 CHAPTER XXX. It was William Sweet-Apple, the gardener's boy, who informed Lowe's that Claude had come back, throwing the information casually over his shoulder as he watered the lawn. See, Mr. Claude, the daum. Oh, no, you didn't, Sweet-Apple, Lowe's contradicted. Mr. Claude is in the West. He may be in the West now, but he wasn't at twenty-five minutes past two this afternoon. Sudden fear brought Lowe's down a step or two of the portico over the Corinthian pillars of which Rose's clambered in early July profusion. In white, in a broad brimmed winter halter hat from which her floating green veil hung over her shoulders and down her back, her strong, slim figure seemed to have gained in fulfilment of herself, even in the weeks that Thor had been away. Where did you see him, Sweet-Apple? Or think you saw him? Sweet-Apple turned to the nozzle of the hose so as to develop a crown of spray with which he bedewed the roses of all colours grouped in a great central bed. I didn't think him. It was him. Well, where? See him first going to the woods leading up to Dot Rock. That was when I was on my way to lawyer Petley's. Did you see him twice? See him again as I come back. He was down in the road by that time. Looking up toward Old Man Faye's, hardly be obstinous place that is to be. Old Man Faye's got a quick, found him moved already. You knew that, didn't you, him? It was because Lois was really alarmed by this time that she said, Oh, you must have been mistaken, Sweet-Apple. Modest as you say him, Sweet-Apple agreed. But I see him. It was him. She withdrew again, receding herself in the shade of the semicircular open porch, protecting the side door, where she had been writing on a pad. Though so near the roadway, a high growth of shrubs screened her from all but the passes up and down Willoughby's Lane. At this time of the year they were relatively few. Many of the residents of County Street having already gone to the seaside or the mountains. Lois enjoyed the seclusion thus afforded her, and the tranquility. The garden and her poorer neighbours gave an outlet to her need for physical activity, while in the solitude of the house, and in that wider solitude created by the absence of all the Willoughby's and Masterman's, something within her was being healed. It was being healed, but healed in a way that left her changed. The change was manifest in what she said, when, with the pad on her knee again, she began to write. I am deeply moved, dear Thor, by your last letter from Colorado Springs, and would gladly say something adequate in response to it. When I can, I will, if I ever can. As to that, the decisive word must be with time. I cannot hurry it. I can give you no assurance now. Now I feel—but why should I repeat it? An illusion once dispelled can rarely be brought back. Still less can you replace it by reality. What we are looking for is a substitute for love. You may have found it, but I have not. I can accept your definition of love as a giving out, a pouring forth, a desire to do and to contribute. But it is precisely here that I failed to respond to the test. There is something in me stagnated or damned up. My heart feels like a well that has gone dry. I have nothing to yield. I understand what Rosie Faye said to me the day when I talked to her on Duck Rock. I am empty. I have given all I had to give. It was less blameworthy on her part than on mine, because she, poor little thing, had given so much, and I, so little. And yet my supply seems to be exhausted. It must have been thin and shallow to begin with. As I feel at present it would take a new creation to replenish it. With regard to my calling forth what is best in you, dear Thor, well, any one would do that, or anything. You are one of those who have nothing but the best to offer. Do you know what Uncle Sim said of you last night? Thor is always on the side of the angels, and though he makes mistakes they'll rescue him. They will, dear Thor, I'm sure of it. They may rescue us both. Even at a present I don't see how. Having written this much, she paused to ask what she should say further. Should she speak of his coming home? No. Since the address you had given her indicated that he was on his way, it was best that he should take the responsibility of his own return. Should he tell him that Sweet Apple thought he had seen Claude? No, it would alarm him without doing any good. If Claude was back he was back, besides which Sweet Apple might be wrong. So she signed her name with her usual significant abruptness, sealing the envelope and addressing it. Her hesitation came in putting on the stamp. Somehow the letter seemed too cold to send. She didn't want to be cold, only to be sincere. Sincerity during these weeks of solitude have become a sort of obsession. She couldn't tell him that she had forgiven him, as long as resentment lingered in her heart. And yet she was anxious not to wound him more than she could help. Wounding him, she wounded herself more deeply. For in spite of everything, his pain was hers. Slowly she tore the letter open again, to a sunset chorus of birds of whose song she had just become conscious. From tree to tree they flooted to one another and answered back, now with a reckless, passionate warble, now with a long, liquid love-note. It was the voice of the rich world that lay around her, a world of flowers and lawns and meadows and upland woods, and cool, deep shades and mellowing light. But it was also the voice that had accompanied her into the enchanted land on that winter's day when Thor had kissed her wrist. The day seemed now immeasurably far away in time, and the enchanted land had been left behind her. But the voice was still there, fluting, calling, reminding, entreating, with an insistence that almost made her weep. She wrote hurriedly in postscript, If there was ever anything I could do for you, dear Thor, perhaps what I used to feel would come back to me, if it only would, if I could only be great and generous and inexacting as you would be. I wanted to be Thor, darling, I longed to be, but I am like a person paralysed whose limbs no longer answer to his will. I pray for recovery and restoration, but will it ever come? As encouragement to Thor, she was no more satisfied with this than with what she had said earlier, but it expressed all she could allow herself to say. Anything more would have permitted him to infer such things as he had permitted her to infer—an accident that must have no repetition. She ended the note definitely, getting it ready for the post. She was still engaged in doing so when, the crunching of footsteps causing her to lift her head, she saw Claude. Having come round to the side of Portico on a hint from William Sweet Apple, he stood at a little distance, smiling. He was smiling, but as a dead man might smile. Lois could neither rise nor speak from awe. Claude himself could neither speak nor advance. He stood like a spectre, but a spectre who has been in hell. The very smile was that of the spectre who has no right to come out of hell, and yet has come. Lois was not precisely troubled. She was terrified. If Claude had only spoken a word or taken a step forward, it would have broken the spell that held her dazed and dumb. But he did nothing. He only stood and smiled that awful smile which expressed more anguish than any rictus of pain. He stood just as he came into sight on turning the corner of the house, with the many colours of the rose bed at his left hand. It was exactly like this, she had always imagined, that disembodied spirits or astral forms made their appearances to portend death. She got possession of her faculties at last. Claude! She could just whisper it. He continued to smile as he advanced and came up the steps. But it was not till he was actually beside her that he said, in a voice which might also have been that of a dead man. You didn't expect me, did you? She remembered afterwards that they neither shook hands nor exchanged any of the usual forms of greeting. But at the minute it didn't seem natural that they should. Her own tone was as strained as his, as she answered awesomely. No. Sit down, Claude. When did you come? Throwing his hat on the floor, he dropped wearily into a deck chair and closed his eyes. With the sharp profile grown extraordinarily white and thin, the dead man's expression terrified her again. She wished he would raise his head and look at her, look more like life. All he did was to open his eyes heavily, as he replied. Got back yesterday. He possessed from interest than from the desire to get on the plane of actual things. Then she asked, Where are you staying? Step to the house last night. Old Mags, the caretaker, has the keys, so I made him let me in. But are you going to stay any time? Might as well, don't you, why not? There was so much to say, and so much she was afraid to say, that she hardly knew with what to begin. Weren't you—she ventured timidly—weren't you having a good time? His answer, as he lay back with eyes closed again, was another of his smiles. Only dimmer now, with a faint bittersweetness. She knew it was like asking a man if his pain is better when it is killing him. Nevertheless, the ground of common practical things was the only one to keep to, said she went on. But you won't like sleeping at the house every night with no one in it. Don't you want to come here? He shook his head. No, thanks. Mrs. Mags will make my bed and give me breakfast. That's all I need. Get the rest of my meals in town. But you're stated in an eye, won't you? He lifted himself up in his chair at last, his face taking on its first look of life. Thor be there? Why, no, Thor's away, in the West, didn't you know? He started nervously. Away in the West? Not looking for me? She tried to smile, of course not. He went to attend the medical congress in Minneapolis. He's on his way home now. When do you expect him? Oh, not at once. I don't know when. He's taking his time. He studied her a while with eyes that seemed to read her secret. What for? Well, to see the country, I suppose. My last letter was from Colorado Springs. He dropped back into the chair with a tired sigh of relief. All right, I'll state it in her. Thanks. She allowed him to rest, asking no more questions that she could help, till dinner was over, and they'd come out again on the portico, so that he might have his cigar in the cool scented evening air. She was more at ease with him, too, now that she could no longer see the suffering in his pinched, emaciated face. Claude, why did you come home? He withdrew the cigar from his lips just long enough to say, because I couldn't stay away. Why couldn't you? Because I couldn't. Don't you think it would have been well to make the effort? What was the good of making the effort when I couldn't keep it up? But you kept it up for a while. Not after—after I heard. Heard about Rosie? He made an inarticulate sound of a scent. What did you hear? I heard what she did. How? Who told you? And that chump, Billy Cheever, wrote me. How did he know it had anything to do with you? Oh, I was full enough to tell him about her once, and so he caught on to it. Put two and two together, I suppose, when he heard that she sees the opportunity to make the first incision toward getting in her point. That she threw herself into the pond. Did he say that Jim Breen dived after her and brought her up? He answered indifferently. He said, Someone did. He didn't say who. It was Jim. He saved her. As the statement evoked in her response, she continued, Claude, what did you come home for? Again he withdrew his cigar from his mouth, looking at her obliquely, to marry her. She allowed some time to elapse before saying, Claude, I don't think you will. Oh, yes, I shall. What makes you so sure? Because I am. I'm not, or rather, if I am sure, it's the other way. He sprang up, seizing her by the arm over which there was nothing but a gaussed calf by way of covering. Lois, for God's sake, what do you mean? You know something, tell me. She hasn't gone away with thought, has she? She, too, sprang up, shaking off his hands as if it had been a serpent. You fool, don't touch me. She'll marry Jim Breen. She'll be in love with him in a week or two. He was all over, in an instant. But the blaze in her eyes seemed literally to knock him down. He fell back into the deck chair again. Though he's had a stride on it, with his feet on the floor, covering his face with his hands. I beg your pardon, Lois. He muttered humbly. I don't know what I'm saying. No, you don't, she agreed. Speaking breathlessly because the leaping of her heart was so wild. But that's hardly an excuse for taking leave altogether of your senses. He continued to mutter into his hands. I'm crazy. I'm drunk. I'm stark mad. Oh, Lois, if you knew what I've been through, you wouldn't mind. That hot anger that had rolled over her with a wrath such as she had never felt before began to roll away again, leaving her sick and shivering. It was an excuse for going into the house to find a cloak and for getting the minutes respite necessary to self-control. To regain it, to overcome that throb of her being, of which the after-effect was a faintness unto death, she was obliged to walk steadily, holding her head high. She was obliged, too, to repent of the Tigris impulse with which she had turned on Claude, flinging in his face that for which she had meant to prepare him by degrees. The fact that it had seemingly passed over his head, was no paliation to the outrage. As she mounted the stairs and went to her room, she repeated her own formula. Nothing that isn't kind and well thought out beforehand. What she had said had been neither well thought out nor kind, but the temptation had been overwhelming. For the instant it had seemed secondary that Thor hadn't taken Rosie to the west, since Claude, who knew so much more of the inner history of the episode than she did herself, had thought such an action possible. More clearly than ever before she saw that some appalling struggle for the possession of the little creature must have taken place, and that it had been going on during those months when life was apparently so peaceful, and she had been living in her fool's paradise. If not till she had lost the fight, the Thor had come to her in the snowbound woods, with the twitter of birds and the deep music of the treetops, accompanying those half-truths she had been eager to believe. She herself had been fatuous and vain in assuming that he could love her, but if there was little to say for her, there was nothing at all to be said for him. He had been the more false for the reason that, as far as he went, he had been sincere. It was his very sincerity that had tricked her. Less than that at any time since the day when he had stammered out his futile explanations, did she feel it possible to pardon him. But there was something else. Now, if she chose, she could know. In his present state of mind, Claude would betray anything. She would only question him to throw the emphasis adroitly here or there, and the whole story would come out. It was like having a key come into her hands, a key that would unlock all those mysteries which were her terror. She was still a resolute, however, as to using it, after she had taken an old opera cloak from a wardrobe, thrown it over her shoulders, and gone downstairs again. She found Claude as she had left him, a stride on the deck chair, his face in his hands, the burning end of the cigar that protruded between his fingers making a point of light. The abject attitude moved her to pity in spite of everything. She herself remained standing, her tall figure thrown into dim relief between two of the right Corinthian pillars of the portico. By standing, it seemed to her obscurely, she could more easily escape if any such awful revelation, as she was afraid of, were to spring on her against her will. She could almost feel it waiting for her in the depths of the heavy-scented darkness. For the minute, however, the folly of Claude's return was the matter immediately to be dealt with. To get him to go away again was the end to be attained. It was with this in view, as well as with a measure of compassion, that she said, You, poor Claude, you have been through things, haven't you? The answer came leconically. Been in hell? Yes, that's what I thought, she agreed simply. I thought at the instant you came round the corner this afternoon. But why? For what reason exactly? He lifted his haunted face, stemming out his recital in a way that reminded her of Thor. She could see that he had profited by his mistake of a few minutes earlier, and that Justice Thor had tried to tell Claude's story without involving his own, so Claude was endeavouring to spare her by doing the same thing. Being able to supply the blanks more accurately now than on the former occasion, she found a kind of poignant, torturing amusement in fitting her knowledge in. He began with his first meeting with Rosie, describing the scene. He had not taken the adventure seriously, not any more than he had taken a dozen similar. Girls like that could generally be thrown off as easily as they were taken on, and therefore you know ill-will for the change. As a matter of fact, a new flirtation generally began where the old one ended, which made part of the fun for the girl as for the man. He was speaking of respectable girls, lowest was to understand, village girls, shop girls, and others of the higher wage-earning variety, who didn't mind showing a spice of devil before they married and settled down. Lots of them didn't, and were no worse for it in the end. It did not occur to him that Rosie would be different from others of the class, or that she would take in deadly earnest what was no more than play for him. When he had made this discovery, he had tried to withdraw, but ended with the result of becoming involved more deeply. Over the processes by which he was led finally to pledge himself, he grew incoherent, as also over the signs which caused him to suspect that Rosie was playing fast and loose with him. His muttering goes to, somebody else was in love with her, and who was ready to put up money, threw her back on memories of his uneasy questions concerning Thor on the evenings after the return from the honeymoon. It was with a sense of the key slipping into the lock that she said, and that made you jealous, as the devil. It was because he did it that I knew I couldn't give her up, that I'd never let her go. There was sincere curiosity in her tone as she asked the question. But, Lord, why did you? Because she lied to me. Oh, and had you never lied to her? He mumbled something about that not being the same thing. She swore to me that there'd never be any put-up job between her and— She held him out. The other person. She could hear the key grating as it turned. And was there? He made the impatient circular movement of his head, as though his collar chafed him, with which he was familiar. He was gaining time in order to use tact. Oh, I don't know. There was—there was something. Whatever it was she denied him when all the while they were— She felt obliged to fully return the key. She knew how perilous the question might be, but it was beyond her to keep it back. They were what, Lord? They were trying to catch me in a trap. It was like the door into the hall of mysteries are opening, but only to make disclosures dimmer and more mystifying still. The postponement of dreadful certainty is enabled her, however, to say with some slight relief. But this—this other person couldn't have been very fond of her himself if he— if he gave her up to you. He bite his head still lower into his hands, muttering towards the floor. Oh, I don't know, I—I don't care now. Anyhow, she lied to me, and he lifted his haggard eyes again, and I jumped at it. I—I saw the way out, and I jumped at it. I told her—I told her I—I'd go and marry someone else. Did you mean else, you darling? He nodded, speechlessly. It was to come back again to the point which her anger had caused her to miss, that she went forward and laid her hand on his shoulder kindly. I would, Claude, if I were you, she said, in a matter-of-fact voice. She'd make you a good wife. No one will make me a good wife now, he said hoarsely. I'm going to marry Rosie. I'll marry her if it puts me in the gutter. I'll marry her if I never have a scent. She went back to her place between the pillars, leaning against one of them. But, Claude, she reasoned, would that do any good? Would it make either of you happy, after all that's been said and done? He seemed to writhe. I don't care anything about that. I've got to do it. You haven't got to do it if Rosie doesn't want it. It's got nothing to do with her. She looked at him in astonishment. Nothing to do with her. What do you mean? He tried to explain further. He had not primarily come back to atone for the suffering he'd inflicted on Rosie, or because his love for her was such that he couldn't live without her. He'd come back to propitiate the demon within himself, the demon or the god, he was not sure which it was, for it possessed the attributes of both. He'd come back to escape the chastisement his soul inflicted on itself, because without coming back he could no longer be a man. He'd come back because the furious had driven him with their whip of knotted snakes, and he could do nothing but yield to their hounding. If Lowe's thought that travelling in the west was beer and skittles when hunted and scourged by yourself like that, well, she'd better try it and see. What she must understand already was that Rosie and happiness had become minor considerations. He would sacrifice both to regain a measure of his self-respect. He had never supposed, and he didn't suppose now, that Rosie would be happy marrying him, but that was no longer the point. The demon or the god must be appeased at no matter what cost to the victim. He made these explanations not straightforwardly or concisely, but with rambling digressions that took him over half the Middle West. He described, or hinted at, all sorts of scenes, peopled by gay young businessmen and garnished by pretty girls, in which he could have enjoyed himself had it not been for the enemy in his heart. It wasn't merely that he'd thrown over Rosie with a cruelty that made her try to kill herself, and still less was it that he couldn't live down his love when once he set about it. It was that the Claude who might have been was strangled and slain, leaving him no in a fellowship but with the Claude who was. Reviving the Claude who might have been was like reviving a corpse, and yet there was nothing to do but make the attempt. I'm a gentleman, what? he asked, raising his white face pitifully. I was acting like a gentleman, what? Yes, but if it's too late, Claude, for that particular thing. Ah, but it won't be, not when she sees me. It might be, and if she doesn't want it, Claude, I don't see why you— I don't see why, because you're not me. If you were, you would. A woman hasn't a man's sense of honour, anyhow. She let this pass with an inward smile in order to say, But Claude, suppose you can't do it? He twisted his neck with his customary chafing irritated movement. I'll do it, or croak. Oh, but that's nonsense. To you, not to me. You haven't been through the mill that I've been ground up in. You don't know what it is to have been born, born a gentleman, and to have blasted yourself into human remains. That's what I am now, not a man, say nothing of a gentleman, just human remains, too awful to look at. She tried to reason with him. But Claude, you mustn't exaggerate things or put the punishment out of proportion to the crime. Admitting that what you did to Rosie was dishonourable, but brutal, if you like. Oh, it isn't that. It's what I did to myself. Can't you see? She saw, but not with the intensity of Claude himself. Sitting down at last she let him talk again. He'd felt something shattered in him, so he said, at the very minute when he had turned to leave the cucumber-house on the day of the final rupture. He knew already that he was a cad, and that he was doing what only a cad would have done. But he had expected the remorse to pass. He'd known himself for a cad on other occasions, and yet had outlived the sense of shame. That he should outlive it again he had taken for granted, though he knew that this time he couldn't do it without suffering. He was willing to take the suffering. He was not especially unwilling that Rosie should take it, too. In a way she'd been as much to blame as he was. Though he didn't question the sincerity of her love for him, she had plotted and schemed to catch him, because from her point of view he was a rich man's son, and even so had had moments of disloyalty. He find it not unreasonable to expect her to share the responsibility for what had overtaken her. But she, too, would outlive the pain of it and follow his example in marrying someone else. Lois felt her opportunity to have fully come. I think she will. She'll marry Jim Breen, if you'd only leave her alone. Oh, rot! The tone expressed the degree of importance he attached to this possibility. He went on again, discursively, incoherently, covering much of the same ground, but with new and illuminating details, details of which the background was still a jumble of suppers and dances and journeys, but in which the God, or the demon, gave him no rest. His distaste for diversion, having declared itself from the day of his starting for Chicago, he'd whipped up an appetite to contract it. Avening himself of the freedom of a young man, plentifully if it's far applied with money for the first time in his life, he made use of all the resources with its strange and exciting cities could furnish him to get back his zest in light-heartedness. The result was not in pleasure, but in disgust and a horror of himself that grew. It grew from the beginning like some giant poisonous weed. It grew while he was in Chicago. It grew with each further stage of his journey, in St. Louis, in Cincinnati, in Los Angeles. It was in Los Angeles that he'd received Biddy Cheever's letter with the news of Rosie's mad leap, and he knew for a certainty that the only thing to be done was to turn his face eastward. Whatever happened, and whoever suffered, he must redeem himself. Redemption had become for him a need more urgent than food, more vital than life. Though he didn't use the word, though his terms were simple and boyish and slangy, Loes could see that his stress was that which sent pilgrims to the Holy Sepulchre, and drove Judas to go and hang himself. Redemption lay in marrying Rosie and restoring his honor and bringing the claw to might have been back to life. Indeed, it was difficult to tell at times which of the two were slain, whether the claw to might have been or the other clawed, so distraught and involved were his appeals. But beyond marrying Rosie and keeping his word, being a gentleman, as he expressed it, his outlook didn't extend. Any damn thing that liked could happen, when that atoning act had been accomplished. There were so many repetitions in his turns of thought that Loes ended by following them no more than listlessly. Not that she had ceased to be interested, but her mind was occupied with other phases of the drama. She remembered, what she had so often heard, that in the masterman so there was this extraordinary strain of idealism of which no one could foresee the turn it would take. She knew the traditions of the great grandfather whose heart had broken on finding that America was not the regenerated land he hoped for. Tales were still current in the village of old Dr. Masterman, his son, who through sheer confidence in his fellow men never paid anyone he owed and never collected money from anyone who owed it to him. Archie Masterman, in the next generation, was supposed to have taken the altruistic tendency by the throat in himself and choked it down. But Uncle Sim was a byword of eccentric goodness throughout the countryside. Now the impasse was manifested clawed in this revulsion against his own failure, in this marred and broken vision of a something to which he had not been true. And as for Thor, but here she was tortured and frightened. Who knew what this strange inheritance might be working in him? Who could tell how big and tender and transcending it might become? That it would be transcending and tender and big was certain. If poor, frivolous, futile Claude could feel like this, could feel that he must redeem his soul though any damn thing that liked should happen as the price of his redemption, in Thor the yearning would outflank her range. Might not the secret of secrets be that? Might not that which she had been seeing as treachery to herself be no more than a conflict of aspirations? If Claude, with his blurred distortion of the divine in him, serve no other purpose, he at least threw a light on Thor. Thor, too, was a masterman. Thor, too, was born to the vision, to the longing after the nationally perfect that had become legendary since the time of the great grandfather, to the sweet, neighborly affection that ran through all the tales of that man's son, to the sturdy righteousness of Uncle Sim, to the stanzas of honour for which poor Claude had fallen as angels fall, and to God any knew what high-prompting strangled and vitiated in his father. Thor was heir to it all, with something of his own to boot, something strong, something patient, something laborious and loyal, something long-suffering and winning and meek, that might have marked the leader of a rebellious people or a pagan, sceptic Christ. Her mind was so full of this ideal of the man against whom, and also for whom, her heart was hot, that she made no effort to detain Claude when, after long silence, he picked up his hat and slipped away into the darkness. End of Chapter 30 Chapter 31 of The Side of the Angels by Basil King This Librivox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Simon Evers. Chapter 31 He slipped away into the darkness, but only to do what he had done on the previous evening after making arrangements with old mags. He climbed the hill north of the pond, not so much in the hope of seeing Rosie or anyone else, as to haunt the scenes so closely associated with his spiritual downfall. It was a languorous, luscious night, with a scent of new-mown hay mingling with that of gardens. If there was any breeze, it was lightly from the east, bringing that mitigation of the heat traditional to the week following Independence Day. As there was no moon, the stars had their full midsummer intensity, the scorpion trailing hotly on the southern horizon, with Antares throwing out a fire like the red rays in a diamond. Beneath it, the city flung up a yellow glow that might have been the smoke of a distant conflagration, while from the hilltop the suburbs were a sparkle. As, standing in the road, Claude looked through the open gateway down over the slope of land, the hot-house roofs and the distant levels of the pond leaned with a faint ghostly radiance like the sheen of ancient tarnished crystal. The house was dark. It was dark and dead. It was dark and dead and haunted. Everything was haunted. Everything was dark. Even the furnace chimney looming straight and black against the stars was plumbless. But in the silence and stillness there was something that drew him on. He crossed the road and went a few paces within the gate. He had not ventured so far on the previous evening, and during the day he dared no more than to look upward from the boulevard below, after that pilgrimage to Dark Rock on which William Sweet Apple had surprised him. Now in the darkness and quietness he stood, not searching so much as dreaming. He was dreaming of Rosie, dreaming of her with a kind of cheer. After all, he would be bringing joy to her as well as getting peace of spirit for himself. It wouldn't be so hard. She would meet him as she used to meet him here, as she used to let him come and visit her. And then the atonement would be made. The process would be simple, and he should become a man again. The conviction was so sweet that he lingered to enjoy it, penetrating a few steps farther into the spacious dimness of the yard. It was the first minute of Inwood Ease he had known since he had turned his back on it. Now that he was once more on the spot, the Tlord, who was a devil of a fellow, something of a sport, but a decent chap all the same, began again to run with red blood, where there had been nothing but a whining, shriveling apostate. It was like rejuvenessence, like a recreation. Suddenly something moved. It moved at first in the shadow of the house, and then out in the starlit spaces. It moved stealthily and creepily, and with a grotesque swiftness. Its action seemed irregular and uncertain, like that of some night-marauding animal, till Tlord perceived that it was stalking him. He waited long enough to get a view that was almost clear of a crouching attitude, crouching attitude of a beast when it means to spring, whereupon he turned and fled. That is, he turned and walked away swiftly. He would have run had it not been for his renaissance to self-respect. He couldn't bring himself to run from poor old Faye, even though his nerves were tingling. He tried to reassure himself by saying that it was no more than a repetition of that dogging to which he had been subjected before, and that it would discontinue once he was off the premises. But when he turned to glance over his shoulder, it seemed to him that the sinister footsteps glided after him. That, he reasoned, might have been no more than fancy. Dark lights were rare on this rather lonely road, and the enormous shadows they flung lent themselves to the startling of sick imaginations. Nevertheless, as he walked, Tlord continued to look back over his shoulder, always with renewed impressions of a creepy thing trying to track him down. Having entered the obscurity of their own driveway, he broke at last into a light, soundless trot, which was not slackened till he reached the relative protection of the door. But by morning he had regained a measure of tranquility. Knowing what he had to do, he was resolved to do it promptly, with sunlight and summer and the sense of being home again to brace him up. The Tlord, who was a devil of a fellow, seemed in a fair way to be reborn. Waiting after breakfast only long enough to be discreet, he took his way up the hill again. He was confident by this time, and the more so because of his being beyond the need of concealments. There would be no more shrinking into the odorous depths of the hot-house, or hesitancies or equivocations. He would walk up and avow himself, to father and mother, as well as to Rosie. The hero in him was coming into his own at last. The gash in the hot-house roof which you could see from a distance was what he noticed first. In his two nocturnal visits this had not been apparent. Now that he saw it, he stood stock still. It was something like a gash within himself, a gash in his current preps, or a gash in the dream of a reconstituted self. He knew vaguely that his father had refused the renewal of the lease, and that at some time in the near future Faye would have to go. But he had not expected the immediate signs of a complete demoralisation. Now that they were there, they disconcerted him. He went on till he was in view of the house. It gave him the blind stare with which empty houses respond to interrogation. He continued his way to the gate and into the yard. All was neglected and fantastically overgrown. Vetch, Burdock, and Yarrow were in luxuriant riot with the planting and seeding of the spring. No living creature was in sight but a dappled mare, whose round body and heavy fetlocks spoke of a canook strain, hitched in the shade of the magnolia tree. The mare wore a straw hat to which was attached a bunch of artificial roses, and switched her tail to drive away the flies. Harnessed to a light form of drae, the animal suggested business, so that Claude put on a business air, going forward with the assurance of one who has a right to be on the spot. He not advanced twenty paces before the hot-house door opened to allow the passage of a fern-tree in a giant wooden pot, behind which came the pleasant countenance of Jim Breen, red and perspiring for so much exertion under a July sun. Claude paused till the fern-tree was deposited in the drae, when the two men stared at each other across the intervening space. For the first time Lose's mention of the young Irishman's name returned to Claude as significant. What the young Irishman thought of him, he had no means of knowing, for a sudden eclipse across the cheery's face was followed by an equally sudden clearing. Hello, Claude! Jim threw off the greeting guardedly, and yet with a certain challenge. His very use of the Christian name was meant to be a token of man to man equality. Having attended the public school with Claude, and taken part with him in ball-games at an age too early for class distinctions, he was plainly disposed to use that fact as a basis of privilege. He attempted however no other advance, remaining sturdily at the tail of his drae, hatless and in his shirt's leaves, but with hair direct and grey eyes set fixedly. The only conciliating feature was his smile, which had come back, not with its native spontaneity, but daringly and aggressively, as a brave man smiles at a foe. Claude resented the attitude, he resented the smile, he resented the use of his Christian name, but he was resolved to be diplomatic. He went forward a few steps farther still, but in spite of himself his voice trembled when he spoke. Mr. Fay around? Jim answered nonchalantly. No, gone to town. What a good fern-tree, Claude. Two or three corkers here. Look at that one now. Get it cheap, too. Dandy in the corner of a big room. Sickeningly aware of his feebleness in contrast with his easy, honest figure, Claude made an effort to be manly in matter of fact. Mr. Fay selling off? Oh, not exactly selling off. Fixed things up with Father. Father's taken the stock, and Mr. Fay's going in with him. Didn't want this old place any longer. Jim continued loftily. Can't have clung to it because he'd put money into it like money-eater, that's what it was. Make more in a year with Father than he would in this old rockery in ten. Had to be obstants bought the place. No, that, don't ya? Come to think it was your old man who owned it. Well, it's had to be obstants now, or will be the day after tomorrow. Have a swell residence here. Good enough for that. Too small for a plant like Mr. Fay's. Claude did his best to digest such details in this information as were new to him while he nerved himself to say, His Miss Fay about? Jim nodded towards the blank windows of the house. Moved. Better take a fern-tree, Claude. Won't get a bargain like this. Not if every florist in the town goes bankrupt. This one's a peach, and you'll call it a scream compared to the one I've got inside. Bring it out so as you can get a squint at it. Can't wait, can you? Well, so long. Gotta finish my job. Back more, back. Any time you do want a fern-tree, Claude. Claude was obliged to speak peremptorily in order to detain him. I want to know where the Fay's have moved to. To town, was the really answer. Well, so long. If I don't get on with my job. What part of town? Jim turned to the hot-house door. Oh, very nice part. Well, that's not telling me. No, the young Irishman threw back with his peculiar smile. And if you take my advice, you won't ask anybody else. If old man Fay was to see you within a mile of the place... Claude decided to be confidential. Old man Fay has no reason to be afraid any longer, Jim. Not as far as I'm concerned. Ah, it isn't as far as you're concerned. It's as far as he is. The boot's on that foot now. Claude loathed this discussion with a man so inferior to himself. But he was obliged to get his information somehow. If he thinks... It's not what he thinks, but what he knows. That's what's the matter with old man Fay. If I was here, I'd give him a darn wide berth from now on. Here's what Jim, you don't understand. I understand what I'm telling you, Claude. If you don't clear out of this village for the next six months. Claude was beside himself with exasperation. Look, oh God, man, I've come back to marry Rosie. Now, don't you see? Jim stalked forward from the hot-house door. Standing over the smaller, slighter man with a tolerant kindness, which persisted in his sunny, steely smile. No, I don't see. You clear out. Take a friend's advice. Whether you come back to marry Rosie, or whether you haven't, won't make a sense worth a difference to old man Fay. Clear out, all the same. In his excitement, Claude excreamed shrilly. Like hell I will. Like hell you have to. Mind you, Claude, I'm telling you as a friend. And as for marrying Rosie, well, you can't. Claude became aggressive. Hey, that's because you think you can. Gee, me, what do you know about that? It's all I can do to get her to look at the same side of the road I'm on. So far. But if I can't, still less can you, and for a very good reason. What reason, Claude demanded with his best attempt to be stern? The other became solemn and dramatic. The reason that… that she's dead. Claude jumped. Dead? What in the thunder you were talking about? She wasn't dead this afternoon. Oh, yes, she was, Claude. That Rosie. She… she drowned herself. When I dived in after it was another Rosie altogether that I brought up. Do you get me? Claude broke in with smothered objugations, but Jim, feeling the value of the vein he had started, persisted in going on with it. He did so not bitterly or reproachfully, but with a playful, Celtic sadness, in which a misty blinking of the eyes struggled with the smile that continued to hover on his lips. Rosie, you knew Claude, was all limp and white as I held her in my arms, while Robbie Willet rode us ashore? She was gone. The soul was out of her. She was as much in heaven as she'd been dead a week. Her eyes were shut and her eyelashes wet, just as you might see the fringe of a flower hung with dewdrops of a morning. And her mouth? You know the kind of mouth she's got, a little open when she looks at you, as if you'd taken her by surprise like. Well, that's the way it was then, a wee little bit open, as if she was going to speak, but more as if she were going to cry. And her lips that white. And not a beat to her heart, no matter how tight you held her. When Dr. Hill brought the breath into her again, it was a different Rosie that came back entirely. Claude wheeled away in order to hide the spasm that shot across his face. Oh, shut up, damn you! was all he had the strength to say. But the term moved Jim to compunction. The Irishman in him came out as he tried to make things easier for Claude, without at the same time desisting from his object. Sure, you couldn't tell that was the way she'd take it. You couldn't tell that at all. If you'd known it beforehand, you'd have acted quite different. You'll know that. Anyone else might have done the same thing that was—that was— he sought a consolidatory phrase. That was like you. He plunged still further. I might have done it myself if I hadn't been built the other way round. Only that won't matter to old Manfe, nor to Matt, neither. Claude turned so suddenly pale of the mention of the brother, that Jim followed up his advantage. The old fellow has to be out of this by tomorrow night, and Matt gets his walking tip from Colchord the next morning. He laid his strong, earthy hand on the neat summer black-and-white check of Claude's shoulder, with the lightest hint of turning him in the direction of the gate. Now, if you make yourself scarce for a spell, I'll be able to manage them both and coax them back to their senses. Though he felt himself irresistibly impelled toward the road, Claude made an effort to recover his dignity. If you think I'm going to run away. Jim slipped his arm through his companions, helping him along. Sure, you're not going to run away. Lay low for a spell. That's all you'll be doing. Old Manfe is crazy. Start staring, roaring, crazy. It isn't you, and it isn't Rosie. It's having to get out of here. It was bluff what I said a minute ago about the place being too small for his plant. He's dotty on these three old hot houses. My lord, you think no one ever had hot houses before and never would again? You think it was the end of the world to hear him talk? You die laughing. The better he'd like to put it over on is your old man. Gives me a mouthful about him three or four times a day. And it'd be a barrelful of buckshot in the back if he could get at him. Lucky he's in Europe. But I'll calm him down, don't you fret? And I'll calm down, Matt, once I get at him. Let me have two months. Let me have a month. And I'll have them coming to you like a grey squirrel comes for nuts. Out in the roadway Claude made a last effort to react against his humiliation, doing it almost tearfully. But look here, Jim, I've got to marry Rosie. I've got to! The Irishman and the young man were still in the ascendant as he whacked his head sympathetically. Sure, you've got to, if she wants it. What she does want it, doesn't she? She must have told you so, or you wouldn't know so much about it. She's told me all about it from seeding to sale, and it's God's truth I'm handing out to you, no bluff at all. This Rosie's another proposition. Ah, marry her, whatever she is, Claude, it's there bravely, and I've got to see her, too. Jim looked thoughtful. It isn't so easy to see her because—well, now I'll tell you straight, Claude, because it makes her kind of sick to think of you. Oh, that's nothing, he hastened to add, on seeing a second convulsion pass across Claude's face. Sure, she'd feel the same about anyone she'd done the like of that to her, now wouldn't she? It isn't you at all. Not any more than it'd be me or anybody else. If I could see her, Claude so weakly, I'd explain. Ah, but she couldn't explain quick enough. That's where the trouble about that'd be. She'd be down on the floor in a faint before you'd be able to say knife. You couldn't get near her at all, at all, not this Rosie, not who it was to explain away the ground beneath her feet. She'd get over that, Claude began to plead. She'd get over it if it didn't kill her first, but it's my belief it would. If you could have seen her the night she'd told me about you, it was like cutting out her own heart and picking it to pieces. She's never mentioned you before nor since, and I don't think ever will again. No, Claude. He continued in a reasoning turn. There's no two ways about it, but you've got to get out. For a spell at any rate. If you don't, old man'll fail, I'll be after you with a gun. And what might fail, too, may be worse. I can handle them if you'll keep from hanging yourself out like a rag-rag to a bull-like, but if you don't, then the Lord only knows what'll happen. What'll happen? Claude cried with a final up-leaping of resistance. Is it you all, Mary Rosie? I'll marry her if she'll have me. Don't you fret about that? I won't try to marry her. Never do I see that she's got the least little bit of a wish to marry you, Claude. I'll play fair. If she changes her mind from the way she is now, and gets so as to be able to think of you again, and wants you, wants you of her own free will, then I'll put up the bands for you myself. And that's honest to God. He offered his hand on the compact. But Claude didn't take it. He didn't take it because he didn't see it. And he didn't see it, because he looked over it and beyond it, as over and beyond the young Irishman himself. It was not that he had any doubt as to Jim's word being honest to God, or that he questioned Rosie's state of mind as Jim had sketched it. It was rather that he was seeing that Claude, who was a gentleman and a hero, and a devil of a fellow, recede into the ether. While he was left eternally with the Claude who remained behind. Jim felt no resentment for the neglect of his prophet hand. But the long stare of those sick, unseeing eyes made him uneasy. Well, I guess I must beat it back to my job, he said, beginning to move away. So long, Claude, and good luck to you. He added in order to return to a colloquial tone. If you ever want a fern-tree, don't forget that we've got some daisies. But Claude was still staring at the great blue blank, which the fading of his ideal had left behind it. End of Chapter 31 Twenty-four hours after Claude turned to take the way of humiliation down the hill, undiseived by Jim Breen's friendly tone and the hope of future possibilities held out to him, four mastermen find himself almost within sight of home. While arriving in the city late in the afternoon, he went to a hotel where he took a room and dined. When he devised the means of letting Lois know that he was camping outside her gates, she might be sufficiently touched to throw them open. She might never love him again. She might never have really loved him at all. But he would content himself with a benevolent toleration. Like her he was afraid of love. The word meant too much or too little, he was not sure which. It was too explosive. Its dynamic force was at too high a pressure for the calm routine of married life. If Lois could find a substitute for love, he was willing to accept it, giving her his own substitute in return. All he asked was the privilege of seeing her, of being with her, of proving his devotion, of having her once more to share his life. It was not to force this issue, but to play lovingly with the hope in it, that when dusk had deepened into evening, he took the open electric car that would carry him to the village. He had no intention beyond that of enjoying the cool night air, and loiting for a few minutes inside of the house that sheltered her. She might be on the balcony outside her room, or beneath the portico of the garden door, so that he should catch the flutter of her dress. That would be enough for him, to-night. He might make it enough for the next night, and the next. After absence and distance, it seemed much. County Street was as he had known it on every warm summer night since he was a boy. And yet to convey that impression which every summer night conveys, and being the first and only one of its kind. The sky was majestically high and clear and spangled, with the scorpion and the red light of Antares well above the city's amber glow. Along the streets and lanes, dim trees rustled faintly, casting gigantic trembling shadows in the circles of the electric lights. The breeze being from the east and south, the tang of sea salt mingled with the strong, dry scent of new-mown hay, and the blended perfumes of a countryside of gardens. All doors were open as he passed along, and so were all windows. On all verandas and porches and steps faint figures could be discerned, low-voiced for the most part, but sending out an occasional laugh or snatch of song. Four knew who the people were. Many of them were friends. To some of them he was related. There were few with whom he hadn't ties, anti-dating birth. It was soothing to him, as he slipped along in the heavy shadow of the alms, to know that they were near. While approaching his father's house, which he expected to find dark, he was astonished to see a light. It was a light like a blurred star on one of the upper floors. From what window it shone he found it difficult to say the mass of the house being lost in the general obscurity. The strange thing was that it should be there. He passed slowly within the gate, and along the few yards of the driveway, pausing from time to time in order to place the quiet beacon in this room or in that, according to the angle from which it seemed to burn. He was not alarmed. He was only curious. It was no infertive light. Though the curtains were closed, it displayed itself boldly in the eyes of the neighbours, and of the two or three ornamental constables who made their infrequent rounds in County Street. He could only attribute it to old mags who lived in the Coachman's Cottage at the far end of the property. Though as to what old mags could be doing in the house of this hour in the evening, at a time when the parents were abroad and clawed away on a holiday, he was obliged to be frankly inquisitive. An investigating spirit was further arised by the fact that in one of his pauses, as he alternately advanced and halted, he was sure he heard a footstep. And if it was not a footstep it was a stirring in the shrubbery, as if something had either moved away or settled into hiding. He was still unalarm'd. Night crimes were rare in the village, and relatively harmless even when they were committed. The sound he had heard might have been made by some roving dog or by a cat or a startled bird. Had it not been for the light, he would have scarcely have noticed it. Taken in conjunction with the light, it suggested someone who had been watching and had slunk away. But even that thought was slightly metadramatic and so well-ordered a community. He went on till he was at the foot of the steps, at a point where he could no longer describe the glow in the upper window, but could perceive through the fan-light over the inner door that, though the lower hall was dark, the electrics were burning somewhere in the interior of the house. He verified this on mounting the steps and peering into the vestibule through the strip of window at the sides of the outer door. Turning the norm tentatively, he was surprised to find it yield. On entering, he stood in the porch and listened, but no sound reached him from within. To he's bunch of keys from his pocket, he detached his latch-key softly and as softly inserted it in the lock. The door opened noiselessly, showing a light down the stairway from the hall above. He could now hear someone moving, probably on the topmost floor, with an opening and shutting of doors that might have been those of closets, followed by a switching sound like that of the folding or packing of clothes. He entered, and closed the door with a distinctly audible bang. Listening again, he found that the sound ceased suspiciously. Whoever was there was listening, too. It was easy by the light streaming from above to find the button and turn on the electricity. Someone came out of a room and peered downward. He himself went to the foot of the stairs, looking up. When the watcher on the third floor spoke at last, it was in a voice he didn't instantly recognize. He would have taken it for clods, and it was so frightened and shrill. Who's there? Who are you? Thor demanded, in tones that were red, and in tones that rolled and echoed through the house. There was a long, hesitating silence. Straining his eyes upward, Thor could dimly make out a white face leaning over the highest banister. When the question came at last, it was as if reluctantly and trinkedly. Is that you, Thor? Thor retreated from the stairs, backing away to the library, of which the door was the nearest open one. He had no idea what was going on. He had no idea what was going on, of which the door was the nearest open one. He distinctly recorded the words that passed through his mind. He might have uttered them audibly, so indebtable was the impression with which they cut themselves in. By God, I've got him! Out of the confused suffering of two months earlier, he heard himself saying, I swear to God that if I ever see Thor again, I'll kill him. He hadn't meant on that occasion deliberately to register a great oath. The oath had registered itself. It was there in the archives of his mind, signed and sealed and waiting for the moment of putting it into execution. It hardly thought of it since then, and now it urged itself for fulfilment, like a vow. It was a vow to cover not merely one offense, but many—all the long years of nameless, unrecorded irritations, ignored but never allayed, culminating in the act by which this man had robbed him, robbed him uselessly, robbed him not to enjoy the spoil, but to fling it away. It was a moment of seeing Red similar to many others in his life. For the instant he could more easily have killed Claude than refrained from doing it, that he should so refrain was a matter of course, naturally. He still kept a hold on common sense. He would not only refrain, but be civil. If Claude were in need of anything or were short of cash, he would probably write him a cheque. It was the irony of this kind of rage that it was so impotent. It was impotent and absurd. It might shake him to the foundations of his being, but it would come to nothing in the end. It both relieved and embittered him to foresee this result. From the threshold of the library he called up to Claude. Come down! The term was imperious. It was even threatening. That degree of menace at least he was unable to suppress. Claude's steps could be heard on the stairs. They were slow and clanking, because the carpets were up and the house full of echoes. To Thor's fevered imagination it seemed as if Claude dragged his feet like a man wearing chains, going hauntingly and clumsily before some ominous tribunal. The sensation, it was more that than anything else, caused the elder brother to withdraw into the depths of the library, where he turned on a light. The room, with its bare floors, its shrouded furniture, its screened bookcases, its blank pictures swaddled in linen bags, its long gaunt shadows, and its dead-and-are, suggested to itself horribly and ridiculously as a fitting scene for a crime. He might kill Claude with a blow, and if he turned out the lights and shut the door and stole back to his hotel, no one would ever suspect him as the murderer. The idea would be no more than grotesque had it not acquired a certain terror from the mingling of affection and anger and pity in his heart, at the sound of Claude's shrinking, clanking, advance. In proportion as Claude seemed to be afraid of him, he was the more aware that he was a man to be afraid of. The consciousness called him to get deeper into the dimly-lighted room, taking his stand at the remotest possible spot, with his back to the empty fireplace. But when Claude appeared, coqueless in the doorway, his head was thrown up defiantly in apparent efforts to treat Thor's entrance as unwarranted. What the devil are you doing here? Because of the semi-obscurity his face was white with a whiteness that quickened Thor's sympathy into self-reproach. What are you doing here? That's my business. He, making this reply, clung to the door and said, Claude seemed to take it for granted that they met on terms of hostility. Though he added, less aggressively, if you want to know, I'm packing up, taking the train for New York at one o'clock tonight. Thor endeavored to speak with casual fraternal interest. What brought you back? Claude took a time to light a cigarette, saying as he blew out the match. You? Me? I thought it might be someone else. Then you thought wrong. He walked to a metal ashtray which helped to keep the covering that protected one of the low bookcases in its place, and deposited the burnt match. He threw off with seeming carelessness as he did so. I know only one traitor to make me keep returning on my tracks. Because the impulse to violence was so terrific, Thor braced himself against it, standing with his feet planted apart and his hands clenched behind him till the nails dug into the flesh. He could not, however, restrain a scornful little grunt which was meant for laughter. You talk of craters. I keep quite about that, Claude, if I were you. You make it too easy for an opponent. Oh, well, Claude returned early. I'm used to doing that. I made it infernally easy for an opponent last winter. But then sneaking's always easy to a snake till you get your heel on him. And snarling's easy to a puppy till you've throttled him. And blusters easy to a fool till you let him see you held him in contempt. As to holding in contempt to comply with that game, Claude, you might find the competition dangerous. Claude came nearer the lighted cigarette between his fingers. Not on your life, that's one thing in which I'm not afraid to bet on myself. He came nearer still, planting himself within a few paces of his brother. His smile, his mirthless, dead man's smile, held Thor's eyes as it had held Lois's a day or two before. He made an effort to speak jauntily. Why, Thor, a volcanic on belch fire as far as I can spit contempt on you. There, take that! With a rapid twist of the hand he threw the lighted cigarette into Thor's face, where it struck with a little smarting burn below the eye. Thor held himself in check by clenching his fists more tightly and standing with bowed head. It was a minute or more before he was sufficiently master of himself to loosen the grip with which his fingers dug into one another, and put up his hand to brush the spot of ash from his cheek. Being in so great fear of his passions, he felt the necessity for speaking peaceably. What did you do that for, Claude? It's beastly silly. Oh, no, it isn't. Not the way I mean it. But why should you mean it that way? What have I ever done to you? Good Lord, what haven't you done? You've ruined me! The chant was so unexpected that Thor looked more amazed than indignant. Ruined you? Yes, ruined me. What else did you set out to do when you began your confounded interference? I didn't mean to interfere. Claude might have posed for some symbolical figure of accusation, as with hands in his trousers' pockets and classic profile turned in a three-quarter light, he flung his words and directed his glances obliquely and disdainfully at the brother who glowered with bent head. When you don't mean to go into a thing, you keep out. That was your place. Out! Do you get that? Out! But you're never satisfied to do you've made as vile a mess of everyone else's affairs as you've made of your own. Feeling some justice in the charge, Thor began to excuse himself. If I've made a mess of my own, Claude, it's because because you can't help it. Oh, I know that. No one can be anything but a damn fool if he's born one. All the more reason then why you should keep away from where you're not wanted. By a great effort Thor managed to speak meekly. How could I keep away when—when you're a rubber-neck bread in the bone? No, I suppose you couldn't. But you hate a spy and a liar, even when he can't be anything else. And the worst of it is— Oh, is there anything worse than that? There's this that's worse—that your spying and your lying weren't bad enough till you got me into a fix why I'd have to look like a cad when— The protest in his soul against the role he was compelled to play expressed itself in a little gasp when I'm—when I'm not one. The older brother found himself unable to resist the opportunity. If you look like a cad, I suppose it's because you've acted like a cad. It's the usual reason. Oh, there's cad and cad. There's a fellow who gets snulled up in the barbed wire because he runs into it. And there's another who deliberately lays the trap for him. The one can afford to crawl away with a grin on his face while the other lies scratched and bleeding. It seems to thaw that there was an opening here for a timorous attempt to cry quits. If it comes to the question of suffering, Claude, it isn't all on one side. You may be scratched and bleeding, as you say, and yet you can get over it. Whereas I'm, lame for life. Ah, don't come the hypocrite. If you're lame for life, as I hope to God you are, is because you've got a bullet in the leg, which is what anyone hands out to a poacher. Relatively gentle tone was again the effect of a surprise stimulated to curiosity. When was I ever a poacher? You were a poacher when you went making love to a woman who belonged to another man while you belonged to another woman. Very well, Thor said, quietly, after a minute's thinking. I accept the explanation, but I never did it. Then you did something so infernally like it that to deny it is mere quibbling with words. All the same, I insist on making the denial. Claude shrugged his shoulders. I'm not surprised at that. It's exactly what your type of ker would do. Unfortunately for you, I have the proof. The proof of what? Of your torturing a poor girl into saying she was willing to marry you, and then throwing the words in her teeth. It was from the flame in Thor's eyes that Claude leaped back a half-pace, though he steadied himself against a small table covered up from the accumulation of summer's dust by a piece of common calico. Giving himself time enough to have deliberately counted to twenty, Thor subdued the impulse of the muscles, as well as that of speech. Who told you that? he asked at last. In the tone he might have used of some matter of no importance. Who do you think? There's only one person who could have told you. Oh! you've met as much as that, do you? There is a person who could have told me. Yes, I've met as much as that, but you must have misunderstood her. Thor's dignity and self-restraint were not without an effect that might eventually have made for peace. Had not the brother's conscience been screaming for a scapegoat on which to lay a portion of his sins. For him alone the entire weight had become intolerable. Thor would be known to accept such precarious burdens before now. In the hope that he would do so again, Thor'd answered tauntingly. I don't misunderstand her when she said you were making me a cat's paw to do what you wouldn't do yourself. What kind of stuff are you made of, Thor? You go flaunting your money before a poor little girl who you know can't resist it. And then, when you get her willing to do God knows what, you push her off on me and want to pay me for the job of relieving you of your dirty work. After you've dragged her in the dust, she's still considered good enough for me. Stop! The roar of the monosyllable echoed through the empty house, while Thor strode forward the devil in him, loose. With the skill of a toro-door and throwing his cloak into the eyes of an infuriated bull, Thor'd snatched the calico strip from the table beside which he stood, and flung it in Thor's face. The result was to check the letter in his advance, giving Thor time to dart nimbly to the other side of the room. As Thor stared about him days by his rage, he bore out still further the resemblance to a maddened animal in the bull-ring. Fear struggled in Thor's heart with the lust for retaliation. Like Thor himself, he knew the minutes to be one in which he could work off a thousand unpaid scores that had been heaping themselves up since childhood. For the time being, it seemed as if he could not only make the scapegoat bear his sins, but stab him to the heart while he did it. Stop! he laughed shrilly. Like hell I'll stop! Did you stop when you went sneaking after Rosie Faye? Did you got her in a state where she wanted to kill herself? The red glare in Thor's eyes was an incentive to go on. Did you stop when you tried to father your beastly actions off on me and jiggle me into marrying the girl you've had enough of? Did you stop when you fooled Lois Willoughby into thinking you were saint and breaking her heart when she found you out? Look at her now! With the smothered oath Thor charged, as a wounded rhinoceros might charge, in a lond that would have borne his brother down by sheer force of weight had not clawed eluded him lightly. Once more, Thor shook himself stupified by his passion, blinded by the blood in his eyes. He needed an instant to place his victim, who, with his white face and wild terrified glances, had found a temporary shelter behind the barricade of the heavy library table. But before renewing his rush, Thor marched to the door that led to the hall, the only door to the room, locking it and pocketing the key. The muttered, "'By God, I'll have you now!' reached Thor's ears, bringing to his lips a protest which had not burst into words before the huge figure charged again. Behind his fortification, Thor was alert, dancing now this way and now that, as Thor brought his strength to bear on the table to wrench it aside. But by the time that was done, Thor was already elsewhere, overturning tables and chairs in his flight. Behind a sofa, Thor entrenched himself again, a small chair raised above his head as a weapon of defence. Thor sprang on the sofa, only to receive the weight of the chair in his chest, staggering him backward, while Thor bounded off to another refuge. Both were cursing inarticulately, both were panting at broken grunts and sobs. From both the perspiration in that airless room and in the heat of the July night was streaming as rain. The pursuit was like that of a leopard by a lion, the one lithe, agile and desperate, the other heavy, tremendous and sure. In darting from point to point, Claude found himself near a window, where he fumbled with the fasting and the hope of throwing up the sash, though wooden shutters defended the outside. Driven from this attempt, he made for the locked door, pulling at it vainly on the chance that it would yield. Seeing Thor bearing down on him with redoubled fury, he obeyed the impulse of the moment and switched off the electricity as he crept swiftly along the wall. In the darkness he stumbled to a corner where his laboured breathing could not but betray his hiding place. While he crouched in the corner, making himself small, he knew Thor was stalking him by the sound. He was stalking him, and yet in the inky blackness of the room, accurate hunting down was difficult. It was like a duel between blind men. Thor was moving uncertainly, pausing from second to second to fix the object of his search. In the mad hope of reaching the fireplace and creeping into the chimney, Claude wriggled from his corner along the floor, keeping close to the waynskirt. As he did so, he touched the legs of a footstool which suggested its use at once. Controlling the thumping of his heart and the pumping of his lungs as best he could, he got noiselessly to his feet. Inch by inch, slinging the footstool by a leg, he moved toward the spot from which Thor's panting breath seemed to proceed. If he could put batter in that long skull, he would be acquitted of responsibility on the ground of self-defense. But he was afraid of anything that approached the hand to hand. When it seemed to him that he could vaguely make out the swaying of a figure in the darkness, he hurled the missile with all his might, only to hear it crash into one of the covered pictures. Claude was disappointed, and yet in the din of the shattering glass he was able to escape again. He had lost all sense of direction. Even his touch on the furniture didn't help him, since everything was now displaced. Nevertheless, he continued to duck and dodge to wriggle and creep and allude. Once Thor's touch was actually upon him, but he managed to tear himself free with nothing worth the long rent in his shirt sleeve. Again Thor seized him, but only to tear his collar from the stud. A third time Thor's strong fingers were closing round his throat, and yet after a momentary choking groan he had been able to slip away. Never before had Claude supposed himself so strong. There was a minute where he had felt Thor's hot breath snorting in his face, and still was able to pick up a small round table on which his mother sometimes placed her tea tray, sending it hurtling towards his pursuer, checking him again. With a splutter of stifled oaths, Thor grasped the piece of furniture, throwing it violently back. Claude rejoiced as he crashed into a window and loosened the shutters outside, if he only knew which of the windows it was, there might be a chance of his getting out by it. With this possibility before him he took heart again. The sound of the breaking of the window enabling him to fix his whereabouts, he began feeling his way towards the unexpected hope of exit. It became the more urgent to reach it, as he guessed by the fumbling of Thor's hands along the wall, that the latter was trying to find the electric button so as to turn on the light. He groped, therefore, between the tables and overturned chairs, getting as far from his enemy as possible. If only his heart wouldn't pound as though about to burst from his body, if only his breath wouldn't weed itself out with a gurgle of water through a bottleneck. He couldn't last much longer. He was so nearly spent that if Thor kept up the attack, he must wear him out. In the end he must let those powerful hands close round his throat, as he had felt them close a few minutes before, while he strangled without further resistance. He felt oddly convinced that it would be by means of strangling that Thor's quiet, awful tenacity of revenge would wreak itself. During these horrible minutes Thor had the same conviction. All the force of his excited nerves had seemed to be centering in his hands, if he could only tear out that tongue which had hardly ever addressed him except with a sneer since it had begun to lisp. Now that the amazing opportunity was at hand, he wondered how he could have put it off so long, that he should do the thing he was bent on might have been written like a fate. It was like something he had always known, like something toward which he had been always working. The tenderness with which he had yearned over Thor never since the days when they were children seemed never to have any other end in view. So he stalked his prey while the minutes passed. Five minutes, ten minutes, perhaps more, perhaps less. He had lost all count of time. So he stalked him through the darkness round and round over tables and chairs into corners and out of them. The room was sealed, the house was empty, the grounds were large. They might have been in some subterranean vault. When the right moment came he would find the button by which to turn on the light and then revulsion came from the fact that he had accidentally put his hand on the button and lit up the spectacle of the room. At sight of it he could have laughed. Nothing but the big library table on one of the heavy arm-chairs stood on its legs. One of the windows had a gash like a grin on its prim countenance, and one of the pictures sagged drunkenly from its hook, a mere bag of gilded wood and glass. Carrying in a corner, Thor was again arming himself with a chair. It was not his weapon, but his whiteness that stirred Thor to a pity almost hysterical. One of his arms was bare where the shirt-sleeve had been torn from it. One side of his collar sprang loose from where it had been rested from the stud. His dips were parted in terror, his eyes starting from his head. The thing Thor could have done more easily than anything else would have been to fling himself down and weep. As it was he could only hold out his hands with a kind of shamed, broken-hearted appeal, saving. Claude, come here! Though his trembling hands dropped the raised chair, Claude shrank more desperately into his corner. When, to reassure him, Thor took a step forward, Claude moved along the wall, with his back to that protection ready to spring and dodge again. If he understood Thor's advances he either mistrusted or rejected them. Don't be afraid, Thor tried to say, encouragingly, but after the attacks of the past few minutes his voice sided hollow and unconvincing to himself. In proportion as he went nearer Claude sidled away, always keeping his back to the wall with gasps that were like groans. He spoke but once, Open that door! It was all he could articulate, but it implied a test of the brother's sincerity. Thor accepted it, striding to the threshold, turning the key energetically, and flinging the door wide open. The quiet light burning in the quiet hall produced something in the nature of a shock. He stepped into the hall to wipe his brow and curse himself. He could never win his own pardon for the madness of the past quarter of an hour. Neither probably could he ever win Claude's, they must go back and make the attempt. What happened as he turned again into the library he could never clearly explain for the reason that he never clearly knew. The minute remained in his consciousness as one unrelated to the rest of life with nothing to lead up to it and nothing to follow it. Even the savagery of their mutual onslaught had been no adequate preparation for what now took place so rapidly that the mind was unable to record it. As he re-entered the room Claude was standing by one of the low bookcases. So much remained in the elder brother's memory as fact. The vision of Claude raising his arm in a quick, vicious movement was a vision and no more, since on Thor's part it was blurred and then he faced in a sharp, sudden pain accompanied by a blinding light. Of his own act, which must have followed so promptly as to be nearly simultaneous, Thor had no recollection at all. By the time he was able to piece ideas together, Claude was senseless on the floor, while he was bending over him with blood streaming down his face. For the instant the brother was merged in the physician, to bring Claude back to life after the blow that had stunned and felt him was obviously the first thing to be done, Thor worked at the task madly, tearing open the shirt, chafing the hands and the brow, feeding the pulse, listening at the heart. Whether or not there was a response there, he couldn't tell. His only motion was too overpowering. His fingers on Claude's wrist shook as with a palsy. His ear at Claude's heart was deafened by the pounding of his own. Meanwhile Claude lay limp and still, dead white, with eyes closed and mouth a little open. Thor had seen many a man in a state of syncope, but never one who looked so much like death. Was he dead? Could he be dead? Had the great oath been fulfilled? He worked frantically, never till that instant had he known what terror was, never had he beheld so clearly what was in his own soul. As he worked he seemed to be looking in a mirror from which the passion-ridden fratricide whom he had always recognized dimly within himself was staring out. The physician disappeared again in the brother. Oh God! Oh God! he could hear himself breathing the words. But at what use were they? As he knelt and chafed and rubbed and listened, they came out because he couldn't keep them back. And he was accomplishing nothing. Claude was as still and limp as ever. Not a breath, not a sign, not a throb of the pulse, and the minutes going by. He dropped the poor arm that fell lifeless to the side and threw back his head with a groan. Oh God! If you're anywhere, give him back to me! The broken utterance was the first prayer he had ever uttered in his life. But having said it, he went on with his work again. He went on with new vigor and perhaps a little hope. He fancied he saw a change. It was not much of a change—a little warmth, a little colour, but no more than might have been created by a fancy. He ran for water to the nearest tap. In return to the library his foot struck something on the floor. It was the metal ashtray which had helped to keep the covering in place on one of the bookcases and into which Claude had thrown a match. The picture of a few minutes earlier reformed itself. Claude standing just there with the ashtray under his hand, the rapid motion of the arm, the paralyzing pain, the dancing light, and then the blow with which he must have hurled himself on Claude striking him to the floor. There was no time to co-ordinate these memories now or to attend to the wound in his own forehead. The explanation came of its own accord as he touched the ashtray with his foot, or dashing back to Claude's side. The change continued. There were positive signs of life. The mouth had closed. There was the faintest possible quiver of the lips. When he threw a little water into Claude's face there was the twitching of the muscles and a slight protesting movement of the hand. Thank God! He couldn't note the involuntary expression of his aggratitude which had nevertheless been audible. Claude had need of air. Taking him in his arms he lifted him like a baby and staggered to his feet. The body hung loosely over his shoulder as he crossed the room and laid it on the sofa. The broken window served its purpose now, for a little air was coming in by it through the spot where the wooden shutter had given way. Four succeeded in forcing the shutter altogether, letting the light summer breeze play into the marble face. Have you only had a little brandy? He summed up hurriedly the possibilities in the house, coming to the conclusion that nothing of the sort would have been left within reach. Even the telephone had been disconnected for the summer. It would be, however, an easy thing to run to his office. It would be the easiest still to run to his house, which was nearer. Claude was breathing freely now. He could be safely left for the few minutes, which was all he needed to be away. With a simple restorative the boy would soon be on his feet again. He pushed the sofa closer to the open window, needing once more beside it. Yes, the danger was passed. Thank God! Thank God! The words were audible again. It was deliverance. It was salvation. There was a positive tinge of colour in the cheeks. The eyes opened wearily and closed again. Four seized the two cold hands in his own and spoke. It's all right, old chap. Just lie still for a minute till I go and get you a taste of brandy. Be back like a shot. Don't move. You'll be all right. That is a fiddle when you've had something to brace you up. No answer came. But Thor sought for none. The worst was passed. The danger was averted. With the two cold hands still pressed in his own, he bent forward and kissed the pale lips with a life-giving kiss, such as Elijah gave to the Shunamite woman's son. Under the warmth of the imprint, Claude stirred again as if making a response. He ran, pantingly, like a spent dog. But he ran. He had no idea what time it was. It might have been midnight. It might have been near morning. He was amazed to hear the village clock strike ten, only ten, and he'd lived a lifetime since nine. He rejoiced to see a light in the house, though he would be up. As he drew near, he saw it was the light streaming from her room to the upper balcony outside it. When nearer still, he caught the faint glimmer of a white dress. She was sitting there in the cool of the night, as they had so often sat together in the spring. He called out as soon as he thought he could make her hear him. Lois, come down. The white figure remained motionless, so that as he ran he called again. Lois, come down. He could see her rise and peer outward. Still running, he called the third time. Lois, come down. I want something. I was hurried. O Thor, is it you? After which the figure disappeared in the light from the open window. She met him at the door as he ran up the steps. There was no greeting between them. He'd just breath enough to speak. It's Thor. He's down there in the house. He's hurt. I want some brandy. He was in the hall by this time, while she followed. His own appearance now that he was in the light drew a cry from her. But Thor, you're all cut and bleeding. He was now in the dining-room fumbling at a draw of the sideboard. Never mind that now. It doesn't hurt. I'll tend to it by and by. I must get back to Thor. Is it here? No, here. She produced the bottle of cognac from a cupboard, thrusting it into his hands. Now come. I'm going with you." They stopped for no further explanation. That could wait. Thor was out of the house tearing down the empty street, while she followed scarcely less swiftly. At that time of night they were almost sure to have the roadway to themselves. She lost sight of him as he turned in at the avenue, but continued to press on. That there had been a struggle between the brothers, she could guess. Though she let the matter pass without further mental comment. The fact that filled her consciousness was that in some strange way Thor was back, wild-eyed and bleeding. Whatever had happened, he would probably need her now, accepting the substitute for love. Halfway up the avenue she saw that both the inner and outer doors of the house were open, and that the electricity from the hall lit up the porch and steps. Thor was still running, but at the foot of the steps he surprised her by coming to a halt instead of leaping up them two or three at a time. Stopping abruptly, silhouetted in the spot of light, he threw his hands above his head as if he had been shot, and was staggering backward. He hadn't been shot because there was no sound. He hadn't even been wounded. Because as she sped toward him she could see him stoop, spring away, return, and stoop again. She was about to call out, her thought, what is it? When on hearing her footsteps he bounded to his feet and ran in her direction. Go back! he cried hoarsely. Go back! Go back, Lois! Go back! But she hurried on. If there was trouble or danger she must be by his side. He wheeled around again to that over which he had been stooping, but with a repetition of the movement of flinging up the hands. After that he seemed to crawl away till he reached the steps, where, putting himself halfway up, he lay with his face hidden. The thing he had seen was something fatal and final, leaving no more to be done. The thought came to her that if there was no more for him to do, it was probable that her work was just beginning, and that she must keep herself calm and strong. She came to him at last and bent over his long, prostrate form. It was wracked and heaving. The sobbing was of a kind she had never heard before, the violent, convulsive sobbing of a man. Raising herself she looked about for the cause of this grief, for a second or two, seeing nothing. The respite enabled her to renew her sense of the necessity laid upon her to be helpful. Whatever was there she must neither flinch nor cry out, she must take up the task where he had been forced to delay it down. It was a bare arm from which the shirt-sleeve had been torn away that caught her attention first. A bare arm with a spatter of blood on it, its leg extended along the grass just beside the driveway. She was obliged to take a step or two toward it before seeing that it was Claude's arm and that he himself was lying on the sword of the lawn with a little trickle of blood from his heart. She was not frightened, she was not even appalled. She understood as readily what she ought to do, as if the accident had been part of every day's routine. But as her glance went first to the dead brother and then to the living one, she knew that her substitute for love had been found. End of chapter 32