Chapter II

(I) Miss ANNIE HAMILTON had just finished dressing for dinner, and stood a moment before her glass, listening to the sound of wheels and looking at herself.

She saw, framed in walnut wood, a pretty figure and a pretty face; but she did not quite know how pretty was that slender, long-limbed self, the thin round arms emerging from deep sleeves at the elbow, the pleasant pallour of the face heightened by a pair of very dark eyes and eyebrows, and a crown of black hair. She crossed her hands, let them drop again, advanced a foot and withdrew it. Then she became aware of the sin of vanity, and turned resolutely away, a little annoyed with herself. It would have to be inentioned to the Vicar on Saturday, too. But before she had reached the head of the staircase she was wondering how she would look in a low-cut frock next year.

A charming-looking fair-haired rosy boy of seventeen came out of his room as she passed his door, his smooth chin held rather high by reason of a collar, his hands deep in his pockets, and a stiff breast-plate of shirt-front bulging from his waistcoat.

“Tsay! they've come,” he said.

She nodded.

“T like that chap Dell,’ proceeded Jack, going down beside her. ‘‘ He wouldn’t shoot, though.”

“How much did you get?”

Jack mocked her for her phrase, and proceeded to give her the statistics of the day’s bag; he had only got back an hour before from pheasant-driving at Amplefield.

“TY don’t think you'll like him, though,’ he interrupted himself suddenly.

She put her finger on her lips and pointed below to where two figures, one in black clerical dress and the other in ordinary evening dress were crossing the hall. Each was making strange movements with his arms; that would be their cuffs, she supposed. What odd creatures men were!

She dropped her eyes, composed her features, and went forward into the room.

She was always a little excited by Father Yolland’s presence. He ought to have had all the mystery of the Erring Sister behind him, but he seemed so extremely natural. She had wondered more than once whether his frank ease were not a triumph of training after all at the hands of those clerical masters of deportment, the Society of Jesus. A priest, she thought, ought to have somewhat of a pontifical air at all times, such as the Vicar had, who always spoke on a monotone, and pronounced all his vowels the same.

She shook hands with the priest, and then glanced up momentarily as her mother made Mr. Dell known to her. No, she decided; Jack was right; she would not like this long-faced man with the smouldering eyes; his face was too much like a mask, and he bowed too low. She was sure he was cold and calculating, with a spice of mockery.

Before she could begin to speak, the door opened again and Lord Brasted came in, and introductions began once more.

This nobleman was of the Pink Type, stoutish, with tufts of light-red frizzed hair above and below his ears. His dominant colour pervaded all the rest of him that could be seen, and presumably what could not; his hands had a slight growth of the same hair on their backs. Annie disliked his hands very much; they were too well padded, too soft, and too square.

Yet he had an undoubtedly agreeable manner. He stood now on the hearthrug in the exact position and with the precise manner that indicated his standing in the house. He was a guest, but so old a friend that he was very nearly the host. Yet he always deferred charmingly to Jack, and over herself assumed the protection without the severity of a parent.

“You had a good day, I hear, Mr. Dell,” he was saying.

“ Ah! I was not shooting, but it was excellent. I had great pleasure in watching Mr.—er—Mr. Jack Hamilton.”

The boy flushed with pleasure, and came a step nearer.

“T am sure you can shoot, Mr. Dell,” he said. “ You know all about it, I expect.”

Chris smiled brilliantly—he had very white, even teeth, the girl noticed—too white; it was part of the mask.

“My dear boy, I couldn’t hit a haystack. I haven’t shot for years.”

The boy came even nearer

“Come out to-morrow,” he said, “if you would care to pot rabbits, at least.”

Mrs. Hamilton rose as the door was opened, and a soundless-voiced butler presented the top of his head.

“Mr. Dell, will you take my daughter in? Father Yolland, do you mind coming with Jack?”

It was all muddled, thought Chris, as he moved out with Annie’s hand on his arm. Then he turned to her, and said an enthusiastic word or two about the oak pendants of the ceiling.

Mrs. Hamilton did not get a word with him, till the fish had disappeared; but she listened, during Lord Brasted’s remarks on her right, with considerable complacency to her daughter’s conversation. She seemed to be talking really well, and she was usually shy.

It was good for her to meet men of tne world, even if they did look like melodramatic actors; it would break the shock of next year.

““ My dear lady,” protested her other neighbour at last, “ you are not listening to a word I am saying.”

Her shrewd grey eyes twinkled pleasantly at him as she slowly turned her head.

“T was not,” she said. ‘I was thinking how cheerful Annie was.”

Lord Brasted lifted his head like an amiable ram to glance across.

“Who is he?”” he asked in a soundless voice.

“TI don’t know. A friend of Dick Yolland’s.”

When Chris had helped himself delicately to a sweetbread on toast she laid a slender jewelled left hand on the table.

“You are here long, Mr. Dell?” she said.

“T beg your pardon,” said Chris impulsively. “ How rude Iam! But really Miss Hamilton - he broke off with an admirable air of confusion.

She was pleased with this; it was so natural. No; the man was not really so very like an actor after all; it was only that he was very well groomed.

“T am so glad you had a good day,” she said. “ Jack has taken a great fancy to you. I suppose you know that.”

He smiled cordially.

“Well, yes,” he said. “ And what a charming boy he is—an Etonian, I suppose?”

“‘T had to take him away last half to cram for the Army. They are no good, there, you know.”

“No, but what a colour it gives to life! I think I envy Etonians more than anyone in the world. I would give anything ‘

““You were not there?”’ she said, knowing that he was not.

He smiled full at her.

“Thank you! No, I was not.”

He seemed very melancholy for a moment or two after that, and crumbled his bread in silence with a delicate hand.

“ Dick Yolland and I were up at Oxford together,” he went on presently. “ What a good fellow he is!”

She had noted two facts by now, and hastened to add to them.

“Do you see much of him in town?” she asked.

“T have not seen him for a good while,” explained Chris. ‘I have been abroad such a lot, you see, and now my work 3

“ Your work?”

“Well, I am a sort of journalist,” he said, ‘‘ when I can get anything to do—articles and that sort of thing. When I can’t sy

He stopped abruptly.

“Yes, Mr. Dell?”

“T starve,’ he said, with the utmost frankness and seriousness.

Mrs. Hamilton almost gasped. This was very startling; at least the man was not designing as she had been inclined to suspect. It was almost inconceivable that this trim gentleman could mean what he said.

“That is relative, I suppose,’ she observed presently.

He shook his head, looking at her intently for a moment, and then dropping his eyes humbly.

“No, absolute. I meant it, Mrs. Hamilton. Forgive me ” he broke off again with every appearance of distress.

Before she could summon up any answer to this she heard her daughter break in.

“Mr. Dell, do attend a moment. Father Yolland says * Then Lord Brasted’s suave voice made a remark about cylinders, and she forced herself to listen and answer.

There was a good deal of laughter during the rest of dinner between the other four; they were at an oval table that made such communication possible, especially when Jack leaned his head between the ferns to contribute his share; and Mrs. Hamilton was able to exchange a good many remarks with her old friend.

“ He is a very odd man,” she said presently, with scarcely moving lips. “I think I like him.”

The other put his head politely on one side; he was not interested in odd young men; he liked them conventional.

“He has been saying such curious things,” she went on. ‘I wonder if they are true.”

“To Miss Annie, too?”’ he asked.

She looked at him an instant.

“Of course not,” she said. ‘‘ They were exchanging reminiscences of chi’dhood when I last listened. He appears to have worn diamond socks.”

Lord Brasted murmured something appreciative.

“Why don’t you like him?””’ she demanded.

“ Dear lady, I have no views at all. He is extremely well-dressed; that is all that I have observed at present.”

““ Observe some more,” she said. ‘“‘ Make him talk when we go. I should like to know what you think.”

She was astonished at her own interest. She had a hundred criticisms—of his talk, his bearing, his sleek head, his thin suggestive hands; and yet she forebore to formulate them even to herself. They hung for the present suspended. She would see after Lord Brasted had given his opinion, and she would also like to hear Annie’s.

She gathered her fan at the earliest occasion, and swept out with her daughter, bowing her grey-piled head towards Chris, who was of course at the door, alert and trim, with his napkin in his left hand.

She said nothing at all for a moment, but sat warming her pretty blue-veined hands at the fire, and watching Annie bring up a stool.

“No, my dear; don’t sit there, or move before they come in. What do you think of Mr. Dell?”

“He is delightful, mamma. He told us such funny stories.”

Mrs. Hamilton’s face had a shadow of amusement on it for an instant, then she reminded herself that the contrast might be the result of pluck.

‘What sort of stories?”

“Oh! about the Italians, and the way they behave in church—all sorts of things, mamma.”

“Is he a Roman Catholic?”

“Yes: I asked him.”

Mrs. Hamilton fell to warming her hands again.

‘There are plenty of men like that, my dear,” she observed presently.

“ Like what?”

“Like Mr. Dell.”

Annie was puzzled. She had completely reversed her opinion of Chris long before the end of dinner. She was still afraid that possibly he. was not a very good man, which, of course, would be very sad, if true; but he was a very nice one. He was not stout and red like Lord Brasted; he did not patronise her at all; on the contrary he had asked her for her opinion on several matters; he had given enthusiastic praise to that dear boy Jack, and he had somehow conveyed the impression that he thought her very charming and good. Perhaps that was vanity, she reflected; but he had certainly said some very true and touching things about the influence of good women in general—even of girls. Why, then, did her mother not like him?

She was apt to be a little afraid of her mother, but she determined to be brave just now.

An Attack of Feverishness 4]

“Don’t you like Mr. Dell?” she asked, innocent-eyed.

Her mother laughed.

“My dearest, how can I tell? I have hardly spoken to him. You monopolised him altogether.”

Annie smiled with pleasure.

“ He would talk to me, mamma,” she said.

“Well, you must let me talk to him when he comes in. Don’t forget, I want to.”

There was no question as to who was to talk to Mr. Dell that evening. Mrs. Hamilton, sitting now on a high-backed sofa apart from the rest, swept aside her silken skirts and called him by name.

“Come and talk to me, Mr. Dell.”

There was no help for it. Annie drifted off to a table with Father Yolland and talked country-side, intensely conscious of the two on the sofa. Lord Brasted came and chimed in presently with an air of one who makes concessions, and Jack, after revolving round the sofa for ten minutes disappeared, presumably to the smoking-room, closing the door unnecessarily sharply behind him. There was no question, thought Dick Yolland, as he observed these phenomena, that his friend was a success. But then he always was on such occasions.

The butler presented the top of his head again before either of the groups was re-sorted, and this time his news was audible. Father Yolland’s brougham was at the door.

Annie shut the book they were looking at—the countryside had proved rather sterile—and stood up with a slight air of resentment, looking towards her mother. They seemed very busy in conversation; then Father Yolland stepped forward.

“J am afraid we must go, Mrs. Hamilton. It’s rather a cold night.”

The two rose, still talking, and then, to Annie’s amazement, Mr. Dell, taking her mother’s hand, raised it to his lips. She did not seem in the least disconcerted.

“Then on Saturday,” she said, “‘ about five.”

Chris murmured something.

Annie shook hands with the two men, secretly terrified at the thought that Mr. Dell might kiss her hand too, but he only looked at her with a kind of melancholy admiration, and then followed his friend out. She could see Jack, with a very sulky air standing outside to see them to the carriage.

When she turned again, her mother was talking to Lord Brasted.

“J don’t want to hear,” the girl heard her say. “JT have my own opinion now. I may tell you he is coming to stay here on Saturday.”

Annie was so much pleased at the news that she hardly noticed Lord Brasted’s shrug of his broad shoulders.

“ J will not dispute your intuition,” he Side). WBUe

“No ‘buts, ” she said. “ Good-night, Annie.”

“ Mamma, why did he, why did he cay

“Well, my dear?”

‘““Why did he kiss your hand?”’

She laughed naturally, but her eyes were bright and interested.

“Tt is a pretty Italian custom,” she said. “Go to bed, child.”

Dick Yolland was silent for sheer amusement for a full hundred yards from the house-door. Chris had been so entirely characteristic of himself—so superb, so adaptable. What in the world had he talked to Mrs. Hamilton about, that had elicited that invitation? Jack, too, had accompanied Chris to the carriage door, pressing entreaties to pot rabbits up to the last moment; Annie had been a new creature; she had talked with sparkling eyes; her reserve had been melted.

At last he broke silence.

“You are a wonderful chap, Chris.”

By the glow of the cigarette that the other had lighted in the porch from one of Jack’s matches, Dick could see a pair of eyes look at him sideways.

“What do you mean, Dick?”

By the tone the priest thought he was slightly offended.

“ Why,—wonderful,” he said. ‘You have made three conquests. How do you do it?”

“Not four then?”’ came the voice.

Dick had forgotten the fourth.

“Oh! I daresay four. I don’t know about Brasted. He is a tough chap. How do you do it? What did you talk to Mrs. Hamilton about?”

Chris was silent a moment.

“My dear man!” he said; and there was a ring of expostulation in his voice.

For a moment the priest was astounded; yet he had known Chris before now take offence at what he considered ill-manners.

“Oh! don’t be a fool,” he said. ‘‘ How was I to dream it_was private? Do you want me to apologise? ”

A hand was laid on his arm.

“My dear chap, of course it isn’t private to you. I—I talked about myself.”

For one instant a thunder-cloud of fou rive enveloped the priest; but he fortunately restrained himself. Why, of course! What else should Chris talk about with such earnestness? He thanked Divine Providence that the brougham was dark.

“It interested her, at any rate,” he said, trying to keep the quaver out of his voice.

Chris drew sententiously upon his cigarette and expelled the smoke with pursed lips. Dick could feel the aromatic sting in his eyes.

““ T showed her my heart,” said the egoist. “ Dick! there is no limit to the power of a good woman.”

The epithet ‘‘ good” was perhaps one of the last, though not the least, true, of all those applicable to Mrs. Hamilton, but the priest knew what Chris meant by it; it signified what he would have called sympathy.

“And to her daughter?”’ he enquired.

“My dear man, of course I shouldn’t talk like that toa girl. But what a dear creature she is—pure and good and virginal. Oh! my God!”

This was nearer the mark; but Dick had heard those epithets applied to not less than five other maidens before.

They were both silent for perhaps a hundred yards. Then the voice went on out of the darkness.

“Oh! my God! If I had known such people ten years ago, what a different man I should have been!”

There was again undoubted sincerity in the man’s voice, but how far was there genuineness?

“ Well—I’m delighted you’ve made friends,” said Dick serenely. ‘‘ How long have they asked you for?’

“She said till Monday.”

“And what about Lord Brasted?”

There was a swift movement beside him.

“ You noticed it too?” cried Chris. ‘That man was trying to pump me. I saw it at once. He’s my enemy, Dick.”

_““ My dear man, he’s perfectly harmless. He spuds dandelions.”

“I don’t care, he’s my enemy; I knew it at once. I hate those red-haired, white-skinned, fat men. They smell, too.”

“You're talking complete rubbish. I know him well. He’s nothing of the sort.”

“You don’t understand,” said Chris; “it’s a question of magnetism. He hates me as much as I hate him.”

“Bosh!”’ said the priest.

Chris threw himself back without a word, and Dick did not care to break the silence. This man was really too absurd. Neither moved till the carriage stopped in creaking motionlessness at the lodge-gate. Then Dick felt himself seized once more by the arm.

“My dear Dick, forgive me—I’m a wild fool. But I must trust my instincts. They’re all I’ve got.”

“You’re quite wrong about Brasted,” repeated the priest steadily.

Chris said no more, and they drove in silence down the long drive, till the open hall-door shone out pleasantly and the carriage stopped.

Dick slipped out and stood waiting on the steps. Chris came out looking rather constrained, passed him in the hall and took up his bed-candle.

“You're not going to bed?” cried the priest.

The other nodded.

“Tm tired out; this kind of evening exhausts me. Good-night, dear man.”

When Dick got to the smoking-room he found his father with a book and pipe.

“ Well 2?”

Dick shut the door and sat down, helping himself from a syphon.

‘Chris has been a great success. Mrs. Hamilton asked him to stay there when he leaves here.”

Mr. Yolland’s eyes grew amused.

“As you told me,” he said. ‘‘ Well, I have been thinking too. I am very sorry for that young man. How about the library here?”’

“ How 2?”

“Well, it’s in shocking bad order. Do you think he would think it beneath him to arrange and catalogue? It would give him breathing-time.”

“Tm awfully grateful,” said Dick, ‘‘ but how about you? Wouldn’t you hate to have him here?”’

“Oh! we should only meet at meals. That would have to be understood. What do you think of it?”

“J think it excellent.”

He mused a minute or two.

‘““Why didn’t he come in?” said his father.

Dick roused himself.

“Oh! I think he was rather annoyed with me.

It’s his way, you know; he takes offence rather easily.”

‘“‘What’s the matter?”

“Oh, there was some rot about Brasted. He didn’t like him. I told him he was a fool.”

“Ts he likely to lose his temper with me? ” asked Mr. Yolland gravely.

Dick laughed.

“TJ must talk to him. I’ve been meaning to ever since last week. He’d be such a good chap if he’d only take himself in hand. He’s got no will, you know, except when he’s excited. He was always ‘like that.”

Mr. Yolland put his book down with an air of finality.

“Dick,” he said, “I don’t want you to answer if you can’t, but I wish you’d tell me more about him. I want to know what he’s really like.”

Dick’s snub-nosed face grew serious.

“ About morals, you mean? Well, I’m afraid they aren’t very good. I expect he’s done most things. [ve never actually enquired, you know. But I should think he’s gone pretty deep. But you can trust him here.”

“Youre sure there’ll be no trouble? I shouldn’t like a scandal, you know.”

“Oh! that'll be all right. He’s got too much sense of honour. He’s perfectly honourable. And I’ve no doubt he’ll tell you everything you want to know, in a week or two, at any rate. He’s often wanted to tell me, but I put him off. I can’t bear that sort of thing. Besides, it isn’t really a part of him—Oh! I can’t explain.”

Mr. Yolland filled his pipe before answering.

“Well, then, what about his religion? He hasn’t been to mass at all.”

“Oh! he talks a lot of nonsense about all religions, but he’s a Catholic all right. He’s rather like a Renaissance man; I think that’s his ideal.”

“But he goes to mass and all that?”

“Oh! yes, when he gets up in time; and he’s very fervent indeed now and then. It’s all rather feverish; but I haven’t a doubt as to his faith, though he would probably deny that he had any. That’s the worst of these converts; they never can distinguish between faith and emotion.”

Mr. Yolland’s mouth twitched under his grey moustaches.

“Your father, for example?”’

Dick laughed.

“Oh! you don’t count. You’re practically an old Catholic.”

“Except as regards sending you to Winchester? ”

“Yes, except that,’ answered Dick smiling.

“Well, then,’ went on Mr. Yolland presently. “Then that is settled so far as 1am concerned. You will sound him, please, to-morrow. I suppose the cataloguing will take not less than six weeks. He will have everything supplied here; and money—? How much shall I say?”’

“ Fifty pounds,’ answered Dick promptly. “If that’s not too much.”

“Tt shall be fifty pounds.”

Mr. Yolland rose.

“Then I shall go to bed. By the way, Dick, Rolls is coming out to lunch to-morrow. I shall shoot too, Tt think:”

Dick nodded.

“ Good-night, father. It’s most awfully good of you. I don’t know what to say.”

“Oh! I hope it'll turn out well. Good-night, Dick.”

The priest sat on, letting his cigarette burn itself into a long unheeded curl of grey ash.

At times like this his affection for his father waxed into a sort of passion. He was always so sensible and youthful; there was no jawing—there never had been. Dick had been flogged as a boy more than once by his father, and it had been always done with-the same promptness and humanity; and his first pony had been given to him with the same decisive air. A certain time was devoted to consideration first, and then the announcement of blame or praise came out clear and precise. When Dick was in need of funds for charity in Soho he met with the same treatment. His father either said No, or sent exactly the amount asked for without question or comment. Lately it had been the latter more than the former; Dick felt that his father had begun to trust his judgment, and it was very delightful to him.

Now here was this new thing, and this crowned all; his father had accepted his recommendation practically without enquiry, and, on the strength of it had laid himself open to the risk of severe inconvenience. Dick sincerely trusted that his confidence was secure. Surely Chris would behave himself!

He must have along talk to him to-morrow. There was a number of small points on which advice was necessary; Chris must understand the situation; he was not in any sense to be a servant, but neither was he to be a guest with a right to entertainment; also he must do what he was told; he was to be a professional in the matter of the library, not an irresponsible amateur. Then he must really be down to breakfast in time, and must go to mass on Sundays; and he must keep himself tolerably employed for, say, seven hours a day. That was not too much to ask.

As regarded graver matters of behaviour Dick did not propose to speak; Chris knew perfectly well what he thought. He would do no more than indicate the general course of life.

The priest stretched his legs to the blaze, threw away the ash of his cigarette and took another.

There were other things he would say to his friend to-morrow. He would tell him not to sulk, not: to make a childish exhibition of himself if he thought that his pride was injured. That little affair in the carriage coming home was really absurd. It was only a small thing—even Chris could not make it a great one—but it should not have happened at all, and the going to bed in a huff was the pinnacle of folly. _ He would tell him that he needed ballast, a wholesome tranquillity, a grip on himself, greater faith in other people. It was all very well to be emotional, but emotions should be servants, not masters, or at least not tyrants.

The secret lay in the will, as it always did, the priest reflected, secure in his ramparts of casuistic reading. The personality should reside there as in a castle, and issue orders to the passions and intellectual apprehensions, who, in their turn should inform their master of external happenings and await his decision. Now Chris’s personality did not reside in his will; it ran about the battlements, mixed in the fray, ordered and counter-ordered at random, was swept off its feet in panics and sallies, and all the while stormed or paced or attitudinised according to mood in a hundred varying postures.

This was an excellent analysis, Dick told himself;

it was Chris to the life; he wondered he had not thought of it before. Well, his friend should have the benefit of it to-morrow, tactfully given, and without any assumption of superiority. Had not Chris told him a hundred times how wise he was? Very well, Chris should hear wisdom. - And all the while the priest did not recognise how really fond he must be of his friend to give him all this inspired thought. He honestly believed that he was impartial and just.

He threw away his cigarette end and stood up, looking with steady, honest eyes at the dying fire. A good fellow, Chris, but a child in some things!

Then old Mr. Rolls was coming to join them at lunch to-morrow—that queer lean man who lived all alone in his fortified house. What would Chris make of him—-and, as an afterthought, what would he make of Chris?

Then Dick Yolland blew out the lamp, and went up to bed, well-pleased.

Chris was rather silent at breakfast, and disappeared soon after, saying that he would have to be extremely busy that morning with correspondence as respected his desired position on the Saturday Express, and would join them, if he might, at lunch.

Dick saw very well that he was in one of his moods, of which the small affair last night had been a symptom, so he left him alone, indicated the cottage where lunch would be served, and went off to the gun-room without saying a word about the library-scheme. If Chris was still sulky, he reflected, the offer would fall on him with greater reproachful force; if he were not sulky, it would do no harm to wait till evening when the matter could be talked out.

They had an excellent morning; both father and son shot well, and a little before one o’clock found themselves close to the cottage Chris emerged from the door as they arrived.

Again Dick noticed that air of extreme trimness in his friend. As he stood there with his hands in his deep pockets, the cap of a proper tint upon his head, well-shaved, slender and virile, with a due amount of spat appearing beneath a neat trouser, it was almost impossible to believe that this man was practically penniless and homeless.

He hailed them with an enquiry as to the bag, was informed, and turned with Dick into the gamekeeper’s cottage.

It was a charming room, low-ceilinged and raftered: a few fallowbucks’ horns sprouted from the walls; an ancient gun or two hung from a beam; a neat glazed gun-rack glimmered in the corner; the floor was cheerful red-brick with a couple of skins upon it; an oak table was set out with steaming food—maigre, for it was a Friday—diamond-paned windows looked out on to the deep autumn woods, and a wood fire blazed pleasantly on the hearth.

Chris sat down by it, pulling up his trousers first, and spreading his thin hands to the fire.

“Rolls hasn’t come then,” observed Dick.

“Who?”

‘““ Rolls—he was going to meet us here.”

“Oh! Who is he?”

Dick finished taking out his cartridges, snapped the breech, set down his gun, and came across to the fire.

It was evident that Chris had not recovered; there was still a little vibration of nerves in the air. It was too absurd, Dick told himself; it was like a schoolgirl —not a man.

So he answered rather coolly.

“ Oh! Rolls is Rolls. He lives near here; I don’t know that there’s much to say about him. He’s— he’s rather odd. You can’t help attending to him, you know.”

oe Oh! ”

“He’s got a fine house—fearfully old. It’s got a moat, and soon. He lives there alone.”

ce Oh! a3

This was discouraging; it was more than discouraging—it was irritating. After all, the man might try to behave civilly! Dick made a mental addition to his list of subjects to be laid before his friend that evening.

There was a sound of voices; the door was darkened, and a tall old man came through, followed by

Mr. Yolland. Chris sprang up and stood at a sort of attention.

‘“‘ Here he is,” said Mr. Yolland. “Mr. Dell, let me introduce you to Mr. Rolls.”

Dick watched the little scene with interest. There was Chris, with a deferential curve of the back, looking, as most men did, about three sizes too small by the side of this tall old man, grey-haired, with a brown, clean-shaven face like a hatchet, covered with wrinkles. Dick saw his eyebrows twitch, and his melancholy eyes going through the stranger like swords, but he said nothing.

Chris recovered his upright attitude, and stood, as he always did after an introduction, with a sudden air of fierce independence. Once more Dick remembered the melodramatic stage.

Chris’s air of slight resentment vanished wholly as lunch proceeded; he talked briskly about sport, about the deceptive flight of certain kinds of birds,

‘and was at first at least as conventional as it is possible to be. He handed things about smartly, was punctilious in helping his neighbour before himself, and, on the whole cut a decent, if an overdrawn, figure.

Mr. Rolls sat silent most of the time, but his silence was oddly significant, as it always was. It revealed rather than obscured his personality. Dick could see that Chris was affected by it; his mental face was turned continually towards the newcomer; he twice broke off in a sentence to hear what the other was saying in his melancholy voice; he upset the salt, and was extravagantly apologetic in his eagerness to serve him. Yet the priest was not sure whether it was a favourable impression or not.

Chris, in fact, did most of the talking. Three times it was he who broke a silence; for Mr. Yolland talked little too, and the young man exerted himself considerably. It was one of his ideas, Dick remembered, that sociability depended on conversation; yet he was not wholly successful towards the end of lunch.

He was talking about Russia, and happened to mention that he had once learnt to speak the language of that country.

Mr. Rolls looked up.

“Indeed, Mr. Dell? Do you speak it well?”

“Yes, I speak it all right,” said the young man airily.

The other instantly uttered what sounded to Dick’s ears like a string of hauks and spits, and looked gravely at Chris, who glanced back uneasily.

““Er—I don’t see the point of that,” he said.

Dick felt uncomfortable and also amused. What on earth had that sentence meant? He determined to ask. But he had no chance then; Chris deftly swept to another subject.

“The woods are charming now,” he observed, finishing his last glass of red wine. ‘‘ They are like the best Persian rugs. Who was it who said that nature imitates art?”

A profound silence fell. Dick’s heart sank; he remembered that sort of conversation at Oxford. Chris would do it sometimes. He hastened to break in

“Yes, very clever,’ he said. ‘That sort of paradox won’t do though.”

Chris eyed him sharply.

“Won't do, Dick?”

“Tt is too easy. One can make any number like phaterit:

“Make one then,” said the other sharply.

Dick was conscious of a moment of profound irritation. It was too much; he had tried to show his friend that this kind of thing would not do at all with Mr. Rolls who sat with his glass in his hand saying nothing, and he had received rather a rude rebuke. He was also conscious of having spoken tactlessly, which made it worse.

He drove down his annoyance with an effort.

“You have me there! I can’t. One to you.”

But Chris did not smile. He turned to Mr. Rolls again.

“Were you ever in Monte Carlo, sir?”

Again the priest’s heart sank. He knew this mood too well. Chris was astonishingly obtuse sometimes; he summed up situations too quickly, trusting to what Dick now called privately his infernal intuitions. He had apparently taken Mr. Rolls for what he would: have named a ‘“‘ man of the world,” but he had chosen a singularly unfortunate subject.

Mr. Rolls turned a courteous face.

“Yes, Mr. Dell.”

“Ah!” went on Chris airily, “it is a wonderful place—a place of passionate beauty and passionate sins. It is like wine. It flames like these autumn woods.”

Dick could not bear it. He pushed his seat abruptly back, and got up. Mr. Yolland rose opposite with a look of extreme gratitude, and Chris snarled soundlessly. But Dick was too much annoyed to mind. Here was his friend, whom he had recommended so earnestly, making quite the wrong kind

An Attack of Feverishness Sy, of exhibition of himself. It was trying, because no one would understand how superficial it was, who did not know him intimately. Besides, Monte Carlo was really too much.

He took up his gun.

“ Shall you come, with us, Chris?”

Chris was dead silent for a moment, standing before the fire. Dick repeated his question. Chris looked sharply round, and then answered in a head-voice.

“T beg your pardon. I was thinking. No, I think not; it is rather cold.”

' There was no more to be said and Dick went out ashamed and miserable.

Outside he made an opportunity to draw near to the older guest.

“What did that sentence, you said, mean?” he asked. “‘ Was it Russian?”’

The other looked at him without a smile in his melancholy.

“Yes, Father Yolland. It was nothing remarkable. It meant ‘Do you speak Russian?’ ”’

“Oh!” said Dick.

He had a reflective afternoon and shot abominably. It was hateful that Chris should behave like this, and try to show off so unwarrantably, especially when such schemes were in hand on his behalf; no doubt it was his idea of independence, to receive favours boorishly with the intention of depriving them of the sting of charity.

Mr. Yolland apparently was following the same course of thought. Once at a corner father and son were together for a moment, and the elder man spoke without any preface. 5—(2096)

“ What was the matter at lunch?”

Dick tried to be airy.

“Oh! he was upset. He’s a good chap really.”

“ But that kind of remark =

“Tt’s a trick,” said Dick decisively. “It isn’t him. He thinks it smart and epigrammatic.”

ing Oh.’’

Dick was yet more upset by this incident. He had tried to hope that his father had not noticed—and what about the library-scheme now? He was almost appalled by the reflection that his father and Chris would breakfast, lunch and dine together in solitude for six weeks; if Chris engaged in that kind of talk what in the world would happen?

He was not therefore in the most tranquil of moods when, after leaving his father at the farm, he came up in the dusk to the garden-gate and saw Chris standing there with that eternal cigarette at just the wrong angle protruding from his mouth.

Chris said nothing, but turned with him towards the house.

In front lay the row of square Georgina windows, glimmering oblongs of light; overhead was the ruddy evening sky promising another clear, bracing day for the morrow; the sting of frost was already in the air, and the gravel of the broad walk was crisp to the tread.

But Dick was sore and irritated; he had the slight headache that sometimes follows shooting; he was rather wet and dirty, his shoulder ached a little. So his gambit was not soothing.

“ Look here, Chris; I wish to goodness you hadn’t said all that at lunch. You mustn’t mind my saying so, but Rolls isn’t a bit that kind of man. I only say this because 3

“I don’t know what you are talking about.”

This was said with such a venomous kind of breathlessness and was so entirely unexpected that Dick felt every nerve in his tired body thrill with excitement. He felt like one who had leapt into what he thought water, and found it a gulf instead.

Before he could answer Chris had gone on.

“Do you really mean that you are telling me to mend my manners?”

_“‘ Look here, Chris, don’t let’s have a row

The two men were standing perfectly still, facing one another, though Dick was scarcely aware at what point they had stopped walking. Chris instantly snapped back—

“Row! Why—why—my dear man—good God! You tell me to mend my manners and then jaw at me for making a row!”

“TI didn’t,” said Dick, seriously roused. “It wasn’t a question of manners at all. It was the choice of subjects”

“Isn’t that manners? Do you think I am a cad? or a fool, and don’t know what you mean raed

“Look here! Chris. For God’s sake let’s both keep our tempers =

“There again! You insult me at every word. I know I’m your guest. You seem to forget it——”

shea Og

“And I’m your pensioner

“ Hold your tongue, Chris; you don’t know.

Chris recoiled with such a savage agility that for one instant the priest really believed it would be a question of blows. The affair had developed with such astonishing speed, and Chris’s temper was obviously so evil, that he would have been surprised at nothing. Then he heard a swift indrawn breath hiss between the other’s teeth.

“ Dick!” began his friend, and his voice sank to a horrid kind of calmness. “‘ Dick! There are some things that no man can stand. If I owed you my life—instead of—how much? Thirty pounds? Thirty pounds! If I owed you my life I wouldn’t stand it. I never dreamt of such a thing! It was bad enough at lunch. You snubbed and interrupted me enough then; I could hardly believe my ears— and now: Do you know why I was waiting for you here?”

The priest shook his head; he could not speak. His heart was labouring, sick and hot, at the root of his throat; he felt twinges of emotion thrill along to his finger-tips.

“Well, then,” said the other, looking at him with cruel, hating eyes—“I was waiting because I thought you would wish to apologise. I was waiting. The two were moving on now mechanically; they stopped again at a sundial in the centre of the path. “T was waiting because I thought you would long to tell me how sorry you were. Oh! my God!” he wailed, suddenly breaking off.

He took a quick, faltering step forward, threw his arms across the dial and buried his face in them, sobbing heart-brokenly.

It was so swift and unexpected that the priest stood absolutely motionless a moment. It was surely unreal; a dream, or a mad melodrama! —

A bird was chirping good-night from the laurel shrubbery twenty yards away; the light was inexpressibly tender and peaceful round him, and the tawny autumn flowers burned emberlike in the boxlined beds on either side. And there in the middle, not a yard away lay that body of his friend, grotesque and ludicrous in the contrast of the fashionable coat and spats and of the piteous, passionate attitude of a hysterical woman.

Dick felt the heart in his throat stop beating for an interminable instant; then again it began to beat sharp and quiet like the engine of a racing-boat. His nerves thrilled and quieted into tenseness.

“Chris!” he said. “ Chris!”

• Then the wailing voice began.

“TI thought you were my friend—that you really cared—you were generous and good—I know ma brute—I can’t help it—and you insult me—and despise me!”

“Oh! Chris—for God’s sake

He came a step nearer, hesitating to touch that fawn-coloured coat. He was conscious, with a knowledge that he hated, of an intense desire that this miserable sight should not be seen from the windows; it was such horribly bad form, he thought. How could he explain? And was it his fault?

The moaning was going on, but he was mentally framing sentences of appeal, of rebuke, of anything that would end this shocking business; but he rejected each in turn.

“Chris,” he said again. ‘‘ Chris.”

Still the other did not move, but the moaning died into dry sobs, and the sobs to silence, till the heaving shoulders lay still. Dick began to think bitter things —trying to steel himself; he told himself that Chris lay there to be admired for his abandon, his passion— x)

that the whole affair was the other’s fault. Then he told himself that he was a brutal bully—that he ought to have remembered that hot, hysterical nature, and the hardships the poor chap had gone through, and his sore soul.

An inspiration rose from despair. He went past the sundial, treading sharply, and spoke over his shoulder as he went, in a perfectly controlled voice.

“T am going in. Come.”

For a moment yet there was silence, then he heard a sigh, and steps following him.

He paused an instant till the other almost came up, and then went on, taking care not to look at him; he passed straight up the steps into the smoking-room, lit a cigarette elaborately over the lamp to give his friend time to dispose himself; then he sat down in a deep chair and glanced up.

Chris was standing by the mantelpiece with one arm resting on it, and his head on that, in an attitude of deep dejection. One neat boot was placed on the brass fender.

“‘ Chris,’ said the priest, “let us have this out quietly. Help yourself to tea. And first, 1 wish to apologise sincerely and humbly for my tactlessness and—and rudeness.”

The other turned his face slightly, and let a spasm of emotion be seen upon it; but his tears had been objective enough, for the rims of his eyes were a little red.

‘“‘ Say no more, dear fellow,” came a low, trembling voice from the mantelpiece. ‘It was I who was wrong—I was hasty and—and——”

The head went down again on the sleeve.

“ You don’t know how I have suffered—my nerves are in tatters. I know I’m a fool,’ came a broken moan once more.

“Tea,” said Dick cheerfully, but with a heavy heart. He was beginning to think again about his wild library-scheme. He helped himself, trying to make a normal jingle with the cups. But he had poured out and drunk two cups before the posed figure by the fender moved again.

This time it turned completely round and extended a hand, after the manner of Sir Henry Irving. Dick took it, half-ashamed and half-satisfied, and let it drop quickly. He felt indignant that he was smiling so tremulously.

Then Chris sat down languidly, took off his cap, unbuttoned his coat, and helped himself to bread and butter.

“Took here,” said the priest after a pause. “‘ Let me explain, its the only satisfactory

“No, no, my dear man. You have apologised; I ask no more.”

Dick gulped rather at this. Still, it was true.

“All right, old chap. We won't say any more. There was something else too I wanted to say, which will show you that ty

He checked himself abruptly. Was it as well to make the announcement without further consideration? But Chris looked up so sharply that he thought it as well to go on.

“Took here, it was this. It was my father’s suggestion. He asked me last night whether I thought it possible you would do him a great service i

“Delighted, my dear man; anything——”

His tone was decidedly convalescent, and Dick went on reassured.

“Well, you know the library here is in an awful state, and I know you know about books, and all that. Well, do you think you would have time to arrange it for us? It would be most awfully good of you *

“Why, my dear chap

“Yes, I know,” went on the priest hastily. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but of course you must not do it for love; though I know you would.”

“Oh! my dear Dick, you must indeed allow me. It’s nothing at all—I couldn’t dream a

“ Stuff and nonsense,” said the priest, and corrected himself hastily. “I mean—I mean, of course we couldn’t ask you to do such a thing unless you had some—some sort of remuneration. My father thought that—that you might stay here—it’ll take at least six weeks—and—and, say fifty pounds. Do you think that

“My dear chap, I couldn’t possibly &

“Oh! yes; yes. Then that’s all right. Have a cigarette?”’

He pushed the box rather nervously across the tray. Then he hastened to add—

“It’s most awfully good of you, really, Chris. It’s an awful job. I don’t know how ever you'll get through it -

He glanced at the other, astonished at the silence. He had expected protest, gratitude, even tears. But he was yet more astonished by the complete and business-like self-command that he saw. Chris was rolling his cigarette delicately, pushing a slender finger into the end to drive back the protruding tobacco.

“ Well, of course, Dick, I’m delighted,” he said quietly. ‘‘It’s very good of you to think of me. That puts it all on a more satisfactory basis.”

“Yes, just so,” said Dick blankly.

“Tm really grateful,” went on Chris briskly. “You have done it so delicately too. You have given me back my self-respect. I hated taking your money for nothing. And now ” he extended a hand once more. ‘“ Thanks, old boy.”

The priest took it, and sat back in dumb bewilderment.