3 182;? 01391 8644 
 
 
 
 N
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 CALIFORNIA 
 SAN DIEGO
 
 3 1822 01391 8644 
 
 
 + 
 
 1103
 
 -
 
 THE 
 YELLOW VAN
 
 THE 
 YELLOW VAN 
 
 BY 
 
 RICHARD WHITEING 
 
 Author of "No. 5 John Street" 
 and "The Island" 
 
 PUBLISHED BY THE CENTURY CO. 
 NEW YORK : 1903
 
 Copyright, 1902, 1903, by 
 THE CENTUBY Co. 
 
 Published, October, 1903 
 
 THE DEVINNE PRESS.
 
 THE YELLOW VAN
 
 THE YELLOW VAN 
 
 there ever such a match! A 
 great English nobleman, the Duke 
 of Allonby, and a mere American 
 ' ' school-marm ' ' from a rising com- 
 munity out West where they got 
 the fashions a month late. She 
 was beautiful, if you like, with 
 a mingled pride and tenderness in her face worthy 
 of the Madonna with the bambino; tall and with a 
 presence, too; educated, and withal of a true no- 
 bility of soul, and even of manners, that left nothing 
 to be desired. But a school-marm going to England 
 to be a duchess ! Yet there it was. 
 
 It had come about in the most natural way in the 
 world. He was looking about incognito for a ranch 
 on the Pacific slope; her uncle, a man of substance, 
 was the local real-estate agent, and so they met. The 
 alias of his mere family name, as distinct from the 
 title, kept him secure against impertinent curiosity, 
 and he was little more to them than a Mr. Nobody; 
 but he had an air of distinction, and he paid his
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 way, and that was enough. He stayed at her 
 uncle's house as what he called a "lodger" and 
 they a boarder. The two young people were thrown 
 together in romantic associations, and in that sole 
 circumstance you are well on your way to the 
 core of the mystery. For the rising township was 
 still backed by the deep forest, of which it was but 
 recently a clearing. And here in the heart of it 
 was a being with the virtues of the woods and the 
 toilets of civilization. 
 
 Her charm was subtly compounded. She was 
 cultivated and yet a wayside flower, a happy union 
 of opposites. She had taken a good degree at her 
 university, and was of much miscellaneous reading; 
 yet she lived and thought as simply as Lodge's 
 Rosalynde in the wild. She could talk the duke 
 down on any subject, because her intent seemed 
 only to be to talk herself up to the highest reaches. 
 There was something fascinating in the way in 
 which she leaned in the porch, at eventide, and 
 looked wistfully toward a wide, wide world which 
 she had almost made up her mind she was never 
 to see save through the medium of the monthly 
 magazines. She had charmed him not more by her 
 beauty and grace than by her character. 
 
 Hers was that high-bred assurance of self of 
 those who have never known the shock of a cross 
 word, and who are as free from a sense of bonds 
 as any creature of philosophic anarchy. This na- 
 turally made short work of one whose whole life 
 had been a surfeit of deference. She was his in-
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 tellectual superior, and she met him on that foot- 
 ing of social equality on which, by the somewhat 
 feeble tenure of a pious opinion, he held the hope 
 of one day meeting his fellow-creatures in heaven. 
 He had made her acquaintance at a time when his 
 head was still smarting from the impact of two 
 able-bodied young women of family, thrown at it 
 in a single season by as many unnatural mamas, 
 to say nothing of an orphaned third who had 
 achieved the same operation by a sort of double 
 somersault, of great initial velocity, on her own 
 account. He was eager to be loved for himself 
 alone. And, even beyond that, he wanted some- 
 thing not himself; and here it was in this most ex- 
 quisite being who was all faith, hope, energy, en- 
 thusiasm, and who seemed only to live to shape her- 
 self and others to the finest ends. 
 
 On the other hand, he was well to look at, in a 
 quiet, non-obtrusive, manly way, and his manners 
 were almost as good as her own, though just a 
 trifle tainted by the arrogance of his birth-mark 
 and of his training at Eton. He was one of those 
 rare creatures the gentlemen of nature, which is 
 as much as to say one who has the Christian, or 
 for that matter the pagan, virtues in a social setting, 
 and especially the unwillingness to give or to take 
 offense. Above all, in spite of the magnificence 
 which was as yet his own secret, he sought the har- 
 vest of the quiet eye, the quiet mind, and had a 
 lively horror of pribble-prabble and all pretense. 
 
 There are noblemen of that stamp, good fellows
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 who never feel so uneasy as when they are in their 
 robes, and whose evening pipe after the most im- 
 posing function is a sort of burnt-offering of re- 
 pentance for much foolishness suffered and some 
 done noblemen who go through life longing, and 
 too often in vain, to find a fellow-Christian who 
 will call them by a Christian name, and who have 
 come into miraculous possession of the great truth 
 that Charlemagne slept but little better for his 
 hundred and twenty watchmen with flaming 
 torches and naked swords. They are tired of their 
 state. Oh, how tired they are! One such, as we 
 know, actually fled from it in perpetuity, to serve 
 in a merchantman, by preference, we believe, in 
 the stoke-hole, for the benefit of the greater privacy, 
 and had the extreme good luck to die in mid- 
 ocean, where they had to bury him in the absolute 
 seclusion of fifty times fathom five. 
 
 It is evident that in such a situation the duke was 
 at the mercy of the following accidents: a summer 
 evening on a veranda, where the inwardness of 
 things was a sort of message printed in glowing 
 colors over all the sky, a more subtle blend of light 
 and shadow in a fine face, an eye drooping liquid 
 glories like the orb itself, a pretty evening gown 
 of white, just speckled with floral ornament, a 
 shapely foot peeping therefrom, folded hands, and 
 a sigh. And, one day, they all came together, the 
 sigh with the rest. It was a sigh at the right time, 
 no doubt, but it was not an effect of art. A sort of 
 acquired distaste for flirtation had kept her in ig- 
 
 6
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 norance of that terrible law of the Amazons that no 
 girl should marry until she had killed a man. She 
 simply pitied herself, for the moment, under a sense 
 of the limitations of her lot. 
 
 Then he sighed on his own account ; and, with that 
 same self-consciousness, not unpleasing, on her part, 
 and embarrassment as well. 
 
 In states of this description, when they are of hope- 
 ful tendency, the mood of one soon becomes the 
 mood of both. There is not a more infectious com- 
 plaint. It was so in this instance. He caught the 
 embarrassment as quickly as he had caught the 
 sigh. 
 
 There was silence for a while. 
 
 "It is so wretched to have to say good-by," he 
 said at length. "Yet I must soon go; I have had 
 letters from home." 
 
 "At least you are going back to the world." 
 
 "Hardly: the world is here." 
 
 "As a pious opinion in transcendentalism," she 
 laughed. "I heartily agree but " 
 
 "What more would even you have?" 
 
 "Well, perhaps one might wish to import the isles 
 of Greece and all the rest of it, since they are to be 
 had in no other way. ' ' 
 
 "Believe me, you have their best as it is their 
 beauty of life particularly." 
 
 "Oh!" 
 
 "Yes just in a woman going and coming look- 
 ing after her Hoys and girls in the school-house, and 
 setting them endless examples of manliness and
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 womanliness ministering to her quaint old uncle 
 and the little household when she comes home." 
 
 It was not easy to mistake his meaning now, and 
 she grew troubled, mainly with the wish to hide the 
 signs of it. 
 
 "There may still be something wanting," she 
 said, with a rather piteous smile. 
 
 "What, I wonder?" 
 
 ' ' The larger life. You should know, for you have 
 told me of it men and cities, Provence and Avignon, 
 Florence, the world! the world!" 
 
 "Not one thing assuredly, and that the chief." 
 
 There was silence once more, but it was as the 
 silence in heaven for both. 
 
 She turned toward the house. 
 
 He detained her; and, in the desperation of the 
 moment, he said his word, timidly at first, but with 
 all the needful fire and energy as he drew courage 
 from her rising color and even from her downcast 
 eyes. And, since it was to be so, he presently heard 
 the one precious word he wanted in return, but no 
 more. 
 
 Yet she felt that her duty was not entirely to 
 herself. So it was still a conditional promise, with 
 more than one clause the full consent of the se- 
 nior who had for many years been father and 
 mother to the orphaned girl; the suitor's own fixity 
 of resolve, to be tested by his temporary return 
 to his own country, with all the risks it might bring 
 forth; and withal some natural terror of the great 
 venture of marriage in a strange land. This, in- 
 
 8
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 deed, still left her brother, a young man just leav- 
 ing college, out of the reckoning; but she knew 
 that any wish of hers would be his law. 
 
 The duke was obliged to be content with this. He 
 had more speedy success than he expected with the 
 old man. As a dealer in real estate Mr. James 
 Gooding was particularly accessible to the tempta- 
 tion of satisfactory reference. The duke, as "Mr. 
 Harfoot," was easily able to put him in communi- 
 cation with bankers and others, who, without re- 
 vealing more than was necessary, fully confirmed 
 their client's assertion of independent means, and 
 gave the inquirer complete satisfaction on every ma- 
 terial point. 
 
 Then he went away to his own side of the world, 
 to write to her every day, to chuckle over her letters 
 in reply, with her sweet little motherly cautions to 
 him against overboldness in the attempt to make 
 their common fortune letters with promises to 
 wait till he was quite ready, and assurances that 
 they were already married in her heart. Yet, be- 
 ing characteristically American, she still talked of 
 fortune as one of his goals in life. It was not that 
 she coveted the riches, but only that she feared to 
 depress him by seeming to question his power to 
 acquire them. To have doubted a man's prowess 
 for such an achievement in this age would have 
 been like doubting his power to make short work 
 of a giant in the days of chivalry. 
 
 And when the correspondence had yielded its 
 full delight, he crossed the ocean again, to reveal
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 himself as one of the greatest nobles in the world, 
 to lay at her feet a fortune that matched his title, 
 to beat down every objection in his new-found joy 
 in feeling that he was loved for himself alone, and 
 finally to marry and bring her back to his ancestral 
 home. 
 
 Do not be too hard on him or on his chronicler. 
 Such things may happen, do happen, or they would 
 never form the staple of fairy-tale, which perhaps, 
 in its essence, is but the realized highest possible 
 of our human lot. 
 
 10
 
 II 
 
 H, what a night of vigil it was for 
 her when her lover had told her 
 his news and suffered her to es- 
 cape from his embrace! Her little 
 bedchamber seemed all alight in the 
 darkness, and every single object 
 in it to be burning itself into her consciousness 
 in outlines of fire. All the livelong night the brain 
 throbbed, taking its time from the heart. The 
 shock of surprise was too great, almost too cruel 
 to-day a little nobody, to-morrow to stand before 
 kings! The mere rank, in and for itself, was the 
 smallest allurement of the prospect; the greatest 
 was the realization of more generous ideals. She 
 who had scarcely moved beyond her own modest 
 circumscription in all her life, save for a State 
 fair in the local capital or a flying visit to New 
 York, was now to see the via sacra of European 
 travel, with a monument or a memento at every 
 step. And she was to see it in total freedom from 
 the sordid considerations of ways and means. 
 
 Ever, when the girl had tried to visit these ro- 
 mantic scenes in fancy, with the help of her little 
 picture-gallery of foreign post-cards and her "Pic- 
 turesque Europe," she had been all too surely held 
 back by the fear that their boarding-house rates 
 
 1 1
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 might not fit in with her scheme of enchantment. 
 What a thing for her to be able to put away for- 
 ever such humiliating cares, and to be free for the 
 true business of living nature, art, and poesy, and 
 the commerce of great souls! For she was unso- 
 phisticated enough to think that the first families 
 of the British peerage necessarily kept the best 
 spiritual society of their time. 
 
 Add to this her greater joy in the contemplation 
 of those families as shapers of human lots. Her 
 heart beat faster than ever at the thought of the 
 good she would do as the chieftainess of an historic 
 house, and of the obliging nature of the lesser 
 people about her who would kindly suffer it to be 
 done. It was rather hard to play that bountiful 
 part in America, with a whole democracy wanting 
 nothing of its neighbor but his power to want no- 
 thing of anybody else. A great English commu- 
 nity, with its culture and refinement in the upper 
 ranks, its ordered degrees of dependence in the 
 lower, and its supposed equality of happiness in 
 all, would satisfy the deepest need of her woman's 
 nature in giving her a comforting and protecting 
 part. 
 
 Her blood coursed through her veins, in the very 
 ecstasy of being, at the prospect. But, a moment 
 after, it became sluggish in the cold fit of the dread 
 of her unfitness for the position, and of the tor- 
 tures she might have to bear in the persecution of 
 grand dames resenting her intrusion into their set. 
 She saw herself made to look a fool in her own 
 
 12
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 drawing-room by vindictive rivals who had once 
 hoped to sit in her seat, all forlorn with her want 
 of pedigree, her country manners, and, where these 
 failed to barb the dart, with the "twang" which was 
 hers inalienably, for better or for worse, as much 
 as her beautiful complexion. These white nights on 
 the eve of new ventures in being who that has ever 
 aspired has not known them? And since we live 
 rather by the count of sensations than by the count 
 of time, to have watched through one of them is to 
 have lengthened the allotted span by a count of 
 years. 
 
 She spoke her fears to him next morning: only 
 to be told, of course, that her voice was music ; that, 
 for her pedigree, she would be his wife; and that, 
 for the trick of manners and customs as distinct 
 from the root of the matter which she had in her 
 own fine nature, she would be placed under the sure 
 guidance of a dowager of his own choice. With 
 all this to comfort and to strengthen her, being 
 human, she was still a little wild in her course. She 
 borrowed "Lives of Eminent Women" from the 
 nearest public library, and was mentally marked as a 
 backslider by the gray-headed librarian by reason of 
 her inquiries for recent British fiction dealing with 
 the manners of the great. Her repentance, however, 
 was both rapid and effectual. Before a week had 
 passed she had returned to her allegiance to classic 
 authors, and had registered a vow from which she 
 never afterward departed to take herself, as finally 
 she gave him leave to take her, for better or for worse. 
 
 '3
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 But what a stir in the papers when it was known ! 
 That day was her last of perfect privacy on this 
 earth. Its morrow saw her in the forefront of the 
 publicity of two continents of one continent es- 
 pecially. Uncle Gooding, with the duke's leave, 
 whispered it to the editor of the local paper. The 
 editor, who was in touch with a great news agency, 
 blazed it forth to the AVestern Hemisphere. The 
 Western passed it on to the Eastern that same night, 
 through three thousand miles of sea. Weary for- 
 eign editors looked up his Grace's pedigree in the 
 "Peerage," and his speeches in the House of Lords, 
 as materials for a sketch of his career. Smart writ- 
 ers of leaderettes compared him to King Cophetua, 
 and wrote homilies on the American invasion. 
 And next morning it was on its way to every 
 capital, to every club, to every hamlet and house- 
 hold of the planet, south of that ultimate settlement 
 of civilized man at Hammerfest, beyond which lie 
 sheer barbarism and the arctic night. Such is the 
 circulation of a paragraph when it is a paragraph 
 of the right sort. 
 
 The evening of the second day brought down 
 swarms of reporters, and the poor girl had to sub- 
 mit to the process known technically as "writing 
 up." In a few hours more she was able to read her 
 own history from birth with the interest of one 
 who has met a stranger for the first time. She was, 
 so to speak, introduced to herself. It was not that 
 the particulars were inaccurate: she had wisely 
 guarded against that by a meek submission to the 
 
 14
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 inevitable of public interrogatory, and her friends 
 of course had given of their best. It was only that 
 she had never realized herself before, or learned 
 how the small beer of personal chronicle may still, 
 by judicious treatment, become the strong brew of 
 biographical record. The recorders threw her mod- 
 est little career into perspective, and made it all 
 seem to belong to one great composition. It is at 
 least quite as startling to find that you have all 
 your life been making biography as that you have 
 all your life been talking prose. With the old pri- 
 vacy of her lot went, inevitably, some of the old 
 simplicity. She was never to be wholly unaware of 
 herself again. Now she felt, for the first time, that 
 when she rebuked the big boy for rudeness in class 
 she had a queenly glance. And her weekly ramble 
 with the children in the summer woods was a joint 
 effect of a love of nature, proficiency in botanic 
 science, and goodness of heart. Her affection for 
 her uncle was, in the same way, filial piety thwarted 
 by circumstance, yet still determined not to be 
 balked of an object. She blushed for herself in 
 distracting alternations of the one belief that she 
 was a bit of an angel, and of the other that she 
 was only a bit of a prig. Terrible moment of the 
 full consciousness of intelligent public curiosity 
 when the old partnership of the soul is enlarged, 
 and it is no longer yourself and your Maker, but 
 also an "& Co." of the man over, the way! 
 "Blessed indeed are those ears which listen not 
 after the voice which is sounding without." Never 
 
 '5
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 again! But A Kempis never underwent the ordeal 
 of a Sunday edition. 
 
 For the ceremony itself, however, they dodged 
 the common informer with great success. 'It was 
 given out that the local church might be the 
 scene of it, and lo ! they fled by night to an edifice 
 a hundred miles away, with none but their wit- 
 nesses and Augusta Gooding's pastor to bear them 
 company, and were united only less quietly than 
 the primal pair. It was the most successful evasion 
 on record. Several reporters were discharged. 
 
 Their honeymoon was slightly ridiculous and 
 wholly delightful. They made straight for the 
 Mediterranean, and saw the sights like a pair of 
 happy children on a holiday. The duke, who had 
 at first scoffed at the absurdity of such a pilgrim- 
 age, finally made it the object of an almost reverent 
 interest. He had run through these scenes a dozen 
 times, but never to give them the slightest atten- 
 tion as matters of intellectual concern. He thought 
 he had tired of them in that character, while really 
 he had never heeded them at all. And now here he 
 was in Naples, Kome, Florence, or what not, "do- 
 ing" famous galleries, monuments, views, and 
 broadening his mind amazingly in the process. It 
 was the most profitable change from clubs for golf 
 or pigeon-shooting, and from other transplanted 
 institutions wherein it was still England, England 
 everywhere, in spite of foreign skies. 
 
 Now, finally, they are coming home to Allonby 
 Towers, to open that season in the country which 
 
 16
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 is about all we have left to distinguish the major 
 from the minor great. The former come up to town 
 for a lesson in humility, for they find their best and 
 biggest still lost in the crowd. In the country, with 
 the stately setting of their own places, they loom 
 large on the public gaze. No man may hope to rank 
 even as a good second in our modern Rome. 
 
 They are to make their formal entry in a few 
 days, to show themselves to their humbler neigh- 
 bors, and to entertain friends. Uncle Gooding had 
 been asked to join the house-party, but he had de- 
 clined by letter, on the ground of an unfortunate 
 reminiscence. On his first and only visit to Eng- 
 land, it seemed, he had been put up by another 
 nobleman, for whom he was negotiating the pur- 
 chase of a ranch. In default of a personal atten- 
 dant, he was valeted by a servant of the house 
 "a fellow," as he wrote in confidence to his niece, 
 "who sneaked about my room on tiptoe before I 
 got up, hiding all my things." The statement 
 really meant no more than that the man was merely 
 reducing his apparel to order from the confusion 
 of the gas-brackets and angles of picture-frames 
 on which it had been thrown the night before. It 
 was enough, however, to prejudice Mr. Gooding 
 against distinguished hospitality for the rest of his 
 life.
 
 Ill 
 
 LLONBY, with its countryside, of 
 course, was in a ferment in its 
 own way like a vat in the brew- 
 house with its excitement still 
 mostly confined to the depths. 
 The smaller folk were hardly less 
 exercised in their minds about the newcomer than 
 their betters. If one set asked, "What kind of 
 leader of society?" the other was no less concerned 
 in the question, "What kind of almsgiver?" The 
 village of Slocum Parva was the center of these 
 meaner anxieties just because it was the most in- 
 significant speck in the ducal landscape. One could 
 say no more of it, as one took in the view from 
 the Towers, than that it was there somewhere, amid 
 the dim confusion of green and red in the hollows 
 below. Slocum Parva was rarely disturbed by any 
 event from without, but when it was it vibrated 
 to the core of its being. It was different at Slocum 
 Magna, about a mile higher up the road. Occur- 
 rences that might fairly be classed as strange had 
 not been unknown there, even in that purely mod- 
 ern period embraced in historical disquisitions 
 which have their starting-point with the sixteenth 
 century. At Slocum Parva the very mill had long 
 
 18
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ceased work, and it was left standing only because 
 it was not worth the expense of pulling down. The 
 village was self-contained, self-dependent, and it 
 would have satisfied the exacting conditions of re- 
 pose of Korea. It had hitherto been only a frag- 
 ment of Slocum Magna, and, seen by the bird's eye, 
 it was but a bit of dark red in an undulating land- 
 scape, still rich in all but the absolute perfection of 
 verdant beauty, even in this August time. 
 
 This truly celestial scene stretched right up to 
 the castle, which crowned a height of the sky-line, 
 and which, even from Slocum Parva, could be seen 
 flinging its immense ducal banner to the breeze. 
 Here and there, by virtue of the residential color 
 of chimney and roof, you might recognize what in 
 these parts passed for a settlement of men. The 
 nearest town of Randsford, some four miles from 
 the village, seemed only less fast asleep than the 
 rest of the landscape. It had done nothing of im- 
 portance since, in an outburst of energy that could 
 not last, it burned a Lollard some five centuries 
 ago. The Towers and the other country-seats were 
 still but part of the green and red. They were 
 marked, according to their degree, by the greater 
 symmetry of woodland design; and they were so 
 many evidences of occupation by the five barons, 
 the ten earls, the fifteen baronets, and what not, 
 who, according to the local almanac, had their seats 
 within the county. 
 
 On this evening of the mellowing summer Slo- 
 cum was assembled in committee of public curiosity 
 
 '9
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 on its patch of village green that bordered the high- 
 road. Workmen had arrived from London to con- 
 firm the public report that the home-coming was 
 to be in state, and that the duke and the tenantry 
 between them would make a brave show. They had 
 begun already to border the line of route with those 
 scaffold-poles, unknown to the experience of the 
 Adriatic, which it pleases some decorative artists 
 to dignify by the name of Venetian masts. They 
 had labored in this way all day long, at first only 
 under the close but silent observation of the urchins 
 and the gossips, but now under the eye of the men- 
 folk from the fields. The groups were as yet per- 
 fectly distinct the observers belonging to the won- 
 dering and rather suspicious village, the observed 
 to the cockney contingent who mocked them with 
 impunity, by virtue of their mastery of an un- 
 known tongue. The former held together for moral 
 support. 
 
 In the foreground Samson Skett, the all but bed- 
 ridden navvy who had once been the strong man 
 of the countryside, leaned on his two walking- 
 sticks and turned a glazing eye to a pennon al- 
 ready in its place. And near him, for one precious 
 moment, lingered Job Gurt, the blacksmith, detained, 
 though unwillingly, on his way to the Knuckle of 
 Veal Inn, which formed the background of the 
 picture. 
 
 Hard by stood a lad and lass who had evidently 
 wandered into the composition in sheer preoccupa- 
 tion of mind. One of these, George Herion, seemed 
 
 20
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 a candidate for the honors which the venerable Sam- 
 son had long resigned. "Deft his tabor" was to be 
 surmised, for he looked light of limb; and "cudgel 
 stout," at need, was beyond all question, for 
 strength was written all over him, and especially 
 in the way in which his head was set on his neck, 
 and in his deep chest. He and Rose Edmer, the 
 pretty dark-haired girl by his side, his match to 
 scale in the lithe vigor of youth, were intent on 
 each other, and yet at once in spite of that and 
 because of it without eyes for anything much 
 lower than the sky. This was more specially true 
 of the young fellow. He was unmistakably in that 
 dawn of the idyl when the hopes and fears are in a 
 perfect balance which a hair may disturb either 
 way, with a certainty of delicious emotion. Blessed- 
 est of all moments, the moment when one is not 
 quite sure! Who was the inestimable sage that 
 defined happiness as the sense of constant progress 
 toward a desirable object? He was careful not 
 to speak of attainment. The girl was as yet of 
 those who have only to let themselves be loved to 
 make happiness enough for two. 
 
 Another female the term is obligatory as a sign 
 of respect was old Sally Artifex the Methody, 
 one of the most respected characters of the commu- 
 nity by reason of the fact that her life of incessant 
 drudgery best represented the common lot. She 
 almost looked her simple history, which was a 
 drunken husband long since laid comfortably out 
 of mischief, and a family "r'ared" by the practice 
 
 21
 
 of all the virtues on the part of his widow, espe- 
 cially that of thrift. She was at this very moment 
 on her way to chapel, not for worship indeed, but 
 only for the scrubbing of the floors, without preju- 
 dice, of course, to her rights as communicant on the 
 appointed days. 
 
 Old Spurr, the small farmer, a wild figure in 
 shirt-sleeves earning a precarious subsistence by all 
 but incessant labors of the field, had suffered himself 
 to be drawn for a moment from his customary 
 bounds. 
 
 Even the constable paused the constable, Peascod 
 by name, and, to make it somewhat more ridiculous 
 by the accident of collocation, Herbert as well. That 
 there was no harm in him seemed to be attested by 
 his moon-face, and by his tall, gawky figure, as of 
 merely incipient manhood. He was liked in the vil- 
 lage because he was communicative and made no 
 secret of his ambition to work up to the metropolitan 
 service, and to distinguish himself by chasing burg- 
 lars over warehouse roofs. 
 
 Rupert Ness, the gamekeeper of Sir Henry Lid- 
 dicot, a neighboring baronet and landowner, was 
 naturally in the company of Herbert Peascod; and, 
 no less naturally, his eye was fixed on the sturdy, 
 thick-set figure of the poacher Bangs, who, as it was 
 near nightfall, might reasonably be suspected of be- 
 ing on his way to work. 
 
 Really intelligent curiosity was represented by 
 Mr. Grimber, a retired tradesman from London, who 
 had come here to end his days on a modest com- 
 
 22
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 petence amassed by forty years of strenuous chan- 
 dlery in the heart of Seven Dials. 
 
 Mr. Bascomb, the High-church vicar of Slocum 
 Magna, in his cap, and long black robe tied with a 
 sash round the waist, had, in his scholarly retire- 
 ment, heard of the event of the day, as, in his clerical 
 character, he might have heard of an apparition. 
 He mingled with the villagers and surveyed the scene 
 with an air of aloofness which still showed a friendly 
 intent. The other persons were the infinitely little 
 of Slocum Parva, mere items of entry in the parish 
 register, awaiting their only chance of publicity at 
 the judgment-day. 
 
 Slocum found its tongue next morning, and in 
 that and the few days following it lived a whole 
 cycle of Cathay. Its inn was thronged, and not 
 merely because the weather was warm. The work- 
 men from town, especially, were blessed with a 
 natural thirst that made them independent of the 
 accident of the seasons. There was a happy hug- 
 ger-mugger of good-fellowship, guzzle, crowding, 
 dirt, and bad air in its tap-room and bar-parlor, 
 and even in its kitchen and outhouses, which took 
 the overflow. Customers came from all parts. The 
 v countryside was astir, and more than the country- 
 side. 
 
 All the duke's places claimed their part in the 
 celebration. Allonby might have the best of it as 
 the ancestral home and residence, but Anstead, in 
 the far north, brought in even more revenue than 
 Allonby, and Lidstone, on the west, was not to be
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 left out. Then there was the London estate. Two 
 of the properties were the largest and richest in 
 a country which is the richest to the square mile 
 in the world. They had all the main essentials of 
 wealth mines and flourishing cities, harbors and 
 ports, endless acreage of plow-land and pasture all 
 the duke's, with a great density of population which 
 was his no less in effective ownership. An acre 
 means an acre in such a realm, and as for a league, 
 well, its potentialities are hardly to be realized. 
 For twenty miles round at Anstead, as for thirteen 
 here at Allonby and for about the same at Lidstone, 
 you might walk without setting foot on any man's 
 land but the duke's. 
 
 And these were only the massed estates, the 
 places his Grace might condescend to name if any 
 one were saucy to him. The fringes and pickings 
 unattached, any one of them a domain for an up- 
 start, dotted the kingdom. In thirteen different 
 counties you might call out, "Duke of Allonby! 
 Duke of Allonby!" and that great nobleman, or 
 some one of his name, would be there to answer, 
 "Here am I." There were three peerages in the 
 family. There was in all some quarter of a million 
 of acres, and of such acres as we have seen. The 
 London estate, not the largest of its kind, was ra- 
 ther to be measured by the square foot, so precious 
 was its content in squares and crescents, and even 
 in slums. If Allonby Castle had been bolted by 
 an earthquake, its owner would still have had his 
 choice of half a dozen other homes, each stored with 
 the spoil of the ages in the pomp of life. 
 
 24
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Perhaps the village best vindicated its wisdom in 
 its readiness to accept its nickname of Silly Slocum. 
 Thankfulness and rest seemed the lesson of its 
 situation in such a landscape. And beyond, on the 
 other side of the park wall of red, mellowing into 
 roan with extreme age, was the Eden of Allonby, 
 a veritable garden of the Lord. How easy to be 
 good in such a place! How difficult not to be a 
 poet, if only impulse obeyed the soft persuasions 
 of nature, and faculty went with mere opportunity ! 
 Everything was at Allonby in garden, wood, or 
 chase all "trees of noblest kind for sight, smell, 
 taste," all flowers in their season in the castle 
 grounds, or out of it in the conservatories, cave 
 and waterfall, fountain and "crisped brook," 
 breezy stretches of open country, "shaggy hills," 
 thicket, and tufted moor. 
 
 Slocum 's arch of evergreens crowned with a 
 vegetable coronet, and relieved at intervals with 
 pendent shields bearing the ducal blazon, though gen- 
 erally considered to do credit to the taste of all con- 
 cerned, seemed but a poor approach to this land of 
 wonders. The Venetian masts for once reduced the 
 straggling highway to the semblance of regularity. 
 An inscription in giant needlework spanning the 
 road, "Welcome to our Noble Duke and Duch- 
 ess," if not particularly choice, was at least sim- 
 ple and well meant. And the villagers had done 
 something on their own account. Many a cottage 
 exhibited a national flag as supplied by the cheap 
 Jacks, unyielding, by virtue of its material of tin 
 or cardboard, to the blandishments of the breeze. 
 
 2 5
 
 IV 
 
 ENRY, how good you are to me!" 
 Augusta and the duke are in 
 their private waiting-room at the 
 station, watching the procession 
 as it forms for the march to Al- 
 lonby. The train which has 
 brought them so far backs coyly out of sight, as 
 though rather ashamed of the wreath on the funnel 
 of the engine. 
 
 She lays her hand on his arm, and their eyes 
 meet. 
 
 "It is all done for you, little woman. I want 
 to show them how proud I am of my wife." 
 
 They have come down for the great day of the 
 entry, and she is still under the impression of 
 their run through the perfect scenery. Its sug- 
 gestion of order, peace, prosperity, of a toilet made 
 every morning, as with brush and comb and even 
 tweezers, has appealed to her, as it appeals to 
 every one. It is beyond the England of her dreams. 
 ''Henry, I feel that I am going to be happy ever 
 after. But please don 't go on making me talk. ' ' 
 
 The absolute novelty of most of it is part of 
 the charm. You may always have that at command 
 by crossing a frontier for the first time. Every-
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 thing looks a little wilfully wrong, but with this 
 it has the air of being quite delightfully itself. 
 Even Peascod attains to originality as he takes his 
 place in the ranks of constabulary that are to lead 
 the way. Their helmets are, at any rate, somewhat 
 taller and uglier than the variety worn in town. 
 
 The first section of the procession consists of the 
 agricultural estates of the ducal realm, the tenants 
 holding under the duke. Here are the large far- 
 mers on horseback, the men renting by the five hun- 
 dred or the thousand acres, most of them belonging 
 to the smaller gentry and some to the greater. 
 They ride as masters of those who line the road, 
 with manifest pride in their great and well-ordered 
 farms, their farm-houses which are little mansions, 
 their stately use and wont of life the dinner-bell 
 and the dressing-bell before it, the refined woman- 
 hood in the drawing-room and boudoir, the prize 
 stock in their stables, whereby they make a living 
 of a kind out of land ever tending to cease alto- 
 gether to rear corn and men. The small farmers, 
 fifty-acre men aad less, are to follow them afoot, 
 and among them is the venerable Spurr, smartened 
 up for the occasion, his every-day self only to be 
 recognized in his still untamable beard and whisker 
 and his iron hair. 
 
 "And the hired hands behind them," says Au- 
 gusta, "in their store-clothes! Why don't they wear 
 their smock-frocks?" 
 
 "Because they have n't got 'em, my dear. No- 
 thing of that sort now except in the picture-books. 
 
 27
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 By the by, Augusta, would you mind saying 'agri- 
 cultural laborers'?" 
 
 "Oh, Henry, who told me I had such a tiny 
 mouth?" 
 
 She is aware of a secret pang of resentment 
 against Kate Greenaway, but she keeps her own 
 counsel, if only for fear of making another mis- 
 take. But for this she might have ventured a re- 
 mark on the vacuous placidity of the laborers' 
 faces, due, though she does not know it, to the fact 
 that, among the fifty of them, there is not so much 
 as a yard of land or the rudiments of a syllogism. 
 
 The carriages now being marshaled into line re- 
 store the dignity of the scene. They bear the chiefs 
 of the districts into which the Allonby estate is 
 marked out mostly younger sons, for the appoint- 
 ments are much coveted by men of family with a 
 turn for field-sports. The agent stands between the 
 tenants and the duke's head man receives their 
 petitions for redress of grievance, forwards these, 
 with the report, to the central office, and is gener- 
 ally a little governor of his province. 
 
 One agent, whose years and bearing do not sug- 
 gest recent service in the cavalry, is hailed with a 
 murmur of "There go old Snatcher" that betokens 
 a sort of gruesome admiration on the part of the 
 crowd. 
 
 " 'Old Snatcher'?" murmurs her Grace, as 
 though to give an opportunity for an explanation 
 without insisting on it. 
 
 "A mere nickname," returns the duke, evasively. 
 
 28
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 This personage, who has seen most of his service 
 under the late duke, is indeed the most skilful 
 picker up of unconsidered trifles of common land 
 in the whole countryside. In days past the peasant 
 had his rights to the waste land as well as the lord. 
 In fact, only when the man was served could the 
 master stretch out his hand for the superfluity. 
 Whole generations of Snatchers have generally put 
 an end to that, but, here and there, precious strips 
 of greensward, dear to the camping gipsy, remain 
 by the roadside and elsewhere, a kind of no-man's- 
 land. The venerable Snatcher has a way of grab- 
 bing those for his employer ''snicking" is the 
 local term which is unsurpassed. First, he puts 
 up a notice-board warning mankind at large against 
 trespass and its consequences. Then, when the no- 
 tice has matured into a kind of assumption of pri- 
 vate ownership, he puts up a fence. The fence, in 
 its turn, matures into a full recognition, as from 
 time immemorial; and the strip is now part of the 
 ducal domain. 
 
 "He seems a good old man," says the bride, 
 ready to take everything for the best. 
 
 The bridegroom says nothing to the contrary. 
 
 Distant strains from a band following the con- 
 stabulary show that the head of the procession has 
 begun to move. This leaves more elbow-room for 
 the next section, still in course of formation, the 
 staff of the Yard. The Yard is still a peculiar fea- 
 ture of some of the old-fashioned estates. It is 
 the great industrial village nestling under the 
 
 2 9
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 castle at the other side of the ridge, where all the 
 needful builders' work on the whole stretch of the 
 property is done by the duke's own men. It is 
 part of the traditional system of making the do- 
 main sufficient to itself, and wanting nothing from 
 the world without. Here are forges, workshops, 
 and the like, and all the duke's. The overseer, the 
 foremen, the gangers, marching heads up and with 
 steady step, have the air of old retainers, proud of 
 their service, and aware that, with good behavior, 
 it is a service for life. Their leader, the clerk of 
 the works, follows in a carriage, as befits one whose 
 business it is to decide in the last resort, subject 
 to the veto of a superior who has the right of per- 
 sonal audience and who takes the pleasure of his 
 Grace. 
 
 More music, and then come the retainers from 
 the north. Anstead, the duke's creation as a plea- 
 sure-city by the sea and his property, is represented 
 by its town council in deputation, a dash of wel- 
 come color in robe and chain. The great seaport 
 miles away, distinguishable from Anstead with 
 powerful glasses by the faint haze of its own smoke, 
 is the duke's, too, in ultimate ownership, and a 
 due share of its rich yield in the profits of com- 
 merce on every sea goes into his coffers. Grave 
 delegates of its harbor board follow the municipal- 
 ity of Anstead, to do their homage with the rest. 
 
 The whole district is rich in mine and quarry, 
 and it sends the representatives of the companies 
 mining under the great man. Augusta gives a lit- 
 
 3
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 tie cry at the sight of a few figures in outlandish 
 rig who form part of this contingent. They are 
 pallid in complexion, but wiry by the evidence of 
 their springy tread. 
 
 "Pitmen," explains the duke. 
 
 They wear brand-new mining-suits as a decora- 
 tive effect, and they carry their lamps and the wea- 
 pon-like tools of their craft. The duchess regards 
 them with wonder not unmixed with awe. They 
 have that strange air of otherworldliness common 
 to most men, even the roughest, who habitually 
 bear their lives in their hands. Other miners and 
 quarrymen follow, and the rear is brought up by 
 the mineral bailiff, a dignified person in a closed 
 carriage, who is chief officer of this part of the do- 
 main. 
 
 The Lidstone and London estates march together, 
 as being too far-fetched to claim full pride of place. 
 They are separated only by the steward of Allonby 
 Castle, a little beyond his beat, but seen in all the 
 better relief on that account. He is the prime minis- 
 ter of the mere household, and it is so vast, with its 
 army of servants, and so engrossing, with its huge 
 tradesmen's accounts and its frequent changes of 
 place, that its intendant need hardly yield a point 
 to a viceroy in his look of weariness of the labors of 
 his charge. The town contingent includes clerks, 
 agents, architects, and surveyors, some of them 
 members of the cabinet council of the board that 
 manages the London property, occasionally under 
 the presidency of the duke himself. 
 
 3 1
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 His Grace nods to the next comer, the great man 
 who centralizes the general management of the 
 whole territory in his capacious brain. He is the 
 only one of all the throng who has direct personal 
 relations with his master as a matter of right. He 
 sits in a finely appointed carriage, not gaudy but 
 good, behind high-stepping bays; and no mandarin 
 with the privilege of the audience-chamber could 
 wear a loftier air. You can do nothing without 
 him, and you had better make up your mind to 
 that. He dispenses as much patronage as a minister, 
 and he holds some of the proudest people of Eng- 
 land in the hollow of his hand. He is but one re- 
 move from supreme greatness, for as beyond him 
 there is nothing but the duke, so beyond the duke 
 there is nothing but the King of England. 
 
 The nobility and gentry whose carriages come 
 next in the line are, in a sense, equals of the duke, 
 yet they yield a willing homage to him as the chief 
 of their order. Many of their womankind are with 
 them, on their way to the reception. The duke 
 points out Sir Henry Liddicot, his near neighbor, 
 with his daughter, a fresh rosebud set in a fine con- 
 fusion of silk and chiffon, whose all but unattain- 
 able white and red wins Augusta's generous praise. 
 These are followed by the superior clergy, a prel- 
 ate as a matter of courtesy, and many members of 
 the chapter of the cathedral which has its site in 
 one of the duke's towns. His Grace presents to 
 so many pulpits that a wise church cannot remain 
 indifferent when he brings home his bride. It is 
 
 32
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 divinity still in the good company of law, as the 
 latter is represented in the file of gentry by the 
 county bench. 
 
 The marshal of the pageant now enters, hat in 
 hand, to claim the victims. Augusta feels sure all 
 the color has left her cheek as she steps forth on 
 her husband's arm to take her place in a chariot 
 and four with postilions and with outriders. Her 
 interest in the crowd, as a matter of narrative, is 
 henceforth lost in the crowd's interest in her. The 
 whole procession is now on the march, and it moves 
 to the most inspiriting discord of shouting, of bra- 
 zen instruments, and of clanging bells. Slocum 
 meanwhile, unable to contain itself any longer, 
 sends forth swift couriers from the village school 
 for tidings, and finally one returns breathless to 
 announce a sound of trumpets and a gleam of uni- 
 forms and arms. The villagers turn out to line 
 the street behind the masts; the school-children, 
 with some pushing and many rebukes, take their 
 places for the choral welcome; and then, since 
 there is nothing more to do, Slocum stands still and 
 listens to the beating of its own heart. 
 
 They are in the village now, and the volunteer 
 band blows "The Conquering Hero," a welcome 
 relief from previous excesses in the "Wedding 
 March." The strains presently cease by command, 
 as the children take up their choral song, clear, ex- 
 quisite, and penetrating to the innermost sense with 
 the inalienable innocence of the singers, let the 
 little monkeys be what they may. It is maddening 
 
 3 
 
 33
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 when the band resumes. The very frogs in the 
 pond, roused from their broken slumbers, croak a 
 protest that serves to swell the volume of acclaim. 
 It would be hard to say whether they or the visitors 
 best represent the negligible quantity. The gulf is 
 a wide one between both of them and Henry Plan- 
 tagenet Mackenzie Norice-Vesey-Ravelin-Harfoot, 
 Duke and Marquis of Allonby and Lidstone, Earl 
 Ravelin, Viscount and Baron Rodmund, Earl Nor- 
 ice, and Lord Poynce. There was more of it as the 
 lawyers compared parchments over his marriage 
 settlement, as there will be more when the heralds 
 recite style and titles over his grave. 
 
 He is a most amiable nobleman to the view, es- 
 pecially as he now sits bowing and smiling from 
 his seat. The features, in so far as they are those 
 of a race, were evidently once strong. But they 
 have been rounded by centuries of easy living, and 
 the assurance of a life beyond the accident of 
 events. The eyes have lost the glare of those of 
 the great ancestor who held the French duke fast 
 at Crecy till the first of the Liddicots came up to 
 make good the precious prize and to earn that fifth 
 share in the ransom which was the foundation 
 of both their fortunes. The chin may be as square 
 as ever beneath its soft coating of flesh, but there 
 is the coating, as you can but guess. All the old fa- 
 mily faces get worn down in this way. The snub 
 noses of the Pharaohs attest the dateless age of their 
 line. Such are the ravages of ineffable calm; and 
 Eastern art has done well to choose their effects for 
 
 34
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 its type of a being that has passed beyond all per- 
 turbation of mortal affairs. The duke, in fact, in 
 one aspect, is a Buddha in a Bond-street tie the 
 right tie. His very hair is neither dark nor light, 
 but chestnut; his blue eyes sparkle with geniality 
 but with no stronger flame; his features are regu- 
 lar; his eyebrows form an easy line; he seems nei- 
 ther tall nor short, but just the mean. With so 
 many stored deeds behind him, he has no taste for 
 further exercise in the toils of the arena. He looks 
 as restful as an old athlete. 
 
 His duchess, whose one moment of misgiving has 
 long since passed, wins general praise. Her dress- 
 makers and her sense of self-respect, between them, 
 have wrought wonders in fitting her for her new 
 part. It is the governess still, but the American 
 variety of the type; and in the short drive she has 
 taught herself to regard the roaring crowd before 
 her as but a larger class. She is a stately creature 
 in Build and beauty, a Diana of Versailles who has 
 stooped to the yoke of marriage. The note of the 
 face is dignity with animation. It looks at once 
 supermundane and yet aware; above the meaner 
 concerns of life, yet not unmindful of their exis- 
 tence. All beauty has its particular "message." 
 Why the message of this type of it has so much at- 
 traction for the race of man, which, in its aggre- 
 gate, rarely rises superior to petty concerns, is a 
 mystery. Yet it is perhaps to be explained by the 
 fact that we are prepared to admire in others our 
 own unrealized ideals, and that next to succeeding 
 
 35
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 on one's own account is the pleasure of beholding 
 another who has arrived. 
 
 The duchess looks as magnanimous as we all 
 should like to be. She is therefore as interesting 
 as those ladies of the pagan heaven who have at 
 once, with the sense of mortal anxieties, the power 
 to despise them. The firm, regular features are 
 tempered into amiability by the gracious curves of 
 the mouth, by the lenity of the eyes, and even by 
 the magnificent sweep of the hair from the brow, 
 as though it had been carried backward in one im- 
 petuous gesture, in a futile attempt to escape from 
 the oppression of a mass of gold. She is tall one 
 can see that as she sits and queenly in her bear- 
 ing, in being superbly at ease with herself. She 
 bows to right and left, looks happy and even 
 touched, and speaks frequently to the duke in run- 
 ning comment on everything she sees. The village 
 beauty, Rose Edmer, is evidently one subject of re- 
 mark as she gazes with trance-like fixity on the 
 vision of commanding loveliness before her. In 
 this way the eyes on both sides meet, as though in 
 pledge of future acquaintance. "While Rose looks 
 at the duchess, George Herion, after a momentary 
 glance of curiosity at the carriage, looks at her. 
 The arrangement seems eminently satisfactory to 
 all the parties concerned. 
 
 Yeomanry and mounted police close the proces- 
 sion, and it is soon lost in the ample grounds, with 
 their twenty miles of drives. Then it winds about 
 till it comes in sight of the castle on the other side 
 
 36
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 of the lake, with the time-worn battlements and 
 towers rising from their foundation of solid rock 
 and glowing in the rays of the setting sun. As it 
 nears the outer gate it halts to enable the duke to 
 dismiss his humbler friends with a few well-chosen 
 words of thanks and of welcome, to their entertain- 
 ment in the grounds. 
 
 The others, after leaving the barbican and the 
 Norman gateway, alight at the entrance to the main 
 building, and, passing by the grand staircase and 
 the guard-chamber, finally reach the great hall, in 
 which the reception is to be held. There is no ban- 
 quet, for there would be too many to serve; but 
 there are refreshments which the reporter in the 
 county paper will in due course describe as pala- 
 tial. The scene is one of wonderful suggestiveness, 
 as the county and the dependencies beyond, in their 
 myriad activities of wealth and industry, file before 
 the ducal pair, and it presents no bad image of the 
 state of a modern noble, and of his household of 
 agriculture, trade, and commerce which has taken the 
 place of the household of arms. 
 
 37
 
 jLONBY is the new planet for 
 Augusta. Nothing resembles what 
 she has left behind, except the 
 human nature. In the planet, 
 according to Utopian fancy, they 
 are without lungs, without stom- 
 achs, or without feelings. In this one, while still 
 crouching under such burdens, they are like none 
 but themselves. They begin where other folk leave 
 off, and end in the same eccentric way. A topsy- 
 turvy world, yet such a world of its own! 
 
 The one compensation is her immense enthusiasm. 
 She has come as a believer. It is still the England 
 of her dreams an England where everything 
 stands out romantic, beautiful, against its back- 
 ground of historic past. 
 
 Her diffidence about herself is a hindrance. 
 What would she not give to be a mere spectator, 
 watching, wondering, taking in, with nothing to 
 give out, and thanking God meanwhile in whispers 
 for the variety and design of his universe. But 
 to have to lead the dance! 
 
 It would be overwhelming, were it not for the 
 rooted determination in her a sort of birthmark 
 of character to be equal to her fortunes, whatever 
 they may bring. The trial that has come to her
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 is none of her seeking, and she is going to see it 
 through. In this consideration the extremes of diffi- 
 dence and of self-confidence meet. The golden 
 rule for travel in all strange places is notoriously 
 to keep your nerve. In this way you keep your 
 head along with it, among the wildest. Augusta 
 is at present in a circle of chiefs, who watch her, 
 though not unkindly, for the slightest sign of fear. 
 And she is so frightened, and so brave. 
 
 Her strong points are those of the ancient Per- 
 sians: she can ride and speak the truth. The rid- 
 ing, in one of her station, is a mere accident of her 
 life among the ranches. She has no remembrance 
 of a time when she could not master a horse. That 
 mastery wins unwonted indulgence for her know- 
 ingness about other things. 
 
 "My dear," says her tutelary dowager, a relative 
 of the duke, "don't talk booky to 'em, or they '11 
 think you 've been a lecturer." 
 
 "Aunt Emily!" 
 
 "Well, yes, I know; only do give 'em a chance, 
 my dear. And don't let your travels run into ar- 
 chaeology. It gives them a turn. Don't mind an 
 old woman's counsel, and give me a kiss. I 'm so 
 delighted you 're goin' to be friends with Mary 
 Liddicot. She 's such a nice girl." 
 
 The dowager has certainly not spoken too soon. 
 The two younger women if Mary, as a mere legal 
 infant of seventeen, is to be reckoned a woman are 
 good friends already. They are together in the 
 private garden this morning. 
 
 39
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Why not sit here, duchess?" And Mary throws 
 herself on a time-worn step of the terrace. "We 
 may dodge the sun for an hour under the balus- 
 trade." 
 
 It is notorious that no human being can possibly 
 be half so good as some women look, so devotees 
 must e'en make the best of the limitations of our 
 fallen nature. Here, for instance, is another of 
 them who seems all health of body and of mind 
 in fresh cheek, clear eye, straightness of manner. 
 Health is always beauty of a kind, but other is not 
 wanting in the fine, firm drawing of cheek and 
 brow, tempered into expression by the suavity of 
 the mouth and the benignant eyes. 
 
 "Will the steps bear us, Mary? That is the point. 
 And please don't call me 'duchess' any more. Au- 
 gusta is my name." 
 
 "Why not,d I mean Augusta as to the steps?" 
 
 "It will have to be something shorter to-morrow; 
 so I give you warning. As to your silly question, 
 look at the crannies and the moss." 
 
 "Yes; and as to your wise answer, don't forget 
 the fresh masonry on the other side." 
 
 "The old order and the new patchwork, eh, 
 Mary?" 
 
 "Just like Allonby, at any rate. We are more 
 consistent in decay at Liddicot." 
 
 "Well, I take your word for it; for who ought 
 to know Allonby, if you don 't ? That is why I want 
 you to show me round my own place." 
 
 "Then come to the bowling-green; we shall be 
 
 40
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 better under the terrace there. Give me a hand 
 with the sketching-traps, and I '11 lead the way." 
 
 "Oh, is n't it just lovely!" cries the delighted 
 duchess, as they reach a stretch of faultless turf 
 lying under the shelter of an ancient wall. "But 
 I forget : I must n 't put it in that way. ' ' 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "Slang and not English slang, at that." 
 
 "What 's the matter with it?" 
 
 "Mary, you must help me in these little things. 
 Be cruel to be kind. What would you have said 
 now?" 
 
 "What about?" 
 
 "About the loveliness." 
 
 "What could I have said but 'it is lovely'?" 
 
 "Ah, you 've left out the 'just' in spite of your- 
 self; so I stand rebuked." 
 
 Lovely it is, for want of a better word. The 
 sheared grass stands as firm and upright in its 
 ranks as a regiment of Spanish pikemen. The wall, 
 a mere accident of lusty decay, has been turned to 
 the best account. It is paneled by its buttresses, 
 and every space between them is a mass of flowers 
 springing from a bed of mold at the base. There 
 are more flowers in the coping, with potted plants 
 to mark the lines of buttress, and the whole compo- 
 sition has the time-worn red of the brickwork for 
 its background. A clipped hedge forms the border 
 on the other side of the alley, and gives a choice 
 of luminous shade. There is more turf beyond the 
 wall, and beyond that a growth of wood vast and 
 
 41
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 deep enough, to all appearance, to house the whole 
 pagan world of dryad and faun. Impenetrable 
 privacy is the note. Surely, if there can be any 
 sure defense against the siege of troubles, here is 
 the triple line. 
 
 "Too beautiful," again murmurs Augusta. 
 "Who wants to play at stupid bowls in such a 
 place or to play at anything except being in hea- 
 ven?" 
 
 "Well, you must decide, you know. It is your 
 garden, all yours. Father says the duke himself 
 would hardly intrude without asking leave." 
 
 "Mary, we '11 sit here all day long and read 
 'The Golden Pomp.' " 
 
 "What about exercise?" says Mary, simply. 
 
 "Oh, very well. I '11 learn the stupid game, if 
 I must." 
 
 "Why should you? There are links on the other 
 side of the wood. Yours, too. 'All trespassers will 
 be prosecuted' even from the house-party." 
 
 ' ' The house-party ! ' ' echoes Augusta, with a sigh. 
 "Well, never mind all that this morning. Let us 
 just sit here and feel sorry for most of our fellow- 
 creatures. Ach, du lieber Gott!" 
 
 The head coachman approaches and touches his 
 hat. "Would your Grace like to see the stables this 
 morning? The horses came down yesterday." 
 
 "Stables, Mary? Must it be stables now? One 
 might as well be back home." 
 
 "Well, you see they 're your stables. Jarvis 
 might feel ' ' 
 
 42
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Say no more, my dear." 
 
 Mr. Jarvis is very proud of his horses, his car- 
 riages, his harness-room, of all that is his as head 
 coachman of the duke. The stables are marvelous; 
 and the lodging for the men is worthy of the 
 lodging for the beasts you can say no more. 
 The woodwork is real and rare, the plated metal 
 is as good as silver to the eye. The architect 
 was a poet playing with a fancy of stately comfort 
 in brick and tile picked out with crest, coronet, and 
 monogram, and with the most lavish exercise of 
 invention. The mere cleanliness is a marvel, too. 
 Mr. Jarvis 's ideal is a place in which the duke, 
 should he ever wish to do anything so absurd, 
 might "eat his dinner off the floor." With all its 
 brightness, it is as severe in taste as a Greek tem- 
 ple. There is no superfluity if only for that rea- 
 son, there is no dirt. There is only everything of 
 the very best, even light and air, and, at need, arti- 
 ficial warmth. The riding horses are shown by the 
 stud-groom, a swell of the domestic order who 
 wears no livery, and whose office is of historic 
 origin. The splendid creatures in residence, glis- 
 tening in their coats to match the general scheme, 
 turn meek faces, with eyes of fire, as the visitors 
 trip from stall to stall without once having to lift 
 a skirt. Here is Chieftain, the champion hunter of 
 England, who, it is hoped, may carry the duchess 
 herself. 
 
 The auguries are favorable. "The beauty 
 beauty!" cries her Grace, running her hand over 
 
 43
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 his coat. "We 're going to be the best friends in 
 the world, Chieftain." And she lays against his 
 neck a face that stands out fairer than ever from 
 the background of bay. 
 
 "Sixteen hands, or hardly an inch under, your 
 Grace." 
 
 "Surely not quite that!" 
 
 "It 's his build, and good proportions. He 
 matches himself all over. You can have a horse 
 as big as a house if you breed him right. If ever 
 anything happens to him, I '11 keep his skeleton, 
 and then your Grace will see what he is in bone." 
 
 "May my skeleton be ready first! I 'm going to 
 love him too much." 
 
 "Augusta, Augusta, come and see your new 
 ponies ! " It is a cry from Mary, who leads the 
 way. She stands in ecstasy before a pair matching 
 in everything but color, and in that a sharp con- 
 trast which shows that no match has been sought. 
 
 "Twelve hundred and fifty guineas is what the 
 duke paid," says Mr. Jarvis; and, like a wise man, 
 he leaves it there. 
 
 "He is too good," murmurs the duchess. 
 
 And, after all, it might have been worse. What 
 of that queen of Egypt who had the revenues of a 
 whole city to keep her in shoes alone! 
 
 The ponies are skittish and resent her caress ; but 
 she goes away with an uplifted forefinger that 
 promises a speedy struggle for the mastery. 
 
 "The Yankee trotter is for the duke. Supposed 
 to beat anything in this country," says Mr. Jar- 
 
 44
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 vis, in a tone which marks his indifference to all 
 that lies beyond. "Your Grace might like to see 
 the harness-room?" His h's bespeak his social al- 
 titude. He has risen by them, as well as by his 
 skill with the reins. 
 
 It is a wardrobe of fashion, only it has a richer 
 variety of suits. The more costly ones shine out 
 at you in gold plate and patent leather from their 
 cases of plate glass. Even the least costly have 
 that kind of right through excellence which marks 
 the struggle for perfection. The best that money 
 can buy is Mr. Jarvis's estimate of its claim to 
 notice; and he is right. Where it forbears orna- 
 ment, the leather is still silky to the touch; and the 
 mastery of its hand-stitching might bring a sad- 
 dler's apprentice to his knees. 
 
 The stud-groom, in the interest of his colleagues, 
 now urges the kennels, the stud-farm, the pedigree 
 cows, even the aviary, since there is everything in 
 the wonderful place. But the duchess has to tell 
 him that these are for another day. After duly 
 expressing her approbation, she turns toward the 
 castle, first stopping to pick up a bewildered Jap- 
 anese spaniel which has followed her to the 
 grounds. The picturesquely ugly mite is of course 
 one of the costliest things of its kind in all Eng- 
 land. Everything is of price at Allonby. The 
 meanest of the stable-hands flitting to and fro on 
 their labors in the glorious sunlight has the sense 
 of the choice and the exclusive. The fellow spong- 
 ing the foolish face of one of the Jerseys, that 
 
 45
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 keeps her apartment by the doctor's orders, is 
 ready, on the slightest encouragement, to recite her 
 style and titles to the distinguished visitor. Sally 
 is the heroine of half a dozen agricultural shows, 
 and her certificates of glory are nailed in black and 
 white over her stall. She is the best Jersey in all 
 England, bar none; she fetched the best price, and 
 she belongs to the best duke and duchess in that 
 favored land. It makes the lowest of them feel 
 their kinship with the real old sort of the founda- 
 tion of things ; and that is moral impulse, of a kind. 
 Here is Allonby, and on the other side of its wall 
 is the balance of the world. Their very expletives 
 are tempered by a sense of the dignity of their 
 office, and even their occasional profanity is counted 
 but another mode of clean speech at the Knuckle of 
 Veal. 
 
 The ladies are for turning back to the house, but 
 the duchess has a sudden fancy : ' ' Mary, I think 
 I '11 begin to be good friends with Chieftain now. 
 I 'm wild for a gallop. Ask them to saddle him, 
 while I run inside and put my habit on. ' ' 
 
 "Augusta! The duke?" 
 
 "I thought he was my horse. I must have one 
 spin on him, if I die for it." 
 
 Her readiness to accept this gruesome condition 
 by no means puts the stud-groom at his ease. 
 "Your Grace might like to try him first in the 
 riding-school. We don't know him very well our- 
 selves yet." 
 
 "Hush! he 'd never forgive us if he heard us 
 talking like that. Wait for me here, Mary." 
 
 4 6
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 She scampers into the house, and her guide turns, 
 with a sigh, to give the necessary orders. They 
 have hardly been carried out when she reappears in 
 costume, and comes running toward the unhappy 
 pair. 
 
 ' ' Her Grace took it into her own head, Miss Mary. 
 You '11 bear me out in that" 
 
 "You don't think it might be better to wait, Au- 
 gusta? He 's new to the place, you see, as well as 
 to the people. He might" 
 
 "How could he, now, when I 'm going to give 
 him this nice lump of sugar? But it 's not for the 
 goodies, Chieftain dear, is it? It 's because he 
 likes me." 
 
 She nestles up to him again, caresses him, seems 
 to whisper in his ear, glances at his girths, and in 
 another moment, with the help of a broad palm, 
 is in the saddle, with the reins in hand. 
 
 "Adios, Mary. Just one spin across the park!" 
 
 "She 's off," mutters the chief officer, evidently 
 not in the best temper with her, nor indeed with 
 anybody, including himself. 
 
 It is not a mad gallop by any means, but it is 
 a smart one. Chieftain is fresh and skittish for 
 mere joy of life, but he has a foolish idea that he 
 could get on better if he had the spin to himself. 
 He flies with her now and then, and once or twice 
 shakes himself ominously, as though thinking he 
 would like to ask a question before accepting her 
 for better or for worse. It is presently asked and 
 answered. As soon as they have come to a perfect 
 understanding, she gives him his head for a run 
 
 47
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 before the wind, talking pleasantly to him the 
 while. Then, just as he begins to feel he has had 
 enough of it, she gently eases him down into trot 
 and walk, leaving him, and perhaps herself for a 
 moment, to fancy that it is all over. But there is 
 a long fence between them and the spot where Mary 
 and the others stand, and it is clear that Augusta 
 has made up her mind to take it on her way back. 
 The gradual change in Chieftain's pace shows that 
 he has received the necessary orders, and soon he is 
 in full course for the obstacle. 
 
 "I don't like this kind of circus work," mutters 
 Mr. Jarvis, wiping a cold drop from his brow. "I 
 can't stand it, if you ask me." There is no time 
 to say or even to think more. In another moment 
 they are at it, and, in a moment again, safe and 
 sound on the other side of the wall. 
 
 "She 's done it, by" mutters Mr. Jarvis, rein- 
 ing himself in on the very edge of expression. 
 "This must be my lucky day." He also forbears 
 to add, "Who said she 'd only been a governess?" 
 but it is in his mind. His only additional obser- 
 vation is, "She '11 do." 
 
 "Sorry!" laughs Augusta, as she touches earth 
 and her friend's cheek once more. "It had to be 
 done. I was beginning to feel you know. But 
 don't look so cross, dear! I guess I can take care 
 of myself as well as the next one when I 'm on a 
 horse. ' ' 
 
 "What about the appointment with Mr. Raif ?" 
 was all that Mary allowed herself to say. 
 
 4 8
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "With Mr. Raif?" 
 
 "Yes: the domestic chaplain, duchess." 
 "Augusta, if you please Miss Liddicot!" 
 "And Mr. Bascomb. You know they are both 
 to come to you this morning about the poor in the 
 village. I dare say they are waiting in your morn- 
 ing-room. ' ' 
 
 "Oh, hurry up, Mary, like like a little lamb, 
 and go in and amuse them while I change. I '11 be 
 down again before you have finished with the wea- 
 ther." And she was almost as good as her word. 
 
 49
 
 VI 
 
 !j|R. RAIF, the domestic chaplain, is 
 the born conscience-keeper of a 
 noble pair, sleek, apple-faced, un- 
 wrinkled, untroubled by a doubt. 
 He has cast all difficulty of that 
 sort behind him in his solitary 
 volume "The Struggle for Faith," the title-page 
 of which is the sole attestation of his having ever 
 wrestled with a fiend. The victory has been so un- 
 mistakably on the right side that it has left him 
 scarcely a memory of the encounter. The work 
 commended him to the duke by the orthodoxy of 
 its sentiments, and he was appointed to the dig- 
 nified office of reading prayers twice a day to the 
 household. He has thus, by anticipation, entered 
 into the joy of his Lord. His parsonage, within 
 the gates of the domain, has a wide prospect of the 
 scenery that may easily be regarded as an outlook 
 on the plains of heaven. There, surely, in the re- 
 moter distance, is the green bank in a flowery val- 
 ley where angels will one day serve far more excel- 
 lent nourishment than afternoon tea to him and to 
 the whole croquet-party on his lawn. All is in 
 harmony in the celestial view. In the nearer dis- 
 tance is the model village of the domain, in which 
 
 5
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Mr. Raif keeps in comfort the castle poor for Al- 
 lonby has its pet breeds in this line, as in horses 
 and cows on the easy condition of their being per- 
 fectly virtuous in order that they may be per- 
 fectly happy. They rise with the lark and retire 
 with the other reputable birds. They carouse on 
 mineral waters. They peruse the cheaper British 
 poets in a reading-room which is quite a little mas- 
 terpiece of domestic Gothic, and in which a bust 
 of Shakspere faces a bust of the duke. They see 
 Palestine with the aid of lantern-slides. So may 
 we hope to enjoy our leisure in a better world. 
 
 "Your Grace will come and see us soon, I feel 
 sure. I do not press. The multifarious duties of 
 the present moment I know something of their 
 claims. But some questions are urgent. Our wilder 
 spirits in the reading-room are getting up a round- 
 robin for beer." 
 
 "Very sad!" 
 
 "I was glad when the pitmen who came to the 
 procession went back to their homes. They do our 
 people no good. Happily, cock-fighting on bank- 
 holidays is a purely acquired taste." 
 
 "I suppose I ought to like him, Mary," said the 
 duchess, when he had turned his back; "but some- 
 howwell, I dare say he is quite a good man." 
 
 "Mr. Bascomb is my favorite," returned Mary. 
 "See, here he comes through the gate. I wish the 
 other looked a little less sure both of earth and 
 heaven. Dear old Bas ! His hold on earth is of the 
 weakest. He contrives to look untidy in spite of a 
 
 5 1
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 cassock that hides him from head to foot. Even a 
 man, one would think, could hardly go wrong with 
 an overall of that sort. But only look at the but- 
 tonsall in the wrong holes!" 
 
 "Ah, men are just as clever in muddle as in all 
 else. One of us would have blundered into the right 
 hole midway uncertain sex. Tell me something 
 about him before he comes up." 
 
 "Great scholar, great gentleman," said Mary, 
 breathlessly talking against time as the parson 
 gained on them in his toil up the sloping walk. 
 "Warn me when he 's within ear-shot, but remem- 
 ber he 's a trifle deaf. ' ' 
 
 "Go on: still half a minute to the good." 
 
 "Does n't believe there has been any Christian 
 church to speak of for hundreds of years." 
 
 "Oh, Mary! Only ten seconds more. Make the 
 best use of them." 
 
 "Thinks that Allonby should be melted down 
 and spent in making everybody good." 
 
 "Why, that 's rank Social How do you do, 
 Mr. Bascomb? Very glad to meet you. Miss Lid- 
 dicot has been saying such nice things in your 
 praise!" 
 
 Five and forty is about his age, but his untidi- 
 ness adds some ten years to the rough estimate. A 
 skullcap worn at the back of his head, at a slope 
 that suggests miraculous agency, gives an effect of 
 the innocence of childhood. The state of his robe 
 seems to show that he has been valeted by a house- 
 maid who has mislaid her duster. The tall, spare 
 
 5 2
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 figure, bent with the toil of patristic learning, the 
 high Roman cast of the face, are so many notes of 
 the mystic. But the dreamy eyes have that in 
 them which betokens a terrible fellow to meet in 
 some stock-exchange concerned with the transac- 
 tions of another world. 
 
 He smiled affectionately at Mary and took her 
 hand, first making his bow to the duchess, not with- 
 out grace. This done, he gazed on the new mis- 
 tress of Allonby as though he had, at once, a 
 perfect sense of her beauty and a like power of re- 
 ferring it to the same category of impersonal won- 
 ders of nature as the rose and the dawn. 
 
 "It is a joy to me to meet you, madam. You 
 have so much power for good, and I am sure you 
 are disposed to use it." 
 
 His voice is music in its intonations, as voices 
 are wont to be when they have ever kept close touch 
 with the spiritual harmonies of which music is 
 made. 
 
 "I hope I may be able to make myself useful, 
 with your help. But there seems so little to do 
 here. It is different in town." 
 
 "Madam, we are of the earth, as well as on it. 
 I think you will find that. Kest assured you will 
 not languish for want of opportunity." 
 
 "Mr. Raif has promised to show me his model 
 village." 
 
 A slight cloud passed over his features. "I have 
 no doubt Mr. Raif has done his best with it, but 
 somehow these questions of machinery I shall be 
 
 53
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 pleased to take your Grace's opinion on all the 
 villages at some future time." 
 
 The conversation soon drifted into generalities, 
 wherein, however, he showed himself so utterly in- 
 competent, or at any rate so ill at ease, that the 
 duchess in mercy gave him an opportunity of es- 
 cape. On leaving, he looked at her again with a 
 kind of awe, and seemed to take her in from head 
 to foot. 
 
 "Pray don't flatter yourself," laughs Mary. 
 "He fixes every charming woman in that way; 
 but half the time, you know, he forgets that they 
 are alive. I do believe he thinks we are plants, and 
 that one day he '11 try to break off a finger for a 
 buttonhole. He used to lift me on to the table 
 and look at me like some little image of piety, all 
 the time I was in short frocks. It was done quite 
 without distinction of persons. He treated Rose 
 Edmer in just the same way. Dear old thing I 
 do love him so ! " 
 
 "And so shall I. But who is Rose Edmer? You 
 know, child, you are my guide to Allonby." 
 
 "Rose Edmer is the village beauty. Every self- 
 respecting village has an institution of that kind." 
 
 "Then I know her perfectly well. Listen: dark- 
 eyed as well as dark-haired ; heavy-eyed, too, a little, 
 by reason of a sort of lowering mischief in the lids. 
 I made her show them to me all the same, for they 
 were wide open as I passed. Trouble there, if 
 crossed. The face a good oval, not so much by 
 the narrowness at the chin as by the breadth at the 
 
 54
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 cheek. Lips that pout more with determination 
 than with caprice, and that I should say might give 
 great satisfaction in other uses. What a little 
 type ! No, not a type at all, but just her individual 
 self. And what an inventory, eh? Gracious! it 's 
 like an early Victorian novel." 
 
 "That 's the girl. True as steel, I should say, 
 if you win her; but wants winning all the same. 
 They say George Herion is the boy to do it. It 
 will be a pretty game, lost or won, for the on- 
 lookers. ' ' 
 
 "George Herion I never saw him." 
 
 "Perhaps, duchess, because he never saw you, 
 saving your presence, all the same. It 's the crisis 
 of his fate, so I hear and I get a bulletin almost 
 every morning from my maid." 
 
 "No wonder. It would never do to let love-mak- 
 ing become one of the lost arts; so let us all keep 
 an eye on Phyllis and Corydon. Ah, what a land, 
 what a land ! ' ' 
 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 "I don't know. The whole country seems like 
 a book so many 'Half Hours in a Library,' illus- 
 trated with copperplates, as much too picturesquely 
 good to be true as a scene at the play. That feel- 
 ing, I remember, came on me with a perfect rush 
 at Warwick. I saw old beadsmen in cloaks that 
 suggested the funeral procession of Queen Eliza- 
 beth, walking in and out of old almshouses to match, 
 with an old Shaksperian square in the background. 
 I declare, when some incongruous old thing in an 
 
 .55
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 overcoat and a stovepipe hat came out of one of 
 the houses I could have shaken him for an anachro- 
 nism. And in the market-place I believe they were 
 roasting an ox whole, and hiring plowmen and 
 dairymaids at a 'statute' fair." 
 
 "But how would you hire them, Augusta? You 
 know that 's the proper way." 
 
 "Who said it was not? What a dear old land!" 
 ' ' How do they hire them in your country, then ? ' ' 
 "How do I know or care? Not that way, that 's 
 all. No such luck." 
 
 "What a funny sort of country it must be!" 
 "No, no. It just spreads itself about too much 
 to be anything in particular. This one is perfect, 
 and if I had my way I 'd put it all under a glass 
 case. Our glass case is the sky, and that 's too big 
 for comfort to the beholder. How are you going 
 to keep the dust off five and twenty miles of corn 
 all in one unbroken line ? What you lose in breadth 
 you gain in variety, intensity of impression. A 
 dozen 'vestiges of creation' is a space no bigger 
 than the back of your hand ! I want to label it all. 
 At least, Mary, help me to label out the 'county,' 
 that mysterious thing you were telling me about 
 the other day; the people to whom I have to go 
 and 'pay my respects' in the family coach, in re- 
 turn for their dutiful performances of the same 
 sort here." 
 
 "Well, first you want two big glass cases one 
 for our set and one more for the other." 
 
 "Tell me about the other. Our set I am begin- 
 
 56
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ning to know birth, acres, long settlement. Oh, 
 I am so frightened of some of them, Mary! But 
 don't you dare tell. I 'm going to manage them 
 by springing right into the cage, firing my pistol, 
 and keeping them too busy with the trick to have 
 time to devour me." 
 
 "They don't want to devour you, except in the 
 way of kindness nice as you would be." 
 
 "Nonsense. I 'm certain that venerable noble- 
 man (is n't that the right way to put it?) to whose 
 place I went the other day was a man-eater. Not 
 a sign was wanting the long, solemn face, the 
 sepulchral voice, the lean family drawn up behind, 
 in their huge cavern of a drawing-room, waiting 
 for their prey." 
 
 "Don't be so unkind. That 's just what you '11 
 find at Liddicot, I warn you, when you come to see 
 us in our moated hall. How can people help being 
 a thousand years old?" 
 
 "Child, you know I don't mean that." 
 
 "Besides, the Ogrebys and ourselves are just old- 
 timers; we don't set up for being smart. But 
 you '11 find plenty of nice people quite up to date, 
 I assure you. Why, look at Allonby itself ! ' ' 
 
 "Still, Allonby is sometimes rather alarming. 
 I stumbled into the family mausoleum the other 
 day, railed off from the rest of the church. What 
 a scare all the effigies still glaring mastery over 
 the destinies of men from sightless orbs! Another 
 Temple of the Sun, with the embalmed Incas all in 
 rows from the beginning of a dateless line except 
 
 57
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 that the Incas sat up to their work. And then, what 
 about the people who are not nice?" 
 
 "Oh, you '11 soon know more than you want about 
 them. They 're the real danger. You '11 find it 
 hard to keep out of their clutches, duchess as you 
 are." 
 
 "Are they so very hateful?" 
 
 "Dreadful people. They 've made all their 
 money in business, heaps and heaps of it ; and where 
 we are in any way salable they just come and buy 
 us out. Sometimes they issue us as companies, with 
 our names on the prospectus." 
 
 "Insolent creatures; and with their own money, 
 too!" 
 
 "You don't understand, Augusta; but you will." 
 
 "Silent contempt?" 
 
 "How are you to keep it up, when they make 
 such a noise? There 's a terror of a man down 
 here called Kisbye who tried his hardest to get a 
 corner in your procession the other day. His house- 
 parties are a perfect scandal, and he 's got the very 
 place in which the Parringtons were born." 
 
 "Well, it 's easy enough to keep out of it now." 
 
 "Not so easy as you think. He tries to do every- 
 thing, from the shooting to the dinners, twice as well 
 as everybody else, so far as the mere luxury goes. 
 And some of our younger sons positively go there 
 for the dinners. Why, even my brother Tom oh, 
 it 's a shame ! And they make game of it all when 
 they come away." 
 
 "And we both think that 's a greater shame still;
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 don't we, Mary? But don't be afraid: I am going 
 to be perfectly orthodox and hate Kisbye. Only just 
 now I am much busier with attractions than repul- 
 sions. I do so want to like everybody, the women 
 above all." 
 
 "What is to prevent it? I am sure they all want 
 to like you." 
 
 "Sometimes they seem so" 
 
 "So what?" 
 
 "So near and yet so far, like the star in the song 
 so effusively indifferent, so cordially cold." 
 
 "Augusta!" 
 
 "Oh, don't misunderstand. It 's nothing per- 
 sonal, to you especially not even to myself. I 
 am sure they all treat me exactly as they treat 
 one another. But their aloofness is sometimes 
 a trial. I suppose it 's the smart manner. They 
 don't seem to care a hang for anybody or anything. 
 Yet underneath that mask of cynical hardness what 
 wonderful women some of them are! They know 
 so much, and they 've seen so much, and they Ve 
 even thought and felt so much, and they seem so 
 very much ashamed of it, after all. That hard, 
 short, dry style I 've seen in one or two here ! None 
 of us women are like that by nature mere souls 
 reduced to the state of an anatomical preparation. 
 Why should we make ourselves such pieces of bad 
 art?" 
 
 "I never thought of that. I suppose it must be 
 so, since you see it so. I wonder if it is because 
 they are trying to please the men? I remember, 
 
 59
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 now, how Tom changed as soon as he went to Eton : 
 not much kissing good-by and kissing how-d'-ye-do 
 after that. He did give me a furtive hug behind 
 the door at the end of the first term ; but it was too 
 good to last. Our men, you see, won't stand what 
 they call 'gush.' Will yours?" 
 
 "We never ask 'em," said Augusta, simply. 
 "They have to take us as we are. It does them a 
 world of good." 
 
 "That 's it, I suppose. You never let them get 
 out of hand. I wonder if they don't like you all 
 the better for just being yourselves, instead of try- 
 ing to talk golf and races and stables to them, and 
 all that." 
 
 "They like us well enough," said Augusta, as 
 simply as before. ' ' But never mind, dear. ' When 
 you are in Rome' you know the rest. And I 'm 
 going to get Anglicized as fast as I can." 
 
 "Take care we don't get Americanized first and 
 save you the trouble." 
 
 "No; my turn first. Come and help me out with 
 my visiting-list. Here 's a Blyth, I see." 
 
 "Excuse me, but would you mind not sounding 
 the 'th'? You know you asked me to mention any 
 little thing of that sort." 
 
 "Thank you a thousand times; but shall I never 
 call a fellow-creature by his right name in this 
 country? I learned 'Coohoon' and 'Chumley' and 
 'Abergenny' from a Sunday paper before I came 
 out, and I thought I was through. The rule of it, 
 the distracting rule? Shade of Ward McAllister, 
 
 60
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 will nobody give me a glimpse into first principles? 
 Is it something like this : always sound one English- 
 man 's name as some other Englishman writes his? 
 I suppose we must be 'Applebys,' as we begin with 
 an 'AP; and Halifax is sounded as 'Gomshall,' dear 
 say it is; and 'Waldegrave' as 'Zoroaster,' by way 
 of giving a neighbor a lift." 
 
 "Augusta, you are really unfortunate to-day! 
 It 's 'Walgrave,' at any rate, as true as I live." 
 
 "Mary, Mary, we 've gossiped away half the 
 morning, and we 've a whole house-party on our 
 hands. Besides, I must have a first peep at the 
 village this afternoon." 
 
 "Which one-Mr. Kaif's?" 
 
 "No; little Slocum. That 's more to my taste. 
 But he may come all the same, if it 's part of his 
 show. ' ' 
 
 61
 
 VII 
 
 T was no easy matter. In these 
 exalted regions the simplest in- 
 cident has to be contrived. A 
 duchess from Allonby can hardly 
 walk into Slocum Parva as you or 
 I do. Nothing merely occurs in 
 such lives: everything is matter of specification. 
 Mr. Jarvis had to be consulted about the carriage, 
 and he put the priceless ponies in harness by way 
 of giving them an airing. Her Grace would fain 
 have walked, but she was told it was unusual in the 
 circumstances. Then the housekeeper was sent for. 
 In such houses domestics are as keenly concerned 
 for the privilege of menial office as are nobles in a 
 court of claims contending for their right of bear- 
 ing a towel or a pair of spurs at a coronation. In 
 vain may the unhappy object of their attentions 
 wish them at the devil. It is their "perquisite," 
 not his luxury, and the thing is done for the doer's 
 sake. Custom ordained a hamperful of goodies and 
 physic whenever a Duchess of Allonby went among 
 her subjects for the first time. 
 
 "You may go in an old frock and a waterproof 
 later on," said Mary, as she stepped in after her 
 friend. Augusta sighed and took the reins. Mr. 
 Raif and a man in livery were in the rear. 
 
 62
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 The drive in the fresh air, stirred by a rush from 
 a gap in the distant hills and cooled by a recent 
 shower, was exhilarating. The road was all vistas 
 contrived by centuries of landscape-gardening on 
 the grand scale. The village looked as blandly 
 beautiful as a mezzotint. Where the red tile failed, 
 brown thatch continued the curves of the exqui- 
 sitely broken line. A glory of honeysuckle and 
 other climbers covered window and porch; the gar- 
 den patches were in their later and richer bloom. 
 A lady, apparently on her travels in search of the 
 picturesque, rose from her easel and bowed as the 
 duchess passed. The children were still at their 
 lessons, but a shuffle of feet as the carriage skirted 
 the school seemed to betoken the spontaneous dis- 
 ruption of a class. Their mothers meekly awaited 
 developments in the gloom of interiors, as though 
 following some ritual of becoming behavior for 
 the Last Day. 
 
 Mr, Raif made a good showman. The carriage 
 stopped here and there as he gave the word, and 
 the duchess saw tidy homes adorned with chromo- 
 lithographs of the royal family, bright furniture, 
 and clean-aproned matrons bobbing reverence from 
 the knees, for want of mastery of the art of lateral 
 extension. It distressed her. "Please don't be so 
 respectful," she said at first, until she saw that, 
 with their training, it gave them even more embar- 
 rassment to withhold than her to accept. Then she 
 yielded with one sigh more. And besides, resis- 
 tance was not in the spirit of a scene which 
 
 63
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 seemed to put to shame the placard of a county 
 paper outside the grocer's shop announcing battle, 
 murder, and sudden death in other parts of the 
 earth. 
 
 At a turn of the road a bent figure of age came 
 in sight. It was the octogenarian Skett, the broken- 
 down navvy whose acquaintance as one of the non- 
 descripts of village life we have already made. He 
 dragged himself homeward with the help of his 
 two walking-sticks and of a pair of lower limbs 
 which seemed ready at any moment to strike work 
 for life. 
 
 "Poor old man!" cried her Grace, reining in 
 the ponies. "Open the hamper, James, and see 
 what you think he would like." 
 
 "Quite unnecessary, duchess," said Mr. Raif, 
 rather hastily; "he is well provided for, and I 'm 
 afraid he is not much of a man for dainties." 
 
 "Tell me something about him." 
 
 "There is really little to tell. He was a good, 
 honest, hard-working fellow in his day, though not 
 very saving, I 'm afraid; and we do what we can 
 for him now." 
 
 "What do you do?" 
 
 "I don't quite know," returned Mr. Raif, in 
 some confusion, "but I can easily find out." 
 
 "And where is your cottage, old man?" said her 
 Benevolence perhaps by way of protest against 
 that tyranny of the middleman which is the curse 
 of our time. 
 
 But Mr. Raif was not easily baffled. "He lives 
 
 6 4
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 alone; and I am afraid your Grace might hardly 
 care" 
 
 "It ain't nor a stone 's-throw, neyther," piped 
 Samson, "if anybody 's a mind to come and see 
 a f eller-creetur. " There was desperation in his 
 manner; the vision splendid was not to be suffered 
 to fade without a struggle for better acquaintance. 
 
 "May I come?" said the duchess. 
 
 "And thank you kindly, if you don't mind walk- 
 ing," returned this more terrible infant of second 
 infancy: "you got good legs." 
 
 The duchess evidently bore no malice; Mr. Raif 
 looked unutterable horror. 
 
 It was one of a row of brick-built cottages in 
 the execrable taste of most modern work of this 
 kind. They formed a sort of back street for the 
 village, and their manifest avoidance of all out- 
 ward display bore the suggestion that even in Slo- 
 cum there was something not meant to meet the eye. 
 Their sites were part of a clearance made by the 
 old duke in accordance with the general policy of 
 keeping down population by keeping down house- 
 room. But the old duke had cut it too fine, and 
 had destroyed so rashly that his successor had been 
 obliged to build again to house his own laborers. 
 Still the area of ruin exceeded the area of restora- 
 tion; and the population of Slocum was smaller 
 in our period than it had been at the close of the 
 middle ages. It had finally attained to that state 
 of perfect numerical balance which is the glory of 
 the statistical tables of France. The governing
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 idea of the modern scheme of architecture was the 
 upturned box with holes in it, the smaller openings 
 as windows, the larger as doors. A lower box, if 
 it may be so described, was the day-room, an upper 
 the bedroom, and the two made a building which 
 might serve to remind a Chicago sky-scraper of the 
 modesty of its origin. The doors were an unneces- 
 sarily close fit for the inquisitive figures by whom 
 they were now filled. One of the latter, Mrs. Arti- 
 fex, seeing what company Samson was about to en- 
 tertain, now came into his cottage to "speak up 
 for him" in conjunctures wherein his own modesty 
 or his own courage as a petitioner for charitable fa- 
 vors might be expected to fail. The principle im- 
 ported a future exchange of good offices of the 
 same sort on his part. 
 
 His room was untidy. It was the penalty of 
 age and infirmity with him, as with most of his 
 neighbors. Their partners were mostly in the 
 churchyard. Their young people had gone to fight 
 for themselves in the world. The old were the mere 
 wastage of the settlement, kept there only because 
 they refused to enter the workhouse, and on a 
 scanty allowance of outdoor relief by which the 
 guardians made a reasonable bargain for the rate- 
 payers. 
 
 Samson's way of doing the honors was all his 
 own. 
 
 "Sit ye down, my loidy; here be old Sam Skett 
 a-waitin' his call all that 's left on him, all that 's 
 left!" 
 
 66
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Remember where you are, Skett," said Mr. 
 Raif, severely; "that 's hardly the way to speak to 
 her Grace." 
 
 "Oh, please let him speak as he likes," said Au- 
 gusta; "he won't hurt me." 
 
 "You be a beauty, an' no mistake," cried the 
 delighted old man. It was a tribute to moral quite 
 as much as to physical worth. Mr. Raif cast pro- 
 testing eyes upward, and a still more protesting 
 chin. 
 
 It was easy to see that Samson's manners had 
 stood in the way of his advancement in life. He 
 was not one of the courtly poor, and his obtuseness 
 left him beyond the reach of Mr. Raif 's art as an 
 introducer of indigence to the notice of the great. 
 Most of his neighbors in this row were in the same 
 plight. Mr. Raif's choicer specimens were the 
 trained bands of the model village within the do- 
 main, and the select few of Slocum Parva whom he 
 had just left. These had become, under his tui- 
 tion, as sleek as any peasants in old china. Poor 
 Skett was but the ignoble savage of the rural scene. 
 He was still magnificent in his ruin a giant in 
 beam, well-nigh as broad as long, and not short at 
 that. And nature seemed again to assert his bro- 
 therhood with the ox in the great flat face, and in 
 the neck all dewlapped with wrinkles. The blue 
 eye, bleared though it was with age, betokened the 
 Frisian peasant of almost pure descent. His brown 
 skin was a diaper of the seams of age and toil which 
 made him look like something in rhinoceros hide. 
 
 6 7
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 His history was that of many an English laborer 
 of his day. He was one of the earth-men of our 
 railway age, and he had left his lasting mark on the 
 planet with pick and shovel. He had read nothing, 
 for the best of all reasons, thought nothing, 
 hoped nothing, but had just dug, fed, and slept. 
 It was enough for pride. " Worked on the first 
 railway made in this warld," he piped, ''an* worked 
 all over the country after that, Aye, an' my own 
 brother went to a place called France an' Spain to 
 make more railways there under Muster Middle- 
 massold Middlemass whose son 's a lord now. 
 You '11 find that reet." 
 
 "What a fine strong man you must have been!" 
 said the duchess. 
 
 The compliment gave Sally an opening for the 
 neighborly office of the song of praise. "Aye, your 
 Grace, 'e wur a good un in 's time could wheel six 
 'undredweight. 'Is old feyther wur a good un too. 
 Made nothin' o' liftin' up a 'undred in each 'and." 
 
 "Aye, an' used to win beer wi' it," muttered 
 Samson, as though editing her with notes. 
 
 "Well, this 'ere man 'e could lift fifty more. 
 'Never give in' that was 'is motter; 'e was real 
 cruel at 's work. Took a job on the roads when 'e 
 'ad to give up his navvyin', an' one day, when 
 'e wur over seventy, they finds 'im lyin' in a faint 
 beside 's load o' stone." 
 
 "I 'ad n't give in, mind yer," annotated Samson. 
 "I 'd been knocked out o' time. Ricked ma back- 
 that 's what a did." 
 
 68
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Aye," interposed Sally; "an' thowt nothin' o' 
 buttin' 'is 'ead through the panel of a door, in 's 
 prime. ' ' 
 
 "Don't you tell tales out of school," said Sam- 
 son, shyly; "young men will be young men." 
 
 It was honored age rebuking an untimely allu- 
 sion to the follies of youth. He felt that it was a 
 generous folly still, and that he had lived it down. 
 
 "Well, I hope you are comfortable now." 
 
 "Two an' six a week from the parish, an' six- 
 pence extry for coals in the bitter weather. Got 
 to be careful rent out of it, and every blessed 
 thing." 
 
 "He 's so lonesome, your Grace," said Mrs. Arti- 
 fex; "that 's the worst on 't. Fell out o' bed 
 t' other night, an' cut 'is face." 
 
 "It war n't nowt," he chuckled. "Why, old 
 Grutt 'e 'urt 'isself same way a month ago, an' he 
 ain't well yet." 
 
 Mr. Raif was manifestly ill at ease. It was not 
 exactly the show for a mistress of Allonby; and 
 he made a move for the door. 
 
 The duchess was content to follow, but she wished 
 first to make the old man a present, and she fum- 
 bled at her purse. There were difficulties. She had 
 yet to attain to full mastery of the value of the 
 coins in it, for the British monetary system is not 
 exactly a thing that comes by the light of nature. 
 If half a crown a week kept him going, it would per- 
 haps be unadvisable to give him so much. But what 
 was half a crown ? It was more bewildering, in the 
 
 6 9
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 circumstances, than Peel's: "What is a pound?" 
 She pecked wildly therefore, at the first thing that 
 came to hand a florin, as it proved. Then how 
 to offer it to him without wounding his self-respect ? 
 With her lifelong associations, she had scruples on 
 this point which had not been wholly overcome by 
 her short experience of European travel. The 
 good things in her hamper were, after all, mere 
 presents of courtesy, if you chose to look on them 
 in that light; but a tip in hard cash to one who 
 had been a workman, and was no tramp of the 
 roadside ! 
 
 "Would you allow me to offer you a little a 
 little change?" she said timidly, slipping the florin 
 into his palm of horn. 
 
 To her intense relief, Samson did not hurl it to 
 the ground with the pride of the free-Horn. He 
 only said, "Thank ye kindly," and fobbed it with 
 the avidity of a Tantalus who has unexpectedly 
 caught a bite. 
 
 Mr. Raif looked vainly round for a diversion, 
 until it came by the mere compulsion of his desire, 
 as they passed one of the honeysuckle cottages on 
 their way to the carriage. 
 
 A neatly dressed girl was standing in the porch, 
 half hidden in its shade, and evidently keeping an 
 eye on the road. 
 
 The duchess whispered to her friend: "Why, 
 surely, Mary, it is your village beauty, Rose- 
 Rose-" 
 
 "Rose Edmer. Oh, is n't it funny! She 's wait- 
 
 70
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ing to catch a glimpse of him on his way home from 
 work ; and she '11 vanish as soon as he comes in sight. 
 She 's dairymaid at Allonby, you know, one of 
 your people, and he a laborer at Kisbye's you re- 
 member George Herion, the young fellow I told 
 you about to-day. Do speak to her, Augusta. She 
 is so sweet." 
 
 It was an unfortunate moment for an introduc- 
 tion, for Rose wanted anything but company, even, 
 as we have seen, the company of George. She was 
 in the earliest and perhaps the most entrancing 
 stage of the divine complaint. George's love for 
 her, admiration for her, was her first initiation into 
 love and admiration for herself. Hitherto she had 
 been a chit of a girl, half aware, or scarcely aware 
 at all, that she was anything out of the common. 
 He had lifted her into the fullness of the realiza- 
 tion of personality, and had brought into her soul 
 the exquisite delight of the feeling that she was 
 part of the beauty of the world. From this came 
 wonder, pride, joy in herself nay, a kind of rev- 
 erence of her own girlhood. Oh, the music of it! 
 All the things she had done before, not knowing 
 there was anything in them, fetching water from 
 the well (he had spoken with a rude rapture of her 
 beauty as she stood there), plucking berries from 
 the garden for the meal, were now sanctified as 
 so many things that gave her a part in life. She 
 had grown from child to essential woman in a night, 
 with the thought of that part. She loved George 
 though as yet she was in no hurry to tell him so 
 
 7 1
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 for loving her. Of course she was in no hurry. 
 What joy to go on forever like this, to be merely 
 courted and adored! 
 
 And, besides, she must not make herself too 
 cheap. There was always that dreadful warning 
 of her mate in the dairy, Silly Jane. Jane, yet 
 little more than a child, had suddenly found love 
 in the confession of a stable-boy of much the same 
 standing, and had forthwith called her playmates 
 about her to make solemn renunciation of childish 
 things. There could be no more hide-and-seek, or 
 skipping-rope: she had a sweetheart now. The 
 ceremony included the refusal of her dinner as a 
 public function. She wanted nothing but a slice 
 of bread and butter, and the right to sing softly to 
 herself all day long. The whole village knew it: 
 it was a jest at the Knuckle of Veal. Then one 
 day, goaded thereto perhaps by the banter of the 
 inn, the stable-boy, without a word of warning, 
 gave a penny to an infant, and told her to seek 
 Silly Jane with the message that he had had enough 
 of her. The message was duly delivered before a 
 whole household, and for a day or two Jane's pa- 
 rents thought it prudent to keep watch on the well. 
 The precaution was unnecessary. Silly Jane re- 
 sumed her dinner and her skipping-rope, not much 
 the worse, except that she was more of a laughing- 
 stock than ever. Better death than that fate for 
 Rose. So, as Mr. Raif opened the garden gate to 
 summon her to the presence of the duchess, she 
 abruptly fled from the porch, and locked herself 
 
 7 2
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 in her chamber, with a determination to die rather 
 than meet any lady in the land. 
 
 Yet, in spite of this agreeable diversion, Mr. 
 Raif's feelings were doomed to yet another shock. 
 The ponies were in full trot for the castle when they 
 showed a disposition to shy at a strange object sur- 
 rounded by awe-struck urchins on the village green. 
 It was a huge covered van of the kind used by 
 traveling showmen ; it was painted in bright aggres- 
 sive yellow, and it bore the announcement of a 
 "Lecture on the Land and the People" for that 
 very night. The mystery was deepened by the cir- 
 cumstance that the vehicle was as yet hermetically 
 closed, and that, having no horse in the shafts, and 
 to all appearance no human being in charge, it 
 gave not a sign of life. 
 
 "What does it mean?" said Mary. 
 
 "Radicals, I am very much afraid," said Mr. 
 Raif. 
 
 73
 
 VIII 
 
 HE yellow van had decidedly 
 stolen a march on Slocum Parva. 
 None paid heed to it as it entered 
 the village, because it looked so 
 much like a van conveying a fat 
 lady to business at a distant fair. 
 But the wiser sort soon saw reason to repent of 
 their indifference. The placards calling for ''the 
 restoration of the land to the people and of the 
 people to the land," and the aggressively displayed 
 opinions of eminent persons on this subject, told 
 their own tale. The worst sign of all was that the 
 vehicle had stopped as on a camping-ground, its 
 driver, after releasing the old horse, having gone 
 off in search of quarters for the night. So much, 
 and no more, was to be learned from the awe-struck 
 urchins beginning to cluster about the door. 
 
 The duchess pulled up, and she was for staying 
 to hear the lecture; but on this point Mary came 
 to the aid of Mr. Kaif : 
 
 "You really mustn't think of such a thing, Au- 
 gusta. It would never do down here. Only fancy 
 a Duchess of Allonby taking notice of a thing like 
 that! Don't you know what it means?" 
 "How can I, until I hear what it says?" 
 
 74
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "I feel sure it would annoy the duke." 
 
 The duchess flicked the ponies without another 
 word, and Slocum Parva was left to the full enjoy- 
 ment of its mystery. 
 
 No sound came from the van for some time, but 
 at length the patience of the youthful watchers was 
 rewarded by an infant's wail within, and finally 
 by the sight of a gentle face at the doorway, as its 
 owner, the wife and mother, offered a penny to any 
 one who would fetch her a pail of water. The ap- 
 parition, however, was too alarming, and it had the 
 momentary effect of dispersing the whole swarm 
 in hasty flight. 
 
 There was really nothing to be afraid of. The 
 little house on wheels was but the mission van of 
 a "movement," and it had come out this year, 
 after its wont, for its village campaign against 
 the feudal system. Its fortunes were nearly always 
 the same apathy and fear on the part of the peas- 
 antry, a contemptuous refusal to fight on the part 
 of the feudal system, and that most plentiful lack 
 of funds which in England necessarily attends un- 
 dertakings still awaiting the patronage of the no- 
 bility. Nobody made anything by the society. Its 
 itinerant lecturers worked for only as much as would 
 keep body and soul together ; but they, and its whole 
 tiny frame, were kept going by a Band of enthusiasts 
 who maintained the subscription lists at a level of 
 mediocrity. It was an interesting situation : on the 
 one hand, a still vigorous growth of law and custom 
 covering all England, and on the other this little 
 
 75
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 thing in yellow, assuredly the tiniest engine of war 
 ever sent out against a giant power intrenched in its 
 pride. For comparison, a catapult against the rock 
 of Gibraltar might serve our turn. 
 
 In due course the lecturer reappeared, and his 
 wife passed the baby to him across the hutch for 
 a run in the open air. He was a tall, well-knit 
 young fellow, with regular features, and with the 
 orator's potential flash in the light of his eye. The 
 whole manner of him betokened a way of managing 
 crowds. He dispersed the returning infants with a 
 peremptory "Be off with you, and tell your fathers 
 to come to the meeting when your mothers have put 
 you to bed," at the same time presenting his wife 
 to the gathering audience with apologies because 
 it was "not a gipsy this time." 
 
 "I 've found a chairman, Amy, and a place for 
 the van, too both birds with one stone. He '11 let 
 us a whole field for the night for eighteenpence, so 
 we sha'n't do badly at that. But there '11 be two 
 miles to travel still." 
 
 "Get it over as soon as you can," said the wife, 
 "or it will be another twelve-o'clock job; and one 
 does bob about so in those fields in the dark. ' ' 
 
 "Anything since I went away?" 
 
 "No, dear; the same jokes about the van." 
 
 "I fancy I hear them now, especially when they 
 are thrown at the window, and only miss it because 
 they are aimed." 
 
 "I think I heard somebody call it a 'yaller-fever' 
 van." 
 
 7 6
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ''That 's new; we must be thankful for small 
 mercies on the road. We 've known what it is to 
 trace the same joke, with local variations, all the 
 way from Land's End to John o' Groat's. 
 Haven't us, old girl?" 
 
 "I think I '11 put baby to bed. She does keep so 
 wakeful, unless she goes off before the chairman's 
 speech." 
 
 The infant, now chasing an inquisitive duck with 
 some prospect of success, was herself chased, cap- 
 tured, and carried into the van, not without pro- 
 tests of the usual kind. Her father, however, soon 
 turned the current of her thoughts by opening the 
 door and bringing out the materials of his platform, 
 which he put in position in front of the van. This 
 done, he gave the child a farewell kiss for the night, 
 and then, closing the door on his family, laid aside 
 the husband and parent to become the tribune of 
 the people. 
 
 His first care was to beckon a rugged figure from 
 the crowd, and, having hauled his man up to the 
 platform, to propose him as chairman of the meet- 
 ing. The election of this functionary was duly put 
 to the assembly, and was supposed to be carried by 
 the remark, "Why, blest if it ain't old Spurr!" 
 The lecturer had made his choice with judgment, 
 for the sight of the familiar form of the farmer of 
 a small patch in the neighborhood, who toiled for 
 all the days of the year, and for all the feasts of the 
 church, to make his rent, had a distinctly reassuring 
 effect on the electorate. They seemed to draw some- 
 
 77
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 what less close to one another and closer to the van. 
 As a mere stranger the lecturer would certainly 
 have lacked magnetism, in spite of his plausible 
 ways. 
 
 The two who drew closest were George Herion 
 and Rose, who had paused in momentary interrup- 
 tion of their evening stroll. These and a few more 
 stood for the modest villainage of the place, while, 
 a little apart from them, Ness the gamekeeper and 
 Constable Peascod seemed to represent the feudal 
 system, vigilant, and perhaps somewhat over- 
 manned. For by their side was Mr. Grimber, the 
 retired tradesman who always supported the landed 
 interest, with Mr. Kisbye, the London gentleman in 
 business who rented the adjacent hall. The latter 
 surveyed the scene from the elevation of horseback, 
 from time to time making suggestive play with his 
 whip-handle on a well-booted leg. 
 
 Mr. Spurr made a model chairman. He showed 
 no disposition to take the bread out of the mouth 
 of the speakers that were to follow him. His ora- 
 torical generalities on the land question were decid- 
 edly a failure, perhaps by reason of his opening 
 statement that in assuming his present position he 
 did not mean no offense to nobody. So many people 
 was poor, and so many was working their 'earts 
 out at the same time, that he thought there might 
 be no 'arm in giving something new a bit of a trial. 
 He did not wish to go beyond that. In the look 
 and manner of him he suggested Job pleading for 
 a dab of ointment, just by way of experiment. If 
 
 78
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 it failed, one would still be strengthened for resig- 
 nation to the sores. 
 
 "A tell you true, neighbors, A cannot make ma 
 rent and fill ma belly. If A don't send every bit 
 to market, A 'm behind 'and, and A 'm sometimes 
 glad to get a lick o' lard for ma bread. So now 
 A '11 ask yew to 'ear this young man." 
 
 None of the country dialect is now pure. The free 
 communication between county and county, and, 
 above all, between county and London, has spoiled 
 all. It is but a hash of the old local form inter- 
 mingled with abundant cockneyisms to spoil the dish. 
 You may hear bits of Somerset in the eastern coun- 
 ties and bits of Northumbrian at the Land's End. 
 It is not even consistent with itself. The same 
 speaker will, almost in the same breath, use one and 
 the same word in its townish setting and in the 
 earlier country one to which he was born. The school 
 boards are more especially responsible for that. 
 
 The lecturer swung into his place, and in a mo- 
 ment or two had got into his stride. He took them 
 all in from beneath pent brows, and seemed to know 
 where to pitch his voice for laughter, and even 
 for a tear at need. "You are a landless people," 
 that was the burden of it, "and while you are land- 
 less you must be poor. If anything happened to 
 your manufactures to-morrow, and something is 
 going to happen before long, you would be on your 
 beam-ends. But the town won't be able to save the 
 country forever, and we shall all starve together if 
 we don't look out." 
 
 79
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Oh, shall we?" 
 
 The interruption raised a laugh, and so, appar- 
 ently, answered the sole purpose of the inevitable 
 wag of the meeting. It was uttered in a kind of 
 squeak, and it might have come from one of a group 
 of stable-boys belonging to the castle. It is impos- 
 sible to be more precise, such was the author's mas- 
 tery of the artifice of "throwing the voice." 
 
 "No other civilized folk in the world is quite 
 such a stranger to its own soil as you are. Some five 
 hundred members of the peerage own a third of the 
 workable acreage of the whole country. The rest 
 of us have to take our luck in a kind of raffle for 
 what is left. Most of the land is kept as a rich 
 man's toy, for ornament and not for use, for parks 
 and gardens, game-preserves, and the devil knows 
 what. A good deal of it is owned by the Stock Ex- 
 change, even when it seems to be owned by the 
 nobility and gentry. These other gentry in the city 
 have too much fellow-creature in the way of busi- 
 ness, and they like to hear the cuckoo for a change. ' ' 
 
 The voice: "Cuckoo!" 
 
 The lecturer, evidently a seasoned campaigner, 
 was not to be stopped in his rush. 
 
 "Most of the big owners can live on their invest- 
 ments in every good thing that is going, from China 
 to Peru. They don't want to live by the land. 
 Even if it 's worked for a profit, it won't keep the 
 three that have to live out of it, owner, farmer, and 
 laborer, so the laboring-man has to go to the wall. 
 He still gets his wages in shillings, in an age when 
 
 80
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 there 's no keeping soul and body together without 
 a bit of gold. Have it or leave it, they don't want 
 you as husbandmen. They lay down the land in 
 pasture, and tell you to go to the towns, and you 
 have to go, -whether you like it or not. I defy you 
 to find a single acre to live on, or to live by, without 
 their good leave. Try to start a business in a vil- 
 lage, or to tickle the fields into a harvest on your 
 own account, and see what they '11 say to you as 
 lords of the soil. How many did Slocum Magna 
 keep in the old days ? "We know it by the records- 
 three times the number it keeps now. Look at the 
 size of the old church." 
 
 The voice, whose method seemed to be simplicity 
 itself : 
 
 "Just look at it now!" 
 
 The chairman: " 'Old yer tongue, will 'ee?" 
 
 It was a little too much, even for the lecturer. 
 
 "One at a time, gentlemen; but flunkies next 
 turn, with all my heart." It won the laugh and 
 peace. 
 
 "The feudal system has come down to you with- 
 out a break, except in its forms, and the new one 
 is worse than the old. The old lord had duties, and 
 he paid for the right of owning his fellow-creatures 
 by finding men and money for the service of the 
 state. The new one has only his rights, and the 
 chief of them is to keep the smoke of a poor man's 
 chimney out of his sight. "What the nobles did not 
 want was left as waste land for the poor, and there 
 was a living to be made out of it. How much is 
 
 81
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 left now? Every inch is mapped and owned and 
 come if you dare! Saxon chiefs or Norman lords 
 in the fullness of their power were not in it with 
 the landowner of to-day. He has got you, body 
 and soul. The parson is actually his nominee, and 
 often his poor relation. The farmers, who are al- 
 most the only employers of labor besides himself, 
 are his tenants at will, and possibly his debtors. 
 The tradespeople of the village rent under him, and 
 even if they don't they can be ruined by his frown. 
 The laborers live in his cottages, and are absolutely 
 at his mercy for the privilege of hiring a bit of al- 
 lotment land hiring, not owning ; mark that well ! 
 He is usually the magistrate ; and so he and his 
 administer the law that should stand between you 
 both." 
 
 He went on without further interruption until a 
 cry of "Daddy!" from the domestic apartments of 
 the van was smothered before it could obtain com- 
 plete utterance. Such as it was, it occasioned an- 
 other break in the magnetic current, and he had to 
 hurry on to save the situation: 
 
 ' ' Till the other day you had less local government 
 in the villages than they had for centuries before 
 and for centuries after the Conquest. But mark 
 this: next spring Slocum Parva is going to elect its 
 first parish council, and to come into line with the 
 rest of the country. Make the most of it. Try to 
 do a little bit for yourselves. Put your own men 
 in, and your own women, too, if you can find any 
 willing to stand, and do your best in your day of 
 
 82
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 small things, hoping that the great will come. Bet- 
 ter late than never. Who '11 stand when the time 
 comes, and who '11 work for it now ? ' ' 
 
 "I 'm your man, master!" cried George Herion. 
 "Put me down." 
 
 The crowd seemed thunderstruck by this unex- 
 pected declaration, and Constable Peascod made an 
 entry in his note-book, as though to take the speaker 
 at his word. Mr. Kisbye glared. It was the only 
 other sign of animation. Not a peasant of them 
 spoke, or even stirred to look at George. The lad 
 had shown some excitement during the speech, but 
 even the few who had noticed it never expected 
 this. He was now, for the moment, awed into si- 
 lence by his own temerity, though he still flushed 
 defiance and resolve. There was intense anguish in 
 the eyes of Kose. The manhood of Slocum Parva 
 at length took courage to pretend to be idly busy in 
 lighting its pipe, while it eyed the constituted au- 
 thority of squire and policeman over the grimy edge 
 of the bowl. Finally Mrs. Artifex ventured on a 
 fatuous "That do seem roight." This, however, 
 was hardly enough for the business of the meeting, 
 and the lecturer resumed : 
 
 "Does anybody want to ask a question?" 
 
 Nobody wanted to ask a question. 
 
 "Does anybody want to oppose?" 
 
 The manhood received this much as it was in the 
 habit of receiving the courteous invitation to try a 
 fall with the wrestler at the local fair. 
 
 The meeting was melting away at its edges. The 
 
 83
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 children, losing their respect for the invader, began 
 to eye the supports of his platform with manifest 
 intent. Mr. Kisbye again tapped his leg, this time 
 as though he loved it. 
 
 "You rascal," he cried, pointing a threatening 
 whip at the lecturer, "I warn you, and I warn all 
 your dupes, that if you do a single illegal act, or 
 say a single illegal word, you '11 hear of it. Peas- 
 cod, keep an eye on that man. As for you, you 
 whelp," turning to George, "never let me see your 
 face again on my place!" 
 
 Perfect silence fell once more on the meeting, and 
 every footfall told as a threat as the speaker rode 
 away. 
 
 "There, George," wailed the poor village beauty, 
 "you 've done it now! And what '11 they say at the 
 castle if they know I was in this night's work?" 
 
 The young fellow looked uncommonly foolish. 
 "My blood was on fire," he said. 
 
 "And I 've caught a chill," cried the girl, trying 
 to frown in pettish displeasure, and then bursting 
 into tears and running away. 
 
 It was again one of those moments, like that 
 which had just passed, when everything seemed to 
 hang on the pure hazard of a lead. The lecturer 
 naturally wished to rally his meeting. He had his 
 short way with the landed interest to propose in the 
 form of a resolution. He had also to thank his 
 chairman in the same manner. But Mr. Kisbye had 
 hardly passed out of sight and hearing when an- 
 other clatter of hoofs came, from the distance this 
 
 8 4
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 time, as though he had only gone to fetch up his re- 
 serves, and a turn of the road brought two of the 
 castle drags in view. 
 
 It was a fragment of the ducal party house and 
 other hurrying back to dress for dinner after a 
 day's shooting; in other words, the feudal system 
 in full trot for the scene of the meeting. The awe- 
 struck villagers could distinguish the Liddicots, 
 Beuceys, Lavertons, Mohants, Neves, and Incledons 
 from the neighboring strongholds of social power, 
 as they sped by, chatting in music on the day's 
 sport. It was the leadership of the land in a nut- 
 shell Parliament, office, military command, satra- 
 pies, wealth, worship, and power in some of their 
 most imposing forms. Herbert Peascod stood at 
 the salute, and most of the others involuntarily fol- 
 lowed his example in their own way. The system 
 was not unobservant of the meeting and of the van, 
 and its laughter, which was not much more than a 
 smile made audible, betokened a turn in the current 
 of thoughts that were still pleasant from first to 
 last. The lecturer, who had gazed with the rest, 
 turned to rally his meeting, but found that the vil- 
 lage green was all his own.
 
 IX 
 
 OW, then, Amy, off we go! Two 
 mile to bedtime." 
 
 The lecturer entered the van on 
 tiptoe, and gazed tenderly at a 
 bundle of bedding securely tied to 
 a shelf. It contained his only child. 
 ''Hasn't she gone off nicely?" said the wife, ad- 
 justing the clothes. "I was afraid when the man 
 on horseback began to shout. Who was he?" 
 
 "Oh, only one of the heathen. She '11 get used 
 to them soon. He cut us out of our vote, though, 
 and out of our sale of literature. If we could have 
 postponed him for five minutes we should have been 
 eighteenpence to the good." 
 
 He put the horse in, while his wife made all tight 
 for the jolting journey before them by extinguish- 
 ing the lamp and wedging it and the crockery into 
 a padded box. 
 
 "Hold tight, Amy! Gee up, Tom!" 
 The vehicle started with a creak, and the wife 
 sat still in the darkness, with one hand on the pre- 
 cious bundle, and the other on a hat-peg. 
 
 Agitators are supposed to revel on the fat of the 
 land, but in truth the public cause has only too 
 little of this delicacy to spare for its rank and file. 
 
 86
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 The Tommys of the social war have as hard a lot as 
 those who carry a musket in the other one ; and they 
 are to be counted happy if the balance of the day's 
 operations leaves them with a whole skin and a ra- 
 tion. They have their liberty, though, or what they 
 take for such, which is just as good. The people on 
 the road grow fewer and fewer, for civilization 
 means a postal address. The wandering Kirghiz, 
 with his tent of felt and his old freedom of the 
 Asian plains, is now circumscribed by law and 
 order; and his pitch, cand count of cattle, have be- 
 come items of entry in the note-book of a Muscovite 
 policeman. The immigrant-wagon has made way 
 for the immigrant-train. Soon the last king of the 
 gipsies, or perhaps the last commoner, for the mon- 
 archs of the tribe generally lead the way into shop- 
 keeping, will boil his last kettle by his last roadside, 
 and sink to obscurity in a slum. Meanwhile the van 
 is the camel of our deserts of mansuetude, and a 
 home of a kind for those prophets of struggling 
 causes who escape stoning only by keeping per- 
 petually on the go. 
 
 The opening of a gate, and a new variety of jolt 
 that marked the change from macadam to grass, 
 showed that they had reached their journey's end. 
 
 Old Spurr, the chairman of the meeting, was in 
 waiting with his lantern; and his wild figure, in 
 the shirt-sleeves which formed the full dress of his 
 everlasting labor, was revealed in rugged effects 
 of light and shade as he guided them to their place 
 for the night. 
 
 87
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Come to back o' t' 'ouse; ye '11 be more out of 
 the way loike in t' other field. He '11 be up early, 
 and sniffin' about." 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 "Squoire Kisbye." 
 
 "What has he to do with it?" 
 
 "Well, if you gets off in good time in the morn- 
 ing, I dussay you '11 never know. Here, tek this," 
 he added with a shamefaced air, laying a small 
 basket on the van. "The wife sent ye a quart o' 
 milk and a few eggs. Need n/t say nothin ' about it, 
 if anybody asks. Ye 're supposed to pay for every- 
 thing here." 
 
 Amy went in to thank her hostess and to com- 
 plete her modest shopping for the day. Meanwhile 
 the horse was taken out of the shafts and turned 
 loose in the field, where, late as it was, he woke the 
 echoes with a thunderous gallop which signalized 
 his sense of freedom. When the wife returned, the 
 old man cried a cheery good night, and the wander- 
 ers were left alone. 
 
 One charm of van life lies in its frequent surprises. 
 It seems to promise nothing, while it offers every- 
 thing by turns. This poor little inclosure of nine 
 feet by seven was, at a pinch, kitchen, dining-room, 
 nursery, and even library and drawing-room, 
 though, as to the last, perhaps it was rather the 
 parlor sitting-room of lodgings at the seaside. It 
 was also a bedroom ; and, for purposes of argument, 
 if not of use, it had even a sort of upper floor, in 
 fact garrets, at a pinch.
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 The housewife now drew forth the kerosene-lamp 
 and the tiny cooking-stove, neither of which could 
 be lighted with safety until the vehicle was at rest. 
 The next thing was to draw the curtains and make 
 all snug. It was not to be done in a moment. 
 There was a window in each of the four sides, and 
 each window had a pair of muslin curtains for the 
 daytime, and of serge for the night. A skylight was 
 left unveiled, on the consideration that the stars 
 were not to be suspected of impertinent curiosity. 
 The windows were but eighteen inches square, and 
 their curtains being cut to measure, they had a 
 ridiculous air of being in short clothes. 
 
 The larder stood confessed in an open cupboard, 
 with crockery and stores of eatables above, and with 
 pots and pans below; and the small stove was soon 
 in full blaze, in so far as the phrase may be used 
 in regard to a volume of combustion positively be- 
 neath the notice of science. The peculiarity of 
 this stove was that it would cook only one thing at 
 a time, and even that but a dish for a table of 
 Lilliput; so, just as the chops were beginning to 
 frizzle, the potatoes were getting cold. The wit of 
 man, or at any rate of that better half of him prin- 
 cipally concerned, had not yet discovered how to 
 serve both dishes together hot and hot. This prob- 
 lem, however, had the touching insistence of an un- 
 realized ideal; and the better half was still busy 
 over it with bent brows, while the other went to tidy 
 up the library. This part of their almost too com- 
 modious dwelling consisted of a set of pigeonholes, 
 
 8 9
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 with shelves sloping downward to prevent the 
 escape of their contents to the floor. Much of the 
 literature of pamphlet used in the propaganda was 
 stored here tract "The Curse of Landlordism," a 
 great favorite, with "The Crux of the Land Ques- 
 tion," "Better Homes for the Workers," "Land 
 Nationalization Why Do We Want It?" and 
 "The Landless Man." Besides these such is the 
 weakness of our nature were a common tobacco- 
 pipe and as common a pouch, with a cigar-box, 
 which, however, was redeemed to finer uses as a 
 receptacle for pen and ink. These things, as the 
 van moved, were perpetually charging forward to 
 the apertures, looking over the dizzy precipice be- 
 low, and then rolling back baffled into the gloom of 
 their caves. The library, as beseemed an institution 
 devoted to the service of the mind, had stretched 
 beyond these narrow limits, and its annex was 
 found at the end of the vehicle, on the same shelf 
 as the bed for the child. The nursery seemed rather 
 dangerously near the garret window, but as the lat- 
 ter remained intact, the infant Amy was probably 
 one of those wingless angels that do not kick in their 
 sleep. In a general way she had certainly come to 
 terms with her environment. Under her mother's 
 brooding gaze, she slept as soundly with the van in 
 motion as with the oratory. Exceptions excepted, 
 the same smile of the better world which she had 
 just left was on her face, whether the house rumbled 
 over fresh cobbles, or some town meeting carried a 
 resolution by the acclamation of a roar. 
 
 9
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "I '11 lay the supper-things now, old girl, if you 
 like." 
 
 "Please." 
 
 This operation involved the conversion of the 
 middle part of the van into a dining-room, by un- 
 folding a couple of deck-stools, and drawing out a 
 table trained to subdue itself to the most demure 
 insignificance by the management of its flaps. 
 
 The chops at least were hot; and, with a little 
 good will, it was easy to treat the potatoes as an ice. 
 They ate their meal to the accompaniment of the 
 regular breathing of the child, visible rather than 
 audible, near as they were to its cot. 
 
 Their puzzle-box was now ready for one change 
 more. It became a bedroom by the simple expedient 
 of emptying a linen-chest, using its lid and a sup- 
 plementary flap with iron supports for the frame 
 of the couch, and drawing a pair of curtains to make 
 all snug within. 
 
 The lecturer went out to smoke his pipe, and finally 
 turned in, after the horse had rubbed good night on 
 his shoulder and received a pat in return. Soon there 
 was perfect quiet in the van, though not exactly 
 perfect peace. The cows in the field, with the curi- 
 osity which is said to be the bane of their sex, could 
 not refrain from approaching the vehicle for pur- 
 poses of exploration. Their deep breathing on the 
 very walls of the tenement would have been of 
 ghostly suggestion at this hour, had any one within 
 been wakeful enough to hear it. But it passed un- 
 noticed, with a direful rattle of their horns when 
 
 91
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 these were caught in momentary entanglement with 
 the wheels. There was indeed something to hear 
 the livelong night, as there always is in the open 
 fields. Nature seems to wake when we sleep, and 
 as her stars are at least more visibly busy, so her 
 creeping and even some of her flying things are 
 more audibly so at night. It is their fear of man 
 perhaps, at any rate on the part of the crawling 
 under-world, that keeps the more timorous creatures 
 astir at unreasonable hours; and earth, that dis- 
 dains him, is notoriously given to all sorts of inop- 
 portune movements. 
 
 Next morning the yellow van had resumed its 
 travels through broad England before the moon- 
 face of Constable Peascod appeared at the gate of 
 the paddock. The child, sitting up in bed, was 
 blowing a penny trumpet as they passed under the 
 walls of Allonby. Nothing happened to the walls. 
 
 9 2
 
 EOEGE followed Rose from the 
 meeting, and contrived to cut her 
 off from her mother's cottage by 
 taking a path which involved a 
 trespass on private grounds. He 
 was just in time. The road was 
 hilly, and she was on the last rise when she found 
 him before her. A few steps more would have 
 brought her in sight of the cottage, and, what is 
 more, the cottage in sight of her. Even as it was, 
 the moon was looking on. 
 
 She was still in high displeasure, and was for 
 passing him without a word. His passionate admi- 
 ration had made a woman of her, with all a woman's 
 claims. She had grown to it in a night and a day, 
 from the wild girlhood of her tousled hair and her 
 rough work at home and farm a spiritual condi- 
 tion till now tempered only by the Sunday-school. 
 The tremendous discovery that she was part of the 
 beauty of the world had come to her quite suddenly, 
 while yet she thought herself but a part of its 
 strength and coarser uses. All her upbringing had 
 fostered this depressing illusion. She had read no- 
 thing, seen nothing but the annual school treat in 
 the castle grounds. The county town was a far 
 
 93
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 country to her ; great London, another world. Then 
 had come this fierce playmate of old to touch her 
 into a new and wholly bewitching sense of person- 
 ality with his rude deference and his honeyed 
 tongue. Something in her had suddenly tamed 
 him into gentleness and the wish to please, where 
 before there had been only the rude give-and-take 
 of the playground. And now, after all this, after 
 the almost mystical change, he could still find 
 time to listen to a mere spouter on the tail-board of 
 a van. To set his blood on fire was surely her glo- 
 rious privilege; and the very essence of the joy it 
 gave was in exclusive rights. The absurdity of the 
 position that all this involved jealousy of a public 
 movement did not wholly escape her, but it only 
 made the matter worse. Her rival was simply a 
 wretched handbill, not even any accredited obstacle 
 in flesh and blood. Added to this was the humilia- 
 tion of the burst of tears which had betrayed so 
 much. Could she ever forgive herself or him? 
 
 "Rose!" 
 
 "Keep your own side o' the road now. You no 
 business this side ; you know it as well 's me. ' ' 
 
 This observation, which seems more properly to 
 belong to an altercation of carters, was still very 
 much to the purpose. It was a maxim of the com- 
 mon law of Slocum, in matters social, that young 
 people of opposite sexes who wished to avoid scan- 
 dal should keep opposite sides of the road. Even 
 lovers respected it. For all who were not in that 
 relationship it was obligatory. To ignore it was 
 
 94
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 to be "talked about." The roads were narrow, 
 perhaps a considerate highway board had in this 
 way tempered the wind to the shorn lamb, but, 
 such as they were, travelers of this critical standing 
 were expected to keep their left and right, though 
 they might be going the same way. It implied no 
 very flattering estimate of peasant manners, per- 
 haps, but that was as it might be. The local Pyra- 
 mus and Thisbe, who respected themselves and the 
 code, had always between them this wall of atmo- 
 spheregenerally a wall of darkness too, through 
 which their confidences were as those of the wan- 
 dering voice. If in the present instance the barrier 
 of obscurity was wanting, that was the fault of the 
 moon. 
 
 It was a beautiful scene. The plantations on each 
 side rose and fell with the road; and their timber- 
 crowned heights and masses of bracken in the hol- 
 lows dear to the birds who were so soon to die were 
 full of mystery. It was anybody's landscape seen 
 in this light, though it lay in the heart of ordered 
 England, with all its measurements recorded in a 
 hundred deeds of settlement or parish rolls. A wild 
 man of the woods might have seen something to re- 
 mind him of home in its solid swaths of impenetra- 
 ble shade, with here and there a tremulous speck of 
 silver in the open as the brook caught a ray from 
 above. And, after all, in spite of the records, it 
 was perhaps as wild and unspoiled as nature had 
 left it. The road, with its fence and its hedge, was 
 about the only thing of human handiwork. Wild 
 
 95
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Celtic persons had probably sought vale and slope 
 on this very business now in hand. The Roman sol- 
 dier at his post hard by may have cursed the luck 
 that kept him a prisoner in this hole of an island 
 while the nut-brown girl in the Campagna was con- 
 soling herself with the other man. 
 
 "Just you keep your own side!" 
 
 "Not me; I want to see you near. Oh, Rose, 
 you 're the prettiest girl in all this world." 
 
 "T ain't likely." 
 
 It was her way of saying that flatteries would not 
 serve. We must excuse a certain want of art on 
 both sides. Thus they say sweet things, and thus 
 they reject them, in the real Arcadia. The proud 
 setting of earth and sky seems to touch it into 
 beauty in spite of all. 
 
 "Well, I never used to think so, sure," said the 
 swain. "It seemed to come to me, loike, all of a 
 sudden. Lord, I never thowt nothin' of ye, Rose, 
 when we used to go to school." 
 
 "An* I never thought nothin' o' you no time: 
 that 's all the difference." 
 
 "What a little tomboy you was! D'ye remember 
 how I pulled your 'air, one day, when you collared 
 my hoop ? You got it done so nice now. ' ' 
 
 "You are a silly sheep, no mistake baa, baa!" 
 
 "I could chop off my 'and for it now, I could. 
 I can't tell what make me feel so. Maybe it 's the 
 long frocks." 
 
 "Gone foolish over a print gownd! I should be 
 'shamed to say so, if I was a young man."
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "No, it ain't that, either. It 's a somethin'-like 
 in your eyes, an' in the way you holds yourself. I 
 often lays awake o' nights wonderin' what it is. 
 The fellers 'u 'd laugh at me about it, if they was n 't 
 afraid o' gettin' punched. Oh, Eose, you are a 
 beauty, no mistake. I could say my prayers to ye. ' ' 
 
 "That 's wicked. People ha' been struck dead 
 in the Bible for less." 
 
 "It can't be. I never felt so good since I was 
 a little kid. No gammon, Rose. I think you 're 
 right about the sheep, though, all the same. I feel 
 silly-like ; an ' then, along wi ' that, I feel strong. I 
 could punch anything, I could, if you was lookin' 
 on. I seem to be walkin' about on buttercups. 
 Don't you go an' tell nobody, to make a laughin'- 
 stock o' me, or I '11 kill 'em. Oh, it 's the funniest 
 feelin' I ever had in my life. Eose, you must have 
 me: I '11 die if you don't." 
 
 What it lacked in fascination was made up by 
 the kindly mother watching over all the stars quite 
 intent upon the scene in spite of their having so 
 much to do elsewhere, the music of the nether-world 
 in the faint stirrings of leaf and flower in the breeze 
 and the fainter of creeping things, just as much in- 
 terested, in their way, as their betters ab'ove. 
 
 The night was in their souls; but one of them, 
 at least, hardly knew it. The peasant misses a 
 good deal in using his skies only as a weather sign. 
 His mate is often better advised. 
 
 "It 's the fine evenin' make you feel so," said 
 the girl, as though she were commiserating a sudden 
 
 97
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 cold. She strove for sarcasm, but achieved only 
 tenderness and pity in spite of herself. "Daytime 
 you don 't care for me. ' ' 
 
 "Why?" he asked fiercely, and crossing over to 
 his own side. 
 
 "Takin' up with a common showman. Ain't 
 that enough? Why, he '11 be gone to-morrer, miles 
 away; an' then where '11 you be? He 's got no 
 work to give away." 
 
 "I don't care about that. I '11 find work for 
 myself. ' ' 
 
 "What work? George, George! What can such 
 as us do when we 've offended the big folks?" 
 
 "I '11 go on the road." 
 
 "Go on the road!" she echoed faintly. 
 
 "Yes; there 's more things to peddle than little 
 tracts about the land pots and pans and kettles, 
 knives and forks, needles and thread, candles and 
 calico, tea and sugar. I '11 be a general shop on 
 wheels that 's what I '11 be. I 've thought over it 
 dozen o' times when I been thinkin' of you. 
 There 's a fortune in it. Why, there ain't no place 
 nearer than Randsford, if you want a gridiron! 
 I '11 take the villages for twenty mile round Allon- 
 by. It 's a fortune, sure ! I can do anything in all 
 the world if you '11 only put your 'and in mine." 
 
 No knight of old could have been prouder on his 
 quest of giant or dragon or holy cup; no man of 
 our day in his boast of a high ambition in church 
 or state. All 's relative: for the scale of Slocum 
 Parva, George Herion was a hero of romance. 
 
 9 8
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 It was entrancing in its perspective of high des- 
 tinies, but she dared not trust herself to believe in 
 it too soon. And, besides, she felt real alarms. 
 Public opinion would the gossips approve and 
 support? Her mother? 
 
 "You couldn't never do it, George. How are 
 you goin' to get your license? Oh, it is a big world 
 to fight in that way, an' no mistake." 
 
 "I '11 do it, no fear, if you '11 say yes." 
 
 "George, I 'm frightened for ye only for that. 
 Can't you wait?" 
 
 "Wait! What for to see if Mr. Kisbye '11 take 
 me back again?" 
 
 "Never that, George, with my will. And you 
 know it." 
 
 "Well, then, wait for what? Wait or starve? 
 Starve an' p'r'aps lose you! No; I '11 have your 
 promise now, or I '11 go many a long mile afore I 
 see you again if ever I do." 
 
 She paled, even in the moonlight. "Many a long 
 mile." 
 
 "Rose, mark my words; there's goin' to be 
 fightin' in that there place they call Africa. You 
 remember; we 've sung it out on the maps many a 
 time. There '11 be fightin' to see which is best 
 man, the Queen or old Krujer. That 's where I '11 
 go, and good-by to your sojer-boy!" 
 
 It was decisive. Swiftly came over her the horror 
 of the thought that her unkindness might drive him 
 to his death ; and, death or not, that, with him gone, 
 life would fall into abysses of spiritual solitude and 
 
 99
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 spiritual insignificance from which she could never 
 pluck it out. There could be no life now without 
 him to cleave to, him to cleave to her. 
 
 She was on his side of the road now, and the vil- 
 lage Grundy missed the chance of a lifetime. She 
 crossed to where he stood facing her, on the little 
 bridge that spanned the gully, and threw herself 
 sobbing on his Breast. Then, suddenly raising her 
 head, she returned his kiss of passion, and ran home 
 without another word. 
 
 He did not try to follow her. He sat down on the 
 stone parapet, looked up at the sky, and for the first 
 time in his life saw that it was something more 
 than a barometer. His whole soul was in that 
 tumult of the sense of being which we reach in its 
 fullness but once or twice in a lifetime. Nature is 
 chary of the experience, for it is a revelation of her 
 innermost secret. The great experiences will alone 
 do it great music, great love. And with this came a 
 sense of the inadequacy of the thing revealed. It was 
 not great enough for his superlative mood rich 
 enough, full enough. If he had known how, he could 
 have cried out with the lover in the German song : 
 
 "Earth, hast thou no fairer flowers 
 
 Than these to show? 
 Sky, hast thou no orbs of fire 
 
 That brighter glow? 
 My heart 's so full of happiness, 
 
 It must, it will, o'erflow!" 
 
 So here we have a plowboy quite a common 
 plowboy touched with gentleness, poetry, religion, 
 
 100
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 and all because a dairymaid, the right dairymaid, 
 though a common one still, has given him a kiss. 
 Eeally, really, it is almost enough to make one be- 
 lieve that your one valid introduction to the whole 
 circle of arts and sciences is immortal love. 
 
 101
 
 XI 
 
 T was Augusta's first house-party 
 at Allonby a great trial. She 
 was responsible as hostess, and a 
 mere onlooker, as one new to the 
 whole thing. If her first country 
 season failed, she failed with it. 
 To make it succeed, she had to keep hundreds of 
 persons amused, in relays counted by the score, for 
 weeks at a stretch. A great gathering of this kind 
 is, no doubt, Liberty Hall, but it must still offer 
 only a freedom of choice in enchantments. And 
 for these the host and hostess are responsible, say 
 what you will. Whatever happens, their guests are 
 never to know a moment of weariness, except by 
 their own default. Think of the responsibilities of 
 it, as a sort of variety-show in excelsis, with light- 
 ning changes of program, and something to suit 
 everybody's taste. 
 
 And all tastes were there: of statesman, soldier, 
 sportsman, artist, light of literature, and mere man 
 or woman of the world some of them doubling 
 their parts with the sport. They came down in 
 sets, for three or five days, usually the former; and 
 for each in his turn Allonby was to be a realized 
 fairy-tale. Augusta had never dreamed of the like 
 
 102
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 of it, for the descriptions accessible to her had 
 failed altogether in their rendering of its atmo- 
 spheric effects. What she wanted to do was stand 
 in the corner and look on, in speechless curiosity, 
 at the best of England, and even of the rest of the 
 world, in its best moment of social expansion. 
 What she had to do was take her place as leader of 
 the revels, and give the note. The task might have 
 been beyond her powers but for precious aid. Aunt 
 Emily was there, as duenna, for counsel in the 
 higher proprieties; and, for the others, there were 
 any number of the ministers of household state who 
 held office under the duke. Happily, both ministers 
 and their masters are permitted to qualify by a 
 sort of impartial ignorance of the work of depart- 
 ments. Allonby could only be governed like an 
 empire, it was such a big affair. For her first sea- 
 son, at any rate, our duchess, nee Augusta Gooding, 
 was content to do as she was told, and she was as 
 submissive to her bureaucracy as a sultan or a 
 czar. 
 
 The style of it, the luxury, the wealth, the very 
 extravagance well, no words will serve! As in 
 London the triumph of entertaining is to make ex- 
 tremes meet by bringing the fruits of summer to 
 the winter board, so here you have to overcome the 
 natural quiet of a scene formed for introspection 
 and repose by the importation of all the bustle of 
 town. Out of its season, Allonby was as magnifi- 
 cently dull as a peak in the Andes. It was a peak 
 itself, for that matter, but a host of the most bril- 
 
 103
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 liant figures were to dance on it in the most glitter- 
 ing panoply of revel, with nothing to put them 
 out of countenance but the occasional solemnity of 
 the sky. What a business to get the right people, 
 and to put them in the way of keeping each other 
 amused! As Augusta sped or failed in this task, so 
 might the family influence wax or wane in the 
 remotest parts of the earth. For every parting 
 guest took his report to the next house of call on 
 his ceaseless round of pleasure, until it became smok- 
 ing-room talk in Ultima Thule, and giant headline 
 in the neighborhood of the Golden Gate. 
 
 It was an unusually large party this year because 
 of the marriage. The fame of the duke's strange 
 adventure in love had gone forth, and every one 
 wanted to see his conqueror. The tiny station could 
 hardly cope with the traffic, fortified as the manager 
 was by the assistance of an emergency gang. At 
 night, especially, it suggested the arrival of distin- 
 guished company in Hades, with its many cries in- 
 dicative of souls in travail, and strange flashings of 
 light in the gloom. For every newcomer had to be 
 supplied with carriage accommodation according to 
 his needs, even if these went no higher than the 
 station fly ; and many, as an additional courtesy due 
 to sex or rank, exacted a ducal carriage, with a 
 brake for the piles of luggage that strewed the plat- 
 form. The luggage was distracting. The men's 
 was bad enough in its litter of the gear of sport. 
 The women's well, it is only to be imagined in its 
 lavish provision for three or four complete toilets 
 
 104
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 a day, and no day like the last. And with many of 
 them came their body-servants: the English valets; 
 the French maids watching over huge sarcophagi of 
 basket-trunks, or grasping headless "shapes" in 
 palls of brown holland which seemed to have been 
 denied a portion of their funeral rites. For the mo- 
 ment the maids were more in evidence, as they 
 clubbed their way through the press with jewel- 
 cases and hardly less precious dressing-bags which 
 they kept in their own charge. The servants, of 
 course, had to be lodged as well as their betters; 
 and their life in the great cavernous halls below 
 stairs was only less wondrous in character and va- 
 riety than the life above. The others seemed to 
 claim every nook of the vast superstructure for the 
 needs of their state in bedrooms, dressing-rooms, 
 and even sitting-rooms for the married pairs. 
 
 The stately and elaborate routine of it begins 
 from the moment they enter the castle gates. To- 
 morrow most of the men go after partridges, and 
 most of the women after the devices of their own 
 hearts. The pheasant remains sacred and inviolate 
 till the first of the next month. It is still being 
 coddled for the gun in its preserves of rich 
 bracken watched against poachers for the early 
 market by men who lie out all night; fed, almost 
 as with a spoon, with huge smoking messes of In- 
 dian corn which the keepers carry to its haunts, 
 whistling a call to dinner as they go. The shooting 
 people are early afoot, and they breakfast by them- 
 selves. The regular meal is later, when the ladies 
 
 105
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 come down in charming morning toilets, and the 
 ladies' men are in attendance. The meal is wholly 
 devoid of form. The guests straggle down in any 
 order of time that pleases them, and, as often as not, 
 help themselves from the sideboard to the more solid 
 fare. They eat as our ancestors ate in the German 
 woods; and no one smirks, hands a dish, or takes 
 any ceremonial notice of his neighbor. You are per- 
 fectly free in every respect, even to fast or feast in 
 your own room. 
 
 Some of the ladies will presently change to tweeds 
 to join the guns, perhaps to take a shot, if they like. 
 The duchess draws the line here in her duties of 
 patronage, but not for want of knowledge of the 
 game. She can go as straight to the mark on a 
 target as the others on a bird. The wild life of the 
 woods has been about her from childhood, but she 
 has never drawn trigger on a living thing. But, 
 now and then, she joins the shooting-parties at their 
 luncheon in field or farm-house, wherever the pro- 
 gram of the day's sport may lead. The meal is 
 sometimes spread in one of the little rustic lodges 
 that dot the domain. It is Watteau without the ar- 
 tificiality, if also without the rather incongruous 
 grace. The birds are the business. Every incident 
 of this part of the day, new to Augusta's eyes, at- 
 tests the pomp and circumstance of sport: the 
 lordly keepers, rulers of the hour; the obedient 
 "guns"; the silent line all working to signs, lest a 
 bird should hear a whisper or a footfall where it 
 is presently going to die to something like a roar of 
 artillery; the rustic beaters driving the game on to 
 
 1 06
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 its fate, and their hang-dog air as of creatures who 
 have all their lives been driven on to theirs in much 
 the same way all so manifestly a growth of law, 
 custom, class supremacy, and class pride, maturing 
 through centuries of time. 
 
 The other arts of life must await their turn till 
 the tea-hour unites most of the party at the castle 
 perhaps in the vast hall, for the greater freedom 
 of movement and incidentally the greater brilliancy 
 of effect. Augusta is here again, in another change 
 of toilet, and as a matter of duty the only one in 
 bonds, because it is her part to see that the others 
 have their perfect liberty. For, if they do not like 
 any of these things, they may sketch the ruins, bury 
 themselves in the library, play billiards, ride, drive, 
 or what not, or even take a nap. It is her part to 
 see that they have no hindrance in such pursuits, 
 especially in the subtlest and most disagreeable 
 form of a too manifest solicitude for their comfort. 
 In fact, she has to make everything occur accord- 
 ing to desire for everybody, without seeming to have 
 any hand in the matter. The dowager is invaluable 
 here, and not the least so with her occasional "My 
 dear, just let 'em alone." Most of them uncon- 
 sciously second her efforts by their usage of the 
 mode of life, and by their knowledge of their own 
 minds. For the burden of ceremony in England you 
 must attend a tea in the suburbs with muffins for 
 four. At this reunion it is soothing, to Augusta at 
 least, to find that women do enter a little more fully 
 into the scheme of things. Some sports, like some 
 faiths, do not tend to give the sex an indispensable 
 
 107
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 part in life. Manu, it is said, was produced without 
 female assistance, and was but an emanation of the 
 austerities of prayer. Live and let live: for one 
 half of the world, at least, it can never be his best 
 title to regard. 
 
 After tea it is again Liberty Hall till the first 
 bell sounds for dinner, when you enter into com- 
 munity life. It is much the same with the hours 
 that immediately follow. Nothing seems to happen 
 by contrivance, but everything occurs at the right 
 time even the impromptu charades. Augusta 
 knows. The artists from the Frangais who have 
 come down from London for the duologue are ad- 
 mittedly a matter of pecuniary arrangement, but 
 they are received on a footing of social equality 
 with a nuance which might leave all but themselves 
 ignorant of the fact. The thought-readers, though 
 they seem so spontaneous, are a put-up job. The 
 dowager suggested the man of letters who is now 
 writing his autograph. Her life is spent in little 
 services of this sort, and she prides herself on being 
 able to "get" anybody in the world of notoriety 
 that the world of fashion may at any moment wish 
 to see. All she asks is a little backing from those 
 in whose interest she labors. "Certainly I can get 
 him if you want him ; but you must take the trouble 
 to read one of his writin's. It makes him look like 
 a fool ; and, if that does n 't so much matter, only 
 think of me ! It is so awkward to have people starin' 
 at him, and talkin' about the weather, as if he was 
 a mere gun." 
 
 1 08
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 The duke is proud of his wife's success, and it is 
 unquestionable. There is not the slightest difficulty 
 with the old families. Their own claims of birth 
 are much more modest than other persons, who have 
 none, are disposed to make for them. And besides, 
 the duke's pleasure would be enough, if Augusta's 
 modesty, good sense, and self-reliance were not there 
 to keep her armed at every point. She always has 
 the tone, if sometimes she may lack the manner, of 
 their august order. 
 
 For all that it is hard to avoid embarrassment 
 when one of her own coroneted countrywomen taste- 
 fully invites her assent to the proposition that only 
 blood tells. 
 
 The duke looks uneasy, but smiles, which is some- 
 times his way of showing that he is annoyed. 
 
 ' ' Blood ? ' ' returns his wife. ' ' There are so many 
 varieties. ' ' 
 
 "I mean the blue," says her friend. 
 
 "Some of that," observes Augusta, sweetly, "re- 
 minds one of the advertisement of the writing-fluid. ' ' 
 
 "I never read advertisements." 
 
 "Blue in the first impression only, Hut mere black 
 at last." 
 
 "I was speaking of society." 
 
 "And I," retorted Augusta, "was thinking of the 
 seventy-odd millions of the United States." 
 
 "I regret to say that I have not so many 
 on my visiting-list. It is my misfortune, but 
 it might be awkward when it came to shaking 
 hands." 
 
 109
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Once the Boman women were horny-handed; 
 and the world went pretty well then." 
 
 "I dare say; and once, no doubt, the American 
 woman made cheeses." 
 
 "I hope she makes them still: it may be useful 
 at a pinch." 
 
 "Quite out of fashion, I assure you." 
 
 "More 's the pity. Let us keep up our faith in 
 American ideas. I still like to think that, as soon 
 as we Ve found out how to heat the water in Boston 
 harbor, there '11 be afternoon tea for the universe." 
 
 The duke chuckles; and what can his wife want 
 more? 
 
 The people know each other, that is the great 
 point, and they blend. They meet so often at this 
 or other houses that they all seem to belong to one 
 great family. Yet they are deliciously catholic in 
 their tastes, interests, and ways of life. They have 
 a selectness of habit, training, and privilege rather 
 than of race, and they very much answer to the de- 
 scription of that most ancient of aristocracies who 
 had great domains, spoke a separate language, and 
 were held incapable of crime. The particularism 
 in the mode of speech may go no further than slang ; 
 but there it is as a sign of independence. They are 
 a law unto themselves. Apart from those of their 
 order who merely make a dash at it, and then run 
 back to work, they form a class who live to purely 
 recreative ends, and they are apt to die with some- 
 thing like a feeling of resentment at the carelessness 
 of Providence. 
 
 I 10
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Their life has been magnificently organized for 
 active indolence by the labor of ages. They are 
 after the partridge now ; presently they will be after 
 the stag or the fox-cub, the salmon, or anything else 
 to their mind in water, earth, or air. It is house- 
 party after house-party, with London in between 
 for a sort of snap shot of a winter season, or south- 
 ern Europe or the Nile, and the strenuous toil of 
 pleasure all the way. They believe that most people 
 that is to say, the mass of mankind not in their 
 set are but half alive, and feel as sorry for them 
 as we all do for the babies born in that condition in 
 the slums. To keep up the sense of vitality, they 
 shrink from no experience that offers the promise 
 of a sensation. 
 
 One of the countesses keeps a bonnet-shop in 
 Bond street by deputy, of course, but still without 
 any attempt to conceal the matter from her own 
 set. Another dabbles in socialism ; not that she be- 
 lieves in it, for she believes in nothing in particular ; 
 but it is at least an experience and a pose. And 
 then she is so absolutely ignorant of the a-b-c of her 
 heresy that even the National Democratic Federa- 
 tion might be moved to tears. It is only baby, and 
 the gun is not charged. A little raconteur of stand- 
 ing, of that tattling sex which physiologists now say 
 is the male, tells stories of his order that even so- 
 cialists might like to hear. The rule of the profes- 
 sional secret makes it all safe. An informal dance 
 may belong to the amusements of this hour, but as 
 a rule the men are too dead beat after their day's 
 
 I I I
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 work with the gun for anything of that sort. They 
 revive for the smoking-room when the ladies have 
 left for the night, and there they swap the lies of 
 anecdote until the small hours of the morning. 
 "When it is not scandal it is the rigor of the game 
 in sport: pointer or retriever, the old style against 
 the new; aiming with only one eye open, or with 
 both, one school maintaining that nature has shown 
 her wonted prodigality in the supply of this organ ; 
 schools of shooting ; have your guns cut to measure, 
 though you buy your coats ready-made; soft shot, 
 chilled shot, hard shot; how best to lay out a wood 
 for a day's sport; poachers, polecats, pin-fires; and 
 so on until the head fairly spins with it, if one is 
 not to the manner born. 
 
 On Sunday the birds have a day off, and time to 
 count their missing friends. Their enemies go to 
 church, stroll through the stables, the kennels, and 
 even the picture-galleries, if they can find time for 
 the last without any breach of the divine ordinance 
 of repose for the day. 
 
 All this to make a poor young duchess feel that 
 the world is a bigger and a stranger place than is 
 dreamed of in the philosophy of the geography 
 class, bigger even than the all outdoors of her wild- 
 est conceptions. Her brain throbs with the sense 
 of it. What a wonderful scene! And what won- 
 derful things she is going to do in it, and for it, 
 as lady of Allonby ! They marveled as much at her. 
 She had made no mistakes worth mentioning, 
 though her talk beat a book. 
 
 I 12
 
 xir 
 
 HE duchess is driving over to 
 luncheon at Liddicot, one of the 
 moated halls that still survive in 
 this amazing land. 
 
 Sir Henry Liddicot at home is 
 the British squire in his most rare 
 and precious and exquisite survival. For a full 
 thousand years the family has been there, not 
 precisely at Liddicot Manor, of course, but there 
 in ownership, and in the county in settlement 
 one race winning, holding, and sitting tight. The 
 Conquest was an innovation to them. They read of 
 Norman William, as one might say, in their morning 
 papers, wondering what was up now, and feeling full 
 sure it would not be very much. The rumor of his 
 ship-building was brought to them by runners from 
 the south, and they set out with their quota to join 
 the Saxon king in obedience to royal messages from 
 the north. They were a most respectable family 
 in Alfred's time, and they had shaken their heads 
 over the extension of the empire when a later king 
 took Manchester. Dim rumors of the Mohammedan 
 invasion of India were brought by pious pilgrims to 
 the ale-bench of their hall fire. 
 
 Their halls, of course, have changed since then. 
 They have been rebuilt half a dozen times in every 
 
 8
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 style of domestic architecture, each of them Saxon 
 blockhouse, Norman keep, Elizabethan manor, with 
 Jacobean or Palladian notions to follow, in turn the 
 smartest thing of its kind. 
 
 Here or hereabout have been the Liddicots, taking 
 their share of every good thing going in all that 
 time. Think of it only. It may be simple enough 
 to win the luck, but to keep the luck in the family 
 for a thousand years! It is rare even in this land, 
 with an average peerage which is but a mushroom 
 growth. Families rise and fall as the sap of mas- 
 tery within them has a nimble or a sluggish flow. 
 So little will do it a touch, they say. The founder 
 toils; the founder's son takes it easy; the son's son 
 makes a fool of himself, and then, with the Jews 
 as brokers, the many come into their own again. 
 
 The Liddicots did it, in the first instance, by 
 their judicious mixture of the attributes of tiger and 
 fox. When they were not snatching, they laid a fin- 
 ger to the nose not defiantly, as in one of the many 
 varieties of that expressive gesture, but as in mature 
 reflection on the next step. They made their sub- 
 mission to the first William at the right time and 
 in the right way, and he gave them grace. They 
 sided with the greatest of the Edwards in his strug- 
 gle for domestic mastery, when all the other wise- 
 acres of their part of the country were putting 
 their money on the other horse. They made an 
 equally wise choice with the last Henry, who gave 
 them a monastery or two for their pains, and with 
 Dutch William. After that, though not all at once, 
 
 114
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 the premonitions of the long sleep that overtakes all 
 of us at length came over them. They drew slowly 
 toward the conclusion that there is nothing more 
 to do but keep a sort of perpetual balance with 
 things as they are. The problem of perpetual rest 
 is as trying as that of perpetual motion, and it has 
 engaged the attention of whole generations of the 
 most respectable families time out of mind. 
 
 So they invented a sort of philosophy of fatigue 
 which, in their present representative, has reached 
 its finest flower. The good old baronet has an hon- 
 est impatience of every kind of thoroughness of 
 thought and action which makes him the perfect 
 Englishman of his time. His whole line in life is 
 determined by a rooted suspicion of first principles. 
 He lives by a glorified rule of thumb, and moves 
 from event to event with the pious ejaculation of 
 "Sufficient unto the day" He is incurably sus- 
 picious of all attempts to get to the bottom of things 
 in "politics, literature, science, and art." "Lord, 
 how the world is given to fads ! " is his cry of protest. 
 He shivers at the thought of new departures, unless 
 they are reasonably old, and he is sure that when 
 they started they went beyond what was necessary. 
 He accepts them as soon as they are there, just be- 
 cause they are there, for he is the very genius of 
 submission to the accomplished fact. But if he had 
 been asked his sanction in advance, they would have 
 had long to wait. He is for moderation in all things ; 
 even moderation "must n't go too far, you know" 
 the man of the unjust milieu, in a word. 
 
 "5
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 He has elaborated his theory of life as a mere rub- 
 bing along in the old house on the old estate, both 
 slowly wearing to decay without discomfort and 
 without shock. All he wants is to live by the land, 
 as his fathers did before him, making it pay for all 
 their mistakes. His farmers farm stupidly, his la- 
 borers fly to the towns, he has a spendthrift son in 
 the army like his sire, one of the best fellows in 
 the world. Yet it never strikes him for one moment 
 that his wasteful housekeeping, his mortgages, his 
 entails, his huge system of patriarchal dependence, 
 is anything less than in the nature of things. He 
 is everything such a man may be expected to be: 
 not a Tory, only a Conservative, in favor of ' ' reason- 
 able reforms, ' ' such, for instance, as the one affecting 
 the precedence of baronets; not a Protectionist, the 
 name brings a shock to his mind, but only a per- 
 son desiring a moderate duty for the encouragement 
 of agriculture. He is a moderate churchman cer- 
 tainly not High, undoubtedly not Low, one capable 
 of tempering the rigor of the demand for the east- 
 ward position by the offer of an east-by-north. He 
 compounds for the confessional by now and then 
 asking his vicar to dinner, and casually putting 
 points of conduct to him over the wine. There is 
 nothing wrong with him in the world but his horo- 
 scope: he is Sir Roger de Coverley born just two 
 centuries too late. 
 
 To have everything in keeping, his home is his 
 castle in the most exact sense of the term. Where 
 else could he live but in one of the beautiful old
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 moated halls still to be found in England, with 
 living water in the moat? He still raises his draw- 
 bridge every night and lowers it every morning, 
 just because his fathers had done the like for cen- 
 turies, and he really is not equal to the effort of 
 beginning to leave off. His habits are not to be af- 
 fected by anything so transient as the new dispensa- 
 tion of a county constabulary. What joy in the 
 thought of this continuing city amid the eternal flux 
 of things! You may enter without difficulty by a 
 stone bridge on the other side, the tradespeople do 
 so enter every day, but that does not count. 
 
 117
 
 XIII 
 
 HE house comes in view at last, 
 peeping forth from its belt of trees 
 as the duchess approaches it on this 
 summer day. The trees were part 
 of the old scheme of fortification. 
 You might pass them without sus- 
 pecting that they screened an abode of men. The 
 garrison lay in hiding, or pounced forth in sudden 
 aggression, according to circumstances. Now that 
 concealment is no longer necessary, they show a gable 
 at need, or even a whole facade, through the gaps. 
 On one side you catch sight of a whole range of 
 domestic Tudor rising sheer from the moat, where 
 parts of it, resting on columns of solid stonework, 
 stand like a man in water up to the knees. In an- 
 other facade the owners before building have mani- 
 festly been at peace with the world. The struggle 
 of the more elemental kind is over. No one is going 
 to disturb the Liddicots. The architect therefore 
 plans for lawns sloping to the water's edge, treats 
 himself to the stone bridge aforesaid, and cuts down 
 the trees to give a fair view of his handiwork. 
 
 The drawbridge is lowered now, "for fun," as 
 Mary promised, and that young person is seen 
 waving joyous welcome from the castellated porch 
 
 118
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 beyond. Augusta answers the signal with her hand- 
 kerchief, and, at the same time, becomes aware of 
 the master of the house. He is fishing in the moat 
 from his study window, and he decamps in some 
 confusion to take his place at his own door, where 
 he is seen in an entirely suitable framework. He 
 is of middle height, sturdy, square to the four winds 
 still like his dwelling. He looks engagingly dense, 
 obstinate, unideal and golden-hearted where he 
 likes, but only there. The manner is blunt one can 
 hardly say to a fault. He has a singular brevity of 
 conversational style, due to a desire to ' ' get it over ' ' 
 with the smallest possible delay. His broad face 
 is now all melted out of its ordinary lines of char- 
 acter by his unaffected joy at the sight of his guest. 
 He bows his bare head low over her hand in courtly 
 style, leads her to the foot of the great oak stair- 
 case, and then, surrendering her to his daughter, 
 turns aside into the dining-room to await her re- 
 turn. 
 
 ' ' Mary, what a place ! ' ' murmurs Augusta, as 
 they come down-stairs. 
 
 " Wait till you have seen it," laughs the girl. 
 "Dad, you had better let me be guide: you are too 
 slow. I '11 show you over at the same time, if you 
 behave yourself." 
 
 "All right, my dear. I shall be here when you 
 want me. Don't trust to her dates, duchess: when- 
 ever she gets beyond the Eestoration, I have to dig 
 her out." 
 
 A great peace steals over Augusta's mind as she
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 strolls through the black oak galleries, the low bed- 
 rooms, the lofty reception-rooms of these strata of 
 the past, with their furniture, folios, armor, gear 
 of hall, and gear of bower all in perfect keeping. 
 
 " We have everything a genuine old place should 
 have, I think," says Mary, simply, "including the 
 entire absence of a bed slept in by Queen Elizabeth. 
 Those beds are only for the new-fashioned show- 
 houses, and Wardour street can hardly keep pace 
 with the demand. If you want something real in that 
 line, we can show you a bed stuffed with rabbit's fur, 
 the down of its day. Don't look so serious, father 
 dear." 
 
 "Don't be foolish, Mary." 
 
 "Well, never mind about the bed; but please, 
 Mary, I want a ghost only a little one." 
 
 "Nothing of that sort here," said the squire. 
 
 " Father! " 
 
 "Oh, you mean the noises. All fancy, that ! They 
 hung the wrong man, pure inadvertence, and 
 they thought he walked. They fidgeted that was 
 all. Besides, it was hundreds of years ago, and 
 what 's that to do with us?" 
 
 "Yes; but they hung him up -stairs, dad." 
 
 "Up-stairs?" shuddered Augusta. 
 
 "Old times, you know, duchess. We had to do 
 everything on the premises then, even the judging 
 and the rest. Modern improvements since cir- 
 cuits, jails, and what not. Every man's house was 
 his workshop, too. We 've a suit of Saxon armor, 
 all steel, and all made in the place." 
 
 120
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "All very well for the armor, Sir Henry, I dare 
 say. But for the hanging who gave them the 
 right? " 
 
 "Manorial courts, you know every lord of a 
 manor his own judge, jury, executioner. I assure 
 you, there was no other way. Great improvements 
 now, and all for the best, I Ve no doubt." 
 
 "The duchess wants to see the room, father." 
 
 "Mary!" "Mary!" from both host and guest. 
 Yet, somehow, one led the way, and the other fol- 
 lowed. There was really nothing to see but a long, 
 bare attic immediately under the roof, with huge 
 whitewashed cross-beams, which looked little more 
 than a streak in the artificial gloom. The squire 
 seemed to feel that some apology was expected. 
 
 "You see, it was very hard to keep the field-labor- 
 ers from passing out of their class and place of set- 
 tlement and going to the towns to pick up a trade. 
 It is a difficulty even now, I assure you. Our people 
 were hard sometimes I can't deny that. We have 
 funny entries in the old register down-stairsburn- 
 ing on the forehead, and what not. Shocking! I 
 hate all that excess. But I suppose this really was a 
 bad case. It 's the only one on the family, so far 
 as I know. My grandfather's grandfather used 
 merely to put 'm in the stocks, and he would be 
 called unreasonable now. We must march with the 
 times. ' ' 
 
 "Oh, we have been a disreputable gang in our 
 day!" laughs Mary. "We can show you a turret- 
 chamber in the other wing where one of our re- 
 
 121
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 moter grandmamas had to pass her honeymoon be- 
 hind bars and bolts, after she had been stolen from 
 her father's house." 
 
 "They went too far; I 've told you, they went 
 too far," says the squire, testily, as he turns from 
 the room. ' ' What can you say more ? But we might 
 still learn a thing or two, even from them. I 'm 
 going to offer you a carp at luncheon, duchess, 
 caught in the moat this morning, and own brother 
 in point of dressing and flavor to one that was stewed 
 in wine for King Henry VII when he passed this 
 way four hundred years ago." 
 
 "You must give me the receipt for Allonby, Sir 
 Henry." 
 
 "Mary will turn it into plain English for you. 
 It is in our old buttery-book one of the best bits 
 of reading in the library. You have to know how 
 to read it, though. It is all in monkish script, and 
 it looks as spider-webbed as a writ of Edward III. ' ' 
 
 "And all illuminated, if you please," adds Mary, 
 "with an initial letter showing one early Liddicot 
 at dinner helping himself with thumb and finger, 
 and another wiping his mouth with his sleeve and 
 looking as though he had done no evil. Oh, we really 
 were a disreputable set once upon a time! Please 
 don't ask questions about the plate, duchess. Some 
 of it was no better than what the dreadful house- 
 Breaking people nowadays call 'swag' bagged from 
 the looted chateaux by a Liddicot who served under 
 the Regent Bedford in the French wars. ' ' 
 
 "Mary, don't tease," says her father. 
 
 122
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 After luncheon they generously leave him to his 
 nap, on pretense of a stroll through the rooms. 
 There is the usual mixture of good and bad in the 
 picture-gallery, most of it old indeed, but not all 
 genuine. Some of the Titians were never seen by 
 that master. Yet they were entirely adequate for 
 wonder and delight to earlier Liddicots who had ac- 
 quired them on the grand tour. Mingled with these 
 are the family portraits dames and damsels of 
 many epochs (some, in which the family expression 
 reappears after temporary eclipse, looking like Mary 
 dressed for a masquerade) , judges and soldiers, with 
 here and there the kings they served. Both the 
 ladies stop before the effigy of a cavalryman of our 
 time, still glistening with the glories of varnishing- 
 day at the Academy, fair, yet well tanned by field- 
 sports, well groomed, square-chinned, round-headed, 
 close-cropped, and with a look of satisfaction in the 
 joy of being, characteristic of those spoiled children 
 of Fortune whom she has never put to the trouble 
 of saying "No." 
 
 ' ' That 's my brother Tom, ' ' says the girl, fondly, 
 in answer to the other's glance of inquiry, "and 
 he 's coming down next week." 
 
 "What a lovely man I mean what a fine, hand- 
 some fellow. Is n't he just perfect!" 
 
 "Oh, he 's not so bad, though I say it, and the 
 most good-natured thing in the world. But he 's 
 just a little costly for poor father. Not that he can 
 help that: it 's a crack regiment, you know." 
 
 "I suppose he 's hard at work at his mili- 
 
 123
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 tary studies, with all this trouble ahead at the 
 Cape." 
 
 "I don't think so. You see, he had to pass, and 
 all that sort of thing, before he got in, and they 
 don't trouble them much after that. And, besides, 
 he knows where he is on a horse, and he 's quite a 
 beautiful shot; so there does n't seem much more to 
 learn. ' ' 
 
 "One sometimes fancies there might be," says the 
 duchess, gravely. "But I dare say he has quite 
 enough to do." 
 
 "Never a moment to spare, I assure you, and 
 four house-parties ahead. It was a terrible London 
 season; in fact, he 's coming down to rest." 
 
 "Please bring him to Allonby, dear, before the 
 week is out. I hope I shall have a brother to show 
 you soon. I 've written for Arthur, who has just 
 left college. The baby, I call him, because he 's 
 three years younger than I am; but he 'd pass for 
 a man, all the same." 
 
 "That will be nice." 
 
 The girl is for hurrying on ; but the duchess insists 
 on stopping to look at another portrait that hangs 
 by the side of Tom's. It is Mary herself. She is 
 very handsome, tall and finely built. She has dig- 
 nity a courteous and gentle dignity, not by any 
 means the terrifying "hauteur" of the melodra- 
 matic heroine, though the head is held very high 
 and the whole posture is strong and quietly self-pos- 
 sessed. The dress, so far as one can see it beneath 
 the big cloak, seems to be a sort of lace tea-gown, 
 
 I2 4
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 freely flowing. The face is a full oval (not a peaky 
 egg-shape), the nose straight and somewhat Grecian. 
 Large brown eyes, frank and kind, and beautifully 
 curved, full lips, give the face an expression of 
 truth and sweetness. Over the brow, which is broad 
 and high, the hair descends in little films and curls, 
 and is piled up on the head in light masses. Resting 
 on these clouds of b'rown, a large black hat with 
 plumes sweeps upward in a bold slant. It reminds 
 one of the head-gear of some Velasquez portrait 
 a Spanish general or monarch ; and the folds of the 
 dark mantle, lightened as it is by creamy satin and 
 lace, voluminously falling from the shoulders and 
 down the front, add to the rich and flowing effect. 
 It is pleasantly free from the frightened, unim- 
 aginative stiffness of ordinary modern costume. Yet 
 Mary is no Velasquez lady with mysterious eyes 
 that look at one straight and brimful of meaning, 
 yet will not reveal one of their myriad secrets. In 
 spite of her great mantle and sweeping hat, Velas- 
 quez would either have refused to paint her, or he 
 would have given her different eyes and a different 
 expression. Her attraction thus transformed might, 
 to some tastes, be more powerful, but she would have 
 lost her simple English quality, and the grand, free, 
 modern look that belongs peculiarly to our day 
 if portraits truly represent the women of the past. 
 
 At their leave-taking Mary gives her guest a bunch 
 of rare and precious ferns that might have suggested 
 a whole course of lectures to a professor of botany 
 maidenhair, spleenwort, three-leaved saxifrage, 
 
 125
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 hart's-tongue, ivy-leaved snapdragon, even umbel- 
 lated chickweed, picked from the crannies of wall 
 and roof, or from the crumbling brickwork of the 
 moat. 
 
 The duchess wonders as she drives away whether 
 men or mosses have anything more to fear when once 
 they have turned the corner of a thousand years. 
 
 126
 
 XIV 
 
 HE found the duke out of sorts on 
 her return. 
 
 "He won't sell and be hanged 
 to him ! " he said, handing her a let- 
 ter from his solicitors. One of the 
 inclosures was a note from his 
 neighbor, Mr. Kisbye of "The Grange," refusing 
 to part with a piece of land on any terms. 
 
 Years ago, in a fatal moment when the duke's 
 agent happened to be looking the other way, Mr. 
 Kisbye snapped up a field or two that impaired 
 the rounded integrity of the ducal domain. 
 
 This purchase cut right into the estate, and 
 spoiled the amenity of it. The intruder got it by 
 an extravagant bid to a needy owner, at a time when 
 his Grace's solicitors were opening their parallels 
 in the usual impious way that assumes the eternal 
 duration of the world. He wanted a country settle- 
 ment, and here it was within a stone's cast of one 
 of the greatest estates in England. So he sneaked 
 it by purchase much as the duke's forefathers 
 might have sneaked it in another way. His Grace 
 offered to pay handsomely for his mistake through 
 the solicitors, but Mr. Kisbye smiled derisively at 
 every bid, and stuck as close as a horse-fly with a 
 lodgment. 
 
 127
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "A Naboth's vineyard at Allonby," Augusta 
 said. "Who would have thought it?" 
 
 "It is not exactly that, but it establishes this 
 bounder from town, this nondescript without any 
 means of getting a living that can be known and 
 traced, as a country gentleman and farmer, even a 
 landlord in his small way." 
 
 "I understand a little. I 'm going to get quite 
 as much annoyed as you are when I understand 
 more. ' ' 
 
 "It 's his set," he said, laughing. "Didn't you 
 hear them holding their witches' sabbath in the mid- 
 dle of the night? " 
 
 "I thought it was rooks, and took it for poetry." 
 
 "Quite enough to wake them, with the glare and 
 the noise." 
 
 "We 're not obliged to speak to him." 
 
 ' ' Speak ! It 's the rubbing shoulders I can 't 
 stand." 
 
 "Kisbye does not seem very anxious to rub." 
 
 " No., the worst of it is, they 're beginning to be 
 sufficient to themselves. They join hands across 
 counties; and the motor-car brays their progress 
 from house to house of their set for costly guzzle, 
 and all their other comforts of home." 
 
 "I haven't exactly got to that yet," she said, 
 "b'ut I feel that I 'm coming to it." 
 
 "To what?" 
 
 l< That horror of merely living in the same hemi- 
 sphere with undesirables. Why not look the other 
 way?" 
 
 128
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "There are so many other ways. They 're every- 
 where. They snap up all the old places in the 
 market, and furnish in a night and a day, and, not 
 only in upholstery and dinner-services, but in people 
 to sit at the board. I assure you this fellow actu- 
 ally bids for younger sons and needy elders who 
 don 't always find it easy to get to Allonby; aye, 
 and gets 'em, too." 
 
 "Don't you know why? Because, from all I 've 
 heard, through the open windows, if you like, 
 there is a go in their mirth which is sometimes want- 
 ing in the statelier establishments. Their stars of the 
 variety stage are livelier than those of Bayreuth, and 
 they import an up-to-date wickedness of the asphalt 
 which puts the historic and legendary sort in the 
 shade. They can get art and literature of a kind, 
 even poets of the minor constellation, and thinkers 
 for metaphysics and the love of a good dinner are 
 still as closely allied as ever." 
 
 "Yes, yes," he said, with a sigh. "If they don't 
 always know what to do with their chances, they '11 
 learn in time. There are West End tailors to rig 
 them in the costume of sport, though on some of 
 them it sits about as gracefully as the court-dress at 
 wax- work shows; gamekeepers to teach them to 
 point a gun, and even to carry it; crack billiard- 
 players for their object-lessons in the mathematics 
 of amusement; and, for the golf, the costliest im- 
 portations from St. Andrews, who are canny enough 
 to reserve the bad language of uncontrollable disgust 
 for the safe side of the bunker. Their motto is that 
 
 129
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 everything may be picked up. They don't mind 
 consulting the groom of the chambers as to the 
 amount of the tip, and offering to toss him for the 
 difference between his estimate and their bid. The 
 thing hums. They buy the old halls, sometimes only 
 as sites and names, and put up new ones of marble 
 and plate-glass in their places, with the armor still 
 on the premises, and the turret-chamber in com- 
 munication by telephone with the Stock Exchange. 
 They mean business, that is the humor of it, and 
 they are going to fight it out on this line till the 
 judgment day." 
 
 "People of that sort always make me laugh," said 
 Augusta. 
 
 ' ' They make me sad. ' ' 
 
 ' ' I 'm sure that 's more dignified. ' ' 
 
 "Come now, Augusta. Do you remember that 
 specimen we saw at Rome the one I had to com- 
 plain of to the landlord of the hotel?" 
 
 "Shall I ever forget him?" 
 
 "Well, he 's one of Kisbye's barons. I met him 
 yesterday, as large as life; and he had the impu- 
 dence to bow. Somebody gave me his history circus 
 rider to start with, declined into billiard-marking, 
 married a pawnbroker's widow, ennobled her at her 
 own expense by investing part of the dowry in a 
 title. He gets himself interviewed in the papers as 
 a rollicking blade who has outridden and outdrunk 
 the Magyars, and generally had a deuce of a life. 
 It 's killing, I 'm told, to catch him in one of his 
 familiar haunts in town. After a hard day's work 
 
 130
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 in pursuit of the widow of the moment, he sinks 
 into a seat with an order for a pint of beer. That 's 
 one of the set at 'The Grange'; I hope you 're an- 
 noyed with Kisbye now." 
 
 "No; I 'm still laughing." 
 
 "Well, then, listen to this. I hear that he has had 
 the impudence to beg, borrow, or steal a photograph 
 of Mary Liddicot, and to hang it in his drawing- 
 room without ever having exchanged a word with 
 her in his life. ' ' 
 
 "Now you may put him to death," said Augusta.
 
 XV 
 
 HE peddler rang his bell as he 
 neared the village, and the women 
 came to their doors. It was an au- 
 dience as well as a knot of cus- 
 tomers. He had things to sell which 
 they could get nowhere else without 
 a long journey ; and he brought the local news and 
 that strange atmosphere of the outer world which 
 attends the very tramp on his rounds. In his uses 
 as a chapman he had well-nigh everything in their 
 simple range of wants crockery, tinware, scraps of 
 furniture, plain stuffs and the wherewithal for their 
 make-up, writing-paper of the commonest, some of it 
 destined to carry fateful words from village homes 
 to the uttermost ends of the earth, pipes and pouches 
 for the men, fancies in bead- work or cheap jewelry 
 for the women, toys for the children, oil for the mur- 
 derous little village lamps. 
 
 All this was arranged on his cart in most orderly 
 confusion ; he could have found his way to a needle 
 or slate-pencil with his eyes shut, and you could have 
 robbed him of hardly a packet of pins without im- 
 mediate detection. But no one wanted to rob him. 
 All seemed to like him, and to have friendly rela- 
 tions with even the horse in the shafts. He was a 
 
 132
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 good-looking young fellow ; and his manners, a mix- 
 ture of cautious familiarity and genial sarcasm, were 
 part of his stock in trade. He sold the article, and 
 threw in the epigram by way of bonus. 
 
 His face was turned toward Slocum Parva, yet he 
 was miles away from that restful spot, in a scene, 
 if possible, more restful still. England has almost 
 the secret of these placid hamlets which seem a hun- 
 dred miles from everywhere. His bell, for all the 
 lenity of its motion, seemed to smite the stillness with 
 a note of alarm. 
 
 He was soon surrounded, mainly by those who 
 coveted his gauds. There is always something to 
 sharpen the appetite of want in a general store. No 
 human being might seem to need a cow in glazed 
 earthenware, with a view of Brighton inserted as a 
 medallion in the center of its system; yet he had 
 found a buyer for such an article by urging a young 
 woman on the eve of marriage to consider the tragedy 
 of a home without pretty things. It is a peculiarity 
 of purchases of this kind that they awaken unavail- 
 ing remorse immediately on the completion of the 
 bargain. The young woman hid her offense with 
 her apron as she moved away. He did a brisk trade, 
 with varying fortunes, for the customers often cut 
 him close. His final encounter was with a matron 
 who had to complain of the behavior of a clock 
 bought of him last week. This sex is distinguished 
 by its twin passions for adulation and for the sallies 
 of a sprightly audacity which might seem to pre- 
 clude it. The peddler had both oil and vinegar in 
 
 '33
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 his manner, but the acid was only a subflavor, and, 
 like a good salad, he was preeminently bland. 
 
 ' ' Won 't go, ma 'am ! Nonsense ! Let 's have a look 
 at it. ' ' He stretched out his hand for the delinquent, 
 and subjected it to a keenly scrutinizing gaze. It 
 was a most melancholy little object in painted wood, 
 but one degree above the timepiece of a Noah's ark. 
 ' ' Ah, I thought so : it 's in a temper, that 's what 's 
 the matter with it. You bought it too cheap, ma'am, 
 you really did. Clocks have their feelin's, like 
 Christians : an article o ' this sort does n 't like to be 
 knocked down at two and elevenpence ha'penny. 
 But you 've got such a way with you ! I wonder you 
 did n 't get it for nothin ' : you might, if you 'd stood 
 out." 
 
 "None of your gammon!" 
 
 "P'r'aps the young uns have been playing with 
 it? Not as I tear no malice; I could forgive 'em 
 anything children like that." 
 
 "It 's been on the top shelf all the toime, out of 
 their reach. ' ' 
 
 "That 's it; it felt lonesome. There, it '11 be all 
 right now." 
 
 "It's afeard o' you, I reckon; it'll go wrong 
 soon 's you 've turned your back. ' ' 
 
 "Money returned if not found suited; but give it 
 another trial. Do you know what I fancied at fust ? ' ' 
 he added as a parting shot. "I thought somebody 
 might ha' been nagging their 'usbands. I 've known 
 a woman 's tongue stop a clock. Thank you ! ' ' 
 
 The last words were evidently a signal to the ani- 
 
 '34
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 mal in the shafts, and the equivalent of the "Gee 
 up ! " of the ordinary commerce of horse-flesh. They 
 were uttered with a peculiar intonation, and at the 
 sound of them the faithful creature moved forward 
 with a jerk that gave a rattle to the whole stock in 
 trade. It was a sign of the completed transaction 
 in flummery, and it carried horse and man beyond 
 the reach of reprisal. None was to be feared in this 
 instance. The woman laughed a good-natured threat 
 of vengeance, and went indoors with the clock in her 
 arms. The peddler, before leaving the parish bounds, 
 waylaid a little girl, and, with the gift of a pepper- 
 mint, induced her to take charge of a bundle of hand- 
 bills for house-to-house distribution. They con- 
 tained an announcement of the forthcoming elections 
 for the parish councils, and an earnest appeal to the 
 Progressive party at large to return candidates of 
 the right sort. He dropped other bills of the same 
 kind on the bare hedge-rows, where, as they occa- 
 sionally fluttered to the ground, they looked like 
 some new and belated variety of fungoid growths. 
 
 The man was George Herion, of course. Much 
 had happened since he was last seen. For one thing, 
 he had got married ; for another, he had started the 
 little general shop on wheels wherewith he threatened 
 defiance to adverse fate on a memorable occasion. 
 With the success of it Rose had Been dazzled into 
 the great venture, and Slocum Parva had almost 
 shaken off. its terror of heroic ideals. Our merchant 
 adventurer began cautiously by buying a small stock 
 in trade, piling it on a hand-truck, and wheeling it 
 
 '35
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 two-and-twenty miles out and home every day, 
 "standing market" for a rest on the outward jour- 
 ney. Nothing could resist such determination. What 
 the villages on one line of route refused had a sec- 
 ond chance in the little market town, and a third in 
 the other villages on the home stretch. When George 
 had ten golden sovereigns knotted in his handker- 
 chief, he told Rose that the time had come to name 
 the day. She named it without further hesitation. 
 The village knew it that night ; the duchess knew it 
 next morning ; and by the favor of that august per- 
 son they were established, within a fortnight, in their 
 own cottage, after one of the prettiest village wed- 
 dings Slocum had ever seen. 
 
 But for Augusta they would have been homeless. 
 Slocum maintained so exquisite an adjustment of 
 means to end in house-room that it had no place for 
 the new pair. George had lived with his mother, 
 Rose with hers: there were no cottages to let. To 
 build was out of the question: the area of human 
 shelter was fixed as by some law of nature. The 
 village was almost hermetically closed to newcomers. 
 Even babies were considered to have taken an unfair 
 advantage, and were discouraged for the very reason 
 that they might one day grow up with claims of 
 independent settlement like those of Rose and 
 George. As individuals these young persons might 
 plead a right of prescription; as a pair they were 
 intruders. The mothers tried to settle the matter 
 with a happy thought : by living together they might 
 set one cottage free. But the duke's agent was not 
 
 136
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 disposed to sanction this arrangement until the 
 duchess signified that it had her entire approval. So 
 Rose now lived as wife in the cottage in which she 
 had lived as nursling, and, indeed, had first seen the 
 light. 
 
 The marriage gave George more to work for, and 
 so, naturally, he worked more. He went on till he 
 saved enough to put shafts to the hand-cart, and a 
 horse to the shafts. In a little time people began 
 to turn their faces toward Slocum when they wanted 
 a flat-iron or a rolling-pin, and Randsford saw its 
 proud supremacy assailed. Rose now needed little 
 to make her the happiest young woman in all the 
 wide world, not even the contrast of a latent anxiety. 
 George still kept up the interest in village politics 
 which owed its birth to the passage of the van, and 
 which had cost him the favor of the "gentlefolks" 
 in the person of Mr. Kisbye. But the ideal of well- 
 being at Slocum Parva was a life without opinions 
 as the prime condition of a life without events. 
 Rose trembled for her mate, now with vague ap- 
 prehension, and then again with joy at the thought 
 of his power of making things come right. 
 
 And so, singing by the way, the peddler went from 
 hamlet to hamlet in his wide round, through villages 
 of all varieties villages sleepier and sillier than 
 Slocum itself; petted villages, coddled as carefully 
 as Mr. Raif 's; wicked villages, where you might get 
 drunk at unlawful hours by whistling in the right 
 note at the right back door; fighting villages, where 
 they lived on dim though still stimulating memories
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 of a time when it was "Who are yer, stranger? Can 
 ye foight?" and off went their coats till the way- 
 farer established his right of sojourn by the ordeal 
 of battle. He was greeted, as he passed, by the 
 country sights, the country sounds, the plow, the 
 drill, the humming steam-thresher, the opening notes 
 of chaffinch or blackbird, the opening flower of cro- 
 cus or primrose, here and there perhaps by some 
 almost white-haired school-boy with a red neck, here- 
 after, as soldier or sailor, to keep the flag in the sun- 
 light on its passage round the world. Ah, the glori- 
 ous life of the road! Amid such scenes who could 
 not wish forever to defer the visit of the ' ' terminator 
 of delights and the separator of companions"? 
 
 At a turn of his course he drew up to make room 
 for a carriage and pair cleaving their way through 
 a light cloud of Olympic dust of their own raising. 
 He had just time to recognize the liveries, and bring 
 himself to the salute, when, with a smile and a cheer- 
 ful "Good day, Herion," the duchess was whirled 
 out of sight. The family was still in residence, but 
 was preparing for the annual migration to town. 
 The house-parties were over ; the whole world of the 
 British worldlet was going up for the annual meeting 
 of Parliament, and for the ordeal by. fire of the 
 London season. 
 
 Augusta's interest in George, at first a mere con- 
 sequence of her interest in Rose, had grown with 
 better acquaintance. She had learned to like him 
 for himself, and for the variety which his pluck and 
 resource had introduced into the pattern of village 
 
 138
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 life. He was refreshing, after the rather too mo- 
 notonous note of submission; and the sight of him 
 somehow seemed to remind her of her native land. 
 But she was trying to learn to take her patterns as 
 she found them, and this not all in resignation, but 
 simply as a philosopher in petticoats, which is as 
 much as to say a woman of the world. Here was 
 her new home and place of settlement, and here, 
 with it, must be her new point of view. It was as 
 fascinating as China to the thoughtful mind. So 
 millions live and have lived in their own way, and 
 apparently to the greatest ends, in a majestic order 
 with dependence for its main principle. What a 
 contrast, not unrefreshing at times, to those tumultu- 
 ous millions on "the other side," where every man's 
 morning thought is how he may get one step ahead 
 of his neighbor ! 
 
 Augusta remembered Uncle Gooding's fable of 
 how they brought the great railway out West. Ac- 
 cording to this, they put a line of workmen one be- 
 hind the other, with the smartest last, to give the 
 time. "The one ahead had to keep pace with the one 
 behind, you bet, or he felt the point of the pick in 
 his heel as he was plugging along. By gum, sir, 
 that last one hotfooted up the whole circus, and they 
 got it fed into them that they had to hustle for all 
 they were worth!" 
 
 The peddler was at home now, and the wife re- 
 ceived him with a kiss in a kitchen which ought to 
 be considered the "best room" of the house, since it 
 was at least without pretense of style. But his ad- 
 
 139
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 miration, like hers, was reserved for the lurid glories 
 of another chamber into which at last they peeped 
 fondly on their way up-stairs. There it was in its 
 sanctities of plush- framed photographs George in 
 his Sunday wear, colored like life, Rose in her wed- 
 ding hat; in its antimacassars, saddle-bag suites, 
 tormented carpets, their patterns echoing the cries 
 of pain from the walls. Ah, how grateful they felt, 
 how good, at the thought of all this redeeming gaiety 
 and beauty in their rather sordid lives! The peep 
 into the best room especially was almost devotional 
 in its effects. George registered a silent vow to be 
 more deserving of his new-found luck. Rose mingled 
 the thought of it with her prayers. 
 
 140
 
 XVI 
 
 HE family had left for town. The 
 great house was shut up. But Slo- 
 cum was saved from the void of 
 human interests by the election of 
 its first parish council. The prob- 
 lem of such an election in such a 
 place should be dear to science as to history, since 
 it touches on the question of the indivisibility of 
 matter in the legislative domain. You cannot get 
 much farther down in institutions seen under the 
 microscope. The relation of all parliamentary 
 boards and other assemblies of the British govern- 
 mental scheme to this speck on the planet is that of 
 Ossa to the wart. Slocum's council is the village 
 senate, the village administration, the village forum, 
 the village tribune in one. It is still a new thing. 
 Parliament, finding the peasantry clamorous for the 
 right to manage their own affairs, has tossed them 
 this log. So it is Gurth the swineherd at the council, 
 with Wamba the witless, if he can find a place, and, 
 with them, Cedric the Saxon, and even Brian de 
 Bois-Guilbert, retired, if any can manage to com- 
 mend himself to the favor of the tiny electorate. 
 
 There is something quite captivating in the 
 thought of the exquisite littleness of the whole thing. 
 The observer seems to watch the processes of insect 
 
 141
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 life. Here is the smallest unit, the very protoplasm 
 of corporate existence, and it has, as such, the charm 
 of all absolutes. You can hardly get nearer to the 
 vanishing-point of institutions than the village 
 council. It has been known to have an audit of 
 nineteen shillings and eightpence ha'penny for the 
 entire year. One may conceive a worn chancellor 
 of the exchequer turning to its debates for refresh- 
 ment of spirit after a budget night. The question 
 of the abolition of the village pump, in favor of a 
 supply from the mains, means as much to Slocum 
 as the abolition of slavery or the repeal of the corn- 
 laws once meant to the world at large. 
 
 It should have been a walk-over for the Conserva- 
 tive party; but new yearnings, new hopes had come 
 with the yellow van. It is idle to make a secret of 
 it: Slocum Parva was undermined with subversive 
 literature about village rights. The batteries were 
 charged at George's; so much was known. Peascod 
 had several times brought to the station dangerous 
 handbills left in the hedge-rows. Bad characters 
 were growing bold. Bangs, the poacher, had openly 
 defied the collector of Easter offerings for the 
 church. 
 
 It would be difficult to exaggerate the significance 
 of this incident as it stood entered in the constable's 
 official report. 
 
 As the collector entered the reprobate 's cottage on 
 his peaceful, not to say his holy, mission, Bangs 
 called out ominously to his son in the back room, 
 "Boy, put the poker on the fire." 
 
 142
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 The collector began to collect. 
 
 "Is it hot, boy?" 
 
 "Yes, father." 
 
 "Well," to the collector, "I 've heard of meat- 
 offerings and of drink-offerings; I '11 give you a 
 burnt-offering if you don't get out." 
 
 The collector left in haste. We live in strange 
 times. 
 
 Then England was still under the shock of the 
 tremendous news from South Africa, and Slocum 
 Parva was a part of England, if only a speck of its 
 dust. A few weeks after the departure of the ducal 
 family came the declaration of war, with all that 
 followed, "recoil and rally, charge and rout, and 
 triumph and despair." Stormberg, Magersfontein, 
 Colenso in one black week ; Spion Kop ; and then 
 again hope, with Paardeberg and Bloemfontein. 
 The most startling event of all for the village had 
 been the hasty departure of Captain Liddicot for the 
 front, with his regiment, on the very eve of the 
 Christmas festivities, with Mary turning recluse and 
 knitting comforters, and her father's sentient life 
 reduced to one protracted exclamation of "Bless my 
 soul ! " In an atmosphere so charged with electricity 
 even Slocum could not preserve its wonted calm. 
 
 There were five members to be chosen, that was 
 the minimum allowed by law, and there were six 
 candidates. The Conservatives had put up for all 
 the seats. Their phalanx, which they believed irre- 
 sistible, consisted of Kisbye, Grimber, and the school- 
 master, Parson Raif, the nominee of the castle, and 
 
 "43
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 one Fawke, a person in the grocery and lollypop 
 line, who ran in the same general interest, but with 
 some stress on a harmless question of his own affect- 
 ing the management of the annual flower show. But 
 George had determined to set up one candidate for 
 the Radicals, and had succeeded in persuading Spurr 
 to quit his retirement for public life. This aged per- 
 son, though, as we have seen, no orator, was a repre- 
 sentative of the doomed class of small farmers whose 
 all but fruitless struggle to keep themselves out of 
 the workhouse might be expected to touch the sym- 
 pathies of the electorate. The constituency could 
 not possibly carry more. George canvassed for him, 
 spoke for him, in spite of the sickening forebodings 
 of Rose, who sought confirmation of her worst fears 
 in the prophecies of the penny almanac. She found 
 no specific warning against the danger of "tamper- 
 ing with parish councils," her constant theme; but 
 this, of course, was only an oversight on the part of 
 the reader of the stars. 
 
 Nothing could prevent George from working heart 
 and soul for his man. As one born and bred in the 
 village, he knew what he knew. For behind these 
 fair outsides of Slocum, with their honeysuckle 
 porches, there were sometimes dire realities. In the 
 dry weather our peddler, after his hard day 's work, 
 had often to walk a mile to get a couple of pails of 
 drinking-water for his wife's use. It was lucky 
 for the duchess that she did not push her researches 
 in Samson's cottage as far as the back premises. She 
 would have found the narrow yard one pool of slush, 
 
 I 44
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 and, in spite of the occasional brickbats used as step- 
 ping-stones, would have risked damage to her dainty 
 shoes. The rain and the damp at times claimed free 
 right of entry in these ramshackle bowers of bliss. 
 The workmen from London who came down for the 
 wedding decorations would hardly look at them as 
 dwelling-places. 
 
 The overcrowding was sometimes terrible, in spite 
 of the refusal to build or because of it. Slocum 
 knew how many members of growing families were 
 occasionally crowded into one room. What our vil- 
 lage Hampden wanted was to get these things set 
 right; with his instinct of self-help, the instinct 
 that had enabled him to recover himself after the 
 mishap at Mr. Kisbye's, he thought that only the 
 village in council could manage it. His soul sick- 
 ened against all the meddlesome guidance from 
 above that was but coddling at the best the very 
 charity blankets lent in winter and sealed up during 
 the summer, the seal to be broken only by the house- 
 keeper at the Towers. 
 
 The combat was now joined. Skett, the navvy, 
 was pressed into the service, and was engaged, very 
 much in the manner of a famous character of drama, 
 to represent a wall whereon the Progressives might 
 exhibit a placard which was strung round his neck 
 as he sat at the cottage door. Sally Artifex promised 
 a public canvass of the entire womanhood of the vil- 
 lage, not so much in the interest of any political 
 party as with a view to the selection of candidates 
 pledged to the practice of all the domestic virtues,
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 especially on the part of the male sex. The Con- 
 servative interest stood proudly aloof from these 
 anxieties, relying on the all-sufficiency of its nod at 
 the right moment. Only Mr. Kisbye rode more fre- 
 quently through the village, and slightly deepened 
 his scowl, while, to nice observers, Herbert Peascod, 
 on his beat, seemed to keep the Knuckle of Veal in 
 detective observation as the headquarters of the ene- 
 mies of the country. The powers that be were all 
 indifferent or worse, knowing that the new council 
 was only one more institution to capture. There 
 was one exception: the High-church recluse, Mr. 
 Bascomb, made an unwonted irruption into the po- 
 litical arena as a supporter of the popular ticket. 
 
 For the rest, even smug Mr. Grimber from Lon- 
 don boldly proclaimed that he was for the castle, and 
 did not care who knew it. What was good enough 
 for the Duke of Allonby was good enough for him. 
 The powers of darkness, as represented by the larger 
 areas of local government, looked down on Slocum 
 Parva with undisguised contempt. The scorn of Al- 
 lonby Towers had a spice of mirth in it, and so was 
 tempered by good nature. The Duke of Allonby 's 
 amazement at the thought of this village was sublime 
 in its intensity, if not exactly in its mode of expres- 
 sion. His village, in all its goings out and its com- 
 ings in, it was, and ever should be ; and the thought 
 of its having a will of its own tickled him to that 
 degree! The words were his, and so was the trick 
 of leaving the rest of the sentence to the imagination 
 of his hearers. 
 
 146
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 The populace would soon be ready for anything. 
 This very night an orator standing on a chair out- 
 side the Knuckle of Veal publicly clamored for a 
 new letter-box for the benefit of the straggling con- 
 tinuation of the village a quarter of a mile beyond 
 its center. He was succeeded by a carter, who said 
 there never would be quiet in the country-side till 
 Sokes Lane, that well-known short cut between two 
 main roads, had a new coating of metal, and a full 
 cart-load in the hole at the bend. Then, as to the 
 charities, a new recruit, and a woman this time, for 
 the sex had mysteriously left the fence, asked if it 
 were "trew" that the old writings provided for fuel 
 without respect of persons, while under the new 
 practice it was "no churchman, no coals." 
 
 But the water was the burning question, strange 
 as that may seem. It threw out a heat, in the course 
 of discussion, that led to the removal of the meeting 
 to the inn parlor, where the flame was partly reduced, 
 again in a manner contrary to experience, fty the use 
 of spirituous fluids. The village had now discovered 
 that it wanted water all the year round. At present 
 it had to depend upon its wells. But nature some- 
 times forgot Slocum Parva, and there were days 
 when water was as dear as "tuppenny," and bad at 
 that. Such were the statements overheard through 
 the open window of the inn. They were boldly con- 
 tradicted by the Conservative interest, otherwise 
 called the Moderate, which remained outside the 
 building in protest for this occasion. , The Conserva- 
 tive interest, quoting a letter of one of its cousins, 
 
 H7
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 argued that Australia got on very well in spite of 
 droughts, since common laborers there earned five 
 shillings a day. A voice from within said that Slo- 
 cum might manage to make do with the wells, if 
 some one would only put pumps to them. It was 
 the everlasting bucket going up and down that 
 troubled the water, and in summer made its muddy 
 sediment yield "worms and insecks and things," in- 
 stead of potable fluid. 
 
 A Conservative, suspected to be Mr. Grimber, cre- 
 ated a diversion by asking who was to pay for the 
 pumps. There was a moment's consternation within 
 the building, when another voice replied mockingly, 
 and with the expected reward of a guffaw, "His 
 Goodness Gracious, to be sure," an allusion to the 
 owner of the Towers as unmistakable as it was in- 
 solent. 
 
 "Men, men," cried George, in his cheery voice, 
 "we don't want any stuff o' that sort." 
 
 The meeting now seemed to get completely out of 
 hand, until its very promoters grew terrified at the 
 spirit which they had raised. 
 
 "When Bangs (his words were taken down) bel- 
 lowed, "Why can't we have water-pipes, like the 
 duke and Squire Liddicot?" the landlord himself 
 grew alarmed, and said with becoming severity, 
 "Gently, please." 
 
 It was anybody's meeting now, and a Camille 
 Desmoulins might have run a free course. The wild- 
 est cries were heard amid the din. 
 
 "Oil-lamps for the main street!" 
 
 148
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "A playground for the children!" 
 
 ' ' Seats in the shady lane ! ' ' 
 
 Mr. Grimber turned homeward with the reflection 
 that he should never have thought to see this day; 
 and other well-disposed persons followed his example. 
 
 Then the meeting Began to talk of letting the shoot- 
 ing over the old gravel-pits which were given to the 
 parish after the great inclosure of 1810, and Bangs 
 offered to bid. 
 
 The landlord put out the lights. 
 
 149
 
 XVII 
 
 HE great day of the election came at 
 last just because it had to come. 
 They were all afraid of it as some- 
 thing impending, and would gladly 
 have put it off. It was a fairish 
 day, yet, to speak the truth, not 
 much more so than the one that went before. You 
 might never have guessed with what sort of event 
 it was charged. 
 
 The result was a startling surprise. George got 
 his man in, at the expense of all persons of the 
 castle 's candidate ! Spurr triumphed over Mr. Raif . 
 The Conservatives, who took for the occasion their 
 second baptismal name of Moderates, had expected 
 to have it all their own way. They were left with 
 but four winners, Kisbye and the schoolmaster, 
 Grimber and Fawke. Radicalism, treacherously 
 calling itself Progressive to confuse the issue, had 
 effected a lodgment in the sacred soil. Its victory 
 had all the interest that might attach to the creation 
 of a soul under the ribs of death. The other side 
 took it so: Squire Liddicot thought that things 
 were going rather too far ; the ducal agent frowned ; 
 Mr. Kisbye said that George Herion was a firebrand, 
 and that there would b"e no peace in Slocum till he 
 was turned out of the place.
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 It was understood that there would be a full 
 evening sitting at the Knuckle of Veal. The event 
 had to be adjusted to consciousness, to be digested, 
 so to speak ; and where but in the village inn ? The 
 landlord, who had quite overcome his rather unpro- 
 fessional displeasure of the other evening, was in his 
 best humor. There was a flutter of expectation in 
 the outer bar, as though new times were at hand. 
 Bangs, the poacher, found other gossips already as- 
 sembled in the parlor, old Skett among them, and 
 Job Gurt who would have been there, as at a post 
 of duty, in any case. 
 
 It would be an error to suppose that the black- 
 smith was a sot. If he was a glutton for drink, he 
 was also a glutton for work. He earned "good 
 money," and, with his pickings in the season at Al- 
 lonby, turned in an average five-and-twenty shillings 
 a week. Sixteen of these shillings he gave to his wife 
 for housekeeping ; the rest he reserved for beer. As 
 he had no children, he could not be said to be doing 
 an injustice to his family. He began with his gener- 
 ous liquor at five in the morning, to clear his head 
 of the fumes with which he usually charged it at 
 night. His prudent helpmate took care that the 
 house should never be without this restorative. He 
 was a genuine Saxon peasant, and one of his remoter 
 ancestors had probably contracted his final head- 
 ache by a blow from a mace at Senlac. To be fair 
 to him, however, it should be said that he was on 
 this occasion extremely moderate in his potations. 
 He had recently had a bout. He was now slowly
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 getting sober again, so that his system might the bet- 
 ter respond to treatment with his favorite beverage 
 on next bank-holiday. 
 
 These and other small fry were there to make an 
 audience. The principal figures who were more in- 
 timately connected with the event of the day lin- 
 gered, as befitted their state. The first of them to 
 arrive was Mr. Grimber, the retired tallow-chandler, 
 doubly respected as a Londoner and as a person of 
 independent means. He may best be described as 
 the essential ratepayer of the smaller sort, the de- 
 spair of the champions of the lost causes in heroic 
 ideals. He was absolutely self-centered, save for 
 his immense reverence for wealth and station, and 
 nothing could exceed his disdain for all who, as he 
 put it, were fed, clothed, or educated at his expense. 
 He had paid rates nearly all his life, -not without 
 satisfaction to his vanity as a man of substance, 
 and for the same period had cherished a profound 
 contempt and aversion for those who derived the 
 slightest benefit from his enforced contributions to 
 the public cause. In short, he was in every respect 
 a genial model of skullcapped nincompoopery, alike 
 in body and in soul. 
 
 On his entry, the others said in chorus, "Good 
 evening, Mr. Councilor. ' ' It was a new form for the 
 new occasion, and it was one that, as a precedent, 
 would govern Slocum for all future time. Mr. Grim- 
 ber replied, "Good evening, gentlemen." When his 
 colleague, the schoolmaster, followed, he was saluted 
 in the same way. His reply was, "Good evening, 
 
 152
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 gentlemen and Mr. Councilor." It was another 
 precedent for the ages. Mr. Kisbye, of course, was 
 not for this company. 
 
 The defeated, and yet, in a sense, the triumphant, 
 party presently appeared in the person of old Spurr. 
 He was toil-worn, rugged, dirty as usual, and he had 
 the air of some hunted Hebrew prophet who had 
 momentarily left his wilderness in search of refresh- 
 ment while dodging the wrath of a king. There was 
 no sport to be expected from his taciturnity and 
 from his total want of repartee. He even failed to 
 comply with the formula. George, it was known, 
 would be late, as he was still on his rounds. The 
 sitting, therefore, lacked animation until the arrival 
 of Mr. Fawke, a little man, now swelling with im- 
 portance, whose face seemed to say nothing except 
 that pudding was cheap. His flowing salutation 
 Brought the whole composition into convivial har- 
 mony with a sweep of the hand. 
 
 "I drink your 'ealth, sir, and proud to welcome 
 you," said the ratepayer, raising his glass. 
 
 "An' I should loike to drink it, tew," piped Sam- 
 son Skett. 
 
 Like most persons called for the first time to public 
 station, Mr. Fawke seemed wishful to show that it 
 had not made him proud. 
 
 "I 'ardly know 'ow it 'appened, I 'm sure," he 
 said, "an' when I think 'ow many there is in this 
 parish that knows more than me, I could almost 
 throw it up. I can only do my best, that 's all." 
 
 Nobody helped Mr. Fawke at this stage, and a 
 
 J 53
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 humane person might have felt that he was rather 
 hardly used. 
 
 "But, gentlemen, it 's no use tryin' to make be- 
 lieve. I never 'ad a day's schoolin' in grammar in 
 all my loife an* me to be a speaker, too!" 
 
 "Woire in, Fawke, and get your name up. That 's 
 all you 've got to dew." 
 
 "Well, mates, I '11 say this for mysen: it 's come 
 through no seekin' o' mine. I 'ad n't even no idee 
 of it till I see my nime in the list. ' ' 
 
 A voice: "Come, now, didn't 'e say that, if any- 
 body 'u'd ask 'e, you 'd make one?" 
 
 "I may have said it, but I asked no man to ask 
 me, and I canvassed no man, neyther." 
 
 The voice: "What about Maw?" 
 
 Fawke, changing color: "Now I '11 just tell 'e all 
 about that. Maw said he did n 't think his name 
 was on the register casual-like, as we was passin' 
 the time o' day. Well, I said I 'd look; an' there, 
 sure enough, I found it, an' I jes let him know." 
 
 The schoolmaster: "Why not? Why not? What 
 've ye got to be ashamed of, man?" 
 
 Fawke, taking heart: "I certainly did say, after 
 that, 'My number 's four on the pollin'-card'; but it 
 went no further." 
 
 The voice: "There!" 
 
 Fawke : ' ' The fact is, the act 's a bit too com- 
 plected. It wants masterin '. 'T ain 't so easy to put 
 yer mark agen a name if you can't read the name. 
 We 'aven't all got the edication." 
 
 Grimber, contemptuously: "Education, educa- 
 
 154
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 tion nothin' but that now! I speak as a rate- 
 payer. ' ' 
 
 Job Gurt : "You 're reet there, maister. It 's a 'ard 
 thing on them as 'ave got children. A child as might 
 be earnin' a few pence a week to 'elp keep 'issen, 
 taken away and sent to school as you might say, 
 by force of arms. It 's a 'ard thing on a parent, 
 say Oi." 
 
 "It 's the law, and we 've got to put up with it," 
 growled the schoolmaster. Even he thought that the 
 parent had a case. 
 
 It was the matured deliverance of the rural mind 
 on this subject. No one in that parlor spoke up for 
 education; its warmest apologists simply held their 
 peace. And while silly Slocum talks thus after 
 its nature, tremendous Germany and tremendous 
 America, with their systems polished to the last point 
 of perfection, are waiting to spring on an unlet- 
 tered prey. Truly, there is no fighting against doom. 
 
 "We want to be guided," said Fawke, directing 
 his gaze to an aged person in the corner, who seemed 
 to require propitiation. "We 're mere young uns 
 at it." 
 
 It was the voice (for this person was the owner and 
 embodiment of that organ) , but it took not the slight- 
 est notice of him. 
 
 "I wish it 'd all passed more amicable and 
 f riendly-like, " continued Fawke, still propitiatory. 
 "I wish there 'ad n't been no opposition to the dook 
 as one might say. It ain't pleasant to 'ave a con- 
 tused election 'mong neighbors." 
 
 '55
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Contested," suggested Grimber, not unkindly. 
 
 "All my grammar 's self-taught," said Fawke. 
 
 "Well, you got a progrim o' your own, I under- 
 stand, if it comes to that," said Grimber, sharply. 
 "What 's your little game? I 'ope you ain't comin' 
 on the rates for more money." 
 
 "I don't quite ketch your meanin', Mr. Coun- 
 cilor." 
 
 "Well, what 's your wheeze for the free and in- 
 dependent elector, your job line, speakin' as a trades- 
 man to a tradesman?" 
 
 Fawke, clearing his throat: "The question o' the 
 day in Slocum Parva, aye, an' Slocum Magna, too, 
 is prizes at the flower an' vegetable show. You see, 
 it 's like this here. Our fust prize is five shillin ' ; 
 our second 's two an ' six ; our third 's only a shillin '. 
 Now it ain't enough to encourage laborin' people. 
 It don't pay, when p'r'aps you 've brought forward 
 as many beans, 'taters, an' onions as 'u'd cover this 
 table. The thing I 've been workin' for all my life 
 is to get the money raised to seven an' a kick, five 
 bob, an' two an' a half. That 's the way to en- 
 courage industry an' beat the furiner. An', mark 
 my words, it 's got to come. ' ' 
 
 "It will b"e a tough job," said Grimber. " 'Ow 
 often do we meet?" 
 
 "A full hour every month," said Fawke, eagerly, 
 "sometimes two; an' I mean to bring it on fust 
 thing." 
 
 The discussion could not be maintained at this high 
 level, and it soon began to decline into sheer incon- 
 
 156
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 sequence. Fawke became almost interjectional in his 
 vain repetition of stock phrases "I 've no edica- 
 tion," "we do our best," "it 's got to come." Grim- 
 ber made an effort to restore it by a masterly digres- 
 sion on the water question. He recalled a time when 
 the wells of London were condemned, owing to an- 
 outbreak of cholera, and when the shop of his father, 
 an undertaker, like a second Temple of Janus, was 
 never closed, night or day, for three weeks. 
 
 ' ' I speak of a man as I find him, ' ' maundered the 
 wretched Fawke. 
 
 Grimber looked as though he thought he would 
 say something to Fawke; then again he looked as 
 though he thought he would not. And the more 
 merciful view prevailed. 
 
 A stir at the door, and George came in. "Good 
 evenin', gentlemen all. Well, lads, we 've done it" 
 shaking hands with Spurr. The old man smiled 
 in iron lines, and, by way of showing some excite- 
 ment of sensibility, knocked the ashes out of his pipe. 
 
 Every kind of leadership soon makes itself felt, 
 even the humblest. All pressed forward to shake 
 hands with the peddler. Mr. Grimber did it with 
 the unmistakable air of taking leave of him on his 
 passage to perdition. Still, it was done. The school- 
 master thought he was proud to have had him in his 
 class, but said only, "Well, well ! Well, well !" with 
 the qualified praise which he had formerly given to 
 a successful lesson. The youngster had the self-pos- 
 session of his new pride in himself. He was begin- 
 ning to do things instead of merely thinking things
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 and hoping them precious moment for all of us. 
 He was alive with the new sense of opportunity. 
 The village was not the narrow place he once thought. 
 His success in his new trade showed that something 
 might be done in Slocum, if one only tried. And 
 now there was this second and greater success. He 
 might start the village, as he had started himself, in 
 some way of life less miserably narrow and bounded 
 than the old one. It was no revolt against his bet- 
 ters. He was a peasant still, and recognized their 
 right to rule him; all that he wanted was to be al- 
 lowed to bear a hand. Regenerative ideas mature 
 slowly, and no one gets new-born all at once. What 
 a triumph if he could endow Slocum with a tight 
 thatch and a pail of clean drinking-water all the 
 year round! He was elate, radiant. Fawke tried 
 to introduce his panacea of the flower show, but 
 George waved him off with a laugh. "Never mind 
 that now ; let 's all have a chat, same as old times. ' ' 
 
 The proposition was evidently relished; the con- 
 versation at once took a more convivial tone, and the 
 oldest chestnuts of anecdote began their weary and 
 yet welcome round. There is still a market in the 
 inn parlor for worn-out jokes, as there is one else- 
 where for worn-out boots. Nature knows nothing of 
 waste. 
 
 The wide, wide world, too, came into their talk, 
 but only as the universe might come into the talk 
 of astronomers. It seemed immeasurably far. Yet 
 not always so. They mumbled cricket, even at this 
 season, and it seemed to bring Australia very near to 
 
 158
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 them. America was remote as being less in their 
 thoughts. The national game was, in a manner, their 
 tie of empire. How this county bowled, how that 
 one batted, rallied them, as experts, to a sense of a 
 common interest in life. 
 
 George now called for a song, and though this re- 
 quest was evidently welcome, compliance was de- 
 layed by the usual sheepish unwillingness to face the 
 company. One or two cleared their throats, and 
 pondered, and gave it up, professing to have forgot- 
 ten the words. The landlord at length came to the 
 rescue with a contrivance expressly designed for 
 emergencies of this sort, and superfluously intro- 
 duced by Fawke as the " grammerphone, " perhaps 
 with the thought of his own educational deficiencies 
 still running in his head. The function of this most 
 dismal instrument seemed to be to make the min- 
 strelsy of the music-hall accessible to the rural dis- 
 tricts. The landlord adjusted the slides, not without 
 difficulty, and touched the springs, not without mis- 
 takes. At length, after several false starts, the thing 
 was delivering a metrical pleasantry on the subject 
 of paper collars, in a far-off tone which suggested 
 a revel of cockney gnomes in the bowels of the earth. 
 Yet nothing could have been at once more impres- 
 sively unearthly in its metallic travesty of the hu- 
 man voice, nor more commonplace in its general 
 drift. 
 
 It was as disappointing in this respect as those 
 sittings of unlettered mediums in which the sages 
 of history revisit our sphere to talk the wisdom of 
 
 '59
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 the copy-book in the vernacular of Whitechapel. It 
 left the company cold, but not for this reason. They 
 felt that it was dull, while they silently acknowledged 
 that it was perhaps too fashionable for their com- 
 prehension. In short, they put it in the same cate- 
 gory as the selections from Wagner at village con- 
 certs, performed by distinguished amateurs. In the 
 one instance, as in the other, they were much too 
 well-bred to complain. The judicious landlord saved 
 them the trouble by covering the machine once more 
 with its oil-cloth, and stimulating Bangs to harmony 
 with the offer of a drink. 
 
 The poacher accordingly plunged headlong into a 
 patriotic ditty, inspired by the war, with a burden 
 of "England, be proud of your boys in brown." 
 The choice of a color was but a tacit confession of 
 the poet's inability to make khaki subservient to the 
 purposes of his art. Whatever its faults in composi- 
 tion and execution, this was at least a vital deliver- 
 ance, and it had the happiest effect. The whole 
 parlor joined heartily in the chorus, and Fawke, 
 in particular, grew manifestly reckless, as though 
 meditating an immediate start for the front. The 
 ice thus broken, Mr. Grimber next undertook to 
 oblige. 
 
 "I ain't got nothin' new," he said, "but if you 
 care for one of the old uns, here 's something that 
 my old father learned from his father, who was a 
 volunteer in the great French war. It 's about Na- 
 poleon Bonyparte." 
 
 An old song, and a song that might contain some 
 
 160
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 mention of the battle of Waterloo! Nothing more 
 was needed to bespeak their most reverent attention. 
 It opened as follows : 
 
 "Come, all you young men, beware of ambition, 
 Or else, in course o' time, you may alter your 
 
 condition. 
 
 Oh, think upon 'is woes who was born to be a yero, 
 And now is gone to end his days in the isle of St. 
 'Eleno." 
 
 There were twelve verses, and they traced a career 
 of misguided ambition from the cradle almost to 
 the grave. In the treatment of it, and particularly 
 in Mr. Grimber's rendering, this dazzling but irregu- 
 lar genius became an awful warning for the rising 
 manhood of Sloeum Parva of the dangers of dis- 
 content with their lot. He seemed to walk the earth 
 again to impress upon them the great truth that if 
 they were not exceedingly careful they might cease to 
 be British boors. He had probably served the same 
 purpose for their grandsires, and so had not lived 
 altogether in vain. The song was thus of real social 
 and political significance in its solemn echoes of the 
 teaching of the catechism in regard to contentment 
 with the state of life to which we are called. The 
 implied rebuke seemed especially to come home to 
 Mr. Fawke, with his newly awakened desires for civil 
 and even for military distinction. He sat silent, as 
 though meditating, with thankfulness, his exceed- 
 ingly narrow escape of a throne. 
 
 161
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 They were at the height of their rude revel when 
 a child from the village came in and handed a letter 
 to George. It had just been left at his cottage, and 
 the messenger who had brought it from the agent's 
 room at the castle said it was pressing. So few let- 
 ters, pressing or other, came to them that all present 
 boded something momentous, especially when they 
 saw the young man, as he opened it, turn deathly 
 pale. He read it again in the perfect silence, dropped 
 it, and staggered forth without a word. One of them 
 picked it up and without ceremony read it aloud for 
 the benefit of the company. It was a formal notice 
 to quit, on the ground that the cottage was wanted 
 for a new laborer on the estate. They all realized its 
 dire significance just as fully as George. It meant 
 ruin. Without Slocum as a center, his little business 
 would be nothing; and for a man under the ban of 
 the castle there would be no other footing anywhere 
 throughout the countryside. "A fancied summat 
 was comin'," said Job, "when A see the agent makin' 
 a ugly face," 
 
 162
 
 XVIII 
 
 ITHIN a fortnight of that day, so 
 swiftly was it done, George Herion 
 was in London, earning his living 
 at the dock-side. 
 
 Thus the blow fell. There was 
 the agent 's decree of expulsion, for 
 such it was, and no valid appeal. 
 The duchess, their one friend, was in town, amid the 
 whirl of her first season, as effectually out of reach 
 as Arcturus. If she had been at their door, they 
 might never have dared raise a voice to her. The 
 duke 's agent was the duke, the duke was the duchess, 
 in their simple minds. It was all one great machinery 
 of fate which crushed them at their appointed time. 
 To those immortals what were the likes of them? 
 
 Yet the mothers counseled submission, after the 
 wont of their kind. "Do 'ee now 'umble yourself," 
 said George's. "Tell un you be sorry-loike if ye 
 ha' done amiss. It 's the mother as nussed ye tell 
 ye so. Do, like a good boy." 
 
 "I '11 die fust, mammy," said the bad boy, the 
 form of the appeal taking him back to the time when 
 he drew his life from her breast. "If I went to 
 heel, I 'd only get another kick for my pains. What 
 did Kisbye sack me for? Nothin'. What have I 
 
 163
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 done sence? Nothin' again. Ask Peascod if I ain't 
 always kep' within the act o' Parli'ment." 
 
 The poor old things looked at Rose, as though 
 urging her to back them. But she shook her head. 
 It was the second of her two moods, the dogged one. 
 "I '11 stand by what 'e does," was all she said. 
 
 "Well, not to 'umble hisself, deary," pleaded her 
 mother. ' ' P 'r 'aps 'e could get a cottage somewheres 
 else, an' not lose the bezness. He 's so cliver. Oh, 
 the bezness, the b'ezness!" And the two mourners 
 keened in chorus over the good thing dead and gone. 
 
 "It 's no use," said George. "I couldn't get a 
 foothold anywheres within ten mile of Allonby; an' 
 if I did, they 'd hunt me down. With their mark 
 ag'in' you, you 're a lost man." 
 
 "He 's goin' for a sojer, see if he ain't!" cried 
 the old woman. "Oh, cruel, cruel! an' with my gal 
 for 's wife ! ' ' 
 
 Even the daughter paled. 
 
 "I 'm goin' to London," said George, kissing 
 Eose, "an' my gal 's goin' wi' me. Will that dew?" 
 
 "London!" wailed the desperate old creature. 
 "An' what '11 ye make there, ye silly sheep that 
 I should call you so ! What '11 ye make there ? ' ' 
 
 "Make my fortune, mother. What I 've done 
 once with a bezness I can do again. That 's the place 
 to win the brass. That 's the place where every- 
 body 's free." 
 
 The neighbors dropped in to condole. "What 
 I 've noticed all ma little loife," said Job Gurt, "is 
 this: Speak yer mind, an' you get the sack. You 
 
 164
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 don't get it for speakin' yer mind ; you get it, that 's 
 all. But it 's just as good as though you got itt' 
 other way. D' ye think they '11 chalk up more beer 
 for 'ee at the Knuckle o ' Veal because you 're what 's 
 called a victim? 'T ain't loikely. A wouldn't do 
 it mysen. Publican 's got to live. My old feyther 
 told me that when I wur a boy, an' I 've found it 
 roight." 
 
 An invincible terror of their betters, as beings 
 mighty to hurt, was the note with most of them. 
 There was the life of habit, with all its drawbacks, 
 and how change it without risk ? ' ' When ma missus 
 went off for a week last Easter to see her mother, 
 I missed her tongue. A take ma Bible oath on it, so 
 I did. When she 'ad 'er say I was payin' as I went 
 on." It was Job still. 
 
 "You 'd be a good plucked un, even if you was 
 a leaseholder, young man," said Mr. Grimber. 
 "People can't afford to 'ave so much sperrit when 
 their rates is included in the rent. ' ' 
 
 Mr. Bascomb slipped two sovereigns into Rose's 
 hand, and then went home, with a sigh, to read ' ' The 
 City of God." Mr. Raif called, as in duty bound, 
 but it was only to shake his head. The domestic 
 chaplain had caught George in the very act of his 
 defiant utterance as to making his fortune in Lon- 
 don. He took leave of the outcast meekly, yet as 
 one giving thanks that he was rid of a knave. 
 
 The little home was broken up. The mothers took 
 most of the furniture to store for happier times; 
 the rest was sent to town. The business had no sell- 
 
 165
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ing value, and it was left to perish. The two out- 
 casts went forth quietly. The omens were not all 
 against them. It was a chilling spring, yet the 
 blackthorn flowered; a redstart sang them farewell. 
 But for this they might have lacked attention, the 
 neighbors having been specially canvassed by Grim- 
 ber, with a view to a display of masterly inactivity 
 within doors. It was thus, in its lack of publicity, 
 as in other respects, a sort of expulsion from Eden, 
 with Peascod's walking-stick as a poor substitute 
 for the flaming sword. They went forth to keep 
 London the largest of all the cities of the world, and 
 rural England, in a sense, the smallest of all the 
 countries. None but old Spurr came to bear a hand 
 with the traps, which George was himself to wheel 
 to the station for transport by a later train. Few 
 as these were, the little hand-cart would not hold all 
 of them, and George looked round for a lift. 
 
 It came at a turn of the road. The yellow van 
 hove in sight, not in marching order at present, but 
 merely bound for the station, itself to take train to 
 a distant center for the opening of the spring cam- 
 paign. Only a carter's lad was in charge this time. 
 The lecturer, the wife, the baby, the posters were 
 to join at a later stage, and, for the moment, the 
 vehicle looked all forlorn. The driver wanted but a 
 word to induce him to hoist the bundle on the tail- 
 board; and with a "gee up," he took his place be- 
 hind the little cart. The two old grannies, yet to 
 be, hid their faces with their aprons and ran indoors. 
 The same thought had come to both of them in a 
 
 1 66
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 flash. It looked exactly like a funeral procession 
 fourth-class. 
 
 They gravitated toward the east end of the great 
 city; and, while waiting to turn himself round, the 
 young fellow took his unskilled strength into the 
 market and found a job at the dock-side. At the 
 sight of their dismal lodging in dismal Poplar, Rose 
 wavered for a moment in utter heartbreak, and 
 would have written to her august friend. But 
 George sternly forbade, strong in his confidence of 
 righting himself, grim in his disdain. Nobody was 
 to know of this fleeting experience of discomfort; 
 even the mothers were to be spared details. Rose 
 was nothing loath on that point. Her peasant pride 
 revolted at the thought of the admission of even 
 temporary failure. All would come right so very 
 soon, and then she and George would return to 
 Slocum in state, wearing new Sunday clothes. 
 
 The duchess heard of it, for all that, if only in 
 the postscript of a belated letter: 
 
 " Your young friends Rose and George are now 
 your neighbors in town. Herion, I hear, has rather 
 lost his head with some notion of making his fortune 
 in London, and, on the strength of it, or perhaps we 
 had better say the weakness, has been disrespectful 
 to the agent. Anyhow, he has taken himself off with 
 his pretty little wife." 
 
 It was Mary reporting the reports of Mr. Raif. 
 So, notoriously, is history made. But the squire's 
 
 167
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 daughter had enough to think of just now to excuse 
 her from trying to get her information at first 
 hand. In spite of the drawbridge at Liddicot Hall, 
 many worries and anxieties had crossed the moat, 
 and father and daughter agreed that all thought of 
 a season in town was out of the question. With 
 Tom at the front, they lacked the spirit for gaiety. 
 They lacked even the means, after the heavy pecu- 
 niary sacrifices entailed by his outfit and departure. 
 
 So Augusta read her postscript, not thinking there 
 was very much in it, and went on with her season. 
 It was a sad season, the shadow of the war was 
 over it, though the devotees of pleasure managed 
 to pick a bit here and there, like some sick navvy 
 at his third helping of rabbit-pie. 
 
 Yet even they had their trials. There was always 
 that weekly picture-book of the dead in the illus- 
 trated papers, with its portraits of the poor lads who 
 had been laid low on the veldt. The war seemed a 
 monster that devoured youth. There they were in 
 all the smartness of mufti or of uniform, beardless, 
 many of them without the barber's art, clear-eyed, 
 ingenuous, and, for all the manly glory of their 
 sacrifice, sheer mothers' boys. Yet the customary 
 things had to be done, for gaiety is one of the public 
 services, like the water and the gas. When the pub- 
 lic courage seemed to faint, the venerable Queen 
 came out and was driven through the cheering 
 streets, guarded, tended, as well as attended, even 
 in her carriage weary as with the memory of in- 
 numerable pageants and with the sense of the vanity
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 of things, almost immobile, bowing, if one may say 
 so, mainly from the eyes. 
 
 Incessantly they pitied themselves, especially 
 when they went to bed without a headache, and they 
 left town for Easter with the most sincere conviction 
 that they needed a thorough rest. Strengthened and 
 refreshed, they came back for a great dinner-party 
 at the duke's, a court concert, and a thousand and 
 one nothings which left them thoroughly exhausted 
 by Whitsuntide. There were no court balls for one 
 reason, because, with eight thousand of her Majesty's 
 Guards in South Africa, there were no dancers. 
 There were still enough soldiers left, however, to 
 make a brave show for the trooping of the colors for 
 the Queen's birthday, and a braver, if possible, for 
 the regimental dinners of a later stage. The first 
 meet of the coaching club was pretty. The duke 
 had promised to drive his own coach, but at the last 
 moment he had to confide Augusta to another chariot- 
 eer. He was engaged in finishing a weighty literary 
 deliverance on the causes of the depopulation of 
 rural England, to which he had been urged by the 
 editor of a fashionable review. 
 
 A debutante is the imperious need of every season, 
 of such a season above all. Augusta was the nine 
 days' wonder, and, human nature being what it is, 
 that was enough for her. London was new to her; 
 she had but passed through it on her arrival in Eng- 
 land. Her self-possession was much admired in the 
 circumstances. The truth is, she found it not by 
 seeking for it, but by a lucky accident. She was 
 
 169
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 so intensely interested in what passed that she was 
 often able to forget her own share in it. She re- 
 sembled those favored persons on the Elizabethan 
 stage who were at once parts of the audience and 
 parts of the spectacle. Often when she was the real 
 center of attraction in a group she was eagerly and 
 interestedly aware of everybody in it but herself, 
 and so took it with a quiet absorption of curiosity 
 which served her as well as the hardihood bred of a 
 dozen campaigns. Her first drawing-room was a 
 kind of waking dream in which she was mainly 
 busy with the memories of a notable tale of fairy- 
 land read years ago by the fire in a ranch. 
 
 There were tableaux at the Great Opera House. 
 It was all society under a hat a big hat, of course. 
 Society filled the bill in every sense; the humblest 
 supers on the stage were personages, so were the 
 very gods in the gallery. Royalty swept the circle 
 from its box. It was a Mask of Peace and War, 
 something for a charity, with the colonies offering 
 toffy to mama, and the massed bands of the Guards 
 the poor Guards were nothing but band, with all 
 the men at the front blowing "Rule Britannia " 
 toward the universe. Public enthusiasm took its 
 temperature from the evening papers. There were 
 good telegrams that night, and the house felt good 
 along with them. 
 
 After the entertainment came supper at the res- 
 taurant. "When Augusta saw what a pretty sight 
 it was down-stairs she canceled the order for a pri- 
 vate room. A few of the tables were perfect con- 
 stellations. But it was very mixed, and there were 
 
 I/O
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 dreadful-looking people here and there, guzzling like 
 trusts at feeding-time, and positively trying to make 
 believe they were hungry. This was finance. Kisbye 
 was among them, and he had the impudence to try 
 to catch the duke's eye! What a mixture it was, 
 and no mixing home and foreign nobility, South 
 African millionaires, mincing stage misses. Dying 
 is about the only unaffected thing in some lives. 
 Everybody that was anybody in any line that 
 seemed to be the rule: a collection of ''bests," even 
 in depravity. It gave one a sense of power, in a way. 
 Here, at least, were all the people who had found 
 out how to do things even those who could only 
 talk cleverly about doing them ; for the distinguished 
 author was not wanting, as a matter of course. Even 
 authors must eat ; and society seethes something bet- 
 ter than pottage for the sons of the prophets. The 
 Prince had won the Derby a second time, and the 
 duke was to dine with him at the Jockey Club in 
 honor of the occasion. The duchess received her Ma- 
 jesty's commands for a performance of opera at 
 Windsor Castle. 
 
 In a letter Augusta gave an account of these 
 gaieties with this postscript, in answer to Mary's: 
 
 "I think the Herions have made a mistake, but 
 we shall see. I like his pluck, all the same. Good 
 night, Mary. I 'm writing this before turning in. 
 I shall have a surprise for you soon. It will be a 
 surprise visit a stranger! male sex! There, you 
 must do the rest for yourself. Now get a wink of 
 sleep, if you can." 
 
 171
 
 XIX 
 
 IR HENRY LIDDICOT is out of 
 sorts this morning, as he sits at 
 breakfast with his daughter in his 
 moated hall. He has had a kind of 
 threatening letter from a money- 
 lender, and not his money-lender, 
 but the other man 's. The other man is his son. Tom, 
 it seems, has accepted accommodation to gentlemen 
 about town as generously as it is usually offered in 
 the initial stage. He is deeply involved, in fact ; and 
 the money-lender, who signs himself Claude Vava- 
 sour, thinks that the squire may like to know. The 
 squire does not like to know in the least. 
 
 "I thought I 'd cleared him nicely before he went 
 out," he says. "I call it sly." 
 "No, no, father not that!" 
 "Who is this fellow with a name out of a playbill? 
 And what are we going to do ? " 
 
 Mary sighs at the thought of another appeal to 
 the family solicitors. It involves a confession of a 
 most embarrassed state of affairs. Messrs. Stall- 
 brass, Stallbrass, Fruhling, Jenkins & Prothero 
 where do family solicitors get these appalling collo- 
 cations? are a sort of outer conscience for the 
 squire, and he approaches them in his difficulties 
 
 172
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 like a naughty Hoy. The girl knows what those dif- 
 ficulties are even better than her father. His poor 
 eyesight has long made him dependent on her for 
 clerical work. 
 
 "What are you going to do, father?" 
 
 "Put the letter in the fire." 
 
 "And Tom? Remember he 's not here to look af- 
 ter himself." 
 
 "I 'm tired of looking after him mess, clubs, 
 turf, life ab'out town there 's no end to it. Why 
 did n 't I send him into a marching regiment ? What 
 are you huddling up there, Polly?" 
 
 It was Tom's little bills for his late equipment for 
 the front as an officer of a crack regiment : luncheon- 
 baskets, cases of wines and spirits, guns, polo-clubs, 
 golf-tools, a truly edifying variety of fancy shirts 
 all consigned as "urgent military stores." 
 
 ' ' Ah, ' ' he said, as though mollified in some curious 
 way, "it 's a dearer trade than it was in my day. 
 March of progress, I suppose." But he said no 
 more. 
 
 There was silence for a while, broken only by the 
 chipping of an egg-shell. 
 
 "I gave him all he wanted," he added presently, 
 "and ready money, too. I don't see why he should 
 spring all this private debt upon me. The land 
 won't stand it." 
 
 You never could answer for the squire's mental 
 machinery as an implement of research. Perhaps 
 somewhere in the background of his mind was an 
 idea of the burdens upon an acre of Liddicot land
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 as they had been accumulated by the slow growth of 
 custom in the course of centuries. So much may be 
 conjectured, for he murmured: "There 's you and 
 me, and Tom, and your Aunt Dorothy, and your 
 Aunt Elizabeth "and with that he seemed to give 
 it up. 
 
 An expert might have followed up the clue in this 
 way: Not only did all the persons named expect to 
 reap and garner the acre for their private needs: 
 there were the poor relatives, as well as the entailed 
 ones a venerable second cousin or two in foreign 
 boarding-houses to whom the squire was "good." 
 Further claims were represented by the pensioned 
 servants and other dependents, one of them an old 
 fellow in the next cottage to Skett's, who had been 
 surly to all and several for the last fifteen years 
 of bedridden impotence on the strength of his hav- 
 ing carried the ferrets in his pocket when the squire 
 went ratting as a boy. Then came the farmer and 
 his laborers, with their respective wives, children, 
 and hangers-on, according to degree, who naturally 
 expected to live by the land. Each claimed his share, 
 big or little. This was only the pure ideal of the ar- 
 rangement. Some got the share only now and then ; 
 others never got it at all. The fractions, as they 
 stood in the scheme of benevolent muddle, always 
 overran the total. The acre wouldn't go round. 
 The attempt to make it behave itself was the stand- 
 ing puzzle of the patriarch's life. The squire and 
 his son and daughter of course had to come first. 
 He was sorry for those who came last and he thought 
 the government ought to be ashamed of itself. 
 
 174
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Couldn't we cut down the living expenses, 
 dad?" 
 
 "Be reasonable, my dear. We used to be almost 
 a first-class house ; we 're hardly a third now. How 
 many people have we about the place ? ' ' 
 
 " Quite fifty." 
 
 ' ' Thought as much, ' ' he said, with a quiet chuckle. 
 "Cut it down if you can. We 're undermanned in 
 stablemen and keepers ; we have n 't a single war- 
 rener. Where are you going to begin on the home 
 farm?" 
 
 " Do we want all those mechanics idling about ? ' ' 
 
 "All right; sack your bricklayer, carpenter, 
 painter, and wheelwright, and get it jobbed outside. 
 But take care, Polly, or you '11 have the moat in the 
 cellars one day, if not the cellars in the moat." 
 
 "Still-" 
 
 "I gave up the deer-park before you were born," 
 he pleaded. "Reason that 's all I want. Half our 
 gardeners are boys. We 've hardly got anything 
 under glass. But I 'm not exactly going to the green- 
 grocer for my peaches, for all that." 
 
 "Well, father, but-" 
 
 "And I don't think you 'd like to put down the 
 laundry, Mary, with all these new-fashioned com- 
 plaints about. Come, now, let 's stick to something 
 or give up the game. ' ' 
 
 It was his way of looking at life. He had brought 
 up his son on it. Some such thought was in Mary's 
 mind. 
 
 "Then I 'm afraid Mr. Vavasour is inevitable," 
 was all she said. 
 
 175
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "No, no; I don't go so far as that. Sorry I 'm a 
 magistrate : I should like to put him in the moat. ' ' 
 
 "He 'd walk still, father. It would only be a 
 second ghost at Liddicot." 
 
 "It 's Tom's extravagance," he began. But then 
 he thought of his boy at the front, and his anger 
 melted away. Such a good fellow, such a nice, manly 
 sort of lad a first-class athlete, the best gentleman 
 jockey in the county, so simple and straight with 
 his breezy belief that youth was the season for en- 
 joyment and that the chief business of his elders was 
 to push him on without any exertion on his part ! 
 Only wanting everything he had a mind to, and 
 prone to measure himself with the best. 
 
 "It 's my fault as much as his," he mused. "I 
 ought to go to headquarters and give him a lift. I 
 know one or two at the War Office used to, at any 
 rate. It 's a mischief we can't entertain a bit in 
 town this season. And yet it 's nobody 's fault, after 
 all. It 's the state of the country. "What are you 
 to do with a wretched government that won't look 
 after the landed interest?" 
 
 He took up a newspaper, but it seemed only a fresh 
 cause of annoyance, for, with the exclamation ' ' Gad- 
 flies!" he threw it down again. 
 
 Mary caught it as it fell. They were attacking 
 his precious boy, by implication, in a scathing dia- 
 tribe on "Our Military Dunces," provoked by some 
 fresh blunder at the front. These unfortunate per- 
 sons, it seemed, had learned nothing of their trade, 
 and consequently they had nothing to forget. The 
 
 176
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 particular insect in question had dipped its stingf 
 in a recent report on military education, and it left 
 venom with every wound. Sandhurst was a mere 
 survival of the practical joke; the cadets at Wool- 
 wich took their lessons of application from a muzzle- 
 loading howitzer without a carriage ; even Aldershot 
 was nearly as bad. The military geography, in spite 
 of the manuals, was child's play. It was sleepy 
 hollow everywhere; ignorance was positively wor- 
 shiped throughout the army. 
 
 The poor girl dropped the paper in her turn. A 
 tear trickled down her cheek, for Tom's sake, 
 and she wished she could horsewhip somebody. It 
 was a new and ghastly light on the absent hero's 
 contempt of book work, and his amiable derision, a 
 grace in itself, at the expense of the fellow that 
 ''swots." 
 
 "It 's a lie!" thundered the squire. "That lad's 
 education, first and last, cost me seven thousand 
 pound." He was not grumbling now; he was only 
 protesting against the attack. He was proud of the 
 cost. It was part of his duty to his son to give him 
 the best that money could buy ; and in this, of course, 
 as in most things, the more you paid the more 
 you had. It was at the root of his philosophy of 
 life. 
 
 "A fine sum," he murmured, after a pause, "to 
 be at the mercy of the pull of a trigger from such 
 as them!" 
 
 It was the expression of his disgust at the thought 
 of all that invested capital in the graces of mind 
 12
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 and station under the rifle of a crouching farmer. 
 It made him realize the cost of the war. 
 
 "And they pretend he can't spell, father! Did 
 you ever hear such impertinence ?^' The same 
 thought was in both their minds. It was all per- 
 sonal to Tom. 
 
 ' ' All spite all newspaper spite, ' ' he said. ' ' Some 
 of our little comforts have reached the front, I sup- 
 pose, and they can't bear the thought of it. Such 
 people never can. Just see what they say about the 
 pursuing column." 
 
 It was a mocking account of a so-called flying 
 column, hampered with portable beds, wash-stands, 
 and what not, including tents of a cool green to 
 baffle the sun. The column flew all the same, ap- 
 parently under the influence of a terrible colonel 
 who could put up with a dog-biscuit for ration, and 
 who sent all the finery to the rear. Tom's regiment 
 was actually named, with the additional fact that at 
 the end of the day the mess still managed to appear 
 in some approach to suitable evening wear. 
 
 "That 'a Tom all over," said the old man. "He 'd 
 be lost without his change at dinner-time. But 
 green 's going too far, ' ' he added reflectively. "It 's 
 a bit foppish, if you ask me." 
 
 Some misgiving appeared to enter the girl 's mind. 
 She echoed him no more. There was none in the 
 squire's. "I know that sort," he said, harking back 
 to the abstemious colonel. "Promotion from the 
 ranks, eh ? All done to curry favor. I suppose he 's 
 one of K 's lot."
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 The force of manly indignation could no further 
 
 go. K was that tremendous figure, hated of the 
 
 squire and his kind for his unseemly passion for 
 the rigor of the game of war a passion that threat- 
 ened to spoil the army as a good thing for men of 
 family. It was the old ideal of military service 
 perishing under the rude shocks of the new men 
 the men who were for bringing a gentlemanlike call- 
 ing back to its old realities of berserker fury and 
 berserker sweat. The fury was all very well in its 
 season. It was so easy to die in that game, as in 
 tiger-shooting, or, for that matter, in riding to 
 hounds; but it was disgusting to think of having 
 to run the risk without the relief of the elementary 
 comforts of home. 
 
 Mary was silent still. She thought of a passage 
 in one of Tom's letters in which that amiable youth 
 had related, with such spelling as he could muster, 
 an adventure of his own with the personage in ques- 
 tion. A group of officers of Tom's regiment at Cape 
 Town, on easy leave, were laying themselves out for 
 a round of social pleasures while waiting for "an- 
 other flutter" at the front. The leave had been had 
 
 for the asking before K arrived to take matters 
 
 in hand, and the distraction of the hour was a game 
 of pool. To the assembled heroes enters suddenly a 
 grim figure in khaki, colossal, with little to dis- 
 tinguish his rank but his commanding port and a 
 something in the solemn glare of his eye that strikes 
 
 awe into the beholder. It is K himself, come 
 
 down in a night and a day of incessant traveling to 
 
 I 79
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 whip up stragglers. ''What are you doing here, 
 gentlemen?" "On leave, sir, from the front." 
 "Get back to the front by the next train, or home 
 by the next steamer. " ' ' Pretty cool, and for a chap 
 in the Engineers, Polly!" said Tom. "Guess how 
 he 's loved." 
 
 It was not that Tom was a milksop ; he could be 
 as hard as nails on occasion. But he thought the 
 little relaxations were due to his position, and he was 
 hard to balk of them. He shared his father's con- 
 tempt for the status of the enemy, mere field- folk 
 who took their coats off to it, and he 'd be hanged 
 if he was going to go dirty just because he was 
 fighting them. He was born to cleanliness, and he 
 was going to have it to his shroud. Had n 't he 
 read somewhere that the Spartans prepared for the 
 shock of battle by dressing their hair, and were found 
 so employed just before the shock of Thermopylae? 
 Tom, after all, was not so exigent. All he wanted 
 was a brush-up when his work was done. 
 
 Polly had perhaps taken it that way at first, cer- 
 tainly the heroic figure had found litle more favor 
 in her eyes than in Tom's, but gradually, in the 
 course of this troubled morning, with its themes of 
 public and of private sorrow, it had been borne in 
 upon her that, after all, here was a man. And look- 
 ing at the poor old inheritor of a name before her, 
 and thinking of the brother whose faculty and char- 
 acter were the only hope of their house, it had come 
 upon her that what the Liddicots wanted was ex- 
 actly what the nation, by God's providence, had 
 
 1 80
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 found a man once more. Such a feeling must ever 
 weigh heavily on the woman in societies that still 
 compel her to appear only by her champion in the 
 lists of life. Fain would Mary have mounted to the 
 topmost tower of Liddicot to look for such a helper, 
 like a second Sister Anne. 
 
 181
 
 XX 
 
 HAT night's post brought a wel- 
 come change of ideas. 
 
 "Well, Mary, here 's your sur- 
 prise [wrote Augusta]. My little 
 brother has arrived, and he 's go- 
 ing to see you. If I know him at 
 all, he '11 be at Liddicot about as soon as this. I 'm 
 the big sister. If you see the slightest sign of his 
 forgetting it, let me know. Arthur is his name. He 
 has just left college, after doing pretty well there, 
 and he is looking round to pick up notions of things 
 before making a start. He '11 do for a boy or a man, 
 just as you choose to take him. Wasn't it our am- 
 bassador here who said that America and England 
 might do worse than swap school-boys, now and 
 then, just to give each other points? Well, here 's 
 our sample, for want of a better. And now what 
 are you going to do about it ? He means well, Mary ; 
 be as indulgent as you can. 
 
 * ' He '11 cheer you up, perhaps : change of per- 
 sonality is as stimulating as change of air. He will 
 stay at Allonby, of course, and that will bring him 
 within delightfully easy reach of Liddicot. No keep- 
 ing him in town impossible. Wild horses could n't 
 do it, and certainly not the tame variety at our dis- 
 
 182
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 posal. He 's very keen about the country life, and 
 he calls poor London Britannia's case of swelled 
 head. This just to let you know what an impudent 
 young monkey he is. Be a mother to him, Mary, all 
 the same. 
 
 "Keep him till we all come back, which will be 
 soon, for the season wanes. It will be easy : you have 
 only to let him spend his time with you." 
 
 This was the answer : 
 
 "Delighted to put him up here. Must have him, 
 in fact. Father says you can't begin burying alive 
 again, at Allonby ; you 'd be five centuries too late. 
 Not but what there was something to be said, etc. 
 which I mercifully spare. Who 's to keep off the 
 ghosts from a lone man in your marble halls ? And, 
 besides, if he doesn't want society, we do. Please, 
 Augusta, lend us the baby out and out. We '11 take 
 such care of him. Just wire the hour of his train. ' ' 
 
 Within the shortest time possible after that, two 
 figures might have been seen crossing the moat at 
 Liddicot in a dogcart. One of them was the man 
 in livery with the reins; the other was a stranger, 
 still early in the twenties, who was manifestly an 
 expected guest. He was like the average guest of 
 his years at an English house in being of fair height 
 and of good muscular development ; also like him in 
 wearing tweeds and a bowler-hat, and in being 
 scrupulously clean-shaven, so as to give his coun- 
 
 183
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 tenance the full benefit of every Roman line. Beards 
 are only for the ages and races that make futile 
 attempts to rule mankind with a poor chin. He 
 looked uncommonly English of his age and stand- 
 ing ; that is to say, uncommonly Greek. The Hermes 
 of Praxiteles might have come straight from Ox- 
 ford or from Harvard. Mary thought he would do 
 quite nicely as she spied on him from a turret-win- 
 dow. There was barely time to dress for dinner, so 
 she left the squire to receive him. 
 
 On coming down she found them both ready for 
 her, and the guest greeted her, yet without a touch 
 of familiarity, as though they had been friends for 
 years. She had but few categories for her fellow- 
 creatures, and while waiting to examine this one 
 more at leisure she hurriedly tried them, only to find 
 that they would not do. The "thinks so much of 
 himself" pigeonhole was a wretched fit ; he evidently 
 thought so much of her as a woman, and of the squire 
 as his senior and host. He was quietly deferential 
 without fear the perfect blend. It was the mixed 
 American system, though she did not know that, in 
 one of its happiest results. He had been carefully 
 trained, and from puppyhood had never been allowed 
 to feel shy at the sight of drapery. His manner of 
 retrieving a fallen handkerchief at the very outset 
 left nothing to be desired. Later on he proved simply 
 lynx-eyed for a longing or a need in this finest of all 
 sport, and he worked by the eye of his keeper rather 
 than by the voice. The type was wholly new to the 
 experience of the English girl, and it fluttered her. 
 
 184
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Being fluttered, she next feared he was going to be 
 of the "cynical and clever" variety, and felt slightly 
 more ill at ease. His youthful candor made that 
 as gross a misfit as the other. It was all done in a 
 moment, so swiftly have we to jump to conclusions 
 about one another at the first go-off. She had only 
 just time to fall back on the merely "self -possessed" 
 when it was time to move. To her great comfort, 
 he seemed to pop into that receptacle without a 
 crease, and, leaving him there, she was free to ask 
 for further news of the party in town as they went 
 down-stairs. 
 
 He gave it with a measured precision of utterance 
 which was rather disconcerting. It reminded her 
 of something she had read about the speech peculiar- 
 ity of another of his countrymen. He seemed dis- 
 posed to extend the principles of the Declaration of 
 Independence to his syllables, and to leave them all 
 free and equal, without a trace of accentuation that 
 might render one the tyrant of the rest. Now she 
 began to wonder if she should not shift him into 
 the "learned and severe." But there was no present 
 opportunity, for by this time they were in the dining- 
 room. The plain truth is, he had the freshness of a 
 boy who happened to have been born a man of the 
 world. Having no pigeonhole for that, she meekly 
 settled down to her soup, while he entertained the 
 squire. 
 
 For this was really the way of it: the guest was 
 host. Mr. Arthur Gooding did the honors of the 
 neighborhood. He gave information, while seeming 
 
 185
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 only to ask for it, about views, soil, proportions of 
 parkland, plowland, and meadow, which, as it af- 
 fected the district at large, occasionally left his 
 senior at a loss. He was never in that predicament 
 himself. He took everything merely as a new con- 
 versational crisis to be dealt with as it arose. 
 
 "I am so sorry we have no one to meet you," she 
 said; "but there is hardly a soul in the country just 
 now. ' ' 
 
 "We may have a host without numbers," replied 
 the young man. 
 
 Compliments always troubled Mary. This one, 
 mild as it was, had the rather singular effect of 
 making her wonder whether there was anything 
 wrong with her hair. 
 
 She darted a swift glance at him to find out, with, 
 of course, still greater inconsistency, for only a mir- 
 ror could have served her turn. He was inquiring 
 in a most ingenuous way afiout some of the magnates 
 of the country-side, whose names he seemed to have 
 at his fingers' ends, and asking how they spent their 
 time. 
 
 The squire seemed embarrassed. "Well, let me see. 
 Torold 's rather an authority on church restoration ; 
 Nethercott keeps the pack; Offley never misses a 
 meeting at quarter-sessions; Kodeland 's very keen 
 on model villages. The prime minister, though he 
 does n't belong to this part of the country, is a great 
 man in the Primrose League, and came down to our 
 demonstration the other day." 
 
 "Anybody in business?" 
 
 186
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 The squire winced. " There 's no answering for 
 people nowadays. Rodeland's son, I believe, does 
 something in tea." 
 
 "Your prime minister must be a very interesting 
 man," said Arthur. "I should like to meet him." 
 
 It was the nearest approach to the sense of a joke 
 other than the practical that the squire had ever 
 made in his life. He laughed heartily. 
 
 Even Mary felt inclined to transfer her guest to 
 the "cheeky" pigeonhole forthwith. But there was 
 something in his wistful innocence of all idea of pre- 
 sumption that made her hold her hand. It was evi- 
 dent that he had come abroad for useful informa- 
 tion, and that he would have sought the Archbishop 
 of Canterbury on the spiritual status of the Peculiar 
 People, or the lord chancellor on kindred points of 
 interest in British law, without any sense of incon- 
 gruity. Of mortal man, and that included his "su- 
 periors," he knew no fear. 
 
 He seemed faintly apprehensive of something 
 wrong, though he still had to feel his way to it. "I 
 want to know everything about your Primrose 
 League," he said. "We 've nothing like it on our 
 side. Your prime minister would be the very man. ' ' 
 It was said, not in apology, but only as amplifying 
 his phrase. 
 
 "You see, he 's very high up," said the squire. 
 "People of that sort are rather hard to get at. Be- 
 sides, they are not expected to take an active part." 
 
 "I see, I see," said the young man, sympatheti- 
 cally-" tired." 
 
 187
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Well, perhaps so," said the squire. "They 
 patronize things, you know." 
 
 "I think I understand a mikado sitting motion- 
 less on his throne to preserve the peace of the world." 
 
 "They 've had push enough in their time." 
 
 "Of course," he said kindly. "People forget that. 
 "Why, you were good Americans centuries before us. ' ' 
 
 "Oh, my dear Augusta [wrote Mary, a few days 
 after], he has been here less than a week, and he 
 knows more about us than some who have been here a 
 lifetime. He has been all the way to dear old Rands- 
 fordhe calls it 'the circus.' He has such funny 
 terms of expression, and all without moving a muscle. 
 And what do you think he has found out atiout it? 
 That all the while they pretended they didn't want 
 the factory, because they thought it would displease 
 the duke, they were dying for it, the artful things ! 
 You remember some dreadful London firm offered 
 to bring all its work-people there, and talked of 
 making the fortune of the place, and we only just 
 managed to save them by threatening to cut off the 
 water-power. Well, he has chapter and verse for it 
 to show that they did n 't want to be saved. Oh, he 
 is such a person for finding out things ! But do you 
 think it can be true? 
 
 "After telling us that, he just said, 'Happy are 
 the sleepy, for they shall soon drop off,' and then 
 went on to something else. Father asked him whose 
 clever saying that was, and he said, 'Nietzsche,' 
 hope I 've got the spelling right, meaning some au-
 
 thor, you know. Father thought it was the name of 
 a new German chancellor. Oh, it was such a lark ! 
 
 "Then Gurt's wife has told him something about 
 Nopps 's thatch that I 'm sure you and the duke never 
 heard of before. Dreadful, if it 's true ; but you 
 know what those people are. He does bring home 
 such a budget every day ! The dinners are so lively 
 now, and father threatens to raise the drawbridge on 
 him and never let him go. It 's killing to hear him 
 trying to give the story in the Gurt style. You know 
 he 's as careful about his words as you are, and one 
 might print him straight off. So just fancy him 
 struggling with something of this sort! 
 
 " 'When they London work-people come down 'ere 
 for the triumphant arches, old Nopps an' 'is wife 
 think they might earn a trifle by puttin' up a pair 
 of my gentlemen, as the inn was full. Well, the old 
 couple takes the spare room theirselves, so as to give 
 the lodgers the best un. Job 'elp the pore things 
 to move, an' we make un as comf 'abl' as we can, by 
 puttin' un under the dry corner o' th' thatch. If 
 the rain kep' off, they 'd ha' done pretty well, for 
 I lent un a peddykwoat mysel' to plug the hole in 
 the winder. But when the water come in, old Mr. 
 Nopps he moan o' nights, an' she couldn't pacify 
 un, though he 'd 'a' Been three shillin' to the good 
 at the week-end.' 
 
 "It was so funny to hear him trying to shorten 
 Mrs. Gurt's comf 'abl'. He could n't do it to save his 
 life, and when I tried to explain to him about clip- 
 ping his g's ,(by request), he kept waylaying me all 
 
 189
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 day with absurd challenges to a game of 'pin'-pon'.' 
 He has the most ridiculous theories about what he 
 calls our revised version of the English language. 
 He pretends to think that the dropped Ti's began 
 with a natural tendency to move along the line of 
 least resistance in the short spells of hot weather. 
 The only way to meet a climate like this, he says, 
 is to lay aside your coat and your aspirates when the 
 hustle comes. Isn't 'hustle' a funny word, Au- 
 gusta ? And he does bring it in so cleverly now and 
 then. 
 
 "Then he reads us killing little bits out of his 
 American papers. Just listen to this: 'The Filipino 
 is treacherous and deceitful. Besides, we want his 
 country.' And isn't this a good hit: 'Mr. Pierpont 
 Morgan is very fond of the Bible, due probably to 
 the fact that it is a number of books merged into 
 one.' "We catch it sometimes: 'If America had not 
 sold two hundred thousand horses and mules to 
 Great Britain, the Boers would be all on foot by 
 this time ! ' Father says he can 't see the point, but 
 I call it decidedly sly. 
 
 "I 'm afraid he does n't think much of Mr. Raif 's 
 model village. He calls it 'the penny in the slot.' 
 Don't you think that 's meant to be rather dis- 
 respectful ? 
 
 "And, would you believe it, he has actually met 
 that odious person Kisbye, and has discovered he is 
 not exactly the utter brute we all think him down 
 here. It appears that he 's fond of music, and has 
 some beautiful pictures and quite a library. Fancy ! 
 
 190
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "When we heard that, we had Mr. Bascomb to 
 meet him, just to take the taste out of his mouth. 
 A. was perfectly sweet: not a funny saying, not a 
 laugh, but all reverent attention, as if he were at 
 church. The old dear quite bridled under it, and 
 I never saw him look so pleased. "When he was gone, 
 A. said it was the most wonderful thing he had 
 'struck' in his travels. That was the expression; I 
 wrote it down. 
 
 "He does go into the strangest places and meet 
 the strangest people. What do you think he did 
 on Tuesday? You remember that dreadful Radical 
 van? Spent the whole day with them, and bought 
 a huge bundle of the trash they call their ' literature ' ! 
 He seems to be quite keen about our country life, 
 knows all the laboring people, has been to see old 
 Spurr, just as he might come to see us, you know, 
 and actually went to a meeting of the parish council 
 and heard a debate on the pumps. He keeps apolo- 
 gizing for staying on, but we are so delighted to have 
 him. Do make him stop till you come back, though 
 it seems like a reason for not wishing for your speedy 
 return. ' ' 
 
 "Keep him just as long as you find him useful 
 [Augusta wrote in reply]. You know I sent him to 
 cheer you up. I 'm glad you don't take him too 
 seriously ; he 's only a boy looking round. But he '11 
 be a man the moment he gives his mind to it. So we 
 think."
 
 XXI 
 
 T is mid- August, and the family is 
 returning to Allonby. The poor 
 season in town has flickered out, 
 but this new one in the country 
 is to give due compensation. There 
 is more cheerful news from the seat 
 of war ; the nation is in better spirits : society is ex- 
 pected to rise to the occasion. 
 
 For weeks the four hundred people attached to 
 the service of the castle agents, stewards, grooms 
 of chambers, gardeners, keepers, the little army of 
 the stables have been on the move. The miles of 
 walks in the great deer-park, trimmed with spade 
 labor, have the precision of lines on a map. The 
 dappled herds, scudding without sound of footfall 
 through the glades, yield effects of low-lying cloud. 
 The very river flowing through the domain seems 
 to have been washed for the occasion. You may count 
 the pebbles in the shallower parts of the bed, and the 
 fish in the deeper. The mere osiers and river-grasses 
 are organized schemes of color, intensified by the 
 clearness of the stream. A fleet of tiny pleasure- 
 boats, spick and span like all the rest, stands at its 
 mooring in the lake. 
 
 Not a pond but can give an account of itself. The 
 
 I 9 2
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 frogs are unmistakably on the establishment; the 
 squirrels, the birds, and all the other living things 
 exhibit the freedom from fear which may be sup- 
 posed to have characterized their kind in Eden. The 
 trees have the cleanliness which is the coquetry of 
 age. Their parasites are trained for sentimental ef- 
 fects of dependence, and where the withering limbs 
 threaten collapse under the burden of centuries, 
 their crutches are at hand. The same perfection of 
 artificial conditions is seen in the great vineries as 
 in the peach-houses and the apricot-houses, that are 
 to be measured by substantial fractions of a mile, and 
 in the tropical house a perfect university of floricul- 
 ture, with a head-gardener as its principal dean of 
 the faculty, and distinguished professors in the sev- 
 eral chairs. Every tree, plant, flower, beast of the 
 field, and fowl of the air, as a retainer of the house, 
 seems to glory in its cultivated and individualized 
 perfection. 
 
 The preserves especially are in magnificent order. 
 A large party is expected for the shooting, and 
 some are already busy with the grouse on one of 
 the duke's moors in the North. The partridges pos- 
 itively languish for the 1st of September. The pin- 
 ing pheasants will have to wait for a month more be- 
 fore the head-keeper can redeem his promise of whole 
 battalions of slaughter in well-stocked preserves. 
 With these, and with the ground game, there is every 
 hope of sport for the autumn and winter. When the 
 birds have been silenced, the death-squeal of the rab- 
 bit will take up the wondrous tale. The ferrets, 
 
 13 193
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 whose business it is to serve these shy creatures with 
 notice of ejectment, are already longing to be at 
 them. Meanwhile an occasional rat tossed into their 
 cage saves them from the lapse into vegetarian diet, 
 and keeps them wicked for their work. 
 
 Nothing is left to chance: it is the note of man- 
 agement in this lordly pleasure-house. When the 
 guns are ready for the game, the game must be 
 ready for the guns. The ferret winds into the bur- 
 rows and drives the rabbits into the open. The 
 beaters drive them on to the line of fire, as they 
 perform the same kindly service for the birds. This 
 last ill turn, indeed, might seem to be enough to 
 frighten all animated nature from Allonby as from 
 a place accursed. But such creatures, being un- 
 troubled by school histories, which keep alive the 
 memory of grievance, are incapable of bearing the 
 malice of tradition. 
 
 The cultivated completeness of it all makes a pro- 
 found impression on the American visitor. " And 
 what may his name b'e?" he asks the head-keeper 
 once, in a moonlight ramble, as a hare crosses their 
 path. 
 
 " His name, sir?" 
 
 "Yes; surely you have him somewhere on the 
 register. Shall we call him Leopold, just for the 
 sake of the argument?" 
 
 Mr. Gooding's sole experience of sport is an oc- 
 casional bear-hunt where the beast looks after him- 
 self, and the man follows his example : a blanket and 
 a camp-fire for one, a cave for the other, and let the 
 
 194
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 best win. So they hunted the boar in Calydon. The 
 fox-hunting of the Genesee valley may set all that 
 right in time for the younger community. Mean- 
 while, if you want sport as a fine art, you must seek 
 it in a country which is too small and too thickly 
 peopled to let anything happen by accident, even a 
 hen's egg. 
 
 The art of producing that egg in pheasantry, and 
 rearing it to its maturity of flight in whirring fea- 
 thers, is one of the triumphs of civilization. The 
 sacred birds govern the empire. Parliament rises 
 for them; the professions make holiday to await 
 their good pleasure. The partridges are supposed to 
 be wild, but that is only their fun. The main dif- 
 ference between them and the others is that they are 
 watched in the gross, while the pheasants are tended 
 in detail. Both have to be guarded day and night, 
 and not merely against poachers. Stray dogs must 
 not come near them, nor even stray cats. No foot- 
 fall of the wandering lover of nature may render 
 them uneasy in their minds. You can hardly get 
 a country walk, for the birds. Even when you have 
 the liberty of the manor, the keeper expects you 
 to skirt his fields, lest you flutter the game. 
 
 11 I suppose you don't insist on their going to 
 church Sundays? " Mr. Gooding asks. 
 
 The keeper rises to the occasion. " Well, if they 
 did, they 'd hear summat to their advantage in 
 the exhortation to ' all ye fowls of the air.' 
 
 " Fact is, sir, you must have it so, or do with- 
 out your sport. The pheasants has to be nussed like 
 
 '95
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 babies from first to last, leastways them as is hand- 
 reared. Some tries to manage it for theirselves, but 
 they 're ontidy mothers. All I ask them to do is 
 lay their eggs. After that it 's like the advertise- 
 ment' we do the rest.' If they get that business 
 over nice an' early in the year, that 's all we want 
 of 'em. My men '11 go through the bracken an' 
 pick up the eggs, an' I '11 see to the hatchin'. That 
 great clearin' close to my lodge is where the hen 
 sits on 'em common barn-door fowl, that 's your 
 motherin' bird, ready to lay on anything, from a 
 duck's or a pheasant's egg to a lump of plaster of 
 Paris. Pity we can't put 'em on to some of the poor 
 wizened babbies born in the cottages." 
 
 It is a pregnant saying in these days, when there 
 is some danger that mere human mothering may 
 become one of the lost arts, crowded out, as it were, 
 by societies for the improvement of the mind, the 
 development of the individual, and other equally 
 pressing concerns. Perhaps the European cuckoo 
 is destined to be the emblem of the womanhood of 
 the future, with her startling invention of mother- 
 ing by deputy. The cuckoo dames of social life, 
 who are mothers last, whatever else comes first, 
 should include a bird of this variety in their aviaries. 
 It would be interesting to learn from closer observa- 
 tion how the bird employs the abundant leisure 
 which she derives from the neglect of her offspring, 
 and, incidentally, from the destruction of that of her 
 neighbors. It is probably devoted to the more intel- 
 ligent contemplation of nature, the more refined care 
 
 196
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 of her plumage, the improvement of her voice, and 
 the power of visiting at seasons when so many other 
 birds are kept at home. 
 
 Arthur sticks close to the keeper by day and fre- 
 quently by night, wondering at the varieties of life 
 in the world. Sometimes, in their wanderings 
 through the woods, they come upon huge gibbets 
 whereon the withered bodies of weasels, stoats, rats, 
 hawks, and what not that prey upon the game, swing 
 high and dry in the wind as an awful warning to 
 their kind. And ever at intervals, from distant 
 clumps in the prospect, comes the sharp crack of the 
 gun as some new offender falls. 
 
 All day long the under-keepers are on the watch 
 to keep these marauders off the rearing-grounds. 
 And one night Arthur goes out with two of the men 
 to look for poachers. It is a ghostly round. No one 
 speaks as they stalk through the awesome woods in 
 Indian file. No one carries a lethal weapon ; the law 
 forbids: the gun is for the day alone. But a stout 
 sapling of oak or blackthorn is still arguable as a 
 walking-stick, and with that they have to be content. 
 " Poachers '11 use their guns soon as look at ye," 
 says a keeper, bitterly, ' ' but us may n 't. That 's 
 English law for ye!" 
 
 For miles they wander through the dewy grass, 
 with no incident but an occasional snare set by the 
 poacher's jackal in the daytime and as yet unvisited 
 by his employer. The jackal is the vague man, the 
 most familiar figure of the country-side. You may 
 see him every day taking mild refreshment in a 
 
 197
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 corner of the Knuckle of Veal, while his female mate 
 squats outside on the sack which contains all their 
 belongings. Nothing is known of the vague man but 
 that he is one who " won't do a day's work when 
 there is mushrooms about." It is insufficient as a 
 characterization. Mushrooms do not grow all the 
 year round, and the vague man seems to be out of 
 work at all seasons. He looms particularly large 
 now that the game is coming to maturity. He is un- 
 troubled by self-respect, and therefore by rancors. 
 When the keepers warn him off their fields, he climbs 
 the fence without a word, and seems to dissolve over 
 its remoter side. But he has left his snare, perhaps, 
 for all that, and the poachers know where to look for 
 it on the moonless nights. 
 
 Suddenly, as the three walk, one of them stumbles 
 over something in the grass, and a shape rises, only, 
 however, to be instantly pinned to the ground again. 
 A timely oath serves to establish its identity with hu- 
 mankind. Three others come to the rescue in a 
 twinkling from behind trees, and the poachers stand 
 confessed. Arthur grasps his cudgel and advances 
 to the assistance of the struggling keeper, but the 
 other holds him back. 
 
 ' ' Ware stones, sir ! Tim 's all right. He 's got 
 a look at un, an' that 's all he want. We '11 know 
 where to find un to-morrer mornin'." 
 
 The words are hardly out of his mouth when 
 some heavy missile makes a close shave of Mr. Good- 
 ing's ear, and rebounds, with a thud, from a tree to 
 the ground. 
 
 198
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 " Get behind a tree, sir! They '11 smash your 
 face in. They got their pockets full o' that ammy- 
 nition, you lay your life." 
 
 The next thing is a volley of oaths and stones to- 
 gether ; and under cover of it the gang makes off. 
 
 " Who was they, lad? " 
 
 " Jinkins's lot." 
 
 " Wust lot in all this county, sir, bar none. Nearly 
 did for yours truly last year in a public where I 
 was havin' a glass to myself in the tap-room. A 
 put-up job, but they was at the bottom of it. Three 
 fellers, perfect strangers to me, comes in, all of a 
 sudden locks the door, turns out the light, an' then 
 makes tracks for me in the dark. I caught it, I do 
 assure you, sir; but I slipped under the table, an' 
 that kep' off the wust of the shower. When they 
 thought they 'd settled me, they let theirselves out, 
 leavin' me to guess the riddle of a broken rib. The 
 table suffered wust two legs kicked to splinters." 
 
 " You hunted 'em down? " 
 
 ' ' 'Ow could I, when there was no swearin ' to 'em ? 
 They come from another part p'r'aps forty mile 
 away. The gangs work together for little things o' 
 this sort. Aye, an' they put up the money to defend 
 when we prosecute at the 'sizes, an' keep the famil- 
 ies o' them as gets lagged. It 's a great business, 
 poachin' is." 
 
 " So is sport," said Mr. Gooding " trust versus 
 trust." 
 
 199
 
 XXII 
 
 HE duke aud his wife the " fam- 
 ily, ' ' as Slocum always ealled them 
 on these occasions arrived in a 
 few days. 
 
 Augusta's sense of responsibil- 
 ity for her second and decisive 
 county season was deepened by a keener sense of her 
 husband's importance. In London he was still, in a 
 sense, one of the crowd. At Allonby he commanded 
 homage as well as respect. The very porter that 
 opened the door of his railway-carriage hurried 
 through the operation as though in sign of a duke's 
 exemption from the toll of tips. Seen in his proper 
 setting as noble, as lord lieutenant of his county, 
 and as only Burke and the recording angel knew 
 what besides, he was manifestly a magnate of the 
 first rank. You would have found his territorial 
 mark of occupancy on maps of the planet in which 
 they think nothing of crowding a settlement of five 
 millions into a dot. His grandeur seemed to be 
 heightened by the quietism which, on his return, 
 he had resumed as a sort of second nature, and which 
 was in impressive contrast to the strenuousness of 
 Augusta's spirit. He seemed to belong to some 
 fabled race that moved without friction of the 
 
 200
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 nerves, and prevailed only by the irresistible compul- 
 sion of silent and hidden forces. 
 
 The bustle of stately business that ensued on their 
 arrival was still something of a new experience for 
 the duchess. She was, of course, not wholly ignorant 
 of the peculiarity which makes our older societies, 
 seen from above, but a descending scale in parasit- 
 ism, and, from below, a Jacob's ladder leaning on 
 the stars. But here was the system in full view. 
 Only one or two of the highest officers of the house- 
 hold were admitted to the ducal presence, and these, 
 again, vouchsafed personal notice to hardly as many 
 more. The agent who had just had the honor of 
 audience passed through the antechamber without 
 deigning a glance to right or left. It was impres- 
 sive, no doubt; and so, Augusta thought, was that 
 court of the first king of the Medes, where all were 
 forbidden to laugh. 
 
 The duke seemed to find a certain comfort in it. 
 lie was at least among his own people. Everybody 
 knew him at Allonby, though he was not always 
 able to return the compliment. In London he was 
 still as obscure, in most part, as the calif in a mid- 
 night ramble. Lordship is sometimes too impersonal 
 in these days. He had once been much amused, 
 when taking the number of an impudent driver, to 
 find his own cipher and coronet on the door of the 
 cab. As figurehead of a hackney-carriage company, 
 he owned this insignificant person, and could have 
 crushed him with a word. He did not speak the 
 word, because his good nature shrank from the 
 
 2OI
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 thought of its devastating effects. But the offense 
 was grave. He might have extended his drive by at 
 least thirty yards for the shilling which he had ten- 
 dered in payment of his fare. Yet, as he alighted 
 at the door of his club, he was followed by the scorn- 
 ful cry, "There yer go, to enj'y yerself at my ex-- 
 pense ! ' ' 
 
 Augusta turned with still fuller relief to the more 
 human associations of the village. The Herions were 
 naturally first in her thoughts. She had more than 
 once determined to hear the other side of the story 
 of their exodus. As it stood in the casual notice of 
 Mary Liddicot's postscript, it was an act of re- 
 bellion. George had been " disrespectful to the 
 agent," as though a midge had wantonly arraigned 
 the splendor of the sun, and he had rashly thrown 
 up a profitable calling for the fatuous dream of a 
 " fortune in London." So had Mr. Eaif reported, 
 and so, without giving a second thought to it, had 
 Mary written. What was the truth? 
 
 Augusta soon found her way to the cottage in 
 which the two mothers had clubbed their fortunes 
 to make a home for Rose and George. They received 
 her with the profoundest respect, yet at first, charac- 
 teristically, without a single word on the subject 
 which was nearest to their hearts. They were too 
 much afraid of her for that. After all, she was 
 still one of the " betters " who had dealt the blow. 
 
 "It do seem a powerful long time sence your 
 Grace went away, sure-ly." 
 
 " Yes, and what changes! " 
 
 202
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 " Aye at the war, loike? " 
 
 " No, at Slocum; the village seems hardly the 
 same. ' ' 
 
 ' ' Oh, that parish council ! They '11 niver get 
 beyand the well-water. Your Grace need n't be 
 afraid. ' ' 
 
 Tabby Edmer, as she was called, had held the 
 parable hitherto; but now old Phoebe Herion broke 
 in with vehemence: 
 
 ' ' I wish they was at the bottom of the well ! 
 They bin the curse o' the place." 
 
 ' ' Hush ! ' ' said her mate, reprovingly, and then 
 burst into tears. 
 
 " Tell me all about it," said the duchess, taking 
 a chair. 
 
 " Oh, your Grace," cried Tabby, " they 're gone, 
 they 're gone out of all sight and knowledge lost 
 i' London! Look 'ee here." She drew from her 
 pocket a returned letter, marked officially, "Gone 
 away. ' ' 
 
 " What, your children? That 's nothing only 
 a change of lodging. They '11 soon write again. ' ' 
 
 "It 's bad luck, your Grace. I know my gell. 
 She 's 'shamed of some trouble; that 's her sperrit." 
 
 ' ' Shame for you ! ' ' said Phoebe, turning like some 
 vexed animal on her mate. " Shame for you, to 
 think your own flesh an' blood would n't have no 
 feelin' for your trouble, too." 
 
 "Then she 's ill or dead," returned the other, 
 quickly. ' ' There, now ; you 've said it yersel ' ! " 
 
 "An' my boy, too, then," faltered Phoebe, yield- 
 
 203
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ing to the pitiless logic of the case. Whereat the 
 two bereaved Rachels lifted up their voices together 
 in a lamentation that filled their little four-square 
 world with woe. 
 
 " There may be some mistake," said the duchess. 
 
 "No mistake, your Grace," wailed Tabby. "Read 
 the prenting, ' O.H.M.S.' ' On Her Majesty's Sar- 
 vice'; it 's from the Queen. The first letter in all 
 my loife I 've iver 'ad thrown back at me in that 
 way. I know she was hidin' somethin' all along. 
 But that 's her sperrit never give in. Oh, they 're 
 lost! they 're lost! " 
 
 ' ' We '11 find them again, ' ' said Augusta. And 
 she added gently: "But why did they ever go 
 away?" 
 
 "Because they was druv," cried the old woman, 
 simply, and with a touch of revolt in her tone. 
 
 " Oh, no, I assure you," said Augusta, in her 
 haste to console ; " I know all the facts. ' ' And then 
 she stopped and bit her lip with the mortifying re- 
 flection that she did not know a single one of them 
 for which she could vouch. 
 
 "You see," she went on, by way of groping 
 toward the light. "George was dissatisfied with 
 his life here, though I thought he was doing so 
 well." 
 
 "Dissatisfied! Your Grace, he was makin' his 
 fortune. Saved eighteen bright sovereigns 'n less 
 'an half a year." 
 
 "But he wanted to make more in London, it 
 seems." 
 
 204
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "God forgi'e me! but some un 's bin tellin' lies," 
 said Tabby. 
 
 " I want the whole story from the beginning," 
 said Augusta, sternly. " Right here." 
 
 Still they could not tell it ; they were too much in 
 awe of their visitor. These acquired habits of defer- 
 ence often cut clean athwart nature's rights. It 
 is sometimes easier with this class to die than to 
 offend a superior with a too intrusive claim. 
 
 So Augusta had to proceed by cross-examination. 
 
 "Was he not disrespectful to the agent?" 
 
 "Never spoke a word to the agent, or about 'un, 
 all the days of his loife." 
 
 Augusta was still stern. "Please do me the favor 
 to treat me as a fellow-creature, if we are to get on." 
 
 Plain speaking being now the line of least resis- 
 tance, Phcebe said: "Then you 'd better have the 
 truth about it duchess as y' are. He wur clean 
 hunted out of the place for raisin' 's voice at the 
 'lection. Gentlefolks won't stand that in their 
 'earts, though they make believe not to mind. You 
 can't understand how should ye? You 're a 
 woman from over the sea. George wur a fool, an' 
 spoke up, an' they 've ruined 'im. Now turn me out 
 on the roadside, if you like, 's well 's 'im. I doan' 
 much care." 
 
 Augusta jumped up, and, kissing them both where 
 they stood in dutiful pose before her, drew them 
 to her side on the old dimity-covered sofa. And 
 there, duchess no longer, but just woman to woman, 
 she heard the whole dismal story Kisbye's "mark" 
 
 205
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 on George because of his little outburst on the night 
 of the visit of the van; the agent's "mark" for the 
 crime of leavening the parish council with a Radical 
 candidate. The pair had well-nigh all the talking to 
 themselves ; their visitor hardly spoke a word, except 
 to ask for a name or a date. And she was still as 
 sparing of speech when the tale was done. She 
 merely hurried back to the castle, and went straight 
 to her husband's room. 
 
 206
 
 XXIII 
 
 HE was imperious no longer. On the 
 contrary, the duke thought he had 
 never seen her so radiantly cheer- 
 ful since they rambled through the 
 European cities on their honey- 
 moon tour. He was up to the eyes 
 in business, as a matter of course, but he gladly suf- 
 fered her to make a feint of sweeping all his papers 
 aside. 
 
 " Henry, you are going to make this the happiest 
 day of my life." 
 
 ''And why not every day after it, too?" he said 
 gallantly. It was inevitable, with his feeling for her 
 and his breeding combined. His brief training as a 
 husband, however, had not left him free from mis- 
 givings of a kind. "A blue diamond is a vain thing, 
 my Augusta, but still" 
 "A blue diamond?" 
 
 ' ' You Ve been reading that nonsense in this morn- 
 ing 's paper." 
 
 "No; only listening to two old women." 
 "Much the same thing, I should say. It 's an heir- 
 loom ; and how do we know it is in the market ? ' ' 
 
 "True enough," she said, by way of taking him 
 in his humor. "But something else may do." 
 
 207
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ' ' Well, let me know the worst. ' ' 
 
 "A little act of justice of reparation," she said; 
 "a poor insignificant thing smaller than the dia- 
 mond, I dare say. You see, I want to let you down 
 as gently as I can. ' ' 
 
 "Perhaps I 'm going to wish it was the diamond, 
 after all. Reparation for what?" 
 
 "You remember the Herions, Rose and George? 
 You know I told you about them the village wed- 
 ding?" 
 
 "I remember everything you tell me, of course; 
 only sometimes I 'm a little dense about names. 
 Anybody wanting a place?" 
 
 "That 's just it. Oh, you do guess things so 
 beautifully ! They 've been driven out of their place 
 in Slocum, and I want to bring them back. ' ' 
 
 " My dear Augusta, my finite intelligence can 
 hardly take note of the fall of a sparrow. 'Driven 
 out!' I thought they were here still if I thought 
 anything about it, I am obliged to say. What is it 
 want of house-room or anything of that sort? We 
 can soon set that right, if it will please you." 
 
 "Henry, they have managed to offend the agent, 
 from no fault of theirs, and they are ruined." 
 
 His face darkened slightly. "That 's rather a 
 different matter. I don't like to interfere." 
 
 "Yet if it was all a wretched mistake?" 
 
 "Of course; but what the deuce is it all about, 
 I wonder?" he added a little peevishly, and pushing 
 the papers back in real earnest this time. 
 
 "Something about the election." 
 
 208
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ''What election? There are so many of them." 
 
 "The the parish council, don't you call it?" 
 
 "Scent recovered," he said, with a smile of relief. 
 "My dear, what do I know about that? Yes, I do 
 know something, after all. Was n't your swain the 
 one who had his hand to the plow and looked back in 
 his pride to organize an ' opposition to the castle ' ? " 
 
 "I dare say." 
 
 The words meant a good deal, and they both felt 
 it. But she added nothing to them, and he saw 
 that it was his turn next. 
 
 ' ' He might have contrived to be civil to the agent. ' ' 
 
 "Henry, he never spoke one word to the agent, 
 or about the agent." 
 
 "I am obliged to leave these matters to Willocks," 
 he said, looking wearily at his papers again. "One 
 thing I am quite sure of: he acted for what he 
 thought the best in the interests of the estate." 
 
 "Do you think I would have troubled you with 
 all this if I had not convinced myself that the mis- 
 take was on our side?" 
 
 Her tone betrayed a secret and a more searching 
 pang. The sense of injustice was bad enough; but, 
 human nature being what it is, here was something 
 worse. She had expressed a wish, and a man had 
 hesitated to gratify it. She had never before been 
 thwarted in that way. It was a new experience for 
 her, both as bride and as woman. 
 
 "It is hard," she said coldly. 
 
 He could not wholly miss her meaning, though 
 the more intimate part of it escaped him still. 
 
 14 209
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 " 'Pride goeth before a fall/ " she added; "but 
 I thought I had been so careful." 
 
 This quickened his apprehension. "Augusta, 
 what is it you want me to do?" 
 
 "To stand fair between them and the man who 
 has wronged them in your name." Her very pride 
 now forbade the slightest allusion to the more deli- 
 cate point. 
 
 "Augusta, you do not quite understand. There 
 is more in it than you think. We must know our 
 own minds." 
 
 "We must do justice." 
 
 "As much as you like, but the larger justice. 
 What are we here who have England in our charge 
 ten thousand, or a hundred thousand, I don't care 
 which? A handful. Where should we be, and the 
 country with us, if we could be made to sing small 
 by any bumpkin fresh from his first pamphlet on 
 the right of way to govern about a fifth of the hu- 
 man race? That 's what it comes to, in the long 
 run, though this one 's only beginning with his own 
 parish. We hold on just by mere prestige. I am 
 not now talking about what the penny papers call 
 society. I 'm talking of the whole thing, if you 
 will have it so the fabric of a thousand years. It 
 is still a government for the people instead of by 
 them with all imaginable respect for the Parish 
 Councils Act." 
 
 She was bitterly disappointed. So this was one 
 of the implications of the part to which she had 
 been disposed to take so kindly! This was the ro- 
 mance of the feudal relation on its business side. 
 
 210
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ''Oh, Henry, we want air here. It can't last." 
 
 "It has lasted pretty well," he said. 
 
 "Yes, too long, I 'm afraid. We are still play- 
 ing at being in the middle ages, and without con- 
 viction, too. We 're grown-up children now: we 
 must change our toys with the times." 
 
 "Toys!" 
 
 ' ' These heights of worship and honor, those depths 
 of reverence and submission. Do let us help people 
 to feel that they 're alive." 
 
 "You seemed to like the toys, Augusta, when you 
 began the game." 
 
 The reproach stung her, for it was true. Had 
 she not taken a little too readily to her feudal part ? 
 There seemed so much to be said for paternal gov- 
 ernment when it was of the right sort. The duke's 
 duchess had naturally liked to think so, since it gave 
 her her opportunity (dear to every woman) as 
 earthly Providence. The contrast with what she had 
 left behind was so refreshing. How exquisite to have 
 about one fellow-creatures trained for the petting, 
 instead of a set of wild things of the wood whose 
 only wish was to have you out of the way! So she 
 had come to hold place and power in the Primrose 
 League, to patronize local charities, to be a sort of 
 mother of her people within the domain. 
 
 "I never thought of that," she said, more to her- 
 self than to him. 
 
 ' ' Another riddle, Augusta ? ' ' 
 
 "Well, that our power to keep meant so much 
 power to hinder and hurt." 
 
 "Power, I take it, is a sort of all-round thing. 
 
 21 I
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 And, you know, you 're a greater aristocrat than 
 any of us, if you care to look at it that way." 
 
 "Henry!" 
 
 "In your sense of the claims of mind, manners, 
 character that 's all I mean. ' ' 
 
 "You are very complimentary this morning." 
 
 "Give us a little share in that praise, too." 
 
 "Oh, but-" 
 
 "Well, be as generous as you can." 
 
 "I suppose we 've got to be everlastingly trying 
 to master people in this weary old life. Still, we 
 might all start fair. It 's such a wayward sort of 
 handicap here!" 
 
 "Which the same you might rise to explain." 
 
 "The inherited deference the peak of the cap 
 an institution, almost an act of faith ! The paltry 
 village education in manhood and womanhood ! The 
 social system a sort of worship of ancestors, and 
 mostly other people's ancestors at that! The petti- 
 ness of it all my God, the pettiness! Anything 
 rather than that, even the fierce millions all straining 
 at the leash for they know not what, but at least for 
 the good of muscle and nerve." 
 
 He was nettled. "Why not? Authority must 
 be maintained, worse luck for those who are rather 
 tired of their share of the work. Is it really differ- 
 ent, do you think, anywhere else in the world ? ' ' 
 
 She took up the challenge. "Perhaps there are 
 places where they leave both sides to fight it out 
 more according to their strength, without calling 
 in the catechism." 
 
 212
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "No doubt," he said, answering her according to 
 her parable : ' ' the best and the worst of places, where 
 both sides, good and bad, are at it for all they are 
 worth, with the powers that be as a mere bottleholder. 
 Can anybody be sure which side is going to win ? ' ' 
 
 "Can anybody doubt it?" she said. 
 
 "A free fight of that sort might shake some of us 
 to pieces. If all are born to the conflict, they are 
 born to the weapons, too." 
 
 "What a reason for ruining a man because he 
 has shown want of respect!" 
 
 "If you come to that, what a reason for ruining 
 him because he wants brains!" 
 
 "It is a step forward in ruling castes, at any rate, 
 poor as the step is. One day I suppose we shall have 
 all the strength in the world at the service of all 
 the weakness. But, Henry, we are talking at one 
 another, and where are the Herions meanwhile?" 
 
 They both laughed. 
 
 This sally helped him to recover his temper, by 
 restoring Augusta to him in all her glory. The 
 curious by-play of their little scene was that the 
 more he opposed, the more she insisted; and as she 
 insisted, the more he felt the charm of the almost 
 coquettish wilfulness of self-respect with which she 
 had originally won him. Say, if you like, that he 
 was the more ready to be impressed by it in matters 
 of this sort because, in others, he was perfectly tired 
 of the claims of his blazon. 
 
 He yielded a point. "I can't always do as I 
 please. Who could, standing in my shoes?" 
 
 213
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 She felt for him, yet she could hardly bring her- 
 self to say so there and then. She knew that at 
 times, with the solitary exception that was the all in 
 all for her, he was doomed to be almost as free from 
 personal longings, personal initiative, as the hero 
 of the Bhagavad. It was his business, as a patron 
 of his portion of the human race, to like what ought 
 to be liked in rigid social convention, to do what 
 ought to be done. Since her marriage she had been 
 a silent but sympathetic observer of these trials of 
 a fellow-creature who was everlastingly doing his 
 duty. He was not merely lord lieutenant of his 
 county : with his birth, his wealth, his position, there 
 was no escaping that. He was a commanding officer 
 of volunteers and of yeomanry; he held the com- 
 mission of the peace, and frequently sat in the chair 
 of justice at quarter-sessions. He patronized jus- 
 tice as he patronized the auxiliary forces, and as, in 
 another and a more technical sense, he patronized 
 the church by nominating to some four-and-twenty 
 pulpits. He bred impartially for the course and for 
 the cattle shows. It seemed all one to him, since 
 the region in which his lot was cast was above that 
 of personal tastes. It was his pride that one could 
 never tell what he liked best from his manner of 
 doing it. The only clue to his preference was to be 
 found when he happened to travel beyond the circle 
 of social obligations. Thus, while foundation-stones 
 were hardly to be attributed to him as creature com- 
 forts, there was a certain taint of relish in his free- 
 masonry. He bought pictures, statuary, curios, 
 
 214
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 without caring a fiddlestick about them, and simply 
 by way of being civil to the arts. His wife's after- 
 knowledge of all this showed her by what a mighty 
 effort he must have broken one link of his chain 
 when he stood forth before all the world to say: 
 "This is the woman of my choice." 
 
 But he had said it; and how could she fail in 
 grateful remembrance of it now? 
 
 "I understand everything," she said with great 
 tenderness. "I leave it in your hands." 
 
 In spite of claims that, with her, were as those 
 of birthright, she was still ready to yield to love 
 what she might have refused to principle full of 
 most delicious contradictions in that way, and there- 
 fore the true woman still, or perhaps, after all, only 
 the true human being. Her whole anxiety now was 
 to save him from the pain of the conflict which she 
 had raised in his mind. 
 
 "See these poor old people," she said; "hear their 
 story. If you are satisfied, leave the rest to me. 
 You need not appear in it at all." 
 
 But he was now, if possible, keener than herself. 
 
 "Better find the young people at once, and get 
 it at first hand. The rest will be my part." And 
 he led her to the door. 
 
 It was Augusta's triumph, whatever the issue. 
 With all the higher claims, luckily, it is the greater the 
 sacrifice the greater the joy. The smug religions per- 
 ish : the faiths that are to supplant them wisely begin 
 by calling for volunteers for martyrdom. Happy 
 the nation whose women are never afraid to ask! 
 
 215
 
 XXIV 
 
 TILL thirsting for information, Mr. 
 Arthur Gooding thought he would 
 like to tear out the heart of rural 
 England in a motor-car. This 
 mystery is usually the reward of 
 
 years of toilsome observation. Mr. 
 
 Gooding was in a hurry. America, to which he be- 
 longed, is in much the same state. He purposed to 
 devote a day to it. 
 
 A project of Mary Liddicot's gave him the excuse 
 for the adventure. Mary was the delight of his 
 active and observant spirit, a constant stimulus to 
 his sense of wonder. She was something quite new, 
 as one of those who are still children at three-score 
 and ten, if they live as long, and this by no mere 
 reversion to second childishness. Simple and down- 
 right, she suggested an organism untroubled by con- 
 volutions of the brain. It was neither a fault nor a 
 quality with her, but merely a fact. These childlike 
 natures, seeing life solely in its direct issues, may 
 be the most vicious creatures alive. There are adults 
 of infancy in the jails, as well as in the country 
 houses and honeysuckle homes. They are not un- 
 known on thrones, and there they sometimes exhibit 
 amazing powers of mastery. Where this ever-endur- 
 
 216
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ing age of innocence is Hacked by a strong under- 
 standing, as in Mary's case, it is capable of yielding 
 precious result. She was a yea or nay girl, a sort 
 of high-bred Quaker, incapable of " point" in any- 
 thing but her shoes. She often hit the nail right on 
 the head in the most felicitous manner, yet, if you 
 complimented her for epigram, she said, ' ' Fancy ! ' ' 
 not knowing in the least what you meant. Some- 
 times she seemed deliberately hard, sometimes quite 
 insensitive; and then, again, you thought she was 
 ready to swear blood-brotherhood with you on the 
 spot. You would have been just as wrong in this 
 case as in the others. You had given her a pleasur- 
 able emotion, and she showed it like any other child ; 
 that was all. 
 
 Mary and her father were going to London. The 
 squire began it. He had received another letter 
 from the mysterious money-lender, Mr. Claude Va- 
 vasour, hinting at the prudence of a friendly ar- 
 rangement of Tom Liddicot's affairs. The captain 
 being in South Africa fighting for his country, it 
 behooved those who were interested in the honor 
 of the family name to consider their position. Such 
 was the impression that Mr. Vavasour contrived to 
 convey, by suggestion, of course, without saying a 
 single word that could be quoted to his detriment. 
 It made the squire hot and cold, and finally led him 
 to form the strong resolution of facing Mr. Vavasour 
 in his den and having it out with him. Mary 
 dreaded the consequences, and tried to dissuade her 
 father in the process, of course, only urging the 
 
 217
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 very things that made him more intent on his pur- 
 pose. Then she said she would go up with him, as 
 she wanted to go shopping. That was her nearest 
 approach to a stroke of politic subterfuge, but, the 
 squire having much the same cast of mind as her- 
 self, it served her turn. 
 
 Now came Mr. Gooding's opportunity. He pro- 
 posed to meet them in town, and give them a lift, 
 on their way home, in his car. Mary was wild with 
 delight. It was untried being. With that prospect 
 on her part, the squire's objection to the mode of 
 transit was speedily overruled. They went up by 
 train, on the understanding that their escort should 
 await them next morning for the return journey. 
 
 So, early on the appointed day, the squire knocked 
 at the door of Mr. Vavasour's office, situated in an 
 old nondescript West End square under the lee of 
 Buckingham Palace. Mary, who had been left below 
 in the cab, found plenty to amuse her in the move- 
 ment of the scene. She was still busy with anticipa- 
 tions of the coming trip when her father almost 
 rushed back into the street, as pale as one who had 
 seen a ghost, and a good half-hour before the time 
 for their meeting with the young man. And at his 
 heels, vainly attempting to perform the ceremony of 
 conducting him to the door, was Mr. Kisbye ! 
 
 It was Mary 's turn to look pale now. She started, 
 averted her gaze from the apparition, and gave a 
 faint nod into vacancy in acknowledgment of an 
 obsequious bow. 
 
 Yet that glance of a single instant had shown 
 
 218
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 her something more of him than she had yet seen. 
 In their chance encounters of the roadside she had 
 persistently cut him dead. She now realized him as 
 of middle height and age, bald, with the swarthy 
 look of a "foreigner," yet well dressed in the Eng- 
 lish manner, probably by way of an informal at- 
 tempt at naturalization. 
 
 The effect was scarcely less startling upon him. 
 He blushed through his tan, cast an admiring look 
 at the girl, muttered something which seemed to die 
 away on his lips, ducked again, and vanished. 
 
 The behavior of all, indeed, was as though each had 
 been a ghostly visitant for the others. The squire had 
 gone up-stairs to seek out an indeterminate money- 
 lender, and had found his detested neighbor of the 
 Grange. Mr. Kisbye had come down-stairs to show 
 him out, and had encountered Mary, hardly a phan- 
 tom, but still an entirely unexpected shape. Mary 
 had been as little prepared for this sudden discharge 
 of the hated creature at short range. 
 
 The old man threw himself into the cab, and dart- 
 ing his fist through the trap, gasped, "Home!" 
 
 "Father," said the girl, "home is Liddicot now; 
 we can 't get there in a hansom. ' ' And, in obedience 
 to her amended order, the driver began to walk his 
 horse slowly round the square. 
 
 "What is it, dad?" 
 
 ' ' Don 't you see for yourself, Polly ? Our money- 
 lender is Kisbye one face of Satan under two 
 hoods. An infernal usurer, with a place between ours 
 and the duke's. And Tom in his toils!" 
 
 219
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Did n't he seem ashamed of being found out?" 
 
 ''Never a bit." 
 
 "What did you say?" 
 
 "I said, 'Who are you? I came to see Mr. What- 
 d'-ye-call-'em.' " 
 
 "And then?" 
 
 " 'That 's my name in business,' says he, with a 
 smile for which I could have choked him." 
 
 "And you?" 
 
 "I said, 'Oh!' " 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 ' ' Then he fingered his watch-guard. It may come 
 in useful if ever they want to hang him in chains. ' ' 
 
 "Of course, dear and?" 
 
 "Well, you see, there was n't much to say after 
 that." 
 
 "Father, you are keeping something back." 
 
 "What is there to keep? Well, then he came 
 out with a rigmarole of his infernal shop-walker's 
 civility and attention on the subject of Tom's affairs. 
 His style was like a butler looking for a place. But 
 his meaning was, 'What are you going to do about 
 it? 'just that." 
 
 "Never mind, we can snub him to death, and then 
 he '11 have to leave the county." 
 
 "Much he cares for that, you little simpleton. 
 If snubbing could kill, we 'd have had him in his 
 grave long since. Polly, there was mastery in his 
 eye." 
 
 "Insolence, you mean, dad." 
 
 "No, not that exactly. That 's only his way in 
 
 220
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 the country passing you with his coach and his 
 grinning grooms in livery, as if he invited you to 
 take it or leave it, the whole turnout. But in busi- 
 ness he rubs his hands. He treated me like a cus- 
 tomer, and was as sleek as if I had come to buy a 
 necktie. His table is his counter, where it 's not his 
 'social board.' Polly, I detest that man!" 
 
 Mary thought she had the whole story now, but 
 she was woefully in error. He was still keeping back 
 something that he would have died rather than tell 
 her. It was nothing less than the gentlest of all pos- 
 sible hints, on the part of Mr. Kisbye, that every- 
 thing might be arranged if the master of Liddicot 
 Manor would look favorably on the money-lender's 
 pretensions to Mary 's hand. Elusive as it was meant 
 to be, it was still plain to the father's excited sus- 
 ceptibilities and quickened apprehension of danger 
 to his house. He had risen in inexpressible disgust, 
 and made haste for the door without another word. 
 
 In truth, the interview was Mr. Kisbye 's oppor- 
 tunity, and, though it had taken him by surprise, 
 he had done his best to make the most of it. He 
 was in no hurry to be identified with Claude Vava- 
 sour, and he had hoped that his communications 
 with the squire would for some time longer be con- 
 fined to correspondence. On the other hand, he was 
 indifferent to the accident of the discovery. It was 
 necessarily Captain Liddicot 's secret, and, though 
 he had his own reasons for silence, it might at any 
 moment become common property. Yet, having 
 the squire face to face with him for the first time 
 
 221
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 in their lives, Kisbye thought he could afford to give 
 a glimpse of his hand. He had lent freely to the 
 spendthrift son, on poor security, and he knew per- 
 fectly well that he could never hope to see his money 
 back. But he was willing to pay for his pleasures; 
 and the dreary gospel in which he had been reared 
 taught him that even this beautiful girl might not 
 be unattainable by money wisely invested in the em- 
 barrassments of a falling house. He despised her 
 father. His civility, as the old man had surmised, 
 was due merely to his sense of duty as a shopkeeper. 
 In the country he held himself as good a magnate 
 as the best, and he meant to lord it with them, and 
 over them, before he had done. 
 
 "Polly, Polly!" groaned the squire, as their cab 
 still kept up its soothing perambulations, ''he '11 
 get to Allonby one day, mark my words! That 
 brute is the new landed interest: the Liddicot mil- 
 lennium coming to its fag-end. His office was hung 
 with auctioneers' bills, as though he had half Eng- 
 land in the market. What do you think of this for 
 a crack of doom? 'Sutherland, Scotland. For sale, 
 by private bargain, the Island Kingdom of Tillee. 
 Winter shooting. Splendid golf-links,' and all the 
 rest of it. A kingdom ! Most likely for some 
 American. By the way, when will that young spark 
 be here?" 
 
 "He 's here already, father. There 's his motor 
 on the other side of the square." 
 
 "I can't do with him to-day. We '11 go home by 
 train." 
 
 222
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Mary said, "Very well," and looked intensely 
 wretched. That was quite enough for her father. 
 In five minutes more they had transferred them- 
 selves and their slender hand-baggage the rest had 
 been sent on by train to the shining car, and were 
 picking their way through the London labyrinth 
 to a great main road. 
 
 223
 
 XXV 
 
 RTHUR saw that there was some- 
 thing wrong, but took no notice 
 of it. His good breeding never 
 failed, and he made short work of 
 his salutations, as befitted the oc- 
 casion. Besides, he was his own 
 steersman, and for a good half-hour he enjoyed the 
 full benefit of the rule against superfluous speech 
 with the man at the wheel. He had not forgotten, 
 however, before starting, to make all taut for his 
 visitors, and particularly for the lady. "When we 
 get the way on," he said to Mary, "it may blow 
 half a gale." So he abounded in practical sugges- 
 tions as to veils and wraps and tresses struggling 
 to be free. His own outfit was simple in the extreme, 
 and the girl was thankful to him that he forbore 
 goggles and a leather jacket. The squire suffered 
 himself to be rigged for rough weather without a 
 word. It was a new experience for both of them, 
 for him especially, and he had his misgivings. He 
 might have said, with old Sam Johnson, when they 
 talked of conceivable travel at something over ten 
 miles an hour: "Sir, it would be impossible; you 
 could not breathe." They had forgotten that. 
 The horse traffic of the London streets did not 
 
 224
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 appear to like the looks of them. Mr. Gooding con- 
 siderately gave it time to correct first impressions 
 by going at a crawl. Then, as they reached the sub- 
 urbs, he put on the pace. 
 
 "Oh!" said Mary. "Ugh!" said the squire. 
 Earth seemed to come rushing at them with intent to 
 do grievous bodily harm, but only to get tossed into 
 the background for its pains, as so much refuse of 
 picturesque wonder. Its villages, turrets, steeples, 
 and wayfaring folk were whirling, whirling, whirling 
 past, from an infinite of things that endure forever, 
 to an infinite of things that were. The lazy teams 
 seemed as trotters trying to break the record. The 
 very policemen on point duty were in the movement. 
 It was cosmic motion realized to sense, and for the 
 first time. "With the best of railway-cars the vault 
 of heaven is not in the race. Even a gallop was out 
 of the comparison. One had to work too much in 
 partnership with the horse for the sense of pure 
 effortless cleavage of the air. The motor-car is per- 
 haps a godsend for those of us who are too deep- 
 rooted in the idea of the stability of things. It is 
 a vastly more exhilarating suggestion of the earth's 
 dance than the pendulum and the sanded floor. 
 
 For the gray-haired senior it marked an end of 
 the old leisurely picturesque of travel, and brought 
 in a new one of landscape by lime-light flash. Soon 
 they were in Buckinghamshire, that second garden of 
 England ; in its dignified lenity of tone, a proof after 
 Woollett touched into color and life. Venerable 
 Aylesbury, which he knew, as matter of historic evi- 
 
 225
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 dence, had endured for centuries, passed him, in an 
 instant, out of nothingness back into it again. Spires 
 that might have been Oxford seen from Bicester 
 glared at him for a moment, and then hurried by 
 to the common doom. For the first fifteen minutes 
 of it he was sulky ; in the second he began to feel that 
 he would lower the fines in cases of this description 
 before the bench; at the third he beamed like a 
 happy child. All his troubles, including Kisbye, had 
 gone to limbo with hamlet and town, the rushing 
 wind of things carrying freshness and healing to 
 the innermost nerves of the brain. Hurrah for the 
 latest life of the road ! When will the doctors codify 
 it into a treatment for half the worries of our lot? 
 
 Mary dared not confess to herself the ecstasy she 
 felt. She looked wistful with delight. Poor child ! 
 she was at the budding age when we begin to realize 
 the fullness and the glory of the inheritance of sensa- 
 tion into which we have been born. Yet she had her 
 doubts, inspired, perhaps, by ascetic teachings of 
 Mr. Bascomb entirely foreign to her nature. Was 
 it right to feel so intensely alive ? She dreaded this 
 arrow-flight through space, as sometimes she dreaded 
 the very organ-peals and the quired hymns, lest they 
 should carry her to heights of presumption that 
 might, one day, measure only depths of spiritual 
 fall. Was not this rapture of physical being some- 
 thing to be watched and curbed before it made her 
 the bond-slave of sense? It might be rash to feel 
 such mastery over things in such a world. 
 
 ' ' Too much pace for you ? ' ' inquired Mr. Gooding, 
 
 226
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 considerately. He knew that he was going too fast 
 and that he owed amends to the outraged law. He 
 was a sure hand; it is impossible to make a better 
 excuse for him. He steered for a fine, as others 
 sometimes ride for a fall. He simply could not resist 
 the temptation of giving her a happy scare. 
 
 "No; only too much 'don't care.' ' And with 
 quick, impulsive finger she checked his make-believe 
 attempt to slacken down. 
 
 "Sorry to be alive, perhaps?" he asked, his twink- 
 ling eye still set straight ahead. 
 
 "No ; only sorry not to be sorry. I " The wind 
 caught the rest. 
 
 Thereafter she scarcely spoke; but the deepened 
 pink of her exquisite complexion, the fire of her 
 glance, made words a superfluity. The run was, in 
 the main, a mere inter jectional transaction from first 
 to last. Another benefit of this matchless invention 
 is that it tends to prove the futility of utterance. 
 
 For this reason it precludes even expostulation 
 on the part of the justly scandalized wayfarer. As 
 the terror threatens him at short notice, he naturally 
 postpones the assertion of his rights under the High- 
 ways Act until he has reached cover. When he has 
 reached it the terror is out of range, and reproof 
 would be a waste of words. There can be no im- 
 pressiveness in mere fag-ends of objurgation strug- 
 gling in the teeth of a hostile wind. The very barn- 
 door fowls see the folly of protest. They hold out 
 longer than their superiors, and the lord of the harem 
 preserves the majesty of his strut until the thing 
 
 227
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 is almost upon him. Then, with a screech which is 
 still but horror, he signals the sauve qui pent, sup- 
 plementing an all too lingering hop with a flutter 
 that costs him some of the glories of his tail. If a 
 reproach comes afterward, it is only in the form 
 of a quavering screech of remonstrance, as from 
 man to man, against the brutality to say nothing 
 of the fatuous want of respect for a common interest 
 of domestic supremacy that lowers him in the eyes 
 of his womankind. 
 
 At Stratford-on-Avon father and daughter had 
 perforce to alight to catch a cross-country train for 
 Liddicot. The squire was profuse in thanks. Mary 
 simply pressed the young fellow's hand, and mur- 
 mured, "So soon!" It was, in substance, a prayer 
 to Apollo for one more lift in the chariot of the sun. 
 
 228
 
 XXVI 
 
 R. GOODING himself had to stop 
 for a fresh supply of oil and for 
 some needful adjustments that 
 promised to detain him for half an 
 hour. It was against his will. He 
 had come, not exactly to see middle 
 England in a day, but only to survey what he hoped 
 to see, later on, in a month or a year. It was but a 
 mode of looking at the map. He wanted the lie of 
 the land in actual vision, as he already had it in his 
 reading wide and deep. And, for that matter, no 
 length of time could fully serve here. The church, 
 the winding river, the ancient bridge, the broad, 
 bland land, which a thunder-storm will touch with 
 terror and a burst of sunshine recover to hope and 
 joy what are they but hints of a secret of the all- 
 sufficiency of genius that none of us will ever 
 fathom? Out of this, without further aid from na- 
 ture, came the cave of Cymbeline, perhaps, the 
 beetling rock of Lear; for Dover cliff is but a legend 
 the fairy wood of the ' ' Dream. ' ' The rest is pure 
 chemistry of the brain, or perhaps, as they fable it, 
 some earlier soul-birth with the universe for its 
 range. 
 Yet some is still here to-day, as, for those who 
 
 229
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 know how to see it, it was three centuries ago. The 
 wench Audrey, a mere speck of white in the deepen- 
 ing twilight, still heads homeward the lumbering 
 kine. The patient creatures, the horned impact of 
 which, in rage, might be measured by a very respect- 
 able figure in tons, groan with anguish because a 
 slip of a girl bars their passage with a twig; and 
 matter owns its allegiance even to this humblest 
 manifestation of mind. A fellow at road-making, 
 who touched his hat vaguely, as though to propitiate 
 mankind at large, was Costard fallen on less cheer- 
 ful days. Another, in the modern blue of his office, 
 who solemnly demanded Mr. Gooding's name and 
 address, though the vehicle was then demurely travel- 
 ing at a pace within the act, was not far to seek. 
 
 " Fancy I could name you without asking," was 
 the reply. ''You are Constable Dull of blessed mem- 
 ory, and you serve Ferdinand, King of Navarre. ' ' 
 
 "Young joker," returned the officer, "none of 
 your lip." 
 
 Unchangeable England! Nowhere, except of 
 course in Navarre, is the policeman so much the 
 mere monitor of the evil-doer, looking down on him, 
 indeed, from cerulean heights, yet still ready to 
 admit that he, too, once trod earth and its miry ways. 
 This one drew no sword, flourished no truncheon. 
 He simply made an entry in his note-book, and re- 
 sumed his round. 
 
 On and forever onward ! A rush of eight miles by 
 a perfect road: a mighty fortress with foundations 
 in the solid rock, a wide, wide stretch of battlement 
 
 230
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 and tower, shining plate-glass, port-holes that are 
 mere mysteries of shade, and a huge flag that now 
 only dominates a landscape where it once dominated 
 a land Warwick. The rush continued for five miles 
 more, and other towers, red in the sun for all the 
 waste of years, and as wide in their sweep as the cir- 
 cuit of a walled city Kenilworth. About as far 
 again, and then three spires on the sky-line, and 
 thrice three times as many factory chimneys 
 Coventry. Old gabled houses here, flanked by new 
 emporiums; tramways in the winding streets of the 
 "ride"; above them telegraph wires from which a 
 second Peeping Tom might flash his secret to the 
 uttermost ends of the earth in time for the evening 
 editions. England still, the past and the present 
 inextricable at once a patchwork and a growth. 
 Creeping disentanglement for the machine, then an- 
 other rush, and a smear that means a mining village. 
 Compensation at hand in George Eliot's country. A 
 dip in the road Griff, the home, snug in its hollow, 
 and lovely still. A rise, and the turning to castel- 
 lated Arbury, the Cheverel Manor of "Mr. Gilfil's 
 Love-Story. " Chilvers Coton (Shepperton) beyond, 
 and then Nuneaton (Milby or nothing), the girl- 
 hood's haunt. Clear of all that, after a good run, 
 the Ashby-de-la-Zouch of Mary Stuart's captivity, 
 and of "Ivanhoe." Next, the Derby of Celt and 
 Roman, Saxon and Dane, of the Pretender's march, 
 and Heaven and history only know what beside. 
 Mr. Gooding is able to give full fifteen minutes to 
 its memories, for the machine calls a halt for more 
 
 231
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 fuel. It is hardly enough for the depth and breadth 
 of it in dateless time. Roads that the legions once 
 trod, especially the legion recruited in Spain, with 
 many a brown cheek and flashing eye in the sur- 
 viving peasantry to tell the tale. Ipstones hard by, 
 with its townsfolk, British to this day in every es- 
 sential of race type for soul and body keen eyes, 
 black hair, manner that is all nerves: some tribe 
 that escaped exterminating conquest the Corvi, per- 
 haps by the accident of a river full of ravines, 
 roads all tracks and byways, a sort of British Trans- 
 vaal. The Corvi keep shop there now, immune from 
 the tourist as from the Roman, but ready, behind 
 their counters, to make the modern invader pay 
 for all. 
 
 A long swerve to the right, rather a blunder of 
 Mr. Gooding's, and Ollerton as a starting-point for 
 the dukeries. You may cover them with a hat, 
 though it must be a Quaker's of the old school. The 
 agent's house, castellated, if you please, to mark 
 his state, a placid stream banked with dense trees, 
 bushes, and osiers, and exquisite in its windings of 
 luminous shade. Then Thoresby Park, a dukery, 
 though now the seat of an earldom ; and in the dis- 
 tance the manor, a mass of modern masonry seen 
 through the glass, but softened by the blue haze 
 into perfect keeping with the sylvan scenery. Work- 
 men's houses a picture, like everything else on the 
 estate Arcadia in a ring-fence. Up hill and down 
 dale, the road stretching to the horizon ; but courage ! 
 and presently Clumber. Magnificent glades of 
 
 232
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 woodland, deer, red j(and proud of it), bracken to 
 your waist. In a clearing an old inn, with its sign 
 the arms of the "family," "Loyaute n'a honte," as 
 Mr. Gooding makes it out in the rush, and the ribbon 
 of the Garter conspicuous in the decorative scheme. 
 Hard by, one of the gates of the estate, and presently 
 the house, seen through an opening in the deep woods 
 Italian in the general scheme, and a mere thing 
 of yesterday, being less than a century and a half 
 old. Then the great gate, with a long, long avenue 
 of limes as exquisitely trimmed as anything at Al- 
 lonby. Out of the park again, by another gate of 
 weather-stained stone, and now the road to Welbeck. 
 Lodges, the trailing growths of which might earn 
 for England a subtitle of the Flowery Land, but 
 little life of man or beast here or anywhere else. 
 Now and then a laborer; now and then a game- 
 keeping giant, white-bearded, perhaps, and red- 
 nosed, each effect ever keeping pace with the other 
 in intensity. But the men are rare, the villages rarer 
 still. It is yet an unpeopled land, with scores of 
 square miles waiting for effective settlement, vast 
 wastes of beauty in virgin forest or cultivated park. 
 Welbeck at last, an ordered scheme of grandeur like 
 the rest, massive, endless, and finally burrowing un- 
 derground in architectural caves of Kentucky, as 
 wondrous as anything above. The whole region, like 
 distant Allonby itself, manifestly a government 
 within a government, with England lying outside. 
 
 To Worksop Manor now, a dukery still by cour- 
 tesy, as having once been the seat of a duke. Thence, 
 
 2 33
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 quitting the charmed circle, a long run for Chats- 
 worth imperative for Mr. Gooding, though his ma- 
 chine begins to pant for rest. But he calls on it, and 
 it answers, and whirls him to new scenes, one of them 
 a lurid city of Dis, on the edge of the coal region, 
 turreted with chimneys belching fire in the broad 
 day, its river of hot water from the works steam- 
 ing to the sky. Unwashed gangs on the roads, day- 
 shifts going home, after relief by night-shifts, as yet 
 shining from soap and towel, who are deep, deep 
 under the soil a perpetual motion of labor to feed 
 the mighty estate above. It is a ducal colliery, and 
 its grime is soon effaced by the beauties of the valley 
 that lead to the last great house on the list. Wild 
 moors, grim gorges, hill-slopes of purple heather, 
 with patches of grass showing through, and of gray 
 primeval stone polled with undying mosses; beet- 
 ling rocks with wooded summits ; streams crossed by 
 rustic bridges, and with villages to match in one 
 word, every imaginable beauty of hill and dale to 
 atone for the valley of doom we have just left. A 
 wayside inn now, with a "Devonshire Arms" to 
 warn us in whose country we are. Then the park, 
 a calm as of Eden, and more red deer, facing round 
 at the new enemy of sylvan peace to cover the flight 
 of their hinds. Chatsworth at last, the great house 
 seen through an opening in the immense circuit of 
 leafage by which it is screened, and with a river 
 flowing in its front. No time to pause now for the 
 belated traveler ; but he well knows what lies beyond. 
 A place that starts fair with a mention in Doomsday, 
 
 234
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 and a product of all the centuries since in planning, 
 building, collecting for art and luxury and the pride 
 of life. Building and rebuilding. Tower added to 
 tower, and hall to hall, age by age. Wren one of its 
 architects; the Scottish queen one of its prisoners. 
 In happier times a school of landscape-gardening 
 surpassing the inventions of Eastern fable. A cloy- 
 ing mass of wonders in which a man not to the man- 
 ner born of the best in life might hardly hope to 
 sleep a wink for the throbbing sense of the wonders 
 of his lot. 
 
 But there is no time to linger. Daylight is begin- 
 ning to wane, and miles yet lie between the traveler 
 and the place to which he has telegraphed for rooms. 
 So, doubling on his route again, he makes for supper 
 and bed at the same pace as before, with only his 
 blazing lamps and the guide-posts to show the way. 
 They are hardly enough for a man who does not 
 know it already. The gloom deepens ; the very mile- 
 stones are now mute ; the great silence begins, and a 
 void of miles of country without a single wayfarer. 
 To make matters worse, the machine strikes work, 
 and for a full hour its driver fusses and fumes over 
 it without result. It moves again at last, but slowly, 
 and as though only under his own compulsion of 
 want of rest and refreshment. 
 
 And then a new trouble. A certain sickening soft- 
 ness in the sense of motion warns Mr. Gooding that 
 he has left the road. He alights in haste, to find 
 himself on turf, and in a leafy lane, with a timbered 
 glade beyond that may be the entrance to an en- 
 
 2 35
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 chanted wood. He has clean lost his road, and, by 
 way of a call for guidance, he tries a blast on his 
 bugle-horn, now hoarser than ever with the labors 
 of the journey, and instinctively raises the wild war- 
 whoop of his college cry. This wholly new sensation 
 for Sherwood Forest wins sympathetic, though 
 hardly helpful, notice from the rabbits in frantic 
 scamper across the line of light. A second and a 
 third summons have but the same fortune; but a 
 final effort is answered by a shout in the distance, 
 and a responsive light from the blackness of the 
 forest belt. At closer quarters it is the wild figure 
 of a man past middle age, waving a lantern from the 
 tail-board of a covered vehicle. 
 
 11 Where am I?" 
 
 " In Sherwood Forest." 
 
 "Robin Hood's country?" 
 
 "Where else, if you expect an answer to the bugle- 
 horn?" 
 
 "The way to Edwinstowe, if you please." 
 
 "No guiding you that gate within an hour of mid- 
 night ; but you may come up here, if you don't mind 
 roughing it." 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 ' ' In the yellow van. ' ' 
 
 236
 
 XXVII 
 
 ONVERSATIONAL preliminaries 
 are naturally brief when one has 
 the appetite of an ogre. In a very 
 few minutes Mr. Gooding was at 
 work on the squarest meal the van 
 could afford, with his host com- 
 placently looking on. 
 
 It was not a bad meal. The little larder produced 
 pressed beef and pickles, a slice of tongue, a loaf of 
 brown bread, a bottle of stout. A lamp threw a 
 roof ray on host and guest. The van stood in deep 
 shadow. Seen from the distance, they would have 
 looked well a bit of the void of darkness redeemed 
 to comfort and light. 
 
 It was another lecturer this time. Three-score and 
 five was about his age. His high cheek-bones, round- 
 ish head, keen glances flashing through the mere slits 
 of his eyes, even the crisp, curling hair, were all so 
 many signs of one about equally ready for the word 
 and the blow. No fear of the latter just now. He 
 was evidently in his most expansive mood as he 
 watched his guest. 
 
 ' ' Redmond 's my name, if anybody wants to know 
 it. 'Jack Redmond' 'Old Redmond.' " 
 
 "My card by and by," returned the wayfarer, 
 helping himself to another slice of beef. 
 
 2 37
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "You 're my sort," said the host. "Don't spare 
 it, though it 's a fellow-citizen o' yours. So 's the 
 tongue, for that matter, and the peaches that 's com- 
 ing next. We 've left off learning how to feed our- 
 selves in this country. All fellow-citizens." 
 
 It was some minutes before Mr. Gooding 's answer 
 came: 
 
 "How do you know about fellow-citizens?" 
 
 "You 're so careful in sounding your words." 
 
 "Now I '11 push on," said Mr. Gooding, as he rose 
 to fill his pipe. 
 
 ' ' Could n 't think of it ; you 'd never find the way, 
 and I 'm too tired to show you. Stay to oblige me ; 
 and I '11 stand a drop of something short." 
 
 Arthur looked round. 
 
 ' ' Oh, we 've got a spare bedroom, ' ' said the other, 
 proudly, "and I '11 fix you up in a twinkling, if 
 you '11 bring your rug inside." 
 
 "Done," laughed Mr. Gooding, without further 
 ado. And he went out and made the machine com- 
 fortable under a light cloth. 
 
 "Sleepy?" inquired Eedmond. 
 
 "Never a bit. I could go on all night now talk- 
 ing, motoring, anything you like." 
 
 "Make it talking. I have n't exchanged a blessed 
 word with anybody all day long." 
 
 "The van 's an old acquaintance. Never saw you 
 before. ' ' 
 
 "No; I 'm not the regular man. T' other 's ill. 
 Labor o' love with me, but sometimes I pine for 
 company. I thought you might be a happy beggar- 
 
 238
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 man on tramp, and we 'd have a rouse to pass the 
 hours. ' ' 
 
 ''Sorry to disappoint." 
 
 "You '11 do as well, far 's I can judge. They 're 
 good company, though, the roadside men. Lord ! 
 what they see and say nothin' about! It 'u'd fill a 
 book. But you Ve got to know where to find 'em. 
 Wager I 'd lay my hand on two or three in a cave 
 by the roadside not so far from here. All snug, and 
 always a box of matches, and sometimes a bit o' 
 victual left for the next man. And the ' county con- 
 stab, ' if you please, none the wiser. Ah, it 's a fine 
 life in the summer-time." 
 
 The pipes were well alight by this time, and the 
 drop of something short had long been on the board. 
 Arthur pulled quietly and felt good. The trees, 
 with the light breeze stirring in their branches, were 
 evidently in the same mood. The rest was silence, 
 as though all living things were stilled by terror of 
 the lamp. 
 
 "Sherwood Forest, I think you said," murmured 
 the young man, dreamily. 
 
 The old one was in no hurry to reply. Hurry 
 was manifestly out of the question in such environ- 
 ment. 
 
 "'Hey, jolly Robin!'" 
 he observed at length. 
 
 " 'Hoe, jolly Robin! 
 
 Hey, jolly Robin Hood!' " 
 returned Mr. Gooding, with much solemnity. 
 
 ' ' Good boy ! D ' ye know it, too ? ' ' cried the other, 
 
 239
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 jumping up to pluck a pocket edition of the "Bal- 
 lads" from the library shelf. 
 
 "Why not?" said Gooding. 
 
 "Will ye cap verses?" said the other, with grow- 
 ing excitement. "To think of it and you all the 
 way from the other side! " 
 
 ' ' Why not ? ' ' said the other, again. ' ' I, too, have 
 sat at good men 's feasts. ' ' 
 
 "Only to think of it! It 's my Bible I 'm hand- 
 ling now Kobin, who stood up for all the weak 
 things of life against the strong things! A strong 
 man on the right side." 
 
 " 'All wemen wershep he,' ' 
 said the guest. 
 
 "Your hand again," said the host, "wherever you 
 come from. 
 
 'He was a good out lawe 
 And dyde pore men much god.' 
 The poor against the rich, the laborer against the 
 lord. 
 
 'But loke ye do no housebonde harm 
 That tylleth with his plough. ' 
 
 Robin, the first that struck for us after the long 
 night. The whole burden of it a protest against 
 the cruel forest laws, a part of the land laws that 
 have left bonny England where it is to-day. Cap, 
 cap, and be hanged to ye! It 's my happy night!" 
 
 " 'Hey, jolly Kobin!' " 
 said Mr. Gooding, again. 
 
 "Right again, youngster. That 's the spirit of it. 
 Jolly Robin. Grin and ply your cudgel. Keep a 
 
 240
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 good heart. I can't do that. I waste myself m 
 rages. T ' other one was a hero. I am but as I am. ' ' 
 "Yet you 're camped in the greenwood? 
 'There he herde the notes small 
 Of byrdes mery syngynge. ' ' : 
 "Aye, but you 're a crony, and no mistake !" cried 
 his admiring senior. ' ' Just one drop more ? ' ' 
 
 "Thank you. My favorite tipple is fresh air, if 
 you don't mind." 
 
 "It 's all in Robin Shakspere's mate, and a 
 greater, for he sang in deeds. You 11 find every- 
 thing in that little book. He was a wise leech, with 
 his finger on the pulse of the world. Look at him 
 turning butcher, and breaking the trust with their 
 own tool of a cutting price. 
 
 'For he sold more meat for one peny 
 Than others could do for three. ' 
 A frolic, and the fun on the side of the hungry man. 
 Ah, it was a merrier England when the nobodies had 
 the last laugh. Most of it 's sheer allegory, if you 
 know how to take it. The fight with the giants 
 nothing of the sort: a fight with the monopolists. 
 And when the biggest comes down: 
 
 ' So from his shoulders he 's cut his head, 
 Which on the ground did fall, 
 And grumbling sore at Robin Hood, 
 To tie so dealt withal.' 
 Isn't it just like 'em never satisfied?" 
 "Seems a little exaggerated," said Mr. Gooding. 
 "Well, well, well, well! Grant me a miracle or 
 two for my Scripture ( since you 'd claim it for yours. 
 
 2 4 I
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Suppose his full range at the butts was not exactly 
 the measured mile, as they say it was." 
 
 "Oh, that 's all right. They give it as a story of 
 the longbow." 
 
 ''Anyhow, he shot on our side, and we want an- 
 other champion. Who '11 stand up for us now? As 
 fast as 'the million' make the money the millionaire 
 fobs it. Does it every time. Just a turn of the hand 
 like the spot stroke. Lord, will it ever be barred ! I 
 sometimes wonder how it 's all going to end." 
 
 "Don't worry," said Mr. Gooding, knocking out 
 his ashes for a refill. 
 
 "Which is as much as to say, 'Trust in Provi- 
 dence ' ? You may be right. P 'r 'ps it is n 't a matter 
 for champions, and it '11 settle itself, in the long run, 
 by getting worse so that it may get better. It 's a 
 growth, and we must give it its chance. Let it work 
 itself to a flower, poisonous or other, and then it '11 
 rot of its own accord. Dollar-hunting, land-grabbing 
 its own cure p'r'aps that 's the hope. It can't last 
 forever. They 're getting sick sick of their own 
 dismal trade. 
 
 "Beautiful story, that, of one of the mightiest of 
 your Yankee hunters did you ever strike it? When 
 he 'd made more than he knew what to do with, he 
 tried to unload a little, just to get breath, in a kind 
 of grand tour. Special cars and state-rooms all the 
 way along; special teams to whirl him about in 
 Europe; special guides, couriers, interpreters the 
 devil knows what. At last they got him to Amster- 
 dam, and tried to show him the pictures. He stood 
 
 242
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 it for half an hour, then slipped out to the Stock Ex- 
 change, and made fifty thousand in half an hour 
 more. ' ' 
 
 "Manifest destiny," said Mr. Gooding. 
 
 "No; only secret itch. A case for the doctors, be- 
 lieve me. We shall live to see 'em at one another's 
 throats, and then mankind will come into its own 
 again. Ever noticed the gnawing envy in the eye of 
 Five Million when he feels that Six Million looks 
 on him like 'dirt' the hangdog shame of him? 
 Can't abear to be in the same room with his betters 
 in the infernal trade. The gradations of it! Five 
 Million a derision to Six, and a loathing to Four, and 
 so on till you reach the things that live in the mud. I 
 stood outside a fashionable restaurant the other day, 
 and watched two men in the street peering through 
 the crimson curtains at a party picking their dainty 
 way through a five-pound meal. Give you my word, I 
 thought one of 'em would have fallen down and wor- 
 shiped. However, to be fair, t' other blasphemed." 
 
 "They '11 get that dinner and the whole earth 
 soon as they are fit for it," said Mr. Gooding, "but 
 not a moment before. Tell 'em to hurry up over 
 their beer. That 's the meaning of America." 
 
 "Oh," groaned the old man, "we all thought so 
 once. But is there a more self-consciously degraded 
 thing in all creation than the American poor man? 
 I 've been there and marked his pariah shuffle and 
 his downcast eye." 
 
 "Give your coffee time to settle. You seem to 
 have been about a bit. ' ' 
 
 243
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Everywhere, specially on your side Pacific 
 slope before you were born, islands, Australia. Lord, 
 Lord, it 's a big dot of a world ! ' ' 
 
 "And all built on pretty much the same plan, eh ? " 
 said Mr. Gooding. 
 
 "That 's so; devil take the hindmost; and 'How 
 soon can I get out of it?' about the wisest thought 
 you can start with when you 're born. Really, the 
 burial club seems to be the only reasonable institu- 
 tion. And it might be such a happy family ! ' ' 
 
 "Give us a song," said Mr. Gooding. 
 
 "What '11 you have 'England 's Going Down the 
 Hill'? Heard it from a gutter in a slum, sung by 
 the composer." 
 
 "It 's such a fine night," pleaded the guest. 
 
 And such a night it was. The glades, where 
 buskined Marian might have walked, stretched in 
 every direction under a sky luminous with stars. 
 One avenue seemed to end in a kind of amphitheater, 
 a conceivable council-place of the outlaw band. And 
 here and there was a great swarth of shade for 
 hiding, and still, no doubt, a shelter for all the 
 tremulous life of the forest, bending ten thousand 
 thousand pairs of eyes on the glare of light from 
 the van. 
 
 "As you please," said Redmond. "And what 's 
 your news ? ' ' 
 
 "Oh, just the heart of England in a lightning- 
 flash. It 's that or nothing for the tourist." 
 
 "For the American tourist." 
 
 "Even for the stars themselves, I should say. 
 
 244
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 They can't see much of us, with the ball in 
 flight." 
 
 "S'pose that 's why they never interfere. And 
 what do you think of it?" 
 
 "Pretty sight." 
 
 "Bah! You holiday people don't know how to 
 look at a landscape. You miss all the devilment of 
 it. If only you did know ! You 'd see the villages 
 in all their little infamies under their greasy smile. 
 Mother Ship ton's, the secret-boozing ken; and Mother 
 Quickly 's, that 's worse. They 're not even good in 
 their stagnation only goody at the best. How can 
 you wonder? They 've got so little for idle hands 
 to do. And so well, just like their betters, for that 
 matter, and for the same reason. It is n't the towns 
 that corrupt them. They corrupt the towns, taking 
 their wickedness and their poverty and their feck- 
 lessness up to market, because the energies behind 
 them can find no healthy outlet at home in- profitable 
 toil. A fine price we have to pay for your hothouse 
 'Beauties of England and Wales,' with all the 
 country-side driven by a kind of monster conscrip- 
 tion into the army of the slums. We 're worth some- 
 thing better than to make a holiday for Americans. ' ' 
 
 He dropped his bantering tone, and flashed out 
 passionately : 
 
 ' ' Look at me, ruined by farming ; and I 've toiled 
 like a slave all my life. Who killed Cock Robin? 
 Shall I tell you? The English land system. Here 
 am I to-day to show that the man who farms straight 
 and farms honest can't hope to make a living out of 
 
 2 45
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 it while idle ownership claims such a huge share of 
 his labor. We are being beat by the foreigner who 
 works for himself on his own patch. You can't keep 
 all this wicked luxury of landlord, aye, and gentle- 
 man farmer, too, out of one pair of laborer's hands. 
 But if you won 't try, there 's always plenty that will, 
 in the struggle for a crust. Have it or leave it ; and 
 if you don't like it, off with you to the main sewer 
 of London town. You can't live and thrive, in- 
 crease and multiply, here without the good leave of 
 your betters; and they won't give you leave. They 
 want the land for a pleasure-ground; they can get 
 their incomes somewhere else. Rural England is 
 starved for lack of an opening. Blank stagnation 
 everywhere, and kept so by word of command. Try 
 to do something to make a man of yourself, and see 
 how soon they '11 shunt you out of the place. Why 
 do your cities in America spring up in a night and 
 a day from log huts? Because every man 's free to 
 do his best. There is n't a hamlet in England but 's 
 hag-ridden by some 'noble house.' That 's what your 
 historian Motley meant when he talked of the fear- 
 ful price paid by the English people for the parks, 
 castles, fisheries, and fox-huntings of its 'splendid 
 aristocracy. ' 
 
 ' ' But there, ' ' he added, with a bitter laugh at his 
 own expense, "what 's the use of talking? I 'd say 
 pass the bottle, and forget it all, if I was a man of 
 that sort. The little van that goes up and down to 
 testify against it takes itself seriously enough; but 
 that 's only its foolishness. The feudal system don't 
 
 246
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 mind. And feudal system it is, alive and kicking as 
 fresh as ever in this our latest growth of time. For 
 the essence of the accursed thing is that one man 's 
 the property of another, and that his first care on 
 coming into his manhood is to find some fellow- 
 creature to kneel to, and, laying hand in hand, say, 
 'Please take possession of me.' The old system went 
 from man to man until it reached the highest. It 's 
 perfect to-day as between peasant and farmer, far- 
 mer and lord; but there 's sometimes a break when 
 the noble owner himself belongs to a money-lender 
 or to a queen of the music-halls. 
 
 "And now, youngster, let 's turn in. I 'm tired, 
 and you must be sleepy after this rigmarole. I '11 
 put the supper-things outside, and attend to 'em in 
 the morning. Would you mind giving me a lift with 
 the linen-chest? Thanks. There 's your bed on the 
 lid, if you '11 take out the big mattress. I '11 fix my- 
 self up on the other in my old soldier's cloak. Draw 
 the curtain, and there 's your spare room. Mind 
 your head, please, against the library shelves, and 
 don't go into the crockery when you 're taking off 
 your coat." 
 
 ' ' The cloak for me, ' ' said Mr. Gooding. ' ' I must 
 turn out early to make it up with the machine." 
 
 "Well, every man to his taste. Good night, and 
 pleasant dreams ' ' ; and almost as the words left his 
 lips he was fast asleep. 
 
 Next morning a kindly hand on his shoulder 
 roused the young man to sunrise and all the glories 
 of Sherwood. 
 
 247
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 His toilet was deferred, but it took a full hour to 
 valet the car. The creature was sulky at first, and 
 seemed to have developed a mechanical spavin with 
 the hard work of the day before. Fortunately, there 
 was a good reserve of fuel. 
 
 All was right at last, and then Redmond, giving 
 his guest a send-off from the turf with his shoulder, 
 put him square to his work on the highroad. 
 
 "Good-by; good luck." 
 
 So they parted, and the young man was soon bowl- 
 ing along toward bath and breakfast, in the forest 
 hotel which he had missed in his wanderings the 
 night before. A telegram awaited him: "Want 
 you." It was signed "Augusta," and of course it 
 brought his wanderings to a close. 
 
 248
 
 XXVIII 
 
 N receipt of Augusta's message 
 Arthur Gooding made straight for 
 Allonby. A certain note of im- 
 periousness in it had the double 
 charm of the elder sister and of 
 the woman. Though there was so 
 little difference in years between them, it carried him 
 back to the time where hers was the protecting arm 
 and the guiding brain. 
 
 He found her troubled, and yet with a certain 
 radiancy as of hope and certainty. 
 
 "Arthur, I want you to find a ring in the Eed Sea 
 two rings." 
 
 "One chance more for me." 
 "You Ve heard me speak of the Herions." 
 "I know all about them." 
 "Why, you never saw them in your 1" 
 "Never saw Alexander the Great, if it comes to 
 that." 
 
 "Don't be absurd, Arthur. Well, they are lost in 
 town, and I want them Sack at Allonby right 
 here." 
 
 "A slumming job." 
 
 "Just to please little-big sister. I don't think 
 you are quite so attentive as ever." 
 
 249
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "You have n't started yet." 
 
 "I ought to be. You are quite as unreasonable." 
 
 J'l '11 get Mary to ask you." 
 
 "Don't be absurd, Augusta. Do you happen to 
 know the time of the next train?" 
 
 It was a large order, and he felt as much as the 
 express flew townward with a steady recurrent beat 
 of movement that made him feel like Sindbad under 
 the roc's wing. How shall the lost be found in 
 mighty London, the home of the vanishing-trick? 
 He steamed into the great station as the local trains 
 were steaming out with their freight of business men 
 homeward bound. The city fills and empties every 
 day, from its suburbs back to the suburbs again. 
 The return is a rush as of the river at Dinan, roar- 
 ing home in flood fast enough to drown the urchins 
 picking the pebbles from its bed. And any two of 
 these obscure wayfarers might be Rose and George. 
 
 Next morning it was, Where to begin ? All he had 
 to guide him was the returned envelop that bore 
 the address of their last-known lodging, with its in- 
 dorsement of "gone away." So he made that quar- 
 ter his starting-point. It was a strange neighbor- 
 hood, exquisitely dismal in its newer parts, as ex- 
 quisitely flavored with tender and fragrant mem- 
 ories in its many remains of the past. Here yet 
 stands the church that marks, though in a modern 
 casing, the site of Chaucer's "Scole of Stratford atte 
 Bowe" one of its ancient tombs within that of a 
 child who owed heaven to the kindness wherewith 
 
 250
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Nature his nurse gott him to bed betimes." And 
 hard by, a Board school, naked and unashamed, 
 stands where stood, not too long ago for some of us 
 to have passed our childhood there, an old hunting- 
 lodge of the first James, majestic in its gables and its 
 paneled glories, its finely ceiled state-rooms, its deep- 
 bayed hearths, sacred to the gods of the fireside. 
 Surely a pick in the hands of a vestryman may be 
 the deadliest of murderers' tools. 
 
 The lodging was in one of the mean streets that 
 have usurped the site of the old-time garden. The 
 landlady, a Megaera from the wash-tub, received 
 Mr. Gooding's inquiries with a look of mingled sus- 
 picion, respect, indifference, all in one glassy, non- 
 committal stare. 
 
 "Herion," said the young man, repeating his first 
 mention of the name. 
 
 "'Erring, 'Erring?" she mused. 
 
 "Why, certainly, if you wish it." 
 
 "A young feller, fine figger of a man, like, an' 
 wife to match? Sort of country couple?" 
 
 "That's it." 
 
 "Owe me thirteen shillin's rent." 
 
 "I '11 pay it." 
 
 She held out her hand at once, and, on the com- 
 pletion of the transaction, said in a really obliging 
 manner: "Well, they don't live here." 
 
 "Ah, don't tell me too much at once." 
 
 "You see, they went on all right till he lost his 
 job at the docks ; an ' then, you see, they fell be 'ind- 
 'and with their rent. An', of course, I could n't " 
 
 251
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "You 're a pansy. But what 's become of them?" 
 
 "Couldn't tell yer, guvnor." 
 
 "Switch me on to somebody that can." 
 
 "Well, there was a man from the country as knew 
 'em porter at a ware 'us in the Borough name of 
 Jubb." 
 
 "The warehouse or the porter?" 
 
 "I couldn't say." 
 
 Jubb was found, and he proved to be the owner 
 of the shop. And, in due course, his porter was run 
 to earth for more leisurely examination in his own 
 home. 
 
 The porter was communicative, but hardly help- 
 ful. He and his wife were two grains of the human 
 rubbish which the feudal system dumps into the 
 towns. By good hap they had fallen in a cranny 
 of the stony places where, after a fashion, they might 
 take root. He was quiet in manner, as one awe- 
 struck with his luck, yet perplexed with yearnings 
 for the old village home. The inquirer had to en- 
 dure much from him in the way of reminiscence, in 
 the hope of getting the one thing needful at last. 
 
 "Fust I see o' London in all my life I come up 
 for a 'oliday. Frightened of it like when I got there, 
 an' trots into a pub to ask my way. Stops in the 
 pub all day, an' goes back at night, same way 's I 
 come. I 'ad n't seen much, but, mind yer, I got 
 'ome to time." 
 
 It was his first experience in dissipation, but it 
 sufficed. 
 
 252
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "I ain't seen much more of it now, master, 
 though I 've been up this five year. But I 've got 
 a place, an' that '11 do for me. I loads an' un- 
 loads my 'taters all day long, an' then, when I Ve 
 swep' out the ware 'us, I comes 'ome and 'as my 
 tea." 
 
 He expected no more. His life in the village had 
 been one long apprenticeship to the living death. 
 Full many a winter's night had he tramped home in 
 the darkness through miry ways to a mildewed cot- 
 tage lighted by a farthing dip, and to a supper of 
 bread-crusts soaked in liquid grease, offered and 
 eaten in the silence of a life without events. What 
 was there to talk about? Nothing had happened, 
 nothing was going to happen. The muteness of his 
 mate betokened no ill feeling, but only stagnation 
 of the mind. And sometimes, to break the silence, 
 there was the half-delirious wail of a child down with 
 one of the diseases of its age. To-day was as yester- 
 day; to-morrow would be as to-day. The sweet 
 privacies of dawn to the early riser, so restful to the 
 tormented spirit, were but aggravations of the 
 melancholy of his lot. It was not sorrow, but the 
 far worse thing absence of joy: a life wherein 
 nothing came to pass but a rank pipe. This it is, the 
 sense of the vacuity of being, that empties the cot- 
 tage into the slum. The gin-palace is at least a pres- 
 ent discount of the promises; and the clodhopper 
 has almost ceased to believe in the brightness of # life 
 to come, for want of a sign. 
 
 253
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 He had resisted that consolation, for he had not 
 enough temperament for vice. Town was as dull as 
 country for him. Yet he lived by a doctrine, as all 
 must, though they may not be able to give it a name. 
 It was the doctrine of the futility of resistance to 
 the hurtful forces of the world. 
 
 "We keeps ourselves to ourselves," he said to Mr. 
 Gooding, by way of apology for his ignorance of the 
 further movements of the Herions. "We don't say 
 nothin' to nobody : you gets on best that way. I never 
 see any one come to much good as did. The gentry 
 doan' like it. All the noise they want they can make 
 for theirselves. Keep quiet eh, master? an' then 
 you won't find the churchyard so much of a change. 
 It 's the lively ones that finds dying such a worry. 
 I fancy that was young Herion's complaint, from 
 all I 've heared." 
 
 "I dare say; but how are we going to cure Him, 
 if you can't put me on his track?" 
 
 The wife wrinkled her brow in thought. "There 
 was a woman a sort of a woman as 'elped her at 
 the birth of her baby. So I was told. It came on 
 sudden-like, soon after they went away." 
 
 "Don't you fancy I 'm in a hurry," said Arthur, 
 settling himself. "If it comes to a pinch, I Ve got 
 all night long." 
 
 "Mrs. Patch was her name if she was a Mrs." 
 
 ' ' Hurry up a bit, just for fun, ' ' said the youth. 
 
 "She lived at a place called Batley's Rents in 
 Limehouse. So I was told." 
 
 "Thank you. I 'm sure you 're always among 
 
 254
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 those present," he said, pressing half a crown into 
 her hand. 
 
 "GONE 'opping," was the report in the Rents; but 
 the scent was now so hot that Batley's, with scarcely 
 an effort, was enabled to name the village in Kent 
 where Mrs. Patch might not inconceivably be found. 
 
 2 55
 
 XXIX 
 
 HAT same night, such is the per- 
 fection of the railway system and 
 such are the vicissitudes of a quest, 
 Mr. Gooding was sitting by a 
 camp-fire in Kent. His com- 
 panions were a gang of hop- 
 pickers who had finished their day's work and were 
 prolonging their evening revel into the small hours. 
 It was a motley throng outcasts of town and 
 country, and a few quite decent folk who took their 
 hopping as a recreation and killed the two birds of 
 work and the summer holiday with one stone. 
 
 The "sort of a woman" he had come in quest of 
 was among them. She sat a little apart from the 
 rest, pulling at a pipe with tranquil energy, and 
 gazing into vacancy. The glow of the fire lighted 
 up her dismal, tormented face of early middle age, 
 seamed with the coarser cares. She was a drab, even 
 in the punning sense of the word, being of a dry- 
 mud color in her very clothing, as though she had 
 quite immediately sprung from the soil, and might 
 dissolve back into it at any moment by the accident 
 of a shower. She was shod only less solidly than 
 a horse, and mainly with metal, too, which glittered 
 bright in nail and clamp from the surface of her up- 
 
 256
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 turned soles. She seemed as densely unideaed as a 
 frog at rest a peasant woman of the lowest order, 
 who had received her final touch of brutishness in 
 town. The gang girls of the fen country look so 
 when their womanhood has flowered in the squalor 
 of a provincial center. In such the earth seems hun- 
 gry to claim its own before the time. A too ex- 
 clusive commerce with it has degraded them to the 
 lowest level. They seem to gape wonder at every- 
 thing in the cosmic scheme that is not a clod. Arthur 
 thought of his sister, and wondered whether the 
 evolutionary system might not possibly be brought 
 under new management for the speedier elevation 
 of the race. It might otherwise take thousands of 
 years to give Mrs. Patch a lift toward the skies. 
 
 She grunted forth her answers in one syllable till 
 Mr. Gooding mollified her with a tip. Then she went 
 into two, though but a little way. ' ' Yes ; I knowed 
 'er, fast enough." The neatness of her questioner's 
 attire seemed to have some effect upon her, as upon 
 all of them. They settled down to make the most 
 of the unwonted visit of a ' ' gentleman, ' ' eyeing him 
 the while with contemptuous wonder, as Hotspur 
 might have eyed his fop. 
 
 The arrival of Mrs. Patch's "man" with a can 
 of beer was a welcome diversion. He was an abso- 
 lute contrast to her small, foxy, nimble, voluble, 
 but still chary of speech at first, as though to make 
 the most of his information. For her his coming was 
 evidently a relief to the tedium of talk, and she re- 
 sumed her silence and her pipe.
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Yes; we knowed 'em, fast enough," he repeated. 
 "You 're at the right shop here, guvnor." 
 
 ' ' Where are they now ? ' ' 
 
 ""Well, we '11 come to that by an' by. I was in 
 the same gang with 'im, this 'ere friend o' yours, at 
 Lime 'us Dock. Garge, we used to call 'im. I can 
 see 'im as well as I see you a reg'lar glutton for 
 work. ' ' 
 
 "Yes, yes." 
 
 "Then we both got the sack, the work comes an' 
 goes, guvnor, an' I loses sight on 'im for a time. 
 To tell you the truth, they was both rather a cut 
 above me an' my missus. But you know how it is 
 hard up, an' the kid comin'. People can't afford 
 to be partic'lar when they 're like that. Can they, 
 now?" 
 
 "You 're giving us rather too much hot air," said 
 Mr. Gooding. 
 
 "Then I struck 'im again, guvnor. An' where 
 d' ye think it was ? But there you 'd never guess. " 
 
 "Then I won't try." 
 
 "Well, he was jest mad for a job\ An' what do 
 you think he was doin', sir? Gospel truth!" 
 
 "Governor of the Bank of England?" 
 
 "No, sir; but jest outside it, peddlin' knickknacks 
 on the curb studs, pocket-combs, toothpicks, 'all this 
 lot a penny.' Seem he 'd once been in that line. 
 That 's the way English-born men has to live now- 
 adays, guvnor, if they 're not foreigners. An' even 
 that lot is cuttin' into the street trade." 
 
 "Sorry, but" It was maddening. 
 
 258
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Things '11 never be right," piped another of the 
 group, "till them sort is kep' out of this country. 
 I 'm a snip, an' I know what they are in my trade. 
 Talk about religion ! ' ' 
 
 "I 'm not talking about it," said Mr. Gooding. 
 
 "Well, if you was, you 'd see as God A 'mighty 
 seems to think more o' the Jarmans than he does of 
 his own countrymen." 
 
 "An' dynamite on your door-step as soon as look 
 at ye, if you put 'em out!" said a decent-looking 
 woman, comfortably shawled. 
 
 ' ' Ever 'ad any on yours, missus ? ' ' some one asked. 
 
 It turned the laugh against her, and spoiled her 
 effect. There was evidently a sneaking kindness for 
 this agency with most of them. Nobody approved, 
 but nobody blamed. It was left a moot point. 
 
 "As to that," returned the tailor, "there 's a 
 good deal to be said on both sides. Dynamiters ain 't 
 all bad. They mean well, some of 'em. It 's the 
 swells they 're after most o' the time; it ain't us 
 lot." 
 
 A chill fell on the group. The woman in the shawl 
 had a repentant air. 
 
 "You see, Englishmen likes to enjoy theirselves, " 
 said the foxy little man, by way of diversion. 
 ' ' That 's their natur '. ' Jolly Englishmen ! 'you 've 
 beared the sayin'. This foreign scum they don't 
 want no enjoyment. Live on pickles, seen it with 
 my own eyes, an' sleep on the same shelf as they 
 keep the jar. That 's their touch. They don't want 
 no music- 'alls in the evenin', an' no social glass 
 
 259
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 jest as we might be 'avin' now. That 's what fust 
 brought me up to town the lights in the street." 
 
 "It ain't the foreigners," said the tailor; "it 's 
 the rich people, no matter where they come from. 
 All the coin o' the world drains into their pockets. 
 If you want sights, go round the West End. That 's 
 the way the money goes. Ever done Bond street, 
 mate, on a fine evenin'?" 
 
 "No; not my touch." 
 
 "The pantymines ain't in it for glory. Every 
 winder ablaze; the very coffee-shops like Aladdin's 
 palace, an' gals in long trains to wait. When I got 
 nothin' else to do, I watch it from outside. An' the 
 jewel-shops, with the glare of it beatin' down on the 
 goods till it stings 'em into burnin' life throb, 
 throb, throb! An' the blasted knickknacks! None 
 o' your 'this lot a penny' there. Cases in solid gold 
 to hold a ha'p'orth o' lead-pencil; penholders like- 
 wise ; even the very pens. My Gawd, it 's cruel ! 
 They dunno what to do with the coin. They say the 
 Jarmans is comin' over 'ere to give us a good 'idin' 
 one o' these days. It '11 serve us damned well right." 
 
 Arthur was sick at heart. He was baffled in his 
 quest. Either they knew nothing or they would 
 not tell. And the misery chilled him. He had such 
 a sense of opportunity in life opportunity for all; 
 and the instinctive pessimism of these wretches 
 seemed to give it the lie. He had dreams of being 
 a great financier, of world-girdling combinations in 
 which his own aggrandizement would be that of the 
 race. Yet these people were some of the items of 
 
 260
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 his reckoning. What, after all, could he, or his 
 tribe, do for any but themselves? Was this the 
 result of ages of profit-hunting, on the principle 
 that the good of one was the good of all? He had 
 crossed the Atlantic with hopes of a venture which 
 was to determine his choice of a career. Men of 
 wealth and standing in his own country, who had 
 faith in him, were ready for a new invasion of Eng- 
 land, of Europe, if he, or others like him, could show 
 the way. It could have no attraction for him if it 
 were not beneficent. He was going to make himself 
 a rich man to the end of making himself a useful 
 one. Yet where could be the certainty of that, after 
 what he had seen in this direful object-lesson? JLt 
 began to look as though all corporate life were but 
 one eternal mode of slave-labor, the forms varying, 
 but the mass ever in the position of the under dog. 
 What had he seen as a mere tourist with his eyes 
 open? A land that could not even feed its own 
 people ; a competitive system that had nothing nobler 
 than sheer hunger and destitution for its starting- 
 point; a most appalling poverty, a still more ap- 
 palling wealth. Hundreds of thousands without so 
 much as the assurance of the elementals of bed, 
 clothing, and a crust, things without which no saint 
 could take up his sainthood, no sage his parable, no 
 workman his hammer, no writer his pen. It was 
 sickening to feel that, after ages of stable and con- 
 tinuous civilization, no one had found out how to 
 give everybody three meals a day and a clean shirt. 
 And all the sages supposed to be at work on it stead- 
 
 261
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ily, and all the statesmen, and all the churches? 
 There must have been slackness somewhere. And 
 still worse was it to know the gnawing doubt that he 
 and all his precious labors as a coming captain of 
 industry might only make things worse. He de- 
 tested Socialism, and well-nigh all else ending with 
 the same syllable. He was so sure that "these 
 States" had found the secret in limitless freedom 
 and limitless struggle, with wealth for the prize. 
 Yet see what hideous results of these were before 
 him in the old land! 
 
 He rose to leave, and to stamp off the chill of the 
 night air. The foxy man, watchful through the slits 
 of his eyes, seemed to feel that if his "missus" was 
 to earn the guerdon already paid, she had better 
 make haste. 
 
 "There was one o' that missionary lot as took up 
 with 'em, so I 've heared say. They ain't no class 
 for me." He nodded at the woman, as though 
 urging her to speak. ' ' She knows. ' ' 
 
 She went on smoking. 
 
 Then he swore at her. "Can't yer open yer 
 mouth an ' tell the gentleman ? Yer 've got 'is money 
 in yer pocket. ' ' 
 
 Arthur looked at her. It was the sex, after all, 
 even in this ghastly image. 
 
 "Don't talk to her like that." 
 
 She eyed him as though he were some wandering 
 child of the sun, out of his sphere, and muttered: 
 "Place over a fried-fish shop off Poplar Road. 
 
 262
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Pawnshop at the corner. ' Christ! 'n 'Ope Sersiety.' 
 They might know." 
 
 The mission woman, seen next day, could only 
 shake her head. "I 'm afraid the Herions have sunk 
 out of our reach. There 's a point where these people 
 touch the lower levels of misery and are quite lost. 
 All of us are useless in that slough, though some 
 don 't like to confess it. The Salvation Army, which 
 is the charwoman of the Church, fails there. I knew 
 Mrs. Herion very well : a quiet, hard-working woman 
 pretty, too ; proud as a duchess in her humble way. 
 There isn't enough work to go round for such as 
 they. If the wages rise a bit, up goes the rent along 
 with it. There 's always somebody, a landlord or 
 a sweater, to graft every penny of the increase. .If 
 you housed them for nothing, down would go the 
 earnings to the point at which the poor things could 
 just manage to eat and drink. The Herions had 
 saved a little while his work lasted, but her confine- 
 ment and the loss of work together pulled them 
 down. And they went from bad to worse when they 
 came this way. The rent was crushing. It keeps 
 pace with the very need of shelter. The greater the 
 crowd, the dearer the homes. In this quarter they 
 are asking ' key money ' now, a premium on the right 
 of a mere first chance in the scramble for a lodging. 
 What is London to do with all these human misfits? 
 Why don't we find out how to keep them in their 
 villages? How can they strike out with their 
 wretched education, suited to their 'state in life'? 
 
 263
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 You may walk round with me, if you like, to see our 
 poor very decent, all of them. Some of them might 
 be able to tell you more than I can. Kose always 
 tried to keep the best company among them." 
 
 He went with her as a forlorn hope. The utter 
 inadequacy of the remedy to the disease was dis- 
 heartening. The missioners had evidently no grip 
 on it. The soft deans by whom they were more re- 
 motely inspired rarely mentioned the religion of 
 economic relations, the root of the matter, to ears 
 polite. Their silence was not time-serving, but con- 
 viction. It was policy, too. If they rashly tampered 
 with the doctrine that everybody should grow as rich 
 as he could, where would charity get its ten-pound 
 note? 
 
 A few old people eked out a scanty subsistence 
 under her care. It was better than nothing, perhaps, 
 but all around! One, a sort of specimen number, 
 asked Mr. Gooding if he happened to know the 
 shortest verse in the Bible. As it did happen, he 
 was able to tell her. Then came a poser : What was 
 the word that stood in the very middle of the sacred 
 book? He gave it up. She named it with triumph 
 as the result of efforts that had cost her six months' 
 application to the dreary business of the count. 
 
 He turned away with his rather shamefaced guide. 
 
 "When did you last see the Herions?" he asked. 
 
 "George had gone out again to look for work. 
 
 Hose was lying ill on the bed in a dismal room, still 
 
 and quiet, with a baby opening its eyes, for the first 
 
 time, on a vista of East End back yards. A mouse, 
 
 264
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 trustful in the stagnant peace, foraged for its break- 
 fast, and hardly stirred when I came in." 
 
 "Who sublets such holes?" 
 
 " 'Speculators.' " 
 
 "Who owned that one?" 
 
 "The Duke of Allonby, I believe." 
 
 Arthur left town that night to report. 
 
 265
 
 XXX 
 
 HREE months of the country sea- 
 son have passed, with their round 
 of sport and play according to the 
 rubric, and we are now at the open- 
 ing of a new year. Allonby, by 
 general consent, has never seen the 
 like of it. There has been one steady whirl of or- 
 dered movement, as brisk in its way as the rotation 
 of the earth. The only thing that saves us in the 
 general arrangement is that the planet is forever on 
 the go. If once it paused to take stock of itself, we 
 might all be shivered into fragments. Having no 
 time for reflection, Augusta has been able to take the 
 congratulations of her friends in good part, and to 
 admit that her success has been almost without a 
 flaw. 
 
 Yet, in the very moment of supreme satisfaction, 
 there came a doubt. In one thing she had to own 
 failure. The Herions were still waiting for ducal 
 justice, still undiscovered of late, even, still un- 
 sought. The sense of right was still strong with 
 her. The sense of the smart of failure was just 
 as strong, for she was as inconsistent in her virtues 
 as the rest of us. 
 
 The truth is, she had won over the duke alone, 
 
 266
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 and the system was still against her. He had con- 
 sented to the reinstalment of the Herions, but the 
 agent, the family solicitors, in fact the whole per- 
 manent staff of management, had resolved that his 
 order should never be carried out. He had told them 
 to advertise. They advertised in the leading jour- 
 nal! A dock-laborer seeking himself in an agony 
 column at threepence a peep was a grotesque con- 
 ception, but he could not realize that. He suggested 
 private detectives. The private detectives took their 
 cue from those who instructed them, the more so 
 as they naturally languished without the stimulus 
 of a scandal or a crime. Augusta was puzzled at 
 first, until George Herion 's mother gave her the clue. 
 "They not goin' to 'ave 'em back, your Grace, till 
 they come in their coffins mark that!" Then it all 
 flashed on Augusta in an instant: "they" meant the 
 counterplot. She colored with resentment and in- 
 dignation, and determined to find her birds for her- 
 self. 
 
 Yet Allonby still claimed her for the moment, and 
 in the most imperative way. Its brilliant season 
 was to have an ending of supreme splendor in the 
 visit of a royal pair. Invitations were out for a 
 great party to meet the duke and duchess whose 
 place was on the steps of the throne. 
 
 It was the day of their arrival. The castle looked 
 watchfulness and expectation from every port-hole. 
 All were at their posts, from the steward to the scul- 
 lions. It was the first visit of an heir in the direct 
 line of succession for over a century, and this one 
 
 267
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 had still some of the interest of mystery. He had 
 been brought up in the close companionship of the 
 best of mothers, one of the most beautiful and the 
 most devout women of her time, and still as youth- 
 ful to look at as her own children. 
 
 The struggle for invitations to the house-party 
 had been unusually keen. The party was limited to 
 thirty; and, according to custom, every name had 
 been submitted in the highest quarter. The host and 
 hostess had drawn up their lists. The royal duke 
 and duchess had used the blue pencil freely, to strike 
 in or to strike out. There could not have been more 
 orderly fuss about it if the choice of so many am- 
 bassadors had been the matter in hand. 
 
 For, the truth is, these august persons had the 
 reputation of social austerity in the court circle. 
 The prince had his mother's horror of the smart set, 
 and his wife was known to share his sentiments to 
 the full. The set would cheerfully have left both 
 alone in their glory, but it had to reckon with them 
 in spite of itself. To be at Allonby on such an oc- 
 casion was, no doubt, to endure intolerable boredom ; 
 yet not to be there was, in some measure, to be 
 classed. The prince was eminently "serious"; and 
 it was well understood that when his day came so- 
 ciety would have to toe the line. 
 
 The figurative expression bore a literal reference. 
 It was really a question of the right sort of toe for 
 the purpose. The illustrious person was familiarly 
 known to the set as "Young Square Toes." This 
 meant nothing to the prejudice of his bootmaker, 
 
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 The Yellow Van 
 
 but only that the customer, in spite of a limited 
 count of years, was smitten with incurable age of 
 mind. Some of those who called him Square Toes 
 were hoary with eld ; but that did not matter. Their 
 "footwear" was their accepted symbol of eternal 
 youth. One symbol will serve as well as another to 
 signify the most profound difference in the view of 
 life. At one time, as we know, it was the cut in love- 
 locks; to-day it is the cut in shoe-leather: yet Cav- 
 alier and Roundhead maintain their everlasting con- 
 flict amid the changes of form. And, after all, the 
 more joyous party may easily be commended to our 
 sense of dignity by regarding them as a sort of 
 Pointed Order of the fabric of state. 
 
 The Square Toes, by common consent of the others, 
 stood for the dullness of respectability and the gloom 
 of the moral law in fact, for the reaction toward 
 puritanism in a court that had long been going it too 
 fast. The Points, as they were familiarly called, 
 were for the joie de vivre, and for every other felici- 
 tous phrase that signified the yearning for a good 
 time. They were for taking this life in a galliard 
 and in a coranto, whatever might be the fortunes of 
 the next. 
 
 It was war to the knife between them, as a mat- 
 ter of course, though their animosity was naturally 
 tempered in expression by their good breeding. The 
 Squares detested the Points as threatening ruin to 
 the nation and discredit to the throne. The Points 
 despised and ridiculed the Squares as killjoys whose 
 coming supremacy meant sackcloth for court-dress. 
 
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 Many a Point disappeared beneath the blue pencil 
 in the course of revision. Some got through by a 
 timely fit of mealy-mouthedness, or by good judg- 
 ment in lying low. It would have been impossible 
 to sacrifice all of them. If the proscription had been 
 too rigorous, there might have been no house-party. 
 
 When all was done, the factions were exceedingly 
 well defined. The Squares included that unblem- 
 ished nobleman Lord Ogreby, whose acquaintance 
 Augusta had made soon after her arrival, with sev- 
 eral members of his family. The earl was known 
 for the rigor of his evangelical principles and for 
 the studied simplicity of his life. Whatever else was 
 served at his board, boiled mutton always had a 
 place there; and, by friendly consultation with his 
 tailor, he had contrived to introduce homespun into 
 the composition of his dress-suit. His hose, for all 
 occasions, were of hodden-gray. You might have 
 ruled a ledger with the ends of his shoes. These 
 circumstances, however, are of minor importance, 
 for of course the actual costume of the sections was 
 only in accidental conformity with their symbolic 
 name. The earl was accompanied by his son and 
 heir, Lord Beglerbeg, who stood high in Christian 
 Science, and by a daughter, Lady Francesca Darton, 
 who held a humble rank in the Salvation Army, and 
 wore its serge, its bonnet, and its badge in the most 
 glittering throngs. This was the best the neighbor- 
 hood could afford in the ultra-respectability of de- 
 votion. But that qualification was not exacted by 
 the illustrious visitors, who asked only for decency. 
 
 270
 
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 Two or three ministers and as many of the highest 
 judges supplied gravity without any admixture of 
 the ridiculous. With these were a few who looked 
 in vain for an opening in great affairs, and who 
 were part of that strength of England which is run- 
 ning to waste for want of organization. Mr. Bas- 
 comti, the High-church dignitary of Slocum Magna, 
 was almost of the party, though he was not in social 
 residence. But he came and went by special desire 
 of Mr. Gooding, who had a great respect for him, 
 and by pressing invitation of Augusta. Another 
 contingent, quite after the prince's own heart, was 
 that of the sportsmen, who, for the most part, were 
 saved from frivolity by the manliness of their tastes. 
 The Points were variously composed. There was 
 Mr. Kenneth McAlister Bruce, a magnate of modern 
 finance who had nothing of the Scotsman but the 
 astuteness and the name. It was enough, especially 
 the first. He had shootings in the Highlands, a 
 house in Park Lane, a hand in well-nigh every en- 
 terprise of moment in the country, though ostensibly 
 his transactions were confined to the China trade. 
 You found him everywhere. You burrowed into un- 
 derground tubes : there he was. You coquetted with 
 new and far-reaching patents: he was there, too. 
 He financed there it is, in a word. He was ready 
 with the requisite subvention for every good thing 
 going. Had he been present at the rise of Moham- 
 medanism, he would have found the money for the 
 advance on Mecca, and secured exclusive banking 
 privileges with the new faith. He bore arms on his 
 
 271
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 note-paper; he spoke English with the accent of 
 Frankfort ; he was bold and resolute, and in the fur- 
 ther reaches of his operations he was, no doubt, a 
 man of blood at need. But with his command of the 
 best legal advice he could take a pound of flesh with- 
 out any fear of the law. Neither his feet nor his 
 manners were made for the Pointed style, and he 
 walked Turkish carpets as uneasily as the ancient 
 chief of his order walked the burning marl. He had 
 the bluffness of his tremendous consciousness of 
 strength, and, in all his transactions with his fellow- 
 men, a sort of terrifying air of throwing off the mask. 
 He was rude to them. They knew it, and knew that 
 he knew it, too. Therein was one of the secrets of 
 his power. He had obliged the royal house; and 
 while, with them, he paid due regard to the forms, 
 he made no difficulty of alluding to the duke's chief 
 guest as "the youngster," over his cigar. Women 
 of the highest rank he snubbed to their faces in re- 
 turn for his encouragement of their futile hopes for 
 information as to the way to get rich. 
 
 In his division, and, to some extent, in his train, 
 was a courtly set of young men from Oxford, all of 
 good birth, and with nothing but good breeding for 
 their share of its supposed heritage of the humani- 
 ties. They were young men who believed in making 
 great strokes on the stock exchange and enjoying 
 life not coarsely, indeed, for they knew the value 
 of refinement in pleasure as an element of staying 
 power. They had found what they conceived was 
 a short cut to that Epicurean goal for which men 
 
 272
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 have so long striven a state in which we may neither 
 suffer nor fear, a state of the absence of pain in the 
 body and of trouble in the mind. In this respect 
 they were the very latest outcome of Oxford culture, 
 and their rise had providentially synchronized with 
 the world-embracing bequest of Mr. Rhodes. 
 
 Another social interest was represented by the 
 services, and by the army in particular. These per- 
 sons, high in command, knew that they had a good 
 thing in our military system, and meant to hold it 
 for themselves and their dependents, at least quite 
 as firmly as they could have held a beleaguered fort. 
 They were already casting far-seeing glances to the 
 future, when the close of the war might bring home 
 a victorious general whose soul hungered to restore 
 the Roman discipline and the Roman simplicity. 
 They had no ill will for that general, but they wished 
 to put him in his place, and they were determined 
 to balk his berserker rage against incompetence by 
 keeping the supreme control of the military machine 
 in their own hands. They were accordingly prepar- 
 ing for his promotion to a post of great dignity be- 
 yond the seas in which he might employ his ravening 
 energies with profit to the country, without disturb- 
 ing the even tenor of their own way. 
 
 At the head of a section more immediately de- 
 voted to the arts was an amiable nobleman who en- 
 joyed a great reputation as a collector. In a richly 
 stocked land such as England, the gathering of pic- 
 tures and statuary is mainly a thing of the past. 
 The old country has all it wants in that line, and, 
 
 273
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 besides, America has grown so insistent. But the 
 curious has taken the place of the beautiful, and the 
 culture of the postage-stamp shows that wealth and 
 research need never be without an object. The noble- 
 man in question had discovered a new hobby. Play- 
 bills were denied him by mere anticipation. It was 
 the same with china and the various forms of hard- 
 ware. But there remained one line of virgin enter- 
 priseomnibus and tram-car tickets. He had begun 
 to collect these treasures for the benefit of posterity 
 too late in their history to give him the command of 
 them at cost price. But he was willing to pay hand- 
 somely for his neglect, and he had secured with 
 incredible pains the first issues of nearly all the 
 southern lines of the metropolis, and well-nigh 
 every example of the northern section dating from 
 the period of the assumption of control by the 
 County Council. Of one or two of these, indeed, 
 he possessed costly proofs before letters specimens 
 without the stamp of their date. He was also by no 
 means ill provided with foreign examples, and he 
 had paid particular attention to the transatlantic, 
 in the modest hope of contributing his quota to the 
 promotion of the American alliance. His albums, 
 adorned with a book-plate of his coronet and the 
 well-known motto, " Punch, boys, punch; punch 
 with care," boasted a first Milwaukee, and an early 
 San Francisco; and he was now in treaty for a 
 primitive Salt Lake City, which had necessitated ad- 
 vances, not altogether agreeable in themselves, to 
 the successors of the Mormon prophet. 
 
 274
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 He was fortunate in finding a contingent of 
 Americans at Allonby on this occasion to sympathize 
 with his efforts, if not to aid him in his work. One 
 or two of these were actually English by adoption, 
 and even by the change of nationality. They had 
 all the peculiarities of local accent, and the tricks of 
 manner at times in the proportions of caricature. 
 They were even prepared to suggest a belief that the 
 Declaration of Independence was only a regrettable 
 fit of temper, and that, by a proper exercise of for- 
 bearance on the part of the mother-country, it might 
 yet admit of modifications importing a return to 
 more filial sentiments. These were present, not by 
 the good will of the duchess, tut by the request of 
 the royal pair. It was appropriate, after a fashion, 
 for they were of those who are more royalist than the 
 king. They had caught everything of the tone of a 
 ruling caste, except, perhaps, the necessary reserves 
 of prudence. Their estates on English soil were 
 managed with a rigor of the rights of possession 
 which gave the wandering lover of the beautiful no 
 share in their glories and the resident poor but scant 
 hopes of the falling crumb. 
 
 275
 
 XXXI 
 
 HE arrival was in semi-state. The 
 duke awaited the royal pair at the 
 station with postilions and out- 
 riders. The Volunteers performed 
 the services for which Volunteers 
 appear to exist in peaceful climes. 
 Augusta, looking her loveliest, was at her threshold. 
 To a nice observer her smile of welcome might have 
 seemed to lack conviction. Circumstances had some- 
 what shaken her faith in the institutions of which 
 the symbols were the glittering pageant, the bowing 
 pair, and the roaring crowds. Though the village 
 made as much noise as ever, she could not but be 
 aware of the two souls that had dropped out of its 
 reckoning since she herself came to Allonby with 
 blare of trumpet and beat of drum. The Knuckle 
 of Veal, however, demonstrated as cheerily as though 
 nothing had happened. Job Gurt toasted the royal 
 family in the parlor. Mr. Grimber gave them per- 
 sonal encouragement with heart, or at any rate with 
 hat and voice, outside. He was ably seconded by 
 Mr. Raif, who led the shouting of the village choir. 
 Mary and her father were among the first to be pre- 
 sented. Mr. Kisbye was effectually absent, as be- 
 fore; yet, for all that, he contrived to signalize his 
 
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 The Yellow Van 
 
 existence by a flaunting banner and the discharge 
 of an impertinent gun. 
 
 A glance at the chief guest served to show the 
 extreme injustice of party nomenclature. He had 
 been seriously maligned by his nickname. His 
 toe-caps would have gone through the eye of a 
 needle. Nor was there the slightest severity in his 
 manner. His air was not wanting in cordiality ; and 
 if he had a fault, it was only in a certain excess of 
 correctness. It was probably but an effect of shy- 
 ness: he seemed to have been exceedingly well 
 brought up. 
 
 His demeanor toward the Points left little to be 
 desired. He seemed absolutely unaware of their 
 existence as a faction, and he received their homage 
 as though rehearsing for his future part of the father 
 of all his people. His consort followed his lead. 
 Their ladies and gentlemen in attendance bore them- 
 selves with less tact, and were to be suspected of a 
 sniff. 
 
 There was barely time to dress for the great din- 
 ner which was the chief ceremonial feature cf the 
 day. The luggage poured in from the distant rail- 
 way-station in the wake of the visitors, and the 
 village kept in line to cheer the brakes long after it 
 had caught the last sight of the carriages. 
 
 It was understood that, for all the three days of 
 the visit, the same costume would not b'e worn twice. 
 The maids had the care-worn look of trainers en- 
 gaged in the last touches on racing day. They 
 peeped over the great staircase with an air of mingled 
 
 277
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 triumph and solicitude as they delivered their 
 starters at scratch for the procession from the draw- 
 ing-room. 
 
 If the banquet was at first depressing in its sol- 
 emnity, it was all the fault of the Points. They 
 were too manifestly on their good behavior, and 
 their enforced homage to the sense of propriety 
 seemed to freeze the genial current of their souls. 
 They confined themselves, for the most part, to the 
 generalities of sport; but one who happened to be 
 nearest to the prince branched off into the question 
 of Arctic travel, with no very conspicuous success. 
 The Squares had an easier part to play. They had 
 only to eat their dinner to feel perfectly at their 
 ease. Lord Ogreby, flattered by a special attention 
 of the chef to his yearnings for boiled mutton, soft- 
 ened into a joke which seemed to give a final touch 
 of intensity to the prevailing gloom. The meal 
 might have been a total failure but for the happy 
 accident of a report, in stealthy circulation, which 
 seemed to divide the honors of curiosity between Mr. 
 Gooding and the prince. It was whispered that the 
 young Californian was the agent in advance of a new 
 colossal combination which was to make the roast 
 beef of old England a mere side-dish to American 
 pork and beans. He knew nothing of the cause of the 
 attentions which were showered on him in conse- 
 quence ; but, being human, he could only be pleased 
 by their effect. Strong men sought to catch his eye 
 with glances of respect. Beautiful and high-born 
 women unmistakably gave him permission to offer his 
 
 278
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 homage at a later stage. The Bruce himself, for the 
 moment, was in eclipse. Arthur's looks and his un- 
 failing courtesy were other things that told in his 
 favor. He was surrounded in the drawing-room, 
 while the Bruce scattered incivilities in his path 
 without so much as the correction of a fan. 
 
 The support of his own countrywomen set the seal 
 on Mr. Gooding 's success. A few gave it reluctantly, 
 under the uneasy suspicion that he might, after all, 
 be only something in literature or art. They were 
 naturally more exclusive in this respect than the 
 society whose manners they aped. His relationship 
 to the duchess, his education, and his bearing would 
 not have sufficed ; for, to say .the truth, these fastidi- 
 ous persons were only watching for the opportunity 
 of snubbing Augusta as a parvenue in her own home. 
 She had not given them the opportunity; that was 
 all. The rumor of her brother's share in cosmic 
 finance seemed to decide the matter in his favor. 
 
 "I am still not so sure that he is in New York 
 society," said one of them to Lady Ogreby, "but I 
 will go as far as this : if both of us were there now, 
 I should send him a card for my next party." 
 
 Lady Ogreby, a plain woman in more senses than 
 one, seemed mystified. 
 
 "Because he 's rich?" 
 
 "No; not that, exactly." 
 
 "I see. He has such nice manners." 
 
 "Oh, dear, no." 
 
 "Then manners don't count?" 
 
 "Yes, they do; and yet" 
 
 279
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "And wealth is not everything?" 
 "On the contrary; yet 
 "And you 've no such thing as rank?" 
 "In one way of looking at it; but" 
 The old lady listened in a state of stupefaction. 
 Her only clear impression was a confirmation of her 
 dislike of the subtleties of the Athanasian creed. 
 
 The entertainment put a stop to further conversa- 
 tion. It was of the usual kind: stars of opera at a 
 guinea a note ; a short drawing-room comedy in one 
 act by distinguished amateurs, most superbly cos- 
 tumed; a fencing-bout by a French and an English 
 performer of the first distinction. A zenana dance 
 by a young lady, wherewith the Points had hoped to 
 secure a little of the fun of the fair, had been ruled 
 out by the blue pencil. The discomfited party 
 yawned through the program until the withdrawal 
 of the royal pair enabled them to seek their consola- 
 tion in the smoking-room. Hard fate, however, at- 
 tended them even here. The Squares invaded this 
 scene of repose with the royal duke at their head. 
 For a time the talk, in deference to his tastes, turned 
 almost exclusively on the prospects of to-morrow's 
 sport. But Providence was still watchful over the 
 dispirited faction, and at the third cigarette he took 
 his leave, with the most of the Squares in his train. 
 It is the unwritten law of such gatherings every- 
 where : the Points usually sit out the others, but, until 
 this comes to pass, the conversation is kept within 
 the safest limits. At a later period it takes, if not 
 a wider, a more personal, range ; and with the small 
 
 280
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 hours it is apt to descend to scandals, with those who 
 feel themselves sure of one another both in taste and 
 in respect for the professional secret. When suc- 
 cessive reductions have brought about a final sur- 
 vival of the unfittest, you may hear anything you 
 are willing to listen to. As the hours wore on, that 
 glittering Point, Tom Penniquicke, was telling how 
 the true heir to the greatest peerage in England now 
 languished as a publican on one of his late father's 
 town estates, for want of the power to establish his 
 rights, if not even of the very knowledge of them 
 confined to Tom and his set. He was also able to 
 show how the equally innocent usurper of his title 
 was really of peasant origin on one side. It was 
 rather fresh to the listeners, but the servants knew 
 it all by heart. 
 
 And the evening and two o 'clock the next morning 
 were the first day. 
 
 281
 
 XXXII 
 
 HE Square-Toed faction of the 
 court held the field, and all was 
 moral improvement at Allonby 
 Castle. The frivolous Pointed 
 Toes were still in eclipse. Mr. 
 Raif saw that the chance of his 
 life had come, and he made the most of it. If he 
 could interest the royal visitors in his ministrations 
 to the village poor, it might be the first step to a 
 bishopric. He was a sort of despatch agent of bless- 
 ings, earthly and divine. With him the model town- 
 ship was a sheepfold, with a shepherd who was the 
 beneficent tyrant of its flock. In short, he was the 
 middleman fighting for his own, an extremity in 
 which the middleman is dour. He was keen to detect 
 any infringement of his priestly right to the control 
 of the human conscience. His choice example of the 
 inadequacy of religious instruction in the board 
 schools was an unfortunate reference to the colum- 
 bines of Solomon which he professed to have had 
 from a town-bred child. 
 
 And in so far as he consented in his own mind to 
 share the dignities and tEe emoluments of agency, 
 he could act only with the nobility and gentry. 
 These and the clergy combined were the appointed 
 
 282
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 leaders of the people ; and Mr. Raif was as sure that 
 the latter wanted leading in body and in soul as any 
 of his forerunners. He held firmly to the view of re- 
 ligion as mainly an affair of apparatus that finds so 
 much favor in our day. When in London he always 
 attended the ministrations of a colleague who enticed 
 to brighter worlds by means of lantern-slides sand- 
 wiched in between the prayers and the sermon, and 
 by catchy advertisements of the variety-show of the 
 Sunday to come. These methods, as being specially 
 suited to the treatment of the working-classes, were 
 much admired by the superior clergy. Their in- 
 ventor was understood to be assiduously preaching 
 the art of standing on his head in the pulpit by way 
 of crowning the 'edifice of the conversion of England. 
 Mr. Raif was much interested just now in a 
 scheme for winning Job Gurt, the village sot, to total 
 abstinence. The blacksmith had fallen on evil times 
 in spite of his "good money." As his potations in- 
 creased with plentiful earnings, his staying power 
 at work naturally diminished. He had finally been 
 compelled to make overtures for assistance, through 
 his wife, to the domestic chaplain, and had been given 
 to understand that redress of grievance must pre- 
 cede the grant of charitable supplies. Job" was in- 
 teresting as a character so materially minded that 
 he could only conceive the resurrection of the body 
 as an effect of pins and needles after unrefreshing 
 sleep. The chaplain had formed the laudable de- 
 sign of wrestling for the possession of him with the 
 powers of darkness as represented by the Knuckle 
 
 283
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 of Veal. He seemed likely to be successful : Job had 
 capitulated on the imminence of a Saturday night 
 without the prospect of a Sunday's dinner. 
 
 On the Friday evening, accordingly, the penitent 
 was seated in the little club-house of the model vil- 
 lage, with a determination to make himself as merry 
 as circumstances admitted. Mr. Raif was prepared 
 to meet him more than half-way. The gathering was 
 avowedly for a convivial purpose, but its members 
 were to wet their whistles with mineral waters for 
 the bacchanalian songs dear to the old condition of 
 lapse. Mr. Raif was in some measure the patentee 
 of it, and he was proud of the achievement. With 
 the one exception of the intoxicant, the associations 
 were to be as nearly like those of the Knuckle of 
 Veal as the circumstances allowed. The scheme was 
 based on the idea of the coffee-tavern, in which the 
 tippler is supposed to accept harmless liquors as a 
 full and sufficient equivalent for strong drink, by 
 having permission to call for them at a dismal bar. 
 Its inventors have forgotten that, with all its faults, 
 the bar of perdition is at least bright. 
 
 The struggle won the sympathetic attention of the 
 village. There was a crowd about the club-house 
 door to witness the arrival of Job. It was felt that 
 his was a test case, and, moreover, that Satan was 
 prepared to regard it in that light. Discomfited in 
 this encounter, the fiend would probably trouble Slo- 
 cum no more. 
 
 Half-past seven was the time for the revel, and 
 at that hour the wretched Job entered the institute 
 
 284
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 with Mr. Grimber, as a kind of sponsor, by his side. 
 The retired cockney tallow-chandler was as yet no 
 convert, but he had come down, by invitation, to see 
 how he liked it, and to report afterward to his own 
 soul. 
 
 Mr. Raif was at the door to meet them ; and shaking 
 both cordially by the hand, he invited Job's atten- 
 tion to the fact that it was a fine evening with per- 
 haps less success than he had a right to expect. 
 
 The blacksmith looked round the room, and found 
 it at once as near to the pleasures of imagination 
 and yet as far from those of sense as the star in the 
 poem. The floor was sanded; the long, hard settle 
 by the fireplace yielded hardly a point in discomfort 
 to the like contrivance at the Knuckle of Veal. There 
 were real pipes over the mantelpiece, long and white, 
 as though they were meant for business. From sheer 
 force of habit the unhappy man stretched out his 
 hand for one of them, and, addressing the boy in 
 waiting, made up with real apron and real shirt- 
 sleeves, called for a screw of tobacco. 
 
 "A very natural mistake," said Mr. Raif, ur- 
 banely, but with a frown that silenced the rising 
 titter. ''Bring a little soap and water: Job might 
 like to blow a bubble or two. We are no foes to 
 innocent recreation here. We welcome it, in fact." 
 
 It was brought, and Mr. Raif blew a few bubbles 
 by way of example. One of them made its way out 
 of the window. It was followed on the opening of 
 its journey into infinite space with a shout by the 
 urchins, and a smile, as of happy omen, by Mrs. 
 
 285
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Gurt and other matrons who had now joined the 
 group. 
 
 Job shook his head, relinquished the pipe, and 
 pushed the dish of soap-suds from him as he might 
 have done some new variety of tipple repugnant to 
 the conservatism of his British taste. 
 
 "Not me," he whispered to his henchman. 
 
 ' ' Time 's flying, Jasper, ' ' said Mr. Raif. ' ' I think 
 we 'd better get on." 
 
 The man addressed, an old shepherd whose guid- 
 ing principle of action seemed to be to stand well 
 with the parson, took the chair without further in- 
 vitation, and with the brief remark, "Give your or- 
 ders, gents." 
 
 "Now, Gurt," cried Mr. Raif, cheerily, "ginger- 
 beer, soda, lemonade squash, if you fancy it; but 
 it '11 cost you a ha'penny more." 
 
 "Pop," murmured Job, in the tone of a dying 
 man 
 
 "Gents," said the chairman, when all were served, 
 "the usual loyal. Charge your glasses. The 
 Queen !" It was part of Mr. Raif 's method to begin 
 the evening with this toast as a happy compromise 
 between a brutish indifference to the providential 
 order and inadmissible prayer. 
 
 Job sipped his ginger-beer as a sign that he wished 
 no harm to constituted authority, but, for the rest, 
 seemed to reserve his opinion. The others, who were 
 better used to it, drank with less evident distaste. 
 
 Mr. Raif was the only person who showed no mis- 
 
 286
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 giving. He was quite convinced that this was the 
 entirely proper way with the humbler classes. You 
 trained them, and they obeyed as naturally as shrubs 
 took their cue from the volition of the gardener. He 
 patted Job on the back as though he were a kind of 
 scapegoat for the inflictions of the whole party. 
 "That 's right, boys; keep it up. I must leave you 
 now. Sing, drink anything you like within the 
 rules. There they are on the wall. And don't for- 
 get Rule XIII break up at half-past nine." 
 
 There was silence after he left. It might have 
 been a perfectly tolerable silence if it had not been 
 so heavily charged with self -consciousness and the 
 sense of playing a part. 
 
 "I s'pose we 'd better go on," said Jasper, look- 
 ing timidly at the door by which their tyrant had 
 left. 
 
 "Aye; sing a bit, an' get it over, man," said an- 
 other. "He '11 'ear 'e pretty sharp if ye doan't. 
 Then we might have a game at baggytelle." 
 
 "Well, couldn't ye tune up a bit, Job?" asked 
 Jasper. " ' In Cellar Deep ' ' D ' ye ken John Peel ? ' 
 any blessed thing ye like. I 've beared ye 're a 
 pretty good performer." 
 
 "Mate, I ain't got a note in me," moaned Job, 
 from the depths of his anatomy, "to save my life." 
 
 "Give us 'Cellar Deep,' Jasper; that may 
 start un." 
 
 The chairman accordingly cleared his throat and 
 set out in his quavering way through a bacchanalian 
 
 287
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 poem of a whole-hearted depravity of taste that 
 makes it unique in the language : 
 
 "In cel-lar deep I sit and keep 
 
 My soul from cares op-pres-sing, 
 Com-pan-ion mine, the good Khine wine, 
 
 Earth's sweet-est, tru-est bless-ing. 
 With so-lemn pate let wis-dom prate 
 
 Of what we should be think-in g : 
 Give me my glass; my days shall pass 
 
 In drink-ing, drink-ing, drink-ing." 
 
 Done, as it was on this occasion, in split sodas, it 
 is the very triumph of make-believe. But in the 
 idle singing of our empty day it has probably been 
 the cause of more hypocrisy than any other song in 
 the world. Its reckless burden shows how easily it 
 may have lent itself to mere pot-valiancy at the best 
 of times. Few could have hoped to live up to this 
 ideal, even in the Georgian ages of faith. And in 
 ours it is almost confessedly the hollow lie of the 
 smug tradesman at his masonic dinner and of the 
 basso of the convivial club. The syllabic pauses in 
 the measure of the chorus are obligatory for their 
 effect of intensity of conviction. And when the last 
 one of them has been rendered, with due effect, 
 from the very depths of being, one is transported to 
 a world of good-fellowship which seems a foretaste 
 of the stars. There is no time so propitious for the 
 borrowing of half-crowns. But in our decorous day 
 it is no more than a reminiscence of some golden 
 
 288
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 age when rack punch produced no headache and 
 Irish twist was good for the bile. The basso is only 
 playing at it, and is probably the most exemplary 
 of bank-clerks. His hearers are only playing at it ; 
 but their occasional sips of real strong waters are 
 great helps to the make-believe of the game. Yet 
 there are limits to this power of illusion; and, for 
 all but the strongest natures, tea and cocoa and even 
 temperance champagne are a too abrupt descent 
 from the heights of artificial stimulation which they 
 are supposed to feign. 
 
 The first verse was enough for poor Job. After 
 an ineffectual attempt to bear his part in the chorus, 
 he set down his untasted cup of institute coffee and 
 staggered forth into the night, brushing from his 
 path the inquisitive group at the door. 
 
 " Blessed if he ain't got 's load in spite of 'em," 
 said one of the women. 
 
 "Nay," said his more experienced spouse, sorrow- 
 fully; "it 's only temper this time, I reckon and 
 the wuss of the two. ' ' 
 
 All expected to see him wend his way to the 
 Knuckle of Veal, but they were deceived. He made 
 straight for his own cottage, pursued by the echoes 
 of 
 
 "Pour out the Rhine wine, let it flow 
 Like a full and shining river," 
 
 which the company were now washing down with 
 sassafras, a new beverage just introduced to their 
 notice by Mr. Raif. 
 
 289
 
 XXXIII 
 
 ATURDAY afternoon, and Job in 
 a bit of fairyland all by himself, 
 smoking his pipe on the trunk of 
 a fallen tree. He has not wholly 
 lapsed, in spite of the bitter ex- 
 perience of yesterday. The pipe 
 may be a backsliding, but there is still a good half- 
 mile of innocence between him and the can of the 
 Knuckle of Veal. He is in a broad glade of wood- 
 land, bright in the sunshine of winter, and inde- 
 structibly beautiful all the year round. There is 
 temptation, however, at each end, for at the farther 
 one stands the inn of the Duke and the Ditcher. 
 Both houses are rooted only less deep in time than 
 the wood itself. The latter is part of an old royal 
 chase where thousands of fat bucks have died the 
 death according to the laws of forestry. Nothing 
 can exceed the charm of this winding way between 
 the two taverns, with its tiny river, broadening here 
 and there into pools where the fish often play at 
 hide-and-seek with the flashes of light and with the 
 flies caught in their ray. But all this, being a thing 
 of use and wont, is quite thrown away upon Job. 
 He is certainly not thinking of its history, running 
 
 290
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 back into the very Saxon time, of its weird old 
 manor-house, where they hatched one of the deadliest 
 plots in English annals, of its caves once haunted 
 by the outlaw bands whose industry was plunder. 
 Every tree may conceivably have its story of tryst 
 and council, and even of summary execution when 
 the deer-stealer caught red-handed was hoisted high 
 in the wind. Wicked old trees they look, for all their 
 beauty. Most of their coating of bark is gone for- 
 ever, and some lie grim and unrepentant in their 
 ruin, where the winter storms, rather than the wood- 
 man, have cut them down. 
 
 So there sits Job on one of them, musing on the 
 hardness of the road to Jordan, and between two 
 portals of Paradise barred to him by his vow. His 
 back is turned on the village and on the Knuckle 
 of Veal, but for this very reason his face is toward 
 that point of the compass where the Duke and the 
 Ditcher is visible to the eye of faith. Look which 
 way he will, in fact, there is a snare of the enemy. 
 And presently a fellow-creature comes in sight, in 
 the person of Mr. Grimber, strolling from the hamlet 
 served by the last-named house. 
 
 ' 'Day, Job." 
 
 "Day, Mr. GrimEer." 
 
 The slight distinction in the mode of salutation 
 was due to Grimber as a man of independent means. 
 
 "Home all right last night, Job?" 
 
 "Couldn't very well go wrong, as I see." 
 
 Mr. Grimber, as already explained, had squired 
 Job in his quest of repentance. He had no ex- 
 
 291
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 cesses of his own to correct, but he had thought 
 it neighborly to stand by a friend in his hour of 
 trial. 
 
 "Nice thing to be able to get up in the mornin' 
 without a head on ye. ' ' 
 
 "It is that," said Job, dutifully. 
 
 ' ' And with your money in your pocket. ' ' 
 
 "That's so." 
 
 "A week more of it, and you '11 be like me." 
 
 He said it with a certain sadness, for, to tell the 
 truth, he pitied his crony in the prospect. His secret 
 longing was for something to give a pulse to life. 
 It was the stronger now that, for Job 's sake, he had 
 cut himself off from his modest potation and the 
 chatter of the inn. It is all very well to be the per- 
 fect ratepayer, but that Nirvana of civic propriety 
 has its drawbacks and its trials. It is attainable only 
 by a series of negations, and these are hard fare for 
 the spirit of man. Grimber hardly knew what was 
 the matter with him, except that he was weary of 
 his own perfections. He had never done wrong, in 
 so far as he could detect the thing by his limited 
 knowledge of its opposite, yet he had still missed 
 his reward. His religion was a matter of what he 
 regarded as "decent observance" a silk hat on 
 Sundays, a black coat, alertness in the responses, a 
 recognizable contribution to the volume of the 
 hymn. His domestic icon was a lithograph of a 
 royal family that he honored not only with his lips 
 but with his heart. He called one of its members, 
 who was prudence personified, "our sailor prince," 
 and tried to figure him to consciousness as a rollick- 
 
 292
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ing blade. He was of that lowest middle class that 
 is a bulwark of Britain, and at once its pride and 
 its despair. His gospel was convention, his law the 
 fiat of his betters in church and state. His life as a 
 retired tallow-chandler was almost absolutely without 
 events. Its terrific sensations were the unwonted 
 recurrence of a grand bezique and a sequence in the 
 same hand ; its herculean labors, the turning out of 
 the corner cupboard this day week, or the fortnightly 
 polishing of a watch-case with shammy leather with- 
 out injury to the works. And yet and yet People 
 behindhand with their rent, and actually without 
 hope of mercy for unpaid rates, seemed sometimes 
 to get so much more out of life. 
 
 "Which way are you walking?" he said to Job. 
 
 "Yourn, if you like." 
 
 "I was thinkin' of gettin' 'ome again." 
 
 So they turned toward the hamlet, still following 
 the fairy pathway of the glade. 
 
 "I sometimes feel funny-like, in a manner of 
 speakin'," Mr. Grimber said. 
 
 It was a difficult complaint to diagnose on such in- 
 dications. Job did not make the attempt. "I Ve 
 felt that way myself," was his reply. 
 
 The hamlet was now in sight, its most conspicuous 
 object an ornamental glass Hall, quicksilvered in 
 laundry blue, which marked the garden-patch of 
 Mr. Grimber 's home. 
 
 "Will you come in and have a bottle o' pop?" 
 said Mr. Grimber. "Or, stop a minute: I '11 bring 
 it outside. It 's cleanin'-up day, an' she might fancy 
 there was mud on our boots." 
 
 293
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "If there was any other place, we need n't trouble 
 her, need us?" said Job. 
 
 There was a creaking noise overhead: it was the 
 sign of the Duke and the Ditcher swinging gently 
 in the breeze. 
 
 "Match that for music if you can," said Job, 
 apostrophizing an observant bird. 
 
 Mr. Grimber looked up at the same moment, and 
 their eyes met. 
 
 "Just one," said Job. In another moment they 
 were in the parlor of the inn. 
 
 What is the philosophy of this wretched habit? 
 Possibly mere association of ideas. Certain it is 
 that, hitherto of all creatures the most forlorn, Job 
 no sooner had an earthenware pitcher Before him, 
 nay, sniffed its mere coming in the ale-house reek, 
 than he became quite another man. And, curiously 
 enough, nature, powerless over him till now, began 
 to woo him with effect. He chirruped responsively 
 to P robin on the window-sill, plucked a twig from 
 the garden and put it in his coat. To feel this top 
 of the morning in one's blood without the help of 
 fermentations must be the triumph of the strenuous 
 life. Perhaps, indeed, there is no feeling it without 
 some extraneous aid : it is as hard a problem as ever 
 to lift yourself in your own basket. Natures are to 
 be known and classed by the aids they seek. Shall 
 it be woman's eyes, stringed instruments, or a bottle 
 and a jug? 
 
 It was much the same with Grimber. Both men, 
 clown and tallow-chandler, became in a trice hu- 
 
 294
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 mane, courteous, affable, preventive, according to 
 their degree and their breeding in every service of 
 the gentler life extraordinary creatures that we are. 
 
 "We known each other a long time, Mr. Grimber." 
 
 " An' respected each other, I 'ope, Mr. Gurt ; 't any 
 rate, I-" 
 
 "Call me Job, if you doan' mind. Funny I never 
 'eared your Christian name." 
 
 "It ain't much of a one for friendship Ebenezer. 
 Grim 's what she calls me." 
 
 "You 're a trump-card, Grim." 
 
 "I do my best." 
 
 ' ' I ain 't used this place much : my end 's the 
 Knuckle o' Veal." 
 
 "Nor me, either. This one 's a bit too near the 
 'ouse." 
 
 "An', besides, there isn't the same company. I 
 will say that, Grim." 
 
 "Ever hear the story o' the sign?" 
 
 "Yes, an' want to 'ear it ag'in." 
 
 "Well, it 's like this. Years an' years ago there 
 was another Duke of Allonby, an' he was 'untin' 
 in these parts in the days when 'untin' was some- 
 thin' like. He 'ad young noblemen to 'old 'is ster- 
 rups for 'im when 'e mounted, an' 'e was as good 
 as a king. Well, one day he 'd gone on so greedy 
 after a fat buck that he lost all 'is people an' 'e finds 
 'isself alone. 
 
 "There was a ditcher at work by the roadside, an' 
 the duke 'e runs up to ask 'is way. But, afore he 
 could get a start, the ditcher 'e says: 'Young man, 
 
 295
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 they say the duke 's a-'untin' in these parts; I '11 
 stand a jug o' ale if you can point 'im out. I bin 
 'is bondman for thirty year,' 'e says, 'an' I 've a 
 fancy to see the look of 'im before I die. ' 
 
 " 'Brown ale?' says the duke. 
 
 " 'Brown an' nappy,' says the ditcher. 
 
 " 'Come wi' me,' says the duke. 
 
 " ' 'Ow 'm I to know it 's 'im before I part wi' 
 my money ? ' says the ditcher. 'E was no fool. 
 
 " "E '11 be the only man wearin' 'is 'at,' says the 
 duke, 'when all the others is standin' around.' 
 
 " 'Then I can show ye where they others is,' says 
 the ditcher. 
 
 ' ' So they jogged on till they came to a great open 
 place over yonder to this day where all the no- 
 bility an' gentry was standin' about, with a sort 
 o' worried look, waitin' for their master. 
 
 "The moment they see 'im, down they goes on 
 their knees, off goes their 'ats (bonnets they called 
 'em in those times, both male an' female), an' they 
 begins 'orn-blowin' for joy. 
 
 " 'Which be the duke?' says the ditcher. 
 
 " 'Well, us two is the only ones kivered,' says t' 
 other: 'so it must be either you or me.' 
 
 "Down drops the ditcher on both knees, with 
 'is 'ands up. 'Spare a poor man's life, my lord,' 
 says 'e. 
 
 " 'Where 's that jug of ale?' says the duke, 
 laughin'; an' they rode off to this very 'ouse to 
 ' 'ave it, with all the others trampin' behind. 
 
 "When they 'd finished it, the duke 'e stands 'im 
 
 296
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 one more, an' then, 'I make you my 'ead forester,' 
 'e says just like that. Them was the days!" 
 
 "An' all dead an' gone," said Job. 
 
 "We must be stirrin', lad," said Grimber, relaps- 
 ing into melancholy. "Enough 's as good as a 
 feast." 
 
 "You might see me a bit o' the way 'ome," said 
 Job. "I 'm close to the Knuckle." 
 
 "I know it, lad; too close. There 's your trouble, 
 Job." 
 
 "I like your company. I never knew the kind 
 o' man you was till this day." 
 
 "I-she!" 
 
 They went back through the wood talking of good 
 men aging, good men gone, touching life with the 
 poetry without which it is a dead thing to the dull- 
 est soul. The lowest wretch lives on only for the 
 hope of hours like these. We must idealize human 
 relations or die. Every man is a poet, if only the 
 few sing. The British navvy, that thing of granite, 
 is quite mawkish in his cups, and gushes with a 
 fervor that would put a miss in her teens to shame. 
 The boor of Teniers sees heaven as a transparency 
 through the Bottom of his upturned can. The whole 
 business of saint, sage, and social reformer is to help 
 us to see it without a headache next morning. Music 
 is perhaps only an alcoholic wave purged of its 
 grossness. Where would the devil be but for the 
 dullness of some lives? Their talk was worthy of 
 the wood, of the sunshine, of the luminous shade 
 below it, of the whole beautiful world. 
 
 2 97
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Then they came to the Knuckle of Veal. 
 
 The Knuckle of Veal understood it all in a glance, 
 and gave them "the time of day," but took no other 
 notice, as they fell into their accustomed places. 
 
 It was as old in memories as the Duke and the 
 Ditcher, and just such another shanty of prehistoric 
 planks in the upper story, rough-cast, and Eliza- 
 bethan brickwork in the lower, tile and thatch above, 
 blackened beams to hold it all together, old brown 
 outhouses where Jack Ostler had called to Tom Tap- 
 ster in the earliest coaching times, and thirty far- 
 mers' chaises, all with yellow wheels, had been put 
 upon market-days; a tap-room with a fireplace 
 of wrought iron whereto generations of shepherds 
 watching their flocks by night had stolen from the 
 hills for furtive comfort to talk the Armada and the 
 landing of the Dutch king ; a wainscot pock-marked 
 all over with the incised initials of countless dead, 
 monumental in its way, as deciphered by that 
 Academy of Inscriptions, the ale-bench and the old- 
 est inhabitant. What are you to do with such a 
 place but keep out of it ? And in this they failed. 
 
 "Only a drain this time," said Grimber. "I 've 
 got my measure." 
 
 "Tol-lol! tol-lol!" sang Job. "Give us a toast, 
 old corpse-light!" 
 
 It was purely accidental, but unfortunate. Grim- 
 ber 's father had been an undertaker. 
 
 "Who 're ye gettin' at?" he said, putting down 
 his glass. 
 
 298
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "It 's my fun, like," explained Job. "No offense, 
 cocky. ' ' 
 
 "I don't like your fun," said Grimber. "I bin 
 a ratepayer for forty year. ' ' 
 
 "Ratepayer yourself," said Job, incoherently. 
 
 "Wish I could return the compliment." 
 
 ' ' That 's a snack 't me, I s 'pose. ' ' 
 
 "Take it as y' like." 
 
 There was sullen silence for a while. 
 
 Job resumed: "Pity to spoil a good meetin'. Will 
 y ' 'ave a sentiment from me ? ' ' 
 
 "Out with it." 
 
 " ' 'Eart to 'eart an' 'and to 'and.' " 
 
 "That 's better," said the other, returning his 
 grip. 
 
 "Tol-lol! tol-lol!" sang Job. 
 
 "Must be going now," said Grimber. 
 
 "I '11 see yer a bit of the way." 
 
 "Mean to say you think I 'm " 
 
 "For 'eart to 'eart an' 'and to 'and; that 's all," 
 said Job. 
 
 They sallied forth again, arm in arm. The scene 
 was divine to both of them now, as they stepped aside 
 to save a winter flower, giggled at the reflection of 
 the scudding clouds in the pool veritable babes in 
 the wood. 
 
 "It 's a gran' world," said Job. "Take it fro' 
 me." 
 
 "Never thought there was so many respec'ble 
 people in it." 
 
 2 99
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "A gran' life, Grim gran' feller-creatur's! 
 You 're one." 
 
 "Oh, as for that" 
 
 "Never thought it, all the years I 've known yer. 
 Fancied you was a bit of a milksop." 
 
 "No offense; fancied it myself sometimes." 
 
 "This 'ere religion they talk s' much about 
 should n 't wonder if it was somethin ' like what we 're 
 feelin' now. Eh, Grim?" 
 
 " 'T ain't all apistles an' collicks taken cold, lay 
 your life." 
 
 "One more at the Ditcher eh, Grim? Then 
 you '11 see me a bit of the way back?" 
 
 Job had scarcely spoken when a shawled female 
 figure came in sight, and his fellow-sinner was 
 plucked from him as for translation to another 
 sphere. It was done, not by a gesture, not by so 
 much as a word : a single glance sufficed ; but it was 
 one of the right sort. He was alone. 
 
 It was a bereavement, yet St. Francis himself 
 could hardly have been at less loss for companion- 
 ship. Nature, which Job had had about him for half 
 a century without his being aware of it, was there 
 in visible presence at last. "Chip, chip, birdikin!" 
 he cried to a sparrow in the path. 
 
 Cold obstruction had gone out of the whole frame 
 of things, moral and physical. There was no more 
 effort in the world. He walked on air, and with as 
 much ease as any nymph of Guide's "Aurora." 
 Earth was one vast pneumatic tire. 
 
 "Danged if I couldn't finish it mysen now!" he 
 
 300
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 muttered, as he neared the Knuckle again. And he 
 sat down on a fallen trunk, all smooth and silvery 
 with eld, and resumed, as from the balked innings 
 of the night before: 
 
 "In wo-man's smile there may be guile; 
 
 She 's skilled in arts de-ceiv-ing, 
 And she may be most false to me 
 
 When most I am be-liev-ing. 
 Friend more sin-cere I che-rish here, 
 
 While lips to glass I 'm link-ing, 
 And corn-fort true the whole year through ' ' 
 
 He was about to collect himself for the supreme 
 effort of the bass note when a composite apparition 
 of a most extraordinary character came in full view 
 at an angle of the glade. It consisted of the royal 
 and ducal party from the castle, in charge of Mr. 
 Raif. The princess and the duchess led the way, 
 with the domestic chaplain as cicerone. The per- 
 sonages of the suite were a little in the background, 
 with young Mr. Gooding. A knot of villagers 
 haunting the footsteps of the great folks brought up 
 the rear. Mrs. Gurt was among these, and Constable 
 Peascod seemed to have them all in custody, as for 
 some prospective offense. Arthur took a mean ad- 
 vantage of his being out of his sister's range of 
 vision by showing that he still had the heart to smile. 
 The faces of the others expressed blank consterna- 
 tion, though a close observer might have detected 
 that the royal personage was ready on short notice 
 
 301
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 to give way. But Augusta's bearing awed all within 
 reach of her glance. She looked stern displeasure, 
 her beautiful head thrown back, her color coming 
 and going, her lips firm-set. And, as a slight change 
 of position brought him under her gaze, Mr. Gooding 
 became as demure as the rest, and looked sadly 
 toward the ground. 
 
 As for Mr. Raif, he was overwhelmed with con- 
 fusion. It was the opportunity of a lifetime spoiled, 
 and he gasped dismay as the bishopric seemed to 
 fade off forever into the things that might have 
 been. He had been leading the party round the 
 whole circle of his good works the model village, 
 and all its apparatus of automatic virtue, and the 
 village proper, with its selected poor in evidence 
 and the others out of sight. He had arranged his 
 itinerary so as to conclude the demonstration with a 
 distant view of the Knuckle of Veal as a section 
 of the inferno from which he had just rescued a soul 
 in torment, when this wretched mischance occurred. 
 
 The only person quite at his ease was the offender. 
 He beamed serenely on the whole party, and then 
 tried to fix the princess herself with a smile that had 
 in it unfathomed depths of ineptitude. 
 
 "Why, Gurt, what is the meaning of" began 
 Mr. Raif ; but the rest was beyond his power. 
 
 "Is drink-ing, drink-ing, drink-ing," 
 
 gurgled the miserable creature, to conclude his stave. 
 "Gurt, you 're intox " 
 
 302
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "John Barleycorn beats me, gents. I 'm 'appy 
 when I 'm beat. Good aft 'noon, all." 
 
 It was too painful to last. The royal party turned 
 toward the castle as though they had pressing busi- 
 ness in that quarter, and Constable Peascod laid 
 hands on Job. 
 
 "Know the sayin', sir," cried the delinquent in 
 a parting shot at Mr. Raif , ' ' ' When you die it 's for 
 a long time'?" 
 
 The village was about to relieve its long-pent-up 
 feelings with a titter, when it was checked by a glance 
 at Mrs. Gurt. She followed her wretched partner 
 to the lockup as she might have followed him to his 
 grave; and there was despair in her face as he was 
 led off, still wearing his fatuous smile. Like many 
 a woman before her, she was asking herself one of 
 the bitterest of all questions whether drink might 
 not be a more terrible thing to bear in a man than 
 infidelity itself. And, after all, infidelity of a kind 
 it was, and the grossest. It was a counter-influence 
 to hers, and that thought made for jealousy in its 
 most corroding pang. The more sordid her tri- 
 umphant rival, the more galling the sense of her own 
 inferiority of attraction. A living woman, after all, 
 was a worthier conqueror. It was champion against 
 champion, and discomfiture by nothing more humili- 
 ating than the luck of the lists. But defeat by a 
 mere swinish appetite! 
 
 ' ' Tell him I think he 's a brute beast, Mrs. Jukes, ' ' 
 she said to the inspector's wife. "And jest loosen 
 his neck-hankecher, if you doan' mind." 
 
 33
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 He was frivolous still, and insisted on giving his 
 name as Tobit for the charge-sheet. 
 
 There was this excuse for him: the rural station 
 was hardly a place to bring a man to repentance with 
 a sharp turn prison, if you like, but still a prison 
 in Arcadia. An old cottage converted to its present 
 uses, it was rather a residence for the two constables 
 in charge than a house of detention. Its red brick 
 stained with age, its latticed windows overlooking 
 a churchyard which seemed but a change-house on 
 the road to heaven, its walls of loam and timber over- 
 hanging a ground floor that had once been upright 
 but was now not ashamed of looking tired, were all 
 perfect beauty. So was the low doorway, with the 
 neatly dressed children playing on the step, under 
 the eye of a fatherly official at the desk within, while 
 the house-mother bustled to and fro between the 
 sitting-room and kitchen to make tea. Arcadia, in 
 spite of the handcuffs hanging over the porch, a 
 feeble effort of the law to look terrible belied by 
 everything else in the place. Emblems merely 
 no more. An emblem, too, the strange antediluvian 
 contrivance a sort of scaffold-pole with a hook at 
 the end that ran the whole length of the side wall. 
 It was a relic of the days when the villagers strug- 
 gled with fire as best they might, the men fishing for 
 goods and chattels with this unwieldy rod, and the 
 women praying for a good catch. As for the two 
 cells, they were but a mild joke perpetrated at the 
 expense of the outhouses in the back yard. Job 
 was consigned to one of them that happened to 
 
 34
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 be empty ; the other still held the logs for the winter 
 fire. 
 
 The inspector's wife had brought him a cup of tea 
 when he was locked in. She presently revisited his 
 dungeon, though not officially, to ask him, through 
 the air-hole in the door, if he would like another 
 lump of sugar. But there was a change. He was 
 beginning to be that most abject thing on earth, 
 a sot whose Dutch courage, Dutch friendship, Dutch 
 faith, hope, and charity, are passing off. The sing- 
 ing had ceased ; the voice within was one of weeping 
 and lamentation. He was the victim now. He 
 maundered over his sorrows, the injustice of the 
 world to lowly merit, his desertion by his friends. 
 He had been his own worst enemy, but only in being 
 too good, too considerate, too helpful toward the hu- 
 man race. 
 
 The woman, who could have passed a competitive 
 examination in all the symptoms, withdrew without 
 another word. 
 
 Left sniveling perhaps over the thought of a 
 motherland drowning, not even in malmsey, but in 
 swipes. 
 
 20 
 
 35
 
 XXXIV 
 
 HE next day brought the visit of 
 the royal pair to a close. They 
 left on Monday, with the same 
 ceremony as before, and with an 
 air of benignant weariness. The 
 Points breathed once more, and 
 fresh arrivals added a reinforcement to their ranks. 
 It seemed like old times again. The Square-Toed 
 age could not have lasted; really distinguished per- 
 sons were beginning to yawn. The castle wore 
 an unmistakable air of high spirits. The joy of liv- 
 ing began to dispute the empire of sensation with 
 the mere pious opinion of the certainty of death. 
 
 There was a check, though not to say a chill. 
 The public scene was not altogether what it should 
 be. The war dragged on, the government still cried 
 for more men, and the occasional obligation of 
 mourning left the whole scheme of gaiety at the 
 mercy of the accidents of a guerrilla campaign. 
 
 With this came matter of still more serious con- 
 cern in the illness of the sovereign. It was nothing ; 
 yet, at her age, anything might give cause for anx- 
 iety. There was a consequent damping down of the 
 fires of excitement, no more. A house-party is not 
 easily robbed of its rights. 
 
 306
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Guess what we 've been doing all this after- 
 noon," said Mary Liddicot to Arthur Gooding, who 
 was taking her in to dinner. 
 
 "Making mittens for the soldiers." 
 "Don't be absurd. Playing bridge." 
 "Don't take a mean advantage: I daren't echo 
 the reproof." 
 
 "Where 's the absurdity? Everybody does it. 
 Lady Felicia Rawton is simply mad about it." 
 "And a matron of four-and- twenty fie!" 
 "She and Di and Twiggy Penstone had a com- 
 partment to themselves, and played all the way 
 down in the train." 
 
 "We seem to want a foot-note about 'Di,' " said 
 the youth. 
 
 "Oh, Di, from 'Diamond cut diamond.' Muriel 
 Paryngton 's so sharp. Haven't you that sort of 
 thing among men? They used to call Tom " 
 "And may I trouble you for 'Twiggy'?" 
 "Never mind all that. It 's a most fascinating 
 game. ' ' 
 
 "Mind you don't win all their money. But I 
 suppose you only play for hair-pins." 
 "What do you take us for babies?" 
 "Not all of you, upon my sacred honor." 
 "Real coin of the realm, if you please. Sixpenny 
 points sometimes. ' ' 
 
 "Sorry for somebody don't know for which one 
 just yet, some of you look so clever at the game. ' ' 
 
 "Nonsense: it 's nearly all luck and what 's your 
 funny American word for it? bluff: being cheeky, 
 
 37
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 you know, not being afraid. And as for excitement, 
 well whist with your blood running cold." 
 
 "No wonder I couldn't find you after luncheon." 
 
 "Can you keep a secret?" 
 
 "Can the grave?" 
 
 "It was a girls' party in Lady Felicia's room. 
 She chaperons Di and Twiggy. She 's not my 
 chaperon, you know; I belong to Augusta. But 
 don't you dare say a word to her." 
 
 "And they offered to take you in. I see." 
 
 "I wonder if you mean anything ill-natured. 
 Anyhow, I 'm going to drop the subject. What a 
 fine day for the time of year!" 
 
 He took the rebuke in good part, and, on his re- 
 turn to the drawing-room, discreetly avoided not 
 only the topic but Mary herself. In fact, he sought 
 the shelter of a tropical plant, and sat idly toying 
 with an album of views of Allonby, and sometimes 
 surveying the party over the edge of the cover. 
 
 Lady Felicia found him out, for all that. She 
 was a handsome young woman, a sort of creature 
 of polished steel, all compact, in physique and in 
 manner, a mighty huntress, but showing traces of 
 the abuse of violent exercise in an unnatural flush 
 of cheek and fire of eye; for the rest, as cold and 
 hard as a bar of Bessemer. 
 
 "The oracle in his cave," she said, with a smile. 
 
 "No ; only the hermit, at worst." 
 
 "What 's wrong with Lake Shore?" she said ab- 
 ruptly. "They seem to have a fit of the jumps." 
 
 Arthur found it hard to avoid these questions
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 now that his reputation was established as the agent 
 of a trust. He was supposed to know all about every- 
 thing in the way of getting rich. 
 
 "I 'm afraid they 're out of my line," he said. 
 
 "I know what that means: 'Don't bother me to- 
 night. ' Never mind ; perhaps you '11 be more com- 
 passionate to-morrow." 
 
 She returned to the lounge on which she had left 
 her two charges. One of these, Muriel Paryngton, 
 Lord Paryngton 's daughter, a girl as tall and well 
 knit as her protectress, had an extraordinary repose 
 of bearing, an effect of nature not unassisted by art. 
 The other, Ethel Penstone, was a little creature 
 whose dark eyes and languorous vivacity of manner 
 gave her an exotic charm. 
 
 Mary joined them presently, and, after chatting 
 awhile, they withdrew, one by one, as though to their 
 rooms. 
 
 ' ' They 're going to play fridge with that chicken, ' ' 
 said Arthur to himself; "and I think I 'm going to 
 sit up till they leave off." 
 
 The four were in Lady Felicia's sitting-room now. 
 The maids were dismissed for the night, all but 
 Felicia's, a discreet hand of middle age whom noth- 
 ing could scare. Then, almost without a word wasted 
 on small talk, the game began. The luck of the cut 
 paired Mary with the hostess, and Twiggy with 
 Muriel, for the first game. 
 
 "Penny points?" said Felicia, with a cold smile 
 to her partner. ' ' You 're no novice now. ' ' 
 
 At the end of half an hour Mary was the richer 
 
 39
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 by a couple of pounds. It was a new experience 
 for her, the winning of money worth the count, and 
 it had a fascination of its own. Her father had been 
 almost her only antagonist at cards, and her con- 
 tests with him had rarely left her the better or worse 
 by more than a florin. But forty shillings ! It was 
 like a beginning of income. First earnings always 
 mark a new epoch in life. 
 
 "Look at it!" she laughed. 
 
 "Millionaire soon, at this rate," said Muriel. 
 
 Then there were ups and downs ; and Polly blun- 
 dered, and Di for they became all nicknames now 
 bit her lip, and "Fliss" laughingly said, "Better 
 luck next time," and Twiggy, whose mother owned 
 mines in Bilbao, alone seemed unaware that any- 
 thing had happened either way. 
 
 Finally, with a serious change in the luck, poor 
 Polly lost all her winnings and something more in a 
 single deal. 
 
 "I think I '11 go to bed now," she said. 
 
 "Try a change of partners and sixpenny points," 
 said Lady Felicia, dryly. ' * It may change the luck. 
 We can book it, you know, Polly. Di 's the clearing- 
 house ; and we '11 settle up at the end. ' ' 
 
 "Change packs, too, while we 're about it," said 
 Muriel. She swept the two in play to the floor, 
 where they lay like so much wreckage of the woods, 
 and drew fresh ones from a neat morocco box 
 stamped with her monogram. Whatever else was 
 not in that honorable young person's luggage, this 
 was never left behind. It was an object of even 
 greater anxiety to her maid than the jewel-case. 
 
 310
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Mary mated with Ethel Penstone this time, Muriel 
 as dealer, and sixpenny points. 
 
 Ethel shuffled. It was a pretty sight. Her effort- 
 less fingers simply shed the cards ; and it was really 
 difficult to regard these as the devil's playthings 
 while they dropped so gracefully from the direction 
 of the sky. The very rhythm in their slight rustle 
 over the polished surfaces was music of a kind. The 
 bared white arm was quite motionless ; only the wrist 
 moved, and that almost imperceptibly but for a 
 point of light in her diamond bracelet that rose and 
 fell with an even beat. 
 
 They examined their cards, their brows, smooth or 
 troubled, marking degrees of proficiency in the game. 
 Mary pursued her studies with a frown. 
 
 Muriel, as dealer, had the right to decide on 
 the trump suit; but she passed it on to Lady Fe- 
 licia, with the formula: "Partner, I '11 leave it to 
 you." 
 
 Felicia having made her choice, the initiative in 
 raising the value of the stakes came to Ethel as 
 leader. She decided to double, so the points became 
 shilling ones at a stroke. Mary checked herself in 
 futile dissent with a gasp. The next moment she 
 was all aglow with the gambler's everlasting hope 
 of a miracle. 
 
 The charm of this delightful game is that the 
 stake, big or little, has the illusory nature of all 
 matter in the best philosophic systems. It is a single 
 grain of sand at one moment ; at another, by doubling 
 and redoubling at the will of individual players, 
 it becomes a whole Sahara. 
 
 3"
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Ethel led, with an engaging indifference to re- 
 sults which marked her proceedings from first to last. 
 Felicia, becoming ex-officio dummy as partner of the 
 dealer, exposed her hand on the table and simply 
 watched the game. If Mary had been able to look 
 up, she might have found a sort of terror in the 
 steely eyes. The watcher's interests, however, were 
 in excellent keeping, for dummy's hand was played 
 by Muriel. 
 
 It was a scene of strange contrasts, the old and 
 the new. The players, with their charm of age and 
 sex and evening toilets, sat in a turret-chamber with 
 walls a yard thick, glowing in the electric light. 
 The middle ages had blinked and shivered here in 
 the glare of pine torches stuck in the wall, in the 
 fitful warmth of log fires with the open casement for 
 their chimney, and in breezes that sometimes inflated 
 the tapestry like a balloon. There was tapestry still, 
 but it was only part of a decorative scheme, of which 
 innumerable curios in the precious metals, and trifles 
 of every imaginable description in hardly less pre- 
 cious fancy leather, with bronzes, water-colors, sofas, 
 rugs, skins of the chase, and a heavy Persian carpet 
 as a welcome substitute for green rushes, formed the 
 details. 
 
 But the strangest contrast was in the young 
 women themselves. The stern game unsexed them, 
 and they became as hard as men in the like condi- 
 tion. They were playing for money, playing for 
 an income, in the case of Muriel, and they took 
 on the fierce, relentless manner of all who are fight- 
 
 312
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ing for life. The environment is everything. Put 
 Milton's Eve at the pit mouth, to which so many 
 of her daughters have drifted, and softness and 
 sweet attractive grace will no longer be her distin- 
 guishing charm. Give the Dorothea of Cervantes 
 a tough hand to play for her bread and butter, or at 
 any rate for her pins, and she will have the char- 
 acteristics, if not exactly the manners, of the betting- 
 ring. They were hard and curt in question and an- 
 swer, with scant consideration for one another 's little 
 weaknesses and little ways. Man, the idealizer, might 
 have been troubled had he heard and seen. Arthur 
 Gooding kept the chamber under observation from 
 his window in a rectangular wing. It was lucky 
 that nothing more reached him than a ray of light 
 from the chink of a curtain imperfectly closed.
 
 XXXV 
 
 
 AST one o 'clock and a cloudy morn- 
 ing, and ten minutes for refresh- 
 ment. They rose, stretched them- 
 selves. Felicia sent for her dress- 
 ing-gown, and her maid, on re- 
 turning with it, noiselessly mended 
 the fire, so as to cause no scandal to a house at rest. 
 She then put cigarettes on the table, with tea, and 
 waters weak and strong the latter in the form of 
 cognac from her ladyship's dressing-case. They 
 chatted awhile, chiefly in slang and nicknames all 
 but Mary, who was now forty pounds to the bad. 
 She was ready to run for it in sheer terror, but she 
 was held back by two considerations the fear of 
 ridicule, the forlorn hope of recovering her losses. 
 Play resumed, but with no change of partners, the 
 victors having generously offered the others their 
 revenge. The house is fast asleep, save perhaps 
 for the distant smoking-room, where Tom Penni- 
 quicke and his cronies still take up their wondrous 
 tale of the shortcomings of their order. His subject 
 to-night is the scandal of the card-table in great 
 houses. The best and the worst of all talk is not 
 so much what is said as what is assumed. The thing 
 assumed here is the cancerous corruption of a section 
 of society the matron ready to pay in kind the 
 
 3*4
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 gambling debts she is unable to pay in specie; the 
 girl held in pawn by the profligate with the dread 
 of exposure. 
 
 Mr. Gooding, no longer cheered, or rather tor- 
 mented, by the wandering ray, turns in, under the 
 delusive belief that the sitting is at an end. He is 
 much mistaken. They are at two-shilling points now. 
 Mary owes sixty pounds, and is ready for anything, 
 in her desperate desire to recover herself. 
 
 Has her chance come ? Muriel deals her a capital 
 hand in hearts king, jack, nine, and smaller fry, 
 with equally fair cards of other suits; and, at the 
 same time, declares hearts for the trump. 
 
 Ethel declines to double, but passes it on to her 
 partner. Now is the time for the manoeuver by 
 which Mary herself has been so heavily hit. 
 
 She doubles. 
 
 Muriel redoubles as calmly as if she were taking 
 a stroke at croquet. 
 
 Mary hopes that none may hear her heart beat 
 under the shock of surprise ; but it is all or nothing 
 now. She redoubles. 
 
 Then they close for the shock of battle. 
 
 Ethel, by way of great response to her partner's 
 suggestion of great strength in trumps, leads out her 
 single heart. 
 
 Alas! the strong man holdeth only on a well- 
 known condition. Muriel, by the sheer luck of the 
 deal, has a still better hand than Mary, and, with 
 ace, queen, ten, and other trumps at command, is 
 able promptly to put the lead into dummy's hand.
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 It is the Sedan of poor Mary's plan of campaign, 
 not ill devised as it was on the ordinary calculation 
 of chances. 
 
 Dummy leads hearts, and Muriel is able to "sit 
 over" Mary every time. 
 
 When a conflict has reached this stage, the humane 
 spectator withdraws. No one cares to look on sheer 
 butchery. 
 
 Mary makes no count in trumps, and finally loses 
 four tricks, counting sixty-four each, on a score al- 
 ready working out at something over a thousand. 
 
 Her total loss now stands at one hundred and fifty 
 pounds. 
 
 The game is over; the dawn will be here soon. 
 They rise for leave-taking, but not so hurriedly as 
 to preclude a kiss all round. 
 
 Gamblers are rarely nice to look at after an all- 
 night sitting, and these young people are no ex- 
 ception to the rule. They are the mere wreckage 
 of the stately order in which they entered the arena 
 yesterday for their triumphs of the drawing-room. 
 Their hair is a tangle of shreds of coiffure; their 
 eyes are lusterless and rimmed with the stains of 
 fatigue; their lips are dry. Toilets that were stud- 
 ied compositions in the carelessness of art are now all 
 astray in the muddle of mere untidiness. Their un- 
 washed hands have sought brow and cheek in the 
 anguish of the struggle, and left their mark. 
 
 The room is even worse than its occupants. It is 
 the room that awaits the housemaid every morning 
 in all our houses, but aggravated in the grossness 
 
 316
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 of its effects : rugs, table-covers, all awry, soda-water 
 bottles littering the floor, even a tumbler or two with 
 a sediment of stale drink, stumps of cigarettes, 
 cards crunched underfoot in a word, disgusting, 
 and more than ever so in its association with a sex 
 of which refinement of habit is the essential charm. 
 Yet the innermost misery of all is not in these things, 
 but in the fact that girlhood has, for the first time 
 in social history, been smirched with these revolt- 
 ing associations. Wicked old women have played 
 for gain in all ages. It has been reserved for ours 
 to admit young ones who ought to be innocent to 
 the partnership of such unholy rites. 
 
 "Settling day to-morrow, dear, if you don't 
 mind," whispers Lady Felicia in Mary's ear. 
 "We 're leaving after luncheon." 
 
 It says much for Mary's innocence that she takes 
 no thought of her trinkets in this emergency, and, 
 in short, never once remembers that beyond an an- 
 gry father may be found a placid "uncle" at need. 
 It is but a stage, no doubt, in the experience of 
 modern girlhood, but it is most refreshing to the 
 beholder while it lasts. 
 
 So she gives only a feeble smile in response, rushes 
 to her room, and, with the most shocking terrors of 
 remorse, throws herself on her bed with ' ' Gambler ! 
 gambler ! gambler ! ' ' singing in her ears. 
 
 Arthur Gooding might almost as well have made 
 a night of it, too, for all the comfort he had of his 
 couch. He rose after fitful slumbers, and drew his 
 curtains to look for dawn. It was almost broad day-
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 light. A cloaked female figure paced the terrace 
 below at a rate that signified either a cold morning 
 or a troubled mind. A single glance at the figure 
 showed him that it was Mary, so he decided for 
 the troubled mind. He rose, and was soon by her 
 side. 
 
 The poor creature was in torment. She had lost 
 what with her means and opportunities she could 
 never recover. Her debt of honor was even more 
 binding than any other, but how was it to be paid 
 at short notice? Her allowance, reduced as it had 
 voluntarily been on her part since the beginning 
 of her father's troubles, would never suffice. The 
 thought of the poor old man was maddening. Was 
 she, his mainstay in trouble, to be a second Tom? 
 
 But she was brave still, and she returned the 
 young man's greeting with composure. 
 
 "You are out early," she said. The hard, dry 
 voice, with all the youth gone out of it, told half her 
 tale. 
 
 "Looking for an appetite for breakfast. You 
 have n 't seen anything of the sort about ? ' ' 
 
 "If I had," she returned in the same cheerless 
 tone, "I am afraid I should have appropriated it, 
 for I came first." 
 
 ' ' I surrender my claims in any case. ' ' 
 
 "Oh, I was not thinking of that at all," she said 
 impatiently, her self-command yielding a little, in 
 spite of her, to the appalling friction of the nerves 
 that was going on within. 
 
 "I daren't ask questions."
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 She felt that she was betraying herself, and tried 
 to change her tone. 
 
 "Well, if you want to know, I was thinking of the 
 strangest thing in the world." 
 
 "Oh, please share the joke with a friend." 
 
 "It isn't a joke," she said, with a quickness that 
 went straight to his heart. "It was just this : I won- 
 der how women earn money when they happen to 
 want to do it, you know." 
 
 "Augusta could tell you." 
 
 ' ' Oh, but I mean quick quick ! ' ' 
 
 "They don't play bridge with old hands," re- 
 turned the youth, who saw that his moment had 
 come. "That 's the negative of the process, any- 
 way. ' ' 
 
 "Who told you?" she said, almost fiercely. 
 
 "Yourself." 
 
 ' ' So you 've turned against me ! " she cried, with 
 trembling lip and the tears welling to her eyes. 
 
 It was unreasonable, but only the more flattering. 
 He thought of the bank-notes in his pocket-book, 
 and how easily, in other circumstances, a loan might 
 settle the whole business. 
 
 ' ' How I wish you were a man ! " he said. 
 
 "Oh, say anything you like," said Mary. "I sup- 
 pose I deserve it. Tell me I am lowered in your 
 good opinion ; tell me you would never have thought 
 it of me. But remember I only began it out of 
 bravado, and, at any rate, I 'm no worse than ' ' 
 
 "Than?" 
 
 "Your American girls."
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "I assure you, they are not half as brave as you 
 think." 
 
 "You know they are." 
 
 "If some of them could hear you, they might say 
 'Do tell!'" 
 
 "I know what you are thinking of me." 
 
 "I wonder if you do." 
 
 "You made me do it." 
 
 "I?" 
 
 "What you said about the hair-pins. I wasn't 
 going to show I was afraid before before a for- 
 eigner. If I had been an American girl, you would 
 have said it was all right." 
 
 "As in honor bound." 
 
 "You know they do just as they like." 
 
 "Perhaps. You see, there are so many things they 
 don't like." 
 
 Silent misery. 
 
 ' ' I did n 't play for the money, whatever you think 
 of me. I began just to show I was n't afraid. Then 
 I went on to get back what I 'd lost. I 'd do that 
 again, if I could get another chance." 
 
 "That 's the spirit and there 's the breakfast- 
 bell." 
 
 Lady Felicia sought him out at the meal, after her 
 wont. "I hope you are in a kinder frame of mind 
 this morning." 
 
 "At peace with all mankind." 
 
 "And that includes womankind?" 
 
 ' ' Unquestionably. ' ' 
 
 "Then don't trifle; there's a good boy." She 
 
 320
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 had the share-list in her hand, and followed one 
 of the entries with her pencil for pointer. ' ' They 've 
 dropped again." 
 
 "Just like them. It 's an uncertain game. Why 
 not stick to bridge, Lady Felicia?" 
 
 She laughed uneasily, and looked at him, still 
 smiling, but with a world of mischief in her eye. 
 
 "She 's told you." 
 
 "I've found out." 
 
 "Telling isn't the ethics of the game." 
 
 "Oh, the moment you bring ethics into it, where 
 are we? All sorts of questions may arise: players 
 of approved strength against weaklings ; a chaperon 
 with young girls in her charge; perhaps even the 
 obligations of guest to host in a strange house." 
 
 "It was all fair the luck of the game." 
 
 "Bridge is not a gamble, Lady Felicia; if it were, 
 that would only make the case worse." 
 
 "It is like the great game, life itself," she said: 
 ' ' the best wins. ' ' 
 
 "That 's just it: the best head. The deal is only 
 the accident of birth. With two such players as 
 Lady Felicia and Miss Paryngton, invocations to 
 Fortune would be all thrown away. ' ' 
 
 "Muriel 's not such a wonder," she said; "it 's 
 only that Mary 's such a child." 
 
 "That 's just it again such a child." 
 
 ' ' It will be a lesson for her. ' ' 
 
 "I am afraid the duke would hardly like to think 
 of her receiving the lesson at Allonby." 
 
 "Is it a threat?" 
 
 21 
 
 321
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "By no means; only a warning." 
 
 "What do you want me to do?" 
 
 "Only to play the game, Lady Felicia." 
 
 This time her ladyship cowered beneath his gaze. 
 
 He saw nothing of Mary, or of any of them, till 
 luncheon, and then the whole scene had changed. 
 The girl was radiant. 
 
 "We 've been playing all the morning," she said, 
 "same partners. They would have me in, 
 wasn't it nice of them? and I 've won it all back 
 but twenty pounds." 
 
 "I should stop there," said the youth, "and put 
 up my votive tablet at once." 
 
 "Only too happy," she said. "But you were 
 wrong. I told you it was all luck. I seemed to win 
 hand over hand. Even Muriel was stupid; and I 
 never saw Felicia play so badly. Will you own you 
 were all wrong, and make it up?" 
 
 "I '11 own anything, now that you 're all right," 
 he said. 
 
 Felicia winged a rankling shaft as she took her 
 leave. "Lucky Mary, with a friend who threatens 
 to tell ! ' ' she whispered with the parting kiss. 
 
 They were still at the hall door when a groom 
 came in sight. He was from Liddicot, and the bearer 
 of a scrawl from her father: 
 
 "For God's sake, Polly, come home at once!" 
 
 "What is it?" she faltered. 
 
 "News from Mr. Tom, miss. But don't you take 
 on; he 's only wounded." 
 
 322
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 It was the last straw. With the strangest little 
 upward look and smile, as of deprecation of fresh 
 trouble, she fainted. 
 
 ANOTHER and a far more dreadful message of doom 
 was to come next day to Allonby, to all England, and 
 to all the Britains. The last of the Points were 
 leaving the castle, still on their endless round of 
 pleasure, when even they were startled by the thun- 
 derclap of the Queen's death. They seemed to fall 
 apart from one another under the shock, and to be 
 converted in a moment from a band of revelers in 
 full cry into a flying crowd of phantoms scattering 
 before the presence of a great reality. The flag fell 
 half-mast at the castle, and with sorrow in the house- 
 hold, sorrow in the state, the great bell tolled the 
 end of an epoch. For such it was, whatever else was 
 to come for the Queen's realm in the providence of 
 God. 
 
 3 2 3
 
 XXXVI 
 
 ONGr after her recovery of con- 
 sciousness, Mary remained in a 
 state of partial collapse. Her trials 
 had increased her tenderness for 
 both her kin, and her remorse for 
 her conduct to her father. The 
 escapade at the card-table had now adjusted itself 
 to conscience as a wanton betrayal of the old man. 
 She was going to bring down his gray hairs in sor- 
 row by increasing his embarrassments. In this state, 
 of course, she was ready to believe the worst against 
 herself. She was the wicked child. Poor Tom could 
 not help his extravagance : it was the Service. But 
 what excuse had she? Alas! for an ancient house 
 that must find its doom in the follies of a girl. 
 
 So what fitter than that the worst should fall on 
 her as a punishment? It was the hand of Provi- 
 dence: the very date of her brother's wound was 
 the very one on which she had first sat down to the 
 detested game. On the night of her vigil he was 
 perhaps groaning out his life on the veldt. For Tom 
 was going to die, and to be buried, far from all of 
 them, in a foreign grave. It was horrible to think 
 that at this very moment he might be lying under 
 the turf of a Boer farm, like a dead horse. Brought 
 up as she had been, Mary naturally cherished the 
 
 3 2 4
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 proprieties of consecrated ground, British soil, and 
 the family sepulchre. 
 
 In all this she had taken Mr. Gooding into her 
 confidence. He was her strong man and keeper, and 
 she had gradually learned to look to him from the 
 men of her house. The sense of her debt to him for 
 deliverance from her late trouble had come upon 
 her in a flash as the hidden meaning of Lady Felicia's 
 parting sneer: "Luck Mary, with a friend who 
 threatens to tell !" what could it be but that he had 
 forced them to give her another chance. And her 
 fatuous offer of pardon, if he would confess himself 
 in the wrong she could have humbled herself with 
 stripes. 
 
 He knew all that was passing in her mind, and was 
 as "innocent" as ever when her confidences were 
 offered once more. He saw that she was on the 
 brink of some desperate resolution perhaps a 
 journey to South Africa to find Tom, and to bring 
 him back, dead or alive. And when he forestalled 
 it by quietly announcing that business might take 
 him to that part of the world, and that, in fact, he 
 was starting next day, she could have knelt and 
 kissed his hand. Not a single pledge was asked or 
 offered as to his interest in the fate of the wounded 
 man, but the words seemed to give her troubled 
 spirit a foretaste of the great peace. She did not 
 even thank him, while he resolutely talked gold- 
 mines until he bade her and the squire good-by. 
 She returned his pressure of the hand, but she said 
 nothing. 
 
 3 2 5
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Augusta was to have accompanied him to town on 
 her own quest for the Herions, but she was still 
 detained by the disarray of all the family plans. She 
 chafed in her bondage of letters to write, orders to 
 countermand, all the endless detail of the life of 
 rank. The family was like a great ship, hard to 
 start in any new course, but just as hard to stop 
 when once under way. Custom and usage decreed 
 three weeks longer in the country ; and the mistress 
 of Allonby could only contrive to get a week to the 
 good by finally breaking her way out of a coil of red 
 tape. One morning, when her bonds had become in- 
 tolerable, she brushed all her letters aside unopened, 
 ordered her carriage for the next train, and by the 
 afternoon was in town, with the duke to follow as 
 soon as his own servants gave him leave. 
 
 Her first experience was disheartening. It was all 
 failure, and it humbled her into a sort of charity for 
 the lawyers and the detectives. The terrible ob- 
 scurity of the outcasts was the stumbling-block. One 
 can hardly conceive the anonymity of London pov- 
 erty. It is mere nothingness; the absolute of the 
 unconsidered trifle. Often it still labors toward the 
 patronymic from the mere nickname, and knows a 
 man only as "Squinteye," as one of his betters might 
 have been known centuries ago as ' ' Longshanks. " 
 Most of the persons whose addresses Mr. Gooding 
 had so carefully noted on his quest were now them- 
 selves on a lost trail atoms floating in the void. 
 One was in Hades. 
 
 But a single thing was unchanged the slum 
 
 326
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 owned by the Duke of Allonby. Augusta had at 
 length heard of that grim incident of her brother's 
 earlier journey. She went to see the place now, 
 partly for her immediate purpose, partly to peep 
 into the Bluebeard's chamber of the ducal estate. 
 There it was even to the blood in its dismal im- 
 plications. Oh ! And this was the hotbed of human 
 remains wherefrom, in part, the vigor of a noble 
 house derived its sap. It was not exactly the duke's 
 fault; so much she had learned in answer to her 
 eager inquiries. The houses were leased; they had 
 been misused by the tenants; they were to be torn 
 down and rebuilt as soon as opportunity served. 
 Yet nothing could altogether remove the stain of 
 their associations from the greatness of Allonby. 
 
 So passed weeks in idle and, at times, almost aim- 
 less activities without result. Sometimes Augusta 
 turned from her search to her charities, in the en- 
 deavor to hearten herself up with the thought that 
 she was still of some use in the world. One day she 
 went down to the London Hospital, that vast lazar- 
 house of the East End, and wandered from her ward 
 there to the others, through what seemed to be miles 
 of pain, this time, thank Heaven, not unrelieved. 
 It lay quiet, for the most part, gazing upward in 
 mute resignation, perhaps in hope of what lay be- 
 yond to the farthest cry. Here, if anywhere, should 
 there be painted ceilings, not in the halls of hu- 
 manity on the perpendicular. Hardly a moan broke 
 the stillness, but lack-lustre eyes attested the weari- 
 ness of the prospect and the longing for change. 
 
 3 2 7
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 One case was especially touching in its mute resig- 
 nation. An emaciated man, lying like a mummy in 
 his bandages, gazed steadily upward with the others. 
 The whole attitude had a sort of rigidity of death 
 about it, even to the fixity of the stare. The fear 
 that he might actually have passed away made her 
 pause to look at him. And, as she looked, there came 
 a great awe upon her, for she knew at once that what 
 she saw was what she had so long sought. That 
 certainty came in a way she could not define by a 
 something in the expression that we carry with us, 
 almost from the cradle to the grave perhaps from 
 the cradle itself, to one beholder. 
 
 Yet still she lingered dubiously to disentangle the 
 image from a sort of debris of youth and premature 
 age. The old fire was in the upturned eyes, ever 
 only less bright than those of the king of his order, 
 the peasant Burns. But the hair was now gray, and 
 it hung in wisps instead of the old swaths. The 
 cheek had the yellow unbleached whiteness of the 
 bedclothes, and the whole face was modeled mainly 
 in its lines of bone. 
 
 "George George Herion don't you know me?" 
 
 He gave a convulsive start, turned his head in a 
 fierce, resentful stare, then tried to swing head and 
 body away from her, with the help of one disen- 
 gaged arm. 
 
 The whole ward was now in movement with the 
 sense of something coming to pass. 
 
 A nurse ran up, as though to chide her patient, 
 but forbore when she saw the great lady holding his 
 
 328
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 hand. Still, she shook her head, and placed a finger 
 to her lips. 
 
 Augusta mastered herself with an effort, but a 
 gleam of triumph blended with the pity of her eyes. 
 "When may I come to talk to him?" she said. 
 
 "To-morrow, I hope, your Grace. At any rate, 
 we '11 do the best we can. Accident, and a bad case ; 
 we 've had to move him like so much biscuit china 
 for weeks and weeks. ' ' 
 
 Found at last! Yet still she dared not make 
 sure of it without reading his bed-card "George 
 Herion. ' ' So the long, long search was at an end. 
 
 There was another surprise for her when she 
 reached home a telegram from Southampton: 
 
 "Landed Tom Liddicot this morning. Take him 
 home to-morrow. Voyage done wonders ; almost out 
 of danger now. ARTHUR." 
 
 A fruitful day at last. 
 
 3 2 9
 
 XXXVII 
 
 HEY took Tom down to Liddicot, 
 and Mr. Gooding never left him 
 till he had seen him safely over 
 the moat. The invalid could walk 
 with assistance, and he was evi- 
 dently on the mend. The flesh- 
 tones wanted freshening where the tan had yielded 
 to the pale underlying tint that seems to be nature 's 
 first start with us all. 
 
 Father and daughter were both waiting, as on the 
 day of Augusta's visit; but Mr. Gooding was for 
 hurrying away on further " business" when he had 
 delivered up his charge. The old man would not have 
 it so until he had made some attempt to express his 
 thanks. He was naturally able to say rather less 
 than usual, and, in consequence, began to meditate 
 an invitation to dinner as a sort of discharge in full 
 of all demands. A word from Mary put an end to 
 that. 
 
 As for her, feeling that she could say nothing, she 
 wisely said it, and, with a downcast look that derived 
 its sole significance from the wit of the interpreter, 
 suffered the young fellow to take his leave. 
 
 For the story of how the hero was found they had 
 to rely on his soldier-servant, who came home with 
 
 33
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 him, and who had joined the service as a lad from 
 the estate. By the general consent of the servants' 
 hall he was a smart fellow, much improved in speech 
 and manners by travel, and particularly by garrison 
 duties in town. The girls listened to his tale for 
 the teller's sake; and Mary's maid brought it to the 
 dressing-room, in due course, whence her mistress 
 took it to the study fire. 
 
 The wounded man, though perfectly able to talk, 
 and rapidly recovering, had the same constitutional 
 incapacity for narrative as his sire. It was not pre- 
 cisely modesty; it was rather a horror of the se- 
 quence of ideas, as a form of "bookiness" unworthy 
 of a sportsman. Indeed, Tom himself referred Mary 
 to his dependent, as to a person who had no un- 
 easiness on this point. "Don't bother, Polly; there 's 
 a dear. Tell Parker to make Sam turn on the tap." 
 
 And Sam did full justice to his subject ; or, where 
 he failed, the maid in reporting him supplied the 
 finishing touches. 
 
 "What I can never get over," he said to his 
 cronies, "is that these Boer chaps are just the same 
 as you or me: farmin' fellows, most of 'em, livin' 
 on the land, an' by it, too, though they get the pull 
 on us with their blacks. Stock-raisin' most of the 
 time: the cattle darkenin' the land in the great 
 drives. And, you might n 't think it, but all sorts of 
 things in their houses photy graphs, Bibles, an' 
 what not, just as it might be 'ere. 
 
 "What a rummy sort o' thing war is ! Travel thou- 
 sands o' miles to find you 've got a quarrel with 
 
 33 1
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 somebody that 's just such another as yourself. 
 Great stretches o' salt sea, an' dark night, an' winds 
 howlin' all around; an' there you are push, push, 
 pushin' on to get at the man you was fated to kill 
 from your cradle. Goodness! it seems like havin' 
 a row with the next world. But there you find the 
 quarrel waitin' for you, manner o' speakin', when 
 you land. The flags and the mottoes and the music 
 is all the news you get of it at first, and it takes many 
 a mile of footin', heel an' toe, before you see an 
 enemy's face. And not that all at once, mind you. 
 At first all you have to put up with, for a long time, 
 is little specks, nigh a mile off; but you know they 
 want to kill you, and you got to kill them. Pop! 
 pop! and p'r'aps no one much the worse for it, but 
 it 's rummy all the same. You feel you could go 
 over and ask 'em what 's the trouble, an' settle it 
 there an' then. 
 
 "Close quarters is the rummiest of all. Now you 
 see the eyes o ' your man, an ' the color in his cheeks ; 
 an' you got to do him, or he '11 do you. Of course, 
 if he 's comin' straight for you, you put off thinkin' 
 about it till you 've laid him out. But if you 're 
 dodging about, dismounted, p'r'aps, an' sparrin' for 
 an openin', for the life o' you, you can hardly help 
 singin' out, 'Hold on!' 
 
 "That sort o' thing came to me one day. I was 
 scoutin', advance line, over rough country; great 
 big stones (copies, they call 'em there), when from 
 behind one of 'em up jumps a feller not ten yards 
 off. It was such a surprise for both of us that we 
 
 33 2
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 clean forgot to shoot. We just stared each other 
 straight in the face almost rude, as they used to 
 
 call it when I was a kid. By sir ! we knew what 
 
 was in each other's mind, without a word. We 'd 
 got to kill at short notice, an' we couldn't begin 
 for shame. 
 
 "I dropped mine; his never stirred from the stone 
 where it was restin'. 'It 's a fine day,' says he, in 
 English, 'fur the time o' year.' 
 
 ' ' After that, believe me, I could n 't have let fly 
 at him if he 'd asked me to. All I could manage was : 
 'Same to you, rebel; same to you. How are you 
 gettin' on?' 
 
 " 'Pretty fair,' he said, 'but I could do with a bit 
 o' fresh meat. An' you don't happen to have such 
 a thing as a pipe-light?' 
 
 " 'Happy to oblige'; an' I tossed him a box o' 
 blazers. 'Take half, an' kindly return balance, if 
 you please.' 
 
 " 'How d' you pick up a livin, ' said the rebel, 
 'when you ain't at this work?' 
 
 " 'Hosses.' 
 
 " 'Just my line. 'Scuse me, but you 're a trifle 
 too far ahead of your lot ; we 're workin ' round your 
 flank.' 
 
 "Just then the bugle sounded for us to fall back. 
 
 " 'Don't hurry,' he said, 'only keep on your 
 hands an' knees. Creep round this way, an' I '11 
 stand a drink. ' 
 
 "Awful stuff it was; yet, takin' one thing with 
 another, toothsome, too. 
 
 333
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 " 'I 'm a Burghersdorp man,' says my mate for 
 that 's what it had come to by this time. 'If you 
 happen to be round that way when this is over, look 
 me up, an' it '11 be your turn to stand treat. If I 
 ain't in, don't bother. See you p'r'aps in the next 
 world. Anyway, pass a drop o' water to one of our 
 wounded, an' I '11 cry quits wherever I may be.' 
 
 ' ' ' Give us your fist. ' An ' we gripped behind the 
 stone. Take my oath, it was just like sayin' prayers, 
 kneelin' an' all. 
 
 "Then the bugle sung out again, an' we crept 
 back; an' that was the last of him. 
 
 "Rummy like, if you come to think of it! But 
 that 's life, if it ain't exactly war. An' it was war 
 again a moment after, for I passed one or two stiff 
 uns on the way to camp. 
 
 "Less than a week after that Mr. Tom was bowled 
 over. A good feller, but a babby at this sort o' 
 game. Cavalry to cover advance, and he trotted 
 them right into a trap you might have seen a mile 
 off. Trotted up to it, an' trotted into it, sir; and 
 when we got nicely in the middle, they let fly from 
 three sides an ' downed him an ' fifteen others. Lord ! 
 how our fellers swore at him till we got 'em into 
 hospital them as was able to return thanks. Eng- 
 lish gentry are all right : you could n 't get killed 
 in better company. That 's the use of old families, 
 I fancy, in a country like ours figureheads. The 
 city people are sharp enough; an' see how they 
 work 'em in boards an ' such like : others to do the 
 schemin' work. 
 
 334
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 " 'I 'm done, Sam,' he said to me. An', sure 
 enough, it looked a case. Mauser bullet right through 
 the stomach, front to back. Well, the moment he got 
 it he begins to be a sportsman again, artful as they 
 make 'em, workin' with his head-piece to save his 
 men. The way he got that troop under cover was a 
 caution, an' the hole in him all the time, mind. 
 Stuck to it till he fainted; and then the lot of us 
 did a bunk to the rear, wounded an' all. They 
 pulled him about a bit in the ambulance, an' he 
 fainted again an' again. But as soon as he came 
 to for good, he went on workin' with his head-piece, 
 an' saved 'imself, spite o' the doctors. 
 
 "How did he do it? Livin' on his fat. You 
 don't understand? How should you? Well, this 
 way: 
 
 " 'I 'm hit through the intestines,' thinks he 
 ' a clean wound. If I don 't give my inside any work 
 to do for a week, the wound may heal of itself.' 
 
 ' ' Lord, he can be downy when he takes the trouble. 
 So he lies there, still 's a mouse, six mortal days an' 
 nights without bite or sup. Hardly a word all the 
 time, even to me, but gives his orders with his eyes. 
 I wetted his lips now an' then with brandy an' 
 water; that was all. He reckoned he 'd got fat 
 enough to keep him without nourishment, an' he 
 was right. In a manner o' speakin', his fat was his 
 good works, an' he fell back on 'em. By the time 
 he could n 't hold out longer, the wound was healed. 
 Then the young American gent comes with all the 
 delicacies o' the season in a hand-bag, and he begins 
 
 335
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 to pick a bit. The sea-breezes do the rest, an' here 
 we are. Come to think of it, that 's a sort of idea 
 as might do for other things in life, if a chap could 
 work it out. Save all the fat you can, an' live on it 
 when the pinch comes." He was evidently wrestling 
 with the conception that even virtue is only another 
 kind of fat ; but the expression of it was beyond his 
 powers. 
 
 The squire 's heart melted toward the man who had 
 helped to save his son. He had hitherto had his sus- 
 picions of Arthur Gooding, and naturally, for the 
 latter was still something "un-English," all said 
 and done. 
 
 He was quite frank about it. "We 've only been 
 acquaintance up to this time, sir," he said; "my 
 fault. I wish we may be friends. You 're a man. ' ' 
 
 "We have to begin that as early as we can," said 
 Mr. Gooding, "else we get left." 
 
 "I should like to know more of you, sir," added 
 the squire, in a penitential tone. 
 
 "It 's soon told. We 're older acquaintances, Sir 
 Henry, if not older friends, than you think. My 
 grandfather hoed turnips on one of your father's 
 farms." 
 
 "Gooding? Gooding ?" said the old man. "Can't 
 say I remember What, Jack Gooding, big Jack, 
 that used to oh, Lord!" 
 
 "No doubt. It was news to all of us till the other 
 day, when my uncle over yonder turned up a bundle 
 of old letters." 
 
 ' ' Big Jack Gooding, ' ' repeated the squire. ' ' Well, 
 
 33 6
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 well! I don't remember his going away, I was at 
 Cambridge, then, but I perfectly well remember 
 missing him. ' ' 
 
 "Yes, sir, it 's all down in the letters. There was 
 no chance for him here, so he left to the tune of ' To 
 the West,' the hymn, I should like to call it, that 
 peopled America. He sought his chance of a larger 
 life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and found 
 all three. Here they keep the openings so much in 
 the family, and he couldn't wait. If he 'd stayed 
 he might have been Skett at the best ; at the worst- 
 perhaps George Herion." 
 
 The squire looked argumentative, but he kept his 
 thoughts to himself. 
 
 "He made a fresh start in a village on our side. 
 But there are villages and villages ; and that one was 
 panting to make itself a township, and found no- 
 body to say nay. Then it took a fancy to be a city, 
 and still there was no denial ; and a city it is to this 
 day. My grandfather owned half of it; I don't say 
 that 's exactly the highest ideal of humanity, but 
 while it 's a mere scramble, why not he as well as the 
 next man? There was none to bar him because of 
 his birth or his breeding, or to set up the claim of 
 a scutcheon against the claim of native wit. Besides, 
 it all righted itself pretty soon. My father lost 
 it in the virtuous attempt to corral the other half; 
 and so we all had to begin again. It 's capital 
 exercise; and I 'm going home by to-morrow's 
 boat for my share. That 's what I came to 
 say." 
 
 22 337
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ' ' Give me your hand, ' ' said the squire. ' ' We seem 
 to have got it all wrong here somehow." 
 
 "Make it a leave-taking, sir, for the present, and 
 give my respectful compliments to Miss Mary. I 
 could not trust myself to thank either of you in set 
 terms for all the hospitality and all the kindness I 
 have found at Liddicot." 
 
 338
 
 XXXVIII 
 
 UGUSTA went early to the hos- 
 pital, on the day after she had 
 found George. 
 
 She had at first to sue for his 
 story as for a favor. His sullen 
 wrath against Allonby Castle and 
 all its works and workers knew no distinction of per- 
 sons. He had been hit from its towers: what mat- 
 tered the hand or the loophole. Allonby had driven 
 him out, if London had laid him low. 1 he agent was 
 but another name for the duke; the duke, for the 
 duchess ; and he hated them all. It was a last touch 
 of pride and defiance that bound him to life. 
 
 For Augusta this was all so entirely natural that 
 she had no thought of anger or rebuke. It was his 
 cry for vengeance; he wanted her to feel that she 
 had come too late to save the broken thing at her 
 feet. And vengeance was sensation, and sensation 
 was life. 
 
 "I 'm done, lady," he said sullenly. "We '11 get 
 it over soon 's may be, if you doan' mind." 
 "How did it happen, Herion?" 
 "Gentlefolks ask them." 
 
 "Poor fellow! Give me a better answer if you 
 can for the sake of others." 
 
 339
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Sake of others! If she was 'ere, she wouldn't 
 want to see the color of your eyes. What 's done 's 
 done; why make more 'eartbreaks for 'er 'n' me." 
 
 "But if only you had written!" 
 
 It seemed to rouse him to fury. ' ' What was there 
 to write? That a man turned out of a village at 
 short notice comes to town to starve? Who give all 
 of us to all of you? I only wanted to stand on my 
 own feet, and be a man. Slocum's mine much as 
 yours. We been there long as anybody, I dare say, if 
 we ain't got writin's to show for it longer than 
 some. ' ' 
 
 "How did it happen, Herion?" 
 
 "The nuss knows," he muttered. "I got no 
 stomach for the tale." 
 
 ' ' I want you to tell me. ' ' 
 
 "Fell down the 'old of a ship so Allonby's got 
 the laugh, after all." 
 
 "Allonby won't get much of a laugh out of it, 
 Herion. But never mind that; all your stubborn- 
 ness and all your pride won't prevent me from do- 
 ing something to help you." 
 
 "I won't 'ave your 'elp, duchess. As for 'er, I 
 tell you, she wouldn't ah, God forgive me! an' 
 she 's wearin' her fingers to the bone to keep her 
 babby alive. ' ' The hot tears coursed down his cheeks. 
 "Now you 're the winner; my sperrit 's broke." 
 
 A sickening and, at the same time, an awful 
 change. The thought of Rose had brought on him 
 a full sense of the terror of the forces arrayed against 
 the "likes of him" Allonby, and beyond that, 
 
 34
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Heaven's throne and Heaven's judgments the 
 Heaven of Mr. Raif ! It was a reversion to the fears 
 of infancy. He was the peasant child again, the 
 peasant Sunday scholar, with submission at the very 
 heart of him, and the sense of fate. 
 
 "Tell me all. And will you try to believe you are 
 telling it to a friend?" She took the lean and 
 clammy hand. 
 
 He was quite humble now. "Anything you like; 
 only get it over soon 's you can, if you 're a merciful 
 woman. ' ' 
 
 "I 'd ha' put by something," he added apologet- 
 ically, "an' made a start, if the dock work had 
 lasted. When it stopped all of a sudden, I was 
 broke." 
 
 "And then?" 
 
 "Then the babby. Come to think of it, a laborin' 
 man 's no bezness with anything o' that sort, if he 
 ain't in full work. I 've beared Mester Raif say so 
 many a time; an' it 's reet." 
 
 "Never mind Mr. Raif." 
 
 "It 's the sties some of 'em 'ave to get born in, 
 up in the big towns; an' 'unted from sty to sty to 
 that. It breaks the 'eart of a man, aye, an' the 'eart 
 of a woman, what 's stronger still. 
 
 "But I wasn't done yet, mind. You mustn't 
 think, duchess, I was done so easy 's that. I tramped 
 the county for seven weeks, an' I got a bit o' 'ar- 
 vestin', an' kept things goin', and brought back 
 three pound knotted in my 'ankercher to live on 
 while I waited for another chance at the docks. 
 
 341
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Then the devil got the pull on me again. Three 
 thick uns, all in gold, '11 go a long way, but they 
 won't last forever. When they got low, I used to go 
 an' 'ear the talkin' Sundays at Mile End Waste." 
 
 "The outdoor preaching?" 
 
 "Not much o' that," he said, with a bitter laugh. 
 "Anarshists that 's what they call theirselves. It 
 make me feel I 'd rather die than go back to Allonby. 
 Put yourself in my place: touch your 'at to the 
 gentry, touch it to the parson. Always under some- 
 body 's eye: church, Sundays, under one overseer, 
 'oliday sports under another. Coals and blankits 
 if you behave yourself. Dyin' even under the eye o' 
 your betters. I ain 't got 's fur as that yet, and doan ' 
 mean to, if the pieces '11 stick together. Still, 
 duchess, if I 'ad come to it, 'ere you are." He 
 laughed at his own conceit. 
 
 " 'Ow a man sometimes do feel 'shamed of it aye, 
 an' a woman more! All the glory alleluia o' life 
 for the gentry, an ' the leavin 's for us ! We got our 
 thoughts. You see, duchess, I got rebellious-like all 
 foolishness ; I see it now. ' ' 
 
 "Oh, for God's sake, Herion, be rebellious still!" 
 she flashed. 
 
 His resignation was much harder for her to bear 
 than his defiance. In her soul she was ready to honor 
 him for his refusal to yield. She, too, was reverting 
 to her earlier self, the American girl, whose part 
 as duchess had shrunk to the insignificance of a 
 scene of comedy. Her innermost sympathy was 
 for the rebel against the castle, and against all the 
 
 342
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 assumptions of her own fantastic ideal at Allonby. 
 The relation between village and castle was radically 
 false. Nothing could be done in actual life either 
 for or with these figures of Arcady, as unreal as 
 their prototypes of an Elizabethan masque. But 
 her anger was less against him than against herself. 
 She had tried to accept a convention that she knew 
 to be a fable before experience had shown it to 
 be a lie. Here was the miserable proof in this 
 poor, maimed thing maimed even more seriously 
 in spirit than in body for the battle of life. 
 The system of feudal dependence did not rear 
 men, and was not meant to rear them. It was 
 perhaps no part of her duty to change it, since 
 she was without the power; but she might have let 
 it alone. 
 
 "Try it on our chances," was all he said. 
 
 "When the dock work began again, lady, I was 
 too greedy at it. Went at it like a famishin' man 
 at 'is victuals, for victuals it was. The very fust 
 day I was trippin' over a plank stretched across a 
 'old, trippin' for joy, like, an' we both put too much 
 spring in it, me an' the plank together, an' it 
 chucked me clean up in the air. I could n 't ha ' been 
 long gettin' down, but I 'd time to think of Slocum, 
 an' my old mother, and Rose, and the child, before 
 I touched bottom with the flat o ' my back. Aye, an ' 
 more, too. Funny as it seem, I fancied along with 
 all that as I was a penny on the toss, an' that it 
 was boun' to finish me whether I come down 'ead 
 or tail. Then a thud, with not a bit o' pain in it, 
 
 343
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 that put me to sleep for four days, till I woke up 
 'ere." 
 
 He stopped as though he expected some defense 
 of the providential order ; but the duchess said never 
 a word. 
 
 "They riveted me together never mind that. But 
 they can't move me, and 'ere I 've laid ever sence. 
 When I come to she was at the bedside. ' Doan ' you 
 worry, boy,' she whispers, bendin' over me. 'I 've got 
 work lots of it washin' ; an' 'ired a mangle. Can't 
 go at it fast enough. But I got time for babby, all 
 the same, so there 's more washin' to do when the 
 other 's done, an' it 's 'im that comes last of all. 
 Then I kiss 'is little pink body all over, an' put him 
 to bed, an' say my prayers over him. It 's only a 
 short prayer, boy, but it 's a good un, for it 's got to 
 last me all the twenty- four hours. An' 'e sends 'is 
 love to father, an' an' ' Oh ! " 
 
 He hid his face with the disengaged arm, that 
 moved in one piece like a semaphore, and Augusta 
 hid hers. 
 
 ' ' That went on for weeks an ' weeks, and me layin ' 
 'ere all the while. Then one day she come, just same 
 as usual, but she wouldn't give me 'er 'and when I 
 feel for it; an' when she gave it, it was the left. 
 Then I stuck out for the other, an' found it done 
 up like a dolly under 'er shawl. Crushed in the 
 mangle ! Too eager about it, I s 'pose my fault over 
 again. It drawed 'er finger in, like, when she 'ap- 
 pened to turn 'er 'ead to chirrup to the kid in the 
 .cot. 
 
 344
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 " 'No pain, boy,' she says, 'till I put it under the 
 tap to stop the bleedin', an' nearly well again now.' 
 
 "No pain! Ten times wuss than anything as had 
 'appened to me, if you measure it by the square inch. 
 
 " 'Rose,' I said, 'we got to give in, my dear. 
 Write a letter to Allonby. God A 'mighty 's lookin' 
 the other way.' 
 
 " 'Not yet, boy. I can do beautiful by leanin' 
 my wrist ag'in' the side o' the tub. Got all the 
 washin' 'ome Monday, jest the same 's before.' 
 
 "But 'ow could I 'elp seeing it? Faster 'n I got 
 better, she was gettin' worse." 
 
 "Where is she?" cried Augusta, impatiently, and 
 reverting even to the peculiarities of idiom. "I 've 
 got to see that woman right away." 
 
 "It 's visitin' day," he said, "an' she may be 'ere 
 any moment. She might be 'ere now." 
 
 "Go on, then." 
 
 "Weeks an' weeks more, an' me still 'ere. An' 
 one day she come in all smilin', an' when I take 'er 
 left 'and, same 's before, she laughs. ' Where 's your 
 manners?' she says, an' draws it back an' lays her 
 right hand in mine. 'Cured; an' God bless both my 
 boys ! ' 
 
 "Cured! 'Baled, if you like; but no more prizes 
 for fine sewin' for my gal. She split her finger," 
 he added childishly, while another tear rolled down 
 his cheek, yet with a sluggish flow. "No cure for 
 my Rose. She comes reg'lar very visitin' day; but 
 the fight 's tellin' on her life : I can see that. Every 
 time I miss somethin' a bit o' the color from her 
 
 345
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 cheek, a bit o' the roundness from her arm. And 
 the work done without break all this awful time. Oh, 
 we ain't ekal to 'em, we ain't ekal to 'em! They 're 
 nearer the next world nor we ! " 
 
 Then he stopped, and a piteous trouble came on 
 his face. "Where is she now?" he wailed. " 'Alf 
 an 'our late never like that before ! What are we 
 chatterin' 'ere about, payin' compliments?" 
 
 Augusta could bear it no longer. ' ' What, indeed ? 
 Tell me where she is, this instant. Or, stay" as she 
 saw him sink back with exhaustion; "I '11 send the 
 nurse to you, and get it from her. ' ' 
 
 346
 
 XXXIX 
 
 MOMENT more and she was hur- 
 rying on her dismal errand through 
 the dismal streets. The very cab- 
 man was at fault in the labyrinth 
 of squalor. But at length he 
 found his way to a cottage stand- 
 ing in its own garden such as may sometimes be 
 seen in the most densely populated quarters. This 
 one was evidently a relic of an earlier state of settle- 
 ment, when the place was a suburb, and the cockney 
 seeking his pleasure in the green fields paused here 
 for his draught of milk. It had once been white- 
 washed, its roof had once been tiled, and the slates 
 with which it was now covered had once been whole. 
 Still, even in its ruin it had the waywardness of the 
 cottage style. There was a rudimentary gable, with 
 a pleasant confusion of angles in the ground-plan. 
 What had been the garden was now a network of 
 clothes-lines, with things hanging to dry. A board 
 bore the legend: "Star Laundry. R. Herion." 
 
 Augusta knocked at the door, but there was no 
 answer; and a second and a third summons had no 
 better effect. Then a slatternly figure, thrust half- 
 way out of a neighboring window, urged, "Try the 
 back." 
 
 347
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 Augusta picked her way round to a narrow path 
 that led to the back door. It stood wide open, and 
 so did the first door in the narrow passage within 
 the house. She passed through, without further 
 ceremony, and found herself in a kind of best room, 
 poorly furnished, but quite neat, and at present in 
 the sole occupancy of a plump baby crowing in its 
 cot. It was a momentary relief to what was other- 
 wise the perfect stillness of the house. But the still- 
 ness more than held its own, until the child and a 
 little clock, between them, seemed to be but inef- 
 fectual protests against a reign of silence that was 
 charged with portent to the anxious visitor. Au- 
 gusta left the room, hastily called out, "Mrs. Herion ! 
 Mrs. Herion!" without receiving any reply, and 
 then followed the track of a pungent odor of soap- 
 suds, which, in its promise of human labor, was also 
 a promise of a sign of life. 
 
 It was at once a true promise and a false one. 
 She was in the wash-house now, and a figure stood at 
 the wash-tub, bent to the task, and with its back to 
 the door. It was the house-mother, beyond doubt; 
 and Augusta called to her again: "Rose! Rose! 
 Don't you know me? Don't you hear?" 
 
 The figure never stirred, but kept rigid in the lines 
 of its slight stoop over the tub. One arm was bent ; 
 the other clutched at the left breast. 
 
 Augusta screamed, with a sense of dread fore- 
 boding, and ran forward. It was Rose, indeed, but 
 with head bowed, eyes fixed in a glassy stare, and 
 stone-dead at her post of duty and sacrifice. 
 
 348
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 She was still beautiful even in this ruin. The 
 glorious wealth of dark hair was there, though it 
 was now streaked with gray. The wan face had lost 
 the unbroken oval of its line, the cheeks the color 
 from which she might have derived her name. The 
 poor hand, still clutching at the heart, was no longer 
 the hand of the dairymaid of Allonby. It was 
 bleached and wrinkled with the hot water and with 
 the chemical compounds ; and every wrinkle, stiffened 
 in death, looked as though it had been carved in 
 stone. Saddest of all marrings beauty ravaged by 
 toil and misery before its time. 
 
 So perished Rose Herion. "I relieve thee of the 
 burden of existence," whispers the Buddha, as he 
 bestows his boon of eternal sleep on the perfect man. 
 The Merciful, the Compassionate, had looked her 
 way at last. 
 
 349
 
 XL 
 
 JOSE was buried in the great church- 
 yard of Slocum Magna. There was 
 at first an intention of laying her 
 in one of the London cemeteries, 
 but Augusta would not hear of 
 that. Her ideas of justice found 
 a sort of grim satisfaction in bringing back the 
 Herions to their own village, dead or alive. 
 
 Mr. Raif was only less disgusted with the change 
 of plan than the London undertaker. For him this 
 unedifying return of the prodigal with mortuary 
 honors was a humiliation for the system which had 
 driven her forth. It was a bad example for the vil- 
 lage. Poor Rose's coffin might be a Pandora's box 
 charged with all sorts of subversive ideas to taint the 
 country-side. A pauper's grave for it in distant Lon- 
 don might have furnished him with the matter for a 
 homily. As it was, he declined to take any part in 
 the ceremony, and willingly relinquished his share 
 in it to his colleague. 
 
 Augusta attended the funeral, and not by deputy, 
 but in her own person. The whole village was by 
 her side. All sorrowed, even those who, like Grim- 
 ber, saw in the occasion but the fulfilment of a pro- 
 phecy of doom. All had loved Rose. At his evening 
 
 35
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 sitting Job called for another "mug o' yel" to toast 
 her memory. "She wur a good un, she wur died 
 at her post." There was a subflavor of bitterness 
 in the tribute. He could not but reflect that his 
 wife's devotion took the form rather of driving him 
 to his work than of dying to do it for him. His select 
 moral was not wanting. "It 's what I always say : 
 speak yer mind, an' you get the sack. You don't get 
 it for speakin': you get it, that 's all." It was the 
 peasant moral far and wide: "Lie low." 
 
 George was brought back to the village as soon as 
 he could bear the journey, and properly provided 
 for. The child of course came with him, and the two 
 mothers were there to look after both. All this was 
 Augusta's care. It was what the blacksmith called 
 making a clean job of it. The village hardly knew 
 how to look at the matter. A few thought that the 
 injured man was lucky in the prospect of being ' ' kep ' 
 for life," and that a paralyzed spinal system was no 
 excessive price to pay for the luxury. These con- 
 sequently were free to regard him as the victor in 
 the long struggle with the castle. The agent nat- 
 urally had other views. The crippled man, the or- 
 phaned child, were awful object-lessons of the folly 
 of resistance to the system. Who could have a doubt 
 as to the winning side, with this withered thing sun- 
 ning itself in its bandages at the cottage door, by 
 the duke's leave, this child learning to cry "mammy" 
 to its grandams, and with the mother it was begin- 
 ning to forget in the churchyard? The village, on 
 the whole, was much of this way of thinking. The 
 
 35 1
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 muttered moral of the fireside and the ale-bench 
 might have been expressed in the terms of the catch, 
 ' ' Hold thy peace, thou knave ! ' ' All who have given 
 up the struggle with circumstance come to that, 
 from the Trappist to the Russian peasant, that lotus- 
 eater of submission and despair. "Leave it alone; 
 don't trouble: it won't last long. And then, still 
 keeping quiet, quiet, you '11 be carted you know 
 where; and dust will be the end of it. The busy 
 arm, the busy tongue all vanity; and nothing 
 helps." 
 
 So the old stillness settles down upon Slocum, and 
 the grass gets time to grow upon Rose's grave. The 
 village resumes its eternal order of things, if that 
 can be resumed which has never suffered check or 
 pause. For the real order is that Slocum shall some- 
 times struggle, but always suffer defeat; that the 
 Herions and Spurrs shall unfailingly return to heel 
 after futile divagations, and the Grimbers, Gurts, 
 and Sketts never leave the path. Generations reared 
 in dependence and submission find it easiest to go on 
 in that way. 
 
 So thinks Mr. Kisbye as he sits musing in his li- 
 brary to-day over a binding and a cigarette so, and 
 otherwise. The victory over George is as much his 
 victory as the castle's. Brain has won in this skir- 
 mish, as it is going to win in the final battle. The 
 money-lender is sure that he has made a wise choice 
 in living from a single organ. He has found it pay 
 to be without heart and, except on the rare occasions 
 on which he has to call himself a fool, without con- 
 
 352
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 science. Money has given him all he needs. His 
 want of ruth is quite consistent with taste, both in 
 life and art. He knows a painting as well as here 
 and there a one, and will live to the end amid the 
 harmonies of sense. He touches literature in rare 
 covers, and sometimes, though not without a sort of 
 derision, in the matter they contain. In all, he has 
 realized to the full that prevalent conception of 
 life as a conflict of forces for the wise satisfaction 
 of a set of appetites. He is as unpitying at need 
 as a spike-nosed fish ripping up another for a meal. 
 He loves all good things in sheer technical perfec- 
 tion as manifestations of power good music, good 
 talk, good eating and drinking ; and he loathes more 
 heartily than ever all who try to give them an ethical 
 import. Canvas and printed page alike, as things 
 said, are nothing to him. They exist but for the way 
 of saying it. He reads in many languages; and in 
 ours, it may be suspected, not as a mother-tongue. 
 He has just bought Milton's greatest poem in a two- 
 hundred-and-fifty-guinea edition, and he is now dip- 
 ping into it to find refreshment in its principal char- 
 acter, and the luxury of contempt in its dialogues 
 on the all-sufficiency of virtue. "Pa ta tra! and 
 that 's dog French for it ! " he chuckles as he closes 
 the book with a snap. 
 
 His disdain of the lowly is chiefly induced by their 
 interested chatter, as born fools, about the right and 
 the wrong. His wrath against George, dating from 
 the fateful outburst on the night of the meeting, has 
 never cooled. He despises Liddicot as a weakling. 
 
 23 353
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 He hopes to win Mary yet by sheer force of will. 
 He feels sure that the reversion of the honors and the 
 pride and power of feudalism is to his order. To 
 them the country-side must ultimately come, by right 
 of that modern lordship of gold that has taken the 
 place of the lordship of the sword. 
 
 His next victory promises to be at the expense 
 of the Duke of Allonby. He has finally consented 
 to sell, and on extremely reasonable terms, the piece 
 of land which has so long spoiled the view from The 
 Towers. The real price is an invitation to dinner. 
 The solicitors have met once more, and Mr. Kisbye 's 
 have suggested that his client may be found tractable 
 on these terms. The duke has undertaken to see 
 what can be done, and has even sounded his wife. 
 Augusta said never a word. 
 
 354
 
 XLI 
 
 T is nearly a year since Mr. Gooding 
 left. Now he is at Liddicot again, 
 and crossing the moat on his way 
 to luncheon with the squire. He 
 found the invitation waiting for 
 him on his arrival at Allonby last 
 night. 
 
 The scene was pretty much the same as before 
 the visitor on the drawbridge, Mary in espial at the 
 turret window. The squire did the honors of recep- 
 tion, with his son at hand. It would have been im- 
 possible to exceed their cordiality. Tom, now nearly 
 well, has raised the young American to the highest 
 grade in his esteem. He has announced his de- 
 liberate conviction that Mr. Gooding is "a sports- 
 man." Beyond this, notoriously, it is impossible to 
 go, as it includes the lower degree of one who "plays 
 the game." He means the game of life, though his 
 praise might be more precious if he meant the game 
 of polo. 
 
 He is quite happy once more, and has returned to 
 his old cheery conception of the terrestrial sphere 
 as a picnic for persons of position. Mary has been 
 busy with him in loving care of his convalescence, 
 and for him in promoting an inquisitorial examina- 
 
 355
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 tion of his affairs by the family solicitors. Messrs. 
 Stallbrass, Stallbrass, Fruhling, Jenkins & Prothero 
 have succeeded in bringing Kisbye to something that 
 may be called terms. Tom is going to lead a new life. 
 It is a pleasant illusion for him and for his relatives. 
 These total changes of heart and conduct belong to 
 the imaginative literature of resolve. 
 
 Delighted as she was, Mary met her old friend 
 with something of embarrassment. She was no 
 longer the rather critical young person trying to 
 classify him for her pigeon-holes of character. He 
 had established a kind of mastery over her spirit, 
 just because he never made the vestige of a claim. 
 There he was, always efficient in an emergency, and, 
 to all appearance, as indeed very much in reality, 
 never in the least degree aware of it. Mary began 
 to wonder how she could carry it through, and to 
 arrange her commonplaces in advance a fatal por- 
 tent of discomfiture in encounters of this description. 
 
 His tact, or perhaps only the mere human nature 
 in him, saved them both. They had been separated 
 long enough to have memories in common ; and, when 
 they found themselves alone in a walk after luncheon, 
 he, without the slighest effort, became the boy again. 
 It gave her immense relief by putting her, at least 
 for the moment, on their old footing. He had struck 
 the note of the "chatter of irresponsible frivolity" 
 as between boy and girl. 
 
 "And the good old automatic supply?" he asked. 
 "Still going strong?" 
 
 "Now please be intelligible." 
 
 35 6
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Raif ' s village penny in the slot, and the figures 
 work. ' ' 
 
 "Don't be irreverent." 
 
 ' ' And the worst of it is, they work best when you 
 put in pebbles. But there, I 'm not bound to crim- 
 inate myself." 
 
 "That 's a confession. Now I know who brought 
 Grimb'er and Job together on that awful day." 
 
 "I can prove an alibi. I was under Augusta's 
 eye all the time." 
 
 "I hope you have n't come back to upset any more 
 apple-carts, even Mr. Kaif's." 
 
 "No; duty before pleasure when the bell rings." 
 
 A certain change in him had not escaped Mary's 
 eye. He was very much the man now. She liked 
 him the better for it, yet it made their present foot- 
 ing of mere banter hard to maintain. 
 
 "Poor little Slocum you won't care for it any 
 more. ' ' 
 
 "More than ever, perhaps, in a way." 
 
 "But you are going back soon to look after your 
 own villagers." 
 
 "My villagers!" he laughed. 
 
 "What have I said wrong now?" 
 
 "Nothing at all. And all I mean to say is that 
 they 're not exactly taking any just now." 
 
 "Any what?" 
 
 "Looking after." 
 
 "How do they manage, I wonder?" 
 
 "They manage for themselves, I fancy," he said. 
 
 "What a funny country!" 
 
 357
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Oh, it 's just their way. You see, they are all 
 so many little Dukes of Allonby, ownership and all ; 
 and you can 't imagine the extent of their investments 
 in false pride." 
 
 "Five hundred villagers, five hundred masters. 
 Does n 't it seem simpler, now, to cut down the mas- 
 ters by four hundred and ninety-nine?" 
 
 "Simpler for the one?" he said. "But it would 
 be sheer depopulation: the villagers would have to 
 follow suit. Ah, you must travel if you want to see 
 sights. I always call Slocum my new world." 
 
 "I know why you came," she said slyly. "Au- 
 gusta told me. You 're the American invasion." 
 
 He gave a little start, then laughed. "What 's 
 that?" 
 
 "Don't look so innocent. You want to buy up 
 things here. You '11 never do it; we won't sell." 
 
 "Not even your match factories and your steam 
 lines?" 
 
 "Oh, things of that sort!" 
 
 "What other things, Miss Mary?" 
 
 "Well, the fine things Westminster Abbey, for 
 instance. ' ' 
 
 "We don't bid even for the pulpit, in spite of 
 the Christian Science and the wisdom of the East 
 that now go with the lot." 
 
 "Allonby Castle, perhaps?" 
 
 The vein of irony was so unusual with her that 
 she grew discursive with the novelty of the sensation. 
 "The land will soon be about the only thing we have 
 left. Why not try that?" 
 
 358
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 He was silent. It was a good shot. His trust was 
 actually meditating the greatest venture of all the 
 purchase of a huge tract of land in England for the 
 experiment of farming under modern conditions and 
 on the grand scale. Farming as an industry was 
 their watchword, not as the mere labor test of a 
 pauper caste. And, for their principle, they held 
 that not the English land, but only the English land 
 system, had broken down. Fields laid out, plowed, 
 sown, and reaped by the square mile, with good 
 wages for good workers, each man straining to do his 
 best under the inducements of hope ; the farm-house 
 a laboratory; the farm-hands chemist's assistants; 
 the barn an engineer's shop; the hall abolished as 
 only a more glittering poorhouse; the best tools, the 
 best brains, the best men everywhere; the market- 
 place a real exchange, with the railways brought into 
 line, by purchase, too, if need be, as parts of the 
 wondrous plan. And, for the glorious outcome, Eng- 
 land fed without protection from her own fields, and 
 the surplus exported at a profit to the United States. 
 
 ''Uncle Sam as the 'squoire,' " she continued 
 "tail-coat, straps, and all. A second conquest of 
 England." 
 
 ' ' Why conquer when you can buy ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' Dear old Allonby ! Dear old Liddicot ! ' ' 
 
 "Dear old China!" 
 
 "Now I wonder what that means ! I don't see the 
 point." 
 
 "I was thinking of the worship of ancestors," he 
 said. 
 
 359
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Well, I don't mind telling you I was thinking 
 of our poor aristocracy and gentry. ' ' 
 
 "Same thing." 
 
 "We don't worship them; we respect them for 
 having made England what it is." 
 
 "Indeed they have." 
 
 "That 's a sneer," said Mary. 
 
 "It is, and I ask your pardon. But please con- 
 sider the provocation not from you ; oh, never from 
 you ! ' ' And he went on with a vehemence, albeit de- 
 liberate and restrained, that she had never seen in 
 him before : ' ' Such a country going to such waste ! 
 Such a system for running England without the co- 
 operation of the English people! Training them 
 down to the level of their position, not up to the 
 level of their powers and their rights. Their educa- 
 tion, high and low, still a joke for the competing 
 foreigner, and a clerical one at that! The infinite 
 littleness of the whole thing, the poverty of the 
 issues, the inaccessibility to ideas!" 
 
 "We are not going to have our country ruled on 
 'business principles,' " she faltered. 
 
 "Why not, Miss Mary? Business principles are 
 honor, honesty, justice from man to man. What 's 
 the matter with them?" 
 
 "Wooden nutmegs there!" cried Mary, seizing 
 the first missile that came to hand. 
 
 "Remounts," he retorted, breaking into a hearty 
 laugh. "The men who managed that business have 
 not much to learn from anybody." 
 
 360
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 But Mary was not beaten yet. She remembered 
 what she had heard from the squire as to the humble- 
 ness of Mr. Gooding's origin. Her pride of birth 
 came to her aid. To think of it this person with 
 his masterful way with his betters, separated by only 
 two generations from a peasant of one of her fa- 
 ther's fields! 
 
 "You must not talk to me like that," she said in 
 her grandest manner the manner which she had 
 caught less by precept than by the mere example of 
 the picture-gallery at Liddicot. 
 
 The real sting of the rebuke was entirely lost on 
 the young man. It had never occurred to him that 
 he might not approach her on a footing of perfect 
 social equality. The only degrees he knew of in his 
 dealings with his fellow-creatures were those of sense, 
 energy, and courage faculty, in a word, with, of 
 course, a due allowance for the voluntary service of 
 homage where women were concerned. Her tone now 
 made him keenly apprehensive that he might have 
 been wanting in the last. 
 
 "I am afraid I have failed in respect," he said. 
 "Please forgive me again." 
 
 "It is nothing for which you need care to have 
 my forgiveness," said Mary, coldly, quite misun- 
 derstanding him still. 
 
 "I would not say anything displeasing to you for 
 the world." 
 
 ' ' I am afraid you would, ' ' said Mary, still with a 
 good deal of heat beneath the surface of ice. 
 
 361
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 "Is not that rather ungenerous?" 
 
 "It is not meant so, I assure you. You might 
 sometimes fail to understand, that is all." 
 
 "That is it," he said, with the same innocent 
 audacity as before. "One does not take the proper 
 account of ways of thinking, ways of life. ' ' 
 
 It was an apology to the woman still, not to the 
 squire's daughter. 
 
 "We are not exactly your inferiors please re- 
 member that," she said, by way of putting him on 
 the right track. 
 
 "I know little of the others, but I shall always 
 consider myself yours. ' ' 
 
 She began to think that he had caught her mean- 
 ing at last, but she was woefully mistaken. 
 
 "Do you suppose that I could so long have had 
 the privilege of your companionship without feeling 
 the superiority of your goodness, of your devotion to 
 your father and your brother, the charm of ' ' 
 
 If he saved himself from a still more personal com- 
 pliment, it was only by a hair's-breadth. 
 
 Mary began to understand at last, and she left 
 the society of her ancestors and came back to her 
 own time. The mention of her brother turned the 
 whole current of her thoughts as with a pang of the 
 sense of ingratitude. 
 
 "My devotion ! Can I ever forget yours the long 
 journey ' ' 
 
 "An outing." 
 
 And in that train of thoughts came the memory 
 of his supreme service to herself in the affair of the 
 
 362
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 card-table, the one crisis of her simple life. It came 
 with just such a rush of feeling as had kept her 
 silent and abashed in his presence when first she 
 realized the immensity of the obligation. Was it for 
 her to give him lessons, when in all their relations 
 his had ever been the guiding hand and brain, the 
 surer for his lightness of touch and his unconscious 
 avoidance of all vestige of a claim ? Beside such ap- 
 peals, what grossness in any other, and especially 
 in her own of mere social position ! She rejoiced 
 that this blunder had escaped him by the accidents 
 of nature and training, and she felt the full force 
 of his homage to her womanhood, and to that alone. 
 She was conquered by his sheer faculty the only 
 thing, happily, thank God, that wins at last, or where 
 would be the hopes of the race? Here was the 
 strength, in all its finest attributes, for which she 
 had learned to long, and especially in gentleness 
 and never-failing courtesy. Here, once more, was a 
 man! 
 
 "It is for you to forgive me now," she said. "I 
 am but a girl yet, and you are a school-boy no more. ' ' 
 
 "No, no," he laughed. "I am not to be dubbed 
 into that dignity at a moment's notice. Let me still 
 fancy we are only boy and girl together, for it has 
 been the greatest happiness of my life. But since 
 you embolden me to plead for favors, little play- 
 mate," and he took her hand, "promise me that 
 if I come to you when I am really dubbed, and ask 
 you a question, you will try to give me a kind 
 answer." 
 
 3 6 3
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 She said nothing, but the blood rushed to her face 
 as she met his look with eyes as of molten fire from 
 rising tears. 
 
 It was a reply of a sort, and it was so encouraging 
 that, greatly daring, he drew her gently toward him. 
 
 And so it came about. 
 
 3 6 4
 
 XLII 
 
 HE Saturday before the corona- 
 tion, and glorious August weather. 
 London was never brighter or less 
 severe flags out, crowds from all 
 parts of the country and, in spite 
 of previous disappointment, from 
 most parts of the earth. Every other conscript in 
 this huge army of pleasure looked as though he car- 
 ried the marshal's baton in his knapsack that is to 
 say, as one still hoping for a ticket for Westminster 
 Abbey. 
 
 The central point, as the great meeting-place for 
 plebs and aristocracy, was the Marble Arch. All 
 else in London is for one or the other. This is for 
 both. Here rank and wealth and fashion taking the 
 air, yonder their deadly opposites commending them 
 most heartily to the devil, in perpetual public meet- 
 ing, under the friendly guardianship of the police. 
 No other scene in the world to match this for the 
 hate of hate, the toleration of policy and contempt. 
 The police know what they are about. This as- 
 sumption that the devil is ever ready to anticipate is 
 one of the most persistent errors of the vulgar. He 
 is a great student of history, and he bides his time. 
 For those who refuse to bide theirs, the site of the 
 
 3 6 5
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 busy old gallows of Hogarth's day is close at hand, 
 with its memorial stone : ' ' Here stood Tyburn Gate. ' ' 
 It is a gentle hint to the disaffected that valor must 
 still be tempered by discretion. 
 
 A street preacher, who naturally enjoyed the same 
 liberty as the others, held forth on the late postpone- 
 ment of the ceremony as a judgment on the nation 
 for its slack attendance at church. The ballad-mon- 
 gers were in full cry, one of them on the subject of 
 imperial emigration. With its burden of " I mye be 
 a millionhair, " his song was quite a battle-hymn of 
 the democracy, at need. The cheap jacks bawled 
 their wares coronation medals and biographies of 
 the royal pair. The grass was black with recumbent 
 loafers sunning themselves through the long hours 
 between the closing of the casual wards in the morn- 
 ing and their opening at night. 
 
 Lord Ogreby and his family occupied a carriage 
 in the drive. That nobleman was at once cheerful 
 and depressed. His house had for generations 
 claimed the right of offering a toothpick to the mon- 
 arch, after dinner, on coronation day. It was done 
 on bended knee. The right had not been denied on 
 the present occasion by the Lord Chancellor, the Earl 
 Marshal, the Lord Chief Justice, and other members 
 of the Court of Claims ; but, as the Lord Chancellor 
 had observed in giving judgment, after counsel had 
 raised many points of antiquarian and feudal lore, 
 the question was, in this instance, beyond the pur- 
 view of the court. Since there would be no state 
 dinner, there could be no toothpick in active demand 
 as part of the pageant. The right was therefore in
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 abeyance on the present occasion. The applicant 
 submitted, with the sense of duty done : at any rate, 
 he had fought the good fight. "I have my children 
 to think of," he said with spirit, "and one day the 
 banquet may be revived." He was now bearing 
 home a brand-new instrument of this description, 
 ordered perhaps precipitately; and, with its inner 
 and outer casings, it occupied no small part of the 
 roof of his coach. 
 
 He had just exchanged bows with a lady driving 
 in the opposite direction and toward the arch. Her 
 fine face wore an air of weariness that heightened 
 the refinement of its beauty. After passing the gate, 
 her carriage turned down the Bayswater Road, and 
 drew up before a small turfed inclosure a few hun- 
 dred yards on the right-hand side. It was dismissed 
 there, with orders to call again in an hour. 
 
 The person who alighted was Augusta, Duchess 
 of Allonby, in town with the rest for the coming 
 ceremony. The place was her favorite retreat for 
 meditation, and it had been provided by the munifi- 
 cence of an estimable woman, now dead. It was a 
 small chapel, or a large monastic cell, just as you 
 chose to take it, but a chapel without a service or 
 other hindrance to pure spiritual contemplation. 
 Outside, the great roaring thoroughfare ; within, the. 
 peace of the desert, a house of reverie. 
 
 Thus spoke an inscription on its gate : 
 
 "Passengers through the busy streets of Lon- 
 don, enter this sanctuary for rest and silence and 
 prayer." 
 
 3 6 7
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 And again: 
 
 "Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? Come 
 and rest awhile. Commune with your own hearts, 
 and be still." 
 
 The duchess did not immediately enter the chapel. 
 Nodding to the solitary attendant at the door, she 
 passed through a passage to a large garden at the 
 back, well hidden from the road. It was quite in the 
 note, being a garden of the cozy dead. For years 
 they had been disturbed by no newcomer of their 
 own recumbent order. They must have relished their 
 exclusiveness : they were the dead of St. George's, 
 Hanover Square. Posterity had not been unmind- 
 ful of their comfort. Their gravestones had been 
 removed from the original sites, as though to lighten 
 the indispensable labors of the last day ; and all was 
 now in readiness for either the trump of the arch- 
 angel or the pick of the speculative builder. One 
 monument showed that poor Laurence Sterne had 
 here found a bed, after the weariness of his closing 
 pilgrimage. It was but a bed for the night. The 
 flowery inscription, however, said nothing about the 
 body-snatchers who, in due course of business, had 
 stolen him away. Not for that mercurial spirit even 
 the rest of the grave ! 
 
 Augusta took a turn round the cemetery, and then 
 entered the chapel. At first she had it all to herself, 
 for London set small store by this particular bounty 
 of the pious founder. At a later stage she was joined,
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 on tiptoe, by a gray-headed senior, with one hand in 
 a sling and the other at his brow like herself, ap- 
 parently a refugee from the too insistent event of 
 the day. He had evidently come to think things out 
 on his own account, and he was quite unmindful of 
 her presence. 
 
 She would have preferred to be alone. It is amaz- 
 ing how few opportunities of this sort any of us en- 
 joy. There is ever some one by, within intrusive 
 hearing or scarcely less intrusive sight. The part- 
 nership of bed and board with humanity is some- 
 times too rigorous. We have to be gathered together 
 even for prayer. We live in crowds, think in crowds, 
 and rarely have the happiness to stand with no fel- 
 low-creature beyond the range of suggestion. Even 
 in this instance, it was still possible to spy other 
 strangers of a kind on the pictured wall. Its fine 
 sacred art told of things done long ago; yet these 
 might still have been kept more in the key of re- 
 pose. The too thunderous and tumultuous fellow- 
 ship of the prophets, with their deeds of judgment, 
 the excessively strenuous, though glorious, company 
 of the apostles, with their energy of ministration, 
 seemed superfluous in such a connection. The 
 Founder in the wilderness, another founder under 
 the tree, an apostle of quietism in his cell, would have 
 been enough for that contemplation, "without form, 
 likeness, manner, or figure," which is the all in all. 
 
 So Augusta just shut her eyes and began a medita- 
 tion. She was sick at heart. Her grief for the death 
 of Rose, long and deep, had gradually been merged 
 
 24 369
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 in a sort of personal disappointment. She had come 
 out to her new life with such high hopes, and it had 
 all ended in this! At first she meant to accept the 
 system and work it out on its own lines. This failed 
 when she found that it ground out poverty, depen- 
 dence, and depopulation as by a mechanical law. 
 Then, fatuously, she aspired to reform it, and that 
 hope was now buried in a grave. The system had 
 triumphed over her more than over all the rest of 
 them put together. The only part before her now 
 was the insignificant one of leader of fashion and 
 ornament of the country-side. What a business, to 
 be forever setting an example in trivial things, as 
 one of the great exemplars of a nation perishing of 
 the imitation of its betters ! 
 
 "The old order, the old manners, the old faith- 
 piteous to have to smirk one's way through all their 
 proprieties, feeling all the while how they have lost 
 their shaping virtue for the men and women of the 
 time. A day in Mr. Raif 's school as a preparation 
 for the shock of our modern battle of life ! A day 
 in Mr. Kaif 's church ! Really, some religions are not 
 much better than some stimulants. The Dutch 
 courage of these rites for the ordeals of poverty, 
 pain, and death! And most of them so dreadfully 
 old-fashioned, as if the chief business of the science 
 of all the sciences was not to be perpetually renew- 
 ing itself with the larger outlook on nature, and the 
 expansion of the mind and soul. Never has any 
 church been the same thing, thank God, in any two 
 ages, or even in any two generations. Man's re- 
 
 37
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ligions are as the hairs of his head for number, and 
 inevitably so. And Mr. Eaif trying so hard to make 
 us all letter-perfect in the prayer-book of the day be- 
 fore yesterday!" 
 
 The ray from the skylight, after illuminating the 
 face of a pictured apostle, was now rendering the 
 same service to a martyr. Nothing else had hap- 
 pened. The stranger kept himself to himself with a 
 discretion beyond praise. He stroked his wounded 
 hand from time to time, but he never once looked 
 Augusta's way. 
 
 "And sometimes, to be fair," she mused, being 
 still fancy-free, "the poverty of the discoveries, the 
 mere islands under the lee that are mistaken for a 
 continent! Our smart set touchingly busy under 
 American leadership in applying the principles of 
 the game of bluff to man's relations with his Maker 
 trying to will themselves into a good time, and the 
 prolongation of it in earthly immortality. Religions 
 that satisfy the sense of wonder, the sense of credul- 
 ity, without making any troublesome demands on 
 the sense of duty. Mere fancy patterns in Relieving, 
 without even the tables from the Mount. Made-up . 
 mysteries of the great panjandrum, coupled with the 
 right to do as you darned please. Life all apparatus. 
 Automatic cures for drunkenness, and medicated 
 baths for weakness of the will. Interested quests 
 for missing faculties stolen or strayed through the 
 ages. Whole drawing-rooms full of Pointed Toes 
 trying to think anemic glands into energy, in the 
 hope of coming on the track of their lost tribes of 
 
 37 1
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 sense. Why not make the best of those you have? 
 Marcus took overmuch pains in the enumeration 
 of his debts to the wise. He forgot his debt to the 
 fools in teaching him what to laugh at and to loathe. 
 
 "Poor Points ! on the issue of this warfare between 
 them and the Squares turns the welfare of England, 
 and of all human society. History is but a record 
 of its varied fortunes. The Points had a merry time 
 of it in the Italy of the Renascence, and, as we know, 
 their symbol actually curled upward with the sense 
 of successful aspiration to the mastery of life. But 
 a time came! 
 
 "The time is coming here; and England 's going 
 to win, and beat down its baser part under its feet. 
 Let us have that faith in our race." 
 
 A fly buzzed, not without shock to the spirit of the 
 scene.* It was tumult of a kind. Augusta thought 
 "shoo!" to it with the happiest results; and, after 
 this triumphant exercise of will power, resumed. 
 
 Meanwhile the stranger had not been idle on his 
 own account. He uttered no word, gave no outward 
 and visible sign beyond the occasional stroking of 
 the bandaged hand. He merely thought his thoughts, 
 like his neighbor, but, by a law of sympathy which 
 others may know how to trace, they flowed more or 
 less in the same current as hers. For this is what 
 he was saying to himself : 
 
 "Real superiorities anywhere the rarest thing. 
 Whole sections in church and state perishing for the 
 want of them, and the mere caretakers not likely 
 to be of much avail on England's coming judgment- 
 
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 The Yellow Van 
 
 day. I mind me of a certain sheep 's carcass seen out- 
 side a butcher's shop at Christmas-tide, with its card 
 to indicate high honors at Islington. Yet the throat 
 bore witness to just the same treatment as that of 
 the common fellows alongside which had gained no 
 decoration. And the pompous victim had no doubt 
 been hustled to his doom and stretched on the rack 
 as rudely by the fierce tireman with the knife. Fancy 
 its ineffectual bleat : 'Mind what you are doing ! I 'm 
 a first prize at the cattle show ! ' At this stage, alas ! 
 it was but one sheep more." 
 
 In his next flight he almost touched Augusta mind 
 to mind. 
 
 11 America, best of actual nations, no doubt, as 
 once was England before it. But ware breakers! 
 What are you going to Americanize ? Match factories 
 and steam lines are nearly done ; but social justice- 
 how do you stand for that? America eaten up with 
 the pride of life, with Europe waiting for a lead. 
 Are you going to carry it and yourself farther, or 
 only to sink back into mother's arms? Once the 
 hope of the nations, now only their competitor and 
 conqueror a very different thing! Money the too 
 universal test : preachers and poets filing their return 
 of income for the newspapers, to show how well it 
 pays. Not less riches or less comfort for all, but a 
 better share for some. What are you going to do 
 about the back premises ? 
 
 "Come over and help as soon as you can, if only 
 for the sake of helping yourself. Society everywhere 
 apparently under sentence of death for ill-distributed 
 
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 The Yellow Van 
 
 wealth pomp and privation both exceeding all 
 healthful bounds, with resultant deadness of soul 
 and stint of body. For the last see factories and 
 ' far-flung battle-line. ' 
 
 "Touching, yet foolish too, the idle rich every- 
 where, now so extensively resorting to cremation in 
 the vain hope of giving the recording-angel the slip. 
 He '11 find the body, you bet. Discourage, if pos- 
 sible, by suitable remonstrances. Cremation a good 
 thing, but must be loved for itself. 
 
 * ' Will anybody give England a new type of young 
 man, the nation's pride? The government might 
 offer a prize. High marks for modesty, simplicity, 
 earnestness, book-work in the things that count, and 
 the power of 'swotting' at the art of life. General 
 aim highest possible differentiation from the snipe. 
 Class 1, Young Men of Family ; Class 2, Officers and 
 Gentlemen; Class 3, Officers; Class 4, Sons of Toil. 
 Extra prizes for young women to match. 
 
 "A new sort of person wanted very much every- 
 where. Meantime, the counter-jumper may be of 
 help. Strike, but hear. He is frugal, hard-working, 
 obliging, and of a more than courtly civility. His 
 whole life a training in these qualities, with their 
 underlying self-denial and self-control. Has been 
 under the harrow, no small part of it. A wise legis- 
 lature should see that every child had a touch of 
 this instrument at the start. It is far more impor- 
 tant than the lancet; and, in this case, we might 
 fairly abolish the conscientious objector. Similarly, 
 little shop-girls (maids of all work, with ten in 
 
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 The Yellow Van 
 
 family preferred) quite the hope of the nation. No 
 damn nonsense in them, and the country is perishing 
 of that. They see life in its realities of labor, tem- 
 perance, simplicity, low-pitched claim. Young lady- 
 hood is killing the one half of us, and young spark- 
 ishness the other. Post-office and other clerical va- 
 rieties of our modern miss, of great promise, but 
 should be warned against being too sweet on them- 
 selves, and prayed with, morning and evening, 
 against airs. Compulsory marriage between these 
 and young navvies of good conduct worth consider- 
 ing as an extreme measure. Marriage with the 
 merely muscular heathen in the boating and football 
 line placed in the table of prohibited degrees. 
 
 "The absolute necessity of reorganizing our duf- 
 fers in the interest of the social order. A possible 
 revolt of them how awful! Think of their finding 
 a second Spartacus, these failures in all departments, 
 and rising on their lords and masters, the clever fel- 
 lows! The feudal system no other than the clever 
 fellows in their setting of age and circumstance. 
 Muttered wrath of the duffers against these for their 
 usurpation of all the best things of life as their fee 
 for leadership. 'After all, we have our stomachs as 
 well as you; and why make us suffer so fearfully 
 for want of brains?' If they found no Spartacus, 
 the defect might still be made good by mere weight 
 of numbers as though the sheep turned on the dog, 
 on a deliberate reckoning of the cost in torn fleeces. 
 Defeat in the end, no doubt, but what havoc in the 
 course of it ! Perhaps more economic in the long run, 
 
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 The Yellow Van 
 
 in every sense, to admit them to a larger share of the 
 pudding. 'Let us in, or we will spoil your universe' 
 what a rallying-cry !" 
 
 Then Augusta struck in with a stray thought: 
 ''Beautiful on the mountains, Scottish or American, 
 the feet of those poor students working as plowmen, 
 stokers, packers, and cabmen in the intervals of their 
 college terms. Surely Oxford might be restored 
 to persons of this stamp without troubling Mr. 
 Rhodes." 
 
 And thus the stranger again, still harping on 
 England's daughter across the seas: 
 
 "New and serious attempt on the part of our 
 writing clan to rediscover America, following in the 
 wake of our modern Columbus of philosophical liter- 
 ature, E. J. Payne. More and Montaigne and Shak- 
 spere saw that the machinery of feudalism was out- 
 worn, and that we must cross the Atlantic for a new 
 start in truth and nature, if not, as now, to re-teach 
 its second crop of aborigines the lesson they are them- 
 selves making haste to forget. With all its faults, 
 America still looming large as the land of ideas. 
 We must pass through and beyond it to get to higher 
 things. They beat us by their impertinent curiosity 
 about everything under the sun, including their own 
 souls. They are actually trying to make a new re- 
 ligion, and, though the attempt may not succeed, 
 it must have precious results of the experimental 
 order. 
 
 "That Easter-day metaphysic of a worthy bishop 
 sin and death abashed before a miracle, and ut- 
 
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 The Yellow Van 
 
 terly overthrown. He owns, to his sorrow, that 'the 
 church is not in possession.' How can it be, good 
 man? It does not meet the facts of modern suffer- 
 ing, modern discontent ; and we want a new adjust- 
 ment. Be not alarmed; there have been hundreds 
 before, each more or less adequate, and therefore true 
 for its hour. There will be thousands again. 
 
 "Try brotherhoods of social justice, but brother- 
 hoods of the world instead of the cloister; sister- 
 hoodsand more especially as well. Anchorites of 
 the warehouse and of the drawing-room, desperately 
 concerned in finding out how a fine life should be 
 led, and in bringing liberty, equality, and fraternity 
 into every-day concerns. Being pledged one to an- 
 other by their vows cooperators of the affections; 
 trusts of the heart; contrivers of corners in mag- 
 nanimity, self-sacrifice, self-control, leading the 
 world's life, but even that to finer issues, and the 
 soul's life in the temples that are also their homes. 
 
 "But not overmuch organization. The 'plan of 
 salvation' ill-omened phrase! It is all so pigeon- 
 holed and docketed nowadays in affairs of the spirit 
 so far in the fetching, so remote. Rome and Lam- 
 beth these bureaus of paradise ! Less crimson tape. 
 
 "And give the men thus bred their chance of the 
 land, and of every other good thing going. The 
 land for the people, without a revolution of blood 
 unless you insist on it. Break the territorial aris- 
 tocracy, old and new, and buy them out. Liddicot 
 and his Grace of Allonby quite ready for heaven; 
 Kisbye also ripe for a bit of a change in another 
 
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 The Yellow Van 
 
 sphere. The state as owner; and, as holder at a 
 fair rent, anybody that can put the brown earth 
 to good use in any quantity. Other ownership, other 
 rent of it, a crime, as between man and man." 
 
 Augusta was just getting ready for the anti- 
 strophe; and how much longer the silent choral 
 might have gone on between them no man can say. 
 But at this moment the attendant came in, and 
 making a sign to her, held out his hand for the 
 expected shilling, not in vain. It was time to go, 
 the carriage of the Duchess of Allonby stopped the 
 way. 
 
 The duke was waiting for her. 
 
 ' ' I am in luck, ' ' he said. ' ' I was looking for you 
 in the drive, and I met the carriage." He seemed 
 uneasy for all that. 
 
 "I have asked him for to-day, Augusta, just to 
 get it over. Would you mind ? There '11 be nobody 
 else." 
 
 ''And who is the somebody?" 
 
 "Well Kisbye, you know!" 
 
 It was the sign of capitulation. 
 
 "As you please, Henry, of course," and she turned 
 her head to save him the sight of a wry face. 
 
 There was a sense of something impending in the 
 banners, the roll of the traffic, the hum of the street. 
 Was it the end of an epoch the old order that had 
 passed away, the new that had come to take its place ? 
 The omens were not all favorable. The sky became 
 suddenly overcast ; there was a threat of storm. 
 
 Another vehicle was at the gate, rather to the 
 
 378
 
 The Yellow Van 
 
 ducal coachman's disgust. It was a curious struc- 
 ture, mounted on a lorry, as though for repairs, and 
 evidently much the worse for a late mishap. 
 
 Augusta at once recognized the yellow van. And, 
 as she did so, the stranger stalking forth erect, like 
 a soldier taking his place for battle, nodded a march- 
 ing order to the man at the horse's head. 
 
 Old Redmond stood confessed ; and the van served 
 as an introduction. 
 
 "You have met with an accident?" 
 
 "Hardly that, duchess." And he touched his cap. 
 
 She started. 
 
 "A broken head and what not; a house broken 
 over it in a riot raised by the land-grabbers. We 
 shall get both mended, and go on as before. Such 
 things are among our rules of the road." 
 
 "Poor man!" 
 
 "I need no pity: we '11 have England for the Eng- 
 lish people yet." 
 
 All moved away the battered veteran to his line 
 of march, the Duchess of Allonby only to dinner with 
 Mr. Kisbye ! She sighed : it was impossible not to 
 feel the difference in the dignity of their fates. 
 
 When last seen, the van was in a ray from a sun- 
 burst that parted the clouds. 
 
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