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3. 34.33 O7492689 4
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The Vails
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BP THE SAME AUTHOR
THE PRINCESS SOPHIA
Crown 8vo., cloth extra, Six shillings
Daily Telegraph.-'The characterization is excellent, the humour
pleasing, the satire true.”
Westminster Gazette.—“This book is a gay and spirited per-
formance, and the Princess herself a clever picture. It is lively
reading, and the characters bubble along in true Bensonian
fashion.”
Athenaeum.—“There is brilliance, lightness of touch. The
dialogue is neat and brisk, and the miniature Court and its
courtiers are amusingly treated.’
World.—“The best of the book is undoubtedly the admirably-
conceived and skilfully-drawn character of Sophia herself—
princess, gambler, and very woman. Mr. Benson has written nothing
fresher or more graceful than the chapter which tells the story of
her courtship. The art with which he preserves his picture of the
card-playing, betting, hard-riding girl from any taint of vulgarity
or sordidness is not easily over-praised.’
Graphic.—“It is written in its author's bright and lively manner,
with plenty of good-natured chaff at the expense of actual things
and people.”
Literature.—“Told with verve and wit. If the novel is to
amuse, we cannot recommend a more agreeable companion than
Mr. Benson's brilliant friend “The Princess Sophia.”
Birmingham Daily Post.—“As brilliant in execution as it is happy
in conception.”
Guardian.—“We are inclined to think that Mr. Benson's new
book is the best thing he has yet done. It is a very clever study
of gambling and a very clever study of human nature. In all the
book there is not a character which is not natural, and there is also
an absence of the superficiality which has sometimes been notice-
able in Mr. Benson's work. He seems to be thoroughly at home
with his characters, and describes them with truth and with
originality.”
LoNDoN : WM. HEINEMANN, 21 BEDFord STREET, W.C.


AY 7A/E SAME AUTHOR
M A M M O N & C O.
Crown 8vo., cloth extra, Siar shillings
Daily Telegraph.-Mr. Benson has returned to the world of
“Dodo,” to the follies and idiosyncrasies of a certain portion
of the “upper ten,” to bright, witty dialogues, and gay,
fascinating scenes. “Mammon and Co.” is bright, piquant,
and entertaining from beginning to end; full of humorous
sayings and witty things spoken by men and women who are
merry and captivating.’
Spectator.—‘Hooleyism is not the only target of Mr. Benson's
satire. He also deals with the fashionable craze for gambling
in private houses and with dangerous flirtations, and the book
is at once far truer to life and far better calculated to open
people's eyes to their follies than Ouida's highly-coloured
impeachment of London society in “The Masserenes.” It is a
clever and interesting novel.”
World.—“To say only that the book is amusing is not only
insufficient, but also misleading. It is a very serious exposé by
typical figures of certain sides of our social life, with illustrative
recurrences to flagrant scandals in the worlds of fashion and
finance under the present conditions of fusion. The skill with
which those typical figures are drawn and the originality of the
types are remarkable.”
Pall Mall Gazette. — ‘Mr. Benson's new story is in his
happier and clever style. Happily, also, the liveliness does
not tire. The repartee and rattle of the “smart set” are the
genuine thing, and his own pretty conceits and happy little
audacities of turn are not too forced. One of the best things
in the book is the composite character of the promoter.
Decidedly he is a creation.”
St. James's Gazette.—“Mr. E. F. Benson's new novel is also
his best. It has all the smartness of “Dodo,” with a more
interesting plot, a better grasp of character, and a more whole-
some point in its satire. Altogether, this novel has given us a
good deal of pleasure, and it is written in so lively a style that
it is sure to be a popular success.”
LoNDoN : WM. HEINEMANN, 21 Bedford STREET, W.C.


The Luck of the Vails


TFlew 63. Flowelg
JACK RAYMOND
By E. L. Voynich
the HIDDEN MODEL
By FRANces HARRod
TANGLED triNITIES
By DANIEL Woodroffe
Gill ETTE'S MARRIAGE
By MAMIE Bowles
VOYSEY
By R. O. Prowse
SAWDUST
By Dorothea GERARD
FROM A SWEDISH HOMESTEAD
By SELMA LAGERLöf
FOREST FOLK
By JAMEs Prior
THE QUEEN VERSUS BILLY
By Lloyd Osbourne
THE MANTLE OF ELIJAH
By I. ZANGwill
THE LANE THAT HAD
NO TURNING
By Gilbert PARKER
the HOSTS OF THE LORD
By Flora ANNIE STEEL
THE LADY OF DREAMS
By Una L. SilberRAD
THE COURTESY DAME
By R. Murray Gilchrist
THE VOICE OF THE PEOPLE
By Ellen Glasgow
THE IMAGE BREAKERS
By GERTRUDE Dix
London
Willi AM HE in eMANN
21 Bedford STREET, W.C.


The
Luck of the Vails
º
M. €.
E!” Fºº Benson
r–
Author of
“Mammon & Co.,’ ‘The Princess Sophia,” etc.
London
William Heinemann
I90 I
*V


This Adition envoys copyright in
. . ad countries signatory to the Berne
* Treaty,and:is hot to be imported
! intº the United. States of America
*
. . * * *
º, ºtºrs. *


To my Brother,
ARTHUR CHRISTOPHER BENSON,
This Story,
of his, not of my invention,
is affectionately
Dedicated by its admiring Scribe.





C O N T E N T S
chapter pace
i. The shadows dance - - - - - i
il. the coming of the luck - - - - - Io
in I. the spell begins to work - - - - 19
iv. the story of MR. FRANcis - - - - 31
W. A. Point in casuistry - - - - - 39
vi. the Meeting - - - - - - 46
vii. the point in casuistry solves itself - - - 59
viii. the second return to waii, - - - - 69
IX. CARDIAC - - - - - - - 79
x. Mr. Francis Is Better - - - - - 9o
xi. Mr. Francis sees his doctor - - - - Ioz
xii. the Meeting in the wood - - - - I i I
XIII. HARRY ASKs A QUESTION - - - - - 127
xiv. LADY oxTED's IDEA - - - - - - 139
xv. Frost - - - - - - - - 151
xvi. Fire - - - - - - - - 169
xvii. A bird of Night - - - - - - 184
xviii. RAIN - - - - - - - - 205
xix. Geoffrey Leaves VAIL - - - - - 218
xx. Dr. ARMYTAGE ARRIVES - - - - - 232
xxi. Geoffrey Meets the DOCTOR - - - • 242
xxii. Lady oxted has a BAD NIGHT - - - - 258
xxIII. THE MEETING IN GROSVENOR SQUARE - - - 272
xxiv. JIM Goes To BED - - - - - - 285
xxv. M.R. FRANCIS Sleeps - - - - - - 307
epilogue - - - - - - - 318





PART I
CHAPTER I
THE SHADOWS DANCE
THE short winter's day was drawing to its close, and twilight, the
steel and silver twilight of a windless frost, was falling in throbs
of gathered dusk over an ice-bound land. The sun, brilliant,
but cold as an electric lamp, had not in all its hours of shining
been of strength sufficient to melt the rime congealed during
the night before, and each blade of grass on the lawns, each
spray and sprig on the bare hedgerows, had remained a spear
of crystals minute and innumerable. The roofs of house and
cottage sparkled and glimmered as with a soft internal lustre
in the light of the moon, which had risen an hour before sunset,
and the stillness of a great cold—a thing more palpably motion-
less than even the stricken noonday of the south—gripped all
in its vice. Silent, steadfast lights had sprung up and multi-
plied in the many-windowed village, but not a bird chirped or
dog barked. Labourers were home from the iron of the frozen
fields, doors were shut, and the huge night was at hand.
The sequestered village of Vail lies in a wrinkle of the great
Wiltshire downs, and is traversed by the Bath road. The big
inn, the Vail Arms, seems to speak of the more prosperous
days of coach and horn, but now its significance to the shrill
greyhounds of the railway is of the smallest, and they pass for
the most part without salute. About a mile beyond it to the
outward-bound traveller stands the big house, screened by
some ten furlongs of park, and entering the gate, he will find
himself in a noble company of secular trees, beech in the
majority, and of stately growth. Shortly before the house
I


2 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
becomes visible a spacious piece of meadow-land succeeds to
the park; thence the road, passing over a broad stone bridge
which spans the chalk stream flowing from the sheet of water
above, is bounded on either side by terraced lawns of ancient
and close-napped turf, intersected at intervals by gravel walks,
and turning sharply to the right, follows a long box hedge, once
cut into tall and fantastic shapes. But it seems long to have
lacked the shears and pruning hand, for all precision of outline
has been lost, and what were once the formal figures of bird
and beast have swelled into monstrous masses of deformed
shape, wrought, you would think, by the imagination of a
night-hag into things inhuman. Here, as seen in the dim
light, a thin neck would bulge into some ghastliness of a head,
hydrocephalous or tumoured with long-standing disease; here
a bird with dwindled body and scarecrow wings stood on the
legs of a colossus; here conjecture would vainly seek for a
reconstruction.
The end of one of the wings of the house, which was built
round three sides of a quadrangle, abutted on to this hedge so
closely that a peacock with bloated tail peered into the gun-
room window, and in the centre of the gravel sweep rose a
bronze Triton fountain, bearded like an old man with long
dependence of icicle. A bitter north wind had accompanied
the early days of the frost, and this icy fringe had grown out
sideways from the lip of the basin, blown aside even as it con-
gealed. Flower-beds, a riband of dark untenanted earth, ran
underneath the windows, which rose in three stories, small-
paned and Jacobean. As dark fell, light sprang out in the
walls, as the stars in the field of heaven, but to right and left
of the front-door there came through a row of windows yet
uncurtained a redder and less constant gleam than the shining
of oil or wax, now growing, now diminishing, leaping out at
one moment to a great vividness, at the next suddenly dying
down again, so that in the corners of the room there was a
continual battle of shadows. Now, as the flames from the
wood burning on the great open hearth grew dim, whole bat-


THE SHADOWS DANCE 3
talions of them would collect and gather, again with the
kindling of some fresh stuff, they would be routed and dis-
appear. This fitfulness of illumination played also strange
tricks with the tapestries that hung on two of the four sides of
the hall; figures started suddenly into being, and were blotted
out before the eye had clearly visualized them, and in the
inconstancy of the light a nervous man might say to himself
that stir and movement was going on among them; again
they rode to hounds, or took the jesses off the hawk.
The present is the heir of all the achievements of former
ages, and while this great house, with its mile-long avenue,
its tapestries, its pictures, its air of magnificent English sta-
bility, finely represented all that had gone before, all that was
going on now was enclosed in the two large armchairs drawn
close to this ideal fire, in each of which sat a young man.
They talked but in desultory fashion, with frequent but not
awkward pauses of some length, for any social duty of keeping
the conversation going was to them quite outside a practical
call. They had also been shooting all this superb frosty day,
and the return to warmth and indoors, though productive of
profound content, does not conduce to loquacity.
‘Yes, a bath would be a very good thing," said one, “but it
is, perhaps, a question whether in the absolutely immediate
future tea would not be better.”
This was too strong a suggestion to be merely called a hint,
and the other rose.
“Sorry, Geoffrey,’ he said, ‘I never ordered tea. I was
thinking—no, I don't think I was thinking. Tea first, bath
afterwards,” he added meditatively.
Geoffrey Langham stroked an imperceptible moustache.
‘That's what I was thinking,' he said, ‘and I'm glad to see
you appreciate the importance of little things, Harry. Little
things like tea and baths matter far the most.’
“Anyhow, they occur much the oftenest,' said Lord Vail.
“I was beginning to be afraid tea wasn't going to occur at
all,” said Geoffrey.
I-2


4 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Harry Vail appeared to consider this.
‘You were wrong, then,' he said, ‘and you are on the way
to become a sensuous voluptuary.’
‘On the way?" said Geoffrey. “I have arrived. Ah, and
tea is following my excellent example !'
The advent of lamps banished the mustering and dispersal
of the leaping shadows, and threw the two figures seated on
either side of the tea-table into strong light, and, taken
together, into even stronger contrast. The birthright of a
good digestion, you would say, had been given to each, and
for no mess of pottage had either bartered the clear eye and
firm leanness of perfect health; but, apart from this and a
certain lithe youthfulness, it would have been hard at first
sight even, when resemblances are more obvious than differ-
ences, to see a single point of likeness between the two.
Geoffrey Langham, that sensuous voluptuary, seemed the seat
and being of serene English cheerfulness, and his face, good-
looking from its very pleasantness, contrasted strongly with
that of the other, which was handsome, in spite of a marked
and grave reserve which a stranger might easily have mistaken
for sullenness. Indeed, many who might soon have ceased to
be strangers had done so; and though Harry Vail had perhaps
no enemies, he was in the forlorner condition of having very
few friends. In fact, had he been made to enumerate them,
his list would have begun with Geoffrey, and it is doubtful
whether it would not also have ended with him.
But these agreeable influences of tea and light seemed to
produce a briskening effect on the two, and their talk, which,
since they came in, had touched a subject only to dismiss it,
settled down into a more marked channel.
‘Yes, it is a queer sort of coming-of-age party for me,’ said
Lord Vail, ‘and it was really good of you to come, Geoffrey.
I wonder whether anyone has ever come of age in so lonely a
manner. I have only one relative in the world who can be
called even distantly near. He comes this evening. Oh, I
told you that.'


THE SHADOWS DANCE 5
--- -
‘Your uncle,” said Geoffrey.
“Great-uncle, to be accurate. He is my grandfather's
youngest brother, and, what is so odd, he is my heir. One
always thinks of heirs as being younger than one's self.'
“Cut him off with a shilling,” said Geoffrey.
“Well, there isn't much more, in any case, except this great
barrack of a house. What there is, however, goes to him, and
it can hardly be expected that he will marry and have children
now.’
‘How old is he?' asked Geoffrey.
“Something over seventy.’
“And after him P
‘The Lord knows. Anybody; the first person you meet if
you walk down Piccadilly perhaps—perhaps you, perhaps the
Prime Minister. Honestly, I haven't any idea.'
“Marry, then, at once,’ said Geoffrey, “and disappoint the
man in the street and the Prime Minister, your uncle, and me.'
Harry Vail got up, and stood with his back to the fire,
stretching out his long-fingered hands to the blaze behind
him.
‘What advice l’ he said, ‘You might as well advise me to
have a Greek nose. Some people have it, some do not; it is
fate.’
“Marriage is a remarkably common fate,' remarked
Geoffrey; ‘commoner than a Greek nose. I have seen
many married people without it.’
‘It is commoner for certain sorts of people,’ said Harry,
“but you know, I ’ and he stopped.
“Well?' asked the other.
‘I am not of those sorts, the sorts who go smiling through
the world, and are smiled on in return. It was always the
same with me. I am not truculent, or savage, or sulky, I
believe, but somehow I remain friendless. I should be a
hermit, if there were any nowadays.”
“Liver,' said Geoffrey decidedly. “The fellow of twenty-
one who says that sort of thing about himself has got liver.


6 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
“Self Analysis, or the Sedentary Life,” a tract by Geoffrey
Langham. Here endeth the gospel.”
Harry smiled.
‘I don't think about my character, as a rule,’ he said. “I
don't lead a sedentary life, and I haven't got liver; but if one
is a recluse it is as well to recognise the fact. I haven't got
any real friends like everybody else.”
‘Thank you,” said Geoffrey; “don’t apologize.”
“I shall if I like ; indeed, I think I will. No one but a
friend would have come down here.”
‘Oh, I don't know about that,” said the other. ‘I would
stay with people I positively loathed for shooting no worse
than what we had to-day. In the matter of friends, what you
said was inane. You might have heaps of friends if you
choose; but you don't find friends by going into a room alone
and locking the door behind you.’
“Ah ! I do that, do I?’ said Harry, with a certain eager
interest in his tone.
“Just a shade. You might have heaps of friends.’
‘That may be or may not; it is certain that I have not.
Oh, well, this is unprofitable. Take a cigarette from the
recluse.’
They smoked in silence a minute or two.
‘Your uncle?' asked Geoffrey. “He comes to-night, you
said.’
‘Yes, I expect him before dinner. You've never seen him?”
“Never. What is he like P’
Harry pointed to a picture that hung above the fireplace.
“Like that,’ he said, ‘exactly like that.”
Geoffrey looked at it a moment, shading his eyes from the
lamp.
“Fancy dress ball, I suppose,’ he said.
‘No, the costume of the period,” said Harry. “It is not
my uncle at all, but an ancestor of sorts. The picture is by
Holbein; but, oddly enough, it is the very image of Uncle
Francis.'


THE SHADOWS DANCE 7
“Francis Vail, second Baron,' spelled out Geoffrey, from the
faded lettering on the frame.
‘Yes, his name was Francis, too.”
‘What is that great cup he is holding?' asked the other.
“Ah, I wondered whether you would notice that. I will
show it you this evening—at least, I am certain that what I
have found is it.”
“It looks rather a neat thing,” said Geoffrey. “But I can't
say as much for the second Baron, Harry. He seems to me a
wicked old man.’
‘There is no doubt that he was. Among other charming
deeds, he almost certainly killed his own father. He was
smothered in debt, came down here to try to get his father to
pay up for him, and met with a pretty round refusal, it appears.
That night the house was broken into, and the old man was
found murdered in his bed. The burglar seems to have been
a curious man—he took nothing, not a teaspoon.’
‘Good Lord 1 I'm glad I’m not of ancestral family. Which
is the room—the room?'
Harry laughed.
‘The one at the end of the passage upstairs. Shall I tell
them to move your things there?'
‘That is true hospitality,” said Geoffrey. “But I won't
bother you. Do either of them walk?'
“Francis does; so if you meet that gentleman about, and
find he is insubstantial, you will know that you have seen a
ghost.”
“And, if substantial, it will only be your uncle?'
“Exactly, so you needn't faint immediately.’
Geoffrey got up and examined the picture with more atten-
tion.
“If your uncle is like that,’ he said, ‘I’m not so sure that I
wouldn't sooner meet the ghost.’
‘I'm afraid it is too late to put him off now,” said Harry;
‘and unless there is a railway accident, you will certainly meet
him at dinner. But I don't understand your objection to my


8 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
poor old ancestor's portrait. I have always wondered that such
an awful old wretch could be made to look so charming.’
“There is hell in his eyes,” said Geoffrey.
Harry left his chair and leaned on the chimneypiece also,
looking up at the picture.
“Certainly, if you think he looks wicked,” he said, “you will
see no resemblance between him and my uncle. Uncle
Francis is a genial, pink-faced old fellow, with benevolent
white hair. When I used to come down here years ago, before
my father's death, for the holidays, he always used to be
awfully good to me. But he has been abroad for the last
three years, and I haven't seen him. But I remember him
as the most charming old man.’
“Then in essentials he is not like that portrait,” said Geoffrey,
turning away. “Well, I'm for the bath.’
“After you. Turn on the hot water when you're out,
Geoff.”
Harry did not immediately sit down again when his friend
left him, but continued for a little while to look at the second
Baron, trying to see in it what Geoffrey had seen, what he him-
self had always failed to see. He moved from where he stood
to where Geoffrey had been standing, still looking at it, when
suddenly, no doubt by some curious play of light on the
canvas, there flitted across the face for a moment some ex-
pression indefinably sinister. It was there but for a flash, and
vanished again, and by no change in his point of view could
he recapture it. Soon he gave up the attempt, and, with only
an idle and fleeting wonder at the illusion, he sat down, took
up a book, and yawned over a page that conveyed nothing to
him. Then frankly and honestly he shut it up, and lay com-
fortably back in his chair, looking at the fire. He must even
have dropped into a doze, for, apparently, without transition,
in the strange, unformulated fashion of dreams, he thought that
his uncle had come, dressed (and this did not seem remark-
able) in the fashion of the Holbein portrait, and having greeted
him with his well-remembered hearty manner, had sat down in


THE SHADOWS DANCE
9
the other of the two arm-chairs; and though unconscious of
having gone to sleep, he certainly came to himself with a start,
to find the chair opposite untenanted, and the sound of his own
name ringing in his ears.
Immediately afterwards it was re-
peated, and looking up to the gallery that ran across one side
of the hall, and communicated with certain of the bedrooms,
he saw Geoffrey leaning over in his dressing-gown.
“Bath's ready,’ he said, ‘and the portrait is looking at you.’
“Thanks. I’ve been to sleep, I think. Did you call me
more than once, Geoff?”
“No ; the other time it was the second Baron.”
Harry was still a little startled.
“You really only called once P’ he asked again.
‘Yes, only once. Why?'
* Nothing. Hullo | I hear wheels.
That must be my uncle.
Turn the hot water off, there's a good chap. I must just see
him before I come upstairs.”


CHAPTER II
The COMING OF THE LUCK
THE dining-room of Vail was of the same antique spaciousness
as the hall, and as there on the lounger, so here on the diner
looked down a serious company of ancestors. For so small a
party, it had been thought by the butler that conviviality would
be given a better chance if, on this frosty night, he laid them a
small table within range of the fire rather than that the three
should be cut off, as it were, on a polar island in the centre of
that vast sea of floor. And, indeed, though naturally a modest
man, Templeton felt a strong self-approval at the success of his
kind thought; for from the moment of sitting down a cheerful
merriness had held the table, rising sometimes into loud
hilarity, and never sinking into the contented slough of reple-
tion which is held in England to be the proper equivalent for
joviality. But if it was Templeton in part who was responsible
for so desirable an atmosphere, there was credit to be given to
at least one of the diners.
Pleasant and pink was Mr. Francis's face, his hair, though
silver, still crisp and vigorous, his mouth a perpetual smile.
In absolute repose even, a sunshine lingered there, as in a
bottle of well-matured wine, and its repose left it but to give
place to laughter. All dinner through he had been the mouth-
piece of delightful anecdote, and of observations shrewd but
always kindly, rising sometimes almost to the dry level of wit,
and never failing in that genial humour without which all con-
versation, not directed to a definite end, becomes intolerable.
Though talking much, he was no usurper of the inalienable
right of the others to wag the tongue, and though his own
wagged to vibration, he was never tedious. Even in the


THE COMING OF THE LUCK II
matter of riddles, introduced by Geoffrey, he had a contribu-
tion or two to make of so extravagant a sort that this dismal
species of entertainment was for the moment rendered
charming. He unbent to the level of the young men, to the
futility of most disconnected conversation, without ever seem-
ing to unbend. You would have said that his narrow, clerically-
opening shirt, with its large cravat and massive gold studs,
covered the heart of a boy; that the brains of a clever youth
lay beneath that silver hair, prematurely white indeed, yet not
from grief or the conduct of a world long unkind. In person
he was somewhat short, “without the inches of a Vail,” as he
himself said, and pleasantly inclined to stoutness, but to the
stoutness which may come early to a healthy appetite and a
serene digestion, for it was not accompanied either by pallid
flabbiness or colour unduly high, and by the artificial light
scarcely a wrinkle could be scrutinized on his beaming face.
His dress was precise and scrupulous, yet with a certain
antique touch about it, as of one who had been something of
a buck in the sixties, his linen far more than clean and fresh,
and of a snowiness which certainly implied special injunctions
to the washerwoman. His trouser-pockets were cut, we may
elegantly say, not at the side of those indispensable coverings,
but towards the front of the bow window, and there dangled
from the lip of one a fob of heavy gold seals.
They had now approached the end of dinner, decanters
glowed on the table, and a silver cigarette-box, waiting un-
touched, at Mr. Francis's request, till the more manly business
of wine was off the palate, stood by Harry's dessert-plate.
Already, even in this second hour of their acquaintance, the
three felt like old friends, and as the wine was on its first
round, the two young men were bent eagerly forward to hear
the conclusion of a most exciting little personal anecdote told
them by Mr. Francis. He had to perfection that great
essential of the narrator, intense interest and appreciation of
what he was himself saying, and the climax afforded him the
most obvious satisfaction. In his right hand he held his first


I2 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
glass of untasted port, and after an interval accorded to
laughter he suddenly rose.
‘And now,” he said, “comes the pleasantest moment of our
delightful evening. Harry, my dear boy, here is long life and
happiness to you, from the most sincere of your well-wishers.
And for myself, I pray that a very old man may some time
dance your children on his knee. God bless you, my dearest
fellow.’
He drank the brimming glass honestly to the last drop, and
held out his hand to the young man, with a long and hearty
grasp. Then with quick tact, seeing the embarrassment of
remark-making in Harry's face, he sat down again, and without
pause enticed the subject off the boards.
‘How well I remember your dear father coming of age 'he
said. “Dear me! it must be forty years ago, nearly twice as
long a time as you have lived. There's a puzzle for Mr. Lang-
ham, like the one he gave me to do. It was this very port, I
should say, in which we drank his health. The yellow seal, is
it not, Harry P Yes, yes; your grandfather laid it down in the
year '40, and we used to drink it only on very great occasions,
for he would say to me that it was a gift he had put in entail
for his grandchildren, and was not for us. And so it has
turned out. He was very fond of port, too, was dear old
Dennis; it was not a gift that cost him nothing. You would
scarcely remember your grandfather, Harry?"
“I just remember him, Uncle Francis,' said the lad, “but
only as a very old man. I don't think he liked children, for
whenever he saw me he would have no more than a word or
two to say, and then he would send for you.’
‘Yes, yes, so he would—so he would,” said Mr. Francis, “and
we used to have great games together—did we not, Harry P
Games did I say? Indeed, we seemed to be real Red Indians
in the wilderness and Crusaders with paper lances. Dear me !
I could play such games still. Hide-and-seek, too—a grand
business. It requires, as poor Antrobus used to say, all the
strategy of a General directing a campaign, combined with the


THE COMING OF THE LUCK I3
unflinching courage of the private, who has to go straight for-
ward, expecting artillery to open on him every minute. Yes,
and the old man felt it, too. I have seen him playing it with
his grandchildren when he was Prime Minister, and, upon my
word, he was more in earnest about it than the young people !'
Coffee had come in, and after a few minutes the three
moved for the hall. At the door, however, Harry paused and
stayed behind in the dining-room. Mr. Francis took Geoffrey's
arm in his affectionate way, and the two walked into the hall.
‘It has been so pleasant to me to meet you, my dear boy,’
he was saying, “for years ago I knew some of your people well.
No, I do not think I ever knew your father. But I must tell
you I am bad at surnames; one only calls the tradespeople
Mr. So-and-so, and I shall call you Geoffrey. You are Harry's
best friend; I have a claim upon you. Fine hall—is it not?
—and the pictures, well, they are a wonderful set. There is
nothing like them for completeness in England, if one excepts
the royal collections; and, indeed, I think there is less rubbish
here.”
The portraits were lit by small shaded lamps, which stood
beneath each, so that the whole light was thrown on to the
picture, and the beholder left undazzled. Mr. Francis had
strolled up to the fireplace, still retaining Geoffrey's arm, and
together they looked at the picture of Francis, second Baron.
“A wonderful example of Holbein,’ said Mr. Francis ; ‘I
do not know a finer. They tried hard to get it for the exhibi-
tion a few years ago, but it couldn't leave Vail. I should have
been quite uncomfortable at the thought of it out of the house.
Now, some people have told me Ah! I see you have
noticed it, too.”
‘Surely there is an extraordinary likeness between you and
it,” said Geoffrey. “Harry just pointed to it when I asked
him what you were like.’
Mr. Francis's eyes pored on the picture with a sort of fasci-
nation.
“A wonderful bit of painting,' he said. “And how clearly


I4 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
you see not only the man's body, but his soul | That is the
true art of the portrait-painter.’
“But not always pleasant for the sitter,’ remarked Geoffrey.
‘I am not so sure. You imply, no doubt, that it was not
pleasant for this old fellow P'
“I should not think his soul was much to be proud of,' said
Geoffrey.
‘You mean he looks wicked ” said Mr. Francis, still intent
on the canvas. ‘Well—God forgive him —I am afraid he
must have been. But, that being so, I expect he was as much
in love with his own soul as a good man is. For he does not
look to me a weak man, one who is for ever falling and repent-
ing. There is less of Macbeth and more of his good lady in
old Francis. Infirm of purpose? No, no, I think not º'
He turned abruptly away from the picture, and broke into
a laugh.
“He was a wicked old man, we are afraid,” he said, ‘and I
am exactly like him.’
“Ah ! that is not fair, cried Geoffrey.
‘My dear boy, I was only chaffing. And here is Harry;
what has he got?'
Harry had come after them as they spoke thus together,
carrying in his hand a square leather case. The thing seemed
to be of some weight.
“I wanted to show you and Geoff what I have found, Uncle
Francis,' he said. “I thought perhaps you could tell me about
it. It was in one of the attics, of all places in the world—
hidden, it seemed, behind some old pictures. Templeton and
I found it.”
Mr. Francis whisked round with even more than his accus-
tomed vivacity of movement at Harry's words.
‘Yes, yes,” he said with some impatience. “Open it, then,
my dear boy, open it.'
An old lock of curious work secured the leather strap
which fastened the case, but this dangled loose from it,
attached to its hasp.


THE COMING OF THE LUCK I5
“We could find no key for it,” explained Harry, “and had to
break it open.”
As he spoke, he drew from the case an object swathed in
wash-leather, but the outline was clearly visible beneath its
wrappings.
“Ah, it is so,” said Mr. Francis below his breath, and as
Harry unfolded the covering they all stood silent. This done,
he held up to the light what it contained. It was a large
golden goblet with two handles, of a size perhaps to hold a
couple of quarts of liquor, and even by lamplight it was a
thing that dazzled the eye, and made the mouth to water.
But, solid gold as it was, and of chaste and exquisite work-
manship, there was scarce an inch of it that was not worth
more than the whole value of the gold and the craft bestowed
thereon, so thickly was it encrusted with large and precious
stones. Just below the lip of the cup ran a ring of rubies, of
notable size and wonderful depth of colour, and below, at a
little interval, six emerald stars, all clear set in the body of the
cup. The lower part was chased with acanthus-leaves, each
outlined in pearls, and up the fluted stem climbed lordly
sapphires. Sapphires again traced the rim of the foot, and in
each handle was clear-set a row of diamonds—no chips and
dust, but liquid eyes and lobes of light. Half-way down the
bowl of the cup, between the emerald stars and the points of
the acanthus-leaves, ran a plain panel of gold, on which was
engraved in small Early English characters some text that en-
circled the whole.
Harry was standing close under the lamp as he took off the
covering, and remained there a moment, holding in his hand-
the gorgeous jewel, and looking at it with a curiously fixed
attention, unconscious of the others. Then he handed it to
his uncle.
“Tell me about it ; what is it, Uncle Francis P’ he asked,
and involuntarily, as the old man took it, he glanced at the
picture of Francis, second Baron, who, in the portrait, held,
beyond a doubt, the same treasure that they were now examining.


I6 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Mr. Francis did not at once reply, but handled the cup for
a little while in silence, with awe and solemnity in his attitude
and expression. As he turned it this way and that in his
grasp, jewel after jewel caught the light and shone refracted in
points of brilliant colour on his face. The burnished band, on
which was engraved the circle of the text, cut a yellow line of
reflection across his nose and cheeks, which remained steady,
but over the rest of his face gleams of living colour shone and
passed, and now as a ruby, now an emerald, sent their direct
rays into his eyes, they would seem lit inside by a gleam of red
or green. At length he looked up.
“Hear what the thing says of itself,’ he said. “I will read it
you.’
Then, turning the cup till he had found the beginning of the
text, he read slowly, the cup revolving to the words:
‘ Göthen the £uck of the Sails is lost,
gear not fire nor rain nor frost;
&then the £uck is fount again,
3icar both fire amb frost amb rain.”
“Very pretty,” said Geoffrey, with a critical air; but Mr.
Francis made no reply. His eyes were still fixed on the jewel.
“But what is it?' asked Harry.
‘This P. The cup P’ he said. “It is what I have read to
you. It is the Luck of the Vails.’
Geoffrey laughed.
‘You've got it, Harry, anyhow,” he said, ‘for weal or woe.
How does it run ? “Fear fire and frost and rain.” Take care
of yourself, old man, and don't smoke in bed, and don't skate
over deep water.”
Mr. Francis turned to him quickly, with a sudden recovery
of his briskness.
‘You and I would risk all that, would we not, Geoffrey,’ he
said, ‘to have found such a beautiful thing? Yes, Harry, I
see you have noticed it. There it is in old Francis's hand in
the picture. Where else should it be if not there? Whether


THE COMING OF THE LUCK 17
he made it or not, I can't tell you, but that is its first appear-
ance as far as we know.’
Still holding it, he looked at the portrait, then stretched it
out to Harry.
“There, take it,' he said quickly.
“But tell us all about it,” said Harry. “What happened to
it afterwards? How is it I never heard of it?'
‘Your father would never speak of it,” said Mr. Francis,
‘nor your grandfather either. Your father never saw it, your
grandfather only once, when he was quite a little boy. Neither
could bear to speak of it when it was lost. And so it was in
the attic all the time!'
Harry's eyes were sparkling; a sudden animation seemed
to possess him.
“Tell us from the beginning,” he said.
He was already wrapping the goblet up again, and Mr.
Francis looked greedily at it, till the last jewel had been hidden
in the wash-leather.
“Well, it is a strange story, and a short one,’ he said, “for so
little is known of it. It has appeared and disappeared several
times since Holbein painted it there, as unaccountably as it
has appeared again now. In the attic all the time !' he ex-
claimed again.
“But the legend—what does the legend mean?' asked
Harry.
‘I have no idea. Perhaps it is some old rhyme, perhaps it
is a mere conceit of the goldsmith. But be that as it may,
those of your house who have possessed the Luck always
seemed to think that it brought them luck. It was in old
Francis's time, you know, that coal was found on your Derby-
shire estate, which so enriched him for a while. In his son's
time certainly the Luck disappeared, for we have a letter of
his about it, and as certainly the field of coal came to an end.
It appeared again some eighty years later, and again dis-
appeared, and then the grandfather of your grandfather found
it. He, you know, married the wealthy Barbara Devereux,
2


I8 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
-ºr-
and it was he who showed the Luck to your grandfather.
Then it was lost for the last time, and with it all his money in
the South Sea Bubble.”
Harry looked a shade disappointed at this bald narrative.
‘Is that all P’ he asked. “Where does the fire and frost and
rain come in P’
Mr. Francis laughed.
“Well, oddly enough, old Francis was burned to death in
his bed. Mark Vail was drowned. Henry Vail, the last
holder of it, was frozen to death in his travelling carriage cross-
ing the St. Gothard. But a man must die somehow. Is it
not so? Poor, wicked old Francis I he thought, perhaps, to
bring a curse on the house, if it was indeed he who made the
Luck; but how futile—how futile ! Did he think that the
elements were in league with some occult power of magic and
darkness that he possessed ? Ah, no ; beneficent Nature is
not controlled by such a hand. He knows that well, maybe,
now, and perhaps therein is his chastisement, for indeed he
was a man of devilish mind.”


PART II
CHAPTER III
THE SPELL BEGINS TO WORK
MR. FRANCIS was by choice an early riser, and next morning,
before either of the young men was awake, he had been
splashing and gasping in his cold tub, had felt with the keen-
est enjoyment the genial afterglow produced on his braced and
invigorated skin by the application of the rough towel, and was
now out on the terrace, pacing briskly along the dry gravel
walk on this adorable winter morning, waiting cheerfully for
his desired breakfast. Now and then he would break into a
nimble trot for fifty paces, or even give a little skip in the air
as a child does, from the sheer exhilaration of his pulses. His
thoughts, too, must have been as sparkling as the morning
itself, as brisk and cheery as his own physical economy, for
from time to time he would troll out a bar or two of some lusty
song, or stop to chirrup with pursed lips to the stiff, half-frozen
birds, and his pleasant, close-shaven face was continually
wreathed in smiles. Here was one, at least, in whom old age
had brought no spell of freezing to laggard blood, no dulling
of that zest of life which is so often and so erroneously con-
sidered as an attribute of youth only; life was still immensely
enjoyable, and all things were delightful to his sympathetic
eye.
Such a buoyancy of spirits is a most engaging thing, provided
only it be natural and unforced. But too often the old who
remain young have the aspect as of grizzly kittens, their spirits
are but a parody of youthfulness, their antics broken-winded
and spasmodic. In a moment they fall from the heights of
2-2


2O THE LUCK OF THE WAILS
irresponsible gaiety to an equally unwarrantable churlishness,
they maintain no level way, their capers are those of jerking
marionettes, a performance of jointed dolls.
But how different was the joyousness of Mr. Francis
Nothing could be more native to him than his morning exhila-
ration. Authentic was the merriment that sparkled in his
light-blue eyes, authentic the lightness of his foot as it tripped
along the gravel walk, and none could doubt that his fine
spirits were effortless and unaffected.
To reach so ripe an age as that to which Mr. Francis had
attained means, even to those whose life has lain in the
pleasantest lines, to have had to bear certain trials, sorrows,
and misunderstandings necessarily incident to the mere
passage of years. To bear these bravely and without bitter-
ness is the part of any robust nature, to bear them with un-
abated cheerfulness and without any loss of the zest for life is
a rarer gift; and the silver-haired old gentleman who paced so
gaily up and down the terraced walks, while he waited for
young men to have their fill of sleep and make a tardy appear-
ance, was a figure not without gallantry. Here were no
impatient gestures; he was hungry, but the time of waiting
would not be shortened by fretfulness, nor had he any inclina-
tion to so unamiable a failing, and for nearly half an hour he
pursued his cheery way up and down. At length the welcome
booming of the gong sounded distantly, and he tripped towards
the house.
Harry was down, the clock pointing to an indulgent half-past
nine, but the youthful moroseness of morning sat on his brow.
To so old a traveller through life as his uncle the ways of
weaning this were manifold, and he broke into speech.
‘Splendid morning, my dear boy," he said, ‘and the ice,
they tell me, bears. What will you do? What shall we do?
Are you shooting to-day or skating, or will you like to take a
tramp round the old place with me as you suggested last night?'
Harry was examining dishes on the side-table with a super-
cilious air.


THE SPELL BEGINS TO WORK 2I
“Very cold, is it not?' he said. “We were thinking of
shooting. Do you shoot, Uncle Francis?'
‘I will shoot with pleasure, if you will let me,’ he said.
‘Yes, it is cold—too cold for pottering about, as you say.
Fish-cakes, eggs and bacon, cold game. Yes, I'll begin with
a fish-cake. What a hungry place Vail is I am famished,
literally famished . And where is Geoffrey P'
“Geoffrey was going to his bath when I came down,” said
Harry. “It is to be hoped he will be more nearly awake after
it. He had one eye open only when I saw him.’
“Fine gift to be able to sleep like that,” said Mr. Francis.
‘I heard you two boys go up to bed last night, and sat an
hour reading after that. But I awoke at eight, as I always do,
and got up.'
Harry's morose mood was on the thaw.
“And have you been waiting for us since then, Uncle
Francis?’ he said. “Really, I am awfully sorry. We'll have
breakfast earlier to-morrow. It was stupid of me.’
“Not a bit, not a bit, Harry. I like a bit of a walk before
breakfast. Wonderful thing for the circulation after your
bath. Ah, here's Geoffrey ! Good-morning, my dear boyſ'
‘We’ll shoot to-day, Geoff, as we settled,” said Harry.
“Uncle Francis will come with us. Wake up, you pig l'
Geoffrey yawned. -
“How's the Luck?' he said. “Lord! I had such a night-
mare, Harry—you and the Luck and Mr. Vail and the picture
of the wicked baron all mixed up together somehow. I forget
how it went.’
“Very remarkable,” said Harry. “I dreamed of the Luck,
too, now you mention it. We must have dreamed of the
same thing, Geoff, because I also have forgotten how it went.’
“And I,' said Mr. Francis, “dreamed about nothing at all
very pleasantly all night. And what a morning I awoke to
Just the day for a good tramp in the woods. Dear me, Harry,
what a simpleton your dear father used to think me! “What
are you going to do?” he would ask me, and I would only


22 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
want a pocketful of cartridges, a snack of cold lunch, and leave
to prowl about by myself without a keeper, no trouble to
anybody.”
‘Yes, that's good fun,' said Geoffrey. “Now it's a rabbit,
or over the stubble a partridge, then a bit of cover and you put
up a pheasant. Let's have a go-as-you-please day, Harry.'
“The poetry of shooting,” said Mr. Francis. “Cold partridge
for anyone but me? No? You lads have no appetites.’
The keeper had been given his orders the day before, and
very soon after breakfast the three shooters were ready to start.
They went out by a garden-door which gave on a flight of
some dozen stone steps descending to the lawn, and Mr.
Francis, leading the way, nearly fell on the topmost of them,
for they were masked with ice, and half turned as he recovered
himself to give a word of warning to the others. But he was
too late, and Harry, who followed him, not looking to his feet,
but speaking to Geoffrey over his shoulder, at the same moment
almost had slipped on the treacherous stone, and fallen sprawl-
ing, dropping his gun and clutching ineffectually at the railing
to save himself. Mr. Francis gave one exclamation of startled
dismay, and ran to his assistance.
‘My dear fellow,” he cried, “I hope you are not hurt?'
Harry lay still a moment, his mouth twisted with pain, then,
taking hold of the railing, pulled himself to his feet, and stood
with bowed head, gripping hard on the banister.
“All sideways on my ankle,' he said. “Just see if my gun's
all right, Geoff. Yes, I’ve twisted it, I'm afraid.’
He paused another moment, faint and dizzy, with a feeling
of empty sickness, and then hobbled up the steps again.
‘An awful wrench, he said. “Just give me your arm,
Uncle Francis, will you? I can hardly put my foot to the
ground.’
Leaning on him, he limped back into the hall and dragged
off his boot.
‘Yes, it feels pretty bad,” he said; “I came with my whole
weight on to it. I shall be as lame as a tree.”


THE SPELL BEGINS TO WORK 23
Mr. Francis was on his knees, and in a moment had stripped
off Harry's stocking with quick, deft fingers.
‘What bad luck! What awfully bad luck º' he said. “Put
a cold water compress on it at once, my dear boy. It is
already swelling.’
Harry liſted his leg on to a chair opposite.
“It's just a sprain,’ he said. “Go out, Uncle Francis, you
and Geoffrey. I'll put a bandage on.'
Templeton had answered Mr. Francis's ringing of the bell,
and was dismissed again with orders for cold water and
linen.
“Not till I've seen you comfortable, my dear fellow,” said
Mr. Francis. “Dear me, what bad luck! Does it hurt you,
Harry P’
‘No, no, it is nothing,” said he rather impatiently, irri-
tated both by the pain and the fussing. “Do go out, Uncle
Francis, with Geoffrey, and leave me. The men are waiting
by the home cover. I can look after myself perfectly.”
Mr. Francis still seemed half loath to leave him, and, had he
followed his inclinations, he would have instituted himself as
sick-nurse, to change the bandage or read to him. But it was
the part of wisdom to humour the patient, who quite distinctly
wished to be left alone; and as even the most solicitous affec-
tion could not find grounds for anxiety in the sprain, with a
few more sympathetic words, he followed Geoffrey, who was
chafing to be gone. The latter, indeed, might have appeared
somewhat cold and unsympathetic in contrast with Mr. Francis
and his repeated lamentations; but his ‘Bad luck, Harry,'
and Harry's grunt in reply had something of telegraphic brevity,
not misunderstood.
In spite of his protestations that he was no more than an
indifferent shot, it soon appeared that Mr. Francis was more
than a decently capable performer with the gun, and his keen-
ness and accuracy as a sportsman were charmingly combined
with the knowledge and observation of a naturalist. He
pointed out to his companion several rare and infrequent birds


24 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
which they saw during the morning, and implored the keeper
that they might not be shot for curiosities,
“Half the time I am shooting,' he said to Geoffrey, “I am of
a divided mind. Is it not a shame to kill these beautiful and
innocent things P I often wonder Ah ' Up went his
gun, and a high pheasant was torn from the sky, leaving a few
light neck-feathers floating there. “And even while the words
are in my mouth, I go and contradict my sentiments,’ he said,
ejecting the smoking cartridge. “What a bundle of incon-
gruous opposites is a man P
They shot for not more than a couple of hours after lunch,
for the sun set early, and Mr. Francis confessed to a certain
unreasonable desire to get home quickly, and see how Harry
had fared.
‘Indeed, I was half minded to stay with him, in spite of his
wish,' he said ; “for the hours will have been lonely to him.
But he is like all the Vails, self-reliant, and beholden to no
one.’
They were crossing the last meadow before they should
again reach the garden, and even as he spoke a hare got up
from its form in the tussocky grass not more than ten yards
from them, and scuttled noiselessly, head down, across the
field. Geoffrey had already taken the cartridges from his
barrels, and Mr. Francis raised his gun to his shoulder, hesi-
tated a moment, and then fired. He hit the beast just as it
gained the fence of the cover from which they had come.
They saw it bowled over, and drag on a pace or two into the
bushes, then suddenly from where it had disappeared there
came a screaming horribly human. Mr. Francis paused, then
turned quite pale, and Geoffrey, seeing his stricken face,
imagined he thought that he had wounded a beater.
‘It is only the hare,’ he said ; “the men were all out two
minutes ago.”
Mr. Francis turned to him.
“Only the hare l’ he cried. ‘Yes, only the hare. How
dreadful how dreadful I have wounded it !” And he


THE SPELL BEGINS TO WORK 25
started off running to where the beast had been last seen, and
disappeared in the cover.
Geoffrey sent a couple of beaters to assist in the search, but
himself went on to the house, wondering a little at the incon-
sistency which would allow a man to shoot at a hare running
straight away in a bad light, and yet send him hot-foot after it
when wounded. Yet the inconsistency was pleasing: keenness
was responsible for the doubtful shot; an indubitable horror
of causing an animal pain prompted the pursuit of it. He
found Harry lying up, his ankle somewhat severely sprained,
but it no longer pained him, and he asked after his uncle.
“Just at the last moment he shot a hare, wounding it,' he
said, ‘and ran back to try to recover it. He will be in at
once, I should think.’
But half an hour passed, yet still he did not come, and
Harry was already wondering what could have happened, when
he appeared, all smiles again.
“Dear lad, have you had a very tedious day?' he asked.
“The thought of you has been constantly in my mind. I
should have been in half an hour ago with Geoffrey, but I
wounded a hare, and had to go and look for it. Thank God,
I found it. The poor beast was quite dead. But it screamed;
it was terrible, terrible !'
There was a good piano by Bechstein standing in the hall,
and that evening, after dinner, as Harry lay on the sofa nursing
his injury, while his uncle, sitting by him, recalled a hundred
little reminiscences of his own young years which he had spent
here, Geoffrey, who was an accurate performer of simple tunes,
played idly and softly to himself, listening half to his own
music, half to the talk of the others. Now he would indicate
some graceful inevitable fragment of Bach, now a verse of some
Chevalier song, all with a tinkling elementary technique, but
with a certain facility of finger and decided aptitude for the
right notes. By degrees, as this went on, a kind of restlessness
gained on Mr. Francis. He would break off in the middle of
a story to hum a bar of the tune Geoffrey was playing, beating


26 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
time to it with a waving hand, or turn round in his chair to say
over his shoulder, “A graceful melody, my dear boy; please
play us that again.'
But before long this restlessness grew more emphatic, and
at last he jumped nimbly out of his chair.
“I must fetch my flute,’ he exclaimed; “I must positively
fetch my flute. I play but indifferently, as you will hear, but
it is such a pleasure to me. What a charming instrument is
the flute So pastoral, the nearest thing we know to the song
of birds. Be indulgent, my dear Geoffrey, to the whim of an
old fellow, and play some easy accompaniments for me. I
have a quantity of little pieces for the flute by Corelli and
Baptiste.”
He hurried to the door, and they heard his step quickly
crossing the gallery above. In a few moments he reappeared
again, a little out of breath, but with a beaming face. He
fitted his flute together with affectionate alacrity, turned to the
piano, and opened a volume of easy minuets and sarabands.
“There, this one,’ he said; “it is a breath of heaven, a real
breath of heaven. You have two bars of introduction. Ah! a
shade slower, my dear boy; it is an antique measure, you must
remember. Graceful, leisurely—yes, that is exactly right.”
He knew the music by heart, and, when once they were
fairly started, turned from the piano towards Harry. His
cheerful ruddy face composed itself into an expression of
beatific content, his eyes were half closed, the eyebrows a
little raised, and his body swayed gently to the rhythm of the
tune. The formal delicacy of the composition enthralled him.
Perhaps it brought with it the aroma of his youth, the minuets
he had danced fifty years ago; perhaps it was only the sweet
and certain development of the melody which so moved him.
At the end, in any case, he could not quite command his voice,
and he patted Geoffrey gently on the shoulder by way of
thanks.
‘The next,’ he said; “we cannot pass by the next. The
two are complete only together.’


THE SPELL BEGINS TO WORK 27
They played thus some half-dozen little pieces, ending with
a quick ripple of a gavotte to put them in good spirits again—
so said Mr. Francis—and at the last he lovingly packed up his
flute and left it on the piano, saying that they must be very
indulgent to him and let him play again.
Two or three days after this Harry was sufficiently recovered
to be able to go out again, though still limpingly, and it was
arranged that they should shoot certain of the covers near the
house which might be expected to furnish them with a good
day's sport, and at the same time would entail but little
walking. The frost had twenty-four hours ago completely
broken before a warm and violent wind from the south-west,
and the dead leaves, which had lain in ice-glued and com-
pacted heaps, were once more driven about in scurrying multi-
tudes. The sky was low and ominous, a wrack of torn and
flying cloud, and scudding showers fell ever and again; but
the sport was excellent, and they little heeded the angry
fretfulness of the heavens.
Their beats took them at no time far from the house, and
they returned there for lunch; but by this time the weather
had grown so vastly more inclement that Mr. Francis cried of
the resumption of the day, but Harry, eager for out of doors
after his two days' imprisonment, persuaded Geoffrey to come
out again. The rain was a steady downpour in the slackened
wind, but his argument that they were not made of paper
carried weight.
They returned drenched indeed, but with a satisfactory
report of themselves and the birds, to find Mr. Francis per-
forming very contentedly on his flute before the hall fire.
But he jumped up briskly as they appeared.
‘Dear boys, how wet you are " he cried. ‘Of course, you
will change your clothes at once, will you not P And I should
recommend a glass of hot whisky-and-water. Shall I ring the
bell? I told Templeton to see that there was abundance of
hot water for your baths. And you've not overtired yourself,
I hope, dear Harry?'


28 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
This incessant solicitude of his uncle, however clearly arising
from affection, was on the way to get on Harry's nerves and
rouse opposition. At any rate, the suggestion that he should
guard against a chill predisposed him not to be in any hurry
to go upstairs.
‘Oh, tea first,’ he said, not meaning it; ‘one can change
afterwards. Are you going now, Geoff? Ring the bell as you
pass, will you?'
A positive cloud dimmed the brightness of Mr. Francis's face.
‘Dear boy, you are being horribly imprudent,’ he said.
“Do let me persuade you to change at once.'
This drove determination home. Harry was unpleasantly
conscious of the clinging flabbiness of soaking clothes; but
had their touch shaken him with an ague, it would not have
moved him from his chair. He intended to do that which he
chose to do.
‘Oh, I'm all right, Uncle Francis,” he said; “I never catch
cold.’
Tea came, and Harry ate and drank with studied leisure,
and conversed politely to his uncle. Already he felt the pre-
monitory prickling of the skin which precedes a chill, but it
was nearly half an hour before he lounged upstairs. He did
not intend to be fussed over and treated like a child, and the
advice to go and change had been so obviously sensible that
it should never have been offered, and to the contrariness of
youth was impossible to accept. Thus the well-meant but ill-
timed counsel drove him into an opposite course.
Again, after dinner, the evening was melodious with the
breathings of Mr. Francis's flute; but the child-like pleasure
which the performer had taken before in his own performance
was sensibly dimmed. He played with a wandering attention
and an uncertain finger, without the gusto of the artist, and
his eye ever rested anxiously on Harry, who had more than
once complained of the cold, and now sat huddled up by a
mountainous fire, bright-eyed, and with a burning skin, which
seemed to him to cover an interior of ice. At last Mr. Francis


THE SPELL BEGINS TO WORK 29
could stand it no longer, and laying down his flute, came across
to where he sat, and with an extraordinary amenity of voice,
yet firmly:
‘I insist on your going to bed, Harry,’ he said. “You have
caught a chill; it is idle to deny it. Dear lad, do not be
foolish. I have troubled and worried you, I am afraid, with
my fussy care for you, and I am very sorry for it. But do not
make a bad matter worse, and do not punish me, I ask you,
as well as yourself for my ill-timed suggestions. I have
apologized; be generous.”
Harry got up. It was impossible that a mere superficial
boyish obstinacy, of which he was already ashamed, should
stand out against this, and, besides, he felt really unwell.
‘Yes, I am afraid I have caught a chill,’ he said. “It was
foolish of me not to change, as you advised me when I came
in. It was even more foolish of me to have been annoyed at
your excellent suggestion that I should.”
Mr. Francis's face brightened.
‘Now get to bed at once, my dear boy," he said, ‘and I have
no doubt you will be all right in the morning. You have plenty
of blankets? Good-night.”
But Harry was by no means all right in the morning, and it
seemed that for his uncle the joy of life was dead. There was
no brisk, early walk for him to-day. Vail was no longer a
hungry place, and his breakfast was but the parody of a meal.
Unreasonably he blamed himself for his nephew's indisposition,
and the morning passed for him in blank turnings over of the
leaves of undecipherable books, in reiterated visits to the kitchen
with suggestions as to a suitable invalid diet, and disconnected
laments to Geoffrey over this untoward occurrence.
“Ah, this will teach a foolish old man to hold his tongue,’
he said ; “it will teach him also that old fellows cannot under-
stand the young. How excellent were my intentions, but how
worse than impotent, how disastrous ! It is a cold job to grow
old, Geoffrey; it is even colder to grow old and still feel young.
Poor Harry simply thought me a meddling old fogey when


30 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
I wanted him to take precautions against catching a chill, and
I ought to have known that he would think me so. I forget
my white hairs. How are you, my dear boy, this morning P
I hope you have not a chill, too. I am anxious and unsettled
to-day.'
‘Oh, Harry was an ass P said the other. “But there's
nothing at all to be anxious about. He has a chill, rather a
sharp one, and with greater wisdom than he showed yesterday,
he stops in bed. Is that Punch there? Thank you very
much.”
Mr. Francis walked to the window, lit a cigarette, and threw
it away, barely tasted.
‘I wonder if Harry would like me to read to him,' he said.
Geoffrey looked up with an arrested smile.
“I think I should leave him quite alone,’ he said. “I’ve
just been up to him. He's as cross as a bear, and wouldn't
speak to me, so I came away.”
“But that is so unlike him,” said Mr. Francis. “He must
be ill—he must be really ill.'
Geoffrey began to understand Harry's feelings the day
before.
“If I were you, I wouldn't fuss either him or myself,' he
said; “people don't die of a cold in the head.”
“Shall I send for the doctor P' asked Mr. Francis. “We
might tell Harry that he happened to call about some case of
distress in the village, and wished to consult him about it.
Then we could get his opinion. I think, under the circum-
stances, one might venture on so small an equivocation.’
Geoffrey closed his Punch.
“I shouldn't do anything of the kind if I were you,” he said.
‘What an abominable morning ! I'll play some accompani-
ments for you if you like.’
‘Thank you, dear boy,” said Mr. Francis, “but I haven't the
heart to play this morning. Besides, Harry might be dozing;
we should run the risk of disturbing him.’


PART III
CHAPTER IV
THE STORY OF MR. FRANCIS
HARRY VAIL owned a plain, gloomy house in Cavendish
Square, forbidding to those who looked at it from the street,
chilling to those who looked at the street from it. It was
furnished in the heavy and expensive early Victorian style, and
solid mahogany frowned at its inmates. During his minority
it had been let for a term of years, but on his coming of age
he had taken it again himself, and here, when the gloom and
darkness of February and swollen waters made Vail more
suitable for the amphibious than the dry-shod, he came to
receive in exchange the more sociable fogs of London. Parlia-
ment had assembled, the roadways were no longer depleted,
and Harry was beginning to find that, in spite of the friend-
lessness which he had been afraid was his, there were many
houses which willingly opened their doors and welcomed him
inside. Friends of his father, acquaintances of his own, were
all disposed to be pleasant towards this young man, about
whom there lingered a certain vague atmosphere of romance, a
thing much valued by a prosaic age. He was young, attractive
to the eye, he stood utterly alone in the world, with the burden
or glory of a great name on his shoulders, and people found in
him a charming youthful modesty, mixed with an independence
of the sturdiest, which, while accepting a favour from none,
seemed to cry aloud for friendliness and bask therein when it
was found with the mute, unmistakable gratitude of a dumb
animal. His own estimate of his loneliness had probably been
accentuated by the year he had spent, just before he came of


32 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
age, in studying languages in France and Germany; but in the
main it was, when he made it, correct. But at his time of life
change comes quickly; the young man who does not rapidly
expand and enlarge must, it may be taken for certain, be as
rapidly closing up. Within a month of his arrival in London
it was beyond question that the latter morbid process was not
at operation in Harry.
He and Geoffrey were seated one night in the smoking-room
in the Cavendish Square house, talking over a glass of whisky-
and-soda. They had dined with a friend, and Harry had
inveigled Geoffrey out of his way to spend an hour with him
before going home.
‘No, I certainly am not superstitious,’ he was saying, “but if
I was, I really should be very much impressed by what has
happened. I never heard of a stranger series of coincidences.
You remember the lines engraved round the Luck:
“When the Luck is found again,
Fear both fire and frost and rain”?
Well, as you know, two days after I found the Luck I slipped
on the steps as we were going out shooting, and sprained my
ankle. In consequence of not looking where I was going, say
you, and I also for that matter. The Luck, say the super-
stitious : that is the frost. As soon as I get right, I go out
shooting again, get wet through, and catch a pretty bad chill.
Because I didn't go and change, you say. The Luck, say the
superstitious: that is the rain. Finally, the very day you left,
I tripped over the hearthrug, fell into the fire, and burnt half
my hair off. Well, if that isn't fire, I don't know what is.
“Fear both fire and frost and rain,” you see. Certainly I have
suffered from all three; but if old Francis could only give me
a cold and a sprained ankle and a burn, I don't think much
of his magic. But I've paid the price, and now there is the
Luck to look forward to. Dear me, I'm afraid I've been
jawing !'
‘I wonder if you believe it at all,” said Geoffrey. “For


THE STORY OF MR. FRANCIS 33
myself, I should chuck the beastly pot into the lake, not
because I believed it, but for fear that I some day might. If
you get to believe that sort of thing, you are done.’
‘I am sure I don't believe it,' said the other, “and so I
shall not chuck the beastly pot into the lake. Nor would you
if it were yours. But if I did believe it, Geoff, there would be
all the more reason for keeping it. Don't you see, I've been
through the penalties, now let me have the prizes. That's the
way to look at it. I don't look at it, I must remind you, in
that way; I only say, What a strange series of coincidences !
You can hardly deny that that is so.”
‘What have you done with it?’ asked Geoffrey.
“The beastly pot? It's down at Vail. Uncle Francis is
there too. I wanted him to come up to London with me, but
he wouldn't. Now, there's a cruel thing, Geoff. My God l it
makes my blood boil when I think of it !'
* Think of what P'
“Of the persistent ill-luck which has dogged my uncle
throughout his life; of the odious—well, not suspicion, it is
not so definite as that—which seems to surround him. I was
at Lady Oxted's the other night, and mentioned him casually,
but she said nothing, and changed the subject. Oh, it was
not a mere chance—the thing has happened before.”
Geoffrey squirted some soda-water into his glass.
“Suspicion? What do you mean?' he asked.
“No ; suspicion is the wrong word. Uncle Francis told me
all about his life on the last evening that I was at Vail, and I
never heard anything so touching, so cruel, or so dignified.
All his life he has been the victim of an ill-luck so persistent
that it looks as if some malignant power must have been
pursuing him. Well, I am going to try to make it up to him.
I wonder if a rather long and very private story about his
affairs would interest you at all?"
“Rather | I should like to hear it.’
‘Well, this is almost exactly as he told it me from the
beginning. He was a twin of my grandfather's—there's a
3


34 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
piece of bad luck to start with—and being just half a minute
late about coming into the world, he is a younger son, which
is no fun, I can tell you, in our impoverished family.’
‘That may happen to anybody,” said Geoffrey. “I'm a
younger son myself, but I don't scream over that.'
Harry laughed.
“Nor does he. Don't interrupt, Geoff. Then he married a
very rich girl, who died three years afterwards, childless, leav-
ing all her money back to her own relatives. It was a most
unhappy marriage from the first, but don't aim after cheap
cynicism and say that the real tragedy there was not her death
but the disposition of her property. I can tell you beforehand
that this was not the case. He was devoted to her.'
• Well ?”
Harry's voice sank.
“And then, twenty-two years ago, came that awful affair of
young Houldsworth's death. Did you ever hear it spoken
of P'
Geoffrey was silent a moment.
‘Yes, I have heard it spoken of,' he said at length.
Harry flushed.
“Ah ! in connection with my uncle, I suppose P. he said.
‘Yes, his name was mentioned in connection with it.'
‘It is a crying shame " said Harry hotly. “And so people
talk of it still, do they P I never heard of it till he told me all
about it the other night. That is natural; people would not
speak of it to me.’
‘I only know the barest outline,' said Geoffrey. “Tell me
what Mr. Francis told you.’
“Well, it was this way. He was staying down at our house
in Derbyshire, which was subsequently sold, for my grand-
father had made him a sort of agent there after his wife's
death, and he would be there for months together. Next to
our place was a property belonging to some people called
Houldsworth, and at this time, twenty-two or twenty-three
years ago, young Houldsworth (his name was George) had only


THE STORY OF MR. FRANCIS 35
just come into it, having had a long minority like me. Uncle
Francis used to be awfully good to him, and two years before
he had got him out of a scrape by advancing to him a large
sum of money. It was his own, and it was this loan which
had crippled him so much on his wife's death. The arrange-
ment had been that it should be repaid immediately George
Houldsworth came of age. Well, Houldsworth was not able
to do this at once, for his affairs were all upside down, and he
asked for, and received, a renewal of it. For security he gave
Uncle Francis the reversion of his life insurance policy.’
Again Harry's voice sank to near a whisper.
‘Two days after this arrangement had been made young
Houldsworth and Uncle Francis were pottering about the
hedgerows alone, just with a dog, to get a rabbit or two, or
anything that came in their way, and, getting over a fence,
Houldsworth's gun went off, killing him instantly. Think
how awful P
‘Why people will get over fences without taking their
cartridges out is more than I could ever imagine,’ said
Geoffrey; “but they will continue to do so till the end of
time. I beg pardon.'
“Well, here comes the most terrible part of the whole affair,’
went on the other. ‘There was an inquest, and though my
uncle was scarcely fit to attend, for he says he was almost off
his head with so dreadful a thing happening, he had to go.
He gave his account of the matter, and said that he himself
was nearly hit by some of the shot. That, he tells me, was
his impression, but he is willing to believe that it was not so,
for, as he says, your imagination may run riot at so ghastly a
time. But it was a most unfortunate thing to have said, for it
seemed to be quite incompatible with the other evidence.
Then, when it was known about the insurance policy, horrible
sinister rumours began to creep about. He was closely
questioned as to whether he knew for what purpose young
Houldsworth wanted the money he advanced him, and he
would not say. Neither would he tell me, but I understand
3–2


36 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
that there was something disgraceful—blackmail, I suppose. He
had an awful scene with Mrs. Houldsworth, George's mother.
His friends, of course, scouted the idea of such a possibility
as was being hinted at, but others, acquaintances, cooled
towards him, though not exactly believing what was in the air;
others cut him direct. It was only the medical evidence at
the inquest, which showed ‘that the injury of which Houlds-
worth died could easily have been inflicted by himself, that
saved my uncle, in all probability, from being brought to trial.
He said to me that it would have been better if he had, for
then he would have been completely cleared, whereas now the
matter will never be reopened.’
“What an awful story !' said Geoffrey.
‘Yes; and that was not the end of his trouble. Ten years
ago he had to declare bankruptcy, and my father gave him an
annuity. But since his death it has not been paid. I never
knew anything about it, and he would not allow that I should
be told, and he has lived in horrible pensions abroad. That
seems to me such extraordinary delicacy, not letting me know.
I never found out till I came of age.”
‘You have continued it º'
“Of course. I hope, also, he will live with me for the
main part. I have offered him a couple of permanent rooms
at Vail, for he would not come to London. Oh, Geoffrey, it
was the most pitiful story ! And to think of him, bright,
cheery, as we saw him down there, and know what an appalling
load of misery he has supported so long ! Now it seems to
me to be a brave man's part to bear misfortune calmly, with-
out whimpering, but one would think it required a courage of
a superhuman kind to be able to remain sociable, cheerful—
merry even. But oh how bitter he is when he shows one all
his thoughts . He warned me to rely on nobody. He said
there was not a man in the world, even less a woman, who
would stick to you if you were in trouble. Trouble comes,
they are vanished like melting snow, a heap of dirt is left
behind. Then he suddenly burst into tears, and told me to


THE STORY OF MR. FRANCIS 37
forget all he had said, for he had given me the outpourings of
a disappointed, soured man. I was young. Let me trust
everyone as long as I could; let me make friends right and
left, only, if trouble came, and they fell away, then, if I could
find consolation therein, I might remember that the same
thing had happened to others also.”
Geoffrey was staring absently into the fire; his cigarette had
gone out, and his whisky was untasted.
“By Gad Î' he said. “Poor old beggar !'
And Harry, knowing that the British youth does not express
sympathy in verbose paragraphs, or show his emotion by
ejaculatory cries, was satisfied that the story had touched his
friend.
Day by day, and week by week, Harry moved more at his
ease in the world of people, of whom hitherto he had known
so little. The wall of the castle which he had erected round
himself, compacted by his own diffidence and a certain hauteur
of disposition, fell like the fortifications of Jericho at the blast
of the trumpet, and it was a young man, pleasant in body and
mind, pleased with little, but much anxious to please, that
came forth. His dinner invitation to some new house would
be speedily endorsed by the greater intimacy of a Saturday till
Monday, and the days were few on which he sat down to a
cover for one in Cavendish Square.
Among these more particular friends with whom previous
acquaintance soon ripened into intimacy, Lady Oxted, an old
friend of Harry's father, stood pre-eminent. He soon became
ami de la maison, dropping in as he chose, well knowing he
was welcome, and such a footing, speedily and unquestionably
gained, was to one of a life previously so recluse a pleasure
new and altogether delightful; for Lady Oxted had the power
of creating the atmosphere of home, and home was one of
those excellent things which Harry had hitherto lacked. He
had not consciously missed it, because he had never yet known
it; but his gradual understanding of it made him see how
large an empty room there had been in his heart. To come


38 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
uninvited, and to linger unconscionably long, to say firmly
that he must be going, and yet to linger, he found to be an
index to certain domestic and comfortable joys of life not
lightly to be placed low in that delightful miscellany. His
nature from his very youth was not yet enough formed to be
labelled by so harsh an epithet as austere; but hitherto he had
not known the quiet monotonies which can be the cause of so
much uneventful happiness. Even for those whose bulk of
enjoyment is flavoured with the thrill of adventure and the
frothier joys of living, who most need excitement and crave
for stimulus, there yet are times for the unbending of the bow,
when the child within them cries out for mere toys and com-
panionship, and the soul longs to sit by the meditative fire
rather than to do battle with winds and stern events. And
Harry was not one of those who need home least; simply he
had been frozen, but now for the first time the genial warmth
of living began to touch him ; he was like a plant put in some
sunned and watered place, and its appropriate buds began to
appear in this time of the singing bird. Here, too, he met
romance with tremulous mouth and the things of which poets
have sung.


CHAPTER V
A POINT IN CASUISTRY
ONE evening towards the end of June Lady Oxted was driving
home from Victoria Station, where she had gone to meet the
arrival of the Continental express. By her side sat a girl of
little more than twenty, who, to judge by the eager, questioning
glances which she cast at that inimitable kaleidoscope of life as
seen in the London streets, must probably have been deprived
of this admirable spectacle for some time; for her gaze was
quickened to an interest not habitual to Londoners, however
deep is their devotion to the town of towns. The streets were at
their fullest in this height of the season and the summer, and the
time of day being about half-past five, the landau could make
but a leisurely progress through the glittering show. The girl's
cheek was flushed with the warm, healthy tinge which is the
prerogative of those who prefer the air as God made it to the
foul gases which men shut up in their houses; and as they
drove she poured out a rapid series of questions and comments
to Lady Oxted.
‘Oh, I just love this stuffy old London " she said. “But
what have they done with the Duke of Wellington on his
horse? The corner looks quite strange without it. Oh, there's
a policeman keeping everybody back l Do you think it's the
Queen? I hope it is. Why, it's only a little fat man with a
beard in a brougham. Who is he, Aunt Violet, and why aren't
we as good as he P Just fancy, it is three years since I have
been in London—that's not grammar, is it P−and I had the
greatest difficulty in making mother let me come; indeed, if it
hadn't been for your letter saying that you would have me to stay
with you, I never should have come. And then the difficulties


4o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
---------------------
about the time I should stop It wasn't worth while going for
a month, and two months was too long, so I made it three.'
“Well, it is delightful to have you, anyhow, dear Evie,' said
Lady Oxted. “And it really was time you should see London
again. Your mother is well ?”
“Very; as well as I am, and that means a lot. But she
won't come to England, Aunt Violet, except for that one day
every year, and I am beginning to think she never will now.
It is twenty-one, nearly twenty-two, years ago that she settled
at Santa Margarita—the year I was born.”
‘Yes, dear, yes,” said Lady Oxted a little hurriedly, and she
would seemingly have gone on to speak of something else, but
the girl interrupted her.
‘You know her reason, of course, Aunt Violet?’ she said
quietly, but with a certain firm resolve to speak. ‘No, let me
go on. She told me about it the other day only. Of course,
poor George's death must have been terrible for her; but it is
awful, it is awful, I think, to take it in the way she does. She
still thinks that he died by no accident, but that he was in-
tentionally shot by some man with whom he was out shooting.
I asked her what his name was, but she would not tell me.
And for all this time, once a year on the day of George's
death, she comes to England, puts red flowers on his grave,
and returns. Oh, it is awful l’
Lady Oxted did not reply at once.
“She still thinks so about it?’ she asked at length.
‘Yes, she told me herself. But I hope, perhaps, that her
refusing to tell me the man's name—I asked only the evening
before I left—may mean that she is beginning to wish to forget
it. She wished, at any rate, that I should not know, Do you
think it may be so?'
‘I can't tell, Evie. Your mother
* Yes P'
‘Only this: Your mother is hard to get at, inaccessible.
It is almost impossible to know what she feels on subjects
about which she feels deeply. I once tried to talk to her
' and she stopped.


A POINT IN CASUISTRY 41
about it, but she would not. She heard what I had to say,
but that was all.”
The girl assented, then paused a moment.
“Poor motherl what an awful year for her 'she said. “She
had only married my father, you know, a few months before
George's death, and before the year was out George, her only
son, was dead, and she was left twice a widow, and childless.
I was not born for six months after my father's death. How
strange never to have seen one's father I’
They drove in silence for a space. Then the girl said
suddenly: -
“Aunt Violet, promise me that you will never tell me the
name of the man who was out shooting with George. You
see, my mother would not tell me when I asked her; surely
that means she wishes that I should not know.’
Lady Oxted felt herself for the moment in great perplexity.
She had the rational habit, now growing rare, of thinking what
she was saying, and meaning something by what she said, and
as her answer was conceivably a matter of some importance,
she paused, thinking intently.
‘I am not sure that I had better promise you that,' she said
at last.
Evie looked surprised.
‘Why not?' she asked.
‘I can't quite tell you,' she said. ‘Give me time, dear. I
will either make you the promise you ask, or tell you why I
do not make it, this evening. In the meantime, Evie, I ask
you as a favour to avoid thinking about it as far as you are
able. Ah here we are.’
Indeed, the sight of Grosvenor Square was very welcome to
Lady Oxted, for just now she had no clearness of mind on the
question which the girl had put to her, but very great clearness
as to the fact that there were delicate though remote issues
possibly at stake. Here was she with a three months' charge
of Evie Aylwin, the half-sister of poor George Houldsworth,
daughter of his mother, whose attitude towards Mr. Francis


42 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
admitted of no dubiety, while the most constant visitor at her
house was the nephew of the man to whom so terrible a sus-
picion attached. That the two should not meet verged on
impossibilities, and was it fair either to one or the other that
they should run the ordinary chances of an attractive girl and
a handsome boy together without knowing in what curious and
sombre prenatal ordination of fate they were cast? It would
be like indicating summer rain in hard lines of ink to say that
Lady Oxted expected them to fall in love with each other,
but among the possibilities such a contingency could not be
reckoned very remote or unlikely. Probable, the most hard-
ened matchmaker could not call it, but where was the celibate
who would say it was impossible P The sudden, unexpected
demand of the girl, “Promise me you will never tell me his
name,' had been, unknown to her, a request which presupposed
the solution of a problem of a most complicated kind. Lady
Oxted, it is true, had asked for time, already, she was afraid,
unwisely; that, however, was done, and she had until the
evening the power of making or refusing to make that promise.
If she made it, she shouldered herself with the responsibility
of countenancing the free intercourse of the two, the mutual
attraction to which it might easily give rise, and of seeing it
pursue its course to its possible evolution in love and marriage.
The girl was staying with her; Harry Vail was so assiduous in
his presence that he could scarcely be called a visitor. Both
were supremely eligible. It was clearly idle to overlook the
possibility. Given that these things occurred, she foresaw a
moment, possibly very unpleasant, and certainly to be laid to
her door, when Mrs. Aylwin heard of the engagement of her
daughter to the man on whose name, in her mind, rested the
stain of so intimate a bloodguiltiness.
But this unwelcome conclusion brought with it a sudden
reaction of hopefulness. Evie Aylwin had asked her mother
the name of George's companion on that fatal morning, and
had been denied the information. Did not that argue a loop-
hole of encouraging amplitude? Surely to the weaving feminine


A POINT IN CASUISTRY 43
mind it meant that the mother, though, perhaps, neither re-
penting nor regretting the black influence which this suspicion,
founded or unfounded, had had on herself, yet wished her
daughter to move in absolute freedom, avoiding none, open to
all, to conduct her life with perfect liberty, not knowing, more,
being prevented by her own mother from knowing, anything
with definite label of that tragic affair. Else, how was it con-
ceivable that she should not have said those two words
‘Francis Vail'? Mrs. Aylwin, so reasoned this acute lady,
must have known—for who did not know P-the strange,
solitary history of the last and the head of the house, and was
not her refusal to mention the uncle's name a silent recognition,
if rightly interpreted, that the two might meet P
The thought was a pleasant one, for she was much attached
to both Harry and the girl, and for a moment she let her fancy
build a fantastic dome in the air. If Mrs. Aylwin had recog-
nised this—and the inference was not unreasonable—did not
the recognition imply a hope, though of the faintest and most
unformulated, that now she saw her long, bitter suspicion to
have been a mistake P Then her silence would amount even
to a wish that the two might meet, and that one of her blood
might in the remote possibilities wipe away by her union that
of her blood which had been shed.
To take the other side, if she did not make this promise, she
had to refuse, with what softenings and limitations you will, to
bind herself. In case, then, of what event, to meet what con-
tingency, would she make the reservation ? Under what circum-
stances, that is to say, did she desire to leave herself free ?
Clearly in case of the possible happening, of the two falling
under the spell of each other. But in that case (clearly also,
she was afraid) it would be far better to tell the girl now, at
once, and save her the greater shock. To hear the name
Vail now, this moment, would be nothing to her; to hear the
name Vail in its more sinister connection, when already it had
a vital sound to her ear, was a pang that might be saved her
now, but not hereafter.


44 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Again, still dealing with these remote possibilities, in which
connection alone her decision had any significance, was it
conceivably fair to Harry to reveal, though in the most intimate
way and the most pain-sparing words, the stain that hung over
his name? Long ago Lady Oxted had settled with herself
that the affair was dead and buried. At the time, even, it had
been no more than an unproven and dark suspicion, though
endowed with all the mysterious vitality of evil; but was she,
of all women, who held that to repeat an evil tale is only one
degree removed from inventing it, to stir for any purpose that
coiled worm of suspicion? The thought was an abhorrence to
her, and Evie's mother, it seemed, in her own dealings with
her own child, had endorsed her unwillingness. But it was
certain that if the name had to be told it must be told now,
for supposing the two remained strangers to intimacy, there
would be no greater harm done now than afterwards; but if
intimacy was otherwise to be, it was better to kill it in the
womb than to let it live and destroy it afterwards.
A third alternative remained, to write to Mrs. Aylwin, saying
quite simply that Harry Vale was an intimate friend of hers,
that he was attractive, and of unblemished character and repu-
tation—so much she was bound to say for the young man's
sake—and what did the mother want done? But such a letter,
she felt, would be a thing to blush over, even when alone.
How demented a matchmaker she would appear !
Back swung the balance. She was in the position of mother
to the girl, and the mother, out of her own mouth, had desired
that she should not know the name. That desire had reached
Lady Oxted casually, not knowing to whom it journeyed, but
it had arrived, and she was bound to respect it. The promise
was as good as made.
Evie had gone to her room after tea, and these various
fences faced Lady Oxted on all sides till the ringing of the
dressing-bell. But that sound suggested the dinner-table to
her, and at the thought of the dinner-table she suddenly felt
the conclusions wrested from her, for she remembered for the


A POINT IN CASUISTRY 45
first time that Harry dined with them that night. And though
she did not expect that, on entering the drawing-room, he
would immediately throw himself on his knees at Evie's feet,
it seemed to her that, as a controlling power, she was put on
the shelf—that the issues of things were in younger and
stronger hands than hers.
She found a letter or two for her in the hall, and taking
these in her hand, she went upstairs.
“The Luck of the Vails,’ she said to herself, and the phrase
shaped itself to her steps—a step to a syllable.
Still with her letters in her hand, she looked in at Evie's
room, and finding her ‘betwixt and between,’ went on to her
own, and as her maid did her hair she opened the letters.
The first was from Harry.
* The greatest luck,' it ran. ‘The Grimstons have influenza
in the house, and have put me off. So I can and will and
shall come to you for Sunday at Oxted. I shall see you this
evening, but I can't resist writing this.'
“Kismet,” murmured Lady Oxted, “ or something very
like it.”


— — — — -- -
CHAPTER WI
THE MEETING
DINNER was over, and of Lady Oxted's party there only
remained by eleven o'clock a couple of her guests. There
was a ball at one house, an evening party at another, a concert
at a third, and each claimed its grilling quota, leaving even
at this hour only Harry Vail and Geoffrey Langham. Lord
Oxted, as was his wont, had retired to his study as soon as his
duties as host would admit without positively violating decency,
but the two young men still lingered, making an intimate
party.
During the last few months Harry had continued to so expand
that it would have been difficult to recognise in him the hero
of that recluse coming-of-age party but half a year ago. But
this change was the result of no violent revolution; his nature
had in no way been wrested from its normal development—
merely that development had been long retarded, and was now
proportionately rapid. For years his solitary home had ringed
him with frost, the want of kindly fireside interests had led him
on the path that conducts to the great unexplored deserts of the
recluse, but the impulse given, the plunge into the world taken,
he had thriven and grown with marvellous alacrity. Indeed,
the stunted habit of his teens remained in him now only as
shown in a certain impression he produced of holding himself
still somewhat in reserve, in a disposition, notable in an age
which loves to expose its internal organism to the gaze of sym-
pathizing friends, to be his own master, to retain if he wished
a privacy of his own, and to guard, as a sacred trust, his right
to his own opinion in matters which concerned himself.
Lady Oxted, however, on this as on many other occasions,


48 THE LUCK OF THE WAILS
“And will you go to the dance?’
‘No, nor to the concert. If I go away, I shall go to bed.’
‘You speak as if you were all six Great Powers sending an
ultimatum to Heligoland,” said Lady Oxted.
“Not in the least; if you send me away, I shall go.”
Lady Oxted laughed.
‘Heligoland replies that the six Great Powers may wait ten
minutes,” she said.
Harry turned to Evie Aylwin.
‘Yes, I feel just as you do,” he said eagerly, reverting at once
to the conversation which had been interrupted by Lady Oxted's
strictures. “I love the sense of being in the middle of millions
of people, all of whom, just like you and me, have their own
private paradise and joy of life, which the world probably never
guesses.’
Evie looked at him quickly.
“Have you a private joy, Lord Vail P’ she asked. “Do tell
me what it is. A thing that is private is always interesting.’
Harry laughed.
“It is called “the Luck,” he said—“the Luck of the Wails.” "
“Are you really beginning to believe in that nonsense, Harry?"
asked Lady Oxted.
‘I have begun,’ said he.
‘Oh, Aunt Violet, how horrid you are P cried Evie. “Do
let Lord Vail tell me about it. It is private; I am dying to
know.’
“Shall I? I will make it short, then,' said Harry, “for Lady
Oxted's sake.’
‘I would rather that you made it long for mine,' said the
girl; “but that is as you please.’
Lady Oxted gave a loud and quite voluntary sigh.
“Poor dear Harry " she said. “Geoffrey, let us talk about
something extremely tangible the while. You are on the Stock
Exchange. Speak to me of backwardation and contango; that
may counteract the weakening effect of Harry's nonsense.
Are you a Bear?'


THE MEETING 49
Harry smiled, and drew his chair closer to the girl's. “I
will talk low,” he said, “so that we shall not offend Lady Oxted,
and you must promise to stop me if you get bored. Anyhow,
you brought it on yourself, for you asked me about my private
joy. This is it.’
Blue eyes, deepened by the shaded light to violet, looked
into his as he began his tale; into hers looked brown eyes,
which seemed black. He told her of the ancient history of
the cup, and she listened with interest to a story that might
have claimed attention, even from a stranger. Then he came
to his own finding of it in an attic upon a winter's day; to the
three accidents to himself, each trivial, which had followed the
finding; and her eyes, which up till now had been at one time
on his, at another had strayed with a certain consciousness
and purpose (for he never looked elsewhere than at hers) now
this way, now that, had superintended the disentangling of a
piece of lace which had caught in her bracelet, or had guided
her finger as it traced the intricate ivory of her fan-handle,
became absorbed. They saw only Harry's big dark eyes, or
at their widest circuit his parted lips from which the words
came. Her own mouth, thin, finely-lipped, drooped a little at
the centre with interest and expectation, and the even line of
teeth showed in the red, a band of ivory set in pomegranate.
Once she impatiently swept back a tress of hair which drooped
over her ear, but the playing of her fingers with her fan had
become unconscious, and her eyes no longer followed them.
And it would seem that Harry had forgotten his promise to
make the story short for Lady Oxted's sake, and had rather
acceded silently to the girl's request to make it long for hers,
for the startling revelations about backwardations and Bears
had long languished before the tale was done.
At last Harry's voice stopped, and there was silence a
moment, though each still looked at the other. Then Evie
gave a little sharp involuntary sigh, and her eyebrows met in a
frown.
“Throw it away, Lord Vail,” she said sharply, “throw it away

4.


5o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
at once, when it will be lost, lost. It is a terrible thing. And
yet, and yet, how can one believe it? The thing is gold and
gems, that is all. Ah, how I should like to see it ! It must be
magnificent, this Luck of yours. All the same, it is terrible.
How can it be your private joy P'
Harry rose. If he was not earnest, it was an admirable
counterfeit.
“Do you not see?' he said, ““Fear both fire and frost and
rain,” runs the rhyme. But think what the cup is called : it
is the Luck of the Vails, and the Vails are—well, they are I
and my uncle. Ah, I forgot one thing. Only two days ago
my uncle found the key to its case. It was locked when
I found it, and had to be broken open. Well, I fell into the
fire, I caught a chill in the rain, I sprained my ankle owing to
the frost. I have paid the penalties of the Luck. Now, don't
you see, I am waiting for the luck itself. Indeed, perhaps it
has begun,' he added.
‘How so?' asked the girl, with security, for she knew he was
not the kind of man to pay inane compliments.
‘Since I found it I have begun to become human,’ he said
gravely. ‘Indeed, six months ago I had no friend in the
world except Geoffrey.’
“What's that about me?' asked Geoffrey, who was playing
picquet with Lady Oxted.
“I was only saying you weren't such a brute as you appeared,’
said Harry, without looking round. ‘I'm a true friend, Geoff."
Then, dropping his voice again: “Then, on the finding of the
Luck, I became—oh, I don't know what I became—what I
am, anyhow.’ He leaned back again in his chair, blushing a
little at his own unpremeditated burst of egotism. “Of course,
soberly, and in the light of nine a.m. earnestness, I don't
believe in it,” he continued ; “but my having those three little
accidents was a very curious coincidence, following as they did
on the heels of my finding the Luck. Anyhow, it pleases me
to think that there may be one coincidence more—that those
three little bits of bad luck will be followed by a piece of very


THE MEETING 51
-
---
good luck. That is my private joy—the thought of some great
good thing happening to me. And then, oh then, won't I just
take the Luck and stamp on it, and throw the rent pieces to
the four winds of heaven l'
There was a moment's silence as his voice, slightly raised,
gave out the blindly-spoken words, which had yet a certain
ring of truth about them. But as soon as they were spoken
Evie's mood changed.
‘Oh, you mustn't l’ she cried. “You could not bring your-
self to destroy such a lovely thing. Those stars of emeralds,
those clear-set diamond handles | Oh, it makes my mouth
water to think of them | I love jewels"
Lady Oxted at this point was deep in the heavily-swollen
waters of Rubicon, and her tone was of ill-suppressed acidity.
“Is the nursery-rhyme nearly finished P' she asked.
Harry advanced to her and held out his hand.
‘Make it up, Lady Oxted,” he said. “My fault entirely.”
Evie followed him.
“Dear Aunt Violet,” she said, “shake hands with Lord Vail
this moment. He has given me the most exciting half-hour,
and you may die in the night, and then you'll be sorry you
spoke unkindly to him. And now we'll talk about liquidation
as much as you please. Oh, you are playing picquet ! Really,
Lord Vail, your story was one of the most interesting I have
ever heard. You see, it isn't over yet; you still have the
Luck. That makes all the difference. One is never told
a ghost-story till the house is pulled down, or all the people
who have seen the ghost are in lunatic asylums. But your
story is now only at the beginning. Upon my word, I can't
make up my mind what you ought to do with the Luck. But
I'll tell you some day, when I feel certain. Oh, I shall never
feel certain P she cried. “You must act as you please.”
‘I have your leave P’ he said, quite gravely and naturally.
*Yes."
At that again their eyes met, but though they had looked at
each other so long and so steadily on this first evening of their
4–2


52 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
acquaintance, on this occasion neither of them prolonged the
glance.
Presently after the two young men left and strolled back to
Geoffrey's rooms in Orchard Street, on the way to Cavendish
Square. Both were of the leisurely turn of mind that delights
in observation, and makes no use whatever of that which it has
observed, and scorning the paltry saving of time and shoe-
leather to be secured by a cab, they went on foot, through the
night bright with lamps of carriages and jingling with bells of
hansoms.
“Well, I've had an awfully nice evening,” said Harry.
“Extra nice, I mean, though it is always jolly at the
Oxteds'.'
“I thought you were enjoying yourself,' said the other, “when
you refused to go to the concert, for which, as you remember,
only this afternoon you were wishing for an invitation. After-
wards, also, I thought you were enjoying yourself.”
‘Oh, for God's sake, don't try to be sly P exclaimed Harry.
“I wished I was a better hand at telling a story. But, all the
same, I think it didn't bore Miss Aylwin. After all, the Luck
is a very curious thing,' he added.
‘You are going to Oxted for the Sunday, are you not?'
asked Geoffrey.
‘Yes; the Grimstons have the flue in the house, bless
them 1 And you go home, don't you? Oh, I never saw such
wonderful eyes in my life " he cried.
‘You are alluding to mine, apparently?' said Geoffrey.
‘Yes, of course I am. Deep violet by candlelight, and soft,
somehow, like velvet.”
“Very handsome of you. I'll look to-night when I go to
bed. My hair, too, soft and fluffy, and the colour of the sun
shining through a mist.’
Harry laughed.
“The habit of being funny is growing on you, Geoff,' he
said. “Take it in time, old chap, and see some good man
about it. Oh, it's no good going to bed now; let's go to


THE MEETING 53
the Club; it's only just down Park Lane. I'm not feeling
like bed just yet.'
Meantime, at the house they had just left, Evie had gone
up to bed, leaving Lady Oxted to do what she called ‘write
two notes,’ a simple diplomatic method of stating that she did
not herself mean to come upstairs immediately. These written,
she announced, she would come to talk for five minutes, and
they would take, perhaps, a quarter of an hour to write. In
other words, as soon as Evie had gone, she went downstairs to
seek her husband in his room, where she would be sure to find
him sitting by a green reading-lamp, in mild exasperation at
anything which the Government might happen to have done
with regard either to a kindly old President of a South African
Republic or the second standard for Board Schools.
‘Violet, it is really too bad l’ said he, as she entered.
“Have you read the Home Secretary's speech at Manchester?
He says Let me see ; where is it?'
‘Dear Bob,' said his wife, ‘whatever he said, you would
quite certainly disagree with it. But never mind showing
it me this minute. I want your advice about another
matter.”
A faint smile came over Lord Oxted's thin, sharp face. He
usually smiled when his wife came to him for advice. He put
down his paper and crossed one leg over the other.
‘What sort of advice P he asked. “Be far more explicit
before you consult me. Do you want to tell me of some
decision you have made, and wish me to agree with you, or is
it possible that you have not yet made your decision ? It is
as well to know, Violet, and it may save me from misunder-
standing you.’
Lady Oxted laughed.
‘I am not yet sure which it is,' she said. “Let me tell you
my story, and by that time, you see, I may have made up my
mind; in which case I shall want the first sort of advice, but if
I have not, the second.”
‘That sounds fair,’ he assented.


54 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
In a few words she told him all that had passed between
her and Evie.
‘And now,” she concluded, ‘am I to promise or not º'
Lord Oxted was a cynic in a certain mild and kindly
fashion.
“Certainly promise,’ he said. “And, being a woman, you
will probably, at the very back of your mind—the very back, I
say—reserve to yourself the right to break it if it becomes
inconvenient to keep it.”
‘Don’t be rude, Bob. I think I shall promise, but at the
same time write to Mrs. Aylwin.'
Her husband chuckled quietly.
‘That is precisely what I meant,’ he said, ‘only I did not
put the reservation quite so far forward in your mind. Did
the two young people get on well together P'
“Too well. Harry has developed an amazing knack of
getting on well with people. And he is coming to us for the
Sunday.”
“Then most likely you are already too late. You should
have thought of these things before, Violet. Your after-
thoughts, it is true, are often admirable, but, so to speak,
they never catch the train. Bear this also in mind: if any-
thing happens—if the two get engaged, we shall be liable at
any moment to a crushing descent from Mrs. Aylwin. If she
comes, I go. That is all.'
“But she is charming.’
“And completely overpowering. I will not be made to feel
like a child in my own house. Dear me, you have probably
got into a mess, Violet. Good-night, dear.’
‘You agree with me, then P' she asked.
‘Completely, entirely, fervently. For it is clear to me that
you want the first sort of advice.” -
Lady Oxted went slowly upstairs and to Evie's room. Her
maid had already left her, and the two settled themselves down
for a talk. The night was hot, and Evie, in a white dressing-
gown, with a touch of blue ribbon, lounged coolly by the open


THE MEETING 55
window. The hum of ambient London came up to them like
the sound of drowsy innumerable bees, and the girl listened in
a sort of ecstasy.
‘Hark! hark P. she cried; “hundreds, and thousands, and
millions of people are there ! Lord Vail felt just as I do about
it. Oh, what a host of pleasant things there are in the world !’
she cried, stretching out her arms as if to take the whole
swarming town to her breast. Then she turned quickly away
into the room again. “Now, dear aunt,” she said, ‘before we
settle down to talk—and I have lots to say—let me know that
one thing. Do you promise never to tell me the name of that
man?
Lady Oxted did not pause.
‘Yes, I promise,’ she said.
“Thank you. So that is all right. It would be dreadful,
would it not, if I had been obliged to be afraid that every
particularly delightful person that I met was the son or the
nephew, or the cousin of that man, or even the man himself
But now that is all right. Mother would not tell me, and you,
knowing her wish—is it not so?—also will not. Oh, Aunt
Violet, I intend to enjoy myself so | What a jolly world it is,
to be sure | I am so glad God thought of it ! Is that profane?
No, I think not.’
Lady Oxted, it has been said, had anticipated one unpleasant
moment. This, she considered, made two. And though it
was not her habit to question the decrees of Providence, she
wondered what she had done to deserve a position where the
converse of candour was so sorely in demand. But she had
not much time for thought, for Evie continued:
“Only one evening gone,’ she said, ‘and that not yet gone,
and what pleasure I have already had 1 Aunt Violet, how
could you want Lord Vail not to tell me the story of the Luck?
It was the most exciting thing I have ever heard, and, as I told
him, he is only at the beginning of it. Italy, the south, is sup-
posed to be the home of romance, but I do not find it there.
Then I come to England, and in London, in Grosvenor Square,


56 THE LUCK OF THE WAILS
I hear, within an hour or two of my arrival, that story. I
think ” She stopped suddenly, got up, and sat down on
the sofa by Lady Oxted.
‘Lord Vail, who is he ” she asked. “What pleasant people
you have at your house, Aunt Violet ! He is so nice. So is
his friend Mr. Langton, is he not P So was the man who took
me in to dinner. What was his name P I did not catch it.'
There was not much comfort here. The girl had forgotten
or not heard the name of the man who took her in to dinner;
she had got Geoffrey Langham's name wrong, and out of all
these “nice people’ there was only one name right.
‘Langham, dear; not Langton,’ said Lady Oxted. “And
the man who took you in to dinner was Mr. Tresham. Surely
you must have heard his name. He is in the Cabinet. Really,
Evie, you do not appreciate the fine people I provide for your
entertainment.”
The girl laughed lazily, but with intense enjoyment.
“Not appreciate?' she said. “Words fail me to tell you how
I appreciate them all. Mr. Tresham was simply delightful.
We talked about dachshunds, which I love; and what else?
Oh, diamonds. I love them also. Aunt Violet, I should like
to see the Luck; it must be a wonderful thing. So Mr.
Tresham is a Conservative P’
‘It is supposed so,” said Lady Oxted, with slight asperity.
“When the Conservatives are in power, dear, the Cabinet is
rarely composed of Liberals.’
The girl laughed again.
‘Dear Aunt Violet, you are a little hard on us poor innocents
this evening. You blew up Lord Vail in the most savage
manner, and now you are blowing me up. What have we
done? Well, now tell me about Mr. Langham.’
“Geoffrey is a younger son of Lord Langham,” said the other.
‘He is on the Stock Exchange, and is supposed to know
nothing whatever about stock-broking.’
‘How very good-looking he is 'said Evie. “If I wanted to
exchange stock, I should certainly ask him to do it for me.


THE MEETING 57
Somehow, people with nice faces inspire me with much more
confidence than those whom I am assured have beautiful minds.
One can see their faces—that makes so much difference.”
Lady Oxted assented, and waited with absolute certainty for
the next question. This tribute to Geoffrey's good looks did
not deceive her for a moment: it was a typical transparency.
And when the next question came she only just checked herself
from saying, “I thought so."
“And now tell me about Lord Vail,” said Evie, after a pause.
“Well, he seemed to be telling you a good deal himself,' said
Lady Oxted. “What can I add P. He is not yet twenty-two,
he is considered pleasant, he is poor, he is the head of what
was once a great family.’
“But his people?' asked Evie.
“He has no father, no mother, no brothers or sisters.”
“Poor fellow !" said Evie thoughtfully. “But he doesn't look
like a person who need be lonely, or who was lonely, for that
matter. Has he no relations P'
“Of his name only one,' said Lady Oxted, feeling that Pro-
vidence was really treating her with coarse brutality, “that is
his uncle—his great-uncle, rather—Francis Vail,' and as she
spoke she thought to herself in how widely different a connec-
tion she might have had to use those two words.
“Do you know him P'
“I used to, but never intimately. He has not lived in the
world lately. For the last six months he has been down at
Harry's place in Wiltshire. The boy has been exceedingly
good to him.’
“Is he fond of him P
“Very, I believe,” said Lady Oxted. “He often speaks of
him, and always with affection and a tenderness that is rather
touching.’
‘That is nice of him,' said the girl with decision, “for I sup-
pose he cannot be expected to have much in common with
him. And so the old man lives with him. He is old, I sup-
pose, as he is Lord Vail's great-uncle?'


CHAPTER VII
The POINT IN CASUISTRY SOLVES ITSELF
LADY OxTED always breakfasted in her own room, and before
she appeared next morning she had spent a long hour in wrest-
ling over her letter to Mrs. Aylwin. She had been desirous to
tell the unvarnished truth and yet to steer clear of a production
by a demented matchmaker, and her letter, it must be con-
fessed, was an admirable performance. Evie had told her, so
she wrote, of her mother's refusal to let her know the name of
the man at whose door she laid, or used to lay, her son's death,
and taking this to mean that Mrs. Aylwin, for any reason, did
not wish Evie to know it, the writer had, at Evie's request,
promised on her own part not to tell her. The present Lord
Vail, she must add, Mr. Francis' nephew, was a constant
visitor at her house, and he and Evie had already met. Mrs.
Aylwin, she was bound to understand, put no prohibition on
their meeting in the way they were sure to meet during the
season. Lord Vail was a young man, pleasant, attractive, and
of excellent disposition.
Lady Oxted laid down her pen for a moment at this point,
then hurriedly took it up to add an amiable doxology and sign
it. She felt convinced she could not do better—convinced
also that if she gave the matter further consideration, it would
end in her doing much worse. Then she took Evie out with a
warm and approving conscience.
That afternoon they left London, as had been originally
planned, to spend the Sunday at their country house in Sussex.
During the hours of the night Lady Oxted had sternly interro-
gated herself as to whether she ought on any lame or paltry
excuse to put Harry off, but on the strength of her promise


6o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
given to Evie, and the letter she was about to write to Mrs.
Aylwin, she felt she could not take any step in the matter until
she received her answer. To put him off, argued the inward
voice, was to act contrary to the spirit of her promise, which
entailed not only silence of the lips, but abstinence from any
manoeuvring or outflanking movement of this kind. This
reasoning seemed sound, and as it went in harness with her
instinct, she obeyed it without question.
The house stood high on a broad ridge of the South Downs,
commanding long views of rolling fields alternating with the
more sombre green of the woods. To the east lay the
heathery heights of Ashdown Forest, peopled with clumps
and companies of tall Scotch fir; southwards, the smooth
austerity of the hills behind Brighton formed the horizon
line. Thatched roofs nestled at cosy intervals beside the
double hedgerows which indicated roads, a remote church
spire pricked the sky, or an occasional streamer of smoke
indicated some train burrowing distantly at the bottom of the
valleys before it again plunged with a shriek into the bases of
the tunnelled hills; but except for these the evidences of
humanity were to be sought in vain. The house itself was
partly Elizabethan, in part of Jacobean building, picturesquely
chimneyed, and high in the pitch of its outside roofs; inside it
was panelled and oaken-beamed, spacious of hearth, and open
of fireplace. Round it ran level lawns, fringed with flower-
beds, wall-encompassed, which, as they receded further from
the house, gradually lost formality, and merged by imper-
ceptible steps into untutored nature. Here, for instance, you
would pass from the trim velvet of the nearer lawns into the
thick lush grass of an orchard planted with apples and the
Japanese cherry, but the grass was thick in spring with the
yellow of the classical daffodil, the scarlet of the anemone was
spilled thereon, and the dappled heads of the fritillary rose
bell-shaped. Here, again, in a different direction, the lawn
further from the house was invaded by a band of lilac-bushes,
and, to the wanderer here, a Scotch fir would suddenly stand


THE POINT IN CASUISTRY solves itself 6,
sentinel at a turn of the grassy path; while, if his walk took
him but fifty yards more remote, the lilacs would have ceased,
and he would be treading the brown, silent needles of the fir
grove, exchanging for the sweet, haunting smell of the garden
shrubs the clean odour of the pine. In a word, it was a place
apt to reflect the moods of the inhabitants: the sombrely-
disposed might easily see in the pines a mirror of their
thoughts; the lilacs, whose smell is ever a host of memories,
would call up a hundred soft images in hearts otherwise dis-
posed; while for the lover of pointed conversation, what milieu
could be more suitable than the formality of the lawns near the
house, which, clean and trim-cut as French furniture, irre-
sistibly gave to those who sat and talked there a certain stan-
dard of precision. Beyond, again, the orchard was every
evening a singing contest of nightingales, and through the soft
foliage of fruitful trees moon and stars cast deep shadows and
diapers of veiled light into grassy alleys.
The party was but a small one, for influenza had for the last
month been pursuing its pleasant path of decimation through
London; and, as Mr. Tresham remarked while they drank
their coffee in the tent on the lawn after lunch next day:
“Those of us who are not yet dead are not yet out of its
clutches.’
Lady Oxted sighed.
‘I had it once a week throughout last summer,” she said.
“It is a consolation when it is about to know that the oftener
you have it the more liable you become to it.’
Mrs. Antrobus finished her coffee and tried to feel her pulse.
‘I never can find it,” she said, ‘and that is so frightening.
It may have stopped for all I know.’
“Dear lady,' said Mr. Tresham, “I will promise to tell you
whether it has stopped or not, not more than a minute after it
has done so, as it will then be too late P
“Ah! there it is,” said Mrs. Antrobus at length—“one, two.
It has stopped now. Take the time, Mr. Tresham, and tell
me when a minute has gone.’


62 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
‘Your mother is the only really healthy person I know,” said
Lady Oxted to Evie. “Whether she is ill or not, she always
believes she is perfectly well, and as long as one fully believes
that, as she does, it really matters little how ill one is.’
Lord Oxted got slowly out of his chair.
“Some doctor lately analyzed a cubic inch of air in what we
should call a clean London drawing-room,’ he said. “He
found that it contained over two hundred bacilli, each of
which, if they lived carefully and married, would, with its
family, be soon able to kill the strongest man. I surrendered
as soon as I heard it.'
‘Quite the best thing to do,” said Mr. Tresham, “for other-
wise they would kill you. It is better to give yourself up and
be taken alive.”
‘It is certainly better to remain alive,’ said Mrs. Antrobus.
“That is why we all go to bed when we get the influenza. We
surrender, like Lord Oxted, and so the bacilli do not kill us,
but only send us away to the seaside. It is the people who
will not surrender who die. Personally I should never dream
of going about with a high temperature; it sounds so im-
proper.'
Evie was sitting very upright in her chair listening to this
surprising conversation. She had seen Mrs. Antrobus for the
first time the evening before, and had made Lady Oxted laugh
by asking whether she was a little mad. It had been almost
more puzzling to be told that she was not than if she had been
told that she was. And at this remark about her temperature
Evie suddenly looked round for a sympathizing eye. An eye
there certainly was, and she felt as if, in character of a hostess,
she had looked for and caught Harry Vail's. At any rate he
instantly rose, she with him, and together they strolled out of
the Syrian tent on the lawn, and down towards the cherry-
planted orchard.
For a few paces they went in silence, each feeling as if a
preconcerted signal had passed between them. Then Evie
stopped.


THE POINT IN CASUISTRY SOLVES ITSELF 63
‘I wonder if it is rude to go away P she said. “Do you
think we ought to go back P’
‘It is never any use going back,' said Harry. ‘Certainly
in this case it would not do. They would think’—and a
sudden boldness came over him—‘they would think we had
quarrelled.’
Evie laughed.
‘That would never do,” she said, “for I feel just now as if
you were an ally, my only one. What strange things Mrs.
Antrobus says Perhaps they are clever ?'
She made the suggestion hopefully, without any touch of
Sarcasm.
“Most probably,” said Harry. “That would be an excellent
reason, anyhow, for my finding them quite impossible to
understand P
“Don’t you understand them? Then we certainly are allies.
You know, I asked my aunt last night whether she was at all
mad, and she seemed surprised that I should think so. But
really, when a woman says that she wishes she had been her
own mother, because she would have been so much easier to
manage than her daughter, what does it all mean P' she asked.
‘Oh, she's not mad,' said Harry. “It is only a way she has.
There are lots of people like her. I don't mind it myself;
you only have to laugh; there is no necessity for saying any-
thing.’
‘And as little opportunity,” remarked Evie.
She paused, then pulled a long piece of feathery grass from
its sheath.
‘England is delightful,” she said with decision. “I find it
simply delightful, from Mrs. Antrobus upwards or downwards.
Just think, Lord Vail, I have not been here for three years.
What has happened since then P
“To whom P'
“To anybody. You, for example.’
“Have I not told you? I have come of age. I have found -
the Luck.'


64 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Evie threw the grass spearwise down wind. She had not
exactly meant to speak so personally.
“Ah, the Luck!' she exclaimed. ‘Lord Vail, do promise
to show it me !'
Thereat Harry again grew bold.
“Nothing easier,’ he said. “I have to go down to Vail next
week. Persuade Lady Oxted to bring you down for a day or
two. The Luck is the only inducement, I am afraid—it and
some big bare Wiltshire Downs.”
‘Big, large, and open?” she asked.
“All that. Does it please you?'
“Immensely. I should love to come. And the Luck is
there? You must know that I am horribly inquisitive—
perhaps, if you were indulgent, you would say, “interested,”
and leave out the “horribly”—in other people's concerns. So
tell me, what do you hope the Luck will bring you?'
‘I don't dare to hope. I am inclined to wait a little.”
Evie frowned.
‘That would be all very well for a woman,” she said, “but it
won't do for a man. It is a woman's part to sit at home and
wait for the luck; but it is a man's to go and seek it.”
‘I am on the look-out for it. I am always on the look-out
for it,” he said.
Some shadow passed across the brightness of Evie's eyes;
again the personal note had been a little too distinct in her
speech, and she replied quickly:
‘That is right. I should go for the highest if I were you.
I think I should plot a revolution and make myself King of
England—something big of that sort.’
‘I had not thought of that,' said Harry, “and I sometimes
wonder—it is all nonsense, you know, about the Luck, and
of course I don't really believe in it, but I sometimes
wonder >
He paused a moment.
‘I wonder whether you would care to hear some more family
history?" he said at length.


THE POINT IN CASUISTRY SOLVES ITSELF 65
“Is it as exciting as the Luck 2' asked the girl.
“I don't know if you would find it so. It is certainly more
tragic."
“Do tell me,’ she said.
“Promise me to exercise your right of stopping me as
before.”
‘I never stopped you!' she exclaimed.
Harry laughed.
‘No. I meant that you had the right to,” he said. “Do
you really want to hear it? It is intimate stuff.'
“Indeed I do,” she said.
Harry paused a moment, then began his story.
“There lives at Vail,” he said, “a man whom I honour as
much as anyone in the world, my great-uncle, Francis Vail.
He is old, he has led the most unhappy life, yet if you met him
casually you would say he was a man who had never seen
sorrow, so cheerful is he, so full of kindly spirits.”
‘He is your only relation, is he not?' asked the girl.
‘He is. Who told you?'
‘Lady Oxted. I beg your pardon; I did not mean to
interrupt.”
“He has led a life of continuous and most unmerited mis-
fortune,” said Harry, “and when I began just now “I wonder”
I was going to say, “I wonder whether the Luck will come to
him.” You see, it is a family thing. He, one would think,
might get the good, not I. And I honestly assure you that I
should be more than delighted if he did.”
“It is about him you would tell me?’ asked Evie.
‘About him. I need not give you the smaller details—his
unhappy marriage, his sudden poverty, his bankruptcy even,
for there is one thing in his life so terrible that it seems to me
to overshadow everything else.'
They had come to a garden seat at the far end of the orchard,
and here Evie sat down. Harry stood beside her, one foot on
the bench, looking not at her, but out over the dreamy, sleeping
landscape.
5


66 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
“It is nearly twenty-two years ago,” he said, ‘that my uncle
was staying down at an estate we used to have in Derbyshire,
which has since been sold. The place next us belonged to
some people called Houldsworth. What?'
An involuntary exclamation had come to Evie's lips, but she
checked it before it was speech.
“Nothing,” she said quietly. “Please go on.’
“And young Houldsworth,’ continued Harry, “who had just
come of age, was great friends with my uncle, who was as kind
to him as he is to all young people, as kind as he always is—
and that I hope you will soon know for yourself. Well, one
day the two were out shooting togethe >
Evie made a sudden, quick movement.
“And George Houldsworth accidentally shot himself,' she
said.
Harry paused in utter surprise.
‘You know the story?" he said.
‘Yes, I know it.”
‘You, too!" he cried. ‘Good God, the thing is past this
more than twenty years, and people still talk of it ! Oh, it is
monstrous ! So I need not tell you the rest?'
‘No,' said Evie quietly. “Your uncle was unjustly—for so
I fully believe—unjustly suspected of having shot him. It is
monstrous ! I quite agree with you. But I am not so monstrous
as you think,’ she added, rather faintly.
In a moment Harry's heightened colour died from his face.
“Miss Aylwin, I did not say that P he exclaimed earnestly.
“Forgive me if I have said anything that hurt you. But
indeed I did not say that ſ’
Evie looked at him a moment. She knew the thing she had
so much desired not to know, but the knowledge, strangely
enough, did not frighten or affect her.
‘No, in justice to you, I will say that you did not. But you
broke out, “It is monstrous,” when I told you I knew the story.’
Again the colour rose to his face, but now not vehement—
only ashamed.


THE POINT IN CASUISTRY SOLVES ITSELF 67
“I did,” he said. “It is quite true. I spoke violently and
unjustifiably. But if you knew my poor uncle, Miss Aylwin, I
do not think you would find it hard to forgive me; you would
see at once why I spoke so hastily. He is the kindest and
best of men, and the most soft-hearted. Think what that
suspicion must have been to him, the years, so many of them
and all so bitter, in which it has never been cleared up.”
‘I do think,’ she said softly, “and I like you for your
violence, Lord Vail. You are loyal. It is no bad thing to be
loyal ; but '—and she looked up at him—“but you must not
think that I am a willing listener to gossip and old scandal that
does not concern me.’
‘I do not think that,’ cried Harry. “Indeed, I never
thought that.”
His words rang out and died on the hot air, and still the
girl made no answer. This way and that was her mind
divided. Should she tell him all P should she tell him nothing?
The latter was the easier path, for his last words had the ring
of truth in them, convincing, unmistakable, and she, so to
speak, was acquitted without a stain on her character did she
decide not to speak. But something within her, intangible
and imperative, urged other counsels. Her reason gave her
no account of these, but simple instinct only called to her.
What prompted that instinct, from what deep and vital source
it rose, she did not pause to consider. Simply it was there,
with reason warring on the other side. The battle was brief
and momentous. Immediately almost she spoke.
‘I am sure you never thought that,' she said; “but I wish'—
and her pulse ticked full and rapid—“I wish to prove to you
how it was not through gossip that the knowledge came to me.
For this is how I heard it: my mother was George Houlds-
worth's mother.’
Harry drew a long breath, which hung suspended in his lungs.
His eyes were fixed on the eyes of the girl in a long glance of
sheer astonishment, and hers were not withdrawn. At last—
“God forgive us all !' he said. “And do you forgive me?’
5–2


CHAPTER VIII
THE SECOND RETURN TO WAIL
It was the day following Lady Oxted's return to London from
the Sunday in the country that she received the expected letter
from Mrs. Aylwin in answer to her own. The opening of it,
it would be idle to deny, was made with an anxious and appre-
hensive hand. Already it was plain to her with how swift and
strong a movement, as of flood-water hastening towards sluice-
gates, the first attraction between the two was speeding into
intimacy, and had she known what had passed between them
in the orchard, she would have guessed that its swiftness had
outrun her eye. Already it would have been far better, if
the girl was to know the name her mother had refused to tell
her, that she should have known it on the night of her arrival.
But these things were past prayer, and Lady Oxted drew the
sheet of paper from its envelope, and found, at any rate, that
the communication was short.
“I leave it entirely to your judgment,’ wrote Mrs. Aylwin,
‘whether you tell Evie or not. You say that you have
promised not to; in that case, supposing at some future time
you consider it advisable, and you can accept the quibble, tell
it her, not in your name, but in mine. My reason for not
telling it her you may easily have guessed : the knowledge, or
so I thought it, that George was murdered, has poisoned my
life, and now I question myself as to whether I have been cer-
tainly right about it. But remember this: if there arises
between the two—the thing is possible, as evidently you fore-
see — a friendship which develops, as is natural between a
man and a maid, it is certain that some time Evie will know.
I leave it to you to decide whether it is better that she should


7o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
know now or later. I thank you, dear Violet, for your care
for her.’
‘Dear Violet’ heaved a sigh of relief. Mrs. Aylwin had
been known to stagger those who were dear to her by sending
them letters which partook of the nature of an ultimatum.
But there was no ultimatum here. She was willing to treat,
and this letter, though couched with the precision of an official
despatch, was not without amenity.
She hurried downstairs to join Evie—for they were going out
to lunch—with the sense of a burden removed. Such being
the attitude of Mrs. Aylwin, she determined that her own
promise to the girl should certainly stand, and she thought
with scornful wonder of her husband's diagnosis that, at the very
back of her mind, she would reserve to herself the right to
break it. Men's ideas of women, she told herself, were in-
credibly crude and elementary. They reserved for themselves
a monopoly of certain qualities, like courage, justice, and
honour, and simply took it for granted that such things did
not exist for women. Poor dear Bob, and after so many years,
too !
Evie was somewhat silent as they drove down Bond Street,
and though her gaze at the jostling crowds was not less intent
than usual, it seemed to have lost the sparkle of its avidity,
and to dwell rather than alight and be gone again. She looked
this morning at the seedy toy-sellers and flower-vendors more
than at their fragrant or painted wares, and instead of finding
fascination in the little tin figures that moved their scythes
over the surface of an absolutely smooth pavement with the
industry of those who reap the whirlwind, or commenting on
the phenomenal cheapness of collar-studs, it was rather the
tragic meanness of their exhibitors which to-day attracted her.
‘How do you suppose they live, Aunt Violet P she asked.
‘Look at that man with studs—six a penny. I know, because
I bought six on Saturday. Well, supposing he sold sixty a
day, which I imagine he does not, and that they cost him
absolutely nothing, in the evening he would have tenpence.


THE SECOND RETURN TO VAIL 71
Yet they are not beggars: they work for their bread. Now, in
Italy we have nothing like them; their place is taken by the
smiling, picturesque lazzaroni, who would not stir a finger to
help themselves. They just sit in the sun and smile, and get
fed. Oh dear!”
“What is it now, Evie P' asked Lord Oxted.
“Nothing. I suppose I am just realizing that it takes all
sorts to make a world, and that extremes meet, and so on.
Look at me, now. Here am I in this comfortable victoria,
much more like the lazzaroni than the toy-sellers, and who
shall say how far the toy-sellers are above the lazzaronif I
sit in the sun, and if there is no sun I sit by the fire, and to do
me justice, I generally smile. Yet, supposing I had to work
for my bread, should I do it cheerfully, do you think? Should
I maintain even a low average of industry? Supposing there
came some great call on me for courage or resolution, should
I respond to it? I have no reason whatever for assuring you
or myself either that I should.”
Lady Oxted's mind flew back with an inward smirk of satis-
faction to her own heroic determination to keep the promise
she had made to Evie.
“Probably you would,” she said. “Probably we are not so
bad. When it comes to our having an opportunity for behaving
abominably, we do not behave as we thought we were going to.
The thought of the dentist poisons my life for days beforehand,
yet I go all the same, and ring the dreary bell, and behave, I
believe, with average courage under the wheel. Morally, too,
I expect we are better, when a thing has to be done, than we
were afraid we were going to be. Also, on the whole, one is
more honourable than one thinks—more honourable, certainly,’
she added, with a sudden irrepressible spurt of indignation
against her husband, “than those who know us best believe us
to be.”
Evie laughed.
“Dear aunt, have you been very honourable lately?' she
asked, ‘or has Uncle Bob been doubting your first qualities?


72 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
‘Cynicism always ends in disappointment,’ remarked Lady
Oxted, leaping a conversational chasm, “but since it is cynical,
I suppose it expects it.’
‘Is Uncle Bob a cynic?' asked Evie, dragging her back
over the chasm again.
“Well, I made a promise the other day,” said Lady Oxted,
‘and asked him his advice about it. He told me I should
probably reserve to myself the right to break it.'
Evie sat up suddenly, and toy-maker and lazzaroni were
swept from her mind.
“A promise?' she said. “Not the promise you made me?’
Lady Oxted looked up in surprise.
‘Yes, the same. Why, dear?'
Evie deliberated with herself for a moment.
‘For this reason, she said slowly: ‘because I now know
what I asked you not to tell me. Your promise has had the
kernel taken out of it.’
‘You know? Who told you?'
‘Lord Vail,” she replied.
Lady Oxted looked at the girl's heightened colour, wonder-
ing what emotion flew that beautiful standard there.
‘I will never waste an ounce of resolution again in deter-
mining to abide by my word,” she announced.
Evie laughed again, with a great ring of happiness in the
note.
“Then you will confirm Uncle Bob in his cynicism,' she
replied, “and disappoint him of all his pleasant little disap-
pointments.’
It was not long before Lady Oxted found that to be
chaperon to one of the greatest heiresses in England could not
be regarded even by the most negligent as a sinecure, and to
fulfil its duties at all adequately cost considerable time and
thought. Had the girl been dull, heavy, serious, or plain, her
task would have been lighter; but as it was, Lady Oxted
became, before a fortnight was past, a really hard-worked
woman. Evie's appetite for gaiety was insatiable. She took


THE SECOND RETURN TO VAIL 73
to London like a bird to the air, found everybody charming,
and everybody returned the compliment. Indeed, the girl
seemed to bring wherever she went a breath of spring and
morning, so utterly sincere and spontaneous was the pleasure
that bubbled from her; and since nothing pleases people so
much as to find themselves pleasing, London in general was
exceedingly glad that Santa Margerita was the poorer for
Evie's presence here. With the eager avidity of youth, and
with youth's serene digestion, she gathered and devoured the
heaped-up feast of daily and nightly gaiety. Self-conscious-
ness for once seemed to have been left out of the composition
of a human being, and she played and laughed and enjoyed
herself among these crowds as a child may play in the daisies
by itself in some spring meadow, not hoarding and reflecting
on its happiness, but simply happy. Parsifal with the flower-
maidens was not more unreflective than she, surrounded by
the well-dressed hosts, her charm in the mouth of all.
It might have been hoped, thought Lady Oxted, that since
so large a ring was always assembled to see her smile, the
smiles would have been, considering the number and variety
of the circle, distributed with moderate evenness. In this she
was not disappointed, but—a thing far more disconcerting to
the responsible chaperon—Evie's seriousness certainly was not
impartial. For all the world but one she seemed to have no
seriousness, but about that one there could be no mistake.
Already between her and Harry there existed a relation,
dear and indefinable, to be dwelt on with silent wonder; some
alchemy, secret and subtle, untraceable as the course of the
swallow's flight, was at work; an effervescence already had
begun to stir, brightening the dark well of destiny within them
by a hundred points of light; a mysterious luminosity was
growing in tremulous flame.
Until the receipt of Mrs. Aylwin's letter, Lady Oxted had
felt a little uncertain as to whether she could accept Harry's
invitation for herself and the girl to Vail. In any case, the
next two Sundays were impossible, and the matter had been


74 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
left undecided. But now that all restriction was withdrawn,
she arranged to take Evie down in three weeks' time, at the
end of the month. Harry himself, however, had business at
his house which could not be postponed, and towards the end
of the week he went down there, with the intention of clear-
ing it off as quickly as might be, and returning again to
London.
Mr. Francis had been at Vail almost continuously since the
winter, and Harry found him in the enjoyment of his usual
merry spirits. He looked even better in health and younger
to the eye than when his nephew had seen him last, and the
briskness of his movements, the clear, scarcely wrinkled skin
of his face, were indeed surprising in one of his years. He
had driven to the station to meet Harry, and the train being
stopped on an inside curve just before reaching the platform,
Harry, leaning out of the window, saw him standing there.
Mr. Francis caught sight of his face, and pulling out his hand-
kerchief, continued to wave it till the train finally drew up at
the platform.
“And here you are, my dearest boy,” he cried effusively,
before Harry was out of the carriage. ‘How late your train
is It is scandalous and abominable ! I should have found
two sharp words for the station-master, I expect, if I had not
been so happy to think you were coming. How well you look,
Harry ! London seems to suit you as well as the country
suits me.’
‘Indeed, that is saying a great deal,” said Harry, looking at
that cheerful, healthy face. “I have never seen you looking
better, Uncle Francis.’
A smile of great tenderness played round the old man's
mouth.
‘And for that I have to thank you, my dear boy,’ he said,
“in that it is to you I owe my quiet retreat, my days of busy
tranquillity. Ah, Harry, it has been worth while to grow old
if at the end you find such peace as is mine.’
They drove briskly up the mile of deep country lane which


THE SECOND RETURN TO VAIL 75
separated the station from the high-road, and Harry found an
unlooked-for pleasure in the wealth of honeysuckle which
embowered the hedges in their fragrant curves, and in the
clean, vigorous tendrils of the dog-rose, starred with the
delicacy of its pink blossom. Something in that young un-
folding of simple loveliness which had never really struck him
before now smote on his heart with a pang of exquisite
pleasure. How wonderful was youth, and the growth of
young things How like in some subtle and intimate way
were these springing sprays of blossom to a girl on the verge
of womanhood l For instance—and he turned to his uncle
again.
‘Yes, London suits me,’ he said, the thrill and surprise of
his thoughts glowing in his handsome face. ‘People are so
kind, so friendly. Oh, it is a warm, nice world !’ and his hand
shook the two horses to a swift trot.
‘You will always find people kind and friendly to you,
Harry,' said Mr. Francis, “if you look at them as you looked
at me just now. Men and women know nothing so attractive
as happiness. My dear boy, what have you been doing to
yourself? You are more radiant than Apollo.'
Harry laughed.
‘I would not change places with him,” he said. “I will take
my chance as Harry Vail. I have done nothing to myself, if
you ask ; but I have found many friends. But I do not for.
get, Uncle Francis, that the first friend I found was you, and I
do not think I shall find a better.’
They turned into the glare of the white high-road, and Mr.
Francis, who, while they were in the shadow of the deep lane-
banks, had carried his hat on his knee, letting the wind blow
refreshingly through his thick white hair, put it on again.
“Ah, Harry, I hope you will some time, and soon, find a
friend, and dearer than a friend, for life,' he said, ‘who will
speedily make you forget your old uncle. But give him a seat
in the chimney-corner. That he asks, though he asks no
more, and let him nurse your children on his knee. He has


76 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
a way with children; they never cry with him. I pray, I often
pray,’ he said, lifting his hat as he spoke with a gesture touch-
ing and solemn, “that I may do that. That, dear Harry,
would be the crowning happiness of my happy days.'
The words died gently on to the air; no direct reply was
needed. For a moment Harry was half determined to tell his
uncle of his dream and his hope, longing with the generous
warmth of youth for the sympathy which he knew would so
fully be his, and the words were even on the threshold of his
lips when Mr. Francis suddenly straightened himself from his
attitude of musing, and plunged into less intimate talk.
‘I have not been idle, dear Harry,’ he said, ‘while you
have been away, charging about the world, as youth should.
I think you will find—I may say it without undue complacence
—that the home-farm is in better order and is more profitable
than it has ever been. There is no credit due to me; it is
simply the work of a bailiff I had the luck to find, an invaluable
man. And in the autumn I can promise you better pheasant-
shooting than there has been for many years.”
‘I am sure it is so,' said Harry, “and we will prove it
together, Uncle Francis. Really, I cannot thank you enough ;
it is too good of you to devote yourself as you have been
doing to the estate. Dear me, it is four months since I was
here. I am an absentee landlord, but a better landlord than
I has been on the spot, and I am not afraid that I shall be
shot at.”
They turned in at the lodge-gates, and bowled swiftly along
under the huge trees. The hay was standing high in the fields
to the left, on the right the pasturage of the park was grazed
by sleek kine, already beginning to leave the mid-day shadows
of the trees for their evening feed in the cool, and the sense of
smell and scent alike drank deep of the plentiful and luxuriant
summer. Rooks held parliament in their debating-houses in
the high elms, round the coops of the pheasant-rearing hens
chirped innumerable young birds, and the breeze that should
blow at sundown was already stirring to try its wings. Extra-


THE SECOND RETURN TO VAIL 77
ordinarily pleasant to Harry was the sense that all this was his,
yet there was neither vainglory nor selfishness in his delight,
for he valued his own, not for the thought of what it was to
him, but for the joy another perhaps should take in it. Then,
emerging from the mile-long avenue, they came to the shining
lake, and the sound of coolness from the splashing sluice.
Swan and water-lily reflected themselves on the surface, and
as they turned the corner a moor-hen made its water-logged
scurry to the cover of the reed-beds. Then, with a hollow
note from the wheels, they rolled over the bridge, and turned
in under the monstrous shape of the cut-box hedge to the
gravel-sweep in front of the house. There it stood, the shadow
of one of the wings fallen half across the courtyard, stately and
grave, full of dignity and gray repose, surely no unworthy gift
to offer to any. And at that thought a sudden pulse leaped
within him.
‘It is all unworthy, he said to himself, banishing with an
effort that irrepressible thrill of joy, “and I the unworthiest
of all.”
He lingered a moment at the door, and then followed Mr.
Francis into the house. Again the joy of possession seized
him. His were the tall faint tapestries of armoured knights
and garlanded lovers, his the rows of serious portraits which
seemed to-day to his eye to have a freshness and welcome for
him which had never been there before. He contrasted, with
keen relish of the change, his last home-coming and this.
What a curious dream-like month that had been which he had
spent here at his coming-of-age How gray and colourless
life seemed then, if looked at in the light of all that had
passed sincel He had pictured himself, he remembered, slowly
putting spadeful after spadeful of time, heaped gradually from
month to year, on the grave of his youth, spending a quiet,
often solitary, existence here in the home of his fathers. Uncle
Francis, so he had planned it in those days when he had been
alone here before his arrival and Geoffrey's, no doubt would
be glad to come here sometimes. Geoffrey, too, would very


78 THE LUCK OF THE WAILS
--
likely spend a week with him now and again in the shooting-
season. Otherwise, it would be natural for him to be much
alone, and the prospect had called up in him no emotion even
so lively as dislike. He would be out-of-doors a good deal,
pottering and poking about the woods, he would read a good
deal, and no doubt the year would slip away not unpleasantly.
In course of time the portrait of Henry Vail, twelfth Baron,
and of seemingly morose tendencies, would gloom from the
wall, for that series must not be broken. A little longer, and
moss would be green in the lettering of his tombstone.
But now he could scarcely believe that the lad who had
meditated thus six months ago, not dismally, but without joy,
could be the same as he who stood with a kindled eye beneath
old Francis's picture. He looked at his own hand as he raised
his teacup, he looked at his boots and his trousers. Yes, they
were certainly his, and he it had been who had drunk tea here
before. What, then, had happened? he asked himself. He
had discovered the world, that was all, and Columbus had only
discovered America. And the world was quite full of charm-
ing things, and people in particular; to descend to details, or
to generalize on the whole—he hardly knew which was which
—it was full of one person.


CHAPTER IX
CARDIAC
MR. FRANCIS soon joined him for tea, and, after proposing a
stroll in ten minutes' time, had gone to his room to answer
an urgent letter. Harry was well content to wait, for nothing
could come amiss to so harmonious a mood as his, and,
lighting a cigarette, he strolled round the walls beholding his
forbears. Opposite the portrait of old Francis, second Baron,
he stood long, and his eye sought and dwelt on the Luck as a
familiar object. The sun streaming through the western
windows fell full on to the picture, and the jewels, so cunning
and exact was their portrayal, sparkled with an extraordinary
vividness in the gleam. The Luck I Was it the Luck which
had given him these days of wonderful happiness, with so great
and unspeakable a hope for the days to come P Was this the
huge reward it granted him, for which he had paid but with a
cold in the head, a burn on the hand, a sprain of the foot?
How curious, at the least, those three coincidences following
so immediately on the finding of the Luck had been How
curious also this awakening of his (dating from the same
time) from the solitary lethargy of his first twenty-one years
For the awakening had come with the coming of Uncle Francis,
and his own instant attachment to him. It was indeed he—
he and Geoffrey, at any rate, between them, on their visit here—
who had started him on the voyage which had already resulted
in the discovery of the world. It was then that his potential
self had begun to rustle and stir in the chrysalis of isolation
which had grown up round it, very feebly and tentatively
indeed at first, but by degrees cracking and bursting its brown
bark, then standing with quivering and momentairly-expanding


8o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
wings, which gradually unfolded and grew strong for flight.
The Luck I Was it indeed the gems and the gold which had
done this for him P. It was much, it was very much; but to
him now how infinitely more than he had did he desire Six
months ago he had desired nothing, for he was dead; but now,
being alive, how he yearned for more—one thing more I
A sudden idea seized him, and he rang the bell, and until it
was answered looked again at the picture. Old Francis's face,
he thought, and old Francis's hands, did not fare so well in the
sunlight as the glorious jewel which he held. The hands
clutched rather than held the cup ; the lines of them were
greedy and grasping; they gripped the treasure with nervous
tension; and in the face there were ugly lines which he had
never noticed before, but which bore out the evidence of the
hands. Avarice sat on that throne, and cunning as deep as
the sea, and cruelty, and evil mastery. Still looking and
wondering, he suddenly saw the face in a different light: it
was no longer a vile soul that looked from those eyes, but the
kind, cheerful spirit of his own uncle. He started, for the
change had the vividness of actuality, and at the moment the
bell was answered by the old butler.
“Ah, Templeton,’ he cried, “I am glad to see you. All
well? That's right. I rang to say that I wanted you to get
out the Luck—the big cup, you know, which you and I found
in the attic last Christmas—and put it on the table to-night as
a centre-piece.”
“Mr. Francis has the key, my lord,” said Templeton; “it is
on his private bunch.'
“Ask him to give it to you, then. Say it was by my order.
Oh, here he is 1 Uncle Francis, I want the key of the case in
which is the Luck. I want to have it on the table to-night.”
“Dear boy, is it wise?" said Mr. Francis. “Supposing the
house was broken into ; you know the thing is priceless.’
“But burglars cannot take it further from before our noses
while we sit at dinner,’ said Harry; “and as soon as dinner is
over, even before we leave the room, it shall be put back


CARDIAC 81
again. See to that, Templeton ] That is the key, is it?
Why, it is gold, too ! Old Francis knew how to do things
thoroughly.’
Uncle and nephew strolled out together—Harry with his
head high and leading the way. An extraordinary elation was
on him.
‘I have a feeling that the Luck is bringing me luck,” he
said. ‘Oh, I don't seriously believe it, but think how strange
the coincidences have been. Fire and frost and rain I had
a turn with all of them. And you know, Uncle Francis, since
I found it, I have had more happiness than in the whole of
my life before.”
‘What happiness, Harry?"
‘Friends—you the first; the joy of life; the conscious feeling
that one is alive, which I suppose is the same thing. All, all,'
he cried—‘the world, men, women, things, all !’
Mr. Francis did not reply at once, but went forward a few
steps, his eyes on the ground.
‘Don’t believe it, Harry,’ he said. “I would never have told
you about the foolish old story if I had thought that there was
the slightest chance of your paying more attention to it than
one gives to a fairy tale. My dear boy, you are really quite
silly. You caught cold because you would not listen to my
excellent advice and change your clothes when you got in from
shooting; you sprained your ankle because you did not look
where you were going, and see that the steps were covered
with ice; you burned yourself because a careless housemaid
had forgotten to tack down the carpet. I do not believe in
magic at all; there is, I assert, no such thing; but even if one
did, it would be a very childish, weak kind of spell that could
only bring curses of that sort.’
‘That is just what I think,’ said Harry, “the evil, perhaps,
has run down, so to speak; it is nearly impotent. Oh, I am
only joking. But if that is the price I have paid for my
present happiness, I consider it dirt-cheap. And if the Luck
can give me more happiness, I hereby declare to the powers
6


82 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
that work it that I will take any amount more on the same
scale of charges.’
Mr. Francis laughed, and took Harry's arm affectionately.
‘Dear lad, you were only jesting, I know,” he said. “But it
is not well to dwell on such fantastic things too much, though
we constantly remind ourselves that they are nonsense. The
human mind is a very wonderful and delicate piece of
mechanism, and if once we begin playing experiments with a
thing of which we understand so little, it may get out of order
and strike the wrong hour, and fail to keep time. Lead your
wholesome, honourable life, dear boy, and take gratefully what
happiness comes in your way, and do not forget whence it
comes. Then you will have nothing to fear from the Luck.’
‘No, and nothing to gain from it,” said Harry, “for I expect
magic cannot touch those who do not believe in it.’
“Dear boy, enough,' said Mr. Francis, with a certain earnest-
ness. “You have told me you do not believe in it. Ah, what
a wonderful evening ! Look at those pink fleeces of cloud in
the west, softer than sleep, softer than sleep, as Theocritus
says. How I wish I was a painter | Think of the privilege
of being able to show those sunset glories—to show, too, as
the true artist can, the feelings, infinite and subtle, which those
rose clouds against the pale blue of the sky produce in one, to
show them to the toiler of the London streets. Ah, Harry,
what a wealth of senses has been given us, what diverse-facing
windows to our souls, and how little we trouble to look out of
any, or to keep bright and clean even one ! The gourmet
even, the man who eats his dinner, using his palate with
intelligence, is a step above most people. He has trained a
sense. And what exquisite pleasure that sense, even though
it be the most animal of all, gives him 1 And who can say
that each sense was not given us in order that we should
cultivate it to the fullest?'
Suddenly he raised his hat, and in a low, clear voice he cried:
“Oh, world, as God has made it, all in beauty
And knowing this is love, and love is duty,
What further can be sought for or declared?”"


CARDIAC 83
-- --— -------——
For a long moment he stood there, his face irradiated by
the fires of sunset, his eyes soft with gentle unshed tears, his
hair stirred by the caress of the evening breeze, with who
knows what early dreams and cool reveries of boyhood
reminiscent within him? His harsh, untoward past had gone
from him; he had lived backwards in that moment to the
days before troubles and darkness came about his path.
Aspirations seemed to have taken the place of memory—he
was a youth again, and Harry's face as he looked at him was
loving and reverent.
It was already deep dusk when they turned back, and only
the faint reflections of the fires of sunset lingered in the sky.
The green of grass and tree had faded to a sombre gray, and
the green of the fantastically cut box-hedge had deepened to
black when they again passed under its misshapen shapes and
monstrous prodigies. Somehow the look of it cut out against
the unspeakable softness and distance of the sky struck Harry
with something of an ominous touch.
‘That must be seen to,” he said, pointing to it; ‘look at the
horror of its shapes; it is like a collection of feverish dreams.”
“The old box-hedge?' asked Mr. Francis. ‘If I were you
I should not have it touched. See how Nature is striving to
obliterate the intruding hand of man. How grotesque and
quaint it appears in this light! How delightfully horrible !'
‘Horrible, certainly,” said Harry; “but I do not find delight
there. Come, Uncle Francis, let us go in. It is already close
upon dinner-time, and one has to dress.’
But the box-hedge seemed to have a strange fascination for
Mr. Francis, and he still lingered there, standing in the road,
with his eye wandering down the lines of that nightmare
silhouette.
“Indeed I would not touch it, dear Harry,’ he said. “It is
so grotesque and Gothic. What a thickness the hedge must
be eight feet at the least.’
“But it is hideous,” replied the lad. ‘It is enough to
frighten anybody.”
6–2


CARDIAC 85
--~------------------ - - - - - - - - - -
the footman who carried it walked a man with liqueurs whom
Harry could not remember having seen before. He looked at
him a moment, wondering who he was, when he recollected
that his uncle had spoken to him about his own man, who,
he proposed, should wait on him at Vail. Last came Temple-
ton, carrying the leather case of the Luck.
Harry took coffee and liqueur, and had another look at his
uncle's valet. The man wore the immovable mask of the
well-trained servant; he was no more than a machine for
handing things.
‘Yes, take the cup, Templeton,’ said Harry; “have you the
key of it?”
‘No, my lord; it is on Mr. Francis's bunch.”
‘Would you give me the key, Uncle Francis? I will lock
it myself and keep the key.’
Mr. Francis did not at once answer, but continued sipping
his coffee, and Harry, thinking he had not heard, repeated his
request. On the repetition Mr. Francis instantly took the key
off his bunch.
“By all means, dear boy,’ he said; “it is much better so,
that you should have it.”
Templeton packed the jewel in its case, and Harry turned
the key on it.
‘Lock it up yourself, Templeton,’ he said, ‘in one of the
chests. I must have a new case made for it, I think. This is
very old, and it would be much too easily carried away—eh,
Uncle Francis P’ and he swung the locked case lightly in his
hand.
“It is the original case, Harry,” he said. “I should be sorry
to change it.'
The men left the room, Templeton going last, with the case
containing the Luck. The candles still burned brightly, but
half the light seemed to have been withdrawn from the room
now that the great jewel no longer gleamed on the table ; it
was as if a cloud had hidden the sun. Harry still held the
key in his hand, looking curiously at its chased and intricate


86 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
wards, and for a few moments neither spoke. Then he put it
into his pocket, and, pushing his chair a little further from the
table, flung one leg over the other.
“I propose to stop here four or five days, Uncle Francis,'
he said, “but not more, unless we cannot get through our
business. But indeed I cannot see what there is to do. The
place looks in admirable order, thanks to you. There is the
box-hedge; that is positively all I can see that wants looking to.”
Mr. Francis laughed gaily.
‘Dear Harry,’ he said, “if you are not careful you will
become as absurd on the subject of this box-hedge as you are
in danger of becoming about the Luck. The dear quaint,
picturesque thing ! How can you want it trimmed and cut !”
Harry laughed.
“As you say, it does not frighten you or me or the gardeners,’
he said; “but, as I was about to tell you as we drove from the
station, when something put it out of my head, I shall have to
consider others as well.'
Suddenly he stopped. In the intense pleasure with which
he had looked forward to the visit of Evie and Lady Oxted,
which should be, so he had figured it, hardly less welcome to
his uncle, as a sign, visible and pertinent, of how utterly dead
and discredited was the lying rumour which at one time had
so blackened him, he had not consciously reckoned with the
moment of telling him. But he went on, almost without a
pause:
“At the end of the month Lady Oxted has promised to
come and spend a Sunday here, and with her will come—oh,
Uncle Francis, how long this or something of the sort has
been delayed, and how patiently you have waited for it !—with
her will come her niece, Miss Aylwin, who has just come to
England from Italy.’
He looked not at his uncle as he spoke, but, with a delicacy
unconscious and instinctive, kept his eyes on the ground.
Such an announcement as the visit of George Houldsworth's
sister must, he knew, be momentous to the old man, and


CARDIAC 87
perhaps would give rise to an emotion which it was not fit
that other eyes should see. His uncle would know that in
the mind of one at least most intimately connected with the
tragedy suspicion was not. This visit would be a reconcilia-
tion, formal though silent. It was right that the hearer should
have as great a privacy as might be, and so, both when he
spoke and after he had finished speaking, Harry kept his eyes
on the ground.
There was a moment's silence, broken by the crash of
breaking china, and, looking quickly up, Harry saw the coffee-
cup fallen from his uncle's hand, and the brown stains leaping
over the white tablecloth. The spoon clattered metallic in the
shattered saucer, and jumped to the floor, and Mr. Francis's
hand dropped like lead on the edge of the table. The candles
were between Harry and his uncle; he could see no more,
and he sprang up with a sudden pang of horror rising up
within him.
There, with his head fallen over the back of the chair, lay
Mr. Francis, sprawling and inert. His face was of a deadly,
strangled white; the wholesome colour had fled his cheeks,
and only on the lips and below the eyes lingered a mottled
purple. His breathing was heavy and stertorous—you would
have said he snored—and from the corner of the slack mouth
lolled the protruding tongue. His hands lay limp upon his
lap, gray and purple.
Harry made one step of it to the bell, and rang peal after
violent peal, scarce daring to look, yet scarce able not to look,
at that mask-like horror of a face at the end of the table.
“What had he done? What if he had killed him P Death
could not be more ghastly, ran the shrill voice of terror-
stricken thought through his head. His instinct was to go
to him, though his flesh shrank and shivered at the thought
of approaching that, to do something, but he knew not what;
yet meddling might only cause damage irreparable, instead of
giving relief. Still, he did not cease ringing, and it seemed to
him that the muffled clanging of the bell he rang had sounded


88 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
for years, when steps came along the passage and burst into
the room. -
“There, there, look to him What is the matter?' cried
Harry, still working on the bell like a man demented. “Send
for the doctor—send for his servant; perhaps he knows what
to do. Ah, there he is 1 and he dropped the bell-handle.
Mr. Francis's valet of the mask-like face had gone straight
to his master, and, lifting him bodily from the chair, laid him
flat on the floor. Then, with deft fingers, he untied his cravat
and collar, and told them to open all doors and windows wide.
He tore open his shirt and vest, so as to leave his breathing
absolutely free, and then paused. The great rush of warm
summer air that poured in gently stirred the hair on Mr.
Francis's head, and rustled the folds of the tablecloth; yet in
spite of this, and the heavy, stertorous breathing of the stricken
man, it seemed to Harry that an intense silence reigned
everywhere. Maid-servants had gathered in the doorway;
but Templeton, with a guttural word, sent them scurrying
down the passages, and the three watched and waited round
the one.
Then by blessed degrees the breathing grew less drawn and
laboured, and by the light of the candles which Mr. Francis's
man had placed on the floor near the body it was possible to
see that the colour of the face was less patched. Then the
valet turned to Harry, who, white-faced and awestruck, stood
at his shoulder.
‘He will do well now, my lord,” said Sanders. “It was
lucky you did not touch him. Mr. Francis has had these
fits before—cardiac, the doctors say—but the right thing is to
lay him flat.”
‘He is not dead He will not die?’ cried Harry, shaking
the man by the shoulder, as if to make him hear.
‘Lord bless you, no, my lord ' he said. “As like as not
he'll be dressed to-morrow before you are awake. Cardiac
weakness,’ he repeated, as if the words were a prescription,
‘and all agitation to be avoided.’


CARDIAC 89
‘Oh, my God, I never meant to agitate him 1' cried Harry.
‘I told him something which I should have thought he would
have given his right hand to hear.”
The man smiled.
“Just the sort of thing which would agitate him, my lord,’
he said, “if you'll excuse my saying so. And now, Mr.
Templeton, if you'll be so kind as to get a shutter or some-
thing, we'll move him up to bed, keeping him flat. I’ll sit up
with him to-night.”
‘You’re a good fellow—an awfully good fellow !' cried
Harry. “And there is no further anxiety? Shall I not send
for the doctor P’
‘Quite unnecessary, my lord. See how quiet his breathing
has become. As like as not he will sleep like a child. He's
had these attacks before, and I know well when the danger is
over. Cardiac. You can go to sleep yourself, my lord, as if
nothing had happened.’


CHAPTER X
MR. FRANCIS is better
THE cheerful optimism of Sanders was borne out by events, if
not in letter, at any rate in spirit, and Harry on waking re-
ceived the most encouraging reports from the sick-room.
Mr. Francis had slept well for the greater part of the night,
and though he would take his breakfast in bed, he expected
to be down by the middle of the morning. He particularly
desired that Harry should be told, as soon as he woke, how
completely he had recovered from his attack, and sent him his
dear love.
Here, at any rate, was great good news. Again and again
during the night Harry had woke from anxious, feverish dreams
of that ghastly mask-like face and sonorous breathing; all the
earlier hours seemed a constant succession of agonized awaken-
ings. Now it would be the white mottled face, which grew
ever larger and nearer to his own, that tore him almost with a
shriek from his uneasy slumber, after long paralyzed attempts
to move ; now it would be the breathing, that got louder and
yet more guttural till the air reverberated with it. Again and
again he had sat up in bed with flying pulse and damp fore-
head, and lit a match to see how much more of the night
there was still to run ; or, looking for any sound of movement
from his uncle's room at the end of the passage, he would
think he heard steps along the corridor, and a stealthy opening
or shutting of midnight doors. Once it was a spray of jasmine
tapping at his window which woke him with a start, and, think-
ing that some evil news was knocking at his door, it was with
an effort that he controlled his throat sufficiently to bid the
knocker enter. But about the time of the first hint of the


MR. FRANCIS IS BETTER 9I
midsummer dawn, when the birds were beginning to tune their
notes for the day, and the bushes and eaves grew merry with
chirrupings, he fell into a more peaceful sleep, and woke only
on the rattle of his blinds being rolled up.
His heart leaped as he received his uncle's message, and he
got up immediately, and, putting on only a dressing-gown and
slippers, went out with a rough towel over his arm for a dip in
the lake before breakfast. The sluice at the lower end of it,
where a cool ten feet of water invited him, lay not more than
a couple of hundred yards from the house across a stretch of
nearly level lawn, and was hidden from both road and house by
a screen of bushes. Sleep still lingered like cobwebs in drowsy
corners of his brain, but all the horror of the evening and its
almost more horrible repetitions during the earlier hours of the
night, had been swept away by the news at awakening, and
it was with a thrill of pleasure, as indescribable as the scent
itself of the clear morning, that he drank deep of the freshness
of the young day. The sun was already high, but the grass
that lay in the shadow of house and bush was still not dry of
its night dews, and a thousand liquid gems brushed his bare
ankles. The gentle thunder of the sluice made a soft, low bass
to the treble of birds and the hum of country sounds—that
summer symphony which pauses only for the solo of the night-
ingale during the short dark hours. The lightest of breezes
ruffled the lake, scarcely shattering the mirrored trees and sky
that leaned over it. And Harry stood for a moment white and
bare to the soft wind, with the sun warm on his shoulders,
wondering at the beauty of his bath. Then, with arms shot
out above his head, and his body braced to a line, he sprang
off the stone slab of the sluice, and disappeared in a soda-water
of bubbles and flying spray.
Surely that moment, he thought, as he rose again to the
surface, was the crown and acme of bodily sensation. The
sleep had been swept from him—house, bed, pillows, darkness
had gone. He was renewed, starting fresh again, cool and
clean, with all the beautiful round world waiting for him.


92 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Expectancy and hope of happiness, interest, awakening love,
were all strung to their highest pitch in this completeness of
bodily well-being; his soul was moulded in every part to its
environment, freed of its bodily burden, and with a song in his
mouth he stepped out of the water for the glow of the towel.
He sauntered leisurely back to the house, purring to himself
at the delight which the moment gave him. How could there
be men who found their pleasure in eating and drinking, in the
life of crowded rooms and smoky towns, when in half the acres
of all England, and round all its coasts, were such possibilities?
How, above all, was it possible to exist for a moment if one
had not the privilege of being violently in love? Then, with
a laugh at himself, he suddenly found that he was hungry,
ravenous, and his step quickened.
Half an hour later he was seated at breakfast, but already
the first mood of the day was past. He had for an hour gone
free, untrammelled by all the obligations which events and
circumstances entail, but now he was captured again. One
thing in particular wove a heavy chain round him. He had
seen with amazed horror the effect on his uncle of that news
that he had thought would be so welcome. Was it reasonable
to suppose, then, if a name alone produced so ill-starred a
result, that he could bear the sight of the girl? After the
catastrophe of the night before, it would be cruelty of a kind
not to be contemplated to return again to the subject. The
disappointment was grievous. That visit of Lady Oxted's and
Evie's, so bright in anticipation that his mind's eye could
scarcely look on it undazzled, must be given up. Plain, simple
duty, the ordinary incontrovertible demands of blood and kin-
ship, compelled him to it. His own happiness could not be
purchased at the cost of suffering to that kindly old man; and
who knew how much he might be suffering even now?
Then, with the mercurial fluctuation of those in love, he fell
from the sky-scraping summits into a black, bottomless gulf of
despondency. Evie could not come here, she could never
come here, he told himself. And at that, and all which that


MR. FRANCIS IS BETTER 93
implied, he pushed his chair quickly back from the table, and
left a half-eaten breakfast. His reasonable mind could not
make itself heard; it told him that he was pushing things
comically far, that he was imagining an inconceivable situa-
tion when he concluded that a young man must not marry
because of the feelings of his great-uncle on the subject; but
his mood was not amenable to reason. The world had gone
as black as an east wind, and all the flowers were withered.
He heaved a lover's sigh, and, going out of the glass-door
into the garden, walked moodily up and down the lawn for a
space, consumed with pity, half for himself, half for his uncle.
Directly above were the windows of his own bedroom, wide
open, and a housemaid within was singing at her work.
Further on were the two rooms in which his uncle chiefly
lived, a big-sized dressing-room in which he slept, and next
door the bedroom which he had turned into a sitting-room.
These windows were also open, and Harry, even on the noise-
less grass, trod gently as he passed them, with that instinct for
hushed quiet which all feel in the presence of suffering.
“Poor old fellow ! poor dear old fellow !' he thought to him-
self, with a pang of compunction at the shock he had so un-
wittingly caused that cheerful suffering spirit.
Then suddenly, as he passed softly below, there came from
the windows, mingling in unspeakable discord with the house
maid's song, a quick shower of notes from a flute.
Harry paused; the player was evidently feeling his fingers
in the execution of a run, and a moment afterwards the dainty
tripping air of “La donna è mobile’ came dancing out into
the sunlight like a summer gnat. Twice the delicate tune was
played with great precision and admirable light-heartedness,
which contrasted vividly with the listener's mood, and was
instantly succeeded by some other Italian air, unknown to the
lad, but as gay as a French farce.
Harry had paused open-mouthed with astonishment. His
own thoughts about his kinsman, sombre and full of tenderness,
were all sent flying by the cheerful measure which the kinsman


94 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
was executing so delightfully. A smile began to dawn in the
corners of his mouth, enlightenment returned to his eye, and,
standing out on the gravel-path, he shouted up :
“Uncle Francis 1 Uncle Francis I’
The notes of the flute wobbled and ceased.
‘Yes, my dearest fellow,’ came cheerfully from above.
‘I am so glad you are so much better. May I come up and
see you?'
“By all means, by all means. I was just on the point of
sending Sanders down to see if you would.”
Harry went up the stairs three at a time, and fairly danced
down the corridor. Sanders, faithful and fox-like, was outside,
his hand on the latch.
‘You will be very careful, my lord?' he said. “We mustn't
have Mr. Francis agitated again.”
“Of course not,’ said Harry, and was admitted.
Mr. Francis was lying high in bed, propped up on pillows.
The remains of his breakfast, including a hot dish of which no
part remained, stood on a side-table; on his bed lay the case
of the beloved flute.
“Ah, my dear boy,’ he cried, “I owe you a thousand and one
apologies for my conduct last night. Sanders tells me I gave
you a terrible fright. You must think no more of it; you must
promise me to think no more of it, Harry. I have had such
seizures many times before, and of late, thank God, they have
become much rarer. I had not told you about them on purpose.
I did not see the use of telling you.’
‘Dear Uncle Francis, it is a relief to find you so well,” said
Harry. “Sanders told me last night that he knew how to deal
with these attacks, which was a little comfort. But I insist on
your seeing a really first-rate doctor from town.”
Mr. Francis shook his head.
‘Quite useless, dear Harry,’ he said, ‘though it is like you
to suggest it. Before now I have seen an excellent man on
the subject. It is true that the attack itself is dangerous, but
when it passes off it passes off altogether, and during it Sanders


96 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
“So that is settled,’ he said, ‘and they are coming, you tell
me, at the end of the month. That is why you want the box-
hedge cut, you rascall You are afraid of the ladies being
frightened. I almost suspected something of the kind. And
now, my dear boy, you must leave me. I shall get up at once,
and be down in half an hour. Ah, my dear Harry, my dear
Harry P and he grasped his hand long and firmly.
Harry left him without more words, and strolled out again
into the sunlight, which had recaptured all its early brilliance.
Had ever a man been so ready and eager to spoil his own
happiness, he wondered. Half an hour ago he had blackened
the world by his utterly unfounded fears, all built on a fabric
of nothingness, and in a moment reared to such a height that
they had blotted the very sun from the sky, and, like a vampire,
sucked the beauty from all that was fair. A thought had built
them, a word now had dispelled them.
He went round to the front of the house, where he found a
gardener busy among the flower-beds, and they went together
to examine the great hedge. It would be a week's work, the
man said, to restore it to its proper shape, and, Harry answer-
ing that it must therefore be begun without delay, he went off
after ladder and pruning tools. Then, poking idly at its com-
pacted wall with his stick as he walked along it, Harry found
that after overcoming the first resistance the stick seemed to
penetrate into emptiness, though the whole hedge could not
have been less than six or eight feet thick. This presented
points of interest, and he walked up to the end far away from
the house, and, pushing through a belt of trees into which the
hedge ran, proceeded to examine it from the other side. Here
at once he found the key to this strange thing, for, half over-
grown with young shoots, stood an opening some five feet
high, leading into the centre of the hedge, down which ran a
long passage. More correctly speaking, indeed, the hedge
was not one, but two, planted some three feet apart, and this
corridor of gloomy green lights led straight down it towards
the house. At the far end, again, was a similar half-overgrown


MR. FRANCIS IS BETTER 97
door, coming out of which one turned the corner of the hedge
and emerged on to the gravel sweep close by the house, imme-
diately below the windows of the gun-room.
To Harry there was something mysterious and delightful
about this discovery, which gave him a keen, childlike sense of
pleasure. To judge from the growth over the entrances to the
passage it must have been long undiscovered, and he deter-
mined to ask his uncle whether he remembered it. Then
suddenly and unreasonably he changed his mind; the charm
of this mystery would be gone if he shared it with another,
even if he suspected that another already knew it, and, smiling
at himself for his childish secrecy and reserve, he strolled back
again to meet the gardener to whom he had given orders to
clip it. There must be no possibility of his discovery of the
secret doors; the box-hedge should be clipped only with a
view to the road; the other side should not be touched, a
whited sepulchre. These orders given, he went back to the
house to wait for the appearance of Mr. Francis.
The latter soon came downstairs, with a great Panama hat
on his head, round which was tacked a gaudy riband; he
hummed a cheerful little tune as he came.
“Ah, Harry,’ he said, ‘I did not mean you to wait in for me
on this glorious morning, for I think I will not go fast or far.
Long-limbed, lazy fellow,’ he said, looking at him as he sat in
the low chair.
Harry got up, stretching his long limbs.
‘Lazy I am not,’ he said; “I have done a worldful of things
this morning. I have bathed; I have breakfasted; I have
listened to your music; I have given a hundred orders to the
gardeners—at least, I gave one; I have read the papers.
Where shall we go, Uncle Francis?’
‘Where you please, as long as we go together, and you will
consent to go slowly and talk to me. I am a little shaky still,
I find, now that I try my legs; but, Harry, there is a lightness
about my heart from your news of last night.’
‘It is good to hear you say that, for I cannot convey to you
7


98 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
how I looked forward to telling you. And you feel, you really
feel, all you said to me?’
Mr. Francis paused.
“All, all,' he said earnestly. “The past has been expunged
with a word. That burden which so long I have carried about
is gone, like the burden of Christian. Ah, you do not know
what it was But now, if she—Miss Aylwin—believed it, she
would not come within a mile of me; if her mother still
believed it, she would not let her, and Lady Oxted would not
let her. A hard, strange woman was Mrs. Aylwin, Harry; I
told you, I remember, what passed between us. But it is
over, over. Yes, yes, the healing comes late and the recom-
pense, but it comes, it has come.’
‘I do not know Mrs. Aylwin,’ said Harry. “I have never
even seen her. But I can answer for it that Miss Aylwin
believes utterly and entirely in your innocence.”
‘How is that—how is that ?" asked Mr. Francis.
“She told me so herself,’ said Harry. “How strange it all
is, and how it all works together I told her, you must know,
the first evening I met her, about the Luck, and last week,
when I was down with the Oxteds, I told her, Uncle Francis,
about the awful troubles you had been through—particularly,
particularly that one. At the moment I did not know that
she was in any way connected with the Houldsworths ; I knew
of her only what I had seen of her. And then in the middle
she stopped me, saying she knew all, saying also that she
entirely believed in you.’
Mr. Francis walked on a few steps in silence, and Harry
spoke again.
‘Perhaps I ought not to have told her,’ he said, “but the
Luck held. She was the right person, you see; and somehow
—you will agree with me, I think, when you see her—she is a
person to whom it is natural to tell things. She is so sym-
pathetic—I have no words—so eager to know what interests
and is important to her friends. Yes, already I count myself
a friend of hers.”


MR. FRANCIS IS BETTER 99
“Then her mother had not told her all?' asked Mr. Francis,
with the air of one deliberating.
“Not all, not your name. She had no idea that she was
talking to the nephew of the man about whom she had heard
from her mother.’
Mr. Francis briskened his pace, like a man who has made
up his mind.
‘You did quite right to tell her, Harry,' he said—' quite
right. It would come to her better from you than from anyone
else; also it is far better that she should know before she came
here, and before you get to know each other better. I have
always a dread of the chance word, so dear to novelists, which
leads to suspicion or revelations. How intolerable the fear of
that would have been We should all have been in a false
position. But now she knows, we have no longer any fear as
to how she may take the knowledge ; and thank you, dear
Harry, for telling her.’
The next two or three days passed quietly and busily.
There were many questions of farm and sport to be gone into,
many balancings of expenditure and income to be adjusted,
and their talk, at any rate, if not their more secret thoughts,
was spread over a hundred necessary but superficial channels.
Among such topics were a host of businesses for which Mr.
Francis required Harry's sanction before he put them in hand
—a long section of park-paling required repair, some design of
planting must be constructed in order to replace the older trees
in the park against the time that decay and rending should
threaten them. All these things and many more, so submitted
Mr. Francis, were desirable, but it would be well if Harry
looked at certain tables of estimates which he had caused to be
drawn up before he decided, as he was inclined to do, that
everything his uncle recommended should be done without
delay. Items, inconsiderable singly, he would find ran to a
surprising total when taken together, and he must mention a
definite sum which he was prepared to spend, say, before the
end of the year, on outdoor improvement. Things in the
93.5135A
------------
7—2


Ioo THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
house, too, required careful consideration; the installation of
the electric light, for instance, would run away with no negli-
gible sum. How did Harry rank the urgency of indoor
luxuries with regard to outdoor improvements? If he in-
tended to entertain at all extensively during the next winter,
he would no doubt be inclined to give precedence to affairs
under the roof; if not, there were things out of doors which
could be mended now at a lesser cost than their completer
repair six months hence would require.
Mr. Francis put these things to his nephew with great
lucidity and patient impartiality, and Harry, heavily frowning,
would wrestle with figures that continually tripped and threw
him, and in his mind label all these things as sordid. But the
money which he could immediately afford to spend on the
house and place was limited, and he had the sense to apply
himself to the balancing. At length, after an ink-stained and
arithmetical morning, he threw down his pen.
‘Electric light throughout, Uncle Francis,” he said, ‘and hot
water laid on upstairs. There is the ultimatum. The house
is more behind than the park, therefore the house first.’
‘You see exactly what that will come to ?' asked Mr.
Francis.
‘Yes, according to the estimates you have given me I can
afford so much, and the park palings may go to the deuce.
One does not live in the park palings, and since you mention
it, I dare say I shall ask people here a good deal next winter.
Let's see ; this is mid-June—let them begin as soon as Lady
Oxted and Miss Aylwin have been, and they should be out of
the house again by October, though the British workman
always takes a longer lease than one expects. I shall want to
be here in October. Oh, I wish it was October. Pheasant-
shooting, you know,' he added, in a tone of apology.
He tore up some sheets of figures, then looked up at his
uncle.
‘You will like to have people here, will you not, Uncle
Francis P’ he asked. “There shall be young people for you to


MR. FRANCIS IS BETTER IOI
play with, and old people for me to talk to. And we'll shoot,
and oh, lots of things I’
He got off his chair, stretching himself slowly and
luxuriously.
“Thank goodness I have made up my mind l’ he said. “I
thought I was never going to. Come out for a stroll before
lunch.”
Whether it was that the multiplicity of the arithmetical
concerns came between the two, or, as Harry sometimes
fancied, his uncle was not disposed to return to that intimacy
of talk which had followed his strange seizure on the first
night, did not certainly appear. The upshot, however, was
plain enough, and, busy as a committee of ways and means,
the two did not renew their conversation about Miss Aylwin
and all that bordered there. As far as concerned his own
part, Harry did not care to speak of what was so sacred to
him, and so near and far; she was the subject for tremulous
solitary visions, to discuss was impossible, and to trespass near
that ground was to make him silent and awkward. No great
deal of intuition was necessary on Mr. Francis's part to under-
stand this, and he also gave a wide berth to possible em-
barrassments.
The Sunday afternoon following Harry left again for London,
for he was dining out that night. He said good-bye to his
uncle immediately after lunch, for at the country church there
was a children's service which Mr. Francis had to attend,
since he was in charge of a certain section of the congregation
—those children, in fact, who attended his class in the village
Sunday-school.


CHAPTER XI
MR. FRANCIS SEES HIS DOCTOR
HARRY had held long sessions in his mind as to whether he
should or should not ask other people to Vail, to meet Lady
Oxted and Miss Aylwin at the end of the month. It was but
a thin hospitality, he was afraid, to bring two ladies down to
Wiltshire to spend a country Sunday, and provide for their
entertainment only the society of himself and his uncle; and
this fear gradually deepening to certainty, he hurriedly asked
four or five other guests only two days before the projected
visit, in revolt all the time at the obligations of a host. All
of these, however—as was not unnatural at this fullest time in
the year—were otherwise engaged, and he opened each letter
of regret with increasing satisfaction. He had been baulked
in the prosecution of his duty; it was no use at this late hour
trying again.
There were also other reasons against having a party; his
uncle's health, for instance, so he wrote to him, had not been
very good since his attack. He had been left rather weak and
shattered by it, and though his letter was full of that zest and
cheerfulness which was so habitual a characteristic with him,
Harry felt that it might be better, particularly since his first
meeting with Miss Aylwin would of necessity be somewhat of
an emotional strain to him, not to tax him further either with
the arrangements incidental to a larger party, or with their
entertainment. These dutiful considerations, it must be con-
fessed, though perfectly genuine, all led down the paths of his
own desires; for it was just the enforced intimacy of a partie
carrée in the country from which he promised himself such an
exquisite pleasure. With a dozen people in the house, his


MR. FRANCIS SEES HIS DOCTOR Io3
time would not be his own; he would have to look after
people, make himself agreeable to everybody, and be continu-
ally burdened with the hundred petty cares of a host. But the
way things were, all that Sunday they would be together, if not
in foursome then in pairs; and the number of possible com-
binations of four people in pairs he could see at once was
charmingly limited.
But though to him, personally, the refusal of others to come
to his feast was not an occasion for regret, an excuse to the two
ladies as to the meagreness of the entertainment he was pro-
viding for them, however faltering and insincere, was still
required. This he made with a marvellously radiant face a
few evenings before their visit, as he sat with them in Lady
Oxted's box at the Opera.
‘I have to make a confession,’ he said, drawing his chair up
at the end of the second act of “Lohengrin,’ ‘and as you are
both so delighted with the music, I will do so now, in the hope
that you may let me off easily. There is absolutely no one
coming to meet you at Vail; there will be my Uncle Francis
and myself, and that is all.'
Evie turned to him.
‘That is charming of you,' she said, ‘and you have paid us
a compliment. It is nothing to be asked as merely one of a
crowd, but your asking us alone shows that you don't expect
to get bored with us. Make your curtsey, Aunt Violet.’
“But there's the Luck,” said Lady Oxted. ‘I gathered that
the Luck was the main object of our expedition, though how it
was going to amuse us I don't know any more than I know
how Dr. Nansen expected the North Pole to amuse him.
And why, if you wanted to see it, Evie, Harry could not send
for it by parcel-post I never quite grasped.’
“Or luggage train, unregistered,” said Violet. “Why did you
not give it to the first tramp you met, Lord Vail, and ask him
to take it carefully to London, for it was of some value, and
leave it at a house in Grosvenor Square, the number of which
you had forgotten? How stupid of you not to think of


MR. FRANCIS SEES HIS DOCTOR IOS
‘Indeed I shan't, Miss Aylwin,’ said Harry. “Don’t think
it. But will you, then, come to Vail, Lord Oxted P I thought
it would be no use asking you.’
‘I may not be popular,’ said he, “but I have still a certain
pride.”
Here the orchestra poised and plunged headlong into the
splendid overture of the third act, and Lady Oxted, whose
secret joy was the hope that she might in the fulness of time
grow to tolerate Wagner by incessant listening to him, glared
furiously at the talkers and closed her eyes. Lord Oxted, it
was observed by the others, thereupon stole quietly out of the
box.
The curtain rose with the ‘Wedding March,” and that done,
and the lovers alone, that exquisite duet began, rising like the
voices of two larks, from height to infinite height of passion as
clear and pure as summer heavens. Then into the soul of
that feeblest of heroines began to enter doubt and hesitation;
the desire to know what she had promised not to ask grew in
the brain until it made itself words, undermining and unbuild-
ing all that on which love rests. Thereafter, the woman having
failed, came tumult and death; the hopeless lovers were left
face to face with the ruin that want of trust will bring upon all
that is highest, and with the drums and the slow, measured
rhythm of despair, the act ended. -
“The hopeless, idiotic fool of a girl ' remarked Evie, with
extreme precision, weighing her words. “Oh, I lose my
patience with her l'
“I thought your tone sounded a little impatient,” said Lady
Oxted.
‘A little ! Why, if Lohengrin had said he wanted to write a
letter, she could have looked round the corner to see that he
was not flirting with one of the chorus, and have opened his
letter afterwards. If there is one thing I despise, it is a sus-
picious woman.’
‘You must find a great many despicable things in this
world,' remarked Lady Oxted.


Ioë THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
‘Dear aunt, if you attempt to be cynical, I shall go home in
a hansom by myself,’ said Evie.
‘Do, dear, and Harry and I will follow in the brougham.
Do you want to stay for the last act?'
“No ; I would sooner go away. I am rather tired, and Elsa
has put me in a bad temper. Good-bye, Lord Vail, and expect
us on Sunday afternoon; please order fine weather. It will
be enchanting; I am so looking forward to it.’
Harry himself went down to Vail on Friday afternoon, for
he wished both to satisfy himself that everything was arranged
for the comfort of his visitors, and also to meet them himself
when they came. The only train he could conveniently catch
did not stop at his nearest station, and he telegraphed home
that they should meet him at Didcot. This implied a ten-mile
drive, and his train being late on arrival, he put the cobs to
their best pace in order to reach Vail in time for dinner.
Turning quickly and rather recklessly into the lodge gates, he
had to pull up sharply in order to avoid collision with one of
his own carriages which was driving away from the house. A
stable-helper, not in livery, held the reins, and by his side sat
a man of dark, spare aspect, a stranger to him. As soon as
they had passed he turned round to the groom who sat behind.
‘Who was that P’ he asked.
‘I don't know his name, my lord,” said he, “but I drove him
from the station last Monday. He has been staying with Mr.
Francis since then."
Harry was conscious of a slight feeling of vexation, arising
from several causes. In the first place—and here a sense of
dignity spoke—any guest either of his or his uncle's ought to
be driven to the station properly, not by a man in a cap and a
brown coat. In the second place, though he was delighted
that Uncle Francis should ask any friend he chose to stay with
him, Harry considered that he ought to have been told. He
had received a long letter from his uncle two days ago, in which
he went at some length into the details of his days, but made
no mention of a guest. In the third place, the appearance of


MR. FRANCIS SEES HIS DOCTOR 107
the man was somehow grossly and uncomfortably displeasing
to him.
These things simmered in his mind as he drove up the long
avenue, and every now and then a little bubble of resentment,
as it were, would break on the surface. He half wondered at
himself for the pertinacity with which his mind dwelt on them,
and he determined, with a touch of that reserve and secrecy
which still lingered in corners and angles of his nature, that if
his uncle did not choose of his own initiative to tell him about
this man, he would ask no questions, but merely not forget
the circumstance. This reticence on his own part, so he told
himself, was in no way to be put down to secretiveness, but
rather to decency of manners. His uncle might have the Czar
of all the Russias, if he chose, to stay with him; and if he did
not think fit to mention that autocrat's visit, even though it
was in all the daily papers, it would be rude even for his
nephew to ask him about it. But he knew, if he faced himself
quite honestly, that though good manners were sufficient excuse
for his reticence, he preferred to employ secretiveness, and
nothing else was the reason for silence. Certainly he wished that
the man had not been so disrelishing to the eye; there was
something even sinister about the glance he had got of him.
Mr. Francis was in the most cheery and excellent spirits,
and delighted to see him. He was employed in spudding
plantains from the lawn as the carriage drove up. But,
abandoning this homely but useful performance as soon as he
heard the wheels on the road, he almost ran to meet him.
‘Ages, it seems literally ages, since you were here, dear boyſ'
he said. “And see, Harry, I have not been idle in preparing
for our charming visitors. Croquet !” and he pointed to a
large deal box that lay underneath the clipped yew-hedge.
‘Templeton and I found the box in a gardener's shed,' he
said, ‘and we have been washing and cleaning it up. Ah!
what a fascinating game, and how it sets off the ingenuity of
the feminine mind I was a great hand at it once, and I
think I can strike the ball still. Come, dear boy, let us get


Io8 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
in ; it is already dinner-time. Ah! my flute—it would never do
to leave that ; and he tripped gaily off to a garden-seat near,
on which lay the case containing that favourite instrument.
It happened that at dinner the same night Mr. Francis
passed Harry through a sort of affectionate catechism, asking
him to give exhaustive account of the manner in which he
had spent the hours since he left Vail a fortnight ago. Harry
complied with his humour, half shy, half proud of the number
that had to be laid inside Lady Oxted's door, and when this
was finished, ‘Now it is my turn, Uncle Francis,' he said.
“Begin at the beginning, and tell me all as fully as I have to
you.’
“Well, dear Harry, if I have not galloped about like you,
taking ditch and fence, I have trotted along a very pleasant
road,” he said. “All the week after you left me I was much
employed in writing about estimates and details with regard to
the electric light. You must look at those to-morrow. They
will be rather more expensive than we had anticipated, unless
you have fewer lights of higher power. However, that busi-
ness was finished, I remember, on Saturday. On Sunday I
had my class, and dawdled very contentedly through the day.
All this week I have been busy in little ways. One day will
serve for another. At the books all morning, and in the
afternoon pottering about alone, doing a bit of gardener's work
here, feeding the pheasants there—and they are getting on
capitally—or down at the farm. Then very often a nap before
dinner and a blow on the flute afterwards. A sweet, happy,
solitary time.”
The servants had left the room, and as Mr. Francis said
these words he looked closely at Harry, and saw his face, as
he thought, harden. The lips were a little compressed, the
arch of the eyebrows raised ever so little; something between
surprise and a frown contracted them. He had already
thought it more than possible that Harry might have met the
other trap driving away from the house, and he thought he saw
confirmation of it in his face. He sighed.


MR. FRANCIS SEES HIS DOCTOR Io9
“Ah, Harry,’ he said, “can you not trust me?’
Mr. Francis's voice was soft, almost broken ; his blue eyes
glistened in the candle-light, but still looked intently at his
nephew. And at the amenity and affection in his tone the
boy's reserve and secretiveness, which he had labelled good
manners, utterly broke down.
‘You have read my thoughts,” he said, ‘and I apologize.
But why—why not have told me, Uncle Francis P You would
not have thought I should mind you having whom you liked
here.”
Mr. Francis sighed again.
“I will tell you now,” he said, slightly accentuating the last
word. “I did not tell you before; I purposely concealed it
now ; yes, I even used the word “solitary” about my life during
the last week in order to save you anxiety.’
‘Anxiety?' asked Harry.
‘Yes. You met, probably, somewhere near the lodge gates,
one of your carriages going to the station. A man out of
livery drove it, a man of middle age sat by him. He was my
doctor, Harry, and he came here on Monday last. I wished '
—and his tone was frankness to the core—“I wished to get
him out of the house before you came. I did not know you
were coming till this afternoon, and I saw he could just catch
the train to town. I ordered the carriage to take him instantly,
and the man had not time to get into livery. That is all.' .
At once Harry was all compunction and anxiety. He left
his chair at the end of the table, and drew up close beside his
uncle.
“Dear Uncle Francis,” he said, ‘what was his opinion of
your health P. He was satisfied ?'
‘Fairly well satisfied,” said Mr. Francis. “The upshot was
that I must live very quietly, and take no great exertion, and
guard against quick movements. I might then hope—I might
certainly hope—to live several more years yet. At my age, he
said, one must not go hurdle-racing. Seventy-three—well, well,
I am getting on for seventy-three.' -
*


IIo THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Harry was tongue-tied with a sort of vague contrition, for
what he could hardly tell. He had been put in the wrong,
but so generously and kindly that he could not resent it. He
had had no suspicions of any kind, and his uncle's simple
frankness had made him wear the aspect of the suspector.
Indeed, where could suspicion look in P Suspicions what of P
The gist of his feeling had been that he should have been told,
and here was the considerate reason why he had not, a reason
sensible, conclusive, and dictated by thoughtful affection. Yet
he felt, somehow, ashamed of himself, and his shame was too
ill-defined for speech. But there was no long pause, for Mr.
Francis almost immediately got up from his chair, with a
nimbleness of movement which perhaps his doctor would not
have liked.
“Well, a truce to these sombrenesses, Harry,’ he said.
‘Indeed, I am brisk enough yet. Ah! what a pleasure to
have you here instead of that excellent, kind, unsociable fellow !
I have such a good story for you. Let us go to the billiard-
room; I could not tell you before the servants, though I have
had it on the tip of my tongue all evening. The doctor re-
commended me billiards after dinner; gentle, slow exercise
like that was just the thing, he said. Well, the story r
Harry rose too.
‘One word more,' he said. “Is your doctor a really first-
rate man? You remember I wanted you to see a good man.
What is his name P'
“Dr. Godfrey,” said Mr. Francis, “32, Half Moon Street.
He is a first-rate man. I have known him since he was a
boy.’


CHAPTER XII
The MEETING in The WOOD
THE two ladies were to arrive about tea-time next day, and as
the hour drew on a lively restlessness got hold of Harry. He
could neither sit, nor stand, nor read; but after a paragraph of
a page, the meaning of which slipped from his mind even as
his eyes hurried over the lines, he would be off on an aimless
excursion to the dining-room, forget what he had gone about,
and return with the same haste to his book. Then he would
remember that he wanted the table to-night in the centre of
the room, not pushed, as they had been having it, into the
window, and there must be a place left for the Luck in the
middle of the table. Again he would be off to the dining-
room. There was the table in the centre of the room, and in
the centre of the table a place for the Luck, for he had given
twenty repetitions of the order to Templeton, which was
exactly twenty repetitions more than was necessary. Harry,
in fact, was behaving exactly like the cock sparrow in mating
time, strutting before its lady, an instinct in all young males.
But there were not enough flowers. There must be more
flowers and less silver. How could Dutch silver be ornamental
in the neighbourhood of that gorgeous centrepiece, and how,
said his heart to him, could the Luck be ornamental, consider-
ing who should sit at his table P
After giving these directions, he went back again to the hall
where tea was laid. Mr. Francis was out on the lawn. He
could see his yellow Panama hat, like a large pale flower,
under the trees. The windows were all open, and the gentle
hum of the warm afternoon came languidly in. Suddenly a
fuller note began to overscore these noises in gradual crescendo.


THE MEETING IN THE WOOD II3
hand-shake, the form of words, more intimate than a man
would use to a stranger, were admirably chosen—if choice
were not a word too full of purpose for so spontaneous a
greeting—to at once recognise and obliterate the past. The
meeting was, as it were, a scene of reconciliation between two
who had never set eyes on each other before, and between
whom the horror of their vicarious estrangement would never
be mentioned or even be allowed to be present in the mind;
and Mr. Francis's words seemed to Harry to meet the situation
with peculiar felicity.
The old man seated himself near Lady Oxted.
‘This is an occasion,' he said, ‘and both Harry and I have
been greatly occupied with his house-warming. But the
weather—there was little warming there to be done; surely we
have ordered delightful weather for you. Harry told me that
Miss Aylwin wished for a warm day. Indeed, his choice does
not seem to me, a poor northerner, a bad one ; but Miss
Aylwin has perhaps had too much Italian weather to care for
our poor imitation.’
‘Lord Vail refused to promise,’ said Evie; “at least, he did
not promise anything about the weather. I was afraid he
would forget.”
“Ah, but I told my uncle,' said Harry. “He saw about it;
you must thank him.’
Evie was sitting opposite the fireplace, and her eye had been
on the picture of old Francis which hung above it. At these
words of Harry's she turned to Mr. Francis with a smile, and
her mouth half opened for speech. But something arrested
the words, and she was silent, and Harry, who had been
following every movement of hers, tracing it with the infallible
minute intuition of a lover to its deriving thought, guessed
that the curious resemblance between the two had struck with
a force that for the moment had taken away speech. But
before that pause was prolonged, she answered.
‘I do thank you very much,' she said. “And have you
arranged another day like this for to-morrow?'
8


II4 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
She looked, as she spoke, out of the open windows and into
the glorious sunshine, and Harry rose.
“Shall we not go out?' he said. “Uncle Francis will think
that we do not appreciate his weather if we stop in.”
Evie rose, too.
‘Yes, let us go out at once,” she said, “but let me put on
another hat. I am not in London, and my present hat simply
is London. Oh, Lord Vail, I long to look at that picture
again, but I won't ; I will be very self-denying, for I am sure—
I am sure it is the Luck in the corner of it.”
She put up her hand so as to shield the picture from even
an accidental glance.
‘Will you show me my way?' she asked. “I will be down
again in a minute.’
Harry took her up the big staircase, lit by a skylight, and
lying in many angles.
‘Yes, you have guessed,’ he said. “It is the Luck; you
will see the original to-night at dinner. Did anything else
strike you in the picture ? Oh, I saw it did P
‘Yes, a curious false resemblance. I feel sure it is false,
for I think that portrait represents not a very pleasant old
gentleman. But your uncle, Lord Vail—I never saw such a
dear, kind face I’
Harry flushed with pleasure.
“So now you understand,’ he said, ‘what your coming here
must mean to him. Ah, this is your maid, is she not? I will
wait in the hall for you.’
The two elder folk had already strolled out when Harry
returned to the hall, a privation which he supported with
perfect equanimity, and in a few minutes he and his companion
followed. As they crossed the lawn, Harry swept the points
of the compass slowly with his stick.
‘Flower garden, kitchen garden, woods, lake, farm, stables,'
he said.
Evie's eyes brightened.
‘Stables, please,” she said. “I am of low, horsey tastes, you


THE MEETING IN THE WOOD II 5
must know, and I was afraid you were not going to mention
them. We had the two most heavenly cobs I ever saw to take
us from the station.”
‘Yes, Jack and Jill,’ said Harry, “but not cobs—angels.
Did you drive them?'
‘No, but I longed to. May I when we go back on
Monday?'
‘Tuesday is their best day,” said Harry, ‘except Wednes-
day.”
They chattered their way to the stables, where the two
angels were even then at their toilets.
“There is not much to show you,” said Harry. “There are
the cobs that brought you. Good-evening, Jim.’
The man who was grooming them looked up, touched his
bare head, and without delay went on with the hissing toilet,
as a groom should. Evie looked at him keenly, then back to
her companion, and at the man again.
‘Yes, they are beautiful," she said; and as they turned, ‘Is
Vail entirely full of doubles?’ she asked.
Harry smiled, and followed her into the stables of the riding
horses.
‘Jim is more like me than that picture of old Francis is like
my uncle,' he said. “I really think I shall have to get rid of
him. The likeness might be embarrassing.’
‘I wouldn't do that,’ said Evie. “Our Italian peasants say
it is good luck to have a double about.'
* Good luck for which P’
‘For both. Really I never saw such an extraordinary
likeness.”
They spent some quarter of an hour looking over the horses,
and returned leisurely towards the house, passing it, and going
on to the lake. The sun was still not yet set, and the glory
of the summer evening a thing to wonder at. Earth and sky
seemed ready to burst with life and colour; it was as if a new
world was imminent to be born, and from the great austere
downs drew a breeze that was the breath of life—fresh, dry,
8—2


II6 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
unbreathed. Evie appropriated it in open draughts, with head
thrown back.
“Aunt Violet was quite right, Lord Vail, when she said you
should never come to London,’ she exclaimed. ‘How rude
she was to you that night, and how little you minded ! Even
now, when I have been here only an hour, I can no longer
imagine how one manages to breathe in that stuffy, shut-in
air. Winter, too; winter must be delicious here, crisp and
bracing.’
“So it would seem this evening,” said Harry; “but you
must see it first under a genuine November day. A mist
sometimes spreads slowly from the lake, so thick that even I
could almost lose my way between it and the house. It does
not rise high, and I have often looked from the windows of
the second story into perfectly clear air, while if you went
out at the front-door you would be half drowned in it. Higher
up the road again you will be completely above it, and I have
seen it lying below as sharply defined as the lake itself, and if
you walk down from that wood up there it is like stepping
deeper and deeper into water. A bad mist will rise as high
as the steps of those two buildings you see to the right of the
house, like kiosques, standing on a knoll, under which the
road winds, in front of the trees.’
“And the house is all surrounded, like an island? What
odd buildings | What are they?'
‘One is a summer-house; I couldn't now tell you which.
We used to have tea in it sometimes, I remember, when I was
quite little. The other is the ice-house, a horrible place; it
used to haunt me ! I remember shrieking with terror once
when my nurse took me in. It was almost completely dark,
and I can hear now the echo one's step made, and there was
a great black chasm in the middle of the floor with steps lead-
ing down, as I thought, to the uttermost pit. Two chasms
I think there were; one was a well. But the big one was that
which terrified me, though I dare say it was only ten or twelve
feet deep. Things dwindle so amazingly as one grows up. I


THE MEETING IN THE WOOD 117
wish I could see this lake, for instance, as I saw it when I was
a child. It used to appear to me as large as the sea seems
now, and as for the sluice, it might have been the iron gates
of the Danube.”
‘I know, things do get smaller,’ said Evie; “but after all,
this lake and the sluice are not quite insignificant yet. What
a splendid rush of water | And I dare say the ice-house
chasm is still sufficient to kill anyone who falls in. That,
after all, is enough for practical purposes. But then, even if
things grow smaller, how much more beautiful they become.
When you were little, you never saw half the colour or half the
shape you see now. The trees were green, the sky was blue;
but they gave one very surface impressions to what they give
now.’
‘Oh, I rather believe in the trailing clouds of glory,’ said
Harry.
“Then make an effort to disbelieve in them every day,” said
Evie. “Shades of the prison-house begin to grow around the
growing boy, do they P What prison-house does the man mean,
if you please? Why, the world—this beautiful, delightful world.
Indeed, we are fortunate convicts | And Wordsworth called
himself a lover of Nature P she added with deep scorn.
“Certainly the world has been growing more beautiful to me
lately,' said Harry.
“Of course it has. Please remind me that I have to cut my
throat without delay if ever you hear me say that the world is
growing less beautiful. But just imagine a person who loved
Nature talking of the world as a prison-house. Who was it
said that Wordsworth only found in stones the sermons he
had himself tucked under them to prevent the wind blowing
them away P’
‘I don't know. It sounds like the remark of an indolent
reviewer.’
Evie laughed.
“Fancy talking about reviewers on an evening like this ' she
said. ‘Oh, there's a Canadian canoe 1 May we go in it?'


I 18 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
The far end of the lake was studded with little islands, only
a few yards in circumference for the most part, but, as Evie
explained, large enough for the purpose. And then, like two
children together, they played at Red Indians and lay in wait
for a swan, and attempted to stalk a moor-hen with quite
phenomenal ill-success. No word of any tender kind was
spoken between them, they but laughed over the nonsense of
their own creating; but each felt as they landed that in the
last hour their intimacy had shot up like the spike of the aloe-
flower. For when a man and a maid can win back to child-
hood again, and play like children together, it is certain that
no long road lies yet to traverse before they really meet.
Lady Oxted was doomed that night to a very considerable
dose—a dose for an adult, in fact—of what she had alluded to
as nursery rhymes, for the Luck seemed absolutely to fascinate
the girl, and Harry, seeing how exclusively it claimed her eyes,
more than once reconsidered the promise he had made her
to have it to dinner the next evening as well. She would
hardly consent to touch it, and Harry had positively to put it
into her hands, so that she might read for herself its legend
of the elements. They drank their coffee while still at
table, and Evie's eyes followed the jewel till Templeton had
put it into its case. Then as the last gleam vanished, ‘I am
like the Queen of Sheba,” she said, ‘and there is no more
spirit left in me. If you lose the Luck, Lord Vail, you may
be quite sure that it is I who have stolen it, and when I am
told that two men in plain clothes are waiting in the drawing-
room, I shall know what they have come about. Now for
some improving conversation about facts and actualities, for
Aunt Violet's sake.’
Sunday afternoon was very hot, and Lady Oxted, Evie, and
Harry lounged it away under the shade of the trees on the
lawn. Mr. Francis had not been seen since lunch-time, but
it was clear that he was busy with his favourite diversion, for
brisk and mellow blowings on the flute came from the open
window of his sitting-room. Harry had mentioned this taste


THE MEETING IN THE WOOD II9
of his to the others, and it had been received by Lady Oxted
with a short and rather unkind laugh, which had been quite
involuntary, and of which she was now slightly ashamed. But
Evie had thought the thing pleasant and touching rather than
absurd, and had expressed a hope that he would allow her to
play some accompaniments for him after dinner. If Aunt
Violet, she added incisively, found the sound disagreeable, no
doubt she would go to her own room.
Harry was in the normal Sunday afternoon mood, feeble
and easily pleased, and the extreme and designed offensiveness
of the girl's tone made him begin to giggle hopelessly. Evie
thereupon caught the infection, for laughter is more contagious
than typhus, and her aunt followed. The hysterical sounds
apparently reached Mr. Francis's ears, in some interval between
tunes, for in a moment his rosy face and white hair appeared
framed in the window, and shortly afterwards he came briskly
across the grass to them.
‘It is getting cooler,’ he said gaily, “and I am going to be
very selfish, and ask Miss Aylwin to come for a stroll with me.
My lazy nephew, I find, has not taken her through the woods,
and I insist on her seeing them. Will you be very indulgent
to me, Miss Evie, and accept a devoted though an aged com-
panion ?'
Evie rose with alacrity.
“With the greatest pleasure,” she said. “Are you coming,
too, Aunt Violet P’
“Not for the wide, wide world,” said Lady Oxted, “will I walk
one yard. Harry, stop where you are, and keep me company.’
The two walkers went up under the knoll on which stood
the ice-house, talking and laughing in diminuendo. Harry
saw Mr. Francis offer the girl his arm for the steep ascent, and
it pleased him in some secret fashion to see that, though her
light step was clearly in no need of exterior aid, she accepted
it. With this in his mind he turned to Lady Oxted.
“It is a great success,’ he said. “They are delighted with
each other. Think what it must mean to my uncle !’


I2O THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Lady Oxted stifled a yawn.
‘Who are delighted P’ she asked.
Harry pointed at the two figures half-way up the slope.
‘You knew whom I meant perfectly,’ he remarked.
“I did. I really don't know why I asked. By the way,
Harry, I apologize for laughing just now. Your uncle is the
most courteous and charming old gentleman, and he is devoted
to you. In fact, I got just a little tired of your name yesterday
evening before dinner.'
Harry did not reply; he was still watching the two. They
had surmounted the knoll, and in another moment the iron
gate leading into the ride through the wood closed behind
them, and they passed out of sight among the trees.
Mr. Francis was, as has been indicated, very fond of young
people, and those who had the pleasure of his acquaintance
always found him a delightful companion. He had an intimate
knowledge of natural history, and this afternoon, as he walked
with the girl, he would now pick some insignificant herb from
the grass, with a sentence or two on its notable medicinal
qualities, now, with a face full of a happy radiance, hold up
his hand while a bird trilled in the bushes, in rapt and happy
attention.
“A goldfinch, Miss Evie,” he whispered ; “there is no mis-
taking that note. Let us come very quietly, and perhaps we
shall catch sight of the beauty. That lazy nephew of mine,’
he went on, when they had seen the gleam of the vanishing
bird, ‘was saying the other day that there were no goldfinches
in Wiltshire. I dare say he will join us here soon. He almost
always comes up here on Sunday afternoon. It used to be his
father's invariable Sunday walk.”
They strolled quietly along for some half-hour, up winding
and zigzag paths which would lead them presently to the brae
above the wood, and disclose to them, so Mr. Francis said, a
most glorious prospect. Below them, down the steep hillside
up which they had circuitously made their way, lay the blue
slate roof of the stables. In the yard they could see a retriever


THE MEETING IN THE WOOD I2 I
sleeping, and the sound of a man whistling came up very clear
through the stillness of the afternoon. Then they turned a
corner—the last, so Mr. Francis said—and the path, which
had hitherto been all loops and turns, straightened itself out
as it gained the end of the ridge up which the wood climbed.
But here they were no longer alone, for not fifty yards in front
of them they saw a girl in a pink dress, and with her a young
man in straw hat and dark-blue serge, of strangely familiar
figure; his arm was about her waist. On the instant the man
turned, and Evie, to her indescribable amazement, saw that it
was Lord Vail. He said a word hurriedly to the girl, and
turned off down a side-path, while the girl walked quickly on.
The glance had been momentary.
A short, stifled exclamation arose from Mr. Francis.
“Ah! the foolish fellow !" he cried ; and then, without a
pause: ‘Yes, as I told you, there are only beeches up here,
Miss Evie. Those oaks which you were admiring so much
seem to stop as suddenly as if you had drawn a line of demar-
cation half-way up the hill. Now, why is that, I wonder?
The oak is the hardier of the two, yet it is the beeches that
prefer the colder situation. Strange, is it not? There used
to be oaks here, but they have all died.’
They soon came out at the top of the hill, where the glorious
prospect which Mr. Francis had promised Evie spread largely
round them. But he had grown silent and distrait, quite
unlike himself, and instead of rhapsodizing over the magni-
ficence of the rolling hills, he gazed for a moment but sadly at
them, pointed out to his companion various distant landmarks,
as if he did not expect her to be interested, and remarked that
it was time for them to turn. Nor was Evie much more
talkative; the sight of Harry with that girl had strangely
wounded her. Little had she thought, when Mr. Francis said
he often spent his Sunday afternoon here, that she would see
him thus. She told herself that he was perfectly at liberty to
walk in his own woods with anyone he pleased, but that he
had availed himself of that liberty she felt like an insult offered


I22 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
to her. Her quick eye had taken in the girl in a moment;
her dress, the way she put her feet down when she walked, all
spoke of a certain class. Ten to one she was the daughter of
the gamekeeper or butler. Ah! how disgusting men were !
Mr. Francis walked by her in silence, with a frown on his
usually serene brow, and, it would seem, some matter in
debate. Suddenly he turned to her.
‘Dear Miss Evie,’ he said, ‘will you allow a very old man
to take a very great liberty? Do not think too hardly of
Harry, poor fellow, I beg of you. He has been much alone,
without companions, and young men will be young men, you
know. And I would stake—yes, I would stake all I have—
that what you and I have seen was a mere harmless little
flirtation, a few words said on either side, not meant by either,
a kiss or two, perhaps, changing owner. Harry is young, but
he is a good fellow, and an honest one. You are disgusted,
naturally; but I have never known—believe me, I have never
known—these little foolishnesses of his mean anything; they
are altogether superficial and innocent.’
He spoke with a very kind and serious voice, and with
much of entreaty in his tone. But Evie's eyes were still hard
and angry; she thought she had never heard so tame a
defence.
‘This sort of thing has gone on before, then P' she asked.
“Ah ! do not force me,' pleaded Mr. Francis. “I will go
bail, I tell you, on Harry's honesty.’
“Certainly I will not force you,' she said. “Come, Mr.
Francis, this is not a nice subject; let us have no more of it.
That was really Oxford we saw just now, was it? How
wonderfully clear the air must be here !'
They passed down through the wood and to the house,
where they both turned in. But in a minute or two Evie
found she had left a book on the lawn, and went out to fetch
it. Tea was laying there, and under the trees where she had
left them an hour ago were Lady Oxted and Harry at full
length in their garden-chairs, both, it would seem, fast asleep.


THE MEETING IN THE WOOD 123
And at that sight a sudden question asked itself in the girl's
mind. How could it possibly be Harry they had seen in the
wood? And before the question was asked the answer came,
and she said softly to herself, ‘Jim.”
Her book was lying close to the sleepers, but she had
already forgotten about it, and she turned quietly away,
casting one glance at Harry, whose straw-hat was lying on the
grass, and noticing with a faint, unconvincing sense of justi-
fication that his clothes were also of dark-blue serge. But,
habitually honest, even with herself, she knew that her self-
judged case would be summed up against her, and she set her
teeth for a lonely and most humiliating ten minutes. Without
definite purpose in her mind, except that association should be
an added penance, she went to the lake, and sat down in the
Canadian canoe in which they had played Red Indians the
evening before.
How could she, she asked herself, have been so distrustful,
so malicious, so ready to blacken P. She had seen a young
man walking with a girl, and she had been knave enough, and
also fool enough (which was bitter), to accept the shallow
evidence of her eyes when they told her that he was Harry.
Had she not been warned against such wicked credulity, even
as Elsa had been warned by Lohengrin, by the sight of that
slim, handsome groom last night in the stable-yard? Had she
not said to Harry, ‘Is Vail full of doubles?” Out of her own
mouth should she be judged. A worse than Elsa was sitting
in the Canadian canoe. For half an hour at least she had
believed that Harry was flirting with a servant-girl, that he was
capable of leaving her to suppose that he was going to keep
Lady Oxted company under the trees, and as soon as her
back was turned set off to meet his village beauty. Loyalty
a feeling she professed to admire How would any girl in her
position who had an ash of what had once been loyalty have
acted? She would have flatly refused to believe any evidence;
sight, hearing, every sense, would have been powerless to touch
her. Harry could not do such a thing. How did she know


I24 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
that ? For the present that was beside the point; she knew
it, and that was enough. Perhaps—and the warm colour
came to her face—perhaps she would come to that presently.
She sat up and beat the water with the flat of the paddle.
‘Fool, fool—base little fool!' she whispered, a syllable to a
stroke.
Suddenly she stopped, the paddle poised.
‘I have never known these little foolishnesses of his mean
anything’ rang in her ears. So ! This sort of thing had hap-
pened before. . . . What? Was she again skulking and
suspecting, even after the lesson she had received P. She had
believed, though only for half an hour, the evidence of her
own eyes, and she had suffered for it. Was she now to believe
the evidence of somebody else's tongue? Yet Mr. Francis
had said it, that dear old fellow who was evidently so devoted
to Harry, so pained at what they had seen. No; it did not
matter if the four major prophets had said it. She knew
better than all the stained glass in Christendom, and again
she belaboured the water to the rhythm of ‘Fool, fool—base
little fool!'
For a few moments her thoughts flew off to Mr. Francis.
He must have known that Harry's twin brother was a groom
in the stables, yet he had been as certain as she that it was
Harry they had surprised in the wood. He had been at pains
to persuade her that the fault was venial, to remind her that
young men would be young men, that Harry was honest. Why
had he felt so certain on so slight a glance that it was Harry?
What did it mean P. Then she whisked Mr. Francis from her
mind. He was as despicable as she, neither more nor less.
He was as great a fool as she.
Was he? Was he? Did he know Harry as well as she,
he who had known him all his life, she who had known him
a month, no more? Certainly he did not, could not. She,
who knew him so well, had rightly accused herself of disloyalty
to him, compared herself to Elsa, and him. . . . Did she,
then, owe him loyalty P Ah, a big word


THE MEETING IN THE WOOD I25
She put the dripping paddle back into the boat, for she was
in wider fields than self-reproach has ever hedged about, and
leaned forward, hearing the ripples lap and cluck on the sides.
Supposing anyone else, Geoffrey Langham, for instance, had
chosen to walk in a wood with a dairymaid, would she have
cared, would it have stung her ? Not a jot. Then why—
At this she rose, stepped out of the boat, and for a moment
looked at the wavering outline of her reflection in the lake.
Then she stood upright, her arms fallen by her sides, and a
little voice spoke within her, which she tried to tell herself was
not she.
“I surrender,’ it said.
She walked back to the lawn, proud and shy of the revela-
tion she had made to herself, and with a mind once more un-
shadowed. Lady Oxted apparently had just awoke, and was
looking distractedly round, as if she found herself in a strange
bedroom ; Harry, with one arm behind his head, still slum-
bered.
“Unconscious innocent—tea said Lady Oxted, truculently
poking him in the ribs with her parasol.
Harry opened both his eyes very wide like a mechanical doll
awakening.
‘Why did you do that?' he said. “I have been lying here
quietly, thinking. Have they come back from their walk?'
‘No,' said Lady Oxted; “they are lost. A search-party
went out about three hours ago to look for them. Rockets
and other signals of distress have been seen intermittently
from the downs.”
Harry sat up and saw Evie, and instantly turned his back on
Lady Oxted.
‘Did you have a nice walk?" he asked. ‘I wish I had come
with you. I'—and he looked round to see whether the
parasol was within range—'I have been terribly bored this
afternoon. Lady Oxted has positively no conversation.’
Evie looked first at him, then at her aunt.
“Well, you both look all the better for your—your silence,’


I26 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
she said. “Yes, Lord Vail, we had a charming walk. And
we surprised your double love-making in the wood.'
“Oh yes, the dairymaid,” said Harry. “She's as pretty as a
picture.”
‘I always wonder where the lower orders get their good
looks from,” said Lady Oxted parenthetically.
Harry picked up his straw-hat.
“Probably from the lower orders,’ he remarked. ‘Let's
have tea. Sleeping is such hungry work, is it not, Lady
Oxted P I am sure you must be famished.”
‘Elephantine wit,” sighed that lady. “When Harry is so
kind as to make a joke, which is, unfortunately, not so rare as
one might wish, I always feel as if heavy feet were tramping
about directly overhead.”
“And when Lady Oxted makes a joke,” said the lad, ‘which
is not so often as her enemies would wish, she always reminds
me of a sucking spring directly underfoot. I give one water-
logged cry, and am swallowed up. Do pour out tea for us,
Lady Oxted. You are such an excellent tea-maker.’
‘The score is fifteen all,” remarked Evie.
“When did Harry score ?' demanded Lady Oxted, seating
herself at the urn.
“Just now, dear aunt. And so Jim is to marry the dairy-
maid, Lord Vail P'
‘And who is Jim P' asked Lady Oxted.
‘My double. I wish I knew as much about horses as he.
Yes, Jim is walking out with the dairymaid.’
‘I have heard enough about Jim,” said Lady Oxted de-
cisively. ‘Here is Mr. Francis. Mr. Francis, take my side;
there is a league against me.’
“A charming one,’ said Mr. Francis, directing his gay glance
to Evie.
But the girl did not meet it; she looked quite gravely and
deliberately away.


CHAPTER XIII
HARRY ASKS A QUESTION
HARRY was leaving next morning with the two women, being
unable to induce Lady Oxted to stop another day; and, in
consequence, he sat up late that night, after they had gone to
bed, looking over the details of the expense of putting in the
electric light. The cheapest plan, it appeared, would be to
utilize the power supplied by the fall of water from the lake,
for this would save the cost of engines to drive the dynamos.
In that case it would be necessary to build the house for them
over the sluice, but this, so wrote the engineer, would not
interfere with the landscape, for the roof would only just be
seen above the belt of trees; or, if Lord Vail did not mind a
little extra expense, a tasteful erection might be made, which,
instead of diminishing, would positively add to the beauty of
the view from the house. Then followed a horrific sketch of
Gothic style.
Harry's thoughts were disposed to go wandering that night,
and he gave but a veiled and fugitive attention to the figures.
The lake suggested other things to him brighter than all the
thirty-two-power lamps of the electric light. The latter, it
appeared, could be in the house by September, but the other
was in the house now. In any case there should be no horrors
ornamental or otherwise over the sluice, and he turned to the
second estimate, which included engines, with a great deter-
mination to think of nothing else.
The scene of this distracted vigil was his uncle's sitting-
room, where all the papers were to hand. Mr. Francis had sat
up with him for half an hour or so, but Harry had then per-


128 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
suaded him to go to bed; for all the evening he had appeared
somewhat tired and worried. Then from next door there came
for some half-hour the faint sounds of brushings and splashings,
that private orchestra of bedtime, and after that the house was
still.
Harry settled down again to his work, and before long his
mind was made up. He would have, he saw, to screw and
pinch a little, but on no account should anything, Gothic or
not, spoil the lower end of the lake; then, pouring himself out
some whisky-and-soda, he took a last cigarette.
The table where he worked was fully occupied, but orderly.
A row of reference-books—Bradshaw, the Peerage, Whitaker's
Almanack, and others—stood in a green morocco case to the
left of the inkstand; to the right, in a silver frame, a large
photograph of himself. Among other books he was amused
to see a Zadkiel's Almanack, and he drew it from its place, and
turned idly over a leaf or two. There was a cross in red ink
opposite the date of January 3, on which day, so said this
irresponsible seer, a discovery of gold would be made. Harry
thought vaguely for a moment of South Africa and Klondyke,
then suddenly gave a little gasp of surprise. That had been
the day on which he had found the Luck.
The coincidence was strange, but stranger was the fact that
his uncle, who had so often remonstrated with him on his half.
laughing, half-serious notice of the coincidences which had
followed its discovery, should have a Zadkiel at all, strangest
that he should have noted this date. Then suddenly a wave
of superstitious fear came over him, and he shut Zadkiel hastily
up, for fear of seeing other dates marked. Two minutes later
he was already laughing at himself, though he did not reopen
Zadkiel ; and, as he took his candle to go to bed, his eye fell
on a red morocco ‘Where Is It?" which lay on the table. He
knew that there was some address he wanted to verify, but it
was a few moments before he turned to G. There was the
name, “Dr. Godfrey, 32, Wimpole Street,' and on each side of
the name minute inverted commas. He looked at it in some


HARRY ASKS A QUESTION 129
astonishment, for he would have been ready to swear that his
uncle had told him 32, Half Moon Street.
He went straight to his room, however, without wasting con-
jecture or surmise over this, undressed, and blew out his candle.
Outside a great moon was swung high in heaven; no leaf
trembled on the trees, but through the summer night the songs
of many nightingales bubbled liquidly.
A few nights afterwards he and Geoffrey were sitting alone
in the house in Cavendish Square. Harry had been full of
figures, wondering what was the least sum on which this London
house could be made decently habitable. One room wanted
fresh paper, distemper was essential to another, most required
fresh carpets, and stamped leather was imperatively indicated
for the hall. Geoffrey listened with quiet amusement, for
Harry was talking with such pellucid transparency that it was
difficult not to smile. Then the question of electric light at
Vail was touched upon ; and suddenly he stopped, rose, and
beat the ashes of his pipe out into the grate.
“By the way, Geoff,' he said, ‘supposing you looked out the
name of a man whom you did not know, and had only once
heard of, in a “Where Is It?” belonging to a friend, and
found the name in inverted commas, what inference, if any,
would you draw? No, it is not a riddle—purely a matter of
curiosity.’
Geoffrey yawned.
“Even Sherlock Holmes would not infer there,' he said;
‘and even his friend Watson could not fail in such a perfectly
certain conclusion.’
“What conclusion P
“Wait a moment; let us be an obtuse detective. Is the
person from whom you have heard the name the same as the
person to whom the “Where Is It?” belongs P Lord! I give
points to Watson.'
‘It happens that it is so. Does that influence your con-
clusion?"
“It only makes it even surer; no, it can't do that, but it
9


I3o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
leaves it as sure as it was. Of course, the name in the “Where
Is It?” is not the man's real name—not the name he goes by,
anyhow.”
“So it seemed possible to me.’
“Then you were wrong. There is no question of possibility.
It is dealing with absolute certainties. Now, satisfy my
curiosity. I have not much, but I have some.’
‘Bit by bit,” said Harry. ‘Have you ever heard of a Dr.
Godfrey—heart specialist, I take it—who lives at 32, Wimpole
Street P”
“Never. But Wimpole Street is just round the corner. I
imagine he will have a plate on his door. I thought your
heart was in a parlous state.’
‘Oh, don't be funny,' said Harry, “but come along.'
Geoffrey got up.
“Shall I have to hold your hand?' he asked.
‘No, I am not going to consult him. Indeed, there is no
mystery about the whole matter. Simply Dr. Godfrey is my
uncle's doctor, and he consulted him the other day about his
heart. I happened to look out the doctor's address in his
“Where Is It?” and found the name in inverted commas. Oh,
by the way, there is a red book by you. Look out 32, Half
Moon Street. Does Dr. Godfrey live there?'
Geoffrey turned up the street.
“Certainly not, he said. “But why?'
“Nothing,” said Harry, unwilling to mention the different
address, which might have been a mistake of his own. “Come,
Geoff.”
They were there in less than a couple of minutes: Harry
had not even put on a hat for the traversing of so few paving-
stones. An incandescent gas-lamp stood just opposite the
door, and both number and plate were plainly visible. On
the plate in large square capitals was ‘Dr. G. Armytage.”
They read it in silence, and turned home again. Geoffrey
had pursed up his lips for a whistle, but refrained.
“We spell it Armytage, and pronounce it Godfrey,’ he said


HARRY ASKS A QUESTION 131
at length. “Sometimes we even spell it Godfrey, or perhaps
G. stands for Godfrey. Not that it makes any difference.”
Harry laughed, but he was both puzzled and a little troubled.
Then the remembrance of the evening when he had seen the
strange and distasteful man, Dr. Armytage it must now be
supposed, driving away from the house, came to his mind.
How excellent and kindly on that occasion had been the
reasons for which his uncle had desired that the visit should
remain unknown to Harry ! And after that lesson, should not
the pupil give him credit for some motive, unguessable even
as that had been, but equally thoughtful? He had given him
a wrong name and he felt sure a wrong address; in his own
reference-book that same wrong name, but with inverted
commas, appeared. Harry being human and of discreet
years, did not relish being misled in this manner, but he told
himself that there might be admirable reason for it, which he
could not conjecture. He had intended, it is true, to see
Dr. Godfrey privately, so as to get his first-hand opinion on
his uncle's condition, but he was not at all sure that he would
ring at Dr. Armytage's door-bell.
Lady Oxted, a few days after this, fell a victim to influenza,
and after a decent interval, Geoffrey, who, for the remainder
of the summer, had let his own rooms in Orchard Street, and
lived with Harry, called on the parts of both to ask how she
was, was admitted, and taken upstairs to her sitting-room.
Her voice was very hoarse, a temperature thermometer lay on
the table by her, and he felt himself a very foolhardy young
man.
“It is no use your being afraid of it,' said that lady to him
by way of greeting, ‘because on the one hand the certain way
to get it is to be afraid of it, and on the other you have to
stop and talk to me. I have seen no one all day, not even
Bob, as I don't want fresh cases in the house, and of course I
haven't allowed Evie near me. Oh, I am reeking of infection;
make up your mind to that.'
“But I don't matter,’ said Geoffrey.


132 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
“Not the least scrap. Really it is too provoking, getting it
again. I believe every doctor in Wimpole Street has seen me
through at least one attack. I shall begin on Cavendish
Square soon. Now talk.”
The thought of Dr. Armytage and the strange confusion of
names and addresses had often been present in Geoffrey's
mind since he and Harry had made that short and incon-
clusive expedition to No. 32, Wimpole Street, and here
perhaps was an opportunity for adding a brick to that vague
structure that was in outline only in his mind.
“Have you tried Dr. Godfrey?' he asked.
‘I never heard of him. Otherwise I should have tried him.
Where does he live?'
“It is not quite certain,’ said Geoffrey. “Personally, I
believe at 32, Wimpole Street.’
‘Is this supposed to be bright and engaging conversation,”
asked Lady Oxted, ‘which will interest a depressed influenza
patient?'
“It may interest you in time,” said Geoffrey. “To continue
—have you ever heard of a Dr. G. Armytage, heart specialist,
of 32, Wimpole Street?’
The effect of this was instantaneous. Lady Oxted sat up on
her sofa, and her shawl whisked the temperature thermometer
to the ground, smashing the bulb.
‘Yes, of course I have,' she said. “So have you, I imagine.
Or perhaps you were not born. How detestably young young
men are.’
“They get over it,” said Geoffrey.
‘Yes, and become middle-aged, which is worse. Now tell
me all you know, categorically, about Dr. Armytage.”
‘I don't know that there is one for certain,’ said Geoffrey.
“True, his plate is on the door. I don't know if I have a
right to tell you. In any case, really I know nothing.’
Lady Oxted made an impatient gesture.
“It concerns Francis Vail, of course,' she said.
Geoffrey stared.


HARRY ASKS A QUESTION I33
‘How did you know that?” he asked.
‘I will tell you when you have finished your story,” she said,
‘which, I may remind you, you have not yet begun.’
Harry had told his friend about his chance encounter at
the lodge gates with the doctor, and Geoffrey could pass on
the story complete: Mr. Francis's silence about his visit there,
his excellent reason for silence, the false name given to Harry,
and, so he thought, the false address, the false name in his
reference-book with the Wimpole Street address, and finally
their visit to the door. Lady Oxted heard him with gathering
interest, it would appear, and long before the end she was oft
her sofa, and walking up and down the room.
“And now for your story,’ said he. ‘How did you know
that it concerned Mr. Francis P’
Lady Oxted sat down again.
‘G. Armytage is Godfrey Armytage,’ she said, “a side-point
only. You have told your tale very clearly, Geoffrey. But
there is one weak point in the evidence.”
‘Evidence? What evidence?' asked Geoffrey.
‘Yes, evidence is the wrong word—chain of circumstance,
if you will. The weak point is that there is no certain
proof of the identity of Dr. Godfrey with Dr. Armytage. It
is certain to you and me, I grant you, but still— Did
Harry say what this man he met driving to the station
was like?"
““Nºt a canny man,” were his words,” said Geoffrey—
“dark, clean-shaven, forty, and distasteful.”
‘That is on all fours,” said Lady Oxted.
‘You haven't answered my question,” Geoffrey reminded her.
“No ; I will. Did you ever hear of the Houldsworth case—
the death of George Houldsworth P'
‘Yes; Harry told me about it.’
“All P The evidence of the doctors?”
‘No, not that.'
“George Houldsworth was shot, you will remember. At the
coroner's inquest the whole question naturally turned on the


I34 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
---------------— — — –---
distance from his head at which the gun which killed him was
fired. This, you will easily understand, was of the utmost
importance, for if the muzzle of the gun was not more than,
say, a yard or four feet off, it was certainly possible that he
had shot himself accidentally. But imagine the gun to have
been ten feet off, it becomes certain that some gun not his
own shot him. Now, his head was shattered; it looked to
the ordinary mind as if the injury must have been done by
shot that had already begun to spread — I cannot speak
technically. But the doctor who maintained that the shot
might easily have been fired within the shorter distance, who
was responsible, in fact, for the case not going beyond the
coroner, was Dr. Godfrey Armytage.’
Geoffrey was silent a moment.
“Well, it is all natural enough,” he said at length. “Mr.
Francis, on your own showing, has probably known the man
for a long time; it is natural also that he did not wish to tell
Harry his real name, for it was connected with that dreadful
tragedy. It is also natural, if Dr. Armytage is an eminent
man, that he should wish to consult a doctor he knew about
his condition. Why not?'
‘For this reason,’ said Lady Oxted: “Dr. Armytage is not a
heart specialist any more than you or I. He is a surgeon,
and not a very reputable one. I needn't go into details. But
it would be as sensible to go to him, if you suffered from heart,
as to go to a cabinet-maker.’
Geoffrey frowned.
“What does it all mean?' he asked sharply.
‘I have no idea at all,” said Lady Oxted. “Probably it
means nothing. Things seldom do. In any case say nothing
to Harry.'
Tea came in at this moment, and they talked of other
matters till the man had left the room. Then—
‘One thing more,' said Lady Oxted, ‘and the last. I hardly
like to say to you that I suspect nothing and nobody, because
that sounds as if there was possibly something to suspect.


HARRY ASKS A QUESTION I35
There is nothing. But this is a curious circumstance, and it
has interested me.’
Geoffrey walked back to Cavendish Square feeling vaguely
sombre and depressed. A tepid drizzle of rain was falling,
making the pavement slippery; the air was hot and thundery,
suggestive of expectancy and unrest, and this accentuated his
mood. He had no clue of any kind as to what these secret
dealings could possibly mean, and nothing that his ingenuity
could suggest was even a faintly satisfactory solution.
Every moment the sky seemed to be pressing more heavily
on to the earth, and it was as if the very tightness of the air
prevented the breaking of the storm. By the time he had
reached Cavendish Square a faint thick twilight showed over-
head, the drizzle of rain had ceased, and only a few large
drops fell sparingly. He let himself in with his latchkey, and
found himself immediately face to face with Harry, who was
just coming out. And at the sight of him he suddenly felt
that his vague fear was going to be at once realized, for in his
eyes sat a miserable despair.
‘Harry, Harry ! what is the matter?' he cried.
Harry did not look at him.
“Nothing,' he said. “Where have you been?
‘Sitting with Lady Oxted.’
“Then perhaps she will see me. She is better, I suppose.
Tell me, Geoff,' and he fidgeted with the door-handle, “did
you see Miss Aylwin?’
‘No. Lady Oxted does not allow her to come to her room
for fear of her getting the influenza.'
*Thanks. I shall be back for dinner, I expect. But don't
wait,” and he opened the door.
Geoffrey laid his hand on his arm.
‘You are not going to do anything foolish, Harry?" he asked
in a sudden, vague spasm of alarm.
‘No, you idiot. Let me go.'
‘Is there nothing I can do?' he asked.
“Nothing, thanks.’


136 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Geoffrey went into the smoking-room, and sat down in a
bewilderment of distress and anxiety. What could possibly
have happened? he asked himself. If anything had gone
wrong—if Mr. Francis, to imagine the worst, had even died
suddenly—surely Harry would have told him. Then why did
he wish to see Lady Oxted, but apparently did not wish to
see Miss Aylwin P For the moment he thought there might
be a light here; it was conceivable that he had proposed to
her and been refused. But when, where? For Geoffrey had
left him not two hours ago in his accustomed good spirits.
Again, if he had ever felt certain of anything, it was that,
unless the girl was the most infernal and finished flirt ever
made for the undoing of man, the attraction between the two
was deep and mutual. And no girl had ever seemed to him
less of a flirt than Evie. Even if this was so, why should
Harry at once wish to go to Lady Oxted? These things had
no answer; there was nothing to do but wait—wait drearily
and listen to the hiss of the faster-falling rain.
Harry drove to Grosvenor Square through the blinks of
lightning, and was shown up. Like Geoffrey, Lady Oxted
was appalled at that drawn and haggard face; like Geoffrey,
too, the question whether Evie had refused him suggested
itself to her, but was instantly rejected.
‘My dear boy, what is the matter?' she cried. ‘Have you
bad news from Vail?'
Harry took a letter from his pocket, and folded it down so
as to leave some ten lines of large, legible hand for her to read.
‘Will you read that?' he said, giving it to her.
She took it from him, and he sat down in the window.
‘. . . must prepare yourself,' it ran, “for a great shock. I
saw with such pleasure your intimacy with Miss Aylwin, and I
know, I am afraid I know, what you hoped. Harry, dear boy,
you must not allow yourself any fond feelings there. She is
already engaged, so I heard this morning from a friend near
Santa Margarita, to a young Italian Marchese. So make a
great effort, and cut her out of your life with a brave and


138 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
heart hammered creakily in his throat. Then he raised his
eyes again and met her glance. And at that his courage
coursed back like wine in his veins; she flooded and over-
flowed his heart; he was lost in an amazement of love, a man
again. In two steps he covered those ten miles.
‘You told me to aim at being the King of England,” he
said ; “I have aimed far higher. And I have come to you
for the crown.”
Thus no word was said at all about the Italian Marchese, no
longer young.


CHAPTER XIV
LADY oxTED's IDEA
LADY OxTED, in spite of her husband's general reflections
upon her character, could not reasonably be called an un-
generous woman, and when, ten days after these last occur-
rences, it was her painful duty to visit the convalescent sofa of
Geoffrey Langham, she said, without circumlocution or any
attempt to shirk due responsibility, that she supposed it was
she from whom he had caught the influenza. Geoffrey, on his
side, did not regard this as anything but a certain conclusion,
but added, with the irritable resignation which accompanies
convalescence, that he did not suppose she had done it on
purpose.
The effect of this was to make Lady Oxted wonder
whether she had really given it him at all.
‘You speak as if it were quite certain,” she said. “But when
one comes to think of it, Harry came to see me the same day,
in great depression, which predisposes you to catch it, and he
hasn't, so to speak, blown his nose since.”
“Very well, then, you did not give it me,’ said Geoffrey.
‘Please have it your own way. It was my own idea. I
evolved influenza for myself. Besides, Harry was deeply in
love. You can't do two things at once.’
‘Hush-a-by, baby,' said Lady Oxted. ‘Geoffrey, I didn't
come here to be contradict 3.
‘No, to contradict, it appears.”
‘Primarily, not even that, but to propose that you and I and
Bob should go down to Oxted to-morrow ; or, rather, to tell
you that Bob and I are going, and propose that you should
join us; we shall get well in half the time down there.”


I4o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
‘Are you not well?' asked Geoffrey. “You look a picture l'
“A picture of a boiled rag,” said Lady Oxted, ‘treated with
extreme realism. Well, will you come P'
“Of course I will, with pleasure. I long to get out of this
frowsy town. What does Miss Aylwin do?'
“She will go to the Arbuthnots while I am away, poor
dear!”
“She might do worse. And Harry?"
‘Harry will probably go to the Arbuthnots, too, a good deal,”
remarked Lady Oxted.
She got up.
‘I am glad you have promised to come without any hesita-
tion,’ she said, “because otherwise I should have had to press
you, which is degrading. Harry's engagement has given me
a lot to think about, and I want to express my thoughts to
some very slow, ordinary person like you, in the same way as
Molière used to read his plays to his housekeeper. I have
got a sort of idea in my head, and I wish to see how it
impresses the completely average mind.”
‘I hope it is a nice idea,' said Geoffrey. “But one can't
tell with you. You have such an inconvenient sort of mind.”
‘It isn’t nice,” said Lady Oxted ; “in fact, it is just the
opposite. However, you will hear more of it to-morrow
evening. Here's Harry. I shall go. Dear me, I wonder
whether Bob looked as idiotic as that when we were engaged P
I don't think he can have, or I should have broken it off.”
Harry's face, in fact, wore a smile of intensely inane radiance,
but his desire to score off his aunt, as he now called her,
caused it to fade off like the breath off a razor.
‘No, dear aunt,” he replied, “but, you see, he wasn't engaged
to a person of-well, to Evie.”
Lady Oxted put her nose in the air, as if she had caught the
whiff of a bad smell.
‘Can you explain the idiocy of your smile when you
entered P' she asked.
‘Rather; I was just going to, when you began to be


LADY OXTED’S IDEA I41
personal. Three Sundays ago, when Evie was down at Vail,
she went out walking after lunch with Uncle Francis. Do you
remember, dear aunt, and you snored loud and long under
the trees on the lawn all that blessed afternoon P Yes, I see
you remember. Well, they met—oh, Lord! you can't beat
this—they met Jim and the dairymaid walking out all properly
in the wood, and Evie thought, until she came back and found
me on the lawn—she seriously thought—that Jim was me.
She was furious—I got her to confess that she was furious.
Great Scot! she thought I was flirting with the dairymaid. I
know a maid worth two of her.’
Lady Oxted began to attend suddenly in the middle of
this.
‘And what did Mr. Francis say?’ she asked. ‘Did he also
think it was you?'
‘I don't know ; Evie didn't mention him. And, then, we
began talking about something else. Poor old Geoff, how goes
it? If you give me the “flue,” I’ll poison your beef tea, and
you may lay to that. It's all the Luck.’
Lady Oxted sighed.
“Jack and Jill went up the hill,” she remarked.
‘Yes, you may laugh if you like,' said Harry, “but I'm
beginning to believe in the Luck. I paid my penalty, and
now I’m getting the reward. Oh, a big one I Did anybody
ever hear of such luck P’ he demanded.
‘Laugh? cried Lady Oxted. “Who talked of laughing?
Of course, if Evie chooses to marry a man with unmistakable
signs of incipient mania, and Mrs. Aylwin doesn't object, it's
her own affair. But I wish I was her mother.”
‘Yes, that would be something,’ said Harry, in a tone of
extreme indulgence. “It would be charming for you, as you
can't be her husband. Poor aunt l’
‘Thirty—love,’ said Geoffrey.
Lady Oxted gathered up a card-case and parasol.
‘You just wait, my boy, till I get you to Oxted,” she said
truculently.


I42 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
‘Is Geoff going to Oxted?' asked Harry, throwing himself
extravagantly on the sofa by him. “Geoff, Geoff, would you
leave me alone—alone in London, like Jessica's first prayer?
I will follow you, if it be on foot and begging my bread. I
cannot live without you. See Wilson Barrett,’ he explained,
sitting upright again, and smoothing his tumbled hair.
Lady Oxted shrugged her shoulders and shook a despairing
head.
“Poor Evie ' she said—“poor dear Evie P
Harry sprang up, and stood with his back to the door.
‘Now, why “poor Evie "?" he asked. ‘Explain precisely
why. You don't leave the room until you have explained.’
“If you don't come away from that door and let me out,’
said Lady Oxted, ‘I shall ring the bell, Harry, continuously.
This sort of ballyragging is so good for a man with a splitting
headache, and shattered by influenza. I always tell everybody
how considerate you are.”
“Geoff, have you got a headache P asked Harry.
“No ; fight it out.’
Lady Oxted cast one baleful glance at him, advanced to the
bell, and made an awkward, unconvincing movement to
indicate that she was pressing it. Harry burst into loud, rude
laughter.
“Try again, he said, ‘You have to press the button in the
centre of the bell, not a spot on the wall-paper. More to your
left.”
‘Forty—love,’ said Geoffrey.
Lady Oxted turned away from the bell with dignity.
‘I don't understand the difficulty some people feel about
apologizing,' she said. “I apologize fully for all I have said.’
‘Explain it,” said Harry.
“There is no explanation known to me. I spoke at
random ; I have not the slightest idea what I meant. Let
me out, Harry.'
At this he granted her liberty, saw her to the door, and ran
upstairs again.


I44 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
minutes ago, I propose that you should tell me the rest after-
wards.”
It was Geoffrey's first attempt at stairs since he had gone to
bed, and he threw an arm round Harry's neck and leaned his
weight on him.
‘And ten days ago,' he said, ‘I met death and despair in the
hall, and that was you. “This is what comes of the Luck,”
thought I. Oh, Harry, if I wasn't so shaky I’d fetch you such
a whack in the ribs l'
And after the manner of the British youth, they quite under-
stood each other.
The influenza party left London next day after lunch. Lord
Oxted had brought a whole library of Blue-books with him, out
of which he hoped to establish an array of damaging facts
against the Government, and his red pencil, as they sped out
of London, had no sinecure. Mile after mile of the incon-
ceivable meanness of house-backs fell behind them, and at last
Lady Oxted consented to the partial opening of one of the
carriage-windows.
“There, that is a proper breath of air, she said. “Sniff it
in, Geoffrey. But I will have no suburban microbes flying
into my face. Oh, we are wrecks, we are wrecks, but we will
stop at Oxted till we are refloated.’
Lord Oxted frowned heavily, and scored the offending page.
“Is the man Colonial Secretary,’ he asked, ‘or is he the
autocrat of all the Englands? And it never occurred to any
of them, apparently, that there might be something in those
grand pianos. I should have thought that somebody might
have guessed that this immense importation of huge cases
implied something. But I am wrong; nobody guessed it.
They said they could not be expected to see through stone
walls. Stone walls, indeed! They couldn't see through plate-
glass windows.’
“So the pianos turned out to be stone walls,” said his wife.
‘Yes; they were put up round Pretoria.”
The heat in London had been intense, and perhaps it was not


LADY OXTED’S IDEA I45
less at Oxted, but there was a difference in its quality unnoticed
by the thermometer, and after tea the two wrecks made them-
selves exceedingly comfortable on the lawn, and Lady Oxted,
without warning, began the statement of her idea to the very
ordinary person.
‘Harry's marriage is fixed for the middle of November,” she
said; “Evie will have to go back to Santa Margarita first, and
I hope she may persuade her mother to come over for it. It
is now the middle of July; there are four months before he
will be married. Much may happen in four months.”
‘As a rule very little does,’ remarked Geoffrey. -
“In this case I sincerely hope that very little will,” said she.
“Geoffrey, I am not altogether happy about it.’
‘Why not?' he asked. “You told me you pushed Harry till
he went and asked her. Did you mean him to be refused?
Or are you afraid that either of them will think they have made
a mistake P Of course, they are both young.’
Lady Oxted laughed.
‘You funny old maid,” she said. “No, I am not afraid of
that.”
“Never mind me,’ he said. “What are you afraid of, then?'
Lady Oxted was silent so long that Geoffrey would have
repeated his question had he not felt quite certain that she
had heard it. As it was, it was a full half-minute, an aeon of a
pause in conversation, before she replied. Then, “Of Mr.
Francis,” she said.
Geoffrey had just lit a match for his cigarette, but he held it
so long that it burned down, and he threw it hastily away as
the flame scorched his finger-tips. The cigarette he put very
carefully and absently back in his case.
‘What on earth do you mean?' he asked.
“It was to tell you that—that I particularly wanted you to
come down here. Listen l'
Lady Oxted felt herself suddenly nervous, even when her
only audience was the very ordinary person. She had thought
the matter over in her own mind so constantly that she hoped
IO


146 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
she was familiarized with it; but when it came to speaking of
it she found she was not. Thus it was that she began very
haltingly, and with frequent pauses.
“I feel sure that he is essentially opposed to the marriage,’
she said, “for reasons which I will soon tell you, and when he
professes to be so much delighted with it, I conclude he is
acting a part. Now, one has always to be cautious in dealing
with a man who is acting, until you know both what his part is
and what he himself is. As regards Mr. Francis, I know
neither. I feel sure, however, that he is a very clever old
man. Well ?”
“But is it not pure assumption that he is acting a part?”
asked Geoffrey.
‘No, it is reasoned truth. I will tell you how I know it.
The Sunday that Evie and I were down at Vail, Mr. Francis
and Evie (Evie told me this, and Harry, as you heard yesterday,
corroborated a part of it) walked in the afternoon in the wood
just above the house, and suddenly came on one of the grooms,
Jim—yes, his name was Jim—walking out with his young
woman, who is dairymaid. Now, Jim in appearance—you
have seen him many times, probably—is the very spit and
image of Harry. Evie (they only had the most momentary
glance of him) thought it actually was Harry, till she saw him
half an hour later, sleeping under a tree on the lawn. But it
appears that Mr. Francis also thought it was Harry, for he said
to himself, half aloud, “Ah, the foolish boy " Now, you,
Geoffrey, have known Harry some time, and—well, have you
ever known him behave as many young men do behave : talk
to barmaids, flirt with waitresses, all that kind of thing?'
“Never. He never did such a thing. At Oxford we used
to call him the “womanthrope.””
“Then explain to me what follows. Mr. Francis begged
Evie not to be too hard on him. He said that Harry was
honest, that his “previous foolishnesses”—the exact expression,
Evie tells me—had never been anything serious. Now, you
say there never were any.’


LADY OXTED’S IDEA 147
‘No, never,’ said Geoffrey—‘not to my knowledge, at least.
Oh, I can go much further than that: I know there cannot have
been. Harry simply is not that kind of fellow.’
“Then it appears to me that Mr. Francis only alluded to the
harmless nature of Harry's “previous foolishnesses” in order to
set Evie against him. A nice girl, you know, does not like that
sort of thing. And how was it that it never occurred to Mr.
Francis that the two figures they saw were Jim and his young
woman? It is impossible that it should not, it seems to me.
The two are engaged, Harry tells me; they often walk out
together. Mr. Francis must have known that; he must also
have known of Jim's extraordinary likeness to Harry.'
“But the likeness deceived Miss Aylwin. By the way, had
she ever seen Jim P
‘Yes, the evening before only.”
‘Yet she was deceived. Why not Mr. Francis also P
Lady Oxted paused.
‘It is very unlikely, but I grant you that it is possible.
Take what I have told you alone, and it proves nothing. But
there is more.’
She was speaking less lamely now—the words had begun to
COme.
‘You met Harry in the hall when you went back from
having tea with me a fortnight ago,” she said. “How did his
face strike you? Was it very happy? And do you know the
cause of it?’
“No ; Harry did not tell me, though I asked him.’
“Then I shall tell you,' said Lady Oxted. “I know how his
face struck me, for he came to see me immediately afterwards.
I thought all was over between him and Evie. Harry thought
so too, and his reason for it was a letter he had just received,
of which he showed me a piece. In it Mr. Francis—I know it
was he . Harry told me so afterwards—said that Evie was
engaged to an Italian Marchese. Here again there was a
certain foundation for his thinking so. It was true, at any
rate, that last winter an Italian in Rome fell very violently in love

Io-2


148 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
with her, that he proposed to her; but Evie refused him point-
blank. The thing was talked about, for it was a very good
match ; but Mr. Francis tells Harry she is engaged. He may
have been told so—again, it is just possible, though not more
than possible. Now, take these two incidents together. In
each Mr. Francis made, let us say, a mistake ; on one occasion
he mistook the groom for Harry, on the other he says that
Evie is engaged to an Italian, whereas that was never true;
she refused him. Now, does a common motive seem to lie
behind these two mistakes P Supposing for a moment that
these mistakes were, well, deliberate mistakes—very cleverly
founded on fact, I grant—can you account for both of them
by supposing one desire in Mr. Francis's mind?'
“I see what you mean,’ said Geoffrey.
“Say it, then ; I want it said.’
‘You mean that Mr. Francis wished to prevent their engage-
ment. Is that bald enough P'
‘Yes, that will do. It is a possibility which must not be
overlooked. He has failed, but I see no reason to suppose
that anything has since happened which reconciles him to
their marriage. His letter to Harry in answer to the announce-
ment of his engagement was charming, perfectly charming.
But so was his letter in which he urged him to be brave and
cut Evie out of his life with a firm hand. So also, no doubt,
was his manner when he begged Evie to overlook Harry's
platonic little walk with a dairymaid.’
Geoffrey felt vaguely uneasy. Now that these things were
said to him, he knew that somewhere in the very inmost
recesses of his brain there had lurked for some time a feeling
of which he was ashamed—a secret, unaccountable distrust of
this kind old man. It had been emphasized by the curious
adventure of Dr. Armytage's door, and since then it had
grown more alert, more ready to put up its head.
‘Now, why,' continued Lady Oxted, speaking rapidly,
“should he wish to separate the two? You would have
thought—Harry thought, and still thinks—that by this marriage


LADY OXTED’S IDEA I49
Mr. Francis would feel that the old stain of suspicion that for so
long had been on his name ever since the Houldsworth affair
will be removed. And Harry has good reason for thinking so.
Mr. Francis himself told him that Evie's coming to Vail was
the happiest thing that had happened to him for years. Why,
then, should they not marry?"
‘Perhaps Mr. Francis finds that the continued revival of
those memories which Miss Aylwin calls up is too painful,’
said Geoffrey.
“Does that seem to you reasonable P asked Lady Oxted,
‘and, if reasonable, can mortal mind invent a more awful piece
of selfishness?'
Geoffrey considered a moment.
‘No, it does not seem to me reasonable,” he said. “I recant
that.”
‘Can you, then, think of any other motive?'
“Ah, you are monstrous,” said Geoffrey suddenly. “You
suggest monstrous things.”
‘I have suggested nothing. I want to hear your suggestion.
What is it, Geoffrey P’
‘You mean that Mr. Francis does not want Harry to marry
at all. You remember that he is Harry's heir. Do you not see
how absurd such an idea is 2 Whoever heard of an old man over
seventy trying to make his grandnephew celibate P You might as
well hope to rear a child who should never see a fire or a book.’
“Ah, you are shocked,” said Lady Oxted; “but wait a
moment. Do you remember what you told me about Dr.
Godfrey and Dr. Armytage? Geoffrey, what is that sinister
man doing at Vail P He is appalling, I tell you. He is one
of the black spots on the medical profession. Heart specialist I
He is a surgeon of terrible dexterity—unscrupulous, venal.
What does Mr. Francis want with him P'
Geoffrey got up in great excitement.
“I will hear no more,” he said in a tremulous voice. “It is
you who suggest things that I have to put into words. Tell
me what you mean—say straight out what you suspect.'


I5o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Lady Oxted rose, too.
“If I knew what I suspected I would tell you,' she said.
“But I can't make out what it is. At any rate, we have talked
long enough for the present.”
She paused a moment, then broke out again, her own
anxiety—how deep she had never known till this minute—
breaking all bounds.
“Promise me this,' she cried. “Promise me you will be a
good friend to Harry. Be much with him, be observant—not
suspicious, but observant. Remember that I am afraid, though
I do not know what of. See if you cannot find out what it
is that I fear. There, that is enough. You promise me
that, Geoffrey P
“I will not play detective,’ said he. “I both like and
honour that old man.’
‘I do not ask you to play detective,' she said. “And I pray
that your liking and honour for Mr. Francis may never be
diminished. But be much with Harry, and be full of common-
sense. Come.’
‘Yes, I will promise that,' said he.


PART IV
CHAPTER XV
FROST
HARRY left London at the end of the month, paid a couple
of visits in England, went to Scotland for the remainder of
August and loitered there, since he was at the same two houses
as Evie, till September had reached its second decade of days,
and then travelled south again with her. She was on her way
straight to Santa Margarita, to spend the remainder of the
month of months with her mother, and Harry saw her off by
the boat express from Victoria, she having sternly and abso-
lutely refused to let him do anything so foolish as to travel to
Dover with her.
‘You would propose coming to Calais next,” she said; “and
Calais is but a step to Paris. I know you, Harry. And—and
how I hate the journey, and how I should love it if you were
with me !'
‘Oh, let me come 1” said he.
“Not even to Herne Hill; and the train slid out of the
vaulted gloom of the station.
Geoffrey joined him late on the same day, and next after-
noon they set off together down to Vail. Stockbroking, it
appeared, was, like pheasants, quite impossible in September,
and he was going to spend the remainder of the month with
Harry, unless some unforeseen urgency called him back. This,
he considered, was not in the least degree likely to happen, for
the unforeseen so seldom occurs.
“The house is all upside down, Geoff,' said Harry to him as
they drove from the station, “and all the time which you do


I52 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
not employ in getting severe electric shocks over unprotected
wires you will probably spend in falling into hot and cold water
alternately upstairs. The housemaids' closets seem to me just
now the only really important thing in England. I thought it
better not to tell you all this before we started, for fear of your
not coming.’
‘Oh, I can always go back,” said Geoffrey. “Is Mr. Francis
there?'
“Just now he is, but he is going away in a few days,’ said
Harry. “In fact, he is only waiting till I come, to put the
unprotected wires into my hands.’
* Is he well ?”
‘Yes, extraordinarily well, and he asked after you in his last
letter to me. Also he seems wonderfully happy at the thought
of my marriage. So we are both pleased. Well, I'm sure I
don't wonder; it will be a sort of death-blow to that tragedy
twenty years old and more now—a sort of seal and attestation
of the vileness of the suspicion. Besides, you know, it's pretty
nice for anyone to have Evie in the house always.'
“Is he going to continue being with you, then?' asked
Geoffrey.
“Certainly, as much as he will. Evie and I settled all that
without any disagreement, thank you. He is also thinking of
having a little ventre à terre, as somebody said, in town—a sort
of little independence of his own. I am delighted that he will.
Six months ago he couldn't bear the thought of going about
among people again; but now it is all changed. He will begin
to live again, after all these years. Dear old fellow, what a
good friend he has been to me ! Fancy caring about people
of twenty or so when you are over seventy. What wonderful
vitality 1"
Whatever shadow of approaching cloud—so thought Geoffrey
—might darken Lady Oxted's view of the future, it was clear
that to Harry there could not have been a more serene horizon.
Since that first afternoon down at Oxted he had not exchanged
a further word with her or anyone else on the subject, and by


FROST I53
degrees that ghastly conversation had grown gradually fainter
in his mind, and it was to him now more of the texture of a
remembered nightmare than an actual experience. For several
days afterwards, it is true, it had remained very unpleasantly
vivid to him; she had been so ingenious in her presentation of
undeniable facts that at the time, and perhaps for a fortnight
afterwards, it had nearly seemed to him that Mr. Francis had
been plotting with diabolical ingenuity against this match. If
such were the case, his apparent delight at it assumed an aspect
infinitely grave and portentous, his smiles would have been
creditable to a fiend. But as the sharper edge of memory
grew dulled, these thoughts, which had never been quite suffi-
ciently solid to be called sober suspicions, became gradually
nebulous again. Two circumstances had been the foundation
of Lady Oxted's theory, each separately capable of explanation,
and in making a judgment so serious it was the acme of unfair-
ness, so it seemed to him now, to put the two together and
judge. Each must be weighed and considered on its sepa-
rate merits, and if neither had weight alone, then neither had
weight together. There had been darker insinuations to follow;
at these Geoffrey now laughed, so baseless appeared their fabric.
Dr. Armytage might or might not be a reputable man, but the
idea of connecting his visit to Vail, when one remembered how
long he had known Mr. Francis, with something sinister and
unspoken with regard to Harry, was really a triumph for the
diseased imagination which is one of the sequelae of influenza.
Oddly enough, as if by thought transference, Harry's next
words bore some relation to this train of ideas which had been
passing through Geoffrey's mind.
“Do you remember that evening when we went to find Dr.
Godfrey, Geoff?” he said. “Well, I have so often thought
about it since, that I have determined to tell Uncle Francis
about it, and ask him to explain it all.’
This appeared an excellent plan to Geoffrey, for, little as he
believed in the solidity of Lady Oxted's bubbles of imagina-
tion, it would still be a good thing to have them pricked.


I54 THE LUCK OF THE WAILS
* Do,” he said; “ask him some time when I am there. I
should like to see his face when his little ruse is exposed. It
might be a useful lesson. Personally, I never know how to
look when my little ruses are discovered.’
Harry laughed.
“There's an excellent explanation behind, you may be sure
of that,’ he said. -
Accordingly at dinner that night, in a pause in the conversa-
tion, Harry suddenly asked:
“Seen Dr. Godfrey again, Uncle Francis?
*No, I have had no occasion to send for him, I am thankful
to say,’ he answered. “I have been wonderfully well these
last two months.”
“Geoff and I went to see him one night at 32, Wimpole
Street,' continued Harry. ‘Oh, we were not going to consult
him. But we just went to his house.’
It would have been hard to say whether a pause followed
this speech. In any case it was but a moment before Mr.
Francis broke out into his hearty cheerful laugh.
“And I'll be bound you didn't go in Phe cried. ‘Dear God-
frey! he would have been delighted to see you, though. Ah,
Harry, what a good thing you and I are friends ! We are
always finding each other out. So you actually went to
32, Wimpole Street, and found not Dr. Godfrey's name on the
plate, but Dr. Armytage's. How did you get his address, you
rascal ?”
‘Your “Where Is It?" was lying on your table the last night
I was here, when I worked at the electric light estimates. I
turned to G.’
‘Simple,’ said Mr. Francis. “Everything is simple when
you know all about it. And my explanation is simple too. I
didn't want you to go to Armytage, and fuss yourself about me,
so when you asked me for his name, I told you, if you re-
member, his Christian name, Godfrey, and I am afraid I gave
you the wrong address. He is a dear fellow, a dear good
fellow, but the sort of man who warns you against tetanus, if


FROST I55
you cut yourself shaving. He would certainly have alarmed
you, how unnecessarily look at me now and judge. He knows
too much ; I am always telling him so. He knows how many
things may go wrong, and he bears them all in mind. Yes,
my dear boy, I deceived you purposely. Do you acquit me?
I throw myself on your mercy, but I beg you to bear in mind
how kindly were my intentions.”
“Without a stain on your character,’ said Harry.
Coffee was brought in at this moment, Templeton, as usual,
bearing the case of the Luck, which had been the centrepiece
at dinner.
“Ah! they are going to put the Luck to bed,” said Harry.
“I drink to the Luck. Get up, Geoff.”
Geoffrey rose in obedience to the toast-master, and, looking
across at Mr. Francis, saw that his hand trembled a little. His
genial smile was there, but it seemed to Geoffrey, in that
momentary glance he had of him over the flowers, that it was
a smile rather of habit than happiness. His glass was full, and
a few drops were spilled as he raised it to his mouth. The
thing, trivial as it was, struck him with a curious sense of
double consciousness; it seemed to him that this was a repeti-
tion of some previous experience, exact in every particular.
But it passed off immediately, and the vague, rather un-
comfortable impression it made upon him sank below the
surface of his mind. It was already dim as soon as it was
made.
“So we are together again, we three,’ said Mr. Francis, when
he had drunk to the Luck, and carefully watched its stowage
in its case. “It is like those jolly times we had last Christmas,
when this dear fellow came of age. What a chapter of little
misfortunes he had, too ! When he was not slipping on the
steps he was falling into the fire, when he was not falling into
the fire he was catching a severe chill.’
“Not my fault,” said Harry; “it was all the Luck.”
“Dear boy, you are always jesting about the Luck. Do be
careful, Harry. If you do not take care, some day you will


156 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
find that you have fancied yourself into believing it. Six, eight
months have passed since then. What have you suffered since
at the hands of fire and frost and rain P
“Ah I don't you see?' cried Harry. “The curse came first,
then the Luck itself—I met Evie. Is not that stupendous P
Perhaps the curse will wake up again, and I shall sprain my
ankle worse than before, and burn my hand more seriously,
before the middle of November. I don't care; it's cheap, and
I wonder they can turn out happiness at such a trifling cost. I
expect there's no sweating commission at the place where the
old scoundrel who made the Luck has gone.’
Mr. Francis looked really pained.
“Come, come, Harry P he said gravely. ‘Let us go, boys;
they will be wanting to clear away.”
This implication of rebuke nettled Harry. He was a little
excited, a little intoxicated with his joy of life, a little head-
strong with youth and health, and he did not quite relish being
pulled up like this, even though only before Geoffrey. But he
did not reply, and with a scarcely perceptible shrug of his
shoulders followed Mr. Francis out. Shortly after his uncle
got out his flute, and melodies of Corelli and Baptiste tinkled
merrily under the portraits of the race.
Next day uncle and nephew had estate business to occupy
them. ‘Their work,” Mr. Francis gaily declared, “would, like
topmost Gargarus, take the morning’; and Geoffrey was given
a dog and a keeper and a gun to amuse himself till lunch-
time. He wanted nothing better, and soon after breakfast he
was off and away for all he could find in wood and hedgerow.
The stubbles only and the small brown bird were dedicated for
to-morrow.
Mr. Francis and Harry worked on till one, but on the
striking of that hour the latter revolted.
‘I can't go on any more,' he said—“I simply can't. Come
out till lunch, Uncle Francis ; it is only an hour.”
Mr. Francis smiled and shook his head.
“Not to-day, dear boy,” he replied; “there is this packet of


FROST 157
letters I have to get through before the post. But do you get
out, Harry, and sweep the cobwebs away.”
Harry stood up, stretching himself after the long session.
* Cobwebs what cobwebs P’ he asked.
“Those in your curly head.”
“There are no cobwebs. Oh, Uncle Francis, as we are talk-
ing of cobwebs, I want to get that summer-house on the knoll
put in order—the one close to the ice-house, I mean. Have
you the keys? By the way, which is which P
Mr. Francis was writing, and, as Harry spoke, though he did
not look up, his pen ceased travelling.
‘Yes, a very good idea,' he said after a moment. ‘The keys
are in the cabinet there—two of the same ; the same key fits
both. Indeed'—and his pen began slowly moving again—
“indeed, you will find plenty of cobwebs there. The summer-
house is the one on the left as you ascend the knoll going from
the house. Don't go plunging into the ice-house by mistake.
They are both shuttered on the inside; it would be a good
thing if you were to open all the windows and let them get a
good blow out. Shall I— Oh no, I must stick to my work.’
Harry had found the keys, and as he turned to leave the
room, “The one on the left is the summer-house?' he asked
again.
‘Yes, the one on the left,” said Mr. Francis, again fully
absorbed in his writing.
Harry, key in hand, went out whistling and hatless. The
morning was a page out of heaven, and as he strolled slowly
up the steep grassy bank where the two outhouses stood, with
the scents and sounds of life and summer vivid in eye and
nostril, he felt that his useful occupation of the hours since
breakfast had been a terrible waste, when he might have been
going quietly and alert with Geoffrey through cover and up
hedgerow, to the tapping of sticks and the nosing of the
spaniels. However, he had been through the farm accounts
with minute care; there would be no call for such another
morning till the closing of the next quarter.


158 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
The two buildings towards which he went were exactly alike,
of a hybrid kiosque sort of appearance, fantastic and ridiculous,
yet vaguely pleasing. Each was octagonal, with three blank
sides, four windows, and a door. Still whistling, and full of
pleasant thoughts, he fitted the key in the lock of the one to
the left hand, and, turning it, walked in. The interior was
dark, for, as Mr. Francis had told him, all the windows were
shuttered inside, and coming out of the bright sunlight, for a
moment or two he saw nothing. For the same reason, no
doubt, it struck him as being very cold.
He had taken three or four rather shuffling steps across the
paved floor, when suddenly he stopped. Somehow, though he
saw nothing, his ear instinctively, hardly consciously, warned
him that the sound of his steps was not normal. There should
have been—the whole feeling was not reasoned, but purely
automatic and instinctive—no echo to them in so circum-
scribed a building, but an echo there was, faint, hollow and
remote, but audible. At this his whistling stopped, his steps
also, and, drawing a loose match from his trouser pocket, he
struck a light. Less than another pace in front of him was a
black space, on which the match cast no illumination: it
remained black.
He felt a little beady dew break out on his forehead and on
the short down of his upper lip, but his nerves did not tell him
that he was afraid. He waited exactly where he was till the
match had burned more bravely, and then he chucked it for-
wards over the blackness. It went through it, and for two or
three seconds no sound whatever reached his ears. Then he
heard a little expiring hiss.
Still not conscious of fright, he went back, with the light of
another match, for the door had swung shut behind him, and
in another moment was out again, with the sweet, soft sun-
shine round him, and the firm grass beneath his feet. He
looked round. Yes, he had gone to the left-hand building,
the one his uncle had told him was the summer-house. He
had nearly, also, not come out again.


FROST I59
------------------- - -
At this sobering reflection a belated spasm of fear—for he
had felt none at the moment of danger—seized him, but laying
violent hold of himself, he marched up to the other door,
unlocked it, and, throwing it open, waited on the threshold
till his eyes had got accustomed to the darkness; then, seeing
a couple of wicker tables and some garden-chairs peep through
the gloom, he went in turn to each window, unshuttered it, and
threw it open.
At this moment the iron gate leading into the woods close
behind him clanged suddenly, and with a jump that testified
to his jangled nerves, he looked out. It was Geoffrey, gun on
shoulder, coming back to the house. Harry leaned out of the
window.
‘Come in here, Geoff,' he said.
Geoffrey looked round.
“Hullo I have you been opening the old summer-house 7 he
asked.
‘Yes,’ said Harry, very deliberately, ‘I’ve been opening the
old summer-house.’
Geoffrey handed his gun to the keeper, who was close behind
him, and vaulted in through one of the open windows.
“Rare good morning we’ve had,” he said, ‘You should have
come, Harry. Why, you look queer. What's the matter?'
Harry had sat down in one of the garden-chairs, and was
leaning back, feeling suddenly faint.
“I’ve had the devil of a fright !” he said. “I went gaily
marching into the ice-house by mistake, and only just stopped
on the lip of the ice-tank or the well—I don't know which it
was. Either would probably have done.’
‘Lord! how can you be such an ass?' cried Geoffrey. “You
knew that one of the two was an ice-house, and yet you go
whistling along out of the sunshine into pit-mirk, and never
reflect that the chances are exactly even that the next moment
you will be in kingdom come.’
‘Give me a cigarette and don't jaw,’ said Harry; and he
smoked a minute or two without speaking. ‘Say nothing


FROST I6I
“It is highly improbable,” said Geoffrey.
It still wanted a quarter of an hour to lunch-time, and Harry
went indoors to finish up. Geoffrey, however, remained out-
side, and as soon as Harry was gone began playing a very
curious and original game by himself. This consisted in stalk-
ing Mr. Francis, and was played in the following manner. He
hurried over the grass to the entrance of the path where they
had last seen him, and followed cautiously from bush to bush.
Soon he had the sound of the flute again to guide him, but
after a little, hearing that it was getting louder, he retired on
his own steps, and from the shade of certain rhododendrons
observed the cheery old gentleman coming back again along
the path he had taken. Mr. Francis passed not thirty yards
from the stalker; then the music ceased, and he crossed the
lawn in the direction of the two kiosques. At that a sudden
nameless thrill of horror took hold of Geoffrey, and creeping
after him till both kiosques had cleared the angle of the house,
he observed his doings with a fascinated attention.
Mr. Francis went first to the ice-house, and turned the
handle of the door, but apparently found it locked. He stood
there a few seconds flute in hand, and, taking off his Panama
hat, passed a handkerchief over his forehead, for the day was
very warm. Then it would seem that the open windows of the
summer-house caught his eye, and in turn trying that door, he
found it open. He did not, however, enter, but merely held
the door open, standing on the threshold. Then he turned,
and rather slowly—for the grass, maybe, was slippery from a
long drought—began to descend again towards the house.
Geoffrey, on his part, made a wide circuit through the shrub-
bery, and emerged on to the gravel in front of the house just
as Mr. Francis entered. The latter saw him, but apparently
had no word for him, and on the moment the bell for lunch
rang.
Their meals usually were merry and talkative; lunch to-day,
perhaps, only proved the rule, for it was eminently silent.
Geoffrey was gloomy and preoccupied, his mind in an endless
II


I62 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
tangle of indecision, shocked, horrified, yet ever telling him
that this nightmare of a morning could not be true. Harry
also, his nerves still on edge with the experience of the last
hour, was inclined to brevity of question and answer, while the
brisk cheerfulness of Mr. Francis, which, as a rule, would cover
the paucity of two, seemed replaced by a kind of dreamy
tenderness: he sighed, ate little; it was as if his mind dwelt
on some regret of what might have been. Perhaps the weather
was in part responsible for this marked decay of elasticity, for
the clear warmth of the morning had given place to a dead
sultriness of heat; the atmosphere had grown heavy and full of
thunder. At last, as they rose from a very silent meal, ‘I
went up to the summer-house this morning, Uncle Francis,'
said Harry, with the air of a man who had carefully thought
over what he was going to say. “It wants putting in order, for
it is damp and very cobwebby, as you warned me. But it
would be worth while to do it; there is a charming view from
the windows. I shall send a couple of servants up to clean it
and make it a bit more habitable.’
‘Do, dear boy—do,” said Mr. Francis. “Dear old place—
dear old place | Your father used to be so fond of it.’
The threatening of a storm grew every moment more immi-
nent, and the two young men, who had intended to ride over
the downs, decided to postpone their expedition. They stood
together at the window of the smoking-room watching the
awful and mysterious mobilization of cloud, the hard, black
edges of thunder, ragged, as if bitten off some immense pall,
coming up against what wind there was, and rising higher every
moment towards the zenith, ready to topple and break. Once
a scribble of light, some illegible, gigantic autograph, was
traced against the blackness, and the gongs of thunder, as yet
remote, testified its authenticity. Before long a few large
drops of rain jumped like frogs on the gravel path below the
windows, and a hot local eddy of unaccountable wind, like a
grappling-iron let down from the moving vapours above, scoured
across the lawn, stirring and rattling the dry-leaved laurels in


FROST 163
*-
the shrubbery, and expunging, as it passed, the reflections on
the lake. It died away; the little breeze there had been
drooped like a broken wing; the willows by the water were
motionless as in a picture; a candle on the lawn would have
burned with as steady a flame as in a glass shade within a
sealed room. The fast-fading light was coppery in colour, and
the darkness came on apace as the great bank of congested
cloud shouldered its way over the sky, but, despite the gloom,
there was a great precision of outline in hill and tree.
Harry turned from the window.
“We shall have to light the lamps,’ he said. “It is im-
possible to see indoors. Really, it looks like the Day of Judg-
ment. Shall we have a game of billiards, Geoff?”
As he spoke, the door was opened with hurried stealth, and
Mr. Francis, pale, and strangely shrunken to the appearance,
came in.
“Ah, here you are,’ he said. “I was afraid you had gone
out, and that I was alone. Is it not horrible P. We are going
to have a terrific storm. What a relief to find you here ! I—
I should have been so anxious if you had been out in this.”
‘We were just going to the billiard-room,” said Harry.
‘Come with us, Uncle Francis; we will play pool, or cut in
and out.”
“Thank you, dear Harry, but I could not possibly play with
the storm coming on,' he said. “Thunder always affects me
horribly. But if you will let me, I will come with you, and
perhaps mark for you. I cannot bear being alone in a thunder-
storm.’
They went to the billiard-room, and Harry lit the lamps,
while Mr. Francis, creeping like a mouse round the walls, and
taking advantage of the cover of the curtains, began hurriedly
closing the shutters.
‘Oh, why do you do that P' said Harry. “We shall not see
the lightning.’
Even as he spoke a swift streamer of violet light shot
down, bisecting the square of window where Mr. Francis was
II–2


164 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
nervously tugging at the shutter, and for a moment showing
vividly the dark and stagnant shapes of the drooping trees.
Mr. Francis's hand fell from the shutter as if it had been
struck, and with a little moaning sigh he covered his face with
his hands. Almost simultaneously a reverberating crash, not
booming or rumbling, but short and sharp, answered the light-
ning, and Mr. Francis hurried with crouching steps to the
sofa.
“Put up all the shutters, I implore you, Harry,’ he said in a
stifled voice. ‘Shut them quickly, and draw the curtains over
them. Ah!’ he cried, with a whistling intake of breath, “there
it is again l'
His terror was too evident and deep-seated not to be pitied,
and the two young men hastily closed all the shutters,
drawing the curtains over them as Mr. Francis had requested.
“Is it done—is it done?’ he asked in a muffled voice, his
face half-buried in a sofa cushion. ‘Be quick; oh, be quick!’
For an hour he sat there with closed eyes and finger-
muffled ears while the storm exploded overhead, the picture of
cowering terror, while the other two played a couple of games.
From time to time, if there had been a comparatively long
interval of quiet, he would begin to take a little interest in the
play, and once even, when for some five minutes the steady
tattoo of the rain on the leads overhead had continued un-
broken by any more violent sound, he went to the marking-
board. But next moment a dirling peal made the rest drop
from his hand, and at a shuffling run he went back to the sofa
and again muffled ears and eyes.
The storm passed gradually away, the sharp crack of the
overhead thunder gave place to distant and yet more distant
rumblings, and the afternoon was not over when Mr. Francis,
cautiously opening a chink of shutter, let in a long, dusty ray
of sunshine. The heavens were clear again, washed by the
rain, and of a most pellucid blue, and Mr. Francis, recovering
with mercurial rapidity, went gaily from window to window
unshuttering.


FROST 165
‘What a relief, what a blessed relief P he cried. “How
delicious is this freshness after the storm 1 Ah, the beauty of
the world ! I drink it in ; it is meat and drink to me.’
He nodded to the others.
‘I must go out,’ he said. “I must go out and see if this
horrible storm that has passed has done any damage. I am
afraid some trees may have been struck by that cruel lightning,
in all their strength and beauty. It is terrible to think of,
that exquisite delicate life, rent, shattered in a moment by the
flame.’
He went out, and the two others looked at each other like
augurs.
“Nerves,’ said Harry.
‘Bad conscience,” said Geoffrey, and these were all the
comments made by either on Mr. Francis's hour of purgatory.
It was too late when the storm was over to go for the intended
ride, and after tea Harry and Geoffrey sauntered aimlessly out,
played Red Indians again among the islands of the lake (a
game which on the present occasion was far less delightful to
Harry than when he had played it last), and finally came home-
wards as dusk fell. As they passed down the box-hedge, it
suddenly occurred to Harry (so imaginative had been the
realism with which his friend had played Red Indians), that
Geoffrey was perhaps capable of seeing the secret of the inside
passage in a suitably romantic light, and he took him round
to the back of the hedge.
‘A mystery, Geoff, a deep dark mystery,’ he said, and
shutting his eyes against the springing twigs which had over-
grown the door, jumped into the hedge. The elastic fibres of
the box flew back like a spring into their normal position, and
Geoffrey, who for the moment had been intent, with back
turned, on the lighting of a cigarette, looked up when that
operation was over, and found that Harry had vanished as
suddenly and as completely as any lady in the cabinet-trick.
In the dusk it was impossible, except to anyone who knew
where to look, to see any difference of uniformity in the


I66 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
texture of the hedge, and the illusion of his vanishing was
complete.
“Here, Geoff, come in,’ said Harry, still invisible, “and
don't put out that match. It is darker than the plague of
Egypt.”
‘Come where? How? Where are you?'
Harry laughed, and held back the twigs.
‘That was a great success,’ he said. “And oh, Geoffrey, if
you have a spark of the romantic left in you—and I think you
have, for you were a masterly Red Indian—this ought to make
it blaze. Look | a tunnel right down the hedge. Isn't that
secret and heavenly Think how many plots we might over-
hear if people were only kind enough to make them as they
went down the road. Think of the stirring rescues you could
make, hiding here till the pursuit went by.”
Geoffrey was quite suitably impressed.
‘I call this really ancestral,” he said. “Talk low, Harry;
we may be overheard. Where does it lead to ?
“Right down to the house, and comes out by another door,
like the one we went in by, just opposite the gun-room window.
Geoff, if you'll conceal yourself here all to-morrow, I'll bring
your meals when I can slip away without attracting attention.
You mustn't smoke, I'm afraid.’
‘Oh, if only there was the smallest cause for doing so I said
Geoff “Does no one know it except you and me?’
‘I don't think so. I daren't ask Uncle Francis if he does
for fear he does. I shall tell Evie, but no one else. Lord,
what a baby one is . Why does this give me pleasure? There,
just peep out at the end, Geoffrey, so that if you are pursued
from the house you will know where the door is ; but be
cautious. Now we'll walk up again inside, and steal softly out
where we came in, else someone from the house might see us.
No, I think not another match. It's too risky.”
“I should like to give one low whistle,’ said Geoffrey.
“Just as a signal P All right.”
Even as the whistle was on his lips, there came from some-


FROST 167
- F--------
where close at hand a sudden gush of notes from a flute, and
the two stood there huddled against each other in the narrow
passage, petrified into sudden silence and immobility, but
shaken with inward laughter. Peering on tiptoe, as it were,
through the hedge, they could just make out the figure of Mr.
Francis, walking airily along the grass border by the edge of
the drive, on his way to the house. Soon his feet sounded
crisp and distant on the gravel, and the two idiots breathed
again.
“A near thing,” said Harry. ‘Let us go back, Geoff; if you
had lit that match, we should almost certainly have been dis-
covered.”
Mr. Francis left early the next morning for London to see
two or three little flats, one of which he thought might perhaps
be compassable with the modest sum he was prepared to give for
a pied à terre in town. None of them were in very fashionable
districts; the one which seemed to him most promising was in
Wigmore Street, and this held forth the additional advantage
of being near Cavendish Square. Harry had telegraphed to
the caretaker there to get a couple of rooms ready for his uncle,
and without his knowledge (for he would certainly have depre-
cated such a step) he had sent up from Vail a kitchenmaid,
who was also a decent cook, in order to make him more com-
fortable. Mr. Francis had breakfasted, and the trap to take
him to the station was already at the door when the two
young men came down, and he hailed them genially from the
threshold, as his luggage was put up.
“Good morning, dear boys,’ he cried. “You will have a
lovely day for your shoot. It is perfect after yesterday's storm.
Yes, I am just off, I am sorry to say. I shall stop at least a
week in town, I expect, Harry, but I will let you know when
I am thinking of coming back.’
Harry went out, just as his uncle climbed nimbly up into
the dog-cart. Geoffrey had stayed in the hall, and was
glancing at the paper.
“Uncle Francis,” he said, “do take that more expensive flat


I68 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
in De Vere Gardens, if you find it suits you better. Don't
consider the extra expense at all ; I can manage that for you
perfectly.”
‘You are too generous to me, dear Harry,” said the othel,
stretching down and grasping his hand. “But no, dear boy;
I could not think of it. I shall be immensely comfortable in
that one in Wigmore Street. But thank you, thank you.
Luggage all in P Drive on, Jim,” he said abruptly.
Harry turned indoors, and went across the hall to the dining-
room. But Mr. Francis, after having driven not more than a
couple of hundred yards, stopped the cart, and, descending,
began to walk back towards the house. Half-way there he
stopped, and stood for a moment lost in thought, then, with
an air of a taken decision, went on more quickly. On the
threshold again he stopped, biting his lip and frowning heavily.
At that moment Geoffrey got up from his paper, and, cross-
ing the door into the entrance hall on his way to join Harry
in the dining-room, saw him through the glass-door standing
like this, and went to see why he had come back. And the
face that met him was the face of old Francis, a wicked, malig-
nant mask, even as Harry had seen it that day when the sun
shone brightly on the picture. But next moment it changed
and melted.
“I thought you had gone,' said Geoffrey. “Have you for-
gotten something?'
‘Yes, my flute,’ said Mr. Francis, not looking at him, and,
picking it up from where it lay on the piano, he went out again,
and walked quickly up the drive to where the dog-cart was
waiting.
‘That was not what he came for,” thought Geoffrey to him-
self.


CHAPTER XVI
Fire
HARRY was in the most extravagantly high spirits this morning,
and at breakfast the two laughed over the most indifferent
trivialities like schoolboys. Stories without wit, and of the
bluntest kind of point, rude personal remarks, repartees of the
most obvious and futile kind, were enough to make one or
other, and usually both, fit to choke with meaningless laughter.
To Geoffrey, at least, there was great and conspicuous cause
for a mounting spiritual barometer in the departure of Mr.
Francis. All yesterday, since he had seen him tripping up to
the ice-house after Harry's escape, he had grown increasingly
aware of a creepiness of the flesh which his neighbourhood, or
the thought of him, had produced. He had not slept well
during the night, and had kept awaking from snatches of
nightmare-dozing, in which sometimes Mr. Francis, sometimes
the figure of the portrait of old Francis, would be enticing
Harry on to some dim but violent doom. Now, like some
infernal Piper of Hamelin, Mr. Francis would precede Harry,
playing on his flute, and drawing him ever nearer to a bank of
lurid cloud out of which from time to time leaped crooked
lightning; now he would have him affectionately by the arm,
and walk with him chatting and laughing towards a little house
that stood on rising ground. The house, to the tongue-tied
dreamer who longed to warn his friend but could not, kept
changing in form ; now it would stand alone, now it would be
but one in a countless row of houses all alike, stretching to left
and right from horizon to horizon; but whether solitary or
among a hundred identical with it, he knew that there lurked
there a danger of vague and fatal kind. Sometimes it was the


17o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
beams and very stones of it that were ready to fall as soon
as the door was opened; sometimes every window of it, he
knew, would bristle with shooting flames as soon as Harry
set foot within it; sometimes he could see that it was in
reality no house at all, but a black pit, infinite in depth, from
which rose an icy miasma. Yet in whatever form Harry's
companion appeared, and in whatever form the house, when
they were quite close to it, Mr. Francis would push Harry
suddenly forward with an animal cry of gratified hate, and
Geoffrey would start from his dream in a sweat of terror.
Then there was another shocking point: the man who walked
with Harry was indefinite and changeable; he would start with
him in the image of Mr. Francis, and they would yet be but a
stone’s-throw on their walk when it was Mr. Francis no more,
but the old baron of the Holbein picture. Sometimes Evie's
face would look out in panic terror from an upper window, and
the dreamer could see her wave her hands and scream a
warning; but the two apparently could neither see nor hear
her, and drew steadily nearer that house of death.
But the sanity of the morning sun, the crisp chill of his bath,
above all the departure of Mr. Francis, restored Geoffrey to
his normal level, and, the normal once reached, the pendulum
swung over to the other side by as much as it had fallen short
during those nervous terrors of the night, and he ate with a
zest and appetite more than ordinary, and a keen and conscious
relish for the day. Even at the end of this ridiculous meal,
when he had already laughed to exhaustion, a fresh spasm
suddenly seized him, and Harry paused, teacup in hand, to
know the worst.
‘Oh, it is nothing,” said Geoffrey; ‘indeed, it didn't strike
me as at all funny at the time. But as I came across the hall,
there was Mr. Francis at the door, though I had heard the
dogcart start. He had come back for something he had for-
gotten. Guess what it was ; I only give you one guess.'
Harry's hand began to tremble, and the corners of his mouth
to break down.


172 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
“The Luck is waking up,” he said. “Frost yesterday—that
was the ice-house—and this looks awfully like fire.”
Several panes of glass in the window had been shattered by
the concussion, and Harry pointed the gun out.
‘Now for the second barrel,” he said; and the click of the
falling trigger was the only answer.
He opened the breech, and took out the smoking cartridge-
Case.
‘One cartridge only,’ he said; then, looking down the
barrels: “And the left barrel is clean. It looks rather as if
the gun had been cleaned and a cartridge put in afterwards.
Odd thing to happen. Now we'll go shooting, Geoff.”
But Geoffrey was holding on to the table, trembling violently.
‘You’re not hurt?' he said.
“No ; I shouldn't go shooting if I was. Come, old chap,
pull yourself together; there's no harm done. I shall make
inquiries about this. Don't you say anything, Geoff. I am
going to look into it thoroughly, detective fashion.’
“But—but aren't you frightened?' asked Geoffrey feebly.
‘No, funnily enough, I’m not. It's the Luck; I firmly
believe it's the Luck, and the poor old devil who put the
curse in it is doing things in a thoroughly futile manner. I
am ashamed of him.’
“Ah, destroy the beastly thing !' cried Geoffrey. “Burn it,
smash it, chuck it away!”
“Not I. Oh, it's cheap—it's awfully cheap ! A hole in the
ceiling, and a penny for the cartridge, and November coming
closer.’
“Do you mean to say you believe in it all?' asked Geoffrey.
‘Yes; I believe in it all.”
“But, good God, man, somebody put the cartridge there !
Somebody told you that the summer-house was on the left >
and he stopped suddenly.
‘Yes, Uncle Francis told me that,' said Harry. “And who
made him forget which was which of the two houses? Why,
the Luck, the blessed Luck!' he cried almost exultantly.


FIRE 173
At this all the nightmares of the last twelve hours swarmed
round Geoffrey, flapping about his head.
“And who put the cartridge in that gun?' he cried, not
thinking how direct an accusation he was making.
Harry's face grew suddenly grave; the smile was struck
from it. A flash of anger and intense surprise flamed in his
eyes, and his upper lip curled back in an ugly way. Then,
seeing Geoffrey holding on to the table, still dazed and white,
he recovered himself.
‘Come, old boy,' he said, “don’t be so much upset. Yet,
Geoff, you shouldn't say that sort of thing even in jest. Have
a whisky-and-soda before going out; you're all shaky. Believe
in the Luck, like me, and you'll take things more calmly.
Yes, I mean it; at last I really mean it. I am the inheritor
of a curse and a blessing, so I take the good with the bad,
and, oh, how much the one outweighs the other By the
way, the painters are in the house; they must patch up the
paper here, and mend that hole in the ceiling. Shall I order
a whisky for you at the same time?'
‘No, I'm all right,' said Geoffrey; and he followed the
other out.
Harry was at all times a good shot; to-day he verged
on brilliancy. Geoffrey, on the other hand, who as a rule
was more than good, to-day was worse than bad. His gun
was a laggard; he shot behind crossing game, below anything
that was flying straight away from him; he was not certain
about the easiest shots, and he was only certain to miss
the more difficult ones. It seemed, indeed, that the two
had divided between them the accident in the gun-room;
the infinitely short moment in which Harry had felt the hot
breath of the fire, sharp and agonizing like a pulled tooth,
was his, but the reaction, the retarded fear, the subsequent
effect on nerve and brain, were entered to Geoffrey. He was
utterly unstrung by this double escape; twice during the last
twenty-four hours, in this peaceful country house, had Harry
looked in the very face of death—yesterday stepping gaily


174 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
towards the lip of the ice-tank; to-day, by as little a margin,
escaping this shattering extinction. A foot more, a foot less—
and as he thought of it Geoffrey bit his lip for fear of scream-
ing—and brain and bone would have been shredded over the
gun-room floor. Accidents would happen; there had always
been accidents, and there always would be, but, unlike mis-
fortunes, they nearly always came singly. What was this
malignancy that haunted Harry, dogging his steps ? What
dim figure, deadly and full of hate, hovered on the wing by
him, ready to strike? Cartridges do not automatically find
their way to guns that are cleaned and put in the stand, as
dust collects in corners. They have to be placed there; a
human hand has to open the breech, stuff it with death, close
it, and put the gun down again. These things must inevit-
ably happen before a gun goes off. Who in this case did
them P
They came by one o'clock to one of the prettiest pieces of
rough shooting on the ground, a long very narrow strip of
moorland country bounded on both sides by reclaimed fields,
tufted thickly with heather, diversified by young clumps of fir
and dense low-growing bushes, and honeycombed with rabbit-
burrows. It was scarcely more than sixty yards across, but
full half a mile in length, and the sport it afforded was most
varied and unconjecturable. On warm days partridges would
be here, covey after covey, sunning in the sandy little hollows
bare of growth, or busy among the heather, and from the
thickness of the cover and the undulations of the ground a big
covey would seldom take the air together, but rise one by one
or in couples, without general alarm being given, to right or
left of the guns, or even behind them, so close had the birds
lain in the long grasses. Here and there attempts had at one
time been made to bring the land into cultivation, and as you
tramped through heather, you would suddenly come on a
vague-edged square of potato-planting, the vegetables run riot
with great wealth of thick leaf; or a strip of corn already half
wild, and with a predominant ingredient of tares, would make
*


FIRE I75
you go slowly on the certainty of the break of brown wings, or
the delayed and head-down scurry of a hare.
To those happily old-fashioned enough to care for the sober
joys of walking up, it was the very poetry of sport, but to-day
it appeared to Geoffrey a barren and unprofitable place. For
the last hour the questions that tormented him had been
volleying even more insistently; horrible doubts and suspicions
no longer quite vague, flocked round his head like a flight of
unclean birds, and he desired one thing only, to get to the
gun-room alone, and clear up a certain point.
They had to walk over a bare and depopulated stubble to
get to this delectable ground, and Harry, as they neared it,
looked first at Geoffrey's lack-lustre face, then at his watch.
‘I had no idea it was so late, Geoff,' he said; “I think we'll
take the rough after lunch. We're only half a mile from the
house, and you look as if lunch would do you good.’
He took the cartridges carefully out of his gun.
“No mistake this time,’ he said. “We'll start over the rough
at two, Kimber ; meet us here. Oh, by the way, come up to
the house; I want to ask you something.’
Geoffrey gave up his gun with a sigh of relief.
‘Yes, let's do that piece afterwards,” he said; “I can't hit a
sitting haystack this morning, Harry.'
“There's one ; have a shot at it,” said Harry. ‘Oh, Geoff,
don't look so awfull What has happened P. There is a hole
in the gun-room ceiling. You didn't do it, and I’m not going
to send the bill to you.’
“But aren't you frightened?' asked Geoffrey. “Are you
made of flesh and blood P
“I believe so. But haven't you ever had a shave of being
shot P I'll bet you didn't give it a thought half an hour after-
wards.'
‘I know ; but it's more cold-blooded indoors, happening
the way it did. And coming on top of your ice-house affair
yesterday !’
“It's the Luck,' cried Harry. “That's the explanation of it,


176 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
and it's proved to the hilt. Fire and frost; they are done;
scratch them out, and now there remains the rain. I'm afraid
we shall not get the rain to-day, though. If one has to go
through a thing—and I certainly have—it is better to get it over
quick, and I, to do me justice, am getting it over. And, oh,
Geoff, there's a good time coming !’
Harry had to see the foreman who was in charge of the
electric light, as well as the keeper, when he got in; and
Geoffrey, after seeing him go upstairs, went quickly through
the baize door at the end of the passage from the hall, and
down to the gun-room. He wanted to find out what had
caused Harry to give a jerk to the gun when he took it up.
He had consciously seen him, the moment before it went off,
put his hand to it to lift it out of the stand, then give an addi-
tional effort, as if it had stuck. All the morning he had been
wondering about that. The obstacle, whatever it was, must,
he felt certain, have been in connection with the trigger, for it
was that jerk which had caused the gun to go off.
The men had already been at work over the damage, but
they had gone to their dinner, and the room was empty. He
went to the rack where the gun had stood, and next moment
he gave a sudden little gasp, though not of surprise; for he
had found only what he expected he should find, or some-
thing like it. Round the post at the corner of the rack was
tied a piece of cotton. Two ends, each some six inches long,
came out from it; the extremities were ragged, as if the piece
had been broken.
Another gun with hammers stood in a glazed cupboard at
the other side of the room ; Geoffrey took it out, and leaned
it in the rack as nearly as possible in the position in which he
remembered Harry's gun to have stood. Then, kneeling
down, he stretched the two broken ends of cotton in its direc-
tion. They just went round the right trigger.
He had a momentary impulse to call Harry, and show him
this, but decided not to. Harry, as he had said, was going to
investigate the mysterious presence of a cartridge in a cleaned


178 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
‘Later,’ he said, ‘Oh, how I bless the man who invented
lunch ! Do you remember saying to me once that little things
like baths and tea were much more important than anything
else?'
‘Yes; you called me a sensuous voluptuary,” said Geoffrey.
“I believe I did. So you are. So am I.’
The sensuous voluptuaries went out again as soon as lunch
was over, to shoot the rough ; and as they walked, Harry
told his friend what he had learned from the keeper.
‘I asked him first,” he said, “without telling him what had
happened, who put those two guns, yours and my uncle's, on
the table, and he didn't know. He had come in early to get
cartridges and put the guns out, and found them there. So
he took the cartridges and went. Now, until this morning, I
haven't shot here since last February, and I didn't take the
gun that behaved so—so prematurely to-day to Scotland. So I
asked whether anyone had used it since I went away, and it
appeared that Uncle Francis had several times; for his own
gun, the hammerless one which we found on the table, had gone
to the maker's to have a rust-hole taken out. Do you follow?
“Perfectly.”
“Well, two days ago, the day we came down here, Kimber
was feeding the pheasants, and he heard a shot near at hand;
and a moment afterwards a wounded hare ran across the
clearing, followed immediately by Uncle Francis. He was
almost crying, said Kimber. Do you remember how he
wounded a hare last Christmas, and was out for an hour trying
to recover it? Well, the same thing had happened, and it was
his first shot—remember that. Kimber was certain there had
been only one. But this time the hare had run into thick
cover, and there was really no chance of getting it, for it had
been hit, Kimber saw, only in one leg. Now attend, Geoff,
very closely; it's quite a detective story. As they stood there,
Kimber saw Uncle Francis take the discharged cartridge-case
out of the right barrel, and slip the unused cartridge from the
left into it. Now, that bears all the stamp of truth on it.


FIRE I79
* --~~~--------
I have seen Uncle Francis do just that a dozen times, when he
has killed with his first barrel, and does not immediately expect
another shot. To continue : then he drew another cartridge
from his pocket, but suddenly said, “I can shoot no more with
that poor wounded thing unfound.” And he snapped the
breech to, and went home. Now do you see P'
“But didn't Kimber clean the gun afterwards?
‘No,' said Harry; “Uncle Francis's man always cleans his
gun, and he, probably, seeing him return to the house almost
immediately after he had set out, and go into the garden,
naturally thought that he had decided not to shoot, and did
not clean the gun. That was why the second barrel was
clean; no shot had been fired from it, and Uncle Francis
simply forgot that he had left one cartridge in. The whole
thing hangs completely together. Then came I, picked up
the gun quickly, no doubt hitting the trigger against some-
thing, and there is a hole in the ceiling.’
Once again Geoffrey thought of the looped cotton, and once
again decided not to tell Harry. There was no use at present,
especially since Mr. Francis was not here, in giving him so
sinister a piece of information.
‘That certainly clears up a lot,” he said, conscious of the
deadly double meaning of his words.
“It clears it all up,' said Harry; “and I'll tell you now that
I felt immensely uncomfortable about it all morning, though I
was not frightened. Of course, it was horribly careless of
Uncle Francis to leave that cartridge in, and awfully careless
of his man not to look to the gun. He thought Uncle Francis
had not been shooting, for he must have returned to the house
not more than a quarter of an hour after he set out; but it
would have saved some lath and plaster if he had made sure.
Here we are; now for the rough.”
Mr. Francis, Geoffrey now believed beyond doubt in his
secret mind, was no less accountable for this gun-room explosion
than for the mistake about the ice-house; and Harry's story,
proof to the other of his direct hand, was in a way a relief to

I2-2


FIRE 181
a clue of a kind. To guard against rain, it is true, was a vast
and ill-defined project, for such an agency might be held to
include many forms of death, from drowning to pneumonia;
but it was, he felt sure, through the supposed potency of the
Luck that Mr. Francis was striking.
They spent a most rewarding hour that afternoon over the
rough, and the evening passed, as is the privilege of shooters,
in lazy, dozing content. One game of billiards had been
succeeded by a nominal reading of the evening papers, and
Harry had gone upstairs to bed at eleven, yawning fit to wrench
off a jaw not firmly muscle-knit; but Geoffrey, on the excuse of
being too comfortable in his big chair to move just yet, had sat
on in the hall, not ill-pleased to be alone, for he had many
things to ponder, and he had not yet made up his mind what
he ought to do. Conclusive as the evidence seemed to him,
Harry, he well knew, would not possibly listen to it; to tell
Harry what he believed meant simply that he left the house.
Something far more conclusive must occur before he told
Harry, and Geoffrey prayed silently that nothing more conclu-
sive should ever be on foot; he was quite satisfied with the
demonstration as it stood. And he curled himself more closely
in his chair, and began to think.
What, after all, if this series of events was due to the Luck P
Certainly, immediately after its finding three accidents by fire
and frost and rain had happened to Harry, for none of which
could Mr. Francis be held remotely responsible. What if now
these more serious accidents were to be referred to the same
agency? Geoffrey found himself smiling at the absurdity of
the thought, yet he still continued to consider it. He did not
believe it, so he told himself; his reasonable mind entirely
rejected the possibility that a thing inanimate, the work of
men's hands, be it made of wood and stone, or gold and
precious stones, could control destiny. It mattered not, as far
as the Luck was concerned, how one thought of destiny; it
was the laws of Nature, if you will, unalterable, of an in-
exorable logic; or to refer the matter one step back, it


182 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
was the will of God, who had set these natural laws at
work. Yet were not the sins of the fathers visited on the
children? Was it not possible, though ever so dimly and un-
conjecturably, that some subtle law of this hereditary kind
governed the destinies of the Vails, and that without supposing
that a cup of gold could be responsible for danger, sudden
death, and, on the other hand, for the meting out of great
happiness and prosperity, yet that the belief in some man's
mind as he watched the chasing of the legend on that plaque
of gold was true? He had observed, let us suppose—and cor-
rectly observed—some tide in the affairs of Vails; he had
embodied it allegorically in that rune on the cup, and the
allegory was true, because that which it illustrated was true.
Indeed, he had put his allegory into a form extraordinarily
vivid. Night after night that gorgeous goblet had stood before
the diners in the light of the candles, and night after night it
had seemed to grow more and more alive. What if some
occult force lurked there—if some unsleeping presence dwelt
in those diamonds? From immemorial time men had believed
that certain powers and qualities dwelt in precious stones.
There was danger in opals, and warning; they turned stale and
dim in the presence of an enemy; no opal, he remarked, was
set in bowl or handle or foot of the cup, else—here his thought
was confused, for the Luck was the potency—it might have
sickened and paled when Mr. Francis ate his dinner near it.
The amethyst drove away the fumes of wine; in diamonds
there was sovereignty; sapphires conferred judgment deep and
clear as themselves on the possessor. What if there was truth,
however small a residuum, in these tales P and how might the
potency of the stones be increased if they were put in their
appointed settings with a blessing and a curse P
He sat up in his chair conscious that he had been half
dozing, for the chime of a clock lingered on the vibrating air;
yet he had not heard the hour strike, and, still sleepy, he leaned
back again with a strong determination to go to bed instantly.
Suddenly and without cause, so far as he knew, he became


FIRE 183
broad and staring awake; his eye might unconsciously have
seen something, or his ear unconsciously heard a movement,
yet not have forwarded it in full to the brain. But every sense
told him that he was not alone.
He sat up hurriedly and looked around. Peering cautiously
into the room, barely visible in the shadow, was the face of
Mr. Francis.


CHAPTER XVII
A BIRD OF NIGHT
For a moment neither spoke.
“Dear boy, how late you sit up !' said Mr. Francis, coming
into the room. “It has already struck one. You were asleep,
I think, when I came in, and I was unwilling to awake you.
But now, tell me, is Harry all right?'
Geoffrey by this time had every sense alert; he felt perfectly
cool and collected, and saw his policy stretching away in front
of him, like a level, well-defined road.
‘Yes, Harry, by a miracle almost, is alive and unhurt,” he
said.
“Ah, I knew it! I knew it!" said Mr. Francis below his
breath.
Geoffrey paused a moment.
‘You knew what?” he asked very deliberately.
‘I knew he had been in great danger,’ said the other. ‘I
had the strongest premonition of it. You remember seeing
me this morning come back after I had started P I came back
to warn Harry. Yet how absurd he would think it! I was
deliberating about that when you saw me at the door, and
wondering what I could say to him. Then I told myself it
was a ridiculous fancy of mine, which would pass off. But all
day it has clung to me. Do what I would, I could not shake
it off, and this evening I came down here to see if all was well.
You spoke of Harry having been in great danger. Tell me
what happened, my dear boy.’
‘He nearly shot himself in the gun-room this morning,” said
Geoffrey. “He took up his gun, which was standing in a rack
close to the window, and it went off, narrowly missing him.’


A BIRD OF NIGHT 185
“But it missed him completely?' asked Mr. Francis. “He
was not touched ”
“If he had been touched he would not be alive,’ said
Geoffrey, lighting a cigarette, and looking at Mr. Francis very
intently. “The velocity of shot at such very short range is
considerable.”
Mr. Francis made a very slight movement in his chair, more
of a tremor than a voluntary motion.
‘Terrible, terrible P he said. “What awful fate is it that
dogs poor Harry?"
Geoffrey paused with mouth half open, a little wreath of
smoke curling from the corner of it.
“In what other way has an awful fate dogged Harry P he
asked.
Mr. Francis replied almost immediately.
“Those three accidents he had last spring,” he said. “How
strange they were ! they quite unnerved me.’
“He was thinking of the ice-house,” said Geoffrey to himself,
with absolute certainty. “That was a mistake.” Then aloud,
“They were not so very serious,” he said.
‘No, but uncomfortable. And, then, to-day.”
‘Yesterday, you mean,’ said Geoffrey, trying to trap him.
Mr. Francis looked up inquiringly.
“True—yesterday. How exact you are, my dear fellow ! I
had forgotten that it was, as the Irish say, to-morrow already.
But how awfull how awful That was what my strange pre-
monition meant.”
“It is odd that your premonition should have lasted all day,”
said Geoffrey, “when the danger was over by half-past ten this
morning.’
For half a second Mr. Francis's face altered. The perturbed,
anxious look which he had worn throughout the interview gave
place, though but for a moment, to a trouble of a different
type, annoyance, you would have said, keener and more
poignant than his anxiety.
‘Yes, the whole feeling I had was unaccountable,” he said.


A BIRD OF NIGHT 187
a cartridge in it. That, at least, is how Harry and I put the
thing together.’
Mr. Francis's hands went suddenly to his head, as if they
had been on wires, and he clutched despairingly at his hair.
“It is true—it is all too true !” he moaned. “I did use
Harry's gun. I did fire one shot only two days ago. Can
I have left the other cartridge in P It is possible—it is terribly
possible ! Ah, my God, what an awful punishment for a little
piece of carelessness Ah, what a lesson what a lesson 1
Supposing he had shot himself, oh, supposing >
Geoffrey watched him for some few moments in silence, as
he rocked himself backwards and forwards in his chair.
“Well, well,” he said at length, “there is no harm done. A
few shillingsworth of lath and plaster will pay for the damage.
Oh yes, and an extra penny for the cartridge, as Harry said.
But it nearly filled the bag and something more at one shot,
like Mr. Winkle.”
This very cold and unsympathetic consolation had an
astonishing effect on Mr. Francis. His rockings ceased, his
hands left his head, and by degrees his face again assumed a
sad smile.
‘Dear lad,” he said, “you have such invaluable common-
sense. There is certainly no use in crying over milk which is
not spilt. What you said was like a douche of cold water over
an aching head—yes, and an aching heart. But, tell me, is
Harry very angry with me? does he blame me, as he has every
right to, very severely?"
‘No, he is inclined to laugh at the whole thing,” said
Geoffrey. “He knows, of course, what a simple, and, in a
way, a natural accident it all was. He is no more angry
than he was yesterday, when ’ And he stopped suddenly,
remembering his promise to Harry not to tell Mr. Francis of
the ice-house occurrence. But dearly would he have liked to
have broken his word.
Again a remarkable change took place in Mr. Francis's face,
and Geoffrey, even in the middle of this midnight fencing-


I88 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
match, thought what a marvellous quick-change artist he would
have made, if only he had decided to devote his undeniable
talents to that innocuous branch of art. His smile was not; a
frightened man sat there, moving his lips as if his mouth were
dry.
‘Yesterday ! What of yesterday P he asked.
“Nothing,” said the other shortly. “I, like yourself just now,
had forgotten that it was already to-morrow. Do you know, I
am very sleepy.”
This was not ill done, for Mr. Francis could scarcely refuse
to accept an excuse which he had himself offered, and Geoffrey
could scarcely prevent smiling. But as soon as Mr. Francis
spoke again, he was again absolutely intent on their conversa-
tion.
“It is too bad to keep you up,” said he; ‘but, positively,
you must tell me more about this dreadful accident. What
else? What else?’
“There is nothing more—to tell,” said Geoffrey, pausing
designedly; for his immediate object was now to frighten
Mr. Francis, and he meant to do it slowly and thoroughly.
“What more, indeed, could there be? It was over in a
moment. Partly, I am afraid, by your fault, partly by your
man's, a cartridge was left in Harry's gun. Oh, by the way,
since you are anxious for minutiae, there is one more tiny
point that might conceivably interest you. There seemed
to me—I happened to be looking at Harry—some slight
resistance somewhere when he took the gun up. He took
hold of it, you understand, and then gave it a jerk. It has
occurred to me very forcibly, in fact, that this resistance,
whatever it was, was the cause of the gun going off.”
"The trigger, perhaps, caught in the edge of something,'
suggested Mr. Francis.
‘I don't think so,” said Geoffrey carelessly.
“Well, something of the kind,” said Mr. Francis. “Or,
again, it may have been pure imagination on your part.’
‘I don't think that either,’ said Geoffrey. “A gun, even


A BIRD OF NIGHT 189
when loaded and at full-cock—as this one must have been—
does not naturally go off when handled. Besides, I found,
when I examined the place x
He stopped suddenly, and looked up at Mr. Francis. Quick
as a lizard, fear unmistakable and shaking leaped there for a
moment, and was as quickly gone.
‘You found ?' he asked, under his breath.
“Ah, you remind me. I found a little thing—a very little
thing—which may turn out to be important. Oh, it is
ridiculous ! I cannot really tell you. I will keep it to myself,
please.’
“Really, my dear Geoffrey,' said Mr. Francis, “you tell a
story, and stop when you come to the point.”
‘I do,” said Geoffrey, “and I apologize. Anyhow, I have
made a scrupulous examination of the place, and have taken
note of a small circumstance. Again I apologize.'
Suddenly this nocturnal visit began to show in a different light
in Geoffrey's mind. Mr. Francis had come here, it is true, at an
hour when he might reasonably expect the house to be in bed,
but it was still unlikely that he had taken this trouble, and run
even so small a risk of detection, simply to learn the result of
the morning's accident. What if he had come here for some-
thing more reasonable—to destroy, perhaps, some little piece
of evidence—the evidence, it might be, which lay even now in
Geoffrey's cigarette-case ?
“Of course, I will not press you, my dear Geoffrey,” he
replied. “But consider whether it would not be better to
tell me.”
Geoffrey paused, this time because he really wanted to
think.
‘Why?" he said at length. “Either this occurrence was pure
accident, or it was a foul attempt on Harry's life. Yes, that
sounds horrible, does it not? But certainly it was either the
one or the other. Now, carelessness seems to account very
largely for it. You left a cartridge in the gun, your servant
did not clean it. But, supposing one had reason to think that


I90 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
there was foul play, I should take this evidence to the police.
And, you may be sure, at whatever cost to Harry's feelings,
and, of course, yours, at making the affair public, I will do so
at once—the moment I can form, or that I think they can
form, a conclusive series of evidence.’ He got up on these
last words, and turned to light a bedroom candle. ‘Well,
good-night,’ he said. “I shall see you at breakfast P'
‘No, my dear boy, you will not,” said Mr. Francis. “And,
Geoffrey, you must not tell Harry I have been here. I am
almost ashamed of my foolishness in coming, but that presenti-
ment of evil which was so strong in me all day drove me.
No, I shall be gone again before anyone is stirring, and break-
fasting in town while you lazy fellows are still dressing, I dare
say.”
Geoffrey thought a moment.
“As you will,’ he said. “By the way, how did you get in P
‘I got in by the front-door,” said Mr. Francis. “It was left
unlocked. Very careless of the servants.”
“Very indeed. Did you lock it?’
‘Yes, and I was just stealing upstairs when you awoke. I
had meant to go very quietly to Harry's room, and just look
at the dear lad, to satisfy myself he was all right. If I had not
had the good fortune to find the door open, I should have
passed the night in the summer-house, and just seen that
all was well in the morning. I hope Harry will speak to
Templeton about the door.”
“But how will Harry know, unless he knows of your
coming?'
“Ah!’ Mr. Francis paused a moment. “I will leave it
unlocked; indeed, I must when I go out. You can then call
his attention to it. Good-night, my dear boy. I shall go to
my room, too. I will sleep on the sofa; the bed must not be
slept in.'
Geoffrey turned into his room with slow and sleepy steps,
shut the door, and locked it. Then he undressed very quickly,
and over his nightshirt put on a dark coat. He was too full


A BIRD OF NIGHT I91
of this appearance of Mr. Francis, and of wonder what it really
meant, to waste time in mere idle contemplation of it, and
he sat on his bed, following out end after end of tangled con-
jecture.
Harry's safety during the hours which had to pass before
morning was his first thought, but that he speedily dismissed.
‘I have frightened the old man,’ he said to himself with
strong satisfaction. “I have made him tremble in his wicked
shoes. No, he dare do nothing to-night. There is a witness
that he is here, that he arrived secretly after dark, and left
before morning. No, Harry is all safe for to-night, but I am
glad I woke.’
Geoffrey lay back on his bed, keenly interested in what lay
before him, but astounded by the possibly imminent issues.
Hitherto his life had always run very easily—a pleasant, light
business; but now suddenly there were thrust into his young
and inexperienced hands the red reins of life and death—reins
that governed, or governed not, horses that he could but indis-
tinctly conjecture. But the reins were in his hands; it was
his business, and now, to steer as well as he could between
God knew what devils and deep seas. A thousand directions
were open to him; in all but one, as far as he could forecast
the future, lay disaster. A solution and a rescue he felt there
must be, but in what direction did it lie? To go now to
Harry's room, what risk was there, what fear of eyes behind
curtains, and, once there, what sort of reception would he
meet? Harry had gone to bed near three hours ago, and
must he be plucked from his sleep to hear this wild tale—a
tale so full of conjecture, so scant in certainties? And if he
heard it, what, to judge by Geoffrey's previous knowledge of
him—his only guide in this lonely hour—would be his manner
of taking it? One only; he knew it well: bewildered surprise,
and scorn that one whom he had accounted friend should bring
him so monstrous a tale; that he must certainly expect indig-
nant speech, or silence even more indignant, and a rupture
that would not easily be healed. No, to go to Harry now


I92 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
would in all probability mean to sever himself from him, and
this in the hour of dark need and danger.
Geoffrey got up from where he was lying, and walked silently
with bare feet up and down the room. Then he stripped off
coat and nightshirt, and sluiced head and neck with cold water.
He felt awake enough, but stupid from sheer perplexity, and
he was determined to give his faculties, such as they were,
every opportunity for lively and wise decision. There had
been, for instance, some train of instinctive thought in his mind
when he had shut the door, but dressed himself for possible
action. His brain had told him that he did not mean to go
to bed yet. Had it not told him something more? His action
in putting on dark coverings had been, perhaps, involuntary;
it was his business now to account for it.
Ah! the door by which Mr. Francis had entered—that was
it. He did not believe that he had come in, as he said, by
the front-door, for the noise of its opening and shutting, the
noise, too, of the lock which he said he had turned after he
had come in, must have awoke him from a sleep that had
never quite become unconsciousness. A clock had struck, it
is true, the moment before he was completely roused, and he
had not heard it; but how often, he reflected, do one's ears
hear the clock strike, yet never convey the message to the
brain? It was far more likely that the slight stir of movement
made by Mr. Francis as he peeped round the inner door lead-
ing to the staircase had awoke him. How, then, was it pos-
sible that he should have opened, shut, and locked a door—
the heavy front-door—have crossed the hall, and yet never
have broken in upon his doze? Besides, the face that looked
at him was that of a man peeping into a room, not of one
leaving it. It seemed, then, very likely that Mr. Francis had
not entered by the front-door; it was also hardly possible that
it should not have been locked at nightfall by the servant who
put up the shutters.
Then another difficulty occurred. Since Mr. Francis had,
by his own account, locked the front-door when he came in, it


I94 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
curly to his bare feet. Next moment he had closed the door
behind him, though without latching it, and was in the long
dark corridor running from the top of the main stairs by the
hall to the far end of the house, where were Mr. Francis's two
rooms.
Geoffrey's bedroom was close to the head of the stairs, and
the faint glimmer of the starry night filtering through the sky-
light by which they were lit made it easily possible to find his
way down. These stairs lay in short flights, with many angles,
sufficiently luminous, but on getting to the first corner he
stopped suddenly, for on the wall in front of him was a pattern
of strong light and shade; the many-knobbed banister was
imprinted there, cast by a candle. But in a moment the
shadow began to march from left to right. The light, there-
fore, was moving from right to left. Someone else, and well
he knew who, was also going downstairs at this dead hour,
three turns of the staircase ahead of him. Silently moved the
shadow, no sound of the candle-bearer reached him, and he
might reasonably hope that his own barefooted step was as
inaudible to the night-walker as was the night-walker's to him.
Then the shadow of the banister was suddenly turned off,
another corner had been passed by the other stealthy tread—
and Geoffrey moved on again and down.
This staircase at its lower end gave on to a corridor parallel
and similar to the one upstairs from which the row of bed-
rooms opened. Immediately on the right was the door into
the hall, round which, but an hour ago, Mr. Francis's face had
peered; to the left were drawing-room and dining-room, and
at the far end the baize-door leading into the flagged passage
to the servants’ stairs and the gun-room. Two panes of glass
formed the upper panels of this door, and Geoffrey, having
reached the bottom of the stairs, saw two squares of light cast
through these on to the ceiling of the corridor. They
lengthened to oblongs, diminished again to vanishing-point,
and disappeared, leaving him once more in the dim filter of
starlight. Mr. Francis, it was clear, had gone to the gun-room.


A BIRD OF NIGHT I95
Opposite the foot of the stairs, but on the other side of this
corridor, stood a tall verde-antique pedestal, on the top of
which was a bust of Harry's father. A dark curtain hung
behind this, setting off the whiteness of the Carrara bust, and
Geoffrey was just considering the value of this curtain as a
hiding-place in case Mr. Francis (the other point) went through
the hall to arrange the front-door, when the square of light
through the glass panels again reappeared, silent as a dream,
but growing very rapidly brighter. In two steps he was across
the corridor, but he had not yet got behind the curtain when
the baize door opened again, and Mr. Francis reappeared.
But now his step was quick and careless of noise, and Geoffrey,
casting one glance at him before he stepped behind the curtain,
saw rage and hunted fear in his face. And at that the thrill of
the tracker awoke in him, and he hugged himself to think of
the little piece of cotton in his cigarette-case; its value, to
judge by the baffled hate that came up the passage, was im-
measurably increased. Then he slid behind the curtain.
The steps came nearer very quickly, muffled but audible,
and paused opposite Geoffrey's hiding-place. Then for a
moment his heart stood still, for they did not turn towards the
hall, but pattered swiftly upstairs. He had thought Harry safe
for the night, at any rate, but what could be safe from that
mask of rage and hatred he had just seen P
In another moment he would have followed at all costs,
when a light again shone round the corner of his curtain, and
the unseen steps passed where he stood and into the hall.
Instantly Geoffrey slipped from his hiding-place, stepped silently
across the corridor, and mounted a few stairs. From there he
could see Mr. Francis's movements in the hall; from there,
also, he had a good start of him to the upper floor again. The
snap of a lock, the grating jar of a bolt, drawn or withdrawn,
followed, and, having heard that, he waited no more, but went
swiftly up again to his room, and closed the door behind him
quickly, but with elaborate noiselessness. Soon light footsteps
came along the passage outside; they went by his door, by
13–2


A BIRD OF NIGHT 197
Harry made his appearance at an hour not unusually late,
with a perfectly normal face and manner; no sound of last
night's excursions had reached him. They talked in their
usual desultory fashion, but Geoffrey's mind was preoccupied
with the yet unsolved problem. He felt certain that Mr.
Francis had some secret way in and out of the house, and it
should be the next piece of business to discover what that was.
Had he come in by some back-door, or through an unbolted
window, he would have told him so last night; but he had said
he came through the front-door, a thing impossible. But the
subject of a secret door was easy to approach.
“I’m working all morning, Geoff,' said Harry, “what will you
do with yourself? Poke and potter with a gun, if you like ;
we'll ride this afternoon.’
“I’ll poke and potter,’ said he, “but without a gun, I think.
I feel box-hedgy this morning.’
“I thought you did,” said Harry cordially, “but I have no
idea what you mean.’
‘That is just a little slow of you,” said Geoffrey. “It means
that I shall look behind tapestry and tap panelling, and find a
secret staircase.”
‘Do. I'll give you a shilling for every secret stair you find.”
“Done. Anything extra for a secret door?'
‘Door is two,” said Harry; “concealed will ten, skeleton
fifteen. Other objects will be valued by arbitration. Baron
von Vail has kindly consented to be arbitrator,’ he added, in a
burst of futility.
“Fifteen is a little too low for a skeleton,’ said Geoffrey. “It
would fetch more than that at a medical shop.”
“Well, twenty, if you like, but you don't raise me again.
Well, I'm off.”
“Where to ?'
“To work, you lazy hog.'
‘Yes, but where?'
‘Smoking-room. If you want to do any panel-knocking
there, come and do it at once. What a baby you are l'


198 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Geoffrey rose.
“The search is going to be exhaustive,’ he said; “I’ll begin
with the smoking-room.’
There ensued a couple of hope-deferred hours. From the
smoking-room, which yielded no results at all, he went to Mr.
Francis's rooms, which he had fixed upon as being the most
likely place for the conjectured passage to communicate with,
but the strictest scrutiny of the panelling revealed nothing.
He tapped every foot of it, and every foot sounded promisingly
hollow, yet nothing of any sort could he discover which should
yield him even a sixpence. There were cupboards of the most
alluring probability: all wore the aspect of concealment, yet all
declined to yield their secret.
Geoffrey had never been in this room before, and after a
fruitless search he took a look round before leaving it. Orderly
and industrious were the indications of its master; docketed
papers lay neatly in little heaps, and the appurtenances of its
stationery were finished and complete. Each set of papers
had its elastic band, each its note of contents in red ink; two
sets of penholders lay in separate trays, and the examination of
the nibs showed that Mr. Francis was of that rare type of man
who dedicated without violation certain pens to black ink,
certain others to red. The pencils were all well sharpened,
ink-eraser was there as well as india-rubber, a taper of green
wax was ready for the sealing of important envelopes. All this
had a curdling fascination for Geoffrey, but at present he was
on the hunt for shillings, and a detailed examination of a
writing-table brought him no nearer them.
The whole of the second floor he searched without success,
except in so far as the discovery of gaunt, chilly bedrooms,
in which a lively imagination might conjure up a pleasing thrill,
could be reckoned a reward to his labours. Over most was
the trail of the plumber, electric bells and light had been newly
introduced, and these modern improvements jostled strangely
with the faded medieval discomfort of large gloomy beds and
tapestried hangings. Like the poor lion with no early Chris-


2OO THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
tell Harry. But after a few paces his legs literally refused to
carry him in that direction. The secret was his by right of
trove; he must make the first joyful exploration alone. Again
he turned the knob, and from his chair vaulted easily into the
panel. The passage led right and left into darkness, and he
would have jumped down again to get matches, when he saw
in a little recess in the wall a candle with matches by it. This
was eminently convenient, and due no doubt to Mr. Francis's
thoughtfulness; and after lighting up, he pulled the panel ajar,
and, after satisfying himself that the catch was of the simplest
kind, latched it back into its place.
Two thoughts were in his mind as he waited for the red
wick of the candle to grow black again—the one the further
tracking of the game he had definitely roused during the night,
the other sheer childish pleasure in a story of adventure come
true. Alas! for the stockbroker, he cared no more for the
shillings. There was a dark passage in the wall, and the im-
perishable child within him trembled and smiled. Mr. Francis,
the man felt sure, had used this passage last night. Here was
double cause for excitement and joy. The candle burned
more bravely, and two ways were open. Like all right-handed
folk, his impulse was to turn to the left, and, obeying it, he
traversed six yards or so of a level, rough-floored passage. On
his right ran the courses of bricks in the main wall, a little
dank and mildewy; on his left the panelling of the hall. A
turn at right-angles—at the corner, no doubt, of the hall—dis-
closed a flight of wooden steps leading downwards. Here the
stockbroker awoke ; he greedily counted them, and ten
shillings were his. But the stockbroker, it seemed, was a
gentleman of second-rate vitality; he awoke from his torpor
but to count, and slumbered again, leaving the child and the
hunter to go their way.
At the bottom of these steps Geoffrey paused a moment to
recollect his bearings. He had entered the secret way on the
short side of the hall; the steps, therefore, were on the long
side of it, and on the garden side of the house. But inasmuch


A BIRD OF NIGHT 2OI
as the passage, when he entered it, was some six feet above
the ground-level of the hall, these ten downward steps would
bring him back to ground-level again. He was therefore
walking in the outer wall of the hall, on a level with the floor.
This clear, he went slowly on.
Suddenly he was confronted by a blank brick wall straight
in front. But on the right hand the regular courses of the
brick were interrupted by a panelled wooden oblong, some
five feet high; beyond this, up to the wall that ended the
passage, the courses went on again. In the middle of it was
a round wooden handle, straight below it on the floor ran two
flanged metal lines. Laying hold of this handle, he pulled at
it, and on each side of the wooden panel opened a jagged edge
of light, irregular and full of angles. It drew inwards some
three feet till it reached the end of the metal lines, running
smoothly, but with a sense of great weight. Sunlight poured
in, and Geoffrey stepped on to the lawn outside, and regarded
his discovery. Indeed, it had been a cunning brain and hand
that had devised this. The house wall outside here ran in
courses of small brick, and the opening of this door drew these
inwards irregularly. The top of the door, for instance, was
four bricks in length, but the second row of bricks detached
numbered six; below that, again, was a course of four with-
drawn, then one of five, then one of six again. The joining
was fitted with extreme accuracy. Here the interspace of
mortar between the bricks would move with the withdrawn
piece of wall, here it would remain on the wall in place.
Detection of the line of the door to one who did not know
where to look, even to one who did, would be nearly impossible.
Regarding it more closely, another thing struck him. Half-
way down the withdrawn portion was a broken edge of brick,
and, taking hold of this, he drew the door back into its place
again. Seen thus, as part of the whole wall, detection appeared
impossible. There was no line to follow, and though he had
closed it but a moment before, he could not trace the junc-
tures; the thing fitted as well as a jawful of good teeth.


2O2 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
But he surveyed it only for a moment, then, with an effort
pushing it back again, he re-entered, closed it behind him,
and took up his candle to explore the branch of the passage
that led to the right of the picture. He again mounted the
ten steps, again came opposite the hinged panel, and passed
on. Ten similar steps again led down to the ground-level of
the hall, and at the bottom of these the passage ended in a
wooden panel, by the side of which was a latch exactly re-
sembling that by which the picture-panel was shut and opened.
He turned it, and the hinged woodwork swung wide, giving on
the short space between the stairs where he had watched last
night, and the door into the hall round which Mr. Francis's face
had first appeared to him when he awoke from his doze. This,
then, explained all. It was here, not from behind the picture,
that the old man had entered; from here, seeing a light in
the hall, he had peeped round the corner.
Geoffrey stepped out into the corridor, and examined the
hinged panel from outside. It was in deep shadow, but round
it ran bossed circles, similar to those in that which held the
portrait over the mantelpiece. The second on the right in the
same manner raised and lowered the latch.
He blew out the candle, leaving it on the bottom step of the
secret way, closed the door, and went to the smoking-room.
Harry was still at work, ill at ease with figures.
“And seven,' he observed truculently, as Geoffrey entered.
‘Twenty,' said the other, “and two secret doors. I beg your
pardon, three. Twenty-six bob, Harry. Stump up.’
Harry raised a malevolent face for a moment, and finished
his column.
“Any skeleton P’ he asked with pungency.
“No ; no skeletons. Will you come and see it now P
Harry sprang up.
‘Look here, Geoff, are you playing the fool P' he said. ‘If
so, are you prepared to die?’
“Neither,’ said Geoffrey, “but don't let me interrupt you.
Better get on with your work; the passage won't run away.”


A BIRD OF NIGHT 203
“Nor will the work. I wish it would. Do you really mean
it, Geoff? There is a holy awe about your face.”
‘Come and see,' said Geoffrey.
They went together to the panel by the staircase, and entered.
Geoffrey lit the candle he had left there, and preceding Harry,
who made no comment beyond unintelligible mutterings,
stopped opposite the back of old Francis's portrait.
‘The second secret door,’ he said, opening it; ‘the door I
discovered first. I'll show you afterwards how to get in from
the outside. And here,' he said, pointing to the recess—“here
I found this candle and the matches. Convenient.’
‘That candle !' said Harry. “Why, it is nearly new It is
not dusty. And the matches, too. Used they to use matches?'
And he stopped suddenly. ‘Give me the candle a minute,
Geoff,' he said. He looked at the crest and monogram on it,
and returned it. ‘Come on,’ he said, with something of an
effort; “let’s see where the passage leads.’
‘What's the matter?' asked the other.
“Nothing; get on.’
They went down to the outer door, and looked at it again
from the outside. Though he had been through it twice that
morning, yet, when it was closed, Geoffrey could not see where
it was, so perfect was the joining of it.
“And the bit of broken brick is the handle to pull it to,” said
Harry with interest.
But he was visibly preoccupied, and his delight was clouded;
there was no childish joy in him. Geoffrey guessed the reason
for it, and at lunch afterwards Harry spoke.
‘That was a candle of Uncle Francis's, Geoff,' he said. “It
was his monogram,’ and he looked up as if expecting that his
information was surprising.
But Geoffrey went on eating quite calmly.
“So I supposed,’ he said.
“Then you think that he knows of the secret passage P'
“I feel sure he does.”
Harry's face clouded a little more ; it was dark already.


CHAPTER XVIII
RAIN
Two mornings after this discovery of the passage, as they were
sitting at breakfast, a telegram was brought in for Harry.
‘Brougham to meet the evening train,’ he said to the man
after reading it; ‘and tell them to get Mr. Francis's rooms
ready.”
“He comes to-night?' asked Geoffrey.
‘Yes; I did not expect him so soon. But he is only coming
for a couple of days, he says. He has taken the flat in
Wimpole Street; I suppose he means to go back there.”
“What is he coming here for?'
‘Can't say ; to get some furniture and things, I expect.
Then the passage is a secret, eh, Geoff?”
“Why, surely,” said Geoffrey, “like the box-hedge. I
shouldn't take the slightest pleasure in it if I thought other
people knew -
“But you said you were sure that Uncle Francis did know,'
interrupted Harry.
“Let me finish my sentence, if you don't mind. I was
about to say that I shouldn't take the slightest pleasure in it if
I thought that other people knew that I knew.”
Harry broke a piece of toast meditatively.
‘I'm not sure about it,” he said. “Personally, I felt rather
aggrieved that Uncle Francis had not told me anything about
it. Well, wouldn't he as naturally feel aggrieved if I don't tell
him?"
‘It is superfluous to tell him,' said Geoffrey, “because he
knows already. Secondly, it will spoil all my pleasure if he
knows we know, and I shall wish I hadn't found the thing


2O6 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
at all. Fifthly and lastly, you never paid me that twenty-six
bob, and thirdly, it is your house, after all.”
Harry was silent. Then suddenly :
“Geoffrey,’ he said, “tell me what further proof you have,
apart from the candle, that Uncle Francis does know about it.
I'll draw you a cheque after breakfast. Haven't got any
money.’
“Is that a bribe P asked Geoffrey.
*Yes.”
‘And you really wish to know?'
‘Yes; I ask you,” said Harry. “No, it is not a bribe. If,
soberly, you would rather not tell me, don't.'
For a moment Geoffrey could not make up his mind whether
he wished Harry to know or not. If only the tale would have
put him on his guard, he would have had no hesitation about
telling him all—his conversation with Lady Oxted, the looped
cotton, the midnight visit. But he felt the right time had not
come, though it might come any day. On the other hand, it
was difficult to speak merely of Mr. Francis's visit without
betraying some hint of his suspicions, and this he did not want
to do. But the balance of advantage seemed to incline towards
telling him; for if he did not, in answer to so direct an invita-
tion, Harry would not unnaturally accuse him, though silently,
no doubt, of unfounded suspicions against a man whom he
himself honoured very highly. So he determined to speak.
‘Three nights ago,' he said, ‘on the evening of the gun-room
affair, you went to bed early, and I sat in the hall and dozed.
I awoke suddenly, and saw Mr. Francis's face looking round
the corner by the staircase.’
Harry pushed back his chair.
“What l’ he said.
‘Oh, I was not dozing then. We talked for some time, and
he told me why he had come with this secrecy. He also asked
me not to tell you, but I don't mind.”
“And why had he come P' asked Harry.
“All day,’ he said, “he had been haunted by a strong pre-


208 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
thing now. It looks as if the Luck touched more than me.
It gave Uncle Francis a hint of what it was doing. You know
the Luck's getting on. It is making more reasonable attempts
on me. Do you think I've been encouraging it too much P
Perhaps I have. We won't drink its health to-night.'
‘I would if I were you,' said Geoffrey. “Perhaps in that
way you have put the old thing in a good temper. Well, keep
it up. It can't avoid having shots at you, but it always manages
to miss.”
“Ah, you are beginning to believe in it too."
“Not a bit. All the effect the Luck has is to make you talk
arrant nonsense about it. I believe in it, indeed I was just
humouring you.'
‘Your notions of the humorous are obscure,' observed Harry.
Mr. Francis arrived late that night, full of little anecdotes
about his house-hunting, and loud in praises of his flat. He
had only come, as he had said, for a couple of days, to collect
some books and sticks of furniture, and by the end of the
month at the outside he hoped to have it completely habitable.
His pleasure in it was that of a child with a new toy, delightful
to hear, and they sat up late, listening to his fresh, cheerful
talk, and hearkening between whiles to an extraordinary heavy
rain which had come on before sunset, and was beating at the
windows.
This downpour was continuous all night, and next morning
they woke to the same streaming heavens: the sky was a
lowering arch of deluge, the rain relentless. Harry and
Geoffrey, who regarded the sky and the open heavens as the
proper roof for man, and houses merely as a shelter for unusual
inclemency, had felt not the smallest inclination to stir abroad,
but Mr. Francis at lunch announced his intention of walking,
rain or no rain.
“It doesn't hurt me,’ he said ; “a brisk walk, whatever the
weather. So neither of you will come?'
Harry looked out into the soupy splashing gravel.
“Geoff, shall we go for a swim?" he said.


RAIN. 209
“Thank you, no. I'm too old for mud-pies.’
Mr. Francis laughed heartily.
“So am not I,’ he said. “Well, Harry P’
“It certainly is raining,” said the lad.
“Not a doubt of it,' assented Mr. Francis.
Geoffrey turned to Harry suddenly.
“Fear both fire and frost and rain,’ he said, in a low
tone.
Harry went briskly towards the door.
*Thanks, Geoff; that settles it,' he said. “An excellent
reason for going, and getting it over to-day, if possible. Yes,
Uncle Francis, I'll put on my boots and come. I'm not made
of paper, any more than you.’
Geoffrey followed him into the hall, a sudden vague fore-
boding filling him.
“Don’t go, Harry,” he said.
‘You are beginning to believe in it, you know,” said Harry.
“Indeed, I am not.’
‘Looks like it,” and, Mr. Francis joining them, he went off
whistling.
Very much rain must have fallen during the night, for
yesterday the lake was not notably higher than its normal
limits, whereas now, so few hours afterwards, it had swollen so
as to overtop the stonework of the sluice, and a steady rush
of water fell over the ledge into the outlet below. This,
ordinarily a smooth-flowing chalk stream, was now a riotous
race of headlong water, sufficient to carry a man off his feet,
and as they paused a minute or two to watch the grand rush
of it, they could see that even in so short a space the flow of
water over the stonework was increasing in volume, showing
that the lake was rising every minute. The gate walls of the
sluice were not very thick, and seemed hardly built for such a
press of water; in one or two places Mr. Francis observed that
there seemed to be cracks right through them, for water spurted
out as from a hose. The sluice itself seemed to have got some-
what choked with the débris of branches and leaves with which
I4


2IO THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
the storm had covered the surface of the lake, and a Sargasso-
sea of drift stretched out to a considerable radius from it.
Adjoining the main lock was a small wooden water-gate,
designed, no doubt, for relief in time of flood; but this was
shut down, and Harry, splashing through the water, tried
to pull it up, in order to give an additional outlet, but the
wood was swollen with the wet, and he could not stir it.
Mr. Francis observed his actions with some attention. His
feet were firmly planted on the stone slab that covered the
sluice, and the water rose like a frill over his boots, as with
bent and straining figure he exerted his utmost force to raise
the gate. Once, as, for firmer purchase, he wedged his right
foot against the side of the water channel and bowed to a final
effort, the block of stone on which he stood seemed to tremble.
A cry of warning rose to Mr. Francis's lips, but it remained
unuttered; only his face wore an expression of intense con-
flicting expectation. But Harry's endeavours were fruitless,
and, soon desisting, he splashed his way back. Elsewhere
the lake was rapidly encroaching on the outskirts of the lawn;
pools of rain lay in the lower undulations of it, and these,
joining with its swollen waters, formed long liquid tongues
and bays. Here a clump of bushes stood out like an island
in a lagoon; here an outlying flower-bed was altogether sub-
merged, and the dark soil was floated by the water in a
spreading stain over the adjoining grass.
‘This will never do,” said Harry; “the place will be in
a mess for months if we don't get the water off somehow. It
is that choked sluice which is doing all the mischief. We had
better go up to the farm, Uncle Francis, and send some men
to clear it. Lord! how it rains !'
‘Yes, that will be the best plan,’ said he. “Stay, Harry, I
will go, and do you run back to the sluice, my dear fellow, and
see if it is raised quite to the top; we never looked at that.
You might get a big stick also, and begin clearing away the
stuff that chokes it. And have another pull at the wooden
gate. If you can get that open it is all right. Go and break


2I2 THE LUCK OF THE VAILs
the lake, brushing his hand from its grasp as lightly as a man
whisks a settling fly from sugar, and rolled him over and over
among the screaming débris, now tossing him into mid-stream,
now burying him in the yellow, turbulent flood, now throwing
him up on the top of a wave like chaff in a high wind, as
helpless as a sucking child in the grip of some wild beast.
Impotently, and without purpose, he snatched at hurrying
wreckage, even at the twisted ropes of water that hurled him
along, conscious only of the wild excitement of this foregone
battle, without leisure to be afraid. He seemed to himself to
be motionless, while the banks and lawns shot by him with
inconceivable swiftness, but bearing towards him, as he
suddenly remembered, with the same giddy speed, the bridge
over which the road to the lodge passed. How often had he
stood there watching the trout poise and dart in the clear
flowing water
A turn in the stream-bed, and he saw it rushing up towards
him like an approaching train, the water already nearly on a
level with its arch, and soon to be how vastly higher with the
wave of the flood that carried him in the van of the torrent
from the broken sluice. His first instinct was a resolve to
clutch at it, in order to stop himself; but in a moment
realizing that if he wished to make death certain this was the
way of it, he huddled himself together, burying his head in the
water. He just saw the first of the flood strike against the
bridge in a huge feather of broken turbulence, and then came
a darkness full of loud chucklings and suckings, as if the water
laughed inwardly with an evil merriment. Once in that blind
moment his shoulder was banged against the gorged arch ;
once he felt his coat catch against some projecting stone,
and it was as if the weight of the whole world was pressed
against him, as for a half-second he checked the stream; the
next he was torn free again, and out into daylight once more.
Not till then did the chance of his ultimate escape strike
him with a sense that he might possibly have a share in that
matter. Hitherto the wild pace had given a certain bewilder.


RAIN 213
----------->=======-------------------→-------.
ment to his thoughts not unpleasant in itself. All reasoning
power, all remembrance of what had gone before, all realiza-
tion of what might follow after, had been choked; his con-
sciousness, a mere pin-point, did not do more than receive the
sensation of the passing moment. But after the bridge had
been passed it sprouted and grew; he became Harry Vail
again, a man with wits and limbs that were meant to be
used, and therewith the will to use them. But the power
to use them was a thing arbitrarily directed by the flood.
Breath was the prime necessity, and it was a matter requiring
both effort and an ebb of the encircling wave to fling his face
free from that surging and broken race of water and get air.
Only with this returning increase of consciousness was he
aware that he was out of breath with his prolonged ducking;
for, broadly speaking, he had not decently breathed once since
he had tumbled with the tumbling sluice. So with a downward
and backward kick, the instinct of treading water, he raised his
head from the yellow race, and felt the air sweet and essential.
Three long breaths he took, throat-filling, lung-filling, like a
man half dead with drought; and as he struggled to overlook
the water for the fourth time it was for the purpose of using
eyes as well as lungs, and what he saw caused hope to leap
high in his heart, though he had not known he had been
hopeless. For here the stream had already widely overflowed
its banks, now no longer held in by the masonry of the first
stretch below the sluice, and every gallon of water that came
down spread itself over a widely-increased area; speed and
the concentrated volume were even now diminishing. The
sense that he was bound and helpless, a swathed child, passed
from him, and, pushing with arms and feet (so random a stroke
could scarcely be called swimming), he soon saw that he was
appreciably leaving the main rush of the stream. Before long
he was brought up with a violent jerk; his foot had struck the
ground, and the water stood up over his head like a yellow
frill. But that was no more than a playful buffet after the
grimness of his struggle. He staggered to his feet again, and,


2I4 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
now no longer swimming, after a few more splashing efforts
stood firm and upright in waist-high water, leaning with all
his weight against the press of the flood. Then step by
plunging step he got to land, and at last stood utterly free
on the good safe earth.
He stood and dripped for a moment, the water running
from all points of himself and his clothes, as if off the ribs of
an umbrella; then wringing out the baggier folds with his
hands, he tried to start running towards the house. But
twenty paces told him he was dead-beat, and dropping to a
soberer pace, he made his splashing way across the fields.
Suddenly he stopped.
“The Luck,’ he cried aloud to the weeping sky. “It was
the rain that did it! Blooming old futile old Luck! It
couldn't kill a blue-bottle.”
This was an inspiring thought, and he went the more lightly
for it, taking note, with a delightful sense of danger past, of
the distance of his water-journey. And what was that spouting
column of yellowness and foam three hundred yards further
up, standing like a fountain in mid-stream P. And with a
sudden gasp of reasoned recognition he knew it to be the
bridge over which the road passed, under which so few minutes
ago he had himself been whirled. Cold and shivering as he
was, he could not resist a moment's pause when he came
opposite it, and he turned away again with a sense of respect
for the Luck which his last words, shouted to the streaming
heavens, had lacked. Under that he had blindly burrowed,
helpless as a baby in an express to stop his headlong course.
“Not such a bad attempt of the Luck, after all,” he said to
himself.
Five minutes later he had cast his water-trail over the gravel
and into the hall. Geoffrey was deep in an arm-chair reading.
“Geoffrey, old chap, the Luck's been having another go,' he
cried, almost triumphantly. “But it can't pull it off; it simply
can’t. Get me some hot whisky and water, will you? and come
to my room. I'm going to get between blankets a bit. Nothing


RAIN 215
like taking care of one's self, and running no risks. I'll tell
you all about it. Can't stop now.’
Geoffrey's book flew on to the floor as he sprang out of his
chair.
‘Oh, Harry, what has happened?" he cried. “What has he
done now P
“Old Francis?’ asked Harry, pointing at the picture. ‘He's
used the rain this time. Penny squirt, you know. Hurry up
and come to my room. Whisky—rather strong, please.'
Harry was out of his clinging clothes in a couple of minutes,
and dropping them into an empty hip-bath where they could
drip innocuous to carpets, got into blankets, and, sipping his
whisky, told Geoffrey all his story, from the moment of the
dismemberment of the sluice to his staggering landing half a
mile down stream.
“And if ever you want to travel expeditiously by water,’ he
said in conclusion, “I recommend you a six-foot flood in a
narrow channel. But avoid a water-choked bridge ahead of
you; man, it gives you a wannbling inside, and no mistake.
All the same, it makes you feel an AI hero afterwards, I can
tell you that. Why, I'm choking with pride, just choking,
though what the particular achievement is, I can't tell you. I
had to go underneath it, and there were no two words to it.
Well, I went.”
“But what happened to Mr. Francis?’ asked Geoffrey.
‘Couldn't he see that the sluice was groggy P
‘No, of course not, you dolt; he'd gone trotting off to the
farm. Oh, I didn't tell you that part, so you're not a dolt.
We went out together, as you saw, and I took a haul on that
old stricken sluice, but I couldn't make it budge. So we
began walking away to get men from the farm, but the water
was rising so fast that he went on there alone, and I went
back to have another pull at it, which I did, with this blessed
result. And oh, Geoffrey, how dry and warm the rain felt
when I got out of that flood-race. Lord, I thought I was
done. No, I didn't think it, I only knew I was. But not till


RAIN 217
Geoffrey did not reply for a moment. He had felt morally
certain after the gun-room accident that, if danger of death
again looked into Harry's face, it would be Mr. Francis who
brought it there; he had even said to himself that it would
be by rain that danger would come. By rain indeed it had
been ; but where, taxing ingenuity to the utmost, did Mr.
Francis come in P Harry had been alone, Mr. Francis half.
way to the farm. What if Harry was right? And the thought
challenged his reasonable self.
‘How can you talk such utter nonsense?' he said angrily.
‘How can that pewter-pot break down a sluice and put a
cartridge in your gun, and make you go to the ice-house
instead of the summer-house?'
‘’Tain't pewter,’ said Harry's voice, muffled in the shirt he
was putting on.
At that moment Geoffrey's eye caught sight of the figure of
Mr. Francis trotting gaily through the rain down the side of
the lake from the direction of the farm, and he disappeared
behind the bushes that screened the sluice from the house.
Almost immediately he reappeared again, this time coming
towards the house, with the same lightness of step. He must
have seen, thought Geoffrey, that the flood had carried away
the sluice. Harry, he must have known, was probably there
when it was carried away. What reconstruction of facts would
fit these factors? At present, none; but perhaps Mr. Francis
could supply them. He rose.
“Mr. Francis is just coming in,’ he said; “but I do not see
the farm men.’
Harry came across to the window.
“They are probably following,' he said. “Go down to him,
Geoff, and tell him I’m all right.'
‘You will be down soon P
‘Yes, in a couple of minutes. You might order tea, too.”


CHAPTER XIX
Geoffrey Leaves Wail
Geoffrey went slowly downstairs, reciting to himself exactly
all he knew. One point was salient: Mr. Francis had cer-
tainly seen the broken sluice. And he entered the hall.
Mr. Francis had taken off his waterproof, and was sitting
comfortably in a chair. He looked up with his cheery smile
when Geoffrey came in.
“Ah, my dear boy,’ he said, “you were quite right not to
come out. The weather was odious. I have never seen such
rain. But one feels better, after all, for a breath of air.’
“I preferred the house,” said Geoffrey. “Was the water in
the lake very high P'
‘Yes, it was a good deal swollen. In fact, it has carried
away a considerable portion of the sluice. It must be
seen to.”
“A dangerous moment,' observed Geoffrey, picking up a
magazine and turning over the pages.
‘Yes, I wish I had seen it go. A fine sight it must have
been, six feet of water in that narrow channel. But we were
on the way to the farm, I suppose, when it happened. I must
talk—I must talk to Harry about it this evening. It will want
mending at once.”
At this moment Geoffrey heard Harry's foot on the stairs
just outside the hall. Though he knew nothing of psychology,
he believed this to be a psychological moment.
“Is he out still P’ he asked, seeing out of the corner of his
eye that he was even now entering the hall.
“I suppose so,” said Mr. Francis. “He left me on the way
up to the farm.’


GEOFFREY LEAVES VAIL 219
Harry had now entered the hall, and his step was noiseless
on the thick carpet. Mr. Francis, with his chair facing the
fire, could not see him, but another half-dozen paces would
bring him close.
‘You are wrong,” said Geoffrey slowly, ‘for he seems to
have come in. This is he, is it not, or his ghost P
Mr. Francis, contrary to the doctor's orders, made an ex-
ceedingly brisk movement, springing to his feet and facing
about. He saw Harry. He cast one brief look at Geoffrey,
to which fear and a devilish enmity contributed largely, and
turned to his nephew again, in perfect control of himself, and
without further hesitation—Geoffrey had scarce time to tell
himself that there was an awkward choice he had to make—
“Ah, my dear boy!” he cried, “so you are all right. I felt
sure you would be; but for a moment, for one moment, I was
anxious, when I came back from the farm with the men and
we found the sluice broken.”
Geoffrey stared in sheer astonishment at the man's glib-
ness.
“With the men?' he asked. ‘Surely not º'
‘Dear fellow,” said Mr. Francis, with the most natural
manner, ‘how pedantically exact you are I must be exact,
too, it seems. I was a little ahead of them, for I ran back
from the farm, being just a little uneasy about the weight of
water that I knew must be pressing on the sluice. I thought,
indeed, that when Harry made his first attempt to pull it up
it was a little unsafe for anyone to stand there.”
Suddenly all his doubts and certainties surged up in
Geoffrey's mind.
‘Did you warn him " he asked.
Geoffrey saw Harry's eyebrows knot themselves together in
a frown of perplexity which he could not decipher. But Mr.
Francis turned to him with the eagerness of a boy anxious to
confess.
“I did not,’ he said, ‘and all the time that I was going to
the farm the thing weighed on me. I ought to have—I ought


222 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
the farm, for he was making, at your suggestion, an attempt to
raise the wooden gate. You come back and find symptoms of
the confirmation of your fears. The sluice is broken, Harry is
not there. Then you walk quietly back to the house and tell
me you suppose that Harry is out still. I repeat that I do
not follow your train of thought. It is curious. Harry, does
not this seem to you also to be curious?'
Harry looked from one to the other a moment, puzzled and
bewildered. Geoffrey spoke so quietly and collectedly, that it
was impossible not to listen calmly to what he said, impossible,
also, not to understand what he meant. On the other hand,
he was saying things that were absolutely incredible. From
Geoffrey he looked to Mr. Francis, who was standing between
them. The old man's mouth quivered, his agitation was
momentarily increasing. Then suddenly he recollected the
doctor's warning, that all agitation was bad for him, and he
was his uncle, his friend, and an old man.
“Stop, Geoffrey !' he cried; “don’t speak. Uncle Francis,
don't listen to him. He doesn't mean what you think he
means. There is some ghastly misunderstanding. Geoff, you
idiot I'
Mr. Francis's face grew paler and more mottled. His
breathing was growing short and laboured, and Harry was in
an agony of terror that another of those awful seizures would
come upon him. But in a moment he spoke, slowly, and with
little pauses for breath.
‘Harry,’ he said, ‘either your friend—apologizes — un-
reservedly for—what he has said—or, one of us—leaves the
house—now, this evening. It will be for you—to decide—
which of us leaves it.’
At these words another terror seized Harry, the terror of
the precipice at the edge of which all three of them stood.
Whatever happened now, it seemed to him, a catastrophe must
be—one friend or the other (and as he thought of the two his
mind veered backwards and forwards like a shifting weather-
cock) must go. But the primary necessity was, by any means


GEOFFREY LEAVES VAIL 225
Mr. Francis just shrugged his shoulders.
“I remember last winter,’ he said, ‘that we used to play a
very diverting game called Russian scandal.”
‘The next move you know, Harry,' continued Geoffrey, still
taking not the slightest notice of Mr. Francis, “he wrote to
tell you that Miss Aylwin was already engaged.”
Harry wore an inscrutable face.
“Go on,' he said.
‘That also did not—did not come off,' said Geoffrey, “and
you were engaged. Ten days ago we came down here. On
the first morning you asked Mr. Francis which of the two
houses on the knoll was the ice-house, and which the summer-
house—'
“Ah, you have broken your word to me!' cried Harry.
‘You promised to keep that secret from my uncle.’
A violent trembling had seized Mr. Francis.
‘What? What?' he murmured, half rising from his chair.
‘I have broken my word to you,” said Geoffrey, still seem-
ingly unconscious of the presence of a third person. “I am
sorry, but I cannot help it. You followed the directions he
gave you, and nearly met your death. We came back to-
gether, and found him playing the flute in the garden, dancing
to it as he played. Then you went into the house. I re-
mained outside and watched him. He went up the knoll to
the two houses, and tried the door of the ice-house. He found
it locked, opened the summer-house and looked in. Try to
reconstruct what was in his mind. He made no allusion to his
mistake. Had he already forgotten that he had given you a
direction that nearly sent you to your death P Or was the
mistake yours? He told you to go to the left hand of the two
houses, so you said to me. Is that the case?'
Harry did not at once reply; he looked eagerly, imploringly
at his friend, but he could find no words to express a feeling
he could not comprehend; he did not know ever so vaguely
what he thought. In despair and utter perplexity, he faced
quickly round to his uncle. Mr. Francis was sitting with half-
I5


226 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
closed eyes; his hands, like the hands of a blind man, groped
and picked at the buttons in the arm of his chair, stricken
helpless. Suddenly, as if with a drowning effort, he threw his
head back, and saw Harry.
‘No, no,” he said, “not the left hand, not the left hand. I
never said that. Oh, the Luck, the cursed, cursed Luck! I
could not—indeed, I could not—have said the left hand. “Do
not go to the left hand by mistake"; I can hear myself saying
the words now. Oh, weary, weary day ! But you went there,
you went to the ice-house instead of the summer-house, you
went from the brightness of God's sunshine into the dark, to
that edge, to the edge of the well. Oh, my God, my God P
and the cry was rung from him like water from a twisted
cloth.
The old man buried his face in his hands, collapsing like a
broken doll. He regarded neither Harry nor his accuser, the
anguish of his spirit covered him like a choking wave, and into
it he went down without a struggle, but only that moaning sob,
a sight and a sound to stagger the unbelief of an infidel. And
Harry—no infidel, but a lad of kindly heart and generous im-
pulse, quick to believe good, a laggard to impute harm—could
not but be moved.
Geoffrey neither looked at the bowed figure nor wavered,
and his face was flint. But though that moaning cry, that
passionate incoherence did not move him, yet the sight of
Harry's face, with its bewilderment of perplexity and compas-
sionate trouble, filled him with a sudden fear. To himself
that bent and venerable head was a mockery of grief, a fraud
finished and exquisite, and he was more afraid of Harry's
divided mind, on which Mr. Francis played as on an instru-
ment of music, than he had been of the evil and hunted face
that had come down from the gun-room, as he stood behind
the curtain, in those dead hours ten days ago.
Mr. Francis sat huddled in his chair, his face invisible, his
fingers clasped in his white head, and long dry sobs lifted and
relaxed his figure like the pulsation of a wave. And though


GEOFFREY LEAVES VAIL 227
Geoffrey, so few minutes ago, had turned himself to steel, he
could not go on speaking with that silent stricken figure in
front of him. The low, heart-broken murmuring, the silent
sobs—filched resolution from him. Once or twice he began to
speak, but no sentence would come. As many times he told
himself that he must go on, that he knew that this feigned
anguish was a thing to awake horror or laughter, but never
pity. Yet it affected him as a scene in the play affects the
stalls. It was all unreal, he knew it was unreal, yet he could
not immediately speak. Suddenly, and before long, it seemed,
while he was still cursing his infirmity of purpose, Harry came
to his side.
“Go away, Geoff, go away,’ he whispered. ‘Leave me with
him. Whatever you have to say, you cannot and must not say
it now. Look there and judge. It may kill him. Go away,
there's a good fellow !'
He got up at once; that was enough. Harry was still
willing to hear him; now or at another time, it did not matter.
All he wanted was that Harry should hear him to the end, and
then his part was done. Exposure there was no pleasure in
the act of it; he only wanted that it should be there. Truly,
the man was vile, and an enemy, but he did not covet the post
of executioner as such. By him, it is true, justice was done;
the murderer was put out of a world with the welfare of which
his presence was incompatible, and a man to do it there must
be; but who did not shudder at the shadow of the hangman P
That dry, inarticulate sobbing, which he had no need to tell
himself was but a counterfeit grief, yet wore the respectable
semblance of woe. What, again, if remorse had at length
touched Mr. Francis? What if the imminence of his exposure
had at last revealed to him his immeasurable enormity? If
such a possibility was within the range of the most distant
horizon, how contemptible would be his own part in trampling
in a truth that was realized All that was generous within
him—and there was nothing that was not—revolted from so
despicable a rôle.
I 5–2


228 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
But against that possibility, how large and near loomed the
probability that these grovelling pangs were but of the same
texture as the rest! No, he was not taken in. He registered
privately the unalterable conviction that Mr. Francis was Mr.
Francis still, for no opprobrious word conveyed to him half
the horror of all which that canonized name implied. Yet
Harry was by him, asking him, not bidding him, to go. That
was sufficient, and even as he told himself it was sufficient,
back swung the balance again. What duty could be more
obvious, more staring, than to finish now at once with that in-
effable old man? Yet he sat there sobbing. And without
another word Geoffrey turned and went, leaving uncle and
nephew together.
It was not long before Harry joined him in the smoking-
room.
“Uncle Francis has gone to his room,” he said. “He is
quieter now ; I could leave him safely. But I have tele-
graphed for the doctor; I daren't take the responsibility of not
sending for him. He kept asking me one question, Geoff; he
kept repeating and repeating it—Which of you two is to go?
He says he will not stophere another night if you remain here.
God knows whether I have decided right.”
“It is I who go, you mean?' said Geoffrey.
‘Yes, it is you.’
Harry sat down wearily, as if tired out. That, too, was his pre-
vailing feeling: body and mind were dead-beat. Geoffrey rose.
‘Since that is so,” he said, ‘I ask you before I go to hear
the rest of my story; indeed, I must tell it you. Then I shall
have done all I can. Oh, it will not take long, he added, with
a sudden inexpressible bitterness. “In half an hour I shall
be gone.’
Harry sprang up as if he had been stung.
‘I do not deserve that from you, Geoff, he said. “Do you
think I want to get rid of you? Do you think it is fine fun
for me to tell you to go? I am not conscious of any great
pleasure in it.’


GEOFFREY LEAVES VAIL 229
“No ; I am sorry,' said Geoffrey. “I had no business to
say that or think that. But oh, Harry, before I go, for the
dear Lord's sake, hear me ! I have not been speaking idly.
Do you think, in turn, that it is fine fun for me to get up and
bring these awful accusations against Mr. Francis P’
“Of course I don't. But the whole thing I have to put on
one side for the present. Uncle Francis will not stop in the
house while you are here, Geoff, and I cannot let him go,
whatever the truth may be, while he is like this. I dreaded
every moment that a seizure might come on him again.
Besides, he is an old man; he is my uncle. For the present,
then, I am like this: I neither believe what you have told me,
nor do I disbelieve it. I put it aside, though before long,
when my uncle is recovered, I shall have to do one or the
other. Either I shall believe, be convinced you are right—
and then God knows what I shall do!—or I shall think your
accusations wild and incredible, and, I warn you, too infinitely
base for words. And then, too,” he added suddenly, “God
knows what I shall do. But at present, as I tell you, there is
no question of that. My certain and immediate duty is to
look after Uncle Francis.”
“I ask you, then, before I go,' said Geoffrey, “to hear the
remainder of what I have to say.”
“Certainly ; but, whatever you tell me, I shall not attempt
to judge of it now. You had just spoken about the confusion
which came in somewhere between the ice-house and the
summer-house.’
So Geoffrey told him of the loop of cotton he had found
round the post of the gun-rack, of Mr. Francis's visit to the
gun-room, and finally of his own finding him in the afternoon,
after the breaking of the sluice, sitting before the fire in the
hall, “supposing’ that Harry had not yet come in. And
Harry heard in silence and without comment.
“That is all?' he asked, when Geoffrey had finished, “You
are sure there is nothing more ? You are sure, also, you have
been exact throughout P


230 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
‘That is all,” said Geoffrey, “and I have been exact.'
“Then, dear old boy,” said Harry, “let us for the present
put it from our minds. Your carriage will be round in ten
minutes; I told them to pack for you. And tell me that you
agree with me when I have to ask you to go. I feel, I know,
that I cannot do otherwise.'
‘Yes, you are right, and God guard you,' said Geoffrey.
Then suddenly the whole flood of fears and suspicions and
certainties surged in his mind together and overflowed it. He
was leaving Harry alone with that hellish man. Who knew
what he might not attempt next? Every fibre in his being
cried aloud to him that danger of subtle and deadly sort hung
suspended over Harry, imminent to fall so long as that white-
haired old man was under the same roof. But what could he
do? He could not force Harry to see the clearness of that
which was so clear to him. He could not even make him
exercise his judgment upon it. And his anxiety for him broke
bounds.
‘Yes, you are right,” he said. “But I cannot persuade
myself that I am right to go. Oh, Harry, I ask you once
again, do you tell me to go?'
Harry got up and leaned his head on the chimney-piece.
‘Don’t make it harder for me, Geoff,' he said.
Here was a ray of hope.
‘I will make it as hard as I can,’ said Geoffrey. “I appeal
to anything that will move you. We are old friends, Harry.
Wiser and better friends you will find, but none more faithful.
You are doing a cruel thing.’
Harry turned round suddenly.
“Stop!' he said. “I tell you to go. Oh, Geoff, who is
doing the cruel thing? You know. Oh, my God, won't this
nightmare cease?'
Geoffrey saw his lips quivering; his own also were not
steady. He came close to him, and laid his hands on his
shoulders.
“What have we done, Harry,' he said, ‘that this should


GEOFFREY LEAVES VAIL 231
happen to us? You have answered me. But promise me
one thing; I insist on that.”
‘I will promise you anything you think right to ask me,
Geoff,' said he, “and you know it, provided only it does not
make me cancel what I have said and what I have decided
to do.’
“It does not. It is simply this: Three times within the last
ten days you have been in imminent danger. God knows
what it all means, but it is certain that many dangers surround
you on all sides. I ask you to promise to be careful. I don't
ask you to consider all I have told you now; you must do that
when you feel that you can. You promise me this?'
‘Willingly.”
“And let it be soon that you consider what I have said.
Judge the thing as you would judge for another, and God send
you the right judgment. That is all I want.”
“Amen to that,’ said Harry.


CHAPTER XX
DR. ARMYTAGE ARRIVES
DR. ARMYTAGE, for whom Harry had telegraphed, arrived
about nine that night. He had left London immediately on
receipt of the summons, without dining, and, having seen his
patient, came downstairs to join Harry in a belated meal. In
appearance he was a dark man, and spare, his chin and upper
lip blue-black from a strong crop of hair close-shaven; heavy
eyebrows nearly met over his aquiline nose; his mouth had a
certain secrecy and tightness about it. But his manner was
that of a man reserved but competent; his thin, delicate hands
were neat and firm in their movements, and Harry, torn and
distracted by a world of bewilderment, found it an unutterable
relief to have put one out of all his perplexities—the care of
his uncle—into such adequate hands.
For the moment, at least, the boon of the doctor's arrival
quite overscored that sinister impression he had formed of
him when in the summer he had passed him driving to the
station.
With regard to the patient, he was grave, but not alarming.
Grave, however, one felt he would always be, and Harry
remembered Mr. Francis's criticism of him—that he knew too
much, and had always in his mind the most remote conse-
quences of any lesion, however insignificant.
‘I can give you no certain account of him to-night, Lord
Vail,” he said. “I found Mr. Francis in a lethargic state, the
natural reaction from, so I understand, an agitating scene that
took place this afternoon. I did not even speak to him, for I
thought it better not to rouse him, as he seemed in a fair way
to get a good night's rest. But I spoke to his man, who told


DR. ARMYTAGE ARRIVES 233
me that he thought something agitating and painful had taken
place. May I ask you if that is the case?'
‘Yes,’ said Harry. “A friend of mine, Mr. Francis, and I
had a terrible scene this afternoon.’
‘Can you tell me about it—the merest outline only P You
see, if Mr. Francis experiences any return of this agitation,
which is, to put it frankly, so dangerous, it might be very likely
useful that I should know about it, and be able to soothe him
with something more specific than wide generalities.’
Harry paused. They were alone over dessert.
“It is all very horrible,” he said at length. ‘and I can hardly
speak of it. But I can tell you this: within the last ten days I
have had three very narrow escapes from a violent and sudden
death.’
Dr. Armytage put down with neat haste the glass he was
raising to his lips, and gave Harry one quick glance from below
his bushy eyebrows. Startling though the words were, you
would hardly have expected such sudden alertness and interest
from so self-contained a man.
‘Yes P’ he said.
“Well, for one at least of these my uncle blames himself,'
said Harry. “That certainly was one of the causes of his
agitation, though perhaps not the greatest immediate cause.
Oh, it is awful to speak of it !” he cried. “Tell me what you
advise. Had I better tell you everything?'
“I repeat, it may possibly be of use to me,’ said the doctor.
“All you say, of course, will be under the seal of my profes-
sion.’
The servants had entered the room with coffee, and Harry
did not immediately reply. Templeton, as usual, carried the
case of the Luck, and even as he took the jewel into his hand
Harry hurriedly filled a wineglass.
‘The Luck,’ he said, in no very cordial tone. Then, turn-
ing to the doctor, “Please excuse me,’ he said; “it is a custom
I have got into. Yes, that is the Luck; my uncle may have
spoken to you about it. You would like to look at it?'


234 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
The doctor waved it away.
“Another time—another time,’ he said, and waited till the
servants had left the room. Then, “Yes,’ he continued, ‘I
have heard Mr. Francis speak of it. An extraordinary de-
lusion in so clear-headed a man, is it not ? He thinks—I
hope I am not intruding into family secrets, Lord Vail—
he soberly thinks that the Luck brings blessings and curses
on your house. I may say that the idea almost possesses
him.’
‘Surely you are mistaken,” said Harry. ‘He is always
laughing, sometimes even he is distressed, at my believing—ah,
not believing, but thinking I believe in it. But very curious
things have happened,’ he added.
“There is doubtless some mistake,” said the doctor. “But
to return: all you tell me will be under the seal of my profes-
sion.’
‘You mean that I speak to one who is necessarily as silent
as the grave,” said Harry. “You will pardon my insistence on
this.’
“I give you my word on it,” said the doctor.
“Well, it is a strange, dark story,” said Harry, “and if I
speak a little incoherently, you will know by the end what per-
plexities I am in. Now, there are two kiosque sort of places
near the house—one is a summer-house, one an ice-house. I
got the keys one morning, and asked my uncle which was
which. He told me quite distinctly that the left-hand one was
the summer-house. He made a mistake, and I went whistling
into the ice-house—they were both shuttered and quite dark
inside—and came within an ace of falling into the big tank. I
am quite sure I went to the one he told me was the summer-
house.”
‘Number one,’ said the doctor.
“Next morning he went up to London,’ continued Harry,
‘and I and Geoffrey Langham (this friend of mine who left
to-day) were going out for a day's shooting. My gun was
standing in the rack, and as I took it up, it went off, narrowly


DR. ARMYTAGE ARRIVES 235
missing me. The last person who had used that gun, and who
had left the cartridge in it, was my uncle.”
‘Number two,' said the doctor.
“To-day he and I went out together and looked at the
flooded lake. I tried to raise an extra sluice that we have,
and, finding that I could not make it move, we went up
towards the farm to get men to help. But, again at his sugges-
tion, he went on to the farm and I went back to have another
try at it. As I was standing on the main sluice, pulling, the
whole thing gave way, and I went down with the flood-water,
as near to being drowned as anyone can wish to be. My uncle
had thought the sluice not very safe, but he had not thought it
worth mentioning.’
The doctor was silent awhile.
“You bear a charmed life, Lord Vail,” he said at length;
“but I think you have more to tell me.’
Harry gave him one dumb, appealing glance, and met eyes
which were grave but not unkind, firm and deeply interested.
He had the impression that they had long been watching him.
‘Yes, I have more, I have more,' he said with agitation,
‘and it is horribly painful. Dr. Armytage, I have two great
friends—or so I think—my uncle and this Geoffrey Langham, a
fellow of my own age or thereabouts. This afternoon, to my
uncle's face, though I am bound to say he would have pre-
ferred to tell me privately, Geoffrey made horrible insinuations,
accusations. He said that Uncle Francis had long been my
enemy; that he had tried to prevent my engagement to Miss
Aylwin; that he had failed there, and that in this affair, for
instance, my uncle had intentionally—had intentionally >
And a strangling knot tied itself in his throat, choking utterance.
The doctor pushed the water-bottle gently a little closer to
Harry, and he poured himself out a wineglassful and drank it,
unconscious that any suggestion had been made to him.
“Then there was an awful scene,’ he went on. “My uncle
was nearly off his head, I believe, with remorse and horror for
those words which had so nearly sent me to my death, and


236 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
this was aggravated, I must suppose, by black, ungovernable rage
against Geoffrey. I felt that I had never seen an angry man
before. He refused to stay another night in the house with
him; he asked me continually which of them it was who
should go. He could not go—of that I was convinced—in
that state, and I sent Geoff off. Besides, I cannot, simply I
cannot, believe in Geoff's accusations. It is flatly impossible
that Uncle Francis should be guilty of the least intention
which Geoff attributed to him. Do I not know him P. There
must be some other explanation. And if you want to know
what my other explanation is, it has stood in front of you all
dinner. It was the Luck; fire and frost and rain—the ice-
house, the gun, the sluice. Oh, it has happened once before
like that.”
‘Yes, Mr. Francis told me,’ said the doctor, still looking
very intently at him.
Harry flicked the ash off his cigarette.
‘Here am I, then,” he said; “of my two best friends, one
lies upstairs, the other—God knows if I shall ever see the other
again. I have to tell him whether I believe what he said, and
I cannot believe it. It is monstrous; he is monstrous to have
thought it. Yet I see why he thought it; to anyone not be-
lieving in the Luck there was no other explanation. There
are other things too; I need not trouble you with them. He
came to the conclusion, for instance, that my uncle wished to
stop my engagement—prevent it, rather, for I was not engaged
then. They were specious; good Lord they were specious
enough. But I have been considering them all, and I simply
cannot believe them. It is not that I wilfully shut my eyes;
I hold them open with pincers and chisels, so to speak, but I
am unable—that is clear—to believe anything of this. How
could it be possible P God does not allow such things, I tell
you.'
‘That is your verdict, then P You believe nothing against
your uncle?” said the other, with an intonation absolutely
colourless.


DR. ARMYTAGE ARRIVES 237
‘I cannot.’
‘May I tell your uncle this, Lord Vail?' asked the doctor
presently. “If his agitation returns, I can think of nothing
which would so much tend to soothe it as the assurance that
these accusations are to you absolutely void and empty—these
vile accusations,’ he added in a moment.
‘Yes, they are vile,” said Harry, half to himself.
‘May I, then, use my discretion to tell him so, if I think it
desirable P' asked the doctor, pressing his point. “It would be
better, I think, for me to tell him than you. That would be
agitating work for both of you,” he said, watching the lad closely.
‘Oh, you may tell him whatever you please !' cried Harry,
with the sudden petulance of nerves utterly overwrought.
Instantly the doctor's face changed. The symptom for
which he had been waiting had come.
‘Now, then, Lord Vail,” he said, with a peremptoriness
which startled Harry, ‘I do not want two patients instead of
one. You were on the verge of hysterics, let me tell you.
We will have none of that, please.’
This treatment was shrewd and prompt. Judging rapidly
and correctly, he saw that any word of sympathy or kindness
would be likely to throw Harry altogether off the balance, and
he was justified when, in answer to this rough speech, he saw
an angry flush spring to his face.
‘I am not accustomed to be spoken to like that,’ he said
hotly.
‘No, it was a liberty on my part,” said the doctor. “Please
excuse it. But I think you will acknowledge that I was right.
You are your own man again now.’
Harry considered this a moment, then smiled.
‘Yes, you were perfectly right,’ he said candidly. “But I
have had rather a trying time to-day.”
“Indeed you have, and I may say now that I am very sorry
for you. I recommend you therefore to go to bed, and not to
write to your friend to-night, nor to think what you will say to
him when you do.'


238 THE LUCK OF THE WAILS
“And to go to sleep very quietly and soundly till morning,'
said Harry. ‘Excellent advice, Dr. Armytage.’
‘Oh, you will do all these things if you follow my directions,’
said the doctor.
“I should like to hear them, then.’
“To drink the dose I will send you up to your room,” he
said quietly.
At that moment, as if by a flashlight suddenly turned on,
Harry saw himself again meeting at the lodge-gates this man
for whom, at first sight, he had conceived so violent and
instinctive an antipathy, and simultaneously the curious adven-
ture in the search for Dr. Godfrey shone in his mind. What
if, after all, Geoffrey was right, and he himself was alone in
this house with a man such as his friend had pictured Mr.
Francis to be, and his mysterious confederate physician, whose
ways were so dark? The suspicions which had seemed to him
so utterly beyond the horizon of credibility leaped suddenly
nearer; and when he spoke, though he tried to make no
alteration in his tone, even to himself his voice sounded
unusual.
‘I don't think I shall require any doses,’ he said. “I dare
say I shall sleep all right. Thanks, all the same.’
“Ah! you don't trust me,’ said the doctor in the same quiet
tone.
This exceeding frankness both pleased and offended Harry.
“Is it not a pity to say a thing like that,’ he asked, “when
you really have no warrant for it? To show you how wrong
you are, I will take your dose with pleasure.”
The doctor's grave face relaxed.
‘That is right, Lord Vail,” he said. “But do you think your
now consenting to take it proves that I was wrong? Might
not a man consider that it showed I was right?'
Harry smiled also.
‘A man of sufficient ingenuity can make plausible the most
extravagant conclusions,’ he said, rather enjoying this tiny
fencing-match.


DR. ARMYTAGE ARRIVES 239
“True; we will not draw any at all, since there is no
need,” he said. “And now, with your leave, I will go up and
see Mr. Francis again. I hope and trust I shall find him
asleep."
“I shall be in the hall,” said Harry; “please give me your
report as soon as you have seen him.”
Dr. Armytage went upstairs, and Harry lit a cigarette and
waited his return. Dinner and the presence of this capable
man had to a large extent quieted his jangled nerves, and he
was conscious, more than anything, of a great weariness. The
acuteness of his perplexities had for the moment worn off a little,
and though their aching weight was no less, they pressed on
him, so it seemed, without the fret of sharp edges. He reso-
lutely set himself not to think of them, but rather of that
exquisite point of happiness which was day by day coming
nearer to him. Evie would be in England in less than a fort-
night now ; five weeks brought him to that day to which his
whole life hitherto seemed to have been leading up. But
suddenly the claws and teeth again recaptured him: Geoffrey
was to have been his best man, and now—and with that his
feverish mill-race of bewildering possibilities began again, and
it was a relief when the doctor reappeared.
‘Mr. Francis is sleeping, I am glad to tell you,' he said.
‘Thanks, I will smoke one cigarette before I go upstairs, and
when I go, you go, too, if you please, Lord Vail. I have put
your dose in your bedroom.’
“Thanks, I will take it. I am tired.’
The doctor settled himself in a chair.
‘Yes, that tiredness is exactly what my dose will give a
chance to,” he said. “You are tired and excited—a horrible
combination l—and your excitement would certainly keep you
awake. That I hope to remove by this sedative draught, and
let your tiredness act naturally. But I must really congratulate
you on your nerves. In the last ten days you have had enough
escapes to last a lifetime, and upon my word you don't look
used up. A very fine nervous constitution. Mr. Francis also


DR. ARMYTAGE ARRIVES 24I
‘That he has gone to London?' suggested the doctor
casually.
‘As a matter of fact, he has gone to his father's house for a
few days, down near Sevenoaks—Lord Langham, you know.’
“Ah, yes,' said Dr. Armytage. ‘Good-night, my dear Lord
Vail; I am convinced you will sleep well.'
Half an hour afterwards the house was dark and quiet.
Harry had drained his dose, and was sleeping deeply and
dreamlessly; Mr. Francis was not more wakeful. The night
was warm and mellow after the heavy rain, and Dr. Armytage
sat long at his window looking out with fixed, undeviating eyes
into the blackness. At intervals some real or fancied stir from
the sick-room would make him rise mechanically, and, crossing
the floor, look in on his patient. Once Mr. Francis in his
sleep called out, ‘Harry, Harry, take care P in a strangling,
agonized voice. But even then he did not wake, and the
doctor returned again to his seat in the window, and still gazed
out into the night. The rain had ceased soon after sunset,
and now the sky was nearly clear, and star-inwrought; in the
east the moon would soon be rising. But he regarded not,
nor saw either stars or the climbing crescent.
At length a striking clock aroused him, and he got up.
‘No, no—a thousand times no 'he said to himself.
16


CHAPTER XXI
GEOFFREY MEETS THE DOCTOR
DR. ARMYTAGE, despite Lady Oxted's round and uncom-
promising definition of him as a dexterous surgeon of sinister
repute, proved himself during the next day or two to be far
more intimately acquainted with the vital structure of the
animal called man than is at all necessary for one who only
concerns himself with the dissection of artery and muscle and
the severing of bones. Under his wise and beneficent care,
Mr. Francis rapidly rose again to his accustomed surface, and,
no less testimony to his skill, Harry once more looked the
world squarely and courageously in the face. These inner and
spiritual lesions require for their healing, not only a skilful
diagnosis, but a mind of delicate and certain touch; and of his
two patients, the doctor was inclined to think that Harry made
the more flattering recovery. During these days he kept uncle
and nephew studiously apart. He would allow no visits to the
sick-room, and communication was limited to messages passed
to and fro by the doctor himself. Mr. Francis, on the one
hand, was bidden to keep his bed for three days, and quiet
was insisted on; quiet, on the other hand, was sternly forbidden
to Harry. For him the prescription was to go out as much as
possible, and busy himself with any employment—all were
good—which he found congenial, and when indoors to apply
himself slavishly to all the businesses which Mr. Francis had
hitherto managed for him.
‘Oh, you have plenty to do,” said the doctor to this harassed
young gentleman; ‘go and do some of it.’
But among these things which had to be done was an affair
of difficulty—the letter which must be written to Geoffrey.


244 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
you should have spared me this trouble. What do you
mean P'
Dr. Armytage took a chair close to the table where Harry
was failing to write.
“Three days ago, Lord Vail, when I first arrived,” he said,
‘I offered you a sleeping-draught, which you refused. I sug-
gested that you refused it because you distrusted me. Tell
me, now, was I right in suggesting that P'
Harry looked straight, as his wont was, at the dark, secret
face he had once thought so sinister. To him now it appeared
only sad.
‘What has that got to do with it?' he asked.
“Was that suggestion right?' repeated the doctor.
‘Yes, quite,’ said the other frankly.
“Just so. Eventually you did trust me, or at any rate
behaved as if you did, and you found your confidence not
misplaced. You awoke, in fact, after a good night's rest. And
now, if you grant that, you owe me the benefit of a doubt.”
• Well ?”
‘I ask you to trust me again,” said the doctor; “for the fact
is, I have already written to your friend myself, telling him not
to expect a letter from you yet. I knew that you would find
it impossible to write to him, and it seemed to me that if I
wrote at once, as I did, it would save him some anxious hours.
That is my confession.’
Again Harry tried to feel what he told himself was a just
resentment, but the sentiment that he raised in his mind was
but a phantom. He ought, so he considered, to feel that his
liberty was being tampered with ; but this curiously self.
possessed man appeared to have the gift of impeccable
meddling. Then he laughed outright.
“I simply do not know what to say to you,' he said. “You
take it upon yourself to interfere with affairs of mine that do
not in the least concern you, and yet I don't really resent it.”
“In that you are quite wise,’ said the doctor.
Harry threw down his pen.


246 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
in Mr. Langham's knowledge? For the circumstances,’ he
said, looking gravely at Harry, “were suspicious.”
‘I know they were,' said Harry. “Poor old Geoff! Well, I
couldn't have written that letter if I had tried till midnight.”
He got up also, as the dinner-gong sounded.
‘That's dinner, and we are not yet dressed,’ he said. “But
you were quite right to do it for me, Dr. Armytage,’ and
frankness became him infinitely better than reserve, ‘and you
might have added that I have a very good friend here who
looks after both my uncle and myself.”
Dr. Armytage smiled rather grimly.
‘I came to the conclusion that such a statement would not
have increased his confidence,” he said, ‘either in me or in your
safety. There is no sense in gushing, particularly if one gushes
about one's self.'
That night, when the doctor had made his last visit to Mr.
Francis, he brought him as usual some small affectionate
message from Harry, and Mr. Francis yawned, for he was
sleepy, and made no immediate reply. But in a moment or
two he roused himself.
‘My love—my very best love,’ he said, ‘and add some
amiable doxology. By the way, how do you and he get on
together? Is it very trying? I am afraid so. But it is of
the utmost importance that you should gain Harry's confidence
—that you should make him trust you.'
“So you told me, and without boasting I think I may say I
have been fairly successful. I made a good beginning, you
know, the first night I was here.”
“Ah, yes, that sleeping-draught º' said Mr. Francis appre-
ciatively. ‘A little bromide of potassium, you told me; quite
simple and harmless. A charming drug, and an ingenious
idea. Yes, Harry's consenting to take a sleeping-draught from
your hands certainly showed that, if he was disposed not to
trust you, he was fighting that inclination. And you have
improved your advantage, dear Godfrey P
‘Yes, we are on excellent terms. And to tell you the truth,


GEOFFREY MEETS THE DOCTOR 247
I do not find it trying at all. Your nephew is both amiable
and intelligent.’
“Poor Harry " said Mr. Francis softly. ‘Yes, his very
simplicity has a certain charm, has it not? It is also a very
convenient quality. Well, I am to go to sleep, I suppose:
I sleep so well now. And you intend to take me to London
at the end of this week?'
‘That was the proposal,” said the doctor.
‘And you, being an autocrat—for indeed doctors are the only
autocrats we have left—insist on it. I assure you it will be
the best plan. That young cub who left the other day has
wits of a kind: he is rather sharp. It will quiet his outrageous
suspicions, I think, if I leave Vail soon. I hope Harry will
not be very dull alone,’ he added.
“He may not choose to stop here,” said the doctor.
‘It does not matter,’ said Mr. Francis. ‘He is certain to
come back here before his marriage, to see that the house is
quite ready to receive them after their honeymoon. I count
on that. By the way, do you call him “Harry” yet?’
* No.”
“Dear Godfrey, how short and glum you are I never make
monosyllabic replies; they are so unnecessarily curt. Try
to call him by his Christian name; it produces an admirable
effect, and so cheaply. Practise saying “Harry, Harry,” when
you are alone. You will find it make it easier. Ah, well, I
must go to sleep. Good-night, my dear man.’
It was therefore definitely settled and announced to Harry
that Mr. Francis and the doctor should leave for London at
the end of the week. He would be the better, so said the
doctor, for a change; for the very dark and autumnal weather
which had settled down on Vail during the last day or two was
of depressing influence, and he strongly recommended a week
or so in London, where the little arrangements and excite-
ments incidental to settling in a flat would keep him agreeably
occupied.
Mr. Francis dined downstairs on the last night before he left,


GEOFFREY MEETS THE DOCTOR 249
set that point at rest. Dr. Armytage told me that you believed
in the Luck, Uncle Francis. I simply couldn't credit it. You
have always ridiculed me for even pretending to.”
Mr. Francis laughed.
“Harry, these medical men cannot keep a secret,” he said.
‘No, my dear boy, I am only joking; but it is quite true that
I have found myself wondering, after your extraordinary series
of accidents early in the year, whether it were possible that
there could be anything in it.”
He paused a moment, and then went on quite naturally.
“And these last three horrible escapes of yours,” he said.
‘How strange! The ice-house—frost; the gun—fire; the sluice
—rain. “There are more things in heaven and earth—”
Well, well P
Here was proof at any rate that Mr. Francis knew how
entirely Harry trusted him, and though, at the thought of that
awful scene between Geoffrey and his uncle, the lad was
startled at so direct a mention of that which had caused it, it
was something of a relief to know that the subject did not cause
Mr. Francis pain.
‘Yes, taken all round, it would be sufficient to convince the
most hardened sceptic,’ said Harry. “Poor old Luck what
an abominably futile business it has made of it all !'
Mr. Francis suddenly covered his face with his hand.
“Ah, it won't do to jest about,’ he said. “I spoke lightly,
without thinking; but I find I cannot quite stand it, dear
Harry. It is too recent, too terrible I'
At this the talk veered to less intimate subjects, and before
a couple of minutes had passed, Mr. Francis was again in that
exuberance of spirits which had made him play “See the con-
quering hero comes.’ He had always some contribution,
apposite and gay, to make to the conversation, capable of
fantastic development and garnished with pleasant conceits.
But for him the meal would have somewhat languished; for
whether it was that Harry's old habit of reserve had returned
to him, or that his thoughts were again a prey to the per-


250 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
plexities which his uncle's words might have recalled, he was
unwontedly silent, while on the part of the doctor it seemed
that a somewhat absent assent or dissent, and that only when
directly appealed to, was all he had to give. But Mr. Francis
was the man for the moment; he rose to the social emergency,
and he told a hundred little anecdotes, diversified and amusing,
and the growing silence of the other two was but a foil to the
amazing agility of his tongue. But the most capacious mill
is emptied at last, and about the time of dessert spent and
dropping shots without effect were the only remnant of that
loquacious artillery. And it was in silence that the first glasses
of port were poured out, and to break a notable hush that
Harry rose.
“The Luck l’ he said. “I drink to the Luck I’
The doctor and Mr. Francis rose to the toast, the latter with
too eager alacrity. His napkin, which he flung on the table,
caught his glass, and the wine was spilled.
On the Saturday that the doctor and Mr. Francis were
travelling up from Vail, Geoffrey was also going to London, in
consequence of a strangely unexpected summons. He had
duly received the doctor's letter a week ago, and this had been
followed three days later by a shorter note, informing him that
he and Mr. Francis were leaving Vail for London on the
Saturday following, and asking if Geoffrey would give the
writer an opportunity of seeing him on a matter the importance
of which could not be estimated. Dr. Armytage would be at
his house that evening between five and seven, and if these
hours would not suit, he asked Geoffrey to name any time
which was convenient to him after their arrival in London, and
he would make a point of being in then, laying any other
engagement he might have aside. Then followed a notable
Sentence.
“It occurs to me,’ wrote the doctor, ‘that you, following the
thread of the suspicions of which Lord Vail has spoken to me,
may see in this request a deep-laid scheme for insuring your
presence in London on a given day and hour, and your certain


GEOFFREY MEETS THE DOCTOR 251
absence from any other place. But I beg you to ask yourself
why, if such was the case, I should have written to you at all.
I may add that Mr. Francis Vail and I reach Paddington at
12.37 (mid-day) on Saturday. Be at the station, if you will,
and assure yourself that we have left Vail.’
So far the letter ran with the precision and orderliness
of a despatch. Then followed the signature, and after the
signature a strange postscript.
“I must see you, I must see you!' read Geoffrey, and the
writer's pen had spluttered with the underlining of the words.
No very long consideration was necessary, but knowing from
Lady Oxted what he did of the doctor's antecedents, it was
clearly possible that he might be placing himself in a position
of some personal danger. To attempt to form any accurate
idea of the scheme which might conceivably lie latent behind
this letter was an idle task; but what he saw, and that without
shadow of doubt, but with a certain exultation, was that it was
he above all men whom Mr. Francis had most reason to fear,
and as long as he went at large, with all the circumstantial
evidence that he held, it was clearly very unlikely that any further
attempt would be immediately contemplated against Harry, for
the risk would be prodigious. So far, then, it looked that this
letter might be a bold and cunning scheme to get him, too, into
the power of this hellish man. On the other hand, he could not
neglect this possible chance: the letter might conceivably be
genuinely inspired. Looking at it coolly, as was his habit of
mind, he thought that this balance of probability dipped to
the sinister side; this Dr. Armytage was far more likely to be
Mr. Francis's confederate than a disinterested doctor, or a foe.
Yet there was a certain touch of truth about the spluttering pen
of the postscript, and Geoffrey's debate was but of short duration.
Then, with wonderment at his own slowness of wit, next
moment the obvious safeguard struck him, and he telegraphed
to the doctor at 32, Wimpole Street, that he would meet him
at five o'clock at the junction of Orchard Street with Oxford
Street. This was conveniently near to his own lodgings, where


GEOFFREY MEETS THE DOCTOR 253
‘Why?' asked Geoffrey.
‘Because we are dealing, or I hope shall soon be dealing,
with a very subtle man, who, for aught I know, may be watch-
ing either you or me.”
Geoffrey wheeled round quickly.
‘Come to my rooms in Orchard Street,” he said—“No. 12;
I will walk on the other side of the road.”
The distance was but a few dozen yards, and three minutes
later the two men were in the sitting-room, which overlooked
the street. Geoffrey pointed to a seat, and waited for the
other to open the conversation.
“I repeat,” said the doctor, ‘that your amendment of my
plan was reasonable, for you have little reason to trust me.’
‘It seemed to me so,' said Geoffrey. “I thought it wise to
take that and other precautions. But it was you who asked
for this interview ; kindly tell me what you have to say.”
“It is told in two words,” said Dr. Armytage. “Your friend
Lord Vail has, by almost a miracle of luck, escaped from three
well-devised schemes against his life. Thrice has Mr. Francis
failed. We cannot expect such luck to continue.”
Not a muscle of Geoffrey's face moved.
‘You mean he will make another attempt?" he said.
‘He will certainly make another attempt.’
Geoffrey's hands were playing with a box of cigarettes on
the table, opening and shutting the lid in a careful and purpose-
less manner.
‘Here, smoke,” he said, ‘and give me a minute to think.”
The doctor took a cigarette, lit it, and waited. He had
smoked it half down before Geoffrey spoke again.
‘You see my position,’ he said at length. “There is no harm
that I can see in my telling you that I know how intimate you
are with Mr. Francis. I am wondering whether possibly I may
be aiding him and you by seeing you; for your intimacy with
Mr. Francis was very close as much as three-and-twenty years
ago, at the time, let us say, of the violent death of Harold
Houldsworth. That is so, I believe P'


254 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
“Certainly,” said the doctor. “I received, I may tell you,
two thousand pounds for the service I did Mr. Francis at the
coroner's inquest.”
Geoffrey looked up quickly.
“Ah! that sounds genuine,’ he said.
‘About that you must decide for yourself,' said the doctor.
Geoffrey snapped down the lid of the cigarette-box, took out
of his coat-pocket the revolver he had placed there, and laid
it on the table close to the doctor's hand.
‘I have decided, you see, to trust you,” he said. “Perhaps
my parting with that revolver is an unconvincing proof, for it
would certainly be incautious of you to shoot me here and
now, but I can think of nothing better. There it is, anyhow.'
Dr. Armytage took up the revolver and opened it.
“Six chambers—all loaded, I perceive,’ he said. “Let me
return it you as I received it. I have no use for it.’
Geoffrey took it from his hand, and put it back in the table-
drawer.
‘And now let us talk,” he said.
An extraordinary look of relief crossed the doctor's face; the
whole man seemed to brighten to the eye.
‘I hardly dared hope you would trust me,’ he said, “and
your affection for your friend must have been strong. Butlet
us waste no more time. Yes, your suspicions were quite
correct. Harry Vail has no bitterer enemy than his uncle.
He has made no less than three attempts to put him out of the
way.”
‘You speak as if you were sure of it,” said Geoffrey.
‘I am ; but what evidence have we? It would not take a
lawyer ten minutes to tear it to shreds; for it is entirely
circumstantial, and weak at that. There is the devilish cunning
of the man. Again, if we are to save Harry, we must save him
in spite of himself, for he believes not a word of it, and we deal
with a man who is cunning and utterly unscrupulous, far more
cunning probably than you and I put together. But we have
one great advantage over him.’


GEOFFREY MEETS THE DOCTOR 255
‘What is that?' asked Geoffrey.
“The fact that he counts on me to be his accomplice. If
we succeed I am to have ten thousand pounds.’
At these words distrust again flared high in Geoffrey's mind,
refusing to keep silence.
“God give you your portion in hell, he cried, “if you are
playing a double game !'
The doctor showed no sign of resentment, but he did not
immediately reply.
‘This will not do at all,” he said at length. “Either you
trust me or you do not. If you do not, I will go; we are but
wasting words. I may remind you, however, that if I am
playing a double game, my conduct in wishing to see you is
utterly unaccountable, but if not, that it will be barely possible
for me alone to save your friend; for it is my strong impression
that Mr. Francis's man—Sanders, is it not ?—will help his
master. Come, which is it to be P'
‘Yes, yes, I trust you,' said Geoffrey in great agitation. “I
ought never to have said that. Please go on.’
‘I can give you no certain details yet,” said the doctor; “but
the attempt will be made between Harry's return to Vail from
Lady Oxted's, where he goes in a few days, and his moving
to London before the marriage. So much I have gathered
from Mr. Francis. It is, you will understand, of the utmost
importance to him that the marriage should never be consum-
mated. More exactly than that I cannot tell you, but I want
you in any case to hold yourself in readiness to come to
Vail or anywhere else at a moment's notice, and at a word
from me.’
‘Yes, I promise that,” said Geoffrey.
“The particulars I cannot give you,” continued the doctor,
“for I do not yet know them; indeed, I doubt whether Mr.
Francis has yet worked them out himself. But to-day, as we
were coming up in the train, he blew on his flute a long time,
and then said suddenly to me: “I have a new hobby, the
properties of certain powerful drugs. We will have some great


GEOFFREY MEETS THE DOCTOR 257
not till then did I decide to save him if I could, and not to do
—the other thing. And every day strengthened my decision,
and the thought of the ten thousand pounds grew less attractive.
My reason is hard to give you—convincingly, at any rate. It
was due perhaps to a great charm and attractiveness which
Lord Vail possesses; it was due perhaps to an idea in my own
mind that I would not commit murder. That sounds a little
crude, does it not? Good-bye, again.”
Geoffrey held out his hand.
“I trust you,' he said, ‘quite completely, and so, it seems,
does Harry. I do not believe that we are both wrong.’
Dr. Armytage turned quickly away without a word. A
moment afterwards the street-door banged behind him.
17


CHAPTER XXII
LADY Oxted HAS A bad night
HARRY was sitting cross-legged on the hearthrug after dinner,
poking the fire in an idiotic manner with the tongs. Gun-
cotton would have smouldered out under so illiterate a stroke.
He was also talking with about equal vivacity and vacuity to
Lady Oxted and Evie ; but while his conversation was not
more than difficult to bear, his poking of the fire was quite
intolerable. Lady Oxted got swiftly and silently up from her
chair, and, in the manner of a stooping hawk, took the instru:
ment from him.
“We can attend better, dear Harry,” she said, ‘to your most
interesting conversation if you do not distract our minds by
making a bayonet of improper fire-irons. You can do that
after we have gone to bed.’
“They are improper,' said Harry; “but my sense of delicacy
forbade my telling you so. How a respectable woman like
you could tolerate their presence in the house has been more
than I was able to imagine. But now the ice is broken—oh, I
never told you about the ice-house—no more I did.'
Lord Oxted looked up from the evening paper which he was
reading distractedly but diligently, and made a bee-line for the
door. His exit, though made without protest, was somewhat
marked. He had no manners, as his wife often told him.
“The ice-house,” said Harry, as if he was giving out a text
to a diminishing congregation, and a spicy emphasis was re-
quired to retain the rest, ‘and the gun and the sluice.”
The shadow of Lord Oxted lingered a moment in the door-
way at this alluring selection, but immediately disappeared on
the next words—"I'll make your blood run cold.'


LADY OXTED HAS A BAD NIGHT 259
“Has the Luck been singing its nursery rhymes P' asked
Lady Oxted, uncertain what to do with that white elephant the
tongs.
‘Singing?' cried Harry, digging the shovel into the fire—
“singing, quo' she My good woman, I can and will a tale
unfold, which, if you have tears, prepare to shed them now,'
said he with a felicitous air.
Lady Oxted annexed the shovel also. Thus there were two
white elephants.
‘I am not the washerwoman, Harry,” she remarked with
reason.
‘No, dear aunt,” said he, growing suddenly grave; “and if I
hadn't been so absurdly happy to-night, I shouldn't have made
a joke of it; for, indeed, it was no joke. Anyhow, the doctor
congratulated me on my admirable nerves.”
“Some people, when they prepare to tell a story,' said Lady
Oxted, “begin at the beginning. Others—this is without pre-
judice—begin at the end, and work laboriously and slowly
backwards. Let me at least ask you, Harry, not to be slow.
Tell me about this doctor, as we are to go backwards. Did
his name begin with an AP'
‘Quite right,” said Harry; “and it went on with an R.'
Lady Oxted dropped her white elephants on the carpet, and
sat down by Evie.
‘Armytage P’ she asked ; and the fooling was gone from her
voice.
“Right again. You had much better tell the whole story
for yourself, hadn't you?'
“No ; when other people begin to talk about the Luck, I
take no part in the conversation,’ said she, “except, at least,
when Geoffrey is here, and then I talk of Bears and Bulls.’
The Harry who had played bayonet with the tongs had by
this time vanished; vanished also were the flying skirts of
farce, and in absolute silence on the part of his audience, and
in gravity on his own, he told them the three adventures,
narrating only the salient facts, and alluding neither directly
17–2


26o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
nor otherwise to Geoffrey or his uncle. But while his tale was
yet young Evie crossed from the sofa where she had been
sitting with Lady Oxted, and joined Harry on the hearthrug.
One hand held her fan, the other was on her lap. Of the
latter Harry easily possessed himself, and the tale of the gun
was told with it in his. But as he spoke of the raking gash
that riddled the cornice and ceiling of the gun-room, it was
suddenly withdrawn and laid on his shoulder.
‘Oh, Harry, Harry " she murmured.
He turned and stopped, spontaneously responsive.
‘My darling,” he said, ‘I ought never to have told you;
only I could not help telling you some time, and why not
now? Was it not better to tell you like this, making no con-
fidence of it?'
If ever a word ought to have carried the weight of a hint,
the word was here. But Lady Oxted showed not the slightest
sign of following her husband, or saying she must write two
notes.
“Go on, Harry, she said. “We are waiting. So the gun
went off?'
But Harry turned to the girl.
“It is with you,' he said. “Will you have the third
adventure, or not. Simply as you wish. Here am I, anyhow.’
‘Yes, tell us,’ she said.
At the end Lady Oxted rose crisply.
‘I never heard of such impotent magic in all my life,” she
said. “Really, Harry, if you must tell us supernatural experi-
ences in the evening, we have a right to expect to be pleasantly
frightened. But I have never been less frightened. You
whistled your way into an ice-house, you took up a gun care-
lessly, you stood on a piece of unsafe stonework. If I were
you, Evie, I should buy him a nice leading-rein.”
These brutalities were effective, and banished the subject,
and, without pausing to comment or let others comment, Lady
Oxted sent for her husband, and they sat down to a table of
bridge.


LADY OXTED HAS A BAD NIGHT 263
must consider not only yourself, but Evie. In her mother's
absence, I have a certain duty towards her. I do not ask you
from curiosity, but because of the relations in which both you
and I stand to her. You have within the last few weeks been
in three positions of extreme personal danger. Can you,
however vaguely, account for this? Have there been no
suspicious circumstances of any kind which might lead any-
one to think that these were not entirely accidents? You say
that Geoffrey was in the house on all these occasions. Did he
take it all as lightly as you seem to ?"
‘I would rather not bring Geoffrey into it,” said Harry.
“Have you quarrelled?'
‘Yes; I suppose that you may say that we have quarrelled,’
he replied.
‘Harry, why will you not tell me, and save my asking you
all these questions? I intend to go on asking them. Was
your quarrel with Geoffrey connected in any way with these
accidents P'
‘Oh, give me a minute,’ cried Harry. “I want to make up
my mind whether I am going to tell you or not. I suppose if
I did not, you would go to Geoff?'
“Certainly I should,” said Lady Oxted promptly, although
this had not occurred to her.
“Well, it is better that I should tell you than he,” said Harry,
and without more words he told her all that he had purposely
left unsaid, from the mistaken direction which had sent him to
the ice-house instead of the summer-house, down to the scene
in the smoking-room when he had parted with Geoffrey. She
heard him in silence without question or interruption, and
when he had finished, still she said nothing. Apt and ready
as she was for the ordinary social emergency, she could frame
nothing for this. She could not say what she thought, out-
spokenly like Geoffrey, for Harry's sake. She would not say
what she did not think, in spite of her diplomatic tendencies,
for her own.
At last the silence became portentous, and Harry broke it.


LADY OXTED HAS A BAD NIGHT 265
dignified, calm, world-without-end letter. It is so easy to make
an estrangement permanent; you can always do that.”
‘I haven't written at all,” said Harry. “I tried to, but
I could not do it. There is no hurry; besides, Geoffrey will
not expect to hear from me. Dr. Armytage wrote to tell him
not to.”
Lady Oxted just succeeded in suppressing the exclamation
of surprise that was on her lips.
‘That was very kind of him, and wise as well,” she said.
‘He is both the one and the other,’ said Harry. “He was
down at Vail a week; I liked him immensely. But I don't
mind telling you that I was glad to get away—to part with
him, with Uncle Francis, with the Luck for a time. I felt as
if there was some occult conjunction against me, and I didn't
like it. I had continually to keep a hold on myself, to make
an effort not to be scared. But here I am being beautifully
relaxed; I feel secure. Yes, that's the word.”
Lady Oxted continued her diplomatic course.
“There is nothing so catching as superstition,” she said,
‘and all the evening, since you told Evie and me about it,
I have been wondering Oh, it must be all nonsense !'
she cried.
‘You mean the Luck?' asked Harry. ‘Is Saul also among
the prophets?'
‘Yes, I mean the Luck. How does the nursery rhyme go?
Fire and frost and rain, isn't it? Well, there they all were,
and it is no use denying it.’
“Not the slightest,” said Harry.
“Certainly it is very strange. Harry, I don't like the Luck
at all; it's uncanny. I wish you would smash it, or throw it
into the sea. Yet somehow I feel as if you are safe as long
as you are here, away from it. I wish you would stop here
till your marriage. Then you go away, you see, for six weeks,
and in the meantime some burglar might be kind enough to
steal it.’
Harry shook his head.


LADY OXTED HAS A BAD NIGHT 267
By degrees, as she paced her room, a kind of clearness came
to her. Mr. Francis's design was evident; he had shown his
hand by the nature of his earlier attempts in which he had
tried to stop Harry's marriage. Then, in the miscarriage of
that, he had turned to directer deeds—fouler they could
scarcely be, but of more violent sort. There had been a
species of awful art in his doings; he had taken, with a fiend's
gusto and pleasure in the ingenuity of it (so she pictured),
Harry's avowed superstition in the power of the Luck to compass
his ends. As a musician takes a subject, and on this theme
works out a fugue, as an artist paints a portrait in a definite
preconceived scheme of colour, so had Mr. Francis taken the
Luck, and the dangers it was thought to bring to its possessor;
these he had elaborated, put into practical shape. It must
have dwelt in his mind like a lunatic's idea; not only, as in
the case of the gun, did he make his opportunity, but, as in the
affair of the ice-house, he must have been alert, receptive, in-
stinctively and instantaneously turning to his ends whatever
chance put in his way.
This thought brought her a certain feeling of relief on the
one hand, but on the other it added an indefinite terror. No
man morally sane could devise and steadily prosecute so
finished a scheme; the very thoroughness and consistency of
the three attempts stamped them as the work of a madman.
Nine-tenths of the blood murderously shed on the earth was
to be put down to a spasm of ungovernable anger and hate
which at the moment possessed the murderer; this long pre-
meditation, this careful following of one idea by which frost,
fire and rain should be the direct causes of Harry's death, was
not to be attributed—so devilish and so finished was the ap-
plication—to a sane author. Here lay the consolation: her
shuddering horror of the white-haired, old gentleman, with
his flute-playing and his boyish yet courtly manner, was a
little assuaged, and gave way to mere human pity for a
mind deranged. But simultaneously, as if with a clash of
cymbals, her fear of him clanged in her breast; that cunning


27o THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Dr. Armytage, of which Geoffrey told her, seemed but a
doubtful gain.
‘What does one know of him?’ she asked. “Nothing that
is not bad. Mr. Francis could not have chosen a more apt or
a more unscrupulous tool. He got two thousand pounds, you
tell me, for his services in connection with the Houldsworth
case. What will he not do for ten ? Oh, we may be dealing
with a cunning of which we have no conception | What if all
this was told you simply to blind you? Nothing can be more
probable, and how admirably it has succeeded ! Already you
trust the man—their object, as far as you are concerned, is
gained.’
‘I had to trust him or distrust him,” said Geoffrey, “and I
chose to do the former. If I had chosen the latter the door
would have closed on it, and I do not see that we should be
any better off than we are now. If he is dealing straight with
us, we have an immense advantage in knowing all he knows
of Mr. Francis's plans; if he is not, he can at the most give us
misleading information, which is not worse than none at all.”
Lady Oxted considered this in silence a moment.
‘Yes, that is true,' she said; “yet somehow my flesh misgives
me to be allied with that man. Oh, Geoffrey, is it because
this awful Luck has cast a spell on us that we imagine Harry
surrounded by these intimate and immediate perils? Are our
fears real? Let us tell ourselves that we are ordinary people,
living in an age of prose and policemen; we are not under the
Doges' This is the nineteenth century, she said, rising, “ or
the twentieth, if you will. We look out on Grosvenor Square;
a hansom is driving by.”
She stopped suddenly.
‘I am wrong," she said, “it is not driving by. It has stopped
at the door, and Dr. Armytage has rung the bell. Oh, what
shall I do?’ she cried. ‘God in heaven, what are we to do?
What has he come to tell us?”
Geoffrey got up.
‘Now quietly, quietly, Lady Oxted,” he said. “He has


THE MEETING IN GROSVENOR SQUARE 273
“There is no need, therefore,' he began, as if continuing his
private train of thought, ‘that I should speak at any length of
what has already happened. Harry, I gather, has told you,
Lady Oxted, of his three escapes; he has told you also of his
quarrel with his friend here, and the reason of it?'
There was something in his bald abruptness which pleased
Lady Oxted ; it looked genuine, but at the same time she
made to herself the conscious reservation that it might be a
piece of acting. If acting, it was a very decent performance.
She gave a silent assent.
‘You have asked me to speak before you,” he went on, “but
in doing so I am somewhat at a personal disadvantage. I
have no reason to suppose that you trust me; indeed, there is
no reason why you should. You know of me probably as an
intimate friend of Mr. Francis, and when it appears that I am
a traitor to him, you naturally ask yourself if I am really so.
But'—and he paused a moment—“but I do not think that this
need much concern me. I am here to tell you in what way
Mr. Francis hopes to kill his nephew. It is our object, I take
it, to prevent that.'
There was something in his tone that smacked of the lecture,
so dry and precise was it; but a clearer observer of him than
either of his present audience, to whom the words he said were
so much more just now than the man who said them, would
have seen that an intense agitation quivered beneath the
surface. The man was desperately in earnest about some-
thing.
“There is one more preliminary word,” he went on. “We
are dealing, so far as my observations go, with a man who is
scarcely sane. In the psychology of crime we find that such
patient, calculated attempts to take life are usually associated
with something else that indicates cerebral disorder, some fixed
idea, in short, of an insane character, which is usually the
motive for the homicidal desire. That symptom is present
here.”
“The Luck l' exclaimed Lady Oxted.
18


THE MEETING IN GROSVENOR SQUARE 275
morning—for I, as you will see, am to figure in them—and
what he will do is this.’
The doctor again paused, and adjusted his finger-tips
together.
“He expects Harry,’ he said, “to return to Vail before the
end of the month. He and his servant will return about the
same time, or perhaps a day or two earlier, for there will be a
few arrangements to make. I shall also accompany Mr.
Francis, so he tells me, on the ground of his continued ill-
health.”
“Ah ! those heart attacks,’ said Lady Oxted; “are they
genuine P'
“Perfectly; they are also dangerous. To continue: On the
night appointed—that is to say, as soon as we are all there—
I am to administer to Harry a drug called metholycine. In
all respects it is suitable for Mr. Francis's purpose, and a small
dose produces within a very few minutes complete unconscious-
ness, to which, if no antidote or restorative is applied, succeeds
death. It also is extremely volatile, more so even than aconite,
and a very few hours after death no trace of it would be found
in the stomach or other parts of the body. The drug, how-
ever, is exceedingly hard to get. No chemist would con-
ceivably give it to any unauthorized person; but a few years
ago I was experimenting with it, and it so happens that I still
have some in my possession. Mr. Francis has a most retentive
memory, and though I have no recollection of ever having
mentioned this fact to him, he asked me this morning if I had
any left. He did so in so quiet and normal a voice that for
the moment I was off my guard, and told him I had. But
perhaps, after all, it was a lucky occurrence, for he seemed
much pleased, and played on his flute for a time. Then he
came back to me, and told me what I have already told you,
and what I shall now tell you.’
There was something strangely grim about the composure
of the doctor's manner. You would have said he spoke of
Danish politics. More grim, perhaps, was this mention of the
18–2


276 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
flute-playing. Certainly, it added an extreme vividness to his
narrative, and the flute-player was more horrible than the man
who planned death.
“In this respect, then, first of all, continued the icy voice,
‘I am useful to him. In the second place, Mr. Francis seems
to have a singular horror of doing himself, actually and with
his hands, this deed. In another way, also, I shall be of
service to him; and here I must touch on things more grue.
some, but it is best that you should know all. The drug is to
be administered late at night, after the servants are out of the
way. It is almost completely without taste or odour, and Mr.
Francis's suggestion is that a whisky-and-soda, which he tells
me Harry always takes before going to bed, should be the
vehicle. Ten minutes after he has taken it he will be un-
conscious, but he will live for another half-hour. During that
time we shall carry him down to the plate-closet, where the
Luck is kept with the rest of the plate. There Sanders will
be. That part will be in Sanders' hands, but he will not use
firearms for fear of the noise of the report reaching the servants,
and the blow that kills him, you understand, looking at the
occurrence from the point of view of the coroner, must be
dealt while he is still alive; otherwise the absence of effusion
of blood and other details would show a doctor that he was
already dead when his skull was broken—this is the idea—
by a battering blow. Here again Mr. Francis anticipates
that I shall be of use to him in determining when unconscious-
ness is quite complete and death not yet immediate. He has
a curiously strong desire that Harry should feel no pain, for
he is very fond of him.'
Lady Oxted and Geoffrey alike were glued to his words,
both paler than their wont. As the doctor paused they sought
each other's eyes, and found there horror beyond all speech.
“Some of the most valuable of the plate,’ continued the
doctor, “will be taken, and, of course, the Luck. The plate
will be the perquisite of Sanders; the Luck Mr. Francis will
keep secretly, the presumption being that it was stolen also.


278 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
------------- ------- -
‘And Mr. Francis will not find it easy to get more,” said the
doctor.
The effect of this was great and immediate. Both Lady
Oxted and Geoffrey felt as much relieved as if an imminent
danger had been removed, though the logic of their relief,
seeing that they both trusted Dr. Armytage, in whose domain
the poison lay, was not capable of bearing examination. At
any rate, Lady Oxted sat briskly up from the cramped huddling
of the position in which she had listened to the doctor's story,
and clapped her hands.
“Ha! check number one,' she said. “And what next, Dr.
Armytage P'
‘That depends on what end you have in view,’ said he. “Is
Harry's safety all?'
‘Yes, but his safety must be certain,' she said. “I must see
that man in a criminal lunatic asylum or in penal servitude.
Harry will never be safe till he is behind bars.”
‘I agree with you,” said Geoffrey.
Dr. Armytage left the fireplace, where he had been standing
since the beginning of the interview, and sat down.
“Do you realize what that demands P’ he said. “It means
that Mr. Francis must be allowed to make the attempt.”
“Which we have already frustrated,” said Lady Oxted, point.
ing to the fireplace.
Dr. Armytage shook his head.
“If the idea is to catch him red-handed, that is not suffi-
cient,’ he said. “Harry takes whisky-and-soda and salt one
night, very little salt, for the drug is potent. He may or may
not notice the salt. What then? Sanders, meantime, is wait-
ing in the plate-closet. No doubt we can thus catch Sanders.
But that is all.”
Lady Oxted rang the bell.
“We can do nothing,” she said, ‘except go straight to Scot-
land Yard and put the whole matter in the hands of the police.
You will please come with me, Dr. Armytage, Geoffrey too.
To us, of course, the evidence is overwhelming; look at it,


THE MEETING IN GROSVENOR SQUARE 279
from the Houldsworth case onwards—' And she stopped
suddenly and looked at the doctor. “Good heavens, I never
thought of that ſ’ she said.
The doctor rose.
‘I, as you may imagine, have thought a good deal of that,'
he said.
“Is it possible by any means to get hold of this man
Sanders?’ asked Lady Oxted at length. “Get me a hansom,'
she said to the man who answered the bell.
“I should prefer to try that first,” said the doctor, “and I
will see what I can do. It may be possible to buy the man;
he may be scamp enough to be venal. But if we have to go
to Scotland Yard, we have to go to Scotland Yard, but for the
moment we need not; Harry is safe with you for ten days
more, and Mr. Francis is not thinking of leaving London for
ten days. Something, perhaps, may turn up in the interval.
If not, I am ready.’
Lady Oxted felt that no words could meet the situation, and
did not make the attempt.
“Then the hansom shall take me to the station instead,” she
said. “I have just time to catch my train. Drive with me
there, Geoffrey.” She stood up, drawing on her gloves. “Please
let me hear from you, Dr. Armytage,’ she said; “ or if you
have any communication to make which had better not be
written, come down to Oxted, or wire for me to come up.
At present, then, there is nothing more to be said P’
She shook hands, and the three went out through the hall
and across the broad pavement to where the hansom was
waiting. Lady Oxted got in first, and Geoffrey was already on
the step to follow, when a man crossing the road came from
behind the hansom, and stepped on to the pavement close to
where the doctor was standing. -
“Dear fellow,” said a very familiar voice, “what a glorious
afternoon ſ'
The thing was so sudden that the doctor had literally no
time to lose his nerve.


THE MEETING IN GROSVENOR SQUARE 281
appeared, showing two rows of white and very even teeth.
The pleasant rosiness of the face was blotched and mottled with
patches of white and purple, the forehead and the corners of the
quivering mouth were streaked with corrugations so deeply cut
that the dividing ridges of flesh cast shadows therein. The
stamp of humanity was obliterated.
He stood there for perhaps five seconds, his lower jaw work-
ing gently up and down as if chewing, and a little foam
gathered on his lips. Each moment the doctor expected him
either to fall senseless on the pavement or to spring upon him;
for it seemed impossible that any human frame could contain
so raging an energy of emotion and yet neither break nor give
it outlet. Then the horrible chewing of the jaw ceased, and
the man, or beast, wiped the froth from his lips.
‘You black, treacherous scoundrel !' he said, very softly.
“Do you think I am the sort of man to be thwarted by a faith-
less subordinate P’
He came a step nearer; his mouth still seemed to be forming
words; but it was as if the human nature of the man had been
so effaced as to preclude speech, and he stood chattering and
gesticulating like some angry ape. Yet the resemblance roused
in the doctor no sense of the ludicrous, but only a deep-seated
horror at this thing which had doffed its humanity like a cloak,
and become part of the brute creation. He summoned all his
courage to his aid—an empty effort, for he knew within
himself that if this travesty of a man came but one step nearer,
he would, in spite of himself, simply turn tail and run from it.
But Mr. Francis came no nearer, nor did he speak again,
and before the lapse of another five seconds he turned away,
and walked quickly down towards the corner of the square
without looking back. The doctor followed him with his eye,
and saw him hail a hansom at the end of Upper Grosvenor
Street, and then get in and drive northwards. He himself
stood there, his brain a tumult of bewildered conjecture, and
did not see who it was rapidly approaching him till the figure
was by him, and he heard his own name called.


THE MEETING IN GROSVENOR SQUARE 283
He stepped out of the entry, hailed a cab from a rank a little
way down the street, and said a few words to the cabman,
pointing out to him the hansom he was to keep in sight. He
drew up at the curb opposite their place of observation. Not
forty yards in front was Mr. Francis's hansom.
The sober, respectable street dozed in the haze of the after-
noon sun with the air of a professional man resting for a little
from his work. Vehicles were but few, the pavements only
sparsely populous, and the roadway nearly empty. The driver
of Mr. Francis's cab got down from his perch, and was talking
to the hall-porter of the house of flats and pulling at a laggard
pipe. Then suddenly both porter and cabman looked up as
if they had been called from within, and disappeared into the
entry, to come back with various small pieces of luggage.
Then the cabman mounted his box, and, with the other's
assistance, drew up a portmanteau on to the roof. At that
moment Mr. Francis stepped across the pavement and entered
the cab. He had on a straw hat. In his hand was the
morocco flute-case, on his mouth a smile and thanks to the
porter. Sanders followed, and, after a word, got in after him.
At the same instant of time the doctor and Geoffrey had
sprung into their places, and the two cabs started together.
The passage of half a dozen streets was sufficient to make
their destination tolerably certain, and when Mr. Francis's cab
turned into the steep decline leading to the departure platform
at Paddington, the matter was practically beyond doubt.
Here the doctor stopped the cab, and they got out.
“It is certain,’ said Geoffrey, though no word had passed
between them. ‘Look, it is ten minutes past five. The fast
train to Vail will start in seven minutes. Now, what are we
to do?'
‘Harry is at Oxted,” said the doctor, as if speaking to him-
self. “Yes, we only want to be perfectly certain that Mr.
Francis goes to Vail.’
‘I will find that out,” said Geoffrey.
He walked down the incline past Sanders, who was busy


284 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
with the luggage, and into the booking-office. There were a
considerable number of passengers waiting, but Mr. Francis
was already high up in the queue. Geoffrey waited with his
back turned till he heard him speak to the clerk.
‘One first and one second single to Vail,” he said.
With this their information was complete, and he rejoined
the doctor.
Harry at Oxted ; Mr. Francis, with luggage for a prolonged
stay, at Vail—here was the sum of it, and the movements were
duly telegraphed to Lady Oxted. So far all was well, in such
a degree as anything could be well in this dark business, and
by mutual consent they determined to leave all further de-
liberations till the morrow. They were fully informed,
prepared for all moves. To-morrow, it might be, Mr. Francis
would show for what reason he had gone to Vail.


º
CHAPTER XXIV
JIM GOES TO BED
GEOFFREy, in spite of, or perhaps owing to, his anxieties, slept
long and late, and it was already past ten when he came half-
dressed from his bedroom to the adjoining sitting-room in quest
of letters.
But there was no word either from Dr. Armytage or Lady
Oxted, and here no news was distinctly good news. No fresh
complication had arisen. Harry, it might be safely assumed,
was safe at Oxted, Mr. Francis as certainly at Vail, though
his safety was a matter of infinitesimal moment. Yet, in spite
of this, Geoffrey had no morning face; an intolerable presage
of disaster sat heavy on him, and he brooded sombrely over
his meal, reading the paper, yet not noting its contents, and the
paragraphs were Dutch to him. Even here in London, the
fog-centre, one must believe, of created things, the morning
was one of fine and exquisite beauty. Primrose-coloured sun-
shine flooded the town, the air was brisk with the cleanly smell
of autumnal frost. How clearly could he picture to himself
what this same hour was like at Vaill How familiar and inti-
mate was the memory of such mornings when he and Harry
had stepped after breakfast into the sparkling coolness of the
young day, and the sunshine from without met with a glad
thrill of welcome the sunshine from within. The lake lay level
and shining—the brain-picture had the vividness of authentic
hallucination—a wisp of mist still hanging in places over it;
level and shining, too, were the lawns; a pearly mysterious
halo moved with the moving shadow of the head. Blackbirds
scurried and chuckled over the grass, the beeches were golden
in their autumn liveries, a solemn glee even smiled in the gray


286 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
and toned red of the square house. At that, regret as bitter as
tears surged up within him. Never again, so he thought, could
the particular happiness of those unreflecting days be his;
tragedy, like drops from some corroding drug, had fallen in
sting and smoke upon him; over that fair scene slept on the
wing the destroying angel; between himself and Harry had
arisen the barrier of irreconcilable estrangement; and, like a
monstrous spider spinning threads, God knew where, or to
catch what heedless footstep, Mr. Francis stretched his web
over every outlet from that house, and sat in each, malign and
poisonous.
These vague forebodings and the mordancy of regret grew to
be unbearable, and, taking his hat, Geoffrey walked out west.
ward, aimlessly enough, only seeking to dull misgivings by the
sight of many human faces. The crowd had for him an
absorbing fascination, and to be in the midst of folk was to
put the rein on private fancies, for the spectacle of life claimed
all the attention. But this morning this healthful prescription
seemed to have lost its efficacy, or the drugs were stale and
impotent, and the air was dark with winged fears that came to
roost within him, chattering evilly together. Yet the streets
were better than his own room, and for near two hours he
wandered up and down the jostling pavements; then, return-
ing to Orchard Street, he entered his weary room, and his
heart stood suddenly still, for on the table was lying a tele-
gram.
For a moment he stood by the door, as if fearing even to go
near it; then, with a stride and an inserted finger, the pink
sheet was before his eye.
‘Harry has just left for Vail,’ it ran, “passing through
London. Sanders has telegraphed that his master is danger-
ously ill, and he must come at once to see him alive. Take
this direct to Dr. Armytage.’
The shock was as of fire or cold water, disabling for the
moment, but bracing beyond words. All the brooding, the
regret, the dull, vague aches of the morning had passed as


288 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
deliberate deception on a solemn matter. To say ‘Yes' was
to declare to his friend that he desired the forgiveness of
that horrible man whom he soberly believed to be guilty of
the most monstrous designs. But the momentous debate was
but momentary.
‘No, Harry, I cannot,’ he said.
The two turned from each other without further words, and
Geoffrey took a step to where the doctor stood.
‘I came to have a word with you,' he said; and together
they went into the consulting-room.
Scarcely had the door closed behind them when Geoffrey
drew the telegram from his pocket.
‘I have just had this from Lady Oxted,” he said. “Probably
she has telegraphed the same to you. Now, how did Harry
come here, and what has passed between you?'
The doctor glanced at the sheet.
‘Yes, she telegraphed to me also,” he said. “Harry's coming
was pure luck. He wanted me to go with him down to Vail
to see if anything can be done for Mr. Francis. I hope,” he
added, with a humour too grim for smiles, ‘to be able to do a
great deal for Mr. Francis.”
“So you are going—thank the Lord 'said Geoffrey. “And
do you believe in this illness?'
“He may have had another attack,” said the doctor, with a
shrug; “indeed, it is not improbable after the agitation of
yesterday. Again, he may not, and he is a subtle man."
“It is a trap, you mean, to get Harry there?'
“Possibly, and if so, a trap laid in a hurry, else he would
never have telegraphed to Harry at Lady Oxted's; he might
have guessed it would be passed on to us. I am sorry, by the
way, that you could not manage to say “Yes” to his wish that
you should go with him. But I respect you for saying “No.”
‘I couldn't do otherwise,’ said Geoffrey. “All the same, if
it appears desirable, I shall come to Vail.’
“Ah you will come secretly, on your own account, just as
you would have if you had not seen Harry. That will do just


JIM GOES TO BED 289
as well. Now, I can give you three minutes. I shall be in
the house; you, I suppose, will not. How can I communi-
cate with you?'
Geoffrey thought a moment, and his eye brightened.
“In two ways; no less,’ he said. “Listen carefully, please.
At any appointed time tap at the portrait of old Francis in the
hall. I shall be just behind it, and will open it; or, secondly,
go to the window of the gun-room, open it, and call me very
gently. I shall be within three yards of you, in the centre of
the box-hedge just outside. I will do whichever seems to you
best.’
“Does Mr. Francis know of either?' asked the doctor, after a
pause.
“He knows of the passage inside the house: of that I am
sure. I don't know that he knows of the box-hedge.’
“Then we will choose that. Now, how will you get to Vail?
You must not go by the same train as we. You must not run
the risk of Harry seeing you.’
“Then I shall go by the next—5.17, same as Mr. Francis
went by yesterday. It gets in at half-past six. I will be at the
box-hedge soon after seven.’
“Very good,' said the doctor. “Now in turn listen to me.
Mr. Francis believes he has the metholycine with him; he has
also Sanders. It seems to me, therefore, probable that he
will attempt to carry the thing out in the way he indicated to
me, which I told you and Lady Oxted.’
Geoffrey shook his head.
“Not likely,’ he said. “You hold the evidence of the
metholycine he has taken from your cabinet.’
‘Yes, but he is desperate, and the drug almost untraceable.
Also the fact that he has the metholycine from my cabinet may
be supposed to shut my mouth. It looks very much as if I
was his accomplice, does it not ? He will guess that this is
awkward for me, as indeed it would be, were not the metholy-
cine common salt.
“Hal” said Geoffrey. “Go on.’
I9


290 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
“I expect—I feel sure, then, that his plans are more or less
the same as before, only he and Sanders will have to carry them
through alone. I see no reason why they should alter the idea
of the supposed burglary. It is simple and convincing, and
my mouth is sealed in two ways.”
‘How two P asked Geoffrey.
‘Two, so Mr. Francis thinks. Houldsworth and metholy-
cine. Now, the metholycine will fail, and they will have to
get Harry into their power some other way. Also, Mr. Francis
will be very anxious, as I told you, that he should not suffer
pain. Of that I am certain; it is a fixed idea with him.
Probably also the attempt will be made as planned, late, when
the servants are in bed. Now, is there not a groom in the
stables very like Harry?"
Geoffrey stared.
‘Yes, the image of him,' he said. “And what about him?
“Go down to the stables as soon as you get to Vail, and tell
him he is wanted at the house. He knows you, I suppose.
Walk up with him yourself, and let him be in the box-hedge
with you.’ -
For a moment the excitement of adventure overpowered all
else in Godfrey's mind.
“Ah! you have some idea?' he said.
“Nothing, except that it may be useful to have two Harrys
in the house. Allowing time for this, you should be at the
box-hedge by eight. That shall be the appointed hour.”
“But what shall I tell Jim P'
‘Jim is the name of the groom P Tell him that it may be
in his power to save his master from great peril. Harry is
liked by the servants, is he not? All that we know at present
is that he must wait in the box-hedge with you in case we need
him. But supposing he is swiftly and secretly needed, how
are we to get him into the house?”
“By the secret passage within,' said Geoffrey, quick as an
echo.
“Good again. It looks as if the Luck was with us. And


JIM GOES TO BED 293
see him first yourself, and if this has been a heart-attack like
to what he had before, and he seems now to be quietly re-
cuperating, do not let him know I am here. It may only
alarm him for his condition.’
‘Pray God it may be so P said Harry.
The doctor looked steadfastly at the carriage-mat.
‘Medically speaking,' he said, ‘I insist on this. I should
also wish that you would guard against all possibility of his
knowing I am here. Sanders, I suppose, looks after him. I
should therefore not wish Sanders to know.’
‘Oh, he can keep a secret,” said Harry.
“Very likely, but I would rather he had no secret to keep.
I am not speaking without reason. If, as you fear, and as the
telegram seems to indicate, this attack has been unusually
severe, I must assure you that it is essential that no agitating
influence of any kind should come near him. If he is in real
danger, of course, I will see him.’
‘Would it not be likely to reassure him to know you are
here?' asked Harry.
‘I have told you that I think not,’ said the doctor, ‘unless
there is absolute need of me. I hope ’—and the word did not
stick in his throat—‘that quiet will again restore him.’
A trap was waiting for them at the station, driven by Jim,
and the doctor had an opportunity of judging how far the like-
ness between the two might be hoped to deceive one who knew
them both. Even now, with the one in livery, the other in
ordinary dress, it was extraordinary, not only in superficialities,
but somehow essentially, and he felt that it was worth while
to have arranged to profit by it, should opportunity occur.
The groom had a note for Harry, which he tore open hastily.
“Ah, that is good P he said, and handed it to the doctor.
It was but a matter of a couple of lines, signed by Temple-
ton, saying merely that the severity of the attack was past, and
at the time of writing Mr. Francis was sleeping, being looked
after by Sanders, who had not left him since the] seizure.
And to the one reader this account brought an upspringing of


JIM GOES TO BED 295
ready. Well, sir, I heard coming from Mr. Francis's room,
very low and guarded, so that I should have heard nothing
had I not stood outside a moment listening, you may say, but
I did not know for what, a little lively tune I have heard him
play a score of times. But in a minute it ceased, and then I
heard two voices talking, and after that Mr. Francis laughed
—that from a man who was sleeping, so Sanders told us.”
‘This is all very strange,' said the doctor.
‘Ay, and then the door opened, and out came that man
Sanders; black as hell he looked when he saw me! But little
I cared for his black looks, and I just asked him how his
master was. Very bad, he told me, and wandering, and he
wondered whether his lordship would be here in time.”
The doctor came a step nearer.
‘Templeton,” he said, ‘I rely on you to obey me implicitly.
It is necessary that neither Mr. Francis nor Sanders knows I
am here. Things which I cannot yet tell you may depend
on this. And see to this: let me have the room I had
before, and put his lordship into the room opening from it.
Lock the door of it which leads into the passage, and lose the
key, so that the only entrance is through my room. If he
asks why his room is changed, make any paltry excuse. Say
the electric light in his room is gone wrong—anything. But
make his usual room look as if it was occupied ; go up there
during dinner, turn down the bed, put a nightshirt on it, and
leave a sponge, brushes, and so on.’
‘Master Harry?' gasped the butler, his mind suddenly
reverting to old days.
The doctor frowned.
‘Come,' he said, “do not get out of hand like that. Do as
I bid you, and try to look yourself. I can tell you no more.”
Harry came down from the sick-room a few minutes later
with a brow markedly clearer.
‘He is much better—ever so much better, Sanders thinks,”
he said. “He was sleeping, but when he wakes he will be told
I have come.’


296 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
“Ah, that is good P said the doctor. “Did Sanders tell you
about the attack P’
‘Yes; it came on while he was dressing this morning.
Luckily Sanders was with him, but for an hour, he tells me,
he thought that every breath might be his last. He's a trump,
that man, and there's a head on his shoulders, too. He has
hardly left him for five minutes.’
‘Will Sanders sleep in his room to-night?' asked the doctor.
‘Yes; he has his meals brought to him there, too, so that it
will be easy for you not to be seen by him, since you make
such a point of it. Oh, thank God, he is so much better!
Ah, look 1 we are going to have one of those curious low
mists to-night.”
The doctor followed Harry to one of the windows which
Templeton had left unshuttered and looked out.
The autumn twilight was fast closing in, and, after the hot
sun of the day, the mist, in the sudden coolness of its with-
drawal, was forming very thickly and rapidly over the lake.
There was a little draught of wind towards the house, not
sufficient to disperse it, but only to slide it gently, like a sheet
over the lawns. It lay very low, in thickness not, perhaps,
exceeding five feet over the higher stretches of the lawn, but,
as the surface of it was level, it must have been some few feet
thicker where the ground declined towards the lake. It ap-
peared to be of extraordinary density, and spread very swiftly
and steadily, so that even while they watched, it had pushed on
till, like flood-water, it struck the wall of the house, and pre-
sently lawn and lake had both entirely vanished, and they
looked out, as from a mountain-top, over a level sea of cloud,
pricked here and there by plantations and the higher shrubs.
Above, the night was clear, and a young moon rode high in a
heaven that silently filled with stars.
Geoffrey, meantime, had followed two hours behind them;
his train was punctual, and it was only a little after seven when
he found himself, having walked from the station, at the edge
of the woods, looking down on to this same curious sea of mist.


JIM GOES TO BED 297
The monstrous birds of the box-hedge stood out upon it, like
great aquatic creatures swimming there, for the hedge itself
was submerged, and the descent into it was like a plunge into
a bath. Not wishing to risk being seen from the house, he
made a wide circuit round it towards the lake. Here the mist
rose above his head, baffling and blinding; but striking the
edge of the lake, he followed it, guided as much by the sob-
bing of the ripples against the bank as by the vague muffled
outline, till he reached the inlet of the stream which fed it.
From this point the ground rose rapidly, and in a few minutes
he could look over the mist again and see the house already
twinkling with scattered lights, moored like some great ship in
that white sea. A few hundred yards more brought him to the
stables, and, conveniently for his purpose, at the gate stood
Jim and a helper, their work over, smoking and chatting.
Geoffrey approached till it was certain they could see who
he was.
“Is that you, Jim P' he said. “They want you at the house.’
Jim knocked out his pipe and followed; his clothes had
“evening out 'stamped upon them, and there seemed to be an
unpleasant curtailment of his liberty in prospect.
‘Come round by the lake,” said Geoffrey in a low voice when
the groom had joined him. “I have something to tell you.'
He waited till they were certainly out of earshot.
‘Now, Jim, he said, ‘it’s just this: We believe that an attempt
will be made to-night to murder Lord Vail. I want your help,
though I can't tell you in what way you can help, because I
don't know. But will you do all you can or are told to do?'
‘Gawd bless my soul 'said Jim; then, with a return to his
ordinary impassivity: ‘Yes, sir, I’ll do anything you tell me to
help.”
‘Come on, then. You can trust me that you shall run no
unreasonable risks.’
“I’m not thinking you'll let them murder me instead, sir,’
said Jim. “And may I ask who is going to do the
murdering P'


298 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
Geoffrey hesitated a moment; but, on reflection, there seemed
to him to be no reason for concealing anything.
‘We believe—Dr. Armytage and I, that is—that Sanders,
Mr. Francis's man, will attempt it.”
Jim whistled under his breath.
‘Bring him on,' he said. “Lord, I should like to have a
go at that Sanders, sir! He walks into the stable-yard as
if every horse in the place belonged to him.’
They had by this time skirted the lake again, and the boom-
ing of the sluice sounded near at hand; then, striking for
higher ground, they saw they had already passed the house,
and close in front of them swam the birds of the box-
hedge.
The mist had sunk back a little, and now they sat, as if in a
receding tide, on the long peninsula of the hedge itself, visible
above the drift, and black in the moonlight.
‘This way,” said Geoffrey.
And, groping round to the back of it, they found the over-
grown door and entered. Thence, going cautiously, and feel-
ing their way, they passed down the length of it, and soon saw
in front of them, like a blurred moon, the light from the gun-
room windows. The time had been calculated to a nicety, for
they had been there scarcely five minutes when a shadow
moved across the blind, which was then rolled up, and the
window then silently lifted a crack. The figure, owing to the
density of the mist, was indistinguishable, but Geoffrey recog-
nised the doctor's voice when it whispered his name. He
touched Jim to make him follow, and together they stood close
by the window.
‘Good l you have Jim with you,' said the doctor, ‘and you
have told him we may need him P I want him inside the
house, so go with him through the secret passage, and open
the panel by the stair which you told me of I shall be there,
and I will tell you what we are going to do. Harry has gone
to dress, and the house is quiet. Wait, Geoffrey; take this;
and he handed him out a rook-rifle and eight or ten cart-


JIM GOES TO BED 299
ridges. “Put these inside the hedge,’ he whispered, “and
come round at once with Jim.’
Five minutes later Geoffrey gently opened the panel of the
door, and the doctor glided in like a ghost, latching it noise-
lessly behind him. His face brooded and gloomed no longer;
it was alert and active.
“There is very little time,’ he said, “so first for you, Geoffrey.
Go back for the rifle and cartridges, and get somewhere in
cover where you can command the front of the house. What
course events will take outside I cannot say, but the Luck and
the plate will be stolen, and they will have to get them away
somehow. You must stop that. Sanders, I expect, will try to
remove them.”
‘Beg your pardon, sir,’ put in Jim, “but Sanders was down
at the stable this afternoon, and said that the door of the coach-
house and one of the loose-boxes was to be left unlocked
to-night, in case a doctor was wanted for Mr. Francis. He
said he could put-to himself, sir, so that none of us need
sit up.’
The doctor's keen face grew a shade more animated ; his
mouth bordered on a smile.
‘Good lad!” he said. “Well, that's your job, Geoffrey; you
must use your discretion entirely. You may have to deal with
a pretty desperate man, and it is possible you will feel safer
with that rifle.’
‘Where shall I go?' asked Geoffrey.
“I thought the summer-house on the knoll would be a good
place; it stands above the mist.’
“Excellent. And for Jim P'
‘We must be guided by the course of events. Jim will have
to wait here in any case probably till eleven, or even later.
Then I expect he will go to bed in Harry's room, where I—I
can't tell you; it is all in the clouds at present. I want to
spare Harry horror. Anyhow, he will stop here until I tap
twice on the panel outside. Now I cannot wait. Harry may
be down any minute; we dine at a quarter-past. Ah! this is


3oo THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
for you, Geoffrey,’ and he handed him a packet of sandwiches,
‘and this for you, Jim. Now, you to the summer-house,
Geoffrey; Jim waits here; I dine with Harry. Yes, your hand
and yours. God help our work º'
Though never a voluminous talker, the doctor was even more
silent than usual at dinner that night, and, despite the alertness
of his eye, confessed to an extreme fatigue. Thus it was that
soon after ten he and Harry went upstairs, he straight to his
room, the latter to tap discreetly at the door of the sick-room
and learn the latest of the patient.
The change of Harry's room from the one he usually occu-
pied to that communicating with the doctor's caused no com-
ment, either silent or spoken, from him, nor did the loss of the
key seem to him in any way remarkable. He came straight
from his visit to Mr. Francis to give the news to the doctor.
‘Still sleeping,” he said, ‘and sleeping very quietly, so
Sanders tells me. And I–I feel as if I should sleep the clock
round. I really think I shall go to bed at once.”
He went through the doctor's room and turned on his light,
then appeared again in the doorway.
“Got everything you want?” he asked. ‘Have a whisky-and-
soda P"
A confused idea of metholycine, a distinct idea that he did
not wish Harry to run the risk of being seen by Sanders going
to another room than the ordinary, made itself felt in the
doctor's reply.
“Not for worlds,’ he said—“a poisonous habit.'
‘That means I mustn't have any—does it?' asked Harry
from the doorway. “Now, that is hard lines. I want some,
but not enough to go and fetch it from the hall myself. Do
have some. Give me an excuse.’
“Not even that,” said the doctor.
‘Well, good-night,” said Harry, and he closed the door
between the two rooms.
For so tired a man, the doctor on the closing of the door
exhibited a considerable briskness. Very quickly and quietly


302 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
distant, moving very slowly down the passage, were two figures,
those of Mr. Francis and his valet. The latter was dressed in
ordinary clothes, the former, vividly visible by the light of the
candle the servant carried, in a light garish dressing-gown and
red slippers. At this moment they paused opposite the door
of the room Harry usually occupied, and here held a word of
inaudible colloquy. There was a table just outside the door
fronting the top of the stairs, and a dim lamp on a bracket
hung above it. On it Mr. Francis put down a small bottle and
what looked like an ordinary table napkin, and the two went
down the stairs.
It was the time for caution and rapidity. Already, as he
knew, luck had favoured him in that neither had entered
Harry's room, and, after giving them some ten seconds' law, he
went noiselessly over the thick carpet of the passage to the
table, and opened the bottle Mr. Francis had left there. The
unmistakable fumes of chloroform greeted his nostril, and he
stood awhile in unutterable perplexity. Fresh and valuable as
this evidence was, it was difficult to form any certain conclu-
sions about it. Conceivably, the chloroform was an additional
precaution, in case Harry had not drunk the whisky; con-
ceivably also the metholycine idea had been altogether aban-
doned in the absence of a skilled operator. That, at least, he
could easily settle, and turning into the bedroom Harry usually
occupied, he switched on the electric light. Templeton had
followed his instructions about making the room look habit-
able, but on the dressing-table stood what was perhaps not the
work of Templeton. A cut-glass bottle was there on a tray,
with a glass and a syphon. He spilled a teaspoonful of the
spirit into the glass and tasted it. Salt.
So much, then, was certain. One or both of the figures he
had seen go downstairs would return here with the chloroform.
And still cudgelling his brains over the main problem, as to
why Mr. Francis had gone downstairs at all, he lingered not,
but felt his way down to the bottom of the flight. Here he
paused, but, hearing nothing, tapped twice at the panel which


3O4 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
gentle sigh of the scraped carpet, and from that or from the
infallible sixth sense that wakes only in the dark, he knew
that someone had entered. Then from closer at hand he
heard the faintest shuffle of movement, and he knew that, whoever
this was in the room beside the groom and himself, he was
not a couple of yards distant. After another while the least
vibration sounded from the glasses in the tray, as if a hand
had touched them unwittingly, and again dead silence suc-
ceeded, till the doctor's ears sang with it. Then from the bed
his ear suddenly focussed the breathings of two persons, one
very short and quick, the other a steady respiration, and simul-
taneously with that his nostril caught the whiff of chloroform.
Again the rustle of linen sounded, and hearing that, he held his
breath, and counted the pulse which throbbed in his own
temples. Twenty times it beat, and on the twentieth stroke
his finger pressed the switch of the light, and he drew back
the curtain.
Already Jim was sitting up in bed, bland and impassive in
face, and his left hand flung the reeking napkin from him. By
the bedside crouched a white-haired figure, clad in a blue
dressing-gown; close by it on the floor stood the leather case
which held the Luck; the right hand was still stretched over
the bed, though the napkin which it had held was plucked
from it. His face was flushed with colour; the bright blue eyes,
a little puckered up in this sudden change from darkness to the
glare of the electric light, moved slowly from Jim to the doctor,
and back again; but no word passed the thin, compressed
lips.
Suddenly the alertness of the face was gone like a burst
bubble; the mouth opened and drooped, the eyes grew staring
and sightless; the left hand only seemed to retain its vitality,
and felt gropingly on the carpet for the Luck. Then, with a
slow, supreme effort, the figure half raised itself, drawing the
jewel tight to its breast, folding both arms about it, with fingers
intertwined in the strap that carried it. Then it collapsed
completely, rolled over, and lay face downwards on the floor.


306 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
and seeing these, the doctor clicked his teeth against his
tongue.
‘That's how we missed him,” he said; “he went this way up
to Mr. Francis while we were going down the front stairs.'
‘Yes, sir,’ said Jim.
They passed through into the hall, and a draught of cold air
met them. There was no longer any reason for secret move.
ments, and the doctor turned on the electric light. The front-
door was open, and wreaths of dense mist streamed in.
“Go and see if you can help Mr. Geoffrey, Jim,” he said,
“if you can find him. It is clear that Sanders has left the
house; who else could have opened that door? I must see
to that which we left upstairs.”
He ran up. The room door, as they had left it, was open; on
the floor still lay what they had left there. But it was lying no
longer on its face; the sightless eyes were turned to the ceiling,
and the Luck was no longer clasped with fingers intertwined
in its strap to the breast.
The doctor fought down an immense repugnance against
touching the body; but the instinct of saving life, however
remote the chance, prevailed, and, taking hold of one of the
hands, he felt for the pulse. But as he touched it, two of the
fingers fell backwards, dislocated or broken.
Then, with a swift hissing intake of his breath, he pressed
his finger on the wrist. But the search for the pulse was vain.


CHAPTER XXV
M. R. FRANCIS SLEEPS
It was about a quarter past eight when Geoffrey left Jim in
the secret passage, and, in accordance with his instructions,
went back to the box-hedge where he had concealed the rifle
and cartridges. With these he skirted wide up the short
grassy slope that led to the summer-house, and trying the
door, found it unlocked. It stood, as he supposed, some
fifteen feet above the level of the mist that lay round the house
below, and was admirably situated for the observation of any
movement or manoeuvre that might be made, for it commanded
a clear view past the front of the house down to the lake, while
the road from the stables passed not fifty yards from it, joining
the carriage sweep; from the carriage sweep, at right angles,
ran the drive. Clearly, then, if Jim's account of Sanders's visit
and order to the stables covered a design, the working out of
it must take place before his eyes.
The summer-house stood close to the background of wood
in which last summer Evie and Mr. Francis had once walked,
a mere black blot against the blackness of the trees, and
Geoffrey, pulling a chair to the open door, sat commandingly
invisible. His rifle he leaned against the wall, ready to his
hand, and it was in more than moderate composure that he
ate the sandwiches with which the doctor had provided him.
There was, he expected, a long vigil in front of him before any
active share in the operations should stand to his name; the
first act would be played in that great square ship of a house
that lay anchored out in the sea of mist. What should pass
there in the next two hours he strenuously forebore to con-
jecture, for it was his business to keep his brain cool, and
2O-2


308 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
avoid all thoughts which might heat that or render his hand
unsteady. That short interview with the doctor had given him
a confidence that made firm the shifting quicksands of fear
which all day had quaked within him, for the man had spoken
to him with authority, masterful and decided, which had stilled
the shudderings and perplexities of the last twelve hours. He
had to see to it that they should not awake again.
At intervals of seemingly incalculable length the clock from
the stable drowsily told the hour, and but for that and the slow
wheeling of the young moon, he could have believed that time
had ceased. No breath of wind stirred in the trees behind, or
shredded the opaque levels of the mist in front; a death and
stagnation lay over the world, and no sound but the muffled
murmur of the sluice from the lake broke the silence. The
world spun in space, and the sound of the invisible outpouring
waters might have been the rustle of its passage through inter-
stellar space.
Then the spell and soothing of the stillness laid hold of him;
the hour of action was near, the intolerable fret of anxiety
nearly over. Inside the house that dark, keen-eyed man was
not one whom the prudent would care to see in opposition—
and on which side he was Geoffrey no longer entertained
a doubt's shadow—nor, for that matter, was his lieutenant,
the impassive spurious Harry. By his unwilling means last
summer had Mr. Francis made the first of his vile attempts;
by his means, perhaps, this should be the last. Geoffrey could
rest assured that they would do all that lay in the power of two
very cool heads; his business was to see that his own part
should not be less well done.
Some years ago—or was the stroke still resonant?—half-past
ten had struck on the stable clock, and, since eleven had not
yet sounded, it was earlier than he expected it, when there
came a noise which sent his heart hammering for a moment in
his throat. He could not at once localize or identify it, and
though still obscure and muffled, he had only just decided
that it could not be very far off before he guessed what it was.


MR. FRANCIS SLEEPS 3 II
*
*
fired at the horse, just below the ear. At so short a range a
miss would have been an incredible thing, and with the report
of the rifle the head sank out of sight into the mist.
Then he stood up.
“If you move, Sanders, I fire P he cried—“this time at you.’
But, even as he said the words, the box was already empty.
The man had slipped down with astonishing rapidity behind
the wagonette, and when Geoffrey next saw him dimly through
the mist he was already some yards away. Even while he
hesitated, with another cartridge yet in his hand, he was gone,
and waiting only to put it in, he ran down to the cart. The
case, the same beyond a doubt as was in Mr. Francis's hand
ten minutes ago, which he had seen Sanders swing on to the
box before mounting himself, was gone also.
At that he ran down at the top of the speed he dared use
after the vanished figure. Once he heard the crunch of gravel
to the right, and turned that way, already bewildered by this
blind pursuit in the mist; once he thought he heard the rustle
of bushes to his left, and turned there. Then beyond any
doubt he heard his own name called. At that he stopped.
‘Who is it?” he cried.
“Me, sir—Jim,” said an imperturbable voice close to him.
“Ah! is Harry—is his lordship safe?'
‘Yes, sir, quite safe. The doctor sent me out to see if I
could help you.’
Before Geoffrey could reply, a sudden wild cry rang out into
the night, broken short by the sound of a great splash.
“My Gawd! what's that P' cried Jim, startled for once.
“I shouldn't wonder if it was Sanders,’ said Geoffrey.
‘Come to the lake, Jim. God forgive us for trying to rescue
the devill I wonder if he can swim.’
“Like a stone, sir, I hope,” said Jim cheerfully.
The roar of the sluice was a guide to them, but they had lost
each other twenty times before they reached the lake. In that
dense and blinding mist, here risen high above their heads,
even sound came muffled and uncertain, and it was through


312 THE LUCK OF THE VAILS
trampled flower-beds and the swishing of shrubs against their
faces that they gained the edge and stood on the foaming
sluice. The water was very high, the noise bewildering to the
senses, and despite the fact that five minutes ago Geoffrey
had been hesitating whether or no to shoot at that vague runner
through the fog, caring nothing whether he killed him, yet now
he did not hesitate to run a risk himself, in order to save from
drowning what had been within an ace of being the mark for
his bullet.
“He must be here,” he said to Jim ; ‘the pull of the water
would drag him against the sluice.'
‘You're not going in after that vermin, Mr. Geoffrey P asked
Jim incredulously.
Geoffrey did not reply, but kicked off his boots and threw
his coat on the grass.
‘Stand by to give me a hand,” he said, and plunged out of sight.
“Well, I'm damned P. said Jim, and took up his stand close
to the edge of the water-gate. The risk he had been willing to
run for his master he had faced without question—indeed, with
a certain blitheness of spirit; but to bear a toothache for
Sanders's life appeared to him a bargain that demanded con-
sideration. But, even as he wondered, a voice from close to
his feet called him.
“Give a hand,’ bubbled Geoffrey from the water; ‘I’ve got
him. I dived straight on to him.'
Jim caught hold of Geoffrey first by the hair, and from that
guided his grasp to a dripping shirt-collar. Then, after Geoffrey
had got a foothold on the steep bank, between them they
dragged the nerveless and empty-handed figure from the water,
and laid it on the grass.
“Dead or alive?—that is the only question,’ said Geoffrey.
“Get back to the house, Jim, and bring the doctor here. I
don't know what to do to a drowned man."
Jim made an obvious call on his resolution. To stay here
with that dripping clay at his feet was a task that demanded
more courage than he had needed to get into Harry's bed.


MR. FRANCIS SLEEPS 313
‘No, sir,’ he said; “you run back to the house and get your
wet things off. I’ll stay here,' and he set his teeth.
Geoffrey could not deny the common-sense of this, nor,
indeed, had he any wish to, and he shuffled and groped back to
the house. As yet he knew nothing except that Harry was
safe, and for the present his curiosity was gorged with that
satisfying assurance. The hall-door he found open, the hall
empty and lit, and running upstairs, he saw the door of Harry's
bedroom open and went in. The doctor was there; he was
just covering with a sheet that which he had removed from the
floor on to Harry's bed. He turned round as Geoffrey entered.
‘Quick P said the latter. “Go down to the sluice. Sanders
lost his way in the fog, and fell in. We fished him out, alive
or dead I don't know.’
His eye fell on the covered shape on the bed, with an awful
and sudden misgiving, for it was Harry's room.
* Not ’ he began.
The doctor turned back the sheet for a moment, and then
replaced it quickly.
“Go to my room very quietly, Geoffrey,’ he said, “for Harry
is asleep next door, and get your wet things off. Put on
blankets or something, or clothes of mine. By the sluice, you
say?"
It was some half-hour later that Geoffrey heard slow, stumbling
steps on the stairs, and, barefooted and wrapped in blankets,
he went out into the passage. Jim and the doctor were carrying
what he had found in the ooze of the lake into Harry's room,
and they laid it on the floor by the bed.
“It was no use,’ said the doctor; “I could not arouse the
least sign of vitality. Cover the face. Let us leave them.’
He stood in silence a moment after this was done.
“So they lie together,’ he said, ‘in obedience to the in-
scrutable decrees of God. In His just and merciful hands we
leave them.’
So the three went out, leaving the two there.
+ + + + +


MR. FRANCIS SLEEPS 315
Then there was silence for awhile, for the events were still
too awful and too close for chattering. The doctor broke it.
“There are two more things to be done,’ he said; “one to
bring back the plate from the summer-house, the other, Harry.
He must be told everything, but to-morrow will be as well as
to-night. By the way, Geoffrey, where will you sleep? You,
too, Jim P Can you get into the stable so late?’
‘Yes, sir; thank you, sir,’ said Jim. “I’ll wake the helper.
I brought in the rifle, Mr. Geoffrey; you left it by the lake.
Shall I help bring in the plate, sir?'
‘No, we must get Templeton and another man, in any case,'
said the doctor. “It must be stowed somewhere to-night; the
lock of the plate-closet is forced. So get you to bed, Jim.
Shake hands like a man, for you are one.’
‘Jim, you devil, say good-night to a man,’ said Geoffrey, and
pleasure and pride made the groom laugh outright. “But you
won't tell Harry to-night?' said Geoffrey, after a moment.
‘Hush, what's that? My God—Harry P
The gleam of a candle shone through the door leading
to the staircase, and Harry advanced two steps into the
hall.
‘I woke just now,” he said, speaking to the doctor, ‘and—
Geoffrey !'
“Call Jim back,' said the doctor. “Steady, Harry. Not a
word.”
Geoffrey gathered his blankets round him, and went to the
hall-door, which the groom had just closed behind him. He
came back at once in answer to the call.
“But what is it—what is it all?' cried Harry. “Where is
my uncle P I woke, as I began to tell you, and thought I
heard people moving about, and got uneasy. I thought he
might be worse, or something. Then I went into your room,
Dr. Armytage, but you were not there. His door, too, was
open, and there was a light burning, but he was not there.
Where is he P What is it?' he cried again. “Geoffrey, Jim,
what are you doing here P’


MR. FRANCIS SLEEPS 317
Still without a word he turned to the doctor, with the same
action. Then, still steadily, he walked across the hearthrug
to Geoffrey, and the doctor moved from where he stood,
touched Jim on the shoulder, and withdrew with him. Not
till then did Harry speak, but now his mouth quivered, and
the tension grew to snapping-point.
“Geoff, Geoff l’ he said, and the blessed relief of tears came
to him.


EPILOGUE 321
‘I knew I had, and feebly was it performed. Ah, that
morning ! Just the one word from Dr. Armytage, “Come !”.'
Evie returned to the fire again, and sat down.
“If Geoffrey had not been here the night before, she said—
‘the night when it took place—I don't know what would have
happened to Harry. There would have been a raving lunatic,
I think. As it was, he just howled and wept, so he told me, and
Geoff sat by him and said, “Damn it all, Harry "-yes, I don't
care—and gave him a whisky-and-soda, and slapped him on the
back, and did all the things that men do. They didn't kiss
each other and scream, and say that nobody loved them, as
we should have done. And, as like as not, they played a game
of billiards afterwards, and felt immensely better. I suppose
David and Jonathan were like that. Oh, I want Harry always
to have a lot of men friends,’ she cried. ‘How I should hate
it if he only went dangling along after his wife . But he loves
me best of all, so don't deny it.’
‘Oh, I don't anticipate his eloping with the doctor,’ said
Lady Oxted.
Outside the evening was fast falling. It was now a little
after sunset, and, as a year ago, a young moon, silver and slim,
was climbing the sky, where still lingered the reflected fire
from the west in ribands and feathers of rosy cloud. But
to-night no mist, low-lying and opaque, fit cover for crouching
danger, hung over lake and lawn. The air was crisp with
autumnal frost, the hoarse tumult from the sluice subdued and
low, after a long St. Martin's summer. The four men—Jim,
servant-like and respectful, a little distance from the rest—had
left the churchyard, and strolled slowly in the direction of the
stable and the house. Opposite the stable-gate Jim would
have turned in, but Harry detained him.
‘No, Jim,” he said, ‘come with us a little further.’ And,
like man and man, not master and groom, he put his arm
through that of the other. Then, by an instinctive movement,
the doctor and Geoffrey closed up also, and, thus linked, they
2 I


RED ROWANS
By FLORA ANNIE STEEL
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Daily Chronicle.—“Judge it by what canons of criticism you will
the book is a work of art. . . . . The story is simple enough, but it is as
lifelike as anything in modern fiction. The people speak and act as people
do act and speak. There is not a false note throughout. Mrs. Steel draws
children as none but a master-hand can draw.”
The Westminster Gazette.—“Far and away above the average of novels,
and one of those books which no reader should miss.”
The Daily News.--The book is written with distinction. It is moving,
picturesque, the character drawing is sensitive and strong.’
Black and White.—“It reveals keen sympathy with nature and clever
portraiture, and it possesses many passages both humorous and pathetic.”
THE FLOWER OF FORGIVENESS
By FLORA ANNIE STEEL
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Academy.—“Nothing here ought to be neglected, for there is in
most places something profitable for not too obtrusive exhortation, and
almost everywhere something for enjoyment.’
The Glasgow Herald.—“A clever book which should tend to widen
Mrs. Steel's circle among the reading public.’
The Scotsman.—“They have a rich imaginative colour always.”
The Manchester Guardian.—“Much sympathy with humanity however
dark the skin, and a delicate touch in narrative, raise Mrs. F. A. Steel's
Indian Stories into a high rank. There is a pathos in them not common
among Anglo-Indian story-tellers.”
MISS STUART'S LEGACY
By FLORA ANNIE STEEL
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Saturday Review.—“It throbs with the vigour of real creative
ower.
The Spectator.—“It is remarkably clever; it is written in a style which
has ease, dignity, grace, and quick responsiveness to the demands of the
theme; it has passages of arresting power and fine reticent pathos; and it
displays a quick eye for character and a power of depicting it with both
force and subtlety.”
The Westminster Gazette.—‘A most faithful, vivid impression of
Indian life.”
The Daily Telegraph.-‘A singularly powerful and fascinating story.”
LoNDoN : WILLIAM HEINEMANN, 21 Bedford STREET, W.C.


T H E PRIN C E S S S O PHIA
By E. F. BENSON
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Athenaeum.—“There is brilliance, lightness of touch. The dialogue
is neat and brisk, and the miniature Court and its courtiers are amusingly
treated.”
Literature.—“Told with verve and wit. If the novel is to amuse we
cannot recommend a more agreeable companion than Mr. Benson's brilliant
friend The Princess Sophia.”
The World.—“The best of the book is undoubtedly the admirably conceived
and skilfully drawn character of Sophia herself—princess, gambler, and very
woman. Mr. Benson has written nothing fresher or more graceful than the
chapter which tells the story of her courtship. The art with which he
preserves his picture of the card-playing, betting, hard-riding girl from any
taint of vulgarity or sordidness is not easily over-praised.’
The Westminster Gazette.—“A gay and spirited performance, and the
Princess herself a clever picture. It is lively reading, and the characters
bubble along in true Bensonian fashion.’
By E. F. BENSON
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Spectator.—“A clever and interesting novel.”
The Daily Telegraph.-‘Bright, piquant, and entertaining from beginning
to end, full of humorous sayings and witty things spoken by men and women
who are merry and captivating. There is little to find fault with. It is a
very clever, smart novel, wherein lies a little lesson and much entertainment.’
The Pall Mall Gazette.—“Mr. Benson's new story is in his happier and
clever style. Happily, also, the liveliness does not tire. The repartee and
rattle of the “smart set" are the genuine thing, and his own pretty conceits
and happy little audacities of turn are not too forced. One of the best things
in the book is the composite character of the promoter. Decidedly, he is
" THE GADFLY
By E. L. VOYNICH
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Academy.—“A remarkable story, which readers who prefer flesh and
blood and human emotions to sawdust and adventure should consider as some-
thing of a godsend. It is more deeply interesting and rich in promise than
ninety-nine out of every hundred novels.”
The World.—“The author's name is unknown to us: if this be his first
work of fiction, it makes a mark such as it is given very few to impress, for
the strength and originality of the story are indisputable.”
The St. James's Gazette.—“A very strikingly original romance which
will hold the attention of all who read it, and establish the author's reputation
at once for first-rate dramatic ability and power of expression. No one who
opens its pages can fail to be engrossed by the vivid and convincing manner
in which each character plays his part and each incident follows the other.
Exciting, sinister, even terrifying, as it is at times, we must avow it to be a
work of real genius, which will hold its head high among the ruck of recent
fiction.
LoNDoN : WILLIAM HEINEMANN, 21 BEDFord STREET, W.C.


BY STEPHEN CRANE
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Athenaeum.—“The characters are admirably sketched and sustained.
There is tenderness; there is brilliancy; there is real insight into the
minds and ways of women and of men.”
The Spectator —‘Mr. Crane's plot is ingenious and entertaining, and
the characterisation full of those unexpected strokes in which he excels.”
The Academy.—“The book is full of those feats of description for which
the author is famous. Mr. Crane can handle the epithet with surprising,
almost miraculous dexterity. Active Service quite deserves to be called a
remarkable book.’
The Scotsman.—‘The most important feature of the story is the genius
of the author, whose strength both in narrative and in description has never
been more effective than in this novel. He carries everything before
him. He has wit; he has humour; he has intellect; above all, he has
lightning-like vividness of imagination. He charms his reader.’
BY STEPHEN CRANE
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Athenaeum.—“In his present book, Mr. Crane is more the rival of
Mr. Henry James than of Mr. Rudyard Kipling. But he is intensely American,
which can hardly be said of Mr. Henry James, and it is possible that if he
continues in his present line of writing, he may be the author who will intro-
duce the United States to the ordinary English world. We have never come
across a book that brought certain sections of American society so perfectly
before the reader as does The Third Violet, which introduces us to a farming
family, to the boarders at a summer hotel, and to the young artists of New
York. The picture is an extremely pleasant one, and its truth appeals to the
English reader, so that the effect of the book is to draw him nearer to his
American cousins. The Third Violet incidentally contains the best dog we
have come across in modern fiction. Mr. Crane's dialogue is excellent, and
it is dialogue of a type for which neither The Red Badge of Courage nor his
later books had prepared us.”
THE EAGLE'S HEART
BY HAMLIN GARLAND
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Athenaeum.—‘Mr. Garland's work is always fresh and vigorous, and
this story is full of his characteristic energy. He makes one share with delight
in the irresistible fascination of wild life in the Far West.”
The Illustrated London News.-‘If Mr. Hamlin Garland had never
written anything else, The Eagle's Heart would suffice to win him a reputa-
tion. It is a fine book, instinct with humanity, quivering with strength, and
in every fibre of it alive.”
The Daily Telegraph.-An excellent specimen of a book for boys. He
has much that is interesting to say of cattlemen and cowboys and their work,
and his descriptions of the scenery are those of a true lover of Nature. The
moving panorama of lands and scenes is described in charming word-pictures
of colour and feeling.’
LoNDoN : WILLIAM HEINEMANN, 21 BEd Ford STREET, W.C.


THE CHRISTIAN
BY HALL CAINE
In One Volume, price 6s.
Mr. Gladstone writes:—“I cannot but regard with warm respect and
admiration the conduct of one holding your position as an admired and
accepted novelist who stakes himself, so to speak, on so bold a protestation
on behalf of the things which are unseen as against those which are seen, and
are so terribly effective in chaining us down to the level of our earthly
existence.”
Dean Farrar.—“After all deductions and all qualifications, it seems to
me that The Christian is of much more serious import and of much more
permanent value than the immense majority of novels. It is a book which
makes us think.’
The Sketch.-‘It quivers and palpitates with passion, for even Mr.
Caine's bitterest detractors cannot deny that he is the possessor of that rarest
of all gifts, genius.’
The Newcastle Daily Chronicle.—‘Establishes Mr. Caine's position
once for all as the greatest emotional force in contemporary fiction. A great
effort, splendid in emotion and vitality, a noble inspiration carried to noble
issues—an honour to Mr. Hall Caine and to English fiction.’
The Standard.—“The book has humour, it has pathos, it is full of colour
and movement. It abounds in passages of terse, bold, animated descriptions.
. . . There is, above all, the fascination of a skilful narrative.”
The Speaker.—‘It is a notable book, written in the heart's blood of the
author, and palpitating with the passionate enthusiasm that has inspired it.
A book that is good to read, and that cannot fail to produce an impression on
its readers.”
The Scotsman.—“The tale will enthral the reader by its natural power
and beauty. The spell it casts is instantaneous, but it also gathers strength
from chapter to chapter, until we are swept irresistibly along by the impetuous
current of passion and action.’
THE MAN XMAN
BY HALL CAINE
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Times.—“With the exception of The Scapegoat, this is unquestion-
ably the finest and most dramatic of Mr. Hall Caine's novels. . . . The
Manxman goes very straight to the roots of human passion and emotion. It
is a remarkable book, throbbing with human interest.’
The Queen.—“The Manxman is undoubtedly one of the most remarkable
books of the century. It will be read and re-read, and take its place in the
literary inheritance of the English-speaking nations.”
The St. James's Gazette.—“The Manxman is a contribution to litera.
ture, and the most fastidious critic would give in exchange for it a wilderness
of that deciduous trash which our publishers call fiction. . . . It is not possible
to part from The Manxman with anything but a warm tribute of approval.’—
EDMUND GOSSE.
LoNDoN : WILLIAM HEINEMANN, 21 BEDFORD STREET, W.C.


THE LION AND THE UNICORN
BY RICHARD HARDING DAVIS
In One Volume, price 6s,
Literature.—“Written with point, with eloquence when eloquence is
needed, and with restraint; above all, though there is plenty of “body” in
them, they are light reading. The situations are fresh and worked out with
much cleverness, but the cleverness is not oppressive; it is skilfully concealed.
You would hardly desire a more agreeable companion.’
The Pall Mall Gazette.—“Eight short stories, each of them written with
a brilliance worthy of the author of Soldiers of Fortune, and each a perfect
piece of workmanship. Every one of them has a striking and original idea,
clothed in the words and picturesque details of a man who knows the world.
They are genuine literature. Each is intensely fresh and distinct, ingenious
in conception, and with a meaning compounded of genuine stuff. There is
something in all of the stories, as well as immense cleverness in bringing
it out.
The Daily Telegraph.-‘Stories of real excellence, distinctive and
interesting from every point of view.”
SOLDIERS OF FORTUNE
BY RICHARD HARDING DAVIS
In One Volume, price 6s. Illustrated.
The Pall Mall Gazette.—“We heartily congratulate Mr. Davis on this
story—it is one which it is a great delight to read and an imperative duty to
raise.
p The Athenaeum.—“The adventures and exciting incidents in the book are
admirable; the whole story of the revolution is most brilliantly told. This
is really a great tale of adventure.”
The Spectator.—“The fighting is described with a vividness and vigour
worthy of Mr. Stephen Crane. The story is artistically told as well as highly
exciting.’
Tºdaily Chronicle.—‘We turn the pages quickly, carried on by a
swiftly moving story, and many a brilliant passage: and when we put the
book down, our impression is that few works of this season are to be named
with it for the many qualities which make a successful novel. We congratu-
late Mr. Harding Davis upon a very clever piece of work.”
THE NIGGER OF THE ‘NARCISSUS’
By JOSEPH CONRAD
In One Volume, price 6s.
A. T. Quiller-Couch in Pall Mall Magazine.—Mr. Conrad's is a
thoroughly good tale. He has something of Mr. Crane's insistence; he
grips a situation, an incident, much as Mr. Browning's Italian wished to
grasp Metternich; he squeezes emotion and colour out of it to the last drop;
he is ferociously vivid; he knows the life he is writing about, and he knows
his seamen too. And, by consequence, the crew of the Warcissus are the
most plausibly life-like set of rascals that ever sailed through the pages of
fiction.
LoNDoN : WILLIAM HEINEMANN, 21 Bedford STREET, W.C.


THE CELIBATES’ CLUB
By I. ZANGWILL -
In One Volume, price 6s.
The St. James's Gazette.—“Mr. Zangwill's Bachelors' Club and Old
Maids' Club have separately had such a success—as their sparkling humour,
gay characterisation, and irresistible punning richly deserved—that it is no
surprise to find Mr. Heinemann now issuing them together in one volume.
Readers who have not purchased the separate volumes will be glad to add
this joint publication to their bookshelves. Others, who have failed to read
either, until they foolishly imagined that it was too late, have now the best
excuse for combining the pleasures of two.’
THE PREMIER AND THE PAINTER
By I. ZANGWILL AND LOUIS COWEN
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Morning Post.—“The story is described as a “fantastic romance,”
and, indeed, fantasy reigns supreme from the first to the last of its pages. It
relates the history of our time with humour and well-aimed sarcasm. All the
most prominent characters of the day, whether political or otherwise, come in
for notice. The identity of the leading politicians is but thinly veiled, while
many celebrities appear in propriá personi. Both the “Premier” and
“Painter” now and again find themselves in the most critical situations.
Certainly this is not a story that he who runs may read, but it is cleverly
original, and often lightened by bright flashes of wit.'
N U D E S O U L S
By BENJAMIN SWIFT
In One Volume, price 6s.
Mr. W. L. Courtney in the ‘Daily Telegraph.”—“Any one who is so
obviously sincere as Mr. Benjamin Swift is an author who must be reckoned
with. The story is very vivid, very poignant, very fascinating.’
The Daily Chronicle.— Mr. Swift has a real descriptive touch, whether
it be psychological or physical facts that he is handling. There are some
quite beautiful passages in all his books, and Nude Souls is no exception.
He never lingers over his descriptions; he never describes, merely for the
sake of showing how well he can do it, and that restraint gives forcefulness
to his work.”
The World.— Mr. Benjamin Swift was a bold man when he called his
new story Wude Souls. There is a self-assertion about this title which only
success could justify. Let it be said at once that the author has succeeded.
He lays absolutely bare before the reader the souls of a striking company of
men and women. There is that about the book which makes the reader loth
to put it down, loth to come to the end—comprehension of human nature,
and relentless power of expression.”
London: WILLIAM HEINEMANN, 21 Bedford Street, W.C.


McLEOD OF THE CAMERONS
By M. H. A. M I L T ON
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Speaker.—“We have read many novels of life at Malta, but none so
vivid and accurate in local colour as M'Leod of the Camerons. A well-told
and powerful story . . . acute analysis of character; it offers a standard of
perfection to which the majority of writers of fiction cannot attain.”
The Manchester Guardian.-‘Striking and exceedingly readable. Miss
Hamilton is to be congratulated upon a very fresh, exciting, and yet natural
piece of work.”
THE FREEDOM OF HENRY MEREDYTH
By M. HAMILTON
In One Volume, price 6s,
The Observer.—“Miss Hamilton has seldom written to better advantage
than in this volume. The book is mainly dependent for interest on its
characterisation, but there is a distinctly human note struck throughout, and
the author displays keen insight into everyday life and its complications.”
Literature.—“Well told in a vein of vigorous and consistent realism.”
The Court Journal.—“It is written with good taste, and is full of shrewd
perceptive touches, so the interest is sustained agreeably without effort and
without the artificial stimulus of sensationalism. The story, in a word, is
both interesting and pleasant, and one that should not be missed.”
A SELF-DENYING ORDINANCE
By M. H. A M I L T ON
In One Volume, price 6s.
The Athenaeum.—“The characters are exceptionally distinct, the move.
ment is brisk, and the dialogue is natural and convincing.’
The Daily Chronicle.—'An excellent novel. Joanna Conway is one of
the most attractive figures in recent fiction. It is no small tribute to the
author's skill that this simple country girl, without beauty or accomplishments,
is from first to last so winning a personality. The book is full of excellent
observation.”
LoNDoN : WILLIAM HEINEMANN, 21 Bedford STREET, W.C.