Chapter IX: Book III: Jane (2)

"No, no, no ... I can never talk to you. You don't understand. It's all no use."

She cried on. He kissed her, soothed her, poured out all his love....

When he had gone her mother came into the room, an open letter in her hand.

She did not appear to notice Nell's tear-stained face.

"George Chetwynd sails for America on the thirtieth of May," she remarked as she went across to her desk.

"I don't care when he sails," said Nell rebelliously.

Mrs. Vereker did not answer.

That night Nell knelt longer than usual by her narrow white bed.

"Oh! God, please let me marry Vernon, I want to so much. I do love him so. Please let things come right and let us be married. Make something happen.... Please God...."

_2_

At the end of April Abbots Puissants was let. Vernon came to Nell in some excitement.

"Nell, will you marry me now? We could just manage. It's a bad let--an awfully bad one--but I simply had to take it. You see, there's been the mortgage interest to pay and all the expenses of the upkeep while it's been unlet. I've had to borrow for all that and now of course it's got to be paid back. We'll be pretty short for a year or two, but then it won't be so bad...."

He talked on, explaining the financial details.

"I've been into it all, Nell. I have really. Sensibly, I mean. We could afford a tiny flat and one maid and have a little left over to play with. Oh! Nell, you wouldn't mind being poor with me, would you? You said once I didn't know what it was to be poor, but you can't say that now. I've lived on frightfully little since I came to London, and I haven't minded a bit."

No, Nell knew he hadn't. The fact was in some way a vague reproach to her. And yet, though she couldn't quite express it to herself, she felt that the two cases were not on a par. It made much more difference to women. To be gay and pretty and admired and have a good time--none of those things affected men. They hadn't that everlasting problem of clothes--nobody minded if they were shabby.

But how explain these things to Vernon? One couldn't. He wasn't like George Chetwynd. George understood things like that.

"Nell."

She sat there, irresolute, his arm round her. She had got to decide. Visions floated before her eyes. Amelie ... the hot little house, the wailing children ... George Chetwynd and his car ... a stuffy little flat, a dirty incompetent maid ... dances ... clothes ... the money they owed dressmakers ... the rent of the London house--unpaid ... herself at Ascot, smiling, chattering in a lovely model gown ... then, with a sudden revulsion, she was back at Ranelagh on the bridge over the water with Vernon....

In almost the same voice as she had used that evening she said: "I don't know. Oh! Vernon, I don't know."

"Oh! Nell darling, do ... do!"

She disengaged herself from him, got up.

"Please, Vernon--I must think ... yes, think. I--I can't when I'm with you."

She wrote to him later that night:

Dearest Vernon:

Let us wait a little longer--say six months. I don't feel I want
to be married now. Besides, something might have happened about
your opera then. You think I'm afraid of being poor, but it's not
quite that. I've seen people--people who loved each other--and they
didn't any more because of all the bothers and worries. I feel that
if we wait and are patient everything will come right. Oh! Vernon,
I know it will--and then everything will be so lovely. If only we
wait and have patience....

Vernon was angry when he got this letter. He did not show the letter to Jane, but he broke out into sufficiently unguarded speech to let her see how the land lay. She said at once in her disconcerting fashion:

"You do think you're sufficient prize for any girl, don't you, Vernon?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, do you think it will be awfully jolly for a girl who has danced and been to parties and had lots of fun and people admiring her to be stuck down in a poky hole with no more fun?"

"We'd have each other."

"You can't make love to her for twenty-four hours on end. While you're working, what is she to do?"

"Don't you think a woman can be poor and happy?"

"Certainly, given the necessary qualifications."

"Which are--what? Love and trust?"

"No, you idiotic child. A sense of humour, a tough hide, and the valuable quality of being sufficient unto oneself. You will insist on love in a cottage being a sentimental problem dependent on the amount of love concerned. It's far more a problem of mental outlook. You'd be all right stuck down anywhere--Buckingham Palace or the Sahara--because you've got your mental preoccupation--music. But Nell's dependent on extraneous circumstances. Marrying you will cut her off from all her friends."

"Why should it?"

"Because it's the hardest thing in the world for people with different incomes to continue friends. They're not all doing the same thing naturally."

"You always put me in the wrong," said Vernon savagely. "Or at any rate you try to."

"Well, it annoys me to see you put yourself on a pedestal and stand admiring yourself for nothing at all," said Jane calmly. "You expect Nell to sacrifice her friends and life to you, but you wouldn't make your sacrifice for her."

"What sacrifice? I'd do anything."

"Except sell Abbots Puissants!"

"You don't understand."

Jane looked at him gently.

"Perhaps I do. Oh! yes, my dear, I do very well. But don't be noble. It always annoys me to see people being noble! Let's talk about _The Princess in the Tower_. I want you to show it to Radmaager."

"Oh! it's so rotten. I couldn't. You know, I didn't realize myself, Jane, how rotten it was until I had finished it."

"No," said Jane. "Nobody ever does. Fortunately--or nothing ever would be finished. Show it to Radmaager. What he says will be interesting, at all events."

Vernon yielded rather grudgingly.

"He'll think it such awful cheek."

"No, he won't. He's a very high opinion of what Sebastian says, and Sebastian has always believed in you. Radmaager says that, for so young a man, Sebastian's judgment is amazing."

"Good old Sebastian! He's wonderful," said Vernon warmly. "Nearly everything he's done has been a success. Shekels are rolling in. God! how I envy him sometimes."

"You needn't. He's not such a very happy person, really."

"You mean Joe? Oh, that will all come right."

"I wonder. Vernon, do you see much of Joe?"

"A fair amount. Not as much as I used to. I can't stand that queer artistic set she's drifted into--their hair's all wrong and they look unwashed and they talk what seems to me the most arrant drivel. They're not a bit like your crowd--the people who really do things."

"We're what Sebastian would call the successful commercial propositions. All the same, I'm worried about Joe. I'm afraid she's going to do something foolish."

"That bounder La Marre, you mean?"

"Yes, I mean that bounder La Marre. He's clever with women, you know, Vernon. Some men are."

"You think she'd go off with him or something? Of course Joe is a damned fool in some ways." He looked curiously at Jane. "But I should have thought you----"

He stopped, suddenly crimson. Jane looked very faintly amused.

"You really needn't be embarrassed by my morals."

"I wasn't. I mean--I've always wondered--oh! I've wondered such an awful lot...."

His voice died away. There was silence. Jane sat very upright. She did not look at Vernon. She looked straight ahead of her. Presently, in a quiet even voice, she began to speak. She spoke quite unemotionally and evenly, as though recounting something that had happened to someone else. It was a cold concise recital of horror, and to Vernon the most dreadful thing about it was her own detached calm. She spoke as a scientist might speak, impersonally.

He buried his face in his hands.

Jane brought her recital to an end. Her quiet voice ceased.

Vernon said in a low shuddering voice: "And you lived through _that_? I--I didn't know that such things were."

Jane said calmly: "He was a Russian and a degenerate. It's hard for an Anglo Saxon to understand that peculiar refined lust of cruelty. You understand brutality. You don't understand anything else."

Vernon said, feeling childish and awkward as he put the question: "You--you loved him very much?"

She shook her head slowly, began to speak and then stopped.

"Why dissect the past?" she said after a minute or two. "He did some fine work. There's a thing of his in the South Kensington. It's macabre, but it's good."

Then she began once more to talk of _The Princess in the Tower_.

Vernon went to the South Kensington two days later. He found the solitary representation of Boris Androv's work easily enough. A drowned woman--the face was horrible, puffed, bloated, decomposed, but the body was beautiful ... a lovely body. Vernon knew instinctively that it was Jane's body.

He stood looking down on the bronze nude figure, with arms spread wide and long lank hair reaching out mournfully.

Such a beautiful body ... Jane's body. Androv had modelled that nude body from her.

For the first time for years a queer remembrance of the Beast came over him. He felt afraid.

He turned quickly away from the beautiful bronze figure and left the building hurriedly, almost running.

_3_

It was the first night of Radmaager's new opera, _Peer Gynt_. Vernon was going to it and had been asked by Radmaager to attend a supper party afterward. He was dining with Nell at her mother's house. She was not coming to the opera.

Much to Nell's surprise, Vernon did not turn up to dinner. They waited some time, and then began without him. He arrived just as dessert was being put on the table.

"I'm most awfully sorry, Mrs. Vereker. I can't tell you how sorry I am. Something very--very unexpected occurred. I'll tell you later."

His face was so white and he was so obviously upset that Mrs. Vereker forgot her annoyance. She was always a tactful woman of the world and she treated the present situation with her usual discretion.

"Well," she said, rising, "now you are here, Vernon, you can talk to Nell. If you're going to the opera you won't have much time."

She left the room. Nell looked inquiringly at Vernon. He answered her look.

"Joe's gone off with La Marre."

"Oh, Vernon, she hasn't!"

"She has."

"Do you mean that she has eloped? That she's married him? That they've run away to get married?"

Vernon said grimly: "He can't marry her. He's got a wife already."

"Oh, Vernon, how awful! How could she?"

"Joe was always wrong-headed. She'll regret this--I know she will. I don't believe she really cares for him."

"What about Sebastian? Won't he feel this terribly?"

"Yes, poor devil. I've been with him now. He's absolutely broken up over it. I'd no idea how much he cared for Joe."

"I know he did."

"You see, there were the three of us--always. Joe and I and Sebastian. We belonged together."

A faint pang of jealousy shot through Nell. Vernon repeated:

"The three of us. It's----Oh! I don't know. I feel as though I'd been to blame in some way. I've let myself get out of touch with Joe. Dear old Joe, she was so staunch always--better than any sister could be. It hurts me to think of the things she used to say when she was a kid--how she'd never have anything to do with men. And now she's come a mucker like this."

Nell said in a shocked voice: "A married man. That's what makes it so awful. Had he any children?"

"How should I know anything about his beastly children?"

"Vernon--don't be so cross."

"Sorry, Nell. I'm upset, that's all."

"How could she do such a thing?" said Nell. She had always rather resented Joe's unspoken contempt of which she had been subconsciously aware. She would not have been human had she not felt a faint sense of superiority. "To run away with anyone married! It's dreadful!"

"Well, she had courage, anyway," said Vernon.

He felt a sudden passionate desire to defend Joe--Joe who belonged to Abbots Puissants and the old days.

"Courage?" said Nell.

"Yes, courage!" said Vernon, "At any rate she wasn't prudent. She didn't count the cost. She's chucked away everything in the world for love. That's more than some people will do."

"Vernon!"

She got up, breathing hard.

"Well, it's true." All his smouldering resentment came bursting out. "You won't even face a little discomfort for me, Nell. You're always saying 'Wait' and 'Let's be careful.' You aren't capable of chucking everything to the winds for love of anyone."

"Oh! Vernon, how cruel you are ... how cruel!"

He saw the tears come into her eyes and was immediately all compunction.

"Oh! Nell, I didn't mean it--I didn't mean it, sweetheart."

His arms went round her, held her to him. Her sobs lessened. He glanced at his watch.

"Damn! I must go. Good-night, Nell darling. You do love me, don't you?"

"Yes, of course--of course I do."

He kissed her once more, hurried off. She sat down again by the disordered dinner table. Sat there, lost in thought....

_4_

He got to Covent Garden late. _Peer Gynt_ had begun. The scene was Ingrid's wedding, and Vernon arrived just at the moment of the first brief meeting of Peer and Solveig. He wondered if Jane were nervous. She managed to look marvellously young with her fair plaits and her innocent calm bearing. She looked nineteen. The act ended with the carrying off of Ingrid by Peer.

Vernon found himself interested less in the music than in Jane. To-night was Jane's ordeal. She had to make good or go under. Vernon knew how anxious she was, above everything else to justify Radmaager's trust in her.

Presently he knew that all was well. Jane was the perfect Solveig. Her voice, clear and true--the crystal thread, as Radmaager had called it--sang unfalteringly and her acting was wonderful. The calm steadfast personality of Solveig dominated the opera.

Vernon found himself for the first time interested in the story of the weak storm-torn Peer, the coward who ran from reality at every opportunity. The music of Peer's conflict with the great Boyg stirred him, reminding him of his childish terror of the Beast. It was the same formless bogy fear of childhood. Unseen, Solveig's clear voice delivered him from it. The scene in the forest where Solveig comes to Peer was infinitely beautiful, ending with Peer bidding Solveig remain while he went out to take up his burden. Her reply: "If it is so heavy it is best two should share it." And then Peer's departure, his final evasion: "Bring sorrow on her? No. Go roundabout, Peer, go roundabout."

The Whitsuntide music was the most beautiful, but in atmosphere very Radmaagian, Vernon thought. It led up to and prepared for the effect of the final scene: the weary Peer asleep with his head on Solveig's lap, and Solveig, her hair silvered, a Madonna blue cloak round her in the middle of the stage, her head silhouetted against the rising sun, singing valiantly against the buttons' moulder.

It was a wonderful duet--Chavaranov, the famous Russian bass, his voice deepening and deepening, and Jane, with her silver thread singing steadily upward and ever upward, higher and higher, till the last note was left to her--high and incredibly pure.... And the sun rose....

Vernon, feeling boyishly important, went behind afterward. The opera had been a terrific success. The applause had been long and enthusiastic. He found Radmaager holding Jane by the hand and kissing her with artistic fervour and thoroughness.

"You are an angel--you are magnificent--yes, magnificent! You are an artist. Ah!" he burst into a torrent of words in his native language, then reverted to English. "I will reward you--yes, little one, I will reward you. I know very well how to do it. I will persuade the long Sebastian. Together we will--"

"Hush," said Jane.

Vernon came forward awkwardly, said shyly: "It was splendid!"

He squeezed Jane's hand, and she gave him a brief affectionate smile.

"Where's Sebastian? Wasn't he here just now?"

Sebastian was no longer to be seen. Vernon volunteered to go in search of him and bring him along to supper. He said vaguely that he thought he knew where he was. Jane knew nothing of the news about Joe and he didn't see how he could tell her at the moment.

He got a taxi and drove to Sebastian's house but did not find him. Vernon wondered if perhaps Sebastian might be at his own rooms where he had left him earlier in the evening. He drove there straight away.

He was feeling suddenly elated and triumphant. Even Joe did not seem to matter for the moment. He felt suddenly convinced that his own work was good--or rather that it would be some day. And somehow or other he also felt that things were coming right with Nell. She had clung to him differently to-night--more closely--more as though she could not bear to let him go.... Yes, he was sure of it. Everything was coming right.

He ran up the stairs to his room. It was in darkness. Sebastian was not here then. He switched on the light, looked round. A note lay on the table, sent by hand. He picked it up. It was addressed to him in Nell's handwriting. He tore it open....

He stood there a long time. Then, carefully and methodically, he drew up a chair to the table, setting it very exactly straight, as though that were important, and sat down holding the note in his hand. He read it again for the tenth or eleventh time:

Dearest Vernon--forgive me--please forgive me. I am going to marry
George Chetwynd. I don't love him as I love you but I shall be safe
with him. Again--do forgive me--please.

Your always loving Nell.

He said aloud: "_Safe with him._ What does she mean by that? She'd have been safe with me. _Safe with him?_ That hurts...."

He sat there. Minutes passed.... Hours passed.... He sat there, motionless, almost unable to think.... Once the thought rose dully in his brain: "Was this how Sebastian felt? I didn't understand...."

When he heard a rustle in the doorway he didn't look up. His first sight of Jane was when she came round the table, dropped on her knees beside him.

"Vernon, my dear, what is it? I knew there was something when you didn't come to the supper. I came to see."

Dully, mechanically, he held out the note to her. She took it and read it. She laid it down again on the table.

He said in a dull bewildered voice: "She needn't have said that about not being safe with me. She would have been safe with me."

"Oh! Vernon--my dear...."

Her arms went round him. He clutched at her suddenly--a frightened clutch such as a child might give at its mother. A sob burst from his throat. He laid his face down on the gleaming white skin of her neck.

"Oh! Jane ... Jane...."

She held him closer. She stroked his hair. He murmured:

"Stay with me. Stay with me. Don't leave me."

She answered: "I won't leave you. It's all right."

Her voice was tender--motherly. Something broke in him like the breaking of a dam. Ideas swirled and rushed through his head. His father kissing Winnie at Abbots Puissants ... the statue in the South Kensington ... Jane's body ... her beautiful body.

He said hoarsely: "Stay with me."

Her arms round him, her lips on his forehead, she murmured back: "I'll stay with you, dear."

Like a mother to a child.

He wrenched himself suddenly free.

"Not like that. Not like that. Like this."

His lips fastened on hers--fiercely, hungrily--his hand clutched at the roundness of her breast. He'd always wanted her--always. He knew it now. It was her body he wanted, that beautiful gracious body that Boris Androv had known so well.

He said again: "Stay with me."

There was a long pause--it seemed to him as though minutes, hours, years passed before she answered.

She said: "_I'll stay...._"

chapter 4

On a day in July Sebastian Levinne walked along the Embankment in the direction of Jane's flat. It was a day more suggestive of early spring than of summer. A cold wind blew the dust in his face and made him blink.

There was a change visible in Sebastian. He had grown perceptibly older. There was very little of the boy about him now--there never had been much. He had always had that curious maturity of outlook which is the Semitic inheritance. As he walked along now, frowning to himself and pondering, he would easily have been taken for a man over thirty.

Jane herself opened the door of the flat to him. She spoke in a low unusually husky voice.

"Vernon's out. He couldn't wait for you. You said three, you know, and it's past four now."

"I was kept. Just as well, perhaps. I'm never quite sure of the best way of dealing with Vernon's nerves."

"Don't tell me any fresh crises have arisen? I couldn't bear it."

"Oh! you'll get used to them. I've had to. What's the matter with your voice, Jane?"

"A cold. A throat, rather. It's all right. I'm nursing it."

"My God! and _The Princess in the Tower_ to-morrow night. Suppose you can't sing?"

"Oh! I shall sing. Don't be afraid. Only don't mind my whispering. I want to save it every bit I can."

"Of course. You've seen someone, I suppose?"

"My usual man in Harley Street."

"What did he say?"

"The usual things."

"He didn't forbid you to sing to-morrow?"

"Oh! no."

"You're an awfully good liar, aren't you, Jane?"

"I thought it would save trouble. But I might have known it would be no good with you. I'll be honest. He warned me that I'd been persistently overstraining my voice for years. He said it was madness to sing to-morrow night. But I don't care."

"My dear Jane, I'm not going to risk your losing your voice."

"Mind your own business, Sebastian. My voice is my affair. I don't interfere in your concerns, don't interfere in mine."

Sebastian grinned.

"The tiger cat at home," he remarked. "But you mustn't, Jane, all the same. Does Vernon know?"

"Of course not. What do you think? And you're not to tell him, Sebastian."

"I don't interfere really," said Sebastian. "I never have. But Jane dear, it will be ten thousand pities. The opera's not worth it. And Vernon's not worth it either. Be angry with me if you like for saying so."

"Why should I be angry with you? It's the truth and I know it. All the same, I'm going through with it. Call me any kind of a conceited egoist you like, but _The Princess in the Tower_ won't be a success without me. I've been a success as Isolde and a furore as Solveig. It's my moment. And it's going to be Vernon's moment too. I can at least do that for him."

He heard the undercurrent of feeling, the unconscious betrayal of that "at least," but not by a muscle of his face did he show that he had realized its significance. He only said again very gently: "He's not worth it, Jane. Paddle your own canoe. It's the only way. You've arrived. Vernon hasn't and may never."

"I know. I know. No one's what you call 'worth it'--except perhaps one person."

"Who?"

"_You_, Sebastian. _You're_ worth it--and yet it's not for you I'm doing it!"

Sebastian was surprised and touched. A sudden mist came over his eyes. He stretched out his hand and took Jane's. They sat for a minute or two in silence.

"That was nice of you, Jane," he said at last.

"Well, it's true. You're worth a dozen of Vernon. You've got brains, initiative, strength of character...."

Her husky voice died away. After another minute or two he said very gently:

"How are things? Much as usual?"

"Yes, I think so. You know Mrs. Deyre came to see me?"

"No, I didn't. What did she want?"

"She came to beg me to give up her boy. Pointed out how I was ruining his life. Only a really bad woman would do what I was doing. And so on. You can guess the kind of thing."

"And what did you say to her?" asked Sebastian curiously.

Jane shrugged her shoulders.

"What could I say? That to Vernon one harlot was as good as another?"

"Oh! my dear," said Sebastian gently. "Is it as bad as that?"

Jane got up, lighted a cigarette, and walked restlessly about the room. Sebastian noticed how haggard her face had become.

"Is he--more or less all right?" he ventured.

"He drinks too much," said Jane curtly.

"Can't you prevent it?"

"No, I can't."

"It's queer. I should have thought you would always have great influence over Vernon."

"Well, I haven't. Not now." She was silent for a moment and then said: "Nell's being married in the autumn, isn't she?"

"Yes. Do you think things will be--better then?"

"I haven't the least idea."

"I wish to God he'd pull up," said Sebastian. "If you can't keep him straight, Jane, nobody can. Of course, it's in the blood."

She came and sat down again.

"Tell me--tell me everything you know. About his people--his father, his mother."

Sebastian gave a succinct account of the Deyres. Jane listened.

"His mother you've seen," he concluded. "Queer, isn't it, that Vernon doesn't seem to have inherited one single thing from her? He's a Deyre through and through. They are all artistic, musical, weak-willed, self-indulgent, and attractive to women. Heredity's an odd thing."

"I don't quite agree with you," said Jane. "Vernon's not like his mother, but he _has_ inherited something from her."

"What?"

"Vitality. She's an extraordinarily fine animal--have you ever thought of her that way? Well, Vernon's inherited some of that. Without it he'd never have been a composer. If he were a Deyre pure and simple he'd only have _dallied_ with music. It's the Bent force that gives him the power to create. You say his grandfather built up their business single-handed. Well, there's the same thing in Vernon."

"I wonder if you're right."

"I'm sure I am."

Sebastian considered silently for some minutes.

"Is it only drink?" he said at last. "Or is it--well, I mean, are there--other people?"

"Oh! there are others."

"And you don't mind?"

"Mind? Mind? Of course I mind. What do you think I'm made of, Sebastian? I'm nearly killed with minding.... But what can I do? Make scenes? Rant and rave and drive Vernon away from me altogether?"

Her beautiful husky voice rose from its whisper. Sebastian made a quick gesture and she stopped.

"You're right. I must be careful."

"I can't understand it," grumbled Sebastian. "Even his music doesn't seem to mean anything to Vernon now. He's taken every suggestion from Radmaager and been like a lamb. It's unnatural!"

"We must wait. It will come back. It's reaction--reaction and Nell together. I can't help feeling that if _The Princess in the Tower_ is a success, Vernon will pull himself together. He must feel a certain pride--a sense of achievement."

"I hope so," said Sebastian heavily. "But I'm a bit worried about the future."

"In what way? What are you afraid of?"

"War."

Jane looked at him in astonishment. She could hardly believe her ears. She thought she must have mistaken the word.

"_War?_"

"Yes. The outcome of this Sarajevo business."

It still seemed to Jane a little absurd and ridiculous.

"War with whom?"

"Germany--principally."

"Oh! surely, Sebastian. Such a--a--far-away thing."

"What does the pretext matter?" said Sebastian impatiently. "It's the way money has been going. Money talks. I handle money--our relations in Russia handle money. We know. From the way money has been behaving for some time we can guess what is in the wind. War's coming, Jane."

Jane looked at him and changed her mind. Sebastian was in earnest, and Sebastian usually knew what he was talking about. If he said war was coming, then, fantastic as it seemed, war would come.

Sebastian sat still, lost in thought. Money, investments, various loans, financial responsibilities he had undertaken, the future of his theatres, the policy to be adopted by the weekly paper he owned. Then, of course, there would be fighting. He was the son of a naturalized Englishman. He didn't wish in the least to go and fight, but he supposed it would be necessary. Everyone below a certain age would do so as a matter of course. It was not the danger that worried him, it was the annoyance of leaving his pet schemes to be looked after by someone else. "They'll make a mess of it, sure to," thought Sebastian bitterly. He put the war down as being a long job--two years, perhaps more. In the end, he shouldn't wonder if America was dragged into it.

The government would issue loans--war loans would be a good investment. No highbrow stuff for the theatres. Soldiers on leave would want light comedy--pretty girls--legs--dancing. He thought it all out carefully. It was a good thing to get a chance to think uninterruptedly. Being with Jane was like being alone. She always knew when you didn't want to be spoken to.

He looked across at her. She, too, was thinking. He wondered what she was thinking about--you never quite knew with Jane. She and Vernon were alike there--didn't tell their thoughts. She was probably thinking about Vernon. If Vernon should go to the war and be killed! But no--that mustn't be. Sebastian's artistic soul rebelled. Vernon mustn't be killed.

_2_

The production of _The Princess in the Tower_ has been forgotten by now. It came at an unfortunate time, since war broke out only about three weeks later.

At the time it was what is called "well received." Certain critics waxed a little sarcastic over this "new school of young musicians" who thought they could revolutionize all existing ideas. Others praised it with sincerity as a work of great promise, though immature. But one and all spoke enthusiastically of the perfect beauty and artistry of the whole performance. Everyone "went to Holborn, such miles out of the way, dear, but really worth it," to see the attractive fantastic drama, and "that wonderful new singer, Jane Harding. Her _face_, dear, is simply wonderful--quite mediæval. It wouldn't be the same without her!" It was a triumph for Jane, though a triumph that was short-lived. On the fifth day she was forced to retire from the cast.

Sebastian was summoned by telephone at an hour when Vernon would not be there. Jane met him with such a radiant smile that he thought at first that his fears were not going to be realized.

"It's no good, Sebastian. Mary Lloyd must go on with it. She's not too bad, considering. As a matter of fact, she's got a better voice than I have and she's quite nice-looking."

"H'm, I was afraid Hershall would say that. I'd like to see him myself."

"Yes, he wants to see you. Not that there's anything to be done, I'm afraid."

"What do you mean? Nothing to be done?"

"It's gone, my child. Gone for good. Hershall's too honest to hold out any real hope. He says of course you never can be absolutely sure. It might come back with rest, _et cetera, et cetera_. He said it very well, and then I looked at him and laughed--and then he had to look shamefaced and own up. He was relieved, I think, at the way I took it."

"But Jane, darling Jane...."

"Oh! don't mind so much, Sebastian. Please don't. It's so much easier if you don't. It's been a gamble, you know, all along--my voice was never really strong enough. I gambled with it. So far I won--now, I've lost. Well, there it is! One must be a good gambler and not let the hands twitch. Isn't that what they say at Monte Carlo?"

"Does Vernon know?"

"Yes. He's most awfully upset. He loved my voice. He's really quite broken-hearted about it."

"But he doesn't know that----"

"That if I had waited two days, and not sung on the opening night of his opera, it would have been all right? No, he doesn't know that. And if you are loyal to me, Sebastian, he never will."

"I shan't make promises. I think he ought to know."

"No, because really it's unwarrantable what I've done! I've laid him under an obligation to me without his knowledge. That's a thing one shouldn't do. It isn't fair. If I had gone to Vernon and told him what Hershall said, do you suppose he would ever have consented to let me sing? He'd have prevented me by main force. It would be the meanest and cruellest thing in the world to go to Vernon now and say: 'See what I have done for you!' Snivelling and asking for sympathy and gratitude ladled out in a soup plate."

Sebastian was silent.

"Come now, my dear, agree."

"Yes," said Sebastian at last. "You're right. What you did was unethical. You did it without Vernon's knowledge, and it's got to be kept from him now. But oh! Jane darling, why did you? Is Vernon's music worth it?"

"It will be--some day."

"Is that why you did it?"

Jane shook her head.

"I thought not."

There was a pause, Sebastian said: "What will you do now, Jane?"

"Possibly teach. Possibly go on the stage. I don't know. If the worst comes to the worst, I can always cook."

They both laughed, but Jane was very near tears.

She looked across the table at Sebastian and then suddenly rose and came and knelt down beside him. She laid her head down on his shoulder and he put his arm round her.

"Oh! Sebastian ... Sebastian ..."

"Poor old Jane!"

"I pretend I don't mind--but I do ... I do. I loved singing. I loved it, loved it, loved it.... That lovely Whitsuntide music of Solveig. I shall never sing it again."

"I know. Why were you such a fool, Jane?"

"I don't know. Sheer idiocy."

"If you had the choice again----"

"I'd do the same thing again."

A silence. Then Jane lifted her head and said:

"Do you remember saying, Sebastian, that I had great 'driving power'? That nothing would turn me aside? And I said that I might be more easily turned aside than you thought. That between Vernon and me, I should go to the wall."

Sebastian said: "Things are queer."

Jane slipped down on the floor beside him, her hand still in his.

"You can be clever," said Sebastian, breaking the silence. "You can have the brains to foresee things, and the wits to plan things, and the force to succeed, but with all the cleverness in the world you can't avoid suffering some way or another. That's what's so odd. I know I've got brains, I know I'll get to the top of anything I undertake. I'm not like Vernon. Vernon will either be a heaven-sent genius, or else he'll be an idle dissipated young man. He's got a gift if he's got anything, I've got ability. And yet with all the ability in the world, I can't prevent myself getting hurt."

"No one can."

"One might, perhaps, if one gave up one's whole life to it. If you pursued safety and nothing but safety. You'd get your wings singed, perhaps, but that would be all. You'd build a nice smooth wall and hide yourself inside it."

"You're thinking of somebody in particular? Who?"

"Just a fancy. The future Mrs. George Chetwynd, if you want to be exact."

"Nell? Do you think Nell has the strength of character to shut herself out from life?"

"Oh! Nell has got an enormous power of developing protective colouring. Some species have." He paused, then went on: "Jane, have you ever heard from--Joe?"

"Yes, my dear, twice."

"What did she say?"

"Very little. Just what fun everything was, and how she was enjoying herself, and how splendid one felt when one had had the courage to defy convention." She paused and then added: "She's not happy, Sebastian."

"You think not?"

"I'm sure of it."

There was a long silence. Two unhappy faces looked into the empty fireplace. Outside taxis hooted as they sped rapidly down the Embankment. Life went on....

_3_

It was the ninth of August. Nell Vereker turned out of Paddington Station and walked slowly down toward the park. Four-wheelers passed her with old ladies in them laden with many hams. Staring placards were flaunted at every street corner. In every shop was a queue of people anxious to buy commodities.

Nell had said to herself many times: "We're at war--actually at war," and had not been able to believe it. To-day, for the first time, it seemed to come home to her. A train journey where the ticket office refused to change a five-pound note had proved the turning point. Ridiculous, but there it was.

A taxi passed and Nell hailed it. She got in, giving the address of Jane's flat in Chelsea. She glanced at her watch. It was just half-past ten. No fear that Jane would be out so early.

Nell went up in the lift and stood outside the door, having rung the bell. Her heart was beating nervously. In another minute the door would open. Her small face grew white and strained. Ah! now the door was opening. She and Jane were face to face.

She thought Jane started a little--that was all.

"Oh!" she said. "It's you."

"Yes," said Nell. "May I come in, please?"

It seemed to her that Jane hesitated a minute before drawing back to let her enter. She retreated into the hall, shut a door at the far end, and then drew open the sitting-room door for Nell to pass in. She followed her, closing the door behind her.

"Well?"

"Jane, I've come to ask you if you know where Vernon is."

"Vernon?"

"Yes. I went to his rooms--yesterday. He's left. The woman there didn't know where he'd gone. She said his letters were forwarded to you. I went home and wrote to you asking for his address. Then I was afraid you wouldn't tell me, wouldn't even answer, perhaps, and I thought I'd come instead."

"I see."

The tone was noncommittal, unhelpful. Nell hurried on.

"I was sure you'd know where he was. You do, don't you?"

"Yes, I know."

A slow answer, unnecessarily slow, Nell thought. Either Jane knew or she didn't.

Again a pause. Then Jane said: "Why do you want to see Vernon, Nell?"

Nell raised a white face.

"Because I've been such a beast--such a beast! I see it now--now that this awful war has come. I was such a miserable coward. I hate myself--simply hate myself. Just because George was kind and good and--yes, rich! Oh, Jane, how you must despise me! I know you do. You're quite right to despise me. Somehow this war has made everything clear--don't you find that?"

"Not particularly. There have been wars before and there will be wars again. They don't really alter anything underneath, you know."

Nell was not paying attention.

"It's wicked to do anything except marry the man you love. I do love Vernon. I always knew I loved him, but I just hadn't the courage.... Oh! Jane, do you think it's too late? Perhaps it is. Perhaps he won't want me now. But I _must_ see him. Even if he doesn't want me. I must tell him."

She stood there looking piteously up at Jane. Would Jane help her? If not, she must try Sebastian--but she was afraid of Sebastian. He might refuse flatly to do anything.

"I could get hold of him for you," said Jane slowly, after a minute or two.

"Oh! thank you, Jane. And Jane--tell me--the war?"

"He's applied to join up, if that's what you mean."

"Yes. Oh! it's dreadful--if he should be killed. But it can't last long. It'll be over by Christmas--everybody says so."

"Sebastian says it will last two years."

"Oh! but Sebastian can't know. He's not really English. He's Russian."

Jane shook her head. Then she said: "I'll go and--" she paused--"telephone. Wait here."

She went out, closing the door behind her. She went to the end of the passage and into the bedroom. Vernon raised a dark rumpled head from the pillow.

"Get up," said Jane curtly. "Wash yourself and shave yourself and try and make yourself reasonably decent. Nell's here and wants to see you."

"Nell! But----"

"She thinks I'm telephoning to you. When you're ready, you can go outside the front door and ring the bell--and may God have mercy on both our souls."

"But Jane. Nell ... what does she want?"

"If you want to marry her, Vernon, now is your chance."

"But I'll have to tell her----"

"What? That you've been leading a 'gay life,' that you've been 'wild'? All the usual euphemisms! That's all she'll expect--and she'll be grateful to you for laying as little stress on that as possible. But tell her about you and me and you bring it from the general to the particular--and take the child through hell. Muzzle that noble conscience of yours and think of her."

Vernon rose slowly from the bed.

"I don't understand you, Jane."

"No, probably you never will."

He said: "Has Nell thrown over George Chetwynd?"

"I haven't asked for details. I'm going back to her now. Hurry up."

She left the room. Vernon thought: "I've never understood Jane. I never shall. She's so damned disconcerting. Well, I suppose I've been a sort of passing amusement to her. No, that's ungrateful. She's been damned decent to me. Nobody could have been more decent than Jane has been. But I couldn't make Nell understand that. She'd think Jane was dreadful...."

As he shaved and washed rapidly he said to himself: "All the same, it's out of the question. Nell and I could never come together again. Oh! I don't suppose there's any question of that. She's probably only come to ask me to forgive her, to make her feel comfortable in case I get killed in this bloody war. The sort of thing a girl would do. Anyway, I don't believe I care any more."

Another voice, deep down, said ironically: "Oh! no, not at all. Then why is your heart beating and your hand shaking? You bloody ass, of course you care!"

He was ready. He went outside--rang the bell. A mean subterfuge--unworthy--he felt ashamed. Jane opened the door. She said, rather like a parlour maid, "In here," and waved him toward the sitting room. He went in, closing the door behind him.

Nell had risen at his entrance. She stood with her hands clasped in front of her.

Her voice came faint and weak, like a guilty child.

"Oh! Vernon...."

Time swept backward. He was in the boat at Cambridge ... on the bridge at Ranelagh. He forgot Jane, he forgot everything. He and Nell were the only people in the world.

"Nell!"

They were clinging together, breathless as though they had been running. Words tumbled from Nell's lips.

"Vernon--if you want--I do love you--Oh! I do.... I'll marry you any time--at once--to-day. I don't mind about being poor or _anything_!"

He lifted her off her feet, kissed her eyes, her hair, her lips.

"Darling--oh! darling. Don't let's waste a minute--not a minute. I don't know how you get married. I've never thought about it. But let's go out and see. We'll go to the Archbishop of Canterbury--isn't that what you do? and get a special licence. How the devil _do_ you get married?"

"We might ask a clergyman?"

"Or there's a Registry Office. That's the thing."

"I don't think I want to be married at a Registry Office. I'd feel rather like a cook or a house parlourmaid being engaged."

"I don't think it's that kind, darling. But if you'd rather be married in a church, let's be married in a church. There are thousands of churches in London, all with nothing to do. I'm sure one of them will love to marry us."

They went out together, laughing happily. Vernon had forgotten everything--remorse, conscience, Jane....

At half-past two that afternoon Vernon Deyre and Eleanor Vereker were married in the church of St. Ethelred's, Chelsea.