Chapter I

(I) Mrs. HAMILTON sat out on the lawn beneath the great striped umbrella.

It was a really hot July day, and the sun was still high. Below the terrace the park fell away in a long smooth sweep of pale green and gold, broken by railed plantations, down to the cool shadow of the tall woods. All about her the flower-beds murmured with bees, and butterflies like settling scraps of white and coloured paper dipped and curtseyed above the geraniums and mignonette. The long stately house had put out awnings like sleepy eyelids, and beneath them the windows were wide. A pigeon cooed from the roof, and a small fat dog snored on a promontory of the lady’s dress.

Mrs. Hamilton looked very content and rather sleepy too, and she was expecting tea to make her more of the one, and less of the other. She would drive a little afterwards; the pony carriage was ordered for half-past five. She and Annie would drive together without the groom, and by the time that they got back Jack would have arrived from the station. It would be very nice to see Jack again; the poor boy needed some rest too. She had seen him last week, and he looked thoroughly tired.

She was extremely glad that the season, for her at least, had come to an end, although she had had a satisfactory two months of it. Annie had come out wonderfully. Last year there had been the unfortunate incident of that Mr. Dell who had behaved so badly, and Annie was listless and unintelligent in consequence. That first season had not been a success. But this second one was a very different affair; two or three younger sons had been very attentive, besides poor Mr. Summerfield, the minor poet, whom Annie had treated so cruelly. But then Annie had had enough of that kind of thing, and a burnt child fears the fire. Next year they would do better; it was not to be a question of younger sons then; she would take a larger house, there would be four balls and perhaps a piece of red carpet at one of them.

Of course Mrs. Hamilton did not care in the least for that kind of thing she told herself; she only wished to see Annie married to a good man, not positively penniless, and a title would add grace— it was not at all essential. These things were very empty; the real thing was the dear child’s happiness, as she had assured Mr. Stirling when he came to call yesterday; she could not understand how mothers could plot and scheme like poor dear Lady Scrymgeour. The season, balls, German princes, and so on, were no more than the unfortunate accompaniments of a necessary process. She would far sooner live in the country—God’s country—in a simple way, and leave all else to guidance. Yes, Providence was very kind. He had intervened almost miraculously eighteen months ago, and, through Mr. Rolls’ extraordinary tact, had succeeded in restoring Annie’s equanimity. That September week over at Foxhurst had done wonders. What a very clever and good man Mr. Rolls was! She would never feel anything but gratitude towards him.

How sweet the country was!—(God’s country.)

Mrs. Hamilton sighed contentedly, looking with half-closed eyes across the terrace down to the rolling park. She never felt so happy as when at home; things were so simple there; there was just the pleasant little round of duties, the company of her daughter, peace and prosperity. And she had under-gone a great mental conversion during the last few months. Unconventionality seemed unsafe when put into action; it was all very well in thought, in fact it was the spice of life; but it must be a philosophy to think by instead of a rule to act by. Even for thought too there was something pleasing in a wholesome normality acquiesced in not because of a lack of personal originality, but because it had been deliberately discovered to be the highest art of living— it resembled the verification of a platitude. The little country-church for example—how sweet that was!—She had grown really fond of it. Of course Mr. Stirling was rather tiresome sometimes, but then he had been remarkably sensible in their great trouble. He had pointed out to Annie so clearly that sometimes great difficulties were permitted only in order to strengthen character—a kind of inoculation, he had said almost apologetically. He had quoted a little Tennyson, too, with fervour and felicity, about ‘‘ dead selves” and “ higher things.” Yes, his influence had been wholly good, if somewhat trite. When the first shock was over Annie had found refuge in religion all through the spring; she was at church morning and evening, and there was a dreamy introspective look in the dear child’s eyes that had promised great serenity to follow. Of course she did not like to talk about Mr. Dell—it had all been so painful and shocking—but she had come to her mother at last, after a week at the seaside before going up to town, and had said, with such a beautiful look, that she had found herself at last able to pray for him, and Mr. Rolls had completed the cure.

His treatment had been very different to the Vicar’s, but of course he could not be expected to be as highly trained. He had just told Annie to leave the past alone—that the future was her business—that people were intended to develop along their own lines, and not along those of others—so Annie had reported. She said that he had not been at all brutal, as she had half-feared. Of course he was unconventional, but Mrs. Hamilton liked that. Conventions were so dull and tiresome she told herself. That was the one blot on Mr. Stirling, though a blot that had served her well last year. They were the garments worn by common-sense, and, like all garments, serviceable enough when used as clothing, utterly irritating when paraded without their proper body. Mr. Rolls lacked conventions, but he certainly had a naked kind of common-sense, sometimes disconcerting but always reliable.

She was rather interested in this train of thought, and believed it to be epigrammatic; she had been told more than once how sharp she was, and how incisive, and, in a well-bred sort of manner was pleased to be told so. That was exactly what she wished to be, unconventional in thought and word, but positively rather than negatively, sensible, stately, friendly, and incisive.

So she did not notice Annie following the man who carried the tea-urn on its tray, until she was close upon her.

“My dear child,” she said, “‘ how well you look! I have had a meditation.”

Annie smiled contentedly, sat down, and began to tickle the inside of the fat little dog’s hindleg with the end of a lace-fringed parasol.

She did look extremely well in her white cotton dress, marvellously innocent and fresh, with sufficient pallor to imply a soul, and sufficient warmth to demonstrate a healthy body. She had been in the country just a week, and a charming freckle or two proclaimed that she had spent her time suitably

“What was your meditation, mamma?”

“ Only how nice everything is, and how pleased I am!” murmured Mrs. Hamilton.

Annie nodded gravely, and withdrew her parasol as the fat little dog kicked and grunted.

“T entirely agree,” she said. “‘I love it more than ever.”

Then the cucumber-sandwiches came out.

“What about a call on Mr. Rolls?” asked her mother presently. “I think it would be graceful.”

Annie smiled again, very prettily.

“Yes, I do like him,” she said. “He is such a sensible man. I shall never forget what he said last year. I-can’t think why people don’t like him.”

“ Of course he is very odd,” went on the other, “and some people can’t see below that. He is entirely unconventional, as I was thinking just now.”

“ But that is what is so nice. You know I am sure he doesn’t care for that lovely old house;_ he never says anything about it, and hates to show people over.”

Mrs. Hamilton sat silent.

“Mamma, do tell me. Is all that is said about him true?”

“What is said about him, my dear?” asked the other a little coldly.

“Oh, you know—about his gambling, and his breaking his wife’s heart and so on?”

Her mother sat silent again a moment before she answered.

“TI don’t know, my darling,” she said at last. “I know it is said—I should think it might be possible. I—I don’t know what to think.”

She spoke with such an odd hesitation that her daughter looked at her surprised.

“Mamma, are you—are you at all afraid of Mr. Rolls?”

“ Of course not,” came back rather sharply.

“ce Oh.”’

Annie sat still, looking out along the length of the lawn and flower-beds, but she did not see them; she was wondering whether her mother’s last words were quite true. For herself, she was afraid of him. He had not said a word last year that was not perfectly courteous and kind; more than that, he had really soothed away her terrors and quieted her, telling her that she must not fret about what she could not help, and somehow making that platitude appear both true and new. But she had an odd feeling that there was a great deal behind all this, and she could not imagine what it was. He lived a very ordinary life, writing a good many letters, walking alone for the most part, never seeming ina hurry. She had walked _ with him a good deal in the gardens—knowing quite well that she was there for the purposes of a nerve-cure, and being rather pleased with the fact; and her life had never seemed quite the same since that week. Things appeared more real, small things more large, large things less significant. He had neither cut nor untied the knot; he had touched it only, and it had fallen apart.

Tt was all very mysterious.

““What’s the matter, Annie?”

“ Nothing.”

“ Are you thinking about Mr. Rolls?”

She smiled, showing a double line of very white teeth.

“ Yes, mamma.”

Well?’

“T don’t know, mamma. Who are all those odd people who stay with him? ae

The elder woman looked at her daughter doubtfully.

“His friends, I suppose,” she said shortly, and stood up. ‘There are the wheels.”

It was a delightful drive through the lanes to Foxhurst in the evening sunshine, and the two talked comfortably of small things—the new pony that went so well with the old one that Annie wished to have a pink ribbon on one and a blue on the other; the new curate who, Mrs. Hamilton remarked (and noted for use on another occasion) had all the qualities of a poker except its occasional warmth; the leak in the hot-water cistern; a question of tulle; an entirely new and subtle interpretation of a text by Mr. Stirling on the previous Sunday, that hitherto had appeared to bear a crudely obvious meaning—until at last Foxton village was traversed, a last yellow brick house on the right was passed, and Foxhurst towers appeared at the end of the short lime avenue.

An elderly man took off his soft felt hat to the ladies as they wheeled in.

“ That’s the new chaplain,” whispered Annie. “A monk, I think. He doesn’t look like one.... Oh! what a place it is!”

Two slender old brick towers showed before them like a castle in a tale, linked by a battlemented room over a wide high arch. To right and left looked stately rows of windows, diamond-paned, barred, out of a high wall once red, now nearly a pale orange with time and lichen. Through the arch as they approached the bridge now welded for ever by peace and civilisation, showed a wide gravelled court with a great lead pump in the centre.

As the ponies’ feet rang hollow on the bridge Annie looked to right and left at the wide deep moat as still as a mirror—a mirror of bewildering green and blue and rose, from the heavy elms and the evening July sky, itself clear brown water, lying fifty yards to this side and that, and turning in a broad angle at the outward sloping corners of the house that ran down into it.

Within the court, as they crossed it at a trot, the great house rose high against the sky to right and left—the same rows of windows, all open, through which looked the upper-half of portraits hung in the shallow corridor beyond, dark oak, gorgeous paper; while in front lay the long low red-brick entrance corridor, broken by a squat tower, where the great hall had once reared its lantern. Over the parapet to the left rose up the western window of the old chapel, surmounted by a smail Latin cross.

“T had forgotten,” murmured Annie again, as the ponies wheeled and drew up. “Tt 1s: likeca dream.”

«Yes, Mr. Rolls was at home,” said the grave man at the door; ‘“ would the ladies come ieee

A second man appeared, to hold the ponies’ heads, and the two went in up the steps and turned to the right through the little parquetted entrance hall— absurdly new, for it was only built in the days of the First George—and so into the older part.

It was a long, uneven corridor through which they went, carpeted with some heavy stuff, unnoticeable to both sight and touch; a row of windows on the tight looked directly into the court, while on the left a door or two and a flight of old steps with slender carved banisters, gave entrance to the living-rooms and first floor. There were portraits everywhere, ecclesiastics, kings, great women, children, each looking out in the fashion of his day, and three or four great old chests.

Then a door was thrown open before them, and their names were called out.

Annie looked again with interest, as she always did, at the tall lean man, brown-faced and grey-haired, who pushed aside his chair, and came towards them.

He was already half-dressed for dinner, wearing a velvet coat over his evening-clothes, and appeared to have been writing letters, for his table was covered with paper, and an unfinished sheet lay on his blotting-book.

He said nothing at all as he shook hands, but that, Annie remembered, was his way; she rather liked it. But her mother began at once a murmur of general talk.

“Tt was’ such a charming evening. We were obliged to come. We only came down last week. I hope we are not disturbing you at this time.”

“ Indeed, no; I am always at home in this room,”

The girl remembered then the little mysterious toom upstairs which she had never entered, whence twice only during her visit her host had been summoned. She had learnt after a couple of days that he was officially not at home when he was there; but that he was always accessible here.

How pleasant his voice was too! It was always a delight to hear it; it was rather low, and particularly virile, and seemed very slightly to affect the throat of the listener. Yet it always gave her a sense of security and strength.

Annie sat down, and looked cautiously about her, as her mother began the proper kind of conversation.

There were the four portraits that she remembered; the bearded man in the ruff over the fireplace, the stout ruddy Georgian woman between the bookcase and the door into the corridor; the boy, killed at

Naseby, on the wall opposite the fire, and the fair-haired girl in mid-Victorian dress over the writing-table whom she understood to have been this man’s wife. Yes, she looked innocent enough to have her heart broken.

The rest of the room too had a mysterious interest, for it was so little modernised; panelling ran from floor to ceiling on all sides, covered, as were also the two doors, with linen-pattern, the ceiling was crossed by a couple of great beams; a low bookcase ran along from the hearth to the old press, all black wood and scroll-work that stood opposite the window. The writing-table too was attractive; the edges were long worn into bluntness; it appeared to be supported by about seven legs. The floor was polished, with three or four mats lying upon it; there were half-a-dozen tall-backed chairs besides those in which she and her mother sat. It was certainly a perfect room of its kind, and its perfection was enhanced by the square-paned window hung with painted coats, beyond which lay the nearer trees of the park, a stretch of grass and the mellow distance.

And the owner of it all seemed appropriate, in spite of his apparent detachment from it. There was an air of age and carved oak about his thin brown sharp-profiled face and grey hair, of stateliness and strength about his upright attitude, his immoveability, his slow virile voice; and with the gossip about him still before her mind, there was a pleasing parallel between the house that had passed through such storms of history, and the man about whom floated such rumours.

Her train of thought was suddenly broken.

“ Annie, my dear, you would like to go round the house again, I am sure. Mr. Rolls, might she?”’

The girl knew perfectly well that she was to be under discussion, but she did not mind that; it was interesting, so she stood up cheerfully.

“We shall all go?” said the tall old man standing up.

“No, no, if you please. I want to talk to you. Annie, my darling, you will find your way, won’t you? May she, Mr. Rolls?. Come back in a quarter of an hour.”

When the door had closed, the elder woman turned again, determined not to be garrulous.

“T am so much satisfied,” she said. ‘‘ The child is perfectly herself again. You did wonders with her last year.”

Mrs. Hamilton was fully aware that she was not at her best with this old man. It was easy enough to be incisive and authoritative and unconventional in her own house, but it was not so easy here. She found herself anxious to please, deferential in her manner and just a little timid.

Mr. Rolls bowed a little.

“Tam so thankful you told her what you did; it was just what she wanted,” went on Mrs. Hamilton, struggling for complete self-possession.

“‘ She is happy, then?” asked the man quietly.

‘She is perfectly happy, and as simple as a child still. That trouble last year seems to have left no mark on her; she is as natural as ever.”

“T understand.”

“You do think it would have been the greatest mistake to have allowed the matter to go on? Of course it was impossible.”’

Mr. Rolls dropped his eyes.

“Tt would have been—the greatest mistake.”

“Tam so glad you think so. Of course there was only one opinion. And she felt as strongly as I did.”

The other nodded meditatively two or three times.

“And as for Mr. Dell ” “she went <on../ “41 simply do not know what to say. When I think how I was taken in ie

Mr. Rolls looked up.

“TI beg your pardon?” she asked.

“ Taken in?” he said.

“Yes, you know he told me a great deal about himself; I thought him very—very frank and all that, and then I found out he had not told me a hundredth part——’”’

“Tsee. But surely you would have known that.”

“Ym afraid I don’t understand.”

The other leaned back in his chair.

“A spendthrift, Mrs. Hamilton, never reveals all his debts.”

She shifted in her chair.

“Of course a

The other went on as if she had not spoken.

“We must not expect people to do what they cannot; neither Mr. Dell, nor your daughter.”

It was said so quietly that she did not quite understand.

“Nor yourself, nor myself, Mrs. Hamilton,” he ended.

She was completely bewildered. But it was a comfort that he had included himself.

“ Then—then what happens to responsibility?”

“We are responsible for doing what we can,’ he said gravely. 13—(2096)

This was very odd conversation; it was either the deadliest platitude, or the most startling novelty; and she was not sure which.

“Then—then what is the proper treatment?” she asked vaguely, hoping that she was making the tight shot.

It seemed that she had; for the melancholy eyes instantly turned upon her full, and the drooping eyelids lifted. There was a new ring in his voice too.

“Ah! One must be nurtured and encouraged; the other must be broken to pieces. One is weak and another deformed.”

“ And how are we to know? And—and what am I >” she added on a sudden impulse.

She felt that she was being intelligent, but the feeling waned a little as he turned full on to her.

“Do you wish me to answer, Mrs. Hamilton?”

‘Why, yes, of course.”

When Annie came back from her wanderings ten minutes later she perceived that something had happened. Her mother’s eyes were very bright, and her cheeks flushed, and she was sitting very upright indeed on the edge of her chair.

The tall old man was very grave opposite her, leaning his head on his hand; but he stood up alert and upright as she came in, and asked her courteously how she had fared.

Her mother was certainly cold at her good-byes, and a little defiant, and said nothing at all until they were clear of the park.

“ What were you talking about, mamma?” asked the girl curiously.

Mrs. Hamilton whipped the ponies briskly, and set her lips tight.

“Nothing at all, my dear.”

When the ladies had gone, John Rolls turned to the butler.

“ The dog-cart is gone?” he said.

“ Yes, sir, half-an-hour ago.”

He nodded and went back, walking very slowly through the hall, turned to the left, passed along the corridor, and pushed open one leaf of a heavy door. He closed it behind him, genuflected, and sat down ‘n a chair to his right, laying his hands along his thighs, and so remained motionless.

The chapel was full of the soft evening light streaming from overhead through the west window and falling on the square-cut granite altar, the bronze door of the tabernacle and the round apse behind. It was dead silent within here, and the chirp of the birds without and the distant cries from the village seemed to be a separate affair altogether.

The man himself sat like an image, his hatchet-face lifted, his lean brown fingers reaching to his knees, and his feet together. And so he remained.

At the sudden echo of hoofs from beneath the arch on the other side of the court, half an hour later, he moved and drew a long breath, rose up, genuflected once more, and went out, signing himself as he did so, and he was on the steps as the dog-cart drove up. “ Come,in, father,” he said. Together he and Father Yolland went along the corridor, wheeled to the right, passed along again, still in silence, and went into the sitting-room Mr. Rolls shut the door.

“‘ Now,” he said, “ give me the fact; we will talk after dinner.”

The priest looked worn and anxious, and his snub nose added pathos.

“‘ Dell is in London,” he said.

“Have you seen him?”

ce No.”’

“Very well.” He looked at his watch. “ You have twenty minutes for dressing.”

Dick gave him a quantity of small news during dinner, of not much importance to either of them; and the men came and went behind their chairs like intelligent shadows.

At the clink of coffee-cups in the doorway, Mr. Rolls stood up.

“You have finished your wine, father? Coffee is in my room.”

There was no appearance of haste or interest in the old man’s face as he sedately took a cup of coffee, and pushed the little spirit lamp over to the priest. Then he stood up and went to the hearth, holding his cup and saucer, and facing the other as he sat in the chair by the writing-table.

“Now, if you please

Dick sighed, looked straight in the other’s melancholy eyes a moment, and then began.

“Tt was this morning I heard. I met Brandiston —you don’t know him, sir, I think? He told me that he had seen Chris go into a boarding-house in Westminster—I’ve got the address. He let himself in’ with a key, so I suppose he lives there. That is absolutely all. So I sent the wire, as you told me, and followed it up.”

“Did Mr. Dell see this man?”

“ce No.”’

“How was he dressed?”

Dick smiled wearily.

“Oh, smartly. That proves nothing.”

“Ah! and his writing? Have you seen any of his work in the papers?”’

The priest hesitated.

“T don’t know. A fortnight ago I thought that perhaps one article on the Olympians might be his. I wrote to the editor; it was the Westminster, I think, and was told politely that there was no information for me.”

ce Yes? ”

“‘T dare say it wasn’t his, either. He writes just like—like everybody else of his sort—purple and scarlet, you know.”

“ And that’s all?”’

The priest nodded.

“ Absolutely all. I haven’t heard a word since. told you how he disappeared.”

“T remember.”

“I wrote to the address of the woman in Paris— three times altogether, I think—and got no answer.”

ce Yes.’

Mr. Rolls emptied his cup, set it on a chair, and turned again to the priest.

“Shall we go out? It will be very pleasant out of doors, I think.”

L mal

Between the entrance-corridor and the moat lay a broad, sloping strip of turf, and at the edge of the water ran a long gravel path, closed by a seat at either end, set in a recess of laurels.

The Consulting Room 19]

They walked up and down here two or three times before either spoke, under the radiant evening sky in which glimmered half-a-dozen tiny jewels; the air was full of the clamour of rooks, and the scent of miles of grass and flowers. On one side rose up the house, the line of red-brick corridor pierced with windows, and finishing in the chapel at one end and the corner of the great saloon at the other running down into the water below and rising to a square tower above. On the other side lay the moat, an oily mirror of rosy sky, broken only by the cautious circles of the fish sucking down supper. Beyond that again stretched the flat park, rising a mile away with the slopes and woods of the Amplefield estate.

Then suddenly the elder man spoke.

“J supposed it was this,’ he said. “The Hamiltons were here this afternoon.”

ce Yes? bed

“ Those things always fall together, if you watch. You must go and see him.”

“ He will refuse me.”

“Your name is not necessary. Ask for his room.”

“ And then?”

“That is all for the present.”

“But we must be prepared

“Certainly. That is why you are here.

Dick was silent. He still felt rather bewildered with the rush of town, the sudden shock of the news, and the anxious journey. But the country air and the evening, and above all the presence of this curious old man, so extremely quiet and strong, who walked and talked so precisely—all this was beginning to soothe him. He waited confidently.

“ Well, father?”

“TI was waiting for you, sir; I thought you said——”

“Have you any proposal?”

Dick shook his head.

“And you wish me to make one?”

“Tf you please.”

The old man was silent for a moment.

“ This is a tentative offer then. But I do not make it positively.”

“T understand, sir.’’

“It is that you should bring him here, and leave him—leave him entirely to me.”

“T suppose I may come and see him?”

“No, father; you are not the man for him.”

It was so brutally unexpected that the priest winced, audibly.

“You are wounded, father? But remember you have failed.”

“But was it my fault then?” asked the priest piteously.

Mr. Rolls indicated a seat with one hand.

“Sit down, father. Light a cigarette, if you please... No, it was not your fault; nor was it Miss Annie’s. It is chiefly a question of temperament. Innocence and love are not sufficient.”

Dick sat still, strangely moved, but he scarcely knew why. It was partly the intoxicating evening air, the fresh scent of rushes and water, the mystical light. Partly too it was the presence of this man— so true to type in his clean-cut, well-bred face, his precise clothes, his attitude as he sat easily back; so peculiar in his deep, steady eyes, the rigid, downturned mouth, and his odd vibrant voice. And then those words— ‘Innocence and love are not sufficient ”’—Dick told himself for the hundredth time that this was his superior in everything except matters hierarchical.

‘‘ Please tell me, sir,” he said at last.

“You really wish it?”

Dick nodded, horribly afraid.

“He needs one thing, just as you and f do, father. I need not tell you what that is. But the way by which Grace comes, is another matter, and in our hands. That way may be Love or Wrath. And I think it to be wrath here. Remember he has lived a gross and filthy life.”

“Well, sir?” Dick’s voice trembled as he spoke. “This man must be broken to pieces, I think.” Dick half-rose and sat down again.

“ Ah!” he cried.

The other turned his face questioningly.

“Yes father? You wish me to say what I think? Is it not so?”

“‘ Yes,”’ whispered the priest.

“ Well, then. We might give him a child to care for. With some I should do that. But not for him. It is too late for that.”

“‘ May I speak, sir?”’ asked the priest breathlessly.

“Tt is what I wish.”

“‘ My dear sir,” began Dick volubly, with a sensation that he was pleading for his friend’s life. “He has had a terrible time. I can’t explain how much he has suffered—he is as sensitive as a child! His soul is.. is bleeding. I—I swear that it is! That is his excuse. I never meant 4

The other looked at him with steady melancholy eyes, and Dick stopped.

“Yes, father?”

‘Mr. Rolls, I should never have wired to-day, if I had thought—if I had dreamt you would think all this...He—he needs love and..and tenderness— and—and building up. Of course I don’t forget his sins: but for God’s sake don’t say——”

“Yes, father?”

“Oh, my God! Don’t you understand? Don’t you understand?”’ cried Dick passionately.

Dick could see his profile, thin and severe against the evening sky, the chin a little tilted, the heavy brows like thatch over the eyes, the tight, down-turned lips together. It looked utterly heartless, and he repented with all his might that he had come down here to-night. Why had he not gone to Chris as his heart told him? He felt helpless in this presence.

Then the thin lips opened.

“This is my suggestion, father. It is the best I have to make. Do you wish for my reasons? ”

Dick swallowed in his throat.

“Tf you please, sir.”

“The man is poseur,” said the other serenely. “T mean by that that his character is encrusted. That then must be all broken away. It cannot be melted now; it is too late. It has been fused, and has hardened again. It cannot be fused again. Do you follow me, father?”

Dick laughed without merriment.

“ Breaking, sir! And who will do the breaking?”

The sharp profile turned into a thin, full face, and the melancholy eyes were on him.

“T will do that,” he said.

“How? How?”

“You can leave that in my hands.”

“ But he will not stay?”

“T shall make him.”

“ce How? ”

The other was silent a moment; then he turned.

“T shall first appeal to his pride,” he said.

Dick felt utterly helpless before this unsmiling, unfrowning, courteous cruelty. He sat paralysed as regards actions or words, and his thought ran round like a mouse in a cage, seeking escape. The darkness seemed to have fallen very quickly; it was coming on, veil by veil. There were a dozen stars out by now; a window in the corridor brightened suddenly as a lamp was lit. It was all as inexorable as this cruel, tranquil atmosphere that had closed so quickly on him. He felt himself shivering a little. Then a night-insect blundered, humming, against his sleeve, and he started violently.

“Well, father?” said the quiet voice.

“ Give me time,” whispered Dick. “ I must pray; I don’t know what to say.... It’s impossible— impossible.”

““ Shall we say to-morrow morning then, after mass? When must you leave, Father Yolland?”

Dick stammered out that he must lunch at Amplefield, and go up to town in the afternoon.

“Very well then. You will allow me to serve you?”’

Dick bowed.

“Tt is a semi-double, I think. May I recommend a mass of the Holy Ghost?”’