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BY
J. D. BERESFORD
The JervaisE COMEDY
AN IMPERFECT MOTHER


THE PRISONERS
OF HARTLING
BY
J: D. BERESFORD
'There is a sore evil which I have seen under the
sun, namely, riches kept for the owners thereof to
their hurt.
Ecclesiastes v. 13.
New York
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1922
All rights reserved


PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
COPYRIGHT, 1922,
BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.
Set up and printed. Published February, 1922.
Press of
J. J. Little & Ives Company
New York, U. S. A.


To
H. H. BASHFORD





Librarian
Wahr
8-3-25
12190





THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
D OG'S life, old man, a dog's life; you can't get
away from that.”
Arthur Woodroffe's voice was quite cheerful as
he framed this indictment of the life of a general
practitioner in a poor neighbourhood, but his com-
panion frowned and shook his head impatiently.
"You are still re-acting to the pernicious influences
of that damnable war," he said. “You're hankering
after the intoxication of saving wounded under fire;
exciting stunts of that sort; Sbana and Pharpar,
rivers of Damascus. You've got to learn to be
content with Jordan. Risk your life in more homely
ways saying the sick in Peckham. Same thing,
really; only you don't get orders for it. And of
course . .;" he hesitated, pushed up his gold-
rimmed spectacles, and stared hard at his friend
and paid assistant. “Any way, what is it you're
hankering after, my good chap?” he concluded.
Woodroffe looked critically round the little room,
and then at Somers glowering down at him from
the hearthrug. "More space,' he said briefly; "and
more ..." He seemed to jib at the word that ;
was obviously in his mind.
“More beauty," Somers suggested.
"If you like,” Woodroffe agreed carelessly.


4. THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"Something of that sort. I'd like to get about the
world a bit, too."
"As medical attendant to a hypochondriac mil-
lionaire ?"
"Or some job abroad; or ...".
“What you really want, my lad, is an independent
income and lots of leisure," Somers commented.
"You can't say I've ever been a slacker, Bob,”
Woodroffe said.
"No, but you'd soon pick it up if you had got
enough to live on without worrying."
Woodroffe considered that before he replied.
"Don't believe I should. Go in for research or
something. Hate having nothing to do.”
"There's always hunting and golf, and bridge
and billiards, and cricket, and so on,” Somers said.
"Life of a country gentleman. Also, you might
marry and beget a family, and go in for politics.
Quite a strenuous life it seems, for a lot of 'em."
"Bit of a change wouldn't it, after the life of a
panel doctor in Peckham," Woodroffe remarked;
but I don't think it's my style all the same. I'd
like to do something, something useful. And by
the way, old thing, if you're taking on Nellie
Mason, I'd advise you to turn in. I saw her this
morning, and she's pretty near her time. Rotten
job it'll be, too. But I'll take her on if you like.
A fat primip like her would be good for my char-
acter."
"No, I'll take it,” Somers said. "I promised her
I would. She thinks you're a bit young. All the
same, I'm not going to bed yet. I want to have
this out with you. It's interesting, for one thing.
I suppose nothing particular has upset you lately,
has it? Nothing that's set your mind roving."
"I don't know. Yes. In a way. Had a letter


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 5
this morning asking me to spend a week-end with
a wealthy sort of connection of mine in Sussex-
or Surrey, is it? Hartling's the name of the place.”
“Never heard of it, nor of your connection with
wealth," Somers said.
"It's a bit distant,” Woodroffe explained. “My
aunt, my mother's sister that is, married the old
man's son. His name's Garvice Kenyon. Ever
heard of him?”
Somers shook his head.
"It'd be a bit before your time,” Woodroffe
acknowledged. “The old chap must be about ninety.
I've only seen him once. I went there to stay with
my mother when I was a kid of about nine or ten.
Some idea of keeping up the connection, I suppose.
But after my father got that living in Yorkshire,
we dropped out. I don't remember much about
the place or the people. General impression of
grandeur, and so on, that's all. Mighty fine place,
I believe."
"How did you pick 'em up again ?" Somers asked.
"Well, I haven't picked 'em up again yet,"
Woodroffe said. "But I sat next to old Beddington
at that public dinner you took me to a fortnight
ago, and in the course of conversation—the sort
of tosh one does talk to your next door neighbour
on those occasions—he happened to mention that
he was going down to see old Kenyon. So I claimed
the connection for the sake of something to say,
After that Beddington talked a lot about Kenyon;
in fact he told me more than I had ever heard
before. And, well, I suppose in much the same sort
of way he must have talked to old Kenyon about
me, when he was down there. Anyhow, this morn-
ing I got a letter from my aunt-forwarded from
Holt's—Beddington probably told 'em I'd been in


6 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
the R.A.M.C.-asking me to go down there the
week-end after next. She says the old man would
be 'very interested to hear some of my war expe-
riences.' Bright old bird, apparently, for ninety.
Beddington said he was as fit as a flea, still, but a
bit absent-minded.”
“And the thought of going down there has un-
settled you, has it?" Somers asked.
"Don't know that I am going,” Woodroffe said.
“My togs are a bit rusty for that kind of show."
"I'd almost forgotten that one felt like that at
twenty-eight," commented Somers. “After the
war, too. Accept the wisdom of forty-five, my dear
boy, and believe me that rusty togs are quite dis-
tinguished these days."
"Makes you feel rotten, all the same," Wood-
roffe thought.
“But you still avoid the real issue,” Somers
persisted; "why this invitation has unsettled you."
"I don't know," Woodroffe said, settling himself
a little deeper in his arm-chair. “I suppose if one
analyses it, the thing set me thinking of-of the
differences between Kenyon's position and mine.
Here I am with no decent clothes, and no money;
sweating myself thin over a dirty job like trying to
mitigate the sickness of Peckham, while old Ken-
yon's got more money than he knows what to do
with."
"Incipient socialism, this," Somers confided to
the wall opposite.
"It isn't," Woodroffe said. “I've no sympathy
with the greasy proletariat; not my line at all.
It is that the whole thing has just set me wondering
how I'm going to get out of it. It's no damned
good pretending, my dear Bob, that I wouldn't
sooner be lying snug in a clean comfortable bed


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 7
than delivering women like Nellie Mason. And,
oh! Lord, the accent is on the clean all the time.”
"You don't mean to imply ..." Somers began.
“My dear chap, of course I don't,” Woodroffe
cut in. “My bed here is clean enough for any one,
but for about twelve hours of the day I am mixing
with dirtiness of every sort and kind, and I had
more than my fill of it in the war-lice by the yard
and every sort of filth. You blooming base-wallahs
never knew your blessings. Well, all I know is
that I used to tell myself stories of getting clean,
fantasy hot baths in exquisite surroundings, and
picture myself going straight from them into brand
new clothes and that sort of thing. Instead of
which I've dropped straight into this. I know I'm
clean all right, Bob, but I can't feel clean. You've
got to admit now, haven't you, that ours is a dirty
job, take it all round?" .
Somers put his hand under his coat and scratched
his left shoulder vigorously. “Oh! damn," he re-
marked, after a thoughtful interyal.
"I might come back to it, after a couple of years
or so," Woodroffe began again apologetically.
“But it's becoming almost an obsession with me
just now. I expect these psycho-analysis Johnnies
would say I was suffering from some suppression
or shock or something."
"You've definitely made up your mind to chuck
this job, then ?” Somers asked.
"I hadn't when we began,” Woodroffe replied.
“But talking to you about it seems to have cleared
my mind. Honestly I'd no idea of chucking it when
we started this jaw, and now it seems the only
possible thing to do."
"What are you going to live on?” Somers asked.
"I've saved between four and five hundred


8 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
pounds," Woodroffe said. “Carry me on for a bit,
though I suppose it isn't worth two hundred these
days. And then I might have a look round one of
the colonies, Canada or New Zealand, or some-
where. It'd be cleaner than Peckham.”
Somers sighed, and made a gesture of renuncia-
tion. "I'm sorry about this, Arthur," he said;
"very sorry-not only because I shall lose you-
though that's bad enough, but also, because, well,
your attitude disappoints me."
Woodroffe hunched himself in his chair and began
to fidget, touching various marks here and there
on the hearthrug with the toe of his slipper.
“You've always said we ought to express our-
selves,” he grumbled, “and here I'm going contrary
to my inclinations all the time. I haven't forgotten
your yarns on that subject at the hospital eight
years ago.”
"My dear old chap, that's the very point,"
Somers replied. “That's what disappoints me. I
thought you had something better to express than
these calf-like yearnings for change and luxury."
Woodroffe's handsome face had taken on the
expression of a sulky schoolboy. He was still intent
on tracing some ideal pattern in the design of the
hearthrug as he said: “Had nearly five years of
it. Over four years in the Army and six months
here. Don't see why in the name of God I shouldn't
at least get out into some clean, decent country like
Canada."
"I shan't try to stop you," Somers replied.
"All the same you're making me feel perfectly
rotten about it,” Woodroffe said. “Making me feel
as if I were a deserter, slinking off and leaving you
here. Might just as well say at once that you won't


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 9
let me go. Of course I shan't, now I know how you
feel about it."
Somers stared hard at the opposite wall, tucked
his hands under his short coat-tails, and as he spoke
alternately raised himself on his toes, and let him-
self down on his heels with an effect of emphasising
his points.
"I stand reproved, Arthur," he said. "I was
wrong-quite wrong. Purely selfish. I've been a
bit tired lately and bad-tempered.”
"Not you,” Woodroffe mumbled.
"I have,” Somers insisted. “I'm in a nasty mood
to-night.”
"I wish you'd let me take Nellie Mason,” Wood-
roffe put in.
"I can't. I promised her, five months ago.
Never mind that. We're talking about you. And I
want you to go. Yes; I mean it. You ought to go.
I'm a short-sighted old fool; much too wrapped
up in myself and my own affairs; but now that I've
heard the case stated I can see the truth. You'd
only stultify and repress yourself by staying here.
I know how loyal you are, and I know that at a
word from me you'd go on. You mustn't. You'd
do harm to yourself and to the practice by denying
your impulse. As you reminded me, that's a
well-established principle of mine, though I haven't
thought much about it for the last five years
there's been too much to do. The point is, however,
that you'll do no good to yourself or any one while
you're working against the grain. Fay ce que
voudra. It's possible that you may come a tre-
mendous cropper, and that might do you all the
good in the world. But go you must. I wouldn't
keep you now if you wanted to stay,”


10 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
Woodroffe had stopped fidgeting. "But look
here, Bob, old man,” he said. “As a matter of fact,
I can't go yet, not for a month or two."
“You can go to-morrow if you want to,” Somers
replied. “Bates wants a job and he'd be glad to
come.”
“Oh! Lord! Bates !” interjected Woodroffe.
“Yes, ohlordbates !” Somers corroborated him.
“Dear old wooden-headed, persistent, patient, un-
inspired Bates. He's just the man I want. The
panel patients'll love him, because he'll take so
much trouble over 'em. It's true that he'll have
to work eighteen hours a day to get through, but
he likes that sort of thing. Makes him feel as if
he were being some use in the world, poor chap.
Oh! yes, I can do with Bates, but God! I'll miss
you, Arthur.”
"I'm damned if I'll go," Woodroffe announced,
getting up. “Everlastingly damned if I will."
"You will, my son, because I won't keep you,”
Somers said. “But I don't say that I won't ever
have you back. That depends, of course, on how
you return to me. If you want to come back in
two, or three, or five years' time; just turn up and
say, 'Bob, I think I'd like to take up the old work
again! and we'll go into partnership.' You'll be
ripe for it. Now you've got to go and find out
what you are fit for. You're not just now fit for
this job or you wouldn't be feeling as you do about
it. I know you'd stay out of friendship for me,
but that's no good-no good at all. I'd sooner
have ohlordbates trying to be some use in the
world.”
Woodroffe sat down again and stared rather
gloomily at the pattern of the hearthrug. "I feel
rather a swine, all the same, Bob,” he said.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING II
“You won't in a month's time," Somers assured
him.
Woodroffe contemplated that remark for a mo-
ment and then smiled rather grimly. "In a way I
hope I will,” he said, “and in another way I hope I
won't. You needn't think it'll be a case of 'out of
sight, out of mind,' Bob; but I shouldn't care to live
permanently with the thought of myself as being a
swine for having left you."
"You're not leaving me, my dear man, I'm send-
ing you away for your own good and that of the
practice," Somers returned.
“Comes to the same thing. It means I've failed
you."
"It means that you've failed yourself," Somers
corrected him. “Now I want you to go out into the
world and find out where and why. You'll do it.
I shall expect you back sometime."
Woodroffe sighed and got up, but his face had
cleared. "I'll come back," he said; "but I'll admit
it's a relief to go in a lot of ways. I-good Lord,
I want more space," and he stretched out his arms
as if to demonstrate how very little space there was
in that small room.
Somers nodded. “That's settled,” he said. “And
I don't know that you could make a better begin-
ning, Arthur, than by accepting that invitation of
your rich connections for a week-end.”
“Oh! ah! I'd forgotten that,” Woodroffe said,
looked down at the knees of his trousers, and added
with a faint blush: "Might get myself some new
togs out of capital? I'm sure to want 'em sooner
or later. Only things are such a filthy price just now.
They rook you about thirty quid for a dress suit."
"I should certainly get some new togs," Somers
advised him. "Treat it as an investment."


12 THE PRISOVERS OP HARTLING
"Of course, if you put it like that," Woodroffe
said, with a grin.
"I'll take the responsibility of letting you squan-
der your capital," Somers replied gravely.
"Facetious old dog, you! Woodrofie returned.
"Like to pretend I'm still in leading strings, don't
you?"
"Lord, you're not ready for leading strings yet,"
Somers said. "Wait till you're weaned before you
try to walk."
Woodroffe thumped him playfully on the chest.
"Ohl go to bed," Somers growled. “I'm going
to try and snatch an hour before I'm fetched for
Nellie Mason; if I am fetched. Personally, I
shouldn't be surprised if it wasn't for another week
yet."
“Dog's life, old man, a dog's life," Woodroffe
commented as he left the room.
When he had gone Somers threw himself down
with a groan into the arm-chair. "I wonder how
long it'll be before he comes back?” he thought.
"If he'll ever come back ?”
In his mind's eye he had a disgustingly clear
image of the solemn, carnest face of young Bates.





ARTHUR WOODROFFE'S true defence of his
action in leaving Peckham did not occur to him
until after he had parted with Somers.
In the course of the ten days that had passed
since his sudden arrival at a decision, he had fallen
into a perfect intoxication of spending. In that
time he had spent over two hundred pounds. ·
And with that expenditure he had broken another
habit of thought. His early life had always been
overshadowed by the cares and threats of re-
spectable poverty, and when his last financial re-
sponsibility had been closed by his mother's death,
eighteen months earlier, he had continued to save
money, with the prudent thought that he might
presently need capital.
But just as he had suddenly and surprisingly
realised that there was no compelling reason why
he should stay on as Somers' assistant at Peckham,
so, also, he had realised when he began his shop-
ping, that he might, if he wished, do the thing in
style. He was beginning a new life. He was young
and competent, and he had a profession. He would
let the future take care of itself.
And here was one of his fantasies coming true;
he would have everything new and clean. He
remembered his dream of stripping naked and
plunging into a deep wide river, a sweet and rapid
flood of purifying water; of swimming many miles
until he came to a new land where vermin were
unknown; and of walking out of the river, cool,
15


16 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
and refreshed, to dress he had never told any one
that-in white silk from head to foot. Nothing
but the smoothest silk would do. He had seen
that silk in imagination glimmering with the sheen
of a fine pearl. He smiled now at the extravagance
of that fancy, but the temptation to buy an entirely
new outfit was too strong to be resisted. He had
deserved it. The impulse marked his real recovery
from the effects of the war.
The world owed him five years of youth! That
was the true defence of his action in leaving Peck-
ham. He saw his justification with astounding
clearness as he stod on Westminster Bridge looking
up the river, half an hour before his train was timed
to leave Charing Cross—the train that was to take
him to Hartling for his promised week-end. In a
re-action against his orgie of spending, he had come
as far as that by tram, lugging his new kit-bag and
dressing-case. The tram would have taken him
on to Charing Cross, but when it had stopped close
to his old hospital, he had felt an urgent desire to
see the river from the old standpoint. The thought
of his bags had not deterred him. He was bursting
with vigour and energy that morning.
Society, the World, Life owed him five years for
those he had given. The years from twenty-two
to twenty-seven. He had joined up in August,
1914, had been sent down to Salisbury Plain for his
training, and had been in France by the summer of
next year. He had been lucky in some ways. He
had not been wounded or gassed or suffered from
shell-shock, and in the following winter he had been
combed out and sent back to the hospital for two
years to finish his training, before returning to
France as a Lieutenant in the R.A.M.C. But


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 17
looking back now, it seemed to him that he had
had no relaxation in all that time. He had taken
the war too seriously and the shadow of it had lain
over him. If it had not been for that, he would not
have joined dear old Bob Somers on the very day
that he had been demobilised. He had got the habit
of being strenuous and self-sacrificing and all the
rest of it, and the habit, or whatever it was, had
apparently dropped from him almost miraculously
in the course of that conversation. It was unques-
tionably gone. He felt himself, unexpectedly and
delightfully, not only free but also young again. He
must write to Bob and explain that theory of the
lost years of youth and the world's debit account.
He would not be hard on his debtor. He would
not exact a full repayment of the original loan. He
would take only two years. After that he would
go back to the strenuous habit of self-sacrifice and
leave his youth behind.
He could recover the very spirit of it in this place.
How often he had glanced down from the end of
a ward and taken back to his work a picture of the
river, of the bridge, or of the Gothic dignities of
the Houses of Parliament. In retrospect those
pictures were all coloured with the vivid emotions
of youth. He could place some of them with the
distinctness of a clearly remembered dream. There
was, for instance, that wonderful morning in Feb-
ruary, mild and clear as a day in April, associated
with the thought that he was playing for his hospital
in one of the "Rugger" cup ties that afternoon.
Great days, those were; and in effect, he was
physically little older now than he was then. He
was splendidly fit.
He laid hold again of his two bags, and strode
triumphantly across the bridge.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 19
always hear you when you speak to him; but no
doubt that's because he's thinking o' something else.
He's not what you call deaf, not in the least.”.
"Good Lord. Wonderful !” Arthur commented.
His mind was engaged in framing a tentative essay
on the causes of disability in old age, more par-
ticularly with reference to arterio-sclerosis, but he
reserved that as being a shade too technical.
“Though there's no real reason, you know," he said,
"why we shouldn't live to be a hundred or even a
hundred and twenty. There's a fellow in Asia
Minor who is supposed to be a hundred and fifty."
"I suppose not, sir," the chauffeur replied without
enthusiasm, and added, apparently as an after-
thought, "You're a doctor, I was told, sir."
Arthur nodded. “I haven't come down here pro-
fessionally, though," he said.
"No, sir; I shouldn't say as Mr Kenyon had
much faith in doctors ..." The chauffeur's sen-
tence tailed off on a high note, with an effect of
there being more to come; also he reduced the pace
of the car as if he had something of importance
to add before they reached the house.
“I've wondered sometimes, sir,” he continued,
after a short pause, "whether he oughtn't toto
take advice, as they say. Them fits of absent-
mindedness I was telling you about, for instance,
come on very queer sometimes. It's like as if he
was sound asleep with his eyes wide open. Scared
me once or twice he has. I thought perhaps being
a doctor you might be able to say if it was anything
serious. Of course, being ninety-one ..."
Arthur would have liked to give a ready diagnosis
of this abnormal condition, but his expertise was
not equal to the task, and he fell back on the usual
defence of his profession.


20 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"Couldn't possibly say without examining him,"
he said. “It might be due to one of several con-
ditions."
The car running down a slight incline with a free
engine had almost stopped. The chauffeur appeared
to be deep in thought.
"At Mr Kenyon's age ..." he began tenta-
tively
"One would not expect him to be quite the man
he was at twenty-eight," Arthur supplied.
"Exactly, sir, one wouldn't," the chauffeur replied
in the tone of one aroused to a consciousness of his
immediate duties; and he let in the clutch and
speeded up the car with an effect of turning his
attention to more pressing affairs.
For the last quarter of a mile they had been
running alongside a high brick wall, and as they
now swerved in between a pair of wide-open iron
gates, Arthur realised that the rather ugly wall was
the boundary of Mr Kenyon's property.
The contrast between the outside and the inside
was, as perhaps it was designed to be, sudden and
startling. From the dusty side road flanked on
one side by that erection of crude brickwork, he
was transported without any kind of preparation
into a finished and extensively cultivated garden
of unusual extent and beauty. Seen from that
entrance by the little lodge, the garden wonderfully
displayed itself. It lay on a moderate slope, lifting
up in a steady rise from the entrance gates to the
climax of the house, that spread itself along the
crest of the hill with an effect of dignified watchful-
ness. And the designer of that garden had had fine
natural material to work upon other than the slope
that provided the excuse for that triple tier of
terraces with their shallow stone steps and low


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 21
balustrading. He had had, for example, a fine
selection of forest trees, elm, oak, and beech, with
as a contrast a plantation of larches and silver birch
bounding the estate on the east side. Also he had
had an abundance of running water. A little river,
its point of entrance hidden by the close shrubberies
and plantations that shut out all sight of the ugly
boundary wall on the garden side, cascaded not too
artificially, out of obscurity into the sunlight, ran
as a decently restrained little river for a hundred
yards or so between close-cut lawns, the upper one of
which was bordered by a row of graceful wych elms;
and then spread itself into an irregular lake, over
which the main drive to the house was carried by
the spring of a slender bridge. But any catalogue
of that garden's innumerable "features" must in-
evitably convey a false impression. Whoever had
planned it, had had the genius to conceive his effect
as a whole. It was arranged, composed, to display
itself from the entrance lodge as a broad mass that
was presented to the mind as a miniature park,
abounding with natural opportunities, which had
for many years been scrupulously kept, planted, and
mown. And seen thus on the broad, it could not
be classified as belonging either to the formal or
the landscape type; rather it had the air of a dili-
gently cultivated suburban garden enormously en-
larged. There was something new, bright, almost
deliberately factitious in its pretensions.
The chauffeur had but one comment to offer as
they spun up the long curve of the gravel drive to
the house. As they crossed the stone bridge over
the pond, he pointed to the right, indicating a
rough-cast and half-timbered building nearly hidden
by the trees of the larch plantation into which the
little river plunged out of sight.


22 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"Power house, sir," he explained. “We do all
our own Eghting and promoting by water-power.
Pleased to show you over, er, if you have time.
Nice little plant we're
Arthur found a sense of satisfaction in the
thought of the completeness of the place.


III





III
ARTHUR remembered the bridge and the lake
A now that he saw them again. He had had
some vague recollection of an immense sheet of
water and an equally immense bridge that he had
vaguely connected-he thought, mistakenly-with
his boyhood visits to Hartling. The only other thing
he remembered was a colossal elephant's pad in the
hall. He found it still there, and in the interval
of twenty years, it had diminished less than the lake.
The detail of the house itself had apparently left
little impression on his boyish mind. As he glanced
round the hall, he had an uncertain feeling of being
familiar with that massive staircase, but he had no
idea how the rooms were placed.
His bags had gone round to some other entrance
with the car; and as he gave his keys to the butler
Arthur realised the splendid support of his ex-
pensive outfit. It made a difference, gave him
assurance, a sense of being at home in these sur-
roundings. That outfit was worth the money if
only for the one week-end. It would have been
absolutely rotten to have spent his whole time in
trying to live down shabby clothes.
There seemed to be a perfect crowd of people
in the room into which he was shown by the butler
after having elected to go straight in to tea. He
presumed it was a regular week-end party.
His aunt got up when he was announced and
came across the room to greet him. She was a little
tired-looking woman with a distinct likeness to his
lected to do was shown but of people
25


26 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
own mother, who had died in the first year of the
war. He had always attributed that gray, pinched,
slightly distracted air, in his mother's case, to the
difficulties of life in a country parish on insufficient
means; but as his aunt had the same air it was
probably a family characteristic.
Mrs Kenyon's voice and manner also reminded
him of his mother.
“How you've altered, Arthur," she said in a low,
even voice.
"In twenty years, aunt,” he reminded her cheer-
fully, “one grows a certain amount.”
"I've seen you since then," she said quietly, "in
town. Your poor mother brought you to see me
off at Charing Cross: your first year at the hospital,
I think it was. Now, come and have some tea."
She led him towards the tea-table as she spoke,
and introduced him in passing to her husband, a
bald, rather untidy man, who was lying back in an
arm-chair. “How're you ?” he said indifferently
to the newly recovered nephew. "Little chap in
knickerbockers, about three foot nothing, last time
I saw you."
Arthur smiled his acknowledgment of this remi-
niscence with, he hoped, an effect of not caring
whether he was remembered or not. These people
were certainly not effusive; but probably this was
their usual manner. The more money you had the
less you troubled about manners and personal ap-
pearance. His uncle had been wearing a soft,
rather crumpled collar and old flannel bags. Miss
Kenyon, the eldest of the family, was presiding at
the tea-table. She was a tall, white-haired woman
of sixty or so, with what Arthur mentally described
to himself as a “domineering expression." She
hardly smiled as she shook hands with him,


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 27
"I remember your first visit here very well,”
she said, and he grasped at the opportunity to
avoid the usual futilities of an opening conversa-
tion.
"Only the vaguest recollection of it myself, Miss
Kenyon," he replied brightly, as he accepted the
tea she offered him. “I dare say that's because my
earlier memories have been rather overlaid by the
experiences of the last six years." He felt that he
had taken rather a sound line. He could see chances
of quite good talking ahead, supported by a backing
of medical and psychological authority.
Miss Kenyon, however, cut him off by saying in
her cold, clear voice, “One wouldn't expect you to
remember much, you were only five.”
He couldn't believe it. “Oh! surely a lot more
than that,” he protested. “About nine or ten, I
thought.”
"Jubilee year," Miss Kenyon affirmed quietly,
but with an air of final authority. "In August."
Arthur did not care to contradict her again, but
he was still unconvinced. “Was it really ?” he asked.
"Astonishing how one forgets !”
Miss Kenyon was not to be deceived by this
simulation of agreement.
"Don't you remember, Hannah?” she asked,
turning to her sister-in-law, who had sat down near
them, and was apparently brooding over the empti-
ness of life.
Mrs Kenyon started. “Remember, Esther? Oh!
when Arthur came before," she said. “Not very
distinctly, I am afraid. But he was quite a little
fellow, in a holland tunic. I remember that because
he got himself very dirty one morning, and poor
Emily hadn't got a change for him.”
Miss Kenyon nodded calmly. "In any case," she


28 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
remarked, "we can verify the date without difficulty.
I shall have a note of it in my diary.”
"Esther is always accurate in her facts," her
sister-in-law murmured. “Her memory is simply
wonderful.”
Miss Kenyon did not acknowledge this compli-
ment. She was looking out through the great
bay-window that was one of the principal features
of the room in which they were sitting. Her ex-
pression was one of conscious authority-supreme,
unquestionable.
Arthur felt snubbed, and, for the moment could
think of no other suitable topic of conversation.
Perhaps it would be advisable to admit that he was
wrong, before he tried another subject.
"Stupid of me," he tried. “But as I was saying
just now, the experiences of the past few years have
rather altered one's scale of values. I probably
mixed up my visit here with some other visit I
paid with my mother when I was a bit older. One
does that, sometimes.”
He paused. Miss Kenyon was regarding him
with a quiet, detached interest. It was evident that
she had no further intention of interrupting him if
he cared to go on talking, but that he must not ex-
pect any sort of response.
Arthur dropped his thesis with a slight sense of
irritation and turned to his aunt.
"Aren't there some cousins of mine I ought to
know?” he asked.
She indicated her two children with what Arthur
thought to be a singular lack of enthusiasm. “That
is Hubert by the fireplace. Elizabeth is over there
in the window. I will introduce you to them when
you have finished your tea.”
Arthur took stock of his two cousins with atten-


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 29
tion. He was beginning to wonder if he were not
in for an uncommonly depressing week-end. His
observations of the third generation did little to
reassure him.
Hubert was a young man of about twenty-five,
with a long, melancholy face. He was dressed in
rough tweeds, and wearing cloth gaiters, that gave
him the look of a man whose interests lay among
horses. And in Arthur's experience men who talked
about horses were quite unable to talk about any-
thing else. Elizabeth, a rather pretty girl, probably
two or three years younger than her brother, was
more interesting, but she, too, had the same ex-
pression of lassitude.
Arthur, still brightly aware of his newly recoy-
ered youth, felt as if he would like to take her by the
arm and run with her out into the sunlight; shake
her, make her sing and dance, force her to show
some signs of enjoying her consciousness of life.
"And the little man talking to Hubert, who is
he?” Arthur had no urgent desire to hurry the
introduction to his cousins, and he was thoroughly
enjoying the various cakes provided for tea.
He had not tasted cakes like these since the war.
Also, Miss Kenyon had now gone from the table
and left the room, and he felt more free to talk.
Aunt Hannah might be rather dull but she was ať
least reasonably polite.
"That's Charles Turner,” she told him. “He
married Mr Kenyon's second daughter, Katherine
-she's over there in the window by Elizabeth.
Charles is the uncle of the present Lord Greening,
you know."
Arthur did not know, but he nodded as he re-
plied, “Are they staying here for the week-end?”
“Oh! no," Mrs Kenyon said. "We all live here,
hep And the of enjoy and la into the take my recom


20 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
There is no one from outside here this week-end
-except yourself."
Was that the reason for their tepidity? Arthur
reflected. He was some one “from the outside"
intruding upon the family circle. Perhaps, in spite
of their wealth, the Kenyon family mixed very little
with the outside world. They were a complete
group living within the enceinte of that ten-foot
Þrick wall, self-sufficient, and it might be a little
self-conscious in the presence of a stranger. That
general air of lassitude and of-there was some
other element in it that he could not quite define-
might be the effect of shyness which, as he knew,
often took strange forms. Not that Miss Kenyon
had appeared to suffer from any known form of
shyness. She was evidently an overbearing woman.
"You're quite a large family party, aunt,” he
commented to keep the conversation going.
Mrs Kenyon blinked as if he had in some way
touched upon a sore subject. She gave, however,
no hint of that in her reply. "And there's Eleanor,
whom you haven't seen yet," she said. "She acts
as a sort of secretary to Mr Kenyon. She's the
daughter of James, the second son. He and his
wife are both dead, and so is their elder daughter
Margery.” She looked at her son as she added,
“Charles and Katherine have a son too, but he does
not live with us. He is acting as a clerk to a stock-
broker. Quite a good position, I believe. Have
you finished your tea? I am sure Hubert is waiting
to talk to you."
"All but, aunt," Arthur said. "Sorry to bother
you with all these questions, but I want to know
who's who to begin with. And Mr Kenyon? He
isn't down here of course."
"He never takes tea,” Mrs Kenyon said; "and


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 31
we don't see a great deal of him at any time. I
don't mean that he is in any way an invalid or a
recluse, you know, but at his age ..."
"Ohl precisely," Arthur agreed. His aunt's
sentence had tailed out into nothing, in much the
same tone as that of the chauffeur when he had
hesitated over precisely the same words. At his
age. ... The inference undoubtedly was that
anything might happen when a man reaches the
age of ninety-one.
"He keeps awfully fit, though, doesn't he?”
Arthur went on.
"Yes. He's remarkably well and active ..."
his aunt replied, paused again, and then concluded
firmly, “but you will see him at dinner.”
Arthur noted again that effect of some unstated
contingent.
Possibly his aunt, also, was a trifle uneasy about
the old man's health.
"I've really finished at last, Aunt Hannah," he
said, with a smile.
She did not return the smile, but rose at once
with an appearance of relief. Arthur felt as if he
ought to apologise for having bored her.
His cousin Hubert greeted him, as Arthur had
expected, without enthusiasm. He turned almost
at once to the Hon. Charles Turner, hoping that
there he might perhaps find some kind of response.
Turner was a small man whose age might have
been anything between sixty and seventy, but he
at least, obviously took trouble over his dress, and
his rather elvish face was crinkled into an expression
that gave promise of a rather satirical humour.
Once or twice Arthur had caught Turner's gaze.
resting upon him with a slightly quizzical look.
"You've gone in for medicine, I hear," Turner


32 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
began, asing kind oeople's come that aspect. There
began, and without waiting for a reply, continued:
“Depressing kind of profession, isn't it? Always
listening to other people's complaints ?”
Arthur had never considered that aspect of the
doctor's life. “Oh! I don't know," he said. “There
are other things besides diagnosis. I mean ...".
"Oh! quite," Turner cut in; “but you're always
with sick people. That's what you're for. Don't
you find yourself getting in the way of looking at
every one as a possible patient?”
“Lord, no," Arthur replied, laughing.
“You
don't get so wrapped up in it as all that."
"You don't, perhaps,” Turner said. “You're
young yet, and I dare say you can drop your work
when you are away from it. But I know a fellow,
a Harley Street specialist, great authority on the
heart ..."
"Sir Stephen Hunt?” Arthur put in.
“That's the chap," Turner agreed. "Well, he's a
terrible fellow. You'll see him looking round a
dinner table and spotting symptoms. I remember
sitting near him at dinner one night, and after the
women had gone, he leant over to me and said,
‘D'you know how long Lady Spendale has been
suffering from'-let's see what did he call it-some
sort of goitre ?"
"Exophthalmic, possibly," Arthur supplied.
"I believe it was. She had rather protuberant
eyes, I remember.”
“That's it," Arthur confirmed him.
"Well, naturally I didn't even know she'd got it,
if she had," Turner continued. “But what I mean
is-ghastly sort of life to lead, always trying to
spot something wrong with people's hearts or what
not. Now, d'you mean to tell me honestly that you
can help looking out for symptoms like that, more


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 33
or less ? Supposing I'd got protuberant eyes, for
instance ?"
"That's such a frightfully obvious thing," Arthur
objected. “As a matter of fact, there aren't so
many diseases that can be diagnosed like that at
sight. And-and-well, one rather gets out of the
way of looking for them when one's off duty. As
a student, I'll admit, one did a certain amount of
showing off; kind of a game, you know, trying to
spot the symptoms you'd just been reading up. But
one soon dropped that.”
"H'm! Well! And so you like doctoring, do
you? Got a practice, or what?” Turner asked.
"No, nothing at the moment," Arthur said.
"I've been helping a friend down in Peckham, but
I've chucked that for the time being."
"Loose end? What?” Turner inquired.
“Got some notion of going to Canada," Arthur
said.
Turner pursed his mouth and looked down at his
neat patent-leather shoes. "Fine climate and splen-
did opportunities there," he commented softly.
"Free, open-air life and all that sort of thing. Just
suit a vigorous young chap like you, I should say.”
Hubert Kenyon, who had been gloomily listening
to the conversation without attempting to join in
it, drew a long breath and exhaled it in a deep sigh.
"That how you feel about it?" Arthur inquired.
"I? Oh! How d’you mean?" Hubert asked.
"Blowing a bit, weren't you, at the mention of
Canada ?” Arthur said.
"Oh! That! I don't know,' Hubert replied,
without throwing much light on the meaning of his
sigh.
The conversation was dropping again. Arthur
felt the silence coming, and did not care. He was


34 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
a guest and it was the family's duty to entertain
him. But what was the matter with them all? Or
with him?
He looked down the room. Miss Kenyon had
come back, and they were all sitting about, reading
or working in an uninterested kind of way-doing
something or other as if it did not matter whether
the thing was done or not. What was it the place
and the people reminded him of? Yes! It was
that boarding-house he had stayed in at Scarbor-
ough one winter. He had been there for a week
with his mother. But that was a very different kind
of place, and those were very different people. This
room was beautifully designed and furnished, and
these relations and connections of his were all rich
and presumably care-free. Nevertheless there was
something that reminded him of that Scarborough
boarding-house. Something in the pose of those
indifferently diligent women, perhaps?
The voice of Hubert broke in on his meditations.
"I don't know what we're waiting here for?” he
said. “Care to come and have a look at the gar-
den?”
"Thanks. Yes, I should,” Arthur replied cheer-
fully.
He had it now. They all had the effect of waiting
for something; for some climax, or change, or in-
terruption; of waiting interminably for some known
or unknown crisis that might never develop. Mr
Turner was politely yawning as he stooped to pick
up the Times.


IV





THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 41
"I don't know that we'd got as far as a quarrel,”
he said. “I confess that my new-found cousin,
Hubert, annoyed me rather.”
Hubert raised his eyebrows. He had not moved
when Eleanor joined them, and still stood in that
uneasy looking pose of his. “Can't imagine why,''
he said. “Only asked him if he wanted grand-
father's influence to get a job anywhere."
Eleanor frowned faintly and shrugged her shoul-
ders. “Oh! my good Hubert, how unoriginal of
you,” she said.
Arthur was faintly perplexed by the adjective.
"As a matter of fact," he said, "I was just telling
Hubert that what I want to do is to go out to
Canada.”
Eleanor's expression perceptibly brightened. She
might have been the recipient of good news. "How
splendid," she said warmly, “to go to a new and
free country like that.”
Arthur accepted that statement as a true expres-
sion of feeling. There had been a warmth, an air
of admiring congratulation in her tone, that en-
chanted him after the chilliness of his reception in
the drawing-room.
"It would be rather a jolly adventure," he said.
"I've got enough money for my passage, and outfit,
and all that, and I don't suppose I should have any
difficulty in getting a post of some kind out there."
She was about to reply when Hubert unhitched
himself and remarking that he had something to do
before dinner, wandered aimlessly away in the direc-
tion of the lower garden.
For a moment the thread of the conversation
was broken. Both Arthur and Eleanor were watch-
ing the departing figure of their cousin, and, as often
tion of a momboth A


42 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
happens when a third person leaves a group, the
other two were aware of an impulse to speak of him.
"Poor old Hubert,” Eleanor murmured in an
undertone. "There's probably nothing in the world
he would like better than to go to Canada."
Arthur was surprised. He had already made
some sort of estimate of his cousin's character, and
sized him up roughly as a "feeble sort of rotter."
"Well, then, why doesn't he?” he asked.
"I shouldn't be surprised if he did," Eleanor
replied, looking thoughtfully across the formal
garden. “However, I dare say he'll tell you about
it himself when he knows you a little better. You're
—you're rather new to us just at present. We're
so secluded here. We don't very often see people
from the outside."
Arthur marked that repetition of his aunt't
phrase with a slight sense of uneasiness. “Queer
thing to say," he remarked. “Why from the 'out-
side'? Aunt Hannah used the same expression at
tea. Sounds rather as if you were all confined in a
prison or an asylum.”
Eleanor blushed and bit her lip. “Yes, it's a
stupid phrase,” she said quickly. "I didn't mean
it the least in that way. Only we are so—what
shall I say ?—so self-sufficient. We've everything
we want, nearly; and-oh! never mind. Is this as
much of the garden as you've seen?” She led him
across the little quadrangular enclosure as she con-
tinued: “I should like to show you my favourite
place, if you haven't been there yet. It's just a little
lower down, on the terrace, overlooking the stream
and the lake. And I want you to tell me about
Canada. You're a full-fledged doctor, aren't you?
Aunt Hannah said you wrote from Peckham. Were
you practising there?”


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 43
As they made their way to the terrace she had
indicated, Arthur told her something of his work in
Peckham and of his reasons for wishing to leave it.
He expected sympathy from her, but he found none.
"I dare say it was dirty," was her comment-his
insistence on that aspect had demanded a reply-
"but it was work, real work. You were doing some
good in the world.”
They had reached the terrace now, and from
where they stood they overlooked a croquet lawn
-Aush and smooth as a green carpet-bounded on
its further side by the row of wych elms and the
stream. Beyond, they could see the falling slope
of the garden down to the shrubberies that hid the
wall; but from this point there was no vista of the
rich Sussex landscape without.
Arthur sighed. "I had had six years of it,” he
said, “and I had a sort of feeling that I wanted to
-to recover my youth for a bit. I wanted to try
something of this sort for a change."
“Of this sort?" she repeated on a note of per-
plexity.
"I suppose it's impossible for you to realise what
it means to me," he replied. “You've had it
always. You think just because this is what you're
used to and perhaps tired of, that it's very splendid
and exhilarating to work in the slums. If you had
had my experience, you'd understand that to me this
garden seems a sort of Paradise. You can't appre-
ciate the attractions of this sort of life unless you
come in, as I do—from the outside.”
She was obviously troubled by that outburst.
"And how long do you think you could stand being
shut in here?" she asked, after a pause.
“At this moment, it seems to me that I could
stand quite a lot of it,” Arthur said.


44 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
He knew that he was not saying the things she
wanted him to say. He could feel her longing to
hear him disparage the delights of Hartling and
enlarge upon those of what she had called "real
work.” But her very urgency made it impossible
for him to respond in his present mood. Also, he
was aware of a curious desire to contradict her,
even to hurt her. It was, as he put it to himself,
all very well for her to talk about things she knew
nothing about. He looked at her with a new criti-
cism, and her youth and freshness seemed almost
an offence. The whiteness of her hands, the spot-
lessness of her pale gray linen dress, the clearness
of her complexion and of her blue eyes, even the
lines of her firm, well-nourished young figure were
all effects of the protected life she had lived. It
was not for her to find fault with him for wanting
some share of the luxury that to the Kenyons had
become commonplace.
"You surely don't mean that you would care to
stay—to live here?” she was saying.
The little bark of laughter with which he replied
held a note of derision.
"Does it seem so extraordinary," he said, "that
after five years of dirt and disease and unmention-
able minor tortures, a man should hanker after a
little cleanliness and comfort?".
She shook her head. "No, no, of course not,"
she said. "I didn't in the least mean that. I'd
like you to have a rest. You've earned it. It's
just that ... this sort of thing can't go on always.
You wouldn't like, would you, to stay here in-
definitely, even if you could ?”
He knew that he was being a trifle perverse as
he answered that. "Too good to be true," he said.
She looked at him again with that look of earnest


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 45
inquiry with which she had first greeted him. "If
you really think that ..." she began, and then
stopped abruptly. “We ought to be getting back,"
she went on in another tone. "Dinner is at eight.
We shall only have half an hour to dress. You'll
see my grandfather this evening. He sent you a
message and I came out to give it to you, but ...
However, he told me to ask you if you couldn't
stay on for a day or two; whether you need go back
to town on Monday ? I'll tell him what you've said.
Do you mind if I go on? I have one or two things
to see to before dinner.”
Before he had time to answer, she was running
back towards the house. She ran lightly and grace-
fully, with the ease and vigour of an active girl of
twenty.
Arthur following, kept her in sight as long as he
could.
"Rather a ‘ripper,'” was the comment that came
first to his mind. It was followed by the determina-
tion to stay at Hartling as long as they could put
up with him-or he with them. In his thought of
"them” he was picturing the “crowd" he had met at
tea-time.
Dressing for dinner was a delightful experience.
Eleanor, whether deliberately or not, had made a
mistake in the time, and when Arthur had found
his room with the help of the butler, he had a full
thirty-five minutes in which to dress.
The first five of them were spent in a blissful
revel in his surroundings. He had a bathroom all
to himself-a perfect bathroom with white walls
above a tiled dado of pale green that curved round
smoothly at its base to form a tiled floor of the
same colour. The bath and lavatory basin were of


46 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
white porcelain with nickel-silver taps, and the
ample bossy towel rails heated by hot water, were
also of nickel silver.
And his bedroom was so bright and exquisitely
clean. It was done in the modern style with simple
effective furniture almost devoid of mouldings.
The motive of the colour scheme was an unob-
trusive blue, taken up in the carpet, the faintly
patterned wallpaper and the linen curtains at the
window. And from the window itself, the approach
to which was not encumbered by furniture, he
could look out above the shrubberies and the wall
and catch glimpses between the trees of the great
swelling lines of Sussex, of the immense background
and setting of this jewelled Hartling garden.
He leaned out and sniffed the sweetness of the
evening air. Twenty-four hours ago, he had been
in the midst of London foulness, irritable with the
grit and dust of a hot evening in late May. Now
he had this freshness and sweetness to savour and
delight in. The contrast was that between Hell
and Heaven. Already his skin felt cleaner.
With a sudden whoop of joy he came back into
the room and began to strip himself. He would
have a bath at once, and another when he came to
bed. Lovely hot water, nice soap, and splendid
warm towels. Ripping house! Would he stay as
long as he could ? Wouldn't he rather! He would
stay altogether if he had the chance. Lord, what
fools these people were downstairs, not to know
when they were well off.
He was putting on his dinner jacket as the second
gong sounded, and he tore down the stairs just in
time to join the straggling procession that was
crossing the hall. They had not waited for him,


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 47
He caught his uncle looking at him with a smile,
and ranged himself beside him.
"Feel pretty young, what?” his uncle said with ..
a chuckle.
* "Fairly fresh,” Arthur agreed. “Jolly place,
this." .
“Yes, fine place,” his uncle admitted.
Arthur, remembering that his uncle was the
eldest son, and would probably inherit the property,
decided that he was a person to be propitiated.
Also, he seemed, on the whole, to be less inimical
than the others.
When they reached the dining-room, Arthur had
his first sight of the founder and head of the House
of Kenyon.
He was already seated at the far end of the long,
narrow table, and as the family went to their places
he watched them with a calm paternal smile of
satisfaction. Then, almost by chance it seemed, his
glance rested on the new-comer, and his expression
changed to one of more vivid interest. He made
a slight inclination of the head in Arthur's direction,
and turning to his daughter-in-law said in a clear,
thin voice :
"Hannah! Bring Arthur Woodroffe up and in-
troduce him to me."
He called it an introduction, but there was,
Arthur thought, a dignity about the formal request
that gave the function almost the air of a presenta-
tion.
But here, at least, was no sign of that aloofness
which had marked his reception by the rest of the
family. The old man was gracious and friendly.
"Eleanor gave me your message,” he said. "I'm
so glad that you will be able to stay with us for a


48 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
few days. We must have a talk. I want to hear
something of your experiences in the war. But not
to-night." His smile had again that gentle, pater-
nal quality as he concluded with a nod of dismissal.
"You must indulge the humours of a very old man,
and let me choose my own time."
Arthur went back to his place at the other end
of the table, with a faint sense of awe.
Mr Kenyon was certainly a wonderful old man.
Arthur's mind reverted continually to that thought
in the fairly long intervals between the snatches of
polite conversation he held with Miss Kenyon, who
was on his right at the foot of the table, or with
his pretty but uninteresting Cousin Elizabeth on
his other side. Hubert, who was immediately op-
posite, was plunged in a melancholy silence.
But in what, precisely, the wonder of Mr. Kenyon
lay, Arthur was a little uncertain. His appearance
was certainly striking. He had abundant white
hair, not dead white like his eldest daughter's, but
with the smooth sheen like the gloss of a pearl,
and with something too of an old pearl's cream in
the colour. His eyes were a pale blue, with a hint
of brilliance that was lacking in his daughter, who
greatly resembled him in many ways. But the
queer thing that Arthur presently disentangled from
his analysis was that the old man, in spite of his
alertness and vigour, looked his age; looked, indeed,
as if he might have been any age. His skin was not
so much lined as crinkled. There were no deep
furrows in his face, but the skin had the appearance
of a piece of paper that had been crushed into a
tight ball and then partly smoothed out. He
seemed to have arrived at a stage in which he might
remain indefinitely. He had achieved a physical
type of the old man. He might very well look


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 49
precisely as he did now, in ten, twenty, or fifty
years' time.
Yet, when all the effect of his appearance had
been allowed for, there remained a cause for wonder
about him that had not been explained. He was so
amazingly self-confident and serene. With all his
air of gentleness and affection, he had some quality
of supremacy.
Two things Arthur noted in the course of dinner,
that gave him still further material for reflection.
The first, in so far as its immediate consequences
were concerned, he could not understand.
The older generation at the further end of the
table had been talking about Italy, and Arthur's
uncle had apparently come to life and began an
enthusiastic account of the beauties of a North
Italian spring. He was talking, Arthur thought,
surprisingly well. He had evidently the eyes of an
artist for colour. Moreover, there was an emo-
tional undertone in his descriptions that made them
peculiarly vivid.
And then old Mr Kenyon, who had been listening
with a kind, approving smile, said gently :
"I have often wondered, Joe, why you don't live
in Italy. I feel that, in many ways, you would be
more at home there than here.”
It seemed such a friendly, fatherly speech, but
the effect of it was as if his son had been brutally
reproved. He coloured slightly, hung his head, and
went on with his dinner in an embarrassed silence.
He had the look of a man who was thoroughly
cowed. His sister, Mrs Turner, who was sitting
on his right, also looked rather embarrassed.
The second observation was of another kind.
The entrée had just been removed when Arthur
became aware of a curious hush that had fallen upon


50 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
the room. The service throughout had been quiet,
unostentatiously efficient, but now the butler and his
two attendant parlour-maids were moving about on
tip-toe, and every sound of conversation had ceased.
* Instinctively Arthur looked up the table at Mr
Kenyon.
He was leaning back in his chair, his hands clasp-
ing the arms, his eyes were wide open, but stared
unseeingly down the room. He looked like a man
in a trance; it flashed into Arthur's mind that he
looked like a dreaming god.
The servants were standing now by the sideboard,
doing nothing. And for perhaps a couple of min-
utes the progress of the dinner was suspended.
Every one sat in silence and waited until the dream-
ing god smiled and leaned forward again in his
chair. He came back to his world with no sign of
disturbance or shock. He was to all appearances
unaware of the interval that had passed. And
immediately, with a quiet inevitableness the sub-
dued sounds of footsteps and low conversation
crept back into the room.
Arthur remembered the remark of the chauffeur
who had driven him from the station. What was
it he had said? "It's as if he were sound asleep
with his eyes wide open." That explanation did not
satisfy Arthur's feeling for physiological proba-
bility. He wondered if it might be a case of petit
mal, minor epilepsy?
He looked round the table and thought that he
could detect a general air of demure resignation in
the bowed faces around him. Ninety-one! They
were all remembering that the old man was ninety-
one. Anything might happen at that age!
He glanced across the table again and saw that
Eleanor was watching him. He smiled at her, but
IT


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 51
the smile with which she answered him had no
warmth in it. It was nothing but a polite response.
How jolly she looked in that soft white dress!
He returned to the enjoyment of his dinner,
which seemed to him to be the best he had ever
eaten. It was a simple dinner: soup, entrée, a
saddle of mutton, sweet, savory, and dessert; but
it was perfectly cooked and served. The clear soup
had had wine in it, and a flavour that was at once
delicate and strong; the entrée had had just that
touch of piquancy that gave one an appetite for the
joint. And the saddle was a joint to remember,
so firm and tender, its richness nicely mitigated by
the new potatoes and green peas that accompanied
it. Arthur had a palate and could appreciate these
good things. Also, although he had had a limited
experience of wine, he knew that the claret was no
ordinary vintage. It had an aroma like fruit. At
dessert there were magnificent strawberries. Arthur
found a justification for the theory that such things
as new peas, potatoes, and strawberries taste better
in the third week of May than at the end of June.
It was, he decided, because they brought a fore-
taste of summer, and the anticipation has always
some exquisite flavour that is lacking in the present
reality. He was pleased with this conceit and tried
it on Miss Kenyon.
She regarded him thoughtfully. "It may be true.
when one is under forty," she said. “After that,
one prefers to live in the present.”
He was emboldened by the claret to press the
old psychological truism to its conclusion. “And
later still there comes a time, I believe, when one
lives chiefly in the past," he hazarded.
“It may come to some people," Miss Kenyon
said, and glanced at her father down the length of


52 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
the table. She had an unimpeded sight of him
above the low silver dishes of fruit, that with their
reflection in the rich dark mirror of the polished
mahogany were an ample decoration.
Arthur had not enough courage to name the
exception she so obviously had in her mind.
Over the dessert and the coffee and cigarettes
that followed before Miss Kenyon rose from the
table, Arthur at last discovered a subject for dis-
cussion with his cousin Elizabeth. She was, it
seemed, an expert croquet player, and wanted to
play in tournaments. She grew quite animated in
her talk of the game, although her technicalities
were beyond his knowledge.
"I'll teach you, if you like," she said. “It'll be
jolly to have some one new to play with. None of
the others are any good really."
"I expect I'd pick it up pretty quickly," Arthur
replied with a touch of pique. "I'm fairly good
at those sort of games, billiards, and golf, and so
on, you know."
Elizabeth smiled the condescending smile of the
expert. "It's chiefly a matter of constant practice,
of course," she said. "I generally put in a couple
of hours every day.”
In his heart Arthur thought that croquet was
rather a piffling game, and had an inner conviction
that he would very soon be able to give his cousin
a good match. He made an appointment with her
to take his first lesson the next morning. The
Kenyons were not Sabbatarians. “No one goes to
church, hardly, except mother," Elizabeth told him.
Later he discovered another example of expertise
in the family. Old Mr Kenyon did not accompany
his family to the drawing-room, and after a few
aimless minutes, in the course of which most of the


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 53
family settled themselves down to the same occupa-
tions that had engaged them after tea, Mr Turner
came across the room and asked if he would "care
for a game of billiards.”
Arthur assented with enthusiasm. He rather
fancied himself as a billiard player, and in any case
there was nothing else to do. Presently he might
get up a flirtation with Elizabeth, but the beginning
of that could very well wait until the croquet lesson.
She had looked up at him and smiled as he was
leaving the drawing-room, and he had returned the
smile and waved his hand.
Eleanor, presumably, was with her grandfather.
His evening's billiards served him as an object-
lesson, in how the game ought to be played. After
the first game, Turner gave him two hundred start
in three hundred up; a handicap that produced a
fairly close finish.
Turner admitted that he kept himself in practice.
"Nothing much else to do,” he explained," "except
get licked by Elizabeth at croquet.”
"And what's your game?" Arthur asked Hubert,
who had strolled in while they were playing and had
been marking for them.
"Play golf a bit,” Hubert said. “There's quite a
decent course about a mile from here. I go over
most days. Give you a game any time you like."
"Well, I didn't bring any clubs down,” Arthur
replied. “Had no practice to speak of, you see, in
the last six years, but I used to be rather keen.”
“Hubert is hot stuff," Turner commented. “Plus
two, isn't it, now, Hubert?”.
"Three, since I won the last medal," was his
nephew's reply.
"Good Lord! Why that's Amateur Champion-
ship form," Arthur exclaimed.


54 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"Oh! hardly that!" Hubert thought. He ap-
peared to be quite indifferent to Arthur's admira-
tion.
When he was alone in his delightful bedroom,
Arthur made a reflective audit of his day's experi-
ence. The balance he arrived at was that he would
thoroughly enjoy his visit to Hartling.
Miss Kenyon was rather a dragon-a cold,
practical woman, probably a very good manager,
was his estimate of her and none of them had
been particularly cordial to him, although old
Turner had relaxed to a certain extent when they
were playing billiards. But there were overwhelm-
ing compensations to set against this small dis-
couragement.
He looked round his bedroom and drew a deep
breath of contentment, then went into the bath-
room and turned on the hot water. The window
was open and he drew back the curtain and leaned
out. What a comfort it was not to be overlooked,
to know that there was nothing out there but the
sweetness and serenity of the night! It gave him
a sense of freedom and cleanliness, of being in touch
with Nature.
But when he was in his bath his thoughts turned
back to less æsthetic compensations. The great and
essential question of what he was going to do at
Hartling, had been solved for him. There would
be games, a succession of games of various kinds,
to be played with skill against opponents from
whom he would be learning all the time. (That old
chap Turner was a fair nailer at billiards ! He
played all his shots with "drag" like a profes-
sionall) He would not, of course, be able to im-
prove his own game appreciably in three or four
days, but with luck he might be asked to stay a


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 55
week. He would accept like a bird if they did ask
him. ... He must try to entertain the old man
when that promised talk came off. He was evi-
dently the boss still, in spite of his age. The invi-
tation to stay had come straight from him. He was
an impressive old fellow too, with a remarkable air
of dignity and what one spoke of vaguely as "per-
sonality." He gave you the feeling that he would
get his own way about things. ... His eldest son
did not take after him. Rather a sloppy chap,
Uncle Joe. His tie had been all round his neck by
the end of dinner. Funny the way he had shut up
about Italy. He was probably only a gasser, and
did not in the least want to live there. He would
certainly let the property down when he came into
it, unless he had some one to look after it for him.
Arthur had a contempt for slackness. His opin-
ion of his cousin had gone up a hundred per cent.
since he had learnt that Hubert's handicap was
"plus three.” That was a form of efficiency.
Melancholy-looking devil, though. They were all a
bit on that side for some reason or another; looked
depressed and bored, as if they were tired of waiting
for something ... except Eleanor. She was dif-
ferent from the others. Different, but not neces-
sarily nicer. There was a touch of the school-
mistress about her. She wanted to do what she
thought were the right things.
Elizabeth might be amusing when one got to
know her better,








ARTHUR saw very little of Eleanor and old Mr
A Kenyon in the course of the next few days.
They had lunch and dinner with the family, and once
or twice he caught sight of them in the garden while
he was playing croquet with Elizabeth; but on none
of these occasions did he find an opportunity of
speaking to either of them. Meanwhile, he was
improving his acquaintance with the other members
of the party permanently assembled at Hartling;
although further than that he was unable to go.
He had revised his first impression of them as being
definitely inimical, but they remained acquaintances.
His uncle and Mr Turner had come nearest to
passing beyond the limitations of polite intercourse;
and the latter had shown an interest in Arthur's
plans for the future; had, indeed, discussed with
him the prospects of getting an appointment in
Canada, and promised him two or three introduc-
tions. But the point at which he and all the others
had drawn back, had been the returning of any sort
of confidence. They offered none, and put him off
if he attempted any question. They left him with
the impression of some important reserve behind
all their treatment of him. It was as if they all
shared some secret that he could never know. When
he was with them he could never forget that he was
an outsider, not one of the family.
He had even been aware of that reserve as a
check upon the development of his flirtation with
Elizabeth. She at once encouraged him and kept
him at a distance. She might have been a princess


60 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
of the blood, amusing herself with a member of the
nobility whom she might know but could never
marry. He had been definitely piqued by that at-
titude in his own first cousin, and had tried to break
down her defence, to claim her as an equal and a
contemporary. So far, however, that attempt had
been a failure. She had not apparently resented
his overtures, but they had not advanced his
intimacy with her. There was some invisible bar-
rier always between them, a barrier that seemed to
be essential and permanent.
He was sorry because he believed that he was
ready to fall in love with her if she would let him.
She was certainly pretty in a general sort of way,
with brown eyes, rather dark hair, and a fair skin
that had freckled over the bridge of her snub nose.
And her mastery of the game of croquet had been
a revelation to him. He had realised on that first
Sunday morning how scientific a game croquet could
be, played on that perfect lawn. She was as much
his superior, hopelessly beyond rivalry in her own
game as Charles Turner or Hubert were in theirs.
Her tennis was fairly good, too; quite as good as
his own, but she complained that she got no practice.
Hubert played, but none of the others, except
Eleanor, who seldom had any time for games.
Arthur was taking a lesson from Mr Turner in
the billiard-room at a quarter to seven on Tuesday
evening when Eleanor came in to him with a
message.
She waited while her uncle played his shot and
then turning to Arthur said :-
"Would you mind dressing early to-night, Mr.
Woodroffe? My grandfather thought he might
find a chance of talking to you before dinner.”


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 61
"Ah! yes, of course," Arthur agreed. "I'll go
now." He could have no doubt that this was a
command. Turner had put down his cue as if he
had been prepared for some such developement as
this, and took no further interest in the game.
Nevertheless there must have been still something
that he did not know, for he looked at Eleanor
with raised eyebrows, plainly hinting a question
the nature of which she, presumably, could gress;
although the slight shrug of her shoulders with
which she replied intimated that she did not, as yet,
know the answer.
Arthur pondered that exchange of signals as he
dressed. He had begun to wonder whether he
might not find an explanation of various things that
had puzzled him at Hartling; in the desire of the
Kenyons to conceal a family secret. Was it not
possible that the head of the house was slightly
insane? If that were so, everything could be
accounted for: their references to people coming
in “from the outside”; their half-suspicious reception
of himself; the separation of the old man from the
family-life except at lunch and dinner; the constant
attendance of Eleanor. ... Arthur was inclined
to believe that he had guessed the riddle, and
resolved to be very observant during the coming
interview.
He was tying his bow when some one knocked
at his bedroom door. He guessed that it was
Eleanor come to fetch him, and snatching at his
waistcoat, called out, “One minute! I won't be a
moment.” But when he opened the door a few
seconds later, he was amazed to find old Mr Kenyon
himself standing outside.
“I'm sorry, sir, I didn't realise ..." Arthur
began.


62 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
The old man waved aside his apology. "I quite
understand," he said. “Naturally you were not
expecting me. May I come in ?".
"Oh! please. Yes, do," Arthur responded. He
felt embarrassed by this strange mark of favour.
He had pictured the promised interview as likely
to be something of a function. Was it possible
that the old man had temporarily escaped from his
keeper?
Mr Kenyon had seated himself in a little chintz-
covered arm-chair and appeared quite at his ease.
“We shall be quieter here,” he said with a smile.
“Smoke if you want to. I haven't smoked now
for fifty years, but I don't at all dislike it."
Arthur took advantage of this indulgence with
a faint smile at the whimsical reflection that the
old man had abandoned the habit of smoking more
than twenty years before Arthur himself had been
born. Mr Kenyon apparently read the young man's
thought, for he went on :-
“Yes, there is a long gap between you and me,
Woodroffe. I was born in the reign of George the
Fourth. And I have no doubt that you find it a
little difficulty to realise that I still keep in touch with
present-day affairs.”
Arthur, with his new suspicion fresh in his mind,
was watching the old man with a more or less in-
formed eye, and although he could find at present
no least confirmation of his theory, he thought
there would be no harm in attempting a leading
question.
"Do you really, sir?" he commented. “You
mean that you can still take a pleasure in reading
about modern life, and hearing about it?”
"And in living it," Mr Kenyon said, with his
gentle smile. "You must not suppose that I keep
Little difficu And I haporn in the between yo


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 63
myself shut in here. I often go to town in the
car. More often, in fact, than any other member
of the family.”
"You must have a perfectly marvellous constitu-
tion, sir," Arthur said.
Mr Kenyon slightly shrugged his shoulders. “It
seems a commonplace to me,” he returned. “Per-
haps because I have always had it. I have never
been ill. But I did not come here to talk about my-
self. I am more interested in you. I want you to
tell me something of your experiences in the war;
and then ..." He broke off suddenly. His keen
blue eyes were intently watching Arthur's face.
"And then, sir?" Arthur prompted him.
Mr Kenyon's expression of watchfulness relaxed.
“And then," he said graciously, "something of what
you intend to do in the future.”
Arthur would have preferred to take the second
point first. He had already abandoned his theory
of insanity. And it had come to him with an ex-
hilarating sense of certainty that Mr Kenyon in-
tended to "do something for him.” When the old
man had concluded his sentence, he had worn the
benign, generous air of patron.
"Well, you see, sir, I joined up in August, '14,"
Arthur began, meaning to get the history done
with as quickly as possible; but Mr Kenyon pulled
him up before he had gone very far with the brief
outline he had intended to draw of the main facts
of his experience.
"Then you saw service in the trenches ?” he put
in, and when Arthur admitted that he had, began
to pose some very shrewd questions as to the effect
that terrible experience might have on a young
man's nerves and temperament.
"But you, yourself, came through without any


64 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
le
permanent disaffection ?” he continued, after Arthur
had let himself go a little on the pathology of war-
shock.
"Absolutely, as far as one can judge, sir,” Arthur
replied.
Mr Kenyon nodded. "I believe it is true, is it
not,” he asked, “that the really normal man was not
subject to these nerve troubles ?".
"As far as we know, sir," Arthur replied. "It's
the general theory that in the bad cases of psycho-
neurosis, there was always a predisposition before
the man went out.”
He would have gone on with a youthful pride in
his knowledge to elaborate the theory, but Mr Ken-
yon switched him off by saying, with a change of
tone that suddenly quickened Arthur's interest:-
"You are, now, a fully qualified medical man, I
understand?"
“Oh! yes, fully qualified," Arthur said promptly.
Mr Kenyon nodded, and then rose and began to
walk slowly up and down the room. He had a
silver-headed, ebony stick with him, but he hardly
leaned upon it, his back was not bowed, and his
step was perfectly firm. His figure and general
activity might have been that of a man of sixty.
Arthur watched him with admiration. It was
almost incredible to him that the old man could be
ninety-one. And it crossed his mind that his uncle
might have to wait many years yet before he came
into the property.
Mr Kenyon continued to walk up and down the
room as he went on :
"I have thought once or twice lately that I should
like to have some one living here in the house who
might ...” he paused before he added, "who
would be competent in an emergency. There is a


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 65
HENRI
doctor in the village-an able, pleasant man, for
whom I have considerable respect—but he lives two
miles from us, and ..." He let the sentence die
away without completing it, beginning again in a
firmer voice, “At my age, Arthur-I must call you
that! we are, after all, connected-one has fancies.
I don't deceive myself with any foolish idea that I
can live for ever. And one of my fancies, a fairly
common one, I believe, is a fear of premature burial.
I should like to have some one permanently here
whom I could trust. Moreover, I have felt that
a competent medical man with whom I was in touch,
would be in a position to give me-shall I say-
warning. You may be surprised to learn that I-
a business man by training and inclination-have
been so unbusinesslike as to have left my own affairs
unsettled. There are reasons, of course, family
reasons that I need not trouble you with, but you
must think it very lax in a man of ninety-one not
to have completed his testamentary dispositions.
I have, it is true, made a will, but not a final one.
I have an eccentric inclination-a touch of super-
stition perhaps—to postpone that duty, although
my present will,” he turned and faced Arthur with
an expression of humorous despair, “is nothing
more or less than an untidy mass of codicils. In my
opinion, it is dangerously contestable in its present
state. Fleet, my lawyer, thinks otherwise, but I
have had more experience than he has.
"In any case, I mean to make a new one, and
since you have been here it has occurred to me that
I might indulge my little eccentricity more safely
if I had some competent and experienced person on
whom I could rely, permanently in the household;
some one who would be with me for an hour or so
every day, an expert who would be in a position to


66 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
say to me: “Kenyon, I must warn you that your
days are running out and it is time for you to put
your affairs in order.” Also, as I have said, I
should prefer to trust the matter of my death certi-
ficate to a medical man in whose integrity I could
have perfect confidence. These are the fancies of
a very old man, no doubt, but after all why should
I not indulge them if I can? I may tell you quite
frankly, Arthur, that I am not of those who make
a virtue of self-sacrifice."
He broke off abruptly, stood staring in front of
him for a moment, as if he reflected on that last
statement, and then sat down again in the chintz-
covered arm-chair.
Arthur realised that the time had come for him
to reply, and that he was not ready with an answer.
If the arrangement that was now suggested had
been hypothecated while he was dressing, he would
have laughed at the idea of refusing it; but as Mr
Kenyon had been speaking, Arthur had seen a vision
of his own future that had been vaguely repellent-
a vision of idle, satisfied days spent in perfecting
himself at various games, waiting for something
that he could not precisely define. What was there
to wait for in such a life as that except death?
Marriage and the begetting of children would only
be incidents, comparable, perhaps, to the making
of his first hundred break or doing the course in
“bogey." And yet, what else had life, any life, to
offer him? He had no peculiar gifts. He would
never become famous. The end of him would al.
most certainly be a small practice somewhere and
a perpetual struggle to live within his income.
Nevertheless, his spirit drooped at the prospect of
the life he anticipated if he accepted this offer.
There was no adventure in it.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 67
"Frightfully flattered, sir, by your-your confi-
dence in me and so on,” he muttered, “and, of
course, in many ways, almost every way ..."
Mr Kenyon stopped him. “No, no, Arthur," he
said, “I haven't even made my proposal yet; and
in any case I do not want you to give me an answer
to-night. I understand that at your age you natur-
ally have ambitions, that the future has romantic
possibilities for you. I have not forgotten that.
But," he leant forward, dropping his forehead on
to the ivory handle of the stick he held between
his knees, “I have a feeling that your service would
not be a very long one-six months, a year perhaps,
at the outside." His voice was so low that Arthur
could hardly follow him as he concluded: “And
then you would have ... opportunity, greater op-
portunity ... pecuniary advantages . .. I would
provide for that.”
Six months, a year at the outside! He probably
knew as well as any one. He looked as sound as a
bell, but he might go to pieces all at once. Those
queer trances of his were no doubt symptomatic of
some deep-seated trouble. Would it be very rotten
to take on a job like that with the idea of having
money left to you? Arthur fancied that he could
make out a good case for himself on that score.
And beyond all that personal issue there was a
greater one. Putting that hypothetical legacy out
of the question, would he not be doing this old man
a real service by accepting his offer? He un-
doubtedly felt the need of some one to perform the
two offices he had indicated.
"If I might consider ...” Arthur began, and
was interrupted by the sound of the second gong
booming through the house.
Mr Kenyon raised his head. “Well, well,


68 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
Arthur, think it over, think it over," he said, getting
to his feet. "I will only add now that it would be
a great relief to me if you saw your way to accept
my offer. Do not forget that side of it. And-we
will have another talk to-morrow.”
Arthur was aware of a new atmosphere at the
dinner-table that night. For the first time since
he had been in the house, the Kenyons were wide-
awake and curious; the object of their curiosity was
unquestionably himself. They seemed to be watch-
ing him. Whenever he looked up the table, he had
the impression that one of them had just averted
his or her eyes, and when he was talking to Eliza-
beth or Miss Kenyon, he was conscious of being
under steady observation from every part of the
table. Only Eleanor kept her eyes down, and to
the best of his knowledge never once looked in his
direction. Yet this new attitude towards him had
no effect of being hostile. It was merely as if he
had suddenly become an object of peculiar interest.
Even Miss Kenyon's manner was changed, al-
though it was not until they were half-way through
dinner that she put a direct question to him.
"You had your little talk with my father this
evening ?” she said then in a tone that sounded, he
thought, a faint note of propitiation.
“Yes, I did; quite a long talk," he replied, feel-
ing no inclination to make a confidante of Miss
Kenyon
"Has he asked you to prolong your visit to us?"
she went on, making a more direct attack. "I hope
you may be able to stay over the next week-end in
any case."
"Thanks very much, I should like to immensely,"


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 69
Arthur returned. “Yes, Mr Kenyon did suggest
something of the sort. In fact .
"Well?" Miss Kenyon prompted him with a
touch of asperity.
"Oh! well, in fact he made a kind of proposal to
me that we are going to discuss again to-morrow,”
Arthur admitted.
Miss Kenyon stared at him thoughtfully for a
moment.
“One more or less doesn't after all make much
difference in a family like this,” she said, with a
touch of resignation.
"But I haven't decided yet,” Arthur began.
"You will,” she interrupted him dryly, and at
once devoted her attention to Hubert on the other
side.
“Does that mean that you're staying on inde-
finitely?" Elizabeth asked.
Arthur shrugged his shoulders. “It seems as if
you all knew more about it than I do myself,” he
said. “I really don't know yet."
"But he wants you to ?” Elizabeth pressed him.
"Apparently," Arthur admitted.
Elizabeth sighed thoughtfully. "You're a kind
of grand-nephew, I suppose," she remarked, ad-
dressing no one in particular, and then added,
“Are you going to be a sort of tame medical at-
tendant p's going to be articular, and emarked, aad
"If I stay," Arthur agreed.
"You'll stay all right,” Elizabeth replied, echoing
her aunt's tone. "Why shouldn't you?"
“Don't you want me to stay?” Arthur asked.
"Might teach you to play croquet in time," she
replied pertly.
"Is that all?" he inquired. He felt as if he were


70 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
at last getting past that barrier she had set up
against him.
She met his eyes frankly and pursed her un-
doubtedly pretty mouth. “Oh, wait and see," she
said.
"I can see now, and I don't want to wait,” Arthur
returned boldly.
Her smile was not one of encouragement. She
had suddenly ceased to flirt with him. “Even pup-
pies don't get their eyes open for nine days," she
said coldly, "and you haven't been here four yet.
You haven't the least idea what you're talking
about."
Arthur frowned impatiently. He was not vexed
by the snub he had received-girls of Elizabeth's
type thought it "smart" to be rude-but by the
reintroduction of that suggestion of a family secret
which separated the Kenyons from the outside
world. There was an air of arrogance about the
thing that annoyed him.
"Is there so much for me to learn here?” he
asked dryly.
Elizabeth told him to "shut up."
This was the way in which she always treated
him; and as he rather sulkily continued his dinner
he asked himself if it was "good enough.” If she
were willing to be decent, he might possibly fall in
love with her, but he was not going to stand being
treated like a schoolboy. Elizabeth might go and
hang herself.
She made no attempt to entice him out of the
silence he was thus too easily able to maintain for
the rest of the meal.
But in the drawing-room after dinner, he found
that the family as a whole seemed inclined to put
him on a new footing. Even Mrs Turner, who had


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 71
so far almost ignored him, came up and began to
talk about the gardens. She was a rather stout
woman with something of her brother's carelessness
in the matter of dress, and Arthur had wondered
how her husband had ever managed to fall in love
with her. To-night, however, it occurred to him
for the first time that she might in her youth have
been the very prototype of her niece Elizabeth.
They had only been talking for a few minutes
when her brother joined them. As usual, after
dinner, his face was flushed and puffy-an effect
due, Arthur judged, to the food rather than to the
wine he had taken.
"So you're thinking of joining the family party
for a time, I hear?” he began in a friendly voice.
"Well, I haven't decided anything yet," Arthur
replied, and waited to see if his uncle would echo
his sister's and his daughter's “You will."
He did not. He was fidgeting with his cigar, the
ash of which he had dropped and smeared all over
his dinner-jacket and waistcoat.
"Giving up the Canada idea, any way ?” was his
response.
“It was never more than an idea," Arthur said.
“Not a bad one, all the same," his uncle mur-
mured, and then apparently feeling that he was
making a mess of what he had to say, he went on,
"However, it's not for me to advise you. I can't
boast that I'm any sort of example for you, eh,
Catherine ?"
Mrs Turner kept her eyes on the bead bag she
was making, an occupation that certainly necessi-
tated close attention. “Don't you think, Joe ..."
she began, and then stopped, picking up a bead on
the point of her needle with a slightly exaggerated
intentness.


72 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
“No, no, of course not,” her brother said. “It
was only that I thought, as Arthur's uncle, he
might care to know—to hear, that is ..."
"Oh! rather. I should,” Arthur put in, as the
sentence failed to get itself completed. "I should
be very glad of your advice.”
“I was only going to say,” his uncle responded,
"speaking from my own experience, you know, that
the life here, jolly enough as it is in many ways,
does not offer much scope for a young fellow with
any ambition. There's Hubert, for instance-he's
-he's getting lazy-can't blame him; got nothing
much to do except play golf—but it's hardly the life
one would have chosen for him, eh?”.
Arthur smiled. “But I'm not proposing to stay
here permanently, uncle,” he said. “Six months or
a year at the outside. I've been having rather a
strenuous time you see, and I thought a rest of sorts
might do me good.”.
Joe Kenyon and his sister exchanged a glance
that Arthur could not interpret; they might have
been recalling some old and rather terrible reminis-
cence.
“My father said that, did he?" Kenyon said.
“Six months or a year at the outside ?”.
Arthur nodded. He could not possibly tell them
why that limit had been assigned.
Mrs Turner sighed and returned to her niggling
beads. He brother leaned back in his chair and
blew a cloud of smoke. Arthur longed to warn
him that the ash was again in danger of falling.
"I've been here over thirty years," his uncle re-
marked thoughtfully.
Arthur failed to see the relevance of this state-
ment. "Have you really ?” he commented politely.
"And in the first instance," his uncle continued,


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 73
"I came back on the understanding that it was to be
for twelve months, at the outside. However,"
he went on more briskly, sitting up and incidentally
dropping another large instalment of cigar ash
down his shirt front and waistcoat, “that's nothing
to do with you; nothing whatever, and I shouldn't
like you to be influenced by anything I've said.
Your case is entirely different in every way." He
had the air of a man who has been tempted into
an indiscretion and wanted to cover it without de-
lay.
"Oh, yes! obviously,” Arthur agreed.
"You could hardly be called a relation of Mr
Kenyon's, could you ?" Mrs Turner added, by way
of giving point to her brother's retraction of his
instance.
"Oh! if I came here, it wouldn't be in any way as
a relation," Arthur explained. "I should come as
a medical man for-for a certain purpose."
Enlightenment had come to him at last, he be-
lieved. These people were jealous of his possible
share in the Kenyon fortune. They, too, no doubt
knew of that untidy will and its projected superses-
sion; and they were afraid of his having too great
an interest in it. They wanted to get rid of him.
All this talk of his uncle's had been designed to
prevent him from accepting the appointment that
had been offered. Arthur blushed with shame at
the thought of their suspicion, the more readily
in that the anticipation of some legacy had been al-
ready in his mind.
"As a matter of fact, I don't think I shall stay
on here," he said, getting up. He felt that he
could not tolerate the company of these two Ken-
yons for another moment. They were like all rich
people, mean and grasping. They had lived in


74 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
polite he had to meet his
comfort all their lives and yet hated to part with a
single penny. What difference would a few thou-
sands out of the Kenyon fortune make to them?
He looked round for Turner, but he was not to
be seen. And then he saw that Eleanor had come
in while he had been talking and was sitting alone,
reading, on the far side of the room. She looked
up at the same moment and let her book fall in her
lap, with a gesture that was an invitation to him
to join her.
As he crossed the room he reflected that Eleanor
at least would give him an unprejudiced opinion.
There was something honest and straightforward
about her. She was, for instance, utterly unlike
Elizabeth.
She rose to meet him, anticipating, it seemed,
what he had to say, for before he could speak the
polite sentence with which he was prepared, she
said,
“It's rather hot in here to-night, isn't it? Would
you care to come out into the garden?”
“Love to," Arthur responded eagerly.
He drew a deep breath of enjoyment as they
came out into the open. It was not yet ten o'clock,
twilight still lingered in the garden, and the air
was sweet with the aftermath of the perfumes that
lilac and pinks and honeysuckle had been giving
out so generously during the day, and that were
now being refined by the fresh, cool scents of the
night. To Arthur it seemed that in such a garden
as this was attained the ultimate triumph of the
liaison between nature and cultivation. Everything
that grew here was the result of the sympathetic
collaboration between man and the wild, of art using
the natural forces of the world itself in the
technique of its design. And the design was a


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 75
sketch of man's ideal for the perfected earth; the
setting for the more orderly, leisured life that he
might live when the elemental forces were subdued.
After all, riches served a great purpose. Might
it not be said that old Mr Kenyon had made
a worthy use of his wealth in creating this gar-
den?
"I suppose you want to ask my advice," the clear
voice of Eleanor broke in upon his meditations, re-
calling him rather unpleasantly to the realisation
that he had been five minutes before announcing his
intention of leaving this pleasance in order to take
up the primitive struggle with the wild. It was
strange how different everything appeared to him
out here, away from the influences of that luxurious
house and its bored inhabitants. “Yes, I do," he
said. “I very much want your advice. Shall we go
to that place where you found me with Hubert the
day I came? It's sort of shut in, gives one a feeling
da seclusionanted quiet-Upper terræere pacing
day I camion." wietly, and they in silence, an
She assented quietly, and they descended the
shallow steps of the upper terrace in silence, and
did not speak again until they were pacing the rec-
tangular lawn of the "cloister."
"Will you let me explain my case to you in the
first instance?” Arthur began, and then went on
apologetically, “It is frightfully good of you to
listen to me at all. I don't know why you should.
We've only met once before practically. But you
said one or two things on that occasion, didn't you,
that made me feel you understand better than any
of the others? I can't help guessing in a sort of
way that they're rather prejudiced against my ac-
cepting the appointment, and I feel that you . . .'
"Why should they be prejudiced ?" Eleanor broke
in.


76 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
temper. - don't!” heoin the cliques, she sai
Arthur was embarrassed by that direct question.
He saw, now, that he had had no right to make any
insinuation against the motives of the family to
which his companion belonged. For the moment
he had been tempted to regard her, also, as being
an outsider.
"I didn't mean that,” he said; "at least I only
meant that they all seem so bound up in a kind of
clique, rather suspicious of strangers.”
Within that enceinte of box hedges it was too
dark now for him to see her face, but the tone of
her voice was appreciably colder as she said :-
"And you want to join the clique ?"
“No!'I don't!” he protested with a touch of
temper. “That's what they all seem to think; and
as a matter of rather brutal fact, that doesn't tempt
me in the very least. I wanted to explain to you, I
thought you'd understand, that the only thing that
tempts me in the offer your grandfather made me,
was the prospect of a little rest and quiet. I feel
that I've earned it. I've had my youth stolen from
me and I want to get a little of it back—six months
or a year isn't too much return to ask surely? And
when this miraculous opportunity drops out of the
skies, as it were, you want to deny it me. Why?
I can understand the others. They've got no
imagination. They have always had everything
they want and they cannot see what this rest would
mean for me. But I thought, I don't know why,
that you were different. I didn't expect you to
accuse me of wanting to join the clique.”
She ignored his reference to herself; taking up
a single sentence in his speech by the half-whispered
comment: “'They've always had everything they
want l' To any one from outside, I suppose they
do seem to have had everything."


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 77
He overlooked the possible implications of that.
“Oh! well; you know what I mean,” he said im-
patiently; "everything that money can buy." He
was afraid that she was going, as he put it, to
preach.
"But you've evidently made up your mind to
stay and have your rest,” she replied, going off at
another angle. "I can't see why you should bother
to ask my advice."
"I haven't made up my mind,” he asserted, "and
I do want your advice. I only thought you might
as well know first just why it tempts me so fright-
fully to stay."
"And there's Elizabeth," she put in, "you rather
like her, don't you ?"
“She's quite a jolly girl," Arthur replied coldly.
Jolly? he questioned that the moment he had
spoken, but made no effort to retract the adjective.
He had an inclination to depreciate Elizabeth now
that he was with Eleanor, an inclination that he re-
pressed as being in bad taste, even a trifle vulgar.
Nevertheless, he would have liked to make it quite
clear that he was not in love with Elizabeth.
When Eleanor spoke again, however, Elizabeth
had fallen out of the conversation. "I do see that
it looks like hard lines on you,” she said more
gently; "but as you want to know what I really
think, I must tell you. And all that I can say is,”
she paused, and there was a thrill of passion in her
voice as she concluded : “that if I were you I would
get away from here, now, at once, to-night ..."
“But, why ?” he protested, half amused at the
fantastic suggestion of his leaving Hartling that
night. “There must be some reason, I mean, for
-well—such an extravagant remedy as that."
"I can't give you any reasons,” she said.


78 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
He groaned with an intentional effect of exag-
geration.
"Have you all got some terrible secret that you're
hiding?” he asked. “I assure you one really gets
that impression. I had begun to wonder whether
perhaps Mr Kenyon was a dangerous lunatic or
something, before I saw him this evening. Now,
I wonder if he's the only one of you that's perfectly
sane. Or is it just this beastly money of yours?
Are they afraid up at the house that I want some
of it, because if they are you can tell them that I
don't. They all seem to think I'm cadging.
Hubert began it the first afternoon I was here.
I tell you it's simply incomprehensible to me—the
whole attitude.”
Eleanor did not appear to be in the least offended
by this outbreak, but her voice had a new note of
agitation in it as she said, -
"Didn't my grandfather offer to do anything for
you, when you were talking this evening? Didn't
he say anything to you about his will ?”
Arthur was glad that she could not see the blush
that again burnt his face. “What made you ask
that?” he said in what he congratulated himself
was a non-committal tone.
"I guessed,” she replied quietly. "Was I right?"
“He did mention it,” Arthur admitted.
"But that doesn't weigh with you ?".
“Not a scrap; not the least little bit in the
world." ;
“Bet it might presently."
"I don't think so.”
“Think how you might feel in six months' time,"
she persisted; "after living here in a sort of luxury,
at the prospect of having to rough it again, when
by simply going on you might never have to bother


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 79
about money any more. Think of the temptation
to take life easily, with the probability of having
quite enough money to live on when my grandfather
dies. And that would always seem to be a possi-
bility only just ahead. He'll be ninety-two in Oc-
tober, you know. Even if you did begin to want
work again for its own sake, you'd put off going
because it would seem silly to risk losing that legacy
just for the sake of staying on for another month
or two. Can't you put yourself in that position and
see what a temptation it would be?”.
Her speech had been delivered in a level, weary
voice, the voice of one who speaks out of experience
rather than from the stimulus of imagination; and
for a moment Arthur was impressed by her earnest-
ness. She was, he supposed, in her modern way,
what one called "pious.” She believed in the great
gospels of work and self-sacrifice. She wanted to
save him from the snares of wealth as his own
mother had once wanted to save him from the
snares of the devil. And just as he had always been
tender and forbearing with his mother when she
had preached to him of the dangers of the world,
so now he must be tender to this preacher of the
new gospel of ... Perhaps she was a Socialist?
"Really, you needn't be afraid,” he said gently.
“There isn't the least fear of that. As a matter
of fact I'm too keen on adventure." (He had told
his mother in precisely the same way, he remem-
bered, that he had been too keen on his work to
want to go to music-halls.) “Perhaps that's why
this offer attracts me so much. It'll be a sort of
adventure to stay here for a month or two-a sort
of experience anyway. So, honestly, Miss Kenyon,
if that's all you've got against it, I don't see why
I shouldn't accept. I think, in any event, I shall


80 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
tell your grandfather that I couldn't pledge myself
in any way; that I could only agree, at the most,
to stay for three months.”.
He heard her sigh deeply, and her reply when it
came was unexpected.
“Oh, well,” she said, "nothing that any of us
could say is likely to make the least difference. He
means to have you. I'm going in now, good-night."
She had slipped away into the darkness almost
before he was aware of her intention, and he was
unable to find her again.
There were still many secrets in that garden
which he had not explored, and he caught no
glimpse of her as he made his way back to the
house.
He was annoyed. He wanted to cross-examine
her, make her give him some kind of explanation
of her minatory attitude, and especially of that last
cryptic speech. What did she mean by saying, "He
means to have you?”
There was, certainly, a fairly obvious interpre-
tation, namely that old Mr Kenyon had set his
mind on getting his own way in this matter of hav-
ing a resident medical attendant at Hartling-a
perfectly reasonable wish. But she had not meant
that, or at least not in a reasonable way.
Was it possible that Eleanor also was poisoned
by this degrading love of wealth; that all this talk
and admiration for work and independence was noth-
ing more than an assumption to hide her own fear
of another rival for her grandfather's testamen-
tary favour? Indeed, was not that the explanation
of the pretended secret of Hartling? The explana-
tion was that there was no secret-unless it were
that the whole Kenyon family were vultures,
ti


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 81
crouched in a horrible group about this one aged
man; waiting gluttonously for his death in order
to divide the spoil; determined that their share
should not be decreased by the addition of a single
new member to that gloating circle. That might
be called a secret; it was certainly a detestable fact
that every one of them would wish to hide.
Arthur straightened his back and lifted his chin
with a gesture of disgust, but he no longer felt any
desire to leave Hartling. It had come to him that
he had an honourable purpose to serve by remain-
ing: he might be a true help and support to the
aged head of the house. Old Kenyon was so piti-
ably isolated from his family. He must always be
aware that he was marked down, that the circle
of harpies was forever closing more tightly about
him, that the only interest that his descendants
took in him was in the search for symptoms of his
approaching death. He would surely welcome some
one coming from the outside, who would have no
selfish object in view, who would give him real sym-
pathy and understanding.
Arthur felt a glow of self-satisfaction at the
thought. He would make it quite clear, of course,
in the coming interview, that no question of any
legacy must complicate the arrangement. That
should be absolutely definite; and yet-it was just
a whimsical fancy, and he shrugged his shoulders-
what fun it would be to cut out the rest of the
family, to be made one of the principal heirs and
disappoint those ghastly birds of prey! Their dis-
appointment would be only momentary. He would
take the fortune solely in order to hand it back to
them, but in doing that what an admirable lesson
he might read them; what contempt he might show


82 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
for the pitiful gaud of wealth. (He might possibly
retain just enough to give him a small-a very
small independent income?)
Above all, he would like to show Eleanor how
miserable a vice was this love of money, begetting
as it did every kind of sham, insincerity and pre-
tence. In her, at least, the vice could not be deep-
seated, and she would be worth saving. She would
look back on the worship of riches with horror
once she were away from the influence of this house.
He paused on the terrace and looked up at the
perpendicular lines of the imitation Tudor facade,
dim and impressive in the half-darkness. Yet, the
very house itself was a sham, an anachronism.
The Tudors had been autocrats and the principles
of autocracy were out of date. Even wealth was
no longer the power it had once been. The rich
were threatened on every side, by taxation from
above and the increasing clamour and power of
labour from below. They had lost prestige and
influence. :;:
Arthur Woodroffe felt remarkably full of vigour
that evening, confident in the knowledge of his own
abilities, and delightfully aware of his glorious in-
dependence. When he reflected on the lives of the
Kenyons he at once despised and pitied them for
their insane worship of wealth. He thought of
them as poor trammelled creatures, as vultures that
had lost the power of flight.


VI





VI
WHEN Arthur had been five weeks at
Hartling, he believed that he knew the other
inmates of the house as well as he would ever know
them, although he had to admit to himself that he
knew none of them any better, now, than he had
after he had been there three days. His social
relations with some of the Kenyons had lost for-
mality. He was familiar in his treatment of
Hubert, on terms of impudence with Elizabeth,
and of occasional persiflage with Joe Kenyon and
Charles Turner. But these intimacies were only
such as he might have developed in a month's stay
with them at the same hotel. On both sides there
was an effect of enforced toleration, of making the
best of a casual temporarily unavoidable proximity.
He was still some one who had come in from the
"outside.” The Kenyons never snubbed him, but
he could not be quite at his ease with them; he knew
that if for any reason he left Hartling, the whole
family would become for him the chance acquain-
tances of a prolonged visit. He could see himself,
a few months hence, meeting one of them in the
street, pausing to exchange a few conventional in-
quiries, and passing on with no more than a whimsi-
cal smile at a recollection of an old adventure.
There was, however, one exception. If the de-
scendants of old Mr Kenyon had not emerged from
the indeterminate background of humanity in gene-
ral, the old man himself stood out as a distinctive,
even a slightly impressive figure. Arthur's original
quiries, and not to exchange a few of them in the
85


86 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
inclination, to pity the head of the house, had been
gradually diverted; he was not on closer acquain-
tance, a figure that called for pity; and once or
twice Arthur had had a strange sensation that was
almost akin to fear. There was, indeed, something
about old Kenyon that was not quite human, some-
thing more than that indescribable appearance of
immortal old age. He appeared so intimidatingly
detached from the common cares and interests of
human life. He had boasted of his power to keep
in touch with contemporary movements and affairs,
but he was never disturbed by them. Nearly every
morning Arthur spent an hour in the old man's
company, and in that time he usually discussed the
morning's news, but never as yet, had Arthur seen
him display the least emotion with regard to any
question of politics or finance. He would speak of
the Irish situation, the starvation of Austria, the
threat of labour troubles, the cost of living, or the
burden of the Income Tax as if they were incidents
in the reign of George IV. rather than in that of
George V. And if Arthur himself gave any sign
of heat or partisanship the old man would regard
him with the cold speculative eye of one who
watches the lives and furies of infusoria under a
microscope. He seemed to have completely lost
the warm-blooded human passion for interference
in other people's affairs.
There was another aspect of him also that was
giving Arthur an occasional qualm of uneasiness.
He had found that the old man was not dependable
in such things as the consideration of one's natural
needs in the matter of ready money. In that second
interview when Arthur had put his position quite
plainly, acknowledged himself willing to accept the
post offered him for three months on trial, and


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 87
hinted more or less indirectly, but as he believed
quite plainly, that he would greatly prefer that
there should be no question of any posthumous gra-
titude, the essential point of present remuneration
in the form of salary had not been mentioned. Nor
had any reference been made to it since that occa-
sion. And the truth was that Arthur had been
spending quite a lot of money in the last five weeks.
His original outfit had only been intended to carry
him over a glorified week-end, and he had found it
necessary to add to it. Also, he had paid his en-
trance fee, and a year's subscription to the golf
club, bought himself some new clubs, a croquet-
mallet, a new racket, and a billiard cue, and al-
though he still had a balance at his bank, it had
begun to appear rather inadequate when regarded
as capital for starting a new life in Canada. The
thought of his shrinking resources had begun to
embarrass him, but he had felt a strong disinclina-
tion to approach the subject in his conversations
with Mr Kenyon, moreover, the very fact that he
was being paid nothing held a kind of implicit pro-
mise that he would be "remembered" later. A
man of old Kenyon's wealth and position would not
expect a qualified medical man, who was at best
quite a distant connection to give his services, to
say nothing of his immediate chances, and receive
no sort of compensation.
For in the course of those five weeks Arthur had
lost some of his scruples with regard to figuring in
Mr Kenyon's will. The atmosphere of the house
may have had its influence on him. Living, as he
presumed he did, among the people who had no
other ideal other than that of inheriting as capital
what they now enjoyed as interest, he had come
by unnoticed degrees to think of that way of life


88 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
as being more or less normal and reasonable. And
when he thought of the future he had already begun
to anticipate the probability of his staying on at
Hartling until old Kenyon died.
It was so easy to find reasons for planning that
mode of life, so difficult to contemplate any other;
more particularly when it seemed probable that
only by staying could he hope to be rewarded for
his services. He still fidgeted occasionally at the
thought that he was wasting his time, perhaps his
life; but he was steadily accustoming himself to
luxury, and the thought of Peckham grew more and
more repulsive every day. He had not written to
Bob Somers for nearly a month. He had a definite
disinclination even to think of Somers. The life
at Hartling was very easy. He was enormously
improving his game at golf, croquet, and billiards;
and, take it all round, he got on quite well with the
family—with all the family-except Eleanor.
For some reason, he and she were still strangers
to one another. If there was a barrier between
him and the rest of the Kenyons, there was a gulf
between him and Eleanor; although, in the first in-
stance, she had seemed to be the only one of them
who was prepared to come out and greet him as a
friend. But, since he had made his decision to
stay on at Hartling for a trial period of three
months, there had been little intercourse between
them, and never once had he been alone with her.
She treated him with a calm aloofness, and he on
his side had made no overtures. He supposed that,
for some reason she disliked him, and had decided
that he, also, disliked her.
The first break in the general stagnation in the
Hartling mode of life came with the intrusion of


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 89
another member of the family, young Kenyon Tur-
ner, the budding stockbroker. He came down for
a week-end, and Arthur detested him from the out-
set.
He had been playing golf with Hubert until six
o'clock, and his first sight of the new arrival was
in the garden. He was walking up and down the
middle of the terrace with Eleanor, deep in what
appeared to be a very engrossing conversation. He
was an almost deliberately handsome young man,
just too well-dressed in Arthur's estimation. His
own Conduit Street tailor had never been able to
produce that, perhaps too noticeable effect of ab-
solute correctitude. It was probably not the tailor's
fault, he was too careless, or the wrong figure or
something. And in any case, he despised a man
who took too much trouble with his clothes.
He decided on the spur of the moment to inter-
rupt the tête-à-tête; an intrusion that young Turner
quite obviously resented.
"Been playin' golf ?” he asked, with a supercilious
air when Eleanor had made the introduction. "Not
my game. Don't get enough time for it.”
Arthur noted that Turner's eyes were those of a
man who was making too great demands on his
vitality; tired eyes, shadowed with dark lines, and
already thinly creased at the outer corners.
“Good, healthy game," he commented, staring
rather contemptously. "Keeps you in the open
air."
"Ohl do you play for medical reasons ?" Turner
replied. “'Fraid I haven't the determination for
that.” And as he spoke he turned back to Eleanor
intimating as plainly as he could that he had no
further use for Arthur's company.
Eleanor's tone had a faint note of apology as


90 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
on was
she said: “Kenyon was asking my advice about
something."
Arthur could not resist that chance. "You're
rather great on giving advice, aren't you?" he
asked, and was surprised to see that she winced
as if he had hurt her.
“Am I?” was all she said, and Arthur instantly
regretted his rudeness.
"I only meant,” he began, “that you ... I'm
sorry. I didn't mean it that way.”
She smiled sadly. “It's an ungrateful task in
any case,” she said, “and I'm afraid that in this
case, too, my advice will not be taken."
Arthur excused himself and went on towards the
house, wondering if she were advising young Tur-
ner, as she had advised himself, to fly the tempta-
tion of Hartling. Why had she done that? He
was still unable to find any satisfactory reason for
her recommendation of so drastic a course. He
could not now believe that she had been jealous of
his influence with her grandfather, and the theory
that she had conceived so strong an aversion for his
personality that she had desired to scare him away,
was foolishly improbable. Eleanor was not like
that. In some ways he rather admired her. Even
Elizabeth always spoke nicely about her.
He was surprised to find an air of disturbance up
at the house. Most of the Kenyons were in the
drawing-room, but instead of sitting about their
familiar occupations, they were gathered together
in a group, engaged in what appeared to be a some-
what anxious conference. Their talk ceased
abruptly as he came in, and both Mr and Mrs Tur-
ner faced round with an expression that was at once
expectant and apprehensive. Arthur would have


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 91
gone out again at once, but Turner hailed him by
saying :
""Hallo! Arthur. Seen my son anywhere?”
“Yes, he's on the middle terrace with Eleanor,"
Arthur said. "I was just introduced to him, but as
they obviously did not want me, I came on up."
Turner looked at his brother-in-law, Kenyon, who
shrugged his shoulders, but made no further com-
ment; and they had returned to their discussion
with an effect of rather desperate resignation be-
fore Arthur was fairly out of the room.
He wondered if there were some sort of affair,
perhaps an engagementbetween Eleanor and
young Turner; and if the family as a whole objected
on account of the nearness of the relationship?
He decided that if they consulted him, as they
generally did on any matter presumed to be within
his province as a medical man, he would make it
clear that a marriage of first cousins was not neces-
sarily dangerous. Nevertheless, he despised Elea-
nor for her choice.
The function of dinner was even more formal
than usual that night, and old Mr Kenyon had a
prolonged lapse of consciousness that kept them
all waiting for more than five minutes. These
solemn intervals of suspense always produced in
Arthur an effect of being present at some religious
observance, and to-night he was more aware of it
than usual. He remembered how, as a youth, he
had been half-awed and half-exasperated when he
attended the Sacrament at home by the ceremonial
deliberation of his father. He had had an evan-
gelical tendency, but in this service he had favoured
quite an elaborate ritual of his own, and his bearing
of the chalice and the paten from the ambry to the


92 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
altar, and the subsequent presentation consecration,
and personal acceptance of the elements had been
conducted in a low, scarcely audible voice, and with
an air of almost exaggerated reverence. Once or
twice Arthur had sacrilegiously wondered if his
father had found an unusual satisfaction in being
the sole human instrument and representative of
this mystery of the consecration, and had unduly
prolonged the periods of silence involved? And
to-night, the same thought crossed his mind with re-
gard to old Kenyon. Was he, perhaps, extending
the interval of waiting after he had recovered con-
sciousness, exulting in the exercise of his power?
Instinctively Arthur glanced across the table at
Eleanor. She was sitting very still, her hands in
her lap, her eyes downcast, but he fancied that her
expression conveyed something of impatience and
revolt. Did she know? he asked himself. Was
she inclined to be critical of her grandfather's
whims? Was she, perhaps, desperately ready to
marry young Turner in order to escape from Hart-
ling?
As soon as the service was released again, he
turned for information to Elizabeth.
“Is anything up ?” he asked in an undertone.
"Anything out of the ordinary?”
She looked at him out of the corners of her eyes
and softly blew her relief. “We got a good dose
to-night,” she whispered, and continued, “That
means there's going to be a fuss.”
“About young Turner and Eleanor ?” he tried.
“Eleanor ? Where does Eleanor come in?" was
her surprised response.
"I don't know. I thought possibly ..." He
hesitated, finding an unexpected difficulty in putting
his guess into words.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 93
“Nothing whatever to do with Eleanor," Eliza-
beth said, without waiting for him to finish his sen-
tence.
"What is it, then?” he insisted.
"About him,” she said, indicating Kenyon Tur-
ner. "I can't possibly tell you now.'
But after dinner he received enlightenment as to
the cause of the impending "fuss" from the prime
disturber of the peace himself.
"Care to have a game of pills ?” he asked, com-
ing over to Arthur as they were leaving the dining-
room.
His first instinct was to refuse. The conceit of
the fellow annoyed him he had two lines of braid
down his dress trousers—but Arthur was on the top
of his form just then, and was spurred by a desire
to beat him at what was, no doubt, his own game.
He had been so cursedly supercilious about playing
golf for "medical reasons.”
"Don't mind,” he said in the true Hartling man-
ner of one condescending to a casual visitor from
the outside.
But although he did, in fact, beat young Turner,
he realised that his victory was due to the fact that
his opponent was “off his game," and could prob-
ably give him twenty in a hundred on ordinary
occasions. Young Turner's touch was almost as
delicate as his father's.
"I'm no earthly good to-night,” he said, putting
down his cue at the conclusion of the game. "All
this business is such an infernal worry.”
As he spoke he looked at Hubert—who had been
exercising his predestinate function of marker-
rather than at Arthur.
"You're not the only one,” Hubert commented
morosely.
ponent watwenty iner's touch


94 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
Arthur, who had been continuing a break that
had not been completed when he reached game,
straightened his back and faced his cousin. "What
is this business ?” he asked.,
Hubert, who had got into that uneasy-looking
pose of his, looked down at his crossed ankles.
“The old man's so infernally difficult,” he said.
"So cursedly tight with the money-bags,” Turner
explained.
""Have you been trying to milk him, then?”
Arthur asked.
"Oh, well I the fact is I'm in a hole, on the rocks,"
Turner admitted. “I've put it off as long as I can,
but something has cursedly well got to be done
now."
Hubert smiled contemptuously. “Got to be
done,” he repeated. “Who's going to make him?
What it'll end in 'll be your coming to live down
here!"
"I'm damned if it will,” Turner declared vehe-
mently, but there was a note of fear in his voice
as he continued: “It's out of the question. I mean
I'm not doing so badly at the office and all that.
If only the old man allowed me a decent screw, I
should be all right. In an office like ours you simply
have to be in everything that's going. Sometimes
one of the partners 'll put you in to what he thinks
is a good thing, for instance, and you're practically
bound to have a fiver on. There's a lot of that sort
of thing anyhow you can't keep out of.”
"And how much notice d'you think the old man'll
take of that?” Hubert asked, without looking up.
Turner almost whimpered. "He's got to put me
right,” he protested, "absolutely got to."
Hubert rocked silently from foot to foot. “He
hasn't," he said quietly, "and you can't make him.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 95
You know that well enough. What did Eleanor
say?"
"She promised to do all she could," Turner re-
plied unhopefully, and added: "I'd sooner emigrate
than come to live down here.”
"Got the money for your passage?” Hubert in-
quired.
"I suppose I could get that somehow,” Turner
said. "Trouble'd be to dodge my creditors. Be-
sides, some of the money must be paid-fellows
in the office and so on. I couldn't let them down."
"You'll be living here before you're a week
older," Hubert decided. "Safe as houses."
Turner began to pace up and down the billiard
room. There was possibly a touch of the histrionic
in his manner of doing it, but he was without ques-
tion genuinely distressed.
"Oh, I'll be double damned if I do!" he repeated.
“It's all very well for you—you seem to like this
sort of life-but I'd be a raving lunatic in a month.
I simply couldn't stand it. I-oh! God! I'll make
the old man pay. Why the devil shouldn't he?
He's got more money than he knows what to do
with."
Hubert was quite unmoved by his cousin's emo-
tion; indeed he seemed to take a melancholy pleas-
ure in watching him. “When are you going to see
him ?” he asked.
"To-morrow morning,” Turner said. “And, by
the Lord, if he refuses I'll give him a piece of my
mind."
Hubert smiled sadly. "Not you,” he commented.
Arthur had not attempted to interrupt this con-
versation. Once more he had a sense of some
curious mystery behind the commonplace situation.
Both Hubert's dismal resignation and young Tur-


96 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
ner's too violent asseverations hinted at some
quality in their grandfather's treatment of them
that Arthur found it difficult to associate with the
old man himself. It was true, certainly, that he
had overlooked or forgotten to offer his medical
attendant a salary, but he had none of the signs of
the miser. Arthur knew that he gave freely to
charities, and spent money without stint on the up-
keep of Hartling. And did he not keep his whole
family in idleness from one year's end to another?
“Why are you so sure that your grandfather will
refuse?” Arthur now broke in, looking at Hubert.
Hubert exchanged a glance with young Turner,
and it was the latter who answered.
"He's not sure," he protested. “Anyway, I'm
not."
Hubert pursed his mouth and stared thought-
fully at the billiard table.
"Do you think he'll have a down on you for
gambling?" Arthur asked.
Turner laughed brusquely. “Well, hardly," he
said. “Been a pretty good gambler himself in his
day. That was the way he made most of his money.
Jolly shady some of his business was too, I've heard.
He happened to bring it off, so it was all right.
If he hadn't he'd have found himself on the wrong
side of the big door."
"You are a pretty damned fool, Ken, to talk like
that,” Hubert put in softly.
"Oh, well! it makes me so wild,” Turner pro-
tested. “You know the whole amount's under fif-
teen hundred, and what's that to a man worth over
half a million? The pater told me this evening
that the old chap's worth all that. Quite likely a
heap more.”
Hubert solemnly closed his left eye, and con-


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 97
tinued to stare at the billiard table with the other.
"If you come to live down here, he'll put you in the
will," he remarked.
Turner snorted impatiently. “It isn't good
enough,” he said crossly. “Besides, it's a rotten
game waiting for dead men's shoes."
"Specially if you can't damned well help your-
self,” Hubert agreed, without the least sign of
being offended.
Arthur's general perplexity was not enlightened
by this conversation, although he had now no fur-
ther doubts as to the reason for Kenyon Turner's
visit. There still remained that old suggestion of
something taken for granted, something that was
hidden from Arthur himself. The two men had
apparently spoken quite frankly before him, and
Turner, at least, had verged upon the indiscreet
until Hubert had pulled him up. But behind all
their talk lay the hint of an assumption that vio-
lated Arthur's feeling for common sense. This
particular refusal of money could be accounted for.
Old Mr Kenyon, if he had been a successful gam-
bler himself, might feel a contempt for the failure,
or he might, very reasonably, dislike young Turner.
But why should he, in either case, want him to
come and live at Hartling? Unless that alternative
was being held over him as a kind of threat?
Nor did the temporary solution of the immediate
problem elucidate the general situation. Kenyon
Turner had his interview with his grandfather on
Sunday morning, and left for town half an hour
later in the Vauxhall.
Arthur, burning with curiosity, made an oppor.
tunity to get Hubert alone after lunch.
"Well, what happened this morning ?” he asked.
"Given him a month," Hubert replied.
Nor did the fun the general situacrandfather on


98 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
“How do you mean?" Arthur said.
"Month to think it over," Hubert elaborated.
"If he'll chuck the city and come to live down here,
the old man'll put him straight."
"And if he won't?".
“Then he can jolly well look out for himself."
"But, good Lord, why does Mr Kenyon want
him to come and live here?” Arthur broke out.
“Thinks he'll be company for you and me, per-
haps?” Hubert suggested.
"Oh! rot! He must have some reason," Arthur
protested.
Hubert scratched his eyebrow.
"Don't you know what it is ?" Arthur persisted.
Hubert seemed to purse not only his mouth but
his whole face. “Can't say I do," he said, paused,
and then continued in another voice: "I'm up against
it too. You know Miss Martin, don't you?
Didn't you meet her up at the club-house? Well-
it's a case with her and me. And what the devil
I'm going to do about it, I don't know.”





102 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
an
“And you don't think the old man could do with-
out you?
“Oh! it isn't that. I don't do anything, really,"
Hubert said. “Rankin runs the place. I'm only a
figurehead.”
Arthur had already suspected this fact, but he
was surprised to hear his cousin state the case so
frankly.
“I thought you seemed to have plenty of time on
your hands," he commented.
"Simply nothing to do," Hubert agreed.
"All the same, you know that your grandfather
wants to keep you here?”.
"He wants to keep us all here, you included,"
Hubert said.
Arthur knew now that that was true. But this
calm acknowledgment of the old man's peculiarity
seemed to imply a comprehension of motive that
was as yet quite beyond his own understanding.
They had been walking down through the spinney
towards the power-house, and Arthur stopped in
the quietness of the wood and laid his hand on his
cousin's shoulder.
"I say," he said, “I can see that. He does want
to keep us here. But why does he? Do you know?
Is there some secret about it?"
“Lord, no-secret? Why should there be ?"
Hubert returned with perfect candour.
“Seems so damned rum,” Arthur said, frowning.
“Doesn't it to you ?" And then a queer analogy
flitted across his mind and he added: "It's like
Pharaoh and the Israelites. I never could make
out why he wanted to keep them.”
"Oh! he's like that, always has been," Hubert
replied, ignoring the uncomplimentary parallel.
"And he gets worse. He's been frightfully difficult


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 103
lately." He paused and warming to a closer con-
fidence, went on, “The devil of it is that you never
know what he's really after. If he got into a fear-
ful pad, you'd know where you were, more or less.
But he's always as cool as a cucumber. Makes you
feel such an infernal ass.”
"But suppose," Arthur suggested, "that you
simply didn't do what he wanted you to ? Suppose,
for instance, that you stuck it out you were
going to marry Miss Martin and be damned to
him. What could he do ?”
The mere suggestion seemed to make Hubert
uneasy. “Couldn't do anything in a way," he
grumbled. “But-well—no more could I. Her
people aren't well off and I simply haven't got a
bean of my own.”
"You might get a job somewhere else as an es-
tate agent?" Arthur put in.
Hubert shook his head. “Those jobs are jolly
hard to get,” he said. “I have thought about it.
But I've had no experience really, not to count.
And naturally I shouldn't get any testimonial from
the old man, if I chucked this. Rankin would have
ten times the chance I've got of a job like that,
and you should hear him let himself go when he
gets cold feet about anything. He's got five kids,
you know, and he'd do any mortal thing not to
offend the old man. And then, of course, he guesses
that he's down for a bit in the will. They all do
all the servants, I mean. They're all hanging on
on low wages.” He gave a little bark of laughter
as he concluded: “Like the rest of us.”
“Rotten," Arthur agreed sympathetically. He
had begun to like Hubert. It was not his fault
that he had no backbone. He had never had a
chance to develop one. And this affair with the


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 105
principal organs to be considered. I've wondered
if he isn't held up, in a way, by his will-power. He
keeps himself so aloof—if you know what I mean?
Never lets himself get excited about any mortal
thing; hardly seems interested, really ..."
"Well, but is there any reason why he shouldn't
go on holding himself up?" Hubert inquired, as
Arthur paused.
"It might break him down if he were badly
crossed," Arthur said.
They walked on in silence for a few yards, pon-
dering the significance of that last pronouncement
before Hubert said,
"Couldn't do that, though, not on purpose. Be
pretty much like murder, wouldn't it?''
"Pretty much,” Arthur agreed. "And anyway,
it's pure speculation on my part.”
"I can't afford to cross him,” Hubert went on, as
though he had finally dismissed the thought of his
cousin's speculations in pathology. "I expect you'll
think I'm jolly soft, but I couldn't face being
chucked out of here without a penny and no pros-
pect of getting a job.”
"But surely Uncle Joe would help you,” Arthur
put in.
"The pater! Good Lord! what could he do?"
Hubert said. "He hasn't got a red cent of his own.
I don't suppose he could lay his hands on a fiver
to save his life.”
Once or twice in the course of the last few weeks
Arthur had had a faint suspicion that ready money
was rather scarce among the Kenyons, but he was
shocked by this plain statement.
"Doesn't the old man allow them anything?” he
asked.
“Not a bean-in cash," Hubert said. “Of course


106 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
we can get anything we want in reason, but the
old man pays all the bills. He isn't a bit mean that
way. Never grumbles. Draws the line at jewellery,
though, as you've probably noticed.”.
Arthur had not noticed that omission, but he
instantly remembered it, and he saw now that the
absence of jewellery gave some air of distinction to
the Kenyon women. He approved the old man's
taste in this particular. He hated to see women
smothered in diamonds.
"Why's that?" he asked, passing by the admission
of his failure to observe the phenomenon.
“Hates jewellery; always has," Hubert ex-
plained. “One of his fads. Says he'd as soon see
women wear a ring in their nose as in their ears."
Arthur nodded. He had no inclination to enter
into any discussion of the æsthetic value of jewellery
as an aid to the enhancing of woman's beauty.
And he was intrigued for the moment by the new
aspect of Hartling that Hubert's confidences had
unexpectedly revealed to him. The Kenyons seemed
to be living a sort of communistic life, he reflected.
They had goods, everything they wanted in reason,
but no money. Well, it was an easy life-for the
elderly and middle-aged. They had no responsi-
bilities, no anxieties. He could understand now
why they had all got into such slack habits. After
all, why shouldn't they? They had no incentive to
do anything but what they were doing. Indeed, it
seemed that they had no power to alter their way
of life. They were the slaves of a benevolent
autocrat who demanded no service from them ex-
cept respect. Hartling was a Utopia, a Thelema
in which there was no necessity for work; and one
soon forgot that it was also a prison.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 107
that they in the wore majority
He realised at the same time that he might have
drawn these inferences for himself, and was slightly
annoyed with his own obtuseness. He was, he
thought, too much inclined to take things for
granted. He had come down to Hartling with
ready-made opinions and formal judgments. He
had certainly been far too willing to judge the
Kenyons, without knowing any of the facts of the
case. But he condemned them no longer. It is true
that they were not, as Eleanor might say, doing
any good in the world, but they were no worse in
that respect than the majority of rich people, and
the Kenyons had the valid excuse that they could
not help themselves.
Abruptly his thoughts returned to Hubert's
troubles.
“I'll admit it's rotten luck about Miss Martin,"
he said, as if he were continuing their conversation.
“But you do get a good time down here."
"If I'd the money to emigrate and she'd come
with me, I'd go to-morrow,” Hubert said, “and be
damned to the good time.”
Hubert was in love, Arthur reflected. Also, he
had never known any other condition and could not
realise the horrible realities of dirt and disease.
"Feel a bit uplifted, I expect, just now," he re-
marked casually
Hubert stopped and faced him. “Do I look
uplifted ?” he asked.
He certainly did not. He had an air of settled
melancholy at the best of times, and at this moment
he had apparently abandoned himself to the deepest
gloom.
Five weeks earlier Arthur would have advised
his cousin to take his courage in his hands and


108 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
break away from Hartling at any cost-even as
Eleanor had once advised himself—but now he
could appreciate to the full Hubert's difficulty.
And then it occurred to him that he had still
just enough money to solve the present problem.
If that expression of the wish to emigrate had been
sincere, he might free his cousin by offering him
the loan of, say two hundred pounds. It would,
in any case, be interesting to see whether or not he
would accept the chance if it were given to him.
But he knew, even as the will to help Hubert rose
up in him, that he was afraid.
Old Kenyon would surely find out who had
advanced that money and then he would ...
Arthur was not quite sure what he would do, but
he feared the consequences. He might be turned
out of Hartling; he would certainly lose any hope
of that future remuneration for which he was now
working.
The thought of making an offer flashed through
his mind and was rejected. He must, at least, have
his three months.
"Oh! cheer up, old man,” he advised the gloomy
Hubert with an assumption of hopefulness.
“Things are never as bad as you think they're going
to be. Something will happen, right enough."
“There's only one thing that'll help me," Hubert
muttered, as they once more continued their walk.
“And that's bound to happen sooner or later,"
Arthur returned. “I dare say you won't have to
wait much longer.”
Hubert gave a little snort of impatience. "Jolly
fine," he said; "but the pater, for instance, has been
practically waiting all his life.”
Arthur was stirred to candour. "In a way," he
said, “but I don't suppose it has worried him much."
Things atmething we thing thatcontinuede for later to


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 109
"Hasn't it? You ask him," retorted Hubert.
Arthur thought over that for a moment before
he said, "If I did, he probably wouldn't tell me.
You're a secretive lot down here, you know. You're
absolutely the first person who has given me any
sort of confidence.”
"We can't,” Hubert replied. “It isn't safe. You
never know what the old man'll find out he's
damnably sharp in some things, and he's got us all
as tight as wax. If he chose to cut up rough, he
could turn any of us out of here without a blessed
penny. I don't suppose he'd like it, for instance,
if he knew that I was talking like this to you.
But—I don't know, I wanted to tell you, and that
affair of Ken's makes you think a bit, doesn't it?
He's in a cleft stick all right now—like the rest
of us."
Arthur had a memory of his first night at Hart-
ling, and of the way in which his uncle had suddenly
dropped out of the conversation after his father
had, with apparent gentleness, expressed surprise
that his son did not go to live in Italy. Was it
possible that that quiet expression veiled a threat?
"But the old man's a good sort, surely,” Arthur
protested. “He wouldn't do anything absolutely
rotten, I mean.”
"You never know what he'll do," Hubert said.
“You ask the pater about Uncle Jim, Eleanor's
father. I don't suppose he'd mind telling you.
You're practically one of us now, aren't you?”
But some spirit in Arthur rebelled furiously
against that suggestion.
“Good Lord, no; not in that way," he asserted
vigorously. "I'm perfectly free to go whenever I
want to. Even if I haven't got a cent, I could
always get a job as a doctor."


110 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
“Yes, you score there," Hubert agreed, without
enthusiasm. "Wish to God I'd got a profession.”
Their conversation was interrupted at this point
by their arrival at the little power-house in which
Scurr, the engineer-chauffeur, was busily engaged
on a minor repair to one of the temporarily dis-
mantled dynamos. And as they returned to the
house half an hour later, Arthur determinedly
discussed certain alterations the Committee were
proposing in connection with the thirteenth and
fourteenth holes of the golf course. He had defi-
nitely quashed the assertion that he was now to be
numbered among those who were waiting for a
certain long deferred event, and chose to think no
more about that subject at present. He was, as
he had asserted, free to leave Hartling whenever he
wished. He was not tied in any way, he never
could be. And there was no reason why he should
not enjoy his three months' holiday. He was sorry
for Hubert, but if he had that £200, he probably
would not dare to break away. It would not be
worth while for one thing, and for another he was
too "soft," spoilt by the ease of a luxurious life.
And Hubert, on his side, made but one further
reference to his love affair. No doubt he was afraid
that he had already been rather indiscreet, for just
before they reached the house he said, -
"Absolutely between you and me, of course, what
I told you this afternoon."
“Rather. Absolutely," Arthur assured him.
It was impossible not to have a slight feeling of
contempt for them all, Arthur thought, even though
he had began to pity them. Congratulating himself
anew on his own magnificent independence, he was
inclined, just then, to regard the Kenyons as
parasitic, bloodless creatures. He had once pic-


114 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
only guess what the world's like outside this place,
but the things we do guess don't tempt us to
explore it.” He paused a moment before he con-
tinued: “We don't talk about ourselves, of course,
but you must know the truth pretty well by
this time—besides, you're practically one of us
now.”
Arthur was keenly interested. "I'm not sure that
I do know the truth, Uncle Joe,” he said. “Except
-well, Hubert told me this afternoon that your
father-er-keeps you pretty short of cash and
so on; makes it jolly difficult for you to sort of
-well-break away.”
Joe Kenyon smiled grimly. “Difficult!” he
repeated, and then, “I suppose you haven't got a
cigar on you? All right, never mind. I smoke
too much : that's another compensation."
“Couldn't you tell me how things are, a bit
more?" Arthur ventured. “You know I might be
able to help.”
"It isn't easy to tell you, you see," Joe Kenyon
said, after a short pause. "Let's sit down. But
..." he hesitated, grunting and sighing, before he
blurted out, “But you might just run up to the house
and get me a couple of cigars, there's a good fellow.
Then, I'll—I'll tell you a story. Only you needn't,
that is, I shouldn't say anything to the others about
our being down here."
While his uncle had been talking Arthur's heart
had warmed to him, but in the ten minutes that now
intervened while he went to the house for the cigars,
he had a brief reaction. As he entered the house,
the habit of mind that had been growing upon him
for the past five weeks strangely reasserted itself.
He was aware again of the futility and weakness
of the Kenyons, their laziness, their self-indulgence,


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 115
and what he could only regard as the meanness of
their attitude towards the expected inheritance.
And his uncle seemed to be the very type of all
these aspects of the family-a man so idle and weak
that he could not exist without his cigar for half
an hour. He might have endless excuses, but there
must be a horribly lax strain in him somewhere.
He was afraid even of his own sisters and his
brother-in-law. He had not wanted them to know
where he was and what he was saying.
In deference to that wish, however, Arthur went
to the smoking-room for the desired cigars-a room
that was used as a store and in which no one ever
sat. There was more or less realisable wealth there,
he reflected, as he opened a box of his uncle's cigars.
Why, these cigars must have cost over five pounds
a hundred before the war.
He was crossing the hall on his return to the
garden, when the drawing-room door opened and
Miss Kenyon came out. Arthur had a feeling that
she had deliberately tried to catch him. He had
always disliked and rather feared her. She was
different from the other Kenyons, more decided and
more efficient. He had not modified his original
opinion of her as a hard woman.
“Going out?” she asked coldly.
“Yes; it's jolly in the garden," Arthur said.
"Is my brother out there?" she continued.
Arthur hesitated on the edge of an implied
untruth, but she gave him no opportunity to
prevaricate, adding almost immediately,
“I wish you would tell him I want to speak to
him.”
"I will, if I can find him," Arthur said.
"Oh! You'll know where to find him," Miss
Kenyon replied, and re-entered the drawing-room.


116 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
It was almost certain, then, Arthur reflected, that
she had heard him and had come out to give him
that message. She had probably seen him coming
up the garden, and had some purpose in putting an
end to his conversation with her brother. He was
annoyed by the interruption. He felt bound now
to deliver her message and had no doubt that it
would put an end to his uncle's confidences.
"I met Miss Kenyon in the hall as I was coming
out,” he said, as he rejoined his uncle. "At least,
I think she must have seen me coming up from the
drawing-room window. She came out and told me
to tell you that she wanted to speak to you, and
went back again.”
Joe Kenyon was leaning back in one of the com-
fortable wicker chairs that were scattered about
the garden, and gave no sign of being perturbed by
the message.
"Got the cigars ?” he asked, stretching out his
hand, and then after an interval in the course of
which he had got the cigar satisfactorily going, he
went on: "Esther's so cautious. She thinks I'm
indiscreet. Perhaps I am, but I can't really see
what difference it can make, so long as we don't
say anything against the old man. And in any
case, I trust you, Arthur. I can trust you, can't I ?"
There was a wistful note in the last sentence that
robbed it of any offence, and Arthur was touched
by it. The effect of his brief visit to the house was
being dissipated already by the surroundings of the
garden.
"Rather. Yes, absolutely," he said gently. "I
mean what possible reason could I have for giving
you away?"
Joe Kenyon sighed. “Reason?” he reflected.
"Well, reason enough in all conscience."


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 117
Arthur was puzzled. “What?” he asked.
“Oh! there you are,” his uncle replied. “Either
you know too little or too much, and one has to
trust you in either case. But surely, my dear boy,
you can at least see that you've got it in your power
to give any of us away to the old man ?”
"Oh, good Lord!" Arthur ejaculated in an un-
dertone. He had a horrible picture of the Kenyons
living a life of eternal suspicion and distrust, fearing
that one or other of them might by some trick or
disloyalty obtain an unfair hold on the old man's
affection. His uncle's next speech, however, de-
stroyed that picture even as it began to take shape.
“That doesn't apply to us, of course," he said.
“We've got a sort of unspoken agreement between
ourselves. Had to have. We hadn't at first
though, you know," he continued, looking round
and changing his voice as if he were making an unex-
pected announcement.
"Hadn't you?” Arthur murmured encouragingly.
"By Jove, no," his uncle went on reminiscently.
"But that was nearly forty years ago, of course;
just after this place was built; at the time when I
tried to break away." He paused a moment and
then went on: “I wanted to be an artist. I've
got portfolios of stuff upstairs if you'd ever care
to look at 'em. I dare say I shouldn't have been
any good, not really first-class, but I can see things,
and now and again I can get something down.
There was a note of the wood I made when we first
came here, that was rather good. I'll show it to you
sometime. The wood was pretty nearly all pines
then. The old man planted those larches—said the
pines were too gloomy. I dare say he was right.”.
"And he wouldn't let you become an artist?”'
Arthur put in.
he continued hadn't at first
na changing his ow


ÍIS THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"He didn't actually forbid it," Joe Kenyon said.
“But he made it simply impossible. He-well”-
he lowered his tone almost to a whisper-"we used
to believe in those days that he had some insidious
disease or other. I suppose he must have started
the idea himself. I can't remember. But I know
that my poor mother used to be very depressed
about it at times. She died in '83, you know, a
year or two after we came here to live. However,
what with one thing and another, there seemed to
be no alternative except to put off my going to
Paris—from month to month at first, and after-
wards from year to year.” He gave a grim laugh
as he added. “In a way of speaking you may say
it's going on still. Not long ago at dinner I was
talking about Italy and the old man asked me why
I didn't go there."
"Yes, it was after I came. I heard him," Arthur
said. “But, I didn't understand ..."
"Oh, well! if I'd said I would, I shouldn't have
got the money to go with in the first place," his
uncle explained, “and in the second it would have
been all up with me so far as the old man's will was
concerned. He never threatens one, not directly,
but we know. And, well, I can't face the thought
of the workhouse. They don't allow you cigars
there, I'm told,” he concluded whimsically.
Arthur thought that he could realise the old
situation fairly accurately. His uncle's original
weakness showed so clearly through his narration.
He had, no doubt, procrastinated, and bargained
with himself, continually shirking the immediate
necessity to take definite action. All that side of the
affair was comprehensible enough, but what of that
other point from which the narrative had so casu-
ally rambled away?


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 119
“Yes, I see,” Arthur agreed sympathetically;
"but what was it you were going to say about your
having some agreement among yourselves, uncle ?
It was apropos of my being an outsider, you know."
“We got to understand it wouldn't do, that's
all," Joe Kenyon said, “not to quarrel among our-
selves, that is. Esther was inclined to make mis-
chief in the old days. I don't know whether I
ought to be telling you all this. Anyhow, we soon
saw that it would never do for us to be jealous of
one another. We had to find a modus vivendi and
—and take our chance. That was after Catherine
married Charles and they had come to live with us.
The idea at that time was that Charles was going
into the Diplomatic later on.”
Kenyon paused, but made no movement to rise
and go up to the house in obedience to his sister's
summons. His next sentence, however, apparently
referred to that issue.
“Seems to me,” he said, "that there can't be any
harm, now, in telling you these things. I don't
mind admitting that we've discussed it among
ourselves-Esther, Catherine, Charles, and myself,
that is. Of course what Esther says is that you
might go behind us, as it were, but I know there's
no sort of fear of that.”
Arthur had never liked Miss Kenyon; but now
he began quite actively to hate her.
"She must have a disgustingly low opinion of me
if she could think a thing like that," he said bitterly,
“Oh, well,” his uncle replied calmly, "you get
like that when you've lived here long enough,
Can't trust any one from outside. Never know,
that after all these years, we mayn't be left in the
lurch. But, as I've pointed out to 'em, you're
different."
1


120 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
Nevertheless he was, without doubt, distinctly
uneasy. He knew that he had been indiscreet, and
now was anxious for reassurance. Twice in the last
minute he had ended with an assertion of belief in
his nephew's trustworthiness.
And it was with a strong feeling of desire to
confirm that belief both for his uncle's sake and his
own, that Arthur now said,
“I wish I could do something to help to help
Hubert, I mean. Don't you think I might say some-
thing to Mr Kenyon about it? Reason with him?
I wouldn't mind doing it in the least. He always
seems reasonable enough when we're talking to-
gether. A bit hard, perhaps, rather—what shall I
say?-not really interested in life, and so on; but
not a bit-well—unkind—cruel, if you know what
I mean?”
He had expected an almost scornful refusal of
his offer to act as an intermediary, but his uncle
appeared ready, at least to consider the proposal.
"That's good of you, Arthur,” he said, "but
there's another thing to be thought of, too; Esther's
dead against the engagement.”
That announcement instantly stiffened Arthur in
his resolve. The thing was worth doing in any case,
but the possibility of inflicting defeat upon Miss
Kenyon afforded an immense additional inducement.
"I'd like to do it,” he said, with sudden ardour.
Joe Kenyon sat up in his chair and turned to
face his nephew with an effect of new interest.
"I don't for a moment believe your embassy will
make the least difference, my dear boy," he said
earnestly; "but I, personally, should be grateful if
you'd undertake it. For Hubert's sake. It would
be a-a tremendous compensation for him if he
were married, and-well, we don't know yet that
there hat's eady, at an inteno


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 121
the old man will oppose the idea. At the same time
I suppose you realise what it may mean for you?"
"Mean? Yes. Well, I suppose. ..." Arthur
began, uncertain of his uncle's precise intention.
"Mean that you may be turned out of the place
at an hour's notice," Joe Kenyon interrupted him.
"If you get on the old man's wrong side he'll have
no scruples. That's what happened with my brother
James, Eleanor's father, you know. He wanted
to marry a girl, such a charming girl she was too
-Eleanor takes after her—and somehow or other
he put the old man's back up. Poor old Jim, he
had an awful time-married Eleanor-Eleanor's
mother, you understand out of hand, and they
practically starved. He used to write, but we
couldn't help him, of course not to count; and the
old man wouldn't. He was as hard as nails—hard
as nails. They were in South America somewhere,
Rio, I think it was, when Jim's wife died, and he
only survived her about six months. We heard
all about it from a fellow called Payne and his wife.
Payne was in the Cable Company out there, and
Jim knew them and asked them to bring Eleanor
home. She was only seven or eight then, a dark,
solemn little chit as ever you saw, poor dear. By
God! you could tell she'd been through it. I can
see them all standing in the hall now. Payne was
a great stout chap with a grayish beard. His wife
was a big woman too. They had Lord knows how
many children of their own, I believe. And that
little solemn elf Eleanor looked like a midget beside
them. Thin as a herring she was, but as pretty as
a fairy. She was always graceful, even as a bit of
a child-sure in her movements-it was a pleasure
to watch her. ...'
Joe Kenyon paused as if savouring his recollec-


122 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
tion, taking reflective pride, perhaps, in his power
of "seeing," and then continued with a chuckle,
"And this chap Payne was all taken aback. He
hadn't expected a place like this evidently. Jim
hadn't told him anything, I suppose, and Payne
probably thought we weren't much better off than
Jim. He put it in a bit thick, I remember, about
Jim's poverty over there. Nice, decent sort of
people. We heard from 'em once or twice after-
wards, inquiring after Eleanor, and then they went
back to South America and we lost touch with them;
though I believe Eleanor still hears from them
occasionally. However, what I was going to say
was that we didn't know, of course, whether the
old man would have Eleanor or not. Esther
wouldn't have anything to do with it, so in the
end your aunt and I took Eleanor up to show her
to the old man, and as luck would have it he took
a tremendous fancy to her. She's been his favourite
ever since.” He hesitated a moment before he
added: “But there's never been any question of
our being jealous of her, of course. She has told
us that if by any chance the old man left her the
bulk of his property, she wouldn't keep it. She
wouldn't, either. In fact I shouldn't be at all sorry
if it was that way. You could trust Eleanor to be
absolutely fair-and generous.”
Joe Kenyon stopped speaking, but for a time
Arthur made no comment on the story he had just
heard. His attention seemed to be following two
strands at the same moment. One side of his mind
was attempting to weigh his uncle's motives in
making all these confidences. Had he and his sister
been quarrelling? There had been more than one
reference to Miss Kenyon that had sounded dis-
tinctly bitter, and the emphasis he had laid on his


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 123
last sentence might have implied that he hoped that
if in some moment of aberration his father made
an unjust will, he might be at the mercy of Eleanor
rather than be dependent on the goodwill of his
sister.
The other side of Arthur's mind was engaged in
the contemplation of a desolate little fairy standing
in the hall of Hartling House solemnly awaiting
her fate. Even now, she had sometimes a look of
desolation, of loneliness. He wondered if she still
remembered her early troubles, if she occasionally
grieved for her father and mother?
"I hope I haven't bored you with all this ?” his
uncle's voice murmured. "It is—to tell you the
truth—a relief to let oneself go a little to some one
who doesn't know. I dare say you can't understand
that?”
“I can. Rather," Arthur said, suddenly appre-
ciating the fact that his uncle's motive was the
purely personal one of relief. "I can quite under-
stand now you must get fed up with all this some-
times."
Joe Kenyon sighed, but he did not otherwise
comment on this expression of sympathy. “I've
been yarning so, we've got rather away from the
point,” he said. “But you know, Arthur, I don't
want you to go into this affair of Hubert's without
knowing what you are doing. There it is, my boy.
You may be cutting your own throat. I assure you
the old man will put you out at an hour's notice
if you happen to get on his wrong side.”
"Honestly, uncle, I don't care a little hang about
that,” Arthur affirmed bravely. "I never meant to
stay here and I've had a jolly six weeks.”
"Of course we shall have to say something to
Esther first,” his uncle replied.


126 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
a bit,” he interjected in an undertone. "Beastly
hot in here."
"Very friendly of Arthur," Turner commented,
turning slightly towards the young man as he spoke.
"No reason, after all, why he should bother himself
about our affairs.”
“I suppose he understands ..." his wife began,
and then stopped abruptly. She was still looking
anxiously at her brother as if inviting further con-
fidences.
Joe Kenyon nodded. “Oh, of course, of course,"
he said. "Hubert told him all about it this after-
noon."
"About what, Joe?” Miss Kenyon put in, speak.
ing for the first time. She gave him no indication
of perturbation or anxiousness, but she was reading
her brother's face as if she sought some evidence of
his secret motive.
"Well, about the engagement, and having no
money and so on,” Joe Kenyon rather desperately
explained.
"No money?" his sister returned, with a lift of
her eyebrows. “What do you mean, by having no
money?"
"Well, Hubert hasn't any, not of his own," her
brother replied. “And he was saying, I gather,
that he would like-well—a change of air if he
were married. About enough of us here, without
him, perhaps. That sort of thing. And Arthur
very generously offered through me to lend him a
couple of hundred pounds if he wanted it.”
Whether or not he had intended to create a
diversion by this further announcement, he had
certainly achieved that object.
Turner gave an exclamation of surprise, but it
was Mrs Kenyon who answered.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 127
"Oh, but we couldn't possibly accept that,” in
an agitated voice; and Arthur, looking down, saw
that her hands were trembling. She was, he rea-
lised then, by far the most nervous of the five, and
he recognised in her at that moment a strong like-
ness to his own mother. She, too, had been a
timid woman, apprehensive not only of danger, but
also of change. Miss Kenyon had let her work fall
in her lap, and was sitting, plunged, apparently, in
a fit of deep abstraction.
"No, no, of course not,” Joe Kenyon replied. “I
have already refused that."
“On what grounds ?” Miss Kenyon put in sharply.
"Er–I don't think-I suggested, Esther, that
Hubert would be—well, rather lost if he were to
find himself in a new country with a wife to support
on a capital of £200.”
Miss Kenyon gave a short impatient sniff, and
turned to Arthur. “A little strange, isn't it,” she
asked, “for you to offer to finance us?” .
“Only Hubert, you know," Arthur explained.
"Hubert has a father and mother alive, to say
nothing of uncles and aunts," she returned. “I
don't know why he should need help from a com-
parative stranger.”
"He seemed to need it,” Arthur said dryly, “or I
shouldn't have made the offer."
Miss Kenyon shrugged her shoulders and turned
back to her brother. "Are we to understand, Joe,"
she said, "that Arthur Woodroffe knows all about
us now? Have you told him everything?"
"Damn it, Esther, what do you mean by every-
thing ?” Joe Kenyon exploded defensively. "I-it
seems to me-Hubert had pretty well told him
all that mattered, before I said a word. I told him
about Jim, if that's what you mean?”


128 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
Miss Kenyon began to drum her fingers on the
arm of her chair. “And what good do you expect
to do to yourself or anybody else by speaking to my
father about Hubert's engagement?" she asked
Arthur.
Turner leant back in his chair and crossed his
legs. "Precisely, that's the real point,” he agreed.
"Well, naturally, I hope to persuade Mr Kenyon
to sanction the engagement," Arthur said.
"Why?” snapped Miss Kenyon.
"Friendship for Hubert," Arthur said.
"I wasn't aware that you and he were such great
friends," was Miss Kenyon's criticism of that ex-
planation.
"Oh, well, pretty fair," Arthur compromised.
"Anyhow, I'll be glad to help him if I can."
"I can't imagine that anything you could say to
my father would carry the least weight,” Miss Ken-
yon said dryly.
"Perhaps not,” Arthur agreed. “No harm in
trying, though, is there?"
"I think that's quite true, you know, Esther,"
Mrs Kenyon put in, “and it would be rather a re-
lief if-that is, I hope, for Hubert's sake at all
events, something can be done to smooth things
over."
Miss Kenyon turned from her sister-in-law with
a slight suggestion of contempt. “Do you know
this girl, Dorothy Martin ?" she asked, looking at
her brother.
"Slightly," he said. “Met her twice, I think.
Seemed a jolly girl, I thought. Full of life.”
"Quite a nice girl," his wife put in eagerly.
“Oh! you've met her too, have you?" Miss Ken-
yon commented coldly.
“At the Club House. Hubert took me up there


130 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
had been of his sister's breed? Had he, perhaps,
had his sister's hands also; those white, strong
managing hands that were now so threateningly
clenched?
She stood there for a moment, dominating them
all, while she allowed the threat of her unfinished
sentence to take effect; then she turned and left the
room with a quiet dignity that was in itself a men-
ace.
Nevertheless, Arthur at least had not been in-
timidated by her outburst, and her contemptuous
reference to himself had provided him with the
very stimulant he desired. Moreover, he had now
a fierce desire to humiliate his handsome opponent,
a desire that arose from a new source. He had seen
her as a woman for the first time, and he was aware
in himself of a hitherto unrealised impulse to
cruelty. He wanted to break and dominate that
proud, erect figure. However sneeringly she had
challenged him, and in the zest of his unsatisfied
youth, he longed to conquer her, although his vic-
tory could be but the barren victory of the intel-
lect.
He took the seat Miss Kenyon had just vacated
with a pleasant sense of mastery. He felt that he
could do anything he liked with the other four.
They were all of them looking, just then, so com-
pletely cowed and depressed. Joe Kenyon and his
sister were crumpled into their chairs, with an air
of rather absurd dejection. Mrs Kenyon had re-
sumed her fancy work and was bending over it in
an attitude that suggested the possibility of hidden
tears; and Turner, nervously twisting his exquisitely
neat little moustache, was staring thoughtfully at
his own reflection in the darkened window.
"I don't see why we shouldn't help Hubert, all


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 131
the same," Arthur tried, by way of making a be-
ginning.
Little Turner withdrew his gaze from the win-
dow and regarded the intrepid youth with an ex-
pression of half-amused pity.
“You don't know," was his only comment.
"Well, I think I do, to a certain extent,” Arthur
said boldly. “Uncle Joe told me a good many
things to-night, one way and another. More than
he cared to admit, perhaps, before Miss Kenyon.”
He had made a deliberate bid for inclusion into
their secret counsels by that last sentence, and he
had at least succeeded in stimulating their interest.
"Oh, well, well,” his uncle said, sitting up with
an effect of reinflation, "perhaps I did. Esther's
got a queer temper, now and then. And possibly
I told you more than was altogether discreet. He
looked at his brother-in-law as he added, "I'll ad-
mit to being a bit down in the mouth about the
whole affair."
“But do you really think,” Mrs Kenyon began
unhopefully, "that it would be any good for you
to come into the affair at all?”
"Well, I'm perfectly free, you know,” Arthur
said, and instantly realised that he had said the
forbidden thing. They could not bear that ad-
mission of bondage in a full company.
"Can't see that that's anything to do with it,”
Turner replied. “We're all free enough, so far as
that goes. Point is, whether your interference is
advisable; whether you might not put Mr Kenyon's
back up and make things a hundred times worse
for Hubert.”
Arthur chose to overlook the snub. “Well, I
don't see that it could do any harm,” he said. He
felt pleasantly young and capable among those four


132 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
old people; he believed that they were too inert to
oppose him, that they would accept any leader cap-
able of taking the initiative. “Anything I did,"
he continued, "would only react on me, and I-
don't care. Uncle Joe has warned me that Mr
Kenyon may sling me out of the house at an hour's
notice, but I'm perfectly willing to take that risk.”
No one answered him. For the second time in
two minutes he had all too clearly displayed their
weakness with his youthful boast of freedom, and
this time they had no defence but to ignore him.
For a few seconds there was a painful, uneasy
silence, and then Turner looked at Mrs Kenyon
and said, in a confidential tone,
"What does Eleanor say about it all? I suppose
you've asked her advice ?"
"She thinks he'll be against it,” Mrs Kenyon said
timidly. “But nothing has been said to him as yet.
She-she would like Hubert to go away—but I
can't see how—even if we accepted ..." She
glanced at Arthur as she concluded.
"Oh, well,” Turner replied, standing up, "we'll
have to leave it at that presumably. No good in
our interfering, obviously.” And he looked at his
wife, who began to fumble her work into an untidy
bundle, preparatory to getting to her feet.
"With our own trouble hanging over us," she
remarked allusively, and added, “What's going to
happen to poor Ken, I don't know. He's deter-
mined that he won't come to live here."
They were all standing now, saying good-night,
but Joe Kenyon lagged behind with Arthur as they
trailed across the spaces of the drawing-room.
"I'm afraid it's no good, you know," he mur-
mured, "very generous of you to make the offer,
all the same."


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 133
When he was alone in his own delightful bed-
room, Arthur stood at the open window, listening
to the sound of the rain and inhaling the welcome
scents of the grateful earth. Already his mood of
resentment against these four impotent old people
had passed. They had snubbed and checked him,
given him to understand that though he might, in-
deed, know something of the facts of their position,
he knew nothing of the spirit. But he could not
cherish anger against them, nor even contempt.
They had been in shackles too long; he could not
reasonably expect them to enter with him into any
kind of conspiracy against the old man. They were
so helpless, so completely dependent upon his good-
will. Nevertheless, although they had given him
no authority, he meant to persist in his endeavour
although he risked expulsion from this Paradise of
comfort and well-being. He was genuinely anxious
to help his uncle, aunt, and cousin, and he thrilled
at the thought of crossing swords with Miss Ken-
yon. If he defeated her, it would, indeed, be a
glorious victory.
And, possibly, Eleanor would be on his side? He
had an amazingly clear picture of her in his mind,
a forlorn, independent child, in the midst of the
splendours of the Hartling hall. He could see her
standing by the side of the colossal elephant's pad;
an amazing contrast between the slender and the
gross.
What was it his uncle had called her? “A lovely,
solemn little chit?" Yes, she was lovely. He had
hardly realised it until now. Perhaps she would
change her opinion of him after to-morrow.








VIII
ARTHUR'S usual hour for his morning inter-
A view with old Mr Kenyon was 11 o'clock, but
two or three times a week he received a message
either at breakfast or immediately after, releasing
him from attendance. He had been prepared for
such a reprieve this morning, imagining that the old
man might be a trifle exhausted by his passage of
arms with Kenyon Turner the day before, but as no
message arrived he went into the library to read the
morning papers for an hour and a half before going
upstairs.
* All the important journals were taken at Hart-
ling, most of them in duplicate; and Arthur was
probably the only member of the household who
had ever considered the expense involved. He had
calculated once that, including magazines and other
periodicals, more than a hundred pounds a year
were spent under this head alone. But the expendi-
ture of the place was all on the same magnificent
scale. Arthur remembered his uncle's whimsical
comment that cigars were not provided in the work-
house, and smiled grimly at the thought that the
inmates of Hartling were the most pampered pau-
pers in the world.
The library was empty that morning. Arthur
generally found Hubert there at that time, but he
had presumably had breakfast even earlier than
usual and gone out. Nor did Mr Turner, who came
in half an hour later, settle himself down there to
137


138 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
his customary study of the Times. Instead he
nodded a curt good-morning to Arthur, selected
half a dozen papers, and immediately retired with
them to some other room.
After that Arthur was left severely alone. The
inference was clear enough: the Kenyons did not
wish to appear in the cause he was going to plead.
They might approve his intention but they pre-
ferred not to influence it. If he failed, they would
deny any kind of responsibility for what he had
said. Their attitude had been foreshadowed in
the course of their conversation the previous night.
“No good our interfering,” Turner had said. They
were afraid of being dismissed from their luxurious
almshouse.
Arthur put down his paper, walked across to the
window, and stood there looking out into the gar-
dens. It had rained heavily in the night and there
was more rain coming. Low wisps of ashen gray
cloud were travelling intently across the dark pur-
ples of the heavy background, and the horizon was
hidden by the mist of an approaching downpour.
It was not a day, he reflected, remembering many
such days, to spend in going from house to house
through fountains of London mud; nor in receiving
poor patients at the surgery. How their wet clothes
reeked! They brought all the worst of the weather
in with them, the mud and the wet invaded the con-
sulting room; one was never dry or clean on such
days as these.
Instinctively he rubbed his hands together, and
then looked down at them. They were better kept
than when he had first come to Hartling; it had
been impossible to keep his hands like that in Peck-
ham. He liked the brown of their tan, deeper on
the back than at the finger tips, and his nails were


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 139
rather good. It was worth while now to spend a
little time on them.
Were the Kenyons to be pitied? They were not
free, of course, but no one was free. They were
certainly more free living their life here than he
would be if he went back to Peckham. It was a
dog's life that, even Somers couldn't deny it.
The tall trees in the garden were bent by a rush
of wind, and the rain suddenly spattered furiously
against the plate glass of the window. How pro-
tected one was here! Hartling windows did not
rattle in the gale, nor let in the wet. A day such
as this gave a zest to the comfort of it all. And
although one could not go out there was plenty
to do, any amount of books to read, billiards with
Turner, and probably they would play bridge in
the afternoon-his uncle, Turner, and Elizabeth
all played quite a good game. ...
If the old man turned him out for interfering in
a matter in which he was not concerned, he would
have to go back to Somers for a night or two. If
he was not very careful with the little money still
left to him, he would have to give up the idea of
Canada altogether. Living in a place like this for
five weeks changed one's scale of values. He did
not look forward to "roughing it" so much as he
had before he came away from Peckham.
Was he pledged in any way to plead Hubert's
cause with his grandfather? Would it not be bet-
ter from every point of view to leave it alone? If
Hubert's own family would not put in a word for
him, why should a comparative stranger interfere?
The old man would almost certainly be annoyed.
How on earth.could one open the subject to him
without impertinence? That offer last night had
been made in a moment of sentimental benevolence.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 141
had come in some odd way to associate that clump-
ing thing with Eleanor. He could almost see her
now, a slender, solemn child, dusty with recent
travel, waiting to learn her destiny. ...
And it was Eleanor whom he saw first when he
entered Mr Kenyon's suite of apartments. She had
answered his knock—no one went into those rooms
without knocking—and he found her standing near
the door with an effect of impatience.
"Are you going to say anything to him about
Hubert?" she asked at once in a low voice.
Arthur hesitated before he said, “I've been
thinking that perhaps, on the whole, it would be
better if I didn't. It might make it worse for him.
I've no sort of influence with Mr Kenyon, I mean.”
She looked at him suspiciously. He could not
mistake the doubt in her eyes. She did not believe
in the excuse that he had put forward. She had
always mistrusted him for some reason or other.
"Well, have I ?” he persisted feebly.
"None whatever, I should imagine," she said;
“only, I thought. . . . She paused and looked to-
wards the closed door of the inner room. “You're
ten minutes late now," she added inconsequently.
He was irated by her attitude towards him,
her dismissal of him as a person of no importance.
He longed to show her that he was not a man to be
lightly despised. But all he could find to say was
a foolish, petulant accusation of her own motives.
lices longoissal ofd by she addanes rond looke said;
a food she not impu would be slimost child
"No doubt you would be glad enough to see me
turned out," he said, with an almost childlike sullen-
ness. “You've always disliked me."
She stood quite still, staring past him towards
the door of her grandfather's room. She was again
wearing the dress of pale gray linen in which he had


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 143
can't seriously believe," she said, "that I should be
so mean and small as to persuade you into this for
any purely selfish purpose of my own? Why, none
of them would be as paltry as that.”
He blushed, but he would not drop his eyes from
hers. "I'm to respect your motives, of course," he
said defiantly; "but you're at liberty to impute any
sort of cowardice to me?”.
“Isn't it cowardice then?" she asked, returning
his stare without flinching. “Haven't you changed
your mind because you're afraid of having to leave
here?"
She had defeated him; and realising that he dared
not answer that question truthfully, he sought ref-
uge in a youthful petulance. “Ohi very well,” he
said, turning his back on her, and crossing the room
towards the inner door. "Have it your own way.
You can think anything you like about me. I don't
care." He knocked and then entered Mr Ken-
yon's room, without looking back to see what effect
this speech might have on her. He was persuaded
that he did not care any longer what she thought
of him. She was so confoundedly self-sufficient and
superior.
Mr Kenyon was reading the Times, a thing he
could do without the aid of glasses. His sight and
hearing were apparently as good as Arthur's own.
But he dropped the paper on his knees as Arthur
came in.
"You've been having a talk with Eleanor ?” he
remarked in his usual friendly tone. “What a won-
derful girl she is, isn't she? I'm surprised that
you and she don't get on better together. I had
hoped you might be friends."
Arthur was slightly taken aback. It had never
occurred to him that the old man might wish him


144 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
to be on more friendly terms with Eleanor. He
had never before referred to the subject in any way.
Had he, perhaps, heard or guessed at the quarrel
between them in the next room?
"I'm afraid she doesn't like me ?” he explained.
"Oh! in that case there's nothing more to be
said,” the old man replied quietly. “Well, you
needn't stay this morning, if you've anything else
to do. I had meant to send you a message."
Arthur understood that he was dismissed, that
he might now go back and explain to the people
downstairs that he had been given no opportunity
to act as the family's catspaw that morning. For
twenty-four hours at least he was relieved from
any kind of obligation, and in the meantime he
could re-discuss the whole question with Hubert
and his father. There was but one objection to
this plan; he would have to tell Eleanor as he re-
turned through the next room.
He sighed and stood irresolute. Mr Kenyon had
returned to his study of the Times. No encour-
agement could be hoped from that quarter. The
old man had an amazing gift of detaching his in-
terest from his surroundings. He had probably
forgotten that his attendant was still in the room.
Why could not Eleanor have undertaken this mis-
sion herself? Ohl obviously because she knew that
it was futile, purposeless, utterly foolish. Never-
theless, he was not going to be accused of cowar-
dice, nor of trying to propitiate the old man for the
sake of being remembered in his will.
"Might I speak to you a minute, sir?” Arthur
made his opening curtly, almost contemptuously.
By the very act of asking the question he had re-
gained his freedom. He saw that his fear and re-
spect of the old man before him were based on noth-


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 145
ing but the longing for comfort and luxury, for
abundance and idleness. Now that he had resolved
to leave Hartling rather than endure the accusation
of cowardice, all his fears had slipped from him.
Mr Kenyon put down his paper and looked up.
His pale blue eyes were suddenly intent, the eyes
of a hunting animal or a bird of prey, in sight but
not yet sure of its quarry.
"Sit down, Arthur,” he said quietly, pointing to
a chair nearly opposite to his own. "You may
speak for an hour if you wish. I have nothing to
do this morning."
"It was about Hubert," Arthur said, accepting
the invitation to sit down. He did not care now,
so far as he himself was concerned, what was the
upshot of this conversation, but while he was about
it he might as well do his best for poor old Hubert.
Mr Kenyon nodded, gravely attentive.
"No doubt, sir, you'll wonder what concern it is
of mine," Arthur continued, “but the truth is that
I like Hubert, and I'm rather sorry for him. ..."
"Sorry for him ?” Mr Kenyon repeated with a
faint surprise.
"We young men of the present generation, sir,"
Arthur explained, revelling now in his sense of
liberty, “think a great deal of our freedom. I
don't mean to say that Hubert has any particular
ambition in that direction. He was brought up in
a different atmosphere. But from my point of view,
you see, his life seems dreadfully confined and
limited, though perhaps it is a trifle presumptuous
for me to be sorry for him on that account."
“And you wish ...?” Mr Kenyon suggested,
without the least sign of displeasure.
"Oh, well! that's another matter," Arthur said.
"The fact is, sir, that Hubert has fallen in love,


146 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
and for some reason that I can't pretend to under-
stand, neither he nor my uncle seem to care about
coming to ask your consent to his marriage. Som
so I've come to plead his cause for him."
"Who is the girl he wants to marry?” Mr Ken-
yon put in. A change had come over him in the
course of Arthur's last sentences. He sat less stiffly
in his chair; he had the air of a man re-confronted
by some familiar trouble with which he had often
battled in the past.
"Her name is Dorothy Martin," Arthur began.
“She ..."
Mr Kenyon interrupted him with a gesture of
his hand. "I know, he said, "her father is Lord
Massey's agent-a homely fellow and rather stupid.
So Hubert wants to marry Miss Martin, does he?"
His head drooped a little forward and he began
to slide his hands slowly backward and forward
along his knees.
Arthur felt suddenly sorry for him. Neither
Hubert nor his father had told him that Miss Mar-
tin's father was, to put it bluntly, not in the Ken-
yons' class. He understood better now why they
had hesitated to approach the old man. And how
decently he had taken it! Without any sign of
anger, even of vexation.
"I believe he's very much in love with her,"
Arthur murmured.
Mr Kenyon sighed and sat up. “As you re-
marked just now, Arthur," he said, “you naturally
can't be expected to understand, and I wonder if it
would be indiscreet of a very, very old man to en-
lighten you ?"
His expression as he spoke was pathetic, wist-
ful; he looked at Arthur as if he besought him to
approve the offered confidence.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 149
m
.
spoke his thoughts aloud; and now he raised him-
self with an effort and stared at Arthur as though
he had become suddenly aware of his presence in
the room.
"So Hubert wants to marry Miss Martin, does
he ?” he asked, returning to the point at issue; “and
has sent you to plead for him."
“No, he didn't send me, sir,” Arthur explained.
"It was entirely my own idea.”
Mr Kenyon smiled paternally. "Rash youth !
rash youth 1” he said. "Have you no battles of
your own to fight?"
"Well, at the moment, no sir," Arthur replied,
"I have been having a very easy time here for the
last five weeks.”
"And now you're pining to get back into the
struggle again, eh?” Mr Kenyon said, with a lift
of his eyebrows. “Well, youth and senility are the
ages of selfishness, and when there comes a clash
between them it is senility that always must give
way. And yet, Arthur, I should be so glad if you
could stay with me—till the end. I gave you my
reasons when we first talked the matter over to-
gether. I can add still another, now; I've taken a
great liking for you. Are you absolutely deter-
mined to go?"
"I? No, sir. I didn't mean ..." Arthur stam-
mered.
The old man was watching him keenly. "But
you don't deny that you had that in your mind,
when you began to speak to me about Hubert?"
he said, and then, reading confirmation of that
statement in Arthur's embarrassment, he came up
to him and laid his hands on his shoulders.
“Natural enough; natural enough, my boy," he
said, "there's nothing to be ashamed of. And I


150 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
wouldn't ask you to make the sacrifice if I were a
younger man. But as it is what difference will a
year, two years at most, make to you at your time
of life? Come, now," he smiled with a flash of
roguery, "let's make a bargain! Your friend
Hubert shall have his Miss Martin, if you'll prom-
ise to stay with me and perform those little duties
I mentioned when I'm gone."
“Oh, of course, sir, rather," Arthur said, blush-
ing with pleasure and embarrassment. “I would
promise that in any case. There's no need for any
any quid pro quo, I mean.”
Mr Kenyon still had his hands on the young
man's shoulders, and he gave him a gentle shake as
he said, “Very well, that's a bargain then; and I
may tell you that you've taken a great weight off
my mind. Now, go and tell Hubert to come up to
me. I'll promise to let him off more lightly than he
deserves.
Arthur strode out of the room with the conscious
pride of one who has all life at his feet.
Eleanor rose from the desk at which she was
writing as he entered.
"So you did speak to him after all?" she said,
searching his face with an eager, inquiring stare.
“Yes, I did. It's all right,” Arthur returned,
disciplining his expression of triumph to a becom-
ing modesty. "He wants to see Hubert now. He
has promised to let him off lightly," he said.
"And you're staying on?" Eleanor inquired.
"Yes. He-he made me promise that.” Arthur
found himself inexplicably dropping into apology.
"I couldn't possibly refuse him, could I? You see
he wants me to be here-at the end."
"I understand," Eleanor said coldly, turning her
back on him and reseating herself at the desk.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 151
“Will you give Hubert the message or shall I send
some one?"
"I'll go," Arthur replied curtly.
He was suddenly vexed and disheartened. She
had dispersed all the glamour of his achievement;
had made him feel as if he had done a mean rather
than a splendid thing. There could be but one ex-
planation of her attitude-she suspected him of
working on her grandfather's affections. No doubt
she knew that he had become a special favourite;
had known it probably before he knew it himself.
Yet even so, if there were no jealousy on her part
—and Uncle Joe had made it certain last night
that her motives were above suspicion-why should
she be so annoyed? Was she afraid that he might
be designing to cut out the rest of the family ?
He had reached the hall when that explanation
came to him, and he paused there, burnt with shame
by the bare thought of such a suspicion. It was
degrading, infamous. He felt that he could not
endure that she should hold such an opinion of him
for another moment. He turned back towards the
staircase with the intention of instantly challenging
her, and then a better means of vindication occurred
to him, and he went on into the drawing-room.
They were all there now, except Eleanor; and
they made no attempt to disguise their interest and
excitement. They faced the door with what seemed
to be a concerted movement as he entered—and at
once misread the signs of his still evident emotion.
Miss Kenyon, indeed, made so sure of the correct-
ness of her inference that she acted upon it without
further consideration.
Arthur saw her then, he believed, in her true
character. She rose and came towards him across
the room with an effect of vindictive triumph. Her


152 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
pale blue eyes were bright, the pupils contracted
almost to a pin-point; they were the eyes of some
fierce bird that is at last within sight of the kill.
"Well?" she said in a clear, cold voice, “so you've
in my father: no attempte said, and I understar
Arthur made no attempt to prevaricate. "Yes,
he wants to see Hubert," he said, and looked across
the room at his cousin as he added, “I understand
that he won't raise any objection.” He saw, as he
spoke, the lift of Hubert's head and the quick
change of his expression, before his attention was
snatched back to Miss Kenyon.
“And you ?” she asked sharply.
There was no need to put the question more
plainly. He knew they all knew what she meant.
"Your father has asked me to stay on-in-
definitely," he said quietly.
She made no reply, but she instantly veiled her
eyes, lowering her glance to the simple brooch she
was wearing at her breast, at the same time putting
up a hand as if to adjust it. And when she looked
up again her expression betrayed no sign of anger
or resentment.
He was disappointed. He had expected, even
hoped, for some indication of defeat from her.
Vaguely he had pictured her going up to her father
to enter a violent protest. This apparently meek
submission annoyed him.
"I'm sorry to disappoint you," he said provo-
catively.
"I have forgotten the meaning of the word dis-
appointment,” she returned gravely, looked him
full in the eyes for a moment, and then passed on
towards the door.
Her self-control was superb, but the picture that
remained in Arthur's mind was of her advance to-


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 155
how terribly he had embarrassed them by thus
naming the secret thing in public. Mrs Turner was
fumbling with her work; her husband leaned back
in his chair, staring up at the ceiling; and Elizabeth,
flushing slightly, got up and walked over to the win-
dow.
It was his aunt who answered him, however, in-
directly. "Perhaps we'd better go into another
room, Catherine," she said, addressing her sister-
in-law. “I've never been able to understand legal
affairs, and this proposal of Arthur's, so far as I
understand it, seems to be something of the kind.”
Mrs Turner grabbed her work and got up with a
nod of agreement, but then some purpose seemed
to stiffen her. She hesitated, nearly dropped the
bead bag she was making, and said in a scarcely
audible voice, “But we do appreciate the spirit of
it all the same."
“Oh, rather) of course,” her brother echoed
her.
Turner returned to that as an opening, when the
three men were left alone to discuss the proposition
that had been vaguely indicated. “Very decent of
you, Woodroffe," he said; "and you put the thing
quite delicately too; but you understand, don't you,
that it would never do to have any kind of formal
agreement?”
"I don't. I should prefer it to be as formal and
binding as possible,” Arthur protested.
Joe Kenyon shook his head. "No, no, it would
never do,” he said. “You see, my boy, the old man
might think we'd been influencing you."
"Good Lord! I'd make that clear enough to
him," Arthur exclaimed
The two older men exchanged a smile that pitied
his innocence.


156 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
“You don't know him," Turner remarked causti-
cally.
Arthur was a trifle disgusted. He was still warm
with gratitude to the old man who had treated him
so delightfully that morning, and he resented the
bitter note of aspersion in Turner's voice.
“He has been most frightfully decent to me," he
said coldly.
Joe Kenyon began to drum on the arm of his
chair. “Well, no need to go into that, eh,
Charles ?” he asked nervously. “The point is-
what we've got to make clear to Arthur comes to
this, that we're quite glad, what! to trust his word
without any damned deeds and so on?”
“Oh, quite! quite !" Turner agreed.
“But you know ..." Arthur began to protest.
"My dear chap," Turner interrupted him, "if we
can trust you to do the straight thing that's surely
all that's necessary. Shake hands on it, if you like;
but no parchments, for the Lord's sake."
“Very good of you," Arthur mumbled, a little
overwhelmed by this evidence of their faith in him.
“If we hadn't trusted you, I couldn't have said
what I did last night," his uncle put in. “And I
for one am very grateful to you for interfering in
Hubert's affair." He sighed profoundly as he con-
cluded: “It will help him in some ways, I don't
doubt.”
There was apparently nothing more to be said,
and Arthur was on his feet preparing to go when
Turner remarked casually to his brother-in-law,
"Totting 'em up pretty fast just now, isn't he?
That'll make three more of us if poor old Ken has
to come in."
Joe Kenyon's only reply was to draw down the
corners of his mouth and raise his eyebrows.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 157
Arthur did not want to hear any more. He was
sorry that he had heard so much. These petty
criticisms of old Kenyon made him despise Turner
and his uncle; they represented another aspect of
their cowardice. Damn it, the old man was worth
the lot of them, if you excluded Eleanor.
He supposed that she would hear of his agree-
ment with the family, and wondered if she would
apologise to him.


TX





IX
ARTHUR received a letter from Somers by the
second post. It was still raining, and he was
playing billiards with Turner when the letter ar-
rived, so he did not open it until after tea.
Somers had written in a mood of depression.
Bates, Arthur's successor at the Peckham surgery,
was not a success. “The fool means well, too well,”
Somers wrote; "but I was wrong in anticipating
that the panel patients would like him. They don't.
They have taken his measure, and all his good in-
tentions can't disguise the fact that he is pudden-
headed. When are you going to Canada ?" If you
are going? Isn't that visit of yours being amaz-
ingly protracted? I suppose you're lapped in luxury
and can't tear yourself away. Or have you got a
permanent job there as tame medico to the old man?
Or is it a girl? I wish to God you would write
and tell me in any case. I can't keep Bates (he has
got on my nerves) and I should like to know for
certain if there is the least hope of your coming
back. I can't see you marrying for money, and if
the hypothecated girl is the right sort, she would
face the world with you on five hundred a year.
I might make it up to that. The private practice
is better than it was. Sackville, who has been here
so long, is getting too old. You and I between us
would get pretty nearly all the new people. And
if my first guess was the right one and you've got
some sort of sinecure in the Hartling household, the
161
Anda
ortling and your


162 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
sooner you chuck it the better, my son. For one
thing you'll get soft, and for another you'll get
no experience. If you were doing hospital work
(which you ought to be), I should not try to tempt
you away, but if you are just letting your mind rot,
I shall think it is my duty to save you at any cost.”
As he read, Arthur lost the sense of his sur-
roundings. He visualised the narrow sitting-room
of the little Peckham house, and heard Somers's
voice telling him that he ought to be doing hospital
work or getting varied experience in a general prac-
tice; that he was becoming soft, going to pieces from
a professional point of view. He blushed like a stu-
dent under the rebuke of the demonstrator.
Then he looked up and the illusion vanished.
He saw that all his circumstances were now
changed. All that advice would be sound enough
if he were forced to return to such a general prac-
tice as Peckham. But if the old man left him, say
£10,000, he might have a shot for his Fellowship;
try for a registrarship at one of the bigger hospi-
tals; perhaps get on the staff of one and set up in
Wimpole Street. With a certain amount of capital,
this would be so much easier, and the war had given
him a taste for minor surgery. Indeed, it had al-
ways appealed to him more than medicine. Mean-
while, it was true that he must not let himself get
rusty. He ought to go on reading, order some
books from town; or at least have the Lancet sent to
him every Friday. He must keep himself up to
date while he was waiting. At the outside, he could
not have to wait more than five years. He would
only be thirty-three then. ...
He paused doubtfully on that thought, but just
then Hubert came in, and the moment of uneasiness
passed and was forgotten. It had stopped raining


164 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
they were allowed to go out into the world they
would come awful croppers like the unfortunate,
hot-headed James, Eleanor's father. The old man
had learnt a lesson in the course of that affair. He
was a bit of an autocrat, no doubt; but he had good
reason to be, with a family that could not be trusted.
Hubert appeared either unwilling or unable to
provide a definition of the family's attitude. “Oh,
well," he said, “no good discussing that, is it?
Here we are and we've got to put up with it. And,
personally, you know, I don't care much now
partly thanks to you, old man.”
Only "partly," Arthur reflected, but he made no
comment on that. “That's all right, then," was all
he said.
Hubert was in luck, for Miss Martin was at the
Club House, drawn thither, no doubt, by the same
hope that had stimulated her lover, and although
they cheerfully proposed a foursome, Arthur knew
that they would sooner be alone, and declined.
The proposed fourth player in the case was Fer-
gusson, the general practitioner from the village,
to whom reference had been made when the post
of medical attendant had been first offered to Ar-
thur. He and Fergusson had met once or twice on
the links, but their brief conversations had so far
been limited to golf. The doctor was a man of
sixty or so, with thick gray hair and moustache and
a strong, clumsy figure. Arthur had formed the
opinion that he was rather a surly fellow.
"Care to take me on for nine holes—haven't
time for more ?" Arthur asked him.
Fergusson nodded. "Not that I'm particularly
anxious to play," he said. “The ground will be
very wet, I'm thinking, after all the rain we've had
to-day. I just looked in on my way home, without


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 165
much idea of getting a game. Indeed, to be honest,
I've had a very long day and am not so anxious to
exert myself.”
"Scattered sort of practice, I expect,” Arthur
commented. "Have a cigar.”
Fergusson accepted the cigar with a nod of
thanks. “One of your perquisites ?” he asked, smil.
ing rather grimly.
Arthur stiffened. "Never thought of it like
that," he said. “They're all over the shop up
there. You just take 'em as you want 'em."
“No need to get ruffled," Fergusson replied
quietly. "I know. I used to be up there once a
week or so before you came. Nice little sinecure.”
“But I say, look here,” Arthur said, suddenly
conscious for the first time that he might have been
guilty of a breach of medical etiquette, "you don't
mean to tell me that I've taken away one of your
cases ?”
Fergusson laughed dryly. “Well, you have and
you haven't," he said. "But your conscience is
no doubt clear enough and everything was done in
proper form. The old man wrote to me and
explained, and I went up and talked it all over with
him. You were playing golf on that occasion, I'm
thinking. However, it'll be a soft job for you.”
Arthur still looked uneasy. "I never once
thought about you in that connection, you know," he
said. “I ought, anyhow, to have come and seen
you."
"Oh, no need to fash yourself,” Fergusson re-
turned. “Mr Kenyon was very considerate about
the affair. I'm not complaining."
“Yes, he is very considerate,” Arthur agreed,
automatically. Had Fergusson been promised a
place in that untidy will as compensation ? was the


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 167
me. However, you stand a better chance than I do,
for I presume you can give me thirty years."
Arthur shivered slightly. His suspicion had been
fully confirmed, and the thought of it troubled him.
Still, from one point of view, it was reasonable
enough that Mr Kenyon should have this particular
eccentricity. All his life he had been wrestling with
a family that could not be trusted with money, and
the habit had possibly grown into an obsession. He
looked at Fergusson, who was somewhat grimly
enjoying his cigar. He had all the appearance of
an honest man. “Known him twenty-five years,
have you ?” he commented.
"Ay!" Fergusson said. “I came to this damned
place when I was thirty-seven, and I thought I was
in luck to get hold of a rich patient like Kenyon.
Well, as you can judge from what I told you, he
looked an oldish man then. Not so withered nat-
urally, but if he was only sixty-six at that time I
should say that he looked more than his age. But
there you are. I knew an old chap of the name of
Simon-he has been dead God knows how long-
who was a contemporary of Kenyon's, used to do
business with him in the 'sixties, and he has told
me that Kenyon was always a dry stick-one of
those men who look old at forty and never change
afterwards.
"And there's another queer thing he told me,”
Fergusson went on, after a slight pause, “a thing
you'll be disinclined to credit, which is, that Kenyon
was never a good business man—not really able or
far-sighted, that is."
“But he made a pile of money," Arthur put in.
"He did," Fergusson said, “but Simon used to say
that he got it by sheer luck; that he never touched
an investment that didn't go right by some fluke


168 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
or another, though by all the laws of probability,
it ought to have gone just the other way. Maybe
Simon was a bit jealous, but he had a mighty poor
opinion of Kenyon as a business man—though
begob, I'm inclined to differ from him, myself."
"He has been most frightfully decent to me,”
Arthur commented uneasily; and remembered that
he had made the same remark to Turner a few
hours earlier.
"Ay, he would be that,” Fergusson said. “There
have been times when I have liked him very well
myself; but I always had the feeling that there was
something queer about him-a trifle uncanny, if you
know what I mean.”
"Oh, well! Perhaps. I don't know," Arthur
said. "He seems sometimes to be extraordinarily
detached; as if he were living a sort of life of his
own."
"Hm! Likely enough,” Fergusson agreed.
“Simon told me that Kenyon had a hell of a time
when he was a young man. His father, who was
in the business before him, was one of your old-
fashioned bullies. Used to treat his son like a dog,
Simon said. So no doubt Kenyon got the habit of
keeping things to himself then, and it stuck to him
after his father was dead.”
"Yes, that might account for it, in a way,"
Arthur admitted.
Arthur's thoughts went back to that conversation
as he dressed for dinner. He was inclined to trust
Fergusson. Fergusson had been very decent about
his supersession at Hartling, and it did not seem
likely that his rather disparaging attitude had been
designed to frighten his rival out of the field. In-
deed, a few weeks ago such a suspicion would not


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 169
have crossed Arthur's mind; but there was some
influence in the air of Hartling that bred suspicions
of that kind, and he put them from him now with
a just perceptible sense of self-approval.
The trouble that still faced him was that even
when he had deliberately cleared his mind of any
doubts concerning the good-faith of all the many
potential legatees, he was thrust back upon a doubt
of the man who appeared in the rôle of his bene-
factor. A few hours ago he had whole-heartedly
advised and trusted him. When he had come away
from his interview that morning, he had definitely
ranged himself on the old man's side, had, as he
believed, learnt at last to understand and approve
the old man's motives.
But then, aş always, he had been induced by
various influences to doubt again. It seemed so
impossible in this place to arrive at any certainty.
No theory he had been able to formulate accounted
for all the facts, not even the far-reaching, comfort-
able theory that there was a certain amount of
right—and wrong—on both sides. There appeared
to be some secret, some key to the whole situation,
that was as yet beyond his reach.
Could Eleanor put it in his hands ? His thought
turned towards her with a leap of hopeful anticipa-
tion. She had given him no sign so far that she had
repented her manifest disapproval of him that
morning. She, too, perhaps, was being continually
swayed by the uncertainties bred of the Hartling
condition. But it might be that she had not yet
heard of the unsigned agreement that he had made
in imitation of her own method? In any case, he
had an excuse for asking her to have a little quiet
talk with him. She owed him an explanation. He
could even demand it. ...


170 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
He might be able to judge by her expression at
dinner whether she had changed her opinion of his
motives since the morning, and if he found the least
evidence of her softening towards him, he would
ask her to listen to what he had to say; to the
reasons that had decided him to stay on at Hartling
until her grandfather died.
But he received no sign from Eleanor in the
course of dinner. She would not look at him.
Though he persistently stared at her, trying to
attract her attention, she managed to avoid his
glance with a steadiness which could not have been
accidental. She talked more than usual both to
Hubert and his father who sat on her other side,
but so far as he was able to overhear her conver-
sation, the subject of it had no relation to his own
plans or doings. Most of her talk seemed to be con-
cerned with Hubert's fiancée, Dorothy Martin.
And Arthur's own attention was continually being
distracted by Elizabeth. Never before had she
been so ready to flirt with him.
It seemed that she had dressed for the part. She
was wearing a gown that he had not seen before,
and that was something too elaborate for a family
dinner. Her plump, well-developed bust and shoul-
ders emerging with an effect of challenge from a
foam of pink chiffon, looked almost startlingly
naked. Nevertheless, if it were a trifle theatrical,
the dress suited her brunette prettiness, and gave
value to the air of vivacity that she had, also, as-
sumed. This was one of Elizabeth's most effective
moods. He had seen her pert and rather forward
on other occasions but never quite so daring as she
was to-night.
Yet he lacked the least inclination to flirt with


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 171
her. He recognised her feminine attractions, but
they failed to arouse him. Indeed, when he com-
pared her with her cousin, dressed as usual in a soft,
simple white frock, he found Elizabeth's forward-
ness vulgar, almost to him in his present mood
repulsive. He responded to the best of his ability,
he had no wish to snub her, but he felt that she
must be distressingly conscious of her failure to
strike fire from him.
Miss Kenyon on his other side gave no indication
of cherishing any ill-will against him for having
defeated her that morning. He and she rarely
talked to each other at the dinner table. They
had nothing to say. And to-night her manner
discovered no shade of difference from her habitual
attitude towards him.
Nevertheless, it was Miss Kenyon who, whether
deliberately or not, thwarted him as they were
leaving the table. She addressed some unnecessary
remark to him as they were getting up, and thus
gave Eleanor time to leave the room in front of
them. When he was able to escape and follow her
into the hall, she was half-way up the stairs.
He paused in the hall, staring after her, and when
she reached the second landing he caught her eye
for an instant looking down at him. But she turned
away again at once, and he had not the courage
either to attempt to address her from that distance,
or to follow her upstairs.
He avoided Elizabeth when he went into the
drawing-room and almost immediately haled Turner
out into the billiard-room. Elizabeth did not follow
them. No doubt she believed that her attractions
had no power over him in his present mood.
Arthur himself would have declared that they had
not at that moment, and yet little more than an


172 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
hour later he was seriously debating whether he
would or would not propose to her.
Billiards was a failure so far as he was concerned
that evening. He could not get a shot himself and
Turner's slick facility began to irritate him. He
had to keep himself firmly in hand in order to hide
his annoyance. And as the game went on his spirits
sank lower and lower into a mood of profound
depression.
"You're off your game to-night," Turner com-
mented jauntily, when Arthur rather impatiently
refused to play again. “Anything the matter?"
They were alone in the billiard-room-Hubert
had not joined them to-night as usual—and Turner
suddenly dropped into a mood of confidence.
"Feel a bit doubtful about settling down here?”
he went on. “You needn't. We've all passed
through that stage, but you soon become reconciled;
why shouldn't you? Get everything you can pos-
sibly want here except a certain measure of free-
dom, and no one's really free. It's one sort of
slavery or another for every one of us. If I were
you, my boy, I'd marry Elizabeth and make up my
mind to it. Then you won't be continually on
tenterhooks as to whether the old man's going to
last one year more or ten.”
“Oh! Good Lord!" Arthur gesticulated. “It
isn't that. I'm a bit out of sorts, that's all, touch
of indigestion, I expect. No need to resort to
desperate remedies for that."
Turner smiled. "I won't tell Elizabeth,” he
commented dryly. “And if you take my advice
you'll think it over. Coming back into the other
room?"
“No, I've got a letter to write,” Arthur said,
remembering that Somers would expect an answer


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 173
ang?
It was in girl
to his main question. "I'll go upstairs, I think,
good-night."
He had wanted, savagely, to get away from
Turner just then, but when he was upstairs in his
bedroom he was oppressed by a sense of loneliness.
There was not a single human being in that house
in whom he could confide. He had, for instance, to
write to Somers; he had to say that there was no
chance of his returning to Peckham, and although
he had given his promise and had really no option,
he would have liked to talk it over with some one
before making an irrevocable decision. Had not
Turner been right after all? If Elizabeth was
willing to marry him, would not her companionship
alleviate the occasional tediousness and loneliness
of life at Hartling? If they were married they
might become friends. It was impossible to be on
terms of real confidence with a girl of that sort
until you were married to her. She was always
too conscious of her sex and doubtful about your
intentions.
Now that he came to think of it, she had certainly
looked very tempting in that pink frock. She was
one of the prettiest girls he had ever known
though she might run to flesh in a few years' time.
He got up from the table at which he had been
sitting before a still virgin sheet of Hartling note-
paper, and began to walk up and down the room.
How familiar, even commonplace, that room had
become to him, he reflected. A few weeks ago it
had been a delicious entivement, a thing ardently
desired. But he would have missed it horribly
if he had had to go back to Peckham. Would his
marriage with Elizabeth produce a like develop-
ment of sensation, beginning with enticements and
ardent luxuries that would gradually become fa-


174 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
miliar, a matter of habit? He was not in love with
her, but he might be when he knew her better.
At present he knew absolutely nothing about her
inner life. They had never talked about anything
but games for more than a minute at a time. .
One thing was certain, he must write that letter
and announce his decision. No other had been
possible. Apart from his promise to Mr Kenyon,
no sane man would hesitate a moment between the
alternatives of Hartling and Peckham. He would
ask Somers to recommend him some modern works
on surgery. He would not allow himself to rust,
although it was the practical experience that was
most useful. Still, he would get that in hospital-
later. No one could say how long he would have to
wait, but Fergusson had been talking through his
hat when he had said that the old man would
probably outlive him. Fergusson was good for at
least another ten or fifteen years, probably more;
and people did not live to over a hundred. Give
the old man five years at the outside. He would
probably collapse quite suddenly at the end.
But suppose, just for the sake of argument, that
the old man left him, Arthur, nothing after all ?
No! he would not consider that. It was disloyal.
He had had what amounted to a promise from him,
and in common justice some compensation would
have to be made for taking the best years of his
life. The very fact that he was getting no salary
was a guarantee an absolute guarantee. Old
Kenyon might have various eccentricities, they were
only, to be expected at his age, but he was a good
sort, and if anything a shade too impartial in his
administration of justice.
And then, what about the idea of marrying
Elizabeth if she would have him? He walked over


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 175
to the window and leaned out. It was raining again,
a light, steady rain. It looked as if they might be
in for a lot of rain. Getting engaged to and marry-
ing Elizabeth would be something to do, an excite-
ment that would be a pleasant change from golf,
billiards, croquet, and tennis. Should he go down
now and try his luck? She had looked rather
ripping in that pink frock. He would be able to
put more ardour into his proposal when she was
dressed like that. And, unless she had changed
since dinner, she was in just the right mood.
Still leaning out of the window, he began to
picture the proposal. He saw himself alone with
Elizabeth somewhere he might make some excuse
to take her into the library-and then, beginning
to overcome her levity and caprice by his earnest-
ness—he would say that he had been in love with
her from the first, but that he had been afraid to
tell her—no prospects—that sort of thing. He
imagined her becoming suddenly serious, recipro-
cating his seriousness, confessing that she, too, had
always—liked him. They would be quite close
together when she admitted that, and he would
put his arms round her waist or over her shoulders
-she had lovely shoulders—and kiss her. ...
He came back into the room at that point of his
dream and began to walk impatiently up and down.
It was very queer, he couldn't in any way account
for it; but he did not in the least want to kiss
Elizabeth. He had just done the thing in imagina-
tion, very vividly and realistically, and it had not
stirred him in the least degree. On the contrary,
it had produced a sense of being mean and con-
temptible. He had often kissed girls in the past,
and had always liked doing it. Did he feel like
that now because Elizabeth was in a different class








Joe Ken The other
merience, anapped. Se last
THE arrangements for breakfast at Hartling
1 were in keeping with Arthur's early estimate
of the place as a first-class hotel. The members
of the family came down when they chose, and
between eight and ten o'clock there were rarely
more than two people in the breakfast-room at the
same time. Miss Kenyon and Hubert came first.
Hubert had a habit of getting up at six in the sum-
mer, and Miss Kenyon was a precisian. Arthur
succeeded them between half-past eight and nine and
sometimes had his aunt for a companion. The other
four straggled in uncertainly—Joe Kenyon or his
sister was always the last-and occasionally their
meals overlapped. So much Arthur knew from ex-
perience, and as he had never seen Eleanor in the
morning, he had inferred that she probably break-
fasted with her grandfather upstairs.
He was greatly surprised, therefore, to find her
at the table when he entered the room at half-past
eight the next morning, surprised and for a minute
or two distinctly embarrassed. He was never now
in the mood for conversation so early in the day.
Until he had come to Hartling he had always
been fresh and eager in the morning, but the
Kenyons were taciturn and inclined to be irritable
at that time, and by degrees their example had
influenced him. He presumed that it was their
example, but he was not sure whether or not he
could attribute to the same source the sense of
dissatisfaction with himself that commonly haunted
179


180 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
him now when he first woke; dissatisfaction and a
strange feeling of staleness and of disinclination to
begin his easy, amusing day.
He addressed her as he might have addressed a
casual acquaintance in a hotel.
"Don't often see you down here in the morning,"
he remarked vapidly, as he rang the bell.
"I've been given a holiday to-day,” she said,
without looking up. “And I was to tell you that
you needn't go up this morning. My grandfather
says he's feeling a little tired.”
"He had rather an exciting day," Arthur agreed;
investigated the cold dishes on the sideboard, and
then crossed the room and sat down opposite her.
Eleanor went on quietly with her breakfast. She
seemed prepared, he thought, to sit there in silence
for the rest of the meal, while he on his part could
think of no reasonably intelligent conversation.
After the interval provided by the entrance of the
butler, however, an opening presented itself to him.
“What are you going to do with your holiday ?”
he asked. “It'll be rather too wet for tennis,
won't it?"
“I'm going for a long walk into Sussex," she said.
His first thought was that he would now find no
opportunity for a quiet talk alone with her that day.
"All alone?” he asked.
“I long to be alone, sometimes," she murmured.
"It seems to me that you spend most of your
time alone,” he said. “We don't see much of you."
She looked up at him with an expression that
seemed to indicate both surprise and disappoint-
ment. “One can never be alone in the house," she
said. .
He did not understand. “Are you always with
your grandfather ?” he asked,


182 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
to-day," he said. "There are a heap of things I
want to talk to you about. I know you don't like
me, but it would be a real kindness if you would
let me talk to you a little sometimes. There's
simply no one here I can explain things to."
“Why me?” she replied.
"You're so different from all the others," he said.
“And are you?" she asked.
“Different from the others ?” he repeated, stag-
gered by the suggestion that he could be thought to
resemble, in any particular, the other members of
the Hartling circle.
“Yes,” she prompted him quietly.
He stared at her frowning. "Am I the least like
them ?” he inquired with a faint trepidation in his
voice.
“Not yet, perhaps; but you will be,” she said.
"But they aren't like each other," he remon-
strated. "Which of them shall I be like if I stay
long enough, Uncle Joe, or Mr Turner, or Hu-
bert ...
"Aren't they all rather alike in one way?” she
asked.
He saw at once that they were; that there was
some characteristic common to every one of them,
even Miss Kenyon. Seen as individuals they were
as different from each other as are the ears of
wheat in a cornfield, but they all bowed the same
way to the prevailing wind. In their attitude to-
wards the head of the house they could all be re-
lied upon to present the same face.
"But you've been here fourteen years," he said,
"and you're still different. Or do you think it takes
longer than that to get assimilated ?"
"I'm not different," she replied. “Or I shouldn't
be here still.”


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 183
Of course, u since the I can't agi
“Of course, I don't know you,” he said. “I've
hardly seen you since the first three or four days
I was here. But-well-I can't agree with you
about that.”
She just perceptibly shrugged her shoulders.
"You haven't said whether you will let me come
with you on your walk," he began again, after a
short pause.
"I would sooner you didn't,” she told him. “It
can't do any good. There can be nothing new that
you want to ask my advice about. I said all I had
to say to you about that five weeks ago, and you
took no notice. I can only repeat what I said
then.”
"But I can't go now," he protested. “I've given
my promise. I made a sort of bargain in fact."
She shook her head impatiently. “You needn't
keep it,” she said.
"That's absurd,” he remonstrated, getting to his
feet. “Of course I must keep my promise in any
circumstances.”
“I suppose you do really believe that?" she asked,
looking up at him. “Would you keep it just the
same, for instance, if you knew for certain that it
meant staying on here for ten years and getting
nothing, absolutely nothing, at the end of it? Would
you, honestly? Or don't you think you'd ask to
be let off ?”
"I might ask to be let off," he admitted, after a
few seconds' thought.
“Then you'll only be keeping your promise or
bargain or whatever it is because you want to stay
-or because you've got to," she said.
"Perhaps," he agreed. “But I've never said that
I didn't want to stay. I do."
She sighed. "Precisely, and now we're back again


184 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
W
to what I said just now. Whatever is the good of
talking to me about it?''
“We might talk about other things,” he suggested.
"I should very much like to get away, too, for a
few hours."
She hid her face in her hands, leaning her elbows
on the table, and he waited patiently for her answer.
"Why don't you finish your breakfast?" she
asked, when she looked up after what seemed to
him a long interval of silence.
“I have. I don't want anything more," he said.
She got up then, and he thought she was going
to leave him without deigning to take any further
notice of his request, but when she was half-way
across the room, she looked back and said, “Can you
be ready in ten minutes ?”
He started forward with the eagerness of a dog
beckoned by its mistress. “Do you really mean
that?” he asked, hardly understanding his own
excitement.
She stood still regarding him with an expression
that was half-amused and half-disdainful. "I didn't
know you were so keen on long walks," she re-
marked, “or on getting away from here. Isn't this
rather a new departure for you?”
The look of eagerness left his face. "Perhaps it
is," he said stiffly. "And it's hardly likely to be
much of a success if—if you're going to take that
sort of tone."
"I told you that I didn't want you to come," she
replied, and there was something of defiance in
her tone and in the pose of her firm, upright figure.
“I should at least like to know why you have
taken such a dislike to me,” he said. "But you
might not feel inclined to tell me that in any
case.!!


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 185
"Oh! dislike," she responded, almost contemptu-
ously. “That's much too strong a word.”
He had a sense of hopeless frustration. All her
half-unwilling responses appeared now to have been
nothing more than a condescension to his ineptitude.
And he was all too horribly conscious of the fact
that he deserved nothing better than her contemptu-
ous opinion of him. He was just an average young
man of twenty-eight. He had done nothing that
thousands of other young men had not done as
well or better. The only boast he could have made
would have been that of ambition, a boast that was
no longer possible for him after his recent admission
that he meant to stay on at Hartling and liked being
there. He knew intuitively what her reply would
be, if he told her that he meant to study, to prepare
himself for the work of a specialist. Indeed, he
himself saw that project, now, as little more than
a fatuous piece of self-deception. Practice was
what he wanted : book-work would be no good
without that. And in five years he would be soft
and over-fed; his nerve would be gone.
He looked down and began to trace the pattern
of the carpet with his toe. “Yes, I'm not worth
hating," he muttered.
She turned away with a gesture of impatience.
"Well, shall you be ready in ten minutes?” she threw
at him over her shoulder.
"But if you would so much sooner I didn't
come. . ." he conceded humbly.
"I'll meet you in the hall,” she said, as she went
out.
He hesitated again while he was putting on his
shoes. If she merely despised him, as she obviously
did, what was the use of trying to win her confi-
dence? Nothing he could say or do would alter


186 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
her opinion of him. He had nothing to say. There
was nothing he could do. The most he could hope
for would be to defend his position by argument.
He had little doubt that her contempt for him was
based on the fact that he had consented to stay on
at Hartling; and it might be well that she had not,
as yet, a proper understanding of his reasons. She
might not have heard of his verbal compact with
the family made the previous day? Was it worth
while attempting his own defence ?
He was still weighing that question when she
joined him in the hall. He continued to weigh it
as they walked together in silence down the length
of the garden.
The clouds were lifting, and before they reached
the big gates the sun broke through. He looked
up, noted the promise of a hot, fine day, and his
spirits began to rise. What did it matter whether
or not she despised him? He was a free man. He
was not in any way dependent upon her opinion.
If she chose to snub him, he could leave her to
continue her walk alone. He could be perfectly
happy without her He was twenty-eight, in perfect
health, and without a care in the world. Why
shouldn't he enjoy life in his own way? If he had
a regret at that moment, it was that he had eaten
hardly any breakfast.
He began to whistle softly under his breath. He
had no intention of beginning the conversation.
He was content to enjoy the day and the adventure
of this walk-the first he had undertaken since he
had come to Hartling. Except for the path to the
links and the links themselves, he knew nothing
of the country round about. None of the family
ever seemed to bother about going outside the


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 187
grounds. They had this amazing garden and were,
presumably, satisfied with that.
How little Eleanor was satisfied with it, however,
was shown the moment they passed through the
gates into the dusty high-road. She set back her
shoulders, lifted her head, and gave a sigh of relief.
"It's going to be fine, after all,” she said. "I think
we'll strike across country to a place I know where
we can look right over to the South Downs. It's
so big and open there."
There was no hint of embarrassment or restraint
in her manner. She might have forgotten every-
thing that had passed between them that morning;
and Arthur, on his side, was quite willing to post-
pone his arguments and explanations, or even to
omit them altogether. If she were going to treat
him decently for the time being, that was all he
asked.
“Sounds jolly," he said.
"It's seven or eight miles,” she warned him.
“Oh! that's nothing," he returned. "I'm good
for all that and more. But are you?”
"I've done it twice in the last ten days,” she said.
"This holiday of yours is not altogether an ex-
ception to the general rule, then ?” he asked.
"I've been out several times—lately," she ad-
mitted..
He thought he detected the suggestion of some
reservation in her answer, and said, "Only lately?
Do you mean that this is a new freedom for you?”
She manifestly hesitated before she replied to
that, and her “Oh, no! not new exactly,” still left
him in doubt as to what was in her mind.
They had left the main road now, and were walk-
ing in an olive-green twilight along a deep, narrow


188 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
lane, its banks lush with fern luxuriating in the
warm shade afforded by high banks, topped by
hornbeam and hazel hedges that nearly met over-
head.
Arthur lifted his hat, and wiped his forehead.
"It's exactly like being in a hothouse down here,”
he said. "Rather ripping though."
"We shall come out on to the common a few yards
farther on," Eleanor replied. “It's almost too hot
to talk here, isn't it?".
He conceded that, but when they had walked on
in silence for fifty yards or so she suddenly said,
“I know I'm not being honest with you, but I will
be presently, even if it does mean talking about
things I would so much sooner forget. Forgetting
isn't being honest, even with oneself. Only not till
we're right out in the open if you don't mind."
"Of course I don't mind," Arthur responded
warmly. “And I'd like you to do exactly what you
want to about-being honest. If you'd sooner not
talk about the other affair, we won't.”.
She nodded her agreement, but he was uncertain
whether or not she meant to revert to Hartling as
a topic of conversation when they were “in the
open.” And, when presently they came out on to
the common, it seemed that she was still skirting
that topic, for she began to talk about the war.
"I was only fifteen when it began," she said, in
answer to some comment of Arthur's. “And I
really didn't understand all that it meant until it
was nearly over. My grandfather used to keep
the papers away from me, and told my governess
-Elizabeth and I shared a governess then-not to
tell us about it. But we all shirked it; tried to
pretend that we couldn't do anything. And in a
way it never touched us. Hubert would have gone
halk about ded her a meant to


192 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
issue that had been impending ever since he had
made his decision on the previous day, they would
only continue in their present impossible relations.
What the alternative might be he could not guess,
though he had a premonition that it would not, in
any case, be entirely agreeable. Some conflict was
inevitable, and it must be faced. It might well be,
he thought, that here on this Sussex hill, he would
be confronted with a choice that would prove the
turning point of his whole life.
They had sat there in absolute silence for more
than ten minutes when Arthur at last said,
"Well, shall we talk now and—and get it over?"
She did not change her position nor turn her
gaze from the distances of the South Downs as she
replied,
"We will talk, but you mustn't think that we can
ever 'get it over.' It will go on just the same
perhaps for years and years."
"In one sense, perhaps,” he admitted, his eyes
admiringly intent on her steady profile; "but it will
get over this—this misunderstanding between you
and me, I hope.”
"It may," she said; "but you don't in the least
understand yet. You don't understand, for instance,
that after this, either you or I will have to leave
Hartling."
He sat up with a start of surprise, and moved a
little nearer to her. “But, good Lord; why?” he
asked in a voice that sufficiently expressed the depth
of his incomprehension.
"Because of that thing you don't know," she said,
still without turning her head; "because my grand-
father wants to—to throw us together.” And then,
having unburdened herself of this difficult essential,
she continued quickly before he had time to reply,
.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 193.
"That's why I've been given so many holidays lately,
though that isn't my chief reason for knowing. Not
that that matters, does it? I do know for certain;
never mind how. And I have known, oh! for a
month or more, though he has never said a word to
me directly. So you see now, don't you, that that's
a fact which makes all the difference to our talk,
and how impossible it was for me to say anything
to you until you knew it too?"
He waited for a few seconds after she had fin-
ished before he said quietly, “I ought to have
guessed really; but I didn't. He said something to
me about it yesterday morning—that he had hoped
you and I would be friends, or something of the
sort."
“And you, what did you say?" she put in.
"I told him that I was afraid you didn't like me,
and then he said that in that case there was nothing
more to be done. We didn't mention it again. It
was before I told him about Hubert."
“Though, whether I like you or not has nothing
whatever to do with it, of course,” she commented
thoughtfully.
"Hasn't it?” he asked, as if he doubted that
inference.
"Nothing whatever," she insisted
"Still if-I mean-it seems to me that ..." he
began; but she cut him short by saying with an
impatient lift of her chin,-
"I know what you mean, perfectly well. You
needn't try to put it into words. That isn't really
the point at all."
"What is the point then?” he asked in bewilder-
ment. "I may be frightfully stupid, but I can't quite
see ..."
She turned her face still farther away from him


194 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
as she said in a scarcely audible voice, “Nothing
should ever induce me to be a bait for you."
A bait! He saw in a flash the peculiar implica-
tions of the word she had used, but hesitated to
accept them.
"You can't mean that Mr Kenyon has deliber-
ately tried to—throw us together, in order to keep
me in the house ?” he urged, his tone apologising
for the unlikelihood of such a wild deduction.
“Of course I mean that,” she returned bitterly.
"But why?" he pressed her. "Why should he
want to keep me as much as all that?"
"He does," she said, and then as he was mani-
festly still doubtful, continued, “I can't tell you
why. I don't know. I only know that he wants to
keep us all there till he dies. But you—you were
different. I wondered when he first invited you
what he meant to do. There was something I
disliked, instinctively, in the way he asked about
you. It was just as if he he was trying to catch
you then. And when I saw you that first night I
tried to warn you. I daren't say very much. We
none of us dare because we know that he's-oh!
inhuman in a way; that he would turn any one of
us out to-morrow without a penny if he thought that
you is to
Therhe first
hd surelying against h: Penny if her any one
"Oh! surely not," Arthur protested.
She laughed scornfully. "He seems to have made
you believe in him," she said.
"He has been most frightfully decent to me, you
see,” Arthur replied emphatically.
"Did he say anything to you about my father
yesterday?" she asked, turning to face him for the
first time.
“Something," he acknowledged.
"Did he tell you how my father pleaded with


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 195
him, offered to do or to be anything, if only he
might be allowed to marry my mother?”
Arthur shook his head. "No, he didn't tell me
that. What was his objection ?” he said.
“My father never knew—unless it was that my
mother had no money of her own. I only know
what Uncle Joe told me, of course, but he heard
all about it at the time. I don't believe that he
had any real objection. You can never be sure
whether he will say yes or no to anything, but you
may be quite certain whichever it is, that he will
stick to it afterwards whatever happens. And he
said 'No' to my father, and turned him out of
the house because he was willing to give up any-
thing in the world rather than my mother. And
when he had been gone about a month he sent that
elephant's foot that stands in the hall. He meant
it as an insult. Uncle Joe says that they were
afraid to tell him. They all knew what it meant,
of course; that it was a sort of symbol of his
methods. But he wasn't the least bit insulted. He
seemed to be proud of it, and had it put where it is
now, for every one to see.”
She had been speaking rapidly, almost fiercely,
with an excitement completely unlike her usual
rather staid manner.
"But why have you gone on staying there if you
feel like that?" Arthur asked.
She put her hands up to her face for a moment
and then looked at him with a whimsical smile.
“You aren't the only person who has been blind,”
she said.
“Do you mean that you have only been feeling
like that just lately ?” he asked.
"I was only seven when I came," she said, “and I
was brought up there. I never went to school.
afraid to tell him Uncle Join the hall. he sent that


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 197
after that, as I said just now, I saw it all happen-
ing.”
She paused, but Arthur made no reply. He was
leaning on his elbow looking down over the broken
sweep of the weald. For him, the "key" of which
she had spoken was not yet plain. There were
traits in the character of the old man, that Arthur
believed were not consistent with Eleanor's judg-
ment of him as “inhuman.”
His mind was busy with the search for excuses
and extenuations, when Eleanor began in a new
voice, “I suppose you think it very rotten of me
to have said all that about him, and, in any case,
you don't believe me.”
"I do; I do," Arthur protested, rousing himself
from his abstraction. "I don't think it's rotten of
you in the very least. What I'm doubting is whether
your deductions are sound.”
She appeared now to have given up any hope
of persuading him, and looked at him with a frank
smile as she said, “Well, I suppose we ought to be
setting our faces towards home?".
“Oh, no! not yet,” Arthur replied, with such
evident distress in his voice that she laughed out-
right.
"But surely you must be pining to get back to
your golf and billiards and croquet ?" she suggested.
"Or, if we start now, we might get in some tennis
after tea."
“I don't believe I have ever heard you laugh
before to-day," was Arthur's answer.
"It isn't exactly a gay house, is it?" she replied.
“My Lord, no, it isn't," Arthur agreed, after a
moment's reflection; "though I don't think I'd
thought of it like that before. Elizabeth always
laughs as if she had been wound up inside and set


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 199
"But oh, yes !” she said. "I was thinking about
it all before you came. The war made me dis-
satisfied. We none of us did anything, and I
couldn't help feeling what empty, useless lives we
were living here."
“I don't see that you'd be doing anything more
by working for a millionaire in the city than by
working for Mr Kenyon," Arthur put in.
"I know. That weighed with me," she agreed.
“What I really want is to be a nurse. Only I don't
quite know how to begin. But you can tell me
about that, can't you?”
He pushed her inquiry on one side. "I can't see,"
he said, "why either you or I have to leave. I can't
really."
She had been talking to him freely, almost gaily,
but now her manner took on the air of constraint
with which she had begun the conversation.
"Need we go back to that?" she asked.
“Why, of course we must," he said in an ag-
grieved tone. “As far as I can see that's what we
came out to talk about.”
"But we settled it," she returned. "I'm going !"
"And if I went? If I broke my promise and went
instead, would you stay ?”
"I might for the sake of the others,” she said.
"I do help them a little. And in spite of everything,
I'm sorry for him—for that wicked old man up-
stairs." She dropped her voice and looked down
at her clasped hands as she concluded, "He is
wicked, although you may not believe it."
"Even so," Arthur argued, choosing to ignore
that point for the moment, “I don't in the least un-
derstand why my going should make any difference
one way or the other.”
She bent her head a little lower as she said, “No


200 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
corShe listenand his hope her his plargument
doubt it's very quixotic and sentimental of me, but
I can't bear to watch your life being ruined. It's
different with the others. They're so helpless.
Hubert is not fit to earn his own living, and Ken-
if he comes—would probably be safer there than
he would in town. He is very wild. If he comes,
he'll probably marry Elizabeth and settle down.”
Arthur saw that at last the time had come to
set out his defence. “Yes, but why take it for
granted that I should be wasting my life?" he began,
and then, with one or two pauses at first, but
gathering confidence in his own argument as he
went on, he laid before her his plans for studying
at Hartling and his hope for the future.
She listened to him attentively, attempting no
comment, either by word or gesture until he had
finished. He believed that he had convinced her,
until she said gently,—
“And if my grandfather lives more than five
years? What then?”.
"He can't,” Arthur expostulated. “People don't
live as long as that.”
"A few do," she said, "I saw in one of the papers
a day or two ago, that Miss Spurgeon, the preach-
er's aunt, would be one hundred and one next
month.”
Arthur shrugged his shoulders. "Frightfully
exceptional case,” he muttered.
“This might be a frightfully exceptional case,
too,” she insisted. “You don't find anything wrong
with him, do you? And he lives such a sheltered,
detached sort of life. Nothing ever upsets him.
He hasn't altered the least little bit, all the years
I have known him. And you know, don't you, that
thirty years ago it began in just the same way with
the others? They thought that he wouldn't live
ca.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 201
more than five years, or ten at the outside." She
could not look at him, as she concluded gently,
“Don't waste your life as they've done. Anything
would be better than that."
He saw it all quite clearly. He knew that she
was right. But something within him continued to
protest fiercely against her advice. He could no
longer doubt that she was entirely disinterested.
He was consoled, even a trifle flattered, by the fact
that she so evidently desired his welfare. But he
didn't want to leave Hartling, and he feverishly
sought excuses for staying. He could find half a
dozen that would satisfy himself, but he knew them
for sophistries and dared not put them into words.
She, on her side, seemed disinclined to add any-
thing to what she had already said, and for some
minutes they sat in silence. Eleanor returned to
her study of the distant downs and Arthur, with
his head' in his hands, furiously sought an escape
from the dilemma imposed by her two alternatives.
It was Eleanor who at last broke the long silence.
"I must be going now," she said—sighed, rose to
her feet, and began to brush and shake the grass
from her skirt. "There is absolutely nothing more
to be said," she continued, “and in any case we
shall have plenty of time to say it on the way
back."
He nodded rather resentfully and followed a pace
or two behind her as they made their way down
the hill. He could not as yet overcome the feeling
that it was "hard lines" on him to be sent away from
Hartling. For that was what it all amounted to.
He would have to gompromise or no promise. He
could not possibly allow her to get work in some
city office, or enter herself as probationer at a
hospital, while he idled away his time at Hartling.


202 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
Also he hated the thought of her mixing either with
city clerks or young medical students. They were
a coarse lot, and she would certainly meet with all
kinds of beastly advances. In imagination he could
hear the men at the hospital talking about her
among themselves, and his face burnt with anger,
first at the intolerable familiarities of his hypo-
thetical students, and then with himself for thinking
these thoughts in connection with her. Still she
would know how to protect herself. No one could
be more aloof and cold than she was sometimes.
If that warm generosity of hers did not betray her?
Those silly young fools at the hospital would not
understand. They ... He found a relief in men-
tally cursing the particular type of young medical
student he had all too vividly pictured. He saw
himself taking one of them by the throat and
choking the life out of him.
No, it was obvious that in no circumstances what-
ever, could she be permitted to face that kind of life.
Plenty of nice girls did, of course; but she was
different. And a city office would be just as bad,
or worse. It was impossible to imagine her mixing
with a crowd of dirty little Cockney clerks or greasy
business men. Damn them.
After all, Peckham would not be so bad. Somers
was one of the best and would be tremendously glad
to hear that he was coming back. Only—that
would be the end, so far as any hope of seeing
Eleanor was concerned_until the old man died
and it was perfectly true, as she had said, that he
might be an example of one of those exceptional
cases of longevity. He saw the probability more
clearly now that his interest was more detached.
Up there at the house, they were compelled to cheat
themselves with the belief that it could not last
nor was cofectly true; one of those ability mood.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 203
much longer. Life would not be endurable without
that hope. They had been living on it, some of
them, for forty years. ....
He suddenly awoke to the fact that this might
be the last time he would be alone with Eleanor and
that he was wasting it in these perfectly detestable
reflections, when he might be talking to her.
"I've made up my mind," he said, quickening his
pace to catch her up. “I'll go. You're quite right.
I can't stay there now.”
She looked up at him with a hint of question in
her face.
"I couldn't stand the thought of your going into
a hospital or an office,” he continued. "You've no
idea of the sort of thing that you have to put up
with and the people that you have to mix with;
no idea."
"Oh! but I don't want you to go in order to save
me," she exclaimed.
"But you'd go to save me," he returned.
She gave a little protesting laugh. "No, I
shouldn't save you if I went," she said. “You would
stay on here then. All I said was that I would not
be used as an influence to make you stay. You
remember what I told you about my grandfather's
plans. Well, sooner than that, I'd do anything.
It's purely selfish, I admit that. I don't mind your
being ruined, you see, but I won't take any sort
of responsibility for it."
"But in that case," he submitted. “I might stop
on for a time at all events, if it was quite certain
that you weren't the case of my staying.
"No, no; don't begin like that,” she broke out
passionately. “Once you begin to procrastinate and
find excuses there'll be no end to it. That must
have been how they all began."


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 205
as
re con-
"No difference so far as my prospects are con-
cerned,” he said.
"Oh, no!" she replied quickly, as if she were
afraid that he might go on to elaborate his rea-
sons for wanting his week's grace. “But are you
quite sure of yourself? Are you sure that at the
end of the week you won't want to put it off
again ?"
"I give you my word of honour," he said sol-
emnly, and went on, "I've made up my mind. I'll
write to Somers as soon as I get in and tell him to
expect me next Tuesday.”
They reached the gates of Hartling as he was
speaking, and automatically they both paused as
if this agreement were one that must necessarily
be made outside that enclosure.
“Very well,” she said, and gave him her hand.
He took it and held it as he replied. “And that
other favour? You haven't granted it yet. Will
you give me at least one more chance to talk to
you alone before I go ?”
"Oh! you're sure to have that,” she said lightly.
"But will you promise?”.
"If you like," she agreed.
It was as they were walking up the garden that
they decided upon the necessity for keeping the news
of his departure from the rest of the family. Some
sense of freedom had left them as they passed
through the gates, and already Arthur was begin-
ning to wonder at the comparative ease with which
he had made his decision to leave Hartling. Now
that he was back again in the garden that had
become so familiar to him in the course of the last
five weeks he felt again the lure of its shelter. The
place was so secure, so rich with the promise of
comfort and rest, of freedom from all the struggles


206 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
and responsibilities of the world. Probably none
of the Kenyons had ever wanted to leave it (Hubert
was happy enough now that he was going to marry
Dorothy Martin. If he were offered £5000 to go to
Canada with her, he probably would not take it).
They pretended to be imprisoned, played with the
idea of having ambitions. It was a sort of boasting.
No doubt they wanted their jailor to die. He stood
between them and the semblance of freedom. But
when he was dead and they were independent, they
would almost certainly go on living there just as
they were doing now. They wouldn't want to
change their habits after all these years.
It was amazing how differently he saw the prob-
lem, now that he was back again within the enclosure
of those protecting walls.
Nevertheless, he wrote to Somers, even giving
him the time of the train by which he might be
expected on the following Tuesday. He was, he
thought, being rather quixotic, but he meant to
keep his promise to Eleanor, and ask to be released
from the one he had made to the old man. And
if that release were denied, what could he do?
Insist? Say calmly that he meant to go whether
he were released or not? Allow the old man to
regard him as an ungrateful cad? Or make Eleanor
bear witness ? Make a clean breast of everything
and say that one or the other of them had to go,
and he preferred that it should be himself, for
excellent reasons? It was just possible that they
might both be turned out if the old man knew that
they had been plotting against him as it were. On
the other hand, he might suggest that the difficulty
could be overcome-in another way.
Arthur jumped to his feet and began to pace


208 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
perverted by this infernal Hartling atmosphere
could see it. And Eleanor, who had not been per-
verted, the one exception in that place, had judged
him without bias, had seen him as he was. Little
wonder that she had despised him. His one hope
now was to prove that she had in effect misjudged
him. He must tell her that he had realised, how-
ever tardily, the kind of weak fool that he had been,
and he would support his confession by action. He
would not wait for a week, he would go the next
day. He would see her for a minute after dinner,
and just announce his determination, ask her to
make sure of his appointment with the old man
next morning. ...
Before he went, he would make an opportunity
to say good-bye to her. It was a heroic measure,
but the only way by which he could hope to recover
her esteem.
In his bath, and while he was dressing for dinner,
he deliberately took his leave of luxury. He had
lived the life of a millionaire for more than five
weeks; might live it, if he chose, for perhaps another
five years. But he was willing, eager, to renounce it
all in order that he might recover Eleanor's esteem.
He would make still greater sacrifices if he could
win that reward.
And, oddly enough, there was another compensa-
tion which he had not consciously sought, but which
he was instantly aware of as a result of his decision
he was a free man again. As he stood and
looked at his reflection in the glass before going
down to dinner, he was aware of that same feeling
of release that had come to him when he had made
his petition on behalf of Hubert, the day before.
He lifted, is head with a touch of arrogance and
squared his shoulders. Good God! what a damned


212 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
before she said in a low voice, “He had a letter
from Ken by the second post, a defiant letter, and
rather rude. Ken's going to break away, he has
borrowed the money to pay the worst of his debts,
and leave enough over to pay his passage to South
Africa. He knows some one who has a farm there
and he's going to join him. Uncle Charles and
Aunt Catherine are fearfully upset, of course, and
it's one of those rare occasions when the founda-
tions of the house begin to shake. I've only seen
it happen before in the case of servants who have-
well-broken away, but the effect is much the same,
though the rumblings are deeper this time.”
"Is he very annoyed?” Arthur asked. “He didn't
seem upset at dinner.”
“He? Oh, no! He's as calm as Fate,” Eleanor
said, “and as cruel.”
"But why is he going up to town? Is he going
to see Ken himself?"
She shook her head, glanced once more round
the hall, and then bending towards him, whispered,
"He's going to see his lawyer and alter the will.
He hasn't said so, but every one knows."
Arthur pursed his mouth. “Pity I couldn't see
him before he goes,” he remarked. “Might save
him another journey."
She looked at him with a frank approval, smiling
her appreciation of his humour. “You're not afraid
of him, are you?" she said.
He was afraid of nothing, as long as he could
win her smiles, but he didn't brag. “There's no
reason why I should be, is there?" he replied.
"Absolutely none,” she said confidently. “But
you may find him difficult, harder to deal with than
you think. It was different with Ken. He didn't
want to keep Ken. He does want to keep you. I





XI
ARTHUR hoped that he might meet Eleanor at
I the breakfast-table again the next morning, but
although he put in an appearance before Miss
Kenyon and Hubert had finished, and waited until
after his aunt had come down, he saw nothing of
Eleanor. He consoled himself with the reflection
that she was probably busy with some preparation
for her grandfather's visit to town.
He was awake now to the effect that the visit
was having on the household. They were all
uneasy, even Miss Kenyon, all as it seemed to him,
unnecessarily nervous about their future. He
inferred something of this attitude from the pre-
occupation of the three members of the family he
met at the breakfast-table; and later, his inference
was fully confirmed.
They were momentarily shaken out of the belief
into which they habitually lulled themselves, the
belief that eventually they must all be decently
provided for. The security of Hartling itself was
threatened. Who knew what the old man might
do in some fit of eccentricity? He might devise the
estate to be used as a convalescent home or as a
country house for the Chancellor of the Exchequer,
if he chose. No one had the power to stop him or
dispute his testament afterwards. For all legal
purposes he was sane enough.
Joe Kenyon, Turner, and Hubert were all in the
library at ten o'clock, but it was certainly not their
217


218 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
the recep their attisinclined to
than the be better
interest in the morning papers that kept them
there. Yet, although they were manifestly unable
to keep their attention on what they were reading,
they appeared disinclined to talk.
Arthur was not less fidgety than the other three.
He could not decide whether it would be better to
wait for Eleanor after the old man had gone, or to
go and find her. She might have a certain amount
of work still to do that morning, and if so, might
prefer to remain undisturbed until she had done
it. On the other hand, she might expect him to
come and fetch her.
“What time is Mr Kenyon going?” he asked at
last, addressing his question vaguely to the company
at large.
Neither Turner nor Hubert took any notice, but
after a slight hesitation Joe Kenyon pulled out his
watch, stared at it absent-mindedly, and then said,
“Oh, I don't know! About half-past ten or eleven
probably. He generally does.”
Arthur put down his paper and walked over to
the window. From there he could see the car
already drawn up at the front door, but the attitude
of Scurr, comfortably reclining in the driver's seat,
seemed to imply that he was well accustomed to
waiting. Waiting was an art in which one acquired
proficiency at Hartling. Those who could not
acquire it, like Ken Turner, had no place there.
Eleanor was the single exception to all rules. She
worked. ... So did Miss Kenyon, for that matter,
She ran the house amazingly well. But she waited,
just as much as the others. She had been disturbed
by the "rumblings of the earthquake"-was doubt.
ful of her security. Eleanor did not care. She
would be glad to go.
The front door opened soon after eleven o'clock,


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 219
and Arthur saw the head of the house come out
with Eleanor in attendance.
"He's just going,” Arthur announced to the other
occupants of the library, and they dropped their
papers at once and came over to the window.
The old man was just getting into the car. He
needed no help. Eleanor stood by with a despatch
case, which she gave to him after he was seated,
but she did not offer to assist him in any other way.
He was quite capable of looking after himself. He
stepped into the car like a man of sixty. Then
Scurr closed the door, and touched his cap, and in
another minute they were slipping down the drive.
None of the family had gone to the door to see him
off. Not once, since he had been at Hartling, had
Arthur seen any sign of filial affection displayed by
the family. The old man patronised them with
his gentle smile, but apparently he never looked for
any return other than obedience and respect. He
did not expect gratitude.
Joe Kenyon stretched himself in a prodigious
yawn as the car vanished over the bridge. “Re-
minds me of the day poor old Jim went,” he said.
Little Turner had begun to pace the width of the
room under the windows. He had his hands on his
hips, slowly smoothing them as he walked. He
looked even neater and sleeker than usual_this
morning, but he was manifestly agitated. That
odd, mechanical rubbing of his hands up and down
his hips was the action of a man unconsciously
seeking some relief.
"Well, it didn't so far as we know, make any
difference to us, then," he commented, in reply to
his brother-in-law's remark.
“So far as we know,” Joe Kenyon repeated, awk-
wardly settling himself down in the window-seat.


220 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"All U.P. with Ken, of course," Turner went on.
"I hope to God he'll make some sort of a do of it
in South Africa. He might-one never knows. I
wish I could have done more to help him.”
"Absolutely impossible to do anything," Joe
Kenyon said, looking out of the window. "Fact
was he didn't really want Ken. Got a strong streak
of Jim in him. I've noticed it before. He'll do
all right, I expect. Jim would have, in time. He
had bad luck, that was all. Damned sorry for you
and Catherine all the same."
"Wish to God I could go with him," Turner said.
His brother-in-law thrust out his under-lip and
shook his head. "Too soft for that kind of life," he
murmured, still staring out of the window.
Turner chose to overlook that remark. "It's
this cursed lack of ready money that beats you
every time," he grumbled, as he paced up and down.
"No getting round that anyway. We couldn't raise
five hundred pounds between us to save our eternal
souls.”
Hubert, leaning against the end of the massive
oak table that stood in the centre of the room,
solemnly nodded his head. "Not three hundred,"
he said judicially.
Turner looked at him for an instant, but made
no reply.
"Nothing whatever to be done,” he went on.
“We know that by this time. No need for him to
show his fangs again to teach us that."
“Glad to have the opportunity all the same," Joe
Kenyon put in.
Arthur, despite his immense preoccupation with
the thought of Eleanor, could not help listening.
They had never hitherto spoken as frankly as this
before him. “Do you mean," he put in, "that he


224 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"Oh, well! my boy," he remarked, "we'll wait to
settle that point of when you'll go until after you've
seen him. He may have a card or two to play that
you haven't guessed at so far. Eh, Joe?”
Joe Kenyon pursed his mouth. His expression
was not hopeful.
"I've quite made up my mind," Arthur said, with
what he hoped was an effect of complete finality.
He had settled his problem now. He would go and
find Eleanor. All the day, his last day, might be
lost if he waited for her. She might be angry with
him, but he would risk that. He could not endure
this suspense any longer. He could hear the hall
clock striking twelve.
Little Turner with a knowing, half-whimsical
look of doubt on his face, still stood in front of him.
"Well, it's no good arguing that, is it?" Arthur
continued irritably. "You'll know for certain to-
morrow.”
Turner turned away with a shrug of his neat
shoulders. “Wonderful house for to-morrows,
this,” he said. “Always has been."
Arthur, inspired to pretend that he considered
himself insulted, walked out of the room. By that
little piece of chicane he escaped from all his
dilemmas at a stroke. He had been horribly afraid
that if he attempted some excuse to get away,
Hubert might offer to accompany him. The sug-
gestion of golf had hung in the air as a way of
passing the afternoon, and some sort of untruthful
evasion would have been necessary to avoid it.
He went first to the drawing-room on the off-
chance that Eleanor might have come as far as that
in search of him, but no one was there except his
aunt and Mrs Turner; the latter, sitting with her


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 225
hands in her lap staring fixedly out of the window.
She had obviously been crying. His aunt did not
look up from her fancy-work as he passed through
with an air of having accidentally intruded upon a
private ceremony. Poor old Mrs Turner; it had
not occurred to him that she would be so upset
by her son's departure for South Africa. He was,
as a matter of fact, lucky to have broken away;
but to the Kenyons, no doubt, the evils of the outer
world appeared altogether monstrous compared
with the securities of Hartling.
He had no hesitation now as to where he should
seek Eleanor. Unless she had gone out without
him-a ghastly alternative that he refused to
believe-she must be upstairs somewhere in old
Mr Kenyon's private suite. But when he knocked
at the door of the little room whose chief use
appeared to be that of a lobby, no one answered.
He had never before entered the suite unannounced,
and he opened the door and went in with a faint
sense of trepidation. The room was empty and
the door to the next room closed, but this time he
entered without knocking.
He was now in the apartment in which he had
always been received when he paid his morning
visit, and farther than this he had never penetrated.
Obviously, however, there were other rooms be-
yond. He remembered that he had seen Eleanor go
through that way sometimes when he had been
engaged with the old man, and as he stood hesi-
tating he thought he heard very remotely the
clicking of a typewriter. He went over to the
farther door and knocked, and was answered faintly
from within. He discovered then that there were
double doors, four feet apart, between him and the
clicking heath the some


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 227
gave her the air of being faintly embarrassed, an
air that was not less marked when she whirled the
letter off the roller and having glanced at it said
in a formal voice, “This is our office, the heart of
the house. Don't you think it looks very orderly
and business-like?”
He agreed without enthusiasm. His mind was
still obsessed with the idea that they were again
going out together to the hill that had the view
of the South Downs. He felt no inclination just
then to discuss the business affairs of old Kenyon.
"This is the mainspring of the whole machine,"
Eleanor went on, looking at the range of deed boxes
in front of her; "and I don't think there is the least
fear of the machine breaking down. We are very
methodical and very safe. We never gamble. We
don't pretend to be far-sighted or ingenious, we're
just plodders, adding a few thousands to our capital
every year. Do you know that there are securities
in this room worth well over half a million? I can't
give you exact figures because there are one or two
secrets into which the private secretary is not ad-
mitted. But I do know that even after we've paid
the enormous sums demanded from us in taxes, our
income considerably exceeds our disbursements."
She looked round at him as she added, “Aren't you
dazzled? Don't you feel exalted by being in the
presence of all this wealth ?”.
He was puzzled, uncertain of her mood. Her
speech had had a strong flavour of irony, but there
was no trace of it in her manner. “Oh! confound
the beastly money," he said, “I came up to see if
we were going for another walk."
"Not to-day," she said. “I have far too much
to do. Perhaps this letter I've just written will
explain why."


228 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
She held it out towards him, and he jumped up
and took it from her and then read it, leaning
against the edge of the table.
It was addressed to Mrs Payne, and after a few
opening phrases, continued: “I want to come and
stay with you for a week or two if you could possibly
manage to have me. I can't tell you why till I see
you, but I should like to come on Friday, the day
after to-morrow. I know it is dreadfully short
notice. ..."
He broke off there and looked at her in bewilder-
ment. His mind had leapt back to their talk on
the hill. Was she doing this, he wondered, in order
that he might stay on?
“But I don't in the least understand why you
have written this,” he said frowning. "Why are
you going? Do you mean that you're leaving here
for good?"
She nodded gravely.
"But why?” he persisted. “I thought that we
agreed ..."
“Don't you want me to go ?” she asked.
"No. I don't,” he said emphatically.
"Would you stay on if I went ?" she returned.
"No, I wouldn't. Nothing on earth should in-
duce me to,” he declared vehemently, still regarding
her departure as an alternative to his own.
“Then what's your objection?" she said.
His eyes were suddenly opened then to a new
prospect. He would not lose sight of her if they
both left Hartling. He hated the thought of her
working in a London office, but she would be within
his reach there. He could, in a sense, look after
her. They could meet quite often-if she were
willing.
“You mean,” he said, "that we might both go ?”


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 229
"I know of no reason why your going should
affect me one way or the other.” Her tone was
cold, even a trifle disdainful.
He was slightly taken aback. “No, no, of course
not. It has nothing to do with me,” he agreed.
“But what has made you change your mind? Or
don't you want to tell me that?!!
She got up from her chair and walked over to the
window. “There's one thing I want you to tell me
first,” she said. “Will my going have the least effect
on your own plans?”
He considered that for a moment before he re-
plied with perfect sincerity. “Absolutely none.
Whatever happens, I'm going back to Somers
to-morrow afternoon."
She had turned her back on him and was looking
out over the prospect that had so recently failed
to interest him.
"It isn't altogether that,” she said over her
shoulder, making a gesture with her hand that may
have indicated the distant weald of Sussex. “I
shouldn't go if it were only that I wanted to be free
and independent.”
She paused so long after this statement that he
was emboldened to prompt her by saying, “You
seem to have made up your mind so suddenly."
“The truth is that I can't stand it any longer,"
she said in a low voice. "I simply can't stand it."
He waited patiently this time for her to continue.
He saw that she had something to say which she
found difficult to put into words. The pose of her
upright figure suggested a certain tensity of motion
and when after another silent interval she turned
and faced him, her hands were clenched.
“And I'm haunted by the fear that I may be
wrong after all,” she said, looking at him as if for


230 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
help. "And you are the last person in the world,
I suppose, who can tell me whether I am wrong
or not.”
"I don't quite understand yet. Is it about him
-Mr Kenyon ?” he asked.
She did not deign to answer his question directly.
"You're supposed to know something about psy-
chology, aren't you?" she went on. "Well, is it
possible for a man to lose all decent, human feeling
even for his own family ?"
“Lord, yes," Arthur replied. "Speaking gen-
erally, of course, misers, for instance. Some of
them seem to lose all human feeling."
"He isn't the least a miser," she put in. "He's
often extraordinarily generous outside his own
family."
"I only instanced that as a well-known type," he
said. “But drink or drugs will do the same thing."
"Yes, but in all those cases there is always a
definite vice of some sort," she complained. “Some-
thing that you can take hold of, understand more
or less, as a cause for it all. But he hasn't any
vices, unless you can call it a vice to be deliberately
cruel to your own children and grandchildren with-
out any apparent reason.”.
“But is he actually cruel ?" Arthur remonstrated.
"Doesn't he perhaps really mean it all for their
own good. He may be deluded-he almost said
as much to me-into thinking that they are weaker
and less capable than they actually are; but that
would be a natural delusion enough in a man of
his age.”
Eleanor threw out her hands with a gesture of
confutation. “And you !” she exclaimed. “Does
he believe that you aren't capable of looking after
your own interests too ?”.


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 231
"Why me?” Arthur objected.
"Because he has been trying to get you. Oh!
manifestly trying to—to add you to his collection,”
she exclaimed passionately. “It was that that
opened my eyes. Until you came, I had hardly a
doubt of him. I didn't like the life we lead here.
It bored me. I believe I've always hated money-it
must have been born in me, if that's possible. But
I believed more or less what you do now, that he
looked after them, that his only fault, if anything,
was that he looked after them too much.
“And then there was the suggestion of your
coming here for a week-end visit. That was some-
thing rather exceptional. We'd had old Mr Bed-
dington not long before-it was he who told my
grandfather about you—and I remember wondering
whether he was beginning to pine for more company
or something. And I-I was rather interested in
what I heard of you; we talked a little about you
once or twice, and one day, after you had accepted
the invitation, he threw out a kind of hint that
he'd like to keep you here. That bothered me
somehow. I'd made some sort of picture of you in
my mind, and I—it's difficult to explain exactly-
but I didn't like the idea of your-getting like the
others. Some silly, romantic school-girl notion or
other. I don't know quite why."
She paused and turned back to the window. Her
colour had risen again, and Arthur believed that she
was embarrassed by her thought of him as the hero
of her old dream. How bitterly disappointed she
must have been when she had found that her
imagined hero had been a mere idler, like the others,
willing to slack about and play games, in the hope
of a place in the old man's will! Good God, what
a poor thing she must have thought him! He


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 233
if he is not an inhuman, heartless brute ?" Eleanor
concluded.
Arthur could find no answer to that.
“But you still believe in him?" she asked.
"It's so-so incredible," he said.
“Oh! and this morning !" Eleanor broke out, with
a passion of resentment in her voice. “All this
petty, silly, detestable business of his going up to
town to alter his will. Why? I don't believe for
a moment that he ever left Ken anything. He never
liked him. Ken was too independent to please him.
No; I believe that he has gone to see Mr Fleet
to-day, just to make them feel his power over them.
He was glad of the opportunity. ..."
“That's exactly what they were saying downstairs
just now," Arthur admitted. “That he was glad
of the opportunity to shake them up a bit. But I
suppose I'm prejudiced; I'm so new to it all; only
it doesn't seem to me, somehow, as if he were that
kind of a man."
"He has been nice to you, of course," Eleanor
commented. “He would be, just yet. And you've
only seen one side of him. But doesn't it strike
you that this is a queer household? I don't remem-
ber any other; but I've read novels, and if they're
anything like life, it must be very unusual for a
man to live with his family and never receive any
sign of affection from them. Doesn't it seem to you
as if he were their master rather than their father?”
“Yes. I was thinking something of the kind this
morning," Arthur agreed. “But I wondered if
there weren't faults on both sides in a way.”
Eleanor looked at him doubtfully. "I don't
know; it's beyond me," she said. “But now you
know why I'm going, don't you? It isn't as if I
could help any of them by staying. No one has
as if he were the from them. and neve


234 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
the least influence with him, not the very least. It
may have looked as if you had helped Hubert about
that engagement. You did in one way, but it was
all because he was trying to get a tighter hold of
you. Oh, well !” she sighed, and half turned away
from him, before adding unexpectedly, “I'm glad
you're going."
“You despised me for wanting to stay, didn't
you ?” he said.
"I was sorry," she admitted.
"More than that, you despised me," he insisted.
“You were right, too, absolutely right. I really
only saw it properly when you said just now that
you were interested in me, in a way, before I came.
And then, of course, you were bitterly disappointed.
I can see all that now.".
She was looking out of the window again, and the
fact that he could not see her face gave him courage.
He came a little nearer to her, as he went on, "I
haven't any excuse to offer. None at all. I was a
silly, weak fool, and I should have gone on being a
fool if it hadn't been for you. But now I have come
to my senses, and I'm going back to work, and it
would help me frightfully if—when I'm in Peckham
Gif you're ever up in town—if I could see you now
and again. You've only seen me here and I've been
a different person since I've been here. Would it
be possible for me to see you ever, after you go to
stay with those people ?"
She was kneeling up on the window seat now,
leaning her forehead against the glass, and she did
not move her position as she said, in the tone of one
who quietly weighs a proposition, “Oh, yes. Why
not ?"
"It would help me tremendously," he submitted.
She was silent for a few seconds before she


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 235
suddenly said in a light conversational tone, "It
was all bosh, of course, what you said just now.”
“What was ?” he asked in surprise.
"All that about your being a weak fool and my
despising you for it,” she said, still with her fore-
head pressed against the glass of the window.
“Do you mean that you didn't despise me?” he
asked eagerly, and then as an afterthought, “But
in that case why were you so fearfully down on
me?"
"I didn't want you to waste your life here," she
murmured, “I know it wasn't any business of mine,
but I simply couldn't stand the thought of your
becoming one of-them."
He could not mistake the implication of those last
two sentences. She had confessed to an interest
in his welfare that deeply stirred and aroused him.
Something of his humility began to fall from him,
his recent passion of self-condemnation assuaged
by her belief in the promise of his life. And with
that reaction all those phases of his admiration
which had for so long been secretly merging into
love, were suddenly tinged by an ecstasy of grati-
tude. She appeared infinitely more to him at the
moment than either friend or possible lover. She
was the supreme miracle of creation embodied in
that graceful form, outlined against the window.
The benefactor, the giver, the maker of himself.
By her simple expression of belief in him, she had
given him a soul. He wanted to kneel before her
in adoration. ...
Intrigued and a little embarrassed by his pro-
longed silence, she slipped off the window seat and
turned to him with the beginning of a conversational
commonplace that was checked by the adoring
intensity of his gaze.


236 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
g whad at anticipate her parmanikine broke
"It must be nearly ..." she had begun, and then
stopped and put her hands to her face to hide the
flood of colour that leapt to her cheeks.
* And still he could not speak. All the love and
poetry that surged within him could find no expres-
sion in his modern phrase. At the mere thought of
any gesture, movement, or word, he was frozen by
his self-consciousness; all too aware of himself as
a product of his own time, of the little conventional
self that he had always presented as a representa-
tive of the authentic Arthur Woodroffe.
And yet he knew that this was his moment, that
if he let it slip he might never again find an oppor-
tunity to say what he knew, now, was within him,
and so he grasped at an opening, however conven-
tional, in order to anticipate some slipping back
into the everyday manner, on her part or his own,
that might release the fatuities of the manikin.
"There is something I must say to you," he broke
out. "Please don't interrupt me. It's-oh! neces-
sary. 1..." He found that he could not lose
himself, standing there in stark inaction with her
before him, and began to pace up and down the
room, keeping his eyes on the ground.
“To begin with, I must thank you," he went on,
trying not to think of himself in any future relation
to her. "I want to go on thanking you. I can't
possibly tell you what you've done for me. Every-
thing, all life, is different now that I've got just the
hope that you believe in me. It has given me a
hope of-myself. If you can believe in me, nothing
can ever be the same again. Oh! I wish I could
tell you all that it has done for me, just knowing
you. But I can't. I can't say it, but I can live it,
and you know that I will. I'm sure you know that.
I can feel it. If ..."
REN
BL


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 237
He paused and looked up. She was sitting in the
window-seat, her head bent and her hands in her
lap. And with that he forgot his self-consciousness,
plunged across the room, and went down on his
knees before her.
"Eleanor," he said. “Do you know how I wor-
ship you?”
She did not answer him in words, but it seemed
as if by a series of infinitely delicate movements they
came slowly together, until her hands, with his own
clasping them, were on his breast and they were
looking into each other's eyes. There was no need
then for them to say that they had loved from their
first meeting, but now that the pressure of that first
overpowering urgency had weakened, words came
more easily.
It was not, however, until some time later that
he found one essential explanation.
“But the first time that I really knew how much
I loved you," he said, "was when I saw you in
imagination, as a solemn little chit of seven standing
by the elephant's pad in the hall. You seemed so
precious then.”





XII
THEY had their afternoon together-free from
1 embarrassment, for they constrained them-
selves to conceal their happiness during the ordeal
of lunch in order that they might enjoy for an hour
or two the sacred reserves of their precious secret.
After that, as they well understood, the family
would have to know, and more than the fact of their
engagement. They would have to be told, also, that
Hartling was to lose two of its members.
They debated that last decision before they were
agreed. Arthur, still suspicious of the good faith of
Miss Kenyon and Charles Turner, was for post-
poning what he regarded as the lesser announcement
until after his interview with the old man. Eleanor
saw more clearly.
"They would never dare to anticipate us," she
said. “It would be too risky. Haven't you realised
that they never interfere with him? For one thing
they are agreed that there shan't be any kind of
competition between them, for favours and so on
—which is awfully wise of them, if you come to
think of it. And for another, they would not like
to be the bearer of bad news or even disturbing
news. Their fear of him goes as deep as that."
“And yet he never loses his temper with them,
does he? Or threatens them in any way?” Arthur
asked.
"He threatens them all the time, indirectly," she
said. “But I've never seen him lose his temper.
He doesn't seem to care enough for that."
241


244 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
of destinies, and the affair was amply justified by
precedent. Mrs Turner was still very depressed,
and the news seemed to add another melancholy
to her very depressed thoughts. No doubt she was
reflecting that if her son had fallen in love with his
Cousin Elizabeth, he too might now be settling
down with the others to await the inevitable event
that must finally determine their period of bondage.
And if he had done that, the family would have
been complete, with no further fear of any intrusion
from the outside.
Hubert gave the fullest expression to his con-
gratulations. He appeared genuinely pleased, and
went as far as suggesting that his own marriage
and Arthur's might take place on the same day.
And Elizabeth was at least outwardly complacent;
although Arthur wondered if her almost incessant
chatter, that afternoon, concealed a faint chagrin.
Probably she would have married him if he had
asked her. Not because she was in love with him,
but because he happened to be the only man avail-
able.
Joe Kenyon alone exhibited any signs of uneasi-
ness, glancing across at Arthur more than once over
the tea-table with a look that conveyed a hint of
doubt and suspicion.
Arthur himself was far from confident. He was
unhappily aware of the fact that he was accepting
their congratulations under false pretences. And
he could not bring himself to announce his further
plans to the full company. If Eleanor had been
present they might have dared it together. But
she had gone straight up to her grandfather after
confiding the news of the engagement to Mrs
Kenyon, and had not come down again.
It was inevitably his uncle that Arthur chose as


246 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"Is it possible to live on that, in these days ?"
his uncle asked.
"Oh, yes! rather. It isn't much, of course,"
Arthur said.
"Both of you?”
"For a time. I hope to make more—in a year
or two."
"Then why doesn't Eleanor wait until you've
felt your feet a bit?”
"She won't. She wants to get away quite as
much as I do-more, I think.”
"But where's she going to-to-morrow? If she
goes to-morrow?"
"To the Paynes. The people who brought her
over from South America."
"Seem to have worked it all out,” Joe Kenyon
commented, with a deep sigh. “How long have
you been making these plans?”
"Only this afternoon." Arthur said. “But she
had written to the Paynes before we before I said
anything to her, you know. She meant to go in any
case."
"The old man doesn't know yet, of course," his
uncle continued.
"Going to tell him to-morrow morning."
Joe Kenyon considered that thoughtfully for a
few seconds before he said, “Can't do anything to -
you, of course. You may have a pretty stiff time,
both of you, but damn it, you're free. He's got no
hold on you. Can't do anything—except chuck you
out, which is all you're asking for."
“Quite," Arthur agreed, and then added: “This
won't affect you in any way, will it, uncle?"
Joe Kenyon pursed his mouth. “Can't put it
down to us. Can he?" he inquired. “You'll make
that plain enough, between you. What I mean is,


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 247
this'll be a knock for him, worst in twenty-five years,
and he may be spiteful, work off his annoyance on
one of us after you've gone, if there's the least
excuse."
"Oh! there can't be the least question of involv-
ing any one but our two selves," Arthur assured
him.
“Damn it, I wish it hadn't been Eleanor," his
uncle grumbled, adding inconsequently, “Pretty
stiff coming the day after the other affair. If
anything'll upset him this will. He'll put up a devil
of a fight for Eleanor. She's damned useful to him.
But, Good Lord! what can he do, when it comes to
the point? If you're determined to go, there's the
end of it. He can't make you stay." He looked
apologetically at Arthur as he continued: “It's
different for you. You've got a profession, pros-
pects. None of us have. And then we'd been
brought up to it. So has Hubert. . . . All the
same, we'd thought you'd stay. We shouldn't have
blamed you either if you had. Very glad in a way.
Oh, well! Good Lord; I don't know. Honestly,
Arthur, how long do you think it's possible he might
hang on?”
Arthur shook his head. “You can't tell," he
admitted. "He's as sound as a bell physically, and
he has got the will to live. And so long as a man
has that, you know, and there's nothing organically
wrong..."
"Might easily live another ten years?" Joe
Kenyon said.
"Quite easily," Arthur replied.
He realised later in the evening that in his con-
versation his uncle had summarised the family
opinion. Their attitude towards himself was


248 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
marked by that same discretion which had charac-
terised it immediately before his championship of
Hubert. They were afraid of the least appearance
of complicity; and avoided too direct a reference
to the subject that must have been uppermost in
their thoughts. Turner's casual, "Hear you're
going to take up your work again. Pretty dull for
you down here, I suppose, without any settled
employment," was a mere acknowledgment of the
fact, and manifestly deprecaid any further elabora-
tion of the topic. And Hubert contented himself
with spasms of melancholy gazing, as if he were
trying to intimate as tactfully and safely as possible
his personal sorrow and regret. Miss Kenyon was
more nearly affable than Arthur had ever known
her to be, and talked to him at dinner about his
profession with every sign of interest.
The meal had an unprecedented air of informal-
ity that night owing to the absence of the head of
the house, who dined in his own room. Eleanor,
also, was absent from the table—to Arthur's great
disappointment. He hoped to have another talk
with her before his interview with the old man,
and had fully expected to see her in the dining-room
and be able to make some appointment with her
afterwards.
About half-past nine, however, this particular
anxiety was relieved, if none too satisfactorily, by
a note that was brought down to him by one of
the maids. “No hope this evening," Eleanor had
written, “but I will see you upstairs before you go
in to him to-morrow. Come up at half-past ten.
I have told him about our engagement and he
seemed to be pleased-chiefly, I think, because he
believes it will give him a greater hold over you.
It's rather awful, somehow. I'm not a bit happy


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 249
about your seeing him. I'm afraid of some-
thing, though I don't in the least know what. Sleep
well.”
Arthur cherished that little letter for its first
sentence. “No hope this evening" thrilled him by
its sweet familiarity and its quiet acceptance of the
fact that they wanted to be together. It said so
much more than any sterotyped term of endear-
ment. Her final note of foreboding did not disturb
him. He had no fear for the future, since the only
future he saw was life with Eleanor. He had begun
to plan the possibility of a small flat somewhere,
if one could be found. There was no reason why
they should not be married quite soon.
He looked up to find the eye of little Turner
fixed upon him with a half-whimsical smile.
"What about a last game ?” he asked, making a
daring reference to the forbidden topic.
“Rather,” Arthur agreed cheerfully.
"I'll come and mark,” Hubert volunteered in
much the tone he might have used if he had been
offering his services as chief mourner.
Arthur found no difficulty in following Eleanor's
advice to sleep well. He lay awake for half an hour
or so thinking of her, but after that he slept soundly
and his sleep was undisturbed. He did not even
remember his dreams when he woke. And he had
no sinking of the heart, no sick qualms of antici-
pation the following morning. His waking thoughts
were all of Eleanor, the incident of the necessary
interview with old Kenyon appeared to him as no
more than one of the many necessary steps that he
must take before he could enter the Paradise of his
life with her. He was, for the time being, obsessed
with a single idea, and his one annoyance was the


250 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
fact that two and a half hours must elapse before
he would see her again.
His uncle misread his evident abstraction when
they met in the library after breakfast.
"Worried, Arthur?” he asked in a confidential
voice behind the shield of the Times, although
there was no one in the room just then but himself
and his nephew.
“Worried? Lord, no," Arthur replied frankly.
"Quite the contrary."
"All right for you, my boy, but you'll have a rare
trouble to make him give up Eleanor," his uncle
said.
“He can't keep her if she wants co go," Arthur
returned, but Joe Kenyon refused to commit him-
self any further.
“Oh, well! Wait and see," he said.
Arthur's peace of mind was in no way disturbed
by that hint of the possible difficulties ahead of him.
His uncle's warning seemed to him nothing more
than a symptom of the characteristic Kenyon weak-
ness. They were timid, apprehensive creatures,
sapped and enfeebled by their life of comfort and
seclusion.
He was, however, suddenly startled into doubt
by Eleanor's reception of him in the little ante-
room. He had expected to find her as confident
and self-reliant as he was himself. He had hoped
that their half-hour's talk would be all of their own
delightful future. He found her anxious, trembling,
on the verge of tears.
"Sit down," she said, when Arthur came in. "I
want to talk to you first. It's quite safe. He's in
the office, and in any case you can't hear what's said
from the next room.”
But after he had obeyed her, she could not come


252 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
could see, or put out, or anything. But directly I
began to talk to him this queer feeling of fear came
over me. It was . . . Arthur, it was just as if I
knew something terrible was going to happen.”
She slipped her pulse from his fingers, thrust her
hand into his, and clung to it tightly as she con-
tinued, “And I've been thinking that perhaps I may
have been wrong about him. I don't believe I slept
an hour last night. I kept going over it all again
and again until I nearly persuaded myself that he
had always meant well—underneath. And if he
has, and I desert him now, and the shock of it made
him ill—it might, mightn't it?-I should feel so
awful about it. Oh! what do you think we ought
to do? You know we might be-be married-here
—and go on much as we have been with that
difference.”
For a moment Arthur was tempted, realising in
his own feelings something of what the other dwell-
ers in the house must have gone through before
they descended to their present level of fatalistic
acceptance. And if he had not been so deeply in
love with Eleanor he would almost certainly have
yielded as the others had done before him. He was
saved by the memory of his own abasement the
previous morning. He had known then that he
could never be worthy of her so long as he was too
inert to face the struggle of life.
He put his arm round her and drew her close
to him—the first caress he had dared. "No," he
said. “Quite definitely no! I should hate myself
if we did that. You have cured me of the least
wish to slack my life away. I shouldn't be good
enough for you, if I did. I don't mean to say that
I'm good enough in any case, but I shall try to
be. ." He paused, and with the lingering fond-


15
THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 253
ness of one who murmurs the tenderest of all en-
dearments, added softly, “Eleanor."
Her only answer was to press a little nearer to
him, and he felt that she was now leaning upon his
strength; she who had given him that strength in
the first instance.
"It was you who made me see everything so
clearly, yesterday," he went on. "I saw myself as
I was, a detestable parasite. I could have hated
myself for daring to love you. And whatever hap-
pens, I could not face that feeling again. It has
gone absolutely. I don't believe I should ever have
had it if it hadn't been for the influences and temp-
tations of this place. It undermines one's will
though it has never undermined yours.”
She hid her face. “It has, it has," she whispered.
"I didn't know it until last night. I thought I was
strong."
He was seized with a momentary panic. “You
mean that you're afraid to face life with me on five
hundred a year?” he asked.
She lifted her head and smiled at him. "I'd face
life with you on a hundred a year, cheerfully," she
said. “It isn't that."
He was infinitely relieved by that assurance, for
he had had a glimpse of a condition that might
still defeat him. If she had been afraid of the life
he had had to offer her, he might have been forced
to compromise. "What is it, then ?” he asked ten-
derly.
"My grandfather,” she said. "He-he paralyses
my will, I think. I can feel his power over me here,
this very minute. I'm afraid of him now that I'm
going to oppose him, just as they are all afraid of
him. It's like the fear one has in a dream, the fear
of something with an unearthly power that you


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 255
"Can you see Arthur now? He's here," she said
coldly; and having received her reply she looked at
Arthur and formally beckoned him to go in. But
as he passed her in the doorway she momentarily
clasped his arm with her two hands as if she were
loath, even now, to let him go.
Yet, despite all this ominous introduction, it was
pity and not fear that Arthur felt as he sat down
by the old man, who had, so mysteriously it seemed,
terrified his own family. He looked even less in-
timidating than usual this morning. He was ob-
viously pleased by the news of the engagement, and
his first words were almost roguish.
"Well, well, Arthur: I mustn't keep you long to-
day,” he said. “And I suppose, after this, that I
shall have to reconcile myself to seeing rather less
of Eleanor. However ..." He completed his
sentence with a gesture of his delicate, shrivelled
hand.
Arthur knew the inference that he was expected
to draw:in a few months—a year or two, at longest
-all these little cares and troubles would have
ceased for ever. And it crossed his mind that he
might open his extraordinarily difficult announce-
ment by some well-considered professional assur-
ance that his patient might quite conceivably live
another ten or fifteen years. He rejected that as
being clumsy and tactless—although every form of
approach seemed to him, just then, to be either
clumsy or cruel. And it was in desperation, alarmed
by the growing significance of his own silence, that
he at last said, -
“Yes, sir, I'm afraid you'll miss her-rather-
at first."
The old man appeared to be unaware that this
sentence held any unusual suggestion. "Have you


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 257
Arthur blushed vividly. "You see, sir," he
blurted out, with the gaucheness of a peccant school-
boy, “I feel rather-as if-if I were wasting my
time here-in a way. I don't really want to be un-
grateful, you know, although I suppose it must seem
like it, but-I'd be awfully glad if you could see
your way to letting me off.”
"And your promise ?” Mr Kenyon asked, still in
the same cool, formal voice. “Does that count
for nothing with you?”
"I'm sorry, sir. I feel that I can't stay," Arthur
looked down again as he spoke. He found it diffi-
cult to meet the stare of those fierce hunting eyes.
"You realise, of course,” Mr Kenyon continued,
“that this will put an end to your engagement ? I
could not spare Eleanor."
"She-she wants to go too, sir," Arthur said.
“But she can't,” Mr Kenyon replied, in the tone
of a man who pronounces an unimpeachable judg-
ment. "If you go, Arthur, you will go alone.”
Then, with a change of voice, he went on, “But
you will alter your mind about this, I am sure.
When you come to think it over, you will realise, I
hope, how dishonourable it would be for you to
leave me, after the bargain we made and the pro-
mise you gave me. In any case, take a week to
think it all over. Take a month if you like.”
Arthur sat in silence for what seemed to him a
considerable time after the old man had finished
speaking. He was thinking of the rest of the Ken-
yons downstairs. He had blamed them many times
for their weakness, but he understood now how
nearly impossible it must have been for them to
have done anything but wait, postponing any de-
cision from month to month. He himself, with all
their experience behind him, was faltering; though


260 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
knees gave way, and he crumpled pitifully, collaps-
ing like a broken doll without making the least
effort to save himself.
Arthur bent over him, lifted him, laid him out
on his back, and rapidly unfastened his collar. ...
There was nothing to be done but get him to bed.
He knew that perfectly well. But first he must
have help. He jumped up and flung open the door
into the ante-room.
"Eleanor," he said in a voice that he found diffi-
cult to control, "he has had a stroke. Send some
one at once in the car for Fergusson. If he's not
at the surgery they must go after him; find him
somehow."
Clear and suddenly familiar in his mind, as if it
were a tune that he had been trying to recall, was
a sentence that he had spoken to Hubert a few days
earlier :-
"It might break him down if he were badly
crossed," he had said.


XIII
THE gates were standing open. They may have
1 been opened in expectation of the coming of
the specialist who might arrive at any minute, but
even the garden wore a new aspect that morning.
It was as if the wide airs of Sussex were creeping
in and subtly perverting the seemly splendour of
that suburban super-garden.
Old Kenyon had been unconscious for twenty-
four hours. Both Arthur and Fergusson knew with
almost absolute certainty what was the matter with
him. A cerebral artery had been ruptured and the
area of damaged tissue appeared to be slowly ex-
tending. No remedy was possible. The chances
were that within another twenty-four hours he
would die without recovering consciousness. But
he had trained nurses in constant attendance and a
specialist had been sent for. Scurr had gone with
Fergusson to fetch him in the big car.
Arthur had been up with the unconscious man all
night, and had come out into the garden now for a
breath of fresh air. When he came downstairs he
had found himself a centre of burning interest.
All the family, except the one he most wanted to be
with, were drawn towards him as if he were the
newly found vortex of a whirlpool. They tried
desperately hard to be casual and decorous, but they
found it impossible to keep their eyes off him. It
seemed to Arthur that they almost gaped.
They were all extraordinarily wide-awake and
feverishly inactive. The women's fancy-work had
feverity were thus that keep the deco
263


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 265
"Oh, obviously," Arthur agreed.
“But I say, how did it happen?” his uncle asked.
"We haven't the shakiest notion you knows
and ..."
"I just murdered him," Arthur said quietly.
"Eh! What's that?" Joe Kenyon ejaculated.
"For all intents and purposes,” Arthur explained.
“I opposed him, and he tried to take cover—went
into one of his 'trances.' Did you know they
weren't trances, by the way?”
"No. What the devil were they, then?"
"Pretences, pieces of acting, fantasies of his own
making. He used to hide himself in them, as it
were. Dream what a great and powerful being he
was, able to keep you all in attendance, keep you
waiting for ten minutes in the middle of dinner
if he liked, while he enjoyed the sense of holding
you there. And when he was in danger of losing
his temper with me, he tried to get under that cover,
to shelter himself, rehabilitate his own pride."
"And you? What did you do?”.
"Treated him as if he were a case in a clinic.
Began to test his reactions. And-and-well, he
couldn't keep it up.”
"And then?"
"Couldn't control himself. Lost his temper-
frightfully. Whacked at me with his stick—and
collapsed. It was losing his temper did it-first
time he has done it probably for forty years. Had
you ever seen him lose his temper?”
Joe Kenyon considered that question for a mo-
ment or two before he said, “No! That was some-
thing he always had in reserve, something we were
afraid of. He was always terrible to us, in a way,
and we felt that if he went one step further he'd
be-oh! devastating."


266 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"He wasn't, you know," Arthur said. "He
wasn't terrible, I mean. Not in the least. He was
essentially a weak man and not even clever. I sat
up with him all last night, and everything came to
me as clearly as if I'd read it somewhere. He has
altered, you see, in face and expression since he be-
came unconscious. His chin seems to have retreated
and all the lines round his mouth have changed.
I couldn't keep the idea of a rat out of my mind
when I looked at him. I got that effect somehow-
something horribly intent and voracious but essen-
tially weak. I remember looking at a dead rat in
the stables when I was a boy. It was lying on its
back with its feeble little front paws stuck up and
the feet dangling. . . . And he had just the same
expression on his face-ineffectual and yet cruel-
as if his one regret was that he couldn't hurt any
one again. I was almost sorry that he couldn't
—especially as I had murdered him.”
"Oh, nonsense, Arthur; nonsense,” his uncle in-
terposed. “Don't say that.”
“True, though, in a way, isn't it?" Arthur said.
“Truer than you guess, because I had known that
it might kill him if he had a great shock. I'd even
said so to Hubert, a few days ago Sunday, I
think it was. But I'd forgotten it. When I was
telling him that I meant to go and take Eleanor
with me whatever he did, I never once considered
that it might be too much for him. And that was
criminal carelessness in a medical man. I've been
thinking about it more or less ever since.”
He paused and looked ahead of him, out through
the gate into the Sussex lane, and it was manifest
that he was confessing to himself rather than to
Joe Kenyon as he continued: "Not that I propose
to take any responsibility for his death. That
Criminal hight be if he did, to go and When day, I


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 267
wouldn't help any one. It happened so, and I shan't
forget it, but that's all. Fergusson knows. There's
no need to worry about it. Only—I've grown up.
I'm not quite the same man I was twenty-four hours
ago. I came down here to get back some of the
years of youth that I'd lost in the war. Well,
they're gone for good and all. I shall never be
able to recover them now.”
"Oh, nonsense!” his uncle repeated, taking his
arm. “You've got a thundering good time ahead
of you."
Arthur smiled. “I've got the best time any man
could have ahead of me," he said, "but I shall en-
joy it as a man, not as a boy. I didn't say that I
regretted the passing of my youth, uncle."
"No, no, of course not," Joe Kenyon agreed.
"And look here, old boy, we've been talking about
you since yesterday morning, about you and Elea-
nor, that is; and Turner and I—and Hubert, of
course—are quite agreed that if the old man has,
after all, overlooked you in his will, that we shall
take it for granted that it was just an oversight-
though probably Eleanor will be left pretty well
off. If he had a favourite, it was Eleanor."
“Good of you, uncle," Arthur replied warmly.
"Awfully good and generous of you, but you must
see that I couldn't take a farthing, even if the old
man left it to me."
“I don't see why not,” Joe Kenyon began, but
Arthur stopped him by saying.
“No! Absolutely! In no circumstances what-
ever! It isn't simply that I could not bear to profit
now by his death—though that counts. But-well
-perhaps it needn't apply to you and the rest of
them—but last night, while I was watching that
poor thing on the bed, I realised so profoundly that


268 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
his one source of power had been his money. I
assure you that he was a weak man and not clever.
If you can't believe me, go upstairs and look at him.
And without his money he would have had no
authority, no power over you of any sort. It was
just his money that gave him the chance to spoil all
your lives. Oh, Lord! I'm talking like a father
to you. Honestly, uncle, I feel nearly old enough
for that, this morning. Want of sleep, perhaps.
It does clear the head in a queer way sometimes.”
“Hm! I dare say you're right, Arthur, about
the money," Joe Kenyon mumbled. "I-I hope we
shall make a better use of it. I don't think any of
us has got the old man's cruelty—he was damned
cruel, that's true enough.”
"Not even Miss Kenyon?” Arthur put in.
"Esther? Oh, well! I don't know. Perhaps a
little. But she has suffered like all the rest of us,
and learnt her lesson.”
There was no time to reply to that; for while Joe
Kenyon was still speaking, the car turned in at the
front gates, and they both hurried forward to meet
it. When it stopped at their signal to Scurr, the
specialist was introduced, and then both Arthur and
his uncle got into the car, and they all went on to-
gether up to the house.
The conference in the old man's bedroom was a
very short one, and the specialist had nothing to
add to what they already knew, save the prestige
of his authority. He was a tired, gray-looking
little man of fifty or so, with an absent-minded man-
ner, but when his anticipated acceptance of the
diagnosis had been given, he looked keenly at Fer-
gusson and said, -
"Made a lot of money, didn't he? All by his
own efforts."


THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING 269
"It's more than half a million I've been told,"
Fergusson answered.
The specialist faintly shrugged his shoulders.
“Wouldn't think it to look at him now. What?"
he commented, and with the indifference of his pro-
fession he carelessly pinched the retreating chin of
the little lax figure in the great bed.
“The predatory type, I presume,” he added
thoughtfully.
"Ay; he was that,” Fergusson agreed. “More
cunning than clever, though he had eyes that made
you think of the eyes of a kite when he was roused.
But he has altered greatly since this seizure. May-
be you'd hardly credit it now, but he has been a
rare autocrat with his family.”
"You see," Arthur put in, "he had them so ab-
solutely in his power. He could leave his money as
he liked, and they were all dependent upon him.”
“And yet he must have had a certain generosity,"
Fergusson added, "for he kept the whole lot of
them."
The specialist looked shrewdly at Arthur and
slightly pursed his mouth. “That was his one in-
terest and amusement, perhaps," he said. “The
love of power of a naturally weak man. It's com-
mon enough if you care to look for it. Who suc-
ceeds ?”
"We don't know yet," Arthur replied. “His
lawyer is coming down by train this afternoon, and
will stay here until the end-in case of a possible
return to consciousness. But I suppose he'll tell us
nothing until the old man's dead.”
"You interested?” the specialist asked.
"No," Arthur said. “Not even to the extent of a
five-pound note.”
"You know that much, then?”


270 THE PRISONERS OF HARTLING
"I know that for certain," Arthur affirmed.
Fergusson whistled softly under his breath, but
made no other comment.
They were quite a large party at dinner that
night. Ken Turner had been telephoned for, and
had come down by the same train as Mr Fleet, the
solicitor. Joe Kenyon had taken his father's place
at the head of the table, but occupied it as deputy
only, for his sister and not his wife faced him from
the other end.
They had nearly finished, when one of the trained
nurses entered the room and made a sign across the
table to Arthur. He jumped up at once and fol-
lowed her. He knew even before she spoke to him
just outside the dining-room door why she had
fetched him.
There was nothing more to be done, but he sat
for a few minutes beside the dead, remembering
that he had promised some kind of autopsy to in-
sure the body against premature burial. He would
keep that promise, although he knew that the pre-
caution was quite unnecessary. Also he thought
again of the dead rat in the stable at home. The
likeness was more pronounced than ever.
He found them all collected in the drawing-room
when he returned to make his expected announce-
ment.
"Yes! It's all over. He is dead," he said
gravely, in answer to the look of inquiry they thrust
at him.
And with that statement his function in the house-
hold ceased. They had eyes for him no longer.
The centre of interest had shifted from the doctor
to the lawyer. ..
His head drooped, he was very tired, and he



THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
DATE DUE
JUMARATE
JUN 2 4 1986