Front matter (continued 5)

Dicky rose restlessly to his feet, and continued his address standing.

"Now I think," he said, "that we can set my grandfather, cotton operative, against the late lamented Banks, plumber and gas-fitter. Banks, of course, was the bigger man socially--you know how plumbers get asked simply everywhere--but Mainwaring's son married the daughter of an Earl; so we will call them quits. Anyway, Tilly is quite as good as I am--miles better, in fact."

"Dear Dicky!" murmured Connie approvingly. Here was a lover of the right metal.

"What about friend Perce?" enquired a gruff voice.

It was a telling question. If Dicky could clothe such an uncompromising fact as Percy Welwyn in a garment of romance, he was capable of making a success of any marriage. Mr. Carmyle waited grimly for his answer.

"Ah--Percy!" replied Dicky thoughtfully. "Yes, Tiny, old soul, that's a sound question. Well, Percy is n't exactly polished--in fact, one might almost be forgiven for describing him as a holy terror--"

"He wants losing," said Carmyle with conviction.

"But listen," pursued Dicky. "Percy may be all we say, but he cheerfully hands over half his weekly screw, which is n't a fabulous one, to the common fund of the Family. It is not every young man who would do that, especially such a social success as Percy. Oh, yes, Connie, he is a social success; so don't look incredulous. I tell you he is a regular Apollo at shilling hops. He took me to one a few weeks ago."

"Where?" asked Connie.

"Somewhere near Kennington Oval. The girls simply swarmed over him. But he is not in the least stuck up about it; and--well, he is kind to Tilly. I am, therefore," concluded Dicky stoutly, "an upholder of Percy."

Mr. Carmyle, encouraged by the silence of his wife, felt emboldened to continue his cross-examination.

"What about mother-in-law?" he queried.

It was a foolish question.

"She is a woman in a thousand," said Dicky promptly, and Mrs. Carmyle, with a withering side-glance at her unfortunate lord, nodded her head vigorously in affirmation.

"Mrs. Welwyn is not what we call a lady," proceeded Dicky, "but she is the right stuff all through. I admit that she has not been quite successful in her efforts to polish Percy, but look at the others! The little sister, 'Melia, is a dear. The twins are rippers. Old Welwyn--well, he's a rotter, but he's a gentlemanly rotter; which pretty well describes the majority of my friends, now I come to think of it. And he is no hypocrite: he is quite frank about his weaknesses. Now, to sum up. On her father's side Tilly is a lady; on her mother's side she is a brick. That's a pretty good combination. Anyhow, it's good enough for me; and if she'll have me I'm going to marry her."

Dicky concluded the unburdening of his soul with a shout and a wave of his hat, and all the sparrows flew away.

"Now," said Connie, patting the seat in a soothing fashion, "sit down and tell me how you are going to do it."

Dicky resumed his place beside her and said meekly:--

"I'm looking to you to tell me that, Connie."

Apparently he had made the remark that was expected of him, for Connie immediately assumed a little air of profound wisdom, and her unregenerate husband emitted an unseemly gurgle.

"Your first difficulty, of course," she said to Dicky, ignoring her wretched and ill-controlled spouse, "will be to see Tilly. After the humiliation of yesterday her only instinct will be to hide herself. She will be not-at-home to you every time you call; and of course, it is n't fair that you should hang about in the hopes of catching her outside."

"No," agreed Dicky. "Not the game."

"You have written to her, I suppose?" said Connie.

"Yes. Left a note this morning," replied Dicky, brightening up.

"Well, of course, that is no use. It will make her happier, poor little soul, but it won't change her decision. Letters never do. You've simply got to see her, Dicky! Bill, run away for a minute, there's a dear. Go and think about a cantilever, or something, over there."

Mr. Carmyle, puffing smoke, obediently withdrew to the other side of a clump of sooty rhododendrons. Connie turned eagerly to Dicky. Her face was flushed and eager, like a child's.

"Dicky," she whispered earnestly, "see her! See her! See her alone! Take her in your arms and tell her that you will never, never, never let her go! She will struggle and try to break away; but hold on. Hold on tight! Go on telling her that you love her and will never leave her. When she sees that you mean it, she will give in. I know. I'm a woman, and I know!" Connie squeezed Dicky's arm violently. "I know!" she repeated.... "You can come back now, Bill dear."

"Nice goings-on, I don't think," observed Mr. Carmyle severely, reappearing round the rhododendron. "Shouting all over the garden--what?"

But the two conspirators, still in the clouds together, took no notice of him. Instead, Connie rose to her feet and began to walk towards the nearest gate. The two men followed.

"Connie, how am I going to do it?" asked Dicky deferentially.

"I have a plan," replied Connie, with portentous solemnity. She was launched on an enterprise after her own heart. "Listen! Have you a portmanteau?"

"Yes, at my rooms."

"Well, go there and pack it."

"Why?" asked Dicky in a dazed voice.

Mrs. Carmyle replied by quoting a famous and oracular phrase which had lately fallen from the lips of a prominent statesman, and the party reached the railings.

"Hallo, there's a taxi at the Welwyns' door," said Carmyle. "I wonder--oh, Lord!"

He fell hastily to the rear, his knees knocking together. Two figures were ascending the steps of the house. One was majestic and purposeful; the other small and reluctant. The front door opened and closed upon them.

"My mother--already!" exclaimed Dicky in dismay.

That burned child, William Carmyle, broke into a gentle perspiration.

"Never mind," said Connie reassuringly. "She was bound to come. She can't do any harm."

"Supposing she gets Tilly to agree never to see me again?" said Dicky feverishly. "Supposing she insults her with money?" He ground his teeth, and Carmyle groaned sympathetically.

Connie patted his arm soothingly.

"The last word is the only thing that matters in this case," she said with great confidence; "and you are going to have that, Dicky, my friend. Now, run away and pack your portmanteau. Then come and lunch with us at Prince's. I must fly. I have an appointment with a gentleman at Russell Square Tube Station at twelve-thirty. It is after that now."

Dicky glanced at Bill Carmyle for an explanation of this mysterious assignation, but that gentleman merely shook his head in a bewildered fashion.

"Don't ask me, old man," he said.

"Who is the gentleman, Connie?" Dicky enquired.

"An admirer of mine," replied Mrs. Carmyle, with a gratified smile. "I met him in the train this morning."

"For the first time?"

"No--second. When I saw him I had an idea, so we arranged to meet again at twelve-thirty. He has another engagement, but he said it did n't matter when I asked him. After he has done what I want, he is coming to lunch, too. Now run and pack. Au revoir!"

Revelling in every turn of the highly complicated plot which she was weaving, little Mrs. Carmyle, followed by her inarticulate but inflated husband, pattered swiftly away round the corner--and incidentally out of this narrative--turning to wave a reassuring hand to her client before disappearing.

The Freak, puzzled but confident, went home to pack his portmanteau.

CHAPTER XXV

PURELY COMMERCIAL

I

"Well," said Mrs. Welwyn, taking off her apron, "the beds are done, anyway. One less to make," she added philosophically, "now that Pumpherston has hopped it. That's something."

"We could do with the rent of his room for all that, Mother," commented practical Amelia.

"That's true, dearie," sighed Mrs. Welwyn. "Well, perhaps we shall get another lodger. Where's your father, by the way?"

"He went out half an hour ago. I expect he's at the Museum."

"Did Mr. Dick see him?"

"I don't know."

"And Mr. Dick said he did n't want to see me?" Mrs. Welwyn spoke rather wistfully.

"That was what he said," admitted 'Melia in a respectful tone.

"I don't suppose he's very anxious to see any of us much," said Mrs. Welwyn candidly. "We must just get the idea out of our heads, that's all. Forget it! Then, there's that broker's insect. We are going to get him paid off double-quick, or I 'm a Dutchman. I don't know how it's going to be done. Still, we have got round worse corners than this, have n't we, duckie?"

"Yes, Mother," said Amelia bravely.

Martha Welwyn suddenly flung her arms round her little daughter.

"My precious," she whispered impulsively, "I would n't mind if it was n't for you children." Her voice broke. "God pity women!"

"Mother, Mother!" cried little 'Melia reprovingly. "That's not like you!" And she hugged her tearful but contrite parent back to cheerfulness again.

A door banged downstairs, and the two fell apart guiltily.

"That's Tilly," said Mrs. Welwyn. "We must n't be downhearted, or she'll scold us. Bustle about!"

With great vigour and presence of mind this excellent woman snatched the cloth off the table and shook it severely. Amelia, having hastily removed a tear from her mother's cheek with a duster, opened the piano and began to wipe down the keys, to the accompaniment of an inharmonious chromatic scale.

The door flew open and Tilly marched in, humming a cheerful air.

"Such luck, Mother!" she cried.

For a moment Martha Welwyn was deceived. She whirled round excitedly.

"What do you mean, dearie?" she exclaimed.

"I've got a berth--with Madame Amelie--old Mrs. Crump, you know--in Earl's Court Road. One of her girls is leaving--"

"Got the sack?" enquired Mrs. Welwyn, rearranging the tablecloth.

"No. She's only"--Tilly's voice quavered ever so slightly--"going to be married. I've got her place, and I 'm once more an independent lady."

"That's capital news, Tilly," said Mrs. Welwyn heartily. At any rate, her daughter would have something to occupy her mind.

"Now the next thing to do," proceeded Tilly with great animation, "is to get rid of the broker's man. We ought to be able to raise the money all right. I'm at work again. Dad has had an offer of newspaper articles; and if only we can get Mr. Pumpherston's room let--"

"The broker's man has gone, Sis," said Amelia.

"Gone?" cried Tilly and Mrs. Welwyn in a breath.

"Well, gone out, anyhow. I saw him shuffling across the Square half an hour ago."

"My lord will find the chain up when he comes back," said Mrs. Welwyn grimly.

"Still, we must find the money," persisted Tilly. "We have never been in debt yet, and we are never going to be." Her slight figure stiffened proudly. "Independence! That's the only thing worth having in this world. Be independent! Owe nothing to nobody!"

Certainly, whether she derived it from her father's ancestry or her mother's solid worth, Tilly Welwyn was composed of good fibre. With flushed cheeks and unnaturally bright eyes she turned to the mirror over the drawing-room mantelpiece and began to take off her hat.

"It's a mystery to me," ruminated the puzzled Mrs. Welwyn, "why that creature went out. He must have known we would n't let him in again."

"Perhaps Dicky kicked him out," suggested that small hero-worshipper, Amelia, with relish.

Tilly turned sharply.

"Who?" she asked. A hatpin tinkled into the fender.

Little 'Melia bit her lip, and turned scarlet.

"Mr. Dick, dearie," said Mrs. Welwyn, coming to the rescue. "He looked in this morning."

"What for?" asked Tilly, groping for the hatpin.

"I don't know. I did n't see him," admitted her mother reluctantly.

"I do," said 'Melia, having decided to get things over at once. "He left a letter for you, Sis."

Tilly rose to her feet again, keeping her back to her audience.

"Where is it?" she enquired unsteadily.

"Here," said Amelia, with a hand in the pocket of her pinafore.

"Put it on the table," said Tilly, standing on tiptoe while she patted her brown hair into position before the glass. "I'll read it presently."

"There's the front-door bell!" said Mrs. Welwyn nervously. "What are we to do if it's Russell again?"

"Lock the door," said Amelia promptly.

"I don't know, I'm sure," said Mrs. Welwyn doubtfully. "I wonder what the law is. I wish Daddy was in." She considered, perplexed. "Anyhow, I'll go down and see. Come with me, 'Melia," she added tactfully.

The pair slipped out of the room and went downstairs, leaving Tilly alone with her letter.

"Supposing he rushes in the moment we open the door?" whispered Amelia, as they consulted on the mat. "What then?"

"We'll put the chain up first, and then open the door a crack," said Mrs. Welwyn.

This procedure was adopted, with the result that Mr. Mainwaring and Lady Adela, waiting patiently upon the steps outside, were eventually confronted, after certain mysterious clankings had taken place within, with a vision of two apprehensive countenances, one childish and the other middle-aged, set one upon another against a black background in a frame eight feet high and three inches wide. It was but a glimpse, for the vision was hardly embodied when it faded from view with uncanny suddenness: and after a further fantasia upon the chain, the door was tugged open, to reveal the shrinking figures of Mrs. Welwyn and Amelia.

"Good-morning, Mrs. Welwyn," said Lady Adela. "I hope you will forgive this early call, but we are anxious to have a talk with--er--Miss Welwyn."

Miss Welwyn's agitated parent ushered the visitors into the dining-room, bidding Amelia run upstairs and give warning of the coming interview. Resistance did not occur to her.

Amelia found her sister sitting motionless on the edge of a chair, with her arms upon the table. In her hands she held an open letter, which she was not reading. Her grey eyes, wide open, unblinking, were fixed on vacancy. Her lips moved, as if repeating some formula.

Amelia touched her softly on the arm.

"Tilly," she whispered, "they want to see you."

Tilly roused herself.

"Who?" she asked dreamily.

The question was answered by the appearance in the doorway of Lady Adela, followed by her husband. Tilly rose, thrust the letter into her belt, and greeted her visitors.

"How do you do?" she said mechanically. "Won't you sit down?"

Lady Adela, singling out that well-tried friend of yesterday, the sofa, sank down upon it. Mr. Mainwaring remained standing behind. Little 'Melia, after one sympathetic glance in the direction of her sister, gently closed the door and joined her mother on the landing outside.

"'Melia," announced that harassed châtelaine, "there's the front door again! It must be Stillbottle this time. Supposing he meets them?"

"It don't signify if he does," replied her shrewd little daughter. "They have met once already. Still, we may as well keep him out."

Mother and daughter accordingly proceeded to a repetition of their previous performance with the door-chain. As before, the front door was ultimately flung open with abject expressions of regret.

On the steps stood a small, sturdy, spectacled young clergyman.

"Oh, good-morning," he exclaimed. "I am so sorry to trouble you, but I have been asked by a friend to look at your vacant room. Might I do it now?"

This was familiar ground, and Mrs. Welwyn escorted the stranger upstairs with a sigh of relief.

"My friend proposes to move in almost immediately," explained Mr. Rylands, mounting at a distressingly rapid pace, "if they are satisfactory. That is--of course"--he added in a panic--"I am sure they will be satisfactory. But my friend proposes to move in at once."

His approval of the late lair of the bellicose Pumpherston when--almost before--the panting Mrs. Welwyn had pulled up the blind and unveiled its glories, erred on the side of the ecstatic. The terms asked for the dingy but speckless apartment were not excessive, and Mr. Rylands agreed to them at once.

"May I ask, sir," enquired Mrs. Welwyn, as they descended the staircase--"did some one recommend us? We like to know who our friends are."

Mr. Rylands was quite prepared for this question.

"As a matter of fact," he explained volubly, "I believe the gentleman saw the card in the window; and being particularly fond of Russell Square, and--and its associations, and so on, he decided to come and reside here. He will send his luggage round this afternoon."

By this time they had passed the closed drawing-room door and were in the hall again.

"Will you give me the gentleman's name, sir, please?" asked Mrs. Welwyn, in obedience to a reminding gleam in the eye of her small daughter, who was standing full in the open doorway, apparently with the intention of collaring Mr. Rylands low. "I suppose he can give a reference, or pay a week in advance? That's our usual--"

"Certainly, by all means," said Rylands hurriedly. Like most men, he found it almost as delicate and embarrassing an undertaking to discuss money matters with a woman as to make love to her. "In point of fact," he continued, searching furtively in his pocket, "my friend would like to pay a month in advance. He is anxious to make quite sure of the rooms, so--oh, I beg your pardon!" (This to little 'Melia, into whom he had cannoned heavily in a misguided but characteristic attempt to walk out of the house backwards.) "Good-morning!"

And the Reverend Godfrey Rylands, thrusting a warm bank-note into Mrs. Welwyn's palm, stumbled down the steps into the Square, and set off at a most unclerical pace in the direction of Piccadilly. He was going to lunch, it will be remembered, with Connie Carmyle.

"He never left the new lodger's name," recollected Mrs. Welwyn, too late.

"No, but he left a five-pound note," said practical Amelia.

II

Meanwhile, upstairs, Lady Adela was concluding a stately and well-balanced harangue. Of her two auditors Mr. Mainwaring appeared to be paying more attention. He looked supremely unhappy.

Tilly sat bolt upright on a hard chair, staring straight through Lady Adela at the opposite wall. Occasionally her hand stole to her belt. It is regrettable to have to add, in the interests of strict veracity, that the greater part of Lady Adela's carefully reasoned and studiously moderate address was flowing in at one ear and out at the other. Tilly had no clear idea that she was being spoken to; she was only vaguely conscious that any one was speaking at all. All her thoughts were concentrated on the last page of Dicky's letter--all she had read so far. She sat quite still, occasionally nodding intelligently to put her visitors at their ease. Once or twice her lips moved, as if repeating some formula.

"Do not imagine, Miss Welwyn," Lady Adela was saying, "that we are in any way angry or resentful at what has occurred. We are merely grieved, but at the same time relieved. So far from wishing you ill in consequence of this attempt upon your part to--to better yourself, my husband and I are here to offer to do something for you. You must not think that we want to be unkind or harsh. This is a difficult and painful interview for both of us--"

"For all of us, Miss Welwyn," murmured Mr. Mainwaring.

"You appreciate that fact, I hope, Miss Welwyn," said Lady Adela in a slightly louder tone; for the girl made no sign.

Tilly nodded her head absently.

"He loves me! He loves me!" she murmured to herself. "He loves me still!"

Lady Adela ploughed on. She was a kindly woman, and in her heart she felt sorry for Tilly. Not that this fact assisted her to understand Tilly's point of view, or to remember what Dicky had never forgotten, namely, that the girl before her was a lady. She laboured, too, under a grievous disadvantage. Deep feeling was to her a thing unknown. She had never thrilled with tremulous rapture. The sighing of a wounded spirit had no meaning for her. Her heart was a well-regulated and rhythmatic organ, and had always beaten in accordance with the laws of what its owner called common sense. It had never fluttered or stood still.

Lady Adela had married her husband because he was rich and she was the youngest daughter of a great but impoverished house; and after the singular but ineradicable habit of her sex, she had founded her entire conception of life upon her own experience of it. To her, marriage was a matter neither of romance nor affinity. It was a contract: a sacred contract, perhaps,--in her own case it had even been fully choral,--but a mere matter of business for all that. To her, her son's ideal bride was a well-bred young woman with the same tastes and social circle as himself, and possibly a little money of her own. It had never occurred to her that Love contained any other elements. Accordingly she ploughed on; trying to be fair; quite prepared to be generous. She offered to "advance" Tilly in life. She talked vaguely of setting her up "in a little business." She remarked several times that she was anxious to do the right thing, adding as in duty bound that certain conditions would be attached to any arrangement which might be made, "the nature of which you can probably imagine for yourself, my dear." She begged Tilly to think things over, and assured her that no reasonable request would be refused. Altogether Lady Adela's was a very conciliatory and well-balanced proposition. Had it been made by an encroaching railway company to a landed proprietor in compensation for compulsory ejection from his property, or by a repentant motorist to an irate henwife, it might fairly have been regarded as a model of justice and equity. As a scheme for snatching an amiable but weak-minded young man from the clutches of a designing harpy, it erred if anything on the side of generosity. But as a tactful attempt to convey to a young girl the information that she could never marry the man she loved, it was a piece of gross brutality. But Lady Adela did not know this.

Fortunately Tilly heard little or nothing. Occasionally a stray sentence focused itself on her mind. "My husband and I communicated our views to our son this morning," was one. "Impart our decision ourselves ... avoid the necessity of a painful interview ... unnecessary correspondence," and the like--the disconnected phrases fell upon her ears; but throughout it all the girl sat with her head in the clouds, fingering her letter and hugging her secret. Once Lady Adela, in a flight of oratory, half-rose from her seat. Tilly, with a vague hope that the call was over, put out a hand, which was ignored.

But the interview came to an end at last; and Lady Adela, conscious of a difficult task adequately and tactfully performed, but secretly troubled by Tilly's continuous apathy, rose to her feet. Tilly mechanically stood up, too.

"Good-morning, Miss Welwyn," said Lady Adela, offering her hand. "We have to thank you for a patient hearing."

Tilly smiled politely, shook hands, but said nothing. Mr. Mainwaring, his heart sore for the girl, timidly signalled to his wife to leave her in peace.

"Do not trouble to show us out," said Lady Adela; and departed imposingly through the door.

With a long sigh of relief Tilly dropped back into her seat. Suddenly she was aware that she was not yet alone. Mr. Mainwaring had lingered in the room. He came forward now, and took the girl's hand in both of his.

"My dear, my dear!" he said quickly. "I wish you were my daughter. God give you a good husband!"

There was an ominous cough upon the landing outside; and the old gentleman, recalled to a sense of duty, trotted obediently out of the room, closing the door behind him.

Tilly snatched the letter from her belt.

"He loves me!" she murmured. "He loves me! He loves me still!"

She was not referring to Mr. Mainwaring senior.

CHAPTER XXVI

THE FINAL FREAK

Tilly finished writing her letter, signed and addressed it, and leaned back in her chair.

She had just declined to marry Dicky Mainwaring.

"That's done, anyhow," she said to herself, with the instinctive cheerfulness of those who are born plucky. "Now I'll go out and post it before the Family come home, and then perhaps a little walk round Bloomsbury will give me an appetite for tea." But as Tilly rose briskly to her feet her eye fell upon the letter from Dicky, lying beside the answer to it which she had just written. For the tenth time she picked it up and re-read certain passages.

I don't think I ever loved you as I did yesterday afternoon. As I watched you fighting that brave, uphill battle of yours in the face of the most awful odds--Mother and Sylvia are awfully odd, you know--I suddenly realised how utterly and entirely I had become part of you--or you of me, if you like. I was on your side in that plucky, preposterous, transparent little conspiracy from start to finish, and when the crash came I think I was harder hit than anybody. The only complaint I have to make is that you did not take me into your confidence. I could have put you up to one or two tips which might have made all the difference--you see, I have known Mother and Sylvia longer than you have--and we could have enjoyed the fruits of victory together. Still, I forgive you for your obstinacy in trying to put the enterprise through single-handed. It was very characteristic of you, and anything that is characteristic of you is naturally extra precious to me. So don't imagine that yesterday's little interparental unpleasantness is going to make any difference to you and me--to You and Me!

"To You--and Me!" echoed Tilly softly.

... You will probably receive a call from my esteemed parents. They mean well, but I mistrust their judgment. They will probably intimate that we must never see one another again, or something of that kind. I am afraid it is just possible that my dear old mother will offer you compensation, of a sort. If she does, try to forgive her. She does not understand. Not at present, that is. One day she will laugh at herself--which will establish a record--and apologise to you for having entertained the idea.

"No, she won't!" observed Tilly at this point.

... It seems ridiculous, does n't it, that any one should seriously set out to appeal to you to "abandon your demands" upon me? As if things were not entirely the other way. It is I who am making demands upon you, dearest. The idea! To lecture you as if you were some designing little adventuress, instead of the most wonderful worker of miracles that ever lived--the girl who made bricks without straw--the girl who made a man of Dicky Mainwaring!

... So do not be afraid with any amazement--do you know where that quotation comes from?--at anything my mother may say. She will probably pile on the agony a bit about the various kinds of trouble that await a couple who marry out of different social circles, and punk of that kind. She is a dear thing, my old mother, but very feminine. When she wants to argue about anything she always begins by begging the question. Besides, our love is big enough to square any circle, social or otherwise. So don't you worry, little girl. Leave things to me, and--

Tilly read more slowly and yet more slowly, and then stopped reading altogether. Then she rose slowly to her feet, crossed the room, and stood gazing into the fire. She did not know what begging the question meant, but she had other food for reflection. Connie Carmyle was right. When it comes to a pinch, letters are useless things, and being useless are, more often than not, dangerous.

On the mantelpiece stood two framed photographs--one of Tilly, the other of Dicky. The original of the first addressed the second.

"I wish you had n't put in that last bit, Dicky dear ... 'Abandon my demands' ... 'A little adventuress.' ... That's what I am, when all is said and done. A little adventuress, trying to better herself! Lady Adela is right and we were wrong. What else could you think of me, Dicky, once you married me and found me out--a silly, hysterical, common little chit? ... There's your letter, dear. I dare say I could have got quite a lot for it in a court of law; but some adventuresses are n't up to sample. They have no spirit."

Dicky's much-read epistle dropped into the flames, and Tilly turned with sudden briskness from her lover's photograph to her own.

"As for you, Tilly Welwyn," she observed severely, "just remember that you are only an ordinary, hard-working, matter-of-fact little London work-girl. You can put all fancy notions about fairy princes and happy-ever-after out of your head. You are getting a big girl now, you know. You must live your life and go your own way; and sometimes--only sometimes, mind!--when you are feeling downhearted and up against it, I'll allow you to let your thoughts go back to the best man that ever walked; and although you may cry a bit, you will thank God you did not spoil his life by marrying him."

The doors leading onto the landing creaked, and Amelia peeped cautiously in. Tilly started guiltily. None of us like to be caught talking to ourselves. The habit savours of exclusiveness--and other things.

"Tilly dear," said little 'Melia listlessly, "the new lodger has come with his luggage. Could you give him a hand with it? Everybody is out, and it's rather heavy for me."

"All right," said Tilly readily. "I'll be down in half a minute."

Amelia disappeared, leaving the doors open; and Tilly hastily assumed a business-like yet hospitable expression, suitable for the welcoming of a second-floor.

"One thing more, though, my girl," she remarked sternly, releasing her features for a moment in order to address her own reflection in the overmantle mirror. "Just remember that this will require a real effort. It's all very well to feel heroic just now, and talk about giving him up, and living your own life, and so on; but it won't be easy. You will have to put your back into it. Supposing you meet him in the street one day? What then? Can you walk past him? You know you are as weak as water where he is concerned. What are you going to do about it?"

Tilly met her own eyes in the glass, and looked very determined. The eyes in the glass responded by filling with tears. Tilly turned away impatiently from this disloyal exhibition.

"Very well, then," she said. "If you are as weak as that about it, you must just make up your mind to avoid him--that's all. There's nothing else for it. You must never see him again.... And I love him so!" she added inconsequently.... "Poor Tilly!"

Little 'Melia appeared in the doorway again.

"He's bringing up his portmanteau," she announced breathlessly, and vanished.

Tilly turned towards the door. Laborious steps were audible upon the staircase, as of one ascending with a heavy load. Presently a man in a great-coat passed the open doorway. On his left shoulder he carried a large portmanteau, which hid his face. He passed up the second-floor staircase and out of sight.

Tilly, hot and cold by turns, stood shaking in the middle of the floor.

There was a bump overhead. Then steps descending, slowly. He was coming back.

Tilly shut her eyes tight for a full half-minute; then opened them and tottered forward with a cry.

In the doorway--laughing, joyous, open-armed--stood The Freak.

"You foolish, foolish Tilly!" he said; and caught her as she fell.

THE END

The Riverside Press CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS U . S . A

By Ian Hay

THE FIRST HUNDRED THOUSAND. SCALLY: THE STORY OF A PERFECT GENTLEMAN. With Frontispiece. A KNIGHT ON WHEELS. HAPPY-GO-LUCKY. Illustrated by Charles E. Brock. A SAFETY MATCH. With frontispiece. A MAN'S MAN. With frontispiece. THE RIGHT STUFF. With frontispiece.

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY BOSTON AND NEW YORK