Chapter XX: Introduction: To the Snowdon Edition of 1901 (17)

She laughed, and said, 'I suppose I must begin with his forehead then. It was almost of the tone of marble, and contrasted, but not too violently, with the thin crop of dark hair slightly curling round the temples, which were partly bald. The forehead in its form was so perfect that it seemed to shed its own beauty over all the other features; it prevented me from noticing, as I afterwards did, that these other features--the features below the eyes, were not in themselves beautiful. The eyes, which looked at me through spectacles, were of a colour between hazel and blue-grey, but there were lights shining within them which were neither grey, nor hazel, nor blue--wonderful lights. And it was to these indescribable lights, moving and alive in the deeps of the pupils, that his face owed its extraordinary attractiveness. Have I sufficiently described him? or am I to go on taking his face to pieces for you?'

'Go on, Winnie--pray go on.'

'Well, then, between the eyes, across the top of the nose, where the bridge of the spectacles rested, there was a strongly marked indented line which had the appearance of having been made by long-continued pressure of the spectacle frame. Am I still to go on?'

'Yes, yes.'

'The beauty of the face, as I said before, was entirely confined to the upper portion. It did not extend lower than the cheek-bones, which were well shaped.'

'The mouth, Winnie? Describe that, and then I need not ask you his name, though perhaps you don't know it yourself.'

'A dark brown moustache covered the mouth. I have always thought that a mouth is unattractive if the lips are so close to the teeth that they seem to stick to them; and yet what a kind woman Mrs. Shales is, and her mouth is of this kind. But, on the other hand, where the space between the teeth and the lips is too great no mouth can be called beautiful, I think. Now though the mouth of the gentleman was not ill-cut, the lips were too far from the teeth, I thought; they were too loose, a little baggy, in short. And when he laughed--'

'What about that, Winnie? I specially want to know about his laugh.'

'Then I will tell you. When he laughed his teeth were a little too much seen; and this gave the mouth a somewhat satirical expression.'

'Winnie,' I said, 'there is no need now for you to tell me the name of the gentleman. In a few sentences you have described him better than I could have done in a hundred.'

'And certainly there is no reason why I should not tell you his name,' she said, laughing, 'for if there is a word that is musical in my ears, it is the name of him whose voice is music--D'Arcy. When he told me that I should know everything in time, and that there was nothing for me to know except that which would give me comfort, and said, "You confide in me!" I could only answer, "Who would not confide in you? I will wait patiently until you tell me what you have to tell." "Then," said he, "the best thing you can do is to lie down for an hour or two on that divan and rest yourself, and go to sleep if you can, while I go and attend to certain affairs that need me." He then left the room. I was glad to be alone, for I was terribly tired. I felt as though I had been taking violent bodily exercise, but without feeling the staying power that Snowdon air can give. I lay down on the divan, and must have fallen asleep immediately. When I woke I found the same kind face near me, and the same kind eyes watching me. Mr. D'Arcy told me that I had been sleeping for two hours, and that it had, he hoped, much refreshed me. He told me also that he took a constitutional walk every day, and asked me if I would accompany him. I said, "Yes, I should like to do so." At this moment there passed the window some railway men leaving some luggage. On seeing them Mr. D'Arcy said, "I see that I must leave you for a minute or two to look after a package of canvases that has just come from my assistant in London," and he left me. When I was left alone I had an opportunity of observing the room. The walls were covered with old faded tapestry, so faded indeed that its general effect was that of a dull grey texture. On looking at it closely I found that it told the story of Samson. Every piece of furniture seemed to me to be a rare curiosity.'

'Now, Winnie,' I said, 'I am not going to interrupt you any more. I want to hear your story as an unbroken narrative.'

IV

'Well,' said Winnie, 'after a while Mr. D'Arcy returned and told me that he was now ready to take me for a stroll across the meadows, saying, "The doctor told me that, at first, your walks must be short; so while you go to your room I will get Mrs. Titwing in for my usual consultation about our frugal meal."

'"My room," I said, "my room, and Mrs. Titwing; who's--"

'"Ha! I quite forgot myself," he said, with an air of vexation, which he tried, I thought, to conceal. "I will ring for Mrs. Titwing--the housekeeper--and she will take you to your room."

'He walked towards the bell, but before reaching it he stopped as if arrested by a sudden thought. Then he said, "I will go to the housekeeper's room and speak to Mrs. Titwing there. I shall be back in a minute." And he passed from the room through the door by which he and I had first entered.

'Scarcely had the door closed behind him before a woman entered by another door opposite to it. She was about the common height, slender, and of an extremely youthful figure for a woman of middle age. Her bright-complexioned face, lit by two watery blue eyes, was pleasant to look upon. It was none the less pleasant because it showed clearly that she was as guileless as a child.

'I knew at once that she was the person--the housekeeper--that Mr. D'Arcy had gone to seek at the other side of the house. Evidently she had come upon me unexpectedly, for she gave a violent start, then she murmured to herself,

'"So it's all over, and all went off well." she said. Then she walked quietly towards me and threw her arms round me and kissed me, saying, "Dear child, I am so glad."

'The tone of voice in which she spoke to me was exactly that of a nurse speaking to a little child.

'I was so taken by surprise that I pulled myself from her embrace with some force. The poor woman looked at me in a hurt way and then said,

'"I beg your pardon, miss. I didn't notice at first how--how changed you are. The look in your eyes makes me feel that you are not the same person, and that I have done quite wrong."

'While she was speaking, Mr. D'Arcy had re-entered the room by the door by which he went out. He had evidently heard the housekeeper's words.

'"Miss Wynne," he said, "this is Mrs. Titwing, my excellent housekeeper. She has been attending you during your illness; but your weakness was so great that you were unconscious of all her kindness."

'I went up to her and kissed her rosy cheek, at which she began to cry a little. I afterwards found that she was in the habit of crying a little on most occasions.

'"Will you, then, kindly show me my room?" I said to her. But as she turned round to lead the way to the room, Mr. D'Arcy said to her,

'"Before you show Miss Wynne the way, I should like one word with you, Mrs. Titwing, in your room, about the arrangements for the day."

'The two passed out of the room, and again I was left to myself and my own thoughts.'

V

'Evidently there was some mystery about me,' said Winifred, continuing her story. 'But the more I tried to think it out the more puzzling it seemed. How had I been conveyed to this strange new place? Who was the wizard whose eyes and whose voice began to enslave me? and what time had passed since he caught me up on Raxton sands? It seemed exactly like one of those _Arabian Nights_ stories which you and I used to read together when we were children. The waking up on the couch, the sight of the end of the other couch behind the screen, and the tall woman's feet upon it, the voices from unseen persons in the room, and above all the strange magic of him who seemed to be the directing genie of the story--all would have seemed to me unreal had it not been for the prosaic figure of Mrs. Titwing. About her there could not possibly be any mystery; she was what Miss Dalrymple would have called "the very embodiment of British commonplace," and when, after a minute or two, she returned with Mr. D'Arcy, I went and kissed her again from sheer delight of feeling the touch of her real, solid; commonplace cheek, and to breathe the commonplace smell of scented soap. Her bearing, however, towards me had become entirely changed since she had gone out of the room. She did not return the kiss, but said, "Shall I show you the way, miss?" and led the way out.

'She took me through the same dark passage by which I had entered, and then I found myself in a large bedroom with low panelled walls, in the middle of which was a vast antique bedstead made of black carved oak, and every bit of furniture in the room seemed as old as the bedstead. Over the mantelpiece was an old picture in a carved oak frame, a Madonna and Child, the beauty of which fascinated me. I remember that on the bottom of the frame was written in printed letters the name "Chiaro dell' Erma." I was surprised to find in the room another walking-dress, not new, but slightly worn, laid out ready for me to put on. I lifted it up and looked at it. I saw at a glance that it would most likely fit me like a glove.

'"Whose dress is this?" I said.

'"It's yours, miss."

'"Mine? But how came it mine?"

'"Oh, please don't ask me any questions, miss," she said. "Please ask Mr. D'Arcy, miss; he knows all about it. I am only the housekeeper, miss."

'"Mr. D'Arcy knows all about my dress!" I said. "Why, what on earth has Mr. D'Arcy to do with my dress?"

'"Please don't ask me any more questions, miss," she said. "Pray don't. Mr. D'Arcy is a very kind man; I am sure nobody has ever heard me say but what he is a very kind man; but if you do what he says you are not to do, if you talk about what he says you are not to talk about, he is frightful, he is awful. He calls you a chattering old--I don't know what he won't call you. And, of course, I know you are a lady, miss. Of course you look a lady, miss, when you are dressed like one. But then, you see, when I first saw you, you were not dressed as you are now, and at first sight, of course, we go by the dress a good deal, you know. But Mr. D'Arcy needn't be afraid I shall not treat you like a lady, miss. I'm only a housekeeper now, though, of course, I was once very different--very different indeed. But, of course, anybody has only to look at you to see you are a lady, and, besides, Mr. D'Arcy says you are a lady, and that is quite enough."

'At this moment there came through the door--it was ajar--Mr. D'Arcy's voice from the distance, so loud and clear that every word could be heard.

'"Mrs. Titwing, why do you stay chattering there, preventing Miss Wynne from getting ready? You know we are going out for a walk together."

'"Oh Lord, miss!" said the poor woman in a frightened tone, "I must go. Tell him I didn't chatter--tell him you asked me questions and I was obliged to answer them."

'The mysteries around me were thickening every moment. What did this prattling woman mean about the dress in which she had at first seen me? Was the dress in which she had first seen me so squalid that it had affected her simple imagination? What had become of me after I had sunk down on Raxton sands, and why was I left neglected by every one? I knew you were ill after the landslip, but Mr. D'Arcy had just told me that you had since been well enough to go to Wales and afterwards to Japan.

'I put on the dress and soon followed her. When I reached the tapestried room there was Mr. D'Arcy talking to her in a voice so gentle, tender, and caressing, that it seemed impossible the rough voice I had heard bellowing through the passage could have come from the same mouth, and Mrs. Titwing was looking into his face with the delighted smile of a child who was being forgiven by its father for some trifling offence. As I stood and looked at them I said to myself, "Truly I am in a land of wonders."'

VI

'Mr. D'Arcy and I,' said Winifred, 'went out of the house at the back, walked across a roughly paved stable-yard, and passed through a gate and entered a meadow. Then we walked along a stream about as wide as one of our Welsh brooks, but I found it to be a backwater connected with a river. For some time neither of us spoke a word. He seemed lost in thought, and my mind was busy with what I intended to say to him, for I was fully determined to get some light thrown upon the mystery.

'When we reached the river bank we turned towards the left, and walked until we reached a weir, and there we sat down upon a fallen willow tree, the inside of which was all touchwood. Then he said,

'"You are silent, Miss Wynne."

'"And you are silent," I said.

'"My silence is easily explained," he said. "I was waiting to hear some remark fall from you as to these meadows and the river, which you have seen so often."

'"Which I see now for the first time, you mean."

'"Miss Wynne," he said, looking earnestly in my face, "you and I have taken this walk together nearly every day for months."

'"That," I said, "is--is quite impossible."

'"It is true," he said. And then again we sat silent.

'Then I said to him with great firmness, "Mr. D'Arcy, I'm only a peasant girl, but I'm Welsh; I have faith in you, faith in your goodness and faith in your kindness to me; but I must insist upon knowing how I came here, and how you and I were brought together."

'He smiled, and said, "I was right in thinking that your face expresses a good deal of what we call character. I should have preferred waiting for a day or two before relating all I have to tell," he said, "in answer to what you ask, but as you _insist_ upon having it now," with a playful kind of smile, "it would be ill-bred for me to insist that you must wait. But before I begin, would it not be better if you were to tell me something of what occurred to yourself when you were taken ill at Raxton?"

'"Then will your story begin where mine breaks off?" I said.

'"We shall see that," he said, "as soon as you have ended yours."

'"Do you know Raxton?" I said.

'At first he seemed to hesitate about his reply, and then said,

'"No, I do not."

'I then told him in as few words as I could our adventures on the sands on the night of the landslip, and my search for my father's body afterwards, until I suddenly sank down in a fit. When I had finished Mr. D'Arcy was silent, and was evidently lost in thought. At last he said,

'"My story, I perceive, cannot begin where yours breaks off. I first became acquainted with you in the studio of a famous painter named Wilderspin, one of the noblest-minded and most admirable men now breathing, but a great eccentric."

'"Why, Mr. D'Arcy, I never was in a studio in my life until to-day," I said.

'"You mean, Miss Wynne, that you were not consciously there," he said. "But in that studio you certainly were, and the artist, who reverenced you as a being from another world, was painting your face in a beautiful picture. While he was doing this you were taken seriously ill, and your life was despaired of. It was then that I brought you into the country, and here you have been living and benefiting by the kind services of Mrs. Titwing for a long time."

'"And you know nothing of my history previously to seeing me in the London studio?" I asked.

'"All that I could ever learn about that," said he, in what seemed to me a rather evasive tone, "I had to gather from the incoherent and rambling talk of Wilderspin, a religious enthusiast whose genius is very nearly akin to mania. He was so struck by you that he actually believed you to be not a corporeal woman at all; he believed you had been sent from the spirit-world by his dead mother to enable him to paint a great picture."

'"Oh, I must see him, and make him tell me all," I said.

'"Yes," said he, "but not yet."

'What Mr. D'Arcy told me,' said Winnie, 'affected me so deeply that I remained silent for a long time. Then came a thought which made me say,

'"You. too, are a painter, Mr. D'Arcy?"

'"Yes," he said.

'"During the months that I have been living here have you used me as your model?"

'"No; but that was not because I did not wish to do so."

'Then he suddenly looked in my face and said,

'"Is your family entirely Welsh, Miss Wynne?"

'"Entirely," I said. "But why did you not use me as your model, Mr. D'Arcy?"

'"Poor Wilderspin believed you to be a spiritual body," he said; "I did not. I knew that you were a young lady in an unconscious condition. To have painted you in such a condition and without the possibility of getting your consent would have been sacrilege, even if I had painted you as a Madonna."

'I could not speak, his words and tone were so tender. He broke the silence by saying,

'"Miss Wynne, there is one thing in connection with you that puzzles me very much. You speak of yourself as though you were a kind of Welsh peasant girl, and yet your conversation--well, I mustn't tell you what I think of that."

'This made me laugh outright, for ladies who called on Miss Dalrymple used to make the same remark.

'"Mr. D'Arcy," I said, "you are harbouring the greatest little impostor in the British Islands. I am the mere mocking-bird of one of the most cultivated women living. My true note is that of a simple Welsh bird."

'"A Welsh warbler," he said, with a smile, "but who was the original of the impostor?"

'"Miss Dalrymple," I said.

'"Miss Dalrymple, the writer!--why I knew her years ago--before you were born."

'Our talk had been so lively that we had not noticed the passage of time, nor had we noticed that the clouds had been gathering for a summer shower. Suddenly the rain fell heavily; although we ran to the house, we were quite wet by the time we got in.

'We found poor Mrs. Titwing in a great state of excitement on account of the rain, and also because the dinner had been waiting for nearly an hour. That scamper in the rain, and the laughing and joking at our predicament, seemed to bring us closer together than anything else could have done. Mr. D'Arcy told Mrs. Titwing to take me to my room to change my dress for dinner, and he seemed quite disappointed when I told him that I could eat no dinner, and would like to retire to my room for the night. The fact was that the events of that wonderful day had exhausted all my powers; every nerve within me seemed crying out for sleep.

'I went to my room, dismissed Mrs. Titwing, and went to bed at once. But no sooner had I got into bed than I began to perceive that, instead of sleep, a long wakeful night was before me. Mr. D'Arcy's story about finding me in a London studio took entire possession of my mind. How did I get there? Where had I been and what had been my adventures before I got there? Why did the painter, in whose studio Mr. D'Arcy found me, believe that I had been super-naturally sent to him? I shuddered as a thousand dreadful thoughts flowed into my mind. "Mr. D'Arcy," I said to myself, "must know more than he has told me." Then, of course, came thoughts about you. I wondered why you had allowed me to drift away from you in this manner. True, I was probably removed from Raxton immediately after my illness, when you were very ill, as I knew; but then you had recovered!'

VII

When Winifred reached this point in her story, I said,

'And so you wondered what had become of me from your last seeing me down to your waking up in Mr. D'Arcy's house?'

'Yes, yes, Henry. Do tell me what you were doing all that time.'

As she said these words the whole tragedy of my life returned to me in one moment, and yet in that moment I lived over again every dreadful incident and every dreadful detail. The spectacle on the sands, the search for her in North Wales, the meeting in the cottage, the frightful sight as she leapt away from me on Snowdon, the heart-breaking search for her among the mountains, the sound of her voice, singing by the theatre portico in the rain, the search for her in the hideous London streets, the scenes in the studios, the soul-blasting drama in Primrose Court--all came upon me in such a succession of realities that the beautiful radiant creature now talking to me seemed impossible except as a figure in a dream. And she was asking me to tell her what I had been doing during all these months of nightmare. But I knew that I never could tell her, either now or at any future time. I knew that to tell her would be to kill her.

'Winnie,' I said, 'I will tell you all about myself, but I must hear your story first. The faster you get on with that the sooner you will hear what I have to tell.'

'Then I will get on fast,' said she. 'After a while my thoughts, as I tossed in my bed, turned from the past to the future. What was the future that was lying before me? For months I had evidently been living on the charity of Mr. D'Arcy. My only excuse for having done so was that I was entirely unconscious of it; but now that I did know the relations between us I must of course end them at once. But what was I to do? Whither was I to go? Besides Miss Dalrymple, whose address I did not know, I had no friends except Sinfi Lovell and the Gypsies and a few Welsh farmers. To live upon my benefactor's generous charity now that I was conscious of it was, I felt, impossible.

'I was penniless. I had not even money to pay my railway fare to any part of England. There was only one thing for me to do--write to you. When I rose in the morning it was with the full determination to write to you at once. I had been told by Mrs. Titwing that Mr. D'Arcy always breakfasted alone in a little anteroom adjoining his bedroom, and always breakfasted late. My breakfast, she said, would be prepared in what she called the little green room. And when I left my bedroom, dressed in a morning dress that was carefully laid out for me, I found the housekeeper moving about in the passages. She conducted me to the little green room. On the walls were two looking-glasses in old black oak frames carved with knights at tilt and angels' heads hovering above them. Each frame contained two circular mirrors surrounded by painted designs telling the story of the Holy Grail. The room was furnished with quaint sofas and chairs on which beautiful little old-fashioned designs were painted. She told me that as I had not named an hour for breakfasting I should have to wait about twenty minutes.

'In one corner of the room was a rather large whatnot, on which lay one or two French novels in green and yellow paper covers and a few daily and weekly newspapers, which I went and turned over. Among them I was startled to find a paper called the _Raxton Gazette_. But I saw at once how it got there, for written on the margin at the top of the paper was the address, "Dr. Mivart, Wimpole Street, London." Mr. D'Arcy had told me that the gentleman whose voice I heard behind the screen was the medical man who attended to me during my illness, and it now suddenly flashed upon my mind that at Raxton there was a Dr. Mivart, though I had never seen him during my stay there. These were, no doubt, one and the same person, and some one from Raxton had posted the newspaper to the doctor's house in London.

'I looked down the columns of the paper with a very lively interest, and my eye was soon caught by a paragraph encircled by a thick blue pencil mark. It gave from a paper called the _London Satirist_ what professed to be a long account of you, in which it was said that you were living in a bungalow in Wales with a Gypsy girl.'

When Winifred said this I forgot my promise not to interrupt her narrative, and exclaimed,

'And you believed this infamous libel, Winnie?'

'To say that I believed it as a simple statement of fact would of course be wrong. I never doubted you loved me as a child.'

'As a child! Do you then think that I did not love you that night on Raxton sands?'

'I did not doubt that you loved me then. But wealth, I had been told, is so demoralising, and I thought your never coming forward to find me and protect me in my illness might have something to do with inconstancy. Anyhow, these thoughts combined with my dread of your mother to prevent me from writing to you.'

'Winnie, Winnie!' I said, 'these theories of the so-called advanced thinkers, whom your aunt taught you to believe in--these ideas that love and wealth cannot exist together, are prejudices as narrow and as blind as those of an opposite kind which have sapped the natures of certain members of my own family.'

'The sight of your dear sad face when I first saw it here was proof enough of that,' she said. 'As your life was said to be that of a wanderer, I did not care to write to Raxton, and I did not know where to address you. What I had read in the newspaper, I need not tell you, troubled me greatly. I cried bitterly, and made but a poor breakfast. After it was over Mr. D'Arcy entered the room, and shook me warmly by the hand. He saw that I had been crying, and he stood silent and seemed to be asking himself the cause. Drawing a chair towards me, and taking a seat, he said,

'"I fear you have not slept well, Miss Wynne."

'"Not very well," I answered. Then, looking at him, I said, "Mr. D'Arcy, I have something to say to you, and this is the moment for saying it."

'He gave a startled look, as though he guessed what I was going to say.

'"And I have something to say to _you_, Miss Wynne," he said, smiling, "and this seems the proper time for saying it. Up to the last few weeks a young gentleman from Oxford has been acting as my secretary. He has now left me, and I am seeking another. His duties, I must say, have not been what would generally be called severe. I write most of my own letters, though not all, and my correspondence is far from being large. His chief duty has been that of reading to me in the evening. For many years my eyes have not been so strong as a painter's ought to be, and the oculist whom I consulted told me that the strain of the painter's work was quite as much as my eyes ought to bear, and that I could not afford much eyesight for reading purposes. I am passionately fond of reading. To be without the pleasure that books can afford me would be to make me miserable, and I have looked upon my secretary's duty of reading aloud to me as an important one. If you would take his place you would be conferring the greatest service upon me."

'"Mr. D'Arcy," I said, "I suspect you."

'"Suspect me, Miss Wynne?"

'"I suspect that generous heart of yours. I suspect you are merely inventing a post for me to fill, because you pity me."

'"No, Miss Wynne; upon my honour this is not so. I will not deny that if it were not in your power to do me the service that I ask of you, I should still feel the greatest disappointment if you passed from under this roof. Your scruples about living here as you lived during your illness--simply as my guest--I understand, but do not approve. They show that you are not quite so free from the bondage of custom as I should like every friend of mine to be. The tie of friendship is, in my judgment, the strongest of all ties, stronger than that of blood, because it springs from the natural kinship of soul to soul, and there is no reason in the world why I should not offer you a home as a friend, or why, if the circumstances of our lives were reversed, you should not offer me one. But in this case it is the fact that the service I am asking you to render me is greater than any service I can render you."

'I was so deeply touched by his words and by his way of speaking them, that my lips trembled, and I could make no reply.

'"It is a shame," he said, "for me to talk about business so soon after your recovery. Let us leave the matter for the moment, and come to me in the studio during the morning, and let me show you the pictures I am painting, and some of my choice things."

'The morning wore on, and still I sat pondering over the situation in which I found myself. The servant came and removed the breakfast things, and her furtive glances at me showed that I was an object at once familiar and strange to her. But very little attention did I pay to her, in such a whirl of thoughts as I then was. The moment that one course of action seemed to me the best, the very opposite would occur to me as being the best. However, I was determined to know from Mr. D'Arcy, and at once, what was the state in which I was when I was brought to this place, and what had been the course of my life during my stay here. Mr. D'Arcy had told me that, for reasons which he so touchingly alluded to, he had not used me as a model. How, then, had my time been passed? To question poor Mrs. Titwing would only be to frighten her. I would ask Mr. D'Arcy for a full confession.

'Mrs. Titwing came into the room. She began pulling at the ribbon of her black silk apron as though she wanted to speak and could not find the proper words. At last she said,

'"I hope, miss, there have been no words between you and Mr. D'Arcy?"

''"Words between me and Mr. D'Arcy? What do you mean?" I asked.

'"He seems very much upset, miss, about something. He is not at his easel, but keeps walking about the studio, and every now and then he asks where you are. I'm sure he used to dote on you when you were a child, miss."

'"When I was a child?" I said, laughing. "But I see what it is. I have been very neglectful. I promised to go into the studio to see the pictures, and he is, of course, impatient at my keeping him waiting. I will go to him at once," and I went.

'When I entered the studio he turned quickly round and said,

'"Well?"

'"You were so kind," I said, "as to invite me to see your treasures."

'"To be sure," he said. "I thought you came to give your decision."

'He then showed me the curious divan upon which I had rested the day before, and explained to me the meaning of the carved designs.'

VIII

Winifred described the designs on the divan so vividly that I could almost see them. But what interested me was the painter, not his surroundings; and she now seemed to grow weary of talking about herself.

'Did he,' I said, 'did he say anything about--about painters' models?'

'Yes,' she said, 'Mr. D'Arcy took me to an easel and showed me a picture. It was only the half-length of a woman; but it was a tragedy rendered fully by the expression on one woman's face.

'"I had no idea," I said, "that any picture of a single face could do such work as that. Was this painted from a model?"

'"Yes," he said, with a smile, which was evidently at my ignorance of art. "It was painted from life."

'There were four other half-lengths in the room, all of them very beautiful.

'"Two of these," he said, "are copies; the originals have been sold. The other two need still a few touches to make them complete."

'"And they were all painted from life?" I said.

'"Yes," he said. "Why do you repeat that question?"

'"Because," I said, "although they are all so wonderful and so beautiful in colour, I can see a great difference between them--I can scarcely say what the difference is. They are evidently all painted by the same artist, but painted in different moods of the artist's mind."

'"Ah," he said, "I am much interested. Let me see you classify them according to your view. There are, as you see, two brunettes and two blondes."

'"Yes," I said, "between this grand brunette, to use your own expression, holding a pomegranate in her hand and the other brunette whose beautiful eyes are glistening and laughing over the fruit she is holding up, there is the same difference that there is between the blonde's face under the apple blossoms and the other blonde's face of the figure that is listening to music. In both faces the difference seems to be that of the soul."

'"The two faces," said he, "in which you see what you call soul are painted from two dear friends of mine--ladies of high intelligence and great accomplishments, who occasionally honour me by giving me sittings--the other two are painted from two of the finest hired models to be found in London."

'"Then," I said, "an artist's success depends a great deal upon his model? I had no idea of such a thing."

'"It does indeed," he said. "Such success as I have won since my great loss is very largely owing to those two ladies, one so grand and the other so sweet, whom you are admiring."

'The way in which he spoke the words "since my great loss" almost brought tears into my eyes. He then went round the room, and explained in a delightful way the various pictures and objects of interest. I felt that I was preventing him from working, and told him so.

'"You are very thoughtful," he said, "but I can only paint when I feel the impulse within me, and to-day I am lazy. But while you go and get your luncheon--I do not lunch myself--I must try to do something. You must have many matters of your own that you would like to attend to. Will you return to the studio about five o'clock, and let me have your company in another walk?"

'Until five o'clock I was quite alone, and wandered about the house and garden trying my memory as to whether I could recall something, but in vain. At any other time than this I should no doubt have found the old house a very fascinating one; but not for two minutes together could my mind dwell upon anything but the amazing situation in which I found myself. The house was, I saw, built of grey stone, and as it had seven gables it suggested to me Nathaniel Hawthorne's famous story, of which my aunt was so fond. Inside I found every room to be more or less interesting. But what attracted me most, I think, was a series of large attics in which was a number of enormous oak beams supporting the antique roof. With the sunlight pouring through the windows and illuminating almost every corner, the place seemed cheerful enough, but I could not help thinking how ghostly it must look on a moonlight night.

'While the thought was in my mind, a strangle sensation came upon me. I seemed to hear a moan; it came through the door of the large attic adjoining the one in which I stood, and then I heard a voice that seemed familiar to me, and yet I could not recall it. It was repeating in a loud, agonised tone the words of that curse written on the parchment scroll which I picked up on Raxton sands. I was so astonished that for a long time I could think of nothing else.

IX

'At five o'clock I was going towards the studio to keep my appointment when I met Mr. D'Arcy in his broad-brimmed felt hat, ready and waiting for me to take the proposed walk with him.

'Oh, what a lovely afternoon it was! A Welsh afternoon could not have been lovelier. In fact, it carried my mind back here. The sun, shining on the buttercups and the grey-tufted standing grass, made the meadows look as though covered with a tapestry that shifted from grey to lavender, and then from lavender to gold, as the soft breeze moved over it. And many of the birds were still in full song; and brilliant as was the music of the skylarks, the blackbirds and thrushes were so numerous that the music falling from the sky seemed caught and swallowed up by the music rising from the hedgerows and trees.

'I lingered at one of the gates through which we passed to enjoy the beauty undisturbed by the motion of my own body.

'"I have often wished," Mr. D'Arcy said, "that I had a tithe of your passion for Nature, and all your knowledge of Nature. To have been born in London and to have passed one's youth there is a great loss. Nature has to be learnt, as art has to be learnt, in earliest youth."

'"What makes you know that my chief passion is love of Nature?" I asked.

'"It was," he said, "the one thing you showed during your illness--during your unconscious condition."

'"And yet I remember nothing of that time," I said. "This gives me an opportunity of asking you something--an opportunity which I had determined to make for myself before another day went by."

'"And what is that?" he said, in a tone that betrayed some uneasiness.

'"You have told me how I came here. I now want you to tell me, too, what was my condition when I came and what was my course of life during all this long period. How did the time pass? What did I do? I remember nothing."

'"I am glad you are asking me these questions," he said, "for I believe that the more fully and more exactly I answer them, the better for you and the better for me. Victor Hugo, in one of his romances, speaks of the pensive somnambulism of the animals. 'Somnambulism,' sometimes pensive and sometimes playful, is the very phrase I should use in characterising your condition when you first came here and down to your recovery from that strange illness. But this somnambulism would every now and then change and pass into a consciousness which I can only compare with that of a child. But no child that I have ever seen was so bewitchingly child-like as you were. It was this that made your presence such a priceless boon to me."

'"Priceless boon, Mr. D'Arcy!" I said. "How could such a being as you describe be a priceless boon to any one?"

'"I will tell you," he replied. "Even before that great sorrow which has made me the loneliest man upon the earth--even in the days when my animal spirits were considered at times almost boisterous, I was always at intervals subject to periods of great depression, or rather, I should say, to periods of _ennui_. I must either be painting or reading or writing. I had not the precious faculty of being able on occasions to sit and let the rich waters of life flow over me. I would yearn for amusement, and search in vain for some object to amuse me. When you first came I was deeply interested in so extraordinary a case as yours; and after a while, when the acuteness of my curiosity and the poignancy of my sympathy for you had abated, you became to me a joy, as a child is a joy in the eyes of its parents."

'"Then your interest in me," I said, with a smile, "was that which you would feel towards a puppy or a kitten."

'"I perceive that you have a turn for satire," he said, laughing. "I will not deny that I have an extraordinarily strong passion for watching the movements of animals. I have, to the sorrow of my neighbours, filled my garden in London with all kinds of purchases from Jamrach's. But from the moment that I knew you, who combined the fascination of a fawn and a child with that of a sylph or a fairy, my poor little menagerie was neglected, and what became of its members I scarcely know. I suppose I am very uncomplimentary to you, but you would have the truth. The moment that I felt myself threatened by the fiend _Ennui_ I used to tell Mrs. Titwing, who was in the habit of calling you her baby, to bring you into the studio, and at once the fiend fled. At last I grew so attached to you that your presence was a positive necessity of my life. Unless I knew that you were in the studio I could not paint. It was necessary for me at intervals to look across the room at that divan and see you there amusing yourself--playing with yourself, so to speak, sometimes like a kitten, sometimes like a child. I would not have parted with you for the world."

'He did not say he would not now part with me for the world, Henry, and I thought I understood the meaning of that expression of disappointment which I had observed in his eyes when I first saw them looking into mine. I thought I understood this extraordinary man--so unlike all others; I thought I knew why my eyes lost the charm he was now so eloquently describing to me the moment that they became lighted with what he called self-consciousness.

'After a while I said, "But as I was in such an unconscious state as you describe, how could you possibly know that a speciality of mine is a love of Nature?"

'"It was only when you were out in the open air that the condition which I have compared to somnambulism seemed at times to disappear. Then your consciousness seemed to spring up for a moment and to take heed of what was passing around you. You would sometimes scamper through the meadows, pluck the wild-flowers and weave them into wreaths round your head, or stand listening to the birds, or hold out your hands as if to embrace the sunny wind. One day when a friend of mine, an enthusiastic angler, who comes here, was going down to the river to fish, you showed the greatest interest in what was going on. The fishing tackle seemed so familiar to you that my friend put a fishing rod into your hand and you went with him to the river. I do not myself care for angling, and I was at the time very busy with a picture, but I could not resist the temptation to follow you. You skipped into the punt with the greatest glee, baited your hook, adjusted your float on the line, cast it into the water and fished with such skill that you caught two fish to my friend's one. Observing all these things, I came to the conclusion that you had lived much in the open air, and other incidents made me know that you were a great lover of Nature."

'"And you," I said, "must also be a lover of Nature, or you could not find such delight in watching animals."

'"No," he said, "the interest I take in animals has nothing whatever to do with love of Nature or study of Nature. They interest me by that unconsciousness of grace which makes them such a contrast to man."

'We then went into the house. Our talk during our ramble in the fields seemed to remove effectually all awkwardness and restraint between us.

X

'That day,' said Winnie, 'a determination which had been caused by many a reflection during the last few hours induced me at dinner to lead the conversation to the subject of pictures and models. In a few minutes Mr. D'Arcy launched out in an eloquent discourse upon a subject which was so new to me and so familiar to him.

'"You were saying this morning, Mr. D'Arcy," I urged me to tell her what had befallen myself since we had parted at the cottage door at Raxton. Even had it been possible for me to talk about myself without touching upon some dangerous incident or another, my impatience to get at the mystery of mysteries in connection with her and her rescue from Primrose Court was so great that I could only implore her to tell me what had occurred down to her leaving Hurstcote Manor, and also what had been the cause of her leaving.

'Well,' said Winnie, 'I am now going to tell you of an extraordinary thing that happened. One fine night the moon was so brilliant that after I quitted Mr. D'Arcy I stole out of the side door into the garden, a favourite place of mine, for old English flowers were mixed with apple trees and pear trees. I was strolling about the garden, thinking over a thousand things connected with you, and myself, and Mr. D'Arcy, when I saw stooping over a flower-bed the figure of a tall woman. I could scarcely believe my eyes, for I had all the while supposed that, excepting Mr. D'Arcy, myself, and Mrs. Titwing, the servants were the only occupants of the place. I turned away, and walked silently through the little wicket into what is called the home close. As I pondered over the incident, I recalled certain things which singly had produced no effect on my mind, but which now fitted in with each other, and seemed to open up vistas of mystery and suspicion. Mysterious looks and gestures on the faces of the servants pointed to there being some secret that was to be kept from me. I had not given much heed to these things, but now I could not help connecting them with the appearance of the tall woman in the garden.

'Some guests arrived next day, and when I pleaded headache Mr. D'Arcy said, "Perhaps you would rather keep to your own room to-day."

'I told him I should, and I spent the day alone--spent it mainly in thinking about the tall woman. In the evening I went into the garden, and remained there for a long time, but no tall woman made her appearance.

'I passed out through the wicket into the home close, and as I walked about in the grass, under the elms that sprang up from the tall hedge, I thought and thought over what I had seen, but could come to no explanation. I was standing under a tree, in the shadow which its branches made, when I became suddenly conscious that the tall woman was close to me. I turned round, and stood face to face with Sinfi Lovell. The sight of a spectre could not have startled me more, but the effect of my appearance upon her was greater still. Her face took an expression that seemed to curdle my blood, and she shrieked, "Father! the curse! Let his children be vagabonds and beg their bread; let them seek it also out of desolate places." And then she ran towards the house.

'In a few minutes Mr. D'Arcy came out into the field without his hat, and evidently much agitated.

'"Miss Wynne," he said, "I fear you must have been half frightened to death. Never was there such an unlucky _contretemps_."

'"But why is Sinfi Lovell here?" I said, "and why was I not told she was here?"

'"Sinfi is an old friend of mine," he said. "I have been in the habit of using her as a model for pictures. She came here to sit to me, when she was taken ill. She is subject to fits, as you have seen. The doctor believed that they were over and would not recur, and I had determined that to-morrow I would bring you together."

'I made no reply, but walked silently by his side across the field to the little wicket. The confidence I had reposed in Mr. D'Arcy had been like the confidence a child reposes in its father.

'"Miss Wynne," he said, in a voice full of emotion, "I feel that an unlucky incident has come between us, and yet if I ever did anything for your good, it was when I decided to postpone revealing the fact that Sinfi Lovell was under this roof until her cure was so complete and decisive that you could never by any chance receive the shock that you have now received."

'I felt that my resentment was melting in the music of his words.

'"What caused the fits?" I said. "She talked about being under a curse. What can it mean?"

'"That," he said, "is too long a story for me to tell you now."

'"I know," said I, "that some time ago the tomb of Mr. Aylwin's father was violated by some undiscovered miscreant, and I know that the words Sinfi uttered just now are the words of a curse written by the dead man on a piece of parchment, and stolen with a jewel from his tomb. I have seen the parchment itself, and I know the words well. Her father, Panuel Lovell, is as innocent of the crime of sacrilege as my poor father was. What could have made her suppose that she had inherited the curse from her father?"

'"I have no explanation to offer," he said. "As you know so much of the matter and I know so little, I am inclined to ask you for some explanation of the puzzle."

'I thought over the matter for a minute, and then I said to him, "Sinfi Lovell knows Raxton as well as Snowdon, and must have been very familiar with the crime. I can only suppose that she has brooded so long over the enormity of the offence and the appalling words of the curse that she has actually come at last to believe that poor, simple-minded Panuel Lovell is the offender, and that she, as his child, has inherited the curse."

'"A most admirable solution of the mystery," he said, his face beaming with delight.'

XII