What a Man Wills

Mrs George de Horne Vaizey (continued 5)

Reading edition

For one moment Norah was stupefied with amazement, the next her eyes shone, and the dimples dipped in her cheeks, for with a flash of intuition she had grasped the significance of the situation! What the advanced lady really desired was not a companion who would talk and air her own opinions, but a dummy figure to whom she herself could lay down the law; a target at which she could let fly the arrows of her newly-acquired wisdom. An occasional murmur of assent would therefore be the extent of the companion’s duties, which feat Norah felt herself well able to accomplish.

For the next few months the enterprising Miss Boyce fulfilled her two daily engagements with equal satisfaction to herself and her employers. In the morning, within the fusty confines of Number 8 Berrington Square, she read aloud extracts from antiquated volumes which had been the favourites of the old lady’s youth; likewise retrimmed caps, sprayed the leaves of the india-rubber plant, retrieved dropped stitches in knitting, droned out voluntaries and national airs on the wheezy old harmonium, and listened to endless reminiscences of the Henstock family, and other worthies equally unknown.

In the afternoons Norah roamed the different parks in company with Miss Mellor, preserving an attentive silence while that good lady quoted the opinions of her friends, or paraphrased the leading articles in the Radical press. Her first feeling towards this, the second of her employers, had been largely tinged with impatience and lack of sympathy, but as time went on, she relented somewhat in the hardness of her judgment, and felt the dawning of a kindly pity. She was a very lonely woman—this tall angular spinster who talked so loudly of her rights; love had never come into her life, and in all the breadth of the land she had hardly a relation whom she could take by the hand.

Once, in the middle of a heated argument on the suffrage, Miss Mellor paused to look longingly at a curly-headed baby toddling across the path; and beside the duck-pond in Regent’s Park she invariably lost the thread of her argument in watching the crowds of merry children feeding their pets. Norah reflected that had Miss Mellor been a happy wife and mother she might not have troubled her head about a vote. All the same, the result of education on the woman’s question had been to convince Norah that the demand for “rights” had been founded on some very definite wrongs. After the long walk the two ladies would return to tea in the flat, where the companion consumed the wafer-like bread and butter and dainty cakes with Philistine enjoyment, and even Miss Mellor herself descended from her high horse, and inquired curiously:

“Where do you get your hats?”

Of her two employers Norah had distinct preference for the old lady, Mrs Baker. She was of a more lovable nature than the voluble Miss Mellor, and, moreover, as she herself had announced—she had a nephew! The nephew was a handsome, well-set-up man of thirty, who possessed considerable culture and refinement, and a most ingratiating kindliness of demeanour towards his homely old aunt.

The first Sunday after Norah entered upon her duties, young Mr Baker did not call at Berrington Square; on the second Sunday he came to midday dinner; on the third, he met the two ladies at the church door after morning service, and remained with them for the whole of the afternoon; on the fourth, he was already seated in the pew when they entered the church, and he persisted in these good habits until it became a matter of course that he should spend the whole day in Berrington Square, as Norah herself had done from the beginning of her engagement. In the afternoon Mrs Baker would invariably make the hospitable suggestion that “if John liked” he could descend to a chill, fireless room in the basement to indulge in an after-dinner weed, but John refused to move until Miss Boyce had given her repetition of the morning’s service. He said that he was afraid she might forget an important point, in which case he should be at hand to jog her memory. “John is so thoughtful!” said his aunt proudly.

As a matter of fact, John never once volunteered a suggestion on any one of these occasions. He seemed to be fully occupied in using his eyes and ears, and in truth it was both a pretty and touching sight to see the young fresh face bent close to the withered countenance of the deaf old woman, and to listen to the thrush-like tones of the girl’s voice, as with a sweet and simple eloquence she gave her brief résumé of the morning’s sermon. The old lady nodded and wagged her head to enforce the points, while the tears trickled down her cheeks. From time to time John also would take a promenade to the window, and clear his throat loudly as he stared at the dusty trees. Strange how much more powerful those sermons appeared in the repetition!

After the recital was over, young Mr Baker would take Miss Boyce to examine the ferns in the tiny conservatory, while his aunt enjoyed her forty winks; in the evening he escorted her back to her lodgings. He was a most attentive young man!

In Mrs Baker’s opinion “John” was infallible, and by and by Norah became so much infected with this view that her afternoon’s occupation became fraught with misery, as she thought of what “John” would say if he knew to what heresies she was lending her ears. One Sunday afternoon returning to the Berrington Square drawing-room after a short absence, she overheard a few words which sent an added pang through her heart.

”—Most fortunate indeed!” John was saying. “You might have searched the world over, and not found another like her. I had begun to fear that the type was extinct. A sweet, modest, old-fashioned girl!”

That evening Norah wet her pillow with her tears, and astonished the advanced lady the next afternoon by contradicting assertions, and raising up objections in a most unprecedented fashion. These signs of backsliding were very distressing to Miss Mellor, who had been encouraged by her companion’s unfailing acquiescence to imagine herself unanswerable in argument, but she was encouraged to believe that example might perhaps accomplish what precept had failed to inspire.

“You will, I know, rejoice with me on a great honour which has been conferred upon me by my fellow-workers,” she announced proudly one day. “I have been promoted from the reserves to a foremost position in the fighting line. I am nominated for active service on Friday next!”

Norah’s eyes were exceptionally large and expressive, and the saucer-like stare of curiosity which she turned upon the speaker was very gratifying to that good lady’s feelings.

“On Friday evening. At the Albert Hall. The Chancellor is to speak. We shall be there. Twenty are nominated for service. I am Number Nine!”

Norah stared harder than ever. This sounded rather perilously like the story of a Nihilist Plot which she had read in a shilling shocker some weeks before. She had visions of bomb explosions and wholesale arrests, and, as ever, the thought of John obtruded itself into the foreground of her mind. What would John think if Miss Mellor were arrested, and gave the name of Norah Boyce as her chosen friend and confidante?

“Number Nine, for what?” she gasped nervously, and Miss Mellor was hurried into unthinking reply:

“For screaming—I mean protesting. The first eight champions will raise their voices in rotation. They will be silenced, probably ejected. Then it will be My Turn.”

“Ejected!” Norah looked scared. “Turned out. Oh-h! How dreadful! They will seize hold of you—men will seize hold of you, and pull and drag. They will pinch your arms... It must be horrid to be pinched!”

“What would have become of the world if other great reformers had ceased their struggles through dread of being pinched?” demanded Miss Mellor sternly; and Norah felt snubbed, and looked it. She had no courage left for further argument.

On the next Friday afternoon Norah took her way to the flat to accompany her fighting employer on the walk abroad which should invigorate her for the evening’s fray, but to her dismay found the good lady stretched upon the sofa, very flushed as to face, and husky as to voice.

“It is quinsy,” she announced. “I’m subject to it. I felt it coming on, but I would not give in. I have gargled and fomented all morning, but it is too late. I couldn’t scream to save my life. It’s a terrible, terrible disappointment, but I am thankful that I need not upset the Committee’s plans. You shall take my place!”

“I?” cried Norah shrilly. “No, no—I can’t! I couldn’t—I wouldn’t—not for anything in the whole wide world! Call out before a whole meeting, have them all staring at me, strange men catching hold of me, dragging my sleeves, crushing my hat—never! I’d sooner die!”

“Then,” croaked Miss Mellor hoarsely, “I shall go myself!” And from this point she refused to budge. She was ill; in the natural course of events she would grow worse; if she went out into the damp and the cold, and endured the excitement of a crowded political meeting, she would most certainly be very ill indeed; but she had promised; she could not disappoint the Committee at the eleventh hour; she had no energy to seek further for a substitute. Then her voice took a pathetic turn, and she sighed feebly.

“I have been kind to you, Norah. I have tried to be your friend. Danvers (the maid) would accompany you to the Hall. You have nothing to do but to sit still and interrupt when your turn arrives. How can you be so selfish and unkind?”

As time went on and argument and appeal alike failed to move Miss Mellor from her position, a paralysis of helplessness seized Norah in its grip. She knew that in the end she would be compelled to consent, for of two horrifying alternatives it seemed the least to dare a certain amount of buffeting for herself, rather than allow another woman to run the risk of serious, even fatal, consequences. At nine o’clock that evening, then, behold a trembling and faint-hearted Number Nine seated at the end of one of the rows of stalls at the Albert Hall, the faithful Danvers by her side, listening with all her ears, not to the eloquence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but to the shrill interruptions from feminine tongues which punctuated his utterances. Numbers One and Two had been escorted from the gallery by indulgent, if somewhat contemptuous, stewards. Numbers Pour and Five had received less consideration; Number Six had been undeniably hustled; Number Seven had squealed aloud. Norah realised with a dread sinking of the heart that the temper of the meeting was rising, and that each fresh disturber of the peace would receive less consideration. Only one more, and then... The great building whirled before her eyes, the faces on the platform became faint and blurred, her heart pounded so loudly that it seemed impossible that her neighbours should not hear its thuds. She turned her head to look at the nearest door and examine the faces of the group of stewards waiting in readiness at its portal. Were they very big, very fierce, very formidable? Which of the number would be the first to tear her from her seat? Her pretty face was blanched and drawn beneath her flower-wreathed hat; one of the stewards meeting her glance moved forward to her side with a stifled exclamation of dismay. He bent low over her, whispering in her ear:

“Miss Boyce! what are you doing here? Are you alone? You ought not to be here without a man to look after you. It is getting too noisy—too excited. If there are any more interruptions things will become dangerous. Let me take you out quietly, while there is time—”

John Baker, by all that was confounding and terrible! John, the last man on earth whom she would have wished to witness her humiliation! John, who had called her a “modest, old-fashioned girl.” ... It was the last straw to poor Norah’s composure; her fluttering heart gave one sickening leap, and then appeared to stop altogether; she held out her hands with a feeble, despairing gesture, and collapsed in a limp little heap in John Baker’s arms.

When Norah came back to consciousness she was lying on a form in a bare, boarded room, and John was engaged in sprinkling water from a water-jug over the front of her best silk blouse. She sat up hastily, brushed the hair from her forehead, and stared around with bewildered eyes. A roar of applause from the great hall broke the silence, and brought back struggling remembrance.

“Did you—did you turn me out?”

“I carried you out! You fainted, and I brought you in here. It was no wonder; you were not accustomed to such sights. Did you imagine in your faintness that you had been turned out like those other screaming women, you poor little frightened girl?” asked John’s big voice in its most caressing tones.

Norah shivered with dismay.

“I was—I am—I mean I should have been, if I had stayed five minutes longer! I’m Number Nine!” she cried; and then seeing John’s stare of stupefied dismay, promptly threw up her hands to her face, and burst into weak-minded tears.

“Oh—oh! What will you think of me—what will you say!—I was obliged to earn some money—and half a crown a day was not enough,—Mrs Baker gives me half a crown. I—I go to another lady in the afternoons, and she is a Suffragette. She is very kind to me, and very patient, because I’m stupid, and can’t understand, and—and I don’t seem to care! I don’t want a vote, but she was Number Nine to-night, and she is ill—her throat is very bad, she might be dangerously ill if she came out. She would only stay at home if I promised to take her place, and, she has been very kind.—I promised, and now I’ve failed. I was too terribly frightened. And then I saw your face... Oh, what do you think of me?”

But John Baker refused to give any expression of opinion. All he said was:

“Half a crown a day! She offered you that! Oh, my poor little girl!” And his voice was so low and tender that at the sound of it Norah sobbed afresh.

“Don’t cry. Put on your hat. I will take you into the air, and drive you home in a taxi. You will feel better in the air,” said John quietly.

He gave her his arm, and escorted her into the corridor, and as they walked along, another roar sounded from within the precincts of the hall, and through an open doorway shot a dishevelled female form, struggling in the grasp of half a dozen stewards. Danvers herself! The faithful Danvers, who, seeing the collapse of her mistress’ proxy, had gallantly taken upon herself the duties of Number Nine. Norah shuddered, and grasped more tightly John’s protecting arm.

“Oh, what must you think of me?” she demanded once more; and John, looking down at her as they reached the cool air of the street, replied sturdily:

“I think that no woman can serve two masters. Can’t you make up your mind to take one instead?”

Chapter Eleven.

The After Years.

Fifteen years had come and gone. The men and women who had sat round the fire on that memorable New Year’s Eve in Mrs Ingram’s hospitable country manor, had left youth behind, and entered upon the strenuous term of middle age, while their host and hostess had reached a stage still further on the downward path, and frankly ranged themselves among the old.

Fifteen years ago! And now once more the end of the year was approaching, and Mr Ingram and his wife were discussing their plans for the festive season. It was a very frail woman who lay back against the cushions of her chair, and to her husband all outside considerations were as naught compared with the necessity of screening her from undue exertion.

“Forget that it is Christmas time, that’s the best thing you can do! All your life you have worked and schemed to give other people pleasure, now you must take it easy, and let them have a turn for a change. No Christmas presents, no village treats, no house-party over the New Year. You and I will have a quiet resting time, and think of nobody but ourselves.”

His wife smiled, her fine, delicate smile, and stretched out her hand to meet his.

“Foolish man!” she said softly. “What folly you do talk! The Christmas presents are ready, dear. I begin collecting them each January, as soon as the last batch is out of the way, and it would break my heart to disappoint the villagers of their treat; but I’ll be very good, and leave the whole of the arrangements to the vicar. That’s a concession made entirely to please you. I want to please you, because as regards the house-party I am going to ask you to give in to me! I’d been planning a very special gathering for this year. Please, dear, don’t say no! It would be such a great interest. I want to ask all the members of that Heart’s Desire party of fifteen years ago—all that are left, that’s to say, and sit over the fire together as we did then, for the first hour of the New Year, and talk over our different experiences. I have thought of it for the last three or four years, but something has always come in the way, and now—now I would rather not postpone it again.”

Her husband knew the meaning of that unwillingness. She was thinking that she might not live to see another New Year, and the knowledge was enough to stifle any objections which he might have made.

“You shall do as you choose, dearest,” he said softly. “I ask only that you should spare yourself. You must spend the mornings in your own room, and then you will be able to enjoy your guests for the rest of the day.” He was silent for a few minutes, gazing into the heart of the fire. “It is one thing to wish,” he said at last, “and another to confess what has really happened. I wonder if they will confess!”

“Probably—not!” Mrs Ingram said. “We may be sure of one thing at least, that the happenings which went deepest will never be put into words. All the same we shall know. It is not only by speech that the heart tells its secrets, Hubert!”

“But the ordinary man judges only by his ears. His eyes are holden that he cannot see.”

“Ah, well,” sighed Mrs Ingram softly, “there’s an instinct that is truer than sight!”

Her husband pressed her hand, but did not answer. He knew well that his wife possessed a wonderful heart-vision which could pierce beneath the deceptions of surface appearance, down to the truth beneath; but this was a plane to which he could not follow; and in truth he could not trust himself to discuss it. This dearly loved wife had always been of an unusual exalted character, and with the decline of bodily health, she seemed to cast from her one by one the hindering frailties of the flesh, and to become ever more spiritual and crystalline. He reverenced, he worshipped, but—he feared! A spirit so fine seemed out of place on this gross earth.

But, thank God! the old gaiety was not dead, and her laugh rang clear as ever as a few minutes later he brought a writing-table to her side, and they embarked upon the work of tracing old friends under new conditions.

Mr Ingram would have been hard put to it to remember the names alone of all who had been present on the historic occasion, but his wife’s diary supplied an account not only of these, but of manners and appearance, with a surprisingly verbatim record of what each person had said. She had the memory which records words, and now as she read over one pronouncement after another, something of her own keenness entered into her husband’s manner.

“By jove, you have a memory! It all comes back as I hear you reading—the very words—the very expressions. I can see Claudia sitting in that chair, telling us about the rich cousin who sent her cast-off clothes, and looking so wonderfully pretty and sparkling. Ah, poor Claudia! Well—one is bound to come up against tragedy, if one follows the happenings of nine lives for fifteen years. All things considered, I think we have less of it than might have been expected. Who comes next on the list? Norah Boyce, eh? We shan’t have Norah, since that clever husband of hers has got this appointment in Canada; but we know at least that things go well with her. Nice little Norah! She deserved her good luck. And then comes Lilith Wastneys. No need to look up her address, eh? Care of the Rt. Hon. Hereward Lowther, would reach her the world over. And John Harely Malham! These friends of yours have developed into very great personages, dear! Do you think they will care to accept invitations from simple country dwellers like ourselves?”

“I shall send them invitations, and I think they will come,” Mrs Ingram said quietly. People had a way of doing what she wished, which seemed the more extraordinary as she never argued nor persuaded. “Those two are our only notables; the others are leading quite ordinary lives, so ordinary that we shall have to resort to the directory to trace one or two. I have not heard of Francis Manning for years.”

“Manning, Manning! Which was Manning? The man who was in such a dickens of a hurry to get himself into trouble?”

“No, that was Val Lessing. Val is quite a prosperous City man now. He sends me a Christmas card every year. Francis Manning was the big, lazy creature who couldn’t think of anything he wanted so much as to be let alone, to jog along in comfort. I have heard nothing of him since he wrote years ago to tell me of his marriage. I sent him a present.”

“I’ll bet you did!” commented her husband, laughing. “Oh, well, we can easily track Mr Manning. Then there comes Juliet! There’s no difficulty about Juliet. Let me see! What was it that Juliet wished for?”

“Adventure!” Mrs Ingram said, and they both smiled.

“So Juliet wished for adventure, did she? Well! Well!” cried Mr Ingram nodding. “How many inches should you say she measures round the waist at the present moment?”

But at this his wife protested strongly.

“Too bad! Too bad! Why should the mere fact of being stout make it seem ridiculous for a woman to have a share in romance or excitement? I’m not going to allow you to laugh at Juliet. Wait at least until you have heard what she has to say. Now we come to the last on the list—Rupert Dempster, Rupert who wished for love.”

“I remember,” said her husband shortly. Many things that had happened on that evening had faded from memory, but the shock occasioned by Rupert’s unexpected confession had impressed it on his mind. In imagination he could see the firelight playing upon the tired face, and hear the strong, quiet tone speaking of his ideal love, the primal, overmastering affinity of mind for mind, soul for soul, body for body. And it was this Rupert Dempster who had married a woman admittedly insane! Rumour said that she had to a great extent regained her reason, but still... Mr Ingram registered a hope that Dempster and his wife would not accept his wife’s invitation for New Year’s Eve!

It was New Year’s Eve, and throughout the afternoon one batch of visitors after another drove up to the door of the Manor. Some had travelled by train, some by motor, and each guest in turn was received by the hostess, welcomed with her inimitable charm, and escorted to the rooms apportioned to them, where tea was served instead of in the hall downstairs, as was the usual custom in the household. It did not satisfy Mrs Ingram’s dramatic sense that her guests should meet one by one; she preferred to postpone the moment until they met en masse round the dinner table later on.

Six invitations had been sent out, and in due time six replies came back. Some were affectionate in tone, others politely formal, some implied a willingness to stay as long as they should be asked; others regretted that one day only could be spared; but so far as the anniversary itself was concerned, each of the six notes brought the acceptance which Mrs Ingram had so confidently expected. By six o’clock that evening six of the surviving members of the original party were once more gathered together beneath the roof of the Manor.

It was just eight o’clock when the sound of the gong pealed through the house, and Mr and Mrs Ingram took their stand in the great hall, to watch the procession of their guests down the stairway.

First of all came a tall man, muscular and healthy, a typical country squire, the sunburn of his skin showing in marked contrast to his white shirt and waistcoat. A handsome man, with an air of agreeable content, and beside him a stout matron, her large face wreathed in smiles, her dress a handsome creation of the year before last.

Behind her, creeping close to the wall, a plain, insignificant woman trailed a robe of magnificent gold brocade, while the glitter of diamonds on neck and head lent an additional wanness to the pinched face. This was the Lady Anne Malham, and by her side walked the husband whose success in life had made him a world-known figure. The large head, and hawk-like features had been so often represented in the Press that the public recognised him at a glance, but few of those who studied the weary face realised that this was a man who had not yet seen his forty-fifth year. There was no lingering trace of youth on the face of John Malham, millionaire!

Behind the Malhams came yet another couple: the woman’s left hand rested lightly on the banister, while on the inner side of the stairway, her husband slipped his arm through hers, as though to afford a double security to her descent. Slim, ethereally transparent, her white shoulders rising above a dress of misty black, a carmine flush staining the soft oval of her cheeks, Eve Dempster appeared more like a beautiful wraith than a woman of flesh and blood. The years had brought to her none of the ordinary signs of age; as though loath to mar so exquisite a creature, they had passed by, leaving behind nothing but an air of additional transparence and fragility to mark their course. Rupert, on the contrary, looked more than his age. His face was lined as by a ceaseless anxiety, but in his eyes there was a great content.

Eve Dempster’s long, misty train floated so far behind as to necessitate a gap in the descent of the guests. The gap, and the isolated position which she occupied as the first of the guests to descend in single file, threw into greater prominence the stolid, ungainly figure of Mrs Francis Manning, clad in a satin gown of a violent shade of blue. Her light hair was elaborately waved and dressed in the latest eccentricity of the day; tight white kid gloves came to an end half-way up her reddened arms. She looked what she was, a middle-class matron of the suburbs, divided between pride and embarrassment in her present position. Her husband followed close behind, large, heavily built, with clean-shaven face, patient, saddened, strikingly controlled. Mrs Ingram, watching from the hall beneath, felt a smarting of the eyes as she looked at that face, and remembered the torpid complacence of the days that were gone!

The next couple were in appearance perhaps the most normal of any. A man too alert and supple to be yet classed as middle-aged, a pretty, soft-eyed woman, with humorous lips, and a graceful head poised at an angle which suggested an agreeable touch of coquetry; a woman whose spirit remained young; a woman who retained the power to charm, though the dreaded forty hovered but a few years ahead.

And then, last of all, sweeping downwards with the indefinable air of those accustomed to high places, came the guests of honour, the Rt. Hon. Hereward Lowther, and Lilith, his wife. The Minister was smiling, and the smile showed him at his best. A physiognomist would have read in his face a curious mingling of weakness and strength but the old shadow was replaced by a radiant complacence, and there was a touch of obvious though perfectly good-natured condescension in his bearing as he surveyed the group in the hall. He was ready to be all that was agreeable to his wife’s old friends, but he expected that in their turn they would appreciate the honour paid by his presence.

As for Lilith herself, a murmur of incredulity arose from the watchers as she stepped into sight, so extraordinarily like the Lilith of old did she appear. The pale hair was twisted round the head in identically the same fashion as of yore, the white satin dress, with the swathing of tulle round the shoulders, followed the same natural lines. There was no glitter of gems, but Val Lessing noticed with a thrill of remembrance that round her throat there were ropes of pearls,—lustrous, shimmering pearls, for which a man might venture his life. In the shaded light of the lamps there were no lines to be seen on the quiet face. It seemed impossible to believe that fifteen long years had passed by since that white-robed figure had last descended that staircase!

A few moments of merry greetings and laughter, of introductions by host and hostess, and then the house-party once more formed into pairs, filed into the dining-room, and took their places round the festive board.

It was a long and elaborate meal which followed, and in the drawing-room afterwards the guests found a delightful entertainment provided for their benefit. The days were over when dancing appealed as an ideal manner of passing the time; to-night the guests sat still and were amused by others, and as the hour of twelve drew nigh, watched the performance of an exquisite little masque of the seasons, in which the old year and the new played the leading characters.

More than one person suspected the authorship of that masque, and recognised another instance of Mrs Ingram’s generalship, in tuning the minds of the hearers to a desired note, before the moment of the conference arrived.

They stood together in the great hall, hand in hand, waiting for the striking of the hour from the church tower, men and women, where before had stood youths and maidens; together, as the last note died away, they turned back to the fire, and seated themselves in the circling chairs, but when they were all seated there were still two chairs which remained vacant. To the majority of the company the presence of these chairs appeared the most meaningless of incidents; two only of the number divined their significance,—Rupert Dempster and the Squire’s stout, prosaic-looking wife. As usual it was the woman who put her thoughts into words:

“Ah, poor Claudia! poor Meriel!” she sighed softly. “How little we thought that they would be absent when we met again! And such tragic fates... That beautiful Claudia! Can you remember how she sat that night, making her naughty, audacious speeches, and looking so sweet and bewitching all the time that one could not believe that she meant half she said. But she did, or how could she have married that man? Meriel was staying with her, at the time that she first—found out! She persuaded her to see the specialist. Claudia dared not tell her husband. To the very last she braved it out. One would not have expected her to have such courage! And when he did know, he went straight away and never saw her again. She would see no one. She lived alone with her nurses until the end. Poor Claudia! She wished for great riches, and she got them, but—”

“Pound bitterness to her soul! Yes. That is the reward of seeking the worthless thing,” Mrs Ingram said quietly. “Claudia had a few years given to her to taste the power of money, and a few years more to test its helplessness. She learned many lessons, poor child, in that hidden room. I sent for one of her nurses after she died. The woman cried bitterly when she spoke of her. She said she had never had a patient who was more thoughtful and considerate. I was thankful to know that the poor child had had someone with her who really loved and sympathised.”

There was a tense silence. The pathos of Claudia’s fate lay heavy upon those who remembered her in the flush of her youthful triumph, and with that other name, too, was the connection of tragedy.

“And Meriel! Meriel wished for happiness,” Francis Manning said slowly. “She was shipwrecked, wasn’t she, when she was sailing to India with some friends?”

“With Geoffrey Sterne and his wife,” Val Lessing told him. “My sister kept up a correspondence with her for some years, and I heard from her. They had both been at school with Mrs Sterne. She appeared to lose her health after the marriage, but while Meriel was paying her first visit it was discovered that the real trouble was—drink! There’s no harm speaking of it now, for later on it became public property, but at the time they hoped for a cure, and the great object was to let no one suspect. She was fond of Meriel and begged her to stay on, in the place of a hired nurse, and Meriel was a lonely creature. She told my sister that she was thankful to find someone who needed her. But she had a hard time. All the trouble, and isolation, and patience, and—Hastiness, for nothing! It was a hopeless case, and grew steadily worse and worse. Meriel left off writing during that time, but my sister said that even before that her letters had grown awfully sad... Then they sailed for India, I suppose to try what the change would do, and there was a collision. Some of the passengers got away in boats and were saved—Meriel refused to leave. Some of the passengers told how they had seen Sterne trying to persuade her; but she would not leave.”

There was another silence. With one accord the guests looked at Mrs Ingram, and she recognised the meaning of that look, shook her head, and held out her hands with a gesture of helplessness.

“You are thinking that my theory has failed, and that Meriel found none of the happiness for which she longed. Yes! it sounds like it. Her youth spent in isolation, with a drunken woman as companion, and the result of it all—failure! I don’t deny it, dear people. I don’t argue. On the surface it’s a pitiful tale, but we know only the surface. No one can read the secrets of Meriel’s heart. She was happy in one thing, at least—that the time of her loneliness was short, and I think there are none among you who will deny that Meriel is happy now. Whatever may be your creeds, you will agree that such brave, unselfish giving is a garnering of wealth for the life that is to come. We may be satisfied that Meriel has come into her kingdom!” She paused just for a moment, then with a challenging smile turned towards Val Lessing, who sat on her right. The conversation had taken a pensive turn, and with the generalship of a born hostess she was ready to switch it back into a livelier channel. Among all the couples who were present none looked more absolutely sane and satisfied than Val and his wife. Val could obviously be trusted to give a cheerful report.

“Well, Val, what have you to tell us? Was fate kind or unkind enough to lead you through any perilous seas before you reached your present very sunshiny haven?”

Val bent his head in acknowledgment of the compliment. There was a tinge of embarrassment on his face; he glanced across the hearth at his wife, and as quickly averted his eyes.

“W-e-ll,” he said slowly, “I think I may say that it was! I had an experience of er—what appeared at the time to be a very—er—acute danger. It lasted for some four or five weeks, and then was—er—relieved in a somewhat remarkable manner. You will excuse the details. I have only to confess that the experience taught me the most useful lesson of my life—to appreciate the blessings of safety! I don’t deny that in the course of that experience there were moments of excitement which I intensely enjoyed, but on the whole I discovered that it is much more agreeable to live in peace.” He paused for a moment, and into his eyes there leaped a delightful smile. “I may add,” he said dryly, “that my wife has relieved me of one great dread. She is good enough to provide a spice of uncertainty, which makes it impossible that I shall ever have to complain of monotony in life!”

Everyone looked at Delia, and Delia flicked her long eyelashes, and stared into space with an expression of angelic innocence. But a dimple dipped in her cheek. Delia at thirty-eight was still a minx. There was more than one man in the room who envied Lessing the possession of his delightful wife!

The general laugh subsided, and Mrs Ingram turned to the Squire’s wife.

“So much for Danger!” she said smiling. “Now, Juliet, what have you to report of Adventure? Your friends will remember how impatiently you were straining at your bonds. Has the adventure really come along?”

More than one of the listeners felt it an effort at that moment to repress a smile, so exceedingly unadventurous was the appearance of the portly dame. Perhaps she felt the covert amusement, for there was a note of defiance in her voice as she took up the challenge.

“Yes, it did,” she said emphatically. “It most certainly did, and I have to thank you, dear Mrs Ingram, for making me—er—receptive—so that when the opportunity arose, I was ready to take it. Before our talk here fifteen years ago, I had drifted into the belief that nothing adventurous or interesting could ever happen to me, and that I must just resign myself to be bored. After that I changed my way of thinking, and expected the chance to come. I am like Mr Lessing—I prefer not to give you any details, but I think I am quite safe in saying that no other woman ever met her husband in the extraordinary circumstances under which I met mine. It was very adventurous indeed, and we were engaged—oh, at once, and married in a month, and after my husband’s service abroad we settled down in the dear old house where we are still living with our six children.” She paused, and looked around with a warning air. “Please don’t murmur sympathetically! Whenever I say ‘six,’ people always murmur sympathetically, and it’s so misplaced. It’s just what we wanted—lots of little heads round the table. Five sturdy boys, and one little girl.”

“Well, at any rate, you can’t have much adventure now!” It was Mrs Francis Manning who spoke, the faint Cockney twang of her voice sounding discordantly in contrast to the cultured tones of her companions. “Children are such a tie. We have four, and I never seem to have a free hour. And to live in the country, too. It’s a good thing you had some adventure when you were young, for there’s no chance of it now.”

“I deny it!” cried Juliet, hotly. “I deny it. Can anything in the world be more adventurous than to start a new home, and a new generation, to have six young lives entrusted to one to train for the world’s service? Think what those six lives may mean, multiplying into fresh lives, spreading influence wherever they go! There are no such adventures in life, as marriage and parent-ship, if one can only see them in the right light, and keep on seeing...” She gave a little laugh, half shy, half apologetic, a trifle ashamed of her own intensity. “Ah, well! it’s adventurous enough to have a pack of boys who ate learning to ride, learning to shoot, trying to copy everything that their father can do to-day, hobbling home almost every day of the week with cuts and bruises, and breaks and sprains. I have all the adventure that I need, and,—what shall I say? Only this, that I enjoy it even more than I expected!”

She stopped, panting, and her husband smiled at her across the room, and silently clapped his hands. “I beg to second the motion!” he said gravely, and there was a general stir of laughter. It was pleasant to meet a couple of the good old-fashioned type which was yearly becoming more rare. Every person in the room felt a sincere respect for Captain and Mrs Antony Maplestone.

“Well, of course—if you put it like that,” said Mrs Manning doubtfully, “I’m sure I’ve always done my best to be a good mother, and the girls go to school now, which makes it easier, but with the boy being blind—well, naturally, it’s a tie! My husband tells me he wished for Comfort, and there’s no doubt but he’s got it. We’re not rich, of course, but comfortable, quite comfortable. He’s only to express a wish, and it’s there for him, and I keep a first-rate cook. But as I said to him only to-day, he doesn’t give himself a chance. Always slaving and worrying for someone else, particularly for the boy, even now when he is getting quite big, and able to do for himself. It’s wonderful how clever blind people become! Of course we all want to be helpful, but, as I say, there is a medium course, and everyone notices how Frank has altered these last years. If you remember he used to be quite stout—”

“Please, Marion! Spare my blushes. I am perfectly well, and my greatest pleasure is looking after the boy.” Francis Manning spoke with quiet self-possession, nevertheless his hearers divined a hidden wound, and unanimously forbore from comment, but those who had known the man fifteen years before, marvelled at the change which had come over his whole personality. It was more than a change; it was a transfiguration. What trumpet-call had sounded in this man’s ears to rouse him from his sleep?

Mrs Ingram looked around and met the glance of John Malham, millionaire, leaning back in his chair with his head supported on his hand. Of all the men in the room he looked the most worn and exhausted, and she wondered if perchance at this very moment his tired brain was evolving another Titan scheme by which fresh coffers could be added to his store. Her smile had more of pity than envy as she addressed him:

“Mr Malham, it is unnecessary to ask your report! All the world knows how you have succeeded. It only remains for your old friends to congratulate you, and wish you a continuance of your success.”

“Thanks very much, Mrs Ingram. It is a great pleasure to be here, and to meet you all again. I only wish I could have managed to make a longer stay.”

Malham was obviously ill at ease, obviously annoyed when his wife took up the strain, and in her flat voice proceeded to enlarge on her husband’s marvellous powers. With the obvious intention of avoiding the ordeal he bent forward towards Juliet, and pointing to a miniature which hung from her neck, said in a low voice, “Is that one of the six? The little girl? May I see?”

Juliet beamed broadly as she held out the pearl-rimmed case containing a pretty round young face. “And you? How many have you?”

“None,” he said shortly, and Juliet hurried to retrieve her mistake.

“Yes. That’s the girl. A great pet, of course. I called her Celia. Her father thought it too fanciful, but he had had his own way about the boys, so I insisted on it. It’s such a pretty name, so sweet and winsome—don’t you think so? And uncommon. One meets so many Gladyses and Phyllises, but so seldom a Celia. Did you ever know a Celia?”

She looked at him, and the motherly smile faded at sight of his tortured face.

“Yes. I knew a Celia,” he said thickly, and Juliet looked hurriedly in another direction, her heart leaping to a swift conclusion.

“He loved a girl called Celia, and she died, and he married Lady Anne for her position. All his success has not brought him happiness. Oh, the poor, poor man!”

Meantime Lady Anne’s voice had trailed into silence, and Rupert Dempster was answering Mrs Ingram’s unspoken summons. Like Manning he had but little to say, but there was all the difference in the world in his manner of saying it.

“I wished for Eve,” he said simply. “Here she is!” and again he slipped his hand through his wife’s arm. As a matter of course he had seated himself by her side; as a matter of course Eve had looked for his coming. For all their friendliness and courtesy, there was about these two an air of detachment from their surroundings, an air of living apart in a world of their own, fenced round with an ambuscade through which no darts could pass. The affectionate camaraderie of the Lessings and Maplestones was a good and pleasant thing to witness, but the bond which bound these two was finer, more exalted.

Eve’s eyes were deep and luminous at that moment, but their beautiful glance held no remembrance of her companions. All her thought was for her man.

“Ah, Rupert, yes! you have gained your wish!” Mrs Ingram said deeply. She looked at the two as they sat side by side, and a reflection of their own radiance showed in her own face. “It was a great wish,” she said, “a wish that was worth while, for your treasure can never be taken away. Death itself is powerless to divide your souls. Dear Rupert, I am glad for you. We are all glad! It is good to have you among us to-day...”

Hereward Lowther bent forward in his seat, the firelight playing on his eager, animated face. Throughout the evening he had worn an air of expectancy, and now he burst eagerly into speech.

“Mrs Ingram, I have to thank you for a tremendously interesting evening. My wife told me that she had a special reason for wishing to accept your invitation. I understood that we were to celebrate some sort of anniversary, but as old friends you will remember that she is chary of words, and I was entirely ignorant of its nature. I have been intensely interested in the history of the various wishes, but I confess that my chief feeling has been curiosity. Please tell me! What was my wife’s wish?”

Mrs Ingram looked at the corner by the fireplace where for the last hour a white figure sat, silent, immovable, her face shadowed by an outstanding beam. Even so fifteen years ago had the girl Lilith Wastneys watched and waited, until at her hostess’s summons she had moved softly forward to make her extraordinary pronouncement. The remembrance of that moment was vivid in the minds of her old friends, as Mrs Ingram answered:

“Lilith,” she said deliberately, “wished for Power.”

The next moment the silence was broken by a peal of laughter. It was Hereward Lowther who laughed, giving way to a gust of amusement with the boy-like unrestraint which still characterised his moods. He threw back his head, he clasped his knees, he opened his mouth and let the loud ha-ha’s echo through the hall. In a very paroxysm of amusement he repeated the word, over and again, and between each repetition, swayed with fresh laughter.

“Power! Lilith? Lilith wished for Power? Of all the inexplicable wishes! I might have guessed for months but I should never have guessed that. Lilith? the most humble and retiring of women. Look at her now! That’s where she would always be, if she were not driven forward,—hiding in some out-of-the-way corner. And you tell me that she wished for Power? When was that—fifteen years ago? And we have been married for twelve... How extraordinarily she must have changed!”

Through eight different minds the reflection was passing, how extraordinarily Lilith remained the same, but it did not become mere friends to contradict the verdict of a husband, so they remained silent, and, his outburst of amusement over, Hereward Lowther vouchsafed a more serious attention to the problem.

“Well!” he said thoughtfully, “we may say that vicariously she has gained her wish. As my wife—” He checked himself as though fearful of seeming to boast, and added quickly, “I should be delighted to feel that I have been able to provide Lilith with anything for which she wished!”

Lilith bent forward and sent him a smile of acknowledgment. Then her eyes travelled round the circle and rested on her hostess’s face. The two women looked at one another long and steadily and a flush rose into Mrs Ingram’s cheeks.

“I think,” she said quietly, “I must reckon Lilith among my successes. Mr Lowther, may I tell you how proud my husband and I feel to number you among our guests to-night? Ordinary people who can only stand by and watch feel a profound gratitude to workers like yourself, who are types of all that is honourable and disinterested. England owes you a great debt to-day.”

Every man present joined in a murmur of assent, for though political opinions differed, one and all acknowledged the singleness of Lowther’s aim. Across one or two minds flitted a remembrance of the tragic eclipse which had marked the statesman’s early career, but in each case the remembrance brought with it an increased admiration. Not one man in a thousand would have had the power to climb out of so deep a ditch!

And now, one by one, the nine histories had been discussed, and the company instinctively drew their chairs nearer the fire, watching with questioning eagerness the eloquent face of the woman whose words had had so large a bearing on their lives. Here she was, an old woman now, worn to the point of breaking, yet vital, as ever, with the flame of an encompassing sympathy.

“Ah, dear people,” she sighed, “dear people, it is so good to meet you again! I am so grateful to you for coming. The remembrance of this night will be company for me during many quiet days. I shall have much to think over, but at present I am conscious only of one thing—that my prophecy is true, is almost terribly true! We are only faintly beginning to understand the real power of steady, concentrated will. The thing that a man aims for, with a strong, single, undeviating aim, that thing, sooner or later, a man can have! So much is certain, but I blame myself for not insisting more upon the initial question. Is it worth while? Oh, dear people, so often our ambitions are not worth while. An aim which is to ride dominant over every call, an aim for which all hindrances are to be cast aside, must needs have a spiritual nature, if it is to satisfy a spiritual being. In the days to come, teach your children the importance of this great decision; teach them their power, but be sure, be very sure, to teach them to think long and earnestly, lest in their blindness they choose the dross, and go starving all their days!”

John Malham leaned back in his chair, so that his face was in the shadow. Francis Manning’s eyes gazed deeply into space. Across the silence broke the harp-like tones of Eve Dempster’s voice:

“Mrs Ingram, you have gained your own wish. It is written in your face that it was worth while. Will you tell us what it was?”

The hostess looked down at her thin, locked hands. Her voice trembled, as she slowly recited her answer, dwelling with eloquent emphasis on one of the earlier words:

“I have—Learned—in whatever state I am, therewith to be Content!”

The End.