A GRAY EYE OR SO

SHORTLY after noon he was with her. He had left his rooms without touching a morsel of breakfast, and it was plain that such sleep as he had had could not have been of a soothing nature. He was pale and haggard; and she seemed surprised—not frightened, however, for her love was that which casteth out fear—at the way he came to her—with outstretched hands which caught her own, as he said, “My beloved—my beloved, I have a strange word for you—a strange proposal to make. Dearest, can you trust me? Will you marry me—to-morrow—to-day?”

She scarcely gave a start. He was only conscious of her hands tightening upon his own. She kept her eyes fixed upon his. The silence was long. It was made the more impressive by the distinctness with which the jocularity of the fishmonger’s hoy with the cook at the area railings, was heard in the room.

“Harold,” she said, in a voice that had no trace of distrust, “Harold, you are part of my life—all my life! When I said that I loved you, I had given myself to you. I will marry you any time you please—to-morrow—to-day—this moment!”

She was in his arms, sobbing.

His “God bless you, my darling!” sounded like a sob also.

In a few moments she was laughing through her tears.

He was not laughing.

“Now, tell me what you mean, my beloved,” said she, with a hand on each of his shoulders.

“Tell me what you mean by coming to frighten me like this. What has happened?”

“Nothing has happened, only I want to feel that you are my own—my own beyond the possibility of being separated from me by any power on earth. I do not want to take you away from your father’s house—I cannot offer you any home. It may be years before we can live together as those who love one another as we love, may live with the good will of heaven. I only want you to become my wife in name, dearest. Our marriage must be kept a secret.”

“But my own love,” said she, “why should you wish to go through this ceremony? Are we not united by the true bond of love? Can we be more closely united than we are now? The strength of the marriage bond is only strong in proportion as the love which is the foundation of marriage is strong. Now, why should you wish for the marriage rite before we are prepared to live for ever under the same roof?”

“Why, why?” he cried passionately, as he looked into the depths of her eyes.

He left her and went across the room to one of the windows and looked out. (It was the greengrocer’s boy who was now jocular with the cook at the area railings.)

“My Beatrice—” Harold had returned to her from his scrutiny of the pavement. “My Beatrice, you have not seen all that I have seen in the world. You do not know—you do not know me as I know myself. Why should there come to me sometimes an unworthy thought—no, not a doubt—oh, I have seen so much of the world, Beatrice, I feel that if anything should come between us it would kill me. I must—I must feel that we are made one—that there is a bond binding us together that nothing can sever.”

“But, my Harold—no, I will not interpose any buts. You would not ask me to do this if you had not some good reason. You say that you know the world. I admit that I do not know it. I only know you, and knowing you and loving you with all my heart—with all my soul—I trust you implicitly—without a question—without the shadow of a doubt.”

“God bless you, my love, my love! You will never have reason to regret loving me—trusting me.”

“It is my life—it is my life, Harold.”

Once again he was standing at the window. This time he remained longer with his eyes fixed upon the railings of the square enclosure.

“It must be to-morrow,” he said, returning to her. “I shall come here at noon. A few words spoken in this room and nothing can part us. You will still call yourself by your own name, dearest, God hasten the day when you can come to me as my wife in the sight of all the world and call yourself by my name.”

“I shall be here at noon to-morrow,” said she.

“Unless,” said he, returning to her after he had kissed her forehead and had gone to the door. “Unless”—he framed her face with his hands, and looked down into the depths of her eyes.—“Unless, when you have thought over the whole matter, you feel that you cannot trust me.”

She laughed.

“Ah, my love, my love, you do not know the world,” said he.

He knew the world.

Another man who knew the world was Pontius Pilate.

This was why he asked “What is Truth?”

Harold Wynne was in Archie Brown’s room in Piccadilly within half an hour.

Archie was at the Legitimate Theatre, Mr. Playdell said—Mr. Playdell was seated at the dining-room table surrounded by papers. A trifling difference of opinion had arisen between Mrs. Mowbray and her manager, he added, and (with a smile) Archie had hurried to the theatre to set matters right.

“It is kind of you to call, Mr. Wynne,” continued Mr. Playdell. “But I hope it is not to tell me that you regret the suggestion that you made yesterday—that you do not see your way to write to your sister to invite Archie to her place.”

“I wrote to her the moment you left me,” said Harold. “Archie will get his invitation this evening. It is not about him that I came here to-day, Mr. Playdell. I came to see you. You asked me yesterday to give you an opportunity of doing something for me. I can give you that opportunity.”

“And I promise you that I shall embrace it with gladness, Mr. Wynne,” said Playdell, rising from the table. “Tell me how I can serve you and you will find how ready I am.”

“You still hold to your original principles regarding marriage, Mr. Playdell?”

“How could I do otherwise than hold to them, Mr. Wynne? They are the result of thought; they are not merely a fad to gain notoriety. Let me prove the position that I take up on this matter.”

“You need not, Mr. Playdeil. I heard all your case when it was published. I confess that I now think differently respecting you from what I thought at that time. Will you perform the ceremony of marriage between a lady who has promised to marry me and myself?”

“There is only one condition that I make, Mr. Wynne. You must take an oath that you consider the rite, as I perform it, to be binding upon you, and that you will never recognize a divorce.”

“I will take that oath willingly, Mr. Playdeil. I have promised my fiancÃ©e that we shall be with her at noon to-morrow. She will be prepared for us. By the way, do you require a ring for the ceremony as performed by you?”

Mr. Playdeil looked grave—almost scandalized.

“Mr. Wynne,” said he, “that question suggests to me a certain disbelief on your part in the validity in the sight of heaven of the rite of marriage as performed by a man with a full sense of his high office, even though unfrocked by a Church that has always shown too great a readiness to submit to secular guidance—secular restrictions in matters that were originally, like marriage, purely spiritual. The Church has not only submitted to civil restrictions in the matter of the celebration of the holy rite of matrimony, but, while declaring at the altar that God has joined them whom the Church has joined, and while denying the authority of man to put them asunder, she recognizes the validity of divorce. She will marry a man who has been divorced from his wife, when he has duly paid the Archbishop a sum of money for sanctioning what in the sight of God is adultery.”

“My dear Mr. Playdell,” said Harold, “I recollect very clearly the able manner in which you defended your—your—principles, when they were called in question. I do not desire to call them in question now. I believe in your sincerity in this matter and in other matters. I shall drive here for you at half past eleven o’clock to-morrow. I need scarcely say that I mean my marriage to be kept a secret.”

“You may depend upon my good faith in that respect,” said Mr. Playdell. “Mr. Wynne,” he added, impressively, “this land of ours will never be a moral one so long as the Church is content to accept a Parliamentary definition of morality. The Church ought certainly to know her own business.”

“There I quite agree with you,” said Harold.

He refrained from asking Mr. Playdell if the Church, in dispensing with his services as one of her priests, had not made an honest attempt to vindicate her claims to know her own business. He merely said, “Half past eleven to-morrow,” after shaking hands with Mr. Playdell, who opened the door for him.

CHAPTER XXXIX.—ON CONSCIENCE AND THE RING.

HAROLD WYNNE shut himself up in his rooms without even lunching. He drew a chair in front of the fire and seated himself with the sigh of relief that is given by a man who has taken a definite step in some matter upon which he has been thinking deeply for some time. He sat there all the day, gazing into the fire.

Yes, he had taken the step that had suggested itself to him the previous night. He had made up his mind to take advantage of the opportunity that was afforded him of binding Beatrice to him by a bond which she at least would believe incapable of rupture. The accident of his meeting with the man whose views on the question of marriage had caused him to be thrust out of the Church, and whose practices left him open to a criminal prosecution, had suggested to him the means for binding to him the girl whose truth he had no reason to doubt.

He meant to perpetrate a fraud upon her. He had known of men entrapping innocent girls by means of a mock marriage, and he had always regarded such men as the most unscrupulous of scoundrels. He almost succeeded, after a time, in quieting the whisperings by his conscience of the word “fraud”—its irritating repetitions of this ugly word—by giving prominence to the excellence of his intentions in the transaction which he was contemplating. It was not a mock marriage—no, it was not, as ordinary mock marriages, to be gone through in order to give a man possession of the body of a woman, and to admit of his getting rid of her when it would suit his convenience to do so. It was, he assured his conscience, no mock marriage, since he was seeking it for no gross purpose, but simply to banish the feeling of cold distrust which he had now and again experienced. Had he not offered to free the girl from the promise which she had given to him? Was that like the course which would be adopted by a man endeavouring to take advantage of a girl by means of a mock marriage? Was there anything on earth that he desired more strongly than a real marriage with that same girl? There was nothing. But it was, unfortunately, the case that a real marriage would mean ruin to him; for he knew that his father would keep his word—when it suited his own purpose—and refuse him his allowance upon the day that he refused to sign a declaration to the effect that he was unmarried.

The rite which Mr. Playdell had promised to perform between him and Beatrice would enable him to sign the declaration with—well, with a clear conscience.

But in the meantime this same conscience continued gibing him upon his defence of his conduct; asking him with an irritating sneer, if he would mind explaining his position to the girl’s father?—if he was not simply taking advantage of the peculiar circumstances of the girl’s life—of the remarkable independence which she enjoyed, apparently with the sanction of her father, to perpetrate a fraud upon her?

For bad taste, for indelicacy, for vulgarity, for disregard of sound argument—that is, argument that sounds well—and for general obstinacy, there is nothing to compare with a conscience that remains in moderately good working order.

After all his straightforward reasoning during the space of two hours, he sprang from his seat crying, “I’ll not do it—I’ll not do it!”

He walked about his room for an hour, repeating every now and again the words, “I’ll not do it—I’ll not do it!”

In the course of another hour, he turned on his electric lamp, and wrote a note of half a dozen lines to Mr Playdell, telling him that, on second thoughts, he would not trouble him the next day. Then he wrote an equally short note to Beatrice, telling her that he thought it would be advisable to have a further talk with her before carrying out the plan which he had suggested to her for the next day. He put each note into its cover; but when about to affix stamps to them, he found that his stamp-drawer was empty. This was not a serious matter; he was going to his club to dine, and he knew that he could get stamps from the hall-porter.

He felt very much lighter at heart leaving his rooms than he had felt on entering some hours before. He felt that he had been engaged in a severe conflict, and that he had got the better of his adversary.

At the door of the club he found Mr. Durdan standing somewhat vacantly. He brightened up at the appearance of Harold.

“I’ve just been trying to catch some companionable fellow to dine with me,” he cried.

“I’m sorry that I can’t congratulate you upon finding one,” said Harold.

“Then I congratulate myself,” said Mr. Durdan, brightly. “You’re the most companionable man that I know in town at present.”

“Ah, then you’re not aware of the fact that Edmund Airey is here just now,” said Harold with a shrewd laugh.

“Edmund Airey? Edmund Airey?” said Mr. Durdan. “Let me tell you that your friend Edmund Airey is——”

“Don’t say it in the open air,” said Harold.

“Come inside and make the revelation to me.”

“Then you will dine with me? Good! My dear fellow, my medical man has warned me times without number of the evil of dining alone, or with a newspaper—even the Telegraph. It’s the beginning of dyspepsia, he says; so I wait at the door any time I am dining here until I get hold of the right man.”

“If I can play the part of a priest and exorcise the demon that you’re afraid of, you may reckon upon my services,” said Harold. “But to tell you the truth, I’m a bit down myself to-night.”

“What’s the matter with you—nothing serious?” said Mr. Durdan.

“I’ve been working out some matters,” said Harold.

“I know what’s the matter with you,” said the other. “That friend of yours has been trying to secure you for the Government, and you were too straightforward to be entrapped? Airey is a clever man—I don’t deny his cleverness for a moment. Oh, yes; Mr. Airey is a very clever man.” It seemed that he was now levelling an accusation against Mr. Airey that his best friends would find difficulty in repudiating. “Yes, but you and I, Wynne, are not to be caught by a phrase. The moment he fancied that I was attracted to her—I say, fancied, mind—and that he fancied—it may have been the merest fancy—that she was not altogether indifferent to me, he forced himself forward, and I have good reason to believe that he is now in town solely on her account. I give you my word, Wynne, I never spoke a sentence to Miss Avon that all the world mightn’t hear. Oh, there’s nothing so contemptible as a man like Airey—a fellow who is attracted to a girl only when he sees that she is attracting other men. Yes, I met a man yesterday who told me that Airey was in town. ‘Why should he be in town now?’ I inquired. ‘There’s nothing going on in town.’ He winked and said, ‘cherchez la femme’—he did upon my word. Oh, the days of the Government are numbered. Will you try Chablis or Sauterne?”

Harold said that he rather thought that he would try Chablis.

For another hour-and-a-half he was forced to listen to Mr. Durdan’s prosing about the blunders of the Administration, and the designs of Edmund Airey. He left the club without asking the hall-porter for any stamps.

He had made up his mind that he would not need any stamps that night.

Before he reached his rooms he took out of the pocket of his overcoat the two letters which he had written, and he tore them both into small pieces.

With the chatter of Mr. Durdan there had come back to him that feeling of distrust.

Yes, he would make sure of her.

He unlocked one of the drawers in his writing-table and brought out a small boule case. When he had found—not without a good deal of searching—the right key for the box, he opened it. It contained an ivory miniature of his mother, in a Venetian mounting, a few jewels, and two small rings. One of them was set with a fine chrysoprase cameo of Eros, and surrounded by rubies. The other was an old in memoriam ring.

He picked up the cameo and scrutinized it attentively for some time, slipping it down to the first joint of his little finger. He kept turning it over for half an hour before he laid it on the desk and relocked the box and the drawer.

“It will be hers,” he said. “Would I use my mother’s ring for this ceremony if I meant it to be a fraud—if I meant to take advantage of it to do an injury to my beloved one? As I deal with her, so may God deal with me when my hour comes.” It was a ring that had been left to him with a few other trinkets by his mother, and he had now chosen it for the ceremony which was to be performed the next day.

Curiously enough, the fact of his choosing this ring did more to silence the whispering jeers of his conscience than all his phrases of argument had done.

The next day he called for Mr. Playdell in a hansom, and shortly after noon, the words of the marriage service of the Church of England had been repeated in the Bloomsbury drawing-room by the man who had once been a priest and who still wore the garb of a priest. He, at any rate, did not consider the rite a mockery.

Harold could not shake off the feeling that he was acting a part in a dream. When it was all over he dropped into a chair, and his head fell forward until his face was buried in his hands.

It was left for Beatrice to comfort this sufferer in his hour of trial.

Her hand—his mother’s ring was upon the third finger—was upon his head, and he heard her low sympathetic voice saying, “My husband—my husband—I shall be a true wife to you for ever and ever. We shall live trusting one another for ever, my beloved!”

They were alone in the room. He did not raise his face from his hands for a long time. She knelt beside where he was sitting and put her head against his.

In an instant he had clasped her passionately. He held her close to him, looking into her eyes.

“Oh, my love, my love,” he cried. “What am I that you should have given to me that divine gift of your love? What am I that I should have asked you to do this for my sake? Was there ever such love as yours, Beatrice? Was there ever such baseness as mine? Will you forgive me, Beatrice?”

“Only once,” said she, “I felt that—I scarcely know what I felt, dear—I think it was that your hurrying on our marriage showed—was it a want of trust?”

“I was a fool—a fool!” he said bitterly. “The temptation to bind you to me was too great to be resisted. But now—oh, Beatrice, I will give up my life to make you happy!”

CHAPTER XL.—ON SOCIETY AND THE SEAL.

THE next afternoon when Harold called upon Beatrice, he found her with two letters in her hand. The first was a very brief one from her father, letting her know that he would have to remain in Dublin for at least a fortnight longer; the second was from Mrs. Lampson—she had paid Beatrice a ten minutes’ visit the previous day—inviting her to stay for a week at Abbeylands, from the following Tuesday.

“What am I to do in the matter, my husband—you see how quickly I have come to recognize your authority?” she cried, while he glanced at his sister’s invitation.

“My dearest, you had better recognize the duty of a wife in this and other matters, by pleasing yourself,” said he.

“No,” said she. “I will only do what you advise me. That, you should see as a husband—I see it clearly as a wife—will give me a capital chance of throwing the blame on you in case of any disappointment. Oh, yes, you may be certain that if I go anywhere on your recommendation and fail to enjoy myself, all the blame will be laid at your door. That’s the way with wives, is it not?”

“I can’t say,” said he. “I’ve never had one from whom to get any hints that would enable me to form an opinion.”

“Then what did you mean by suggesting to me that it was wife-like to please myself?” said she, with an affectation of shrewdness that was extremely charming.

“I’ve seen other men’s wives now and again,” said he. “It was a great privilege.”

“And they pleased themselves?”

“They did not please me, at any rate. I don’t see why you shouldn’t go down to my sister’s place next week. You should enjoy yourself.”

“You will be there?”

He shook his head.

“I was to have been there,” said he; “but when I promised to go I had not met you. When I found that you were to be in town, I told Ella, my sister, that it was impossible for me to join her party.”

“Of course that decides the matter,” said she. “I must remain here, unless you change your mind and go to Abbeylands.”

He remained thoughtful for a few moments, and then he turned to where she was opening the old mahogany escritoire.

“I particularly want you to go to my sister’s,” he said. “A reason has just occurred to me—a very strong reason, why you should accept the invitation, especially as I shall not be there.”

“Oh, no,” said she, “I could not go without you.”

“My dear Beatrice, where is that wifely obedience of which you mean to be so graceful an exponent?” said he, standing behind her with a hand on each of her shoulders. “The fact is, dearest, that far more than you can imagine depends on your taking this step. It is necessary to throw people—my relations in particular—off the notion that something came of our meeting at Castle Innisfail. Now, if you were to go to Abbeylands while it was known that I had excused myself, you can understand what the effect would be.”

“The effect, so far as I’m concerned, would be that I should be miserable, all the time I was away from you.”

“The effect would be, that those people who may have been joining our names together, would feel that they have been a little too precipitate in their conclusions.”

“That seems a very small result for so much self-sacrifice on our part, Harold.”

“It’s not so small as it may seem to you. I see now how important it would be to me—to both of us—if you were to go for a week to Abbeylands while I remain in town.”

“Then of course I’ll go. Yes, dear; I told you that I would trust you for ever. I placed all my trust in you yesterday. How many people would condemn me for marrying you in such indecent haste—that is what they would call it—and without a word of consultation with my father either? When I showed my trust in you at that time—the most important in my life—you may, I think, have confidence that I will trust you in everything. Yes, I’ll go.”

He had turned away from her. How could he face her when she was talking in this way about her trust in him?

“There has never been trust like yours, my beloved,” said he, after a pause. “You will never regret it for a moment, my love—never, never!”

“I know it—I know it,” said she.

“The fact is, Beatrice,” said he, after another pause, “my relatives think that if I were to marry Helen Craven I should be doing a remarkably good stroke of business. They were right: it would be a good stroke—of business.”

“How odd,” cried Beatrice. She had become thoroughly interested. “I never thought of such a possibility at Castle Innisfail. She is nice, I think; only she does not know how to dress.”

In an instant there came to his memory Mrs. Mowbray’s cynical words regarding the extent of a woman’s forgiveness.

“The question of being nice or of dressing well does not make any difference so far as my friends are concerned,” said he. “All that is certain is that Helen Craven has several thousands of pounds a year, and they think that I should be satisfied with that.”

“And so you should,” she cried, with the light of triumph in her eyes. “I wonder if Mr. Airey knew what the wishes of your relatives were in this matter. I should like to know that, because I now recollect that he suggested something in that way when we talked together about you one evening at the Castle.”

“Edmund Airey gave me the strongest possible advice on the subject,” said Harold. “Yes, he advised me to ask Helen Craven to be my wife. More than that—I only learnt it a few days ago—so soon as you appeared at the Castle, and he saw—he sees things very quickly—that I was in love with you, he thought that if he were to interest you greatly, and that if you found out that he was wealthy and distinguished, you might possibly decline to fall in love with me, and so——”

“And so fall in love with him?” she cried, starting up from her chair at the desk. “I see now all that he meant. He meant that I should be interested in him—I was, too, greatly interested in him—and that I should be attracted to him, and away from you. But all the time he had no intention of allowing himself to be attracted by me to the point of ever asking me to marry him. In short, he was amusing himself at my expense. Oh, I see it all now. I must confess that, now and again, I wondered what Mr. Airey meant by placing himself so frequently by my side. I felt flattered—I admit that I felt flattered. Can you imagine anything so cruel as the purpose that he set himself to accomplish?”

Her face had become pale. This only gave emphasis to the flashing of her eyes. She was in a passion of indignation.

“Edmund Airey and his tricks were defeated,” said Harold in a low voice. “Yes, we have got the better of him, Beatrice, so much is certain.”

“But the cruelty of it—the cruelty—oh, what does it matter now?” she cried. Then her paleness vanished into a delicate roseate flush, as she gave a laugh, and said, “After all, I believe that my indignation is due only to my wounded vanity. Yes, all girls are alike, Harold. Our vanity is our dominant quality.”

“It is not so with you, Beatrice,” he said. “I know you truly, my dear. I know that you would be as indignant if you heard of the same trickery being carried on in respect of another girl.”

“I would—I know I would,” she cried. “But what does it matter? As you say, I—we—have defeated this Mr. Airey, so that my vanity at least can find sweet consolation in reflecting that we have been cleverer than he was. I don’t suppose that he could imagine anyone existing cleverer than himself.”

“Yes, I think that we have got the better of him,” said Harold. He was a little surprised to find that she felt so strongly on the subject of Edmund’s attitude in regard to herself. He did not think it wise to tell her that that attitude was due to the timely suggestion of Helen. He could not bring himself to do so. He felt that his doing so would be to place himself on a level with the man who gives his wife during the first year of their married life, a circumstantial account of the many wealthy and beautiful young women who were anxious—to a point of distraction—to marry him.

He felt that there was no need for him to say anything about Helen—he almost wished that he had said nothing about Edmund.

“We got the better of him,” he said a second time. “Never mind Edmund Airey. You must go to Abbeylands and amuse yourself. You will most likely meet with Archie Brown there. Archie is the plainest looking and probably the richest man of his age in England. He is to be made the subject of an experiment at Abbeylands.”

“Is he to be vivisected?” said she. She was now neither pale nor roseate. She was herself once more.

“There’s no need to vivisect poor Archie,” said he. “Everyone knows that there’s nothing particular about Archie. No; we are merely trying a new cure for him. He has not been in a very healthy state lately.”

“If he is delicate, I suppose he will be thrown a good deal with us—the females, the incapables—while the pheasant-shooting is going on.”

“You will see how matters are managed at Abbeylands,” said Harold. “If you find that Archie is attracted toward any girl who is distinctly nice, you might—how does a girl assist her weaker sister to make up her mind to look with friendly eyes upon such a one as Archie?”

“Let me see,” said she. “Wouldn’t the best way be for girl number one to look with friendly eyes on him herself?”

Harold lay back on his chair and laughed at first; then he gazed at her in wonder.

“You are cleverer than Edmund Airey and Helen Craven when they combine their wisdom,” said he. “Your woman’s instinct is worth more than their experience.”

“I never knew what the instincts of a woman were before this morning,” said she. “I never felt that I had any need to exercise the instinct of defence. I suppose the young seal, though it has never been in the water, jumps in by instinct should it be attacked. Oh, yes, I dare say I could swim as well as most girls of my age.”

It was only when he had returned to his rooms that he fully comprehended the force of her parable of the young seal.

CHAPTER XLI.—ON DRY CHAMPAGNE AND A CRISIS.

THE next morning Archie drove one of his many machines round to Harold’s rooms and broke in upon him before he had finished his breakfast.

“Hallo, my tarty chip,” cried Archie; “what’s the meaning of this?”

He threw on the table an envelope addressed to him in the handwriting of Mrs. Lampson.

“What’s the meaning of what?” said Harold. “Have you got beyond the restraint of Mr. Playdell alcoholically, that you ask me what’s the meaning of that envelope?”

“I mean what does the inside mean?” said Archie.

“I’m sure you know better than I do, if you’ve read what’s inside it.”

“Oh, you’re like one of the tarty chips in the courts that cross-examine other tarty chips until their faces are blue,” said Archie. “There’s no show for that sort of thing here. So just open the envelope and see what’s inside.”

“How can I do that and eat my kidneys?” said Harold. “I wish to heavens you wouldn’t come here bothering me when I’m trying to get through a tough kidney and a tougher leading article. What’s the matter with the letter, Archie, my lad?”

“It’s all right,” said Archie. “It’s an invite from your sister for a big shoot at Abbeylands. What does it mean—that’s what I’d like to know? Does it mean that decent people are going to make me the apple of their eye, after all?”

“I don’t think it goes quite so far as that,” said Harold. “I expect it means that my sister has come to the end of her discoveries and she’s forced to fall back on you.”

“Oh, is that all?” Archie looked disappointed. “All? Isn’t it enough?” said Harold. “Why, you’re in luck if you let her discover you. I knew that her atheists couldn’t hold out. She used them up too quickly. One should he economical of one’s genuine atheists nowadays.”

“Great Godfrey! does she take me for an atheist?” shouted Archie.

“Did you ever hear of an atheist shooting pheasants?” said Harold. “Not likely. An atheist is a man that does nothing except talk, and talks about nothing except himself. Now, you’re asked to the shoot, aren’t you?”

“That’s in the invite anyway.”

“Of course. And that shows that you’re not taken for an atheist.”

“I’m glad of that. I draw the line at atheism,” Archie replied with a smile.

“I hope you’ll have a good time among the pheasants.”

“Do you suppose that I’ll go?”

“I’m sure you will. I may have thought you a bit of a fool before I came to know you, Archie—”

“And since you heard that I had taken the Legitimate.”

“Well, yes, even after that masterpiece of astuteness. But I would never think that you’d be fool enough to throw away this chance.”

“Chance—chance of what?”

“Of getting among decent people. I told you that my sister has nothing but decent people when there’s a shoot—there’s no Coming Man in anything among the house-party. Yes, it’s sure to be comfortable. It’s the very thing for you.”

“Is it? I’m not so certain about it. The people there are pretty sure to allude in a friendly spirit to my red hair.”

“Well, yes, I think you may depend upon that. That means that you’ll get on so well among them that they will take an interest in your personality. If you get on particularly well with them they may even allude to the simplicity of your mug. If they do that, you may be certain that you are a great social success.”

Archie mused.

It was in this musing spirit that he took in a contemplative way a lump of sugar out of the sugar bowl, turned it over between his fingers as though it was something altogether new to him. Then he threw the lump up to the ceiling, his face became one mouth, and the sugar disappeared.

“I think I’ll go,” he said, as he crunched the lump. “Yes, I’ll be hanged if I don’t go.”

“That’s more than probable,” said Harold.

“Yes, I’d like to clear off for a bit from this kennel.”

“What kennel?”

“This kennel—London. Do you go the length of denying that London’s a kennel?”

“I don’t do anything of the sort.”

“You’d best not. I was thinking if a run to Australia, or California, or Timbuctoo would not be healthy just now.”

“Oh.”

“Yes, I made up my mind yesterday, that if I don’t have better hands soon, I’ll chuck up the whole game. That’s the sort of new potatoes that I am.”

“The Legitimate?”

“The Legitimate be frizzled! Am I to continue paying for the suppers that other tarty chips eat? That’s what I want you to tell me. You know what a square deal is, Wynne, as well as most people.”

“I believe I do.”

“Well, then, you can tell me if I’m to pay for dry champagne for her guests.”

“Whose guests?”

“Great Godfrey! haven’t I been telling you? Mrs. Mowbray’s guests. Who else’s would they be? Do you mean to tell me that, in addition to giving people free boxes at the Legitimate every night to see W. S. late of Stratford upon Avon, it’s my business to supply dry champagne all round after the performance?”

“Well,” said Harold, “to speak candidly to you, I’ve always been of the opinion that the ideal proprietor of a theatre is one who supplies really comfortable stalls free, and has really sound champagne handed round at intervals during the performance. I also frankly admit that I haven’t yet met with any manager who quite realized my ideas in this matter. Archie, my lad, the sooner you get down to Abbeylands the better it will be for yourself.”

“I’ll go. Mind you, I don’t cry off when I know the chaps that she asks to supper—I’ll flutter the dimes for anyone I know; but I’m hanged if I do it for the chaps that chip in on her invite. They’ll not draw cards from my pack, Wynne. No, I’ll see them in the port of Hull first. That’s the sort of new potatoes that I am.”

“Give me your hand, Archie,” cried Harold. “I always thought you nothing better than a millionaire, but I find that you’re a man after all.”

“I’ll make things hum at the Legitimate yet,” said Archie—his voice was fast approaching the shouting stage. “I’ll send them waltzing round. I thought once upon a time that, when she laid her hand upon my head and said, ‘Poor old Archie,’ I could go on for ever—that to see the decimals fluttering about her would be the loveliest sight on earth for the rest of my life. But I’m tired of that show now, Wynne. Great Godfrey! I can get my hair smoothed down at a barber’s for sixpence, and yet I believe that she charged me a thousand pounds for every time she patted my head. A decimal for a pat—a pat!”

“You could buy the whole Irish nation for less money, according to some people’s ideas—but they’re wrong,” said Harold.

“Wynne,” said Archie, solemnly. “I’ve been going it blind for some time. Shakespeare’s a fraud. I’ll shoot those pheasants.”

He had picked up his hat, and in another minute Harold saw him sending his pair of chestnuts down the street at a pace that showed a creditable amount of self-restraint on the part of Archie.

Three days afterwards Harold got a letter from Mrs. Lampson, giving him a number of commissions to execute for her—delicate matters that could not be intrusted to any one except a confidential agent. The postscript mentioned that Archie Brown had arrived a few days before and had charmed every one with his shyness. On this account she could scarcely believe, she said, that he was a millionaire. She added that Lady Innisfail and her daughter had just arrived at Abbeylands, that the Miss Avon about whom she had inquired, had accepted her invitation and was coming to Abbeylands on the next day; and finally, Mrs. Lampson said that her father was dull enough to make people believe that he was really reformed. He was inquiring when Miss Avon was coming, and he shared the fate of all men (and women) who were unfortunate enough to be reformed: he had become deadly dull. Lady Innisfail had assured her, however, that it was very rarely that a Hardened Reprobate permanently reformed—even with the incentive of acute rheumatism—before he was sixty-five, so that it would be unwise to be despondent about Lord Fotheringay. If this was so—and Lady Innisfail was surely an authority—Mrs. Lampson said that she looked forward to such a lapse on the part of her father as would restore him to the position of interest which he had always occupied in the eyes of the world.

Harold lay back in his chair and laughed heartily at the reference made by his sister to the shyness of Archie, and also to the fact of Norah Innisfail’s sitting at the table with the Young Reprobate as well as the Old. He wondered if the conversation had yet turned upon the management of the Legitimate Theatre.

It was after he had lunched on the next Tuesday that Harold received this letter—written by his sister the previous day. He had passed an hour with Beatrice, who was to start by the four-twenty train for Abbeylands station. He had said goodbye to her for a week, and already he was feeling so lonely that he was soon pacing his room calling himself a fool for having elected to remain in town while she was to go.

He thought how they might have had countless strolls through the fine park at Abbeylands—through the picturesque ruins of the old Abbey—on the banks of the little trout stream. Instead of being by her side among those interesting scenes, he would have to remain—he had been foolish enough to make the choice—in the neighbourhood of nothing more joyous than St. James’s Palace.

This was bad enough; but not merely would he be away from the landscapes at Abbeylands, the elements of life in those landscapes would be represented by Beatrice and Another.

Yes; she would certainly appear with someone at her side—in the place he might have occupied if he had not been such a fool.

An hour had passed before he had got the better of his impulse to call a hansom and drive to the railway terminus and take a seat beside her in the train. When the clock had struck four, and it was therefore too late for him to entertain the idea of going with her, he became more inclined to take a reasonable view of the situation.

“I was right.” he said, as he seated himself in front of the fire, and stared into the smouldering coals. “Yes, I was right. No one must suspect that we are—bound to one another”—the words were susceptible of a sufficiently liberal interpretation. “The penetration of Edmund Airey will be at fault for the first time, and the others who had so many suspicions at Castle Innisfail, will find themselves completely at fault.”

He began to think how, though he had been cruelly dealt with by Fate in some respects—in respect of his own father, for instance, and also in respect of his own poverty—he had still much to be thankful for.

He was beloved by the loveliest woman whom he had ever seen—the only woman for whom he had ever felt a passion. And the peculiar position which she occupied, had enabled him to see her every day and to kiss her exquisite face—there was none to make him afraid. Such obstacles in the way of a lover’s freedom as the Average Father, the Vigilant Mother and the Athletic Brother he had never encountered. And then a curious circumstance—the thought of Beatrice as a part of the landscapes around Abbeylands caused him to lay special emphasis upon this—had enabled him to bind the girl to him with a bond which in her eyes at least—yes, in his eyes too, by heaven, he felt—was not susceptible of being loosened.

Yes, the ways of Providence were wonderful, he felt. If he had not met Mr. Playdell.... and so forth.

But now Beatrice was his own. She might stray through the autumn woods by the side of Edmund Airey or any man whom she might meet at Abbeylands; she would feel upon her finger the ring that he had placed there—the ring that——

He sprang to his feet with a sudden cry.

“Good God! the Ring! the Ring!”

He looked at the clock on the mantelpiece. It pointed to four-seventeen.

He pulled out his watch. It pointed to four-twenty-two.

He rushed to the sofa where an overcoat was lying. He had it on him in a moment. He snatched up a railway guide and stuffed it into his pocket.

In another minute he was in a hansom, driving as fast as the hansomeer thought consistent with public safety—a trifle over that which the police authorities thought consistent with public safety—in the direction of the Northern Railway terminus.

CHAPTER XLII.—ON THE RING AND THE LOOK.

HE tried, while in the hansom, to unravel the mysteries of the system by which passengers were supposed to reach Brackenshire. He found the four-twenty train from London indicated in its proper order. This was the train by which he had invariably travelled to Abbeylands—it was the last train in the day that carried passengers to Abbeylands Station, for the station was on a short branch line, the junction being Mowern.

On reaching the terminus he lost no time in finding a responsible official—one whose chastely-braided uniform looked repressful of tips.

“I want to get to Mowern Junction before the four-twenty train from here goes on to Abbeylands. Can I do it?” said Harold.

“Next train to the Junction five-thirty-two, sir,” said the official.

“That’s too late for me,” said Harold. “The train leaves the Junction for Abbeylands a quarter of an hour after arriving at Mowern. Is there no local train that I might manage to catch that would bring me to the Junction?”

“None that would serve your purpose, sir.”

Harold clearly saw how it was that this company could never get their dividend over four per cent.

“Why is there so long a wait at Mowern?” he asked.

“Waits for Ditchford Mail, sir.”

“And at what time does a train start for Ditch-ford?”

“Can’t tell, sir. Ditchford is on the Nethershire system—they have running powers over our line to Mowern.”

Harold whipped out his guide, and found Ditch-ford in the index. By an inspiration he turned at once to the page devoted to the Nethershire service of trains. He found that, by an exquisite system of timing the trains, it was possible to reach a station a mile from Ditchford on the one line, just six minutes after the departure of the last local train to Ditchford on the other line. It took a little ingenuity, no doubt, on the part of the Directors of both lines to accomplish this, but still they managed to do it.

“I beg pardon, sir,” said an official wearing a uniform that suggested tolerance of views in the matter of tips—the more important official had moved away. “I beg pardon, sir. Why not take the four-fifty-five to Mindon, and change into the Ditchford local train—that’ll reach the junction four minutes before the express? I know it, sir. I was stationed at change into the Ditchford local train—that’ll reach the junction four minutes before the express? I know it, sir. I was stationed at that part of the system.”

To glance at the clock, and to perceive that he had time enough to drive to the Nethershire terminus, and to transfer a coin to the unconscious but not reluctant hand of the official of the liberal views, occupied Harold but a moment. At four-fifty-five he was in the Nethershire train on his way to Mindon.

He had not waited to verify the man’s statement as to the trains, but in the railway carriage he did so, and he found that the beautiful complications of the two systems were at least susceptible of the interpretation put on them.

For the next two hours Harold felt that he could devote himself, if he had the mind, to the problem of the ring that had been so suddenly suggested to him.

It did not require him to spend more than the merest fraction of this time in order to convince him that the impulse upon which he had acted, was one that he would have been a fool to repress.

The ring which he had put on her finger, and which she had worn since, and would most certainly wear—he had imagined her doing so—at Abbeylands, could not fail to be recognized both by his father and his sister. It had belonged to his mother, and it was unique. It had flashed upon him suddenly that, unless he was content that his father and sister should learn that he had given her that ring, it would be necessary for him to prevent Beatrice from wearing it even for an hour at Abbeylands.

Apart altogether from the question of the circumstances under which he had put the ring upon her finger—circumstances which he had good reason for desiring to conceal—the fact that he had given to her the object which he valued most highly in the world, and which his father and sister knew that he so valued, would suggest to both these persons as much as would ruin him.

His father would, he knew, be extremely glad to discover some pretext to cut off the last penny of his allowance; and assuredly he would regard this gift of the ring as an ample pretext for adopting such a course of action. Indeed, Lord Fotheringay had never been at a loss for a pretext for reducing his son’s allowance; and now that he was posing—with but indifferent success, as Harold had learned from Mrs. Lampson’s postscript—as a Reformed Sinner, he would, his son knew, think that, in cutting off his son’s allowance, he was only acting consistently with the traditions of Reformed Sinners.

The Reformed Sinner is usually a sinner whose capacity to enjoy the pleasures of sin has become dulled, and thus he is intolerant of the sins of others, and particularly intolerant of the capacity of others to enjoy sin. This is why he reduces the allowances of his children. Like the man who advances to the position of teetotal lecturer, after having served for some time as the teetotal lecturer’s Example, he knows all about the evil which he means to combat—to be more exact, which he means his children to combat.

All this Harold knew perfectly well. He knew that the only difference that the reform of his father would make to him, was that, while his father had formerly cut down his allowance with a courteously worded apology, he would now stop it altogether without an apology.

How could he have failed to remember, when he put that ring upon her finger, how great were the chances that it would be seen there by his father or his sister?

This was the question which occupied his thoughts for the first hour of his journey. He lay back looking out on the gray October landscapes through which the train rushed—the wood glowing in crimson and brown like a mighty smouldering furnace—the groups of children picking blackberries on the embankments—the canal boat moving slowly along the gray waterway—and he asked himself how he had been such a fool as to overlook the likelihood of the ring being seen on her hand by his father or his sister.

The truth was, that he had at that time not considered the possibility of her going to Abbey-lands. He knew that Mrs. Lampson intended inviting her; but he felt certain that, when she heard that he was not going, she would not accept the invitation. She would not have accepted it, if it had not suddenly occurred to him that the fact of her going while he remained in town would be to his advantage.

Would he be in time to prevent the disaster which he foresaw would occur if she appeared in the drawing-room at Abbeylands wearing the ring?

He looked at his watch. The train was three minutes late in reaching several of the stations on its route, and it was delayed for another three minutes when there was only a single line of rails. How would it be possible for the train to make up so great a loss during the remainder of the journey?

He reminded the guard at one of many intolerable stoppages, that the train was long behind its time. The guard could not agree with him, it was only about seven minutes late, he assured Harold.

On it went, and it seemed as if the engine-driver had a clearer sense of his responsibilities than the guard, for during the next thirty miles, he managed to save over two minutes. All this Harold noticed with more interest than he had ever taken in the details of any railway journey.

When at last Mindon was reached, and he left the train to change into the one which was to carry him on to the Junction, he found that this train had not yet come up. Here was another point to be considered. Would the train come up in time?

He was not left for long in suspense. The long row of lighted carriages ran up to the platform before he had been waiting for two minutes, and in another two minutes the train was steaming away with him.

He looked at his watch once more, and then he was able to give himself a rest, for he saw that unless some accident were to happen, he would be at Mowern Junction before the train should leave for Abbeylands Station on the branch line.

In running into the Junction, the train went past the platform of the branch line. A number of carriages were there, and at the side glass of one compartment he saw the profile of Beatrice.

The little cry that she gave, when he opened the door of the compartment and spoke her name, had something of terror as well as delight in it.

“Harold! How on earth—” she began.

“I have a rather important message for you,” he said. “Will you take a turn with me on the platform? There is plenty of time. The train does not start for six minutes.”

She was out of the carriage in a moment. “Mr. Wynne has a message for me—it is probably from Mrs. Lampson,” she said to her maid, who was in the same compartment.

CHAPTER XLIII.—ON THE SON OF APHRODITE.

WHAT can be the matter? How did you manage to come here? You must have travelled by the same train as we came by. Oh, Harold, my husband, I am so glad to see you. You have changed your mind—you are coming on with me? Oh, I see it all now. You meant all along to give me this delightful surprise.”

The words came from her in a torrent as she put her hand on his arm—he could feel the ring on her finger.

“No, no,” said he; “everything remains as it was this morning. I only wish that I were going on with you. Providentially something occurred to me when I was sitting alone after lunch. That is why I came. I managed to catch a train that brought me here just now—the train I was in ran past this platform and I saw your face.”

“What can have occurred to you that you could not tell me in a letter?” she asked, her face still bearing the look of glad surprise that had come to it when she had heard the sound of his voice.

“We shall have to go into a waiting-room, or—better still—an empty carriage,” said he. “I see several men whom I know, and—worse luck! women—they are on their way to Abbeylands, and if they saw us together in this confidential way, they would never cease chattering when they arrived. We shall get into a compartment—there is one that still remains unlighted, it will be the best for our purpose; there will be no chance of a prying face appearing at the window.”

“Shall we have time?” she asked.

“Plenty of time. By getting into the carriage you will run no chance of being left behind—the worst that can happen is that I may be carried on with you.”

“The worst? Oh, that is the best—the best.” They had strolled to the end of the platform where it was dimly lighted, and in an instant, apparently unobserved by anyone, they had got into an unlighted compartment at the rear of the train, and Harold shut the door quietly, so as not to attract the attention of the three or four men in knickerbockers who were stretching their legs on the platform until the train was ready to start.

“We are fortunate,” said he. “Those men outside will be your fellow-guests for the week. None of them will think of glancing into a dark carriage; but if one of them does so, he will be nothing the wiser.”

A Gray Eye or So. In Three Volumes—Volume III

A GRAY EYE OR SO

By Frank Frankfort Moore

In Three Volumes—Volume III

Sixth Edition

London

Hutchinson & Co., 34 Paternoster Row

1893

A GRAY EYE OR SO.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.—ON A KNOWLEDGE OF THE WORLD.

CHAPTER XXXIX.—ON CONSCIENCE AND THE RING.

CHAPTER XL.—ON SOCIETY AND THE SEAL.

CHAPTER XLI.—ON DRY CHAMPAGNE AND A CRISIS.

CHAPTER XLII.—ON THE RING AND THE LOOK.

CHAPTER XLIII.—ON THE SON OF APHRODITE.