Chapter I

(i)

dear girl," said Val tranquilly, and with an air of extraordinary experience, " apart from exceptional cases and circumstances, men are infinitely braver than women. There's nothing to be ashamed of, I assure you. Women aren't meant to be brave. They've... they've got other advantages instead," he ended vaguely.

Val and Gertrude Marjoribanks, in the old schoolroom upstairs after tea, were discussing women's rights; and it was rapidly becoming an enumeration of masculine and feminine virtues, with a complete dissatisfaction to both sides.

"What advantages?" asked Gertrude, slightly flushed with argument. And Val, compelled to be precise, began to explain.

Val had grown up with great rapidity during the past three years, and had entirely fulfilled his rather hbbbledehoyish promise. He had become, in fact, an exceedingly pleasant-looking young man — - though with the Medd nose and chin always in evidence. These redeemed his face, however, from the ordinariness of young men of nineteen, and with his clean-shaven lips, his brown eyes, his wholesome pallor, he was distinctly of a romantic appearance.

Gertrude too had improved enormously. She had been rather markedly jeune fille, rather too slender and delicate and, simultaneously, rather abrupt and disturbing. But she had settled down by now into a poise of self-restrained youth fulness and even dignity, and her slight jerkiness had transformed itself into magnetism. She had made her curtsey at Court under Lady Beatrice's protection last summer; her portrait had appeared in a good many newspapers, and her name in lists of house-parties, especially where there were theatricals. She was taking herself rather seriously just now, as she was perfectly aware of her success; but it certainly did not detract from her charm. She was on a round of visits just now, and was spending Christmas with her old friends the Medds.

And now these two had drifted upstairs after tea, and were discussing women's rights with extreme vivacity. Val had reached the point of explaining that the great charm of women lay in their dependence and their sympathy. He even condescended to remark that a man's character was not complete without a woman's; that a man's natural courage was too hard a quality until lined, so to speak, with a woman's tenderness, and his recklessness softened by her prudence. And Gertie listened to him with intense eagerness, contradicted him warmly, and when she was not looking at his face, watched his shoe impatiently beating in the firelight. It may be added that she was dressed in a very charming tea-gown, which she had put on immediately after a hasty cup of tea in the hall, drank by her while her riding-habit still reeked and steamed with wet; and that she made great play with a fan with which she was protecting her face from the roaring glare of the wood fire.

"When are you leaving here?" asked Val abruptly; suddenly tired, it seemed, of women's rights. (After all, had not that question been settled, a hundred times, in as many undergraduates' rooms in Cambridge?)

" My aunt's coming to take me on to the Northamptons on Tuesday. I'm in some theatricals there, you know."

"Oh! Tuesday," said Val reflectively. "What are you acting in? "

He watched her as she described her part.... It seemed that Royalty was to be present, too.

Now of course Val was sentimental. Let that be said at once. And it must further be remarked that no young man of his age and temperament could possibly be anything else. He thought a great deal, that is to say, about negligible externals— about the texture of this girl's hair; the gleam on her stocking: he liked to think of her when he had got into bed and turned the light off, to make small plans for next day, to rehearse the incidents of the past day; even to design a vague but delicious future when Gertie and he should have a moderately sized house in the country and a little flat in town, and be perfectly reasonable and sympathetic one to another without growing any older, for ever and ever. All this, of course, was perfectly suitable and inevitable; and the only significant point, distinguishing Val's love-career from that of the perfectly ordinary boy, was that it had lasted three years, with more or less continuity, ever since the day when, to the sound of music in the hall, he had first perceived that she was charming and lovable. Other girls had, of course, flitted across his vision; but they had never stayed. Gertrude Marjoribanks had been the underlying type and model of them. He had seen her fairly frequently. She had been up to Cam-bridge with May to see him row; he had shot with her people; and she came to Medhurst at least twice a year for a tolerably long stay. It was a clean, honest adoration; and he was beginning to feel, at last, that it was getting a little too much for him and that something must be done. After all, he would be far from penniless in a few years' time; and she too would be moderately well off. They could manage the flat in town, anyhow; and perhaps Medhurst would serve for the present as their country house.

In other respects the three years that had elapsed since the Switzerland affair had developed the situation on orderly and conventional lines. Austin had grown a moustache at Cambridge, and had cut it off again when he began to eat his dinners in the Temple; and was now a perfectly respectable barrister and something of a prig. He was to stand for Parliament when a suitable occasion arose. He and Val saw very little of one another, and got on as well as such brothers usually do; that is to say, they were quite reasonably polite to one another, and occasionally, with a pregnant word or two, began and ended small decorous quarrels. Val thought Austin a prig, and Austin thought Val immature and rather conceited; and they were both quite right. May had also become three years older, and had began to be what is called " a good daughter"; that is to say, she used to help her mother to write invitations, and to tell her father, playfully, not to sit up too late. The General's confusion when this happened for the first time, and his acquiescence in it when he understood that it was only playful, and quite suitable, was really edifying. He too was three years older, rather grey about the ears, and rather bald on the top of his head; and his wife too had developed along parallel feminine lines; that is to say that she walked less, and rather slower, and was more tolerant of the High-Church pranks of her vicar.

All things, therefore, were as they should be, after three years. People came and went as usual; they shot, they danced, they spent peaceful if rather uneventful week-ends at Medhurst. Everybody went up to London at the end of May and came away again at the end of July. And the great house sat still and unchanged; it buzzed with subdued life below in the servants' quarters, and beat tranquilly with stateliness and beauty above. The pheasants clucked over their young during the spring in the deep woods, and flew cackling over the guns in the winter. The horses came round as usual, the bell rang from the stable-turret, and the gong sounded within. There was still the annual flower-show, and the harvest festival, and all the other proper things. And the Medd pride lay over all like a benediction, and burned within like a steady flame of fire.

(n)

" I quite agree with you," said Gertie suddenly, " that men must be brave. If they aren't that they aren't men. But, as a matter of fact, women are just as brave, and often a good deal braver."

" I used to think I was a coward," said Val, smiling reminiscently. " Do you remember my being thrown off Quentin three years ago? Well, you know, I was awfully nervous next day. I couldn't ride anyhow, as I had strained myself. But, you know, I was awfully glad I couldn't."

She looked up.

"Yes?"

" Well, it was all nonsense, of course. Of course I should have ridden if I had been able. And the feeling frightened one couldn't help. I remember reading in a book on riding that that often happened when one fell slowly."

She nodded.

''' Yes, I see. So long as one does ride, the feeling doesn't matter."

" Well, when I came back from Switzerland, of course I rode just as usual. Oh! and the same thing happened in Switzerland — the time I found out I hadn't any head for climbing. I was horribly ashamed at first, until a man out there — the Secretary of the Alpine Club — told me he had known just the same thing happen to a V.C. He just couldn't look over a precipice. I was frightfully sick at the time. I'd have given anything to have climbed the Matterhorn with the rest; but it simply wasn't fair on the others that I should try, with a head like mine."

" Yes, I see. And I should think not climbing the Matterhorn was really braver than climbing it."

Val shifted comfortably in his chair. The firelight fell on his face, and she noticed his eyes sparkle.

" Well, I know it seemed much harder, anyhow. To have to stop at home and grin — 'to see them off to the Schwarz-See, and then to go back to dinner with all the old women, when one knew perfectly well that if it wasn't for one's beastly head one could climb it perfectly? "

He stopped dramatically.

Gertie was in that warm and genial mood that follows an afternoon's hard exercise, closed by tea and a hot bath, and a complete change into very charming and comfortable clothes; and it seemed to her that this boy was really a very fine creature. He seemed to her so modest and so subtly courageous. Most young men would have shirked such a story. He faced it. She felt a real and rather subtle admiration for him.

"Look here, Gertie," said Val suddenly. "If you're going on Tuesday, I wish you'd come a really long ride with me one day first. You said you'd never seen Penshurst. Why shouldn't we go over?"

She began to smile, and then stopped.

" Oh! do you think we could? " she said.

"Why not? On Monday. We'd take lunch and go easily."

" There's the dance in the evening."

" We'd be back before dark."

She was silent.

Gertie, was no more calculating or ambitious than the average girl. Her people were reasonably well to do, and she was the only daughter. There certainly had been moments this previous year when various prospects of rather a glittering nature had passed before her eyes; it had occurred to her, for instance, that it would be extremely pleasant to be a Viscountess, and not altogether inconceivable... But somehow these things faded rather at Medhurst, and it was a fact that the Viscount in question had shown no signs of his existence since August, though she believed she was to meet him at the Northamptons'. Meanwhile here was Med-hurst; and here was Val — Val, whom she had known for three years, with whom she had danced, played, ridden, skated; who was always pleasant to her, and courteous and natural. Of course, he was only a Cambridge undergraduate at present; but he would not be that for more than two years more.... And... and he obviously liked her very much.

So, suddenly in the firelight (they had not troubled to turn on the electricity) it seemed to her that prudence was a very ignoble thing — the prudence, that is, which sets a Viscount before a Medd. Anyhow, this was a very splendid place, and had a great tradition, even though the physical possession of it would never be Val's. (He was to "be an engineer," she believed, when he left Cambridge; which would mean that he played at work for a few years, and then began to work at playing instead, on a very competent income.) Yes, prudence and calculation were detestable and cold-blooded things; and Val looked very gallant and sweet in the firelight.

" Well, I'll come," she said, " if you'll arrange it all."

(m)

Austin, meanwhile, was holding forth to his mother in her morning-room on the very same subject. He was standing on the hearth-rug, his legs rather wide apart, looking almost too mature and dignified for twenty-two. He was in his dinner-jacket and trousers, for he too had changed on coming in; and he held his dark, well-shaped head rather high.

Now Austin had been perfectly loyal to his younger brother over the Swiss business. He had repeated, though coldly, Val's voluble and warm-blooded explanations upon their return. For, indeed, it was impossible to do anything else. But he had remembered the facts; and, if the truth must be confessed, was not sorry to have a definite peg on which to hang that very natural and almost universal elder brother's contempt for a younger. But he was prig enough to be unaware of all this; he only told himself now and then, when a safety-valve was needed, that poor Val must not be blamed too much: somehow or another an unfortunate strain had got into his blood. This was very convenient and soothing when Val made himself a nuisance, as it preserved his own dignity and made him feel magnanimous.

The fact that Val was, officially, a " man," made things harder. You can treat a boy as a boy; you cannot treat an undergraduate as a child. Val smoked now openly, and drank whisky unrebuked; he had a dressing-case with silver fittings; he shaved every day — he did, in fact, all those things that had separated him and Austin three years before. And now he was making love too, in an offhand way, and it was not actually ridiculous; at least it needed to be called ridiculous before it was so.

This was what Austin was doing.

" I feel rather foolish," he said, looking very wise and mature, " in speaking about it at all, mother. Of course I haven't said a word to Val; he wouldn't stand it. But do you think it's quite wise to let those two — Val and Gertie, I mean — go about alone together so much?"

His mother was just a shade respectful to him now. Sir James Meredith, K.C., had been very complimentary about the application and solid conscientiousness of this son of hers, though he had not used the word " brilliance." And he was the son and heir, and had a great deal of dignity.

" Are they so much alone together? And "

" Why, they rode together all to-day, away from the rest of us. I don't think father liked it."

" But they've known one another a long time, Austin "

" And I'm sure Val's got some plan in his head for Monday. Gertie goes on Tuesday, doesn't she?" (Austin was not quite so much detached as he wished to think himself. To be perfectly frank, he had attempted a few solemn courtesies to Gertie himself, and he had gathered that they were met with irony — almost with amusement. But he honestly did not know that this was affecting him in his very conscientious remarks this evening.)

He proceeded to explain that Val was only nineteen and Gertie eighteen; that Val had to apply himself very steadily if he was to pass his engineering examinations; and that while it was not for one single instant his business to interfere, if Val chose to engage himself at this absurd age to a girl who was not in the least suited to him, yet he... well, he considered it his duty to do so. It was all said with a tremendous air of responsibility, and his mother was conscious more than once of a desire to laugh. But that would never do.

" Well, my son," she said, " I'm glad you've told me. I don't think I'd better interfere, though. Gertie's going on Tuesday, anyhow. And even if you're right, and it's more than a mere boy and girl affair, I'm not quite so sure as you are that it would be such a bad thing. She's a very good girl, you know, and Val will have nearly a thousand a year of his own when he leaves Cambridge."

Austin thrust his chin a shade higher.

" Oh! that's all right," he said; " so long as you know. But I thought I'd better tell you." " Thank you, Austin," she said quite gravely.

Austin's very slightly ruffled feelings were not smoothed by his reception in the schoolroom. This was one of those delightful nondescript rooms which girls have in big houses, as much theirs as the smoking-room is the men's, or, in this case, as the sitting-room at the end of the north wing was the boys'. Here small, inconvenient tables occupied the spaces in front of the low mullioned windows; pieces of embroidery were pinned upon the walls; low white chairs were gathered round the open fireplace; china was grouped in corners and on the mantelshelf. It was a room entirely white and green, suggestive of innocence and cleanliness. The boys only came here on invitation expressed or understood; and there was no room to do anything anywhere, as every vacant space on table and floor was occupied with partly finished works in paint or pokerwork or needlework — with easels, and workboxes, and a large spinning-wheel completely out of repair.

Austin came in here with stately step, and was confounded by the darkness and the sound of a faint movement.

" That you, Austin? " came from a boy's figure outlined against the glowing chimney.

Austin switched on the light.

" Yes," he said, " I came to see if — er - May "

" May's playing pool with Tom Meredith and Miss Deverell. She was here a little while ago." (To be perfectly accurate, May had looked in to find a ball which she had taken upstairs to amuse the kitten with, at a quarter to six. It was now ten minutes past seven.)

"Oh!" said Austin.

" Anything else I can do for you? " enquired Val politely.

Gertie stood up, looking at a watch on her bracelet.

" Good gracious! " she said. " It's after seven. I must fly."

She flew. Austin held the door politely open and closed it after her.

Then he advanced a step.

"Val," he said.

"Yes?"

" Rather odd your sitting all alone here with Gertie so long."

" I beg your pardon? "

Now Austin ought to have detected from a i8o THE COWARD peculiar tone in the other's voice that this was, emphatically, not the time to advance criticisms. Val still had within him the warm, tingling effect of an hour and a half alone with a very charming and magnetic girl, and his mood was one that can only be called dangerous.

Besides, it was an entire surprise to him (as it always is in such cases) that anyone else had noticed the faintest possible relationship, beyond the most ordinary between himself and Gertie. He thought that no one was aware of it except himself.

Well, Austin in his rectitude knew nothing of this. He thought it merely a good opportunity of acting in a superior and elder-brotherly manner.

" I say," he repeated firmly, " that it's rather odd your sitting all alone with Gertie here, ever since tea • — in the dark/' he added as a clincher.

There was a moment's silence. Then he saw Val lick his lips, and perceived that he looked odd; and simultaneously realised that in his passion for decorum he had gone a shade too far. He recoiled, interiorly.

" I've never heard such vile insolence in my life. How dare you speak to me like that! "

" My dear chap "

" You'd better get out of this room," went on Val, still icily, though his voice quavered ever so slightly. " I don't want to hit you in the face."

Austin perceived that Val, with his hand still on the chair-back which he had gripped on rising, swayed a shade nearer him.

He wheeled sharply on his heel, so resolutely as to silence any question of his courage. At the door he turned again.

" It's disgraceful you should speak to me like that/' he said quietly. " I simply came to "

" You'd better not say any more. Get out of my sight."

Val took a step nearer his brother. He regretted this afterwards, for Austin instantly sat down on a little white sofa and put one knee over the other. This was a distinct challenge; and Austin, to his satisfaction, saw that Val hesitated.

" I shall not go," said the elder, " at your bidding.... Val; sit down a minute. You must hear what I have to say, in justice to myself."

Val sat down, slowly, as if his righteous anger were just, and only just, curbed by his keen sense of justice. Austin perceived his own advantage, but resolved to be magnanimous.

" Look here," he said, " I'm tired of these perpetual rows. I came in here "

" And say something offensive," spat Val, shaken by a spasm of indignation.

" I came in here," repeated Austin, " simply to warn you that you're making... that you'll be making an exhibition of yourself with Gertie if you don't look out. I should have thought "

"You're very good," said Val bitterly. "It's extraordinarily kind of you to. And may I ask what business it is of yours? "

Austin felt the battle was won. There had certainly been a moment when he had been slightly frightened himself; but he saw he was on top now. He stood up and put his hand on the door again.

" My good chap. If you think it's not my business, there's no more to be said. Personally, I should have been grateful under the same circumstances; but I see you're not. Very good. I won't bother you again."

" I suppose you mean to imply that I'm... I'm in love with Gertie? "

(( T »

''' Will you be good enough to answer my question?"

Austin dropped the handle again.

" I meant nothing more than that it looked like it," he said.

" Well then, it looked wrong," said Val, deliberately and consciously lying. " It's simply scandalous that I can't be friends with a girl who's been in and out of this house for three years, without people poking and prying and suspecting I'm in love. I like Gertie; and I'm going to do exactly and precisely as I like. I'm going a long ride with her on Monday, if that's any satisfaction to you. And I'll thank you to keep your remarks to yourself, and to mind your own business."

Austin smiled gently. He even bowed a little.

" Then I think," he remarked, " there's no more to be said."

His knees shook a little as he went down the passage, humming just loud enough for Val to hear.

" Poor chap! " he said to himself. " He funked me badly then."

Val remained standing. He heard Austin humming. He smiled by a muscular effort.

" I frightened him rather badly that time, I think," he said out loud.

T