Chapter IV

A general content, sinister, some might think, in its promise of an early break-up, had settled in the Bruno home.

Mr. Bruno was very contented. His mercury, as he phrased it, was high. The phrase was a new use of his. No other word could so well describe, in his detached and humorous analysis of his own emotions, that abject financial depression which followed a damaging review of his latest book, or that quick rise in spirits induced by a handsome tribute or a publisher's statement showing excellent sales. After a grand morning's work, when his brain had outrun his pen, the mercury, as it were, rose to his head, filling it with visions of an imperial home, with horses in the extensive stabling and forty wines in the cellar, and cattle moving among the trees of the park. After a morning when nothing but the commonplace or the obvious would take substance on his paper, he saw a lower-middle-class jerry-built house, in which, with two children who went out to poorly-paid jobs, lived a writer whom the world had once acclaimed and quickly forgotten. To read about such a person, as one did sometimes in the paper, was to send his mercury to freezing point. He no longer saw the bankruptcy court, however, or the casual ward, for against these disasters he had amassed a capital sum, and if his brain collapsed to-morrow (thought he), his dividends would pay the rent of the jerry-built house and put some bread and cold meat in the larder.

There were reasons just now why his mercury should be high. A year before he had written his first play and secured its production. It had failed most noisily. When a destructive critic produces a play that has obvious weaknesses, it is to ask for artillery; and Mr. Bruno and his play went down beneath a reverberating bombardment. Concluding that his fame was mortally wounded and a year or so later would see the end, he wondered how he could cut down his style of living, and began to turn off gases that people had left alight on the stairs, or to complain courteously when coke was not mingled with the coal on the fire. "No one ever yet put coke on a fire," thought he, surprised how the worrying thought could make his head ache, "who didn't pay the fuel bill." And to his daughter if she prattled glibly about the pleasure-seeking life she would lead when grown up, he would say, "Nothing of the sort, my child. You'll go into a milliner's shop; and, as for Owen, he'll earn his ten shillings a week sweeping out a solicitor's office." But then, as the mercury crept up, he wrote another play, freeing it from the weaknesses that the crowding critics had pointed out in such detail. It was as lively and noisily successful as its brother had been wilting and moribund. The critics crowded to its jubilee instead of to its funeral. Mr. Tenter Bruno was more than ever news; he had long been known to the literary and the vaguely literary world, but now his face and his repartee and his movements and his anecdotes were the property of readers of the halfpenny press. "And you can write him a liar," said Mr. Bruno, "who denies that that pleases him."

He was content about his children, hearing excellent reports of the new governess. Daphne spoke enthusiastically of her, because her motions of love made all talk of Miss Carrell a pleasure; Miss Durgon reported the girl in the highest terms, because she had to justify her move in securing her; and Hollins said, "Why, that little Miss Carrell can do anything with the child, she can. It does me good to see it." So no household or parental cares needed to cross the doormat of Mr. Bruno's room. He began to play with the idea of setting forth on his travels again. And from the moment he welcomed the idea into his lonely study, he knew that he would finally succumb to its charm. And at length he introduced it to Miss Durgon.

"My work, I begin to find, demands that I move--and travel, rather than stagnate. One's imagination is starved by living too long in a London street. So few people realize it.... I brought a lot of stimulus out of the East. What I am really longing for is the day when my daughter shall be old enough to be my constant and enthusiastic companion. Then my powers of observation will be doubled, I verily believe, by the delight of revealing to her the romance of other lands and other manners."

Leaving these sentiments behind him, Mr. Bruno departed for a winter in Madeira.

Miss Durgon was contented. Released entirely from the charge of the children, which Miss Carrell and Hollins shared, she needed to do little but reign elegantly over the household. And the encomiums, confidences and frequent absences of her employer made her feel finally secure in the position which she had now held for nearly nine years. Incredible that it could be nine years! Her mind told her that she looked younger, more vivacious, and certainly more fashionable than when first she came knocking at Mr. Bruno's door. Her security made her, perhaps rashly, indifferent to the comments of servants. Her excursions when she was absent a whole day were more frequent than before. And once or twice she entertained Mr. Stokes, or Mr. Anthony, in the breakfast-room, which she had now made into her private sitting-room. They came singly, of course, the visits of each being unknown to the other.

Mr. Stokes and Mr. Anthony were gentlemen friends who liked her companionship at theatres and suppers, though they conducted these relaxations beyond the regions swept by their wives' eyes. Tacitly it was understood that the wives were not informed. Miss Durgon saw no reason why they should be. There was nothing scandalous in their husband's change of companionship; and she found herself quite able to meet Mrs. Stokes and Mrs. Anthony at tea-parties, or in their own homes. But it was unlikely they would understand her reasoning--a reasoning learnt from their husbands, which made play with words like Life, and Naturalness and Affinities. So her concealment was the concession of a reasonable woman.

Little Miss Carrell was contented because she lived and slept and woke in the morning with her own schemes. They required that she did all in her power to develop Daphne's adoration, and to secure its publication to Daphne's papa and its concealment from the housekeeper.

"You know what Miss Durgon is, Duffy darling. If she thought you were so fond of me, she would do her best to get rid of me. I'm sure she would. And I don't want to leave you, now that I've grown so attached to you. And I really believe you'd miss me."

To confirm this Daphne put her arms about Miss Carrell--since nobody was by.

"You must pretend sometimes that you don't like the way I make you stick at your work; and that I'm a bit of a tyrant. That'll be a sure way to make the old Durgon think I'm a person to be kept."

And Miss Carrell, for her purposes, had made a friend of Hollins. She set out to be attractive to the good soul, conceiving her to have a heart that could be easily engaged. With Hollins she was always polite, smiling, considerate and talkative, though never losing the slight dignity that lent worth to her condescension. The balance was skilfully kept.

The wisdom of this _entente cordiale_ had been shown to her one morning when she was passing the dining-room door, and overheard a conversation between Hollins and a sweeping maid.

"She's ordered the decanter of whisky and the soda water and the sandwiches to be put to-night in what she's pleased to call her room, though when it became her room and stopped being the breakfast-room _I_ don't know. And I wonder which it is that's coming to-night. Some people have got a cheek--using that house in that high and mighty way, as if she was its lady."

"High and mighty!" scoffed the maid. "Low, I call it. Who are these Mr. Anthonies and Mr. Stokeses? Not that they can be much if they see anything attractive in _her_."

"Ah, yes, who are they?" said the voice of Hollins. "That's what many of us'd like to know. I reckon it's laughable being a charmer at her age. And do Mr. Stokes approve of Mr. Anthony, I want to know, and do Mr. Anthony approve of Mr. Stokes? Why are they never here together? That's what wants sort of--what I call--answering."

"There's many things that want answering that don't get it," said the maid sententiously.

"Yes, there are," agreed Hollins, and the listening Miss Carrell could picture the mysterious nod of her head.

Miss Carrell left no openings unguarded, however small. If she were to keep Hollins's good opinion it would be well (she imagined) that Daphne's adoration were none too visible to her old nurse.

"She mustn't be allowed to think, dear, that you are fonder of me than her, though I suppose it is natural that there must always be more between people of the same class and of a nearer age than between a young mistress and her ancient servant. But you mustn't hurt the dear, fat old thing. It wouldn't be kind. Also she might get jealous. So you be especially nice to old Hollins. For she is a dear, fat old thing. I love her. And let her know (just so that she mayn't dislike me) that I love her, and realise how much she has done for my little Duffy, and that I impress it all upon you."

And after saying this, Miss Carrell was more than ever satisfied with her skilful pilotage; and Daphne was more than ever satisfied with the essential goodness of her governess; and Hollins, when Daphne had done all she was bidden, was more than ever satisfied with the high breeding of Miss Carrell. "A real lady. It's a treat to have dealings with one at last."

With Miss Durgon, Miss Carrell was obliging and considerate, relieving her delicately of one duty after another. She made herself a pleasant companion, always interested, generally agreeing, but disagreeing sufficiently not to become insipid.

"I hope that child's getting on," the elder lady would say. "She's a little girl that wants a lot of control if she's not to run to seed."

"She needs to be kept hard at it, certainly," agreed Miss Carrell. "The boy is much more amenable. He's a really lovable little thing."

"Yes, he is. No trouble at all."

Once when Miss Durgon complained of a headache, Miss Carrell assured her that she needed a holiday. Impossible, declared the martyred Miss Durgon; she would never trust the household to Hollins alone. Then Miss Carrell made her suggestion. Couldn't she (Miss Carrell), who had long kept house for her mother, and now knew the ins and outs of Mr. Bruno's home--couldn't she come into residence for a week or so and manage things? Miss Durgon demurred, but finally saw something in the plan.

When the plan was tried Miss Carrell had need to hold her wheel with a very delicate hand indeed. Her elevation to deputy housekeeper, even though only for twenty-one days, very nearly lost her the adhesion of Hollins. Hollins could not see why a chit like that should be required when she was on the spot. Miss Carrell was fortunate enough to be in the hall when Hollins was discussing the matter with the other servants in the dining-room. "The Durgon's done it on purpose to spite me," Hollins was saying. "Of course she has. It's as plain as the nose on your face. I don't altogether blame the little governess. I don't think she'd hurt anybody if she could avoid it. But what I do say, and what I have always said, is that it was a bad day when that Durgon woman came knocking at our doors. And who is she going away with, is what I should like to know? Is it your Stokes or your Antonio?"

Little Miss Carrell saw her course. By gently refusing to notice any sullenness, and by skilful reductions of work and an increase of privileges and an improvement in the kitchen meals, she gradually persuaded all below stairs that it was a pity she hadn't always had the management of the house.

When Miss Durgon returned the regent stepped down from the throne with all the grace and some recollection (since she had just been reading about him to Daphne) of Cincinnatus returning to his plough.

In time it became quite a custom for Miss Durgon to take a week off now and then, and hand over the reins to her lieutenant.

But not when Mr. Bruno was back from Madeira or elsewhere.

"I feel I ought to be in my place when Mr. Bruno is here. There's really more to do then."

"Of course," said Miss Carrell, wondering if Miss Durgon really supposed she didn't see through her. It was beginning to dawn on her that the lady housekeeper, inside her fine clothes and her dignity, was a very considerable fool.

Probably Mr. Bruno would never have known of these arrangements if Hollins hadn't thought it on her conscience to say, in the course of a conversation with him:

"Oh, but that happened when Miss Carrell was doing the housekeeping--when Miss Durgon was away."

Mr. Bruno looked up.

"What did you say, Hollins?"

"I said that happened when Miss Carrell took Miss Durgon's place and ran the house."

"Did she? When was this?"

"Oh, she often does when you're away, sir. I thought you knew, and sort of suggested it."

"I did nothing of the sort," said he, feeling rather important. "I must ask Miss Durgon about it. I can't think Miss Carrell is old enough to manage a household such as this."

"Oh, she's done none so badly, sir," assured Hollins. "And, of course, I was there to help her."

"Of course, Hollins. And she's really a wonderfully capable little person, isn't she?"

Hollins gone, Mr. Bruno sat in his chair for some time thinking. It was perhaps a small thing, this French leave habit of Miss Durgon's, but it seemed to show him traces of falsity in her character which he knew his quick version could have seen long ago had he given it the order to see. He dreamed out a conversation after dinner that night when he rebuked Miss Durgon. It was a conversation from which he issued with increased dignity. "I cannot think, Miss Durgon, that such a step was within the autonomy with which---- Please don't think I am anything but highly satisfied, but---- Your need of a holiday no one would deny, and I confess to having been remiss in not thinking of it before. Had you so much as mentioned it to me----" But as the meal drew to its close he felt what an exceedingly uncomfortable thing it was to administer rebukes to a person in Miss Durgon's position, and how the contemplation of it was spoiling his appetite and his conversation. Even she might say: "Very well, Mr. Bruno, if you think I am incompetent or neglect my duty, I had best resign my office. With all thanks, I am sure, for your kindness and unvaried courtesy in the past." And he would be reduced to the horrid necessity of begging her to reconsider her decision. No, things were perhaps best left as they were. Doubtless Miss Carrell was capable, or Miss Durgon would not have done such a thing. And this evening he especially wanted to work on a play with an unagitated mind.

"But I can't help admiring the impudence of that little Carrell girl seating herself astride my home like that. There's a lot in her."

Miss Durgon, ignorant of these movements in her employer's mind, had been so pleased to find that the governess could fill the position of deputy housekeeper that she was seeing the convenience of having the young woman in permanent residence. Then she would at any moment be free to go away, if only for a night or so. Miss Carrell, after some doubts, fell in with the scheme more readily than Miss Durgon had dared hope. It was a grateful matter that the difficulty of her mother could be so easily overcome.

Now to approach Mr. Bruno. In his room Miss Durgon hastened to pour out all the points she had previously enumerated on her fingers' ends: that she was very satisfied with the governess's remarkable success with the children; that Daphne was getting too big to be left, in the evenings when she herself happened to be out, to the charge of servants; that Miss Carrell would be able to help the children with their homework; that it would relieve them all of the sewing and care of the clothes, which was getting heavy; and that, in a household of so many persons, it would hardly cost a penny more a week, since she already had lunch and tea with him.

"Oh, if we can have all that for nothing a week, let's have it," Mr. Bruno smiled.

But he thought this would be a good opportunity to mention his knowledge that his household had already been somewhat frivolously left, for weeks at a time, to the management of a twenty-three-year-old girl. And his eye, the eye of a dramatist, saw at once the hidden embarrassment of Miss Durgon.

"Yes," she admitted, "I was feeling so run down while you were away that I made that arrangement, but only with a deep sense of responsibility. I would not have suggested such a thing had I not decided that Miss Carrell was quite exceptional. Quite exceptional."

"I feel she is," endorsed Mr. Bruno.

"Yes, she is. Quite exceptional," repeated Miss Durgon, since this was her justification.

So Miss Durgon helped to weave the rope that hanged her.

Miss Carrell hanged her at Christmas time. Quite simply. To be sure, it had been simpler to suggest that Hollins mentioned Mr. Stokes and Mr. Anthony to the master; but it would be rather undignified, this enlisting of servants' aid. And yet simpler had she herself alluded innocently to Miss Durgon's friends; but this savoured of ugly informing, and Mr. Bruno, a clever man, would see through it. And she didn't want Miss Durgon to go to the rope thinking her companion had "sneaked." In their conversations Mr. Anthony and Mr. Stokes had necessarily been spoken of, but always very casually, as if their visits were naturalness itself, and Miss Carrell the sort who could understand: the foolish woman even (so thought Miss Carrell) was not without a pride in hinting at her attractiveness. Besides, the thing, if only told, might not be very effective with Mr. Bruno: preoccupied, he would but half take it in. It must be seen in being.

Conceiving of Miss Durgon, Mr. Anthony, Mr. Stokes and Mr. Bruno as the chess pieces of Miss Carrell--Miss Durgon the queen, Mr. Anthony and Mr. Stokes her knights, and Mr. Bruno the opposing king--obviously the plan was to get the king into a position from which he could capture one or both of the knights. Always a difficult position to contrive, for the moves of knights are crooked. Herein came Daphne. When at last the occasion offered, she was used as pawn to lure out the king.

Christmas time brought the children's parties; exciting entertainments that illuminated not only the day whose evening they would adorn, but many of the days that went before. And the most brilliant of these, throwing a light that reached down weeks, was Lady Montefiore's fancy-dress affair, from four to nine, in the Kensington Town Hall. Costumes had to be resolved upon and made, and sewing became more than tolerable--joyous. Daphne was to go as a Shepherdess, and Owen as a Musketeer, Miss Carrell having just finished Dumas' romance and decided that it was the finest book she had ever read. But she gave far less time to Owen's dress than to Daphne's.

Their father had been told of this party, by Daphne often, by Owen three times, by Miss Carrell once, but he had hardly heard. And it was soon known that he would be at a dinner in town that evening. Presumably he would be late, since Miss Durgon had ordered a tray of spirits, siphon, sandwiches and cigarettes for the entertainment of one of her guests.

Mr. Bruno had lunched out, but he returned to his study before three o'clock. He had just sat at his desk and taken up his pencil to write down some memoranda, when a timid knock at the door made him use the pencil for a patient tapping on his paper.

The governess entered.

"Excuse me, Mr. Bruno, but just for once I felt I simply must intrude. Would you mind if I showed you Daphne in her fancy dress? She looks so sweet, and I think it'll please her if you like it."

"Fancy dress?" echoed Mr. Bruno. "Oh, yes, of course, she's going to a party of some sort, isn't she? Certainly I'll come."

He laid down the pencil and rose quickly, having assumed the gay cloak of an interested father. He followed the governess upstairs to the schoolroom. Miss Carrell passed in before him and apparently whispered to the children to hide. Her face reappeared. "Now, Mr. Bruno, if you'll come in."

He entered a room that seemed to be empty, and looked around as if interested in such a strange apartment. Then Miss Carrell said: "You can come now, Daphne."

Daphne appeared, half shyly and half merrily, from behind the screen; and Mr. Bruno gasped. He had intended all along to gasp, but when he saw his daughter the gasp was genuine. She stood before him in a straw bonnet, her brown hair curled into ringlets. A black velvet corselet bodice reached to a point below her waist. A fichu was about her neck, frills at her elbows and black velvet ribbons at her wrists. Brocade panniers swelled out on either hip above a quilted satin petticoat. Her stockings were white, and her black shoes had silver buckles. In her right hand she held a crook, necklaced with ribbons. Mr. Bruno gasped, and something caught at his heart.

"Good heavens!" he laughed; "is that my Daphne?" But though he laughed, the word "my" gave him unexpected pleasure. "No, it's a changeling, stepped out of a Watteau canvas.... What's all this talk about a party? Why have I not been better informed? And there's Owen, too, all dressed up. What's he? Mephistopheles?"

"I'm a Musketeer."

"Not one of Dumas', I hope." But seeing by every one's chapfallen silence that Owen was Dumas' hero and none else, he put them at their ease by saying: "Well, please announce to everybody that the dress is founded on your own literary taste and not mine. You must be careful how you tread on the literary grass, Mr. Owen.... Where's this rout to be held? Buckingham Palace?"

Miss Carrell explained.

"It's Lady Montefiore's party at Kensington Town Hall. A very big affair. I did tell you about it, but I don't think you quite heard."

"No. I'm afraid I don't sometimes. It must appear very rude. I'm sorry."

"Oh, Mr. Bruno." Miss Carrell looked almost beseechingly into his face. "I hardly like to suggest what's in my mind."

There's no sentence surer to stimulate interest.

"What's that?" asked Mr. Bruno.

"Run away, Duffy darling, and take Owen, and show yourselves to Hollins."

The children gone, Miss Carrell proceeded:

"Oh, don't you think you could look in for a minute at the party? Just before it's over--perhaps to bring the children away. There are to be such a number of famous people there, and reporters, and I do want Duffy to see her name in the paper to-morrow, and a mention of her dress. But in such a huge crowd she's hardly likely to be noticed unless you come too. What a wonderful surprise it'd be for them, if you came and drove them home! But of course, it's impossible ... it's impossible. You're out to dinner."

"It's not impossible. It's not at all impossible," interrupted Mr. Bruno, to whom the word "reporters" was bait difficult to refuse. Besides, the vision of Daphne had stirred his desire for the envy and admiration of those who should know her for his daughter. "My dinner is only an official monthly business, and I can escape. I shall make a point of getting there. And don't you tell them. What time's it over?"

"Officially at nine o'clock. But I doubt if we shall get away before half-past nine. And I don't suppose the--the celebrities will be there till fairly late. I've promised Miss Durgon to have the children home by ten o'clock."

"I shall be there soon after nine, Miss Carrell. And keep it as a surprise from them...."

The governess was such a pleasant little person that he quite enjoyed having a secret with her.

At ten o'clock there were laughter and children's voices on the front steps at 18 Deseret Road, as Mr. Bruno, followed by Miss Carrell, Daphne and Owen (who had been allowed to pay the cabman), ascended to the hall door, searching for his latch-key.

"Shall I ring?" asked Miss Carrell, who may have been tired, for she looked pale and her voice trembled. "The maids will be up."

"No. Here we are.... Now then, Owen, open the door and don't keep us all waiting. The ladies are cold in their cloaks. That's right. Open Sesame!" The door opened. "Enter Ali Baba and two of his donkeys."

Miss Carrell passed in first, and Owen was about to go in after her when his father pulled him back, saying: "The lady your sister first, if you're the swashbucklering gallant your dress suggests." Daphne passed in. "That's right. Now the old man, because his great age gives him right of precedence. Then the young D'Artagnan."

He was hanging his hat on a peg when he observed the coat of Mr. Anthony.

"Hallo! A visitor? Who's this?" He lifted the lapel of the coat as if it might answer him.

Just then a maid appeared to see if the master or the children needed anything before retiring. (Or that was her ostensible reason. Actually she was the reporter commissioned by the kitchen, which had heard with surprised delight the master's voice on the steps, to proceed at once to the seat of war. As Hollins had said: "_Now_ how's she going to explain her masher in the breakfast-room?")

"Who's the visitor, Alice?" asked Mr. Bruno, glancing at the coat.

"Mr. Anthony, sir."

"Mr. Who?"

"Mr. Anthony."

He turned inquiringly to Miss Carrell.

"You know," she explained; "Mr. and Mrs. Anthony, who live in the new flats near the station."

"Oh, yes. Well, what on earth can he want with me at this time of night?"

"He's with Miss Durgon, sir," said the maid, taking his coat from him.

"Has he been here long?"

"Since eight o'clock," answered the maid innocently. "He often comes."

"The first I've heard of it." He turned again to Miss Carrell. "Does he----" But he stopped, perceiving the indelicacy of discussing Miss Durgon with the governess or the servants. "Well, good night, Duffy. Good night, Owen, old man. I'm sure neither of you'll sleep after all that pastry. Good night, Miss Carrell." And he walked along the passage into the dining-room to be alone.

He was troubled, annoyed; but not quite clear on what to base his annoyance. Why was it that Miss Durgon mustn't entertain a married man from eight to eleven on evenings when he was away? There were passages in his books suggesting the right of any woman to entertain any soul-mate she liked. But none of that could apply to Miss Durgon. She wasn't doing it because she was an intellectual in conscientious rebellion (so sneakily, too, when his back was turned), but because she was a damned hypocrite. That utterly conventional and pietistic fool, Miss Durgon, as a social rebel--pshaw! it was funny! She'd been secretive, too, now he came to remember, over those holidays of hers.... No, the whole thing was false and wrong. The children, he had said, must be taught conventional morals, till they were old enough and strong enough (if ever) to venture into deeper waters. Of course. If they were ever to be taught to resist the tyranny of outworn creeds, they should be taught it as a high philosophy, not as a sneaking truancy. He would like to hear more about these visits of Mr. Anthony, whom, by the by, he remembered as rather an ill-bred cad, material and gross. Should he ask Miss Carrell about them? No, that would be quite out of place. She was too young and--pretty. Hollins? She had been with him a dozen years, a heavy, married creature. He laughed. It would please the old thing enormously to be taken into confidence. He liked to please people. But she'd certainly brag about his confidence to the other servants--he could read her character as well as any one else's. But there, the servants knew all about it already. A pretty fool that woman had made of him before his servants. God damn it! He rang the bell.

"Is Hollins in bed yet?" he asked the maid.

"No, sir."

"Ask her to come and speak to me, please."

"Yes, sir."

Though there was no quaver in the maid's voice, he knew she was delighted.

Hollins, on being questioned, was completely communicative. It had not been her place before, but since Mr. Bruno asked her ... there were times, she would admit, when she thought she ought to speak.... But then she had said to herself, the master knew what he was about when he appointed Miss Durgon.... And doubtless Miss Durgon, who was a lady, knew more about these things than she.... She had not been able to bring herself to speak. Besides, what did she know? She had only begun to smell a rat, as the saying was, when that Mr. Stokes----

"_Stokes?_" exclaimed Mr. Bruno.

Yes, Mr. Stokes. Mr. Stokes was an occasional visitor when the master was away.

"But not surely when----" began Mr. Bruno, but he stopped and walked away and stood looking out of the window on to the veranda.

"Thank you, Hollins. Thank you. I'm obliged to you. Please don't mention our conversation in the kitchen. Confidences are confidences."

"No, sir," promised Hollins, and withdrew, quite obviously as happy a woman as any in London.

Standing there with his hands in his pockets and his eyes staring vacantly at the window, Mr. Bruno indulged in a bath of warm self-sympathy. It was a shame of Miss Durgon to have taken this advantage of him, a widower so dependent on his dependants; an author, so necessarily kept busy at his work. It was too bad, considering the children; if she was that sort they had been probably neglected whenever he wasn't looking. Damn it, it was insufferable to have treated so facilely the privilege of caring for T. Tenter Bruno's children. There must be people all over the country who would regard it as an honour--something to boast about--to be charged with the children of a man of such fame. To do all this, and at the same time to accept the generous salary he had given her, the comfortable home, and the extravagant courtesy with which he had always treated her! It was enough to make a cynic and misanthrope of any man. Had all people to be watched by a foreman lest they scamped their tasks? Was there no one who would care for his children without his perpetual supervision, so that he could be free to work for them. He himself needed no such dragooning. He worked hard enough, undriven, to keep the home over everybody's head.

Mr. Bruno dropped into a chair that he might loiter in this bath of warm self-sympathy. But, as with all people in their baths, the pleasure was partly spoiled by the knowledge that at some moment he must achieve the courage to step out of the grateful warmth; and he knew he would leave the enervating self-sympathy for the cold air of self-reproach.... As if suiting the action to the thought, he rose from the chair and stood on the floor. Confound it! He was to blame. With his indolent _laissez faire_, his forever choosing of the line of least resistance, he had undoubtedly suffered the weeds to spread. For his children's sake he ought to have been perpetually on the watch, lest they were being moulded by soiled or clumsy hands. Daphne in her shepherdess costume! She was an exquisite thing; he could pick her up and crush her to him in his swelling love. Let one hope that so far no harm had been done. Thank goodness, that little Miss Carrell was an exceptional person; she seemed sane enough, and steady, and a perfect lady, as Belle would say. But who ever would have thought that Miss Durgon would have been anything but a subdued, middle-aged virgin? "Confound it!" thought he, "what a blasted fool I must have looked all this time to this woman and her friends! It's a damned insult to me." Thus Mr. Bruno stepped back into his bath.

He had a mind to go abruptly into the breakfast-room next door, and to break in upon Anthony and Miss Durgon, to their confusion. But, as he foresaw the awkwardness of a meeting between Anthony and himself, and the discomfort Anthony and Miss Durgon would endure, and his own discomfort in witnessing their discomfort, he decided he could not face the scene. If you discover your butler in the act of drinking your whisky out of its decanter, it is an open question which suffers the more, you or he. Had Mr. Bruno possessed a butler, and chanced upon him in such a pilfering, he would have retired like the guilty party in the hope that his butler had neither seen nor heard him.

He sat again in his chair. In the morning he would take a strong line. The phrase was pleasing. It savoured of a monarch dismissing his prime minister: or of a father performing his stern duty by his children. In the morning he would show Miss Durgon that these quiet and trusting men had, none the less--what was the trite metaphor?--an iron hand beneath the velvet glove.

With this resolve he mounted to his bedroom, that mercy might attend poor Anthony to the door.

At breakfast Miss Durgon appeared with a mien of studied composure, and he rather admired her for not keeping her bedroom and publishing a headache. He talked of everyday subjects; they could not handle over cold bacon and boiled eggs such an explosive grenade as dismissal. After breakfast it should be. He would send for her to his study. It would be painful having to treat a woman of forty-five like a schoolboy: "Miss Durgon, I feel that, as my daughter will soon be going to school (the first he had thought of it), perhaps...." No, he would not prepare his speech. He would wait on inspiration. "Mr. Bruno, I can only thank you for your unfailing courtesy and consideration. I hope we part with no ill-feeling, for I consider it has been a privilege to share in...." "Not at all, Miss Durgon, not at all." If she had any tact, she would drop such a curtain of gauze over the harder features of the scene.

But when, after breakfast, he was reading his paper, he postponed the event till his pipe should be exhausted; and, after that, till all the matter in the _Times_ necessary for a well-informed mind had been exhausted. Then he dropped the paper on his knees. No, the thing would best be done through a woman: that would be more consistent with the courtesy she had invariably received from him. Belle had engaged her, and Belle should be summoned to conclude the engagement; he could imagine her enjoying it thoroughly and all the while deceiving herself, like the brainless creature she was, that the duty was unpleasant.

Belle arrived the next afternoon; and it was delectable to watch her surprise and indignation.

"Extraordinary, Tom. Extraordinary in an officer's daughter. So ridiculous, too. A _passé_ creature like that! I don't know which is the more ridiculous, she or the idiotic _roués_ who could flit round such a--such a----"

"Rushlight," suggested he.

"Rushlight! The creature must go at once."

"Yes. But there's nothing gained by doing it otherwise than gently. Let her have some excuse with which she can withdraw in a haze of dignity. Let her have everything that's owing to her, and let--let crowns for convoy be put into her purse."

Belle seemed hardly less childish than Daphne, and to be similarly bantered and confused.

"But, meantime, we shall have to look out for some one else," pursued Belle, who was indubitably spending a delightful afternoon. "I'll busy myself about that at once. But in the interregnum, what's to be done?"

"Oh, the little Carrell can carry on. She's done it before."

"Carol who?"

"Carol no one. Miss Carrell, the children's governess."

"But she can't manage the household."

"Indeed she can; and the War Office and Admiralty as well, if necessary. With marvellous competence."

"But, Tom, she doesn't look twenty."

"She's twenty-three, I believe. If Pitt was Prime Minister of England at twenty-one, Miss Carrell can be mistress of my household, for a fortnight, at twenty-three."

"Yes, but Pitt was a genius."

"He was not the last of the race." It was always annoying, the way Belle spoke about geniuses. "Perhaps Miss Carrell is one too. In fact, I've been wondering whether she couldn't permanently fill the breach." The idea, to be truthful, had only just struck him.

"What? Become your----"

He enjoyed Belle's dismay.

"Yes. Why not?"

"Oh, no, no. Why, the servants wouldn't obey a child like that. And what about the children?"

"They love her. She's been more successful with them than any one else."

"And then again--forgive me mentioning it, but you literary people are so unworldly-wise--she's too pretty." Belle smiled rather roguishly. "People would talk. With a man in your position it might do untold harm to have a Mistress of the Household, as you call her, of such youth and beauty."

With contempt Mr. Bruno saw, under the veil of righteousness, his sister's relish for the subject.

"You mean they would say that the Mistress of the Household was also the Lady of the Bedchamber?"

"Tom! I wonder why you artistic people always love to shock."

The altercation continued, with the result that Mr. Bruno saw more and more sense in his idea as he saw more and more foolishness in Belle's arguments against it. She fell back on the personal appeal.

"Oh, Tom, let me beseech you to do nothing of the sort. It would be unwise in the extreme. I will do all in my power to secure you a really worthy and capable housekeeper. You can trust me."

It occurred to him to retort: "Your last effort was no proof of your trustworthiness. And it justifies me in a bold innovation." But he only replied:

"It might, at any rate, be given a trial. The children love her as much as they distrusted Miss Durgon, and I begin to believe they are good judges. The servants unite in praising her. We'd better see Miss Carrell."

He leaned forward and touched the bell. As it rang down below he wondered if he was rashly committing himself to something that wanted longer thought. Was he being driven by the character that was now his tyrant to take again the line of least resistance? No, surely this time the easiest line chanced to be the best.

"Tom, you don't mean to say you have determined?"

He had not meant to say so; indeed, was wondering how, if necessary, he could avoid saying so; but such a question from Belle was answered as soon as asked.

"Yes, I think I have."

"Well, I wash my hands of the whole business. It's bound to be a failure."

This made him resolve that, if possible, it should be an echoing success.

When, happy to be the purveyor of pleasure, he took Miss Carrell into his confidence, offering her £80 for a start and £100 later "if the arrangement answered," she looked both pleased and frightened. (Frightened, because there is always something uncanny in the success of all one's plans.) And he was charmed with the little creature's ingenuousness.

"I know one person who'll be delighted," said he, to reassure her. "That's my little daughter."