Chapter II: Book I: A Society Scandal (2)

There was a lingering sweetness in her tone which still had a note of mockery in it. Her silence left Aynesworth conscious of a vague sense of uneasiness. He felt that her eyes were raised to his, and for some reason, which he could not translate even into a definite thought, he wished to avoid them. The silence was prolonged. For long afterwards he remembered those few minutes. There was a sort of volcanic intensity in the atmosphere. He was acutely conscious of small extraneous things, of the perfume of a great bowl of hyacinths, the ticking of a tiny French clock, the restless drumming of her finger tips upon the arm of her chair. All the time he seemed actually to feel her eyes, commanding, impelling, beseeching him to turn round. He did so at last, and looked her full in the face.

“Lady Ruth,” he said, “will you favor me with an answer to my message?”

“Certainly,” she answered, smiling quite naturally. “I will come and see Sir Wingrave Seton at four o’clock tomorrow afternoon. You can tell him that I think it rather an extraordinary request, but under the circumstances I will do as he suggests. He is staying at the Clarence, I presume, under his own name? I shall have no difficulty in finding him?”

“He is staying there under his own name,” Aynesworth answered, “and I will see that you have no difficulty.”

“So kind of you,” she murmured, holding out her hand. And again there was something mysterious in her eyes as she raised them to him, as though there existed between them already some understanding which mocked the conventionality of her words. Aynesworth left the house, and lit a cigarette upon the pavement outside with a little sigh of relief. He felt somehow humiliated. Did she fancy, he wondered, that he was a callow boy to dance to any tune of her piping--that he had never before seen a beautiful woman who wanted her own way?

THE GOSPEL OF HATE

“And what,” Wingrave asked his secretary as they sat at dinner that night, “did you think of Lady Ruth?”

“In plain words, I should not like to tell you,” Aynesworth answered. “I only hope that you will not send me to see her again.”

“Why not?”

“Lady Ruth,” Aynesworth answered deliberately, “is a very beautiful woman, with all the most dangerous gifts of Eve when she wanted her own way. She did me the scanty honor of appraising me as an easy victim, and she asked questions.”

“For instance?”

“She wanted me to tell her if you still had in your possession certain letters of hers,” Aynesworth said.

“Good! What did you say?”

“I told her, of course,” Aynesworth continued, “that having been in your service for a few hours only, I was scarcely in a position to know. I ventured further to remind her that such questions, addressed from her to me, were, to say the least of it, improper.”

Wingrave’s lips parted in what should have been a smile, but the spirit of mirth was lacking.

“And then?”

“There was nothing else,” Aynesworth answered. “She simply dismissed me.”

“I can see,” Wingrave remarked, “your grievance. You are annoyed because she regarded you as too easy a victim.”

“Perhaps,” Aynesworth admitted.

“There was some excuse for her, after all,” Wingrave continued coolly. “She possesses powers which you yourself have already admitted, and you, I should say, are a fairly impressionable person, so far as her sex is concerned. Confess now, that she did not leave you altogether indifferent.”

“Perhaps not,” Aynesworth admitted reluctantly. He did not care to say more.

“In case you should feel any curiosity on the subject,” Wingrave remarked, “I may tell you that I have those letters which she was so anxious to know about, and I shall keep them safe--even from you! You can amuse yourself with her if you like. You will never be able to tell her more than I care for her to know.”

Aynesworth continued his dinner in silence. After all, he was beginning to fear that he had made a mistake. Lovell had somehow contrived to impart a subtly tragic note to his story, but the outcome of it all seemed to assume a more sordid aspect. These two would meet, there would be recriminations, a tragic appeal for forgiveness, possibly some melodramatic attempt at vengeance. The glamour of the affair seemed to him to be fading away, now that he had come into actual contact with it. It was not until he began to study his companion during a somewhat prolonged silence that he felt the reaction. It was then that he began to see new things, that he felt the enthusiasm kindled by Lovell’s strangely told story begin to revive. It was not the watching for events more or less commonplace which would repay him for the step he had taken; it was the study of this man, placed in so strange a position,--a man come back to life, after years of absolute isolation. He had broken away from the chain which links together men of similar tastes and occupations, and which goes to the creation of type. He was in a unique position! He was in the world, but not of it. He was groping about amongst familiar scenes, over which time had thrown the pall of unfamiliarity. What manner of place would he find--what manner of place did he desire to find? It was here that the real interest of the situation culminated. At least, so Aynesworth thought then.

They were dining at a restaurant in the Strand, which Aynesworth had selected as representing one, the more wealthy, type of Bohemian life. The dinner and wine had been of his choosing. Wingrave had stipulated only for the best. Wingrave himself had eaten very little, the bottle of wine stood half empty between them. The atmosphere of the place, the effect of the wine, the delicate food, and the music, were visible to a greater or less degree, according to temperament, amongst all the other little groups of men and women by whom they were surrounded. Wingrave alone remained unaffected. He was carefully and correctly dressed in clothes borrowed from his new tailor, and he showed not the slightest signs of strangeness or gaucherie amongst his unfamiliar surroundings. He looked about him always, with the cold, easy nonchalance of the man of the world. Of being recognized he had not the slightest fear. His frame and bearing, and the brightness of his deep, strong eyes, still belonged to early middle age, but his face itself, worn and hardened, was the face of an elderly man. The more Aynesworth watched him, the more puzzled he felt.

“I am afraid,” he remarked, “that you are disappointed in this place.”

“Not at all,” Wingrave answered. “It is typical of a class, I suppose. It is the sort of place I wished to visit.”

In a corner of the room Aynesworth had recognized a friend and fellow clubman, who was acting at a neighboring theater. He was dining with some young ladies of his company, and beckoned to Aynesworth to come over and join them. He pointed them out to Wingrave.

“Would you care to be introduced?” he asked. “Holiwell is a very good fellow, and the girls might interest you. Two of them are Americans, and they are very popular.”

Wingrave shook his head.

“Thank you, no!” he said. “I should be glad to meet your friend some time when he is alone.”

It was the first intimation which Aynesworth had received of his companion’s sentiments as regards the other sex. Years afterwards, when his attitude towards them was often quoted as being one of the extraordinary features of an extraordinary personality, he remembered his perseverance on this occasion.

“You have not spoken to a woman for so many years,” he persisted. “Why not renew the experience? Nothing so humanizing, you know--not even cigarettes.”

Wingrave’s face fell, if possible into sterner lines. His tone was cold and hard.

“My scheme of life,” he said, “may be reconstructed more than once before I am satisfied. But I can assure you of this! There will be no serious place in it for women!”

Aynesworth shrugged his shoulders. He never doubted but that in a month of two his vis-a-vis would talk differently.

“Your scheme of life,” he repeated thoughtfully. “That sounds interesting! Have you any objection, I wonder, to telling me what manner of life you propose to lead?”

It was several moments before Wingrave answered him. He was smoking a cigar in a mechanical sort of way, but he obviously derived no pleasure from it. Yet Aynesworth noticed that some instinct had led him to choose the finest brand.

“Perhaps,” he said, letting his eyes rest coldly upon his questioner, “if I told you all that was in my mind you would waive your month’s salary and get back to your journalism!”

Aynesworth shrugged his shoulders.

“Why should you suppose that?” he asked. “I am not a moralist myself, nor am I the keeper of your conscience. I don’t think that you could frighten me off just yet.”

“Nevertheless,” Wingrave admitted, “there are times when I fear that we shall not get on together. I begin to suspect that you have a conscience.”

“You are the first,” Aynesworth assured him, “who has ever flattered me to that extent.”

“It may be elastic, of course,” Wingrave continued, “but I suspect its existence. I warn you that association with me will try it hard.”

“I accept the challenge,” Aynesworth answered lightly.

“You are rasher than you imagine,” Wingrave declared. “For instance, I have admitted to you, have I not, that I am interested in my fellow creatures, that I want to mix with them and watch them at their daily lives. Let me assure you that that interest is not a benevolent one.”

“I never fancied that you were a budding philanthropist,” Aynesworth remarked, lighting a fresh cigarette.

“I find myself,” Wingrave continued thoughtfully, “in a somewhat unique position. I am one of the ordinary human beings with whom the world is peopled, but I am not conscious of any of the usual weaknesses of sentiment or morality. For instance, if that gentleman with the red face, who has obviously eaten and drunk too much, were to have an apoplectic fit at the moment, and die in his chair, it would not shock or distress me in the least. On the contrary, I should be disposed to welcome his removal from a world which he obviously does nothing to adorn.”

Aynesworth glanced at the person in question. He was a theatrical agent and financier of stock companies, whom he knew very well by sight.

“I suppose,” Wingrave continued, “that I was born with the usual moral sentiments, and the usual feelings of kinship towards my fellow creatures. Circumstances, however, have wholly destroyed them. To me, men have become the puppets and women the dancing dolls of life. My interest in them, if it exists at all, is malevolent. I should like to see them all suffer exactly as I have suffered. It would interest me exceedingly.”

Still Aynesworth remained silent. He was anxious to hear all that was in the other’s mind, and he feared lest any interruption might divert him.

“There are men in the world,” Wingrave continued, “called philanthropists, amiable, obese creatures as a rule, whose professed aim in life it is to do as much good as possible. I take my stand upon the other pole. It is my desire to encourage and to work as much evil as possible. I wish to bring all the suffering I can upon those who come within the sphere of my influence.”

“You are likely,” Aynesworth remarked, “to achieve popularity.”

Wingrave regarded him steadfastly.

“Your speech,” he said, “is flippant, but you yourself do not realize how near it comes to the truth. Human beings are like dogs--they are always ready to lick the hand that flogs them. I mean to use the scourge whenever I can seize the opportunity, but you will find the jackals at my heels, nevertheless, whenever I choose to whistle.”

Aynesworth helped himself to a liqueur. He felt that he needed it.

“One weakness alone distresses me,” Wingrave continued. “In all ordinary matters of sentiment I am simply a negation. There is one antipathy, however, which I find it hard to overcome. The very sight of a woman, or the sound of her voice, distresses me. This is the more unfortunate,” he continued, “because it is upon the shoulders of her sex that the greater portion of my debt to my fellow creatures rests. However, time may help me!”

Aynesworth leaned back in his chair, and contemplated his companion for the next few moments in thoughtful silence. It was hard, he felt, to take a man who talked like this seriously. His manner was convincing, his speech deliberate and assured. There was not the slightest doubt but that he meant what he said, yet it seemed to Aynesworth equally certain that the time would come, and come quickly, when the unnatural hardness of the man would yield to the genial influence of friendship, of pleasure, of the subtle joys of freedom. Those past days of hideous monotony, of profitless, debasing toil, the long, sleepless nights, the very nightmare of life to a man of Wingrave’s culture and habits, might well have poisoned his soul, have filled him with ideas such as these. But everything was different now! The history of the world could show no epoch when pleasures so many and various were there for the man who carries the golden key. Today he was a looker-on, and the ice of his years of bitterness had not melted. Tomorrow, at any moment, he might catch a whiff of the fragrance of life, and the blood in his veins would move to a different tune. This was how it seemed to Aynesworth, as he studied his companion through the faint blue mist of tobacco smoke.

“This expression of your sentiments,” he remarked at last, “is interesting so far as it goes. I am, however, a practical person, and my connection with you is of a practical order. You don’t propose, I presume, to promenade the streets with a cat-o-nine-tails?”

“Your curiosity,” Wingrave remarked, “is reasonable. Tomorrow I may gratify some portion of it after my interview with Lady Ruth. In the meantime, I might remark that to the observant person who has wits and money, the opportunities for doing evil present themselves, I think, with reasonable frequency. I do not propose, however, to leave things altogether to chance.”

“A definite scheme of ill-doing,” Aynesworth ventured to suggest, “would be more satisfactory?”

“Exactly,” he admitted.

He called for the bill, and his eyes wandered once more around the room as the waiter counted out the change. The band were playing the “Valse Amoureuse”; the air was grown heavy with the odor of tobacco and the mingled perfumes of flowers and scents. A refrain of soft laughter followed the music. An after-dinner air pervaded the place. Wingrave’s lip curled.

“My lack of kinship with my fellows,” he remarked, “is exceedingly well defined just now. I agree with the one philosopher who declared that ‘eating and drinking are functions which are better performed in private.’”

The two men went on to a theater. The play was a society trifle--a thing of the moment. Wingrave listened gravely, without a smile or any particular sign of interest. At the end of the second act, he turned towards his companion.

“The lady in the box opposite,” he remarked, “desires to attract your attention.”

Aynesworth looked up and recognized Lady Ruth. She was fanning herself languidly, but her eyes were fixed upon the two men. She leaned a little forward, and her gesture was unmistakable.

Aynesworth rose to his feet a little doubtfully.

“You had better go,” Wingrave said. “Present my compliments and excuses. I feel that a meeting now would amount to an anti-climax.”

Aynesworth made his way upstairs. Lady Ruth was alone, and he noticed that she had withdrawn to a chair where she was invisible to the house. Even Aynesworth himself could not see her face clearly at first, for she had chosen the darkest corner of the box. He gathered an impression of a gleaming white neck and bosom rising and falling rather more quickly than was natural, eyes which shone softly through the gloom, and the perfume of white roses, a great cluster of which lay upon the box ledge. Her voice was scarcely raised above a whisper.

“That is--Sir Wingrave with you?”

“Yes!” Aynesworth answered. “It was he who saw you first!”

She seemed to catch her breath. Her voice was still tremulous.

“He is changed,” she said. “I should not have recognized him.”

“They were the best ten years of his life,” Aynesworth answered. “Think of how and in what surroundings he has been compelled to live. No wonder that he has had the humanity hammered out of him.”

She shivered a little.

“Is he always like this?” she asked. “I have watched him. He never smiles. He looks as hard as fate itself.”

“I have known him only a few hours,” Aynesworth reminded her.

“I dare not come tomorrow,” she whispered; “I am afraid of him.”

“Do you wish me to tell him so?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” she answered. “You are very unfeeling, Mr. Aynesworth.”

“I hope not,” he answered, and looked away towards the orchestra. He did not wish to meet her eyes.

“You are!” she murmured. “I have no one to whom I dare speak--of this. I dare not mention his name to my husband. It was my evidence which convicted him, and I can see, I know, that he is vindictive. And he has those letters! Oh! If I could only get them back?”

Her voice trembled with an appeal whispered but passionate. It was wonderful how musical and yet how softly spoken her words were. They were like live things, and the few feet of darkened space through which they had passed seemed charged with magnetic influence.

“Mr. Aynesworth!”

He turned and faced her.

“Can’t you help me?”

“I cannot, Lady Ruth.”

The electric bell rang softly from outside, and the orchestra commenced to play. Lady Ruth rose and looked at herself in the mirror. Then she turned and smiled at her visitor. The pallor of her face was no longer unnatural. She was a wonderful woman.

“I shall come tomorrow,” she said. “Shall I see you?”

“That,” he answered, “depends upon Sir Wingrave.”

She made a little grimace as she dismissed him. Wingrave did not speak to his companion for some time after he had resumed his seat. Then he inclined his head towards him.

“Have you come to terms with her ladyship?” he asked drily.

“Not yet!” Aynesworth answered.

“You can name your own price,” he continued. “She will pay! Don’t be afraid of making her bid up. She has a good deal at stake!”

Aynesworth made no reply. He was thinking how easy it would be to hate this man!

“HAST THOU FOUND ME, O MINE ENEMY?”

Aynesworth was waiting in the hall on the following afternoon when Lady Ruth arrived. He had half expected that she would drive up to the side door in a hansom, would wear a thick veil, and adopt the other appurtenances of a clandestine meeting. But Lady Ruth was much too clever a woman for anything of the sort. She descended at the great front entrance from her own electric coupe, and swept into the hotel followed by her maid. She stopped to speak to the manager of the hotel, who knew her from her visits to the world-famous restaurant, and she asked at once for Sir Wingrave Seton. Then she saw Aynesworth, and crossed the hall with outstretched hand.

“How nice of you to be here,” she murmured. “Can you take me to Sir Wingrave at once? I have such a busy afternoon that I was afraid at the last moment that I should be unable to come!”

Aynesworth led her towards the lift.

“Sir Wingrave is in his sitting room,” he remarked. “It is only on the first floor.”

She directed her maid where to wait, and followed him. On the way down the corridor, he stole a glance at her. She was a little pale, and he could see that she had nerved herself to this interview with a great effort. As he knocked at the door, her great eyes were raised for a moment to his, and they were like the eyes of a frightened child.

“I am afraid!” she murmured.

There was no time for more. They were in the room, and Wingrave had risen to meet them. Lady Ruth did not hesitate for a moment. She crossed the room towards him with outstretched hands. Aynesworth, who was standing a little on one side, watched their meeting with intense, though covert interest. She had pushed back her veil, her head was a little upraised in a mute gesture of appeal.

She was pale to the lips, but her eyes were soft with hidden tears. Wingrave stood stonily silent, like a figure of fate. His hands remained by his sides. Her welcome found no response from him. She came to a standstill, and, swaying a little, stretched out her hand and steadied herself by grasping the back of a chair.

“Wingrave,” she murmured, and her voice was full of musical reproach.

Aynesworth turned to leave the room, but Wingrave, looking over her head, addressed him.

“You will remain here, Aynesworth,” he said. “There are some papers at that desk which require sorting.”

Aynesworth hesitated. He had caught the look on Lady Ruth’s face.

“If you could excuse me for half an hour, Sir Wingrave,” he began.

“I cannot spare you at present,” Wingrave interrupted. “Kindly remain!”

Aynesworth had no alternative but to obey. Wingrave handed a chair to Lady Ruth. He was looking at her steadfastly. There were no signs of any sort of emotion in his face. Whatever their relations in the past might have been, it was hard to believe, from his present demeanor, that he felt any.

“Wingrave,” she said softly, “are you going to be unkind to me--you, whom I have always thought of in my dreams as the most generous of men! I have looked forward so much to seeing you again--to knowing that you were free! Don’t disappoint me!”

Wingrave laughed shortly, and Aynesworth bent closer over his work, with a gathering frown upon his forehead. A mirthless laugh is never a pleasant sound.

“Disappoint you!” he repeated calmly. “No! I must try and avoid that! You have been looking forward with so much joy to this meeting then? I am flattered.”

She shivered a little.

“I have looked forward to it,” she answered, and her voice was dull and lifeless with pain. “But you are not glad to see me,” she continued. “There is no welcome in your face! You are changed--altogether! Why did you send for me?”

“Listen!”

There was a moment’s silence. Wingrave was standing upon the hearthrug, cold, passionless, Sphinx-like. Lady Ruth was seated a few feet away, but her face was hidden.

“You owe me something!” he said.

“Owe--you something?” she repeated vaguely.

“Do you deny it?” he said.

“Oh, no, no!” she declared with emotion. “Not for a moment.”

“I want,” he said, “to give you an opportunity of repaying some portion of that debt!”

She raised her eyes to his. Her whispered words came so softly that they were almost inaudible.

“I am waiting,” she said. “Tell me what I can do!”

He commenced to speak at some length, very impassively, very deliberately.

“You will doubtless appreciate the fact,” he said, “that my position, today, is a somewhat peculiar one. I have had enough of solitude. I am rich! I desire to mix once more on equal terms amongst my fellows. And against that, I have the misfortune to be a convicted felon, who has spent the last ten or a dozen years amongst the scum of the earth, engaged in degrading tasks, and with no identity save a number. The position, as you will doubtless observe, is a difficult one.”

Her eyes fell from his. Once more she shivered, as though with physical pain. Something that was like a smile, only that it was cold and lifeless, flitted across his lips.

“I have no desire,” he continued, “to live in foreign countries. On the contrary, I have plans which necessitate my living in England. The difficulties by this time are, without doubt, fully apparent to you.”

She said nothing. Her eyes were once more watching his face.

“My looking glass,” he continued, “shows me that I am changed beyond any reasonable chance of recognition. I do not believe that the Wingrave Seton of today would readily be recognized as the Wingrave Seton of twelve years ago. But I propose to make assurance doubly sure. I am leaving this country for several years, at once. I shall go to America, and I shall return as Mr. Wingrave, millionaire--and I propose, by the way, to make money there. I desire, under that identity, to take my place once more amongst my fellows. I shall bring letters of introduction--to you.”

There was a long and somewhat ominous silence! Lady Ruth’s eyes were fixed upon the floor. She was thinking, and thinking rapidly, but there were no signs of it in her pale drawn face. At last she looked up.

“There is my husband,” she said. “He would recognize you, if no one else did.”

“You are a clever woman,” he answered. “I leave it to you to deal with your husband as seems best to you.”

“Other people,” she faltered, “would recognize you!”

“Do me the favor,” he begged her, “to look at me carefully for several moments. You doubtless have some imperfect recollection of what I was. Compare it with my present appearance! I venture to think that you will agree with me. Recognition is barely possible.”

Again there was silence. Lady Ruth seemed to have no words, but there was the look of a frightened child upon her face.

“I am sorry,” he continued, “that the idea does not appeal to you! I can understand that my presence may serve to recall a period which you and your husband would doubtless prefer to forget--”

“Stop!”

A little staccato cry of pain; a cry which seemed to spring into life from a tortured heart, broke from her lips. Aynesworth heard it, and, at that moment, he hated his employer. Wingrave paused for a moment politely, and then continued.

“But after all,” he said, “I can assure you that you will find very little in the Mr. Wingrave of New York to remind you of the past. I shall do my utmost to win for myself a place in your esteem, which will help you to forget the other relationship, which, if my memory serves me, used once to exist between us!”

She raised her head. Either she realized that, for the present, the man was immune against all sentiment, or his calm brutality had had a correspondingly hardening effect upon her.

“If I agree,” she said, “will you give me back my letters?”

“No!” he answered.

“What are you going to do with them?”

“It depends,” he said, “upon you. I enter into no engagement. I make no promises. I simply remind you that it would be equally possible for me to take my place in the world as a rehabilitated Wingrave Seton. Ten years ago I yielded to sentiment. Today I have outlived it.”

“Ten years ago,” she murmured, “you were a hero. God knows what you are now!”

“Exactly!” he answered smoothly. “I am free to admit that I am a puzzle to myself. I find myself, in fact, a most interesting study.”

“I consent,” she said, with a little shudder. “I am going now.”

“You are a sensible woman,” he answered. “Aynesworth, show Lady Ruth to her carriage.”

She rose to her feet. Hung from her neck by a chain of fine gold, was a large Chinchilla muff. She stood before him, and her hands had sought its shelter. Timidly she withdrew one.

“Will you shake hands with me, Wingrave?” she asked timidly.

He shook his head.

“Forgive me,” he said; “I may better my manners in America, but a present I cannot.”

She passed out of the room. Aynesworth followed, closing the door behind them. In the corridor she stumbled, and caught at his arm for support.

“Don’t speak to me,” she gasped. “Take me where I can sit down.”

He found her a quiet corner in the drawing room. She sat perfectly still for nearly five minutes, with her eyes closed. Then she opened them, and looked at her companion.

“Mr. Aynesworth,” she said, “are you so poor that you must serve a man like that?”

He shook his head.

“It is not poverty,” he answered. “I knew his history, and I am interested in him!”

“You write novels, don’t you?” she asked.

“I try,” he answered. “His story fascinated me. He stands today in a unique position to life. I want to see how he will come out of it.”

“You knew his story--the truth?”

“Everything,” he answered. “I heard it from a journalist who was in court, his only friend, the only man who knew.”

“Where is he now?”

“On his way to Japan.”

She drew a little breath between her teeth.

“There were rumors,” she said. “It was hard for me at first, but I lived them down. I was very young then. I ought not to have accepted his sacrifice. I wish to heaven I had not. I wish that I had faced the scandal then. It is worse to be in the power of a man like this today! Mr. Aynesworth!”

“Lady Ruth!”

“Do you think that he has the right to keep those letters?”

“I cannot answer that question.”

“Will you be my friend?”

“So far as I can--in accordance with my obligations to my employer!”

She tried him no further then, but rose and walked slowly out of the room. He found her maid, and saw them to their carriage. Then he returned to the sitting room. Wingrave was smoking a cigarette.

“I am trying the humanizing influence,” he remarked. “Got rid of her ladyship?”

“Lady Ruth has just gone,” Aynesworth answered.

“Have you promised to steal the letters yet?” he inquired.

“Not yet!”

“Her dainty ladyship has not bid high enough, I suppose,” he continued. “Don’t be afraid to open your mouth. There’s another woman there besides the Lady Ruth Barrington, who opens bazaars, and patronizes charity, and entertains Royalty. Ask what you want and she’ll pay!”

“What a brute you are!” Aynesworth exclaimed involuntarily.

“Of course I am,” he admitted. “I know that. But whose fault is it? It isn’t mine. I’ve lived the life of a brute creature for ten years. You don’t abuse a one-legged man, poor devil. I’ve had other things amputated. I was like you once. It seemed all right to me to go under to save a woman’s honor. You never have. Therefore, I say you’ve no right to call me a brute. Personally, I don’t object. It is simply a matter of equity.”

“I admit it,” Aynesworth declared. “You are acting like a brute.”

“Precisely. I didn’t make myself what I am. Prison did it. Go and try ten years yourself, and you’ll find you will have to grope about for your fine emotions. Are you coming to America with me?”

“I suppose so,” Aynesworth answered. “When do we start?”

“Saturday week.”

“Sport west, or civilization east?”

“Both,” Wingrave answered. “Here is a list of the kit which we shall require. Add yourself the things which I have forgotten. I pay for both!”

“Very good of you,” Aynesworth answered.

“Not at all. I don’t suppose you’d come without. Can you shoot?”

“A bit,” he admitted.

“Be particular about the rifles. I can take you to a little corner in Canada where the bears don’t stand on ceremony. Put everything in hand, and be ready to come down to Cornwall with me on Monday.”

“Cornwall!” Aynesworth exclaimed. “What on earth are we going to do in Cornwall?”

“I have an estate there, the home of my ancestors, which I am going to sell. I am the last of the Setons, fortunately, and I am going to smash the family tree, sell the heirlooms, and burn the family records!”

“I shouldn’t if I were you,” Aynesworth said quietly. “You are a young man yet. You may come back to your own!”

“Meaning?”

“You may smoke enough cigarettes to become actually humanized! One can never tell! I have known men proclaim themselves cynics for life, who have been making idiots of themselves with their own children in five years.”

Wingrave nodded gravely.

“True enough,” he answered. “But the one thing which no man can mistake is death. Listen, and I will quote some poetry to you. I think--it is something like this:--

“‘The rivers of ice may melt, and the mountains crumble into dust, but the heart of a dead man is like the seed plot unsown. Green grass shall not sprout there, nor flowers blossom, nor shall all the ages of eternity show there any sign of life.’”

He spoke as though he had been reading from a child’s Primer. When he had finished, he replaced his cigarette between his teeth.

“I am a dead man,” he said calmly. “Dead as the wildest seed plot in God’s most forgotten acre!”

LORD OF THE MANOR

She came slowly towards the two men through the overgrown rose garden, a thin, pale, wild-eyed child, dressed in most uncompromising black. It was a matter of doubt whether she was the more surprised to see them, or they to find anyone else, in this wilderness of desolation. They stood face to face with her upon the narrow path.

“Have you lost your way?” she inquired politely.

“We were told,” Aynesworth answered, “that there was a gate in the wall there, through which we could get on to the cliffs.”

“Who told you so?” she asked.

“The housekeeper,” Aynesworth answered. “I will not attempt to pronounce her name.”

“Mrs. Tresfarwin,” the child said. “It is not really difficult. But she had no right to send you through here! It is all private, you know!”

“And you?” Aynesworth asked with a smile, “you have permission, I suppose?”

“Yes,” she answered. “I have lived here all my life. I go where I please. Have you seen the pictures?”

“We have just been looking at them,” Aynesworth answered.

“Aren’t they beautiful?” she exclaimed. “I--oh!”

She sat suddenly down on a rough wooden seat and commenced to cry. For the first time Wingrave looked at her with some apparent interest.

“Why, what is the matter with you, child?” Aynesworth exclaimed.

“I have loved them so all my life,” she sobbed; “the pictures, and the house, and the gardens, and now I have to go away! I don’t know where! Nobody seems to know!”

Aynesworth looked down at her black frock.

“You have lost someone, perhaps?” he said.

“My father,” she answered quietly. “He was organist here, and he died last week.”

“And you have no other relatives?” he asked.

“None at all. No one--seems--quite to know--what is going to become of me!” she sobbed.

“Where are you staying now?” he inquired.

“With an old woman who used to look after our cottage,” she answered. “But she is very poor, and she cannot keep me any longer. Mrs. Colson says that I must go and work, and I am afraid. I don’t know anyone except at Tredowen! And I don’t know how to work! And I don’t want to go away from the pictures, and the garden, and the sea! It is all so beautiful, isn’t it? Don’t you love Tredowen?”

“Well, I haven’t been here very long, you see,” Aynesworth explained.

Wingrave spoke for the first time. His eyes were fixed upon the child, and Aynesworth could see that she shrank from his cold, unsympathetic scrutiny.

“What is your name?” he asked.

“Juliet Lundy,” she answered.

“How long was your father organist at the church?”

“I don’t know,” she answered. “Ever since I was born, and before.”

“And how old are you?”

“Fourteen next birthday.”

“And all that time,” he asked, “has there been no one living at Tredowen?”

“No one except Mrs. Tresfarwin,” she answered. “It belongs to a very rich man who is in prison.”

Wingrave’s face was immovable. He stood on one side, however, and turned towards his companion.

“We are keeping this young lady,” he remarked, “from what seems to be her daily pilgrimage. I wonder whether it is really the pictures, or Mrs. Tresfarwin’s cakes?”

She turned her shoulder upon him in silent scorn, and looked at Aynesworth a little wistfully.

“Goodbye!” she said.

He waved his hand as he strolled after Wingrave.

“There you are, Mr. Lord of the Manor,” he said. “You can’t refuse to do something for the child. Her father was organist at your own church, and a hard struggle he must have had of it, with an absentee landlord, and a congregation of seagulls, I should think.”

“Are you joking?” Wingrave asked coldly.

“I was never more in earnest in my life,” Aynesworth answered. “The girl is come from gentlefolks. Did you see what a delicate face she had, and how nicely she spoke? You wouldn’t have her sent out as a servant, would you?”

Wingrave looked at his companion ominously.

“You have a strange idea of the duties of a landlord,” he remarked. “Do you seriously suppose that I am responsible for the future of every brat who grows up on this estate?”

“Of course not!” Aynesworth answered. “You must own for yourself that this case is exceptional. Let us go down to the Vicarage and inquire about it.”

“I shall do nothing of the sort,” Wingrave answered. “Nor will you! Do you see the spray coming over the cliffs there? The sea must be worth watching.”

Aynesworth walked by his side in silence. He dared not trust himself to speak. Wingrave climbed with long, rapid strides to the summit of the headland, and stood there with his face turned seawards. The long breakers were sweeping in from the Atlantic with a low, insistent roar; as far as the eye could reach the waves were crusted with white foam. Every now and then the spray fell around the two men in a little dazzling shower; the very atmosphere was salt. About their heads the seagulls whirled and shrieked. From the pebbled beach to the horizon there was nothing to break the monotony of that empty waste of waters.

Wingrave stood perfectly motionless, with his eyes fixed upon the horizon. Minute after minute passed, and he showed no signs of moving. Aynesworth found himself presently engaged in watching him. Thoughts must be passing through his brain. He wondered what they were. It was here that he had spent his boyhood; barely an hour ago the two men had stood before the picture of his father. It was here, if anywhere, that he might regain some part of his older and more natural self. Was it a struggle, he wondered, that was going on within the man? There were no signs of it in his face. Simply he stood and looked, and looked, as though, by infinite perseverance, the very horizon itself might recede, and the thing for which he sought become revealed....

Aynesworth turned away at last, and there, not many yards behind, apparently watching them, stood the child. He waved his hand and advanced towards her. Her eyes were fixed upon Wingrave half fearfully.

“I am afraid of the other gentleman,” she whispered, as he reached her side. “Will you come a little way with me? I will show you a seagull’s nest.”

They left Wingrave where he was, and went hand in hand, along the cliff side. She was a curious mixture or shyness and courage. She talked very little, but she gripped her companion’s fingers tightly.

“I can show you,” she said, “where the seagulls build, and I can tell you the very spot in the sea where the sun goes down night after night.

“There are some baby seagulls in one of the nests, but I daren’t go very near for the mother bird is so strong. Father used to say that when they have their baby birds to look after, they are as fierce as eagles.”

“Your father used to walk with you here, Juliet?” Aynesworth asked.

“Always till the last few months when he got weaker and weaker,” she answered. “Since then I come every day alone.”

“Don’t you find it lonely?” he asked.

She shook her head.

“At first,” she answered, “not now. It makes me unhappy. Would you like to go down on the beach and look for shells? I can find you some very pretty ones.”

They clambered down and wandered hand in hand by the seashore. She told him quaint little stories of the smugglers, of wrecks, and the legends of the fisher people. Coming back along the sands, she clung to his arm and grew more silent. Her eyes sought his every now and then, wistfully. Presently she pointed out a tiny whitewashed cottage standing by itself on a piece of waste ground.

“That is where I live now, at least for a day or two,” she said. “They cannot keep me any longer. When are you going away?”

“Very soon, I am afraid, little girl,” he answered. “I will come and see you, though, before I go.”

“You promise,” she said solemnly.

“I promise,” Aynesworth repeated.

Then she held up her face, a little timidly, and he kissed her. Afterwards, he watched her turn with slow, reluctant footsteps to the unpromising abode which she had pointed out. Aynesworth made his way to the inn, cursing his impecuniosity and Wingrave’s brutal indifference.

He found the latter busy writing letters.

“Doing your work, Aynesworth?” he remarked coldly. “Be so good as to write to Christie’s for me, and ask them to send down a valuer to go through the pictures.”

“You are really going to sell!” Aynesworth exclaimed.

“Most certainly,” Wingrave answered. “Heirlooms and family pictures are only so much rubbish to me. I am the last of my line, and I doubt whether even my lawyer could discover a next of kin for my personal property. Sell! Of course I’m going to sell! What use is all this hoarded rubbish to me? I am going to turn it into gold!”

“And what use is gold?” Aynesworth asked curiously. “You have plenty!”

“Not enough for my purpose,” Wingrave declared. “We are going to America to make more.”

“It’s vandalism!” Aynesworth said, “rank vandalism! The place as it is is a picture! The furniture and the house have grown old together. Why, you might marry!”

Wingrave scowled at the younger man across the room.

“You are a fool, Aynesworth,” he said shortly. “Take down these letters.”

After dinner, Wingrave went out alone. Aynesworth followed him about an hour later, when his work was done, and made his way towards the Vicarage. It was barely nine o’clock, but the little house seemed already to be in darkness. He rang twice before anybody answered him. Then he heard slow, shuffling footsteps within, and a tall, gaunt man, in clerical attire, and carrying a small lamp, opened the door.

Aynesworth made the usual apologies and was ushered into a bare, gloomy-looking apartment which, from the fact of its containing a writing table and a few books, he imagined must be the study. His host never asked him to sit down. He was a long, unkempt-looking man with a cold, forbidding face, and his manner was the reverse of cordial.

“I have called to see you,” Aynesworth explained, “with reference to one of your parishioners--the daughter of your late organist.”

“Indeed!” the clergyman remarked solemnly.

“I saw her today for the first time and have only just heard her story,” Aynesworth continued. “It seems to be a very sad one.”

His listener inclined his head.

“I am, unfortunately, a poor man,” Aynesworth continued, “but I have some friends who are well off, and I could lay my hands upon a little ready money. I should like to discuss the matter with you and see if we cannot arrange something to give her a start in life.”

The clergyman cleared his throat.

“It is quite unnecessary,” he answered. “A connection of her father’s has come forward at the last moment, who is able to do all that is required for her. Her future is provided for.”

Aynesworth was a little taken aback.

“I am very glad to hear it,” he declared. “I understood that she had neither friends nor relations.”

“You were misinformed,” the other answered. “She has both.”

“May I ask who it is who has turned up so unexpectedly?” Aynesworth inquired. “I have taken a great fancy to the child.”

The clergyman edged a little towards the door, and the coldness of his manner was unmistakable.

“I do not wish to seem discourteous,” he said, “but I cannot recognize that you have any right to ask me these questions. You may accept my word that the child is to be fittingly provided for.”

Aynesworth felt the color rising in his cheeks.

“I trust,” he said, “that you do not find my interest in her unwarrantable. My visit to you is simply a matter of charity. If my aid is unneeded, so much the better. All the same, I should like to know where she is going and who her friends are.”

“I do not find myself at liberty to afford you any information,” was the curt reply.

Thereupon there was nothing left for Aynesworth to do but to put on his hat and walk out, which he did.

Wingrave met him in the hall on his return.

“Where have you been?” he asked a little sharply.

“On a private errand,” Aynesworth answered, irritated by his words and look.

“You are my secretary,” Wingrave said coldly. “I do not pay you to go about executing private errands.”

Aynesworth looked at him in surprise. Did he really wish to quarrel?

“I imagine, sir,” he said, “that my time is my own when I have no work of yours on hand. If you think otherwise--”

He paused and looked at his employer significantly. Wingrave turned on his heel.

“Be so kind,” he said, “as to settle the bill here tonight. We leave by the seven o’clock train in the morning.”

“Tomorrow!” Aynesworth exclaimed.

“Precisely!”

“Do you mind,” he asked, “if I follow by a later train?”

“I do,” Wingrave answered. “I need you in London directly we arrive.”

“I am afraid,” Aynesworth said, after a moment’s reflection, “that it is impossible for me to leave.”

“Why?”

“You will think it a small thing,” he said, “but I have given my promise. I must see that child again before I go!”

“You are referring,” he asked, “to the black-frocked little creature we saw about the place yesterday?”

“Yes!”

Wingrave regarded his secretary as one might look at a person who has suddenly taken leave of his senses.

“I am sorry,” he said, “to interfere with your engagements, but it is necessary that we should both leave by the seven o’clock train tomorrow morning.”

Aynesworth reflected for a moment.

“If I can see the child first,” he said, “I will come. If not, I will follow you at midday.”

“In the latter case,” Wingrave remarked, “pray do not trouble to follow me unless your own affairs take you to London. Our connection will have ended.”

“You mean this?” Aynesworth asked.

“It is my custom,” Wingrave answered, “to mean what I say.”

Aynesworth set his alarm that night for half-past five. It seemed to him that his future would largely depend upon how soundly the child slept.

THE HEART OF A CHILD

The cottage, as Aynesworth neared it, showed no sign of life. The curtainless windows were blank and empty, no smoke ascended from the chimney. Its plastered front was innocent of any form of creeper, but in the few feet of garden in front a great, overgrown wild rose bush, starred with deep red blossoms, perfumed the air. As he drew near, the door suddenly opened, and with a little cry of welcome the child rushed out to him.

“How lovely of you!” she cried. “I saw you coming from my window!”

“You are up early,” he said, smiling down at her.

“The sun woke me,” she answered. “It always does. I was going down to the sands. Shall we go together? Or would you like to go into the gardens at Tredowen? The flowers are beautiful there while the dew is on them!”

“I am afraid,” Aynesworth answered, “that I cannot do either. I have come to say goodbye.”

The light died out of her face all of a sudden. The delicate beauty of her gleaming eyes and quivering mouth had vanished. She was once more the pale, wan little child he had seen coming slowly up the garden path at Tredowen.

“You are going--so soon!” she murmured.

He took her hand and led her away over the short green turf of the common.

“We only came for a few hours,” he told her. “But I have good news for you, Juliet, unless you know already. Mr. Saunders has found out some of your friends. They are going to look after you properly, and you will not be alone any more.”

“What time are you going?” she asked.

“Silly child,” he answered, giving her hand a shake. “Listen to what I am telling you. You are going to have friends to look after you always. Aren’t you glad?”

“No, I am not glad,” she answered passionately. “I don’t want to go away. I am--lonely.”

Her arms suddenly sought his neck, and her face was buried on his shoulder. He soothed her as well as he could.

“I must go, little girl,” he said, “for I am off to America almost at once. As soon as I can after I come back, I will come and see you.”

“You have only been here one day,” she sobbed.

“I would stay if I could, dear,” Aynesworth answered. “Come, dry those eyes and be a brave girl. Think how nice it will be to go and live with people who will take care of you properly, and be fond of you. Why, you may have a pony, and all sorts of nice things.”

“I don’t want a pony,” she answered, hanging on his arm. “I don’t want to go away. I want to stay here--and wait till you come back.”

He laughed.

“Why, when I come back, little woman,” he answered, “you will be almost grown up. Come, dry your eyes now, and I tell you what we will do. You shall come back with me to breakfast, and then drive up to the station and see us off.”

“I should like to come,” she whispered, “but I am afraid of the other gentleman.”

“Very likely we sha’n’t see him,” Aynesworth answered. “If we do, he won’t hurt you.”

“I don’t like his face!” she persisted.

“Well, we won’t look at it,” Aynesworth answered. “But breakfast we must have!”

They were half way through the meal, and Juliet had quite recovered her spirits when Wingrave entered. He looked at the two with impassive face, and took his place at the table. He wished the child “Good morning” carelessly, but made no remark as to her presence there.

“I have just been telling Juliet some good news,” Aynesworth remarked. “I went to see Mr. Saunders, the Vicar here, last night, and he has found out some of her father’s friends. They are going to look after her.”

Wingrave showed no interest in the information. But a moment later he addressed Juliet for the first time.

“Are you glad that you are going away from Tredowen?” he asked.

“I am very, very sorry,” she answered, the tears gathering once more in her eyes.

“But you want to go to school, don’t you, and see other girls?” he asked.

She shook her head decidedly.

“It will break my heart,” she said quietly, “to leave Tredowen. I think that if I have to go away from the pictures and the garden, and the sea, I shall never be happy any more.”

“You are a child,” he remarked contemptuously; “you do not understand. If you go away, you can learn to paint pictures yourself like those at Tredowen. You will find that the world is full of other beautiful places!”

The sympathetic aspect of his words was altogether destroyed by the thin note of careless irony, which even the child understood. She felt that he was mocking her.

“I could never be happy,” she said simply, “away from Tredowen. You understand, don’t you?” she added, turning confidentially to Aynesworth.

“You think so now, dear,” he said, “but remember that you are very young. There are many things for you to learn before you grow up.”

“I am not a dunce,” she replied. “I can talk French and German, and do arithmetic, and play the organ. Father used to teach me these things. I can learn at Tredowen very well. I hope that my friends will let me stay here.”