Red Pottage

The superficial reader of these pages may possibly have forgotten, but the earnest one will undoubtedly remember that in an earlier chapter a sale of work was mentioned which was to take place in the Wilderleigh gardens at the end of August.

The end of August had now arrived, and with it two white tents, which sprang up suddenly one morning, like giant mushrooms, on one of Doll's smooth-shaven lawns. He groaned in spirit as he watched their erection. They would ruin the turf.

"Might as well iron it with a hot iron," he said, disconsolately to Hugh. "But, of course, this sort of thing—Diocesan Fund, eh? In these days we must stand by our colors." He repeated Mr. Gresley's phrase. Doll seldom ventured on an opinion not sanctioned by the ages, or that he had not heard repeated till its novelty had been comfortably rubbed off by his wife or the Gresleys.

The two men watched the proceedings mournfully. They could not help, at least they were told they could not help the women busily engaged in draping and arranging the stalls. They were still at large, but Doll knew, as well as a dog who is going to be washed, what was in store for him in the afternoon, and he was depressed beforehand.

"Don't let yourself be run in," he said, generously to Hugh. "You're not up to it. It takes a strong man to grapple with this sort of thing. Kills off the weakly ones like flies. You lie low in the smoking-room till it's all over."

"All I can say is," remarked Mrs. Gresley, as she and Hester led the Vicarage donkey and cart up the drive, heavily laden with the work of many months, "that the Pratts have behaved exceedingly badly. Here they are, the richest people by far in the parish, and they would not even take a stall, they would not even furnish half of one, and they said they would be away, and they are at the Towers, after all. No one likes the Pratts more than I do, or sees their good points as I do, but I can't shut my eyes to the fact that they are the meanest of the mean."

The Pratts had only contributed two "bed-spreads," and a "sheet-sham," and a set of antimacassars. If the reader wishes to know what "bed-spreads" and "sheet-shams" are, let him ask his intended, and let him see to it that he marries a woman who cannot tell him.

Mrs. Pratt had bought the antimacassars for the Towers, and secretly adored them until Ada pronounced them to be vulgar. The number of things which Ada discovered to be vulgar increased every day, and included the greater part of her mother's wardrobe, much to the distress of that poor lady. Mrs. Pratt had reached the size when it is prudent to concentrate a love of bright colors in one's parasol. On this particular afternoon she shed tears over the fact that Ada refused to accompany her if her mother wore a unique garment of orange satin, covered with what appeared to be a plague of black worms.

Of course, the sale of work was combined with a garden-party, and a little after three o'clock carriage after carriage began to arrive, and Sybell, with a mournful, handsome, irreproachably dressed husband, took up her position on the south front to receive her guests.

The whole neighborhood had been invited, and it can generally be gauged with tolerable accuracy by a hostess of some experience who will respond to the call and who will stay away. Sybell and her husband were among those who were not to be found at these festivities, neither were the Newhavens, save at their own, nor the Pontisburys, nor the Bishop of Southminster. Cards had, of course, been sent to each, but no one expected them to appear.

Presently, among the stream of arrivals, Sybell noticed the slender figure of Lady Newhaven, and—astonishing vision—Lord Newhaven beside her.

"Wonders will never cease," said Doll, shaken for a moment out of the apathy of endurance.

Sybell raised her eyebrows, and advanced with the prettiest air of empressement to meet her unexpected guests. No, clearly it was impossible that the two women should like each other. They were the same age, about the same height and coloring; their social position was too similar; their historic houses too near each other. Lady Newhaven was by far the best looking, but that was not a difference which attracted Sybell towards her. On this occasion Sybell's face assumed its most squirrel-like expression, for, as ill-luck would have it, they were dressed alike.

Lady Newhaven looked very ethereal, as she came slowly across the grass in her diaphanous gown of rich white, covered with a flowing veil of thinnest transparent black. Her blue eyes looked restlessly bright; her lips wore a mechanical smile. Rachel, watching her, experienced a sudden pang at her undeniable loveliness. It wounded her suddenly, as it never had done before. "I am a common-looking, square-built woman compared to her," she said to herself. "No wonder he—"

She instinctively drew back as Lady Newhaven turned quickly towards her.

"You dear person," said Lady Newhaven, her eyes moving restlessly over the crowd, "are you still here? Let us go and buy something together. How nice you look," without looking at her. She drew Rachel apart in the direction of the tents.

"Where is he?" she said, sharply. "I know he is here. I heard all about the accident, though Edward never told me. I don't see him."

"He is not in the gardens. He is not coming out. He is still rather knocked up."

"I thought I should have died when I heard it. Ah, Rachel, never love any one. You don't know what it's like. But I must see him. I have come here on purpose."

"So I supposed."

"Edward would come, too. He appeared at the last moment when the carriage came round, though I have never known him to go to a garden-party in his life. But where is he, Rachel?"

"Somewhere in the house, I suppose."

"I shan't know where to find him. I can't be wandering about that woman's house by myself. We must slip away together, Rachel, and you must take me to him. I must see him alone for five minutes."

Rachel shook her head.

Captain Pratt, tall, pale, cautious, immaculate, his cane held along his spinal column, appeared suddenly close at hand.

"Mrs. Loftus is fortunate in her day," he remarked, addressing himself to Lady Newhaven, and observing her fixedly with cold admiration. "I seldom come to this sort of thing, but neighbors in the country must support each other. I see you are on your way to the tents. Pray allow me to carry your purchases for you."

"Oh! don't let me trouble you," said Lady Newhaven, shrinking imperceptibly. But it was no trouble to Captain Pratt, and they walked on together.

Lord Newhaven, who could not have been far off, joined Rachel.

"Well, my dear," said Mrs. Pratt to Ada, "you might have let me wear my black and orange, after all, for you see Lady Newhaven has something very much the same, only hers is white underneath. And do you see she has got two diamond butterflies on—the little one at her throat and the big one holding her white carnations. And you would not let me put on a single thing. There now, Algy has joined her," continued Mrs. Pratt, her attention quickly diverted from her own wrongs. "Now they are walking on together. How nice he looks in those beautiful clothes. Algy and Lord Newhaven and Mr. Loftus all have the same look, haven't they? All friends together, as I often say, such a mercy among county people. You might walk a little with Lord Newhaven, Ada. It's unaccountable how seldom we see him, but always so pleasant when we do. Ah! he's speaking to Rachel West. They are going to the tents, after all. Well, whatever you may say, I do think we ought to go and buy something, too. Papa says he won't put his hand in his pocket if the Loftuses are to get all the credit, and we ought to have had the choice of having the sale at the Towers, so he sha'n't do anything; but I think it would be nice if we went and bought a little something. Just a five-pound note. You shall spend it, my dear, if you like."

"This is sheer recklessness," said Lord Newhaven, as Rachel bought an expensive tea-cosey from Fräulein. "In these days of death-duties you cannot possess four teapots, and you have already bought three teapot costumes."

"That is what I am here for," said Rachel, producing a check-book. "How much did you say, Fräulein?"

"Twenty-seven and seex," said Fräulein.

"Now I see it in the full light, I have taken a fancy to it myself," said Lord Newhaven. "I never saw anything the least like it. I don't think I can allow you to appropriate it, Miss West. You are sweeping up all the best things."

"I have a verr' pretty thing for gentlemen," said Fräulein. "Herr B-r-r-rown has just bought one."

"Very elaborate, indeed. Bible-markers, I presume? Oh, braces! Never mind, they will be equally useful to me. I'll have them. Now for the tea-cosey. It is under-priced. I consider that, with the chenille swallow, it is worth thirty shillings. I will give thirty for it."

"Thirty-two and six," said Rachel.

"The landed interest is not going to be browbeaten by coal-mines. Thirty-three and twopence."

"Forty shillings," said Rachel.

"Forty-two," said Lord Newhaven.

Every one in the tent had turned to watch the bidding.

"Forty-two and six," said Rachel.

Fräulein blushed. She had worked the tea-cosey. It was to her a sonata in red plush.

"Three guineas," said Captain Pratt, by an infallible instinct, perceiving, and placing himself within the focus of general interest.

The bidding ceased instantly. Lord Newhaven shrugged his shoulders and turned away. Fräulein, still shaking with conflicting emotions, handed the tea-cosey to Captain Pratt. He took it with an acid smile, secretly disgusted at the sudden cessation of interest, for which he had paid rather highly, and looked round for Lady Newhaven.

But she had disappeared.

"Fancy you and Algy bidding against each other like that," said Ada Pratt, archly, to Lord Newhaven, for though Ada was haughty in general society she could be sportive, and even friskily ingratiating, towards those of her fellow-creatures whom she termed "swells." "Why, half Middleshire will be saying that you have quarrelled next."

"Only those who do not know how intimate Captain Pratt and I really are could think we have quarrelled," said Lord Newhaven, his eyes wandering over the crowd. "But I am blocking your way and Mrs. Pratt's. How do you do, Mrs. Pratt? Miss West, your burden is greater than you can bear. You are dropping part of it. I don't know what it is, but I can shut my eyes as I pick it up. I insist on carrying half back to the house. It will give a pleasing impression that I have bought largely. Weren't you pleased at the money we wrung out of Captain Pratt? He never thought we should stop bidding. It's about all the family will contribute, unless that good old Mamma Pratt buys something. She is the only one of the family I can tolerate. Is Scarlett still here? I ought to have asked after him before."

"He's here, but he's not well. He's in hiding in the smoking-room."

"He is lucky he is no worse. I should have had rheumatic fever if I had been in his place. How cool it is in here after the glare outside. Must you go out again? Well, I consider I have done my duty, and that I may fairly allow myself a cigarette in peace."

"Really, Mr. Loftus, I'm quite shocked. This absurd faintness! The tent was very crowded, and there is not much air to-day, is there? I shall be all right if I may sit quietly in the hail a little. How deliciously cool in here after the glare outside. A glass of water? Thanks. Yes, only I hate to be so troublesome. And how are you after that dreadful accident in the boat?"

"Oh! I am all right," said Doll, who by this time hated the subject. "It was Scarlett who was nearly frozen like New Zealand lamb."

Doll had heard Mr. Gresley fire off the simile of the lamb, and considered it sound.

"How absurd you are. You always make me laugh. I suppose he has left now that he is unfrozen."

"Oh no. He is still here. We would not let him go till he was better. He is not up to much. Weak chap at the best of times, I should think. He's lying low in the smoking-room till the people are gone."

"Mr. Scarlett is an old friend of ours," said Lady Newhaven, sipping her glass of water, and spilling a little; "but I can't quite forgive him—no, I really can't—for the danger he caused to Edward. You know, or perhaps you don't know, that Edward can't swim, either. Even now I can't bear to think what might have happened."

She closed her eyes with evident emotion.

Doll's stolid garden-party face relaxed. "Good little woman," he thought. "As fond of him as she can be."

"All's well that ends well," he remarked, aloud.

Doll did not know that he was quoting Shakespeare, but he did know by long experience that this sentence could be relied on as suitable to the occasion, or to any occasion that looked a little "doddery," and finished up all right.

"And now, Mr. Loftus, positively I must insist on your leaving me quietly here. I am quite sure you are wanted outside, and I should blame myself if you wasted another minute on me. It was only the sun which affected me. Don't mention it to Edward. He is always so fussy about me. I will rest quietly here for a quarter of an hour, and then rejoin you all again in the garden."

"I hope I am not disturbing any one," said Lord Newhaven, quietly entering the smoking-room. "Well, Scarlett, how are you getting on?"

Hugh, who was lying on a sofa with his arms raised and his hands behind his head, looked up, and his expression changed.

"He was thinking of something uncommonly pleasant," thought Lord Newhaven, "not of me or mine, I fancy. I have come to smoke a cigarette in peace," he added aloud, "if you don't object."

"Of course not."

Lord Newhaven lit his cigarette and puffed a moment in silence.

"Hot outside," he said.

Hugh nodded. He wondered how soon he could make a pretext for getting up and leaving the room.

There was a faint silken rustle, and Lady Newhaven, pale, breathless, came swiftly in and closed the door. The instant afterwards she saw her husband, and shrank back with a little cry. Lord Newhaven did not look at her. His eyes were fixed on Hugh.

Hugh's face became suddenly ugly, livid. He rose slowly to his feet, and stood motionless.

"He hates her," said Lord Newhaven to himself. And he removed his glance and came forward.

"You were looking for me, Violet?" he remarked. "I have no doubt you are wishing to return home. We will go at once." He threw away his cigarette. "Well, good-bye, Scarlett, in case we don't meet again. I dare say you will pay Westhope a visit later on. Ah, Captain Pratt! so you have fled, like us, from the madding crowd. I can recommend Loftus's cigarettes. I have just had one myself. Good-bye. Did you leave your purchases in the hall, Violet? Yes? Then we will collect them on our way."

The husband and wife were half-way down the grand staircase before Lord Newhaven said, in his usual even voice:

"I must ask you once more to remember that I will not have any scandal attaching to your name. Did not you see that that white mongrel Pratt was on your track? If I had not been there when he came in he would have drawn his own vile conclusions, and for once they would have been correct."

"He could not think worse of me than you do," said the wife, half cowed, half defiant.

"No, but he could say so, which I don't; or, what is more probable, he could use his knowledge to obtain a hold over you. He is a dangerous man. Don't put yourself in his power."

"I don't want to, or in anybody's."

"Then avoid scandal instead of courting it, and don't repeat the folly of this afternoon."

Captain Pratt did not remain long in the smoking-room. He had only a slight acquaintance with Hugh, which did not appear capable of expansion. Captain Pratt made a few efforts, proved its inelastic properties, and presently lounged out again.

Hugh moved slowly to the window, and leaned his throbbing forehead against the stone mullion. He was still weak, and the encounter with Lady Newhaven had shaken him.

"What did he mean?" he said to himself, bewildered and suspicious. "'Perhaps I should be staying at Westhope later on!' But, of course, I shall never go there again. He knows that as well as I do. What did he mean?"

It was the third week of November. Winter, the destroyer, was late, but he had come at last. There was death in the air, a whisper of death stole across the empty fields and bare hill-side. The birds heard it and were silent. The November wind was hurrying round Westhope Abbey, shaking its bare trees.

Lord Newhaven stood looking fixedly out eastward across the level land to the low hills beyond. He stood so long that the day died, and twilight began to rub out first the hills and then the long, white lines of flooded meadow and blurred pollard willows. Presently the river mist rose up to meet the coming darkness. In the east, low and lurid, a tawny moon crept up the livid sky. She made no moonlight on the gray earth.

Lord Newhaven moved away from the window, where he had become a shadow among the shadows, and sat down in the dark at his writing-table.

Presently he turned on the electric lamp at his elbow and took a letter out of his pocket. The circle of shaded light fell on his face as he read—the thin, grave face, with the steady, inscrutable eyes.

He read the letter slowly, evidently not for the first time.

"If I had not been taken by surprise at the moment I should not have consented to the manner in which our differences were settled. Personally, I consider the old arrangement, to which you regretfully alluded at the time"—("pistols for two and coffee for four," I remember perfectly)—"as preferable, and as you appeared to think so yourself, would it not be advisable to resort to it? Believing that the old arrangement will meet your wishes as fully as it does mine, I trust that you will entertain this suggestion, and that you will agree to a meeting with your own choice of weapons, on any pretext you may choose to name within the next week."

The letter ended there. It was unsigned.

"The time is certainly becoming short," said Lord Newhaven. "He is right in saying there is only a week left. If it were not for the scandal for the boys, and if I thought he would really hold to the compact, I would meet him, but he won't. He flinched when he drew lots. He won't. He has courage enough to stand up in front of me for two minutes, and take his chance, but not to blow his own brains out. No. And if he knew what is in store for him if he does not, he would not have courage to face that either. Nor should I if I were in his shoes, poor devil. The first six foot of earth would be good enough for me."

He threw the letter with its envelope into the fire and watched it burn.

Then he took up the gold pen, which his wife had given him, examined the nib, dipped it very slowly in the ink, and wrote with sudden swiftness.

"Allow me to remind you that you made no objection at the time to the manner of our encounter and my choice of weapons, by means of which publicity was avoided. The risk was equal. You now, at the last moment, propose that I should run it a second time, and in a manner to cause instant scandal. I must decline to do so, or to reopen the subject, which had received my careful consideration before I decided upon it. I have burned your letter, and desire you will burn mine."

"Poor devil!" said Lord Newhaven, putting the letter, not in the post-box at his elbow, but in his pocket.

"Loftus and I did him an ill turn when we pulled him out of the water."

The letter took its own time, for it had to avoid possible pitfalls. It shunned the company of the other Westhope letters, it avoided the village post-office, but after a day's delay it was launched, and lay among a hundred others in a station pillar-box. And then it hurried, hurried as fast as express train could take it, till it reached its London address, and went softly up-stairs, and laid itself, with a few others, on Hugh's breakfast-table.

For many weeks since his visit at Wilderleigh Hugh had been like a man in a boat without oars, drifting slowly, imperceptibly on the placid current of a mighty river, who far away hears the fall of Niagara droning like a bumblebee in a lily cup.

Long ago, in the summer, he had recognized the sound, had realized the steep agony towards which the current was bearing him, and had struggled horribly, impotently, against the inevitable. But of late, though the sound was ever in his ears, welling up out of the blue distance, he had given up the useless struggle, and lay still in the sunshine watching the summer woods slide past and the clouds sail away, always away and away, to the birthplace of the river, to that little fluttering pulse in the heart of the hills which a woman's hand might cover, the infant pulse of the great river to be.

Hugh's thoughts went back, like the clouds, towards that tiny spring of passion in his own life. He felt that he could have forgiven it—and himself—if he had been swept into the vortex of a headlong mountain torrent leaping down its own wild water-way, carrying all before it. Other men he had seen who had been wrested off their feet, swept out of their own keeping by such a torrent on the steep hill-side of their youth. But it had not been so with him. He had walked more cautiously than they. As he walked he had stopped to look at the little thread of water which came bubbling up out of its white pebbles. It was so pretty, it was so feeble, it was so clear. Involuntarily he followed it, watched it grow, amused himself, half contemptuously, with it, helped its course by turning obstacles from its path. It never rushed. It never leaped. It was a toy. The day came when it spread itself safe and shallow on level land, and he embarked upon it. But he was quickly tired of it. It was beginning to run muddily through a commonplace country, past squalid polluting towns and villages. The hills were long since gone. He turned to row to the shore. And, behold, his oars were gone! He had been trapped to his destruction.

Hugh had never regarded seriously his intrigue with Lady Newhaven. He had been attracted, excited, partially, half-willingly enslaved. He had thought at the time that he loved her, and that supposition had confirmed him in his cheap cynicism about woman. This, then, was her paltry little court, where man offered mock homage, and where she played at being queen. Hugh had made the discovery that love was a much overrated passion. He had always supposed so; but when he tired of Lady Newhaven he was sure of it. His experience was, after all, only the same as that which many men acquire by marriage, and hold unshaken through long and useful lives. But Hugh had not been able to keep the treasures of this early experience. It had been rendered worthless, perhaps rather contemptible by a later one—that of falling in love with Rachel, and the astonishing discovery that he was in love for the first time. He had sold his birthright for a mess of red pottage, as surely as any man or woman who marries for money or liking. He had not believed in his birthright, and holding it to be worthless, had given it to the first person who had offered him anything in exchange.

His whole soul had gradually hardened itself against Lady Newhaven. If he had loved her, he said to himself, he could have borne his fate. But the play had not been worth the candle. His position was damnable; but that he could have borne—at least, so he thought if he had had his day. But he had not had it. That thought rankled. To be hounded out of life because he had mistaken paper money for real was not only unfair, it was grotesque.

Gradually, however, Hugh forgot his smouldering hate of Lady Newhaven, his sense of injustice and anger against fate; he forgot everything in his love for Rachel. It became the only reality of his life.

He had remained in London throughout October and November, cancelling all his engagements because she was there. What her work was he vaguely apprehended: that she was spending herself and part of her colossal fortune in the East End, but he took no interest in it. He was incapable of taking more interests into his life at this time. He passed many quiet evenings with her in the house in Park Lane, which she had lately bought. The little secretary who lived with her had always a faint smile and more writing to do than usual on the evenings when he dined with them.

A great peace was over all their intercourse. Perhaps it was the hush before the storm, the shadow of which was falling, falling, with each succeeding day across the minds of both. Once only a sudden gust of emotion stirred the quiet air, but it dropped again immediately. It came with the hour when Hugh confessed to her the blot upon his past. The past was taking upon itself ever an uglier and more repulsive aspect as he saw more of Rachel. It was hard to put into words, but he spoke of it. The spectre of love rose like a ghost between them, as they looked earnestly at each other, each pale even in the ruddy fire-light.

Hugh was truthful in intention. He was determined he would never lie to Rachel. He implied an intrigue with a married woman, a deviation not only from morality, but from honor. More he did not say. But as he looked at her strained face it seemed to him that she expected something more. A dreadful silence fell between them when he had finished. Had she then no word for him. Her eyes—mute, imploring, dark with an agony of suspense—met his for a second and fell instantly. She did not speak. Her silence filled him with despair. He got up. "It's getting late. I must go," he stammered.

She rose, mechanically, and put out her hand.

"May I come again?" he said, holding it more tightly than he knew, and looking intently at her. Was he going to be dismissed?

The pain he caused her hand recalled her to herself. A look of bewilderment crossed her face, and then she realized his suspense and said, gravely, "You may come again."

He kissed the hand he held, and, as he did so, he knew for the first time that she loved him. But he could not speak of love after what he had just told her. He looked back when he reached the door, and saw her standing where he had left her. She had raised the hand he had kissed to her lips.

That was three days ago. Since then he had not dared to go and see her. He could not ask her to marry him when he was within a few days of the time when he was bound in so-called honor to give Lord Newhaven satisfaction. He certainly could not be in her presence again without asking her. The shadows of the last weeks had suddenly become ghastly realities once more. The roar of Niagara drowned all other sounds. What was he going to do? What was he going to do in the predicament towards which he had been drifting so long, which was now actually upon him? Who shall say what horror, what agony of mind, what frenzied searching for a way of escape, what anguish of baffled love crowded in on Hugh's mind during those last days? At the last moment he caught at a straw, and wrote to Lord Newhaven offering to fight him. He did not ask himself what he should do if Lord Newhaven refused. But when Lord Newhaven did refuse his determination, long unconsciously fostered, sprang full-grown into existence in a sudden access of passionate anger and blind rage.

"He won't fight, won't he! He thinks I will die like a rat in a trap with all my life before me. I will not. I offered him a fair chance of revenging himself—I would have fired into the air—and if he won't take it is his own look-out, damn him! He can shoot me at sight if he likes. Let him."

If we could choose our ills we should not choose suspense. Rachel aged perceptibly during these last weeks. Her strong white hands became thinner; her lustreless eyes and haggard face betrayed her. In years gone by she had said to herself, when a human love had failed her, "I will never put myself through this torture a second time. Whatever happens I will not endure it again."

And now she was enduring it again, though in a different form. There is an element of mother-love in the devotion which some women give to men. In the first instance it had opened the door of Rachel's heart to Hugh, and had gradually merged, with other feelings, and deepened into the painful love of a woman not in her first youth for a man of whom she is not sure.

Rachel was not sure of Hugh. Of his love for her she was sure, but not of the man himself, the gentle, refined, lovable nature that mutely worshipped and clung to her. She could not repulse him any more than she could repulse a child. But through all her knowledge of him—the knowledge of love, the only true knowledge of our fellow-creatures—a thread of doubtful anxiety was interwoven. She could form some idea how men like Dick, Lord Newhaven, or the Bishop would act in given circumstances, but she could form no definite idea how Hugh would act in the same circumstances. Yet she knew Hugh a thousand times better than any of the others. Why was this? Many women before Rachel have sought diligently to find, and have shut their eyes diligently, lest they should discover what it is that is dark to them in the character of the man they love.

Perhaps Rachel half knew all the time the subtle inequality in Hugh's character. Perhaps she loved him all the better for it. Perhaps she knew that if he had been without a certain undefinable weakness he would not have been drawn towards her strength. She was stronger than he, and perhaps she loved him more than she could have loved an equal.

"Les esprits faibles ne sont jamais sincères." She had come across that sentence one day in a book she was reading, and had turned suddenly blind and cold with anger. "He is sincere," she said, fiercely, as if repelling an accusation. "He would never deceive me." But no one had accused Hugh.

The same evening he made the confession for which she had waited so long. As he began to speak an intolerable suspense, like a new and acute form of a familiar disease, lay hold on her. Was he going to live or die. She should know at last. Was she to part with him, to bury love for the second time? Or was she to keep him, to be his wife, the mother of his children?

As he went on, his language becoming more confused; she hardly listened to him. She had known all that too long. She had forgiven it, not without tears; but still, she had forgiven it long ago. Then he stopped. It seemed to Rachel as if she had reached a moment in life which she could not bear. She waited, but still he did not speak. Then she was not to know. She was to be ground between the millstones of four more dreadful days and nights. She suddenly became aware, as she stared at Hugh's blanching face, that he believed she was about to dismiss him. The thought had never entered her mind.

"Do you not know that I love you?" she said, silently, to him, as he kissed her hand.

When he had left her a gleam of comfort came to her, the only gleam that lightened the days and nights that followed. It was not his fault if he had made a half-confession. If he had gone on, and had told her of the drawing of lots, and which had drawn the fatal lot, he would have been wanting in sense of honor. He owed it to the man he had injured to preserve entire secrecy.

"He told me of the sin which might affect my marrying him," said Rachel, "but the rest had nothing to do with me. He was right not to speak of it. If he had told me, and then a few days afterwards Lord Newhaven had committed suicide, he would know I should put two and two together, and who the woman was, and the secret would not have died with Lord Newhaven as it ought to do. But if Hugh were the man who had to kill himself, he might have told me so without a breach of confidence, because then I should never have guessed who the others were. If he were the man he could have told me, he certainly would have told me, for it could have done no harm to any one. Surely Lady Newhaven must be right when she was so certain that her husband had drawn the short lighter. And she herself had gained the same impression from what Hugh had vaguely said at Wilderleigh. But what are impressions, suppositions, except the food of suspense." Rachel sighed, and took up her burden as best she could. Hugh's confession had at least one source of comfort in it, deadly cold comfort if he were about to leave her. She knew that night as she lay awake that she had not quite trusted him up till now, by the sense of entire trust and faith in him which rose up to meet his self-accusation. What might have turned away Rachel's heart from him had had the opposite effect. "He told me the worst of himself, though he risked losing me by doing it. He wished me to know before he asked me to marry him. Though he acted dishonorably once he is an honorable man. He has shown himself upright in his dealing with me."

Hugh came back no more after that evening. Rachel told herself she knew why—she understood. He could not speak of love and marriage when the man he had injured was on the brink of death. Her heart stood still when she thought of Lord Newhaven, the gentle, kindly man who was almost her friend, and who was playing with such quiet dignity a losing game. Hugh had taken from him his wife, and by that act was now taking from him his life too.

"It was an even chance," she groaned. "Hugh is not responsible for his death. Oh, my God! At least he is not responsible for that. It might have been he who had to die instead of Lord Newhaven. But if it is he, surely he could not leave me without a word. If it is he, he would have come to bid me good-bye. He cannot go down into silence without a word. If it is he, he will come yet."

She endured through the two remaining days, turning faint with terror each time the door-bell rang, lest it might be Hugh.

But Hugh did not come.

Then, after repeated frantic telegrams from Lady Newhaven, she left London precipitately to go to her, as she had promised, on the twenty-eighth of November, the evening of the last day of the five months.

It was nearly dark when Rachel reached Westhope Abbey. A great peace seemed to pervade the long, dim lines of the gardens, and to be gathered into the solemn arches of the ruins against the darkening sky. Through the low door-way a faint light of welcome peered. As she drove up she was aware of two tall figures pacing amicably together in the dusk. As she passed them she heard Lord Newhaven's low laugh at something his companion said.

A sense of unreality seized her. It was not the world which was out of joint, which was rushing to its destruction. It must be she who was mad—stark mad—to have believed these chimeras.

As she got out of the carriage a step came lightly along the gravel, and Lord Newhaven emerged into the little ring of light by the archway.

"It is very good of you to come," he said, cordially, with extended hand. "My poor wife is very unwell, and expecting you anxiously. She told me she had sent for you."

All was unreal—the familiar rooms and passages, the flickering light of the wood fire in the drawing-room, the darkened room, into which Rachel stole softly and knelt down beside a trembling white figure, which held her with a drowning clutch.

"I will be in the drawing-room after dinner," Lady Newhaven whispered, hoarsely. "I won't dine down. I can't bear to see him."

It was all unreal, except the jealousy which suddenly took Rachel by the throat and nearly choked her.

"I have undertaken what is beyond my strength," she said to herself, as she hastily dressed for dinner. "How shall I bear it when she speaks of him? How shall I go through with it?"

Presently she was dining alone with Lord Newhaven. He mentioned that it was Dick Vernon with whom he had been walking when she arrived. Dick was staying in Southminster for business, combined with hunting, and had ridden over. Lord Newhaven looked furtively at Rachel as he mentioned Dick. Her indifference was evidently genuine.

"She has not grown thin and parted with what little looks she possessed on Dick's account," he said to himself; and the remembrance slipped across his mind of Hugh's first word when he recovered consciousness after drowning—"Rachel."

"I would have asked Dick to dine," continued Lord Newhaven, when the servants had gone, "but I thought two was company and three none, and that it was not fair on you and Violet to have him on your hands, as I am obliged to go to London on business by the night express."

He was amazed at the instantaneous effect of his words.

Rachel's face became suddenly livid, and she sank back in her chair. He saw that it was only by a supreme effort that she prevented herself from fainting. The truth flashed into his mind.

"She knows," he said to himself. "That imbecile, that brainless viper to whom I am tied, has actually confided in her. And she and Scarlett are in love with each other, and the suspense is wearing her out."

He looked studiously away from her, and continued a desultory conversation; but his face darkened.

The little boys came in, and pressed themselves one on each side of their father, their eyes glued on the crystallized cherries. Rachel had recovered herself, and she watched the children and their father with a pain at her heart, which was worse than the faintness.

She had been unable to believe that if Lord Newhaven had drawn the short lighter he would remain quietly here over the dreadful morrow, under the same roof as Teddy and Pauly. Oh, surely nothing horrible could happen so near them! Yet he seemed to have no intention of leaving Westhope. Then, perhaps, he had not drawn the short lighter, after all. At the moment when suspense, momentarily lulled, was once more rising hideous, colossal, he casually mentioned that he was leaving by the night train. The reason was obvious. The shock of relief almost stunned her.

"He will do it quietly to-morrow away from home," she said to herself, watching him with miserable eyes, as he divided the cherries equally between the boys. She had dreaded going up-stairs to Lady Newhaven, but anything was better than remaining in the dining-room. She rose hurriedly, and the boys raced to the door and struggled which should open it for her.

Lady Newhaven was lying on a sofa by the wood fire in the drawing-room.

Rachel went straight up to her, and said, hoarsely:

"Lord Newhaven tells me he is going to London this evening by the night express."

Lady Newhaven threw up her arms.

"Then it is he," she said. "When he stayed on and on up to to-day I began to be afraid that it was not he, after all; and yet little things made me feel sure it was, and that he was only waiting to do it before me and the children. I have been so horribly frightened. Oh, if he might only go away, and that I might never, never look upon his face again!"

Rachel sat down by the latticed window and looked out into the darkness. She could not bear to look at Lady Newhaven. Was there any help anywhere from this horror of death without, from this demon of jealousy within?

"I am her only friend," she said to herself, over and over again. "I cannot bear it, and I must bear it. I cannot desert her now. She has no one to turn to but me."

"Rachel, where are you?" said the feeble, plaintive voice.

Rachel rose and went unsteadily towards her. It was fortunate the room was lit only by the fire-light.

"Sit down by me here on the sofa, and let me lean against you. You do comfort me, Rachel, though you say nothing. You are the only true friend I have in the world, the only woman who really loves me. Your cheek is quite wet, and you are actually trembling. You always feel for me. I can bear it now you are here, and he is going away."

When the boys had been reluctantly coerced to bed, Lord Newhaven rang for his valet, told him what to pack, that he should not want him to accompany him, and then went to his sitting-room on the ground-floor.

"Scarlett seems a fortunate person," he said, pacing up and down. "That woman loves him, and if she marries him she will reform him. Is he going to escape altogether in this world and the next—if there is a next? Is there no justice anywhere? Perhaps at this moment he is thinking that he has salved his conscience by offering to fight, and that, after all, I can't do anything to prevent his living and marrying her if he chooses. He knows well enough I shall not touch him, or sue for a divorce, for fear of the scandal. He thinks he has me there. And he is right. But he is mistaken if he thinks I can do nothing. I may as well go up to London and see for myself whether he is still on his feet to-morrow night. It is a mere formality, but I will do it. I might have guessed that she would try to smirch her own name, and the boys through her, if she had the chance. She will defeat me yet, unless I am careful. Oh, ye gods! why did I marry a fool who does not even know her own interests? If I had life over again I would marry a Becky Sharp, any she-devil incarnate, if only she had brains. One cannot circumvent a fool, because one can't foresee their line of action. But Miss West, for a miracle, is safe. She has a lock-and-key face. But she is not for Scarlett. Did Scarlett tell her himself in an access of moral spring-cleaning preparatory to matrimony? No. He may have told her that he had got into trouble with some woman, but not about the drawing of lots. Whatever his faults are, he has the instincts of a gentleman, and his mouth is shut. I can trust him like myself there. But she is not for him. He may think he will marry her, but I draw the line there. Violet and I have other views for him. He can live, if he wants to, and apparently he does want to, though whether he will continue to want to is another question. But he shall not have Rachel. She must marry Dick."

A distant rumbling was heard of the carriage driving under the stable archway on its way to the front-door.

Lord Newhaven picked up a novel with a mark in it, and left the room. In the passage he stopped a moment at the foot of the narrow black oak staircase to the nurseries, which had once been his own nurseries. All was very silent. He listened, hesitated; his foot on the lowest stair. The butler came round the corner to announce the carriage.

"I shall be back in four days at furthest," Lord Newhaven said to him, and turning, went on quickly to the hall, where the piercing night air came in with the stamping of the impatient horses' hoofs.

A minute later the two listening women up-stairs heard the carriage drive away into the darkness, and a great silence settled down upon the house.