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 flN-ANALYTICALSTUDY 
 hYMORLEY-ROBERTS 
 
 MD CCGXCV- 
 
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 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND 
 
 MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID 
 
A QUESTION OF INSTINCT 
 AN ANALYTICAL STUDY 
 BY MORLEY ROBERTS 
 
 LONDON 
 
 H HENRY AND CO LD 
 
 93 ST MARTIN'S LANE 
 
Uniform with this Volume. 
 
 THE GODS, SOME MORTALS 
 AND LORD WICKENHAM. 
 
 By John Oliver Hobbes. 
 
 BOCONNOC. 
 
 B IRomance of llClfIb ©at Cafec. 
 By Herbert Vivian. 
 
 SUSANNAH. 
 
 B movel. 
 
 By Mary E. Mann. 
 
1 
 
 6 
 6 
 
 I 
 I 
 
 To G 
 
 Printed by Hazell, Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury. 
 
A QUESTION OF INSTINCT 
 
 . CHAPTER I 
 
 There are persons alive, and dully pursuing 
 happiness, for whom a drab house in London 
 or its dingy outskirts forms a fitting shell. 
 Like forlorn hermit-crabs, they hasten to 
 conceal their vulnerable pulp in any mean 
 but handy structure ; they merge artistically 
 in the tones of a soulless suburb or by-street ; 
 they do not rebel against contact. Classing 
 themselves with their own order, whose 
 limit of revolt is reached when they protest 
 against a common imposition, they accept 
 all things, even themselves, with ignoble 
 cheerfulness. 
 
2 A Question of Instinct 
 
 But among such men Fate sets un- 
 common contrasts, and a commercial brick 
 may separate peculiar antipathies. John 
 Miller, whom the gods had for a moment 
 stranded in a purlieu of Bayswater, thought 
 so as he contemplated the Respectable at low 
 water. The very look of the street made 
 him dream nightmares ; the better aspect of 
 his own altered house was no consolation, as 
 his heart ached for the freedom which he 
 had but just now left behind. 
 
 He stood outside as dust and paper and 
 a few starved leaves whirled about him. 
 The night was grey, and the indeterminate 
 sky dully opaque. It suggested a lost moon 
 beyond the reek of London ; and suddenly 
 in his mind he saw her climb the ineffable 
 tropic night, while her silver swept the desert 
 sand from his little palmy oasis to the far 
 horizon like a midnight mirage. He sighed 
 heavily as the vision passed and he touched 
 
A Question of Instinct 3 
 
 the rattling latch of the feeble iron gate. 
 Yet inside was home, and one whom he 
 loved. 
 
 *' I wonder," said John Miller, as he 
 stayed for another moment — '* I wonder if 
 I shall find her awake. It's early yet ; 
 hardly eleven." 
 
 He looked up at the window of his bed- 
 room. As he stood the light there was 
 turned down, and when he opened the hall- 
 door a woman ran swiftly to him E and put 
 her arms about his neck. 
 
 **You are a good John to come home 
 early," she said. '' After so long a time 
 away you must have many people to see, 
 and so much to say to them." 
 
 ** No, not much,'* said Miller ; and he 
 followed her into the sitting-room, which 
 was still lighted by a warm fire. He took 
 her by the waist and lifted her off the 
 ground and kissed her on the mouth. 
 
4 A Question of Instinct 
 
 ** Who is there but you, after all, Madeline?" 
 he said. She sat on his knee, and laid her 
 head upon his shoulder. ''But what's your 
 mood to-night, child ? " 
 
 She spread out her hands to the blaze. 
 
 *' I just wanted you, John.'' 
 
 '' Good little girl," said the big man 
 tenderly, and he stroked her hair. 
 
 She shook her head doubtfully, but turned 
 to him with a flickering smile. 
 
 ** How strange it is to hear you still call 
 me a girl!" she answered. ''Think of all 
 my life, and all I know, and all I have done ; 
 all the harm " 
 
 " And all the good, Maddy." 
 
 " And I feel so old — like a sphinx, like 
 something buried in the sand of endless 
 centuries. Am I still young, John ? Now, 
 tell me." 
 
 Twisting round she faced him, and put 
 her long, slender hands against his bearded 
 
A Question of Instinct 5 
 
 cheeks. He looked at her steadily, and a 
 strange quiver passed over her. 
 
 '' I'm glad it's not very, very light, John," 
 she cried, with a little, uneasy laugh. But 
 he laughed good-humouredly. 
 
 '' Foolish girl ! you are as young as the 
 dawn. And — as old." 
 
 '' And still pretty, still beautiful ? Need 
 I cry yet because I'm too ugly to be 
 loved ? " She put her head sideways, and 
 looked at him with a touch of anxiety. 
 *' Because, you see, I'm more than thirty." 
 
 Miller laughed again, and with a little coo 
 of pleasure she laid her head upon his 
 shoulder. 
 
 '* Years are nothing to some women, dear. 
 What is time to you, Sphinx ? He passed 
 you by." 
 
 '' Oh, but, John," said Madeline, '' it was 
 Time's wings that drove the sand over the 
 sphinx and buried it." 
 
A Question of Instinct 
 
 '' They dug it out " 
 
 '' With that beautiful nose gone," said she. 
 '' However, mine is all right yet. What a 
 fool I am ! Would any one think I had 
 any brains, John ? " 
 
 '' No, if they had none themselves. It's 
 a grand thing to be foolish sometimes in 
 the way of nature, dear," answered Miller. 
 
 *'Then am I all the world to you ? — still 
 all the world to you ? " 
 
 '' Yes," he said. 
 
 But she knew there was a pause before 
 he answered. 
 
 Madeline turned away from him, and 
 looked into the fire. 
 
 '' Did you answer then very quickly, John ? 
 No, no, you didn't. Fm not all the world to 
 you, or you would not travel so." 
 
 He stared into the fire too, and perhaps 
 saw some vision in the hot coals, for his brows 
 contracted. 
 
A Question of Instinct 7 
 
 ** There is always something wanting, 
 Madeline." 
 
 And she knew so well what that some- 
 thing was. Knowing, she shrank from him 
 a little, and care came back to her, deepen- 
 ing every faint line upon her fair face. 
 
 '' Am I a woman at all — a real woman ? " 
 she asked despairingly. *' I sometimes 
 w^onder, and sit wondering, and I look out 
 of the window at other live women in the 
 street, and then I feel not human. Am I 
 so very strange, John ? " 
 
 She put her hands to his face again, and 
 made him look at her straight, and she 
 stared into his eyes. A coal fell from the 
 height of a fantastic fire-castle into a fiery 
 abyss, and as it burnt brightly she could 
 see his mind working. 
 
 *'Ah! but you are strange enough, 
 Madeline," he replied ; and, holding her to 
 him, he stared at the flame, and went back 
 
8 A Question of Instinct 
 
 into the years and days to the very hour 
 when her strange and peculiar beauty first 
 caught him and held him fast. 
 
 She was very slight, even delicate, to look 
 at, and yet in times of nervous passion she*^ 
 was almost as strong as Miller himself. Her 
 complexion was still the rose of a young girl, 
 and her big eyes shone starlike. But above 
 all was the crowning beauty of her hair, that 
 in the shade was a dark bronze, and in the 
 sun had strands that reddened like fresh 
 blood. She wore it loose, and as it was 
 strong in texture it stood out crown-like. In 
 its heavy curls was for ever sun and shadow, 
 day and night. 
 
 ** I will shave, and wear a wig," she said 
 once. For it was a labour to keep it beauti- 
 ful. Yet she admired it greatly. 
 
 In spite of her very strange physical 
 beauty, which a strange touch of elfish un- 
 earthliness made at times almost appalling, 
 
A Question of Instinct 9 
 
 it was not difficult to understand how she 
 might drive many men from her. 
 
 *' I'm a witch," she said sometimes to 
 Miller ; and, though he answered her lightly, 
 when he asked her if she had been off on 
 her broomstick among the devils and the 
 angels, he was aware that she was not 
 always wholly human. 
 
 ''Is it the absence of some passion, or 
 the addition of some difficult knowledge ? " he 
 asked himself. For at times he was aware 
 she passed him into unknown regions. 
 
 No one understood her, but only she 
 could have told how little she understood 
 herself. Sometimes she was terrified at the 
 discovery of abysses in herself where others 
 seemed so strangely easy of access. Yet 
 her innocence was absolute, inherited ; it 
 amounted to a disbelief in evil. But one 
 thing was constant in her — her love for John 
 Miller. And even that had its periods. 
 
lo A Question of Instinct 
 
 She revolved about him like a moon, but 
 often went into eclipse. He only gradually- 
 learned to leave her to herself, and even in 
 an hour she shone on him again. But 
 sometimes she looked at him — and he knew 
 it — with the aspect of a soulless, forlorn 
 creature who found herself desolate among 
 peculiar mortals ; and then, as comprehen- 
 sion of her surroundings grew on her, he 
 saw rebellion, even hate, sit throned with 
 the love for him which she often strove to 
 explain, but still found inexplicable. 
 
 Had Miller been more subtle, had he 
 even followed with patience the thread he 
 often held in his hands, it would have led 
 him into deep and sometimes morbid 
 psychology, where knowledge would have 
 given him peace. But then he was man 
 living with woman ; and often treating her 
 on general principles which did not apply, 
 he lost his hold on those same principles 
 
A Question of Instinct 1 1 
 
 where they would have helped him. He 
 never saw how her very complexity made 
 her simple : he stood in the position of one 
 who knows no more of the powers of nature 
 than to call each wind by a separate godlike 
 name. But he was man, and impulsive ; he 
 never knew that the woman of his heart 
 was a miniature nature in herself. 
 
 And, in addition to the strangeness of 
 his life with her, there was something still 
 needed, something he believed she could 
 never give him. It was little wonder that 
 he was occasionally tempted to stoop from 
 this volcano, crowned with fire and snow, to 
 some simpler creature of the under-world. 
 There seemed strange healing virtue in the 
 ploughed fields and common talk and the 
 usual fruits of human vineyards. 
 
 But he had come back out of the desert 
 to her, and she was wonderful and sweet. 
 
 *'Ah! you are strange enough," he said 
 
12 A Question of Instinct 
 
 — ^^ strange enough. Go and play me 
 something, Maddy." 
 
 ** I've been Hke a leaf in a whirlwind all 
 day," she said. '' How can I play when I 
 feel so old and haggard and jumpy ? " 
 
 '' It will do us both good," said he. " Go 
 and play something old and simple and 
 soft." 
 
 But, sitting at the piano in the darkening 
 room, she struck some chords which were 
 complex and very sombre. 
 
 '' Not a funeral march ! " cried the man, 
 with sudden irritation. '' A lullaby, if you 
 like." 
 
 She did not play, and kept silence so 
 long that at last John turned towards her. 
 He found her staring at him with wide and 
 pitiful eyes. 
 
 '' Poor John ! " she said ; and he knew 
 what she meant. 
 
 There would never be in that strange 
 
A Question of Instinct 13 
 
 household any little child to soothe with 
 sweet music, and for a moment she was 
 bitterly sorry. Yet her very sorrow touched 
 John Miller on a raw nerve when he looked 
 at her again. 
 
 '' You don't really care," he said ; and the 
 bitterness in his tone angered her sorely. 
 
 She shrank back and stared at him like 
 one who is utterly and for ever alone. 
 
 For who could understand ? 
 
 And it ended by Miller sitting in solitude 
 till the dawn came. But when it flushed 
 rosily even in that mean London street, 
 Madeline came down to him, and drew 
 him back to her again. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 As the result of sitting up so late and 
 eating his heart out, Miller felt anything 
 but fit for work next day, and went to 
 his club instead of doing anything. For 
 he did work a little, in spite of possessing 
 a small competency. His papers and 
 lectures on geographical subjects and his 
 own travels were far above the average in 
 merit, and would have been much better if 
 he had possessed ambition. But it usually 
 seemed to him that the end of life was 
 to live, and industry was not in him. 
 
 *' To live is to develop all your faculties 
 and energies, good, bad, and indifferent," 
 he used to say, *'not to strive painfully after 
 some ideal form.'* 
 
A Question of Instinct 15 
 
 ''You never had any desire to be a 
 clipped yew in a Dutch garden," said his 
 friend Harmer. 
 
 And it was Harmer he wanted to see 
 now. He did not get to the club till 
 quite late in the evening. He found half- 
 a-dozen painters and writers in the 
 Athenians' smoking-room, and Harmer was 
 standing on the hearthrug talking. He 
 dropped a sentence in the middle, and 
 rushed to Miller to shake hands. 
 
 ''Are you on the stump, then.^" asked 
 the traveller, smiling. 
 
 '' Of course he is, said Hale — a man 
 of a worn and dissipated and weary aspect, 
 with finely cut features. 
 
 " You ancient cameo, be quiet," said 
 Harmer. ** Of course. Miller, we were 
 at the usual subject of late — I mean 
 women.'' 
 
 " It has always been a subject of con- 
 
1 6 A Question of Instinct 
 
 siderable interest to mankind at large. 
 Why *of late'?" 
 
 *' Ah, I see," said Harmer ; *' you've been 
 out of England — out of the grim grind of 
 the central world. You have been on the 
 edge of things, under suns and stars and 
 palm trees, while we have been at the 
 perpetual clinic, the sick-room of civilisation. 
 You don't know all the latest symptoms. 
 The women are beginning to get up and 
 howl for liberty. Some of them roar for 
 repression, but they are a pure minority. 
 Their cries are painful; but then, those 
 who are squeezed squeal. And it's my 
 little opinion that women haven't cried out 
 before they were hurt." 
 
 *' You're going off the track again," said 
 Hale languidly. *' Orator of the Feminine 
 Human Race, propound your polygamous 
 propositions." 
 
 And Miller sat down. 
 
A Question of Instinct 17 
 
 '* What's the trouble, and what's your 
 remedy ? " he asked, laughing, as he lighted 
 his pipe. 
 
 Harmer shook his head. 
 
 ** I've no remedy but mere liberty. And 
 I suggest speaking the truth. I was just 
 remarking as you came in that it's absurd 
 concealing the fact from ourselves any longer 
 that we men are all polygamous by nature ; 
 and until women know it, and know that 
 it's by no means criminal, we shall not get 
 any further." 
 
 *'And the corollary is .^" asked 
 
 Miller. 
 
 '* That they should have liberty too," 
 replied Harmer, like a flash. 
 
 '* But many men don't and won't practise 
 polygamy," said a quiet man in a corner. 
 
 '' Of course not," said Harmer. ** I mean 
 
 that men are all polygamous by nature, 
 
 whether they practise it or not. I mean 
 
 2 
 
1 8 A Question of Instinct 
 
 that those who do not practise it deny 
 their natures for various reasons/' 
 
 *' Chiefly economical," said Hale cynically. 
 
 *' Or moral prepossessions, or mere 
 cowardice," added the original lecturer; 
 *'or even a quasi-artistic prepossession in 
 favour of the beauty, the ideal fitness, of 
 monogamy. I don't think many men can 
 conscientiously deny this." 
 
 Miller nodded. 
 
 *' It's probably correct, this theory of 
 yours. But then, isn't the real question 
 whether it's right to combat our natures in 
 the matter ? " he asked. 
 
 Harmer snorted. 
 
 ** This kind of thing should be put out- 
 side the question of a moral struggle. Til 
 grant you a perpetual moral struggle in man 
 if you like. But the question of eating pig 
 is a moral one. Eating meat on a Friday 
 is a moral one. Eating meat at all may be 
 
A Question of Instinct 19 
 
 a moral one. But we grant liberty on this 
 question. Where the morality comes in is 
 in not being greedy and selfish. If liberty, 
 true liberty of the sexes, ever arrives, 
 men and women will have all the oppor- 
 tunity they require for moral training and 
 restraint and self-sacrifice/' 
 
 '' How do you make that out, you pro- 
 miscuous prophet?'' said Hale, astounded. 
 
 '' They will have to learn to give up what 
 Is not theirs, and to be fair and just ; that's 
 all the morality I want. However, that's 
 not the present question. If we have an 
 evil it will not cure It to ignore it. What- 
 ever moral doctrines may be preached, the 
 fact remains. Is it best to acknowledge the 
 truth or to go on lying about It ? How 
 shall we cure anything unless we know ? 
 That's the trouble with so many of the 
 writers on the subject. The men don't 
 know the women, and the women don't know 
 
20 A Question of Instinct 
 
 the men. I'll sacrifice my beautifial character 
 and be a martyr to truth. Theoretically I'm 
 a polygamist." 
 
 *' And practically ? " asked his right-hand 
 neighbour. 
 
 '' That's not your business, now, is it ? " 
 urged Harmer, with a twinkle in his eye. 
 *' You see," he went on, *' we delude the 
 poor women into the belief that we are 
 monogamous." 
 
 '' Stuff!" said Hale ; ** no woman believes 
 anything of the kind." 
 
 Harmer smoked for a moment. 
 
 *' You're a debauched character, Hale, and 
 mustn't judge all women by your favourite 
 classes." 
 
 *' Harmer's quite right about the average 
 young English woman," said Miller. 
 
 '' Of course ; and then, when the truth 
 peeps out, they cry, and are disgusted, and 
 object terribly. They ought to understand 
 
A Question of Instinct 21 
 
 men better, and then most of the trouble 
 would disappear," 
 
 *'Are women polyandrous ? " asked Hale 
 quietly. 
 
 *' I think so, in a way," said Harmer. 
 '' But we are simultaneous and successive ; 
 they, as a rule, only successive. And I think 
 the sooner a man knows that it's no reason 
 a woman shall love him in five years because 
 she loves him now we shall have made a 
 considerable step forward. Let us abolish 
 lying ; it's a form of paint and powder ; it 
 ruins a good moral skin, and worsens a bad 
 one. As it stands, monogamy means carry- 
 ing on but one intrigue at a time ; it is 
 mostly confined to innocent young bachelors. 
 Dear, dear me ! how I yearn to speak the 
 truth ! " 
 
 And they all laughed at him good- 
 humouredly. 
 
 *' But you think the women will put up 
 
22 A Question of Instinct 
 
 with polygamy?" asked Hale, who for him 
 was greatly interested in the matter. 
 
 Harmer looked at him quizzically. 
 
 " Hark to ignorance yearning for the 
 truth ! Why, man alive, half of them have 
 to put up with it ! And many who know 
 the world put up with it with hardly a 
 murmur. Some women will say it's a libel, 
 but I'm sure there are numbers of them not 
 ferociously jealous if they can persuade 
 themselves they are the most loved. And 
 for the matter of that, in cases of violent 
 passion, many will accept the second place 
 if they must, not, I admit, without heart- 
 burnings and jealousy and at times a good 
 deal of self-contempt. But the reason of 
 this is, that polygamy is founded not only on 
 the passions but the larger nature of men. 
 It's difficult for a man of wide sympathies to 
 find a correspondence in one woman. This 
 many women see ; and those who accept 
 
A Question of Instinct 23 
 
 the truth always feel that they are the chief, 
 or at least a necessary and beautiful, portion 
 of their lovers' lives." 
 
 ** And when will monogamy really come 
 in ? " asked Miller. *' I suppose, according to 
 your theories, when women are grown up." 
 
 ** That's it, friend of mine," said Harmer. 
 ** When they have cast themselves adrift from 
 dead convention ; when they have achieved 
 freedom, and have given their embryonic 
 energies time to bud and grow — then, with 
 an opener life, they'll have bigger minds 
 and brains, and wider sympathies. There's 
 a good deal of the parasite, the creeper, 
 about women as they are. By-and-by they 
 will stand on their own feet, and give a big - 
 shade. Then monogamy will stand a show. 
 And, whether I'm right or not, I defy any 
 man to swear solemnly that he has not 
 polygamous instincts deeply rooted in him." 
 He blew a snort of contempt against any 
 
24 A Question of Instinct 
 
 one who should declare himself absolutely 
 monogamous. But no one did. The whole 
 room admitted the impeachment in silence. 
 Harmer quitted the hearthrug, and sat down 
 by Miller. 
 
 ** I suppose you are right," said Miller. 
 *' I think we have progressed from absolute 
 promiscuity into polygamy and then into 
 monogamy, and that we shall get back, on 
 a higher plane, to all these institutions. But 
 you can't make a single suggestion about 
 regulating the sexes which is not to be 
 found somewhere." 
 
 ^^Oh, come!" cried Harmer. ^^ Why, I'll 
 wager you anything you like that I can 
 make a suggestion you never heard of!" 
 
 Miller smiled. 
 
 *' I'll bet you a cab fare for the two of 
 us — and, if you live where you did, we can 
 go together — that you can't." 
 
 *' I take it," said Harmer. '' Well, my 
 
A. Question of Instinct 25 
 
 notion is that some day husbands and wives, 
 or whatever name they have, will live in 
 entirely separate houses." 
 
 Miller nodded. 
 
 '* In South America — I think in Venezuela 
 — there is a tribe where the men live on one 
 side of the village street and the women on 
 the other, and they never enter each other's 
 houses, and only meet in the forests." 
 
 Harmer laughed. 
 
 ** Well, I'm hanged! That's near enough. 
 In fact, it goes further. So, if you are coming, 
 we can go together, and I'll pay." 
 
 And the two friends left the club. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 They walked from Piccadilly to Knights- 
 bridge before they thought of taking the 
 cab which Harmer owed Miller ; but then, 
 as they had not met for many months, there 
 was a deal of talk to be got through, and 
 many questions to be asked. 
 
 ** How is your wife ? " asked Harmer 
 finally, as he really hailed a hansom. 
 
 ** Very well, I think," said Miller. *^ But 
 you remember the old trouble ? " 
 Harmer nodded. 
 
 '' I don't think any one but you and 
 she know of it, and sometimes I think 
 it is folly on my part. And yet — no, it 
 can't be ; the desire of offspring is very 
 strong in most of the race who are healthy, 
 
A Question of Instinct 27 
 
 so perhaps it's not morbidly strong in 
 me." 
 
 '' But it troubles you still ? '' 
 ** It does," said Miller ; ** and perhaps it 
 makes it worse for me that, in her heart, I 
 think she is not dissatisfied about it. Poor 
 girl ! she always pretends, but I fancy I 
 can see through some of her little flimsy 
 pretences." 
 
 Harmer smoked, and did not speak for 
 some time as they drove west. 
 
 *' Come now," said he at last, ''have you 
 no children ? " 
 
 " Not that I'm aware of," said the traveller 
 grimly. 
 
 *' Then it seems to me that the lecture 
 which I was delivering when you came into 
 the club might by some men seem extra- 
 ordinarily a p7^oposr 
 
 " It has been a propos in one sense 
 for years," returned Miller; *'but, to tell 
 
28 A Question of Instinct 
 
 the truth, it was more than that to- 
 night." 
 
 " Why ? " asked his friend eagerly. 
 
 ** It is difificult to say exactly," said Miller, 
 turning up the end of his beard and taking 
 it between his teeth, *' but let it be that it 
 was. I think you dropped in one word at 
 the psychological moment. I really believe 
 it might be possible for — for my wife, you 
 know, to understand if I did go crooked 
 in this respect. And yet " 
 
 ** And yet " said Harmer. 
 
 '' And yet," went on the other, '' I just 
 adore her. By God ! there's no woman like 
 her, and no woman who ever will be ! She 
 stands alone, separate, distinct, and extra- 
 ordinary ; it's not my passion for her, though 
 that has never burnt out, but I know 
 it. She knows more, sees more, feels more 
 than any human being I ever met. And 
 she's like day with the sun, and night with 
 
A Question of Instinct 29 
 
 rest to me. When I go off into the wilder- 
 ness it's a wrench that sickens me ; when I 
 come back it's paradise again. But in spite 
 of it all, Harmer, there is polygamy in our 
 blood — there is, and no one will ever believe 
 how I've fought against it. If it had only 
 
 been " And he sank back into the 
 
 corner of the cab sighing. 
 
 Harmer pressed his hand. 
 
 '' Good old man ! don't trouble. What 
 does it all matter ? Trust your nature." 
 
 ** But I've two, man," said Miller des- 
 perately. 
 
 '' Shout with the larger," returned Harmer 
 irreverently. 
 
 ** Which is the larger.^" said Miller, 
 thrusting out his under lip. 
 
 ** Which," said his friend—** which ? Well, 
 as I'm going to get out here, I'll tell you, 
 just as a secret. It's the one that gets the 
 upper hand after a long struggle, my friend." 
 
30 A Question of Instinct 
 
 And, stopping the cab, he jumped down. 
 
 '' Come up to my place any time you 
 like, old man," he cried, *' and if you want 
 any help or any word at any psychological 
 moment let me know, and you shall have 
 it. Good-night." 
 
 And he slipped off into the darkness, 
 leaving Miller, by an oversight of his im- 
 pulsive nature, to pay for the cab after all. 
 
 ** I am done," said John Miller ; '' that's a 
 fact." 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 "In any case," Harmer had once said to 
 Miller, *'one can't be very wrong if one 
 speaks the truth. All real immorality is 
 based on lies of some sort, whether they are 
 spoken or not. It's about the only virtue I 
 care to have. A character for truthfulness, 
 even to one's own temporary disadvantage, 
 is better as a permanent possession than any 
 other quality I know. It saves one a great 
 deal of bitterness." 
 
 This was in Miller's mind when he went 
 out the next day, and he considered it in all 
 its bearings. 
 
 *' I have a good mind to tell Madeline'* 
 he said. *' How would she take it.'* Do I 
 know ? By heavens, no ! Of course an 
 
32 A Question of Instinct 
 
 ordinary woman would either rage, or cry, 
 or turn into stone, and stump off, like the 
 Commendatore, to dreadful music. But she 
 might act like an angel, or she might have 
 a fit, or she might sit down and play funeral 
 marches till she fainted with fatigue, or she 
 might coolly suggest that she should commit 
 suicide. Yet she has often said that she 
 would forgive me anything, so long as I 
 really loved her. She knows that, even 
 when she drives me to despair." 
 
 He got to his club, and sat down in the 
 quiet tea-room for an hour. 
 
 ** Of all the other women I know, on my 
 soul I think Isabel Maitland is far and away 
 their superior as far as brains, knowledge, 
 and lack of conventionality go. I don*t 
 suppose she knows how things stand with 
 me — I haven't written to her for two years — 
 and I have no friends who could tell her. 
 I think Harmer is the only man in England 
 
A Question of Instinct 33 
 
 who knows anything about it, and he doesn't 
 talk of other men's affairs. I wonder if 
 she's in London still ? " 
 
 He ordered tea, and, after drinking a cup, 
 sat down and wrote a letter. 
 
 '' I don't know whether you care to see 
 such an irregular correspondent and visitor, 
 but if you do I am in London now for some 
 time, having just returned from Sikkim. 
 If you are at home I could call almost any 
 afternoon or evening. 
 
 ** Your old friend, 
 
 **JoHN Miller.*' 
 
 And having dropped this note into the 
 box, he went to the library of the Geo- 
 graphical Society, where he read and wrote 
 the whole of the afternoon. But his mind 
 often left the printed page as he thought 
 of Madeline. 
 
 3 
 
34 A Question of Instinct 
 
 '' I feel like a mean beast," he muttered ; 
 ** and yet, if she were only genuinely sym- 
 pathetic in this one thing, she might be the 
 all-round ideal companion that Harmer was 
 painting as the woman of the future, when 
 monogamy shall be no longer an ideal." 
 
 Then he wrote a little, and dropped his 
 pen to think of Isabel Maitland. 
 
 "It is curious how steadily we have been 
 mere friends. I wonder now whether she 
 has got over that fancy for me which I knew 
 she had when I went away two years ago. 
 It was odd how I found that out. If it 
 hadn't been for my mad, intolerable passion 
 for Madeline, which tortured me that once 
 in Madrid to crying out to her as I might 
 have done to any sympathetic soul, I should 
 never have known." 
 
 For the story of his courtship had been 
 such as one might expect with a woman of 
 Madeline s strange and tempestuous nature. 
 
A Question of Instinct 35 
 
 When he met her in Malaga she was then 
 engaged to a Spaniard, and he had only 
 succeeded in winning her at the expense of 
 half ruining himself, of making Madeline 
 ill, and of fighting a duel in which both 
 combatants had been desperately wounded, 
 
 '' If," thought Miller, ^* Isabel is still fond 
 
 of me, why " and then he leant on his 
 
 elbows, and stared out of the window. 
 
 ** She always acted and posed as an 
 advanced woman free from any moral super- 
 stitions. She always talked openly of these 
 perpetual questions of sex. Perhaps she 
 would understand. She knows I hate 
 marriage in theory, and if I remember 
 rightly she argued against it herself. And 
 I am certain she feels the emptiness of hei* 
 life. Now her mother is dead she has no 
 one to think of directly ; she is practically as 
 free as any woman can be." 
 
 He tried with a certain honesty to think 
 
36 A Question of Instinct 
 
 what he could offer this woman, and he 
 shook his head at the prospect. 
 
 '' No, it's not fair ; and of course it will 
 come to nothing. I'm only just dreaming, 
 and in my dream playing with fire. But 
 if anything comes of it Til tell her all the 
 truth as far as possible. She shall know me 
 as well as I can tell her, and then I shall 
 be free from the bitterest responsibility of 
 all. She is a woman, not a child ; and a 
 reasonable, intellectual woman, not a stormy- 
 whirlwind, half human, half divine, angelic, 
 diabolic, like Madeline." 
 
 And somehow he laughed a little and 
 cheered up and smiled. 
 
 '' After all, the hunting instinct isn't dead. 
 Madeline told me not long ago she hoped 
 it never would be. I wonder how much she 
 meant it." 
 
 He went downstairs and played a game of 
 billiards and laughed almost merrily with Hale. 
 
A Question of Instinct 37 
 
 '* Have you seen the advocate of polygamy 
 about to-day ? " he asked. 
 
 But Hale was a wreck. He said gloomily 
 that he felt like a living corpse, and added 
 that drinking brandy and soda up to three 
 in the morning did not appear to suit him. 
 He would only talk of death, and the destruc- 
 tion of dynasties, and the downfall of nations. 
 His lowness of spirits acted like a tonic on 
 Miller, who began to feel as strong as a 
 giant and as eager for combat. There was 
 the promise of one for him in the air. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 At the time Miller wrote to Isabel Maitland 
 she was occupying a small Chelsea flat, one 
 of a block originally built for workmen which 
 had been seized on by clerks and many un- 
 attached people of the lower middle class. 
 She found this gave her more liberty a 
 a small price than was to be procured in 
 lodgings. 
 
 *'So many landladies are apt to assume a 
 guardianship over a single woman's morality," 
 she said. 
 
 And feeling sure of herself both physically 
 
 and morally, for she was not devoid of 
 
 courage, after her mother's death, which left 
 
 her with fifty pounds a year, she set up for 
 
 herself. 
 
 38 
 
A Question of Instinct 39 
 
 Yet she found it desolate enough work. 
 She had few friends, and many of them lived 
 in far-off quarters of X-ondon. To these 
 she attached herself without enthusiasm for 
 the most part, but with a steady, enduring 
 faith which found a fair reward in certain 
 cases. But of intimate friends she had none ; 
 there was no other woman whom she would 
 ^ have admitted into the inmost circle of her 
 mind. And certainly no one but herself 
 knew how she missed Miller's occasional 
 presence or his rare letters. She even hid 
 from herself the knowledge that her affection 
 for him, often for a moment in revolt against 
 some brutal speech or strange motion of this 
 man's mind, had grown into a concealed 
 passion. She often recalled, however, the 
 day in Madrid, whither she had gone with 
 her mother to see a dying relative, when she 
 discovered that Miller was passionately in 
 Jove with another woman. He had spoken 
 
40 A Question of Instinct 
 
 oddly, angrily, with a mixture of emotions, 
 but she could see how he was tortured and 
 wasted by madness and desire and the im- 
 possibility of things. She had cried out to 
 herself desolately, for at the sight of him 
 her heart had opened. Now the gates closed 
 again, and in her soul there was the last 
 anguish of a woman's mind. She thought 
 that her life was fixed in its one line ; she 
 expected to yield no more flowers ; she had 
 to renounce love. 
 
 Yet if she renounced it, and if she was 
 by no means so beautiful as to command 
 it, she had for some people a charm as 
 subtle and as incapable of satisfactory analysis 
 as an acquired relish for some peculiar sauce 
 or uncommon fruit. Not a single feature 
 of her piquant and mobile face was in 
 accordance with the dignity of ideal art, 
 and none taken by itself was even mediocre 
 inits modelling. Yet her eyes, which were 
 
A Question of Instinct 41 
 
 sometimes black and sometimes brown, could 
 sparkle or grow soft ; ^nd when they were 
 tender they gave her a beauty always moving 
 to those intelligent enough to perceive in 
 her an odd personality, which, according to 
 its kind, was perfect, if perhaps a little 
 bizarre. She was small and perfectly formed, 
 and she moved with a certain dainty coquetry 
 rare among English women after their first 
 youth is passed, and it was certain that hers 
 had long gone by ; for she was at least 
 thirty, and when solitude or ennui possessed 
 her she looked it to the full. If anything 
 moved her to disgust or anger, the quaint 
 pouting of her mouth, in her lighter moods 
 of simulated pettishness, gave way to a 
 rigidity which might have seemed charac- 
 teristic of a religious mind. And yet Isabel 
 Maitland, since she abhorred dogma and 
 professed a crude agnosticism, would have 
 stoutly averred that she was devoid of 
 
42 A Question of Instinct 
 
 religion in any of its known forms. But 
 then she believed she was humorous because 
 she could laugh, which was as if a man should 
 show his teeth as proof of his qualities in 
 gastronomic appreciation. 
 
 To one without humour life is ever difficult; 
 and if to such a lack be added a lack of fibre 
 and resolution akin to hardness, the world 
 becomes an impossible place of absurd and 
 cruel processes of trial and torture. That 
 Isabel never found it this even in her worst 
 periods of discouragement proved that she 
 possessed the strength to endure and to 
 suffer without yielding. And many years of 
 struggle in surroundings which nothing but 
 her quality of fanatic would have rendered 
 endurable, gave her a tinge of bitterness, 
 discernible to a subtle observer, and a real 
 hardness, obvious to any one with eyes, 
 towards those for whom she had no affection. 
 
 To live in perpetual conflict with h^r 
 
A Question of Instinct 43 
 
 mother, who was both Puritan and religious, 
 had tried her patience to the utmost. It 
 was only after a prolonged and bitter battle 
 that she achieved the liberty of freedom so 
 far as to be absolved from the outward 
 observance of formal religious duties. For 
 at last she extorted a silent acquiescence 
 in matters of church going which after many 
 years was, owing to her mother's failing 
 strength, converted finally into permission 
 to occasionally speak her own mind and 
 to draw conclusions from a major premiss 
 of belief which the elder woman believed 
 to be essentially damnable. And in addition 
 to the domestic conflict there was a perpetual 
 fight with the world for social recognition. 
 Mrs. Maitland, being ambitious of a circle, 
 was capable of pinching to keep up appear- 
 ances which her annuity of three hundred 
 a year by no means justified. And in this 
 Isabel was not wholly at two with her mother. 
 
44 A Question of Instinct 
 
 '' Isabel teaches music, my dear," Mrs. 
 Maitland said a thousand times, '' because 
 she has peculiar ideas of independence. 
 And, indeed, with a girl of her strange 
 character, I sometimes think it best that 
 she should do some work : she will take 
 no interest in domestic matters." 
 
 Isabel, indeed, knew no more of household 
 work or management than if she had been 
 the daughter of some rich parvenu ; and 
 when in her new life she had to consider 
 such details she went helplessly to shop- 
 keepers and, throwing herself on their mercy, 
 asked for provisions and information with 
 an innocence characteristic of a learned pro- 
 fessor in his relations with the common 
 housekeeper. 
 
 From her earliest childhood she had buried 
 herself in books, and consumed her hours 
 in the acquisition of knowledge ; and even 
 when her mother s death made it necessary 
 
A Question of Instinct 45 
 
 for her to work much harder, in her leisure 
 she still read unceasingly. For, in addition 
 to her love of mere knowledge, she needed 
 an anodyne, and drugged herself with books 
 in order to attain phantasmal possession of 
 lost hope. She thought that Miller had 
 utterly disappeared, and, knowing he was 
 without ', relatives, she could see no great 
 reason for a man of his disposition to return 
 to England. She even believed by now 
 that her passion for him was dead, or at 
 least dying, but when his letter came she 
 saw how she had deceived herself. 
 
 '* What of the other woman ? " she asked. 
 *' Ah ! perhaps she has gone out of his life. 
 Such a passion could not last. Did he not 
 himself say that it was murderous and 
 diabolical at times ? And yet he said she 
 was the most beautiful, the sweetest woman 
 he ever knew." 
 
 But all lovers say that; and Isabel was not 
 
46 A Question of Instinct 
 
 uninclined to look on her unknown rival as 
 some demon — some she-devil of curious, 
 subtle, and poisonous arts, who could suck 
 blood and give madness to a lover, and 
 then laugh. She recalled a chance transla- 
 tion of a poem of Heine's which she had 
 once seen. 
 
 " She had them bound 
 And tenderly drowned. 
 So sorrowful swim the dead." 
 
 But at any rate he was not dead, and was 
 in England, and cared to see her. If it 
 meant nothing more than the old friend- 
 ship, it was good to have him come back. 
 It pleased her to think of the man's lined 
 face, and his pointed beard, and his curiously 
 animal eyes, which were sometimes hawk- 
 like and sometimes soft as a tame deer's. 
 And she heard his voice again, with its 
 uncommon timbre ; she saw him stand near 
 her, so much taller than herself, and take 
 
A Question of Instinct 47 
 
 her hands, and look at her with at least 
 affection in those eyes ; and she heard him 
 say, ''Well, well, my friend, so we do meet 
 again ? " And her own eyes softened, and 
 her colour rose no little, as she sat down 
 to answer his note. But how carefully and 
 coldly she phrased it ! 
 
 '* I am not now in Highgate, but your 
 letter came to me here. I am glad to know 
 you are back in England ; and if you care 
 to call some evening during the week I 
 shall be pleased to have a talk with you. 
 Perhaps Thursday would suit me best, about 
 half-past eight* 
 
 ''Your friend, 
 
 " Isabel Maitland." 
 
 When it was gone she blamed herself 
 for not saying Monday. Why not Monday, 
 indeed ? Why should she wait so long 
 
48 A Question of Instinct 
 
 to see her friend ? For, of course, he was 
 only a friend. No, he would never be 
 more ; it was absurd of her to think of 
 him in any other light. He would no more 
 settle down than the hawk he resembled. 
 Always mad and wild, he would go on 
 through life as a kind of superhuman demon 
 — a queer, strange, out-of-the-way mortal, not 
 to be judged quite as others — a genius who 
 had done nothing but explore unknown parts 
 of far-off lands, a man whose name was 
 unknown save to a very few. 
 
 So she passed the time from Saturday to 
 Thursday. But ever and again, when her 
 intellect loosed its hold, either at night or 
 in some moment of dream before the day 
 caught and fixed her soul, her fibres were 
 relaxed, and the senses sang clearer ; she 
 knew her own heart and pleaded for a little 
 joy. Life as it went was so devoid of real 
 pleasure — and how good it seemed to let 
 4 
 
A Question of Instinct 49 
 
 herself go for a moment ! Her barred 
 emotions cried, like Sterne's starling, for 
 the Elysian fields and the sun and lucid 
 air. 
 
 And so Thursday came, and with it Miller, 
 who in the interval had put his intentions 
 concerning Isabel far into the background. 
 
 *' Why should I trouble her and myself 
 for nothing?" he had asked. ''She is a 
 good little woman and an old friend. Yet 
 I wonder ? How strangely strong the 
 temptation is when one knows a woman 
 loves one! It's provocation of the ex- 
 tremest order. It will be best for her if 
 she does not care any more. And yet — 
 why best ? I am a slave to common forms 
 of speech myself." 
 
 He walked up the steps of the entrance- 
 hall, and, after some climbing, discovered 
 her number. She heard his step, and went 
 towards the door ; but she checked herself, 
 
50 A Question of Instinct 
 
 and waited for his knock. When he entered 
 he seemed to fill her little hall. 
 
 ** I am glad to see you again," he said. 
 And he shook hands with visible pleasure. 
 
 ^' Let me take your hat and stick," she 
 answered, with apparent calmness. '' This 
 is a very tiny place, and there is no room 
 for anything else but you in the room." 
 
 ''And now," she said, w^hen she came 
 back and closed the door, ''tell me about 
 yourself." 
 
 She saw a veil come over his eyes, and 
 knew he would not speak openly. Recog- 
 nising that look of old, its return now made 
 her wince a little, for she knew by it that 
 his life was as it had been, with parts 
 in it of which he would not speak openly. 
 
 ** I have only just come back from Sikkim," 
 he said lightly. 
 
 *'And where is that?" 
 
 '* In the north of India. I went to study 
 
A Question of Instinct 51 
 
 Buddhism, and to plan a possible journey 
 in Thibet." 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 *' Like all travellers, you hanker after 
 Lhassa ? " she asked. 
 
 '*As all human beings after the impos- 
 sible," he returned. '' But tell me of your- 
 self. How came you to leave Highgate ? " 
 
 She looked grave. 
 
 '*Then you do not know my mother 
 died eighteen months ago ? " 
 
 ** I did know," he said, **and I am sorry. 
 And yet she was an old woman, and not, 
 as I think, unhappy. She had lived in 
 her youth.'' 
 
 *' It altered everything for me." 
 
 '' Of course. You are content here ? " 
 
 '* I am content." 
 
 But he saw the flicker of a lid and the 
 drooped lashes. 
 
 ** I do a good deal of work," went on 
 
52 A Question of Instinct 
 
 Isabel, after a pause. ** I teach music and 
 singing. I manage to live without trouble, 
 and I need very little." 
 
 Miller growled most discourteously. 
 
 '' It's not living — that," he said. 
 
 ** It's a woman's lot," returned Isabel, 
 with a slight flush. 
 
 ** Then the sooner women kick over the 
 traces the better," retorted Miller. '' But 
 there — they are kicking vigorously, and will 
 kick more." 
 
 ** What do you propose I should do?" 
 asked Isabel. '' Is it not all a woman can 
 do to earn her living and be independent ? " 
 
 *' It's a good deal — a very great deal," 
 said John, biting the end of his beard ; 
 **but it's not living." 
 
 '* What is living ? " asked Isabel, trembling 
 slightly. 
 
 '' Hum," said Miller — '' I suppose I have 
 lived." 
 
A Question of Instinct 53 
 
 '' But you are a man, of course/* said 
 Isabel, with a little bitterness. 
 
 *' And you have as much right to liberty 
 as a man." 
 
 '' I have my liberty," cried Isabel, rather 
 angrily. 
 
 '' Exactly so ; and don't use it, as I guess.'* 
 
 Isabel looked him in the face. 
 
 '' I don't understand." 
 
 ** No, more do I," said Miller steadily. 
 
 '' Then let us talk about yourself," said 
 Isabel. '* How are things with you ? You 
 remember when I last saw you ? " 
 
 Miller's face twitched, and he nodded 
 a little gloomily. 
 
 '* I never knew how it ended. How is 
 —she?" 
 
 *^A11 right," said Miller briefly; but his 
 face softened again, and Isabel saw his mind 
 wander. She could not follow him, but the 
 look in his eyes made her heart ache. 
 
54 A Question of Instinct 
 
 **You will tell me nothing," she said 
 petulantly and with a little coquettish plead- 
 ing, as she bent towards him. 
 
 "We are old friends," he answered. 
 ** But what is the use? You must imagine 
 what you like." 
 
 For a moment she imagined what pleased 
 her, which was a very different thing from 
 what his words and tone suggested. 
 
 ** Then we won't quarrel," she said 
 pleasantly. ** I know you are a magnifi- 
 cently obstinate person. Let it be enough 
 you have returned to England caring 
 sufficiently for an old friend to come to see 
 her. Tell me about Sikkim, or about 
 Buddhism, or about your last new fad. Are 
 you crusading about anything ? " 
 
 *' I have had the crusading beaten out 
 of me," said Miller, relaxing. '* I'm like the 
 Christian crusading bishop who only brought 
 back from the Holy Land the earth to 
 
A Question of Instinct 55 
 
 make the Campo Santo at Pisa. I can 
 bury my dead theories in holy ground. A 
 man has only so much strength to fight 
 the world, and mine is very nearly done 
 for." 
 
 '' Then you mean," said Isabel, *' that you 
 are settled and fixed and have no more 
 volcanoes and earthquakes ? You don't want 
 to shock society or burst a convention ? 
 You have given up conquering ? " 
 
 And somehow there was an odd provoca- 
 tion she little meant or understood in her 
 voice. Miller looked up at her from under 
 his heavy eyebrows. 
 
 '' I am not given over to convention, my 
 friend ; and in the peacefulest place there 
 is something to conquer." 
 
 '' Yes, oneself," said Isabel. 
 
 '' That's not a peaceful place. One can 
 go crusading after little things or big ones. 
 I shall always go in for the attack. I should 
 
^6 A Question of Instinct 
 
 fight my friends if there was no one else to 
 fight with." 
 
 ^^Not all, I hope?" said Isabel. 
 
 And there was a moment's silence. In 
 it a cloud came down on Miller's face. 
 
 *' I'm sure you're not happy," she said 
 suddenly ; and, leaning forward, she laid her 
 hand on his. 
 
 *' No, not exactly, I imagine," said Miller 
 frankly ; and he saw her eyes fill. 
 
 *^Why, why?" 
 
 '' I can't say," said Miller. '' Perhaps I 
 may some day. No — perhaps I won't." 
 
 *' Do ! " she said. And he rose. She 
 imitated his example. 
 
 They stood close together for a moment — 
 for a long moment — and then he took her 
 hands. 
 
 '' Poor little woman ! " he said. '' Do you 
 find life satisfactory ? " 
 
 She quailed and blenched, and as he saw 
 
A Question of Instinct ^'j 
 
 that the male rose up in him, and what 
 was thrust away came forward again and 
 dominated his mind. He drew her towards 
 him very Hghtly, and she resisted, 
 
 '' No." 
 
 And he drew her again. 
 
 *'Why not? What is Hfe, and what does 
 it mean ? Is it folly or wisdom, or a mixture 
 of both?" 
 
 She failed utterly, and came to his arms. 
 He bent and kissed her. 
 
 *' She loves me," he said. '' And why 
 not, if I tell her the truth ? For I am fond 
 of her myself, in a different way." 
 
 '' You should not," said Isabel, in distress, 
 freeing herself at last. '' What do you think 
 of me ? " 
 
 '' You know I am fond of you," said Miller 
 quietly. 
 
 "' But " said Isabel. And then she 
 
58 A Question of Instinct 
 
 broke off; for she was not at all sure of 
 the past, and doubted whether it were not 
 the present also. She understood a little 
 of Miller's impulsive, dominating character, 
 and almost touched the truth in that moment 
 of enlightenment. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 It was only natural that Miller, when he 
 reached home at a late hour after a long 
 walk, should enter his own den and sit there 
 smoking. He had a great deal to consider ; 
 and yet, as he considered, it seemed to him 
 that there was no need of thought. Always 
 necessarian and fatalistic to the very marrow 
 of his bones, he saw the roots of the day's 
 flowers deep in the past ; he could account 
 for the genealogy of his words ; he saw 
 himself arising from the ashes after each 
 fiery crisis essentially the same man still. 
 The love of excitement was become a per- 
 petual fever ; he could only find peace in the 
 prospect of some hazard. If the danger 
 were physical and arduous so much the 
 
6o A Question of Instinct 
 
 better, but if it should be no more than the 
 chance of mental disaster, or of possible 
 reprobation, he would welcome it just the 
 same. It was this which sent him on his 
 travels. Probably no desire of public esti- 
 mation bade him risk his life : he cared little 
 for the praise or blame of the indifferent 
 world. A smile from Madeline, or, indeed, 
 from any one who was momentarily pleasing 
 to him, would have made him risk more 
 than the prospective distinction of decorations 
 or orders ; at least, he believed so when he 
 saw little prospect of obtaining them. 
 
 To a man of such an emotional yet logical 
 temperament — for it was a logical estimate 
 of the worth of fame which partly made him 
 what he was — the prospect of a new liaison, 
 with an end in view, excited both his love 
 of pleasure and his own disdain. Perhaps 
 for the very reason that he had no children, 
 love had become a means of seeking for 
 
A Question of Instinct 61 
 
 ideal satisfaction which his reason, in a 
 disregarded whisper, affirmed could never 
 be attained. For ever needing something 
 which no woman and no sky could give 
 him, he was perpetually tempted to change 
 both ; and if Madeline had not been such a 
 remarkable personality, perpetually provok- 
 ing and aloof, she would never have held 
 him beyond the common duration of a 
 common passion. And because she lacked 
 the power and the desire to satisfy one 
 instinct, she appeared sometimes unable to 
 satisfy any. But nevertheless, when he was 
 contemplating a new course of action, he 
 was angered at his own want of faith; and 
 ancient prejudices, founded perhaps on right, 
 made him discontented with his own theory 
 of morals. He was ashamed of deceiving 
 Madeline, and wavered doubtfully as reason 
 combated desire. And as he reached this 
 point, knowing, if there were no new motive 
 
62 A Question of Instinct 
 
 given him, how he would drift, the door of 
 his room opened and Madeline came in. 
 She was clad in a dressing-gown, and her 
 hair, not yet done up, rolled in marvellous 
 masses of colour over her shoulders and 
 hung down to her waist. In the lamplight 
 it looked dull bronze, with here and there a 
 flash of red fire in it, and with her pale, clear 
 skin and white robe it made her unearthly 
 and magical. She came towards him slowly, 
 moving as if she were in a dream ; but her 
 eyes were open, and their pupils widely 
 dilated. 
 
 ''How could I love any other woman?'' 
 said John to himself, as he held out his 
 hands to her with a smile which was appeal- 
 ing and pathetic. For he was of the world 
 and she was of heaven, or of some strange 
 country that borders on both. 
 
 She took one hand and held it against 
 her smooth cheek, which felt fevered ; then 
 
A Question of Instinct 63 
 
 she sat down on a stool, and leant against 
 his knee. She looked at him steadily for a 
 long moment, till he bent and kissed her. 
 
 '' My poor boy," she murmured, '' I 
 wonder if I have ruined you ? " 
 
 *' Never !" said Miller. '^What is wrong 
 with you to-night, Madeline ? " 
 
 " I could not sleep," she said. '' I felt 
 awake — wide awake — so awake that it seemed 
 sleep would never come to me again. And 
 since I went upstairs I have been seeing 
 all my life, and all yours ; and I have been 
 wondering if I have not made you more 
 unhappy than if you had never seen me." 
 
 She looked up at him as though to read 
 his mind. 
 
 ** Ah, yes, dear," said Miller, " more un- 
 happy, but more happy, too. It is enough 
 for me to think that if I had never known 
 you I should not have existed at all. I 
 can't conceive not having loved you, any 
 
64 A Question of Instinct 
 
 more than I can imagine what I should 
 have been if I had not been born." 
 
 '' But, John," she said, '' I don t give you 
 everything, and I torment you by my moods. 
 You are moody and strange yourself; and 
 when I see you asleep, or even without a 
 smile, you look so sad, so unutterably sad. 
 And I am so melancholy, or so strange, and 
 so inexplicable, when I should be calm and 
 cheerful." 
 
 ''You are yourself, my dear," replied the 
 man, stroking her hair ; '' and if you were 
 otherwise perhaps we should not have loved 
 each other. It is well as it is." 
 
 But Madeline shook her head. 
 
 '' No, no ; it is not well. For two days 
 I have been thinking a great deal about 
 many things, and I have come to tell you. 
 I like to tell you everything that I can ex- 
 plain ; for, of course, you know sometimes 
 we cannot explain thoughts in words — don't 
 
A Question of Instinct 65 
 
 you ? Say you do, John ; because I want 
 you to try and understand it." 
 
 He bent and kissed her forehead. 
 
 *' Why, child, of course — of course." 
 
 And he, too, would have liked to tell 
 her everything — only now the outside life 
 seemed shameful, and the world was far 
 away. 
 
 She pressed his hand. 
 
 *' You know how I love you ? Yes, yes. 
 And I want you to understand more : I 
 want you to see that you could do nothing 
 which would make me love you less." 
 
 ** What — nothing ? " asked Miller, dropping 
 his eyes. 
 
 *' Nothing at all ? I think you might 
 even be cruel and angry with me, and I 
 should forgive you. For I don't think I 
 have what they call a proper spirit. Per- 
 haps the trouble and strangeness of life 
 have been too much for me: perhaps I'm 
 
 5 
 
66 A Question of Instinct 
 
 quite broken down. But I am what I am ; 
 and I love you, and I want you to be 
 happy." 
 
 She hid her head partly in her own hair 
 and partly against his hand and knee. Her 
 hair opened at the back, and through it 
 Miller stroked the white nape of her neck. 
 She w^ent on talking. 
 
 *'You are a strange, wild man, John — a 
 savage and a genius — and I see I don't quite 
 fill your life. I think you once said it was 
 quite possible for a man to love many 
 women at once — one, say, for her passion, 
 one for her beauty, one for her intellect and 
 sympathy — though, of course, they would all 
 have to be sympathetic. Didn't you say that 
 once ? " 
 
 ''Something like it," answered Miller. 
 
 '' Then," said Madeline, '' I want you to 
 love some one else." 
 
 " And give you up ? " cried Miller. 
 
A Question of Instinct 67 
 
 She looked at him with the faintest flicker 
 of a smile 
 
 '' I don't think you could, John. But I 
 know what you want, — what your life wants 
 what your instincts want, — and I can't give 
 it you." 
 
 She opened her hands with a gesture of 
 pathetic despair. 
 
 ** And," she went on, in a whisper, '* don't 
 be angry with me, dear, but I so often think 
 I would not if I could by wishing it. I 
 don't think I should have the right to give 
 any human being my own temperament, my 
 own mind, my own troubled spirit ; it would 
 be wrong. Oh, John, John ! love some one 
 else a little, and don't hate me, or go away 
 from me altogether — not altogether ! " 
 
 And she clung to him closer and closer, 
 until at last he bent down and lifted her up 
 and held her against his heart. As he raised 
 her, he felt the tears run down her cheeks. 
 
68 A Question of Instinct 
 
 '' I shall not be angry, John ; and if — if you 
 had a child I would try to love it. I would 
 love it — I would ! " 
 
 And, struggling with many emotions, her 
 self-control gave way, and she burst into a 
 passion of weeping. In the midst of the 
 paroxysms she spoke again. 
 
 " I want you to do it. Many women love 
 you, I know. I should not think it wrong. 
 It might make you so much happier." 
 
 But he could not speak or do aught but 
 try to sooth her with inarticulate murmurs, 
 as one hushes a child. 
 
 '' Be calm, dear girl — my own dear," he 
 said, and a tear ran down his own lined 
 face. And then she rose. 
 
 '' I will go upstairs now," she said. ** I 
 am better. I think I shall sleep to-night." 
 
 But he carried her up himself; and she 
 lay in his arms, with her hands locked round 
 his neck. 
 
A Question of Instinct 69 
 
 '' Whatever you do I shall always love 
 you," she said. 
 
 And he listened, and knew it for a truth 
 eternal as life, immortal in her very ashes. 
 Yet then he renounced the earth and the 
 unborn child, and, dominated by her beautiful 
 spirit, was purged of the world and born 
 anew, until the third day thereafter. 
 
 For then nature returned once more after 
 her unnatural shame ; and she budded and 
 bourgeoned, and clad herself in the flowers 
 and leaves of spring, claiming as her own 
 the Passion of the Summer and the Fruit of 
 the Ending Year. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 In the meantime, seeing that Miller neither 
 wrote nor came again, Isabel Maitland went 
 through strange experiences. For one thing, 
 she was alarmed to see the abyss of the 
 senses opened up before her; and for another, 
 almost shamed to recognise the intoxicated 
 delirium with which she could have plunged 
 into its depths. In spite of her strength, 
 and in spite of her refusal of moral sanctions 
 based on religion, she was moral in her 
 colder moods ; and the distinction of un- 
 morality as opposed to immorality, which 
 appealed so to the social anarch Harmer, 
 was in its essence alien from her nature. 
 
 But the shock at her first plunge into the 
 flood of the senses was only passing. She 
 
A Question of Instinct 71 
 
 recognised its inevitability under certain 
 conditions, and certainly would have rejoiced 
 to see herself freed from solitude if she were 
 to share life with Miller. Yet that was the 
 point. How much did she know of him, 
 how far could she trust him, and, bitterest of 
 all, how far could he trust himself.'^ She 
 knew his emotional nature, his revolt against 
 law, and his incitements to the breaking it 
 on the part of others. What did he mean 
 by saying her life was not ** living''? As 
 she sat in the darkness considering it, she 
 heard his voice out of the long past : 
 
 '' To live is to satisfy to the full all our 
 powers and faculties. He who has not 
 satiated his soul, his body, his spirit, has not 
 lived. To be physical, spiritual, intellectual 
 and religious, either at once or in due order, 
 is Life." 
 
 So he had by implication accused her of 
 a buried talent. Would he then have been 
 
72 A Question of Instinct 
 
 better pleased if he had found her full and 
 occupied, perhaps loving some other man ? 
 She revolted against the notion, and yet 
 conceived it as possible with some jealousy 
 on his part. Again she heard his voice : 
 
 ** A man loves all women. He is essen- 
 tially a sultan. To marry is a confession of 
 failure." 
 
 This, then, was perhaps the real deep 
 distinction between men and women — a 
 distinction painful to those saturated with 
 monogamous ideals, but none the less not 
 to be avoided, not to be put on one side 
 with shrieks of horror and disgust. 
 
 Then, again, he might have really come 
 to her at last : this was his method of love- 
 making. And again she denied her own 
 soul its desire. Of a certain, this other 
 woman was still to the fore, still alive, still 
 dominating his life. If she could only 
 believe her influence was passing even now 
 
A Question of Instinct 73 
 
 But as the days went by, and he made no 
 sign, neither writing nor calling, she became 
 bitter, and her spirit failed. His hands and 
 lips had been full of cruelty; he had given 
 way to a sensual impulse, and had not 
 regarded the old claim she had on his 
 forbearance. It was more than cruel, it was 
 wicked, and its effects spread into the life 
 of her days and her nights. Her little 
 peace and acquired content were gone ; her 
 little painfully grown garden of common 
 flowers trampled down. She saw nothing 
 beautiful in the world ; there was no joy in 
 the sky, or the river, or the colour of any 
 blossom ; all pleasure had gone out of her. 
 
 Then on the first day of his spiritual 
 repentance Miller wrote to her. 
 
 '' Forgive me if I have made life harder 
 to you." 
 
 This was all. If he had made life harder, 
 she thought — if! He had made it as hard 
 
74 A Question of Instinct 
 
 as it could be made, surely, and as surely he 
 must have known it. For he had surprised 
 her secret ; he knew that she loved him, and 
 that touched her with the womanly shame 
 which is based on the instinct that recognises 
 the polygamous instinct in man. He had 
 said once that with most men this was 
 sufficient to set them in pursuit. Were they 
 then like dogs or cattle that will pursue 
 the flying ? Her ideal picture of the man 
 was strangely blotted and disfigured, though 
 even yet she did not doubt that in her 
 delineation of him her knowledge had been 
 sure. She conceived she knew his faults as 
 she did his features. This was perhaps an 
 aberration : he was often strange in manner, 
 perhaps not always wholly sane. 
 
 And a week later she heard again from 
 him, asking if he might come and see her. 
 This letter she answered with deliberation; 
 but she did answer it, and bade him come. 
 
A Question of Instinct "j^ 
 
 *' What am I to think of you — you, my 
 old friend ? Am I no better than one to 
 be hunted, to be made a quarry of? Had 
 not our old friendship entitled me to nobler, 
 to more generous, conduct ? " 
 
 But nevertheless she said '' come," and 
 hoped strangely. And on his part he was 
 almost sublimely and egotistically uncon- 
 scious of the disaster he had caused — far 
 more unconscious of it than he would have 
 been in the old days before bitter suffering 
 had made him, as it does all but the 
 noblest characters, selfish and self-centred. 
 
 Being now set free in his mind by 
 Madeline's tacit recognition of a peculiar 
 liberty, he allowed a curious passion for 
 Isabel to grow in his heart. In the days 
 before he had met the w^oman with whom he 
 lived, he had certainly been near marrying 
 Isabel, or at least near asking her to be 
 his wife. For at that time, and till an 
 
76 A Question of Instinct 
 
 episode in his life had set him thinking, he 
 had not been set so strongly against marriage. 
 It was on more than one occasion the merest 
 chance that prevented him trying his fate 
 in this direction. Twice when he had 
 practically made up his mind, Isabel had 
 repelled him by a peculiar coldness which 
 he had ignorantly attributed to a lack of 
 affection in her nature, when he should have 
 been aware that it was a screen of reserve. 
 On another occasion she had dogmatically 
 and successfully controverted him about a 
 matter of fact when his nerves were in a 
 state of abnormal irritation. His vanity had 
 suffered, and the question was never asked. 
 If on one occasion she had gone on his dis- 
 creet and friendly invitation, to the same 
 coast town in North Wales in which he was 
 staying, she might have married him if she 
 had so desired. He wished to see a certain 
 independence in her ; and had she possessed 
 
A Question of Instinct 'j^ 
 
 no more than the strength requisite to defy 
 her mother's dictum on the point he would 
 have been amply satisfied. But so much 
 strength she had not possessed; and, indeed, 
 he attributed her refusal, not wholly unjustly, 
 to a belief on her part that it was not right 
 to disregard conventionalities. This had 
 been the first indication to him that she 
 was less free than her talk would have 
 led him to believe. 
 
 But as she imagined him other than he 
 was, and formed her idol after her own 
 desired image, so he, equally anthropomorphic 
 in passion, created her again according 
 to his own desire. She w^ould see things 
 with his eyes, and all would go strangely, 
 impossibly well. As if he had known any- 
 thing out of the common law, fashioned 
 wearily by mortals, go without accident in 
 his own life of catastrophe. Yet in one 
 thing he did right, though therein he showed 
 
yS A Question of Instinct 
 
 strange ignorance of all women in his 
 imagined knowledge of one. 
 
 ** She shall know the truth — know me 
 as I am, for what I am. I will get 
 nothing by lies, nothing by subterfuge, 
 though I sue and plead in strange fashion.' 
 
 Surely, then, there was ironic laughter in 
 the haunted air about him — the laughter 
 of dear, dead women, glad to be deceived 
 in the ancient order of the appointed 
 world. And, with that, the laughter too 
 of lovers who had lied sweetly, and pleaded, 
 under all the season's colours of natural 
 fraud, to obtain their heart's desire and 
 continue a fresh world, that in its turn 
 would live and love and fashion alluring 
 falsehood. 
 
 ** I am what I am. Let her know," 
 he said ; and when he entered he took her 
 in his arms and kissed her on the mouth. 
 
 ** I mean not to lie to you," he said 
 
A Question of Instinct 79 
 
 again aloud. '' I suppose, according to 
 common notions, I am a bad man. Why 
 don't you send me away ? Perhaps it 
 would have been better, Isabel, not to let 
 me come." 
 
 She was constrained and severe. 
 
 ''I do not understand you. What am 
 I to understand ? Are you my old friend, 
 or who are you ? " 
 
 **Your old friend," said Miller, a little 
 mockingly. '' But now things are changed. 
 You know I was always fond of you." 
 
 But he did not say he loved her. He 
 saw she noted the omission. 
 
 **Your other life," she said — **what of 
 that ? Are you married ? " 
 
 He sat down and looked at her steadily. 
 
 '*You must regard me as married," he 
 said firmly ; and though he meant to imply 
 no regret, she put what he never thought 
 to be supplied into his tones. 
 
8o A Question of Instinct 
 
 ** He is caught fast and cannot get away, 
 and would if he could," she said to herself. 
 '' Can I help him ? Ah ! " 
 
 And her bosom heaved. Again the abyss 
 of the senses opened beneath her, and Miller 
 saw it. He caught her in his arms, and 
 held her till she yielded and kissed him. 
 
 *' It is not fair or kind," she said breath- 
 lessly. ''What are you?" 
 
 '' I am a man," returned Miller, a little 
 sullenly ; '• not much better or much worse 
 than most, only I like to tell the truth. If 
 you read the books, you will have strange 
 notions of men. Read one bound in his 
 own skin ; distrust parchment ; touch the 
 living flesh, and believe the truth." 
 
 '' How many can a man love ? " asked 
 Isabel, with a set mouth. 
 
 '' More than he will ever see," returned 
 Miller. *' Have I not said men were poly- 
 gamous?" 
 
A Question of Instinct 8i 
 
 And she set herself apart from him, for 
 she distrusted herself. His voice thrilled 
 her. She sang discords to his touch ; but 
 still she sang. Part of her pleaded for 
 liberty, and her intellect cried, '' Folly ! " her 
 morality, ''Evil!" her ancient prejudices, 
 ''Shame!" 
 
 She tried hard for tranquillity, and 
 obtained a forced peace. She tried to laugh. 
 
 "My lord pasha," she said; and he 
 caught her again. 
 
 The word was fatal, and the faint, 
 humorous recognition of his attitude fired 
 his blood, making him believe she owned 
 the right of his acts, and even yielded. 
 
 But she broke away again. 
 
 "This cannot be. I do not understand 
 you. Have you not broken my heart and 
 my peace ? " 
 
 He stared at her, open-eyed. 
 
 "I have misjudged you, perhaps," he 
 
 6 
 
82 A Question of Instinct 
 
 said. ** I thought you were freer of mind ; 
 but I suppose you are like most women, 
 and love to feed on lies." 
 
 **No!" she cried. *' But what is the 
 truth you want to tell me ? " 
 
 '*I see you have made an ideal of me," 
 said Miller. ''I will pull it down. You 
 shall worship no gods, paint them as you 
 will. Take the flesh, the man, the reality ; 
 do not fool yourself. And yet you have 
 done it." 
 
 '* Oh, I know you better — much better," 
 said the woman, with curious confidence. 
 ''Just now you are mad, I think." 
 
 Miller laughed, and stood up, and spread 
 out his great hands, and bent over her. 
 
 '' I think I know you better than you 
 do me," he said. '' You have created a 
 John Miller which may be true in one 
 sense ; but when you showed you loved 
 me, you got the right to see the truth. 
 
A Question of Instinct 83 
 
 Yes, I can love many — for each phase of 
 my character perhaps one. I could love 
 the world. I say this is true of all men, 
 and true of me." 
 
 '' Then women will never yield to that," 
 said Isabel. "And I have sometimes heard 
 you defend women, and speak up for them, 
 and demand liberty for them." 
 
 Miller clapped his hands. 
 
 '* I demand liberty for you, and I com- 
 mand you to take it. Strip yourself of 
 social chains, of any fetters but your own 
 desire, and answer me then." 
 
 *' I will never yield. What should I 
 be? I will not come into your life unless 
 I bring order into it where there is none." 
 
 *'You can never bring order, but you 
 might bring some peace. Whatever my 
 life is, I need you, and I will have you 
 yet." 
 
 But Isabel stood up and faced himi 
 
84 A Question of Instinct 
 
 '' No, you will never, never do it ! You 
 cannot, on such terms." 
 
 ** By heavens ! I will yet," said Miller ; 
 and he smiled with a certainty that made 
 Isabel blench and quiver. 
 
 *' Say that you know you are speaking 
 wildly, that you don't mean it." 
 
 Miller stamped, and then grew quite quiet. 
 
 ** I do mean it, and it will be, as sure 
 as I go now, as sure as you will some 
 day not mind me as I am. Good-night. 
 Perhaps I will write. Good-night." 
 
 He bent and kissed her again very calmly, 
 and left her shaking. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 If Isabel Maitland had known that after 
 this scene John Miller went back to his 
 club and played billiards and talked till three 
 o'clock, she would have considered him ' 
 callous and brutal. She was bewildered, 
 but he was calm. It would have seemed 
 incredible to her. But then he was a man 
 of experience ; and though she was his own 
 age within five years, experience she had 
 none. She knew as much of men as the 
 average innocent fool knows ; for her know- 
 ledge, gained by reading and talking, which 
 to some extent deceived Miller, was as 
 pertinent to the situation as knowledge of 
 adventure in books is to one in sudden and 
 unlooked-for hazard. 
 
 8s 
 
86 A Question of Instinct 
 
 Had she known this she would have hated 
 him, and have been strong where she was 
 weak. But her hatred would have been as 
 ignorant as her love. He acted like any 
 other man, and was not essentially base 
 therefor. 
 
 '' Poor little woman ! " he said, as he got 
 into Piccadilly ; '' she will understand some 
 day. She would be satisfied in a sort of 
 fashion if I came to her broken down and 
 offered her the wreck of a life. These 
 women will accept the debris of a feast who 
 object to sit down with another. That 
 strikes me as being quite as immoral, if one 
 must use the word. Let me be open with 
 myself. I want her to be my mistress ; 
 that is true. But it is not to satisfy a mere 
 whim : it is to satisfy a deep instinct of 
 man's which I take to be worthy of respect. 
 I shall tell her the truth, let it cost what it 
 will. She shall know me if I can make her 
 
A Question of Instinct 87 
 
 know me. I do not care for obtaining any- 
 thing on false pretences." 
 
 He walked into the club, and of course 
 found Harmer, who was there from morn 
 to midnight nine days out of ten. 
 
 '* Where is Hale .'^ " he asked. 
 
 **In the billiard room," said Harmer, 
 ''prophesying dolorous things. He is a 
 terrible wreck to-day, not having got to 
 bed till five.'^ 
 
 '' It's a pity," said Miller : ''he hasn't the 
 strength to keep this going ; and he has 
 the brains of ten ordinary men." 
 
 " That's what sent him wrong." 
 
 And they went to the billiard room. Hale 
 was playing a game with an air of the most 
 profound discouragement. He looked as if 
 he had been picked out of a river and dried 
 standing ; his long hair hung down on each 
 side of his pallid face. He smiled patiently 
 as Miller and Harmer came in. 
 
88 A Question of Instinct 
 
 *' Here Is the polygamist," he drawled, in 
 a peculiarly musical voice. '' How s the 
 harem to-day ? " 
 
 And he made a shot which he entirely 
 failed in. His opponent scored and ended 
 the game. 
 
 '* No, not another," said Hale ; '' it's a 
 futile game — just like life." 
 
 He sank into a chair and lay limply. 
 
 '' Do you think a large whiskey and soda 
 would do you any good," asked Harmer 
 solemnly. 
 
 '* It might," said Hale wearily. 
 
 They drank together, and it did cheer 
 Hale up. 
 
 ** How are your theories, Harmer ? " he 
 said. '' Have you settled the number of 
 wives a man may have ? '' 
 
 '' It's just according to his circumstances, 
 his temperament, the different phases of his 
 character. I have no rooted objection to 
 
A Question of Instinct 89 
 
 monogamy. Pray understand that. But if 
 men are polygamists, it's the women's fault 
 as it stands. They are so narrow that they 
 compel a man to lock up and atrophy some 
 side of his nature, or else go to some other 
 woman for encouragement." 
 
 '' You hold a brief for the men," said Hale. 
 
 ** It's about time some one did," answered 
 the young polygamist. *' We have had a 
 bad slating during the past year or two." 
 
 *' That may be true," said Hale, *'and 
 maybe we deserved it. I have a great 
 notion that the polygamous instinct, as you 
 call it, is in most cases self-indulgence run 
 riot. If we lived decent lives all our lives, 
 we should not seek partners among the 
 Amalekites and Hittites and add to the 
 harem side of the house." 
 
 Miller broke in. 
 
 *' True enough. Hale, but there may be 
 other reasons. Suppose a man marries a 
 
90 A Question of Instinct 
 
 woman who suits him, and then they proceed 
 to develop in different ways ? " 
 
 **That should be a reason for divorce," 
 answered Hale; *'and indeed I own that 
 I think it highly probable we may end in 
 making it legal to have the power of termi- 
 nating a marriage after ten years. Let us 
 suppose a man marries at twenty-one or two. 
 We know his character is not formed, or 
 anything like it. It may be best for him 
 and his wife to separate at thirty. Both are 
 then grown up. But at forty much of his 
 youth is gone ; he has probably altered again, 
 not so much by new growths, unexpected 
 even by himself, as by the elimination by 
 natural selection of some faculties. Then 
 he might be entitled to consider his marriage 
 again. When he is fifty he could arrange, 
 having full knowledge of himself, of life, and 
 of women, whether he should alter or not. 
 And the women must have the same liberty." 
 
A Question of Instinct 91 
 
 ''You are tolerably liberal," said Harmer. 
 But Hale spoke again. 
 
 '' Not but what I think women are a poor 
 lot — far, far inferior to men. Perhaps what 
 I suggest might improve them ; yet I own 
 I have very little hope." 
 
 *' But, Hale," said Miller, '' your plan 
 doesn't touch the present time. You have 
 to alter public opinion very essentially to 
 allow of your form of terminable contracts. 
 What is to be done now ? " 
 
 *' Do as you please, or as you can, and take 
 the consequences," said Harmer, answering 
 for the other man. *' I have no regard for 
 my own character in that sense. Suppose, 
 Hale — and, of course, this is a thing that 
 happens very often — suppose a man is 
 married and has no children, is he justified 
 in forming an irregular connection ? " 
 
 Harmer did not look at Miller as he spoke. 
 '' I think," said Hale, ''that in the opinion 
 
92 A Question of Instinct 
 
 of all men of the world, and of most women 
 of the world, too, that he would be justified : 
 that is, if offspring were necessary to his 
 happiness. Though why men should want 
 to bring other miserable wretches into this 
 miserable world entirely beats me. It's 
 there that a fight should be between intellect 
 and instinct." 
 
 *'You are not considering the women," 
 said Miller. 
 
 '' I consider them very little," answered 
 Hale contemptuously. '' They are very 
 futile objects — necessary, I suppose, but 
 mostly very tiresome. I hope, if there is 
 any immortality, it will be arranged on the 
 basis of an entire separation of the sexes. 
 The monastic ideal is one that commends 
 itself to my coldest reason. Still, even in 
 the case you mention, I should consider it 
 kind of the man to behave with reasonable 
 lack of brutality. Even if women are futile. 
 
A Question of Instinct 93 
 
 I believe they can suffer. They assure one 
 of it with the most damnable iteration." 
 
 He spoke with such a melancholy air of 
 the bitterest experience that Harmer, looking 
 at the speaker's handsome face, saw a whole 
 procession of suffering women who had 
 fallen victims to his beauty. 
 
 '' Poor chap ! " he murmured ; and Hale 
 glanced at him with a look of partial com- 
 prehension. '' But we may take it for 
 granted, oh, most deeply experienced, that 
 you approve the irregular connection in this 
 case : 
 
 Hale nodded, and lighted a cigarette. 
 
 '* Provided," he said, '' that no lies are told." 
 
 '' What ! " cried Harmer ; '' would you tell 
 the wife ? " 
 
 ** If she had brains, and was wise, which 
 means I wouldn't," said Hale. '' But I 
 think the other woman should understand 
 the situation to a certain extent." 
 
94 A Question of Instinct 
 
 '' It's a curious system of truthful in- 
 trigue/' said Harmer, after a pause. '* But 
 it certainly would make things easier for 
 every one all round." 
 
 And they played pyramids until Hale 
 wearily renounced his cue. 
 
 ** I must go to bed — I really need it. I 
 have not been in bed till five o'clock for 
 five nights. I have a terrible temperament, 
 and you men are the devil : I wish I was 
 as strong." 
 
 '' Then live quietly for a year, you weary 
 cyclone," said Harmer. 
 
 And Hale faded slowly out of the door ; 
 for his motions were so deliberate as to 
 suggest a lengthy process of dissipation into 
 space. , 
 
 When he was gone, and another game 
 over, Miller sat down and lighted his pipe, 
 while Harmer tried in vain to make a par- 
 ticular fancy shot. Miller grunted once or 
 
A Question of Instinct 95 
 
 twice as if he were about to say something, 
 but for a quarter of an hour he was given 
 no encouragement. Then Harmer sat down 
 by him. 
 
 '' I think," said Miller at last, '' that I am 
 in a fair way to test some of your theories." 
 
 *^ Which?" said his friend lightly: *'the 
 one I hold about a man having a natural 
 right to commit murder once in his life, or 
 my socialist one, or that which we were 
 speaking of when old Hale was here?" 
 
 '' That," said Miller. 
 
 '* Then don't get into a mess, Miller, I 
 beg. I don't say I don't believe in my 
 theories, but I have a strong notion that 
 any man who attempted to carry them out 
 would incur great disapprobation, and perhaps 
 end by being hanged. The world is not 
 subtle, and its judgments are crude. But 
 what is up ?" 
 
 Miller shrugged his shoulders. 
 
96 A Question of Instinct 
 
 '' Oh, nothing — only the old trouble is 
 likely, I can see, to lead me out of con- 
 ventional ways." 
 
 Harmer could have shouted with laughter. 
 But as Miller had lived his own life so 
 quietly he had come to look upon it as 
 perfectly conventional. He knew the line 
 of people about ancient intrigues, and now 
 his own past was history to him. 
 
 '* Indeed," was all Harmer could say. 
 
 *' Yes," went on Miller, almost innocently; 
 '* and now I'm pretty sure I'm fond of some 
 one else as well. What do you think ? Is 
 a man justified in following his instinct ? " 
 
 Harmer, with an air of wisdom equal to 
 Balzac's in his most useful books, pondered 
 for a while. 
 
 '* As regards a man's wife, yes ; as regards 
 himself, yes : it entirely depends on the 
 other woman. What is her position ? would 
 it be known ? would it destroy her if kncwn ? 
 
A Question of Instinct 97 
 
 or, if not destroy her, leave her infinitely- 
 worse off than she is ? Would she take help 
 from you ? What is her class ? what her 
 strength ? what her feeling for you ? " 
 
 '* I think these are all the questions to 
 ask," said Miller. '' I have thought of it 
 all. She's an educated woman, who is 
 practically alone, though she hangs on to 
 some friends who probably are not worth 
 much. She is fairly strong physically, and 
 has a good intellect. I am sure she is very 
 fond of me, but I doubt whether she is 
 strong enough to face social disapproval. 
 She would, under some circumstances, take 
 help if it were needed. And I think that 
 nothing need ever be known by any one 
 but ourselves." 
 
 Harmer nodded. 
 
 '' Then I should say, if you have told 
 her, or intend to tell her, the truth, that 
 you can leave it to her decision." 
 
 7 
 
98 A Question of Instinct 
 
 *^ That's the point," said Miller. "You 
 know you have to force a decision by acts 
 from a woman : she won't accept the 
 situation coldly." 
 
 ** I mean, you are justified in forcing a 
 decision, then." 
 
 But Miller shook his head. 
 
 '' I suppose I shall let myself go as I 
 have always done. If I really were not fond 
 of her, curiously fond of her, I would leave 
 her alone." 
 
 **But would she like that?" 
 
 *' Of course she wouldn't. She would be, 
 like every other woman, for some kind of a 
 compromise. She would like things in the 
 old way; but, you see, I lost my head, and 
 kissed her, and the old way is shut." 
 
 ** You're a peculiar devil," said Harmen 
 
 '* I see no difference between myself and 
 other men. You are still young enough to 
 think men really different in these things." 
 
A Question of Instinct 99 
 
 '' And you are old enough to forget the 
 differences," said Harmer sharply. For he 
 was really young. 
 
 '' Well, there would be little difference if 
 men trusted and dared follow their instincts." 
 
 '' Have you the courage to follow yours ? " 
 
 '' Unless 1 am indeed too old," said 
 Miller. And just then he looked it ; for 
 it was very late. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 Two days later Isabel Maitland received a 
 long letter from Miller, which was like the 
 blast of air that throws down a card castle. 
 
 It had terrified her, and pleased her in 
 spite of terror, to hear Miller declare he 
 would win her yet ; for she had never 
 been confronted before by the virile instinct, 
 and to see that she was worth the savage 
 declaration of conquest flattered one starved 
 portion of her soul. She had so needed 
 love ; and though she was no child, no girl, 
 she had not yet destroyed her ideal of it. 
 The passion was simple and sweet and 
 comprehensive, gentle and tender. It made 
 a man good, and brought out the best in his 
 nature ; it caused him to place all the joy 
 
A Question of Instinct loi 
 
 of the world in one woman, who, however 
 unworthy, would become worthy in sacrificing 
 herself for him in passionate return. And 
 yet to consider the guise in which this 
 love came to her. The love she dreamed 
 of was as if an inhabitant of a strange 
 world was shown, by her messenger and 
 guide, the Apollo Belvidere, or a young 
 Antinous in marble, as one of the race of 
 men. The love she saw was as if that 
 child of another planet in some dark forest 
 came across a woodman, clad in skins and 
 bearded, who was swinkt with toil, marred 
 and lined by labour, bent and tortured by 
 many sorrows. 
 
 This then was the strange reward of her 
 innocent loneliness. Was she then so igno- 
 rant — she, who had believed herself learned 
 in uncommon lore ? It seemed incredible. 
 
 Then, when he was gone, she began to 
 build him up again : she made excuses for 
 
I02 A Question of Instinct 
 
 him ; said he was wild that night, over- 
 wrought, perhaps not yet recovered from 
 bitter toil in far-off lands. If he were only 
 in his right mind he would be an Antinous 
 too. He really loved her — her only — and 
 was unhappy. It was a sweet conclusion. 
 
 And then his letter came. 
 
 In it he acknowledged he still loved the 
 other woman ; and he coolly went on to write 
 an essay on the polygamous instinct in man. 
 
 ** You can be to me what no other woman 
 can." 
 
 But then, apparently, the other woman 
 was necessary. What did he think of her ? 
 Did he believe that she could injure that 
 other woman secretly ? Ah ! he had fore- 
 seen that. 
 
 *' There is no need of me to say much 
 on this point ; but, believe me, if you do not 
 prove hard to me I shall be deceiving no one." 
 
 That was significant enough. But what, 
 
A Question of Instinct 103 
 
 then, was his love or this woman's love ? 
 How did it come about ? She read further, 
 and felt outraged ; for now he diverged 
 into the paternal instinct, and, professing 
 that his life was imperfect, he suggested 
 she might see her way to supplying a long 
 felt want. It is true that his words were 
 ambiguous, their meaning veiled, the writing 
 both discreet and melancholy; but that was 
 the essence of his intention. To translate 
 it in common phraseology made it almost 
 humorous — not, indeed, because it was humor- 
 ous in itself, but because it was so flagrantly 
 unlike any form of known courtship, legal 
 or illegal. The absurdity of the situation 
 was patent to Isabel, but she saw more 
 readily its peculiar likeness to brutality. 
 Why did he strip the garments from love, 
 and insist, as surely no other lover had ever 
 done, on supplying her with physiological 
 charts of instincts ? She forgot how he 
 
I04 A Question of Instinct 
 
 had insisted on his desire in no way to 
 deceive her ; and, longing to be deceived 
 and fed, how could she care for an account 
 of the processes of digestion or analyses of 
 the proffered food ? She preferred to forget 
 that food might be flesh, and, desiring its 
 suitable disguise in amiable cookery, she 
 shrank from the platter. 
 
 And now, though she was certainly with- 
 out any justification for the supposition, she 
 began to take it for granted that he meant 
 by implication to suggest marriage to her. 
 As she was of course ready to believe a 
 certain remnant of loyalty to the other 
 woman forbade him to declare openly that 
 he had ceased to love her, she deceived her- 
 self into that belief, and fancied he suggested 
 the other's tacit relegation into subjects not 
 to be spoken of. And still she did not 
 believe he loved her with a real love. Was 
 it then possible to marry a man who really 
 
A Question of Instinct 105 
 
 desired nothing more of her than offspring ? 
 She considered the point deeply, and found 
 herself adrift on a strange sea of emotion. 
 What if there were no children after all ? 
 Would not that mean incredible misery for 
 herself and for him ? In agitation she sat 
 down and wrote. 
 
 ** How could I marry a man under such 
 conditions ? Again and again I ask myself 
 if you can possibly be the old friend I knew 
 so well, as I imagined. Supposing you did 
 not obtain your desire ? Can I believe you 
 really love me ? I seem to be quite adrift. 
 If you have mistaken yourself, if seeing that 
 I loved you has spurred you into a sort of 
 spurious passion such as might touch any 
 man for a moment, what would the end be 
 if the marriage were fruitless ? " 
 
 She repeated this again and again in 
 
io6 A Question of Instinct 
 
 many forms, and finally sent the letter with- 
 out reading it. And his answer destroyed 
 her ideal of him for the time. 
 
 '' I think you have misunderstood me on 
 a point where your knowledge of me should 
 have least failed. You know my entire and 
 utter aversion to marriage : it is one which 
 time has not altered, and one time is not 
 likely to alter ; it is, believe me, based on 
 what I now consider moral grounds, and I 
 conceive that in the future no such binding 
 tie will be desired by either sex. I fancied, 
 too, that you had an almost equally reasoned 
 prejudice against it. If I ever should marry 
 there is one for whom I might believe it 
 my duty to overcome my abhorrence of a 
 legal sanction, if it could, under any altered 
 conditions, ameliorate her suffering. I do 
 not think it ever will be necessary. 
 
 ** I begin to see vaguely that the more we 
 
A Question of Instinct 107 
 
 understand each other the further we drift 
 apart. I have tried, both in conversation 
 and by letter, to make my standpoint clear. 
 You know I have always been fond of you — 
 not, indeed, with that mad, exclusive passion 
 which, having known, I believe morbid, but 
 with a healthy affection that seems most 
 natural in an ideal state of things when no 
 artificial barriers are in existence between 
 the sexes. I believed that this affection, in 
 action, might have made your life more 
 tolerable ; it would have secured an outlet 
 for your emotions, have given you new 
 interests, and enabled you to live, if not a 
 perfect life, as perfect a one as under the cir- 
 cumstances is possible for either of us. It is, 
 in my experience, rare for two human beings 
 to live in constant contact without revolt 
 and the unexpected genesis of divergencies 
 which appear extreme when intimacy, without 
 relaxation, lays unnatural stress upon them. 
 
io8 A Question of Instinct 
 
 '* Considering both my own detached 
 life and my circumstances, which would 
 have enabled me to give you any natural 
 aid if it should be needed, I thought it 
 likely you might see your way to un- 
 derstanding the peculiar and impossible 
 position in which I stand ; but if this is 
 not so, I grieve deeply to have hurt and 
 disturbed you. I wish it were possible to 
 secure your entire happiness, even if it 
 were with some one else. And, believe 
 me, it would cause me more suffering 
 than you are likely to credit ; for, in my 
 desire to deceive you in nothing, perhaps 
 I have made myself appear more cold- 
 blooded, more brutal, than I really am. 
 Is it, then, to be good-bye ? " 
 
 When Miller wrote this letter he said : 
 *' Well, I suppose I have done for myself 
 now! If so, it can't be helped." 
 
A Question of Instinct 109 
 
 But even so he was not really honest. 
 He should have written, '' Not, indeed, 
 with that exclusive passion which, having 
 known and still feeling " ; yet he so far 
 played with his conscience as to make 
 that omission. 
 
 Still, as it stood it was quite effectual. 
 In this world of tempered lies the truth 
 is like a douche of cold water ; and under 
 it Isabel quivered, blenched, set her teeth, 
 and recovered from the glamour which his 
 spoken words had cast over her. She 
 came out into a clearer atmosphere, and 
 for a time saw true. She could have no 
 more to do with a man who was what 
 Miller declared himself. 
 
 But it was not at first so greatly the 
 man who proved impossible : it was the 
 situation, which he seemed incapable of 
 understanding. It is true that for him — 
 a man with a certain income, who lived 
 
no A Question of Instinct 
 
 what he with truth called a detached life 
 — any public reprobation concerning matters 
 which he conceived no one's business but 
 his own would hardly move him, save to 
 ironic laughter. He was, in fact, unassail- 
 able, except through his club ; and even 
 there he was by no means so rooted in 
 desire as to care for the extremely unlikely 
 prospect of anger on the part of men who, 
 for the most part, believed with him and 
 played with such topics academically with- 
 out really caring where a theory led to. 
 And Madeline neither received nor visited ; 
 she lived in a world of dreams and music. 
 But for Isabel it seemed a very dif- 
 ferent matter. Had Miller been able to 
 watch the motions of her mind, he would 
 have been aghast to see how he had 
 mistaken an intellectual amusement for an 
 intellectual attitude. Her disdain of the 
 world's conclusions was the disdain of a 
 
A Question of Instinct 1 1 1 
 
 superstitious person for superstition. She 
 denied social ghosts when one derided 
 them ; but at night time it was another 
 thing. And now the night was on her, 
 and, prowling in her new bedchamber, she 
 saw Social Disdain sheeted and gibbering, 
 while her bones turned to water and her 
 blood ran cold. She acknowledged fear- 
 somely that she had no strength to face 
 even the prospect of unreasonable contumely. 
 Her ancient social conclusions ranked as 
 pious opinions. Before a possible inquisi- 
 tion she declared her belief in a moral 
 geocentric theory. 
 
 Then she thought again of the mere 
 situation. How could he have so misun- 
 derstood her as to believe she could give 
 herself, sacrifice herself, to one who had 
 no real passion or self-sacrifice to offer in 
 exchange ? It would end in misery. She 
 began to see dimly that she must in many 
 
112 A Question of Instinct 
 
 ways have given him a wrong impression. 
 Perhaps, when she took pains to hide 
 her affection, she had hidden her sensi- 
 bility, her weakness against any form of 
 ill-will, her highly emotional temperament. 
 He had got to look on her as a much 
 stronger and more self-contained woman than 
 she was, as one who cared little for opinion, 
 little for her own small circle, which was 
 a world to her after all. 
 
 But, above everything, she deeply re- 
 gretted she had allowed for a moment 
 her knowledge of his entanglement to fall 
 into the background. Certainly in nothing 
 he had said, even when she imagined he 
 thought of marriage, was there anything 
 to make her believe that this other woman 
 would go out of his life. In essence, then, 
 she had allowed his polygamous view to 
 pass by default. Did he, then, despise 
 her? No; for he had said that he did 
 
A Question of Instinct 113 
 
 not, could not — that it was a common and 
 erroneous opinion of women that men de- 
 spised those whom they loved outside the 
 circle of marriage. Yet she was too pain- 
 fully aware that an ordinary man of 
 ordinary opinion might despise her, how- 
 ever unjustly, and she had sufficient weak- 
 ness to consider it might not be unjustly, 
 after all. She began to bitterly resent 
 Miller's pursuit of her, and in her anger 
 wrote down all that had passed through 
 her mind. 
 
 '' I should have thought," she said, at 
 the end of her letter, '' that the veriest 
 child, to say nothing of a man of your 
 ability, would have been able to see this 
 end." 
 
 Miller received the letter the same night, 
 
 and read it coldly. 
 
 ** Would there have been no sacrifice?" 
 
 8 
 
114 A Question of Instinct 
 
 he said to himself. '* It would have en- 
 tirely altered my life in every way. It 
 would have meant, to say nothing more, 
 that I should have had to work at last 
 to supplement my income. It would, in 
 all probability, have kept me in England 
 steadily. She might have had much to 
 do with my future. And assuredly it was 
 not all entire selfishness. I hate to think 
 of her cold, lonelv life. What does she 
 know of life now ? She is not capable of 
 knowing that some memories of an hour 
 are worth a year's content — that some joys 
 are well bought with a life's pain. But 
 she will bear neither fruit nor flower. The 
 lot of these is the lot of the drones, who 
 serve their turn and are swept out." 
 
 He went to dinner, and considered her 
 letter over his wine. 
 
 *' She is quite wrong in this," he thought, 
 with a touch of vanity, as he laid his 
 
A Question of Instinct 115 
 
 finger on the final sentence : ** I did fore- 
 see this end. I knew, in all probability, 
 it would come to this. If I had lied 
 sweetly to her, according to the true 
 acquisitive instinct of the lover, it would 
 have been a different story. If I had 
 told her I was married, and unhappy, and 
 that I deeply regretted not having fallen 
 in love with her before it was too late — 
 if I had wrung my hands, and kissed 
 her, and exaggerated my feeling for her 
 — I could have fooled her to the top of 
 her bent. They all want it. I have played 
 an experiment, and it has failed. Women 
 like lies, and will have them. It's the 
 merest folly to tell them the truth, unless 
 they are incapable of understanding it, or 
 so blinded with passion that they care for 
 nothing." 
 
 For now he was full of temporary 
 resentment against her, due very greatly 
 
ii6 A Question of Instinct 
 
 to the check to his vanity. But it was not 
 all vanity by any means, for the moment 
 he swung clear of the moment's anger he 
 was full of a purer affection for her than 
 he had known since he first started in pur- 
 suit. Then there came a dull feeling of 
 pain ; for, in all probability, he would never 
 have sufficient affection for any other woman 
 to take the trouble to win her, and that 
 meant, he knew, a denial of the only form 
 of immortality he believed in — the trans- 
 mission of himself to later generations. 
 
 But — in spite of his vanity, his anger, 
 and his regret — there was also a curious 
 feeling of relief. Henceforth he would be 
 quite faithful to Madeline, and, trying to 
 stifle the desire which could not be ap- 
 peased, he would be loyal in thought and 
 deed to her who had brought him greater 
 peace than he had ever known. He pon- 
 dered over the future, and painted pictures 
 
A Question of Instinct 117 
 
 of the time when he should have grown 
 tired of wandering ; and, as he sat, in 
 fancy, an old man by the hearth, there 
 was a sudden inrush into the club, and 
 Harmer came in like a fresh breeze. As 
 though he had scented the sm.ell of that 
 unlighted fire of Miller's, he proceeded, 
 with many gestures and a cheerful voice, 
 to kick its imaginary embers broadcast. 
 For he was ending a conversation with a 
 man whom he had invited to dine. 
 
 " How do. Miller ? " he said. '' Yes, let's 
 sit here. What was I saying ? Oh yes, I 
 remember. Yes ; it's said by men that they 
 love their homes and their fireside, to say 
 nothing of their wives and children. But I 
 maintain that man is not home-loving, and 
 that what he mistakes for domesticity is 
 mostly simple fatigue. If he wasn't tired, 
 it's much he would see of home ! he prefers 
 gadding about like a tom-cat ; and it's a 
 
1 1 8 A Question of Instinct 
 
 mass of lies, propagated by men in their 
 own interests, to say he doesn't ! Clubs, 
 beer, travel, billiards, adventures, barmaids 
 and other strange women — that's what men 
 really like. They pine for the edge of the 
 tiled roof, the risk of the parapet, the im- 
 minence of the water-butt, the evasion of 
 the hurled boot. No ; they don't love the 
 rug, and the fire, and the poor deluded 
 wife, till they are tired, wet, draggled and 
 disgusting." 
 
 And with that ringing in his ears, Miller 
 went to the writing-room to write what he 
 really fancied might be his last letter to the 
 woman whose peace he had so disturbed. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 Miller's letter to Isabel was a specimen of 
 bad taste and bad temper ; but it completed 
 his ruin with her for the time, and to some 
 extent he had this in his mind. 
 
 ''The best thing I can do for her is to 
 saturate her with the belief that I am entirely 
 selfish, brutal and undesirable, and that she 
 has had a lucky escape from me." 
 
 So, instead of assuring her that he had 
 been quite a blind fool, who had neither 
 understood her in the least nor foreseen 
 the inevitable result, he wrote thus : — 
 
 '' I don't want to defend myself : I am 
 tired of trying to explain. All I can say is, 
 that I see my folly in endeavouring to show 
 
 "9 
 
I20 A Question of Instinct 
 
 you what a common man is. I don't want 
 to pose as an angel or a martyr or a stainless 
 hero, but perhaps you may find one some 
 day who combines the three. In the mean- 
 time, I can only hope you will discover all 
 compensations in the esteem of the good 
 world which you have done nothing to 
 forfeit. 
 
 '' Still, in common fairness, I may be 
 allowed to make a few remarks about the 
 end of your letter. I have shown myself a 
 fool tactically, no doubt : the result proves 
 it ; but then, I knew what I wanted, and how 
 I wanted it. I did foresee the end almost 
 inevitably, but I thought it worth while to 
 know if you were as broadminded as you 
 appeared to be. I wanted you dearly, but 
 I wanted to get nothing by putting the best 
 face on harsh facts. I see your emotions 
 are more in hand than I imagined. How 
 far they would have been if I had played 
 
A Question of Instinct 121 
 
 the usual but unfair game I cannot say, but 
 I have my doubts. I am sorry now that 
 all this has happened. Don't heap up 
 bitterness against me if you can help it ; 
 yet I know you will either do that or come, 
 in the end, to my conclusions by making me 
 what I am not. Adieu." 
 
 Isabel, when she received this letter, 
 almost lost her head with justifiable anger 
 Had he then been playing a game with her, 
 perhaps to make his own life interesting ? 
 Surely it could not be. She sat for hours 
 picking up the fragments of her shattered 
 idol, trying to put together sufficient to 
 recognise Miller as he had been before she 
 had had the bitter folly to let him know her 
 feeling for him. The task was infinitely 
 difficult ; she seemed about to succeed, when 
 a phrase of his letter came with a malicious 
 grin to destroy her work. 
 
122 A Question of Instinct 
 
 Had he even been fond of her at all ? 
 Perhaps he had taken to human vivisection, 
 and become as brutal as a scientific novelist 
 who was without scruples. 
 
 '' No, no," she said ; and with trembling 
 hands she loosed her long hair and let it 
 flow down about her She loosed her collar 
 too, and bathed her face. She was hot with 
 angry shame, and almost ready to call him 
 to her to endure her just anger. But she 
 knew the tone of his voice would melt her, 
 and, face to face, he would have ten words 
 for her one ; and with phrases close knit and 
 musical, and with the power of his sex behind 
 — when, indeed, he must use the weapons 
 of instinct, and discard the curiously vain 
 armament he had chosen — he would beat 
 her down, and elude her, and take her captive. 
 It was best, thrice best, not to face him. 
 Since she knew her weakness, it was vain 
 to oppose it to him, when he was strongest. 
 
A Question of Instinct 123 
 
 And the thought brought back his kisses 
 to her lips ; she yearned for them again, 
 and then hated him. She hated herself. 
 *' She had been played with, played with," 
 she said. And how greatly she had to 
 thank herself for it ! 
 
 Men could not be like this, she urged 
 to herself. Cruel some of them were, and 
 brutal ; but then they were the exceptions. 
 The men she knew were fairly good, honour- 
 able men — not with blameless pasts, but 
 oh ! doubtless without presents. The in- 
 stinct of paternity she understood, because 
 she felt vaguely what the maternal feeling 
 might be ; but the polygamous dissatisfaction 
 with monogamy was, she assured herself, 
 not to be found in ordinary men. And 
 even if it were — and certainly she had ad- 
 mitted this to discussion — that was not the 
 real point now. Miller had known what 
 would happen, and had submitted her to 
 
124 A Question of Instinct 
 
 a cruel test, under which he believed she 
 must fail. 
 
 She wrote him her mind without mitiga- 
 tion. It is sufficient to give his answer. 
 
 ** I must beg you to believe that I did 
 not do all this deliberately. You accuse me 
 practically of doing it for amusement. This 
 shows what I said before, that words on paper 
 are no good. We drift further apart the 
 more we correspond. I certainly thought it 
 possible you might have taken my view. 
 I see now that you do not. Whether you 
 ever will I cannot say. I feel tired and worn 
 out — too tired even to write. Good-night." 
 
 And with that she let it go. Why should 
 she write again ? It was best to go on 
 with her life, which had one friend the less. 
 Yet she still hoped he might one day return 
 even as a friend. 
 
A Question of Instinct 125 
 
 As she let him go, after he had so 
 strangely destroyed himself, she shed many 
 tears ; for she had indeed loved him, and 
 now regarded him as lost. If she had only 
 been able to think of him as she had known 
 him in the dear old days when all things 
 were possible, and she had been able to meet 
 his eyes with eyes that were untroubled ! 
 She would put him out of her life. But in 
 the secret recesses of her mind she kept 
 the broken statue of her lover, and laboured, 
 half unconsciously, to restore him to his 
 vacant pedestal. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 Though it was not to be compared with 
 Isabel's experiences, Miller by no means had 
 a pleasing time of it in meditation during 
 the next few days. The blow to his vanity 
 he recovered from easily ; it was not the 
 first time he had met a rebuff, and he had 
 discounted this before it came. Moreover, 
 he was thoroughly convinced that, according 
 to common reasoning, he deserved every- 
 thing that could be said to him, and much 
 more than Isabel had written. It is some- 
 times a consolation to advanced people to 
 take refuge in the conclusions they usually 
 scorn ; and Miller, having discovered it 
 impossible to make Isabel understand his 
 motives, was ready to shrug his shoulders 
 
A Question of Instinct 127 
 
 and accept the same judgment as any 
 man foiled in commonplace seduction might 
 well receive. 
 
 But the next moment, when he had 
 forgiven Isabel her most cutting phrases, he 
 was conscious of a new lack in his life. He 
 missed her friendship, which he had in such 
 an unlikely manner tried to foster into love 
 according to his own desire, and, since he 
 had at one time believed in his imminent 
 success, he missed the love he was ready 
 to claim as his own. 
 
 The feelings with which he had regarded 
 her decisive letter were not of long duration. 
 He was certainly not resigned to her loss 
 and the loss of his own satisfaction. As 
 Harmer had asserted with great truth that 
 man only went home when he was tired, 
 so there is a great difference between man 
 at night and man in the morning. A rest 
 from the emotions of the last few days, 
 
128 A Question of Instinct 
 
 which had as sensibly fatigued him as they 
 had broken Isabel's sleep and strength, made 
 him again what he had been ; he renounced 
 nothing with sincerity. All he did was to 
 recognise the probable stultification of his 
 instincts. His passion for Isabel, though 
 of sudden growth, was so far true that it 
 was not likely to be easily replaced ; and 
 for consolation he was compelled to fall 
 back on his faithfulness to Madeline, for 
 which he was by no means responsible, 
 unless, indeed, his Quixotic truthfulness 
 to Isabel was the real cause of it still 
 existing. 
 
 However, the result was the same ; and 
 Miller, with a man's inevitable readiness to 
 place even a foiled desire to his own credit, 
 tore up his refused cheque with the con- 
 sciousness that his account was all the larger 
 and that it might be drawn again in the 
 future. He was not long in letting Madeline 
 
A Question of Instinct 129 
 
 know that she need not trouble herself by 
 any vain imaginings that he was likely to 
 drift away from her ; and, to give him the 
 little that was his due, he could conceive no 
 possible combination of circumstances likely 
 to alter the one set passion of his life. 
 For to Madeline he was incredibly tender, 
 and showed himself as no other human being 
 had ever seen him. Though in the course 
 of time he altered to the world, growing 
 harder and more indifferent, he was with 
 her the same man that he had been when 
 he took her by force, and overwhelmed her 
 for a while in his turbulent personality. 
 
 He came back to her now very humbly, 
 and with as remarkable a consciousness of 
 sin as any monk who had trespassed against 
 a law he believed to be God's. He who 
 had a thousand times poured scorn on 
 dogmatic religion, as it was understood, had 
 a religion deep within him ; and every real 
 
 9 
 
130 A Question of Instinct 
 
 religious instinct was twined about Madeline, 
 who was become an inscrutable goddess to 
 him. She, the pagan, the Christian, the 
 superstitious, the soulless, and yet the very 
 essence of spirituality, dominated him by 
 her mysteries, and recalled him as often as 
 she drove him away. Her moody strange- 
 ness, the far-off look with which she some- 
 times viewed him, the music of her voice, 
 the aspect of her immortal face, suggested 
 for ever the unattainable for which the good 
 in him struggled. He knew that to com- 
 prehend her would be the death of half 
 himself: as he lay dying, purged of all 
 gross desires, he might understand. And 
 yet he was the man who had sued Isabel 
 Maitland in mere human passion ; the 
 man who had dissected his less worthy 
 portion, and proffered it as himself, who had 
 analysed motives so coldly. He forgot, then, 
 that if Madeline had little of the ordinary 
 
A Question of Instinct 131 
 
 mortal, yet ordinary mortals possessed a 
 portion of the spirit that informed her. And 
 now he went back to her in repentance. 
 He bade her play to him that night, and 
 as she played his soul became dominant. 
 
 '' My own dear Madeline." 
 
 He watched her who had no need to 
 watch him ; for by intuition she had followed 
 him day by day. Every time he avoided 
 her glance he told her something ; his 
 preoccupation of mind was visible writing to 
 her. She could read him like music until 
 she came to a change of key, and then 
 she sadly closed the book. She knew his 
 strength and his weakness. In many things 
 he had been cruel, but in all things he 
 had tried to be kind. She knew that by 
 some inexplicable mood she had often sent 
 him headlong. At times she had said and 
 done what she knew would drive him frantic. 
 But as she loved him with a passion and 
 
132 A Question of Instinct 
 
 self-abnegation most incredible, she strove 
 to make up for all things. 
 
 She touched him now very gently. 
 
 '* I am glad you have come back to me, 
 John," she said. And he knew she under- 
 stood very much. 
 
 *' I am not a good man, am I ?" he said 
 simply. 
 
 ''You are always good to me," she 
 answered. 
 
 *' No, no," he said. ** I wish I was 
 better. How did you ever come to love 
 me?" 
 
 ''Is it still incredible?" 
 
 He kissed her hand. 
 
 " It always will be. I think it is that 
 in you which makes it incredible " 
 
 '' That sometimes drives you away, John ? " 
 she asked. " Oh yes ; I understand. I know 
 Vm not always human. But you have come 
 back ? " 
 
A Question of Instinct 133 
 
 '* I have never really been away," said 
 he quietly. 
 
 ** I know that," she answered. '' Oh yes, 
 I know it. But some day you will go quite 
 a distance, with a human being ; and you 
 will come to me again, and I shall love 
 you just the same." 
 
 She leant back in her chair. 
 
 ** Am I very different from other women, 
 John, dear ? Would they think me terrible, 
 and perhaps what they call wicked ? I 
 suppose I am wicked. Sometimes I feel it. 
 How much harm I have. done!" 
 
 He knew she was far away in the past ; 
 and that always angered him. 
 
 **Come back," he said. And she rose up 
 and went to the piano again. 
 
 She chose a piece he had never known 
 her play, and it stirred his blood like the 
 Marseillaise. There was fighting and struggle 
 and victory in it, and great unrest even after 
 
134 A Question of Instinct 
 
 victory. The unrest was in him too, and 
 he gave it voice. 
 
 ''Why do you play such provocations.'^" 
 he said. '' Do you want me to go wandering 
 again ? " 
 
 '' I am not sure, John. Perhaps it would 
 be best. Our lives will never be common 
 lives, never easy, never peaceful, never 
 rusted over with custom. I hate your going, 
 but if you never went you would never come 
 back ; and your return is the greatest joy." 
 
 '' And to me," said Miller. '' But I have 
 only been home a month*" 
 
 ''A month is a year, and a year a life. If 
 you want to go — go, John. I can live and 
 dream and make music until you return. 
 1 need so little — you, or dear dreams of you. 
 I like you strong and brown and ardent." 
 
 She came and leant over him. 
 
 ** Never, never let us be like other people ! " 
 she cried. 
 
A Question of Instinct 135 
 
 *' Small chance, indeed," said her lover. 
 *' Did we ever even quarrel like others?" 
 
 He rose and paced the room. 
 
 '' I think I will go for some months," 
 he said. '' Only yesterday I was asked to 
 go into the interior of Morocco with a man 
 who has some theory. His theory may be 
 worth little, but he has a great deal of 
 money. I am becoming a professional 
 traveller, a superior dragoman. But perhaps 
 money might be useful ; I think more of it 
 than I did." 
 
 And she saw his mind dip and elude 
 her. He was gone already. 
 
 The next day he started for Paris. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 Before he went he wrote a note to Isabel. 
 It was short, and without reproach or apology, 
 but it took for granted her continued interest 
 in him. 
 
 ** You might like to know, in case you 
 should have occasion to write to me and 
 get no reply, that I have gone to Africa. 
 Adiosr 
 
 The Spanish farewell brought the Madrid 
 days back to her ; and, feeling sure that 
 he was alone upon his journey, her heart 
 softened to him after many days of bitterness. 
 
 How well she remembered the day he 
 
 had come to her and cried out for a little 
 
 136 
 
A Question of Instinct 137 
 
 sympathy ! In return she had in anguish 
 opened her heart as though to say, ** If you 
 need help come to me, for I love you." 
 And instantly shame and regret had surged 
 over her. Though she thanked him then for 
 an apparent blindness to her self-revelation, 
 she was angered at her weakness. 
 
 How was it that she had had the strength 
 to refuse him now ? For no sooner was 
 he gone than the process of rehabilitation 
 began. There was a fight in her mind 
 between Miller as he had been and Miller 
 as he was, or rather between the man she 
 had imagined and the man he believed 
 himself when with her. 
 
 For with all Miller's experience and know- 
 ledge there was something not unlike childlike 
 innocence in him. She who was innocent, 
 but in nothing childlike, had been curiously 
 attracted by this feature in his character ; it 
 half excused his selfishness, and gave a 
 
138 A Question of Instinct 
 
 strange value to his thoughts. That part 
 of a woman's love which is ever maternal 
 in its expression and origin had of old 
 drawn her to him with a desire of protection. 
 In spite of his capability in arduous under- 
 takings, and his invariable success, she found 
 it possible to credit him with a remarkable 
 helplessness that bade him turn instinctively 
 for comfort to those whom he thought able 
 to give it. This characteristic, which was 
 more imaginary than real, though it certainly 
 existed to some extent, now pled with her for 
 pardon. She believed him in greater distress 
 than he was ; yet she had refused him for 
 social and selfish reasons, which appeared 
 more and more selfish the less likely they 
 were to be successfully combated. 
 
 She had fought to retain what she had, 
 and in the conflict had won ; but she had lost 
 for ever what she now desired more ardently. 
 The friends she had feared to lose seemed 
 
A Question of Instinct 139 
 
 less desirable ; only those she best liked she 
 still cared for. As though a flood was deep 
 upon her world, some of them were beneath 
 its waters ; she ceased for a long time to 
 correspond with those not nearest her heart. 
 Her power of affection seemed lessened 
 when her interest was only concentrated. 
 
 What were the compensations she pos- 
 sessed ? A certain pallid esteem of the 
 indifferent, the right to demand respect 
 because her instincts were less strong than 
 her reason. And the reason which had led 
 her into the desert seemed folly. It is 
 enthusiasm that makes a hermitage habitable, 
 the glory of the triumphant spirit adorns 
 solitude. But enthusiasm with her was the 
 sister of content, and content was based on 
 the possession of things reasonably to be 
 desired. Let her struggle as she would to 
 choke the voice of nature, in her preferred 
 and chosen silence it spoke in tones of 
 
140 A Question of Instinct 
 
 thunder, and her intellect cowered like a 
 fainting beast in a storm. 
 
 Then had she not been unjust and harsh 
 to Miller ? Was it right, under the strange 
 circumstances, to conclude that he spoke 
 the truth ? Was it not possible that, through 
 some scruples which she did not fathom, 
 he had believed it wrong of him to say- 
 all that was in his mind ? Perhaps he 
 had come to her in more extreme misery 
 than he had showed : it might be that he 
 hated the woman who had been near 
 wrecking him, but that by a strong loyalty 
 he felt constrained to utter no word of 
 the bitter change. She knew vaguely that 
 through him this woman was devoid of 
 friends ; it was not likely he w^ould turn 
 on her now in speaking to the woman 
 he really loved. The thought gave her 
 peculiar confidence in his trustworthiness : 
 if she had yielded, he would not have 
 
A Question of Instinct 141 
 
 found any excuses for leaving her desolate 
 and alone. For she knew how greatly 
 lack of courage had influenced her. 
 
 But perhaps the most striking and effica- 
 cious reason for her renewal of faith in 
 a non-existent and imaginary man was the 
 natural persistence with which her mind 
 recurred to him as she had ignorantly 
 known him. It was with the most infinite 
 difficulty that he had succeeded in destroying 
 her ideal of him, and now the new man 
 was no longer there to mock at the old. 
 For ever trusting her own intelligence, it 
 seemed more credible she should have been 
 deceived by seeing him in an hour's storm 
 than be in error about her accumulated 
 calm judgments of many years. 
 
 So, after the m^anner of a woman who 
 loves, as the days went by she renewed 
 her ancient faith in him, and believed in 
 all he had thrown down. 
 
142 A Question of Instinct 
 
 And now, too, she began to conceive 
 a peculiar and bitter abhorrence for the 
 woman whose name she had never known. 
 So long as he had offered her no love, 
 however professedly imperfect or socially 
 monstrous, she had been ready to credit 
 her, though grudgingly, with many good 
 qualities; but, concluding that the frenetic 
 desire devouring Miller had now burnt out 
 or been quenched, these gifts, demanding 
 patient judgment and tenderness, vanished 
 in her own fanned passion. The woman 
 became a monstrous growth, poisonous and 
 diabolic, however atrociously and malig- 
 nantly beautiful. It was easy to excuse the 
 man his folly, for strange drugs obscure 
 the vision, and delude not only sense 
 but intellect. She had heard Miller, in a 
 fanciful discourse on poisons, describe how 
 one destroyed true vision and induced in- 
 credible hallucinations — how another made 
 
A Question of Instinct 143 
 
 a low voice into denouncing thunder, or 
 diminished an earthquake's roar into the 
 murmur of a woodland breeze. Now, at 
 last, he was recovering in anguish from 
 something more subtle of analysis, but 
 assuredly no less to be dreaded ; and she 
 herself had refused him a helping hand 
 or a draught of cool water to aid his 
 awakening desire to escape before he 
 perished. But then she had denied her- 
 self too. 
 
 The knowledge that he was gone on a 
 far journey, which, knowing him, she con- 
 ceived as full of possible peril, made her 
 even yet more ready to blame herself and 
 believe in him as of old. The sharpest 
 stings of jealousy were gone. He was 
 among strangers, in a clearer atmosphere. 
 His going confirmed many conjectures she 
 made in his favour ; it was the verification 
 of her deductions. Thinking again of the 
 
144 ^ Question of Instinct 
 
 last few years, she could see no reason 
 for his travels other than a desire for the 
 freedom he had jeopardised. A single 
 glimpse of Madeline might have made her 
 understand, but it would have destroyed 
 both her own theories and this new-old 
 estimate of the man. She yearned to see 
 her, and yet did not wholly desire it ; a 
 lingering suspicion of the banished truth 
 restrained her from attempting it. And 
 was she not certain this other was what 
 she imagined ? Of course she was utterly 
 sure. 
 
 When Isabel, after many weeks, had 
 arrived at this stage, she converted his 
 silence into despair and into goodness. 
 She prayed for a letter, for a line ; but 
 as it never came, she knew that he was 
 too far off to write, or too doubtful of 
 her to wish to do so. What did he think 
 of a restrained passion like hers, which 
 
A Question of Instinct 145 
 
 would never swear the world well lost ? 
 Knowing a little of him, she could conceive 
 him trying her, in order to be assured 
 of her love. A man who had gained a 
 desire against the world, who had risked 
 all, and who had found a woman to give 
 up all, might perhaps be exacting. For 
 an ordinary woman in unpleasing circum- 
 stances marriage with some one — not, at 
 any rate, disliked — must in the present . 
 world be a great temptation. Could he 
 have been trying her love to see if it 
 were more than affection ? Had she de- 
 stroyed herself.^ The blood left her cheek 
 at the very thought. If it had occurred 
 to her when he was attacking her, the 
 garrison might have yielded. She sat and 
 tried to follow the possible workings of 
 his mind. 
 
 She conceived him deliberately making 
 
 the worst of himself and the worst of the 
 
 10 
 
146 A Question of Instinct 
 
 position he offered her ; and, desiring to 
 believe this, she credited him with a power 
 of restrained calculation little characteristic 
 of such a nature. He had subjected her 
 to an ordeal apparently cruel only because 
 he believed her of a higher, more self- 
 sacrificing nature than she really was. He 
 had made the conditions hard, and she 
 had failed — failed utterly. If she had suc- 
 ceeded, if her impulses had been strong 
 enough to overcome her prejudices, or if 
 her reason had been keen enough to fathom 
 his motives, how strangely different it might 
 have been ! 
 
 And even if not, if he had not meant 
 this, supposing she had yielded, what a 
 power she would have held over him in 
 case of the only circumstance which might 
 necessarily have rendered her ostensible 
 position precarious ! A child would have 
 bound him to her with fetters of steel ; 
 
A Question of Instinct 147 
 
 she might have imposed conditions, and 
 found him yielding. The sense of what 
 she was sacrificing, together with the joy- 
 she would have given him, would have 
 altered all things. And the very thought 
 broke up the fountains of her locked in- 
 stincts ; she almost fainted with strange 
 and overwhelming sensations. If Miller 
 had found her then, her defence was past 
 help ; her sex would have betrayed her 
 intellect, and beaten her pride down with 
 tears. 
 
 But he was in a far-off land, thinking 
 of her without bitterness, and with sorrow 
 and tenderness. But in that passionate 
 sunlight, his heart was with Madeline, 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 Whenever Miller left her for a longer or 
 shorter journey, the day ended for Madeline, 
 and a peculiar night of dream began. She 
 went from her bed to her garden, and from 
 the garden to her music, which she wrote 
 without technical accuracy but with great 
 untrained talent, feeling like one who is 
 walking in her sleep. As a somnambulist 
 usually avoids what will hurt him, she 
 avoided unconsciously all contact with the 
 world which might ruffle her calm and 
 let daylight into her magical darkness. 
 And as she walked alone in the luminous 
 shadows of her fervent imagination, she lived 
 again and again through her past life. But 
 
 she preferred to dwell on that which had 
 
 Z48 
 
A Question of Instinct 149 
 
 passed since she knew Miller, and the story 
 without incident, since its one great tragedy, 
 never lost by any repetition ; it became more 
 and more dyed in colour which was the 
 purple tint of her melancholy yet not wholly 
 morbid mind. With her musical soul she 
 remembered sounds only too well ; but as 
 the accidental memory of some remarkable 
 dissonance was capable of renewing real 
 physical pain, so the vivid recollection of 
 Miller's voice, in all the true cadences of 
 passion's melody, was a perpetual joy to her 
 which was almost sensual. 
 
 But her love was clear and distinct in 
 knowledge ; she held no illusions dear that 
 wrapped a single fault of his in haze, or cast 
 any glamour over the open imperfections 
 of his nature. If she were wrong in her 
 estimation, it was rather that she saw his 
 virtues exaggerated than his faults lessened. 
 She believed him greater in intellect than 
 
150 A Question of Instinct 
 
 fair competition with his peers might prove ; 
 kinder and more controlled in exercise of 
 authority than was in truth the fact. 
 
 She was aware of his selfishness in 
 many things ; she knew his male tendency 
 to resent in great measure the exhibition of 
 any peculiarity which was not founded on 
 common reason, though he himself was at 
 times unreason itself She had fathomed 
 the depths of his animal nature, and by 
 instinct knew his instincts, which often 
 offended her by their frank exhibition. For 
 to him an instinct justified itself: he had 
 little comprehension of another's clashing 
 with it. And since she knew that nature of 
 his in itself, she was well aware of the outlets 
 it might at any time seek. Almost devoid 
 as she was of common jealousy, it pained her 
 to imagine that he could by any means 
 stoop to one not worthy to be his mate. 
 By a frank discussion in her merrier moods 
 
A Question of Instinct 151 
 
 of imaginary lapses she sometimes helped to 
 send him wandering. And when he seemed 
 to stray, she suffered, not as others mostly 
 suffer, but perhaps rather from an internal 
 conviction that she only was good enough 
 for the best that was in him. Yet she was 
 always pitiful and always forgiving ; she 
 knew that if there were gold in him it was 
 to be found in clay. Her passion was so 
 predominantly mental, including both the 
 appreciative intellect and the emotions, that 
 it seemed rather the love of some wise 
 immortal than of an ignorant human being. 
 Hence it was that his adoration partook 
 of the true nature of worship, his lapses 
 of the nature of sins as regarded her 
 only. 
 
 Yet it is by no means true that Miller 
 was frequently unfaithful to her in act. 
 The frankness of his nature often led him 
 to tell her of the mental and physical dis- 
 
152 A Question of Instinct 
 
 turbance common to most men, when the 
 mere sight of some woman, not perhaps 
 so beautiful as peculiarly sympathetic in 
 aspect, saddened him by the impossibility of 
 her attainment and sent him away uneasy. 
 Though this pained her, it was owing rather 
 to her knowledge that she had not wholly 
 satisfied his ideal and real faculties than to 
 any quality in him of which she deprecated 
 the existence. And in one chief point she 
 knew she had not satisfied him, and probably 
 never would. 
 
 The absence of children from their con- 
 nection had not been without its compen- 
 sations for her. Desiring the peculiar peace 
 of her own dream-life when he was not 
 there, she knew how an infant would have 
 broken it, and she was not ready to believe 
 its possession would prove a compensa- 
 tion. Her knowledge of her own mental 
 peculiarities, her marked and varying moods, 
 
A Question of Instinct 153 
 
 the distress which, without any warning, fell 
 on her like a cloud, her ungoverned emo- 
 tions in certain physical states, made her 
 feel a horror of the influence of heredity 
 on any child of hers. Had he been satisfied 
 she would have been no whit the less happy. 
 But then he was not satisfied, and had by 
 implication, and even directly, said as much. 
 She recognised the imperative nature of 
 the instinct which made him uneasy ; she 
 was even aware of its scientific basis, which 
 puts the matter outside the individual con- 
 sciousness, basing it on racial continuance. 
 Its partial or entire absence in herself made 
 her less dissatisfied that she could not give 
 him this desired joy ; but, all the same, her 
 exalted love demanded it for him. One 
 thing only she required — that she should 
 neither see the mother nor the child, if it 
 were given him ; and yet sometimes in her 
 softer moods she thought it might be 
 
154 A Question of Instinct 
 
 possible to adopt it as her own when know- 
 ledge had grown familiar. 
 
 As most, if not indeed all, of her knowledge 
 of men had been gained from Miller, who in 
 introspective moods was frankly and curiously- 
 analytical, she had little of the acquired and 
 religious horror, common to most women, 
 which might have stood her instead of 
 jealousy for combating his nature. Though 
 he had not asserted that all men were like 
 himself, she understood fairly well that most 
 men lie both to their wives and mistresses 
 with a readiness which becomes instinctive. 
 Whether men trespassed or not she was 
 convinced that they frequently desired to 
 do so ; and to her the desire seemed by no 
 means so unnatural as it might have done to 
 a narrower-minded woman, and if evil, quite 
 as evil as any act. If this is so, she said, 
 then let us recognise it. What good can 
 be gained by studiously avoiding the truth 
 
A Question of Instinct 155 
 
 and thrusting one's head into the dust and 
 ddbris of unlikely ideals ? Experience and 
 long lonely consideration forced her to the 
 conclusion that, if all things were beautiful 
 and orderly in the due return of their 
 seasons, the seasons changed and varied. 
 In some of her loftier moods, when her love 
 for Miller was refined to its rarest essence 
 and she felt wholly spiritual and detached, 
 she conceived that if his spiritual love for 
 her were true, as she knew it to be, it 
 mattered as little to her what he did in 
 his more human hours, as it concerned her 
 whether he drank red wine or water from 
 a running brook. 
 
 That she reasoned in this way was to 
 some extent due to the fact that Miller 
 had, so far as he understood her, dominated 
 and directed her mind. Though he talked 
 little of his theories and often listened as 
 an apparent learner to his young friend 
 
156 A Question of Instinct 
 
 Harmer's passionate denunciations of exist- 
 ing institutions, he practically lived, as he 
 believed, far ahead of his time. Love, as 
 the poets write of it when they speak in 
 passion, he believed an entirely unnatural 
 state of mind, due very greatly to restraint, 
 and, perhaps even more, to its being the one 
 pleasure and joy possible to a life cramped 
 and distorted by unnatural social conditions. 
 Though he himself was more passionate 
 than most, he conceived his own nature 
 might be the result of generations partly 
 deprived of free enjoyment ; he looked for 
 a time when love would be calm in its 
 physical manifestations, when jealousy would 
 almost entirely die out. He dreamed of 
 a world, with women independent and free, 
 which would leave men to live their natural 
 lives without cramping themselves to provide 
 for others. He knew how much of the 
 commoner feminine jealousy was based on 
 
A Question of Instinct 157 
 
 a practical fear of desertion, and saw that 
 with their independence it would tend to 
 vanish. In the future, then, it would be no 
 one's business but the woman's who was 
 the father of her child ; he believed it might 
 become one of the things which were never 
 mentioned, not, indeed, because it was 
 catalogued among the creatures of shame, 
 but because of a frank recognition of the 
 merest human rights and necessities. 
 
 And in much of this Madeline saw eye 
 to eye with him. But nevertheless, when 
 theory threatened to become practice, it 
 was not without alarm that she viewed the 
 prospect. She, too, as well as Isabel, under- 
 stood the hold that the mother of his child 
 might have over Miller ; and though it 
 rarely occurred to her that her own position 
 was precarious, she was now forced to think 
 of it. It would be saying too much to 
 assert that she never wished for the vulgar 
 
158 A Question of Instinct 
 
 sanction of marriage ; and the possible 
 chance of losing him made her cast about 
 for any means of strengthening her hold 
 when she considered the matter on the 
 more usual basis. It was an extremely deep 
 view of his nature which led her to reject 
 it utterly at the last. She knew well enough 
 that no social sanction had any power over 
 him, and she felt that an imperative only 
 roused him to revolt. To know that society 
 could compel him to support any one would 
 have spurred him to give no more than could 
 be taken from him by law. She even fore- 
 saw that if in the future some other woman, 
 attacking him on his weaker side, exacted 
 a marriage, she would gain by it nothing 
 more than the legal right to bear his name 
 and receive so much a month in cash. And 
 in the end Madeline might even benefit. 
 
 But nevertheless, and in spite of her 
 strength, which came so greatly from her 
 
A Question of Instinct 159 
 
 power to dismiss all such thoughts and live 
 in a world of her own where Miller was all 
 her own too, the fact that she was now by 
 no means sure what he was doing caused 
 her no little pain. Having followed his 
 mind to the point where she deemed it her 
 duty to give him his liberty, she was troubled 
 now to know how far he would avail himself 
 of it, or whether he would avail himself of 
 it at all. She understood that the last con- 
 versation with him in which the subject had 
 been indirectly touched upon was by no 
 means decisive. '' I have never really been 
 away," he had said. But how had she 
 answered } By prophesying that he would 
 go, and assuring him of her forgiveness if 
 he did. And the next day he had gone on 
 one of his journeys. She wished she could 
 know one way or the other what he was 
 doing ; for now in her dreamland he stood 
 ambiguous, with a veiled face. Had she to 
 
i6o A Question of Instinct 
 
 forgive him or not ? The question was 
 unanswerable ; but she answered it a thousand 
 times, in a thousand ways, and it disturbed 
 her peace, rather more than less as the time 
 rolled on. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 For Miller the five months of arduous 
 exertion spent in the interior of Morocco, 
 when he and his companions often held 
 their lives in their hands, were in the nature 
 of a savage tonic. He became more natural 
 again, less capable of refinements of analysis, 
 much more apt to do what came to his 
 hand, to say what entered his mind. In 
 spite of the hardships his party endured — 
 and he certainly shirked none of them — he 
 dropped five years of his age, and looked 
 younger and more cheerful as the days 
 passed. The deepest lines in his worn face 
 grew less ; the lesser ones disappeared. He 
 shook off much of the cares of civilisation, 
 and was glad at the close of day to sit 
 
i62 A Question of Instinct 
 
 by his tent door and view nature with a 
 serene appreciation. For days at a time he 
 thought of no woman at all ; even Madeline 
 disappeared in a haze, and he was hardly 
 conscious of Isabels existence. But the 
 months passed, and the return by way of 
 Spain was at hand. Then they both came 
 back to him. With his assured possession 
 of Madeline's heart he was not then so 
 much concerned : he really thought more of 
 the one who had escaped him. 
 
 '* Poor little woman ! " he said again and 
 again. '' I suppose I seemed very brutal and 
 callous. I daresay I was a fool to think 
 her so superior to the ordinary good young 
 person who accepts her morality, as she 
 does her pocket-money, from her parents 
 without any thought of where they got it. 
 And, besides, I made the worst of myself after 
 all. If she could only understand how a 
 man can be fond of more than one at once ! " 
 
A Question of Instinct 163 
 
 He determined to see her again ; for 
 her bitter letters had passed out of his 
 mind. She, too, harked back to what 
 she had been in his mind. 
 
 He wrote to no one as he travelled home. 
 He knew it was unlikely that there would 
 be any public account of their return to the 
 coast ; and, even if there were, Madeline, who 
 rarely read a paper, would not see it. To 
 make sure against any catastrophe, he told 
 the man whom he had personally conducted 
 that he was going to Algiers for a couple 
 of weeks. In fact, he did go there, but took 
 the first boat to Marseilles, and went up by 
 the fast night express to Paris. Late the 
 next evening — for it was May, and the 
 Channel boats were delayed by a gale — he 
 reached London ; and, instead of going home, 
 drove direct to old lodgings of his near 
 Victoria. By good luck he found them 
 vacant, and was at once installed in rooms 
 
164 A Question of Instinct 
 
 he had occupied before he knew Madeline. 
 Somehow or another there seemed less dis- 
 loyalty thereby than there would have been. 
 For a time Madeline was non-existent. 
 
 At nine o'clock he stood knocking at 
 Isabel's door, wondering if she were at 
 home. He had not long to wait. 
 
 Isabel had by now entirely created him 
 anew ; he was better than he had been — 
 greater, sweeter, truer. Strong she had 
 known him, and ardent, and impetuous : his 
 power of suffering she had gauged ; but he 
 was brave, loyal, reticent. And how miser- 
 able ! and how solitary ! 
 
 And her own accentuated, awakened lone- 
 liness, with the gnawing senses ever more 
 powerful, pleaded with her for pity. She 
 wanted love. Oh, how she wanted it ! and 
 the right to help and caress and be caressed 
 again. Solitude might be made endurable ; 
 but solitude not only without compensations, 
 
A Question of Instinct 165 
 
 but with remorse and gnawing pain, was 
 intolerable. Would he ever come back to 
 her ? And how ? 
 
 She thought of writing, but feared to do 
 it lest he might misunderstand her, and 
 take it as an entire confession of weakness. 
 She preferred to believe she was not wholly 
 weak ; she said she would never yield if he 
 were what he had said. But he was not 
 that — no, surely not. 
 
 And she had been sitting thus, trying in 
 vain to work, when she heard a heavy 
 footstep on the stone stairs outside. She 
 stopped, and flushed, and grew pale, and 
 put her hand to her bosom. She could have 
 sworn that was his footstep ; but then it 
 could not be. But yet — and then came his 
 knock : that, at least, she was truly certain 
 of. She ran to the door, and then ran back 
 and with a fevered touch arranged her hair. 
 She saw her eyes, and for a moment there 
 
1 66 A Question of Instinct 
 
 was a prayer in her heart for some new 
 beauty to alight upon her and make her 
 desirable. Then she opened the door. He 
 was standing there, with his hat in his hand. 
 Was he sure that she would ask him in, or 
 was it a sudden feeling of respect ? Her 
 mind worked like lightning ; but it was only 
 part of her mind now. The world was out- 
 side ; let her intellect go with it. Her 
 emotions dominated her and stayed het 
 speech. 
 
 She held out her hand first as he looked 
 down on her with a grave and doubtful 
 smile. 
 
 ** I understand," she said. '' Come in." 
 And she drew him into her room. 
 
 What was it she understood — his faint 
 doubt or him ? Perhaps both, he said, as 
 he saw her mobile face in strange excite- 
 ment which she held under till it choked her 
 words. He put his hands on her shoulders. 
 
A Question of Instinct 167 
 
 as he had done before, and shook her to 
 and fro slowly. She felt his fingers tighten 
 on her flesh : it pained her, but she did not 
 mind ; she only felt his enormous physical 
 power against her own. Would she want 
 excuses ? Look then at the disparity of 
 the contest : that would be her plea. 
 
 He bent her forward, and slipped his 
 arms round her neck, and, locking his fingers 
 behind her head, with his closing arms he 
 turned her face up to his. He saw the 
 glow there, the imminent tears ; and passion 
 caught him and swayed him as he had 
 swayed her. And as unequal was the 
 contest. 
 
 **You are glad, you are glad!" he said. 
 '* Don't dare say you don't love me ! " 
 
 She murmured, and cast her eyes down. 
 But he took her to his heart and kissed her. 
 
 *' Say you love me." 
 
 But she would not. 
 
1 68 A Question of Instinct 
 
 He lifted her from the ground, and held 
 her in his arms like a child. 
 
 **My child, say it.'' 
 
 And her pride broke down in tears. 
 
 '* I love you." 
 
 *'As I am?" 
 
 '* As you are." 
 
 She put up her trembling mouth to his. 
 
 ** You ask nothing, say nothing, but love 
 me ? " 
 
 She struggled strangely ; but above the 
 last appeal of the sinking world rose the 
 triumphant flame of the senses. 
 
 ** I love you. Yes, yes, I love you. But 
 what am I ? What shall I be ? " 
 
 He sat down, and held her. 
 
 *' Ask nothing ; for what can it av^l ? 
 You know all things or nothing. Which 
 is it?" 
 
 '' Nothing." 
 
 '' Then let the world go. It is a foolish 
 
A Question of Instinct 169 
 
 world : it gives you dead sea fruit. How 
 do you like cold esteem and the funeral 
 meats of a dead and virgin love ? Does it 
 satisfy you ? " 
 
 And her reply was passion^s answer. How 
 weak she felt ! — how unable ! Her very 
 bones melted : she had no strength at all. 
 
 '' I would be fair with you. But I have 
 come straight to you." 
 
 '' Oh, tell me nothing ! " she cried. 
 
 And he smiled strangely. 
 
 ** Am I cruel — wicked ? " 
 
 '* I do not care. But you are not." 
 
 '' I am." 
 
 '' I do not care." 
 
 *' Was it then so miserable being alone ? 
 Did my going make it worse ? " 
 
 /' No, no — oh yes, it was worse ! But 
 where — where have you been ? " 
 
 '' Far away," he answered : *' in the desert." 
 
 And she took the answer with her own 
 
170 A Question of Instinct 
 
 meaning. She saw a desert of her own 
 imagination that might be populous ; for 
 she knew such a country, and had long 
 gone athirst in it, desiring water that was 
 not at hand. 
 
 ** I knew I was wrong," she said — '' so 
 wrong ! Now I see the truth. You are 
 good and noble and loyal. And life is so 
 miserable ! You will not be cruel because I 
 was. I never meant to hurt you. I think I 
 understand your troubles. You need never 
 tell me." 
 
 And he saw how her mind had worked. 
 
 ** Kiss me," he said ; and with a faint smile 
 she raised her head, and then covered her 
 mouth. He drew her hand away. 
 
 " My own. Will you give me your 
 love ? " 
 
 '* Give it you," she said with surprise. 
 ''Ah! it has always been yours." 
 
 *'And will be." 
 
A Question of Instinct 17 t 
 
 ^*I believe it.'' 
 
 " Whatever happens ? whatever you found 
 me ? Do you think I have always spoken 
 the truth to you ? " 
 
 - Not all— John.'' 
 
 He took her in his arms again. 
 
 ** Say you believe I have spoken the truth, 
 that you believe all I say, that I have said ; 
 and that I love you, need you, want you." 
 
 She revolted a moment, and then failed. 
 She could hardly speak. 
 
 ** Whatever you will," she said faintly. 
 *Ah, yes." 
 
 And she lay back in his arms. 
 
 And though at one time the awakening 
 might be bitter, she found the slumber 
 sweet. For whether the world, that was 
 then so little to her, looked in and approved, 
 or whether, daintily picking up its skirts 
 and walking on the other side of the way. 
 
172 A Question of Instinct 
 
 it looked askance at her from a distance, she 
 cared but little. For then, being one with 
 him, she believed with him that there are 
 other paths across the desert, and other 
 oases than those dedicated to the orthodox 
 pilgrim. Being satisfied of his love, how- 
 ever strangely warped by bitter circumstance, 
 it was a compensation for any possible loss ; 
 and the last thought the world gave her 
 before it drifted away was one for ever very 
 dear even to the earth's unorthodox children, 
 for she knew she could rely on his discretion. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 A WEEK after Miller s return to England he 
 went with Isabel to Vienna. 
 
 '* I don't know it ; you don't know it ; 
 and we are not likely to meet any one we 
 know," he said. " For all its reputation as 
 a pleasure-loving city, few English people 
 ever think of it." 
 
 During a fortnight spent there, and in 
 an old schloss converted into a hotel near 
 Meran, Isabel, who tried not to let her 
 thoughts wander into the future, spent the 
 one happy time of her life. It was an oasis 
 so nearly perfect, in spite of the desert path 
 which had led to it and the desert that 
 threatened to begin again, that she could 
 not believe it real ; it had so much of the 
 
174 A Question of Instinct 
 
 dream nature in it that she felt unable to 
 pass moral judgments on herself, and unable 
 to credit bitter judgments on the part of 
 others. Then the sudden cessation of daily 
 responsibility, the feeling that she need do 
 nothing, was asked to do nothing but live, 
 made her aware how heavy a burden her 
 solitary life had been. She knew now how 
 nearly she had fainted by the way. In spite 
 of all the peculiar resentment common in 
 many women on their first subjection, she 
 was grateful to the man who had taken her 
 by storm. She looked at him not without 
 terror ; but she assuredly loved him. It was 
 true she had never lived : she had existed in 
 prison, and never seen the sun till he 
 had released her by force and incredible 
 audacity. 
 
 Sometimes she wondered how he had 
 dared, when she recalled her ancient mind. 
 She had been so assured of her strength, or 
 
A Question of Instinct 175 
 
 rather so assured of the effect her assumed 
 strength would have on him. She felt per- 
 haps as some animal relying on protective 
 mimicry might feel when a deceived enemy 
 was deceived no longer. The hawk had 
 pounced in spite of her futile show of 
 terrifying offence ; and now she was caught 
 into the air. She looked at him doubtfully 
 when this came into her mind, for he was 
 calm now, and very quiet. But his intuition 
 was not at fault* 
 
 ** This is the calm centre of a cyclone^ 
 Isabel," he said, smiling. '' Is it absolutely 
 necessary I should be in storm ? " 
 
 '' But ' she said, looking at him 
 
 steadily. 
 
 He considered her a moment, and an- 
 swered her unspoken question. 
 
 '* I am not accustomed to these incidents, 
 believe me." 
 
 His power of reading her mind met no 
 
176 A Question of Instinct 
 
 corresponding intuition on her part. She 
 had not yet learnt to trust the emotions 
 in which intuitions flourish, and her in- 
 stincts were still unfledged. She was con- 
 scious now how little she had known of 
 men ; and, deluded to some extent by his 
 complexity, believed she knew even less 
 than she did. 
 
 '* At any rate, I can trust you,'* she 
 said aloud. And he pressed her hand. 
 
 But as a general rule he gave her little 
 time to think. One incident followed an- 
 other : she was continually amused by new 
 things ; his comments on the people were 
 full of humour. If these did not meet 
 with every appreciation on her part, she 
 was at any rate pleased with the attitude 
 of mind that suggested them. She gave 
 herself the credit of having made him 
 happy ; for he had always been so in- 
 tensely serious. Her most vivid previous 
 
A Question of Instinct 177 
 
 impressions of him were melancholy to 
 an extreme. 
 
 *' How do you like the continent?" he 
 asked one day. '' Don't you think the 
 people really seem to enjoy life more than 
 the English?" 
 
 '' Perhaps they don't have fogs," she 
 answered. '' And how can I tell ? If I 
 had come here by myself under other 
 circumstances I might have seen little 
 that I see now." 
 
 *^ Are you glad you have come ? " 
 
 And just then the thought of England 
 brought back many things to her mind. 
 
 '* I might have been more glad," she 
 said. 
 
 **That is always so, Isabel, in this life. 
 
 One can have nothing without regrets ; but 
 
 to live is the end of life, as I understand it. 
 
 There are many applications for the parable 
 
 of the Ten Talents. But come, you must 
 
 12 
 
178 A Question of Instinct 
 
 dress. Don't you remember we are going 
 to the theatre ? " 
 
 Under the influence of the time she 
 grew more beautiful ; the anxiety was gone 
 out of her eyes ; her figure was greatly 
 improved. The care she had formerly 
 taken over her toilette was now redoubled. 
 She would have desired to please him 
 without any arriere pensde ; and there would 
 for ever be some thought of the future deep 
 in her mind. It was not without a feeling 
 of annoyance that she felt her ideas about 
 many things change. She was intellectual, 
 and had to some extent posed as such ; and 
 to the pure intellect the adornment of the 
 body seemed half savage. But now she 
 was conscious of her pleasure in dress, and 
 it grew daily as her emotions found free 
 vent. To choke them down was to throttle 
 half her feminine instincts, and she now 
 watched them expand with a touch of shame. 
 
A Question of Instinct 179 
 
 Her superiority or even equality to man 
 was not now so manifest ; the very know- 
 ledge that the use of such words was futile 
 gave her at first a feeling of being the lesser 
 creature. But then he had cultivated the 
 whole ground. She had been forced of old 
 to content herself with a meagre plot of 
 the open world. And she saw that most 
 women were in the same position. She 
 suspected her faculties were half atrophied, 
 her nature dwarfed on one side and over- 
 grown on another. 
 
 As for Miller, though he was at times 
 disturbed by a strong sense of disloyalty, 
 he emphasised the freedom which had been 
 explicitly allowed him. So far as Madeline 
 was concerned he was utterly as he had 
 been, but, knowing he did not know. her to 
 the full, his one trouble was lest a storm 
 of unexpected feeling on her part should 
 disturb their settled relations. He knew it 
 
i8o A Question of Instinct 
 
 would be vain not to tell her anything ; he 
 was well aware that his mind was an open 
 book to her. In the end he was forced 
 to let things go : the present was with 
 him. 
 
 So far as Isabel was concerned he had 
 allowed her to retain her ideal of him, 
 knowing that by daily and hourly contact 
 she would learn him anew, and perhaps be 
 content as she herself changed. He believed 
 her new life would after all offer many 
 compensations, even if it were lived in secret 
 with all the hazards attending. He was 
 glad to see that she made no allusion what- 
 ever to the other side of his life ; and though 
 he did not believe she deceived herself 
 entirely, he knew enough of women to be 
 aware with what readiness they did deceive 
 themselves when disillusion might be fatal. 
 
 And now the time came for their return 
 to England. 
 
A Question of Instinct i8i 
 
 ** I must not stay longer if I am to take 
 up my work," said Isabel. 
 
 Though she did not emphasise that '' if," 
 it was significant to Miller. 
 
 *' In every way it will be best you should, 
 Isabel," he said ; '' but perhaps there will not 
 be so much necessity for your drudging at it." 
 
 '' I will always make my own living/' 
 she answered, *' unless anything should 
 prevent it." 
 
 '' Then you will come to me, of course ? " 
 said Miller. 
 
 And she leant against his shoulder. 
 
 '' Have you really been happy all this 
 while, Isabel?" he asked. 
 
 *' What is happiness ?" she said curiously. 
 
 '* It is not what children and young 
 women think," he said gravely, **but a very 
 different thing : it is the easy fulfilment 
 of function ; it is health really without 
 hindrance." 
 
1 82 A Question ol Instinct 
 
 '' But there are hindrances," she sighed. 
 
 '* And absolute health does not exist. But 
 you have been happy, dear ? " 
 
 ''Yes, yes. But now?" 
 
 He made no answer, but stood up and 
 stretched out his arms. 
 
 '' I feel very strong. Shall I throw you 
 out of the window, Isabel ? " 
 
 " Why, no," she said, with a smile ; '' it's 
 not so bad as that." 
 
 '' It has been sometimes," he cried signi- 
 ficantly. *' You shall regret nothing. Live, 
 and love, and work, and consider no to- 
 morrow too curiously." 
 
 '' I was considering the past," said Isabel, 
 almost as if it were a question. 
 
 ** It is also the to-morrow," answered 
 Miller. And she did not rebel openly 
 against his enigmatic saying, which she 
 knew meant much ; for she had closed her 
 mind to many suggestions. It was im- 
 
A Question of Instinct 183 
 
 possible to believe if he loved that other 
 woman that he loved her so greatly or in 
 the same way that he loved herself. And 
 thinking this, her jealousy became less 
 real ; for any other love must be something 
 fantastic and strange, not to be compared 
 with real human passion. 
 
 But nevertheless, when Miller left her at 
 her old home by the river, and she saw him 
 drive away, she burst into a flood of tears. 
 The sunlight had gone with him, and in the 
 night came strange and terrible doubts. To 
 reassure herself she went through the last 
 three weeks, hour by hour, and recalled 
 his every word. Surely, surely he was not 
 a liar. If she doubted him, then she would 
 doubt the light. She knew now she could 
 not have been deceived ; she saw her 
 instincts spoke truly. She would have 
 never yielded if they had not done so ; and, 
 having yielded, each reiterated experience 
 
184 A Question of Instinct 
 
 of the hours abroad was a confirmation of 
 his truth. If, indeed, he loved another 
 woman, it was not as he loved her. She 
 was assured she had the only love which 
 was worth a contest, and, taking up her old 
 work with a strangely altered view of its 
 value, she awaited the time of his return 
 with confidence. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 Instead of going home or staying in London, 
 Miller crossed the same night to Paris, 
 and, remaining there for a week, wrote an 
 account of his Morocco journey for the 
 Proceedings of the Geographical Society. 
 He then returned to England. 
 
 As he neared Madeline he was distinctly 
 conscious of dread lest she should act in some 
 manner beyond even his experience of her 
 moods. Though he had no intention of 
 telling her anything about Vienna, he knew 
 with deadly certainty that she would discover 
 it without his speaking. To say nothing of 
 anything else, he was by no means so 
 bronzed as he would have been had he 
 
 returned directly ; and he knew she would 
 
 185 
 
i86 A Question of Instinct 
 
 notice that at once. He was obliged to 
 comfort himself with the thought that she 
 had given him liberty and could not now 
 blame him. Nevertheless, he was in terror 
 lest she should not have really known herself. 
 He even conceived her suicide as by no 
 means impossible, now he thought of it. For 
 this new affair had a serious aspect : it was 
 no mere trip ; it might have the gravest . 
 results. She was quite capable of imagining 
 herself in the way. 
 
 He had telegraphed from Dover, and he 
 found her expecting him. He saw in a 
 moment that the crisis was nearer at hand 
 than he had expected, and more serious 
 than he had looked for at the first. 
 
 She was clothed in white, and her cheeks 
 were pale ; but a red spot blazed on each. 
 Her eyes were very large ; their pupils 
 abnormally dilated. As he entered the 
 room she came to him swiftly, and put a 
 
A Question of Instinct 187 
 
 hand on each of his shoulders and stared 
 him straight in the eyes. He could not bear 
 it; he attempted to take her in his arms. 
 She eluded him with a look of horror. 
 
 '' No, no," she said. '' Where have you 
 been since the ist of May?" 
 
 ** What do you mean, Madeline ? " 
 
 *' I saw you were at Tangiers then. I 
 read it. You sent so few letters. Yes ; I 
 know you have been back three weeks." 
 
 He looked at her, and looked away, and 
 clenched his hands. 
 
 ''And what then? Is it not possible — 
 don't you know me well enough to know 
 how seldom I write ? " 
 
 She went towards him again. 
 
 *' It's not worthy of you, John." 
 
 And he faced her with a groan. 
 
 '' No, you are right, Madeline ; it's not 
 worthy. Do you want the truth — all the 
 truth ? " 
 
1 88 A Question of Instinct 
 
 She shrank as though he was going to 
 strike her. 
 
 '' No, no ! " she cried ; '' I don't, I don't ! 
 Go, and leave me, leave me." 
 
 But he got her by the wrists. 
 
 ** I will not. I have come back." 
 
 She cowered, and shrank again. 
 
 **And have been away with — a human 
 being. I know, I know." 
 
 She broke from him, and sat forlorn in 
 the farthest corner. She talked to herself. 
 
 **My own fault, my own fault. I didn't 
 know. How could I ? Why am I strong 
 when I ought to die ? " 
 
 He came and knelt to her. 
 
 ** Don't say it, Madeline, my own, own 
 dear love. Say you forgive me." 
 
 She was white to the lips. 
 
 '' What have I to forgive ? I sent you, 
 I sent you." 
 
 '* But you can forgive me, all the same." 
 
A Question of Instinct 189 
 
 And he saw her lips set rigidly for a 
 moment. But they quivered again. She 
 bent towards him. 
 
 *' My poor boy, my poor, selfish, unselfish, 
 tender, cruel lover. Have I been so terrible 
 to you ? " 
 
 ** You have been heaven to me," he 
 answered brokenly. 
 
 ''And purgatory and hell," she said, and 
 she rose. She walked the room with rapid 
 steps. 
 
 '' What, what shall I do or say ? It is my 
 fault. But I thought — oh, John, I thought 
 you wouldn't, you wouldn't ! I was strong, 
 strong, as I thought, but really weak. You 
 have said I was a witch, an Undine, a will- 
 o'-the-wisp ; but I am a woman. I don't 
 know what to do." 
 
 He followed her, and took her in his arms. 
 
 She allowed his embrace for a moment, 
 and then gave a scream. 
 
19c A Question of Instinct 
 
 *' No, no! I can see her, I can see 
 her!" 
 
 And she pointed to the shut door as 
 though it stood open with Isabel there. 
 John started, thinking she had gone insane, 
 and he shook as his blood ran cold. 
 
 '* No, Madeline, no ; there can never be 
 any one here. Don't you understand ? You 
 have said you could." 
 
 *' But you have been away so long, John 1 " 
 she cried. 
 
 '' And have I lost you ? " he answered, 
 dropping his hands to his side. 
 
 '' I do not know," said Madeline, '' I do 
 not know. I must have time, time, time to 
 think and to see what you are, and if you 
 have really come back — the best of you, 
 the man I loved, that I loved so ! " 
 
 She broke down, and fell on her knees 
 by a chair, sobbing. He knelt by her and 
 murmured inarticulately ; but she refused to 
 
A Question of Instinct 191 
 
 be comforted. He arose again and paced 
 the room. 
 
 '' Madeline, Madeline," he said ; '' my 
 own beloved, my queen, my great desire, 
 be good to me, I pray, I pray ! Be calm. 
 I know how — how I have hurt you. Yes, 
 I know it. But — no, I won't say you gave 
 me liberty ; but in the one thing you gave 
 me no sympathy. A little, a very little 
 might have saved us both." 
 
 She sobbed still, but her sobs grew quieter. 
 
 '' Come here," she said at last ; and he 
 knelt by her again. *' John, will you ever 
 be the same again ? Look me in the eyes ; 
 let me see what you have brought me 
 back." 
 
 She scanned him feverishly. Age grew 
 into his face as the long moments passed ; 
 the vanished lines appeared again. 
 
 *' Do you grow old, John ? Let me look 
 at your eyes. Is it you — you?" 
 
192 A Question of Instinct 
 
 *' It is I," he said, with quivering lips. 
 
 *' But changed," she said. '' But — yes, 
 you have come back. Isn't it true you 
 have ? '* 
 
 '' As true as the sun ! " he cried. 
 
 ''Ah! what you have not brought me 
 I never had. Yes, it is you. It is only 
 knowledge of you that is deeper." 
 
 He blenched. 
 
 '[ But your love, Madeline ? " 
 
 '' And yours, John ; what of it ? Was I 
 deceived ? " 
 
 ''Never," he cried, "never!" 
 
 And she fainted in his arms. For one 
 exquisite moment, when she recovered, she 
 was only conscious of her joy at his return, 
 and then misery came back, rolling over 
 her. But its flood lessened. He knelt by 
 her as she lay on the couch to which he 
 had carried her. 
 
 " Yes, you do love me, John dear. Am 
 
A Question of Instinct 193 
 
 I utterly base ? You used to say I was 
 all spirit." 
 
 *' Would that you had been always what 
 you seem now ! " he said, with a tinge of 
 bitter recollection. 
 
 '' I shall not be ! " she cried : ** I shall be 
 less that than I was." 
 
 He held her hands tightly. 
 
 *' Not always, not always, Madeline." 
 
 But she shook her head. 
 
 ''You don't want me to die, John?" 
 
 She saw him grow pallid to the lips. 
 
 '* Don't say it, don't say it. I thought 
 you would never talk of that again. Be- 
 lieve me, I have brought you the best." 
 
 '' Ah ! " she said ; '' if I did not believe 
 that would you have found me here ? " 
 
 And there was a long silence as Miller 
 thought of all that might have been. If 
 he had found her vanished, gone out deso- 
 lately and helpless to death, it would have 
 
 13 
 
194 A Question of Instinct 
 
 destroyed his soul. He followed her anguish 
 in the weeks she had waited for him ; and 
 for the moment he repented. The escape 
 made him feel sick ; he reeled as he stood. 
 Madeline saw it, and sprang to him. 
 
 '* I forgive you, John. You can never do 
 anything to make me hate you. Lie down 
 for a little while." And she soothed him 
 as he obeyed her like a child. 
 
 While she in her turn sat by him, an 
 exaltation came over her which was an 
 ecstatic renunciation of every fleshly desire. 
 The passion through which she had passed 
 had purged her of the body as it had des- 
 troyed her strength. She looked on her lover 
 as if she was indeed of the heaven above, 
 and he a poor earth-child of the troubled 
 world beneath. He was man, and therefore 
 selfish ; human, and therefore fleshly ; flesh, 
 and therefore weak. As his strength was 
 but the strength of physical combat, how 
 
A Question of Instinct 195 
 
 should she require of him, and obtain it, 
 the spiritual grace which almost failed her, 
 in those gifts his infinite superior ? But 
 above all there was in her a pity that was 
 divine ; she saw him seeking, and knew 
 he would not attain. The love she had 
 given him was not enough, or lacking in 
 some earthly grace, and he had sought 
 strange love to supplement it. She believed 
 that even if he found it, and with it the 
 satisfaction of his most fervent desire, he 
 would still be seeking for ever. Though 
 another brought him a gift she could not 
 give, and though a little child blessed him 
 in this desolate world, she knew he was 
 driven onward by something not himself, 
 the hungry desire of humanity seeking in 
 vain for that full peace which it can never 
 find. 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 So John Miller had wrought out his desires, 
 and he now lived according to his formed 
 creed, which by no means really fitted his 
 conscience or his ancient habits, or the 
 apparent customs of good society. All his 
 responsibility was doubled or tripled ; he 
 never knew what surprise of scandal might 
 be in store for him, and he was compelled 
 to work harder and harder each day. Who 
 could tell what fresh need there might be 
 for money when he had taken a new soul 
 into his keeping to guard against the world 
 which he pretended to despise, but which 
 he could not now help fearing. 
 
 In the secret security of his old life with 
 
 Madeline he had attained the peace of a 
 
 196 
 
A Question of Instinct 197 
 
 sanction to their relations which was really 
 nothing but the world's ignorance and the 
 approval of his own mind. When those 
 relations were disturbed he was troubled ; 
 and many times he regretted the instinct 
 and passion that had led him to bring Isabel 
 into his life. If it had been possible without 
 dishonour, as he felt it, he might have broken 
 with her now. But that was, he felt, even 
 more shameful than any thought which 
 had yet come to him ; and, besides, he 
 had not been paid the price for what 
 seemed curiously like a sin — a sin almost 
 in the theological acceptation of the word. 
 He referred everything to Madeline's 
 standard ; he gauged himself by her measure. 
 She was perfect ; she was pure. Her fatal 
 and oddly recurrent coldness seemed not 
 only sweet but right as well. So, as he 
 worshipped her and was atheist as to any 
 other god, he felt that he had sinned. 
 
198 A Question of Instinct 
 
 Then, of course, the usual male revulsions 
 came to him, when passion broke suddenly 
 into blood-red blossoms and renewed life's 
 spring. And passion abolished his scruples, 
 as it does the scruples of all men, till cold 
 dawn comes and Fate presents a little 
 account not always to be paid easily, and 
 never to be utterly ignored. 
 
 But what saved him mostly from remorse 
 and worry and ceaseless morbid introspection 
 was the necessity for work which he had 
 brought upon himself. He now laboured 
 daily in the library of the Geographical 
 Society, and laid out for himself a long 
 task. He proposed publishing a connected 
 account of his African explorations, and in 
 addition he undertook to write a book for 
 a traveller with more money than brains 
 or literary skill. This, with his former 
 journalistic work, which could easily be 
 expanded, filled up all his time and gave 
 
A Question of Instinct 199 
 
 him good promise of another three hundred 
 a year. He banked everything over and 
 above his former income, and earmarked 
 that money mentally as Isabel's, if she should 
 have need of it. 
 
 And soon there was little doubt that she 
 would want it, or, at the least, some of it ; 
 for that portion of her work which required 
 her to be seen out of doors she refused to 
 undertake. This cut her down to some 
 precarious typewriting, that hardly afforded 
 her sufficient to live on. But she was 
 remarkably content in spite of her troubles. 
 
 *' It is fulfilling destiny, I suppose," she 
 thought more than once. *'And, after all, 
 whom have I to think of ? whom can I 
 hurt but myself ? " 
 
 And then gain she thought of the stigma 
 which might be attached to her child, unjust 
 and foolish though such a stigma might be, 
 and that certainly troubled her greatly. But 
 
200 A Question of Instinct 
 
 she had ' a secret hope in her heart which 
 she cherished even in the odd hysterical 
 storms which now sometimes came to her, 
 though she never spoke to Miller of what was 
 in her mind. She believed that wisdom 
 dictated this course to her, when, indeed, it 
 was fear, and not a little doubt. 
 
 For Miller now seemed sometimes a little 
 off-hand in :his manner to her. It was 
 not that he behaved differently, or that he 
 was really careless, but her peculiar position 
 asked for more support than he readily 
 afforded. He took things so much for 
 granted. It seemed easy and natural, and 
 it did not occur to him at first that he was 
 callous or selfish. He recognised that his 
 position was now more out of the way than 
 it had been, yet it never occurred to him 
 that for a woman like Isabel to bear him 
 a child was more abnormal than if he had 
 been responsible for a dozen families. But 
 
A Question of Instinct 201 
 
 no man yet has fathomed an average woman's 
 desire to be respectable, and in all probability 
 never will : it is a man's coat, but a woman's 
 very skin ; the one a necessity, the other a 
 luxury. Yet when Miller, who was certainly 
 quick enough at noticing what especially 
 concerned himself, began to see what was 
 in Isabel's mind, he commenced to counter- 
 mine at once. 
 
 *' It is curious," he said, '* how marriage 
 is being attacked, openly and in secret ; and, 
 oddly enough, I fancy the very people who 
 do most harm to the detestable relic of the 
 times when marriage meant real and legal 
 ownership would be most surprised if 
 they knew it. I mean those who counsel 
 prudence and go in for late marriages. 
 What with those who can't marry, those 
 who won't, and those who put it off (and the 
 two last are rapidly increasing), the sacred 
 institution is in a bad way. I should not be 
 
202 A Question of Instinct 
 
 surprised if, in times to come, to be married 
 will carry the imputation of being weak, 
 unable, and merely sexual." 
 
 '* It is not so now at any rate," said Isabel, 
 a little tartly. 
 
 '' Of course not," answered Miller. '' Only 
 the other night I saw a beautiful example of 
 what it means to some of the lowest classes, 
 for I interfered with a man who was half 
 strangling a woman on the Embankment ; 
 and when I pulled him off, he told me in 
 a voice of indignant remonstrance that she 
 was his wife. This the poor wretch, who 
 really wanted to get rid of him, tearfully 
 denied. But in the tones of both was the 
 implication that, if she had been, he would 
 have been within his rights." 
 
 '*And what does that lead to.^" asked 
 Isabel. 
 
 **Why, to this," said Miller: ^'that the 
 true, ancient notion of marriage now only 
 
A Question of Instinct 203 
 
 exists in the lower classes, and in the time 
 to come the institution itself will only survive 
 with them. It is like the ancient dogmatic 
 religion left to those who are without the 
 light of the higher criticism and the facts 
 of modern science : all institutions descend. 
 It reminds me that it is said to be true by 
 some naturalists that all variations of colour 
 commence at an animal's head and go 
 generation by generation back to its tail. 
 Marriage will be left to the residuum at 
 last. At present I should say the bars on 
 the social tiger are about at his waist — that 
 is, the middle classes." 
 
 Isabel by no means cared to hear him talk 
 in this fashion. A year ago it might have 
 amused her, but now matters were very 
 different. It was all very well to theorise and 
 think ahead of one's time, but motherhood 
 meant a reversion to her, and her old opinions 
 were chaff. She was faced by a big fact. 
 
204 A Question of Instinct 
 
 '' Don't talk so, dear," she said hastily. And 
 then she could have bitten her tongue out, 
 for she did not wish to let him know what 
 her attitude was ; she preferred to wait 
 until the time came when her position would 
 be strongest, when she felt he ought not to 
 be able to resist her, when she believed he 
 would not wish to do so. 
 
 For now the other woman was as nothing. 
 She was half a myth, an eidolon, a mere 
 ghost, not a warm, live woman who loved 
 him. By half suggestion, by sudden surprise 
 when he was least able to refuse her pleading, 
 she had made him swear he loved her best 
 of all the world ; and she had not dared to 
 ask herself why his voice did not ring true, 
 why he had shown such reluctance to say it. 
 She deceived herself again because she 
 wished to be deceived. And yet the time 
 was coming when she would bring him the 
 great desire of his heart that she alone could 
 
A Question of Instinct 205 
 
 give him ; and then she said she knew that 
 he would come to her, and be hers for ever. 
 She yearned for the time to come to put it 
 to the test, to win him or lose him wholly; 
 she did not then conceive a middle course 
 possible. She argued entirely from false 
 physical premises, or at least from those which 
 were peculiar to her own sex. She was most 
 essentially a woman fit to be a mother, 
 and better adapted for it than nine out of 
 ten who have children of their own. Her 
 instincts were strong, and in that direction 
 essentially good and natural. She knew she 
 would love the child with a strange passionate 
 abandonment, and she believed that Miller 
 too, in a very great measure, would have 
 the same feeling for it. And it is highly 
 probable that Miller believed so himself. 
 Certainly, if she had asked him that question 
 directly, he would with all sincerity have 
 answered it as she desired. But then he 
 
2o6 A Question of Instinct 
 
 knew as little of himself as she did of him, 
 and only time could show whether he was 
 not deceived in thinking so. And he never 
 really dared to analyse wholly his own 
 attitude towards Isabel. He was begin- 
 ning to be aware that in satisfying one 
 great and primitive instinct of his nature 
 which had hitherto gone hungry, she had to 
 some extent played her part in the selfish 
 drama of his life ; and though he knew her 
 claim on him daily became stronger, he was 
 daily less inclined to acknowledge it. For 
 the other side of his life was more interesting, 
 more peculiar, more tumultuous, and it took 
 him the greater part of the energies left over 
 from his work. He was determined that 
 Madeline should never go from him, and 
 for a long time he had to fight for his hold 
 upon her. Sometimes, and that not infre- 
 quently, he was angry with himself, and 
 deeply regretted the endless complications 
 
A Question of Instinct 207 
 
 Into which his theories had led him. For 
 one thing, he was now interested in his work ; 
 and these two women almost dragged the 
 pen out of his hand. He remembered one 
 conversation he had had with MadeHne 
 about a friend of his. 
 
 '' It was very natural, I suppose,'' she had 
 said ; *' but then he behaved badly." 
 
 '' My dear, all men behave badly," was 
 his answer. " And if they don't, it is more 
 good luck than good management." 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 During the year following Miller's return 
 from Vienna his relations with Madeline 
 underwent some curious changes. And 
 Madeline's mental life during that period 
 had been one of furious revolt and patient 
 acquiescence oddly mixed and mingled. 
 She sometimes endeavoured to take a clear 
 view of the situation in all its complexity, 
 and the result of that view entirely prevented 
 her making any motion. She stood like an 
 ignorant spectator in the midst of dark and 
 awful machinery, and, awed by the strange 
 intricacies which threatened destruction, she 
 waited for some guide to help her. And 
 the assistance she needed came in peculiar 
 
 and cold calm which could reckon up the 
 
 208 
 
A Question of Instinct 209 
 
 weakness of humanity without despising it. 
 It was not Millers fault; it was not her 
 own ; it was not even the fault of the un- 
 fortunate wretch who had been fool enough 
 not to see that Miller did not really love 
 her, or weak enough to grasp at the mere 
 semblance of passion, or passionate and evil 
 enough to take him as a lover who did not 
 love. For Madeline did not and could not 
 understand that Miller was really fond of 
 the other woman. 
 
 Yet her chief solace, when she reached 
 some degree of resignation, was that at 
 any rate she had not prevented Miller from 
 endeavouring to satisfy his natural instincts. 
 This was no less a joy to her even when 
 she felt that he was more likely to suffer 
 from his liberty than not. She cared nothing 
 about the other woman, and probably would 
 not have been displeased to know that 
 she suffered for some of her resentment 
 
 14 
 
2IO A Question of Instinct 
 
 against Miller was soon transferred from his 
 dear body to the corpus vile of this feminine 
 delinquent. She soon began to look on her 
 as a beloved mistress might on the harmless 
 necessary wife. For in the old days much 
 of her fretfulness and many of her peculiar 
 outbursts had been caused by the gradual 
 subsidence of Miller into the commoner 
 marital relations. Cold as she was physically, 
 she missed the storms of anger and the 
 warm rains of delightful tenderness which 
 had characterised her lover in the first years 
 of their living together. Now things were 
 changed once more. John was again pas- 
 sionate, loving, demonstrative, suppliant ; he 
 took nothing for granted, and was capable 
 of gratitude, the one thing chiefly lacking 
 in the usual husband. And yet she was 
 terrified by the child ; this, she knew, might 
 throw down even as she built, and bring 
 desolation to her solitary chamber. Its very 
 
A Question of Instinct 211 
 
 possibility daunted her, but at last roused 
 her to combat. 
 
 ''John," she said, ''you know I ask you 
 nothing now. I don't know, and I hardly 
 care, what other women might think ; indeed, 
 sometimes I believe they would say one 
 thing and mean another and act as I do 
 in a similar case. But I want to know what 
 happens — if anything happens ? " 
 
 " You shall know," said Miller, with 
 averted eyes. 
 
 Madeline touched his bowed head as she 
 passed him. She sat down at the piano* 
 
 " Do you think you are a very bad man, 
 John ? Sometimes I should like to know 
 what you think about yourself." 
 
 Miller winced perceptibly. 
 
 " I think Tm more fool than knave, 
 frankly," he answered. " Fm often very 
 sorry that I have acted as I wished to 
 act." 
 
212 A Question of Instinct 
 
 Madeline's smile at this confession, which 
 was no news to her, was rather melancholy. 
 
 " There is always something sorrowful 
 about harvest," she said, ** whether of tares 
 or wheat. But, John," and she struck a 
 chord on the piano, '' I do not know that 
 I am sorry now." 
 
 '' You mean " said Miller eagerly. 
 
 ** I mean, I have g^ my lover back again." 
 
 He rose and took her in his arms. 
 
 ** Bless you, dear, for saying that." 
 
 When he loosed her she turned to the 
 instrument and played for a few minutes. 
 
 *' Why should we think so much of these 
 things, John ? " she asked suddenly. 
 
 '' It's purely abnormal," said Miller, with 
 emphasis; ''and, to tell the truth, if it were 
 not for the woman's attitude I don't think 
 men would. I am sure the women who 
 scream loudest have been badly hurt, but I 
 doubt whether a single one of them under- 
 
A Question of Instinct 213 
 
 stands what a man is. Much of it's our 
 fault, because we lie so to you ; but our lying 
 has been the result of two or three conflict- 
 ing codes of morals — masculine, feminine, 
 and theological — and the two last lack a 
 physiological basis, while the first has been 
 one of pure expediency." 
 
 '' I think I understand that," said 
 Madeline. 
 
 But she did not look as if she did, and 
 Miller tried to explain further. 
 
 '' Two codes don't work," he said. 
 '' Imagine two or three codes of signals at 
 sea. It's like two languages. Why should 
 a boy learn his moral language and a girl 
 hers, and then have to meet without a 
 dictionary ? " 
 
 '' Do you want restrictions for the man, 
 John ? " asked Madeline. 
 
 Miller laughed a little uneasily. 
 
 *'No; but provided women understand 
 
214 A Question of Instinct 
 
 and are free, their comparatively passionless 
 natures will be a natural restriction." 
 
 *' You look a long way ahead," said 
 Madeline ; '' and meantime " 
 
 **We learn languages," said Miller. ** It 
 is a pity some of the novels don't speak up 
 a little for men, and try to explain a few of 
 their difficulties, which date back to their 
 school days, and are a thousandfold accentu- 
 ated before they are grown up. A young 
 people's grammar of the sexes, edited by a 
 sensible physiologist, would meet with a 
 storm of abuse and supply a long-felt 
 want." 
 
 '' Yes," said Madeline, ** we, who don't 
 need it, are taught restraint, restraint, 
 restraint from our cradles, and " 
 
 *' Boys," interjected Miller, *'are handed 
 over to a debauched crowd of their ignorant 
 fellows, who inculcate license, which is only 
 too natural to us. We might reverse things 
 
A Question of Instinct 215 
 
 with some advantage for a time. I am sick 
 of myself, fairly sick." 
 
 Madeline left her seat and went to him. 
 She put her arms round his neck. 
 
 '' But I don't want you to be anything 
 else but what you are, John." 
 
 Which was very feminine, false, and true, 
 and extremely consolatory, and a satire on 
 the conversation. But then she knew that 
 the last rather inconsequent remark of her 
 lover's referred to the complications due 
 to the woman whom she now sometimes 
 thought of as ** John's wife, poor thing." 
 For she had reoccupied triumphantly her 
 old position as his mistress, and no longer 
 feared her, but only her child. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 During the next three months it was 
 perhaps a lucky thing for John Miller that 
 he had to work very hard, and that he had 
 no lust after strong drink in excess ; for 
 though Madeline was infinitely kind and 
 thoughtful, and much healthier minded than 
 she had been, yet Isabel became more and 
 more trying. He had in the old times 
 endeavoured to tell her the truth, and now 
 he knew how impossible it was ever to do so. 
 He began to think that no one could tell 
 the truth to a woman. And it would now 
 be cruel. When he asked himself what the 
 truth was, he was not a little puzzled to 
 declare it roundly. But one result of the 
 whole intrigue was that he felt infinitely 
 
 2X6 
 
A Question of Instinct 217 
 
 mean and a great blackguard. Against this 
 feeling he rebelled strongly; and in a moment 
 of rare expansiveness he communicated 
 sufficient of his woes to Harmer for the 
 latter to form an opinion and let him know 
 it. They talked in Miller's writing- room, 
 which was a barely furnished apartment, 
 adorned with maps and a few books 
 of geographical reference : an extremely 
 prognathous skull occupied the place of 
 honour on the mantelpiece. 
 
 '' I understand it's a bit of a mess," said 
 Harmer, who was thoroughly in his element 
 when reducing a mixed vulgar fraction of 
 morals to its simplest form, '' and that mess 
 has to be got out of as best you can. That, 
 I take it, is not the question. If you only 
 grant my thesis of polygamy, and if you've 
 told no lies, I don't see why you should be 
 down in the mouth as to the eternal moral 
 aspects of your acts. You see, opinions 
 
21 8 A Question of Instinct 
 
 differ so that one must either take the 
 current code or go to first principles. Now 
 our amiable and beautiful Hale thinks the 
 greatest sin of all is for a woman to break 
 the seventh mosaic rule of conduct; but for a 
 man to do it, is only sheer amiability. What 
 can one say to a loose thinker like that ? '' 
 
 *' Is it such loose thinking ? " asked Miller 
 grimly. 
 
 ** My dear fellow ! " cried Harmer, '* are 
 you a pure savage, like this prognathous 
 gentleman grinning jawless at us up there ? 
 or are you a modern man, with some idea of 
 liberty ? You have told no lies and followed 
 your natural instincts. The onus is not on 
 your shoulders. If you had lied I should 
 recommend you to select a fitting spot, and 
 then cut your throat. Your quasi-remorse 
 is nothing but the fear that the second lady 
 has deceived herself and will lay the blame 
 on you." 
 
A Question of Instinct 219 
 
 '* There's something in that," said Miller, 
 wincing ; '' but it isn't all." 
 
 **Then what's the rest?" 
 
 '' I'll tell you when I know." 
 
 iVnd Harmer was sharp enough to see 
 that Miller did not quite understand how he 
 would feel when the new element was in- 
 troduced into his life. Miller himself turned 
 the conversation upon general principles. 
 
 '* But has the woman liberty ? " he 
 asked. 
 
 ''If she doesn't tell lies, why, yes," said 
 Harmer. *'Then the man must like it or 
 lump it, or leave her. The onus is on him. 
 That she hasn't the liberty now, even if she 
 speaks the truth, is the root of most social 
 trouble. It's only the truth we want." 
 
 *' And the courage," said Miller dolefully. 
 
 ''You've faced savages," cried Harmer. 
 
 " Savages," said Miller scornfully, and 
 broke into a peal of laughter. Harmer 
 
220 A Question of Instinct 
 
 joined in good-humouredly, but did not 
 quite catch his friend's meaning. 
 
 '' Never mind," he said cheerfully. '' But 
 what fools we all are to be mucking and 
 fooling about so simple a question when 
 folks are starving and there are real things 
 to be faced and nature is to be beaten or 
 ofot round ! Ancient institutions are all rot : 
 the jaw bones of dead asses can yet slay 
 their thousands. We are backing, tail fore- 
 most, on the future ; lamenting property in 
 woman, when property is doomed. I'm a 
 socialist, that's what I am." 
 
 *' Be what you like," said Miller, rising, 
 '' so long as you don't explain it to me. 
 I've got my hands full as it is. If I make 
 a mess of my own affairs I'll take on the 
 world's." 
 
 *' That sounds clever," said Harmer, ''but 
 it's very cheap." 
 
 They went down town together. Harmer 
 
A Question of Instinct 221 
 
 had done Miller a good turn in cheering 
 him when he needed it badly. His last 
 saying stuck in John's mind. 
 
 ''Why put yourself on the rack about 
 your faults ? Remember lots of folks love 
 you, old man ; and youVe done good solid, 
 hard work in the world, and will do more 
 yet. That ought to be enough. A man's 
 not like a diamond, because he s not meant 
 for ornament ; and flaws don't stop diamonds 
 from cutting glass." 
 
 And then Miller went to Chelsea. He 
 spent a very quiet and simple domestic 
 evening for Isabel was in one of her best 
 moods, and was not fretting. As she did 
 not worry him for any proof of affection, he 
 felt really affectionate and thought more 
 serenely of the future. But the future as 
 he imagined it did not fit in with Isabel's 
 ideas ; and before he went she let him 
 see it. 
 
222 A Question of Instinct 
 
 ** I am doing very little work now, John," 
 she said. 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 *' There is no need. Why should you ? 
 Take it easily. There is a time to toil 
 and a time to leave it alone. A woman 
 has not always a big margin of energy left 
 over." 
 
 Isabel, who was working with her needle 
 looked up at him. 
 
 ** But I am very lonely without the old 
 tasks, John ; and now I have nobody to 
 see me." 
 
 Miller nodded. 
 
 '* You will be busy soon, dear." 
 
 ''Shall I not see more of you, John?*' 
 
 ** I am here very often, Isabel." 
 
 She glanced at him swiftly. 
 
 " Has any one a greater right to your 
 time, dear ? " she asked, looking down again. 
 
 He did not answer. 
 
A Question of Instinct 223 
 
 '*Will you never shake yourself free?'* 
 she asked^ in a low voice, which he hardly 
 heard. 
 
 '' I am free," he answered, rather sternly. 
 
 *' And I am not," said Isabel. But, 
 catching sight of his gloomy face, she 
 held her peace. 
 
 *' My time is not yet," she told herself. 
 And she smiled to think of the dear gift 
 that should bring him to her, bring him for 
 ever, and give him the courage to break 
 adrift from the rusted chains that bound 
 him. How sure she felt of that ! 
 
 And presently the time was at hand for 
 her to put her faith to the test* 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 Three days after Isabel's child was born 
 John Miller telegraphed to her that he was 
 called out of town on urgent business for 
 forty-eight hours at the least, and the brief 
 telegram was followed by a letter confirming 
 it. He told Madeline the same, and, pack- 
 ing his small bag, he really did go out of 
 town. But his business was apparently of 
 no serious order ; it merely took him to 
 an old inn, about twenty miles from London, 
 where he was sometimes accustomed to stay 
 for a brief breathing time. And now he most 
 distinctly required time for consideration. 
 But in the cool quiet of dewy peace which 
 poured about him that late summer he put 
 off considering in concrete terms and let 
 
A Question of Instinct 225 
 
 his resolutions grow. To think in set 
 terms is but a forcing-house for our natural 
 actions ; if it ripens them faster, they are 
 less enduring. 
 
 The hours that he spent upon a bird- 
 haunted patch of common aloof from the 
 silver Thames, which he could see from its 
 northern verge, were given up outwardly to 
 the minute observation of natural objects. 
 The birds especially drew his attention : 
 they were now free from considering the 
 welfare of their young broods ; they sang 
 at ease, and lived for themselves. The 
 ripening apples on bending branches ; the 
 yellow wheat, almost ready for the sickle, oj 
 rather for the rattling reaper, spoke of 
 fertility which was easy and natural; the 
 lilies of the field were not borne down by 
 thought or alien considerations of some 
 new order that crushed their ancient instincts. 
 Save for their common liability to death, 
 
 15 
 
226 A Question of Instinct 
 
 what was there between these and him, 
 the unwilling child of an artificial world ? 
 All things brought him back again to 
 London, and to those he had left there. 
 But when he entered the house and saw a 
 mother with her young brood of puppies, 
 obviously the offspring of the big dog 
 which always lay in the sun under the old 
 inn's verandah, he saw nature at work 
 again untrammeled. What did the watch- 
 dog care about the pups ? They were the 
 absolute and entire property of the mother. 
 She sometimes even growled with guarded 
 hostility when he walked past forgetful of 
 the springtime of dalliance ; her entire 
 joy was in those brown balls of rolling 
 fluff which tugged at her teats as she lay 
 stretched upon the warm earth. But his 
 business was to guard the house, to fight 
 any strange dog whose aspect did not 
 please him ; he was nothing to her. 
 
A Question of Instinct 227 
 
 There was, too, in the little paddock at 
 the back of the old inn, a mare whose young 
 foal had been born late in the spring. Did 
 the brood mare take any thought of its 
 sire ? was not her ripe pleasure the 
 provision of milk merely, the sensuous joy 
 of her continued life that sprang renewed 
 by her side ? 
 
 Even in the wilder countries he remem- 
 bered that the male is rarely needed for 
 protection against wild beasts. But he 
 recalled rather sadly the savage sexual 
 instinct of property in the wild stallion. 
 They came in the night and thieved their 
 domesticated partners from the settlers 
 in the wilderness, and drove the unwilling 
 ones with infinite brutality. One such 
 mare, which was unable to gallop through 
 being hobbled, he recalled having seen 
 kicked to death by the brutal stallion. 
 ** They are as bad as men," said he. 
 
228 A Question of Instinct 
 
 Yet all these considerations led him in- 
 evitably where his own wild nature would 
 have drawn him more easily if social con- 
 vention had not fettered his natural instincts. 
 '* Our notion of property in women has 
 spoiled them for freedom, and has tied us 
 to them as gaolers. Instead of a help, how 
 often do they become a hindrance ! We 
 have prevented them using their faculties 
 to gain their own living, and have saddled 
 ourselves with providing for both. The 
 I man who holds a captive is himself captive, 
 and women are at last like those prisoners 
 who dread freedom after a long captivity." 
 So Miller argued to himself as he saw 
 much prospect of his own freedom going. 
 His selfish, self-centred, introspective and 
 yet active life might now be fatally 
 hampered by the calls of one who would 
 not understand him. 
 
 ** Madeline does understand," he said. 
 
A Question of Instinct 229 
 
 '' But now I see that Isabel wants me to 
 marry her. And she has the child. I 
 wonder if I am quite abnormal ? I suppose 
 the respectabilities would denounce me as 
 unnatural." 
 
 For the birth of the child had been as 
 a new light thrown upon many dark places 
 of his mind. When he first held it in his 
 hands his feeling was one almost entirely of 
 mere satisfaction and a certain natural male 
 pride. What other feelings he had were 
 mostly fleeting sorrow for the pain Isabel 
 had suffered, and some pity for the child 
 who would have to face the world. But as 
 it was a boy it would have to fight : there 
 was joy in combat. But what troubled 
 him greatly at first was that he was not 
 conscious of feeling particularly affectionate 
 to the child. He supposed he ought to 
 love it, and yet he did not. He ended 
 by concluding that this was the mothers 
 
230 A Question of* Instinct 
 
 business, not his. If affection came with 
 him, it must come slowly. He knew well 
 enough that it might never come, for he 
 was aware how often there is little but 
 an armed peace between father and son. 
 Perhaps the feeling of property came in there 
 again. It was seldom that such relations 
 were true friendship, for the boys have 
 to revolt to gain freedom. The fight too 
 often leaves bitter wounds, not easily healed, 
 and scars which are always perpetual re- 
 minders of an unequal combat, He came 
 to the conclusion, which he knew would 
 be unpopular, that a father's affection 
 was mostly pride, self-deluded into the 
 belief that in the child he owned a piece 
 of highly desirable freehold property not 
 easily matched in the family market. He 
 remembered with a smile the story of a 
 father who, having been well thrashed by 
 his own son, went round bragging of his 
 
A Question of Instinct 23! 
 
 boy's prowess ; for, as he averred, no one 
 else in the entire state of Texas could have 
 whipped him under any circumstances. 
 He knew now that the pain which had 
 oppressed him in the old days, when he 
 reflected that he had no child, was merely 
 the feeling of a stultified instinct which 
 cried out for its ancient satisfaction. But 
 now that the instinct had fulfilled itself in 
 due order of natural law he was confronted 
 with the claims of a mother not sufficiently 
 emancipated to take the view which com- 
 mended itself to his male intellect. And 
 he was well aware that on common grounds 
 much exception could be taken to any course 
 he could pursue. Let him say what he 
 would about the position of freedom which 
 women should occupy, he was easily 
 answered by showing that they were still 
 pretty much as they had been, and that no 
 woman had yet dared to proclaim that she 
 
232 A Question of Instinct 
 
 was an unmarried mother without suffering 
 for it in some way. 
 
 *' If it takes a killed bishop to get safe 
 railway travelling," said Miller sardonically, 
 ** it should at least require an emancipated 
 duchess to popularise illegitimacy. And 
 I'm afraid that wouldn't do it. ^ Nothing 
 but making men see what slaves they are 
 will ever induce them to give up property 
 of any kind," 
 
 And property of the order which can 
 speak and claim loudly to be owned seemed 
 to him just then a peculiarly undesirable 
 form of the institution. For before he left 
 London, Isabel had spoken openly to him 
 and claimed marriage as her due. 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 Miller prolonged his stay in the country to 
 a full week ; and the time of freedom for 
 fancy and deep excursions into dreamland 
 was not unpleasant to Madeline. As a 
 matter of fact she knew he was in the 
 country, and alone ; and as she guessed that 
 other complications had sent him there, she 
 was not ill-pleased. His letters were always 
 a delight, and a day rarely passed without 
 its bringing one to her. And yet she was 
 uneasy. For though Miller had not yet 
 told her, she was intuitively aware that a 
 new element had entered into his life ; and, 
 in spite of all her knowledge, she was not 
 able to predict any of his acts with satis- 
 faction to herself. And she certainly was 
 
i^^ A Question of Instinct 
 
 distinctly jealous of the child. It was 
 not that she believed it would really 
 alienate his affection. She knew him well 
 enough to feel that his love for her was more 
 enduring than any passion which might 
 momentarily draw him away; and knowing 
 as she did that the new relationship into 
 which he had entered was one motived by 
 the desire for offspring, she believed that 
 he had no real affection for the other woman. 
 Though she was wrong in this, yet his 
 affection for Isabel was of such an order 
 that it practically made no difference where 
 passion was really concerned. 
 
 But in spite of Madeline's peculiar un- 
 worldliness she was well aware of the world, 
 which, to her fantastic imagination, seemed 
 a Juggernaut on straight lines of rail laid 
 down in ancient ruts. If it progressed, it 
 appeared to progress in being more cruel, 
 more mechanical. For she lived her own 
 
A Question of Instinct 235 
 
 life, and except through Miller, was not 
 open to the movements of the time. While 
 cruelty existed there was no improvement ; 
 and even if some of the world's inhabitants 
 objected to cruelty, it made little difference 
 to the mass of horror in the universe. And 
 part of the world's inhumanity was its absurd 
 fakeer-like torturing of itself; its useless, 
 ridiculous and half-pathetic martyrdom to 
 idiotic, worn-out creeds and ideals. Now 
 she knew that it would be on the side 
 of the woman with the child so far as trying 
 to compel a marriage was concerned. It 
 would blame this creature for being free, 
 and suggest the prison-house of marriage 
 as a fitting punishment. For to Madeline 
 marriage was doing public and shameful 
 penance in a white sheet ; it was at once 
 the pillory and the stocks for the man and 
 the woman both — even though it was some- 
 times advantageous to the latter. And that 
 
236 A Question of Instinct 
 
 any other woman should have a legal hold 
 on the man she loved was most intolerable. 
 It was worse than the jealousy which ate 
 out her heart, but which she concealed. 
 She desired that the man she loved should 
 be free — free as air, as the sunlight, as 
 the wild deer, as the waves. She who had 
 not desired to bind him even so far as the 
 exaction of a mere promise, who laid her 
 forbidding hand upon his lips even if he 
 wished to swear a mere lover's oath of 
 passion ; she who had asked no guarantee for 
 his continuance by her side ; she who had 
 scorned the fetters a man should break if he 
 wished to break them, could not but look on 
 any other binding him as an outrage and 
 a pitiful confession of memorable weakness. 
 For her own part she was ready to die ; and 
 she would die if he left her, but she would 
 not lift a finger to retain him. That, pride 
 forbade ; and so far she was proud to the last 
 
A Question of Instinct 237 
 
 fibre of her being. At least she thought so 
 then. 
 
 But she knew something of those other 
 women, whose hold on Hfe, whose lack of 
 thoroughness in love, whose weak desire 
 to lean on another, forbade their relying 
 on themselves. If they failed, they were 
 cowards, and could not face death. She 
 knew they looked many ways, but chiefly to 
 society, lamenting the good friends who 
 would leave them at a breath of scandal, 
 and the infatuate relatives, who at a touch 
 of nature were an alien world. The child 
 was the visible symbol of disgrace, though 
 it seemed incredible that it should be so ; 
 and this other woman would come pleading 
 to him, whose weakness she knew too well. 
 She feared that he had not the strength to 
 stand by his intellectual opinions, and make 
 another suffer who had suffered through him, 
 even though such anguish was the price of 
 
238 A Question of Instinct 
 
 freedom. She feared that if she died he 
 would marry the mother of his child, and 
 drift at last into being middle-class and 
 possibly even respectable. 
 
 Sometimes, at two in the morning, when 
 the life in her was at its lowest ebb, she felt 
 half inclined to let him be what he would; 
 for then nothing seemed worth fighting for. 
 Indeed, was not the fight ignoble? If she 
 could have believed that he would be happy 
 she might have wrapped her mantle about 
 her and set forth alone upon the final 
 journey. But this she could not imagine ; 
 and as the dawn rushed up and her blood 
 flowed faster, she felt strong to protect him 
 from insidious assaults. She would beat 
 the other yet, even if that other held 
 of her lord by a tenure beyond her own 
 right. 
 
 And Miller returned at last. He had 
 been away over seven days, and he expected 
 
A Question of Instinct 239 
 
 to find Madeline melancholy, moody, perhaps 
 half-estranged, and suspicious of the time he 
 had spent in the country. 
 
 But she was like a flame, and vivid and 
 eager. She lapped him in colour, and sang 
 to him, and played triumphant music ; she 
 swept him off his balance in a very flood 
 of emotion, which was the deeper and more 
 tremendous in that it was restrained between 
 the barriers of a set purpose. Often in the 
 old days she had frittered away her emotions, 
 had squandered them in an untimely hour, 
 had gone perilously near being a fountain 
 in flood when her lovers heart was set 
 on sunshine, had been sunshine and tropical 
 when he had pleaded for repose. But now 
 she knew what she wanted as she had never 
 done before, and she proposed to get it or 
 to perish, whatever it might lead to. And 
 indeed it might go too far. 
 
 That night, after dinner, she went behind 
 
240 A Question of Instinct 
 
 him as he sat in the big arm-chair by the 
 fire, and put her hands upon his head. 
 
 '' Do you still believe in the English home 
 being a fraud, John ?" she asked. 
 
 '' Never was more convinced of it in my 
 life," said he, laughing. 
 
 *'Then you don't think this is like a 
 home ? " 
 
 '' Not a solid, English, ideal, middle-class, 
 backbone-of-the-country home," said John. 
 '* I thank Fate for it ! The home is the last 
 refuge of tyranny, the fountain and origin of 
 ills. But then the ideal home doesn't exist 
 except on paper. Most of the journalists 
 who prate about it in a column and an 
 eighth never knew one, or, if they did, 
 thanked heaven when they left it." 
 
 '' Nonsense," said Madeline. '* Now 
 wouldn't you like what you call a hair- 
 seated home which shone with French 
 polish and was slippery and respectable ? " 
 
A Question of Instinct 241 
 
 John reached for his pipe. 
 
 *' Respectability is the final sanctuary for 
 the ugly — in fact, for the respectable. There's 
 no more to be said. — Where's my tobacco ? " 
 
 Madeline gave it him and sat on his 
 knee. 
 
 ** Then am I beautiful, sir?" 
 
 '' The most beautiful creature in this or 
 any other earth," said Miller emphatically. 
 
 '* Will you maintain that, John, against 
 the world ? " 
 
 *' Against all the worlds, now and after- 
 wards. With your feather in my cap I'll 
 ride against a squadron." 
 
 And she flew to the piano to play a wild, 
 
 fantastic march, which ended in the hurrahs 
 
 of a charge, and afterwards she came in with 
 
 the Marseillaise. It made Miller shout. 
 
 Though he had drunk nothing that night, 
 
 the music intoxicated him. 
 
 '' With the Marseillaise playing, a common 
 
 16 
 
242 A Question of Instinct 
 
 cripple could fight a deaf giant ! " he cried. 
 ** It's but one or two or a handful against 
 the world, and down goes good deaf 
 Respectability in the dust. When will 
 the child world (to vary the metaphor) 
 prick its doll god to see the sawdust run 
 out ? — Play the Walkurenritt ! " 
 
 And all the time he knew that any other 
 road but the common one was a hard way 
 to travel. To-morrow promised a hill with 
 no obvious means of surmounting it. But 
 that was in the background of his mind, 
 for Madeline was more like a human being 
 than he had ever known her. Yet she 
 would not let him pause to consider, and 
 played him through the quick hours with 
 human music and bright words. He rode 
 on the horses of the Valkyrs. 
 
 *'Why?" he asked once. 
 
 She threw herself into his arms. 
 
 *' Because i forgive you and love you 
 
A Question of Instinct 243 
 
 and know how much you are mine in spite 
 of everything. Tell me, tell me one thing, 
 John?" 
 
 **What?" said he. 
 
 '' Tell me, — you know I ask nothing, — but 
 is the other beautiful ? " 
 
 His eyes were troubled. 
 
 '' No,'' he answered. '' No.'' 
 
 iVnd she sang to him. Yet all the time 
 her heart bled, and she was deeply ashamed. 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 In the afternoon of the day following, Miller 
 went down to Chelsea in a mood which did 
 not often come to him : for he was cold 
 and rather hard ; he felt detached and 
 aloof, and in moments particularly able to 
 stand quite by himself. This was doubtless 
 the natural reaction of the yesterday's 
 passion, and he knew it would pass ; he 
 knew that it must pass. But in this 
 temporary aloofness he felt able to meet 
 Isabel, though he felt sure this meeting 
 would be a critical one, probably a combat, 
 possibly even a bitter quarrel. She meant, 
 he knew, to ask him again to marry her ; 
 he was equally certain that he meant to 
 refuse her this request. And in that same 
 
A Question of Instinct 245 
 
 mood he was able to see himself as he had 
 never done before. He despised his weak- 
 ness, and his own inability to deny himself; 
 he was contemptuous of his own sensuality; 
 he was even philosophic enough for that 
 hour to criticise his own instincts ; he 
 perceived the futility of mankind in the 
 mass, and his own microscopic futility was 
 something to jeer at. Why did we make 
 such mountains out of such mole-hills ? why 
 did we consider anything of such import- 
 ance ? A calm sense of our littleness would 
 smooth the world's path for ever. 
 
 And if this was so, why did not Isabel 
 see it ? Had not her instincts flowered 
 too ? He perceived with weak annoyance 
 that she would be highly unreasonable ; he 
 looked forward to an afternoon in which he 
 would play a part not unlikely to meet 
 with public opprobrium from that part of 
 public opinion a man always carries with 
 
246 A Question of Instinct 
 
 him which is known as conscience. He did 
 not go into the conflict singleminded : his 
 reasoned opinions were hampered by un- 
 reasonable prejudices. And this woman was 
 not as strong as she should be, according to 
 his theory which was of course very annoy- 
 ing, even if he was quite up to date himself. 
 
 He found Isabel occupied with the child, 
 which she presented to him for an embrace. 
 Though the boy was everything an infant of 
 such an age should be. Miller was more and 
 more conscious that he was not overpower- 
 ingly fond of it. He found himself regarding 
 it as a man might a book which he had greatly 
 desired to write, but which he hardly cared 
 to read. It was well that it was done, that 
 was all. Yet he kissed the boy affectionately, 
 and turned to the mother. 
 
 ** You are looking well, Isabel," he said ; 
 ''has the little one helped to fill up the 
 time?" 
 
A Question of Instinct 247 
 
 "While you were away? Yes," said 
 Isabel. But she was conscious that the 
 child meant much more to her than her 
 words or her tone implied. She knew in 
 the unconscious portion of her consciousness, 
 in the background of her life, that, provided 
 her livelihood was assured without any public 
 reproach, she could easier spare the father 
 than his offspring. For she was just a little 
 bitter against Miller now. 
 
 ''You have been a long time away?" 
 she said, as she sat down with the baby 
 in her arms. 
 
 ''Yes," said Miller rather absently. He 
 was thinking vaguely of the whole surround- 
 ings, of the fearful domesticity of the little 
 room, of its very odour. 
 
 " No," he said suddenly, as if awaking 
 to the meaning of what she said ; "it was 
 not so long." 
 
 " You are glad to be back ? " s^id Isabel, 
 
248 A Question of Instinct 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 '' But I shall have to go away again 
 directly," he added hastily. ''It is highly 
 probable that I shall go to Swahililand for 
 the whole winter." 
 
 This was perhaps the first real lie Miller 
 had told for years. But the air of proprietor- 
 ship which Isabel assumed naturally was 
 intolerable. He salved his conscience by 
 vowing that he would go into Africa that 
 winter if he had to go at his own expense. 
 
 *' Why is that ? " asked Isabel, who was 
 visibly disturbed. '' I thought, John, that 
 you were not going to do any more travelling 
 in such places." 
 
 '' It's my work," he said, with a twitch of 
 his forehead. '' I can't always repose." 
 
 She put the child down on some cushions 
 on the sofa, and busied herself with getting 
 the tea. If the devil himself had threatened 
 Miller with the terrors of the pit for com- 
 
A Question of Instinct 249 
 
 parisons, he could not have helped comparing 
 her with Madeline. Though the comparison 
 was between incommensurables, he felt that 
 Isabel was more the ordinary woman, even 
 in her dainty ways of moving, and her 
 way of referring to him for his opinion 
 or his preference was far less detached 
 than Madeline's. He could hardly explain 
 the difference, but, roughly, it amounted to 
 throwing all the responsibility on him. And 
 Madeline invariably took more than her 
 share of it by some subtle show of freedom, 
 which in turn left him free. But to be 
 with Isabel for an hour under these new 
 conditions was for her to weave strong 
 invisible threads about him which might 
 in time leave him helpless in a social 
 web. 
 
 She gave him some tea, which he only 
 tasted. He felt the crisis was coming, and 
 he w^s half inclined to precipitate it, 
 
250 A Question of Instinct 
 
 ''But when you come back from Africa ? " 
 she said, looking at him. 
 
 ''Yes, when I come back — what? "asked 
 Miller half defiantly. 
 
 She ignored his tone ; and, indeed, it did 
 not wound her. She felt fairly sure of her 
 ground, and she almost respected the view 
 he would naturally take about the other 
 woman. She must lead him to see that 
 it was right now for him to break openly 
 with her. 
 
 " I meant, John, that perhaps things 
 would be different when you came back ? " 
 she suggested. 
 
 " How different, Belle ? " he asked, with 
 a little yawn. "With you?" 
 
 " No, with you." 
 
 " Then how different with me ?" he asked, 
 with knitted brows, as he took up his tea-cup. 
 
 He perceived some signs of her putting 
 hers down as a preliminary to coming 
 
A Question of Instinct 251 
 
 closer. She noticed that he held his cup 
 well in front of him, and her intuition told 
 her why. She began to fear that her task 
 might not be so easy if, on the merest 
 approach to the real question, he wished to 
 avoid any possible demonstration of affection. 
 And yet the very act showed his weakness. 
 
 '' Don't, John," she said, half smiling. And 
 she took his cup from him. It annoyed 
 him that his little manoeuvre was so quickly 
 seen through ; but that she spilt some of the 
 tea as she put it down distinctly irritated 
 him. She did come closer, and she kissed 
 him on the forehead. It seriously annoyed 
 him. 
 
 '' I mean you will lead a different life 
 when you return, John. Would not your 
 going away be a good opportunity ? " 
 
 He felt himself no match for her just 
 then in delicate fence. It was better to 
 fight openly, with cudgels, if need be, 
 
252 A Question of Instinct 
 
 '* I do not understand you, Isabel," he 
 said gravely. 
 
 She rose from the chair she had taken 
 by his side. 
 
 ** You do understand, John," she answered. 
 
 Miller nodded. 
 
 ** Very well, then; let it be that I under- 
 stand. I do not want to discuss anything," 
 he said, with a frown. 
 
 She misunderstood him, and yet half 
 purposely misunderstood him. 
 
 ** But you will do it, John?" she said. 
 
 '' Do what ? " 
 
 '' Come back free." 
 
 He rose and went to the fireplace. 
 
 ** Did I not tell you I was free?" he 
 asked. 
 
 She followed him and took his reluctant 
 hand. 
 
 '' Look, John," she said, and she pointed 
 to the sleeping child. ** In that I am not 
 
A Question of Instinct 253 
 
 free. You know it, and you love me. John, 
 dear, say you love me." 
 
 He kissed her rather coldly on the 
 brow. 
 
 '*You know I do," he said impatiently. 
 
 *'Then marry me, John." 
 
 '' I cannot," he said. 
 
 But she did not believe him. His '' can- 
 not " she traced back to fear of wounding 
 some one unworthy. She fought for her- 
 self and for him. 
 
 ** Don't say so, John," she pleaded: *' it 
 may be hard, and it may be cruel ; but you 
 love me, and I love you, and here is the 
 child I have given you — that you wanted 
 so. Oh, John I understand something of 
 life better now, and I know how men 
 may get entangled and hate to give pain 
 by breaking loose. But, now, who has 
 the greatest claim on you ? Is it not I, 
 John ? " 
 
254 A Question of Instinct 
 
 And he knew it was not, but he did not 
 speak. 
 
 *'This other, John, is not worthy of 
 you " 
 
 **Ah!" said Miller. -What do you 
 mean ?" 
 
 He turned on her with an open astonish- 
 ment that made Isabel quail. 
 
 '' I know," she cried, ** that you have 
 tried to be loyal to one who has made 
 you unhappy. And I have tried to make 
 you happy, I have tried." 
 
 -Yes," said Miller; -but she is not 
 unworthy. No, no, by God, she is not!" 
 
 He spoke with such sudden, strange 
 fervour that Isabel dropped his hand. 
 Miller turned round upon her. 
 
 -Do you think that — I — hate her?" he 
 asked, staring. 
 
 -No, no!" cried Isabel; -but now you 
 love me, and I have given up everything, 
 
A Question of Instinct 2^^ 
 
 and have borne you a child. John, John, 
 marry me, and put me right with the world 
 again ! " 
 
 The world, the world ! the dear, good 
 world again — composed for each human being 
 of about one hundred miserable, little-minded 
 people all afraid of each other, all terrified 
 of walking on the grass, all policed into set 
 paths. It was too ridiculous. 
 
 ''You know what I have always said 
 about marriage," said Miller, sick at heart 
 of himself 
 
 '* But it's different — different now ! '' cried 
 Isabel, interrupting him, hating to hear him 
 affirm the old opinions, fearing lest he should 
 repeat them and confirm himself in them 
 once more. '' Oh, John, it is all different ! " 
 
 But he shook his head. 
 
 '^Nothing is different," he said. *'You 
 knew every thought of mine before this 
 happened." 
 
256 A Question of Instinct 
 
 Yes, that was true, true ; but then he did 
 not know how her mind had worked. She 
 caught him by the arm. 
 
 ** I yielded for your sake " she 
 
 began. 
 
 ** Not for your own at all.^" he asked, 
 with curious melancholy, and half smiling. 
 
 *' Yes, for my sake, because I loved you ! " 
 she cried passionately — '' but for yours, be- 
 cause I was sorry for your loveless life." 
 
 Miller started. 
 
 ** What do you mean?" 
 
 She stared at him, open-eyed. 
 
 *' Did I not tell you word for word how 
 it stood with me ? " he demanded. 
 
 ^^What, John?" 
 
 *' Did I not tell you the truth about 
 myself?" he repeated. ** Did I ever say 
 my life was loveless ? " 
 
 She had taken his hand again, but she 
 dropped it once more. 
 
A Question of Instinct 257 
 
 *' I didn't understand," she stammered. 
 '' No, no, John ; don't tell me you love her! 
 don't tell me that! Say you were trying 
 not to be unjust to her. I knew you were 
 unhappy, very unhappy. 
 
 She burst into tears, and caught his arm 
 and bowed her head on it. 
 
 '' I tried to tell you the truth," he said 
 gently. *' I did tell it. You sent me away. 
 When I came back, did I say anything was 
 altered ? " 
 
 She loosed him and walked across the 
 room. 
 
 She looked down on the child, and then 
 stared out of the little window upon the 
 grey river. 
 
 '' God help me, I never believed it," she 
 said, '' I never believed it. Can you think 
 a woman believes in your theories when 
 this comes to her ? You were a strong 
 man, and I loved you ; and now I am an 
 
 17 
 
258 A Question ot Instinct 
 
 outcast, not even loved by the man I gave 
 up everything for." 
 
 ** Don't say that,'' said Miller. 
 
 '' I do say it," she cried, '' I do say it ! 
 How can a man love two women ? " 
 
 ** I thought you understood. I tried to 
 explain. I gave you every chance of know- 
 ing," said Miller wearily. 
 
 '' Yes, I suppose you did," said Isabel 
 bitterly ; '* and I fooled myself, I fooled 
 myself." 
 
 She sat down by the child. 
 
 *' Don't you think of the child ? " she 
 said. ** Is he not illegitimate ? " 
 
 ** It makes little or no difference to a 
 man," said Miller. *' I shouldn't have the 
 slightest objection to being illegitimate 
 myself." 
 
 But in Isabel her motherhood had caused 
 every old prejudice to flourish. 
 
 ''It is a stigma," she said ; *'and, John, 
 
A Question of Instinct 259 
 
 dear John, you could partially remove 
 it." 
 
 ** If you can think like that," said he 
 coldly, *' I wonder how you can care for me 
 at all, how you can have ever cared for 
 me. I should have thought every opinion 
 ot mine was abhorrent to you." 
 
 *' It is different now," she said, so deso- 
 lately that pity was roused in Miller. 
 
 " Don't be so unreasonable, dear," he 
 said. ** You say everything is different. Has 
 the difference brought nothing to you ? 
 What was your life before?" 
 ** I had friends," said Isabel. 
 ** Any friend you had will be more a friend 
 now," said Miller. "Any friend that is less 
 is none. If I had a friend who would fall 
 away from me in deserved disgrace I would 
 willingly lose him. And you have acted in 
 no way disgracefully. You have done what 
 you had a perfect, an inalienable right to dOi 
 
26o A Question of Instinct 
 
 But perhaps you would rather have married 
 a man you hated : that at least would have 
 been quite respectable." 
 
 Isabel shook her head. 
 
 ** I am very miserable," she said ; ''for I 
 thought you really loved me." 
 
 ''But I do love you!" cried Miller des- 
 perately. 
 
 Isabel shook her head again. If he loved 
 her, then he could not love the other. If 
 he loved the other, he could not love her. 
 She wanted single, exclusive, dominating 
 passion ; and if that existed he would marry 
 her. 
 
 *' Are you married ? " she asked suddenly. 
 
 For one moment Miller was tempted to 
 lie to her again. If he said he was married, 
 he would put an end to the situation as it 
 stood. But he felt quite mean enough 
 without any more lying. 
 
 " I am not," he answered. 
 
A Question of Instinct 261 
 
 And Isabel felt comforted. She had 
 been defeated in the first battle, it was 
 true ; but in the next she might win the 
 victory. She restrained herself from that 
 moment ; and by that very restraint Miller 
 understood what was in her mind. He 
 would never again have any peace there ; 
 he would suspect her every word, her every 
 motion. He was angry now that he had 
 not lied to her, if she had asked him that 
 question again, he would have told her a 
 falsehood. He was half sorry that it was 
 not true. 
 
 He left her that evening earlier than was 
 usual, and the relief he felt when he got 
 outside was incredible. He had told her 
 the truth once more. Surely, surely she 
 would believe it now. It seemed so reason- 
 able to himself, as he walked arguing the 
 matter ex parte, that he was convinced a 
 little consideration on her part would enable 
 
262 A Question of Instinct 
 
 her to settle down quietly without any bitter 
 revolt. 
 
 " We take life too seriously/' he said. 
 
 And yet Isabel did not see with his eyes. 
 Though her child was indeed more to her 
 than she had made out, yet she was bitterly 
 concerned about social estimation. It is 
 probable that nothing but the proposal to 
 take the child away and put her back in her 
 old situation would have opened her eyes to 
 the relative value of what she had lost and 
 what she had gained. As she nursed the 
 little boy that night, she saw something 
 of this. If she had not suckled it herself 
 it would have been infinitely harder for her. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 '' We take life too seriously," was Miller's 
 comment on Isabel's view of the situation. 
 
 He wanted her to take it quietly, and not 
 worry. It was singular the fuss women 
 made about their reputations ; it was more 
 than singular, it was absurd. He thought 
 so little of such matters ; and why should a 
 woman care ? why should her little public 
 trouble her ? He propounded the question 
 to the ingenious Harmer, who proceeded to 
 settle the matter out of hand. 
 
 ** Every one," said Harmer, in high delight, 
 ''must have something to pride themselves on. 
 Women are not essentially honest, and not 
 essentially truthful, because we have exacted 
 
 neither from them. But as men feel about 
 
 263 
 
264 A Question of Instinct 
 
 cheating at cards and being found out in 
 lies, they feel about this matter. It's public 
 opinion, of course ; there is nothing in such 
 chastity qua chastity, but it's a quality, like 
 youth and beauty, demanded by men. The 
 market creates the supply, and if the supply 
 is not all according to specification, they try 
 and feign it ; and at last they believe in it 
 themselves. I can believe it possible that 
 pedigree dogs take acute interest in their 
 pedigrees." 
 
 **You talk, and explain nothing," said 
 Miller lazily ; '' or, if you explain, it's no 
 good." 
 
 ** Nothing is much good," answered 
 Harmer. " Are we much good ? " 
 
 Miller grunted. 
 
 'We are fools,' he said. 
 
 ** Exactly, friend of mine," cried Harmer. 
 '' We are fools ; and I'm beginning to be 
 sick of this talk about women. The sexual 
 
A Question of Instinct 265 
 
 side of a man's life should be much less im- 
 portant than it is, and as it is the chief side 
 of a woman's, it is forced on us whether we 
 would or not. They take us too seriously. 
 A woman's business is to live, and love, 
 and have children — one or two — and then 
 live out her life, without clinging for ever 
 to a man. When women are economically 
 independent " 
 
 '' Date ? " asked Miller. 
 
 ** Nonsense ! " said Harmer. ** When you 
 will ; but, without fixing dates, it's obvious 
 they will be some day. I say when they 
 are independent they won't hamper men as 
 they do. We have made them slaves and 
 are slaves to them." 
 
 Miller yawned. 
 
 '' It's all very well, young man," he 
 murmured ; ** but here we are, and women 
 are so, and they are practically helpless. If I 
 kiss a woman I have to keep her, so to speak." 
 
266 A Question of Instinct 
 
 " Rot ! " said Harmer. *' However, any 
 stuff of that sort doesn't alter the fact that 
 we think too much about the matter. It 
 shouldn't be of such importance. The im- 
 portance for a woman is to fulfil her nature 
 and live. There is no warrant in the nature 
 of things for her to stick to one man, or to 
 make him keep her by the sweat of his brow. 
 To help women now is to put them in the 
 open air, and help to give them courage and 
 self-reliance. But we believe in property 
 and the rest of it, and are in revolt against 
 the very things we've created." 
 
 ** And women against those who've created 
 them." 
 
 '' Exactly. But if we leave off our green- 
 house treatment they will revert again to a 
 natural type, which won't want pots, and glass, 
 and careful watering, and a steady thermo- 
 meter. And at the present, if we don't tell 
 any woman any lies, and they are of an age 
 
A Question of Instinct 267 
 
 to understand the nature of their own acts, 
 there is no obligation on us to provide green- 
 houses. But it's a matter of education and 
 economics ; and until we place sexual matters 
 in the same category as our other functions, 
 we shall always be in trouble. Tve just 
 invented a notable parallel between such 
 women and domesticated dogs which is very 
 striking : Vm writing an article on it." 
 
 '' So I should have guessed from your 
 style," said Miller. '' But it will take tons of 
 articles to smother the British hearth and 
 home." 
 
 **And about that " cried Harmer 
 
 eagerly. 
 
 But Miller shook his head. 
 
 '* Another time, my boy. I've got to get 
 home myself." 
 
 And Harmer, left alone in the club 
 smoking-room, wrote a diatribe on the 
 home as a delusion and a snare which 
 
268 A Question of Instinct 
 
 was offered in vain to twenty respectable 
 magazines. For he was not a practical 
 man, and a berth in the Civil Service kept 
 him from the necessity of being one. 
 
 But though Harmer almost always sup- 
 ported Miller, and so far comforted him in the 
 difficulties he had brought on himself, it was 
 by no means any easier for Miller to apply 
 the theories of to-morrow to the practice 
 of to-day ; and the entire situation was 
 wholly without any charm for him. Though 
 he was still fond of Isabel, he resented her 
 attempting to make him marry her. He 
 had, he said, told her no lies, and she had 
 nothing to complain of while he was ready 
 to support her and the child. Try as he 
 would, he found it utterly impossible to see 
 from her standpoint. Public estimation was 
 nothing to him, he kept on averring. He 
 forgot that he enjoyed a certain amount of 
 it, and might feel its loss ; and it did not 
 
A Question of Instinct 269 
 
 occur to him that Isabel was supported by 
 no theory held in sincerity. That she did 
 not believe in his he felt as a distinct slight. 
 It showed she was not so clever as he had 
 imagined her in the days when she played, 
 dilettante-like, with the propositions he was 
 wont to lay before her. He did not see how 
 different things were with the child in her 
 arms ; and his slowly growing anger with 
 her was accentuated by the fear that he 
 might yield at last. He saw with absolute 
 distinctness that he would yield if Madeline 
 were in no way concerned in the affair ; and 
 this was the only reason he could give 
 himself for supposing that Isabel had some 
 reason on her side. But the reason was 
 nothing; it only meant the same accursed 
 weakness which had got him into such a 
 situation. He felt that any moment he 
 might commit the cowardice of running out 
 of the country, after dividing his surplus cash 
 
270 A Question of Instinct 
 
 between the two banking accounts on which 
 Madeline and Isabel drew. A trip to 
 British Guiana or some part of Africa 
 might be called, by an euphemism, time for 
 consideration. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 How much longer this situation might have 
 endured without any important change it is 
 impossible to say ; but two things occurred 
 within the month following Miller's talk with 
 Isabel which promised developments. For 
 one thing, Miller's book, which was at last 
 published, brought to a point the estimation 
 in which his lesser papers were held. It 
 was a great, almost an unequalled, success 
 as a book of travel. For, whatever his social 
 weaknesses, whatever his faults, as an 
 observer he was one among ten thousand ; 
 and his logical nature, which bore strange 
 fruit in his private life, found ample material 
 to work upon in the slow accumulations of 
 fifteen years' wandering. He was dragged 
 
272 A Question of Instinct 
 
 from his obscurity and asked every- 
 where. 
 
 At first Miller, who was certainly modest, 
 could by no means understand the propor- 
 tions of his own success. The reward 
 seemed more than adequate to his deeds 
 when he remembered work, which he believed 
 better, that had been consigned to obscurity. 
 He never quite realised that it was the 
 charm of his personal style that enlarged 
 his scientific into a popular circle ; it was the 
 flavour of the individuality, which attracted 
 such dissimilars as the two women with whom 
 his life was linked, that drew a charmed 
 world to hear him discourse on subjects 
 hitherto reserved for an esoteric audience. 
 But when he at last realised his success, 
 he greatly wished Madeline to share it with 
 him. He asked himself how it was he had 
 never married her. He forgot that in those 
 days his objections to marriage were a new 
 
A Question of Instinct 273 
 
 creed and were quite valid in his own eyes, 
 
 He began to wonder if Madeline was really 
 
 so wedded to the opinions he had preached 
 
 with sincerity as to object to such a course 
 
 if he proposed it now. He tried hard to 
 
 persuade himself that he was not led to such 
 
 a conclusion by the fear that Isabel might 
 
 so work upon him as to put it out of his 
 
 power to offer Madeline her choice. And 
 
 he really did not tell himself that he would 
 
 have taken Madeline into society as his wife, 
 
 married or unmarried, if he had not been 
 
 afraid of a possible revenge on Isabels part 
 
 which was quite alien from her character. 
 
 He did, however, own to himself that 
 
 Madeline, by her strange and peculiar beauty, 
 
 might add to his success. He regretted her 
 
 love of seclusion, and feared that it might 
 
 not now be removed even if she were his 
 
 legal wife. It was curious that he first 
 
 thought of marrying her when a possible 
 
 18 
 
274 ^ Question of Instinct 
 
 divergence in their characters might only 
 too easily arise. He perceived new ambi- 
 tions in himself, and was ashamed of his 
 desire for the social esteem which he had 
 assured Isabel v/as worthless. 
 
 Isabel, during this period, pursued her 
 end with patience, if not with skill ; and 
 that perseverance, which annoyed him, was 
 not in her favour. If she had known him 
 well she would have watched him for some 
 moment of weakness to exact a promise. 
 But he saw her mind, and was wary of 
 letting himself go. He spoke coldly of his 
 success, and mocked the praise which was 
 given him ; he minimised the success and 
 the praise both, and chilled any effort of 
 her calculated enthusiasm or her natural 
 pleasure when she forgot herself for a 
 moment. And yet, if she had not desired 
 to bind him in fetters of steel, he would 
 have been a delightful comrade, if not 
 
A Question of Instinct 275 
 
 an ardent lover, who would have lightened 
 her load with strong affection at the least 
 And such restraint on his part chilled her 
 to the marrow. She sometimes hated him 
 with sudden conviction, and turned mourn- 
 fully to his child, which she bitterly believed 
 he did not care for. Who and what could 
 this woman be who held him against her ? 
 what was her strength of soul and body ? 
 Her old curiosity arose again in jealous 
 revival, and she at last determined to see 
 her. Though Miller believed she did not 
 know his private address, which he had 
 never told her, she had known it for a 
 long time. A curious woman was hardly 
 likely to be at loss for such information 
 with a man of Miller's habits. His 
 carelessness with letters saved her the 
 dishonour of spying or seeking secretly 
 for what he had always withheld. And 
 the next day after his visit she went 
 
276 A Question of Instinct 
 
 to the little street in Bayswater at a time 
 she knew he was at the Geographical 
 Society. She walked there most of the 
 way in a curious dreamy calm, wondering 
 whether she would succeed in her quest, 
 wondering how she should manage it. The 
 simplest plan seemed the best. 
 
 When she reached the house, which was 
 one of an unimportant row, she noticed 
 that it looked better kept than its neigh- 
 bours. It had been lately painted ; there 
 were well-filled flower boxes in the lower 
 windows, but otherwise there was nothing 
 noticeable about it. Isabel knocked and 
 rang and waited in a dream. And presently 
 the door was opened by a tall and thin 
 woman of a rare and uncommon type, w^hose 
 beauty was very gentle and melancholy. 
 Isabel put her hand to her heart. She 
 spoke at last in a far-off voice which 
 sounded unlike her own. 
 
A Question of Instinct 277 
 
 '' Is Mrs. Miller at home? '' she asked. 
 
 ''I am Mrs. Miller," said the strange 
 woman. 
 
 *' I am sorry," said Isabel, *'but you 
 are not the Mrs. Miller that I know. I am 
 sorry to have disturbed you." 
 
 And she went away drearily. No ; this 
 was not the woman she knew in her mind 
 — certainly she was not the woman. It 
 seemed very hard that she should be so 
 beautiful, so strange. She understood in 
 her heart then how it had sometimes been 
 necessary for Miller to seek a lower altitude 
 than the rare atmosphere in which this 
 unnatural beauty dwelt. One little bit 
 of joy was left to her : she had given him 
 some joy. She understood him better. 
 But she looked in her own glass for a long 
 time when she reached her little home and 
 came back to the child the other could 
 not give him. 
 
278 A Question of Instinct 
 
 That very night Miller asked Madeline 
 to marry him. She stared at him in strange 
 amazement. 
 
 '* You are a curious man, John." 
 
 *' Yes," said Miller, with a certain self- 
 contempt that did not escape her. *' But, all 
 the same, I want you to marry me now ? " 
 
 -Why, John?" 
 
 But she did not expect the truth. 
 
 '' I want you to go out with me, Madeline." 
 
 " I will come sometimes," said Madeline, 
 **as I am. Why do you ask me, John? 
 What has made you alter ? " 
 
 *' I am not altered," he answered. '' But 
 it is said that I am married, and people 
 ask for you." 
 
 Madeline shook her head. 
 
 '* I do not care about them. I would 
 rather go away with you on your travels, 
 John, than be received by all the great 
 people in the world." 
 
A Question of Instinct 279 
 
 ** You shall come," said he. ''I can take 
 you now, where you will.'' 
 
 She went up to him and put her hands upon 
 his shoulders and looked into his troubled eyes. 
 
 ''Are you very happy, John?" 
 
 '' I love you as I have always loved 
 you,'' he said. 
 
 But that was no answer. 
 
 *' What difference would it make if I 
 refused, John ? " 
 
 '' It would make no difference. But don't 
 refuse." 
 
 Her thoughts ran off to the other woman 
 with the child. For a moment she was 
 tempted to vow she would not yield. She 
 knew what was in his mind. She would 
 hold him for ever without binding him. 
 But — and she bit her lips. She went to 
 the open piano and struck some light chords. 
 
 ''I'll marry you, John," she said. "But 
 I'm afraid it's a mistake." 
 
280 A Question of Instinct 
 
 For perhaps he was not sure of himself. 
 She wondered at his strength and his 
 weakness. How was it he could charm 
 the world, and hold his own among savages, 
 when he needed protection ? She turned 
 to him with a strange and marvellous new 
 feeling in her which brought the tears into 
 her eyes. 
 
 '' My own," she said tenderly, ** my own/ 
 
 But Miller pondered gloomily. 
 
 *' Everything is very difficult," he said. 
 ** Perhaps I have been wrong in many 
 ways, ril do my best — for every one." 
 
 Madeline looked at him, and half opened 
 her lips, but she did not speak for a long 
 minute. 
 
 '' I think you are my child after all, John," 
 she said. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 Printed by Hazcll, Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury 
 
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 12 Coloured Illustrations by Reginald Hallward. 
 
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"There need be no hesitation in pronouncing this work of 
 Muther's the most authoritative that exists on the subject, 
 the most complete, the best informed of all the general 
 histories of Modern Art." — Times. 
 
 THREE VOLUMES, IMPERIAL 8vo. 
 
 The History of Modern Painting. 
 
 By RICHARD MUTHER, 
 Professor of Art History at the University ot Breslau. 
 
 2304 Pages, and 1300 Illustrations. 
 
 VOL. I. NOW READY, i8j. NET. 
 
 ** Of general histories of Art . . . this book, so far as the first volume 
 carries it, appears one of the best. The translation, executed by Mr. 
 Ernest Dowson, Mr. Greene, and Mr. Hillier, is, of course, of very 
 different quahty from the work of hack translators. . . . The author of the 
 volume before us has to be thanked for the tolerance and comprehensive- 
 ness of his spirit, the thoroughness and learning of his long labour. And, 
 more than this, he is not a mere dry-as-dust and academic student. He is 
 a writer, with something of a writer's charm." — Standard. 
 
 "It is well that we should have a translation of Professor Muther's 
 * History of Modern Painting,' if only because it is the sole book in exist- 
 ence which professes to take anything like a historical survey of European 
 Art during the last hundred years." — IVesttninster Gazette. 
 
 ** Although the bibliography which Professor Muther has appended to 
 this first volume of his history includes several hundred distinct works, 
 there is not one of them which can be said to survey the whole field of 
 modern painting with any approach to his thoroughness and complete- 
 ness." — Speaker. 
 
 '* A comprehensive and learned review of the history of painting during 
 the century that is closing. . . . The book . . . will be one of substantial 
 value, both as a work of reference and as a large and clearly outlined 
 review of the century's Art. . . . Professor Muther has approached his 
 subject not in that narrow technical manner that too often enthrals the 
 expert and sterilises his knowledge, but in the largest and best spirit of 
 the philosophic student." — Scotsman. 
 
MESSRS, HENRY'S FOUR-SHILLING SERIES, 
 
 The Honse of the Strange Woman. 
 
 By F. NORREYS CONNELL. 
 
 " He is such a comical, quizzical, cynical dog, is Mr. Connell, that the 
 brutality of his story cannot deprive the reader of a certain keen enjoy- 
 ment of this very clever, curious, and audacious hook."— Morning. 
 
 An Impression called " The Imagination of 
 their Hearts." 
 
 By MICHAEL DURE. 
 
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 The Legitimist Kalendar for 1895. 
 
 EDITED BY THE 
 
 MARQUIS DE RUVIGNY AND RAINEVAL. 
 
 With Nine Genealogical Tables, and Portraits of the King and 
 Queen of France, Spain, and Navarre. 
 
 Crown Svo, 5 s. net. 
 
 " Preg-nant with the zeal of modern Jacobitism."— i?^a/m. 
 
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 "A very noteworthy performance." — Royalist. 
 
 "Contains much truthful and interesting material." — Times, 
 
 " It is just" possible that the volume may one day obtain a success of 
 curiosity, and be sought after by collectors of odd hoo\iS."~Athen^iim . 
 
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