Chapter 7

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_ CHAPTER VII

For some minutes longer the men lay resting in the heather, their eyes drinking the colour and varied lights and lines of the vast horizon. The downs rose like cliffs, and the dead level of the weald was freckled with brick towns; every hedgerow was visible as the markings on a chess-board; the distant lands were merged in blue vapour, and the windmill on its little hill seemed like a bit out of a young lady's sketch-book.

"How charming it is here!--how delightful! How sorrow seems to vanish, or to hang far away in one's life like a little cloud! It is only in moments of contemplation like this, when our wretched individuality is lost in the benedictive influences of nature, that true happiness is found. Ah! the wonderful philosophy of the East, the wisdom of the ancient races! Christianity is but a vulgarization of Buddhism, an adaptation, an arrangement for family consumption."

They were not a mile from where John had seen Kitty for a last time. Now the mere recollection of her jarred his joy in the evening, for he had long since begun to understand that his love of her had been a kind of accident, even as her death a strange unaccountable divagation of his true nature. He had grown ashamed of his passion, and he now thought that, like Parsifal, instead of yielding, he should have looked down and seen a cross in the sword's hilt, and the temptation should have passed. That cruel death, never explained, so mysterious and so involved in horror! In what measure was he to blame? In what light was he to view this strange death as a symbol, as a sign? And if she had not been killed? If he had married her? To escape from these assaults of conscience he buried his mind in his books and writings, not in his history of Christian Latin, for now his history of those writers appeared to him sterile, and he congratulated himself that he had outgrown love of such paradoxes.

Solemn, and with the great curves of palms, the sky arched above them, and all the coombes filled with all the mystery of evening shadow, and all around lay the sea--a rim of sea illimitable.

At the end of a long silence Mike spoke of his poem.

"You must have written a good deal of it by this time."

"No, I have written very little;" and then yielding to his desire to astonish, confessed he was working at a trilogy on the life of Christ, and had already decided the main lines and incidents of the three plays. His idea was the disintegration of the legend, which had united under a godhead certain socialistic aspirations then prevalent in Judaea. In his first play, _John_, he introduces two reformers, one of whom is assassinated by John; the second perishes in a street broil, leaving the field free for the triumph of Jesus of Nazareth. In the second play, _Jesus_, he tells the story of Jesus and the Magdalene. She throws over her protector, one of the Rabbi, and refuses her admirer, Judas, for Jesus. The Rabbi plots to destroy Jesus, and employs Judas. In the third play, _Peter_, he pictures the struggle of the new idea in pagan Rome, and it ends in Peter flying from Rome to escape crucifixion; but outside the city he sees Christ carrying His cross, and Christ says He is going to be crucified a second time, whereupon Peter returns to Rome.

As they descended the rough chalk road into the weald, John said, "I have sacrificed much for my religion. I think, therefore, I have a right to say that it is hard that my house should be selected for the manufacture of blasphemous trilogies."

Knowing that argument would profit him nothing, Mike allayed John's heaving conscience with promises not to write another line of the trilogy, and to devote himself entirely to his poem. At the end of a long silence, John said--

"Now the very name of Schopenhauer revolts me. I accept nothing of his ideas. From that ridiculous pessimism I have drifted very far indeed. Pessimism is impossible. To live we must have an ideal, and pessimism offers none. So far it is inferior even to positivism."

"Pessimism offers no ideal! It offers the highest--not to create life is the only good; the creation of life is the only evil; all else which man in his bestial stupidity calls good and evil is ephemeral and illusionary."

"Schopenhauer's arguments against suicide are not valid, that you admit, therefore it is impossible for the pessimist to justify his continued existence."

"Pardon me, the diffusion of the principle of sufficient reason can alone end this world, and we are justified in living in order that by example and precept we may dissuade others from the creation of life. The incomparable stupidity of life teaches us to love our parents--divine philosophy teaches us to forgive them."

That evening Mike played numerous games of backgammon with Mrs. Norton; talked till two in the morning to John of literature, and deplored the burning of the poems, and besought him to write them again, and to submit them, if need be, to a bishop. He worked hard to obliterate the effect of his foolish confidences; for he was very happy in this large country house, full of unexpected impressions for him. On the wide staircases he stopped, tense with sensations of space, order, and ample life. He was impressed by the timely meals, conducted by well-trained servants; and he found it pleasant to pass from the house into the richly-planted garden, and to see the coachman washing the carriage, the groom scraping out the horse's hooves, the horse tied to the high wall, the cowman stumping about the rick-yard--indeed all the homely work always in progress.

Sometimes he did not come down to lunch, and continued his work till late in the afternoon. At five he had tea in the drawing-room with Mrs. Norton, and afterwards went out to gather flowers in the garden with her, or he walked around the house with John, listening to his plans for the architectural reformation of his residence.

Mike had now been a month at Thornby Place. He was enchanted with this country-side, and seeing it lent itself to his pleasure--in other words, that it was necessary to his state of mind--he strove, and with insidious inveiglements, to win it, to cajole it, to make it part and parcel of himself. But its people were reserved. Instinctively Mike attacked the line and the point of least resistance, and the point of least resistance lay about three miles distant. A young squire--a young man of large property and an unimpeachable position in the county--lived there in a handsome house with his three sisters. His life consisted in rabbit-shooting and riding out every morning to see his sheep upon the downs. He was the rare man who does not desire himself other than he is. But content, though an unmixed blessing to its possessor, is not an attractive quality, and Mr. Dallas stood sorely in need of a friend. He loved his sisters, but to spend every evening in their society was monotonous, and he felt, and they felt still more keenly, that a nice young man would create an interest that at present was wanting in country life. Mike had heard of this young squire and his sisters, and had long desired to meet him. But they had paid their yearly visit to Thornby Place, and he could not persuade John to go to Holly Park.

One day riding on the downs, Mike inquired the way to Henfield of a young man who passed him riding a bay horse. The question was answered curtly--so curtly that Mike thought the stranger could not be led into conversation. In this he was mistaken, and at the end of half a mile felt he had succeeded in interesting his companion. As they descended into the weald, Mike told him he was stopping at Thornby Place, and the young squire told him he was Mr. Dallas. When about to part, Mike asked to be directed to the nearest inn, complaining that he was dying of thirst, for he wished to give Mr. Dallas an excuse for asking him to his house. Mr. Dallas availed himself of the excuse; and Mike prayed that he might find the ladies at home. They were in the drawing-room. The piano was played, and amid tea and muffins, tennis was discussed, allusions were made to man's inconstancy.

Mike left no uncertainty regarding his various qualities. He liked hunting as much as shooting, and having regard for the season of the year, he laid special stress upon his love for, and his prowess in, the game of tennis. A week later he received an invitation to tennis. Henceforth he rode over frequently to Holly Park. He was sometimes asked to stay the night, and an impression was gaining ground there that life was pleasanter with him than without him.

When he was not there the squire missed the morning ride and the game of billiards in the evening, and the companion to whom he could speak of his sheep and his lambs. Mike listened to the little troubles of each sister in the back garden, never failing to evince the profoundest sympathy. He was surprised to find that he enjoyed these conversations just as much as a metaphysical disquisition with John Norton. "I am not pretending," he often said to himself; "it is quite true;" and then he added philosophically, "Were I not interested in them I should not succeed in interesting them."

The brother, the sisters, the servants, even the lap-dog shared in the pleasure. The maid-servants liked to meet his tall figure in the passages; the young ladies loved to look into his tender eyes when they came in from their walk and found him in the drawing-room.

To touch Mike's skin was to touch his soul, and even the Yorkshire terrier was sensible of its gentleness, and soon preferred of all places to doze under his hand. Mike came into Dallas' room in the morning when he was taking his bath; he hung around the young ladies' rooms, speaking through the half-open doors; then when the doors were open, the young ladies fled and wrapped themselves in dressing-gowns. He felt his power; and by insidious intimations, by looks, words, projects for pleasure, presents, practical jokes, books, and talks about books, he proceeded joyously in his corruption of the entire household.

Naturally Mike rode his host's horses, and he borrowed his spurs, breeches, boots, and hunting-whip. And when he began to realize what an excellent pretext hunting is for making friends, and staying in country houses, he bought a couple of horses, which he kept at Holly Park free of cost. He had long since put aside his poem and his trilogy, and now thought of nothing but shooting and riding. He could throw his energies into anything, from writing a poem to playing chuck-farthing.

The first meet of the hounds was at Thornby Place, and in the vain hope of marrying her son, Mrs. Norton had invited the young girls of the entire country-side. Lady Edith Downsdale was especially included in her designs; but John instantly vetoed her hopes by asking Mike to take Lady Edith in to lunch. She stood holding her habit; and feeling the necessity of being brilliant, Mike said, pointing to the hounds and horses--

"How strange it is that that is of no interest to the artist! I suppose because it is only parade; whereas a bit of lane with a wind-blown hedge is a human emotion, and that is always interesting."

Soon after, a fox was found in the plantation that rimmed the lawn, and seeing that Lady Edith was watching him, Mike risked a fall over some high wattles; and this was the only notice he took of her until late in the afternoon, until all hope of hunting was ended. A fox had been "chopped" in cover, another had been miserably coursed and killed in a back garden. He strove to make himself agreeable while riding with her along the hillsides, watching the huntsman trying each patch of gorse in the coombes. She seemed to him splendid and charming, and he wondered if he could love her--marry her, and never grow weary of her. But when the hounds found in a large wood beneath the hills, and streamed across the meadows, he forgot her, and making his horse go in and out he fought for a start. A hundred and fifty were cantering down a steep muddy lane; a horseman who had come across the field strove to open a strong farm-gate. "It is locked," he roared; "jump." The lane was steep and greasy, the gate was four feet and a half. Mike rode at it. The animal dropped his hind-legs, Mike heard the gate rattle, and a little ejaculatory cry come from those he left behind. It was a close shave. Turning in his saddle he saw the immense crowd pressing about the gate, which could not be opened, and he knew very well that he would have the hounds to himself for many a mile.

He raced alone across the misty pasture lands, full of winter water and lingering leaf; the lofty downs like sea cliffs, appearing through great white masses of curling vapour. And all the episodes of that day--the great ox fences which his horse flew, going like a bird from field to field; the awkward stile, the various brooks,--that one overgrown with scrub which his horse had refused--thrilled him. And when the day was done, as he rode through the gathering night, inquiring out the way down many a deep and wooded lane, happiness sang within him, and like a pure animal he enjoyed the sensation of life, and he intoxicated on the thoughts of the friends that would have been his, the women and the numberless pleasures and adventures he could have engaged in, were he not obliged to earn money, or were not led away from them "by his accursed literary tastes."

Should he marry one of the sisters? Ridiculous! But what was there to do? To-day he was nearly thirty; in ten years he would be a middle-aged man; and, alas! for he felt in him manifold resources, sufficient were he to live for five hundred years. Must he marry Agnes? He might if she was a peeress in her own right! Or should he win a peerage for himself by some great poem, or by some great political treachery? No, no; he wanted nothing better than to live always strong and joyous in this corner of fair England; and to be always loved by girls, and to be always talked of by them about their tea-tables. Oh, for a cup of tea and a slice of warm buttered toast!

A good hour's ride yawned between him and Holly Park, but by crossing the downs it might be reduced to three-quarters of an hour. He hesitated, fearing he might miss his way in the fog, but the tea-table lured him. He resolved to attempt it, and forced his horse up a slightly indicated path, which he hoped would led him to a certain barn. High above him a horseman, faint as the shadow of a bird, made his way cantering briskly. Mike strove to overtake him, but suddenly missed him: behind him the pathway was disappearing.

Fearing he might have to pass a night on the downs, he turned his horse's head; but the animal was obdurate, and a moment after he was lost. He said, "Great Scott! where am I? Where did this ploughed field come from? I must be near the dike." Then thinking that he recognized the headland, he rode in a different direction, but was stopped by a paling and a chalk-pit, and, riding round it, he guessed the chalk-pit must be fifty feet deep. Strange white patches, fabulous hillocks, and distortions of ground loomed through the white darkness; and a valley opened on his right so steep that he was afraid to descend into it. Very soon minutes became hours and miles became leagues.

"There's nothing for it but to lie under a furze-bush." With two pocket-handkerchiefs he tied his horse's fore-legs close together, and sat down and lit a cigar. The furze-patch was quite hollow underneath and almost dry.

"It is nearly full moon," he said; "were it not for that it would be pitch dark. Good Lord! thirteen hours of this; I wish I had never been born!"

He had not, however, finished his first cigar before a horse's head and shoulders pushed through the mist. Mike sprang to his feet.

"Can you tell me the way off these infernal downs?" he cried. "Oh, I beg your pardon, Lady Edith."

"Oh, is that you, Mr. Fletcher? I have lost my way and my groom too. I am awfully frightened; I missed him of a sudden in the fog. What shall I do? Can you tell me the way?"

"Indeed I cannot; if I knew the way I should not be sitting under this furze-bush."

"What shall we do? I must get home."

"It is very terrible, Lady Edith, but I'm afraid you will not be able to get home till the fog lifts."

"But I must get home. I must! I must! What will they think? They'll be sending out to look for me. Won't you come with me, Mr. Fletcher, and help me to find the way?"

"I will, of course, do anything you like; but I warn you, Lady Edith, that riding about these downs in a fog is most dangerous; I as nearly as possible went over a chalk-pit fifty feet deep."

"Oh, Mr. Fletcher, I must get home; I cannot stay here all night; it is ridiculous."

They talked so for a few minutes. Then amid many protestations Lady Edith was induced to dismount. He forced her to drink, and to continue sipping from his hunting-flask, which was fortunately full of brandy; and when she said she was no longer cold, he put his arm about her, and they talked of their sensations on first seeing each other.

Three small stones, two embedded in the ground, the third, a large flint, lay close where the grass began, and the form of a bush was faint on the heavy white blanket in which the world was wrapped. A rabbit crept through the furze and frightened them, and they heard the horses browsing.

Mike declared he could say when she had begun to like him.

"You remember you were standing by the sideboard holding your habit over your boots; I brought you a glass of champagne, and you looked at me...."

She told him of her troubles since she had left school. He related the story of his own precarious fortunes; and as they lay dreaming of each other, the sound of horse's hoofs came through the darkness.

"Oh, do cry out, perhaps they will be able to tell us the way."

"Do you want to leave me?"

"No, no, but I must get home; what will father think?"

Mike shouted, and his shout was answered.

"Where are you?" asked the unknown.

"Here," said Mike.

"Where is here?"

"By the furze-bush."

"Where is the furze-bush?"

It was difficult to explain, and the voice grew fainter. Then it seemed to come from a different side.

Mike shouted again and again, and at last a horseman loomed like a nightmare out of the dark. It was Parker, Lady Edith's groom.

"Oh, Parker, how did you miss me? I have been awfully frightened; I don't know what I should have done if I had not met Mr. Fletcher."

"I was coming round that barn, my lady; you set off at a trot, my lady, and a cloud of fog came between us."

"Yes, yes; but do you know the way home?"

"I think, my lady, we are near the dike; but I wouldn't be certain."

"I nearly as possible rode into a chalk-pit," said Mike. "Unpleasant as it is, I think we had better remain where we are until it clears."

"Oh, no, no, we cannot remain here; we might walk and lead the horses."

"Very well, you get on your horse; I'll lead."

"No, no," she whispered, "give me your arm, and I'll walk."

They walked in the bitter, hopeless dark, stumbling over the rough ground, the groom following with the horses. But soon Lady Edith stopped, and leaning heavily on Mike, said--

"I can go no further; I wish I were dead!"

"Dead! No, no," he whispered; "live for my sake, darling."

At that moment the gable of a barn appeared like an apparition. The cattle which were lying in the yard started from under the horses' feet, and stood staring in round-eyed surprise. The barn was half full of hay, and in the dry pungent odour Mike and Lady Edith rested an hour. Sometimes a bullock filled the doorway with ungainly form and steaming nostrils; sometimes the lips of the lovers met. In about half an hour the groom returned with the news that the fog was lifting, and discovering a cart-track, they followed it over the hills for many a mile.

"There is Horton Borstal," cried Parker, as they entered a deep cutting overgrown with bushes. "I know my way now, my lady; we are seven miles from home."

When he bade Lady Edith good-bye, Mike's mind thrilled with a sense of singular satisfaction. Here was an adventure which seemed to him quite perfect; it had been preceded by no wearisome preliminaries, and he was not likely ever to see her again.

Weeks and months passed, and the simple-minded country folk with whom he had taken up his abode seemed more thoroughly devoted to him; the anchor of their belief seemed now deeply grounded, and in the peaceful bay of their affection his bark floated, safe from shipwrecking current or storm. There was neither subterfuge or duplicity in Mike; he was always singularly candid on the subject of his sins and general worthlessness, and he was never more natural in word and deed than at Holly Park. If its inmates had been reasonable they would have cast him forth; but reason enters hardly at all in the practical conduct of human life, and our loves and friendships owe to it neither origin or modification.

It was a house of copious meals and sleep. Mike stirred these sluggish livers, and they accepted him as a digestive; and they amused him, and he only dreamed vaguely of leaving them until he found his balance at the bank had fallen very low. Then he packed up his portmanteau and left them, and when he walked down the Strand he had forgotten them and all country pursuits, and wanted to talk of journalism; and he would have welcomed the obscurest paragraphist. Suddenly he saw Frank; and turning from a golden-haired actress who was smiling upon him, he said--

"How do you do?" The men shook hands, and stood constrainedly talking for a few minutes; then Mike suggested lunch, and they turned into Lubini's. The proprietor, a dapper little man, more like a rich man's valet than a waiter, whose fat fingers sparkled with rings, sat sipping sherry and reading the racing intelligence to a lord who offered to toss him for half-crowns.

"Now then, Lubi," cried the lord, "which is it? Come on; just this once."

Lubi demurred. "You toss too well for me; last night you did win seven times running--damn!"

"Come on, Lubi; here it is flat on the table."

Mike longed to pull his money out of his pocket, but he had not been on terms with Lubi since he had called him a _Marchand de Soupe_, an insult which Lubi had not been able to forgive, and it was the restaurateur's women-folk who welcomed him back to town after his long absence.

"What an air of dissipation, hilarity, and drink there is about the place!" said Mike. "Look!" and his eyes rested on two gross men--music-hall singers--who sat with their agent, sipping Chartreuse. "Three years ago," he said, "they were crying artichokes in an alley, and the slum is still upon their faces."

No one else was in the long gallery save the waiters, who dozed far away in the mean twilight of the glass-roofing.

"How jolly it is," said Mike, "to order your own dinner! Let's have some oysters--three dozen. We'll have a Chateaubriand--what do you say? And an omelette soufflee--what do you think? And a bottle of champagne. Waiter, bring me the wine-list."

Frank had spoken to Mike because he felt lonely; the world had turned a harsh face on him. Lord Mount Rorke had married, and the paper was losing its circulation.

"And how is the paper going?"

"Pretty well; just the same as usual. Do you ever see it? What do you think of my articles?"

"Your continuation of my series, _Lions of the Season?_ Very good; I only saw one or two. I have been living in the country, and have hardly seen a paper for the last year and a half. You can't imagine the life I have been leading. Nice kind people 'tis true; I love them, but they never open a book. That is all very nice for a time--for three months, for six, for a year--but after that you feel a sense of alienation stealing over you."

Mike saw that Frank had only met with failure; so he was tempted to brandish his successes. He gave a humorous description of his friends--how he had picked them up; how they had supplied him with horses to ride and guns to shoot with.

"And what about the young ladies? Were they included in the hospitality?"

"They included themselves. How delicious love in a country house is!--and how different from other love it is, to follow a girl dressed for dinner into the drawing-room or library, and to take her by the waist, to feel a head leaning towards you and a mouth closing upon yours! Above all, when the room is in darkness--better still in the firelight--the light of the fire on her neck.... How good these oysters are! Have some more champagne."

Then, in a sudden silence, a music-hall gent was heard to say that some one was a splendid woman, beautifully developed.

"Now then, Lubi, old man, I toss you for a sovereign," cried a lord, who looked like a sandwich-man in his ample driving-coat.

"You no more toss with me, I have done with you; you too sharp for me."

"What! are you going to cut me? Are you going to warn me off your restaurant?"

Roars of laughter followed, and the lions of song gazed in admiration on the lord.

"I may be hard up," cried the lord; "but I'm damned if I ever look hard up; do I, Lubi?"

"Since you turn up head when you like, why should you look hard up?"

"You want us to believe you are a 'mug,' Lubi, that's about it, but it won't do. 'Mugs' are rare nowadays. I don't know where to go and look for them.... I say, Lubi," and he whispered something in the restaurateur's ear, "if you know of any knocking about, bring them down to my place; you shall stand in."

"Damn me! You take me for a pump, do you? You get out!"

The genial lord roared the more, and assured Lubi he meant "mugs," and offered to toss him for a sovereign.

"How jolly this is!" said Mike. "I'm dying for a gamble; I feel as if I could play as I never played before. I have all the cards in my mind's eye. By George! I wish I could get hold of a 'mug,' I'd fleece him to the tune of five hundred before he knew where he was. But look at that woman! She's not bad."

"A great coarse creature like that! I never could understand you.... Have you heard of Lily Young lately?"

Mike's face fell.

"No," he said, "I have not. She is the only woman I ever loved. I would sooner see her than the green cloth. I really believe I love that girl. Somehow I cannot forget her."

"Well, come and see her to-day. Take your eyes off that disgusting harlot."

"No, not to-day," he replied, without removing his eyes. Five minutes after he said, "Very well, I will go. I must see her."

The waiter was called, the bill was paid, a hansom was hailed, and they were rolling westward. In the pleasure of this little expedition, Mike's rankling animosity was almost forgotten. He said--

"I love this drive west; I love to see London opening up, as it were, before the wheels of the hansom--Trafalgar Square, the Clubs, Pall Mall, St. James' Street, Piccadilly, the descent, and then the gracious ascent beneath the trees. You see how I anticipate it all."

"Do you remember that morning when Lady Helen committed suicide? What did you think of my article?"

"I didn't see it. I should have liked to have written about it; but you said that I wouldn't write feelingly."

Mrs. Young hardly rose from her sofa; but she welcomed them in plaintive accents. Lily showed less astonishment and pleasure at seeing him than Mike expected. She was talking to a lady, who was subsequently discovered to be the wife of a strange fat man, who, in his character of Orientalist, squatted upon the lowest seat in the room, and wore a velvet turban on his head, a voluminous overcoat circulating about him.

"As I said to Lady Hazeldean last night--I hope Mr. Gladstone did not hear me, he was talking to Lady Engleton Dixon about divorce, I really hope he did not hear me--but I really couldn't help saying that I thought it would be better if he believed less in the divorce of nations, even if I may not add that he might with advantage believe more in the divorce of persons not suited to each other."

When the conversation turned on Arabi, which it never failed to do in this house, the perfume-burners that had been presented to her and Mr. Young on their triumphal tour were pointed out.

"I telegraphed to Dilke," said Sir Joseph, "'You must not hang that man.' And when Mrs. Young accused him of not taking sufficient interest in Africa, he said--'My dear Mrs. Young, I not interested in Africa! You forget what I have done for Africa; how I have laboured for Africa. I shall not believe in the synthesis of humanity, nor will it be complete, till we get the black votes.'"

"Mr. Young and Lord Granville used to have such long discussions about Buddhism, and it always used to end in Mr. Young sending a copy of your book to Lord Granville."

"A very great distinction for me--a very great distinction for me," murmured Buddha; and allowing Mrs. Young to relieve him of his tea-cup, he said--"and now, Mrs. Young, I want to ask for your support and co-operation in a little scheme--a little scheme which I have been nourishing like a rose in my bosom for some years."

Sir Joseph raised his voice; and it was not until he had imposed silence on his wife that he consented to unfold his little scheme.

Then the fat man explained that in a certain province in Cylone (a name of six syllables) there was a temple, and this temple had belonged in the sixth century to a tribe of Buddhists (a name of seven syllables), and this temple had in the eighth century been taken from the Buddhists by a tribe of Brahmins (a name of eight syllables).

"And not being Mr. Gladstone," said Sir Joseph, "I do not propose to dispossess the Brahmins without compensation. I am merely desirous that the Brahmins should be bought out by the Indian Government at a cost of a hundred and fifty or two hundred thousand. If this were done the number of pilgrims to this holy shrine would be doubled, and the best results would follow."

"Oh, Mrs. Jellaby, where art thou?" thought Mike, and he boldly took advantage of the elaborate preparations that were being made for Sir Joseph to write his name on a fan, to move round the table and take a seat by Lily.

But Frank's patience was exhausted, and he rose to leave.

"People wonder at the genius of Shakespeare! I must say the stupidity of the ordinary man surprises me far more," said Mike.

"I'm a poor man to-day," said Frank, "but I would give L25 to have had Dickens with us--fancy walking up Piccadilly with him afterwards!

"Now I must go," he said. "Lizzie is waiting for me. I'll see you to-morrow," he cried, and drove away.

"Just fancy having to look after her, having to attend to her wants, having to leave a friend and return home to dine with her in a small room! How devilish pleasant it is to be free!--to say, 'Where shall I dine?' and to be able to answer, 'Anywhere.' But it is too early to dine, and too late to play whist. Damn it! I don't know what to do with myself."

Mike watched the elegantly-dressed men who passed hurriedly to their clubs, or drove west to dinner parties. Red clouds and dark clouds collected and rolled overhead, and in a chill wintry breeze the leaves of the tall trees shivered, fell, and were blown along the pavement with sharp harsh sound. London shrouded like a widow in long crape.

"What is there to do? Five o'clock! After that lunch I cannot dine before eight--three hours! Whom shall I go and see?"

A vision of women passed through his mind, but he turned from them all, and he said--

"I will go and see her."

He had met Miss Dudley in Brighton, in a house where he had been asked to tea. She was a small, elderly spinster with sharp features and gray curls. She had expected him to address to her a few commonplace remarks for politeness' sake, and then to leave her for some attractive girl. But he had showed no wish to leave her, and when they met again he walked by her bath-chair the entire length of the Cliff. Miss Dudley was a cripple. She had fallen from some rocks when a child playing on the beach, and had injured herself irremediably. She lived with her maid in a small lodging, and being often confined to her room for days, nearly every visitor was welcome. Mike liked this pallid and forgotten little woman. He found in her a strange sweetness--a wistfulness. There was poetry in her loneliness and her ruined health. Strength, health, and beauty had been crushed by a chance fall. But the accident had not affected the mind, unless perhaps it had raised it into more intense sympathy with life. And in all his various passions and neglected correspondence he never forgot for long to answer her letters, nor did he allow a month to pass without seeing her. And now he bought for her a great packet of roses and a novel; and with some misgivings he chose Zola's _Page d'Amour_.

"I think this is all right. She'll be delighted with it, if she'll read it."

She would have read anything he gave, and seen no harm since it came from him. The ailing caged bird cannot but delight in the thrilling of the wild bird that comes to it with the freedom of the sky and fields in its wings and song. She listened to all his stories, even to his stories of pigeon-shooting. She knew not how to reproach him. Her eyes fixed upon him, her gentle hand laid on the rail of her chair, she listened while he told her of the friends he had made, and his life in the country; its seascape and downlands, the furze where he had shot the rabbits, the lane where he had jumped the gate. Her pleasures had passed in thought--his in action; the world was for him--this room for her.

There is the long chair in which she lies nearly always; there is the cushion on which the tired head is leaned, a small beautifully-shaped head, and the sharp features are distinct on the dark velvet, for the lamp is on the mantelpiece, and the light falls full on the profile. The curtains are drawn, and the eyes animate with gratitude when Mike enters with his roses, and after asking kindly questions he takes a vase, and filling it with water, places the flowers therein, and sets it on the table beside her. There is her fire--(few indeed are the days in summer when she is without it)--the singing kettle suggests the homely tea, and the saucepan on the hearth the invalid. There is her bookcase, set with poetry and religion, and in one corner are the yellow-backed French novels that Mike has given her. They are the touches the most conclusive of reality in her life; and she often smiles, thinking how her friends will strive to explain how they came into her life when she is gone.

"How good of you to come and see me! Tell me about yourself, what you have been doing. I want to hear you talk."

"Well, I've brought you this book; it is a lovely book--you can read it--I think you can read it, otherwise I should not have given it to you."

He remained with her till seven, talking to her about hunting, shooting, literature, and card-playing.

"Now I must go," he said, glancing at the clock.

"Oh, so soon," exclaimed Miss Dudley, waking from her dream; "must you go?"

"I'm afraid I must; I haven't dined yet."

"And what are you going to do after dinner? You are going to play cards."

"How did you guess that?"

"I can't say," she said, laughing; "I think I can often guess your thoughts."

And during the long drive to Piccadilly, and as he eat his sole and drank his Pomard, he dreamed of the hands he should hold, and of the risks he should run when the cards were bad. His brain glowed with subtle combinations and surprises, and he longed to measure his strength against redoubtable antagonists. The two great whist players, Longley and Lovegrove, were there. He always felt jealous of Lovegrove's play. Lovegrove played an admirable game, always making the most of his cards. But there was none of that dash, and almost miraculous flashes of imagination and decision which characterized Mike, and Mike felt that if he had the money on, and with Longley for a partner, he could play as he had never played before; and ignoring a young man whom he might have rooked at ecarte, and avoiding a rich old gentleman who loved his game of piquet, and on whom Mike was used to rely in the old days for his Sunday dinner (he used to say the old gentleman gave the best dinners in London; they always ran into a tenner), he sat down at the whist-table. His partner played wretchedly, and though he had Longley and Lovegrove against him, he could not refrain from betting ten pounds on every rubber. He played till the club closed, he played till he had reduced his balance at the bank to nineteen pounds.

Haunted by the five of clubs, which on one occasion he should have played and did not, he walked till he came to the Haymarket. Then he stopped. What could he do? All the life of idleness and luxury which he had so long enjoyed faded like a dream, and the spectre of cheap lodgings and daily journalism rose painfully distinct. He pitied the street-sweepers, and wondered if it were possible for him to slip down into the gutter. "When I have paid my hotel bill, I shan't have a tenner." He thought of Mrs. Byril, but the idea did not please him, and he remembered Frank had told him he had a cottage on the river. He would go there. He might put up for a night or two at Hall's.

"I will start a series of articles to-morrow. What shall it be?" An unfortunate still stood at the corner of the street. "'Letters to a Light o' Love!' Frank must advance me something upon them.... Those stupid women! if they were not so witless they could rise to any height. If I had only been a woman! ... If I had been a woman I should have liked to have been Ninon de Lanclos." _

Read next: Chapter 8

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