Love,—and the Philosopher: A Study in Sentiment

“Cold comfort, applied with sweet eloquence!” said the Philosopher, rousing himself from his momentary abstraction. “I understand! And you may be right! My experience of men and things has not mellowed my disposition—I have grown a crust upon myself, and honestly, I enjoy my own crustiness. But you, dear child!—if you only made more allowance for this, you would find it is all on the surface, and only on the surface. Now you have been perfectly frank with me up to a certain point,—why do you not declare at once honestly the real obstacle that prevents your marrying me? Why?”

She was silent. Her head drooped, and he stroked her bright hair.

“Why?” he repeated, in a tone of bland argument. “I don’t think I should make a bad husband, I should have my ‘moods’ undoubtedly—and I should expect them to be humoured and tolerated. And you—you would most certainly mount your ‘high horse’ occasionally, and I should permit you to prance upon it like a child on rockers till you were tired. You would soon be tired, and so should I! But I would take every care of you—I am old enough to fill your father’s place should he be taken from you, and I could give you a position in cultured society—not the society of American millionaires, but the society of art and letters. And I would promise not to be ‘rude’ or ‘sarcastic’ more than I could possibly help—”

She rose from her pretty appealing attitude at his knee, and smiling, shook her head at him regretfully.

“Ah, you would never be able to help it!” she said. “It is your nature! I should have fallen in love with you if it hadn’t been!”

Goaded to retort by her tone, and more or less vexed at the airy aloofness of her figure as she stood upright now and a little apart from him, he said:

“If it hadn’t been? You mean if it hadn’t been—for Jack!”

CHAPTER XIV

The Philosopher twisted himself round in his chair with a movement of irritation.

“How can you be sure?” he demanded. “You go by sentiment as usual! All wrong! Facts are the only props to lean on. When the War Office declares a man is ‘missing’ in this deplorable war, facts plainly point out the evidence that he is dead. You don’t want to believe it of course—your ‘sentiment’ refuses to believe it; but sentiment is a false guide—especially for women. It leads them into a morass of mistaken ideals and—and—er—wasted affection.”

“Yes,” she said, simply. “I am very wrong, I know—and you are—you must be—always right.”

His eyelids twitched with a quiver of irritation.

“Is that sarcastic?” he asked.

She started.

“Sarcastic? Oh, no! Did it seem so? I’m sorry!”

“You need not be sorry,” he said equably. “It is only your usual way of leaving facts for fiction. You are not ‘very wrong’—you are merely sentimental; and I am not, nor am I bound to be, ‘always right’—I am only endowed with a little common sense. And my common sense protests against your posing as a sort of war widow.”

He had scarcely said this when he would have given a great deal not to have said it. Her glance swept over him with an expression of regret, pain, anger and pity all commingled in one bright flash. She moved away from him and resumed her seat, bending her head anew over her embroidery to hide the tears that despite her efforts had sprung to her eyes at the rough touch he had laid on a smarting wound. Annoyed with himself—he nevertheless went on in the track suggested by his evil demon—

“A war widow is an interesting personality,” he said, in rasping tones. “I grant you that! Just now she is the ‘rage’—the pivot of smart society! She gets herself up in the most attractive way—wears the most enchanting headgear adorned with a long, flowing, airy, black veil, and when she has a pretty face looks a pathetic picture. And she goes on posing with the pathos and the veil, till she finds another man to replace the one she has lost. All very natural and nice! But I don’t see why you should ‘pose’ in the fashionable attitude! You were not engaged to the missing Jack—and if we take it for granted—as we must—that he is dead, you have no occasion to seek for some one in his stead. You have the offer of a husband who would be kind to you and protect you to the utmost of his power—who would love you—”

She looked up, her eyes wet and sorrowful.

“Ah, no!” she said in a thrilling voice. “Not love! You do not know what love is or you would not hurt me!”

He was taken aback for a moment—her accents were so plaintive.

“Have I hurt you?” And he was conscious of a sense of shame. “Really? Well—I apologise! Of course you think me a clumsy brute—I dare say I am—I can’t help myself—”

“You could help yourself!” she said, almost passionately. “Yes, you could if you tried! You could help being cruel! You are cruel in your cold, sharp words!—your cynical estimate of all that makes life worth living! As for Jack, if you had once realised the awfulness of war—if you could, with all your cleverness, reading and learning, get imagination enough to picture him or any other brave young man lying dead on the battle-field, half trampled in mud, all the beautiful, gay, strong spirit of him gone for ever,—oh!—you surely would have some sort of feeling!—even for me!—for his poor father!—you would not, could not put it aside as a light matter for ill-placed jesting! You know—yes, you know very well that I would never ‘pose’ as a war widow,—so why do you say such an unkind thing?”

Her sweet face, quivering with suppressed pain moved him more than her words. He rose from his comfortable chair, stretched himself and smiled,—then came over to her where she sat.

“We are getting melodramatic,” he said, “and that will never do! As I before said, I apologise! You are not a war widow. And you will not ‘pose’ as one. Good! That’s settled. You will put the missing Jack in a shrine of your own fancy and surround his image with the incense of a sentimental faith. And you will not marry me? No, certainly not! Not yet! But—perhaps—some day! I do not lose hope—I am not disheartened! Dear child, I am very sorry to have said anything to vex you—try to forget it! But when you are calm again—when you are quite normal—I want you to think quietly to yourself—think sensibly in a perfectly matter-of-fact way—that life is not as the vulgar put it ‘all beer and skittles’—nor is it all honey and roses, and women have more or less a difficult time of it if they are alone in the world. They ought to be treated kindly; but they are not. Now I offer myself as a sort of wall,—the kind of wall through which Pyramus and Thisbe—(that is to say, Sentiment and Folly) may just peer at intervals—a wall against which you may lean without any fear of knocking it down. A wall is not a pretty thing—but it is sometimes useful. In short”—here he very gently laid his hand on her bent head—“I am here if you want me,—I don’t hesitate to say that I shall be glad if you do want me!—but,—if you don’t—why then I must just grin and bear it!—and do my best to be unselfish!”

A sudden surprise smote her, touched with remorse. There were “points” in his curious temperament and character which she had not recognised, and to which she had scarcely done justice. One of these “points” was that being selfish he knew that he had that failing. It is a great achievement for any man, especially a “philosopher,”—to know and to recognise his chief fault, even while still persisting in it. She looked up from under the touch of his hand on her head and smiled.

“What a pleasant man you might be if you liked!” she said, impulsively. “Only—”

“Only I don’t like!” he finished, placidly. “Quite true! I don’t like ‘being pleasant.’ You see I’ve journeyed fairly well on in life and my experience has proved to me that so-called ‘pleasant’ people are generally consummate bores and wholly devoid of intelligence. They are generally cowards too,—in a moral sense. That is to say that they would rather be ‘pleasant’ than honest. Now I would rather be honest than pleasant. You see?” He smiled. “And that’s why I’m rude, crusty,—and selfish!”

She could not bear to hear him running himself down in this way, and impulsively rising from her chair she laid both her little hands on his.

“No, you’re not!” she declared. “I won’t have you say so! You’re a very charming man,—or you can be—if you choose!—and I dare say I have often misunderstood you. And perhaps—perhaps you’ll marry some nice woman some day—and you’ll have to be always charming then!—for her sake!”

He laughed outright.

“I think I see myself at it!” he said. “Charming for her sake!—the ‘nice woman’! Oh, ye gods! My dear child, have you ever thought what a ‘nice woman’ is, in the full meaning of that common term? A man flies from her as from the plague! Propriety and commonplace in one! You’re not a ‘nice woman’!—if you were—”

She echoed his laughter, still resting her hands on his.

“If I were, what then?”

“Why then”—and his voice vibrated with an emotion he really felt—“I should never have grown so fond of you as I am nor should I have dared to ask you to marry me as I have done!”

Poor little Sentimentalist! The grave tenderness of his tone made her gentle heart beat quickly—she looked up and met his eyes bent down upon her with a protective kindness that was wonderfully moving;—she could not help being touched by the thought that this “clever” man, this light of a literary “clique” actually found her lovable; and for the moment all his odd brusqueries, rudenesses and cynicisms were forgotten. Almost—yes!—almost she could have loved him! The swift doubt crossed her brain,—was she wise to refuse him? Her thoughts seemed drifting to and fro like leaves in a storm,—then, all suddenly she stooped and kissed one of the hands on which her own lay.

“I cannot kiss the place and make it well!” she said in a tremulous little way. “For I suppose ‘the place’ this time is in your heart!—or you would say so! But do please believe that I am very grateful for your affection!—and—and—that I am deeply sensible of the honour you have done me!”

He drew his hands away from hers.

“That’s like a bit of Jane Austen,” he said. “Prosy Jane Austen whom all the critics have agreed to praise because she can no longer gain any advantage from their approval! I suppose you know,—you ought to if you don’t,—that, nine out of ten of the so-called ‘literary’ oracles haven’t read a line of Jane Austen and wouldn’t for their lives! She’s a sort of refuge where they take shelter when they want to shy stones at modern novelists,—they cower under her wing and say, ‘We turn with relief to the delicate delineations of Jane Austen’—when they all know there isn’t a single character of Jane Austen that ‘lives,’—or if one did live, he or she would be such a confounded prig and bore that the rest of society would run away from the very contact. No, my dear child!—please don’t ‘be sensible of the honour I have done you’—it’s no particular ‘honour’ to a pretty woman to ask her to become the life companion of an elderly and by no means good-looking man. I have likened myself unto a wall—a wall of safety and protection—and if ever you find such a wall necessary or useful—well!—here I stand!”

She lifted her pretty blue eyes to his trustfully.

“Thank you!” she said,—then, after a pause she added—“I am sorry if—if I have ever misunderstood you in any way!”

“Oh, I’m easily misunderstood!” he said, airily. “I rather like it! When people understand you, you are on their level,—now I don’t want to be on anybody’s level. I flatter myself I’ve got a little bit of rising ground on my own—just a little bit of course, but it’s not absolutely flat.” Here he bethought himself of his pipe as a convenient distraction from the conversation, and went to the mantelpiece where he had left it. “Of course it’s only a little bit,—I don’t brag of it—but it’s off the beaten track.” He began to fill his pipe slowly, moved by his evil genius to do it in a peculiarly irritating manner, prodding the tobacco into the bowl with his forefinger much too tightly for it to “draw” successfully—“and, as regards my being a wall, naturally I’m not the only sort of wall you might have—if you chose—to lean upon; you might”—here his evil genius pressed him harder than ever—“you might have an American millionaire wall!—and—after all—he’s only a few years older than I am!”

Her face flushed,—then grew pale.

“I don’t know what you mean,” she said, quietly. “At least I hope I don’t. If you allude to Mr. Durham—”

He nodded sagaciously.

“Then,” she continued, “he is not a millionaire. And if his son has been killed in this wicked war, I shall be glad to do all in my power to try and console him,—just as if I were his daughter—” She broke off, too troubled by her own emotion to say more.

“Daughter is a good relationship,” said the Philosopher calmly, pursuing his demon track. “A daughter can inherit if the son is dead. And you say he is not a millionaire? He doesn’t look it, I admit—but looks are deceptive. The showy man generally lives on his wits, having nothing else to live on,—but the shabby, out-at-elbows fellow is almost sure to have a big balance at his banker’s. One learns these interesting things as one goes on in life,—they add to the charm of philosophy! Not a millionaire? Good! But millionaire or pauper he makes another very good ‘wall’ for you should you need one—and if you prefer him to me—”

She clasped her hands in a kind of worried desperation.

“Oh, why will you go on talking like this!” she exclaimed. “I want nothing—I need no protection from anybody! I could make my own living by myself if I were driven to it,—and I would rather be left utterly alone in the world than to marry a man I did not love!”

The Philosopher struck a fusee and tried to light his pipe but failed—it was too tightly packed.

“Love again!” he commented. “You think of nothing else! I’ve told you often that what you accept as ‘love’ is mere sentiment. For example, take me,—I have a great affection for you,—so great that I have asked you to marry me,—but the very variable emotion which boys and girls call ‘love’ doesn’t move me a jot. I don’t believe in it. Out of a hundred couples who marry for ‘love’ ninety-nine of them regret their folly before the honeymoon is over!”

She was silent. He went on pleasantly—

“All the old novels used to end in the union of the hero and the heroine who were supposed to ‘live happy ever after.’ We know now that they don’t live happy ever after. That bubble of illusion is broken. The common conclusion according to hard fact is that they live unhappy ever after! There are exceptions of course—but exceptions prove the rule. A really fortunate marriage is one where the contracting parties are good friends—without any sentiment. This sort of sensible people go jogging along comfortably and often celebrate their ‘Golden Wedding,’ whereas the silly ‘love’ business usually ends in the divorce court. Do you follow my line of argument?”

She was watching his futile efforts to light his pipe.

“Quite!” she said, and a tiny smile uplifted the corners of her mouth. “It’s quite easy to follow!—much easier than to light a pipe when the bowl is crammed too full! Let me do it for you!”

She took the briar from his unresisting hand and deftly loosened the tobacco with the point of her embroidery scissors, shaking some of it into the fireplace, whereat he groaned.

“What a waste!” he commented. “So like a woman! To throw away what she doesn’t want—”

“What he doesn’t want, you mean!” she said, laughing as she handed him back his pipe. “There!” and she lit a fusee. “You’ll find that all right now.”

Slowly and morosely he drew a whiff or two.

“Yes—it’s all right,” he admitted. “But look at what you have cast away in the grate! Enough for a half refill!”

“And whose fault?” she queried. “Who over-filled the bowl?”

He was silent a minute or two.

“I suppose I did,” he admitted after a while. “My own cup—the cup of bitterness,—was over-filled and unconsciously I matched my pipe with it. Ah, you may laugh!—but that’s a fact!” He paused again,—then resumed: “And though you’re not a war widow you still are resolved to play the part of one—that is to say, you’ll remain unmarried—”

“Till I know the real truth,” she interposed gently. “Till I am sure Jack is no longer in this world! You see”—she hesitated, then went on—“Jack was—is—very fond of me—and I—I was not fond of him a bit till you came!”

The Philosopher drew his pipe from his mouth and stared at her, amazed.

“Till I came!” he echoed. “What in the name of all the gods and goddesses did I do to make you fond of him?”

A pretty rose-colour flushed her cheeks, and she smiled; then she went on steadily:

“I was beginning to be fond of you!” she said. “Yes, I was! I don’t mind telling you now. I thought you delightfully clever—and you seemed kind—and I was quite proud that you liked my companionship. That was at first, you know! But afterwards when you were rude—and when you said unkind things you need never have said—well!—then I began to think about you in a different way. I loved your little eccentricities and grumpishness—but that sort of thing can be carried too far sometimes!—and bitter words never sweeten friendship. You were harsh and cynical—Jack was always tender and gentle—and though Jack is not clever and you are!—dreadfully clever!—I felt that love is better than all the cleverness in the world!” She paused,—there was a dewy sparkle as of tears in her eyes. “You see how it happened?” she went on again. “I should hardly have loved Jack so much if I had not contrasted him with you! Do you understand?”

The Philosopher gave a resigned gesture.

“I understand!” he said. “I over-filled the bowl! And of course the pipe doesn’t ‘draw.’ Well, well! I must accept my fate,—the inevitable result of the strange humours of women! Could anything be more fantastic than your beginning to care for me ‘at first’ and then starting to care for young Durham ‘at second’ because I failed to come up to your standard of good temper and mild manners! Merciful Providence!” The Philosopher shot out this exclamation like a dart from an air-gun. “Who can fathom the mysterious pools of the feminine mind! Child, do you want perfection in a man? If you do you won’t get it!—make no mistake about that!”

“I don’t want perfection,” she answered mildly, her rosy underlip quivering just a little. “I never thought of such a thing! But I do want—kindness!”

She turned her face away quickly lest he should see the tears in her eyes which now brimmed over and fell. He was silent a moment, then—

“Kindness? Kindness can be overdone. It then becomes mawkish sentimentality. Like politeness, it can be a bore. The man who is always bowing and saying ‘Pardon me!’ is the very chap who’ll give you a good deal to pardon him for in the long run. It’s the same thing with kindness—if you are always kind to people you’ll find them always cruel—it’s the necessity of contrast. You can’t say I have ever been really unkind to you—now can you?”

She hesitated.

“You’ve been rough—and rude!” she murmured, at last.

“Granted! Well, what then?”

She peeped timidly at him.

“Then? Why then—I was disillusioned!” she said. “That’s all!”

He paced two or three times up and down the room.

“Oh! That’s all!” he echoed. “And you think perhaps that I’m the only sort of man that proves a ‘disillusion’? You dear little goose! I’m sorry for you! You make ‘ideals’ which no man can ever come up to—and then you are vexed when they fail! If you’ve made an ideal of young Durham—”

“Oh, no, I haven’t ever made an ideal of him!” she said, emphatically. “He never professed to be clever—he’s just ordinary—nothing particular about him—but he wouldn’t hurt any one by saying unkind things—”

The Philosopher stopped abruptly in his pacing up and down.

“Dear child, the folks who allow themselves to be ‘hurt’ by what they consider an unkind thing, are silly and conceited folks at best. I don’t think you are silly or conceited—but if you feel ‘hurt’ at anything I have said to you or at anything anybody has said, then you haven’t as big a spirit as I thought you had! I may be rough—I may be rude—but you, in your youth and strength should make allowances for age in a man,—for disappointments and difficulties and disillusions far worse than your disillusionment—disillusions extending over a long life of study and thought—study of human nature, which teaches you not to expect the best but always the worst—”

“That’s where you are wrong!” she exclaimed. “You should expect the best!—the best always!”

He came up to her and taking her hand, patted it soothingly.

“Charming!—charming!” he said. “You are a true sentimentalist; but a very sweet little lady all the same! And now what you have to do is to put your precept into practice!—expect the best!—the best always!—even the best of Me!”

CHAPTER XV

On this particular day she happened to be very much alone. The Philosopher had taken himself off to Oxford almost as suddenly as old Durham had taken himself off to London,—her father was engrossed in the writing of an article for the dullest of monthly magazines, and the whole house was curiously silent. Far away in the great metropolis the sirens and guns had announced the “Armistice,”—that cessation of battle which appeared to make the German foe consider himself the victor,—but here in the heart of a quiet country there was a wonderful stillness—the lovely stillness of far-stretching fields and the slow-winding river,—a stillness too which suggested the monotony of life without some stirring action or emotion to vibrate through its tranquillity. And, for some inexplicable reason the usually well-braced and cheerful spirit of the Sentimentalist began to droop,—a cloud of melancholy darkened her mind, and she pictured herself alone—always alone!—alone in the old Manor house, stitching at her embroidery or working in her garden, with nothing further to look forward to but just placid comfort and well-being for the rest of her days! Surely she could never stand it! Better to marry the Philosopher and rub up against all his odd humours and eccentricities, than have nothing whatever to move her out of the rut of the easy commonplace! Better perhaps to become a “loud” woman like some of the modern vulgar,—women who stoop to the baseness of betraying their friends’ confidences and publishing them in “rag” newspapers for so much cash down,—better to be a “film” star (or tallow-dip!) than live wholly without any sort of “sensation”! And yet!—she raised her eyes and saw a warm shaft of the sun strike on a bunch of brown sedges near the river, flecking the whole plant with gold, and close by on a leafless twig, a robin perched, looking at her with its fearless bright eyes, and ruffling its bonny crimson breast, and as she saw this little “phrase” of nature, this wordless speech which means so much to the simple heart and pure mind, her mood changed and brightened.

“After all I’d rather live a dull life than a low one!” she said to herself. “I’d rather be honest than mean! I wouldn’t like to look at myself in the glass and know that I was a despicable little scandal-monger, raking up stories about my friends and sneering at them and taking money for doing it! That sort of thing may be ‘sensational’ but it’s disgraceful! And as for films and ‘stars,’ I hope they’ll all go out one day and never come back! And I’ll be content as I am—I’ve so much to be thankful for!—and if Jack ever comes home—”

She broke off in her musings here, being called by her father. She ran off to obey the summons, and was soon busy with the various trifles he wanted in the way of string, sealing-wax and a long envelope in which to enclose his magazine article for the post. The old gentleman looked very cheerful, and rubbed his hands joyously over “Armistice Day.”

“They’ve stopped killing each other for the time being,” he said. “And that’s a mercy! Dear, dear! What fools men are, to be sure! As if any Governmental quarrel should be settled by the murdering of innocent men! There’s no sense of justice in it.”

“But is there any justice in anything?” queried Sylvia, with sadness in her tone as she put the question. “It doesn’t seem to me that there is!”

Her father looked at her tenderly.

“Anything the matter, little girl?” he asked. “You don’t seem very bright! What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,—really nothing!” she answered, quickly. “Only—I find it hard to believe in justice when such dreadful cruelties happen as have been happening in the war,—when innocent people are killed, and men torture each other in every imaginable way—”

“Yet justice is done,” said Dr. Maynard, gravely. “Sooner or later,—believe that, my dear! For all the lives wasted there will be a reckoning—not in our way, but in God’s way! We must not doubt that Right is the ruling power, always bound to come uppermost!”

“It seems very long in coming sometimes,” she murmured, then suddenly and in a timid voice she said: “Dad dear!—do you know—can you imagine—that Mr. Craig has asked me to marry him?”

Dr. Maynard smiled.

“Oh, he has, has he? Well, I’m not surprised! And you,—what did you say to him?”

“I said ‘No,’” she replied. “I asked him not to go on with it—but—but—of course—I feel he has done me a great honour.”

The old scholar looked meditative.

“Um—um—perhaps he has—and perhaps he hasn’t! We men are apt to think too much of ourselves, and you women are prone to think too much of us! Craig is a clever fellow—but—well!—he’s a leetle old for you, my pretty one!—just a leetle worn and battered in the battle of life to be the husband of a small fairy like you! So that the ‘honour’ of his asking you to marry him doesn’t seem so great to my mind as the ‘honour’ of your accepting him—if you did!—which you won’t!”

“Which I won’t!” and she slipped a loving arm round his neck. “You’re sure of that, Dad? How do you know?”

He put one hand under her chin and turned her sweet face up to his own.

“How do I know?” he echoed, and laughed as he spoke. “Why, because you’re not in love with him! God bless my soul! Do you think I’m such an old noodle as not to know when a girl’s in love?—and my own little girlie too! There, there! You can’t play bo-peep with me! He has proposed to you—well and good!—it’s a bit of a cheek on his part, but never mind that!—and you’ve thought it might be a good thing for you to be established in life as the wife of a distinguished Oxford man,—but—see here, my child!” And his bantering tone changed to one of earnest and tender gravity. “We are living in queer times—this old world has got a shock straight to the heart in this war, and men and women are drifting away from the faith of their forefathers—the faith and right principle which made Britain ‘Great.’ Don’t go with the fatal ‘swim,’ Sylvia!—it’s bound to end in a whirlpool of trouble. Keep to the straight lines of life,—and one of those straight lines is love. Love, my little one!—nothing but real, pure love can make a woman happy in marriage.”

Sylvia nestled close to him.

“Dear Dad! You are quite eloquent!” she said, and smiled up into his eyes. “And you don’t think I’m in love with your distinguished friend?”

He laughed.

“Not a bit!” he replied. “Nor is he really in love with you! He thinks you a pretty little armful of charms—which you are—but he wouldn’t know how to treat you as a wife, nor would he know how to treat any wife! He’s past all that. His habits are settled, and he wouldn’t change them to please any woman!”

“No, I suppose he wouldn’t!” she murmured meditatively. “And those habits are rather trying—sometimes!”

Her father laughed again.

“Of course they are! The habits of bookworms are always trying! I’m a bookworm. My habits are trying!”

“No, they’re not!” And she linked her arms round his neck and hugged him. “No, Dad, you’re just the dearest and best man in the world to me! You know that, don’t you?”

“Well, you make me believe so!” he answered, submitting to her caresses with a very good grace. “But when the gout is on me—”

“Ah, that’s not you!” she declared, lovingly. “That’s the gout only! You’re not in it!”

“I wish I were not!” he responded. “But I tell you what, Sylvia,—it’s less violent than it was. Craig has certainly helped me to ignore it—if he hadn’t kept me at work—”

“Ah, yes! ‘The Deterioration of Language!’” smiled Sylvia. “You must both be sorry that it is nearly finished—that great book!”

“It is a great book!” he agreed, triumphantly. “And it’s a book that’s wanted. Language is getting more and more deteriorated every day. When you see the press circulating the vilest slang—such as ‘the blinkin’ this, that, or t’other’—the ‘bally’ rag of some special thing, and women, passing for ‘ladies,’ talk of ‘tommy rot’ in ordinary conversation, surely it’s time some protest was made! A slangy nation is always a decadent one—purity of speech is the result of purity of thought, while coarse language expresses coarseness of mind and morals.”

The old scholar was wandering off on his favourite theme and turned to get a book to confirm what he was saying. His daughter stood watching him for a moment,—then suddenly, in a hushed tone she said:

“Dad, do you think Jack Durham is really killed?”

He looked at her thoughtfully and kindly.

“Do I think so? My dear, I don’t know what to think—but so far as my own impressions go, I rather feel that he’s alive. Of course all the facts are against me,—all the same I cannot realise anything else. It seems to me impossible that he should be dead. I know there are thousands of young fellows like him who are gone—more’s the pity!—but”—here he paused and stretching out a hand drew his daughter tenderly towards him—“I suppose you were really fond of him?”

She hesitated, then spoke in rather a hushed tone.

“Yes, Dad—I think I was,—I think I am! And yet—do you know I never thought of being fond of him till your friend, the Philosopher”—and she smiled—“came on the scene. I really was quite taken with him!—he rather made a sort of love to me for a time, and I was quite proud that such a clever man should even seem to like me. But after a while, such ugly sides of his character began to show—he could be so rough and rude—and—and—selfish! that I began to dislike him, as much as I had once liked him. And Jack—”

“Well?” interpolated her father, gently. “And Jack?’

“Jack was always kind,” she said, “and quite unselfish. He told me before he went away that he was fond of me—but he would not bind me to any promise or engagement—he left me quite free. Only one thing seemed to trouble him a little—he hoped I would not marry the Philosopher!”

“And yet you had some vague idea of doing it!” laughed her father.

“Only vague!” she responded. “Very vague!”

“Suppose the worst—that Jack is really gone—would you marry Craig?”

She thought a moment, then answered—

“No, I don’t think I could!”

“Right! You’d be a fool if you did! Dear child, you know what I’ve told you before this—there’s only one right way of marriage and that is great love on both sides. It’s no good playing with a sacrament. The thousands of miserable marriages and divorces are ample proofs of the mistakes men and women make in taking each other for better or worse on the strength of a mere ‘fancy,’ or by way of monetary convenience. Now I”—he paused—“I loved your mother!—loved her above everything in the world!—and I know she loved me! She gave me YOU!—and though I may be a testy old fellow at times I love you next best to Her. And I want you to be happy, my little girl!—and for your sake I hope Jack Durham is not killed. He’s not particularly clever—but I believe his heart is in the right place, and that he would make you a kind husband. Kindness is better than all the intellectual brilliancy in the world!”

He kissed her with lingering fondness, and then with an air of shaking off his mood of seriousness, resumed his groping among his books.

“And so Durham has gone to town?” he suddenly queried, looking round.

“Yes. So his housekeeper at the cottage told me this morning.”

“Some sudden business, I suppose! Craig won’t be back till to-morrow, so you’ll have to pass a quiet evening with me all alone! Poor little Sylvia! I’m afraid it’s very dull for you here sometimes.”

“It’s not,” she declared with emphasis. “When I find my own dear Dad’s company ‘dull’—I deserve to be branded as an ungrateful little brute! How can you think such a thing!”

His old eyes rested upon her sorrowfully.

“Ah, my dear! Times have changed!” he said. “In the old days ‘home’ was a happy abiding place for the young folk who honoured their old folk—but now, thanks to the stupid governments under which the people pay taxes and groan their lives away, ‘homes’ are broken up and old folk made mock of while the young are encouraged to run a wild life as they will, without faith in God or trust in any good save for themselves. You are not of these—I have brought you up differently—but it’s an ‘old-fashioned’ bringing-up, Sylvia!—and you are not a ‘modern’ minded girl. Perhaps you’ll thank me for that some day—perhaps not!—but I maintain that an ‘old fashion’ which built up the homes of the nation and taught the people to believe in God and live clean, loyal, loving lives, was a ‘fashion’ worth following. No ‘new’ fashion will ever equal or surpass it!”

CHAPTER XVI

“But it’s such a wonderful work!” she said, with all the tender indulgence she truly felt. “You’ve had so much patience and spent so much time over it!”

“Very true!” and Maynard smiled. “But publishers don’t care about that. They think of trade. ‘Will it sell?’ is their one demand. If it won’t, what’s the good of it? Think of Milton gratefully accepting Five Pounds for ‘Paradise Lost’! There’s a life’s lesson!” He looked at the Philosopher’s note again and a little smile hovered round his lips. “Yes! I should say Craig has found a likely man and is bringing him along.”

“Well, I’ll have a nice tea ready for them when they come,” said Sylvia. “That will help to put them in a good humour.”

She went off then on her various household duties, and presently bethought herself that though it was chill November there was one warm corner in the garden where a few monthly roses still found courage to bloom. One or two of these would brighten the tea-table, she decided, and putting on her hat and cloak she ran out in search of them. They were all in a little pink group together—drooping rather on their stems, yet not without soft fragrance, and she was almost reluctant to gather them. She remembered how Jack Durham had called her a “rose-lady,” and quick tears sprang to her eyes as the pretty name chimed in her memory like a fairy bell. Slowly and very tenderly she plucked three or four of what were indeed the “last roses of summer”—and as she did so was startled by a gruff voice speaking on the other side of the hedge.

“Missy! Missy Maynard!”

She looked up and saw the unkempt head and rough brown face of “Riverside Sam” peering at her through a tangle of leaves.

“Don’t be skeered, Miss! It’s only me!” he said in a kind of hoarse whisper. “I say! Look ’ere! I thought ye might like to know Mr. Durham’s back. He got ’ome early this mornin’. Yes—he’s ’ome—all well an’ ’arty!”

“I’m very glad!” said Sylvia, gently. “Thanks, Sam! It’s kind of you to come and tell me. I shouldn’t have known unless you had, as I can’t go down to the cottage to-day—we have visitors this afternoon.”

“Have ye?” And Sam grinned through the aperture he had made in the hedge somewhat in the fashion of a yokel at a country fair grinning through a horse-collar. “Visitors comin’, eh? From Oxford mebbe?”

Sylvia nodded carelessly, a little surprised at his exceptionally friendly familiarity.

“The old gentleman ain’t arf bad!” went on Sam. “For all ’is larnin’ an’ queer talk ’e’s got a bit of ’art in the right place! I’ve taken to likin’ ’im now—I usen’t to. He’s not much sport about ’im—skeered of ’is life at a water-rat, an’ all that sort o’ thing. I s’pose ’e’ll be comin’ back from Oxford to-day?”

“Yes—I think so!” Sylvia answered, still perplexed by something in his manner which she could not understand. “Do you want to see him?”

“Not pertikerly,” and Sam grinned again. “’E don’t owe me nothing. ’E ain’t very fond of the river,—fishin’ ain’t in ’is line. An’ Lor’ bless ye, the river ain’t much to look at now—all brown an’ muddy with a few whistlin’ reeds on the banks—very different to the days when you an’ pore Mr. Jack used to walk along by the path as prutty to see as two birds on the ’op! Ah! pore Mr. Jack!—he was a good lad! as good as ye’ll find anywhere! An’ to think the Germans ’ave got ’im!”

Sylvia moved restlessly.

“I must be going, Sam,” she said. “Is there anything you want? Anything I can do for you?”

“No, Miss Maynard, no! Thank you all the same! No one wishes ye better luck than I do! That’s why I came up ’ere this mornin’—just to tell ye that old Mr. Durham is back safe so as ye mightn’t worry!”

And with that he drew his head back from the aperture in the hedge and went off, while the Sentimentalist stood inert for a moment, with the roses she had gathered in her hand, wondering whether she would have time before luncheon to run down to Mr. Durham’s cottage and see how he was, and what news he brought from London. News? What news could he bring? Except just a description of how the ‘armistice’ was hailed by the great city’s multitudes. That would be interesting—but it could wait. She decided it would be best to remain at home, and let Mr. Durham take his own time for a visit to her father during the day.

“And if he comes when Mr. Craig and the publisher are here talking business with Dad, I’ll manage to take him off and entertain him in another room,” she said to herself. “For of course if the great ‘Book’ is to be discussed, nothing must be allowed to interfere!”

She smiled, and hummed a little tune under her breath as she went back from the garden into the house and set her roses in a crystal vase, which so enhanced their beauty that they seemed to cheer up and look almost as fair as they were accustomed to do in summer. And the hours swept on glidingly till a flare of deep scarlet and gold in the west spread itself out in all the glory of a November sunset. The glow of a big log fire shed bright reflections all over the charming drawing-room of the Manor house, sparkling on the daintily set out tea-table with its polished silver and delicate china, and the Sentimentalist surveyed her preparations with pardonable pride.

“I do love pretty things!” she said, inwardly. “And luxurious things too! The Philosopher would say there is no necessity for either beauty or comfort,—but I know no one who loves the good ‘tastes’ of life more than he does! He always chooses the easiest chair to sit in,—ah, that reminds me!” And she forthwith began to place the chairs in the most comfortable and friendly positions near the tea-table. “Now they can talk without straining themselves!” and she smiled. “Dad and Mr. Craig and the publisher! I’ll be out of it—for of course as soon as I’ve poured out tea I’ll leave them together. Women are never wanted in ‘business’ by the men—and yet I think they often manage better than the men when they get a chance!”

Just then a bell rang, sending a deep musical echo through the house.

“There they are!” she said. “I’ll run upstairs just to see if my hair looks tidy!”

This was always her little excuse for taking a peep at herself in the mirror before presenting an appearance to visitors. As a matter of fact her hair was seldom actually “tidy,” being of too wilful, curly and “fluffy” a disposition. It rambled all over her head in fair bright tendrils of warm brown-gold, and curled knowingly and becomingly on the nape of her neck like feathery flecks of sunshine. The polished smoothness of the modern “transformation” peruke was nowhere in evidence. Still, it was just as well to have a glance in the looking-glass as not,—and she was not altogether dissatisfied with the reflection of herself as she saw it. She put a light hairpin or two in a rebellious tress that strayed too freely over her forehead, and then hastened downstairs, wondering why the parlourmaid had not announced the arrival of visitors. Entering the drawing-room now lit only by the sparkle of the fire and the red glow of the sunset, she saw a man standing with his back towards her,—one man,—not the Philosopher—not her “Dad”—just one man. Was it the publisher? She stopped short, with a curious hesitation,—her heart beat quickly—then she heard a muffled voice speaking—

“Don’t be frightened!—now don’t! It’s only me!”

“Jack!!” she cried, and rushed forward, almost falling as the “one man” turned round and caught her in his arms.

“Jack!!” she exclaimed, sobbingly again. “Oh, Jack! Is it really, really you?”

There was no audible answer. But the silence was more eloquent than speech,—the silence of that intense joy which only too seldom lifts poor humanity above its daily care and weariness and moves it to thank God for the dear possession of love.

CHAPTER XVII

“Yes—he found out the prison the Boches had put me into. It wasn’t an easy matter either! But these learned professors always hang together, and he has a friend high up in the diplomatic service of Germany, who is, like himself, a sort of book-worm—and he started the search for me and found me. And then—” Here Jack broke off, evidently overcome by emotion. His “rose-lady” caught at his hand and kissed it.

“Yes, Jack!—and then?”

“Well—he found me pretty well done for! But just because the Philosopher, as we call him, had been a boyhood’s friend of his, he got me out of the awful hole I was in, and as I was ill and half starved—”

“Oh, Jack!” and the Sentimentalist gave a little cry of pain.

“Yes!—but it’s all over now,” and Jack kissed her tenderly. “As I say, this first-class old German got me out and took me to his own house, where I was nursed as if I had been his son. And that’s not all. He managed to send me to England—and that’s where the Philosopher comes in!”

Sylvia listened almost breathlessly.

“The Philosopher met me at the boat and took me himself to a private hospital in London—a real A-1. You couldn’t imagine his doing all he did do!”

“Oh!” cried Sylvia. “Then he knew you were alive all the time!”

“He knew I was alive but he didn’t know how soon I should be dead!” Jack replied. “I was very, very ill, dear! I had been wounded as well as starved—and there was plenty of reason for thinking I should never pull round. So the good old chap kept his own counsel. He did not tell my father or any one that I was alive and in England. Nobody knew. If the War Office knew, it didn’t tell! And the Philosopher made up his mind to keep his own counsel.”

“Oh, he might have let us know!” cried Sylvia almost indignantly. “He might have relieved all our sorrow and suspense!”

Jack caught and clasped her hands in his own.

“Now, now, Sylvia!” he said. “Don’t you mistake the old boy! I used to hate him!—but I know he’s one of the finest fellows living! Yes, truly! He used to come and see me, and talk to me—when I was able to listen—and he told me all about my father and about you—and he would say—‘If I explain things they’ll want to come and nurse you—and you’ll be nursed to death! If I hold my tongue they’ll be none the worse—and you’ll be spared all the emotional excitement and worry, and you’ll get well. And while you’re getting well I’ll be a sort of Cupid’s messenger.’”

Here Jack laughed, but there were tears in his eyes.

“Yes—a Cupid’s messenger,” he went on. “That meant that he would bring me all the news of you whenever he could! He was a queer old ‘Cupid’s Messenger!’ but there couldn’t be a kinder sort of ‘Cupid’ anywhere! I was pretty slow in recovering—but it’s been ‘slow and sure’ with me—and with all the care and good things the learned Craig has been showering on me, why! I’m as fit as ever I was! And I certainly owe it to your old ‘Philosopher’—the man I begged you not to marry while I was away—do you remember?”

Sylvia looked up. Her lovely blue eyes were wet and sparkling but there was a glint of mischief in her smile.

“Shall I marry him now you are home again?” she asked.

For answer he caught her in his arms and held her close and fondly.

“You’ll marry me and no one but me!” he said, tenderly. “That’s settled!”

There was a brief silence. The firelight flickered and leaped into flame, sending a warm glow through the room—the hues of the sunset seen through the window had paled into delicate amber like the petals of a daffodil. The restful pause was broken by quite an ugly sound,—a cough distinctly harsh and irritating. A gruff voice followed the cough.

“Dear me!” said the voice, querulously. “Humanity can never be original!—it always imitates! The old, old story!”

And the Philosopher, rather “hunchy” of shoulder and somewhat shambling about the feet looked into the room with a quizzical air of enquiry.

The Sentimentalist rushed at him with the light swoop of a bird flying from heaven to earth.

“Oh, how could you!” she exclaimed, half laughing and half crying together. “How could you—”

“Well, well! Now what’s the matter?” And the Philosopher fenced off with one arm her eager little hands ready to embrace his coat sleeve. “Be calm! Be normal! How could I—what?”

“How could you be so wicked!” she went on. “Yes!—so wicked!—and so—so—good!”

“I couldn’t,” and the Philosopher smiled quite a superior smile. “I couldn’t be wicked and good at the same moment! Sentiment again, you see! Dear child, you will overdo the thing! You must really try to be less emotional! And how do you find your young man looking?”

For answer to this he found his hand caught and kissed, despite his efforts to avoid the impulsive caress.

“There, there!” he said, gently. “That will do, you foolish little girl! Durham, you’ll have your work cut out for you when you take her in hand! Now what about tea?”

“It’s ready!” and Sylvia pulled him along towards the daintily spread table. “All but the making—and I’ll see to that directly—”

“Well, begin at once,” said the Philosopher. “You needn’t wait for Dad. Both Dads are on their way across the garden—but they wanted you to meet the Oxford publisher first!”

He gave a short gruff laugh, and feigned to be more bored than pleased when Jack Durham grasped his hand, saying in a low tone: “I can never thank you enough, sir!”

And, at that moment “the two Dads” came in, making a complete “joy” party of happy hearts and radiant faces, while Sylvia, her fair cheeks flushing like roses with her inward delight, made the tea and dispensed it, Jack performing the duty of handing it round to the three elderly gentlemen who, like pleased spectators at a charming comedy, watched the proceedings with the absorbed interest of conspirators rejoicing in the successful result of a ripened plot.

“I should never have thought it possible,” said old Mr. Durham, breaking through the light desultory chatter presently with measured, drawling accents, “that you could have lent yourself”—here he fixed his eyes on the Philosopher who had just taken his cup of tea from the fair Sentimentalist’s hand.

“Lent myself?” and Craig smiled. “Why don’t you say gave myself? I gave myself to my own scheme—if that’s what you mean—and it seems to have turned out pretty well!”

“Yes, that’s right, Dad!” interposed Jack. “He gave himself—literally gave himself body and soul to the business of getting me well and about again!—and here I am!”

His father looked at him with eyes in which age had not burnt out tenderness.

“Here you are—thank God!” he said. “But what I find hard to understand—”

“I know!” interposed Dr. Maynard. “But we won’t say anything about it—”

“Oh, yes, we will!” and the Philosopher munched a piece of toast and washed it down with tea. “We will ask ourselves how it is that we who profess to know a great deal, know next to nothing about character! Character!—your character—my character!—everybody’s character! The duality of ourselves, as it were! What you don’t understand, my good Mr. Durham, is why I should have taken trouble over your son—who is nothing to me”—here he waved his tea-cup melodramatically—“literally nothing! Merely a worthy young man—an American—and I have very little use for Americans,—who was taken prisoner by the Germans. Now I have more friends among Germans than I have among Americans. Never mind that! It occurred to me that a German friend might be useful to the American young man under the circumstances; and—and—well!—there’s the whole story!”

“Not the whole story by any means!” broke out Jack, impetuously. “Not the care, the kindness, the attention, the patient watchfulness—”

The Philosopher held up his hand.

“Now, Jack!—you see I call you ‘Jack’ quite familiarly—I never thought I should! That’s quite enough! Don’t harp on the subject! Remember I hate sentiment!”

Here he gulped down his tea with an ugly gurgle and passed his cup to Sylvia for more.

“I hate sentiment!” he repeated, then paused as old Dr. Maynard pointed a finger at him and said:

“Yes, you do!—when your own sentiment is not in question! Then it’s quite another matter! You’ll go any length for it! Yes, Craig!—you know you will! God bless me! Don’t I know it! I’ll give you away—sentiment and all!—yes, I will! I’ve been in your scheme all along—I’ve known your plot! Sentiment? I should think so! Why you’d do anything for Sylvia!”

There was a moment’s silence—an awkward pause. But the Philosopher was not embarrassed. On the contrary he lifted his head and looked round with quite a defiant air.

“Quite so!” he said. “You put it rather bluntly, Maynard!—but you’re right! I certainly would do anything for Sylvia! And—crusty and selfish old bear as I am—I’ve done my best!”