 Book 2, Chapter 5 of Marcella. Before she went home, Marcella turned into the little rectory garden to see if she could find Mary Hardin for a minute or two. The intimacy between them was such that she generally found entrance to the house by going round to a garden door and knocking or calling. The house was very small, and Mary's little sitting-room was close to this door. Her knock brought Mary instantly. Oh, come in. You won't mind. We were just at dinner. Charter's going away directly. Do stay and talk to me a bit. Marcella hesitated, but at last went in. The meals at the rectory distressed her. The brother and sister showed the marks of them. Today she found their usual fare carefully and prettily arranged on a spotless table. Some bread, cheese, and boiled rice—nothing else. Nor did they allow themselves any fire for meals. Marcella, sitting beside them in her fur, did not feel the cold, but Mary was clearly shivering under her shawl. They ate meat twice a week, and in the afternoon Mary lit the sitting-room fire. In the morning she contented herself with the kitchen, where, as she cooked for many sick folk and had only a girl of fourteen whom she was training to help her with the housework, she had generally much to do. The rector did not stay long after her arrival. He had a distant visit to pay to a dying child, and hurried off so as to be home if possible before dark. Marcella admired him, but did not feel that she understood him more as they were better acquainted. He was slight and young and not very clever, but a certain inexpugnable dignity surrounded him, which, real as it was, sometimes irritated Marcella. It sat oddly on his round face, boyish still, in spite of its pinched and anxious look, but there it was not to be ignored. Marcella thought him a conservative, and very backward and ignorant in his political and social opinions. But she was perfectly conscious that she must also think him a saint, and that the deepest things in him were probably not for her. Mr. Hardin said a few words to her now as to her straw-plating scheme, which had his warmest sympathy. Marcella contrasted his tone gratefully with that of Wharton, and once more fell happily in love with her own ideas. Then he went off, leaving the two girls together. Have you seen Mrs. Hurd this morning? said Mary. Yes, Willie seems very bad. Mary assented. The doctor says he will hardly get through the winter, especially if this weather goes on. But the greatest excitement of the village just now, do you know, is the quarrel between Hurd and Westerl. Someone told Charles yesterday that they never meet without threatening each other. Since the covers at Tudley End were raided, Westerl seems to have quite lost his head. He declares Hurd knew all about that, and that he is hand in glove with the same gang still. He vows he will catch him out, and Hurd told the man who told Charles that if Westerl bullies him any more he will put a knife into him. And Charles says that Hurd is not a bit like he was. He used to be such a patient, silent creature. Now he has woken up to a few more ideas and a little more life than he had, that's all, said Marcella impatiently. He poached last winter and small blame to him. But since he got work at the court in November, is it likely? He knows that he was suspected, and what could be his interest now, after a hard day's work, to go out again at night and run the risk of falling into Westerl's clutches when he doesn't want either the food or the money? I don't know, said Mary, shaking her head. Charles says if they once do it they hardly ever leave it off altogether. It's the excitement and amusement of it. He promised me, said Marcella, proudly. They promised Charles all sorts of things, said Mary, slyly, but they don't keep to them. Warmly grateful as both she and the rector had been from the beginning to Marcella for the passionate interest she took in the place and the people, the sister was sometimes now a trifle jealous, divinely jealous, for her brother. Marcella's unbounded confidence in her own power and right-over-mella, her growing tendency to ignore anybody else's right or power, sometimes set Mary a flame for Charles' sake, heartily and humbly, as she admired her beautiful friend. I shall speak to Mr. Raven about it, said Marcella. She never called him oldest to anybody, a stiffness which jarred a little upon the gentle, sentimental Mary. I saw you pass, she said, from one of the top windows. He was with you, wasn't he? A slight colour sprang to her sallow cheek, a light to her eyes. Most wonderful, most interesting was this engagement to Mary, who, strange to think, had almost brought it about. Mr. Raven was to her one of the best and noblest of men, and she felt quite simply, and with a sort of Christian trembling for him, the romance of his great position. Was Marcella happy? Was she proud of him as she ought to be? Mary was often puzzled by her. Oh, no, said Marcella, with a little laugh. That wasn't Mr. Raven. I don't know where your eyes were, Mary. That was Mr. Wharton, who is staying with us. He has gone to a meeting at Whidrington. Mary's face fell. Charles says Mr. Wharton's influence in the village is very bad, she said quickly. He makes everybody discontented, sets everybody by the ears. And after all, what can he do for anybody? But that's just what he wants to do, to make them discontented, cried Marcella. Then if they vote for him, that's the first practical step towards improving their life. But it won't give them any more wages, or keep them out of the public house, said Mary, bewildered. She came of a homely middle-class stock, accustomed to a small range of thinking and a high standard of doing. Marcella's political opinions were an amazement, and on the whole, a scandal to her. She preferred generally to give them a wide berth. Marcella did not reply. It was not worthwhile to talk to Mary on these topics. But Mary stuck to the subject a moment longer. You can't want him to get in, though, she said, in a puzzled voice, as she led the way to the little sitting-room across the passage, and took her work-basket out of the cupboard. It was only the week before last Mr. Rayburn was speaking at the school-room for Mr. Dodgson. You weren't there, Marcella? No, said Marcella shortly. I thought you knew perfectly well, Mary, that Mr. Rayburn and I don't agree politically. Certainly I hope Mr. Wharton will get in. Mary opened her eyes in wonderment. She stared at Marcella, forgetting the sock she had just slipped over her left hand, and the darning needle in her right. Marcella laughed. I know you think that two people who are going to be married ought to say ditto to each other in everything. Don't you, dear old goose? She came and stood beside Mary, a stately and beautiful creature in her loosened furs. She stroked Mary's straight, sandy hair back from her forehead. Mary looked up at her with a thrill, nay a passionate throb of envy, soon suppressed. I think, she said steadily, it is very strange that love should oppose and disagree with what it loves. Marcella went restlessly towards the fire, and began to examine the things on the mantelpiece. Can't people agree to differ, you sentimentalist? Can't they respect each other without echoing each other on every subject? Respect, cried Mary, with a sudden scorn, which was startling from a creature so soft. There, she could tammy in pieces, said Marcella, laughing, though her lip was not steady. I wonder what you would be like, Mary, if you were engaged? Mary ran her needle in and out, with lightning speed for a second or two. Then she said, almost under her breath, I shouldn't be engaged unless I were in love, and if I were in love, why I would go anywhere, do anything, believe anything, if he told me. Believe anything? Mary, you wouldn't. I don't mean as to religion, said Mary hastily, but everything else I would give it all up, governing oneself, thinking for oneself. He should do it, and I would bless him. She looked up crimson, drawing a very long breath, as though from some deep centre of painful, passionate feeling. It was Marcella's turn to stare. Never had Mary so revealed herself before. Did you ever love anyone like that, Mary? She asked quickly. Mary dropped her head again over her work, and did not answer immediately. Do you see, she said at last, with a change of tone, do you see that we have got our invitation? Marcella, about to give the rain to an eager curiosity Mary's manner had excited in her, felt herself pulled up sharply. When she chose, this little meek creature could put on the same unapproachableness as her brother. Marcella submitted. Yes, I see, she said, taking up the card on the mantelpiece. It will be a great crush. I suppose you know. They have asked the whole county, it seems to me. The card bore an invitation in Miss Rayburn's name for the rector and his sister to a dance at Maxwell Court. The date given was the 25th of January. What fun, said Mary, her eyes sparkling. You didn't suppose that I know enough of balls to be particular. I have only been to one before in my life, ever. That was at Cheltenham. An aunt took me. I didn't dance. There were hardly any men, but I enjoyed it. Well, you shall dance this time, said Marcella, for I will make Mr Rayburn introduce you. Nonsense! You won't have any time to think about me. You will be the queen. Everybody will want to speak to you. I shall sit in the corner and look at you. That will be enough for me." Marcella went up to her quickly and kissed her. Then she said, still holding her, I know you think I ought to be very happy, Mary. I should think I do, said Mary, with astonished emphasis when the voice paused. I should think I do. I am happy, and I want to make him happy. But there are so many things, so many different aims and motives, that complicate life, that puzzle one. One doesn't know how much to give of oneself to each. She stood with her hand on Mary's shoulder, looking away towards the window and the snowy garden, her brow frowning and distressed. Well, I don't understand, said Mary, after a pause. As I said before, it seems to me so plain and easy, to be in love and to give oneself all to that. But you are so much cleverer than I am, Marcella. You know so much more. That makes the difference. I can't be like you. Perhaps I don't want to be. And she laughed. But I can admire you and love you and think about you. There, now, tell me what you are going to wear. White satin. And Mr. Raven wants me to wear some pearls he is going to give me, some old pearls of his mother's. I believe I shall find them at Mella when I get back. There was little girlish pleasure in the tone. It was as though Marcella thought her friend would be more interested in her bit of news than she was herself, and was handing it on to her to please her. Isn't there a superstition against doing that before you're married? Said Mary, doubtfully, as if I should mind if there was. But I don't believe there is, or Miss Raven would have heard of it. She's a mass of such things. Well, I hope I shall behave myself to please her at this function. There are not many things I do to her satisfaction. It's a mercy we're not going to live with her. Lord Maxwell is a dear, but she and I would never get on. Every way of thinking she has rubs me up the wrong way, and as for her view of me, I am just a tear sewn among her wheat. Perhaps she is right enough. Marcella lent her cheek pensively on one hand, and with the other played with the things on the mantelpiece. Mary looked at her, and then half smiled, half sighed. I think it is a very good thing that you are to be married soon, she said, with her little air of wisdom which offended nobody. Then you'll know your own mind. When is it to be? The end of February after the election. Two months, mused Mary. Time enough to throw it all up in, you think, said Marcella, recklessly putting on her gloves for departure. Perhaps you'll be pleased to hear that I am going to a meeting of Mr. Raven's next week. I am glad you ought to go to them all. Really, Mary, how am I to lift you out of this squaw theory of matrimony, allow me to inform you that the following evening I am going to one of Mr. Wartons here in the schoolroom. She enjoyed her friend's disapproval. By yourself, Marcella, it isn't seemly. I shall take a maid. Mr. Warton is going to tell us how the people can get the land, and how, when they have got it, all the money that used to go in rent will go in taking off taxes and making life comfortable for the poor. She looked at Mary with a teasing smile. Oh, I dare say he will make his stealing sound very pretty, said Mary, with unwanted scorn as she opened the front door for her friend. Marcella flashed out. I know you are a saint, Mary, she said, turning back on the path outside to deliver her last shaft. I am often not so sure whether you are a Christian. Then she hurried off without another word, leaving the flushed and shaken Mary to ponder this strange dictum. Marcella was just turning into the straight drive which led past the church on the left to Mella House. When she heard footsteps behind her and looking round, she saw Edward Hallinn. Will you give me some lunch, Miss Boyce, in return for a message? I am here instead of Aldous, who is very sorry for himself, and will be over later. I am to tell you that he went down to the station to meet a certain box. The box did not come, but will come this afternoon. So he waits for it, and will bring it over. Marcella flushed, smiled, and said she understood. Hallinn moved on beside her, evidently glad of the opportunity of a talk with her. We are all going to the Gearsley meeting next week, aren't we? I'm so glad you're coming. Aldous will do his best. There was something very winning in his tone to her. It implied both his old and peculiar friendship for Aldous and his eager wish to find a new friend in her, to adopt her into their comradeship. Something very winning, too, in his whole personality, in the loosely knit, nervous figure, the irregular charm of feature, the benign and eyes and brow, even in the suggestions of physical delicacy cheerfully concealed, yet nonetheless evident. The whole balance of Marcella's temper changed in some sort as she talked to him. She found herself wanting to please, instead of wanting to conquer, to make an effect. You have just come from the village, I think, said Hallinn. Aldous tells me you take a great interest in the people. He looked at her kindly, the look of one who saw all his fellow creatures nobly, as it were, and to their best advantage. One may take an interest, she said, in a dissatisfied voice, poking at the snow crystals on the road before her with the thorn-stick she carried, but one can do so little. And I don't know anything, not even what I want myself. No, one can do next to nothing. And systems and theories don't matter, or at least very little. Yet when you and Aldous are together, there will be more chance of doing for you than most. You will be too happy and powerful people. His power will be doubled by happiness. I have always known that. Marcella was seized with shyness, looked away, and did not know what to answer. At last, she said abruptly, her head still turned to the woods on her left. Are you sure he's going to be happy? Shall I produce his letter to me? He said, bantering, or letters, for I knew a great deal about you before October 5, their engagement day, and suspected what was going to happen long before Aldous did. No. After all, no. Those letters are my last bit of the old friendship. But the new began the same day, he hastened to add, smiling. It may be richer than the old. I don't know. It depends on you. I don't think I am a very satisfactory friend, said Marcella, still awkward, and speaking with difficulty. Well, let me find out, won't you? I don't think Aldous would call me exacting. I believe he would give me a decent character, though I tease him a good deal. He must let me tell you sometime what he did for me, what he was to me, at Cambridge. I shall always feel sorry for Aldous's wife that she did not know him at college. A shock went through Marcella at the word, that tremendous word, wife. As Hallyn said it, there was something intolerable in the claim it made. I should like you to tell me, she said faintly. Then she added with more energy and a sudden advance of friendliness. But you really must come in and rest. Aldous told me he thought the walk from the court was too much for you. Shall we take this short way? And she opened a little gate leading to a door at the side of the house through the cedar garden. The narrow path only admitted of single file, and Hallyn followed her, admiring her tall youth and the fine black and white of her head and cheek, as she turned every now and then to speak to him. He realized more vividly than before the rare, exciting elements of her beauty, and the truth in Aldous's comparison of her to one of the tall women in a Florentine fresco. But he felt himself a good deal baffled by her all the same. In some ways, so far as any man who is not the lover can understand such things, he understood why Aldous had fallen in love with her. In others, she bore no relation whatever to the woman his thoughts had been shaping all these years, as his friends fit a natural wife. Luncheon passed as easily as any meal could be expected to do, of which Mr. Boyce was partial president. During the preceding month or two, he had definitely assumed the character of an invalide. Although to inexperienced eyes like Marcellus, there did not seem to be very much the matter. But whatever the facts might be, Mr. Boyce's adroit use of them had made a great difference to his position in his own household. His wife's sarcastic freedom of manner was less apparent, and he was obviously less in awe of her. Meanwhile, he was as sore as ever towards the Rayburns and no more inclined to take any particular pleasure in Marcellus' prospects, or to make himself agreeable towards his future son-in-law. He and Mrs. Boyce had been formally asked in Miss Rayburn's best hand to the court ball, but he had at once snappishly announced his intention of staying at home. Marcellus sometimes looked back with astonishment to his eagerness for social notice when they first came to Mella. Clearly the rising irritability of illness had made it doubly unpleasant to him to owe all that he was likely to get on that score to his own daughter. And moreover, he had learnt to occupy himself more continuously on his own land and with his own affairs. As to the state of the village, neither Marcellus in treaties nor reproaches had any effect on him. When it appeared certain that he would be summoned for some specially flagrant piece of neglect, he would spend a few shillings on repairs, otherwise not a farthing. All that filial softening towards him of which Marcellus had been conscious in the early autumn had died away in her. She said to herself now plainly and bitterly that it was a misfortune to belong to him, and she would have pitted her mother most heartily if her mother had ever allowed her the smallest expression of such a feeling. As it was, she was left to wonder and chafe at her mother's newborn mildness. In the drawing-room, after luncheon, Hallinn came up to Marcellus in a corner, and, smiling, drew from his pocket a folded sheet of false-gap. I made oldest give me his speech to show you before tomorrow night, he said. He would hardly let me take it, said it was stupid, and that you would not agree with it. But I wanted you to see how he does these things. He speaks now on an average two or three times a week. Each time, even for an audience of a score or two of village folk, he writes out what he has to say. Then he speaks it entirely without notes. In this way, though he has not much natural gift, he is making himself gradually an effective and practical speaker. The danger with him, of course, is lest he should be over-subtle and over-critical, not simple and popular enough. Marcellus took the paper half unwillingly, and glanced over it in silence. You are sorry he is a Tory, is that it? He said to her, but in a lower voice, and sitting down beside her. Mrs. Boyce, just catching the words from where she sat with her work, at the furthest side of the room, looked up with a double wonder. Wonder at Marcellus' folly, wonder still more at the deference with which men like Aldous Rayburn and Hallyn treated her. It was inevitable, of course, youth and beauty rule the world, but the mother, under no spell herself, and of keen, cool wit, resented the intellectual confusion, the lowering of standards involved. I suppose so, said Marcellus, stupidly, in answer to Hallyn's question, fidgeting the papers under her hand. Then his curious confessor's gift, his quiet questioning look with its sensitive human interest to all before him, told upon her. I am sorry he does not look further ahead to the great changes that must come, she added hurriedly. This is all about details, palliatives. I want him to be more impatient. Great political changes, you mean. She nodded, then added, but only for the sake, of course, of great social changes to come after. He pondered a moment. Aldous has never believed in great changes coming suddenly. He constantly looks upon me as rash in the things I adopt and believe in, but for the contriving, unceasing effort of every day to make that part of the social machine in which a man finds himself work better and more equitably, I have never seen Aldous's equal, for the steady passion, the persistence of it. She looked up. His pale face had taken to itself glow and fire. His eyes were full of strenuous, nay severe expression. Her foolish pride rebelled a little. Of course I haven't seen much of that yet, she said slowly. His look for a moment was indignant, incredulous, then melted into a charming eagerness. But you will, naturally you will, see everything. I hug myself sometimes now for pure pleasure that someone besides his grandfather and I will know what Aldous is and does. Oh, the people on the estate know, his neighbours are beginning to know, and now that he is going into Parliament, the country will know some day if work and high intelligence have the power I believe. But I am impatient. In the first place, I may say to you, Miss Boyce, I want Aldous to come out of that manner of his to strangers, which is the only bit of the true Tory in him. You can get rid of it, no one else can. How long shall I give you? And in the next, I want the world not to be wasting itself on baser stuff when it might be praising Aldous. Does he mean Mr. Wharton, thought Marcel quickly? But this world, our world, hates him and runs him down. But she had no time to answer. For the door opened to admit Aldous, flushed and bright-eyed, looking round the room immediately for her and bearing a parcel in his left hand. Does she love him at all, thought Hallyn, with a nervous stiffening of all his lithe frame as he walked away to talk to Mrs. Boyce? Or, in spite of all her fine talk, is she just marrying him for his money and position? Meanwhile, Aldous had drawn Marcel into the stone parlor and was standing by the fire with his arm covetously around her. I have lost two hours with you, I might have had, just because a tiresome man missed his train. Make up for it by liking these pretty things a little, for my sake and my mother's. He opened the jeweller's case, took out the fine old pearls, necklace and bracelets it contained, and put them into her hand. They were his first considerable gift to her, and had been chosen for association's sake, seeing that his mother had also worn them before her marriage. She flushed first of all with a natural pleasure, the girl delighting in her gourd. Then she allowed herself to be kissed, which was indeed inevitable. Suddenly she turned them over and over in her hands, and he began to be puzzled by her. They are much too good for me. I don't know whether you ought to give me such precious things. I am dreadfully careless and forgetful. Mama always says so. I shall want you to wear them so often that you won't have a chance of forgetting them," he said gaily. Will you? Will you want me to wear them so often? She asked in an odd voice. Anyway, I should like to have just these and nothing else. I am glad that we know nobody and have no friends, and that I shall have so few presents. You won't give me many jewels, will you? She said suddenly, insistently, turning to him. I shouldn't know what to do with them. I used to have a magpie's wish for them, and now, I don't know, but they don't give me pleasure. Not these, of course, not these, she added hurriedly, taking them up and beginning to fasten the bracelets on her wrists. Aldous looked perplexed. My darling, he said, half- laughing, and in the tone of the apologist. You know we have such a lot of things, and I'm afraid my grandfather will want to give them all to you. Need one think so much about it? It isn't as though they have to be bought fresh. They go with pretty gowns, don't they, and other people like to see them. No, but it's what they imply, the wealth, the having so much, while other people want so much. Things begin to oppress me so. She broke out, instinctively moving away from him, that she might express herself with more energy. I like luxury so desperately that when I get them, I seem to myself now the vulgarest creature alive, who has no right to an opinion or an enthusiasm or anything else worth having. You must not let me like them. You must help me not to care about them. Rayburn's eye, as he looked at her, was tenderness itself. He could, of course, neither mock her, nor put what she said aside. This question she had raised, this most thorny of all personal questions of the present, the ethical relation of the individual to the world's fair and its vanities, was, as it happened, a question far more sternly and robustly real to him than it was to her. Every word in his few sentences, as they stood talking by the fire, bore on it for a practised ear the signs of a long wrestle of the heart. But to Marcella it sounded tame. Her ear was haunted by the fragments of another tune, which she seemed to be perpetually trying to recall and piece together. Oldus's slow miner made her impatient. He turned presently to ask her what she had been doing with her morning, asking her with a certain precision and observing her attentively. She replied that she had been showing Mr. Wharton the house that he had walked down with her to the village and was gone to a meeting at Widerington. Then she remarked that he was very good company and very clever, but dreadfully sure of his own opinion. Finally she laughed and said dryly, there will be no putting him down all the same. I haven't told anybody yet, but he saved my life this morning. Oldus caught her wrists. Save your life. Dear, what do you mean? She explained, giving the little incident all, perhaps more than, its dramatic due. He listened with evident annoyance and stood pondering when she came to an end. So shall I be expected to take quite a different view of him hence-forward, inquired at last, looking round at her with a very forced smile? I'm sure I don't know that it matters to him what view anybody takes of him, she tried flushing. He certainly takes the frankest views of other people and expresses them. And while she played with the pearls in their box, she gave a vivid account of her morning's talk with the radical candidate for West Blockshire and of their village expedition. There was a certain relief in describing the scorn with which her acts and ideals had been treated and underneath a woman's curiosity as to how Oldus would take it. I don't know what business he had to express himself so frankly, said Oldus, turning to the fire and carefully putting it together. He hardly knows you. It was, I think, an impertinence. He stood upright, with his back to the hearth, a strong, capable, frowning Englishman, very much on his dignity. Such a moment must surely have become him in the eyes of a girl that loved him. Marcella proved restive under it. No, it's very natural, she protested quickly. When people are so much in earnest, they don't stop to think about impertinence. I never met anyone who dug up one's thoughts by the roots as he does. Oldus was startled by her flush, her sudden attitude of opposition. His intermittent lack of readiness overtook him, and there was an awkward silence. Then, pulling himself together with a strong hand, he left the subject and began to talk of her straw-plating scheme of the Gearsley meeting and of Hallinn. But in the middle, Marcella unexpectedly said, I wish you would tell me, seriously, what reasons you have for not liking Mr. Wharton, other than politics, I mean. Her black eyes fixed him with a keen insistence. He was silent a moment with surprise. Then he said, I'd rather not rake up old scores. She shrugged her shoulders, and he was roused to come and put his arm round her again, she shrinking and turning her reddened face away. Dearest, he said, you shall put me in charity with all the world. But the worst of it is, he added, half- laughing, that I don't see how I am to help disliking him doubly, henceforth, for having had the luck to put that fire out instead of me. End of Book Two, Chapter Five. Book Two, Chapter Six of Marcella. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Paul Stevens. Marcella by Mrs. Humphrey Ward. Book Two, Chapter Six. A few busy and eventful weeks, days never forgotten by Marcella in after years, passed quickly by. Parliament met in the third week of January. Ministers, according to universal expectation, found themselves confronted by a damaging amendment on the address and were defeated by a small majority. A dissolution and appeal to the country followed immediately and the meetings and speech-making already active throughout the constituencies were carried forward with redoubled energy. In the tuddly end division, Aldous Rayburn was fighting a somewhat younger opponent of the same country gentleman's stock, a former fag, indeed, of his at Eaton, whose zeal and fluency gave him plenty to do. Under ordinary circumstances, Aldous would have thrown himself with all his heart and mind into a contest which involved, for him, the most stimulating of possibilities personal and public. But as these days went over, he found his appetite for the struggle flagging and was harassed rather than spurred by his adversaries' activity. The real truth was that he could not see enough of Marcella. A curious uncertainty and unreality, moreover, seemed to have crept into some of their relations and it had begun to gall and fever him that Wharton should be staying there week after week, beside her, in her father's house, able to spend all the free intervals of the fight in her society. Strengthening an influence which Rayburn's pride and delicacy had hardly allowed him as yet, in spite of his instinctive jealousy from the beginning, to take into his thoughts at all, but which was now apparent not only to himself but to others. In vain did he spend every possible hour at Meller he could snatch from a conflict in which his party, his grandfather and his own personal fortunes were all deeply interested. In vain, with a tardy instinct that it was to Mr. Boyce's dislike of himself and to the willful fancy for Wharton's society which this dislike had promoted, that Wharton's long stay at Meller was largely owing, did oldest subdue himself to propitiations and amenities, wholly foreign to a strong character long accustomed to rule without thinking about it. Mr. Boyce showed himself not a wit less partial to Wharton than before, pressed him at least twice in Rayburn's hearing to make Meller his headquarters so long as it suited him and behaved with an irritable malice with regard to some of the details of the wedding arrangements which neither Mrs. Boyce's indignation nor Marcella's discomfort and annoyance could restrain. Clearly there was in him a strong consciousness that by his attentions to the radical candidate he was asserting his independence of the Rayburn's and nothing for the moment seemed to be more of an object with him, even though his daughter was going to marry the Rayburn's heir. Meanwhile Wharton was always ready to walk or chat or play billiards with his host in the intervals of his own campaign and his society had thus come to count considerably among the scanty daily pleasures of a sickly and disappointed man. Mrs. Boyce did not like her guest and took no pains to disguise it, least of all from Wharton, but it seemed to be no longer possible for her to take the vigorous measures she would once have taken to get rid of him. In vain, too, did Miss Rayburn do her best for the nephew to whom she was still devoted in spite of his deplorable choice of a wife. She took in the situation as a whole probably sooner than anybody else and she instantly made heroic efforts to see more of Marcella, to get her to come oftener to the court and in many various ways to procure the poor deluded oldest more of his betrothed society. She paid many chattering and fussy visits to Mella, visits which chafed Marcella and before long indeed roused a certain suspicion in the girl's willful mind. Between Miss Rayburn and Mrs. Boyce, there was a curious understanding. It was always tacit and never amounted to friendship, still less to intimacy, but it often yielded a certain melancholy consolation to oldest Rayburn's great aunt. It was clear to her that this strange mother was just as much convinced as she was that oldest was making a great mistake and that Marcella was not worthy of him. But the engagement being there, a fact not apparently to be undone, both ladies showed themselves disposed to take pains with it, to protect it against aggression. Mrs. Boyce found herself becoming more of a chaperon than she had ever yet professed to be and Miss Rayburn, as we have said, made repeated efforts to capture Marcella and hold her for oldest, her lawful master. But Marcella proved extremely difficult to manage. In the first place, she was a young person of many engagements. Her village scheme absorbed a great deal of time. She was deep in a varied correspondence, in the engagement of teachers, the provision of work rooms, the collecting and registering of workers, the organization of local committees, and so forth. New sides of the girl's character, new capacities and capabilities were coming out. New forms of her natural power over her fellows were developing every day. She was beginning under the incessant stimulus of Wharton's talk to read and think on social and economic subjects, with some system and coherence, and it was evident that she took a passionate mental pleasure in it all. And the more pleasure these activities gave her, the less she had to spare for those accompaniments of her engagement and her position that was to be, which once, as Mrs. Boyce's sharp eyes perceived, had been quite normally attractive to her. Why do you take up her time, sir, with all these things? Said Miss Rayburn impatiently to Lady Winterbourne, who was now Marcella's obedient helper in everything she chose to initiate. She doesn't care for anything she ought to care about at this time, and oldest sees nothing of her. As for her true so, Mrs. Boyce declared she has had to do it all. Marcella won't even go up to London to have her wedding dress fitted. Lady Winterbourne looked up bewildered. But I can't make her go and have her wedding dress fitted, Agnetta. And I always feel you don't know what a fine creature she is. You don't really appreciate her. It splendid the idea she has about this work and the way she throws herself into it. I dare say, said Miss Rayburn indignantly, that's just what I object to. Why can't she throw herself into being in love with Aldous? That's her business, I imagine, just now. If she were a young woman like anybody else one had ever seen, instead of holding a loop from everything he does and never being there when he wants her, oh, I have no patience with her. But, of course, I must, said Miss Rayburn, hastily correcting herself. Of course, I must have patience. It will come all right, I'm sure, when they're married, said Lady Winterbourne, rather helplessly. That's just what my brother says, cried Miss Rayburn, exasperated. He won't hear a word, declares she is odd and original and that Aldous will soon know how to manage her. That's all very well. Nowadays, men don't manage their wives. That's all gone with the rest. And I am sure, my dear, if she behaves after she is married as she is doing now, with that most objectionable person, Mr. Wharton, walking and talking and taking up his ideas and going to his meetings, she'll be a handful for any husband. Mr. Wharton, said Lady Winterbourne, astonished, her absent black eyes, the eyes of the dreamer, of the person who lives by a few intense affections, saw little or nothing of what was going on immediately under them. Oh, but that is because he is staying in the house. And he is a socialist. She calls herself one. My dear, said Miss Rayburn, interrupting emphatically, if you had now an unmarried daughter at home, engaged or not, would you care to have Harry Wharton hanging about after her? Harry Wharton, said the other pondering. He is the Leaven's cousin, isn't he? He used to stay with them. I don't think I've seen him since then. But yes, I do remember. There was something, something disagreeable. She stopped with a hesitating, interrogative air. No one talked less scandal. No one put the ugliness of life away from her with a hastier hand than Lady Winterbourne. She was one of the most consistent of moral epicures. Yes, extremely disagreeable, said Miss Rayburn, sitting bolt upright. The man has no principles, never had any, since he was a child in petticoats. I know Aldous thinks he's unscrupulous in politics and everything else. And then, just when you are worked to death and have hardly a moment for your own affairs to have a man of that type always at hand to spend odd times with your lady love, flattering her, engaging her in his ridiculous schemes, encouraging her in all the extravagances she has got her head twice too full of already, setting her against your own ideas and the life she will have to live, you will admit that it is not exactly soothing. Poor Aldous, said Lady Winterbourne thoughtfully, looking far ahead with her odd look of absent rigidity, which had in reality so little to do with a character essentially soft. But you see, he did know all about her opinions. And I don't think, no, I really don't think I could speak to her. In truth, this woman of nearly 70, old in years but wholly young in temperament, was altogether under Marcella's spell, more at ease with her already than with most of her own children, finding in her a satisfaction for a hundred instincts, suppressed or starved by her own environment, fascinated by the girl's friendship and eagerly grateful for her visits. Miss Rayburn thought it all both incomprehensible and silly. Apparently no one can, cried that lady in answer to her friend's demura. Is all the world afraid of her? And she departed in wrath, but she knew nevertheless that she was just as much afraid of Marcella as anybody else. In her own sphere at the court, or in points connected with what was due to the family, or to Lord Maxwell especially as the head of it, this short, capable old lady could hold her own amply with oldest's betrothed, could maintain indeed a sharp and caustic dignity which kept Marcella very much in order. Miss Rayburn, on the defensive, was strong, but when it came to attacking Marcella's own ideas and proceedings, Lord Maxwell's sister became shrewdly conscious of her own weaknesses. She had no wish to measure her wits on any general field with Marcella's. She said to herself that the girl was too clever and would talk you down. Meanwhile, things went untowardly in various ways. Marcella disciplined herself before the Gersley meeting and went thither, resolved to give Aldous as much sympathy as she could. But the performance only repelled a mind over which Wharton was every day gaining more influence. There was a portly baronet in the chair. There were various primrose dames on the platform and among the audience. There was a considerable representation of clergy and the laborer's presence seemed to Marcella the most obsequious of their kind. Aldous spoke well, or so the audience seemed to think, but she could feel no enthusiasm for anything that he said. She gathered that he advocated a government inspection of cottages, more stringent precautions against cattle disease, better technical instruction, a more abundant provision of allotments and small freeholds, et cetera. And he said many cordial and wise-sounding things in praise of a progress which should go safely and wisely from step to step and run no risks of dangerous reaction. But the assumptions on which, as she told herself rebelliously, it all went, that the rich and the educated must rule and the poor must obey, that existing classes and rights, the forces of individualism and competition must and would go on pretty much as they were, that great houses and great people, the English land and game system and all the rest of our odious class paraphernalia were in the order of the universe. These ideas conceived as the furniture of oldest's mind threw her again into a ferment of passionate opposition. And when the noble baronet in the chair, to her eye a pompous frock-coated stick sacrificing his after-dinner sleep for once that he might the more effectively secure it in the future proposed a vote of confidence in the conservative candidate when the vote was carried with much cheering and rattling of feet, when the primrose dames on the platform smiled graciously down upon the meeting as one smiles at good children in their moments of pretty behavior, and when finally scores of toil-stained laborers young and old went up to have a word and a handshake with Mustrah Rayburn, Marcella held herself aloof and cold with a look that threatened sarcasm should she be spoken to. Miss Rayburn, glancing furtively round at her, was outraged anew by her expression. She will be a thorn in all our sides, thought that lady. Aldous is a fool, a poor, dear, noble, misguided fool. Then on the way home she and Aldous drove together. Marcella tried to argue, grew vehement, and said bitter things for the sake of victory till at last Aldous, tired, worried, and deeply wounded could bear it no longer. Let it be, dear, let it be, he entreated, snatching at her hand as they rolled along through a stormy night. We grope in a dark world. You see some points of light in it. I see others. Won't you give me credit for doing what I can, seeing what I can? I am sure, sure, you will find it easier to bear with differences when we are quite together, when there are no longer all these hateful duties and engagements and persons between us. Persons? I don't know what you mean, said Marcella. Aldous only just restrained himself in time. Out of sheer fatigue and slackness of nerve he had been all but betrayed into some angry speech on the subject of Wharton, the echoes of whose fantastic talk, as it seemed to him, were always hanging about Mella when he went there. But he did refrain and was thankful, that he was indeed jealous and disturbed, that he had been jealous and disturbed from the moment Harry Wharton had set foot in Mella, he himself knew quite well. But to play the jealous part in public was more than the ray-bone pride could bear. There was the dread, too, of defining the situation, of striking some vulgar irrevocable note. So he parried Marcella's exclamation by asking her whether she had any idea how many human hands a parliamentary candidate had to shake between breakfast and bed. And then, having so slipped into another tone, he tried to amuse himself and her by some of the daily humours of the contest. She lent herself to it and laughed. Her look mostly turned away from him, as though she were following the light of the carriage lamps as it slipped along the snow-laden hedges, her hand lying limply in his. But neither were really gay. His sawness of mind grew as in the pauses of talk he came to realise, more exactly, the failure of the evening, of his very successful and encouraging meeting from his own private point of view. Didn't you like that last speech he broke out suddenly, that labourer's speech? I thought you would. It was entirely his own idea. Nobody asked him to do it. In reality, Gersley represented a corner of the estate which Olders had specially made his own. He had spent much labour and thought on the improvement of what had been a backward district, and in particular, he had tried a small profit-sharing experiment upon a farm there which he had taken into his own hands for the purpose. The experiment had met with fair success, and the labourer in question, who was one of the workers in it, had volunteered some approving remarks upon it at the meeting. Oh, it was all very proper and respectful, said Marcella hastily. The carriage rolled on some yards before Olders replied. Then he spoke in a drier tone than he had ever yet used to her. You do it in justice, I think. The man is perfectly independent and an honest fellow. I was grateful to him for what he said. Of course, I am no judge, cried Marcella quickly, repentently. Why did you ask me? I saw everything crooked, I suppose. It was your primrose dames. They got upon my nerves. Why did you have them? I didn't mean to vex and hurt you. I didn't, indeed. It was all the other way, and now I have." She turned upon him laughing, but also half crying, as he could tell by the flutter of her breath. Evaldi was not hurt, and once more changed both talk and tone. They reached the drive's end without a word of war-ton. But Marcella went to bed hating herself, and Olders, after his solitary drive home, sat up long and late, feverishly pacing and thinking. The next evening, how differently things fell. Marcella, having spent the afternoon at the court, hearing all the final arrangements for the ball, and bearing with Miss Rayburn in a way which astonished herself, came home full of a sense of duty done, and announced to her mother that she was going to Mr. Wharton's meeting in the Baptist Chapel that evening. Unnecessary, don't you think? Said Miss Boyce, lifting her eyebrows. However, if you go, I shall go with you. Most mothers, dealing with a girl of twenty-one, under the circumstances, would have said, I had rather you stayed at home. Mrs. Boyce never employed locutions of this kind. She recognized with perfect calmness that Marcella's bringing up, and especially her independent years in London, had made it impossible. Marcella fidgeted. I don't know why you should, Mama. Papa will be sure to want you. Of course, I shall take Deacon. Please order dinner a quarter of an hour earlier and tell Deacon to bring down my walking things to the hall, was all Mrs. Boyce said in answer. Marcella walked upstairs with her head very stiff. So her mother and Miss Rayburn, too, thought it necessary to keep watch on her. How preposterous! She thought of her free and easy relations with her Kensington student friends, and wondered when a more reasonable idea of the relations between men and women would begin to penetrate English country society. Mr. Boyce talked recklessly of going, too. Of course, I know he will spout seditious nonsense, he said irritably to his wife, but it's the fellow's power of talk that is so astonishing. He isn't troubled with your Rayburn heaviness. Marcella came into the room as the discussion was going on. If Papa goes, she said in an undertone to her mother as she passed her, it will spoil the meeting. The laborers will turn sulky. I shouldn't wonder if they did or said something unpleasant. As it is, you had much better not come, Mama. They are sure to attack the cottages and other things. Mrs. Boyce took no notice as far as she herself was concerned, but her quiet decision at last succeeded in leaving Mr. Boyce safely settled by the fire, provided, as usual, with a cigarette and a French novel. The meeting was held in a little iron Baptist chapel, erected some few years before on the outskirts of the village, to the grief and scandal of Mr. Harden. There were about 120 laborers present, and at the back some boys and girls come to giggle and make a noise, nobody else. The Baptist minister, a smooth-faced young man, possessed, as it turned out, of opinions little short of Wharton's own, in point of vigor and rigor, was already in command. A few latecomers, as they slouched in, stole side looks at Marcella and the veiled lady in black beside her, sitting in the corner of the last bench. And Marcella nodded to one or two of the audience, Jim heard amongst them. Otherwise no one took any notice of them. It was the first time that Mrs. Boyce had been inside any building belonging to the village. Wharton arrived late. He had been canvassing at a distance and neither of the mellow ladies had seen him all day. He slipped up the bench with a bow and a smile to greet them. I am done, he said to Marcella, as he took off his hat. My voice is gone, my mind ditto. I shall dribble for half an hour and let them go. Did you ever see such a stolid set? You will rouse them, said Marcella. Her eyes were animated, her colour high, and she took no account at all of his plea of weariness. You challenge me? I must rouse them. That was what you came to see? Is that it? She laughed and made no answer. He left her and went up to the minister's desk. The men shuffling their feet a little and rattling a stick here and there as he did so. The young minister took the chair and introduced the speaker. He had a strong Yorkshire accent and his speech was divided between the most vehement attacks couched in the most scriptural language upon capital and privilege, that is to say on landlords and the land system, on state churches and the idle rich, interspersed with quavering returns upon himself as though he were scared by his own invective. My brothers, let us be calm! He would say after every burst of passion with a long deep-voiced emphasis on the last word. Let us, above all things, be calm! And then bit by bit, voice and denunciation would begin to mount again towards a fresh climax of loud-voiced attack, only to sink again to the same lamb-like refrain. Mrs. Boyce's thin lip twitched and Marcella bore the good gentleman a grudge for providing her mother with so much unnecessary amusement. As for Wharton, at the opening of his speech he spoke both awkwardly and flatly and Marcella had a momentary shock. He was, as he said, tired and his wits were not at command. He began with the general political program of the party to which, on its extreme left wing, he proclaimed himself to be long. This program was, of course, by now a newspaper commonplace of the Stalist sort. He himself recited it without enthusiasm and it was received without a spark so far as appeared of interest or agreement. The minister gave an hear-hear of a loud official sort. The men made no sign. They might be a set of Dutch cheeses, sought Marcella indignantly after a while. But, after all, why should they care for all this? I shall have to get up in a minute and stop those children romping. But through all this, as it were, Wharton was only waiting for his second wind. There came a moment when, dropping his quasi-official and high political tone, he said suddenly with another voice and emphasis, well now, my men, I'll be bound your thinking that's all pretty enough. We haven't got anything against it. We dare say it's all right, but we don't care a brass-hapeth about any of it. If that's all you'd got to say to us, you might have let us bide at home. We don't have none too much time to rest our bones a bit by the fire and talk to the misses and the kids. Why didn't you let us alone instead of bringing us out in the cold? Well, but it isn't all I've got to say and you know it because I've spoken to you before. What I've been talking about is all true and all important and you'll see it some day when you're fit. But what can men in your position know about it or care about it? What do any of you want but bread? He thundered on the desk. A bit of decent comfort. A bit of freedom. Freedom from tyrants who call themselves your betters. A bit of rest in your old age. A home that's something better than a dog-hole. A wage that's something better than starvation. An honest share in the wealth you are making every day and every hour for other people to gorge and plunder. He stopped a moment to see how that took. A knot of young men in a corner rattled their sticks vigorously. The older men had begun at any rate to look at the speaker. The boys on the back benches instinctively stopped scuffling. Then he threw himself into a sort of rapid question and answer. What were their wages? Eleven shillings a week? Not they, cried a man from the middle of the chapel. You must reckon it wet and dry. I returned back two days last week and two days this. Fowler's shillings last each week. That's what I call skin and ovure. Water nodded at him approvingly. By now he knew the majority of the men in each village by name and never forgot a face or a biography. You're right there, Watkins. Eleven shillings, then, when it isn't less. Never more and precious often less. And harvest money. The people that are kind enough to come round and ask you to vote Tory for them make a deal of that, don't they? And a few odds and ends here and there. Precious few of them. There, that's about it for wages, isn't it? Thirty pounds a year, somewhere about, to keep a wife and children on. And for ten hours a day work, not counting mealtimes, that's it, I think. Oh, you are well off, aren't you? He dropped his arms folded on the desk in front of him and paused to look at them, his bright kindling eye running over rank after rank. A chuckle of rough laughter, bitter and jeering, ran through the benches. Then they broke out and applauded him. Well, and what about their cottages? His glance caught Marcella, passed to her mother sitting stiffly motionless under her veil. He drew himself up, thought a moment, then threw himself far forward again over the desk, as though the better to launch what he had to say, his voice taking a grinding, determined note. He had been in all parts of the division, he said, seen everything, inquired into everything. No doubt on the great properties there had been a good deal done of late years, public opinion had affected something. The landlords had been forced to disgorge some of the gains rested from labor to pay for the decent housing of the laborer. But did anybody suppose that enough had been done? Why he had seen dens, I, on the best properties, not fit for the pigs that the farmers wouldn't let the laborers keep lest they should steal their straw for the littering of them, where a man was bound to live the life of a beast and his children after him. A tall, thin man of about sixty rows in his place and pointed a long, quavering finger at the speaker. What is it, Darwin? Speak up, said Wharton, dropping at once into the colloquial tone and stooping forward to listen. My sleep in room six foot nine by seven foot six. We have to shift our bed for the rain's coming in and you may see for yourselves there ain't much room to shift it in. And beyond us there's a room for the children, same size as our own, and no window, nothing but the door into us. Of a summer night the children, three on them, is all of a sweat of four there asleep and no garden and no chance of decent ways know how. And if you're asked for a bit of repairs you'll get sworn at. And that's all that most of us can get out of squire boys. There was a hasty whisper among some of the men round him as they glanced over their shoulders at the two ladies on the back bench. One or two of them half rose and tried to pull him down. Wharton looked at Marcella. It seemed to him he saw a sort of passionate satisfaction on her pale face and in the erect carriage of her head. Then she stooped to the side and whispered to her mother. Mrs. Boyce shook her head and sat on, immovable. All this took but a second or two. Our well, said Wharton, we won't have names. That'll do us no good. It's not the men you've got to go for so much, though we shall go for them too before long when we've got the lawnmower on our side. It's the system. It's the whole way of dividing the wealth that you made, you and your children, by your work, your hard, slavish, incessant work between you and those who don't work, who live on your labor and grow fat on your poverty. What we want is a fair division. There ought to be wealth enough. There is wealth enough for all in this blessed country. The earth gives it. The sun gives it. Labor extracts and piles it up. Why should one class take three-fourths of it and leave you and your fellow workers in the city as the miserable pittance which is all you have to starve and breed on? Why? Why? I say, why? Because you are a set of dull, jealous, poor, spirited cowards, unable to pull together, to trust each other, to give up so much as a pot of beer a week for the sake of your children and your liberties and your class. There, that's why it is, and I tell it you straight out." He drew himself up, folded his arms across his chest and looked at them, scorn and denunciation in every line of his young frame and of the blaze of his blue eye. A murmur ran through the room. Some of the men laughed excitedly. Darwin sprang up again. You keep the police office and geest the cutting up of their blooming parks on will to it fast enough, he cried. Much good that'll do, just at present, said Wharton contemptuously. Now you just listen to me. And, leaning forward over the desk again, his finger pointed at the room. He went through the regular socialist program as it affects the country districts. The transference of authority within the villages from the few to the many. The landlords taxed more and more heavily during the transition time for the provision of house room, water, light, education and amusement for the labourer and, ultimately, land and capital at the free disposal of the state to be supplied to the worker on demand at the most moderate terms. While the annexed rent and interest of the capitalist class relieves him of taxes and the disappearance of squire, state parson and plutocrat leaves him master in his own house, the slave of no man, the equal of all. And, as a first step to this new Jerusalem, organization self-sacrifice enough to form and maintain a union, to vote for radical and socialist candidates in the teeth of the people who have coals and blankets to give away. Then I suppose you think you'd be turned out of your cottages, dismissed your work, made to smart for it somehow. Just you try. There are people all over the country ready to back you, if only you'd back yourselves, but you won't, you won't fight. That's the worst of you. That's what makes all of us sick when we come down to talk to you. You won't spare tuppence hate me a week from boozing, not you, to subscribe to a union and take the first little steps towards filling your stomachs and holding your heads up as free men. What's the good of your grumbling? I suppose you'll go on like that, grumbling and starving and cringing and talking big of the things you could do if you would and all the time not one honest effort, not one to better yourselves, not to pull the yoke off your necks by the Lord. I tell you it's a damn sort of business talking to fellows like you. Marcella started as he flung the words out with a bitter, naya, brutal emphasis. The smooth-faced minister coughed loudly with a sudden movement, half got up to remonstrate and then thought better of it. Mrs. Boyce for the first time showed some animation under her veil. Her eyes followed the speaker with a quick attention. As for the men, as they termed clumsily to stare at, to laugh or to talk to each other, Marcella could hardly make out whether they were angered or fascinated. Whichever it was, Warton cared for none of them. His blood was up, his fatigue thrown off. Standing there in front of them, his hands in his pockets, pale with the excitement of speaking, his curly head thrown out against the whitened wall of the chapel, he lashed into the men before him, talking their language, their dialect even, laying bare their weaknesses, sensualities, indecisions, painting in the sombrist colors the grim truths of their melancholy lives. Marcella could hardly breathe. It seemed to her that among these cottages she had never lived till now, under the blaze of these eyes within the vibration of his voice. Never had she so realized the power of this singular being, he was scourging, dissecting the weather-beaten men before him, as with a difference he had scourged, dissected her. She found herself exulting in his powers of tyranny, in the naked thrust of his words, so nervous, so pitiless. And then by a sudden flash, she thought of him by Mrs. Hurd's fire, the dying child on his knee against his breast. Here, she thought, while her pulses leapt, is the leader for me, for these. Let him call, I will follow. It was as though he followed the ranging of her thought, for suddenly, when she and his hearers least expected it, his tone changed, his storm of speech sank. He fell into a strain of quiet sympathy, encouragement, hope, dwelt with a good deal of homely iteration on the immediate practical steps which each man before him could, if he would, take towards the common end, spoke of the help and support lying ready for the country labourers throughout democratic England, if they would but put forward their own energies and quit themselves like men, pointed forward to a time of plenty, education, social peace, and so with some good-tempered banter of his opponent, Dodgson, and some precise instructions as to how and where they were to record their votes on the day of election, came to an end. Two or three other speeches followed, and among them a few stumbling words from her. Marcella approved herself and applauded him as she recognised a sentence or two taken bodily from the labour clarion of the preceding week. Then a resolution pledging the meeting to support the Liberal candidate was passed unanimously amid evident excitement. It was the first time that such a thing had ever happened in Mella. Mrs. Boyce treated her visitor on their way home with a new respect, mixed, however, as usual, with her prevailing irony. For one who knew her, her manner implied not that she liked him any more, but that a man so well-trained to his own profession must always hold his own. As for Marcella, she said little or nothing. But Wharton, in the dark of the carriage, had a strange sense that her eye was often on him, that her mood marched with his, and that if he could have spoken, her response would have been electric. When he had helped her out of the carriage, and they stood in the vestibule, Mrs. Boyce having walked on into the hall, he said to her, his voice hoarse with fatigue, Did I do your bidding? Did I rouse them? Marcella was ceased with sudden shyness. You rated them enough? Well, did you disapprove? Oh, no! It seems to be your way. My proof of friendship, well, can there be a greater? Will you show me some, to-morrow? How can I? Will you criticise? Tell me where you thought I was a fool tonight, or a hypocrite, your mother would. I dare say, said Marcella, her breath quickening, but don't expect it from me. Why? Because, because I don't pretend. I don't know whether you rouse them, but you rouse me. She swept on before him into the dark hall, without giving him a moment for reply, took her candle, and disappeared. Wharton found his own staircase, and went up to bed. The light he carried showed his smiling eyes bent on the ground, his mouth still moving, as though with some pleasant desire of speech. End of Book 2, Chapter 6. Wharton was sitting alone in the big mellow drawing-room after dinner. He had drawn one of the few easy chairs the room possessed to the fire, and with his feet on the fender, and one of Mr. Boyce's French novels on his knee, he was intensely enjoying a moment of physical ease. The work of these weeks of canvassing and speaking had been arduous, and he was naturally indolent. Now beside this fire and at a distance, it amazed him that any motive whatever, public or private, should ever have been strong enough to take him out through the mire on these winter nights to spout himself horse to a parcel of rustics. What did I do it for? he asked himself. What am I going to do it for again to-morrow? Ten o'clock. Mr. Boyce was gone to bed. No more entertaining of him to be done, one might be thankful for that mercy. Miss Boyce and her mother would, he supposed, be down directly. They had gone up to dress at nine. It was the night of the Maxwell Court ball, and the carriage had been ordered for half-past ten. In a few minutes he would see Miss Boyce in her new dress, wearing Rayburn's pearls. He was extraordinarily observant, and a number of little incidents and domestic arrangements bearing on the feminine side of Marcella's life had been apparent to him from the beginning. He knew, for instance, that the true so was being made at home, and that during the last few weeks the lady for whom it was destined had shown an indifference to the progress of it, which seemed to excite a dumb annoyance in her mother. Curious woman, Mrs. Boyce. He found himself listening to every opening door, and already, as it were, gazing at Marcella in her white array. He was not asked to this ball. As he had early explained to Miss Boyce, he and Miss Rayburn had been cuts for years, for what reason he had, of course, left Marcella to guess. As if Marcella found any difficulty in guessing, as if the preposterous bigotries and intolerances of the lady's league were not enough to account for any similar behaviour on the part of any similar hybrid spinster. As for this occasion, she was far too proud, both on her own behalf and Wharton's, to say anything either to Lord Maxwell or his sister on the subject of an invitation for her father's guest. It so happened, however, that Wharton was aware of certain other reasons for his social exclusion from Maxwell Court. There was no necessity, of course, for enlightening Miss Boyce on the point. But as he sat waiting for her, Wharton's mind went back to the past connected with those reasons. In that past Rayburn had had the whiphand of him. Rayburn had been the moral superior dictating indignant terms to a young fellow detected in flagrant misconduct. Wharton did not know that he bore in many particular grudge, but he had never liked Oldus as a boy that he could remember. Naturally, he had liked him less since that old affair. The remembrance of it had made his position at Mellor particularly sweet to him from the beginning. He was not sure that it had not determined his original acceptance of the offer made to him by the Liberal Committee to contest Old Dodgson's seat. And during the past few weeks, the exhilaration and interest of the general position, considering all things, had been very great. Not only was he on the point of ousting the Maxwell candidate from a seat which he had held securely for years, Wharton was perfectly well aware by now that he was trespassing on Oldus Rayburn's preserves in ways far more important and infinitely more irritating. He and Rayburn had not met often at Mellor during these weeks of fight. Each had been too busy. But whenever they had come across each other, Wharton had clearly perceived that his presence in the house, his growing intimacy with Marcella Boyce, the freemasonry of opinion between them, the interest she took in his contest, the village friendships they had in common, were all intensely galling to Oldus Rayburn. The course of events, indeed, had lately produced in Wharton a certain excitement, recklessness even. He had come down into these parts to court the joy of eventful living politically and personally. But the situation had proved to be actually far more poignant and personal than he had expected. This proud, crude, handsome girl, to her certainly it was largely due that the days had flown as they had. He was perfectly, one might almost say gleefully, aware that at the present moment it was he and not Oldus Rayburn who was intellectually her master. His mind flew back at first with amusement, then with a thrill of something else over their talks and quarrels. He smiled gaily as he recalled her fits of anger with him, her remonstrances, appeals, and then her awkward inevitable submissions when he had crushed her with sarcasm or with facts. Ah, she would go to this ball tonight. Oldus Rayburn would parade her as his possession, but she would go with thoughts, ambitions, ideals, which, as they developed, would make her more and more difficult for a Rayburn to deal with. And in those thoughts and ambitions, the man who had been her tormentor, teacher, and companion during six rushing weeks knew well that he already counted for much. He had cherished in her all those divine discontents which were already there when he first knew her, taught her to formulate them, given her better reasons for them, so that by now she was a person with a far more defined and stormy will than she had been to begin with. Wharton did not particularly know why he should exalt, but he did exalt. At any rate, he was prodigiously tickled by the whole position. A step, a rustle outside, he hastily shut his book and listened. The door opened and Marcella came in, a white vision against the heavy blue of the walls. With her came, too, a sudden strong scent of flowers, for she carried a marvellous bunch of hot-house roses, Oldus's gift, which had just arrived by special messenger. Wharton sprang up and placed a chair for her. I had begun to believe the ball only existed in my own imagination, he said gaily. Surely you are very late. Then he saw that she looked disturbed. It was Papa, she said, coming to the fire and looking down into it. It has been another attack of pain, not serious, Mimar says. She is coming down directly. But I wonder why they come and why he thinks himself so ill. Do you know? She added abruptly, turning to her companion. Unhesitated, taken by surprise. During the past weeks, what with Mr. Boyce's confidence and his own acuteness, he had arrived at a very shrewd notion of what was wrong with his host. But he was not going to enlighten the daughter. I should say your father wants a great deal of care, and is nervous about himself, he said quietly. But he will get the care, and your mother knows the whole state of the case. Yes, she knows, said Marcella. I wish I did. And a sudden, painful expression of moral worry, remorse, passed across the girl's face. Wharton knew that she had often been impatient of late with her father, and incredulous of his complaints. He thought he understood. One can often be of more use to a sick person if one is not too well acquainted with what ails them, he said. Hope and cheerfulness are everything in a case like your father's. He will do well. If he does, he won't owe any of it. She stopped as impulsively as she had begun. To me, she meant to have said, then had retreated hastily, before her own sense of something unduly intimate and personal. Wharton stood quietly beside her, saying nothing, but receiving and soothing herself reproach just as surely as though she had put it into words. You are crushing your flowers, I think, he said suddenly. And indeed her roses were dangling against her dress, as if she had forgotten all about them. She raised them carelessly, but he bent to smell them, and she held them out. Summer, he said, plunging his face into them with a long breath of sensuous enjoyment. How the year sweeps round in an instant, and all the effect of a little heat and a little money! Will you allow me a philosopher's remark? He drew back from her. This quick, inquisitive, but still respectful eye took in every delightful detail. If I don't give you leave, my experience is that you will take it, she said, half laughing, half resentful, as though she had old aggressions in mind. You admit the strength of the temptation. It is very simple. No one could help making it. To be spectator of the height of anything, the best, the climax, makes any mortals pulses run. Beauty, success, happiness, for instance? He paused, smiling. She lent a thin hand on the mantelpiece, and looked away. Aldous's pearl slipped backwards along her white arm. Do you suppose tonight will be the height of happiness? She said at last, with a little scorn. These functions don't present themselves to me in such a light. Wharton could have laughed out her pedantry was so young and unconscious, but he restrained himself. I shall be with the majority tonight, he said to Muley. I may as well warn you. Her colour rose. No other man had ever dared to speak to her with this assurance, this cool, scrutinising air. She told herself to be indignant, the next moment she was indignant, but with herself for remembering conventionalities. Tell me one thing, said Wharton, changing his tone wholly. I know you went down hurriedly to the village before dinner. Was anything wrong? Old Patton is very ill, she said, sighing. I went to ask after him. He may die any moment. And the herdsboy too. He lent against the mantelpiece, talking to her about both cases with a quick, incisive common sense. Not unkind, but without a touch of unnecessary sentiment, still less of the superior person, which represented one of the moods she liked best in him. In speaking of the poor, he always took the tone of comradeship, of a plain equality, and the tone was, in fact, genuine. Do you know, he said presently, I did not tell you before, but I am certain that Herd's wife is afraid of you, that she has a secret from you. From me? How could she? I know every detail of their affairs. No matter. I listened to what she said that day in the cottage when I had the boy on my knee. I noticed her face, and I am quite certain. She has a secret, and above all a secret from you. Marcella looked disturbed for a moment. Then she laughed. Oh, no! she said, with a little superior air. I assure you, I know her better than you. Wharton said no more. Marcella, called a distant voice from the hall. The girl gathered up her white skirts and her flowers in haste. Good night. Good night. I shall hear you come home and wonder how you have sped. One word, if I may. Take your role and play it. There is nothing subjects disliked so much as to see royalty decline its part. She laughed, blushed, a little proudly and uncertainly, and went without reply. As she shut the door behind her, a sudden flatness fell upon her. She walked through the dark stone parlour outside, seeing still the firmly knit, lightly made figure, boyish, middle-sized yet never insignificant, the tumbled waves of fair hair, the eyes so keenly blue, the face with its sharp, mocking lines, its powers of sudden charm. Then self-reproach leapt and possessed her. She quickened her pace, hurrying into the hall, as though from something she was ashamed or afraid of. In the hall a new sensation awaited her. Her mother, fully dressed, stood waiting by the old billiard table for her maid, who had gone to fetch her a cloak. Mother stopped an instant in surprise and delight. Then ran up to her. Mama! How lovely you look! I haven't seen you like that, not since I was a child. I remember you then once in a low dress, a white dress, with flowers coming into the nursery. But that black becomes you so well, and deacon has done your hair beautifully. She took her mother's hand and kissed her cheek, touched by an emotion which had many roots. There was infinite relief in this tender, natural outlet. She seemed to recover possession of herself. Mrs. Boyce bore the kiss quietly. Her face was a little pinched and white. But the unusual display deacon had been allowed to make of her pale golden hair, still long and abundant, the unveiling of the shapely shoulders and neck, little less beautiful than her daughter's, the elegant lines of the velvet dress—all these things had very nobly transformed her. Marcella could not restrain her admiration and delight. Mrs. Boyce winced, and, looking upward to the gallery which ran round the hall, called deacon impatiently. "'Only, mamma,' said Marcella, discontentedly, "'I don't like that little chain round your neck. It is not equal to the rest, not worthy of it.' "'I have nothing else, my dear,' said Mrs. Boyce, dryly. "'Now, deacon, don't be all night!' Nothing else, yet if she shut her eyes, Marcella could perfectly recall the diamonds on the neck and arms of that white figure of her childhood, could see herself as a baby playing with the treasures of her mother's jewel-box. Nowadays, Mrs. Boyce was very secretive and reserved about her personal possessions. Marcella never went into her room unless she was asked, and would never have thought of treating it or its contents with any freedom. The mean chain which went so ill with the costly hoarded dress, it recalled to Marcella all the inexorable silent miseries of her mother's past life, and all the sordid disadvantages and troubles of her own youth. She followed Mrs. Boyce out to the carriage in silence, once more in a tumult of sore pride and doubtful feeling. Four weeks to her wedding-day, the words dined in her ears as they drove along. Yet they sounded strange to her, incredible almost. How much did she know of Aldous, of her life that was to be, of all, how much of herself? She was not happy, had not been happy or at ease for many days. Yet in her restlessness she could think nothing out. Moreover, the chain that galled and curbed her was a chain of character. In spite of her modernness, and the complexity of many of her motives, there were certain inherited simplicities of nature at the bottom of her. In her wild demonic childhood you could always trust Marcella Maurice, if she had given you her word. Her school-fellows knew that. If her passions were half-civilized and southern, her way of understanding the point of honor was curiously English, sober, tenacious. So now. Her sense of bond to Aldous had never been in the least touched by any of her dissatisfactions and revolts. Yet it rushed upon her to-night with amazement, and that in four weeks she was going to marry him. Why? How? What would it really mean for him and for her? It was as though in mid-stream she were trying to pit herself for an instant against the current which had so far carried them all on, to see what it might be like to retrace a step, and could only realize with dismay the force and rapidity of the water. Yet all the time another side of her was well aware that she was at that moment the envy of half a county, that in another ten minutes hundreds of eager and critical eyes would be upon her, and her pride was rising to her part. The little incident of the chain had somehow for the moment made the ball and her place in it more attractive to her. They had no sooner stepped from their carriage than Aldous, who was waiting in the outer hall, joyously discovered them. Till then he had been walking aimlessly amid the crowd of his own guests, wondering when she would come, how she would like it. This splendid function had been his grandfather's idea. It would never have entered his own head for a moment. Yet he understood his grandfather's wish to present his heir's promised bride in this public ceremonious way, to the society of which she would some day be the natural leader. He understood, too, that there was more in the wish than met the ear, that the occasion meant to Lord Maxwell, whether Dick Boyce were there or no, the final condoning of things past and done with, a final throwing of the Maxwell's shield over the Boyce weakness and full adoption of Marcella into her new family. All this he understood and was grateful for. But how would she respond? How would she like it? This parade that was to be made of her, these people that must be introduced to her. He was full of anxieties. Yet in many ways his mind had been easier of late. During the last week she had been very gentle and good to him, even Miss Rayburn had been pleased with her. There had been no quoting of Wharton when they met, and he had done his philosopher's best to forget him. He trusted her proudly, intensely, and in four weeks she would be his wife. Can you bear it? He said to her in a laughing whisper, as she and her mother emerged from the cloakroom. Tell me what to do? She said, flushing. I will do my best. What a crowd! Must we stay very long? Ah, my dear Mrs. Boyce, cried Lord Maxwell, meeting them on the steps of the inner quadrangular corridor. Welcome, indeed. Let me take you in. Marcella, with oldest's permission, he stooped his whitehead gallantly and kissed her on the cheek. Remember, I am an old man. If I choose to pay you compliments, you will have to put up with them. Then he offered Mrs. Boyce his arm, a stately figure in his ribbon and cross of the bath. A delicate red had risen to that lady's thin cheek in spite of her self-possession. Poor thing, said Lord Maxwell to himself, as he led her along. Poor thing! How distinguished and charming still! One sees tonight what she was like as a girl. Olds and Marcella followed. They had to pass along the great corridor which ran round the quadrangle of the house. The antique marbles which lined it were tonight masked in flowers, and seats covered in red had been fitted in wherever it was possible, and were now crowded with dancers sitting out. From the ballroom ahead came waves of waltz music. The ancient house was alive with colour and perfume, with the sounds of laughter and talk, lightly fretting and breaking the swaying rhythms of the band. Beyond the windows of the corridor, which had been left uncurtained because of the beauty of the night, the stiff Tudor garden with its fountains, which filled up the quadrangle, was gaily illuminated under a bright moon, and amid all the varied colour of lamps, drapery, dresses, faces, the antique heads ranged along the walls of the corridor, here Marcus Aurelius, their Trajan, their Seneca, and the marble sarcophagi which broke the line at intervals, stood in cold whitish relief. Marcella passed along on Oldus's arm, conscious that people were streaming into the corridor from all the rooms opening upon it, and that every eye was fixed upon her and her mother. Look! There she is! She heard in an excited girl's voice, as they passed Lord Maxwell's library, now abandoned to the crowd like all the rest. Come quick! There! I told you she was lovely! Every now and then some old friend, man or woman, rose smiling from the seats along the side, and Oldus introduced his bride. On her dignity, said an old hunting squire to his daughter when they had passed, shy, no doubt, very natural. But nowadays girls, when they're shy, don't giggle and blush as they used to in my young days. They look as if you meant to insult them and they weren't going to allow it. Oh, very handsome, very handsome, of course. But you can see she's advanced, peculiar, or what you call it, women's rights, I suppose, and all that kind of thing. Like to see you go in for it, Netty, eh? She's awfully handsome, sighed his pink-cheeked, insignificant little daughter, still craning her neck to look. Very simply dressed too, except for those lovely pearls. She does her hair very oddly, so low down, in those plates. Nobody does it like that nowadays. That's because nobody has such a head, said her brother, a young Hazar lieutenant beside her, in the tone of connoisseurship. By George, she's ripping. She's the best-looking girl I've seen for a good long time. But she's a tartar, I'll swear. Looks it anyway. Everyone says she has the most extraordinary opinions, said the girl, eagerly. She'll manage him, don't you think? I'm sure he's very meek and mild. Don't know that, said the young man, twisting his moustache with the air of exhaustive information. Rayburn's a very good fellow, excellent fellow. See him shooting, you know, that kind of thing. I expect he's got a will when he wants it. The mother's handsome, too, and looks a lady. The father's kept out of the way, I see. Rather a blessing for the Rayburns. Can't be pleasant, you know, to get a man like that in the family. Look after your spoons, that kind of thing. Meanwhile, Marcella was standing beside Miss Rayburn at the head of the long ballroom, and doing her best to behave prettily. One after another she bowed to or shook hands with half the magnates of the county, the men in pink, the women in the new London dresses, for which this brilliant and long expected ball had given so welcome an excuse. They knew little or nothing of her, except that she was clearly good-looking, that she was that fellow Dick Boyce's daughter, and was reported to be odd. Some, mostly men, who said their conventional few words to her, felt an amused admiration for the skill and rapidity with which she had captured the party of the county. Some, mostly women, were already jealous of her. A few of the older people here and there, both men and women, but after all they shook hands like the rest, knew perfectly well that the girl must be going through an ordeal, were touched by the signs of thought and storm in the face, and looked back at her with kind eyes. But of these last Marcella realized nothing. What she was saying to herself was that if they knew little of her, she knew a great deal of many of them. In their talks over the stone pile of fire, she and Wharton had gone through most of the properties, large and small, of his division, and indeed of the division's round, by the help of the knowledge he had gained in his canvas, together with a blue book, one of the numberless, recently issued on the state of the Midland laborer. He had abounded in anecdote sarcasm, reflection, based partly on his own experiences, partly on his endless talks with the working folk, now in the public house, now at their own chimney corner. Marcella, indeed, had a large, unsuspected acquaintance with the county, before she met it in the flesh. She knew that a great many of these men, who came and spoke to her, were doing their best, according to their lights, that improvements were going on, that times were mending, but there were abuses enough still, and the abuses were far more vividly present to her than the improvements. In general, the people who thronged these splendid rooms were to her merely the incompetent members of a useless class. The nation would do away with them in time. Meanwhile it might at least be asked of them that they should practice their profession of land-owning, such as it was, with greater conscience and intelligence, that they should not shirk its opportunities or idle them away. And she could point out those who did both, scandalously, intolerably. Once or twice she thought passionately of winter-herd, washing and mending all day in her damp cottage, or of the patterns in the parish house, thankful after sixty years of toil for a hovel, where the rain came through the thatch, and where the smoke choked you, unless with the thermometer below freezing-point you opened the door to the blast. Why should these people have all the gay clothes, the flowers, the jewels, the delicate food, all the delight and all the leisure? And those nothing. Her soul rose against what she saw she stood there, going through her part. Wharton's very words every inflection of his voice was in her ears, playing chorus to the scene. But when these first introductions, these little empty talks of three or four phrases of peace, and all of them alike, were nearly done with, Marcella looked eagerly round for Mary Harden. There she was, sitting quietly against the wall in a remote corner. Her plain face all smiles, her little feet dancing under the white muslin frock, which she had fashioned for herself, with so much pain under Marcella's directions. Miss Rayburn was called away to find an arm-chair for some dowager of importance. Marcella took advantage of the break, and of the end of a dance, to hurry down the room to Mary. Oldus, who was talking to old Sir Charles Levin, Frank's father, a few steps off, nodded and smiled to her as he saw her move. Have you been dancing, Mary? She said severely. I wouldn't for worlds. I never was so much amused in my life. Look at those girls, those sisters, in the huge velvet sleeves, like coloured balloons. And that old lady in the pink tulle and diamonds, I do so want to get her cloak. And those lances, I never could have imagined people danced like that. They didn't dance them, they romped them. It wasn't beautiful, was it? Why do you expect an English crowd to do anything beautiful? If we could do it, we should be too ashamed. But it is beautiful, all the same you scornful person, cried Mary, dragging her friend down beside her. How pretty the girls are, and as for the diamonds I never saw anything so wonderful. I wish I could have made Charles come. Wouldn't he? No, she looked a little troubled. He couldn't think it would be quite right. But I don't know, a sight like this takes me off my feet, shakes me up, and does me a world of good. You dear simple thing, said Marcella, slipping her hand into Mary's as it lay on the bench. Oh, you needn't be so superior, cried Mary, not for another year at least. I don't believe you are much more used to it than I am. If you mean, said Marcella, that I was never at anything so big and splendid as this before, you are quite right. And she looked around the room with that curious, cold air of personal detachment from all she saw, which had often struck Mary, and tonight made her indignant. Then enjoy it, she said, laughing and frowning at the same time. That's a much more plain duty for you than it was for Charles to stay at home there. Haven't you been dancing? No, Mr. Rayburn doesn't dance, but he thinks he can get through the next lances if I will steer him. Then I shall find a seat where I can look at you, said Mary decidedly. Ah, there is Mr. Rayburn coming to introduce somebody to you. I knew they wouldn't let you sit here long. Olders brought up a young guardsman, who boldly asked Miss Boyce for the pleasure of a dance. Marcella consented, and off they swept into a room which was only just beginning to fill for the new dance, and where, therefore, for the moment, the young grace of both had free play. Marcella had been an indefatigable dancer in the old London days of those students' parties, with their dyed gloves and lemonade suppers, which were running in her head now, as she swayed to the rhythm of this perfect band. The mere delight in movement came back to her, and while they danced, she danced with all her heart. Then in the pauses, she would lean against the wall beside her partner, and rack her brain to find a word to say to him. As for anything that he said, every word, whether of Ascot or the Last Academy or the new plays or the hunting and the elections, sounded to her more vapid than the last. Meanwhile, Olders stood near Mary Harden and watched the dancing figure. He had never seen her dance before. Mary shyly stole a look at him from time to time. Well, he said at last, stooping to his neighbor, what are you thinking of? I think she is a dream, said Mary, flushing with the pleasure of being able to say it. They were great friends, he and she, and tonight somehow she was not a bit afraid of him. Olders' eye sparkled a moment. Then he looked down at her with a kind smile. If you suppose I am going to let you sit here all night, you are very much mistaken. Marcella gave me precise instructions. I am going off this moment to find somebody. Mr. Rayburn, don't, cried Mary, catching at him. But he was gone, and she was left in trepidation, imagining the sort of formidable young man who was soon to be presented to her and shaking at the thought of him. When the dance was over, Marcella returned to Miss Rayburn, who was standing at the door into the corridor and had beckoned to her. She went through a number of new introductions and declared to herself that she was doing all she could. Miss Rayburn was not so well satisfied. Why can't she smile and chatter like other girls, thought Aunt Nita, impatiently? It's her ideas, I suppose, what rubbish. There now, just see the difference. For at the moment Lady Winterbourne came up, and instantly Marcella was all smiles and talk, holding her friend by both hands, clinging to her almost. Oh, do come here, she said, leading her into a corner. There's such a crowd, and I say all the wrong things. There, with a sigh of relief, now I feel myself protected. I mustn't keep you, said Lady Winterbourne, a little taken aback by her effusion. Everybody is wanting to talk to you. Oh, I know! There is Miss Rayburn looking at me severely already, but I must do as I like a little. You ought to do as old as likes, said Lady Winterbourne, suddenly, in her deepest and most tragic voice. It seemed to her a moment had come for admonition, and she seized it hastily. Marcella stared at her in surprise. She knew by now that when Lady Winterbourne looked most forbidding, she was in reality most shy, but she was still taken aback. Why do you say that, I wonder? She asked, half reproachfully. I have been behaving myself quite nicely. I have indeed, at least as nicely as I knew how. Lady Winterbourne's tragic air yielded to a slow smile. You look very well, my dear. That white becomes you charmingly, so do the pearls. I don't wonder that Aldous always knows where you are. Marcella raised her eyes and caught those of Aldous fixed upon her from the other side of the room. She blushed, smiled slightly, and looked away. Who is that tall man just gone up to speak to him? She asked of her companion. That is Lord Wondle, said Lady Winterbourne, and his plain second wife behind him. Edward always scolds me for not admiring him. He says women know nothing at all about men's looks, and that Lard Wondle was the most splendid man of his time. And I always think it an unpleasant face. Lord Wondle exclaimed Marcella, frowning, Oh, please come with me, dear Lady Winterbourne. I know he is asking Aldous to introduce him, and I won't. No, I will not be introduced to him. And laying hold of her astonished companion, she drew her hastily through a doorway near. Walked quickly, still gripping her through two connected rooms beyond, and finally landed her and herself on a sofa in Lord Maxwell's library. Pursued meanwhile through all her hurried course by the curious looks of an observant throng. That man, no, that really would have been too much, said Marcella, using her large feather fan with stormy energy. What is the matter with you, my dear, said Lady Winterbourne in her amazement? And what is the matter with Lord Wondle? You must know, said Marcella, indignantly. Oh, you must have seen that case in the paper last week, that shocking case. A woman and two children died in one of his cottages of blood poisoning. Nothing in the world but his neglect, his brutal neglect. Her breast heaved. She seemed almost on the point of weeping. The agent was appealed to, did nothing. Then the clergyman wrote to him direct and got an answer. The answer was published. For cruel insolence I never saw anything like it. He ought to be in prison for manslaughter, and he comes here. And people laugh and talk with him. She stopped, almost choked by her own passion. But the incident, after all, was only the spark to the mine. Lady Winterbourne stared at her helplessly. Perhaps it isn't true, she suggested. The newspapers put in so many lies, especially about us, the landlords. Edward says one ought never to believe them. Ah, here comes Aldous. This indeed, with some perplexity on his brow, was to be seen approaching, looking for his betrothed. Marcella dropped her fan and sat erect, her angry colour fading into whiteness. My darling, I couldn't think what had become of you. May I bring Lord Wondle and introduce him to you? He is an old friend here and my godfather. Not that I am particularly proud of the relationship, he said, dropping his voice as he stooped over her. He is a soured, disagreeable fellow, and I hate many of the things he does. But it is an old tie, and my grandfather is tender of such things. Only a word or two, then I will get rid of him. Aldous, I can't, said Marcella, looking up at him. How could I? I saw that case. I must be rude to him. Aldous looked considerably disturbed. It was very bad, he said slowly. I didn't know you had seen it. What shall I do? I promised to go back for him. Lord Wondle, Miss Boyce, said Miss Rayburn's sharp little voice behind Aldous. Aldous moving aside in hasty dismay, saw his aunt looking very determined, presenting her tall neighbour, who bowed with old-fashioned deference to the girl on the sofa. Lady Winterbourne looked with trepidation at Marcella, but the social instinct held to some extent. Ninety-nine women can threaten a scene of the kind Lady Winterbourne dreaded for one that can carry it through. Marcella wavered, then with her most forbidding air, she made a scarcely perceptible return of Lord Wondle's bow. Did you escape in here out of the heat? He asked her. But I am afraid no one lets you escape tonight. The occasion is too interesting. Marcella made no reply. Lady Winterbourne threw in a nervous remark on the crowd. Oh, yes, a great crush, said Lord Wondle. Of course we all come to see Aldous happy. How long is it, Miss Boyce, since you settled in Mellor? Six months. She looked straight before her and not at him, as she answered, and her tone made Miss Rayburn's blood boil. Lord Wondle, a battered, coarsened, but still magnificent-looking man of sixty, examined the speaker an instant from half-shut eyes. Then put up his hand to his moustache, with a half-smile. You like the country? Yes. As she spoke her reluctant monosyllable, the girl had really no conception of the degree of hostility expressed in her manner. Instead she was hating herself for her own pusillanimity. And the people? Some of them. And straight away she raised her fierce black eyes to his, and the man before her understood, as plainly as any one need understand, that whoever else Miss Boyce might like, she did not like Lord Wondle, and wished for no more conversation with him. Her interrogator turned to Aldous with smiling a plum. Thank you, my dear Aldous. Now let me retire. No one must monopolise your charming lady. And again he bowed low to her, this time with an ironical emphasis not to be mistaken, and walked away. Lady Winterbourne saw him go up to his wife, who had followed him at a distance, and speak to her roughly with a frown. They left the room, and presently through the other door of the library which opened on the corridor, she saw them pass, as though they were going to their carriage. Marcella rose. She looked first at Miss Rayburn, then at Aldous. Will you take me away? She said, going up to him. I am tired. Take me to your room. He put his hand inside her arm, and they pushed their way through the crowd. Outside in the passage they met Hallyn. He had not seen her before, and he put out his hand. But there was something distant in his gentle greeting, which struck at this moment like a bruise on Marcella's quivering nerves. It came across her that for some time past he had made no further advances to her. That his first eager talk of friendship between himself and her had dropped. But his acceptance of her into his world and Aldous's was somehow suspended in abeyance. She bit her lip tightly and hurried Aldous along, again the same lines of gay chatting people along the corridor, and on either side of the wide staircase greetings introduction and nightmare of publicity. Rather pronounced to carry him off like that, said a clergyman to his wife with a kindly smile, as the two tall figures disappeared along the upper gallery. She will have him all to herself before long. Aldous shut the door of his sitting room behind them. Marcella quickly drew her hand out of his arm, and going forward to the mantelpiece rested both elbows upon it and hid her face. He looked at her a moment in distress and astonishment, standing a little apart. Then he saw that she was crying. The colour flooded into his face, and going up to her he took her hand, which was all she would yield him, and holding it to his lips, said in her ear every soothing tender word that love's tutoring could bring to mind. In his emotion he told himself and her that he admired and loved her the more for the incident downstairs, for the temper she had shown. She alone among them all had had the courage to strike the true stern Christian note. As to the annoyance such courage might bring upon him and her in the future, even as to the trouble it might cause his own dear folk, what real matter? In these things she should lead. What could love have asked better than such a moment? Yet Marcella's weeping was in truth the weeping of despair. This man's very sweetness to her, his very assumption of the right to comfort and approve her, roused in her a desperate stifled sense of bonds that should never have been made and that now could not be broken. It was all plain to her at last. His touch had no thrill for her, his frown no terror. She had accepted him without loving him, cubiting what he could give her. And now it seemed to her that she cared nothing for anything he could give, that the life before her was to be one series of petty conflicts between her and a surrounding circumstance which must inevitably, in the end, be too strong for her, conflicts from which neither heart nor ambition could gain anything. She had desired a great position for what she might do with it. But could she do with it? She would be subdued, oh, very quickly, to great houses and great people, and all the vapid pomp and idle toil of wealth. All that picture of herself, stooping from place and power to bind up the wounds of the people in which she had once delighted, was to her now a mere flimsy vulgarity. She had been shown other ideals, other ways, and her pulses were still swaying under the audacity, the virile inventive force of the showman. Everything she had once desired looked flat to her. Everything she was not to have glowed and shone. Every adventure, passion, the joys of self-realization, these she gave up. She would become Lady Maxwell, make friends with Miss Rayburn, and wear the family diamonds. Then in the midst of her rage with herself and fate, she drew herself away, looked up, and caught full the eyes of Aldous Rayburn. Conscience stung and burned. What was this life she had dared to trifle with? This man she had dared to treat as a mere pawn in her own game. She gave way utterly, appalled at her own misdoing, and behaved like a penitent child. Aldous, astonished and alarmed by her emotions, and by the wild incoherent things she said, won his way at last to some moments of divine happiness. When, leaving her trembling hand in his, she sat submissively beside him, gradually quieting down, summoning back her smiles and her beauty, and letting him call her all the fond names he would.