IN MEMOR1AM 
 BERNARD MOSES 
 
 */; 
 
LIFE THE ACCUSER 
 
Life the Accuser 
 
 A Novel in Two Parts 
 
 BY 
 
 E. F. BROOKE 
 
 AUTHOR OF "A SUPERFLUOUS WOMAN 
 AND "TRANSITION " 
 
 New York 
 Edward Arnold 
 
 70 Fifth Avenue 
 1896 
 
BERNARD 
 
 Copyright, 1896, 
 
 BY EDWARD ARNOLD. 
 
 29tttbersttg 
 JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. 
 
PART I. 
 
 
 
 HOT SUMMER. 
 
 783713 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE Armstrong family, with one exception, ac- 
 cepted their own theory of existence without mis- 
 giving. The exception rebelled. Unfortunately 
 this single enterprise was strategically ill-managed 
 and returned upon the rebel in suffocating bitter- 
 ness of heart, against which there was no resource 
 save in private explosions whose point was lost to 
 the world. 
 
 This is how it came about that on a fine summer 
 afternoon in the year 1876, Eliza Armstrong, a girl 
 of something over twenty years of age, declared to 
 herself, with every evidence of sincerity, that " life 
 was not worth living," and that she " did not know 
 why she had been born." 
 
 The mischief was that intellectually Eliza Arm- 
 strong's eyes were too wide open, while affection- 
 ally they were too close shut. In her aspect a 
 similar contradiction prevailed. Undeniably pretty, 
 the effect of her whole personality was singularly 
 inharmonious, so that the mere regularity of feature 
 and the fair vivid colouring were lost. It is not 
 3 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 actual beauty, it is "charm" that succeeds; and 
 Eliza had not this "charm." Nature apparently 
 had not decided whether to turn the girl out a 
 beauty or the reverse, a genius or something else ; 
 and in this incoherent predicament she had been 
 thrown upon the world to solve the problem for 
 herself. 
 
 Eliza's medium was a family of seven with a 
 commercial basis. 
 
 The foundation had been of a hasty construc- 
 tion, the Armstrongs having barely escaped the 
 obscurity which was their native element. The 
 truth was that the hang of the Armstrong family 
 was as inharmonious as the personality of Eliza. 
 The clan was of two distinct branches ; the stem 
 from which Eliza's father, old Mr. Samuel Arm- 
 strong, had sprung being that of simple working- 
 class folk who for generations had lived and died 
 in the same northern locality, and whose later his- 
 tory was a running commentary on the changes 
 and vicissitudes of the manufacture of cotton cloth. 
 At the present moment most of the members wore 
 the artisan jacket and worked as factory hands in 
 the near cotton-mills, whilst still inhabiting old 
 stone cottages wherein their forbears had driven 
 hand-looms of their own ; others of them netted 
 poor gains into the small tills of small retail village 
 shops, and tasted with the operatives the ups and 
 downs of fortune, which include the element of 
 "strikes;" while one member of repute, com- 
 4 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 monly called in his native village "Owd Union 
 John," had curiously risen from the condition of 
 a cotton operative to that of a second-hand book- 
 seller in Cottonopolis. 
 
 The other branch of the clan from which Mrs. 
 Armstrong had sprung was of a much more genteel 
 standing. Mrs. Armstrong in marrying her hus- 
 band had not changed her name ; she was his 
 second wife, and the step-mother of his four chil- 
 dren, Edward and Gilbert, Eliza and Sylvia. She 
 came from the master branch of the Armstrongs, 
 from the class of the owners of cotton-mills instead 
 of the workers therein. The nature of the cleav- 
 age in the original clan leading to this marked 
 division was lost in history : the story of how old 
 Mr. Armstrong bridged the chasm from the oper- 
 ative to the master was a secret locked in his own 
 breast, and not fully known even to his wife. 
 
 Eliza had been taught to glide skilfully over her 
 connection with that branch of the Armstrong 
 family which included " Owd Union John," and 
 to lay stress upon her much more remote kinship 
 with the small stock of Armstrongs who moved in 
 the genteel circle and ruled the cotton-mills from 
 afar. 
 
 " Papa was partner to old Mr. Theophilus Arm- 
 strong of Hare barrow, his relation. And when my 
 own mother died, he married his partner's daughter. 
 That is why my step-mother never really changed 
 her name." 
 
 5 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Thus ran the formula from the lips of Eliza and 
 Sylvia Armstrong. When Edward the elder brother 
 pulled up his shirt-collar and referred to themselves 
 as " belonging to the rich Armstrongs of the Clough 
 of Harebarrow, don't you know," the family ap- 
 peared to be thrown into a distinction that made 
 Eliza feel vaguely uneasy. 
 
 "We're on promotion/' Edward' would say. 
 " Really, any day we 're as good as the Peels 
 and we mean to reach the top. The Peels began 
 on cotton." 
 
 " What are we being promoted into ? " Eliza 
 would ask, without any intention of being sharp- 
 tongued. 
 
 Her inquiry would be answered by the contempt 
 of silence. 
 
 The elegance of the second Mrs. Armstrong, and 
 of her sister, Miss Caroline Armstrong, was evidence 
 of the Harebarrow connection, living and moving 
 amidst them. Old Mr. Armstrong had himself not 
 advanced beyond a prejudice in favour of Dissent 
 and Smiles's Self-Help^ as forming the most reliable 
 title to respectable distinction on earth and a final 
 " mansion in the sky." But his early ambition had 
 set moving causes which had issued in results, in 
 many parts wearisome and distasteful to himself. 
 It was natural that the second Mrs. Armstrong, who 
 was a very superior and coldly gentle person, with a 
 final set of prejudices and a perfect habit in house- 
 wifery, should desire to bring her own connection 
 6 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 into as strong a light as possible, and to exercise a 
 gently effacing effect upon allusions to the closer 
 but more obscure branch to which her husband be- 
 longed ; and it was natural that " Aunt Caroline 
 Armstrong," the sister whom she had taken to live 
 with her upon her marriage, should aid and abet 
 her in this. Nor was Mr. Armstrong altogether 
 averse to the obliteration of his immediate family 
 obligations ; but from the two ladies emanated an 
 atmosphere of superiority and nice conduct and 
 accomplishment which was chilling and irksome in 
 the extreme. Again, they were Churchwomen, and 
 sniffed at Dissent. 
 
 Indeed, as regards religion, Mr. Armstrong stood 
 between two batteries of opinion. Mrs. Armstrong 
 had the rigid beliefs of a strict Evangelical, while 
 Miss Caroline was supposed to be " well read " and 
 of a sceptical tendency. For the rest, Miss Caro- 
 line sacrificed to convention and Harebarrow by at- 
 tending church regularly, and going through the 
 service with an inscrutably bored demeanour. 
 
 Six years before the opening of this story, and 
 probably though this was not the ostensible rea- 
 son - in order to be rid of the two prominent 
 evidences of their origin, old Mr. Samuel Arm- 
 strong, acting under the pressure of Edward, who 
 was again backed by his step-mother, had con- 
 sented to migrate from the cotton district, to which 
 from time immemorial they had belonged, to a 
 southern county. He selected, in a preliminary 
 7 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 visit, a small estate in the purchase of which he in- 
 vested a tolerable sum of money. This estate was 
 a quiet bit of agricultural land, having in its centre 
 an old farmhouse and a number of farm buildings. 
 The land had been used for hop culture, for clover 
 and grass-growing, and for the culture of beans. A 
 sweet and homely aroma hung over it. The garden 
 grounds, straggling and picturesque, were full of old 
 fruit trees, which in the sunny patches of the spring 
 and summer continued punctually to push out from 
 the knotted, lichen-covered twigs and branches, 
 clusters of blossom, and afterwards glistening rounds 
 of richly coloured and sweet-tasting fruits. Some- 
 thing in the homeliness of the place appealed to the 
 heart of old Mr. Armstrong, and since by the will 
 of his family and by the drift of his own ambition 
 he was being removed from the familiar atmosphere 
 of oil, cotton waste, and machinery, and from the 
 grey-looking stones of the northern village, set in 
 stern prose amidst the uttermost romance of land- 
 scape scenery, he fastened on this peaceful farm- 
 stead as furnishing at least something consonant 
 with the remote reaches of his inherited nature and 
 habits. 
 
 In this, however, he reckoned without his host. 
 
 Edward stood out to the rest of the family as 
 something of large import. He had been the idol 
 of his father, and still was the favourite with his 
 step-mother and aunt, who permitted their refined 
 opinion to be added to from within the home-circle 
 8 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 only in this instance. At the time of the purchase 
 of the estate he was at the University, and was ac- 
 cepted by them as an authority upon what was 
 "correct," " the thing," "good form." 
 
 " We must improve the place, father," said 
 the young gentleman, when he heard of the 
 purchase. 
 
 And his father, not understanding the scope of 
 the word " improve," and believing the University 
 standard to be final, nodded good-naturedly. 
 
 It happened that the ancient farmstead was a 
 dogged survival from a cluster of like places which 
 had been gradually absorbed by the great land- 
 owners of the district, whose passion for space, 
 park-growing, and privacy, exercised through cen- 
 turies of opportunity, had gradually shaped this 
 corner of the country into a series of fine and 
 mellowed instances of England's "stately homes." 
 The estate, for example, immediately contiguous to 
 the acres which old Mr. Armstrong purchased, was 
 an over-flowing portion of the immense possessions 
 of Lord Warrenne in the neighbouring county ; and 
 this intruding foot of some twenty-five acres of his 
 land was the residence of Mrs. Trelyon, his kins- 
 woman. It was a beautiful place, and had received 
 the modest name of " South Downs." Mr. Arm- 
 strong's farmstead, on the other hand, was a free- 
 hold, said to have been for generations an irritating 
 thorn in the flesh to the great family of the Dayn- 
 trees, who were lords of the manor in this part 
 9 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 of the county. The residence of the Dayntrees, 
 which was called "The Manor House," lay on 
 the western side of two great commons. These 
 were timidly hedged by small private villas and 
 cottages, rows of which occurred at intervals 
 between the woods and spinneys ; no railway or 
 station was permitted in the neighbourhood, but 
 the commons, with their gorse and heath and 
 scanty pasture, intruding thus in a rugged protest 
 of popular right amidst the stately seclusion of the 
 landed gentry, were intersected by white roads over 
 which the carriages of the Families rolled in their 
 visitations one upon another. The commons were 
 the highest lands of the district, and to any one 
 standing upon them with the face turned westwards, 
 it was possible on a bright clear day to see thrown 
 up against the sky the faint tracings of the roofs 
 and pinnacles of a great city the delicate spirit 
 and flower and poetry of it shadowed with its 
 poignant suggestion and solemn romance, as a 
 living dream in the burning fires of a western sky. 
 
 The subject of the purchased land was spoken 
 of amongst the Families when they met in casual 
 social intercourse. It was felt as an annoyance 
 that a stranger had broken into the circle and 
 snapped up the land. 
 
 " Who 's, Armstrong ? " was on every tongue. 
 
 Nobody knew. He was not even an American. 
 Dayntree, into whose composition something cos- 
 mopolitan rather than democratic had entered, said 
 10 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 he understood he came from the north ; these risen 
 fellows were often shrewd enough, and probably 
 the place would be improved. 
 
 The amiable hope was unfortunately short-lived ; 
 the nature of the improvements when they began 
 exciting the horrified comment of the neighbour- 
 hood. The sturdy farmstead, with its sunny, 
 ripened homeliness, lying like a country smock 
 amongst the velvet mantles of the Parks, was 
 cleared away in favour of a brand-new idea. The 
 hop-fields, the beans, the orchards and low hedges 
 in spring and summer nourishers of a tangle of 
 black-thorn, wild-rose, convolvulus, and black- 
 berry were rooted up ; the old picturesque 
 red-roofed outbuildings, the rambling and ancient 
 farmhouse, all were cleared away amidst dust and 
 desolation, and the estate given by contract into 
 the hands of the landscape gardener, the modern 
 architect, and the newest art upholsterer. The 
 erasure of everything which in the eyes of old 
 Mr. Armstrong had made it worth while to invest 
 his money in the land, caused him a sickening 
 twinge of the heart-strings. The erection of a 
 brand-new mansion, fantastically copied from the 
 ancient by the most modern of architects, and the 
 deposit therein of the new art furniture (modelled 
 on the idea, of an historic family in decay) put the 
 finishing touch to his distaste. The furniture 
 arrived in vans simultaneously with the suits of 
 armour and second-hand portraits, the whole mis- 
 ii 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 cellany being planted down according to the taste 
 of the upholsterer. 
 
 Old Mr. Armstrong felt himself not to be a 
 judge, but his common-sense was offended by an 
 assumption of ancestral armour in a family whose 
 heraldic bearing was at most a shuttle. For the 
 rest, this total obliteration of all that was consonant 
 with the habitual past, this transplantation into 
 surroundings as much like home to one of his 
 upbringing as the stage of a theatre would be, 
 struck him with a mortal pain and sickness under 
 which he secretly dwindled and pined. 
 
 The girls, mere children at the time, accepted 
 the change without open criticism. Gilbert, a 
 young man still in his teens, whose career so far 
 had been a secret downward slide along the road 
 " paved with good intentions," felt in face of the 
 new surroundings a vacuity of resource and paraly- 
 sis of the will which was indescribable. 
 
 The two rooms allotted to Eliza and Sylvia 
 opened out of each other, but the first night they 
 preferred to occupy one together. Next morning 
 Eliza waked early. Her ruffled red-gold hair fell 
 about the pillow like poured-out sovereigns ; Sylvia's 
 smoother and less brilliantly coloured locks were 
 just visible above the coverlet. Eliza put out a 
 cautious finger and touched them. 
 
 " I 'm wide awake," said Sylvia, creeping a little 
 from under cover, so that the light fell on her 
 delicate girlish face and large inexperienced blue 
 
 12 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 eyes ; " I listened ever so long for the humming of 
 the mills, and then remembered." 
 
 " We shall never hear that again," said Eliza, 
 plaintively ; " I Ve had bad dreams, I 'm all 
 worked up. This newness and the new people 
 about terrify me." 
 
 u It 's best not to think," said Sylvia, crisply. 
 
 " That 's all very well for you, who are so pretty, 
 and slide about like an eel. You don 7 t know what 
 it is to feel quite the largest and most fixed thing in 
 a room. And to know that your hair burns under 
 the chandeliers like flames." 
 
 " Well, oil it, and plait it tighter." 
 
 "But tell me, Sylvia, do you remember what' 
 papa said was the lord of the manor's name? " 
 
 "Mr. Dayntree, he called him. The Rector's 
 name is Mr. Woodruff." 
 
 Eliza sat up in bed. 
 
 " Don 't you remember the red strawberry 
 emery cushion that I keep in my treasure- 
 box?" asked she. 
 
 "Yes. 4 Constant's cushion' you call it." 
 
 " I seem to know where I am quite suddenly," 
 said Eliza. " Constantia is Mrs. Dayntree. Miss 
 Mincing Racker's school, where I was sent when I 
 was such a tiny little mite, is on the other side this 
 county. Constantia's carriage came sometimes on 
 Saturdays to take me away a long distance. And I 
 lised to stay all Sunday and play with a boy called 
 Evan. He was a dear little boy, Sylvie. I remem- 
 '3 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 her the swell of the old cabinet in the drawing- 
 room that he used to open and show me. I sat on 
 a high chair to reach it, and Evan held me on lest 
 I should fall. It was because he called Mrs. Dayn- 
 tree l Constantia ' that I did so too." 
 
 "Who was Evan?" 
 
 " I don't know, except that he belonged to the 
 Dayntrees." 
 
 " Mother and Aunt Caroline will be glad that 
 you know the Dayn trees." 
 
 " But I don't ! " said Eliza, exceedingly alarmed. 
 " And I dread the idea of them. I am terrified 
 monstrously terrified of all these grand new 
 people. It would be better to be back in our 
 old home." 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 IN other ways than in the matter of his present 
 exile amidst art upholstery, Mr. Armstrong had set 
 causes going that he wot not of. The effect had 
 already been particularly exemplified in the char- 
 acter of Eliza, and was destined to fulfil its influence 
 in her fate. 
 
 Mr. Armstrong was in this instance, however, 
 again merely an ignorant agent. It had been his 
 early boast that he could afford his children " the 
 best of everything;" by this he meant that he 
 could afford for them to do and have things which 
 were not usual in his own class, but which he 
 remarked were common in a class of life to which 
 he did not belong. He had no idea that the 
 things he coveted were the accidents and not the 
 essentials of that other class. Expense, again, was 
 Mr. Armstrong's standard of probable excellence. 
 His limited knowledge gave him no other criterion. 
 But in the days when his children were young it 
 was a much more difficult thing to arrive at a 
 proper distinction of " the best " from the shoddy 
 and showy than it is now, because it required a 
 preliminary culture to know of it at all. In matters 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 of education this was pre-eminently the case ; 
 education, especially education for girls, as offered 
 in the market, being an inconceivably spurious and 
 shamelessly fraudulent affair. In this era of certifi- 
 cates and inspection, and of the ideal of " a ladder 
 from the Board School to the University," the most 
 ignorant man who is sincerely desirous of educat- 
 ing his children, may toss them blindfold into the 
 educational mill and be pretty certain that he is 
 subjecting them to some genuine training, and that 
 they will come out in the end with at least some 
 useful acquirement. 
 
 In the days when the Armstrong girls were 
 children this was not so. " Dotheboys " schools 
 might have been abolished ; Dothegirls schools 
 were rampant in every county as respectable and 
 established institutions. An expensive girls' school 
 was, in the vast majority of instances, merely a last 
 resort of distressed gentlewomen, who saw their 
 way to amassing " an independence " at the expense 
 of credulous middle-class parents, the crop of risen 
 families springing up like mushrooms in the forcing- 
 bed of the textile industries, affording a fine field 
 for these ignorant and narrow persons to pasture on. 
 It was easy for the distressed gentlewoman to 
 impose on rich vulgarity by an assumption of 
 refinement, and in return for substantial cheques 
 to starve the minds (sometimes the bodies) and 
 oppress the spirits of female children by a "gen- 
 teel" diet and a routine of inanities, puerilities, 
 16 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 vile pruderies, and petty cruelty. It was in those 
 days possible to pay two or three hundred pounds 
 a year for a daughter's education, and to bring her 
 out at the end not only with far less mental equip- 
 ment than is now possessed by a child of the 
 people in the standards of the free Board Schools, 
 but with her health injured and her character warped. 
 Years ago, when Eliza was a mite of six when 
 they still lived in the North, and when the second 
 Mrs. Armstrong was making her first experiments 
 within her husband's household, the child had been 
 sent away from home by her step-mother's advice, 
 to a fashionable boarding-school for young ladies in 
 the same distant county to which the whole family 
 afterwards migrated. The experiment proved to 
 Eliza as a life-long fatality. Some natures thrive 
 rather better amid conventions than amid freer 
 surroundings. Eliza did not; her nature would 
 neither fit into nor develop amid conven- 
 tions, and dating from that disastrous school- 
 experiment, a sense of scare, timidity, and 
 failure attached itself to her character as the 
 shadow to the man. The horrors of Miss 
 Mincing Racker's establishment for young ladies 
 were, however, intermingled with pleasanter mem- 
 ories, for example, those which she connected 
 with the strawberry emery cushion. It happened 
 that on a summer morning when Eliza's second 
 school-term was coming to a close, two beautiful 
 young women of the county paid the fashionable 
 2 17 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 boarding-school a visit. The elder of the two 
 was Mrs. Norman Dayntree, a young wife who 
 was not yet the mother of children ; the other was 
 her younger sister, Miss Irene Severne. They were 
 both in the hey-day of youth, beauty, and success, 
 and their personalities were such as to make one 
 tremble lest any alteration in the scheme of things 
 should for ever deprive the world of just that turn 
 of human sweetness and gracious demeanour. 
 
 Constantia Dayntree was dark, but not too dark, 
 tall and noble-looking. She had the serenity of 
 happiness in which her mere physical beauty 
 merged and melted as in something more exquisite 
 than itself; she was of the very essence of womanli- 
 ness, and gave it away at every turn of hand and 
 face. She had the primal qualities which still sur- 
 vive in womanhood, qualities out of which the 
 world grows, upon which it rests and lives, and with 
 which perfected it will fall asleep at last as a child 
 that is comforted. 
 
 Irene carried with her a pair of dove-like eyes, 
 the quiet manner of one who took her own course 
 in preference to that of others, and even as early as 
 that, a dry humorous twitch of a smile upon a 
 gentle pair of lips. 
 
 This was the vision that broke suddenly on the 
 lack-lustre eyes of a school-room full of miserable 
 " young ladies " who on a hot summer afternoon 
 bent wearily over the ridiculous studies which formed 
 the scheme of education in the establishment. 
 18 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 The door had been opened by one of the " gen- 
 tlewomen," a middle-aged spinster with all the 
 attributes formerly connoted by the word. She 
 was small and hard as a dried chip, her thin grey 
 hair was rolled under a cap in two curls on either 
 side her churchman's brow, and fastened in securely 
 by two side-combs ; on her bitter narrow mouth 
 was for the moment a false, forced smile. She pre- 
 ceded her two guests, and opening the door led 
 them into a close and faded atmosphere, which 
 seemed to smite them in the face with stifling 
 unwholesomeness, both physical and mental. The 
 room was a large and fine one (for show was every- 
 where in the programme), and a row of windows 
 looked towards the west. Through the unopened 
 glass fell great sunbeams down which the dust 
 sailed, and at the desks beneath, on wooden stools 
 without backs, in excruciatingly upright postures, 
 .pined and panted the budding girlhood which 
 should have been lying full length on the fragrant 
 lawn, or reposing outside in hammocks, or exercis- 
 ing its strength (as lads do at that hour) in cricket, 
 boating, climbing trees, or sports of any kind. But 
 neither good sense, a knowledge of hygiene, or 
 sympathy with the impulses of active youth, was 
 in the programme of the distressed gentlewoman, 
 nor anywhere lodged in her little brain. Amongst 
 the rows of ill-natured, fatigued faces one girl was 
 distinguished from the rest because she happened 
 to be walking from a table (behind which sat 
 19 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Mademoiselle " in state) back to her desk. A 
 sulky flush came to her cheek as the visitors 
 appeared on the threshold, and she made a dart to 
 her stool. 
 
 The false smile on the "gentlewoman's" face 
 changed to an acrimonious twist. 
 
 "Miss Bryant, stand out!" cried she, in a harsh 
 tone of command. 
 
 The girl thus addressed dived her hand under 
 the desk and made a pull at her stocking, and then 
 sulkily obeyed. All the other " young ladies " sus- 
 pended their work and stared, a trifle of interest 
 enlivening their cross and jaded faces. The unfor- 
 tunate Miss Bryant being now, in obedience to the 
 stiff directing forefinger of the "gentlewoman," 
 planted conspicuously in a bare space on the floor, 
 exhibited the " elastics " of the thin shoes dragging 
 loose behind her, while a soiled white stocking slip- 
 ping from the garter fell over one ankle. She had an 
 unconquerable sin of untidiness ; and the hasty snatch 
 underneath the desk had not availed to pull the 
 stocking back over her knee. The "gentlewoman " 
 indicated the lapse by a wave of one hand, which 
 she afterwards brought back into contact with the 
 other in a finished gesture of disdain peculiarly 
 exasperating to the victim. 
 
 "An exhibition of disorder. Return to your 
 
 desk, Miss Bryant. Miss Marsh, kindly remember 
 
 that Miss Bryant loses her mark for conduct." 
 
 Then in a more confidential tone, and changing the 
 
 20 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 bitterness of her lip back to the false smile, she 
 turned to Constantia, 
 
 "I always tell my dear girls that to be lien 
 chaussee, bien gantee, et Men coiffee is the mark of a 
 true lady/' said she. 
 
 Mrs. Dayntree did not seem to hear her. Shak- 
 ing off the shy and startled feeling with which she 
 had hesitated on the threshold of this academy of the 
 rich middle-class, she advanced amongst the rows 
 of Unfortunates. She spoke first to a girl whose 
 swollen glands were tied up in a handkerchief that 
 seemed to frame her sickly face in woe. A good 
 many of the young ladies watched the easy grace 
 of her movements, and devoured the details of her 
 apparel with the critical envy born of their educa- 
 tion ; a few " favourites," whose ineradicable vanity 
 had been pampered by the system, pursed their 
 lips. Constantia reached the sulky victim of the 
 untidy stocking ; she slipped the embroidered scarf 
 which it was the fashion to wear about the person 
 from her own shoulders, and placed it on those of 
 the girl. 
 
 " Do take this ! " said she, in the voice of one 
 who asks a favour. " It suits your pretty face so 
 well. You are Irish, I think, from your nice-sound- 
 ing name? I love the Irish." 
 
 She was gone before either the girl or the other 
 pupils could recover their surprise, and returned to 
 the side of her sister. Irene laid her hand on her 
 arm. 
 
 21 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 "Constantia," said she, in a low voice, "look 
 there ! " 
 
 In a far corner of the room, with her face turned 
 from the windows and directed to a blank space 
 of wall, stood a tiny creature between seven 
 and eight, whose red-gold hair burned in the sun- 
 light. She was holding in her little hands a long 
 heavy pole ; it was placed behind her shoulders, 
 under her armpits and within the hollow of the 
 elbow, her mites of hands being turned backwards 
 at the wrist to clutch the instrument of torture as 
 well as they could in the excruciating position. 
 Her face, heavy and white, drooped forward, and 
 her lids were closed in pain and exhaustion ; she 
 stood now on one leg and now on another ; her 
 breath came in difficult gasps, and her look was of 
 stupefied misery; she seemed to be unaware of 
 what was going on in the room before her. 
 
 Lost to consciousness of the outside world the 
 child certainly was, for she was tempering the 
 cruelty of her position by an absorbing and imagi- 
 native day-dream. Her little spirit had escaped 
 from the dull school-room with its faded atmos- 
 phere, and was out in the open air, amongst green 
 trees and green places and gentle breezes, that 
 turned the burning sun just now so dismally 
 smiting her red-gold head into a joy. 
 
 "Cool grass to roll in," said she to herself; 
 "plenty of primroses, and nice baskets to put them 
 in. And nobody will gather a big mother primrose 
 22 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 when there is a little one for it to take care of. I 
 shall have a basket on my arm, and the big girls 
 won't take it from me. Everybody will have a 
 basket. Then there will be a bank, and we shall 
 know from the smell that violets white ones 
 are hidden somewhere. And we shall begin to look. 
 They will hide under the leaves as if it was a game. 
 
 "They don't mind being gathered; it doesn't 
 hurt; they only hide because it is fun to play with 
 us. And nobody will snatch. If I find one, a big 
 girl won't say, ' Now, Miss, I saw that first.' 
 
 " And in the grassy place under the wild crab- 
 tree, there will be a table-cloth spread, and cups 
 and plates on it white cups with pretty blue 
 speckles. And somebody like a nurse, and not 
 like a governess will be spreading out our tea. 
 She shall have a cap on, and round cheeks, with a 
 little hole in one when she laughs, and she will 
 smile all the time. And Pollie Wimpenny will be 
 climbing the crab-tree, and the nurse won't mind 
 at all. Pollie Wimpenny will peep down from the 
 leaves with her eyes twinkling, and will say : ' Little 
 Eliza, you try too ! It is so nice up here. I 'm a 
 bird in a nest.' And the birds will sing. 
 
 "And then the nurse will say, 'Tea! Tea! 
 Tea ! ' and clap her hands as if it were a bell, and 
 everybody will come running. And Pollie will 
 slide out of the tree with green smudges on her 
 stockings. And it won't matter. Tea will be 
 lovely." 
 
 23 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Here the little dreamer sighed deeply because of 
 physical pain, and drooped her head lower, and 
 stood on the left leg instead of the right, her body all 
 falling to one side because of the weight of the pole. 
 
 " There will be bread and butter plenty. And 
 jam. Not sour gooseberry, but something else. 
 Strawberry probably. And a sugar cake, that nurse 
 will cut into slices. And Miss Mincing Racker 
 won't be there to make me say with her eye, 4 Not 
 any more, thank you,' when I 'm feeling hungry. 
 Nurse will hand the plate round, and say : ' Take 
 a piece of cake, little Eliza. Two pieces.' And I 
 sha* n't feel ashamed. Two pieces for all of us. 
 
 "There won't be a Miss Mincing Racker. She 
 will have gone into a picture. She will be one of 
 the Inquisitors in Fox's ' Book of Martyrs/ and 
 she can't get out from between the leaves ever 
 again. And when she is nothing but a picture, 
 Sylvie and I may pick out her eyes with a pin, 
 just like we pick out the Inquisitors' eyes with- 
 out being punished. We may do it on Sunday 
 afternoon, when we have our clean pinafores on, 
 and are allowed to look at ' The Book of Martyrs ' 
 and ' Pilgrim's Progress,' because it will be a reli- 
 gious game. 
 
 " Nurse will say : ' Two pieces, Pollie Wim penny ! 
 Two pieces, Adeline Bryant.' 
 
 "There won't be a Miss Mincing Racker. And 
 there won't be God. Because if there were, we 
 should know it would have to come to an end, 
 24 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 and there would be church, and hard benches to 
 sit on, and the Litany and the Ten Commandments, 
 and a long sermon, and an ache in my back. But 
 I think there might be angels. Not too close, lest 
 they dazzle. And as it 's very hot " the poor head 
 twisted, to get out of the sun u there will be a 
 sound of a brook under the hedge, and under the 
 plank on the stile, as if someone was laughing all 
 the time. And perhaps perhaps if nurse would 
 let us we might, just when the angels were n't 
 looking we might take off our shoes and stockings 
 and paddle ! " 
 
 Thus had run the child's dream, for quarter of 
 an hour at least, during the infliction of the pole 
 punishment. 
 
 The two sisters walked up to her. The gentle- 
 woman followed, with a sour look of disgust on her 
 lips. 
 
 " Little one ! " said Constantia, in a motherly 
 voice. 
 
 The child's head simply drooped lower, in in- 
 creased stupefaction. That, of course, was part of 
 the dream. The gentlewoman tried her method. 
 There was hate in her eye as she did so grown- 
 up hatred of a child. She darted her hard hand 
 out with a well-directed prod on to the little crea- 
 ture's aching backbone ; starting with sensitive pain, 
 the mite drew herself up suddenly to impossible 
 rigidity, and opened her eyes wide in a frightened 
 stare. When she became aware of the two new 
 2 5 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 faces watching her, the innocent and sinless crea- 
 ture flushed to the roots of her hair with an unut- 
 terable and indescribable look of abject guilt. At 
 the same time her eyes, unflinching and steady, 
 gazed deep into those of Constantia, and they had 
 a look as though drinking. 
 
 " Why are you standing in this corner and in 
 this position?" asked the latter gently, without 
 more ado relieving the child from the pole. 
 
 " Speak the truth, Miss Eliza. Don't prevari- 
 cate," put in the gentlewoman. 
 
 The pale frightened eyes veered a moment in 
 the direction of the voice, and then returned to 
 Constantia. 
 
 " I poke" murmured she, in a miserable tone of 
 self-confession. 
 
 " Do you ! " said Irene suddenly, kneeling down 
 on the floor and clasping the little thing in her arms. 
 " So do I ! I always poked when I was a child. 
 Is it the fire or your chin, you mean ? " 
 
 The little victim laughed shrilly. 
 
 " Don't scream, Miss Eliza ! a little lady never 
 makes a noise like that," put in the gentlewoman, 
 with a sneer. 
 
 "Do you know, Eliza," said Irene, "we are 
 going to ask Miss Mincing Racker to give you all 
 half-a-holiday this beautiful afternoon. Where would 
 you like to go and play ? " 
 
 " Speak the truth ! " again put in the gentlewoman 
 threateningly. 
 
 26 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 Eliza closed her eyes obediently, and thought. 
 
 "The primrose wood to gather primroses," an- 
 swered she, opening them again. 
 
 " Now, Miss Eliza, don't be stupid. You know 
 there are no primroses this time of the year," put 
 in the gentlewoman. 
 
 '''Then violets," murmured the child, crestfallen. 
 
 " Nor violets either. Try to think" put in the 
 gentlewoman. 
 
 The child, thus adjured, dropped back into a con- 
 dition of distressed stupefaction. The gentlewoman 
 assisted her with another prod. 
 
 "You have been asked what you would like by 
 these ladies who are good enough to take notice of 
 you, Miss Eliza. Don't show obstinacy, but answer 
 at once." 
 
 The pale frightened eyes wandered from face to 
 face. The little mind had still not cleared its dream 
 away ; it remained midway between that world of 
 its imagining and this cruel place of prods, and 
 bullying, and pain, and confusion. She was un- 
 aware of the anxious waiting of all the elder girls 
 upon her choice. Fast between her dream and her 
 terror, she had no resources. 
 
 "Tea tea," faltered she; "jam and cake. 
 Two pieces." 
 
 The gentlewoman turned a little pale. Her lips 
 
 seemed to quiver. The elder girls shrugged their 
 
 shoulders and pursed their lips. The child stared 
 
 abjectly - the picture of heavy stupidity. .The gen- 
 
 27 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 tlewoman laid her hard nipping hand on her shoul- 
 der. She turned towards the two distinguished 
 guests. 
 
 "Miss Eliza was always a greedy, obstinate child," 
 said she. " I do not ask you to excuse her. She 
 is selfish, and thinks of no one but herself. Pray 
 take no notice of her. Pray address your kind in- 
 quiry to some child with a less vulgar mind. Miss 
 Eliza, you have committed a breach of manners." 
 
 As she spoke, the nipping hand tightened and 
 the arm administered a shake to the exhausted 
 frame. 
 
 " Irene," said Constantia, quickly, " let us go 
 home." 
 
 Neither sister saw the final fate of Eliza that day. 
 Hate hunted the tender spirit upstairs to bed in 
 the beautiful early hours of the evening ; falseness 
 harried the natural candour and clearness of the 
 young soul ; threats cowed her nerve ; sneers cut at 
 her self-respect ; a vile parody of religion swooped 
 like an obscene thing upon all the singing birds of 
 her sweet fancy ; joy, natural confidence, and inno- 
 cence itself swooned away in face of that bitter 
 countenance of incarnated narrowness. 
 
 " What have I done, Miss Mincing Racker ? 
 What have I done ? " piped the anxious little voice 
 over and over. And for answer there was nothing 
 but, as it were, the whirling before her frightened 
 eyes of two bobbing grey curls and a hard, enraged 
 face too ugly for childhood to see accompanied 
 28 
 
Hot Summero 
 
 by the reiterated and torturing prods of an insulting 
 hand. 
 
 Left alone in the far corner of a dreary bedroom 
 whence she could not see the garden, with a heart 
 beating in the perplexed inarticulate passion of 
 childhood, little Eliza heard the steps of her school- 
 mates passing out to the treat the guests had secured 
 them ; she heard also the mocking voices the 
 voices of those insensibly trained to falseness and 
 unkindness that cried in the corridors 
 
 " Miss Eliza asked for two pieces of cake for her- 
 self! Two pieces of cake ! Greedy Miss Eliza ! " 
 
 One hung her head and pondered silently, and 
 fingered the gay scarf she wore about her -neck. 
 That was the girl with the untidy stocking. She 
 thought she would give Miss Eliza her new pencil- 
 case to-morrow. 
 
 Upstairs the child sat on her bed, her chin on 
 her knees, her eyes startled and too wide-open, 
 staring at the bare white walls and the dusty pane 
 until they darkened. She understood nothing of 
 what had happened, had no power to discriminate, 
 and was too wounded in her sensitiveness to hurl 
 defiance at the injustice done her. The air still 
 rang with hootings, with the pointless upbraidings 
 of Miss Mincing Racker, and the assurances of the 
 wrathful sneers of God in heaven. 
 
 What seven-year-old child of vivid imagination 
 could hold up against this accumulated testimony 
 to the abject disgustfulness of her own nature? 
 29 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 The white lids closed once or twice over the staring 
 eyes ; but they shot open again, gazing vaguely at 
 the spot of fading light, while slowly within her ten- 
 der innocence the courage of innocence died out 
 and the damnable lying horror of " a sense of sin " 
 was born. Not even young Mrs. Dayntree's after 
 kindness could save her. 
 
 Such was the particular effect which the distressed 
 gentlewoman, in pursuit of ah " independence " by 
 the simple expedient of farming out the souls of 
 children, achieved in the case of Eliza. For the 
 rest the result was not so evident. The second 
 Mrs. Armstrong and Aunt Caroline voted the girl a 
 failure" when, at seventeen, she finally returned home 
 after a ten years' course of various spinsters' " Es- 
 tablishments for Young Ladies," without having 
 acquired distinction in manners, or readiness at the 
 proprieties, or even the art of " playing the piano." 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Miss MINCING RACKER, her avarice and her 
 petty wickedness, had long been gathered to igno- 
 minious shades, but the county families remained. 
 
 One of Miss Mincing Racker's methods had been 
 to refer to these established names, in such a man- 
 ner as to be inferentially contemptuous to the rising 
 middle-folk on whom she fed ; this was inexpres- 
 sibly galling to the young creatures she farmed, and 
 whom she suppressed beneath her narrow thumb ; 
 probably it was at the basis of Eliza's dread. 
 
 The transplantation of the Armstrongs to the dis- 
 trict could hardly be called a success as time went 
 on. There was a degree of truth in Mr. Arm- 
 strong's notion that the difference between one 
 class and another was a matter of expenditure, his 
 error lay in considering it from the point of view of 
 quantity instead of quality. Moreover, there are 
 things which no expenditure and scarcely any study 
 can acquire. The Families, after one or two 
 attempts, held nervously aloof; and the attempt 
 would hardly have been made had it not been for 
 the singular exception of Eliza. Mrs. Norman 
 Dayntree and Mrs. Trelyon led the running in the 
 3 1 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 neighbourhood ; to be in either of their sets was to 
 be in every other. Owing to the accident related in 
 the last chapter, Eliza found herself welcomed in 
 the first circle ; another chance brought her into the 
 second. 
 
 Until the year 1875 the Trelyons had been rep- 
 resented in the neighbourhood by Mrs. Trelyon, 
 who had taken the pleasant estate known as " South 
 Downs" some seventeen years previously. Mrs. 
 Trelyon was the wife of the Honourable Leonard 
 Trelyon, who was Governor of one of the English 
 Colonies ; he had resided abroad for years, in a 
 land presumably too sultry and too distant for Mrs. 
 Trelyon's health. A lady thus content to be sep- 
 arated by a hemisphere from her husband might 
 easily become the target for gossip, but Mrs. Trel- 
 yon's selection of a residence had silenced tongues. 
 A faint rustle of arrowy talk, rumours shaken from 
 arched eyebrows, suggested rather than expressed, 
 had clustered about her name for a short period at 
 the time of Mr. Trelyon's departure abroad. No 
 one quite knew what had been the relation between 
 himself and his wife, the latter a beautiful person 
 existing in a zone of lassitude. A hitch was sus- 
 pected, but her discreet choice of residence stilled 
 the beginnings of inquiry. For her withdrawal from 
 the world to live under the immediate protection of 
 her august relative Lord Warrenne suggested rather 
 a timid clinging to propriety than a wandering 
 course. At Lord Warrenne's time-mellowed habi- 
 3 2 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 tation, with its moat, its antiquities, its Anne-a- 
 Boleyn chamber, and historical place in the 
 country's history, she had been an honoured guest 
 before coming into residence at " South Downs," 
 and a string of notable and titled persons drove ten- 
 tatively to her door and left their cards upon her 
 hall-table. Having come the first time, they came 
 yet again a second, to enjoy (upon others) the 
 amusing sting which she hid under her velvet voice, 
 and used with an innocent uplift of her eyes. 
 
 No one for a moment was deceived by Mrs. 
 Trelyon's occasional air of the ingenue. It came to 
 be regarded as the precursor of a rankling shaft, 
 and nervous folk were apt to be undone by the 
 mere look without the words ; but her character for 
 cleverness, together with her great beauty, secured 
 in time not exactly her popularity, but a long visit- 
 ing-list and a crowded drawing-room. 
 
 Meanwhile during the seventeen years of her 
 residence at " South Downs " a passage of time 
 which had changed her fresh beauty to something 
 more mellow she had not been known either to 
 pay or to receive a visit from her husband. Sus- 
 picion, however, of unseemly estrangement was 
 assuaged by the regularity of the correspondence, 
 and the decorous dispatch of presents of great 
 value and uncouth appearance from the far West, 
 witli which she dutifully made her drawing-room 
 hideous. 
 
 It was five years after the coming of the Arm- 
 3 33 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 strongs during which period they had hung 
 unvisited upon her outskirts that the event 
 occurred which re-awakened the slumbering 
 rumours as black crows from their nests. In this 
 event the little creature Eliza was involved. Early 
 in 1875 the death of the Hon. Leonard Trelyon 
 was announced, and Mrs. Trelyon went into absence 
 and mourning. After six months " South Downs" 
 was prepared to receive her again, but upon her 
 return it was discovered that a daughter whose 
 existence had hitherto been unsuspected, had come 
 from beyond the seas with other miscellanies 
 belonging to the late Mr. Trelyon, to establish her- 
 self in a prominent place in Mrs. Trelyon's house- 
 hold a daughter whose exceptional beauty and 
 original charm accentuated the fact of her own 
 undreamed-of existence into a very piquant mystery 
 indeed. 
 
 But if this could have been all ! Mai-adroit 
 Eliza Armstrong, who had lost some of her first 
 awe of the Families without gaining worldly knowl- 
 edge or discretion, succeeded in betraying to a 
 perplexed neighbourhood that this did not cover 
 the extent of the irregularity. For was not " Rosa- 
 lie Trelyon " the very girl whom she had met at 
 Miss Edwards's finishing-school at Clapham? 
 the girl who never went home for the holidays, and 
 with whom she had struck up one of those strong 
 girlish friendships that often serve the purpose of 
 first love? The bond formed between the two 
 34 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 lapsed when either girl left school, for Rosalie was 
 not expansive in letter-writing, nor communicative 
 about herself. Eliza had remained as ignorant as 
 the rest of the world of her relation to Mrs. Trelyon 
 of " South Downs," but when her friend, with- 
 out a word of warning or of explanation, suddenly 
 appeared on the scene in the role of that lady's 
 only daughter, she flew, in unabated affection 
 and with characteristic unsophisticatedness, to re- 
 embrace her. 
 
 The Armstrong family felt that Eliza had played 
 the part of enfant terrible. Nor were the rest of 
 the neighbours particularly grateful; they would 
 have preferred to accept Miss Trelyon's existence 
 without a knowledge of the London school-days on 
 which the mother had kept so singular a silence. 
 A cold look or two crept Eliza's way. Unsophisti- 
 catedness is the least successful of the qualities ; no 
 one believes in it ; it presents indeed to the general 
 mind the effect of deep duplicity. 
 
 Mrs. Armstrong, whose severity could be molli- 
 fied for a whole day by a chance bow from the 
 Trelyon carriage, sat down in perplexity to seek 
 how the worldly situation might be over-reached by 
 an Evangelical Christian. 
 
 Miss Armstrong rated Eliza. 
 
 " With your forwardness and your want of ton, 
 you have placed your whole family in a most serious 
 and compromising position," said she, with a bitter 
 and superior air. 
 
 35 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " What have I done, Aunt Caroline ? " inquired 
 small fatal Eliza, opening her pale clear eyes. " I 
 thought you wished to know Mrs. Trelyon better." 
 
 Aunt Caroline shook a derisive and discarding 
 finger. Eliza remained submerged. 
 
 Meanwhile Mrs. Trelyon took hold of the situa- 
 tion and overcame it. All Mrs. Trelyon's qualities 
 were apparently passive ones she existed by 
 implication. Her very attire was incalculable : she 
 might be found dressed in fashion's height, or 
 clothed in garments of a date so ancient and a cut 
 so strange that they suggested a rag-shop. In her 
 personality she had the gift of mystery, of an histori- 
 cal manner and brow, a reminiscent air which 
 revealed nothing, but enfolded her in remoteness 
 and silenced inquiry. When this poetic and com- 
 memorative vagueness was disturbed by so pro- 
 nounced a fact as the appearance of a beautiful 
 daughter, she met the situation with that tranquil 
 candour which is the most powerful of reserves. 
 
 " My daughter," said she, introducing the beauti- 
 tiful enigma with her carelessly abstracted air. 
 
 As to Eliza, she met that disconcerting fact by a 
 conduct too delicate and perfect to earn a name. 
 
 " My daughter's school-friend, Miss Armstrong," 
 said she, when some exalted but rather hesitating 
 guests stumbled on the pair hand-in-hand, happy 
 and chatting. 
 
 Her manner included Eliza in the all-pervading 
 courtesy which was usual to her. A less clever 
 36 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 woman would have petted the girl ; an idiot would 
 have snubbed her. Mrs. Trelyon had been candour 
 itself, curiosity quailed before it, yet had learnt 
 nothing. 
 
 Mrs. Dayntree was the first, shortly after Mrs. 
 Trelyon's return with her mysterious appendage, to 
 direct her coachman to drive to " South Downs." 
 Later, Irene Severne was heard to announce over 
 the tea-cup edge at Lady Susannah Woodruffs, 
 that she found Miss Rosalie Trelyon " quite charm- 
 ing." It is moreover difficult to be too critical of 
 any one shadowed under the stem of a great earl- 
 dom, and so the long and shining list returned up 
 the avenue at " South Downs " as though nothing 
 strange had occurred, and Lady Susannah, the 
 Rector's wife, resolved to give an " At Home," and 
 cards of invitation, including Mrs. Trelyon and her 
 daughter, were issued. 
 
 As far as the county is concerned, the black 
 wings of rumour had sunk to their nests after an 
 ineffectual rustle. Meanwhile in the London clubs 
 was a much more considerable flutter; there the 
 " world's eye " winked indeed, and the world's 
 tongue found a wicked word or two to say. But 
 club scandal was just what Norman Dayntree 
 dropped behind the club doors when he left them 
 for his house. A hint of what was said there 
 never passed his lips. No man in England was so 
 careful to keep that white patch of his existence 
 which he named " home," and which bore in the 
 37 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 forefront of his mind the perfect figure of his wife, 
 uncontaminated by the world. He had a special 
 and nervous sensitiveness on the subject of his own 
 particular women ; to his mind they were " set 
 apart," scarcely tasting the common nature which 
 compounds the common world human enough 
 to thrill a man's sense, but not so human as to be 
 thrilled in return ; spiritually adjusted and poetised 
 and refined to a delicacy attributable to the highest 
 blossom of the tree which the sun hits, but the ele- 
 ments of earth hardly mount to, and winging the 
 fancy to higher things even in the moment that the 
 warm hand sacrilegiously gathers it. It shocked 
 him in this region of artistic fastidiousness even to 
 think of the coarse and mingled flood of the world's 
 life sweeping so much as the hem of Constantia's 
 garment. In his opinion men and women stood 
 upon entirely different planes, and it was part of 
 his business as a husband jealously to protect his 
 wife, and to prevent any whiff of the atmosphere of 
 the manly plane from invading the purer air of her 
 refined existence. 
 
 So Norman shut his mouth on the tasty whispers 
 of the clubs, and said not a word. If it had hap- 
 pened at all and he doubted it it had hap- 
 pened so long ago that it hardly mattered now. 
 
 Lady Susannah's party was a subject of expecta- 
 tion. Usually the formalities at the Rectory were 
 dull. Lady Susannah's chief claim to interest was, 
 that though of the bluest blood she had eloped with 
 
 38 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 the curate in her youth, the curate having justified 
 his audacity by a series of Church preferments, which 
 had finally settled him in a fat living. Lady Susan- 
 nah had studied court life in earlier days in both 
 the English and French capitals, and remained an 
 admirer and intimate friend of the ex-Empress 
 Eugenie, her manner of concluding an afternoon 
 call by " Ah ! the dear Empress ! But I must fly. 
 Good-bye \ " having passed with some into a by- 
 word. 
 
 On this particular occasion, however, recollections 
 of the Tuileries were to be taken with a biting 
 sauce ; so far only glimpses of Miss Trelyon had 
 been obtained, but startling bits of gossip had flown 
 from tongue to tongue. She was more beautiful 
 than her mother, and had an extraordinary viva- 
 city ; but it was the gossip emanating, if truth were 
 known, from the servants' hall, and trickling into the 
 ears of the higher circles from the lips of ladies' 
 maids, that caused the real excitement. Somehow 
 it crept out that Mrs. Trelyon's maid on unpacking 
 the numerous boxes of the young lady had been 
 unable to discover one scrap of the regulation 
 linen, whereas she had turned out some singularly 
 masculine-looking garments, and at length amongst 
 the brilliant but bizarre costumes had come upon a 
 set of clothes more suitable for a masquerading boy 
 than an English " young lady." The blushing 
 maid being at a loss, and with her breast thumping 
 with the terrors of this Babylonish garment, had 
 39 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 appealed to her mistress, whereupon she received 
 the languid explanation that it was believed Miss 
 Trelyon had ridden much with her father when 
 abroad, and had used them for the conveniences of 
 hard travel. A movement in favour of putting 
 them on at " South Downs " had been cut short in 
 a hot altercation between the mother and daughter. 
 
 For a lady as devoted to conventions as was 
 Mrs. Trelyon, the lovely Rosalie seemed likely to 
 prove an unmanageable portion. Little by little it 
 oozed out that the Hon. Leonard Trelyon had 
 brought up his daughter as much like a boy as natu- 
 ral circumstances would permit. He had kept her 
 by his side on every occasion, and had accustomed 
 her to participation in his life. She had journeyed 
 with him on horseback through miles of country, 
 had encamped with him days and nights together, 
 had sailed with him up the long mysterious rivers, 
 and cruised about the lakes ; she could climb and 
 leap like a lad, ride and shoot and manage a canoe. 
 Moreover, she did a part of his secretarial work 
 for him, read the dispatches, and was reported to 
 have understood them. Her life had been a ro- 
 mance of adventure, taken for the most part in the 
 open air, and filled in none save herself per- 
 haps knew how by the flaming colours appro- 
 priate to a young and beautiful woman in the 
 tropics. 
 
 When she passed from this stirring colonial life 
 with her father to the charge of her conventional 
 40 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 mother at "South Downs," she brought with her 
 not only Mr. Trelyon's last testament and bequest 
 by which she herself was left his sole heiress 
 but a sealed envelope and a variety of odd " treas- 
 ures." 
 
 With her mother, her manner was short and 
 reticent, somewhat patronising it may be, and 
 not without an infusion of contempt. Mrs. 
 Trelyon followed her about with curious watch- 
 fulness, but as a rule avoided any attempt at 
 inquisitorial questions. On one occasion, however, 
 an inquiry escaped the tongue it burned. Two 
 rooms opening from an upper passage had been 
 accorded to Rosalie as her own ; the passage ended 
 in doors of coloured glass, which opened on a 
 covered bridge that arched a space behind the 
 house, and led on to a terrace of. the garden. 
 These rooms the girl decorated with the treasures 
 she had brought from abroad, in such a manner as 
 to recall to her continual remembrance the old 
 home in the far-off land. In such a moment of 
 her work the door opened, and her mother entered 
 unannounced. The girl turned with a flush on her 
 cheek and a look under her lids to match Mrs. 
 Trelyon's own. Two miniatures, finely executed, 
 of two young men in old-fashioned dress had just 
 been hung on the wall in a place of honour. Her 
 eye travelled up her mother's person from her feet 
 to her forehead ; Mrs. Trelyon's leapt to the por- 
 traits. She extended a delicate high-bred hand 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 and pointed. The act had less leisurely indiffer- 
 ence than was her wont. 
 
 " My husband, I perceive. But the other ? Am 
 I allowed to inquire? " 
 
 "His friend whom my father bade me love 
 and honour." 
 
 The words "my father" left her lips with a 
 lingering accent of appropriating pride. 
 
 " His name? " murmured Mrs. Trelyon softly. 
 
 Rosalie shook her head as calmly. Mrs. Trel- 
 yon 'beheld her entrenched in her most reticent 
 mood. She met it by a glance too small for 
 observation of curiosity and derision from heavily 
 lashed lids. Her daughter, at the moment unlock- 
 ing a box, handed her a sealed envelope. 
 
 " For you," said she briefly, with her coldest 
 manner. 
 
 The envelope contained the single confidential 
 document which had passed between the husband 
 and wife during all the years of their separation. 
 The letter, save for one sentence, was simply a care- 
 ful piece of advice as to the treatment of the girl 
 whom the final circumstance of Death obliged him 
 to hand to another guardianship than his own. 
 The exceptional sentence riveted Mrs. Trelyon's 
 attention, and brought into her eyes a reflective 
 look. Thus did it run 
 
 " I have brought her up to a man's vigorous 
 activity. I have done this of set purpose, BECAUSE 
 
 ' 
 
 42 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 was the only chance. So far I believe it to have, 
 prospered. Continue my work in the beloved 
 child:' 
 
 It was upon the long gap after the word 
 " BECAUSE " that Mrs. Trelyon laid her finger, with 
 the light gleaming in her eyes. It was the word- 
 less portion which was the understood and intimate 
 thing ; the symbolic dots contained the innermost 
 meaning. But when the utmost has been spoken 
 from one to another, news lies hidden in either 
 breast. Presumably Mrs. Trelyon read into the 
 eloquent symbol something more than her husband 
 had thrown there, or something different : or it 
 may be that cleverness is no security for the depth 
 of judgment called wisdom ; however it might be, 
 Mrs. Trelyon, after prolonged reflection, destroyed 
 the letter, and made up her mind to totally reverse 
 the policy. She sent a confidential epistle of her 
 own one with no silent spaces in, but frank and 
 candid as the day, and with all the sentiments fully 
 expressed to a lady of eminent and established 
 propriety. The result of the communication was 
 that there arrived at "South Downs" a "perfect 
 treasure," recommended by the eminent lady as 
 a suitable chaperone and care-taker of the lovely 
 Rosalie. 
 
 By the time that Lady Susannah issued her cards 
 
 of invitation, Rosalie had been for three months an 
 
 inmate of her mother's house. Her father was her 
 
 god and her standard ; she tried all men by it ; 
 
 43 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 his treatment of her as a woman was the treatment 
 she exacted from all. "My father" ran on her 
 tongue with frequency, and with a pretty unques- 
 tioning pride that was winning. Mrs. Trelyon 
 listened with lowered lids. Rosalie quoted his 
 views on Colonial policy, and believed them to be 
 the ultimate wisdom. Colonial matters were prior in 
 her view to home and foreign affairs. She burned 
 with ardent partisanship on topics that drawing- 
 room politicians knew nothing of. England was a tri- 
 fling item in the great Imperial Empire. She thrilled 
 responsive to the beat of waves on the distant edges 
 of another hemisphere ; and the talk she heard 
 tinkled in her ears like domestic cattle-bells. 
 
 One day shortly before the party, Lady Susannah 
 inadvertently kindled a small fire of interest. 
 
 " You must talk of these things with Mr. Dayn- 
 tree one day," said she, stealing a well-bred glance 
 at the easy-fitting school-girl gown in which Rosa- 
 lie could without impediment have climbed a tree ; 
 " people so often indicate him as a future Secretary 
 for the Colonies he has all the knowledge. My 
 interests are in the European courts, I was intimate 
 at the Tuileries. The dear Empress " 
 
 The girl's proud glowing face belied her gown. 
 
 " A nymph ! an Amazon ! " ejaculated the Rec- 
 tor, with so much enthusiasm being in spite of 
 his cloth at bottom but a man on his way down 
 the drive, that Lady Susannah abruptly recalled the 
 talk to duty and the church poor-box. 
 44 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 A future Colonial Secretary ! It was the first 
 stirring of real interest she had felt in her new 
 home. How slow they all were ! Was there any- 
 thing anywhere to take hold of ? Anything which 
 might draw her again within the rushing current of 
 genuine life? A picture shone in her mind fora 
 moment she saw herself mounted close by her 
 father's side on a star-lit night, she felt again the 
 mettle of the horse that her knees gripped, and the 
 bridle lightening in her left hand, while her ear bent 
 towards her father's rapid and murmured counsels. 
 Then the silent wait and the wild thrill of danger, 
 and the tension of her body and nerves up to the 
 reach of the moment, her hands stretching as it 
 were between death and life ; and after that the 
 mysterious rush by of an unseen troop of Indians 
 somewhere in the night, and the twang and rustle 
 of a stray arrow shot at random and flying over- 
 head. 
 
 That sort of thing quickened existence and made 
 life worth living. A hair-breadth escape from death 
 brought one to clasp one's own flesh and bones in 
 rapture ; to have been certain of one's nerve while 
 the King of Terrors passed, uplifted the sense of 
 one's own personality as though nature itself had 
 kissed one on the mouth. 
 
 But this suppressed existence of stays and sofas ! 
 
 How was she to run a scarlet thread of interest 
 
 within the dun-coloured material ? The two words, 
 
 " Colonial Secretary," suggested that at least in the 
 
 45 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 neighbourhood was one man who could talk ; her 
 need for adventure and for touching the moment 
 with skilled appropriating handling, brought about 
 a second suggestion for creating secret amusement 
 out of Lady Susannah's party. As she walked to 
 her dressing-table she determined to undertake for 
 the evening the role of decorum and fashion, and to 
 play it off on the local inquisitors whom she rightly 
 surmised as being preoccupied by her personality 
 and dying of curiosity concerning it. 
 
 The eyes of the interested discovered her there- 
 fore seated meekly on a lounge, in a Worth gown, 
 and holding the fire of her glance beneath a down- 
 cast lid, while prettily accepting the homage of a 
 number of gentlemen and of some ladies to her 
 youth, her exceptional experience, and her beauty. 
 
 " Trousers and leggings ! " whispered a disap- 
 pointed gossip to Irene Severne, " if it were n't for 
 her eyebrows one would swear she still ate bread- 
 and-treacle with the nursemaid, and played 'La 
 Grace ' in the garden." 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon viewed the proceedings of her 
 daughter with a watchful eye ; presumably she 
 recognised the hereditary principle ; an apprecia- 
 tive understanding kindled in her sleepy glance. 
 
 Lord Warren ne specially entreated for the oc- 
 casion hurried up first, and a sequence of the dull 
 and decorous followed. A miscellany of conversa- 
 tion was offered up in bits. She got the foxhounds 
 from one, and the proceedings of the Royal Institu- 
 46 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 tion from another. Her ears yearned for the Colo- 
 nies, and the nearest she arrived at was the recent 
 insurrection in Bosnia and Herzegovina. 
 
 " What we want," said a sententious politician, 
 expounding the Eastern question, " is simply to get 
 at the facts, and then to apply free, fresh, moral 
 principles to them." 
 
 Lord Warrenne, who was a Whig, and regretted 
 the late Government, kept his mind in a constant 
 state of opposition ; he had secret information 
 that the present Foreign Secretary was committed 
 to a totally wrong course. 
 
 " Lord Derby," he began, " as every one 
 knows " 
 
 Rosalie languished under it, and grew a trifle 
 pale. Lord Warrenne, having unhooked his button 
 from the politician with the ready remedies, re- 
 turned to her side. 
 
 " I recall your father in old days,' 7 he said kindly. 
 
 That secured her attention ; and it was at this 
 moment that the room, which seemed sinking into 
 the hopeless neutral tints of inanity, shot all over as 
 with crimson light and colour. The voice of an 
 invisible servant announced 
 
 " Mr. and Mrs. Dayntree." 
 
 Her gaze was upon Norman in a moment, and 
 after a brief and anxious inspection she emitted a 
 faint, satisfied sigh. Here was quarry worth the 
 game at last ! Lord Warrenne, remarking her wan- 
 dering eye, thought her breeding, which had ap- 
 47 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 peared perfect, might after all be improved ; he 
 must persuade his wife to ask their little kinswoman 
 to the Castle. Catching the critical glance, she soft- 
 ened it by a pretty appeal. 
 
 " Who is this Mr. Dayntree?" asked she. 
 
 " Dayntree ? Well, he is lord of the manor, and 
 a prince amongst merchants, and the handsomest 
 man in the county, and married to the best of 
 women, and old enough to be your father," spoke 
 Lord Warrenne to the very young miss whose harm- 
 less muslins had so prettily bespread the sofa all 
 evening. 
 
 " Introduce him, please ; some one called him 
 the Colonial Secretary." 
 
 " Ah, yes ! " responded her august kinsman, 
 wondering he had not remarked her eyebrows 
 before ; " so they say. It is n't much more than 
 aspiration at present, I fear." 
 
 " I was told he had all the knowledge. He ought 
 to be Secretary." 
 
 " Ah, yes ! But I 'm afraid we don't choose 
 our State Secretaries that way, Rosalie, my dear. 
 Though I admit if Dayntree chose to put himself in 
 the way of it, he 'd get the office for the asking." 
 
 A man who might be Colonial Secretary and who 
 stood aloof, was even more stimulating than a man 
 caught and entrenched in the Cabinet. 
 
 " I wish to talk to him about the Colonies. I 
 was my father's secretary, and read the dispatches." 
 
 Her eye kindled. Lord Warrenne laughed pleas- 
 48 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 antly. He liked an English girl to be modest in 
 her manner and comme-il-faut, but this kindling eye 
 gave a pleasant touch of sauce and interest. He 
 was of course willing to humour and please her, and 
 leaving her side he skirted slowly towards Dayntree ; 
 presently he had him by the elbow, and said some- 
 thing laughingly in his ear. Dayntree responded 
 by an amused nod and a raised eyebrow. Rosalie 
 saw without appearing to watch. Her mind, body, 
 and nerve steeled itself to the encounter. She had 
 seen the good-natured mirth, and her spirit was fired. 
 Her mood rose on a wave of presumptuous resolve. 
 When Dayntree, still with the amused light in his 
 eyes, approached, and Lord Warrenne made the 
 introduction, she bent her head with the air of a 
 princess and signed to him to take a seat by her 
 side ; at the same moment she threw from under 
 her lashes a challenging glance that pricked like a 
 pin. Dayntree caught it again on a raised eye- 
 brow, and, seating himself by her side to discourse 
 on the Colonies, looked for a brief moment pene- 
 tratingly into the dark irises. 
 
 49 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 "THE MANOR HOUSE," Norman Dayntree's an- 
 cestral home, was a show-place amongst English 
 antiquities. He had inherited it when a young 
 man through the unlooked-for death of an elder 
 brother, but had not for that reason relinquished 
 the career to which his tastes led him. It was out 
 of deliberate choice that he had thrown his activi- 
 ties into commerce ; to discover the resources of a 
 country, to develop them, and to run the show for 
 all it was worth, was his ideal of activity. The 
 commercial idea was with him by no means limited 
 to money ; personal gain was not his last and ulti- 
 mate object. There was a streak of the magnificent 
 in his transactions, and the line between his com- 
 mercial policy and the significance of political affairs 
 was not always clear. 
 
 Dayntree's knowledge was, however, not a thing 
 acquired politically, but was rather an accidental 
 result pertaining to his business method. Con- 
 sequently there was a practicality in his Colonial 
 attitude that appealed to the English type of mind ; 
 he seemed to handle the thing as it were in sub- 
 stance, and folk who were suspicious of mere theo- 
 5 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 rists, political or otherwise, got into a habit of saying 
 that he had a wider knowledge of the Colonies and 
 saner views on Colonial questions than most men, 
 and he combined these supposititious attributes 
 with a fine social position, an impressive presence 
 and great riches, and hence the suggestion of the 
 Secretaryship followed as a natural sequence. 
 
 So far, however, Norman was not even in Parlia- 
 ment ; a flood of affairs had swept him even from 
 that threshold to ambition. In early days he had 
 travelled much and at the present time still kept 
 well-selected emissaries to do the travelling no 
 longer possible for himself. His office in the City 
 sent out sensitive feelers into many 'distant lands, 
 and news of every kind that eager impress of 
 fresh development that keeps the best minds awake 
 and aware to the finger-tips of natural and human 
 movement throughout the world tumbled by let, 
 ter, by newspaper, by telegram, daily into his office - 
 to be dissected and analysed by his clerks and 
 brought up to him to deal with. Possibly he felt 
 that his office door opened to an arena wider than 
 that of routine politics ; at any rate, he had justified 
 his choice of a career by supreme success. Never- 
 theless, the political side remained an ambition to 
 him, and he habitually felt about his shoulders the 
 mantle of an honour still to be. 
 
 In appearance he justified Rosalie's sigh of satis- 
 faction ; he was handsome, and forty years of exist- 
 ence had mellowed his natural grace into a very 
 5 1 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 dignified appearance ; some said he was courtly 
 enough for a Speaker ; others said, " Don't thr^w 
 Dayntree away on that ; he is a born administrator." 
 
 " He is a profoundly clever man," said Mrs. 
 Trelyon, with her innocent air ; " everything appears 
 to hang on his silence." 
 
 At the same time there was a point of Norman's 
 physiognomy to which the eye returned, and which 
 on occasion repulsed the average man and sent 
 him away wondering whether Dayntree was so 
 "safe" after all. To women the look it lay 
 chiefly in his eyes was attractive ; Constantia, his 
 wife unconsciously perhaps read it as a testi- 
 mony to that portion of his nature which she alone 
 knew by heart and loved him the better for. 
 
 It happened that one afternoon of this hot sum- 
 mer of 1876 (on the same day as that on which 
 Eliza Armstrong concluded that death was prefer- 
 able to life) Mrs. Dayntree awaited the visit of her 
 sister Irene Severne in a large upstair room of the 
 Manor House. The place was the very home of 
 peace. She stood by a clothes-press which lay 
 along one side of the wall. The doors were open, 
 and disclosed the miscellaneous collection of a 
 boy's wearing apparel. She was searching amongst 
 them, and presently drew forth a small muddy heap 
 from a corner. It was a pair of child's knicker- 
 bockers. Turning with them to the light, she held 
 them with the thumb and forefinger of both hands, 
 so as to secure to her motherly sense the luxury of 
 
 5 2 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 the outline while measuring the damage she had 
 suspected and discovered, Then she imprinted a 
 butterfly kiss upon the rough material, and prosa- 
 ically sat down to mend them. 
 
 It was now the heart of the day, late in the after- 
 noon. The room was a bright airy place which she 
 called her sewing-room. Mrs. Dayntree's work- 
 table was near the hearth. Immediately above the 
 chair where she was sitting was a photograph of a 
 number of boys from one of her Majesty's training 
 ships for the Royal Navy. From amongst these 
 indistinguishable personalities, Mrs. Dayntree was 
 wont to pick out one, and to name it with a tender 
 air of pride, " Our Ronald." 
 
 At this period, Constantia was a handsome 
 woman of thirty-nine. If she had lost the 
 graces of early youth, she had taken on new 
 beauties. Her face was full of serene experience ; 
 there was not a small or fretful line upon it ; her 
 personality was harmonious and full of repose. 
 When Irene appeared, she looked up with a smile 
 of welcome, and extended the damaged knicker- 
 bockers to her view. Irene glanced at them with 
 amused, melting eyes, and touched the outline 
 whimsically. Neither spoke, but the looks of the 
 two women met on one of the delicious secrets of 
 the affections. 
 
 " Shall I ring for tea ? " asked Mrs. Dayntree. 
 
 " Thanks, no. I drank it in the splendid atmos- 
 phere of Rosalie Trelyon, with Mrs. Trelyon look- 
 53 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 ing silently on. And I have come away feeling my 
 age." 
 
 " Nonsense about your age. Rosalie is a school- 
 girl!" 
 
 " On the contrary, she has never been young. I 
 like her ; but so much originality in a girl in her 
 teens withers me up. It used to be my quality ; 
 but I turn into a platitude in her presence." 
 
 " I don't think Norman quite approves of her," 
 said Constantia. 
 
 " He does not count. We are all ridiculously 
 old-fashioned people. Let us talk of the past, 
 Constantia." 
 
 Irene seated herself close to the window, and the 
 trees threw a shadow over her; but presently a 
 small breeze arose and disturbed the leaves, and a 
 sunbeam came through and touched her cheek. 
 Constantia gave a delighted cry. 
 
 " It is the sunlight on your cheek," she explained ; 
 " it made you look ten years younger. It brought 
 back the old look I remember so well the look of 
 your face, dear, that even a fashionable bonnet 
 could not prevail over." 
 
 " I recall the bonnets. They were flat over the 
 forehead, and had composite side-whiskers of tulle 
 and roses, and a ' curtain ' behind." 
 
 " It is twenty years ago," said Constantia, sigh- 
 ing ; " Norman must just have proposed to me. 
 And here I am now with a son sixteen years of 
 
 age, while you " 
 
 54 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " While I am still on the market labelled ' Dam- 
 aged Goods : a Reduction.' " 
 
 " Irene " 
 
 " Don't hesitate, Constantia ! I have reached 
 my last matrimonial chance. Mr. Dixon has, 
 as you have constantly forewarned me, proposed 
 in the most proper manner, and I have refused 
 him. Done it, my dear, in a final and emphatic 
 way." 
 
 "Oh, Irene ! And those two nice little girls 
 of his ! " 
 
 " I am not, at my age, prepared to open an 
 orphanage, Constantia." 
 
 "But I was going to say such an excellent 
 man ! " 
 
 " Ah, yes ! An eminent Whig. He carries his 
 political opinions as an accumulated growth upon 
 him. I know the correctness of his liberality by 
 the cut of his whiskers. I 'm afraid I 'm provoked 
 into red-hot Toryism when he is present. Generally 
 I begin to uphold the integrity of the Turkish 
 Empire; the sufferings of Bosnia and Herzegovina 
 cease to appeal to me ; and I 'm seized with perver- 
 sity on the subject of the Berlin Note ; or at least I 
 take an early opportunity of admiring Disraeli's 
 novels, and wondering with what title the Queen 
 is about to reward his eminent services to our 
 country. Now, Constantia ! Imagine the domestic 
 hearth under these circumstances ! " 
 
 "But consider 
 
 55 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Oh yes ! I 've considered everything. I 've 
 considered the furniture in the drawing-room, the 
 curtains, the upholstery. Very likely he would 
 allow me three hundred a year to dress on. Even 
 that does not move my heart." 
 
 Constantia laughed, and then sighed. The fact 
 that her beautiful sister remained unmarried had 
 always been a grievance. She was of opinion that 
 no life was complete for a woman save that of a 
 wife or mother. But Irene was incorrigible. And 
 after all a marriage with Mr. Dixon the widower 
 was not, even in her estimation, quite the genuine 
 thing, and she suspected that her tone in recom- 
 mending him lapsed into that of the second-hand 
 dealer. Irene would be sure to say so if she per- 
 sisted ; and when her sister finally complained that 
 she was in effect being asked to exchange her 
 brown hair and pallor for a blond wig and rouge, 
 Constantia smilingly dropped the subject, and put her 
 hand out caressingly towards the quiet coils of hair. 
 
 When about half-an-hour later Irene left, she laid 
 aside her sewing and glanced at the clock; the 
 hands moved towards six, and the dinner-hour was 
 at seven. Her husband usually contrived to be at 
 home by this time. She opened the door and went 
 out into the passage and called his name. There 
 was no answer, and, returning to the room, she 
 began to pace about rather restlessly. The swing 
 of a side-door and a distant step reassured her ; 
 she paused, and then heard a servant speak while 
 
 56 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 the step came on up the stairs towards the sewing- 
 room. It was not, however, Norman, but a fair girl 
 with red-gold hair who appeared on the threshold. 
 She stood there hesitatingly, pushing before her a 
 bunch of splendid cream roses. 
 
 57 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 IF Constantia felt her spirits dashed by this inept 
 presence, she did not show it ; she extended her 
 hand with one of her kindest smiles. 
 
 Eliza Armstrong laid her roses on her friend's 
 knee silently. 
 
 " What have you been doing lately ? " asked 
 Constantia, when the girl had seated herself by the 
 window. 
 
 "Practising scales chiefly. I wish to play. 
 Music is what Edward and Sylvia care for. I am 
 far behind them. Music won't come for me out of 
 strings or keys. I practise ; but when all is done I 
 can only listen. I have n't the right sort of hand 
 for the piano." 
 
 " It is a very pretty hand," said Constantia, 
 quickly, " and a good listener is rare." 
 
 " But," said Eliza, " that is not what they care for. 
 Edward wants more noise. This afternoon " 
 
 " Well ? " said Constantia, for the girl paused. 
 
 "Edward was playing with Sylvia and she was 
 called away. I went on listening to Edward. Not 
 that I like his playing, but I liked what he was 
 playing. Edward considers me a fool.' 7 
 
 58 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " Why ? " asked Constantia, her brow darkening. 
 
 " Because I did not take up the piece and go on 
 just where Sylvia had broken off. He said he 
 wanted a glorious crescendo at the end a voice or 
 a clash of keys. Why should he expect that from 
 me when I can do neither ? He considers me a fool." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Constantia, " and so the piece had 
 to end after all in the extremely harsh sounds of 
 Mr. Edward Armstrong's violin ? " 
 
 Eliza looked puzzled. She detected satire in 
 Mrs. Dayntree's voice. But her judgment was dis- 
 ordered by the family atmosphere of the glorification 
 of Edward. It was impossible to conceive that he 
 was satirised ; if there were satire, it was probably 
 in some way pointed at herself. 
 
 " So many people," said Constantia, gently, " mis- 
 take the unimportant for the important, and worry 
 their lives out over a trifle. But you have no need 
 to do that, Eliza." 
 
 "Need I not?" 
 
 " Certainly not. There is something better in 
 store for you. I do not say that life will be easy 
 for you. I have often remarked that you see more 
 and less than others do. That is a difficult com- 
 bination of qualities." 
 
 Eliza leaned forward and touched her friend's 
 hand. 
 
 " I know I have got some power," said she, " but 
 I do not see that it is any use. Power in my head 
 and none in myself." 
 
 59 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " You ought to trust yourself. You should be 
 strong." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Eliza. " And I would give a good 
 deal for permission to be weak. In other Ways," 
 she added, with a gleam of humour, " I have much 
 to contend with. There is my hair, for example. 
 I do think when Providence made me stupid he 
 might have made me inconspicuous too. But when 
 a bonnet or a dress is in question, they say : ' Eliza 
 must be toned down.' " 
 
 "My dear child! You have talent. And your 
 hair and complexion are lovely." 
 
 " Well ! If so, it is an inconsistency the more. 
 I envy the consistently stupid those who have all 
 their edges blunted just as I feel it would have 
 been better to be ugly outright. The hard fate is 
 to be neither one thing nor another to be all 
 inconsistency. I envy the very gardener's boy. 
 He knows exactly what he is, neither more nor less. 
 He gets up every morning to certain work, and 
 knows from hour to hour that nothing fresh can 
 by any possibility occur. Yes, I envy the gardener's 
 boy ; he is a quite consistent example of plainness 
 and dulness." 
 
 Constantia laughed, and patted the girl's hand 
 kindly. 
 
 " If I could get into my own planet," she con- 
 tinued whimsically "my powers, you see, are 
 those of a telescope it would be more convenient 
 to be able to see what is under my own nose. The 
 60 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 gardener's boy has at least this much advantage 
 over me his mother adores him. But Aunt 
 Caroline said to me the other day : ' Eliza, you 
 will never be loved.' '' 
 
 " That was an exceedingly wrong remark to 
 make," said Constantia, with emphasis. 
 
 " But true," returned Eliza, gloomily ; " I see it 
 in my telescopic moods. Even you have nothing 
 better to advise than that I should be strong. If 
 you only knew how gladly I would accept insignifi- 
 cance if only it were accompanied by affection ! 
 I have dreams that is the worst. But I am con- 
 demned to be founded upon a rock ! The pupil of 
 Marcus Aurelius and all the Stoics with a hand 
 like this, red hair and pale eyebrows, and the 
 Christian name 'Eliza' !" 
 
 " I am very fond of you, little Peri ! " said Con- 
 stantia, laughing, and kissing the tips of her fingers 
 towards her. 
 
 Eliza rose and reached the door without respond- 
 ing. There she stood touching the handle and 
 turning over Constantia's last words thoughtfully. 
 
 "Yes," said she, " so you think. And I am cer- 
 tain of my own love for you. Nevertheless, at the 
 bottom of my heart lies a conviction that the irony 
 of things has selected me out of all others to bring 
 you annoyance and pain." 
 
 She turned the handle and was gone. 
 
 " Eliza ! " cried Constantia, starting from her seat 
 in kind dismay. 
 
 61 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 But the hurrying feet went too quickly. Constan- 
 tia turned back to the window. Glancing at the 
 clock, she saw that the hands were moving close on 
 to seven. Possibly her husband had already ar- 
 rived ; she opened the door and went out a second 
 time, and stood leaning over the banisters to listen ; 
 then, once more, called his name softly. 
 
 Silence followed the first attempt; a second 
 brought after it a sound of feet in a great hurry, 
 and a small boy appeared in the hall beneath. He 
 was breathless, dirty, and voluble ; he raced up 
 the stairs, talking in gasps of excitement as he 
 came, his sentences being interspersed by cries of 
 " Mother ! " and he made, without pause straight 
 at the cool lavender-hued gown, and burrowed his 
 curly head into the soft and perfumed folds. A 
 casual glance at the face had caused him to antici- 
 pate reproach. 
 
 The gong struck for dinner. 
 
 " Ted ! Ted ! " said Constantia, reprovingly, 
 "have you washed your hands?" 
 
 The face came out from its refuge red and ruffled, 
 the eyes dancing with mirth. 
 
 " You are a shocking grimy boy ! And the din- 
 ner-gong has struck ! Where is father? " 
 
 " He has n't come in. But come along, mother ! 
 If he is n't there I can sit in his place and say : 
 * Charles, fill your mistress's glass with claret.' " 
 
 Constantia caressed the curly head. 
 
 "I don't know what father will say," said she. 
 62 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " But go and make yourself tidy first while I change 
 my dress." 
 
 Ted, from long experience, knew that the com- 
 promise was effected ; and in the end the two pro- 
 ceeded to the dining-room together. The master 
 of the house was absent. Ted got his wish, and 
 sat in his father's chair and embarrassed the butler 
 by his orders. His mother seated opposite fell in 
 with his humour and smiled at her small vis-a-vis, 
 and listened to his account of the adventures of the 
 day. There was hardly opportunity for feeling that 
 Norman was away. 
 
 It was after Ted had gone to bed that the con- 
 sciousness of his absence became again oppressive. 
 And to lose the pertinacity of the feeling she left 
 the drawing-room and went into the garden. 
 
 It was a beautiful still night, the darkness too 
 pale to be illumined by many stars ; dying colours 
 were visible on the horizon, night clasping a fainting 
 day upon its breast. Not a breath stirred, and the 
 scent of flowers rose heavily. From the windows 
 of the front rooms patches of light fell on the ter- 
 race, and in and out of them the quiet meditative 
 figure of Constantia passed, rolling small stones of 
 the gravel with a tiny rustle of her skirts. 
 
 The Manor House, beneath whose ivy-covered 
 historic walls she paced, had been her home ever 
 since her marriage ; her existence amid these estab- 
 lished surroundings was an additional element in 
 forming within her life and character the sense of 
 63 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 unassailable tranquillity and happy security to which 
 nature predisposed her. It was the peculiar at- 
 traction of her personality that nothing in the nature 
 of fretful anxiety rippled the deep leisure of her 
 feeling towards men and things. There was time 
 as well as depth in her sympathy. Life had been 
 indulgent to her mellowing. 
 
 Through the quiet of the night sounds travelled 
 far. She heard the striking of the hour from the 
 church clock and the hum, small as the flight of 
 bees, which told that the commoner, more urgent 
 life of the village was still awake. She touched that 
 life chiefly by her benevolences, her own existence 
 being set apart. She learned human woe as through 
 a mirror, leaning towards it with sad wondering 
 eyes, and extending over it healing hands, but not 
 in her own heart knowing the smart of it. She was 
 the woman sheltered by the man, placed by his 
 pride and love in an enchanted tower, and locked 
 therein by the secret invisible key of jealous de- 
 fence. 
 
 The drawing-room when she returned to it was 
 still empty. In the continued absence of her hus- 
 band it was difficult to set to any occupation. She 
 seated herself upon the sofa with a sense of languid 
 depression, and leaning back amongst the cushions 
 fell suddenly into deep slumber. 
 
 The sleep was filled by a dream by a visionary 
 uneasiness at variance with her habitual peace. It 
 may be that through the doors left unprotected by 
 64 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 vigilant reason, the restless spirits of the earth crept 
 in to touch the sensitive fabric of her mind with 
 desolating fingers, and to write upon it their 
 warning. 
 
 She thought in her dream that she stood again 
 outside on the terrace of her home ; but in place 
 of the evening peace of the old-fashioned garden, 
 she saw the familiar scene dissolve into disaster and 
 chaos, while the house, to which she turned as to 
 an habitual refuge, met her by a strange and treach- 
 erous repulse inanimate things filled by conscious 
 malice the bolts and bars of the door and win- 
 dows shooting themselves back against her entry, 
 as under invisible hands. 
 
 Constantia gave a start forward and woke with a 
 cry on her lips, to find that the click of Norman's 
 latchkey was in her ears. He was coming in by a 
 side door, and as she rose to meet him it faintly 
 passed her mind that she did not remember his 
 coming in at night by that particular entrance be- 
 fore. The door did not open promptly, he seemed 
 to fumble with the key, and then as she advanced, 
 her eyes fixed upon it, it was pushed open quietly, 
 almost stealthily. She saw the pale summer dark- 
 ness of the sky behind a branch darkly etched 
 against it, and a faint star in the heavens, and the 
 form of her husband upon the threshold. Gladness 
 at his appearance sounded in her voice. 
 
 " Norman ! I have waited so long ! " she cried. 
 
 The words dropped upon an embarrassed silence. 
 5 65 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 She had run towards him, and caught at his arm 
 with her hands ; her breast pressed it. From the 
 touch she received a strange impression of his 
 agitation. 
 
 " Why ! " cried she, " your heart beats against 
 my hand. Come into the light that I may see 
 you." 
 
 Norman freed himself from his wife's clinging 
 fingers, came forward, and stooped down. 
 
 " Let me get my boots off," said he ; " you 
 startled me. Yes. I am very late. I thought you 
 would have been in bed." 
 
 He sat upon a chair and occupied himself with 
 his bootlaces. Constantia stood for the moment 
 amazed, but only for the moment; her mind in- 
 stantly excusing what was unusual by a vague refer- 
 ence to something that had possibly happened in 
 the "City." Outside the peaceful home things 
 often went wrong, and reverberations of trouble 
 would be carried in her husband's voice. As a 
 rule, indeed, he discarded " business " on the 
 threshold, or permitted it only to reach her in inti- 
 mate confidences that increased her sense of one- 
 ness with him. She was the last to allow personal 
 trifles to change her bearing, and at once dropped 
 her surprise into that zone of the temperate in 
 which it was her habit to exist. 
 
 "Your slippers, dearest," was all that escaped 
 her ; " I will fetch them." 
 
 He raised his head. 
 
 66 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " No ; I do not like your doing things of the 
 kind for me. Where is Ted?" 
 
 " In bed long ago, Norman." 
 
 The wonder increased. 
 
 "To be sure. I had forgotten. I will fetch 
 them myself. I will follow you to the drawing- 
 room directly." 
 
 His wish to be alone was expressed by his man- 
 ner. Constantia moved away. The soft chiming 
 of a clock announced that it was a quarter to mid- 
 night. She passed down the hall between the array 
 of portraits and ancestral curiosities, her aspect 
 nobly feminine, her walk neither a march nor a 
 glide, but steady and tranquil, with the flow of lacy 
 skirts about it. She carried the dignity of the house 
 well. Norman glancing after her thought so, and 
 wondered and went on unlacing his boots. She 
 passed into the drawing-room and remained there 
 awaiting him. Her face had been subtly changed 
 by his presence. There was not merely the stirring 
 of affection, as when a loved friend approaches, 
 but she had the look pleasant, dignified, some- 
 thing between resistance and a gentle elation 
 which women wear because of men, as though their 
 coming opened the door to a world towards which 
 they yearn, but which is not altogether theirs. 
 
 She heard her husband run lightly upstairs to his 
 
 dressing-room ; five minutes later his step was on 
 
 the stair again. By this time she was on the hearth, 
 
 one hand resting on the mantel-shelf, and looking 
 
 67 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 towards the door. When Norman entered he wore 
 the air of courteous, somewhat ceremonious, rever- 
 ence which was his habitual demeanour in the pres- 
 ence of his beautiful wife. He came up to her and 
 took her hand and kissed it in the way to which she 
 had been accustomed all the days of their life to- 
 gether ; and he inquired how she had spent her time. 
 
 " Irene has been here. But what detained you, 
 Norman ? " 
 
 " I have been over to the Armstrongs' place." 
 He passed his hand over his beard with the musing 
 smile of a confident man. " It was the old fellow 
 who invited me. The younger I have not quite 
 fathomed. He is not merely shallow." 
 
 "You mean Edward?" 
 
 " Yes : he gives out false notes if you hit him 
 unprepared. He has a suspicious fluency. I am 
 reminded of an advertising agent of bogus pills." 
 
 " I dislike him," said Constantia, with feminine 
 emphasis ; " what is his conduct to his sisters ? " 
 
 " I am not in the domestic secrets. I should 
 say that he had a rough side. The Armstrongs are 
 too new to be civilised. But what of the sisters?" 
 
 " Eliza called here to-day." 
 
 " A very unattractive personality." 
 
 " Oh ! she has a fine underlying character, and, 
 I think, genius." 
 
 " A man does not care to probe deep into femi- 
 nine eccentricity. The charm should be expressive. 
 How about Ted?" 
 
 68 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " He has been so sweet to-day, dearest." 
 
 The father and the mother looked into each 
 other's eyes and smiled. That was an intimate 
 moment. Constantia brought her shoulder against 
 the hollow of his arm. 
 
 "All the same," said Dayntree, as though think- 
 ing aloud, " I may have to see a good deal of Eliza 
 Armstrong in the future ! " 
 
 "How is that?" 
 
 " One of the secrets that I confide to my wife. 
 Old Armstrong is, I believe, a man haunted by a past. 
 His face has a padlock look, as though he feared his 
 secrets would be rifled. I have the advantage ot be- 
 ing a stranger, eminent enough, far enough away, to be 
 trusted. He sent to me to make a singular proposal." 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 " He desired me to become sole executor of his 
 property under his will." 
 
 " That is unusual ? " 
 
 "Very. I hesitated. But, after all, why not? 
 The old man's eyes were haggard with their thought. 
 I could hardly refuse him. He laid stress on it. 
 And the will is a simple one." 
 
 " And you accepted ? " 
 
 "Yes. The will is too simple to involve me 
 in serious trouble. I have but to divide his prop- 
 erty fairly there is no trusteeship. And one 
 cannot refuse a neighbourly act to an old fellow 
 standing on the brink of the grave, and with a 
 constitutional terror of life troubling him. I believe 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 he distrusts his son. He was relieved by my 
 consent." 
 
 " And I am glad. At least you will see that 
 Eliza receives just treatment." 
 
 " I shall do that." 
 
 "Ah, thanks ! Poor little Eliza is safe then." 
 
 "You take too many protegees into that great 
 heart of yours," said he, smiling at the proud assur- 
 ance of her look. 
 
 " There is room for them all," said she ; " and 
 have you not got Evan for your own ? " 
 
 70 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE Trelyons' drawing-room was a long place 
 divided in the centre by folding-doors which Mrs. 
 Trelyon preferred to keep closed. 
 
 Originally the place had been furnished in the 
 Louis Quinze style ; and the rather faded cool- 
 coloured carpet with its sketchy groups of flowers, 
 the painting . on the walls and panels, and the 
 polished civilisation of the furniture remained, but 
 the effect, suavely uncompromising, was bewildered 
 by the bizarre introduction of a multitude of foreign 
 things handsome rags of costly embroidery, odd- 
 shaped and brightly coloured objects, screens, fans, 
 exotics all of them products and inventions of a 
 sunny clime, and all needing brilliant light to carry 
 their effect. 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon preferred things in shade. 
 
 Irene Severne, speculating upon the strange taste 
 which permitted in a room of habitual occupation 
 so incongruous a jumble as to suggest the hasty 
 transplanting of the contents of a heathem temple 
 to a European fireside, sometimes fancied that she 
 caught Mrs. Trelyon's abstracted eyes wandering 
 7 1 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 over the idolatrous miscellany with a sarcastic ray 
 in them. 
 
 On this hot afternoon of Irene's early call, the 
 light wherever possible had been extinguished or 
 modified, and Mrs. Trelyon, from^a comfortable 
 lounge, talked to her guest in a fatigued voice that 
 matched the semi-darkness. 
 
 Suddenly the folding-doors were pushed back, 
 and a stream of sunlight ran along the floor and 
 leapt to the polished points of the furniture and the 
 barbaric tinsel. Mrs. Trelyon closed her large- 
 lidded eyes, and Irene turned with an expectant 
 smile. In the middle of the light stood Rosalie, 
 holding a cricket bat and wearing on her head a 
 scarlet knitted cap. Her hair escaped from under 
 it in a dark fluffy cloud, edged by sunlight ; her 
 dress, a bright-tinted cotton, oddly mitigated by a 
 black sash for mourning, was short, loose, and 
 scanty; her poise, as she stood hesitating for a 
 moment to peer into the darkness, was easy and 
 graceful. With her bat and her careless head-gear, 
 she looked like a tall, unconscious child. The 
 moment afterwards, as she passed down the room 
 towards Miss Seveoae.. the equilibrium of her bear- 
 ing, her power of throwing out a charmed circle of 
 distance around her own personality, a hint of ex- 
 perience in her splendid eyes, and, above all, her 
 soft, ripe voice, corrected the impression. 
 
 Irene Severne considered Rosalie a departure 
 from anything she had ever encountered before, and 
 72 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 for this reason was inclined to favour her ; for Irene 
 preferred new types to routine individuals. As the 
 girl advanced she held out her hand with a smile ; 
 Rosalie smiled a little too. 
 
 " Miss Severne, come out with me," said she ; 
 " mother, your head aches ; it always does, and you 
 will be glad to be rid of your visitor. I like this one 
 of our guests, and I mean to entertain her. She 
 shall come out with me instead of staying in here 
 in an over-scented room boring you and herself " 
 
 Irene started a little, and slightly coloured. What 
 Rosalie said was so obviously true that she was 
 naturally anxious to deny it. 
 
 " Come," said Rosalie, softly, " you have really 
 not the occasion to invent." 
 
 Irene, who had not spoken, rose. 
 
 " Show Miss Severne the rose-garden," said Mrs. 
 Trelyon, suavely. 
 
 "If you wish it, mother. But Miss Severne 
 would certainly prefer the loft or the hay-field." 
 
 "As you wish." 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon waved a white hand in dismissal. 
 Irene, who was being hurried towards the folding- 
 doors, glanced back, and saw her in rumpled and 
 tarnished mourning sinking to the cushions with an 
 air of relief. 
 
 " Rosalie ! " 
 
 The pair were already half across the outer 
 drawing-room, and Rosalie had closed the folding- 
 doors. Mrs. Trelyon's voice was a little raised. 
 73 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 "Well, mother?" 
 
 " If you go to the loft or the hayfield, take Miss 
 Glynn." 
 
 Rosalie, who was at the moment ushering Irene 
 into the hall, smiled to herself, but she obeyed. 
 
 She went to the bottom of the stairs and called 
 
 " Glynn ! " 
 
 Irene waited on events. The monosyllable was 
 twice repeated. After the third a commotion, com- 
 posed of a slamming door, slippers, a skirt, and a 
 voice, was heard above. It came on towards the 
 banisters, over which at length the head of a middle- 
 aged lady was thrust. A loud tremulous whisper 
 came down the stairs. 
 
 " My dear Rosalie the footman ! The footman, 
 Rosalie ! Consider, my love ! " 
 
 "What is wrong with the footman? Come down, 
 Glynn. You are required to chaperon me into the 
 hayfield and the loft. You will have to climb a 
 ladder. Miss Severne is here." 
 
 " Hem ! " 
 
 Miss Glynn, perceiving an eminent stranger, 
 scuttled downstairs in effusive hurry, with a smile 
 nicely compounded of an apologetic sense of in- 
 ferior station and a consciousness of merit. 
 
 " There 7 s no time for a bonnet, Glynn, nor for 
 curling your fringe, nor changing your old comfort- 
 able boots for some that pinch. Miss Severne and 
 I are in a breathless hurry. Take that parasol and 
 come ! " 
 
 74 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 Miss Glynn found her version of an elegant bow 
 cut short. She was scarcely able to determine 
 whether or no she was smitten to the heart by the 
 girl's words. She hurried to the umbrella stand, 
 one hand nervously straying towards her hair to 
 gauge the extent of the disorder, the other ready to 
 seek out the most prosaic amongst the bright-hued 
 sunshades. She selected an old brown thing in 
 favour of crimson. It was not that she did not pre- 
 fer the latter; her genuine taste in colour was 
 furious ; but a stern interior monitress kept pluck- 
 ing back any small vital promptings which she might 
 have had. She dieted on shreds, and called it 
 merit ; conduct to her meant contortion ; as to 
 nature, the very paroquets, had she had her way, 
 would have been sent to the dyer's and reduced 
 to mourning hues. 
 
 As Rosalie ran forward to open a side door, Miss 
 Glynn had an opportunity of imparting some ex- 
 planatory fictions to their guest. 
 
 " I find it best," murmured she, looking anxiously 
 at Irene Severne, whose amused composure she 
 envied and found " aristocratic," " to humour Miss 
 Trelyon. Her mother has done me the honour to 
 commit her to my charge. I find her an interest- 
 ing study, but she requires moulding'' 1 
 
 There was not time for more ; they were out in 
 
 the air and the sunshine, and Rosalie was by Miss 
 
 Severne's side again. Miss Glynn, the moulder, 
 
 still assiduously seeking opportunities to pat down 
 
 75 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 her hair, followed her charge with anxious eyes. 
 They passed the lawn where little Ted was 
 found before a wicket, a bat in his hand, medita- 
 tively practising the attitudes of manhood in shirt- 
 sleeves. 
 
 " Rosalie ! you promised to come back. Aunt 
 Irene, where are you taking her?" shouted he, 
 dropping back to childhood. 
 
 " I think Rosalie is taking me, Ted," said Irene. 
 
 "Well! she promised. I call it right down 
 mean." 
 
 Rosalie ran to the boy, and knelt on the grass so 
 as to bring her face on a level with his. 
 
 " Ted ! we will go to the loft," said she ; "isn't 
 that better?" 
 
 Her face was full of soft colour and coaxing dim- 
 ples. Ted's large eyes stared into it ; he found 
 himself vaguely .affected, and his indignation 
 melted. 
 
 " Be quick then," said he ; '"promise." 
 
 " But won't you come ? " 
 
 " No. It won't be any fun in the loft. I don't 
 so much mind Aunt Irene, but you won't get that 
 old lady to make slides down the hay. Where have 
 you hidden the bath with the tadpoles in?" 
 
 Ted appeased, the trio went on. Miss Glynn's 
 anxiety increased when they turned from the well- 
 ordered gardens towards the back parts and the 
 fields. She walked in protest. Rosalie, always a 
 little in front, made a picture of elastic vigour and 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 beautiful swaying slimness charming to the eye. 
 Every now and then she raised her head, taking 
 deep looks into the foliage where the light played 
 and the bees hummed. Her senses pastured on 
 the beauty of things, and the freedom and the air. 
 Pausing with her hand on a small iron gate, she 
 turned back to Irene. Her face under the scarlet 
 cap, caught thus after an interval, was astonishingly 
 vivid and softly brilliant ; to Irene's imagination it 
 seemed to blossom out of the air itself, weaved of 
 light and colour and joy and health and change- 
 fulness. The voice, when she spoke, so strangely 
 ripe and full, deepened the impression, though the 
 words were nothing. 
 
 "Would you prefer the loft or the field?" said 
 she. 
 
 "I think the field," returned Irene, in secret 
 deference to the tremors of Miss Glynn. 
 
 "I am glad," said Rosalie, "the light is too 
 beautiful to lose." 
 
 " In the west from which you came there is so 
 much sunshine." 
 
 " And freedom," added Rosalie. 
 
 "Do you find us in England so very conven- 
 tional?" asked Irene. 
 
 "There is conventionality everywhere," said 
 Rosalie ; " use brings it about. But in England I 
 find you chiefly absurd." 
 
 Miss Glynn, in duty and fear, was incoherent but 
 deprecatory under her parasol. 
 77 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Glynn would have me lie," said the girl, tran- 
 quilly ; "she is here to teach me to do it. Miss 
 Severne, let us sit down on those haycocks under 
 the trees ; you will get a glimpse of the pond ; the 
 ripples of it and the sky give me the best suggestions 
 of liberty I can get here." 
 
 " Liberty is a beautiful word," said Irene, softly. 
 
 Miss Glynn seated herself on a haycock at a little 
 distance in an attitude of decorum, one hand still 
 endeavouring to bring order amidst the little wisps 
 of her hair. She was, Irene thought, an almost 
 pathetic figure of the keeper led about by the kept. 
 
 Rosalie sank into the dry grass with a. luxurious 
 sigh, throwing herself down at full length ; her hands 
 were under her head; her breast rose and fell. 
 The eyes of Irene, the fair English-trained woman, 
 wandered over her with an unwilling, fascinated 
 look ; the figure was beautiful as a statue, but then 
 it was almost as expressive. 
 
 "What makes you and Eliza Armstrong such 
 great friends?" asked she, suddenly. 
 
 " Because in one department of our natures we 
 suit," returned Rosalie ; " we meet on that. Eliza 
 is a wild bird with a cut wing." 
 
 "Is she?" 
 
 "Yes. And I am a bird whose wing has not 
 been cut. Miss Severne, I see under my lids a 
 field-mouse, brown, soft, staring at us with his bright 
 eyes from between the blades of grass. His heart 
 is thumping. Softly ! " 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " Where ? where ? " screamed Miss Glynn, clutch- 
 ing at her skirts. 
 
 " Idiot ! " said Rosalie, without deigning to 
 turn her head ; " you have frightened my little 
 brother." 
 
 " I saw him, Rosalie," said Irene, quickly, " pretty 
 little fellow ! " 
 
 And at the same moment she put out a kind hand 
 to soothe the lady wounded by the word. Miss 
 Glynn was still fidgeting and searching. 
 
 "Come," said Rosalie; "Glynn will have no 
 peace until we are out of this region of monsters. 
 She weeps at a spider. It is part of the con- 
 vention." 
 
 " I have a sensitive nature," explained Miss 
 Glynn, " and I am told I believe a weak 
 heart." 
 
 Rosalie sprang to her feet. 
 
 " You showed neither a weak heart nor sensitive- 
 ness when you stamped on the earwig last night. 
 Come ! the haymakers are going back to their work. 
 They have had tea and will finish to-night. Splendid 
 fellows they look ! You see that gate ? It is 
 always kept locked. They will undo it now 
 undo it for you, Glynn. I can dispense with a key." 
 
 So saying, the girl ran down a slope towards a gate 
 at the bottom of the field. 
 
 A procession of young labourers was approaching 
 it at the moment. She reached it before them. 
 Her hands touched the top in a white flashing 
 79 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 moment, and her beautiful body flew over the barrier 
 with a light rustle of raiment. 
 
 The labourers stopped, clustered together, and 
 shouldered one another. Looks of sleepy admira- 
 tion stole from face to face. Rosalie stood on the 
 other side in cool unconcern, pushing the falling 
 hair back from her neck, and panting gently. She 
 looked scarcely more conscious than a doe. 
 
 Miss Glynn was hurrying down the slope, anger 
 bursting over her countenance. 
 
 " She did it as a display before men before 
 labourers on the grounds,' 7 she cried to Irene. 
 
 One of the labourers unlocked the gate and held 
 it open, while the other men trooped through fol- 
 lowed by Miss Glynn, who immediately planted her- 
 self by Rosalie. Irene had descended the slope 
 more at leisure ; the man at the gate looked towards 
 her ; she passed through and thanked him. He fas- 
 tened it again, turned away indifferently, and walked 
 off to his work. Rosalie stood watching every one 
 of his actions. 
 
 " Let us sit here," said she, leading the way to a 
 pleasant spot. 
 
 They all seated themselves again. Rosalie took 
 up her position much more staidly than before, and 
 sat for a long time in silence. She still followed 
 the labourer with her eyes ; in her face was much 
 the same expression with which she had looked 
 at the field-mouse. Miss Glynn shed a tear or two 
 under her sunshade. 
 
 80 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " This is a strange, beautiful, dangerous nature," 
 thought Irene to herself. 
 
 She watched the expression deepening in her 
 features, it seemed to burn slowly up and open 
 vividly in the eyes at last as coloured petals break 
 out from the sheath. But the face was older for 
 bearing it, as the flower is older than the bud ; and 
 Irene hardly knew whether it lightened or threw 
 a shadow over it. Could she have painted an im- 
 personation of the evening, she would have set there 
 the look of Rosalie's, neither young nor old, but 
 written over with nature's impress rather than per- 
 sonal memories ; she could have dreamed that 
 thought was obliterated in sensation, subtle, har- 
 monious, and varied as the hour ; within it also 
 was the restless human touch, the outstretch and 
 yearning. Songs of birds were in the air, the scent 
 of wild roses came from the hedge, a warm grassy 
 smell rose from the earth, ripples of sunlight, heat, 
 and colour came and went on the wings of dancing 
 creatures. Rosalie's eyes still followed the man of 
 the fields. 
 
 " Watch him take the step forward," she cried, 
 " and stoop to the scythe with the swing of his arms 
 round. The sunlight runs along the blade and 
 bites the edge, and the edge bites the grass ; and 
 the grass tosses the light and falls to his will with 
 a little rustle. So he reaps earth's fruit. There 
 is only one thing better than the reaper. That is 
 the reaped." 
 
 6 81 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Yes," said Irene, rather vaguely. 
 
 " But have you ever wished to be a working girl, 
 brown, untidy, with burnt hair and bare feet, and to 
 belong to a strong sinewy splendid man like that? 
 To be in his power ?" 
 
 Miss Glynn screamed like a hare ; and a startled 
 look shot over Irene's delicate face. She glanced 
 at the girl's pearly ears, almost expecting to find 
 them pointed. A sense of civilisation weighted her 
 heart. She souglxt for the right word and discarded 
 all she found. 
 
 "What makes you say it? " said she, presently. 
 
 "Because it is there. It is part of the colour 
 and light and the sounds and the warmth. It 
 comes out of the earth. It is in me in you too." 
 
 " I believe you are probably right, Rosalie," said 
 Irene; "as you speak it, it sounds to me simple 
 and natural ; so that I cannot believe I have been 
 without the feeling. You translate it; I should 
 not; that is the difference. 77 
 
 By this time the incoherent anger and alarm of 
 Miss Glynn had risen to the point of expression ; 
 she was scandalised at Miss Severne's participation ; 
 a sense of duty was urgent. 
 
 " I have no words to express my disapproval," 
 she began ; " the hint of such a thing on the part 
 of a young lady you ought not even to think. 
 
 Rosalie, not even to think I am incoherent, 
 
 Miss Severne, but my mind is, I hope, so constituted 
 that I can hardly in delicacy frame a sentence 
 82 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 She broke off with a drawn lip and offended air, 
 and then suddenly ejaculated in smothered accents 
 
 " A man in corduroy trousers ! " 
 
 Rosalie got up from the ground and gave her 
 hand to Irene to help her to rise. 
 
 "Come," said she, addressing herself to Miss 
 Glynn, " you piece of discord ! We are going back 
 to the over-scented drawing-room and all the vari- 
 ous pretences you love. When I look into your 
 mind I seem to see a ruled copy-book with polite 
 maxims in copperplate handwriting. When I at- 
 tempt to get a glimpse of your nature, I am re- 
 minded of Euclid's definition of a point. As to 
 myself, you mistake when you address me as a 
 young lady. I am no such thing. Primarily I am, 
 with other men, an animal, and my sex is feminine. 
 I am young, vigorous, and ready for any pleasant 
 emotions that are going. My temperament is sen- 
 suous, and my intellect has a touch of cynicism ; I 
 have no notion of concealment of facts which are 
 patent to every one as part of our common nature. 
 I pursue what I find good, and intend to do so. 
 You can give notice if you like, Glynn, for you are 
 in a ridiculous position. I am absolutely indiffer- 
 ent to your opinion, for I find you not only imbecile 
 but also a humbug. I suspect no, I am sure 
 that the row of books with rigid bindings and reli- 
 gious titles that you keep in your bedroom are 
 only covers for improper printed matter." 
 
 Then she walked forward by Irene's side, the 
 
 83 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 chaperone following in silence. The hint about giv- 
 ing notice had terrified her, and angry protest and 
 moral asseveration were lost in the anxious inquiry 
 how so to manage her tactics between mother and 
 daughter as to keep her place. On their return to 
 the lawn, Ted was found there bending over a tin 
 bath. He was eagerly inspecting the manoeuvres 
 of some tadpoles which Rosalie had collected for 
 him within. 
 
 " I 'm saving the little frogs," said he, when the 
 shadow of the beautiful girl covered him ; " they 
 are in my pocket-handkerchief, and they are very 
 much obliged to me. You can look at them if you 
 like. I shall go home with Aunt Irene." 
 
 " There are strawberries and cream in the draw- 
 ing-room," said Rosalie, gently. 
 
 Ted's brown eyes deepened meditatively to their 
 reflection in the bath. 
 
 " I might stay," said he, " if Aunt Irene would 
 too. There are lots of people visiting in there." 
 
 "Who has come?" 
 
 " Mr. Edward Armstrong for one. Does n't he 
 think himself the swagger thing ! " 
 
 And Ted, nimbly rising to his feet, puffed out his 
 chest and fondled an imaginary moustache. Rosalie 
 went in laughing, accompanied by Irene. The 
 drawing-room was full of guests ; the tea-table was 
 spread, and Mrs. Trelyon was pouring out tea and 
 casting, between her low musical sentences, despair- 
 ing glances at the door. Upon Rosalie's appearance, 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 the scarlet cap still on her head, she beckoned her 
 daughter, and murmured the monosyllable " Glynn " 
 in her ear, and Ted, who had crept in behind, was 
 dispatched on a message to that lady, who, upon 
 hearing that she was wanted, bounded up the stairs, 
 in joyful agitation and completely restored good- 
 humour, to touch up her fringe and to fling on a 
 muslin fichu over her morning gown, just to give 
 sufficient finish to her attire to enable her to take 
 her place with satisfaction to herself " amidst the 
 grace and fashion of the county." 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 MR. EDWARD ARMSTRONG walked alone in his 
 father's garden at eventide. The light of the set- 
 ting sun, falling on his face, revealed him as a 
 good-looking, well-fed person, of sanguine colour- 
 ing. His most marked characteristic was the rise 
 of a curling mass of very beautiful brown hair from 
 a white brow ; the least noticeable, was a slight ten- 
 dency of the feet to turn inwards. 
 
 "The thing will pan out right enough, if only 
 father has seen where his plain duty lies," said the 
 young man to himself, staring at the horizon with a 
 frown ; " if he has not, the very deuce is in it. 
 Take the round sum as two hundred thousand. 
 Divide that by five " 
 
 It was a habit of Edward's to be continually 
 doing sums. 
 
 A constant fret in the smooth life of the young 
 man lay in the fact that his father, the most yield- 
 ing of men in many points, had a few prejudices, 
 from which no persuasion could induce him to 
 budge. One was an extreme reticence on the 
 subject of his fortune. He would impart neither 
 the amount nor the event which had placed him 
 86 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 in a position to acquire it. Edward hated cotton, 
 because the very word suggested to him a possi- 
 bility of extreme obscurity of origin. The Arm- 
 strong children did not know that their father had 
 managed to sidle out of the operative class to which 
 he belonged, into the Olympic superiority of the 
 master's world. They knew there had been a 
 l( rise," but were not wholly aware from what grade 
 it had begun. The " rise," Edward had reason to 
 believe, had taken place very long ago in the 
 thirties, and had connection with a cotton opera- 
 tives' strike, in which " Ovvd Union John " had 
 figured as a leader. There had been a mob, he 
 believed, and some shooting from the Clough Mill 
 at Harebarrow ; he was inclined to conjecture that 
 his father's conduct had been heroic, besides being 
 marked by well-conducted prudence ; he was sure 
 that their kinsman, Mr. Theophilus Armstrong, 
 must have considered that he owed him for some 
 inestimable service; at any rate, the collapse of 
 the strike had been marked by the extraordinary 
 promotion of his father, and the casting of " Union 
 John " into gaol. From that day to this no com- 
 munication whatever had passed between his father 
 and this disreputable relative. The young Arm- 
 strongs, none of whom were born when the event 
 occurred, regarded it as a fine tradition redounding 
 to credit, and found their father's obstinate refusal 
 to relate the incident significant of his detestation 
 of the disgrace brought upon them by his cousin. 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Edward never for a moment suspected that his 
 father had been on an absolute equality with the 
 operative strike leader to begin with. Occasion- 
 ally he excited himself by romantic theories as to 
 the source of the family : according to these the- 
 ories Cousin John Armstrong had descended in 
 social scale, falling to be " a common workman " 
 in his youth, and momentarily dragging his father 
 after him. These theories his father neither denied 
 nor acquiesced in. Mrs. Armstrong was, however, 
 not quite so reticent. The superior person can 
 no more conceal his superiority than the lover his 
 love. 
 
 " I should never have married your father," she 
 would explain to the depressed ears of her step- 
 daughters, " if he had not proposed through the 
 penny post. On his first visit to me, after my rash 
 acceptance of him, I said to myself as I opened 
 the door, and my eyes fell upon him : ' He will 
 never do.'" 
 
 Somehow, taking one thing with another, Ed- 
 ward felt himself to be on perhaps slippery ground, 
 when it came to the question of origin, and that 
 it would be the part of a skilful skater to bring him- 
 self safely over. Perhaps this was at the bottom of 
 his distaste for cotton. At any rate, so far from 
 encouraging a hope that he might take up the 
 career natural to an Armstrong, he had, when his 
 expensive three years' sojourn at the University 
 came to an end, signalised his dislike by entreating 
 88 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 his father to sell out of the Harebarrow interest 
 altogether, and to invest his money elsewhere. 
 
 Of late he had been harassed by the anxious 
 question whether his father's income was large 
 enough to enable him in the future to fulfil his 
 rather ample ideas of the conduct of life when he 
 entered on his proposed career of a rich man. 
 
 It was when he came to the divisor that 
 Edward pulled up his thinking with a frown. He 
 whistled slowly, gloom upon his brow, and his eyes 
 depressed to his boots. 
 
 " If father had really done his duty," said he 
 to himself, " he would have set about founding a 
 Family long ago. He ought to have concentrated 
 himself on the one end. If he had only done so, 
 we should have had a clear field before us by now, 
 and could begin to live ! I am as certain as a man 
 can be of anything, that if father had done what 
 he ought, he would be able to establish his suc- 
 cessor in a fair position in the county. And that 
 was father's clear duty. Of course, all other in- 
 terests ought to be subordinated to that of the 
 Family. And the thing cannot come out right if 
 he has not seen it. For let 's go back to the round 
 figure. Take it again as two hundred thousand ; 
 divide by five me, mother, Gilbert, Eliza, Sylvia. 
 Forty thousand apiece is absurd, on the face of it. 
 It is far too little to found a Family on, and far too 
 much to leave in the hands of women. It is also 
 not the right thing for Gilbert, who would be best 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 kept in hand by having a limited income judiciously 
 doled out to him. The women, of course, ought 
 to be a charge on the Estate dependants upon 
 the future Head of the House. Look how all the 
 big families manage it ! I am myself an admirer 
 of entail. Now that we possess 'The Court/ an 
 entail ought to have been arranged. It is the 
 proper thing ; no family can be founded without 
 it. Then, look how father has missed it with Gil- 
 bert ! It is just his crass ignorance about what is 
 the proper thing. The younger son, of course, 
 ought to enter a profession. All the big families 
 do that. He ought to have been made indepen- 
 dent of the Estate, and the burdens of the Estate 
 lessened by so much. Besides, it's the aristo- 
 cratic thing to do." 
 
 Edward sighed, as the sense of wasted oppor- 
 tunity flowed over him. 
 
 " What I always say is," he continued, " that 
 there 's only a step between us and the top of the 
 tree, if only father will concentrate on the main 
 idea, and see where his proper duty lies ! " 
 
 At this point Edward clenched his hands in his 
 pockets with a sudden qualm. Suppose he had 
 not? The baffling thing was that circle of reti- 
 cence and resistance in his father's nature which he 
 had never been able to break down. Round this 
 shut spot his brooding thought prowled, incessantly 
 curious, anxious, insatiate. What did his father, 
 for instance, want to talk so much with Mr. Dayn- 
 90 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 tree for just now? However, Dayntree was a 
 man of the world, and he had confidence that he 
 would see things in the right light. 
 
 But suppose it was n't two hundred thousand 
 after all, but only one ? Did they live in the style 
 of two hundred thousand ? One hundred thousand 
 divided by five. Good Lord ! The paltriness of 
 the thing was enough to make a man sick. 
 
 A sudden consciousness of some one's presence 
 directed his reflections to a new point, without 
 altering the quality of them. His sister was com- 
 ing across the lawn on her return from an evening 
 walk. He surveyed her from beneath his eyelids, 
 and found himself fastidiously critical of the glow 
 which exercise had brought to her cheek. Then 
 Eliza sometimes came back from a country walk 
 with a light in her eyes quite beyond her brother's 
 comprehension, and wholly dissonant from his 
 rfioods. Anything less aristocratic, less in the style 
 of " Lady Clara Vere de Vere," can hardly be 
 imagined. Edward groaned when he thought of 
 her in connection with " Society.'* 
 
 " Your face," said he, frowning, " is as red as 
 beet-root. I would have you know that Mr. Dixon 
 and Mr. Dayntree are here. I do wish you would 
 contrive to behave as a sister of mine ought to 
 behave." 
 
 The dreams which had lit Eliza's eyes died 
 instantaneously. When Edward saw the look of 
 pain and indecision rise into her face, he turned on 
 9 1 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 his heel with a scarcely concealed expression of 
 dislike. Eliza went on to the house, feeling in- 
 describably hurt. Upon entering she caught sight 
 of the coachman in his best livery hovering in the 
 side passage. One of old Mr. Armstrong's pre- 
 judices lay in a dogged refusal to keep a butler. 
 Mrs. Armstrong, urged by Edward, would silently 
 introduce the coachman when distinguished guests 
 were in question. His presence in the house was 
 therefore to Eliza a symptom of entertainment and 
 unmanageable hours. 
 
 By this time she was precipitated into a state fatal 
 to herself and others, and before she reached her 
 room signalised it. Down the passage up which 
 she advanced her aunt approached. Miss Caroline 
 Armstrong was a woman of thirty-five, with a grace- 
 ful carriage and striking features. At the moment 
 Eliza's quick eyes detected an unusual care in the 
 toilette, and a little pleasant excitement in the face. 
 Some said that Mr. Dixon called on Miss Arm- 
 strong's account. In her anxiety to make no fur- 
 ther mistakes, the girl paused dead, with her terrible 
 wide-open eyes fixed on her aunt's unusual elabora- 
 tion of dress. 
 
 " Aunt ! Ought I to put on my silk dress or my 
 delaine?" 
 
 " For what reason?" was the reply, accompanied 
 by a sudden stoniness of feature. 
 
 It increased the girl's perplexity and drove her 
 on to fresh indiscretions. 
 92 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " Edward says that Mr. Dixon and Mr. Dayntree 
 are here," faltered she. 
 
 " Eliza," was the severe retort, " it is exceedingly 
 vulgar to make these differences on account of mere 
 callers. Be what you are. ' ' 
 
 She got to her room. The details of life were 
 perplexing. She stared out of her window with the 
 merest meek yearning to give satisfaction all round 
 to everybody and an entire despair of attainment. 
 And at this moment, in the hearts of both brother 
 and aunt, the idea of her personality smarted as 
 something almost too exasperating to be borne. 
 
 " If aunt had only said ' Your silk, Eliza,' or 
 'your delaine,' or 'your muslin,' I would willingly 
 put on anything if I only knew which to choose." 
 
 The zone of colour deepened in the west ; an 
 evening beauty fell on common and uncommon 
 things alike. Eliza moved to the window, threw it 
 wider, and looked out. A majesty of skies lay be- 
 fore her ; the deep glimpse into it surprised away 
 the momentary fret, and set her again into relation 
 with that wider existence which pressed upon her 
 with so strong a sense of reality in solitary hours. 
 She began to dress carefully, unconsciously, and all 
 too slowly. Thoughts prevented her from marking 
 the flight of time. When she came to herself it 
 was late ; a buzz of talk and laughter in the hall 
 recalled her ; the glow vanished in face of a prosaic 
 disaster in the realisation that she had missed a 
 valuable opportunity. 
 
 93 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 For next to Constantia and Irene, Mr. Dayntree 
 held the high place in Eliza's estimation. In some 
 respects he stood highest of all. She adored him 
 afar off as the single embodiment of manly culture 
 with which she was acquainted. His mind was the 
 only one she knew that brought her into touch with 
 the world of men and things. His fascination lay 
 in this he seemed to carry the world with him, to 
 have its heart beating under his waistcoat ; proces- 
 sions of actual beings, facts and experiences, passed 
 in and about his conversation, producing a sense of 
 stir and actuality that nothing in her own life ever 
 brought her. 
 
 Realising that she was losing his visit, she ran 
 hurriedly downstairs. A lively group rilled the 
 hall. Her step-mother, effusive and gracious, was 
 bidding adieu to Mr. Dayntree ; her sister Sylvia, 
 as sweet and easy as a bud in June, and in simple 
 muslin, had let fall one of her bright speeches ; 
 Norman himself, bearded, handsome, with his forty 
 years of mastered realities, was smiling because of it. 
 Aunt Caroline, restored to composure, her cheek 
 beautified by a slight flush, stood near; Edward 
 stood near, and Gilbert hung behind with a smile 
 of good-natured participation on his face. From 
 the drawing-room door her father looked on. Eliza 
 noticed that he leaned against the doorway, that his 
 face was grey, and that it was pushed forward with 
 a certain dogged obstinacy in the jaw, a startling 
 depth of expression in the eyes. By his side was 
 94 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 Mr. Dixon obviously remaining for the evening. 
 Mr. Dixon, who was nothing whatever in Eliza's 
 eyes ! But it is always this the gods feave, the 
 ordinary person lingers. 
 
 Eliza hovered for one moment on the last step of 
 the stair, and then advanced. It seemed so sweet 
 a picture. The poems which slumbered in her 
 heart were apt to be thrown out as an atmosphere 
 for the commonest incidents, the stature of men 
 and women being magnified thereby; and those 
 who made up the group and could be easy one with 
 another, beautiful in demeanour and gracious in 
 speech, shone to her eyes as visionary beings. 
 Never was onlooking heart less tainted with sus- 
 picion or more wistful of participation. She ad- 
 vanced, and extended a small white hand towards 
 Mr. Dayntree. The latter, naturally startled by this 
 salutation at a parting moment, broke off his speech, 
 took the hand, and bowed with a twinkle in his eye. 
 The merry group seemed to fall to pieces in pres- 
 ence of this bit of isolation ; Mr. Dayntree stepped 
 towards the door, and all that was harmonious went 
 with him. 
 
 " Gawk ! " whispered brother Gerald, as one 
 after another dispersed. 
 
 The darkness which was gathering in the sky set- 
 tled also on Eliza's heart. She heard them collect 
 in the drawing-room, and, from the sounds which 
 came from the closed door, knew that the mirth of 
 the evening was resumed for Mr. Dixon's benefit 
 95 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 The entertainment of Mr. Dixon, however, was not 
 very attractive, and turning to the front door she 
 stood watching the deepening shadows and waiting 
 for the stars. 
 
 A quarter of an hour passed. 
 
 Then Gilbert came out of the drawing-room, and 
 paused to look at her with a curious smile. He set 
 his chin up in boyish imitation of her attitude. 
 
 "Well, Miss Johnny-head-in-air!" cried he; 
 "star-gazing? They are laughing at you in the 
 drawing-room how you go about staring up into 
 the sky and seeing nothing." 
 
 " I see everything" heavily retorted Eliza, yet with 
 a truth to which her less gifted brother had no clue. 
 
 " Oh, do you ? Dixon calls you ' La Penserosa.' " 
 
 " She saw everything." 
 
 Gilbert, not very clear as to the meaning of the 
 phrase, but wishing to assert his superiority in age 
 and sex, seized another weapon. 
 
 " They say you shook hands with Mr. Dayntree 
 like a pump-handle," said he. 
 
 Eliza stared at him silently. A sense of outrage 
 cut her heart like a scarlet thread. 
 
 "Elizer ! 'm " continued Gilbert, not ill- 
 naturedly. 
 
 But she turned her shoulders on him, and did 
 not wait for the rest. Her name, always a griev- 
 ance, thus pronounced became an insult. She fled 
 upstairs and took refuge in her bedroom and a 
 locked door. 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 The rest of the house went on its way. In the 
 kitchen the evening coffee was being brewed, and 
 the best china cups were spread out for use. The 
 old housekeeper bent over the fire ; the waitress 
 prepared a silver basket with dainty cakes ; and the 
 coachman, in his best clothes the fictional ele- 
 ment which Edward was so fond of introducing into 
 his surroundings prepared to enhance the family 
 dignity by himself bearing in the tray. 
 
 "You know Dayntree well?" said Mr. Armstrong 
 in the drawing-room, addressing himself to Mr. 
 Dixon. 
 
 He stood on the hearthrug with an air which 
 Edward found too commercial. He was still grave 
 and thoughtful. His head pushed forward in the 
 particular attitude Eliza had noticed, showed as 
 something rugged, forceful, and a little grim. 
 
 " Oh dear ! Papa is in one of his moods," thought 
 Mrs. Armstrong. 
 
 " Yes/' returned Mr. Dixon ; " I may say that, 
 I suppose, seeing our acquaintance dates from 
 Oxford. Dayntree has not fulfilled his early prom- 
 ise, you know." 
 
 Mr.' Armstrong turned his head sharply. 
 
 " He made a figure at the Union debates in un- 
 dergraduate days. It was thought his career would 
 be political, and that he would probably take office." 
 
 Miss Armstrong was of opinion that office de- 
 manded more solidity of character. Mr. Dixon 
 smiled. 
 
 7 97 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 "He showed his solidity of character to some 
 purpose when he threw himself into a commercial 
 career," said Mr. Armstrong, speaking with marked 
 decision ; " his education was n't a mere bit of em- 
 broidery. He has built up a splendid fortune." 
 
 " Oh ! There 's no doubt he is a fine manipula- 
 tor of money affairs," assented Mr. Dixon. 
 
 "The man is a born financier," said Mr. Arm- 
 strong, lifting his head suddenly, as does one who 
 knows what he is saying. 
 
 " Well ! That 7 s a very main thing in business 
 matters, of course." 
 
 " He has the whole thing in his finger-tips 
 runs at the market like a dog with his nose to the 
 ground," said Mr. Armstrong. 
 
 "Are we .to judge everything by pecuniary re- 
 sults ? " murmured Mrs. Armstrong, in her elevated 
 manner. 
 
 Edward frowned uneasily at his father's metaphor, 
 and disliked the turn the conversation had taken. 
 Whiffs from the mill, the counting-house, the town- 
 ofrlce, pervaded the conversational air. "A dog 
 with his nose to the ground." How Lancashire 
 and uncultivated ! Who but a cotton-operative 
 would say such a thing ! He sauntered across the 
 room Oxford veneered on his manner and 
 leaned against the corner of the mantel-shelf. 
 
 "1 wonder the University didn't wash all that 
 sort of thing out of him," said he, shortly ; " a man 
 ought to adopt the higher ambition." 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 Aunt Caroline softly struck her hands together in 
 applause. 
 
 " What I long to see," said Mrs. Armstrong, " is 
 both commerce and politics brought under really 
 Christian principles." 
 
 " What does Miss Armstrong say ? " asked Mr. 
 Dixon. 
 
 Miss Armstrong turned her interesting face 
 the long thin nose with a ripple in it, the bitingly 
 thin lips and the fine hatchet jaw. 
 
 " That the country carries on some of its com- 
 mercial enterprises under the Christian flag with 
 great advantage to its own pocket," said she. 
 
 Mr. Armstrong's head had fallen forward again, 
 and he appeared to have lost interest in the 
 conversation. 
 
 It was a curious anomaly in the Armstrong house- 
 hold that Aunt Caroline was permitted thus to take 
 her enjoyment in the utterance of paradox. Mrs. 
 Armstrong, however, explained her sister's unortho- 
 dox speeches to her own mind as eccentric mani- 
 festations of the Armstrong cleverness, and in her 
 pride of family upheld her. As to herself, her chief 
 characteristics were a weak low voice that suggested 
 fatigue and a coldly balanced demeanour. She af- 
 fected also a rigid austerity, which manifested itself in 
 excessively early rising, and in a neglect of the dain- 
 ties of the table. These traits were supposed to 
 signalise particular strength of character, and they 
 certainly afforded a basis from which to harry the 
 99 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 family with a sense of shortcoming. Mrs. Arm- 
 strong's superiority and Aunt Caroline's cleverness 
 produced together a subtle network of thin but highly 
 effective tyranny, under which the soul of Eliza 
 groaned and perished. 
 
 "Caroline! Are you not too radical? Gilbert 
 is present," murmured Mrs. Armstrong. 
 
 " Original!" supplied Mr. Dixon, with a bow. 
 
 " When you come to originality," remarked 
 Gilbert, with cheerful irrelevancy, " commend me 
 to Mrs. Dayntree's sister. She 's a oner ! " 
 
 "You allude to Miss Severne?" asked Miss 
 Armstrong. " A delicate-looking woman. A ' rare 
 pale Margaret ' sort of creature. Gilbert, do avoid 
 slang ! " 
 
 " Ah ! " said Mr. Armstrong, suddenly ; " a 
 woman with a dry tongue." 
 
 Miss Armstrong had risen and was approaching 
 the piano. Mr. Dixon followed her with his eyes. 
 
 " This is delightful," said he. 
 
 Aunt Caroline opened the piano and glanced 
 round on the rest. 
 
 " Edward, are you in voice ? " said she ; " we 
 might try a part song. Come and sing the 
 second, Isabella. Now Sylvia and Gilbert ! I will 
 accompany." 
 
 Mrs. Armstrong protested on her own behalf, 
 
 but, her objections being overcome, the family 
 
 gathered round the piano. After some debate and 
 
 delay a part song was selected. The four stood 
 
 100 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 behind Aunt Caroline. Sylvia led with her clear 
 soprano ; Mrs. Armstrong standing by her side, 
 tall and very upright, moving a long hand gently 
 and monotonously in time, contributed with visible 
 effort a sweet musical second ; Edward gave a harsh 
 tenor under a frowning brow ; and Gilbert in boyish 
 style the bass ; Miss Armstrong seated at the piano 
 kept them firmly together, and showed Mr. Dixon 
 a graceful profile with a brow indicative of rather 
 shallow intellectual furnishing. Mr. Armstrong 
 extended himself upon an armchair, and fell into 
 immovable silence. Mr. Dixon, eyeing Miss Arm- 
 strong, was troubled by a vision of Miss Severne 
 flitting across his mind of Miss Severne with her 
 gentle eyes and dry tongue. He followed the 
 vision by a sigh. 
 
 Outside stood the coachman and the waitress 
 with trays in their hands, both in perspiring un- 
 certainty whether to break in on the melody or to 
 wait. The melody ended. It was followed by 
 the tuning of a violin. 
 
 " Bide for the Lord's love, James ! That's Mr. 
 Edward on now," whispered the waitress in agony. 
 
 A long-drawn cry from the fiddle, and an un- 
 distinguishable welling of pianoforte notes reached 
 the untutored ears. 
 
 " I tell you it 's tuning up they 're at. In with 
 you, Mary ! " 
 
 The door burst open, and the small procession 
 entered with tramp and rattle. Edward, his arm 
 101 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 suspended on the second note of Gounod's Melody, 
 dropped his bow and turned to his step-mother. 
 
 " I never yet/' said he, with subdued savagery, 
 " began to play anything on my violin in this house, 
 but that somebody instantly put on coals, or the 
 servants burst in with coffee." 
 
 102 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE long-drawn scream of Edward's violin stole 
 from the drawing-room to Eliza, who was still lean- 
 ing out of her bedroom window ; she caught her 
 hands to her ears; but the uneasiness could only 
 be avoided by escaping into the open air. Eliza 
 resolved to pay an evening call on Rosalie Trelyon. 
 It was beautiful and quiet outside, all the summer 
 had been wonderful days of sunshine linked to 
 nights of breathless calm. A star or two, poeti- 
 cally irrelevant and exquisite, hung in the sky. It 
 was the fancy of her bewildered but delicate soul 
 to believe that from their omen-lit edges remote 
 relationships escaped. The page of life, as learned 
 in home experience, was a hunting of angry shad- 
 ows round a barren circle, the life which dropped 
 from the cool fingers of nature had more of actual- 
 ity and substance, but so far it was an existence 
 suspended imminent behind a cloud, and needing 
 an energising force to bring it within vision. To- 
 night this vibration upon her sensibility affected 
 her as a sharp tease of presentiment; she stood 
 quite still, looking up, and feeling as a ball poised 
 103 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 in the hand of a great thrower, and ready for the 
 pitch over barriers into the undiscovered beyond. 
 
 The estates of "The Court" and of "South 
 Downs " ran undulating edges one into another ; 
 and the feet of the two girl-friends, in frequent visi- 
 tations, had beaten a path across a field flanked by 
 a plantation, which led into the upper fruit-garden 
 of the Trelyons. The garden was on higher ground 
 than the house, and was linked to it by the covered 
 stone bridge and glass doors which led straight on 
 to the passage in which the rooms of Rosalie were 
 situated. The fruit-garden was quiet and retired 
 a picturesque place, broadly cut into four parts 
 by two main paths intersecting each other in the 
 centre ; here they were linked by a creeper-covered 
 arbour constructed with four arched openings, hav- 
 ing as many corner seats. Eliza had made it a 
 habit to reach the house from the top of the path 
 that led through the rustic arches straight on to the 
 bridge. A visit by night was of course uncommon, 
 yet she ventured it without hesitation, having so far 
 never found her presence unwelcomed by Rosalie, 
 The prearranged three taps on the inner glass door 
 recognised and allowed by " Glynn " and the 
 servants had scarcely ever failed to draw to the 
 entrance the face of her friend with welcome in her 
 eyes. And if by day-time why not by night ? The 
 fair-haired dreamer, softly unopening the small wicket 
 from the plantation to the garden, knew of no reason 
 to the contrary ; nor was it within her philosophy 
 104 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 to surmise that any save herself should ever use her 
 own preconcerted signal ; nor that the innocence of 
 her hand-beat upon the glass might become a little 
 sterile to an ear expectant of the thrills of life, and 
 ready for new sensations. She stood for a moment 
 looking round and breathing the pungent cleanly 
 smell of fruit and herbs, her mind no less than before 
 overshadowed by its specially spiritual atmosphere. 
 Eliza was so peculiarly the pilgrim of hidden expe- 
 rience that any sudden evidence of discreditable 
 affairs was bound to shock and overthrow. 
 
 Standing thus wrapped in her habitual mood on 
 the brink of this night of events, the first thing that 
 startled her was a sense of the unusual near at hand. 
 By choice she had taken the broad grassy edge of 
 the beds, the silence being too precious to be broken. 
 It was this stillness of her own which enabled her 
 to catch the sound of steps elsewhere ; the garden 
 was, she discovered, already disturbed by sauntering 
 footfalls. They came from the far end of the inter- 
 secting path, and while she was approaching the 
 arches from the top, they made for the same spot 
 from the right. It did not occur to her to desist 
 from her own progress ; this garden and the bridge 
 were Rosalie's and hers by consecrated right ; if 
 others intruded she had but to slip into or behind 
 the arbour, wait until they passed, and dart on 
 to the glass doors to give her habitual signal. Down 
 the grassy edge the girl passed on unheedingly, 
 every trick of habit and the just innocence of her 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 heart leading her, and having in her own nature 
 nothing that could turn her back. In spite of this 
 Eliza's instinct keen as any one's dwelt on the 
 sound of the steps and read into them certain indi- 
 cations. They were quiet and leisurely as of per- 
 sons choosing to be alone ; they told of snatched 
 interviews, precious because rare or dangerous ; 
 they carried adventure and secrecy with them. 
 The wrong step in the wrong place that is eerie 
 to the consciousness and brings the heart into the 
 mouth and pricks up the ear. Something, she knew 
 not what, trembled through her blood. By and by 
 came other indications ; there was a murmur of low 
 voices, rippling laughs soft and with the indefinite 
 quality of close and intoxicated enjoyment; the 
 interchange of sound, too, was masculine and femi- 
 nine a vocal duet learned so long ago in Paradise 
 that it is recognisable to the most unpractised. 
 Eliza jumped to the inevitable conclusion. A 
 moment afterwards instinct lost that inference in 
 reason. As the sounds approached, hooded in cau- 
 tion, she distinguished the quality of at least one 
 tone, and that was Rosalie's. Now Rosalie had no 
 accepted lover. Rosalie's affairs were plain, she 
 believed, to her reading as the lines on her own 
 palm ; Rosalie she knew to be Tieart-free. There 
 was no masculine intimacy forbidding her intrusion ; 
 why then draw back ? and yet arrived as she now 
 was close to the arbour her instincts were so loud in 
 wavering that she drew her skirts together and 
 106 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 shrank behind an arch preparatory to flying back 
 undetected on the way she came. The moment 
 afterwards her capacity of coherent thinking was 
 broken by a crushing surprise. The advancing 
 pair were close upon her, they entered the arbour ; 
 for a moment the rays from the lighted bridge 
 touched them. Eliza hardly controlled her cry of 
 astonishment. 
 
 That was Rosalie, sure enough. The inexplicable 
 thing was the identity of the person accompanying 
 her. 
 
 Hardly conscious of what she was doing, she 
 walked forward and seated herself on one of the 
 corner seats without any attempt at concealment ; 
 the red light from the bridge crept up her muslin 
 skirt. There was of course, she argued, no neces- 
 sity to retreat. Instinct was now almost obliterated 
 by reason. The pale eyebrows contracted with a 
 slight frown, and the features delicately chiselled 
 out against the darkness became severely thought- 
 ful. She could bring nothing to bear on the event 
 but a girl's untarnished philosophy, and could do 
 nothing but lend it the protection of her innocence. 
 Rosalie was her own familiar friend ; there were 
 certain laws which one never dreamed of transgress- 
 ing thus she picked up the threads of thought 
 possible to her obviously the presence of a third 
 person in an interview where the parties were pro- 
 saically distanced by fate and time, could not be an 
 intrusion. She sat quite still with her small hands 
 107 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 loose on her knee and waited ; she could conceive 
 no reason why she should not do so. 
 
 And yet instinct kept alive in her breast as a 
 thumping heart. The odd sensation was not at all 
 of the nature of thought. It was one of those 
 impressions which wait months, even years, before 
 they clothe themselves with so much substance as 
 is comprehended in an expressible idea. When 
 the dim prophecy is fulfilled they return on the 
 mind with incredible vividness, forcing from the 
 tongue the cry, " I said so ! " when what we mean 
 is that so we felt. 
 
 Back the pair came on the return journey, saun- 
 tering and talking; they were near enough for her 
 to hear what was said. 
 
 " Law, then, has no meaning to you unless based 
 on what is natural ? " 
 
 " None whatever. Need and nature those are 
 my criterions." 
 
 " It is a masculine idea a man's standard." 
 
 '' And must become a woman's too. It is mine. 
 I own no other." 
 
 ["Rosalie I n ] 
 
 The voice leapt from the centre of the arbour, 
 and a lightly robed figure rose before them. After 
 it there slowly blossomed from the' darkness the 
 face of Eliza, its wide-open steadiness of gaze and 
 innocence of contour throwing out in the uncertain 
 light an impress of severity. It was doubt on the 
 one side, alarmed fancy on the other, that thus 
 1 08 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 sketched into the girl's features an attribute of the 
 kind. On her part the grating of startled feet on 
 the gravel after the soft footfalls struck on her ear 
 as with a lifetime of consequence ; and after it utter 
 silence fell. She held the pair in her unwinking 
 gaze, marvelling to see in either face anger chasing 
 dismay. That was erased from the masculine eyes 
 by a steely dislike that cut like a knife ; then, with 
 hastily lifted hat, he the intruder turned and 
 walked away. The two girls were left face to 
 face. 
 
 "Rosalie!" repeated Eliza, astonished at this 
 quiver of emotion, in a moment prejudged by her 
 as commonplace. 
 
 The heart in the breast of the beautiful Rosalie 
 stirred curiously. She blinked her eyes once or 
 twice, and Eliza shivered. For Rosalie's face held 
 a cold immovable anger not to be borne ; Eliza's 
 intellectual capacity seemed to shut up under it. 
 In her helpless pain she put out her hand and 
 touched her friend and cried her name again. 
 
 Rosalie turned away impatiently and stood in 
 th dark, her shoulder averted. 
 
 "Why do you come stealing on me like this 
 and. spying?" she asked, in a voice of the same 
 cold immovable anger. 
 
 " /spy on you ! I just came. What is is 
 the matter?" 
 
 Rosalie pushed into the arbour, and sat down 
 suddenly. Eliza stood where she was, the most 
 109 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 perplexed creature between the heavens and the 
 earth. 
 
 " You born fool ! " said Rosalie. 
 
 " Rosalie don't!" 
 
 Rosalie sat silent, but the wild thumping of her 
 pulses in that insane access of anger was getting 
 stilled. 
 
 " Why," asked Eliza, " does he look at me as 
 though I were hateful? what does it all mean? " 
 
 " What are you here for ? " 
 
 " I should like to have heard you talk ! " was 
 the irrelevant reply. 
 
 " You are a baby. How did you know he was 
 here?' 7 
 
 " I saw him." 
 
 "Saw him I Where?" 
 
 " From the path behind this arch. I meant to 
 go back at first. But seeing who it was, of course 
 I stayed. And why not?" 
 
 Rosalie threw her head back and suddenly 
 laughed. 
 
 "Goose! Goose! GOOSE!" said she. "What 
 on earth were you doing on the path behind the 
 arbour ? " 
 
 " I was coming to see you." 
 
 " Come at a less crazy hour, then. Where 's 
 your maid, your chaperon ? Good gracious, Eliza ! 
 We 're both lost women ! Glynn 's in her bedroom 
 with her nose greased and her toes in hot water 
 and a basin of callidum cum by her side. She has 
 no 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 a bad cold, and I saw her safely locked up for the 
 night. Then was the hour for sport, and we're 
 both, you and I, found out without our chape- 
 rons. The fat's in the fire." 
 
 " Oh, Rosalie ! " said Eliza, forlornly, and in a 
 tone singularly flat after the other's crisp sentences, 
 " I don't have a maid or a chaperon. I'm no 
 beauty. Nobody takes that much trouble over 
 me.' 7 
 
 " Happy mortal ! Well ! skurry home now. I 'm 
 dead tired. Good-night." 
 
 The tall beautiful girl rose from her seat, and, 
 leaning down to the drooping face of Eliza, kissed 
 her cheek. Eliza turned away giddily. Her brain 
 was benumbed, and was an absolute blank from 
 anything like comprehension of the occurrence. 
 She left the arbour and stepped up the path. Then 
 she heard Rosalie call her again. Turning back, 
 she caught sight of her face against the black curve 
 of an arch, wonderful with beauty in the dim light, 
 the mouth hungry and wistful for life, the eyes 
 gleaming and tantalising. 
 
 " Eliza ! " 
 
 " Oh, yes ! " 
 
 " It was a dull talk you interrupted mere 
 politics." 
 
 " Was it ? " said Eliza, without interest. 
 
 " And you shook the last phrase out of my head." 
 
 " Oh something about law. Does it matter? 
 Not very interesting, I think." 
 in 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 The eyes held her with their smile, and drew her 
 in a net of influence. 
 
 "No, not very. I recall. We won't talk of 
 our little escapade yours and mine to Glynn 
 or Aunt Caroline, shall we ? " 
 
 "Oh, no! Why should I talk of it? There's 
 nothing to say." 
 
 "Nothing at all." 
 
 The voice was lucid and emphatic. 
 
 112 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 BREAKFAST was spread in the dining-room of 
 " The Court." It was a sunny morning and the 
 French windows were thrown open. Over one of 
 the lawns a little procession of two gardeners and a 
 mowing-machine passed up and down, and the drowsy 
 sound came in with the scent of freshly mown hay. 
 
 Aunt Caroline stood at the window; she had 
 been reading Walt Whitman's poems they were 
 quite in fashion for the moment ; half the readers 
 sternly disapproved, and the other half became 
 wildly emancipated under them. Aunt Caroline 
 was looking out on a world tinctured newly by 
 Whitman moods and Swinburnian expressions. 
 
 The whistle of a far-off engine was coincident in 
 her ear with the opening of the door to admit her 
 elder niece. Miss Armstrong, whose attitude played 
 the listener, raised her hand and beckoned. There 
 was nothing to be heard but the mowing-machine 
 and a distant train. Eliza, her eyes still dimmed 
 by last night's weeping, approached. She had a 
 conviction that her aunt was going to be too clever 
 for her, and that she should miss her meaning. 
 8 113 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 But Miss Armstrong was too much occupied to 
 care who was her auditor or what was the fashion. 
 The whistle sounded again. 
 
 " Ah ! " said she, softly, " the sound of the whistle 
 of an engine and the whirl of wheels through the 
 dimness of a distance." 
 
 " I used to like it when I was a chitcl," began 
 Eliza, quite eagerly. " Don't you remember that 
 puff of white steam that curled along the plain in 
 our old home every morning, in and out amongst 
 the trees? I knew the time, and I used to run to 
 the nursery window with Sylvie every day." 
 
 Aunt Caroline turned away rather impatiently. 
 She had never noticed a train in her life before, and 
 found the stale reminiscence tiresome. 
 
 At the moment Mrs. Armstrong, for whom the 
 day was already old, entered. With a glance at the 
 clock and her hand on the bell, she surrendered her 
 cheek to the morning salutation, and summoned the 
 servants to prayers. Sylvia and the boys straggled 
 in, and Mrs. Armstrong herself sat down to read the 
 psalm. 
 
 "Where 's father?" whispered Gilbert, thrusting 
 his curly head and uncouth face, as yet so unre- 
 deemed from barbarism, close to Eliza. 
 
 Eliza shook her red mop expressively. 
 
 Between prayers and breakfast was a short in- 
 terval. Aunt Caroline moved softly about with her 
 air of intellectual aloofness. Sylvia had disappeared 
 at a sign from her step-mother. Gilbert, with his 
 114 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 hands in his pockets, whistled a tune, and Edward 
 paid some attention to his nails. 
 
 " Edward," said Mrs. Armstrong, suddenly, from 
 the breakfast-table, where she stood rather absently 
 rearranging the cups, " your father is very strange 
 this morning." 
 
 Everybody looked towards her ; Edward left off 
 polishing his nails, and. the spell of silence being 
 broken, the family gathered round the table. 
 
 " Is n't he coming down ? " asked Edward, when 
 the maid had closed the door. 
 
 " No. I have sent his breakfast upstairs by Syl- 
 via. He is very strange. I believe Gilbert had 
 better take the dog-cart and drive over for the 
 doctor." 
 
 "Then he is ill?" 
 
 " He insists that I shall invite old Mr. John Arm- 
 strong to stay with us. I have been combating the 
 idea for days.' 7 
 
 Mrs. Armstrong made a plaintive gesture with 
 her hands, and gently shook her head. Everybody 
 looked at everybody. Edward leaned back in his 
 chair, pushing his plate away. 
 
 " Of course that 's impossible, mother," said he ; 
 " yes, Gilbert had better go for the doctor." 
 
 " Why is it impossible for old Mr. John Arm- 
 strong to come and stay with us?" asked Eliza. 
 
 " Eliza ! Do, for goodness' sake, not be an 
 idiot ! " 
 
 It was almost a chorus. 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Isabella," said Aunt Caroline, in a low, re- 
 proachful tone ; " surely you can manage him ! " 
 
 " I cannot. I am at a loss, and wash my hands 
 of it. I repeat that he insists that old Mr. John 
 Armstrong shall come and stay at ' The Court.' " 
 
 Mrs. Armstrong's tones were, as ever, very soft 
 and measured. 
 
 "Why did not you appeal to me before, 
 mother ? " said Edward, irritably. " Father must 
 be off his head." 
 
 " Will you try your influence with him now, then ? 
 I am at an end of mine." 
 
 " I will reason with him, certainly. I '11 go up to 
 his room after breakfast. Of course we can't let 
 him wreck us by this ridiculous whim." 
 
 " Old Mr. John Armstrong! " murmured Aunt 
 Caroline, very expressively and with a complete 
 erasure of the democratic vistas of Whitman. 
 
 At the moment Sylvia returned to the dining- 
 room. 
 
 " You have been very long," said Mrs. Armstrong, 
 with enough severity to arrest the girl on the thresh- 
 old. " Did father say anything ? " 
 
 " He sent me with a message first. And then he 
 told me to come back and pour out the tea." 
 
 Leaning against the door in her fresh morning 
 muslin, Sylvia turned her blue eyes first to one face, 
 then to another. 
 
 " A message ! " 
 
 "A telegram," said Sylvia. "He had one writ- 
 116 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 ten ready, and he sent me round to the stable with 
 directions that it was to be sent off at once." 
 
 Eliza listened with all her ears. Something very 
 like panic was written in the faces of her elders. 
 Sylvia stood at the door the picture of a pretty cul- 
 prit. Edward sprang from his chair with an expres- 
 sion which sounded as much like an oath as was 
 convenient to feminine ears to infer. 
 
 " Edward," said Mrs. Armstrong, rather quickly, 
 but in the most fatigued of her evangelical tones ; 
 " this cannot be prevented. It must be met" 
 
 And at the last word she brought her clenched 
 hand down upon the table with a silent emphasis 
 which Eliza found dreadful. It would have been 
 less so had the cups jingled. 
 
 " At least let Gilbert hurry for the doctor," im- 
 plored Aunt Caroline. 
 
 "Sylvia," said Mrs. Armstrong; 4< you have car- 
 ried one order to the stable. Carry another now." 
 
 Gilbert began to drink down his coffee in great 
 gulps. 
 
 "The dog-cart!" shouted Edward, as Sylvia's 
 bright skirt vanished through a second door. " Gil- 
 bert will want to bring the doctor back." 
 
 The blow fell heaviest upon Edward. He had 
 such a very long list of matters that were of the 
 highest importance. Things were always " trem- 
 bling in the balance " with him. It was that which 
 brought the sense of instability into existence. 
 When a hair's-breadth or the cut of a collar may 
 117 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 wreck you, life is apt to present itself as a series of 
 cataclysms. 
 
 That morning, when he entered his father's 
 dressing-room (a place which the old man had 
 found it convenient to secure to himself as a refuge), 
 he stood as high in the estimation of his family as it 
 was possible to do. He found his father partially 
 dressed and seated near the window in the warm 
 sunlight. Mr. Armstrong did not at first notice his 
 son's entry, and Edward, as he opened the door, 
 hesitated, with his eyes fixed on a little table by his 
 father's side. Upon that table lay the two books 
 which Mr. Armstrong was wont to say had formed 
 the basis of his conduct in life and his success. 
 These books were the Bible and Smiles's " Self- 
 Help." The look of the worn bindings was some- 
 thing as familiar to Edward's eyes as the rough 
 outline of his father's profile traced out against the 
 window-pane, the head a little bent in moody reflec- 
 tion. From the Bible the old man had culled an elastic 
 and evasive morality, a solid expectation of mansions 
 and golden floors in the future (not unmingled with 
 a curiously persistent taste for mahogany furniture), 
 ancl a rich knowledge of fine old English phrase- 
 ology. From the second book he had taken that 
 line of conduct to which throughout his career he 
 had conscientiously adhered. Smiles's " Self-Help " 
 was his epic of life. That and the Bible occupied 
 in his mind places of equal importance, and he 
 accorded to them a like veneration. He read with 
 118 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 an equally satisfied sense of pious emotion the 
 resonant passages in which the Psalmist damns his 
 foes, and the sentences in whose trim glow Smiles 
 canonises his saints. To Edward himself the books 
 had become a superstition from long association. 
 As a child, by his father's side, and under his fa- 
 ther's guiding ringer, he had stammered through 
 marked passages of " Self-Help," and had accepted 
 them as the very foundation of life's success, and 
 the corner-stone of that moral bridge by which you 
 pass on to an affluence and distinction not shared 
 by your fellows. He knew certain of the passages 
 by heart, could see them in the eye of his mind 
 through the closed covers on the fading, well- 
 thumbed page, with the deeply marked pencil lines 
 beside them, 
 
 " The other barbers found their customers leav- 
 ing them, and reduced their prices to his standard, 
 when Arkwright, determined to push his trade, 
 announced his determination to give * a clean shave 
 for a half-penny/ " 
 
 " Sir James Graham rose after him, and declared, 
 amidst the cheers of the House, that it rendered him 
 more proud than he had ever before been of the 
 H. of C., to think that a person risen from that 
 condition should be able to sit side by side, on 
 equal terms, with the hereditary gentry of the 
 land." 
 
 "He had many sons, and placed them all in 
 situations where they might be useful to each 
 119 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 other. . . . He lived to see his children connected 
 together in business." 
 
 " The family was worthily ennobled in the reign 
 of Charles II." 
 
 " Search was made, and presently a diver came 
 up with a solid bar of silver in his arms. When 
 Phipps was shown it, he exclaimed, t Thanks be to 
 God ! we are all made men. . . .' Phipps' share 
 was about .20,000, and the king, to show his 
 approval of his energy and honesty in conducting 
 the enterprise, conferred upon him the honour of 
 knighthood." 
 
 And so on, in the style of that famous little Jack 
 who " pulled out the plum," and reflected upon his 
 own virtue, Edward, with his eyes on the old 
 leather binding, recalled the familiar and encourag- 
 ing lessons. They were like a good omen, and, 
 shaking off his hesitation, he came forward and 
 showed himself to his father. The old man's eyes 
 glistened, and his face wakened up. 
 
 " Well, Edward lad ! " said he. 
 
 " You 're not quite yourself, father, this morning, 
 I understand," said Edward. 
 
 The old man shook his head, and then let it droop 
 again to his breast. Edward seated himself oppo- 
 site, and looked stealthily at the handsome crown 
 of wavy white hair and the sleepy mask of the old 
 face. How should he reach his finger to the secret 
 which that imperturbability concealed ? 
 
 " We Ve sent for the doctor, father," said he, 
 120 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 cheerily ; "we 're not going to let you slip through 
 our hands, you know." 
 
 The old man's eyebrows moved slightly upwards, 
 and he lifted the ringers of one hand from the arm 
 of the chair over which they fell ; but that was his 
 only response. 
 
 " Still you are n't over bad, you know. For 
 you were brisk enough to send off a telegram this 
 morning? " 
 
 The old man did not raise his head, but he 
 opened his faded lids and stole a quick glance at 
 his son. Mr. Armstrong's eyes were of a light-blue 
 colour ; and if there is an eye which can dart a ray 
 of suspicion and lively cunning better than another, 
 it is a smallish eye of a skyish-blue. Edward's 
 heart jumped under the glance. 
 
 "Who told you that I had sent out a 
 telegram?" said Mr. Armstrong slowly, when his 
 lids had fallen back to their former posture. 
 
 " Sylvia, of course," said Edward lightly. 
 
 Old Mr. Armstrong moistened his lips once or 
 twice. 
 
 "You know," said Edward, encouraged by this 
 sign of nervousness, " you have never any occasion 
 to worry yourself, father. I am here. You should 
 just send for me when you want things done." 
 
 Mr. Armstrong blinked his eyes. He looked 
 like an obstinate child who has done the mischief, 
 and has some satisfaction in reflecting that it is 
 irreparable. It was very difficult for Edward to 
 
 121 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 keep up his sympathetic tone in face of this pro- 
 voking demeanour, and whilst his heart was groan- 
 ing under the weight of important affairs which had 
 to be carried through this narrow way of gins and 
 snares, a ditch on either side. 
 
 " You have telegraphed for old John Armstrong, 
 I understand?" ventured he, rendered desperate 
 by his father's enigmatical silence. 
 
 " Who told you I had telegraphed for 
 John Armstrong ? " said the latter, in a slow loud 
 tone. 
 
 " Sylvia, of course," replied Edward, quite in the 
 role of Adam. 
 
 " I gave Sylvia a sealed envelope. If she opened 
 it " 
 
 Evidences of extreme anger struggled in his face, 
 and prevented further utterance. He looked at his 
 son with a helplessly tragic rage in his * dim blue 
 eyes. 
 
 "No no ! " cried Edward, quickly ; " when I 
 come to think of it, she only said you told her to 
 carry a telegram to the stable." 
 
 " That is as it may be," returned Mr. Armstrong, 
 instantly mollified. 
 
 He turned his head a little and looked out at 
 the garden. A cold, steely fear lay between the 
 two. On Edward's side were those high impor- 
 tances. On his father's was a thought running like 
 a rat through hairbreadth escapes to its lair. 
 
 "Then you did not telegraph to old John Arm- 
 
 122 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 strong?" questioned Edward, as carelessly as he 
 could. 
 
 " No," said his father, suddenly and shortly. 
 
 The extreme unexpectedness of the reply knocked 
 Edward's mind flat. He was not in reality a ready 
 man. People who have so many selfish issues 
 risked on the moment rarely are adepts at this kind 
 of duel ; they give themselves away in their colour, 
 their lips, their glances. And Edward, when the 
 special fear was killed by the leaping upon it of a 
 host of vaguer but more terrible surmises, showed 
 obvious trepidation. He was pale in the jowl, and 
 his lips drew in. He was not one to stand with 
 equanimity under the startling shifts of fortune. 
 Mr. Armstrong watched him reflectively, moistening 
 his lips and ruminating this manifestation of alarm. 
 
 " I telegraphed to Dayntree," said he quietly, at 
 last, " in reply to a letter from him." 
 
 " To Dayntree ! " exclaimed Edward, in the 
 deepest surprise. 
 
 " Yes. You know, Edward, when I 'm gone I 
 want you to have a strong man of affairs to help 
 you with advice. And Dayntree has been good 
 enough to yield to my wish." 
 
 He stole a cunning, half-frightened glance at his 
 son as he spoke, which was not noticed. The in- 
 ference Edward made was that Mr. Dayntree was 
 appointed co-executor with himself, and he sorted 
 the news with a rapid finger, nipping his small fair 
 moustache between his lips and frowning the while. 
 123 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Dayntree's position was so high that his name could 
 not fail to cast a reflected glory ; but Edward did 
 not like the idea of being overshadowed. He 
 wanted a freer hand than was comprehended in a 
 partnership with Mr. Dayntree, for he was by no 
 means certain of his ability to manage things exactly 
 as he wished over the head of such a man as he. 
 And yet the attraction of this glittering alliance was 
 very great ; it had in itself its own uses. 
 
 " Dayntree of course is in a first-rate position," 
 said he slowly, without removing his frowning stare 
 at the ground. 
 
 " Dayntree is the square man in the square hole," 
 said his father. 
 
 But Edward did not want the assistance of a 
 square man. He had supreme belief in his own 
 power so to manipulate things that they should 
 bring him out top. He had no intention whatever 
 of cheating his relations, but he very much resented 
 having the opportunity of doing so completely 
 erased from the calculation. He disliked any- 
 thing so fit and straightforward as his father had 
 planned. 
 
 " I tell you what, Ned, my lad," said old Arm- 
 strong, his face softening at the obvious depression 
 of his son, " I 've got my property very well in- 
 vested. But there 's one lot worth the whole of the 
 rest put together." 
 
 Edward's eager eyes leaped to his father's face, 
 and hung there. 
 
 124 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " Yes, lad ; that 's the way of it. Now I must 
 talk things over with Dayntree, and see how we can 
 manage to put the bird that lays the golden egg in 
 your hen-roost. Eh ? " 
 
 The old man's eyes turned upon his son. The 
 thing which he had just said was the last thing he 
 intended to say. But the habit of his infatuated 
 affection for Edward made him fall to inconsistent 
 postures ; at the moment this uneasy yearning found 
 no other outlet than concessions to his son's spirit 
 of selfishness and greed. His glance sought over 
 Edward's face and read it quite clearly, but he had 
 no power for the moment to recall his own deter- 
 mination, or to rescue himself from the old influ- 
 ence. His lids dropped again, leaving his face a 
 rugged mask, the curved lines above the eyebrows 
 lending it a tragic force ; the subtle marking of the 
 chin indicating a rather gross form of pride ; while 
 the folding of the lips in habitual reticence, and the 
 depressed pose of the head, gave the whole the 
 touch of pathos. 
 
 " You are very good, sir," said Edward, in cau- 
 tious effusion and profound respect. 
 
 " I 'm not sure that you '11 like the colour of your 
 money when you get it, all the same," said Mr. 
 Armstrong, with a sigh. 
 
 " I think, sir, you must mean that it lies in the 
 direction of cotton," insinuated Edward. 
 
 " No," came his father's cautious tones, " not 
 cotton." 
 
 I2 5 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Edward was startled again ; he hardly knew 
 whether to be gratified or the reverse. 
 
 "You really are very good, father," he mur- 
 mured, as he held in his features to moderate 
 composure. 
 
 That softening on his son's face melted the old 
 man to a feebler mood. 
 
 "I want to see you succeed, Edward," he 
 whimpered. 
 
 " Thanks. I believe I 'm well on the way to it," 
 said Edward, stroking down the leg of his trousers 
 complacently. 
 
 " I Ve tried to bring you up right, Edward," 
 continued the old man, wistfully ; " I hope you '11 
 remember. Read your Bible, my lad, and help 
 yourself" 
 
 "Yes, father. I won't forget," said Edward, 
 a little impatient at these generalities when he so 
 yearned for the particular. 
 
 The old eyes closed for a moment. 
 
 " You were speaking of cotton," urged Edward. 
 
 "Of cotton! Nothing of the sort. Cotton? 
 There is none. I sold out of that years ago." 
 
 Edward was too much astounded to speak at 
 first. His father's eyes were wide-open again and 
 face excited. 
 
 " Aye ! I sold out of it ! I sold out of it ! 
 Wasn't it your wish I should do so?" 
 
 Edward rose and took his father's hand and 
 shook it kindly. But the old man's head sank to 
 126 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 sudden quiescence upon the pillows, and he hardly 
 seemed conscious of his son's presence. 
 
 "Hold up, father!" said Edward, speaking 
 loud and clear in his ear ; " you 're all right at 
 present, you know. What did you do with the 
 money?" 
 
 "Mines," answered Mr. Armstrong; "I put it 
 into mines ' Sherman's Reward 7 is the name. 
 The mills were the bird that laid the golden egg, 
 and the mines can hatch it." 
 
 "You did very well, father," said Edward, em- 
 phatically and with a sudden rise of respect for his 
 progenitor ; " I am exceedingly glad of this good 
 news. And this is my portion?" 
 
 Mr. Armstrong opened his eyes again and looked 
 straight into the face of his son. If there was one 
 thing dear to his mind in that moment, it was that 
 Edward was the child of some moral obliquity of 
 his own, the direct issue of that part of his own 
 nature which had tinctured all his life with ruinous 
 remorse. 
 
 "That is as it may be," said he, moving rest- 
 lessly in his chair. " I shall look after you, lad 
 be sure of that and, Edward, don't you forget. 
 1 Look after the main/ as old Theophilus damn 
 him used to say." 
 
 " Mr. Theophilus Armstrong of Harebarrow 
 Vale?" questioned Edward, scandalised. 
 
 He had an image of a marble tomb recording 
 virtues, of a portrait of rather sanctimonious re- 
 127 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 spectability with baggy under-lids and a gold 
 chain. 
 
 " Well, lad," whimpered his father, irrelevantly, 
 " * the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away,' 
 and you must forgive me, for I wrote to my cousin, 
 John Armstrong, and he 's coming to-morrow." 
 
 "What on earth did you do that for?" asked 
 Edward, in consternation tempered by the good 
 news he had heard. 
 
 "A man is glad to see an old face before he 
 dies," returned his father. 
 
 " Well ! You shall ! " said Edward, in diplomatic 
 yielding, " I '11 talk mother over." 
 
 " Tell her to get the best bed ready," said old 
 Armstrong. 
 
 Edward nodded as he left the room. 
 
 128 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE summer days burned on exhaustingly. A 
 young fellow in the dress of a mechanic, who had 
 walked the five miles between the station and the 
 lodge gates of the Manor House, turned into them 
 with a sense of relief. Some coolness was to be 
 found under the shadow of the century-old trees, 
 and the grass was delicious after the beaten road. 
 He knew what heat was in tropical lands, but de- 
 clared to himself that when England chose to be 
 hot. it was hotter than anywhere else. He was a 
 tall young fellow with a graceful figure that gave the 
 impression of agile strength, and he had the general 
 appearance which led men to sum him up colloquially 
 as having " a head on his shoulders." He came in 
 at the side gate in a quick, unpretentious sort of 
 way, closing it after him gently, so that his step on 
 the gravel was the only thing that signalised his 
 passing to the lodge-keeper's wife. That personage 
 threw a careless glance out of a diamond-paned 
 window; then she pressed a good-humoured face 
 eagerly against it; then she snatched up a clean 
 apron and ran outside, binding it about her portly 
 9 129 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 waist. The graceful figure in the worn and scanty 
 blue serge suit was passing along up the drive in 
 the shadow of the trees ; she stared after him, her 
 lips breaking into ejaculations. 
 
 " Well ! If ever I did ! No, it never is ! But 
 it is, though ! ? Ome from his travels for them 
 clothes has seen some wear. Lord, love the boy ! 
 There '11 be some mending to do ! " 
 
 And she wiped a benedictory tear from her 
 eye. 
 
 The young workman did not take the way to the 
 back of the house, as became one in his station ; he 
 walked straight for the front terrace. A bed of 
 laurels and a group of beech-trees separated the 
 part of the gravel terrace up which he was walking 
 from a lawn ; he heard voices beyond, and caught 
 sight between the foliage of the summer muslins of 
 women. He walked more slowly, a pleasant hesi- 
 tation in his manner and gladness in his eyes. He 
 could see them there in a group under the trees 
 drinking afternoon tea and talking. Constantia was 
 there, and Irene, and a girl whose appearance hq 
 rather liked. It was she who caught sight of him 
 first. She saw him stepping on to the grass between 
 the beech-trees, lifting a shabby blue cap. 
 
 " Some one is coming," said Eliza, her eyes held 
 by the stranger's brown ones. 
 
 The freshness of the whole picture was a poem 
 to the young fellow after a dusty day, and he was 
 considering amongst other items that a pink and 
 130 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 white skin and red-gold hair made a delicate bit of 
 tinting under a wide hat drawn with apple-green 
 silk. Constantia turned. 
 
 " It is Evan ! Irene ! It is Evan ! " 
 
 " I am really not fit to touch," said the young 
 man, glad under the caressing fingers of his kins- 
 woman ; "I preferred to come up on the engine." 
 
 His eyes wandered again to the face delicate, 
 he thought, like a shell or a moth under the 
 apple-green hat. 
 
 " This is a very old friend of ours, Eliza," said 
 Constantia, when Irene had finished her admiring 
 astonishment at his growth, his moustache, and his 
 broad shoulders ; " he is a relation of Norman's 
 one we have not seen for some years. His name is 
 Evan Dayntree." 
 
 " He had a bald head and a long white frock on 
 when we first saw him," said Irene, " and was, his 
 nurse said, ' a very masterful young gentleman.' " 
 
 " But I remember the name ! I think do I 
 not know him?" 
 
 The two young people were looking hard at each 
 other, and out of either face peeped for the moment, 
 to each pair of eyes, the round, unformed physiog- 
 nomy of a child, and then was lost again in the 
 maturer features. It was towards this flashing 
 reminiscence of a laughing, familiar playmate that 
 the two stretched hands and clasped them. 
 
 " Why, it 's Eliza ! " 
 
 " Evan ! " 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Of course ! " cried Constantia, utterly delighted. 
 
 " You were the funniest little girl ! " said he of 
 the brown eyes. 
 
 " And you such a merry boy ! " 
 
 " And you 're kind enough to recognise me in 
 spite of my clothes ? I 'm afraid I was a rough play- 
 mate. You were a trustful little thing, and believed 
 everything I said " 
 
 " I remember only kindness." 
 
 " Oh ! you were a small brick and followed on 
 splendidly. I'm afraid I tormented you," he 
 had rubbed his hair back uneasily at the praise. 
 " And so you don't mind my clothes ? I Ve been 
 walking as well as driving the engine," said he, 
 turning to Constantia. " It must be six miles from 
 the station here round by the commons. I came 
 up from the North with my old friend, John Arm- 
 strong ; he is staying somewhere in the neighbour- 
 hood, and he chose to walk. I accompanied him 
 to the gate, where a most exquisite young gentleman 
 dismissed me as a tramp." 
 
 That last was not to be mistaken, and Eliza 
 pricked up her ears. 
 
 " Armstrong ! " she exclaimed ; " that must be 
 my relative." 
 
 Evan thought for a moment, and then faced 
 round. 
 
 " Your name is Armstrong, too, of course ; I am 
 getting it all into line at last. Well ! if old John 
 Armstrong is kin of yours, you are fortunate. But 
 132 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 I remark that there are points where you resemble 
 him." 
 
 His finger in quick succession touched his brows, 
 lips, and chin. The old acquaintance threw them 
 into familiarity from the first. 
 
 " Good-bye, Constantia," said Eliza, feeling un- 
 accountably happy ; " I must go now. Good-bye, 
 Irene." 
 
 She held her hand to Evan. 
 
 "I am glad I resemble old Mr. Armstrong," 
 said she. 
 
 " And so am I," said he. 
 
 " We shall keep Evan here ever so long," said 
 Constantia. "You must come and tell us about 
 your relative. But we shall hear from Norman, 
 perhaps. He is going to your house to-night ; he 
 is expected there, I believe." 
 
 The glow on Eliza's face faded. Upon leaving 
 the Manor House she turned in the direction of 
 " South Downs." She had called on Constantia 
 first, really with a view to bracing her spirit before 
 making the visitation upon Rosalie ; she wanted to 
 erase as quickly as possible the confusedly unpleas- 
 ant impressions of the last interview, impressions 
 which, with habitual humility, she set down to her 
 own mistakes. But so strong had been the uneasi- 
 ness created, that her feet seemed to drag on the 
 way, and to make as though they would turn back 
 of themselves. She found it impossible to pass 
 round to the fruit-garden, and to enter unobserved 
 133 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 by the glass doors over the bridge according to the 
 usual plan, and so the front bell rang formally. 
 Rosalie, when summoned, entered the Louis Quinze 
 drawing-room with a face of bright defiance. She 
 found Eliza seated on the sofa under a heathen god 
 and banner, making depressed efforts to converse 
 with Mrs. Trelyon, whose cleverness was not apt 
 to waste itself on unconsidered hearers, and who 
 responded in sleepy monosyllables. Rosalie's face 
 changed instantly to comic amazement. 
 
 " Eliza ! The front door-bell ! We advance in 
 civilisation indeed ! I thought it was at least ' Aunt 
 Caroline ' come to inform mother that I took a 
 lonely gallop over the commons yesterday afternoon 
 without attendance. But mother found it out her- 
 self. The servants, you know, are paid spies, and 
 Glynn has been in tears. But I ask mother to look 
 at the matter from the bright side, and to be thank- 
 ful that I took a saddle. A saddle is sufficient 
 chaperon, I consider.'* 
 
 Eliza was extricated from her conversation dif- 
 ficulties, and Mrs. Trelyon in relief vouchsafed a 
 phrase. 
 
 " Our local Ccelebs is once more actively in search, 
 I believe ? " said she, with an inquiring smile. 
 
 Eliza looked bewildered. 
 
 " Oh, never mind ! " said Rosalie, kindly ; " mother, 
 you need not talk local politics to Eliza : it is pure 
 waste of time." 
 
 On the way from the drawing-room to her own 
 134 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 particular sanctum, Rosalie called at the pantry and 
 brought out a plate of cherries ; when in her room 
 she took some freshly gathered flowers from a vase, 
 and made them into a knot for Eliza's breast. In 
 her bright friendliness no hint of last night's trouble 
 was discoverable ; she had the art of discarding a 
 past shadow, and throwing into a new moment all 
 the freshness of her spirit. Eliza's timid overture 
 was royally met and yet the anxious wonder 
 lying at the bottom of her heart won no reply. 
 
 "What did Mrs. Trelyon mean?" said Eliza, 
 taking a low seat in the shadow which the sun- 
 blinds made near the window. 
 
 " She meant that a man honestly determined to 
 make an honest woman of some one, adjusts his 
 benevolence to the circumstances." 
 
 " Rosalie ! You know I can't make out what 
 you mean." 
 
 "And what / meant was that sarcasms of the 
 kind were lost on the dove-winged innocence of 
 my friend. Eliza ! there are moments when I 
 envy you." 
 
 Out of habitual determination to be at all moments 
 aggressively defiant of Glynn's sense of the proper, 
 Rosalie seated herself upon the table ; she swung a 
 daintily slippered foot idly up and down, and con- 
 templated her friend with eyes that deepened to a 
 beautiful melancholy. 
 
 " Of me ! " cried Eliza, humbly incredulous. 
 
 " Of you. I see wings folded under your muslin, 
 135 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 and a halo over your hair. What a safe creature 
 you are, to be sure ! If one strikes you, the quality 
 of the note is sound." 
 
 " Rosalie ! I don't like being compared to an 
 angel." 
 
 " There ! what did I say ? ' Strike you and the 
 quality of the note is sound.' You repudiate the 
 angelic ; your human nature is rich and safe. Now 
 look here ! " 
 
 She took some cherries from the dish, dangled 
 them by the stalk above her face, and snapped at 
 them with her teeth. 
 
 " You bet I catch this one ! " said she, tossing 
 up another and snatching at it with her mouth. 
 
 " There ! " said she, as her lips closed over it ; 
 " it ? s in ! " Her eyes shone in childish delight and 
 a little surprise. " Now try." And she threw some 
 over to Eliza. 
 
 With all her boyish movements and ways, she 
 never for a moment looked masculine. That was 
 sometimes inexplicable to Eliza. It was the femi- 
 nine attractiveness, her great grace and charm as a 
 woman binding and limiting her audacity, that ren- 
 dered her irresistible. Eliza accepted the cherry 
 without trying the trick. 
 
 " I saw some one new this afternoon," said she. 
 
 " New ! ' Can any good thing come out of Naz- 
 areth ? ' Man or woman." 
 
 " Man. His clothes were remarkable." 
 
 " Not a foreigner? I am sick to death of them. 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 One makes havoc of them so easily. There 's no 
 joy of conquest." 
 
 " I never said a foreigner." 
 
 " Englishman then. That 's better. An English- 
 man is like a fortress of which you have n't got the 
 plan. Let me see. You said clothes. Oh, an 
 acrobat ! Now, fairly, I do love acrobats." 
 
 " An acrobat ! As if I should notice an acrobat ! " 
 
 " That 's where you 're so silly, Eliza. An acro- 
 bat is beautiful." 
 
 "Well! He is n't an acrobat." 
 
 "An ordinary Englishman? As I say, in an 
 Englishman there are generally infinite possibilities." 
 
 " Not ordinary." 
 
 " Where did you meet him?" 
 
 " At the Manor House." 
 
 Rosalie tossed another cherry in the air, snapped 
 at it, and missed it. 
 
 " Now out with it, Eliza ! Why is n't he ordinary ? " 
 
 " Because of his clothes." 
 
 " Had he perhaps been dressed exclusively at a 
 ready-made clothing establishment? Oh! a sol- 
 dier, perhaps." 
 
 "Nothing as grand as that." 
 
 "A clergyman? But you said 'not ordinary. ' 
 A sailor?" 
 
 " Neither. He is just a gentleman." 
 
 " Ugh ! The description makes me creep. 
 Young?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 137 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " A young gentleman. Why do I infallibly think 
 of smooth thin hair and nursery innocence? I 
 hate the inexperienced.' 7 
 
 "He is 'about twenty-five. His hair was dark 
 brown and very untidy. I'm not sure that his 
 hands were quite clean. There may have been a 
 smudge on his forehead. He had been driving an 
 engine, and he was dressed like a common man. 
 And yet he is a friend of Constantia's. You don't 
 guess at all well." 
 
 " I know the sort of person," said Rosalie, with a 
 little grimace ; " I detest him already. He is a 
 reformer a person with a craze about the People, 
 who shows a great deal more throat than is at all 
 nice, and yet fails of being as interesting as a 
 Cowboy. I don't distinguish them from local 
 preachers." 
 
 " Rosalie ! " 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " I thought him I thought I had never seen 
 any one in the least like him." 
 
 Rosalie's eyes laughed. 
 
 " You 've seen such a small assortment of any- 
 thing." She sought amongst the cherries. Eliza's 
 eyes dreamed. " I '11 leave you your hero. You 
 shall have him all to yourself." 
 
 "What do you say things like that for?" said 
 Eliza, shrinkingly. " It is nothing but my old friend 
 Evan the boy I told you of that I used to play 
 with/' 
 
 138 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 She felt as though she had been bending her face 
 over some darkly clear and wonderfully still pool, 
 and some one had carelessly cast a stone in over her 
 shoulder. 
 
 " Come ! Don't curl up like a sensitive plant. 
 It occurred to me to make the remark. I believe 
 you would be offended if I said you were pretty." 
 
 Eliza blushed and looked shy. 
 
 " No, I should n't," said she ; " I should like to 
 hear it ; but I don't think I should believe it." 
 
 "Not with that hair?" 
 
 u My hair is nothing except conspicuous." 
 
 " But there 's your fair skin and colour." 
 
 "That lacks mystery and shadow. I prefer a 
 Hindoo. But don't catalogue me, please ! " 
 
 " I 'm not to be stopped. I think you clever. 
 Your remarks often amaze me." 
 
 " I only talk my best to you." 
 
 "Eliza ! when they pruned you into a stick, they 
 spoiled you." 
 
 " Oh, yes." 
 
 " Nevertheless you are pretty, and you are clever." 
 
 " If I am, I might just as well not be." 
 
 "How is that? But I know. Clever girl! 
 straight to the point as usual. You mean that it 's 
 no use possessing beauty unless you have in addi- 
 tion the indescribable power of looking as though 
 you possessed it." 
 
 " Just so. Some have only the second gift, and 
 it does just as well without the first," said Eliza. 
 139 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Possibly. It 's a refined kind of cheek that 's 
 all. But there 's neither cheek nor humbug about 
 you. You are all dove, and none of the serpent. 
 Unfortunately men (and women too) like being 
 humbugged." 
 
 " You have everything, Rosalie ! " said Eliza, in 
 fervent admiration. " I don't think it would mat- 
 ter very much to you if you were not pretty. I 
 don't think it would make any difference." 
 
 Rosalie reflected with half- shut lids, her eyes 
 shining between. 
 
 " No : fairly, I don't think it would. But all the 
 same, it 's convenient to have the other attribute as 
 well." She laughed. She was too handsome, too 
 unself-conscious not to be able to mention an obvi- 
 ous fact without the smirk of it. " Now, Eliza," 
 she continued, " why not put on a new man ? The 
 world is so infinitely grateful for audacity in the 
 midst of its platitudes. There 's nothing from 
 which men are so anxious to be delivered as their 
 own piety." 
 
 " I know. But I have at least enough sense not 
 to play the part of the ass who imitated the pet 
 dog." 
 
 She rose from her seat, and took up the wide 
 apple-green hat to replace on her head preparatory 
 to a return home. Rosalie watched in admiration. 
 
 " You really are lovely, Eliza ! a perfect 
 picture." 
 
 Eliza stamped her foot. 
 140 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 "You can't prevail over me," said she. "You 
 can't deceive me. I am what I am. I am aware 
 of myself. Don't you know that figure a subjec- 
 tive one of the fancy who lurks in the obscure 
 corners of the mind, or creeps about its intricate 
 windings, and who solemnly, inexorably, patiently, 
 turns the ever-same thought over and over, and 
 judges the self as no exterior judge can ever judge 
 it ? " 
 
 Rosalie, from her table, stared for a few seconds 
 in blank silence, her cheek perceptibly paler. Then 
 the colour flushed into it more deeply. 
 
 " Eliza ! " cried she. " You talk like Isaiah and 
 Jeremiah, Moses, and all the lesser prophets ! No. 
 Indeed. I know nothing about such creepy things. 
 And I would advise you not to, either. Except that 
 you look like a Sibyl when you talk like that, or 
 Deborah, or some one. It's really very fine talk. 
 Like a bit of Beethoven, you know. Why not do 
 it before Mr. Dayntree, for example?" 
 
 Something flew over her face as she spoke; it 
 reflected an inward thought which certainly made 
 no appearance in her words. 
 
 " I can't even think anything when any one is 
 near me as a rule," said Eliza, " much less talk." 
 
 " As I say, the one thing you lack is audacity. 
 I recommend you to get audacity and badness, as 
 they recommend you to get wisdom and under- 
 standing in the Bible. Just enough wickedness to 
 give piquancy, you know. Then you 're made. 
 141 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Your great white thoughts want two black wings 
 apiece. Come ! Encourage yourself." 
 
 The tears came into Eliza's eyes. 
 
 " I am going," she said. " I want to hurry 
 home. Constantia told me that Mr. Dayntree is 
 coming to-night. I don't want to meet him. I 
 shall escape as soon as dinner is over and avoid 
 
 him. I hate to be so foolish " She stumbled 
 
 into incoherence. 
 
 Rosalie listened with downcast eyes, a reddening 
 cheek, and a musing smile. 
 
 "Yes," said she, with the faintest suspicion of 
 mockery in her voice when Eliza concluded her 
 confused and broken speech ; " I would hurry if I 
 were you. You may meet him coming along, you 
 know. Off with you ! Fly ! " 
 
 The next moment she leapt from the table, her 
 manner full of warmth and kindness, and took her 
 friend into a fervent embrace. 
 
 " Don't fret and be so hopelessly ridiculous,' 7 said 
 she. " Have some pluck. Your little finger is 
 worth most people's whole bodies." 
 
 It was honest affection ; there was not a note 
 of falseness in it. The two faces were pressed 
 together ; the two girlish figures clung within each 
 other's arms. 
 
 142 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 " You have quite a nursery garden here ! " 
 
 The words uttered in Mrs. Trelyon's velvet tones 
 a wasp's sting from a flower had first opened 
 Edward's eyes to the effect of the improvements at 
 The Court. It is one thing to walk in imagination 
 in the shades of an avenue of a hundred years' 
 growth, and another to pass in sober reality between 
 a row of little trees of your own planting. Mrs. 
 Trelyon's remark hung corrosively in his memory, 
 but old John Armstrong's observations as he walked 
 up the drive from the gate where Edward had met 
 him were, in the utter absence of malicious intent, a 
 worse offence. 
 
 " Now what trees does the soil suit best? " asked 
 he, eyeing the striplings that flanked either side with 
 a ribbon of many-tinted green. 
 
 "I really don't know," said Edward, coldly; 
 "that's the gardener's department." 
 
 " Every tree to its soil," pursued old John, lay- 
 ing his stick against the slender stem of a beech and 
 innocently measuring its height ; " in my country it 
 is the mountain ash and the larch. Not but what 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 we have oaks ; but they don't express themselves. 
 They tell a tale of experience instead, clinging 
 like half-daft things to the soil with the scare of the 
 northwest wind in their hair. But here I reckon 
 the oak and the beech will do." 
 
 " There are some fine oaks in a park the other 
 side of the common," said Edward, sulkily. 
 
 " Ah, yes. I noted them. Fine old fellows 
 rooted in time itself. There 's a Holm oak there, 
 too, that '"s doing well enough seemingly ; we 
 stopped a bit to see the wind toss its branches. 
 Winter and spring in one moment." 
 
 Edward wished that instead of interesting himself 
 in detail, his humble relative would permit the full 
 effect of the surroundings to touch him. But just as 
 they came in sight of the handsome facade of the 
 house, old John stopped again and poked up the 
 soil to examine its nature. 
 
 "Ay dear! dear!" said he; "what a soil for 
 pansies ! Do you cultivate them ?" 
 
 " We don't cultivate anything in particular," re- 
 turned Edward ; " though," he added as an after- 
 thought, " I intend to build glass and take up 
 orchids." 
 
 "Ah!" said John, absently; "well, I don't 
 blame you. They 're tickle things, are pansies. It 
 takes a man's patience to grow 'em, and then you 
 may fail. Oh, it's heart-breaking work. I don't 
 blame you. You may select your seed, and give a 
 deal of thought to the mixing, and you may nourish 
 1 44 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 'em and watch 'em up and then they don't meet 
 your expectation. Not," he added, " but what I 've 
 a good few at home." 
 
 Mr. Armstrong sank that evening into a lethargic 
 state, from which it was not thought well to rouse 
 him, and Mr. John Armstrong's visit to his chamber 
 had to be postponed until the morning. He was 
 conducted to the drawing-room, there to await 
 dinner in the charge of Mrs. Armstrong. The 
 moment of his entry was more trying to his hostess 
 than the guest. She came forward with a flush of 
 anxious trepidation, to find a fine old man with a 
 quiet musing face standing before her, and gently 
 waiting upon her initiative. There was a simplicity 
 about old John that carried off any surroundings, and 
 the nil admirari air, which was the result of that sim- 
 plicity, would have saved him from disaster any- 
 where. Mrs. Armstrong's good breeding was too 
 genuine not to find it a relief; she had dreaded 
 boisterous encroachment, but this man was no 
 strange animal to whom she had to act as keeper ; 
 he kept a circle of distance of his own, and left her 
 to hers. She led him to the window, and showed 
 him where, beyond the " nursery garden " and a 
 peep of the common, lay, on such a summer even- 
 ing as this, a soft faint pencilling against the sky 
 which men called London. The nature of old John 
 drew the best out of Mrs. Armstrong ; there was an 
 inextinguishable gentleness about his lips that was as 
 dew after the arid atmosphere of home bickerings ; 
 10 145 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 and his unpretentiousness made it a pleasant thing 
 to talk to him. 
 
 " He '11 be an old man now my Cousin Sam ? " 
 he inquired. 
 
 " My husband is seventy years of age," returned 
 Mrs. Armstrong. 
 
 "That will be it," he said ; "and yet his face lies 
 before me as a lad's." 
 
 He moved his hand slowly over his knees to in- 
 dicate the clearness with which the young face of 
 old Sam presented itself. 
 
 " My husband's mind is dissipated, I fear, upon 
 worldly matters," said Mrs. Armstrong, "when I so 
 earnestly desire to see him concentrate it upon 
 things heavenly." 
 
 " Ah ? " said old John. " And so you distinguish 
 between them, ma'am?" 
 
 All dinner-time, Eliza's eyes surreptitiously 
 watched the visitor ; as a relative he was doubly 
 interesting. He spoke little, and chose the plainest 
 fare. Now and then he joined in the conversation 
 with a remark that seemed to her of a finer quality 
 than she was accustomed to ; Aunt Caroline in her 
 replies sounded strained and tawdry; old Cousin 
 John turned and looked at her once or twice, and 
 when she directed her smart speech to him merely 
 answered, 
 
 "Just so, ma'am." 
 
 He was more silent after that. So was Aunt 
 Caroline. 
 
 146 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " Who was that young man you had with you at 
 the gate, Mr. Armstrong?" asked Edward, to fill 
 the gaps of silence ; " an acquaintance picked up 
 on the road?" 
 
 Mr. John Armstrong turned politely towards the 
 young fellow handling the carver at the head of 
 the table. 
 
 " An old friend, sir. We came from the North 
 together." 
 
 He bent his head courteously to Edward's supe- 
 rior social position, which was somehow asserted in 
 all his movements. 
 
 " Cousin John ! " everybody turned and looked 
 at Eliza "I know who he is." 
 
 " Cousin John," seeing a timid girl face opposite 
 with the nervous pink creeping into the cheek, 
 irradiated into a smile. 
 
 " He is Evan Dayntree a relative of the Dayn- 
 trees of the Manor House. I saw him there this 
 afternoon." 
 
 "Yes, my dear. That is it." 
 
 Gilbert, opening eyes and mouth, was about to 
 express astonishment, when Edward, scarlet to the 
 brow, kicked him under the table. Eliza remem- 
 bered that Evan had said she resembled old John 
 Armstrong, and she raised her finger to her lips and 
 chin to trace the small copy there. Evan had 
 spoken of her relative as his friend, and it thrilled 
 her with pleasure that he had added the rest. 
 
 The mention of the Dayntrees, however, recalled 
 147 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 to her mind Constantia's announcement of her hus- 
 band's probable visit. After old John Armstrong's 
 claim of acquaintanceship with Evan, it appeared so 
 likely a thing that they should receive some call 
 from the Manor House, that Eliza said nothing 
 about her expectation, but the moment the front- 
 door bell rang, quietly slipped out of the drawing- 
 room, and, as was her habit when desiring to avoid 
 a social occasion, escaped from the house on a 
 long evening ramble. Towards ten o'clock she 
 returned home, and hurried up the stairs straight 
 to her bedroom. Her face was very pale and a 
 little drawn, and there was a strained startled look 
 in her eyes. Sylvia's bedroom was empty, and the 
 lights were turned low ; she closed the door be- 
 tween, and sat down to think. Her condition was 
 one peculiar to her nature. On the one hand was 
 the stultifying effect of her inexperience, her inno- 
 cence and self-distrust ; on the other, there re- 
 mained in her mind a picture suspended between 
 reality and vision, the meaning of which she could 
 not endure to contemplate, but upon which her 
 memory kept tenacious hold ; it was something that 
 had struck upon her ken in a place of shadows and 
 dim light, that had come before her as momentary 
 and passing phantoms in chiaroscuro, and yet had 
 conveyed to her mind only too fixed an impression 
 of unmistakable identity. 
 
 She sat thinking of what she had accidentally 
 seen, in intense agitation of mind. Then she un- 
 148 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 dressed and got into bed, and out of pure exhaus- 
 tion fell into a sound short sleep, from which she 
 was wakened by a light in her room. Her step- 
 mother was there, standing by her bed, and shading 
 a light with her hand ; from Sylvia's half-open door 
 streamed more light. Eliza rose up in bed, her 
 thought fixed in wild apprehension upon the pic- 
 ture with which she had fallen asleep. Mrs. Arm- 
 strong placed the candle on the table near, and sat 
 down by the bedside. Eliza saw that the pale, 
 well-chiselled face, the small well-kept curls, the 
 air of perfection that Mrs. Armstrong always carried 
 with her, were faintly ruffled at this moment by 
 excitement. 
 
 "My dear child," she murmured, in that half- 
 breathed voice of hers, which reminded one of 
 dead rose-leaves in ancient china. 
 
 "Yes, mother," said Eliza; "did did Mr. 
 Dayntree stay long?" 
 
 "What did you say, dear?" asked Mrs. Arm- 
 strong, wonderingly. 
 
 " I heard some one in the drawing-room besides 
 Cousin John when I came back from a walk. It 
 was Mr. Dayntree, mother ? " 
 
 She unconsciously clasped her hands, as though 
 in entreaty. 
 
 " Mr. Dixon's voice," said Mrs. Armstrong, smil- 
 ing a little. 
 
 " No ! Mr. Dayntree's. When did he come ? 
 When did he leave?" 
 
 149 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Mrs. Armstrong's expression changed first to sur- 
 prised annoyance, then to alarm. She stretched 
 her hand and laid a finger on Eliza's wrist. The 
 pulse was certainly leaping. 
 
 " Does this indicate illness ? " murmured she, 
 rapidly and anxiously. " Oh, Eliza ! and with your 
 dear father stretched on a bed of sickness, and the 
 house already upset ! " 
 
 " I 'm not ill," exclaimed Eliza. "Mr. Dayntree 
 was expected. Did he stay long? " 
 
 " ' Mr. Dayntree ' ! Are you delirious ? He 
 has not been here at all. No one expected him. 
 Mr. Dixon has been here. Surely you knew? " 
 
 Eliza gazed at her step-mother like a wild thing. 
 
 " Surely you have remarked Mr. Dixon's atten- 
 tions to your aunt?" continued Mrs. Armstrong, 
 her mind full of her event, while Eliza's as tena- 
 ciously clung to its own. " To-night he made her 
 an offer. It was what we expected. He tells us 
 that it has been a long and serious attachment. He 
 has left the house the happiest of men. " 
 
 150 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 IT was Eliza's turn to read her father the morn- 
 ing Psalm. She hovered on the threshold of the 
 drawing-room first, and saw old John sitting there ; 
 the cool airs blew through the windows, and he 
 was tranquilly reading. 
 
 On the landing was Edward standing at his bed- 
 room door, his hands in his pockets, and a frown 
 on his brow. Circumstance was an ass to him, and, 
 like Balaam, he had no further wisdom than to 
 goad it. Seeing Eliza, he came forward with a 
 smile. 
 
 " Going in to see dad?" said he. "Look here, 
 Eliza. I want to talk to dad." 
 
 " I have to read the Psalm." 
 
 " All right, I'll come too. I '11 talk to him after- 
 wards. I want you to be there and to hear what 
 I say. Is the Psalm long?" 
 
 " I could choose ' The Lord is my Shepherd/ " 
 
 u Yes ; choose that. We Ve only a short time. 
 I don't know why he has brought old Armstrong 
 here. I must see father first." 
 
 Eliza nodded. They approached the door to- 
 gether. At an earlier date it would have pleased 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 her to be in any confidence with Edward ; last 
 night's event, however, had shaken and quickened 
 her mind ; she had not understood it, but her moral 
 feeling was in arms against it ; and it had left her 
 this morning, not in a suspicious but in an open- 
 eyed frame. She hated intrigue with all the strength 
 of her candid nature, and with the peculiar quality 
 of her intellect. Something, she hardly knew what, 
 set her now on her guard ; Edward felt provoked 
 at the quiet indifference of her profile as she turned 
 the handle. He wanted an enthusiastic tool. 
 
 "Mind you listen," said he, plucking her by the 
 elbow. 
 
 The old man, wrapped in blankets and supported 
 by pillows, sat in an invalid chair by the open win- 
 dow. He had insisted upon rising from his bed. 
 The Bible and Smiles's " Self-Help " lay on the table 
 by his side as before. 
 
 Eliza came to the window and touched his fore- 
 head with her lips. 
 
 " Shall I read the Psalm ? " said she. 
 
 His face softened at her voice. 
 
 "Shall I read 'The Lord is my Shepherd'?" 
 Edward has come too." 
 
 Edward took a chair a little in the background 
 in the shadow of the bed curtain. Eliza, opposite 
 her father by the window, with the light on her hair 
 and cheek, read about the " green pastures " and 
 "still waters," and the soul that is led. The old 
 man sat motionless, listening; his ear loved the 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 fine English, his memory travelled back on the 
 sound to the early days when his mother, a woman 
 of the artisan classes, traced the printed lines with 
 her work-roughened finger, and murmured the 
 words to him as one croons a lullaby. He heard 
 his own child's voice halt after, he felt the texture 
 of her cotton gown, and he heard the swing of the 
 pendulum in the eight-day clock, and the rolling 
 of the wooden cradle which she rocked with her 
 foot. 
 
 "7 shall not want" he repeated, when Eliza's 
 voice ceased. 
 
 Enclosed though it might be by hazy religious 
 emotion, the heart of the promise held a more 
 definite assurance to his ear, and his mind lifted 
 itself unconsciously on a tidal hope that the value 
 of mine shares was still rising. 
 
 A vague terror of circumstance had haunted him 
 all his life, and he had banked up riches and slip- 
 pery deeds against it. A similar terror, yet a 
 meaner, the fear lest the biggest share should not 
 fall to himself, shook Edward's face now as he 
 peered round the curtains in anxious watchfulness. 
 From below came the sound of an opening door : 
 old John might even now be mounting the stairs, 
 and his presence would put a period to the oppor- 
 tunity. The cool strong face and resolute slow 
 manner seemed to Edward to threaten his personal 
 interests more than anything he had ever met with. 
 Once more he urged the ass he rode. 
 153 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Old John Armstrong is coming to see you, 
 father. I wanted just to say a word before you 
 see him." 
 
 "Hey?" 
 
 " I want you just to carry your mind back to a 
 conversation we had the other morning." 
 
 He paused. The face by the window had that 
 shut, impenetrable look he dreaded. 
 
 " You seemed to wish me in the case of a 
 division of the property, which I sincerely hope is 
 far distant you seemed to wish me to undertake 
 as my share, and of course my responsibility, the 
 ' Sherman's Reward ' mines." 
 
 There was no response, but he was convinced 
 from certain facial signs that his father heard. 
 
 " I just wanted you to tell me again clearly that 
 you desired me to take the ' Sherman's Reward ' 
 mines in Western Australia as my share." 
 
 His father's hand moved faintly over the blan- 
 kets. The foot of old John was even now upon 
 the stair. 
 
 " Did you not say, father," urged Balaam, " that 
 you wished me to have the mines the whole of 
 the ' Sherman's Reward ' mines as my share ? " 
 
 " So I said.' 7 
 
 " That was your wish as regards me ? " 
 
 " So I said." 
 
 The handle of the door turned, and Mrs. Arm- 
 strong, looking in, beckoned to Edward and Eliza 
 to withdraw. 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 Old John, his hands linked behind him, walked 
 across the big and handsome room, his attention 
 quietly bent on the -figure by the window. Old 
 Sam's eyes started wide-open at the sound of his 
 cousin's step, and they followed him in speechless 
 emotion as he walked through the room, and took a 
 chair by the window opposite. The look was of 
 that suspended alarm which human eyes wear when 
 the situation is strange and the power of calculation 
 at fault. 
 
 Old John quietly seated himself by the window 
 opposite his cousin. Neither spoke ; each had his 
 memory. It was forty years and more old now, 
 but it lived like a rat still at the bottom of old Sam's 
 heart, and slumbered like a passionate grief trans- 
 figured to patience in old John's. 
 
 The deed was not one amenable to man's law, 
 or even to the scourge of public opinion. It had 
 the quality of a deeper blackness. It had happened 
 in the early thirties, and was described in the press 
 at the time as an event under the heading of " The 
 Harebarrow Strike." Old John had in his room 
 at home a set of worn and faded extracts from the 
 " Workman's Dawn o' Day," pasted on cardboard 
 and attached to his wall by four small nails ; these 
 extracts gave the bald recital of the event ; there 
 were certain gaps which the memories of the two 
 cousins supplied. According to the press account, 
 the collapse of the perfectly justified and well- 
 planned Harebarrow manoeuvre was owing chiefly 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 to some information having been inexplicably con- 
 veyed to the police beforehand ; the result had 
 been a seizure of two of the, leaders for imprison- 
 ment in gaol, violence from the disaffected opera- 
 tives, and bloodshed from the defenders of a certain 
 mill. But the thing which was not recorded in the 
 extracts mouldering on " Union John's " bedroom 
 walls was what burned most in the memory. When 
 " Union John " came out of gaol, and walked 
 through the Clough of Harebarrow for the last time 
 on his way into exile, he learned that his cousin and 
 trusted associate had been promoted by his distant 
 kinsman, the detested and unjust master, and was 
 fairly on the way to a probable partnership. More 
 than forty years lay between the poignant agony of 
 that moment and this. 
 
 " You 're changed, John," said old Mr. Arm- 
 strong, when he had moistened his lips once or 
 twice and gazed into the mild, steady eyes before 
 him, as he never could into Edward's ; " now, I 
 doubt I 'm done." 
 
 John passed his hand slowly over his mouth and 
 chin, and said nothing. 
 
 " How 's the ' Grand National ' going now ? " 
 asked Sam, presently. 
 
 " It perished," returned John, " towards the end 
 
 of '34." 
 
 "Dead, is it?" He knew it. It was old, old 
 news, which he had heard forty years back and 
 more. But then, he had never heard it from Sam's 
 
 156 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 lips. It sounded something new from them, and 
 he spoke quite briskly. Again, John had nothing 
 to add. 
 
 "You remember old Theophilus?" jerked out 
 old Sam once more, after the pause. 
 
 " I had to deal in his 4 Tommy ' shop too long 
 not to have a lively recollection of him," said John, 
 drily. 
 
 " He was the father of lies," said Sam. 
 
 " So you think so now?" said John, gently. 
 
 Old Sam his white hair on the fine white pillow 
 slowly inclined his head. The years lay before 
 him as a map. 
 
 " It 's a queer thought at times/'* said he, " the 
 road one might have gone by and missed.' 7 
 
 " Just so/' said John. 
 
 " It 's a queer sort of notion what would have 
 happened if we 'd decided on some other plan than 
 the one we took." 
 
 "That's so, Sam." 
 
 " Blest if I can get a bit of comfortable sleep 
 without my mind setting off of itself and creeping 
 back to that particular corner. And yet I 've 
 prospered." 
 
 He waved his hand round to indicate the hand- 
 some room. 
 
 "You've got it in mahogany? Yes," said old 
 John. 
 
 " And mine shares, and railway stock, and land, 
 and what not ! " 
 
 157 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " And a position in the county/' he added, 
 quoting from Edward. 
 
 " Aye. Thou wed owd Theophilus' lass o' 
 Plarebarrow Clough," said John, with a gentle 
 smile of humour, and taking the vernacular to salve 
 the offence. 
 
 " How 's that fellow Rayner now?" asked Sam, 
 presently changing the topic. 
 
 " Rayner? Did n't he go out like a puff of smoke 
 at last?" returned John. 
 
 " Well, I think he did. He was a chap to be up 
 and down again like a rocket. He 'd used to sell 
 us a tub or two of oil for the Harebarrow Clough 
 mills, and was glad to be in our debt for a five- 
 pound note. And then he got up that big cotton 
 corner. Recollect it, John?" 
 
 " I was out of cotton then, you know." 
 
 " Still he did set 'change on a flare, and 
 strutted about for a bit like a cock on a dung-hill. 
 He made a million of money. He was in every- 
 body's mouth. And then he must needs go and 
 try it on again, and miscalculate. Oil-tubs and 
 five-pound debts even were too big for him after 
 that." 
 
 " A cock on a dung-hill that 's so." 
 
 " He was a warning to me, John," said old Sam, 
 shaking his head ; " and yet I Ve gone safe. I 've 
 gone safe." 
 
 " Yes," said old John. 
 
 158 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " I Ve been no speculator like Rayner. I Ve 
 only dabbled in speculation once. It was in '62. 
 You '11 mind that year, John ? " 
 
 " Mind it? I do so. The famine year." 
 
 Old Sam chuckled faintly from the blankets. 
 
 " So they called it. Why ? There was more 
 cotton in the market those famine years than 
 ever at any time before or since. I 'd ought to 
 know." 
 
 Again the old fellow faintly chuckled. 
 
 "Well? "said John. 
 
 " There was Tom Ramsbottom recollect Tom, 
 with his long crooked nose ? once he got hold of 
 his cotton he was like a dog with a bone. Could n't 
 let it go. He overreached himself and lost. But I 
 did n't. Mine prospered. I sold at the very top 
 of the market. It was Billy Pilkington that bought 
 the bulk of the bales for export, the rest went to 
 Samuels and Willens. They got off with a mod- 
 erate loss. But Billy, he held on. You recollect 
 Billy?" 
 
 " A man with a little flat head and a pair of eyes 
 wide apart, and a habit of sniffin' and wagglin' his 
 head, and looking to and fro like a dog in search of 
 garbage? Aye. I mind him." 
 
 "That'll be him. Well, he bought the bulk of 
 the cotton, and he held on too well. Not but what 
 he 'd a tidy bit of money left. But they kept him 
 at home after that, and just let him have a shilling 
 or two in his pockets to get drunk on; and they 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 kept him clean, and gave him good clothes, and let 
 him hand the plate round in church on a Sunday. 
 He seemed content enough for a time. They 
 brought the railway past his place not so long after. 
 That was a grand affair to Billy. He 'd used to 
 go down to the bit of a station at Bowker Bank to 
 watch the morning train off, and he } d shake his 
 stick at it, and say ' Hurra ! ' and cry. Oh, he was 
 very content, was Billy, till his mind took worse 
 ways, and the drink did the rest. Then he got that 
 maggot into his brain about silver. Thought there 
 was n't change enough in all England to meet his 
 liabilities. And he 'd run about sniffing and wag- 
 gling his head, and searching and begging for six- 
 pence here and sixpence there. He always asked 
 for sixpence. They found scores and scores of 
 sixpences in his pockets when he died of stroke of 
 a sudden. He 'd beg of anybody at last trades- 
 people and all." 
 
 "That was the man that bought your cotton, 
 was it?" 
 
 "Yes, it was Billy. If I 'd held on I 'd maybe 
 have been like him. But I made a fine thing out 
 of it." 
 
 Old Sam sighed again. 
 
 " It left me with a touch of palsy in my hand," 
 he added. 
 
 John had his hand over his eyes ; his heart in its 
 day had wept tears of blood at Sam's desertion. 
 From the rich man, amidst his fine pillows and 
 1 60 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 handsome curtains, a second thin weak sigh escaped 
 after the silence ; it breathed the burden of woful 
 years, a sound of the ghostly enemy rather than 
 the common earthly griefs of anxious poverty, and 
 the struggle that is laid on man, and sickness, and the 
 loss of friends. Woe to those who, to escape the 
 common ill, put on the burden of the ghostly .enemy, 
 and the fetters with which he binds ! 
 
 "Thou may speak, Sam," said old John, softly 
 answering the eloquence of the sigh. 
 
 " You Ve a good heart to me? " asked old Sam, 
 feebly. 
 
 Yes yes, lad ! That 's so." 
 
 " I doubt I Ve missed it here and there, John. 
 I 'm troubled in my mind." 
 
 John bent his head lower, and speechlessly gave 
 his cousin to feel that he listened. 
 
 "I'm confused at times, and think that old 
 Theophilus is alive." 
 
 " He died twenty years back, Sam." 
 
 "And if he'd died twenty years before, I 'd may- 
 be have been happier. There 's a sight of fear and 
 anxiety when a man's rich." 
 
 " That 's so, maybe." 
 
 " I Ve the fear of leaving division and rage be- 
 hind, and murmuring children." 
 
 " You Ve made your will, Sam ? " 
 
 " Lean forward, John. Is Edward there ? No. 
 I Ve made it right now. It 's what I want. But 
 I 'in confused. 
 
 ii 161 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 "One day I saw that lad busy in his room, his 
 lips muttering figures, and his brow too inward on 
 his own thought to note me. ' Say two hundred 
 thousand, and divide by five no, four,' says he. 
 I 'd ever been chary of trusting my own : I 'd ever 
 kept my lips locked on my affairs. And I knew 
 what he was at. It went like a sword to my heart, 
 already sore with the world's combat, and heaping 
 up riches. The lad was dividing my property while 
 life was still hale in me. And when he was gone, I 
 slipped in and took the paper he 'd scribbled his 
 make-believe figures on ; and I saw a fool's brain, 
 and a spendthrift's, and a heartless lad's, that says 
 of his father, 'It is a gift,' and counts his mother 
 and sisters as robbers from himself, and a brother 
 as a diminisher of his own fortune. And the old 
 fear ran like a rat through my mind, for I thought 
 I saw old Theophilus again. And I sent for a man 
 I can trust, and opened my wish to him. And I 
 made a new will." 
 
 " It 's a sore fear for a man on his deathbed/' 
 said John. 
 
 " Ay ! and I doubt I 'm afraid of betraying my- 
 self again. My lad Edward was the apple of my 
 eye. I see him still a mite in a white frock and 
 pinny with a yellow curl on top his head toddling 
 to his mother's arms her as died, John, I mean. 
 And my heart goes weak " 
 
 He fixed his eyes mournfully on the garden land- 
 scape, a look of confusion and perplexity harassed 
 162 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 his face, and the thin tormented sigh escaped him 
 again. 
 
 " An apple of Sodom, John/' murmured he ; " it 's 
 a burden. I doubt I 'm leaving treachery, and 
 strife, and division, and the melting away of money 
 behind me. And I doubt " 
 
 His mind, searching within himself after one 
 strong, clear deed, could not assure itself that some- 
 how he had not betrayed his own intention to be 
 just ; the smile of old Theophilus caught his mem- 
 ory in hate and dread ; he made an effort to recall 
 his own action to assure himself of straight, firm 
 dealing ; but his mind tottered and failed ; the thin 
 tormented sigh escaped him again, and he closed 
 his eyes. He was ever a man with a forked road 
 in his mind. 
 
 Old John rose hastily from his seat, and leaned 
 over him ; he saw a shadow on the face that was 
 unlike anything belonging to life. And in his own 
 heart was a yearning affection that no memory of be- 
 trayal, no division of years could uproot. He took the 
 thin worn hand tenderly in his own, and spoke to the 
 fading sense of the ear in the old vernacular. 
 
 " Sam, lad ! " cried he ; "it 's John, thou knows. 
 John is with thee ! " 
 
 The lids faintly moved, and a gleam of joy shone 
 dimly between them. 
 
 " Aye, John lad ! " said old Sam ; " I 'm very fain." 
 
 Next morning the old man passed gently away. 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 " THE COURT " was a house of decorous mourn- 
 ing, the simple figure of undivided grief being that 
 .of old John. 
 
 Mrs. Armstrong, cold, impressive, draped in heavy 
 weeds, seemed acting a part in a solemn drama. 
 Aunt Caroline, elegantly black, moved in mourning 
 under protest. 
 
 " Why," she asked of Mr. Dixon, who, ceremoni- 
 ous to his finger-tips, was present out of courtesy, 
 " cannot we return to simplicity in these days ? A 
 wicker basket carried cheerfully to the grave, or 
 subjected to the sanitary process of the furnace, an 
 indifferent demeanour in face of the inevitable and 
 natural such is my ideal." 
 
 At the open grave, attention to the service and 
 the occasion could not entirely prevail with Edward 
 against his habit of casting up sums. His fancy, 
 caught away from the finish of life in this " earth to 
 earth " ceremony, sent him in imagination swagger- 
 ing with a bit of careless information to an admir- 
 ing acquaintance. 
 
 " My father's fortune totted up to a cool two 
 hundred thousand, you know. We did n't live up 
 164 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 to it, I allow. But ostentation wasn't old dad's 
 form." 
 
 Meanwhile every moment brought him nearer 
 the ambush where lay brutal reality with his rapier 
 point. 
 
 The will of the late Samuel Armstrong proved 
 when read to be simple. Norman Dayntree was 
 left sole executor of his fortune, and, subject to a 
 small complimentary legacy to himself, the whole 
 was to be divided between Isabella, wife to Samuel 
 Armstrong, and Edward, Gilbert, Eliza, and Sylvia, 
 children of the same, according as the discretion of 
 the executor should dictate ; nor were the persons 
 interested to have power to dispute his ruling. By 
 such an eccentric testament had the old man thought 
 to put a period to the inherent tendency of human 
 nature to fight over booty. The fortune when 
 realised would probably mount up to eighty thou- 
 sand pounds. 
 
 " Your father, Mr. Edward," said the lawyer, in 
 reply to his incoherent exclamations, " never, that 
 I know of, claimed to be an extraordinarily rich 
 man." 
 
 The bitterness of the observation lay in its truth. 
 
 Not many days later, Eliza found herself listening 
 to the tutoring of Edward as she unwillingly accom- 
 panied him in the direction of the Manor House. 
 
 " Now, Eliza," ran the warning, " you have got 
 to collect your senses. This is an extremely impor- 
 tant matter. It touches the good of the family." 
 
 '65 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Eliza's mouth was ominously set. It exasperated 
 Edward beyond words that her face refused to 
 spring any eager looks of sacrifice by which to meet 
 his demands. The days between their father's 
 funeral and this walk had not been pleasant to any 
 of them ; there had been sensitive tears from Sylvia, 
 whispered conclaves between her step-mother and 
 aunt, and scowls between the two brothers. Eliza 
 had kept as far as possible aloof and silent ; her 
 occasion for trouble was peculiarly her own, and 
 extinguished lesser details. In other matters besides 
 this of the family property, her judgment was feel- 
 ing its way towards emancipation and efficiency. 
 
 Norman received his guests in his study. His 
 own position was eminently distasteful to himself, but 
 Constantia's wish upheld him. It was a cool and 
 pleasant room into which the brother and sister 
 entered, and Mr. Dayntree's courteous though reti- 
 cent demeanour convinced Edward that suavity not 
 bluster was his cue. It was, however, little to his 
 mind to find that Mr. Dayntree was not alone. 
 Upon their entering the room, a young man came 
 forward and shook hands cordially with Eliza. He 
 had been sitting in a retired corner, and had a book 
 in his hand. Edward recognised him as the " work- 
 man " whom he had met in old John Armstrong's 
 company. 
 
 " Ah, Evan ! You are there, to be sure," exclaimed 
 Norman, with satisfaction ; " these are Armstrong's 
 young cousins. My relative," he continued, dis- 
 166 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 tributing his words between Eliza and Edward, 
 " has been residing in the same town with Mr. John 
 Armstrong, and has found a valued friend in him. 
 No, Evan ! Don't go ; sit down." 
 
 The tones of the last words were insistent. Evan 
 turned and re-seated himself by a corner window* 
 and re-opened his book. 
 
 To make a plausible and telling speech was not 
 difficult to Edward. He began by stating that his 
 father had desired to keep up the family name by 
 handing to one of their number to himself, in 
 short, as natural protector enough to carry on a 
 general home, such a place for example as <c The 
 Court," to which they could point as evidence of 
 position and union. He was sure not only of what 
 his father's wishes were in the matter, but also of 
 the extent to which he desired to endow him ; since 
 shortly before his death his father had informed him 
 that the whole of the Sherman's Reward Mines (the 
 value of which he might say he was ignorant of) 
 were designed for him for this purpose. 
 
 In this plausible manner, truth interwoven with 
 falsehood, Edward came at his request. Norman 
 listened quietly. How far Edward believed in his 
 own word-spinning is a nice but insoluble question ; 
 probably he was his own first dupe, for a mind is 
 usually thoroughly tainted by its own sophistry be- 
 fore it attempts to spread the disease to another. 
 Norman, however, was not likely to be detained by 
 such arguments when the broad issue was evident. 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " My dear fellow/' said he, not without a twinkle 
 in his eyes, "this is all very well. But how should 
 1 be fulfilling my office to the remainder of the 
 family if I began by handing to a single member a 
 portion of the property which I have just proved as 
 valuing fully one-half of the whole ? " 
 
 Then his father had spoken truth ! Edward 
 breathed a sigh of relief; his next step was to call 
 upon Eliza for her evidence. Here, however, en- 
 sued a scene in the last degree unexpected. Eliza, 
 who had listened with downcast lids, when she 
 found herself referred to, was at a loss only because 
 of the excess of penetration with which she read the 
 event. Norman, turning his head courteously when 
 Edward demanded her speech, knew not whether 
 to smile or to become graver when he saw himself 
 confronted by an eye of fire. 
 
 " I am asked did my father give Edward the 
 nine shares? Well, Mr. Dayntree," said she, with 
 vigorous decision, " I suppose the bare letter of the 
 thing is as he says. I heard my brother harry my 
 father on his death-bed with a question as to 
 whether or not he had given him the mines, the 
 whole mines, as his share. And my father answered 
 twice over : ' So I said so I said.' That is all 
 that passed in my hearing. Edward, whether Mr. 
 Dayntree will give you the mines I do not know, 
 and I am sure that I do not care. But this I am 
 convinced of, if you get them, they will not do 
 you any good. Don't you see that you will never 
 1 68 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 succeed never, never ? Your plan is false words, 
 and again false words, and always false words. 
 Everything you do and touch breaks off short 
 at false words. There are no true deeds ; you 
 are nothing but a bad dream, and like a bad 
 dream people will put you from them. You seek 
 yourself ; you do nothing that can by any possibility 
 hold." 
 
 She shook out her deliberated judgment in an 
 astonishing jumble ; her tactics were confused, her 
 speech sounded far from the mark. 
 
 " Good Lord ! " exclaimed Mr. Dayntree, lean- 
 ing back in his chair, while Edward, beside himself 
 with amazement, stared at the white face, the flash- 
 ing eyes, the inspired posture, and heard the in- 
 credible echoes of the denunciation against himself. 
 
 Evan's book shut with a snap as the girl sank 
 back to her seat after the outburst. In an instant 
 he was by her side, and, stooping low so as to bring 
 the command of his kind brown eyes to her aid, 
 lightly touched her hand. She found herself 
 hardly knowing how it happened invited from 
 the room and that without ignominy; and almost 
 before she had understood his intention he had led 
 her across the hall, and they were standing by the 
 door of the drawing-room. 
 
 "Constantia is in here/' said he; "won't you 
 like to see her?" 
 
 How little he apprehended the situation ! He 
 was but thrusting her upon a new dilemma. She 
 169 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 shrank back, casting a nervous beseeching glance 
 towards him. 
 
 " I am not fit," she murmured confusedly. 
 
 " Oh, yes ! won't it be best ? " said he, per- 
 suasively. 
 
 Eliza hesitated. Her knowledge stood out as 
 something strong and black that overpowered every 
 other idea ; her mind seemed like a rocking boat 
 in its perplexity. 
 
 " Come now ! " said he, kindly. " I feel sure in 
 bringing you to Constantia I have done the best for 
 you." His fingers still rested on the handle. 
 
 " Very well," said Eliza, gloomily. " You can 
 open. But if I go in I shall regret it." 
 
 The handle turned, and the door closed upon her 
 and her vague words and confusion. Constantia 
 came forward in her most affectionate manner. 
 Her maternal feeling was moved by the aspect of 
 the girl in her mourning and with her strange dis- 
 tracted air. Eliza began to shiver and tremble 
 when she felt her friend's hands laid upon her ; a 
 kind of weakness seized her ; the prevision so com- 
 mon to her showed the event of this meeting in 
 disaster. The direct road of sheer right-doing, 
 unrelieved, unsoftened by those tender undulations 
 and windings which supreme discretion creates, was 
 the only one possible to her ignorance. 
 
 "Did you know that I called, Eliza? I have 
 thought of you so much. Why did you not come 
 before?" 
 
 170 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 Constantia's kindness merely made that over- 
 clouding thought the heavier. She said nothing, 
 but, accompanying her friend across the room, sat 
 down as directed. 
 
 "Are you here alone? I thought I heard 
 voices." 
 
 " I am not alone. Edward is here. Constantia, 
 all life is broken up. I thought it a hard thing to 
 be alive before. But now there is nothing to 
 believe in." 
 
 " Dear ! You have lost your father." She mar- 
 velled a little that the passing of old Mr. Armstrong 
 should leave such a sense of wreck in his daughter's 
 mind. 
 
 " That is bad, but not so bad. One expects 
 to lose one's father. It is the unexpected the 
 startling in life that is so bad." 
 
 " You have found perhaps under the altered 
 circumstances " 
 
 Constantia with her mind on Edward sympathised 
 but hesitated. 
 
 " Yes," said Eliza. " I have read Edward through 
 and through. There is no one in this world upon 
 whom I can rely." 
 
 " Surely ! " said Constantia. Her thought reverted 
 to the strong ally she had secured for the girl in her 
 own husband. 
 
 " I see too much," said Eliza, stupidly. 
 
 " Eliza dear ! Norman is left executor, I know. 
 I am sure that in your and Sylvia's case he will act 
 171 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 almost as guardian should you wish it. You are 
 both so young. I am sure he will do anything. Do 
 come to him if you are in trouble." 
 
 Eliza shook her head with a shudder. Constantia 
 patted her hand. 
 
 "You have not quarrelled with him already?" 
 said she, smiling at the notion that one so strong 
 as Norman should resent the irritable humours of a 
 girl. 
 
 Two slow tears rolled down Eliza's cheeks. The 
 smile of Constantia in face of her knowledge was 
 frightful. Not the least part of her, anguish was the 
 feeling that the knowledge was in itself a kind of injury 
 to Constantia. And yet so incomplete was the work- 
 ing of her mind, so great her girlish ignorance, that 
 she did not grasp the precise nature of the facts she 
 had discovered, nor the full significance of them to 
 Norman's wife. 
 
 " Come tell me," said Constantia. 
 
 Eliza turned her sorrowful eyes on her friend. 
 
 "Must I do so?" 
 
 " Why ! of course if it will ease you." 
 
 " I must tell you, but not because it will ease me. 
 It is as though I was going to strike you. The 
 most dreadful part of all is that Mr. Dayntree 
 has been left executor. For you see I do not 
 cannot " 
 
 She broke off with a wild look ; she caught Con- 
 stantia's proud, amused smile. It shook words 
 from her ; and in her attempt to soften the blow to 
 172 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 her friend she threw forward the least part of the 
 matter the injury to herself. 
 
 " Why does he rob me of Rosalie ? " she asked. 
 
 And by that " robbery " she meant the spiritual 
 loss the flitching of her friend's allegiance from 
 the same sense of right and wrong as hers. But 
 Constantia drew back with a pained repulsing 
 look. 
 
 " Eliza ! what can be the matter with you ? " cried 
 she, reading in the words nothing but the suggestion 
 of evil, jealous feeling which certainly lay upon the 
 surface. 
 
 " Grief is the matter with me," said Eliza ; " fear 
 too. I don't understand. Why does Mr. Dayntree 
 meet Rosalie secretly at nights? Why does he 
 tell you he is coming to us, and then go there? 
 Why " 
 
 It was simply consistent with human nature that 
 the injured wife should strike first at the girl who 
 was doing her best to save her. Nothing was said, 
 but Eliza broke off. The very atmosphere of the 
 room was full of warning. She had not looked, yet 
 knew that Constantia had moved ; and raising her 
 eyes from her own concentrated sense of adverse 
 things in a sunless world, now glanced towards her. 
 Constantia was standing by the mantel-piece, her 
 face averted and yet partially visible. Eliza with 
 her swift sight read it only too clearly. There 
 was no need of words. Constantia's mind had 
 wholly rejected the warning, had never even been 
 173 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 touched by it ; the arrow had returned upon herself; 
 she was not the least believed. 
 
 " Oh, Eliza," murmured Constantia, faintly, " I 
 am inexpressibly shocked. I could not have be- 
 lieved you had so much wickedness in you.'* 
 
 "I I meant to warn you," faltered the girl, 
 struck to the heart by Constantia's irreconcilable 
 demeanour ; " be warned. I am sure that some- 
 thing is wrong." 
 
 " Don't don't say a word more. I am not able 
 to bear the sight and hearing of such wickedness. 
 Nothing but my own senses would have brought me 
 to believe it of you. I am sorry. But you 
 you had better go." 
 
 The girl rose and looked penetratingly at the 
 figure of her friend. Not a falter of doubt ran 
 through Constantia's mind, and her bearing and 
 partially averted face were written all over with 
 evidences of her mental attitude, neither was there 
 a trace of the culprit in Eliza's manner. She 
 merely breathed a deep sigh, and left as she was 
 directed. 
 
 Nothing can play the part of unjust judge so well 
 as personal affection and family pride. But indeed 
 it had been a poor tribute to Constantia's capacity 
 for faithful and trustful love and the capacity for 
 trust demands qualities no less strenuous than faith- 
 fulness to have listened to the warning conveyed 
 to her at once. Ready unbelief would have been 
 treachery. Our virtues at the best are hedged by 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 imperfection, and love itself has need of its own 
 partiality and extravagance to shelter it from its 
 reverses. Nor could an after-knowledge that Eliza's 
 warning, promptly accepted, might have saved 
 them all from the chiefest part of the disaster, have 
 made her regret her first passion of proud, unques- 
 tioning, clear-eyed trust. We are but able to throw 
 into the moment the best we are momentarily 
 capable of j and it is as we grow in the sad wisdom 
 and experience of life that we come to see that 
 even our virtues and truest affections play a 
 double part in this mingled and melancholy drama 
 of existence. 
 
 Meanwhile Eliza had left the house. She had no 
 heart to encourage herself by any reference to the 
 purity of her motives; but her intellect steadily 
 refused to resign its hold on facts. This faithful- 
 ness to her own conclusions gave the touch of 
 grandeur to a character which might otherwise, 
 through misfortune, self-distrust, and over-affection- 
 ateness, have sunk into prostration and weakness. 
 As it was, she went out into a still more darkened 
 world a world full of the loss of friends carry- 
 ing her own burden and unconvicted by her own 
 judgment of any of the things with which Constantia 
 charged her. But it was appalling to be so charged. 
 How black was that wrong which could set the 
 whole world thus in discord and shut the hearts of 
 friends one against another ! 
 
 She turned automatically towards the shrubbery, 
 
 '75 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 and, walking as does one who is brain-benumbed, 
 plunged amongst the larches and fir-trees with the 
 instinct of the wounded creature after hiding. 
 Suddenly she felt her limbs give way under her, and, 
 stumbling up against a pine-tree, slid to the ground 
 and leaned her head against the trunk. She might 
 here have surrendered herself to the suppressed sobs 
 which fought in her breast, but that a step in the 
 underwood warned her to stillness. Out of that 
 underwood strange, sweet surprise after disaster 
 stepped Evan Dayntree. He came and stood 
 before her, plucking shyly at the bark of a fir-tree 
 near, and looking at her with whimsical kindness. 
 Why had he followed her? She was too wretched 
 for a talk. And yet her glance clung to the kind 
 brown eyes and hung on the queer strong face. He 
 flung himself suddenly on the ground beside her. 
 The young fellow's manhood had been deeply 
 stirred by the sight of her distress. It needed but 
 the signs of trouble anywhere to call up a force of 
 tenderness and loyal friendliness within him which 
 nothing would allay. He pushed a leaf towards 
 her on which he had caught a red spider, and it ran 
 from his brown hand over Eliza's dress. 
 
 " I say," he said half laughingly, while Eliza stared 
 at the dancing spider, "you have a tongue ! You 
 must be descended straight from the Saga heroines. 
 What makes you think of such things? Why! 
 you '11 whirl us all to limbo and think nothing of it ! 
 Lord help me if ever you slang me that way ! " 
 176 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 PROVIDENCE tempers the wind to the shorn lamb ; 
 the very hour that broke Eliza's friendship with 
 Constantia brought the renewed gift of Evan's. 
 
 At first she was hardly conscious that anything 
 of the kind was drawing near ; she was too little 
 accustomed to attract to suppose that such an one 
 as Evan was interested in her, but by natural de- 
 grees meetings between the pair became frequent, 
 and an intimacy was fallen into before either was 
 aware. Thus in the thorny wilderness sprang up 
 a rose-garden of love. The bickerings at home 
 began to fall on a deaf ear ; she could escape 
 from the family circle of disputants into a story of 
 her own. 
 
 The pine-wood to which he had first followed 
 her was the chosen meeting-place. Here Evan, 
 after an active morning, would bring his books in 
 the sure expectation that Eliza would recall his 
 cordial hint to join him there. Eliza loved the 
 warm wood with its sunlit spaces, its aromatic 
 odours, its silence, its occasional sounds of the 
 jay and the woodpecker and the squirrel ; above 
 12 177 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 all, for its safe loneliness and the melting of that 
 into this awakening friendship. 
 
 One afternoon Evan, throwing aside his book, 
 referred suddenly to the subject of Edward. He 
 leaned against the trunk of a fir-tree, she was 
 seated on the needle-covered ground; the same 
 beam of sunlight warmed them both. Startled by 
 his reference, she looked up ; he had taken off his 
 hat, the breeze moved his hair, and he wore a 
 musing expression. 
 
 He had inquired if the property was settled yet. 
 That was not the case ; she wished from her heart 
 it was arranged. 
 
 "I wouldn't choose to be the man to cut up 
 the orange," said he ; " but what does your brother 
 know of mines?" 
 
 "That dividends come from them." 
 
 " That sort of knowledge ? My word ! what I 
 know of mines wasn't got in an easy-chair." 
 
 " What do you know ? " 
 
 " Norman sent me out when I was a lad. I 'd got 
 a smattering of engineering, and he fancied I was 
 something of a manager of men, and that the rough- 
 and-tumble life out there would do me good." 
 
 "Out where?" 
 
 " Western Australia." 
 
 " Father's mines are there." 
 
 " Your father took shares in a company, did n't 
 he? Sherman's Reward they call the mines, I 
 think ? " 
 
 178 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " Oh, I dare say that 's the name. I don't care. 
 I believe my father was the principal shareholder. 
 What did you do in the mines ? " 
 
 " It was n't hanging round and asking for a job, 
 I can tell you. The first place I was sent to was 
 the Lake Prospect and Boulder North Battery, 
 where there were twenty head of stamps at work on 
 stone yielding ten to twelve and fourteen ounces 
 per ton. There were camps round the place where 
 two or three hundred men hung out, and a store 
 or two, and a pub, of course. I got a hut, and felt 
 my way a bit." 
 
 " Did you like it ? Was n't it rough ? " 
 
 " There was n't much time to consider. I 'd 
 enough to do keeping straight on my legs, and 
 looking after the engines, and so on. But I know 
 I liked one thing. I took a journey and did a bit 
 of prospecting on my own account, and made a 
 find." 
 
 " What is ' making a find ' ? " 
 
 " Oh, in a mine country it means that a fellow 's 
 going along a road, and he thinks he will just pan 
 out a bit, or make a prospecting hole, and behold 
 he ' strikes ile.' " 
 
 "I think I understand." 
 
 " Nice little girl ! " 
 
 " Did you ' strike ile ' ? " 
 
 "Well, yes. I took it into my head to look 
 into an ironstone outcrop near the track, and I 
 found it contained gold." 
 179 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Did that make you rich ? Was it all yours ? " 
 
 " It made me rich in one way. But the claim 
 was for Norman. I was only there for him.' 7 
 
 " How did it make you rich ? " 
 
 " Oh," said Evan, shamefacedly, " there were 
 one or two things. Norman took a ridiculous 
 view of them. He sent for me home, and made 
 it his business to give me the most splendid en- 
 gineering education that ever a man had ! " 
 
 There was a subdued glow in Evan's brown face 
 a light in the eye. He brought it down by 
 whistling, and striking his hands together lightly. 
 
 "I belong to a poorish branch of the family, 
 you know," said he. 
 
 "Do you like Mr. Dayntree, then ? " asked 
 Eliza, with her heart beating. 
 
 Evan nodded. The repressed gesture said more 
 than a storm of asseveration. 
 
 "Have you done your education yet?" asked 
 the girl, returning hastily from the dreadful subject 
 to a woman's eternal theme of interest in the man 
 and his works. 
 
 "Does one ever finish one's education? I've 
 got through the theoretic part, if you mean that, 
 in one way. Yes, I passed all right. Constantia 
 made a laurel wreath, I believe. But that didn't 
 content me. I wanted to go in for the practical part? 
 and learn to handle steel and iron from the begin- 
 ning. I've been kicked about, I do assure you, 
 like any journeyman apprentice ; and I Ve given 
 180 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 a blow or two myself, mayhap. Just now I *m doing 
 a bit of bookwork again. You can't polish up your 
 knowledge too fine." 
 
 " Did you pretend to be a workman ? Was that 
 how you came to know old Mr. Armstrong?" 
 
 " Is that the only way to get to know John Arm- 
 strong? " asked Evan, showing his teeth in a pleas- 
 ant laugh. " I 'm a genuine workman. And it 
 is n't so bad, either, if you let them see you know 
 a thing or two, and stand out for trade union wages. 
 Armstrong 's a great Trade Unionist." 
 
 "Yes," said Eliza, who only partly understood, 
 but to whom every word, whether comprehended 
 or not, was golden. 
 
 " So am I. In one way or another I Ve seen 
 a bit of life as a workman. But the main thing is, 
 that while you're doing a thing you see how it 
 might be done better ; and then the inventive fever 
 seizes you, and you 're like a chap possessed until 
 you Ve worked the notion out. Then you Ve a 
 wonderful sort of feel. You get it right down to 
 your finger-tips " Evan stretched out his wrists 
 and brown hands from his sleeves " you have a 
 new consciousness of all sorts of things ideas 
 that you can get real hold of, and put into forms 
 that will last. Think how it must have felt to the 
 chap that first got it into his noddle how a bridge 
 might be made to hang together. It 's like a new 
 sense. You go groping round, thinking what a 
 lot there J s left for your faculties to lay hold of." 
 181 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " I understand that 7 " said Eliza, in a glow. 
 
 " Yes I fancy you 're pretty wide-awake, young 
 woman. But to return to where we started. 
 What 's your brother's interest in mines ? " 
 
 11 1 told you. Dividends." 
 
 " Phew ! It 's the making the dividends, not 
 the gathering them, that 's the real fun. But what 's 
 at the bottom ? I mean, you don't seem to trust 
 your brother." 
 
 " I do not," said Eliza. " Once, with the rest, 
 I supposed him to be a hero. And yet I used to 
 wonder why Edward was such a hero. Now I 
 know that he's nothing of the sort." 
 
 " Well, I pity your brother. Give a dog a name 
 too good for him and hang him." 
 
 " Perhaps that 's it ; I don't know. He 's always 
 trying to appear something out of the ordinary, and 
 yet really his acts are shabby and second-rate. 
 That sort of pretence ends in ridiculous disaster. 
 I told him so, did n't I?" 
 
 " Something vigorous of the kind. And you 
 you would avert this disaster ? " 
 
 Eliza's lips opened to the ready "Yes." Con- 
 vention expects of every one a placable disposition. 
 But Evan's face had come to mean something defi- 
 nite to her mind, something that braced her to 
 efforts after truth. The facile affirmative was 
 checked. 
 
 " No," said she at last, "I would not." 
 
 Evan put his lips to the shape of a whistle. Eliza 
 182 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 
 
 turned a little pale, and wished she were not so un- 
 fortunate. But she held to her silence. 
 
 " I tell you what, Eliza," said Evan, in his man's 
 judicial way, " you are too harsh. There 's no part 
 of us where we are so idiotic as in our judgments 
 one of another. I too knew a man who got to be 
 very popular ; he got to the top rung of the ladder, 
 sat there quite comfortably, with his head in the 
 clouds, you know, and everybody took off their 
 hats to him, and grand people asked him to dinner 
 He held on gaily enough for a time : quite an 
 Egyptian god ; and then all of a sudden it was 
 found he had committed a crime a cheap sort of 
 miserable, sneaking fraud he turned out, you see. 
 They had to run him in, and change his broadcloth 
 for a sack embellished with the Government arrow. 
 And of course everybody made haste to drop him 
 like a hot potato ever after ; and yet all the time he 
 was the same man shunned or feted, just the 
 same. The possibility of the crime was in him 
 always, only he had n't been found out. Is n't this 
 over-condemnation or over-praising an unfair thing ? 
 It is best to keep silence. We know very little. 
 And it is foolish to find ourselves flattering a 
 man up one day, and imprisoning him the next ; 
 for all the time it is the same man, and I dare 
 say pretty much of a piece with ourselves. If 
 you knock about the world a bit, you come to 
 know what ups and downs there are in human 
 nature." 
 
 183 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Thus spoke the wider knowledge of a man. Eliza 
 listened painfully. 
 
 "But all the same the disaster brought out the 
 truth," said she. 
 
 Evan threw back his head with a pleasurable 
 laugh. 
 
 " It 's the truth you 're after then eh?" 
 
 " I don't know," said Eliza. " I think the truth 
 is safe." 
 
 " It was n't vengeance you sought ? " 
 
 " I find revenge painful when I try to feel it my- 
 self. But there is something fine and sustaining in 
 the vengeance that comes of itself." 
 
 " That 's it, is it? But I tell you what, Eliza, so 
 fine a sense of of is it justice? must make 
 you a little bit thorny to live with, eh ? " 
 
 The pallor of old distress came again to her 
 cheek. 
 
 " I see too much," said she. 
 
 " Is that it? But that 's fine." 
 
 " I am not loved," said she. " If I were a man, 
 I should be. But what are virtues in a man are not 
 taken in the same way in a woman. Amiable con- 
 cession is the only virtue people acknowledge in a 
 woman. That of course would be maudlin in a 
 man. But it 's no use my pretending I 'm built that 
 way. I can't do it." 
 
 " It just means you are n't a humbug." 
 
 " Of course I should like to think it was some- 
 thing grand. But I 'm afraid I can't do that." 
 184 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " Look here ! You 're pretty jolly, are n't you ? 
 They don't bully you at home ? " 
 
 " Oh, I don't know. I dare say it 's my own 
 fault. I jog on in my way. But I 've never had 
 the experience of joy. Sometimes I shut my eyes 
 and imagine what it would be to feel real turbulent, 
 satisfying joy. I have a Roman emperor feeling 
 that I could do with a good deal. But I have to 
 make shift with what you could carry in a corner of 
 a school-girl's apron." 
 
 " But you have pleasures? " 
 
 " The world is always interesting. Besides, I 
 have a sort of pleasure in keeping myself back from 
 expectation." 
 
 Evan looked at the speaker ; the golden light lay 
 on her young cheek. It was monstrous that such 
 words should issue from such a small red mouth. 
 The sense of manhood stirred his heart, and threw 
 tender rays from his eyes. He left his tree and slid 
 to a seat by her side. Eliza shifted a little, dis- 
 turbed by a sense of sudden warm happiness. She 
 looked shy as a squirrel, and as ready to dart away. 
 Evan's eyes laughed softly. 
 
 " Your name and mine begin with the same let- 
 ter," said he. 
 
 He traced the letter on the sandy soil twice 
 over; they stood out, ridged by a little bank of 
 pine-needles. Eliza perceived that it was as he 
 said ; and this was the very first time in her life she 
 had ever thought of her own name with compla- 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 cency. She advanced her chin towards his shoul- 
 der, and looked over it as he continued to trace 
 letters. " Eliza, Evan/' he made it. 
 
 " I 'm glad it's in pine-needles," said she, struck 
 by something fitting in that. 
 
 "Aromatic and strong. It means we shall be 
 friends are friends, " said Evan. 
 
 " Friends," repeated Eliza, sealing the word on 
 her heart and memory. 
 
 "Come to-morrow; and bring a manuscript with 
 you. Friends don't hide things from each other." 
 
 "A manuscript! Did I ever tell you such a 
 thing?" 
 
 " It was better than telling. I guessed." 
 
 " You know everything. But it seems waste of 
 time when you might be talking." 
 
 " Pish ! I 'in not going to be defrauded. To- 
 morrow at three, sharp." 
 
 And the next day it was fine again it was fine 
 all that summer of 1876. The very sky conspired 
 at this building up of a fleeting paradise. And a 
 pine-wood is the place left on earth for Paradise 
 a pine-wood, with its silence to human sounds, and 
 its opportunity for nature's, and its sun-collecting 
 powers. There for an afternoon you may lie at 
 ease in a golden, aromatic atmosphere, sun and 
 health streaming in at every pore, and hear no 
 sound save the note of the jay, the woodpecker, 
 and wood-pigeon, or the weirder cry of the squirrel ; 
 you may hear, too, its patter-patter as it runs down 
 186 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 the pine columns ; or you may hear the tapping of 
 the woodpecker at work, or the scamper of the rab- 
 bit, or the invisible beat of wings above the high 
 canopy of the trees, or the popping of pods and the 
 dropping of cones. And you may have for spec- 
 tacle bits of the intimate wood-life of creatures, the 
 run of the lizard slipping between the grass- blades, 
 the alert poise of the rabbit conscious of enemies at 
 hand, the tragical wars of the ants, their building 
 and industry, the dance of spiders, and the unfold- 
 ing or shedding of leaves and petals. 
 
 Eliza was acquainted with the secret magic of 
 woods, but the presence of Evan there threw an 
 ever-new enchantment. She never lost the thrill of 
 surprise with which his face and general appearance 
 affected her when she saw him waiting amongst the 
 trees. 
 
 "What have you brought?" said he next day, 
 smiling at the bird-like, speculative way in which 
 she eyed him. 
 
 " A manuscript ; but then " 
 
 "Unhand!" 
 
 He took the MS. from her; the young fingers 
 nestled together in the act. She directed a shy, 
 half-alarmed glance at the strong countenance 
 clear-shaven, the hook of the nose under the straight- 
 lying eyebrows, and the wide eloquent lips beneath. 
 The face had a certain mobility, but the distinctive 
 characteristic was that of a man who knows what 
 he wants and what he is, and stands to it with 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 unconscious and easy strength. The charm of the 
 countenance was in its oddity, its brownness of 
 skin and hair and eyes, and the rare expressiveness 
 which would shoot over the general look of phlegm 
 and dogged reserve. The figure was slim and tall, 
 the general build and aspect being that of a man of 
 active life. He smacked nothing of the book or 
 the desk ; he had but taken culture as a preliminary 
 to active service, and the oil he used up was that 
 which he applied to machinery. Yet he was a 
 thinker ; his enlarged consciousness made him that, 
 a thinker more than in the sense of an engineer 
 and inventor. 
 
 Evan sat at a little distance from Eliza while she 
 read. 
 
 With the closing of the manuscript her courage 
 ran out, and she fell into a timid and self-doubting 
 mood. Evan looked at her with quiet interest, and 
 presently she felt it, whereupon she coloured and 
 her heart beat. 
 
 " So you wrote that?" said he. 
 
 Eliza nodded. 
 
 " I do not quite see why you should be troubled 
 with self-distrust," said he. 
 
 Her face softened : a smile changed her lips ; 
 she turned her head aside, yet showed a deeply 
 tinted cheek. 
 
 " I have not so much minded since I met you 
 again since you praised me." 
 
 "Has it helped you?" 
 
 188 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " I tell you what, Eliza," said Evan, taking a 
 stick and running his eye along it to make a meas- 
 urement, " it 's a bit of very fine common-sense to 
 have a good look at yourself and your capacities, 
 accept the whole lump, good and bad together, and 
 make shift not to be frightened." 
 
 "Does everybody have to do it?" 
 
 " Lord bless you, yes. If they 're worth their salt." 
 
 " Very well, then ; I have done so. I shall be 
 lonely. Yet not so lonely." 
 
 He smiled, and, putting out his hand, took Eliza's 
 in his own and pressed it in a silent promise of 
 good comradeship. 
 
 It was not love, but it might have been love. 
 
 Such an intimacy carried on uninterruptedly 
 would have borne them into the deeps of existence, 
 and a moment would have discovered the impor- 
 tance to each of the other's personality. But Eliza 
 was not a woman to catch a man suddenly on the 
 warm current of his blood ; and in this crowded 
 world opportunities are not prolonged. One hot 
 afternoon in September the change came to her 
 Arcadia. They were still in the pine-wood, and 
 Evan had been teaching her to distinguish birds by 
 their flight. 
 
 " A thing is so much more when one can name 
 it," Eliza had said. 
 
 They were on their way home, and neared the 
 gate that opened to the road. As they approached 
 189 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 they heard the sound of the mad gallop of hoofs on 
 the sward in the lane. A pony went by bearing a 
 figure whether man or woman did not immedi- 
 ately appear. But whoever it was caught a glimpse 
 of Eliza, glanced back and pulled up. It was Rosa- 
 lie. She leapt from the pony's back and slipped 
 the bridle over her arm. She wore one knew not 
 what costume save that it was graceful, boyish, and 
 eminently adapted to her person and to the saddle 
 the saddle, that is, when a ride is contemplated 
 up the pass of a mountain or across the prairies of 
 the West. The scarlet head-gear of which she was 
 so fond, topped her dark rippling hair, and the 
 flame of it was repeated in her cheeks ; but no part 
 of her charm, not excepting her eyes, was so great 
 as the ease and poetry of her activity, her manage- 
 ment and mastery of herself and horse. 
 
 She ran up to Eliza looking like a handsome boy, 
 the pony trotting after her ; the allurement of her 
 sex appealed the more strongly to Evan because of 
 her strange disguise. Through the boyish costume 
 the lines of her figure the slender neck, the thin 
 slight waist, the fineness of limb threw out a 
 strong delicious impress of womanhood in vigour 
 and activity. It touched his heart with a swift sug- 
 gestion of the desirableness of the sex could the 
 more permanent feminine qualities be associated 
 with suppleness of muscle and delicate firmness of 
 nerve. When she stretched over the gate and 
 touched Eliza's cheek with her lips, Evan felt the 
 190 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 bite of it in his heart. She had caught him on the 
 wing of his fancy, spurring up his emotions with the 
 lightest flick, and already they leapt with him to 
 the clouds. She had not yet spoken. The kiss 
 over, she began 
 
 " Here I am, Eliza, in the full swing of final 
 rebellion. Glynn and the groom are scouring the 
 country in search of me. It became necessary to 
 do something marked. So I raked this dress out 
 of a drawer I used to ride in it with my father 
 abroad went to the stables and saddled my pony 
 myself and then rode off, passing the front of the 
 house ostentatiously first. I am bent on reforming 
 Glynn. But the remedies will have to be severe. 
 I must scandalise the county." 
 
 She raised the knot of her riding whip and pushed 
 her scarlet cap back a little for between laughter 
 and wild riding she was hot and perceiving Evan 
 for the first time. The laughter and daring died 
 not one whit from her eyes, but their glance slid 
 from the deep admiration in his. 
 
 " Rosalie, may I introduce Mr. Evan Dayntree ? 
 This is Miss Trelyon." 
 
 The voice was cold, almost weary. She too had 
 marked in his eyes that expression which he had 
 never turned on herself. 
 
 "You had better not know me, Mr. Dayntree," 
 
 said Rosalie, crisply ; " I am a social rebel, and should 
 
 shock your prejudices. Adieu, Eliza. Come and see 
 
 me soon. Just at present I must pursue my flight." 
 
 191 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " The pony had been snuggling its muzzle against 
 her arm ; she laid her hand on its shoulder and 
 was back on the saddle in a moment, disregarding 
 Evan's eager proffer of help. The pony sprang to 
 a gallop and she was gone. 
 
 Evan and Eliza turned and walked, but it was in 
 silence. The birds, the trees, the flowers drew 
 from them no remark. Arcadia was over. Evan, 
 glancing at his companion, found her face was like 
 a homely landscape from which the sun has been 
 withdrawn. Yet he had thought her pretty before. 
 After a little time a groom thundered past on a big 
 grey horse. 
 
 " What a piece of fun ! " murmured Evan. 
 
 "Yes," said Eliza in a low voice. 
 
 It provoked him that she should be so silent and 
 self-contained. 
 
 It is an old tragedy ; the foot of one woman 
 treads too closely on another; Eliza's love-story 
 was broken. 
 
 For the next three days Evan neglected to carry 
 his books to the pine-wood. He thought the 
 weather was clouded and chill. He said not a 
 word to any one not even to Constantia. But it 
 is difficult for a young man to hide his love from a 
 woman interested in him, and older than himself. 
 
 Constantia pondered over the identity of the girl 
 who had caught and chained his fancy. One even- 
 ing a small incident revealed to her that it was 
 Rosalie Trelyon. And then her heart leapt up with 
 192 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 the strangest beat of gladness ; she wondered that 
 her hands trembled, that so intense a relief mingled 
 with her sympathy. Only in that moment did she 
 discover that Eliza's warning had left a mark. She 
 thought she would tell her husband that night how 
 she had guessed at Evan's secret. She did not. 
 Something held her tongue. She shrank from so 
 much self-abasement as would lie in the appearance 
 in her own eyes of managing in a matter in 
 which she proudly disdained to believe. 
 
 13 193 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE day following found Rosalie in a melancholy 
 mood, and without other resource than to wander 
 in the garden. Since her foot touched this land of 
 fogs, and limited scope, she had been subjected to 1 
 occasional fits of ennui, and these a healthy instinct 
 prompted her to combat in ways objectionable to 
 her mother and Miss Glynn. Rosalie was one 
 whose force of nature needed constant outlets to 
 keep it wholesome. Of late the triste and empty 
 moods had deepened to something more sombre ; 
 they usually accompanied the turning of her thought 
 upon her mother, and left her with failing self- 
 assurance and the sense of being as groping a 
 creature as most. 
 
 From patronage and almost open ridicule she 
 began unwillingly to connect her mother with a 
 sense of fear. Deep down beneath that lady's 
 conventions and languid invalidism the daughter 
 thought she detected a daring cynicism, a cold con- 
 tempt of the world she flattered and baffled, before 
 which her own scorn paled. The teasing question 
 was whether this contempt included herself. 
 194 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon's skill in innuendo was proverbial. 
 In the interview to which her daughter was sum- 
 moned after yesterday's escapade, she kept an 
 unruffled demeanour, but exercised that skill of the 
 tongue to its highest point. Rosalie had been 
 affected by it as by something in the last degree 
 dreadful. She felt that she was threatened, but did 
 not learn with what ; the velvet voice admonished 
 her of danger, and went no further with the infor- 
 mation ; somewhere she inferred was a shadow, and 
 at any moment the splendour of existence might be 
 overcast. 
 
 In the park was a favourite place of her resort ; 
 it was a wide and level plateau of grass that might 
 once have been a bowling-green, but which now 
 was a sun-filled spot in which the blades and 
 smaller flowers grew more freely than in a lawn. 
 Thither that afternoon she turned her steps, and, 
 pacing slowly to and fro, her hands linked behind 
 her, her eyes now fixed on the grass and now 
 uplifted to the horizon, marshalled before her 
 memory every incident of her life which had per- 
 plexed her by something the same mystery which 
 her mother's innuendoes intentionally cast towards 
 her to-day. It was necessary for her peace of 
 mind to hunt these hints down to knowledge, and 
 to satisfy herself whether a genuine cause for alarm 
 existed or whether (and to this she inclined) 
 the fear was conventional, and needed but a firm 
 defiance in the crushing. For full an hour she 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 paced up and down, her face wearing the look of a 
 handsome savage, whose every sense and instinct is 
 on the alert against danger. 
 
 This face of Rosalie's was delicately sketched in 
 lines that run to pride rather than pathos ; besides 
 its beauty it was full of charm ; nevertheless it had a 
 quality a certain quality not very easy to define, 
 but perfectly recognisable to the opposite sex. 
 
 When the face was full of healthy occupation the 
 quality appeared merely as a beautiful ripeness ; 
 but on occasion and the first meeting with Nor- 
 man had been one of these it took a stronger 
 accentuation. 
 
 There came a moment when, as by enchantment, 
 the truth she sought leapt suddenly upon her, and 
 showed itself as a thing at once astounding, unwel- 
 come, and convincing ; the bright intensity of ex- 
 pression was smitten from her countenance; she 
 stood motionless, her head drooping, and drew one 
 or two deep breaths. Then she raised her head 
 and showed her eyes hardening a little, while that 
 quality in her face stood out in marked distinctness. 
 She had received a shock, and it had disturbed the 
 least admirable part of a nature full of force in every 
 portion of it. The worst, the most dangerous, was 
 uppermost. 
 
 " I knew it," said she, taking a pace or two for- 
 wards ; " my father ! All along he was telling me 
 the same thing in his way." 
 
 She threw herself full-length on the grass to re- 
 196 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 fleet; it was not in her nature to count herself 
 defeated or even injured, still less and this was 
 unfortunate humiliated in the least degree. 
 
 The news after all was painful only to her con- 
 ventionalised part ; it was on the other hand con- 
 sistent so she proudly told herself with her 
 ideal, and merely broke away any remaining shackle 
 wherewith she had permitted civilisation to bind 
 her. Life had always been a little splendid in cir- 
 cumstance, this argued splendour in herself ; hence- 
 forth she was free indeed ; nothing in her existence 
 from the very beginning had, it appeared, been 
 commonplace ; her very nature had been sown 
 with seeds other than those allowed by social rules 
 and contracts ; her origin was apart from a greater 
 than the laws within which, she was now sure, she 
 had not been born. An instinct always to regard 
 herself pictorially led her to argue on to even finer 
 conclusions. Her mother's figure, for example, 
 began to loom upon her fancy in somewhat heroic 
 dimensions ; those who broke laws were greater in 
 her view than the laws they broke, and greatest in 
 the moment when they broke them. The birthright 
 bestowed upon herself was liberty ; she this 
 Rosalie who lay along the grass was specially the 
 child and heir to freedom ; existence had been 
 given to h A r by the brevet of Nature alone, and 
 that was a more valid one than any these poor 
 puppets born of convention could claim. On ran 
 her imagination dizzily, to conjure at last nothing 
 197 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 but a glowing splendour from her discovery, and a 
 sense of emancipation so exuberant that had she 
 known it, it was akin to license. Then the eyes 
 shining and changing with the rippling of the grass, 
 softened a little. Thought had carried her to her 
 so-called father, and she pondered on his love and 
 large indulgence. Why had it been so ? 
 
 He had been, she knew, one of those quietly 
 original natures who solve problems according to 
 their own conclusions alone. To have accepted a 
 painful experience silently, and to have treated it in 
 a manner out of all precedent was like him. She 
 remembered him as a nature deeply tinged with 
 melancholy, a man of few words, and delighting 
 only in the strenuous activities in which he had 
 trained her to take part. But that he should have 
 thrown such adequate protection over her mother 
 as was involved by his acceptance of herself must 
 find an answer fitted to her dreams. She sought it 
 in the conviction that her father had recognised in 
 the assailant of his honour a character cast in a 
 finer mould than his own a man perhaps whose 
 only right was dauntless deeds and had bowed to 
 the elemental claim of superiority. 
 
 Now indeed the girl clasped a hand upon a beat- 
 ing heart ! To her putative father she had given a 
 golden allegiance as to the man amongst men. 
 Who was great enough to filch allegiance from him 
 and who to be the splendid thief who had 
 tempted her mother from his side? 
 198 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " My mother locks his memory in her eyes/ 7 she 
 murmured ; " I see it when I find the half-lidded 
 look upon me. Would she but speak and let me 
 share ! " 
 
 Upon this fanciful presentment of a great descent _, 
 her fancy clung and brightened. She was full of 
 intoxicated imaginings, her dreams took higher 
 wings. She began to summon from the pages of 
 later history processions of the bearers of great 
 names, to recall stupendous deeds and to remember 
 their authors ; and as the shadows of these great 
 ones of the earth fell on her mind, to first one, then 
 another, her eager pride leapt out with the cry of 
 "Father!" 
 
 The baffling point in this enchanted dreaming 
 was her mother. Why should she sink from the 
 level of that past to a life of subterfuge ? Better a 
 great irregularity, and even crime, than an existence 
 of sleepy order a life for example such as Con- 
 stantia Dayntree led (her mind darted a contemptu- 
 ous daring thought Constantia's way), slow-creeping 
 along trim and common paths. Why should her 
 mother conform to this ignoble world when the 
 secret of the past was worth a bold demeanour? 
 Scornful impatience moved her to higher compacts 
 with herself; should such an hour arrive, thus and 
 thus her fearless choice should lie. With small 
 rash fingers of the soul at heart an innocent for 
 the last time she loosed the safeguards that re- 
 mained, and breathed out the unbridled question 
 199 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 whether one existed whose worth stood level with 
 her clear resolve. 
 
 That was the moment for the vaguer vaunt to leave 
 her mind in the dangerous occupation of detail. 
 
 One she told herself fitted well with her concep- 
 tion of a man. That one fretted her by the sense 
 of imperfect conquest ; there was a reserve, a power 
 she had not shaken a barrier over which her feet 
 had not trespassed. She was teased by the sense 
 of an unconquered world. On her side was there 
 even a ripple of passion ? It might be enough to 
 give zest to the adventure. But passion so far had 
 been a changeling led by her own hand ; she said 
 that she was free when she liked and could cast the 
 changeling off at wish. At that instant, however, 
 drawing within her fevered mind too clear and free 
 a presentment of an admired personality, she found 
 herself assaulted by an insufferable tumult of the 
 heart and pulses ; something unruly had her in its 
 grip, and she leapt to a sitting posture in defiance 
 of this formidable sensation her blood surging at 
 a name. 
 
 A shadow fell upon her from behind, and some 
 one stood between the sun and her; she knew with- 
 out looking up that it was her mother ; with her 
 presence came a chill. 
 
 "Yes? " said she, without turning her head. 
 
 "Your plans for the afternoon, my dear?" de- 
 manded Mrs. Trelyon, suavely ; " are we to repeat 
 the escapade of yesterday? " 
 200 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " My invention is nearly at an end," said Rosalie, 
 with a smile. " By and by I shall think of some- 
 thing." But the smile was nervous. Her nature 
 still shook under that premonitory shudder which 
 felt as a reverberation from something at once allur- 
 ing and destructive. "Mother! Mother!" she 
 added involuntarily. 
 
 The cry rose unbidden. Mrs. Trelyon received 
 it in silence. She had not forgiven yesterday's mad 
 ride ; she was not able to feel tender to the girl 
 whose wilful eccentricity sent perpetual chills of 
 apprehension to a heart too proud to endure the 
 consciousness of them. Looking down upon her 
 daughter, she found her too much the counterpart 
 of herself not to shrink from her ; too much a dis- 
 turber of buried memories ; there were things in her 
 own life yet unpardoned by her own pride, out of 
 which the consequence had been dammed up by a 
 vigorous will and careful discretion. It was difficult 
 for her to bear the re-awakening of half-dead scan- 
 dals. What was the good of having been a woman 
 cleverer than most when everything was risked by 
 Rosalie's insistence on this skittish dance upon the 
 edge of danger? When yesterday she rode past 
 the drawing-room windows in that costume, of what 
 had not the girl reminded her ! There was bitter- 
 ness and anguish in the woman's heart as she stood 
 looking down on the handsome head with its waves 
 of dark hair. There was fear too fear of this off- 
 spring of her own who in pride and spirit and wil- 
 201 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 fulness watched herself, and who had been trained 
 by her husband to a directness of speech and bear- 
 ing which, under the circumstances, she could but 
 find exasperating. 
 
 " I 'm afraid you must not ask for my assistance. 
 But whatever your ingenuity decides on, remember 
 one thing : take Glynn with you" said she, pur- 
 posely toning her voice shaken through and 
 through as she was by misery and alarm to its 
 habitual suave cynicism. 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " Because your character is safe when in her 
 companionship from its own recklessness." 
 
 " She is a vile humbug." 
 
 " No merely stupid." 
 
 " But why is stupidity my safeguard ? " 
 
 " Because stupidity is what society trusts. I long 
 ago made the discovery, and therefore engaged 
 Glynn for you." 
 
 " Do you want me to be a liar and a humbug 
 too, mother? " 
 
 " My dear ! You remind me of your father. He 
 was often violent, and then he introduced irrelevant 
 matter." 
 
 "Mother! mother! who was my father?" cried 
 Rosalie, in a voice burning with dreams. 
 
 A light sigh from Mrs. Trelyon floated over her 
 head. 
 
 " An excellent man who undervalued me." 
 
 "Tell me the truth." 
 
 202 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 " I do so on occasion boldly. And then you 
 reject it." 
 
 "My father was a king amongst men.'' 
 
 " There, love, you seem to me mistaken. But 
 have it your own way." 
 
 " I shall have my own way. I shall take my own 
 way." 
 
 " Take it take it, dear ! cordially. Only 
 take Glynn along with you too." 
 
 " I shall be true," 
 
 " My love ! Try not. Society will never pardon 
 you for that." 
 
 It was a battle of empty words ; but the back- 
 ground was tense with fear. 
 
 203 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 " HEAVEN fit me for this new dawn ! As I 'm a 
 man and a lover I shall do something ! " Evan had 
 procured an introduction to the lady of his dreams, 
 and he was not one to let the grass grow under his 
 feet once his resolve was taken. It was character- 
 istic of him that the leaven of the new emotion, while 
 stirring every department of his nature, pre-emi- 
 nently introduced itself into his conception of work. 
 
 " If I had not met her," said he to himself on his 
 way back from a call at South Downs, " I should 
 have been content with a very small achievement. 
 Just a pump or two, for example, or opening up an 
 English railway. But I'm bound for something 
 better now. There 's that dredging difficulty in the 
 Suez Canal. I 've had a notion or two lately how 
 to worry through that business a notion I got 
 when examining the charts of the Breakwaters and 
 the flow of the currents. Now I Ve a mind to set 
 to work on it in earnest. If on further examination 
 I find my idea holds together, I '11 get Norman to 
 use his interest in giving me a chance to lay it before 
 the authorities, and I '11 get myself sent out there 
 just to have a shy at it. Meanwhile I '11 finish off 
 204 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 that job on the Thames : if I can't make my plan 
 of pneumatic dredging a success, I don't count my 
 head worth a barber's handling." 
 
 Day by day, in the intervals of a passion of appli- 
 cation to his work, he strode in eager haste to 
 Rosalie's side. He thought of her as the noblest 
 " not impossible " mate a man's eyes ever shone 
 upon. She thought of him as the new young man 
 with the odd tanned face and the inevitable look. 
 Perhaps he was a shade more interesting than 
 others, as he never fell back on the inanity of " small 
 talk," but either listened or spoke of real things. In 
 fact Evan was too much possessed by an absorbing 
 sense of the earnestness of life to be in a mood to 
 attempt engaging twaddle ; he talked to her from 
 the level of his own ideas of what she was, and 
 chiefly about the engineering schemes of which he 
 secretly named her the inspirer. She had shown 
 interest in a sketch of the Suez Canal, and in his 
 description of the difficulty caused by the opposition 
 of the Breakwaters to the washing of the sea ; her 
 face brightened pleasantly when he said he had a 
 notion it might be overcome ; that was so much to 
 the good. On his side he endeavoured to tempt 
 her to speak of her colonial life; here he found 
 her reticent; she would draw back, appear con- 
 strained ; the eloquent, beautiful lips closed, only 
 opening again to utter something evasive. 
 
 Rosalie no longer invited conversation on the 
 colonies ; her mental attitude to that portion of her 
 205 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 life was changed. The past was indeed golden as 
 ever, but then her part in it had been played she 
 told herself under false pretences. It had been a 
 gift from Mr. Trelyon, and not her own right ; even 
 the name she bore was not her own. Nothing 
 would cure this complicated wound to her pride 
 save the winning to herself of as striking a position 
 and uncommon an environment from some basis 
 strictly her own. 
 
 Evan remarked, though he misread the reason, 
 that schemes which appealed to the imagination 
 schemes in effect a little "in the air" interested 
 her more than Suez Canal difficulties. Of the 
 particular make of dredging-boat that was to help 
 towards the cleansing of the Thames, he had an 
 instinct not to speak ; that was too prosaic for 
 the ears of the lady of his love, or rather he had not 
 the skill to set out in language any of the poetry 
 which he discerned as lying behind. He introduced 
 the subject of the Soudan and of the proposed rail- 
 way. He told of the run of one hundred and 
 fifty miles that had to be made across a desert un- 
 inhabited, save by wandering tribes, subject to vio- 
 lent dust-storms or to immersion beneath tropical 
 rainfalls or downpours from the reservoirs of granite 
 hills. Something in the sense of vast desolating 
 loneliness touched her treasured memories without 
 hurting them ; she sparkled ; the eyes opened on 
 some intense appreciation ; they were dreamlike ; 
 the interest he could not but see was ulterior but 
 206 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 she was pleased, and that was something. He had 
 knowledge of his subject and talked on, a map 
 under his hand. She broke in on his words with a 
 half-breathed exclamation, 
 
 " A man is wanted to bring the enterprise through. 
 Such a man I know ! " 
 
 It fell as an unpremeditated whisper to her own 
 ear. For a moment Evan's vanity allowed a hope \ 
 but then the absent film in her eyes effaced it. 
 Some pain constricted his heart, and he turned 
 from her face and looked soberly before him with 
 mildly folded lips warning himself to patience and 
 against presumption. 
 
 Walking home that day, he pondered within him- 
 self whether he should throw his energies into the 
 Soudan scheme, and by doubling his work and 
 his efforts, force his way to the front and win her 
 praise. 
 
 " But who was the other fellow she meant?" he 
 asked himself uneasily ; " a word may be a thrust to 
 a man's heart, I find ! It 's part of the condition, I 
 suppose. Well ! the odds are she meant no more 
 than a better foreign or colonial secretary than 
 we Ve got." 
 
 He thought of the slender hand as he had seen it 
 lying by the map near him, the third finger wearing 
 in his fancy not so much a rim of gold as one of 
 light. With that his face turned to the horizon with 
 on-looking eyes, became suffused with emotion, and 
 from his lips broke words of wild yearning tender- 
 207 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 ness ; the song of the night-jar throbbing through 
 the air musically threw them back to his ear : 
 " Wife ! Wife ! Inspirer ! " then rang. 
 
 " No ! no ! " said he to himself as he paced along 
 more rapidly ; " I Ve got not to lose hold on myself. 
 If I 'm to realise my hopes, I 'm not to give up my 
 real instincts for a false step miscalled a short 
 cut. Dredging and kindred work, Evan Dayn- 
 tree, is your settled business, and you 've got to 
 go on setting your hand to it, and find the poetry 
 after." 
 
 He took his cap from his head and walked on, 
 listening to and interpreting the song of the bird 
 by the thrills in his own heart. He knew by the 
 stir there, by the tumult throughout his nature, that 
 the woman he had chosen was his own. There 
 were other young men of course in question. That 
 did not disturb him. Armstrong came there, for 
 example. It scarcely ruffled his feeling. All the 
 world was in love with her, of course ; but it brought 
 him not a falter of doubt. 
 
 Thus day by day the love-story ran on, her 
 charm growing with the hours. And in a sense 
 he saw her truly, building up her qualities and in- 
 ferring her characteristics with the insight of a lover. 
 But his eye failed there where he never dreamed 
 of looking. He took the usual feminine attributes 
 for granted, and no more questioned their existence 
 than he questioned the existence of a white cleanly 
 body beneath her mysteriously picturesque costumes. 
 208 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 Meanwhile it happened to Norman Dayntree to 
 experience the inconveniences of a complicated 
 character. A strong man of less mixed nature is 
 indomitable alike in his wickedness and in his 
 goodness, but there was a backwater in the mind 
 of Norman which interfered with completeness. 
 With him the average sensuality entrenched in 
 custom was beleaguered round by rare spiritual 
 possibilities ; already the foe knocked warningly, 
 irregularly, against the gates ; on occasion, even 
 now, he started at this eerie rap from spectral fin- 
 gers. It was within the hazard of the game that 
 the small thing might become importunate, might 
 rise to thunders, to violent incursion, to a desolating 
 onslaught of something spiritually terrific. Norman 
 was not the type of man who is left alone to his 
 iniquity. 
 
 He met these unfounded scares with the cold 
 negations of common -sense. So far he was clear 
 of anything final, but he was perfectly aware what 
 lay within the possibilities should intoxicating op- 
 portunity continue to hunt him. The contem- 
 plated thing he might refuse to qualify as either 
 right or wrong ; he saw it if he looked at it at 
 all as an action carrying certain balances of 
 advantage for himself, and no harm to any other 
 creature. A commercial transaction standing be- 
 fore him in such a light would not leave room for 
 hesitation. 
 
 As regards the girl ? Well ! There are women 
 H 209 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 and women as there are men and men. Human 
 nature appraises its kind by rules of its own, deter- 
 mining personal worth in a balance by untested 
 weights and measures. From the evening when she 
 had thrown her first ensnaring glance towards him, 
 he had had impressions and instincts ; and in these 
 matters what man erred ? Surmise as to her pos- 
 sible nature was supported by convenient gossip 
 a bit of scandal had of late been revived. Trelyon 
 was recalled as one "without guile," likeable 
 enough, but on occasion obstinate and of wholly 
 incalculable action. Accidentally the girl might be 
 partly a Warrenne, but she was no Trelyon ; his 
 carrying her off secretly and rearing her as his own 
 child was a bit of laughable eccentricity ; but that 
 was Trelyon all over. Apart from origin, Rosalie 
 was, as a man views things, fair game ; for in effect 
 she, not he, was the seducer. There indeed was 
 the rub ! Still he could tell himself that he had 
 kept the reins to this hour in his own hands ; on the 
 whole his manliness was satisfied with itself, but the 
 physical was an element that had to be reckoned 
 with, and he was not one to cry " Fool ! " at a lost 
 chance. 
 
 So far in frigid common-sense the sensual man ; 
 but whence came that tap-tapping of the spectral 
 finger ? Norman thought he knew. Yes : he 
 knew ! he knew ! There are women and women. 
 It was from that great white patch in his existence 
 that the warning came. Constantia and her chil- 
 210 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 dren ! The heaven of Constantia's love and trust 
 was capable of turning into hell. 
 
 Norman, seated in his study, brought his hand 
 down amongst the Armstrong papers with passionate 
 emphasis. 
 
 " Before heaven ! " cried he, in the inmost parts 
 of his soul, " her confidence is not broken. I am 
 her true husband in all that part of me that belongs 
 to her, and the true father of her children. She 
 shall not be hurt : I have the strength to cherish and 
 protect her even from myself. But men are not as 
 women. Nature, not I, is responsible. Her purity 
 is not for me. The sweetness of the flesh what 
 does she know of it, save as something subordinated 
 to and connected with her great sublime protective 
 love of me? But flesh as flesh? This fire in the 
 blood this urgent necessity of physical passion 
 she knows nothing of that. When a woman like 
 Rosalie beckons, let me not name the two names 
 in a breath ! Constantia ? No one is her rival. 
 The one thing precludes the other. Constantia? 
 the total distinction between my feeling for her 
 and my feelings for that other ! No domain of 
 Constantia's is trespassed on. I call heaven to 
 witness I am her true husband. This variation in 
 my nature is not hers nor the best of me. It 
 passes. I slacken this thirst, appease this craze, 
 and who is the worse ? It is just the habit of the 
 man. My own mind judges this thing, and is its 
 own arbiter. Constantia shall not be hurt or 
 
 211 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 touched. As to Rosalie man's evil before which 
 he inevitably falls, and which he as inevitably tri- 
 umphs over and casts off ! as to Rosalie, who 
 knows that I am the first V 
 
 The handle of the door turned. Norman glanced 
 over his shoulder. It was Evan who entered. He 
 carried a letter. 
 
 " The evening post? " said Norman, holding his 
 hand out mechanically. 
 
 " Yes ; I am a bit excited. A queerish thing 
 has turned up." 
 
 " Anything for a break. I 'm wearying over the 
 Armstrong property. I 'm like a lad with his Co- 
 lenso, doing sums for a place in class and solving 
 questions in proportion." 
 
 "Is it settled?" 
 
 " On paper." 
 
 " I 'm afraid this will upset it a trifle ; I Ve got 
 an odd bit of news from Australia." 
 
 " Not the mines ? " 
 
 " That 's it." 
 
 Norman sat silent, stroking his moustache thought- 
 fully. 
 
 " I 'm inclined to question the wisdom of my 
 hearing this news at all. You think it important?" 
 
 Evan nodded. Norman got up and went to the 
 window. He experienced a feeling of invincible 
 dislike to hearing the news. 
 
 "Ignorance may be better than knowledge in 
 some instances," said he. "Who knows that I 
 
 212 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 shall make the division the better or the worse for 
 the news ? " 
 
 Evan remained in respectful silence. 
 
 " Well ! You Ve read it. What is your opinion ? " 
 
 "I think that you should see it." 
 
 "There spoke Evan Dayntree," said Norman, 
 with a short laugh. 
 
 "Hand it over. No! Read it aloud." 
 
 Evan obeyed. 
 
 " This is the passage," said he 
 
 " ' By the way, I Ve just heard that Sherman's 
 Reward has turned out a wild cat ' " 
 
 "What in God's name does that mean? " inter- 
 rupted Norman, irritably. 
 
 " He means the mines have proved a take-in or 
 a swindle." 
 
 " Phew ! Well ! Get on." 
 
 " ' and yet they have been splendidly reported 
 on by the great authority here. But I think people 
 are beginning to find out the games of those big 
 bugs here; certainly fellows on the spot would 
 think not twice but many times before putting their 
 money into concerns which had been glowingly 
 reported on by that particular authority or his 
 colleagues ' 
 
 " There 's more ; but that 's all that matters." 
 
 Norman stretched his hand for the letter. 
 
 "Who's this fellow?" asked he, turning to the 
 signature sharply. 
 
 "A chum of my own. I met him out there." 
 213 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 "You trust him?" 
 
 " I do." 
 
 " Oh ! that 's all very well. I mean has he a 
 head on his shoulders? " 
 
 That was so, Evan said. 
 
 Norman drummed with his paper-knife on the table. 
 
 " This news just now is hugely inconvenient," said 
 he ; " you understand that it has no meaning what- 
 ever without corroboration ? " 
 
 Evan nodded. 
 
 44 I have means of getting it either corroborated 
 or contradicted, and I shall see to it that inquiries 
 are made in the proper way. Can you stop that 
 young fellow's tongue or pen ? " 
 
 " Oh ! He only lets on to me." 
 
 "Well! stop it," said Norman, again with the 
 note of irritation. " And you will keep this to 
 yourself? " 
 
 Again Evan nodded. 
 
 " How was the market to-day ? " 
 
 " Shares still rising." 
 
 "Very well. For the present we dismiss the 
 subject. Now for a smoke. I fancy you are spoil- 
 ing for a talk." 
 
 "So I am, and that's the truth," said Evan; 
 " my pneumatic dredging-boat is to be tried shortly 
 at Mill wall Docks. A lot of engineering fellows are 
 interested. If it 's a success, it 's so much to the 
 good for me. It 's it 's well for a fellow to have 
 two strings to his bow." 
 
 214 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 He came forward and sat down on a sofa, but 
 looked far too energetically restless to lounge. 
 Norman in a more leisurely frame lit a cigar, and 
 threw himself back on an arm-chair. 
 
 " You 're pushing on then, Evan ? " said he, look- 
 ing at the young man with kind paternal eyes. 
 
 " I am so. I don 't mean to turn out a bad 
 investment, you know." 
 
 " Well ! what are your two strings ? " 
 
 " One 's a bit more fancy than the other. Sewer- 
 age and dredging are my line, I 'm convinced. I 
 can't see a river and a town without my head 
 begins planning. I shall, maybe, offer for a posi- 
 tion as practical engineer under the Board of 
 Works. The drainage system over yonder ! Lord ! 
 They're in an awful muddle pouring filth into 
 the river, and then churning it up with pumps. 
 I ? ve got a notion or two about it which really 
 fellows might as well try ; for they can't be worse 
 off than they are. It *s enough to make one sit 
 down and weep." 
 
 " All right ! " said Norman, laughing delightedly ; 
 " put the old M. B. W. straight if you can ! I '11 
 lend you all the interest I have for the place." 
 
 " But that is n't all/' said Evan, a trifle shame- 
 facedly. 
 
 "Ah! The other string the more embroi- 
 dered article ? " 
 
 " Well, yes ! I 'm afraid you '11 think it a bit 
 
 fanciful. And yet " 
 
 215 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Norman took his cigar * from his mouth and 
 looked at the young man. He was sitting up 
 quite straight, his face full of light and colour and 
 the desire of the man to attain, and the hope and 
 longing whose end lies in the achievement of hand 
 and brain. 
 
 " Go on," said Norman softly, his heart full of 
 the pride and affection he had in the young fellow 
 a pride and affection which was hardly second 
 to that he had for his own son Ronald. 
 
 " I 'm honestly desirous of doing my duty," 
 returned Evan, " and if it turns out to be London 
 and the Thames, it 's got to be that. And I don't 
 intend to fail, either. But it 's a big stagnating, 
 is n't it, to stick here always ? " 
 
 " I thought we had got over our Wanderjahre." 
 
 " It is n't a Wanderjahr. It 's a big scheme. 
 You see they 're in difficulties over there at Suez " 
 Norman laid down his cigar and listened atten- 
 tively ; " they Ve prolonged the old channel eight 
 hundred metres; and they've got that dredging- 
 machine in France for working in the open sea. 
 And a very pretty invention too, by all I can hear. 
 But in spite of all this, the opposition of the Break- 
 water continues to arrest and deposit the flow of 
 mud quicker than they can clear it. It 's a diffi- 
 culty only lessened and postponed, not overcome, 
 and I 'd like to have a shy at it." 
 
 " But, my dear lad ! " 
 
 "Oh, I know! I've got a cheek! Well, I 
 216 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 have. For I 've been seeing how the thing can be 
 worked." 
 
 In proportion as Evan glowed, Norman's face 
 became overcast. 
 
 "What do you propose? What do you want?" 
 said he. 
 
 " For you to get somebody's ear, and have me 
 sent out there to look at the thing on the spot, and 
 try and see if my notion fits." 
 
 Norman sighed. 
 
 "Of course, Evan, anything you wish. But I 
 had a hope, the honest truth is, I'm loath to 
 lose you again. I hoped you were going to settle 
 down in England." 
 
 Evan leaned forward, his hands worked ner- 
 vously, his downcast face suffused with the tender 
 regard in which he held his kinsman. But he 
 spoke to his point firmly enough. 
 
 " I shall try for the Thames (and get it too) if 
 the other is hopeless. But if I don't use every 
 effort to realise my Suez idea first, I shall be a man 
 thrown at the very outset of life into a restless, dis- 
 satisfied state. If I take up the lesser job while my 
 head 's fermenting with the bigger, I 'm that much 
 lost energy to the world. You see, I have n't tried 
 myself properly yet. A fellow has a kind of 
 curiosity to know what he 's made of." 
 
 " I have n't the least idea of standing in your 
 way," said Norman, cordially ; " I 'm a bit disap- 
 pointed if I 'm to lose you again, I acknowledge. 
 217 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 But if there 's anything in your plan, my best efforts 
 shall go towards forwarding it. 7 ' 
 
 " Very well," said Evan, looking up with an ex- 
 traordinary brightness in his face ; " and thank 
 you. You sha'n't regret it if I go for Suez." 
 
 Within the same moon, Mr. Edward Armstrong 
 met with an adventure. He possessed a bicycle 
 one of the high spidery affairs on which young men 
 risked their necks twenty years ago. And pending 
 the settlement of the Armstrong property, he de- 
 termined to work off the irksomeness of uncertainty 
 by a week's tour on wheels. As luck would have 
 it, in the course of his run, the exquisite weather 
 which had astonished the hearts of Englishmen 
 during the summer and early autumn broke up, and 
 once more there returned upon the nation the 
 accustomed portion of cloudy skies, wet sheets of 
 mist, pelting downpours, and storms of wind ; and 
 the heavens, royally emptying their contents alike 
 upon the just and unjust, deluged, amongst other 
 items, the form of Mr. Edward Armstrong, who 
 bore the affliction but ill, and instead of reflecting 
 that it " was good for the country," swore audibly 
 at the too open skies. 
 
 " Damn the whole thing ! " said he, in an ecstasy 
 of fury ; " it 's no go. I can't get on to Portsmouth 
 to-night ; I Ve got to put up at the nearest inn." 
 
 And presently he saw in the hollow of the long, 
 lonely road the red roof of a building with a sigii- 
 218 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 post swinging before it. It was an inn of old 
 foundation, standing in a deserted part of the 
 country, where it had been formerly a coaching- 
 station. The building was low, but commodious, 
 of two stories and a garret, standing close upon the 
 road, and having, on the opposite side, a row of 
 seven old trees, with a bench for travellers placed 
 under them. By the time he reached it, Edward's 
 clothes clung like a skin ; he leapt from his bicycle, 
 and, leaving it under the shelter of the trees, he 
 entered the bar to inquire for a room. One only 
 was to be had, and that was at his service. It 
 proved to be a large, airy bedroom over the bar- 
 parlour, and looking out on the trees and the road. 
 It was not particularly lively, but it was better than 
 the dreariness outside, and he was soon settled in 
 it, drying at a comfortable wood fire, and with 
 tolerable food before him. The only amusement 
 was to listen to the sounds from the bar and the 
 road ; a few folk had come in for shelter, and he 
 heard laughter and a song or two. Presently a cart 
 drove up, and the driver leapt out, calling to the 
 landlord - 
 
 " Nice weather for your business ! " 
 
 The door of the bar swung on its hinges, and 
 nothing was to be heard but undistinguishable 
 murmurs ; then it opened again and the cart drove 
 off. After a long interval of silence, during which 
 Edward almost fell asleep, a wagon, full of folk 
 wet and weary after a day's ride, came up. The 
 219 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 driver hailed the landlord with a whistle ; he stepped 
 to the door and stood on the threshold ; and some 
 rough chaff ensued. 
 
 " Anybody as '11 stand us four bottles of whisky 
 shall have my sister," said a weary male voice from 
 the wagon. 
 
 The women in the wagon shrieked. Then he 
 understood that glasses were brought out to the 
 company, and that they were sipping and sharing 
 together, while the horse champed its bit and 
 scraped with its foot. Coarse jokes passed amongst 
 the men, and the women laughed. 
 
 Empty and mirthless and comfortless it sounded, 
 with the drip-drip from the eaves in between, and 
 the impatient scrape of the horse's hoof on the 
 road. The same male voice that had spoken 
 before the weariness and wet of the night in 
 it spoke again. 
 
 " Well ! We 'd better keep toddlin', or the old 
 'oss 'ull feel cold." 
 
 "Thank God, it's fair now," said a woman's 
 voice, " pretty near." 
 
 The wheels once more were in motion, and the 
 wagon rattled away. The bar-door closed, and the 
 voices and laughter became again a distant mur- 
 mur, with the dripping of the eaves the sound 
 closest to the ear. Outside the uttermost silence 
 of the country fell. Edward drew his chair to the 
 fire, stretched out his feet to the blaze, and lit a 
 pipe. It began to get late, and already stragglers 
 220 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 had said good-night and were leaving the bar. 
 Suddenly again the hoofs of horses clattered over 
 the road and stopped before the inn ; and again a 
 murmur of voices began. 
 
 Something in that murmur caught Edward's 
 ear and shook him into wide-awake interest. It 
 smacked small secret washed by the cold, wet 
 atmosphere of a totally different existence from 
 this of the rough habitues of the lonely inn, and 
 drew before his mind on a thread of association 
 pictures of a habit of life removed from anything 
 likely to shelter within the homely walls. 
 
 He got up and lounged to the window. The 
 row of the seven trees opposite were distinguished 
 from the night only by their lumpish darkness, and 
 hardly could he have seen that horses stood beneath 
 them, save that the yet unextinguished lights from 
 the bar caught the harness and the shining sides 
 and limbs of the beasts. The forms of Ihe persons 
 upon them he was unable to make out clearly, but 
 he guessed the one closest under the shelter of the 
 trees to be a boy. The one nearest him a ray of 
 light from the inn just showed, and no more, as a 
 man, as he leapt from his horse and went to the 
 bar. Edward's eyes remained fixed on the motion- 
 less figure seated on the second horse, hardly trace- 
 able against the black of the trees. A conversation 
 maintained in a low voice ensued between the 
 traveller who had alighted and the landlord of the 
 inn, after which the latter went quickly back to 
 221 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 the interior. Then the traveller returned to his horse 
 and leaned against it, apparently waiting a reply ; 
 as he did so, he struck a match and made as though 
 to light a cigar, his hands curved to his mouth 
 to protect the flame. 
 
 So tiny an act, so small a spark, revealed him to 
 the watching eyes above. 
 
 The match, helped by his breath, flared up and 
 illumined his face ; the light caught the tips of his 
 features, hung in a curve over the length of his 
 moustache, and traced the line of eyebrow and 
 the peculiarity of the fall of the eyelids. Even the 
 refined fingers and the signet ring on one of them 
 were revealed by the little flare of the tell-tale 
 match. It was Norman Dayntree who stood there 
 leaning against his horse and lighting a cigarette 
 for momentary comfort against the clinging cold of 
 the night. 
 
 "If this isn't a rum start!" murmured , Edward 
 to himself as he flung out of the chamber. 
 
 Close to his bedroom door was the head of the 
 back stairs of the inn. He assumed that they 
 would lead him straight to the region of the bar, 
 and dashed down them. He passed the bar- 
 parlour, where a crony or two of the landlord's 
 still sat, and the 'landlord's pipe lay on the table 
 awaiting his return, and he pushed on into the bar 
 by the back passage. A broad stream of light ran 
 into the road from the open door, but the travellers 
 kept steadily in the gloom under the trees. Edward, 
 
 222 
 
Hot Summer. 
 
 however, needed no further testimony than that of 
 the match. He pushed by the landlord and his 
 wife, who were talking in the passage, and who 
 glanced at him in surprise. 
 
 " I tell 'ee I can't do it, not if they was to give 
 h'ever so ! " 
 
 He got to the door and thrust his head out, and 
 the man leaning by the horse looked up. 
 
 "Dayntree ! " cried Edward. 
 
 But as he spoke the landlord put him aside, and 
 going out into the road interposed his figure between 
 the traveller and himself. The former, however, 
 was already on his horse again, his hand on the 
 bridle of his companion's. They turned, and, creep- 
 ing under the shadow of the thorns, began a back 
 journey up the lonely road down which Edward 
 had preceded them that afternoon. In the turning 
 of the horses it was impossible, in spite of the black- 
 ness of the night* but that some rays from the lights 
 of the open passage should shoot over them, and 
 Edward distinguished the second horseman as the 
 boy he had surmised. Dayntree's son perhaps? 
 He slowly remounted the stairs to his chamber. 
 No conception of any boy he had ever seen would 
 exactly fit into that slender reed-like figure. The 
 presentment of it momentary obscure though it 
 had been became clearer to his mind ; it sank 
 upon his mental sight with increasing suggestion 
 and hint, until at last, while his fingers fumbled 
 between his tobacco-pouch and pipe, the identity 
 223 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 of it stood out to his apprehension with tell-tale 
 vividness, and scarcely needed that he should give 
 it a name. What is there in the personality which 
 beneath all disguises, is its own self-confession, and 
 renders up its secret in some slightest line or tiniest 
 bend and turn of the form? 
 
 " By all the powers that are ! " exclaimed Edward, 
 letting fall (he pouch and pipe into the fender, and 
 throwing back his head with a great cry. 
 
 224 
 
PART II. 
 
 COLD WINTER, 
 
 225 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 ONE morning two coroneted envelopes lay on 
 the Dayntrees' breakfast-table. They contained 
 invitations to a Cinderella-dance, given by Mrs. 
 Trelyon's great relative, and, the occasion being in- 
 formal, the young daughter Constance was included. 
 
 Warrenne Court lay, as has been said, in the 
 adjoining county, and arrangements had to be made 
 for the accommodation of many guests and their 
 servants for the night. The place was very old, and 
 full of historical interest, but the tower only of the 
 original building was left standing; it had several 
 small chambers, in one of which it was averred the 
 Black Prince had passed a night. The main body 
 of the building was also of great age, and here were 
 the Anne a Boleyn rooms ; late in the eighteenth 
 century a new wing had been added, which increased 
 the comfort of the interior, but spoiled the unity of 
 the architectural effect. Pressure of space demanded 
 careful distribution of the guests, and in the new 
 wing Constantia and her daughter occupied a single 
 room, while Norman was accommodated with a 
 small chamber in the middle portion. Rosalie took 
 a room in the same wing as Constantia, Mrs Trelyon 
 227 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 as a relative having one of the state bedrooms 
 allotted to her, with a small adjoining closet for 
 her maid. 
 
 Evan was also at the house. He got one of the 
 little-used rooms in the tower. To him the evening 
 of the dance was tinged in the expectation but by 
 one thought, and that was spelled in the word 
 " Rosalie." 
 
 Of late Evan's elasticity had flagged. The future 
 lay still before him in landscape dimensions, but the 
 golden atmosphere was fading. He had reached 
 that knotty stage in love when an injurious sense 
 of thwarting mingles with the sense of blessed 
 expansion. 
 
 But he set his teeth. He was not, he thought, 
 to become the bondsman of any woman, not the 
 best and fairest. If she would not return his feel- 
 ing, he had it in him to weep tears of blood ; but 
 the dreams to which she had fired him remained. 
 From them he was not to flinch. Wonderful hand, 
 in whose palm lay the secret of his career ! 
 
 No finer-looking young fellow than he entered 
 the ball-room that evening : he could lay no claim 
 to be named " handsome ; " it was the vein and 
 character of the man expressed on his outward 
 form that made people turn to look at him, not 
 once, but twice ; he was fortunate in possessing an 
 harmonious correspondence between body and soul. 
 
 "I hope soon to see your card full," said Lady 
 Warrenne, noticing it was empty. 
 228 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 " I shall do my duty yes," said he shyly, hiding 
 it under his palm. " I 'm just waiting a bit." 
 
 He had all the whims and delicacies of a lover, 
 and felt that no one's name was to go down on his 
 card before Rosalie's. Parting from Lady War- 
 renne, he stood back against the wall and watched 
 for Rosalie's appearance, with her hardly less beau- 
 tiful mother. It was a rare lover-like sentiment 
 that held him there dumb and silent until she should 
 arrive. When at last she appeared, an expression 
 almost of pain shot over his face. Her beauty was 
 an eternal surprise ; it had a quality of the unex- 
 pected a supreme charm ; moreover, she pos- 
 sessed that exquisite bloom of youth that delicate, 
 evanescent something which is by no means 
 always the attribute of young creatures. Upon this 
 occasion she had chosen to wear simple virginal 
 white, and it added to her slim grace a poignant 
 touch of pathos. Evan was not conscious of having 
 in himself anything to match with this flower of 
 girlhood ; to the young, beauty is not evanescent ; 
 they have not the feeling of the transitory, the stamp 
 of immortality rests upon all, and this gives the 
 edge to their emotion. He walked straight up 
 to her. 
 
 " Rosalie Trelyon looks very beautiful to-night," 
 said Constantia to her husband. 
 
 " Where? " said Norman, turning his head about. 
 
 Constantia experienced a sudden faintness of the 
 heart. She had caught her husband's eyes fixed 
 229 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 on the girl there was something in his look she 
 hated herself for noticing it, and had rushed on the 
 remark in her eagerness to erase the impression and 
 establish herself by his side on the same mental 
 plane, whatever it might be. Of late the ease of 
 perfect accord had given place to terribly groping 
 moments. The delicate adjustment of long rela- 
 tionship, sensitive to disturbance and Norman's 
 hasty subterfuge, was worse than a repulse. The 
 room was darkened to her eyes, and the harmonious 
 murmur of cultivated voices sounded dissonant. 
 All evening, turn where she would, by some cruel 
 magnetism her glance encountered that exquisite 
 form, with the poetised grace of its movements, and 
 that lovely face, rendered every moment more 
 beautiful by the exercise of the dance. If she was 
 not looking at it, it swam before her brain. Her 
 interest in everything else was clouded over ; even 
 her daughter's childlike happiness and her whis- 
 pered assurances of enjoyment failed to create one 
 ripple of responsive gladness. Her heart had be- 
 come too heavy to stand at the level of every-day 
 feeling. Just now she saw Rosalie against the wall, 
 her head thrown back a little, and her hand wafting 
 a feather fan to and fro. 
 
 Constantia tried not to look at her, but her eyes 
 stole back again and again. She seemed to herself 
 to shrivel in her seat under the influence of the 
 girl's beauty. At last, when her eyes ran once more 
 towards the fatal spot, she caught from between the 
 230 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 dark-lashed lids a glance directed to herself. It 
 was a mixture of defiance, cold amusement, and 
 curiosity ; it would have been patently vulgar, but 
 that a second afterwards the white brow crumpled 
 with a shade of trouble. At that moment Evan 
 stepped up to the girl the man next her moved 
 unwillingly away. Constantia raised her hand to 
 her eyes for a brief second. 
 
 " My God ! " murmured she ; " what is it makes 
 me entertain such frightful thoughts ? " 
 
 " This is my dance," Evan had said briefly. 
 
 He took the place of the former partner, his eyes 
 permitted themselves to wander over her for a 
 moment ; then he raised them again, and leaned 
 against the wall by her side. 
 
 "Now tell me," said she, "have you a topic? 
 I 'm tired of hearing that this is a splendid floor for 
 dancing." 
 
 Evan smiled at her sprightly mood. 
 
 " Oh ! " said he ; " that sort of thing is a short 
 cut across awkward moments." 
 
 " What business have people with awkward mo- 
 ments ? God's sun shines in all ; I mean to have a 
 respite. How are your schemes?" 
 
 " A big topic for a ball-room." 
 
 " Even in a ball-room, each man to his own 
 crotchet. You see, I remember yours. Of late you 
 have talked of Africa and Africa. When I see you, 
 I see Africa. When I see a map of Africa, I see 
 you." 
 
 231 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Evan frowned a little, then looked at her with 
 light in his eyes. 
 
 "That's well," said he, "for it is precisely the 
 same upon my part. When I see Africa I see you 
 and when I see you I see Africa." 
 
 The notion touched her fancy. 
 
 " But I can't believe that," said she. 
 
 " Indeed, yes. My words were not empty. But 
 Do you want to dance ? " 
 
 "It depends on the quality of the con- 
 versation." 
 
 "Then come," said Evan; "I must try to 
 please." 
 
 He offered his arm. Rosalie took it. As they 
 walked down the room together, once, relying on 
 his guidance, she closed her lids wearily. He 
 found a comfortable nook in a recess on the stair- 
 case, and seated himself by her side. 
 
 " But you 're tired ! " said he. 
 
 The girl's eyes had closed again ; when she 
 opened them, it was upon a face bent towards her 
 in solicitude. 
 
 "I am not," said she. "Go on about Africa. 
 Break the deadly monotony if you can." 
 
 "Is it so monotonous?" said he. "I haven't 
 felt that. But if you like it, we will talk of Africa, 
 the world's final chance of adventure." 
 
 " I like adventures, but hate the word final. I 
 wish we were n't so limited ! There never seems 
 enough for me of time or anything else." 
 232 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 " Oh, there 's some fun left in this old globe yet. 
 Africa is practically a new world to explore. What 
 I complain of is that this adventure should be left 
 to the private bully. I hate to think of some swash- 
 buckling career, run like a festering wound into the 
 side of the new land." 
 
 " What would you have, then?" 
 
 " Well, you see, to a great many minds Africa 
 is nothing whatever but a ' market,' to another 
 an open ground for the experimental traveller. 
 The first means a sort of glorified thimble-rig- 
 ging; the second mere filibustering. I wish that 
 some great and capable mind would set to work 
 to hit on plans for developing Africa, for Africa's 
 own sake." 
 
 "Who can?" 
 
 " Well, I picture to myself a man with tremen- 
 dous all-round sympathies, and a big constructive 
 brain to matchj and a thorough knowledge of the 
 subject " 
 
 " But how would he get that? " 
 
 " Oh, he 'd have rubbed it in, you know, out of 
 books to begin with. Then he'd have studied 
 colonial policy and that 's a bigger business. 
 Above all, he 'd have knocked about the world him- 
 self, and he 'd have a commercial turn of the right 
 kind and a knack of choosing the right fellow for a 
 job. And then, you know, he 'd somehow have 
 managed to shake himself out of the exclusively 
 jingo British point of view." 
 233 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Go on," said Rosalie ; " I am interested, this is 
 a great man?" 
 
 "Pretty fair," said Evan. "Then imagine such 
 a man Secretary for the Colonies, with a good 
 Government in office and a workable majority in 
 the House at a favourable national moment." 
 
 Rosalie closed her fan and turned her face towards 
 him. Her eyes expressed an eager growing atten- 
 tion. There was the hint of excitement. 
 
 " Go on : I am interested," she repeated. 
 
 "You mustn't take it all for practical truth," said 
 Evan, smiling. " It 's a sort of fairy tale, I 'm afraid. 
 A Secretary does not possess any great determining 
 power, you must remember ; but if he is a man of 
 influential character, his position trebles his influence. 
 I 'm in favour of such a man initiating a nationally 
 organised expedition for exploring purposes." 
 
 " And after the expedition ? " 
 
 " Then we know a little where we are, and how 
 the work is to begin. It ought to be a sort of 
 missionary enterprise, with a total reconsideration 
 of the missionary system ; that is to say, it should 
 be something quite different from an attempt to im- 
 pose our various creeds and customs here and there ; 
 but as to the commercial side, that ought to be far- 
 seeing enough not to assume a grab-trie-booty 
 attitude. It would n't if we organised our colonial 
 policy from the beginning on some national plan 
 thought out by experts and schemed for an all- 
 round good." 
 
 234 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 Rosalie had listened intently. There was an 
 interest which surprised the speaker. It warmed 
 and thrilled him, and the intellectual dreams in 
 which he had of late been indulging escaped his 
 lips in readier words. He noted with exultation 
 that a whole dance slipped by and that she did not 
 remark it. Her partner hunting in the distance 
 failed to discover her. When at last Evan's elo- 
 quence found a period, she softly opened her fan 
 and spread it like a great white wing as shelter 
 over her face. The pause, Evan thought, was 
 more delicious than the talk had been. At last she 
 spoke. 
 
 "And this little one man who is to have the 
 big idea?" 
 
 " A man is never little," said Evan, softly. " One 
 chap always sets the ball rolling." 
 
 "Who is he?" 
 
 She moved the fan and darted a swift bird-like 
 glance towards him. It flew to his soul. He made 
 shift to shake his head gently with a smile. Then 
 her eyes dropped until he saw the lashes lying on 
 her cheek. 
 
 " Are you the man ? " said she. 
 
 A tiny note of derision pricked his heart like a pin. 
 He struck his fingers together lightly and slowly 
 twice before speaking. 
 
 " I never thought of myself for one moment as the 
 man," said he, quietly, " but I was thinking of my- 
 self in connection with matters of the kind. I Ve 
 2 35 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 a notion that if an engineer is wanted Suez-way, for 
 example, I '11 have a shy at it." Again she stole a 
 glance at him. Her purpose had been to draw 
 denial from him only as a preliminary to the name 
 of the man whom she surmised within his mind. 
 She had a need to know with certainty that his idea 
 corresponded with her hope. Assuredly he was 
 speaking of a well-known individuality ; she longed 
 to snatch the name the name already syllabled 
 within her heart. He kept his profile immobile 
 while her eyes searched it, though his pulse quick- 
 ened with the sense of them upon him. Presently 
 she dropped them baffled. After all, why should 
 not he himself, as he had said, play something of a 
 part in the undertaking he had sketched ? She read 
 the mettle of the man in the lines of his face. 
 Until that moment she had noticed merely that he 
 was slim, brown, and young. But for the first time 
 impressions from his character entered her mind ; 
 the meaning of the man, his spiritual part, unfolded 
 a little. But it was not he who was the creator of 
 this vision of a peaceful earth-conquest ; it was her 
 need to have the name spoken to her ear the 
 name she was sure he hid under his tongue, 
 
 " It is a great dream," she murmured, wilfully 
 exaggerating and enlarging his suggestions. 
 
 " Oh, pretty fair. It 's a scheme big enough to 
 make me feel I 'd risk a thing or two for it." 
 
 " A king should be at the back of it. Columbus 
 had a king." 
 
 236 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 " A company and a king are merely two names 
 for the same bad thing. I want to serve a Govern- 
 ment that is fulfilled with purposes beyond timid 
 self-interest." 
 
 She had closed her fan again, and now softly 
 struck her white-gloved hands together. 
 
 " A great dream a great dream," she murmured 
 again ; " but where did you get it ? " 
 
 Once more the swift, bird-like glance touched 
 him, and the voice was soft as honey. He wanted 
 to throw himself on his knees and break forth into 
 an eloquence wherein the love-making of all the 
 poets burned. The emotion he felt was terrifying 
 to him ; the ship of his safety plunged into deep 
 waters, and if his hand was on the tiller he did not 
 see his way. He dared not look at her fingers lying 
 curved in the soft white mystery of her dress, he 
 dared not meet her eyes ; he kept his profile still as 
 a rock. " O my sweet foe, love me and leave me 
 not ! " cried his heart. 
 
 " It came to me lately," said he, gravely dropping 
 the words amidst the storm. 
 
 Her eyes stole towards him again with a vivid 
 look. Speech "hung between two separate ideas in 
 either mind. How should he surmise the tragical 
 nature of the emotion that trembled in the girl's 
 heart ? He who had dreamed " Africa " was, she 
 told herself, a god worthy of a woman's heroic love 
 the love that asks nothing of law. 
 
 " I will be Heloi'se ; but it will be to none but 
 2 37 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Abelard," she had said to herself often enough in 
 the past. 
 
 Had she a love-story, it must be associated with a 
 world-renowned name or deed ; the adventure which 
 lifted her of her heart was to leave a meteoric trail 
 over an enskyed memory. But it might satisfy her 
 to lie in the world's story-book between two 
 leaves that told of the conquest of a land. The 
 lustre of that should suffice. Her eyes hung on 
 Evan's lips. 
 
 Was there the hint of anxiety in them a sordid 
 need to clothe with retrospective purple a poor, 
 naked deed slipped into her life in one unbalanced 
 moment? 
 
 He thought betwixt dream and waking for so 
 the strange instant felt that she followed the 
 heart-beats that had underlain this talk of Africa. 
 He delayed speaking, because the hope that had 
 alighted on the moment bore wings so many- 
 coloured and dazzling that he feared a breath might 
 destroy it. His eyes darkened and softened ; an 
 exquisite humility and reverence pervaded his heart ; 
 he mustered courage at last to turn and look into 
 the face of this all-possibility. 
 
 " We have great power one over another," said 
 he, gravely. " It was you yourself the something 
 in your nature that stirred me and wakened within 
 me the possibility of the dreaming you call great." 
 
 She flung open her fan. The word leapt out 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 between a cry and a laugh. The "slim brown 
 young man ! " Eliza's hero ! 
 
 Evan's lids shut for a moment He got his 
 breath between his teeth ; he scarcely looked at her 
 sheltered behind her great feather-tipped fan. His 
 heart shouted " Fool ! " How exquisitely cruel 
 these tender-looking things called women could be ! 
 He felt the pallor sweeping over his face. Her 
 face, white, half fainting, he could not see. He rose 
 to his feet and coldly stretched his arm. 
 
 " The waltz has begun," said he. 
 
 That night Constantia thanked God for Norman's 
 absence. Unable to sleep, she rose at last from her 
 bed. Through the curtains a gleam of moonlight 
 had penetrated, and lay across her pillow. 
 
 " It is that which disturbed me," said she ; 
 " there is something cruel in the look of moonlight 
 at dead of night." 
 
 It was so brilliant that when she placed her watch 
 in the beam she read the time. The light regular 
 breathing of her daughter came from a small bed in 
 the corner. Still through Constantia's brain danced 
 the beautiful alluring figure of Rosalie the wild 
 lovely girl with the ever-changeful face and gleam- 
 ing eyes. 
 
 " How old she makes me feel ! " 
 
 She pressed her hand over her sleepless eyes; 
 and then, white-robed, barefooted as she was, 
 stepped towards the window and drew the curtains 
 back a little and set her face between them. 
 239 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 The moonlight flooded the garden, but, saving 
 one corner, the side of the house which lay at right 
 angles from the new wing, and which represented 
 the middle and older part, was in shadow. In this 
 side was the window of the room that Norman oc- 
 cupied ; her eyes rested upon it sadly ; the moon- 
 light folded itself about her head. She had no 
 thought of spying upon her husband, the anchorage 
 of her faith might be torn away by other hands, it 
 would not be removed by her own ; her attitude 
 was that of the waiter. But a secret thus played 
 over by the consciousness of three hearts cannot be 
 hid ; and it was inevitable that from the deeps 
 which lie in the nature of things some terrible 
 revelation should arise. First, Constantia became 
 aware of a dim light behind Norman's curtains; 
 then they were withdrawn, and a hand set the light 
 in the window. She pushed her own curtains 
 roughly back, and pressed close to the panes. The 
 spark in Norman's window burned steadily for a 
 few seconds, then it was extinguished. Constantia 
 drew back, and stared round the room with a star- 
 tled face. Was that a signal? She heard the 
 softest opening of a door near her. With that, she 
 darted from the window, thrust her feet into slip- 
 pers, and rapidly clothed herself. Beneath the 
 chatter and noise of merely startled thoughts, be- 
 neath the anger against herself for surmise and for 
 the desperate movement of her mind towards 
 certainty, was the inmost conviction of the less 
 240 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 conscious self lending her the knowledge of 
 disaster. 
 
 Her room opened into a passage ending in one 
 of the principal entrances to the picture-gallery. 
 Down the passage and towards the entrance she 
 made her way, her feet shod with velvet. As she 
 went, she noticed without surprise that the door of 
 a bedroom stood ajar ; so also did that of the gal- 
 lery. On reaching it she silently pushed it wider. 
 
 The gallery was not altogether dark. A moon- 
 beam fell through the nearest window, and lay 
 transversely across the corner near the door ; Con- 
 stantia looked for one brief second across the light, 
 and then shrank back into the passage and stood 
 against the wall, her hand upon her breast. Sur- 
 prise and suspense and every lesser emotion were 
 expunged from her heart in that one moment. 
 Would that she could close the door between her- 
 self and the whispering pair inside ! As in a dream 
 she saw the strongly repressed and hated suspicion 
 of uneasy weeks standing out before her in actuality, 
 yet within herself found neither resource, nor a plan 
 of action, nor a whisper of a word of policy. Her 
 nature was too greatly simple to search for tactics. 
 She stood there overwhelmed by a great tide of 
 solemn pain that swept over and over her, and de- 
 stroyed the landmarks of her life. There was Nor- 
 man ; here stood she. She was as a ship going to 
 pieces. Unutterable anguish fell upon her. With 
 her hand upon her breast she fought for breath ; 
 16 241 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 nothing passed her lips, yet her cries went up to 
 heaven. There was Norman; here stood she. 
 The naked simplicity would take no abatement. 
 The shores of life moved and slipped away, and 
 every second carried her a thousand leagues. Was 
 the time short ? A period of years went by. Her 
 mind leapt over them with lightning-like swiftness, 
 and left them shrivelled. That was Norman ; here 
 stood she. Whither would the hour bear her? 
 Thought touched for a moment on her children, 
 and fled away affrighted. A wind seemed to snatch 
 the cry from her lips, and then she went down 
 down in some sweltering deep that whirled her 
 round, and beat the life out of her heart. After 
 that everything went still. She leaned half-fainting 
 in the corner of the dark passage, in the shadow of 
 the half-open door, the brilliant moonlight lay before 
 her; the whispers were over. A soft footfall ap- 
 proached. Constantia opened her eyes and raised 
 her head. 
 
 On the edge of the moonlight stood a figure. It 
 was Rosalie alone. The girl hesitated as though 
 shrinking from the telltale light, and gazed intently 
 at the far-away and solemn panorama of the skies. 
 Her clothing was a white wrapper, her hair was 
 loose and fell in masses below her waist. She 
 moved forwards with the same hesitating step, and 
 the moonlight shot over her in a sudden illumina- 
 tion. There was something spectral in her look, 
 her face having in the cold beams a waxlike pallor ; 
 242 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 her lips also were pallid, and her eyes gleamed with 
 a smoulder of fast-dying and unhappy excitement. 
 She seemed some apparition of the tomb, some 
 wandering spirit bathing her feet in the cool night 
 of a home-like world. 
 
 Every faculty of Constantia was intensified to 
 abnormal force and clearness in the stress of the 
 moment. With strange and absolute conviction 
 she recognised that the meaning of her life was not 
 to be sought in the long peace of years, but that it 
 met her in this approaching figure, that here and 
 not elsewhere was the clue to her history and exist- 
 ence to be found. 
 
 Thinking of this, she took a step forwards, and 
 stood in the doorway, and gravely confronted the 
 girl. No word was spoken. Rosalie breathed one 
 startled breath, and then passed by. 
 
 243 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 AFTER the night came the morning. Constantia 
 had to drop the curtain on that ghostly stage where- 
 on the great drama is played, and to face the detail 
 of the visible world. 
 
 It startled her to find her husband unaltered in 
 appearance ; she had almost expected that the 
 change in her own mind would find a correspond- 
 ing reflection there. But on his brow was no ruffle, 
 in his glance no perturbation, nor was there disturb- 
 ance in his courteous bearing. So had he looked 
 and borne himself all the years of her life with him. 
 The thing best known to her had never been really 
 seen her world had to be re-learned from the 
 beginning. She seemed to put forth a groping hand 
 to a dark place and to touch nothing. Her heart 
 cried out again " Where is Norman ? Where is 
 my master? Where am I? " 
 
 They were home again, and Norman spoke of a 
 run to town for an hour or two in the afternoon. 
 It surprised her to be asked to walk down the drive 
 with him, but she acquiesced passively. Her mind 
 was stupefied after the excess of agony, and her will 
 244 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 lay dormant. Norman took her hand and placed it 
 in his arm ; she was not conscious of the action. 
 
 " Have you seen anything of Eliza Armstrong 
 lately?" said he, as they sauntered along. 
 
 With the name a painful memory ruffled the 
 stupid silence of her mind. Might not Eliza with 
 her strange instinctive power of vision have saved 
 them all ? 
 
 " No," she replied, in a low voice. 
 
 " I don't want any hint of what I am going to 
 say to get about. I am very anxious about the 
 Armstrongs. Their affairs are not going well." 
 
 Not ? " 
 
 " You know, Constantia, it is my habit to consult 
 you about everything. You are a supremely wise 
 woman such a woman as a man meets once in a 
 lifetime. Not a word of what I am telling you is 
 to escape. You remember asking me to befriend 
 Eliza?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 She looked up to his face. The blinding thing 
 was that it seemed, as usual, that his voice, his 
 praise, was as before. 
 
 " Well, I wish to befriend her now. And I want 
 you to help me. I want to procure Eliza's sig- 
 nature to a paper without the knowledge of her 
 brother or any one else. Can you undertake this 
 forme?" 
 
 Constantia was silent. A week ago she would 
 have leapt to his command with unhesitating alac- 
 245 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 rity. Now she realised that the springs of her 
 trust were broken everywhere. She knitted her 
 brows, and tried to look into that world of affairs 
 in which she had hitherto taken no part. 
 
 " I have not been very friendly with Eliza lately/' 
 said she. 
 
 "Indeed? That comes a little awkwardly 
 for her." 
 
 Constantia caught at the last two words. 
 
 " I Ve no doubt I could procure her signature 
 for anything," said she, in anxious hurry ; " but I 
 should wish to understand more about it." 
 
 " But it is one of those secrets so much better 
 left unspoken." 
 
 " A secret!" 
 
 "From the business world, you understand." 
 
 Constantia did not reply. The incident revealed 
 how difficult life had become. In his own depart- 
 ment she had considered her husband's judgment 
 supreme, but now a sense of her responsibility 
 intruded there helplessly. 
 
 "When can you see Eliza? " urged Norman. 
 
 " Soon," returned Constantia. 
 
 "That is well. I must have an interview with 
 her, and add my persuasions to yours and as 
 quickly as possible." 
 
 " Persuade her to what? " 
 
 " It is for your sake, Constantia. You asked me 
 to look after Eliza, and I mean to do so. I wish 
 her to sell out of some of her property at once 
 246 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 of a small portion I assigned to her. And I wish 
 to arrange this without the knowledge of her brother." 
 
 He spoke gravely, earnestly. They had reached 
 the lodge gate ; he paused with his hand upon it. 
 Constantia paused too, and looked up to him with 
 the deep harassed question of her soul in her eyes ; 
 his glance flinched before hers, and roamed over 
 the landscape ; but the weakness was only momen- 
 tary, and her own lids had need to droop a moment 
 after before the kind solicitude of his look. 
 
 "You are not quite yourself, dearest. I am 
 afraid all this dissipation is too much for you. 
 Mind you rest this afternoon." 
 
 The day went on. Constantia's power of think- 
 ing dwindled to an aching desire for solitude for 
 some vast desert where she might sit alone with her 
 grief, turn it as it were over in her hand, consider 
 the quality of it, look from it on to the world it 
 altered, and upon herself changed beyond knowl- 
 edge of her own identity. No such moment was 
 accorded. Children, guests, servants, one after 
 another, with ordinary cheery faces and details of 
 their own, pressed upon her with the wearying effect 
 of a restless dream to a brain off the balance. All, 
 save her grief, appeared unreal a lying sham in 
 which she was forced to take part. 
 
 It did not arouse any sense of jealousy to sur- 
 mise that her husband and Rosalie had probably 
 arranged a meeting, and might at this moment 
 of her agonising loneliness and distress be losing 
 247 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 themselves in the intoxication of companionship. 
 Her grief was of too great, too vast a quality, to 
 mar itself with torturing details ; her nature moved 
 on lines too large, heroic, and simple. The sun of 
 her universe was eclipsed, and it mattered little, 
 beneath the awful darkness, that the lesser torments 
 to which humanity is subject crept as stealthy sting- 
 ing-worms over the ground on which her blind feet 
 moved towards ever deeper comprehension of her 
 woe. Sorrow, as Love, Religion, and Beauty, takes 
 the mind's own impress. And Constantia's grief 
 was destitute of outcry and devoid of petulance. 
 
 Late in the afternoon, when tea was over, and 
 callers had thinned away, and the children were 
 less restlessly and joyously inclined to dash in and 
 out of every room to which the mother retired, 
 Constantia expected an interval of peace. She 
 leaned her head back on a chair and closed her 
 aching lids. It was as though she had died in 
 the night, and her imprisoned spirit was about to 
 escape to those chill and unrealised regions to 
 which she now belonged. A step outside aroused 
 her as instantly ; she raised her lids with a start and 
 sat upright, again ready for the world's exacting 
 and cruel claims. The door opened, and Evan 
 stood on the threshold. At the sight of him a new 
 corner of her misery revealed itself. She looked 
 at his brilliant young manhood, at the strong face 
 with the slightly hooked nose and the bright, hawk- 
 like eye, and the sensitive mouth which was the 
 248 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 special gift of his mother her impress finishing 
 his masterful manhood with the touch of womanly 
 tenderness. 
 
 " Ah ! " said the lad, " I am fortunate in finding 
 you alone." 
 
 And he came forward and sat down by her side, 
 sheltering himself in the warm shadow of her 
 motherhood and sympathy. 
 
 " You are going, Evan ? " said Constantia, gently. 
 
 " Yes ; I am off. I mean to get my things to- 
 gether to-morrow, and take the night-train. I want 
 to get back to practical hard work." 
 
 "Do you?" 
 
 "Yes," he said, and his eyes were sad though 
 his voice was clear. " I need to be back in the 
 workshop, to get alongside machinery and steel 
 and furnaces and men. I want," he added grimly, 
 " to get grip on the real substantial hardships of 
 the world again." 
 
 He set his teeth and flung out his fist. 
 
 "Yes, Evan," said Constantia, faintly. She laid 
 her finger on his arm, and he turned to her with 
 a softened face. He had no idea that the small 
 slight touch was a cry for mercy for herself. How 
 should he dream that this wise sheltering mother- 
 hood, this refuge for men and children, was itself 
 bare to so stupendous a loneliness and grief? He 
 thought the touch was meant as the mild control 
 by which such women guide and rule the world. 
 
 " There is something I cannot understand," said 
 249 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 he, apologetically, " and it raises a kind of devil in 
 me, not a bad sort of fellow, I think, but some- 
 thing uncommonly stimulating and rousing. Never 
 mind what it is, but it is not anything I expected 
 to break over. Did I ever tell you how the men 
 in the workshop set on me once ? " 
 
 " I think not." 
 
 "There was a difference of opinion between 
 them and me. They tried to coerce me, and took 
 the straps off the wheels, and pushed about me 
 with their fists clenched. I was one amongst a dozen 
 all wanting to make instant mincemeat of me amongst 
 the machinery. Argument had failed, but will was 
 left. It rose up within me that I was worth the 
 whole dozen of them in mettle. I saw a big ham- 
 mer lying on the window-sill near me, and I backed 
 into a corner and stretched my hand out to it steal- 
 thily. Well, I got it ; and then I swung it round 
 my head and shouted, ' Get those straps on again 
 or I '11 brain one or two of you ! ' And they stared, 
 hesitated a little, and at last slunk off and put the 
 straps on ; and when the manager came round, the 
 room was quiet. But I find there are things in life 
 one can't meet in that way." 
 
 " Yes? " said Constantia, softly ; for Evan's voice 
 changed, and this creature of strong nerve and 
 muscle and will nestled, as it were, closer to her 
 broken and exhausted heart for protection and 
 help. 
 
 " I 'm telling you that about the workshop only 
 250 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 but because I can't understand myself," said he, 
 aimlessly. 
 
 He got up sighing, and wandered about the 
 room, and then came back to her side and stood 
 looking down upon her. 
 
 "It's this odd sense," said he, in his half-confi- 
 dence, " of not being able to make my own willing 
 avail one jot." 
 
 " Yes," said Constantia, in a low voice. 
 She felt like some timid thing of the woods 
 trembling amidst traps. 
 
 "Well," continued Evan, shaking back his head, 
 " the workshop 's my place." 
 
 "Yes," said Constantia; "don't don't let this 
 you speak of overmaster you and spoil your life." 
 
 " I think I shall not. I am not going to be 
 weak. I believe I may promise you that." 
 
 " Yes, yes," cried Constantia, with painful eager- 
 ness, " promise that." 
 
 He held out his hand and clasped hers. As he 
 reached the door, Constantia called him again. 
 
 " Shall you see Eliza before you leave ? " asked 
 she. 
 
 " Ah ! " said Evan, his face lightening a little as 
 he recalled the attachment of his small friend, " I 
 should think so indeed, if I can compass it." 
 
 " When you see her, give her my love Con- 
 stantia 's love," said she. 
 
 It was getting late ; in another hour Norman 
 would be back. Constantia listened to Evan's 
 
 25 1 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 steps down the drive ; then she rose and sought the 
 safer retreat of her bedroom. No longer dominated 
 by the need of concealment, her walk, her figure, 
 took the lines of her stupendous grief. She stum- 
 bled gropingly up the stairs, her hand outstretched. 
 The restraints of her dress pained her, as though 
 her pent-up grief had some physical effect upon 
 her heart, which felt like a still and swollen thing 
 in her breast. She changed the gown for a loose 
 wrapper, and sank back into a lounge, her face 
 dropping into the expression of its agony ; already 
 one or two cooling tears crept from her lids ; but a 
 new interruption caught the moment's respite from 
 the mother of the house. A scamper of little feet, 
 a series of cries of " Mother ! mother ! mother ! " 
 were followed by a tattoo of knocks and kicks upon 
 her chamber-door the storming of a child impa- 
 tient to enter. 
 
 Constantia caught her handkerchief, and pressed 
 back the tears from her eyes ; unconquerable emo- 
 tion threatened for the moment to prevent the pos- 
 sibility of reply; but she sat up, mastering the 
 convulsion in her throat, and tuning her voice from 
 any possible jar to that soft music which had domi- 
 nated the house into serenity and peace for twenty 
 years of her life. 
 
 What is it, Ted? " cried she. 
 
 The door burst open, and little Ted rushed in. 
 
 " Mother ! " he exclaimed, with emphasis. 
 
 His brown eyes were wide-open, his face excited. 
 252 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 She extended her hand with her calm, soothing 
 smile, and he ran straight to her breast and clutched 
 the soft lace which she wore about her neck. 
 There was some childish trouble in which a cat was 
 mixed up ; he had been brought up to consider it a 
 point of honour that tears should be shed only at 
 his mother's knee ; his injury or rather sympathy 
 for an injured cat had been long repressed ; he 
 burst into a flood of tears, and drew forth the tiniest 
 of tiny pocket-handkerchiefs to cope with it. 
 
 The emotion was intense and overflowing, and 
 the pocket-handkerchief inadequate. Constantia 
 whipped out her own. She kissed the fair curly 
 head, and pressed it to her bosom, and uncurled the 
 short crisp rings of hair upon her fingers. Then 
 for an hour she talked to him of the ways of kittens 
 and the devices of mankind towards the small 
 beasts of the earth, and the compensations that are 
 to be discovered in the lives of cats, and the kind- 
 ness which men deal out sometimes in forms that 
 are harsh to begin with but end well at the last. 
 Ted listened and amplified the matter by frequent 
 questions and much repetition. All this took time, 
 and Constantia's precious hour of solitude slipped 
 away. So engrossed had she become in her task 
 of consoling the boy that a knock at the door 
 escaped her notice, and, the handle turning softly, 
 she raised her head to find that Norman had en- 
 tered the room. 
 
 " Ted and I are discussing a very particular and 
 253 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 private matter. No ! He has not been naughty, 
 Norman," said she. 
 
 The father, stretching his hand, had turned the 
 tear-stained face upwards, and was smiling whimsi- 
 cally at the traces of grief. 
 
 " It was a question of sentiment, then ? " said he. 
 " Perhaps something out of my pocket will meet 
 the case." 
 
 Ted slid from his mother's side, and stood with 
 his eyes eagerly fixed on his father's pockets. 
 
 Constantia moved to her dressing-table, and rang 
 for her maid. She was thunderstruck to find that 
 her tremendous grief had been for a second effaced 
 by the long habit of her life, and that she, the child, 
 and his father had stood together for that brief 
 moment in ordinary natural intercourse. It appalled 
 her that it should be so. For now the knowledge 
 of her situation returned in redoubled clearness, but 
 accompanied by a sense of curious weakness. Her 
 ears followed her husband's steps to his dressing- 
 room, and her heart began to beat suffocatingly. 
 There was a delirious hurry in her pulses and a 
 panting terror in her breast. It brought a flush to 
 her cheek and a brightness to her eyes. She turned 
 from her dressing-table when her toilette was com- 
 plete and stood hesitating, her eyes downcast, her 
 air that of a soft dignity a little uncertain of itself. 
 All the time her ears had strained themselves for 
 the slightest movement in Norman's dressing-room, 
 and now she heard him go downstairs. 
 254 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 " Oh, mistress ! " exclaimed the maid, unlocking 
 a cupboard to replace the morning gown, "you 
 look lovely to-night. I do feel proud sometimes 
 when I Ve dressed you." 
 
 Constantia cast a perplexed glance at the mirror, 
 thanked the girl gently, and went out. An un- 
 wonted timidity seized her ; when she entered the 
 drawing-room and saw Norman standing alone 
 upon the hearth, handsome, self-possessed, smiling, 
 her eyes drooped beneath his, and her step fal- 
 tered. The habitual, with the difference in it, 
 affected her as by some fume, and all the little 
 lights of thought and will flickered out. 
 
 " You look five years younger to-night, Constan- 
 tia!" said Norman, coming up with alacrity and 
 placing her hand in his arm. 
 
 His eyes travelled over her face in surprised 
 admiration. 
 
 " I do like my wife to look well," he murmured. 
 
 The same inexplicable confusion and partial ob- 
 fuscation of her senses which had attacked her in 
 the bedroom remained with her when she returned 
 alone to the drawing-room. She paced the room 
 slowly, raising her handkerchief more than once to 
 her damp brow. Every sign of her habitual life 
 and habitual happiness was about her ; she felt that 
 this mere habit of life was a sluggish stream that 
 threatened to efface her individual will and con- 
 science ; and before she had forced from her mind 
 a clear idea, Norman was back. He carried the 
 255 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 evening papers in his hand, and brought into the 
 room with him the usual sense of vigour, masculine 
 will, and complete self-possession. She realised 
 acutely how restful was his atmosphere, and how 
 completely her own nature had, during the years of 
 their life together, settled into comfortable subordi- 
 nation to his. And now the parting of the ways 
 had come? 
 
 Norman handed her the papers to choose from, 
 and took those she left. He seated himself on the 
 sofa, threw one leg along it, and leaned lazily 
 against the cushions. Seated opposite, the paper 
 dropping from her hand, she studied the familiar 
 form and face ; and thus looking at him she experi- 
 enced more and more a weakening of her nature, 
 a monstrous temptation to condone everything, 
 shuffle everything by, for the sake of that sweet 
 intimacy which, for the first time for twenty years, 
 was threatened ; to be party to his failure, ac- 
 complice of his lapse, for the sake of retaining the 
 warm peace of the nest of love in which she had 
 existed for so long. 
 
 For there was still peace. In what had his 
 manner differed during this day from what it had 
 always been? In what had his affection towards 
 her and the children diminished? As long as he 
 remained unconscious of her discovery, as long as 
 she stifled her agony, the old life might go on. 
 How should she reach, out of these years of merged 
 existence, a separate individuality strong enough to 
 256 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 set into opposition to his ? The scare of it appalled 
 her. 
 
 " Why," asked she, in spiritual terror, " should I 
 attempt this scission ? Why say a word ? Why risk 
 the outward peace which at least I can retain?" 
 
 The spoken cowardice acted as a goad to her 
 torpid brain; she was startled back into full con- 
 sciousness. She found herself, as her gaze concen- 
 trated more and more upon the unconscious, careless 
 ease of Norman's attitude, in the throes of a supreme 
 debate ; and in the anguish of it, her very passion 
 revived out of the long years of secure and satisfied 
 love which had laid it at rest. She began to 
 tremble at his presence, to shudder at the thought 
 of his touch, at the sight of his hand holding the 
 paper. 
 
 What disorder was this in her life ? For it was 
 disorder. Her deepest consciousness of the some- 
 thing which encircles all emotion and is greater than 
 the emotion itself, taught her to distinguish amidst 
 the distresses of the moment, and to refuse to be 
 blinded by any sophistry of the conventions. 
 
 Just as outside the pale of man's law and in 
 defiance of it general emotion may be not only 
 guiltless but true to the highest and most elevating 
 that man can touch, so within the pale of man's 
 law and permitted by the bond of marriage itself, 
 may sexual emotion defile the discernment, and 
 ruin the moral power and break the individual will. 
 
 Of all such feeling, the ultimate criterion is the 
 17 257 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 fruit in the character and life; the machinery of 
 law and of convention does not affect that higher 
 balance of the judgment. 
 
 At last, rising softly from her chair, she withdrew 
 to another portion of the room ; a glance assured 
 her that Norman, engrossed by his paper, was tak- 
 ing no notice whatever of her movements. She 
 pushed back a curtain that fell over an arch, and 
 passed into a dimly lighted antechamber. Here 
 she walked up and down in agitation, clasping and 
 unclasping her hands, and trembling at the thought 
 of her own husband. 
 
 " I do not understand myself," she said ; " is it 
 an infection ? Am I myself contaminated by mere 
 proximity?" 
 
 258 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 EDWARD ARMSTRONG had played his trump card 
 and had secured the mines, but the event left him 
 without any great sense of satisfaction. He was 
 not troubled at having assumed the part of the 
 blackmailer what was the good of acquiring a 
 certain class of information if you did not use it to 
 your own advantage ? but in spite of the support 
 of some of his family, and the ministrations of their 
 flattery, he had as much difficulty in persuading 
 himself to a comfortable sense of success as some 
 pious persons have in working themselves up to an 
 assurance of having " got salvation." 
 
 Midnight is a proverbially uneasy season, and 
 Edward lay with his nose above the coverlet fever- 
 ishly reviewing the particulars of his coup d'etat. 
 It was a peculiarity of his nature that he was not 
 content to be a villain ; he desired to be a saint or 
 an angel if only it would not cost so much. 
 There was nothing he would have liked better than 
 to play the part of the hero if only that role was not 
 invariably accompanied by a roughly made cross. 
 Now Edward hated carrying a cross ; it was even 
 difficult for him to resign a comfortable arm-chair to 
 259 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 another more tired than himself. But he dearly 
 loved to picture himself as habitually making sac- 
 rifices, and he was skilful in insinuating this ideal, 
 view to others. His step- mother, his Aunt Caroline, 
 and Sylvia remained stanch worshippers ; but at 
 this hour of the night the conviction intruded itself 
 that his father had seen through him at the last, 
 and he was by no means sure that Gilbert's mind was 
 not moving to a like conclusion. Gilbert had not 
 directly opposed the new distribution of the prop- 
 erty which presented Edward with nearly half the 
 whole amount, but he had sat before the fire, rest- 
 lessly picking at his fingers and staring at the flames 
 with a dark look that Edward did not find consoling 
 to his vanity, and which wounded him as an injus- 
 tice. Like the god of the poets he felt that he 
 "missed his little human praise." 
 
 Nevertheless his family on the whole acquiesced 
 in his view of his rights. Even Eliza gave no ex- 
 press denial of their father's gift, though she per- 
 sisted in a bald description of the interview which 
 left it entirely unornamented by those little touches 
 that make a thing convincing. It was, however, 
 in connection with Dayntree that his thoughts were 
 most disturbing. 
 
 Dayntree's idea of the distribution of the property 
 had been a division so exact that Edward could 
 only marvel at the want of imaginative justice in 
 a man who could apportion to his needs the same 
 amount that he handed to Eliza ! Nevertheless it 
 260 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 had at first seemed improbable that he would take 
 any other view. It was not until Edward played 
 his trump card that there had been a sign of yield- 
 ing. It was, however, just on the subject of the 
 trump card that the pricking sense of fear came in. 
 He could not assure himself that the executor had 
 acted solely in alarm that there was not some 
 diabolical joke or prescience at the bottom of it. A 
 sudden reference to the wet night at the inn had 
 evidently affected him, but his words and manner 
 had left Edward uncertain what was his part in the 
 adventure. Rosalie Trelyon had a character for 
 eccentricity Dayntree might have been acting as 
 an emissary for the mother. It was true that his 
 Edward's silence had been bought by the gift 
 of the mine shares, but Dayntree's bearing had not 
 been that of alarm. He had thrown a look diffi- 
 cult to read, while saying, 
 
 " Very well, Armstrong ; you shall have it your 
 own way." 
 
 Even then he refused to make the distribution 
 of the property as desired unless he Edward 
 signed a paper alleging that the portion assigned to 
 himself was his own choice, and in deference to a 
 wish expressed by his dying father and testified to 
 by his sister. Edward particularly disliked that. 
 He was a man who shrinks from seeing his deeds 
 on paper with his name beneath them ; he liked a 
 loophole left for future contingencies. Another 
 point on which Dayntree had insisted was that 
 261 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 ;8ooo of the shares should be distributed to the 
 other members of the family, Edward taking instead 
 ^"2000 of some other scrip. 
 
 It was only yesterday that the rest of the distribu- 
 tion had been concluded. Edward's brain was hot 
 with the kind of angry argument which was common 
 in the Armstrong family. Eliza's share of twelve 
 thousand and odd affected him with a peculiar 
 sense of grudge, why should she and Sylvia have 
 so much? They and their step-mother had taken 
 the same amount as Gilbert, who looked dark and 
 sat silent before the fire. Nor had Gilbert altered 
 his mood upon Edward's endeavouring to represent 
 that the difference between the thirty-two thousand 
 which he had taken and the twelve which Gilbert 
 had received, was somehow representative of an act 
 of sacrifice on his part by which the family would 
 be benefited. 
 
 " We must yield, Gilbert," said Mrs. Armstrong, 
 " to a laudable desire on Edward's part to carry out 
 his father's wish to found a Family." 
 
 " And how the deuce I J m going to do it on thirty- 
 two thousand pounds, the Lord alone knows " 
 
 " Edward ! don't swear ! " 
 
 " I 'm left a pauper a mere pauper to start 
 with. Aunt Caroline, dorft take me up in that 
 ridiculous way." 
 
 " Edward naturally feels excited, Caroline." 
 
 " And T tell you what, Gilbert you don't know 
 it, but it is so I handed eight thousand of my 
 262 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 shares to you and mother and the girls, and took a 
 paltry two thousand in their stead of railway guar- 
 anteed stock, or something slow, that is no use 
 whatever." 
 
 From Gilbert darkly staring at the fire came no 
 reply. But everybody knew what it meant when 
 he picked at his fingers in that way. 
 
 " The wrong," said Edward, perambulating the 
 room and speaking always oracularly, " is the 
 amount the girls have got. But I wash my hands 
 of the whole affair. Father put it out of my power 
 to see justice done to you or any one." 
 
 It was not within Edward's capacity to conceive 
 the poignancy of the smart under which Norman's 
 self-respect suffered, nor his misery at the affront to 
 his pride. Accustomed to deal with men, he had 
 detected the weakness of uncertainty in young Arm- 
 strong's manner, and had met it (at much cost to 
 his nerve) by a firm air of indifference. But the 
 best he could achieve by his manner on one side, 
 and the policy of yielding to Edward's demands on 
 the other, was, he began to perceive, a mere post- 
 ponement of peril. Conduct like money may be a 
 kind of investment, and as commercial prudence 
 recognises the futility of "throwing good money 
 after bad," so did Norman recognise the uselessness 
 of casting away his probity to save his dishonour. 
 Still he did it. The need was urgent ; it was the 
 one handy expedient ; yet, as he-took it, he felt that 
 he was bankrupt, at least in security, while the air 
 263 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 of surprise with which Evan heard of the transfer of 
 the mine scrip to Armstrong made him question 
 whether his bankruptcy did indeed extend to his 
 integrity. 
 
 Meanwhile it added to the ache of Evan's heart 
 about Rosalie to feel that any act of Norman's 
 was difficult of adjustment to his sense of probity. 
 
 " The world is sadly out of joint," said he, as 
 he walked down the lane towards the. Court to 
 say good-bye to Eliza. 
 
 Half-way down the lane he met Mr. Dixon ; 
 he was walking smartly and nodded rather gaily. 
 Evan noticed a flower in his button-hole. 
 
 " Hang the fellow," said he, gnashing his teeth 
 in ill-humour; "he makes one feel more out of 
 joint than ever, with his air of fat success and in- 
 capacity for ruffled feeling." 
 
 Half-way up the court drive he discerned " Aunt 
 Caroline '' slowly sauntering homewards. Evan 
 stepped on to the grass, and walked more slowly ; 
 he had no desire to overtake Miss Armstrong in 
 his present mood. In spite, however, of his pre- 
 caution, she turned and recognised him ; seeing 
 that she waited, he advanced with lifted cap. 
 
 "I am the bearer of a message to Miss Eliza 
 Armstrong. Be so good as to direct me," said 
 he, when the ordinary salutations were over. But 
 Miss Armstrong knew nothing of the whereabouts 
 of so inconsiderable a person. 
 
 Then it came to Evan's mind (and it cut him 
 264 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 to think it) that perhaps she might still be haunt- 
 ing the precincts of the pine-wood. Raising his hat 
 to bid adieu, he turned his steps in that direction. 
 He walked quickly on, the silence of the 
 country about him. It was autumn now, a cold 
 bright day late in October, but in the wood it was 
 warmer. As he opened the gate from the lane, 
 the pleasant pure aroma of the pines, the quie- 
 tude and silence carried the inevitable association. 
 He marvelled to find how soft and soothing was 
 that memory of the pine-wood friendship with 
 Eliza, how it discovered itself to him as a cooling, 
 dim-tinted, twilight thing. Should he find her here 
 now? He went on towards the accustomed spot, 
 treading meditatively upon the fallen needles, his 
 heart partly regretting the peace he had lost. And 
 suddenly he caught sight of the familiar figure ; 
 he did so before she had a chance of seeing him. 
 Then he stopped short, and looked at her steadily. 
 This is how it came about that he saw a woman 
 in her love pain without subterfuge or reserve ; 
 there was no duplicity possible because she did 
 not dream she was observed. She was sitting on 
 the ground, her cape wrapped closely around her, 
 and her head against a tree. Her cheeks were 
 white, and her eyes closed ; her face was a simple 
 page of suffering passion; it was Evan's own 
 experience which enabled him to read it. He 
 stood perfectly still, unable to decide whether to 
 advance or to steal away; his heart was sick 
 265 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 with compunction because he recognised that he 
 himself was the cause of the girl's sorrow; he 
 saw that it must be so, and acknowledged it with 
 perfect simplicity and reverence. At first he was 
 ready to steal quietly away; but if she looked 
 up and saw him, how she would be hurt by that ! 
 It was a brutal thing in a man to leave the woman 
 he had wounded without a word of consolation 
 or help or thanks. He came on, and she heard 
 his step and opened her eyes with a start. He 
 stopped seeing himself a god within them ; 
 his heart was suffused with remorse, modesty, and 
 sympathetic pain ; but his own experience guided 
 him, and he could not hurt the white little suffering 
 soul he had found. It surprised him that Eliza's 
 eyes could look so beautiful, and when the colour 
 rushed into her delicate skin and she threw out- 
 lier hands with a cry, he ran and flung himself 
 on the ground by her side. He felt her quiver 
 with the passion his proximity brought; he knew 
 that in her soul she clung to him. In one breath 
 he excused and accused himself, for, without dream- 
 ing it, he had wrought for her a great sorrow. 
 
 "Have you come here every day since since 
 the last time? 7 ' he asked. 
 
 " Yes," said Eliza. 
 
 How much he himself had traversed ! How 
 
 far he had gone ! He wondered at it; he had 
 
 been led on and on by a subtle enchantment 
 
 until he had become a different being. His 
 
 266 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 manhood, he ventured to think, was a tougher, 
 stronger, more serious thing than it had been, 
 and thereat he sent up a humble aspiration that 
 he might be a more tender thing also. For mean- 
 while Eliza had waited for him in the pine-wood. 
 
 "You are very silent, Eliza," said he, after 
 the long pause his many thoughts occasioned. 
 
 " I would just as soon talk in a concert-room 
 as in a fir-wood," said she. 
 
 "But you used to talk. Talk to me now," he 
 pleaded. 
 
 " Very well." 
 
 He looked at her downcast face, telling himself 
 out of his own experience what hers must have 
 been. It was sharper and worse, he told himself, 
 because she only sat and waited. It seemed so 
 simple to him and natural and yet so piteous that 
 he could not help speaking of it. 
 
 " Do forgive me, Eliza," said he, very humbly. 
 
 She waited a very long time before her startled 
 heart found its reply. 
 
 "Why? "said she. 
 
 " Because I am so sorry." 
 
 She waited a long a very long time again ; 
 it was also very simple to her, but then her heart 
 felt startled. 
 
 "I don't think you need be," said she, "and 
 I have not got any feeling in my heart that makes 
 me need to forgive." 
 
 "Thank you," said he. 
 
 267 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 He felt that he had to be very simple and open ; 
 he pushed the fir-needles about with his stick, and 
 spoke again suddenly. 
 
 " I have fallen in love with Rosalie," said he. 
 
 " Of course," she returned ; " I knew you 
 would." 
 
 And then she leaned her head against the trunk 
 of the tree. After a time he ventured to look 
 at her, and saw the pain and whiteness in her face ; 
 it drooped a little towards his shoulder with closed 
 eyes, and it reminded him, lying thus against 
 the dark rough bark of the tree, of nothing so 
 much as of a soft white moth that has been in- 
 advertently crushed. He did not know if it was 
 right, but he stretched his hand and took hers in 
 its clasp. 
 
 " I said we should be friends," he said, in an- 
 guish. 
 
 " And I the same," she murmured. 
 
 Her ringers were tiny in his palm, but he felt 
 their pressure. Two great tears stole down her 
 cheeks, and he turned away, his lips working ; but 
 he did not know that the saltness of them was for 
 him and not for herself. 
 
 268 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 DISTURBED by the fearful glimpse into the weak- 
 ness of her own nature, Constantia sought safety 
 in absence from home. She took a cottage in a 
 lonely spot, and, released from the exacting claims 
 of domestic life, felt the power of thought returning. 
 Her starting-point was consistent with the simpli- 
 city of her character. She had no conception of a 
 method of action other than what was based on 
 sincerity and a complete recognition of the truth ; 
 mere skillful management of the position was mean- 
 ingless to her, and she could see nothing lying be- 
 tween some sheer definition of her own standpoint 
 or the surrender of her nature to her husband's. 
 
 Her first temptation left her conscious that the 
 thing warring most against the bit of clear individ- 
 ual judgment necessary to the event was her prac- 
 tice of self-surrender as a wife. There is nothing 
 in the constitution of things to ensure us against 
 being entrapped by virtue itself when it has become 
 habitual. It made no difference that her surrender 
 had ever kept within itself the possibility of reserve 
 and denial, that the gift had been in strength and 
 not in weakness a choice and deliberate exercise 
 269 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 in affection. In spite of the acquittal of conscience 
 in this review of the higher emotions, she knew that 
 if treachery was there to entrap her, it lurked within 
 her habit as a wife, tempting her to fall with the 
 fallen rather than accept the scission which the 
 retainment of her own moral standpoint required. 
 Herein was the uttermost poignancy and inward- 
 ness of the sorrow. 
 
 But if anything less than clear reading of this 
 fact of sorrow was impossible to her, so was the 
 idea of revenge. It even troubled her to be so 
 beaten by a storm of personal pain as to be unable 
 to reach a vantage-ground of thought. How then 
 would it help if she chose to range through life 
 as the assailer of the man she loved or of men in 
 general because of his wrong ? The practised calm- 
 ness of her mother-life forbade such an attitude ; it 
 was impossible for Constantia to be pushed by an 
 injury into the chaotic realm of angry reprisal, or to 
 bring the addition of herself to the too universal 
 discord. Not in wrath lay the solution of the prob- 
 lems of life for herself or any. 
 
 Thought at first could reach no further than the 
 knowledge that help was only to be found if she 
 could fling herself beyond this darkening, stabbing 
 mist of the personal. She must tear away through 
 the net of anguish that pinned her to the ground if 
 she was to see into the event its deepest reality, 
 and so arriving at its true proportion and signifi- 
 cance be able to feel and act in some profound 
 270 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 accord with the hidden truth. But it was hard to 
 lift herself so far. 
 
 *' The wings of my heart are broken," said she, 
 " and I cannot lift myself so far." 
 
 She sat as a beggar by the wayside, a creature 
 deprived of home, riches, and the very garments of 
 wonted use ; her sweet wounded memories wept 
 tears of blood with her, and all her children were 
 naked woes. 
 
 Nevertheless the impression rested in her mind 
 with faintly beckoning significance of a far-away 
 calm atmosphere ; thinking of it, she brought her 
 lips dimly to syllable the word " God." And yet it 
 was not too far, but was an interpenetrating, all- 
 comprehending something, which, like the heat and 
 light of the sun, fell equally on the just and the 
 unjust, nourishing the evil man as well as the good, 
 holding all within its circle, and counting none either 
 first or last. 77 did not separate. 
 
 " If I could get there," said she to herself, " I 
 should see Norman again." 
 
 Constantia had never been a religious woman, 
 and was unbiassed by any dogma. The idea of the 
 personal God she rejected and shrank from. She 
 wanted no God that would take sides with herself 
 and revenge her injury; she wanted a mental 
 atmosphere in which she could see Norman again 
 and readjust her power of loving him to something 
 consistent with the fact of what he was and with 
 her own moral integrity. Such a plan of thought 
 271 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 she sought, her hands about her knees, her head 
 upon them in the darkness of humiliation. 
 
 " Where is the God who permitted my own love 
 to wound me, and who understands him, and knows 
 the reason?" 
 
 The mother in her never went out even in the 
 moment of her uttermost pain. She called through 
 this night of pain to be delivered from that distrac- 
 tion of personal torment which shook the lineaments 
 of her sorrow, and to be permitted again to touch 
 the human prerogative which makes possible the 
 difficult phases of life the prerogative of seeing 
 by sympathetic insight that other as well as the Self. 
 Trembling and blinded by her anguish of wife, it 
 was through her motherhood that she reached hands 
 of understanding up to the Soul of all Humanity. 
 She knelt, praying hour by hour for light and for 
 light, for supreme calm, for such a calm as held 
 her when the children about her were wrong and 
 unhappy. 
 
 " This burden is heavy," she said ; " I am weak 
 and have no husband. I have to be mother to all." 
 
 The blameless prayer is the strong effective prayer, 
 the prayer spoken to the high part of mind. 
 Many prayers are uttered in deepest sincerity to 
 fiends conjured from the murky confusion of the 
 character. There is nothing in the human exposi- 
 tions of religion to prevent the murderer asking for 
 a high place in Heaven, the cheat and the gambler 
 that their scheme may be successful, the vain man 
 272 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 or woman that the heart of the rival may be pierced 
 by failure. 
 
 Thought grew clearer at last. One day she had 
 a flashing suggestion of placing herself in the posi- 
 tion of her husband, and imagining him in her own. 
 Suppose it were so ; let her be the false one. Con- 
 ventionality and the law gave at once a remedy into 
 his hands ; he could punish by repudiation, dis- 
 grace, and divorce. But what would be the mean- 
 ing of such punishment? Hardly a freeing of him- 
 self and children from a contaminating influence, or 
 a solemn act of protest against a deed he must 
 never connive in ; for an act of infidelity on his 
 side towards her was not recognised as a wrong by 
 the law, and scarcely so by convention. The pun- 
 ishment would therefore be an act of vengeance. 
 But she had already discarded the idea of revenge 
 as a mere spread of the discord and mischief, which 
 no hurt on her own part could justify. But why 
 did convention and the law thus safeguard her 
 faithfulness to her husband by terrors and threats? 
 
 She raised her arms, and clasped her hands behind 
 her head, and her eyes darkened under her knit 
 brows. She turned the question over and over 
 until it lightened towards her with the suddenness 
 of a new idea. Under this strange legal coercion 
 she put aside for the moment the accompanying 
 injustice lay perhaps the recognition of a simple 
 natural truth. It was not a truth which she had 
 expected to find, but when anguish sharpens the 
 18 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 faculties, the every-day truths which lie on the sur- 
 face of things, but which are concealed from the 
 eyes by a veil of habit, come into prominence again. 
 Constantia was startled by what she said, but in- 
 stinctively thrust out her hand and seized it as one 
 wandering in a hopeless labyrinth seizes the shim- 
 mering silver thread that is the faint guide to the 
 exit. 
 
 " Here is the clue," said she ; " I cannot see 
 yet, but I have the clue in my hand. One day I 
 shall step out of this darkness into light." 
 
 She occupied herself with the thought, walking 
 miles and miles alone over the country and holding 
 no communication with any single creature. She 
 tried it in all possible ways, and in every aspect in 
 which she considered it she found that it radiated 
 light. Above all, the shining from it fell upon the 
 ground about her own feet, and showed her as it 
 were a bit of rock on which she might stand firmly 
 and meet the shocks of fate. 
 
 When at last she returned home, it was as a 
 changed creature. She had effected that necessary 
 release of herself from the tie of sense and from 
 the habit of surrender which had numbed her 
 power of judgment, and though her anguish was still 
 supreme, it no longer threatened her moral force 
 with submergence. 
 
 Norman awaited her return with uneasy surmise. 
 The game was not going as he had meant it ; he 
 had willed to have his hand upon it at every point, 
 274 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 and it seemed, on the contrary, to have laid its 
 hand upon him. He felt about him the hostility 
 and plotting of secret foes foes that were spiritual 
 as well as human. Armstrong's threat and Evan's 
 glance of surprise were gall to his memory, and the 
 thought of his own capitulation in the matter of the 
 mines bitter aloes ; his sensitiveness breathed up 
 evil odours and shuddered, and he felt that the 
 freedom and pride of his bearing was mere self- 
 imitation. He had shut his mind upon the ques- 
 tion what Constantia's absence meant, and he would 
 hardly own that he dreaded her return. When she 
 came if was not to the old place as regards him, 
 and her face was a closed page. She was not cold, 
 it was worse than that. She treated him with the 
 kindly courtesy one expects from the stranger in 
 the street. She made him feel afraid. He was 
 stupefied by her attitude ; he questioned nothing, 
 but permitted her to do as she wished in every par- 
 ticular, acquiescing in the changes she made without 
 a word. It shook, as never before had it been 
 shaken, his faith in his own prescience and judg- 
 ment, that she should thus display this silent hidden 
 force. 
 
 " Are we strangers ? Where is my wife gone ? 
 Was it worth bartering so much ? " 
 
 He was staring at the bedroom door which Con- 
 
 stantia had locked behind her. He walked along 
 
 in his own house as a stranger, and when he sat 
 
 down and thought of that locked door, he lost sight 
 
 2 75 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 of the more subtle spiritual questionings in view of 
 the simply human realisation that the word " home " 
 meant, after all, " Constantia. " 
 
 Meanwhile Constantia, in the circle of her own 
 separate experience, by no means held to the slight 
 footing of safety she had obtained without difficulty. 
 Her determination not to be wrecked by what had 
 happened was tried by daily occurrences; her reso- 
 lution that she herself would stand in the breach 
 against the gathering disaster was put continually to 
 the test. We measure our force always by the 
 greatness of the trial, and neglect in the calculation 
 the multitude of stinging smallnesses that accom- 
 pany it. 
 
 One day she came upon a packet containing evi- 
 dences of his unfaithfulness, and the rush of over- 
 whelming feeling with which she saw it seemed at 
 first a justification for desertion of that higher guid- 
 ance to which she had bound herself. She had to 
 learn herself over again by the light of this experi- 
 ence as a creature of like passions with others. It 
 cost hours of anguish before she could attain com- 
 posure enough to recall that clearer atmosphere to 
 which she had aspired and named " God ; " but 
 through the returning turmoil she still had power to 
 try and aspire upwards. And at last the discord 
 she repudiated was stilled. 
 
 "Why," said she to herself, "should I be unable 
 to think of this woman with common forbearance 
 and patience because the wrong she has done has 
 276 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 hurt mel If it were another man than Norman 
 with whom she had fallen, should I not have meted 
 out a measure of compassion with my judgment? 
 If it had been some other man than my own hus- 
 band, and yet I had to deal in the matter, should I 
 find the position so overwhelming to my judgment, 
 and the clue to it so buried in reproaches and 
 personal pain?" 
 
 Then again she took the event as her mother- 
 heart might have taken some perverse and wicked 
 child, and sought into its meaning with all her ten- 
 der mother-wit and wisdom, and soothed down the 
 soreness of a point here and there, and abated 
 the fury of its smart with mild impersonal reason- 
 ableness. 
 
 The packet contained letters from Rosalie to her 
 husband ; her temptation was to read them. 
 
 "No," said she to herself, "those are the 
 love-letters of another woman. I have not the 
 right." 
 
 There was a faded flower or so and a likeness ; 
 the case of the latter she opened, and gazed upon 
 it with but slight emotion. Her power of suffering 
 seemed in part exhausted. She even found the 
 portrait interesting, and noted its charm and beauty ; 
 unthinkingly she blew away a spot of dust that rested 
 on the cheek. 
 
 Then she took the packet into her own posses- 
 sion, and locked it in the place where she had a 
 habit of gathering those things which Norman's 
 277 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 carelessness left unguarded. At night, when he 
 came home, he found her a beautiful kind stranger 
 in his house, and all his preconceptions fell away 
 into ashes. 
 
 But grief is many-sided, and there were days 
 when her self-respect swooned before the blow it 
 had received. Day after day it might be so ; day 
 after day she seemed to strive with a burden she 
 could not lift. The blow had been double-edged, 
 and cut the springs of joy in two places. Not 
 only had she failed to keep her heart's love, but she 
 was palsied by the feeling that she had bestowed 
 her own unworthily ; the father of her children had 
 fallen from her respect. And if any one knew it ! 
 Against this dread she could not rise the eyes of 
 the world upon //, upon him ! She shrank before 
 imagined words, and her eyes caught pictured 
 glances. This sick and cruel phantasy was an in- 
 tolerable torment ; no meek submission could bring 
 peace from the assault. At last she found that 
 agony thrust her to that timid courage which calls 
 down the blow upon itself. 
 
 " At least," said she, " let the first stone be cast 
 by the hand of a friend." 
 
 And then she sent for Irene. 
 
 Constantia received her in the work-room, which 
 was consecrated amongst other uses to long confi- 
 dential discussions between the two. 
 
 " It is not the children,' 7 she explained quickly, 
 when her sister had seated herself and with ordinary 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 composure drawn a small embroidery case from her 
 pocket. 
 
 Irene, who had taken for granted that some 
 scheme about the children was to be the subject, 
 instinctively laid aside her work and contemplated 
 her sister more narrowly, seeing for the first time 
 the traces which anguish had left on her brow. 
 Constantia, faltering under the burden of speech, led 
 her on by degrees. She drew a hypothetical case 
 of a girl in good position who might form a different 
 conception of moral conduct from their own, and 
 who might act on it. She sketched her incident 
 as lightly as she could, in hints and figures of speech, 
 her tongue shrinking from the bitter nature of its 
 subject. 
 
 Irene listened in wondering silence ; she formed 
 no idea of the event as it touched Constantia, but 
 leapt to some apprehension of the nature of the 
 case. The girl was Rosalie, of course ; the thing 
 that had happened was that her instinct's dim fore- 
 boding was realised. 
 
 " You are speaking of Rosalie Trelyon," said she, 
 after consideration ; " you are telling me that she 
 has made a great mistake." 
 
 " It may be so," murmured Constantia. 
 
 " It probably is so," continued Irene, firmly ; 
 " recklessness such as Rosalie's might easily lapse 
 into something destructive." 
 
 "Yes?" said Constantia. 
 
 " Leaps in the dark by reckless people are very 
 279 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 harmful. On the other hand, if women blameless 
 in life and spirit would but take their stand Calmly 
 and frankly upon a natural basis instead of huddling 
 the physical away and denying their own nature,! 
 think fewer errors would be made. Cleanly people 
 see things truly. Vice throws the glamour of 
 vicious mystery over this subject, and a woman's 
 duplicity about it is a reflection of a bad man's 
 vice." 
 
 So Irene talked, feeling that her phrases though 
 true in themselves were somehow failing of their 
 mark. A heaviness of heart out of the range of 
 theory lay between herself and sister. But Con- 
 stantia listened willingly ; so far she was not hurt. 
 Was it perhaps possible that Irene's mind might 
 prove a fortress from which an enemy would not 
 shoot darts? And would she understand any- 
 thing about the common way along which human- 
 ity falters and she herself was creeping in ragged 
 destitution? For who can separate himself from 
 his near one's sin? She took her sister's hand 
 and pressed it against her heart while she looked 
 mutely and entreatingly into her eyes. Ah, but 
 what a fear ! If she spoke, the wild tiger of moral 
 indignation would spring from them and tear her 
 trembling spirit to pieces. None would under- 
 stand what she was feeling, that her husband's 
 unfaithfulness was her own beggary and rags. She 
 bore him dishonoured still in her heart of hearts ; 
 she was humble as one who asks an alms; her 
 280 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 dark eyes shrank terrified at the grey peace of 
 Irene's. And yet she spoke. She murmured out 
 the words, still with her sister's hand pressed against 
 her breast. 
 
 " Norman is not faithful to me," she said. And 
 then she told the story. 
 
 Irene listened in silence; her face, when Con- 
 stantia timidly glanced at it, was not to be read ; 
 in the serene depths of the eyes were thoughts; 
 presently a tear or two dropped over her cheeks. 
 That was a momentary relief; but when would the 
 stones fall and the cries of " Scoundrel ! Wretch ! 
 Infamy ! " come ? 
 
 Irene wiped the tears away, and folded her hands 
 on her knee. 
 
 " Oh ! " said she, " I am sorry for him." 
 
 The tone was gentle. Physical giddiness kept 
 Constantia silent for many minutes, but during 
 that time she found herself again and called herself 
 again by Norman's name with lips that did not 
 so much tremble ; after many days the burning 
 spot of agony was bathed with dew. 
 
 " Irene," she murmured, scarcely daring to add 
 a word, "do you understand? You so blameless 
 placed so high apart " 
 
 Her words broke off. Irene's face was changed 
 by a look of pain. 
 
 " Do not do me such an injustice ! " cried she, 
 almost fiercely. "Can any one of us bear to be 
 isolated from the common humanity? Better to 
 281 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 fall than to hold aloof ! Norman's fall is pitiful 
 but I understand. Rosalie's fall is piteous : I 
 understand it I understand. You say I am 
 blameless ? So I am ; I have that second-rate 
 quality. But it is not the best of life, Constantia ; 
 it is merely a tribute to imperfect social condi- 
 tions. Like faithfulness in a slave, mechanical 
 obedience in a soldier, monotonous industry in 
 a worker fighting the wolf at the door." 
 
 She paused, and took up a calmer tone. 
 
 " Put my blamelessness in the right place," she 
 continued. " All of us suffer, and all of us long ; 
 most of us enjoy, and all might enjoy without any 
 fall. But each knows the meaning of the social 
 bond of limitation laid on himself by present con- 
 ditions. Unfortunately some fall away from that 
 bond. Some of us recognise it as a second-rate 
 affair, and yet hold to it for all-sufficient reasons. 
 The worst women of all, in despite and hate of 
 their own virtue, bind it as an iron rule on others." 
 
 " It is like my own thought," murmured Con- 
 stantia. 
 
 282 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE ease of mental slumber came to Norman 
 as the days went on, and the surface peace with 
 them. He was not bound to question Constantia ; 
 the home was not the nest of joy it had been, but 
 it was possible to accommodate himself to the 
 change, to accept the hollow order in the house and 
 waive the rest seeing he had his resources outside. 
 
 Thus he succumbed to a coarser form of the 
 temptation which had assailed Constantia, almost 
 without a struggle. It had indeed become won- 
 derfully easy to stifle self-reproach, his sharp 
 apprehension concerning ' Constantia's possible 
 suffering having already been blunted into callous 
 unconcern at her surmises so long as she concealed 
 them under a surface peace. The face repeated, 
 as Constantia noted with a pang, the spiritual 
 change ; the chin coarsened, there was a re- 
 moulding of the nostrils, and those airy indices 
 of just and kindly character which lie about the 
 brow and eyes began to fade. 
 
 One afternoon, on his return from town, he 
 
 sought his wife in her work-room. He kept his 
 
 old bearing, though in her eyes, and sometimes 
 
 even in his own, it had become a conscious parody. 
 
 283 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 In trifling matters all ran smoothly as hitherto. 
 Yet it was just one of these minor affairs that 
 brought about the inevitable crisis between them. 
 There was in his character a turn towards a care- 
 less habit in the handling of small objects : the 
 intrinsic value of them did not make any differ- 
 ence ; if they were small, they were liable to 
 vanish. In the playful days of their honeymoon 
 it had become an established custom that Con- 
 stantia should supplement this teasing irregularity 
 by her order, and so prevent the trickle of small 
 disasters which otherwise would have followed. 
 On that particular afternoon it was an important 
 paper from his solicitor that had been mislaid. 
 
 " We have been all upset in the office to-day," 
 said he, approaching Constantia in her place 
 between the sewing-table and the hearth. " I 
 received a letter from my solicitor last week, and 
 imagined I had taken it to town. If by any chance 
 I left it here " 
 
 He smiled and broke off, nervously edging away 
 from the air of school-boy delinquency which had 
 been habitual on these familiar occasions. The 
 demeanour of his wife held within it none of those 
 unstretched moments which had been so common 
 and had kept a boy-and-girl freshness in their pri- 
 vate intercourse. 
 
 " I have picked up several letters and some other 
 things," said she ; " I stowed them all away to- 
 gether. You had better look." 
 284 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 She spoke without strain, neither did her lip 
 tremble as she put her hand in her work-basket to 
 draw out a small key. 
 
 " In the old place," said she. 
 
 It passed through his mind that no man's wife 
 could be as she was so constant, equable, and 
 trustworthy. The key belonged to a cabinet which 
 stood against the wall between the two windows ; 
 as he walked across the room and placed it in the 
 lock, Constantia laid down her work for she knew 
 that their hour had come. He opened the doors. 
 There were shelves and drawers. One of these 
 shelves was dedicated to his own mislaid property, 
 and he raised his hand towards it ; he saw a few 
 letters and minor articles ; he saw also a small 
 packet. At first it seemed as an illusion of the 
 brain, the trick of the mind throwing into visible 
 appearance a haunting though secret thought. 
 And then it stood out on the shelf in aggressive 
 palpability, in a substance and proportion that 
 seemed to his startled eyes beyond hiding for ever- 
 more. The packet was the small collection of 
 Rosalie's letters and her portrait; its position in 
 such a place seemed a piece of magic played on 
 him by malicious chance. And then a fury seized 
 him to be so tripped up his careful steering 
 dashed on so tiny a rock ; it shamed him that a 
 minor fault of character should have betrayed him 
 and his schemes to this plight, and the movement of 
 his anger went out against the wife who had stolen 
 
 285 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 the march upon him, and had stood by in silence 
 watching and waiting on the event. 
 
 The anger helped him for the moment. He 
 must strike out and assert his masculine strength, 
 and if he struck it must be at her ; so he turned on 
 her unhesitatingly with a white and somewhat dis- 
 torted face. But she did not flinch. She caught 
 this new revelation of the possibilities within her 
 husband's nature on a firm front, and it recalled 
 him to his better self. The steadiness of her look, 
 the dark eyes in the oval face sorrowing but calm, 
 stopped any fatal words before they were spoken, 
 and controlled the tumult of his heart. He had 
 walked rapidly towards her with madness on his 
 lips, but, reaching her, he found he was standing 
 silently holding in his hand the packet which of all 
 others he had wished to conceal. 
 
 On him lay the obligation of the first speech, for 
 though she continued to look steadily at him, she 
 uttered no word. 
 
 "You have read these things?" he brought him- 
 self to ask. 
 
 " I have not. They are the love-letters of an- 
 other woman." 
 
 That surprised without consoling him. He took 
 a turn or two through the room. 
 
 " Damn the things ! " said he, coming to a stand 
 before her again, and dropping the packet on to 
 the tiles of the hearth. 
 
 There was a sound of broken glass. Constantia 
 286 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 stooped, picked the case up, freed the uninjured 
 portrait from the glass, and set it up against a vase 
 on her table. She laid the letters quietly beside them. 
 
 "Why don't you burn them?" asked Norman, 
 chokingly. 
 
 "They are not mine." 
 
 What in heaven's name was he to do ? Accusa- 
 tions and reproaches would have been easier to 
 manage ; they would have called into play his role 
 of man, he could have received any turbulence that 
 rushed upon himself with strong opposing breast. 
 But there she sat quietly alone, leaving the situation 
 to him. He walked through the room with troubled, 
 quailing eyes. 
 
 He had impulses of love-making. Constantia 
 (with other women) had found the sexual suasion 
 in which he was gifted hitherto irresistible ; he was 
 tempted to put forth that side of masculine power. 
 But he was also a master in tact, and it served him 
 now in the place of rectitude. His mind swiftly 
 recognised the uncommonness in her attitude and 
 conduct, and the futility of meeting 1 her with com- 
 mon weapons. This breach was not to be healed 
 either by dominance or a kiss. A dark and hither- 
 to undiscovered continent within the nature of his 
 wife was disclosed to him ; unknown still in quality, 
 he perceived that it was there, and that his best 
 chance lay in leaping blindly to that, and discarding 
 in the moment every known and familiar portion. 
 
 Constantia by this time had risen to her feet, a 
 287 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 recognition of the stress he was under called out 
 this subtle deference ; but she remained where she 
 was, her eyes cast down, and her aspect one of 
 waiting. He reached the other end of the room, 
 and, standing by the windows, caught unconsciously 
 on the retina of his eye the wintry chill of the land- 
 scape, the last leaves shivering frailly on the elm- 
 trees, a bird or two standing on the twigs and 
 puffing out its feathers for warmth. And then it 
 suddenly happened to him to make up his mind 
 to turn round and address this wife of twenty years 
 with the bare respectful truth-speaking which he 
 might have addressed to a man. His tone was 
 very gentle, and his manner reflected the simplicity 
 of hers. 
 
 "Yes, Constantia," said he, "it is so." 
 
 " You mean you are unfaithful to me ? " 
 
 He found this far too sheer a description, but he 
 bowed to it. 
 
 " Have you ever been so before ? " 
 
 He looked surprised. His attitude became 
 tenser. He hesitated, and then resolved. 
 
 " Yes, I was unfaithful if you will call it so 
 before." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 " About five years after our marriage." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 Norman's eyes fell before this woman's, and an 
 expression of pained perplexity came into his face. 
 It was all very well to speak the truth to her as 
 288 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 though she were a man, since she stood up to him 
 like this, but he felt appalled and confused by a 
 tingling sense of her innocence. 
 
 " Really, Constantia," he said, " these are not 
 things I can or ought to discuss with you." 
 
 " They are things you did" 
 
 Norman's mind travelled over the whole range of 
 possible refuges, palliations, replies, and subterfuges. 
 In fancy her eyes followed him everywhere. He 
 found himself constrained at the last to fall back 
 once more on uttermost simplicity. 
 
 "Just so," said he. 
 
 Constantia in her turn walked through the room ; 
 it had become difficult for either to sit down. 
 Arrived at the window, she did not take in the de- 
 tails of the chill landscape as Norman did ; she saw 
 instead herself standing by Norman's side in un- 
 questioning trust in that past year to which he 
 had referred. It was the year after Ronald's 
 birth ; Connie and Ted were as yet unthought of. 
 Her heart pitied her own children.' Then the 
 blood surged up from it to her cheek and back 
 again; she could hardly have told whether the 
 flood of agonising shame was for herself or for 
 Norman. 
 
 " Why did you not tell me?" 
 
 She said it without turning round, the question 
 rising unbidden from her heart, and she did not see 
 the start of amazed perplexity with which he re- 
 ceived it. If he had discovered an unknown terri- 
 19 289 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 tory in her nature, he was keenly aware that each 
 moment was showing her an unsuspected portion of 
 himself. But was the combat an equal one ? He 
 was already parrying defensively the unconscious 
 skill of her dreadful thrusts. 
 
 "Really, Constantia, what can you mean? Tell 
 you ! you ? " he faltered. 
 
 She remained standing against the window with 
 her back to him ; one hand was clenched against 
 the frame, and she leaned her forehead upon it, 
 staring out without seeing anything. 
 
 " Who was the woman ? " she insisted. 
 
 " Constantia ! " implored Norman ; " I beg that 
 you will not question me in this manner. It is im- 
 possible for me to allow it. I cannot insult you 
 with such confidences." 
 
 His pallor accentuated his bitterness. 
 
 " You insult me with your confidences you ! 
 the father of my children ! " she repeated in a low 
 voice, still staring out of the window. 
 
 "Very well, then," returned Norman, desperately; 
 " it had neither beginning nor end, neither a yester- 
 day nor a to-morrow. Constantia, these are not 
 things I willingly bring to your ears." 
 
 " They are what you did" she murmured once 
 more. 
 
 He stood in helpless fury, perplexed for a reply. 
 
 " And she ? " came the next inquiry, in the same 
 level, restrained voice. 
 
 Norman made an incoherent exclamation, and 
 290 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 took a step or two towards her. Then he turned 
 back. 
 
 " For God's sake, don't bring her in ! " he ex- 
 claimed in angry scorn. 
 
 "Oh, but why treat her with contempt? You 
 brought her into your our life." 
 
 Norman sank down suddenly into a chair, and, 
 taking out his handkerchief, wiped the sweat from 
 his brow. 
 
 " Why was it? Was it my fault? Good Lord ! 
 no." 
 
 "When was it?" 
 
 He was white as a sheet. If he could but have 
 got to her face ! But she stood at the window, and 
 he saw nothing but her back and the gloom of the 
 winter afternoon closing in about her. 
 
 " I said about five years after our marriage. I 
 mean when I went that voyage. Constantia, dorft 
 make me speak ! " 
 
 He felt that he could have sobbed like a child, 
 but he only sighed. They were continents apart ; 
 he had no idea of the working of her mind. Her 
 next words brought him to his feet with a cry. 
 
 "In your absence I remained faithful to you* 
 Norman." 
 
 She turned as she spoke, revealing herself to him 
 with a simple gesture, her hands lightly touching her 
 breast, her eyes appealing. 
 
 " Constantia I " 
 
 He walked towards her quickly in a sort of 
 291 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 breathless terror; he wanted to tear her hands 
 down, to take that look out of her face. He feared 
 lest she should speak again. 
 
 "Hush! How am I to bear it? Of course I 
 never dreamed never dreamed of questioning 
 such a thing." 
 
 He was so inexpressibly shocked that his hands 
 and knees trembled. 
 
 " My dear love," he ventured, timidly laying a 
 finger upon her sleeve, " what can make you talk in 
 this shocking way ? " 
 
 His face was near hers now, and the dark eyes 
 looked straight into his. 
 
 " You were not faithful ; might you not be doubt- 
 ing me?" 
 
 " You are crazed ! Don't smite me in this way. 
 I repeat, such an idea has not remotely passed my 
 mind. You must not bring yourself in. You ! 
 the mother of my children ! " 
 
 " But you the father of mine ! " 
 
 " Yes, I know. I dare say you will look at it in 
 that way. But, dear love, dear child, all this was 
 years ago. Can you not at any rate pass this over? 
 Why should we go back to this ? " 
 
 " I have been misunderstanding my married life 
 all along. I must teach myself to understand it." 
 
 " Yes yes. But is this any part of it? " 
 
 Her dark eyes flashed. 
 
 " It is part of the man I married." 
 
 His face fell. 
 
 292 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 " Constantia, you are bitterly hard on me," said 
 he humbly. 
 
 "There you misconceive," said she; "but it is 
 necessary to understand. I find that I have wholly 
 misread my position with you. I find I have estab- 
 lished my relations with you on one basis, and you 
 with me on another." 
 
 " That is a very unjust way of putting it," said 
 he. " On my honour, there have been only these 
 two occasions. It is saying more than a good 
 many men could." 
 
 His voice plucked up a sharper tone. He found 
 himself subtly wounded by that assurance that he 
 was mistaken in charging her with bitterness. Ex- 
 plosive storms were what he really longed for ; this 
 coherent demand to " understand " hurt his pride 
 both as a man and a husband. Whatever he was 
 to her, she to him must remain the flawless thing, 
 the hymn to the stars, the ideal. He could not 
 bear her movement out of her shrine to handle a 
 common topic. He regretted the whole matter 
 especially the going back on so trivial and sordid 
 an event ; and he had space for some discursion, 
 for his last remark had dropped on silence. Notic- 
 ing it, he believed her heart surcharged, and hated 
 himself anew. What had it come to that he should 
 thrust at this delicate feminine creature, whom it 
 was his duty and pride to protect, with news from a 
 masculine world? 
 
 " I am so unwilling to offend you with these mat- 
 293 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 ters/' he murmured. " Your purity is very beautiful 
 to me. And, Constantia, I am not defending my- 
 self for what I recognise as a wrong. Of course I 
 wish that my nature had a strain more perfection. 
 But few men have. I am afraid you will not under- 
 stand if I say that quite possibly a gain here might 
 be a loss elsewhere. You cannot expect me to be 
 different from my kind. I am miserable at speak- 
 ing of such facts to you." 
 
 She did not reply at once, but stood with bent 
 head, her ringers linked, her aspect as one in re- 
 flection. 
 
 "You are not then ashamed of your own 
 nature ? " 
 
 " I have to accept it." He groaned at his futility. 
 " It is ill," cried he, " when a man and a woman 
 argue together on such a point." 
 
 " But you said ' facts.' " 
 
 "Well, yes. Constantia, I am so unwilling to 
 offend." 
 
 " Facts. And if there are facts, why should they 
 frighten me ? Have I proved myself a coward or 
 a fool?" 
 
 " My dear love ! God knows what a wife you 
 have been." 
 
 " To whom have I been a wife ? To what am I 
 a wife ? Did you speak of my purity ? " 
 
 " For which I worship you," he threw in eagerly. 
 
 She moved from her place by the window, and 
 walked once or twice up and down the room. The 
 294 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 dimness of the light somewhat transfigured her face. 
 He saw it passing through the space before him, a 
 little uplifted, the delicate profile (touched with the 
 sobriety of years and maternity) which he knew so 
 well, but which was subtly altered now by emotion 
 and thought, until it became a visionary face in a 
 dream a message, a symbol from the spiritual 
 hidden within this breaking crust of outward 
 circumstance, and confronting him for the moment 
 barely. 
 
 " What a thing is this he tells me," he heard her 
 voice murmuring to herself, " the purity of his wife 
 has weaved the snare for her own husband." 
 
 " How can you so wilfully misunderstand me?" 
 
 " But I understand for the first time. I follow. 
 I see only too well. Will you not understand me 
 also?" 
 
 He looked without answering. 
 
 " This purity you talk of : I do not use the 
 word. What is the word ? I say ( my passion/ 
 ' my capacity for love,' ' my wifehood and mother- 
 hood,' ' my truth and faithfulness/ ' my human 
 nature/ that most of all ; yes ! that that ! 
 I tell you, Norman, the nature on which you retreat 
 is good enough for me." 
 
 " I never expected to hear you say so, Con- 
 stantia," said Norman, reddening and frowning ; " I 
 believed you approached these things from a higher 
 plane." 
 
 "If I have any purity the two feet of it are 
 2 95 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 planted on this earth. I know no other plane. The 
 worship you give me I cannot take because it is 
 founded upon a lie or at least an error." 
 
 A blaze of indignation shot into Dayntree's eyes. 
 He believed that she spoke in mere heat, but he felt 
 that his rising anger against her attitude was justified 
 by the shock she gave him. 
 
 " As my wife, Constantia, I must beg you not to 
 let fall words which dishonour yourself as well as me. 
 It is utterly incomprehensible that you should play 
 with such a topic for a moment." 
 
 "You think lam in play? No. It is necessary 
 that you should learn where I stand. Rough facts 
 have brought me to see where you stand. I am 
 startled enough. I never dreamed of doubting you. 
 Did my unquestioning trust shape no obligation on 
 your side ? You were unfaithful to me in our early 
 married days, and now I find you the seducer of 
 Rosalie Trelyon." 
 
 " Constantia," said Norman, in an ignoble haste 
 which time back in another man he would have used 
 his fist to punish " Constantia ! I hate to say 
 it but I may as well say in your ear alone 
 particularly when you have every right to know 
 that I am not the seducer of Rosalie Trelyon. 
 Really, if it comes to that, the positions are 
 reversed.' 7 
 
 " Probably. By your physical qualities you ac- 
 quire a tremendous power over women in their 
 sexual nature." 
 
 296 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 Norman reeled suddenly, and walking to a sofa 
 threw himself upon it and buried his face in the 
 pillow. He was more bitterly hurt than he could 
 have conceived possible. His own remark was a 
 sorry shift for which he instantly despised himself; 
 it was one of those accidental straws on the current 
 which point whither the nature is trending. But 
 the main to him was that she accepted the truth 
 without outcry, with a tranquillity that introduced 
 a shocking dissonance into his starlike conception 
 of her character. 
 
 "But," she went on presently, "I am sorry 
 you should have put this about Rosalie as you 
 did." 
 
 After a long silence he raised his face and sat up ; 
 his suffering in that region of fastidious fancy, which, 
 as an atmosphere of pure art, pervaded his complex 
 mind, had been very keen. 
 
 " Yes, Constantia," he remarked humbly, " I was 
 a hound to say what I did about Miss Trelyon. But 
 you have your revenge. In desecrating your own 
 image in my mind by words which anger for I 
 will never believe otherwise has prompted, you 
 have hurt and wounded me sufficiently." 
 
 " Norman, there is no anger. My heart is too 
 stricken, too broken for that. But listen. You say 
 that you are miserable before me because of my 
 purity. Be miserable not for that, but because in 
 your dishonour you stand before one of like nature 
 with yourself, one who comprehends both the 
 297 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 temptation and the fall, one who separates herself 
 from none." 
 
 " Good God, Constantia ! " a flame of wrath 
 was in his voice "I set you on a pedestal." 
 
 " Ah, yes ! yes ! The separation in our marriage 
 did not begin to-day." 
 
 " I repeat/' cried Norman, harshly, " this lapse of 
 mine has nothing to do with our marriage. And 
 I will not stand by while you " 
 
 He broke off in agitation. He took a turn 
 through the room. 
 
 " I am very angry, Constantia ! " 
 
 " Yet you must know it. My nature, too, has 
 its infirmer moods when my blamelessness might 
 be found vulnerable. " 
 
 " It is inhuman of you to punish me this way," 
 said he, re-seating himself. 
 
 " A man," said she, " is judged by his peers. 
 The separation in our marriage began when you 
 divided up my nature in your thought of me, and 
 set some of it apart from your own. Out of this 
 division you shaped that which has torn the close 
 strong threads of our union." 
 
 Norman rose again to his feet. He was agitated 
 in ways beyond his expectation, he trod again 
 through the room up and down rapidly. 
 
 " Of course I set you apart ! Of course I 
 thought you blameless ! " he cried. 
 
 "Well! I happen to be so, 77 she returned, with- 
 out any note of elation in her voice ; " but I own 
 298 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 and have never owned any but the common nature 
 the nature common to you, to Rosalie. I am 
 alive, and I am human. It is the condition of all 
 live things that error is possible to them. I could 
 err. But you have thought me pitiless, and have 
 mistaken my faithfulness for mere incapacity. You 
 did me injustice there. My virtue is not a nega- 
 tion, it is positive. Because you thought other- 
 wise it has become the occasion of your ruin. In 
 your vigour and manliness you felt yourself excused 
 from the practice of that which hardly belonged to 
 flesh and blood. And thus it has happened that 
 your uttermost conception of obligation towards 
 the wife you say you ' worship ' has been 
 deception" 
 
 Her voice ceased, falling away to a heart-broken 
 sigh. It was getting very dark, but he knew by 
 the rustle of her garments that she was moving 
 through the room. The pulses in his body beat 
 thin and small, and his throat was dry. He was 
 very angry, and he was deeply horrified. The 
 idea of immaculate passivity in women had accom- 
 panied all his life as a starlike melody floating 
 above it. That was silenced; but amidst many 
 burning thoughts, the angriest and most excruciat- 
 ing lay in the absence of any note of superiority 
 from his wife towards Rosalie, any outbreak of 
 scorn and contempt there. He would have desired 
 to soothe such an ebullition with praises at her 
 "difference," and while kissing on bended knee 
 299 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 the white hand of her spotlessness, to have hidden 
 an experienced and rosy thought over the more 
 earthly texture of the other creature. But Con- 
 stantia had acknowledged no altitude j on the con- 
 trary, she had discovered herself as moving all 
 abroad upon the wide level of things. 
 
 When the door closed and he was alone, his 
 heart took a fuller beat. There was a trifle of 
 hardness in the set of his mouth. Any circum- 
 stance will lend a man all excuse for pursuing a 
 course upon which he is determined. He rose 
 up, giving his head and shoulders a shake ; then 
 he found that his hand was still clasping the small 
 key of the cabinet, and that reminded him of the 
 solicitor's letter. Once more the every-day world 
 was creeping about him ; he wanted that letter 
 badly ; but it was dark enough to make him grope, 
 and he had to find and strike a match and light a 
 candle. When he had secured the latter, he went 
 towards the hearth, and placing the match-box in 
 the glow that still remained in the fireplace, laid the 
 bundle of Rosalie's letters upon it, and left the 
 whole to blaze together. It was the only place for 
 a man of his careless habit. 
 
 300 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE chill winter days ran languidly at The Elms. 
 " Glynn " began to hope that her moulding had 
 begun to take effect, and that she should add to 
 her testimonials ; on three occasions Rosalie had 
 lately accepted her interference in silence. Then 
 she sat more with her mother in the drawing-room 
 amongst the gods, often crouched over the fire with 
 her chin in her hand watching the flame. An oc- 
 casional irony from her mother deftly slipped from 
 her honeyed tongue, and accompanied by a gleam 
 from her eyes, would rouse the girl to fierceness : 
 but it died out immediately, it was nothing but the 
 momentary flare of a smouldering emotion heavily 
 overweighted by dark thoughts. 
 
 Psychologically Rosalie had reached a moment 
 in her life when she was compelled to the practice 
 of self-examination ; hitherto the self-directing im- 
 pulses had sufficed ; but supposing impulse landed 
 one ever so little where one's choice had not con- 
 sented? Her thoughts went patter, patter. The 
 element of will in all she did, of daring but balanced 
 will, was necessary to her self-respect, and all her 
 301 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 thoughts busied themselves in building up a hand- 
 some base on which to erect the done deed in the 
 after-sanction of her finest and heroic choice. And 
 when the new morning waked after a night of sleep 
 the glittering sophism had vanished, the act lay 
 bare, and the weary building was still to be begun. 
 Once meeting her mother's eye a pin-point of 
 light in the handsome melting irises she stifled a 
 shriek upon her lips ; the eye seemed to penetrate 
 her mind, and following its ray she fancied she 
 encountered there Eliza's figure of the veiled in- 
 exorable one who sits within " judging judging 
 as none else can judge." It ran through her brain 
 as in written fiery letters that she had acted with- 
 out deliberation and without splendour. To be 
 splendid was her need. 
 
 But if, for example, he were splendid ! If he 
 were a gigantic figure of the century with whom it 
 would be historic to be associated, why did he not 
 act? She hunted the papers day by day, waiting 
 for the deed which should shine out of the printed 
 page and flood her gloomy heart with satisfying 
 sunshine. He had been pointed out as future 
 Minister for the Colonies, and a glory of tropical 
 empires had streamed in her fancy through his 
 years. Her heart had jumped to the African 
 scheme with exulting hope and after all it dan- 
 gled from the fingers of the slim brown young man 
 and not from his. As a side thought she wished 
 that Eliza would appear to tell her something fur- 
 302 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 ther about Evan Dayntree, but Eliza had left off 
 c.oming. This patching of shreds together, of build- 
 ing with sand, of going over and over the done 
 thing and feeling the bubbling up of a wish that it 
 had not been done or at least not so done, was be- 
 ginning to wear her life down into listlessness. She 
 could not even take a stand or find a reason for 
 taking a stand against herself. The meetings con- 
 tinued, and the brief intoxication of them effaced 
 anything like a consistent thought and consistent 
 motive. She tumbled between listlessness and ex- 
 citement and the after search for a splendid setting 
 for her deeds. But the deed is its own splendour. 
 One evening, tired beyond anything she could 
 have dreamed, and with the sense of failure left by 
 a useless mental exertion, she leaned back in her 
 chair in the drawing-room, dropped the paper which 
 for her held " no news," and closed her eyes ; the 
 roundness of her face and the soft bloom of her 
 skin seemed to shrink under the touch of an anxiety 
 scarcely comprehended but hard to bear. She had 
 been riding all the morning to fight off the convic- 
 tion that her " choice " had been no choice, but 
 came under the category of impulse of a primal and 
 formidable kind. And for the moment she could 
 fight no longer ; the conviction pinned her, and a 
 question whether she even loved the man hit her 
 a sudden blow. Were not the interviews losing 
 piquancy, zest, and grace? She raised her lids to 
 the inquiry, and found herself the object of the 
 33 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 fixed attention of her mother. Rosalie started from 
 her seat with an exclamation. 
 
 " Mother ! You you frighten me ! " 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon did not remove her gaze. 
 
 " It is I who am frightened" said she, in a low 
 voice. 
 
 " You frightened ? Why ? " 
 
 " I have never believed in the inevitable before." 
 
 Rosalie stared with parted lips. What was the 
 inevitable? Her mother was looking down now, 
 and her face was white and pinched and fear- 
 hunted. It was still Rosalie's great need to believe 
 in her mother; it was her need to believe in her 
 more even than she believed in the heroic figure of 
 her imaginary father. But a doubt worse than that 
 about herself turned her cold. She could not bear 
 the atmosphere of the drawing-room a moment 
 longer, and rose and left it. Mrs. Trelyon watched 
 her out of the room with the same intent stare, and 
 then caught her hands over her face and bowed 
 herself in her seat. 
 
 Rosalie put on her things and went out for a 
 walk ; she wished inexpressibly for Eliza ; she had 
 that dumb and rarely granted desire common to 
 human nature in distress an ear to pour her con- 
 fidence into ; and there was nothing offered but the 
 bounded silence of isolated suffering. She took 
 the way towards the common, and walked quickly 
 trying to drive out feeling by swift movement. She 
 intended to reach the stretch of the road over the 
 304 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 common so that she might walk more quickly, in 
 more blind hurry, the wind in her face. But a 
 winding lane lay before her a lane crossed by 
 a brook with a stone bridge over it, and turning a 
 corner she saw approaching, the other side of the 
 bridge, Evan Dayntree. The colour streamed into 
 her face ; she had not seen him since the evening 
 of the Cinderella dance ; as a sub-disturbance of 
 memory came the thought of the night-meeting 
 with Constantia. Where all threatened, the meet- 
 ing to Rosalie was ominous. 
 
 On Evan's side, equally unexpected, it raised to 
 his fancy on the path before him the one desired 
 and unattainable ideal. Some enchanted accident 
 had brought him there and placed his opportunity 
 before him ; lover-like and man-like he leapt to it. 
 It was three months since he had seen her, and 
 the time between had been filled with work and 
 thought ; he came on now quickly, his tread eager, 
 his features determined, " Africa" (as she thought) 
 " in his eyes." Rosalie stood still. On the far hori- 
 zons of her mind rose a little cloud faint, remote, and 
 she did not dream of what a storm it was the pre- 
 cursor ; but even at the moment there ran over her 
 brain a swift comparison between him and Norman. 
 She moved back unconsciously under his eyes, and 
 stood against the bridge wall. At that moment, in 
 his determination, his youth, his strong gravity 
 overarched by the irradiation of passionate tender- 
 ness, he had the best bearing of a man. 
 20 305 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Rosalie Trelyon," said he, quite simply and 
 sharply, "you must listen to me to-day, for there 
 are things I have to say to you." 
 
 " I thought you had gone." 
 
 He remarked that her haughty caprice had van- 
 ished ; she looked at him with a dulness that sur- 
 prised him. But his heart was too full to dwell on 
 the change. For him she was "Rosalie" it 
 summed up all. Divergences and moods mattered 
 little. 
 
 " I went away and I have come back. I went 
 away on your account and I have come back on 
 your account. I am your lover, and I believe you 
 know it. On the night of the ball you seemed to 
 disdain me. That cut me to the heart and drove 
 me away. But I am not a man to be disdained. 
 In my heart of hearts I think of you as my wife. I 
 must speak to you about it. You must think if you 
 can be so. I think of you as my wife because 
 when I first saw you I became filled with a great 
 and new emotion ; and I became inspired to aim at 
 greater things than I had aimed at before. Your 
 hand lifted something in me, and I saw what manner 
 of man it was possible for me to become. Then 
 I knew you must be my wife. That is what I read 
 as the meaning. I am not to go back on what you 
 showed me. I see the relation in which you stand 
 to me ; and I love you with great passion." 
 
 Rosalie listened with downcast eyes. She had 
 had a score of offers, but no man had begun just 
 306 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 like this one. He was offering and asking more 
 than the ordinary ; again and again he " had Africa 
 in his eyes." She was too much accustomed to 
 love-making to be startled at the mere fact of hear- 
 ing his declaration, and yet her heart felt startled 
 now. She was startled by his words not by his 
 love. She was more occupied with them than 
 with him. He seemed to speak to something so 
 intimately understood by her, to be striking on 
 chords that vibrated with too much import to her- 
 self, for her to be either fair or merciful to him in 
 the light of lover. That seemed to be lost in the 
 more pressing question ; she saw him in his new 
 relationship to the secret turmoil of anxious self- 
 questioning within. She looked up at him, and 
 once more Evan wondered at the dull question in 
 her eyes ; he could not, however, flatter himself 
 that he traced a sign of yielding or softening 
 towards himself. 
 
 " What shall you do with your great idea, sup- 
 posing I find myself unable to entertain your 
 proposal to me?" 
 
 Evan, who had taken her hand, dropped it, half 
 seated himself on the stonework by her side, with 
 his arms folded and his lids downcast. 
 
 "I believe I had rather you had not asked me 
 that question," said he, presently ; " I am conscious 
 of being an awkward and ignorant wooer. I wish 
 for my own sake I were more polished. I don't 
 know how to present myself in any unusual light - 
 307 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 to throw any glamour over myself at all ; and yet to 
 be a lover is once in a lifetime. Rosalie ! be pa- 
 tient with a rough kind of fellow whose only skill is 
 to be honest. I 've lived a man's life and seen 
 little of women. 1 Ve a notion they should be 
 approached differently, and I know no other way 
 than the direct way. Really and truly, I have 
 placed you too high in my regard, you are too 
 precious for me to come before you with anything 
 but honest truth in my mouth, in any mood less 
 than the mood in which I should stand before 
 a revered man. Love me and leave me not, 
 Rosalie, if you can ! But if you can't well ! 
 I shall have to go on and do it alone." 
 
 "Do what?" 
 
 " The things that came into my mind after I saw 
 you, the things you brought there. I can't go 
 back on them." 
 
 " They are more to you than I am," said she, 
 musingly. 
 
 " By heaven, they 're not ! " cried he, sharply. 
 " But how could I stand up before the thought 
 of you if I had gone back on your orders ? How 
 could I stand up before myself? " 
 
 " My orders ? I never said a word." 
 
 " No but you made me love you. Good God ! 
 The very sight of the curling of your hair about 
 your neck makes me tremble." 
 
 He pushed at the dust with his foot, grinding his 
 heel into it. 
 
 308 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 "I suppose I'm spoiling my own chances. I 
 can't express myself; I do not place anything 
 before you. But these things are part of you and 
 part of myself. If I took all the honour and force 
 out of my life, or pretended that it could go, 
 where would be the use of asking you to join it? 
 Rosalie ! Love me and leave me not ! But if 
 you won't, I shall be true to myself and true to 
 that part of you I still possess, and which you 
 .can't take from me." 
 
 He stopped speaking and held her with glowing 
 eyes. His arms ached to draw within them that 
 exquisite morsel of humanity who to him was ex- 
 quisite, wonderful, perfect, all through. She looked 
 simply pale and anxious, and her lips were parted 
 with the breath coming and going quickly. He 
 raised his hand to his eyes and covered them a 
 moment, for he found no response to his love, and 
 he was sure that his senses ached in vain. The 
 intimacy of speech was making it worse. And yet 
 he loved his pain because it was mingled with her ; 
 it brought him nearer to her than anything else 
 could ; he would not have parted with it for the 
 world. 
 
 "Well!" he said behind his hand, "I love 
 you. You can't take that away, either. I love you. 
 You make nothing of me. But I love you. And, 
 by God, you 're mine ! " 
 
 " I don't love you ; and if I were to say I did, 
 you would go away to Africa." 
 39 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " You mean I 'd be after those schemes of mine 
 that you set me on? Yes, I should. I don't 
 blame you for looking at it your way. I 've often 
 said to myself that I don't know why ever women 
 marry fellows at all. I 'm sure I don't know 
 why you should love me. Except that women 
 do and I Ve given you the best of myself. I 've 
 never been in love before. It 's a big thing. I 
 have n't got words. It 's the whole of me." 
 
 Rosalie flinched. She bit her lips and became 
 whiter. 
 
 " What would be the good of my presenting 
 myself to you anything but what I am? I want 
 you to marry me not the fiction of me," he 
 went on. "I'm hoping you understand me. I 
 don't quite know what girls want ; I see they do 
 marry. I 'm telling you what I can give the 
 whole passion of me. I 'm a big, strong sort of 
 fellow ; I can fight men ; and you 've taught me I 
 can love a woman. Yes ! I can love. I 'm on fire 
 from my head to my heels. I want you to give me 
 something back for it. For it 's no slight thing I 
 know myself. And if you do, if you '11 only come 
 and trust yourself to me I want to stand up 
 against the world and life for you. If there 's 
 harm on the way, it 's not your hair that shall 
 be grizzled first, it '11 be mine. I ? m your lover 
 to the end." 
 
 " Evan Dayntree ! " 
 
 He looked at her. The film and fire of the lover's 
 310 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 vision died out of his eyes. He found himself 
 compelled to a merely objective attention. 
 
 " I 'm feeling a little " 
 
 He caught her on his arm. He was all surprise 
 and ruth. The face shrinking from his gaze was 
 shutting up like a fading flower, and the figure 
 seemed to collapse. He threw his knee out and 
 got both arms about her and drew her close up to 
 his support; but though the inconceivable had 
 happened and she lay within his arms, his heart 
 went still and cold. He was sure she remained 
 conscious, and yet she seemed as a corpse. 
 
 " What is it ? " he whispered in her ear. " I 'm 
 afraid I Ve kept you standing. Can I help ? " 
 
 The eyes opened and looked up at him ; there 
 was a dumb animal pleading in them. His mind 
 kept stirring up and down with the strangest sur- 
 mises that never came to anything real but appeared 
 as wraiths and went out again. 
 
 " I got a cruel thought," said she ; and she ral- 
 lied and freed herself from his arms and stood 
 upright again. 
 
 " How so? Lean on my arm still," Sid he, 
 feeling as though a golden moment edged by terror 
 had slipped down the day. 
 
 She clasped her hands and held them out before 
 her, her eyes mournfully fixed upon the ground. 
 
 " I need a friend," she murmured. 
 
 " Then I am he ! " 
 
 "You ! " She did not lift her eyes. 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Use me that way, and put aside the rest." 
 
 " I don't see properly," muttered she ; " that was 
 something frightful." 
 
 " I am your true friend," said he ; " take me in 
 your service. I don't understand what your need 
 is. But I am your friend." 
 
 " Thank you, Evan Dayntree " Her mood 
 
 was touched with a humility that astounded him ; 
 " do you happen to know a little white soul of a 
 girl a snow-heart over a volcano named Eliza ? " 
 
 His eyes lightened with surprise. 
 
 li Just such an one," said he. 
 
 " When next you see her and go now say 
 that Rosalie has great need of her." 
 
 She bent her head in grave farewell, and turned 
 to walk feebly up the road. He dared not follow 
 so final had been her look and manner. He stood 
 watching until the last glimpse of her was lost ; 
 and then he stared from the earth to the heavens 
 and from the heavens to the earth in amaze. 
 After which his mind fastened on the thought 
 of Eliza, and therewith his brow knit in new 
 perplexity. 
 
 Life proceeds through complications, each fresh 
 step setting us face to face with a fresh riddle. We 
 form relationships of the free will, and by and by 
 these are perturbed by newer and more attractive 
 ties. It is the changing face of character to which 
 the newer choice is necessary, but the older and 
 prior choice has been consecrated by association 
 312 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 and kindly obligation, and we find ourselves undis- 
 charged from the claim. The manner in which we 
 adjust our conduct between the two is the measure 
 of our social justice and true perception. 
 
 On the surface of his mind Evan felt as though 
 the last scene between himself and Eliza precluded 
 him from seeking her again. But his direct nature 
 quickly escaped from the conventional prompting, 
 and the false intuition was wiped out instantaneously 
 by his truer perception. Love is always of the 
 nature of a gift, and the wounding thing is when it 
 is altogether and peremptorily rejected. He him- 
 self had not now to stand under the smart of such 
 cruelty and injustice ; Rosalie had thanked him and 
 had put him to her service. He was glad, though 
 it was so infinitely less than he had hoped. And 
 why should he conceive of a woman's feeling as 
 other or less than his own ? Why were the grand 
 and mournful simplicities of the loves of men and 
 women to be marred by duplicities and the injustice 
 of assumed difference ? 
 
 Evan's feet were already moving in the direction 
 of the Court as he argued ; he ceased soon to need 
 to argue. He went to his friend in his need, cer- 
 tain that the heart that loved him could only rejoice 
 at his use of the gift. But Eliza was not to be 
 found at the Court ; usually she spent the afternoon 
 in the open air, and presumably she was now out 
 walking. It was evident he must seek her as ever 
 amidst trees and open-air breezes and that large 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 loveliness of nature in which the girl's isolated spirit 
 seemed best to find its home. 
 
 But the pine-wood was a great place, and now it 
 was dumb and dark with winter voiceless of birds 
 and empty of sunshine. He walked about the 
 paths, finding the trunks of the trees stern and 
 devoid of warm light ; a colourless gloom was every- 
 where, and the scintillations of sunlight were erased 
 as by a chill finger. In his heart he carried a reflec- 
 tion of this ill-omened mood of nature. She had 
 hung no crystals upon the branches, and spread no 
 white carpet underfoot ; the very heavens had their 
 grey robes on, and the fir foliage was not blue but 
 black. His foot treading beneath it, the dead 
 bracken shrank from the decaying ooze of the roots ; 
 the slow drip and trickle of moisture from above on 
 the fallen leaves monotonously muttered of the 
 winter's loss. He set his hands to his mouth, and 
 in a kind of desperation gave a loud cooey. From 
 afar, after one or two trials, came a little broken 
 searching cry which excruciated his tender heart 
 so did it thrill with doubtful joy. He knew not 
 into what place he had come in life ; he felt pain 
 and disaster about him. He stood still listening, 
 and had half a mind to flee, so uncertain of himself 
 did he feel. Then he heard a running step, and 
 presently the wet branches of the oak underwood 
 were thrust aside and Eliza appeared, her face 
 triste with the pale hues of the day, but a dim star- 
 light expectation doubtful of itself in her eyes. 
 3*4 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 "Oh, you white moth!" said Evan; "but I 
 bring no good news." 
 
 " A friend called his friend," said the girl, ear- 
 nestly, "and I was glad." 
 
 " Eliza ! in this magic lantern-slide of a world 
 the light has gone out. I dream every night that 
 the festivities are over, and that some one is going 
 round the room putting out the farthing dips one 
 after another. Why do you live in the wood ? " 
 
 " You do not like it? Then let us go into the 
 open." 
 
 " You are, I fear, fitted for nothing but to be the 
 prey of the undeserving." 
 
 " One dies but once and death has been known 
 to be welcome," said the girl, with a whimsical 
 smile. 
 
 Her eyes had hungrily fed upon his face and 
 fallen again. 
 
 " Hate me for a miserable fellow." 
 
 She said nothing. She looked at his hand. 
 
 " I am discontented with myself. An hour ago 
 I stood up to a woman. That was because I stood 
 on my right. Here I am abashed ; because I must 
 be wrong." 
 
 "Are you so wrong? Very well, then, you are 
 wrong. Let it be so ; and so have done with it. 
 But what makes the day so out of tune?" 
 
 " I have made Rosalie Trelyon an offer. That 
 is I meant to do so. But did I? There is, I 
 find, nothing in my memory but a line of red-hot 
 3 r 5 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 light. Perhaps I did not make her an offer. At 
 any rate, I got no reply.' 7 
 
 Eliza stood before him and said nothing. The 
 look of her face, on her slender neck, reminded 
 him now of a white cyclamen. 
 
 "I'm a little at odds with the world," he con- 
 tinued. " It presents no clear face to me. I Ve 
 taken my leap in the dark, and I find myself no- 
 where. But, Lord save us ! How can you bear 
 yourself in the chill and the gloom of the wood ? 
 The whole place droops like an image of sin." 
 
 " Come out into the open," said Eliza. 
 
 She led the way. He saw her going before him 
 a red-gold knot of hair under her hat, her indifferent 
 and yet picturesque figure clad in mourning, and 
 the heels of her boots crushing into the dead leaves. 
 He called over her shoulder, 
 
 " Eliza ! Miss Trelyon sent a message." 
 
 The ear of which he could see most turned pink. 
 
 "She asked if I knew such an one as a girl 
 named Eliza. She said, ' Tell her that Rosalie has 
 great need of her.' " 
 
 She walked on the ear still pink. 
 
 " Why have you come back ? " asked she. " You 
 returned to your wheels and your work." 
 
 He was astonished to hear her voice was stern. 
 
 " The wheels and the work drowned nothing of 
 my care, and I came back to look it in the face 
 again." 
 
 He thought he heard a sigh. He could not see 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 if there were tears or not. The world seemed full 
 of mystery to him ; he had the strangest groping 
 uneasiness. The women held the clue. He looked 
 at the one who was leading him curiously and 
 reverently. 
 
 "Shall you see her again?" asked she, presently. 
 
 He came up to her side. 
 
 " I suppose that I shall see her again and again 
 and again. But perhaps not immediately. The 
 world has turned into pain and wonder. I Ve got 
 to worry through and learn things afresh. I must 
 see to the heart of the matter. A fellow does not 
 give up this sort of thing." 
 
 "No." 
 
 He wiped a drop of dew from his brow. 
 ' " I 'm afraid I 'm all wrong, Eliza. I 'm afraid 
 I 'm selfish to come and talk this way to you. I 
 ought not to come." 
 
 Her heart gave a throb of fear. She dreaded a 
 fall of absolute night. 
 
 " Your own instinct does not tell you that. It is 
 a convention. Conventions are cruel things to 
 women. They bind them up ; they stop all that is 
 good and true and natural. And now you are going 
 to tell me we cannot be friends." 
 
 " Am I then right to come ? " 
 
 " You are right." 
 
 " I trust it may be so." 
 
 "I shall prove it. I would give the world to 
 
 help. But " 
 
 3 T 7 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 She broke off, with an expressive gesture of her 
 hands. Again he seemed to touch the edge of 
 some mystery ; there was a spark of light that dis- 
 solved itself in darkness. He felt like a helpless 
 child, and he wanted to seize the small gloved hand 
 and to say: '"'What is it? There is fear in my 
 heart. Tell me why. You have a wisdom I don't 
 understand. Speak to me, Eliza ! " He plucked 
 at his manhood and knit his brow and trod more 
 firmly and spoke otherwise. 
 
 "It is possible she wants help," said he, in 
 measured gentleness. 
 
 Eliza bent her head. That acquiescent gesture 
 was terrible. 
 
 " I have always thought of her as so whole, so 
 blithe. I am talking to a friend?" 
 
 Eliza searched rapidly through her mind. This 
 thing called love is the most bracing to high natures 
 of all the tonics. 
 
 "Yes to her best friend," said she, calmly. 
 
 Evan felt his own heart suffered. 
 
 " I am glad of that. I do not understand it, 
 but a hint has come to me of possible trouble. I 
 talk in the dark. My tenderness is scarcely allowed. 
 But yours, Eliza ? " 
 
 " I am her oldest friend." 
 
 She spoke the merest prose, but it sounded like 
 a poem in his ears. He thought her words were 
 as a dewdrop running down the stalk of a plant to 
 the parched root. The gate was just ahead of 
 
 318 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 them. Desiring to do her service, he ran forwards 
 and opened it. She stopped. 
 
 " I am not going through. I stay in my wood," 
 said she. 
 
 A slight smile touched her lips a shade of dis- 
 appointment his. Eliza wished that her sex was 
 changed, that her skirt and cape were fashioned as 
 a man's garments, and that she could have gone on 
 with him. If she had been a man, she thought the 
 perplexity would not have been so great. As for 
 him, he desired her presence, but had no choice in 
 the matter ; his message was delivered, and he too 
 felt the separation and reticence of sex between 
 them. He passed through the gate and fastened it 
 behind him. She came forward and laid her hand 
 on the top bar and looked at him for a few moments 
 speechlessly. He could not read the. emotion of 
 which her face was full. He looked at the small 
 curved mouth, the eyes suddenly large and beauti- 
 ful in their troubled hesitation, the personality for 
 once harmonious in the complete possession of a 
 single dominating thought. That this anxious emo- 
 tion had to do with himself he had not the shadow 
 of a doubt ; he felt it to be something great ; he 
 could not follow it, he longed for speech. He 
 desired, too, to thank and comfort her ; his eyes 
 melted ; he would have liked to have taken her in 
 his arms and kissed her ; his impulses were all ot 
 the tenderest kind short of love. And they were 
 all as clear to her apprehension as though they had 
 been openly offered. 319 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Eliza " he began. 
 
 For she still stood there with her incomprehen- 
 sible gaze of unuttered emotion. 
 
 " Eliza " he repeated, held off from further 
 
 utterance by a certain strength and gravity under- 
 lying the wistfulness of her face. 
 
 And he moved a step forward, his own look 
 deepening. She took one back, and a faint sigh 
 escaped her. 
 
 " Good-bye, Evan," she said, and turned sharply 
 and walked away. 
 
 She went hurriedly without looking back, the 
 tears slowly dropping over her cheeks. It scarcely 
 seemed to her that she had willed or decided, but 
 that the whole overwhelming bias and tendency of 
 her own nature, the persistent clear habit of her 
 mind, was laying a hand of iron upon her lips, was 
 compelling her to a silence that meant far more 
 than the sacrifice of herself, for it seemed to involve 
 perhaps the sacrifice of him. Yet the instinct to 
 keep silence was whole, undivided, absolutely mas- 
 terful. She wept against it without a hint of going 
 back in her mind. She had not even the certainty 
 of right and of virtue to sustain her, for the clear- 
 ness of self-confidence was never hers. Only it 
 had been absolutely impossible to do other than to 
 keep silence. A mighty sense of honour, an in- 
 describable hint of the tenderness and broad- 
 heartedness that He at the root of things in spite of 
 our limitations and proprieties, an immeasurable 
 320 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 sympathy with the human nature of the woman who 
 was her rival, and with the untrammelled right of 
 choice in the beloved man, directed her. Help 
 had been asked her, and there was no way of be- 
 stowing it save in the insignificant act of silence 
 and self-withdrawal. 
 
 It was not until she had walked out of the chance 
 of the temptation to speak that she paused and 
 permitted the tenseness of her resolution to break 
 in the passion of regret. Safe in her loneliness she 
 caught hold of the trunk of a fir-tree and cried 
 aloud after her lost opportunity, hating and despis- 
 ing herself, and dashing her unkissed cheek against 
 the rough bark of the tree. 
 
 " He would have kissed me if I had given him 
 the least encouragement. My mouth is red in 
 vain, for I did not lift it to his face. Out of all the 
 worlds of happiness one little kiss might have been 
 spared me, and I did not take it. I want the kiss 
 as the starving want food and drink, as unsunned 
 lands want warmth, I want the kiss. It would 
 have placed me amongst happy women ; and now, 
 for ever, I am outside. But if he had kissed me 
 I should have spoken ; and somehow I know that 
 speech from me would be wrong for him. But 
 Oh, my own virtue ! How I hate you ! " 
 
 321 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 MR. EDWARD ARMSTRONG'S mine shares had so 
 far made a steady march into the skyey regions of 
 profit. Perusing the papers day by day, he seemed 
 to discern an indefinite prospect of doubling 
 his capital. Already since his father's death the 
 ^32,000 had run to a higher figure, an extravagant 
 dividend having been followed by pressure to buy 
 on the part of country speculators who possessed a 
 little money to gamble with. The stock market ap- 
 peared to Edward the very root and base of wealth- 
 making, and a broker a discreet and agreeable 
 person whose function in life was to turn a shilling 
 into two-and-sixpence. Meanwhile, on the strength 
 of the increased value of his shares, he bought a 
 new horse, and added a flashy dog-cart and a 
 groom to the establishment at home. He seemed 
 to be the centre of a magic game ; the Stock 
 Exchange was where the game was played, his 
 part was by proxy, but he swept in the winnings. 
 
 " l Money flows to money,* old dad used to say, 
 and, by Jove, he was right. But dad was slow. 
 He hadn't the necessary go in him. It. wants 
 322 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 genius ; dad had n't the necessary penetration. 
 Dad missed his opportunities. By Jove ! we 'd all 
 have been at the top of the tree if I 'd had the 
 reins. Look how things are going now ! I 've 
 nothing to do but to go to bed, and in the morning 
 I 'm so much the richer." 
 
 He burst out laughing suddenly. 
 
 " Miss Rosalie's queer escapade did me a good 
 turn. I had Dayntree there. Rum start it was ! 
 Wonder what it meant? However, I don't care 
 now I Ve got my way. She cut me last night, 
 looking at me with her eyes as though I were the dirt 
 she could n't see. I 'm dashed if I care. I mean 
 to win all before me. And then she may whistle 
 for me, and I '11 see if I '11 come." 
 
 These pleasing thoughts were thrown off one day 
 during a walk through the city ; in these wintry 
 months fog as usual overpowered London, and the 
 lamps were lit early, while the full tide of life 
 hurried on beneath them ; Edward's face kept 
 blossoming out of the mists to the passers-by, san- 
 guine, fresh-coloured, with abundant wavy hair, 
 and a white brow presiding over a satisfied smile. 
 His business in town concerned a matter between 
 himself and the harness-maker. He had resolved 
 to have " the crest " marked on the steel fixings, 
 and meant to do the thing well while he was about 
 it ; and it was necessary to blow up the harness- 
 maker for some trifling imperfections. 
 
 " Expense is no object with me/' said he, when 
 3 2 3 
 
Life the Accuser, 
 
 the man explained that such and such an extra 
 embellishment meant further outlay. 
 
 The customer turning out of the shop with the 
 air of a most prosperous young man in London, the 
 shopman looked after him, and felt himself invited 
 to charge a tip-top price. Edward walked on 
 through a city of idle dreams. The fog was alive 
 and throbbing with miraculous figures, ought run- 
 ning on ought and forcing the units into royal 
 significance. 
 
 " Say that the shares mount up even at the rate 
 of sixpence a month until the next dividend comes 
 round and that's slow as things might go and 
 then take only a moderate leap in value; for it's 
 best to do things on a low basis and leave a margin 
 for possibilities. Well now ! Let 's start from the 
 beginning. Old dad bought 20,000 one-pound 
 shares at los. each, and they were at par within a 
 year's time = 20,000. They had doubled their 
 value at the time of his death 40,000, of which, 
 let me say, Dayntree fraudulently deprived me of 
 8,000, and handed it round to the rest of the 
 family. Leaves me with 32,000. Company de- 
 clares a big dividend, and the public rush to buy ; 
 and within a few months of his death the shares 
 have put on a value of something over 12 per cent. 
 Why should n't they go on going up sixpence a 
 share per month say = 500 a month ? [Dash 
 that 8,000 Dayntree deprived me of, it spoils the 
 
 sum.] Twelve times 500 equals " 
 
 3 2 4 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 He broke off to make an exclamation. Having 
 come down Old Broad Street, he was turning into 
 Threadneedle Street, and here the streets were 
 thronged with eagerly striving and moving men ; 
 there seemed an unusual bustle, and he was thrust 
 hither and thither. Two young fellows who had 
 been walking before him stopped at the greeting of 
 a third, and Edward's career was brought up short ; 
 this jolt to his thoughts and his march shook the 
 spark of anger from him. The third young man 
 had pushed his hat back on his head; he was 
 pale and untidy, and bore evidence of exhaustion. 
 How common these commercial fellows looked, 
 to be sure! Edward stepped aside, trying to 
 get past; one had need to be an eel to thread 
 one's way amongst them easily, and now he was 
 forced to hear the vulgar talk ; the face of the 
 third disagreeable commercial person twitched, 
 he could not but remark, with a sour kind of 
 grin. 
 
 "I say, you fellows," he heard, " I 'm feeling 
 pretty sick, I can tell you. Ought equals zero or 
 nothing at all this settlement. Goldman & Co. 
 have just been hammered." 
 
 Edward pushed by and tried to remember where 
 his sum left off, but it had gone to pieces in the 
 jostle, and he lost the hang of his thoughts ; he was 
 nearing the Stock Exchange too, and the bustle of 
 men got worse ; there was really an extraordinary 
 excitement and shouting; amongst other agitated 
 325 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 faces he caught sight of an elderly man who seemed 
 to be suffering from some physical disability. He 
 walked rapidly at first, not shouting like the others, 
 but with pale face and starting eyeballs, and then 
 reeled suddenly against a lamp-post, pressing his 
 hand to his heart. 
 
 "The poor devil's bought the wrong stock, I 
 suppose," said Edward. " Now, I will say for old 
 dad, he always knew what was what." 
 
 Wherewith he congratulated his good fortune, 
 and felt his mind once more drifting after his lost 
 calculation. 
 
 " Hang it all ! Where did I leave off? I mean 
 to sell when the shares have touched four pounds. 
 That 's 80,000. It 's not what I 'd a right to ex- 
 pect, but invested at say ten per cent, it '11 do 
 for the present. And afterwards " 
 
 Again he was brought up short against two men 
 talking on the pavement. One was working at his 
 moustache with a quick, restless movement of his 
 fingers, and looking with harassed eyes into the 
 face of another; this second gentleman had his 
 hands clenched, and was working his arms up and 
 down while delivering his opinions in a white pas- 
 sion of energy. 
 
 It was something about " Parisian financiers " and 
 the " mad spirit of speculation " and the " slump " 
 that had come, and the conduct of " bulls " and 
 "bears," and the number of houses that would 
 tumble after Goldman's. Somehow Edward felt 
 326 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 rooted to the side of the agitated stockbroker, in a 
 curious eagerness to hear more. 
 
 " Armstrong ! " 
 
 His own name startled him, and he turned to find 
 himself confronted by Evan Dayntree, whose face, 
 calm and cheery, but not without a hint of troubled 
 sympathy in the eyes, seemed out of place in the 
 scene. Edward was surprised to find that he was 
 being looked at kindly, and at once his vanity was 
 ready to take affront ; on the other hand, Evan was a 
 county man in spite of his strange taste for hard, 
 humiliating work ; it would be well to respond. 
 
 " You in town?" said he, remembering his profits, 
 and assuming a slightly patronising air on that basis. 
 
 " Well, yes. You see, there 's my new invention 
 being tried." 
 
 " An invention ? " inquired Edward. 
 
 " Yes. Not much, you know. Only a new form 
 of dredging-boat on the Thames. I thought the 
 disposal of the spoil could be done more quickly 
 and cheaply by pneumatic power, and it seems it 
 can. The trial has been made to-day." 
 
 " Indeed ! " said Edward, less interested than it 
 could be possible to imagine. 
 
 " I 'm glad to see you looking pretty fit," added 
 Evan kindly, and rather hating himself for his own 
 success at the moment. 
 
 "Fit? Pm all right!" said Edward, throwing 
 himself back into the prosperous air which had led 
 the harness-maker to lay on the price. 
 327 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " Oh, then ! You Ve sold the mine shares after 
 all. I congratulate you." 
 
 " Sold 'em? Lord bless me, no ! I'm no fool. 
 I shall hold until they are worth four times their 
 nominal value, and I can tell you it 's not so far off 
 now. But good-day. I shall just call in on my 
 brokers." 
 
 He pushed by. Evan looked after him with 
 round eyes of blank amazement. There went a 
 fool in his folly as Edward marched off. 
 
 " A dredging-boat on the Thames ! " sniggered 
 he. " Well ! every man to his taste. If ever there 
 was a fellow loved a muckrake, it 's that Evan Dayn- 
 tree. I don't know what the county people are 
 coming to. What is wanted is new blood amongst 
 them." 
 
 He was in Poultry by this time, and recalled his 
 own remark that he should call on his brokers ; his 
 destination was Cannon Street, and to arrive there 
 he must pass the broker's door ; his feet slackened, 
 and he wondered if he should go in. It was merely 
 out of bravado that he had said he should call, out 
 of a vain pretence to look important. In reality he 
 did not wish to do so indeed, he had an odd 
 recoil against it. 
 
 "Damn the fellows!" said he; "they'll be 
 pressing me to sell. They 're all sharks alike, these 
 brokers. But they don't get over me. ' No,' I 
 said to them lately, ' I know what my price is, and 
 I mean to get it.' Why, they wanted me to sell a 
 
 328 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 month ago, just as the divvy was declared, and got 
 up some drivelling rot about a rumour. No I '11 
 not go in." 
 
 He drew out his watch, and saw that the hour was 
 convenient for catching his train at Cannon Street. 
 He was close on to the door of his broker's office 
 now, and as he neared it, a clerk rushed out with 
 every evidence of hurry, bearing a letter in his hand. 
 Seeing Edward, he pulled up sharp, and stole a 
 curious notable glance at his face, and drew aside 
 into the corner of the doorway with a grave, respect- 
 ful movement, as though assured that he was about 
 to enter. It is the doom of a third-rate nature to 
 turn all the indications of the finer feeling of others 
 into shoddy ; Edward settled his shirt-collar, and 
 nodded carelessly and passed on ; the fellow was 
 only a clerk, but still he liked this deferential 
 bearing. 
 
 " Ah ! they 're beginning to know me as a man 
 who understands what's what," said he. 
 
 Settled in a first-class smoking-carriage for the 
 return journey, he lit a cigar, threw himself back 
 against the cushions, and returned to his calcula- 
 tions. At the home station the new dog-cart and 
 the new groom were there to meet him, and he 
 experienced fresh exultation when the smart-looking 
 lad sprang down and threw the ribands into his 
 hand. He glanced over the harness and patted the 
 horse, and wished the new set would come from 
 town quickly, and then got in and enjoyed thinking 
 3 2 9 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 how well the turn-out must look, with his well- 
 dressed self in front, and the groom sitting with 
 folded arms and white-topped boots behind. It was 
 getting dark when they reached the gates of the 
 Court. Edward groaned with impatience to think 
 that the groom had to descend and open the gate 
 himself; of course they ought to have had a lodge 
 long since ; and when would these beastly little trees 
 grow up and make a respectable avenue? How- 
 ever, the drive was smooth and long, and he put 
 some dash into his driving, and brought his cart well 
 up to the front door in handsome style. On the 
 whole he enjoyed himself, though his spirit was for 
 ever criticising his surroundings to see if they were 
 up to the mark. Within the house, however, a 
 darker mood seized him. His inflated spirit came 
 into contact with the not so inflated spirits of others, 
 and a violent sense of irritation ensued. Folk within 
 the home were just in the commonplace mood of 
 every day, engrossed by routine, engrossed by pri- 
 vate worries, and none had his eyes fixed on the 
 glittering pageant in which Master Edward walked 
 in his own view as the central object. He 
 went first to the morning room ; a religious dimness 
 in the light, a whiskered figure on the sofa, Aunt 
 Caroline poised on the hearth-rug, and marking his 
 intrusion by a rather stony silence, warned him that 
 Mr. Dixon was present. He closed the door with 
 an impatient exclamation. What a sickeningly dull 
 atmosphere for a brilliant young man of the world 1 
 330 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 He sought the drawing-room. Mrs. Armstrong's 
 ideal was the old one for women ; she desired the 
 girls to be fitted for " the home " to be " domes- 
 tic." It was Saturday ; the washing had been sent 
 up from the laundry ; callers were not expected ; 
 she and Sylvia had been putting the buttons on the 
 shirts, darning up the holes in the young men's 
 socks, and thoroughly repairing the house-linen ; 
 they had been at it all afternoon. This was the 
 way in which Mrs. Armstrong spent every Saturday 
 afternoon ; she did not " receive ; " but then the 
 Armstrongs were so little sought after ; it was easy 
 for the lady to keep in practice all her delicate 
 prosaic arts of housewifery. The linen never was 
 permitted to go back into the chests unrepaired; 
 to-day a smoking chimney had driven them out of 
 the sewing-room, and an exceptional amount of 
 damage had kept them at their labour beyond the 
 usual time ; the drawing-room was for the moment 
 littered, and to add to the cause of offence Eliza, 
 incapacitated by a bad headache, was lying on 
 the sofa with her eyes closed. Mrs. Armstrong, 
 unfeignedly sorry that any hitch in her beauti- 
 fully regular ways had occurred, looked up on 
 Edward's entrance with a ready apology and ex- 
 planation. 
 
 " Something is wrong with the chimney, Edward, 
 my love, in the " 
 
 " For heaven's sake, mother, don't worry me with 
 these domestic details. Am I to have no peace in 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 my life ? Here I come home from a hard day in 
 the City, at an hour when a man expects to find his 
 women-kind brilliantly dressed, and something of an 
 evening prepared to cheer him, and I find the 
 drawing-room littered with things, and all of you 
 looking the merest set of dowdy drudges. How am 
 I ever to rise with this kind of thing going on ? Do 
 you ever find Mrs. Trelyon sewing in her drawing- 
 room?" 
 
 " No," said Eliza, waking up from the sofa, " the 
 table-linen generally has holes, and she doesn't 
 mind it if she has them in her stockings." 
 
 " Be silent, Eliza," from Mrs. Armstrong. 
 
 " or Mrs. Dayntree hemming and stitching 
 
 when the dinner is all but on the table " 
 
 " Edward ! I repeat, I regret The hour has run 
 on, I admit, but even now the bell has not rung. 
 As to being brilliantly dressed, what do you mean ? 
 Father disliked ostentation, and, moreover, we are 
 in mourning. For the rest, an accident to the 
 chimney has driven us out of the sewing-room. I 
 assure you that Mrs. Dayntree repairs with her own 
 hands " 
 
 " Pshaw ! " said Edward, and slammed the door 
 behind him. 
 
 " Eliza, do get up," said Mrs. Armstrong, anx- 
 iously, when they were alone ; " that is, my love, if 
 your head can bear it. Sylvia, ring the bell, and 
 get the things cleared away. Eliza, my love, don't 
 you think we might put on our Sunday gowns, at 
 332 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 least to please him? And your hair is certainly 
 ruffled like a mop." 
 
 Having slammed the door, Edward stood gloom- 
 ily in the hall, and speculatively inquired whether 
 he was always to be surrounded by these depressing 
 circumstances. The thought of Gilbert drew a yet 
 darker frown to his brow ; he was afraid that Gil- 
 bert was not going to be a credit to him. 
 
 "A man cannot be hampered by his relations all 
 his life long," said he. 
 
 And he moved slowly in the direction of the 
 smoking-room. 
 
 Of late Gilbert had begun to take a heavy, slouch- 
 ing step, and to wear an inward black look upon his 
 face, and to hang his head. The women-kind 
 mourned over him with aching, constant sorrow, 
 and were tender in their ways, trying to draw him 
 back by cords of affection ; for, indeed, they whis- 
 pered between themselves of a miserable suspicion 
 of secret drinking. 
 
 Edward reached the smoking-room, and opened 
 the door ; a blazing fire was on the hearth, the 
 atmosphere was close, and the fumes of tobacco 
 and brandy filled it. Gilbert was not one to be 
 cheerful in his cups ; he had just drunk himself to 
 the stage when the animal in his rough frame had 
 nearly obliterated the man, when lurid possibilities 
 were gathering over his natural good-nature, ready 
 to overpower it by sudden storm. He had a sense 
 of failure which plunged him in gloom ; of wasted 
 333 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 life and powers, that made him bitter ; of injustice, 
 fast rising to hate of his brother. At first the drink- 
 ing had begun because he had too little to do ; 
 since his father's death, and the circumstance at- 
 tending the division of the property, he drank to 
 kill a sense of brooding anger. Each day it required 
 more and more drink to bring him to such a pleas- 
 antly fuddled state that he even forgot to nourish 
 this exceeding wrath; at the moment he had by 
 no means reached it, but was in the condition when 
 thoughts prowled round his mind like hungry beasts 
 of prey. That was the moment in which Edward, 
 in his fit of inflated indignation, opened the door. 
 His eye took in the surface matters at a glance, 
 the stooping, brooding figure of Gilbert, ugly as sin 
 can make men, his dark curling hair grotesquely 
 topping him with childlike beauty, plucking at his 
 fingers and staring at the fire with glowering eyes 
 the spirit-stand and glasses by his side. 
 
 What Edward did not see was that the creature 
 by the fire was a better human being through and 
 through than himself, a ruined good average man, 
 and, to wit, enormously his superior in muscle. As 
 it happened, he might as well have tried the game 
 of stirring up a hungry tiger with a goad as have 
 acted as he did. 
 
 " Faugh ! " exclaimed he, advancing into the 
 
 room, with the white drawn face of petty rage ; " the 
 
 place smells like a beer-house. A man must draw 
 
 the line somewhere ; and really, Gilbert, if you 're 
 
 334 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 going to degrade us all this way, there '11 come a 
 moment when I can't allow my house " 
 
 He had spoken in a shrill snarling voice ; he was 
 answered by a roar. There was no appreciable 
 moment between the words leaving his lips and the 
 explosion ; the figure on the hearth was on him at 
 a bound, and he found himself suddenly called on 
 to grapple with it. It was n't like a fair fight between 
 men ; that grip was instinct of the release of pent- 
 up hate j and before he had time to parley, to ex- 
 plain, to retreat, he was being whirled about in a 
 quite inconceivable and irregular, manner, without 
 having been given a chance or a breath. He mar- 
 velled, between the exigencies of self-defence, what 
 could be the origin of the fray. 
 
 They dashed from side to side, upsetting anything 
 of unstable equilibrium with which they came in 
 contact, and raising a hubbub which was bound to 
 reach somebody's ear outside. At length Edward 
 succeeded in wrenching himself free, and was now 
 barely able to defend himself from the blows levelled 
 by the closed fist of his brother. 
 
 The ecstasy of passion to which Gilbert was 
 brought made the delivery of this shower of blows 
 a more intoxicating relief than anything his strong 
 brute force had ever experienced. Out of the pure 
 vehemence of his enjoyment a destructive child's 
 enjoyment in smashing up some trifling object of its 
 dislike he might have tumbled blindly into a 
 serious mischance, had not an interruption occurred. 
 335 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 The interruption, however, did occur. The door 
 flew open, and Eliza, a dressing-jacket about her 
 shoulders, her girl-face in white dismay looking 
 from between her flowing hair, stood on the thresh- 
 old. The intrusion acted magically ; Gilbert 
 dropped his hands in an instant, and with a strange 
 cry as though the measure of his nature's despair 
 opened to him in that moment ran straight to- 
 wards the girl, and laid his face against her shoulder, 
 under the loose showers of her hair. Eliza said 
 not a word ; she looked beyond him at Edward, 
 with reproach in her eyes. 
 
 The injustice of her speechless indictment was 
 the last bitter drop in Edward's cup of injury. He 
 staggered giddily to the sofa. 
 
 " And this is my home ! " cried he. 
 
 Next morning the broker's letter arrived. 
 
 336 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 ONE evening Norman stood alone on the hearth 
 in his drawing-room ; behind him was an interesting 
 old mantelpiece; the room, cool, delicious, wide, 
 was panelled ; from the cabinets came an odour 
 of the flowers of bygone days ; the place was full 
 of stately reminiscence, and the present owner was 
 a fitting representative ; time and tradition had 
 fashioned his distinguished air, and fine stock had 
 given him his handsome physique. The distinc- 
 tion of the Dayntrees was in a certain readiness and 
 aplomb ; in the past, their eminence had been in 
 statesmanship rather than in war, and their success 
 as politicians. But while Norman carried these in- 
 herited gifts successfully into his commercial activity, 
 his nature laboured under a mental complication ; 
 he had a strain of more poetic quality. Whole, 
 resolute, and self-possessed in matters of the office, 
 a consciousness of duality set him at odds with 
 himself in more intimate affairs. An action opened 
 by him with Dayntree determination and at a some- 
 what low level of convenient sagacity, .would pres- 
 ently be complicated by an unresting and imperial 
 22 337 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 call to try conclusions between this cunning of the 
 earth and the reach of the soul after spiritual con- 
 cerns. He was not of the type of man who 
 flourishes in his wickedness as the green bay-tree ; 
 it was not permitted to his nature to be finished 
 and coldly bad in deed, or even to achieve con- 
 sistency in pettier ways ; the Nemesis of his errors 
 sprang into existence with the errors themselves. 
 
 Opposite him hung the picture of an ancestor in 
 the court trappings of a former day. He resembled 
 his descendant with a difference ; the same resolute 
 handsome air was accompanied by a hardness of 
 eye that Norman missed ; his brow was indicative 
 of a firm but narrow equilibrium of mind which 
 leads to worldly success. Norman, eyeing the 
 painted face with its surface resemblance to himself, 
 was seized with a conviction that a like success and 
 honour would not fall to his portion. The appre- 
 hension was sudden, vivid, unreasoned ; it ran 
 through him as a tremble of ruin through a well- 
 looking building. And he turned his eyes away 
 with a sharp closing of his mind on the subject. 
 The trail of Constantia's robe was on the stairs at 
 the moment. 
 
 Intercourse between the husband and wife was 
 very difficult, but for the sake of that continuity 
 which each one silently conspires to maintain in 
 life, it had to be carried on. A divorce was not in 
 the game, and each day he breathed in less 
 tightened fear of an esclandre ; that did not seem a 
 338 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 likely device from Constantia. But what, in heaven's 
 name, was her purpose? She kept the issue of 
 her conduct behind a shut brow, and so far he was 
 unable to surmise it. 
 
 There was not time for speech even had he 
 sought it, for an accident cut the opportunity short. 
 Steps followed close upon Constantia's along the 
 hall, and as the husband and wife eyed each other, 
 the prose and detail of existence pushed them 
 apart. The door opened, and the butler announced : 
 "Mr. EvanDayntree." 
 
 Norman welcomed the presence of any third 
 person ; but that evening Evan's was not destined 
 to bring the expected relief ; dinner proved to be 
 an uneasy occasion ; there was eating and there 
 was talking ; but the main business lay in the silent 
 preoccupation of each mind with a topic ; on 
 every side was a preparation for spiritual struggle, 
 and Norman began to recognise Evan as part of it ; 
 he recalled the lad's glance of surprise on learning 
 that the mines were handed over to Armstrong, and 
 once or twice during the meal he caught his eyes 
 stealing away as though after a long penetrating 
 look. It makes an epoch in life when one begins 
 to suspect that a disciple is turning into a critic ; 
 the intimacy of private conversation must, of course, 
 he said to himself, be avoided, and he regretted the 
 absence of his elder children, whose presence would 
 have effectually prevented any engrossing subject ; 
 since, however, they were not there, and since he 
 339 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 found himself a man at odds, with his own house- 
 hold, he took the lead that belonged to him, and 
 upon Constantia's rising, rose also and forthwith 
 accompanied her to the drawing-room, signing 
 rather coldly and peremptorily to Evan to follow. 
 This move did not, however, avail him ; Evan 
 could be persistent when he chose. 
 
 " I understand that Sherman's Reward mines 
 have totally collapsed. I fear this panic has been 
 a bad sort of business for the Armstrongs," he 
 remarked, standing on the hearth and stirring his 
 coffee slowly. 
 
 " For Edward Armstrong," said Norman, dog- 
 gedly. 
 
 " I met Armstrong in town on the day of the 
 panic, and he seemed to have no sort of a concep- 
 tion of what had happened.'' 
 
 " Wisdom has not taken up her abode with 
 him." 
 
 " Look here, Norman I don't mind about 
 Armstrong myself; indeed I feel that it would re- 
 fresh me to have the shaking of him but he had 
 been warned, I suppose ? " 
 
 " He had plenty of warning." 
 
 " Eliza told me," said Evan, stirring the coffee 
 about very slowly, " that she received your advice 
 to sell out of the little bit of mine scrip she owned ; 
 and that she did so." 
 
 " Just so. She received plenty of warning." 
 
 He spoke in a carefully level tone ; but his face 
 340 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 hardened. Constantia looked from one to the 
 other with failing heart. There was a long pause ; 
 Norman found himself unable to fill it by a remark, 
 and Constantia made no effort to do so ; she was 
 watching Evan. The latter stood in his former 
 position on the hearth, staring into his cup and 
 stirring the coffee round and round slowly; then 
 he set it down untasted, pressed his thighs, and 
 straightened himself. Constantia, looking at him, 
 saw that he had a very troubled and gentle air; 
 withal there was the tension of resolve. At Nor- 
 man she dared not look; her heart was not with 
 him. 
 
 " Look here," he began again in his lad's fashion, 
 " I 'd like to have the kicking of him downstairs 
 in a fair and open way, don't you know. But 
 you told him the particular rumour that reached us 
 before the division of the property was made ? " 
 
 " I warned him generally." 
 
 "As I look at things," said Evan, with added 
 determination, "the mine shares never ought to 
 have been handed to Armstrong. If the property 
 was good, it was unfair to the rest. But if you 
 gave him the portion knowing it was rotten, that 
 looks to me unaccountable." 
 
 That was the moment for Norman suddenly to 
 read his own action in a light which Evan could 
 not throw upon it. He had handed the rotten 
 mine shares to Edward to prevent the young man 
 from compelling him to worse injustice and humili* 
 34i 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 ation. The situation had been, in reality, a nice 
 balance in treacheries, out of which he had brought 
 himself and others with the least possible complica- 
 tion. Meanwhile, Evan's criticism was producing 
 a cold irritation difficult to repress. At the next 
 words it broke from restraint. 
 
 " Armstrong is left with a handle against you/' 
 said Evan. 
 
 "You have sufficiently delivered your opinion 
 on affairs that do not concern you, I think," 
 said Norman ; " may I ask a reason for this 
 impertinence? " 
 
 Evan lifted his head a little higher and fixed his 
 eyes on the pictures. 
 
 " I hope that my inquiry is not impertinent. 1 
 speak in the hope that the acts can be justified 
 somehow," he replied. 
 
 Norman rose from his chair, and, resting one 
 hand on the table, spoke with a blaze of anger 
 in his face. 
 
 "You presume to ask me to justify my actions to 
 you?" 
 
 A sensitive quiver passed over Evan's face, but 
 he cleared it instantly. 
 
 " If you look at it in that way, I had better go," 
 said he, quietly ; " I did not know that I had over- 
 stepped what is due to myself and you. But at 
 present you think differently. Good-bye, Constan- 
 tia. I am sorry. Don't you fret. I expect it is 
 all right, you know." 
 
 342 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 And he turned and walked uneasily out of the 
 room, leaving a horrible silence behind him. 
 Norman sat down again, and it was long before 
 he could bring himself to look up. He had an 
 impression that when he did so he should find 
 his wife with her large judging eyes fixed upon 
 him, and he avoided movement as long as he 
 couid. When, in desperation, he glanced at her, 
 he found that she was lying back on the couch, 
 pale, with closed lids, and seeming faint. Her 
 weakness drew him, and gave him an old right ; he 
 rose and touched her hand, whereat she opened 
 her eyes and made shift to speak. 
 
 " He had guessed ! " she cried, with clear pre- 
 monition ; " young Edward Armstrong had dis- 
 covered your secret, and you bribed him bribed 
 him with worthless paper ! " 
 
 Norman stepped back. How swift, how merci- 
 lessly acute she was in inference ! With what 
 undressed words she named her fact ! 
 
 Nevertheless the aspect of Constantia, thus over- 
 thrown by physical weakness, had its subtle conso- 
 lation. Of late there had been slowly clearing and 
 strengthening within his mind his never-lost convic- 
 tion that, in his heart of hearts, she was dearer than 
 all others ; that there was a fibre of himself which 
 she alone could move, and by which she held him 
 for ever as her intimate possession and hers alone. 
 It is possible both to a man and a woman to lapse 
 from a high affection to some lamentable craze ; 
 343 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 and in the hour of his worst intoxication about 
 Rosalie he had not lost sight of this distinction: 
 just as a person in an access of fury against one he 
 loves is conscious in the midst of his rage of a su- 
 preme emotion of affection lying beneath ; above 
 and around his wrath, an affection which it is im- 
 possible to overcome, and which is already prepar- 
 ing the unmeasured remorse that follows on a bitter 
 word to a loved being. Or again, as a person who 
 has maintained a high spiritual experience through- 
 out life, knows that no fall could ever be deep 
 enough to loose from his ears the torturing demands 
 of the better aspiration he had followed. From 
 the tenderest and the highest is prepared the sharp- 
 est anguish, and the ties from which the soul is 
 not to be freed are those fashioned from the 
 best. 
 
 " Let me be judged," cries man's soul, " by the 
 one who inspired me with the unalterable love and 
 highest aspiration, for all other judgment save that 
 is too small for me, and by that standard I am alone 
 to be measured. Though all the world crowned 
 me saint and victor, his pardon is my only acquittal, 
 and if he deny it I stand unfurnished of beauty, 
 purity, and worth." 
 
 Meanwhile this evidence of her husband's deteri- 
 oration drove Constantia from her attitude of pas- 
 sivity on to a course which she had contemplated 
 from time to time. 
 
 It happened next day that Rosalie was seated in 
 344 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 one of her silent brooding moods over the draw- 
 ing-room fire, when her mother entered the room 
 dressed for a drive. She raised her eyes in inquiry, 
 and dropped them again. Mrs. Trelyon sat down 
 and buttoned her glove ; her attire, often careless, 
 was particularly so on this occasion. She was 
 wrapped in a fur cloak that had once been hand- 
 some, but was so no longer; she wore an old 
 beaver bonnet tied at the side of her cheek in a 
 knot of rusty black ribbon, and from the rim, as a 
 defence against the cold, drooped a black woollen 
 veil ; in spite of this disguise her figure was majestic, 
 and her eyes notable. She put up the old black 
 veil when her glove was buttoned, and looked 
 doubtfully at her daughter ; Rosalie took no notice. 
 Her mother's presence made her uneasy, and she 
 wished to be alone; she stared at the fire, and 
 longed for her to leave. 
 
 " I am going to pay some calls. I wish you 
 would come too," said Mrs. Trelyon, in a some- 
 what forced voice. 
 
 " I ? Indeed, no ! This cold is horrible. I can't 
 move." 
 
 " Rosalie," said Mrs. Trelyon, in a low voice, " it 
 will be a good thing for us to go driving together 
 and paying calls." 
 
 Rosalie jerked her head round to avert her face, 
 and leaned her cheek on her hand to hide its 
 burning. 
 
 " I cannot conceive what difference to anybody 
 
 345 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 or anything that would make," she said, in as in- 
 different- a tone as she could command. 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon did not respond ; she took the op- 
 portunity of Rosalie's averted face to gaze at her 
 intently. By and by, with a long deep sigh she 
 moved, leaned back in her chair, and closed her 
 eyes. 
 
 " What were you staring at? " asked Rosalie, who 
 had felt but not seen the gaze. 
 
 "I think the past" said Mrs. Trelyon, in a 
 scarcely audible voice. 
 
 "I thought," said Rosalie, a little wearily, "that 
 you were looking at me." 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon said nothing ; she heard the car- 
 riage-wheels and rose to her feet. 
 
 " Had you not better come ? Won't you come ? " 
 
 The girl shook her head. Mrs. Trelyon hesi- 
 tated a little longer, then she walked out of the room 
 and closed the door behind her, leaving her daugh- 
 ter to the loneliness she preferred. The front door 
 banged, and the carriage drove away, and the 
 echoes died in the distance ; for full quarter of an 
 hour Rosalie sat numb. 
 
 Outside the window the winter landscape was a 
 frail sketch with colourless spaces from which the 
 wind scared the light; looking presently upon it, 
 she noted the skeleton trees and the clawing of 
 leafless branches against the buffets of the East; 
 and then she had an impression of something else 
 stirring in this chill exterior ; a moment later there 
 
 346 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 passed against the pane a face bending a little to 
 the keen air, a faint colour in the cheek, and a dark 
 tress blowing across it. 
 
 Rosalie sprang to her feet and ran half-way to 
 the door, and stood there arrested ; thrown off her 
 balance by the unexpectedness of the event, and 
 with anger in her thoughts against Constantia's in- 
 trusion, she could determine upon no course, and 
 while attempting to conjure her heart to coolness, 
 merely listened to the sounds outside, her eyes, 
 large dark orbs of tense abeyance, set in a deadly 
 face; She heard the on-coming steps ; the door 
 opened, and Constantia was announced ; she was 
 clad in furs, and wore an aspect of grave com- 
 posure. The servant closed the door behind. 
 
 " Won't you sit down, Mrs. Dayntree ? " said 
 Rosalie, bitterly conscious that her lips were twitch- 
 ing. 
 
 Neither woman stretched a hand, the nature of 
 this interview did not allow of ordinary movements ; 
 but Constantia's eyes covered Rosalie, and before 
 her look she retreated, running back to the far win- 
 dow, her hand upon the pane as though to lift it 
 and leap out. 
 
 " Do not avoid me. Do not shrink away," cried 
 Constantia. " Are we not two women ? " 
 
 Rosalie dropped her hand. 
 
 "I know what you are come for," said she, 
 defiantly; "it is to reproach me. I will not 
 hear." 
 
 347 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 "No," replied Constantia, "I have come to tell 
 you something about love. I want to speak to you 
 as a woman to a woman.' 7 
 
 Rosalie, shivering a little, sat down mechanically. 
 And then Constantia softly, though it may be with 
 anguished effort, began to tell her something of the 
 meaning and nature of her own long love for Nor- 
 man, of the married years which had rooted and 
 deepened the relationship begun in natural emotion. 
 The deep and tranquil meaning drank up Rosalie's 
 shallower notion as the river takes the brook. Her 
 own dream began to show to her eyes as tinsel 
 beside this shining relation of stanch and tender 
 affection, this illumined history of love. And while 
 she listened there appeared within her mind, hang- 
 ing there as the picture to the story, the present- 
 ment of a face ; her thought stole towards it again 
 and again ; her hand turned the page back to it ; 
 she was tremblingly, unwillingly, conscious of its 
 presence there. 
 
 Had the situation been less tragic, less final, 
 Constantia had conquered in her appeal. But the 
 elements gathering together were something beyond 
 the force of the girl to meet ; she dared not lift her- 
 self to the level Constantia expected of her ; she 
 dared not permit the response to which her native 
 generosity prompted her. Rays from a higher 
 nature than her own had already photographed her 
 presumptuous deed with the mean inward spirit by 
 its side, and she feared indescribably lest the 
 348 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 mounting light should reach to other parts. Her 
 safety seemed to lie within the lumber-chamber of 
 her own soul, and therein, wilfully deaf and blind, 
 her false preconceptions about her, she hid from 
 Constantia's further approach. She got up and 
 walked through the room, and took a chair at a 
 distance. 
 
 "Your heart," said she, in a harsh whisper, "is 
 eaten up by the anger and jealousy with which con- 
 ventional love such as yours guards itself. You 
 have come here to spy whether I also suffer." 
 
 "I have come," said Constantia, "in my own 
 great affliction because I am a woman like your- 
 self, and like yourself capable of great suffering. 
 And the suffering I experience is too deep to be 
 named by the words with which you describe it. 
 The building of my life's work is threatened with 
 destruction. A love rooted in the remotest fibres 
 of my being is threatened. I have wept tears of 
 blood." 
 
 Rosalie turned her head upon the cushions of 
 her chair, and closed her lids so that she should 
 not see the sad eyes of Constantia. She was full 
 of sick misery, and she feared above all things the 
 inroad of something worse. And then a suspicion 
 blazed up that Constantia's visit was from Norman, 
 that she spoke out of a courage gathered in an 
 interview with him. So far she had not questioned 
 her supreme power over him ; to her ignorance it 
 had seemed that the final issue of the connection 
 349 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 lay in her own hands ; flattery and excitement had 
 debauched the judgment of a mind always in- 
 clined to arrogance, and had rendered it useless. 
 Whence the suspicion sprang that her power was a 
 little less, her value not so great as she had pic- 
 tured, she did not know ; but there it was, small, 
 galling, and unendurable. There is nothing in the 
 virtuous parts of character warranted to stand the 
 strain of a false position when the less worthy parts 
 thrust that upon it; the rents and fissures come 
 everywhere. During the last months Rosalie's 
 training had been towards ignoble action, and into 
 ignoble action the torment of the new doubt thrust 
 the nature that was not otherwise ignoble. 
 
 She sat suddenly upright. The one supreme 
 necessity seemed to be this, that she should put 
 her power over Norman to the test ; half-measures 
 had become indignities ; her ultimatum must be 
 delivered now, and in a manner not contemplated 
 before even by herself. 
 
 " Mrs. Dayntree ! " said she, slowly and clearly. 
 
 And her heart shrank at the wide uplift of Con- 
 stantia's eyes, surprised by the notable change in 
 the voice. 
 
 " Mrs. Dayntree, you have been candid with me. 
 I sought neither your candour nor your visit. You 
 have brought me both. You tell me that the na- 
 ture of your suffering is neither in anger nor jeal- 
 ousy. If I am to believe you, I should be foolish 
 not to trust you." 
 
 35 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 The attentive surprise in Constantia's eyes undid 
 her again, and she broke off to moisten her lips. 
 
 " I repeat I did not seek your visit. But since 
 you have come, will you deliver a message from me 
 to your husband ? " 
 
 A blush coloured Constantia's cheek, and she 
 rose to her feet. She had an aspect very gentle 
 but also very majestic. She bent her brows won- 
 deringly on the girl. 
 
 " Do you really ask me to do this ? " 
 
 The controlled indignation should have been a 
 trumpet-blast of warning. Rosalie hesitated long 
 enough, because of it, to make her next plunge 
 more desperate and ruthless. 
 
 "I do," said she. 
 
 A breath came and went through Constantia's 
 heart. She closed her eyes for a moment. Her 
 mind, kept clear through weeks of difficult right 
 action, saw clearly now ; the game, she perceived, 
 was thrust into her own hands, for the solution lay 
 within the girl's gigantic error. 
 
 " I will carry the message," said she, in icy calm. 
 
 Rosalie fell back as though before a blow. She 
 was exhausted as by violent wrestling, though Mrs. 
 Dayntree had said and done so little. By an effort 
 she steadied herself and continued her disastrous 
 speech. 
 
 " Tell him that I wish I require " 
 
 Again she broke off. Constantia's eyes calmly 
 questioned. 
 
 35 1 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 "I require him to come to-morrow in the 
 evening. Mother will be out. The old place, 
 
 say? 
 
 Constantia bowed. 
 
 "Have you got my message right?" said the 
 girl, in a loud crying whisper that astonished herself. 
 
 "That you require him to come to-morrow in 
 the evening when your mother is out, to the old 
 place. I have it clear, I think?" 
 
 Rosalie clenched her fists and bit into her lip. 
 Could women be so small and despicable to woman 
 as she was being? 
 
 "It is my right!" cried she, in another sobbing 
 whisper. 
 
 " Your right ? Possibly it is. At any rate, I shall 
 not fail or forget." 
 
 The girl fell back in her chair, utterly beaten ; 
 the room was electric with warning, but she could 
 see nothing clearly. The presence of Constantia 
 began to frighten her ; she made a repulsing move- 
 ment with her hand. 
 
 " Vow that you won't say more," she murmured, 
 in inexpressible weakness. 
 
 " I shall say those words and no more." 
 
 She looked up for an instant, and found the 
 figure on the hearth still majestic, but in the eyes 
 bent upon her hung pity. An indescribable appre- 
 hension of their relative positions made her heart 
 shiver. 
 
 " Go now ! " she cried. 
 
 35 2 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 Constantia hesitated. The room to Rosalie was 
 full of the feel of her pity. 
 
 " Go ! " she repeated, in a spasm of hate and 
 humiliation and helplessness. 
 
 And then she covered her face. 
 
 2 3 353 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 A SMALL house lay in a lonely position about two 
 miles south of the commons. Here resided a pen- 
 sioner of Norman's, whose discretion was a mingled 
 result of natural powers, family devotion, and good 
 pay. There were no neighbours near enough to 
 exhibit inconvenient curiosity, and he was ot an 
 appearance too well-to-do and respectable to attract 
 the notice of the charitable. The nearest church 
 was four miles distant, and a clergyman having 
 driven over to secure a pew-rent on his first arrival, 
 he informed him that he was of the Baptist persua- 
 sion. The isolation was as complete in its way as 
 Robinson Crusoe's ; yet the existence was not dull 
 or without employment and even excitement. A 
 little land lay about his house, and he and his wife 
 kept fowls and raised garden-stuff, and lived the 
 existence of retired innocence, looking neither to 
 the right nor to the left where their superiors were 
 concerned. 
 
 The following evening, Norman, as one in a 
 
 dream, and acting by order of his wife, mounted his 
 
 horse at the front-door in her presence. Stooping 
 
 to take the reins from the groom, he noticed that 
 
 354 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 she was still standing under the gaslights of the halJ, 
 looking towards him. The groom was already re- 
 treating in the direction of the stable, but Norman 
 checked the horse. A door in a side-passage 
 opening at the moment, Ted appeared, ran up to 
 Constantia, and then caught sight of the open door 
 and the horse on the terrace beyond. He would 
 have run forwards, but Constantia restrained him, 
 and the boy became restive ; and then Norman 
 saw her face change, and a rush of tears flow over 
 her cheeks. He set his horse in motion, wishing 
 he had not looked so long ; but the incident folded 
 itself into his mind as a picture into a book, so that 
 at any moment the page may fall open upon it. 
 
 A ride of at least four miles over and beyond the 
 commons lay before him, and it was dark already. 
 Nevertheless he went slowly, his head hanging, and 
 his eyes fixed on the ears of his horse, which he 
 saw beneath L him against the snow-spread road. 
 The night was clear and starlight, and every tree 
 snow-laden and every twig frosted ; the frost lay on 
 his beard. It was very silent ; he could hear only 
 his own breathing and the steps of the horse and 
 the small creak of the saddle ; but amidst this com- 
 prehensive quietude of nature the inward voice 
 began to call on him aloud by the names of the 
 lost. He jerked the reins with a sensitive hand at 
 the remembrance of the word " unaccountable " in 
 Evan's mouth, and the horse sprang forward and 
 had to be restrained. Then it hung like lead in 
 355 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 his mind that his wife was left weeping and isolated 
 at home, and his son held back from his embrace. 
 Under his twitching hand the horse started forward 
 again ; he stooped and patted its neck and curbed 
 it. The game was not as he had meant to play it ; 
 his spirit hunted scores of minor chances, and a 
 veiled presentiment had him by the hair. 
 
 " Good God ! " said he to himself, " I am very 
 lonely." 
 
 He let the reins fall on the horse's neck and 
 forgot to guide it ; he rode through the still white 
 night as a dead thing astride of a phantom. When 
 the light of the cottage came in sight, rays from 
 certain windows assured him that Rosalie was 
 already there. He started into life again, and 
 frowned. Having thrown the reins to his servant, 
 he walked from the gate to the door with an 
 unwilling step. It was opened before he 
 knocked by Rosalie. She wore a wonderful 
 dress, and her face, when she saw him, changed 
 with a brilliant smile. He blinked, as though hurt 
 by the sudden light, and his momentarily closed 
 eyes fastened on the picture of another face, 
 mournful, and dimmed by a gush of tears. It 
 was then he realised that the knowledge of the 
 girl's ruthlessness to Constantia, in sending the 
 message by her lips, was as a circle of explosive 
 fires in his breast. 
 
 A couple of hours later Norman was again on the 
 road on his return journey. If, as before, his body 
 356 
 
Cold -Winter. 
 
 was inert, and he permitted the horse to pick its 
 way sleepily, the reins on the neck, in spirit the 
 thrills and stabs of existence were deep enough. 
 He was racked by self-flagellating thought. 
 
 And yet it was over ! The thing, hateful now in 
 retrospect, was done for. That was the single 
 consolatory point. 
 
 Rosalie had kept to her resolve to deliver an 
 ultimatum, and her claim had shaped itself to the 
 dimensions of her early extravagant dream. It had 
 been nothing less than on his complete adhesion ; 
 the tribute to her imaginary power over him was to 
 be the overthrow of every other part of his life. 
 Either that or nothing it had been. And it had 
 brought about the inevitable conclusion. There 
 was not that in his feeling which responded to such 
 a claim for a moment; and there was no other 
 issue possible save blank refusal. He had felt 
 himself become cold under her turmoil, his passion 
 ebbing down as a tide, to leave a chill space be- 
 hind, over which his memory now moved chillily 
 regretful. 
 
 The thought of her eyes haunted him, however, 
 confronting him as they had done steadily, earnest 
 and appealing as Constantia's own, though set in a 
 face somewhat haggard from anxiety. For it was 
 just when emotion expired that something in Rosalie 
 had presented itself as a definite characteristic which 
 he had failed to notice before. Her claim had been 
 on the rare and the high ; that was the soul-search- 
 357 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 ing thing ; he had divided his own nature and given 
 a woman to either part, and the two, when brought 
 into collision, did not consent to the separate allot- 
 ment. He had seen Rosalie standing before him, 
 not as an object of sensuous delight, but as an in- 
 jured human being, preferring an unfulfilled claim. 
 And this formed the fret and vexation to himself. 
 Men break these transient ties over and over again ; 
 but usually there is some compensating medium : 
 the nimble all-consoling coin comes in. But here 
 was a creature who proclaimed her price to be high, 
 who averred that she had given her portion and had 
 not received her change. That was a maddening 
 position for a man of fastidious chivalry to be placed 
 in! 
 
 Then had she but burst into shrill upbraiding ! 
 She had done nothing of the kind. Finding him 
 inflexible, she had broken off her passion and her 
 words with a stroke. It was necessary to apprehend 
 yet new qualities ; he saw her suddenly from the 
 side which puzzled and alarmed her mother. Her 
 phrases, few and direct, were merciless to herself, 
 and equally so whether she realised it or not 
 to him. 
 
 " I have never loved you ! " was the first she 
 uttered, after the long silence by which she marked 
 her acceptance of his final reply. 
 
 He recalled how she had turned and looked at 
 him, and how the colour fled from her cheek when 
 she spoke. For the moment he had not seized her 
 
 358 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 meaning, and had hailed this cool dropping of fact 
 into the midst of turmoil. The second afterwards 
 'he understood. An excessive perplexity harassed 
 him in the remembrance as it had harassed him in 
 the moment ; the thought of her face and attitude 
 was a cruel sting now. What and who had taught 
 her the distinction ? He saw her in memory throw 
 herself huddled up in a chair, with closed eyes 
 shame putting out her beauty ; and yet capable of 
 uttering those few self-accusing, remorseless, unde- 
 feated phrases which brought such sharp humilia- 
 tion on himself. 
 
 "/was the persistent aggressor," she had said. 
 
 He coloured darkly in the night at the remem- 
 brance of it at the two-edged blow which stabbed 
 its mortification into his own heart at the moment 
 it had stabbed her own. If she had but accused 
 him more ! 
 
 " Nature is very blind," she had muttered to 
 herself. 
 
 Good God ! It was better for women in their 
 fall to be more reticent, to draw the veil decently. 
 Those words of hers crept through the night after 
 him. What a hideous, hateful mistake it had all 
 been ! 
 
 "It is very commonplace" she had muttered 
 again, in the same self-inclosed tone. 
 
 W r hat was she thinking of? Her attitude left 
 him more shocked, disturbed, and harassed than he 
 could have conceived possible. What ailed his 
 
 .359 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 manhood that the situation brought him no chance 
 to be anything but contemptible? He recalled his 
 poor, inadequate reply, 
 
 " I beg that you won't take it to heart. I shall 
 keep out of your way as much as possible." 
 
 " Yes," she had retorted in the same inward whis- 
 per ; " the man and the woman." 
 
 Though she had lain huddled in her chair, the 
 brilliant dress crushed, the eyes closed, and the 
 breath now and then audible through the dry lips, 
 when she spoke, she smote. 
 
 "Don't you see what the hideous thing is?" 
 had been another of her phrases. " We may keep 
 out of each other's ways, but we can't keep out of 
 each other's memories." 
 
 He had said nothing, but remembered with re- 
 gret that Constantia would have the same delicate 
 apprehension of the eternity of things. Then he 
 frowned, cut to the heart that he had linked Con- 
 stantia with Rosalie. Again it sank heavily to the 
 bottom of his thoughts that Constantia had not 
 withdrawn her garment from the girl. 
 
 " It is a hateful, miserable business. It is a de- 
 testable mistake to interfere with women," he cried 
 aloud ; ' ' but, after all, it is over." 
 
 And his horse started at his voice. 
 
 360 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE Armstrongs still lingered on at The Court, 
 but the splendour had vanished under Mr. Arm- 
 strong's reductions in expenditure. The details 
 were unspeakably distasteful to Edward. All the 
 carriages save one small pony-chaise had been 
 sold ', there was a shrinkage in every part of the 
 establishment, the female servants had dwindled 
 to three, and the men had come down to a single 
 gardener, who despaired over the extent of land 
 committed to his culture, and pottered over his 
 favourite vegetable in one corner of it, but who 
 groomed and harnessed the pony when desired. 
 Mrs. Armstrong, with a gentle determination which! 
 Edward could not resist, argued each reduction at 
 the family board ; perhaps in her secret heart she 
 rejoiced to discover herself restored to a leading 
 position, and at once exercised her power in bring- 
 ing home to her circle a wholesome recognition of 
 the change which had befallen them. She was 
 perhaps apt to be excruciatingly candid, on the 
 points desiring it defined and articulated ; her 
 clippings and snippings at expense were thorough ; 
 she saved candle-ends and watched the carving, 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 and turned the gas low in the hall and curtailed 
 the girls' frills ; she set herself and them to menial 
 offices in coarse aprons ; Edward came across his 
 sisters bed-making and dusting ; there seemed 
 more cleaning than usual. Sylvia was taught to 
 iron, and Eliza " washed up " with a gentle, long- 
 suffering face. A solemn energy of useful toil per- 
 vaded the house, and Edward could never get out 
 of the way of it. Gilbert rather enjoyed the fun, 
 and good-naturedly offered to help with the knives. 
 Edward, with an air of unappreciated merit, handed 
 in his bills. 
 
 One luxury Mrs. Armstrong did not discard, and 
 that was the Century newspaper ; it came in regu- 
 larly by the noon post. Eliza found it lying on 
 the drawing-room table one day and opened it. 
 
 "There is a leading article which will interest 
 you," said Sylvia, who was always beforehand in 
 these things. 
 
 i Eliza turned to the page, and found it illumined 
 by the name of " Evan Dayntree." 
 
 The article contained an account of his work as 
 an engineer beginning with a reference to the 
 humble but ingenious dredging-boat on the Thames. 
 It went on, however, to describe the scope of his 
 conception of the drainage of great cities. 
 
 " The merest tyro," ran the article, " will per- 
 ceive that such suggestions involve a far-reaching 
 change in our sewage system. It is true that the 
 march of human intelligence has brought us on a 
 
 362 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 long way beyond the time when Mr. Chadwick, 
 as autocrat of sanitation, propounded his infallible 
 panacea of hermetically sealed drains with their 
 typhoid-breeding effect. It is true that, dating 
 approximately from the announcement of the Poor 
 Law Commissioners of their inability to cope with 
 the misery and inertia which were the direct out- 
 come of insanitary conditions, the Health of the 
 Public has been recognised as a proper province 
 for continuous and progressive legislation ; we 
 have lately passed an Act consolidating and im- 
 proving former Public Health Acts, and we have 
 but just passed our Rivers Pollution Act ; all this 
 is in the right direction. But it is reserved to this 
 energetic young engineer to have suggested a 
 sweeping reform which brings within measurable 
 distance a permanent solution of the problem of 
 the sanitation of our cities, in face of an increas- 
 ing population. Not less admirable than the engi- 
 neering skill displayed, is the spirit in which he 
 touches the connection between this essentially 
 dismal science and such immaterial benefits as the 
 ' efficiency of the citizen as an acting, willing unit 
 of the State.' Make the soil pure, and the atmos- 
 pheric conditions healthy, and the fruit will be fair, 
 is his postulate. * We will have towns,' he writes 
 in a series of masterly articles in the Engineer; ' let 
 us at least make it possible that their product shall 
 be not squalid and inert paupers, but right- 
 minded men and happy women.' A thinker, a 
 
 363 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 practical man, who thus links superb results to 
 prosaic beginnings, is a fitting person for the Gov- 
 ernment to honour. We regret that his work of 
 sewerage engineering should be interrupted for the 
 moment, but we have to announce that he has 
 been selected by the Government to head the 
 expedition about to depart for Suez, to put into 
 execution a scheme of his own for overcoming 
 the difficulty caused by the opposition of the 
 Breakwaters to the washing of the currents above 
 Port Said. The scheme has the hearty co-opera- 
 tion of the French Government, and the approval 
 of M. De Lesseps ; and there is fair hope of this 
 difficult dredging problem being solved at last." 
 
 Eliza was not the only one who that day perused 
 the leader. The Century was usually delivered at 
 South Downs by the noon post ; Rosalie kept the 
 habit of studying its pages daily, though her reason 
 for doing so was lost. When, upon opening it 
 that morning, she found the name, long searched 
 for in vain, prominent in the first leader, it startled 
 her indescribably. 
 
 After the pitiful storm of her last interview with 
 Norman, she had existed listlessly under the eyes 
 of her mother. The past, she told herself, was 
 "over;" but there was no opening future. 
 Still the sense of finish was in one sense a con- 
 solation or would have been save for her 
 mother's manner. Mrs. Trelyon made no em- 
 barrassing remarks, but her face was habitually 
 364 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 ploughed by a dreadful anxiety, and the girl 
 became aware that she herself was somehow the 
 source of it. There were moments when these 
 signs of pain in her mother's countenance awak- 
 ened a corresponding sympathy in her heart; 
 she yearned to creep up to her humbly and 
 whisper her confession, and bring her the wel- 
 come assurance that the error was resigned. 
 But a great gulf of reticence lay between these 
 two poor souls, and across it they looked upon 
 each other in fear. Rosalie could not but 
 remark that any wistful glance on her part, any 
 move towards an understanding, was met on the 
 mother's side by shrinking alarm. Holding still 
 her preconception as to the abnormally striking 
 circumstances of her birth, she began to find the 
 fancy settling through indifference to cold eclipse. 
 She was hungry for common love, and longed 
 after the adopted father of her youth, and 
 recoiled from this stranger of her splendid 
 dreams. After all, Mrs. Trelyon's love had been 
 a genuine affection, serving for many homely 
 days as well as for more romantic and stirring 
 times. 
 
 Into this suspended calm fell the Century 
 article. At first she read in confusion, unable 
 to grasp the meaning, and then it flew to her 
 heart that the " brown slim young man " was 
 referred to, and not another, " Eliza's hero " and 
 her own once despised lover. 
 
 365 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 A trivial event will lay bare to the mind some 
 hidden and hitherto unrealised condition. 
 
 The article, startling her as it did with Evan's 
 name in the place where for months she had 
 sought another's, operated as the rending of a 
 veil within. There was knowledge there which 
 she had held back with a resolute hand. Laying 
 the article aside and she seemed to gather 
 the sense rather through leaping heart-beats 
 than her eyes she tremblingly recalled her last 
 interview with him. But had she ever forgotten? 
 It stood within her memory vivid and living to 
 the smallest detail, and she felt within the unmis- 
 takable but bitter wakening of her heart a 
 heart which passed into its best knowledge only 
 to realise that the maiden strength of it was 
 gone. 
 
 It was an inconceivable wrecking grief, and 
 her spirit was not free to sustain it. Over- 
 whelmed by pain, she found her habit of inertia 
 no longer tolerable, and leaving the house spent 
 the next hour or two in rapid and exhausting 
 walking. Her thoughts went with her ; she cried 
 to the lost patience whose empty nest no remorse 
 could fill ; to the waiting spirit which should 
 have kept it warm for genuine happiness. The 
 trees by the wayside sorrowed with her as she 
 went, their cold fingers dipped in frost; the 
 clouds drifting sluggishly across a colourless sky 
 were heavy with her woe ; the very brooks 
 366 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 were dumb. Her spirit, laden with self-created 
 misery, could make no shift against the weight 
 of sorrow ; she, a thing enslaved, could stand 
 erect under no such burden. She walked until 
 her limbs were weary, then returned home and 
 threw herself upon a chair in her own sitting- 
 room and closed her eyes. A servant after an 
 interval knocked at the door and brought a letter 
 on a tray. She recognised the handwriting, 
 and extended trembling fingers. There was 
 neither stamp nor postmark, and she questioned 
 how it had come. A messenger had left it, the 
 man replied. That stung to new feeling; she 
 dropped the letter on her knee and pressed her 
 hands to her heart. 
 
 " My God ! He is here here here ! " she 
 cried over and over again. 
 
 To read the sheet was a dread. The inno- 
 cent unquestioning devotion, the man's gift and 
 demand, were judge and conviction in one ; an 
 angel with drawn sword stood within the words 
 and drove her, running and breathless, to an 
 outer place. Her face hung swooning over the 
 superscription while her fingers tried the seal. 
 For why pretend to push desolation from her 
 when it swallowed her with so cavernous a 
 throat? 
 
 " You will not have forgotten I must at least 
 hope that " it ran, " something of what I said 
 367 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 to you when last we met. I should think myself 
 fortunate to look back on an interview which 
 brought you even for one moment to my arms, 
 had it not been for the trouble you displayed, 
 and which I could not follow. I have never 
 forgotten it for an instant. I thought my great 
 love gave me the right to fight my way up to 
 some position from which I could honourably 
 offer you the best protection a man has it in his 
 power to offer a woman. I am thankful I have 
 succeeded ; the French and English Governments 
 have chosen my scheme, and are sending me to 
 Suez. I do not know what your trouble is, but I 
 honour and love you unspeakably; and I ask 
 you to come out of it and to belong to me and 
 to my life to my life, which I will try and con- 
 tinue to make worthy of you, and honourable 
 enough to honour you. I ask you to be my 
 wife. I am coming this evening at six o'clock 
 to take my answer. 
 
 " EVAN DAYNTREE." 
 
 She dropped the letter back on her knee. 
 The words went out of her mind with a rustle as 
 of wing ; they left her cold and desolate in the 
 clip of a dreadful darkness. Thus she remained 
 hushed, incapable, stricken, for an hour's time. 
 And then the passion of her heart's grief woke 
 in her ; she broke into wild sobbing and crying ; 
 she fell upon her knees and lifted her face and 
 called. 368 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 " Mother ! mother ! mother ! " was the cry. 
 
 She called as one calls for God ; a word for 
 " help " was on her tongue ; the picture of her 
 real mother did not pass her mind ; she cried 
 against fate and. irrevocable sequence, and for 
 the refuge of some great Arm against herself. 
 And the door opened and Glynn put in her head. 
 At this the tragedy of her mourning turned to a 
 lesser key, and a spasm seizing her she shrieked 
 with a pointing finger at the face small, curi- 
 ous, and shrivelled with wry mouth. 
 
 " You rat ! " cried she ; " you rat ! Begone.'* 
 
 Whereat Glynn fled with hands uplifted ; and 
 the girl's white lovely throat shook once more 
 with the moan of "Mother ! mother ! mother ! " 
 And all the time it was for help she cried. 
 
 The servants began to collect and to whisper 
 and listen outside ; but none dared open the 
 door. Mrs. Trelyon was the last in the house 
 to move to her daughter's assistance ; a message 
 had been carried, and at length the servants 
 beheld her walking along the passage in their 
 direction. She came on slowly, a beautiful untidy 
 figure, with trailing garments and a shabby white 
 shawl huddled about her shoulders ; she carried 
 her head high, and looked from under her lids 
 at the clustering domestics with a glance so 
 haughty that they shrank before her and stole 
 away one by one to the back parts of the house, 
 the under-housemaid weeping in sympathy for the 
 24 369 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 unhappy girl whose cries of distress still rung after 
 them. 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon entered the room and closed and 
 locked the door. Rosalie, suddenly silenced, 
 rose from the hearth, her face a white flower 
 beaten by storms. She was still wrapped in a 
 loose outdoor cloak, and wore over her rippling 
 hair a picturesque close-fitting hat. She said 
 nothing when her mother entered. Mrs. Trelyon's 
 face was pale as death, and was hardening as for 
 some dreaded moment. Catching sight of the 
 letter lying where it had fallen, she stooped 
 without speaking and secured it. Rosalie made 
 no resistance, for indeed the sight of her mother's 
 face left her without resources. Mrs. Trelyon 
 read the letter, and when she had done so there 
 broke from her lips a deep cry as of relief, and 
 something that was more like glittering light than 
 a smile changed her face. 
 
 "The gods!" she murmured; "the gods!" 
 
 " Mother ! Help me ! " cried Rosalie. 
 
 " The gods ! They still help those who help 
 themselves," whispered Mrs. Trelyon with a half 
 sob. And like one distraught, she stood gazing 
 before her, and curling Evan's sheet round her 
 finger. 
 
 Rosalie glanced from the letter to her mother ; 
 
 the letter no longer seemed her own ; neither did 
 
 the moment of her misery seem her own, for the 
 
 darker misery of her mother had taken it captive. 
 
 37 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 Then at last her mother turned with a softened 
 look on her face which Rosalie had never seen 
 before. 
 
 " I thought hope was over," said she. 
 
 "Yes ! " assented Rosalie. 
 
 " No! It is here!" 
 
 " No, mother." 
 
 " I repeat it is here. Listen to my plans ; am 
 I not your mother? I have a right to urge an im- 
 mediate marriage, and he shall take you with him 
 to Suez." 
 
 She untwisted Evan's letter from her finger and 
 laid it upon the table. 
 
 " Mother," said Rosalie, in a whisper, " you don't 
 understand. I cannot marry Evan Dayntree." 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon approached the table and touched 
 it with the fingers of both colourless high-bred 
 hands. On the hearth beside the table stood Ro- 
 salie ; a high arched window filled with the pale 
 winter sky and showing the tips of snow-covered 
 trees threw the figure of her mother into relief, and 
 drenched, as she cruelly felt, her own white cheek 
 with whiter light. 
 
 "Don't you see," whispered the mother, leaning 
 over the table in sharp eagerness, " don't you see, 
 dear, that Providence sends this to us ? Don't you 
 see it is our escape ? " 
 
 Rosalie's eyes, two spirits of despair, clung to 
 her mother's face. 
 
 "I suppose," said Mrs. Trelyon, after an interval 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 which she had filled with the slow restless moving 
 of her slim hands over the table, " you don't alto- 
 gether dislike him?" 
 
 The girl's face grew whiter, and she pressed 
 both hands to her side. 
 
 " I can't marry him," she gasped. 
 
 " Ah ! " retorted Mrs. Trelyon, passionately, " I 
 know more than you suppose. And knowing it, I 
 say you can and must." 
 
 Rosalie, with the same steady gaze of her mourn- 
 ful eyes, shook her head. 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon turned and walked to the window ; 
 twilight was gathering. Her aspect standing thus 
 in the pale light of the window, her shoulders hud- 
 dled in the dirty white shawl and turned against 
 her daughter, seemed indescribably ominous. 
 
 " I am in trouble. Turn and be a little kind 
 to me," broke from Rosalie's lips in helpless 
 amaze. 
 
 "Kind? Oh, my dear, yes if I can," re- 
 turned her mother over her shoulder and sighing 
 heavily. " But there is only one way. Take it, 
 Rosalie, take it. With shut eyes and in silence." 
 
 " You have no other advice to give me than 
 that?" murmured Rosalie, after a long interval. 
 " Mother, there are reasons why I cannot take it 
 reasons in myself." She paused ; then in a 
 low but very steady voice continued " If you 
 can't help me, won't you let me go to my 
 father?" 
 
 372 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 To this came no reply ; she had an impression 
 that the shoulders in the shawl were moved by 
 secret sobbing. That her mother should weep 
 seemed rather frightful than touching. She could 
 bear the silence, the enigmatic behaviour, the 
 physical distance no longer, and, walking un- 
 steadily, approached and laid hold of the dirty 
 knitted shawl with one hand, and timidly caught 
 the tips of her mother's fingers from behind with 
 the other. 
 
 " Be open with me at last," she entreated ; 
 " tell me the truth. My adopted father taught me 
 not to fear the truth. I have forgotten most of 
 his lessons," she added with a sudden gush of tears, 
 "but at least I have the courage to say that I 
 know I have no real right to his name." 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon pressed the girl's fingers con- 
 vulsively, and then as convulsively snatched her 
 own away. 
 
 " Don't, Rosalie ! " she cried. " We are two 
 lost women. Unless unless Oh, for God's 
 sake, be guided ! unless you will take my 
 way." 
 
 Rosalie shrank back to the hearth stupefied and 
 exhausted. But her mother turning sharply and 
 suddenly showed her face coloured by a passion of 
 energetic resolve. 
 
 " You don't understand ! You don't understand 
 the extent of the disaster," cried she. " People 
 will say people will recall I thought it dead. 
 373 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Are those listening servants gone? Where is 
 Glynn?" 
 
 She darted to the door, looked down the pas- 
 sage, and having ascertained their isolation, came 
 back and turned the key in the lock. This un- 
 accustomed haste and heat of movement alarmed 
 the girl anew. 
 
 " Listen, Rosalie ! Listen to your mother ! 
 Have I ever entreated you before? Use my 
 wisdom my own success is the proof of it. At 
 the end of my life ! No ! I cannot face defeat 
 and shame. It lies with you to save us both. 
 Oh, this hateful world ! Neither you nor I have 
 been so very wrong after all. But the world has 
 no mercy. Fate is better. Fate has sent this 
 loophole of escape. The chances have always 
 been on my side because I knew how to seize 
 them. My dear, don't look into things ; shut your 
 eyes and seize your opportunity. Silence, Rosalie, 
 silence is the best and safe thing. We are drown- 
 ing creatures, and it is sheer presumption not to 
 snatch at the help thrown towards us. The will 
 to be silent and passive is all that is needed. We 
 can't help ourselves and our mistakes ; life has to 
 be a series of skilful adaptations to circumstances 
 as they occur, and here is a safe bridge over a 
 dreadful event. Take it, Rosalie, take it ! And 
 believe your wretched mother that there is no 
 other way." 
 
 The voice snapping and twanging with over- 
 374 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 eagerness paused for a moment, but it was only to 
 gather a new force of solicitation. Once she 
 dropped her majestic figure to a kneeling posture, 
 and raised clasped hands to her amazed and 
 stricken daughter. 
 
 " My hard fate ! My hard fate ! " she cried 
 when in this attitude. 
 
 It was genuine, it was tragical ; but the soul of 
 Rosalie recoiled. She was subtly wounded in a 
 heart still partly innocent to find her own mis- 
 doing not tenderly touched but coldly accepted as 
 a matter of course. No word of comprehension 
 of her piercing trouble, as it presented itself to 
 her own mind, had met her ear ; she found the core 
 of her own misery ignored while she was urged to 
 the acceptance of Evan's offer with a passionate 
 insistence that bit and bit at her fainting heart, 
 and yet failed to reach the citadel of her resolution. 
 " I cannot " was her main response, backed now 
 by pitiful confession, broken by sorrow, tinged 
 then by a little of her old spirit, and falling again 
 to the accent of despair, but through all variations 
 carrying its note throughout the long dispute in 
 poor but unyielding resistance. 
 
 " I fairly believe," said Mrs. Trelyon at last, in 
 a tone of bitter misery, " you do not comprehend 
 what is your own plight." 
 
 " Oh ! " cried Rosalie, in a piteous voice, " it 
 is you who do not understand. It is not merely 
 what I have done, but that something is happen- 
 
 375 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 ing in my own mind. I see by the light of this 
 man's goodness that I have reason for despair. 
 I cannot bear the light. I could not stand in it. 
 I am terrified so to have lost the way." 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon moaned, and turned again to the 
 window. The girl, whose hot hands shook on her 
 knees, leaned back in her chair, the helpless tears 
 coursing down her cheeks, and a miserable 
 wonder at her own physical weakness making 
 the wretchedness worse. Presently Mrs. Trelyon 
 drew out her watch. 
 
 "Rosalie," said she, in a voice of anguish, 
 " you have got in this moment to crush down all 
 your superfine feeling. You have to regard this 
 offer as a hair- breadth escape a hair-breadth 
 escape, I repeat. Once more believe me that 
 there is no other way of saving yourself but by 
 following my directions without inquiry. The 
 time is getting on. Make the best of the mo- 
 ments that remain. Go to your room and change 
 your dress. I will excuse you to him for your dis- 
 ordered condition ; there shall be no difficulty." 
 
 " Mother ! You reckon without me. I will 
 not and dare not deceive him ! " 
 
 There was a perceptible pause, during which the 
 figure at the window stood perfectly still, and 
 Rosalie waited. Then her mother turned round 
 slowly, and the eyes in the marble-white face 
 sought the girl out as slowly and laid themselves 
 upon her and held her. Rosalie felt herself drawn 
 376 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 upright in the chair by the look, and her own 
 eyes widened and fixed in the terror of her spirit. 
 She would have spoken, but her lips could not 
 move. Mrs. Trelyon advanced ; she trod wearily 
 and with a broken air towards her daughter, but 
 there was that in her face to make the girl shrink 
 and hold her hand up as though to defend her- 
 self from a blow. When she was close she 
 stooped and whispered. 
 
 "Oh, no ! " said the girl, with a stare of incred- 
 ulous and innocent surprise. 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon returned to the window, and 
 Rosalie followed her movements with the same 
 suspended stare. Her mother seemed unable to 
 utter a further remark ; she saw her standing 
 against the pane in the fast fading light, and 
 slowly the whispered words dropped from her ear 
 down to her inmost apprehension and laid hold 
 of it. Then something burst suddenly over her 
 face, and she trembled so that she had to grasp 
 the arms of the chair with her hands. 
 
 "It isn't true!" she whispered in piteous 
 terror. 
 
 " Is n't it? " said Mrs. Trelyon, brokenly. 
 
 " But I 'm not that sort of woman. It is hor- 
 rible horrible to me. God would n't be so 
 cruel ! " cried the girl. 
 
 " God! " repeated Mrs. Trelyon, in such an 
 accent that the room shrivelled beneath it. 
 
 " Oh, no ! " faltered Rosalie ; " it could n't 
 happen." 377 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Could rit\\.t" 
 
 " Show some pity ! " 
 
 "I can't, Rosalie. My heart is too sick and 
 dried up. But I mean to save you. Have I 
 fought with facts and put seeming in their place all 
 my life for nothing? Trust to me. The time is 
 slipping away; get up and take that hat off and 
 bathe your eyes. Young Dayntree will be here 
 directly." 
 
 Rosalie gave a cry. 
 
 " Hush ! " said Mrs. Trelyon, stamping her 
 foot. 
 
 " Oh, it has n't happened ! Please, mother, 
 don't say it. I never thought " 
 
 " No ? This all comes of leaving your edu- 
 cation to a man. He fed you on principles and 
 fine feeling." 
 
 "Don't! Oh, my father!" The girl slid 
 from her chair and crouched and shivered. 
 
 "Get up ! " commanded Mrs. Trelyon, this time 
 in a sharp whisper ; " you must see young Dayn- 
 tree. I cannot manage him alone." 
 
 " Oh, mother ! mother ! mother ! " cried the 
 girl, rocking herself to and fro on the floor. 
 
 " Show some spirit," said Mrs. Trelyon, des- 
 perately ; " run to your room and ring for your 
 maid." 
 
 She moaned for answer, with her head on the 
 seat of the chair and her limbs trailing. This 
 physical collapse seemed to frenzy Mrs. Trelyon. 
 378 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 The one course to her was the obvious course, 
 and all that was wanted was the rally of the will 
 to the moment. Time was precious ; yet here the 
 girl lay blenched and prone ! How was she to 
 lend her a spark of her own audacity ? 
 
 " Must I shake you ! " muttered she, turning 
 from the window with her fists clenched ; " at this 
 moment he is coming." 
 
 Then Rosalie suddenly did pull herself together ; 
 she rose and stood on the hearth, grasping the 
 mantelpiece for support. 
 
 " You are asking me to marry him now ? " 
 asked she, in appalled reproach. 
 
 " Rosalie ! you are mad to waste time in argu- 
 ing ! Don't you see that there is no question 
 about it no other way out of disgrace? You 
 have to do it." 
 
 "Disgrace!" cried the girl. "That may be. 
 But so deep never ! never ! never ! " She 
 lifted up her hand. " I swear that I will never 
 do this deed." 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon, with a despairing exclamation, 
 turned back to the window. A pause, broken only 
 by Rosalie's sobbing breaths, fell between them. 
 
 " Rosalie," came her mother's voice presently, 
 cold and dry and hard, " if you decline my ad- 
 vice, what then is your intention? " 
 
 "You cast me off? I know it by your tone. 
 Then one thing you must answer. Who is my 
 father?" 
 
 379 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 She spoke firmly. She was met by silence. 
 During that silence Mrs. Trelyon rapidly reflected. 
 A dreadful tenseness was between the two ; the 
 resolution of the physically enfeebled girl was not 
 to be shaken by persuasion and advice ; she leapt 
 to fact for her next weapon. 
 
 " Not Mr. Trelyon," said she, in a low whisper. 
 
 The truth known, yet never so spoken, forced 
 a sigh from Rosalie's lips. 
 
 "Why then did he love me?" asked she, with 
 mournful regret. 
 
 " In his mind," said Mrs. Trelyon, " he con- 
 nected you with a man a friend to whom at 
 one time he owed a debt of gratitude, and for 
 whom he nourished a deep affection. Mr. Trelyon 
 always touched matters in an unaccountable way. 
 When he discovered you were not his own child, 
 he made certain conditions with me, cut the man 
 in private, and never spoke or wrote to him again. 
 Then he carried you off abroad and brought you 
 up as his own daughter." 
 
 " Oh, the portrait ! " cried Rosalie, upon whose 
 beaten face a little joy began again to dawn ; 
 " I understand it now. This miniature " she 
 pointed at the two portraits on the wall 
 " which my adopted father bade me keep ! I 
 know who he is his name, his home. Mr. 
 Trelyon talked to me of him; he bade me love 
 and honour him. He said there had been wrong 
 in his life, but that there were excuses. He is 
 380 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 a father to be proud of. He is still alive. I 
 am not alone. Mother ! why have you concealed 
 it from me? Thank you at last." 
 
 She rose and looked towards the figure at the 
 window, stretching both hands a little, her face 
 subdued. And once more she received the hor- 
 rifying impression that the shoulders beneath the 
 draggled shawl bent and shook as under a load 
 of shame and woe. The little joy died out of 
 her eyes. 
 
 " At least bear me witness," said Mrs. Trelyon 
 presently, in a voice washed by wild, silent weep- 
 ing, " that I have done my best to save you." 
 
 " I think," said Rosalie, gently, " you did not 
 understand me. You shut me up, or tried to 
 if that was your best." 
 
 " If some one had done that for me ! " cried 
 Mrs. Trelyon, with a lifted hand. 
 
 " It was not my adopted father's way." 
 
 " Ah ! Mr. Trelyon ? No. It was not his way. 
 But I had a deeper knowledge than his." 
 
 " Oh ! " cried Rosalie, " that is not so. I was 
 safe with him. What is not wretched of me, I 
 owe to him. I still, perhaps, shall find a portion 
 left." 
 
 "But what do you intend?" cried Mrs. 
 Trelyon, rapidly. " Assure me of this, Rosalie ! 
 Tell me that you do not really contemplate going 
 there?" 
 
 "It, was Mr. Trelyon's wish." 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 The mother, desperate, stood like a thing at 
 bay. 
 
 "In your present plight?" said she, in a 
 dreadful voice. 
 
 " Oh, my God ! But surely my father will 
 help me." 
 
 " Cease your madness. Rosalie ! I advise you 
 for both our sakes you are beginning to anger 
 me I advise you not to press me further, but 
 to yield. Already Mr. Dayntree must be at 
 hand." 
 
 Again she drew out her watch ; again Rosalie's 
 mind shook between terror and longing at the 
 thought of the lover who footed her world ; 
 again she gathered her own resolution about her 
 as the single armour against despair. 
 
 "The anguish is not there" said she, speaking 
 to her own mind; "it lies in his presence." 
 
 The watch ticked on in Mrs. Trelyon's palm ; 
 her eyes full of desperation followed the hands 
 and not her face. 
 
 " It is half-past five," said she ; " you have 
 still time. Be once more warned. Believe me ! 
 Believe me ! You have got to yield, or you will rue 
 it for a lifetime." 
 
 "This much of worth is left in me," cried the 
 girl, in a voice of awful reproach, " that I will 
 never marry or deceive Evan Dayntree ! " 
 
 " Be warned. Ring for your maid." 
 
 " You will not help me ! I am very forlorn. 
 382 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 Out of your past have you nothing to give me ? 
 My heart faints when I think of Evan Dayntree. 
 I will not wrong him." 
 
 "You refuse finally? After my warning? " 
 
 "I refuse." 
 
 "What shall you do?" 
 
 " I shall go to my father. I will throw myself 
 at his feet. I did not know life had such horrors. 
 Surely a man will forgive ! " 
 
 " A man ! You baby of a girl ! A man 
 forgive!" 
 
 The girl took one step to the door. Mrs. 
 Trelyon turned and looked at her again. There 
 was a desperate threat in the eyes that shocked 
 and startled Rosalie afresh, and again she shrank 
 back to her seat on the chair by the hearth. 
 Her mother left her position by the window and 
 once more moved towards her, but this time her 
 step was swift and her eyes full of resolution. 
 
 "I would have spared you," said she, standing 
 over the shrinking girl and speaking in a tone- 
 less voice ; " but you are cruel to me. Why 
 not let it suffice that I tell you I have bitten the 
 dust? We are two wretched women together 
 and you don't see it. As the world sees things 
 or calls things, for the world is a hypocrite 
 you and I are wrong in the very roots of our 
 nature. To look back, it seems so inexplicable, 
 doesn't it? so momentary as though it wasn't 
 exactly oneself? But as the world takes things, 
 
 383 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 you and I were made wrong throughout. I don't 
 see how we could help it. God made us, too. 
 You think me hard, yet I have sheltered you 
 from the truth. There isn't much tenderness in 
 me, but surely in this I have been tender? Do 
 you insist ? Very well ; I see you do. On me 
 you have no mercy; you tear the truth out of 
 your mother's heart. Here is the truth. No 
 one, save Mr. Trelyon, supposed that friend of 
 his to be the father of my child. Mr. Trelyon 
 was the one genuinely deceived person; others 
 permitted themselves to be deceived. If this 
 present scandal comes out, the old one is re- 
 vived, recalled. But if you go to my husband's 
 friend, my disgrace is proved. Will he forgive 
 me for the rupture with my husband for the 
 life-long delusion I permitted my husband to 
 retain ? He will be the first to repudiate you 
 and me. And who is your father? You ask it. 
 Rosalie? You dare to ask? Ah, well ! If indeed 
 white, beaten thing though you are! you 
 will insist! Truth you keep asking for as 
 though it might be of use. Truth then you shall 
 have. My husband, the Honourable Leonard 
 Trelyon, trusted me too much, Rosalie; he mis- 
 read me altogether; he wearied me with exalted 
 notions, he left me too much to myself. And 
 
 your father, my poor girl, your father was 
 
 the groom, a bold, devil-may-care sort of 
 
 man, handsome, and of gypsy extraction ; he 
 
 384 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 had a passion for horses, and he was a splendid 
 rider; but that, with his looks, was his only 
 distinction." 
 
 The girl shrank back in her chair in a stricken 
 sort of way, and closed her lids in defence 
 against her mother's eyes ; the toneless voice did 
 not stop. 
 
 " You have forced the truth from my heart of 
 hearts where I have hidden it with skill and care 
 for years, seizing chance after chance as it offered. 
 And is the truth the least good now you know it? 
 I would have gone on sheltering you, but you 
 have been cruel to me. You will be cruel no 
 longer? Say that you will not betray me." 
 
 She brought her speech to a close, and Rosalie, 
 hearing the voice stop, thrust a hand out blindly, 
 as though in a feeble effort to push her mother 
 aside. 
 
 " Let me breathe," said she. 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon retreated a step, and stood eyeing 
 her anxiously. 
 
 "A groom," murmured the girl, "a groom, 
 you say ? Ah ! why not ? I seem to understand 
 a few things now that were dark. Alas, poor 
 Rosalie ! " 
 
 She still did not open her eyes ; she lifted her 
 face, with the lids shut, turning it slowly upward. 
 
 " A groom," said she again. 
 
 Mrs. Trelyon watched with suspended breath. 
 
 " I understand," said the girl, still with closed 
 2 5 385 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 eyes, and her hands now a little stretched out on 
 either side of her ; " I too was just a blind worm. 
 But when we are so blind, are we so punished? " 
 
 The mother, drenched with wretchedness, opened 
 her lips and closed them again. 
 
 "Mother?" 
 
 "Yes? Oh, what?" 
 
 " Tell me ! Perhaps it is possible my 
 father, the groom, had at least the attribute of 
 honesty?" 
 
 " What is it, child ! Yes, he was honest with 
 a purse, not a woman. Yes; he was passably 
 honest." 
 
 Rosalie opened her eyes, and rose unsteadily 
 from her seat. A silken tie lay on a table, where 
 she- had thrown it. She took it up absently, and 
 placed it about her throat, and then she began to 
 draw on her gloves. Mrs. Trelyon watched with 
 stealthy, perplexed glances. The core of the girl 
 to the end was an enigma. 
 
 " Thinking me his friend's child, he made me 
 his heiress," Rosalie murmured, in a deeply re- 
 flective tone. 
 
 "Yes," whispered Mrs. Trelyon, eagerly. "Oh, 
 Rosalie ! Have I not done my best for you? " 
 
 The girl turned her face to the miniature por- 
 traits of Mr. Trelyon and his friend. She touched 
 her lips with her fingers. 
 
 " Dear father of my best part I remember ! " 
 said she ; and she moved to the door. 
 386 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 "Where are you going?" asked Mrs. Trelyon, 
 in a low voice. 
 
 " I will try and emulate my father, the groom's 
 one virtue," whispered the girl, with faint dry 
 lips. 
 
 "What are you going to do?" whispered Mrs. 
 Trelyon. 
 
 Her fingers were on the handle of the door; 
 she looked back, with eyes to remember for a 
 lifetime. 
 
 " To try and be ' passably honest,' " said 
 she. 
 
 She went out of the room, and through the 
 passage, walking as an invalid walks, tottering a 
 little, with her hands stretched on either side, to 
 guide and support herself by the walls. Miss 
 Glynn opened a door, and stretched her neck and 
 peeped out with small, round, scandal- mongering 
 eyes, and a mouth greedy of gossip. The look on 
 the girl's face drove her back. 
 
 387 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 A MAN'S repentance does not necessarily make 
 at once for peace ; on the contrary, the path after- 
 wards usually begins to be undividedly thorny. 
 For while the sense-pleasing flowers of erratic 
 indulgence are mown down, the seeds of other 
 blooms are scarcely sown. 
 
 Norman's last interview with Rosalie Trelyon 
 had brought him neither inward satisfaction nor 
 other sense of relief. He was even unable to 
 shake from his mind an impression of malicious 
 treachery in the guidance of what had appeared 
 his best instinct of right action. Looking back, as 
 it were, over the shoulder of his mind, he found 
 the way cut sheer off behind, while that in front 
 was neither straight nor plain. His steps seemed 
 to stray indefinitely, and he bitterly experienced 
 the truth that right, when once a man has been 
 greatly wrong, becomes impossible ; for conduct 
 is as a mirror in a room of varied contents, and 
 reflects not only the goodly thing we would place 
 in the centre, but the settled squalor of the back- 
 ground. 
 
 388 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 He found this out, for example, when he strove 
 to open the subject of his break with Rosalie to 
 his wife. In speech the baser material rises like 
 scum to the top, and sincerer emotions are apt to 
 drop out of sight. It would be more manageable 
 if Constantia would but make an inquiry ! If she 
 would utter a remark to which his tongue could 
 respond some complaint which marital affection 
 could meet ! 
 
 " Dearest ! be comforted. It is over. I have 
 returned." 
 
 The vague fall of restrained phrases of repent- 
 ance and love suited the fastidious taste, which 
 shrank, above all things, from exaggeration and 
 grimace. But Constantia made no sign. Her 
 face remained set to its own thought a waiting 
 face he sometimes found it, as though aware of 
 the crisis hidden in all culminating events. Striv- 
 ing to shake this significant passivity into a ripple 
 of action by delivering himself of his fact, he would 
 bring it to shape upon the tip of his tongue, but 
 could never carry it further. 
 
 " My dear," it would run in the region of his 
 mind, " I have, entirely for your sake, as a vindi- 
 cation of your hurt feeling, discarded my mistress. 
 If it is possible for us to begin afresh, I have made 
 the way clear." 
 
 The crimson flew to his brow as he turned his 
 sentences. Day by day he came home, resolved 
 within himself to break that evening the hardening 
 389 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 silence which lay between them, and day by day, 
 fidgeting with his paper, while Constantia sat grave 
 and reticent upon his hearth, he found that the 
 opening of his lips was stayed. 
 
 In the world things were perhaps better save 
 that Evan was going. Since that night when 
 Evan had chosen to speak his mind upon affairs 
 that did not concern him, there had been reserve 
 between them. But where fellowship is founded 
 upon deep affection, a misunderstanding, the 
 offence even of blame, only avails to temporarily 
 ruffle its peace. Evan, however, was passing from 
 his guidance into schemes and successes of his 
 own. Norman felt that some of the loneliness 
 which accompanies increasing years was meeting 
 him, and that age would not bring honour, and 
 that hope was ebbing away. 
 
 For the rest, the worry of the Armstrong prop- 
 erty, which had been so detestable a complication 
 in his life, was clearing. Old John Armstrong had 
 been summoned to The Court as confidential 
 adviser, and under his vigorous treatment the air 
 was purged. The Court would probably be put up 
 to auction Edward and Gilbert would certainly 
 be removed from the neighbourhood. So far this 
 was to the good. But the dregs, as of an un- 
 savoury drink, lay in his soul. And he hated to 
 think of the shut averted face of his once innocent 
 adorer, Eliza. The face was growing to be, he 
 sometimes remarked, like the sensitive profile 
 39 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 sketch of a saint in an old picture, and he was 
 pained tha.t it should shrink and close before him, 
 not because he was a vain man, the build of his 
 mind and character was on lines too strong for 
 that, but because such an attitude touched warn- 
 ingly on that portion of his being which warred 
 against the effective finish of his grosser works. 
 On the other hand had been the familiar and 
 odious pretension of Edward. The latter lurked 
 about the place, ready to button-hole him with 
 hints and attempted encroachment. He had 
 wondered how long he should restrain his wrath, 
 how long he should be able to retain the bearing 
 of formal courtesy in which he knew, better than 
 most men, to intermingle the baffling element 
 of contempt. But with the advent of old John, 
 this swarming of the gnats of lesser misery was 
 swept away, and he was left to the greater and 
 more solemn aspect of the tragedy of his own 
 creation. Not that he at present recognised its 
 quality, for it is the part of humanity to act without 
 cognisance of the conditions, and to continually 
 set the hand to a treaty of which it does not know 
 the terms. Constantia alone, in her manifest suf- 
 fering and the intensity of her silence, stood as it 
 were for the wrath of God before him ; otherwise 
 the matter remained for him as a tiresome trivi- 
 ality ; and as time went on, and speech continued 
 to hang before him as an inaccessible steep, only 
 to be attempted by sweating effort, he began to 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 relapse into an attitude of patience, of that patience 
 which draws idle hope to the tail of it. Time, he 
 thought, might even cover the rent with tender 
 mosses ; and above all there were always the 
 children. For example, on this still, cold frosty 
 evening, who, intruding casually into the drawing- 
 room, would dream but that the home was a nest 
 of peace? He was there with Constantia, and 
 Ted was the third presence. As usual, Norman 
 was occupied with the evening papers, but, as a 
 matter of fact, was not reading. Ted sat on a low 
 stool by the hearth, tracing the lines of his book 
 with his ringer, and whispering the words to him- 
 self as he read. Ted was no bookworm, but 
 when it was necessary to be " a quiet boy," this 
 was usually his method. Constantia sat at a work- 
 table, not so far off; the little whisper of the child, 
 engrossed in his story, made a pleasant murmur. 
 Norman's eyes rested now and again on the curly 
 head. Yes : he was glad of the children ; fingers 
 like that weaved up the breaches between parents. 
 " In time," said he to himself, " in time." 
 A servant entered the room and carried a letter 
 to his mistress. Norman returned to his paper, 
 and Constantia opened the envelope. There was 
 a long interval, and then he heard her in an 
 intensely weary but gentle tone bid the child 
 retire. The ways of Ted were always interesting ; 
 Norman glanced over the edge of his paper to see 
 how he would evade the order. The curly head 
 39 2 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 was not lifted, but the finger was arrested on its 
 journey along the line. 
 
 "It isn't time yet," he began. 
 
 " Oh, yes," said the mother. 
 
 " Mother, I 'm so comfy here." 
 
 "Are you, dear? But then you must go to 
 bed." 
 
 "I '11 just do half a page more. The Brownies 
 are not being kind to the little toad. I have to 
 see if it gets off safe." 
 
 "Very well, dear. Just half the page then," 
 said she, gently. 
 
 The whispering began again a little hurriedly 
 this time. Norman returned to his paper. Con- 
 stantia's needle was however still, and presently 
 she spoke again. 
 
 "Ted ! you are going on beyond the half-page." 
 
 " You see, mother, so has the toad too ; it 's 
 gone into the next chapter." 
 
 " But you must go to bed now, dear." 
 
 " Oh, mother ! " 
 
 "Yes, Ted." 
 
 Ted shut the book and got up and sidled to her 
 knee. 
 
 " Shall you come and kiss me when I 'm in 
 bed?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Oh, mummy, I do love you ! What 's in that 
 nice little box? Mayn't I open it? " 
 
 " Only sewing-silk, dear." 
 393 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 "Oh, well! I'd better look. I like the 
 colours." 
 
 " Very well, Ted. Only be a little quick." 
 
 Her cheek was unaccountably white, but the 
 voice that had sheltered him all his life was the 
 same, and he did not notice. He leaned up 
 against her and opened the box, and dropped all 
 the silks on the floor. 
 
 " There, Ted ! You Ve tumbled mother's silks 
 down." 
 
 Norman laughed slily behind his paper. 
 
 " Mummy, I do love you, and I 'm so sorry. I 'm 
 going to pick them all up. Will they be spoiled ? " 
 
 " No, Ted ; oh, no ! " 
 
 He scrambled about under the table, and picked 
 them up and placed them one by one in the box. 
 The operation took time. Constantia put her arm 
 about him and drew him towards her. 
 
 " Don't call me to-night," she whispered. " I 
 promise to come and kiss you when you are asleep. 
 Only don't call me. Do you mind, Ted? " 
 
 The eyes which were searching about over the 
 table for something for the hand to pounce upon, 
 suddenly turned to her face and looked into it. 
 There was that in it which he found unaccountable 
 and new ; the cheek, for example, was pale. He 
 put up his hand with a puzzled look and stroked it. 
 His eyes answered hers. 
 
 " I 'm disappointed," said he, " but of course I 
 don't mind. I won't call." 
 394 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 His arms tightened round her neck in his kiss, 
 and then he said good-night to his father and 
 walked out of the room. Norman had heard the 
 talk, had received the child's kiss, as one hears 
 and feels things in a half-sleeping condition ; there 
 always was a good deal of conversation before Ted 
 could be induced to retire to his room, and just 
 for the moment he was interested in his paper. 
 After a short interval he was roused by his wife's 
 voice calling him by name ; it was months since 
 he had heard her say it in that low tender tone. 
 He dropped his paper and turned round on the 
 sofa in amazement, drawing himself up from his 
 lounging position. 
 
 " Yes," said he, and felt his heart beating. 
 
 She was looking at him with her eyes full of a 
 great pity, and she held a letter in her hand. 
 
 "Something very dreadful has happened," said 
 she ; " this is from Evan." 
 
 He got up and walked quickly forwards and 
 took it from her hand. Not for one moment did 
 he guess the nature of the communication. She 
 covered her face while he read. 
 
 The letter simply told them, in short, rough, ter- 
 ribly clear sentences, the two sides of Rosalie's 
 story, her statements as regards her parentage, 
 her abandonment of her home, and lastly her 
 piteous hints as to herself. 
 
 " You see," ran the latter portion, " that the 
 reason I know is that I was last night on my way 
 395 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 to South Downs. I was near the lodge when I 
 chanced to meet Eliza; we stopped for one mo- 
 ment to speak, when we heard some one come 
 stumbling and running, and Rosalie broke in upon 
 us. She was very ill and stricken. We took her 
 to my lodgings in the village ; Eliza stays ; I have 
 a room elsewhere. Constantia, surely you can 
 help her? Won't you come? Rosalie made Eliza 
 tell me last night, not only the truth concerning 
 her parentage, but that about herself. I know 
 nothing beyond the bare fact. Eliza may know 
 more there is a scare in her eyes but she will 
 not speak. I asked for Rosalie to be my wife, you 
 understand. I was coming for my answer. This 
 was my answer. But she is my wife, she lies too 
 deep in my heart for me to doubt it. I was think- 
 ing and hoping for my marriage ; but I fear she 
 will die. She is stricken. She sends me no mes- 
 sage but this : ' God thank you. But no ! I am 
 broken.' Constantia, come and bring her comfort." 
 Silence deep as death was in the room. But 
 over the soul of Norman the truth broke in thun- 
 ders. What need for speech when circumstance 
 the Accuser uttered its word for him? 
 
 396 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 " I AM the man." 
 
 Norman dispatched his brief note to Evan, and 
 then awaited the event, but it was some time be- 
 fore he realised in what kind his dues would reach 
 him. One's worst deeds, repented of, at least 
 claim to be avenged in noise and colour. But as 
 the days dawned and the days set, each one pre- 
 sented a blank. He heard nothing ; News, that 
 through his life had blown her trumpet close to 
 his ear, turned the other way. Presently, however, 
 straws, birds of the air, the lips of a child carried 
 him something. 
 
 " Mother, Lady Susanna gave a children's party 
 last week ; why did n't I go ? " asked Ted. 
 
 " Why do not people call? " asked Connie, home 
 for a half-term holiday, when the reception day 
 passed unmarked. 
 
 The eyes of the husband and wife avoided each 
 other, but thoughts pierced either heart. 
 
 Then he found that the first-class carriage in 
 
 which he travelled to town was deserted; they 
 
 were men of the world who thus left him alone, 
 
 and, as a man of the world, he opined that it was 
 
 397 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 not so much that they had no palliation or excuse 
 to offer, as that something in the mode with which 
 the thing was rumoured to have been managed, 
 struck them as awry, and that they fought shy in 
 their busy days of mixing themselves up with so 
 complicated a bit of gossip. The situation was 
 not unmingled by drops of galHng humour ; one 
 day Mr. Woodruff, the rector, stepping into a 
 waiting-room in which he happened to stand 
 alone, retreated hastily and obviously ; on a near 
 occasion Mr. Woodruff's curate, a small man with 
 pale eyes and faint whiskers, took the opportun- 
 ity of very sincerely posing as " the minister of 
 Christ," and approached him as he stood isolated 
 on the platform to ostentatiously offer his hand. 
 It is bitter when the Church avoids the sinner ; it 
 is also bitter when it too publicly protects him. 
 
 This was, however, the lesser part of the cup 
 of humiliation, and for Constantia's sake Norman 
 held his head erect as he drank it. The dregs 
 lay in Evan's silence. He was slow to realise 
 the strong and simple abstention ; it was the fall 
 of the general silence that first discovered to him 
 how Circumstance dropped him from the calcu- 
 lation, how he, the heart and soul of the disas- 
 trous business, was plucked out of it and thrown 
 aside. These matters were his own, but while 
 strangers handled them, no one carried a hint his 
 way. Could he but learn a word of Evan ! Day 
 by day, entering his office, he threw a longing 
 398 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 glance at his clerks, knowing them the reposito- 
 ries of information hidden from himself; but his 
 entrance was the signal to bend over work in a 
 frenzy of occupation, and by the present flight of 
 pens he could but surmise the babble of irrever- 
 ent talk they dispersed. One day the days 
 dragged on, though time itself seemed at a stand- 
 still the head clerk came into his private room 
 and closed the door behind him ; his nervous 
 manner proclaimed that at least tidings were 
 being carried. Norman raised his eyes to the 
 level of his neck-cloth, and the clerk plunged. 
 
 "Your application for shares, sir, in the Suez 
 expedition is disallowed." 
 
 "Is the list closed?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "Who took up the last shares?" 
 
 " Lord Warrenne." 
 
 "You can go." 
 
 He covered his face with his hands, Lord 
 Warrenne had drawn his hat over his eyes when 
 their carriages had accidentally met on the com- 
 mon. But the recollection of that was not the cut 
 of the moment to Norman. It lay in the realisa*- 
 tion of the depth of Evan's silence. Undoubt- 
 edly the young engineer's influence had debarred 
 him from even the ordinary shareholder's oppor- 
 tunity ; in the silence with which he had met the 
 confession he intended to sail from England, and 
 in that silence he would continue through life. 
 399 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 Norman kept his hands over his face; his very 
 soul sighed and sighed. One measures depth by 
 stillness. There are hurts between friends that 
 bring storms and thunder-claps of words ; it seems 
 a wrecking affair; but presently the atmosphere 
 opens and the friendship has weathered it; the 
 vessels sail on clearer seas and signal shining 
 lights of constancy one to another. But silence 
 after a hurt shows that the bottom is knocked out, 
 and that friendship has floundered with its freight. 
 Norman knew it was for life. 
 
 But in other ways news would surely reach him? 
 Rosalie, for example. He had no tenderness over 
 her in his heart even now, but the wounds of con- 
 ventional honour made him writhe. Behind, the 
 days were warm between them, and the world 
 guessed it, and to-day the girl was broken and her 
 situation he could hardly surmise; his debt re- 
 mained unpaid. One evening something did reach 
 him. The head gardener desired particularly to 
 speak with the master; and through a conversa- 
 tion in which a sale-list, seeds, coveted hot-house 
 a^nd garden stock figured as accessories, Norman 
 gathered the supreme information that Mrs. Trel- 
 yon had fled, and that South Downs was up for 
 auction. 
 
 What then of Rosalie ? A creature so accidental, 
 
 so unanchored to family or fortune, must needs be 
 
 in straits. To possess a well-stocked purse, to 
 
 know that commonest honesty pointed to a hand- 
 
 400 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 
 
 some settlement, and to feel in every nerve that 
 the notion was rejected, was cruel as a snake-bite. 
 Before all other things, Norman told himself he 
 was a gentleman. 
 
 Presently slow currents of gossip left again a 
 shred at his door. Rosalie had been removed to 
 more convenient rooms in a house on the common. 
 Eliza Armstrong hung over the place immovable, 
 but no one called or was permitted to enter save 
 Evan and the doctor ; and it was Evan who paid 
 the bills. He knew what that meant ; the slender 
 resources of Evan and Eliza, or possibly Evan alone 
 with borrowed money, nourished the dying Rosalie. 
 The pride of the young engineer had lifted the 
 beloved woman to a citadel of its own, and no 
 siege of Norman's could touch that barred door. 
 
 From this repulsing world Norman had no refuge 
 save his wife. Home was a place swept and gar- 
 nished, his treasure-house was rifled of dream- 
 pictures, but the foot-fall of a woman, her hand, 
 her eyes remained. It was a strange welcome that 
 met him when he returned to it ever new, ever 
 mingling despair with sweetness. The face was 
 changed, the very children saw it. Ted put his 
 finger wonderingly in the hollow of her cheek; 
 Connie smoothed the wrinkle in her brow. 
 "What's up with mother?" wrote Ronald from 
 the sea. They began to mingle care of her with 
 their dependence. But how should they guess 
 that the care of that eldest child of all, the sup- 
 26 401 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 
 
 porting of him under his burden, was the cause of 
 the sapping of her strength. 
 
 One evening Norman read in the paper of the 
 departure of the Suez expedition. To learn it 
 thus was bare to dreadfulness, but Constantia strove 
 to help him with eyes of piteous courage. He 
 could not bear to see her, and rose and left the 
 room and went out into the night, turning into 
 the fir-wood. 
 
 The night was clear and frosty and still ; stars 
 were in the sky, but there was no moon. The 
 wood was a fairy enchanted place raised by the 
 cold breath of the season to evanescent but in- 
 comparable beauty. Norman passed down the 
 broadest of the paths; on either side stood the 
 giant pines, pillars of ebony and silver lifting 
 pale arches overhead. Within this spanning of 
 majestic silence, nature's innocent wild things 
 nestled in winter slumber, a child's song hushed 
 through a solemn service. He reached the gate 
 where Evan had first seen Rosalie ; the road be- 
 yond was lonely as a moor at night, by day but 
 one person within the hour would pass; every- 
 where he found about him the same unbroken 
 stillness. There was a fallen trunk, and he sat 
 down upon it. The sky was deep and clear; 
 Orion shone out above him, and the remote rays 
 of myriad worlds fell towards him in their sub- 
 lime irrelevancy. 
 
 And then he found that he could marshal his 
 402 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 thoughts no more, but the drift of them lodged 
 at a sense of failure in his life, and then that be- 
 came less and less a definite idea and more and 
 more a ghastly feeling. He could not stir be- 
 cause of it, but sat on the fallen trunk and gazed 
 at the frosted pines and the stars that shone be- 
 tween and above ; then even this misery dwindled, 
 and he saw it as a thing in flight, within his mind, 
 vanishing, the back parts towards him, over the 
 far edges. That too had left him alone. 
 
 He was left alone in a world that was nothing 
 but a vast empty plain in which he, solitary, 
 walked, while the deed which he had done lay in 
 his hand as a book does, and he read in it. The 
 leaves of the book turned over of themselves as he 
 went, and each one held a thought. The thoughts 
 were not written in the language that he knew ; 
 they were not thoughts that went in words, they 
 sank as influences to the heart of hearts. He read 
 in the book for an hour of the night amid the 
 frosty stillness, his head bent, his eyes half closed. 
 He had forgotten every other part of his existence. 
 At last the book opened on a page where there 
 were letters, and the letters had a voice ; he did 
 not know whether the voice was outside him as 
 a thunder-clap, or whether it was a whisper from 
 within. He had been long alone on the world of 
 the plain and had travelled far, though but an 
 hour of mortal time had passed. The edge of the 
 plain was a place of clouds, of desperation and 
 403 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 hair-breadth escapes. The plain was called Earth 
 by men, and as he neared it and stumbled head- 
 long over the brink of it, the book of the fact 
 vanished, and the words of the voice were smitten 
 out of his mind. 
 
 He started to his feet and found that he was 
 alone, and that silence still enfolded him. And 
 then that which he had heard and seen in his deep 
 spiritual dream rolled back clearly upon him, 
 bringing at last to the ears of his mind news of 
 himself, and as one who is overwhelmed by a sud- 
 den and awful thing heard for the first time, he 
 gave a terrific cry ; it rang through the frost- 
 becalmed place and returned through the frosted 
 colonnades in a trembling of remorseless echoes. 
 And upon that a gentle eerie sound of fallen 
 snow. 
 
 404 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 EPILOGUE. 
 ELIZA'S DIARY, 1888. 
 
 " FROM all I have watched and learned two 
 lessons I have taken acutely to my heart. The 
 first is the inadequacy of any theory of religious 
 or philosophical consolation to touch the agonies 
 of life or to explain them ; the second is the 
 almost magic power of patient will so to play 
 upon the face of circumstance as to modify it, 
 until even disaster becomes under its mastering 
 touch something that is not disaster. 
 
 " Of that event and it changed life for all of 
 us I find the lasting pathos to lie in the unwel- 
 come child. I have watched it grow for over ten 
 years now; Evan bade me care for it should it 
 live when it was born. Rosalie never spoke of it, 
 and she passed away the day after its birth. It 
 was when she died that I knew how merciful 
 death could be. The child is a puny, melancholy 
 thing, of a timid, reticent nature, with a type of 
 face carrying a surprisingly small impress of beauty 
 and none of breed, but it is lovable because cling- 
 ing, gentle, and serviceable. Irene helps me in 
 the care of it. 
 
 405 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 " When winter comes back as now and 
 brings snow with it, it brings also to me the mem- 
 ory of Rosalie. The clearest recollection of her 
 face is on that dread evening when she burst upon 
 Evan and me standing together in the snow- 
 covered road close to South Downs. He had told 
 me where he was going ; I guessed the rest, and 
 had heart to wish him well. And then came that 
 strange weak failing step and Rosalie's face in be- 
 tween us. To the last I remained by her side. 
 Evan trusted me. How the memory of his face in 
 those last weeks obliterates the memory of the 
 face I knew before ! Every day he used to call ; 
 he would speak very little, and that is perhaps why 
 his lightest word seems written on my heart. Be- 
 tween the two suffering creatures I stood as sole 
 medium Rosalie dying with shut lips and her 
 face to the wall, and Evan brief, stern, thinking of 
 every possible want and speaking of her always to 
 the doctor as his "future wife." But intercourse 
 between them there was none ; he came to rec- 
 ognise that it was vain to hope or ask for it ; the 
 utmost was a message sent through me. One 
 day there was something; he seemed to know it 
 by my face, and that I shrank from my errand. 
 
 ft ' Don't try and spare me, Eliza,' said he ; ' it 
 does n't matter ; I can't feel any more.' 
 
 "And then I had to repeat her words 'Tell 
 him when he comes that it was my own fault ; say 
 that I was to blame, that I was the aggressor.' 
 406 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 " Rosalie never explained further ; she said those 
 words and left us to find the meaning. She and 
 I had no great talks. She died undefeated, carry- 
 ing her own burden, accepting it. Evan and I 
 understood that she spoke those words and we 
 believed them to be in a sense true as the 
 single reparation she could offer for her share in 
 the deed which had wrought such havoc. That 
 was my thought : I am sure that it was also Evan's. 
 I remember how he took the message. He said 
 nothing, but walked from me turning his back. 
 Presently he approached again, and I do not for- 
 get the face he carried. Heaven send that such 
 a look may never lie there again ! 
 
 " ' Yes,' he said, ' yes ! An ignorant girl and an 
 experienced man ! It is as though a child had 
 run to one and claimed protection, or a country 
 lad trusted one with his purse. Do not think of 
 it but in that way, Eliza ! ' 
 
 " I said ' Be sure of this, Evan that I love 
 Rosalie.' 
 
 " He seemed comforted for a moment ; it was 
 little, but it was all I could do. 
 
 " Meanwhile he worked with all-devouring en- 
 ergy at the Suez scheme. Between the intervals 
 of his visits he spent his time in preparation. Oc- 
 casionally he absented himself on a flying journey 
 to some one of the provincial towns where his 
 machines were in process of making, to superin- 
 tend the construction of some particular part, or 
 407 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 to be present at a final trial. In getting to- 
 gether the workmen he made it his own business 
 to interview and select them ; he showed himself 
 thorough to the smallest point. He sought the 
 advice and criticism of every expert engineer he 
 could meet with ; and I afterwards heard that his 
 industry and tact had won him honour from both 
 the Colonial and Foreign Offices. I knew that 
 Evan would allow no personal grief to mar the 
 task which he had set himself in life, but I mar- 
 velled at the heart he put into it now, and the 
 strength he found within himself to do it. 
 
 " I came to understand in the end. The ex- 
 pedition sailed weeks before Rosalie's death. He 
 made all possible arrangements for her and left 
 me to carry them out ; before he sailed she had 
 become too ill to know whether he stayed or went. 
 Of his advice to her she was unconscious. One 
 day he said briefly to me < When she is asleep, 
 Eliza.' We had to speak so little. And I watched 
 my opportunity and beckoned him in. He stepped 
 very softly and stood at the bottom of the bed and 
 watched the face on the pillow. The moments 
 seemed scarely to breathe. He stood there very 
 still and very long. I watched his face ; there 
 was a chill in his brow newly come there which 
 did not alter, but for the rest there was a clearing 
 as though with the strength of some intense reso- 
 lution, as though he were swearing faith fast and 
 deep to something known between them and only 
 408 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 so known, and of which he would never in his 
 life let go. There was no quiver in his face, the 
 tenderness of it was not of the kind that runs to 
 emotion ; when it was time to go he breathed one 
 deep sigh and turned to go. And all the while 
 the face on the pillow had lain unconscious of 
 what had hung over it. Me he had forgotten ; I 
 never said good-bye to Evan. And since that I 
 have not seen him. 
 
 " But I think of fate as having been very merci- 
 ful to me, for I stand on the same planet with 
 him and he writes. Africa remains his field of 
 work, and now it is the south. Long since I ceased 
 to open his letters with hope of hearing of his 
 return nothing of that sort comes. But I have 
 his friendship ; the letters, with the remittances 
 for the child, reach me regularly ; I know what 
 his work is, and the place where he is working. 
 Gradually I find that the deep stern melancholy 
 is dropping out of his letters, they are filled with 
 the zest of work and active living. Sometimes I 
 wonder if he means me to carry news of him to 
 Constantia ; but from the night that Rosalie was 
 struck down no mention of the Manor House has 
 escaped his lips or pen. 
 
 " The Manor House ! That is another life-long 
 problem. Sometimes I think one thing, some- 
 times another; but all my pondering does not 
 bring me beyond summing up in the end with : 
 'So it happened,' and no more. Then I ask 
 409 
 
Life the Accuser. 
 
 myself what claim have we to understand the 
 working of our own hands? Neither our goodness 
 nor our wickedness seems quite to belong to us. 
 The very faithfulness and sincerity of true men 
 and women have this additional strain, they 
 have to be true in face of an average mediocrity 
 which takes their faithfulness and sincerity for 
 smallness or duplicity. 
 
 " At times I wish that fate could have removed 
 me and the child from the near proximity of Con- 
 stantia; but when Gilbert went to Canada, and 
 Sylvia was married, and old cousin John had 
 found Edward a situation as agent for Moonshine 
 Soap, it seemed natural for mother and me to take 
 the little house by the church, and not far from 
 Irene. Constantia calls sometimes and sees the 
 child ; she is changed, but bears a noble serenity. 
 I would hide the child from her, but that she does 
 not allow. Where sorrow has been so deep, I 
 think the details of it cause no suffering. Gossip, 
 too, is forgetting how clearly once it guessed the 
 truth, and the one person who never betrays by 
 glance or word that he knows the child's paternity 
 is Norman. 
 
 " More than ten years of time have passed since I 
 saw Evan ! And yet I am waiting for a sight of 
 his face. So long as he lives at least the world is 
 homelike ; it is my home because of him, and 
 were he dead my feeling of home would be beyond. 
 Shall I see him? Will he ever come back? A 
 410 
 
Cold Winter. 
 
 night or two ago I had a dream ; it was nothing 
 to chronicle save that Evan was at the end of 
 it. I had walked a long time in a dim place of 
 changing scenes, when suddenly I found myself 
 at the top of a great staircase ; and Evan was be- 
 low me hastening up it. At first I could only see 
 his bowed head, but he raised it, and then the 
 face was clear to my eyes as though sunshine fell 
 upon it. And he smiled." 
 
 THE END. 
 
 411 
 
JRecent fiction 
 
 PUBLISHED BY EDWARD ARNOLD 
 
 7O FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 
 ? 
 
 ACROSS AN ULSTER BOG 
 
 BY M. HAMILTON 
 
 Author of " A Self -Denying Ordinance " 
 
 I2mo, cloth, gilt top, $1.00 
 
 Mr. Hamilton, in " Across an Ulster Bog," gives us one of the 
 stories of Irish life truest to nature of the many we have read 'of 
 late years. . . . The narrative never drags ; we are carried on irre- 
 sistibly from opening to finish. The Nation. 
 
 The author writes with a studious knowledge of people and 
 surroundings ; and the peculiarly local coloring in sceneries, traits, 
 and conversations, as well as the pathos of description, render the 
 story one of unquestionable interest. Boston Courier. 
 
 M. Hamilton has already written one Irish story of some prom- 
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 of work, far in advance of the first. Argonaut. 
 
 One of the strangest and saddest little stories I have read in 
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GEORGE'S MOTHER 
 
 BY 
 
 STEPHEN CRANE 
 Large i6mo, 192 pages, cloth, 75 cents 
 
 The book is strong and sure to attract attention. The Book Buyer. 
 
 Mr. Crane sets forth the various phases of the tragedy in clear, 
 correct, and pathetic fashion. His personal familiarity with the life he 
 describes can scarcely be intimate. The surface of this, the general 
 outlines, he must have learned with his own eyes; but the minor things, 
 the really impressive touches he gives in the story, we fancy were 
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 himself. New York Times. 
 
 "George's Mother," by Stephen Crane, is almost as wonderful a 
 book in its way as 'The Red Badge of Courage." Bookseller. 
 
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 didacticism. He does not pose as a philosopher, or a moralist, or a 
 social reformer. He respects his own genius too thoroughly to covet 
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 BY 
 
 F. F. MONTRESOR 
 
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 To my mind Miss Montre*sor's " Worth While" is the best 
 short story written by a woman. . . . Every page breathes the 
 gentle womanliness of sacrifice and love. . . . No fiction has come 
 to my desk this summer which I can so heartily recommend. 
 Vance Thompson, in Commercial Advertiser. 
 
 These two stories prove that Miss Montresor is one of the most 
 promising of the young novelists. San Francisco Chronicle. 
 
 In "Worth While" Miss Montresor has given ^ literature. 
 The writer has caught the very spirit, the essence of life and love. 
 All that is dramatic, all that is pathetic, all that is deeply and un- 
 avoidably tragic in reality, she has crowded into the two short 
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 With what temperance, what utter absence of pose ! It is just here 
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THE NEW VIRTUE 
 
 BY 
 
 MRS. OSCAR BERRINGER 
 
 i2mo, cloth, $1.00 
 
 A striking story and well written. Rochester Democrat. 
 
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decent fiction 
 
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 HADJIRA: A Turkish Love Story 
 
 By ADALET" 
 Cloth, large izmo, $1.50 
 
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 AND OTHER STORIES 
 
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