ answered Monica. ‘ But I believe 
 he is beautiful.’ 
 
 ‘ He may be dangerous all the same, my dear,’ said the mother 
 anxiously. ‘ And I have forgotten all my French, so that I cannot 
 read and judge for myself. You must be careful, Monica.’ 
 
 ‘ Yes, mother, I will.’ 
 
 1 And if you come upon anything doubtful, you must put away 
 the book at once.’ 
 
 ‘ Yes, mother. But I do not think Dr. St. Claire would lend me 
 anything in the least degree doubtful,’ she added very gently. 
 
 ‘ He knows too much of French literature, my dear, for my 
 taste,’ said Mrs. Barrington, with an air of conviction. ‘ We all 
 know how hopelessly corrupt it is.’ 
 
 Her daughter said no more. She always knew when to give 
 in so that a discussion should not broaden into an argument ; for 
 Mrs. Barrington, like most women, disliked to be pushed into 
 dialectical corners, and nothing disturbed her more than to be forced 
 to trace her assertions to their foundations in fact. This was not 
 because she was arrogant, but because she was timid, and it must 
 be confessed intellectually indolent ; and it annoyed her to be made 
 to clear out her own obscure places. 
 
 Meanwhile the illness of poor Grace went through its appointed 
 stages, and the intercourse between the young doctor and the ladies 
 of the Dower House grew insensibly closer and more intimate, as 
 mental and personal harmonies overpowered conventional discords. 
 One by one all Mrs. Barrington’s faint suspicions were set to rest. 
 She even tolerated French authors of whom she knew nothing, save 
 their nationality; and found pleasure in those sweet and simple 
 little Bomances whereof she knew neither the meaning nor the 
 effect. To please her, the young man learnt one or two of Claribel’s 
 most touching songs ; and it became almost as regular a thing as 
 the cup of afternoon tea, to ask Dr. St. Claire to go to the piano and 
 sing ‘one of his sweet little songs.’ 
 
 This was only when the mother and daughter were alone. 
 When Theodosia was there the talk on literature was restricted, 
 the practice of music was nil, and all things became stiffer, more 
 reserved and less genial. Theodosia kept the ball rolling on her 
 own account and in her own w r ay, and would have been horribly 
 disappointed had things been on the aesthetic footing which was 
 the rule when she was absent. She always made Mrs. Barrington 
 
32 
 
 10NE, 
 
 cross, Monica uneasy, and Armine somewhat embarrassed when she 
 came. But perhaps this restraint was better for them all than too 
 much of that sweet seductive intercourse which had even invaded 
 Mrs. Barrington’s sense of fitness and had given such dangerous 
 reality to Monica’s dreams. 
 
 One day Armine found Miss Barrington alone. Her mother 
 was engaged for the moment in the library, where she transacted 
 all her business. One of Anthony’s tenants had come to ask her to 
 intercede for him about the renewal of his lease on the old terms ; 
 and as his story was pitiable and Anthony had been manifestly 
 harsh and unjust, the dear woman felt bound to listen to the end, 
 if with no certainty of ultimate good, yet with the feeling of giving 
 present consolation. And even an hour snatched from pain counted 
 for something in her estimate of things. Thus Dr. St. Claire and 
 Monica were left for about a quarter of an hour alone — the first 
 time such a chance had befallen them. 
 
 The conversation somehow turned on the modern outbreak of 
 individualism and public ambition in women ; and Armine, though 
 against all excess, as was to be expected from a man of his type, 
 was so far a child of the generation as to be the champion of a 
 certain amount of free will and independence in women, especially 
 in those things which were in themselves beautiful. Monica, on 
 the contrary, represented the seclusion of home and the wholly 
 domestic duties of past ages. 
 
 6 A certain amount F ’ she said with a smile. 6 But does it not 
 all depend on what is that certain amount ? What one person 
 thinks allowable, a second thinks is not enough, and a third too 
 much. So where are we to fix the line ? ’ 
 
 ‘ Where would you place it ? ’ he asked, looking into her eyes. 
 
 ‘IP oh ! I am not of the modern school at all,’ she answered, 
 her colour deepening. 6 My mother’s will is my rule of right, and 
 my home the dearest and happiest place in the world.’ 
 
 6 Still, if not for yourself, you might make limits for others,’ he 
 said. ‘ All young ladies are not so fortunate as you, either in 
 circumstance or disposition. What would you do with one who 
 had a very pronounced artistic or intellectual gift — Bosa Bonheur 
 say, Mrs. Siddons, Grisi, Mrs. Somerville P — would you have had 
 all these quench the light that was in them for the sake of leading 
 purely domestic lives ? ’ 
 
 ‘ No, not these,’ said Monica, to whom, as to others, the success 
 of a thing already done creates its own principle but gives no pre- 
 cedent for the unknown. 
 
 ‘Then if not these, why any p ’ he asked, smiling. 
 
 * But these were such glorious women ! ’ she answered naively, 
 
 i They proved their gloriousness only by trial,’ he argued. ‘ We 
 are all potentialities of unknown value till we are tested. While 
 in the egg an eagle is indistinguishable from a vulture or a barn- 
 
THE PAST AND PRESENT 
 
 33 
 
 door fowl, and incubation, which is proof, alone shows the difference 
 The analogy holds good for mental powers. If we are not allowed 
 endeavour, there can he no success, and the divine fire within 
 us dies down for want of air to feed it and space wherein to 
 burn.’ 
 
 ‘ But true genius always makes its 'way. It is irrepressible/ 
 said Monica. 
 
 ‘ You mean that when it does, it does/ he answered. 1 And what 
 about the mute, inglorious Miltons who never get a chance to show 
 what is in them ? — the buried seeds which are not helped to come 
 to the light and have not power of themselves to lift up the paving- 
 stone ? Had these women we have spoken of been forcibly kept 
 from following the bent of their genius, they would not have been 
 the shining lights they were. But how many would not have been 
 as great if they could but have had the means of showing them- 
 selves ? And surely in the rising generation of girls there are some 
 as gifted as those who have gone before, and who want only leave 
 to develop — only the liberty to rise to their full height. As I 
 said ; disallow endeavour, and success is impossible.’ 
 
 ‘ Still it is better for girls to be dutiful to their parents, and 
 content to remain at home, than to be just like so many boys, rest- 
 less and dissatisfied till they can go out into the world and fling 
 off all the duties of family life for ambition and excitement/ said 
 Monica, womanlike escaping from the logical consequences of an 
 argument by doubling back on the main principle. 
 
 ‘ Certainly. All the same, genius should have its possibilities 
 of expression/ said Armine. 1 And beautiful as the home life is— 
 and no one values it more than 1/ he said with strange emphasis, 
 
 1 there are times when most young people feel that it is both re- 
 stricted and arid. You yourself, Miss Barrington, are there never 
 days wdien you dream of a wider horizon — a more purely ideal, 
 existence ? ’ 
 
 He drew his bow at a venture, and the shaft struck home. He 
 was startled, and more than startled, by the expression which came 
 into Monica’s usually still and dreamy face. Her large soft eyes 
 blazed with sudden fire ; her cheeks grew pale with living passion ; 
 her lips half parted ; her head was thrown back ; her whole air 
 and attitude rapt, yearning, full of unspoken aspiration and unsatis- 
 fied desire, told the hidden story of her mind, the secret of her life. 
 
 ‘ Oh ! ’ she said in a low moved voice, clasping her hands to- 
 gether, ( if only I could ! ’ 
 
 For a moment she hid her face behind those hands still clasped 
 together, the fingers tightly interlaced and the palms turned outward; 
 and the silence which follows an astounding revelation fell between 
 them. When she lowered her hands and looked up, the fire had 
 died down, the passion had burned itself out, and only the soft, sad„ 
 dreamy quiescence of her usual self remained. 
 
 D 
 
34 
 
 IONE. 
 
 1 Obedience to parents is the best of all things/ she said gently ; 
 and her voice sounded like a sigh. 
 
 St. Claire was looking at her earnestly ; so earnestly that she 
 could not meet his eyes. 
 
 4 You hold this obedience high P ’ he said, speaking slowly. 
 
 4 Yes, I do/ she answered. 
 
 4 Above all other things P ’ 
 
 4 Yes/ she said again. 4 Obedience at least to a mother from a 
 daughter.’ 
 
 4 To the extinction of genius, by which an art would be perfected 
 and humanity improved ? ’ 
 
 ‘I cannot even imagine the circumstances where it would not be 
 the first and highest duty — where it would not be better to make 
 one’s mother happy than to earn distinction for oneself and to please 
 a multitude/ she answered. 
 
 4 You advocate, then, the sacrifice of every form of personal 
 desire to this same principle ? ’ he added, not looking at her but 
 carefully examining the edge of one of her wood-work tools. 
 
 4 Yes/ she answered. 
 
 6 You would fling your lover overboard at the desire of your 
 parents ? You would never be Juliet ? Yet how much poorer 
 both the world and life would be without that love, stronger than 
 death, which broke through all barriers and defied even a parent’s 
 will ! ’ 
 
 As he spoke his voice trembled in spite of himself. He had 
 wished to appear calm and disinterested, not taking advantage of 
 that sudden revelation of hidden life, and putting an hypothetical 
 case quite impartially. But that tell-tale voice betrayed him more 
 than he desired. 
 
 A deep blush came into Monica’s face and stayed there, burning 
 like fire on her cheeks. She recovered herself, and answered with 
 studied indifference : 
 
 4 All this is a question with which I have nothing to do — never 
 could have anything to do. If my mother wished me to marry, I 
 would ; and I would not if she did not wish it.’ 
 
 4 You would yield yourself in implicit obedience, without will 
 or choice of your own? ’ 
 
 4 Yes ; without will or choice of my own/ she said. 
 
 4 You would marry where you did not love ? refuse where you 
 did? 
 
 4 It should be entirely as my mother wished/ was her reply. 
 
 He turned away. His heart was full of pain, and his face ex- 
 pressed his trouble. He did not know if she had or had not under- 
 stood him — nor whether she had answered simply, according to 
 the faith that was in her, or with purpose, to warn him betimes. 
 Either way she had been explicit ; and she had spoken as if she 
 had meant what she said — as if it were a vital and active principle 
 
THE EAST AND PRESENT, 
 
 35 
 
 of her life, and not one merely adopted for show and the occasion^ 
 Before all things then, she was a Daughter ; and neither her indi- 
 viduality nor her love, neither intellect nor passion, counted in 
 comparison with her devotion to her mother. It was a lesson 
 which she had set him to learn — hard, distasteful, desolating ; but 
 he must take it to heart and abide by its teaching. 
 
 All this passed through his mind like successive waves of pain, 
 while she, with her face still deeply flushed, but strangely fixed 
 and rigid, sat carelessly turning over the leaves of a book — seeing 
 nothing of the pages which she was making such heroic endeavours 
 to appear to read — that she might accentuate still more pointedly 
 her personal unconcern in the conversation on hand. 
 
 A dead silence fell again between them, and for several moments 
 neither spoke. At last Armine said, in a low and altered voice : 
 
 4 Your obedience is sublime, Miss Barrington ; but — may I say 
 so without impertinence? — you carry your principle too far. Your 
 virtue goes over to the other side/ 
 
 4 Do you think so ? y she answered, still turning over the leaves 
 of the book. 4 1 think that is impossible/ 
 
 4 And that other ? — that other whose life you mar ? — whose 
 heart you break ?’ said Armine, in a tender, pleading way. 
 
 4 There must never be that other/ said Monica very gently, but 
 firmly also. 4 He would be warned in time/ 
 
 4 And if love were stronger than prudence ? and warnings -were 
 like waves beating against the sea-wall ? ’ Armine asked. 
 
 She raised her eyes and looked him full and calmly in the face. 
 This was a point whereon she felt strong, and could afford to look 
 the whole world in the face. 
 
 4 In that case,’ she said quietly, 4 there would be two martyrs to 
 principle instead of one. But the principle of my devotion to my 
 mother, and of my entire obedience to her, would be always 
 paramount/ 
 
 At this moment Mrs. Barrington entered the room, having 
 finished her colloquy with the poor fellow whom her son was bent 
 on ruining for punishment of some fancied insolence, and the young 
 doctor could say no more. So much had the conversation taught 
 him, that Monica would never cross her mother’s will for love of 
 living man, and that he who would win her must first gain the 
 favour of sweet-natured and exclusive Mrs. Barrington — that 
 model of gracious Christian practice and liigh-caste Brahminical 
 principle. 
 
 4 1 am sorry to have detained you so long, Dr. St. Claire,’ she 
 said, coming forward with that quickened step which means apology 
 and redeeming by seconds the time that has been lost in hours. 
 
 4 It does not signify,’ he answered with conventional politeness. 
 
 4 1 am not busy to-day/ 
 
 Had he spoken as he felt, he would have thanked her for her 
 
IONE. 
 
 36 
 
 delay. Assuredly there was nothing in it to regret, save perhaps 
 that result of sadder knowledge. 
 
 * And Grace P ’ the lady asked, still standing. 
 
 He went into the present aspect of the case, superficially, giving 
 just so much professional accuracy as he thought well — no more. 
 As he added a few technical terms, judiciously thrown in, the dear 
 woman was perfectly satisfied, flattered by this compliment to her 
 supposed knowledge, and possessed of the belief that now she under- 
 stood the whole science and mystery of double pneumonia, with its 
 dangers, its difficulties, and its remedies. He took his leave so soon 
 as lie had made his report ; as was expected of him. But when he 
 said good-morning to Monica, he did not shake hands with her as 
 usual. 
 
 Deeply flushed as her face already was, the hard colour in her 
 cheeks burnt with increased fire as she raised her dark-grey eyes 
 with a sudden half-sliy and half-reproachful look to his. Did that 
 look really mean a half-reproacli to him, or was he foolish for 
 thinking that it did ? He could not now cross the room and go 
 round to where she stood, merely to shake hands with her as a sign 
 of reconciliation and to lift off that dumb reproach ! 
 
 He would had he dared ; but he dared not. What would Mrs. 
 Barrington think? and Monica herself? and the chance that his 
 interpretation was a mistake ? And yet, it might be true ! 
 
 It was a small matter for a man to worry about — an apparently 
 trivial, worthless, insignificant and utterly absurd little matter. 
 Yet it threw him into a strange fever of uncertainty and contra- 
 dictory self-reproach, as he drove through the country lanes on his 
 various errands of healing or despair. lie was in a strange state of 
 fever and uncertainty altogether to-day. Never before had he 
 found it so difficult to harmonise his life and co-ordinate possibilities 
 with desires — never before had the difference between a man’s social 
 credit and personal worth seemed to him so bewildering, and the 
 world’s award so unequal and unjust. By birth, education, and 
 inherited status he stood every inch Monica Barrington’s equal ; 
 by his father’s misfortunes and his own present circumstances he 
 was immeasurably her inferior. Must then the lowered social 
 standard of his present condition absolutely and for ever destroy the 
 higher measure of his past ? or might that higher measure and his 
 own individual worth exalt and ennoble the lower social standard 
 of his present condition ? Might the son of the Marquis de Sainte 
 Claire claim as his equal the daughter of the Barringtons ? or was 
 the country doctor at Oakhurst worse than mad to aspire to an 
 alliance with one of the oldest of the county families of Fellshire ? 
 
MAKING I1IS WAY, 
 
 37 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MAKING HIS WAY. 
 
 With unconscious hyprocrisy Dr. St. Claire made that kind of love 
 to Mrs. Barrington which young men are wont to make to elderly 
 women when they wish to get something out of them — whether it 
 be present patronage or a future legacy, an invitation to dinner, a 
 loan of doubtful repayment, or leave to marry the daughter, lie 
 talked to her on her favourite subjects ; followed her lead whether 
 he agreed with her or no ; and always let her have the last word. 
 He asked her advice on private little matters of his own, where he 
 said he felt at sea, and where the judgment of such a person as her- 
 self was invaluable. By the policy of instinct rather than by the 
 forecasting of design, lie threw into his manner a certain almost 
 lilial tone of lialf-caressing tenderness — that kind of tenderness 
 which she had often missed and always regretted in Anthony. 
 But he was profoundly respectful withal ; having that rare gift, 
 accorded to so few — the power of showing respect through 
 familiarity, and of being caressing, tender and intimate, but neither 
 forward nor obtrusive. 
 
 He made his professional visits to the sick maid a pleasant 
 domestic feature in the lady’s day, and brought with him a sense of 
 moral sunshine which brightened for the time the colourless 
 atmosphere of the Dower House. And as all that he did was done 
 with sincerity of feeling, if the end was somewhat different from 
 what appeared, Mrs. Barrington had never cause to be startled and 
 was content with things as they were. 
 
 Most of all she was content with this nice young fellow who 
 made himself so agreeable, and who w r as creeping slowly but surely 
 into the sacred place of her affections. She sincerely liked him for 
 what he w T as — a man who was not her social equal, but whose 
 humanity w r as refreshing and delightful in its own way. His 
 manners were quiet, his attitudes graceful, his words well-chosen, 
 and the tones of his voice were harmonious and sympathetic. He 
 had no strong views on any subject and he was well-informed on all. 
 He was without violent antipathies or inconvenient enthusiasms, 
 and he had neither intellectual crazes nor overpowering passions. 
 'When he talked it was with judgment and moderation. His topics 
 were never painful and always free from doubtful issues. He never 
 touched the bolder chords, the darker themes of life or human 
 nature, and he was eminently safe and soothing. His conversation, 
 with its mild optimism and level philosophy, refreshed Mrs. 
 
IONE. 
 
 38 
 
 Barrington, where that of others exhausted her. For the old value 
 this kind of moral quietude more than the vigorous young can 
 understand. The fiery passions, the tumultuous emotions, the 
 mental unrest, the very intellectual earnestness itself of youth, 
 fatigues them like bodily exertion, or the restless activities of 
 children; while the mild, calm, equable temper, the superficial 
 philosophy which looks only on the bright side of things and leaves 
 the dark alone, is in harmony with their condition, and suits them 
 like the noon-day turn in the garden, the evening game at bezique, 
 and the gossip columns of the newspaper, which make up the sum 
 of their exertions and emotions. 
 
 Mrs. Barrington took it all as it came to her; and that the 
 young man should be so mad, so wicked, as to seek to please her 
 for the sake of her daughter, was a contingency as far from her 
 mind as that he should plan a robbery or commit a murder. Good 
 women, who have lived all their lives in the country, are not prone 
 to think evil of their neighbours. They know too little of the 
 realities of life to have had their senses sharpened by experience at 
 first hand ; and the close-set borders of their own ‘ huis-clos ’ have 
 not been pierced by information from others. Things therefore, 
 which to those who know the world are accepted as matters of 
 course, are to them either absolutely unknown or anathema mara- 
 natha — the possibility of which is not to be received in decent 
 society. Wherefore Mrs. Barrington believed that Dr. St. Claires 
 attentions to her were the result of his natural sweetness, which 
 made him wish to please her for her own sake ; and as she w'ould 
 as soon have suspected the footman of cherishing a tender passion 
 for her daughter as she would have suspected him, she received 
 all his pleasant ways with gentle cordiality and a benevolent kind 
 of condescension to which her age, state, temper and bearing 
 gave a special charm. 
 
 What Monica thought remained her own secret onty. She made 
 no confidences and betrayed no consciousness ; and Theodosia, who 
 often found herself at five o’clock tea at the Dower House, saw 
 nothing more than it was intended she should see. For certain 
 reasons of her own, and always following up the bewildering lead 
 which she had made for herself, she could not possibly suppose that 
 her quiet sister-in-law had any attraction for one whom she was 
 resolute to see only as the pitiable victim of a hopeless attachment 
 to herself. She was always very kind to the young doctor. She 
 meant to be provocative ; but the dew of her coquetry fell on stony 
 and ungrateful soil ; and had Armine been able to read the secret 
 writing of Theodosia’s heart towards him, he would have been as 
 utterly astounded as would gentle Mrs. Barrington had she been 
 able to read that little love poem printed on his and addressed to her 
 daughter. It was a game of blind man’s buff all round, and no one 
 knew the exact place of the other. 
 
MAKING HIS WAY. 
 
 39 
 
 One day the conversation turned on unequal marriages. Society 
 round Oakhurst was much exercised at this time because of the 
 choice which had been made by a certain young Mr. Meade, the 
 heir to a fine estate and the future head of an influential family. 
 He had fallen in love with, and married, an innkeeper’s daughter — 
 a good girl enough, pretty, well-mannered, well-educated and of 
 irreproachable conduct ; but without the soft fringe of social velvet 
 — without even a tag of inherited purple to glorify her fine and 
 cleanly homespun. He himself was simply a boor — an example of 
 atavism and recurrence to the original type ; as we find at times in 
 old families where the sons have been suffered to run wild about the 
 village, and to make their prime friends of ratcatchers and game- 
 keepers. He spoke with a strong provincial accent ; haunted public- 
 houses; liked a game at skittles in the back-alley better than 
 billiards in his father's house ; was familiar with barmaids and 
 awkward with ladies; read nothing save a sporting newspaper, 
 which he had to spell like a schoolboy ; could do little more than 
 write his name ; and he kept his betting-book by an arithmetic of 
 his own composing. For all that he was born into the inheritance 
 of the purple, and he was the son of a county family. Woman for 
 man, Daisy Cross was immeasurably superior to Frank Meade in 
 everything which makes the worth of a human being. Still it was 
 a mesalliance, according to the canons of caste, and it had excited 
 a great deal of uncomfortable feeling in the neighbourhood. 
 
 Mrs. Barrington was never bitter. That was not her way. 
 Nevertheless, gentle as she was in manner, she was inflexible in 
 matter, and she held her views with the firmness proper to those 
 whose views represent to them principles, and whose principles are 
 founded on what they believe to be divine command and law. She 
 would have been false to her own idea of right had she slackened 
 in faithful testimony and uncompromising condemnation. And 
 such a marriage of this of Frank Meade’s together with all the new 
 order of thought — all the tendencies of modern society — was to her 
 iniquitous, revolutionary, and to be fought against as Christian 
 fought against Apollyon. 
 
 ‘ I think it infinitely shocking ! ’ she said. ‘The Meades are an 
 old family, settled in the county for the last three hundred years, 
 and it is simply impious for the eldest son to make such a marriage. 
 How can he hold his proper place in society wflth an innkeeper’s 
 daughter for his wife P What kind of influence can he have ? And 
 think of the example I It is appalling to see the way in which the 
 world is going. We are rushing headlong to the destruction of 
 everything that is good and noble.’ 
 
 4 It is certainly a great pity,’ said St. Claire ; 1 still Mrs. Frank 
 Meade is in herself quite unexceptionable. I hear her very well 
 spoken of everywhere, and I remember to have seen her once when 
 I was called in consultation to a case in her father’s house.’ 
 
40 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 ‘ Her father's house — the “Marshal Blucher ”!’ laughed Theo- 
 dosia, shrilly, tossing her small vivacious head. 
 
 ‘ Still, dear Theo, an inn is a house, is it not ? ’ put in Monica, 
 with a soft smile. 
 
 ‘ But we do not speak of an innkeeper *s daughter living in her 
 father’s house like a lady/ repeated Theo. 
 
 4 No ? ’ said Dr. St. Claire, quite tranquilly. ‘I will amend the 
 record, if I am wrong. In any case she struck me as very well- 
 bred, and she is certainly pretty.’ 
 
 ‘ Were you Frank Meade’s rival? ’ asked Theodosia, audaciously. 
 
 ‘ You speak as warmly as if you had had pretensions in the same 
 direction yourself.’ 
 
 By nature Armine St. Claire was a woman-worshipper, and 
 constitutionally disinclined to cross swords with the sex. He could 
 hear a great deal of impertinence from a pretty woman and feel no 
 resentment ; hut this thrust touched him to the quick. The blood 
 rushed into his face and his eyes grew dark and angry. His lip 
 curled with sudden contempt and his voice trembled in spite of 
 himself. 
 
 ‘No ; ’ he said with infinite pride, infinite disdain, such as they 
 had never seen in him before, nor supposed him capable of feeling ; 
 
 ‘ because I say that Miss Cross is a nice girl for her station, and 
 pretty, and well-educated, that does not make me Mr. Frank 
 Meade’s rival. The favours of an innkeeper ‘s daughter are scarcely 
 in my line, Mrs. Barrington ! 9 
 
 ‘ I did not mean to offend you/ laughed Theodosia, delighted 
 with her power of rousing and exciting. ‘ But I must say it 
 looked like it.’ 
 
 ‘ You have no right to say so/ said Armine, ^warmly. 
 
 She shrugged her neat round shoulders and again tossed her 
 head. But she looked into his face with a smile and an expression 
 in her eyes which he w~as not quick-witted enough to read. She 
 thought he had laid an emphasis on the word you , and that he 
 meant to reproach her for her cruelty in wilfully mistranslating 
 him. He meant nothing of the kind. But he had the benefit of 
 the hallucination — which was something. 
 
 ‘ Still, being a nice girl for an innkeeper’s daughter does not 
 make her fit to be the wife of a country gentleman/ said Mrs. 
 Barrington, a little astonished by this sudden outburst of indigna- 
 tion from the young doctor to her son’s wife. 
 
 ‘No; ’ said Dr. St. Claire ; ‘ not if put in an abstract form. 
 But Mr. Meade is not equal to his position, and his wife is superior 
 to liers ; so they meet.’ 
 
 ‘And if he is not equal to his position, all the more reason that 
 he should have married some one who could have raised him and 
 kept him out of low company/ returned Mrs. Barrington. ‘We 
 have not only the individual to think of — we have the family and 
 
MAKING HIS WAY. 
 
 4 1 
 
 the social position. All these unequal marriages are bad,’ slie went 
 on rather warmly. ‘ People should keep in their own sphere. No 
 good can come of this confusion of classes.’ 
 
 ‘ But I think Dr. St. Claire is right — sometimes we might 
 make an exception, where the person is very nice indeed, very 
 superior,’ said Theodosia, looking full into Armine’s face. 
 
 She knew that she was very naughty to give this young 
 Lovelace such a broad hint ; but no harm could come of it. Anthony 
 was not going to die, and however much in love with her he might 
 be, she did not suppose the handsome young doctor would presume 
 to ask her to run oft* with him. It was all nothing — just a little 
 excitement in this dull monotonous life of Oakliurst, where she had 
 none of the fun of danger and none of the pleasure of pain. 
 
 St. Claire turned his eyes in answer on her. This time they 
 flashed, not with anger, but with gratitude that looked like love. 
 She was half-frightened by that look, and wished she had been a 
 little less incautious — a little more sparing. But the mischief 
 was done now — and how handsome he looked when he was 
 roused ! 
 
 ‘It is sometimes a little difficult to define social station,’ he 
 said, th fit wonderful light still burning in his eyes. ‘ Money makes 
 one test, birth another ; but birth without money — where would 
 you place that P ’ 
 
 ‘Always as a gentleman, of course,’ said dear Mrs. Barrington, in 
 colloquial syntax. 
 
 The blood again rushed into his face. How sensitive he was 
 to-day ! 
 
 ‘ You think so,’ he said quickly, with a rapid glance at Monica. 
 ‘So do I.’ 
 
 ‘Of course supposing a good education, refinement of feeling, 
 and nice manners — else not,’ said Mrs. Barrington, receding from 
 her first position and modifying the breadth of her verdict, as she 
 remembered the watchmaker who might have been the Dauphin ; 
 that Welsh blacksmith who claimed as his ancestor the bluff King 
 Ilal whose portraits he so marvellously resembled ; as well as other 
 undoubted descendants of bygone fallen greatness. ‘And then 
 again,’ she added, doubt deepening with reflection, ‘ birth without 
 money or position is difficult to imagine. For why is it poor ? 
 There must have been some fault somewhere ; and a long line 
 of ancestry ending in dishonour is more shameful than natural 
 obscurity.’ 
 
 ‘There maybe misfortune,’ he said. ‘Misfortune is not dis- 
 honour.’ 
 
 ‘ No, certainly not,’ responded Theodosia, briskly. ‘ Misfortune 
 is interesting.’ 
 
 Mrs. Barrington shook her head. 
 
 ‘ I do not believe much in unmerited misfortunes,’ she said. 
 
42 
 
 ZONE. 
 
 1 Conduct is fate ; and for misfortune we ought for the most part 
 to read fault.’ 
 
 i Always ? without exception P ’ Armine asked in an earnest 
 kind of way, somewhat as if he were holding his breath. 
 
 ‘ Mamma ! how hard you are ! 9 said Theodosia, still in her 
 character of the sweet seductive temptress — the high-born lady 
 receiving from her inferior the homage she would not refuse and 
 the love she could not return. 
 
 ‘ There is no rule without an exception/ said Mrs. Barrington, 
 gently. 6 Of course there may have been afflictions which have 
 reduced a fine estate and made the family beggars ; but it is a 
 difficult state of things to imagine without fault and with prudence.’ 
 
 ‘ And you, Miss Barrington ? ’ asked Dr. St. Claire, abruptly 
 turning to Monica, who all this time had been sitting with down- 
 cast eyes as if studying to the minutest line a wood-work pattern 
 which Armine had brought her. ‘ Do you think that misfortune 
 necessarily presupposes fault and is worthy of only blame ? ’ 
 
 6 1 think with my mother : — In general, but not always, conduct 
 is fate/ she answered rather slowly, looking at her mother, not 
 at Armine. 
 
 It was a safe answer. There could not have been one safer, less 
 explicit, or more generalised. 
 
 ‘And in those exceptional cases where a man of good birth and 
 education has been made poor by no fault of his own — forced into 
 a lower social position than was his by inheritance — in those cases 
 you would allow that he was still a gentleman, emphatically and 
 thoroughly, and the equal of those among whom he was born ? ’ 
 
 ‘ Certainly/ said Monica, and as she said this she looked into 
 his face. 
 
 ‘ But even if he has not been to blame himself, his people 
 must have been in fault/ said Mrs. Barrington, still more and more 
 cautious as the talk seemed to slip somewhat from her guidance. 
 ‘ We must always take this into consideration ; — it is in the blood, 
 and that is as bad as if in the individual.’ 
 
 6 The father may have been unfortunate without blame/ said 
 Armine. 
 
 Mrs. Barrington smiled with a sigh. 
 
 6 Of course that is possible/ she said. ( But in any case we 
 have to bear our burdens. When the fathers eat sour grapes the 
 children’s teeth are set on edge. It is by the Divine decree, and 
 we cannot escape it. Every action bears its consequences ; every 
 seed has its fruit.’ 
 
 c Then you would exile from your society such a one ? ’ he asked. 
 
 He had never pushed an argument so far before. In general he 
 was careful to allow the dear lady, whose favour he had set himself 
 to win as the first step towards that greater gain of the daughters 
 — the lady with whom he was feeling his way so patiently — in 
 
MAKING HIS WAY. 
 
 43 
 
 general lie was careful to allow lier all the honours of victory 
 without the fatigue of the struggle. She might state her opinion 
 in the broadest and loosest way imaginable, and he never pushed 
 her to logical conclusions nor to those closer definitions which 
 women so mortally dislike. She might lay down the law as hard 
 and fast as so many paving-stones, and he never objected to 
 upheaval here, to crookedness there. But to-day he was quite 
 different from his usual self. He felt the talk to be so vital to his 
 future that he must run the risk of wearying and annoying in order 
 to. clear the ground. 
 
 ‘ He could expect nothing else than to be excluded if he had 
 sunk into another sphere,’ said Mrs. Barrington. 
 
 6 Never to be rehabilitated, so that he should take his rightful 
 place P — make an alliance, form, an attachment say, among his 
 former equals P ’ 
 
 Theodosia lowered her eyes and bit her lips. 
 
 6 What a horribly imprudent young fellow he is ! ’ she thought. 
 ‘ I shall have to snub him if he is so rash as this ! ’ 
 
 Monica too lowered her eyes, but she grew pale, not crimson 
 like her sister-in-law. 
 
 6 That would depend on the condition to which he had been 
 brought,’ said Mrs. Barrington, whose sight was dim and who saw 
 nothing of these changeful cheeks. 6 1 confess I could not quite 
 reconcile myself to the idea of a man who had been a shopkeeper, 
 say, even though he had been born a gentleman. And as for 
 marriage — as I said about Frank Meade’s, I think this ought to be 
 essentially between equals in all things. It does not do for a 
 woman to be able to look down on her husband in any particular. 
 On the contrary, she ought to look up to him as her natural 
 superior as well as her social equal. If there is to be any inequality, 
 let it be on the side of his superiority, not hers. But the social 
 line of each should be equal.’ 
 
 ‘And you, Miss Barrington ? ’ St. Claire asked of Monica again, 
 rashly tempting fate. 
 
 She looked at her mother, a sad, set, artificial smile about her 
 mouth. 
 
 ‘ You always hear my views from my mother. We think alike 
 in all things,’ she said ; but her voice was neither clear nor steady 
 as she spoke, and her face was of almost death-like pallor. 
 
 ‘ Forgive me. I have forgotten time in talk,’ said St. Claire, 
 rising abruptly. ‘1 am afraid I must have wearied you, Mrs. 
 Barrington ; but the conversation interested me. I apologise.’ 
 
 His voice too, like Monica’s, was neither clear nor steady ; his 
 face matched hers in its deadly whiteness ; and his lips quivered 
 as he spoke. 
 
 1 Oh no, I am not wearied,’ said Mrs. Barrington kindly, holding 
 out her hand. ‘ Time does slip away so very quickly in conver- 
 
44 
 
 IONE. 
 
 sation ! And I do not think we have agreed ia our views to-day 
 quite so well as usual/ she added with a smile, ignorant of the 
 hidden meaning of this sad little interchange of words. 
 
 4 I am sure it has been very interesting — and you talk so well, 
 Dr. St. Claire/ said Theodosia, hardily, as she shook hands with 
 him in her turn. 
 
 4 Thank you/ he said simply, and pressed her hand as he spoke. 
 Praise spoken before Monica and her mother was very sweet to him. 
 
 Monica said nothing. She merely raised her eyes to his, to all 
 appearance with undisturbed serenity. But perhaps a close ob- 
 server would have seen behind their usual dreamy melancholy 
 something that was more real than dreams, something that w^as 
 more active than melancholy. 
 
 1 Good-bye/ she said in a cold voice ; and Theodosia thought to 
 herself : 4 What an icicle that Monica is ! She is as wooden as if 
 
 carved out of an old bit of park-paling ! I should like to shake 
 her ! ’ 
 
 So that, what between wrong vision and no vision at all, the 
 truth of things connected with Armine St. Claire was in a very 
 disturbed and cloudy condition. 
 
 When he had gone, Mrs. Barrington said, with an accent of 
 surprise rather than of displeasure : 
 
 ‘ What a strange mood Dr. St. Claire was in to-day! I have 
 never seen him so odd and uncomfortable/ 
 
 4 No/ said Monica. 
 
 ‘Why? What fault do you find with him, mamma P * said 
 Theodosia. 
 
 4 He was so argumentative, my dear; so unlike his usual self. 
 He is generally so respectful and pleasant, but to-day he was all 
 pins and needles, and so extraordinarily pertinacious ! I could 
 not make him out at all.’ 
 
 4 I thought him very pleasant/ said Theodosia in italics. 4 1 
 like to hear him argue ; he speaks so well/ 
 
 4 It is scarcely his place, my dear, to argue with me/ said Mrs. 
 Barrington, with a gentle kind of pride infinitely impressive, and 
 as characteristic as impressive. 
 
 Mrs. Anthony Barrington turned away her head and answered 
 in the air by making a small grimace. It relieved her own feelings ; 
 Mrs. Barrington did not see it ; and no one knew wdiether Monica 
 caught the disrespect which it involved or no. 
 
 4 His charm hitherto/ continued the elder lady, 4 has been in 
 his nice respectful ways, the quickness of his tact, and the very 
 proper deference that he has shown me. I should be sorry to think 
 that I had spoiled him by my indulgerce — that I had taken him 
 out of his proper sphere and turned his head by over-kindness/ 
 
 4 Yes/ said Monica, to whom her mother looked for an answer ; 
 4 it would be a pity/ 
 
A STEP ONWARD , 45 
 
 She spoke with the same kind of weary dragging feeling that 
 one has when plodding heavily over a ploughed field. It was an 
 effort to speak at all ; to assent to this theory of spheres and social 
 distances was a pain almost unend urahle. 
 
 4 Perhaps something has happened — to a friend of his — which 
 has disturbed him/ said Theodosia, pulling down her lips. 1 Some 
 — friend — may have loved above himself, and all that we have 
 been speaking of may have struck home on that account.’ 
 
 i Perhaps ; very likely there is something of the kind/ said 
 Mrs. Barrington. ‘ That explains all, poor young man ! He is 
 evidently an affectionate kind of creature, and I imagine would be 
 greatly distressed by any pain to one whom he loved.’ 
 
 ‘ Yes/ said Monica, dreamily ; and ‘ Yes/ said Theodosia, de- 
 murely; adding to that inner self to whom she made her confi- 
 dences : ‘ What a goose mamma is ! She can be made to believe 
 anything. And she is as blind as ten thousand bats !’ 
 
 CHAPTER, VI. 
 
 A STEP ONWARD, 
 
 A pew evenings after this odd little talk on unequal marriages at 
 the Dower House, young Mrs. Barrington proposed to her husband 
 that they should give a dinner-party. They were the great dinner- 
 givers in the neighbourhood, and anything served as an occasion 
 for the display of the massive family plate, and the distribution of 
 that rare old port about which men talked as lovingly as of their 
 wives or horses. This, now proposed, was based on a week’s 
 visit, which an old school-fellow of Theodosia’s, one Lucy Lester, 
 Sir John Lester’s daughter, was about to pay them ; and as Theo 
 said : ‘ They must make it pleasant for her, poor girl ; 1 they would 
 have a dinner-party to begin with. 
 
 ‘ Very well/ said Anthony. ‘ Be it so/ 
 
 Like many heavy men, he was fond of receiving in his own 
 house, where he was the chief personage, and where he did things 
 handsomely and set the neighbourhood an example. 
 
 i When shall it be ? and who is to come F ’ he asked after a 
 moment’s pause. 
 
 ‘ Lucy comes on Thursday, so it must be Thursday/ said Theo- 
 dosia. 1 Let us make out the list. 1 should like fourteen ; our 
 table holds fourteen so comfortably, and it is a nice number. Your 
 mother and sister, of course, will be asked, but mamma will not 
 come. So Monica will be here alone, and we must have Edward 
 Formby as her cavalier. By-the-bye, Anthony, when is that 
 
10NE. 
 
 46 
 
 coming’ off? ’ slie added with a pretty little petulant air. 6 When 
 are they going to many ? ’ 
 
 Anthony’s face grew dark. Every man has his sore place, and 
 this was his. In the whole run of his life, nothing annoyed him 
 so much as the inexplicable delay in this affair. And whose fault 
 was it ? That was the difficulty ! Had he known whom to rate, he 
 would not have been long before setting about his task ; but it 
 was just the vagueness of everything which made the discomfort. 
 
 ‘ Why do you ask me, Theo ? ’ he answered irritably. ( How 
 should I know ? They know their own affairs best. How the 
 deuce can I tell more than yourself ? ’ 
 
 ‘ Now don’t be such a dear old bear ! ’ said Theo, who saw that 
 she had made a false start by setting her husband’s teeth on edge. 
 She had her own reasons for wishing to keep him in good humour, 
 and she had done the very thing to put him wrong. ‘ I will not 
 have little wifey spoken to like that — such a cross old bear as it 
 is ! ’ she added, leaving her place and going over to her husband on 
 whose strong knee she perched herself, while she ran her dainty 
 little jewelled fingers through his close-cropped stubby hair and 
 smoothed his shaggy over-hanging eyebrows. 
 
 6 Was I cross? ’ said Anthony, his stolid face brightening into 
 a smile. What a fascinating little witch it v r as ! No man in the 
 kingdom had such a charming little wife as he — no man ! ‘ 1 did 
 not mean to be a bear, Theo,’ he added amiably. 
 
 ‘ Then say “ I’se sorry,” ’ said Theodosia, putting his broad 
 hands together in an attitude of supplication. 
 
 i You little goose ! ’ he laughed. 
 
 1 Say “ I’se sorry,” else I will get off his knee and go into a 
 corner and cry,’ she persisted. 
 
 ‘ No ; you shall not do that ; so here goes ; — “ I’se sorry,” ’ said 
 Anthony, smooth as satin and soft as down. 
 
 ‘Good boy! Now I’ll give him a butterfly kiss,’ returned 
 Theodosia, fluttering her long eyelashes rapidly over his cheek. 
 
 ‘ I would rather have one from your lips, my pet,’ he said ten- 
 derly. 
 
 She kissed him prettily. She never refused her caresses w r hen 
 she had anything to gain ; and she had something to gain now. 
 
 ‘Now then,’ she said, when she had kissed him; ‘ that’s done, 
 so we’ll go on with our dinner ! ’ 
 
 She went on with the tale of names and pairings ; and after 
 due selection and rejection got up to thirteen without much 
 difficulty. But here she seemed to have come to the end of her 
 resources. Some imp seemed to have taken possession of that 
 fourteenth place and to have resolved that no living man should 
 oust him. No one whom her husband proposed would she accept. 
 She had strong and unanswerable reasons against each and all, but 
 a fourteenth of course they must have ; and it must be a gentleman 
 to match the odd lady on the list. Whom could they ask ? Nor 
 
A STEP ONWARD. 47 
 
 this nor that would do. It was really very tiresome ; whom could 
 they have ? 
 
 i I tell you what it is, Anthony/ at last said Theodosia, her 
 face lightening as if a sudden thought touching on inspiration had 
 struck her. ‘ We will have Dr. St. Claire.’ 
 
 ‘ That apothecary fellow P ’ said Anthony Barrington, in frank 
 amazement. ‘ My dear Theo, have you taken leave of your senses ? 
 Are you mad ? ’ 
 
 ‘ Not that I know of ! 9 she laughed. 6 What are the symptoms ? 
 Should I want to bite my boo’ful old bear ? I would rather pat 
 his dear old face instead/ she said, suiting the action to the word, 
 and laying her soft little hands caressingly on his cheeks. ‘No, I 
 hope I am not mad/ she went on to say, making a distractingly 
 pretty face : ‘ for then I should have to go into a horrid lunatic 
 asylum — poor little me ! Poor old bear too ! How would he get 
 on without his little wifey ! No sir, I am not mad, and we will 
 have Dr. St. Claire as our fourteenth.’ 
 
 ‘ Theo ! child ! how can you propose such an incongruity at a 
 dinner given for Lucy Lester ! ’ said Anthony, more and more 
 amazed at this failure in the nice conduct of things of one whom 
 he fondly hoped he had educated up to the right point. 
 
 ‘ Why not ? ’ she said, opening her eyes to their widest. ‘ She 
 will not fall in love with him, I suppose, and he makes a good ap- 
 pearance. He is far handsomer and better bred than that odious 
 Prank Meade who has disgraced himself so much. And yet we 
 shall be obliged to have him and his barmaid wife, as the county 
 has agreed to receive them. Dr. St. Claire is miles better than 
 they ! ’ she added petulantly, as if in praising him she was con- 
 demning the other — not praising for positive commendation but for 
 comparative blame. 
 
 ‘ But Prank Meade is the son of a county family/ began An- 
 thony, remonstratingly. 
 
 She stopped his mouth with a flyaway kiss. 
 
 ‘ Dear old bearikins need say no more,’ she said. ‘ Little wifey 
 has made up her mind, and there’s an end of it. Kiss her then, 
 and say he is a good old bear, and she will pour him out another 
 glass of wine/ 
 
 t Theo ! you really are too childish, my darling/ he said. 
 
 But he smiled as he spoke, and in another moment had said the 
 prescribed formula and received his reward. 
 
 So this was the way in which young Mrs. Barrington managed 
 her heavy-visaged husband and got her will of him — twisted him 
 round her little finger, as people said. And this was how it came 
 about that Dr. St. Claire was asked to a dinner at the Manor, 
 given to ‘ nice people/ in honour of a baronet’s daughter. It was 
 the longest social stride he had yet made ; would .it bring him any 
 nearer to his goal P 
 
 The day of Lucy Lester’s arrival, and consequent dinner-party 
 
JONE. 
 
 48 
 
 at the Manor, came in its course ; and the guests in ordinary holi- 
 day humour assembled as they were bidden. It was rather pro- 
 voking* perhaps that Dr. St. Claire was just in the same kind of 
 holiday humour as were these others, and showed no special con- 
 sciousness of the honour that had been done to him. He came in 
 like anyone else, only rather handsomer, rather more graceful, and 
 undeniably more distinguished in appearance than the rest, but 
 neither more radiant nor more humble ; really as if he were quite 
 accustomed to be petted by pretty married women to whom he had 
 made love by his eyes, and to be received as an equal in the stiff* 
 drawing-rooms of Braliminical county families. 
 
 Theodosia did not know whether to like him better for his quiet 
 audacity, or to feel disappointed by his ingratitude and affronted 
 by his coolness. She wondered what it meant. Was it to show 
 her that he was to be trusted for delicacy and discretion ? Did he 
 wish her to understand that he was used to this kind of thing, and 
 master of the situation through long apprenticeship ? She had ex- 
 pected him to make a secret sign of some sort — to say or do some- 
 thing to show that he understood and appreciated her grace. And 
 here he w T as, as calm and unmoved as if he had been asked to 
 high tea at Flora Farley’s, or a romping game at loo at Madge 
 Langliorne’s ! This was all her reward for the trouble she had 
 taken to get him here at all — coaxing that cross old Anthony of 
 hers into a good humour, and making her eyelids ache with her 
 butterfly kisses ! What did he mean by it P There was something 
 underneath that quiet assumption of equality which she could not 
 quite make out ; what was it ? 
 
 Anthony’s wife asked herself these questions in vain. She 
 generally did ask herself questions in vain. Her mind was always 
 at work about some perfectly useless problem, busying itself in 
 surmises and suspicions as baseless as so many castles in the clouds 
 — her thoughts were for ever twirling and fluttering like the filmy 
 fins of the hippocampus, but doing no good to herself or to others 
 — carrying her no higher in moral perception, no farther in intel- 
 lectual discernment. Ilers was of the humming-bird order of intel- 
 ligence — doubtless fulfilling some useful purpose in the world of 
 man and mind — but what that purpose was no expert had yet 
 been found keen enough to determine. 
 
 As for Anthony, to whom the well-bred young doctor was a 
 creature of a lower race, secretly resenting his being here at all, 
 he was as much annoyed by the fellow’s quiet assumption of 
 equality as he would have been by any show of any conscious 
 difference. Whether the lamb drinks at the source or the outfall 
 it is the same to the wolf. And on this special occasion Anthony 
 was the wolf and Armine St. Claire was the lamb. 
 
 The disposition of her guests at the table had been an anxious 
 study to Theodosia. She would have liked to have given St. Claire 
 
A STEP ONWARD . 
 
 49 
 
 the second place of honour next herself, hut she dared not put him 
 too much en evidence, nor show him too great attention. She had 
 the craft as well as the daring of her kind, and knew both how to 
 creep in ambush and how to carry by assault. So she placed the 
 handsome young doctor the third from her — near enough to be in- 
 cluded in her own immediate circle, but not unduly exalted in 
 the eyes of the watching world. He was thus immediately opposite 
 Edward Formby and Monica Barrington. 
 
 Next to giving him Monica for his own share, Theodosia could 
 not have done better for Armine than she had done ; and for an 
 instant he was weak enough to ask himself the question — as futile 
 as Theodosia’s — What did she mean by it P Was it by accident 
 or design P Was it ignorance of his feelings or kindly interest in 
 his desires ? Any way, failing the supreme delight of being by 
 Miss Barrington’s side, this was the best place at the table for him, 
 and he was more grateful to his feather-headed little hostess than 
 she would have been glad to have known. 
 
 lie made as much use of his opportunity for observation as he 
 dared — remembering always the supreme need of careful reserve. 
 He, like all the world, had heard of this understanding, which was 
 not an engagement — of the marriage which everyone had arranged 
 save the principals themselves. Somehow he did not quite believe 
 in it. He would have been hard put to it to have said why, but 
 he did not believe that Monica was in love with, or engaged to, 
 her assigned husband. Still, as this was the first time he had met 
 them so closely set together, he wanted to see for himself how 
 things stood — so far as he could judge by looks and manners — and 
 whether all hope for himself was cut off by this barrier as well 
 as by some others. Wherefore he watched the two, carefully if 
 prudently — so prudently that Theodosia, who was watching him, 
 did not catch his pre-occupation. 
 
 As for Monica herself, well-schooled as she was in keeping the 
 secret of her thoughts so that no one should discover them, she 
 seemed to take no more interest in one person than in another. 
 She talked to Edward Formby in the limp, nerveless, half- 
 dreamy way of a well-bred girl who is both bored and patient; 
 but she did not try to shuffle him off on to any other hands than 
 her own ; nor to draw anyone else into the languid stream of 
 their tepid talk ; nor to appear more alert and interested than she 
 really was. She did not look across the table at St. Claire, of 
 whose stealthily watching* eyes she was keenly conscious ; nor did 
 she look much at Edward, nor spread herself abroad in any way. 
 She was mainly interested in her bread-crumbs and the flowers in 
 the low glass troughs ; and for the rest, she accepted her position 
 with that meek acquiescence in fate and the inevitable, which is so 
 pathetic in certain women. 
 
 There was none of the impatience of regret in her, none of the 
 
 E 
 
IONE. 
 
 50 
 
 strife of struggle. She knew how her life was ordered for her 
 by circumstances, and what was expected of her by her 
 friends ; and she accepted her lot as submissively as if she had 
 been a daughter in the Middle Ages destined by her father to a 
 nunnery, or a sister betrothed by her brothers to the baron 
 while secretly in love with the squire. It was to no good that she 
 did not wish to go into the nunnery — that she loved the squire 
 and loathed the baron. Circumstance was too strong for her, and 
 she had nothing for it but to submit. As now, vdien, conscious 
 of what was expected of her, she must keep herself in hand and 
 conquer her secret desires without letting the world know that she 
 had had any to conquer at all. Some rebellions must be met by 
 interdict ; some victories must be celebrated in silence ; and this 
 Avas one of them. Wherefore Monica sat peaceably by the side of 
 Edward Formby, the man designated by the fitness of things to be 
 her husband ; talking without interest on matters without vitality; 
 chiefly occupied in crumbling her bread into dust which she piled 
 into heaps with her little linger; while Armine St. Claire sat 
 immediately opposite, making talk for the florid matron vffiom he 
 had taken down, and longing for one look, only one, from the 
 lady of his love, in vain. 
 
 Once and only once she looked directly at him. This was wdien 
 Theodosia said in her sharp audacious way : 
 
 1 1 hear that you are going to leave Oakliurst, Dr. St. Claire. 
 Is it true ? ’ ■ 
 
 She had not heard this ; but she wanted to say something that 
 should startle him and turn his whole attention on herself. He 
 was almost too conscientiously attentive to that florid matron 
 assigned to him. 
 
 He flushed deeply and laughed lightly. 
 
 6 True P no indeed ! — not that I know of ! ’ he said. 
 
 ( Oh, but I heard it! ’ she persisted in that obstinate way of silly 
 people vdio think if they can say, ’I heard it/ ‘ I v r as told so/ they 
 have sufficiently established their case and refuted your disclaimer. 
 6 Some one told me — I forget now who it was. It was a lady, but 
 I quite forget wlic. And she said that you told her you were 
 going to leave because you did not find the place or people suf- 
 ficiently interesting/ she went on, her audacity of invention 
 increasing with her fiuency. c It w^as not a very flattering compli- 
 ment to poor little us/ she continued with a little grimace. ( But 
 I dare say you are right, and that we are a stupid set. I sometimes 
 think so myself.’ 
 
 L Do you ? ’ answered Dr. St. Claire, again laughing lightly. 1 1 
 do not agree with you, Mrs. Barrington. On the contrary, I think 
 the society at Oakhurst very interesting indeed — some members of 
 it especially so — and I have not the smallest intention of leaving.’ 
 
 He looked at her v r kile he spoke, and his misleading eyes lured 
 
4 STEP ONWARD . 
 
 51 
 
 her on the same pathless way as before. No man, she thought, 
 could look like that who did not feel ! But what an imprudent 
 young fellow he was ! She wished now that she had left the still 
 lake undisturbed, and had not flung into the waters that stone 
 which might create a stronger ripple than she desired. Really those 
 eyes of his were scarcely proper ! As Jane Wintergreen had said 
 in her sharp way: — They suggested the Divorce Court; and they 
 did. 
 
 Then it was that, while Dr. St. Claire was looking at Theodosia 
 and Theodosia was looking at him, Monica raised her dark-grey 
 dreamy orbs and glanced across the table at the man who loved 
 her and whose love she knew. She just glanced at him, no more, 
 when he said that he found some members of the Oakhurst society 
 specially interesting and that he did not intend to leave. But he, 
 looking at her sister-in-law — that laughing, flushed, audacious and 
 vivacious little sinner who liked nothing so well as to play with 
 edged tools and to scatter wildfire all abroad — he did not see that 
 one swift rapid look for which all through the dinner he had been 
 longing in vain. When he brought back his eyes from Theodosia 
 by way of Monica and his own partner, Monica’s were once more 
 fixed on Edward Formby’s shirt-front, and she was saying in her 
 sweet, limp, patient way, as one fulfilling a duty which must be 
 performed at all cost : 
 
 4 Have you any favourite horses now, Edward ? Are you going 
 to win the Derby P ’ 
 
 When the dinner w r as over and the 4 gentlemen had joined the 
 ladies/ the open order of the drawing-room allowed of new combi- 
 nations ; and Armine took advantage of the greater liberty of 
 association permitted, to go up to Monica as she sat by a small 
 table set in the corner of the room, turning over that everlasting 
 resource of ennui, a book of photographs which she had seen at the 
 least twenty times from end to end. He drew a low chair near 
 her and sat down, beginning his conversation by the safe generalities 
 of inquiring, How was her mother ? and How the maid seemed 
 to be going on ? She was getting better by now, but she was still 
 in his hands and legitimately inquired of. 
 
 4 Mother is pretty well and Grace is getting on well/ said Monica, 
 doing her best to be as quiet and limp with Armine St. Claire as 
 she had been with Edward Formby. But in spite of herself, she 
 felt as if she had suddenly received some accession of strength ; as 
 if her blood had been warmed by wine ; as if her back-bone had 
 become stiffened, her muscles more elastic, her whole being, moral 
 and physical, enlivened, braced, invigorated. The grey clouds of 
 her normal atmosphere lifted themselves in one swift breath of 
 glory, and the sunshine gilded the whole earth in which she lived 
 with beauty and radiance. There was nothing either novel or 
 interesting in Dr. St. Claire’s question, but the tones of his voice 
 
 ti. OF ILL LIB. 
 
IONE. 
 
 52 
 
 roused her as if this inquiry after her mother’s health and the 
 servant’s condition had opened vistas of illimitable pleasantness 
 across the dead dulness of her ordinary life. Try as she would she 
 could not retain her usual passive and uninterested hearing. Her 
 pale lips smiled with frank delight and gracious tenderness, and the 
 soft sweet dreamy eyes, which raised themselves as if suddenly 
 waking out of sleep, had in them a certain something which Edward 
 Formby had never seen and which no man save St. Claire had ever 
 called forth. It was only for a moment that she looked, in this 
 strangely responsive and awakened way, into the face bending 
 forward on a lower level than her own ; only for a moment that 
 she smiled as we do smile when we have attained our desire and 
 the circle of our joy is complete. But that short instant was glad- 
 ness enough for St. Claire, living on low diet as he was, uncertain 
 of everything — from her heart to his chances, from her circumstances 
 to his own powers. 
 
 ‘ And how gets on the work? ’ he said after a short pause. 
 He had to make conversation only of commonplaces, while his 
 whole being was strung with passion, his whole heart throbbing 
 with emotion. ‘ Have the little boy and girl completed their court- 
 ship and joined hands among the flowers P ’ 
 
 This was in allusion to the subject of a wood-work frame, which 
 he himself had designed for Monica — a quaint little couple of 
 Dresden china figures done in cherry-wood for pate tendre. 
 
 ‘ Not quite,’ she said with another smile, and something almost 
 like a faint blush on her colourless face. 6 The boy is done, but the 
 little maiden is still only in the sketch. She is not carved into 
 individuality.’ 
 
 6 She takes longer to create than he,’ said St. Claire with affected 
 carelessness. ‘ This too is human nature.’ 
 
 ‘ He is simpler and stands freer,’ said Monica. ‘ She is more 
 entangled in the flowers.’ 
 
 ‘ How pleasant it is to work at these fanciful thiugs ! ’ said 
 St. Claire. 6 When the realities of life go wrong what a relief it is 
 to be able to lose one’s own identity, as it were, in pretty little 
 graceful pictures which amuse, or in deeper poems which absorb ! 
 What a joy it is to turn to a world where the sun always shines — 
 where the flowers never fade and the birds ever sing — where life is 
 always young, beauty unspoiled, and love always blessed ! Do you 
 not feel this, Miss Barrington ? I know you do.’ 
 
 She looked at him as she had looked once before — the secret of 
 her soul gathered like summer lightning in her eyes. 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ she said fervently ; then dropping her lids she added wdth 
 a faint sigh : 1 In one’s own world one is at least free and happy.’ 
 
 ‘ And loved and loving,’ said St. Claire in a low voice. 
 
 She did not answer, but somewhat nervously turned over the 
 leaves of that everlasting book of photographs, and made believe to 
 
A STEP ONWARD. 
 
 53 
 
 find contentment in a little person in a large crinoline, her head 
 turned back over her shoulder, her foot on a footstool, her hand on 
 the back of a chair, the other holding a fan with languid grace, 
 according to the favourite pose and accessories of a fashionable 
 artist some five-and-twenty years ago. 
 
 ‘In one’s own world at least one is above circumstance,’ he 
 continued. 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ she answered ; ‘ in one’s own world only.’ 
 
 c And the doctrine that will is power ? ’ he asked. 
 
 ‘ It is a good phrase for that kind of vague excitement which 
 helps young people,’ said Monica, as staidly as if she had been sixty 
 years old ; ‘ but will is not always power,’ she added with a slight 
 negative movement of her head and hand ; ‘ and circumstances do 
 and must master us.’ 
 
 ‘ No ; not if we will that they shall not,’ he persisted. 
 
 e But when they represent duty P ’ asked Monica, not looking up. 
 ( Then you will allow they are imperative.’ 
 
 ‘ Not above love,’ was the rash reply, made in so low a voice 
 that the very softness of the sentence attracted more attention than 
 if it had been spoken freely and in an ordinary tone. 
 
 Three pairs of eyes were at this moment turned on these two as 
 they sat together in the corner of the room, fencing with the 
 subject that Jay between them as a sleeping child which they must 
 not waken and could not leave. Edward Formby, who liked 
 Monica very well indeed — quite sincerely and unaffectedly, as a mail 
 likes a sweet and placid sister — though he had not the least 
 objection to see her absorbed by the handsome doctor, was yet 
 frankly surprised by the roused interest of her face. He himself 
 had never called forth such vitality of feeling, such latent power of 
 enthusiasm ; and for a moment he felt somehow as if he had lost 
 the chill companion of his future — the nunlike sister of his affections 
 — and had found her again as the passionate priestess of an unknown 
 cult, the torchbearer of a new light. He was at the other end of 
 the room, talking to Lucy Lester, to whom he had just been presented; 
 but he w*as not so fascinated by liis pretty companion as not to see 
 what was going on elsewhere ; and the revelation given by Monica’s 
 face — which however he did not for an instant connect with St. 
 Claire — startled him almost painfully. Theodosia too was watching 
 them, half in displeasure half in amazement, thinking : What 
 could those two be talking about ? and Why was Monica all at once 
 so much interested and excited ? Such a stick as she was in general, 
 why should she have brightened up into vivacity now ? Was St. 
 Claire looking into her eyes as he had looked into her own ? and 
 were two cords vibrating to the same delusive breath ? 
 
 But when Anthony, looking about him as became the giver of 
 the feast and the master of the house, spied out the one obnoxious 
 guest in familiar converse with his sister, and that sister more 
 
54 
 
 10NE. 
 
 animated, more vivacious, more alert tlian was her wont, then the 
 pleasant little drama came to an end, the lights were quenched, 
 the music was hushed, and a rude hand tore down the graceful 
 draperies which had clothed the stern realities of life with momen- 
 tary beauty and illusion. Striding across the room he rather 
 roughly told Monica that she ought to go and talk to Lucy Lester ; 
 she had not spoken to her yet, he said with a sullen frown on his 
 heavy face ; and she was the guest of the evening and Theodosia’s 
 old friend. 
 
 ‘Very well, dear,* said Monica, meekly. ‘I will go.’ 
 
 She locked with a swift yet pathetic look at St. Oiaire; making 
 a slight inclination with her head as she left him to follow her 
 brother. The wine had gone out of her veins, and she was once 
 more limp and nerveless as she sat down by pretty Lucy and the 
 man whom the fitness of things had designated as her own husband 
 when the times were ripe, and talked in her sweet dreamy way on 
 matters wherein she felt no kind of interest and of which her 
 companions had no kind of knowledge. 
 
 Soon after this the carriage came for Miss Barrington, and the 
 party dissolved as if by magic. St. Claire was the first to go after 
 Monica, and all the rest filed out as if a general order had been 
 given for dispersion, leaving the Anthony Barringtons alone with 
 Miss Lester. When she went to her own room, which she did 
 almost immediately, then they w^ere alone with each other. 
 
 Theo was a little cross to-night. Somehow things had not 
 gone quite as she had expected ; and she was uncomfortable in 
 consequence. She could not say what had gone wrong ; but she 
 had the bitter flavour of disappointment in her mouth, and she 
 was both peevish and petulant. Anthony was cross too ; but his 
 little wife did not perch herself on his strong knees, nor join his 
 broad hands together by the palms, nor call him her dear old bear, 
 nor fatigue her eyelids by giving him a butterfly kiss to bring him 
 back to good humour. She did none of these things. On the 
 contrary, she yawned in his face when he spoke to her, and said 
 irritably : ‘ Don't Anthony be so silly ! I don’t like it ! ’ when he 
 would have put his arm round her w r aist — as the process by which 
 he thought to get rid of some of his superabundant bile. 
 
 Nothing was said that could be called a quarrel, but an acrid 
 kind of small sparring went on between them, about irrelevant 
 trifles for which neither cared a straw ; wdiile the name of the 
 obnoxious young man, who was the secret sore on either side, was 
 not mentioned in their little tourney. This is always the way. 
 Straight-liitting is the exception and side-cuts are the rule. Once 
 only did Anthony make a direct thrust when lie said with a 
 sneer : 
 
 ‘ Well, Tlieo, I hope you are satisfied, now that you have had 
 your apothecary friend to the house like an equal. You really 
 
A STEP ONWARD. 
 
 55 
 
 must put some curb on your fancies, Tiieo ! I indulge you too 
 much, and make myself ridiculous as well as you.’ 
 
 ‘ I do not see anything ridiculous in having Dr. St. Claire to 
 dinner/ said Theodosia, pertly. ‘ He is a very pleasant, handsome, 
 well-bred young man — worth twenty of your dull Edward 
 Formbys and your vulgar Frank Meades ! And if I choose I shall 
 ask him again.’ 
 
 6 Theo ! ’ said Anthony, in a warning voice. 
 
 ‘Well? — and what after, Theo?’ she retorted. 
 
 ‘That is not the tone to take with me, Theodosia/ said 
 Anthony, slowly, with grave severity and deep displeasure. 
 
 ‘ It is the tone I mean to take when I like/ replied Theodosia, 
 looking up into his face with a rebellious look on her own. 
 
 And Anthony felt as men do when they are, defied by their 
 wives — helpless, tongue-tied, and handfast. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 u;n t der3tood. 
 
 A few days after this St. Claire went up to the Dower House to 
 pay his farewell professional visit. He had pulled the servant 
 through her perilous attack, and now he must leave her to the 
 beneficent care of nature and Mrs. Barrington. His heart was 
 very heavy as he thought that this was the last time he should 
 have the privilege of going to the house at his own hour — the last 
 time he should be able to feel his way, and if possible make it, 
 with Mrs. Barrington, and through her with Monica. 
 
 It was a well-nigh hopeless task altogether ; but who gives up 
 a task like this while hope has a spark of life remaining? What 
 is a man’s love worth if it cannot face obstacles ? and what is his 
 manhood worth if it cannot overcome them? And yet — is there 
 any use in struggling with the unconquerable ? in defying the 
 inevitable ? Even Thor could not overthrow Old Age nor uproot 
 the foundations of the earth ; and how then should he, St. Claire, 
 conquer those adverse social forces, arrayed against him, which 
 were as formidable as they were potent ? Truly the stars in their 
 courses had, as he said, fought against him all through ; and none 
 were on his side, no, not one! His profession; his want of 
 fortune; his fathers tragic end ; Monica’s social station; the quiet 
 devotion and self-suppression of her character; her duties to her 
 mother, to her family, to . society ; her assignment to Edward 
 Forrnby — all were against him. And to oppose this hostile 
 phalanx he had only his youth, his good looks, his love, himself! 
 
TONE. 
 
 5 6 
 
 It was an unequal struggle. Still, he would strive to the end ; 
 and at least he would not have to reproach himself for faint- 
 heartedness. 
 
 The stars, however, were doubly adverse to-day. It had been 
 Monica’s invariable habit to be at home with her mother at that 
 live o’clock tea to which he had been such a constant guest of late. 
 But to-day she was absent — by accident or design? He had not 
 seen her since the dinner-party. Had too much been said and 
 shown then for her to dare to trust herself again? or was it her 
 sign to him that he had gone beyond his tether, and that she 
 wished him to understand his place ? Whatever the cause, here 
 was the result ; she was absent ; — and only Mrs. Barrington sat 
 by the little oval table covered with that quaintly-worked cloth 
 which was now associated in his mind with the one charm of his 
 existence — with the hope and the love, the sorrow, despair and 
 delight of his life. How he knew every line and colour of that 
 strange border with its conventionalised tlowers, its impossible 
 dragons, its peacocks which were no more like the real thing than 
 if they had been yew-trees clipped in outline ! How it was the 
 visible symbolism of the ideal land where he and Monica met and 
 wandered through those unreal alleys, and sat hand in hand 
 beneath those shadowy trees ! He quite surprised Mrs. Barrington 
 by the oddly intent way in which he, a man, looked at that 
 embroidered border. 
 
 4 He looks as if he wanted to take the pattern,’ she said to 
 herself ; then aloud, an elder’s impatience with unexplained oddity 
 gettingthe better of her good-breeding, she asked St. Claire, What 
 he was studying so deeply in that border ? and, Surely he did not 
 do that kind of work himself? 
 
 ‘No,’ he answered, laughing to hide his embarrassment; ‘I was 
 only thinking how these mythic dragons and heraldic monsters 
 ever took shape in the human mind — whether they were survivals 
 in the historic memory of some late living pterodactyl or ich- 
 thyosaurus, or simply childish combinations, having no foundation 
 in fact.’ 
 
 4 Oh, who can tell ! ’ said Mrs. Barrington, with the faintest 
 accent of displeasure in her voice. 
 
 Speculations of this kind were hateful to her — she thought 
 them so closely trenching on impiety ! 
 
 4 No, indeed, no one can,’ said St. Claire, recovering his lost 
 ground with his usual quickness. 4 As you say, Mrs. Barrington, 
 speculations of this kind are mere waste of time.’ 
 
 She smiled pleasantly. 
 
 4 Yes,’ she answered. 4 And you are not one of those unprac- 
 tical creatures who waste this most valuable possession of all 
 we have, in dreams and theories which are more fanciful and 
 audacious than useful or reverent.’ 
 
UNDERSTOOD. 
 
 57 
 
 ‘ 1 hope not,’ said the young doctor, content to forswear himself 
 if only Monica’s mother would he gracious to him. 
 
 He gained his desire. Mrs. Barrington was gracious ; and had 
 he been in the modest and proper frame of mind for which 
 she gave him credit, he would have been perfectly satisfied 
 with things as they were. For the dear old lady took pains to 
 show how frankly grateful she was for the care he had taken 
 of her servant, and how frankly regretful that this was his last 
 visit. 
 
 ‘ I shall quite miss you at my tea-table/ she said in her sweet 
 way. ‘But you must come to see me sometimes. You know 
 where to find me, and I shall be always glad to see you.’ 
 
 He looked at her eagerly when she said this. With the illi- 
 mitable folly of a lover he speculated on the chance of her words 
 meaning more than they said — of the 1 including Monica. But he 
 saw no trace of undercurrent of feeling or hidden meaning on her 
 smooth, benevolent face, in the gentle condescension of her kindly 
 manner. She meant only what she said — that she would be glad 
 to help to keep him in virtuous paths by her mild tea and thin 
 bread and butter ; glad to minister to his soul’s health, and to the 
 maintenance of his graceful manners, by associating him with 
 herself for half an hour at a time — sometimes but not too often ; 
 glad to put up the social buckler of her patronage between him and 
 that low company to which she feared he might else be destined. 
 She wished him to understand that she had approved of his conduct 
 while he had been in her temporary service, and that she was 
 philanthropically pleased to reward him. That was all. There was 
 no thought of Monica in the whole matter, and he was a fool and 
 a madman for his pains ! 
 
 He could stay no longer. He had exhausted all his pretexts 
 and had thrashed out to the last fibre all his available subjects of 
 talk. If he would not lay himself open to suspicion, he must now 
 take bis leave without being able to say good-bye to Monica — 
 without being able to look into her face and see where those few 
 seemingly unimportant, but in reality significant, words had left 
 her. His heart was heavy ; his beautiful eyes, of which even 
 dear old Mrs. Barrington felt the subtle charm, were sorrowful 
 and pathetic as he stood up and thanked the lady for all her 
 courtesy, her goodness, her kindness. She thanked him in return 
 for his attention and care ; and, as they shook hands together, a 
 pleasant little interchange of friendly words passed between them 
 — she repeating her hospitable invitation ; he, assuring her that he 
 would profit by it ; and both professing mutual trust, goodwill, re- 
 spect, and so much affection as the social abyss which separated 
 them allowed or rendered possible. 
 
 Then he finally took his leave ; bowed again as he was at the 
 door ; and so passed out into the hall, and from the hall down 
 
IONE. 
 
 58 
 
 the broad flight of steps leading from the portico to the terrace — his 
 last visit to the Dower House paid and ended. 
 
 He stood for a moment looking at what was before him. What 
 an interesting place it was, with its quaint rows of clipped yew- 
 trees, its old-fashioned close-set hedges, and its long straight 
 terraces — terrace on terrace — leading by steps down to the fountain 
 and the fish-pond below ! The peacocks sunning themselves in the 
 broad walk and screaming from the lower branches of the formal 
 yew-trees ; the pigeons fluttering about the gabled roof, and cooing 
 to each other, softly, unceasingly, -with the pathetic yearning, the 
 very remonstrance of love in their tones ; the big brown wolf-hound 
 lying tranquilly before the house-door, knowing whom to trust 
 and when to guard ; the beds of fragant flowers — sweet long lines 
 of Mary-lilies and coloured foam of odorous sweet-pea — aromatic 
 clove-pinks and subtle-scented mignonnette set about the feet of 
 damask roses and starry jasmine ; the lazy summer sunshine lying 
 over all, languid rather than fervid and more soothing than exciting 
 — all added to the charm of this most delightful place, this bit of 
 old-world beauty standing in the midst of the garish new, like a 
 noble pearl, slightly discoloured by age, set in the midst of Palais 
 Poyal jewellery. 
 
 And the ladies themselves, with their suggestion of dried rose- 
 leaves and odoriferous gums — they were in keeping with the house ; 
 out of the run of daily life as we have it now ; something purer 
 and more lovely, more modest and more gentle ; something apart 
 and sacred. And Monica, that crown of gracious womanhood, 
 that flower of sweet unsullied maidenhood ! Ah, how pure and 
 beautiful she was! How well he understood now all that poets 
 had ever written of their Beautiful Ladies, their Madonnas, their 
 Lauras, their Beatrices, their Leonoras, their Marias ! How well 
 he knew the empire that lies in a saintly woman’s life — the majesty 
 of her faith, the nobility of her thoughts, the grand dominion of 
 her purity ! Before he came to Oakhurst he thought he had 
 mastered some of life’s most sacred secrets and had touched the 
 chords of some of its deepest melodies. Now he knew that he had 
 known nothing, felt nothing ; that his whole world had lain in the 
 cold and colourless twilight of the early dawn before the sun had 
 touched the mountain tops with glory, or struck its warmth down 
 to the roots of the forest trees, or shed its radiance on the wayside 
 flowers. Neither of woman nor of man had he learned the deepest 
 things ; neither of life nor of death had he seen the truest meaning. 
 His eyes had been blind, his mind obscured, until he came to 
 where his Lady had awakened him with the living light of love. 
 And now he knew all : — but most of all, he knew the infinite 
 grandeur of woman, the infinite power of love, and the force of 
 deathless sorrow. 
 
 All this was in his mind as an impression rather than as a 
 
UNDERSTOOD. 
 
 59 
 
 conscious thought, while he stood for a moment on the terrace’ 
 lacing the downward lines and noting the fountain sparkling in 
 the sun as the closing point of all. 
 
 Suddenly Monica came into view. She turned the corner of 
 the lowest avenue, and came up the steps leading from the fish- 
 pond and the fountain to the house, through the garden and its 
 quaint-cut alleys. She carried her hat in her hand, and her heavy 
 hair, which had fallen a little loose from its fastenings, drooped on 
 her shoulders in a waving mass of tender hrown which the yellow 
 sunlight turned to gold on the edges. That sunlight fell on her 
 face and barred the folds of the white dress she wore with lines of 
 shining light. Of some soft clinging stuff, this dress had about it 
 certain bands and spaces of pale green, so that the girl might be 
 likened to a lily with its green sheath still about the base of the 
 petals, and the face of the angel of which it was the natural expres- 
 sion looking out on life from the chalice. All grace, all purity, 
 all virginal delicacy of soul and body — full of a quiet and tender 
 melancholy which was less sadness than self-suppression — resigned, 
 devoted, humble — making that strange land of ardent dreams her 
 own world apart, and living in the dull monotony of cheerless fact 
 for love’s sake and duty — she was to St. Claire the very ideal of 
 chastened maidenhood whose thoughts were brighter than her days 
 and whose visions reached beyond experience. She was his saint, 
 his love, his lady ; and to live for her happiness or to die for her 
 gain, would be equally his best attainment, should fate prove so far 
 liis friend as to grant him either the one or the other. 
 
 The shock of glad surprise on seeing her coming there in the 
 sunlight so unexpectedly, after he had slain the hope of meeting 
 her to-day and laid it in the grave of his despair, overcame all 
 purely conventional considerations ; and Armine ran hurriedly 
 down the four flights of steps which were between them, to 
 meet her as she ascended. By natural instinct, when he had 
 met her he stood so that their positions were reversed. She was 
 on the step higher than he, looking down on him and towards the 
 fountain — lie was on that lower than hers, looking up to her and 
 the house. 
 
 1 This is my last visit. I have to wish you good-bye,’ he said, 
 speaking abruptly and with some difficulty. 
 
 Her gentle face was yery pale, and as he said this it became 
 even more pallid than before ; but she kept it quite still and 
 motionless, somewhat as if she were acting a part which de- 
 manded absolute immobility of feature. Her eyes were rather 
 darker than usual, and they did not look into St. Claire’s face 
 but over his head, and on to the fountain sparkling in the sun. 
 
 ‘ I am sorry/ she said quietly. 
 
 Immediately after she repented that she had said only so much; 
 for such a sudden flash of joy broke over his face — such a passionate 
 
6o 
 
 IONE. 
 
 outburst of gratitude and delight seemed to stir his whole being 
 — that she was both troubled and repentant. 
 
 For her path was clear ; and since that dinner at the Manor 
 she had realised her own danger as well as grieved over his mis- 
 take. Henceforth there must be no paltering with this present 
 peril, no dallying with this seductive poison. r Her duty was 
 written in broad bold characters. She could not mistake them. And 
 reading those letters as clearly as she did, but one course was open 
 to her. That which might have blossomed into such a glorious 
 flower of life and love and happiness must be nipped now while it 
 w r as time and when only in the unacknowledged bud. 
 
 It was his last chance. Sooner or later ho must tempt Pro- 
 vidence and try conclusions with destiny ; why not now as well 
 as hereafter? He might not see her alone again for weeks — why 
 not utilise what might prove the turning-point of his career ? The 
 servant was out of his hands, and he could not count on any 
 future occasion for daily visits. He must stake his all on the 
 hazard of the die now at once, and know his fate before leaving. 
 
 Quite suddenly, he said in the same abrupt way as before : 
 
 4 I want to have that point cleared up, Miss Barrington — I 
 want to have it thoroughly understood. Do you think all unequal 
 marriages, in all circumstances whatsoever, absolutely inadmis- 
 sible ? Could you never be brought to make one on your own 
 account ? ’ 
 
 4 1 could never marry without my mother's full permission/ she 
 said, answering the second half of his question and not the first. 
 
 4 But if your mother gave her consent, would you then ? y he 
 asked feverishly. 
 
 4 1 need not think of that — my mother never would/ she an- 
 swered, her voice a little lowered. 4 You heard what she said — 
 and I know what she feels.’ 
 
 ‘And you could not be moved against her wishes? — not if 
 you loved ? 9 
 
 He looked up at her, his whole soul on his face ; his love 
 pleading for him in eyes, in voice, in gesture, in all but direct 
 word. 
 
 She turned her eyes from the fountain and looked down at him 
 with sad and infinite tenderness ; then she looked back to those 
 shining falling waters which somehow represented to her the 
 eternal impossibilities of her life. 
 
 4 I would never allow myself to love so as to hurt my mother/ 
 she answered softly, yet without faltering. ‘I owe myself to her, 
 and no one — no one — could induce me to pain her ! ’ 
 
 4 But the heart is not to be commanded by duty/ he said. 4 We 
 love independent of our will.’ 
 
 4 We must control ourselves if our love wars with our duty/ 
 she answered. 4 We have reason, conscience, and self-restraint.’ 
 
UNDERSTOOD. 61 
 
 ‘And if you not only sadden your own life but break another’ 
 heart P ’ he asked. 
 
 4 1 must not break my mother’s/ she returned. 
 
 ‘And is this your real feeling? your own voluntary resolution, 
 not forced on you by pressure from without P ’ he asked again. 
 
 ‘ Yes, it is,’ she said in a low, clear voice. ‘ My one great duty 
 is to take care of my mother and make her happy.’ 
 
 ‘ And your lover ? — the man who loves you better than his 
 own life ? ’ he said, his words half strangled with emotion. 
 
 Again she brought her eyes back from the fountain and 
 turned them down to the feverish, grieving, upturned face below 
 her. 
 
 ‘ Hush ! ’ she said, slightly raising her hand, ‘ I have no lovers — 
 no lovers anywhere — only friends. You will remember this,’ she 
 added, bending a little nearer as she spoke, her own face full of 
 sweetest pity — of an almost divine tenderness — so that all sorrowfor 
 herself seemed swept away in the infinite sympathy she felt for 
 another’s sorrow. ‘ No man must ever confess to me or to others 
 that he loves me, and I must not acknowledge even to myself 
 that I love him. I have only friends — nothing nearer than friends,’ 
 she repeated, a little dreamily and yet steadily. 
 
 ‘ You have one lover faithful to the death ! ’ said Armine, with 
 passion. ‘ Come what may, I love you dearer than my life ; and 
 I shall always love you — always ! No time, no change, not 
 death itself, shall ever warp me from my allegiance to you — 
 Monica. Ah ! let me call you by your dear name once, it is only 
 for this once ! Monica, the world’s soul to me — the meaning of 
 life — the hope of heaven ! ’ 
 
 She held out her hand, affecting not to hear him. 
 
 ‘ I must go now,’ she said. ‘ My mother is expecting me. 
 Good-bye. Keep well — be happy.’ 
 
 ‘ Happy ! ’ he said bitterly. ‘ I shall never be happy ! How 
 is it possible, when I have lost all I care for — all I have lived and 
 hoped for ! Happy ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ she answered gently ; ‘ you will — you must — for you are 
 reasonable and good. You are good,’ she repeated ; ‘you will be 
 happy. I know you will, because I wish it. Good-bye, and God 
 bless you ! ’ 
 
 She laid her hand in his. He carried it to his lips with that 
 sad reverence of a love which is at once hopeless and intense. 
 His eyes were wet, but hers were tearless and dry. The strain 
 as well as the sorrow was on her ; on him was only the sorrow. 
 She must be strong both to deny and to bear ; he had only to 
 bear with what courage and manhood he possessed. The heaviest 
 burden was on the woman,* as it is so often! — when she must 
 pain herself as well as the man who loves her and whom she 
 loves, and refuse for conscience’ sake that which would make her 
 
( ;2 
 
 7(9/ A. 
 
 life's happiness to grant. Poor weak loving woman — how much 
 may he forgiven her because of her love and the burden of her 
 sorrows ! 
 
 ‘ Good-bye/ he said in a broken voice. ‘I unders f and you. 
 God bless you! always, always, my one gracious Lady, the 
 priceless treasure of my life ! No one can prevent my loving 
 you,’ he went on to say passionately. ‘ I may not show it, even 
 to you, and I must not ask your love in return; but thoughts 
 and hearts are free, and to the end of time you will be the one 
 sacred and secretly beloved woman of my inner life — my star, 
 my beloved ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Hush ! hush ! ’ she said, ‘ you must not say these things ! 
 you must forget that you have said them. Remember ! I have 
 already forgotten,’ she said simply and earnestly. ‘We under- 
 stand each other — but all this is forbidden.’ 
 
 ‘ Ah ! what have I lost ! ’ he exclaimed in a kind of agony. 
 ‘ But at least your friendship remains to me ? your friendship is 
 mine for ever, is it not ? ’ he repeated as if he found in that repeti- 
 tion some strange comfort and anchorage. 
 
 ‘For ever,’ she answered solemnly. ‘For ever. My friend- 
 ship ? — yes, always ; we will be always friends.’ She passed her 
 hand over her forehead, and both stood for half a moment silent. 
 Then she seemed as if she woke from a dream. ‘ Now good-bye, 
 once more,’ she said, looking at him steadily. ‘Nothing is 
 changed between us, and we stand just where we. did. You 
 understand all this, do you not? Nothing is changed — never 
 has been — and we are friends as we were in the beginning. 
 Just the same — all the same as in the beginning. Good-bye,’ she 
 repeated tenderly as she made a little movement with her hand 
 — a movement that seemed to express both a benediction and a 
 farewell — then turned away and went slowly up the steps towards 
 the house, leaving St. Claire standing in the yellow summer sun- 
 shine, alone. 
 
 It was all over. He had made no way, and his doom of 
 exile had been pronounced. For the first time he realised the 
 full disabilities of his position and tasted the true bitterness of 
 his social fall. He was only a country doctor, and Monica 
 Barrington, a daughter of one of the county families, could never 
 be his wife. His youthful theories about a man’s individual 
 worth, and the glorious application of science in the mitigation 
 of human ills — where were they now? Standing there in the 
 garden of the Dower House, a rejected suitor for the hand of 
 the only woman he had ever loved, or as it seemed to him, ever 
 could love — what good did they do him ? what solace did they 
 bring? All of which he was conscious was, that the bright 
 bubble of his hope had burst for ever, and that he must bear 
 his anguish in the best way he could. 
 
UNDERSTOOD. 
 
 63 
 
 ' As for Monica, who could say what was in her heart as she 
 went in to her mother, in the sweet and gracious way that was 
 natural to her, dreamy yet loving, her perceptions not always 
 fully aroused, hut her heart ever responsive, her sense of duty 
 ever active, her unselfishness never slackening. 
 
 ‘ My dear/ said her mother, ‘ Dr. St. Claire has just been here 
 for the last time. I am sorry you were not at home. I shall 
 really quite miss his visits ! He is a very painstaking and credit- 
 able young man, poor creature, and he has always behaved well here.’ 
 
 ‘ I met him as I was coming home, and wished him good-bye/ 
 said Monica. 
 
 She spoke quite calmly ; perhaps a little more under her breath 
 than usual ; but she had always a low voice and a soft intonation. 
 
 ‘ That was right/ said Mrs. Barrington, looking at her fondly. 
 
 The girl w~as standing so that the light fell full on her face and 
 made every line and marking clear even to the mother’s dimmer 
 vision. 
 
 ‘ My dear child, how pale you are ! ’ she exclaimed. ‘ Are you 
 well, Monica ? I have never seen you so pale ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Am I P ’ she answered, forcing a smile. ‘ It is nothing, dear 
 mother. I am quite well. Perhaps the heat has touched me a 
 little. It seemed a long way to the village to-day. It must have 
 been the heat.’ 
 
 ‘ You should not have walked. You should have had the car- 
 riage/ said Mrs. Barrington, who had the mania of finding reasons 
 and marking the fault. 
 
 ‘It is nothing/ repeated Monica. ‘But I think I will go 
 upstairs, and lie down for a little while. You will not mind my 
 leaving you, mother P I have a little headache after all.’ 
 
 She spoke in a curious staccato way, her sentences disconnected 
 one from the other ; and as she spoke she passed her hand again 
 wearily over her forehead ; as she had passed it in the garden 
 below. 
 
 ‘ No, my dear, certainly I shall not mind your leaving me. Go 
 and lie down till dinner-time/ said Mrs. Barrington. ‘ It is evi- 
 dently the heat ; and a little rest will do you good.’ 
 
 Monica kissed her mother, then went upstairs ; but not to lie 
 down for the sake of her headache. On the contrary, she flung 
 herself on her couch, and turned her face to the pillows, weeping 
 bitterly. The strain was relaxed and the reaction came, as it 
 needs must. But through all her tears she said to herself again 
 and again, as if she were repeating a charm : ‘ It will all pass, 
 and he will marry someone else. I have done my duty and it will 
 pass — with him, but never with me.’ 
 
 When the gong sounded for dinner, and she went downstairs 
 again, she found Theodosia already installed. Anthony was dining 
 out, officially, and the feather-headed little wife hated solitude. 
 
ZONE. 
 
 64 
 
 The atmosphere of the Dower House was certainly not very con- 
 genial to her, but it was better than loneliness ; so she had come 
 to bestow herself on her mother-in-law, and her mother-in-law had 
 accepted the gift and made her welcome. 
 
 4 My goodness, Monica ! 9 she exclaimed as the girl came into 
 the room ; 4 what a ghost you look ! You are as white as a sheet, 
 and you look as if you had heard some awful news. And your 
 eyes are as red as if you had been crying. Have you been crying, 
 Monica ? ’ pertly. 
 
 4 Theo ! what an idea ! ’ said Monica, with a forced smile. 
 
 4 My dear Theodosia, what should Monica have to cry about ? ’ 
 asked Mrs, Barrington, seriously, looking over her spectacles as if 
 she expected to see something strange. 
 
 ‘That is what I do not know, mamma; but she looks like it/ 
 said Theodosia, still keeping her eyes fixed on her sister-in-law. 
 
 ‘Do I P ’ said Monica, rubbing her cheeks with forced playful- 
 ness. 4 Are they any redder now, Theo ? 9 
 
 4 Your eyes are no less red/ said Theodosia, with a curious air 
 of meaning. 4 I think there must be something in the weather 
 to-day/ she continued in her light, flippant way ; 4 for I met Dr. 
 St. Claire as I was coming here, and he looked as much of a ghost 
 as you do, Monica, and as if he had been crying too. Had you 
 been scolding him, Monica ? ’ 
 
 Nothing was so rare to Monica as to blush. When she was 
 most moved she usually became most pale ; but now the blood 
 rushed into her face in a rosy flood, and she answered, for her quite 
 petulantly : 
 
 4 You certainly contrive to say the most extraordinary things 
 possible, Theo ! I wonder where you get your ideas from — from 
 nothing real I am sure ! 9 
 
 ‘ From my own head — and my own eyes ! 9 answered Theodosia 
 sharply ; her bright and glittering orbs fixed with a curiously 
 searching as well as mocking expression on her sister. 
 
 4 It is a pity, my dear, they have such a poor foundation/ said 
 Mrs. Barrington, calmly. 
 
 4 Oh, I know, mamma, you think me a perfect idiot ! ’ said 
 Theodosia, tossing her head. 4 But I am not so silly as I look, and 
 I see more than most people.’ 
 
 4 Into millstones I fancy, my dear/ returned her mother-in-law, 
 taking her daughter’s arm as they went in to dinner. 
 
 All that evening Theodosia was moody and somewhat morose ; 
 either strangely silent for her, or, when she spoke, decidedly 
 snappish and cross. She spoke suddenly of Dr. St. Claire more 
 than once, and looked sharply at her sister-in-law when she did so ; 
 and she said all sorts of disagreeable little things about him — now 
 that she had heard he was going to marry Miss Flora Farley, or 
 now that he was a most disgraceful and decided flirt. She seemed 
 
UNDERSTOOD. 
 
 65 
 
 as if she wanted to goad Monica to some kind of defence ; but she 
 prodded in vain. The sweet dreamy eyes neither flashed nor 
 failed, and the only answer made to Y vicious sallies was : ‘Oh!’ 
 ‘ Indeed ! ’ i Really ! ’ 4 Do they say ? ’ or the like. 
 
 Still, Theodosia was not beaten ^ff the scent, and Monica saw 
 that she was not. But Mrs. Barrington, who understood nothing 
 of hidden meanings, was simply weary of, and rather offended by, 
 the censorious pertinacity of Anthony’s wife ; and when she went 
 away, the dear lady said with mild sarcasm which was the utmost 
 limit to which her cynicism could reach : 
 
 4 Theodosia was in an unusual mood to-night. I do not know 
 which is the more objectionable — her chatter and frivolity, or her 
 ill- temper and ill-nature. Ah, my poor son ! what a choice he has 
 made ! ’ 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE OAKHUKST INVALID. 
 
 IIe had never been robust, and the life of a country doctor, which 
 tries even the strong until well-seasoned by time and use, had 
 evidently severely tried St. Claire. As the summer waned and the 
 clinging chills of autumn came on, he drooped like a plant of which 
 the roots have been cut beneath the soil. All could see that he 
 suffered, but no one knew what ailed him ; and when asked what 
 was amiss, he invariably answered : 4 Nothing,’ and smiled as if 
 his disclaimer carried conviction in its echo. 
 
 4 The kind of thing that women love,’ for strength he had 
 sweetness, for fibre grace, for stoicism patience, for courage sensi- 
 bility, and for the dissimilarity of sex that likeness of morale 
 which made women call him i so pure/ and love him because he 
 was ‘ so sweet.’ 
 
 They recognised in him a man after their own ideal, one 
 who united the mysterious charm of both sexes, but in whom 
 the moral preponderance was given to their own. Loving him 
 personally as a man, in spiritual comradeship he was to them as 
 one of themselves. And their estimate was just. Like a woman 
 he made Love the end-all and be-all of life, and held ambi- 
 tion itself as merely Love’s strongbacked servitor. And like- 
 a woman he suffered in silence, and the very quiescence of forlorn- 
 ness, when his dream faded into thin air and the fragrance of his 
 hope burnt down into the dull ashes of despair. He sought no 
 relief from the sorrow that possessed him, as another man might, 
 in the lurid pleasures of dissipation, nor in the tougher struggle of 
 
 F 
 
66 
 
 IONE . 
 
 ambition. He neither drank nor gamed, nor yet read hard, nor 
 •wrote with purpose ; and the girlhood of Oakhurst found him as 
 impartially indifferent as he had been from the beginning. He 
 simply suffered with the sad patience of his kind, calling to his 
 aid his one great moral power of endurance, and taking no one into 
 his confidence, how much soever his Heart was wrung and his spirit 
 yearned for sympathy. 
 
 Everyone of course noticed his sudden failure in health, and 
 everyone was talking of it. He was so pale, so dispirited, so silent, 
 so changed altogether from what he had been — and he had never 
 been specially florid nor specially vivacious — that no one could be 
 blind to the fact. Though only one had the right key to the 
 mystery, all had their favourite theories, which were aired when- 
 ever two came together to ‘ talk things over/ and the young 
 doctor’s evident ill-health was one of the topics touched on before 
 they parted. Once some bold spirit suggested that he was in love ; 
 it was Miss Maria Crosby who set this little snowball rolling ; but 
 Mr. Chesson, the retired cheesemonger and a man of a goodly 
 presence — Captain Farley, the weather-beaten old salt, late of the 
 6 Merchant Service ’ — and even Mr. Langhorne, the hard-featured 
 lawyer who had a will of his own, and the way of getting that 
 will of all his clients — they, and other fathers of marriageable 
 daughters, laughed the idea to scorn. 
 
 i Love ! they said, with the disdain of men who knew the right 
 side of leather and the colour of skim-milk ; ‘ do you think such a 
 poor creature as that can love P Lord bless you ! he knows no 
 more of love than a broomstick ! ’ 
 
 And the judgment passed current with the majority. As the 
 young doctor had not chosen a wife from among the blooming 
 maidenhood of Oakhurst, he had incontestably proved that he could 
 not love. 
 
 Monica Barrington, too, had faded and become delicate almost 
 to sickliness. 
 
 * Lord ! ’ said the people with their noses in the air ; 1 how much 
 she has aged, and how awfully she has gone off! ’ 
 
 So she had. And yet her face had taken on itself a new kind 
 of beauty in exchange for that which it had lost, and the spoiled 
 complexion was redeemed by the greater lustre of the eyes and 
 the sweeter sadness of the mouth. Her mother, however, who 
 only saw the pallor and the fragility of form — the almost attenua- 
 tion of her figure, the almost transparency of her hands — more 
 than once wanted to send for Dr. Williamson from Staines, or even 
 for Dr. St. Claire, if Monica thought she could trust him; or 
 would she like to go up to London and consult some man of name 
 and eminence ? It was evident that something was not right with 
 her, and she ought to have a doctor to learn what was wrong. 
 
 But Monica always so strenuously opposed one and all of 
 
THE OAKHURST INVALID. 67 
 
 these proposals that Mrs. Barrington had not the heart to coerce 
 her against her will, even for her own good. 
 
 This kind of contest may often he seen between a mother and 
 daughter, where the girl is all obedience and prevoyance, all self- 
 sacrifice and devotion, both in the small things of daily ordering, 
 and the larger ones of life ; but when a collision of wills does come 
 between them, then it is the mother who yields and the daughter 
 who triumphs. As now ; when, in spite of all that Mrs. Barrington 
 could say, Monica obstinately refused to submit her case to Dr. 
 Williamson, Dr. St. Claire, or the eminent expert in London. So 
 the two poor pallid, sad-eyed and sore-hearted young people looked 
 at each other across the impassable gulf of circumstance, like 
 ghosts doomed to wander on either side that fatal river over which 
 no bark plies, separated for all eternity and looking, longing, 
 sighing, in vain. 
 
 The run-down condition of Dr. St. Claire had also another 
 inconvenience — the neighbourhood did not like it. Sick people prefer 
 a doctor who has tone and vigour to one who is as pallid as them- 
 selves, and as limp. It does them good, on the magnetic principle, 
 to have a large volume of life bursting like sunlight into their sick 
 chambers, so long as that volume is not noisy, that sunlight more 
 revivifying than irritating. Besides, the strong have most com- 
 passion. The weak are too much occupied with their own miseries 
 to give substantial sympathy to others. Wherefore a doctor in 
 delicate health is a mistake, and : i Physician, heal thyself ! ’ is a 
 sarcasm which vitiates every prescription and nullifies all the good 
 of regimen. 
 
 Thus, everything at this moment languished in poor St. Claire’s 
 garden of life, from his enfeebled health to his diminished practice, 
 from his broken heart to his tottering fortune. 
 
 His position was becoming untenable, and the strain was almost 
 beyond his strength to bear. It became a matter of anxious 
 thought with him, whether he should make one bold effort, sell 
 the goodwill of his practice for what it would bring, and throw 
 himself on the sea of chance ; or whether he should still stay on 
 here and do his best to conquer the love which w r as going near to 
 kill him. He would have prescribed flight and change to anyone 
 else ; but had he the courage to.adopt for himself the heroic remedy 
 he would have urged on another ? Could he thus give the final 
 death-blow to that faint little hope, that melancholy pleasure of 
 looking across the impassable gulf, which lingers like a wintry 
 flower deep in the heart of love, even when apparently all is waste 
 and desolation? Could he ? It would be wise — but: Was it 
 possible? 
 
 He was thinking all this one day, and he had not come to a 
 settlement of his difficulty, when he reached Miss Maria Crosby’s 
 door and went up the stairs to give the daily attendance for which 
 
 f 2 
 
68 
 
 IOXE. 
 
 she paid as she paid for so much milk and bread in the day T s 
 dietary — so much floss-silk and so many flowers in the day’s 
 enjoyments. 
 
 ‘You are late to-day, doctor ! ’ she said, with a certain fond 
 reproach as he came into the room. 
 
 She was old enough to he the young fellow’s mother ; hut that 
 did not count. The mingling of the maternal instinct with the 
 amatory makes a rich kind of emotional amalgam that has its 
 charm ; and elderly women in love with comparative hoys are 
 notoriously blind to the ridicule of their position. 
 
 ‘ I have been busy,’ he said, taking his accustomed seat by the 
 couch and beginning his daily catechism. 
 
 Against his own will he spoke coldly, almost contemptuously. 
 Though hound by professional etiquette to undertake the care of 
 disease which did not exist, he was often impatient with this 
 special corner of his scanty vineyard, this special slice off his small 
 loaf. To-day he was more impatient than usual. Really ill for 
 his own part, this travesty of sickness put on for folly and idleness, 
 for wantonness and vanity, disgusted him in more ways than one. 
 And, his heart full of trouble for Monica and his hopeless love — 
 his head on fire and his spirit passing through the Valley of the 
 Shadow — the gestures and glances of this simpering old Amanda, 
 this daughter of a bygone generation who wanted to be his 
 Shulamite as she had made him her Solomon, filled him with 
 repulsion amounting to horror. Could he have rushed out of the 
 room, as if some ‘laidly worm’ had been lying on the couch 
 instead of a faded, waxen-skinned old maid who had once been 
 pretty and who would still have been charming had she not been 
 silly, he would have gone. But he was bound to stay for at least 
 a few moments. Yet in all the circumstances, such as they were, 
 was it to be wondered at if even he, the gentle, mild, and graceful 
 Dr. Armine St. Claire, were to-day less courteous than con- 
 temptuous, less complaisant than repelling P 
 
 Miss Maria Crosby had never had cause to think that the 
 young doctor was made of more melting material, so far as she 
 was concerned, than the marble king in the Arabian Nights tales. 
 But to-day he was more than usually rigid; and even the pro- 
 fessional patience, which was part of his necessary furniture, 
 was of a very threadbare kind as he took his place by the 
 couch and pursued through the vague that troop of ghosts which 
 she called her symptoms, and which he knew to be only her fancies. 
 
 Poor Miss Maria ! After all she was only the whipping-boy 
 for the occasion. It was not her folly so much as his own mis- 
 fortunes which he chastised in her. This is the way of the world. 
 That old gentleman tj ing his shoe — how should he not be kicked 
 when he lies obstructive to our way and handy to our foot, at the 
 
THE OAKHURST INVALID . 69 
 
 very moment when we are smarting with defeat and rasped sore 
 by provocation ! 
 
 Love has quick eyes ; and though a woman may be a fool for 
 being in love at all, still, whether she be wise or foolish, her heart 
 suffers and her spirits droop when things go wrong with the 
 beloved. The would-be Shulamite caught the uncomfortable accent 
 of her Solomon, and met it with the ready sympathy of an affec- 
 tion which only wants occasion for display. 
 
 4 You are not yourself to-day, dear doctor/ she said, laying her 
 hand on bis arm. 4 What is amiss with you P ’ 
 
 4 Nothing/ he answered. 
 
 4 It could not be less/ returned Miss Maria. 4 And you have 
 nothing to make you anxious ? ’ she returned ; 4 no bad cases on 
 hand ? ’ 
 
 4 No ; none/ he said. 
 
 4 How is John Lilley at Stair ? ’ she asked. 
 
 4 Better/ he answered. 
 
 4 Well, that is short ! ’ she cried shrilly. 
 
 4 Do you want me to enter into professional details ? Would 
 you understand them if I did ? ’ he asked unpleasantly. 
 
 4 Oh, come now ! don’t be so snappy to your best friend ! 9 she 
 said, with a slight laugh. 4 1 declare you make me feel as if you 
 had bitten my nose off* ! ’ she added, with what she meant to be 
 girlish playfulness — poor thing. 
 
 4 1 am sorry if I was uncivil/ he said coldly, rising to go. 
 
 Being either coquetted with, or gushed over, by Maria Crosby was 
 really more than he could bear to-day. At all times a corvee — 
 with that aching head of his, that fever in his veins and that pain 
 round his heart — to-day it was unendurable ! 
 
 4 Why ! what takes you away so soon? ’ she said, again laying 
 her hand on his arm. 
 
 She stipulated for half-an-hour’s consultation every day. It 
 was in the bond ; so much money for so much time ; cash paid 
 quarterly for attendance given daily. And to-day the young 
 doctor had not been with her more than eight minutes by the 
 watch on her little table. 
 
 4 1 must go/ he said, 4 1 am busy.’ 
 
 4 1 thought you said you had nothing on hand ! ’ she returned. 
 4 Who is down? Is it Jenny Mason’s boy? They say she had 
 a bad night with him, but may be it w r as only his teeth and it has 
 passed ; so that need not take you away in such a hurry. If not 
 Jenny Mason’s child, and old John Lilley is getting better, who is 
 it ? ’ she asked curiously ; for by virtue of her state, as she made 
 it, unable to go out and garner for herself and dependent for dramatic 
 excitement on the gravitation of news to her couch, she held 
 herself entitled to know all that took place in the little town ; and 
 
IONE. 
 
 70 
 
 they did say in the place that not a hen cackled hut Miss Maria 
 Crosby knew, and could tell the count of all the eggs that were 
 laid between dawn and dusk. The mysterious activities of chronic 
 invalidism were never more fully exemplified than in her ; and let 
 who would go short of local knowledge, she was always well 
 supplied. 
 
 ‘ I really cannot go into the details of my work with you, Miss 
 Crosby,’ answered Dr. St. Claire. ‘ You must take my word for it 
 and allow me to end my visit.’ 
 
 ‘ Then you must give me a whole hour to-morrow to make up 
 for this skimpy call to-day,’ said Maria, with a fond look. 6 1 have 
 not told you half what 1 ought, you know. I have said nothing of 
 that nasty little pain in my chest last night — just like a knife going 
 in at my breast-bone and out between my shoulders. It quite 
 caught my breath, doctor, and made me wonder if it was inflam- 
 mation. And this morning when I woke I had such a dull aching 
 over my right brow ! — and such a big lump in my throat, like an 
 apple stuck there, I could scarcely swallow. I thought I was in 
 for one of my bad days, but I got better after my rum and milk ; 
 and when I got up and had my egg and brandy I was nearly right 
 again. Still, all these flying pains mean something, don’t they, 
 doctor P There is something very wrong with my system alto- 
 gether. I should like to give it a name! ’ 
 
 6 Take some sal-volatile when you feel that pain in your throat 
 - — that lump,’ said Dr. St. Claire. 
 
 i Will that do me good ? ’ she asked in the silly way of people 
 who must speak at any cost, and who would rather talk nonsense 
 than keep silence. 
 
 ‘ I should scarcely have recommended it unless I thought that 
 it "would,’ he returned coldly. 
 
 6 What a way to prescribe ! ’ she said shrilly, again affecting 
 girlish playfulness. 
 
 ‘ I know of no other way, Miss Crosby. I am sorry if my 
 manner does not please you,’ was his uncomfortable answer. 
 
 Her silly light brown eyes, with their sparse lashes and pink 
 lids, filled up with tears. 
 
 ‘ I did not mean to offend you, dear doctor,’ she said humbly. 
 4 1 am sure you know that ! ’ 
 
 6 No, I am sure you did not,’ he answered, his gentlehood over- 
 coming his ill-humour. ‘ Forgive me if I was rude, Miss Crosby. 
 I am not quite myself to-day.’ 
 
 4 No, you are not, poor dear ! You look put out, and are really 
 not yourself,’ was her compassionate reply. 6 And I am sure I do 
 not mind your being short-tempered to me if it is only because you 
 are ill and are not vexed with me. I could not bear that ! ’ she 
 said with the craven fondness, the want of self-respect of the 
 woman who loves unbidden. 4 I could put up with everything else 
 
THE OAKHURST INVALID. 
 
 71 
 
 and never give it a second thought ; hut not that ! 9 she added 
 tenderly. ‘But now tell me what has gone wrong with you/ she 
 continued as if settling herself for a long confidential, amiable talk. 
 
 4 1 can keep a secret like anything if I am told not to tell ; and no 
 one is more interested in you, doctor, than I am/ she added, with 
 a meaning smile. 
 
 His gentler humour passed as quickly as it had come. Her 
 manners, her smile, the coaxing tones of her voice, the caressing 
 action of her hand, the fond glance of her faded eyes, her open 
 love-making and unconcealed admiration, were all too much for 
 his nerves, already so sorely tried. 
 
 ‘I have no secrets to tell/ he said brusquely; ‘and when I 
 have, I do not tell them. If I cannot keep my own counsel, I can 
 scarcely expect others to keep it for me.’ 
 
 ‘But I am different from others/ said Maria, with a tender 
 face! ‘ Every one does not take the interest in you, dear doctor, 
 that I do.’ 
 
 ‘ You are very good ; but I have nothing to say/ said Hr. St. 
 Claire coldly ; and at that instant the door-bell rang, and the little 
 maid, who was waiting in the hall to see the handsome young 
 doctor as he passed through, opened it on the instant, thus cutting 
 short the hasty retreat which else he would have made. 
 
 ‘ Oh, bother ! 9 said the elegant invalid with quite robust 
 energy. 6 Who can it be ? And I not half through my symptoms! 9 
 
 Who indeed P In another instant she knew ; for Mrs. Anthony 
 Barrington and her sister-in-law, Monica, were ushered into the 
 room, they among other great people in the neighbourhood making 
 it a point of conscience to call on the Oakhurst invalid at stated 
 times in the year. They had left the carriage a little way up the 
 street, which accounted for their quasi-incognito while at the door. 
 For else the livery and the bays would have betrayed them, and 
 then neither would St. Claire have been taken by surprise, nor 
 would Miss Maria have said ‘ Bother ! ’ with so much vigour of 
 intonation. 
 
 ( Oh, so you are here, are you, Hr. St. Claire/ cried Theodosia, 
 with an audacious little laugh, a3 if she had come upon something 
 rather doubtful in finding the young doctor by the side of a 
 patient. 
 
 ‘ How do you do, Mrs. Barrington ? ’ said Armine, ignoring 
 the exclamation. 
 
 He turned to Monica and seemed uncertain whether to shake 
 hands or not as he muttered rather than pronounced the prescribed 
 formula ; but Monica held out her hand in her grave, gentle way, 
 looking as if she saw and knew nothing beyond the immediate affair 
 of the moment : — and yet her pale face gradually changed in colour 
 till it burnt like fire, and felt as heated as it looked. The fever-spots 
 in St. Claire’s hollow cheeks also flamed out, and the change from 
 
IONE. 
 
 72 
 
 pallor usual to Loth to this crimson inflammation did not escape 
 the quick eyes of Theodosia nor the loving ones of Miss Maria. 
 
 i My dear Monica, how frightfully flushed you are ! ’ said Theo- 
 dosia, with malicious gaiety. 1 You were so white a moment ago, 
 and now you are like a June rose ! ’ — laughing shrilly. 
 
 ‘ Do you find the room too warm, Miss Barrington P ’ asked 
 Maria, also surprised at that sudden flush, and looking from Monica 
 to St. Claire, though not so suspiciously, yet as sharply as Theo 
 herself had done. 
 
 * It is coming in from the open air,’ said Monica, calmly. She 
 could not control her blood, but she could master her voice and 
 manner. ‘ But your room is not too hot, Miss Crosby,’ she added, 
 with her usual gentle courtesy. 
 
 6 And how well you are looking, Dr. St. Claire,’ continued 
 Theodosia, in the same highpitched key and with the same arti- 
 ficial and malicious gaiety. ‘ You, too, look like a June rose — two 
 June roses in October! ’ she cried, laughing in her falsest manner 
 as she so audaciously bracketed these two inequalities together. 
 
 ‘ Well, I don’t know about that, Mrs. Anthony,’ said Miss 
 Maria. ‘ The doctor has certainly got some colour now, but he 
 was looking peaky enough not five minutes ago, before you came in.’ 
 Here she glanced out of the corner of her eye at Monica. ‘ I have 
 just been telling him he ought to take care of himself. Indeed he 
 wants some one to take care of him — that is just it,’ she added, 
 with an hysterical kind of jocularity. 
 
 4 Thank you for your kind interest, Miss Crosby ; but I think I 
 can manage for myself,’ said Dr. St. Claire, coldly. 
 
 * Oh, men are poor creatures left to themselves ! ’ returned Miss 
 Maria. ‘ You had best get a wife, doctor. There are plenty in 
 Oakhurst to choose from, I am sure.’ 
 
 i That is always what I say to Dr. St. Claire,’ said Theodosia, 
 with an unpleasant laugh. 
 
 ‘ May I ask you to be kind enough to leave me and my affairs 
 alone, Miss Crosby ? ’ said Dr. St. Claire, with strange and sudden 
 sternness. * When I want your kind advice I will ask for it ; and 
 then it will be time enough to give it.’ 
 
 Theo drew herself up, her vivacious little face alight with 
 anger, while Miss Maria’s waxen skin became almost livid as she, 
 too, bridled and resented. To be snubbed like this before these 
 local magnates, these great ladies, whose visits counted among the 
 highest premiums of her state — it was intolerable ; and she who 
 had always held by the young doctor, and had been his best friend 
 from the beginning ! But never again ! she thought to herself ; 
 never again ! He had done for himself with her, and he might go 
 where he would now for so constant a patient and a friend as true 
 as she had been. To be insulted before that little chatterbox of a 
 Mrs. Anthony, who made mountains out of molehills and told all 
 
THE OAKHURST INVALID. 
 
 73 
 
 she knew, and that queer Miss Barrington there, who was so quiet 
 and silent that no one could be sure what she knew or what she 
 did not know — no ! that she would not bear. So he might make up 
 his mind to have done with her, Maria Crosby, and take the conse- 
 quences. It was just thirty pounds a year out of his pocket and a 
 good friend to the back of that !— and he with his face on fire, and 
 Miss Barrington’s to match ! 
 
 If she felt this, Theo felt much the same ; for though the 
 lightning had descended more directly on Miss Maria’s head, the 
 bolt had been intended for each alike, and the waxen-skinned old 
 maid was once more rather the whipping-boy than the original 
 offender. Mrs. Anthony was intensely indignant at the whole 
 thing ; and she resolved, like Miss Crosby, to have done with Dr. 
 St. Claire on her own account, and to make him feel by bitter 
 experience the worse than folly that he had committed, and the 
 good that he had lost in consequence. And she too had her own 
 interpretation of those crimson cheeks, of which interpretation 
 she intended to make a present to Anthony at a convenient oppor- 
 tunity. 
 
 ‘ How is Miss Major P ’ asked Monica, in her sudden way, 
 breaking through the embarrassed silence which followed on St. 
 Claire’s hot words, as if she had seen nothing, heard nothing, 
 known nothing. ‘Is she quite well P ’ 
 
 ‘ Quite, I thank you, Miss Barrington,’ said Maria, a little 
 stiffly — very stiffly considering to whom she was speaking. ‘ My 
 niece enjoys the best of health, I am happy to say; she never 
 knows an ache or a pain, and she cannot understand how others 
 should be afflicted.’ 
 
 ‘ She is an excellent nurse,’ said Monica, with provoking inatten- 
 tion to the bitter animus of Miss Crosby’s words. ‘ Every one 
 knows what a devoted niece she is.’ 
 
 6 She is well enough,’ answered Maria ; ‘ but she is young and 
 thoughtless, as all young people are. It takes a deal of patience to 
 bear with the thoughtlessness and selfishness of young people, Miss 
 Barrington,’ she added, with a certain odd kind of personal applica- 
 tion in her manner, deserved by Monica Barrington least of all 
 the world. 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ said Monica, as if she herself had been old. 
 
 ‘ Some people ought not to be young,’ said Theo, looking full 
 at Dr. St. Claire. ‘ It is a great mistake.’ 
 
 ‘ One which cures itself only too soon, Mrs. Barrington,’ 
 returned Armine, trying to smile and to speak naturally and 
 firmly; in both of which efforts he signally failed. 
 
 ‘ But the process is disagreeable,’ she retorted. ‘ And with 
 some people, in some circumstances, there is no need why they 
 should go through the unpleasantness. Young people forget 
 themselves — forget their proper position and the respect they owe 
 
74 /ONE. 
 
 to their superiors/ she added sententiously. * Do they not, Miss 
 Crosby ? ’ 
 
 6 Yes, indeed, too often, Mrs. Anthony/ was the invalid’s reply. 
 
 ‘ But when they do, they have to be just put back and taught 
 better/ she added, with a vicious tightening of her lips. 
 
 St. Claire looked over to Monica. He understood the moral of 
 the fable, and he wanted to see whether she read between the 
 lines with him. She was looking down while Miss Crosby had 
 pointed Theodosia’s shaft; but, stirred by some subtle magnetism, 
 she seemed to be conscious of that mute appeal, and, raising her 
 sweet eyes, she looked quite steadily at St. Claire, then turned to 
 her sister-in-law, and said gently : 
 
 6 But none of us here are quite so young as that, Theo. We 
 are blaming what does not exist for any of us ; and surely that is 
 waste of time ! ’ 
 
 How weak and nervous he was to-day ! These few words were 
 almost too much for Armine. He was like an hysterical woman whom 
 a kind word enfeebles and a caress prostrates. He felt his heart beat 
 and his head swim till he half feared to fall ; but summoning all his 
 courage, he got up and took his leave, afraid lest he should betray 
 himself too clearly to the unfriendly witnesses watching him so 
 narrowly. And of what use was even that gentle covert defence 
 of him ! They were separated as far as were ever Dives and 
 Lazarus in the Eternal Kingdom, and there was no possibility of 
 nearer approach. So must it be ! And the best thing he could 
 do at this moment was to tear himself from the dear presence 
 which made all his melancholy happiness, and carry safe out of 
 the lire that secret which had caused his heart-break, and would 
 cause his death. 
 
 Soon after this, the ladies also took their leave ; Theodosia’s 
 face still alight with anger; Miss Maria’s still livid with vexation; 
 and Monica’s by now restored to its ordinary pale and dreamy 
 stillness, inscrutable, dumb, illegible. 
 
 When all had gone, and Rachel had come in to hear the diurnal 
 report and receive the orders, which were part of the day’s doings, 
 she found her aunt in tears. 
 
 ‘ Why, aunt Maria, what ever has happened! ’ she said. ‘ What 
 ever are you crying for like that ! ’ 
 
 6 He was so short-tempered, so unkind to-day ! ’ sobbed Maria. 
 ‘ And before those ladies too ! I would not have believed it of 
 him ! ’ 
 
 i If he was short I would not be so soft, if I was you, as to cry 
 about it/ said Rachel, a little stonily, not to say contemptuously. 
 
 With her own poor little hopeless romance so w r ell concealed 
 that no one in the wdiole world suspected it, her aunt Maria’s open 
 and fluid loves were beyond her patience to bear with. 
 
 ‘ Then you just would, if you was me. If you was me, you 
 
THE OAK HURST TV VALID. 
 
 75 
 
 would do exactly as I do/ said her aunt, cross and philosophical in 
 a breath. ‘ And, Rachel, I am to have a glass of hot brandy and 
 water — not too weak. The doctor says so/ she added. ‘My nerves 
 are all to pieces to-day. I want stringing up, and I know it.’ 
 
 ‘You have too many glasses of hot brandy and water, and 
 made far too strong ; that is my opinion/ grumbled Rachel, below 
 her breath, as she went to the chiffonier where her aunt’s special 
 restoratives and stimulants were kept. ‘If aunt does not take care, 
 she will get to like stimulants/ she went on, still speaking to her- 
 self. ‘And she does already, far too much. A little now and then 
 does no one any harm, but brandy here and brandy there, brandy 
 for a headache and brandy because one feels low, — there is no sense 
 in it ! I’ll give the doctor a hint that way, I just will. He orders 
 these glasses far too often. And I will tell him so to-morrow when 
 he comes. It seems a hard thing to say of one’s aunt, but a stitch 
 in time saves nine, and I don’t want a tipsy maniac to wait on as 
 well as an hysterical old woman like aunt is, even now.’ Aloud : 
 — ‘ Here, aunt Maria, is your brandy and water ; and, really, the 
 way that last bottle has gone is just dreadful.’ 
 
 ‘Then somebody has been helping themselves/ said Maria, 
 snappishly. ‘ For I am sure I never drank it all!’ 
 
 ‘ Every drop/ returned Rachel solemnly. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 UROKEN DOWN. 
 
 It was either the damp, ungenial day, or it was Miss Maria Crosby’s 
 ‘gush,’ or haply it might be the excitement and confusion of feeling 
 caused by the painful interview with Theodosia and Monica, which 
 gave the final blow to his tottering health. Be that as it may, 
 when Dr. St. Claire went home that afternoon, after he had 
 offended Mrs. Anthony Barrington and made his love-sick patient 
 his enemy, he was so ill that he was obliged to go to bed, and the 
 next day he was constrained to send for Dr. Williamson, of Staines, 
 the popular consulting physician of the district. By him he was 
 pronounced to have congestion of the lungs, as he already suspected; 
 with complications of a grave kind to add to what was already a 
 sufficiently grave condition. 
 
 Here, then, was the end of the first act in the sad little drama 
 — the total break-down of the handsome, friendless, moneyless 
 young doctor, wasted by his unhappy love to so much physical 
 weakness as to be rendered seriously ill by the first breath of 
 biting east wind — the first clammy chills of autumn. It was a sad 
 
/ONE. 
 
 76 
 
 pass, into which he had fallen for the present, and the future out- 
 look was even worse. For his chest attack, acute to-day, would 
 be chronic to-morrow; and though he might recover now, with 
 care, he was booked for consumption, without a hope of escape, if 
 he did not go to some warm climate for the winter. This was his 
 only chance — his only hope of permanent aud solid recovery. So 
 said Dr. Williamson; and so said his learned brother from London, 
 who chanced to be down there on professional business, and who, 
 with the ready help of his class, drove over to Oakhurst to see this 
 poor young co-professional, making such rapid shipwreck on the 
 rough sands of life. To tell Armine St. Claire that he must give 
 up his practice, and go to some warm climate for the next six 
 months, where lie might live in idleness and sunshine, was like that 
 typical recommendation of turtle soup and champagne to a Dorset- 
 shire labourer, with six children, and thirteen shillings a week to 
 keep them on — like the bland prescription of total rest to the jour- 
 nalist, who has to live at high pressure and in the centre of things, 
 if he is to live at all. But doctors do not trouble themselves about 
 ways and means. These are not in their province. Their business 
 is to indicate the road which must be taken — the means of trans- 
 port is your alfair, and your banker’s. As now, — when Dr. 
 Williamson ordered South Italy, at first generally, and then 
 Palermo specifically, for the young fellow who had not twenty 
 pounds before him, and left it to chance, that fairy god-motlier of 
 men, to supply him with the funds necessary for the journey and 
 six months’ idleness. 
 
 It was just the want cf these funds which made the difficulty. 
 The practice could be managed. A good honest young fellow, who 
 had scraped through his last examination with as little credit as 
 could be this side of failure, and whose heart was in the bush, had 
 agreed to take care of the patients until such time as their own 
 lawful Esculapius should return. He would be a faithful kind of 
 lieutenant, and there would be no fear of his turning out a usurper. 
 He would be a warming-pan, but neither a snake nor a cuckoo ; 
 and so far he was satisfactory. But how to find the money to 
 make this lieutenancy possible P to supply the warming-pan with 
 coals? How indeed ! Who on earth could tell ! 
 
 Dr. Williamson spoke freely of the affair to all the neighbour- 
 hood — to no pne more than to another, but freely to all alike. He 
 had a kind of idea that they might get up a general subscription 
 for this disabled healer of rickety bodies. Wherefore he detailed 
 the case to every one in town, dwelling much on the absolute 
 necessity there was for Dr. St. Claire to spend the winter in Palermo 
 if he were to be saved from consumption and premature death. 
 But — and here he always shrugged his shoulders — w’here was the 
 money to come from? It was a matter of life and death to St. 
 Claire ; but if he could not raise the funds? 
 
BROKEN DOWN. 
 
 77 
 
 He spoke with unction, with sincere compassion ; and he spoke, 
 as was said, to everyone alike — to the Barringtons and the 
 Chessons ; the high and the low — always hoping, but never sug- 
 gesting, that some one would propose a general subscription by 
 which that revivifying southern sun should be rendered possible. 
 
 Edward Formby so far took fire at the idea as to write a note 
 to St. Claire, offering to lend or to give, whichever he liked best, 
 such a sum of money as would enable him to obey Dr. Williamson’s 
 orders. It was a bluntly-worded letter, with one or two mistakes 
 in spelling, and without an attempt at style. A charity school-boy 
 would not have done much worse. All the same, it was of a finer 
 quality than many which might have been composed in classic 
 Greek with a faultless translation into Latin hexameters. Intellect 
 is god-like, truly; and education is the hall-mark of intellect; but 
 nobility of feeling has its value as well as breadth of philosophic 
 speculation ; apd kind-hearted, generous, somewhat illiterate 
 Edward Formby, still with that broad strong hand of his scatter- 
 ing his wild oats along the highway, had a place in the hierarchy 
 which certain of the erudite might have envied. 
 
 The offer was refused. Though his lines had fallen in evil 
 places, and though the family Pactolus had run so miserably dry, 
 St. Claire had not lost with his money the high spirit and inde- 
 pendence characteristic of the English gentleman. If put to it, he 
 would rather lose his life than owe it to polite pauperism. Where- 
 fore he thanked the good fellow who so generously offered to be 
 his banker; and he thanked him warmly; but always as one man 
 with another, one equal with another — and refused to accept as a 
 loan what he knew would be substantially a gift. 
 
 When Edward Formby read this answer, he swore a good 
 round oath between his small square teeth — an oath of the kind 
 which the Recording Angel blots out as soon as inscribed. But in 
 swearing, though he cursed the young fellow’s pride, he respected 
 his independence; felt more than ever convinced that he was a 
 gentleman of the right sort, though only a country practitioner ; 
 and was more than ever his sincere friend. 
 
 Theodosia Barrington also touched the subject of a gift of 
 money to enable the young doctor to spend the winter in Palermo. 
 She had still a strong interest in St. Claire ; but interest of as un- 
 friendly a kind as it had formerly been eulogistic. She talked of 
 him as much as ever, but her talk was seasoned with gall, not 
 sweetened with honey; and when she proposed this sum of money 
 to her husband she spoke as if she had been speaking of a dole to a 
 beggar. The change in her tone, however, was lost on Anthony. 
 He was far too dense to understand these minor subtleties, and 
 never troubled his hard brain with things which were not to be 
 demonstrated. 
 
 ‘Give that young man a sum of money P’ he repeated with a 
 
IONE. 
 
 78 
 
 short laugh. ‘ No, Theo, certainly not ! A man must fight for 
 himself in this world, and it is of no use to bolster up the weak. 
 If Dr. St. Claire is worth saving, he can save himself. The fittest 
 survive and the unfit fall through the meshes. And so it must be. 
 I will hear of no such folly as sending him money. Let his own 
 friends come forward. Why should we ? What claim has he on 
 us ? ’ 
 
 ‘None at all/ said Theo; ‘but if he has no friends ?’ she added, 
 opposition leading her to justice. 
 
 ‘ Then let him make them/ answered Anthony. 
 
 ‘Well, dear, I am sure I do not care about him! ’ said Theo, 
 quickly; ‘ but I think it would be better for every one if he left 
 Oakhurst for a little while. He is of no use here ; and dreamy, 
 sentimental girls may find him too interesting as he is ! ’ 
 
 ‘ What is that to me P ’ said Anthony. 
 
 He looked at his little wife as he spoke, and something in the 
 vicious vivacity of her face struck him as strange and unusual. 
 
 ‘ What do you mean, Theo P ’ he said. 
 
 ‘ Oh, nothing ! 9 she answered, with a little toss of her head. 
 
 ‘ Yes, you do mean something/ he repeated slowly. ‘ What is 
 it, Theo ? 9 
 
 ‘ Nothing, dear, really nothing/ she said. ‘ I dare say I am a 
 little goose — mamma always says I am one — but it has struck me 
 more than once that Monica likes this young man more than she 
 would confess if she were asked ; and I am sure he likes her.’ 
 
 ‘ What confounded rubbish are you talking, Theo ? 9 said 
 Anthony, with profound disdain. ‘If I believed you, I would 
 thrash that fellow to within an inch of his life ! Do, for Heaven’s 
 sake, have more sense, child ! My sister care a button for a country 
 doctor ? Can you not find her an innamorato among the plough- 
 boys ? I do verily believe, Theo, that sometimes you take leave 
 of your senses. You are really too childish ! 1 
 
 ‘Am I?’ laughed Theo, oddly. ‘Perhaps I am. But you 
 need not be so cross, bearikins. If I am a fool, you ought to have 
 patience with me. I did not make myself ! 9 
 
 ‘ Oh, you are sharp enough/ said Anthony. ‘ It is only your 
 imagination that you allow to run away with you. You are no 
 fool, child, but you are wild.’ 
 
 ‘Am I ? 9 she answered ; saying softly to herself: ‘I have more 
 brains and sharper eyes than all of you put together, you Barring- 
 tons ! — and I can see clearly where you are all stone-blind.’ 
 
 One evening Dr. St. Claire was sitting moodily by his solitary 
 fireside. Weak, ill, dispirited, now that he was shut up within 
 the four walls of his cheerless home, all chance of seeing Monica 
 at an end, and the horizon of his life as circumscribed as its 
 activities, he had but one desire — to get away. It was the well- 
 known desire of moral sickness, finding the cause of failure in 
 
BROKEN DOWN. 
 
 79 
 
 everything but itself — in the place, the air, the food, the room, the 
 very paper on the walls, the day’s duties and the day’s doings. If 
 any or all of these could be changed, then the damaged lung 
 would be healed, the peccant liver would be relieved, the im- 
 poverished blood would be enriched. If only he could leave Oak- 
 hurst and this dingy room hung with that bilious buff-coloured 
 paper and carpeted with that hideous arrangement in green and 
 red! He was sick to death of Mrs. Farley’s jellies and Mrs. 
 Chesson’s chicken-broth — sick and weary of all the attentions 
 heaped on him by the kind-hearted bourgeoisie of the place. The 
 birds from that good fellow at Hillside were pleasant ; and the 
 grapes from the Dower House did him more good than all Dr. 
 "Williamson’s prescriptions; but, save these, all other offerings, 
 contributions, attentions — whatever they might be called — revolted 
 and annoyed him. If only he could raise money enough to get 
 away for that six months’ change ! — if only he could go ! 
 
 Sick and weary, lamenting and miserable, he sat there wrapped 
 in his landlady’s shawl, with his great-coat about his knees, the 
 very picture of masculine desolation, eating out his heart and given 
 over to despair, when the door bell was rung sharply ; and imme- 
 diately after the servant brought in a letter. It had come through 
 the post in the ordinary way and he did not recognise the hand- 
 writing. When he opened it, he found wrapped in an inner cover 
 bank-notes to the amount of three hundred pounds. ‘From a 
 friend’ was written in an unknown hand on the enclosure. It 
 was in the same handwriting as was the address ; and both were 
 evidently feigned for the occasion. 
 
 The blood gathered round his heart, and he felt as if the days 
 of miracles were not yet over. Who could have sent that money? 
 It might be Edward Formby who had taken this method to insure 
 compliance with his wish. And yet it was scarcely like him ! He 
 was kind and generous, and a good fellow all round ; but this was 
 more a woman’s way of doing things than was likely with him. 
 It had in it a spice of romance, of delicacy, of sentiment, which 
 did not fit in with his character. He was so much more direct 
 than this. No, it was not Edward Formby. Nor was it likely to 
 be Mrs. Chesson, the wife of the retired cheesemonger, and the 
 mother of little Hose ; for though both father and mother had 
 made unmistakable overtures to him in the first days, and when 
 his sun was shining bright, they had dropped him now when he 
 was broken and his sun was eclipsed. It might be Mrs. Goss the 
 widowed landlady of the ‘ Fox and Grapes,’ who was reported 
 worth twenty thousand pounds if a farthing, and who had no 
 children. She had made the young doctor understand that he had 
 only to ask and have, and that if he chose to play the part of the 
 fox, she would take care he should not find the grapes sour. It 
 might be she. He hoped not ; and he must find out. It could 
 
8c 
 
 IO\E. 
 
 not be Miss Maria Crosby. She too, like the Chessons, bad dropped 
 him in his trouble. It was not the Anthony Barringtons. Mr. 
 Anthony would not — of that he was certain — and Mrs. Anthony 
 could not. She had a very small dowry, and Anthony’s big hand 
 was close-fisted. The blood burnt in his face like fire, as his 
 thoughts touched at last the central point round which they had 
 wandered. But he put the supposition aside. It could not be 
 from Her. He would not believe it ; though, should it be, every 
 shilling would be hallowed like the silver crown of the Madonna, 
 like the silver offering at her shrine. But no ! It was not ! it was 
 not ! Nor was it from Mrs. Barrington, who, though well-off, was 
 not rich, and, though benevolent, was not in any way lavish in her 
 generosities. And this was a lavish gift — a lordly, royal, queenly 
 gift. No ! no ! — it was not Mrs. Barrington, therefore it was not 
 from the Dower House. It was a gift flung down from the clouds 
 — a gift sent by the fairy godmother, unwitnessed and unsigned. 
 He would do his best to trace it to its source ; but failing the dis- 
 covery of that source — and how could he ever strike it? — he 
 must accept the money as it was sent, and use it according to its 
 purpose. 
 
 And thus it was that, all inquiry proving in vain, the handsome 
 young doctor left Oakhurst and England for a winter’s sojourn in 
 Palermo to heal his damaged chest if not his broken heart. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 IN THE SUNNY SOUTH. 
 
 The neighbourhood which had accepted its handsome young 
 doctor with reluctance now parted from him with regret, which 
 soon deepened till it reached down to blame. By this time people 
 had got used to him, and they did not like the trouble of getting 
 used to any one else. And as all men are prone to find a moral 
 fault in an unpleasant circumstance, the Oakhurst world, following 
 the general law, spoke of St. Claire’s touched lung as if it had been 
 an ethical obliquity, and of his escape from fogs and east winds as 
 if it had been flight from his creditors, or a disinclination to face 
 the overhauling of some mud-pie of his own making. 
 
 Little cared the poor heart-broken invalid for all this frothy 
 ebullition of ill-temper. But the less he cared the more it frothed. 
 For nothing creates more enemies than that kind of dignified self- 
 respect which neither asks favours nor makes advances, nor yet 
 concessions. As some owe the lustre of their names to the diligent 
 polishing of camaraderie, so others never get a fair hearing for want 
 
AV TIIE SUNNY SOUTH. 
 
 Sr 
 
 of a herald to announce and a chorus to echo. A man must be 
 cap in hand to the world if he wants that world to pat him on the 
 head. Independence and haying the courage of your opinions — 
 trusting to your own integrity and the sincerity of your intentions 
 — doing the best you know and not touting for trumpeters — stand- 
 ing aloof from all 1 camorras ’ and neither buying the advocacy of 
 others nor selling your own — all this raises you up as many 
 enemies as there are influential persons who like to be entreated ; 
 and those who would have been your judicious bottle-holders, had 
 you had a flexible spine and a glozing tongue, now pelt you with 
 stones because you hold your head straight and forswear flunkeydom. 
 
 This, the experience of so many, was now also St. Claire’s. lie 
 had never sought to make his way other than by putting conscience 
 into his daily life — attending faithfully to his patients, and stand- 
 ing free of both favouritism and gossip. He had never sought to 
 create a party for himself, nor to establish relations with one 
 already made. Consequently now, when he had put the neigh- 
 bourhood to inconvenience and made it cross and surly, he found 
 the disadvantages attached to isolation and received the punishment 
 awarded to independence. He bore it all, however, with that 
 equanimity of pride doubled with gentleness which was his 
 characteristic ; wrote his formal notes of temporary leave-taking 
 to his patients, recommending Mr. Benjamin Hoskins as his locurn- 
 tenens in his absence : spoiled half-a-dozen good sheets of paper 
 before accomplishing his note to Mrs. Barrington of the "Dower 
 House ; and wrote a curiously composite affair to Edward Formby, 
 of Hillside — this man who was his friend, yet destined by the fitness 
 of things to be Monica Barrington’s husband. 
 
 Finally he got all things in train, then left Oakhurst for the 
 sunny South and the restoration of his damaged lung; hoping that 
 his heart would grow lighter as his air-cells grew freer, for life 
 such as he had made it by his hopeless love for Monica was em- 
 phatically not worth living. 
 
 Though he had lived for so many years in France this was 
 Armine’s first visit to Italy, and he yielded, as do so many of us, 
 to the subtle charm which pervades all earth and sky there in the 
 blessed sunshine beyond the Alps. With him as with some others 
 Italy meant Love ; and Love was Monica. All that he felt, all 
 that he saw, was full of her. It was a kind of inverted pantheism 
 with Love and Monica in the place of Nature and God. Where- 
 ever he went he took her with him by the way and found her 
 waiting for him at the end. Her presence was ever about him, 
 but more as a sensation, as an influence, than a circumstance. In 
 the luminous skies he was conscious of her face, veiled by the 
 filmy mists and overpowered by the refulgent sunshine, but ever 
 there like the stars, looking down on him with the large grave love 
 of the Divine. The soft outlines and pearly shadows of the clouds 
 
82 
 
 IONE. 
 
 reminded liim of her hands and hair and the gracious attitudes in 
 which she rested. The blue hills of Fiesole and the azure depths 
 where Vallombrosa lies hidden, were like her eyes. Looking oyer 
 from the Certosa he seemed to see her there, like that Spirit of 
 whom nature is but the transparent garment. The sweet autumn 
 air, fragrant with fruit and the ruddy breath of dying vine leaves, 
 was redolent of her. The stars spelt out her name ; in the tender 
 glory of the dawn he saw the tremulous beauty of her smile ; in 
 the sunset the mystery of her thoughts ; in the mild radiance of 
 the moon the unsullied purity of her life. The flowers in the 
 streets brought back the memory of that quaint garden where his. 
 happiness had been cut down to the roots with the lilies and the 
 pansies ; and the faded roses reminded him of her home. Those 
 faded roses with their sweet and sad associations ! He cherished 
 them as one cherishes the flowers taken from the bier of the 
 beloved, the fragrance of which for ever after brings with it the 
 sense of death. The windows, garlanded with golden melons and 
 crimson pomidori, were frames wherein his fancy set her sweet 
 face as the living picture. A woman and a child praying before a 
 shrine in the open street, suggested her. The dim light of churches 
 and the subdued chant of the hidden monks ; the sun-touched 
 clouds of incense hanging in golden vapour about the altar and 
 rising like incorporate prayer from earth to heaven ; the ecstatic 
 adoration of the blue-robed nuns ; the simple worship of the all- 
 believing poor ; the mild face of the Madonna, type of perfected 
 womanhood and refuge of afflicted souls ; all phrases of prayer, all 
 forms of devotion, were as words and messages from her ; they 
 called his soul to higher things, and those higher things were 
 Monica. The dark eyes of the women and the appealing smiles of 
 the olive-skinned children; the soft language with its lingering 
 accent, like a caress on the mouth ; the orange-gardens dropping 
 with shining gold ; the pearly green of the olive-trees suggesting a 
 wreath for the beloved head — olive and jasmine to crown her 
 queen among all fair ladies ; the palaces which seem to have been 
 built for homes of a statelier, nobler passion than ours ; the pictures, 
 those immortal flowers from the root of faith — all meant one 
 thing only — Love; and Love was Monica. All his dreams, all 
 his vague desires, all his wishes, his enjoyments, his regrets, were 
 Ailed with her, surrounded by and centred in her. Italy was but 
 another name for her — this divine Italy which means to the loving 
 — Love. He lived as in the secret heart of that great Spirit 
 whom some men call nature, others beauty, and whom he knew 
 to be Monica. She was the soul of all things, and all things were 
 her visible expression. Her presence surrounded him as a gar- 
 ment in which she had enwrapped him ; his head was on her 
 heart ; her arms held him on her knees. He lived with her ever 
 and ever — here in the cities and among the vineyards of this fair 
 
IN THE SUNNY SOUTH S3 
 
 Eden where Love is the lord of life — this noonday couch of the 
 sun where dreams are more precious than actualities elsewhere. 
 
 He had come here to be healed of his damaged lung and broken 
 heart ; but the process seemed somewhat doubtful. His love had 
 increased, not diminished, by absence and environment — can love 
 which is real do aught else? True, it was not embittered nor was 
 his wound inflamed ; but it was more and more incorporate with 
 his whole being — like a symphony of minor chords running 
 through the psalm of life. He loved her ! — he loved her ! He 
 loved her as a woman, sick with sad thoughts and pale with fruit- 
 less dreams, loves the man whose happiness she can never make 
 and whose love she may never know. He loved her hopelessly, 
 despairingly, without the power to overcome or the possibility to 
 fnltil ; with unrecognised devotion ; with unrewarded fidelity ; 
 with tears which no one saw : with sacrifice which no one 
 accepted. Her image was at once his talisman and his torture ; the 
 thought of her at once his pain and his delight. 
 
 Italy was to heal him ; but surely this was not healing ! To 
 dream of Monica through the night and to be conscious of her 
 spiritual presence through the day — to see her in the heart of 
 Florence, in the ruins of Rome, in the burning life of Naples — to 
 make her the goddess, standing supreme and ever young in the 
 reconstructed temples of Poestum — to place her as the lady, trium- 
 phant in her beauty, by the restored fountains of Pompeii — to 
 search for her like a child in the darkness, and to spring up in the 
 morning as if sure to find her coming to meet him through the day 
 — to move as in a trance where her hand led him and her feet 
 kept time and pace with his — to see all things as mere forms of 
 her — to make all feeling subordinate to love for her — was this 
 healing P It would not seem so. Yet his health visibly improved 
 in spite of his sadness. He lost his cough ; the pain in his side 
 abated ; his fever waned as his strength waxed ; his pale face 
 became less deathly in hue and a healthier carnation took the 
 place of those two hectic spots on his hollow cheeks ; his attenuated 
 hands were not so transparent and his prominent knuckles became 
 less manifest. He was evidently in better physical condition than 
 when he had left the dear despair of Oakhurst. Italy had begun 
 the cure which Sicily was to complete ; and his grave was not yet 
 du £- 
 
 So one fine evening he took his passage aboard the swift and 
 sensitive little ‘ Galileo Galilei/ and crossed over a waveless sea to 
 that beautiful island of Calypso, that fragrant garden of Armida, 
 where fair and powerful Palermo lies like a pearl in the heart of 
 the Golden Shell. 
 
 For some time the strangeness of all about him sufficed for St. 
 Claire's amusement. There were a few people in the hotel with 
 whom he made that kind of travelling acquaintance which may be 
 
IOXE. 
 
 84 
 
 so pleasant and may be so tiresome : and the streets and buildings, 
 the novelty and colour, made up the rest. He occupied bis even- 
 ings in writing to Monica poetry which would never be published ; 
 in setting songs to music which would never be played ; working 
 up his sketches wherein he always placed her figure, for the delec- 
 tation of no one but himself. She was ever in liis mind here as in 
 Florence, as in Rome, as in Naples. And though he knew that 
 all this was like living on luscious poison, he preferred that poison 
 to wholesome food ; and justified his folly as the loving do. 
 
 At last he got tired of what he had in his outward life and 
 wanted more. 
 
 The runners from Sferrieavallo ; the grand old staircases and 
 courtyards to be found in the city ; the curiously painted carts 
 with their harness and trappings glittering with glass, flashing 
 with brass, noisy with bells and clinking metal, feathered here and 
 hung with-fox tails there ; the beauty of the children ; the lovely 
 faces of the women of the Greek colony — lovelier for their pictur- 
 esque head-gear ; the linen that flutters from every balcony giving 
 the city the look of being always ‘ imbandierata ’ and ‘ in festa ; 1 
 the bougainvillea crimsoning all the walls which look to the south 
 where it can live in the sunshine ; the summer flowers of England 
 to be had now in the winter gardens ; Monreale and the Palatine 
 Chapel ; the walks and drives ; the villa Giulia and the Favorita 
 — it was all very interesting, very lovely ; but he had seen it often 
 enough now to be satisfied, and he had no very special interest in 
 his companions at the hotel. They were only of the usual kind ; 
 and the usual kind is not exciting. 
 
 Then he remembered the letter of introduction that he had 
 brought with him from Edward Formby to a certain Captain 
 Stewart of Palermo, from whom lie was promised that kind of court- 
 eous hospitality which is so precious to a stranger in a foreign land. 
 
 For the matter of that, hospitality was in the Stewart blood — • 
 as well as certain other things not quite so commendable. Hospi- 
 tality and large lines of living had so disastrously wasted a fine 
 estate that, when the present proprietor came to his own, he 
 inherited almost as many debts as rents, and for every acre had a 
 mortgage to correspond. The whole thing was as unsubstantial as 
 a rock that has been honeycombed by the borers, or the roof-tree 
 of a house that has been hollowed by white ants. It was impos- 
 sible for Ralph Stewart to remain at his own place, making this 
 miserable fight with conditions as they were and appearances as 
 they ought to be — with creditors clamouring for their dues on the 
 one side and the family name demanding its sacrifice of gold on 
 the other. So, letting the whole concern, he went off to Palermo 
 as the best place he could think of for the preservation of his 
 wife’s health, which was delicate, and the husbanding of his own 
 resources, which were slender. Here he could live well on what 
 
IN THE SUNNY SOUTH. 
 
 *5 
 
 would have been comparative poverty in England ; and he as much 
 of a social personage as if he had possessed thrice his amount of 
 revenue. The place was beautiful, the climate good ; the English 
 colony at that time was large and flourishing; the Palermitans 
 themselves were pleasant, hospitable, kind-hearted, and fond of 
 the English as brother islanders and the traditional freemen of 
 Europe ; and an honourable as well as an agreeable life could be 
 made beneath the shadow of Monte Pellegrino. He could not do 
 better, and he might do much worse. Accordingly he packed up 
 his lares and penates, parted with his homestead, and sailed over 
 the seas with his wife, his infant daughter Clarissa, and his pretty 
 young sister Helen — He’en of the golden hair and credulous heart 
 — and established himself as a permanent resident and landowner in 
 the fruitful tract lying between Monte Ouccio and the sea. 
 
 He lived about two miles or more out of the town in a pretty 
 villa in the Giardino Inglese — the Villa Clarissa, as it was called, 
 in gallant commemoration of his wife and little daughter, according 
 to the graceful Sicilian fashion. And his preservation from harm, 
 up to this day, was one of the standing marvels of the colony. He 
 had gone there at a time when brigands and mafiosi were assumed 
 to hold the fee-simple of all the land in and about Palermo ; when 
 no man who valued his life, his ears, or his liberty ventured 
 beyond a certain point in the Giardino Inglese on the one 
 side, and of the Marina on the other : when people asked him : 
 Was he mad to place himself so entirely out of the range of pro- 
 tection and civilisation P and, Was it not a tempting of Providence 
 to thus despise all ordinary precautions and the rules observed by 
 those who knew ? when those who went for their 1 villeggiatura f 
 to the villas round about went with their armed retainers as well 
 as their household goods, feeling that they carried their lives in 
 their hands and that they must be prepared to stand a siege and 
 make an effective defence if they would not incontinently lose 
 them ; when blood-curdling stories were told of this brigand chief’s 
 audacity and that brigand band’s brutality — stories circulating 
 from lip to lip, growing as they went, till the women shrieked if 
 so much as a beetle boomed by in his heavy flight through the 
 darkening air, and the men gathered together with pale cheeks and 
 flashing eyes, priming their matchlocks and whispering their plans 
 of defence, if only a mule stirred in his stall or a goat butted at 
 the closed door ; when the island was still under the heel of the 
 Bourbons, before Naples had freed herself from her yoke or 
 Garibaldi had come over the mountains to haul down King Bombas 
 flag and plant in its stead the gracious tricolour of Italia Una — 
 Italia Libera ! 
 
 He had gone out there at a time of general social disorder and 
 political discontent, and every one prophesied that he would either 
 be shot in his own vineyard or carried off to the mountains, to 
 
86 IONE. 
 
 arrive piecemeal to his friends unless a ruinous and impossible 
 ransom were forthcoming. 
 
 But Ralph Stewart, sometime Captain in the Engineers, merely 
 laughed when the croakers mapped out his doom ; for all answer 
 to their prophecies and remonstrances saying curtly : 4 1 am not 
 afraid ' — upheld by that odd British pride of courage as well as 
 obtuseness of imagination, which refuses to fear and is unable to 
 recognise danger. 
 
 As the family had not been shot, nor carried off to the moun- 
 tains, nor in any other way molested by those mysterious and 
 ubiquitous beings who were to the popular imagination what 
 ghosts are to the timid, they were looked on with a certain respect 
 by the rest of the community, and regarded as modern Achillides 
 — of whom, however, the vulnerable part had not yet been found. 
 But it was there and some day it would be touched. Brigands 
 and mafiosi were facts, they said ; and why should one man only, 
 and he a foreigner, have the secret of immunity P 
 
 There were not wanting some who gave it as their private 
 opinion — said below their breath — that Captain Stewart was 
 himself a mafiose, and so far in league with the brigands who 
 hung like a cloud on the horizon of life, in that he paid them 
 black-mail to keep them quiet and himself safe. The want of proof 
 did not vitiate the hypothesis. Certain folk who go to Sicily are 
 so resolute to find brigands and the mafiosi wherever they turn, the 
 only thing to do is to give them their heads and let them career over 
 the fields of superstitious fancy at their will. Their belief may be 
 no more real than those garments woven out of air with which the 
 shivering king sought to cover his nakedness ; but what of that? 
 Belief has always been grandly independent of proof, and 
 faith in the power of evil has ever been omnipotent with men. 
 Let those who like it believe if they will that all Palermo 
 is mafiose ; that their best friends are mafiosi, who will sell 
 them to the Leone of the day with no more remorse than if 
 they were so many heads of cattle or boxes of oranges ; that 
 their physician and their guarda-porta, the police and the peasantry, 
 the servants and the shopkeepers, the nobles themselves, and, above 
 all, the street-coachmen, are all of this vague, all-pervading, and 
 intangible society, and that those who deny these wide-spread 
 ramifications are the most mafiose of all. It was what they said 
 of Captain Stewart, because he lived two miles out of Palermo, 
 and had not been captured, nor killed — what nine-tenths of the 
 colony believed and said boldly, and the other tenth repeated with 
 disclaimers of a half-hearted kind. And yet, for all the exaggera- 
 tion created by superstition and terror, the mafia existed then as it 
 exists now, and you do hold the hand of a mafiose in yours with 
 no more consciousness of your friend’s affiliation than you have of 
 the day of his death, or of your own. And Captain Stewart 
 cherished in his own household a member of this strange and 
 
IN THE SUNNY SOUTH 87 
 
 secret society, to whose good-will he owed more than he either 
 suspected or perceived. 
 
 Mafiose for his own part, as some said him to he, or as free 
 from complicity as from crime, as said others — whether owing his 
 security to judicious payments made by driblets to obviate the 
 necessity of a future ransom in a lump, or protected by his own 
 courage, and the good luck that follows on conduct — however that 
 might be, Captain Stewart managed to live at peace with all men, 
 and to enjoy life as much as an Englishman of active habits and 
 broken career can enjoy it in a country where the ‘dolce far 
 niente ’ takes the rank of a science, and Nature herself discourages 
 industry and discredits energy. He had a garden which was his 
 delight, and wherein he grew every flower and shrub and tree 
 which the soil would nourish and the ardent sun permit to live. 
 He had an orange-garden too, whence he drew part of his income, 
 and where he grew such fruit as was scarcely to be had elsewhere. 
 He had a mill where he ground his own and other people’s corn, 
 and where he made a profit on his labour when the grist-tax was 
 imposed. 
 
 He had a clump of olives which gave him oil ; a patch of ‘ fichi 
 dTndia ’ which gave him fruit for his own family and a surplus for 
 the market : a vineyard which gave him wine — and excellent wine 
 too ; and he lived a quiet, useful, half-patriarchal life, much 
 respected by the many, mortally feared by the few ; with the 
 whispered w ord ‘ Mafiose ’ as the echo to his name, but with 
 open honour from all men — and from none more than from 
 those who most affected to believe him so far an annuity to the 
 brigands. . 
 
 His own men at once loved and feared, respected and dreaded, 
 him. For though even-tempered for the most part, as became one 
 who thought self-control the essential element of moral manhood, 
 he was both furious and implacable when fully roused ; and those 
 in his employ were wont to say that they venerated him as a 
 saint and dreaded him as a devil. What they were always forced 
 to add was that, saint or devil, placid or furious, he was ever just, 
 and his word was to be relied on. 
 
 It was this quality of justice, this absolute trustworthiness, 
 which gave him his hold over the men. They cheated him in 
 little things, but were loyal to him in great matters; and his 
 comparative obtuseness, springing as it did from the large noble- 
 ness of his nature, caused their moral respect, if it carried with 
 it their intellectual contempt. 
 
 ‘ The padrone is a fool/ they used to say among themselves; 
 6 but he is an angel as well/ 
 
 To which once the head man, Vincenzo, a sharp-witted fellow, 
 answered carelessly : 6 Fools make the best angels. It is the 
 devil who has the brains.’ 
 
 Which daring speech, coupled with other things characteristic 
 
S8 
 
 IONE. 
 
 of Vincenzo, terrified the more superstitious of the household, and 
 got him increased influence in the place where already he had 
 too much. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 BY NATURE AND DY ADOPTION. 
 
 The Stewart family at this time consisted of the Captain and his 
 wife ; their daughter, a little over twenty-three years of age ; 
 and a girl two years younger — -just lately come to her majority 
 — whom they called their adopted daughter and treated in all 
 outward matters as they treated their own. They had taken 
 her, they said, as a companion for Clarissa ; as it w T as not 
 well for a child to grow up without a playmate of her own 
 age and sex, to teach her unselfishness by sharing with her the 
 cares of the elders and the love of the world. But who this 
 child was — who were her father and mother beyond the vague 
 designation of ‘ friends of Captain Stewart’s’ — what was her real 
 name, birth, or nationality — remained a profound mystery to 
 everyone save Captain and Mrs. Stewart themselves. The 
 Englishmen of the colony called her Miss lone; the Palermitans, 
 ‘ la bella Signorina;’ Clarissa clipped her name to Nony, and 
 Captain Stewart to Io ; but his wife, to whom familiarities were 
 an abomination savouring of democracy and barmaids, always 
 called her lone, with all the letters carefully pronounced. Some- 
 times, when she spoke of her in private to her husband, she 
 said, ‘ that poor girl,’ or ‘that unfortunate child.’ 
 
 Mrs. Stewart treated this girl whom she had adopted as her 
 own with a certain gentle but persistent coldness, which seemed 
 like the chronic displeasure of a kind-hearted woman, without 
 active ill-will for the one part but immovable in her prejudices 
 for the other. She did not wish to show that she resented the 
 child’s presence here among them, as in truth she did : nor yet did 
 she wish to be unkind. Nor was she, according to her lights. 
 She, like her husband, was always quite just to lone. So much 
 must be conceded for truth’s sake. In the girlish quarrels which 
 necessarily arose between the two children, Mrs. Stewart was 
 careful to keep the balance exactly even ; giving the blame where 
 it was due — if anything indeed, more inclined to blame her own 
 than that other. But justice is not love ; and lone used to feel 
 that she would rather have had the scolding and the love than 
 this icy justice which ‘gave her reason,’ but denied her affection. 
 She lived on the outside of the family life, so far as love and 
 confidence went ; and as in her childhood vaguely, so now in her 
 
BY NATURE AND BY ADOPTION. 89 
 
 girlhood was she keenly, conscious that she was an unwelcome, 
 albeit, it was to be supposed voluntarily, adopted member of the 
 household. She knew that she was not Clarissa’s real sister, and 
 that Captain and Mrs. Stewart, whom she had been taught to call 
 papa and mamma, were her parents by adoption only, not by the 
 grace and gift of nature. Whose child she was — who were her 
 true father and mother — was the one secret which she could not 
 prevail on them to divulge. Nor did Clarissa know ; else in all 
 probability the confidence of their state and age would have made 
 the secret of the one the open possession of the other. 
 
 Since she had wakened up to conscious mental life, lone had had 
 two great desires — that of knowing who were her parents, and 
 that of leaving the home where she was sheltered but not cherished. 
 She longed to know herself and to be with her own ; and she 
 longed to be free from an obligation which pressed upon her like 
 an intolerable burden, and which she felt was as onerous to these 
 others as to her. If she could but make her own living independent 
 of all aid ! But how P She could do nothing that would give 
 her only the elementary ‘piatto di maccherone’ a day. She was 
 too indolent to give herself up to earnest study and really hard 
 brain work. For all her electric force, she burnt herself out in 
 impatient desire of, rather than in steady preparation for, the 
 freedom she so ardently craved. She had learned nothing 
 thoroughly and not very much even superficially. Music was the 
 art wherein she had touched the highest level ; but that highest 
 level was a very modest altitude at the best, and she could neither 
 have played in public nor have taught in private. For the rest 
 she was nowhere. In matters of moral speculation — that region 
 of thought known by the name of 6 opinions’ — she put her 
 intellect into forming judgments without knowledge. She adopted 
 only the one side, and refused to consider the other ; liking to 
 ‘ think things out of herself/ as she used to say, rather than to 
 learn from experience or to be guided by better knowledge. It was 
 the easiest thing to do. It gave life more colour, by reason of the 
 normal attitude of opposition in which she held herself. It 
 strengthened in her that sense of isolation and martyrdom by 
 which she made herself unpleasant and the others uncomfortable ; 
 and it widened the distance already by the nature of things 
 separating her from her pseudo family. 
 
 With this impatience with things as they were and inability to 
 work herself clear of them, there was but small chance of her 
 marrying. She had no marriage portion ; for Clarissa’s was too 
 small to divide ; and naturally in this their own came first with 
 the father and mother who had shared all else. lone was not 
 much liked by the English colony ; and Italians do not take kindly 
 to dowerless wives. They adored her to a man, here in Palermo ; 
 but a portionless bride did not come into their ordering of social 
 
90 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 life, and tliey could only look and long and sigh, and pass by like 
 erotic Levites on the other side. How then could she leave this 
 home which was her prison ? — this beautiful island which was her 
 rock of exile P — these caretakers who were not her parents and 
 whom she counted as her gaolers ? Failing the god coming down 
 from the skies to carry her off, a second Europa, a gladder Proser- 
 pine, a more fortunate Psyche — failing the deliverer who would 
 be to her what Perseus was to Andromeda, the consoler who 
 would be to her what Dionysos was to Ariadne — it seemed un- 
 likely that she would be rescued or relieved ; and patience was the 
 weary lesson set her by pain to learn. 
 
 As for the sister whom Captain Stewart had brought over with 
 him when he first came, she had remained with them a couple of 
 years only. The climate did not suit her, and she had left rather 
 hurriedly. A few months after her departure the family went 
 into mourning, for poor foolish credulous Aunt Helen was dead ; 
 and the Captain went to England to bury her. She had been 
 but a shadow crossing the field of the Stewart history, as transacted 
 at Palermo ; but more than one thought of her with pleasure and 
 remembered her with regret. Even to this day the image of ‘ la 
 bella Elena ’ was in some sense a sacred memory to one to whom 
 little in heaven or earth beside was sacred. Who that one was 
 Ralph never knew. There were some secrets which Helen could 
 not keep, but this she did to the day of her death. She had trans- 
 lated the old phrase: ‘Not wisely, but too well,’ to her own 
 enduring sorrow ; but at least she kept the clue close hidden, and 
 the robber who had despoiled her was never known. Indeed, like 
 those cunning birds which lure the seeker after their nests far 
 away from where they lay close to his feet, Helen contrived to 
 throw suspicion on a passing stranger, who had come and gone 
 and vanished into darkness, the more thoroughly to divert it 
 from that handsome and penniless young Prince whose morals 
 were as loose as his pedigree was exalted. Penniless as he was, 
 with an income which gave him just one room ; a balcony for a 
 few pots of flowers and his chair, whence he could survey all that 
 passed, and be seen of all passers ; enough wine and maccaroni for 
 his simple sustenance ; a good coat for ‘ la societa,’ and a carriage 
 for the evening drive — marriage for reparation was out of the 
 question ; and the weaker had to bear the burden. Helen was 
 self-betrayed, but the Prince was both undiscovered and un- 
 suspected : and for his own part he took care never to show the 
 Englishman that tress of golden hair which he kept in his desk, 
 along with some others, and labelled ‘ La bella Elena.’ Also, as 
 time went on, he took care not to show anything like especial 
 interest in lone as she grew up under his eyes, and nature revealed 
 to him the secret which the Stewarts thought no living man 
 divined — as indeed how should any ? 
 
BY NATURE AND BY ADOPTION. 
 
 91 
 
 But what Captain and Mrs. Stewart themselves did not even 
 suspect, the Prince’s own friends knew from end to end, and kept 
 as religiously as if it had been a Carbonari oath, or a mafiose sign. 
 If in Italy ‘ tutto si dice, tutto si sa,’ the saying holds good for 
 Italians only. We foreigners do not participate ; and our concerns 
 are discussed, our secrets are told before our eyes, while we see no 
 more than if we were stone-blind. As now, in this matter of 
 lone’s parentage, of which the Stewart’s knew only half the truth, 
 and the Prince and all his friends the whole. 
 
 Among these friends was his own nephew Vincenzo ; the same 
 who, not having even his uncle’s pittance, and being thus forced 
 to work for his daily bread, had taken service under the Captain, 
 and was now the head man of the mill, and the most trusted of 
 all the ‘ impiegati 1 at the Villa Clarissa. 
 
 The two Stewart girls were equally pretty, so that it was not 
 from jealousy that the father and mother thrust lone on the edge 
 of the family nest and kept her on the outskirts of the family life 
 and love. Indeed some would have said, as the Stewarts naturally 
 thought, that Clarissa was the prettier of the two. It all depended 
 on the individual taste and amount of artistic perception possessed 
 by the critic, which was the more admired. But artistic percep- 
 tion is not a certain quantity, and taste cannot be proved like an 
 algebraic equation ; and those who upheld the supremacy of the 
 one had always a margin left whereon to record the claims of the 
 other. The verdict was never more than one of comparative 
 degrees of praise, which left no more room for condemnation than 
 for bitterness. 
 
 Both girls were fair ; but this fairness was quite different in 
 character, the one from the other. Clarissa had that kind of 
 light brown hair which the French call ‘blonde cendrde’ — perfectly 
 smooth and glossy, and as soft as so much spun silk. It was fine, 
 long, thick, in every way creditable hair ; and to be counted as a 
 beauty, if not indeed taking rank as a minor moral virtue. It 
 was always carefully brushed and noticeably neat. It was obedient, 
 well-conditioned, well-trained hair — hair with never a line broken 
 nor a tress astray — hair which plaited to perfection, and which would 
 have enabled the girl to have played the part of Lady Godiva had 
 need been, when she unloosed those long thick coronals, so 
 neatly wound about her small smooth head, and let them fall in 
 a shining curtain almost to her feet. Everything was small and 
 round and smooth about Clarissa. Her head was small and smooth 
 and round ; so was her forehead ; so were her rose-leaf cheeks ; so 
 also was her nice little chin, like the half of an ivory ball with a 
 cleft in the middle. She had not an angle anywhere ; and she 
 was as soft as a well-stuffed satin pincushion, or a bird with all 
 its feathers puffed out. Her arched and somewhat indefinitely 
 marked eyebrows were of the same shade of brown as was her 
 
92 
 
 10NE. 
 
 hair; so were her eyelashes — these last being rather short and 
 thin. Her eyes were as blue as two big turquoise heads, whereof 
 the holes or pupils were patently small. Her nose was perhaps a 
 little too void of character, hut it was a nice nose on the whole, 
 with a good outline if a little unfinished about the small pinched 
 nostrils, which, however, were modestly opaque, and decently 
 impossible to dilate. The lips were like a couple of tight little 
 cherries with the dew still glistening on the shining crimson skin ; 
 the shape of the face was round ; the colour pure pink and white 
 — like a monthly rose steeped in milk ; and the figure which 
 belonged to that face was small, round, plump, and desirable. 
 
 In character Clarissa was an amiable little person, with no 
 inconvenient aspirations, no fiery passions, no unpleasant tempers, 
 and with a great many qualities which went well in the domestic 
 harness, where strong individuality is as difficult to manage as 
 vice in horses. She had almost as many friends as she had 
 acquaintances ; not a few lovers ; and not one enemy. The Sici- 
 lians liked and admired her, and the English had a kind of national 
 pride in her prettiness and amiability. She was one who would 
 never bring the national name into discredit, and who could be 
 quoted as a meritorious example of Anglo-Saxon blood and Anglo- 
 Saxon training. She might have been married scores of times 
 since her sixteenth birthday, and she had wished to have been 
 perhaps a dozen. But her parents had resolutely denied her to 
 all natives. They were English to the back-bone ; in the place 
 but not of it ; and they could not admit the idea of a son-in-law 
 who was not English like themselves. So, as none of the marriage- 
 able men in the English colony had as yet come forward, and only 
 Sicilians had demanded her hand, Clarissa Stewart was a flower 
 still ungathered, and the fairy prince who alone would be held 
 good enough for her had not yet appeared to claim her. 
 
 lone, too, was fair ; but how different was her tone from her 
 adopted sister’s well-regulated harmonies ! Tall and slender, she 
 had the supple grace of movement of a panther or a leopardess. 
 Her red-gold hair, which looked as if the sun had got entangled in 
 it, glistened like metal, but did not shine like silk. It fell no 
 lower than her shoulders, and was one mass of rebellious curls 
 and arbitrary, disobedient, unmanageable ends. No brushing could 
 make it smooth ; no fixature kept it straight ; no pins coniine it 
 long within bounds. Fasten it as she would, before half an hour 
 had passed it had set itself free from all its restraints, and had 
 broken into a turbulent kind of aureole about her head, and into a 
 mazy tangled curtain over her forehead, falling to her eyes. Those 
 vagrant hairpins were veritable apples of discord in the family ; 
 and on nothing was Mrs. Stewart more severe than on the sheaves 
 which she and Clarissa were always gathering up from the sofas 
 and the floors. 
 
BY NATURE AND BY ADOPTION 
 
 93 
 
 But what eyes they were which the broad white lids concealed, 
 and that rebellious fringe of hair overshadowed ! Green in some 
 lights ; hazel shot with orange in others ; sometimes angry as a 
 stormy night, then radiant as a sunny day ; sometimes with the 
 pupil dilated so that the iris was nothing but a line of yellowish 
 red ; and sometimes shown as a mere streak of glittering colour 
 from between the narrowed lids and long dark lashes — they were 
 eyes which spoke as eloquently as words. But they were eyes 
 which you could not look at steadily when they looked at you, for 
 the strange fascination which oppressed and the subtle domination 
 which overpowered. The brows above were thick and broad, and 
 as straight as if ruled by a line. They were many shades darker 
 than the hair, as were the long upturned lashes, which were like 
 spreading flower-rays about the lids. The nose was smaller than 
 Clarissa’s and not so well shaped in profile ; and the nostrils were 
 open, thin, transparent, palpitating — according to Mrs. Stewart, 
 almost indelicate. The lips were full and wide, but too pale for 
 perfect beauty ; and about the whole mouth was a look of cruelty, 
 which you saw at first sight and afterwards forgot. 
 
 The complexion was a low soft cream-colour, running into the 
 gold of the hair where this fringed the broad low brow and curled 
 in gracious little rings about the nape of the neck ; and the skin 
 was thicker than Clarissa’s. It had none of that rose-leaf bloom, 
 that clear transparency, that pretty tracery of blue veins, like a 
 finely-lined network under the fair flesh, which were such marked 
 features with the elder girl. Neither was it skin that blushed 
 under excitement, whether of pain or pleasure. On the contrary, 
 it had the trick of turning pale when anything touched the heart, 
 stirred the imagination, or woke the slightly slumbering passions 
 of the girl whose nature was like nothing so much as that grand 
 old mountain whose head they could see on clear days — that Etna 
 with its heart of fire ever ready to break forth in active storm and 
 desolating tempest. And that cream-white face which passion 
 turned to deathly pallor, those dilating nostrils and those flexible 
 pale lips, with the eyes which were apparently of all colours and 
 as changeful in expression as in hue, were more eloquent as 
 evidences of feeling than all Clarissa’s crimson flushes and tearful 
 or it might be dancing eyes, and red lips frankly pouting or as 
 frankly laughing. The face altogether was of the most beautiful 
 type of Saracenic-Sicilian ; and the colour was that strange warm 
 whiteness of one of a dark race, who has fallen by chance on amber 
 for pearl, and on ivory for milk. It was something entirely sui 
 generis, and could scarcely be classified ; but it was a face which 
 once seen could never be forgotten, and which you would either 
 love or hate, admire or shrink from, according to your own idiosyn- 
 crasies. 
 
 The hands were large, white, well-shaped, with long taper 
 
94 
 
 IONE. 
 
 fingers, transparent nails, and a flattened, rather hard, and 
 always burning palm. Clarissa’s were round, pink, soft, small, 
 dimpled, and always moist. Though lone’s hands were beautiful 
 in shape, few people admired them, and no one could perhaps say 
 why. Certainly an adept in palmistry had once said roughly : 
 ‘ They are cruel ! ’ But even Mrs. Stewart had put her disclaimer 
 on this, though Clarissa had looked grave as if there were some- 
 thing in it, and Captain Stewart had glanced up sharply from be- 
 neath his eyebrows, with one of those searching looks of his which 
 few people could bear unmoved. 
 
 lone was one of those few. Looking first at the hand-reader, 
 and then at her adopted father, she said, in her hardest and most 
 defiant way : 
 
 4 Yes, that is quite true. I could be as cruel as anything you 
 like — as a tigress if you like — if I had reason to be so — if anyone 
 wronged me or one I loved.’ 
 
 ‘Do not give yourself a worse character than you deserve, 
 lone,’ said Mrs. Stewart, gravely ; while Clarissa added quickly : 
 
 ‘ I believe you could be, Nony, as cruel as a tigress, as you say, if 
 you were roused ; ’ and Captain Stewart asked in his lazy way : 
 * What kind of wrong, Io ? ’ 
 
 6 Anything that interfered with my rights,’ she said. 
 
 ‘ Your rights ! ’ said Mrs. Stewart, with weak sarcasm. 
 
 * Have I none, mamma,’ asked the girl. ‘ Am I not like 
 every one else P Have I no rights like the rest ? ’ 
 
 4 Who has any, Io ? ’ asked Captain Stewart. ‘ Our rights are 
 only those which we can win and hold for ourselves. They do 
 not come by nature.’ 
 
 ‘ Yes, they do,’ said lone, doggedly. ‘ We all have some rights. 
 We have the right to live and to be loved,’ she added boldly; ‘and 
 the right to the constancy of those whom we love.’ 
 
 6 Not a very profitable subject for a girl to discuss, lone, nor a 
 very lady-like sentiment at any time,’ said Mrs. Stewart, coldly ; 
 and the conversation dropped, after lone had fired off, as her 
 parting shot : ‘ It is not improper, mamma, because it is natural ; 
 and I do not care whether it is lady-like or not — it is true.’ 
 
 Here, then, was the central point of lone’s character and the 
 core of her discontent — her craving for that love which she held 
 to be her right and which she knew that she did not possess ; and 
 the fiery jealousy, the arbitrary tyranny of possession, which 
 burnt in her heart like a consuming flame. 
 
 As a last contrast, it may be said that lone looked as if the 
 abounding fulness of life, the all-pervading electricity that possessed 
 her, would have made her energetic, restless, and as impatient of 
 inactivity as she was of restraint. But in habit she was silent, 
 inactive, indolent ; while Clarissa, who had no such reserve-fund 
 of latent force, was talkative, good-natured, mildly energetic, and 
 
BY NATURE AND BY ADOPTION. 
 
 95 
 
 notably industrious. Without lone’s natural intelligence, she had 
 more application; and though her thoughts were like birds with 
 broken wings, unable to rise from the ground of everyday life, 
 while lone’s went careering into space, bold and fearless in their 
 flight, still the one were as those useful fowl which lay eggs and 
 serve the family table, while the other were as eagles which keep 
 the flocks and broods in fear, and the appearance of which is ever 
 a signal for defence and opposition. The practical result was that 
 Clarissa knew three things to lone’s one, and was by far the more 
 agreeable, the more useful, and the better informed of the two. 
 
 This, then, was the family to whom Armine St. Claire, taking 
 with him his letter of introduction from Edward Formby, set out 
 one afternoon to leave that and his card, wondering what fortune 
 would befall him after. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 VILLA CLAEISSA. 
 
 It was more like the set scene of an opera than anything of real 
 life — prosaic, unpicturesque, humdrum, as we know it in our 
 practical old land of coal-fires and east-winds. The broad double 
 flight of steps, lozenge shaped, leading on the outside to the 
 i piano nobile ; 9 the fountain in the court below, where the boy 
 ever bestrode the dolphin and the dolphin ever spouted water that 
 made rainbows in the sun ; the statues in the niches ; winter 
 though it was according to the solstice, the verdure of the ever- 
 greens, and the scent of English spring and early summer flowers, 
 which mocked the seasons and deranged all the ordering of the 
 zodiac ; the bougainvillea flushing the walls and the Banksia roses 
 shedding their petals over the heliotrope and mignonnette ; the 
 pigeons cooing on the roof ; the peacocks screaming in the garden ; 
 the two pretty girls standing by the fountain in the sun — the 
 taller erect, holding a canary on her finger, while the shorter, 
 bending so as to bring her face in line with the bird, chirped and 
 held out her hand to coax the creature to herself ; the big dogs 
 lying on the gravel ; a bright-eyed, dark-skinned, bare-footed boy 
 laughing and showing his teeth, as he watched this little drama 
 with the familiarity of a slave whom no indulgence can lift out of 
 his servile condition — all was so strange, so beautiful, so unlike 
 the life of winter either in France or England, that Armine halted 
 at the gate to look at this living picture as he might have looked 
 at an operatic mise en scene , loath to ring the bell which was to 
 give him ingress and bring him back to real life. 
 
96 
 
 10NE. 
 
 How beautiful those two girls were, each in her own way ; yet 
 how unlike was the one from the other! That tall, slender, 
 graceful creature was dressed like a sixteenth-century picture — 
 her colours old-gold and green. The shorter was of more correct 
 modern intention, but her rather hard blue gown looked like a 
 topy of metropolitan fashions made by a local milliner who had 
 more confidence in her ideas than diffidence in her method. And 
 Armine, as became the woman-worshipper he was, had keen eyes 
 for all the details of feminine adornment and attire. A high frill 
 about her throat, slashed sleeves, and a girdle round her waist, 
 made that tall girl like a memory rather than a present fact ; and 
 something in her face seemed to take her back to the ages of long- 
 ago, as if she had been Catherine de Medicis before she had felt 
 her power and learned to sin, or Lucrezia Borgia with her fair 
 hair glistening in the sun, and the dread qualities of that Aqua 
 Tofana as yet unproved. 13 ut her companion, all over little ‘ kilt- 
 ings ’ and superfluous bows of ribbons, was emphatically of the 
 present day — as far removed from crime as from poetry, from 
 tragedy as from heroism. 
 
 Armine watched them for a few seconds, and saw, with a cer- 
 tain odd satisfaction, that the bird did not leave the hand of the 
 one for all the invitation of the other. It fluttered its golden wings 
 and chirped back its cheery note of refusal; then finally flew up to 
 the shoulder of the one who seemed to be its mistress, as if to end 
 by a decisive protest a scene of unwelcome temptation. 
 
 ‘ You little darling !’ said the girl in a caressing voice, taking 
 the bird off her shoulder and pressing it against her face with fond- 
 ness. Then a fierce light blazed up into her eyes as she said in a 
 curiously harsh voice : ‘But I would have killed you if you had 
 left me ! 1 
 
 1 For shame, Nony ! you jealous, passionate, cruel thing ! 1 said 
 the shorter girl with temper. 
 
 On which St. Claire rang the bell, and a shuffling old woman, 
 whom he had not seen crouching on the ground inside the gate, 
 slowly raised herself, like an animated bundle of rags, and drew 
 the bolt to let him pass. 
 
 As he entered, she furtively crossed herself and spat on the 
 ground. This stranger, with his soft, dark, melancholy eyes, pale 
 face and clear-cut handsome features — so like the pictures of the 
 Christ in all but the traditional colouring, that even old Concetta 
 saw the resemblance — he was only a heretic like the rest, and one 
 whose baleful influence had to be exorcised by the divine grace of 
 holy saints in heaven. 
 
 Both girls turned to look at the visitor ; and then Clarissa ran 
 into the house to warn her mother, as girls of a certain stamp 
 always do. But lone stood her ground, looking at the new-comer 
 from under her dropped lids while seeming to be apparently occu- 
 
VILLA CLARISSA . 
 
 97 
 
 pied only with her bird. As he came nearer she raised her head 
 and opened her eyes on him with a sudden, swift, and almost 
 dazzling flash, which made him feel as if he had been lightly struck 
 across his eyes. 
 
 Standing there like some fearless creature of the woods and 
 wilds at gaze, nothing on earth could have been more unlike 
 Monica Barrington than was this slender girl, with her flashing 
 eyes and panther-like grace, her strange commingling of Eastern 
 modelling with Western colouring, her look of lightly slumbering 
 and easily awakened passion, of desperate resolve when roused, of 
 jealous tenacity when won. But to those who are in love every- 
 thing is like the beloved. Art is the symbol, nature the garment; 
 all charm has the same savour, all beauty bears the same impress ; 
 life and eternity are interpenetrated with the one thought, the one 
 spirit, and love transforms to itself every circumstance and every 
 association. 
 
 Something, he knew not what, in the pose, the lines of the girl 
 before him, perhaps in the colour of her gown, perhaps in the way 
 in which she held her head, her hand — something, no matter what 
 — reminded Armine of Monica; and that sweet dreamy face, as he 
 saw it when they had met in the garden and understood each 
 other only too plainly, seemed to look at him through lone’s, like 
 a spirit faintly outlined in the moonlight, or like that moon itself 
 when hanging like a cloud in the daylight sky. This strange mix- 
 ture of the East and West — this woman with her panther-like 
 grace and flashing eyes, who involuntarily suggested Lucrezia 
 Borgia and Catherine de Medicis — also reminded him of that mild 
 and tender lily-lady, with whom dreams stood for realities and 
 regret was the strongest form of passion. 
 
 Love parts with no fantasies. Once created, they remain till 
 they crystallize by repetition. No one on the outside ever knows 
 how much a sudden and apparently inexplicable liking for one is 
 due to this kind of vague resemblance to another. For after we 
 have gone through our first youth, when alone our emotions are 
 new and fresh, life ceases to be original, and love itself is more 
 often repetition, remembrance, suggestion, than deliberate choice 
 of irresistible sympathy. 
 
 Her eyes, still wide open, with that strange electric light within 
 them as they looked into his — soft, tender, humid, loving, because 
 full of the thought of Monica — lone took two steps to meet St. 
 Claire, as he, still shaken by his strange confusion of perception 
 and remembrance, went slowly forward to where she stood. 
 
 ‘Do you want papa P — Captain Stewart?’ she asked in English. 
 
 Her voice was penetrating and vibrating, but neither musical 
 nor sympathetic. 
 
 ‘ I came to leave my card and a letter of introduction,’ said 
 Armine, with a slight smile. 
 
 n 
 
98 
 
 TONE. 
 
 The abrupt directness of her address, at once so graceful and so 
 unconventional, roused him from himself and interested him. 
 
 ‘ What letter ? ’ she asked. 
 
 ‘ From a friend of his and mine — Edward Formby,’ he answered. 
 
 ‘ Then you had better come into the house/ said lone. ‘ It will 
 give papa less trouble than if you leave your card and he has to 
 go into Palermo to find you out, as people generally do. Come 
 with me.’ 
 
 ‘ Thank you,’ said St. Claire, with pleasure. 
 
 At this moment a swarthy, Moorish, almost negroid-looking 
 man, with glittering eyes, a fiat nose, protruding jaw and high 
 cheek-bones, passed with a lounging kind of step under the arcade 
 formed by the double flight of steps. He came apparently from 
 nowhere, rounding the angle of the house like a shadow, as dark 
 and as noiseless. He was not barefooted, like the boy, but his 
 shoes were of some soft material which deadened the sound of his 
 footsteps so that he made no more noise than a cat creeping by the 
 wall. 
 
 4 Vincenzo ! where is papa P ’ asked lone, in Sicilian. 
 
 ‘At the mill, Signorina/ he answered, uncovering his head and 
 showing a shock of curly twisted hair, of the same quality as her 
 own, but dead-black where hers was living gold. 
 
 ‘Ask him to come to the house,’ said lone. ‘An English gentle- 
 man has a letter from a friend, and wants to see him.’ 
 
 She spoke in a curt abrupt way, without the faintest pretence 
 of courtesy; but the man was respectful to servility, and smiled as 
 if the very insolence of her bearing conferred on him favour and 
 honour. All the same, his eyes were bold, and seemed to take her 
 in too completely for a servant — to express too much admiration — 
 to confess her womanhood too openly — in view of the different 
 positions in which they stood and the respect due from him and 
 owing to her. So at least it seemed to St. Claire. But then he 
 did not understand Italian eyes ; and lone, who was evidently 
 haughty enough for a young queen, did not seem to see what he 
 saw, and certainly not to resent what half-annoyed him. 
 
 ‘ Come up to the drawing-room,’ she then said to Armine. ‘ You 
 can see mamma till papa comes from the mill.’ 
 
 ‘ Thank you,’ repeated St. Claire, thinking the whole affair 
 somewhat of an adventure and more than pleasant. His fancy 
 and imagination both were excited, and the gentle kind of artistry, 
 which was one of his characteristics, had food enough in the girl, 
 the scene, the circumstances — ail of which were so novel and so 
 beautiful, so stimulating and so suggestive. 
 
 He followed lone up the wide double flight of steps into a lofty 
 hall, with frescoed walls, painted ceiling, and smooth blue shining 
 tiles for the marbled paper, uneventful whitewash, and moss- 
 patterned carpets of home ; through several rooms of unspecified 
 
VILLA CLARISSA. 
 
 99 
 
 character ; and so to the last of all — a pretty drawing-room, filled 
 with flowers and pictures, English books and English ornaments, 
 and yet for all these national addenda, not like an English room of 
 native growth. 
 
 It was less luxurious and more brightly coloured ; less complete 
 in its conditions and more scattered in its arrangement ; evidently 
 more adapted as a refuge from the heat of the day than as a com- 
 fortable retreat in the long dark winter evenings. And such home 
 circumstances as were retained had somehow a transplanted look, 
 as if out of place, and not in harmony with the true genius loci. 
 Still, it was more home-like than the hotel. 
 
 Here sat Mrs. Stewart, a fair, plump, not to say obese, little 
 woman, like Clarissa grown older, with tints of blue and yellow 
 for the pure overlay of milk and roses, and fully completed circles 
 for the younger woman’s slighter curves. But, unlike Clarissa, a 
 discontented expression was stereotyped on her round face, as if 
 she were one who had been hardly dealt with by fate and who 
 could not forget her griefs. It might be that she was unhappy 
 because she was in delicate health ; because her husband had been 
 obliged to leave his place and all the social consideration that went 
 with it ; because she had had no son to inherit ; or because she 
 was discontented with her servants. Chi lo sa P Whatever the 
 cause, the result was .undeniable; she was evidently a woman 
 with a grievance, who pitied herself and protested, impotent to 
 prevent. 
 
 But she was gentle if fretful, and especially kind to those of 
 her compatriots who brought letters of introduction from England. 
 She had never really taken to the Sicilians ; and her hospitality to 
 her own was partly because of her want of affection for those who 
 were not her own. 
 
 Such as she was, she received Dr. St. Claire with cordiality, 
 and expressed her pleasure at seeing a friend of her husbands 
 friend, Edward Formby ; whom, however, she knew only by name, 
 and of whom she asked innumerable questions, after the manner 
 of those to whom personal details are the most interesting things 
 in life. She had a trick of sighing and casting up her eyes when 
 she spoke, which was not conducive to cheerfulness ; and she had 
 always that queer self-pitying air which has been noted above. 
 The contrast between her exuberance of physical outline and per- 
 sistent melancholy of manner was almost comical from its incon- 
 gruity and misfitting oddity, and the first questions which every 
 one asked about Mrs. Stewart were: What is the matter with her? 
 and, Why is she so unhappy? 
 
 Presently Captain Stewart came in. A tall, lean, angular man, 
 with a quiet manner, a slow utterance, a monotonous voice, speak- 
 ing little, generally resting in sloping, lazy attitudes, on slight 
 acquaintance he might have passed for indolent and apathetic ; 
 
 H 2 
 
100 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 deeper knowledge revealed the dogged determination, inexhaustible 
 energy, and that quiet courage of the practical and unimagina- 
 tive nature which knows no fear and acknowledges no danger, 
 by which he had made his way and held it in Palermo during the 
 most lawless and disturbed times. The backbone of his character 
 was respect for himself, his caste, his country, his religion, branch- 
 ing out into illimitable contempt for all foreigners of every nation- 
 ality, and for all people of lower social grade than his own. 
 
 He was a man to whom those in his employ were always 
 ‘ those fellows/ and sometimes ‘ these ruffians of mine/ But he 
 did his duty by them for all that he looked on them as little better 
 than our ancestral savages, or our poor relations the apes. He 
 gave them hard words and good wages, and spent his strength in 
 trying, as he said, to hammer some kind of principle into them by 
 rebuke, exhortation, scorn, and honesty for his own part. He said 
 it was heartless work, and that he knew any one of them — even 
 Vincenzo — would buy and sell him before his eyes for sixpence ; 
 yes, even Vincenzo, the overseer at the mill, and the deepest of all 
 in his confidence and respect. 
 
 It is but fair to add that Captain Stewart would have said the 
 same of any working-men, English or other. It was not only 
 because they were foreigners that he despised them, but because 
 they were his social inferiors ; though certainly, being foreigners 
 did add a finer flavour to his disdain and made him ascribe to 
 nationality much that was due to human nature. For his patriot- 
 ism was of that robustly ideal kind which consists in calling every 
 kind of trickiness and vice ‘ un-English so that, to be English 
 was, according to him, to possess all the virtues in a lump while 
 alien to all the vices — to be one of a nation where every man is 
 honest, brave, pure-hearted, and true, and every woman unselfish, 
 tender, domestic, and chaste. 
 
 If this w^as his state of mind with respect to his servants and 
 workmen, he was no more liberal to the gentry. For it was part 
 of his very constitution to believe that no man out of England 
 understood more than the first rudiments of refinement or morality, 
 and, seeing that he held all differences as evidences of our supe- 
 riority and the inferiority of those others, the balance was never 
 in want of a weight and the register had always some deficiency to 
 record. 
 
 ‘ Glad to see you/ he said to St. Claire, as he came into the 
 room with that long slow stride which on a mountain-side we call 
 ‘slogging/ ‘Glad to see any friend of Formby’s/ he added, 
 glancing at the letter which Armine had sent him by Vincenzo, 
 and which he held open in his hand. ‘How long have you been 
 here ? and how long do you stay? ’ he continued, subsiding into a 
 chair where he sat all askew, with his long legs thrust out in two 
 straight parallel lines, like a flying stork’s. 
 
VILLA CLARISSA. 
 
 lot 
 
 1 1 have been here about three weeks, and I stay till April/ 
 answered Armine. 
 
 ‘ And then make the giro ? 9 
 
 ‘ Yes ; then I go round the island.’ 
 
 ‘The usual thing!’ said Captain Stewart, with a satirical smile. 
 c All you tourist fellows do the same thing — like mill horses.’ 
 
 He forgot the time when he had been a tourist fellow himself 
 and had gone the round like the rest. But then that was in the 
 old days, when visitors to Sicily were scarce ; and our own expe- 
 rience is always respectable, where that of others is ridiculous. 
 
 ‘ I suppose we do. We all have naturally the same wish to see 
 Girgenti and Syracuse ; and as the circumstances are invariable 
 and the places immovable, we must follow in each other’s foot- 
 steps/ answered Armine, with simplicity of self-defence, not mean- 
 ing a snub. 
 
 lone lifted her eyelids and half-smiled as she glanced rapidly 
 at the new-comer. She was the only one who caught the snub ; 
 but then she was the only one on the look-out for stings, and 
 undutifullv rejoiced when they came. 
 
 ‘And what have you done since you came P ’ continued Captain 
 Stewart. ‘ Seen the chapel, of course, and Monreale ? ’ 
 
 ‘Yes; I have pretty well done the city and environs/ said 
 Armine, falling into the trick of tongue common to sightseers. 
 
 6 And now you are tired of stones and want society, eh ? ’ 
 
 1 1 suppose so/ said St. Claire, smiling. 
 
 ‘I see you look peaky, and Formbv says you have broken 
 down/ said Captain Stewart, again referring to his letter as to a 
 brief. ‘ The air here will set you to rights in no time, and we will 
 pull you straight if you go wrong.’ 
 
 ‘ Thank you,’ said Armine, looking at Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 ‘ How do you like Palermo, Dr. St. Claire ? ’ asked that lady 
 with a sigh. 
 
 6 Greatly/ he answered. 
 
 She looked at him with a plaintive smile to match her hus- 
 band’s satirical one ; Clarissa turned on him a beaming face, as if 
 he had advocated her cause ; and lone again r ised her strange 
 eyes with that sudden flash which dazzled and bewildered him, and 
 seemed like a light blow across his own eyes. 
 
 ‘ It is a pretty place — for a short time/ said Mrs. Stewart, in 
 the tone of one mahing a generous concession. 
 
 ‘ Terribly behind-hand and dead-alive/ put in her husband. 
 
 ‘ The scenery is beautiful, and some of the architecture is very 
 fine/ said Armine. 
 
 ‘ Which don’t make up for the want of energy, honesty, and 
 progress/ drawled the Captain. 
 
 ‘ You have been here for many years, have you not ? ’ asked St. 
 Claire. 
 
102 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 Mrs. Stewart looked forlorn and oppressed. 
 
 4 Ah, yes ! ’ she said, in the tone of a German who murmurs 
 * Ach Himmel ! ’ 
 
 4 Worse luck, yes/ said Captain Stewart, shrugging his shoul- 
 ders, hut speaking with philosophic cheerfulness. 
 
 4 Poor dear Palermo, I am sure it is very nice ! ’ said Clarissa, 
 affectionately. 
 
 4 England is nicer/ said lone, abruptly. 
 
 4 My dear child, how do you know P ’ asked Mrs. Stewart with 
 melancholy remonstrance. 4 You have never been in England — 
 how can you form any opinion of its merits P 9 
 
 4 1 know it is/ answered lone, tenaciously. 
 
 4 Io is about right for once/ said Captain Stewart ; and St. 
 Claire smiled his assent. 
 
 4 Yes/ he said : 4 if we have not the beautiful skies and flowers 
 of Sicily, we have some other things which are perhaps more 
 valuable and more essential to the well-being of a nation.’ 
 
 4 Of course we have ! 9 said lone triumphantly, identifying 
 herself with the cradle wherein she had never laid her curly 
 head. 
 
 4 Just so/ said Captain Stewart, approvingly, accustomed for 
 his own part to these common-places. 4 That is where the whole 
 thing lies.’ 
 
 4 Yes/ sighed Mrs. Stewart; and 4 Yes’ repeated St. Claire for 
 chorus. 
 
 4 But the climate,’ objected Clarissa, with a little shudder. 
 ‘ There is no sun in England, and it is always raining.’ 
 
 4 Oh ! the climate is absurdly exaggerated/ said Captain Stewart. 
 f Take the good with the bad, all round, there are many worse 
 climates than that of Old England.’ 
 
 4 There are more days in a year when a man can be out of doors 
 without inconvenience — more hours in the week when he can work 
 . — than in any other country in Europe/ said St. Claire. 
 
 4 It is a grand country, and it is free ! ’ exclaimed lone, with 
 sudden enthusiasm. 
 
 4 My dear child, how can you possibly know ? ’ returned Mrs. 
 Stewart, again reproving. 
 
 4 1 do know/ answered lone, as she had answered before. 
 
 4 Perhaps it is too free/ said Clarissa, with a little laugh. 
 
 4 That is impossible,’ said lone. 
 
 4 No, lone, that is very possible. And England does give too 
 much freedom to young women/ said Mrs. Stewart, in the tone of 
 one touching a well-worn theme and quartering beaten ground. 
 
 4 Does it, Dr. St. Claire ? ’ asked lone, turning to Armine with 
 a half-pathetic look of appeal. 
 
 4 Not too much, because they do not make a bad use of it, else 
 perhaps it would/ temporised the handsome young doctor, looking 
 
VILLA CLARISSA. 
 
 103 
 
 first at Mrs. Stewart and then at the girl with a sweet little half- 
 encouraging, half-deprecating smile for each. 
 
 And again their eyes met — his tender, humid, soft, pleading ; 
 hers mysterious, magnetic, passionate, bewildering — eyes which 
 were not part of her personality but were the whole — eyes which, 
 when you looked at them, made you forget all but what you saw, 
 arid which, when they looked at you, made you feel that you 
 possessed the rest. 
 
 And for the second time something, he did not know what, 
 in lone, reminded St. Claire of Monica, and the suggestion seemed 
 to bring her as close to him as if she had been the sister of the 
 one he loved. 
 
 After this the conversation drifted naturally on to the things of 
 Palermo; what he had seen and what he had not seen ; what he 
 admired, and how much he understood of the language, the 
 habits, the architecture, the history ; with the not very consoling 
 inference to be drawn from these questions and his answers, that 
 he had seen nothing in the best way ; that he understood nothing 
 in the true light ; and that if he wanted to make good use 
 of his time he must put himself under Stewartian guidance, 
 and they would direct him aright. And then this first interview 
 ended with an invitation to come and lunch here to-morrow, 
 when they would arrange some excursion which should be at 
 once profitable and pleasant. 
 
 It was all very charming, very cheering, very strange. English 
 in feeling, Palermitan in surroundings, the Stewarts had that odd 
 kind of double nationality which interests the new-comer so much ; 
 — reducing the social chaos in which he finds himself to some kind 
 of intelligible order — giving a key to all the mysteries, and making 
 an oasis of familiarity in the desert of the unknown. 
 
 Yes, indeed, it was all very charming ; and St. Claire, who had 
 so many effeminate characteristics, felt the same kind of gratitude 
 as is felt by the average woman when, desolate and alone, she 
 suddenly lights on a compatriot who makes himself her protector, 
 and henceforth feels herself championed and cared for. He was 
 glad to have made this pleasant acquaintance. Palermo would 
 now wear another and more friendly aspect to him, and the cure 
 which it was to effect would be more certain and more complete. 
 
 As he drove along the upper road of La Favorita, conscious 
 of the aromatic scents of the wild worts and the beauty of the 
 flowers and evergreens, he was surprised to note how much lighter 
 and less depressed he felt than usual. The dead weight of loneli- 
 ness was lifted from his heart, and these good dear people had 
 opened for him a temporary home. It would give him so much 
 pleasure to cultivate their acquaintance ! Already he liked them 
 all, seeing each in his or her ideal. But naturally the two girls 
 interested him most ; and of the two lone was the more suggestive. 
 
IONE. 
 
 I04 
 
 She was evidently a psychological study, and she was of resplendent 
 beauty. Why and how did she suggest Monica Barrington P Not 
 a line of likeness really existed ; and Armine did not yet see that 
 the likeness was only in his own imagination and due simply to the 
 fact of the all-pervading influence of memory. Still it was there, 
 vivid enough if self-made and baseless; and because of it lone 
 Stewart possessed a double charm — her own and Monica’s. 
 
 6 A day to mark in white chalk,’ he said to himself as he drove 
 up to the hotel. ‘And, what a strange coincidence! — it is my 
 birthday,’ he added, looking to the sky just as the sun sunk down 
 behind the noble barrier of Monte Cuccio to the west. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 ‘what they inflict they feel.’ 
 
 The next day at the appointed hour Armine St. Claire found 
 himself at the Villa Clarissa; that strange charm of English life 
 in a foreign setting as keen to-day as it was yesterday, and the 
 fascination of the whole thing as strong. And, as yesterday, he 
 found the two girls in the court by the fountain, again with the 
 bird between them. But this time the spirit of the scene was 
 changed, though the framework and the actors were the same. 
 
 Clarissa, her body curved a little forward and her hands held 
 out as if to repel her sister, stood with a flushed face, weeping 
 violently, speaking passionately and evidently with bitter re- 
 proaches ; while lone, concentrated and deadly pale, her head 
 bent, but her flashing eyes raised from beneath their level brows 
 with a look of defiance and pain united, stood silent and superb, as 
 one who has gained a victory, but at cost. Still, having gained 
 it, she could afford to let the vanquished rave. 
 
 In her hand lay the little canary, dead — two or three drops of 
 crimson blood staining tbe ruffled gold of his feathers. 
 
 ‘ Oh, Dr. St. Claire, think what she has done — she has killed 
 poor Mimi ! ’ cried Clarissa, as the young doctor came through 
 the gate. 
 
 ‘ Killed the bird — what a pity ! what a misfortune ! ’ said St. 
 Claire. ‘ How did it happen ? ’ he added, with a kind of profess- 
 ional interest in death as a familiar and personal circumstance which 
 at once made him part of the affair. ‘ How was it ? ’ he repeated, 
 holding out his hand for the bird — which lone did not give 
 him. 
 
 ‘ She did it on purpose ! ’ sobbed Clarissa, between grief and 
 rage torn out of all conventional bondage and casting good-breeding % 
 
• IVIIAT THEY INFLICT THEY FEEL! 105 
 
 and politic reticence to the winds. 6 She did it for jealousy, 
 because it came to me when I called it.’ 
 
 ‘ Oh no, not on purpose ! J said St. Claire, in his sweet tempor- 
 ising way. 
 
 To a man of his gentle nature such an outburst was both 
 abhorrent and unintelligible ; and that this beautiful girl, who in 
 the mysterious way of all-pervading love suggested Monica, should 
 have done such a savage thing as to kill a favourite bird for 
 jealousy of her sister, was a thing he could neither accept nor 
 understand. It could not have been done on purpose ! He was 
 sure that she could explain away a fact which looked so black 
 against her, and that her action would prove to be rather a 
 misfortune, because unintentional, than a crime, because de- 
 liberate. 
 
 ‘ On purpose ! 7 repeated Clarissa, emphatically. * On purpose ; 
 for iealousy because it came to me when I called it. She cannot 
 deny it.’ 
 
 6 1 have no wish to deny it/ said lone proudly. 1 It was my 
 bird, and it should not have left me for anyone else. It was mine. 
 I had the right to it. — I had the right to kill it if it deserted me. 
 It was faithless : and I did kill it.’ 
 
 ‘ I am very very sorry, and I do not see your right/ said Dr. 
 St. Claire, gravely. 
 
 She looked at him with reproach ; her blazing eyes full of 
 passionate contempt for his tame-spirited want of sympathy. Had 
 he been a true man, she thought in her revolt, he would have 
 understood her feeling, and would have honoured her for the asser- 
 tion of her rights. 
 
 ‘But it was mine/ she repeated, with the monotony of those 
 who have only feeling on which to argue and who cannot bring 
 forward reasons. 6 It had no right to leave me for Clarissa. It 
 belonged to me, and I loved it ; and I was justified in killing it if 
 it no longer loved me/ 
 
 ‘ No, you had no right over it, and you were not justified, Miss 
 Stewart/ said Armine, with more firmness than might have been 
 expected from him, considering the man he was and the girl with 
 whom he was dealing. 
 
 ‘ Love gives no rights P 7 asked lone, with supreme contempt. 
 * Oh ! you are a cold-blooded northerner, else you could not have 
 said that ! ’ 
 
 ‘ I am neither a northerner nor cold-blooded/ said Armine, 
 gently. ‘ And love does not give the right of life and death/ 
 
 ‘ Not for infidelity ? 1 
 
 ‘Not even for infidelity/ he answered. 
 
 ‘ What nonsense you talk, lone ! ’ said Clarissa, with the scorn- 
 ful accent of common sense in the midst of hysterical exaggeration. 
 ‘ Infidelity ! — because a little bird came to another person when it 
 
io 5 
 
 JONE. 
 
 was called! One would tliink you were speaking of men and 
 women — husbands and wives.’ 
 
 6 It is all the same thing/ said lone. 1 It is the love, not the 
 person. My bird was mine, and it should not have gone to you. 
 And you are the murderess/ she said, fiercely turning against 
 Clarissa, as if she would have struck her to the earth. ‘ It is you, 
 with your horrid cold-blooded love of teasing, who are to blame, 
 not me. You were the cause of it all ; you are to blame ! ’ 
 
 ‘ No, no, Miss Stewart/ said Dr. St. Claire ; ‘ you go too far 
 there.’ 
 
 1 It is what she always does/ said Clarissa, weeping. 
 
 6 Oh, come now, don’t ! ’ said St. Claire, sincerely distressed. 
 ‘ Your sister did not mean what she said — she could not mean it/ 
 he said soothingly to Clarissa. 6 You did not mean it, did you ? ’ 
 coaxingly to lone. 
 
 ‘ Yes, I did/ said lone, stubbornly. 
 
 t Oh ! ’ was the young doctor’s exclamation, made in a tone of 
 disappointment. 
 
 4 You don’t know Nony yet/ said Clarissa, with energy. 
 
 6 1 am sure I know her too well for that/ returned Dr. St. 
 Claire, in his sweetest and most winning way. 
 
 lone looked at him, and some of the darker passion went out 
 of her face. 
 
 6 You are angry with me ? ’ she asked suddenly, with a shade 
 more of softness, or rather a shade less of fierceness, in her eyes 
 than had been there before. 
 
 ‘ Angry P My dear Miss Stewart, it is not my business to be 
 angry with you whatever you may do ! ’ he said with a slight 
 smile. 
 
 1 But you are, whether it is your business or not/ she answered. 
 
 6 1 am sorry/ was his rejoinder. 
 
 ‘ Which is the same thing under a different name — the pill 
 sugared/ returned lone, bitterly. 
 
 1 Anyone would be sorry and angry too, Nony, who was not 
 such a monster of cruelty and jealousy as you are/ said Clarissa 
 vehemently. L You are not fit for civilised life — you are nothing 
 but a savage ! ’ she added. 
 
 6 No, no, no ! neither a savage nor a monster, Miss Stewart/ 
 said Armine, trying to speak lightly. e But I am sorry she is so 
 jealous — and very sorry the poor little bird is dead.’ 
 
 ‘ He should not have left me for Clarissa/ said lone sullenly. 
 
 Dr. St. Claire shook his head. 
 
 ‘ It was a small offence for which to cut short its happy life/ he 
 said gravely. 
 
 For a moment lone’s eyes flashed with impatient pride, like 
 a sneer and a reproach flung into the young doctor’s face ; then 
 they fell suddenly to the ground, while a strange and nameless 
 
1 WIIAT THEY INFLICT THEY FEEL.' 
 
 107 
 
 something stole softly over her own. It was strange and nameless 
 even to Clarissa, who knew the varied lights and shadows of that 
 expressive countenance so well ; for, with all its swift changes, it 
 rarely showed tenderness, remorse, or shame — and it was tender, 
 remorseful, and ashamed now. 
 
 ‘ I am sorry my bird is dead ; and that I can never love it 
 again,’ she said softly, a faint quiver passing over her lips. 
 
 Then the gentler mood passed as quickly as it had come, and 
 she raised her eyes again full of defiance into St. Claires, while she 
 stiffened her neck till it became like a column of stubbornness and 
 pride. 
 
 ‘ But he was mine ; and it was a crime for him to leave me for 
 anyone else — to love anyone but me. And I had the right to kill 
 him if he did. And I did kill him,’ she said, setting her lips into 
 a thin line and breathing hard through her palpitating nostrils. 
 
 ‘ You are a cruel, wicked, jealous girl, and you will never come 
 to any good,’ said Clarissa, for her final fling, as they heard the 
 voice of Captain Stewart coming through the garden, summoned 
 by that marvellous telegraphy of looks and signs by which southern 
 Italians are told all they wish to know and tell all they wish to have 
 known. ‘And I will tell both father and mother what you have 
 done,’ she added ; ‘ and then you will see what they will say.’ 
 
 6 1 do not care what they say,’ said lone, with stubborn pride. 
 ‘ It was your fault for enticing my bird from me. He was mine 
 and he ought not to have left me. If it happened again I would 
 do the same — I would kill him,’ she added in her hardest, most 
 tenacious, most desperate manner. 
 
 At this moment Captain Stewart rounded the corner of the 
 house ; Mrs. Stewart came down the outside steps ; and the 
 conversation passed from the bird to St. Claire — How he found 
 himself to-day P What had he done this morning ? Was not 
 Pellegrino looking magnificent P Had lie ever seen the sea so 
 enchanting ? and, Was not the day absolutely perfect ? 
 
 But on this Mrs. Stewart said, with the plaintive discontent of 
 one ever on the look-out for flaws and seamy sides — one who has 
 outlived all illusions : 
 
 ‘ No, not quite perfect, Balph ; there is a point of scirocco 
 in it.’ 
 
 After these necessary preliminaries had been gone through, 
 Clarissa broke out with the story of her sister’s iniquity ; and, for 
 all the presence of the stranger-guest, lone was severely scolded 
 by Mrs. Stewart, and sermonised with more effect but in fewer 
 •words by her adopted father. Yet St. Claire, in spite of his con- 
 stitutional dislike to think ill of others, could not help feeling that 
 Clarissa told the news rather to get lone into disgrace than for 
 righteous indignation at the wrong itself. It was a stone put into 
 her hand by lone against herself, and it was only too easy to 
 
io8 
 
 TONE. 
 
 adjust the sling. Accordingly it was adjusted, and the blow was 
 delivered with telling force. 
 
 The severest thing, however, that was said or done was when 
 Captain Stewart, taking the girl’s burning hand and forcibly 
 opening it, flicked with his forefinger a drop of blood that had come 
 on the palm from the bleeding bird. 
 
 6 Eh P ’ he said, drily. ‘ That hand -reading fellow said it was cruel. 
 He did not go quite so far as to say it would commit murder.’ 
 
 6 And would again,’ said lone, defiantly. 
 
 Vincenzo, the swarthy Saracenic-looking head of the mill, was 
 standing by Captain Stewart, just that one step in the rear which 
 marked his inferior position — standing bare-headed in the sun, no 
 one bidding him be covered, till lone suddenly ordered him to put 
 on his hat, as a sign of grace to him which meant rebuke to the 
 rest. St. Claire, preoccupied and disturbed, had forgotten to 
 return his salute, and, after lone’s abrupt command, the man stood 
 there with no more attention paid to his presence than if he had 
 been a slave or an animal. With the quickness of his race, how- 
 ever, he seemed to have understood all that had taken place ; and, 
 with the ready sympathy which accompanies that quickness, to 
 have identified himself with the matter on hand, though he himself 
 was of no account in it. 
 
 In a clear, unembarrassed voice, but with almost servile devo- 
 tion of manner, he said to lone, as if it were a solatium that he 
 was offering : 
 
 i I will make a little coffin for your bird, Signorina, and we 
 will bury him among the flowers.’ 
 
 Captain Stewart looked at the man sharply, but Mrs. Stewart 
 said, with a kindly smile, addressing St. Claire, while glancing at 
 Vincenzo : 
 
 ‘ He is such a good fellow, this Vincenzo ! He always brings 
 us flowers on Sunday, because he knows that Sunday is a holy day 
 with us — not a mere festa, as with them, poor wretches ! — and he 
 wishes to honour it for our sakes. We have a fairly well-managed 
 garden, as you see ; though I must say I do not think it is equal to 
 its cost — seeing what we spend on it, it ought to be a thousand 
 times better,’ she put in, parenthetically, with her usual accent of 
 displeased discontent ; ‘ but Vincenzo manages to get flowers far 
 superior to any that we have. I do not know where he goes for 
 them ; and he ought to tell us, but he will not ; which is very 
 wrong of him. Still, it is nice of him to bring them to us as he 
 does. It is a graceful little attention, and shows that he appre- 
 ciates all that we have done for him. For without us he would 
 have starved in the streets,’ she added, with that curious acrimony 
 sometimes seen in generous people, when recounting their good 
 deeds, and half-angry with those whom they have served. 
 
‘ WHAT THEY INFLICT THEY FEEL.' 
 
 109 
 
 All this time Vincenzo stood with a smiling face, bright, swarthy, 
 glittering, looking from Mrs. Stewart to Dr. St. Claire, and from 
 them to the others, in that unfocussed way of ignorant participa- 
 tion proper to a sympathetic man, who does not understand what 
 is being said, but who, hearing his own name, makes sure that it is 
 something pleasant and friendly. 
 
 ‘ Does he speak English P ’ asked St. Claire. 
 
 * No. Poor creatures, they are so benighted ! ’ replied Mrs. 
 Stewart. * They know absolutely nothing — no English — nothing 
 of the Bible ; you cannot call them Christians ; indeed they are 
 half savages.’ 
 
 ‘ No, mamma, Vincenzo is not a savage. He is a gentleman 
 by birth, and as good as we are,’ said lone, suddenly. ‘He cannot 
 help being a Roman Catholic, if that is what you mean by being 
 benighted. He was born so.’ 
 
 ‘ Don’t speak to mother like that, Nony,’ said Clarissa, sharply. 
 
 Vincenzo shifted his feet and took off his cap, which he twisted 
 round and round in his hand. He was smiling as he had been 
 smiling all the while ; but the expression on his face was somehow 
 different from what it had been ; and once, when he looked at 
 lone, when no one watched him, his eyes were like burning coals 
 — but not fierce nor unfriendly. 
 
 ‘ He must have Saracenic blood in him,’ said St. Claire, critical 
 and professional. 
 
 ‘ That is self-evident,’ said Captain Stewart. 1 He is a good 
 fellow for what he is — the least of a scoundrel of any I have about 
 me ; but he is an uncommonly ugly dog, I must admit.’ 
 
 6 Yes ; he is no beauty,’ laughed St. Claire. 
 
 And then Vincenzo lifted his coal-black, deep-set, shining eyes 
 into the young doctors face and smiled benignly. He evidently 
 imagined that St. Claire had said something that was compliment- 
 ary and pleasant. 
 
 After this they all turned with the master, and went through 
 the garden to the mill, which was at a little distance from the 
 house. Their way led through hedges of monthly roses in the full 
 perfection of their waxen bloom and delicate perfume ; by large 
 shrubs of broad-leaved fragrant geraniums, not yet in flower ; by 
 miniature trees of glossy-leaved myrtle ; by agaves and aloes and 
 palms — giving a strangely tropical character to the whole scene ; by 
 groves of oranges and silver-dusted olives ; by impenetrable hedges, 
 living walls, of huge prickly-pear, or cactus, or fichi d’India, as it 
 may best please one to call those rude amorphous growths which 
 are so like great vegetable beasts — beasts mutilated, wounded, 
 torn, dismembered, yet surviving all ill-treatment by dint of 
 strength and patience, and doing to the last, in spite of torture and 
 ill-usage, their life’s work of producing delicate and dainty fruit. 
 
no 
 
 IONE. 
 
 Those poor ill-used and all-enduring vegetable beasts ! — they are 
 nearly as pathetic as the tortured ‘ ciuci 7 of Castellammare ! 
 
 How different it all was from anything to be seen in England ! 
 How much more luxuriant, how much more poetic, and how much 
 less complete and orderly ! Villa Clarissa was noted for its good 
 management, but it would not have borne comparison with an 
 English estate tilled by English hands ; and the general look of 
 loose-lying ends and unfinished bits everywhere, like vacant spaces 
 in a mosaic, would have grieved the soul of a high-farming land- 
 owner. Here the marvel was, not the vacant spaces, but those 
 filled in and perfected. Such as it was, however, it was very 
 picturesque, very novel, rich, and lovely ; and St. Claire forgot the 
 weeds in' the flowers and the partial disorder in the general 
 profusion. 
 
 So, passing through this odd kind of enchanted ground, where 
 wonders might have taken place as of the established order of 
 things, they reached at last the mill to which they were bound, 
 and whereof Vincenzo was the accredited overseer. 
 
 Half-a-dozen men were lounging about the place, doing a little 
 here and a little there, in that desultory unmethodical way which 
 seems to be more play than work and more pretence than reality. 
 One moved a sack a few inches farther to the side, as it would 
 appear quite unnecessarily and more as if to mask idleness than to 
 do real work. Another examined with close attention the empty 
 hoppers, which were protected against the wiles of the Evil One 
 by a picture of the Madonna pasted against the upright. A third 
 lazily rubbed the flour between his fingers ; a fourth seemed to 
 find a grave problem in the material of which the sack was made. 
 But when the master and his party came in, even these perfunctory 
 little activities ceased, and all grouped themselves about the sacks 
 and columns of the hall, each man, with the unconscious grace of 
 his nation, making a picture or representing a statue. 
 
 All seemed to turn as if involuntarily to lone. The master was 
 the master, whose favour represented the bread and wine and oil 
 of their homes ; the mistress was the mistress whose grace gave 
 extra gratuities to fill the gaps made by the hand of the Church 
 and the cursed ill-chance of the lotto ; but that younger Signorina, 
 that fair-haired girl, who was as if one of them and yet was not 
 — she was the flower they all admired, the shrine at which they 
 all worshipped, the cynosure of all their bold black roving eyes, the 
 uncrowned queen to whom all their fervent and ideal loyalty was 
 devoted. From Vincenzo to that young lad of sixteen, lounging 
 with the grace of a forest animal and the unconscious dignity of a 
 red Indian across a sack, and devouring lone with his eyes, all 
 turned to her as naturally as Mohammedans to their far-off Mecca, 
 as Sabians to the sun. 
 
 To Clarissa came none of this ardent devotion. She had not 
 
‘ WHAT THEY INFLICT THEY FEELS 
 
 ill 
 
 that electric quality, that magnetic power, possessed in such 
 abundance by lone. She was just a nice little plump white human 
 pigeon to them — no more ; but lone was the young goddess whom 
 each man secretly loved as a woman, yet scarcely wished to find 
 less than divine. 
 
 The girl seemed to feel her position as the untitled queen of 
 all these unsworn subjects, for she was superb in her easy con- 
 sciousness of power — her strange eyes flashing now on one now on 
 another as she silently gathered up their homage and secretly 
 returned encouragement. In that uncongenial life of home, where 
 she was always as if in disgrace and somewhat under chastisement, 
 it pleased her to feel that here, among her adopted father’s men, 
 she was supreme, and that, lowly as it might be, she had an 
 empire which no one could invade. To a woman a sceptre is 
 always a sceptre ; and, in default of gold and ivory, one of humble 
 reeds or woodland flowers is better than none at all. 
 
 To-day the girl’s fascination for these men seemed to be in- 
 creased. Perhaps the mysterious force of her nature had gained in 
 strength from the sin that she had committed and the passion that 
 had possessed her. Who knows? We have not yet sounded all 
 the depths of human nature ; and we do not know the full mean- 
 ing of those words we use so glibly — Spiritual influence. Be that 
 as it may, this spiritual influence always exercised by lone over 
 her father’s men was to-day more potent even than usual. 
 Vincenzo had told the whole story by a few gestures and glances 
 as he came into the mill ; and each man and boy lounging there 
 knew, as he looked, that in the long white hand so closely clasped 
 the little bird lay dead ; and that lone, who loved it, had killed it 
 from jealousy and out of regard for her rights. They knew and 
 sympathised and secretly adored her more than before. 6 She is 
 one of us/ they said among themselves. Daughter as she was of 
 that cold and distant England, where the sun never shines, where 
 no flowers bloom and no fruits ripen, she was nevertheless one 
 of them. 
 
 And yet she, who seemed born for the life of the fervid South, 
 was a passionate lover of England, that unknown but to her ideal 
 land of individual rights and female liberty ; while Clarissa, who 
 physically and by character was English to her finger-tips, cared 
 for no place but Sicily and never wished to leave Palermo. 
 
 By looks and signs the story of lone’s jealousy and revenge had 
 been told by Vincenzo to all the men at the mill. By looks and 
 signs too, the new-comer was discussed — and pronounced a man of 
 no account. He was to be ranked with Clarissa and human pigeons ; 
 but he was not of the height and stature of lone, their queen. 
 They need not trouble themselves about him. To be sure he was 
 one of that powerful nation whose supremacy they had to acknow- 
 ledge in their padrone ; but he was only a poor creature for all his 
 
1 12 
 
 IONE . 
 
 soft eyes and that strange beauty of face which was of the type 
 that painters have taken for St. John or the Christ. And they, the 
 fiery children of the South, with the living sun in their veins, had 
 the right to despise him as one of the traditional ‘ machines ’ of 
 his race. 
 
 And thus, before his face, unseen and undetected, went round 
 from each to each a whole litany of contempt ; and the stranger 
 was relegated to the limbo of the despised. Monica had wept for 
 him in the solitude of her chamber — Monica, the sweetest flower 
 and purest growth of womanhood ; but these wild and ignorant 
 Sicilian peasants ridiculed and contemned him and ranked him 
 below a girl as wild, as passionate, and nearly as ignorant, as 
 themselves. 
 
 The visit to the mill over, they all went back to the house, 
 where the luncheon was English in design and Sicilian in execu- 
 tion— like the translation of a ballad into terza rima. But it 
 pleased St. Claire, disposed to be pleased with everything at the 
 villa Clarissa. He felt as if he should get well and strong now. 
 Yesterday and to-day had given him a lift onward — such a sensitive 
 and impressionable creature as he was, and so painfully under the 
 influence of his imagination and affections ! 
 
 The only thing that disturbed the absolute enjoyment of the 
 hour was the anomalous position which lone seemed to hold in the 
 family. A daughter, like Clarissa, there was yet the most undeni- 
 able if subtle difference made between her and her sister. Where 
 the one was listened to with that kind of respect which springs 
 from love, the other was contradicted and opposed with the 
 chronic contempt of chronic displeasure. Where the one seemed 
 to be in the full sunshine of favour, the other was evidently in the 
 cold shade of mild disgrace. Even the very speech and manner of 
 the girls themselves was different, for where Clarissa called her 
 parents father and mother, lone said papa and mamma ; where 
 Clarissa kissed and fondled each by turn, to receive back as much 
 as she gave, lone never laid her hand on either, nor was she 
 caressed more than she herself caressed. And St. Claire wondered 
 why there was this strange discrepancy of spirit and bearing, and 
 why the younger daughter was always spoken to in the reproving 
 manner of one under enduring cliatisement. What had she done ? 
 — How had she offended that she should be thus rebuffed ? He 
 admired her immensely ; did she not suggest Monica Barrington P 
 — if only in that evasive way of false likenesses and imaginative 
 suggestions, which vanish as you examine them till at last the first 
 impression becomes merely a memory and no longer a fact — still, 
 did she not suggest Monica ? 
 
 Nevertheless, despite all his admiration, all his sympathy, he 
 was sorry that she had killed the bird. The act which had roused 
 for her the ardent admiration of the men at the mill, had saddened 
 
WHAT THEY INFLICT THEY FEEL I 
 
 113 
 
 him. lie could not say that it had revolted him. His repulsion 
 was not so strong as that ; but it had shocked and made him sorry. 
 All the same, he did not like to hear her spoken to as if under 1 
 perpetual chastisement and in enduring if mild disgrace ; and he 
 wondered how such manifestly kind people as the Stewarts had the 
 heart to do it. 
 
 After a time lone, who had lapsed into absolute silence, sitting 
 by the window and looking out on the garden as if dreaming witu 
 her eyes open, got up and left the room, and St. Claire saw her no 
 more. It came to be time for him to leave, but still she did not 
 appear ; and he had to bid the family farewell without including 
 her. As he went through the court she suddenly appeared from, 
 under the archway of the outer staircase and came up to him, 
 almost as if she had watched for him. And yet, it had been only 
 by chance that he had not been accompanied to the gate according 
 to the sweet and hospitable fashion of the place ; in which case 
 watching for him, to have a word with him alone, w’ould have 
 been a needless trouble. 
 
 ‘ Good-bye/ she said, offering her hand. ‘ I want to say I am 
 sorry I killed the bird.’ 
 
 1 Thank you. I am glad that you have said this/ said St. 
 Claire, fervently. 6 God bless you ! ’ 
 
 ‘You are very good — very, very good/ said Icne, looking into 
 his face, her dilated eyes as dark as night. * I feel that you will 
 understand me/ 
 
 Then she turned away, and in a moment she had gone. 
 
 ‘ She has conscience and a heart/ said St. Claire to himself as 
 he passed through the gate, his own heart considerably the lighter 
 for this philanthropic relief. 6 1 am glad she is a good girl after 
 all!’ 
 
 As he thought this, Vincenzo, lounging with his noiseless step 
 along the sunny side of the garden-wall, came up to the carriage, 
 the door of which he opened, while he took off his cap with a 
 smile. 
 
 ‘ Thank you/ said St. Claire, a little brusquely. 
 
 The man inspired him with a certain horror, and for the life 
 of him he could not be suave and sweet as he generally was. 
 
 There was no smile on the Sicilian’s face as he looked after 
 the carriage and made a significant movement with his hand — no 
 smile, but a scowl that made the blazing fire of his eyes yet more 
 potent, as he peered through the bars of the gate and saw lone, 
 with a dead-white face and tears in her eyes, standing motionless 
 by the fountain, the dead bird in her relaxed hand, while she 
 looked at the falling water, conscious of only one thought, one 
 feeling : ‘ I am glad I confessed I was sorry — glad that he was 
 
 pleased with me and said God bless you ! ’ 
 
 Then Vincenzo came through the gate and went up to her. 
 
 X 
 
TONE. 
 
 1 14 
 
 6 Shall I make the little coffin, Signorina P ’ he said, his head 
 uncovered, and his dark eyes reading her face as if he would read 
 down into her heart. 
 
 She turned from him impatiently. He had interrupted her 
 thoughts, broken the flow of her soothing stream of repentance, 
 and she was angry with him, as she often was ; for all that she 
 upheld him when Mrs. Stewart found fault with him, and rebuked 
 those who rebuked him. 
 
 4 No,’ she said haughtily; c when I want you to do anything 
 for me, Vincenzo, I will ask you — you need not offer.’ 
 
 ‘ The Signorina is mistress. She could never ask me for what 
 I would not give her — even my life,’ said Vincenzo, with more 
 earnestness than is generally thrown into such-like professions of 
 faith and offers of service. ‘ But the little bird cannot be kept. ITe 
 must be buried ; and soon.’ 
 
 ‘ Leave me. You are impertinent — you are tiresome ! ’ said 
 lone, angrily. ‘ If I choose, he shall not he buried at all. I am 
 the mistress. If I choose to keep him, wliat is that to you? ’ 
 
 c Padrona,’ said Vincenzo, humbly. ‘ But it will do you harm 
 to keep him, Signorina. It will give you fever.’ 
 
 6 What right have you to speak ? You shall not take my bird 
 from me ! Leave me, I say ! ’ said lone, with vehemence and 
 passion. 
 
 ‘ Padrona,’ repeated Vincenzo ; and at the word he was gone, 
 rounding the corner of the house like a dusky shadow gliding from 
 her path. 
 
 Then lone dashed away for her own part into a special place 
 among the trees which she had made her own, and where she 
 always went when oppressed and disturbed. And here, throwing 
 herself on the ground, she covered the dead bird with passionate 
 kisses, saying again and again : ‘ I loved you, Mimi ! I loved 
 
 you ! Oh, believe that I loved you ! I killed you, but 1 loved 
 you ! ’ 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 DOMESTICATED. 
 
 € We shall have to introduce you to some of our friends,’ said 
 Captain Stewart one day when St. Claire was at the Villa Clarissa, 
 as he so often was now. 
 
 6 If you intend to pass the winter here you must go into 
 society,’ said Mrs. Stewart, in her gently sorrowful way. ( You 
 will tind some pleasant people both among ourselves and the 
 Palermitans.’ 
 
DOMESTICATED . 
 
 115 
 
 ‘ Yes/ said the Captain ; ‘ that every one would say. The 
 Palermitans are wonderfully hospitable to strangers who "are fitly 
 introduced/ 
 
 ‘ I thought the Italians did not understand hospitality/ said 
 St. Claire. 
 
 ‘ In our way perhaps no, in their way yes. They do not ash you 
 to dinner, hut they give you a seat in their carriage and take you 
 to eat ices. You cannot go in upon them at twelve o’clock in the 
 day, hut you are free of their salons every evening when they are 
 at home ; and you may go as early as the habits of the place allow 
 and stay as late — not wearing out your welcome by repetition. 
 We give food, they companionship. Our method is a survival of 
 the time when starvation was a man’s ever-present foe, theirs .of 
 a state of society when personal peril was the greatest fact of 
 life — when, therefore, the defence of association was the greatest 
 need, and admission to that association the supreme mark of con- 
 fidence/ 
 
 ‘ 1 see/ said St. Claire, who thought the explanation more 
 ingenious than true. 
 
 ‘One thing will be sure to strike you — the dreadful number 
 of titles here/ said Mrs. Stewart, in an aggrieved voice. 
 
 She rejoiced in the fact, but she liked to complain of it. She 
 was too thoroughly English not to reverence rank, but she was 
 also too thoroughly English not to resent the apportionment 
 which gave that rank to the Palermitans and left themselves 
 without ‘ handles/ though with undoubted pedigree. 
 
 ‘That makes no difference/ said Captain Stewart. ‘Among 
 themselves they are punctilious enough on the matter of relative 
 rank, but they do not care two straws about it with us. An 
 Englishman is always an Englishman to them, whether he be a 
 lord or only a plain mister ; and they like us as a race. Which 
 is so much in our favour as individuals/ 
 
 ‘ I am sure I wonder that they do ! ? said lone, abruptly. 
 
 No one answered her; and though St. Claire looked at her, 
 as if in response, he did not speak. He thought he should pro- 
 bably get her into trouble if he drew her out. 
 
 ‘ I shall be very glad to know any of your friends/ he then 
 said, having nothing else to say ; but in his own mind he thought 
 he should find none so congenial to him as were these hospi- 
 table Stewarts, with their pretty place and their charming 
 daughters. 
 
 ‘ I will put you up to a few of the most special/ then said the 
 Captain, and forthwith began a list of princes and princesses, 
 barons and baronesses, counts and countesses, till his guest won- 
 dered if the city held an untitled man or woman in its ranks at all. 
 It was a long page of the Palermitan Almanack, de Gotha to 
 learn, but St. Claire had a good head and a retentive memory, and 
 
ii 6 
 
 10NE. 
 
 social dignities came easily in bis way. To be sure be made a few 
 mistakes and misfits, as was but natural. He gave the grandfather 
 as a son, and called the daughter-in-law the mother, and hopelessly 
 jumbled up, as if in a bag, the various members of that large family, 
 each of whom had a different name and title from the others. But 
 he made out something definite at last, and established a kind of 
 central point round which all the rest would cluster in time. 
 
 He made out clearly and distinctly the individuality of that 
 travelled and well-read countess who had been everywhere, and 
 who knew all the picturesque by-places as well as the general 
 centres of interest in Europe. And her daughter — that ideal kind 
 of princess whom all women loved and all men adored, w T hose mind 
 was as rich as her personality was gracious — he got her, too, well 
 established, so that he should know them both when he should be 
 taken to call. That grand old princess, the doyenne of the local 
 aristocracy, with her stainless repute and honourable name ; her 
 daughter so interesting and gentle and so curiously English in 
 character; and her daughter again, so curiously English in physique 
 — these images too, he fixed as those of people he was bound to 
 respect and admire when he met them. The grandfather of this 
 last, this fair-faced Palermitan lily, one of the many noble exiles 
 of ’48, was another personality not likely to slip. When he, St. 
 Claire, came to know him, the Stewarts said, he would find him 
 the most delightful companion in the world, and the best ‘ racon- 
 teur.’ His stories of English life and experience were inimitable ! 
 And those two brothers, who also had been of the emigration — the 
 elder, as Captain Stewart said : ‘the best-bred man in the island 
 to which Mrs. Stewart added as her testimony : 6 with all the 
 graces of his own race and all the virtues of ours, and with none 
 of the faults of either ’ — the younger, in his time one of the most 
 gallant soldiers of all in the national army — they were cleared from 
 the mass, and made as sharp and distinct as two cameos. So were 
 the noble-hearted, handsome wife and the graceful daughter with 
 her gift of genius, belonging to the one — the bright and hospitable 
 signora with the studious son, of the other. That charming group 
 of friends and relations, so good and true and simple and sincere ; 
 the patriarch of the English colony, with his magnificent garden, 
 his gentle wife and her sweet kindliness; the scholarly clergyman, 
 and his wife, whose life had been a romance ; the men of letters 
 here ; the men of science there ; the pleasant baron ; the kindly 
 duke ; the learned abbate ; the famous professor — it was an inte- 
 resting page of personal gossip, the ‘ carte du pays ’ well drawn 
 out ; and it amused St. Claire, who, as has been said, was fond of 
 genealogy and local Debretts. 
 
 ‘ Now be sure you distinguish one from the other, and do not 
 confound A with B nor C with D,’ said Captain Stewart. ‘ Above 
 all, take pains to learn your pronunciation correctly. A letter 
 
DOMESTICATED . 
 
 117 
 
 makes all the difference ; as between that fascinating princess and 
 my dear good friend Luigi, for example. Doubled when it should 
 be single, or deprived of its consort when it should be doubled, will 
 land you in more holes than one. So be careful/ 
 
 ‘ I will do my best,’ said St. Claire. 
 
 ‘ How can it interest you to know anything of the people here, 
 you who come from England ? ’ said lone, scornfully. 
 
 ‘Why not?’ Armine answered. ‘Do you not think it inte- 
 resting to study differences?’ 
 
 ‘ Not for an Englishman to study a continental ! ’ said lone, 
 superbly. 
 
 ‘ How can you be so prejudiced, Nony ! ’ said Clarissa. ‘Why 
 are not foreigners as good as we are ? Poor dears ! 1 am sure 
 
 they are.’ 
 
 ‘ I don’t think so,’ said lone; and on Mrs. Stewart returning 
 plaintively: ‘My poor dear misguided child, what can you 
 possibly know of the matter?’ and Captain Stewart adding 
 bluntly : ‘Shut up, Io, and let us have no more of your confoun- 
 ded nonsense ! ’ that thread of talk dropped and was not taken 
 up again. 
 
 And yet lone had only said what she had heard a dozen times 
 before from the two who represented her parents. Had Clarissa 
 scoffed at the people among whom they had elected to make their 
 home, they would have smiled at her enthusiastic patriotism, and 
 would have said she was not so far wrong in her estimate — but 
 what Clarissa might do with honour was counted to lone for 
 shame — even though the father and mother did their best to be 
 just ; and were just, according to their ability. 
 
 The Stewarts not only made themselves St. Claire’s introducers 
 to the society of the place, but they also took pains to show him every- 
 thing of interest, and specially to localise the native legends and his- 
 toric events. They took him to the exact spot where the Sicilian 
 vespers began, and tried in vain to teach him how to pronounce 
 that famous shibboleth of ‘ ciceri.’ They traced the line on the 
 hill where Garibaldi and his devoted band came down in their 
 strength like a living stream dyed red with the glorious dawn, 
 bringing the freedom of Sicily as their offering to Palermo. The} 7 
 translated for his benefit old ballads, like that of the ‘ Baronessa 
 di Carini,’ and told him those wonderful stories of courage and 
 audacity which have already made of the brigand chief Leone a 
 being almost as legendary as Fra Diavolo. They showed him 
 over the new institutions, and severely criticised all the details of 
 management, as the English always do, whether at home or 
 abroad. They took him to the churches, some of which were 
 under repair, and fell foul of every bit of modern work, however 
 ■well done, which was to restore the lost substance of the old and 
 fill up the gaps made by time. But then they would not have 
 
nS 
 
 TONE. 
 
 been English here too, had they not idealised the remote past of 
 Italy and vilified the immediate present. Had they not read their 
 Iluskin ? and was it not in their province, as members of the nation 
 which set up the duke and his horse over a gateway, and substi- 
 tuted the grifhn for Temple Bar, to lecture all others on taste and 
 the conservation of things ancient and historic ? and, above all, 
 were not the picturesque ignorance and darkness, disease and 
 misery of old times worth all the unsesthetic light and liberty and 
 health and strength of these modern degenerate days? To hear 
 the English in Italy, one would say that the prosperity, the educa- 
 tion and liberty of a whole people are not worth a fine facade, nor 
 an imposing procession ; and that something pretty to look at is 
 worth far more than free government or wholesome living. And 
 the Stewarts, though enlightened people in their own way, were 
 not proof against the prevailing folly of their race. 
 
 And finally, to complete their good offices, they introduced 
 him to society, so that he was made free of all the houses which 
 were open to themselves. 
 
 Then it was that he found for himself how frank and hospi- 
 table are these dear Italian islanders, with the proud and capable 
 Saracenic strain running through their blood ; their myths of old 
 Greece floating like perfume and echoing like music through the 
 air; their pathetic history and their stirring feuds; their saintly 
 legends, which jostle and displace the divine old myths, or rather, 
 into which those myths have transformed themselves ; their corn- 
 memo rati \ e customs which lift out of the commonplace into the 
 ideal; — those dear Italian islanders, to know whom is to love ! — 
 as he proved for his own part ; and with reason. 
 
 The countess showed him her house and the count took him 
 over his garden. The princess had him to her receptions and 
 made him a favourite guest when out for her villeggiatura. The 
 two dear brothers invited him to dinner, and the girl entranced 
 him with her singing. Every one was kind to him, every one 
 made much of him — the women, because he was so interesting and 
 handsome and delicate and young, and the men, because it pleased 
 the women and he looked as if he had no harm in him. So that 
 for a broken-hearted lover, as he was, St. Claire enjoyed himself 
 discreetly and carried his secret sorrows bravely. 
 
 Truly, without disloyalty to his lost love, his wounds were 
 doing well. A spiritual surgeon, making his diagnosis with judg- 
 ment, would have said that they were granulating apace and look- 
 ing remarkably healthy. It must be so. To live with a dead joy 
 never absent from one’s consciousness is very soon to die with it. 
 For the mind follows the law of the body, and wounds which will 
 not heal bring all things to destruction. 
 
 So the time passed. The soft-spoken, gentle-mannered, hand- 
 some young fellow was so accustomed to be petted and caressed — 
 
DOMESTIC A TED . 
 
 i*9 
 
 so used to be treated as a personage of importance — that all the 
 kindness lavished on him by his new friends came to him as by 
 prescriptive right, and he took it with that simplicity of acceptance 
 which of itself is a charm in the beautiful young. He made no 
 disclaimers and no opposition; showed no surprise, and only 
 expressed his gratitude by smiling amiably when he was flattered, 
 and looking content when he was singled out for supreme attention 
 and marked kindness. When bright eyes shone the brighter as he 
 entered the room, and sweet voices had an extra touch of silver as 
 they spoke to him, he took it all as one who knew the whole rosary 
 by heart, and who received only his due. And this quiet uncon- 
 sciousness of any special grace in the favours accorded him made 
 part of his success with the women. The men, perhaps, said a few 
 hard things among themselves, as was but natural ; but the women 
 found it lovely. It was the unconscious self-assertion of a superior 
 person whose credentials are undeniable. It was the prince travel- 
 ling incognito, who does not think it strange when some more 
 acute than the rest drops a court courtesy, and says, Your Royal 
 Highness . 
 
 He took it all so much as his by right that surely it was so. 
 Well-dressed, well-mannered, with his air of accustomedness to 
 luxury and homage and the finer things of life, he had the look of a 
 man richer than his expenditure, and superior to the conditions 
 which it has pleased him for the moment to adopt. To see him 
 here in Palermo no one would have supposed that for his sole 
 wealth he had only what remained of those three hundred pounds 
 which had been brought him by the ravens, and the reversionary 
 interest, when his health should be re-established, of a small 
 country practice which gave him bread and left no margin for 
 butter. He had the air of thousands a year ; and Palermo set him 
 down at the value of his looks. 
 
 This was not his fault. The most rigid moralist could scarcely 
 have held him bound to appear poor for truth's sake, or to publish 
 a statement of his finances in ‘ Lo Statuto.’ It had been his mis- 
 fortune before now to look one thing and be another ; and this 
 was only a repetition of the old litany of misunderstanding which 
 more than once had been intoned to his disaster. 
 
 Where all liked him, the Stewarts liked him most of all. Even 
 the wiry and determined Captain, his very antithesis in some 
 things, found points of agreement in others, which made the run- 
 ning smooth. To be sure he would not have chosen this soft- 
 voiced and gentle-mannered young physician as his partner in a 
 difficult business, where he had risked his fortune to save it only 
 by bold combinations and resolute action. He would not have put 
 him at the head of an exploring expedition where courage and 
 endurance were the alphabet of success ; nor would he have sent 
 him where astuteness and diplomatic fence were the great things 
 
120 
 
 IONE. 
 
 needed. But he liked him as a guest ; he trusted him with the 
 girls; and he believed him to be a man to whom any father might 
 safely give his daughter, sure that, when he married, his wife's 
 happiness would be welded into the very substance of her 
 wedding-ring. 
 
 As they saw more and more of him, both father and mother 
 felt, what they did not acknowledge even to each other, that, as 
 Clarissa’s choice, this charming young fellow should meet with no 
 opposition, and Guli should supply the wedding-cake. They had 
 decided, as we know, that Clarissa should not marry a Sicilian ; 
 and the English colony was poor in available husbands. Though 
 the farthest possible removed from wishing her to marry at all, 
 they were too loving and just to desire her to remain single for 
 their sakes. And here was the man who, in body, mind, and 
 estate, seemed made for the occasion. 
 
 They knew nothing of his broken fortunes and unhappy love. 
 They saw him only as Edward Formby's friend, therefore to be 
 trusted and believed in as what he seemed to be ; and he seemed 
 to be little less than a prince in disguise. In his sweet impartial 
 way he was equally devoted to both girls ; but parental love gave 
 the balance that extra weight which made Clarissa turn the scale. 
 IIow should she not? Who in his senses would prefer lone, that 
 uncomfortable anomaly with her red-gold hair and indescribable 
 green eyes — that odd mixture of passion and indolence, of dreams 
 and unrest — to a sweet-tempered sensible little pigeon like Clarissa, 
 whose worst moods, compared to the ordinary outbursts of that 
 other, were like April showers set against tropical tempests ? And 
 such a good wife as she would make ! — so domestic, so clever in 
 management, so notable and exact — did that count for nothing P 
 lone, who had been just as well trained, given the same advantages, 
 and brought up on the same lines, could do nothing useful, and 
 was discontented, undisciplined, and jealous. In fact, lone was 
 not to be thought of when Clarissa was to the fore ; and St. Claire 
 was far too nice a fellow to be thrown away. 
 
 Yes, the thing fitted. Now that his health had become so 
 much more robust, and there was evidently nothing much amiss — 
 given the question of settlements satisfactorily arranged — there 
 would be no objection raised when the moment came. 
 
 Though the Captain did not harbour this thing as a planned 
 future — only perceived it as a possible contingency — Mrs. Stewart, 
 woman-like, cherished it as a charming picture, over which, how- 
 ever, she would break her heart should it cease to be a picture 
 and become a living fact; and St. Claire got the good of the 
 situation. Meanwhile the picture grew daily more vivid to the 
 mother, as the handsome young fellow crept closer and closer into 
 her affections, and she felt as Oakhurst before her had felt, that he 
 was 1 so good ’ and 1 so pure.’ 
 
DOMES TIC A TED . 
 
 121 
 
 On his side, that healthy granulation of his wounds went 
 steadily on, and the solid silver chain of friendship supplied the 
 broken golden links of love ; he all the time taking everything with 
 that simplicity of acceptance which made petting and devotion his 
 rightful due by the letters-patent of nature and fitness. Not that he 
 was a coxcomb. He was simply a man in whom the feminine element 
 predominated over the masculine — whose very virtues w T ere femi- 
 nine, and whose manhood was free from manly vices — who was 
 sweet and gentle, and affectionate and pure, suspecting no evil, and 
 meaning as little as he suspected. His character failed in force but 
 was rich in beauty ; and for the strength of will which was wanting 
 he substituted delicacy of conscience, which perhaps came to the 
 same thing in the end. 
 
 But with all this pleasant toying with this newly minted silver 
 chain of friendship, his heart turned ever and ever back to the 
 broken golden links, and he knew, with unwavering conviction, 
 that Monica Barrington was the only woman he had ever loved or 
 ever could love, as the true meaning of love goes. All before her 
 had been phantasms — all after her would be ghosts ; and neither 
 in phantasms nor in ghosts is there solid substance for the heart or 
 soul of man. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 WHICH? OE, EITHER? 
 
 None of his later friends took the place of the first with St. 
 Claire. He was stanch to his flag, and allowed no one to exercise 
 the same kind of fascination over him as did the Stewarts, with 
 those two pretty girls as the chief workers of the spell. The glamour 
 of the place was round Clarissa equally with lone, and in his present 
 poetic mood he idealised even that most commonplace little person, 
 and made a bit of ordinary satin-stone do duty for a pearl of price. 
 
 It was all the fault of Nature — that grand enchantress who 
 transmutes common earths into noble gems ; all the fault of that 
 great sun-god who hides beneath a veil of glory whatever is less 
 than lovely, and touches into divine magnificence things which, 
 left to themselves, are mean and sordid and of no repute. 
 
 Moreover, being heart-broken for Monica and pledged to eter- 
 nal widowerhood and constancy, the young doctor had no scruple 
 in surrendering himself to the fascinations of these two innocent 
 Viviennes, believing lone morafly lovely against his better judg- 
 ment and Clarissa poetically delightful against his truer perception. 
 
 Could it be said that he flirted ? If he did, then it was with 
 both girls at once — with one as much as, and no more than, with 
 
122 
 
 ZONE. 
 
 the other. Had he been accused, he would have repudiated the 
 accusation in all eagerness and sincerity, and would have said he 
 meant nothing, and they knew that he meant nothing. But then 
 we repudiate many things which the watching world asserts of 
 us. And which, pray you, is true ? — our own heart, with its trick 
 of self-deception and power of blunting the fine edge of conscience, 
 or the evidence gathered by those who think they see to the founda- 
 tions when they do not penetrate below the surface P Between 
 self-deception and purblindness poor Truth has a bad time of it ; — 
 as now, in the way in which things were going and judged of at 
 the Villa Clarissa. 
 
 For instance, was it flirting when, one afternoon, as the young 
 people were whiling away the time by spelling words with ivory 
 letters, St. Claire, taking up the letters C. A. S., put them before 
 Clarissa, saying: ‘ Your initials are the same as mine, only 
 transposed. Clarissa Alice Stewart — Armine St. Claire ;’ — looking 
 at her as he spoke with eyes which seemed to be as full of love as 
 his words were full of secret meaning P Perhaps Clarissa thought 
 so ; and perhaps lone thought so ; for the one blushed and looked 
 down, and the other grew pale and looked away, as she held up 
 her head with the severe disdain of one who will not waste her 
 time in folly — or worse. 
 
 ‘ You cannot make any good of yours, if I can of mine,’ laughed 
 Clarissa, glancing at her mother, who was comfortably dozing on 
 the sofa. They say that the initials of our name should spell 
 something sensible to bring good luck. Now A. S. C. don’t spell 
 anything, do they? But I can make mine into a word — “cas.” 
 I wonder what “ cas ” ! ’ she laughed again. 
 
 6 All that is beautiful ! — all that is delighful ! ’ said St. Claire, 
 with gallant fervour. 6 If only wishes were as powerful as they 
 are sincere ! 9 
 
 ( Well, if they were ? ’ asked Clarissa, with sweet unconscious- 
 ness of backgrounds and double meanings. 
 
 ‘ You should be one of the golden glories of the world ! ’ said 
 St. Claire, repeating the former phase of gallant fervour. 
 
 ‘ Oh, I should make a very bad kind of “ golden glory ” ! 1 said 
 Clarissa, her eyes sparkling, her whole plump sleek little person 
 sleeker and plumper than ever with this pleasant influx of gratified 
 vanity. ‘ 1 am only a humble little mouse. If I could be trans- 
 formed I should like to be made into a bird or a flower, and to leave 
 all the grand things to others.’ 
 
 6 We will find some good fairy to make you into a pretty little 
 singing-bird, and put you in a cage full of flowers; ’ said St. Claire. 
 
 ‘ And then Nony would kill me,’ said Clarissa, with rather a 
 falsetto accent in her voice. 
 
 4 No, she would take care of you and feed you with sugar/ said 
 St. Claire. 6 What shall we make you, Miss lone ? ’ he asked 
 
WHICH? OR EITHER? 
 
 123 
 
 turning to the younger girl with just the same sweetness of man- 
 ner as he had had when speaking to Clarissa. ‘Will you be a 
 golden glory, or a bird in a cage full of flowers P I fancy the former 
 would suit you better than the latter. What do you say ? ’ 
 
 lone’s rigid face did not relax by a line. She had no relish for 
 the aftermath of attentions — for the mere gleanings of the field ; 
 and to talk nonsense — and such nonsense ! — to her as a second to 
 Clarissa was worse than neglect. 
 
 ‘ I do not know what you are talking about!’ she said with 
 supreme disdain. 
 
 ‘ Whether you will be a bird, like that poor little Mimi you 
 killed, or a golden glory set upon a throne/ said Clarissa. ‘ I am 
 going to be another Mimi — but you are not to kill me, you know. 
 Dr. St. Claire has promised that you will not. He says you will 
 give me sugar instead. Will you give me quantities of sugar, 
 Nony P ’ 
 
 ‘ Do not include me in such absurdity/ said lone, proudly. 
 ‘ You know how much I dislike nonsense.’ 
 
 ‘ I forgot that you are sacred when you play queen — and you 
 are playing queen now/ said Clarissa, with unabated good-humour. 
 ‘ We all have to attend to Nony’s wishes when she plays queen/ 
 she added blithely to St. Claire. ‘ Have we not, Nony ? ’ 
 
 ‘ If teasing is attending to one’s wishes — yes/ said lone. 
 
 ‘ Naughty No ! now you are cross/ laughed Clarissa, pinching 
 her cheek. 6 What a naughty little No it is ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Don’t, Clarissa/ cried lone, pushing away her sister’s hand. 
 6 You are too aggravating to be borne ! ’ 
 
 6 My dear lone, your temper grows worse every day of your life/ 
 said Mrs. Stewart, who had roused herself from her doze at the first 
 sound of lone’s irritated voice. 1 You allow yourself to be made 
 angry by the merest trifle — you cannot bear a joke nor enter into 
 any kind of innocent fun. I really do not know what to do with 
 you/ she added, in her helplessly plaintive but not acrimonious 
 way. 
 
 ‘ It is not fun, mamma ; it is ill-natured teasing/ said lone. 
 
 ‘ That is because you are ill-tempered, my poor girl. If you 
 were as amiable as Clarissa, you would take things as she means 
 them/ said Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 ‘ I am sure I did not wish to tease you, Nony/ said Clarissa, 
 with genuine amiability — perhaps a little heightened for the good 
 effect to be produced. < Do not scold her, mother. It was my 
 fault. I ought to have been more careful/ she added nicely ; and 
 St. Claire thought to himself, ‘ What a heavenly temper that 
 dear little girl has ; and what a pity this beautiful creature should 
 be so nervous/ smiling on both with impartial benignity. 
 
 ‘ I am sorry if I was cross ; but you know you meant to tease 
 me, Clarissa/ said lone, with an effort. 
 
124 
 
 IOAE. 
 
 And with this she got up and left the room, and no one saw 
 her again for that night. She had a headache and had gone to 
 bed, she said, when Clarissa knocked at her barred door to tell her 
 to come into the drawing-room to wish Dr. St. Claire good-night, 
 as he was going away. But Vincenzo, who found himself in the 
 garden beneath her window long after midnight, saw her sitting 
 out on the loggia in the moonlight, with a look on her face which 
 went to his heart like a wound ; and which he thought to himself : 
 How could he avenge ? 
 
 This was one example of St. Claire’s mindless method of making 
 love — but to which ? Or it might be simply an instance of his 
 ordinary manner, according to the way in which it was taken. In 
 any case it must be confessed that it was a manner to the highest 
 extent silly, yet both misleading and provocative. 
 
 Another time lie was singing one of his pretty little French 
 songs — that whereof the burden was : ‘ M’amie que j’aime tant ! ’ 
 
 While he sang he looked at lone, only because she chanced to be 
 in the line of vision, and he must look at something. But, because 
 as he had last sung that song to Monica, his voice was full now of 
 tremulous passion and his eyes were dark and tender with unshed 
 tears. And when a handsome young fellow looks full into the face 
 of a beautiful girl, with such eloquence of feeling as St. Claire 
 betrayed at this moment, and says in tones which vibrate with the 
 very pathos of devotion: 6 M’amie que j’aime tant!’ what can 
 people think but that this too is a method of making love ? 
 
 Yet, in truth, nothing was farther from Armine’s thoughts than 
 wilful love-making. It was only his treacherous eyes, and his state 
 of gentle melancholy and chronic heartbreak which made him 
 look like it. But lone’s cheeks turned pale, and her eyes were 
 dark as night as she cast them down beneath her heavy lids ; and 
 her heart, whispering to her hope : Was it meant P was answered 
 back by both pride and fear. 
 
 St. Claire had a fine cat’s-eye ring. It was almost unique for 
 colour and lustre, and he was proud of it. It was one of the few 
 things which he had preserved from the wreck of his fortune, and 
 he always felt that in some sense his good luck was bound up with 
 this gem. One day Mrs. Stewart — who, by the way, was invari- 
 ably present while St. Claire made his odd double-handed love — 
 asked to see this ring. He took it from his finger and gave it to 
 her. From her it passed to Clarissa, who, girl-like, put it on her 
 own finger. But it was too large for an}*- of the pretty little pink 
 fingers which made the delight of the Palermitan glove-makers, 
 and her own despair at their constant misfits. It ’was next handed 
 to lone, who looked at it without trying it on. 
 
 ‘See if it fits you,’ said St. Claire, as if it had been the glass 
 slipper and he the prince on the search for Cinderella. 
 
 Her hand, though finely shaped, was many sizes larger than 
 
WHICH? OR EITHER? 
 
 125 
 
 Clarissa’s ; and St. Claire’s was small for a man. The ring which 
 he wore on his little finger fitted her third to perfection — her third 
 — the fatal finger of a womans hand ! 
 
 ‘ It goes perfectly/ said St. Claire, with a smile. ‘ 1 did not 
 think our hands paired so well.’ 
 
 ‘ If they do, yours must he too small for a man, or lone’s too 
 large for a woman/ said Mrs. Stewart, with her usual manner of 
 gentle displeasure. 
 
 To which lone, holding up her beautiful hands in the pose in 
 which they made the best lines and had the most becoming 
 physiognomy, said, with hypocritical humility: ‘Mine are too 
 large for a woman, mamma. Did you ever see such awful monsters ? ’ 
 
 ‘ No, they are beautiful ! ’ said St. Claire, with anatomical 
 admiration. ‘And so/ turning to Clarissa, ‘are yours, Miss 
 Stewart — of a different style from your sister’s, but equally 
 beautiful.’ 
 
 ‘ You have catholic tastes, Dr. St. Claire/ said Mrs. Stewart, a 
 shade of petulance mingled with her general melancholy. 
 
 ‘ I cultivate catholicity of taste. I have a great dislike to one- 
 sidedness and narrowness,’ answered Dr. St. Claire, in his sweet 
 way. 
 
 ‘ One may be too catholic/ returned Clarissa’s mother. ‘ I will 
 say to you what our good clergyman once said to a dreadful sceptic 
 who was here : “ Better be anchored to something, no matter 
 
 what, than floating about at the mercy of every wind that 
 blows.”’ 
 
 ‘ Yes, in matters of opinion ; but in the faculty of finding the 
 beautiful — is it not better to be able to find that everywhere than 
 only in a few isolated spots ? ’ asked St. Claire. 
 
 ‘ If you confine yourself to what you call finding the beautiful, 
 to pictures or places or churches, perhaps you are right,’ answered 
 Mrs. Stewart. ‘ But this kind of temperament goes into so much 
 else, and sometimes leads to great danger — to latitudinarianism, 
 for example, and indecision of character all through.’ 
 
 ‘ It may, but not necessarily/ said St. Claire. 
 
 ‘ It is so much better to know your own mind and hold by 
 your opinions/ said Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 And St. Claire could not for the life of him imagine what she 
 meant, or of what she was vaguely accusing him. He had never 
 seen her so nearly ill-tempered as she was to-day ; and he looked 
 at her with professional criticism to catch the hues and lines which 
 should give him the key and tell him what ailed her body and 
 consequently warped her mind. But he could make out nothing 
 different from other days ; so he took refuge in that wide haven of 
 unknown influences, the atmosphere ; and said to himself : ‘ She 
 
 is under the weather. Perhaps it is scirocco.’ 
 
 Soon after this they went into the garden, as they always did 
 
126 
 
 IOXE. 
 
 when St. Claire was at the villa ; for he was not weary yet of this 
 strange and delightful sensation of being in the heart of summer in 
 February and March ; and the Stewarts too were fond of flowers 
 and fresh air. 
 
 As they strolled along the pathway, bordered with roses of all 
 hinds and shades, St. Claire picked a beautiful ‘ blush ’ bud ; 
 round, smooth, compact, delicately tinted; which he gave to 
 Clarissa, saying, with a charming smile : 4 Like to like, as the 
 
 old valentines say ; or Sweets to the sweet — that is better/ 
 
 Whereat Mrs. Stewart, in her turn gently smiling, though with 
 the intention of mild reproof, said : 1 You must not spoil my child 
 by flattering her too much, Dr. St. Claire/ 
 
 6 1 do not think she could be spoilt/ returned St. Claire, in his 
 sweet way. 1 She is too good ! ’ 
 
 6 Yes/ said Mrs. Stewart ; ‘ that is just it — she is too good to 
 be spoilt. But we do not mean the same thing. We use the 
 phrase differently. I mean that she is so nice now, it would be a 
 pity to spoil her by flattery ; and your meaning is not the same/ 
 
 ‘ Is telling people you admire them — is giving them credit for 
 their good qualities, flattery ? ? asked St. Claire, amiably argumen- 
 tative. 6 1 do not think so. There are so many willing to tell 
 us all sorts of disagreeables and horrors, I think it only fair to 
 declare what we admire, and praise candidly what is deserving 
 of praise/ 
 
 4 It is an amiable feeling, but a rather dangerous practice/ 
 said Mrs. Stewart, a little drily ; but when St. Claire replied : 
 6 You are always so just and generous in your sentiments, Mrs. 
 Stewart, I am conscious I ought to attend to your advice/ she 
 did not see that this was flattery, nor that the handsome young 
 fellow reinstated himself in her good graces by the very repeti- 
 tion of the fault which had in some sense disturbed his holding. 
 
 It would not have disturbed her at all had St. Claire been 
 content to flatter Clarissa alone. It was the association of lone 
 — the reduplication — which fretted her. For instance, after this 
 little passage of arms, where the foils were sheathed in velvet 
 scabbards, the young physician tripped again in his fence ; and 
 this time more grievously. 
 
 lone had heard nothing of that compliment and the small dis- 
 cussion founded on it. She had wandered away alone, as she often 
 did, no one knew why, and was now sauntering between the thick 
 lines — indeed almost hedgerows— of spiked lavender, which hid all 
 but her golden head and proud columnar throat. They all met 
 where the rose-path intersected the lavender. At this point was 
 the most beautiful rose-tree in the garden — that superb and royal 
 gloire de Dijon which people bribed the gardener to despoil for 
 them, and paid heavily for buds and cuttings ; which last, it must 
 be said, by some mysterious fatality, never came to any good. 
 
WHICH? OR EITHER? 
 
 127 
 
 Antonio accepted tlie money and gave the equivalent ; hut he 
 took care that this equivalent should never fructify, and that his 
 padrone alone should possess the prize. 
 
 St. Claire picked one of the half-opened flowers and offered it 
 to lone. 
 
 4 The queen of the flowers to the queen of the garden/ he said, 
 thinking of Clarissa's accusation of queenliness, and meaning 
 nothing more than he had meant to Clarissa — nothing more than 
 if he had offered a sugar-plum to a child and kissed her after- 
 wards. 
 
 4 Now, Dr. St. Claire, what have I just been saying ?’ said 
 Mrs. Stewart, sharply. 4 1 will not have these girls spoilt and 
 made fools of ! ’ 
 
 In a moment lone comprehended the situation. Her eye 
 caught the blush rosebud in Clarissa’s breast ; her ear the acrid 
 accent in her adopted mother's voice; and her jealous fancy sup- 
 plied the rest. 
 
 4 Here, Clarissa/ she said, giving her the rose. 4 Hoses and 
 pretty speeches belong to you, not to me.’ 
 
 4 Thank you, Nony, but keep your own/ said Clarissa, quite 
 amiably. 4 Pink and yellow do not go together, and I am satisfied 
 with what I have.’ 
 
 4 Will you not have it ? ’ asked lone, offering it for the second 
 time. 
 
 4 No ! ’ said Clarissa. 
 
 4 Nonsense, lone, take your rose and wear it, and do not make 
 such a fuss about a mere trifle like this ! ’ said Mrs. Stewart, with 
 more and more acridity of voice and manner. 
 
 4 1 do not want it/ said lone, tearing the petals from the calyx 
 and tossing them in a pale golden shower among the scented leaves 
 of the lavender. 
 
 A few minutes after, St. Claire had drawn her away from the 
 others and was standing’ with her among the roses alone. 
 
 4 How did I offend you by giving you that rose? ’ he asked 
 anxiously, his beautiful eyes full of misleading tenderness and 
 undesigned pathos. 
 
 4 You did not offend me/ said lone, proudly. 
 
 1 Then why did you not wear it, as your sister wore hers ? ’ he 
 asked. 4 Why did you destroy it and fling it so contemptuously away, 
 if you w r ere not annoyed with me for giving it to you ? ’ 
 
 4 And why should you give me one when you had already 
 given one to Clarissa ? ’ returned lone. 4 Do you think it a com- 
 pliment to any girl to come second P ’ 
 
 4 But some one must be first in order of time/ pleaded St. 
 Claire. 4 Order of time does not make order of merit or degree of 
 interest/ he added soothingly, looking at lone as if he loved her. 
 
 4 1 do not understand sharing, and I will never take the second 
 
128 
 
 IONE. 
 
 place/ said lone, sticking to her own point, and wide of St. 
 Claire’s. 
 
 And with this she walked proudly away, her head erect, her 
 shoulders straight, her face set like a flint, and her heart full of 
 hatred to all the world, but specially full of contempt for Clarissa 
 and anger against St. Claire. 
 
 He, poor fellow, was lost in a kind of mental fog, wherein he 
 was only conscious of amazement and distress — amazement that he 
 had so evidently hurt lone by such a commonplace little action, 
 and distress that he had blundered so innocently into evil. The 
 true solution never entered his mind ; and he gave the credit of 
 all this abnormal susceptibility to that much-enduring beast of 
 burden the weather — that scapegoat wdiich has to carry so many 
 sins of temper on its back, as now it bore lone’s exaggerated 
 exclusiveness, just as it had carried Mrs. Stewart’s unwonted 
 acerbity. 
 
 6 Assuredly I must pick no more roses at the Villa Clarissa ! 7 
 he said to himself as he walked home to his hotel. * They are as 
 dangerous as those which cost the merchant his daughter and gave 
 poor Beauty to the Beast ! It is enchanted ground all through, 
 and things are not what they seem from first to last. What is 
 true, however, is the sweet amiability of that pretty little Clarissa, 
 and the exceedingly regretable temper of that beautiful lone. 
 What a pity she should spoil herself as she does by her temper ! 
 And what a pity, too, that they should not treat her with a little 
 more consideration of her infirmity ! It is only humane and philo- 
 sophical to be considerate of an infirmity like that/ he went on to say 
 to himself, with the serene philosophy of people who j udge from a 
 distance and whose nerves are not worn by the peculiarities 
 which rasp those of close companions bare. 6 We all have our 
 faults ; but what kind of life should we make if we were not 
 forbearing one to the other ? Of course we ought to be forbearing. 
 And that is just where these dear delightful people fail with lone 
 — they are not forbearing enough to her, and do not know how to 
 treat her. Ah ! if Monica, that beautiful, that half-divine Monica, 
 could but know her ! What good she would do her ! How she 
 would bring out all that is lovely in her nature and check by her 
 sweet example all that is unworthy ! Beautiful and half-divine 
 in very truth — ah ! I shall never see her like ! No one is her 
 equal ! She stands alone like the crowned queen of gracious 
 womanhood ; and I love her, and have lost her ! 
 
 Back over his heart came the old rush of grieving love. His 
 wounds reopened and bled with all their former violence. He 
 forgot Palermo, the Stewarts, lone, his present place, the present 
 moment, and where his footsteps fell and whither they were 
 leading him. He walked on mechanically, like a somnambulist 
 in his dreams, unconscious of whom he met, unconscious, too, that 
 
WHICH? OR EITHER? 
 
 129 
 
 tears were in Lis eyes. He was once more witli Monica 
 in the garden, going through the agony of his denied loye ; and 
 all the rest was blank. He saw nothing and knew nothing ; 
 not even that he passed so close by Captain Stewart as to touch 
 his shoulder with his own. 
 
 ‘ Has St. Claire been here to-day P 1 asked the Captain when 
 he reached home after this odd encounter. 
 
 1 Yes/ returned Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 ‘ Did anything happen P ’ the master inquired again. 
 
 ‘ No, nothing/ was the reply ; but Clarissa blushed a little at 
 her mother’s disclaimer, and lone’s strange eyes flashed, and her 
 cheeks turned ashen pale. 
 
 ‘ Well, he looked like a man possessed, or who has had some 
 heavy sorrow/ said the Captain, with a sharp glance beneath his 
 eyebrows at each of the girls in turn. ‘ He was walking down 
 the Maqueda, evidently seeing nothing and no one ; for he 
 touched me as he passed and never saw me at all ; and I swear 
 his eyes were full of tears ! ’ 
 
 1 Impossible ! ’ said Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 ‘ 1 saw them/ repeated her husband. ‘ His face was as white 
 as a sheet, his eyes were straight before him, and, as I live, they 
 were full of tears ! ’ 
 
 i How extraordinary ! — how very distressing ! ’ said Mrs* 
 Stewart, with a curious little sentiment of pleasure in her 
 sympathy. 
 
 ‘ Did he seem out of sorts ? ’ asked her husband. 
 
 i No ; he was in very good spirits all the time he was here/ she 
 replied. And on the Captain saying ‘ Humph ! ’ the conversation 
 dropped. 
 
 But each woman gave a different version to her own heart. 
 
 ‘ Poor sensitive young fellow, he was pained because I scolded 
 him/ thought Mrs. Stewart, with the complacency of gratified 
 power. 
 
 ‘He thought that mother did not like him to be kind to me/ 
 said Clarissa to herself, with that soft little smile of pleased vanity 
 of which the satin lining is nascent love. 
 
 And : ‘ I made him feel — I made him unhappy. He did not 
 mean to slight me, and he does respect my rights/ were lone’s 
 thoughts as she sat by her window and looked out on the stars, 
 and felt her heart throb with the passionate beat of triumphant 
 pride and assuaged jealousy; — no longer the second, but emphati- 
 cally the first ! 
 
 K 
 
J30 
 
 ZONE 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 A DAY WITH THE GODS. 
 
 Among tlie pleasant home-customs kept up by the English colony 
 in Palermo, that of making picnic parties to beautiful spots in the 
 neighbourhood is the most delightful. The climate lends itself to 
 this form of enjoyment perhaps better than to any other, and the 
 traditions of the old country are in perfect harmony with the con- 
 ditions of the new. 
 
 The Stewarts were great people for these picnic parties ; and 
 their charming outings to Mondello Bay, to Solanto, to Sferrica- 
 vallo, and the like, were among the festas which counted as social 
 blue ribands to the invited. Having now a young prince in dis- 
 guise like Armine St. Claire, to show attention to whom was both 
 pleasure and duty in one, they turned over the idea of a luncheon 
 al fresco at Mondello Bay till they got it into working order; 
 finally arranging to give on a certain Thursday one of those 
 charming picnics, after the manner of the Anglo-Palermitans, in 
 honour of the handsome and heart-broken adorer of dreamy-eyed 
 Monica Barrington — provided only that the scirocco did not blow 
 in those maddening clouds of dust which render life intolerable 
 and locomotion impossible, reducing all sensation to suffering and 
 all virtue to patience ! 
 
 No such mischance, however, happened on this special Thurs- 
 day. The air being as clear as crystal, and no wind to speak of 
 blowing from any quarter at all, the party that had been proposed 
 came off in due course ; and all who bad been invited were present 
 on the ground and punctual to the time. 
 
 No festa ever promised fairer than this which had been got up 
 in St. Claire’s special honour. Though winter according to the 
 calendar, it was summer according to Reaumur ; and the day was 
 one made for happiness alone. It was a day which justified the 
 reputation of the Sicilian climate, and gave those who rejoiced in 
 its splendour cause to pity the poor frozen and befogged dwellers 
 in the brave old home. Bright, light, warm, and full of colour, 
 the atmosphere was as if just renewed in the great laboratory of 
 nature. What germs it held were surely only the forms of beau- 
 tiful growths and harmonious conditions! Disease, decay, rust 
 and stain, could not exist in that exquisite envelope, that luminous 
 ocean of untainted air ; but all forms of beauty floated like filmy 
 clouds across the deep blue sky and looked out from the depths of 
 the translucent sea. The old gods were once more the mild rulers 
 of heaven, the benevolent guests of men, the glad lovers of nymph 
 
A DAY WITH THE GODS. 
 
 I3i 
 
 and mortal maid ; and the past, the present, and the future made 
 one great whole of glorious memory, of perfect possession, of divine 
 foreshadowing. 
 
 It needed no great stretch of imagination to believe that once, 
 when the world was young and the far-seeing gods were demo- 
 cratic in their lives and wholly human in their loves, on such a day 
 as this Arethusa was pursued and Semele was beloved ; that 
 Europa and her companions garlanded the divine bull with aspho- 
 dels and amaranths, and Proserpine laughed as she stood knee- 
 deep in flowers on the fatal plains of Enna ; that naiads sported 
 with their amorous tritons in the coral caves of the purple sea; 
 that n}uiiphs, wreathed with myrtle, played with young fauns in 
 the shadow of the ilex-woods; that Bacchantes, crowned with 
 vine-leaves, danced in the abandonment of youth and the passion- 
 ate joy of life while Dionysos and Ampelus looked on, leaning 
 against each other on the ivory couch spread with leopard skins 
 and strewn with roses ; that Anadyomene rose in her golden shell 
 from the iridescent foam, and heaven and earth met in loving con- 
 tact at her feet. It was a day created for love and consecrated to 
 beauty — a day which makes the young unquiet and leaves the old 
 retrospective; the one full of vague melancholy and unformed 
 desires, the other of dear memories overshadowed by regrets that 
 youth should have been so short and time so swift, and the master- 
 flame of life so soon burnt out ! 
 
 Lucus a non lucendo , because there was not a line of natural 
 relation between Mondello Bay and Oakhurst, not a trace of at- 
 mospheric association between this burning sky of Sicily and the 
 pale sunshine of England, St. Claire’s heart was full of Monica and 
 the Dower House. Wherever he turned he saw the dreamy grey 
 eyes of the girl he loved — whatever he heard had in it the echo of 
 her soft voice. The love which he carried in his heart transformed 
 all to its own likeness, and stimulated by the pungent vitality of the 
 day, his partially healed wounds reopened, in spite of their healthy 
 granulation, and bled afresh — as they had bled on the day when 
 lone had disclaimed his flower and Captain Stewart had met him 
 with tears in his eyes, walking like a somnambulist down the Via 
 Maqueda. 
 
 And so, because he was secretly grieving for the loss of one 
 girl, his manners to these other two were even sweeter, more flat- 
 tering, more sympathetic than usual ; his eyes were softer and 
 fuller of unspoken love ; his voice was lower and more seductive 
 in its musical intonation ; and his whole being was more and more 
 inter-penetrated by that dumb misleading eloquence which pro- 
 claimed him the lover he was — but the lover, neither of Clarissa 
 nor of lone, but of Monica Barrington, unknown and far away. 
 
 Yet who thinks of the possibility of the unknown and far away, 
 when this misleading eloquence of unspoken love reveals itself in 
 
 K 2 
 
TONE. 
 
 132 
 
 every word and gesture, every look and accent, of a handsome 
 young man, apparently devoted to one of two pretty girls ! — which 
 of the two, however, by no means certain, and the choice one which 
 your own imagination may make at its will P Who suspects a 
 palimpsest, written thick and close with unpublished songs of 
 passion and sorrow, in the tablet which looks untouched, save for 
 the first faint tracing of that little word of Love which time is 
 sure to deepen P Palimpsests as we all know ourselves to be so 
 soon as the early days of youth are passed, we accept the seemingly 
 smooth tablet of others with child-like faith ; and when we read 
 that little word drawn lightly across the wax we believe it to be of 
 yesterday’s inscription and due to our own spiritual penmanship. 
 Fools that we are ! It is some old and ineffaceable engraving, the 
 lines of which strike up through the modern overlay, because so 
 deeply marked that nothing can ever obliterate them. They look 
 like new ; but in truth they are the old — the old which renew 
 themselves under all the changed conditions of the surface of things 
 - — the old which are eternal, while that surface of things is the 
 sole shifting circumstance. How much of the love we give is the 
 perennial flower of habit ? How much of that which we receive is 
 the recurrent fruit of memory ? Hearts are like the stems of 
 certain trees, ringed round and round with successive layers. But 
 in the centre is the pith which is always the same, which is only 
 overlaid by new envelopes, and which is the cause and formative 
 energy of all. ‘ On revient toujours a ses premieres amours.’ But, 
 does one ever really abandon them ? The first child born by the soul 
 to Love modifies all that come after, and every new departure i3 
 only in a certain sense a retracing of the old way. The jealous 
 have some reason, then, for demanding absolute virginity of heart 
 in those they love; unless to be jostled and confounded in the 
 memory and association is of no importance to them, and they can 
 make themselves content with the actual fact and the present 
 moment. And the actual fact and the present moment are but 
 very fractional parts of life ! 
 
 Other young men besides St. Claire were at the picnic. Among 
 them was one specially smart and well-set-up young fellow, the 
 Marchese Mazzarelli, one of the prime social favourites of Palermo. 
 Brilliant, clever, lively, and adept, with laughing eyes and a plea- 
 sant tenor voice, an excellent drawing-room conjuror and a 
 graceful dancer, with an inexhaustible fund of good temper, good 
 spirits, and social resource, it was no wonder that all the world 
 agreed to treat him like the favourite child of the community — 
 the spoiled darling of fortune — and to make him feel that he was 
 most welcome where all were well received. He passed for being 
 an admirer of lone Stewart ; but, as he was poor, and she had no 
 marriage portion, his admiration would never be suffered to cul- 
 minate into the fiasco of an offer and the heartbreak of impossibility. 
 
A DAY WITH THE GODS. 
 
 133 
 
 With all his brightness and good spirits, and what looked on the 
 surface like heedlessness and want of reflection, he had far too 
 much solid Italian common sense for that! Had he been in 
 Armines place at Oakliurst, he would have recognised the uncon- 
 querable obstacles in his way at once ; and he would have saved 
 himself by flight or self-control from all that had overthrown the 
 poor young physician. This self-control in the face of impossi- 
 bility, by the way, is just the quality for which the world does not 
 give the Italians credit. It happens to be the strongest they 
 possess. 
 
 For the rest, lone, who liked the Marchese as much as she 
 liked any one in Palermo, loved him no more than she loved the 
 rest. She had never deceived herself as to the name or extent of 
 her feelings for him. For her there was but one kind of love— 
 that which makes women martyrs, saints, or criminals — and this 
 was not the liking that she had for Mazzarelli. 
 
 Nothing could have been more delightful than was the drive to 
 Mondello Bay, through the Favorita and along the fields which a 
 week ago were red with crimson pheasant’s eye, but now were blue 
 with borage and veronica, pale yellow with wild sorrel, and golden 
 with shining chrysanthemums. Tall spikes of Star of Bethlehem 
 stood up like black-eyed meadow-queens in silver robes; the 
 scarlet spears of the gladiolus burnt like flames among the brush- 
 wood ; long lines of monthly roses, of pink and scarlet geraniums, 
 of myrtle, of the feathery flowering tamarisk, grew wild in un- 
 tended hedgerows ; orange-gardens poured tlieir powerful perfume 
 in aerial torrents across the road ; the coral-tree tossed its crimson 
 blossoms like blood-red foam flecking the bright blue sky; the 
 Judas-tree showed its stately purple against the silvery green of 
 the gnarled and twisted olives ; tlie delicately scented blossoms of 
 the acacia made their odour felt like a low whisper after the 
 louder note of the orange-gardens ; and the birds sang from 
 among the drooping branches of the pepper-tree and the thick 
 covert of the ilex-groves, as they had sung from beech and oak 
 when Theocritus wrote his idylls, and Oomatas worsted Lacon in 
 his trial of skill in song. 
 
 Every one was pleased and everyone was pleasant. The girls sang' 
 snatches of part-songs, where the men put in now a bass and now a 
 tenor — songs which were often interrupted by outbursts of laughter, 
 as the clatter of passing carts with their tinkling bells and clink- 
 ing vanes and ornaments of brass, drowned the silver of their voices 
 and broke up what was at the best but very open order and a very 
 ragged kind of going. Still, when one is young and happy and 
 merry and silly, everything adds to enjoyment; and a fiasco does 
 as well as a success. 
 
 It was so good to be alive on this bright sweet day of the 
 gods ! — so good to be young and healthy, and to know that one’s 
 
134 
 
 IONE. 
 
 eyes were bright and one’s cheeks both fresh and soft ; — to know 
 that the future was one’s own — a treasure as yet unsecured, a 
 domain as yet unconquered — but all the same one’s own. 
 
 Even lone, who was not much given to making herself happy 
 with a multitude, and who generally despised what others ad- 
 mired, even she suffered herself to be thawed into a very creditable 
 condition of good-humour, and took her part with the rest as if 
 she had no special sorrows stinging at her heart like snakes. And 
 Armine, who sat opposite to her and Clarissa, was so far untrue 
 to his cherished memories as to add his sweet sympathetic voice 
 when those part-songs were on hand ; even condescending to 
 trivialities like the chorus in the Funicolare and the like. But 
 both he and lone had somewhat the appearance of being happy 
 under protest-like poetry demeaning itself to prose and tragedy 
 forgetting its dignity in farce — which to some gave their good- 
 fellowship a special charm and to others made it a little offensive 
 and pedantic. 
 
 On the whole, however, the ayes had it ; and every one agreed 
 that this special day and special drive, not to speak of the company 
 and association, were the most perfect, the most enjoyable, the 
 most memorable that had ever been or ever could be. And so, in 
 this mood of universal radiance and content, they drew up on the 
 sands fronting Mondello Bay, and turned down the first leaf in this 
 poetic little chapter of the great book of life and fate. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII, 
 
 REVELATIONS. 
 
 Ip nothing could have been more delightful than the drive 
 through the Favorita and rounding the spur of Pellegrino, 
 nothing was more charming than that preliminary stroll on the 
 sands while the servants were preparing the table under the tent 
 already pitched. Ragged men and women, with half-naked 
 children, stood as a fringe round the sandy dimes where grew 
 cistus and myrtles, tamarisk and thorn-apple, with dwarf-iris at 
 their feet. These poor creatures had gathered silently from all 
 four quarters, as if they had come up from the ground ; attracted 
 by that strange instinct which brings wild things where prey is to 
 be had, as well as instructed by that secret language which, in a 
 few signs, had passed the news from one to the other that food 
 was about and fragments were sure to fall. 
 
 As yet there was no separation into small groups or more 
 intimate couples. The whole body kept together, like a battalion 
 in close order ; and so far as things had yet gone the order of 
 the day was essentially republican and the administration com- 
 
REVELATIONS. 
 
 * 3 $ 
 
 munistic. Everybody belonged to everybody else. There was no 
 favouritism, no exclusiveness, no segregation. Armine looked at 
 lone, talked to Clarissa, laughed with the Lancini girls, and paid 
 bis devoirs like a man to Mrs. Stewart and the elder ladies. So 
 did the other young men ; and the girls were no more exclusive 
 than their cavaliers. But when luncheon was over things were 
 naturally changed. They could not all stand shoulder to shoulder 
 like a well-drilled battalion for the whole afternoon ; and when the 
 wanderings and explorings, the searchings for shells, for flowers, for 
 shade, for points of view, had set in, then the solid mass decom- 
 posed into groups here and couples there. And somehow, no 
 one knew how, not even the girl herself, the Marchese Mazzarelli 
 took possession of lone — and kept what he took. 
 
 In general the young fellow’s attentions did not displease 
 lone. She was a girl like others, and girl-like she enjoyed her 
 triumphs. They put her into good-humour with herself; made 
 her forget the insecurity of her fortunes and the unsatisfactory 
 condition of all things with her ; and tore down some of Clarissa’s 
 extra decorations. And this, to a girl of her jealous temperament, 
 was always somewhat soothing. But to-day she wished that the 
 Marchese would leave her to herself and carry his laughing eyes 
 and pleasant words to Clarissa — who had coveted them not a little 
 when she could not h ave them and had had none other to make up for 
 the want of them. To-day she desired them no more than did lone, 
 and would have found them as unwelcome if she had not received 
 them quite so ungraciously. For St. Claire had joined himself to 
 the plump little human pigeon, and seemed as if he were pinned 
 to her skirts, so close was he in his attendance. And when St. 
 Claire was in the field all other men with these two girls were 
 thrust into the hedge. He was their 6 colour ’ for the moment, 
 and they wore none other. 
 
 Devoured by jealousy, lone only wanted to be alone. Life on 
 this splendid day, when the gods had come back to earth, seemed 
 somehow a terrible mistake. It was above all a mistake to her, 
 cast up by the tide of chance from the depths, she knew neither 
 whence nor how — a mere piece of human wreckage gathered up 
 by hands which regretted their kindly work, and made her feel 
 that they did. Without inherited rights, only with natural claims 
 which she could not enforce, what a miserable life hers was ! Had 
 she been the daughter of well-placed parents whose acquaintance 
 was of itself an honour, this new friend of theirs, this Dr. St. 
 Claire, would not have deserted her for Clarissa ! He would have 
 been proud to have devoted himself to her ; as indeed he ought 
 to be now, for she was a truer friend to him than Clarissa was— 
 much, much truer ! If only she could find her own parents and 
 have someone who could maintain her position — or, failing this, if 
 she could but make a home for herself and be free and inde* 
 
IOXE. 
 
 136 
 
 pendent ! If only she could leave this beautiful island 'which, for all 
 its beauty, was to her a prison — these memories of old times where 
 the gods, who once were the friends of man, were to her like grin- 
 ning spectres — if she could but get away from all she knew and 
 begin a new life in free and independent England ! If only she 
 could ! 
 
 How close St. Claire was standing by Clarissa ! What was 
 he showing her ? What was be saying to her P How she wished 
 that she could hear. How weak he was to waste his time on 
 such a commonplace person as Clarissa. He would do far better 
 to devote himself to one of those Lancini girls. At all events they 
 had good eyes, and could use their fans with grace ; but Clarissa’s 
 eyes were just like two china beads, and she used her fan as if it 
 were a broom-handle. Really she would give up all interest in 
 I)r. St. Claire. He was not worth it. No man who could devote 
 himself like this to Clarissa was worth two thoughts from any 
 other girl. What was he showing her ? Their heads were nearly 
 touching. And see ! Clarissa was actually drawing her little finger 
 across the palm of his band, held curved like a cup, as if she were 
 moving something lying in the hollow. She would look no more. 
 The one *was unworthy her interest, the other too hopelessly bad 
 all through, to make their doings of any worth whatsoever. They 
 might do as they would. It did not regard her ! 
 
 Her heart on fire, her brain dizzy with her passionate and 
 jealous wrath, lone turned towards the sea as if to watch the 
 waves as they ran lipping into shore ; while Mazzarelli, always 
 laughing and good-humoured, scraped the sand at her feet for 
 shells, that he might make her find the largest, and glanced at 
 intervals at Clarissa and St. Claire, as they stood there beneath 
 the sun, looking like lovers and talking in commonplaces. 
 
 ‘Who is that young man?’ at last asked Armine, his face 
 turned to Mazzarelli. 
 
 ‘ Which P Captain Bonacore ? ’ asked Clarissa, looking after a 
 cavalrv officer almost out of sight among the rocks. 
 
 ‘ He, talking to your sister,’ said Armine. 
 
 He was not jealous like a man, only curious like a woman. 
 Still, he wished that if lone gathered shells in concert with a 
 well-set-up, good-looking young fellow with laughing eyes, it had 
 been with an Englishman and not an Italian. 
 
 ‘ Oh ! Mazzarelli — the Marcliese Mazzarelli,’ said Clarissa. 
 * He is a great friend of ours, and desperately in love with Nony.’ 
 
 She made this statement with quite radiant satisfaction. A 
 month ago she would have warmly denied it had it been made 
 to her. 
 
 ‘ I thought so,’ said St. Claire, an odd little wave of displeasure, 
 which might be called peevishness, overpowering the softer and 
 more refined melancholy of his ordinary mood. * Are they engaged P * 
 
REVELATIONS . 
 
 137 
 
 ‘No, not yet. There is not quite enough money yet, else they 
 would he. But as Nony has no dot, they have to wait till his 
 fortunes are better. It will all come right when an old uncle or 
 aunt, or something like that, of his dies,’ she added with her well- 
 known amiability ; looking sympathetically pleased that Nony had 
 this not too distant nor too desperate chance of happiness. 
 
 4 Then she is in love with him P ’ asked Monica’s adorer, with 
 another little wave of sad displeasure. 
 
 4 Of course ! ’ said Clarissa, opening her eyes. 4 She would not 
 encourage him as she does if she were not.’ 
 
 Yet, for all her bold lapse from truth at this moment, Clarissa 
 was by no means a chronic fibber. But she was not sorry to deal 
 lone this sharp backhander, as in some sense a fitting punishment 
 for having attracted Mazzarelli. In her own manageable way she 
 had liked the young Marchese herself, and had secretly resented 
 the unmistakable assignment of his attentions to lone. Now she 
 no longer cared for him. Yet she would not let slip this oppor- 
 tunity for punishing the past. 4 Those who have been to the festa 
 must pay the cost,’ she said to herself ; 4 and Mazzarelli had been 
 lone’s festa quite often enough to make it right that she should 
 pay when the time came.’ 
 
 4 They will make a handsome couple,’ said St. Claire, looking 
 at them with that kind of gentle envy which belongs to the sym- 
 pathetic, disappointed in their own happiness, when they contem- 
 plate the blessedness of others. 
 
 4 Yes, he is very good-looking indeed,’ said Clarissa, emphasising 
 the last word. 
 
 4 And your sister is lovely,’ returned St. Claire. 
 
 4 Do you really think so F ’ asked Clarissa, in a tone of surprise. 
 4 1 should say that Nony was more strange-looking than pretty — - 
 certainly not lovely, or anything like it ! With red hair and 
 yellow eyes, how can she be ? ’ 
 
 4 1 call her hair golden ; and her eyes — well, I do not know 
 what they are ! They are all colours,’ said St. Claire. 
 
 4 All colours ! That does not sound very charming,’ said 
 Clarissa, with a little grimace. 
 
 4 Yours, at all events, do not leave themselves in doubt,’ said 
 St. Claire, gallantly. 4 Yours are as blue as the heavens — as blue 
 as forget-me-nots.’ 
 
 4 But blue eyes are so ugly ! ’ said Clarissa, with girlish coquetry. 
 
 4 1 think them beautiful,’ he answered. 
 
 4 As beautiful as yellow ones P ’ she asked with a little laugh. 
 
 4 Surely,’ he answered, more flattering than truthful. 
 
 ‘Well; perhaps it is better than being all colours, like a 
 chameleon,’ she returned. 4 1 am no chameleon in anything,’ she 
 then added after a short pause, 4 neither in my eyes nor my cha- 
 racter. Nony is.’ 
 
IONE. 
 
 138 
 
 ‘ Though there is a certain curious kind of resemblance between 
 you I can scarcely say where it is ; I think it must be that you 
 both have at times a likeness to your father, and that you meet 
 there ; yet you are strangely unlike/ said St. Claire, rather sud- 
 denly, still looking at lone, and from her to Clarissa. 
 
 ‘ Of course we are/ she answered gaily. 6 How should we be 
 alike ? And how should Nony be like father p How funny ! ’ she 
 added with a little burst of merriment that somehow jarred on 
 St. Claire. 
 
 6 Why not ? ’ he asked with astonishment. 6 You are sisters.’ 
 
 Clarissa laughed again. She had been continually laughing 
 during this conversation, and St. Claire, who was usually quite 
 willing to idealize everything connected with any of his new 
 friends, for the first time found himself irritated and oppressed. 
 
 6 Has no one told you ? ’ she asked, arching her eyebrows still 
 more than nature had already arched them. ‘Nony has not the 
 remotest relationship to any of us/ she said emphatically. 6 She 
 is an orphan, the daughter of an old friend of father’s — but she 
 does not belong to us in any way. He took her when she was 
 quite a little thing ; gave her his name and brought her up as one 
 of the family ; because he and mother are so good ; you do not 
 know how good they are ! ’ — she interpolated heartily ; 6 but she is 
 not one of us, not the least in the world/ she repeated as em- 
 phatically as before. 
 
 She scarcely knew why she felt it to be such a satisfaction to 
 say this to St. Claire. She had no conscious enmity to lone ; did 
 not want to injure her with the handsome young doctor, or at 
 least she did not think that she did ; and yet she felt as if 
 Providence had wrought in her behalf by giving her this op- 
 portunity of enlightenment, and that she ought to use it with 
 thankfulness and despatch. She had been longing to tell St. 
 Claire the truth about her sister by adoption. It was not to harm 
 the girl, but to disabuse the man of an error ; also in some sense 
 to detach herself. She thought that he ought to know how things 
 were at the Villa Clarissa. Every one in Palermo knew. Why 
 not he with the rest ? 
 
 Beside this question of truth which seemed to her of such 
 paramount importance how about that patent fib concerning 
 Mazzarelli ? Clarissa was morally ashamed of lone. That indo- 
 lent and discontented nature; those profitless dreams and long 
 hours of idleness ; those fierce outbursts of jealousy — witness that 
 cruel murder of the little bird — revolted the better ordered, more 
 equable and sweet-tempered nature of Clarissa. And just as she 
 felt that she must wash her pink soft hands when she had soiled 
 them, so now she felt that she owed it to herself to repudiate 
 lone as a blood-relation whose character and conduct reflected 
 on herself, or were derived from her parents. 
 
RE VELA TIONS. 
 
 *39 
 
 She looked at her companion to see how her information affected 
 him. An expression came into his face which she could not 
 read. It might be pity or surprise, or something dearer, or 
 something more repellent. She could not fathom it. And as he 
 said nothing more lucid than a trivial * Indeed ! ’ she was no more 
 helped by his voice than she had been by his eyes. She saw, 
 however, that he looked at lone with more interest of a kind — of 
 what kind she could not say — than he had looked at her before. 
 
 Perhaps it was as well that she could not read the sudden 
 keen desire which almost overpowered him — the passionate wish 
 that possessed him — of doing something for the poor girl’s happi- 
 ness ! From the first he had wondered why she seemed to be 
 always in disgrace. Now he understood her isolation ; and his 
 heart yearned to help her. 
 
 So far Clarissa had not taken much by her cast. In thus 
 separating lone from the family she had concentrated St. Claire’s 
 sympathy, given a voice and a meaning to his pity and divided 
 his interest. 
 
 How he pitied this poor lovely and unloved child! And 
 how beautiful she was! Standing in that wonderful pose of 
 hers, at once so graceful and so proud — her slender figure out- 
 lined against the purple sea and deep blue sky — the light wind 
 catching her creamy skirts and blowing them back in cloud-like 
 curves about her feet — the sun glistening on her shining red- 
 gold hair as if it were a broken and interrupted aureole about 
 her head — she might well have been some nymph or goddess 
 of those old times of love and beauty, borne like a radiant 
 dream on the sunshine of to-day ; some nymph or goddess bear- 
 ing the burden of humanity for the dream of love! How 
 beautiful she was and, yes, he understood it all now, how 
 isolated and unhappy ! She made the third in the trinity of 
 sorrow. Monica, himself, lone ; the first two wrecked because of 
 the love which had been born and strangled at its birth; the 
 third desolate because of the love which had never been born at 
 all. Semblance for reality, charity for inheritance, sufferance for 
 rights. Poor lone ! poor beautiful lone ! 
 
 The Marchese, his bright eyes sparkling, was showing her 
 the treasures he had found in the sand ; and she, wearied and 
 preoccupied, devoured by jealousy and conscious only of hatred 
 to all mankind, was not doing even her bad best to appear inte- 
 rested. For she had the defects of her qualities, and to the 
 sincerity which would not feign joined that selfishness of pride 
 which would not conceal. 
 
 Standing there, proud and weary, she looked across the inter- 
 vening space to Armine. Their eyes met. They were at some 
 little distance from each other, but they could see clearly though 
 they could not hear. And looking thus, it seemed to him as 
 
140 IONE . 
 
 if she had called him to her, to her as if he had said : ( I love 
 you.’ 
 
 The pity which shone like tears in his soft eyes burnt into 
 her heart like love ; and she answered what she thought she 
 saw by a look that half commanded and half besought. He 
 felt impelled to go to her. At any cost of appearance, and at the 
 certain risk of offending Clarissa, he felt that he must make her 
 understand how much he pitied her. He was so sorry for her ! 
 and she was so beautiful! He did not believe what Clarissa 
 had told him about the Marchese. lone was not in love with 
 him. He knew no more than this. Engaged or not, lone 
 Stewart was not in love with the Marchese Mazzarelli. 
 
 In two minutes he was by her side ; and Clarissa was left 
 looking for shells alone. 
 
 lone smiled when St. Claire came up as she had not smiled 
 the whole of this after-part of the day. She felt as if a soft mist 
 had come down between her and the brazen sun, beneath which 
 she had been burned and scorched, leaving her free to enjoy and 
 be glad. The man whose devotion she coveted had obeyed her 
 secret wish. He had left Clarissa for her, and so far her jealousy 
 was appeased. But Clarissa, with crimson for blush-rose on her 
 round fair face, tears in her blue eyes, and as much anger in her 
 heart as her tranquil nature would allow, turned back over the 
 sands to where her father and mother were sitting on the ridge, and, 
 showing her shells as the ostensible reason of her return, said to 
 her mother with an acridity unusual to her : 
 
 i Mother, I wish you would speak to Nony and tell her not to 
 flirt so much as she does. Now with one and now with another 
 — it really does not look nice ! It does not seem to matter to her 
 who it is so long as she has some one to pay her compliments and 
 be silly with. And the Italians think it so odd, and say such dis- 
 agreeable things of us English girls when they see us go on like 
 this. I wish you would speak to her ! ’ 
 
 ‘ What has she been doing, my dear P ’ asked Mrs. Stewart, 
 always just and wishing to be impartial. 
 
 6 She has been flirting all the afternoon with the Marchese 
 Mazzarelli, and now she has begun with Dr. St. Claire,’ said 
 Clarissa. ‘ And it looks so dreadful in such a young girl as she 
 is ! She will not mind a word I say, though I try to check her 
 when we are together. But I think she goes on worse than ever 
 when I speak to her. So do you speak to her yourself, mother. 
 She must not be allowed to make herself so conspicuous ! ’ 
 
 ( I will, most certainly,’ said Mrs. Stewart, severely ; for, lone 
 apart, flirting was a thing of which she had a constitutional 
 horror. And she felt quite as keenly as Clarissa the unfavourable 
 impression given to the people among whom she lived, by the 
 undue freedom, not to say worse, of certain of her younger com- 
 
RE VELA TIONS. 
 
 141 
 
 patriots. When it came to anything like indiscretion in her own 
 family it was intolerable. To do her justice, she had been a model 
 of carefulness in her up-bringing of the two girls ; and she was 
 essentially a pure and modest little woman for her own part. 
 
 4 Go to her, Clarissa,’ she continued after a pause, during which 
 she had watched lone standing between the two young men, and 
 had seen how, in confirmation of her daughter’s report, she turned 
 her face to St. Claire and her shoulder to Mazzarelli. 4 Tell her 
 that I want her to join the Lancini girls ; and if she will not, 
 then send her to me.’ 
 
 The Lancini girls were strolling over the sands accompanied 
 by their father and mother, and a couple of handsome young Italians 
 to pay them homage and make the day pleasant ; but there was 
 no possibility of a look or a word passing among them of which 
 the authorities would not approve. Under such surveillance Mrs. 
 Stewart felt that lone would be properly restricted. 
 
 4 We shall have to do something with that poor girl soon ! 9 
 she said to her husband after Clarissa had left, her displeasure, 
 like love, growing with what it fed on. 4 That wretched blood of 
 hers ! ’ she added below her breath ; and her husband wisely did 
 not hear. All that he chose to hear he answered by saying, in 
 his slow lazy way : 
 
 4 Do not take things too seriously. lone does not care a straw 
 for Mazzarelli, and I am very sure that St. Claire does not care 
 for her.’ 
 
 4 She would make him if she could, if only to take him from 
 Clarissa,’ said Mrs. Stewart, hastily. 
 
 4 She cannot take from Clarissa what does not belong to her,’ 
 returned the Captain, with more caution than candour. 4 St. 
 Claire is a nice young fellow enough, but I will undertake to say 
 he has no matrimonial projects in his head.’ 
 
 4 I do not know about that,’ said Mrs. Stewart, demurely. 
 
 4 If I thought so I should have to change my manners,’ said 
 her husband, bound by that queer unwritten law, in force among 
 English fathers, to openly discourage the idea of potential sons- 
 in-law even when secretly desired. And Mrs. Stewart, a little 
 over-awed, let the conversation drop. 
 
 Clarissa went back to the trio and duly delivered her mother’s 
 message. 
 
 4 Nony,’ she said, trying to speak naturally and not quite suc- 
 ceeding; 4 mother wants us to join the Lancini girls. We have 
 left them alone too long, she says.’ 
 
 4 They do not want us,’ answered lone. 
 
 4 Mother wishes it,’ repeated Clarissa. 
 
 4 Do you go then. Why should IP They are your friends, 
 mot mine. I do not care for them,’ returned lone. 
 
 4 That is not the question. It is mother’s wish,’ again said 
 
ZONE. 
 
 142 
 
 Clarissa. 'So, come Nony. Tell her to obey my mother, 
 Marchese,’ she said in Italian to Mazzarelli, as if his wish would 
 he her sister’s law. 
 
 ' La Signorina lone does not need my poor word to do what 
 is right,’ answered the young fellow, laughing. 
 
 ' I do not wish to go,’ said lone, setting her lips. 
 
 ‘ Come, Dr. St. Claire, let us go at all events,’ said Clarissa, 
 as her master-stroke ; and with this she looked at the young doctor 
 prettily, and made a few steps forward. 
 
 St. Claire looked at lone, hut her eyes were cast down on the 
 sand, and her handsome face was as rigid as stone. 
 
 ' Shall I carry your shells for you P ’ he said in his sweetest 
 and most charming manner, touching the ends of the handkerchief 
 which she carried, full of shells, hy the four corners. 
 
 The faintest little smile stole over her face. It was not so 
 much a smile as a tremulous kind of moral sunshine ; hut it 
 expressed all, and conceded all. 
 
 ' Thank you, yes ; take them for me,’ she said ; and without 
 another word turned with him and went up to the Italian ladies. 
 
 Her obstinacy had passed with her jealousy. St. Claire had 
 identified himself with her, and she obeyed neither Mrs. Stewart, 
 nor Clarissa, hut him. As for the Marchese, she overlooked him 
 as entirely as if he had not been in existence ; and St. Claire 
 thought that for a pair of lovers, as Clarissa had said they were, 
 she was remarkably indifferent and he as remarkably cool. But 
 he was more than ever convinced that his blue-eyed informant 
 was wrong, and that lone did not love Mazzarelli. 
 
 After this the day seemed to fade for more than one. A 
 wind rose cold and strong, and the sun seemed to lose its power. 
 The gods deserted the earth, and sea and sky, and wood and plain 
 were once more tenantless of all that divine life, that glorious 
 throng, which had possessed and peopled them in the early 
 day. No one knew what had happened, but all felt that the 
 spirit of the festa had died, and that only the body was left ; 
 and no one was sorry when the order to put to the horses was 
 given, and the drive homeward began. 
 
 During that drive lone was silent and concentrated ; Clarissa 
 was a little cross and pleaded headache; St. Claire was very 
 sorrowful, held by two pains — one for Monica, and the other 
 for lone; the Stewarts were uneasy; and the Lancinis, though 
 always amiable and sweet, were tired. The only person ap- 
 parently at ease was the Marchese Mazzarelli, and his briskness w^as 
 artificial. He had read the little drama aright, and though he knew 
 that he could not marry lone himself, and was not mad enough to 
 be in love with her to no purpose, yet he did not like to see her 
 open preference for another. He would willingly have flung this 
 handsome young Englishman with the French name into the sea 
 
REVELATIONS. 
 
 M3 
 
 as an offering* to tlie infernal gods to whom he belonged — lie 
 would willingly have made a quarrel with him if he could. As 
 he could not, he was exasperatingly good-tempered and bright, 
 and talked all the way home, to no one’s response. 
 
 Once on their way back, lone raised her eyes to St. Claire’s 
 face in that sudden, swift, bewildering way of hers which seemed 
 as if it took the very breath away of those at whom she looked. 
 That look oppressed and haunted him. He could not read it. It 
 was the look of a dumb creature asking for something it could 
 not designate ; of a soul in pain unable to express its sorrow ; of 
 a spirit in bondage within whose liberty lay such plenitude of 
 power, such infinity of glory, and in whose imprisonment was 
 such deadly pain. He was so deeply grieved for her ! She had 
 suggested Monica to him when he first saw her standing by the 
 fountain in the sunshine ; and ever since she had been somehow 
 associated with that beloved image in his mind. How could he 
 do her good P How could he make her happy P Ah, how indeed ! 
 The past gives no light by which the future may be discerned If 
 the mirror of the prophet hang behind him it is obscured and 
 veiled. And Armine’s unhappy love for Monica Barrington at 
 Oakhurst was no guide to tell him how best to insure the well- 
 being of lone Stewart at Palermo. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII, 
 
 PLAYING WITH EIRE. 
 
 St. Claire was a man who might be trusted to keep out of tempta- 
 tion — to keep out of it better than he could withstand it when 
 in it. But he was not a man to arrange circumstances for himself. 
 He had no firm grip on life nor things anyhow ;■ — a man of sensitive 
 soul and tender conscience seldom has. So long as he kept from 
 doing wrong he was content ; he did not always trouble himself 
 to make sure that he was doing wisely. The strongest character- 
 istic about him was his patience, the most tenacious his affections, 
 the most active his pity. He had eliminated from the roll-call of 
 his moral qualities all that part of human nature which is some- 
 times called the savage aud sometimes the animal ; and he had not 
 left alive in his soul the root of one ferocious passion, the outgrowth 
 of one form of tyrannous desire, nor the smallest germ of the 
 ordinary man’s high-handed selfishness. Perhaps he had eliminated 
 more than ferocity and selfishness. Be that as it may, he was 
 eminently the kind of thing that women love as approaching 
 nearer to themselves ; and the dream of some among them is a 
 race of men like Armine St. Claire, unselfish, loving, domestic, gentle, 
 unsceptical and pure. 
 
 Pitiful as he was by nature, use had so far hardened him to the 
 
344 
 
 /ONE. 
 
 sight of the physical pain inseparable from his profession, as to 
 make his nerves steady and his skill more serviceable than his sym- 
 pathies ; but sorrow found him as soft as if he had been a woman, 
 and the tragedy woven into the substance of lone’s life touched 
 him profoundly. He mentally pictured all manner of helpful posi- 
 tions, and made up no end of schemes for her benefit, each one 
 more unworkable than the other. He would have adopted her 
 as his sister, if an unbelieving world would have accepted the 
 relationship in its integrity, and neither have sneered on the one 
 hand nor punished on the other. He thought of writing to Mrs. 
 Barrington, begging her to ask her on a visit, when perhaps Edward 
 Formby would be taken by her beauty, her grace, her charm, and 
 end once for all his unsubstantial relations with Monica in the 
 hard-and-fast fact of marriage with lone. He tumbled out of the 
 bag of his memory the names of all the lonely spinsters who would 
 be so much happier if only they would adopt as a daughter a 
 charming young creature with red-gold hair and amber-coloured 
 eyes, given to fits of moody melancholy and to outbursts of violent 
 jealousy. He worried himself into a couple of sleepless nights and 
 an attack of fever on account of her ; and Clarissa’s clever revela- 
 tion only drew him closer to the girl from whom it was sought to 
 detach him. But he merely gave himself a headache, upset his 
 digestion, shook his nerves, and made himself generally feeble, 
 while he did no earthly good to lone. 
 
 This desire to play Providence was as futile in his case as it 
 has been in that of others ; and he had to confess the sorrowful 
 truth that each of us must dree his own weird as best may be, and 
 that bearing one another’s burdens is as difficult in fact as it is 
 problematical in issue. 
 
 Then he went to the Villa Clarissa and, because he was pitiful 
 and sympathetic, he threw a great deal of superfluous tenderness 
 into his manner, and his handsome eyes looked far more love than 
 he felt. For it was not love that he felt for lone ; it was only 
 love’s mimetic kinsman, pity. 
 
 Coincident with the strengthening of his interest in lone, that 
 of the Stewarts in himself declined. They were disappointed in 
 him, they said one to the other. They had believed him to have 
 been a young man of good principles and refined tastes ; but they 
 .saw now that he did not possess the latter, and they were beginning 
 to suspect the former. They would have been as hard put to it to 
 •explain why they thought this, as if they had looked for snipe in 
 a stubble field. But the reason why has very little to do with 
 feeling, and logic and emotion are the vinegar and oil which, do 
 what you will, never coalesce. The Stewarts, however, were too 
 just and kind-hearted to turn an actively cold shoulder to St. Claire. 
 They turned only one that was passively tepid; and, for the former 
 warm and hearty hand, gave five limp and flabby fingers. Still, 
 
PL A YING WITH FIRE. 
 
 145 
 
 it was as yet a change of spirit to be felt rather than one of pro- 
 gramme to be read aloud as he ran along the way ; and St. Claire, 
 though sensitive, was unsuspicious, and constitutionally averse 
 from finding flaws in others or causes of discomfort for himself. 
 
 Neither did he see, as any one else would have seen, that he 
 was assigned to lone — told off to her as her special property in the 
 oddest way imaginable ; and that she was assumed to be the sole 
 cause of his coming to the Villa at all. 
 
 When he called, and she was not in the room, Mrs. Stewart 
 would say to Clarissa, as soon as the first formal greetings were 
 over: 
 
 ‘ Go and call lone, my dear, and tell her that Dr. St. Claire is 
 here.’ Or she would say to St. Claire himself : i lone will be here 
 directly. She has only gone out of the room for a moment.’ 
 
 Once when the girl had driven into Palermo with the Captain, 
 Mrs. Stewart put on a mournfully sympathetic face, as she said : 
 ‘ I am so very sorry ! lone has gone into town with my husband. 
 She could not have expected you to-day, else I am sure she would 
 not have gone ; and I am afraid you will find your visit very 
 uninteresting with only myself and my daughter to amuse you.’ 
 
 ‘ No, do not say that, Mrs. Stewart,’ answered St. Claire, with 
 genuine earnestness. 6 You know how pleased I am always to be 
 here with you and Miss Stewart.’ 
 
 On which the plump little pigeon took up the parable on her 
 own account, and, with a flushed face that yet had no sweet soft- 
 ness in its colour, said, in a voice acrid for all its forced laughter : 
 * Oh ! how can you say that, Dr. St. Claire ? lam sure not ! ’ 
 
 1 You are sure not P ’ he repeated with a little surprise ; then he 
 added with more gallantry : ‘ And I am sure of just the contrary. 
 An hour passed with you, Miss Stewart, and you ’ (turning to 
 Mrs. Stewart ), i makes my day a veritable festa.’ 
 
 i Then what is it when Nony is at home ? ’ cried Clarissa, shrilly. 
 
 ‘ When your father and sister are at home ? — a festa of super- 
 lative quality — “ Est, Est, Est ! ” ’ he laughed. 
 
 ‘ What a flatterer you are, Dr. St. Claire ! ’ said Mrs. Stewart, 
 in her mildly peevish way. 
 
 ‘ Is confessing the truth flattery? ’ he asked in his sweetest. 
 
 ‘ No, but making out that every one is so very precious to you 
 — and always the one with whom you are, the most precious — that 
 is flattery,’ she returned. 
 
 St. Claire looked grave, and his countenance perceptibly fell. 
 
 ‘ I am sorry you think so meanly of me as that,’ he said in a 
 pained voice, i I was not aware that I was a flatterer, which to 
 my mind is merely synonymous with being a hypocrite. I am only 
 conscious of very strong affections for those who, like yourselves, 
 touch my heart and inspire me with respect ; and of as strong 
 gratitude when people have been as kind to me as you have been.’ 
 
 L 
 
146 
 
 TONE. 
 
 ‘ But you make no distinction ! ’ slie objected. c You are so 
 desperately communistic in all your feelings. One person is just 
 the same to you as another.’ 
 
 i Surely not ! ’ he said with energy. ‘ Here, in Palermo, no one 
 is to me what you all are.’ 
 
 * And you mass us all in a lump together ! ’ said Mrs. Stewart, 
 as if stating a grievance. ‘ You see no difference between us ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Oh yes, he does, mother,’ said Clarissa, coming to the rescue 
 with her wise little air. 6 He likes Nony the best, don’t you, Dr. 
 St. Claire ?’ * 
 
 ‘ I like your sister very much indeed,’ he answered. 6 About 
 liking her the best, I scarcely know what to say. I like you all so 
 much, there is not a best among you, because there is not a worst.’ 
 
 ‘ Oh yes, there is,’ said Clarissa, positive and amiable ; and St. 
 Claire let the matter drop. 
 
 He was conscious of breakers ahead ; and he had no fancy for 
 amateur shipwrecks. 
 
 Soon after this lone and Captain Stewart came in, and St. Claire, 
 troubled and a little embarrassed by the conversation, which had 
 been substantially a bill of indictment against him, met the girl 
 with less than his usual pronounced sympathy and admiration — 
 not so much to shield himself from blame as to protect her. lone 
 caught the change of tone as swiftly as a mirror catches the reflec- 
 tion of the figure that passes before it. 
 
 6 They have been speaking ill of me ; they have prejudiced him 
 against me ; he has been paying compliments to Clarissa, and he 
 does not care to see me ; he is a wretch, and I hate him ; and 
 I do not care whether he likes to see me or not. I do not care for 
 any one or any thing — but I wish I could kill St. Claire ! ’ 
 
 Put into words, these were the sensations rather than connected 
 thoughts which possessed lone like angry demons — burnt and stung 
 like fiery serpents — as she stood at a little distance from St. Claire, 
 motionless as if struck to stone, with a face that might have been 
 the face of a dead Fate, save for the palpitating nostrils and the 
 quivering of the downcast eyelids. 
 
 ‘ Are you tired, lone ? ’ asked Mrs. Stewart, watching her, but 
 not quite comprehending what she saw. 
 
 ‘ No,’ said lone, with an effort. 
 
 ‘ Then sit down,’ said Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 ( 1 said I was not tired,’ said lone, disdainfully. 
 
 ( Where have you been P Whom have you seen in Palermo P 9 
 asked Clarissa, in a chatty and amiable w r ay. 
 
 ‘No one,’ lone answered. 
 
 ‘ Not the Marchese Mazzarelli ? ’ was the girl’s next question, 
 made with sympathetic interest. 
 
 ‘ I said no one,’ returned lone. 
 
 ‘ That was a pity,’ laughed Clarissa, with meaning. 
 
FLA YING WITH FIRE . 
 
 147 
 
 ‘ Why ? ’ asked lone, suddenly raising her eyes flaming with 
 scorn. t 1 did not go to see any one. I went to shop, as you know.’ 
 
 i Still, it would have made it pleasanter if you had seen some 
 one/ said Clarissa, significantly. 
 
 1 You might have thought so ; I did not/ was her answer. 
 
 But in truth she had hoped to have seen St. Claire, and she 
 had been disappointed at not having met him. Yet now, when 
 she had found him, how strange and unlike himself he was ! It 
 was more pain than pleasure to see him ; and she wished he had 
 left before she had arrived. 
 
 How unhappy and unfortunate she was, she thought to herself. 
 Some subtle poison always infected what might else have been her 
 happiness, and reduced it to nothing. It was as if she had been 
 marked out for special persecution by a malignant fate, determined 
 to punish and torment her. This new friend of theirs — how strange 
 it seemed to think of him as new ; she could scarcely imagine what 
 her life had been without him ! — hut this friend, whose kindness 
 and sympathy had flung as it were a rainbow into her leaden sky, 
 now he was passing into the dead dulness of the rest. He was 
 becoming* indifferent to her ; withdrawing himself from her ; 
 turning from her to Clarissa. Was she never to have a friend of 
 her very own? Was she always to be second to this girl, who, 
 without giving her the love, usurped the privileges of an elder 
 sister P How wretched she was ! — and how hateful all men and 
 women were ! 
 
 She was startled out of her reverie of mingled jealousy and 
 despair by Captain Stewart saying abruptly : ‘ Now that you are 
 here, St. Claire, let us have a game at billiards. There will be 
 time enough. Come, Clarissa — come, Io. Are you asleep ? 9 he 
 added to the latter sharply. 
 
 ‘I do not want to play/ said lone, sullenly. 
 
 6 Nonsense ! Stuff! ? said the Captain. i Come/ 
 
 4 Don’t be so selfish, Nony/ said Clarissa. ‘ We all want to play. 
 Why should you spoil our pleasure for your own selfishness P 9 
 
 ‘ Do as you are told, lone/* said Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 ‘ Why should I when I do not wish it ? 1 asked lone. 
 
 1 It would be such a pity to spoil the game/ said St. Claire, in 
 his soft voice and gentle way. 
 
 * The game would not be spoilt without me. Perhaps quite the 
 contrary/ she returned, still sullen, jealous, unpleasant. i Mamma, 
 you can play/ she said, turning to Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 ‘ You know I take a cue only when there is no one else. I do 
 not care for it/ answered that lady rather crossly. 
 
 And indeed this was the truth. Standing for half an hour, 
 with intervals of walking smartly round a table and leaning over 
 the edge in uncomfortable angles, to strike a ball which never by 
 any chance went where she had aimed and always did unexpected 
 
 l 2 
 
IONE. 
 
 148 
 
 things — Caracoling to undesirable places and diving into pockets 
 •which seemed as if they had some special attraction for her balls 
 in particular — all this was an amusement by no means to Mrs. 
 Stewarts taste ; and, as she said, she never played save when com- 
 pelled by politeness and the laws of hospitality to make the fourth 
 in a game which else could not be made without her. 
 
 i Oh, Nony, how tiresome you are ! What a fuss you always 
 make over every little thing ! ’ said Clarissa, with a weary air, not 
 to be wondered at considering the provocation. For indeed lone 
 was essentially tiresome when these fits of jealousy were on her. 
 
 liaising her eyes to look at her sister and slaughter her by their 
 ' dynamic glance/ lone caught St. Claire’s by the way. He made 
 the faintest little sign with his head, meaning 1 yield ’ and ‘ come’; 
 and with this sign he smiled as if sure that she would pleasure him 
 by her obedience. This was the second time that he had undertaken 
 the direction of her actions and the softening of her temper ; and 
 the second time that he had not miscalculated his power. 
 
 Her faced changed from its present sullenness as quickly as it 
 had changed from its radiance of delight at seeing him to the gloom 
 of disappointment and the hardness of resentment at his compara- 
 tive coldness. The strain and tension of her lips relaxed ; the 
 angry light died out of her eyes ; the dead whiteness of her cheeks 
 and lips became less opaque, less vivid, and more as if the blood had 
 left her heart, where it had all gathered, to flow once more naturally 
 and easily through her veins. Then in the most gracious, the 
 sweetest way possible, she turned to Mrs. Stewart, and said, as 
 amiably as if she had been Clarissa herself : 
 
 ( Poor mamma, I am sure I do not wish to annoy you. Of 
 course I will play if you desire it.’ 
 
 Her sudden outburst of unwonted amiability startled her family 
 as if it had been a cry. The two women, and even the Captain — 
 who naturally, as only a dense-witted man, had not the keener flair 
 of these others — saw the motive and understood the reason why ; 
 while St. Claire thought, as he had thought more than once before : 
 ‘ She is perfectly tractable if taken the right way. It is they who 
 do not understand her, not she who is unmanageable.’ 
 
 And thinking this, he ‘ peacocked himself ’ not a little on the 
 deftness of his manipulation and the cleverness of his good general- 
 ship. 
 
 After this little scene the Stewarts gave up the young doctor 
 more and more to lone, and took ever less part in him themselves. 
 This was not done as if they threw lone at his head, or wished to 
 make up serious relations between them. It was done in a half- 
 disdainful, half-uncomfortable way, as if they had said : ‘ As this 
 is your bad taste, take it and make the best of it you can. We 
 hold ourselves superior to you and her and the whole sorry play 
 going on before our eyes. We countenance your special interest in 
 
PLAYING WITH FIRE. 
 
 U9 
 
 this undesirable girl — if you have any special interest, and it is 
 not all a show or sham — but we wash our hands of you; and do 
 not care what becomes of you/ 
 
 And indeed this was the mental attitude of all three ; for 
 Clarissa, reasonable after the event and submissive to destiny 
 according to the way of the lymphatic and amiable, had accepted 
 her position as second to lone with equanimity when once she 
 had shed out all her tender feeling for St. Claire in one copious 
 outburst of disappointed tears. Her normal dislike to her adopted 
 sister had not greatly increased : and her tepid contempt for the 
 young Englishman’s bad taste was perhaps but natural to a pretty 
 girl who sees herself distanced by one not held to be her equal in 
 good looks, social position, or moral conduct, in home attractions 
 or matrimonial desirability. At all events there was no bitterness, 
 no poison, in her feelings towards the two ; and so far her philo- 
 sophy was to her credit. 
 
 It was Mrs. Stewart rather than Clarissa who resented with 
 bitterness the way in which things had gone ; and if she did not 
 make things so actively unpleasant for St. Claire that he could 
 not visit at the house at all, it was only because she saw 
 a chance of getting lone well settled and off her hands for life ; 
 and between maternal jealousy and the prospect of relief, she 
 cherished the latter rather than the former as the more paying 
 investment of time and feeling. 
 
 As for Captain Stewart, he simply dropped his young country- 
 man and handed him over to the women, as a poor creature not 
 worth powder and shot. He was disappointed in him, he said ; 
 but he said no more ; and his wife knew him too well to press 
 on his reserve. There are things not to be dissected even be- 
 tween husband and wife ; and this was one of them. 
 
 It was decidedly an uncomfortable position for . St. Claire. 
 These unexpressed displeasures and silent disappointments always 
 are. But his sweetness of temper, his patience, the purity of 
 his motives, together with his sincere gratitude for past kind- 
 nesses — in spite of that look and air of a disguised prince which 
 made him appear to accept all homage as his due — carried him 
 safely, and in some sense easily, through the ordeal ; enabling 
 him to take the rough with the smooth as of the appointed order 
 of things. And as, fortified in his own heart by his inex- 
 tinguishable passion for Monica, he was very far from intending 
 to make love to lone, he had no scruple in showing her attentions 
 which, as has been said, were the offspring of compassion for her 
 unhappy history, a desire to smooth away some of the worst 
 angles of her uncongenial position, and a purely aesthetic kind 
 of admiration for her beauty and originality. 
 
 ‘ I wdsh I could do something to make you happy/ he said 
 one day, as they were walking about the garden — the chief 
 
IONE. 
 
 150 
 
 pleasure at Villa Clarissa — well in view but out of bearing of 
 Mrs. Stewart and her daughter, who were at some little distance 
 behind them. 
 
 6 Thank you/ said lone, finding her words marvellously diffi- 
 cult of utterance. 
 
 It was strange how her voice all hut failed her when she 
 was alone with St. Claire, and how unpleasant it was to her 
 to hear its tones so deepened and roughened when they did 
 come ; how still more unpleasant to be obliged to take long breaths 
 before she could speak at all. She had never before experienced 
 these sensations, and she was somewhat humiliated in her 
 own mind to know that there lived any one in the world who 
 could thus throw her off her balance and make her less than the 
 absolute mistress of herself she always was when with others. 
 
 ‘ Your life here is evidently uncongenial to you/ continued St. 
 Claire, looking at her full of rash pity. 
 
 ( Yes/ she said. 
 
 ‘ And you cannot change it ? ’ 
 
 ‘ How can I ? ’ was her answer, made with that kind of 
 patience which sounds so like disdain. 1 1 cannot live on no- 
 thing ; and they will not allow me to do anything which might 
 support me.’ 
 
 ‘ But indeed what could you do P 9 he said, so far on their 
 side. 
 
 i A thousand things/ she answered. ‘ I could do what other 
 girls do who have to get their own living — why not ? 9 
 
 ‘ You are not fit to go into the world alone/ said St. Claire, 
 thinking of her beauty. 
 
 i Why not ? 9 she asked quickly, raising her eyes to his. 
 
 At this moment she was no longer embarrassed, no longer 
 subdued and softened. St. Claire’s opposition to her cherished 
 dream, his acceptance of that which she considered a wrong done 
 to her and caressed as her standing grievance, chased away her 
 gentler mood ; and she was once more herself, stiffened to oppose 
 and armed to resent. 
 
 4 You are too lovely/ said St. Claire. 
 
 Her heart leapt with pleasure. 
 
 ‘I am not/ she said, with that false modesty which asks 
 for further assurance — which craves reiteration of that dear 
 praise. 
 
 You are the most beautiful girl I have ever known/ said St. 
 Claire. 
 
 An indescribable expression came into lone’s face. It was 
 not the soft submission of a loving woman, whose love is her 
 honour and her lover her king — not the patient tenderness of a 
 meek maiden accepting with gratitude and prepared to bestow 
 without demanding — but it was the look of a queen who receives 
 
PL A YING WITH FIRE . 
 
 151 
 
 with superh satisfaction the homage which yet she claims as her 
 right. St. Claire’s praises intoxicated her ; but for all that they 
 were her right. 
 
 ‘ You are very good to say so/ she returned, in a lowered voice. 
 But you forget Clarissa/ she added, in an altered tone. 
 
 ‘ She is not equal to you, pretty as she is,’ said St. Claire, 
 ingenuously. 
 
 ‘ Do you think her so very pretty ? ’ she asked jealously. 
 
 ‘Very. She is charming for her type/ he answered. ‘But 
 her type is not equal to yours/ he went on to say, looking at 
 his companion, as he had looked at her before, with eyes full 
 of admiration. 
 
 ‘ Would you tell her so if she asked you ? ’ said lone, with an 
 unpleasant smile. 
 
 ‘ Well, it would be difficult to tell her that/ he replied, 
 also with a smile ; but his was frank, and just a little playful, 
 as if he were putting by the folly of a child. 
 
 ‘ Then you would say the same things to her that you have 
 been saying to me P 9 she asked, looking sideways through her 
 narrowed lids. 
 
 ‘ No, I should not/ was his reply. ‘ I could not, for I do not 
 think it. It would not be true.’ 
 
 ‘ Truth has very little to do with the matter/ said lone, ‘ every 
 one tells stories.’ 
 
 ‘ Not every one/ he said gravely. 
 
 ‘ Not you, when you flatter P ’ 
 
 ‘ I do not flatter/ he replied. 
 
 ‘ You have been flattering me just now/ said lone, with a 
 little laugh, not wholly pleasant nor wholly unamiable. 
 
 ‘ No, I have only told the truth/ he said. 
 
 And then she looked at him with one of those sudden and 
 wonderful looks which seemed to envelope him as if in a garment 
 of fire — to dazzle his sight and take away his breath, and con- 
 fuse his brain so that he could not think distinctly nor reason 
 clearly. 
 
 ‘ What strange power have you ? ’ he said, after a moment’s 
 pause. ‘ Your eyes are worlds in themselves ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Are they ? ’ she answered. ‘ Not very pleasant worlds, I 
 fear ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Worlds where one gets lost — unfathomable, inexplicable.* 
 
 ‘ Oh ! the key is not very difficult/ said lone, with affected 
 indifference. 
 
 ‘ I wish I had it/ he replied. 
 
 ‘ Perhaps you have, if you cared to use it/ she said. 
 
 ‘ I would use it if I knew I had it. I should like to understand 
 you/ he returned. 
 
 ‘ I am easily read.’ 
 
152 
 
 ZONE. 
 
 c By what light ? ’ 
 
 She hesitated ; her eyes wandered a little aimlessly over the 
 ground where they were cast. She could not say what she 
 thought : 6 By the light of love — the light of homage — the light 
 of confessing my supremacy and submitting to my domination ; ’ 
 but after a time she drew her thoughts together under a more 
 befitting veil, and answered : 6 By the light of common sense and 
 a little sympathy.’ 
 
 ‘ I hope I have the former — I know I have the latter/ said 
 St. Claire. i Yet I do not understand you/ 
 
 1 1 thought you did/ she answered, with a changed face. 
 
 ‘ Not your eyes when you look like that/ he said. 
 
 * Then you have less sympathy than you think you have/ she 
 answered, with somewhat harsh frankness. ‘ There is nothing 
 about me or my eyes so very inexplicable if you cared to 
 understand.’ 
 
 ‘ But I do/ he said. 4 1 do wish both to understand and help 
 
 you-’ 
 
 She turned to him with the sweetest graciousness. 
 
 ‘ The very wish helps me/ she said softly. ‘ My life is so 
 lonely that any words of sympathy are pleasant.’ 
 
 i You have all mine/ was his reply, made just as the two 
 ladies, cutting across the garden, came face to face upon them 
 at the angle where the lavender-walk intersected the rose-border. 
 
 All his what P Both mother and daughter heard the words, 
 and discussed them between themselves with some anxiety and 
 more curiosity. All his love ? — all his hope ? — what did he 
 mean ? What had they been saying to each other ? It was of no 
 use to ask lone, and they could not question him ; but things 
 seemed to be coming to a crisis somehow ; and perhaps the hope, 
 now that Clarissa had thrown him over, of St. Claire’s freeing 
 them of lone, was nearing fulfilment. Meanwhile lone herself 
 pondered on his words, his looks, his manner, the tones of his 
 voice, the very movement of his hands. And the result of all 
 was that vague kind of hope, rather than confessed belief, of a 
 woman who has not yet heard the beloved speak of love — that 
 atmosphere of dumb passion which means : 6 He loves me, and he 
 will one day tell me so.’ 
 
 It was playing with fire in truth. And the end of it all ? 
 Her destruction, or his own ? and the bonds which hound him to 
 sweet, dreamy Monica burnt like tow in the flame ? 
 
AT LAST! 
 
 153 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 AT LAST! 
 
 Some days after this they were all once more in the grounds 
 of the Villa Clarissa — sitting under the carruba-tree which stood 
 in the centre of the rose-garden. For three days the scirocco 
 had been blowing, and the nerves and health of every living 
 thing in the island had been severely tried. Frays had been rife 
 among the populace, quarrels had been the rule of life in 
 all the homes ; children had cried with more unappeasable in- 
 sistence than usual ; women had shrieked with shriller voices and 
 heaped insults on each other’s heads with wilder gesticulation ; 
 men had yelled with more fury in their passion, more pungency 
 in their words, more ready recourse to the knife and freer threats 
 of the revolver ; while the more refined and self-controlled of the 
 educated classes had moped or snapped or sulked according to 
 their natures, and made themselves and all about them as uncom- 
 fortable as it was in their power to do. 
 
 St. Claire, always sensitive to weather, had been depressed 
 and ailing. He had not left the hotel, but had sat in his own 
 room stripping the healthy skin from his healing wounds ; dream- 
 ing of Monica and accusing Providence by his grief ; fretting 
 about lone and plaguing himself with impracticable desires and 
 unprofitable schemes for her benefit ; making all his molehills into 
 mountains full of sharp rocks and deep abysses ; and going through 
 a whole world of unnecessary anguish as his participation in the 
 general disturbance of men and things, because the wind blew 
 from the south-east and brought with it some of the poison and 
 torpor of the desert. 
 
 To-day, however, the whole atmosphere was changed. The 
 wind blew fresh and clear from off the sea, and the irritability 
 and nervous exhaustion of the last seventy-two hours had passed 
 like a bad dream. 
 
 It was now the middle of March, and the garden was full of 
 fragrant scents and lovely growths. The walls of the house were 
 still crimson with bougainvillea and perfumed by climbing roses, 
 while heliotrope, lavender, rosemary, and geraniums, all in large 
 bushes rather than plants, mingled with mignonette and orange- 
 blossoms in one rich chord of fragrance which carried a kind of 
 intoxication to the senses. Birds were singing in the trees ; 
 iridescent flies were darting through the air ; gorgeous butterflies 
 and softer moths were fluttering like rootless flowers blown hither 
 and thither by the fresh wind ; the sky was a pure unclouded blue 
 where was never a stain — not veiled and softened, not full of 
 dreamy suggestion and tender languor as it sometimes is, but 
 
TONE. 
 
 154 
 
 stimulating, productive, energising — a sky, a sun, an air which, 
 seemed to mock all sorrow, to dry all tears, and to spur the blood 
 to the gorgeous madness of hope, the exulting insanity of joy. 
 Surely there was not a melancholy line, not a saddened scene in 
 the whole drama of human history ! Surely all men were 
 strong, all women lovely, all hearts loving and beloved on such a 
 day as this ! — a day which had for its whole essence happiness, 
 and for all its circumstances beauty. 
 
 How good it was to live here in this fair and fruitful Palermo 
 — this pearl in the heart of the Golden Shell ! How delicious to 
 drink in delight with every breath that brought the very entrance- 
 ment of existence — the very ecstasy of being ! How all the 
 grief of the past was forgotten, and only the consciousness of the 
 radiant present remained ! It was as if pain had been transformed 
 to pleasure — as if the elements of sorrow had been taken to form 
 the substance of joy. 
 
 And how beautiful lone looked, sitting in that curule-shaped 
 garden-chair — sitting in that motionless and graceful way of hers, 
 which was at once so proud and so seductive ! St. Claire sat 
 on a lower seat, seemed almost at her feet, and Clarissa took credit 
 to herself in that she was too good-natured to say so, and thus 
 spoil the picture and the suggestion. 
 
 They had been sitting here for some time, with sundry of the 
 servants coming about them on trivial pretexts of business, but in 
 reality like children eager to have a share in the small family festa 
 going on beneath the carruba-tree. Of them all, Vincenzo was 
 the most incessant and the most persistent. Now he came to 
 bring the ladies flowers — whereof Mrs. Stewart had the largest 
 number ; but surely lone’s were the most choice, and Clarissa’s 
 the most ordinary! — now he came to speak to the padrone on 
 some perfectly unimportant matter, which he would have dilated 
 on till he had lengthened it out into the parley of an hour, had 
 not the Captain stopped him with military abruptness and as 
 much frankness, telling him he was a ‘ ciuce ’ for his pains and 
 ‘ che diavolo ! ’• — what did he want ? Repulsed or not, however, 
 he always came back to the group beneath the carruba-tree, 
 and always stood where he could best see lone sitting like a fair 
 and youthful Agrippina, her clasped hands resting lightly on 
 her knees, her eyes now cast down and now looking straight 
 before her into space, or sometimes stealing brief glances at 
 Armine St. Claire, as is the way with women who feel more than 
 they have confessed, and who love, unbidden of the beloved. 
 
 The conversation turned on the mafia , which Captain Stewart 
 held as only the tacit convention of certain men to despise the 
 intervention of the law, and to be their own avengers. According 
 to him, it was nothing but the Corsican vendetta under Sicilian 
 conditions ; as thus : if A. were injured or murdered, and B. 
 
AT LAST! 
 
 155 
 
 •were known to be tbe person who had done the crime, A., or 
 his family, would not deliver B. up to justice to be dealt with 
 according to law, but they would bide their time, take their 
 measures, and execute judgment with their own hands. This, and 
 this only, was the mafia, he said ; and people who talked about 
 a secret society, or secret subsidies to brigands to be held harmless 
 of aggression, talked a world of nonsense and did not know what 
 they said. 
 
 Had he said all this to a person who knew Palermo, it would 
 have been confirmation of the whispered suspicion that Captain 
 Stewart was a mafiose himself, and that he owed his immunity 
 from trouble to his punctual payments of black-mail. Men get 
 into the habit of suspicion in this beloved Italy, where the 
 impress of the old hand of tyranny still lies on the flesh of the 
 nation, and where, in consequence, words are held as valuable 
 masks for thoughts ; but as Armine did not understand more 
 than the merest surface of things, he accepted what he heard 
 in its simplicity, and thought it all very straightforward and 
 intelligible. 
 
 From the mafia and the mafiosi , the talk drifted on to the 
 condition of the poor — the wages they received ; the food they 
 ate ; the dwellings in which they lived ; and then on to the 
 strange mixture of servility and familiarity in their manner, and 
 the cleverness which comes by gift of nature to almost all. 
 And specially the Stewarts dwelt on the facility with which a 
 man can turn his hand to anything ; so that your gardener can 
 be your cook, and your cook can be your valet, while your 
 valet makes up your old clothes into new suits for himself as 
 well as if he were a professional tailor, and the tailor buds your 
 roses and cooks your maccaroni w r ith no more trouble than he 
 has when he cuts out your coat. 
 
 1 This Vincenzo now/ said Captain Stewart, ‘ he is simply 
 invaluable. He can do everything, and he will do anything he 
 is asked. The fellow has no pride or nonsense, and he is my 
 right hand in all ways. I do not know how I should get on 
 without him, ugly dog as he is ; though I take care not to let 
 him know that he is worth more than a pinch of snuff to me. 
 If I did, he would become insolent and try to be my master. 
 You have to keep your foot on their necks if you don’t want 
 their knuckles in your own throat.’ 
 
 L You mean they are slaves,’ said St. Claire, quietly. 
 
 ‘ Substantially, yes,’ said Captain Stewart. 6 Centuries of 
 misrule have moulded them into what they are, and the effect of 
 these centuries is not to be overcome in one generation.’ 
 
 ‘ You are sure he does not understand English P ’ asked St. 
 Claire, looking at Vincenzo, who was standing there, cap in hand 
 as usual, surveying the group in the amiable manner of his race. 
 
156 
 
 IONE. 
 
 In spite of tlie broad smile which showed that unbroken row 
 of small shark-like teeth, there was something in the glittering 
 eyes and observant look of the man which always disturbed St. 
 Claire. He had distrusted him from the first, and he distrusted 
 him even more as time went on, and his first impressions deepened 
 rather than wore away. 
 
 ‘ What an idea ! Vincenzo understand English ? No ! ’ said 
 Mrs. Stewart, a little peevishly. 4 What a horrible suggestion, 
 Hr. St. Claire ! You had better call him a mafiose at once ! ’ 
 
 The Captain laughed. 
 
 ‘ No, he is neither a mafiose nor an Admirable Crichton/ he 
 said. 4 He is only a poor devil who ought to be a gentleman, for 
 he is the son of a count, the grandson of a duke, the nephew of 
 a prince, and I don’t know what beside ; but he is penniless, as so 
 many of them are ; so he is my servant instead. Still, he is of 
 good family, so far as that goes, and he answers my purpose 
 admirably. ’ 
 
 4 And being a gentleman by birth, of course he is more high- 
 minded than the rest P ’ said St. Claire. 
 
 4 Well, I don’t know about that,’ drawled the Captain. 4 I 
 cannot say that he is quite honest on his own account — none of 
 these fellows are — but he would not let any one else rob me of 
 a lira.’ 
 
 4 1 should not quite relish his own dishonesty, however careful 
 he might be of my interests with others/ said St. Claire, taking 
 his stand on the British ideal. 
 
 4 Oh, you are too precise for us ! ’ said the Captain, with a fine 
 shade of irony. 4 In Sicily, I can tell you, you must take what 
 you can get, and be thankful it is no worse.’ 
 
 4 It might be better by all accounts/ said St. Claire. 
 
 4 We cannot have perfection anywhere/ returned the Captain, 
 on the defensive for the sake of opposition. 
 
 4 We might try for improvement/ said St. Claire. 
 
 4 At least we have no strikes, no wife-kicking, no drunkenness/ 
 the Captain answered with an aggressive drawl, making Armine 
 responsible for all the sins in Great Britain. 
 
 4 But more general crime an 1 less truthfulness/ said St. Claire. 
 
 The Captain shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 4 We put up with it/ he said with affected indifference. 4 And 
 as we get used to it we understand it better than in the beginning, 
 and are not taken in by it. Their flatteries and promises of 
 mountains and seas, and pleasant little tarradiddles out of pure 
 complaisance and kindness — it is only a way they have. All 
 nations have their ways. The main thing is to understand them 
 so as not to be caught by them.’ 
 
 4 1 do not think I could ever get accustomed to want of 
 truth and honesty/ returned St. Claire, tenacious to his point. 
 
AT LAST! 
 
 157 
 
 4 Then do not live in Italy,’ said the Captain, curtly. 
 
 ( No, I never shall,’ said St. Claire, simply. 
 
 4 I am sure I would rather have this civil, obliging, good- 
 natured, and perfectly respectful Vincenzo about us than any of 
 your insolent English creatures,’ said Mrs. Stewart, with an odd 
 little outbreak. 
 
 To fall foul of anything purely Britannic at this moment was 
 like laying a few stripes on St. Claire’s shoulders, and it soothed 
 her to find a whipping-boy of any kind. 
 
 4 Would you P ’ he asked, sweet and amiably obtuse. 4 I would 
 not. I would rather have more truth and less cleverness — more 
 independence and less sweetness of manner in those who served me.’ 
 
 In saying which he was perfectly innocent of all suspicion 
 that he might be condemning himself. 
 
 But liis host looked at him sharply, and said in his slow 
 deliberate way : 
 
 4 1 should not have thought you would have found fault with 
 sweetness of manner, St. Claire, or would have preferred blunt 
 honesty to gracious — what shall I say P ’ 
 
 4 1 should say flattery,’ said Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 Clarissa laughed. lone’s straight dark eyebrows met above 
 her eyes in a heavy frown. 
 
 ‘No, I do not flatter,’ said St. Claire, with unruffled amiability. 
 4 To show when you like people and to say openly that you 
 admire them — that is not flattery. 
 
 4 But you cannot admire every one so very much as you say you 
 do,’ said Mrs. Stewart, as she had said once before. 4 You must 
 flatter some among them ! ’ 
 
 4 1 do not know which they are,’ he answered, smiling. 4 1 am 
 sure it is not any one here ! ’ he added pleasantly. 
 
 At this moment Vincenzo, who had been gone for some few 
 minutes, suddenly reappeared from the back of everything — 
 coming among them with that quiet stealthy tread which never 
 made itself heard till he was fairly in the midst of them, and then 
 only because he purposely scraped his feet on the gravel. His 
 eyes were very bright, and his breath came thick as if he had 
 been running, but his wide mouth smiled as usual, and his manners 
 were also as usual — good-humoured, familiar, obliging, and sub- 
 servient. He told the padrone that he was wanted in the office ; 
 and Captain Stewart, on rising, looked back to St. Claire, and for 
 all his displeasure with the disguised prince who had disappointed 
 him, said hospitably : 4 Don’t go yet, St. Claire. I shall be back 
 directly.’ 
 
 4 That man of yours may be a good fellow, as you say, but I 
 confess I do not like his looks,’ said St. Claire, as the master and 
 his man moved away. 
 
 4 We do not choose our servants for their beauty,’ said Mrs. 
 
158 I ONE. 
 
 Stewart. ‘ If they do our work well we do not care whether 
 they are plain or handsome/ 
 
 ( But I dislike the man’s face not so much because he is so 
 exceedingly plain — and really I think he is the ugliest fellow I 
 have ever seen — as because it is of such a low type. He does not 
 look straight at you when he speaks. He seems to do so, but he 
 does not. And when he does his eyes are like a tiger s. They 
 are so fierce and with such a strange yellow light about the rim of 
 the iris.’ 
 
 1 He is as good as any of them,’ said Mrs. Stewart, crossly, 
 ‘ and it would be a pity to prejudice my husband against him. 
 He is so useful that we should be quite lost if we had to part 
 with him.’ 
 
 6 1 should be sorry to do that,’ returned St. Claire, gently. 
 
 ‘But finding incessant fault with him and calling him ugly 
 and of a bad type is not exactly the way to make any one satis- 
 fied.’ said Mrs. Stewart, with her disagreeable smile. ‘ You seem 
 to have taken quite a prejudice against the poor fellow from the 
 very beginning,’ she added fretfully. 
 
 ‘ I hope not ! ’ he answered. 
 
 ‘ Perhaps saying hard things of him is your way of showing 
 favour,’ she returned. 
 
 St. Claire looked perplexed. He could not understand this 
 decided change of front in one whom he had been accustomed to 
 consider his maternal Palermitan friend. He had become so 
 used to be a favourite among the Stewarts that it was almost like 
 hearing a foreign language to catch that frosty accent, to hear 
 that fretful voice ; and he looked at his hostess with his beautiful 
 eyes as if asking her with pain what she would have him to under- 
 stand. 
 
 lone turned paler than usual, and for a moment seemed about 
 to speak ; but she did not. She only shot out one glance to Mrs. 
 Stewart which seemed to warrant all that has ever been said of 
 the fabled basilisk ; then lowered her lids and drew her lips into a 
 thin line, her breath coming a little fast as Vincenzo’s had done. 
 Clarissa for her part smiled in an inane and amiable way, as if she 
 were not conscious of the sting and was only amused by the 
 paradoxical humour of her mother’s words. 
 
 And soon after this Mrs. Stewart, still nursing her vague 
 wrath against the young fellow who in the beginning of things 
 had been so nice, got up from her seat saying to her daughter : 
 1 Clarissa, come with me, my dear; 1 have to speak to Amarella.’ 
 Turning to St. Claire she repeated her husband’s words : ‘ Do not 
 go yet, Dr. St. Claire. We shall be back directly. I merely have 
 to give an order to the maid. lone will entertain you till we 
 return,’ she added as her own coda, not in the original theme. 
 
 With this she put her hand on her daughter’s arm and the two 
 
AT LAST! 159 
 
 went slowly through the roses and the flower-beds towards the 
 house. 
 
 And when they were fairly out of sight lone drew a deep 
 breath and looked at St. Claire with her rare and wonderful smile, 
 her eyes dilated, soft, dark, seeming to say in audible words : 
 i How good it is for us to he here together and alone ! ’ 
 
 How beautiful she was, and how perfectly she fitted in with 
 her surroundings ! St. Claire looked at her with admiration, with 
 aesthetic enthusiasm, with artistic satisfaction, even with pro- 
 fessional appreciation and critical content. So young, so full of 
 life, so healthy, so vigorous, and withal so refined ! It was the 
 nervous grace of an Arabian thoroughbred ; the sensitive charm of 
 a young gazelle; the superb power of a sleek-skinned couching 
 panther; it was the freshness of a flower just opened to the 
 morning before culmination has been reached and after immaturity 
 has been passed ; it was the effulgence of the gem ere use has 
 dimmed its lustre; it was maidenhood in its most resplendent 
 moment, When, no longer childish, it is not yet completed woman- 
 hood. And of this resplendent moment lone was the most 
 enchanting and the most perfect product. 
 
 Set against the leaves as both background and frame, with the 
 sunlight falling in one narrow line across her head and shoulder, she 
 sat there silent as was her wont, motionless as was her wont, and 
 yet not inert. Hers was the silence of intensity, the motionlessness 
 of expectation. She was like one of the old-time nymphs waiting 
 for her god to come to her. It was not for her to seek, not even 
 for her to meet. She had only to wait ; to answer when he should 
 call, to greet him when he should arrive, to receive him with glad 
 acceptance of his love, and to give all her own for everlasting in 
 return for his divine grace of a moment. 
 
 After the thin acridity of Mrs. Stewart and the mindless cheer- 
 fulness of Clarissa it was restful and refreshing to be with this 
 beautiful Galatea who assumed to be a statue and who was so 
 true a woman. All her potentialities of fire and fury, of sullenness 
 and of jealousy, as well as all her possibilities of passionate 
 devotion, of the very sublimity of self-immolation for love’s sake, 
 were veiled but not hidden beneath that eloquent silence, that 
 mask of repose ; and St. Claire felt to his inmost being the presence 
 of the passion he dared not analyse, of the power he could not 
 match. 
 
 But if he had neither passion nor power to match lone’s, the 
 affectionate sympathy as well as the poetic sentiment of his own 
 nature was fully awakened and keenly alive. He pitied her as a 
 human being, admired her as a woman, loved her as a sister. The 
 time, the place, the whole surroundings were divine, full of 
 spiritual intoxication, of subtle sensuous charm. He felt as if he 
 should never forget the richness of beauty, the strange depth of 
 
i6o 
 
 IONE. 
 
 tenderness which made this moment like one snatched from 
 Heaven and the gods. It was a new experience to him, and called 
 up something within him which even Monica had neither roused 
 nor taught. 
 
 But at this moment he had forgotten Monica, and the world 
 held only lone as the supreme creation of the summer sunshine. 
 
 i I shall think of this place for ever, of this moment and you. 
 When I leave 1 shall carry it as a picture always with me,’ he said 
 abruptly. 
 
 lone started when he spoke and looked at him with almost 
 terror in her eyes. 
 
 ‘ You are not going away ? ’ she said, in a low voice. 
 
 6 Yes, soon — I must/ he answered, and wondered why he 
 found his voice so difficult to control. 
 
 She turned away her face. She knew that it was pale and 
 full of distress, and she did not wish him to see it. 
 
 ‘ I am sorry to leave/ he continued, after a pause. 6 You have 
 all been so good to me. I shall grieve to leave you.’ 
 
 6 We have done nothing/ said lone, always in that low, half- 
 suffocated voice. 
 
 ‘ You have made my whole life here/ he answered. 
 
 She looked down on him, sitting as it were at her feet, and 
 the sudden flash of her eyes bewildered and disturbed him as of 
 old. Then she dropped her broad lids as she plucked the petals 
 off a rose grasped in her long white hand. 
 
 1 1 wish I were going to England too/ she said. ‘ I hate 
 Sicily — I hate the Italians ! ’ — she added fiercely. 
 
 The leaves of the thick edge of myrtle and monthly rose 
 behind them stirred suddenly as by a passing wind, or as if a large 
 bird had flown heavily through the branches. 
 
 ‘ Yet you are Italian in all but your colour/ said St. Claire, 
 meaning to please her by the ascription of beauty. 
 
 ‘ Do not say that ! ’ she cried. ‘ I am English — pure English 
 — English all through ! 9 
 
 ‘ Yes ? Then the sun has moulded you into the beauty of your 
 adopted country/ he said, looking at her with intense admiration 
 and speaking in a voice like a caress. 
 
 She looked again at him as she had looked before — gathering 
 up the praise, deprecating the connexion. 
 
 ‘ You know that I am not a real daughter here ? ’ she then 
 said ; ‘ that I do not really belong to papa and mamma P 1 
 
 6 Yes/ he answered. 
 
 6 Who told you ? ’ she asked. 
 
 * Your sister.’ 
 
 ‘ Sister ! ’ she repeated, raising her head ; ‘ I have no sister — I 
 have no one — no father nor mother — no brother — no friend — 
 nothing in the whole world.’ 
 
AT LAST! 161 
 
 1 One friend — one always in me,’ said Armine. * Remember — 
 one always in me/ he repeated. 
 
 * Thank you/ she answered, bending lightly towards him. 
 
 A petal of her half-shattered rose fell on his upturned face. 
 She had raised the flower to her lips as she bent, and it rested on 
 his face warm with the touch of hers. 
 
 He took it in his hand. 
 
 4 1 will keep this for ever/ he said tenderly. ‘ It will remind 
 me of this hour, this place, and of you — always of you.’ 
 
 Again he looked at her full of admiration, of sympathy, of 
 poetry, of feeling; and again she turned away her face — not 
 troubled this time, but too eloquent of something which it was due 
 to maidenly pride to conceal. 
 
 The little line of sunlight had shifted its course, and now fell 
 across and through the fringe of curls at the back of her neck. 
 Oh that betraying sunlight and that subtle scent of rose and 
 heliotrope which came from her fair young breast ! Oh the songs 
 of the birds, and the heavy odour of the orange-blossoms like an 
 unseen cloud in the clear blue air ! — and oh for the weakness of 
 human nature, and the folly of a man who drifts through senti- 
 ment and is wrecked on the sunken rocks of poetry ! Not savage 
 nor animal — only sweet and loving and tender and weak ; not 
 able to control circumstances, nor grasping life with a firm hand 
 as a man should — only able to steer clear of the current when on 
 the alert, but carried by the tide where it would when he let him- 
 self go — where was St. Claire now? — this man made after the 
 model of a woman’s mind and according to the dream of woman’s 
 fancy ? 
 
 Her head was turned away ; her heart was throbbing, till it 
 made the flowers in her bosom palpitate as if with sentient life ; 
 her whole being was possessed and overmastered by a soft delicious 
 trouble. And he — the influence of the moment overcame him. 
 Nature and poetry, sense and compassion, were leagued against 
 his better wisdom and stood between him and his truer self. 
 With an impulse he could not control he raised himself from his 
 sitting posture, and, with one knee on his low seat, put his hands 
 on the arms of lone’s chair and kissed the side of her neck — there 
 where the red-gold curl caught the yellow shine of the golden sun. 
 
 She turned and looked at him, her whole body quivering as if 
 under an electric shock. Her eyes seemed to dazzle him with their 
 strange unearthly light, and his seemed to her as the eyes of a god 
 — loving, compassionate, divinely beautiful, and unfathomable as 
 the source of life itself. 
 
 She laid her hands on his shoulders, 
 
 1 You have come at last ! ’ she said in a low soft voice like the 
 very sigh of happiness. ( Oh love ! my love ! at last l ’ 
 
 M 
 
10NE. 
 
 162 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 m THE TOILS. 
 
 Caught! — caught by the tide and swept away by the current; 
 seduced by his amiability, by his weakness, by his pity, by his 
 love ; caught as hopelessly as is a swallow by bird-lime ; allured 
 as destructively as is a moth by the candle ; attracted as by a 
 magnet against his better judgment, his clearer will, his secret 
 wish ; caught, to be held as in a vice by those white young arms, 
 fettered in the tangles of that red-gold hair, imprisoned in the 
 depths of those lustrous eyes ; caught, never to be free again, not 
 though he should break his heart for remorse because of his 
 infidelity and for pain because of his captivity ; — yes, St. Claire 
 was fairly taken in the net which lone’s sorrowful history had 
 first woven, and his own weakness to pity finally closed, round 
 him ; and he would never be his own man again. 
 
 At Oakhurst, where he must return, lived Monica Barrington, 
 in whose heart all his real love lay hidden. But he stood here in 
 the sunlight in Palermo as the accepted lover of lone Stewart ; 
 and he had not the moral courage to tell her that — time and space, 
 flesh and spirit, the senses and the imagination, conspiring against 
 him — his caress had been of impulse, not of design, the result of 
 a moment’s indiscretion and not the deliberate expression of an 
 honest man’s deliberate choice. 
 
 Poor St. Claire ! and, had she known, poor lone ! But she did 
 not know. She, like all who love, created her own god and built 
 up her own heaven. Her mind saw what it brought and 
 worshipped what it made ; and she never stopped to ask if the 
 love and devotion with which she credited St. Claire were things 
 which were, or things which she believed because she wished them 
 to be. 
 
 How happy she was ! Love had transformed her sorrowful 
 .sufferance of days to joyful mastery of life, and had given her a 
 new moral being. Radiant and assured, she was no longer moody 
 as of old. She had no more outbursts of jealous rage, no more 
 spells of sullen silence, no more impatient dreams of impossible 
 release from her uncongenial surroundings. She was now brighter 
 than Clarissa, inasmuch as the sunshine is brighter than the moon- 
 light ; and even an enemy could scarcely have grudged the happi- 
 ness which made her not only so infinitely more beautiful, but also 
 .so supremely fascinating and so amiable. How happy she was ! 
 For the first time in her life she was loved ; — so she thought and 
 believed, and belief is the same as knowledge ; — loved as she loved, 
 
TV THE TOILS, 
 
 163 
 
 loved for herself and beyond all others. Hitherto she had been a 
 pauper in the great world of love, seeing others enjoy the wealth 
 which she was denied ; now she was endowed more richly than the 
 rest, and to the utmost of her desire. Hitherto she had been no 
 one’s special care ; now she was an adored man’s very heart and 
 soul and centre of delight, his whole source of happiness, his whole 
 treasure of joy. What more had she to ask of fate or fortune ? 
 Nothing ; save length of days for the full enjoyment of this bliss. 
 
 And all the time the whole thing was a delusion, and those 
 Gardens of the Blessed wherein she walked were nothing hut a 
 mirage created by love and maintained by self-deception. 
 
 Too confident to be afraid of delusions, too happy to be clear- 
 sighted, lone gave herself up to the enchantment which she her- 
 self thus wove about her life. All that she had ever pictured of 
 blessedness was now fulfilled, and nothing disturbed her belief in 
 her sure possession. She loved and was beloved. Let all the rest 
 go as the dust which falls from the diamond when the crowning 
 facet is being cut ! 
 
 It was very different with St. Claire. The responsibility of 
 worldly matters, and that, far more important, of the truth of 
 things, rested with him; and he knew what lone did not. And, 
 first, there was that humiliating question of ways and means to be 
 dealt with, and that terrible wolf hovering on the horizon to be 
 shown as an all-too certain visitor to the house-door in the future. 
 It was not a pleasant moment for him when he had to explain to 
 Captain Stewart the poverty-stricken character of his schedule ; 
 and how, for all his foolish action which had let loose the flood 
 and set fire to the wood, he was absolutely unable to keep a wife, 
 unless she had money on her own side. And he knew that lone 
 had none. But it had to come. Sooner or later the truth had to 
 come out ; and when the Captain, in his quality of guardian, 
 demanded an explanation, St. Claire, in his character of lover, had 
 to give it, and to stand the brunt of the blow to follow. 
 
 Captain Stewart was intensely annoyed by the whole affair. 
 He was annoyed to find that his estimate of St. Claire’s social 
 position, as represented by his cash-box, was false ; and that, so far 
 from being a prince in disguise, he was little better than a pauper 
 in masquerade ; annoyed that this pauper should have committed 
 lone to an engagement when he had no substantial home to offer, 
 damaging her future chances by just so much of the fine down as 
 is rubbed off a girl’s repute by a confessed betrothal brought to 
 naught ; annoyed that the truth had not been told from the 
 beginning, when he might have better controlled the intercourse 
 between themselves and this handsome young Lazarus dressed in 
 the robes of Dives, and thus have kept his own out of danger ; 
 annoyed that he, the careful father of a prize daughter, should ever 
 have been so far imposed on as to imagine the possibility of an 
 
IONE. 
 
 164 
 
 alliance "between his pearl Clarissa and this very profitless pebble 
 from the waste lands of fortune ; annoyed with everything*, from 
 beginning to end; and therefore, being annoyed, he was disagree- 
 able and unsympathetic. 
 
 i I should be sorry to take her into poverty/ said St. Claire, 
 looking handsome and penitent after he had made his unpleasant 
 confession and tabulated the humiliating score of his finances. 
 
 ‘ You should have thought of that before/ said the Captain, 
 speaking with vicious deliberation ; and St. Claire answered meekly: 
 
 ‘ I own that I have done wrong. I should, as you say, have 
 thought of all that before.’ 
 
 6 But now what do you intend to do? ’ asked Captain Stewart, 
 In the tone of one to whom the whole thing was perfectly 
 indifferent. 1 Are you going on with the engagement ? ’ 
 
 1 1 have not fortune enough to marry on.’ said St. Claire. 
 
 ‘ Then you will break it off? ’ 
 
 ‘ What else can I do ? I have no home fit for your daughter 
 to go to/ he answered. 
 
 ‘ You must tell that to lone yourself/ said Captain Stewart, 
 .knowing the nature of the task imposed. 
 
 ‘ I am so sorry to give her pain ! ’ Armine rather sighed than 
 said. 
 
 ‘ According to your own account of things it has to come/ 
 returned the Captain coldly. * Sooner or later she has to learn that 
 you do not intend to marry her.’ 
 
 ‘ That I cannot/ said St. Claire. 
 
 ‘ Which comes to the same thing/ replied the other. 
 
 ‘ My miserable folly ! ’ said Armine with a groan, his fingers 
 drumming nervously on the table. 
 
 6 It is rather late in the day to bemoan that/ said the Captain 
 grimly. ‘ What you have to do now is to redeem your word like 
 a man, or break it like a man. To sit there weakly bewailing 
 your folly is the act of a woman ; and calling yourself a fool does 
 not excuse you for having been one ! ’ 
 
 His contempt was sharp and wounding ; but it was wholesome, 
 in that it roused St. Claire, and spurred him to some show of self- 
 defence. 
 
 * No man is proof against a moment’s weakness/ he said, with 
 a certain kind of angry dignity that became him. 
 
 1 Evidently, if there are such men, you are not one of them/ 
 returned the Captain contemptuously. 
 
 ‘ You are hard on me, Captain Stewart.’ 
 
 ‘Because I despise your weakness? Would you have me 
 admire what will cost that poor girl more than I care to think of? ’ 
 
 ‘I will trust to her generosity to forgive me, and to her 
 common sense to see things rationally/ said St. Claire. 
 
 ‘ Ya bene/ replied the Captain drily. ‘ I hope you will find 
 
IX TIIE TOILS. 
 
 165 
 
 what you look for. But we have high authority for saying that 
 reeds when they are leaned on have the trick of breaking and 
 piercing the hand which trusts them.’ 
 
 ‘ lone must see for herself that she cannot share my poverty. 
 You yourself would not permit it/ said St. Claire at bay. 
 
 ( Bo not mix me up in the affair/ said the Captain sternly. ‘ It 
 is your own affair/ 
 
 ‘ And yours/ persisted Armine. 
 
 ‘ No, not mine in any way/ said the Captain. * 1 do not forbid 
 the marriage, and I do not desire it ; I throw no obstacle in the 
 way, and I make nothing smooth. If you choose to take the girl, 
 penniless as she is, and begin the battle of life together, you may. 
 Others have married on meagre allowance and thriven well after ; 
 and there is no reason why you should not do the same if you 
 wished it. But I do not counsel it — as little as I forbid it. You 
 and she must settle it between you/ 
 i It is impossible ! ’ said St. Claire. 
 
 Captain Stewart shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 4 You are master of the situation — that is, so far as lone allows 
 you to be/ he said, with exasperating dryness. 4 Her hand is 
 rather a tight one when she closes it/ 
 
 4 1 understand you, Captain Stewart ; and I accept the whole 
 responsibility/ said Armine, feeling that he made no way here, and 
 indeed was only losing time, strength, and patience in the struggle. 
 
 And with this he rose and went out to lone, waiting for him 
 under the shade of the carruba-tree in the rose-garden, feeling that 
 he carried her death in his hand, and in his own heart the 
 consciousness of sin from which, come what might, he should 
 never be free again. Bound or released, he had done that which 
 he could not undo ; and, end as the thing might, some one must 
 suffer ; — all because of his weakness to pitv, and the seduction of 
 nature and the senses to which he had yielded for that brief but 
 fatal moment. 
 
 The day was just as beautiful as that on which he had 
 abandoned the guidance of reason to drift rudderless on the 
 treacherous sea of impulse and emotion. But how changed every- 
 thing was for him ! Nature had lost her spell, and the influences 
 created by sun and shadow, by the songs of the birds, the scents 
 of the flowers, the voices of the day, were as different now from 
 what they had been then as sobriety is different from intoxication, 
 remorse from passion, death from life. Even lone, sitting in 
 exactly the same place and pose on that curule-sbaped garden- 
 chair, was not the lone of that fatal day. She, like Nature, had 
 lost her charm ; and the broken spell no longer worked. The sun 
 shone in that narrow line across her head and neck, and touched 
 the red-gold hair with shining yellow ; but St. Claire had no 
 inclination now to kneel on the seat by her side and kiss that living 
 
i66 
 
 IONE. 
 
 tracery. ITe only wondered liow he had ever suffered himself to 
 be caught by so slight a thing ; and for the first time in his life he 
 despised himself as having done that which he would not have 
 done had he had the self-control which had been his safeguard in 
 Oakhurst. 
 
 And yet, how sorry he felt for the poor girl, knowing as he did 
 what was to come •, — how miserably guilty when he saw the 
 exquisite smile of loving happiness that broke like sunlight over 
 her face as he drew near and she, without rising but bending for- 
 ward, held out both her hands to him, palm upwards, as if it were 
 the offering of herself and her very soul made to that great god 
 Love ! He saw all her love ; all her confidence in him and her 
 future happiness ; all her trust and joy and glad security ; and he 
 knew that he was about to destroy her whole life as her reward 
 for loving him and believing in him. 
 
 He went up to her sadly ; and despite the blinding fervour of 
 her passion, the sensitiveness of her love told her that danger was 
 before her. 
 
 ‘ Are you well ? ’ she ask 3d anxiously. 
 
 ‘ Yes — no— not too well — not much amiss with me/ he answered 
 in confusion. 
 
 ‘ Something is wrong — what is it ? ’ asked lone, in a soft, swee*, 
 sympathetic manner — so unlike the arid egotism of the past. 
 
 6 Something is indeed very wrong/ said St. Claire. 
 
 She opened her large eyes and looked at him, not in fear, 
 rather in defiance of all evil possibilities that should come between 
 them — given his life and her own. 
 
 i What is it P ’ she asked again. ( Has papa been unkind? ’ 
 
 ‘Not that so much as that I have been foolish/ returned 
 Armine. 
 
 She turned as white as the datura in her hand. 
 
 *' What have you done? ’ she asked, her head bent down ; then 
 she raised it and looked at him full of love and confidence. ‘ You 
 cannot have done anything wrong or foolish ! ’ she said, with a 
 sudden abandonment of suspicion for love. It was like a caress — 
 as if she had put her arms about his neck and kissed him on the 
 lips. 
 
 ‘ Yes, both wrong and foolish/ persisted poor St. Claire. ‘ I 
 have made you love me, lone, and I have no means on which to 
 marry.’ 
 
 He said this with a headlong rush, strange for one so sweet and 
 measured as he always was. It was as if he had flung himself off 
 the firm land and dashed himself into the depths where he knew 
 neither his probable foothold nor his ultimate destination. 
 
 ‘ You have made me love you, and you have no means on which 
 to marry ? ’ repeated lone slowly. ‘ Are you very poor ? ’ 
 
 She asked this as calmly, almost glacially, as if she were not 
 
IN THE TOILS . 167 
 
 interested ; as if it were of some one else, not lierself, of whom she 
 was speaking. 
 
 6 Yes, very poor. I have nothing,’ he answered. 
 
 4 You have a profession and a home,’ she said. 
 
 ‘A profession which gives me a hare subsistence, and a home 
 which is not lit for you to share,’ was his reply. 
 
 4 If fit for you it is for me. Where you are I can be. And I 
 can help you in your work,’ said lone, raising her eyes to his. 
 
 4 My poor child, that is impossible ! ’ said St. Claire. 4 How 
 could you help me ? ’ 
 
 4 1 could, if I tried,’ repeated lone. 
 
 4 No, no, that is not to be thought of,’ he returned. 4 1 have 
 been rash, selfish, inconsiderate, lone, and you must forget me and 
 forgive me, if you can.’ 
 
 4 1 am to forget you P ’ repeated lone, going back to the 
 uninterested and glacial manner she had had before. 
 
 4 Yes,’ he said, taking her hand. 4 1 am not worthy of your 
 thoughts.’ 
 
 4 This means that you want to break off the engagement ? ’ she 
 asked. 
 
 4 I must. I have not money enough to marry,’ he replied. 
 
 Neither looked at the other. lone’s eyes were on the ground, 
 his were strained to the far distance seen through an opening made 
 by the trees, which framed the sea as if in a picture-— to the far 
 distance, beyond which lived Monica. 
 
 4 And it is only because you are poor that you want to break it 
 off? ’ lone asked quite quietly. 
 
 How he wished that she would speak with passion — that she 
 would look angry, revolted, proud, indignant, and not remain 
 sealed and bound in this unnatural calmness ! 
 
 4 Yes, only,’ he said in reply. 
 
 She turned to him suddenly and looked at him as if reading 
 his soul while giving her own. 
 
 4 Tell me the very truth, Armine,’ she said. 4 Nothing stands 
 between us but want of money ? If there were money you would 
 not wish to break off the engagement ? It is only because of 
 poverty ? There is nothing else ? Is this the whole truth ? ’ she 
 repeated. 
 
 She forced him to look at her by the very domination of her 
 love. Her eyes were as pathetic as are the Cenci’s. Her parted 
 lips were parched and strained ; her quivering nostrils seemed to 
 breathe out the agony of the Medusa ; the long white hand had 
 closed on his with a convulsive grasp ; her body was bent slightly 
 forward ; and she looked like one whose life is hanging on the 
 verdict to be given. 
 
 His heart failed him. He could not tell her the true truth. 
 It would be too cruel. He could not confess to her that he did 
 
i68 
 
 IONE. 
 
 not love her while she looked like this — that she had simply 
 wakened his pity and stirred hi3 emotion for a moment, while his 
 heart, ins love, his devotion were all another’s for perpetuity. He 
 could not return her truth of passion by the confession of mere 
 weakness to his own impulse. It would be too shameful ! He 
 must iie to her, and trust that God would forgive the sin for the 
 sake of the motive. 
 
 ‘ It is only my poverty,’ he said in a low voice. 
 
 ‘ You love me, Armine, do you not P ’ she continued, the strain 
 increasing. 
 
 ‘Who would not, lone?’ he answered, soft, yielding, pitiful, 
 is he was so sure to be. 
 
 ‘ Me and me only ? ( ’ she asked, forcing him still to look at her. 
 
 Her face was still that of Medusa in her agony— superhuman 
 m anguish, superhuman in beauty — pleading for mercy under the 
 guise of patiei^ce in suffering. He could not bear it. It was like 
 putting a knife to her throat ; and he could not ! 
 
 ‘ Yes, you and you only,’ he said ; but he turned away his eyes 
 as he spoke. 
 
 ‘ Swear it ! ’ she said in a deep voice, her hand still clasping his 
 .as if in a vice. 
 
 ‘ My word is enough,’ was his reply. 
 
 6 Then I care for nothing else ! ’ she said, sinking back in her 
 chair with the long-drawn sigh of one relieved from intolerable 
 pain. ‘ If you love me, Armine, all will be well with us. I will 
 work for you ; I will help you. I will be your good angel ! ’ she 
 added passionately ; / and I will make your life so happy that you 
 shall not know a day or hour of pain. If you love me, I fear no- 
 thing in heaven or earth. The desert with you better than 
 paradise without you ! If you deceive me — if you do not love me,’ 
 she added in a concentrated kind of voice, suddenly breaking 
 through her exaltation and falling back on her old jealousies and 
 suspicion — her face livid, her eyes alight with flame — ‘ if ever you 
 leave off loving me, if ever you deceive me, I will kill myself, 
 Armine ! I have thrown all my happiness on you. If you fail 
 me I shall die ! ’ 
 
 ‘ 1 am not worthy of so much devotion,’ said Armine in torture. 
 4 1 am a miserable wretca, contemptible to myself.’ 
 
 ‘ Do not ! do not ! I will not hear that ! ’ cried lone, laying her 
 hand imperatively on his mouth. ‘ You shall not say such things 
 of yourself. You insult my love when you do. You are so good, 
 so true, so noble — you are worthy of any woman’s love, even of a 
 queen’s ! But no one will ever love you as I do,’ she added. ‘ No 
 one could ! ’ 
 
 ‘But, lone, my beautiful lone, be reasonable !— we must be 
 reasonable ! Love will not keep us,’ urged poor St. Claire. ‘ We 
 
IN THE TOILS. i69 
 
 must come down to material considerations, and think of ways and 
 means.’ 
 
 * Love will keep us/ she said. 6 It shall ! You do not know 
 what a good wife I shall make,’ she added firmly. 6 1 have never 
 had fair play here. When I am happy and with you I shall be so 
 different ! Oh, we are not to be separated for the want of a little 
 money, and because you are afraid I shall suffer ! ’ she added 
 passionately. 1 That would be sacrificing the true for the false, 
 the real for the seeming.’ 
 
 ‘ You do not know what you are undertaking,’ said Armine. 
 
 ‘ You do not understand poverty. After your life here, where you 
 have had everything you can possibly wish for, it will be terrible 
 to you to feel that you have to curtail every desire — maddening to 
 me to see you want and I not able to supply. It will break my 
 heart,’ he added with genuine tenderness, imagination and pity 
 making together a very good simulacrum of love. 
 
 ‘ It would not break mine if I wanted all the world so long as 
 I had you,’ said lone. i Only love me, Armine — love me as you 
 love me now, and poverty will be more delightful to me than 
 riches. The day when you no longer love me I shall kill myself 
 — or you,’ she said, with a sudden resumption of her former 
 manner, her face livid, her eyes mere glittering lines between her 
 narrowed lids, her hands clasped in each other with so much force 
 that the knuckles were white and the flesh indented, her voice 
 lowered to a kind of hiss — the snake, the panther, the wild beast, 
 the demon that was in her roused and erect at the mere thought of 
 her lover’s infidelity. 
 
 At this moment Vincenzo passed before the two, and his 
 shadow fell on them as they sat there beneath the carruba-tree. 
 His broad face was set into its usual smile like an antique 
 mask, but his eyes were burning coals as he dolled his cap and 
 looked at the lovers askance, and so passed on with his noiseless 
 step— the first omen of their betrothal. 
 
 L But that day will never come, will it, Armine ?’ lone added 
 caressingly, coming back to her loveliest and most seductive self. 
 4 You love me as I love you, and you will be as little false to me as 
 I to you ? Is it not so P You could not be false, Armine ? ’ 
 
 ‘ No, I could not ! ’ said Armine, taking her in his arms and 
 kissing her — overborne by her stronger personality, by her greater 
 intensity of love — overborne, and not able to free himself, though 
 the end of the world should come upon him. 
 
 And she, poor passionate lone, did not see that nothing save 
 her own passion existed between them, and that all the rest was 
 glamour created only by herself. She did not feel that his kiss was 
 only responsive ; that his love was only pity ; that his acquiescence 
 in things as they stood was because of his inability to give pain, 
 
170 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 and not by tbe living will of passion. She gave what she had, and 
 saw what she brought ; and she desired no more than that which 
 she believed she possessed. It was phantasmagoric, if one will ; 
 but what else is all life ? — what else all love P 
 
 The engagement then was resumed and re-announced, and that 
 wolf on the horizon was accepted as part of the condition of things, 
 together with the bouquet and the ring. The family was the soul 
 of complaisance, and deeply imbued with the sacred principles of 
 liberty and the right of each individual to regulate his or her own 
 life. lone was of age ; St. Claire knew his own mind. Who then 
 had a right to interfere or object P Their congratulations had 
 perhaps a certain false note of contempt in them ; but lone's 
 happiness made her so comfortable to live with, they could not but 
 rejoice in their own share of the good afloat. Moreover, they were 
 glad to get rid of her. Taking her at all as one of themselves, and 
 an adopted daughter second only to Clarissa, had been one of those 
 mistakes which are sometimes made by arbitrary men when 
 married to weak but persistent women. Captain Stewart had over- 
 borne his wife’s opposition, but he had never been able to conquer 
 her repugnance. Her own nature made her just, but lone’s had 
 not won her love ; so that the plan had not worked well for the 
 happiness of the home, and the Captain had more than once 
 secretly repented of his own masterful determination. Nevertheless, 
 he always maintained when twitted with this failure that he had 
 done what was right, and that he would do just the same had it to 
 come over again. 
 
 Now, when the girl was to pass into other keeping, he was free 
 to rejoice at the cessation of his own guardianship, and free to con- 
 fess that a weight was taken off his hands which gave him the 
 sense of relief. 
 
 So these latter days passed on velvet for all save St. Claire, and 
 for him they were beset with thorns and spikes and burning plough- 
 shares almost unendurable. But as he never found the courage to 
 say to lone : ‘ I do not love you, and I do love some one else,’ he 
 had to abide by his miserable portion, where the only solace was 
 his belief that he was securing her happiness at the cost of his own. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 FOR ALL TIME. 
 
 There was no question of an immediate marriage following on 
 this rash engagement between Armine and lone. On the contrary, 
 it was agreed that he should return to Oakhurst for the summer — 
 and the winter too, if his peccant chest would stand the strain — 
 and in the spring of next year he was to come back to Palermo for his 
 
FOR ALL TIME. 
 
 171 
 
 bride ; if by that time he had a fitting home for a wife. This gave 
 him a little breathing-time and loosened the yoke by just so much. 
 It also, he thought, would enable him to make arrangements for 
 leaving Oakhurst altogether. He would exchange his practice for 
 one which did not include Monica Barrington as a possible patient 5 
 w’hich did not necessitate his carrying a wife to the Dower House, 
 as a proof of how loyally he had sealed his allegiance in his heart 
 and how faithful he had been to his love and his ideal. 
 
 It was like staving off the evil day of payment to a man who 
 has sold his soul to the devil, or given a bill to a creditor. If not 
 redemption, it was at least delay ; and a straw to the drowning man 
 gives a moment’s hope of salvation. 
 
 What was the chance of salvation to Armine, to lone was the 
 possibility of destruction. She would rather have been married 
 now without delay, suitable home or not ; and the restrictions 
 imposed by prudence galled her as those other bonds galled her 
 beloved. With the superstitious fears bom of love, she was afraid 
 of all probable and improbable dangers. This temporary separation 
 was as grievous to her as an eternal farewell, and she saw in it the 
 shapes of all the disasters which could possibly befall both her and 
 the man she loved so blindly and so well. She might have fever 
 and die, or he might be wrecked off the island of Capri on his 
 return to the mainland ; she might lose her beauty by small-pox, 
 or he might be taken by brigands in the giro, which, as an 
 intelligent tourist, he was bound to make before leaving the island ; 
 he might offend a mafiose and be shot — a camorrista, and be 
 stabbed; he might drink in typhus at Naples, or breathe in a 
 perniciosa at Home ; the train by which he travelled might run off* 
 the line ; the boat by which he crossed the Channel might be lost 
 in a fog ; it was quite in the circle of possibilities that some dread- 
 ful mishap should touch him, and then what would be her life? 
 She longed to go with him that she might at least share his fate ; 
 for, strong as the love of life was in her, the love of him who, she 
 believed, loved her, was stronger, and she would rather have died 
 with him than have lived without him. 
 
 If she had but known the truth ! — that truth which was con- 
 fusion of desire and chaos of thought, as now pity for lone and 
 now love for Monica, and now again anger and contempt for him- 
 self dominated him — that truth which was to-day consciousness ot 
 the splendid personality of the one, to-morrow yearning memories 
 of the spiritualized beauty of the other, with remorse for the 
 infidelity into which he had been seduced and for the deception to 
 which he stood committed— that truth which, beneath the appear- 
 ance of glad submission to the sweet bondage of his own love, was 
 dumb revolt against the tyranny of hers ; — had she but known all 
 this, what a fatal end to the cloud-built palaces wherein her soul 
 dwelt royally to the enchanted visions which her love transformed 
 
TONE. 
 
 E72 
 
 to solid facts ! But, blinded as she was by the effulgence of her 
 own passion, she saw nothing of what was, and dreamed away her 
 life in the serene assurance that her enchantments were realities. 
 Whether those dreams of hers came through the gate of ivory orthat 
 of horn was a thiDg she never asked herself. They were beautiful ; 
 they were intoxicating ; they made her life like some stately poem, 
 her love like some noble chant ; and she peeped behind no blanket 
 of the dark, simply for lack of suspicion that anything was to be 
 seen were she to look. 
 
 So the time passed, golden-winged and rosy-fingered to her, 
 leaden-footed and griffin-clawed to him ; and the day came 
 when he must leave his weeping love, sad as ever was Ariadne, and 
 go on the giro like the rest. 
 
 Change of scene and recovery of personal liberty brought to 
 St. Claire that feeling of relief which is the true gauge of pressure. 
 He was no longer the slave of his own pity and the captive of a 
 woman’s love. He was free once more, and might think and act 
 as seemed to him best. The farther he was removed from lone’s 
 direct influence, the more surely he came back to himself, and the 
 more impossible seemed the marriage. Putting his own feelings 
 out of court, and forgetting Monica, he said to himself — standing 
 on the ground of common sense — what had he to marry on P He 
 who could scarcely keep himself, to think of adding a wife and 
 probable children — it was folly to imagine such a thing ; it would 
 be a crime to translate that imagination into action. He pictured 
 to himself his life such as it would be with lone and poverty ; the 
 sordid struggles, the miserable needs, the want of order in the home, 
 the want of harmony in their natures ; and, on his side, the want 
 of abiding love. He saw himself at Oakhurst married by the law 
 to one woman, dedicated in heart and soul to another ; with 
 Monica’s sweet grave eyes looking at him, half in sorrow, half in 
 wonder, at his speedy consolation. This vision haunted him night 
 and day, and seemed to stamp itself as with a red-hot iron into his 
 brain. No, he could not face it ! — he could not ! He must write 
 to Palermo and end that which ought never to have been begun. It 
 would be a pain to poor lone now ; but marriage would be a greater 
 pain to her hereafter ; and of the two it was better to inflict the 
 lesser and more transient than to let her undergo the larger and 
 more enduring. She would learn to reconcile herself in time — to 
 forget him, and perhaps to despise and hate him. The thought 
 was grievous enough to one so sensitive and affectionate as he ; but 
 anything was better than things as they were at present! 
 
 He was full of all this while he went the prescribed round — 
 startling the panting little lizards among the ruins of Girgenti ; 
 tracing out the lines where was fought at Syracuse that great 
 battle which redeemed Sicily and ruined Athens ; remembering 
 Arethusa in her fountain and Galatea at Aci Reale ; reconstructing 
 
FOR ALL TIME. 
 
 173 
 
 the past and repeopling the void as he stood, bathed in the silver 
 of the moonlight or glorified by the sunrise, in the ruined theatre 
 at Taormina ; catching the burning blood-red beauty of the 
 pomegranates and the waxen sweetness of the oleander, as he 
 steamed through that exquisite tract which lies between Taormina 
 and Messina ; — but, wherever he went, feeling the difficulties of 
 his position, and fuller of his own troubles than of the things 
 about him. 
 
 This feeling of difficulty grew, as of course it would, and his 
 courage strengthened with time and distance ; so that when he 
 was at Messina he wrote to Captain Stewart, repeating what he 
 had said before — that he was too poor to marry as things were, 
 and that he saw no prospect in the future of making such an 
 income as would enable him to take a dowerless wife. His health 
 was delicate ; his friends were few ; his outlook was dark ; his 
 horizon was narrow, and ever peopled with those fearful shapes of 
 poverty and want and the gaunt wolf so sure to prowl about the 
 door. In all these circumstances, then, he was bound as a man of 
 honour to give up the engagement and restore lone to freedom and 
 her friends. 
 
 And then, because he was pitiful and kind-hearted, and more 
 easily stirred by emotional impulse than became a man, he wrote 
 to lone more strongly than he really felt, thinking to soften the 
 blow to her by expressing himself as broken-hearted in losing her. 
 
 And indeed at the moment he was deeply moved, thinking of 
 the girl’s sorrow, her beauty, and her love, till his eyes grew moist, 
 and a tear fell from his long lashes on to the paper and blotted 
 what he had written. 
 
 His decision was accepted by Captain Stewart in a curt letter 
 of few words and no regrets, lone did not write at all. But, as 
 she was naturally represented by her adopted father, her silence 
 was of the kind which affirms and consents ; and St. Claire was 
 once more free. He felt stronger and stouter, more manly 
 altogether, than he had felt ever since that fatal day when the sun- 
 shine had bewildered him and his own weakness had overpowered 
 him — when the story of Pygmalion had been renewed to his shame 
 and lone’s misery. As he went on board the boat at Messina, 
 setting his face towards Naples and leaving Sicily in the shadow of 
 the past, his whole being was full of that divine sense of freedom 
 which seemed to make up for all the rest. He was free — free to 
 think of Monica and to forget lone — free to love and live as he 
 would, without any person’s claim or right intervening — free to 
 feel that he had acted as an honourable man should — that he had 
 reasserted his manhood and his strength j and saved lone from 
 poverty and distress. 
 
 And yet her unfathomable eyes every now and them seemed to 
 flash like light before him, and he felt a certain pain at his heart, 
 
174 
 
 IONE. 
 
 a certain oppression of soul and sense when he thought of her 
 there in her loneliness and sorrow, and knew by his own experience 
 what she suffered. 
 
 His mind was tossed and racked between self-condemnation 
 and self-excuse. It had been all his fault, all his sin, that she was 
 so unhappy now. He had been weak and wicked. Yet, what had 
 he done that was so heinous P — given her a kiss. Was that such a 
 crime that he should be required to expiate it with the happiness 
 of his life, with perjury and deceit P It was morbid to condemn 
 himself so severely — worse than morbid to give it such enduring 
 effects. She and her people had taken him too seriously. The 
 mischief had lain here, and not in his innocent kiss, which ought 
 to have committed him to as little as it meant. He reasoned him- 
 self into a tolerably calm frame of mind for one hour ; but the 
 next his troublesome conscience made itself heard in spite of his 
 efforts to silence it, and he suffered the tortures inevitable to folly 
 when a man’s heart is good, and his will has no backbone worth 
 speaking of. 
 
 He was thinking all this one morning while sitting in the 
 Villa at Naples, drinking in the sunlight but scarcely delighting 
 in its charm. He had halted for a day or two on the way; for, 
 though he was so much stronger and better altogether for his 
 sojourn at Palermo, he was not able to bear great fatigue. And 
 he had to husband his strength for his long journey home. 
 
 While sitting there with his air of disguised prince, he saw a 
 tall slight figure coming slowly through the trees. Her cream- 
 coloured dress, with its old-gold trimmings hanging in straight folds 
 to her feet and clinging to her figure — her hat with its cream- 
 coloured feathers tipped with old-gold — her gait and height, all 
 suggested lone. But surely it was only a fond suggestion of his 
 fancy. It was impossible to be lone ; impossible ! It might as 
 easily be Monica herself — and yet how like ! — literally and in 
 very truth, how awfully like lone ! 
 
 The figure came slowly forward, looking to the right and the 
 left as if searching for some one. As it neared him St. Claire saw 
 the face — the yellow-hazel eyes which burned like living fire from 
 under the level brows — the red-gold hair that caught the sunlight 
 in its crossing threads till it glistened like a metallic aureole about 
 her head — the lips apart as of one in mortal agony — the nostrils 
 dilated and quivering with pain — the face that of the Medusa, 
 beautiful, young, a goddess under torture, a woman in her moment 
 of despair — yes, it was she ; it was lone ! He w r as here and she 
 was there, and only a few feet of earth divided them. The sea 
 had been bridged over; time and distance were no more than 
 thoughts ; she had come to seek him in his flight — and she had 
 found him. 
 
 As she saw him she gave a little cry and came up to him, 
 
FOR ALL TIME . 175 
 
 holding out her hands palm upwards, with the same gesture of 
 self-giving as she had made under the carruba-tree. 
 
 c I have come to you because I cannot live without you,’ she 
 said in answer to his half-terrified exclamation. 4 It was worse 
 than death to be there without you, Armine, and I would rather 
 die than live if I am to live away from you.’ 
 
 ‘ My poor girl ! poor lone ! you have ruined both yourself and 
 me/ said Armine, with the very quietness of despair. 
 
 Of what use to struggle when the end has come ? 
 
 ‘ Do not scold me, Armine,’ she said with strange humbleness. 
 * If you love me as you say, you know by your own heart that I 
 could do nothing else. How could I live without you or you 
 without me ? You knew that I would come. You knew that I 
 would either drown myself in the sea or come to you. There was 
 no help for it. And I knew that you wanted me ! ’ she added, 
 turning to him with all a woman’s grace of self-bestowal when 
 she confesses her own passion as a response to her lover’s. 
 
 What can a man do with the unwelcome devotion of a 
 woman? Reject it? — fling it back in her face like the dust of 
 dead men’s bones and the refuse of used things ? But if he him- 
 self has been the cause ? If he has made her believe that he 
 loved her and wanted her love in return ? And if she be young 
 and beautiful, and of a kind whom even a prince, disguised or 
 not, might be proud to win and wear ? — how as a man of honour 
 can he ? — how as a man of flesh and blood is it possible ? Even 
 one who is all soul, and out of whom the beast has been 
 eliminated, even he must pause before such a manifestation, 
 staggered, and in some sense intoxicated. 
 
 It was to no good that Armine had tried to convince himself 
 that he had not been to blame, and that really an innocent little 
 kiss on the back of a girl’s neck ought not to have entailed all these 
 grave consequences. It was of no use ! He had been foolish, 
 putting it at the best and mildest; and having been foolish he 
 must pay for his folly. He had made the girl believe that he loved 
 her, and she had taken him at his own showing. He had told her 
 that his heart was broken, his life desolate, his future dark without 
 her, and she had come to give him joy by the wealth of her love, 
 sunshine by the warmth of her passion. Was this a time to think 
 of maidenly modesty ? of virginal reserve ? — a time to wonder if 
 she had not transgressed the strict bounds of both ? Maidenly 
 modesty and virginal reserve are jewels in the crown of woman- 
 hood ; granted. But if love thinks that love craves ? If the 
 only barrier between happiness and the beloved is conventional 
 prudence, are there not times and seasons when, to the loving, 
 ♦Society is only the ghost of a dead pedant, and Nature and Love 
 are the living lords? 
 
 A woman is of flesh and blood all the same as a man, and 
 
IONE. 
 
 176 
 
 lone’s flesh and blood were more vitalized than were most. It 
 was all because of her belief that Armine loved her and had given 
 her up for her good against his own desire. Had she suspected 
 the arid truth she would indeed have flung herself into the sea rather 
 than have crossed it. For it is one thing for a woman to offer of 
 her own free will the love which she believes is desired though 
 not sought, and another to ask for a response to her own passion 
 which has sprung up spontaneously, neither sought nor desired. 
 The one comes into the list of heroic deeds, the other into that of 
 follies which are also crimes against oneself. And lone’s was of the 
 former. 
 
 Armine’s emotion overcame him. It was not all the emotion 
 of joy, but it was not all that of repugnance. He was a man, 
 though a weak one, and he could not but feel the full force of the 
 tremendous thing she had done for him. It would be his ruin 
 and hers ; nevertheless it was heroic, royal, sublime. And she was 
 so beautiful, and her passionate devotion was so sincere ! 
 
 ‘ Do you really give me up for poverty only? ’ she asked after 
 a pause, her soul stirring like a drugged sleeper half awakening. 
 ‘ You do love me as I love you, do you not P ’ 
 
 Pitiful and kindly, weak and warmed by her love to some- 
 thing of its own fire, he could not undeceive her. She had come 
 to him for love and joy, believing in him, trusting in him, loving him; 
 and he could not give her sorrow and truth instead of that which 
 she came to find — and to give. 
 
 ‘Yes/ he said steadily; ‘I do love you, lone. It is only 
 because of poverty that I gave you up.’ 
 
 ‘ Then I care for nothing now in the world ! ’ said lone, with 
 the air and manner of one who has gained the victory. ‘ If you 
 love me — basta ! I will work for you ; I will be your good genius, 
 Armine; and you shall find all things better because of me 
 Only love me as I love you and all will go well. Love me, and 
 for ever after you shall have reason to bless the day when 1 took 
 my life in my own hands and came to lay it in yours.’ 
 
 She poured out her love as a flood wherein he was overwhelmed 
 — she wrapped him in it as a garment of fire that clung closer 
 than his own flesh ; he could not resist her — no man could ! — and 
 he was swept away by the torrent and burnt by the fire. There 
 was no other course open to him, and he had only to accept his 
 position and legalize hers. He must make her his wife, ruin or 
 not, and save her from the consequences of the folly she had com- 
 mitted for love of him. It was easy to say that he was weak and 
 that he ought not to have yielded, but there are times in one’s life 
 when self-sacrifice is the bravest action and perjury to the past 
 the first virtue ; and this was one of them. 
 
 Wherefore he wrote to Captain Stewart and told him all that 
 had been and all that was to be ; and how, as soon as things could 
 
FOR ALL TIME. 
 
 1 77 
 
 be legally arranged, he would marry lone at the Consulate. lie 
 ended by expressing a hope that he, the Captain, lone's adopted 
 hither, and Mrs. Stewart, her adopted mother, would come over 
 to Naples to give their sanction to the ceremony. 
 
 ‘ But they will not/ said lone, when he read the letter to her. 
 ‘ I know them, Armine ; you do not. They will not/ she repeated, 
 when he combated her dictum by the baseless ‘ hope ’ of that super- 
 ficial optimism which simply re fuse j to see the bad side of things 
 because they are disagreeable to look at. 
 
 She proved herself right. To Armine’s letter came, as a reply, 
 certain legal documents by which Captain Stewart gave his consent 
 to the marriage ; three boxes, full of everything that could be said 
 to belong to lone — all her clothes, her trinkets, her girlish treasure, 
 her books, her music, her very wrecks and relics of childish toys — 
 all her property, down to the veriest bits of rubbish; — but for reply 
 to the request of her adopted parents’ presence to sanction the 
 marriage, simply two lines : ‘We desire to hear no more of you or 
 of her. She is dead to us for ever.’ 
 
 Thus the two began life together alone and absolutely isolated 
 from all family connections whatsoever — she loving him with the 
 whole force of her passion, the whole creative power of her 
 imagination — he loving Monica, but resolved to bury her sweet 
 image deep in the unfathomable recesses of his heart, and to do his 
 duty to the girl who, for love of him, had not done it to herself. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 ACROSS THE AISLE. 
 
 It was a cold, dim, drizzly day when Armine and his bride came to 
 Oakhurst— one of those three bad days in May when we are forced 
 to shiver in dolorous penance for the premature warmth of April. 
 True, the fields were green and the young leaves of the trees were 
 laced with gold or flushed with crimson, but the heavy sky was 
 leaden, overclouded, weeping, and no colour had its value for want 
 of sunlight to give it life. True, too, the banks and hedgerows 
 were starred wdth wild flo^wers and festooned with fragrant 
 climbing-plants, and the trees and bushes were full of bloom ; but 
 the dead air brought forth no perfume from hawthorn or from 
 lilac, from primrose-bank or cowslip meadow, and the flowers 
 themselves gave one the impression of being asleep and silent. No 
 birds sang from the trees with that delirious passion, that joyful 
 ecstasy proper to the springtime and eloquent of the future summer ; 
 only a few nest-calls here and there broke the silence of the woods 
 — only the faint murmur of the bees among the lime-blossoms over- 
 head, like confused voices heard from afar, spoke of the continued 
 
 N 
 
TONE. 
 
 17S 
 
 activities of life and nature. All was cold, colourless, depressed, 
 dreary. It was an English spring at its worst moment — the 
 moment which justifies the dwellers in those southern climes where 
 the sun ever shines in their cynical belief that in England the sun 
 never shines at all. It was as if a key-note had been struck by 
 nature prefacing the theme on which man was hereafter to enlarge. 
 And indeed the things human of this day were, for Armine and 
 lone, only too closely in accord with those of nature. 
 
 The young couple entered on their home-life absolutely un- 
 welcomed. No greeting friend met them at the station; no beam- 
 ing face looked out from door nor window to watch them pass and 
 smile a kindly welcome ; no warm, frank hand pressed theirs as 
 they drove up to the dingy little house where Armine’s slender 
 income was made ; only the one woman servant of the establish- 
 ment — over-dressed, acrimonious, offended by the delay of the train, 
 and already hostile to the new arrangements — and the rough- 
 headed stable-man, seemed to have known of their existence, or to 
 have looked for their arrival. The very locum tenens himself, good 
 Mr. Benjamin Hoskins, was unavoidably absent from the house ; 
 and thus it was that the two young people came to their home 
 without recognition or congratulation from any one. 
 
 Never was a colder, duller, less genial reception of a beautiful 
 bride ; and Armine’s kind heart was pained as he noticed the 
 universal neglect of the neighbourhood, and thought of the pinched 
 poverty and social isolation to which her love for him had doomed 
 lone. 
 
 How sorry he was for her ! — how sorry too, for himself! — and 
 how much he regretted that which no regrets could now undo ! 
 This terrible Frankenstein of disaster which had sprung from that 
 one impulsive and innocent little kiss ! 
 
 lone did not seem to feel the want which was only too palpable 
 to St. Claire. As they crossed the threshold of her uninviting 
 home, she laid her hand on his with a loving gesture — a gesture, 
 however, which had none of that shy submission, that caressing 
 timidity so essentially feminine — but a gesture which expressed a 
 love too energetic to be submissive, too assured to be shy, too 
 intense to be circumspect. Turning to him. she looked into his 
 face with eyes which seemed to claim him as her own — eyes which 
 had never looked at him as yet with aught but the adoration of 
 love. She did not see the ugliness of her surroundings — she saw 
 only the beauty of her husband ; and the universal neglect which 
 had chilled him was to her non-existent, warmed as she was with 
 the fire of her own heart. 
 
 But for all that hidden warmth she could not resist the 
 physical influences of time and place ; and as she went into the 
 cold and gloomy sitting-room she shivered and drew her light 
 mantle closer round her. 
 
ACROSS THE AISLE. 
 
 179 
 
 1 Are you cold, dear ? ’ asked Armine tenderly. 
 
 4 Yes, horribly,’ she answered frankly. ‘ How cold it is ! 
 Does it always rain like this, Armine P ’ 
 
 ‘ No ; not always,’ he said with a smile. Then turning to the 
 woman, he added : ‘ Light a fire, Mary, will you ? ’ 
 
 ‘If you wish it, sir,’ said Mary, her voice both sharp and 
 reluctant. 
 
 6 Certainly I wish it,’ he answered. 
 
 ‘ But the bright bars are in, doctor,’ she returned, with a certain 
 acrid familiarity not reassuring. 
 
 ‘ And what of that? ’ said Armine, to whom bright bars were 
 unknown mysteries. 
 
 i Perhaps your good lady knows P ’ said Mary, looking at lone 
 curiously. 
 
 She was more than doubtful if the good lady, with her foreign 
 eyes and touzled hair, knew anything so civilised. Word had gone 
 through the place that the young doctor had married a heathen 
 papist — a blackamoor — may be a Hottentot; and lone’s passable if 
 not quite perfect English and red-gold hair, which Mary mentally 
 called a carroty mop, had surprised and in a certain sense dis- 
 concerted the woman. Perhaps, after all, she might even know 
 the sacred meaning of bright bars and recognise the iniquity of 
 fires in May ? At all events, Mary made the cast, and waited for 
 the result. 
 
 lone looked at her with the haughtiness, the insolence, which 
 the opposition of her social inferiors always roused in her. These 
 late days of happiness in the fancied security of her love bad not 
 made her democratically amiable to all the world, though they had 
 made her so soft and sweet to Armine ; and she had already taken 
 one of those instinctive dislikes to this woman to which all nervous 
 organizations are liable — dislikes which are to the moral nature 
 what fear and horror are to the physical. 
 
 ‘ I know nothing about your absurd bright bars,’ she answered. 
 
 ‘ Light a fire at once ; do you hear ? ’ 
 
 6 We do not do such things here, Mrs. St. Claire ; but of course 
 if you wish it — you are mistress here now, and the bright bars are 
 none of my business, for I won’t clean them again,’ said Mary 
 insolently. 
 
 She was indignant at being spoken to with authority by a lady ; 
 as is the way with women who have been used only to the slack 
 commandersliip of a master ; and she had moreover that odd con- 
 tempt for lone’s evident unaccustomedness to English habits of 
 life which uneducated people feel for all difference of ways and 
 ignorance of local custom. 
 
 ‘ Do as you are told, and hold your tongue,’ said lone harshly. 
 Then, as Mary after a moment’s hesitation left the room muttering 
 angrily to herself, she said to Armine, with some surprise : 6 What 
 
 N 2 
 
i8o 
 
 IONE. 
 
 a horrid, rude, cross old wretch that is ! How different from that 
 good old Amarella or that dear kind Vincenzo ! ’ she added, her 
 thoughts turning hack with their first shadow of regret to the soft 
 complaisance which was the rule in her old home. There both 
 men and women would have promised ‘ mountains and seas,’ if that 
 would have contented her, and made her forget her inconvenient 
 desire till the time for fulfilment had passed. But if she had per- 
 sisted, they would have said ‘a suo comodo’ with resignation, 
 mentally repeating an Ave to make heavenly capital out of their 
 earthly trouble, or fortifying themselves with those two camels of 
 endurance — ‘coraggio ’ and ‘ pazienza.’ And here this hard, ugly, 
 over-dressed woman made a scene about lightinga fire when it was 
 as cold as winter — a thing which those dear slipshod, untidy, and 
 good-natured creatures would have done of their own accord. 
 
 It was another jarring note in what should have been the day’s 
 glad symphony ; hut lone was too happy to allow herself to be 
 seriously impressed by even this uncomfortable little scene — this 
 small act of strife as the first event of her home-life. 
 
 6 At all events I have you,’ she said, turning to Armine with 
 her imperious love ; ‘ and you will never fail me, will you ? ’ she 
 asked, her hand on his shoulder. 
 
 ‘ No/ said Armine, speaking as if in a dream. 
 
 He was standing by the table, holding in his hand an envelope 
 addressed to Mr. Benjamin Hoskins, and looking intently at the 
 writing. It was Monica’s. 
 
 6 What are you thinking of, Armine ? ’ asked lone, her hand 
 tightening on his shoulder. 
 
 Underneath the soft overlay of her love struck the sharper 
 accent of suspicion, the rougher note of jealousy. 
 
 ‘ Nothing/ answered Armine, just a shade of coldness in his 
 face and manner. 
 
 ‘ Something has annoyed you/ she persisted, her yellow-hazel 
 eyes beginning to glitter. ‘ What is that envelope ? ’ 
 
 ‘ You see/ he said ; ‘ an envelope.’ 
 
 6 Whose writing is it, Armine P ’ 
 
 ‘ How should I know ? ’ he answered evasively. 6 It is not 
 addressed to me.’ 
 
 6 Then what is the matter with you P ? 
 
 ‘ Nothing, lone, nothing! You lose your time in watching me 
 so closely. It is nothing/ he repeated. Then he added, by a 
 happy after-thought — more happy than true : ‘ I am only sorry 
 that Mary was so rude to you.’ 
 
 6 Oh, if that is all, it is nothing,’ she answered, the glitter passing 
 out of her eyes and the softness of love returning to them. ‘ Cross, 
 horrid old wretch, I do not care what she says ! But she shall go 
 if she is rude. I will not keep her if she is insolent ; and even as 
 it is she shall go.’ 
 
ACROSS THE AISLE . 
 
 1S1 
 
 And as she said these words Mary came into the room, having' 
 halted outside the door to listen. 
 
 ‘Yes, Mrs. St. Claire,’ she said viciously, flinging down the 
 bundle of ‘kindling’ she was carrying ; ‘ I am quite willing to go. 
 We are not used to be treated like slaves here, like what you are 
 in those heathen lands you come from. And what is more, I for 
 one won't be neither. So, if you please, suit yourself this day 
 month ; and I hope you'll get some one who will take as much 
 care of the things, and work early and late for poor food and low 
 wage, as I have done.’ 
 
 And with this, forgetting all about the fire and the bright bars, 
 she left the room in a fury, and slammed the door after her so that 
 the whole house shook. 
 
 Armine looked vexed ; lone at first amazed and then furious. 
 
 ‘ What a bad, insolent old woman ! ’ she said angrily. ‘ She 
 deserves a good beating. I should like to fling her out of the house 
 this instant ! Send her away, Armine, at once. Send for the 
 carabinieri and fling her out ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Hush, lone ! you must not say such things here,' said Armine. 
 ‘ We are not used to this kind of thing in England.’ 
 
 ‘Then you will have to get used to it,’ said lone, suddenly 
 assuming that dangerous coldness of obstinate opposition character- 
 istic of the bad and sad old days. ‘ I shall say what I think, in 
 England or anywhere else.’ 
 
 ‘ For Heaven’s sake hush, lone ! ’ reiterated Armine. ‘ Mary 
 may hear you.’ 
 
 ‘ And what do I care if a common wretch like that hears me or 
 no ? ’ retortei lone. ‘ She is a bad, insolent, ugly old creature, and 
 she does deserve a beating and to be flung out of the house.’ 
 
 ‘If this is the way in which you are going to treat English 
 servants, you will find it will not answer,’ said Armine, with 
 undeniable irritation. 
 
 ‘ And you defend a common wretch like that against me, 
 Armine ! ’ cried lone, with a sudden blaze of passion. ‘ If I had 
 not heard it with my own ears I would not have believed it. I 
 can scarcely believe it now.’ 
 
 6 Nonsense, lone, I do not defend her. How can you excite 
 yourself by such exaggeration P ’ he said. 
 
 ‘ Do you mean that I tell lies, Armine ? ’ she asked, as she 
 might have asked the same question of Clarissa when things went 
 cross between them. 
 
 And on this Armine went out of the room, presently returning 
 wflth Mary at his heels and a coal-scuttle in her hand, having 
 coaxed her as a woman to do her duty as a servant. 
 
 Thus it chanced that the first discomfort between these two 
 young people, since their marriage, was brought about by the 
 sordid circumstance of a servant’s ill-temper, founded on the 
 
1 82 
 
 /ONE. 
 
 trifling fact that Tone had drawn her mantle a little closer round 
 her shoulders. So true is it that the greatest events of life spring 
 from the most insignificant causes, and that the deepest feelings 
 may be routed, the most heroic actions nullified, by the meanest 
 and most trivial accidents of life. 
 
 Mary had heard the whole of this conversation — or rather 
 squabble — between the young people; and the first authentic 
 account of the new bride, spread through Oakhurst, was that she 
 was a heathen, a Tartar, and a slave-driver, who offered to beat 
 her, Mary, with her own hands, because she remarked meekly that 
 the bright bars were in the parlour-grate — and should she make 
 the young lady a fire somewhere else ? 
 
 ‘A regular bad ’un ! ’ said Mary to her audience; and her 
 audience sucked in their lips and said : 6 Belike. How could it be 
 else, seeing where she came from P ’ 
 
 Thus the story grew and grew, as all such stories do in 
 country places, till before the week was out, the game of Russian 
 Scandal was repeated in such grave earnest that even lone’s worst 
 enemies would not have recognised her in the caricature which 
 prejudice and exaggeration had hammered out between them. 
 
 Story or not, no one was prepared to welcome these young 
 people — no one was in the mind to receive lone with kindness or 
 to congratulate St. Claire with sincerity. All the fathers and 
 mothers whose daughters had been secretly offered and tacitly 
 rejected were angry with the young fellow who had not found his 
 match at home but had had to go abroad for a wife. They took it as 
 amoral offence, and were prepared to resent it as a personal affront. 
 Miss Maria Crosby was perhaps the loudest in her denunciations of 
 the wickedness which was assumed to lie in this marriage of her 
 former fancy. She had thought better of him, she said with 
 virtuous acrimony ; but there ! no one can say what any one will 
 ever do ; and when you take to any one, you are sure to be dis- 
 appointed in them and to find them not worth a button. This 
 was her experience in life ; and Dr. St. Claire was one who con- 
 firmed her belief. 
 
 Mrs. Anthony Barrington was also disgusted by the marriage. 
 How could they patronise this most undesirable person, the new 
 wife ? While Dr. St. Claire was single, and they were not com- 
 mitted to some odious woman, it was all very well to be kind to 
 him and all that ; but how could they possibly receive her ? She 
 was sure to be some vulgar, underbred creature who would drop 
 her h’s and eat with her knife ; and really it was a most awkward 
 position for every one. 
 
 But when she said this to her husband, he answered a little 
 shortly : 
 
 6 You should have thought of this contingency, Tlieo, before you 
 brought the fellow so far out of his place as to ask him here to 
 
A CROSS THE AISLE . 
 
 1S3 
 
 dinner. And for the matter of that, I dare say she is quite a3 
 good as he is, and will probably be more amusing. We men found 
 him a dull dog enough, I can assure you ; and what you women 
 ever saw in him is one of the things I cannot for the life of me 
 understand.’ 
 
 i Well, I never saw anything ! ’ laughed Theo. ‘ Monica and 
 mamma did, but I — never ! ’ 
 
 On her side, Mrs. Barrington of the Dower House was doubt* 
 ful both of the wisdom and propriety of the whole thing ; seeing 
 that lone came from a foreign country, and might wish to 
 Romanize the people here ; for which unfortunate proselytism, as 
 the wife of the medical man, she would have only too many oppor- 
 tunities. Besides this, the practice of such a place as Oakhurst 
 was not lucrative enough to support the wife and family of a man 
 of Dr. St. Claire’s pretensions. So that altogether she was doubt- 
 ful and almost distressed, and faintly hoped that things would 
 come right in the end and turn out better than they looked now. 
 
 Monicas first feeling was one of acute disappointment; though 
 she hated herself that it should be so, and though she assured her- 
 self twenty times a day that she was very glad Armine St. 
 Claire was happy and had forgotten her. Nevertheless, she was 
 curiously pained for a person who had cause for thankfulness ; but 
 she was pained for him rather than for herself — for his character 
 as an ideal rather than for any change in her own relations with 
 him. She thought his nature had been different, and that he 
 would have considered it a crime to marry a girl brought up in 
 Sicily. Of course he had the right to judge for himself and to do 
 what was best for his happiness; but she could not think that 
 happiness would be secured by marrying a girl brought up in 
 Sicily. She had no fault to find with lone, of whom she knew 
 nothing, while refusing to believe that first crude scandal which 
 spread like wildfire through the place. She knew of her no more 
 than others knew — and this was only what the announcement in 
 the papers told them ; how that Armine St. Claire, M.D., of 
 Oakhurst, had married at the Consulate of Naples, lone, the 
 adopted daughter of Captain Ralph Stewart, of Palermo, Sicily. 
 And this was not much. Still, Sicily was such a long way off ; 
 and the marriage seemed to have been so strangely hurried and 
 unexpected — so unlike anything that might have been looked for 
 from him ! 
 
 This was what she thought to herself — the extreme lengths to 
 which her secret disapprobation went. Outwardly, and to others, 
 she defended his action with her own sweet gentleness of judgment 
 and quiet firmness of advocacy — that kind of gentleness of firm- 
 ness which never arouses opposition to advocacy, because so 
 entirely free from all aggressiveness on its own side. 
 
 Edward Formby was the only one in the whole society who 
 
/ONE, 
 
 1S4 
 
 took an active part in upholding St. Claire. He went in for 
 defence of the marriage with as much loyalty and enthusiasm as if 
 he had had a personal hand in it, and it touched his honour some- 
 how to prove it perfect. He spoke much of the irreproachable 
 standing of Captain Stewart, which was in itself a strong backstay ; 
 and, man-like, he advocated the cause of the girl whose foreign 
 appearance and undeniable beauty had already been as much 
 talked of as her wickedness. He thought that St. Claire was to 
 be envied, not reviled, in that he had fished up a prize in the way 
 of looks out of foreign waters; and he defended the young fellow 
 with genuine warmth when Anthony growled and Mrs. Anthony 
 laughed, and dear Mrs. Barrington mildly doubted and gravely 
 feared, while Monica alone came to his side with that charity 
 which hopes all things and thinks no evil. 
 
 ‘Men marry to please themselves, not their friends,’ Edward 
 said, with unintentional point; ‘ and if a man loves a pretty girl, 
 why should he not make her his wife P What the deuce else can 
 he do ? St. Claire has done quite right ; the only drawback is 
 that cursed question of finance, and whether they can pull through 
 or not. Outside this there is nothing to be said against the 
 marriage. And for the money-bags, that is their own affair.’ 
 
 He spoke with almost personal warmth, as if it had been his 
 own business that he was discussing. 
 
 ‘ I think you are quite right, Edward,’ said Monica ; but she 
 did not look up when she spoke. She was occupied with the tea- 
 spoons. ‘ It is, as you say, their own affair only ; but if we choose 
 we can make things better for them by .our kindness to them ; and 
 I hope we will.’ 
 
 Mrs. Anthony looked at her sister-in-law sharply ; then 
 suddenly, Hushing all over her face, she broke into a thin laugh 
 and said : 
 
 ‘ What a queer creature you are, Monica ! ’ speaking in that 
 short staccato way she had when she was cross — a way like no- 
 thing so much as the dropping shot of small pistols. 
 
 To the discredit of Oakhurst, it must be said that those who 
 went to church next Sunday went as full of the bride as of their 
 devotions. This marriage was the great event of the moment, and 
 by the exaggerated reports afloat concerning lone it had been made 
 of even more than natural importance. Even old Mr. Mil wood, 
 the bachelor rector — a good old soul who had no evil thoughts, 
 though he had as keen an eye for female beauty as he had a dis- 
 criminating taste for old port and brown sherry — even he peered 
 over his spectacles when he rose from his knees after the initial 
 prayer in the reading-desk, to scan his congregation as his manner 
 was, but chiefly to find out the new-comer. And he said 
 approvingly to himself: 6 Pretty dear ! pretty dear ! ’ as lone came 
 in with her husband, looking like a young queen entering on her 
 
ACROSS . THE AISLE . 
 
 185 
 
 kingdom — as superb in lier consciousness of power, and as 
 haughtily indifferent to the homage which nevertheless she 
 claimed as her own, as was ever eastern empress with slaves for 
 subjects. 
 
 The first Sunday ! To Armine it was simply martyrdom, with 
 no crown to recompense him for the cross. He had resolved to 
 bear his pain like a hero and to do his duty like a man. No one 
 should see that he suffered — no one ; not even Monica, to whom it 
 would have been unspeakable relief to have cried out and told the 
 ■whole sad story of his past weakness and present anguish. But he 
 must hide it all ; and let her believe, with the rest, that he had 
 married of his own free will, in nowise compelled by circumstances ; 
 and that he was happy and exultant as a bridegroom should be. 
 
 He came in with his bride ; showed her to her seat in the pew ; 
 arranged her footstool : paid her the few attentions possible to 
 the time and place with almost ostentatious punctiliousness. And 
 just across the aisle, parallel with them, sat Monica and her mother 
 in the Barrington pew — just there where they could not help 
 seeing them and taking cognizance of every look and movement. 
 
 Monica was deadly pale, but quite quiet and composed. This 
 first trial over, she thought, all the rest would be easy ; for she had 
 schooled herself with severity, and fathfully believed that she had 
 learned her lesson. And, for herself, she was glad that the shock 
 of first seeing Armine in his altered conditions had come to her at 
 church. He, too, was as white as the handkerchief with which he 
 so often wiped his upper lip ; but outwardly he was as grave and 
 composed as herself He felt like a criminal, but he bore himself 
 as if unconscious of evil. He was more miserable than he once 
 could have imagined it possible to be, and yet live through the 
 trial — more miserable now than in the past, because self-degraded ; 
 but he had brought himself into this false position, and he must 
 abide by the consequences of his own folly. 
 
 Wherefore, he ostentatiously paid lone all those small 
 attentions which were proper to the time and place, and forbore to 
 look at Monica while be did so. 
 
 There was his Love — the woman whom nature seemed to have 
 made for him — pure, gentle, sweet, refined, patient while she 
 suffered, strong while she wept, able to renounce her own desire 
 for higher things and to conquer even love for the sake of duty. 
 And here was his wife, for whose very beauty he had only that 
 kind of admiration which stirs the senses and leaves the heart un- 
 touched — with whose nature he had no spiritual sympathy, jealous, 
 exacting, over-fond as it was — a woman whose love oppressed him 
 by its tyrannies and fatigued him by its insistence — a woman who 
 held him more than he held her, and who had taken him captive 
 under the guise of surrendering to his will. 
 
 He glanced at Monica’s tender face with its dreamy melancholy. 
 
1 36 
 
 IONE . 
 
 its saintly stillness and resignation, not so beautiful as lone’s, 
 judging by the beauty of the flesh only, but how far more lovely 
 by the spirit ! — and then he caught lone’s yellow-hazel eyes turned 
 on him with that rapt look of passionate love which seemed to 
 envelope him in flames ; and he shivered suddenly as if a cold wind 
 had blown over him. 
 
 Edward Forrnby was immensely struck by the beauty of the 
 young bride. She seemed to him the loveliest creature he had ever 
 seen — a woman to turn men’s heads and make crowds go mad for 
 her mere smile. Her eyes were like new-born worlds to him — - 
 revelations of a new dispensation. They woke up something in 
 him unfelt before. Fur such a woman he thought he could become 
 an anchorite or a hero — live in torture or die in ecstasy. She 
 was too good for St. Claire. Monica Barrington was of the type 
 to have suited him better. Edward had always liked St. Claire, 
 and had stood his friend in the place ; but now he partly envied 
 and partly despised him for the possession of a treasure of which 
 he was certainly not worthy. Perhaps no man would have been 
 fully worthy — but some would have come nearer the mark than 
 Armine St. Claire. 
 
 Once, and once only, Monica looked across the aisle, first at 
 Armine and then at lone. Her eyes a little failed her, and her 
 heart seemed to stop still ; but she turned to the hymn which she 
 had no voice to sing, and tried to lose herelf by closely following 
 the words with her mind and repeating them in her heart. She 
 did not look again, and her subsequent prayers were more fervent 
 than usual ; and they were never cold. 
 
 None of the Barringtons left the church quite so soon as usual 
 to-day, and Armine took out lone rather sooner than had been his 
 wont — mingling with the crowd of the second set, and not waiting 
 for the Upper Ten as in times past. Thus the two former friends 
 did not meet — neither in the porch nor on the walk, nor yet under 
 the lych-gate as of old ; and both St. Claire and Monica felt that 
 it was best. Each had borne as much as w~as wise for the first 
 strain, even though the time and place had helped them. Across 
 the aisle ! The church and the law betweeu them — religion and 
 morality the twin sentinels set against them ; and only the 
 invisible and indestructible tie of a spiritual love to bind them ! 
 
 While the family strolled down the church-walk, Theodosia 
 cried suddenly : 
 
 6 What an odd-looking creature that Mrs. St. Claire is ! Don’t 
 you think so, mamma P ’ 
 
 1 She looks foreign,’ said Mrs. Barrington cautiously. 
 
 Her failing vision had told her only this as a general impression, 
 and had not supplied the details. 
 
 4 She is splendid ! ’ said Edward Forrnby, his cheeks flushed 
 and his eyes glistening. 4 She is magnificent ! ’ 
 
A CROSS THE AISLE . 1S7 
 
 1 What do you think, Monica ? ’ asked Theodosia, with a curious 
 little laugh. 
 
 ‘I think with Edward, that she is wonderfully beautiful/ 
 answered Monica, looking somewhat gratefully into the face of the 
 man for whom the fitness of things and the lay of the land had 
 destined her. 
 
 6 Do you think you shall like her P ’ asked Theo with another 
 laugh. 
 
 ‘ Yes, I am sure I shall/ returned Monica. 
 
 She had made up her mind. Of all in Oakhurst she would be 
 the best friend of Armine St. Claire’s wife, and would stand by 
 her with the most faithful support. 
 
 CHAPTER xxirr. 
 
 THE OAK1UKST BRIDE. 
 
 I one was standing in her shabby drawing-room looking at herself 
 in the glass. She was thinking of Armine more than of her own 
 beauty ; or rather she was looking at her beauty as at something 
 that was Armine by the conversion of love — something that he had 
 made his own and stamped for ever with his impress. This was 
 just the place where he had kissed her this morning before he had 
 left her for his early rounds. She forgot to remember, as she had 
 forgotten to remark at the time, that she herself, with hands 
 clasped round his neck, had drawn his face down to hers, upturned 
 to receive the caress claimed rather than returned. She only knew 
 that just here he had kissed her ; and, smiling that deepdiearted 
 smile of happy love, she passed her hand caressingly over the spot 
 as if she could still find the sweetness of his touch. 
 
 How happy she v\ as ! What a divine thing it was to love and 
 be loved ! — to make the beloved’s whole life, and to be the owner 
 and dispenser of his happiness ! — to live in the light and warmth 
 of a sun to- which the material orb is but a dull and distant star ! — 
 to be the owner of a treasure to which the wealth of the world is 
 but as dross ! True. But if the roles are inverted and the antiphony 
 is falsely intoned ? — if the one gives who ought to yield and the 
 other grants who ought to demand? — then confusion comes in the 
 place of security, sorrow dispossesses joy, and the shame of dis- 
 inheritance falls where should have been the crowned grace of 
 loving womanhood. 
 
 Of all this lone was as oblivious as she was of the fact that the 
 little love-passage which she was recalling with so much exaltation 
 of passion in her remembrance, had been claimed by her rather 
 than proffered by him, and that in the living drama between them 
 she gave and he received — she loved and he endured. Yet in the 
 
IS 8 
 
 IONE, 
 
 midst of all this exaltation she was vaguely conscious of a certain 
 formless want for which she could not have found a name had she 
 tried — that kind of dim consciousness which feels hut does not 
 apprehend. 
 
 While she was still standing there before the glass, a ring at the 
 door-bell startled her from her reverie, and she heard a lady’s 
 voice asking if she were at home. In another moment the servant 
 opened the door of the sitting-room and ushered in Miss Barrington 
 — pale, quiet, heart- sick, but not terrified by what was before 
 her. 
 
 This visit to Armine St. Claire’s wife was an ordeal which 
 Monica would willingly have avoided had she been able. But it 
 had to be gone through, cost what it might : and she thought that 
 the sooner it was undertaken the sooner its terrors would be over. 
 Taking her mother’s card, she drove into Oakhurst to pay this 
 dreaded visit alone ; thinking it safer to meet Armine and his wife 
 without witnesses who might read in her face the shadows of 
 thoughts she could not wholly banish, than to go with Theodosia, 
 say, and subject herself to dangerous diagnosis at the time and 
 moral vivisection ever after. She had confidence in herself and 
 her power of bearing pain without wincing. If those intrusive 
 thoughts were not wholly banished they were held in strict sub- 
 jection — if all human weakness was not destroyed it -was reasoned 
 down as rigorously as if she, who had loved and might never 
 know, had been a nun whose clearest glimpse of the world had 
 been on the day of her profession. She had made it clear to her 
 intelligence that everything was better as it was ; that Armine 
 unmarried would have been sometimes a danger and always a 
 pain ; but married, and taken out of the category of possibilities, 
 he was in a sense sacred — and pain would therefore be a sin. Yes, 
 in the presence of his wife, she would lay her hand in his, hear his 
 voice, look into his eyes, and banish from her for ever all regret, 
 all disappointment, all remembrance of what had been, or, had fate 
 been kinder, what might have been. 
 
 Yet, for all her calm, clear reasoning and brave decision, she 
 was as pale as somethmg dead or dying when she entered the 
 room and stood there face to face with Armine's wife — the woman 
 for whom he had dispossessed her in his heart and for whose love 
 he had forgotten her own. 
 
 Pallor is not an accusing witness of much account, and even 
 the unsleeping suspicion of lone’s jealousy found nothing dis- 
 turbing in this new visitor’s gentle face with its patient melancholy 
 and dreamy abstraction, its beauty of expression rather than of 
 feature or of colouring. She only thought her sw^eet and quite 
 uninteresting — well-bred and by no means fascinating on the one 
 side nor dangerous on the other. To her she was just the Monica 
 Barrington she was to every one else ; good and sweet and gentle, 
 
THE OAKHURST BRIDE . 
 
 189 
 
 but incapable of a heart-throb beyond that which is allowed by 
 the strictest propriety — for fear say, or the vague wrongs of distant 
 peoples — in no wise capable of a heart-throb for love of a man not 
 socially her equal, and now the husband of another woman ! And 
 when Miss Barrington shook hands with the young bride kindly, 
 welcomed her to Oakhurst frankly, and asked after her husband 
 as if nothing lay behind her words and Armine St. Claire had 
 never been the realisation of her ideal, lone neither saw the 
 shadow nor heard the echo of the past whereby, unknown to 
 herself, her whole presence was influenced ; but received and 
 returned Monica Barrington’s greetings with no more distrust of 
 hidden love than she had of future sorrow. 
 
 4 You have been here too short a time to be able to say that 
 you like Oakhurst,’ said Monica, after the first courtesies had been 
 exchanged. 4 But I hope that you are not disappointed with it so 
 far, and that you think it pretty P ’ 
 
 She said this with a curious mixture of advocacy and apology ; 
 fogland being so far behind that beautiful sunland whence this 
 rare creature had come ; but the brave old home having its own 
 claims nevertheless. 
 
 4 It is beautiful ! ’ said lone enthusiastically. 
 
 4 Yet after your lovely Sicily our climate must seem very bad, 
 and our sun very dim,’ said Monica. 
 
 4 Have you ever been to Sicily ? ’ asked lone, a little sharply. 
 
 4 No, never,’ said Monica. 
 
 4 What has my husband been saying about it ? ’ she asked 
 again. 4 Did he write to you, or have you seen him since he came 
 home ? ’ 
 
 4 Neither.’ answered Monica, a look of surprise mingled with 
 fear — what did lone suspect? — for a moment troubling her mild 
 eyes. 
 
 4 1 hate Sicily ! ’ then said lone, speaking with a certain 
 mixture of passion and contempt — a certain accent of resentment 
 that again startled Monica with the sense of secret pitfalls. 
 
 4 1 have always understood that it was so beautiful,’ she 
 returned, not knowing what else to say. 
 
 4 People pretend that they think so, but it is not,’ said lone. 
 4 1 should like you to be there when the scirocco blows ! I never 
 saw any beauty in it, and always wanted to be in England.’ 
 
 4 And now you have your wish,’ said Monica. 
 
 4 Yes ! ’ said lone, a smile coming like light into her face as her 
 thoughts left the turbulent grief of the past and came back to the 
 dear delight of the present. 
 
 4 And are not disappointed : —that is nice,’ said Monica. 
 
 lone touched the locket on her bosom. It contained one of 
 Armine’s raven curls. 
 
 No,’ she said, with the same deep-hearted smile that had 
 
190 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 been on her face once before to-day. * I am too happy to be 
 disappointed/ 
 
 ‘ I am glad/ said Monica, in a low voice. 
 
 L My husband is so good ! No one knows how good he is but 
 me ! ’ said lone. Then she added proudly : ‘ I like to think I am 
 the only one who knows/ 
 
 ‘ He was liked here/ said Monica with some difficulty. 
 
 ( Oh, you could not love him as he deserves ! You did not 
 know him as I do ! ’ returned lone. ‘ And he does not seem to 
 have any real friends here/ she added with her well-known re- 
 sentful accent. 
 
 ‘ I should have thought he had a great many/ said Monica, 
 playing nervously with the tassel of her parasol. 
 
 ‘ When you let him get in such a frightful state of health ! ’ 
 was lone’s reproachful rejoinder. 
 
 1 1 hope he is better/ said Monica. 
 
 The talk was very painful to her, and yet it seemed impossible 
 to change the current of conversation. 
 
 ‘ Oh, he is quite another thing ! People are always well when 
 they are happy/ said lone with a proud kind of laugh. 
 
 ‘ He looks stronger/ said Monica. 
 
 • When did you see him P ’ asked lone with one of her sudden 
 full-front stares. 
 
 ‘ At church/ replied Monica. 
 
 ( Oh yes, of course ! 1 said lone. ( You looked at him then ; 
 and you think he looks stronger P I am glad ! Yes, indeed he 
 is ! You should have seen the wreck lie was when he came to 
 Palermo ; but we took such good care of him from the first that 
 we soon got him well. He is quite a giant now, compared to 
 what he was ! My poor dear, beautiful Armine ! He always used 
 to remind me of a saint, or something like that, when he was so 
 thin and pale ; but he never lost his beauty even when he was at 
 the worst/ 
 
 6 He is very good-looking/ said Monica mechanically. 
 
 She wished that lone would not discuss her husband in this 
 intimate manner. And indeed for one so jealous it might seem 
 strange that she should. But, coincident with this jealousy was 
 her pride in her possession and a certain almost fierce desire to 
 parade her power and prove to the world the arbitrariness of her 
 holding. 
 
 ‘ How dreadfully ill he was ! ’ continued lone. ‘ Y 7 ou had 
 almost killed him among you/ 
 
 ‘ He was sadly broken down before he left,’ said Monica. 
 
 ‘ But you cannot imagine how soon he recovered in Palermo/ 
 lone returned, still harping on that jarring string. 6 He seetned 
 to get well directly after we knew him. And we saw so much of 
 him that we could judge/ 
 
THE OAKHURST BRIDE. 
 
 191 
 
 ‘You saw so much of him?’ repeated Monica, almost like 
 an echo. 
 
 ‘ Yes, from the first,’ said lone. 1 He took to us, and we to him, 
 from the very first. It was all at first sight,’ she added, again that 
 strange proud smile coming like so much physical light into her face. 
 
 Monica’s tender mouth trembled for j ust a moment ; yet she 
 smiled too, despite that sensitive quiver, and looked into lone’s 
 face as if sympathizing with her retrospect of blissful love. 
 
 ‘ Those things always are,’ she said vaguely. 
 
 And lone answered, ‘ Yes ; always,’ as if her words, like 
 Monica’s, were both explanatory and intelligible. 
 
 6 1 hope your father and mother will like your new home,’ then 
 said Monica, as unsuspicious of a stab as lone had been of torture. 
 
 The young bride’s face changed. 
 
 ‘ I do not expect them,’ she said haughtily. 
 
 ‘ No ? not yet p I hear from Edward Form by that Captain 
 Stewart is said to be a very charming man,’ said Monica, glad to 
 make a diversion from Armine. 
 
 ‘ Who is this Mr. Formby ? ’ asked lone, on her side glad to 
 make a diversion from her adopted parents. 
 
 6 Who is he P — Edward Formby of Hillside, a good, dear 
 fellow — a great friend of my brother’s and a good friend to every 
 one. He is nothing else that I can say ; just Edward Formby of 
 Hillside,’ was Monica’s not too lucid reply. 
 
 ‘ He seems rather nice, and such a thorough Englishman ! 7 
 said lone with a little laugh. ‘ It is not the kind we caricature 
 in Italy ; but he is such an Englishman of one kind ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Ho you know him ? ’ asked Monica, in her turn surprised. 
 
 This was only Tuesday. If Edward Formby had already 
 called — the very day after that first public appearance at church — 
 it was showing a zeal for the young couple almost beyond his 
 promise — almost beyond what was necessary. 
 
 6 Yes, he called here yesterday,’ said lone. ‘ And he likes my 
 husband so much that of course I like him. But I did not know 
 more about him than his name and where he lives. And you 
 have told me no more. Armine has not talked to me of the people 
 here. He says they are not interesting.’ 
 
 ‘ I am afraid we are not very,’ said Monica, with a sad kind of 
 patience. 
 
 She remembered when Theodosia had said the same thing. 
 She had not believed her then. Somehow she did believe lone. 
 But what would have wounded her then, if true, seemed now the 
 right thing to have been said. 
 
 ‘ I made him tell me of one or two I noticed at church/ 
 continued lone. 6 You were one,’ shortly ; 1 and that dark, sliArp- 
 faced, little woman, your sister-in-law I think — she was one. She 
 is so like a pretty rat ! But I had not noticed this Mr. Formby.’ 
 
192 
 
 IONE . 
 
 1 It is difficult to understand all about a new place at first/ said 
 Monica, finding it difficult for her own part to realise that Armine 
 had discussed her with his wife. 6 You will soon however grow 
 into it, for the society here is not large. What a nice piece of 
 "ground you have for a garden ! ’ she broke off suddenly, looking at 
 the neglected tract which grew more weeds than flowers and more 
 daisies and dandelions than the turf proper for an English lawn. 
 4 Do you like gardening, Mrs. St. Claire ? ’ she added, to take the 
 conversation away from people, bristling as it was there with diffi- 
 culties, and throw it on innocuous things. 
 
 ‘ I like flowers, but what should I know of gardening P ’ said 
 lone, in a somewhat offended tone. 
 
 Did this pale-faced girl think she had been used to dig and 
 weed and water like papa’s barefooted workman ? 
 
 ‘ I am very fond of gardening/ said Monica simply. ( I like 
 to see my own seeds come up, and the things that I have planted 
 grow and blossom. I feel as if they were part of myself, when I 
 have planted and taken care of them. Do not you ? ’ 
 
 ‘I have never tried/ said lone coldly. 
 
 ‘No ? what a pity ! You have really lost a pleasure ! ’ said 
 Monica with a sweet smile, seeing the feeling behind the manner. 
 6 I have always had my own garden, ever since I was a child,’ she 
 went on to say, thinking to calm this sensitive pride by the com- 
 parison. ‘ At the Manor, and now at the Dower House, I have 
 my own domain where I may do as I like — grow my favourite 
 flowers, and pick them as I choose, without the interference of 
 that dreadful tyrant, Mawe/ she added with another smile. 
 
 ‘ Who is Mawe ? ’ asked lone, a little unpleasantly. 
 
 6 Our head gardener/ returned Monica ; 6 who calls everything 
 his and treats us as interlopers who have no business to interfere 
 when we ask for flowers, or remonstrate with him about the fruit 
 and vegetables/ 
 
 6 He is quite right/ said lone, still unpleasantly. ‘ In Sicily we 
 leave all things of this kind to men ; and though we pick what we 
 like, without leave of course, we do not do the work of servants 
 ourselves.’ 
 
 ‘ We do not call such light work as we can do, servants’ work/ 
 said Monica very gently. 6 You see, English girls are so much 
 more active in their habits than Continental ones. We live so 
 much more out of doors, and use our strength more freely.’ 
 
 4 Still, I should not like to do a man’s work or to make myself 
 a servant/ said lone, sticking to her text, and forgetting all that 
 she had promised both herself and Armine before marriage. 1 And 
 there are so few flowers here/ she continued. ‘There is no 
 bougainvillea, no datura, no acacia, nothing that we have in 
 Sicily ; and the roses are so poor, and the geranium bushes such 
 poor little scrappy things ! I do not look at that place out there 
 
THE OAK HURST BRIDE. 
 
 193 
 
 as a garden at all. It is like the fields round the Favorita \ and 
 not half so pretty as these when the pheasant’s-eyes are out.’ 
 
 ‘There will be more flowers as summer comes on/ said 
 Monica. ‘ It is rather too early yet for full bloom. But when 
 your man has weeded your garden, it will look much better ; and 
 if he will come up to the Dower House I will tell Mawe to let 
 him have some cuttings and bedding-out plants which will furnish 
 it and make it gay.’ 
 
 ‘ I am quite content with it now/ said lone proudly. 6 It is 
 Armines, and I prefer it as it is.’ 
 
 t As you will/ said Monica, a spasm almost like faintness 
 gripping at her heart. 
 
 After this the talk wandered over a few more subjects, to be 
 always dragged round by lone to Armine — ever Armine — the 
 central point of her thoughts, the master-key of her interests. 
 She was not in general a confidential or expansive person ; but a 
 very demon of girlish garrulity seemed to have possessed her to- 
 day ; and, after she had borne as much as she well could, Monica 
 got up and drove away, leaning back in her carriage pale, weary, 
 and with the feeling of having been bruised and beaten all over. 
 
 * She had given her all to this man — her secret soul, her hidden 
 love, her unspoken faith, her unavowed constancy, her wholo 
 power of idealisation and belief in his matchless worth. And 
 from the first moment of his seeing another he had forgotten her 
 and loved that other ! It was a heart-break ; not for herself, to 
 whom he had been ever impossible, but for him — in that he had 
 proved himself so unworthy of her former secret reverence. 
 Nevertheless she would stand his friend as heretofore ; and she 
 would be his young wife’s defender. And as things were in 
 Oakhurst she knew that she had her work cut out ior her, and 
 that her self-imposed task would not be light. 
 
 She was right. The pronounced difference in manner and 
 appearance, in tone of thought and rule of living, between lone and 
 the Oakhurst world, was set down in the score against the young 
 wife as a sin which called for reprobation ; and she had to sufler 
 in general esteem because her hair was shorter and curlier than 
 that of her neighbours j because her manner was stiller on the one 
 hand if, on Ihe other, she used certain little gestures to which 
 English people are unaccustomed — as when she turned up her chin 
 and struck her tongue against her teeth for a negative — shook her 
 forefinger slowly before her face to enforce disapprobation or 
 express earnestness — shrugged her shoulders for disdain, or said 
 Altro for emphasis of assent ; because her eyes were yellow-hazel 
 in some light, green in others, and inexplicable always ; because 
 her nostrils were large, thin, transparent, and never still ; because 
 her face was not modelled after the ordinary English type, 
 and her beauty, which was undeniable, was therefore odd and 
 
194 
 
 IONE. 
 
 displeasing; "because her speech was coloured with the faintest little 
 accent of an indefinite hind — a certain caressing lingering on the 
 letters, which Edward Formby thought the most charming thing 
 in the world and every one else the most affected. All these 
 differences were commented on and condemned whenever two or 
 three were gathered together to discuss the new bride and 
 formulate their causes of disapproval. 
 
 And they were always meeting and discussing and formulating. 
 Nothing was talked of in the place but young Mrs. St. Claire and 
 her queer household management ; the hours at which she got up 
 and those at which she went to bed ; her dresses and her dinners ; 
 her ignorance of money and the questionable mistakes she made in 
 adding up, always taking the shilling at tenpence and thus getting 
 into endless trouble with the tradespeople, whom she angered by 
 her inability to understand their explanations. Her ignorance also, 
 of how things ought to be done, and of how economies might be 
 made, was another fruitful topic among the housewives. In fact, the 
 mess that she made of it altogether, and the unsatisfactory nature 
 of her whole individuality, were the standing texts for local discus- 
 sion and the carpet which every one helped to brush. Oakhurst 
 had not had such a dish of gossip for many a long day ; and ;t is 
 only doing Oakhurst justice to say that it made the best of its fare. 
 
 Meanwhile, the subject of all this uncharitable talk, safely 
 chambered in the fool’s paradise of her own creation, lived in those 
 radiant dreams where we find so much happiness while they last, 
 and before that inevitable dissipation into nothingness comes. She 
 neither heard nor heeded the bitter voices following her feet. 
 "Was she not Armine’s beloved P What then to her was all the 
 world standing without the Golden Gate ? Just what to you is 
 the barking of the cur in the far distance — just that, and no more ! 
 
 And as one expression of her content she intended to make 
 herself English all through, and to be what she had promised — a 
 help to Armine. She had even come to the humiliating grace, or 
 servanthood, as she still thought it, and played at good house- 
 keeping as the fine ladies of the French court once played at 
 bucolic and shepherding. She put on a big apron and did a little 
 dusting in the drawing-room ; and she put on a pair of Armine’s 
 gloves and tried her hand at gardening. But she broke one or tw- o 
 things on the chimney-piece, and she rooted out the seedling 
 annuals in the borders ; so that on the whole her activities were 
 rather more damaging than profitable in the general account. 
 
 What was more to her taste, as well as more within the circle 
 of her possibilities, was the Englishhood of long walks in the lanes 
 and fields; whence she returned with a clear skin, the sense of 
 blood set flowing freely through her veins, and her hands full of 
 wild flowers, which made her lock like some semi-divine Pagan 
 nymph laden with the offerings of her worshippers. 
 
THE OAKHURST BRIDE . 
 
 195 
 
 And to be able to ramble about with more complete satis- 
 faction in her nationality, she bought an expensive walking- 
 costume to save her shabby gowns, and a pretty little jaunty 
 ‘ toque ’ to save her still shabbier hats. 
 
 She had to submit to a bad quarter of an hour when she told 
 her husband what she had done, and called on him to admire 
 and approve : while he, very kindly but quite plainly, told her 
 that, although he admired beyond measure, he could not approve 
 even in the least. She must make no more such purchases for 
 the future, he said quietly ; his slender finances would not bear 
 even so small an extra strain as this. 
 
 ‘ Am I never to have a new dress, Armine ? ’ said lone, her 
 head erect. 6 Other girls marry with a trousseau ; I had nothing. 
 You cannot be so poor as not to be able to afford me a simple 
 little costume like this ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Unfortunately I am, dear/ he answered. ‘ You should have 
 everything you wished if I could afford it.’ 
 
 ‘ Oh, you can! ’ she said positively. ‘ And if you cannot I will 
 save it out of the housekeeping.’ 
 
 ( Yes P ’ said Armine, with a half-sad, half-incredulous smile ; 
 for that housekeeping was already a tangled bit of thorny ground 
 between them. 
 
 The weekly bills were far in excess of the weekly earnings, but 
 lone professed herself unable to curtail them below their present 
 average ; and the theory that what keeps one will keep two was 
 on all fours with that of her help in practical management, where- 
 by she broke the chimney ornaments and rooted out the seedling- 
 annuals. 
 
 But in spite of this outbreak of extravagance in the matter of 
 the walking-dress, and for all that her endeavours after notable 
 servanthood were defective, lone did faithfully desire to do her 
 duty, and to be a help as well as a pleasure to Armine. How 
 indeed should she not, loving him as she did, and when she herself 
 — as she was so sure ! — was the one sole-beloved of his past as the 
 one sole-adored of his present. 
 
 The one sole-adored of his present ; true ; true as the life that 
 throbs on the earth and shouts up to heaven in the sea — true as 
 eternity — true as the divine. And yet, even to her, so certain as 
 she was — and contented ascertain — he sometimes seemed curiously 
 preoccupied, nay almost cold, for a man whose love was so 
 passionate as, in her faith and fancy, was his. Had not her eyes 
 been so full of the effulgence of her own passion she would have 
 seen that she did not possess his. But she put down these 
 moments of voiceless discomfort to the score of his regret that she 
 was poorer than his love for her would have had her. And in 
 this belief she not only forgave what at times looked almost like 
 thinly veiled irritation, and at times was only somewhat frozen 
 
 0 2 
 
IONE . 
 
 196 
 
 coldness, but even carried it to the account of his love and paid 
 interest on it by increased idolatry. 
 
 How madly she loved him, and with what reckless prodigality 
 she showered that love for ever and for ever over him ! If only she 
 would become the wife and sink the mistress ! thought Armine, 
 when she proffered him those wild caresses which he had to return 
 as best he might, though in truth he shrank from them as from the 
 touch of hot iron. The imperiousness, too, lying underneath even 
 her love, galled him. She treated him too much as her possession, 
 and held him as a child holds a bird, which for very delight she 
 half-throttles and wholly tortures. When, in the evening, she 
 made him seat himself on a lower chair by her side, while she 
 passed her arm round his neck and held his head against her heart, 
 kissing his forehead, his eyes, his coal-black curls as if her lips 
 would never be weary of their worship, her eyes adoring him as if 
 he had been a delicate kind of Apollo whose godhead was un- 
 questionable, though his health was decidedly not Olympian — 
 though, of course, as he said to himself, he was grateful for her 
 love, as indeed what man would not be P — he was yet conscious 
 that he only longed to free himself from her and to shake off, if 
 he could for ever, the caressing grasp of that burning, beautiful, 
 but not delightful hand. His thoughts were with his patients, if 
 he had self-control ; if he had not, then they were with that inner 
 self which stood between Monica and Sorrow — that mournful 
 Triad which was his real life. In any case they were not with 
 lone save when she compelled him to speak to her — she speaking 
 to him with that sweet passion in her voice which means even more 
 than a caress — that sweet passion which he could only answer back 
 with an effort ! When she kept him in the morning, as he was 
 starting on his first rounds, while she intoned her unechoed psalm 
 of love, it needed some forbearance not to unclasp her hands — not 
 to put aside those strong, young clinging arms — not to say to her 
 with cruel wisdom that life is too prosaic for these perpetual 
 wanderings into enchanted woods, and that he must go on his 
 millhorse way to make bread for the day’s needs. If only she 
 would leave off this embarrassing worship, this unceasing devotion, 
 and fall into the quietude of wifely companionship and domestic 
 monotony ! If only she would ! It was so hard to pass a lifetime 
 in feigning — never to have a moment’s respite from these fervent 
 demonstrations, which he could meet only by lies ! — it was so 
 maddening to receive so much and to give back nothing ! The 
 temporary enchantment of that fatal moment beneath the carruba- 
 tree had long since past ; the flush of a man’s natural pride for a 
 woman’s almost unsought love — of gratitude for her coming to him 
 as lone had come — had also died away ; and nothing now remained 
 but the chill of the collapse and the bitterness of the truth. 
 
 Of all miserable husbands in England Armine St. Claire was 
 
THE OAKHURST BRIDE. 
 
 197 
 
 at this time the most miserable; but, true to the gentle con- 
 scientiousness of his character, he did his best to hide his self- 
 inflicted misery from the wife whose only fault towards him was 
 the exuberance of her love, and to keep the golden gate of that 
 fool's paradise fast closed. He had an uneasy kind of feeling that 
 things were insecure in more directions than one, and a presenti- 
 ment that the future would see a whole brood of cockatrices 
 hatched about their feet. Meanwhile he was considerate, sell- 
 restrained, patient, doing his best to forget the past and to keep 
 his face turned bravely to the present — and the future. And as he 
 was circumspect to prudery, and kept his eyes in leash and his 
 tongue in check, lone’s unsleeping jealousy found no weak place 
 on which to fasten ; and thus far things were peaceful between 
 them. * 
 
 So there the two stood — lone believing herself to be absolutely 
 and supremely beloved by Armine, and showing him her own love 
 as if there could be no mistake in the answer ; and Armine doing 
 his best to leave her that belief undisturbed — the one self-deceived 
 and torturing, the other honourably deceiving and self-tortured. 
 
 Out of doors things looked rather doubtful. The second set 
 were not sympathetic ; and only Monica spoke of the Oakhurst 
 bride with an admiring friendliness of tone which many heard with 
 surprise, in view of that difference of position so patent, so pro- 
 nounced, and which betrayed to no one the fact that a heart-throb 
 had ever been between her and Armine. Only Theodosia suspected 
 that beneath this smooth outside lay a hidden world of regrets ; 
 •and that what looked so like the interest of personal indifference 
 was in reality the policy of resignation. Her sharp little head full 
 of its busy thoughts, she watched and waited. Her own engou- 
 ment for St. Claire having passed, she was terribly bitter to him, 
 as is the way with great ladies who have condescended and not 
 been caught, beckoned and not been answered. She said he had 
 shown bad taste and ingratitude in bringing home an Anglo- 
 Siciliari wife. Why bad taste, why ingratitude, it would have 
 been hard for her to have explained. She was never good at close 
 reasoning ; and though she spoke ill of Armine as if she really 
 had some foothold for her spring, she could never go to the root 
 of things, nor reveal the true shape of the Causa causans. She 
 only called him conceited and lone detestable ; and when Mrs. 
 Barrington asked Why P she merely tossed up her small sharp chin, 
 and answered shrilly, ‘ Never mind why ! He is conceited, mamma ; 
 and she is detestable ; ’ and there let the matter lie. 
 
 She apd Anthony held themselves aloof from the young people 
 after the first formai leaving of cards. And they were induced to 
 do this little act of courtesy only by the earnest advocacy of 
 Edward Formby, the quiet pleading of Monica, and Mrs. Barring- 
 ton's graver desire. Had it not been for this pressure from 
 
IONE. 
 
 198 
 
 without they would have ignored the St. Claires’ existence ; and 
 in the exalted social status of the Barrington family no one would 
 have wondered at the omission. 
 
 Edward Formby stood with Monica and Mrs. Barrington ; but 
 Miss Maria Crosby joined hands with Mrs. Anthony, and found no 
 more good in either husband or wife than the Jerusalemites 
 found in the Nazarenes. She too held that Armine St. Claire had 
 been strangely wanting in duty to the neighbourhood by this 
 hasty marriage with a foreigner ; and in consequence she withdrew 
 her patronage and made shift to exist without that daily medical 
 attendance which she had found so vitally necessary in times past. 
 She had been so long under medical treatment, she said, when she 
 spohe of this withdrawal, she was almost a doctor herself by now, 
 and could get along quite as well without such a young and 
 inexperienced man as that St. Claire as with him. She had always 
 thought him too young, she added plaintively; saying this even to 
 Jane Winter. 
 
 But Jane, who never let things pass in silence when she 
 thought they ought to be thrashed out in words, said sharply : 
 
 ‘ La, Maria, that does go beyond me ! You who stood out 
 that he was just a miracle and had not a fault to his name — that, 
 young or not young, he was simply perfection — to go back on your 
 word like this and pretend that you thought him this, that, and 
 the other all along — no, that is what I cannot put up with ! What 
 do you say, Rachel ? ’ 
 
 6 1 think Aunt Maria forgets,’ said Rachel. 
 
 ‘ Then your aunt Maria does not forget,’ retorted the invalid. 
 ( And your aunt Maria knows quite as well as other people what 
 she thinks and says. The young man was all very well at the first, 
 but he got conceited and stuck up ; and this wicked marriage just 
 shows what he is made of.’ 
 
 ‘ La, Maria, why is it wicked P ’ asked Jane, with a wink to her 
 friend Rachel. 
 
 6 Because I did not take against him from the very first, as you 
 all did,’ continued Maria, not noticing the question ; i because I 
 gave him a chance to show himself, you make out that I am a 
 turncoat. I am no more a turncoat than any one else ; and so I 
 tell you ! ’ she added with an hysterical sob. 
 
 6 La, Maria, how can you go off about such a trifle as this ? ’ 
 said Jane disdainfully. ‘ I never did see such a crying girl as you 
 are. Anything will set you off ! What does it signify to any of 
 us what the young man and his wife are like ? We do not live in 
 their pockets ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Then don’t reproach me with being a turncoat ! ’ said Maria 
 with tearful anger. 
 
 4 Who did, I should like to know ? ’ said Jane. 
 
 ‘ Both of you ! ’ said Maria. 
 
THE OAKHURST BRIDE . 
 
 199 
 
 Jane Winter and Rachel Major looked at each other, and Jane 
 sniffed, while Rachel said mildly: 
 
 * La, Aunt Maria, how you do go on to he sure ! ’ And Aunt 
 Maria, who had whimpered as the prelude, now wept as the finale, 
 of this oft-enacted scene of familiar discord. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 PACE TO PACE. 
 
 It had to come. Put off for a time hy this good chance and that, 
 it yet was in the order of fated things that Armine and Monica 
 should meet each other alone, when no third person was by to 
 enforce reserve by the fear of self-betrayal and to make restraint 
 the safeguard against detection. Each dreaded the meeting, and 
 both tried to avoid it ; but in spite of their endeavours it came 
 upon them unawares, and in a manner which they were helpless 
 to prevent. 
 
 The lodge-keeper, who was also the head gardener, at the 
 Dower House — that tyrant Mawe, who called the garden his, and 
 forbade the ladies to think it theirs — had rheumatic fever, and Dr. 
 St. Claire was of course in attendance. He had been there once 
 or twice without seeing any one from the House, when one day 
 going at an unexpected hour he fell on Monica passing in at the 
 gate just as he was leaving the Lodge. So now the thing had 
 come upon them, and escape was impossible. 
 
 Blanched cheeks and ashen lips ; his voice roughened and hers 
 difficult to manage ; their eyes not frankly meeting but glancing 
 evasively — away into space, down on the ground, up to the sky, 
 at the shoulder, the forehead, the throat — anywhere but into each 
 other ; the sense of shame and dishonour on his part — of dis- 
 appointment in her ideal, but of divine pity and tender forgiveness 
 on hers : these were the signs and emotions of that first meeting, 
 face to face, of those who had loved without hope, but with the 
 unspoken promise of fidelity to that dream which could never be 
 translated into living happiness. 
 
 Coming together as they did, they were obliged to speak so 
 that Mrs. Mawe, standing there with the gate in her hand, should 
 not see in them any shyness or reluctance which might set her 
 thinking. It was painful and embarrassing enough ; but when 
 the woman, called querulously by her husband, had run into the 
 lodge, and they were free from the control of her presence, some 
 strange kind of strength seemed to come into Monica, so that she 
 shook off her nervousness as she would have shaken off untimely 
 sleep, and was once more natural, unaffected, and herself. 
 
 She had to be strong enough for both ; for his agitation in- 
 
200 
 
 TONE . 
 
 creased as hers passed ; and the more power over herself she 
 gained, the less he seemed able to command. 
 
 They had exchanged those trivialities about the weather which 
 are the refuge of the conversationally stranded, when Monica 
 suddenly said, as if touching the secret sore boldly : 
 
 ‘ I hope Mrs, St. Claire does not find the cli’ ' o very bad here 
 in England P ’ 
 
 Armine felt as if she had struck him in the face ; but he 
 answered as well as he was able — doing his best to appear as if 
 his wife’s name in Monica’s mouth was a mere nothing : 
 
 ‘ She seems pleased with everything English — even w r ith the 
 climate.’ 
 
 ‘ Yet it must be so different from that of Sicily,’ said Monica. 
 
 She intended to talk of lone till she had worn down all 
 embarrassment and talked the subject into familiarity. 
 
 ‘ Yes, it is,’ said Armine. 
 
 ‘ The summer here is not much better than the wfinter there : — 
 is it not so ? ’ continued Monica. 1 Your wife must feel this to be 
 almost winter.’ 
 
 ‘ It is a magnificent climate — almost perfect,’ said A rmine. 
 
 ‘ How you must have enjoyed it ! ’ said Monica, with a rather 
 forced accent of lightness and sympathetic pleasure. ‘ But poor 
 Mrs. St. Claire ! She must feel the change. 5 
 
 6 Novelty is always amusing,’ was the Vague and safe reply. 
 
 1 1 hope it will not be only novelty with her,’ persisted Monica. 
 ‘ I hope she will be as happy as she is now, even when the first 
 freshness has worn off and she has grown accustomed to every- 
 thing.’ 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ said Armine. 
 
 lie could scarcely say less. 
 
 ‘ She seems so delighted with everything, it is quite refreshing 
 to see her ! ’ continued Monica. 
 
 ‘ She ought to be a little happy now — she w r as unhappy enough 
 at her own home,’ said Armine hastily. 
 
 Loyal to lone as he intended ever to be, he yet wished to make 
 Monica understand how much pity had had to do with his 
 marriage. Perhaps she would see that, if he dwelt on lone’s- 
 domestic misery at Palermo. 
 
 ‘ I am sorry to hear that,’ she said. Then she looked into 
 Armine's face, bravely, straightly, steadfastly. ‘But now all that 
 has passed away,’ she said : ‘ and I am very, very glad that both 
 you and she are so happy ! ’ 
 
 It was in his impulse to cry out against this congratulation— 
 to say to her as she stood there, before him, so strenuously 
 renouncing the past and denying the truth of things : ‘ I am the 
 most miserable wretch that lives. I love you, and I do not love 
 her — and my heart is breaking for you and not gladdened by her.* 
 
FACE TO FACE. 
 
 201 
 
 But honour to the woman whom he had married, respect for the 
 woman whom he loved, and the manliness which accepts the 
 consequences of one’s own actions, let them he what they will, all 
 held him hack, and with an effort he said huskily, ‘ Thank you ! * 
 no more. He accepted her sympathy with his happiness because 
 of his union with lone ; and so let it pass as fact and sincerity. 
 
 It was the same kind of day, with its pale yellow sunlight and 
 subdued colouring, as that on which they had met and parted, 
 mutely confessed and dumbly renounced, in this garden less than 
 a year ago — less than a year ago, counting by months and days, 
 but what an eternity, judging by events and feelings ! The 
 outward circumstances of the place were the same now as then* 
 The fountain still flung up its 4 loosening silver ’ in the sunlight, 
 the flower-scents perfumed the air, the peacocks screamed on the 
 walks ; the dark yew-trees grew in their formal close-set alleys — 
 all was the same to sight and hearing. The only things changed 
 were themselves ; his right of aspiration, hers of denial — his 
 right of despair, hers of dreams — and the fact of lone in place of 
 the ideal of love. 
 
 No words were needed to tell how vividly each remembered 
 their last interview in the garden. It came like a picture before 
 them, like an echo, like a reflection. But Monica felt that this- 
 picture must be defaced and a new tracing made over the old lines 
 — the echo must be silenced once and for ever. There would be 
 no living else, sacrilege to love and the past as it might be. 
 But sacrilege to love is sometimes sacrifice to virtue ; and so it 
 was to-day. 
 
 1 Will you come up the steps with me and see my mother ? * 
 said Monica, standing at the wicket-gate which led to the lowest 
 terrace and the fountain facing the steps. 
 
 How gentle and yet how resolute she was! He hesitated 
 for a second before he answered. Then he said : 
 
 * Yes, I will go up with you and see Mrs. Barrington ; ’ he 
 too as desirous as she, if less resolute, to destroy the past and 
 establish the present firm and solid on the ruins. 
 
 ‘ She will be glad to see you,’ said Monica, turning into the 
 terrace, backed by its close-clipped yews and brightened by its 
 sparkling fountain. 
 
 They came to the steps and went up — each step representing 
 a feeling on which they trod — a phrase in the living page of 
 their unpublished love which both did their best to score out. 
 When they came to that where their last interview had ended, 
 he stopped for a moment. The agony which possessed him 
 held his feet so that he could not move. He felt as if his life 
 were going from him, as if he must scorn his manhood and 
 despise his honour, and burst into the passionate tears of a love- 
 lorn and broken-hearted woman. 
 
202 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 Monica, hearing the halt, turned to look at him; and thus 
 they were in the same relative positions as before — she above and 
 he below — he looking up at her and she gazing down at him. It 
 was the old time repeated in the new ; but only as a lifeless statue 
 repeats the features of the dead beloved. 
 
 When Monica looked at him, she saw that his eyes were full 
 of tears. 
 
 4 To-morrow, when you come to see poor Mawe, you must 
 bring Mrs. St. Claire with you/ she said steadily. 4 She has 
 never seen our quaint old garden, and I shall be glad to show it 
 to her. Will you bring vour wife to see me to-morrow, Dr. St. 
 Claire ? 9 
 
 Her words roused him as she intended they should. He 
 shook off the weakness that had fallen on him, as she had shaken 
 off hers, angry with himself in that he had so far failed in the 
 presence of one whose respect was the only thing now left him. 
 
 4 Thank you, yes, I will/ he said, with curiously sudden stead- 
 fastness. 
 
 4 I want her to feel at home here, and that my mother and I 
 are her friends/ said Monica. 
 
 4 How good you are ! How angelic ! ’ said Armine, almost as 
 if speaking to himself. 
 
 4 Why P ’ asked Monica, with a smile that sought to appear 
 playful, and that was so sad instead. 4 Because I want you to 
 bring your wife here to see us as often as possible, and because I 
 want to know her better ? Any one would wish that, I should 
 think — such a beautiful creature as she is !’ she added with forced 
 lightness. 
 
 4 1 am glad that you feel you shall like her/ said Armine. 
 
 4 And I hope that she will like us and feel that we are her 
 friends, both my mother and myself/ returned Monica. 
 
 4 She will need friends, poor girl ! 9 said Armine sadly. 4 The 
 whole thing is so misfitting ! 9 
 
 4 You must not think of that/ replied Monica hurriedly. 4 Oak- 
 hurst is not worthy of her, I know, but your friends must rally 
 round you and make her happy. She must not feel that anything 
 is misfitting, except the climate — and that we cannot help ! ’ she 
 added with a smile that strove hard to be playful and was as sad 
 as her former had been. 
 
 4 It has all been 9 
 
 4 A little sudden, but quite intelligible, when one has once 
 seen her/ interrupted Monica. 4 And just because it was so 
 sudden and so intelligible, we must do our best to make her feel 
 that she has come among friends, and to a true home.’ 
 
 4 Your goodness is more than I deserve,’ said Armine, his face 
 convulsed with pain. 4 1 who must seem to you so worthless ! ’ 
 
 In spite of herself the tears gathered in Monica’s eyes, but she 
 
FACE TO FACE. 
 
 20 
 
 brushed them away under cover of putting back her hair. Then 
 she turned her face steadily to the man in whom she had believed 
 — the man whom she had loved as devotees love their saint, 
 worshippers their god — the man of whose hastily married young 
 wife she was speaking as one might have spoken of a sister. 
 
 6 Why do you say that ? ’ she said. 6 Your affairs are your 
 own, not ours. If it pleased you to marry rather more suddenly 
 than is usual, that is your own matter only, and we have no right 
 even to criticise. It is morbid to call yourself worthless for that, 
 Dr. St. Claire. And that is the only fact in your marriage with 
 which any one could find fault — the only/ she repeated. But 
 though she tried, she could not look at him when she said this. 
 
 Pride, prudence, virtue, all dictated those few words as if they 
 had been a material barrier raised between her and the man she 
 had loved ; but nature and truth w r ere stronger than these others, 
 and — she could not look at him while she spoke. 
 
 1 1 understand/ said Armine in a low voice. 6 You are right/ 
 
 It was almost five o r clock, and tea w r as on the well-known tea- 
 table, in just the same place and with just the same arrangements 
 and conditions as used to be in the days that were gone — never to 
 return. Mrs. Barrington, in her old place, received her former 
 protege with her own sweet courtesy ; but yet with a certain 
 coldness instead of what had once been almost maternal kindness. 
 His marriage had distressed and annoyed her. It was so selfish, 
 so unwise ! In his state of health, and with only such an income 
 as could be got out of the Oakhurst practice, to marry this beau- 
 tiful young woman, who might have done so much better, was, 
 she thought, the very acme of manly selfishness. It was the w*ay 
 in which the world judges, and the conclusions to which it comes 
 when it reasons on appearances only without knowledge of facts. 
 
 ‘ I hope Mrs. St. Claire is well P 1 she said to her former 
 favourite, a little, very little, frostily. 
 
 ( Yes ; quite ; thank you/ he answered. 
 
 ( And happy in her new conditions ? ? 
 
 ‘ Yes/ he said again. 
 
 ‘ I am glad of that. It shows that she is adaptable/ said Mrs. 
 Barrington kindly. 6 What a remarkably pretty person she is ! 
 Pretty is scarcely the word/ she added, correcting herself. 
 6 Handsome I should rather have said/ 
 
 t You admire her? I am glad/ said Armine. 
 
 1 And you admire her too, I suppose/ said Mrs. Barrington 
 with a smile, meaning to be playful and pleasant. 
 
 He forced himself to smile too, in sympathy with her humour. 
 
 ‘ Yes, I admire her/ he answered, speaking as lightly as he could. 
 
 ‘Has she brothers and sisters? 5 asked Mrs. Barrington, who 
 wanted to hear all about the young bride, of whom no one in the 
 place knew more than the name. 
 
204 
 
 10NE. 
 
 ‘No; she has no brothers at all, only an adopted sister/ 
 answered Armine. 
 
 ‘1 suppose her parents will be coming over to see her in her 
 new home P ’ she asked again. 
 
 ‘ I scarcely think so/ was his reply. 
 
 ‘ No ? Well, it is a long way from Palermo ! ’ she said. 
 
 * Yes, a very long way/ he answered. Then, remembering 
 that Mrs. Barrington must some day learn the truth, he thought 
 it better to confess what he might in honour, and put an end so far 
 as he could to a misapprehension which hurt him and did no one 
 any good. 4 The fact is/ he said, with a certain hesitation that 
 seemed to conceal as much as it told, 1 my poor wife has neither 
 father nor mother, nor any blood relations at all. She was only 
 the adopted daughter of Captain Stewart, and neither she nor I 
 know more of her family than this — which you see is substantially 
 nothing.’ 
 
 ‘ Oh ! ’ said Mrs. Barrington, a little shocked and scandalised. 
 
 She had thought St. Claire selfish in marrying lone, when his 
 marriage seemed to have prevented the girls better chances ; now 
 she thought it wrong to himself to have taken a young woman 
 without name or family — a waif and stray thrown by the tide 
 no one knew whence nor how — a creature born of the darkness 
 and existing only by a kind of reflected light. It was scarcely 
 what was due to them. They had deserved more consideration 
 at his hands than this introduction among them of a nameless 
 and therefore doubtful young person, who might — who knows ? — 
 be one of those miserable beings who are antenatally tainted by 
 their parents’ dishonour. 
 
 4 1 know what you think/ then said Armine, watching her. 
 ‘ It was a foolish marriage for both of us. I acknowledge it. You 
 cannot feel it more than I do ; but, believe me, it was one of 
 those things for which no one is responsible. It is too long a 
 story to go into now, but I am sure you will believe me when I 
 say that I was less foolish, less blameable, than you might imagine. 
 Spare me the details, but trust my assurance. You will, will 
 you not ? ’ 
 
 He went over to her and took her hand in both of his, in the 
 old caressing and yet respectful way which had been his charm 
 in times past. His pale face and earnest eyes pleaded with her 
 for belief and generous judgment. He cared little enough for 
 what others might think, but Mrs. Barrington’s trust in him, her 
 sympathy with him, her condonation — hers, and therefore Monicas 
 — were as dear to him as life itself. In one sense indeed they 
 were his very life. 
 
 4 Yes, I will believe you/ said Mrs. Barrington after a pause, 
 and somewhat with the feeling of lowering her guard. ‘The 
 marriage, as it stands, looks worse than foolish, but I will credit 
 
FACE TO FACE. 
 
 205 
 
 you with good intentions — or at least with no unworthy ones. 
 And after all ’ — here she pressed his hand and smiled — ‘ it is not 
 my business to interfere in your affairs.’ 
 
 ‘ It is the business of a friend to be satisfied that nothing* has 
 been done to forfeit esteem/ said Armine. 
 
 6 1 am sure you have done nothing to forfeit mine/ said Mrs. 
 Barrington kindly. 
 
 6 Thank you. That is all I ask/ he returned. ( Believe only 
 that I was overtaken by circumstances which did not leave me a 
 free agent, and that I was not so mad as I seem to have been.’ 
 
 He turned to Monica as he said this, and their eyes met. He 
 had spoken for her as much as for her mother, and she had under- 
 stood him. Now she knew so much of the truth as he wished her 
 to know. It had not been the vulgar levity of a shallow nature 
 which had warped him from the higher law of barren honour and 
 fruitless faith. There was some mystery underneath, which she 
 could npt fathom, but which, if known, would exonerate him. In 
 spite of lone’s naive confession she knew that this love at first 
 sight was a myth, and that there had been no wilful departure 
 from that unspoken troth which had not made herself and Armine 
 lovers but which yet had left them bound. She was glad for the 
 sake of that ideal which is the dearest part of the beloved. It 
 was not the mere flesh and blood, the mere grace and beauty of 
 Armine, that she had loved ; but that loveliness of the soul, that 
 brightness and beauty of the divine nature, which had been the 
 very life of his humanity to her. This obscured, her love must 
 needs die out in weeping for the lost ; but while she could respect 
 and believe in him, she held the essential part — and the rest might 
 g°- 
 
 Yet how sorry she was for him, and even more sorry for lone ! 
 If that marriage had been made by circumstances and not by 
 choice, some day the poor young wife would have to suffer — some 
 day the veil would drop and she would learn the truth which was 
 evidently hidden from her now. One side of that truth, however, 
 she must never learn ; and for her own part Monica resolved 
 more firmly than ever that she would make herself lone’s friend 
 and do her best for her in Oakhurst all through. 
 
 4 You are very good to have confided so much to my mother/ 
 she said in her gentle way to St. Claire. ‘ We shall hold it sacred 
 to ourselves, of course.’ 
 
 ‘ I know that I may trust you/ said St. Claire, scarcely able 
 to speak at all. 
 
 4 Now let us forget all this and turn to something — I will not 
 say less painful, but less embarrassing/ said Mrs. Barrington. 
 ‘ Will you sing to me, Dr. St. Claire P I have heard no music 
 like yours since you left. Sing one of those dear little songs I 
 used to like so much. It will be like old times ! ’ 
 
206 
 
 IONE. 
 
 She asked this as a token of her forgiveness and his rehabilita- 
 tion ; as a sign that his old place of favourite was still warm and 
 open to him, and that the future was to be as the past had been. 
 
 He would rather she had asked him to do himself some grave 
 personal injury. 
 
 ‘ I am out of voice and out of practice,’ he said, turning pale. 
 
 But Mrs. Barrington’s dim vision failed to note his change of 
 colour, and his voice did not betray all the reluctance that he 
 felt. 
 
 6 1 will forgive your want of voice,’ she said, smiling very 
 sweetly. 6 It is good enough to be able to lose something and yet 
 retain more than others have.’ 
 
 ‘ You are very good,’ he answered ; but he did not move. 
 
 ‘ I think the piano is in tune,’ said Monica, going to it and 
 striking a few chords as she stood over the keys. 
 
 He obeyed the request conveyed in the action and sat down in 
 the old place, where he had so often sung his love to Monica and 
 breathed in hers as the echo. Now he had only a threnody to 
 give, and a requiem to receive. 
 
 After a few preliminary notes he sang, to a new arrangement, 
 Shelley s mournful poem, i When the lamp is shattered/ and with 
 difficulty finished it creditably and without a self-confessed break- 
 down. Monica too had need of all her philosophy ; but the 
 horror that lies in a good girl’s heart at the thought of conscious 
 love for another woman’s husband helped her so far that she was 
 able to say with quiet composure : ‘ What a pretty arrangement ! 
 Whose is it P ’ as if the mechanical run of the notes and how the 
 sharps and flats fell had been of more account than the feeling and 
 the words. 
 
 ‘It is my own,’ he said, rising from the piano. 
 
 ‘ How very pretty it is! — how very sweet! ’ said Mrs. Barring- 
 ton. ‘ Where did you compose it P ’ 
 
 ‘ At Palermo,’ he said, not looking at Monica. 
 
 c And after you knew and loved your pretty wife you should 
 have taken that other — that Indian song — and have put to music 
 the “ spirit in your feet ” which led you to her window,’ said 
 Monica in rather a hurried manner. 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ he said, accepting the reproof. ‘ I ought, but I did 
 not.’ 
 
 ‘ It would please her if you did,’ said Monica steadily. 
 
 ‘ I am afraid I have no time now,’ answered St. Claire, pained 
 in spite of himself and his better reason. 
 
 But after all she was right. What was his duty now but to 
 please lone ? She was his wife ; he had undertaken obligations 
 towards her; and Monica was but a shadow and a dream — nothing 
 more substantial than a photograph nor more tangible than a 
 rainbow ! Yes, she was right. He had lost the right to love her, 
 
FACE TO FACE. 
 
 C07 
 
 but he still retained that of desiring her respect, her trust, her 
 confidence. He would prove himself worthy to possess the sole 
 treasures left him. He would devote himself to ensuring Iones 
 happiness. That was the only thing for an honest man to do. 
 The duty was clear enough to his perceptions : a duty constructed 
 solid and four-square by his intellect. Nevertheless the means 
 seemed to him doubtful, oppressed as he was by his wife’s wild 
 love and broken-hearted for want of Monica’s — unable to return 
 the one and forbidden all hope of the other — like a man dying 
 for fresh air to whom is given the stifling heat of a stove-house 
 instead. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 IT* THE WOOD. 
 
 The jaunty little toque and fashionable walking-costume had not 
 been bought for the mere pleasure of keeping them locked up in 
 the wardrobe. Determined to be English all through, lone, as 
 has been said, indolent in Palermo, was energetic at Oakhurst and 
 spent much of her time in taking long walks in the country — 
 always on the road wfliere she thought she might meet her hus- 
 band, and perhaps induce him to leave his trap and return with 
 her on foot. 
 
 She had no fear of these long lonely wklks. England was not 
 like Sicily, she thought. There were no brigands to carry one 
 off into the mountains till a ruinous ransom was forthcoming; the 
 roads were safe and the liberties of women respected. The 
 freedom for which she had longed all her life she might therefore 
 profit by now when she had the chance. And she did ; to her 
 heart’s desire. 
 
 One day she went out as usual. This time she did not take 
 the highway. Armine had gone to Moss Farm, about six miles 
 off by the London road, but only three by the fields and through 
 the wood, where a man could ride but not drive. And she thought 
 that, if she went by the shorter way, she should find her beloved 
 at the other end, when she would make him walk back with her 
 through those lovely meadows, that fragrant wood. He was 
 always so good — he did all she asked him to do ! As indeed was 
 but his duty, was her next thought ; pride traversing her love as 
 a line of steel might pass through a silken web. It was her right 
 to receive all where she had given all — her right to be obeyed 
 where command included claim and obedience was translated 
 gratitude. She had sacrificed everything for him and his love ; 
 it was only just, then, that he should sacrifice his will when it 
 ran counter to hers, and return in as full measure as she had 
 bestowed. 
 
203 
 
 10NE. 
 
 She loved him. Yes; that was beyond question. All the 
 same, she knew her rights and held by them. 
 
 Beautiful always, lone looked supremely lovely to-day. Her 
 spell of mental rest and happiness in her paradise — what mattered 
 it if a fool’s or no ? — had told on her as sleep tells on the weary 
 and worn-out. 
 
 Her moral wrinkles were smoothed out and her former chroni- 
 cally discontented look was lost in one of perfected felicity. Her 
 nervous irritability of temper was in abeyance, and her manner was 
 less watchful for causes of offence than of old. She was rounder, 
 softer, sweeter altogether ; perhaps less exciting because less com- 
 plex in mood ; more satisfactory and less inexplicable ; but with 
 always more than enough of that hidden fire, that mysterious 
 attraction, which makes men mad for other women than Helen, 
 than Cleopatra, than Circe. There was always that reserve fund 
 of nameless possibilities in her which excites some and wearies 
 others. No one ever felt to have got to the depths — to have 
 thoroughly plumbed and sounded her ; no one ever felt to have 
 mastered and subdued her ; and she was always herself and unin- 
 fluenced by the will of others. Even Armine was conscious that 
 she gave voluntary service for the pleasure of love, rather than 
 submission for the grace of duty. She was complaisant because 
 she was strong, not because she was humble; and when she 
 appeared to be most devoted, it was then that she was most self- 
 assertive. As now, when she took these long lone country walks 
 that she might meet her husband at the end and make him go 
 back with her on foot, no matter what were his professional duties 
 nor what was his personal reluctance — the action which looked so 
 like womanly devotion was in fact the arbitrariness of self-will. 
 There is a world of difference between the love which pleases 
 itself in loving, and the love which seeks the pleasure of the 
 beloved. 
 
 lone was walking through the wood, delighting in the balmy 
 freshness of the day, and mentally contrasting this delicious air 
 with the scorching heat of Palermo at this same hour and time, 
 when she came to one of those natural seats made by the forking 
 stems of two beech-trees, with which we are all familiar. How 
 lovely it was, with its golden-green cushions of moss, where the 
 fronds of the polypody and the maidenhair spleenwort stood up 
 like knightly plumes, and the tender little leaflets of the wild 
 wood-sorrel were like smooth silken rosettes set against knotted 
 velvet ! How beautiful it all was, and how peaceful ! She was 
 just a little tired — she must rest there for a moment before going 
 on. She had time ; and she should not miss her darling. 
 
 She sat down on this cushioned seat, dreaming of Armine and 
 linking memory to love. She thought of that moment under the 
 carruba-tree when he bent forward and kissed the back of her 
 
W THE WOOD . 209 
 
 neck — there where the golden sun had touched the golden curl. 
 She remembered the rush of joy that had struck through her like 
 an electric shock — how every nerve and fibre had quivered with 
 ecstasy at knowing herself beloved — she who had loved him with- 
 out his prayer md beside her own hope, now feeling herself 
 clasped in his arms and held strained to his heart! She remem- 
 bered his eyes when she had looked into them, how they seemed 
 to be verily divine, and how his beauty had put on an almost 
 supernatural glory — how at that moment she seemed to have 
 passed away from the ordinary life of man and to have come into 
 the place where she had found God ; and her heart beat with 
 strong, quick, full pulsations as she pictured it all so vividly as to 
 make her feel that she was living through the moment once more. 
 Then her thoughts wandered onward ; and, memory conjuring up 
 the sweetest moments by the way, she stopped at last at the 
 present time and the immediate future of to-day. 
 
 She would bring Armine back with her through the wood, 
 and they would sit here for a while — in England under the beech- 
 tree as a replica of the time when they had sat in Palermo under 
 the carruba. She had made out all the circumstances of this little 
 idyllic love-scene to herself ; — how she would put her arms round 
 him, and he would put his round her; — how she would lay her 
 head on his shoulder, her face upturned so that her lips should 
 almost touch his cheek — almost, not quite, like a promise not yet 
 claimed — a sweet warm challenge to be perforce accepted. And 
 then she seemed to feel the fragrance of his lips on hers — those 
 dear kisses which he always gave when asked She forgot, poor 
 lone ! to remember that they were never given unless asked for. 
 She would draw his head down on her lap and pass her hand 
 among his curls And he would let her have her will of him and 
 love him as much as she would. All the same, to have her will 
 of him in all things was her right. 
 
 She was half asleep with the heat and the delicious dream 
 conjured up like an acted drama before her, when an unkempt, 
 ragged, brutal-looking man came slouching past, and, stopping in 
 front of her, asked for alms in a tone that was more a menace 
 than a supplication. 
 
 lone was one of those women whose courage comes from 
 temper Before her pride was touched she was timid and afraid. 
 Her blood curdled round her heart as this rude, rough man, stand- 
 ing in an insolent attitude before her, demanding alms in a 
 menacing voice, and with something in his face that was half a 
 leer and half a threat, made her suddenly feel her helplessness and 
 his power, her loneliness and his audacity. Yet this was England ; 
 and there are no brigands in England ! 
 
 ( Vatene via ! 1 she said, startled into the familiar phrase. 
 
 Her foreign tongue emboldened the man yet more. It gave 
 
 p 
 
210 
 
 IONE. 
 
 him the impression of isolation — that she did not belong to them 
 anyhow, and that the law, which might have protected or avenged 
 a native-born Englishwoman, would not take cognisance of a 
 stranger. 
 
 ‘ I don’t understand yer, mum/ he said insolently, advancing a 
 step nearer. 
 
 ‘ Go away ! ’ cried lone, in the shrill high-pitched voice of fear. 
 
 ‘ Ye’ll please to give me something afore I do,’ he returned. 
 
 ‘ You are insolent. I have nothing/ she said. 
 
 ‘ You have some pretty shiners there/ said the man, rudely 
 touching the locket on her throat. 
 
 lone sprang to her feet, and struck the man’s face with the 
 hack of her hand. 
 
 ‘ Insolent ! how dare you ! ’ she exclaimed, her blood now up. 
 
 He caught her by her two arms and forced her backward, 
 pinioning her in his strong grasp and pressing her against the bole 
 of the tree. 
 
 ‘You’ll excuse me, mum, hut you’ll please to give them to me/ 
 he said coarsely. ‘ I want them a sight more nor you.’ 
 
 As he spoke he loosened one of her arms, and with his dis- 
 engaged hand tore the locket from the chain. It was that in 
 which she had placed Armine’s hair. 
 
 lone gave one piercing shriek, and, as if in answer to her cry, 
 she heard the sound of a horse’s hoofs coming through the wood 
 towards her — there where she stood pressed back against the tree, 
 and her locket, in which part of the very substance of Armine’s 
 dear body was enshrined, in this ruffian’s grasp. The man heard 
 it too, and, like some beast of prey startled in his pursuit, he 
 suddenly released her ; and with one bound was off and away into 
 the wood, where, crouching down among the bracken and the 
 undergrowth, he was lost to sight and hearing. 
 
 Then Edward Formby rode up, and lone was safe. 
 
 When he saw her standing there, pale with fear, trembling 
 with passion, her large eyes dark and flashing, her nostrils 
 quivering and dilated, he drew rein and threw himself from his 
 horse. Was hers the cry that he had heard ? 
 
 ‘ Good God ! 9 he said impulsively *, ‘ what are you doing here 
 alone P What has happened, Mrs. St. Claire ? You are trembling ; 
 you are terrified — what is it ? ’ 
 
 ‘ A brigand ! ’ said lone, looking round into the wood. ‘ He 
 is there now. But he cannot hurt us ; he had no gun.’ 
 
 ‘ Some scoundrel has frightened you, I can see. But a 
 brigand ? ’ said Edward. 
 
 4 Yes/ answered lone. ‘ And I never thought of such a thing ! 
 I thought you had no brigands in England; but this wretch 
 robbed me of my locket. It is desecration ! ’ she added fiercely, 
 remembering what sacred treasure that small gold case held. 
 
IN THE WOOD. 
 
 211 
 
 e The scoundrel ! He was some rascally tramp, and they are 
 as bad as brigands/ said Edward, in more agitation than was usual 
 with him. ‘"But what are you doing here alone ? Where has 
 that scoundrel gone ? St. Claire should not let you wander about 
 like this by yourself! It is not safe/ he added in a hurried and 
 disjointed way, as if he spoke all in one breath. 
 
 ‘ England is safe/ said lone a little proudly. 
 
 ‘ No, no ! not to the extent of allowing ladies to take long 
 country walks alone/ he repeated. ‘ We have no organised bands 
 of brigands as you have in Sicily, but we have wandering tramps 
 who are just as dangerous when they get the chance. What did 
 this man do to you P ’ 
 
 ‘He wanted me to give him money; and I had none if I 
 would, and I would not if I had had it/ said lone. ‘ Then he 
 took hold of my arms — the wretch ! ’ she added, brushing her 
 sleeves with her handkerchief as if to brush off some pollution 
 from her person ; e and then ’ — and here her voice deepened and 
 roughened out of all likeness to its ordinary tones — ‘ he tore my 
 locket from my neck.’ 
 
 ‘The villain! the scoundrel!’ cried Edward, furious and 
 agitated. ‘ Which way did he go ? Up there ? ’ 
 
 He hitched the bridle of his horse to a bough, and turned to 
 follow the trace of the man made by the broken brushwood and 
 trampled bracken ; but lone caught his arm. The horse, which 
 was a spirited chestnut, was plunging violently ; and she was 
 afraid both of the beast’s heels and to be left alone with the possi- 
 bility of the hidden brigand making a descent on her, or perhaps 
 of assassinating Mr. Eormby. 
 
 ‘ Don’t go/ she said, with a curious mixture of command and 
 entreaty. ‘ I don’t want you to go.’ 
 
 ‘But that scoundrel ! ’ pleaded Edward, whose fighting blood 
 was up. 
 
 ‘ Oh, let him alone ! he is in the wood somewhere. He had no 
 gun, but he might have a revolver. You are better here with me. 
 And I do not like your horse.’ 
 
 ‘ I will not leave you if you would rather not/ said Edward 
 reluctantly. 
 
 He was sorry to give up the chase and the instant chastise- 
 ment with his own hands which would have been so soothing to 
 his superior manhood ; but he promised himself that the ruffian 
 should be watched for, and, when caught, trounced as a magistrate 
 can always trounce a vagrant when he will. Meanwhile, perhaps 
 it was his duty to remain with Mrs. St. Claire. She looked pale ; 
 she had asked him to stay ; and the chestnut might do himself 
 some harm. 
 
 ‘My dear Mrs. St. Claire, be advised by me and warned by 
 this disagreeable adventure/ he said, after he had soothed his 
 
212 
 
 IONE. 
 
 horse ; thinking that, if he could not heat that brutal assailant of 
 St. Claire’s beautiful young wife into a jelly, as he deserved, he 
 •would utilise the time by profitable sermonising. ‘ Do not take 
 these long country walks alone ! You must not ! Indeed you 
 must not ! They are not safe. Where on earth were you going? 
 What were you doing here by yourself?’ 
 
 ‘ 1 was going to Moss Farm to meet my husband,’ said Tone. 
 ‘ And why should I not come here ? I have been all through the 
 •wood before.’ 
 
 ‘Then your husband should not allow it,’ said Edward 
 Formby, dropping his stone into deeper waters than he knew of. 
 
 ‘ My husband does not allow me to do anything. I am my 
 own mistress. I am free to do as I like,’ said lone haughtily. 
 
 ‘ To be free to run into dangers of which you can know nothing 
 is but a poor kind of liberty,’ said Edward manfully. ‘ My idea 
 of a husband’s duty is that he should protect his wife — take care 
 of her and look after her.’ 
 
 ‘ And how can my husband protect and look after me as you 
 call it — as if I were a little dog — when he is obliged to go to 
 those^ horrid patients of his — when he is obliged to be hours 
 away and miles oft'? ’ cried lone with flashing eyes, up in arms for 
 the integrity of her beloved as well as in defence of her own 
 freedom, and glad to be able to lash out against circumstances 
 which annoyed her in proportion to their inevitability. 
 
 ‘Of course. He has his profession ; I forgot. That makes a 
 difference,’ said Edward in an odd staccato manner. ‘ All the 
 same, it is not safe for you to go so far away from houses, and 
 to wander into these lonely places by yourself. You see what has 
 happened to you to-day ; and you can never be sure that the same 
 thing may not happen again.’ 
 
 ‘ Then I might as w'ell be back in Palermo ! ’ said lone con- 
 temptuously, and as if her companion were responsible for the 
 whole thing. ‘And I would rather trust myself to English 
 tramps than to Sicilian carabinieri ! ’ she added passionately — so 
 passionately that the good fellow who had undertaken her en- 
 lightenment was suddenly himself enlightened so far as to know 
 that he was stumbling over ploughshares and floundering in 
 quicksands. 
 
 4 At all events I must keep with you now,’ he said, shifting 
 his point. ‘ You have been frightened and your nerves are 
 shaken ’ 
 
 ‘ They are not shaken the least in the world,’ interrupted 
 lone. 
 
 ‘ And you feel brave enough to go on alone, with the man in 
 hiding in the wood ? ’ asked Edward in frank amazement. 
 
 What an enigma she was ! White with terror and just 
 escaped from a very real danger, with her words of request for 
 
IN THE WOOD. 
 
 213 
 
 protection yet warm on her lips, and now in a moment as proud and 
 defiant as it* that which had happened to her were mere child’s play. 
 
 lone had no intention of coquetry. She was too ardently in 
 love with Armine for that ; for though love cooled down to friend- 
 ship easily admits of a new passion, love at the "boiling-point fills 
 heaven and earth and time and space with its own fumes, and 
 leaves no room for aught beside. Still her look and gesture were 
 perilously like coquetry as she turned her glorious eyes to her 
 companion, and said in the sweetest manner of sudden self-sur- 
 render: ‘ You are very good ! Thank you. Yes, do come with me 
 to Moss Farm, where I shall find my husband.’ 
 
 Though she had so warmly defended her beloved against 
 Edward’s vague charge of neglect, yet she was not sorry that this 
 last should accompany her as her protector against dangers which 
 Armine had allowed her to run. She felt dimly and indistinctly 
 that a little jealousy would be a wholesale condiment and useful 
 spur. All men are the better for a little spur, and condiments are 
 good in daily food. Even dearly beloved Armine might be wakened 
 up to advantage. 
 
 1 1 was half asleep when that brigand came up to me,’ she said, 
 as they set their faces to the west, and walked on the way that 
 led to Moss Farm. 
 
 ‘ And that was imprudent,’ said Edward, with a curiously strong 
 desire to protect and inform this beautiful young wife of the man 
 he called his friend. 
 
 ‘ Why, you are worse than we are in Palermo,’ cried lone, 
 with a little laugh, not unpleasant. 
 
 ‘ Are you so bad there ? ’ he asked, smiling. 
 
 ‘ In some things,’ she answered. 
 
 6 You may not walk in the woods alone ? or go to sleep under 
 the trees in the middle of the day P ’he said lightly. 
 
 ‘ Walk in the Favorita alone? I or Clarissa? Dio mio, no ! 1 
 she returned. ‘ All the world would have been in a ferment if we 
 had, and every one we knew would have called to beseech papa 
 and mamma to put a stop to such iniquity. But then, no Paler- 
 mitan lady walks alone at any time, and very few walk at all.’ 
 
 ‘ And you ? — did you rebel or conform ? ’ asked Edward. 
 
 ‘ We were obliged to conform. We were brought up half like 
 Sicilians, Clarissa and I ; and we w r ere allowed very little more 
 liberty than they. That made me long so much to come to 
 England. I always felt as if I were in a prison at the Villa 
 Clarissa. I longed so to be free ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Ah, you like liberty, I see ; perhaps a little too much,’ said 
 Edward. 
 
 1 How can an English girl like it too much ? ’ she answered. 
 6 It is that which makes us so much better than any one else.’ 
 
 To which Edward Formby answered, ‘Yes, it does;’ both a 
 
214 
 
 IONE. 
 
 little wide of the real meaning of the other. For lone by no means 
 held English girls so far superior to others ; and Edward, who con- 
 sidered them the pinli of creation, had just protested against their 
 normal liberties. Like many men of his kind, his feeling for the 
 women whom he did respect was one of almost exaggerated chivalry, 
 almost excessive protection. Even to those whom he did not 
 respect he was kind and considerate ; for to be a woman was, to 
 Edward Formby, to be entitled to all men’s care and his own 
 especial regard. 
 
 6 1 should have thought your father would have brought you 
 up rather in the English than the Italian way/ he said, continuing 
 the conversation as they walked along the wood-path. ‘ lie was 
 such a thorough Englishman in his time ! As long as I can 
 remember I have heard him spoken of as a kind of oracle for all 
 manly sports, and I should have expected he would have carried 
 the English flag all through.’ 
 
 ‘ You cannot in Sicily. People would say all sorts of things/ 
 said lone. 
 
 i Have you heard from them lately ? Will you remember me 
 kindly to him when you next write ? ’ said Edward. 
 
 ‘1 have not heard from them lately; and I am not going to 
 write/ said lone, suddenly stiff and glacial. 
 
 6 Did you know your aunt Helen ? ’ asked Edward, not con- 
 scious of offence. 
 
 6 No/ she said. 
 
 ( She was so beautiful ! I remember her when I was a boy 
 about ten years old. She must have been about nineteen or twenty 
 then. She was so lovely ! and you are something like her. I 
 cannot say where or how, but you certainly remind me of her, 
 vaguely, oddly, but unmistakably.’ 
 
 ‘ What nonsense ! ’ said lone abruptly. 
 
 ‘ Why nonsense, Mrs. St. Claire P ’ he asked in surprise. 1 Why 
 should you not resemble your aunt? ’ 
 
 ‘ Because she was not my aunt ; because she was no relation to me 
 at all/ said lone ; ‘ because I am not papa’s daughter nor mamma's 
 — only something adopted, no one knows why or from where.’ 
 
 ‘ Surely not/ said Edward, pained by her manner and shocked 
 by her information. 
 
 ‘ And since I am confessing to you, I might as well tell the 
 whole truth. It will save trouble,’ said lone, in the same cynical 
 and hard way as before. * They did not want me to marry 
 Armine, because he was poor; and they are very angry with 
 me. So they do not write ; and I shall never see them again.’ 
 
 ‘ I am very sorry/ said Edward after a pause. ‘ And I do not 
 think St. Claire should have married in such a case as this.’ 
 
 * Do not blame my husband ! ’ said lone, her eyes ablaze. 1 He 
 is perfect ! I will not hear a word against him ! never ! never ! ’ 
 
IN THE WOOD. 
 
 215 
 
 * Well, I will not blame liim, dear Mrs. St. Claire/ returned 
 her companion in a soothing, apologetic way. ‘ You are quite 
 right — you are noble and true and womanly.’ 
 
 4 Thank you,’ said lone with sudden softness. 
 
 By this time they had come to the end of the wood and the 
 gate of Moss Farm ; but there was no trap, no sign of Armine ; 
 and, when Edward Formby went in to inquire, he was told that 
 the doctor had been and gone again this good half-hour or more. 
 So there was nothing for it but to walk back through the wood, 
 with Edward Formby instead of Armine as her companion, along 
 that fragrant glade and through that enchanted ground. 
 
 lone could have wept for disappointment in her hope, and have 
 blazed heaven-high in rage at being obliged to accept Edward’s 
 protection at all. Since she could not have her husband’s she did 
 not want his ! She was very cross and almost as disagreeable as 
 the lone of Palermitan days ; but Edward was a good dear obtuse 
 kind of fellow, without suspicion and free from irritability, and 
 bore his beautiful companion’s snubs with unruffled good-humour, 
 thinking it only natural that she should be put out — and that 
 Armine ought to have foreseen the whole affair and have waited 
 for her till she came. And then he sighed. He did not know 
 why. Perhaps it was because life looked a little dreary to him in 
 that he had no large-eyed wife to be unpleasant to other fellows 
 because disappointed of his own society. 
 
 When they passed the tree where lone had conjured up her 
 loving vision, and where, instead of a caress from her husband, she 
 had been insulted by a ruffian, she found the place occupied by a 
 ragged woman and a still more ragged child, the former of whom 
 got up as the two drew near, and held out in her grimy hand 
 lone’s ravished locket. 
 
 ‘ Please ’m, I found this hard by. It don’t belong to me ; may- 
 be it belongs to you? ’ she said, with that naturalness of manner 
 which practice in deceit and acting makes perfect in. beggars. 
 
 ‘ It is mine ! ’ cried lone, snatching the locket from the dirty 
 hand that held it. 6 And now you have spoilt it for ever by your 
 vile touch ! ’ she added. And as she spoke she flung the trinket to 
 the ground and set her heel on it till she had ground it into a shape- 
 less mass of broken gold and splintered glass, and matted mud- 
 besmeared threads of hair. 
 
 4 It was polluted ! ’ she said, her eyes like wells of living fire. 
 6 You wretch! you wretch! how dare you touch it! And how 
 dare you sit there in that place P — Mr. Formby, strike her with 
 your whip and send her off ! ’ 
 
 But Edward did not take up those cudgels in lone’s behalf and 
 order the woman to move. That mossy seat between the forked 
 stems of the beech-trees was public property, and even a beggar 
 has public rights. He did, however, scare the woman by his 
 
216 
 
 20/VE. 
 
 magisterial severity of speech, threatening the vague terrors of the 
 law, and telling her that both she and her husband, the brute 
 who had just now frightened the lady — oh ! he knew him well 
 enough ! — should smart for it as they little expected. But lone 
 was, in her heart, indignant against him in that he had not avenged 
 her sentimental outrage about the seat ; and in token thereof she 
 made herself more and more like a branch of thorns ail the way 
 home. 
 
 As they were crossing the meadow they came on Miss Jane 
 Wintergreen and Rachel Major taking a constitutional, as they 
 often did together. The ladies bowed — Rachel’s plain good face 
 the colour of a dark-red dahlia : Jane’s rather more jaundiced than 
 usual. Edward raised his hat. lone stared without bowing, and 
 smiled insolently. She was of the kind whom personal sorrow 
 makes bitter and inhuman ; and just now her sorrow for the loss 
 of her much-prized locket made her feel wolfish and misanthropic 
 to all the world — and to these two ladies more than all others. 
 
 4 What hideous creatures some English women can be ! ’ she 
 said, almost in hearing as she passed ; just as Jane, jerking her 
 head and giving a vicious look backwards, said, in her turn : 
 
 4 My word ! our fine madam is beginning early ! The grass 
 don’t grow under her feet ! I said she was bad the first day I 
 saw her ! ’ 
 
 Rachel did not speak. She had a stirred and startled look ; 
 and, like Jane, glanced backward, but not viciously. 
 
 4 Shameful ! ’ continued Jane. 4 A young wife not two months 
 married and carrying on in this audacious way ! — flirting with 
 Mr. Formby like anything ! ’ 
 
 4 1 do not think our Mr. Formby is a man to flirt with a married 
 woman, Jane,’ said Rachel timidly ; but her friend snapped at her, 
 as her manner was. 
 
 4 Men are men,’ she said ; 4 and the best of them are no better 
 than they should be. Edward Formby is no more a saint than his 
 neighbours, and she is a hussy who has been brought up in foreign 
 parts and cannot know aught of good ’ 
 
 4 Perhaps it is the way where she comes from,’ said pacific 
 Rachel. 
 
 4 Then it is not ours, and she’ll have to learn better And our 
 Mr. Formby shouldn't have done it,’ said Jane. 
 
 4 Well, I’m sure I don’t know anything about it,’ said Rachel. 
 
 4 But I cannot believe that our Mr Formby can do wrong.’ 
 
 4 Oh, trust him ! ’ cried Jane, in her shrill way 4 But, goodness 
 me, Rachel, why is your face so red P And, la, child, you have 
 tears in your eyes ! ’ 
 
 4 It is weakness,’ said Rachel hurriedly. 4 Aunt Maria keeps 
 the room so hot I get weak eyes when I go out.’ 
 
 4 Oh, do you P ’ said Jane a little drily. 4 1 never knew that 
 
IN THE WOOD . 
 
 217 
 
 before You’d better bathe them with green tea, Rachel ; it is the 
 finest thing in the world for weak eyes — if, as you say, they are 
 really going bad.’ 
 
 Rachel said no more. She had that at her heart which forbade 
 her to discuss this strangely irregular weakness of her eyes, as well 
 as forbade her to suspect Edward Formby of evil, even when he 
 was caught walking alone in the w~ood with pretty Mrs. St. Claire, 
 not two months married. Nor dared she defend him, also because 
 of that something at her heart which made talking of him at all a 
 pain rather than a pleasure. 
 
 But from that day another flavour of distaste grew about lone’s 
 name and personality here in Oakhurst. She was known to be a 
 slattern, because she wore a dressing-gown in the morning ; she 
 was called Mrs. Pride, because she made the servant button her 
 boots ; and Dorothy Doolittle, because she could not manufacture 
 a pudding nor boil a potato ; and now she was cried out as a flirt, 
 and no better than she should be, because she had been met 
 walking with Edward Formby of Hillside — he leading his horse, 
 and she as bold as you please — according to Miss Crosby’s phrase 
 — in her jaunty little toque and that fine tussore silk walking- 
 costume ! And the poor young man, Armine St. Claire, was almost 
 forgiven the slight he had put upon the neighbourhood by finding 
 his wife out of it, for the certain misery that was before him, with 
 such a conglomerate of moral offences as he had married. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 AFTERNOON TEA. 
 
 ‘ We ought to have those young St. Claires to afternoon tea, my 
 dear,’ said Mrs. Barrington to her daughter. ‘ Poor young people, 
 it would be only kind.’ 
 
 6 Yes, mother,’ said Monica quietly. 
 
 She had broken the neck of her sorrow by now, and had 
 accustomed herself to the fact of Armine’s marriage and to the 
 presence of his wife. No thought of self stood between her and 
 her kindly sympathies for lone. Her love for the only man who 
 had seemed to her to realise her ideal of beauty, poetry, gentleness, 
 and purity lay buried deep in her heart — silent, unacknowledged, 
 unconfessed — a presence not a thought, a perfume not a passion. 
 It was like a disembodied spirit lingering still about the scene of 
 old delights and former life ; a shadow that flickered to and fro in 
 the sunshine and stole abroad in the starlight — that hovered over 
 her in her sleep, and passed like a mist from before her eyes when 
 she woke ; a shadow that was her daily and hourly companion — 
 but only a shadow, not a living being — only a haunting sense and 
 
2i8 10 NE. 
 
 not even an active memory. And yet it was active enough to make 
 her wish to be lone’s friend. 
 
 Since that first interview with the young bride, and then with 
 Armine himself, something had died within her and something had 
 risen in its stead. It was regret which had died when sorrow 
 would have been sin, and it was resignation which had risen in its 
 place, as a flower springs up from the grave of the dead. 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ she said, her sweet face undisturbed, and yet what an 
 undertone of infinite sadness there was even in its stillness ! ‘ It 
 will give them pleasure, as you say, mother; and poor Mrs. 
 St. Claire cannot have a very brilliant kind of life here.’ 
 
 ‘ It was a foolish marriage on both sides,’ said Mrs. Barrington, 
 with a sympathetic sigh. 
 
 ‘ Not a very wise one, I fear,’ said Monica, echoing that sigh. 
 ‘ But now that it is done and cannot be undone ’ 
 
 She stopped. 
 
 ‘We must make the best of it,’ said her mother, completing the 
 sentence. 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ she returned. 
 
 ‘ Well, write the notes, my dear. Let us have a pleasant 
 little gathering. Ask some nice people. It will do the poor 
 young things good to be asked with the nice people ; and I do 
 not suppose they will presume on it afterwards.’ 
 
 ‘ They are so nice themselves,’ said Monica, for one of the 
 rare times of her life pained by her mother’s manner. 
 
 So sweet as she was by nature, so true a Christian by principle, 
 how strange it was that she should always adopt this tone of 
 superiority, of almost arrogant assumption of patronage, when 
 speaking of Armine St. Claire ! After all, were they, the Bar- 
 ringtons, really so very far his superiors P And lone — she was 
 little like one needing the patronage of superior persons ! If 
 mother could only feel for them as kindly as now, but with less 
 condescension ! 
 
 She said nothing of all this, however, as she began her notes 
 of invitation for the afternoon tea whereof the motive was the 
 St. Claires. She only sighed, and wished that foolish futile wish 
 of the earnest and conscientious, that she could make others see 
 with her eyes — that wish, the folly of which is only equalled by 
 the desire of the loving that all others should recognise the perfect- 
 ness which love alone can find. 
 
 ‘We will ask Edward, of course, but he is sure not to come,’ 
 said Monica, looking up from her desk. ‘He has a horror of 
 afternoon teas.’ 
 
 ‘ We can do no less than invite him,’ said Mrs. Barrington ; 
 adding, with the mild disapproval of her kind, ‘it would be 
 better for him if he liked these pleasant little gatherings more 
 
AFTERNOON TEA. 
 
 219 
 
 than he does, dear fellow. He is a dear good hoy, hut he is not 
 very domestic, I fancy. And I am sorry for it.’ 
 
 i No/ said Monica. 
 
 ‘ I shall he pleased if he comes/ continued her mother. ( One 
 never knows how much good may not he done hy little things of 
 this kind. No dropping of good seed is to he despised.’ 
 
 c No/ said Monica again ; and on this very slender chance the 
 note was sent to Hillside with the rest. But, to the surprise of 
 both Monica and her mother, when the afternoon in question 
 came, the first person to arrive was Edward Formhy himself ; and 
 the next was lone — without her husband. He had been called 
 out to a distance, she said, making a brave effort not to show the 
 annoyance she felt. For she had not yet learned even the alphabet 
 of resignation to the inevitable conditions of a medical man’s life, 
 and could never be got to understand how the claims of his pro- 
 fession should be superior to her own. 
 
 * But he will come to take me home/ she added, glad to put 
 herself forward as the cause of his appearance. 
 
 On which Mrs. Barrington said kindly, ‘ I am glad of that, my 
 dear;’ and Monica added even yet more kindly, i We will take 
 good care of you till he does come.’ 
 
 Was it not Armines wife to whom she was speaking? 
 
 * Thank you / said lone, not quite so graciously as might have 
 been. 
 
 She did not feel that she w r anted taking care of, and secretly 
 resented this slight assault on the fringes of her liberty. That 
 liberty was so precious ! It was only another facet of her love — 
 only an interchangeable term for her happiness. With it she had 
 gained Armine, and she watched over it as jealously as one 
 naturally does watch over the ark wherein is enshrined the most 
 sacred possession of one’s life. 
 
 Poor lone ! Her happiness would not have been quite so 
 secure had she known that Armine’s severe case at a distance was 
 merely a pretext to enable him to escape the ordeal of a long 
 afternoon at the Dower House, so that he might compress his 
 agony into as short a space of time as was possible. He too had 
 made heroic efforts to reduce his love to the same ghostly state as 
 that to which Monica’s had attained. But he was not so successful 
 as she had been. The ever-present irritation of lone’s love, which 
 never allowed him to forget the mistake he had made, kept his 
 regret more actively alive than the mere blankness of loss would 
 have done. Had he not been married, or had not lone loved him 
 with such masterful passion, he could have subdued his sorrow 
 more effectually and borne it more stoically. But it was such 
 an incessant sting — such a constant reminder ! The efforts made 
 over himself were so unending and full of such maddening 
 
220 
 
 TONE. 
 
 consciousness ; the fight in his heart between love and duty, repent- 
 ance and regret, distaste and gratitude, was so living, so strong, 
 so terrible. There were times when he felt as if he must tell the 
 whole truth to lone, if only to free himself from the burning 
 imperiousness of her love — that burning imperiousness which made 
 him think of Monica as the blazing sunshine makes one think of 
 the dark starlight ; of the soft grey days of an English spring ; of 
 the tender tranquillity of the fading autumn ; of anything that 
 shall make one forget for a moment this ardent sun which fires 
 the blood and maddens the brain by its very intensity of splendour. 
 But when he fully realised this kind of weariness, then he turned 
 back to his exacting and adoring wife in contrition and tried to 
 believe that he was indeed grateful for her love, and responsive as 
 became him. As if ever men were grateful for a woman’s un- 
 asked love ! As if their passion, not voluntarily given, can ever be 
 evoked because of hers ! 
 
 This afternoon tea, planned with so much kindness by Mrs. 
 Barrington, was outwardly a success. All the nice people who 
 had been invited had come ; and yet, nice people as they might 
 be, no one eclipsed the bride. There was no mistaking lone’s 
 natural position, wife though she was of nothing more aristocratic 
 than a country practitioner. No one, not even Theodosia, could 
 snub her with impunity , nor could dear Mrs. Barrington herself 
 quite succeed in patronising her with comfort. She held her own 
 with such superb self-possession, such impenetrable pride, that all 
 were foiled and baffled, on the side of impertinence and that of 
 kindness alike. 
 
 Theodosia, however, was one of those who, when they wish to 
 attack and have determined to annoy, are no more baffled tliamso 
 many midges, no more to be foiled than so many mosquitoes. 
 Through all this afternoon she was singularly sweet in manner to 
 every one save lone, whom as yet she had ignored ; but she was 
 as watchful as she was amiable. She was still unconvinced that 
 Monica’s composure was as real as it seemed to be ; and this pro- 
 nounced kindness to lone rather confirmed than shook her secret 
 suspicions. Incapable of such generosity herself, she yet knew it 
 when she saw it, and did not confound it with indifference. Also 
 she had heard of lone’s wood-walk with Edward Formby, and she 
 felt as if she were on the threshold of all sorts of potential excite- 
 ments — as if the curtain had just drawn up and the first act of a 
 well-seasoned drama had been set. 
 
 Monica, lone, and Edward Formby made a pleasant triad, a 
 little withdrawn from the rest. lone, treated with distinction by 
 both, posed as a young queen, as she used to pose before her 
 fathers men at the mill. It was so natural to her to be the 
 young queen ! She did it well because it was so natural. Pre- 
 sently Theo fluttered into the midst of the group, bent on mischief. 
 
AFTERNOON TEA . 
 
 221 
 
 lone had taken as strong an antipathy to Anthony Barrington’s 
 sharp-eyed and shrewd-witted wife as Theo in her turn had taken 
 to lone. Hence there was that kind of secret war between them 
 which women alone know how to wage, and each put herself in 
 mental fighting attitude whenever there was the chance of a fray. 
 
 4 You are a great walker, Mrs. St. Claire ?’ said Theo, with 
 an interrogative smile and accent. 
 
 lone raised her eyes in her slow disdainful way. The question 
 seemed innocent enough, but she scented danger all the same. 
 
 4 1 walk,’ she said, 4 like every one else. A great walker is 
 another thing/ 
 
 4 Mrs. St. Claire is a great walker, is she not, Mr. Formby P ’ 
 Theo continued, turning to Edward. 
 
 4 Is she P Yes, 1 suppose you would say so/ he answered. 
 
 4 You must be a good judge/ said Theo innocently. 
 
 4 1, Mrs. Anthony ; why ? ’ he asked. 
 
 4 You walk with her a great deal, do you not ? How delight- 
 ful to be able to take those long country rambles ! ’ 
 
 lone turned on Anthony Barrington’s wife a pair of eyes 
 which blazed with anger. 
 
 4 Mr. Formby walk a great deal with me ? ’ she repeated. 
 4 Who has put this into your head, Mrs. Barrington ? or have you 
 made it up for yourself? ’ 
 
 4 1 have heard it from twenty people at the least, and I never 
 make things up for myself/ said Theo, with delicious simplicity. 
 
 It was Miss Maria Crosby only who had told her. 
 
 'And what did you hear? 1 asked lone, her eyes still fixed 
 with devouring wrath on the little woman’s vivacious face, clothed 
 in its mask of simple candour. 
 
 4 That you and Mr. Formby walk about together a good deal/ 
 said Theo, as if she had said that the sky was clearing or the tide 
 coming in. 
 
 4 Oh, come now, that is going too far ! ’ said Edward, with an 
 uneasy kind of laugh. 
 
 4 1 have not heard it, dear Tlieo/ said Monica gently. 
 
 4 And is your ignorance to be the measure of my knowledge ? 9 
 returned Theo sharply. 
 
 4 Then if you have not made it up yourself, you have heard 
 something so untrue that I do not care to contradict it/ said lone 
 with disdain. 
 
 4 No ; I thought you would not/ said Theo quite amiably. 
 
 4 When I came to England, I believed I came among people 
 who spoke the truth/ said lone. 
 
 4 1 fancy we are a little better in that than yourselves/ returned 
 the other, always amiable and simple. 
 
 4 You are not so good ! ’ said lone, with an Italian uplifting of 
 her chin, expressive of supremest contempt. 
 
222 
 
 IONE. 
 
 4 Do all Italians get angry about trifles ? 9 asked Theo, with, 
 the serious air of one seeking for knowledge. 
 
 4 1 suppose that insignificant and horrid little creatures can 
 make them as cross as others/ answered lone. 
 
 4 That would be quite natural/ answered Theo. 4 But how 
 different everything must be here for you, Mrs. St. Claire ! How 
 much you must have to learn and admire in our English habits 
 and manners ! ’ she continued, suddenly breaking away from the 
 subject immediately on hand and going back to the starting- 
 point. 
 
 4 As I find them at Oakhurst ? 9 asked lone. 4 1 prefer those I 
 have learned at Palermo/ 
 
 4 Naturally you are fond of Palermo. And it is lovely, is it 
 not? 9 asked Monica, eager to create a diversion, distressed as she 
 was by this crossing of swords between her brother’s wife and 
 Armine’s. 
 
 4 Yes/ answered lone hardily. 4 Of course I love it best of all 
 places in the world — my own old home and all my dear friends — 
 of course ! The people are so sweet-tempered and easy to deal 
 with ! so good and amiable and well-bred ! They never say 
 disagreeable things or try to make one uncomfortable, as you 
 English people do. You are so harsh and rude in comparison 
 with them/ 
 
 Which speech, by the way, was scarcely an illustration of 
 Palermitan good-breeding. 
 
 4 You find your set here unpleasant ? — I am so sorry ! 9 said 
 Theo sympathetically. 
 
 4 My set P ’ repeated lone. 4 What do you mean, Mrs. Barring- 
 ton ? My set is yours/ 
 
 4 Do you really think so ? 9 asked Theodosia, with arched eye- 
 brows. 4 1 should not have thought that. But what a pity you 
 married an ill-tempered Englishman, and not one of those dear 
 good-natured Italians ! 9 she continued, as if she were saying the 
 most kind-hearted and sympathising thing possible. 4 It must be 
 dreadful for you, with a cross man, at this wretched little Oak- 
 hurst ! ’ 
 
 4 1 do not deserve your pity/ said lone with fire. 4 1 married 
 my husband, not Oakhurst. And I did not say that he was 
 unamiable. I said others/ 
 
 4 But it must be dreadful for you all the same/ said Theo, 
 still sympathetic. 
 
 lone rose to the fly. 
 
 4 Perhaps you cannot understand that one should love some one 
 better than oneself and everything else/ she said, with an accent 
 which meant to imply Theodosia’s utter ignorance of the power of 
 loving. 4 We learn to love in Sicily. You English marry only for 
 money, but we for love/ she added emphatically. 
 
AFTERNOON TEA . 
 
 223 
 
 Theodosia again arched her well-shaped eyebrows. 
 
 ‘ 1 always thought that, with you, the men married for money 
 only, and the women were sold like slaves/ she said ; ‘ that not a 
 man could be found in all Italy who would marry a girl without 
 a dot ; and that you did all your love-making after, not before, and 
 with every man in the world rather than your own husbands.’ 
 
 ‘ So bad as all that, Theo P ’ asked Monica, with a laugh that 
 vainly tried to make the whole thing a bad joke. 
 
 ‘ What can you, or any of you English people, know of Italy ? ’ 
 sneered lone. ‘ You come over for perhaps two months — rush into 
 all the picture-galleries and churches — do Sicily in a week ; and 
 then go home and say you know the Italians ! You know them 
 as little 
 
 ‘ As you know the English/ interrupted Theo with a laugh. 
 
 ‘ I ? I am English ! ’ said lone, lifting her head. 
 
 ‘ I don’t think we quite acknowledge you ! 7 said Theo. ‘ If you 
 were English you would not do the things you do, Mrs. St. Claire ; 
 or if you did, you would hear of them again from some one.’ 
 
 ‘Theo!’ said Monica, with forced gaiety, ‘what an odd 
 creature you are ! 7 
 
 6 People may say of me what they like/ replied lone ; ‘ I shall 
 do iust as I think proper, and I do not care what the whole world 
 thinks ! ’ 
 
 ‘ You are quite right, Mrs. St. Claire/ said Edward. 
 
 ‘ You will find instead that you are quite wrong/ put in Theo. 
 
 Monica laid her hand on the young wife’s arm. 
 
 ‘You will never even want to do what others do not, dear 
 Mrs. St. Claire/ she said softly. ‘ So you are quite right,’ as 
 Edward says. 
 
 ‘ What a mass of contradiction you are, Monica ! ’ cried Theo. 
 ‘ You and Mr. Formby are the worst advisers in the world ! ’ 
 
 At this moment Armine came into the room, and the sparring 
 between Theodosia and lone perforce ceased. 
 
 St. Claire was deadly pale as he passed through the crowd to 
 where Mrs. Barrington sat on the sofa, facing the door, but his 
 manner was as quiet and apparently as self-possessed, and his 
 bearing was as graceful, as of old. No one could have seen that 
 anything was amiss with him save for that dead-white face, 
 which made his eyes look so large and mournful, and for that 
 artificially composed manner which of itself betrays the fact of 
 effort. After he had spoken to Mrs. Barrington, he made his way 
 towards the group sitting a little apart, seeing in it only Monica 
 by the side of Edward Formby, her naturally assigned husband, 
 and lone, as the eternal negative set against his own happiness. 
 As he came up, lone turned her eyes on him with a kind of triumph 
 in them not difficult to read. Here was her vindication — the 
 Apologia for her life — the worthy cause of all that she had done — 
 
224 
 
 1GNE . 
 
 the idol for whom she had descended from her own pedestal of 
 pride to carry incense in the service of love. She spoke to him, 
 as he greeted Monica, with that imperious kind of accent which 
 her love and its rights gave her, and made room for him on the 
 sofa beside her, He returned her look with a gentle smile, but 
 took a chair at some distance from her — placing himself between 
 Monica and Theodosia. 
 
 Edward Formby’s face suddenly changed. He flushed as if a 
 blast from a furnace had blown on him, and, rising abruptly from 
 his place, went across the room to where Anthony loomed large 
 and heavy among his fellow-men, bored and boring. Theodosia 
 looked after him with marked surprise, then said to Armine in 
 her shrill way: * You have frightened Mr. Formby away, Dr. St. 
 Claire. Have you had a quarrel ? ’ 
 
 ‘ With Formby? one of my best friends? Certainly not ! * 
 said Armine. 
 
 ‘ It is always the best friend,’ she said, more shrilly than 
 before. 
 
 * With whom one quarrels? I hope not/ he answered, 
 glancing rapidly at Monica. 
 
 * How did you find that man ? ’ asked lone, in an indescribable 
 tone of mingled authority and intimacy. 
 
 It was the flourish of her marriage-lines in the face of the 
 world — the assertion of her right of possession. 
 
 i Better/* answered Armine curtly. 
 
 ‘ What is the matter with him ? ’ she asked, in the same way 
 as before. 
 
 ‘We do not talk shop in public, dear/ was his reply, made 
 very gently as to voice and manner, and accompanied by a smile , 
 yet all the same made as an unmistakable rebuke and repression. 
 
 ‘ But it 1 choose to talk shop ? ’ said lone, without gentleness 
 01 a smile. 
 
 Hei husband did not seem to hear her. 
 
 4 How are you getting on with your fretwork, Mrs, Bar- 
 rington ? 1 he asked Theodosia, giving the knife a cruel turn in 
 his own wound. 
 
 4 Why do you ask me ? — I who know so little, and have not 
 learned. Why do you not ask Monica ? You taught her, not 
 me/ said Theodosia. 
 
 4 1 cannot claim the honour of having taught Miss Barrington 
 anything/ returned Armine. 
 
 4 No? I thought you had been her master in a great deal/ 
 said Theo demurely. 
 
 4 Theo ! ’ said Monica, her face suddenly flushing. 
 
 lone looked from one to the other. There was something 
 here that she did not understand ; something of which her sensitive 
 jealousy caught the shadow without discerning the shape. She 
 
AFTERNOON TEA . 225 
 
 did not know what was there before her ; she only knew there 
 was something. 
 
 i Did you teach Miss Barrington fret-work, Armine ? ’ she 
 asked in her quietest voice, her glittering eyes narrowed to a mere 
 line. ‘ I did not know that,’ she added slowly, 
 
 ‘ You did not know what did not exist,’ he answered, as 
 gently as he had spoken before. 
 
 6 When you know my sister better you will understand how to 
 take her,’ said Monica. ‘ Dr. St-. Clause teaching consisted in 
 lending me a few patterns. By-the-by, I nave them st’U ’ she 
 added, turning to him and speaking with studied indifference. 
 i I must look them out and send them back.’ 
 
 ‘ Do not give yourself any trouble They are perfectly useless 
 to me,’ said Armine. 
 
 He would so much rather she kept them. At least they 
 would be a little link, silent and secret as their unhappy love, but 
 always a link ! 
 
 * Why do you deny it P ’ asked Theodosia, looking from Dr. 
 St. Claire to Monica and back again. ‘ What is there to deny or 
 be ashamed of ? How funny you two people are ! ’ 
 
 * You shall teach me, Armine,’ said lone imperiously. 
 
 ‘ It is such a pretty amusement ! ’ said Monica. 
 
 i Have you time to learn, dear ? ’ asked St. Claire of his wife, 
 that pale smile again about his lips, and his manner almost osten- 
 tatiously gentle. 
 
 ‘ If I say I have, I have,’ was her reply. 
 
 She had never spoken like this to him before. Since her 
 marriage she had been so happy, so content with fate and life, 
 that she had dropped all the angularities of her former self and 
 had become as soft as a silken ball. But to-day, irritated by 
 Theodosia’s insolence, and now excited by her insinuations, she 
 was no longer the lone of these later halcyon times, but the lone 
 of Palermo, the moral Ishmaelite whose hand was against every 
 one — even against the man she loved. 
 
 1 If you are going to learn, I will lend you my first patterns,’ 
 said Monica, very kindly. 
 
 ‘ If my husband will not teach me, no one else shall,’ said lone 
 unpleasantly. 
 
 ‘ Of course he will,’ said Monica ; and Armine added, with a 
 little too much eagerness : ‘ Of course, if you wish it, lone. 1 
 shall only be too happy.’ 
 
 lone’s face, which had become proud and set, neither softened 
 nor brightened. What business had this Miss Barrington to 
 answer for her husband ? If she herself could not answer for him, 
 no one else should. 
 
 It was but a slight matter on which to found displeasure, but 
 it was quite enough to make lone sullen and silent during the 
 
 a 
 
226 
 
 IONE. 
 
 walk home; and Armine, glad of her silence because of the 
 respite it gave him from her love, did not seek to break it. Thus 
 the two paced along the highway a little apart, though in line, 
 looking as if they had quarrelled; and lone feeling as she 
 looked. 
 
 All through the evening lone was cross and moody, suffering 
 as she used to suffer at Palermo when the heavens seemed shut 
 against her and no pitying God lived to listen to her prayer. It 
 was the first day since her marriage that she had felt this frightful 
 spiritual loneliness which had been her torture in the past, and, 
 with the superstition of her kind, she connected this rift in her 
 well-tuned lute with the Barringtons, and credited them with 
 future disaster. 
 
 ‘ I shall be made unhappy by them/ she said to herself, and 
 hated them all, as she thus thought — even that soft-voiced, gentle- 
 faced Monica, who yet seemed so sincerely desirous to be land to 
 her. ‘ But I do not want her to be kind to me. I w^ant only 
 Armine’s love, and my rights. And his love is my right/ she 
 added, almost aloud. 
 
 She looked at her husband sitting at the table reading. 
 Suddenly she got up from her place and went over to him. 
 
 ‘ My darling ! ’ she said, putting her hands round his throat 
 and bending back his head w r hile she kissed his face, feverishly, as 
 one kisses something thought to have been lost and now found — 
 as one answers the love despaired of and now granted. 
 
 6 Dear lone ! ’ he said gently, smoothing her hair and returning 
 her kiss as if he had given a flower for a flame. 6 But you must 
 let me read now, my dear. I have my cases to study.’ 
 
 His finger was between the pages, and he opened the book as 
 he spoke. 
 
 6 You are always occupied when I want you ! ’ she replied 
 petulantly. ( You are out all day, and in the evening, when you 
 ought to belong to me, you say you have to read up for your 
 horrid cases. It is too bad, Armine ! I did not marry you to be 
 treated like this ! ’ 
 
 He sighed, and laid his book open face downward on the table. 
 
 ‘ But if I do not study, dear love, I cannot practise. I shall 
 never get on/ he said gently as before. 
 
 ‘ You can read in the morning/ she returned sullenly. 
 
 ‘ When I am seeing patients P ’ 
 
 ‘ The evening is mine. You should not neglect me as you do/ 
 she said. 
 
 ‘ Neglect you, dear P I do not neglect you, lone ! ’ 
 
 He spoke tenderly, and with that remonstrance against sup- 
 posed coldness which means more than assertion. 
 
 ‘ Yes/ she said, ‘ you do. You no longer love me, Armine !— 
 you no longer care for me — I who have loved you so much ! ? 
 
AFTERNOOX TEA . 
 
 227 
 
 Sbe spoke at random, not believing* her own words, but the 
 mere thought was too much for her. Were it true it would be 
 her death-warrant. 
 
 Overcome by the passion of her fancy, she flung herself at liis 
 feet, and, laying her head on his knees, as she crouched like some 
 imploring suppliant before him, she burst into a flood of tears. 
 For the moment she had no rights ; she had only sorrows. 
 
 ( If you do not love me, Armine, I shall die ! ’ she sobbed. 
 
 He put his arms round her, his face deadly white, his lips 
 drawn and quivering. 
 
 i Foolish child ! ’ he said ; ‘ you know that I love you. Why 
 do you make yourself and me unhappy for a mere fancy? ’ 
 
 i Say it again, Armine ! say it again ! ’ she said, lifting up her 
 face, tear-stained and disordered, but as divine as the Medusa’s in 
 her agony, as full of love as Semele’s in the moment of her prayer. 
 ‘ I am so wretched — so heart-broken — tell me that you love me, 
 darling — again ! again ! ’ 
 
 ‘ You know that I love you ! ’ he repeated in a steady voice ; 
 and lone, seizing his hands, kissed them till they burnt like fire 
 under her lips. 
 
 ‘ My life ! my love ! ’ she said, her glorious eyes shining 
 through their tears with that light which once before had almost 
 blinded him. 1 Your love is all my life — all I care for in this 
 world or the next ! Without it I should die ! Must I die, 
 Armine ? ’ she added in a caressing tone, her voice modulated to 
 the sweetest music as she raised one hand and bent his face down 
 to hers. 
 
 i No ; live, poor child ! ’ he answered, laying his hand over her 
 eyes to shut them from his sight; saying to himself: 6 Would to 
 God that I did not ! 9 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 HER HUSBAND’S PRIEND. 
 
 Bachelor’s parties are notoriously charming, and Edward 
 Formby’s were the most charming of their kind. It was always 
 an earnest of pleasant hours set in a golden circlet of generous 
 hospitality when those clumsily written, rudely folded notes were 
 sent out, and a luncheon or a dinner at Hillside was offered to the 
 neighbourhood. The men felt freer there than at places where 
 there was a lady to keep the reins tight, sniffing disdainfully at 
 cigar ash, and measuring the after-dinner magnums as vices to be 
 deprecated even when perforce allowed. And the women amused 
 themselves by examining everything within their range, and 
 noting the difference between their host’s management and their 
 
22o 
 
 JONE. 
 
 own. And as mixed with this curiosity was always a dash of 
 pity for the poor young man’s loneliness and certain discomfort — 
 his bad treatment by his servants, who of course got their will of 
 him in all directions, and plucked him bare to feather their own 
 nests well — they enjoyed themselves immensely; personally 
 profiting by his un-wived condition, while saying how much 
 better everything would be were there but a lady like one of 
 themselves at the head of affairs. 
 
 Hence when, two days after the meeting of forces at the 
 Dower House, notes of invitation to a luncheon party at Hillside 
 fell on about twenty of what Mrs. Barrington called the nice 
 people, those who accepted at all accepted with alacrity, feeling 
 sure that the fates were preparing for them a day which, if it did 
 not count as so much solid substance in their life’s happiness, 
 would at least take rank as a very well-flavoured social sweet- 
 meat. 
 
 Mrs. Barrington had invited the nice people to meet the St. 
 Claires at afternoon tea : — Edward Formby threw beyond her cast 
 into the enlarged domain of luncheon. It was a repetition of the 
 time when he had made the handsome young doctor, newly 
 settled in the place, one with the male aristoi round about. But 
 what he had done then with good-will he did now with en- 
 thusiasm of a rather more intense kind than he acknowledged 
 to himself. Spurred on by this enthusiasm for the sacred rights of 
 women, as represented by lone, and the holy cause of social 
 equality, as embodied in lone's husband, he made the young bride 
 the chief lady of the occasion, and took her into luncheon before 
 even the Dowager Lady Hinton, who was naturally the queen 
 regnant of the district. It was a rash thing to do ; but Edward 
 was not one to measure the width of the leap when he had made 
 up his mind to take it. And he had made up his mind to treat 
 Mrs. St. Claire, the portionless bride of the local practitioner, as 
 if she had been a direct descendant from the Plantagenets and 
 the owner of half the manors in the place. He did not reflect 
 that he might do her more harm than good by his chivalry. He 
 only thought how best to emphasise his admiration for the pretty 
 woman who had come among them like a being from another 
 sphere, and how to hold her with most determination shoulder- 
 high above every one else. 
 
 The Honourable Mrs. Tanner and the Dowager Lady Hinton 
 whispered together ; and they and all the other well-born matrons 
 exchanged looks which were more eloquent than words. They 
 were deeply affronted ; even though Edward Formby was such a 
 dear boy, and Hillside would be such a charming home for Julia 
 or Mabel, Maud or Mary— Monica Barrington showing no haste 
 to make it her own. But lone, the cause of their displeasure, 
 was no whit moved. She took this attention, as she took all 
 
IIER HUSBAND'S FRIEND . 
 
 229 
 
 others paid her, as hers by right ; just as Armine had done in his 
 bachelor days when he lived with the first set and was ranked 
 with the second. It made the other ladies even more angry with 
 her than with Edward, to see her walk in on his arm as proudly 
 in one way and as unconcernedly in another as if she had been 
 one of themselves. When great people patronise little ones, the 
 least they expect is the gratitude of humility in return. And this 
 new girl, this country doctor's wife, was evidently neither grateful 
 nor humble. 
 
 In pairing off his guests, Edward, without thought or know- 
 ledge of any kind, gave Monica to Armine, as he would have given 
 his sister to lone's husband, for better emphasis and declaration. 
 
 What need have we of ghosts to glide about the battlements 
 and haunt the dim chambers of the castle ? We carry our own 
 with us, and have no room for others. The ghosts of murdered 
 love, of withered joys, of strangled hopes, of dead beliefs— we 
 have them incorporate with the very substance of our life. They 
 lie in our bosom and pulsate in our heart *, their sighs are in our 
 breath, their tears are in our blood ; and when we smile, they 
 whisper to us softly, like the cadence of a funeral hymn beating 
 up the valley against the joy -bells. No day dawns without their 
 pale faces meeting ours as we look towards the sun, and the night 
 never comes when we can lay them down to rest before us. The 
 shadows of the past lie over the present and its ghosts live with 
 us, so that we sometimes do not know which is true and which is 
 fancy — that burning life of the long ago, or this pallid death of 
 to-day. 
 
 Those two young people sitting there, apparently living and 
 solid as the rest, were in reality as shadowy, one to the other, as 
 the souls of the dead meeting mournfully in Hades. Between 
 them lay that terrible gulf which nothing now could bridge over. 
 They must not even look at each other across it. They must not 
 consciously remember that it existed at all. It were a sin even 
 to recognise it. Does a woman ever consciously remember that 
 such a gulf exists between herself and a beloved brother P As 
 little then must they — these two who had loved — and who now 
 must ignore and forget. 
 
 Strong in her purity and patience, Monica could bear with a 
 sad kind of equanimity this ordeal born of the new order of 
 things. She looked at lone, measured her beauty and that 
 strange charm which stung while it attracted, and felt herself 
 distant beyond the reach of jealousy. It was to have been ex- 
 pected. She was too beautiful to resist. 
 
 On his side, Armine looked from lone to Monica, thinking how 
 far superior the pearly purity of this latter was to his young wife’# 
 golden glory. For a painter’s model, lone — for the charm of lift* 
 and the holiness of thought, then Monica ! 
 
230 
 
 10 EE. 
 
 Opposite to them sat Theodosia, her herd of invisible thoughts 
 always trotting restlessly through her small head. But save the 
 excessive pallor of Armine, and the rather more than natural 
 quietness of Monica, she saw nothing that could enlighten her; 
 and the luncheon passed decorously, as luncheons generally do. 
 Only once, when Monica said, 6 How very lovely Mrs. St. Claire 
 looks to day ! ’ Armine’s pale face changed colour, and some- 
 thing, which the little woman watching so sharply could not read, 
 came into his eyes. He v» r as too loyal to disclaim the praise 
 which was lone’s due. But he longed to he able to say, 4 Her 
 beaut} 7 is my bane — her love is my torture ! ’ 
 
 As he could not say this, he merely answered as any other 
 husband would : 1 You are very kind to say so. I think she is 
 looking well to-day.’ 
 
 And this trivial reply w^as the most painful thing of the whole 
 of this bitter-sw r eet time, so full of pain and pleasure as it was. 
 
 Conversation between these tw 7 o, so closely united and so 
 widely separated, was dilhcult and hedged round with thorns and 
 briars. When Monica asked about Italy, each remembered the 
 reason for Armine’s going, which made the past a kind of chal- 
 lenge flung in the face of the present. When she spoke of lone, 
 she saw what it cost him to reply. She could not talk of herself, 
 for she had no facts to tell him and her feelings she must conceal ; 
 nor could she question him of himself for the same reason. Hence 
 their talk was spasmodic and unsatisfactory, and as subdued as 
 the whispers of those who w r alk among graves, fearful lest too 
 loud a voice should waken the dead. They were like tw*o thirsty 
 deer, lapping at the stones of a dried watercourse where the living 
 fount was guarded by lions. Yet Monica believed that of course 
 Armine no longer loved her, having married lone ; and Armine 
 believed that of course Monica no longer respected him, seeing 
 how false he had been both to himself and to her. And yet, each 
 felt that it would not be well to go too deep into analysis. 
 
 At the head of the broad table, where lone sat by Edw r ard 
 Foimby, conversation w r as far brisker than it w r as here betw r een 
 these two, who had so much to tell and so little to say. He 
 asked her all sorts of questions about herself, and was as much 
 interested in her habits as if he had it at heart to harmonize them 
 with his own. He was really quite pained when she told him 
 that she had never been on horseback in her life, at least not as 
 English people count being on horseback : that she could not play 
 lawn-tennis ; knew nothing of the laws of cricket ; could not tell 
 a foxhound from a harrier, though she did understand a Maltese 
 from a pug; but he brightened up considerably when she said that 
 she could swim, and that she regretted her ignorance of those 
 other accomplishments, and wished she could redeem the lost 
 time. 
 
HER HUSBAND'S FRIEND . 
 
 231 
 
 ‘ I will lend }'ou a horse/ lie then said, with a joyous look and 
 blithe intonation. ‘ I have the jolliest little mare that will carry 
 you like a bird. Every Englishwoman ought to know how to 
 ride, and you will soon have a perfect seat. You are just the 
 kind for it.’ 
 
 ‘ Thank you/ said lone, with a rapid glance at Theodosia. 
 
 Edward followed her eyes. He laughed aloud. 
 
 ‘ You are not to be frightened by a little gossip ? ’ he said in an 
 under- voice. ‘ If you are, you may live all your life in fear at 
 Oakhurst.’ 
 
 ‘ I am afraid of nothing/ said lone, throwing up her head and 
 making the Italian sound of disdain. 
 
 ‘ So I should have thought/ he said with admiration. 
 
 She looked at him with a slight smile. 
 
 ‘ Except of brigands in a lonely wood/ she said prettily. 
 
 ‘ By George, yes! that is quite allowable ! ’ he cried, laughing. 
 ‘Then when will you come for your first ride? ’ he asked. ‘No 
 time like the present for fixing things.’ 
 
 Something crossed lone’s mood. A sudden blush of pleasure 
 mingled with doubt flashed over her face, but did not linger there, 
 and she looked at her husband as if seeking for direction. He was 
 looking at Monica, and the magnetic power of those glorious eyes 
 failed to attract his attention. Angry that he did not return her 
 look, lone said abruptly to her host ; ‘You are quite right, Mr. 
 Formby. Come to-morrow. If I am to learn at all I might as 
 well begin to-morrow.’ 
 
 She spoke rather loudly, her voice vibrating like metal rods, 
 as it did when she was displeased. 
 
 ‘ Quite too utterly delighted,’ laughed Edward, charmed by 
 her ready acquiescence and meaning no evil in the arrangement — 
 sower of wild oats though he was, with a few handfuls still left 
 in the sack. Those healthy, headstrong, non-introspective people 
 never mean evil. They do it all the same ; but they rush into it 
 without foresight, as one running swiftly down a mountain side 
 rushes over the precipice, unable to pull up in time and not know- 
 ing where he is going. 
 
 ‘ But how about the habit P ’ then said Edward. ‘ If you have 
 not been accustomed to ride you have no hat or habit! ’ 
 
 His handsome, ruddy face, which was so like a faun’s, looked as 
 pained as if he had encountered a real sorrow. A proper hat and 
 well-fitting habit were as much among the things which were de 
 rigueur with ladies as gloves in a ball-room. 
 
 ‘ Cannot I make a shawl do duty for a skirt ? ’ asked lone, 
 with recollections of the mules at Segestae. 
 
 ‘ Oh no, that is impossible ! ’ he answered, really shocked by 
 the' suggestion. ‘We must do better than that. I’ll tell you 
 what we can do. Monica Barrington will lend you hers till you 
 
232 
 
 IONE. 
 
 get your own made. It may not be quite a fit, but it will do at a 
 pinch/ 
 
 4 I do not like borrowing,’ said lone proudly. 
 
 4 Just this once. It does not signify borrowing from Monica. 
 She is such a capital girl ! And no one need mind what she does 
 for them. Besides it is not like anything else. Hats and habits 
 are not necessaries where there have been no horses.’ 
 
 4 No,’ said lone sagely. 
 
 ‘Then I have settled all that first-r^te!’ cried Edward, as 
 joyously as if he had found a prize. 4 We will speak to Monica 
 and get the thing arranged.’ 
 
 So it was all set square between them; and lone consented to 
 borrow Monicas hat and habit, difference of fit notwithstanding, 
 and to take her first ride to-morrow on Edward Formby’s dainty, 
 clever, and sure-footed little mare which was just made to carry her. 
 But if Armine had looked at her when she had looked at him, 
 perhaps she would have put the subject by and have refused her 
 consent to the whole thing. 
 
 "When they went back into the drawing-room, lone, beckoning 
 to her husband, strolled away into the conservatory into which 
 the room opened. She must have a moment alone with him ! 
 Under the cover of the ferns and flowers she must make him feel 
 the vitality of her passion and return the loving caress of her eyes ! 
 She should die else ! she should suffocate ! Dear Armine ! — sweet, 
 precious, darling Armine — how she loved him ! 
 
 A bird was singing loudly in a cage hung up among the 
 passion-flowers which covered the supporting pillars. It was a 
 canary, of the same kind as that which lone had killed at Palermo. 
 
 4 How like poor Mimi ! ’ she said, stopping before the cage. 
 4 Poor pretty faithless little Mimi ! ’ 
 
 Armine was not specially delighted by the reminiscence. 
 
 4 Yes,’ he said gravely. 4 Poor little Mimi ! ’ 
 
 4 Inconstant little wretch ! ’ said lone with sudden bitterness. 
 4 He deserved it ! ’ 
 
 4 Do you think so P ’ said Armine, still grave, and speaking a 
 little wearily. 
 
 Edward Formby came up to them at that moment. They 
 were standing by the cage, Armine looking at the bird, lone 
 looking at Armine. 
 
 4 Are you admiring my bird P ’ he said, in his hearty un- 
 conscious way. 4 Is he not a stunning little chap ? He can do 
 all sorts of things ; sham dead, hop lame, and obey the word of 
 command like a trick horse or a trained dog. He is the j oiliest 
 little brute ! Here, Jack, Jack! come out, my boy, and show 
 yourself,’ he added, opening the door of the cage and putting in 
 his hand, on which the bird hopped, chirping and fluttering" his 
 wings, pleased to be taken notice of by his master. 
 
HER HUSBAND'S FRIEND . 233 
 
 After lie had been put through his paces, as Edward called it, 
 lone held out her hand. 
 
 4 I wonder if he will come to me P ’ she said, speaking to the 
 bird in its own language. It looked at her curiously, chirped to 
 its master, then flew on to her hand, and fluttered its wings as it 
 had done before. 
 
 Edward laughed and looked greatly pleased. 
 
 4 He is not generally so sociable,’ he said. ‘I never saw him 
 do that before. Jolly little beast ! He knows his friends, you 
 see ! ’ 
 
 4 I should not like him to go to anyone else if he were mine,’ 
 said lone. 
 
 4 No ? why not P 9 answered Edward with surprise. 4 I am 
 very glad that he likes you. It shows his good taste.’ 
 
 4 Mr. Formhy is more amiable than I am, is he not, Armine ? ’ 
 lone said hardily, laying her disengaged hand on her husband’s 
 shoulder. 
 
 4 Is he ? 9 returned Armine. 
 
 He knew quite well what she meant ; hut he was in an un- 
 amiahle mood at this moment. It was seldom that he felt so 
 peevish as he did now. If only he could check lone's excessive 
 love — repress her demonstrations — he should hold it for such 
 unspeakable relief ! If only she would forget him for a moment 
 and let him forget her ! 
 
 4 You know what I mean, do you not ? 9 returned lone ; 4 shar- 
 ing the affections of his bird. Mr. Formby is more amiable in this 
 than I am, is he not ? ’ 
 
 Still caressing the bird, she looked at her husband from under 
 her level brows, with that look which was at once a challenge and 
 a menace. 
 
 4 1 suppose I must confess that he is,’ answered Armine, with a 
 smile as unsympathetic as his gravity had been. 
 
 4 1 would do it again,’ said lone hastily. 4 1 would do it to 
 anything that left me for anyone else. Anything — anyone,’ 
 she repeated with emphasis, no longer kept in bounds by Edward’s 
 presence, seeing that he had been taken off by Lady Hinton, who 
 had come on the scene to see what was going on and to assert her 
 own claims to consideration. 
 
 4 Would you?’ said Armine, half carelessly, half kindly. ‘I 
 scarcely think you are so bad as you wish to appear, lone. I do 
 not believe you would.’ 
 
 Extremes meet. Love, as imperious as lone’s, is satisfied with 
 as little as that which suffices for the craven and humble. It is 
 so vigorous, so large, so self-sustaining, so magnifying, that it 
 nourishes itself on the smallest amount of food from without — 
 just as the craven asks only the mere permission to exist. She 
 caught the implied praise in her husband’s words ; and as the grey 
 
10NE. 
 
 234 
 
 mountain peak is turned to ruddy bronze by tbe first ray of sun- 
 rise, so did Armine's words transform her whole being. The 
 angry passions which had begun to dominate her were loosened ; 
 the very outlines of her face were softened ; the burning light in 
 her eyes was quenched ; her heart was filled with joy ; her whole 
 soul felt satisfied, soothed, released. 
 
 s Then you do not think I am bad all through, Armine ? ’ she 
 said tenderly, looking into his face with eyes which caressed him 
 as her lips would have done had not old Lady Hinton been peer- 
 ing at them through the ferns. 
 
 ‘ Not bad at all, dear/ he answered softly. 
 
 But he did not return her eloquent look. He was watching a 
 fly that had become caught in a dionea. 
 
 ‘ At least I am not bad to you, my own darling, my beloved ! 9 
 she said, her voice lowered to a whisper as she bent towards him 
 with a movement full of indescribable tenderness and grace, and 
 laid her hand caressingly on his. 
 
 Armine’s pale face blushed, but not with pleasure. Lady Hinton, 
 watching them through the ferns, smiled sarcastically, and said in 
 an audible whisper to Edward Formby : ‘ What an extraordinary 
 young woman ! ’ while Edward’s bronzed cheeks grew pale, and 
 his hands shook as if with fever ; and then, others of the guests 
 sauntering in, they all went on through the greenhouse into the 
 garden, and so to the hothouse which made part of the attraction 
 at Hillside. 
 
 Suddenly lone gave a little cry. It expressed that kind of 
 emotion born of surprise which is as much pain as pleasure. 
 
 ‘ We have this all over our house at home — at Palermo ! 9 
 she said, pointing to a bougainvillea, which the Hillside cultivator 
 had reared with trouble and regarded with pride. ‘ And this ! 9 
 of a datura ; ‘ and these again ! ’ bending over an Arabian jasmine 
 side by side with a tuberose. 
 
 When she lifted up her face tears were in her eyes. She was 
 astonished at herself. A week ago she would not have believed 
 that anything reminding her of Palermo could have brought tears 
 to her eyes. But to-day she felt strangely moved ; she did not 
 know why. It was almost as if she were unhappy. Yet how 
 could she be unhappy ? Her husband was absolutely perfect ; 
 nevertheless she was dissatisfied and uneasy. 
 
 And all for nothing! She knew that he loved her just as 
 much as she loved him ; and that was more than life itself. But 
 he was not so demonstrative as she was ; and before people he was 
 decidedly cold. She must accustom herself to this, unpleasant as 
 it was. It was English ; and she loved England. Still, these two 
 experiences of society at Oakhurst had not added to her happiness, 
 if they had gratified her pride. She was happier at home with 
 Armine’s dear head on her lap, when she could show him her love 
 
HER HUSBAND'S FRIEND. 
 
 235 
 
 in all its fervour and receive as much as she gave. She hated 
 these restraints ! Her whole life bad been one of restraint. Now, 
 when she had the liberty of expansion, she regretted to lose it 
 even for a few hours. 
 
 Which did not quite explain the reason why her beautiful eyes 
 were dark and humid because she saw a few pots full of flowers 
 which reminded her of Palermo, where she had been so wretched, 
 and whence flight had secured her joy. 
 
 While they were still in the hothouse, a servant came with a 
 message to St. Claire. He had been sent for to the mines, a good 
 seven miles away, to an accident which brooked of no delay. The 
 mines led away from Oakhurst still farther into the country than 
 Hillside, so that he could not take lone back with him on the 
 way ; and he must set off at once. 
 
 ‘ But how am I to get home? ’ asked lone hastily. 
 
 She was always offended when the claims of her husband’s 
 profession clashed with her own, and could never be brought to 
 understand that her rights were second to those of the sick. 
 
 6 1 am sorry, but I must go at once — I cannot help you/ said 
 Armine. 
 
 ‘ What a pity I did not have the carriage ! ’ said Monica. 
 6 We came in the victoria, Theo and I. Anthony is riding. I 
 wish I could give you a seat, Mrs. St. Claire, but Theo’s victoria 
 has no third place.’ 
 
 ‘Thank you, I do not wish a place in Mrs. Barrington’s 
 carriage/ said lone ungraciously. 
 
 ‘ Lon’t make yourself uneasy/ said Edward. ‘ I will see to 
 all that. Mrs. St. Claire will be quite safe in my hands/ he 
 added, turning to Armine; ‘I will take good care of her and 
 land her safe. So don’t worry, my good fellow. It will be all 
 right.’ 
 
 6 It is not very pleasant to be left here like a parcel to be 
 delivered at my own home/ said lone, with a smile too bitter for 
 playfulness. 
 
 ‘I cannot help myself/ said Armine. ‘ I must go now at once. 
 Thank you, Formby, you are very good. I put my wife in your 
 hands, and I am sure you will take care of her. Good-morning. 
 Good-bye, lone. Good-bye, Miss Barrington.’ 
 
 He held out his hand to Monica, and to her only, and he 
 looked at her the last of all to whom he bade adieu. ' Then, with 
 an effort, as if he remembered himself in time, he turned to lone 
 and forced himself to smile; and so passed away, carrying his 
 young wife’s sunshine, with him— that sunshine which cast over 
 him so deep a shadow. 
 
 When the party broke up in due course, lone was naturally 
 left the last of the guests. Edward, however, had had his dogcart 
 brought round with the rest, and he and lone were seated therein, 
 
IONE. 
 
 236 
 
 side by side, before old Lady Hinton and tbe other matrons of 
 pride and place had left the grounds. Still, there was a look of 
 intimacy and assignment about the whole thing which the 
 dowagers noted with as much displeasure as they had noted the 
 fact of lone’s supremacy at luncheon. Patronage was one thing, 
 equality another. Tbe one might pass; the other was inadmis- 
 sible ; and Edward Formby had to receive a lesson which each one 
 concerned made up her mind she would be the first to give him. 
 
 This sudden diversion of thought and plan made both Edward 
 and lone forget all about that hat and habit which she was to 
 have borrowed from Monica Barrington for the sake of those 
 riding-lessons which he was to give her so generously. lie 
 remembered it as he was driving her home, and proposed to go 
 round by the Dower House to make the demand. But lone 
 peremptorily refused to do this, and said : No ; she would wait 
 now until she had a hat and habit of her own. It was not in her 
 way to borrow, and she would not, even of this extremely 
 popular and good-natured Miss Monica Barrington — said with a 
 sarcastic inflection of her voice which rather startled unsuspicious 
 Edward Formby. 
 
 4 You do not know what to order,’ he answered. /If you 
 
 will not ask Monica, you must let me speak to Wilson. He is a 
 
 capital habit-maker when directed ; but he must be kept up to the 
 mark. I know what you want, and you do not.’ 
 
 ‘ Thank you ; yes ; do speak to him,’ said lone, forgetting the 
 shallow water in whmh the domestic bark floated, if indeed it could 
 be called floating at all. 4 If I am to have it, I might as well have 
 
 it perfect ; and, as you say, I do not know the mysteries and 
 
 should not understand what to order.’ 
 
 So there the matter stood. Those riding lessons were to be 
 taken ; the clever mare was to be put in requisition ; and lone’s 
 hat and habit were to be ordered under the direction of Edward 
 Formby of Hillside. He knew what would suit her and what 
 she ought to have. And he was her husband’s sincere friend. 
 Yes, quite true ; he was this and more. Nevertheless, friend to 
 Armine as he was, he felt that lone was far too good both for her 
 husband and her present position — that a man of St. Claire’s weak 
 health and slender income was not worthy of her ; that her social 
 standing was infinitely below her personal deserts ; and that she 
 ought to have married some strong, healthy, w^ell-endowed country 
 gentleman, with a stake in the county and a family-tree of deep 
 roots and well-seasoned branches — a man who would have carried 
 her on the crest of the wave and given her a home such as she 
 deserved— like Hillside, for instance. 
 
THE FIRST STRUGGLE . 
 
 237 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 THE PI It ST STRUGGLE. 
 
 * Armine, I am going to take riding-lessons/ said lone in a some- 
 what more cold and queenly than her usual loving manner. 
 
 A slight change had come over her of* late, damping down the 
 extreme fervour of her love, as that filmy mist, the offspring of 
 heat and precursor of storm, veils the glare of a cloudless sky. 
 There was no positive cloud in the sky of her love, but there was 
 undoubtedly a dim and misty kind of obscuration which neither 
 she nor her husband confessed. Whether confessed or not, it was 
 there ; — torture to her if to him — and herein lay the sorrow of the 
 whole thing — both restful and refreshing, like silence after tur- 
 moil and freedom after oppression. 
 
 ‘I should be very glad if you could,’ was his reply to her 
 announcement. 
 
 ‘ I did not say if I could; I said I am going to,’ returned lone. 
 
 * Yes P But from whom P IIow is it to be managed P ’ he 
 asked, looking at her in some surprise. 
 
 6 Your friend, Mr. Formbv, will lend me a horse,’ she said. 
 
 ‘ And after ? When the horse is lent, who is to teach you, and 
 who will ride with you P You see I have so little leisure ! ’ said 
 Armine, with the denseness of a man whose imagination is not 
 quickened by the jealous fears of love. 
 
 i Mr. Formby will both teach me and ride with me,’ said lone, 
 as if she had said something commonplace and nothing startling. 
 
 ‘ Edward Formby ! ’ 
 
 i And why not, pray ? ’ 
 
 The young husband of the beautiful bride looked grave. 
 
 6 Surely you are not going to be silly, Armine ! ’ said lone, with 
 unmistakable irritation. 6 You never take me with you. I am 
 left to myself all day long — all day long. You cannot object to 
 my amusing myself in the best way I can. And I shall not mind 
 if you do,’ she added unpleasantly. 
 
 ‘ I do not object to your amusing yourself, lone. I often think, 
 indeed, how dull and lonely your life must be, my poor child,’ 
 answered Armine kindly. ‘ But, you see, there are one or two 
 things to be thought of in this besides the mere pleasure.’ 
 
 i Indeed ? What are they P ’ she asked with indifference. 
 
 ‘ Well, you see, you are very young and very beautiful, lone ’ 
 — the set proud face did not relax by a line ; a week ago it would 
 have brightened into more than ordinary radiance with pleasure at 
 the compliment — ‘ and Edward Formby is a young unmarried man, 
 
IONE. 
 
 238 
 
 and not some steady old stager who would be like your father. 
 And English people are strict ; and I really do not think it would 
 quite do.’ 
 
 4 Part of that objection is an insult, and the other part foolish/ 
 said lone. 
 
 4 It is impossible to defy public opinion/ cried Armine. 
 
 4 I intend to try/ she said. ‘In Italy a married woman is free 
 to do what she likes— I am not going to be less free in England! ’ 
 
 4 You will ruin yourself and me/ Armine returned, less re- 
 proachfully than sorrowfully. 
 
 4 If you are silly enough to be ruined for such a trifle, I cannot 
 help it/ said lone. 6 But I mean to have my rights.’ 
 
 4 Do you count among those rights that of keeping a riding- 
 horse? — you, the wife of a poor professional man, in a small 
 country place like Oakhurst ? ’ asked Armine. 
 
 4 The horse will cost you nothing/ she answered. 4 It will 
 only be the riding-habit ; and this is not expensive.’ 
 
 4 No ? I always thought that riding-habits were expensive/ 
 said her husband briskly, glad of the extra leverage which she 
 herself had suggested. 4 In fact I know they are ; and, dear lone, 
 I fear 1 cannot afford the outlay. You may be sure it grieves me 
 to say this, but I cannot.’ 
 
 4 It seems to me you never can afford anything for me,’ said 
 lone bitterly. 4 You contrive to get all you want for yourself. It 
 is only when I want anything that you are suddenly so desperately 
 poor ! ’ 
 
 4 Is that quite fair ? ’ he asked. 
 
 4 Fair or not, it is true/ she said. 
 
 4 1 think not, lone, Poor as I am, I think I share equally with 
 you all that can be afforded.’ 
 
 4 And I do not/ said lone. 
 
 4 1 told you beforehand that, as my wife, you would be subject 
 to all manner of privations/ said Armine, with a touching little 
 accent of regret — almost of apology. 4 1 have always dreaded the 
 moment when you would realise the bitter truth, and when it 
 would press on you heavily, as it does now.’ 
 
 4 1 do not mind it in great things/ she returned. 4 1 did not 
 expect to keep a carriage and men-servants, because you told me I 
 should not ; but I did not expect you would grudge me every little 
 thing as you do.’ 
 
 4 1 grudge you nothing, lone, that I can afford/ he interposed 
 warmly. 
 
 4 And you might certainly let me profit by the kindness of 
 others, without making this absurd and perfectly useless fuss/ 
 continued lone. 4 You neglect me so much yourself, it is not 
 right to object to anyone else being kind to me.’ 
 
 4 1 neglect you no more than my business obliges me to do ; 
 
THE FIRST STRUGGLE. 
 
 239 
 
 and I am delighted when others are kind to you. Yon know that 
 as well as I do. But in this matter — the expense is beyond my 
 means for the first part, and I am honestly afraid of what the 
 world will say for the second.’ 
 
 ‘ I have told you already — I do not believe the one, and the 
 other is an insult,’ said lone. 
 
 ‘ Believe it or not as you will,’ he said firmly, ‘ it is true. I 
 cannot afford it ; and I will not run into debt.’ 
 
 6 But, Dio mio ! I must have clothes ! ’ cried lone scornfully. 
 * Am I never to have a new dress, Armine ? ’ 
 
 ‘ I suppose you must when wanted,’ he said. 1 But there is 
 dress and dress ; and riding-habits cost more than gowns.’ 
 
 ‘ Certainly they do not ! ’ was the reply, made very positively. 
 ‘ That is nonsense. How can they, when they take so little stuff 
 and have no trimming P And then they last so long and save the 
 others. In fact a riding-habit is economy. If you think for your- 
 self you will see it must be so,’ she said, in that triumphant q. e. d . 
 manner of those who are convinced with their will. 
 
 6 Dear lone, you know that it goes to my heart to deny you 
 anything — to thwart you in any way,’ said Armine gently. He 
 was really sorry for her, and he spoke the truth when he said that 
 it pained him to deny her or to thwart her. Not able to love her 
 as she loved him, he did honestly try to make up for his com- 
 parative deadness by complaisance and indulgence. ‘ But what 
 can I do ? ’ he added. ‘ I will not get into debt, even for you, 
 dear’ — smiling a little sadly — ‘and my income is so miserably 
 small ! ’ 
 
 ‘ And what am I to do ? ’ retorted lone. 1 1 cannot tell Mr. 
 Formby that I am too poor to afford myself such a trifle as a hat 
 and habit ! It would be too humiliating — too disgracefully mean 
 and shabby ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Ah, child ! 9 he said sorrowfully ; ‘ you are beginning now to 
 feel the pinch ! 9 
 
 ‘You are making the pinch, as you call it, yourself,’ she 
 answered, lifting her chin disdainfully. 
 
 ‘ Poor girl ! ’ he said gently. 
 
 € I do not want your pity ! ’ said lone, with a gesture as if she 
 flung off something distasteful. 
 
 It was strange how her imperiousness kept pace with his 
 greater mildness. Loving him as she did, it might have been 
 thought that his will would have been her pleasure, and that she 
 would have responded to the faintest show of tenderness in him as 
 an iEolian harp responds to the lowest sighings of the wind. And 
 yet, the thing, when fairly considered, was explicable enough. It 
 was not his love for her that had won her — it was her passion for 
 him that had possessed her from the beginning until now. She 
 had loved him of her own free-will, not because of his prayer; she 
 
240 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 had given, not yielded ; and now when she was secretly sore 
 because of his secret coldness, and openly irritated by his avowed 
 opposition, she was not to be mollified by mere gentleness of 
 manner. Gentleness is not tenderness; and love recognises the 
 difference. 
 
 ‘ I am sorry you take me in this spirit,’ said Armine, always 
 grave and quiet, but with, for him, unwonted firmness. ‘ Believe 
 me, I am grieved to oppose your wish — to deny you any pleasure 
 possible in this dull place.’ 
 
 ‘ Your being grieved does me no good,’ replied lone con- 
 temptuously. ‘ You do not remember the disgraceful position 
 you put me in with Mr. Formby. You neither remember nor 
 care.’ 
 
 ‘ I will manage that,’ said Armine. ‘ 1 have no shame in 
 confessing that I am poor. Debt is the disgrace to my mind, not 
 self-denial: and to get what one cannot pay for, and cannot 
 honestly afford, is surely less noble than to say frankly one has 
 not enough money for such and such an outlay.’ 
 
 ‘It is all very well for you to be so pliilosodhical about it,’ 
 retorted lone. ‘ You have everything you want or have ever 
 been accustomed to. It is only I who have to suffer ; and after 
 such a different life as I led at Palermo it is hard on me ! But 
 what do you care? Nothing! So long as you enjoy yourself, 
 and have your own way, you do not give me a thought ! ’ 
 
 ‘ You are unjust ! ’ said Armine, suddenly roused and strangely 
 moved. ‘ When you have come back to your better self, you 
 will be the first to acknowledge the wrong that you have done 
 me.’ 
 
 He got up as he said this, and went out of the room, leaving 
 lone more resolute than before, and with the same kind of Ishmael- 
 itish feeling that she used to have at Palermo when denied what 
 she desired and held it her right to have. 
 
 In this first serious contest between them she was determined 
 to win the day. She had taken to heart that fatal resolve, 
 cherished by so many young wives, not to give way. It was due 
 to herself, to her present dignity and future independence, to 
 maintain her ground and force her husband to abandon his. The 
 supremacy of woman was one of the assured facts of life to her ; 
 and the best beloved man among them all was, when it came to 
 practice, only a superior kind of hewer of wood and drawer of 
 water for his wife’s benefit. Even when figured like an Apollo — 
 as, for instance, this beloved and adored Armine — even then he 
 was no better than a petted slave to be coerced when he resisted, 
 rewarded with kisses for wages when he yielded, and commanded 
 always as a private is commanded by his captain — questioning or 
 disobedience ranking as a sin. If she gave way now, she thought, 
 she would have to be subordinate for ever. If she conquered 
 
THE FIRST STRUGGLE. 
 
 241 
 
 now, tlie reins would be in her hand, not his ; and her power 
 would be consolidated. No, she would not yield ; and he must, 
 lie must understand that she had married him because she loved 
 him, not because he had wanted her ; married him of her own 
 free will, not because of his insistence : married to ensure her 
 freedom, not to pass under another kind of bondage, even though 
 that were the sweet bondage of womanly love. No : she must 
 not and would not give way. That hat and habit represented her 
 rights, the charter of her liberties. She would take them as her 
 colours and conquer all along the line. 
 
 While she was thinking this, sitting with her hands crossed in 
 her lap, her eyes, with that fatal lurid light in them as in the old 
 disturbed days, fixed on the threadbare carpet, she heard the 
 street-door shut, and knew that her husband had left the house. 
 Had he returned to the room and spoken to her, however plea- 
 santly, she would have repelled him. But she was angry all the 
 same that he had left without coming to sue for peace and be 
 dhmissed with war. Arbitrary and jealous, proud and exacting, 
 passionate, unyielding, she was a difficult creature to manage 
 when her temper was roused. No reasoning had any effect on 
 her ; and kindness but hardened her still more. The only thing 
 to do with her was to leave her to tight her own wild beasts 
 undisturbed, and to work through her moods unhelped and 
 unhindered. It was the safer way ; and at least somewhat con- 
 fined the area. 
 
 While she was still sitting there, eating out her heart because 
 Armine had not come to wish her good-bye, and submit to those 
 vials of wrath which she wmuld have broken over his head, a 
 ring came to the door-bell, and Edward Formby was ushered into 
 the room — the innocent Mephistoplieles of this sullen and self- 
 tormented Gretchen. When he left, after about an hour’s stay, 
 the vffiole thing was arranged, and lone had agreed to do that 
 which her husband had forbidden, and to undertake wffiat he had 
 disallowed — Edward Formby not having a suspicion of the truer 
 >tate of the case. Like many rich people, he could not understand 
 small pecuniary impossibilities. That the St. Claires should not 
 be able to give a thousand pounds for a picture, or five hundred 
 for a yacht — that was within reason and the range of his com- 
 prehension ; but that a thing of the first necessity, like a riding- 
 habit, should be beyond their lawful range of expenditure — that 
 was simply incredible. Not for a moment did it occur to him 
 that this had been a bone of contention between these tw r o young 
 people, or that Armine had forbidden lone what seemed to the 
 master of Hillside as much a matter of course as bread or meat, 
 or shoes or gloves. 
 
 Had she confided in him, he would have thought St. Claire 
 both mean and tyrannical, and he would have offered to reason 
 
 R 
 
242 
 
 10NE. 
 
 with him and to manage him for her benefit. And liad she then, 
 as she would have done, passionately refused his advocacy, or 
 declared that she would not accept anyone’s influence if her own 
 had failed, he would have laughed, as his prototype the faun 
 would have laughed in the woods, had a dryad refused his offering 
 of milk and honey because she did not like the carved pattern of 
 the beech-wood bowl in which it was presented. To Edward the 
 main thing in life was to do as you liked and get what you wanted, 
 if you could without too great a strain on that elastic band called 
 conscience ; and to forego a good for silly pride was an imbecility 
 of which he could not conceive any sRne person guilty. And lone 
 was sane, and not imbecile. Hence he saw nothing and suspected 
 nothing ; and the arrangements were made and completed without 
 his touching the very outer edge of the truth, that all this was 
 without Armine’s knowledge and against his direct prohibition. 
 And when he left, he left lone dangerously radiant and disastrously 
 triumphant, and a worse woman than she was when he found 
 her. 
 
 She was all this in still greater measure when the habit came 
 home, fitting her like a dark-green skin, and making her figure 
 the most perfect thing of the kind to be found within the four 
 seas ; while the masculine hat set on the top of her golden curls 
 became her as no hat nor bonnet had ever done before. She 
 was superb, supreme, divine in her beauty; and as she stood 
 before the glass and looked at herself in her new attire, as she 
 might have looked at a stranger, she could not repress an exclama- 
 tion of joy at the perfection of her beauty, the absolute grace and 
 symmetry of her form. Eeally, with such a result it would have 
 been a sin not to have had a habit and a hat ! 
 
 Armine was sitting in his own room, writing down symptoms 
 and treatment of a difficult case, when Edward Formb} r , followed 
 by his groom leading a lady’s horse, halted at the door. At the 
 same moment lone came downstairs in the dress which had been 
 the cause of their first serious contention, and of which he had 
 heard nothing since the day of dispute. And as that filmy little 
 mist, already spoken of, had gone on steadily increasing and 
 deepening, with always the same quiet and voiceless coolness — so 
 refreshing to him, such torture to her — he had not stirred the still 
 waters, but had let them, and the sleeping dog about his feet, lie 
 unmolested. 
 
 ‘ Good-bye, Armine. I am going to ride with Mr. Formby/ 
 said lone, standing suddenly before him, pale with excitement, 
 conscious of her beauty, proud A’ nerself,her diplomacy, her resolu- 
 tion, and rejoicing in her victory. ‘ Do I not look well P ’ she 
 added hardily. ‘ Is not my habit beautiful ? ’ 
 
 ‘ I see no beauty in disobedience and recklessness/ said Armine 
 coldly. 
 
THE FIRST STRUGGLE. 
 
 243 
 
 ‘ You are not to be cross and disagreeable ! ’ was her rejoinder, 
 made playfully, caressingly. Having won so far, she could afford 
 to be both caressing and complaisant. ‘ I will give you a kiss if 
 you will wish me a pleasant ride. I do so long to learn to ride, 
 Armine ! Ah ! ’ she said, drawing a deep breath and straighten- 
 ing herself ; i if you only knew how delightful it is to me to feel 
 that I look like a lady, as I used — one with the rest and lifted out 
 of all this miserable poverty and wretchedness into which I have 
 sunk ! ’ 
 
 ‘ I am sorry for you, lone,’ said Armine, suddenly vanquished. 
 Any allusion to the poverty into which she had been brought 
 through her love for him always touched him deeply. It was her 
 surest hold over him. ‘ Sorry for you, and sorry for myself! 7 
 he added. 
 
 6 1 do not see why you should be sorry for yourself,’ she 
 answered, her sensitive pride in arms at his words. 6 Not many 
 men have such a wife as I am to you,’ she went on to say, her 
 nostrils quivering ; ‘ neither so loving — nor so worthy to be loved,’ 
 she added with frank self- appreciation. 
 
 1 No P Have I no reason to be sorry when my wife disobeys 
 me to my face ? ’ he replied, trying to speak playfully. 
 
 lone’s eyes blazed. 
 
 ‘ I cannot disobey you,’ she said proudly. 6 How can I disobey 
 when I own no authority ? ’ 
 
 6 Has a husband no authority, lone ? ’ 
 
 6 You ? over me P None ! ’ she said. ( You owe me obedience 
 if you like, because you owe me gratitude.’ 
 
 ‘ Gratitude for what ? for running me into debt ? ’ he asked, 
 still trying to speak playfully. 
 
 1 No, for loving you and marrying you,’ answered lone; and 
 Armine made no reply. ‘ However, I have no time to talk to you 
 now,’ she said hurriedly. 1 Mr. Formby has come for me ; but I 
 thought I would like to say good-bye to you and show you my 
 riding-habit, else I ought to be with him. He is at the door, so 
 come and speak to him, Armine. I cannot go out alone. It is 
 no use your being angry. It is done now and cannot be undone, 
 so you might as well make the best of it. Come ! ’ she added 
 peremptorily. 
 
 ‘ Very well,’ said Armine. 
 
 As she said, it was done now and could not be undone ; and 
 what was the good of spoiling the poor girl’s day of pleasure by 
 making himself disagreeable ? Sl§* had disobeyed him ; but, after 
 all, was her rebellion such a very heinous sin ? Her life was, in 
 truth, both dull and poverty-stricken, and it was only natural that 
 she should wish to take advantage of any enjoyment that might 
 come into it. And Edward Formby was a right good fellow, and 
 to be trusted with lone of all women in the world. Was he' not 
 
244 
 
 IOXE. 
 
 destined for Monica? And then Armine was young liimself, 
 hence tolerant of unwisdom in the cause of pleasure, and hopeful 
 of miracles when pay-day should come round. And lone had 
 married him to her own exceeding loss ; and that she should find 
 interest, amusement, occupation, in other things beside himself 
 was a relief, which he was ashamed to confess but which was 
 nevertheless true. 
 
 Wherefore he went out with her to the door ; and by the 
 time he got into the street he was philosophically reconciled to the 
 whole thing, and in no mood to cavil nor remonstrate. Really 
 it did not much signify after all! As life ran with him nothing 
 did signify so very much ! And at the worst it would soon all be 
 over — like a bad dream when the morning breaks. 
 
 Standing there in the full sunlight, in his shabby morning 
 coat and threadbare, hideous woolwork slippers — Maria Crosby’s 
 gift — a little untidy as a man is who has just been rubbing up his 
 liair while thinking over an anxious matter, who has not noticed 
 that his necktie has worked halfway round his throat, that liis 
 shirt is crumpled and frayed at the edges, and that one cuff is 
 unbuttoned at the wrist — this handsome but uncared-for young 
 fellow with his look of hopelessness and weariness, and letting 
 himself go, because there was no reason for keeping himself up, 
 made a decided contrast to his wife and friend. Edward, in all 
 the massive niceness of an opulent country gentleman’s riding 
 costume, and lone,' fresh and superbly beautiful in her well-fitting 
 dark-green habit, were the salt of society well matched together ; 
 while he, pale, uncared for, and disordered, suggested dissolution 
 and decay, and seemed to have no part in this solidity and sober 
 splendour. But it was only of late that he had had this look of 
 weariness and letting himself go. In olden days he was noted 
 for a delicate carefulness of dress which just stopped short of 
 foppery. 
 
 ‘ Take care of her,’ he said to Edward as he stood by the stirrup 
 of lone’s horse, the groom at the head. 
 
 Edward flushed oddly as he answered, rather hurriedly : 
 
 6 Of course ! You may trust me, St. Claire.’ 
 
 ‘ Don’t go too fast, lone,’ was Armine’s next exhortation as he 
 put her up and adjusted her skirt and stirrup. ‘ Remember this 
 is your first day ; so be prudent.’ 
 
 6 Of course ; when am I ever anything else ? ’ she laughed 
 back for answer. 
 
 Her husband smiled, and for an instant the vision of a tall 
 frirl walking slowly through the Villa Reale at Naples came 
 1 ke a living picture before his eyes. But he said nothing of this ; 
 he only looked up to the sky and said quietly : ‘ I think the day 
 will keep fair.’ 
 
 ‘ Dead sure/ echoed Edward, speaking as he wished. ‘ Come, 
 
THE FIRST STRUGGLE . 
 
 2^5 
 
 Mrs. St. Claire,’ he then said, a little impatiently; ‘if you are 
 ready we will start.’ 
 
 4 Yes, I am ready/ said lone, turning a beaming face to her 
 husband as she and lier escort went off at a slo,w walk down 
 the street. 
 
 ‘ Poor lone ! ’ said Armine, turning back out of the sunshine 
 and this picture of shining opulence into the dingy squalor of his 
 home. ‘ How I wish ’ 
 
 He did not say out to himself clearly what it was that he 
 wished. He only went again to his study, where he leaned back 
 in his chair, half dreaming and half thinking, but forgetting all 
 about his anxious case and its diagnosis, till recalled to himself by 
 the entrance of a patient — the ragged wife of a drunken day- 
 labourer, who came to him with a loathsome skin-affection, brought 
 on by poverty of food and unwholesome conditions of life gene- 
 rally. 
 
 What a sharp and bitter contrast the whole thing was ! 
 Edward Formby and himself — lone, the day’s companion cf the 
 one, proud and beautiful and looking as opulent as he, but the 
 wife for all time of one who was ground between the hard mill- 
 stones of poverty, and unable to extricate herself or assist him — 
 and all without fault of his ; he the sufferer by his poor father’s 
 misfortune, and the victim — yes, that was the only right word — 
 the victim of his own compassion and her unreasoning love! How 
 terrible it all was ! how terrible ! Should he mend matters were 
 he to end them ? And if he did, what would she feel, this poor, 
 proud, passionate lone ? — and Monica P 
 
 Midway in the village a small crowd of children and idlers had 
 assembled to witness the mount, and comment on what they saw. 
 A few sturdy urchins shouted, and a few dogs barked in concert; 
 and Miss Maria Crosby, from her coign of vantage at the window, 
 saw the whole proceeding. 
 
 ‘Rachel, come here!’ she cried. ‘Well, I never! What 
 next, I wonder ! Here is that hussy, dressed to the nines, riding 
 off with our Mr. Formby. It is downright scandalous, and the 
 neighbourhood should take notice of it ! How that foolish young 
 man can submit to it is more than I know ; and see how that 
 ne’er-do-well of a Formby watches her, as if she was made of 
 sugar and would melt in his mouth ! ’ 
 
 ‘ There is no great harm in it, aunt,’ said Rachel, moved partlv 
 by natural opposition to her tyrant, and partly b}^ that unspoken 
 something which she carried like a bird in her bosom — her poor 
 little life’s unshared secret. ‘ Ladies and gentlemen do ride 
 together, so why should not they ? ’ 
 
 ‘ You know nothing about it,’ snapped her aunt. ‘ I think 
 that Mrs. St. Claire has fairly bewitched you, from the way you 
 stand up for her through thick and thin. I shall begin to think 
 
TONE. 
 
 246 
 
 you are no better than your friends, Rachel, if you go on like this 
 much longer ! ’ 
 
 ‘ You may think as badly of me as you like, aunt, but you’ll 
 not make me say what I don't believe, or see harm where I don’t 
 see it ! Not wild horses should ! 9 
 
 On which she turned away and went upstairs to her own room. 
 And when she was safe in her solitude, she broke down into tears, 
 saying piteously to herself : 4 He shouldn’t do it ! he shouldn’t ! 
 and she a married woman too ! So many as look up to him and 
 think him just perfection — he shouldn’t ! he shouldn't ! 9 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 THE STIRRING OF THE WATERS. 
 
 Thfre is no more good in having a hat and habit in which one 
 looks like a nineteenth-century Melusine, than there is in having a 
 fashionable walking-costume and jaunty little toque, if one does 
 not make use of one’s possessions ; especially if, in gaining them, 
 one has made one’s first stand of defiance against an adored 
 husband. Still less is there any good in having a friend like 
 Edward Formby, both able and willing to lighten the dead dulness 
 of life as passed in a country town, where one’s means are small 
 and society is shy, and not profiting by one’s opportunities. It 
 would be simply waste of privilege and force ; and lone thought 
 such waste a sin against all the economies of fortune. Wherefore 
 the hat and habit were in constant requisition ; and Edward 
 Formby’s clever little bay mare grew to consider the light weight 
 so often poised on her back as part of the conditions of her own 
 existence. 
 
 There was no reason why it should not be so. Armine was 
 not jealous — and he had no cause, had he even been inclined to 
 this disastrous vice. Edward Formby was the very model of a 
 preux chevalier ; and had lone been a saint and he her devotee, or 
 had he been a knight consecrated to the defence of her, his lady, 
 against slander and rebuke, he could not have been more respectful, 
 more devoted than he was now, when he carried her over the 
 country and taught her how to get a good seat, and how to keep 
 a firm grip with a light hand. If, when he looked at her, some- 
 thing more came into his face than when he looked at Monica 
 Barrington, for example, and thoughts impossible to put into 
 words passed like hurrying clouds through his mind, the secret 
 shining in his eyes never flowed beyond, and his lips were as mute 
 as his looks were eloquent. 
 
 But w r hat Armine allowed and what was not evil in itself, the 
 
THE STIRRING OF THE WATERS. 
 
 247 
 
 neighbourhood would not bear. The morality of a small country 
 place is of a thorny kind, and the sensitiveness of its virtue is only 
 equalled by the activity of its suspicion. It sees evil everywhere ; 
 and especially does it see it when a pretty young wife, brought 
 from a strange land, goes riding about the country with an un- 
 married man of good fortune, whose face is like that of a faun, 
 and who is the possessor of sacks full of wild oats, some as yet 
 unsown, for all the bountiful crop already harvested. Appear- 
 ances are so all-important in the world ! That which is, is no- 
 where in comparison with that which seems to be. And appear- 
 ances were not in lone’s favour. Wherefore, there was a general 
 stirring of the waters at Oakhurst, and much whispering of acrid 
 voices, as heads bent close together, and the sense of the country- 
 side was expressed in terms, now vigorous and downright, now 
 suggestive and subtle, but always inimical to the bride and her 
 goings on. 
 
 Of those who most strongly condemned, Theodosia Barrington 
 took the lead. As we know, she had for St. Claire that nameless 
 bitterness which, when the fever-fit has passed, women feel for the 
 men for whom they have had a passion which looked like love and 
 was only caprice. Theo had found the young doctor beautiful, 
 and she thought that he had found her desirable. She had put 
 out her little arts, and at one time believed that she had taken 
 him in her net. When she found that she had deceived herself, and 
 that he neither understood nor responded, she turned against him 
 fiercely; giving no account to herself why, only conscious that 
 St. Claire was hateful to her — a kind of moral red-rag which 
 roused her irritation beyond control — and that the best anodyne 
 for this irritation was to find some weak point in his armour 
 where she could strike with effect. And she had found one now 
 in these frequent and mucli-talked-of rides of lone with Edward 
 Formby. 
 
 6 It is disgraceful ! ’ she said to her husband one morning at 
 breakfast. ‘ I must say I am astonished at Edward Formby. I 
 wonder at his taste, to begin with — all but engaged as he is to 
 such a very different person as your sister Monica — and then I 
 wonder at his insolence and indelicacy to the neighbourhood. 
 Carrying on such a barefaced flirtation as this in a place like 
 Oakhurst, where everything is known, and we are all so intimate 
 — it is really dreadful ! What ought we to do, Anthony ? ’ 
 
 ‘ Nothing,’ said Anthony shortly. 
 
 1 Nothing! You do not expect that we, the married ladies 
 here, will submit to such a thing as this ! 1 cried his wife, as sharp 
 as he had been curt. 6 Nothing ! you might as well say ’ 
 
 She stopped. She had not her simile ready. 
 
 ‘ As well say wbatP ’ asked her husband, who liked things to 
 be explicit, and did not relish unimaginative supplements. 
 
ZONE. 
 
 2+S 
 
 ‘ That we ought to encourage it/ she answered. 
 
 i Encourage what P ’ Anthony asked. i What in the name of 
 fortune are you exciting yourself about, Theo ? That Edward 
 Eormbv finds it amusing to ride with the doctor’s wife, and the 
 doctor does not object P I do not see that this is your business 
 or mine, my dear girl. Edward can surely look after himself, and 
 the morals of Mrs. St. Claire are not our affair/ he added con- 
 temptuously. 
 
 i Oh, you are prejudiced in her favour, because she has fuzzy red 
 hair and bright green eyes ! ’ said Theo, tossing up her small, 
 black, shining head, and ‘ snapping’ her dark eyes between their 
 curly lashes. 6 All men are alike! A creature like this Mrs. St. 
 Claire, come from no one knows where, and who is no one knows 
 what, makes them half-crazy. And you are no better than the 
 rest, Anthony ! ’ 
 
 * I think the wife quite as good as the husband/ returned 
 Anthony. 
 
 1 That says nothing ! ’ said Theodosia. 
 
 Tier husband looked at her across the table. She felt his eyes 
 on her, and did not raise hers. 
 
 i Yet you made an absurd fuss about him when he was un- 
 married/ he said, with an accent of surprise. i You would not 
 listen to my advice then, so now you must get out of the scrape 
 as you can. If you will associate like an equal with your social 
 inferiors, Theo, you must expect to suffer for it. You know the 
 old saying about silk purses and sows’ ears ! ’ 
 
 i Don’t be vulgar, Anthony ! ’ said Theodosia tartly. 1 Nothing 
 is so vulgar as this horrid habit of quoting proverbs. I cannot 
 make out where you have picked it up ! ’ 
 
 4 Nothing so vulgar, perhaps, excepting that of a lady losing 
 her temper for jealousy of a beautiful roturiere ! ’ said Anthony 
 slowly and with an unmistakable scowl. 
 
 And Theodosia, who had common sense of a kind, said no more. 
 Anthony was her Jumbo, whom she dared not excite beyond 
 what she could control. When he showed s} r mptoms of becoming 
 dangerous she gave in at once. 
 
 4 No, dear, I am not a bit jealous ! ’ she said with a light 
 laugh, very well done. * No one in the world is less jealous of 
 .other women than I am. I know I am a nice little thing myself, 
 so why should I be ? Only one thing would make me jealous, 
 and that would be — what would it be, Anthony ? ’ she broke off 
 with a pretty little caressing intonation, one of the daintiest 
 weapons in her well-stocked armoury of fascination. i Dear old 
 boo’ful Bear’s deserting little wifey for anyone else. Then I should 
 be, I know — madly! dreadfully- — to break its poor little heart ! ’ 
 
 And when she took this tone her Jumbo was conquered, and 
 she was mistress of the situation. 
 
THE STIRRIXG OF THE WATERS . 249 
 
 ‘ You will liave to wait a long time for that, Theo,' he said 
 amiably. 
 
 ‘ True ? — the true truth ? ’ she ashed, leaning forward, with 
 her hands clasped before her mouth, leaving only her eyes shining 
 above. 
 
 ‘ You silly child ! — the true truth !’ he returned with a heavy 
 smile. ‘ There is no one in the world who would suit me so well 
 as you, Theo. You were just made for me ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Was I P Now that is nice of you ! 9 said Theo, blowing him a 
 kiss off the tips of her dainty fingers. 
 
 But as she blew it — this airy thistledown of love and re- 
 conciliation — she thought in clear and intelligible words : ‘ If I 
 were made for you, I cannot say you were for me ; such a temper 
 as you have, you cross old thing, and so dreadful as it is to be 
 always having to keep you in good-humour ! 1 
 
 Though she had failed to incense her husband against the St. 
 Claires, Theodosia did not give up the war which she had per- 
 suaded herself it was her duty to wage against them and all their 
 works. She threw her line over many waters, and did her best to 
 stir up the neighbourhood to a proper sense of the indignity done it 
 by this open flirtation between Edward Formby, who was one of 
 their own, and this Mrs. St. Claire, who was the unknown wife of 
 a virtual stranger. Some hung back, and some supported her ; a 
 few went beyond her in her virtuous indignation — was she not 
 Mrs. Anthony Barrington ? and the Barringtons were social powers 
 at Oakhurst. At all events a hostile party was made, large enough 
 to carry weight by mere force of numbers ; and the condemnation 
 which began in a whisper threatened to end in a roar. 
 
 But neither Monica nor her mother would join in the cry ; and 
 both stood by their belief that there was no need for any cry to 
 join in. 
 
 ‘Mamma, how can you be so blind! at your age and with 
 your experience ! ’ said Theo pertly, when dear Mrs. Barrington 
 protested in her mild and immovable way against suspicions which 
 dishonoured an old friend and neighbour like Edward Formby, 
 and disgraced without hope of redemption a friendless young 
 creature like Mrs. St. Claire. ‘ One would think you lived in 
 Arcadia or Utopia, or t some place like that ! You never will see 
 things as they are, and really there is no sense in making out every 
 one just angels without faults.’ 
 
 ‘ There is less sense, my dear, in seeing faults wdiich do not 
 exist,’ returned Mrs. Barrington quietly. * I should be sorry to 
 think so ill of my neighbours as to condemn them for so small a 
 thing as this. There is surely no great harm in riding out to- 
 gether. You say yourself that Dr. St. Claire sometimes goes w ith 
 them.’ 
 
 ‘ Which makes it all the worse,’ said Theodosia. 1 IIow can 
 
IONE. 
 
 250 
 
 lie, if be is a man of honour, sanction such a thing as this between 
 his wife and another man ? ’ 
 
 ‘Such a thing as what, Theodosia? ’ asked Mrs. Barrington. 
 
 * Such a thing as his wife’s riding out under the escort of a safe and 
 honourable gentleman like Edward Formby ? ’ 
 
 ‘Safe and honourable! what rubbish! ’ was Theodosia’s rude 
 reply. ‘ Edward Formby is no more safe or honourable than any- 
 one else; and anyone who knows the world and does not go about 
 with their eyes shut, can see what Mr3. St. Claire is like.’ 
 
 ‘ She is very charming and very desirous to do what is right, 
 as well as devotedly attached to her husband,’ said Monica. ‘ 1 
 know her better perhaps than anyone else does, and see her 
 oftener ; and this is all I find in her.’ 
 
 ‘ Now, Monica, for Heaven’s sake leave off playing the 
 ingenue/ said Theodosia with a sudden flush. ‘ It was all very 
 well for you to be as infatuated with Dr. St. Claire as you were — 
 as you are, for anything I know — but really to include this 
 impertinent and half-bred young woman in your craze is more 
 than my patience can bear. It is love me love my dog, with a 
 vengeance ! — and I object to loving my friends’ dogs. My own are 
 enough ! ’ she added with a laugh. 
 
 ‘ I do not know what you mean, Theo,’ answered Monica. 
 
 ‘ Common justice, not to speak of humanity, to a young wife like 
 Mrs. St. Claire, away from her own friends and thrown into such 
 a different kind of life from any she has known before, does not 
 seem to me a craze ; to speak against her so bitterly as you do, for 
 no reason that I can see, is much more of a craze if you will think 
 of it. Why should you dislike her so much, dear ? What has she 
 done to you ? 9 
 
 ‘ Yes ; why should you dislike her so much, Theodosia ? 9 
 chimed in Mrs. Barrington. 
 
 ‘ And why should you uphold her through everything as if she 
 were your dearest friend ? ’ retorted Theodosia, answering Monica, 
 but not her mother. ‘ It is so very odd ! I cannot make it out ! 
 Anyone would think you had really been in love with that young 
 man, and that you were even now so infatuated with him as to 
 put up with anything — even Edward Formby’s desertion — rather 
 than find fault with him.’ 
 
 ‘ Theo, you are positively too bad,’ said Monica, rising in great 
 agitation. ‘You presume too far.’ 
 
 ‘ On what, Monica ? My knowledge ? 9 she returned. 
 
 ‘ No ; on my forbearance,’ said Monica. ‘ You have no kind of 
 respect for others or control over yourself ; and some day you will 
 get into terrible trouble. Your suspicions are like madness.’ 
 
 Her face was ashen white, tears stood in her eyes, and her 
 voice broke and trembled with emotion. Never had a random 
 shaft struck so deep nor hit so true ; and never had she felt sucha 
 
THE STIRRING OF THE WATERS . 
 
 251 
 
 sense of sacrilege and desecration. Had a Gentile laid his rude 
 hand on the Holy of Holies, the guardian of the ark would not 
 have felt more sacred indignation than she did now, when her 
 feather-headed little sister-in-law tore down that concealing veil 
 which she had reverently wrapped round her innermost soul, and 
 laid it with all its wounds and hidden sorrows bare before the world. 
 
 4 You need not look like that, Monica,’ cried Theo with^a hard 
 laugh. 4 1 have said nothing so very dreadful.’ 
 
 4 You do not know what you say, Theodosia,’ said Mrs. 
 Barrington, with unwonted sternness. 4 1 tell you frankly, my 
 child, if I did not think you sometimes rather unduly excited, I 
 should take more notice of your folly. It is because I pity you 
 that I bear with you. I do not like to think you as wicked as you 
 would be, if you were not a little ’ 
 
 4 If 1 were not a little mad,’ said Theodosia with a peal of 
 laughter. 4 Thank you, mamma ; hut I am no more mad than 
 you are, and I have a great deal clearer insight. You see nothing 
 that goes on before your very eyes, and then I am blamed because 
 I do see.’ 
 
 4 Hush, Theo ! you have said enough for one time,’ said Monica. 
 
 1 You know that mother cannot bear the kind of temper that you 
 are in to-day, and I will not hear you speak to her so rudely. 
 Say what you like to me when we are alone, but I will not let her 
 be disturbed.’ 
 
 4 What humbugs you quiet girls are ! ’ said Theo, in the manner 
 of one making a philosophical reflection. 4 You are giants, where 
 we, frank ones, are pigmies ! ’ 
 
 4 Now, Theodosia, we have had enough of this,’ said Mrs. 
 Barrington, laying down her knitting and looking as if she were 
 preparing to rise from her place. 4 If you persist in this kind of 
 conversation you will oblige me to leave the room. You know 
 my extreme dislike to the whole style of thing — to ill-natured 
 remarks about our neighbours and rude sarcasms to ourselves. Let 
 the subject drop. It has lasted already longer than it ought.’ 
 
 Theodosia smiled in an odd way. 
 
 4 Mamma, I will send you some ostrich’s eggs,’ she said quite 
 naturally, as if she had suddenly changed the conversation and had 
 now taken up a different topic altogether — speaking as if it were a 
 fact and not a metaphor that she was handling. 
 
 4 Thank you, my dear, but I do not know what I should do 
 with them,’ returned Mrs. Barrington, accepting the tact, not 
 catching the metaphor. 
 
 4 Hatch them,’ said Theo ; 4 and then there will be two — one 
 for you and one for Monica.’ 
 
 4 Thank you, my dear,’ returned Mrs. Barrington again ; 4 but I 
 think you had better keep them for yourself and Anthony. You 
 have more space at the Manor than we have here ; and ostriches 
 
252 IOXE. 
 
 are such unwieldy creatures, I should not know what to do with 
 them/ 
 
 Her pleasantry nearly cost Theodosia more than it was worth, 
 though it amused her greatly at the time. For Mrs. Barrington, 
 who had not seen the point and knew nothing of the hidden 
 intention, spoke to her son when next she saw him about those 
 ostrich’s eggs which Theodosia had offered her to hatch, making 
 minute inquiries as to how that process was to be performed 
 without a parent bird, and not sun enough in England to warm 
 the eggs into life as on the burning sands of Africa. Yes, it 
 nearly cost her a great deal more than it had been worth ; for 
 Anthony was both proud of, and respectful to, his mother, and, 
 though his wife did twist him round her little finger in all 
 that related to herself, she could not with impunity touch his 
 sacred shrine, or fail in that respect which he felt she ought to pay 
 and his mother should receive. It cost Theodosia a whole 
 battery of caresses and a volume of endearing epithets and mis- 
 leading interpretations before she was able to clear the air of 
 suspicion or lighten her husband’s heavy face of its gathering gloom 
 of wrath — before she was able to bring back to his usual mood of 
 apathetic serenity the man whose dulness bored her to death, but 
 whose wrath would have consumed her alive. 
 
 After Theodosia had left the Bower House — and with the 
 contradiction and strange entanglement of human nature she left 
 it to do a kind action to a poor tenant — Mrs. Barrington some- 
 what broke down. These jarring scenes, which for the last year 
 or so had been more frequent and more discordant than formerly, 
 tried her nerves more than she allowed her daughter-in-law to see. 
 She was so sorry that Anthony had married such an unsatisfactory 
 person! — so sorry that there were no children to employ the young 
 wife’s time and soften her nature ! — so sorry that she gave way to 
 evil-speaking and slanderous insinuations as she did ! — and, above 
 all, so sorry that it was in the obliged order of things to receive 
 her here in this quiet, tranquil, passionless house whenever she 
 chose to come — bringing as she did such a petulant and disturbing 
 atmosphere, which left all things in moral confusion and with the 
 perfume brushed away from the rose-leaves ! 
 
 ‘ It is most extraordinary how from the first Anthony’s wife 
 has made things unpleasant for us about this Dr. St. Claire,’ she 
 said, after she had wiped away a few tears which forced them- 
 selves for very weariness from her dim eyes and rested on her pale 
 cheeks. *1 cannot understand it; for after all, though he is a 
 very creditable young man, and his wife is a rather superior kind 
 of person for her position, they are not of so much importance as 
 Theodosia’s dislike would make them appear. What does all this 
 scandal signify to us P It is not our business.’ 
 
 6 It would be, dear mother, were it true,’ said Monica. 1 But 
 
THE STIRRING OF THE WATERS. 
 
 253 
 
 it is not. There is no harm in Mrs. St. Claire’s riding every now 
 and then with Edward; and Dr. St. Claire is the last man in the 
 world to countenance an impropriety. You know what nice 
 feeling he has — what high principles.’ 
 
 4 Still, one so young and pretty as she cannot be too careful,’ 
 said Mrs. Barrington. ‘For her own sake she had better be 
 warned. I should like you to speak to her, Monica, kindly and 
 judiciously, you know, but advising her to be careful of appear- 
 ances. You are the best person to do it ; and I should like it 
 done.’ 
 
 4 I do not think she will let me,’ said Monica, who naturally 
 shrank from the idea of interfering with Armine St. Claire’s wife. 
 4 She is always very nice to me, but I do not think she will like 
 me to give her advice. I fancy she has never been under much 
 control.’ 
 
 4 Then she had better begin now,’ returned Mrs. Barrington. 
 4 And it is only the part of a true friend to warn her. At least, it 
 will shut Theodosia’s mouth,’ she added with a sigh. 
 
 4 Oh ! Tlieo,’ echoed Monica, with an impatience as rare in her 
 as w r ere tears from her mother. 4 Nothing will ever cure her of 
 her dreadful habit of gossip and exaggeration. She has such a 
 fatal imagination. It is incurable, for it is born with her.’ 
 
 4 Ah, my dear!’ said her mother, as she had often said before : 
 4 it was the most terrible mistake your brother ever made when he 
 brought home Theodosia Huntley as his wife ! ’ 
 
 4 1 think it was, mother,’ said Monica. 
 
 4 Such a tine-looking man as he is, so honourable and true, and 
 with such a position in the county, he might have married where 
 he would — the best in the land. As it is, he has chosen about the 
 v r orst,’ said Mrs. Barrington ; and Monica echoed : 4 He has 
 indeed ! ’ without an attempt to soften matters for her peccant 
 sister-in-law, or to sweeten her mild mother’s distaste by apologies 
 and excuses. 
 
 The two ladies, so notoriously free from all love of scandal, ill- 
 nature, or gossip, as they were, could never speak between them- 
 selves with favour of Anthony’s wife, and they often spoke of her 
 with disfavour. They had done their best to accept her cordially 
 and make her their own : but she tried them too severely. And as 
 time went on she became the source of all their annoyance, all 
 their discomfort. Had it not been for Theodosia, it seemed to 
 Mrs. Barrington, they would not have had a care, nor a displeasure. 
 With her, as one of the family, not a day passed without some 
 crumpling of the rose-leaves, some disturbing influence brought into 
 their life. And perhaps the most painful part of it all, to Mrs. 
 Barrington, was the thought that this small, slight, frothy little 
 nature had power to stir up emotions which to her stood for bad 
 passions — power to ruffle her moral dignity and to destroy both 
 
IONE. 
 
 254 
 
 lier peace of mind and serenity of conscience. As if all life were 
 not hacked and hewn, marred and defaced, by the minor agents 
 rather than major ! — as if this were not the supreme tragedy of 
 human history — this power of the ignoble to hurt the noble — this 
 cruel capacity of those who are perhaps more thoughtless than 
 actively bad, to embitter the happiness and sear the very virtues 
 of the loving and the true ! 
 
 Foiled at the Dower House as well as discountenanced by her 
 husband, Theodosia was none the more inclined to let this question 
 of Edward Formby’s rides with lone rest in peace. She was too 
 wise to speak with quotable distinctness of the affair. She did not 
 intend to be referred to as the original hatcher of the cockatrice 
 eggs which were strewn so thickly over poor lone’s path. But she 
 insinuated dimly what she refrained from 4 planking down ’ in un- 
 mistakable terms ; and, while she stirred the waters vigorously, 
 kept her dredging-machine in the shadow. 
 
 This plan answered, as such plans always do answer ; and not 
 a doubt existed in the minds of the majority that a flirtation 
 existed between lone St. Claire and Edward Formby of Hillside, 
 unbecoming to her state as a married woman and to his position as 
 a ‘ county family.’ They said no more than this ; which, however, 
 was enough. It was unbecoming ; therefore reprehensible ; there- 
 fore again it was in the charter of their rights as neighbours who 
 did not flirt, and whose characters "were mixed up in a general 
 kind of social hash together, to resent — and to show their resent- 
 ment when occasion occurred and opportunity offered. 
 
 And all this time, Armine, lone, Edward, the three immediately 
 concerned, were like Theodosia’s apocryphal ostriches ; their heads 
 were buried in the sands of innocency of intention, and they did 
 not dream that the pursuers were upon them. 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 UNDER PRESSURE. 
 
 What Armine had foreseen had now come to pass. The res 
 angusta domi, always straight, had narrowed beyond the line 
 where dignity of repute or pleasure of existence was possible. 
 Debt had fallen on him like fetters on his wrists, like the chain 
 and bullet round his feet ; and wherever he turned he found him- 
 self beset by difficulties. Business too went as ill as the rest. 
 He lost two substantial patients — one a man who had had 
 aneurism and been a good paymaster ; the other a woman who 
 believed in doctors and lived on drugs. 
 
 Then a rival had set up at the other end of the town ; and 
 many of the disappointed and estranged patronised the new- 
 
UNDER PRESSURE. 
 
 255 
 
 comer with zeal and threw off Armine with haste. Mr. Budd, 
 the son of a country lawyer, w^as a man whom they could under- 
 stand and wdio understood them, they said. He was not like this 
 half-French young fellow with his half-Italian wife — the tw r o 
 together not making one honest English whole, as Jane Winter- 
 green said sharply in one of those frequent discussions on the St. 
 Claires which tilled up the idle hours of Oakhurst. He was a 
 comfortable, conformable sort of person — one of their own. And 
 it -was hut right to encourage one of their own and give those 
 foreigners the go-by. So they did ; working out the law, as set 
 forth by class conscience, with such effect that Mr. Budd had 
 about half the practice before he had been a month in the place. 
 
 Within the four walls of home things were no better than they 
 were without. lone’s promise of help and work had vanished 
 into air. To be sure she would have helped, and she would have 
 worked, had she known how. But she soon came to the end of her 
 powers ; and of late, a little warped as she was by a vague dis- 
 quiet for which she had no name, she had not even the wish to do 
 well. The house was a standing disgrace to her mistresshood. 
 There was neither order nor management in it ; neither enjoyment 
 in its waste nor economy in its stint. It was a hopeless muddle 
 from end to end — a very thorn-bush of maladministration, wherein 
 she felt her own incapacity, and got angry with things because she 
 was deficient in ‘ faculty.’ Then Edward Formby came with his 
 well-groomed mare, and she was glad to escape from the sordid 
 shabbiness of her own poverty to the elegance and pleasantness of 
 his sufficiency. Which did not make matters better for her 
 husband nor her household. 
 
 Debts were accumulating and creditors were getting trouble- 
 some. The tailor had sent in his bill for that famous riding-habit 
 'which was to be such an economy in saving the wear of old 
 gowns. The butcher and the grocer, the baker and the green- 
 grocer, and all the smaller tradesfolk were beginning to clamour 
 for their money, and to compare among themselves the amounts 
 written off with those still to pay ; and the debts more than 
 doubled what was owing to Armine, should all his patients pay 
 all that was due. But some were too poor ever to pay anything 
 at all ; and he had not even this delusive margin on which to build 
 a sand-house of hope. What was to be done? In all this large 
 rich world, with its hundreds of thousands of wealthy philan- 
 thropists, where could he turn for help ? who would hold out a 
 hand to assist him ? 
 
 In his bachelor days, Armine, as has been said, had ever been 
 the flying-fish of the community — not frankly fraternizing with 
 the little people, nor frankly fraternized with by the great. Now 
 the anomaly of his position was even more apparent as his social 
 circumstances were accentuated by his marriage, and lone had 
 
IOKE. 
 
 256 
 
 added lier pride to his in the one case, while in the other she had 
 caused a still stricter exclusion. So that really the two had no 
 friends of any kind, save Edward Formby and Monica Barrington. 
 But this was by-the-by. The real centre of life at this moment 
 was the debt in which they were becoming entangled, and the 
 poverty which was deepening about them. 
 
 Things were looking blacker and still blacker, and reports of 
 those gathering debts and the inability of the creditors to get any 
 money out of the young doctor grew daily louder in the com- 
 munity. They reached at last the Dower House, after they had 
 been accepted and digested by Theodosia at the Manor. But it 
 was she who took them to her husband’s mother. No one but 
 herself would have dared. 
 
 It was at Mrs. Barrington’s favourite social hour — at her five- 
 o’clock tea, where Anthony, Theodosia, and Edward Formby one 
 afternoon all found themselves — that the little wife shouldered the 
 conversation on to her former favourite and present red-rag. 
 
 ‘ By the way,’ she said abruptly, turning her sharp black eyes 
 full on Edward, 6 those St. Claire people seem to be in a very bad 
 way. I hear awful things of tlieir debt and extravagance, and 
 how no one can be paid a farthing. It is really very disgraceful ! 
 and she all the time giving herself the airs of a lady, and he so 
 ridiculously like a hairdresser’s assistant ! ’ 
 
 Edward’s ruddy face became a still ruddier hue ; Monica’s, 
 paler and more under control, grew a shade whiter. 
 
 ‘I see a good deal of them,’ said Edward bluntly ; ‘and I see 
 no extravagance.’ 
 
 ‘ Oh, I forgot ! ’ said Theo ; ‘ you are one of Mrs. St. Claire’s 
 adorers ; so it is not likely you would see anything in her to which 
 to object. If she had committed murder, I dare say you would 
 find out that she had done quite right, and would acquit her on 
 the plea of extenuating circumstances. I only hope she will not 
 some day. She looks capable of it ! ’ 
 
 ‘ My dear Theodosia ! ’ said Mrs. Barrington in her mild 
 manner of reproof. 
 
 Anthony gave a short laugh; Edward pulled at his moustache, 
 and looked as if he had suddenly lost the use of speech. 
 
 ‘ Another cup of tea, Theo P ’ asked Monica in her dreamy 
 way, as if she had not heaid what had been said. 
 
 ‘ Don’t you think so ? ’ returned Theo for all answer, speaking 
 to her sister-in-law. 
 
 ‘Think what?’ replied Monica, busied with the cream-jug, 
 which she seemed to find it difficult to place on the tea-tray. 
 
 ‘ That Mrs. St. Claire is like a murderess, and her husband like 
 a hairdresser’s assistant.’ 
 
 ‘ No, I do not think either one or the other,’ said Monica. 
 ‘ Anthony, more tea ? ’ she added. 
 
UNDER PRESSURE. 
 
 257 
 
 ‘ We have all had enough tea,’ said Theodosia testily. ‘ You 
 are so funny, Monica ! Who ever does take more than one cup 
 of afternoon tea? And, dear, do leave that cream-jug alone! 
 You make such a noise with the spoons and things, it fidgets me 
 to death to hear you ! ’ 
 
 I My dear Theodosia ! ’ said Mrs. Barrington again, gravely. 
 
 ‘ Don’t bully Monica, Theo,’ said Anthony. 
 
 ‘But she does make a noise when she pushes the cups and 
 things about ; and it does fidget me to see her,’ said Theo. ‘ And 
 it is only because I am talking of the St. Claires. She has taken 
 it into her head to protect them, just as Edward has. Beally, 
 people are very odd ! ’ 
 
 ‘Oh, Mrs. Anthony! how you like to chaff!’ said Edward 
 Formby with a forced laugh. 
 
 It was not for him to measure swords with this intellectual 
 little Flibbertigibbet. It w^ould be like the contest of a cock- 
 chafer and a gnat. All lie could do was to deprecate good- 
 humouredly, and call that chaff which was in point of fact some- 
 thing much more solid. 
 
 6 Well, I am sure it is odd that you should care to be so much 
 with her as you are — a young woman without two ideas in her 
 head ! ’ said Theo, lifting up her eyebrows. 6 I think Mrs. St. 
 Claire one of the most stupid people I have ever seen. She never 
 says anything worth hearing ; she never opens a book or seems to 
 have heard of any to open. She is frightfully ignorant and com- 
 mon ; yet you can ride out with her day after day, day after day, 
 and never weary of her, just a doll as she is! And you too, 
 Monica, who go in for high art and poetry and aesthetics, and all 
 that — how can you uphold her or pretend to like her as you do P 
 It is all a mystery to me, I confess ! ’ 
 
 ‘ What makes you dislike her so much ? ’ asked Monica 
 quietly ; but no one, save Theo herself, noticed that she did not 
 look at her when she spoke, and that her gentle face had a certain 
 pained look of embarrassment on it. 
 
 ‘ I do not pay her the compliment of disliking her,’ said Theo, 
 with a laugh. ‘ I think her forward and stupid and pretentious 
 and unladylike ; and I think her husband is no better than she is. 
 And I always have thought so. Only that you and mamma spoilt 
 him so much, and took him so completely out of his position, I 
 would never have asked him to the Manor. But I did not like to 
 hang back when you made yourselves so conspicuously his friends. 
 It seemed like a slight on you. But I am very sorry that I did 
 now, with these disgraceful debts and everything ! It is altogether 
 most unpleasant, and I wish they would leave the place.’ 
 
 I I see no unpleasantness but what you make for yourself, my 
 dear,’ said Mrs. Barrington. ‘ No one that I know of speaks of 
 these things ; and at the worst they are not our affair.’ 
 
 s 
 
258 
 
 IONE. 
 
 1 Tlieo is riglit, mother/ said Anthony, in his slow, impassive 
 way. i They have been awfully spoilt here and taken out of their 
 proper place ; that is not to be denied ; and they are in debt to 
 every one about, and the whole place is ringing with it. And it 
 is disgraceful and unpleasant in the extreme. But after all, as 
 you say, it is not our affair, and each one is free to act as seems 
 best to himself/ 
 
 This seemed as if it would include his mother’s and sister’s 
 freedom to protect the St. Claires if they w r ould. It meant no- 
 thing of the kind. It was an allowance which covered only 
 Edward Formby, and what the world had agreed to call his 
 goings on with lone. 
 
 ‘ Shall we talk of something else? ’ said Mrs. Barrington. ‘ I 
 have no great love at any time for discussing my neighbours, and 
 if I cannot hear good of them I prefer not to hear anything at all. 
 I confess I sge nothing reprehensible in the St. Claires, and I do 
 not care to hear gossip.’ 
 
 i That is right, Mrs. Barrington ! ’ said Edward heartily. 6 It 
 does no good to pick holes in people’s coats. And one can if one 
 likes — anywhere and everywhere ! ’ 
 
 1 One need not pick them in the St. Claires’,’ said Theodosia 
 with her shrill laugh. ‘ They are there already. And that young 
 lady must take care that she does not make another — and the 
 biggest of all ! ’ she added, with a meaning look to Edward. 
 
 Aiming at pigeons and shooting of crows is one of the most 
 familiar experiences of our life ; and this was what Theodosia 
 Barrington now did by her unfriendliness to the St. Claires. She 
 had wished to draw down on them the indignation she had 
 honestly convinced herself they deserved, and instead of this she 
 raised up for them an activity of friendship which would not have 
 been without her. The tares which she had thought to sow came 
 up as fruitful corn ; and Monica and Edward, so far from being 
 checked or chilled, were stimulated and warmed. 
 
 Soon after this last shaft the Anthony Barringtons left, and 
 then Edward Formby got up to go. 
 
 1 Come down the steps, Edward/ said Monica, when he took 
 up his hat. 1 1 want to show you some new Brahmas Price has 
 just bought. Price says they are superb, but I should like you to 
 see them.’ 
 
 ‘ All right/ said Edward, with the slightest possible touch of 
 -embarrassment. 
 
 Monica was always perfectly simple with him, but he was 
 <ever a little out of gear with her. He knew that he was expected 
 to marry her, or at least to ask her ; and she knew that she would 
 not accept him were he to offer. Hence he felt he had not done 
 his duty ; and she was grateful that he had spared her the pain 
 of not doing hers — if indeed it were her duty to marry for the 
 fitness of things, and not for the desire of her heart. 
 
UNDER PRESSURE. 259 
 
 c Is it true wliat Tlieo says of the St. Claires — that they are so 
 deeply in debt ? ’ she ashed as she was going down the steps. 
 
 ‘ 1 am afraid some of it is true/ he answered. ‘ I think Mrs. 
 Anthony exaggerated, you know ; but I fancy there is some tire 
 under the smoke. There generally is.’ 
 
 ‘ I am so sorry/ said Monica. ‘ Can nothing be done for* 
 them ? ’ 
 
 She looked up into his face when she said this. Her own was 
 anxious and troubled — strangely so for the occasion, Edward 
 thought to himself — just a passing thought, not striking deep and 
 not clinging long. 
 
 6 What can ? ’ he answered. 
 
 i I do not know/ said Monica. 1 Some one might lend them 
 some money. Unfortunately I cannot, else I would. I would 
 send Mrs. St. Claire a present anonymously, and take care that 
 she did not find out where it came from.’ 
 
 As she said this, Monica’s pretty short upper lip trembled, and 
 she looked down shyly. 
 
 ‘ Ah ! that would be a good way/ said Edward. 
 
 6 But I cannot do it ! ’ said Monica. 6 Only yesterday Anthony 
 took my bank-book and insisted on investing what I had. He 
 was vexed, too, that I had not more ; and I am such a bad 
 woman of business, I could not account for certain sums. So 1 m 
 drew out all but a mere pittance, saying I was not fit to be trusted 
 with money ; and now I am quite poor.’ 
 
 ‘ Anthony was right/ said Edward. ‘ You ought to invest 
 your savings, Monica.’ 
 
 ‘ So he says, but I cannot see it/ was her reply. i I have no 
 one to save for, and it simply prevents my doing as I like — helping 
 some one, for instance, in whom I feel so much interest as in this 
 poor deplace e Mrs. St. Claire.’ 
 
 ‘ Don’t worry yourself/ said Edward. 6 Save your money, 
 Monica. If you have no one to leave it to now, you may have 
 some day.’ 
 
 *' I think I never shall/ she answered gently. 
 
 ‘ No P ’ he said, not looking at her. * But you will marry some 
 day, my dear.’ 
 
 ‘ Never ! ’ she said. I shall never marry,- Edward. Nothing 
 should ever induce me to leave my mother. I do not intend to 
 marry — ever — anyone.’ 
 
 She repeated this emphatically 5 — she looking up at him, he 
 looking away into the distance, but conscious of her eyes. 
 
 He gave a deep sigh. It might have been for disappointment, 
 but it might also have been for relief. He brought his eyes back 
 from the distance and turned them down on her uplifted face. 
 Something that was not a tear, but looked like the precursor of 
 tears shone in his eyes, and made them soft and dark. 
 
 s 2 
 
zCo 
 
 10NE. 
 
 ‘ You are tlie best girl in the word, Monica/ he said tenderly. 
 You ought to be canonised. They have made worse saints than 
 you, my dear ! 9 
 
 ‘ And better ! 9 she laughed with a pretty shake of her head. 
 ‘If I were a saint, I would extend my protection to these poor 
 young people,’ she added, bringing the conversation back again to 
 its starting-point. 
 
 ‘ So you shall, through me,’ he returned. I will see to it all. 
 I will go to St. Claire to-day, ai;d tell him I will pull him through, 
 and he shall not suffer . Do not be uneasy. My God, no ! ’ 
 
 He said these last words under his breath, and with profound 
 agitation. Did he mean them for Monica or lone? 
 
 ‘ Ah, how good you are, Edward ! ’ said Monica. ‘ I always 
 knew that you were to be depended on ! ’ 
 
 * I hope so,’ he returned with a deep flush. 
 
 Somehow her praise stung rather than soothed him, as his had 
 pained rather than pleased her. Was he in very truth to be 
 always depended on ? Could Monica say that for the past P lie 
 would not ask himself — should Armine be able to say it for all 
 the future? And Monica, in like manner, felt that were Edward 
 to know all that had been in her heart in time past for Armine, he 
 would scarcely call her a saint now, because she wished to see him 
 free of debt and lifted above distress. 
 
 And with this they came to the last of the steps, and turned 
 round to the poultry- yard, where the Brahmas strutted in their 
 allotted compound, the innocent pretext for this important talk. 
 
 After a brief inspection of the handsome fowls, in which he 
 was at once interested, as became a country gentleman solicitous 
 for pure breeds, and for which Monica did not care two straws, 
 Edward took his leave — the two never so much like lovers, never 
 so sincerely attached as now when they had just consulted together 
 for the benefit of the woman who called Armine her husband — of 
 the man who owned lone as his wife. 
 
 Sure enough, the next morning Armine St. Claire held in his 
 hands Edward Formby’s cheque, which was to release him — and 
 lone — from all present embarrassment, and enable them to ‘see 
 about them a little/ as a note which accompanied the cheque 
 expressed it. That note was written in Edward Formby’s special 
 style — badly spelt and full of grammatical errors; but, as once 
 before, it was so full of genuine kindness and delicacy that its errors 
 were mere precious than other folks’ exactness. It was like manna 
 in the wilderness, like a cup of water in the desert ; and though 
 Armine might have refused it had he been alone — preferring to 
 submit to sorrow rather than save himself by another man's hand 
 — yet now, with lone on his neck — lone to suffer as well as him- 
 self — he yielded to the temptation ; and, under pressure as he 
 was, accepted the offer of release with gratitude. 
 
UNDER PRESSURE. 
 
 261 
 
 With gratitude P Yes ; but also with shame ; also with reluct- 
 ance. It wounded his pride, his conscience, his self-respect. Yet, he 
 could not doom lone to distress from which any sacrilice of himself 
 could deliver her. He had bound himself to be her sacrifice, and 
 he must fulfil his task to the end. But this was one of the 
 bitterest moments of all — one of the heaviest of the burdens to 
 carry. 
 
 On his side Edward had an uneasy feeling that he could not get 
 rid of, try as hard and manfully as he would. He seemed to him- 
 self to have bought something which he could never claim and 
 never possess; and the immediate consequence of that small 
 monetary transaction was his sudden departure for Newmarket, 
 where races were on hand, and where he might lose, in heavy bets 
 and perilous fancies, the haunting image of lone St. Claire. 
 
 Meanwhile, of all concerned, Monica was the only one really 
 satisfied, and lone was the only one in the dark. But the materials 
 were too explosive, and set too near to danger, for peace to be of 
 long continuance ; and it was only a question of time when the 
 catastrophe should come. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 THE NEW AE RIVAL. 
 
 In the midst of all this gathering excitement about the St. Claires, 
 old Thornton, of High Street, the confectioner, fancy bread-maker, 
 and general baker of Oakhurst, ‘passed in his checks,’ and died 
 suddenly of apoplexy. As he had amassed a small competency, 
 his widow, who had no children to help her in the weakness of her 
 advancing years, and who had been a hard worker in her past ones, 
 set up the business for sale ; and waited for a purchaser. 
 
 Many looked into the affair and some made impossible pro- 
 posals, but no one came to a successful issue ; when suddenly the 
 modest sum demanded was paid down on the nail ; the shop- 
 ffxtures, dwelling-house, good-will, and brick oven were all taken 
 ■over in the account; and a new man entered on the old place. 
 
 He was a foreigner, speaking English of a somewhat dislocated 
 kind, but good enough to be understood ; though he did call all 
 things, animate and inanimate, ‘ he ’ and ‘ his/ and used the verb 
 4 to make ’ with an indiscriminate generosity that covered every- 
 thing. This, however, was a small matter ; the large one was that 
 he paid the money down after a certain course of haggling wherein 
 lie had to give way, and where, keen as he was, he found Mrs. 
 Thornton his worthy match. Hence there was no need to question 
 bis solvency nor to look into his antecedents. His crisp bank-notes 
 were his sponsors, and he wanted no others. 
 
262 
 
 IONE. 
 
 It was against the widow’s conscience to sell the concern to a 
 foreigner, whose existence she qualified by an epithet more racy 
 than nice. But what was to be don^, she said, when one’s own 
 would not come forward as they should P If home public spirit 
 was dead she had to do the best she could with what she could get 
 from abroad. The wear and tear of the business was too much for 
 her since her good man’s death, and if she could not get rid of it, it 
 would soon get rid of her. 
 
 This she said by way of excuse and apology to the neighbour- 
 hood — the neighbourhood patriotically not approving of the 
 transfer, and doubtful whether it would take kindly to the change. 
 
 That change indeed was very thorough. The whole aspect of 
 the shop, as well as the manner of doing business, was altered ; and 
 Oakhurst was not fond of innovations. There was the Sund ay- 
 dinner baking as of old, but the result was not so satisfactory as in 
 Joe Thornton’s time ; for the pies came out at one time sodden and 
 at another burned. The bread, too, was queer and had an odd 
 trst q as if spice or herbs were put into it ; and the cakes were not 
 the cakes of bygone times. But they were good in their own way 
 — sometimes over-flavoured with rum perhaps, and sometimes too 
 dry and leathery ; but for the most part they were approved of ; 
 and the sweets were acknowledged to be perfection. The shop 
 was differently decorated and differently stocked throughout from 
 what it had been in times past. Instead of the tall bottles of 
 rose-lozenges and barley-sugar, bulls’-eyes and pear-drops, with 
 all the other well-known sweeties dear to British youth ; instead 
 cf the opaque white and transparent yellow glass moulds, to 
 represent blanc-mange and jelly — the plates of Bath-buns and 
 raspberry tarts, of sponge-cakes and macaroons, covered with 
 yellow muslin to keep them from the wasps and flies — there were 
 now piles of lemons and tiers of red-coloured jelly, with variegated 
 sweets of odd shapes and strange compounds, the like of which 
 had never been seen in Oakhurst since Oakhurst began. There 
 were fruit tarts, too, made in plates without a covering crust ; 
 which aroused the scornful mirth of all good housewives. ‘ Straw- 
 berries and cherries laid on paste in that daftlike fashion ! 7 they 
 said, with their heads in the air and their lips crisped as tight as 
 closed purses. ‘ Not perhaps bad in themselves ; but lor-a-mussy, 
 not to be compared to our own fruit pies, where a body could cut 
 and come again, and have his fill of good rich flaky crust, which 
 was something to be proud of when it was done ! ’ But, indeed, 
 all the things were made more for show than use — more as 
 displays of colour and ingenuity than as stays to hungry stomachs. 
 But while it was all fresh it was the town’s talk and the town’s 
 show. The mob of children round the window impeded traffic 
 and gave the sentiment of popular excitement ; a sentiment which 
 was not lessened when sometimes a swarthy-complexioned man 
 
THE NEW ARRIVAL . 
 
 263 
 
 would dash out from the darkness behind the shop and send the 
 whole cohort flying with the violence of his gestures, the roar of 
 his unknown tongue, the fury in his eyes, and the impression 
 generally which he left on them all of being the very devil himself 
 incarnate. But sometimes he was quite the other way; and then 
 he would give both cakes and sweeties to the little ones looking 
 with longing eyes at that raree-show of good things. And it got 
 to be noticed that when he did thus scatter his largesse, he always 
 gave the biggest portion to the fairliaired little girls, demand- 
 ing for his reward kisses which it terrified them to death to 
 give. 
 
 In a short time, however, the keen eyes of the good housewives 
 aforesaid noted that not only was all this pristine brilliancy getting 
 sadly dashed, but that if you wanted either your full shilling's- 
 worth, or the perfection of cleanliness, you had better not go to 
 the shop where old Joe Thornton had made his fortune by honest 
 English ways which every one could understand, and where all 
 had been as clean as a new pin. Now, matters were very 
 different. Those queer whisks and feather-brushes, which were 
 what the foreigner used for keeping things clean, were not equal 
 to the British blue-checked duster and wholesome soap and water. 
 And you could never believe his word when he said that his bread 
 or his cakes had been baked fresh to-day. For if flavour and 
 consistency went for anything it was a moral certainty that 
 neither loaf nor cake had seen the oven for a week or more ! He 
 yvas unbusinesslike, too, in his manner of dealing. He had to be 
 looked after pretty sharply in the matter of change ; he often 
 charged one price to-day and another to-morrow for the very 
 identical thing — and then he would take less than what he first 
 said ; he sent in his bills twice, but on the other hand he often 
 forgot to send them in at all, and would let people run into debt 
 for bread and baking with a looseness of grip enough to make old 
 Joe Thornton turn in his grave. It was all so slipshod and un- 
 certain, no one knew where to have him ; and, as for keeping to 
 his time — as for building on his promise to have that pie baked 
 by half-past twelve, or that cake made by noon to-morrow — you 
 might as well have expected the rain to fall from a cloudless sky, 
 or the hoar frost to last if the wind changed to the south. 
 
 The real proprietor of the concern was rarely visible. After 
 he had concluded with Mrs. Thornton he retired to the little room 
 behind the shop, or to the bakery, where he worked with his own 
 hands or directed his assistant, and where both he and that 
 assistant — a foreigner like himself — smoked all day long, to the 
 disgust of the women, who swore that they found cigar-ash over 
 their potatoes and the flavour of tobacco in their gravy. This 
 incessant smoking was such an offence to the feelings of the wives 
 that some talk was made of setting up against the interloper a 
 
10NE. 
 
 264 
 
 rival establishment to be conducted on pure English principles ; 
 but as yet no one had come forward. 
 
 The sensitive Protestantism, too, of the place was alarmed. It 
 saw the shadow of Jesuitism in the fact of the new-comers 
 strangerhood ; and when it leaked out that he was an Italian, 
 every one made sure that this Trivellato, as he called himself, was 
 a brigand who would lurk round the corner with a dagger in the 
 dark, and not only manage to disseminate popery with his sugar 
 but would also add murder to his handicraft. But — the confec- 
 tionery was good, the sweets were perfection, and the bread and 
 pies grew gradually more home-like ; and as no one had been found 
 with liis throat cut in a dark alley, and no priests had been seen 
 stealing about the lanes, the fears which had been so rife in the 
 beginning somewhat died away, and the new confectioner’s shop 
 became rather the fashion than otherwise. 
 
 All this time the head man was never seen behind the counter. 
 He was to be heard speaking in the little room, where he smoked 
 and peeped through the window of the door to watch what was 
 going on. And the women had seen him in the bakehouse when 
 they went with their pies and toad-in-the-holes for Sunday. But 
 the gentry had to be content with a young man who had been a 
 short time in London; who wore his hair parted down the middle 
 and cut into festoons like feathers on his forehead, as St. Claire 
 had worn his when he first came to Oakhurst ; and who made as 
 deadly havoc with the hearts of the young girls of his own class 
 as Armine had made with those of the second set in the first year 
 of his novitiate. But he spoke English a little more idiomatically 
 than did his proprietor, and also lie understood rather better how 
 to deal with the people. He was as deft at making lies as that 
 proprietor was at making sweets ; and altogether the concern 
 prospered, in spite of loose business habits, stale pastry sold fresh, 
 two prices asked and a third taken, and the flavour of tobacco in 
 the gravy. 
 
 Somehow, no one knew why, the new shop with all it included 
 of popery, possible assassination, and un-English qualities in 
 general, was connected in the public mind with Mrs. Armine St. 
 Claire. The two were twin-cherries oft* the same tree ; but they 
 were cherries with cankered hearts, and not to be approved of at 
 any price. The tiers on tiers of transparent red-coloured jelly and 
 piles of golden lemon3 were as pretty to look at in their own way 
 as the young bride’s red-gold hair and lissom figure ; but we want 
 something more than mere prettiness — as Jane Wintergreen said, 
 her sharp nose high in the air — ‘ and handsome is as handsome does/ 
 
 Jane, uncompromising and staunch, had steadily vilihed the 
 productions and personality of the new confectioner from the 
 beginning. She did not like new-fangled ways, she said sharply, 
 when asked what she thought of this man’s, this Trivellato’s, 
 
THE NEW ARRIVAL , . 
 
 265 
 
 sweets. She liked to know what she ate, and objected to being 
 poisoned by outlandish condiments. Nevertheless, she sometimes 
 went to the shop when hard pressed for a make-up and had to 
 look about her, but she always went under protest, and with the 
 feeling of deserting the Union Jack for the tricolour. 
 
 Naturally, like all the rest, lone went to pay the new place a 
 visit, to inspect the goods, and pronounce on their merits. 
 
 i They are just like Gull’s ! ’ she said in Italian with a laugh 
 as she looked at the sausages and galantines, the vegetables and 
 fruits, all made of sweets. 
 
 She was radiant as she said this. She had not been happy in 
 Palermo, and she was — or had been ? — happy here in Oakliurst. 
 All the same, it made her laugh with joy to see things which 
 reminded her of her old home ; and she felt as if this new establish- 
 ment were part of herself. 
 
 The dark-skinned, soft-eyed, soft-spoken young fellow, standing 
 with his hat on his head behind the counter, was overjoyed to 
 hear his native tongue spoken by one who was evidently a Sicilian ; 
 and the conversation between the two became quite animated. As 
 a mark of special respect he took off his hat which he wore because 
 of the draughts, and braved catching cold in this awful English 
 climate like a hero at the cannon’s mouth. For one so proud and 
 Brahminical as lone, the conversation was more than animated. 
 It was friendly. The young man told her one or tw^o things about 
 the business, and among others that he was not the padrone. He, 
 the padrone, did not come into the shop. He lived there — 
 pointing backward to the rooms behind — where he made his things ; 
 lor he was a gentleman, and could make casscita and pecorelle as 
 well as Guli himself. 
 
 ‘ Is he a Sicilian P ’ asked lone. 1 1 hear that you are.’ 
 
 ‘ Sissignora,’ said the man, Giuseppe ; ‘ he is a Palermitan.’ 
 
 ‘ What is his name ? ’ she asked. 
 
 € Trivellato.’ 
 
 ‘I can see that for myself; it is over the shop,’ said lone dis- 
 dainfully. ‘ I mean his little name.’ 
 
 ‘ Giovanni.’ 
 
 She shook her forefinger before her face with an Italian 
 gesture. 
 
 ‘ 1 do not know him,’ she said. ‘ Giovanni Trivellato. No ! I 
 do not remember him.’ 
 
 Giuseppe looked distressed. 
 
 6 No ? ’ he said in a tone of regret, as if it were a sorrow to all 
 concerned. 
 
 All this time two dark gleaming eyes were watching through 
 the window of the door leading into the back-parlour ; and that 
 door, ajar, allowed every word that was spoken in the shop to be 
 clearly heard by the listener within. 
 
2 66 
 
 IONE. 
 
 ‘ Tlie same, the same, and yet more beautiful than ever ! ’ said 
 the man to himself in Sicilian. ‘ My life ! my soul ! you will 
 come to me at last. 
 
 This talk with Giuseppe pleased lone, not unnaturally ; and 
 she often went to the shop for the ostensible purpose of buying’ 
 cakes and ordering sweets ; but in reality to speak Sicilian and 
 discuss Palermo. Of course her frequent visits were noticed. 
 Miss Maria Crosby’s side-window commanded the whole length of 
 the street — the doctor s house with the rest ; her front faced 
 Trivellato’s. Hence all that took place between earth and sky, 
 within the range of her vision, she saw and commented oil 
 according to her nature. And, through her, handles for scourges 
 to lay on the backs of social sinners were never wanting in Oak- 
 hurst. Just now lone St. Claire was the sinner^?* excellence of 
 the community ; and between those frequent rides with Edward 
 Formby, and this perpetual running in and out of the new con- 
 fectioner’s, Miss Maria was well set up in material. The double sin 
 was the common talk of Oakhurst ; and the only people who did 
 not hear it were lone herself, her husband, and Edward Formby. 
 
 One evening lone was out rather later than usual. She had 
 been riding with Edward, and, still in her riding-habit as she was, 
 she went up the street to Trivellato’s to order some dolci for their 
 neglected and rather scanty dinner. 
 
 ‘ We have no cassata, Signora,’ said Giuseppe with an innocent 
 face. 4 We have some new dolci in the inner room, if the signora 
 will go in to see them.’ 
 
 6 Va bene , 1 said lone. 
 
 She passed through the little trap of the counter, and w^ent 
 on into comparative darkness. A man was standing by the table, 
 holding the back of a chair as if his hands were a vice, or that 
 wooden rail were a live thing that he could press to death. She 
 looked into his face, and at a glance recognised that swarthy skin, 
 those gleaming eyes, that strange Saracenic countenance with its 
 hidden passion and outward quiet smoothness. 
 
 ‘ Vincenzo ! 9 she said with almost a scream. ‘ What are you 
 doing here ? Why have you come P 9 
 
 ‘ To take care of you, signora,’ he said gently. ‘ The day will 
 come when you will want me.’ 
 
 6 Madman ! how should I want you ! ’ she said haughtily. 
 6 How should you take care of me ! I have my husband ! ’ 
 
 ‘ True, Signora, you have your husband,’ said Vincenzo slowly. 
 
 1 And I want no one else,’ she returned quickly. 
 
 ‘ Friends do no harm,’ he said. 
 
 1 Friends ! You forget yourself, Vincenzo. Can a servant be 
 my friend ? 9 she said with unspeakable pride. 
 
 His dark eyes glistened like two polished stones played on by 
 a fiery light. 
 
TIIE NEW ARRIVAL . 
 
 2C7 
 
 1 A dog may be a friend ! ’ lie said, humbly as to mere manner ; 
 and yet there was something in the whole spirit of the man that 
 was arrogant and authoritative and by no means humble and sub- 
 servient as he wished to appear. 
 
 ‘ You are a dog, but you can never be of use to me,’ said 
 lone. 
 
 His eyes flashed. 
 
 6 We shall see/ he answered in a low voice. 
 
 ‘What do you mean, Vincenzo?’ she asked, more agitated 
 than she cared to show. ‘ What help, what friendship can I 
 want ? I who have all that life can give me ! ’ 
 
 ‘ The Signora is alone here — a stranger like myself,’ he said. 
 ‘ She has married a man who is not worthy of her. No ! hear 
 me out ! ’ he said, raising his voice in command, as lone prepared 
 to speak. ‘ The Signora loves him, therefore she does not see ; 
 but those "who love her do see. This cold wooden Englishman is 
 not worthy of her. I say it again and yet again. And the day 
 will come when the Signora will know that I have spoken truth.’ 
 
 ‘ Insolent ! Brigand ! Mafiose ! ; cried lone, transported with 
 passion. 
 
 Vincenzo bent his head. 
 
 ‘ Be it so/ he answered. ‘ All the same, I am the Signora’s 
 friend here. She has none other ! And the day will come when 
 she will say, “Vincenzo, I want you ; help me ! ” ’ 
 
 ‘ I — to you P Never ! 7 she said, all her pride and passion 
 surging like a torrent in her soul. 
 
 Vincenzo touched her riding-habit. 
 
 ‘ The Signora is young, beautiful, alone here,’ he said ; ‘ and 
 her husband, this wdiite-blooded Englishman, gives her into the 
 hands of a man like this Signore, who takes her for hours into the 
 far-off country, where no one knows where they go nor what they 
 do. Is that love, Signora ? is that the care an Italian would have 
 for his wife ? No facchino among us would be so negligent of his 
 honour, or expose his wife to so much danger. Would your 
 husband, if he were worthy of you — if’ — here he bent his head 
 close to Iones, and hissed between his teeth — ‘ if he loved you ? ’ 
 
 ‘ Brigand ! ’ said lone again, striking his face with her gloved 
 hand. ‘ How dare you say such things to me ? ’ 
 
 ‘ How dare I ? And if t dare not, who should ? ’ said Vincenzo, 
 seizing her wrists. ‘ Do you know who I am, Signora lone ? ’ 
 
 1 A slave ! a mafiose ! ’ cried lone passionately. 6 And I will 
 give you up to the police ! ’ 
 
 He laughed. 
 
 ‘ Mafiose, yes,’ he said. ‘ I can confess that here. Mafiose 
 and something more. I am your cousin, Signora lone ; and I love 
 you. Now, betray me if you dare ! ’ 
 
 6 You lie, Vincenzo, and I do not believe you,’ she said, shaking 
 
268 
 
 IONE. 
 
 off his hands and confronting him with tlie same pride and anger 
 as before. 1 My cousin P you ? Liar ! You are no cousin of 
 mine, and I will have you shot ! You shall be hunted out of 
 England by the police ! you shall be shot,’ she repeated. 
 
 ‘ You have no mafia here,’ he answered, with a quick return 
 to his former humble manner ; ‘ and the police cannot touch me, 
 Signora. I have offended against no law, and I am in a free 
 country. I will stay here to make cassata and pecorelle for the 
 good English people, and to watch over your safety. I tell you 
 again, the time will come when you will want me ! ’ 
 
 i Never ! never ! never ! ’ cried lone. ‘ 1 will never enter your 
 shop again, Vincenzo. Insolent ! Mafiose ! You shall never see 
 me here again.’ 
 
 ‘ You will come to-morrow,’ he said slowly. ‘ To-morrow I 
 shall have made some new dolci , and la Signora shall have her 
 choice. You will come ; do you hear? Fatherless and mother- 
 less, cast off by those who adopted you, neglected and unloved by 
 vour husband, you have only me — and always me — this poor 
 Vincenzo who was your servant at Palermo and who is your 
 protector in England — this poor Vincenzo who is your cousin — 
 and who loves you ! ’ 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 WARS ANT) RUMOURS OF WARS. 
 
 Ione’s halcyon days were over. Her bird of love no longer nested 
 on a waveless sea, but beat its wings in pain and storm over the spot 
 where once it had brooded in divinest peace. On all sides strange 
 ills beset her, some of which she knew, while of others she saw 
 only the advancing shadows. Of these ills the presence of 
 Vincenzo here at Oakhurst, and the hateful revelation of her 
 parentage which he had now made to her in full, were the most 
 solid — doubts of her husband’s love the most agonising. Before 
 Vincenzos arrival these doubts had already at times vaguely 
 traversed her brain ; not as thoughts made out and consolidated, 
 but as dim fears more prophetic than actual — spiritual protoplasm 
 lying in the depths and not yet shaped into active life. Now 
 things were different. Through the revelation of her birth and 
 the degradation, including his own relationship, w r hich it involved, 
 Vincenzo held her as a boy holds a captive bird. She was in his 
 power for anything that he chose to demand ; and his choice was 
 to detach her from her husband by proving to her that she was 
 not loved. What ulterior plans lie might have, he carefully 
 concealed ; and for the present he contented himself with dropping 
 
WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS. 2C9 
 
 into her mind disbeliefs which were like the poison that was 
 dropped into the ear of the king. 
 
 How should she not doubt that man whom she so loved, and 
 for whom she had given up her all ! she used to think, as she 
 watched Armine between her half-closed lids when he sat there at 
 the other side of the table, preoccupied, lost in thought, absent, 
 uncompanionable. If she asked him, as she often did, per- 
 emptorily, abruptly, Of what was he thinking ? he used to start as 
 if he had been suddenly awakened out of sleep, and always made 
 the same answer : i My cases, dear.’ 
 
 How she hated his profession which absorbed him so 
 completely, and how jealous she was of its claims and of all his 
 patients ! As for his female patients, she never believed in their 
 illnesses. They were only in love with Armine, and were trying 
 to seduce him from his allegiance to herself. She often made 
 scenes at home, and abroad too ; even about cottagers’ wives and 
 labourers’ daughters ; scenes which were both bitter and loving, 
 but of which the bitterness remained when the love was forgotten. 
 Of late, however, Armine had not given her the details which, in 
 the beginning, he thought might interest her and somewhat divert 
 her passion for himself into a calmer and more generalised 
 philanthropy. When he saw how she took them, and after she 
 had once or twice made herself hateful and him ridiculous, then 
 he closed the book and told her no more. And his silence was a 
 greater grievance to her than his confidences had been the source 
 of pain and misleading. 
 
 He did not talk much to her on any matter; and the even- 
 ings w^hich should have been hers — the pleasaunce of her soul, 
 where her love might have had full liberty and expansion — were 
 used for his work, which took him away from her. And nothing 
 that she could do brought him nearer. If she tried to bend him 
 by the imperious passion of her own love she wearied him.. If she 
 gave way to her temper, as she did not infrequently, she distressed 
 but did not warm him ; if she left him to himself he was tranquil 
 and at ease, but he was so much the farther from her, and none the 
 more loving because he was undisturbed. He was sweet and 
 kind and gentle, but he was not loving ; and she recognised the 
 difference. 
 
 But if he did not love her, whom then did he love P As yet 
 she had not fastened on one for all her sporadic jealousy of all. 
 Still, she could not believe that he was indifferent to every one. 
 He had sworn that nothing but poverty stood between them when 
 he had sought to break his engngement at Palermo — he had 
 sworn it, and he was not a man to lie. But she had begun to 
 doubt him now. He did not love her as she counted love ; then 
 it must be that some other held what she had lost. Who was 
 she ? If she could discover her ! — well, and then ? Then, thought 
 
270 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 lone to herself, there was Vincenzo within call — Vincenzo who 
 would do her will let it be what it would, and who was not a 
 mafiose for nothing. But of all this not a line was sharply defined. 
 She only knew that she was standing on the edge of an abyss, and 
 that some day she should go over. 
 
 Meanwhile, she kept Vincenzo’s secret — and her own; in spite 
 of her pride, her reluctance, her fierce disdain, her personal loathing 
 for the man, went constantly to the confectioner’s shop, because 
 bidden by its master, who now was also hers, and who set a time 
 of return at each visit; rode out with Edward Formby; and 
 offered herself as a target for all the ill-nature and evil-speaking of 
 Oakhurst. 
 
 That riding had become her greatest and indeed her sole plea- 
 sure. She was only happy now when going at a hard gallop for 
 miles at a stretch — working off the fever that burnt in her veins 
 in the wild excitement of her rapid going. Edward was too hard 
 a rider himself to stint her passionate pace. The fever was in his 
 veins too ; but these long swift rides did nothing towards subduing 
 it. On the contrary, they were the food on which it fed. So the 
 two went about the lanes and over the moor at racing speed ; and 
 those who found the thing obnoxious at all found it doubly evil 
 because of the number of miles which were covered in a given 
 number of minutes. 
 
 At last rumour grew so loud and condemnation so distinct that 
 Monica, obeying her mother’s desire, but certain of predestined 
 failure, undertook the perilous task of preaching prudence to lone, 
 and some abatement in these long and frequent rides with Edward 
 Formby of Hillside. It was a perilous task and failure was pre- 
 destined ; so far she knew ; yet for the wife of Armine St. Claire 
 she was willing to undergo defeat and imperil her own pride 
 in the forlorn hope of doing good for the future, if not for the im- 
 mediate present. 
 
 ‘ There can be no harm where there is no wrong,’ said lone, 
 holding up her head like a young queen, when the girl whom her 
 husband loved had very gently advised her to give up these con- 
 stant and rapid excursions. 
 
 ‘ No, of course there is no wrong ; but people are so censorious, 
 and we must attend to appearances,’ said Monica. 
 
 1 In England ? England is a free country ! ’ cried lone. 
 
 ‘ Politically, yes ; conventionally, a thousand times no ! ’ 
 answered Monica with a deprecating little smile. ‘ 1 should say 
 we were far more conventional than even the Italians — at least, 
 about our young married women. Girls are freer.’ 
 
 ‘ So P Then I shall teach you better,’ said lone superbly. 6 In 
 Italy a married woman can do what she likes if her husband does 
 not object. And my husband does not object to my riding with 
 
WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS . 
 
 271 
 
 Mr. Formby. On the contrary — lie likes it. It takes me off his 
 hands and out of his way/ she added bitterly. 
 
 Monica turned her eyes to the window and looked out on the 
 ragged and neglected square of ground which represented the 
 garden. Iones words went into her heart like drops of burning 
 lead. Reading between the lines as she did, what a mournful 
 revelation they gave ! 
 
 ‘ He cannot wish to get you off his hands or out of his way, 
 dear Mrs. St. Claire/ she said after a pause, turning back to lone 
 with a half-caressing, half-admiring intonation. ‘You are too 
 charming, and your marriage is too young for that ! But is it not 
 just possible that he may be a little hurt and very proud, foolishly 
 proud ? — and that he may not like your being so much with another 
 man, yet will not complain nor object? People are so odd some- 
 times ! and jealousy shows itself in such different ways ! 7 
 
 lone’s nostrils quivered, and her lips drew themselves in a thin 
 hard line. 
 
 1 Armine jealous of me ! 7 she said scornfully. ‘ That is simple 
 nonsense, Miss Barrington. Were I to be jealous of him — you 
 know that would be more to the purpose ! 7 
 
 She spoke at random, not meaning more than that Monica, like 
 all the world, and as one only of the rest, knew Armine St. 
 Claire’s delinquencies, and how much she, this ill-treated lone, 
 had to suffer. 
 
 Monica’s quiet face changed as much as colour changes under 
 the flash of light. For a moment she was staggered. How much 
 did lone know P How much had she divined ? Or was it only 
 a chance shot ? At the worst there was nothing overt to know ; 
 and now, nothing on her side, concealed. It was, however, a 
 moment or two before she quite recovered herself and dared trust 
 her voice. When she did, she said quietly : 
 
 ‘I know nothing that should make you jealous of your 
 husband ; nor does anyone else.’ 
 
 ‘ I want no stranger to assure me of that/ said lone harshly. 
 
 ‘ Have I been impertinent ? 7 said Monica gently. 
 
 * Yes, very/ answered the other. 6 Shamefully insolent — un- 
 pardonably. You have taken a liberty I shall never forgive/ she 
 went on, her passion rising with the words — ‘a liberty no one 
 has ever dared to take before, and no one but yourself would dare 
 to take now/ 
 
 ‘ Forgive me/ said Monica. 6 If I have been impertinent, and 
 have taken a liberty, it is only because I am your friend, dear 
 Mrs. St. Claire, and because I know this place, and you do not/ 
 
 ‘ And why should you be my friend ? 7 asked lone slowly, her 
 lips narrowed to a thread, her eyes, half closed, leaving only that 
 glittering green line between the lids, her nostrils palpitating, her 
 
272 
 
 IONE. 
 
 long white hands clenched one within the other. 'I have done 
 nothing that should make you my friend, so devoted as this. Why 
 is it, Miss Barrington ? ’ 
 
 6 Do you think there is nothing in your position to interest 
 one ? ’ said Monica. ‘ You are alone here, away from all your own 
 people ; your husband’s profession leaves you much to yourself ; 
 you do not know the peculiarities of the place nor the customs of 
 English society ; and your husband has been our friend for some 
 time now. That is why I take an interest in you, and have 
 ventured on a liberty in the hope of being of service to you.’ 
 
 ‘ Because my husband has been your friend for some time ? ’ 
 repeated lone in the same slow voice, her face not altering, not 
 softening, not relaxing one hairs breadth of its stony viciousness, 
 its bitter suspicion. 
 
 ‘ In the beginning, yes,’ answered Monica steadily. 1 And now 
 because of yourself.’ 
 
 i I am much obliged to you,’ said lone, keeping her glittering 
 eyes still fixed on Monica’s pallid face. ‘ But will you understand 
 this is never to happen again ? Never ! never ! If you wish to 
 keep me as — an acquaintance ’ — she would not say friend — friend 
 to a woman who had just confessed to an interest in Armine in 
 those dark years when she, lone, had not known him P per Bacco, 
 no ! She would die rather ! — ‘ as an acquaintance, Miss Barring- 
 ton, will you kindly understand that you are not to interfere in 
 my actions, nor take it on yourself to advise me, no matter what 
 I do, whether I ride every day with Mr. Formby or not, either 
 because you have an interest in me, or have been my husband’s 
 friend for some time ? You are very kind, I make no doubt ; but I 
 do not care to be advised by my husband’s friends. I prefer my own.’ 
 
 She spoke with intense insolence, with a mocking accent, and 
 a look of unspeakable bitterness on her face. And as she spoke 
 she rose, as a hint to her visitor to go. Monica rose too. 
 
 4 1 am very sorry, Mrs. St. Claire,’ she said. ‘ I confess I have 
 made a mistake, and that I ought not to have taken this task on 
 myself. But I meant it for your good — for an expression of my 
 own sincere interest in you ; and if it seems to you an impertinence, 
 I had only the wish to be useful and friendly.’ 
 
 4 Good-morning,’ said lone. Then suddenly changing her voice 
 and manner, she said with extreme complaisance : ‘ But perhaps 
 you would like to stay and see my husband ? Pray do so, Miss 
 Barrington, if you like. He will be here presently. Will you 
 not wait to see him ? ’ 
 
 ‘ Thank you,’ said Monica quite quietly. * I am not ill, and I 
 have nothing to speak to him about. Good-morning, Mrs. St. 
 Claire. Forgive me if I have annoyed you,’ she said again, as 
 her last vain endeavour at reparation and peace. i Try to elieve 
 I did not intend to vex you, but quite — quite the contrary.’ 
 
WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS . 
 
 273 
 
 Saying w-bicli she turned away, with the feeling of one who 
 has aimed high and struck low, and who has made a fatal blunder 
 which nothing now can ever put to rights. And the last thing 
 she saw was lone’s face hardened into scorn and hate and jealous 
 wrath, her proud lip curled and her eyes, now fully opened, with 
 one blazing look of passion turned on her like so much infernal 
 tire. 
 
 * Mother was mistaken, and I was weak to yield to her,’ said 
 Monica to herself, as she settled herself in the carriage, feeling 
 humiliated, ashamed and sorry, all in one. 1 And Mrs. St. Claire 
 w r as right to be offended. It w r as an impertinence, when one 
 thinks of it; and she is justified in resenting being treated as a 
 child. What business had I to warn or advise her ? She is his 
 wife, and that ought to be enough for us as for her. But I am 
 sorry. I am sorry for her — and oh, how sorry for him ! ’ 
 
 And of the two, the latter filled her mind more than the 
 former ; and the sorrow she felt for Armine was deeper and 
 sadder than that which she felt for lone — or even for herself, in 
 that she had blundered and brought bale, not blessing, in her train. 
 
 Others beside Monica Barrington took it on themselves to 
 remonstrate ; and of these Vincenzo was the most forcible. IIo 
 was madly jealous of this straight-backed, clean-limbed, broad- 
 shouldered young man — this English cicisbeo — who rode instead 
 of danced, and paid his court in the open air instead of in a 
 boudoir. Of the two he hated Edward more than Armine. The 
 one was of the nature of fate while it lasted, but it was something 
 that death could remove ; the other was voluntary and trenched 
 on an available margin. He lost his time. Cousin though he 
 was, this confectioner and local Gull, with her secret in his hand 
 and his blood in her veins, lone defied his authority and despised 
 his remonstrances. She had no love for the master of Hillside to 
 make her superstitious and timid, as for her husband ; and when 
 Vincenzo prophesied disaster to the man who gave her pleasure 
 and gained for her the disfavour of the neighbourhood, she only 
 lifted her chin and said coldly: ‘ It is nothing tome ; Mr. Formby 
 can take care of himself.’ 
 
 Still she was secretly disturbed, and not quite so sure of the 
 wisdom of her ways as she had been. Had she been let alone, 
 and that dangerous pride of hers not stirred by unskilful handling, 
 Monica’s gentle advice and Vincenzo’s ruder warnings might have 
 worked together in favour of prudence ; and, under the belief that 
 her own better judgment guided her, she would have practically 
 acknowledged the value of that discretion which each had 
 preached ; she would not have confessed to influence, but she 
 would have been influenced all the same, while giving her own 
 common sense the credit of her action— as the proud always do 
 when they let themselves be persuaded. 
 
 T 
 
274 
 
 ZONE. 
 
 But Jane Wintergreen spoilt the better chance. She met lone 
 one day face to face, and fired off a small salvo of insolence and 
 warning, which hardened the young wife like another Pharaoh, 
 and cut down to the ground all the gentler growths which had 
 just begun to sprout. And the consequence of the interview was 
 that lone, from the very haughtiness of opposition, on her next 
 riding excursion four times passed that little house covered with 
 ivy and jessamine, where Miss Wintergreen tyrannised over her 
 maid and took stock of her neighbours ; and each time that she 
 passed it she took care to be laughing very hilariously, with her 
 head turned so as to look straight into Edward’s face. And w r hen 
 heedless young* people do this ldnd of thing to those wdio have 
 ill-nature, and the power to use it, what can they expect but hard 
 handling P And Jane Wintergreen’s hands were hard when she 
 put out their strength. 
 
 lone had failed to stop the current when she could ; and now 
 the waters threatened to overwhelm her ; for Jane was virtuous, 
 though also a little venomous, and she made up her mind to speak 
 to Dr. St. Claire himself, and to speak too plainly to be mis- 
 understood. Men at the best w r ere but false gods to her, and 
 flirting was the accursed thing which must not be allowed, come 
 what might. 
 
 And like all persons w r ho are going to do ill-natured things, 
 she persuaded herself that it was out of pure charity to that mis- 
 guided young thing and that her stripes were laid on for reforma- 
 tion, not punishment. 
 
 i I say, Dr. St. Claire, look after your wife a little better than 
 you do ! ’ she said abruptly, attacking the question point-blank as 
 her manner was. 6 Letting her run about the country with a 
 young man like Edward Formby — though he is one of our own, 
 and we know all about him ; which we cannot say of every one 
 — and letting her be closeted for hours with a foreigner in a back- 
 parlour, as she is with that man who makes cakes and sweets of 
 goodness only know r s what ! — that’s not the kind of thing we 
 decent English folk approve of ; and so I tell you, doctor, as a 
 friend, frankly.’ 
 
 4 1 am sorry if my wife does anything that seems to you 
 undesirable, Miss Wintergreen,’ said Dr. St. Claire in his sweet, 
 graceful, but intangible way ; a way that made you feel you had 
 no hold on him, and could not really touch him — like a beautiful 
 ice-crystal which melted in your hand, or a mist- wreath on the 
 mountain that dissolved as you came near. 
 
 * Undesirable is not quite the word that I should use,’ said 
 Jane grimly. 6 1 should call it something much plainer than that.’ 
 
 Wes? But I confess I do not see any harm in Mrs. St. 
 Claire’s riding out now and then with my friend Edward Formby 
 as her escort, when I cannot go with her myself.’ 
 
WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS. 
 
 275 
 
 Avmine spoke with perfect temper and all his best good- 
 breeding. 
 
 ‘ t hen it would speak better for your common sense if you did 
 see harm where every one else can see it/ returned Jane, even 
 more grimly than before. 6 Your very confiding husbands are not 
 to my taste, doctor. We homely English bodies would call them 
 by another name, I tell you. When young women are married 
 they should think of something else beside pleasure. They should 
 mind the house and keep to their own firesides, and not be met 
 scouring the country like fly-by-nights a good twenty miles from 
 home ! Such goings on, they are not decent ; and you are not the 
 man, doctor, to make Oakhurst take to them.’ 
 
 ‘ I am sorry you see things in this harsh light, Miss Winter- 
 green,’ said Armine. 
 
 6 Then if you are, prove it. You have it in your own hands,’ 
 Jane answered sharply. 
 
 ‘ At all events I thank you for your kind intentions,’ he said 
 in his sweet temporising way. 
 
 ‘ Which I wager anything you will not act on,’ returned Jane 
 rudely. ( We all know who is master in the doctors house, and 
 how meek a henpecked husband* crows! So good-day to you, 
 doctor, and never say you have not had a good friend in Oakhurst 
 who has put herself out of the way to give you good advice, and 
 keep you and your young lady straight.’ 
 
 And with this she flung the young man a disdainful kind of 
 nod, and strode on her way rejoicing. 
 
 For all his graceful acquiescence of manner and virtual in- 
 tangibility when with Miss Wintergreen, her words left St. Claire 
 as perplexed and disturbed as she herself would have desired. 
 He knew that he did not love lone, and that he was but a dull 
 companion for her at the best. He knew, too, that he escaped 
 from her society whenever he could with decency, wearied as 
 he was now with her love, and now with her jealousy ; now with 
 her fiery adoration, and now with her consuming wrath. It 
 seemed churlish to deny her a pleasure which was substantially 
 innocent simply because a few narrow-minded and censorious 
 spinsters chose to speak about it. And yet, was he not bound to 
 protect that young wife of his against the very least misunder- 
 standings? Was not the delicate bloom of her repute the most 
 sacred of his possessions, and its preservation the most imperative 
 of liis duties ? And were not appearances all-important in the 
 world — more especially for one who has to live by the good- will 
 of that world ? 
 
 He was sorry for her. It was a martyrdom and a misery all 
 throughout. But he must do his duty and leave the rest to take 
 care of itself. He worried himself a good deal during the day, 
 but by the time he reached home in the late afternoon he had 
 
IOXE. 
 
 276 
 
 resolved to bring- things to an issue, and to ventilate the matter 
 all through. But it was awkward, all things considered ; — especi- 
 ally that loan from Edward Formby, which at the time had been 
 such a boon, but which now — how much he wished he had never 
 taken ! How strangely his lines had crossed with Edward’s ! 
 He remembered how, in the beginning of things, he had heard 
 that Edward and Monica were destined for each other ; and how, 
 through doubt and fear, he had come to the conviction that the 
 neighbourhood had proposed and the principals themselves had 
 not ratified. It was Edward, too, who had given him that letter 
 of introduction to the Stewarts by which his whole life had been 
 changed — and those old speculations and impossible dreams for 
 lone, and his wishes that she could have found a home at Hill- 
 side ! And now people were beginning to talk of him and lone ; 
 and his money had pulled him, Armine, lone’s husband, through 
 his difficulties. What a strange tangle it was ! 
 
 ‘ Where did you go to-day, lone ?’ Armine asked as he pushed 
 back his chair from the window so that the light should not fall 
 on his face, and spoke with almost more than usual gentleness. 
 It was the instinctive hypocrisy of a gentle nature when an 
 unpleasant duty has to be undertaken. 
 
 ‘ To Cross Roads,’ said lone, a shade reluctantly. 
 
 * All that distance, dear ! Cross Roads is full twenty miles 
 away ! That is far too long a ride,’ he returned. 
 
 ‘ I found it delightful ; not at all too long,’ she said. 
 
 ‘But these long rides are not good for you. Forty miles — 
 that is excessive ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Why are they not good P ’ she asked with studied indif- 
 ference. 
 
 ‘ They are bad for your health,’ he answered. 
 
 ‘ That is absurd,’ was her reply. ‘ I wa3 never in such splen- 
 did health as I am now. I am as strong as a lioness. If that is 
 your only reason for finding fault with them, Armine, it is non- 
 sense.’ 
 
 ‘ I may have another,’ he said. 
 
 ‘Yes?’ 
 
 She spoke in the same studiously indifferent way as before. 
 She seemed to wish to make him understand that his disapproba- 
 tion touched her no more than the idle whistling of the wind. 
 
 ‘ It does not look well to see you going so far and so fast,’ he 
 said. 6 People here do not like it, and have spoken of it to me.’ 
 
 ‘ You mean Miss Barrington, or perhaps Miss Wintergreen, bv 
 your “ people here,”’ said lone. ‘ And you care for what two old 
 maids like these say ! Upon my word, Armine, you are incom- 
 prehensible ! ’ 
 
 The old Palermo scorn came back over her fiice. Her fine 
 eyes flashed, her thin lips curved, her transparent nostrils dilated. 
 
WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS. 
 
 277 
 
 She was lone Stewart, fighting fate and defying law, as in the 
 former days ; she was no longer the lover of Armine and, to her 
 belief, his beloved. 
 
 ‘ Ts there anything incomprehensible in my wishing you to be 
 careful, dear, so that people should have nothing to say against 
 you F ’ said Armine, intrenched in the fastnesses of common sense 
 and conventionality. 
 
 4 If you had thought for yourself and out of regard for me, 1 
 might have attended to you,’ said lone. 4 As the mouthpiece of 
 Miss Barrington and Miss VY intergreen — grazie tante!’ 
 
 4 A thing is right or wrong in itself, lone. It is not who 
 speaks it, but what it is,’ said Armine sagely. 
 
 4 Then you need not trouble yourself,’ she answered. 4 There 
 is no more wrong in my riding twenty miles than ten.’ 
 
 4 Perhaps I should object to the ten,’ said Armine. 
 
 4 That you certainly have no right to do,’ she answered quickly. 
 4 You did not at the first, and you have no right to go back from 
 your word and make new regulations just to please two spiteful 
 old maids. Your Miss Barrington indeed, with her airs of Santa 
 Maria, and that old toad, that Miss Wintergreen ! No, Armine; 
 I am not going to have my life regulated by either one or the 
 other ! ’ 
 
 4 We will not quarrel about names, dear,’ said Armine, always 
 sweet and gentle, and always wise enough to refuse to take up 
 the glove which she brandished so persistently in hi3 face. 4 It is 
 I myself who object to it ; and I have the right, seeing that things 
 have not turned out quite as I expected.’ 
 
 4 What do you mean ? ’ asked lone quickly. 4 How have they 
 turned out ? ’ 
 
 4 By making people talk,’ Armine answered simply. 
 
 4 And you care for that P ’ was her scornful commentary. 
 
 4 We cannot live without the world’s good-will,’ he said. 
 4 Certainly you and I cannot, lone, when our very bread depends 
 on it. We must attend to appearances on the one hand, and to 
 the prejudices among which we live on the other. There is no 
 help for it. So, my dear girl, sorry as I am to say it, you must 
 give up these long rides with Edward Formby, and you must 
 not go out with him so often.’ 
 
 4 Now you have shown your colours!’ said lone disdainfully. 
 4 You confess, then, it is only because of what people say.’ 
 
 4 It is because of prudence and wisdom,’ he answered. 
 
 4 1 do not care now,’ said lone, with a mocking laugh. 4 Your 
 Santa Maria shall have no hand in my life, nor that old zitellone 
 either ! Now, Armine, you are answered, and you need say no 
 more.’ 
 
 4 1 am answered, but not convinced nor conquered,’ he said. 
 4 These rides must be put a stop to. Mr. Formby has good sense, 
 
IONE. 
 
 278 
 
 if you have not. And now that we are talking, there is another 
 tiling I have to speak about. I have heard a strange report of your 
 being so often seen in the back parlour of the confectioner’s shop. 
 I cannot understand what it all means. But people are talking 
 of that too ; and I am all abroad about it.’ 
 
 ‘Miss Wintergreen again? 9 said lone. 
 
 But she rather feigned than felt the disdain she threw into her 
 voice. Her face a little changed, too, in expression, and her eyes 
 had not all the bold candour of opposition that had been in them 
 when she spoke of Edward Formby. 
 
 ‘ Never mind whether it was Miss Wintergreen or not,’ said 
 Armine impatiently. 6 It is enough to know that I was told you 
 have been watched coming out of the back parlour, where you 
 had been for hours. It seems to me so strange to hear such a 
 thing of a girl so proud as you ; for all that the man is, I under- 
 stand, an Italian, and you may like to talk to him in your own 
 language. Still, you to be on familiar terms with a shopkeeper — 
 it is incredible ! 9 
 
 ‘ What wretches you English are ! 9 cried lone, in strange 
 agitation. ‘That odious Miss Wintergreen met me one day 
 coming out of the inner room, where I had been for about five 
 minutes. What a wretch she is — what an old snake and 
 serpent ! 9 
 
 ‘ But what were you doing there, lone ? In England, ladies 
 do not do such things/ said Armine with a kind of fretful 
 dignity. 
 
 It was all such a nuisance, such an imbroglio. 
 
 ‘ What was I doing ? Looking at Vincenzo’s dolci,’ she said 
 defiantly. 
 
 ‘ Who on earth is Vincenzo ? 9 
 
 ‘ That ugly man you hated so much at Palermo — the superin- 
 tendent of the mill.’ 
 
 ‘ That ruffian ! What is he doing here ? ’ asked Armine, with 
 the feeling of being suddenly confronted by a nameless kind of 
 danger. 
 
 ‘ He is the confectioner,’ she said. 
 
 ‘ But why has he come here — here of all places in the world/ 
 he asked again, seriously disturbed. 
 
 ‘ Chi lo sa ; I am not in his pocket/ said lone with a hard 
 laugh. ‘ Perhaps to look after me and protect me from English 
 brigands.’ 
 
 ‘ Nonsense, lone ; how can you condescend to talk such 
 rubbish ? Why did you not tell me he was here ? ’ said Armine 
 with decided temper. 
 
 She turned on him like a lioness at bay. 
 
 ‘ And why should I tell you that or anything else, Armine ? 9 
 she said passionately. 
 
WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS. 279 
 
 ‘ Young wives in general do not keep secrets from their hus- 
 bands/ he said. 
 
 ‘ Husbands ! Husbands ! No, not if their husbands care for 
 them/ she returned. But what do you care for me? Nothing; 
 not half so much as you care for Miss Barrington or Miss anybody 
 else. You neglect me, ill-treat me, deny me every trifle, no matter 
 what it is — even a little pleasure which costs you nothing — you 
 treat me abominably, and then you expect that I am to confide in 
 you, and love you, and obey you, as if you were a god and I a 
 little dog. I will do nothing of the kind, Armine. You are not 
 good to me, and I do not see why I should be good to you. And 
 I will not ; so now you know.’ 
 
 4 My poor lone/ said Armine with sudden gentleness. ‘ It is 
 hard lines for you, I confess. Debt, poverty, want of society, and 
 misunderstanding — I foresaw it all ; and now it has come.’ 
 
 ‘ Anything may come if you love me/ said lone, with an out- 
 burst of old passion. 
 
 She went over to where he sat, and threw herself on her knees 
 before him. 
 
 ‘ Tell me that you love me as much as you did, and then I 
 will do anything for you/ she said. Her arms were round him ; 
 her face was upturned to his ; her dilated eyes were fixed feverishly 
 on him ; her heart was on fire ; her blood was like burning flame. 
 ‘ I care for nothing in the world, Armine, but you. Tell me that 
 you love me as you used — as you loved me at Palermo.’ 
 
 1 1 love you, dear, as much as I ever loved you, the same here 
 as at Palermo/ said her husband, kissing her upturned face more 
 sadly perhaps than fervently, more in contrition than for loving 
 need, more to soothe his own conscience than to satisfy his impulse. 
 
 A strange spasm convulsed her face. 
 
 6 How much was that P ’ she said. 
 
 6 Silly child ; how can you measure love ? ’ he answered smiling. 
 
 6 You do not love me, Armine ; you never have loved me/ she 
 said, not really believing what she said, but with the wish to be 
 reassured and the spirit of one tempting danger. 
 
 ‘ I do not love you when you are silly and doubt me/ he said, 
 tenderly smoothing back her hair. 
 
 ; Do you love me at all ? ’ she asked, letting herself be soothed. 
 
 6 Of course I do/ he answered with a smile. 
 
 ‘ Swear it.’ 
 
 6 1 swear it/ he said. 
 
 6 Better than anyone else in the whole world, Armine ? Swear 
 it by your hope of heaven, by your faith in God ! ’ said lone 
 solemnly. 
 
 ‘ Why take such sacred names in vain for a mere play ? ’ he 
 answered. ‘ Let it content you, child, that I love you, that you 
 are my wife, and that I am faithful to you in word and deed.’ 
 
 rp 4 
 
28 o 
 
 ZONE. 
 
 ‘ Who is she ? 9 cried lone, starting* to her feet. 1 There is 
 some one, Armine — who is it ? It is Monica Barrington.’ 
 
 4 Is it P ’ he said with a rather ghastly attempt at playfulness. 
 6 Just think ! if it should be ! 9 
 
 i If it is I will find it out — and I will kill her,’ said lone, 
 setting her teeth like a trap. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 MAKING POR THE ROCKS. 
 
 Life is a terrible problem. What with contradictory duties, 
 ignorance of the right way, the doctrine of a merciful rod on the 
 one hand and of the father of lies coming before us as an angel of 
 light on the other, we are worse off than belated wanderers in a 
 morass, led by will-o’-the-wisps into folly and by hobgoblins into 
 danger. We have chastisements which we are told are blessings 
 in disguise ; and our rosiest apples, which seem made for nourish- 
 ment and delight, turn out to be but Dead Sea fruit, full of bitter- 
 ness and ashes. It is hard to know how to steer on such a strange 
 phantasmagoric sea ; hardest of all to know whom to love and 
 what to leave, or where assent is foolish and where denial is for- 
 bidden. 
 
 That loan — or gift? — which Edward Formby had made to 
 Armine St. Claire was one of these disappointed contradictions — 
 one of these Dead Sea apples which look like wholesome food and 
 are not fit for mans consumption. In view of all that had been 
 said to him of late, it had made Armine uncomfortable and uneasy ; 
 and in view of his own unconfessed, but none the less existing 
 feeling, it had made Edward Formby also uncomfortable and un- 
 easy. The one asked himself : Had he been bribed P He hated 
 himself for the doubt, but there it was, and he could not get rid of 
 it. If so, what could he do ? How should he act ? He could not 
 fling back the money into Edward’s face. He had spent it, and he 
 might as well try to move the world without a lever as try to re- 
 place it. Duelling was out of fashion, and calm reasoning between 
 man and man was scarcely possible on such a matter. The posi- 
 tion was difficult, delicate, dangerous ; and the young doctor did 
 not see his way quite clearly. He was only conscious of so much 
 — that something must be done. 
 
 On his side Edward Formby asked himself: Had he bought a 
 complaisance which would ruin the whole thing, and turn the 
 sweetest friendship he had ever made into one of the most de- 
 grading ? He, too, hated himself for the doubt ; but self-hatred 
 goes for little against suspicion, and the two young men were at 
 this moment distinctly suspicious of each other. So much was due 
 
MAKING FOR THE ROCKS . 
 
 281 
 
 to that loan, which to Armine had looked so like an interposition 
 of Providence when it was made, and which Edward had offered 
 in such simplicity of good faith. 
 
 lone, for all that she knew nothing of this money transaction, 
 was yet as uncomfortable as were the men. She was harassed by 
 Vincenzo, revolted by his insinuations which clung like burning 
 
 E iteh when once made, humiliated by his presence, his knowledge, 
 is relationship, and maddened by jealousy of some unknown 
 rival with her husband. He had always denied it, but she was 
 now morally sure that some one stood between her and Armine ; 
 though she was unable to say who that some one was. She only 
 knew it in that blind w r av in which we are conscious of a presence 
 beside our own in the dark room where we are shut up. She could 
 not see nor touch ; but she knew. She knew also that Edward 
 Eormby loved her, and that she could deal with him as she would 
 — make him her husband’s scourge and her own avenger if the 
 humour took her or the times were ripe. If she did, she knew 
 also that in the background was always Vincenzo with whom she 
 would have to reckon — Vincenzo, her evil genius incarnate, visiting 
 on her the sins of her parents according to the law. Be that as 
 it would, she held the master of Hillside as a force in reserve — as 
 the Nemesis whom she could command, should the day ever dawn 
 when she must avenge herself on her love. But because she was 
 torn and distracted with doubt and jealousy — with ignorance of 
 how much she had to revenge, and desire to pay back that which 
 was owing, could she but find out what it was — she was uncertain 
 and fitful in her conduct to Edward ; — now maddening in her 
 allurements and now as maddening in her repulsion. At times 
 she would not ride with him, would scarcely speak to him, would 
 not look at him, turned from him as if with loathing; then 
 she was like an angel for sweetness and a demon for seductive- 
 ness ; while Edward, afraid to believe and scarce able to doubt, 
 asked himself, What it all meant P and never came to the true 
 answer. Once or twice he thought that he himself was the cause 
 of all this uncertainty — that she loved him and fought against her 
 passion, but was not always able to conquer — when the burden of 
 the 6 barren honour 3 that must be preserved rested on him. And, 
 heavy as it was, for her sake it must be borne. He was not 
 singular in thinking himself the cause when he was only the occa- 
 sion. This too is among those will-o’-the-wisps by which men are 
 led astray in life and judgment. 
 
 lone was as uncertain in her temper to Armine as she was to 
 Edward. And yet it could scarcely be called uncertainty so much 
 as change and difference. She was cold to him as only those can 
 be whose hearts are burning while their lips are frozen. Bays 
 passed, during which she never proffered him a caress, never laid 
 her hand in his, never called him by an endearing epithet, and 
 
2$2 
 
 TONE. 
 
 indeed scarcely spoke to him at all. Yet during this time of frost 
 and snow he used to see her eyes fixed on him with a look that 
 seemed to strike like a whip — a look of passion and reproach and 
 love and sorrow and latent hate all mingled in one, like the litany 
 of her wrongs written in letters of fire. 
 
 Then he would take himself to task and resolve on better 
 things. He would he a more attentive companion, a more finished 
 courtier than he had been, to the woman whose only fault towards 
 him was the intensity of her love. All the rest was the mere out- 
 growth from this central fact, and in justice could not count in 
 the indictment which weariness and want of sympathy made 
 against her. He would conquer his personal shrinking from her, 
 and see her as he saw her at Palermo — beautiful, unfortunate, a 
 living appeal to his compassion, an imperative claim on his admira- 
 tion. Pie would shut his eyes to all that was antagonistic to his 
 taste, and accept, as if he liked them, those fervid demonstrations 
 which chilled and embarrassed rather than warmed and rejoiced 
 him. Checked now, he believed that, at a sign from him, those 
 fervid demonstrations would break out as warmly as before. It 
 all rested with him. Man- like, he could not doubt his supreme 
 power over the woman who loved him. He had only to beckon 
 with his fore-finger and lone would come back to her devotion, as 
 a well-trained hawk to her lure. He was master of the situation 
 all round ; and those borderlands of feeling where opposites mix 
 and mingle did not exist for him. Love was love to him. He 
 could not understand the state of mind where love transfused with 
 jealousy becomes hate. 
 
 His task of lover-like courtiership was difficult. Marriage, 
 which takes off the edge of romance, sharpens that of uncon- 
 geniality ; and daily contact deepens the cross-hatching of discord. 
 Pinching shoes must be worn long before they are worn easy ; and 
 Armine had not yet trodden his into fitting shape. Nevertheless 
 he would do his best. He would turn over a new leaf, and make 
 himself uncomfortable that he might make her happy. 
 
 6 1 am not busy this afternoon, will you come for a walk with 
 me ? 1 he asked at luncheon one day, after they had been sitting 
 for some time in silence, lone, with her mind full of other things 
 and her feet on the edge of an abyss, not seeing and not caring for 
 the disorder of the table and the unappetising condition of the 
 food which revolted Armine, whose health was too impaired and 
 whose tastes were too refined to bear well with either coarseness in 
 food or disorder in service. 
 
 His offer took lone by surprise. For a moment her strange 
 eyes flashed with pleasure, and a smile broke over her face as a 
 ripple breaks over a sullen mountain tarn. It was only for a 
 moment. Her griefs against her husband were too deep and many 
 to be lost at his first movement towards her. 
 
MAKING FOR THE ROCKS. 283 
 
 1 Thank you/ she said unpleasantly ; 4 but I am going to the 
 flower-show to-day/ 
 
 4 Oh, I forgot ! 7 returned Armine with a forced smile. 4 Of 
 course; the flower-show. We will go there instead/ 
 
 ‘ Together P 7 she asked with a mocking accent. 
 
 4 Surely ! 7 
 
 4 Really it will be quite odd to go any where with you, Armine \’ 
 she said, in the same unpleasant and mocking way. 4 It will be 
 so strange, it wi 11 feel almost improper ! 7 
 
 4 Little goose ! 7 said Armine, he also with the same forced 
 smile as before. 
 
 lone drew her lips into their thin well-known line, and lowered 
 her eyelids till only a glittering thread was seen between the 
 lashes. Jealous and suspicious, she scented the danger of foreign 
 influence, and did not believe in the integrity of her husband’s 
 conversion. 
 
 4 Who has been speaking to you, Armine ? 7 she asked. 
 
 4 About what ? 7 
 
 4 About me/ 
 
 4 About you ? No one/ 
 
 4 Not of your disgraceful neglect of me ? 7 she asked. 
 
 4 As I do not neglect you, no one could take me to task/ he 
 answered very quietly. 
 
 She laughed scornfully. 
 
 4 Not neglect me ! 7 she said. 4 I do not know a husband in the 
 whole world who treats his wife as badly as you treat me — who 
 neglects her so entirely. If you say that you do not, you will say 
 anything ! 7 
 
 4 Asking you to come to the flower-show is a proof of it, is it 
 not P 7 he answered, offering the olive-branch in his pleasant, sweet, 
 caressing voice. 
 
 4 It is a proof that some one has been remonstrating with you, 
 and that you are influenced by some woman whose good opinion 
 you value, not by any care for me ! ’ blazed out lone. 
 
 4 Be it so/ said Armine, a little wearily. 
 
 To undertake a combat, as well as to fulfil a corvee, was 
 beyond his strength. 
 
 ‘ Up to now, Armine, I have believed you at least sincere/ 
 said lone, speaking in the low voice and with the artificial delibe- 
 ration of strong excitement. 4 Now I see that you are a hypocrite 
 as well as other things/ 
 
 4 In that case 1 need say no more/ said Armine, rising from the 
 table. 4 If it pleases you, lone, to think ill of me, I shall not 
 attempt to disturb your enjoyment. You will come to a better 
 frame of mind by- and- by. And I can afford to wait/ 
 
 He turned to go, but she put herself between him and the 
 door. 
 
284 
 
 IONE. 
 
 1 What have I done to you, Armine, that you should behave to 
 me as you do ? ’ she cried, seizing his wrists. 6 1 have loved you 
 as few girls love even the best and greatest man. I have given up 
 everything for your sake — home and money and happiness and 
 station — all for you. And what has been my reward ? Neglect 
 and ill-treatment ! You throw me into the way of a man like 
 Mr. Formby, simply that I may go wrong, and then you will get 
 rid of me. You deprive me of every pleasure. You grudge me 
 common necessaries — and all for what ? What have I done P 
 How have I deserved it ? ’ 
 
 Her voice, which had begun in a low key, had gradually risen 
 into a kind of shriek. Her eyes, which had been fierce and hard, 
 were now still fierce, but wild rather than hard. Her passions 
 were rising, as the storm and the tempest rise in the sky and break 
 over the land. She was losing her self-control. In a few 
 moments that and her beauty and her dignity would have gone 
 like flowers on the sand swept away by the tide. 
 
 Armine stood there passively waiting for the flood — and then 
 the ebb ; while she gripped his wrists with her nervous hands — 
 her fingers closing like steel over his flesh, and her eyes flaming in 
 his face. 
 
 6 You are mad, lone/ he said, with that kind of contempt 
 which innocence puts on when wrongfully accused. ‘ You take 
 the preoccupations of a profession like mine for neglect, and our 
 common poverty for grudging. I told you at Palermo what you 
 were coming into, and that you would be both poor and lonely. 
 As for your shameful words about Mr. Formby/ he went on to say, 
 speaking slowly and impressively ; ‘ if I did not take them as the 
 mere ravings of an ungoverned temper — if I thought that you 
 believed in them — I should act on them now this moment, and 
 now and for ever break off all intercourse with him, even to the 
 slightest acquaintance. You make me regret, lone, that I ever 
 allowed those rides which have borne bad fruit in more ways than 
 one.’ 
 
 ‘ You allowed ? ’ said lone with supreme disdain. 
 
 ‘ Has your husband no rights over your conduct ? 9 he asked. 
 
 ‘ No/ she answered ; ‘I am my own mistress ! ’ 
 
 * And my wife/ he said firmly. 
 
 i Which does not mean your slave/ she retorted. 
 
 i Which means that I am master, lone.’ 
 
 ‘ Mine ? ’ she said, gripping his wrists unconsciously. ( No ! 
 never ! ’ 
 
 1 We shall see when the time comes/ he returned. i But now 
 the question is, are you coming to the flower-show with me or 
 not? ’ 
 
 ‘ Who has told you to ask me ? ’ was her reply. * You have 
 not done so of your own free-wili. Who has made you, Armine ? ’ 
 
MAKING FOR THE ROCKS . 
 
 2S5 
 
 He shrugged his shoulders in his French way. 
 
 4 You are too absurd ! ’ he answered. 
 
 4 But is it not so, Armine P ’ she asked again, her voice a 
 little rounder, her manner a little less insulting, her eyes a trifle 
 softer, and her nervous hands slipping from his wrists nearer to 
 his palms. 
 
 4 No/ he answered curtly. 
 
 4 And you have asked me of your own free-will — no one in- 
 fluencing you P ’ 
 
 4 How often must I say Yes?’ he answered. 4 Who should 
 influence me, lone ? Who on earth would or could interfere between 
 man and wife in this way, or induce me to do so small a thing as 
 this ? ’ 
 
 4 Chi lo sa ! ’ she answered. 4 Perhaps Mks Barrington ! ’ 
 
 Armine’s pale face flushed. With an angry gesture he tore 
 his hands from her and turned away. 
 
 4 You are really too ridiculous to argue with ! ’ he said. 4 1 
 have not seen Miss Barrington. How should she have influenced 
 me ? ’ 
 
 A breath as of flame shot across lone’s face. Her nostrils 
 dilated, and over her whole being came the strange crouching, 
 penetrating expression of a creature who has found the secret — 
 who has struck the trail. But then she had looked like this 
 before when she had blazed out into jealous wrath and base sus- 
 picions about this farmer’s wife or that cottager’s daughter — 
 about Miss Flora Farley or Miss Rose Chesson — about any and 
 every one who claimed her husband’s care and stood between her 
 and her autocratic desire of sole possession. 
 
 4 Her name disturbs you very much,’ she said slowly. 
 
 4 Who would not be disturbed with a wife as insane as you P ’ 
 he returned angrily. 4 Your jealousy, lone, is beyond endurance. 
 It respects no one. You would be jealous of an angel from 
 heaven ! ’ 
 
 4 No ; I am only jealous of a woman on earth,’ said lone, in the 
 same slow way as before ; 4 especially of a woman who is too 
 sacred to be spoken of, like this Miss Barrington, for instance.’ 
 
 4 Are you going to the flower-show or not?’ said Armine, 
 suddenly changing front. 4 Because if you are you had better be 
 thinking of it. I shall have to leave you later in the afternoon.’ 
 
 4 You are very anxious about the flower-show, Armine,’ she 
 said with a sneer. 4 Whom are you to meet there ? ’ 
 
 4 1 suppose all Oakhurst,’ he answered with studied indifference. 
 
 4 Miss Barrington ? ’ 
 
 4 Probably ; and Mrs. Anthony, and Miss Chesson, and every 
 one.’ 
 
 4 If I were sure that Mr. Formby would be there I would go/ 
 she said, casting her fire in his face. 
 
286 
 
 IONE. 
 
 4 Probably he will/ was the answer made, quite quietly. 
 
 ‘ He is always so land, so chivalrous, so gentle, and so strong/ 
 said lone, holding up her head. 4 If you think he will be there, 
 Armine, I will go/ 
 
 Her husband looked at her with a sudden flash of angry con- 
 tempt, but he held back his speech. He would not give her the 
 victory she desired. 
 
 ‘ Are you coming or not ? ’ he repeated. 
 
 4 To meet Mr. Formby ? Yes, I think I will/ she said with an 
 insulting laugh. 
 
 4 No/ said Armine, holding her back as she was passing him ; 
 1 to go with me, lone, not to meet Mr. Formby/ 
 
 1 You are going to meet Miss Barrington/ was her rejoinder. 
 i We shall be only quits/ 
 
 i In that case we had better stay away altogether/ said 
 Armine. 
 
 4 You may do as you like/ she said. ( I am going, with or 
 without you. It does not signify to me whether you accompany 
 me or not. I am going for my own pleasure, not yours. Do you 
 understand ? ’ 
 
 And with this she thrust him aside, with an action which was 
 essentially a blow, as she went upstairs to dress for the local fete. 
 
 Armine sat down by the table and laid his face on his crosse 1 
 arms, like a man weary with the fight. Scenes of all kinds were 
 abhorrent to him — as abhorrent as every sort of violence, of ex- 
 aggeration, of excess. Between lone’s fervid love and frantic 
 jealousy, her wild caresses and wilder wrath, he felt that all the 
 peace and sweetness, all the delight and dignity of life were lost. 
 His only sense of rest was when she was sullen and moody, as she 
 had been of late; and this was but the lull before the storm. 
 Truly the chain and bullet of his servitude weighed heavily on 
 him, and he could neither lighten the weight nor free himself from 
 the fetter. He knew that lone had what is called a stronger 
 character than he — that is, she had a more determined will, a 
 more resolute way. He was too peace-loving to be wilful, too 
 sensitive to be resolute. He would give in for the sake of peace, 
 also not to hurt another ; but she would strive to the end and get 
 her will, if she had to slay her love in the process. 
 
 Wearily thinking of the whole bitter mistake of his life, 
 washing that the end was near and that, without cowardice, he 
 could pass through the gate which gives no backward swing, he 
 sat there as in a dream of pain, when lone returned, dressed and 
 ready. Her heart was touched when she saw him in this attitude 
 of speechless misery. She thought it was because of her — her 
 cruelty and wickedness. And, because she was still in love, her 
 victory and its results made her tender and repentant. 
 
 She went up to him softly and laid her hand on his shoulder. 
 
MAKING FOR THE ROCKS. 287 
 
 1 Wliat is the matter P Are you ill, Armine ? * she said, 
 stooping so that her cheek touched his. 
 
 He started and looked up. His face looked ill enough, 
 haggard and white as it was, and with those mournful eyes, dry 
 and fixed, where it would have been less pathetic to have seen 
 tears. 
 
 In a moment her arms were round him, and she held him to 
 her breast. 
 
 ‘ My darling, my darling,’ she said passionately ; 1 do not 
 mind what I said, I was angry. I do not know what I did say ; 
 but I love you, Armine — you know that I do — you, only you. 
 Darling, my beloved, you are all my life to me.’ 
 
 She covered his pale face with kisses — brow, lips, and cheeks, 
 those mournful eyes, the very curls on his head — she kissed them 
 all ; her lips like fire, her strong young arms clasping him to her 
 heart, her imperious personality enveloping and overpowering him, 
 her love surging like a sea in her soul and breaking like a storm 
 in her caresses. 
 
 A shiver passed over Armine. It was peace he wanted, not 
 passion ; the gentle harmonies of affection, not these tropical out- 
 bursts, now of demoniacal fury and now of delirious love — out- 
 bursts wherein was no sense of peace, no form of dignity. 
 
 ' I know, I know, my dear,’ he said gently. 6 And I dare say 
 you are often sorely tried, poor girl,’ he added, with a tender 
 kind of sigh. ‘ But I never mean to make you unhappy, lone.’ 
 
 ‘ You are an angel ! ’ said lone with passion. i I love you ! I 
 love you ! You do not know how much I love you, Armine ! ’ she 
 added, kissing his throat. 6 Some day you will.’ 
 
 ‘ When you have killed me ? ’ he said with a sad little smile. 
 
 ( When I have died for you,’ she answered fervently. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIY. 
 
 AT THE FLOWER-SHOW. 
 
 It was the last flower-show of the year at Oakhurst, and every 
 one made it a point of honour to go, while all who could sent 
 something to help in the general display. The ground was 
 crowded with people and the tents were filled with produce. 
 The great people contributed their hothouse grapes and peaches, 
 their pines and melons; the farmers sent turnips and potatoes, 
 beets and monster ears of corn ; and a special plank was set apart 
 for nosegays of leaves and grasses, berries and late autumn flowers, 
 by which the cottage children were to be taught perception of 
 colour and form. So that the whole thing was arranged with as 
 much perfection as could be compassed in a place like Oakhurst, 
 
2S8 
 
 10NE. 
 
 where the magnates could he counted on the fingers and the 
 groundlings were as the hairs of the head in comparison. There 
 was a band of music too, of rather wild notions in the way of time 
 and tune ; and there was a Punch-and-Judy show for the little 
 ones ; and some of the toilettes were things to behold and wonder 
 at — the satisfaction of the wearers being always exactly propor- 
 tioned to the extravagance thereof— so that Oakhurst was altogether 
 having a good time, and enjoying itself to the n th . 
 
 In the madness of her late moody displeasure against her hus- 
 band, lone had written to Edward Formby, appointing a time and 
 place where to meet him at the show. She cared nothing for the 
 consequences. If by trailing his name and her own self-respect 
 through the mire she could provoke Armine, pain him, sting him, 
 agonise him, she would, no matter what the end might be. Young 
 as she was, she knew the peril in which she had voluntarily placed 
 herself and how she was emphatically playing with fire. She 
 was conscious how her safety lay in Edwards regard for her 
 purity, and how, when she ceased to respect herself, all the rest 
 would go by the board. But this was as chaff before the wind 
 in the fever of her wrath ; and she counted the shame of her self- 
 degradation a mere nothing if by that she could revenge herself 
 on her husband. 
 
 Now, however, when this fervid reconciliation had edged out 
 her former bitterness, Edward was of no more importance to her 
 than so much thistledown in the air. She was well with her 
 husband, the man whom she loved ; and all the rest was valueless. 
 
 Radiantly beautiful ; dressed in her favourite colours of old-gold 
 and cream ; queenly, proud, elated, superb, and cruel to the discarded 
 as the loving ever are when reconciled to the beloved, lone passed 
 through the gate, with Armine by her side, and went straight to 
 the central tent, where she knew that Edward Formby must have 
 been waiting for her for at least half an hour. Fie had been 
 waiting for more than that time. For a full hour, his impatience 
 going before the clock, the master of Hillside had been standing 
 sentinel among the dahlias and china-asters, afraid to stir, lest lone 
 should come in at one entrance while he went out at another. 
 In which case he should certainly lose five good minutes of her 
 society. And five minutes taken from the contemplation of lone’s 
 face were as five ages to Edward Formby, her husbands friend 
 and benefactor. 
 
 Up to this day he had meant no harm bv this devotion to 
 another man’s wife. Such things can be with men of his character. 
 He was one of those honest unconscious souls who live only in 
 the present and blink, owl-eyed, at the future ; striding down the 
 decline which leads to Avernus without knowing that they have 
 left the level path. He meant no harm and he foresaw no danger 
 — because he foresaw nothing of any kind. He only knew that 
 
AT THE FLOWER-SHOW. 
 
 289 
 
 the hours spent with lone St. Claire were hours of unalloyed 
 happiness ; that to-day was blessed and to-morrow had to come. 
 
 She had brought a new sensation into his life and had led him 
 through a new experience. The seductions of those Birds whose 
 home is in the Wood he knew ; the sincere and passionless affec- 
 tion of a brother for a sister, in his relations with Monica, that 
 also he knew ; but this deep and tremulous passion, at once re- 
 spectful and absorbing — this love which exalted womanhood into 
 something sacred, and protected his ideal from his own desire — 
 this chivalrous devotion which asked only to serve and did not 
 seek to be rewarded — which w r as content to pay its homage in the 
 daylight, and to hide away its hope for the dreams of the night — 
 this was new to him; and, like a boy, he cherished his secret 
 treasure without asking himself whether it were lawfully his or no. 
 
 He never asked himself anything about lone. He trusted the 
 future ordering of things to chance and the instincts of an English 
 gentleman. These had stood him in good stead hitherto, why 
 not now ? And yet, since that loan, in spite of himself his 
 thoughts had travelled into a new path, and his relations with 
 the St. Claires seemed somehow changed. His obligations to 
 Armine were fewer; the right to serve lone was stronger and 
 closer. 
 
 People had heard about this loan. Made by cheque, as it had 
 been, it was sure to creep out in a country-place where secrets are 
 public property and the most astounding fictions are those which 
 are based on facts. And, of course, having leaked out as it had, 
 this friendly little transaction, which had been made in such 
 thorough kindness and good faith, had put on an appearance as 
 far removed from the truth as if the gossips had granted horns 
 to a lion and hoofs to a dove. It was assumed to have been an 
 infamy. Talk to them of kindness pure and simple between man 
 and man, and a loan made without consideration of interest and 
 no chance of repayment — were we in Arcadia P No one out of 
 romances does such a thing as this; and Edward Formby was 
 not an Arcadian, nor was Dr. St. Claire the hero of a romance ! 
 Wherefore, there must be more here than met the eyes ; and that 
 more was necessarily bad. 
 
 So they argued, as ignorant suspicion argues all the world 
 over ; and when lone and her husband came into the tent where 
 Edward Formby had been standing sentinel among the dahlias 
 and china-asters for a good hour by the clock — standing with 
 that unmistakable look of watching on his face which shows 
 expectancy and gives leave to presuppose an assignation — a small 
 crow-d gathered round to note how things w r ould go. 
 
 ‘ Look at her, that -young hussy, that young fly-by-night ! 9 
 said Miss Jane Wintergreen, in rather loud tones, as lone entered 
 the tent, like some queen clad and crowned with gold. i Our 
 
 17 
 
2go IONE . 
 
 Mr. Formby has been waiting for her. I’ll wager my head they 
 had an assignation.’ 
 
 But her fidus Achates, Rachel Major, to whom she spoke, 
 besought her in a terrified whisper to lower her voice, in the first 
 place, and, in the next, not to think evil of a neighbour — for she 
 was as sure as sure that their Mr. Formby could not be so wicked. 
 A married woman! — whatever should he want with waiting for 
 a married woman ! 
 
 ‘ Devilry/ said Jane emphatically. 
 
 On which Rachel said, with quivering fidelity : ( If I were to 
 be torn to pieces by wild horses, Jane, 111 never be made to 
 believe that ! 9 
 
 Still, even she could not help seeing that Edward’s face 
 changed unmistakably when the two entered and he went for- 
 ward to meet them. The truth was he had expected lone to 
 come alone, and he had not reckoned on Armine; and just at 
 this moment — handsome, interesting, charming as Armine was, 
 he would rather have seen the foul fiend than him. 
 
 The turbulent scene through which she had just passed had 
 left its mark on lone. Electric and alive at all points, she had 
 more than ever of that strange power which made her all men’s 
 desire and almost all women’s aversion. Insolent and superb, she 
 looked as if she despised and defied the whole world, and trod 
 under foot both their friendship and their enmity. Even Edward, 
 who was to have been her avenger, was now no more to her than 
 a discarded serf; and the knowledge of how she had played on 
 him for her own use — now tossing him a grace and now snatch- 
 ing from him a hope — helped the proud antagonism to all life and 
 humanity which possessed her at this moment. Mistress of her- 
 self and fate, she stood as a queen, supreme in beauty, in com- 
 mand, in power ; and, hated or loved, all had to confess that she 
 was for the time the pinnacle and apex of social interest in 
 Oakhurst. 
 
 But if she stood there as a queen, it was as a queen smitten 
 with leprosy. Clad in her royal robes, crowned with her golden 
 diadem, bearing her sceptre in her right hand, hung round with 
 the glittering insignia of her state, as it might be, she was never- 
 theless shunned by all. The watching crowd watched still, but 
 gradually edged away, leaving a clear space for her, Edward 
 Formby, and Armine. The two men were evidently embarrassed 
 one with the other, though they made efforts to appear quite 
 friendly and at ease ; while lone, between the two, was insolent 
 to the one because satisfied with the other. Her bird had come 
 back to her hand, not she to her lure ; and the whole wide world 
 was concentrated in Armine and her love. 
 
 While they were standing there talking by themselves, Monica 
 and Theodosia came into the tent by a side opening. 
 
AT THE FLOWER-SHOW. 
 
 291 
 
 1 Those shameless people ! ’ said Theodosia angrily. She too 
 had heard of that loan, and her interpretation had run on all fours 
 with Jane Wintergreen’s. ‘ Monica, you surely are not going to 
 speak to them in a public place like this ! ’ she added, as she saw 
 her sister-in-law with a kind smile on her face turn towards them 
 as if intending to join them. 
 
 6 Why not ? ’ asked Monica. 
 
 c After all that has been said P — Impossible ! ’ said Tlieo. 
 
 ‘ I know nothing that should prevent my speaking to Mrs. 
 St. Claire — and her husband,’ retorted Monica gently. 
 
 ‘ That creature standing there and making e} r es at Edward 
 Formby ; and her husband, who has been bought over, looking 
 on ! Monica, have you no sense of dignity or propriety ? ’ 
 
 ‘I do not think I am wanting in either because I speak to 
 friends, against whom neither you nor I know anything, Theo. 
 What we hear is another matter. I for one do not believe all I 
 hear.’ 
 
 Her gentle persistence, very mild in manner and quite immov- 
 able in substance, seemed to irritate Theodosia more than a more 
 passionate opposition would have done. 
 
 i If you do go and speak to them I shall think you are be- 
 witched — or worse; as bad as she is, or so infatuated about him 
 that you do not care what you do so long as you may be near 
 him,’ said Theodosia in angry whisper. ‘ See ! not a person in 
 the place is speaking to them. Look at the Lanes and the Martyns 
 and the Waltons — no one takes the least notice of them — not 
 even their own set, the Chessons and the Farleys. They are cut 
 publicly, and I do not wonder at it. Monica, you shall not go — 
 I declare I will go up to them and tell them what I think, if you 
 do ! ’ 
 
 ‘If they are cut as you say, Theo, that is all the more reason 
 why I should go,’ said Monica, quite gently but very firmly ; ‘ and 
 why you should come too, Theo.’ 
 
 ‘ I ? No ! not I ! ’ answered Theo bitterly. ‘ I have too much 
 respect for your brother's name, Monica, to degrade it in this way. 
 I remember what I owe to him and myself rather better than 
 you do.’ 
 
 ‘I respect both my brother and my name best when I do what 
 is right and do not do what is wrong,’ rejoined Monica. ‘ And 
 it is wrong to go with the crowd in this undeserved slight on 
 innocent people. So I shall go and speak to them.’ 
 
 And with this she made her way through the ranks and stands 
 of flowers and fruit, and walked quietly to where the three stood 
 by the dahlias and the china-asters. 
 
 Armine had the professional man’s habitual self-command and 
 facial control ; but he could not so entirely govern himself as not 
 to show more than the mere conventional politeness of an ordinary 
 
 u2 
 
IONE, 
 
 292 
 
 acquaintance, when he saw, coming up to them alone, with so 
 much sweet and gentle friendliness, the only woman whom he 
 had ever loved, and who represented to him all that was most 
 desirable in womanhood and most delightful in humanity. Some- 
 thing came into his face which flashed back a lurid light on Tone’s, 
 and, for the second time to-day, she had that strange look of a 
 creature that has found the scent and hit the trail. 
 
 Why should Monica come up to them in this marked manner, 
 while Mrs. Anthony stood apart, her vivacious little face aliame 
 and her sparkling black eyes so full of malice and disdain ? And 
 why should Armine look as he did ? lie said nothing, truly, and 
 he did nothing that might not have been said and done by any 
 one in the place, without calling forth remark or betraying inten- 
 tion. Still, he looked ; and the eyes are traitors where all the 
 rest of the features keep counsel. Yes ; it was Monica Barrington 
 who stood between her and her beloved. It was Monica whom 
 Armine loved ; and Monica loved him. It came before her with 
 the flash of a sudden illumination. Fool that she had been not to 
 have seen it before ! But the punishment was ready, and the 
 whip of scorpions was lying close to her hand. 
 
 It w r as a painful moment for all concerned, save Monica ; and 
 she, the unconscious pivot on which everything w r as turning, was 
 full only of kindness for each — believing in Edward’s integrity, 
 and wishing to prove that she did ; pitying lone’s isolation and 
 false position, and therefore desirous to pay her publicly as much 
 attention as she would have paid to any other person of her own 
 degree ; and full of sorrow for Armine — to whom, however, she 
 wanted to show only the ordinary courtesy of ordinary friendship, 
 not confessing that any cause for special sympathy existed at all. 
 But though it be an angel’s wing which fans the fire, the powder 
 magazine will be reached at last; and the song of a seraph can 
 bring down an avalanche all the same as the cry of a boor. And 
 the suspicion of a jealous woman is as the fire burning close to the 
 powder magazine, and the avalanche trembling on the mountain- 
 side. 
 
 After she had watched her husband for some time, and read in 
 his face more than it revealed, lone turned abruptly to Edward 
 Formbv, still standing there doing his best to strangle his dis-^ 
 appointment and accept the situation with serenity, but not 
 succeeding quite to his satisfaction. 
 
 ‘Will you come with me to the other tents?’ she said hardily, 
 flashing the full light of her glorious eyes on him and smiling 
 with studied sweetness as she spoke. Her smile was forced ; the 
 brilliancy of her eyes was artificial and made up ; the allurement 
 which sfie threw into her face was a mere trick of the muscles ; 
 her voice, never musical, was deeper and more dissonant than 
 usual ; and her nervous hands played restlessly with the handle of 
 
AT THE FLOWER-SHOW. 
 
 2 93 
 
 her parasol. Edward Formby raw none of all these signs of a 
 mind ill at ease, and a womans grace to one man masking a 
 woman’s torture because of another. He was simply delighted 
 that she had asked him to go with her. It was in some sort a 
 salve for his mortification. 
 
 ‘ What is there to see p ’ asked Armine, to include himself. 
 
 ‘ Some very charming wild-flower bouquets in one, and some 
 really fine fruit in the other,’ said Monica, looking at lone, who, 
 still smiling boldly into Edward’s face, did not look back at her. 
 
 ‘Yes, let us go,’ said Edward, partly dense and partly 
 charmed. 
 
 Armine was cautious of rocks ahead and dangers of which he 
 had to beware. lone’s strange vibration of manner; the patent 
 coldness and something worse of the crowd ; Monica’s evident 
 desire to be more than ordinarily kind and to throw the aegis of 
 her name and repute about them in their isolation ; Edward 
 Formby ’s embarrassment ; the consciousness of his own indebted- 
 ness, and now, the growing fear of the motives which had made 
 his friend so generous — not lone's sudden illumination, brought 
 more pain to her than his thoughts brought to him, as he smiled 
 with the forced smile of society and good-breeding, and made 
 believe that nothing ailed him nor his. 
 
 The four gathered into a little knot and turned to leave the 
 tent ; and the crowd fell back as they passed, as if they were 
 indeed smitten with leprosy. Even Monica’s saintly repute did 
 not protect her from blame in associating herself thus publicly 
 with the discarded of the day, and all either looked askance or 
 turned aside altogether to avoid them. Only Rachel Major came 
 timidly forward, and for the first time in her life offered her hand 
 to the master of Hillside. It was her poor little faithful protest, 
 and her brave act of adhesion and advocacy. 
 
 6 1 was so sorry, Mr. Formby, to keep you waiting ! ’ said Iono 
 as they turned away. 
 
 She had pointedly and resolutely separated herself from hei 
 husband and Monica. She would not let Monica walk with her, 
 as this last had wished and endeavoured to do, but had taken 
 Edward Formby to herself, while consigning her husband to Miss 
 Harrington in that unmistakable way which includes a contest if 
 it be not accepted. 
 
 An apology from lone was one of those strange variations in 
 the main theme of a character for which no one is prepared — one 
 of those variations which break up the most compact theories and 
 demand a new alphabet for the book of the soul. 
 
 ‘ You are very good,’ said Edward, a troubled kind of radiance 
 in his eyes. ‘ I began to fear you were not coming.’ 
 
 ‘ After Iliad promised you?’ she said with flattering reproach. 
 
 < That was not like me ! ’ After a pause, as if to better emphasise 
 
294 
 
 IONE. 
 
 her words, she added : 1 Nor what I should have done to you at 
 any time ! ’ 
 
 ‘ I am glad to hear that/ he said, his voice a little unsteady. 
 1 1 did not think you would have ever done anything special for 
 me.’ 
 
 6 No ? ’ She turned her eyes on him with one of her strange 
 flashing looks — turning so that Armine and Monica should see 
 her face. ‘ How little you know me ! ’ she said ; and then, with 
 the same flattering accent of reproach, she added: 6 1 thought you 
 understood me better than this, by now ! ’ 
 
 * Sometimes I think I do ; and then something happens and T 
 am all abroad again/ said Edward in his literal straightforward 
 way. 
 
 ‘ You are certainly very much abroad if you doubt my — how 
 shall I call it P — my affection for you/ said lone boldly. 
 
 6 Have I really a place in your affections ? ’ asked Edward in a 
 low voice, pretending to examine some fruit which he did not see, 
 and steadying himself against the bench as he spoke. 
 
 She glanced back at her husband. He was talking to Monica 
 Barrington and not looking at the show. 
 
 ‘ A place P ’ she asked. ‘ What would you say if I told you 
 — all P 7 
 
 6 That I love you — better than my life/ he answered. 
 
 His large hand trembled like a girls, his handsome ruddy face 
 was illumined with a sudden glory like a god’s — but a god 
 suppliant for all his power, subdued for all his strength. 6 Do you 
 love me, lone ? — can you ? ’ he asked. 
 
 His voice and words sobered her. She was using him for her 
 revenge, not for her pleasure — indifferent whether she made him 
 suffer or not, so long as she could make him the scourge for her 
 griefs. 
 
 ‘No/ she said, taking herself back like a bow suddenly relaxed. 
 6 1 do not love you, Mr. Formbv ; I love him’ 
 
 For a second time she turned and looked at her husband ; and, 
 as she looked, Monica struck her foot against one of the supports 
 of the benches and slightly sprained her ankle. 
 
 There was no cry, no exclamation on either side, as Armine 
 sprang forward to help her ; there was only one rapid look passing 
 like light between them ; — one brief word from him to her ; a 
 gentle little smile of gratitude from her to him. But it was 
 enough. That look burnt into lone’s brain, and for the moment 
 she did not know where she was, nor what had happened, nor 
 what was going to happen. All that she was conscious of was 
 that she was in a storm — it seemed to her a storm of the elements. 
 The throbbing pulses beating in her ears were like the waves of 
 the sea dashing against the sides of the tent — the fiery stream of 
 hate and anguish and passion and jealousy traversing her brain 
 
AT THE FLOWER-SHOW. 
 
 295 
 
 and flashing in her eyes was like lightning darting through the 
 skies — the dark sense of infinite despair was like some dreadful 
 eclipse, where the sun was blotted out and all nature was dead. 
 She was recalled to herself by hearing her name spoken in Italian, 
 as Vincenzo stood bareheaded before her. He was her Thought 
 taken shape and form — he should be her avenger on the one side ; 
 and on the other — was not Edward there as her own translated 
 Revenge ? 
 
 The rich scents of the fruit heaped up on the benches were 
 stimulating and intoxicating. The wide nostrils of Vincenzo 
 seemed to draw them in like food, like wine — or as a wild beast 
 draws in the scent of blood. His glittering eyes were full of fire j 
 his face was instinct with that passionate sense of life which is so 
 near to cruelty ; and yet, as he stood there bareheaded, he smiled 
 and was good-natured and careless and complaisant, according to 
 his race and nation ; ready for a smile, a caress, or a crime, as it 
 might chance — a mafiose for the one part, a devoted friend for the 
 other, a lover to the death, and an enemy as intense as a lover. 
 
 No one knew what he said to lone, and no one knew what she 
 answered back to him. They spoke in Sicilian, and their speech 
 isolated them. But she did not say what he, knowing all, had 
 expected her to say. She did not order him to kill those two who 
 loved each other to her shame and hurt. Still, he said to himself : 
 < It will come. She will come to me at last, and I shall hold her 
 in my hand as she held the dead bird at the mill.’ 
 
 i Shall we go into the open air P ’ asked Monica, who had 
 turned deadly white. ‘ I find this tent so stifling, and my ankle 
 hurts me a little. Will you give me your arm, Edward ? ’ 
 
 lone turned from her rudely. 
 
 i No, stay with me, Mr. Formby,’ she said imperiously. ‘ I 
 think I shall call you Edward, like all the rest,’ she added, with 
 a harsh laugh. 
 
 4 Do,’ returned Edward, who indeed could say no less. 
 
 1 My husband can take Miss Barrington,’ continued lone, with 
 an evil smile and a mocking accent as she said these words ‘ my 
 husband,’ once the dearest of all to her, now the most painful. 
 ‘ Armine, take Miss Barrington,’ she went on to say, not looking 
 at him and speaking with intense insolence. ‘ I will -stay here.’ 
 
 6 1 will certainly take Miss Barrington,’ said Armine, offering 
 his arm to Monica, who took it because she was no longer able to 
 stand alone ; ‘ but I wish you to come too, lone. This tent is too 
 close for you.’ 
 
 ( I intend to stay here,’ said lone. ‘ You are happier without 
 me and I am happier without you. Go,’ she said angrily. 4 Do 
 you want me to make a scene, Armine, and turn you out of the 
 tent by force ? ’ 
 
 Monica looked at lone as she might have looked at something 
 
TONE. 
 
 296 
 
 strange and changed. That pale face, those burning eyes, those 
 quivering nostrils, that cruel mouth, this infinite insolence and 
 unrestrained anger — what did it mean, with Vincenzo standing 
 there bareheaded, smiling, looking from each to each with glitter- 
 ing eyes and wide flat nostrils, drinking in the heavy scents of the 
 fruits like wine or blood P 
 
 She turned to Armine, and her old love came back on her 
 heart, like a flood breaking through the crust of self-control and 
 the barrier of circumstances ; but it came back as pity, not 
 passion; as sorrow for him, not disappointment for herself ; as 
 infinite and endless and fruitless sympathy with suffering she could 
 not soothe, and must not even confess that she knew. And then, 
 overpowered by all these influences — by moral pain and physical 
 suffering, her blood chilled by fear and horror of what she saw, 
 and her senses sickened by the heavy scents of the fruits — she 
 swayed forward, and was caught fainting in Armines arms. 
 
 ‘No/ said lone, laying her hand on Edward’s arm as he 
 stooped to help Armine in carrying Monica to the outer air. 
 * Stay here with me. Vincenzo, take the Signorina outside. 
 Armine has deserted me for her/ she continued to Edward. 
 ‘ It is only fair you should remain with me.’ 
 
 * Let us all go/ said Edward, in profound agitation. 
 
 ( If you do, never speak to me again ! ’ said lone in a low 
 voice. ‘ Stay with me now and I am yours — leave me, and — 
 Buona notte. Those two love each other — let them go. And 
 we will keep together.’ 
 
 ‘ For ever ! ’ said Edward Eormby, feeling as if he had 
 killed a child, and conscious that the instincts of an English 
 gentleman, to which he had trusted, had deserted him in the 
 Lour of need. 
 
 ‘ To-morrow/ said lone, giving him her hand. 
 
 She shuddered as she spoke, but she did not take back her 
 fatal word. On the contrary, she repeated it, not looking into 
 bis face. 
 
 ‘To-morrow. Take me from Oakhurst and all it holds, for 
 ever — for ever ! ’ 
 
 ‘ Now P ’ he said feverishly. 
 
 ‘ No ; to-morrow/ she returned. 
 
 She wanted the interval to gloat over her coming revenge. To 
 strike so swiftly would be merciful ; and she had no mercy in her 
 heart — only cruelty, and that self-torturing desire to torture which 
 springs from jealousy and vitiated love. 
 
IN HER MADNESS. 
 
 297 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 IN HER MADNESS. 
 
 The dinner had passed in unbroken silence. Armine had the 
 feeling of a man who is battling for dear life against fearful odds, 
 and lone was still dangerous and disturbed. Certainly she had 
 made a slight return on herself, which might grow into repentance 
 or might come to nothing. Of her own free grace she had 
 looked hack on the better way she was leaving, and it was just 
 possible that, the angel of her soul conquering the demon now 
 possessing it, Edward Formby would be once more thrown over, 
 and her whip of scorpions laid aside. But also it was just as 
 possible that she would go on just as she had begun, and punish 
 her husband by degrading herself and besmirching Monica Bar- 
 rington’s repute. 
 
 For all the world should know the reason why she had left 
 Armine, she said to herself. She would not be the only one to 
 suffer — he and that serpent should suffer with her ; and in the 
 shipwreck that had to come they should all go to the bottom 
 together. Still, there was a certain renovation, a certain reinfusion 
 of love for this man whom she was planning to destroy, which 
 was acting as a slight anodyne to her jealous wrath and disposing 
 her to better things. 
 
 Words were dead between them, but lone’s eyes took up the 
 tale, and her brief glances were sometimes full of the old eager 
 love ; sometimes soft with a woman’s desire for pardon and recon- 
 ciliation ; though again dark with her new-born hate, and small 
 and green and glittering as a snake’s with her jealous fears. Of 
 those two sitting dumbly there, it was hard to say which was 
 the more miserable, the more oppressed; for, granting all the 
 initiative of evil to lie with jealousy — granting that it is this 
 jealousy alone which causes the pain — that result of pain is 
 equally divided, and 1 what they inflict they feel ’ is only too true 
 a word ! 
 
 Still wearing her old-gold coloured dress, still electric and 
 alive at all points, lone was looking supremely lovely ; but her 
 beauty had ceased to attract Armine. He scarcely now recog- 
 nised even its artistic value, associated as it was with so much 
 moral suffering and discord. His had lost none of its power over 
 her. And how handsome he was to-night, with that dead-white 
 skin and curling raven hair, and those large soft eyes, with their 
 sweeping lashes like a girl’s, and that strange look of stillness and 
 determination on his face ! He was like a god in pain for wilful 
 
IONE. 
 
 2'jS 
 
 humanity ; his divinity untouched for all his pain — sorrowful and 
 desolate in one. How beautiful he was ! how good and sweet 
 and gentle ! and, in spite of all her wrath and madness, how 
 passionately she loved him ! But no other woman should love 
 him ! She held him — she possessed him ; he was hers, hers only ; 
 and rather than let another share even in ber love for him, she 
 would 
 
 Again she thought of Vincenzo, a mafiose, her cousin, the man 
 who loved her and who for love would do her will. It was well 
 to have such devotion at her back ! She might need it ; who 
 knows? 
 
 The dinner was of a better character to-day than usual. For 
 his own pleasure Vincenzo had supplied it as his gift, and it had 
 quite a holiday air. It was the completion of the festa according 
 to him ; and it pleased him to think that lone ate well to-day at 
 his expense. But it dragged; and for all its delicacy Armine 
 scarcely ate at all. He had no appetite, he was suffering in body 
 as well as in mind. The first fogs and damps of autumn had 
 found him out, and his chest was aching as it had ached last year, 
 before that fatal illness which had necessitated that still more 
 fatal voyage to Palermo. 
 
 A fire was burning in the grate, and the red glow of the flame 
 mingled with the whiter shine of the lamp and made the shabby 
 room look radiant. 
 
 The dinner was over and had been removed ; only the dessert 
 was left. Grapes and peaches and heavy scented melons, wine 
 and hothouse flowers from Hillside, with luscious sweets of various 
 kinds from Vincenzo, made a table elegant to luxuriousness ; and 
 as the moments flew by, the young wife felt herself carried farther 
 and farther from her wicked outbreak, and nearer to the blessed 
 peace of loving reconciliation. If only Armine would look at 
 her !— if only he would not keep his eyes so resolutely from her 
 face ! 
 
 The glowing flame of the fire leaped high in the grate, and 
 struck the glass on the table with its burning red reflections, so 
 that the faceted points glittered like rubies, while the golden 
 wine was shot with lines which looked like streaks of blood. It 
 played on the sheeny surface of lone’s gown and dyed the shadows 
 of the folds with crimson. It glanced on the edges of her hair 
 and touched that too with its burning bright reflections, which 
 mingled the suggestion of blood with the colour of gold. Every- 
 where was this suggestion of blood streaking the colour of gold — 
 while the stimulating scents of the fruits and the intoxicating 
 perfume of the hothouse flowers carried on the impressions of to- 
 day within the tents, and threw back the memory to Palermo. 
 Everywhere was this strange contradiction and commingling of 
 strife and love, of poverty and riches, of the present and the past — 
 
IN HER MADNESS. 2 99 
 
 and tlie advancing shadow of the future like dread footsteps steal- 
 ing nearer and nearer to the door. 
 
 Sitting there with the look of a man in the thick of the fight, 
 hardly pressed, but holding his own and resolute to do his best, 
 Armine thought how he should open the discussion which had to 
 come. It was a pity that there should be one as the coda to this 
 lighter theme ; but it was due to his own dignity, to his repute, 
 to their standing in the world, to the possibility of mutual esteem 
 at home. She was young, ignorant, wilful, extreme ; he had been 
 warned to keep her in due subjection ; and he was in his right as 
 her husband to control her. This question of Edward Eormby 
 must be put on a practicable footing. As things were, it was 
 essentially impossible. 
 
 ‘ 1 must have some talk with you, lone/ said Armine, speaking 
 slowly, as he turned his chair sideways to the table, facing the fire 
 and sitting in a kind of three-quarter way to her — neither in 
 profile nor full front. 
 
 ‘It is pleasant to hear your voice. You have been so long 
 silent/ said lone in return, as if nothing were between them save 
 the ordinary matters of life, and as though the conversation that 
 was to come would touch no deeper theme than the flower-show 
 of to-day or the visits of to-morrow. 
 
 i You must tell me what you mean/ he continued, still not 
 looking at her. 6 Things have come to a pass where they cannot 
 continue, and you have compelled me to take matters into my 
 own hands/ 
 
 6 Yes P 9 she said. c What matters ? The housekeeping ? You 
 are quite welcome, Armine! I make a wretched manager, I 
 know, but I cannot do better. The servants are so bad. But 
 you have had a nice dinner to-day, have you not ? 9 
 
 ‘ It is not the housekeeping/ he said. ‘ It is something much 
 more important/ 
 
 4 Yes P ’ she repeated. • By-the-by/ she added rapidly, as if to 
 prevent his return, 6 how is Miss Barrington’s ankle ? Was it 
 sprained ? 1 
 
 6 Yes/ said Armine curtly. 
 
 * Badly ? ’ 
 
 ( Quite bad enough/ 
 
 6 That faint was real ? ’ she asked, with well-acted interest. 
 
 ( What else should it have been ? 7 he answered a little 
 contemptuously. 
 
 ‘Oh, it might have been put on/ said lone quite amiably as 
 to manner, but those narrowed lids, those dilated palpitating 
 nostrils, and the cruel working of the curves about her lips ! 
 6 Girls do those things sometimes, especially when they like the 
 man who will take them in his arms and hold them close to his 
 heart — close — close — as you did Miss Barrington to-day. For a 
 
300 
 
 IONE. 
 
 saint, as you all say she is, I must say this Monica of yours is 
 wonderfully fond of another woman’s husband ! ’ she added with 
 an insulting laugh. 
 
 1 Because you think this, did you behave as you did to-day 
 with Mr. Formby ? ’ asked Armine. 
 
 ‘ I behave ! How did I behave ? ’ was her defiant reply. 
 
 ‘ I scarcely like to characterise your conduct, lone. Disgrace- 
 fully is the only word that I can find/ he answered. 
 
 ‘If I did act disgracefully, Armine, then I was only like 
 yourself,’ she said. ‘ You were disgraceful, if you like ; hut I was 
 not ! ’ 
 
 ‘What then would you call your extraordinary behaviour to 
 Mr. Formby, and still more extraordinary insolence to Miss Bar- 
 rington and myself P ’ he returned angrily. 
 
 ‘ You and she tied in one string together — how pretty ! ’ said 
 lone with a harsh laugh. 
 
 ‘ Because you treated us both alike,’ said her husband. ‘ You 
 force me to connect myself with her because you forced me to be 
 with her.’ 
 
 ‘ That shows my sweet disposition,’ replied lone, with again 
 that harsh laugh and insolent disdain of manner. ‘You had eyes 
 only for her, so I thought you had better have as much of her as 
 you liked. Only — caro mio — you have to pay for your festa. Do 
 you understand, Armine? We all pay for our festas, and you 
 have to do like the rest.’ 
 
 ‘No, I do not understand,’ answered Armine. ‘I only know 
 that you are utterly unreasonable and uncontrollable, in more 
 ways than one.’ 
 
 ‘ Unreasonable ! Good ! Unreasonable in what, Armine ? 9 
 
 ‘ In your jealousy, for one thing.’ 
 
 ‘ Jealousy of Monica Barrington, for instance ? ’ 
 
 ‘ Yes, of Monica Barrington,’ he replied ; and as he said this 
 he turned to his wife full-face and looked at her straight between 
 the eyes. 
 
 ‘ That saint ! That dear, delightful, charming saint ! That 
 serpent, you ought rather to say ! ’ exclaimed lone, passing from 
 taunt to fury with the rapidity of lightning. 
 
 ‘ I will not hear her spoken of disrespectfully,’ said Armine 
 sternly. 
 
 ‘ Is she so sacred as this, she is not to be spoken of like any 
 other person ! You admire her so much as all that ! You do 
 admire her, Armine, do you not ? You admire her excessively — 
 freckles, washed-out eyes, and all ? ’ 
 
 ‘ Yes, I do admire her, and I esteem her as much as I like her/ 
 said Armine. ‘ So should you, lone, if you had either gratitude 
 or common sense, for she has been your best friend here ever since 
 you came. But 1 -want to speak of Mr. Formby, not of Miss 
 
IN HER MADNESS . 3 or 
 
 Barrington/ he added. 1 That is the subject between us at this 
 moment/ 
 
 ‘ And I want to speak of Miss Barrington/ retorted lone. 
 4 Miss Barrington, who is the cause of all the rest — Edward Formby 
 and all. And I do not want her friendship, Armine. She is 
 your friend, not mine/ 
 
 ‘If mine, she is yours/ he said. 
 
 ‘ No, if she is yours she cannot be mine/ flashed out lone. ‘ I 
 will not have her friendship. She is a wicked woman — a bad, 
 wicked wretch — and I will never let her enter my house 
 again/ 
 
 ‘ You need not be afraid. I should say she never would come 
 here again/ said Armine. 
 
 ‘ She shall not. It is my house, and I can say what women 
 come to see me or not. And she shall not — never, never ! I 
 will never shake hands with her again ; and next Sunday at 
 church I will tell her before all the world what I think of her, 
 and what a wicked, abandoned, shameless creature she is ! ’ 
 
 Her passion rose as she went on, growing with that terrible 
 strength of self-feeding and self-consuming jealousy. 
 
 ‘ You are mad/ said Armine contemptuously. 
 
 ‘ Because I do not love your mistress and will not receive her 
 like my sister ? ’ she said. 
 
 He turned from her with a shudder. His sole feeling for her 
 at this moment was one of unutterable abhorrence, of loathing, of 
 contempt. 
 
 ‘ Your mistress/ repeated lone. ‘ You know she is, Armine. 
 You know you love her/ she said, bending foward her supple 
 body in its gold-coloured dress — that supple body a little rounder 
 than of old, a little changed in line and contour, but still lithe 
 and soft and supple and flexible. As she spoke she laid her cheek 
 on her hand, assuming a listening attitude — curved, beautiful, 
 mocking, demoniacal. ‘ Tell me the truth, caro mio/ she went 
 on to say. ‘ You love her, do you not P ’ 
 
 ‘ Love her ? ’ cried Armine, but his voice had in it an accent 
 of despair rather than of deprecation. 
 
 The glittering line between those narrowed lids shone with 
 more and more evil lustre ; the curved body, soft and flexible, 
 suggested more and more closely the idea of a snake preparing to 
 strike — or it might be some tawny soft-footed lioness preparing to 
 spring. 
 
 ‘Yes, tell me the truth, caro mio/ she repeated. ‘You love 
 this English miss — this pale-faced saint who is the mistress of 
 another woman’s husband — my devoted friend who has stolen 
 from me all I had in the world — the heart of the man I loved. 
 You hear, Armine? I say loved. There is a difference, you 
 know. I cannot say love, because I do not love you any longer. 
 
302 
 
 I0NE. 
 
 I did, but I do not now. I will not share my husband with 
 Miss Barrington. I prefer to keep my own things to myself.’ 
 
 She stopped, still looking at her husband, who looked into the 
 fire and kept silence. 
 
 6 You love her, dear, do you not ? 9 then said lone after a short 
 pause. ( You find her beautiful and charming, infinitely more 
 beautiful than I am ? Infinitely more charming altogether ? She 
 would have made you such a nice wife, Armine. Why did you 
 not marry her, dear ? Why did you come to Palermo and choose 
 me ? — I who am so immeasurably her inferior ! You do love her 
 Armine, do you not? — this nice, kind, beautiful Miss Barrington 
 — this pale-faced saint of Oakhurst ? ; 
 
 ‘ Yes,’ said Armine, turning suddenly round and looking full 
 into lone’s face. 6 1 did love her, lone. She is the one perfect 
 woman in the world for me, and the one for whose esteem and 
 friendship I care the most.’ 
 
 i Then you lied to me in the garden that day at Palermo ? ’ 
 said lone. 6 Faithless to her — a liar tome — you give yourself a 
 good character, Armine ! ’ 
 
 i Let the past alone,’ he said. ‘ I did love her once ; but I am 
 none the less your faithful husband — none the less desirous to be 
 your friend and protector, and to make your life as happy as I 
 can.’ 
 
 ‘ You love her ? ’ said lone slowly, keeping exactly the same 
 attitude and expression. 
 
 ‘ I loved her,’ he repeated. 
 
 ‘ To my face, Armine, you say this ? You dare to confess it ? ’ 
 she said. 
 
 6 Yes, to your face,’ he replied steadily. 1 Why should I not P ’ 
 
 She opened her eyes to the fullest. They were like two living 
 orbs of fire, blazing as the fire in the grate blazed and burnt. She 
 sprang to her feet and raised both her hands high in the air. 
 There was a crash, a cry, a heavy fall — and then she was kneel- 
 ing by the hearth, her husband’s lifeless body lying prone across 
 her lap. All around lay the glittering fragments of broken glass, 
 and the firelight shone on them as they strewed the floor like in- 
 fernal gems. The red blood flowed redder as it streamed over her 
 dress. Bosom and sleeves and skirt were dyed with her husband’s 
 life-blood ; and the marred beauty of the man she loved was the 
 last expression of her love. 
 
 With a kind of stupor for the present and a vivid return on 
 the past, she remembered the stain on the yellow feathers of the 
 bird, as she took up a fold of her gown and saw the red blood 
 shot across the gold. She had killed her bird for jealousy, and 
 now she had killed her husband ; but it was in her right that 
 both should belong to her, and her only ; and had not the one 
 deserted and the other betrayed her ? 
 
IN HER MADNESS. 
 
 303 
 
 Ah ! hut that red spot staining the shining feathers of the 
 golden bird, and that marred beauty of the man she loved — that 
 lifeless body lying heavily across her lap ! 
 
 The servant, who had heard the noise, came hurrying in, and 
 her shrieks called in the neighbours. Soon the house was tilled 
 with the curious, whispering, horror-stricken crowd gathering 
 round the doorway and looking at the awful scene, terrified and 
 aghast. The murdered man across the lap of the kneeling woman 
 — the lifeless head pressed against her bosom — the red blood over 
 her dress and the firelight flashing over all : — it was a kind of in- 
 fernal Pieta, where crime stood for sacrifice and the anguish of re- 
 morse for the agony of love. 
 
 Among the rest came Vincenzo, his black eyes glowing, his 
 thick lips apart, his swarthy face transformed from its usual care- 
 less good-humour to the cruel triumph of a hunter who has at last 
 come up with his prey. 
 
 * Can I help you, my life, my love ? 9 he said in Sicilian, bend- 
 ing over lone and touching her head with his hand. 
 
 She pushed back the hair from her forehead — there where he 
 had touched her; and a red streak was left across the golden 
 curls. 
 
 6 No,’ she said, with the quietness of despair ; ‘ I do not want 
 you now. I have revenged myself/ 
 
 But now there came a dull kind of movement and a subdued 
 murmur among the crowd, as the policeman, who had been sum- 
 moned, elbowed his way through the throng and came up to the 
 murdered man and his murderess. It was the end of all the 
 passionate exaltation which had seemed to make this murder 
 natural and right, and the beginning of the vulgar retribution 
 which made it shameful and abominable. It was the end of 
 romance and the beginning of reality — the hand of the law 
 grasping the shoulder of the criminal who had thought herself a 
 victim rightly avenged by a heroine. This man, and the shud- 
 dering breath of the crowd, represented the degradation of her 
 crime. How different from the admiring looks of the men when 
 she had carried her dead bird in her hand at her father’s mill ! — 
 or even from Vincenzo, now, when he bent over her and touched 
 her head and called her his love and his life, while his hot breath 
 on her forehead seemed like the kiss of some demon straight from 
 the hell — where she was going. Going P Where she was at this 
 moment ! 
 
 But there was no help for it. She had committed a crime, 
 and she must suffer for it : and the pitiless justice of the law knew 
 no ruth because of her provocation, because of her passion, nor 
 yet because of her beauty, her youth, nor her love. 
 
 Edward Formby was sitting in the library at Hillside. He 
 was dreaming of lone and of to-morrow — of the terrible step he 
 
IONE. 
 
 304 
 
 was about to take ; of all it involved ; of all to which it committed 
 him both for loss and gain. Name, repute, social position, his 
 own honour, his friends, the consciousness of evil example, the 
 stain for ever on his conscience — these were for loss. For gain — 
 he would have lone. He loved her as he had never loved before 
 and should never love again. And Armine was not worthy of 
 her. Repute and honour would be lost, truly, but love and 
 happiness would remain. She would forfeit what the world calls 
 her claim to respect, but he would surround her with such careful 
 devotion, such chivalrous regard, she should never feel that she 
 had lost but only that she had gained. He would devote his 
 whole life to her, and think the price paid for his treasure small in 
 relation to its worth. What so imperative as love ? What so holy P 
 
 All the same, it had an ugly sound, that phrase which 
 crystallised the coming fact, running away with another man’s 
 wife. Monica and Anthony, and dear mild gentle Mrs. Barring- 
 ton — all like his own family for length of loving friendship — they 
 would not speak to him. Mrs. Anthony would fling her poisoned 
 assegais at him and her. The very tradespeople and peasants 
 would despise him — the magistrate and dispenser of justice who 
 had transgressed the law and lowered himself beyond their level. 
 The county would reject him, and in the hunting-field he would 
 be publicly shunned. And for all this he would care comparatively 
 nothing if, when he came home, he found lone at his fireside — 
 when all the legal preliminaries should be completed — his own, 
 his wife. 
 
 St. Claire had been his friend, yes ; that was true. He had 
 offered him his help in times past, because he pitied him as a 
 robust well-found gentleman might justly pity a poor devil who 
 had neither health nor money. But pity is not equality; and 
 those whom we compassionate are never shoulder to shoulder with 
 ourselves. Lately he had helped him because lone suffered from 
 the lack into which her husband had brought her. But a man 
 who is helped by another man for the sake of his wife, stands on 
 a still lower plane than when he was helped for himself alone. 
 And, in accepting that loan, Armine had yielded his position. 
 Whether or not, the die was cast now, and Edward Formby had 
 pledged himself and could not draw back even if he would ; and 
 he would not if he could. 
 
 Thinking all this — feverish, restless, tormented, unsatisfied ; 
 his eyes following the light rings and wreaths of smoke as they 
 eddied round his head for a few seconds, then dispersed for ever 
 into space ; his heart filled only with lone, her beauty, his own 
 imperious passion, the consciousness of infinite dishonour, and the 
 feeling of the gambler prepared to stake his all on that one 
 throw — thinking all this and planning for to-morrow, the servant 
 with a pale face and scared manner came hurriedly into the room. 
 
IN HER MADNESS. 
 
 3°5 
 
 And behind him walked the country constable, almost as scared 
 as he, leading by the arm lone, red-handed ; her dress dyed with 
 blood ; her dead-white face and red-gold hair both touched with 
 blood ; brought before him, the nearest magistrate — the man 
 whose life-long love she had agreed to be to-morrow — charged 
 with the murder of her husband Armine. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 INTO THE DEPTHS. 
 
 Yeaes passed, and the awful crime of which Oakhurst had been 
 the theatre had passed somewhat into the legendary stage. People 
 of course still remembered lone and all the facts of the case, and 
 still discussed her and her poor husband with the acrimony of 
 partisans. Some held her to have been a monster pure and 
 simple, without excuse or extenuation to be found for her wicked- 
 ness, search as you would ; and others thought that, well, there 
 had been some kind of provocation somewhere, and others were 
 mixed up rather more intimately than was desirable. Not much 
 came out at the trial, but something did — enough to make people 
 think there was more behind, and to obtain for lone a compara- 
 tively lenient sentence. 
 
 A certain nameless cloud passed over Monica’s repute, inasmuch 
 as it came out that lone had been jealous of her. No one said 
 that his jealousy was well-founded. No one even went so far as 
 to say that Dr. St. Claire had dared to raise his eyes so high as 
 Monica Barrington’s fair face. Still less did anyone suppose that 
 she had stooped hers so low as to look at him. All the same, 
 lone had been jealous ; and English society is intolerant of those 
 unmarried interlopers who, however innocently, however uninten- 
 tionally, poach on a wife’s preserves. And though no one could 
 say precisely What, everyone hinted that Something had been ; 
 and though everyone knew that Monica Barrington was an angel, 
 still, on one of her shining wings was a certain slender but un- 
 doubted black feather. 
 
 Edward Formby, too, came in for his share of blame. Those 
 dreams which had traversed his brain and levered his blood as he 
 watched the light rays of smoke eddy and then disperse were 
 never made public to living soul ; but his conduct had been im- 
 prudent enough to set suspicion afoot, and Vincenzo, who hated 
 him, did him what damage he could. A few, however, defended 
 him through all these possibilities of unproven iniquity. And of 
 these Rachel Major was the staunchest. She loved him as women 
 of lower condition, shut in by the narrow circumstances of a small 
 country town, do sometimes love the unattainable great man of 
 
 x 
 
IONE. 
 
 306 
 
 tlie place. It may be the squire or the curate, the captain of the 
 neighbouring regiment, or haply the heir of the ducal house. 
 Whatever it is, it is the old story of the moth and the star ; for 
 the most part without even the chance of scorched wings. No 
 one ever knows of this love, and few suspect it. It has no hope ; 
 no tangibility ; no root-work in fact nor possibility ; nevertheless 
 it is — it exists. It colours all the thoughts and shapes all the 
 dreams, and, even though it does not mould the actual circum- 
 stances of life, it destroys all solid happiness. And loving him as 
 she did, secretly and without hope — loving him as Pygmalion loved 
 Galatea, before love made the marble human — or as maidens of 
 old loved the god whom they desired as their own — Rachel 
 defended Edward Formby with a faithfulness of advocacy which 
 looked like neighbourly fidelity and Christian charity, and was in 
 reality womanly love. 
 
 During the years of lone’s incarceration many changes took 
 place at Oakliurst. Edward Formby was mostty away, travelling 
 in remote places, and Hillside was practically untenanted. He 
 had not married. A wife out in the wilds of Africa, or the un- 
 trodden forests of Madagascar, where he shot big game and ran 
 liair-breadtli risks of his life, would have been as much out of 
 place as patent leather boots and my gentleman’s gentleman to 
 keep them bright. Nor was Monica married. And it seemed 
 now as if neither of these two ever would find the fitting partner. 
 They had been destined for each other by the fitness of things ; 
 and, flying in the face of Providence as they had done by frus- 
 trating its designs, they were rightly condemned to celibacy and 
 joylessness, said those who thought any marriage better than 
 none. 
 
 But Monica was not entirely unhappy for all the increased 
 seclusion of her life, and the absence of outward gaiety. Two 
 years after the murder she had brought home a little child — no 
 one ever knew from where ; and this seemed to have filled up the 
 measure of her life and happiness. She had devoted herself to it 
 as if she had been in very truth its mother, and people who had 
 at first wondered had now left ofF speculating. But Anthony and 
 Theodosia would never acknowledge this adoption, though they 
 did not publicly oppose it. Still the world knew that they did 
 not endorse it ; and there were shrewd surmises why. 
 
 Vincenzo had disappeared. Plis shop had been put up for 
 sale, and a respectable Englishman from the county town — the 
 foreman of the large confectioner’s there — had bought it as it 
 stood, and re-transformed the whole thing to honest British uses. 
 Those outlandish sweets disappeared, and good tough cakes and 
 indigestible Bath-buns were to be found in their stead. Whereat 
 all Oakliurst rejoiced, and gave itself periodical fits of patriotic 
 dyspepsia in consequence. 
 
INTO THE DEPTHS . 
 
 307 
 
 Miss Maria Crosby was still the invalid par excellence of Oak- 
 hurst, and Miss Jane Wintergreen, as formerly, the consecrated 
 constable of private morals ; while poor Rachel was her aunt’s 
 only half-devoted slave— the other half being that of a protesting 
 victim. But then Rachel Major was one of those who are pre- 
 destined to sacrifice by the very circumstances of condition and 
 nature; predestined to give care and not to receive back acknow- 
 ledgment ; to squander a love unseen on a man who neither knew 
 nor could have returned had he known. It is not only organisms 
 which prey on each other. Souls and affections follow the same 
 law. 
 
 The time was now at hand when the term of lone’s imprison- 
 ment should be over. In a few days she would be free. Monica 
 had kept the date ever before her eyes, for the great fear con- 
 nected with it, as also for her determination still to befriend, if she 
 could, the woman whom Armine St. Claire had married. She 
 had always resolved that she would go and meet her at the prison 
 gates and be the first to receive her back to life and liberty, and, 
 she hoped and believed, to repentance and the better way ; and 
 to bring her home to the Dower House — and her child. Criminal 
 as she was, whose hands had been dyed with her husband’s blood, 
 she was the mother of his child ; she had been his wife ; and she 
 could not be discarded. The pity wdiich Christ had shown to 
 sinners might well be repeated by man for his brother; and 
 Monica would be the friend of the passionate and miserable lone 
 — her friend to the last. 
 
 But the fates undid her web of plans and hopes. On the day 
 when lone was to be released, Mrs. Barrington lay dying, and 
 Monica’s place was by her mother’s death-bed, not before lone’s 
 prison-gates. Still, even in the midst of all this anguish at the 
 Dower House, she had remembered Armine’s wife, and had 
 written making arrangements for her safe convoy here. 
 
 As lone came out into the open air she met Vincenzo standing 
 to meet her. Faithful to the end he had come from Sicily to re- 
 ceive her. Where all the rest had deserted her, as it seemed, he 
 stood firm in his love, without failure and without flaw. He was 
 the black thread in her life, woven into its very substance by the 
 sin of her mother ; the fate laid on her by the necessity of circum- 
 stances ; her scourge and her punishment. But he loved her ; he 
 was faithful to her: where the whole world held aloof he came 
 to receive her ; and the crime which had dishonoured her with all 
 others, had not discrowned her with him. 
 
 1 Now you are mine,’ he said as he seized her by her hands, 
 and drew her towards him, kissing her on her lips in the full light 
 of day. ‘ This is the day for which I have lived and waited, lone, 
 my love! my life! Now you belong to me, and I am your 
 saviour ! I, the poor Vincenzo, your father’s servant, the only 
 
ZONE. 
 
 308 
 
 faithful love among all these great lords who pretended to adore 
 you . 9 
 
 ‘ No/ said lone ; i I wdll not go with you. I will go to Monica 
 Barrington. I want my child." 
 
 ‘ You shall have your child/ said Vincenzo. ‘ We will go to 
 the Dower House together. Come wdtli me. We will go.’ 
 
 A carriage was standing there waiting on his orders. He spoke 
 to the man in a low voice, then put lone in, leaping in after her 
 like a bloodhound when the quarry is at last run down. The man 
 struck his horses, and they set otf at a smart pace through the 
 streets, down to the docks, where a vessel lay ready to start for the 
 Mediterranean, to the captain of which, his compatriot, Vincenzo 
 had confided so much of the story as might be necessary to ex- 
 plain why this new passenger should be recalcitrant. 
 
 And when Monica’s messenger returned to the Dower House, 
 all that he could say was that the foreigner who had once owned 
 Thornton’s shop in High Street had taken Mrs. St. Claire in his 
 own carriage to bring her here to Oakhurst. 
 
 But they never came, and by no search were they able to be 
 found. 
 
 Not to be found, in good truth ! Did anyone ever look for 
 them in that remote village on the sunny slopes of Etna, where 
 Vincenzo brought to his lonely farm that beautiful half-foreign 
 woman with her red-gold hair and strange wild eyes and wilder 
 ways — like a bird ever beating her wings in vain, in vain, against 
 an imprisonment worse and more hopeless than that English one 
 had been P Entrapped ; confined in space ; the farm her doorless 
 dungeon ; the olive gardens and the vineyards her roofless cells ; 
 unable to escape ; mafiosi all around her — voluntary gaolers who 
 brought her back when she tried to flee, and w r ho would have 
 stabbed her rather than she should ever be free ; treated as mad 
 when she made her moan, and all chance of a hearing denied her ; 
 degraded by Vincenzo’s love ; revolted by his coarseness ; insulted 
 by his jealousy ; maddened by his tyranny— she dragged out her 
 weary life of expiation by suffering. No frantic prayer could 
 make her husband give her news of her child. 
 
 ‘ It is Monica Barrington’s, it is not yours/ he would say. 
 i Be content with mine.’ 
 
 But his w r ere not Armine’s ; and the bitterness of her mother- 
 hood was the worst of her many tortures. She had passed into 
 the darkness of her fate — dark under the glowdng sunlight, dreary 
 for all the fragrance of the orange-blossoms, the crimson glory of 
 the pomegranates, the splendour of the skies, the beauty of the 
 6eas. The sunlight gave her no joy, the moonlight no peace. She 
 was blotted out from the world, living and yet dead ; a mother 
 who could never see her child ; a lover who had killed her beloved ; 
 the lady-wife of a man who had reduced her to the condition of a 
 
INTO THE DEPTHS . 
 
 309 
 
 peasant, and who kept her as a slave whom he tortured even 
 while he caressed ; the reluctant mother of children abhorrent 
 to her, because she abhorred him who gave them to her; a 
 woman with the fatal gift of constancy, whose soul was never 
 faithless to the past, and whose body was like a jewel pawned 
 and pledged without her will — and impossible to redeem ! 
 
 But she lived. She lived by the strength of the fierce desire 
 and jealous hope that she might one day take Armine’s child to 
 her heart and detach her from Monica — that she might say : ‘ I 
 am your mother and you are my dead love’s second life. Come 
 to me, and leave her for whom he was slain. Love me who loved 
 him and hate her who wronged me and caused his death.’ But 
 that hope was false, that desire for ever unappeased. She lived 
 on and on, in burning flames of jealousy and wrath and hate and 
 yearning for revenge ; and the day never came when she was free 
 nor when she looked into the face of Armine’s fair daughter, 
 whom Monica Barrington had made her own. 
 
 the end. 
 
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 The Hands of Justice. 
 
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 Grace Balmaign’s Sweetheart. 
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 Heart Salvage. | Sebastian. 
 
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 Rogues and Vagabonds. 
 
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 Mary Jane’s Memoirs. 
 
 Tales of To-day. 
 
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