an 
 
 
 
 'earner 
 
 iJ. S.Fletcher 
 
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lf= 
 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
This is the Story 
 
 'X'HIS is the study of an artistic temperament in a 
 -'' generation not so far removed from our own as the 
 hurried events of the last two decades would make it 
 appear — the generation which fought in the Boer War. 
 Mr. Fletcher has told us the Ufe story of a boy, a 
 " thinker " rather than a " doer " — Lucian the Dreamer. 
 We follow with great interest his many love affairs 
 while under the care of his uncle and aunt in the country. 
 We enjoy with him the simple rustic beauties of Wellsby, 
 and from the moment he arrives at the Httle village 
 station until that final tragic scene in the dry-bed of a 
 South African river we are held as in a vice. 
 
 Also by J. S. Fletcher 
 
 THE DIAMONDS THE KANG-HE VASE 
 
 THE TIME-WORN TOWN THE GOLDEN VENTURE 
 
 THE MILL OF MANY WINDOWS 
 
 THE CARTWRIGHT GARDENS MURDER 
 
 THE RAVENSWOOD MYSTERY AND OTHER STORIES 
 
LUCIAN 
 THE DREAMER 
 
 by 
 
 J. S. FLETCHER 
 
 Author of " The Cartwright Gardens Murder," 
 "The Kang-He Vase," etc. 
 
 
 . . • •• 
 
 • ( > > ) 
 
 » J » » • 
 
 LONDON 48 PALL MALL 
 
 W. COLLINS SONS & CO LTD 
 
 GLASGOW SYDNEY AUCKLAND 
 
Copyright 
 
 Printed in Great Britain. 
 
TO 
 
 SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE 
 
 IN SOME SLIGHT RECOGNITION 
 
 OF A KINDLY SERVICE 
 
 KINDLY RENDERED 
 
 say 
 
 4 t^>*3 
 
CHAPTER I 
 
 The railway station stood in the midst of an apparent 
 solitude, and from its one long platform there was no 
 sign of any human habitation. A stranger, looking 
 around him in passing that way, might well have 
 wondered why a station should be found there at all; 
 nevertheless, the board which figured prominently 
 above the white palings suggested the near presence 
 of three places — Wellsby, Meadhope, and Simonstower 
 
 and a glance at a map of the county would have 
 
 sufficed to show him that three villages of the names 
 there indicated lay hidden amongst the surrounding 
 woods, one to the east and two to the west of the 
 railway. The Hne was a single one, served by a train 
 which made three out-and-home journeys a day 
 between the market-town of Oakborough and the 
 village of Normanford, stopping on its way at seven 
 intermediate stations, of which Wellsby was the pen- 
 ultimate one. These wayside stations sometimes 
 witnessed arrivals and departures, but there were many 
 occasions on which the train neither took up passengers 
 nor set them down — it was only a considerable traific 
 in agricultural produce, the extra business of the 
 weekly market-day, and its connection with the main 
 line, that enabled the directors to keep the Oakborough 
 and Normanford Branch open. At each small station 
 they maintained a staff consisting of a collector or 
 station-master, a booking-clerk, and a porter, but the 
 duties of these officials were light, and a good deal 
 of spare time lay at their disposal, and was chiefly 
 used in cultivating patches of garden along the side of 
 the line, or in discussing the news of the neighbourhood. 
 On a fine April evening of the early eighties the staff 
 of this particular station assembled on the platform 
 at half -past six o'clock in readiness to receive the train 
 
 7 
 
8 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 (which, save on market-days, was composed of an 
 engine, two carriages, and the guard's van), as it made 
 its last down journey. There were no passengers to 
 go forward towards Normanford, and the porter, 
 according to custom, went out to the end of the plat- 
 form as the train came into view, and held up his arms 
 as a signal to the driver that he need not stop unless 
 he had reasons of his own for doing so. To this 
 signal the driver responded with two sharp shrieks of 
 his whistle, on hearing which the porter turned away, 
 put his hands in his pockets, and slouched back along 
 the platform. 
 
 ' Somebody to set down, anyway, Mr. Simmons,' 
 said the booking-clerk with a look at the station- 
 master. ' I wonder who it is — I've only booked one 
 up ticket to-day; James White it was, and he came 
 back by the 2.30, so it isn't him.' 
 
 The station-master made no reply, feeling that 
 another moment would answer the question definitely. 
 He walked forward as the train drew up, and amidst 
 the harsh grinding of its wheels threw a greeting to 
 the engine-driver, which he had already given four 
 times that day and would give again as the train went 
 back two hours later. His eyes, straying along the 
 train, caught sight of a hand fumbling at the handle 
 of a third-class compartment, and he hastened to open 
 the door. 
 
 ' It's you, is it, Mr. Pepperdine?' he said. * I 
 wondered who was getting out — it's not often that this 
 train brings us a passenger.' 
 
 ' Two of us this time,' answered the man thus 
 addressed as he quickly descended, nodding and 
 smiling at the station-master and the booking-clerk; 
 ' two of us this time, Mr. Simmons. Ah ! ' He drew 
 a long breath of air as if the scent of the woods and 
 fields did him good, and then turned to the open door 
 of the carriage, within which stood a boy leisurely 
 attiring himself in an overcoat. ' Come, my lad,' he 
 said good-humouredly, ' the train'U be going on — let's 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 9 
 
 see now, Mr. Simmons, there's a portmanteau, a trunk, 
 and a box in the van — perhaps Jim there '11 see they're 
 got out.' 
 
 The porter hurried off to the van; as he turned away 
 the boy descended from the train, put his gloved hands 
 in the pockets of his overcoat, and stared about him 
 with a deliberate and critical expression. His glance 
 ran over the station, the creeping plants on the station- 
 master's house, the station-master, and the booking- 
 clerk; his companion, meanwhile, was staring hard at 
 a patch of bright green beyond the fence and smiling 
 with evident enjoyment. 
 
 ' I'll see that the things are all right,' said the boy 
 suddenly, and strode off to the van. The porter had 
 already brought out a portmanteau and a trunk; he and 
 the guard were now struggling with a larger obstacle 
 in the shape of a packing-case which taxed all their 
 energies. 
 
 ' It's a heavy 'un, this is ! ' panted the guard. ' You 
 might be carrying all the treasure of the Bank of 
 England in here, young master.' 
 
 ' Books,' said the boy laconically. ' They are 
 heavy. Be careful, please — don't let the box drop.' 
 
 There was a note in his voice which the men were 
 quick to recognise — the note of command and of full 
 expectancy that his word would rank as law. He stood 
 by, anxious of eye and keenly observant, while the 
 men lowered the packing-case to the platform; behind 
 him stood Mr. Pepperdine, the station-master, and the 
 booking-clerk, mildly interested. 
 
 ' There!' said the guard. ' We ha' n't given her a 
 single bump. Might ha' been the delicatest chiny, the 
 way we handled it.' 
 
 He wiped his brow with a triumphant wave of the 
 hand. The boy, still regarding the case with grave, 
 speculative eyes, put his hand in his pocket, drew forth 
 a shilling, and with a barely perceptible glance at the 
 guard, dropped it in his hand. The man stared, 
 smiled, pocketed the gift, and touched his cap. He 
 
10 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 waved his green flag vigorously; in another moment 
 the train was rattling away into the shadow of the 
 woods. 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine stepped up to the boy's side and 
 gazed at the packing-case. 
 
 ' It'll never go in my trap, lad/ he said, scratching 
 his chin. ' It's too big and too heavy. We must send 
 a horse and cart for it in the morning.' 
 
 ' But where shall we leave it?' asked the boy, with 
 evident anxiety. 
 
 ' We'll put it in the warehouse, young master,' said 
 the porter. ' It'll be all right there. I'll see that no 
 harm comes to it.' 
 
 The boy, however, demanded to see the warehouse, 
 and assured himself that it was water-tight and would 
 be locked up. He issued strict mandates to the porter 
 as to his safe-keeping of the packing-case, presented 
 him also with a shilling, and turned away uncon- 
 cernedly, as if the matter were now settled. Mr. 
 Pepperdine took the porter in hand. 
 
 ' Jim,' he said, ' my trap's at the Grange; maybe you 
 could put that trunk and portmanteau on a barrow and 
 bring them down in a while? No need to hurry — I 
 shall have a pipe with Mr. Trippett before going on.' 
 
 ' All right, sir,' answered the porter. ' I'll bring 
 'em both down in an hour or so.' 
 
 ' Come on, then, lad,' said Mr. Pepperdine, nodding 
 good-night to the station-master, and leading the way 
 to the gate. ' Eh, but it's good to be back where 
 there's some fresh air! Can you smell it, boy?' 
 
 The boy threw up his face, and sniffed the fragrance 
 of the woods. There had been April showers during 
 the afternoon, and the air was sweet and cool : he drew 
 it in with a relish that gratified the countryman at his 
 side. 
 
 ' Yes,' he answered. * I smell it — it's beautiful.' 
 
 * Ah, so it is!' said Mr. Pepperdine; ' as beautiful as 
 — as — well, as anything. Yes, it is so, my lad.' 
 
 The boy looked up and laughed, and Mr. Pepperdine 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER ii 
 
 laughed too. He had no idea why he laughed, but it 
 
 E leased him to do so; it pleased him, too, to hear the 
 oy laugh. But when the boy's face grew grave again 
 Mr. Pepperdine's countenance composed itself and 
 became equally grave and somewhat solicitous. He 
 looked out of his eye-comers at the slim figure walking 
 at his side, and wondered what other folk would think 
 of his companion. ' A nice, smart-looking boy,' said 
 Mr. Pepperdine to himself for the hundredth time; 
 ' nice, gentlemanlike boy, and a credit to anybody.' 
 Mr. Pepperdine felt proud to have such a boy in his 
 company, and prouder still to know that the boy was 
 his nephew and ward. 
 
 The boy thus speculated upon was a lad of twelve, 
 somewhat tall for his age, of a slim, well-knit figure, 
 a handsome face, and a confidence of manner and bear- 
 ing that seemed disproportionate to his years. He 
 walked with easy, natural grace; his movements were 
 Hthe and sinuous; the turn of his head, as he looked up 
 at Mr. Pepperdine, or glanced at the overhanging trees 
 in the lane, was smart and alert; it was easy to see 
 that he was naturally quick in action and in percep- 
 tion. His face, which Mr. Pepperdine had studied a 
 good deal during the past week, was of a type which 
 is more often met with in Italy than in England. The 
 forehead was broad and high, and crowned by a mass 
 of thick, blue-black hair that clustered and waved all 
 over the head, and curled into rings at the temples; 
 the brows were straight, dark, and full; the nose and 
 mouth delicately but strongly carved; the chin square 
 and firm; obstinacy, pride, detemination, were all 
 there, and already stffening into permanence. But in 
 this face, so Italian, so full of the promise of passion, 
 there were eyes of an essentially English type, almost 
 violet in colour, gentle, soft, dreamy, shadfed by long 
 black lashes, and it was in them that Mr. Pepperdine 
 found the thing he sought for when he looked long and 
 wistfully at his dead sister's son. 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine's present scrutiny passed from the 
 
12 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 boy's face to the boy's clothes. It was not often, he 
 said to himself, that such a well-dressed youngster was 
 seen in those parts. His nephew was clothed in black 
 from head to foot; his hat was surrounded by a mourn- 
 ing-band; a black tie, fashioned into a smart knot, and 
 secured by an antique cameo-pin, encircled his spotless 
 man's collar: every garment was shaped as if its wearer 
 had been the most punctilious man about town; his neat 
 boots shone like mirrors. The boy was a dandy in 
 miniature, and it filled Mr. Pepperdine with a vast 
 amusement to find him so. He chuckled inwardly, 
 and was secretly proud of a youngster who, as he had 
 recently discovered, could walk into a fashionable 
 tailor's and order exactly what he wanted with an evi- 
 dent determination to get it. But Mr. Pepperdine 
 himself was a rustic dandy. Because of the necessi- 
 ties of a recent occasion he was at that moment clad 
 in sober black — his Sunday-and-State-Occasion's suit — 
 but at home he possessed many wonderful things in the 
 way of riding-breeches, greatcoats ornamented with 
 pearl buttons as big as saucers, and sprigged waistcoats 
 which were the despair of the young country bucks, 
 who were forced to admit that Simpson Pepperdine 
 knew a thing or two about the fashion and was a man 
 of style. It was natural, then, Mr. Pepperdine should 
 be pleased to find his nephew a petit-maitre — it grati- 
 fied an eye which was never at any time indisposed 
 to regard the vanities of this world with complaisance. 
 Mr. Pepperdine, striding along at the boy's side, 
 presented the cheerful aspect of a healthy countryman. 
 He was a tall, well-built man, rosy of face, bright of 
 eye, a little on the wrong side of forty, and rather pre- 
 disposed to stoutness of figure, but firm and solid in his 
 tread, and as yet destitute of a grey hair. In his sable 
 garments and his high hat — bought a week before in 
 London itself, and of the latest fashionable shape — he 
 looked very distinguished, and no one could have taken 
 him for less than a churchwarden and a large ratepayer. 
 His air of distinction was further improved by the fact 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER iS 
 
 that he was in uncommonly good spirits — ^he had spent 
 a week in London on business of a sorrowful nature, 
 and he was glad to be home again amongst his native 
 woods and fields. He sniffed the air as he walked, 
 and set his feet down as if the soil belonged to him, 
 and his eyes danced with satisfaction. 
 
 The boy suddenly uttered a cry of delight, and 
 stopped, pointing down a long vista of the woods. Mr. 
 Papperdine turned in the direction indicated, and 
 beheld a golden patch of daffodils. 
 
 ' Daffy-down-dillies,' said Mr. Pepperdine. * And 
 very pretty too. But just you wait till you see the 
 woods about Simonstower. I always did say that 
 Wellsby woods were nought to our woods — ah, you 
 should see the bluebells ! And as for primroses— well, 
 they could stock all Covent Garden market in London 
 town with 'em, and have enough for next day into the 
 bargain, so they could. Very pretty is them daffies, 
 very pretty, but I reckon there's something a deal 
 prettier to be seen in a minute or two, for here's the 
 Grange, and Mrs. Trippett has an uncommon nice way 
 of setting out a tea-table.' 
 
 The boy turned from the glowing patch of colour to 
 look at another attractive picture. They had rounded 
 the edge of the wood on their right hand, and now stood 
 gazing at a peculiarly English scene — a green paddock, 
 fenced from the road by neat railings, painted white, 
 at the further end of which, shaded by a belt of tall 
 elms, stood a many-gabled farmhouse, with a flower- 
 garden before its front door and an orchard at its side. 
 The farm-buildings rose a little distance in rear of the 
 house; beyond them was the stackyard, still crowded 
 with wheat and barley stacks; high over everything 
 rose a pigeon-cote, about the weather-vane of which 
 flew countless pigeons. In the paddock were ewes and 
 lambs; cattle and horses looked over the wall of the 
 fold; the soft light of the April evening lay on every- 
 thing like a benediction. 
 
 ' Wellsby Grange,' said Mr. Pepperdine, pushing 
 
!e4 lucian the dreamer 
 
 open a wicket-gate in the white fence and motioning the 
 boy to enter. ' The abode of Mr. and Mrs. Trippett, 
 very particular friends of mine. I always leave my 
 trap here when I have occasion to go by train — it would 
 be sent over this morning, and we shall find it all ready 
 for us presently.' 
 
 The boy followed his uncle up the path to the side- 
 door of the farmhouse, his eyes taking in every detail 
 of the scene. He was staring about him when the door 
 opened, and revealed a jolly-faced, red-cheeked man 
 with sandy whiskers and very blue eyes, who grinned 
 delightedly at sight of Mr. Pepperdine, and held out 
 a hand of considerable proportions. 
 
 ' We were just looking out for you,' said he. ' We 
 heard the whistle, and the missis put the kettle on to 
 boil up that minute. Come in, Simpson — come in, 
 my lad — you're heartily welcome. Now then, missis 
 — they're here.' 
 
 A stout, motherly-looking woman, with cherry- 
 coloured ribbons in a nodding cap that crowned a head 
 of glossy dark hair, came bustling to the door. 
 
 ' Come in, come in, Mr. Pepperdine — glad to see you 
 safe back,' said she. ' And this'll be your little nevvy. 
 Come in, love, come in — you must be tired wi' 
 travelling all that way.' 
 
 The boy took off his hat with a courtly gesture, and 
 stepped into the big, old-fashioned kitchen. He looked 
 frankly at the farmer and his wife, and the woman, 
 noting his beauty with quick feminine perception, put 
 her arm round his neck and drew him to her. 
 
 ' Eh, but you're a handsome lad ! ' she said. ' Come 
 straight into the parlour and sit you down — the tea'll 
 be ready in a minute. What's your name, my dear?' 
 
 The boy looked up at her— Mrs. Trippett's memory, 
 at the sight of his eyes, went back to the days of her 
 girlhood. 
 
 ' My name is Lucian,' he answered. 
 
 Mrs. Trippett looked at him again as if she had 
 scarcely heard him reply to her question. She sighed. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 15 
 
 and with a sudden impetuous tenderness bent down 
 and kissed him warmly on the cheek. 
 
 ' Off with your coat, my dear,' she said cheerily. 
 ' And if you're cold, sit down by the fire — if it is spring, 
 it's cold enough for fires at night. Now I'll be back in 
 a minute, and your uncle and the master' 11 be coming 
 — I lay they've gone to look at a poorly horse that 
 we've got just now — and then we'll have tea.' 
 
 She bustled from the room, the cherry-coloured 
 ribbons streaming behind her. The boy, left alone, 
 took off his overcoat and gloves, and laid them aside 
 with his hat; then he put his hands in the pockets of 
 his trousers, and examined his new surroundings. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 Never before had Lucian seen the parlour of an 
 English farmhouse, nor such a feast as that spread out 
 on the square dinner-table. The parlour was long and 
 wide and low-roofed, and the ceiling was spanned by 
 beams of polished oak; a bright fire crackled in the 
 old-fashioned grate, and a lamp burned on the table; 
 but there were no blinds or curtains drawn over the 
 latticed windows which overlooked the garden. 
 Lucian 's observant eyes roved about the room, noting 
 the quaint old pictures on the walls; the oil paintings 
 of Mr. Trippett's father and mother; the framed 
 samplers and the fox's brush; the silver cups on the 
 sideboard, and the ancient blunderbuss which hung 
 on the centre beam. It seemed to him that the parlour 
 was delightfully quaint and picturesque; it smelled of 
 dried roses and lavender and sweetbriar; there was an 
 old sheep-dog on the hearth who pushed his muzzle 
 into the boy's hand, and a grandfather's clock in one 
 comer that ticked a solemn welcome to him. He had 
 never seen such an interior before, and it appealed to 
 his sense of the artistic. 
 
 Lucian 's eyes wandered at last to the table, spread 
 for high tea. That was as new to him as the old pic- 
 tures and samplers. A cold ham of generous propor- 
 tions figured at one side of the table; a round of cold 
 roast-beef at the other; the tea-tray filled up one end; 
 opposite it space was left for something that was yet 
 to come. This something presently appeared in the 
 shape of a couple of roast fowls and a stand of boiled 
 eggs, borne in by a strapping maid whose face shone 
 like the setting sun, and who was sharply marshalled 
 by Mrs. Trippett, carrying a silver teapot and a dish 
 of hot muffins. 
 
 ' Now then, my dear,' she said, giving a final glance 
 over the table, ' we can begin as soon as the gentlemen 
 
 z6 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 17 
 
 come, and I lay they won't be long, for Mr. Pepperdine 
 '11 be hungry after his journey, and so I'm sure are 
 you. Come and sit down here and help yourself to an 
 egg — they're as fresh as morning dew — every one's 
 been laid this very day.' 
 
 The boy sat down and marvelled at the bountiful 
 provision of Mrs. Trippett's tea-table; it seemed to him 
 that there was enough there to feed a regiment. But 
 when Mr. Trippett and Mr. Pepperdine entered and fell 
 to, he no longer wondered, for the one had been out 
 in the fields all day, and the other had been engaged 
 in the unusual task of travelling, and they were both 
 exceptional trenchermen at any time. Mr. Trippett 
 joked with the boy as they ate, and made sundry refer- 
 ences to Yorkshire pudding and roast-beef which 
 seemed to afford himself great satisfaction, and he 
 heaped up his youthful visitor's plate so generously that 
 Lucian grew afraid. 
 
 ' Cut and come again,' said Mr. Trippett, with his 
 mouth full and his jaws working vigorously. 
 ' Nothing like a good appetite for growing lads — ah, I 
 was always hungry when I was a boy. Never came 
 amiss to me, didn't food, never.' 
 
 ' But I've never eaten so much before,' said Lucian, 
 refusing his host's pressing entreaty to have another 
 slice off the breast, or a bit of cold ham. ' I was 
 hungry, too, or I couldn't have eaten so much now.' 
 
 ' He'll soon get up an appetite at Simonstower, ' said 
 Mrs. Trippett. ' You're higher up than we are, Mr. 
 Pepperdine, and the air's keener with you. To be 
 sure, our children have good enough appetites here — 
 you should see them at meal times! — I'm sure I oft 
 wonder wherever they put it all.' 
 
 ' It's a provision of nature, ma'am,' said Mr. Pepper- 
 dine. ' There's some wonderful things in Nature.' 
 
 ' They're wanting to see you, my dear,' said Mrs. 
 Trippett, ignoring her elder guest's profound remark 
 and looking at her younger one. * I told them Mr. 
 Pepperdine was going to bring a young gentleman with 
 
 B 
 
i8 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 him. You shall see them after tea — they're out in 
 the orchard now — they had their teas an hour ago, 
 and they've gone out to play. There's two of them — 
 John and Mary. John's about your own age, and 
 Mary's a year younger.' 
 
 ' Can't I go out to them?' said Lucian. ' I will, 
 if you will please to excuse me.' 
 
 ' With pleasure, my dear,' said Mrs. Trippett. ' Go 
 by all means, if you'd like to. Go through the window 
 there — you'll hear them somewhere about, and they'll 
 show you their rabbits and things.' 
 
 The boy picked up his hat and went out. Mrs. 
 Trippett followed him with meditative eyes. 
 
 'He's not shy, seemingly,' she said, looking at Mr. 
 Pepperdine. 
 
 * Not he, ma'am. He's an old-fashioned one, is the 
 lad,' answered Lucian's uncle. ' He's the manners of 
 a man in some things. I reckon, you see, that it's 
 because he's never had other children to play with.' 
 
 ' He's a handsome boy,' sighed the hostess. ' Like 
 his father as I remember him. He was a fine-looking 
 man, in a foreign way. But he's his mother's eyes — 
 poor Lucy!' 
 
 * Yes,' said Mr. Pepperdine. ' He's Lucy's eyes, 
 but all the rest of him's like his father.' 
 
 ' Were you in time to see his father before he died?' 
 asked Mr. Trippett, who was now attacking the cold 
 beef, after having demolished the greater part of a fowl. 
 ' You didn't think you would be when you went off that 
 morning.' 
 
 ' Just in time, just in time,* answered Mr. Pepper- 
 dine. * Ay, just in time. He went very sudden and 
 very peaceful. The boy was very brave and very old- 
 fashioned about it — he never says anything now, and 
 I don't mention it.* 
 
 ' It's best not,' said Mrs. Trippett. ' Poor Uttle 
 fellow! — of course, he'll not remember his mother at 
 all?' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 19 
 
 ' No/ said Mr. Pepperdine, shaking his head. ' No, 
 he was only two years old when his mother died.' 
 
 Mr. Trippett changed the subject, and began to talk 
 of London and what Mr. Pepperdine had seen there. 
 But when the tea-table had been cleared, and Mrs. 
 Trippett had departed to the kitchen regions to bustle 
 amongst her maids, and the two farmers were left in 
 the parlour with the spirit decanters on the table, their 
 tumblers at their elbows and their pipes in their mouths, 
 the host referred to Mr. Pepperdine' s recent mission 
 with some curiosity. 
 
 ' I never rightly heard the story of this nephew of 
 yours,' he said. ' You see, I hadn't come to these 
 parts when your sister was married. The missis says 
 she remembers her, 'cause she used to visit hereabouts 
 in days past. It were a bit of a romance like, eh?' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine took a pull at his glass and shook his 
 head. 
 
 'Ah!' said he oracularly. ' It was. A romance 
 like those you read of in the story-books. I remember 
 the beginning of it all as well as if it were yesterday. 
 Lucy — that was the lad's mother, my youngest sister, 
 you know, Trippett — was a girl then, and the prettiest 
 in all these parts: there's nobody '11 deny that.' 
 
 * I always understood that she was a beauty,' said 
 Mr. Trippett. 
 
 * And you understood rightly. There wasn't Lucy's 
 equal for beauty in all the county,' afi&rmed Mr. 
 Pepperdine. ' The lad has her eyes — eh, dear, I've 
 heard high and low talk of her eyes. But he's naught 
 else of hers — all the rest his father's — Lucy was fair.' 
 
 He paused to apply a glowing coal to the tobacco 
 in his long pipe, and he puffed out several thick clouds 
 of smoke before he resumed his story. 
 
 ' Well, Lucy was nineteen when this Mr. Cyprian' 
 Damerel came along. You can ask your missis what 
 like he was — women are better hands at describing a 
 man's looks than a man is. He were a handsome 
 young man, but foreign in appearance, though you 
 
20 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 wouldn't ha' told it from his tongue. The boy'U be 
 like him some day. He came walking through Simons- 
 tower on his way from Scarhaven, and naught would 
 content him but that he must set up his easel and make 
 a picture of the village. He found lodgings at old 
 Mother Grant's, and settled down, and he was one 
 of that sort that makes themselves at home with every- 
 body in five minutes. He'd an open face and an open 
 hand; he'd talk to high and low in just the same way; 
 and he'd a smile for everybody.' 
 
 ' And naturally all the lasses fell in love with him,' 
 suggested Mr. Trippett, with a hearty laugh. 'I've 
 heard my missis say he'd a way with him that was 
 taking with the wenches — specially them as were 
 inclined that way, like.' 
 
 ' Undoubtedly he had,' said Mr. Pepperdine. 
 * Undoubtedly he had. But after he'd seen her, he'd 
 no eyes for any lass but our Lucy. He fell in love 
 with her and she with him as naturally as a duckling 
 takes to water. Ah ! I don't think I ever did see two 
 young people quite so badly smitten as they were. It 
 became evident to everybody in the place. But he 
 acted like a man all through — oh yes ! My mother was 
 alive then, you know, Trippett,' Mr. Pepperdine con- 
 tinued, with a sigh. ' She was a straight-laced 'un, 
 was my mother, and had no hking for foreigners, and 
 Damerel had a livelyish time with her when he came 
 to th' house and asked her, bold as brass, if he might 
 marry her daughter.' 
 
 ' I'll lay he wo'd; I'll lay he wo'd,' chuckled Mr. 
 Trippett. 
 
 ' Ay, and so he had,' continued Mr. Pepperdine. 
 ' She was very stiff and stand-off, was our old lady, 
 and she treated him to some remarks about foreigners 
 and papists, and what not, and gave him to under- 
 stand that she'd as soon seen her daughter marry a 
 gipsy as a strolling artist, 'cause you see, being old- 
 lashioned, she'd no idea of what an artist, if he's up 
 to his trade, can make. But he was one too many for 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAIMER 21 
 
 her, was Damerel. He listened to all she had to say, 
 and then he offered to give her references about him- 
 self, and he told her who he was, the son of an ItaHan 
 gentleman that had come to live in England 'cause 
 of poHtical reasons, and what he earned, and he made 
 it clear enough that Lucy wouldn't want for bread and 
 butter, nor a silk gown neither.' 
 
 ' Good reasoning,' commented Mr. Trippett. 
 ' Very good reasoning. Love-making's all very well, 
 but it's nowt wi'out a bit o' money at th' back on't.' 
 
 ' Well, there were no doubt about Damerel 's making 
 money,' said Mr. Pepperdine, 'and we'd soon good 
 proof o' that; for as soon as he'd finished his picture 
 of the village he sold it to th' Earl for five hundred 
 pound, and it hangs i' the dining-room at th' castle 
 to this day. I saw it the last time I paid my rent 
 there. Mistress Jones, th' housekeeper, let me have 
 a look at it. And of course, seeing that the young 
 man was able to support a wife, th' old lady had to 
 give way, and they were married. Fifteen year ago 
 that is,' concluded Mr. Pepperdine with a shake of the 
 head. * Dear-a-me! it seems only like yesterday since 
 that day — they made the handsomest bride and bride- 
 groom I ever saw.' 
 
 ' She died soon, didn't she?' inquired Mr. Trippett. 
 
 * Lived a matter of four years after the marriage,' 
 answered Mr. Pepperdine. ' She wasn't a strong 
 woman, wasn't poor Lucy — there was something wrong 
 with her lungs, and after the boy came she seemed to 
 wear away. He did all that a man could, did her 
 husband — took her off to the south of Europe. Eh, 
 dear, the letters that Keziah and Judith used to have 
 from her, describing the places she saw — they read fair 
 beautiful! But it were no good — she died at Rome, 
 poor lass, when the boy was two years old.' 
 
 ' Poor thing!' said Mr. Trippett. ' And had all that 
 she wanted, seemingly.' 
 
 ' Everything,' said Mr. Pepperdine. ' Her hfe was 
 short but sweet, as you may say.' 
 
22 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 * And now he's gone an' all,' said Mr. Trippett. 
 Mr. Pepperdine nodded. 
 
 ' Ay,' he said, ' he's gone an' all. I don't think he 
 ever rightly got over his wife's death — anyway, he led 
 a very restless life ever after, first one place and then 
 another, never settling anywhere. Sometimes it was 
 Italy, sometimes Paris, sometimes London — he's seen 
 something, has that boy. Ay, he's dead, is poor 
 Damerel.' 
 
 ' Leave owt behind him like?* asked Mr. Trippett 
 sententiously. 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine polished the end of his nose. 
 
 ' Well,' he said, ' there'll be a nice little nest-egg for 
 the boy when all's settled up, I dare say. He wasn't 
 a saving sort of man, I should think, but dear-a-me, 
 he must ha' made a lot of money in his time — and 
 spent it, too.' 
 
 ' Easy come and easy go,' said Mr. Trippett. ' I've 
 heard that's the way with that sort. Will this lad take 
 after his father, then?' 
 
 * Nay,' said Mr. Pepperdine, * I don't think he will. 
 He can't draw a line—doesn't seem to have it in him. 
 Curious thing that, but it is so. No — he's all for read- 
 ing. I never saw such a lad for books. He's got a 
 great chest full o' books at the station yonder — wouldn't 
 leave London without them.' 
 
 ' Happen turn out a parson or a lawyer,' suggested 
 Mr. Trippett. 
 
 * Nay,' said Mr. Pepperdine. ' It's my impression 
 he'll turn out a poet, or something o' that sort. They 
 tell me there's a good living to be made out o' that 
 nowadays.' 
 
 Mr. Trippett Hfted the kettle on to the brightest part 
 of the fire, mixed himself another glass of grog, and 
 pushed the decanter towards his friend. 
 
 ' There were only a poorish market at Oakbro' 
 t'other day,' he said. ' Very low prices, and none so 
 much stuff there, nayther.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine followed his host's example with 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAIVIER 23 
 
 respect to the grog, and meditated upon the market 
 news. They plunged into a discussion upon prices. 
 Mrs. Trippett entered the room, took up a basket of 
 stockings, planted herself in her easy-chair, and began 
 to look for holes in toes and heels. The two farmers 
 talked; the grandfather's clock ticked; the fire crackled; 
 the whole atmosphere was peaceful and homelike. At 
 last the talk of prices and produce was interrupted by 
 the entrance of the stout serving-maid. 
 
 ' If you please'm, there's Jim Wood from the station 
 with two trunks for Mr. Pepperdine, and he says is he 
 to put 'em in Mr. Pepperdine's trap?' she said, gazing 
 at her mistress. 
 
 ' Tell him to put them in the shed,' said Mr. Pepper- 
 dine. * I'll put 'em in the trap myself. And here, 
 my lass, give him this for his trouble, ' he added, diving 
 into his pocket and producing a shilling. 
 
 ' And give him a pint o' beer and something to eat,' 
 said Mr. Trippett. 
 
 ' Give him some cold beef and pickles, Mary,' said 
 Mrs. Trippett. 
 
 Mary responded ' Yes, sir — Yes'm,' and closed the 
 door. Mr. Pepperdine, gazing at the clock with an 
 air of surprise, remarked that he had no idea it was so 
 late, and he must be departing. 
 
 ' Nowt o' th' sort ! ' said Mr. Trippett. ' You're all 
 right for another hour — help yourself, my lad.' 
 
 ' The little boy's all right,' said Mrs. Trippett softly. 
 ' He's soon made friends with John and Mary — they 
 were as thick as thieves when I left them just now.' 
 
 ' Then let's be comfortable,' said the host. ' Dang 
 my buttons, there's nowt like comfort by your own 
 fireside. And how were London town looking, then, 
 Mr. Pepperdine? — mucky as ever, I expect.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine, with a replenished glass and a newly 
 charged pipe, plunged into a description of what he 
 had seen in London. The time slipped away — the old 
 clock struck nine at last, and suddenly reminded him 
 
24 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 that he had six miles to drive and that his sisters would 
 be expecting his arrival with the boy. 
 
 ' Time flies fast in good company/ he remarked as 
 he rose with evident reluctance. ' I always enjoy an 
 evening by your hospitable fireside, Mrs. Trippett, 
 ma'am.' 
 
 ' You're in a great hurry to leave it, anyhow,' said 
 Mr. Trippett, with a broad grin. * Sit ye down again, 
 man — you'll be home in half an hour with that mare o' 
 yours, and it's only nine o'clock, and ten to one th' 
 owd clock's wrong.' 
 
 * Ay, but my watch isn't,' answered Mr. Pepperdine. 
 * Nay, we must go — Keziah and Judith '11 be on the 
 look-out for us, and they'll want to see the boy.' 
 
 ' Ay, I expect they will,' said Mr. Trippett. ' Well, 
 if you must you must — take another glass and light a 
 cigar.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine refused neither of these aids to com- 
 fort, and lingered a few minutes longer. But at last 
 they all went out into the great kitchen, Mrs. Trippett 
 leading the way with words of regret at her guest's 
 departure. She paused upon the threshold and turned 
 to the two men with a gesture which commanded 
 silence. 
 
 The farmhouse kitchen, quaint and picturesque with 
 its old oak furniture, its flitches of bacon and great 
 hams hanging from the ceiling, its bunches of dried 
 herbs and strings of onions depending from hooks in 
 the comers, its wide fireplace and general warmth and 
 cheeriness, formed the background of a group which 
 roused some sense of the artistic in Mrs. Trippett 's 
 usually matter-of-fact intellect. On the long settle 
 which stretched on one side of the hearth sat four shock- 
 headed ploughboys, leaning shoulder to shoulder; in 
 an easy-chair opposite sat the red-cheeked maid-ser- 
 vant; close to her, on a low stool, sat a little girl with 
 Mrs. Trippett 's features and eyes, whose sunny hair fell 
 in wavy masses over her shoulders; behind her, hands 
 in pockets, sturdy and strong, stood a miniature edition 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 25 
 
 of Mr. Trippett, even to the sandy hair, the breeches, 
 and the gaiters; in the centre of the floor, at a round 
 table on which stood a great oil lamp, sat the porter, 
 busy with a round of beef, a foaming tankard of ale, 
 and a crusty loaf. Of these eight human beings a 
 similar peculiarity was evident. Each one sat with 
 mouth more or less open— the ploughboys' mouths in 
 particular had revolved themselves into round O's, 
 while the porter, struck as it were in the very act of 
 forking a large lump of beef into a cavernous mouth, 
 looked like a man who has suddenly become paralysed 
 and cannot move. The maid-servant's eyes were wider 
 than her mouth; the little girl shrank against the maid's 
 apron as if afraid— it was only the sturdy boy in the 
 rear who showed some symptoms of a faint smile. And 
 the object upon which all eyes were fixed was Lucian, 
 who stood on the hearth, his back to the fire, his face 
 glowing in the lamphght, winding up in a low and 
 thrilling voice the last passages of what appeared to be 
 a particularly blood-curdling narrative. 
 
 Mr. Trippett poked Mr. Pepperdine in the ribs. 
 * Seems to ha' fixed 'em,' he whispered. ' Gow— the 
 lad's gotten the gift o' the gab!— he talks like a book.' 
 ' H'sh,' commanded Mrs. Trippett. 
 ' And so the body hung on the gibbet,' Lucian was 
 saying, ' through all that winter, and the rain, and the 
 hail, and the snow fell upon it, and when the spring 
 came again there remained nothing but the bones of the 
 brigand, and they were bleached as white as the eternal 
 snows; and Giacomo came and took them dow^i and 
 buried them in the Httle cemetery under the cypress- 
 trees; but the chain still dangles from the gibbet, and 
 you may hear it rattle as you pass that way as it used 
 to rattle when Luigi's bones hung swaying in the wind.' 
 The spell was broken; the porter sighed deeply, and 
 conveyed the interrupted forkful to his mouth; the 
 ploughboys drew deep breaths, and looked as if they 
 had arisen from a deep sleep; the little girl, catching 
 sight of her mother, ran to her with a cry of ' Is it true? 
 
26 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 Is it true?' and Mr. Trippett brought everybody back 
 to real life by loud calls for Mr. Pepperdine's horse 
 and trap. Then followed the putting on of overcoats 
 and wraps, and the bestowal of a glass of ginger- wine 
 upon Lucian by Mr. Trippett, in order that the cold 
 might be kept out, and then good-nights and God- 
 speeds, and he was in the dogcart at Mr. Pepperdine's 
 side, and the mare, very fresh, was speeding oyer the 
 six miles of highway which separated Mr. Trippett's 
 stable from her own. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 While Mr. Pepperdine refreshed himself at his friend's 
 house, his sisters awaited the coming of himself and 
 his charge with as much patience as they could summon 
 to their aid. Each knew that patience was not only 
 necessary, but inevitable. It would have been the 
 easiest thing in the world for Mr. Pepperdine to have 
 driven straight home from the station and supped in 
 his own parlour, and that, under the circumstances, 
 would have seemed the most reasonable thing to do. 
 But Mr. Pepperdine made a rule of never passing the 
 gates of the Grange Farm, and his sisters knew that 
 he would tarry there on his homeward journey, accept 
 Mrs. Trippett's invitation to tea, and spend an hour 
 or two afterwards in convivial intercourse with Mr. 
 Trippett. That took place every market-day and 
 every time Mr. Pepperdine had occasion to travel by 
 train; and the Misses Pepperdine knew that it would 
 go on taking place as long as their brother Simpson and 
 his friends at the Grange Farm continued to exist. 
 
 At nine o'clock Miss Pepperdine, who had been 
 knitting by the parlour fire since seven, grew some- 
 what impatient. 
 
 ' I think Simpson might have come home straight 
 from the station,' she said in sharp, decided tones. 
 ' The child is sure to be tired.' 
 
 Miss Judith Pepperdine, engaged on fancy needle- 
 work on the opposite side of the hearth, shook her head. 
 
 ' Simpson never passes the Grange,' she said. 
 ' That night I came with him from Oakborough last 
 winter, I couldn't get him to come home. He coaxed 
 me to go in for just ten minutes, and we had to stop 
 four hours.' 
 
 Miss Pepperdine sniffed. Her needles clicked vigor- 
 ously for a few minutes longer; she laid them down at a 
 
 27 
 
28 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 quarter past nine, went across the parlour to a cup- 
 board, unlocked it, produced a spirit-case and three 
 glasses, and set them on the table in the middle of the 
 room. At the same moment a tap sounded on the 
 door, and a maid entered bearing a jug of hot water, 
 a dish of lemons, and a bowl of sugar. She was about 
 to leave the room after setting her tray down when 
 Miss Pepperdine stopped her. 
 
 * I wonder what the boy had better have, Judith?' 
 she said, looking at her sister. ' He's sure to have had 
 a good tea at the Grange — Sarah Trippett would see to 
 that — but he'll be cold. Some hot milk, I should 
 think. Bring some new milk in the brass pan, Anne, 
 and another glass — I'll heat it myself over this fire.' 
 
 Then, without waiting to hear whether Miss Judith 
 approved the notion of hot milk or not, she sat down 
 to her knitting again, and when the maid had brought 
 the brass pan and the glass and withdrawn, the parlour 
 became hushed and silent. It was an old-world room 
 — there was not an article of furniture in it that was 
 less than a hundred years old, and the old silver and 
 old china arranged in the cabinets and on the side- 
 tables were as antiquated as the chairs, the old bureau, 
 and the pictures. Everything was old, good, and sub- 
 stantial; everything smelled of a bygone age and of 
 dried rose-leaves. 
 
 The two sisters, facing each other across the hearth, 
 were in thorough keeping with the old-world atmo- 
 sphere of their parlour. Miss Keziah Pepperdine, 
 senior member of the family, and by no means afraid 
 of admitting that she had attained her fiftieth year, was 
 tall and well-built; a fine figure of a woman, with a 
 handsome face, jet-black hair, and eyes of a decided 
 keenness. There was character and decision in her 
 every movement; in her sharp, incisive speech; in her 
 quick glance; and in the nervous, resolute click of her 
 knitting needles. As she knitted, she kept her lips 
 pursed tightly together and her eyes fixed upon her 
 work: it needed little observation to make sure that 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 29 
 
 whatever Miss Pepperdine did would be done with 
 resolution and thoroughness. She was a woman to be 
 respected rather than loved; feared more than honoured; 
 and there was a flash in her hawk's eyes, and a grim- 
 ness about her mouth, which indicated a temper that 
 could strike with force and purpose. Further indica- 
 tions of her character were seen in her attire, which 
 was severely simple — a gown of black, unrelieved by 
 any speck of white, hanging in prim, straight folds, 
 and utterly unadorned, but, to a knowing eye, 
 fashioned of most excellent and costly material. 
 
 Judith Pepperdine, many years younger than her 
 sister, was dressed in black too, but the sombreness of 
 her attire was relieved by white cuffs and collar, and 
 by a very long thin gold chain, which was festooned 
 twice round her neck ere it sought refuge in the watch- 
 pocket at her waist. She had a slender figure of great 
 elegance, and was proud of it, just as she was proud 
 of the fact that at forty years of age she was still a 
 pretty woman. There was something of the girl still 
 left in her: some dreaminess of eye, a suspicion of 
 coquetry, an innate desire to please the other sex and 
 to be admired by men. Her cheek was still smooth 
 and peach-like; her eyes still bright, and her brown hair 
 glossy; old maid that she undoubtedly was, there were 
 many good-looking girls in the district who had not 
 half her attractions. To her natural good looks Judith 
 Pepperdine added a native refinement and elegance; 
 she knew how to move about a room and walk the 
 village street. Her smile was famous — old Dr. Stub- 
 bins, of Normanfold, an authority in such matters, said 
 that for sweetness and charm he would back Judith 
 Pepperdine 's smile against the world. 
 
 There were many people who wondered why the 
 handsome Miss Pepperdine had never married, but 
 there was scarcely one who knew why she had 
 remained and meant to remain single. Soon after the 
 marriage of her sister Lucy to Cyprian Damerel, 
 Judith developed a love-affair of her own with a dash- 
 
30 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 ing cavalry man, a sergeant of the 13th Hussars, then 
 quartered at Oakborough. He was a handsome young 
 man, the son of a local farmer, and his ambition had 
 been for soldiering from boyhood. Coming into the 
 neighbourhood in all his glory, and often meeting 
 Judith at the houses of mutual friends, he had soon laid 
 siege to her and captured her susceptible heart. Their 
 engagement was kept secret, for old Mrs. Pepperdine 
 had almost as great an objection to soldiers as to 
 foreigners, and would have considered a non-commis- 
 sioned officer beneath her daughter's notice. The 
 sergeant, however, had aspirations — it was his hope to 
 secure a commission in an infantry regiment, and his 
 ambition in this direction seemed likely to be furthered 
 when his regiment was ordered out to India and 
 presently engaged in a frontier campaign. But there 
 his good luck came to an untimely end — he performed 
 a brave action which won him the Victoria Cross, but 
 he was so severely wounded in doing it that he died 
 soon afterwards, and Judith's romance came to a bitter 
 end. She had had many offers of marriage since, and 
 had refused them all — the memory of the handsome 
 Hussar still lived in her sentimental heart, and her most 
 cherished possession was the cross which he had won 
 and had not lived to receive. Time had healed the 
 wound: she no longer experienced the pangs and 
 sorrows of her first grief. Everything had been mel- 
 lowed down into a soft regret, and the still living affec- 
 tion for the memory of a dead man kept her heart 
 young. 
 
 That night Judith for once in a while had no thought 
 of her dead lover — she was thinking of the boy whom 
 Simpson was bringing to them. She remembered Lucy 
 with wondering thoughts, trying to recall her as she 
 was when Cyprian Damerel took her away to London 
 and a new life. None of her own people had ever seen 
 Lucy again — they were stay-at-home folk, and the 
 artist and his wife had spent most of their short married 
 Hfe on the Continent. Now Damerel, too, was dead. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 31 
 
 and the boy was coming back to his mother's people, 
 and Judith, who was given to dreaming, speculated 
 much concerning him. 
 
 * I wonder,' she said, scarcely knowing that she 
 spoke, ' I wonder what Lucian will be like.' 
 
 * And I wonder,' said Miss Pepperdine, ' if Damerel 
 has left any money for him.' 
 
 * Surely ! ' exclaimed Judith. ' He earned such large 
 sums by his paintings.' 
 
 Miss Pepperdine' s needles clicked more sharply than 
 ever. 
 
 ' He spent large sums too,* she said. * I've heard of 
 the way in which he lived. He was an extravagant 
 man, Uke most of his sort. That sort of money is earned 
 easily and spent easily. With his ideas and his tastes, 
 he ought to have been a duke. I hope he has provided 
 for the boy — times are not as good as they might be.' 
 
 * You would never begrudge anything to Lucy's 
 child, sister?' said Judith timidly, and with a wistful 
 glance at Miss Pepperdine 's stem countenance. 'I'm 
 sure I shouldn't — he is welcome to all I have.' 
 
 * Umph ! ' replied Miss Pepperdine. ' Who talked of 
 begrudging anything to the child? All I say is, I hope 
 his father has provided for him.' 
 
 Judith made no answer to this remark, and the 
 silence which followed was suddenly broken by the 
 sound of wheels on the drive outside the house. Both 
 sisters rose to their feet; each showed traces of some 
 emotion. Without a word they passed out of the room 
 into the hall. The maid-servant had already opened 
 the door, and in the light of the hanging lamp they 
 saw their brother helping Lucian out of the dogcart* 
 The sisters moved forward. 
 
 ' Now, then, here we are ! ' said Mr. Pepperdine. 
 * Home again, safe and sound, and no breakages. 
 Lucian, my boy, here's your aunts Keziah and Judith. 
 Take him in, lassies, and warm him — it's a keenish 
 night.' 
 
32 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 The boy stepped into the hall, and lifted his hat as 
 he looked up at the two women. 
 
 * How do you do?' he said politely. 
 
 Miss Pepperdine drew a quick breath. She took the 
 outstretched hand and bent down and kissed the boy's 
 cheek; in the lamplight she had seen her dead sister's 
 eyes look out of the young face, and for the moment 
 she could not trust herself to speak. Judith trembled 
 all over; as the boy turned to her she put both arms 
 round him and drew him into the parlour, and there 
 embraced him warmly. He looked at her somewhat 
 wonderingly and critically, and then responded to her 
 embrace. 
 
 ' You are my Aunt Judith,' he said. ' Uncle 
 Pepperdine told me about you. You are the handsome 
 one.' 
 
 Judith kissed him again. She had fallen in love with 
 him on the spot. 
 
 ' Yes, I am your Aunt Judith, my dear,' she said. 
 ' And I am very, very glad to see you — we are all glad.' 
 
 She still held him in her arms, looking at him long 
 and hungrily. Miss Pepperdine came in, businesslike 
 and bustling; she had lingered in the hall, ostensibly 
 to give an order to the servant, but in reality to get rid 
 of a tear or two. 
 
 * Now, then, let me have a look at him,' she said, 
 and drew the boy out of Judith's hands and turned 
 him to the light. ' Your Aunt Judith,' she continued 
 as she scanned him critically, ' is the handsome one, 
 as I heard you say just now — I'm the ugly one. Do 
 you think you'll like me?' 
 
 Lucian stared back at her with a glance as keen and 
 searching as her own. He looked her through and 
 through. 
 
 ' Yes,' he said, ' I like you. I think ' He 
 
 paused and smiled a little. 
 
 ' You think— what?' 
 
 * I think you might be cross sometimes, but you're 
 good,' he said, still staring at her. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 33 
 
 Miss Pepperdine laughed. Judith knew that she 
 was conquered. 
 
 ' Well, you'll find out,' said Miss Pepperdine. 
 ' Now, then, off with your coat — are you hungry?' 
 
 'No,' answered Lucian. ' I ate too much at Mrs. 
 Trippett's — EngUsh people have such big meals, I 
 think.' 
 
 ' Give him a drop of something warm,* said Mr. 
 Pepperdine, entering with much rubbing of hands and 
 stamping of feet. ' 'Tis cold as Christmas, driving 
 through them woods 'twixt here and Wellsby.' 
 
 Miss Pepperdine set the brass pan on the fire, and 
 presently handed Lucian a glass of hot milk, and pro- 
 duced an old-fashioned biscuit-box from the cupboard. 
 The boy sat down near Judith, ate and drank, and 
 looked about him, all unconscious that the two women 
 and the man were watching him with all their eyes. 
 
 ' I like this room better than Mrs. Trippett's,' he 
 said suddenly. ' Hers is a pretty room, but this shows 
 more taste. And all the furniture is Chippendale!' 
 
 ' Bless his heart ! ' said Miss Pepperdine, * so it is. 
 How did you know that, my dear?' 
 
 Lucian stared at her. 
 
 ' I know a lot about old furniture,* he said; ' my 
 father taught me.' He yawned and looked apologetic. 
 ' I think I should like to go to bed,' he added, glanc- 
 ing at Miss Pepperdine. ' I am sleepy — we have been 
 travelling all day.' 
 
 Judith rose from her chair with alacrity. She was 
 pining to get the boy all to herself. 
 
 ' I'll take him to his room,' she said. ' Come along, 
 dear, your room is all ready for you.' 
 
 The boy shook hands with Aunt Keziah. She kissed 
 him again and patted his head. He crossed over to 
 Mr. Pepperdine, who was pulling off his boots. 
 
 'I'll go riding with you in the morning,' he said. 
 ' After breakfast, I suppose, eh?' 
 
 ' Ay, after breakfast,' answered Mr. Pepperdine. 
 ' I'll tell John to have the pony ready. Good-night, 
 
 C 
 
34 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 my lad; your Aunt Judith'll see you're all comfortable.' 
 Lucian shook hands with his uncle, and went cheer- 
 fully away with Judith. Miss Pepperdine sighed as 
 the door closed upon them. 
 
 ' He's the very image of Cyprian Damerel,' she said; 
 * but he has Lucy's eyes.' 
 
 * He's a fine Httle lad,' said Mr. Pepperdine. * An 
 uncommon fine little lad, and quite the gentleman. 
 I'm proud of him.' 
 
 He had got into his slippers by this time, and he 
 cast a longing eye at the spirit-case on the table. Miss 
 Pepperdine rose, produced an old-fashioned pewter 
 thimble, measured whisky into it, poured it into a 
 tumbler, added lemon, sugar, and hot water, and 
 handed it to her brother, who received it with an 
 expression of gratitude, and sipped it critically. She 
 measured a less quantity into two other glasses and 
 mixed each with similar ingredients. 
 
 * Judith won't be coming down again,' she said. 
 'I'll take her tumbler up to her room; and I'm going 
 to bed myself — we've had a long day with churning. 
 You'll not want any news to-night, Simpson; it'll keep 
 till to-morrow, and there's Httle to tell — all's gone on 
 right.' 
 
 ' That's a blessing,' said Mr. Pepperdine, stretching 
 his legs. 
 
 Miss Pepperdine put away her knitting, removed the 
 spirit-case into the cupboard, locked the door and put 
 the key in her pocket, and took up the little tray on 
 which she had placed the tumblers intended for herself 
 and her sister. But on the verge of leaving the room 
 she paused and looked at her brother. 
 
 * We were glad you got there in time, Simpson,' she 
 said. ' And you did right to bring the child home — 
 it was the right thing to do. I hope Damerel has made 
 provision for him?' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine was seized with a mighty yawning. 
 
 * Oh ay!' he said as soon as he could speak. * The 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 35 
 
 lad's all right, Keziah — all right. Everything's in my 
 hands — yes, it's all right.' 
 
 ' You must tell me about it afterwards,' said Miss 
 Pepperdine. * I'll go now — I just want to see that the 
 boy has all he wants. Good-night, Simpson.' 
 
 Good-night, my lass, good-night,' said the farmer. 
 * I'll just look round and be off to bed myself.' 
 
 Miss Pepperdine left the room and closed the door; 
 her brother heard the ancient staircase creak as she 
 climbed to the sleeping-chambers. He waited a few 
 minutes, and then, rising from his chair, he produced a 
 key from his pocket, walked over to the old bureau, 
 imlocked a small cupboard, and brought forth a bottle 
 of whisky. He drew the cork with a meditative air 
 and added a liberal dose of spirit to that handed to him 
 by his sister. He replaced the bottle and locked up 
 the cupboard, poured a little more hot water into his 
 glass, and sipped the strengthened mixture with 
 approbation. Then he winked solemnly at his reflec- 
 tion in the old mirror above the chimney-piece, and sat 
 down before the fire to enjoy his nightcap in privacy 
 and comfort. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 LuciAN went to sleep in a chamber smelling of lavender. 
 He was very tired, and passed into a land of gentle 
 dreams as soon as his head touched the pillow. 
 Almost before he realised that he was falling asleep he 
 was wide awake again and it was morning. Broad 
 rays of sunlight flooded the room; he heard the notes 
 of many birds singing outside the window; it was plain 
 that another day was already hastening to noon. He 
 glanced at his watch: it was eight o'clock. Lucian left 
 his bed, drew up the blind, and looked out of the 
 window. 
 
 He had seen nothing of Simonstower on the previous 
 evening: it had seemed to him that after leaving Mr. 
 Trippett's farmstead he and Mr. Pepperdine had been 
 swallowed up in deep woods. He had remarked during 
 the course of the journey that the woods smelled like 
 the pine forests of Ravenna, and Mr. Pepperdine had 
 answered that there was a deal of pine thereabouts and 
 Ukewise fir. Out of the woods they had not emerged 
 until they drove into the lights of a village, clattered 
 across a bridge which spanned a brawling stream, and 
 climbed a winding road that led them into more woods. 
 Then had come the open door, and the new faces, and 
 bed, and now Lucian had his first opportunity of look- 
 ing about him. 
 
 The house stood halfway up a hillside. He saw, on 
 leaning out of the window, that it was stoutly fashioned 
 of great blocks of grey stone and that some of the upper 
 portions were timbered with mighty oak beams. Over 
 the main doorway, a little to the right of his window, 
 a slab of weather-worn stone exhibited a coat of arms, 
 an almost illegible motto or legend, of which he could 
 only make out a few letters, and the initials ' S. P.' 
 over the date 1594. The house, then, was of a respect- 
 
 30 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 37 
 
 able antiquity, and he was pleased because of it. He 
 was pleased, too, to find the greater part of its exterior 
 half obscured b^ ivy, jessamine, climbing rose-trees, 
 honeysuckle, and wistaria, and that the garden which 
 stretched before it was green and shady and old- 
 fashioned. He recognised some features of it — the old, 
 moss-grown sun-dial; the arbour beneath the copper- 
 beech; the rustic bench beneath the lilac- tree — he had 
 seen one or other of these things in his father's pictures, 
 and now knew what memories had placed them there. 
 
 Looking further afield Lucian now saw the village 
 through which they had driven in the darkness. It lay 
 in the valley, half a mile beneath him, a quaint, pic- 
 turesque place of one long straggling street, in which 
 at that moment he saw many children running about. 
 The houses and cottages were all of grey stone; some 
 were thatched, some roofed with red tiles; each stood 
 amidst gardens and orchards. He now saw the bridge 
 over which Mr. Pepper^ine's mare had clattered the 
 night before — a high, single arch spanning a winding 
 river thickly fenced in from the meadows by alder and 
 willow. Near it on rising ground stood the church, 
 square-towered, high of roof and gable, in the rnidst 
 of a green churchyard which in one comer contained 
 the fallen masonry of some old abbey or priory. On 
 the opposite side of the river, in a small square which 
 seemed to indicate the forum of the village, stood the 
 inn, easily recognisable even at that distance by the 
 pole which stood outside it, bearing aloft a swinging 
 sign, and by the size of the stables surrounding it. 
 This picture, too, was famihar to the boy's eyes — he 
 had seen it in pictures a thousand times. 
 
 Over the village, frowning upon it as a lion frowns 
 upon the victim at its feet, hung the grim, gaunt castle 
 which, after all, was the principal feature of the land- 
 scape on which Lucian gazed. It stood on a spur of 
 rocky ground which jutted like a promontory from the 
 hills behind it — on three sides at least its situation was 
 impregnable. From Lucian's point of vantage it still 
 
38 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 wore the aspect of strength and power; the rustic walls 
 were undamaged; the smaller towers and turrets showed 
 httle sign of decay; and the great Norman keep rose 
 like a menace in stone above the skyline of the hills. 
 All over the giant mass of the old stronghold hung a 
 drifting cloud of blue smoke, which gradually mingled 
 with the spirals rising from the village chimneys and 
 with the shadowy mists that curled about the pine-clad 
 uplands. And over everything — village, church, river, 
 castle, meadow, and hill, man and beast — shone the 
 spring sun, hfe-giving and generous. Lucian looked 
 and saw and understood, and made haste to dress in 
 order that he might go out and possess all these things. 
 He had a quick eye for beauty and an unerring taste, 
 and he recognised that in this village of the grey North 
 there was a charm and a romance which nothing could 
 exhaust. His father had recognised its beauty before 
 him and had immortahsed it on canvas; Lucian, lack- 
 ing the power to make a picture of it, had yet a keener 
 aesthetic sense of its appeal and its influence. It was 
 already calling to him with a thousand voices — he was 
 so impatient to revel in it that he grudged the time 
 given to his breakfast. Miss Pepperdine expressed 
 some fears as to the poorness of his appetite; Miss 
 Judith, understanding the boy's eagerness somewhat 
 better, crammed a thick shoe of cake into his pocket 
 as he set out. He was in such haste that he had only 
 time to tell Mr. Pepperdine that he would not ride the 
 pony that morning — he was going to explore the vil- 
 lage, and the pony might wait. Then he ran off, eager, 
 excited. 
 
 He came back at noon, hungry as a ploughman, 
 delighted with his morning's adventures. He had been 
 all over the village, in the church tower, inside the inn, 
 where he had chatted with the landlord and the land- 
 lady, he had looked inside the infants' school and 
 praised the red cloaks worn by the girls to an evi- 
 dently surprised schoolmistress, and he had formed an 
 acquaintance with the blacksmith and the carpenter. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 39 
 
 * And I went up to the castle, too,' he said in con- 
 clusion, ' and saw the earl, and he showed me the 
 picture which my father painted — it is hanging in the 
 great hall.' Lucian's relatives betrayed various emo- 
 tions. Mr. Pepperdine's mouth slowly opened until it 
 became cavernous; Miss Pepperdine paused in the act 
 of lifting a potato to her mouth; Miss Judith clapped 
 her hands. 
 
 ' You went to the castle and saw the earl?' said 
 Miss Pepperdine. 
 
 ' Yes,' answered Lucian, unaware of the sensation 
 he was causing. ' I saw him and the picture, and 
 other things too. He was very kind — he made his foot- 
 man give me a glass of wine, but it was home-made and 
 much too sweet.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine winked at his sisters and cut Lucian 
 another slice of roast-beef. 
 
 ' And how might you have come to be so hand-in- 
 glove with his lordship, the mighty Earl of Simons- 
 tower?' he inquired. ' He's a very nice, affable old 
 gentleman, isn't he, Keziah? Ah — very — specially 
 when he's got the gout.' 
 
 * Oh, I went to the castle and rang the bell, and 
 asked if the Earl of Simonstower was at home,' Lucian 
 replied. ' And I told the footman my name, and he 
 went away, and then came back and told me to follow 
 him, and he took me into a big study where there was 
 an old, very cross-looking old gentleman in an old- 
 fashioned coat writing letters. He had very keen 
 eyes . . .' 
 
 ' Ah, indeed!' interrupted Mr. Pepperdine. ' Like 
 a hawk's!' 
 
 * . . . and he stared at me,* continued Lucian, 
 ' and I stared at him. And then he said, " Well, my 
 boy, what do you want?" and I said, " Please, if you 
 are the Earl of Simonstower, I want to see the picture 
 you bought from my father some years ago." Then 
 he stared harder than ever, and he said, " Are you 
 Cyprian Damerel's son?" and I said "Yes.'* He 
 
40 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 pointed to a chair and told me to sit down, and he 
 talked about my father and his work, and then he took 
 me out to look at the pictures. He wanted to know 
 if I, too, was going to paint, and I had to tell him that 
 I couldn't draw at all, and that I meant to be a poet. 
 Then he showed me his library, or a part of it — I 
 stopped with him a long time, and he shook hands with 
 me when I left, and said I might go again whenever I 
 wished to.' 
 
 ' Hear, hear!' said Mr. Pepperdine. ' It's very 
 evident there's a soft spot somewhere in the old gentle- 
 man's heart.' 
 
 ' And what did his lordship talk to you about?' 
 asked Miss Pepperdine, who had sufficiently recovered 
 from her surprise to resume her dinner. ' I hope you 
 said ' ' my lord ' ' and ' ' your lordship *' when you 
 spoke to him?' 
 
 ' No, I didn't, because I didn't know,' said Lucian. 
 ' I said '* sir," because he was an old man. Oh, we 
 talked about Italy — fancy, he hasn't been in Italy for 
 twenty years! — and he asked me a lot of questions 
 about several things, and he got me to translate a letter 
 for him which he had just received from a professor at 
 Florence — his own Italian, he said, is getting rusty.' 
 
 ' And could you do it?* asked Miss Pepperdine. 
 
 Lucian stared at her with wide-open eyes. 
 
 ' Why, yes,' he answered. * It is my native tongue. 
 I know much, much more Italian than English. 
 Sometimes I cannot find the right word in English — it 
 is a difficult language to learn.' 
 
 Lucian's adventures of his first morning pleased Mr. 
 Pepperdine greatly. He chuckled to himself as he 
 smoked his after-dinner pipe — the notion of his nephew 
 bearding the grim old earl in his tumble-down castle 
 was vastly gratifying and amusing : it was also pleasing 
 to find Lucian treated with such politeness. As the 
 Earl of Simonstower's tenant Mr. Pepperdine had much 
 respect but httle affection for his titled neighbour: the 
 old gentleman was arbitrary and autocratic and totally 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 41 
 
 deaf to whatever might be said to him about bad times. 
 Mr. Pepperdine was glad to get some small change out 
 of the earl through his nephew. 
 
 * Did his lordship mention me or your aunties at all? ' 
 he said, puffing at his pipe as they all sat round the 
 parlour fire. 
 
 ' Yes,' answered Lucian, * he spoke of you.* 
 ' And what did he say Uke? Something sweet, no 
 doubt,' said Mr. Pepperdine. 
 
 Lucian looked at Miss Judith and made no answer. 
 
 * Out with it, lad ! ' said Mr. Pepperdine. 
 
 ' It was only about Aunt Judith,' answered Lucian. 
 ' He said she was a very pretty woman.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine exploded in bursts of hearty 
 laughter; Miss Judith blushed Uke any girl; Miss 
 Pepperdine snorted with indignation. She was about 
 to make some remark on the old nobleman's taste when 
 a diversion was caused by the announcement that 
 Lucian 's beloved chest of books had arrived from 
 Wellsby station. Nothing would satisfy the boy but 
 that he must unpack them there and then; he seized 
 Miss Judith by the hand and dragged her away to help 
 him. For the rest of the afternoon the two were 
 arranging the books in an old bookcase which they 
 unearthed from a lumber-room and set up in Lucian 's 
 sleeping chamber. Mr. Pepperdine, looking in upon 
 them once or twice and notmg their fervour, retired 
 to the parlour or the kitchen with a remark to his elder 
 sister that they were as throng as Throp's wife. Judith, 
 indeed, had some taste in the way of literature — in her 
 own room she treasured a collection of volumes which 
 she had read over and over again. Her taste was 
 chiefly for Lord Byron, Moore, Mrs. Hemans, Miss 
 Landon, and the sentimentalists; she treasured a steel- 
 plate engraving of Byron as if it had been a sacred 
 picture, and gazed with awe upon her nephew when he 
 told her that he had seen the palazzo in which Byron 
 lived during his residence in Pisa, and the house which 
 he had occupied in Venice. Her own romance had 
 
42 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 given Judith a love of poetry: she told Lucian as she 
 helped him to unpack his books and arrange them 
 that she should expect him to read to her. Modern 
 literature was an unexplored field in her case; her know- 
 ledge of letters was essentially early Victorian, and her 
 ideas those of the age in which a poet was most popular 
 when most miserable, and young ladies wore white 
 stockings and low shoes with ankle-straps. She 
 associated fiction with high waists, and essays with 
 full-bottomed wigs, and it seemed the most natural 
 thing to her to shed the tear of sympathy over the 
 Corsair and to sigh with pity for Childe Harold. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 LuciAN settled down in his new surroundings with a 
 readiness and docility that surprised his relatives. He 
 rarely made any allusion to the loss of his father — he 
 appeared to possess a philosophic spirit that enabled 
 him, even at so early an age, to accept the facts of life 
 as they are. He was never backward, however, in 
 talking of the past. He had been his father's constant 
 companion for six years, and had travelled with him 
 wherever he went, especially in Italy, and he brought 
 out of his memory stores of reminiscences with which 
 to interest and amuse his newly found relatives. He 
 would talk to Mr. Pepperdine of Italian agriculture; 
 to Keziah of ItaHan domestic life; to Judith of the 
 treasures of Rome and Naples, Pisa and Florence, of 
 the blue skies and sun-kissed groves of his native land. 
 He always insisted on his nationahty — the accident of 
 his connection with England on the maternal side 
 seemed to have no meaning for him. 
 
 ' I am Italian,' he would say when Mr. Pepperdine 
 slyly teased him. ' It does not matter that I was bom 
 in England. My real name is Luciano Damerelli, and 
 my father's, if he had used it, was Cypriano.' 
 
 Little by little they began to find out the boy's quaH- 
 ties and characteristics. He was strangely old- 
 fashioned, precocious, and unnaturally grave, and 
 cared little for the society of other children, at whom 
 he had a trick of staring as if they had been insects 
 impaled beneath a microscope and he a scientist examin- 
 ing them. He appeared to have two great passions — 
 one for out-door life and nature; the other for reading. 
 He would sit for hours on the bridge watching the river 
 run by, or lie on his back on the lawn in front of the 
 house staring at the drifting clouds. He knew every 
 nook of the ruinous part of the castle and every comer 
 
 43 
 
44 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 of the old church before he had been at Simonstower 
 many weeks. He made friends with everybody in the 
 village, and if he found out that an old man had some 
 strange legend to tell, he pestered the life out of him 
 until it was told. And every day he did so much read- 
 ing, always with the stem concentration of the student 
 who means to possess a full mind. 
 
 When Lucian had been nearly two months at the 
 farm it was borne in upon Miss Pepperdine's mind that 
 he ought to be sent to school. She was by no means 
 anxious to get rid of him — on the contary she was glad 
 to have him in the house: she loved to hear him talk, 
 to see him going about, and to watch his various pro- 
 ceedings. But Keziah Pepperdine had been endowed 
 at birth with the desire to manage — she was one of 
 those people who are never happy unless they are con- 
 trolling, devising, or superintending. Moreover, she 
 possessed a very strict sense of justice — she believed in 
 doing one's duty, especially to those people to whom 
 duty was owing, and who could not extract it for them- 
 selves. It seemed to her that it was the plain duty of 
 Lucian 's relatives to send Lucian to school. She was 
 full of anxieties for his future. Every attempt which 
 she had made to get her brother to tell her anj^hing 
 about the boy's affairs had resulted in sheer failure — 
 Simpson Pepperdine, celebrated from the North Sea to 
 the Westmoreland border as the easiest-going and best- 
 natured man that ever lived, was a past master in the 
 art of evading direct questions. Keziah could get no 
 information from him, and she was anxious for Lucian 's 
 sake. The boy, she said, ought to be fitted out for some 
 walk in life. 
 
 She took the vicar into her confidence, seizing the 
 opportunity when he called one day and found no one 
 but herself at home. 
 
 ' Of course,' she said, ' the boy is a great bookworm. 
 Reading is all that he seems to care about. He brought 
 a quantity of books with him — he has bought others 
 since. He reads in an old-fashioned sort of way — not 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 45 
 
 as you would think a child would. I offered him a 
 child's book one night — it was one that a little boy who 
 once stayed here had left in the house. He took it 
 politely enough, and pretended to look at it, but it was 
 plain to see that he was amused. He is a precocious 
 child, Mr. Chilverstone.' 
 
 The vicar agreed. He suggested that he might be better 
 able to judge the situation, and to advise Miss Pepper- 
 dine thereon, if he were allowed to inspect Lucian's 
 library, and Keziah accordingly escorted him to the 
 boy's room. Mr. Chilverstone was somewhat taken 
 aback on being confronted by an assemblage of some 
 three or four hundred volumes, arranged with great 
 precision and bearing evidences of constant use. He 
 remarked that the sight was most interesting, and pro- 
 ceeded to make a general inspection. A rapid survey 
 of Lucian's books showed him that the boy had three 
 favourite subjects — history, mediaeval romance, and 
 poetry. There were histories of almost every country 
 in Europe, and at least three of the United States of 
 America; there were editions of the ancient chronicles; 
 th great ItaHan poets were all there in the original; 
 the English poets, ancient and modem, were there too, 
 in editions that bespoke the care of a book-lover. There 
 was nothing of a juvenile, or even a frivolous nature 
 from the top of the old bookcase to the bottom — the 
 nearest approach to anything in the shape of light litera- 
 ture was found in the presence of certain famous histori- 
 cal romances of undoubted verisimilitude, and in much- 
 thumbed copies of Robinson Crusoe and The Pilgrim's 
 Progress. 
 
 Air. Chilverstone was puzzled. As at least one-half 
 of the books before him were in Italian, he concluded 
 that Lucicin was as well acquainted with that language 
 as with EngHsh, and said so. Miss Pepperdine 
 enlightened him on the point, and gave him a rapid 
 sketch of Lucian's history. 
 
 ' Just so, just so,' said he. 'No doubt the boy's 
 father formed his taste. It is really most interesting. 
 
46 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 It is very evident that the child has an uncommon mind 
 — you say that he reads with great attention and con- 
 centration ? ' 
 
 * You might let off a cannon at his elbow and he 
 wouldn't take any notice,' said Miss Pepperdine. 
 
 ' It is evident that he is a born student. This is a 
 capital collection of modem histories,' said Mr. Chilver- 
 stone. * If your nephew has read and digested them 
 all he must be well informed as to the rise and progress 
 of nations. I should like, I think, to have an oppor- 
 tunity of conversing with him.' 
 
 Although he did not say so to Miss Pepperdine, the 
 vicar was secretly anxious to find out what had diverted 
 the boy's attention from the usual pursuits of child- 
 hood into these paths. He contrived to waylay Lucian 
 and to draw him into conversation, and being a man 
 of some talent and of considerable sympathy, he soon 
 knew all that the boy had to tell. He found that 
 Lucian had never received any education of the ordi- 
 nary type; had never been to school or known tutor 
 or governess. He could not remember who taught him 
 to read, but cherished a notion that reading and writ- 
 ing had come to him with his speech. As to his choice 
 of books, that had largely had its initiative in his 
 father's recommendation; but there had been a further 
 incentive in the fact that the boy had travelled a great 
 deal, was familiar with many historic scenes and places, 
 and had a natural desire to re-create the past in his 
 own imagination. For six years, in short, he had been 
 receiving an education such as few children are privi- 
 leged to acquire. He talked of mediaeval Italy as if he 
 had Uved in its sunny-tinted hours, and of modem 
 Rome as though it lay in the next parish. But Mr. 
 Chilverstone saw that the boy was in no danger of 
 becoming either prig or pedant, and that his mind was 
 as normal as his body was healthy. He was the mere 
 outcome of an exceptional environment. He had Hved 
 amongst men who talked and worked and thought but 
 with one object — Art — and their enthusiasm had filled 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 47 
 
 him too. * I am to be a poet— a great poet,' he said, 
 with serious face and a straight stare from the violet 
 eyes whose beauty brought everybody captive to his 
 feet. ' It is my destiny.' 
 
 Mr. Chilverstone had a sheaf of yellow papers locked 
 away in a secret drawer which he had never exhibited 
 to living man or woman — verses written in long dead 
 college days. He was sentimental about them still, 
 and the sentiment inclined him to tenderness with 
 youthful genius. He assured Lucian that he sincerely 
 trusted that he might achieve his heart's desire, and 
 added a word of good advice as to the inadvisability 
 of writing too soon. But he discovered that some one 
 had been beforehand with the boy on that point — the 
 future poet, with a touch of worldly wisdom which 
 sounded as odd as it was quaint, assured the parson 
 that he had a horror of immaturity and had been com- 
 manded by his father never to print anything until it 
 had stood the test of cool-headed reflection and twelve 
 months' keeping. 
 
 The vicar recognised that here was material which 
 required careful nursing and watchful attention. He 
 soon found that Lucian knew nothing of mathematics, 
 and that his only desire in the way of Greek and Latin 
 was that he might be able to read the poets of those 
 languages in the originals. Of the grammar of the 
 English language he knew absolutely nothing, but as 
 he spoke with an almost too extreme correctness, and 
 in a voice of great refinement, Mr. Chilverstone gave 
 it as his opinion that there was no necessity to trouble 
 him with its complexities. But in presenting his 
 report to Miss Pepperdine the vicar said that it would 
 do the boy good to go to school. He would mix with 
 other boys — he was healthy and normal enough, to be 
 sure, and full of boyish fun in his way, but the society 
 of lads of his own age would be good for him. He 
 recommended Miss Pepperdine to send him to the 
 grammar-school at Saxonstowe, the headmaster of 
 which was a friend of his and would gladly give special 
 
48 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 attention to any boy whom he recommended. He 
 volunteered, carrying his kindness further, to go over to 
 Saxonstowe and talk to Dr. Babbacombe; for Lucian, 
 he remarked, was no ordinary boy, and needed special 
 attention. 
 
 Miss Pepperdine, like most generals who conceive 
 their plans of campaign in secret, found that her 
 troubles commenced as soon as she began to expose her 
 scheme to criticism. Mr. Pepperdine, as a lifelong 
 exponent of the art of letting things alone, wanted to 
 know what she meant by disturbing everything when 
 all was going on as comfortably as it could be. He was 
 sure the boy had as much book-learning as the arch- 
 bishop himself — besides, if he was sent away to school, 
 he, Simpson Pepperdine, would have nobody to talk to 
 about how they farmed in foreign countries. Judith, 
 half recognising the force of her sister's arguments, was 
 still angry with Keziah for allowing them to occur to 
 her — she knew that the boy had crept so closely into 
 her heart and had so warmed it with new fire that she 
 hated the thought of his leaving her, even though 
 Saxonstowe was only thirty miles away. Consequently 
 Miss Pepperdine fought many pitched battles with her 
 brother and sister, and Simpson and Judith, who knew 
 that she had more brains in her little finger than they 
 possessed in their two heads, took to holding confer- 
 ences in secret in the vain hope of circumventing her 
 designs. 
 
 It came as a vast surprise to these two conspirators 
 that Lucian himself, on whose behalf they basely pro- 
 fessed to be fighting, deserted to, or rather openly 
 joined, the enemy as soon as the active campaign began. 
 Miss Pepperdine, like the astute woman she was, gained 
 the boy's ear and had talked him over before either 
 Simpson or Judith could pervert his mind. He listened 
 to all she had to say, showed that he was impressed, 
 and straightway repaired to the vicarage to seek Mr. 
 Chilverstone's advice. That evening, in the course of 
 a family council, shared in by Mr. Pepperdine with a 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 49 
 
 gloomy face and feelings of silent resentment against 
 Keziah, and by Judith with something of the emotion 
 displayed by a hen who is about to be robbed of her 
 one chicken, Lucian announced that he would go to 
 school, adding, however, that if he found there was 
 nothing to be learnt there he would return to his uncle's 
 roof. Mr. Pepperdine plucked up amazingly after this 
 announcement, for he cherished a secret conviction that 
 his nephew already knew more than any schoolmaster 
 could teach him; but Judith shed tears when she went 
 to bed, and ffelt ill-disposed towards Keziah for the rest 
 of the week. 
 
 Lucian went to Saxonstowe presently with cheerful- 
 ness and a businesslike air, and the three middle-aged 
 Pepperdines were miserable. Mr. Pepperdine took to 
 going over to the Grange at Wellsby nearly every night, 
 and Judith was openly rebellious. Miss Pepperdine 
 herself felt that the house was all the duller for the boy's 
 absence, and wondered how they had endured its dumb 
 monotony before he came. There was much of the 
 Spartan in her, however, and she bore up without sign; 
 but the experience taught her that Duty, when actually 
 done, is not so pleasing to the human feelings as it 
 seems to be when viewed from a distance. 
 
 No word came from Lucian for two weeks after his 
 departure; then the postman brought a letter addressed 
 to Mr. Pepperdine, which was opened amidst great 
 excitement at the breakfast table. Mr. Pepperdine, 
 however, read it in silence. 
 
 * My dear Uncle Simpson Pepperdine,' wrote Lucian, 
 * I did not wish to write to you until I had been at 
 school quite two weeks, so that I could tell you what 
 I thought of it, and whether it would suit me. It is a 
 very nice school, and all the boys are very nice too, 
 and I like Dr. Babbacombe, and his wife, and the 
 masters. We have very good meals, and I should be 
 quite content in that respect if one could sometimes 
 have a cup of decent coffee, but I believe that is im- 
 
 D 
 
50 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 possible in England. They have a pudding here, 
 sometimes, which the boys call Spotted Dog — it is very 
 satisfying and I do not remember hearing of it before — 
 it has what English people call plums in it, but they 
 are in reality small dried raisins. 
 
 * I am perfectly content with my surroundings and 
 my new friends, but I greatly fear that this system of 
 education will not suit me. In some subjects, such as 
 history and general knowledge, I find that I already 
 know much more than Dr. Babbacombe usually 
 teaches to boys. As regards other subjects I find that 
 it is not en regie to permit discussion or argument 
 between master and pupil. I can quite see the reason- 
 ableness of that, but it is the only way in which I have 
 ever learnt everything. I am not quick at learning 
 anything — I have to read a thing over and over again 
 before I arrive at the true significance. It may be that 
 I would spend a whole day in accounting to myself 
 why a certain cause produces a certain effect — the 
 system of education in use here, however, requires one 
 to learn many things in quite a short time. It reminds 
 me of the man who taught twelve parrots aU at once. 
 In more ways than one it reminds me of this, because 
 I feel that many boys here learn the sound of a word 
 and yet do not know what the word means. That is 
 what I have been counselled to avoid. 
 
 * I am anxious to be amenable to your wishes, but 
 I think I shall waste time here. If I could have my 
 own way I should like to have Mr. Chilverstone for a 
 tutor, because he is a man of understanding and 
 patience, and would fully explain everything to me. 
 I am not easy in my mind here, though quite so in my 
 body. Everybody is very kind and the life is com- 
 fortable, but I do not think Dr. Babbacombe or his 
 masters are great savants, though they are gracious 
 and estimable gentlemen. 
 
 * I send my love to you and my aunts, and to Mr. 
 Chilverstone and Mr. and Mrs. Trippett. I have 
 bought a cricket-bat for John Trippett and a doll for 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 51 
 
 Mary, which I shall send in a box very soon. — And I 
 am your affectionate kinsman, 
 
 * LuciAN Damerel. 
 
 As the greater part of this remarkable epistle was 
 pure Greek to Mr. Pepperdine, he repaired to the 
 vicarage with it and laid it before Mr. Chilverstone, 
 who, having duly considered it, returned with Lucian's 
 kinsman to the farm and there entered into solenm con- 
 clave with him and his sisters. The result of their 
 deliberations was that the boy was soon afterwards 
 taken from the care of the gracious and estimable 
 gentlemen who were not savants, and placed, so far as 
 his education was concerned, under the sole charge of 
 the vicar. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 Mr. Chilverstone was one of those men upon whom 
 many sorrows and disappointments are laid. He had 
 set out in life with a choice selection of great ambi- 
 tions, and at forty-five not one of them had fructified. 
 Ill-health had always weighed him down in one direc- 
 tion; ill-luck in another: the only piece of good fortune 
 which had ever come to him came when the Earl of 
 Simonstower, who had heard of him as an inoffensive 
 man content to serve a parish without going to extremes 
 in either of the objectionable directions, presented him 
 to a living which even in bad times was worth five 
 hundred pounds a year. But just before this prefer- 
 ment came in his way Mr. Chilverstone had the mis- 
 fortune to lose his wife, and the enjoyment of the fit 
 things of a country living was necessarily limited to 
 him for some time. He was not greatly taxed by his 
 pastoral duties, for his flock, from the earl downwards, 
 loved that tj^e of parson who knows how to keep his 
 place, and only insists on his professional prestige on 
 Sundays and the appointed days, and he had no great 
 inclination to occupy himself in other directions. As 
 the bitterness of his great sorrow slipped away from 
 him he found his life resolving itself into a level — his 
 time was passed in reading, in pottering about his 
 garden, and, as she grew up, in educating his only 
 child, a girl who at the time of her mother's death 
 was little more than an infant. At the time of Lucian's 
 arrival in the village Mr. Chilverstone' s daughter was 
 at school in Belgium — the boy's first visits to the 
 vicarage were therefore made to a silent and lonely 
 house, and they proved very welcome to its master. 
 
 Lucian's experience at the grammar-school was never 
 repeated under the new regime. The vicar had been 
 somewhat starved in the matter of conversation for 
 
 52 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 53 
 
 more years than he cared to remember, and it was a 
 Godsend to him to have a keen and inquiring mind 
 opposed to his own. His pupil's education began and 
 was continued in an unorthodox fashion; there was no 
 system and very Httle order in it, but it was good for 
 man and boy. They began to spend much time 
 together, in the field as much as in the study. Mr. 
 Chilverstone, encouraged thereto by Lucian, revived 
 an ancient taste for archaeology, and the two made long 
 excursions to the ruined abbeys, priories, castles, and 
 hermitages in their neighbourhood. Miss Pepperdine, 
 to whom Lucian invariably applied for large supplies of 
 sandwiches on these occasions, had an uncomfortable 
 suspicion that the boy would have been better employed 
 with a copy-book or a slate, but she had great faith in 
 the vicar, and acknowledged that her nephew never 
 got into mischief, though he had certainly set his room 
 on fire one night by a bad habit of reading in bed. She 
 had become convinced that Lucian was an odd chicken, 
 who had got into the brood by some freak of fortune, 
 and she fell into the prevalent fashion of the family 
 in regarding him as something uncommon that was not 
 to be judged by ordinary rules of life or interfered with. 
 To Mr. Pepperdine and to Judith he remained a con- 
 stant source of wonder, interest, and amusement, for 
 his tongue never ceased to wag, and he communicated 
 to them everything that he saw, heard, and thought, 
 with a freedom and generosity that kept them in a 
 perpetual state of mental activity. 
 
 Towards the end of June, when Lucian had been 
 three months at Simonstower, he walked into the vicar's 
 study one morning to find him in a state of mild excite- 
 ment. Mr. Chilverstone nodded his head at a letter 
 which lay open on his desk. 
 
 ' The day after to-morrow,' he said, ' you will see 
 my daughter. She is coming home from school.' 
 
 Lucian made no answer. It seemed to him that this 
 bare announcement wrought some subtle change. He 
 knew nothing whatever of girls — they had never come 
 
54 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 into his life, and he was doubtful about them. He 
 stared hard at the vicar. 
 
 ' Will you be glad to see her?' he asked. 
 
 * Why, surely ! ' exclaimed Mr. Chilverstone. ' Yes 
 
 I have not seen her for nearly a year, and it is two 
 
 years since she left home. Yes — Millie is all I have.' 
 
 Lucian felt a pang of jealousy. It was part of his 
 nature to fall in love with every new friend he made; 
 in return, he expected each new friend to devote him- 
 self to him. He had become very fond of the vicar; 
 they got on together excellently; it was not pleasant to 
 think that a girl was coming between them. Besides, 
 what Mr. Chilverstone said was not true. This Millie 
 was not all he had — he had some of him, Lucian. 
 
 * You will like my little girl,' the vicar went on, 
 utterly oblivious of the fact that he was making the 
 boy furiously jealous. ' She is full of Hfe and fun— a 
 real ray of sunshine in a house.' He sighed heavily 
 and looked at a portrait of his wife. ' Yes,' he con- 
 tinued, ' she is quite a lively girl, my little Millie. A 
 sort of tomboy, you know. I call her Sprats; it seems 
 to fit her, somehow.' 
 
 Lucian almost choked with rage and grief. All the 
 old, pleasant companionship; all the long talks and 
 walks; all the disputations and scholarly wrangles were 
 to be at an end, and all because of a girl whose father 
 called her Sprats! It was unbelievable. He gazed at 
 the unobservant clergyman with eyes of wonder; he 
 had come to have a great respect for him as a scholar, 
 and could not understand how a man who could make 
 the Greek grammar so interesting could feel any interest 
 in a girl, even though that girl happened to be his own 
 daughter. For women like his aunts, and Mrs. Trip- 
 pett, and the housekeeper at the castle, Lucian had a 
 great liking; they were all useful in one way or another, 
 either to get good things to eat out of, or to talk to when 
 one wanted to talk; but girls — whatever place had they 
 in the economy of nature ! He had never spoken to a 
 girl in his life, except to little Mary Trippett, who was 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 55 
 
 nine, and to whom he sometimes gave sweets and dolls. 
 Would he be expected to talk to this girl whose father 
 called her Sprats? He turned hot and cold at the 
 thought. 
 
 His visit to the vicarage that morning was a dead 
 failure. Mr. Chilverstone's behaviour was foolish and 
 ridiculous: he would talk of Sprats. He even went as 
 far as to tell Lucian of some of Sprats 's escapades. 
 They were mostly of the practical-joke order, and 
 seemed to afford Mr. Chilverstone huge amusement — 
 Lucian wondered how he could be so silly. He 
 endeavoured to be as polite as possible, but he declined 
 an invitation to stay to lunch. He would cheerfully 
 listen to Mr. Chilverstone on the very dry est points of 
 an irregular verb, but Mr. Chilverstone on Sprats was 
 annoying — he almost descended to futility. 
 
 Lucian refused two invitations that afternoon. Mr. 
 Pepperdine offered to take him with him to York, 
 whither he was proceeding on business; Miss Judith 
 asked him if he would like to go with her to the house 
 of a friend in whose grounds was a haunted hermitage. 
 He declined both invitations with great politeness and 
 went out in solitude. Part of the afternoon he spent 
 with an old man who mended the roads. The old man 
 was stone-deaf and needed no conversational effort on 
 the part of a friend, and when he spoke himself he 
 talked of intelligent subjects, such as rheumatism, 
 backache, and the best cure for stone in the bladder. 
 Lucian thought him a highly intelligent man, and 
 presented him with a screw of tobacco purchased at 
 the village shop — it was a tacit thankoffering to the 
 gods that the old man had avoided the subject of girls. 
 His spirits improved after a visit to the shoemaker, who 
 told him a brand-new ghost story for the truth of which 
 he vouched with many solemn asseverations, and he 
 was chatty with his Aunt Keziah when they took tea 
 together. But that night he did not talk so much as 
 usual, and he went to bed early and made no attempt 
 to coax Miss Pepperdine into letting him have the extra 
 
56 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 light which she had confiscated after he had set his bed 
 on fire. 
 
 Next day Lucian hoped to find the vicar in a saner 
 frame of mind, but to his astonishment and disgust Mr. 
 Chilverstone immediately began to talk of Sprats again, 
 and continued to do so imtil he became unbearable. 
 Lucian was obliged to listen to stories which to him 
 seemed inept, fatuous, and even imbecile. He was told 
 of Sprats 's first distinct words; of her first tooth; of her 
 first attempts to walk; of the memorable occasion upon 
 which she placed her pet kitten on the fire in order to 
 warm it. The infatuated father, who had not had an 
 opportunity of retailing these stories for some time, 
 and who believed that he was interesting his listener, 
 continued to pour forth story after story, each more 
 feeble and ridiculous than the last, until Lucian could 
 have shrieked with the agony which was tearing his 
 soul to pieces. He pleaded a bad headache at last and 
 tried to slip away — Mr. Chilverstone detained him in 
 order to give him an anti-headache powder, and accom- 
 panied his researches into the medicine cupboard with 
 a highly graphic description of a stomach-ache which 
 Sprats had once contracted from too lavish indulgence 
 in unripe apples, and was cured by himself with some 
 simple drug. The vicar, in short, being a disingenuous 
 and a simple-minded man, had got Sprats on the brain, 
 and he imagined that every word he said was meeting 
 with a responsive thrill in the boy's heart. 
 
 Lucian escaped the fatuous father at last. He rushed 
 out into the sunlight, almost choking with rage, grief, 
 and disappomtment. He flung the powder into the 
 hedge-bottom, sat down on a stone-heap at the side of 
 the road, and began to swear in Italian. He swore 
 freely and fluently until he had exhausted that eloquent 
 vocabulary which one may pick up in Naples and 
 Venice and in the purlieus of Hatton Garden, and when 
 he had finished he began it all over again and repeated 
 it with as much fervour as one should display, if one 
 is honest, in reciting the Rosary. This saved him from 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 57 
 
 apoplexy, but the blood grew black within him and his 
 soul was scratched. It had been no part of Lucian's 
 plans for the future that Sprats should come between 
 him and his friend. 
 
 He slept badly that night, and while he lay awake 
 he said to himself that it was all over. It was a mere 
 repetition of history — a woman always came between 
 men. He had read a hundred instances — this was one 
 more. Of course, the Sprats creature would oust him 
 from his place — nothing would ever be as it had been. 
 All was desolate, and he was alone. He read several 
 pages of the fourth canto of Childe Harold as soon as 
 it was light, and dropped asleep with the firm convic- 
 tion that life is a grey thing. 
 
 All that day and the next Lucian kept away from the 
 vicarage. The domestic deities wondered why he did 
 not go as usual; he invented plausible excuses with 
 facile ingenuity. He neglected his books and betrayed 
 a suspicious interest in Mr. Pepperdine's recent pur- 
 chases of cattle; he was restless and at times excited, 
 and Miss Keziah looked at his tongue and felt his fore- 
 head and made him swallow a dose of a certain home- 
 made medicine by which she set great store. On the 
 third day the suppressed excitement within him reached 
 boiling-point. He went out into the fields mad to work 
 it off, and by good or ill luck lighted upon an honest 
 rustic who was hoeing turnips under a blazing mid- 
 summer sun. Lucian looked at the rustic with the eye 
 of a mocking and mischievous devil. 
 
 * Boggles,' he said, with a Mephistophelian coaxing, 
 * would you like to hear some Italian?' Boggles 
 ruminated. 
 
 * Why, Master Lucian,' he said, ' I don't know as I 
 ever did hear that language — can't say as I ever did, 
 anyhow.' 
 
 ' Listen, then,' said Lucian. He treated Boggles to 
 a string of expletives, delivered with native force and 
 energy, making use of his eyes and teeth until the man 
 began to feel frightened. 
 
58 LUCIAN THE DREMIER 
 
 'Lord sakes, Master Lucian!' he said, 'one 'ud 
 think you was going to murder somebody — you look 
 that fierce. It's a queer sort o' language that, sir— I 
 never heard nowt like it. It flays a body.' 
 
 ' It is the most delightful language in the world when 
 you want to swear,' said Lucian. ' It . . .' 
 
 'Nonsense! It isn't a patch on German. You wait 
 till I get over the hedge and I'll show you,' cried a 
 ringing and very authoritative voice. ' I can reel off 
 twice as much as that.' 
 
 Lucian turned round with an instinctive feeling that 
 a critical moment was at hand. He caught sight of 
 something feminine behind the hedgerow; the next 
 instant a remarkably nimble girl came over a half-made 
 gap. The turnip-hoeing man uttered an exclamation 
 which had much joy in it. 
 
 ' Lord sakes if it isn't Miss Milhe!' he said, touching 
 his cap. ' Glad to see 'ee once again, missie._ They 
 did tell me you was coming from them furrineerin' 
 countries, and there you be, growed quite up, as one 
 might say.' 
 
 ' Not quite, but nearly, Boggles,' answered Miss 
 Chilverstone. ' How's your rheumatics, as one might 
 call 'em? They were pretty bad when I went away, 
 I remember.' 
 
 ' They're always bad i' th' winter, miss,' said 
 Boggles, leaning on his hoe and evincing a decided 
 desire to talk, ' and a deal better in summer, alius pro- 
 viding the Lord don't send no rain. Fine, dry weather, 
 miss, is what I want — the rain ain't no good to me.' 
 
 ' A Httle drop wouldn't hurt the turnips, an^'way,' 
 said Miss Chilverstone, looking about her with a know- 
 ing air. 'Seem pretty well dried up, don't they?' 
 She looked at Lucian. Their eyes met: the boy stared 
 and blushed; the girl stared and laughed. 
 
 ' Did it lose its tongue, then?' she said teasingly. 
 ' It seemed to have a very long and very ready one 
 when it was swearing at poor old Boggles. What made 
 him use such bad language to you, Boggles?' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 59 
 
 ' Lord bless 'ee, missie,' said Boggles hurriedly, ' he 
 didn't mean no harm, didn't Master Lucian — he was 
 telling me how they swear in Eye-taUan. Not but what 
 it didn't sound very terrible — but he wouldn't hurt a 
 fly, wouldn't Master Lucian, miss, he wouldn't 
 indeed.' 
 
 ' Dear little lamb ! ' she said mockingly, * I shouldn't 
 think he would.' She turned on the boy with a sudden 
 twist of her shoulders. * So you are Lucian, are you?' 
 she asked. 
 
 ' I am Lucian, yes,' he answered. 
 
 * Do you know who I am? ' she asked, with a flashing 
 look. 
 
 Lucian stared back at her, and the shadow of a smile 
 stole into his face. 
 
 * I think,' he said musingly, ' I think you must be 
 Sprats.' 
 
 Then the two faced each other and stared as only 
 stranger children can stare. 
 
 Mr. Boggles, his watery old eyes keenly observant, 
 leaned his chin upon his hoe and stared also, chuckling 
 to himself. Neither saw him; their eyes were all for 
 each other. The girl, without acknowledging it, per- 
 haps without knowing it, recognised the boy's beauty 
 and hated him for it in a healthy fashion. He was too 
 much of a picture; his clothes were too neat; his collar 
 too clean; his hands too white; he was altogether too 
 much of a fine and finicking little gentleman; he ought, 
 she said to herself, to be stuck in a velvet suit, and a 
 point-lace collar, and labelled. The spirit of mischief 
 entered into her at the sight of him. 
 
 Lucian examined this strange creature with care. 
 He was relieved to find that she was by no means 
 beautiful. He saw a strong-Hmbed, active-looking 
 young damsel, rather older and rather taller than him- 
 self, whose face was odd, rather than pretty, and chiefly 
 remarkable for a prodigality of freckles and a healthy 
 tan. Her nose was pugnacious and inclined to be of 
 the snub order; her hair sandy and anything but tidy; 
 
6o LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 there was nothing beautiful in her face but a pair of 
 brown eyes of a singularly clear and honest sort. As 
 for her attire, it was not in that order which an exact- 
 ing governess might have required: she wore a blue 
 serge frock in which she had evidently been climbing 
 trees or scrambling through hedgerows, a battered 
 straw hat wherein she or somebody had stuck the long 
 feathers from a cock's tail; there was a rent in one 
 of her stockings, and her stout shoes looked as if she 
 had tramped through several ploughed fields in them. 
 All over and round her glowed a sort of aureole of rude 
 and vigorous health, of animal spirits, and of a love 
 of mischief — the youthful philosopher confronting her 
 recognised a new influence and a new nature. 
 
 ' Yes,' she said demurely, ' I'm Sprats, and you've 
 a cheek to call me so — who gave you leave, I'd like to 
 know? What would you think if I told you that you'd 
 look nice if you had a barrel-organ and a monkey on it? 
 Ha! ha! had him there, hadn't I, Boggles? Well, do 
 you know where I am going, monkey-boy?' 
 
 Lucian sighed resignedly. 
 
 'No,' he answered. 
 
 ' Going to fetch you,' she said. ' You haven't been 
 to your lessons for two days, and you're to go this 
 instant minute.' 
 
 ' I don't think I want any lessons to-day,' repHed 
 Lucian. 
 
 * Hear him!' she said, making a grimace. ' What 
 do they do with little boys who won't go to school, 
 Boggles — eh?' 
 
 If Lucian had known more of a world with which he 
 had never, poor child, had much opportunity of making 
 acquaintance, he would have seen that Sprats was 
 meditating mischief. Her eyes began to ghtter: she 
 smiled demurely. 
 
 ' Are you coming peaceably?' she asked. 
 
 ' But I'm not coming at all,' replied Lucian. 
 
 * Aren't you, though? We'll soon settle that, 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 6i 
 
 won't we, Boggles?' she exclaimed. ' Now then, 
 monkey — off you go ! ' 
 
 She was on him with a rush before he knew what 
 was about to happen, and had lifted him off his feet 
 and swung him on to her shoulder ere he could escape 
 her. Lucian expostulated and beseeched; Sprats, 
 shouting and laughing, made for a gap in the hedge- 
 row; Boggles, hugely delighted, following in the wake. 
 At the gap a battle royal ensued — Lucian fighting to 
 free himself, the girl clinging on to him with all the 
 strength of her vigorous young arms. 
 
 * Let me go, I say!' cried Lucian. * Let me down!' 
 
 * You'd best to go quiet and peaceable. Master 
 Lucian,' counselled Boggles. ' Miss Millie ain't one to 
 be denied of anything.' 
 
 * But I won't be carried!' shouted Lucian, half mad 
 with rage. ' I won't . . .' 
 
 He got no further. Sprats, holding on tight to her 
 captive, caught her foot in a branch as she struggled 
 over the gap, and pitched headlong through. There 
 was a steep bank at the other side with a wide ditch of 
 water at its foot: Boggles, staring over the hedge with 
 all his eyes, beheld captor and captive, an inextricable 
 mass of legs and arms, turn a series of hurried somer- 
 saults and collapse into the duck-weed and water-lilies 
 with a splash that drowned their mutual screams of 
 rage, indignation, and delight. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 It followed as a matter of inevitable consequence that 
 Lucian and Sprats when they emerged from the waters 
 of the wayside ditch had become fast friends for life; 
 from that time forward they were as David and 
 Jonathan, loving much, and having full confidence in 
 each other. They became inseparable, and their Hves 
 were spent together from, an early hour of the morning 
 until the necessary bedtime. The vicar was to a 
 certain degree shelved: his daughter possessed the 
 charm of youth and high spirits which was wanting in 
 him. He became a species of elder brother, who was 
 useful in teaching one things and good company on 
 occasions. He, like the philosopher which life had 
 made him, accepted the situation. He saw that the 
 devotion which Lucian had been about to pour out at 
 his own feet had by a sudden whim of fate been diverted 
 to his daughter, and he smiled. He took from these 
 two children all that they gave him, and was sometimes 
 gorged to satiety and sometimes kept on short com- 
 mons, according to their vagaries and moods. Like all 
 young and healthy things, they believed that the world 
 had been made for their own particular benefit, and 
 they absorbed it. Perhaps there had never been such 
 a close companionship as that which sprang up 
 between these two. The trifling fact that one was a 
 boy and the other a girl never seemed to strike them: 
 they were sexless and savage in their freedom. Under 
 Sprats' s fostering care Lucian developed a new side of 
 his character: she taught him to play cricket and foot- 
 ball, to climb trees and precipices, to fish and to ride, 
 and to be an out-of-door boy in every way. He, on 
 his part, repaid her by filling her mind with ranch of 
 his own learning: she became as famiUar with the 
 scenes of his childhood as if she had lived in them 
 
 herself. 
 
 62 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 63 
 
 For three years the vicar, Sprats, and Lucian lived 
 in a world of their own, with the Pepperdines as a 
 closely fitting environment. Miss Pepperdine was 
 accustomed to remark that she did not know whether 
 Lucian really lived at the farm or at the vicarage, but 
 as the vicar often made a similar observation with 
 respect to his daughter, things appeared to be equalised. 
 It was true that the two children treated the houses 
 with equal freedom. If they happened to be at the 
 farm about dinner-time they dined there, but the 
 vicarage would have served them equally well if it had 
 harboured them when the luncheon-bell rang. Mr. 
 Pepperdine was greatly delighted when he found them 
 filling a side of his board: their remarks on things in 
 general, their debates, disputes, and more than all, their 
 quarrels, afforded him much amusement. They were 
 not so well understood by Miss Pepperdine, who con- 
 sidered the young lady from the vicarage to be some- 
 thing of a hoyden, and thought it the vicar's duty to 
 marry again and provide his offspring with a mother. 
 
 ' And a pretty time she'd have ! ' remarked Mr. 
 Pepperdine, to whom this sage reflection was offered. 
 ' A nice handful for anybody, is that young Sprats — 
 as full of mischief as an egg is full of meat. But a 
 good ge'l, a good ge'l, Keziah, and with a warm heart, 
 you make no mistake.* 
 
 Sprats's kindness of heart, indeed, was famous 
 throughout the village. She was her father's almoner, 
 and tempered charity with discrimination in a way that 
 would have done credit to a professional philanthropist. 
 She made periodical visits through the village, followed 
 by Lucian, who meekly carried a large basket contain- 
 ing toothsome and seasonable doles, which were handed 
 out to this or that old woman in accordance with 
 Sprats's instructions. The instinct of mothering some- 
 thing was strong within her. From the moment of 
 her return from school she had taken her father in 
 hand and had shaken him up and pulled him together. 
 He had contracted bad habits as regards food and was 
 
64 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 becoming dyspeptic; he was careless about his personal 
 comfort and neglectful of his health — Sprats dragooned 
 him into the paths of rectitude. But she extended her 
 mothering instincts to Lucian even more than to her 
 father. She treated him at times as if he were a child 
 with whom it was unnecessary to reason; there was 
 always an affectionate solicitude in her attitude towards 
 him which was, perhaps, most marked when she bullied 
 him into subjection. Once when he was ill and con- 
 fined to his room for a week or two she took up her 
 quarters at the farm, summarily dismissed Keziah and 
 Judith from attendance on the invalid, and nursed him 
 back to convalescence. It was useless to argue with 
 her on these occasions. Sprats, as Boggles had truly 
 said, was not one to be denied of anything, and every 
 year made it more manifest that when she had picked 
 Lucian up in the turnip-field and had fallen headlong 
 into the ditch with him, it had been a figure of her 
 future interest in his welfare. 
 
 It was in the fourth summer of Lucian 's residence 
 at Simonstower, and he was fifteen and Sprats nearly 
 two years older, when the serpent stole into their Para- 
 dise. Until the serpent came all had gone well with 
 them. Sprats was growing a fine girl; she was more 
 rudely healthy than ever, and just as sunburned; her 
 freckles had increased rather than decreased; her hair, 
 which was growing deeper in colour, was a perpetual 
 nuisance to her. She had grown a little quieter in 
 manner, but would break out at times; the mere fact 
 that she wore longer skirts did not prevent her from 
 climbing trees or playing cricket. And she and Lucian 
 were still hand-in-glove, still David and Jonathan; she 
 had no friends of her own sex, and he none of his; each 
 was in a happy state of perfect content. But the stage 
 of absolute perfection is by no means assured even in 
 the Arcadia of childhood — it may endure for a time, 
 but sooner or later it must be broken in upon, and not 
 seldom in a rudely sudden way. 
 
 The breaking up of the old things began one Sunday 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 65 
 
 morning in summer, in the cool shade of the ancient 
 church. Nothing heralded the momentous event; 
 everything was as placid as it always was. Lucian, 
 sitting in the pew sacred to the family of Pepperdine, 
 looked about him and saw just what he saw every 
 Sunday. Mr. Pepperdine was at the end of the pew 
 in his best clothes; Miss Pepperdine was gorgeous in 
 black silk and bugles; Miss Judith looked very hand- 
 some in her pearl-grey. In the vicarage pew, all alone, 
 sat Sprats in solemn state. Her freckled face shone 
 with much polishing; her sailor hat was quite straight; 
 as for the rest of her, she was clothed in a simple blouse 
 and a plain skirt, and there were no tears in either. 
 All the rest was as usual. The vicar's surplice had been 
 newly washed, and Sprats had mended a bit of his 
 hood, which had become frayed by hanging on a nail 
 in the vestry, but otherwise he presented no different 
 appearance to that which always characterised him. 
 There were the same faces, and the same expressions 
 upon them, in every pew, and that surely was the same 
 bee that always buzzed while they waited for the ser- 
 vice to begin, and the three bells in the tower droned 
 out. ' Come to church — come to church — come to 
 church ! * 
 
 It was at this very moment that the serpent stole into 
 Paradise. The vicar had broken the silence with 
 ' When the wicked man turneth away from his wicked- 
 ness,' and everybody had begun to rustle the leaves of 
 their prayer-books, when the side-door of the chancel 
 opened and the Earl of Simonstower, very tall, and 
 very gaunt, and very irascible in appearance, entered 
 in advance of two ladies, whom he marshalled to the 
 castle pew with as much grace and dignity as his gout 
 would allow. Lucian and Sprats, with a wink to each 
 other which no one else perceived, examined the earl's 
 companions during the recitation of the General Con- 
 fession, looking through the slits of their hypocritical 
 fingers. The elder lady appeared to be a woman of 
 fashion: she was dressed in a style not often seen at 
 
 £ 
 
66 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 Simonstower, and her attire, her lorgnette, her vinai- 
 grette, her fan, and her airs and graces formed a 
 delightful contrast to the demeanour of the old earl, 
 who was famous for the rustiness of his garments, and 
 stuck like a leech to the fashion of the ' forties.' 
 
 But it was neither earl nor simpering madam at which 
 Lucian gazed at surreptitious moments during the rest 
 of the service. The second of the ladies to enter into 
 the pew of the great house was a girl of sixteen, ravish- 
 ingly pretty, and gay as a peacock in female flaunts 
 and fineries which dazzled Lucian' s eyes. She was 
 dark, and her eyes were shaded by exceptionally long 
 lashes which swept a creamy cheek whereon there 
 appeared the bloom of the peach, fresh, original, 
 bewitching; her hair, curling over her shoulders from 
 beneath a white sun-bonnet, artfully designed to com- 
 municate an air of innocence to its wearer, was of the 
 same blue-black hue that distinguished Lucian's own 
 curls. It chanced that the boy had just read some 
 extracts from Don Juan : it seemed to him that here was 
 Haidee in the very flesh. A remarkably strange sensa- 
 tion suddenly developed in the near region of his heart 
 — Lucian for the first time in his life had fallen in love. 
 He felt sick and queer and almost stifled; Miss Pepper- 
 dine noticed a drawn expression on his face, and passed 
 him a mint lozenge. He put it in his mouth — some- 
 thing nearly choked him, but he had a vague suspicion 
 that the lozenge had nothing to do with it. 
 
 Mr. Chilverstone had a trick of being long-winded if 
 he found a text that appealed to him, and when Lucian 
 heard the subject of that morning's discourse he feared 
 that the congregation was in for a sermon of at least 
 half an hour's duration. The presence of the Earl of 
 Simonstower, however, kept the vicar within reasonable 
 bounds, and Lucian was devoutly thankful. He had 
 never wished for anything so much in all his life as he 
 then wished to be out of church and safely hidden in 
 the vicarage, where he always lunched on Sunday, or 
 in some corner of the woods. For the girl in the earl's 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 67 
 
 pew was discomposing, not merely because of her 
 prettiness but because she would stare at him, Lucian. 
 He, temperamentally shy where women were con- 
 cerned, had only dared to look at her now and then; 
 she, on the contrary, having once seen him looked at 
 nothing else. He knew that she was staring at him all 
 through the sermon. He grew hot and uncomfortable 
 and wriggled, and Miss Judith increased his confusion 
 by asking him if he were not quite well. It was with 
 a great sense of relief that he heard Mr. Chilverstone 
 wind up his sermon and begin the Ascription — he felt 
 that he could not stand the fire of the girl's eyes any 
 longer. 
 
 He joined Sprats in the porch and seemed in a great 
 hurry to retreat upon the vicarage. Sprats, however, 
 had other views — she wanted to speak to various old 
 women and to Miss Pepperdine, and Lucian had to 
 remain with her. Fate was cruel— the earl, for some 
 mad reason or other, brought his visitors down the 
 church instead of taking them out by the chancel door; 
 consequently Haidee passed close by Lucian. He 
 looked at her; she raised demure eyelids and looked at 
 him. The soul within him became as water — he was 
 lost. He seemed to float into space; his head burned, 
 his heart turned icy-cold, and he shut his eyes, or 
 thought he did. When he opened them again the girl, 
 a dainty dream of white, was vanishing, and Sprats 
 and Miss Judith were asking him if he didn't feel \yell. 
 New-bom love fostered dissimulation: he complained 
 of a sick headache. The maternal instinct was 
 immediately aroused in Sprats: she conducted him 
 homewards, stretched him on a comfortable sofa in a 
 darkened room, and bathed his forehead with eau-de- 
 cologne. Her care and attention were pleasant, but 
 Lucian 's thoughts were of the girl whose eyes had 
 smitten him to the heart. 
 
 The sick headache formed an excellent cloak for the 
 shortcomings of the afternoon and evening. He 
 recovered sufficiently to eat some lunch, and he after- 
 
68 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 wards lay on a rug in the garden and was tended by 
 the faithful Sprats with a fan and more eau-de-cologne. 
 He kept his eyes shut most of the time, and thought of 
 Haidee. Her name, he said to himself, must be Haidee 
 
 no other name would fit her eyes, her hair, and her 
 
 red lips. He trembled when he thought of her lips; 
 Sprats noticed it, and wondered if he was going to 
 have rheumatic fever or ague. She fetched a cHnical 
 thermometer out of the house and took his temperature. 
 It was quite normal, and she was reassured, but still a 
 little puzzled. When tea-time came she brought his 
 tea and her own out into the garden — she observed 
 that he ate languidly, and only asked twice for straw- 
 berries. She refused to allow him to go to church in 
 the evening, and conducted him to the farm herself. 
 On the way, talking of the events of the day, she asked 
 him if he had noticed the stuck-up doll in the earl's 
 pew. Lucian dissembled, and replied in an indifferent 
 tone — it appeared from his reply that he had chiefly 
 observed the elder lady, and had wondered who she 
 was. Sprats was able to inform him upon this point — 
 she was a Mrs. Brinklow, a connection, cousin, half- 
 cousin, or something, of Lord Simonstower's, and the 
 girl was her daughter, and her name was Haidee. 
 
 Lucian knew it — it was Fate, it was Destiny. He 
 had had dreams that some such mate as this was 
 reserved for him in the Pandora's box which was now 
 being opened to him. Haidee! He nearly choked 
 with emotion, and Sprats became certain that he was 
 suffering from indigestion. She had private conversa- 
 tion with Miss Pepperdine at the farm on the subject 
 of Lucian' s indisposition, with the result that a cooling 
 draught was administered to him and immediate bed 
 insisted upon. He retired with meek resignation; as 
 a matter of fact solitude was attractive — he wanted to 
 think of Haidee. 
 
 In the silent watches of the night — disturbed but 
 twice, once by Miss Pepperdine with more medicine, 
 and once by Miss Judith with nothing but solicitude — 
 
 V 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER bg 
 
 he realised the entire situation. Haidee had dawned 
 upon him, and the Thing was begun which made all 
 poets mighty. He would be miserable, but he would 
 be great. She was a high-bom maiden, who sat in the 
 pews of earls, and he was — he was not exactly sure 
 what he was. She would doubtless look upon him 
 with scorn: well, he would make the world ring with 
 his name and fame; he would die in a cloud of glory, 
 fighting for some oppressed nation, as Byron did, and 
 then she would be sorry, and possibly weep for him. 
 By eleven o'clock he felt as if he had been in love all 
 his life; by midnight he was asleep and dreaming that 
 Haidee was locked up in a castle on the Rhine, and 
 that he had sworn to release her and carry her away 
 to liberty and love. He woke early next morning, and 
 wrote some verses in the metre and style of my Lord 
 Byron's famous address to a maiden of Athens; by 
 breakfast-time he knew them by heart. 
 
 It was all in accordance with the decrees of Fate that 
 Lucian and Haidee were quickly brought into each 
 other's company. Two days after the interchange of 
 glances in the church porch the boy rushed into the 
 dining-room at the vicarage one afternoon, and found 
 himself confronted by a group of persons, of whom 
 he for the first bewildering moment recognised but one. 
 When he realised that the earth was not going to open 
 and swallow him, and that he could not escape without 
 shame, he saw that the Earl of Simonstower, Mrs. 
 Brinklow, Mr. Chilverstone, and Sprats were in the 
 room as well as Haidee. It was fortunate that Mrs. 
 Brinklow, who had an eye for masculine beauty and 
 admired pretty boys, took a great fancy to him, and 
 immediately began to pet him in a manner which he 
 bitterly resented. That cooled him, and gave him 
 self-possession. He contrived to extricate himself 
 from her caresses with dignity, and replied to the ques- 
 tions which the earl put to him about his studies with 
 modesty and courage. Sprats conducted Haidee to 
 the garden to inspect her collection of animals; Lucian 
 
70 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 went with them, and became painfully aware that for 
 every glance which he and Haidee bestowed on rabbits, 
 white mice, piebald rats, and guinea-pigs, they gave 
 two to each other. Each glance acted hke an electric 
 thrill — it seemed to Lucian that she was the very spirit 
 of love, made flesh for him to worship. Sprats, how- 
 ever, had an opinion of Miss Brinklow which was 
 diametrically opposed to his own, and she expressed 
 it with great freedom. On any other occasion he would 
 have quarrelled with her: the shame and modesty of 
 love kept him silent; he dared not defend his lady 
 against one of her own sex. 
 
 It was in the economy of Lucian's dream that he and 
 Haidee were to be separated by cruel and inexorable 
 Fate : Haidee, however, had no intention of permitting 
 Fate or anything else to rob her of her just dues. On 
 the afternoon of the very next day Lord Simonstower 
 sent for Lucian to read an Italian magazine to him; 
 Haidee, whose mother loved long siestas on summer 
 days, and was naturally inclined to let her daughter 
 manage her own affairs, contrived to waylay the boy 
 with the beautiful eyes as he left the Castle, and as 
 pretty a piece of comedy ensued as one could wish to 
 see. They met again, and then they met in secret, 
 and Lucian became bold and Haidee alluring, and the 
 woods by the river, and the ruins in the Castle, might 
 have whispered of romantic scenes. And at last Lucian 
 could keep his secret no longer, and there came a day 
 when he poured into Sprats 's surprised and sisterly ear 
 the momentous tidings that he and Haidee had plighted 
 their troth for ever and a day, and loved more madly 
 and despairingly than lovers ever had loved since 
 Leander swam to Hero across the Hellespont. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 Sprats was o! an eminently practical turn of mind. 
 She wanted to know what was to come of all this. To 
 her astonishment she discovered that Lucian was 
 already full of plans for assuring bread and butter and 
 many other things for himself and his bride, and had 
 arranged their future on a cut-and-dried scheme. He 
 was going to devote himself to his studies more zeal- 
 ously than ever, and to practise himself in the divine 
 art which was his gift. At twenty he would publish 
 his first volume of poems, in English and in Italian; 
 at the same time he would produce a great blank verse 
 tragedy at Milan and in London, and his name would 
 be extolled throughout Europe, and he himself pro- 
 bably crowned with laurel at Rome, or Florence, or 
 somewhere. He would be famous, and also rich, and 
 he would then claim the hand of Haidee, who in the 
 meantime would have waited for him with the fideHty 
 of a Penelope. After that, of course, there would 
 follow eternal bliss — it was not necessary to look 
 further ahead. But he added, with lordly condescen- 
 sion, that he and Haidee would always love Sprats, 
 and she, if she liked, might live with them. 
 
 ' Did Haidee tell you to tell me so?' asked Sprats, 
 ' because the prospect is not exactly alluring. No, 
 thank you, my dear — I'm not so fond of Haidee as all 
 that. But I will teach her to mend your clothes and 
 dam your socks, if you like — it will be a useful 
 accomplishment. ' 
 
 Lucian made no reply to this generous offer. He 
 knew that there was no love lost between the two girls, 
 and could not quite understand why, any more than he 
 could realise that they were sisters under their skins. 
 He understood the Sprats of the sisterly, maternal, 
 good-chum side; but Haidee was an ethereal being 
 
 71 
 
72 LUCIAN THE DREAIVIER 
 
 though possessed of a sound appetite. He wished that 
 Sprats were more sympathetic about his lady-love; she 
 was sympathetic enough about himself, and she 
 hstened to his rhapsodies with a certain amount of 
 curiosity which was gratifying to his pride. But when 
 he remarked that she too would have a lover some day, 
 Sprats's rebellious nature rose up and kicked 
 vigorously. 
 
 ' Thank you ! ' she said, ' but I don't happen to want 
 anything of that sort. If you could only see what an 
 absolute fool you look when you are an3rwhere within 
 half a mile of Haidee, you'd soon arrive at the conclu- 
 sion that spooniness doesn't improve a fellow! I sup- 
 pose it's all natural, but I never expected it of you, 
 you know, Lucian. I'm sure I've acted like a real 
 pal to you — just look what a stuck-up little monkey 
 you were when I took you in hand ! — you couldn't play 
 cricket nor climb a tree, and you used to tog up every 
 day as if you were going to an old maid's muffm-worry. 
 I did get you out of all those bad ways — until the Dolly 
 came along (she is a Dolly, and I don't care!). You 
 didn't mind going about with a hole or two in your 
 trousers and an old straw hat and dirty hands, and 
 since then you've worn your best clothes every day, 
 and greased your hair, and yesterday you'd been 
 putting scent on your handkerchief! Bah! — if lovers 
 are like that, I don't want one — I could get something 
 better out of the nearest lunatic asylum. And I don't 
 think much of men anyhow — they're all more or less 
 babies. You're a baby, and so is his Vicarness ' (this 
 was Sprats 's original mode of referring to her father), 
 ' and so is your uncle Pepperdine — all babies, hope- 
 lessly feeble, and unable to do anything for yourselves. 
 What would any of you do without a woman? No, 
 thank you, I'm not keen about men — they worry one 
 too much. And as for love — well, if it makes you go 
 off your food, and keeps you awake at night, and turns 
 you into a jackass, I don't want any of it — it's too 
 rotten altogether.' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 73 
 
 ' You don't understand/ said Lucian pityingly, and 
 with a deep sigh. 
 
 * Don't want to,' retorted Sprats. ' Oh, my— fancy 
 spending your time in spooning when you might be 
 playing cricket! You have degenerated, Lucian, 
 though I expect you can't help it — it's inevitable, like 
 measles and whooping-cough. I wonder how long you 
 will feel bad?' 
 
 Lucian waxed wroth. He and Haidee had sworn 
 eternal love and faithfulness — they had broken a coin 
 in two, and she had promised to wear her half round 
 her neck, and next to the spot where she believed her 
 heart to be, for ever; moreover, she had given him a 
 lock of her hair, and he carried it about, wrapped in 
 tissue paper, and he had promised to buy her a ring 
 with real diamonds in it. Also, Haidee already 
 possessed fifteen sonnets in which her beauty, her soul, 
 and a great many other things pertaining to her were 
 praised, after love's extravagant fashion — it was un- 
 reasonable of Sprats to talk as if this were an evanescent 
 fancy that must needs pass. He let her see that he 
 thought so. 
 
 ' All right, old chap ! ' said Sprats. ' It's for life, 
 then. Very well; there is, of course, only one thing 
 to be done. You must act on the square, you know — 
 they always do in these cases. If it's such a serious 
 affair, you must play the part of a man of honour, and 
 ask the permission of the young lady's mamma, and of 
 her distinguished relative the Earl of Simonstower — 
 mouldy old ass! — to pay your court to her.' 
 
 Lucian seemed disturbed and uneasy. 
 
 ' Yes — yes — I know ! ' he answered hurriedly. ' I 
 know that's the right thing to do, but you see, Sprats, 
 Haidee doesn't wish it, at present at any rate. She — 
 she's a great heiress, or something, and she says it 
 wouldn't do. She wishes it to be kept secret until I'm 
 twenty. Everything will be all right then, of course. 
 And it's awfully easy to arrange stolen meetings at 
 
74 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 present; there are lots of places about the Castle and in 
 the woods where you can hide.' 
 
 ' Like a housemaid and an under-footman/ remarked 
 Sprats. ' Um — well, I suppose that's inevitable, too. 
 Of course the earl would never look at you, and it's 
 very evident that Mrs. Brinklow would be horrified — 
 she wants the Dolly kid to marry into the peerage, and 
 you're a nobody.' 
 
 ' I'm not a nobody!' said Lucian, waxing furious. 
 ' I am a gentleman — an Italian gentleman. I am the 
 earl's equal — I have the blood of the Orsini, the Odes- 
 calchi, and the Aldobrandini in my veins! The earl? 
 — why, your English noblemen are made out of trades- 
 folk — pah! It is but yesterday that they gave a 
 baronetcy to a man who cures bacon, and a peerage to 
 a fellow who brews beer. In Italy we should spit upon 
 your English peers — they have no blood. I have the 
 blood of the Caesars in me ! ' 
 
 ' Your mother was the daughter of an English farmer, 
 and your father was a macaroni-eating Italian who 
 painted pictures,' said Sprats, with imperturbable 
 equanimity. ' You yourself ought to go about with a 
 turquoise cap on your pretty curls, and a hurdy-gurdy 
 with a monkey on the top. Tant pis for your rotten 
 old Italy ! — anybody can buy a dukedom there for a 
 handful of centesimi ! ' 
 
 Then they fought, and Lucian was worsted, as usual, 
 and came to his senses, and for the rest of the day 
 Sprats was decent to him and even sympathetic. She 
 was always intrusted with his confidence, however 
 much they differed, and during the rest of the time 
 which Haidee spent at the Castle she had to listen to 
 many ravings, and more than once to endure the read- 
 ing of a sonnet or a canzonet with which Lucian 
 intended to propitiate the dark-eyed nymph whose 
 image was continually before him. Sprats, too, had to 
 console him on those days whereon no sight of Miss 
 Brinklow was vouchsafed. It was no easy task: 
 Lucian, during these enforced abstinences from love's 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 75 
 
 delights and pleasures, was preoccupied, taciturn, and 
 sometimes almost sulky. 
 
 ' You're like a bear with a sore head,' said Sprats, 
 using a homely simile much in favour with the old 
 women of the village. * I don't suppose the Dolly 
 kid is nursing her sorrows like that. I saw Dicky 
 Feversham riding up to the Castle on his pony as I 
 came in from taking old Mother Hobbs's rice-pudding.' 
 
 Lucian clenched his fists. The demon of jealousy 
 was aroused within him for the first time. 
 
 * What do you mean?' he cried. 
 
 * Don't mean anything but what I said,' replied 
 Sprats. ' I should think Dickie has gone to spend the 
 afternoon there. He's a nice-looking boy, and as his 
 uncle is a peer of the rel-lum, Mrs. Brinklow doubtless 
 loves him.' 
 
 Lucian fell into a fever of rage, despair, and love. 
 To think that Another should have the right of 
 approaching His Very Own! — it was maddening; it 
 made him sick. He hated the unsuspecting Richard 
 Feversham, who in reality was a very inoffensive, fun- 
 loving, up-to-lots-of-larks sort of schoolboy, with a 
 deadly hatred. The thought of his addressing the 
 Object was awful; that he should enjoy her society was 
 unbearable. He might perhaps be alone with her — 
 might sit with her amongst the ruined halls of the 
 Castle, or wander with her through the woods of 
 Simonstower. But Lucian was sure of her — had she 
 not sworn by every deity in the lover's mythology that 
 her heart was his alone, and that no other man should 
 ever have even a cellar-dwelling in it? He became 
 almost lachrymose at the mere thought that Haidee's 
 lofty and pure soul could ever think of another, and 
 before he retired to his sleepless bed he composed a 
 sonnet which began — 
 
 ' Thy dove-like soul is prisoned in my heart 
 With gold and silver chains that may not break, ' 
 
 and concluded — 
 
76 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 * While e'er the world remaineth, thou shalt be 
 Queen of my heart as I am king of thine.' 
 
 He had an assignation with Haidee for the following 
 afternoon, and was looking forward to it with great 
 eagerness, more especially because he possessed a new 
 suit of grey flannel, a new straw hat, and new brown 
 boots, and he had discovered from experience that the 
 young lady loved her peacock to spread his tail. But, 
 as ill-luck would have it, the earl, with the best inten- 
 tion in the world, spoiled the whole thing. About noon 
 Lucian and Sprats, having gone through several pages 
 of Virgil with the vicar, were sitting on the gate of the 
 vicarage garden, recreating after a fashion peculiar to 
 themselves, when the earl and Haidee, both mounted, 
 came round the comer and drew rein. The earl talked 
 to them for a few minutes, and then asked them up 
 to the Castle that afternoon. He would have the tennis- 
 lawn made ready for them, he said, and they could eat 
 as many strawberries as they pleased, and have tea in 
 the garden. Haidee, from behind the noble relative, 
 made a moue at this; Lucian was obliged to keep a 
 straight face, and thank the earl for his confounded 
 graciousness. Sprats saw that something was wrong. 
 
 'What's up?' she inquired, climbing up the gate 
 again when the earl had gone by. ' You look jolly 
 blue.' 
 
 Lucian explained the situation. Sprats snorted. 
 
 ' Well, of all the hardships ! ' she said. ' Thank the 
 Lord, I'd rather play tennis and eat strawberries and 
 have tea — especially the Castle tea — than go mooning 
 about in the woods ! However, I suppose I must con- 
 trive something for you, or you'll groan and grumble 
 all the way home. You and the Doll must lose your- 
 selves in the gardens when we go for strawberries. I 
 suppose ten minutes' slobbering over each other behind 
 a hedge or in a corner will put you on, won't it?' 
 
 Lucian was overwhelmed at her kindness. He 
 offered to give her a brotherly hug, whereupon she 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 7^ 
 
 smacked his face, rolled him into the dust in the middle 
 of the road, and retreated into the garden, bidding him 
 turn up with a clean face at half-past two. When that 
 hour arrived she found him awaiting her in the porch; 
 one glance at him showed that he had donned the new 
 suit, the new hat, and the new boots. Sprats shrieked 
 with derision. 
 
 ' Lord have mercy upon us!' she cried. ' It might 
 be a Bank Holiday! Do you think I am going to 
 walk through the village with a thing like that? Stick 
 a cabbage in your coat — it'll give a finishing touch to 
 your appearance. Oh, you miserable monkey-boy! — 
 wouldn't I like to stick you in the kitchen chimney and 
 shove you up and down in the soot for five minutes ! ' 
 
 Lucian received this badinage in good part — it was 
 merely Sprats 's way of showing her contempt for finick- 
 ing habit. He followed her from the vicarage to the 
 Castle — she walking with her nose in the air, and from 
 time to time commiserating him because of the newness 
 of his boots; he secretly anxious to bask in the sunlight 
 of Haidee's smiles. And at last they arrived, and there, 
 sprawling on the lawn near the basket-chair in which 
 Haidee's lissome figure reposed, was the young gentle- 
 man who rejoiced in the name of Richard Feversham. 
 He appeared to be very much at home with his young 
 hostess; the sound of their mingled laughter fell on 
 the ears of the newcomers as they approached. Lucian 
 heard it, and shivered with a curious, undefinable sense 
 of evil; Sprats heard it too, and knew that a moral 
 thunderstorm was brewing. 
 
 The afternoon was by no means a success, even in its 
 earHer stages. Mrs. Brinklow had departed to a friend's 
 house some miles away; the earl might be asleep or 
 dead for all that was seen of him. Sprats and Haidee 
 cherished a secret dislike of each other; Lucian was 
 proud, gloomy, and taciturn; only the Feversham boy 
 appeared to have much zest of life left in him. He 
 was a somewhat thick-headed youngster, full of good 
 nature and high spirits; he evidently did not care a 
 
78 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 straw for public or private opinion, and he made boyish 
 love to Haidee with all the shamelessness of depraved 
 youth. Haidee saw that Lucian was jealous, and 
 encouraged Dickie's attentions — long before tea was 
 brought out to them the materials for a vast explosion 
 were ready and waiting. After tea — and many plates 
 of strawberries and cream — had been consumed, the 
 thick-headed youth became childishly gay. The tea 
 seemed to have mounted to his head — he effervesced. 
 He had much steam to let off: he suggested that they 
 should follovv the example of the villagers at the bun- 
 struggles and play kiss-in-the-ring, and he chased 
 Haidee all round the lawn and over the flower-beds in 
 order to illustrate the way of the rustic man with the 
 rustic maid. The chase terminated behind a hedge of 
 laurel, from whence presently proceeded much giggling, 
 screaming, and confused laughter. The festive 
 youngster emerged panting and triumphant; his rather 
 homely face wore a broad grin. Haidee followed with 
 highly becoming blushes, settling her tumbled hair and 
 crushed hat. She remarked with a pout that Dickie 
 was a rough boy; Dickie replied that you don't play 
 country games as if you were made of egg-shell china. 
 
 The catastrophe approached consummation with the 
 inevitableness of a Greek tragedy. Lucian waxed 
 gloomier and gloomier; Sprats endeavoured, agonis- 
 ingly, to put things on a better footing; Haidee, now 
 thoroughly enjoying herself, tried hard to make the 
 other boy also jealous. But the other boy was too full 
 of the joy of life to be jealous of anything; he gambolled 
 about like a young elephant, and nearly as gracefully; 
 it was quite evident that he loved horseplay and 
 believed that girls were as much inclined to it as boys. 
 At any other time Sprats would have fallen in with 
 his mood and frolicked with him to his heart's content; 
 on this occasion she was afraid of Lucian, who now 
 looked more like a young Greek god than ever. The 
 lightning was already playing about his eyes; thunder 
 sat on his brows. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 7^ 
 
 At last the storm burst. Haidee wanted to shoot 
 with bow and arrow at a target; she despatched the two 
 youngsters into the great hall of the Castle to fetch the 
 materials for archery. Dickie went off capering and 
 whistling; Lucian followed in sombre silence. And 
 inside the vaulted hall, mystic with the gloom of the 
 past, and romantic with suits of armour, tattered ban- 
 ners, guns, pikes, bows, and the rest of it, the smoulder- 
 ing fires of Lucian' s wrath burst out. Master Richard 
 Feversham found himself confronted by a figure which 
 typified Wrath, and Indignation, and Retribution. 
 
 ' You are a cad!' said Lucian. 
 
 ' Cad yourself ! ' retorted Dickie. ' Who are you 
 talking to?' 
 
 ' I am talking to you,' answered Lucian, stem and 
 cold as a stone figure of Justice. ' I say you are a 
 cad — a cad ! You have grossly insulted a young lady, 
 and I will punish you.' 
 
 Dickie's eyes grew round — he wondered if the other 
 fellow had suddenly gone off his head, and if he'd 
 better call for help and a strait waistcoat. 
 
 ' Grossly insulted — a young lady!' he said, pucker- 
 ing up his face with honest amazement. ' What the 
 dickens do you mean? You must be jolly well dotty!* 
 
 ' You have insulted Miss Brinklow,' said Lucian. 
 ' You forced your unwelcome attentions upon her all 
 the afternoon, though she showed you plainly that they 
 were distasteful to her, and you were finally rude and 
 brutal to her — beast!' 
 
 ' Good Lord!' exclaimed Dickie, now thoroughly 
 amazed, * I never forced any attention on her — we were 
 only larking. Rude? Brutal? Good heavens! — I 
 only kissed her behind the hedge, and I've kissed her 
 many a time before ! ' 
 
 Lucian became insane with wrath, 
 
 * Liar!' he hissed. ' Liar!' 
 
 Master Richard Feversham straightened himself, 
 mentally as well as physically. He bunched up his 
 
Bo LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 fists and advanced upon Lucian with an air that was 
 thoroughly British. 
 
 ' Look here,' he said, * I don't know who the devil 
 you are, you outrageous ass, but if you call me a liar 
 again, I'll hit you!' 
 
 ' Liar!' said Lucian, ' Liar!' 
 
 Dickie's left fist, clenched very artistically, shot out 
 like a small battering-ram, and landed with a beautiful 
 plunk on Lucian' s cheek, between the jaw and the bone. 
 He staggered back. 
 
 ' I kept off your nose on purpose,' said Dickie, ' but, 
 by the Lord, I'll land you one there and spoil your 
 pretty eyes for you if you don't beg my pardon.' 
 
 'Pardon!' Lucian 's voice sounded hollow and 
 strange. ' Pardon!' He swore a strange Italian oath 
 that made Dickie creep. * Pardon! — of you? I will 
 kill you — beast and liar!' 
 
 He sprang to the wall as he spoke, tore down a 
 couple of light rapiers which hung there, and threw 
 one at his enemy's feet. 
 
 ' Defend yourself!' he said. ' I shall kill you.' 
 
 Dickie recoiled. He would have faced anybody 
 twice his size with fists as weapons, or advanced on a 
 battery with a smiling face, but he had no taste for 
 encountering an apparent lunatic armed with a weapon 
 of which he himself did not know the use. Besides, 
 there was murder in Lucian 's eye — he seemed to mean 
 business. 
 
 * Look here, I say, you chap ! ' exclaimed Dickie, 
 ' put that thing down. One of us '11 be getting stuck, 
 you know, if you go dancing about with it like that. 
 I'll fight you as long as you Hke if you'll put up your 
 fists, but I'm not a fool. Put it down, I say.' 
 
 ' Coward!' said Lucian. ' Defend yourself!' 
 
 He made at Dickie with fierce intent, and the latter 
 was obliged to pick up the other rapier and fall into 
 some sort of a defensive position. 
 
 ' Of all the silly games,' he said, ' this is ' 
 
 But Lucian was already attacking him with set teeth, 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 8i 
 
 glaring eyes, and a resolute demeanour. There was a 
 rapid clashing of blades; then Dickie drew in his breath 
 sharply, and his weapon dropped to the ground. He 
 looked at a wound in the back of his hand from which 
 the blood was flowing rather freely. 
 
 ' I knew you'd go and do it with your silliness!' he 
 said. ' Now there'll be a mess on the carpet and we 
 shall be found out. Here — wipe up that blood with 
 your handkerchief while I tie mine round my hand. 
 We . . . Hello, here they all are, of course ! Now 
 there will be a row ! I say, you chap, swear it was all 
 a lark — do }'ou hear?' 
 
 Lucian heard but gave no sign. He still gripped his 
 rapier and stared fixedly at Haidee and Sprats, who 
 had run to the hall on hearing the clash of steel and 
 now stood gazing at the scene with dilated eyes. 
 Behind them, gaunt, grey, and somewhat amused and 
 cynical, stood the earl. He looked from one lad to the 
 other and came forward. 
 
 ' I heard warlike sounds,' he said, peering at the 
 combatants through glasses balanced on the bridge of 
 the famous Simonstower nose, ' and now I see warlike 
 sights. Blood, eh? And what may this mean?' 
 
 ' It's all nothing, sir,' said Dickie in suspicious haste, 
 ' absolutely nothing. We were larking about with 
 these two old swords, and the other chap's point 
 scratched my hand, that's all, sir — 'pon my word.' 
 
 ' Does the other chap's version correspond?' in- 
 quired the earl, looking keenly at Lucian's flushed face. 
 ' Eh, other chap?' 
 
 Lucian faced him boldly. 
 
 ' No, sir,' he answered; ' what he says is not true, 
 though he means honourably. I meant to punish him 
 — to kill him.' 
 
 ' A candid admission,' said the earl, toying with his 
 glasses. ' You appear to have effected some part of 
 your purpose. And his offence?' 
 
 ' He ' Lucian paused. The two girls, fascin- 
 ated at the sight of the rapiers, the combatants, and the 
 
 F 
 
82 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 blood, had drawn near and were staring from one boy's 
 face to the other's; Lucian hesitated at sight of them. 
 
 ' Come!' said the earl sharply. ' His offence?' 
 
 ' He insulted Miss Brinklow,' said Lucian gravely. 
 ' I told him I should punish him. Then he told Hes — 
 about her. I said I would kill him. A man who hes 
 about a woman merits death.' 
 
 'A very excellent apothegm,' said the earl. * Sprats, 
 my dear, draw that chair for me — thank you. Now,' 
 he continued, taking a seat and sticking out his gouty 
 leg, ' let me have a clear notion of this delicate ques- 
 tion. Feversham, your version, if you please.' 
 
 ' I — I — you see, it's all one awfully rotten misunder- 
 standing, sir,' said Dickie, very ill at ease. ' I — I — 
 don't like saying things about anybody, but I think 
 Damerel's got sunstroke or something — he's jolly dotty, 
 or carries on as if he were. You see, he called me a 
 cad, and said I was rude and brutal to Haidee, just 
 because I — well, because I kissed her behind the laurel 
 hedge when we were larking in the garden, and I said 
 it was nothing and I'd kissed her many a time before, 
 and he said I was a liar, and then — well, then I hit 
 him.' 
 
 * I see,' said the earl, ' and of course there was then 
 much stainless honour to be satisfied. And how was it 
 that gentlemen of such advanced age resorted to steel 
 instead of fists?' 
 
 The boys made no reply: Lucian still stared at the 
 earl; Dickie professed to be busy with his impromptu 
 bandage. Sprats went round to him and tied the knot. 
 
 ' I think I understand,' said the earl. * Well, I 
 suppose honour is satisfied?' 
 
 He looked quizzingly at Lucian. Lucian returned 
 the gaze with another, dark, sombre, and determined. 
 
 ' He is still a liar ! ' he said. 
 
 ' I'm not a liar!' exclaimed Dickie, ' and as sure 
 as eggs are eggs I'll hit you again, and on the nose this 
 time, if you say I am,' and he squared up to his foe 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 83 
 
 utterly regardless of the earl's presence. The earl 
 
 smiled. 
 
 ' Why is he a liar?' he asked, looking at Lucian. 
 
 ' He Ues when he says that— that ' Lucian 
 
 choked and looked, almost entreatingly, at Haidee. 
 She had stolen up to the earl's chair and leaned against 
 its high back, taking in every detail of the scene with 
 eager glances. As Lucian's eyes met hers, she smiled; 
 a dimple showed in the corner of her mouth. 
 
 ' I understand,' said the earl. He twisted himself 
 round and looked at Haidee. ' I think,' he said, ' this 
 is one of those cases in which one may be excused if 
 one appeals to the lady. It would seem, young lady, 
 that Mr. Feversham, while abstaining, like a gentle- 
 man, from boasting of it ' 
 
 ' Oh, I say, sir!' burst out Dickie; ' I— didn't mean 
 to, you know.' 
 
 ' I say that Mr. Feversham, like a gentleman, does 
 not boast of it, but pleads that you have indulged him 
 with the privileges of a lover. His word has been ques- 
 tioned—his honour is at stake. Have you so indulged 
 it, may one ask?' 
 
 Haidee assumed the airs of the coquette who must 
 fain make admissions. 
 
 ' I — suppose so,' she breathed, with a smile which 
 included everybody. 
 
 ' Very good,' said the earl. ' It may be that Mr. 
 Damerel has had reason to believe that he alone was 
 entitled to those privileges. Eh?' 
 
 ' Boys are so silly ! ' said Haidee. ' And Lucian is 
 so serious and old-fashioned. And all boys like to kiss 
 me. What a fuss to make about nothing ! ' 
 
 * I quite understand your position and your mean- 
 ing, my dear,' said the earl. ' I have heard similar 
 sentiments from other ladies.' He turned to Lucian. 
 ' Well?' he said, with a sharp, humorous glance. 
 
 Lucian had turned very pale, but a dark flush still 
 clouded his forehead. He put aside his rapier, which 
 until then he had held tightly, and he turned to Dickie. 
 
84 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 ' I beg your pardon,' he said; * I was wrong — quite 
 wrong. I offer you my sincere apologies. I have 
 behaved ill — I am sorry.' 
 
 Dickie looked uncomfortable and shuffled about. 
 
 ' Oh, rot!' he said, holding out his bandaged hand. 
 ' It's all right, old chap. I don't mind at all now that 
 you know I'm not a liar. I — I'm awfully sorry, too. 
 I didn't know you were spoons on Haidee, you know — 
 I'm a bit dense about things. Never mind, I shan't 
 think any more of it, and besides, girls aren't worth — 
 at least, I mean — oh, hang it, don't let's say any more 
 about the beastly affair!' 
 
 Lucian pressed his hand. He turned, looked at the 
 earl, and made him a low and ceremonious bow. Lord 
 Simonstower rose from his seat and returned it with 
 equal ceremony. Without a glance in Haidee's direc- 
 tion Lucian strode from the hall — he had forgotten 
 Sprats. He had, indeed, forgotten everything — the 
 world had fallen in pieces. 
 
 An hour later Sprats, tracking him down with the 
 unerring sagacity of her sex, found him in a haunt 
 sacred to themselves, stretched full length on the grass, 
 with his face buried in his arms. She sat down beside 
 him and put her arm round his neck and drew him to 
 her. He burst into dry, bitter sobs. 
 
 ' Oh, Sprats!' he said. ' It's all over — aU over. I 
 believed in her . . . and now I shall never beUeve 
 in anybody again ! ' 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 That night, when the last echoes of the village street 
 had died away, and the purple and grey of the summer 
 twilight was dissolving into the deep blue and gold of 
 night, Sprats knelt at the open window of her bedroom, 
 staring out upon the valley with eyes that saw nothing. 
 She was thinking and wondering, and for the first time 
 in her Hfe she wished that a mother's heart and a 
 mother's arms were at hand — she wanted to hear the 
 beating love of the one and feel the protecting strength 
 of the other. 
 
 Something had come to her that afternoon as she 
 strove to comfort Lucian. The episode of the duel; 
 Lucian's white face and burning eyes as he bowed to 
 the cynical, pohte old nobleman and strode out of the 
 hall with the dignity and grace of a great prince; the 
 agony which had exhausted itself in her own arms; the 
 resolution with which he had at last choked everj^hing 
 down, and had risen up and shaken himself as if he 
 were a dog that throws off the last drop of water; — all 
 these things had opened the door into a new world for 
 the girl who had seen them. She had been Lucian's 
 other self; his constant companion, his faithful mentor, 
 for three years; it was not until now that she began to 
 realise him. She saw now that he was no ordinary 
 human being, and that as long as he lived he would 
 never be amenable to ordinary rules. He was now a 
 child in years, and he had the heart of a man; soon he 
 would be a man, and he would still be a child. He 
 would be a child all his life — self-willed, obstinate, 
 proud, generous, wayward; he would sin as a child sins, 
 and suffer as a child suffers; and there would always be 
 something of wonder in him that either sin or suffering 
 should come to him. When she felt his head within 
 her protecting and consoling arm, Sprats recognised 
 
 85 
 
86 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 the weakness and helplessness which lay in Lucian's 
 soul — he was the child that has fallen and runs to its 
 mother for consolation. She recognised, too, that hers 
 was the stronger nature, the more robust character, 
 and that the strange, mysterious Something that 
 ordains all things, had brought her life and Lucian's 
 together so that she might give help where help was 
 needed. All their lives — all through the strange mystic 
 To Come into which her eyes were trying to look as she 
 stared out into the splendour of the summer night — she 
 and Lucian were to be as they had been that evening; 
 her breast the harbour of his soul. He might drift 
 away; he might suffer shipwreck; but he must come 
 home at last, and whether he came early or late his 
 place must be ready for him. 
 
 This was knowledge — this was calm certainty: it 
 changed the child into the woman. She knelt down 
 at the window to say her prayers, still staring out into 
 the night, and now she saw the stars and the deep blue 
 of the sky, and she heard the murmur of the river in 
 the valley. Her prayers took no form of words, and 
 were all the deeper for it; underneath their wordless 
 aspiration ran the solemn undercurrent of the new-bom 
 knowledge that she loved Lucian with a love that would 
 last till death. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 Within twelve months Lucian's recollections of the 
 perfidious Haidee were nebulous and indistinct. He had 
 taken the muse for mistress and wooed her with such 
 constant persistency that he had no time to think of 
 anything else. He used up much manuscript paper and 
 made large demands upon Sprats and his Aunt Judith, 
 the only persons to whom he condescended to show his 
 productions, and he was alike miserable and happy. 
 Whenever he wrote a new poem he was filled with ela- 
 tion, and for at least twenty-four hours glowed with 
 admiration of his own powers; then set in a period of 
 uncertainty, followed by one of doubt and another of 
 gloom — the lines which had sounded so fine that they 
 almost brought tears to his eyes seemed banal and weak, 
 and were not infrequently cast into the fire, where his 
 once-cherished copies of the Haidee sonnets had long 
 since preceded them. Miss Judith nearly shed tears 
 when these sacrifices were made, and more than once 
 implored him tenderly to spare his offspring, but with 
 no result, for no human monster is so savage as the poet 
 who turns against his own fancies. It was due to her, 
 however, that one of Lucian's earhest efforts was spared. 
 Knowing his propensity for tearing and rending his chil- 
 dren, she surreptitiously obtained his manuscript upon 
 one occasion and made a fair copy of a sentimental story 
 written in imitation of Lara, which had greatly moved 
 her, and it was not until many years afterwards that 
 Lucian was confronted and put to shame by the sight 
 of it. 
 
 At the age of eighteen Lucian celebrated his birthday 
 by burning every manuscript he had, and announcing 
 that he would write no more verses imtil he was at least 
 twenty-one. But chancing to hear a pathetic story of 
 rural life which appealed powerfully to his imagination, 
 
88 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 he began to write again; and after a time, during which 
 he was unusually morose and abstracted, he presented 
 himself to Sprats with a bundle of manuscript. He 
 handed it over to her with something of shypess. 
 ' I want you to read it — carefully,' he said. 
 
 * Of course,' she answered. ' But is it to share the 
 fate of all the rest, Lucian? You made a clean sweep 
 of everything, didn't you?' 
 
 ' That stuff ! ' he said, with fine contempt. ' I should 
 
 think so ! But this ' he paused, plunged his hands 
 
 into his pockets, and strode up and down the room — 
 ' this is — well, it's different. Sprats! — I believe it's 
 good.' 
 
 * I wish you'd let my father read it,' she said. ' Do, 
 Lucian.' 
 
 ' Perhaps,' he answered. ' But you first — I want to 
 know what you think. I can trust you.' 
 
 Sprats read the poem that evening, and as she read 
 she marvelled. Lucian had done himself justice at last. 
 The poem was full of the true country life; there was no 
 false ring in it; he had realised the pathos of the story 
 he had to tell; it was a moving performance, full of the 
 spirit of poetry from the first line to the last. She was 
 proud, glad, full of satisfaction. Without waiting to 
 ask Lucian's permission, she placed the manuscript in 
 the vicar's hands and begged him to read it. He car- 
 ried it away to his study; Sprats sat up later than usual 
 to hear his verdict. She occupied herself with no work, 
 but with thoughts that had a little of the day-dream 
 glamour in them. She was trying to map out Lucian's 
 future for him. He ought to be protected and shielded 
 from the world, wrapped in an environment that would 
 help him to produce the best that was in him; the ordi- 
 nary cares of Hfe ought never to come near him. He 
 had a gift, and the world would be the richer if the gift 
 were poured out lavishly to his fellow-creatures; but he 
 must be treated tenderly and skilfully if the gift was to 
 be poured out at all. Sprats, country girl though she 
 was, knew something of the harshnesses of Ufe; she knew. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 89 
 
 too, that Lucian's nature was the sort that would rebel 
 at a crumpled rose-leaf. He was still, and always would 
 be, a child that feels rather than understands. 
 
 The vicar came back to her with the manuscript — it 
 was then nearly midnight, but he was too much excited 
 to wonder that Sprats should still be downstairs. He 
 came tapping the manuscript with his fingers — his face 
 wore a delighted and highly important expression. 
 
 ' My dear,' he said, ' this is a considerable perfor- 
 mance. I am amazed, pleased, gratified, proud. The 
 boy is a genius — he will make a great name for himself. 
 Yes — it is good. It is sound work. It is so charmingly 
 free from mere rhetoric — there is a restraint, a chaste- 
 ness which one does not often find in the work of a 
 young writer. And it is classical in form and style. 
 I am proud of Lucian. You see now the result of only 
 reading and studying the best masters. He is perhaps 
 a little imitative — that is natural; it will wear away. Did 
 you not notice a touch of Wordsworth, eh! — I was 
 reminded of Michael. He will be a new Wordsworth — 
 a Wordsworth with more passion and richer imagery. 
 He has the true eye for nature — I do not know when 
 I have been so pleased as with the bits of colour that 
 I find here. Oh, it is certainly a remarkable perfor- 
 mance.' 
 
 ' Father,' said Sprats, ' don't you think it might be 
 published ? ' 
 
 Mr. Chilverstone considered the proposition gravely. 
 
 ' I feel sure it would meet with great approbation if 
 it were,' he said. ' I have no doubt whatever that the 
 best critics would recognise its merit and its undoubted 
 promise. I wonder if Lucian would allow the earl to 
 read it? — his lordship is a fine judge of classic poetry, 
 and though I beheve he cherishes a contempt for modern 
 
 verse, he cannot fail to be struck by this poem the 
 
 truth of its setting must appeal to him.' 
 
 ' I will speak to Lucian,' said Sprats. 
 
 She persuaded Lucian to submit his work to Lord 
 Simonstower next day; — the old nobleman read, re-read. 
 
90 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 and was secretly struck by the beauty and strength of 
 the boy's performance. He sent for Lucian and con- 
 gratulated him warmly. Later on in the day he walked 
 into the vicar's study. 
 
 ' Chilverstone, ' he said, ' what is to be done with that 
 boy Damerel? He will make a great name if due care 
 is taken of him at the critical moment. How old is 
 he now — nearly nineteen? I think he should go to 
 Oxford.' 
 
 ' That,' said the vicar, ' is precisely my own opinion.' 
 
 ' It would do him all the good in the world,' continued 
 the earl. ' It is a thing that should be pushed through. 
 I think I have heard that the boy has some money? I 
 knew his father, Cyprian Damerel. He was a man who 
 earned a good deal, but I should say he spent it. Still, 
 I have always understood that he left money in Simpson 
 Pepperdine's hands for the boy.' 
 
 Mr. Chilverstone observed that he had always been 
 so informed, though he did not know by whom. 
 
 ' Simpson Pepperdine should be approached,' said 
 Lord Simonstower. ' I have a good mind to talk to 
 him myself.' 
 
 ' If your lordship would have the kindness to do so,' 
 said the vicar, ' it would be a most excellent thing. 
 Pepperdine is an estimable man, and very proud indeed 
 of Lucian — I am sure he would be induced to give his 
 consent.' 
 
 * I will see him to-morrow,' said the earl. 
 
 But before the morrow dawned an event had taken 
 place in the history of the Pepperdine family which 
 involved far-reaching consequences. While the earl and 
 the vicar were in consultation over their friendly plans 
 for Lucian 's benefit, Mr. Pepperdine was travelling 
 homewards from Oakborough, whither he had proceeded 
 in the morning in reference to a letter which caused him 
 no Httle anxiety and perturbation. It was fortunate that 
 he had a compartment all to himself in the train, for he 
 groaned and sighed at frequent intervals, and manifested 
 many signs of great mental distress. When he left 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 91 
 
 Wellsby station he walked with slow and heavy steps 
 along the road to Mr. Trippett's farm, where, as usual, 
 he had left his horse and trap. Mrs. Trippett, chancing 
 to look out of the parlour window, saw him approaching 
 the house and noticed the drag in his step. He walked, 
 she said, discussing the matter later on with her husband, 
 as if he had suddenly become an old man. She hastened 
 to the door to admit him; Mr. Pepperdine gazed at her 
 with a lack-lustre eye. 
 
 ' Mercy upon us, Mr. Pepperdine ! ' exclaimed Mrs. 
 Trippett, ' you do look badly. Aren't you feeling well? ' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine made an effort to pull himself 
 together. He walked in, sat down in the parlour, and 
 breathed heavily. 
 
 ' It's a very hot day, ma'am,' he said. ' I'm a bit 
 overdone.' 
 
 ' You must have a drop of brandy and water,' said 
 Mrs. Trippett, and bustled into the kitchen for water 
 and to the sideboard for brandy. ' Take a taste while 
 it's fresh,' she said, handing him a liberal mixture. 
 ' It'll revive you.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine sipped at his glass and nodded his 
 head in acknowledgment of her thoughtfulness. 
 
 ' Thank you kindly,' said he. 'I were feeHng a bit 
 badly like. Is the master anywhere about? I would 
 like to see him.' 
 
 Mrs. Trippett replied that the master was in the fold, 
 and she would let him know that Mr. Pepperdine was 
 there. She went herself to fetch her husband, and 
 hinted to him that his old friend did not seem at all well 
 — she was sure there was something wrong with him. 
 Mr. Trippett hastened into the house and found Mr. 
 Pepperdine pacing the room and sighing dismally. 
 
 * Now then ! ' said Mr. Trippett, whose face was always 
 cheery even in times of trouble, ' th' owd woman says 
 you don't seem so chirpy like. Is it th' sun, or what? 
 — get another taste o' brandy down your throttle, lad.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine sat down again and shook his head. 
 
 ' John,' he said, gazing earnestly at his friend. ' I'm 
 
92 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 in sore trouble — real bad trouble. I doubt I'm a ruined 
 man.' 
 
 * Nay, for sure ! ' exclaimed Mr. Trippett. * What's 
 it all about, like?' 
 
 * It's all on account of a damned rascal!' answered 
 Mr. Pepperdine, with a burst of indignation. 'Ah! — 
 there's a pretty to-do in Oakborough this day, John. 
 You haven't heard nothing about Bransby?' 
 
 ' What, the lawyer?' 
 
 ' Ah, lawyer and rogue and the Lord knows what!' 
 repHed Mr. Pepperdine, groaning with wrath and 
 misery. ' He's gone and cleared himself off, and he's 
 naught but a swindler. They do say there that it's a 
 hundred thousand pound job.' 
 
 Mr. Trippett whistled. 
 
 ' I alius understood 'at he were such a well-to-do, 
 upright sort o' man,' he said. ' He'd a gre't reppyta- 
 tion, any road.' 
 
 ' Ay, and seems to have traded on it ! ' said Mr. Pep- 
 perdine bitterly. ' He's been a smooth-tongued 'un, he 
 has. He's done me, he has so — dang me if I ever trust 
 the likes of him again ! ' 
 
 Then he told his story. The absconded Mr. Bransby, 
 an astute gentleman who had established a reputation 
 for probity by scrupulous observance of the convention- 
 alities dear to the society of a market town and had 
 never missed attendance at his parish church, had sud- 
 denly vanished into the Ewigkeit, leaving a few widows 
 and orphans, several tradespeople, and a large number 
 of unsuspecting and confiding clients, to mourn, not his 
 loss, but his knavery. Simpson Pepperdine had been an 
 easy victim. Some years previously he had consented 
 to act as trustee for a neighbour's family — Mr. Bransby 
 was his co-trustee. Simpson had left everything in Mr. 
 Bransby' s hands — it now turned out that Mr. Bransby 
 had converted everything to his own uses, leaving his 
 careless coadjutor responsible. But this was not all. 
 Simpson, who had made money by breeding shorthorns, 
 had from time to time placed considerable sums in the 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 93 
 
 lawyer's hands for investment, and had trusted him 
 entirely as to their nature. He had received good in- 
 terest, and had never troubled either to ask for or inspect 
 the securities. It had now been revealed to him that 
 there had never been any securities — ^his money had gone 
 into Mr. Bransby's own coffers. Simpson Pepperdine, 
 in short, was a ruined man. 
 
 Mr. Trippett was genuinely disturbed by this news. 
 He felt that his good-natured and easy-going friend had 
 been to blame in respect to his laxity and carelessness. 
 But he himself had had some slight deahngs with Mr. 
 Bransby, and he knew the plausibility and suaveness 
 of that gentleman's manner. 
 
 ' It's a fair cropper!' he exclaimed. ' I could ha' 
 trusted that Bransby like the Bank of England. I alius 
 understood he were doing uncommon well.' 
 
 ' So he were,' answered Mr. Pepperdine, ' uncommon 
 well — out of fools like me.' 
 
 * I hope,' said Mr. Trippett, mentioning the subject 
 with some shyness, ' I hope the gals' money isn't lost, 
 
 an' all?' 
 
 ' What, Keziah and Judith? Nay, nay,' replied Mr. 
 Pepperdine. ' It isn't. What bit they have — matter of 
 five hundred pound each, may be — is safe enough.' 
 
 ' Nor the lad's, either,' said Mr. Trippett. 
 
 'The lad's?' said Mr. Pepperdine questioningly. 
 ' Oh, Lucian? Oh — ay — of course, he's all right.' 
 
 Mr. Trippett went over to the sideboard, produced the 
 whisky decanter, mixed himself a glass, Hghted his pipe, 
 and proceeded to think hard. 
 
 ' Well,' he said, after some time, ' I know what I 
 should do if I were i' your case, Simpson. I should 
 go to his lordship and tell him all about it.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine started and looked surprised. 
 
 * I've never asked a favour of him yet,' he said. * I 
 don't know ' 
 
 ' I didn't say aught about asking any favour,' said 
 Mr. Trippett. ' I said — go and tell his lordship ail about 
 
94 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 \ it. He's the reppytation of being a long-headed 'un, 
 has Lord Simonstower— he'll happen suggest summut.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine rubbed his chin meditatively. 
 
 ' He's a sharp-tongued old gentleman,' he said; ' I've 
 always fought a bit shy of him. Him an' me had a bit 
 of a difference twenty years since.' 
 
 * Let bygones be bygones,' counselled Mr. Trippett. 
 ' You and your fathers afore you have been on his land 
 and his father's land a bonny stretch o' time.' 
 
 ' Three hundred and seventy-five year come next 
 spring,' said Mr. Pepperdine. 
 
 ' And he'll not see you turned off wi'out knowing 
 why,' said Mr. Trippett with conviction. ' Any road, 
 it'll do no harm to tell him how you stand. He'd have 
 to hear on't sooner or later, and he'd best hear it from 
 yourself.' 
 
 Turning this sage counsel over in his mind, Mr. Pep- 
 perdine journeyed homewards, and as luck would have 
 it he met the earl near the gates of the Castle. Lord 
 Simonstower had just left the vicarage, and Mr. Pepper- 
 dine was in his mind. He put up his hand in answer 
 to the farmer's salutation. Mr. Pepperdine drew rein. 
 
 ' Oh, Pepperdine,' said the earl, ' I want to have 
 some conversation with you about your nephew. I have 
 just been talking with the vicar about him. When can 
 you come up to the Castle ? ' 
 
 ' Any time that pleases your lordship,' answered Mr. 
 Pepperdine. ' It so happens that I was going to ask the 
 favour of an interview with your lordship on my own 
 account.' 
 
 ' Then you had better drive up now and leave your 
 horse and trap in the stables,' said the earl. * Tell them 
 to take you to the library — I'll join you there presently.' 
 
 Closeted with his tenant. Lord Simonstower plunged 
 into his own business first — it was his way, when he took 
 anything in hand, to go through with it with as little 
 delay as possible. He came to the point at once by 
 telUng Mr. Pepperdine that his nephew was a gifted 
 youth who would almost certainly make a great name 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 95 
 
 in the world of letters, and that it would be a most 
 excellenT thing to send him to Oxford. He pomted out 
 the ^^^^^^^ which would accrue to Lucian if 
 
 this bourse were adopted, spoke of his own mterest m 
 Se boy and promised to help him in every way he 
 Suld Mr. Pepperdine listened with respectful and 
 
 P'J My^rii' ^^^ said, when the earl had explained h^ 
 views for Lucian, ' I'm greatly obliged to your lordship 
 to your kindness to the lad and your mterest m him 
 I a^ee with every word your lordship says. I ve 
 alwTs known there was something out of the common 
 aS Lucian, and I've wanted him to get on m his own 
 way I never had no doubt about his makmg a great 
 name for himself-I could see that in him when he were 
 a little lad. Now about this going to Oxford-it would 
 cost a good deal of money, wouldn t it, my lordj 
 
 ' It would certainly cost money,' replied the earl. 
 ' But I would put it to you in this way--or rather, this 
 is the way in which it should be put to the boy himself. 
 I understand he has some money; well, he can make no 
 better investment of a portion of it than ^Y spending t 
 on his education. Two or three years at Oxford will 
 fit him for the life of a man of letters as nothmg else 
 would. He need not be extravagant— two hundred 
 pounds a year should suffice him.' .,.,., ^,, 
 Mr Pepperdine hstened to this with obvious per- 
 plexity and unrest. He hesitated a little before making 
 any reply. At last he looked at the earl with the expres- 
 sion of a man who is going to confess something. 
 
 • My lord,' he said, ' I'll tell your lordship what 
 nobody else knows— not even my sisters. I'm sure your 
 lordship'll say naught to nobody about it. My lord the 
 lad hafn't a penny. He never had. Your lordship 
 knows that his father sent for me when he was dying 
 in London— he'd just come back, with the boy, from 
 Italy— and he put Lucian in my care. He'd made a will 
 and I was trustee and executor. He thought that there 
 was sufficient provision made for the boy, but he hadn t 
 
96 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 been well advised — he'd put all his eggs in one basket — 
 the money was all invested in a building society in Rome, 
 and every penny of it was lost. I did hear/ affirmed 
 Mr. Pepperdine solemnly, ' that the Pope of Rome him- 
 self lost a deal of money at the same time and in the 
 same society.' 
 
 ' That's quite true,' said the earl. ' I remember it 
 very well. 
 
 ' Well, there it was,' continued Mr. Pepperdine. ' It 
 was gone for ever — there wasn't a penny saved. I never 
 said naught to my sisters, you know, my lord, because 
 I didn't want 'em to know. I never said nothing to the 
 boy, either — and he's the sort of lad that would never 
 ask. He's a bit of a child in money matters — his father 
 (but your lordship '11 remember him as well as I do) had 
 always let him have all he wanted, and ' 
 
 ' And his uncle has followed in his father's lines, eh? ' 
 said the earl, with a smile that was neither cynical nor 
 unfriendly. ' Well, then, Pepperdine, I understand 
 that the lad has been at your charges all this time as 
 regards everything — I suppose you've paid Mr. Chilver- 
 stone, too?' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine waved his hands. 
 
 ' There's naught to talk of, my lord,' he said. ' I've 
 no children, and never shall have. I never were a 
 marrying sort, and the lad's been welcome. And if it 
 had been in my power he should have gone to Oxford; 
 but, my lord, there's been that happened within this last 
 day or so that's brought me nigh to ruin. It was that 
 that I wanted to see your lordship about — it's a poor 
 sort of tale for anybody's ears, but your lordship would 
 have to hear it some time or other. You see, my lord ' 
 — and Mr. Pepperdine, with praiseworthy directness and 
 simphcity, set forth the story of his woes. 
 
 The Earl of Simonstower listened with earnest atten- 
 tion until his tenant had spread out all his ruined hopes 
 at his feet. His face expressed nothing until the re- 
 grettable catalogue of foolishness and wrongs came to 
 an end. Then he laughed, rather bitterly. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 97 
 
 ' Well, Pepperdine,' he said, ' you've been wronged, 
 but you've been a fool into the bargain. And I can't 
 blame you, for, in a smaller way — a matter of a thousand 
 pounds or so — this man Bransby has victimised me. 
 Well, now, what's to be done? There's one thing cer- 
 tain — I don't intend to lose you as a tenant. If nothing 
 else can be done, my solicitors must settle everything 
 for you, and you must pay me back as you can. I 
 understand you've been doing well with your shorthorns, 
 haven't you?' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine could hardly believe his ears. He 
 had always regarded his landlord as a somewhat cold 
 and cynical man, and no thought of such generous help 
 as that indicated by the earl's last words had come into 
 his mind in telling the story of his difficulties. He was 
 a soft-hearted man, and the tears sprang into his eyes 
 and his voice trembled as he tried to frame suitable 
 words. 
 
 ' My lord!' he said brokenly, * I — I don't know what 
 to say ■' 
 
 ' Then say nothing, Pepperdine,' said the earl. * I 
 understand what you would say. It's all right, my 
 friend — we appear to be fellow-passengers in Mr. 
 Bransby' s boat, and if I help you it's because I'm not 
 quite as much damaged as you are. And eventually 
 there will be no help about it — you'll have helped your- 
 self. However, we'll discuss that later on; at present I 
 want to talk about your nephew. Pepperdine, I don't 
 want to give up my pet scheme of sending that boy to 
 Oxford. It is the thing that should be done; I think it 
 must be done, and that I must be allowed to do it. 
 With your consent, Pepperdine, I will charge myself 
 with your nephew's expenses for three years from the 
 time he goes up; by the end of the three years he will be 
 in a position to look after himself. Don't try to give 
 me any thanks. I have something of a selfish motive 
 in all this. But now, listen: I do not wish the boy to 
 know that he is owing this to anybody, and least of 
 all to me. We must invent something in the nature of 
 
 G 
 
98 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 a conspiracy. There must be no one but you, the vicar, 
 and myself in the secret — no one, Pepperdine, and last 
 of all any womankind, so your mouth must be closed as 
 regards your sisters. I will get Mr. Chilverstone to talk 
 to the boy, who will understand that the money is in 
 your hands and that he must look to you. I want you 
 to preach economy to him — economy, mind you, not 
 meanness. I will talk to him in the same way myself, 
 because if he is anything like his father he will develop 
 an open-handedness which will be anything but good for 
 him. Remember that you are the nominal holder of the 
 purse-strings — everything will pass through you. I 
 think that's all I wanted to say, Pepperdine,' concluded 
 the earl. ' You'll remember your part?' 
 
 ' I shall indeed, my lord,' said Mr. Pepperdine, as he 
 shook the hand which the earl extended; ' and I shall 
 remember a deal more, too, to my dying day. I can't 
 rightly thank your lordship at this moment.' 
 
 ' No need, Pepperdine, no need ! ' said Lord Simons- 
 tower hastily. ' You'd do the same for me, I'm sure. 
 Good-day to you, good-day; and don't forget the con- 
 spiracy — no talking to the women, you know.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine drove homewards with what country 
 folk call a heart-and-a-half. He was unusually light- 
 some in mood and garrulous in conversation that even- 
 ing, but he would only discourse on one topic — the 
 virtues of the British aristocracy. He named no names 
 and condescended to no particulars — the British aristo- 
 cracy in general served him for the text of a long sermon 
 which amused Miss Judith and Lucian to a high degree, 
 and made Miss Pepperdine wonder how many glasses 
 of whisky Simpson had consumed at the * White Lion ' 
 in Oakborough. It so happened that the good man had 
 been so full of trouble that he had forgotten to take even 
 one — his loquacity that evening was simply due to the 
 fact that while he was preparing to wail De Profundis 
 he had been commanded to sing Te De Laudamus, and 
 his glorification of lords was his version of that paean of 
 joyfulness. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 LuciAN received the news which Mr. Chilverstone com- 
 municated to him in skilful and diplomatic fashion with 
 an equanimity which seemed natural to him when hear- 
 ing of anything that appeared to be his just due. He 
 had so far had everything that he desired — always 
 excepting the fidelity of Haidee, which now seemed a 
 matter of no moment and was no longer a sore point — 
 and he took it as a natural consequence of his own exist- 
 ence that he should go to Oxford, the fame of which 
 ancient seat of learning had been famihar to him from 
 boyhood. He made no inquiries as to the cost of this 
 step — anything relating to money had no interest for 
 him, save as regards laying it out on the things he 
 desired. He had been accustomed as a child to see his 
 father receive considerable sums and spend them with 
 royal lavishness, and as he had never known what it 
 was to have to earn money before it could be enjoyed, 
 he troubled himself in nowise as to the source of the 
 supplies which were to keep him at Oxford for three 
 years. He listened attentively to Mr. Pepperdine's 
 solemn admonitions on the subjects of economy and 
 extravagance, and replied at the end thereof that he 
 would always let his uncle have a few days' notice when 
 he wanted a cheque — a remark which made Lord 
 Simonstower's fellow-conspirator think a good deal. 
 
 It was impossible at this stage to do anything or say 
 an5^hing to shake Lucian's confidence in his destiny. 
 He meant to work hard and to do great things, and 
 without being conceited he was sure of success — it 
 seemed to him to be his rightful due. Thanks to the 
 influence of his father in childhood and to that of Mr. 
 Chilverstone at a later stage, he had formed a fine taste 
 and was already an accomplished scholar. He had 
 never read any trash in his life, and it was now extremely 
 
 99 
 
100 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 unlikely that he ever would, for he had developed an 
 almost womanish disHke of the unlovely, the mean, and 
 the sordid, and a delicate contempt for anything in 
 hterature that was not based on good models. Mr. 
 Chilverstone had every confidence in him, and every 
 hope of his future; it filled him with pride to know that 
 he was sending so promising a man to his own uni- 
 versity; but he was cast down when he found that Lord 
 Simonstower insisted on Lucian's entrance at St. Bene- 
 dict's, instead of at St. Perpetua's, his own old college. 
 
 The only person who was full of fears was Sprats. 
 She had been Lucian's other self for six years, and she, 
 more than any one else, knew his need of constant help 
 and friendship. He was full of simplicity; he credited 
 everybody with the possession of qualities and sym- 
 pathies which few people possess; he lived in a world 
 of dreams rather than of stern facts. He was obstinate, 
 wayward, impulsive; much too affectionate, and much 
 too lovable; he Hved for the moment, and only regarded 
 the future as one continual procession of rosy hours. 
 Sprats, with feminine intuition, feared the moment when 
 he would come into collision with stem experience of the 
 world and the worldly — she longed to be with him when 
 that moment came, as she had been with him when the 
 frailty and coquetry of the Dolly kid nearly broke his 
 child's heart. And so during the last few days of his 
 stay at Simonstower she hovered about him as a faithful 
 mother does about a sailor son, and she gave him much 
 excellent advice and many counsels of perfection. 
 
 ' You know you are a baby,' she said, when Lucian 
 laughed at her. ' You have been so coddled all your 
 life that you will cry if a pin pricks you. And there 
 will be no Sprats to tie a rag round the wound.' 
 
 ' It would certainly be better if Sprats were going 
 too,' he said thoughtfully, and his face clouded. ' But 
 then,' he continued, flashing into a smile, ' after all, 
 Oxford is only two hundred miles from Simonstower, 
 and there are trains which carry one over two hundred 
 miles in a very short time. If I should chance to fall 
 
» J 1 > 1 > > 
 
 LUCIAN THE DREAMER loi 
 
 and bump my nose I shall take a ticket by the next train 
 and come to Sprats to be patched up.' 
 
 ' I shall keep a stock of ointments and lotions and 
 bandages in perpetual readiness/ she said. ' But it 
 must be distinctly understood, Lucian, that I have the 
 monopoly of curing you — I have a sort of notion, you 
 know, that it is my chief mission in life to be your 
 nurse.' 
 
 ' The concession is yours,' he answered, with mock 
 gravity. 
 
 It was with this understanding that they parted. 
 There came a day when all the good-byes had been said, 
 the blessings and admonitions received, and Lucian 
 departed from the village with a pocket full of money 
 (largely placed there through the fooHsh feminine 
 indulgence of Miss Pepperdine and Miss Judith, who 
 had womanly fears as to the horrible situations in which 
 he might be placed if he were bereft of ready cash) and 
 a light and a sanguine heart. Mr. Chilverstone went 
 with him to Oxford to see his protege settled and have 
 a brief holiday of his own; on their departure Sprats 
 drove them to the station at Wellsby. She waved her 
 handkerchief until the train had disappeared; she was 
 conscious when she turned away that her heart had gone 
 with Lucian. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 About the middle of a May afternoon, seven years later, 
 a young man turned out of the Strand into a quiet street 
 in the neighbourhood of Covent Garden and began look- 
 ing about him as if endeavouring to locate the where- 
 abouts of some particular place. Catching sight of the 
 name William Robertson on a neighbouring window, 
 with the word Publisher underneath it, he turned into 
 the door of the establishment thus designated, and 
 encountering an office-boy who was busily engaged in 
 reading a comic journal inside a small pen labelled 
 ' Inquiries,' he asked with great politeness if Mr. 
 Robertson was at that moment disengaged. The office- 
 boy in his own good time condescended to examine the 
 personal appearance of the inquirer, and having assured 
 himself that the gentleman was worthy his attention he 
 asked in sharp tones if he had an appointment with Mr. 
 Robertson. To this the stranger replied that he believed 
 he was expected by Mr. Robertson during the afternoon, 
 but not at any particular hour, and produced a card 
 from which the office-boy learned that he was confront- 
 ing the Viscount Saxonstowe. He forthwith disappeared 
 into some inner region and came back a moment later 
 with a young gentleman who cultivated long hair and 
 an aesthetic style of necktie, and bowed Lord Saxonstowe 
 through various doors into a pleasant ante-room, where 
 he accommodated his lordship with a chair and the 
 Times, and informed him that Mr. Robertson would be 
 at liberty in a few moments. Lord Saxonstowe 
 remarked that he was in no hurry at all, and would wait 
 Mr. Robertson's convenience. The young gentleman 
 with the luxuriant locks replied politely that he was 
 quite sure Mr. Robertson would not keep his lordship 
 waiting long, and added that they were experiencing 
 quite summer-like weather. Lord Saxonstowe agreed 
 
 Z02 
 
LUC:r».N THE DREAMER 103 
 
 to this proposition, and opensd the Times. His host or 
 keeper for the time being seated himself at a desk, one 
 half of which was shared by a lady typist who had 
 affected great interest in her work since Lord Saxon- 
 stowe's entrance, and who now stole surreptitious 
 glances at him as he scanned the newspaper. The clerk 
 scribbled a line or two on a scrap of paper and passed 
 it across to her. She untwisted it and read : ' This is the 
 chap that did that tremendous exploration in the North 
 of Asia: a real live lord, you know.' She scribbled an 
 answering line: ' Of course I know — do you think I 
 didn't recognise the name?' and passed it over with a 
 show of indignation. The clerk indited another epistle :^ 
 ' Don't look as if he'd seen much of anything, does he?' 
 The girl perused this, scribbled back : ' His eyes and 
 moustache are real jam!' and fell to work at her machine 
 again. The clerk sighed, caressed a few sprouts on his 
 top-lip, and remarking to his own soul that these toffs 
 always catch the girls' eyes, fell to doing nothing in 
 a practised way. 
 
 Viscount Saxonstowe, quite unconscious of the interest 
 he was exciting, stared about him after a time and began 
 to wonder if the two young people at the desk usually 
 worked with closed windows. The atmosphere was 
 heavy, and there was a concentrated smell of paper, 
 and ink, and paste. He thought of the wind-swept 
 plains and steppes on which he had spent long months — 
 he had gone through some stiff experiences there, but 
 he confessed to himself that he would prefer a bitter cold 
 night in winter in similar solitudes to a summer's day 
 in that ante-room. His own healthy tan and the clear- 
 ness of his eyes, his alert look and the easy swing with 
 which he walked, would never have been developed 
 amidst such surroundings, and the consciousness of his 
 own rude health made him feel sorry for the two white 
 slaves before him. He felt that if he could have his own 
 way he would cut the young gentleman's hair, put him 
 into a flannel shirt and trot him round; as for the young 
 lady, he would certainly send her into the country for 
 
104 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 a holiday. And while he thus indulged his fancies a 
 door opened and he heard voices, and two men stepped 
 into the ante-room. 
 
 He instinctively recognised one as the publisher whom 
 he had come to see; at the other, a much younger man, 
 he found himself staring with some sense of recognition 
 which was as yet vague and unformed. He felt sure 
 that he had met him before, and under some unusual 
 circumstances, but he could not remember the occa- 
 sion, nor assure his mind that the face on which he 
 looked was really familiar — it was more suggestive of 
 something that had been familiar than famihar in itself. 
 He concluded that he must have seen a photograph of 
 it in some illustrated paper; the man was in all likeH- 
 hood a popular author. Saxonstowe carefully looked 
 him over as he stood exchanging a last word with the 
 publisher on the threshold of the latter's room. He 
 noted the gracefulness of the slim figure in the perfectly 
 fashioned clothes, and again he became conscious that 
 his memory was being stirred. The man under obser- 
 vation was swinging a light walking-cane as he chatted; 
 he made a sudden movement with it to emphasise a 
 point, and Saxonstowe 's memory cleared itself. His 
 thoughts flew back ten years : he saw two boys, one the 
 very image of incarnate Wrath, the other an equally 
 faithful impersonation of Amazement, facing each other 
 in an antique hall, with rapiers in hand and a sense of 
 battle writ large upon their faces and figures. 
 
 'And I can't remember the chap's name ! ' he thought. 
 ' But this is he.' 
 
 He looked at his old antagonist more closely, and with 
 a keener interest. Lucina was now twenty-five; he had 
 developed into a tall, well-knit man of graceful and 
 sinuous figure; he was dressed with great care and with 
 strict attention to the height of the prevalent fashion, 
 but with a close study of his own particular requirements; 
 his appearance was distinguished and notable, and 
 Saxonstowe, little given to sentiment as regards manly 
 beauty, confessed to himself that the face on which he 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 105 
 
 looked might have been moulded by Nature from a 
 canvas or marble of the Renaissance. It was a face for 
 which some women would forget everything, — Saxon- 
 stowe, with this thought half-formed in his mind, caught 
 sight of the anaemic typist, who, oblivious of anything 
 else in the room, had fixed all her attention on Lucian. 
 Her hands rested, motionless, on the keys of the machine 
 before her; her head was slightly tilted back, her eyes 
 shone, her lips were sHghtly parted; a faint flush of 
 colour had stolen into her cheeks, and for the moment 
 she was a pretty girl. Saxonstowe smiled — it seemed to 
 him that he had been privileged to peep into the secret 
 chamber of a girlish soul. ' She would give something 
 to kiss his hand,' he thought. 
 
 Lucian turned away from the publisher with a nod; 
 his eye caught Saxonstowe's and held it. A puzzled 
 look came into his face; he paused and involuntarily 
 stretched out his hand, staring at Saxonstowe search- 
 ingly. Saxonstowe smiled and gave his hand in return. 
 
 ' We have met somewhere, ' said Lucian wonderingly , 
 * I cannot think where.' 
 
 ' Nor can I remember your name,' answered Saxon- 
 stowe. ' But — we met in the Stone Hall at Simons- 
 tower.' 
 
 Lucian 's face lighted with the smile which had become 
 famous for its sweetness. 
 
 ' And with rapiers ! ' he exclaimed. ' I remember — 
 I remember! You are Dickie — Dickie Feversham.' 
 He began to laugh. * How quaint that scene was ! ' he 
 said. ' I have often thought that it had the very essence 
 of the dramatic in it. Let me see — what did we fight 
 about? Was it Haidee? How amusing — because 
 Haidee and I are married.' 
 
 ' That,' said Saxonstowe, ' seems a happy ending to 
 the affair. But I think it ended happily at the time. 
 And even yet I cannot remember your name.* 
 
 Mr. Robertson stepped forward before Lucian could 
 reply. He introduced the young men to each other in 
 due form. Then Saxonstowe knew that his old enemy 
 
io6 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 was one of the great literary lions of the day; and Lucian 
 recognised Saxonstowe as the mighty traveller of whose 
 deeds most people were talking. They looked at each 
 other with interest, and Mr. Robertson felt a glow of 
 pride when he remembered that his was the only 
 imprint which had ever appeared on a title-page of 
 Lucian Damerel's, and that he was shortly to publish 
 the two massive volumes in which Viscount Saxonstowe 
 had given to the world an account of his wondrous 
 wanderings. He rubbed his hands as he regarded these 
 two splendid young men; it did him good to be near 
 them. 
 
 Lucian was worshipping Saxonstowe with the guileless 
 adoration of a child that looks on a man who has seen 
 great things and done great things. It was a trick of 
 his: he had once been known to stand motionless for 
 an hour, gazing in silence at a man who had performed 
 a deed of desperate valour, had suffered the loss of his 
 legs in doing it, and had been obliged to exhibit himself 
 with a placard round his neck in order to scrape a living 
 together. Lucian was now conjuring up a vision of the 
 steppes and plains over which Saxonstowe had travelled 
 with his life in his hands. 
 
 'When will you dine with us?' he said, suddenly 
 bursting into speech. ' To-night — to-morrow? — the 
 day after — when? Come before everybody snaps you 
 up — you will have no peace for your soul or rest for 
 your body after your book is out.' 
 
 ' Then I shall run away to certain regions where one 
 can easily find both,' answered Saxonstowe laughingly. 
 ' I assure you I have no intention of wasting either 
 body or soul in London.' 
 
 Then they arranged that the new lion was to dine with 
 Mr. and Mrs. Lucian Damerel on the following day, 
 and Lucian departed, while Saxonstowe followed Mr. 
 Robertson into his private room. 
 
 ' Your lordship has met Mr. Damerel before?' said the 
 publisher, who had something of a liking for gossip about 
 his pet authors. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 107 
 
 ' Once,' answered Saxonstowe. ' We were boys at 
 the time. I had no idea that he was the poet of whose 
 work I have heard so much since coming home.' 
 
 ' He has had an extraordinarily successful career,' 
 said Mr. Robertson, glancing complacently at a little row 
 of thin volumes bound in dark green cloth which figured 
 in a miniature book-case above his desk. * I have pub- 
 lished all his work — he leaped into fame with his first 
 book, which I produced when he was at Oxford, and 
 since then he has held a recognised place. Yes, one 
 may say that Damerel is one of fortune's spoiled dar- 
 lings — everything that he has done has turned out a 
 great success. He has the grand manner in poetry. I 
 don't know whether your lordship has read his great 
 tragedy, Domitia, which was staged so magnificently at 
 the Athenaeum, and proved the sensation of the year? ' 
 
 ' I am afraid,' replied Saxonstowe, * that I have had 
 few opportunities of reading anything at all for the past 
 five years. I think Mr. Damerel' s first volume had just 
 appeared when I left England, and books, you know, 
 are not easily obtainable in the wilds of Central Asia. 
 Now that I have better chances, I must not neglect 
 them.' 
 
 ' You have a great treat in store, my lord,' said the 
 publisher. He nodded his head several times, as if to 
 emphasise the remark. ' Yes,' he continued, ' Damerel 
 has certainly been favoured by fortune. Everything has 
 conspired to increase the sum of his fame. His romantic 
 marriage, of course, was a great advertisement.' 
 
 * An advertisement ! ' 
 
 * I mean, of course, from my standpoint,' said Mr. 
 Robertson hastily. ' He ran away with a very beautiful 
 girl who was on the very eve of contracting a most 
 advantageous marriage from a worldly point of view, 
 and the affair was much talked about. There was a 
 great rush on Damerel' s books during the next few 
 weeks — it is wonderful how a little sensation like that 
 helps the sale of a book. I remember that Lord Pintle- 
 ford pubUshed a novel with me some years ago which 
 
io8 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 we could not sell at all. He shot his coachman in a fit 
 of anger — that sold the book like hot cakes.' 
 
 ' I trust the unfortunate coachman was not seriously 
 injured,' said Saxonstowe, who was much amused by 
 these revelations. ' It is, I confess, an unusual method 
 of advertising a book, and one which I should not care 
 to adopt.' 
 
 * Oh, we can spare your lordship the trouble ! ' said 
 Mr. Robertson. ' There'll be no need to employ any 
 unusual methods in making your lordship's book known. 
 I have already subscribed two large edit:<ons of it.' 
 
 With this gratifying announcement Mr. Robertson 
 plunged into the business which had brought Lord 
 Saxonstowe to his office, and for that time no more was 
 said of Lucian Damerel and his great fame. But that 
 night Saxonstowe dined with his aunt. Lady Firmanence, 
 a childless widow who lived on past scandals and present 
 gossip, and chancing to remark that he had encountered 
 Lucian and renewed a very small acquaintance with him, 
 was greeted with a sniff which plainly indicated that 
 Lady Firmanence had something to say. 
 
 * And where, pray, did you meet Lucian Damerel at 
 any time?' she inquired. ' He was unknown, or just 
 beginning to be known, when you left England.' 
 
 * It is ten years since I met him,' answered Saxon- 
 stowe. * It was when I was staying at Saxonstowe with 
 my uncle. I met Damerel at Simonstower, and the 
 circumstances were rather amusing.' 
 
 He gave an account of the duel, which afforded Lady 
 Firmanence much amusement, and he showed her the 
 scar on his hand, and laughed as he related the story 
 of Lucian's terrible earnestness. 
 
 ' But I have never forgotten,' he concluded, ' how 
 readily and sincerely he asked my forgiveness when 
 he found that he had been in the wrong — it rather 
 knocked me over, you know, because I didn't quite 
 understand that he really felt the thing — we were both 
 such boys, and the girl was a child.' 
 
 ' Oh, Lucian Damerel has good feeling,' said Lady 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 109 
 
 Firmanence. ' You wouldn't understand the Italian 
 strain in him. But it is amusing that you should have 
 fought over Haidee Brinklow, who is now Mrs. Lucian. 
 I'm glad he married her, and that you didn't.' 
 
 ' Considering that I am to dine with Mr. and Mrs. 
 Lucian Damerel to-morrow, ' said Saxonstowe, ' it is^ a 
 bit odd that I don't know any more of them than this. 
 She, I remember, was some connection of Lord Simons- 
 tower's; but who is he?' 
 
 * Lucian Damerel? Oh, he was the son of Cyprian 
 Damerel, an Italian artist who married the daughter of 
 one of Simonstower's tenants. Simonstower was at all 
 times greatly interested in him, and it has always been 
 my firm impression that it was he who sent the boy to 
 Oxford. At any rate, when he died, which was just 
 before Lucian Damerel came of age, Simonstower left 
 him ten thousand pounds.' 
 
 ' That was good,' said Saxonstowe. 
 
 ' I don't know,' said Lady Firmanence. ' It has 
 always seemed to me from what I have seen of him — 
 and I keep my eyes open on most things — that it would 
 have been far better for that young man if fortune had 
 dealt him a few sound kicks instead of so many half- 
 pence. Depend upon it, Saxonstowe, it's a bad thing 
 for a man, and especially for a man of that temperament, 
 to be pampered too much. Now, Lucian Damerel has 
 been pampered all his life — I know a good deal about 
 him, because I was constantly down at Saxonstowe 
 during the last two or three years of your uncle's Hfe, 
 and Saxonstowe, as you may remember, is close to 
 Simonstower. I know how Lucian was petted and 
 pampered by his own people, and by the parson and 
 his daughter, and by the old lord. His way has always 
 been made smooth for him — it would have done him 
 good to find a few rough places here and there. He 
 had far too much flattery poured upon him when his 
 success came, and he has got used to expecting it, though 
 indeed,' concluded the old lady, laughing, ' Heaven 
 knows I'm wrong in saying " got used," for Damerel's 
 
no LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 one of the sort who take all the riches and luxuries of the 
 worid as their just due.' 
 
 ' He seemed to me to be very simple and unaffected,' 
 said Saxonstowe. 
 
 Lady Firmanence nodded the ribbons of her cap. 
 
 ' Yes,' she said, ' he's sadly too simple, and I wish — 
 for I can't help hking him — that he was as affected as 
 some of those young upstarts who cultivate long hair 
 and velvet coats on the strength of a slim volume printed 
 on one side of the paper only. No — Lucian Damerel 
 hasn't a scrap of affectation about him, and he isn't a 
 poseur. I wish he were affected and that he would pose 
 — I do indeed, for his own sake.' 
 
 Saxonstowe knew that his aunt was a clever woman. 
 He held his tongue, asking her by his eyes to explain 
 this desire of hers, which seemed so much at variance 
 with her well-known love of humbug and cant. 
 
 ' Oh, of course I know you're wondering at that!' 
 she said. * Well, the explanation is simple enough. 
 I wish Lucian Damerel were a poseur, I wish he were 
 affected, even to the insufferable stage, for the simple 
 reason that if he were these things it would show that 
 he was alive to the practical and business side of the 
 matter. What is he? A writer. He'll have to live by 
 writing — at the rate he and Haidee live they'll soon 
 exhaust their resources — and he ought to be ahve to the 
 £s, d. oi his trade, for it is a trade. As things are, he 
 isn't alive. The difference between Lucian Damerel and 
 some other men of equal eminence in his own craft is 
 just this: they are for ever in an attitude, crying out, 
 " Look at me — is it not wonderful that I am so clever?" 
 Lucian, on the other hand, seems to suggest an attitude 
 and air of " Wouldn't it be curious if I weren't?" ' 
 
 * I think,' said Saxonstowe, * that there may be some 
 affectation in that.' 
 
 ' Affectation,' said Lady Firmanence, ' depends upon 
 two things if it is to be successful : the power to deceive 
 cleverly, and the abihty to deceive for ever. Lucian 
 Damerel couldn't deceive anybody — he's a child, the 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER m 
 
 child who believes the world to be an illimitable nursery 
 crammed with inexhaustible toys.' 
 ' You mean that he plays at life?' 
 
 * I mean that he plays in life,' said Lady Firmanence. 
 ' He's still sporting on his mother's breast, and he'll go 
 on sporting until somebody picks him up, smacks him 
 soundly, and throws him into a comer. Then, of course, 
 he will be vastly surprised to find that such treatment 
 could be meted out to him.' 
 
 ' Then let us hope that he will be able to live in his 
 world of dreams for ever,' said Saxonstowe. 
 
 ' So he might, if the State were to estabhsh an asylum 
 for folk of his sort,' said Lady Firmanence. ' But he 
 happens to be married, and married to Haidee 
 Brinklow.' 
 
 ' My pubHsher, ' remarked Saxonstowe, ' gloated over 
 the romantic circumstances of the marriage, and ap- 
 peared to think that that sort of thing was good for trade 
 — made books sell, you know.' 
 
 ' I have no doubt that Damerel's marriage made his 
 books sell, and kept Domitia running at the Athenaeum 
 for at least three months longer,' replied Lady 
 Firmanence. 
 
 ' Were the circumstances, then, so very romantic?* 
 
 * I dare say they appealed to the sensations, emotions, 
 feelings, and notions of the British public,' said the old 
 lady. ' Haidee Brinklow, after a campaign of two 
 seasons, was about to marry a middle-aged person who 
 had made much money in something or other, and was 
 prepared to execute handsome settlements. It was all 
 arranged when Lucian burst upon the scene, blazing with 
 triumph, youth, and good looks. He was the comet of 
 that season, and Haidee was attracted by the glitter of 
 his tail. I suppose he and she were madly in love 
 with each other for quite a month — unfortunately, during 
 that month they committed the indiscretion of marriage.' 
 
 '' A runaway marriage, was it not? ' 
 
 * Under the very noses of the mamma and the bride- 
 groom-elect. There was one happy result of the affair, ' 
 
112 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 said Lady Firmanence musingly; ' it drove Mrs. 
 Brinklow off to somewhere or other on the Continent, 
 and there she has since remained — she took her defeat 
 badly. Now the jilted gentleman took it in good part — 
 it is said that he is quite a sort of grandpapa in the 
 establishment, and has reahsed that there are compensa- 
 tions even in being jilted.' 
 
 Saxonstowe meditated upon these things in silence. 
 
 ' Mrs. Damerel was a pretty girl,' he said, after a 
 time. 
 
 ' Mrs. Damerel is a nice little doll,' said Lady Fir- 
 manence, ' a very pretty toy indeed. Give her plenty 
 of pretty things to wear and sweets to eat, and all the 
 honey of life to sip at, and she'll do well and go far; 
 but don't ask her to draw cheques against a mental 
 balance which she never had, or you'll get them back — 
 dishonoured.' 
 
 ' Are there any children?' Saxonstowe asked. 
 
 ' Only themselves,' rephed his aunt, ' and quite plenty 
 too, in one house. If it were not for MiUie Chilverstone, 
 I don't know what they would do — she descends upon 
 them now and then, straightens them up as far as she 
 can, and sets the wheels working once more. She is 
 good to them.' 
 
 ' And who is she? I have some sort of recollection 
 of her name,' said Saxonstowe. 
 
 ' She is the daughter of the parson at Simonstower — 
 the man who tutored Lucian Damerel.' 
 
 ' Ah, I remember — she was the girl who came with 
 him to the Castle that day, and he called her Sprats. 
 A lively, good-humoured girl, with a heap of freckles 
 in a very bright face,' said Saxonstowe. 
 
 ' She is little altered,' remarked Lady Firmanence. 
 ' Now, that was the girl for Lucian Damerel ! She 
 would have taken care of his money, darned his socks, 
 given him plain dinners, seen that the rent was paid, 
 and made a man of him.' 
 
 ' Admirable qualifications,' laughed Saxonstowe. 
 ' But one might reasonably suppose that a poet of 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 113 
 
 Damerel's quality needs others — some intellectual gifts, 
 for example, in his helpmeet.' 
 
 'Stuff and nonsense!' retorted Lady Firmanence. 
 ' He wants a good managing housekeeper with a keen eye 
 for the butcher's bill and a genius for economy. As 
 for intellect — pray, Saxonstowe, don't foster the foolish 
 notion that poets are intellectual. Don't you know that 
 all genius is lopsided? Your poet has all his brain- 
 power in one little cell — there may be a gold-mine there, 
 but the rest of him is usually weak even to childishness. 
 And the great need of the weak man is the strong 
 woman.' 
 
 Saxonstowe 's silence was a delicate and flattering 
 compliment to Lady Firmanence's perspicacity. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 Lady Firmanence's observations upon the family 
 history of Mr. and Mrs. Lucian Damerel sent Lord 
 Saxonstowe to their house at seven o'clock the following 
 evening with feelings of pleasant curiosity. He had 
 been out of the world — as that phrase is known by people 
 whose chief idea of life is to hve in social ant-heaps — 
 long enough to enjoy a renewed acquaintance with it, 
 and since his return to England had found a hitherto 
 untasted pleasure in studying the manners and customs 
 of his fellow-subjects. He remembered Httle about them 
 as they had presented themselves to him before his 
 departure for the East, for he was then young and 
 unlicked: the five years of comparative solitude which 
 he had spent in the deserts and waste places of the earth, 
 only enlivened by the doubtful company of Kirghese, 
 Tartars, and children of nature, had lifted him upon 
 an eminence from whence he might view civilised 
 humanity with a critical eye. So far everything had 
 amused him — it seemed to him that never had life seemed 
 so small and ignoble, so mean and trifling, as here where 
 the men and women were as puppets pulled by strings 
 which fate had attached to most capricious fingers. Like 
 all the men who come back from the deserts and the 
 mountains, he gazed on the whirling life around him 
 with a feeling that was half pity, half contempt. The 
 antics of the puppets made him wonder, and in the 
 wonder he found amusement. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Lucian Damerel, as befitted young 
 people untroubled by considerations of economy, resided 
 in one of those smaller streets in Mayfair wherein one 
 may find a house large enough to turn round in without 
 more than an occasional collision with the walls. Such 
 a house is not so comfortable as a suburban residence 
 at one-tenth the rent, but it has the advantage of being 
 
 114 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 115 
 
 in the middle of the known world, and if its frontage 
 to the street is only one of six yards, its exterior may 
 be made pretty and even taking by a judicious use of 
 flowering plants, bright paint, and a quaint knocker. 
 The interior is usually suggestive of playing at doll's 
 house; but the absence of even one baby makes a great 
 difference, and in Lucian's establishment there were no 
 children. Small as it was, the house was a veritable nest 
 of comfort — Lucian and Haidee had the instinct of 
 settling themselves amongst soft things, and surrounding 
 their souls with an atmosphere of aesthetic delight, and 
 one of them at least had the artist's eye for colour, and 
 the true collector's contempt for the cheap and obvious. 
 There was scarcely a chair or table in the rooms sacred 
 to the householders and their friends which had not a 
 history and a distinction : every picture was an education 
 in art; the books were masterpieces of the binder's craft; 
 the old china and old things generally were the despair 
 of many people who could have afforded to buy a ware- 
 house full of the like had they only known where to find 
 it. Lucian knew, and when he came into possession of 
 Lord Simonstower's legacy he began to surround himself 
 with the fruits of money and knowledge, and as riches 
 came rolling in from royalties, he went on indulging 
 his tastes until the house was full, and would hold no 
 more examples of anything. But by that time it was 
 a nest of luxury wherein even the light, real and arti- 
 ficial, was graduated to a fine shade, where nothing crude 
 in shape or colour interfered with the delicate suscepti- 
 bilities of a poetic temperament. 
 
 When Lord Saxonstowe was shown into the small 
 drawing-room of this small house he marvelled at the 
 cleverness and delicacy of the taste which could make 
 so much use of limited dimensions. It was the daintiest 
 and prettiest room he had ever seen, and though he 
 himself had small inclinations to ease and luxury of any 
 sort, he drank in the pleasantness of his surroundings 
 with a distinct sense of personal gratification. The room 
 was empty of human life when he entered it, but the 
 
ii6 LUCIAN THE DREAMER . 
 
 marks of a personality were all over it, and the person- 
 ality was neither masculine nor feminine — it was the 
 personahty of a neuter thing, and Saxonstowe dimly 
 recognised that it meant Art. He began to understand 
 something of Lucian as he looked about him, and to con- 
 ceive him as a mind which dominated its enveloping 
 body to a love of beauty that might easily degenerate 
 into a slavedom to luxury. He began to wonder if 
 Lucian 's study or library, or wherever he worked, were 
 similarly devoted to the worship of form and colour. 
 
 He was turning over the leaves of an Italian work, a 
 book sumptuous in form and wonderful in its vellum 
 binding and gold scroll-work, when a rustle of skirts 
 aroused him from the first stages of a reverie. He 
 turned, expecting to see his hostess — instead he saw a 
 young lady whom he instinctively recognised as Miss 
 Chilverstone, the girl of the merry eyes and the innumer- 
 able freckles of ten years earlier. He looked at her 
 closely as she approached him, and he saw that the 
 merry eyes had lost some of their roguery, but were still 
 frank, clear, and kindly; some of the freckles had gone, 
 but a good many were still there, adding piquancy to a 
 face that had no pretensions to beauty, but many to the 
 charms which spring from the possession of a kindly 
 heart and a purposeful temperament. Good temper 
 and good health appeared to radiate from Miss Chilver- 
 stone; the active girl of sixteen had developed into a 
 splendid woman, and Lord Saxonstowe, as she moved 
 towards him, admired her with a sudden recognition of 
 her feminine strength — she was just the woman, he said 
 to himself, who ought to be the mate of a strong man, 
 a man of action and purpose and determination. 
 
 She held out her hand to him with a frank smile. 
 
 * Do you remember me?' she said. ' It is quite ten 
 years since that fateful afternoon at Simonstower.' 
 
 ' Was it fateful?' he answered. * Yes, I remember 
 quite well. In those days you were called Sprats.' 
 
 ' I am still Sprats,' she answered, with a laugh. ' I 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 117 
 
 shall always be Sprats. I am Sprats to Lucian and 
 Haidee, and even to my children.' 
 
 ' To your children?' he said wonderingly. 
 I have twenty-five,' she replied, smiling at his ques- 
 tioning look. ' But of course you do not know. I 
 have a private orphanage, all of my own, in Bayswater 
 — it is my hobby. If you are interested in babies and 
 children, do come to see me there, and I will introduce 
 you to all my charges.' 
 
 ' I will certainly do that/ he said. ' Isn't it hard 
 work ? ' 
 
 ' Isn't everything hard work that is worth doing? ' she 
 answered. ' Yes, I suppose it is hard work, but I like 
 it. I have a natural genius for mothering helpless 
 things — that is why I occasionally condescend to put on 
 fine clothes and dine with children like Lucian and 
 Haidee when they entertain great travellers who are also 
 peers of the realm.' 
 
 ' Do they require mothering?' he asked. 
 
 ' Very much so sometimes — they are very particular 
 babies. I come to them every now and then to scold 
 them, smack them, straighten them up, and see that they 
 are in no danger of falHng into the fire or upsetting 
 anything. Afterwards I dine with them in order to cheer 
 them up after the rough time they have had.' 
 
 Saxonstowe smiled. He had been watching her 
 closely all the time. 
 
 ' I see,' he said, ' that you are still Sprats. Has the 
 time been very rough to-day ? ' 
 
 ' Somewhat rough on poor Haidee, perhaps, ' answered 
 Sprats. ' Lucian has wisely kept out of the way until 
 he can find safety in numbers. But please sit down and 
 
 tell me about your travels until our hostess appears it 
 
 seems quite funny to see you all in one piece after such 
 adventures. _ Didn't they torture you in some Thibetan 
 town?' she inquired, with a sudden change from gaiety 
 to womanly concern. 
 
 ' They certainly were rather inhospitable,' he 
 answered. ' I shouldn't call it torture, I think— it was 
 
ii8 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 merely a sort of gentle hint as to what they would do if 
 I intruded upon them again.' 
 
 • But I want to know what they did,' she insisted. 
 ' You look so nice and comfortable sitting there, with 
 no other sign of discomfort about you than the usual 
 I-want-my-dinner look, that one would never dream you 
 had gone through hardships.' 
 
 Saxonstowe was not much given to conversation— his 
 nomadic life had communicated the gift of silence to him, 
 but he recognised the sympathetic note in Miss Chilver- 
 stone's voice, and he began to tell her about his travels 
 in a somewhat boyish fashion that amused her. As he 
 talked she examined him closely and decided that he was 
 almost as young as on the afternoon when he occasioned 
 such mad jealousy in Lucian's breast. His method of 
 expressing himself was simple and direct and school- 
 boyish in language, but the exuberance of spirits which 
 she remembered had disappeared and given place to a 
 staid, old-fashioned manner. 
 
 ' I wonder what did it?' she said, unconsciously utter- 
 ing her thought. 
 
 ' Did what?' he asked. 
 
 ' I was thinking aloud,' she answered. ' I wondered 
 what had made you so very staid in a curiously young 
 
 way you were a rough-and-tumble sort of boy that 
 
 afternoon at Simonstower.' 
 
 Saxonstowe blushed. He had recollections of his 
 youthfulness. 
 
 ' I beUeve I was an irrepressible sort of youngster,' he 
 said. ' I think that gets knocked out of you though, 
 when you spend a lot of time alone — you get no end of 
 time for thinking, you know, out in the deserts.' 
 
 ' I should think so,' she said. ' And I suppose that 
 even this solitude becomes companionable in a way^that 
 only those who have experienced it can understand? ' 
 
 He looked at her with some surprise and with a new 
 interest and strange sense of kinship. 
 
 ' Yes,' he replied. ' That's it— that is it exactly. 
 How did you know?' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 119 
 
 ' It isn't necessary to go into the deserts and steppes 
 to feel a bit lonely now and then, is it? ' she said, with a 
 laugh. ' I suppose most of us get some sort of notion 
 of solitude at some time or other.' 
 
 At that juncture Haidee entered, and Saxonstowe 
 turned to her with a good deal of curiosity. He was 
 somewhat surprised to find that ten years of added age 
 had made little difference in her. She was now a 
 woman, it was true, and her girlish prettiness had 
 changed into a somewhat luxurious style of beauty — 
 there was no denying the loveliness of face and figure, 
 of charm and colour, he said to himself, but he was quick 
 to observe that Haidee' s beauty depended entirely upon 
 surface qualities. She fell, without effort or conscious- 
 ness, into poses which other women vainly tried to emu- 
 late; it was impossible to her to walk across a room, 
 sit upon an unaccommodating chair, or loll upon a much 
 becushioned sofa in anything but a graceful way; it was 
 equally impossible, so long as nothing occurred to ruffle 
 her, to keep from her lips a perpetual smile, or inviting 
 glances from her dark eyes. She reminded Saxonstowe 
 of a fluffy, silky-coated kitten which he had seen playing 
 on Lady Firmanence's hearthrug, and he was not sur- 
 prised to find, when she began to talk to him, that her 
 voice had something of the feline purr in it. Within 
 five minutes of her entrance he had determined that Mrs. 
 Damerel was a pretty doll. She showed to the greatest 
 advantage amidst the luxury of her surroundings, but 
 her mouth dropped no pearls, and her pretty face showed 
 no sign of intellect, or of wit, or of any strong mental 
 quality. It was evident that conversation was not Mrs. 
 Damerel's strong point — she indicated in an instinctive 
 fashion that men were expected to amuse and admire her 
 without drawing upon her intellectual resources, and 
 Saxonstowe soon formed the opinion that a judicious 
 use of monosyllables would carry her a long way in un- 
 congenial company. Her beauty had something of 
 sleepiness about it — there was neither vivacity nor 
 animation in her manner, but she was beautifully 
 
120 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 gowned and daintily perfect, and as a picture deserved 
 worship and recognition. 
 
 Saxonstowe was presently presented to another guest, 
 Mrs. Berenson, a lady who had achieved great distinc- 
 tion on the stage, and who claimed a part proprietorship 
 in Lucian Damerel because she had created the part of 
 the heroine in his tragedy, and almost worn herself to 
 skin and bone in playing it in strenuous fashion for 
 nearly three hundred nights. She was now resting from 
 these labours, and employing her leisure in an attempt 
 to induce Lucian to write a play around herself, and the 
 project was so much in her mind that she began to talk 
 volubly of it as soon as she entered his wife's drawing- 
 room. Saxonstowe inspected her with curiosity and 
 amusement. He had seen her described as an embodi- 
 ment of sinuous grace; she seemed to him an angular, 
 scraggy woman, whose joints were too much in evidence, 
 and who would have been the better for some addition to 
 her adipose tissue. From behind the footlights Mrs. 
 Berenson displayed many charms and qualities of beauty 
 — Saxonstowe soon came to the conclusion that they 
 must be largely due to artificial aids and the power of 
 histrionic art, for she presented none of them on the dull 
 stage of private life. Her hair, arranged on the prin- 
 ciple of artful carelessness, was of a washed-out colour; 
 her complexion was mottled and her skin rough; she 
 had an unfortunately prominent nose which evinced a 
 decided partiality to be bulbous, and her mouth, framed 
 in harsh lines and drooping wrinkles, was so large that 
 it seemed to stretch from one corner of an elongated jaw 
 to the other. She was noticeable, but not pleasant to 
 look upon, and in spite of a natural indifference to such 
 things, Saxonstowe wished that her attire had been either 
 less eccentric or better suited to her. Mrs. Berenson, 
 being very tall and very thin, wore a gown of the 
 eighteenth-century-rustic-maiden style, made very high 
 at the waist, low at the neck, and short in the sleeves — 
 she thus looked like a lamp-post, or a bean-stalk, topped 
 with a mask and a flaxen wig. She was one of those 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 121 
 
 women who wear innumerable chains, and at least half- 
 a-dozen rings on each hand, and she had an annoying 
 trick of clasping her hands in front of her and twisting 
 the chains round her fingers, which were very long and 
 very white, and apt to get on other people's nerves. 
 It was also to be observed that she never ceased talking, 
 and that her one subject of conversation was herself. 
 
 As Saxonstowe was beginning to wish that his host 
 would appear, Mr. Eustace Darlington was announced, 
 and he found himself diverted from Mrs. Berenson by a 
 new object of interest, in the shape of the man whom 
 Mrs. Damerel had jilted in order to run away with 
 Lucian. Mr. Darlington was a man of apparently forty 
 years of age; a clean-shaven, keen-eyed individual, who 
 communicated an immediate impression of shrewd hard- 
 headedness. He was very quiet and very self-possessed 
 in manner, and it required little knowledge of human 
 nature to predict of him that he would never do anything 
 in a hurry or in a perfunctory manner — a single glance 
 of his eye at the clock as eight struck served to indicate 
 at least one principal trait of his character. 
 
 ' It is utterly useless to look at the clock, ' said Haidee, 
 catching Mr. Darlington's glance. ' That won't bring 
 Lucian any sooner — ^he has probably quite forgotten that 
 he has guests, and gone off to dine at his club or some- 
 thing of that sort. He gets more erratic every day. 
 I wish you'd talk seriously to him, Sprats. He never 
 pays the least attention to me. Last week he asked two 
 men to dine — utter strangers to me — and at eight o'clock 
 came a wire from Oxford saying he had gone down there 
 to see a friend and was staying the night.' 
 
 ' I think that must be delightful in the man to whom 
 you are married,' said Mrs. Berenson. ' I should hate 
 to live with a man who always did the right thing at 
 the right moment — so dull, you know.' 
 
 ' There is much to be said on both sides, ' said Darling- 
 ton dryly. ' In husbands, as in theology, a happy 
 medium would appear to be found in the via media. I 
 presume, Mrs. Berenson, that you would like your hus- 
 
122 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 band to wear his waistcoat outside his coat and dine at 
 five o'clock in the morning? ' 
 
 ' I would prefer even that to a husband who lived on 
 clock-work principles,' Mrs. Berenson replied. ' Eccen- 
 tricity is the surest proof of strong character.' 
 
 ' I should imagine,' said Sprats, with a glance at 
 Saxonstowe which seemed to convey to him that the 
 actress was amusing. * I should imagine that Lord 
 Saxonstowe and Mr. Darlington are men of clock-work 
 principles.' 
 
 Mrs. Berenson put up her pince-nez and favoured the 
 two men with a long, steady stare. She dropped the 
 pince-nez with a deep sigh. 
 
 ' They do look like it, don't they?' she said despair- 
 ingly. ' There's something in the way they wear their 
 clothes and hold their hands that suggests it. Do you 
 always rise at a certain hour?' she went on, turning to 
 Saxonstowe. ' My husband had a habit of getting up 
 at six in summer and seven in winter — it brought on an 
 extraordinary form of nervous disease in me, and the 
 doctors warned him that they would not be responsible 
 for my life if he persisted. I believe he tried to break 
 the habit off, poor fellow, but he died, and so of course 
 there was an end of it.' 
 
 Ere Saxonstowe could decide whether he was expected 
 to reply to the lady's question as to his own habits, the 
 sound of a rapidly driven and sharply pulled-up cab 
 was heard outside, followed by loudly delivered instruc- 
 tions in Lucian's voice. A minute later he rushed into 
 the drawing-room. He had evidently come straight out 
 of the cab, for he wore his hat and forgot to take it off — 
 excitement and concern were written in large letters all 
 over him. He began to gesticulate, addressing every- 
 body, and talking very quickly and almost breathlessly. 
 He was awfully sorry to have kept them waiting, and 
 even now he must hurry away again immediately. He 
 had heard late that afternoon of an old college friend 
 who had fallen on evil days after an heroic endeavour 
 to make a fortime out of literature, and had gone to him 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 123 
 
 to find that the poor fellow, his wife, and two young 
 children were all in the last stages of poverty, and con- 
 fronting a cold and careless world from the insecure 
 bastion of a cheap lodging in an unknown quarter of the 
 town named Ball's Pond. He described their plight and 
 surroundings in a few graphic sentences, looking from 
 one to the other with quick eager glances, as if appealing 
 to them for comprehension, or sympathy, or assent. 
 
 ' And of course I must see to the poor chap and his 
 family,' he said. ' They want food, and money, and 
 lots of things. And the two children — Sprats, you must 
 come back with me just now. I am keeping the cab — 
 you must come and take those children away to your 
 hospital. And where is Hoskins? I want food and 
 wine for them; he must put it on top of the hansom.' 
 
 * Are we all to go without dinner?' asked Mrs. 
 Damerel. 
 
 ' By no means, by no means!' said Lucian. ' Pray 
 do not wait longer — indeed I don't know when I shall 
 return, there will be lots to do, and ' 
 
 ' But Sprats, if she goes with you, will go hungry,' 
 Mrs. Damerel urged. 
 
 Lucian stared at Sprats, and frowned, as if some deep 
 mental problem had presented itself to him. 
 
 ' You can't be very hungry, Sprats, you know,' he 
 said, with visible impatience. ' You must have had tea 
 during the afternoon — can't you wait an hour or two 
 and we'll get something later on? Those two children 
 must be brought away — my God! you should see the 
 place — you must come, of course.' 
 
 * Oh, I'm going with you ! ' answered Sprats. ' Don't 
 bother about us, you other people — angels of mercy are 
 not very pleasant things at the moment you're starving 
 for dinner — go and dine and leave Lucian to me; I'll put 
 a cloak or something over my one swell gown and go 
 with him. Now, Lucian, quick with your commissariat 
 arrangements.' 
 
 ' Yes, yes, I'll be quick,' answered Lucian. * You 
 see/ he continued, turning to Saxonstowe with the air 
 
124 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 of a child who has asked another child to play with it, 
 and at the last moment prefers an alternative amuse- 
 ment; ' it's an awful pity, isn't it, but you do quite 
 understand? The poor chap's starving and friendless, 
 you know, and I don't know when I shall get back, 
 but ' 
 
 ' Please don't bother about me,' said Saxonstowe; ' I 
 quite understand.' 
 
 Lucian sighed — a sigh of relief. He looked round; 
 Sprats had disappeared, but Hoskins, a staid and 
 solemn butler, lingered at the door. Lucian appealed 
 to him with the pathetic insistence of the man who wants 
 very much to do something, and is not quite sure how 
 to do it. 
 
 ' Oh, I say, Hoskins, I want — some food, you know, 
 and wine, and ' 
 
 ' Yes, sir,' said Hoskins. ' Miss Chilverstone has just 
 given me instructions, sir.' 
 
 ' Oh, then we can go ! ' exclaimed Lucian. ' I say, 
 you really mustn't mind — oh! I am forgetting that I 
 must take some money,' he said, and hurriedly left the 
 room. His wife sighed and looked at Darlington. 
 
 ' I suppose we may now go to dinner,' she said. 
 ' Lucian will sup on a sandwich somewhere about mid- 
 night.' 
 
 In the hall they found Sprats enveloped in an ulster 
 which completely covered her dinner-gown; Lucian was 
 cramming a handful of money, obviously taken at 
 random from a receptacle where paper-currency and 
 gold and silver coins were all mingled together, into a 
 pocket; a footman was carrying a case of food and wine 
 out to the cab. Mrs. Berenson insisted on seeing the 
 two apostles of charity depart — the entire episode had 
 put her into a good temper, and she enlivened the next 
 hour with artless descriptions of her various states of 
 feeling. Her chatter amused Saxonstowe; Darlington 
 and Mrs. Damerel appeared to have heard much of it on 
 previous occasions, and received it with equanimity. 
 As soon as dinner was over she announced that if Lucian 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 125 
 
 had been at home she had meant to spend the rest of the 
 evening in expounding her ideas on the subject of the 
 wished-for drama to him, but as things were she would 
 go round to the Empire for an hour — she would just 
 be in time, she said, to see a turn in which the per- 
 former, a contortionist, could tie himself into a com- 
 pHcated knot, dislocate every joint in his body, and 
 assume the most grotesque positions, all without break- 
 ing himself in pieces. 
 
 ' It is the grimmest performance,' she said to Saxon- 
 stowe; ' it makes me dream, and I wake screaming; 
 and the sensation of finding that the dream is a dream, 
 and not a reality, is so exquisite that I treat myself 
 to it at least once a week. I think that all great artists 
 should cultivate sensations — don't you?' 
 
 Upon this point Saxonstowe was unable to give a 
 satisfactory answer, but he replied very politely that 
 he trusted Mrs. Berenson would enjoy her treat. Soon 
 after her departure he made his own adieu, leaving 
 Mrs. Damerel to entertain Darlington and two or three 
 other men who had dropped in after dinner, and who 
 seemed in nowise surprised to find Lucian not at home. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 LuciAN swooped down upon the humble dwelling in 
 which his less fortunate fellow resided, like an angel 
 who came to destroy rather than to save. He took 
 everything into his own hands, as soon as the field of 
 operations lay open to him, and it was quite ten minutes 
 before Sprats, by delicate finesse, managed to shut him 
 up in one room with the invalid, while she and the wife 
 talked practical matters in another. At the end of an 
 hour she got him safely away from the house. He was 
 in a pleasurable state of mind; the situation had been 
 full of charm to him, and he walked out into the street 
 gloating over the fact that the sick man and his wife 
 and children were now fed and warmed and made gener- 
 ally comfortable, and had money in the purse where- 
 with to keep the wolf from the door for many days. 
 His imagination had seized upon the misery which the 
 unlucky couple must have endured before help came 
 in their way: he conjured up the empty pocket, the 
 empty cupboard, the blank despair that comes from 
 lack of help and sympathy, the heart sickness which 
 springs from the powerlessness to hope any longer. He 
 had read of these things but had never seen them: he 
 only realised what they meant when he looked at the 
 faces of the sick man and his wife as he and Sprats 
 left them. Striding away at Sprats's side, his head 
 drooping towards his chest and his hands plunged in his 
 pockets, Lucian ruminated upon these things and 
 became so keenly impressed by them that he suddenly 
 paused and uttered a sharp exclamation. 
 
 ' By George, Sprats!' he said, standing still and 
 staring at her as if he had never seen her before, ' what 
 an awful thing poverty must be ! Did that ever strike 
 you?' 
 
 * Often, answered Sprats, with laconic alacrity, ' as 
 
 126 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 127 
 
 it might have struck you, too, if you'd kept your eyes 
 open.' 
 
 ' I am supposed to have excellent powers of observa- 
 tion,' he said musingly, ' but somehow I don't think 
 I ever quite realised what poverty meant until to-night. 
 I wonder what it would be like to try it for a while — 
 to go without money and food and have no hope? — 
 but, of course, one couldn't do it — one would always 
 know that one could go back to one's usual habits, and 
 so on. It would only be playing at being poor. I 
 wonder, now, where the exact line would be drawn 
 between the end of hope and the beginning of despair? — 
 that's an awfully interesting subject, and one that I 
 should like to follow up. Don't you think ' 
 
 ' Lucian,' said Sprats, interrupting him without cere- 
 mony, ' are we going to stand here at the street comer 
 all night while you moon about abstract questions? 
 Because if you are, I'm not.* 
 
 Lucian came out of his reverie and examined his 
 surroundings. He had come to a halt at a point where 
 the Essex Road is transected by the New North Road, 
 and he gazed about him with the expression of a 
 traveller who has wandered into strange regions. 
 
 ' This is a quarter of the town which I do not know,' 
 he said. ' Not very attractive, is it? Let us walk 
 on to those lights — I suppose we can find a hansom 
 there, and then we can get back to civilisation.' 
 
 They walked forward in the direction of Islington 
 High Street: round about the Angel there was life and 
 animation and a plenitude of bright light; Lucian grew 
 interested, and finally asked a policeman what part 
 of the town he found himself in. On hearing that that 
 was Islington he was immediately reminded of the 
 ' Bailiff's Daughter ' and began to recall lines of it. 
 But Islington and old ballads were suddenly driven 
 quite out of his thoughts by an object which had no 
 apparent connection with poetry. 
 
 Sprats, keeping her eyes open for a hansom, suddenly 
 missed Lucian from her side, and turned to find him 
 
128 LUCIAN THE DREMIER 
 
 gazing at the windows of a little caf6-restaurant \vith an 
 Italian name over its door and a suspicion of Continental 
 cookery about it. She turned back to him: he looked 
 at her as a boy might look whose elder sister catches 
 him gazing into the pastry-cook's window. 
 
 ' I say, Sprats,' he said coaxingly, ' let's go in there 
 and have supper. It's clean, and I've suddenly turned 
 faint — I've had nothing since lunch. Dinner will be 
 all over now at home, and besides, we're miles away. 
 I've been in these places before — they're all right, really, 
 something like the ristoranti in Italy, you know.' 
 
 Sprats was hungry too. She glanced at the little cafe 
 — it appeared to be clean enough to warrant one in 
 eating, at any rate, a chop in it. 
 
 ' I think I should like some food,' she said. 
 
 ' Come on, then,' said Lucian gaily. ' Let's see what 
 sort of place it is.' 
 
 He pushed open the swinging doors and entered. It 
 was a small place, newly established, and the proprietor 
 and his wife, two Italians, and their Swiss waiter were 
 glad to see customers who looked as if they would need 
 something more than a cup of coffee and a roll and 
 butter. The proprietor bowed himself double and 
 ushered them to the most comfortable comer in his 
 establishment : he produced a lengthy menu and handed 
 it to Lucian with great empressement; the waiter stood 
 near, deeply interested; the proprietor's wife, gracious 
 of figure and round of face, leaned over the counter 
 thinking of the coins which she would eventually deposit 
 in her cash drawer. Lucian addressed the proprietor in 
 Italian and discussed the menu with him; while they 
 talked. Sprats looked about her, wondering at the red 
 plush seats, the great mirrors in their gilded frames, 
 and the jars of various fruits and conserves arranged on 
 the counter. Every table was adorned with a flowering 
 plant fashioned out of crinkled paper; the ceiling was 
 picked out in white and gold; the Swiss waiter's apron 
 and napkin were very stiffly starched; the proprietor 
 wore a frock coat, which fitted very tightly at the waist, 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 129 
 
 and his wife's gown was of a great smartness. Sprats 
 decided that they were early customers in the history 
 of the establishment — besides themselves there were only 
 three people in the place: an old gentleman with a 
 napkin tucked into his neckband, who was eating his 
 dinner and reading a newspaper propped up against a 
 bottle, and a pair of obvious lovers who were drinking 
 cafi-au-lait in a quiet comer to the accompaniment of 
 their own murmurs. 
 
 ' I had no idea that I was so hungry,' said Lucian 
 when he and the proprietor had finally settled upon what 
 was best to eat and drink. * I am glad I saw this 
 place: it reminds me in some ways of Italy. I say, I 
 don't believe those poor people had had much to eat 
 to-day. Sprats — it is a most fortunate thing that I hap- 
 pened to hear of them. My God! I wouldn't like to 
 get down to that stage — it must be dreadful, especially 
 when there are children.' 
 
 Sprats leaned her elbows on the Httle table, propped 
 her chin in her hands, and looked at him with a curious 
 expression which he did not understand. A half- 
 dreamy, half-speculative look came into her eyes. 
 
 * I wonder what you would do if you did get down 
 to that stage?' she said, with a rather quizzical smile. 
 
 Lucian stared at her. 
 
 * I? Why, what do you mean?' he said. ' I sup- 
 pose I should do as other men do.' 
 
 ' It would be for the first time in your life, then,' she 
 answered. * I fancy seeing you do as other men do 
 in any circumstances.' 
 
 ' But I don't think I could conceive myself at such a 
 low ebb as that,' he said. 
 
 Sprats still stared at him with a speculative 
 expression. 
 
 ' Lucian,' she said suddenly, ' do you ever think 
 about the future? Everything has been made easy for 
 you so far; does it ever strike you that fortune is in 
 very truth a fickle jade, and that she might desert you? ' 
 
 I 
 
130 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 He looked at her as a child looks who is requested 
 to face an unpleasant contingency. 
 
 ' I don't think of unpleasant things,' he answered. 
 * What's the good? And why imagine possibilities 
 which aren't probabilities? There is no indication that 
 fortune is going to desert me.' 
 
 ' No,' said Sprats, ' but she might, and very suddenly 
 too. Look here, Lucian; I've the right to play grand- 
 mother always, haven't I, and there's something I want 
 to put before you plainly. Don't you think you are 
 living rather carelessly and extravagantly?' 
 
 Lucian knitted his brows and stared at her. 
 
 ' Explain,' he said. 
 
 * Well,' she continued, * I don't think it wants much 
 explanation. You don't bother much about money 
 matters, do you?' 
 
 He looked at her somewhat pityingly. 
 
 ' How can I do that and attend to my work?' he 
 asked. ' I could not possibly be pestered with things 
 of that sort.' 
 
 ' Very well,' said Sprats, * and Haidee doesn't bother 
 about them either. Therefore, no one bothers. I know 
 your plan, Lucian — it's charmingly simple. When 
 Lord Simonstower left you that ten thousand pounds 
 you paid it into a bank, didn't you, and to it you after- 
 wards added Haidee 's two thousand when you were 
 married. Twice a year Mr. Robertson pays your royal- 
 ties into your account, and the royalties from your 
 tragedy go to swell it as well. That's one side of the 
 ledger. On the other side you and Haidee each have 
 a cheque-book, and you draw cheques as you please and 
 for what you please. That's all so, isn't it?' 
 
 ' Yes,' answered Lucian, regarding her with amaze- 
 ment, ' of course it is; but just think what a very simple 
 arrangement it is.' 
 
 ' Admirably simple,' Sprats replied, laughing, ' so 
 long as there is an inexhaustible fund to draw upon. 
 But seriously, Lucian, haven't you been drawing on 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 131 
 
 your capital? Do you know, at this moment, what 
 you are worth? — do you know how you stand?' 
 
 ' I don't suppose that I do,' he answered. ' But why 
 all this questioning? I know that Robertson pays a 
 good deal into my account twice a year, and the royal- 
 ties from the tragedy were big, you know.' 
 
 ' But still, Lucian, you've drawn off your capital,' 
 she urged. * You have spent just what you pleased 
 ever since you left Oxford, and Haidee spends what 
 she pleases. You must have spent a lot on your ItaUan 
 tour last year, and you are continually running over to 
 Paris. You keep up an expensive establishment; you 
 indulge expensive tastes; you were born, my dear 
 Lucian, with the instincts of an epicure in everj^hing.' 
 
 ' And yet I am enjoying a supper in an obscure little 
 caf6!' he exclaimed laughingly. 'There's not much 
 extravagance here.' 
 
 * You may gratify epicurean tastes by a sudden whim 
 to be Spartan-Hke,' answered Sprats. ' I say that you 
 have the instincts of an epicure, and you have so far 
 gratified them. You've never known what it was, 
 Lucian, to be refused anything, have you? No: well, 
 that naturally inclines you to the opinion that everything 
 will always be made easy for you. Now supposing you 
 lost your vogue as a poet — oh, there's nothing impos- 
 sible about it, my dear boy ! — the public are as fickle as 
 fortune herself — and supposing your next tragedy does 
 not catch the popular taste — ah, and that's not impos- 
 sible either — what are you going to do? Because, 
 Lucian, you must have dipped pretty heavily into your 
 capital, and if you want some plain truths from your 
 faithful Sprats, you spend a great deal more than you 
 earn. Now give me another potato, and tell me plainly 
 if you know how much your royalties amounted to 
 last year and how much you and Haidee spent.' 
 
 ' I don't know,' answered Lucian. ' I could tell by 
 asking my bankers. Of course I have spent a good 
 deal of money in travel, and in books, and in pictures, 
 and in furnishing a house — could I have laid out Lord 
 
132 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 Simonstower's legacy in better fashion? And I do earn 
 large sums I had a small fortune out of Domitia, you 
 
 know/ 
 
 ' There is no doubt,' she rephed, ' that you have had 
 enough money to last you for all the rest of your life if 
 it had been wisely invested.' 
 
 ' Do you mean to say that I have no investments?' 
 he said, half angrily. 'Why, I have thousands of 
 pounds invested in pictures, books, furniture, and china 
 my china alone is worth two thousand.' 
 
 ' Dear boy, I don't doubt it,' she answered sooth- 
 ingly, ' but you know it doesn't produce any interest. 
 I like you to have pretty things about you, but you have 
 precious Httle modesty in your mighty brain, and you 
 sometimes indulge tastes which only a millionaire ought 
 to possess.' 
 
 ' Well,' he said, sighing, ' I suppose there's a moral 
 at the end of the sermon. What is it, Sprats? You are 
 a brick, of course — in your way there's nobody like you, 
 but when you are like this you make me think of 
 mustard-plaisters. ' 
 
 ' The moral is this, ' she answered : ' come down from 
 the clouds and cultivate a commercial mind for ten 
 minutes. Find out exactly what you have in the way 
 of income, and keep within it. Tell Haidee exactly how 
 much she has to spend.' 
 
 ' You forget,' he said, ' that Haidee has two thousand 
 pounds of her own. It's a very small fortune, but it's 
 hers.' 
 
 ' Had, you mean, not has,' replied Sprats. ' Haidee 
 must have spent her small fortune twice over, if not 
 thrice over.' 
 
 ' It would be an unkind thing to be mean with her,' 
 said Lucian, with an air of wise reflection. ' If Haidee 
 had married Darlington she would have had unlimited 
 wealth at her disposal; as she preferred to throw it all 
 aside and marry me, I can't find it in me to deny her 
 anything. No, Sprats — poor little Haidee must have 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 133 
 
 her simple pleasures even if I have to deny myself of 
 my own.' 
 
 * Oh, did you ever hear such utter rot ! ' Sprats ex- 
 claimed. * Catch you denying yourself of anything ! 
 Dear boy, don't be an ass — it's bad form. And 
 Haidee's pleasures are not simple.' 
 
 * They are simple in comparison with what they might 
 have been if she had married Darlington,' he said. 
 
 ' Then why didn't she marry Darlington?' inquired 
 Sprats, 
 
 ' Because she married me,' answered Lucian. ' She 
 gave up the millionaire for the struggling poet, as you 
 might put it if you were writing a penny-dreadful. No; 
 seriously. Sprats, I think there's a good deal due to 
 Haidee in that respect. I think she is really easily 
 contented. When you come to think of it, we are not 
 extravagant — we like pretty things and comfortable sur- 
 roundings, but when j^ou think of what some people 
 do .' 
 
 ' Oh, you're hopeless, Lucian!' she said. * I wish 
 you'd been sent out to earn your living at fifteen. 
 Honour bright — you're living in a world of dreams, and 
 you'll have a nasty awakening some day.' 
 
 ' I have given the outer world something of value 
 from my world of dreams,' he said, smiling at her. 
 
 ' You have written some very beautiful poetry, and 
 you are a marvellously gifted man who ought to feel the 
 responsibility of your gifts,' she said gravely. * And 
 all I want is to keep you, if I can, from the rocks on 
 which you might come to grief. I'm sure that if you 
 took my advice about business matters you would avoid 
 trouble in the future. You're too cock-sure, too easy- 
 going, too thoughtless, Lucian, and this is a hard and 
 a cruel world.' 
 
 ' It's been a very pleasant world to me so far,' he 
 said. 'I've never had a care or a trouble; I've heaps 
 of friends, and I've always got everything that I wanted. 
 Why, it's a very pleasant world! you. Sprats, have 
 found it so, too.' 
 
134 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 ' Yes/ she said, ' I have found it pleasant, but it is 
 hard and cruel nevertheless, and one realises it some- 
 times when one least expects to. One may wake out 
 of a dream to a very cruel reality.' 
 
 ' You speak as of a personal experience,' he said 
 smiling. * And yet I swear you never had one.' 
 
 ' I don't want j^ou to have one,' she answered. 
 
 * Is sermonising a cruel reality?' he asked with a 
 mock grimace. 
 
 ' No, it's a necessary thing; and that reminds me that 
 I have not quite finished mine. Look here, Lucian, 
 here's a straight question to you. Do you think it a 
 good thing to be so very friendly with Mr. Darlington?' 
 
 Lucian dropped his knife and fork and stared at her 
 in amazement. 
 
 ' Why on earth not?' he said. ' Darlington is an 
 awfully good fellow. Of course, I know that he must 
 have felt it when Haidee ran away with me, but he has 
 been most kind to both of us — we have had jolly times 
 on his yacht and at his Scotch place; and you know. 
 Sprats, when you can't afford things yourself it's rather 
 nice to have friends who can give them to you.' 
 
 ' Lucian, that's a piece of worldHness that's unworthy 
 of you,' she said. ' Well, I can't say anything against 
 Mr. Darlington. He seems kind, and he is certainly 
 generous and hospitable, but it is well known that he 
 was very, very much in love with Haidee, and that he 
 felt her loss a good deal.' 
 
 ' Yes, it was awfully hard on him,' said Lucian, strok- 
 ing his chin with a thoughtful air; ' and of course that's 
 just why one feels that one ought to be nice to him. 
 He and Haidee are great friends, and that's far better 
 than that he should cherish any bitter feelings against 
 her because she preferred me to him.' 
 
 Sprats looked at him with the half-curious, half- 
 speculative expression which had filled her eyes in the 
 earlier stages of their conversation. They had now 
 finished their repast, and she drew on her gloves. 
 
 ' I want to go home to my children,' she said. * One 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 135 
 
 of the babies has croup, and it was rather bad when 
 I left. Pay the bill, Lucian, and get them to call a 
 hansom.' 
 
 Lucian put his hands in his pockets, and uttered 
 a sudden exclamation of dismay. 
 
 ' I haven't any money,' he said. ' I left it all with 
 poor Watson. Have you any?' 
 
 ' No,' she answered, ' of course I haven't. You 
 dragged me away in my dinner-dress, and it hasn't even 
 a pocket in it. What are you going to do?' 
 
 * What an awkward predicament ! ' said Lucian, 
 searching every pocket. ' I don't know what to do — I 
 haven't a penny.' 
 
 ' Well, you must walk back to Mr. Watson's and get 
 some money there,' said Sprats. ' You will be back in 
 ten minutes.' 
 
 ' What ! borrow money from a man to whom I have 
 just given it?' he cried. ' Oh, I couldn't do that!' 
 
 Sprats uttered an impatient exclamation. 
 
 ' Well, do something!' she said. ' We can't sit here 
 all night.' 
 
 Lucian summoned the proprietor and explained the 
 predicament. The situation ended in a procession of 
 two hansom cabs, in one of which rode Sprats and 
 Lucian, in the other the Swiss waiter, who enjoyed a 
 long drive westward and finally returned to the heights 
 of Islington with the amount of the bill and a substantial 
 gratuity in his pocket. As Sprats pointed out with force 
 and unction, Lucian's fooHsh pride in not returning to 
 the Watsons and borrowing half a sovereign had in- 
 creased the cost of their supper fourfold. But Lucian 
 only laughed, and Sprats knew that the shillings thrown 
 away were to him as things of no importance. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 There had been a moment in Sprats' s life when she 
 had faced things — it was when she heard that Lucian 
 and Haidee had made a runaway marriage. This 
 escapade had been effected very suddenly; no one had 
 known that these two young people were contemplating 
 so remarkable a step. It was supposed that Miss 
 Brinklow was fully alive to the blessings and advantages 
 attendant upon a marriage with Mr. Eustace Darlington, 
 who, as head of a private banking firm which carried out 
 financial operations of vast magnitude, was a prize of 
 much consequence in the matrimonial market: no one 
 ever imagined that she would throw away such a chance 
 for mere sentiment. But Haidee, shallow as she was, 
 had a certain vein of romance in her composition; and 
 when Lucian, in all the first flush of manhood and the 
 joyous confidence of youth, burst upon her, she fell in 
 love with him in a fashion calculated to last for at least 
 a fortnight. He, too, fell madly in love with the girl's 
 physical charms: as to her mental qualities, he never 
 gave them a thought. She was Aphrodite, warm, rosy- 
 tinted, and enticing; he neither ate, slept, nor drank until 
 she was in his arms. He was a masterful lover; his 
 passion swept Haidee out of herself, and before either 
 knew what was really happening, they were married. 
 They lived on each other's hearts for at least a week, 
 but their appetites were normal again within the month, 
 and there being no lack of money and each having a 
 keen perception of the joie de vivre, they settled down 
 very comfortably. 
 
 Sprats had never heard of Haidee from the time of the 
 latter' s visit to Simonstower until she received the news 
 of her marriage to Lucian. The tidings came to her with 
 a curious heaviness. She had never disguised from 
 herself the fact that she herself loved Lucian : now that 
 
 136 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 137 
 
 she knew he was married to another woman she set her- 
 self the task of distinguishing between the love that she 
 might have given him and the love which she could 
 give him. Upon one thing she decided at once: since 
 Lucian had elected Haidee as his life's partner, Haidee 
 must be Sprats 's friend too, even if the friendship were 
 all on one side. She would love Haidee — for Lucian 's 
 sake, primarily: for her own if possible. But when 
 events brought the three together in London, Sprats 
 was somewhat puzzled. Lucian as a husband was the 
 must curious and whimsical of men. He appeared to be 
 absolutely incapable of jealousy, and would watch his 
 wife flirting under his eyes with appreciative amuse- 
 ment. He himself made love to every girl who aroused 
 any interest or curiosity in him — to women who bored 
 him he was cold as ice, and indifferent to the verge of 
 rudeness. He let Haidee do exactly as she pleased; 
 with his own liberty in anything, and under any circum- 
 stances, he never permitted interference. Sprats was 
 never able to decide upon his precise feelings for his 
 wife or his attitude towards her — they got on very 
 smoothly, but each went his or her own way. And 
 after a time Haidee' s way appeared to run in parallel 
 lines with the way of her jilted lover, Eustace 
 Darlington. 
 
 Mr. Darlington had taken his pill with equanimity, 
 and had not even made a wry face over it. He had 
 gone so far as to send the bride a wedding present, and 
 had let people see that he was kindly disposed to her. 
 When the runaways came back to town and Lucian 
 began the meteor-like career which brought his name 
 so prominently before the world, Darlington saw no 
 reason why he should keep aloof. He soon made 
 Lucian's acquaintance, became his friend, and visited 
 the house at regular intervals. Some people, who knew 
 the financier rather well, marvelled at the kindness 
 which he showed to these young people — he entertained 
 them on his yacht and at his place in Scotland, and Mrs. 
 Damerel was seen constantly, sometimes attended by 
 
138 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 Lucian and sometimes not, in his box at the opera. At 
 the end of two years Darlington was regarded as 
 Haidee's particular cavaUer, and one half their world 
 said unkind things which, naturally, never reached 
 Lucian 's ears. He was too fond of smoothness in life 
 to say No to anything, and so long as he himself could 
 tread the primrose path unchecked and untroubled, he 
 did not care to interfere in anybody's arrangements— 
 not even in Haidee's. It seemed to him quite an ordi- 
 nary thing, an everyday occurrence, that he and she and 
 Darlington should be close friends, and he went in and 
 out of Darlington's house just as Darlington went in 
 and out of his. 
 
 Lucian, all unconsciously, had developed into an 
 egoist. He watched himself playing his part in hfe 
 with as much interest as the lover of dramatic art will 
 show in studying the performance of a great actor. He 
 seemed to his own thinking a bright and suimy figure, 
 and he arranged everything on his own stage so that 
 it formed a background against which that figure moved 
 or stood with striking force. He was young; he was a 
 success; people loved to have him in their houses; his 
 photograph sold by the thousands in the shop windows; 
 a stroll along Bond Street or Piccadilly was in the nature 
 of a triumphal procession; hostesses almost went down 
 on their knees to get him to their various functions; 
 he might have dined out every night, if he had liked. 
 He very often did like — popularity and admiration and 
 flattery and homage were as incense to his nostrils, and 
 he accepted every gift poured at his shrine as if nothing 
 could be too good for him. And yet no one could call 
 him conceited, or vain, or unduly exalted : he was trans- 
 parently simple, ingenuous, and childhke; he took 
 everything as a handsome child takes the gifts showered 
 upon him by admiring seniors. He had a rare gift of 
 making himself attractive to everybody — he would be 
 frivolous and gay with the young, old-fashioned and 
 grave with the elderly. He was a butterfly and a man 
 of fashion; there was no better dressed man in town, 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 139 
 
 nor a handsomer; but he was also a scholar and a 
 student, and in whatever idle fashion he spent most of 
 his time, there were so many hours in each day which 
 he devoted to hard, systematic reading and to his own 
 work. It was the only matter in which he was practi- 
 cal; in all other moods he was a gaily painted, light- 
 winged thing that danced and fluttered in the sun- 
 beams. He was careless, thoughtless, light-hearted, 
 sanguine, and he never stopped to think of consequences 
 or results. But through ever3rthing that critical part of 
 him kept an interested and often amused eye on the other 
 parts. 
 
 Sprats at this stage watched him carefully. She had 
 soon discovered that he and Haidee were mere children 
 in many things, and wholly incapable of management 
 or forethought. It had been their ill-fortune to have all 
 they wanted all their Uves, and they lived as if heaven 
 had made a contract with them to furnish their table 
 with manna and their wardrobes with fine linen, and 
 keep no account of the supply. She was of a practical 
 mind, and had old-fashioned country notions about 
 saving up in view of contingencies, and she expounded 
 them at certain seasons with force and vigour to both 
 Lucian and Haidee. But as Lucian cherished an 
 ineradicable belief in his own star, and had never been 
 obliged to earn his dinner before he could eat it, there 
 was no impression to be made upon him; and Haidee, 
 having always lived in the softest comer of luxury's lap, 
 could conceive of no other state of being, and was merci- 
 fully spared the power of imagining one. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 In spite of Sprats's sermon in the little cafe-restaurant, 
 Lucian made no effort to follow her advice. He was at 
 work on a new tragedy which was to be produced at 
 the Athenaeum in the following autumn, and had there- 
 fore no time to give to considerations of economy, and 
 when he was not at work he was at play, and play with 
 Lucian was a matter of as much importance, so far as 
 strenuous devotion to it was concerned, as work was. 
 But there came a morning and an occurrence which for 
 an hour at least made him recall Sprats's counsel and 
 ponder rather deeply on certain things which he had 
 never pondered before. 
 
 It was ten o'clock, and Lucian and Haidee were 
 breakfasting. They invariably spent a good hour over 
 this meal, for both were possessed of hearty appetites, 
 and Lucian always read his letters and his newspapers 
 while he ate and drank. He was alternately devoting, 
 himself to his plate and to a leading article in the Times, 
 when the footman entered and announced that Mr. 
 Pepperdine wished to see him. Lucian choked down a 
 mouthful, uttered a joyous exclamation, and rushed into 
 the hall. Mr. Pepperdine, in all the glories of a particu- 
 larly horsy suit of clothes, was gazing about him as if 
 he had got into a museum. He had visited Lucian's 
 house before, and always went about in it with his 
 mouth wide open and an air of expectancy — there was 
 usually something fresh to see, and he never quite knew 
 where he might come across it. 
 
 ' My dear uncle ! ' cried Lucian, seizing him in his 
 arms and dragging him into the dining-room, ' why 
 didn't you let me know you were coming? Have you 
 breakfasted? Have some more, any way — get into that 
 chair.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine solemnly shook hands with Haidee, 
 
 140 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 141 
 
 who liked him because he betrayed such ardent and 
 whole-souled admiration of her and had once bought 
 her a pair of wonderful ponies, assured himself by a 
 careful inspection that she was as pretty as ever, and 
 took a chair, but not at the table. He had breakfasted, 
 he said, at his hotel, two hours earher. 
 
 ' Then have a drink,' said Lucian, and rang the bell 
 for whisky and soda. ' How is everybody at Simons- 
 tower?' 
 
 * All well,' answered Mr. Pepperdine, ' very well 
 indeed, except that Keziah has begun to suffer a good 
 deal from rheimiatism. It's a family complaint. I'm 
 glad to see you both well and hearty — you keep the roses 
 in your cheeks, ma'am, and the Hght in your eyes, 
 something wonderful, considering that you are a town- 
 bird, as one may say. There are country maidens with 
 less colour and brightness, so there are ! ' 
 
 ' You said that so prettily that I shall allow you to 
 smoke a cigar, if you like,' said Haidee. ' Lucian, your 
 case.' 
 
 Mr. Pepperdine shook his head knowingly as he 
 lighted a cigar and sipped his whisky and soda. He 
 knew a pretty woman when he saw her, he said to him- 
 self, and it was his opinion that Mrs. Lucian Damerel 
 was uncommonly pretty. Whenever he came to see her 
 he could never look at her enough, and Haidee, who 
 accepted admiration on principle, used to smile at him 
 and air her best behaviour. She was sufficiently woman 
 of the world to overlook the fact that Mr. Pepperdine 
 was a tenant-farmer and used the language of the people 
 — he was a handsome man and a dandy in his way, and 
 he was by no means backward, in spite of his confirmed 
 bachelorhood, of letting a pretty woman see that he had 
 an eye for beauty. So she made herself very agreeable 
 to Mr. Pepperdine and told him stories of the ponies, and 
 Lucian chatted of various things, and Mr. Pepperdine, 
 taking in the general air of comfort and luxury which 
 surrounded these young people, felt that his nephew had 
 begun life in fine style and was uncommonly clever. 
 
142 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 They went into Lucian's study when breakfast was 
 over, and Lucian lighted a pipe and began to chat 
 carelessly of Simonstower and old times there. Mr. 
 Pepperdine, however, changed the subject somewhat 
 abruptly. , 
 
 ' Lucian, my boy,' he said, ' I'll tell you what s 
 brought me here: I want you to lend me a thousand 
 pounds for a twelvemonth. Will you do that?' 
 
 ' Why, of course!' exclaimed Lucian. ' I shall be 
 only too pleased — for as long as ever you like.' 
 
 ' A year will do for me,' answered Mr. Pepperdine. 
 ' I'll explain matters,' and he went on to tell Lucian 
 the story of the Bransby defalcations, and his own loss, 
 and of the late Lord Simonstower's generosity. ' He 
 was very good about it, was the old lord,' he said: ' it 
 made things easy for me while he lived, but now he's 
 dead, and I can't expect the new lord to be as con- 
 siderate. I've had a tightish time lately, Lucian, my 
 boy, and money's been scarce; but you can have your 
 thousand pounds back at the twelvemonth end — I'm a 
 man of my word in all matters.' 
 
 * My dear uncle ! ' exclaimed Lucian, ' there must be 
 no talk of that sort between us. Of course you shall 
 have the money at once — that is as soon as we can get 
 to the bank. Or will a cheque do? ' 
 
 ' Aught that's of the value of a thousand pounds'll do 
 for me,' replied Mr. Pepperdine. ' I want to complete 
 a certain transaction with the money this afternoon, and 
 if you give me a cheque I can call in at your bank.' 
 
 Lucian produced his cheque-book and wrote out a 
 cheque for the amount which his uncle wished to 
 borrow. Mr. Pepperdine insisted upon drawing up a 
 formal memorandum of its receipt, and admonished his 
 nephew to put it carefully away with his other business 
 papers. But Lucian never kept any business papers — 
 his usual practice was to tear everything up that looked 
 like a business document and throw the fragments into 
 the waste-paper basket. He would treasure the most 
 obscure second-hand bookseller's catalogue as if it had 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 143 
 
 been a gilt-edged secnril^y, but bills and receipts and 
 business letters annoyed him, and Mr. Pepperdine's 
 carefully scrawled sheet of notepaper went into the usual 
 receptacle as soon as its writer had left the room. And 
 as he crumpled it up and threw it into the basket, laugh- 
 ing at the old-fashioned habits of his uncle, Lucian also 
 threw off all recollection of the incident and became 
 absorbed in his new tragedy. 
 
 Coming in from the theatre that night he found a 
 little pile of letters waiting for him on the hall table, 
 and he took them into his study and opened them care- 
 lessly. There was a long epistle from Mrs. Berenson — 
 he read half of it and threw that and the remaining 
 sheets away with an exclamation of impatience. There 
 was a note from the great actor-manager who was going 
 to produce the new tragedy — he laid that open on his 
 desk and put a paper-weight upon it. The rest of his 
 letters were invitations, requests for autographs, gushing 
 epistles from admiring readers, and so on — he soon 
 bundled them all together and laid them aside. But 
 there was one which he had kept to the last — a formal- 
 looking affair with the name of his bank engraved on the 
 flap of the envelope, and he opened it with some curi- 
 osity. The letter which it enclosed was short and 
 formal, but when Lucian had read it he recognised in 
 some vague and not very definite fashion that it con- 
 stituted an epoch. He read it again and yet again, with 
 knitted brows and puzzled eyes, and then he put it on 
 his desk and sat staring at it as if he did not understand 
 the news which it was meant to convey to him. 
 
 It was a very commonplace communication this, but 
 Lucian had never seen anything of its sort before. It 
 was just a brief, politely worded note from his bankers, 
 informing him that they had that day paid a cheque 
 for one thousand pounds, drawn by him in favour of 
 Simpson Pepperdine, Esquire, and that his account was 
 now overdrawn by the sum of £187, los. od. That was 
 all — there was not even a delicately expressed request to 
 him to put the account in credit. 
 
144 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 Lucian could not quite realise what this letter meant; 
 he said nothing to Haidee of it, but after breakfast next 
 morning he drove to the bank and asked to see the 
 manager. Once closeted with that gentleman in his 
 private room he drew out the letter and laid it on the 
 desk at which the manager sat. 
 
 ' I don't quite understand this letter,' he said. 
 * Would you mind explaining it to me? ' 
 
 The manager smiled. 
 
 ' It seems quite plain, I think,' he said pleasantly. 
 ' It means that your account is overdrawn to the amount 
 of £187, los. od.' 
 
 Lucian sat down and stared at him. 
 
 * Does that mean that I have exhausted all the money 
 I placed in your hands, and have drawn on you for 
 £187, los. od. in addition?' he asked. 
 
 ' Precisely, Mr. Damerel,' answered the manager. 
 ' Your balance yesterday morning was about £820, and 
 you drew a cheque in favour of Mr. Pepperdine for 
 £1000. That, of course, puts you in our debt.' 
 
 Lucian stared harder than ever. 
 
 ' You're quite sure there is no mistake?' he said. 
 
 The manager smiled. 
 
 ' Quite sure I ' he replied. ' But surely you have had 
 your pass-book?' 
 
 Lucian had dim notions that a small book bound in 
 parchment had upon occasions been handed to him over 
 the counter of the bank, and on others had been posted 
 by him to the bank at some clerk's request; he also 
 remembered that he had once opened it and found it 
 full of figures, at the sight of which he had hastily closed 
 it again. 
 
 * I suppose I have,' he answered. 
 
 * I believe it is in our possession just now,' said the 
 manager. * If you will excuse me one moment I will 
 fetch it.' 
 
 He came back with the pass-book in his hand and 
 offered it to Lucian. 
 
 * It is posted up to date,' he said. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 145 
 
 Lucian took the book and turned its pages over. 
 
 ' Yes, but — ' he said. * I — do I understand that all 
 the money that has been paid in to my account here is 
 now spent? You have received royalties on my behalf 
 from Mr. Robertson and from Mr. Harcourt of the 
 Athenaeum?' 
 
 * You will find them all specified in the pass-book, 
 Mr. Damerel,' said the manager. * There will, I pre- 
 sume, be further payments to come from the same 
 sources?' 
 
 * Of course there will be the royalties from Mr. 
 Robertson every half-year,' answered Lucian, turning 
 the pages of his pass-book. ' And Mr. Harcourt pro- 
 duces my new tragedy at the Athenaeum in December.' 
 
 ' That, ' said the manager, with a polite bow, ' is sure 
 to be successful.' 
 
 ' But,' said Lucian, with a childlike candour, ' what 
 am I to do if you have no money of mine left? I can't 
 go on without money.' 
 
 The manager laughed. 
 
 * We shall be pleased to allow you an overdraft,' he 
 said. ' Give us some security, or get a friend of 
 stability to act as guarantor for you — that's all that's 
 necessary. I suppose the new tragedy will bring you 
 a small fortune? You did very well out of your first 
 play, if I remember rightly.' 
 
 * I can easily procure a guarantor,' answered Lucian. 
 His thoughts had immediately flown to Darlington. 
 ' Yes,' he continued, ' I think we shall have a long 
 run — longer, perhaps, than before.' 
 
 Then he went away, announcing that he would make 
 the necessary arrangements. When he had gone, the 
 manager, to satisfy a momentary curiosity of his own, 
 made a brief inspection of Lucian's account. He smiled 
 a little as he totalled it up. Mr. and Mrs. Lucian 
 Damerel had gone through seventeen thousand pounds 
 in four years, and of that amount twelve thousand repre- 
 sented capital. 
 
 Lucian carried the mystifying pass-book to his club 
 
 K 
 
146 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 and began to study the rows of figures. They made his 
 head ache and his eyes burn, and the only conclusion 
 he came to was that a few thousands of pounds are soon 
 spent, and that Haidee of late had been pretty prodigal 
 with her cheques. One fact was absolutely certain : his 
 ten thousand, and her two thousand, and the five 
 thousand which he had earned, were all gone, never to 
 return. He felt somewhat depressed at this thought, 
 but recovered his spirits when he remembered the value 
 of his pictures, his books, and his other possessions, and 
 the prospects of increased royalties in the golden days 
 to be. He went off to seek out Darlington in the city 
 as joyously as if he had been embarking on a voyage 
 to the Hesperides. 
 
 Darlington was somewhat surprised to see Lucian in 
 Lombard Street. He knew all the details of Lucian's 
 business within ten minutes, and had made up his mind 
 within two more. 
 
 ' Of course, I'll do it with pleasure, old chap,' he said, 
 with great heartiness. ' But I think I can suggest some- 
 thing far preferable. These people don't seem to have 
 given you any particular advantages, and there \yas 
 no need for them to bother you with a letter reminding 
 you that you owed them a miserable couple of hundred. 
 Look here: you had better open two accounts with us; 
 one for yourself and one for Mrs. Damerel, and keep 
 them distinct— after all, you know, women rather mix 
 things up. Give Robertson and Harcourt instructions 
 to pay your royalties into your own account here, and 
 pay your household expenses and bills out of it. Mrs. 
 Damerel' s account won't be a serious matter — mere pin- 
 money, you know — and we can balance it out of yours 
 at periodic intervals. That's a much more convenient 
 and far simpler thing than giving the other people a 
 guarantee for an overdraft.' 
 
 * It seems to be so, certainly,' said Lucian. ' Thanks, 
 very many. And what am I to do in arranging this? ' 
 
 ' At present,' answered Darlington, * you are to run 
 away as quickly as possible, for I'm over the ears in 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 147 
 
 work. Come in this afternoon at three o'clock, and we 
 will settle the whole thing.' 
 
 Lucian went out into the crowded streets, light- 
 hearted and joyous as ever. The slight depression of 
 the morning had worn off; all the world was gold again. 
 A whim seized him: he would spend the three hours 
 between twelve and three in wandering about the city — 
 it was an almost unknown region to him. He had read 
 much of it, but rarely seen it, and the prospect of an 
 acquaintance with it was alluring. So he wandered 
 hither and thither, his taste for the antique leading him 
 into many a quaint old court and quiet alley, and he 
 was fortunate enough to find an old-fashioned tavern 
 and an old-world waiter, and there he lunched and 
 enjoyed himself and went back to Darlington's office in 
 excellent spirits and ready to do anything. 
 
 There was Httle to do. Lucian left the private bank- 
 ing establishment of Darlington and Darlington a few 
 minutes after he had entered it, and he then carried 
 with him two cheque-books, one for himself and one 
 for Haidee, and a request that Mrs. Damerel should call 
 at the office and append her signature to the book 
 wherein the autographs of customers were preserved. 
 He went home and found Haidee just returned from 
 lunching with Lady Firmanence : Lucian conducted her 
 into his study with some importance. 
 
 * Look here, Haidee,' he said, * I've been making 
 some new business arrangements. We're going to bank 
 at Darlington's in future — it's much the wiser plan; and 
 you are to have a separate account. That's your 
 cheque-book. I say — we've rather gone it lately, you 
 know. Don't you think we might economise a little?' 
 
 Haidee stared, grew perplexed, and frowned. 
 
 ' I think I'm awfully careful,' she said. ' If you 
 think ' 
 
 Lucian saw signs of trouble and hastened to dispel 
 them. 
 
 * Yes, yes,' he said hurriedly, * I know, of course, 
 that you are. We've had such a lot of absolutely neces- 
 
148 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 sary expense, haven't we? Well, there's your cheque- 
 book, and the account is your own, you know.' 
 
 Haidee asked no questions, and carried the cheque- 
 book away. When she had gone, Lucian wrote out a 
 cheque for £187, los. and forwarded it to his former 
 bankers, with a covering letter in which he explained 
 that it was intended to balance his account and that he 
 wished to close the latter. That done, he put all 
 thoughts of money out of his mind with a mighty sigh 
 of rehef. In his own opinion he had accomplished a 
 hard day's work and acquitted himself with great credit. 
 Everything, he thought, had been quite simple, quite 
 easy. And in thinking so he was right — nothing 
 simpler, nothing easier, could be imagined than the 
 operation which had put Lucian and Haidee in funds 
 once more. It had simply consisted of a brief order, 
 given by Eustace Darlington to his manager, to the effect 
 that all cheques bearing the signatures of Mr. and Mrs. 
 Damerel were to be honoured on presentation, and that 
 there was to be no limit to their credit. 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 In spite of the amusing defection of his host, Saxon- 
 stowe had fully enjoyed the short time he had spent 
 under the Damerels' roof. Mrs. Berenson had amused 
 him almost as much as if she had been a professional 
 comedian brought there to divert the company; Darling- 
 ton had interested him as a specimen of the rather 
 reserved, purposeful sort of man who might possibly 
 do things; and Haidee had made him wonder how it is 
 that some women possess great beauty and very little 
 mind. But the recollection which remained most firmly 
 fixed in him was of Sprats, and on the first afternoon 
 he had at liberty he set out to find the Children's' 
 Hospital which she had invited him to visit. 
 
 He found the hospital with ease — an ordinary house 
 in Bayswater Square, with nothing to distinguish it from 
 its neighbours but a large brass plate on the door, which 
 announced that it was a Private Nursing Home for 
 Children. A trim maid-servant, who stared at him with 
 reverent awe after she had glanced at his card, showed 
 him into a small waiting-room adorned with steel 
 engravings of Biblical subjects, and there Sprats shortly 
 discovered him inspecting a representation of the animals 
 leaving the ark. It struck him as he shook hands with 
 her that she looked better in her nurse's uniform than 
 in the dinner-gown which she had worn a few nights 
 earlier — there was something businesslike and strong 
 about her in her cap and cuffs and apron and streamers : 
 it was like seeing a soldier in fighting trim. 
 
 ' I am glad that you have come just now,' she said. 
 ' I have a whole hour to spare, and I can show you all 
 over the place. But first come into my parlour and 
 have some tea.' 
 
 She led him into another room, where Biblical prints 
 
 149 
 
150 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 were not in evidence — if they had ever decorated the 
 walls they were now replaced by Sprats 's own posses- 
 sions. He recognised several water-colour drawings of 
 Simonstower, and one of his own house and park at 
 Saxonstowe. 
 
 ' These are the work of Cyprian Damerel — Lucian's 
 father, you know,' said Sprats, as he uttered an ex- 
 clamation of pleasure at the sight of familiar things. 
 ' Lucian gave them to me. I like that one of Saxon- 
 stowe Park — I have so often seen that curious atmo- 
 spheric effect amongst the trees in early autumn. I am 
 very fond of my pictures and my household gods — they 
 bring Simonstower closer to me.' 
 
 * But why, if you are so fond of it, did you leave it?' 
 he asked, as he took the chair which she pointed out to 
 him. 
 
 ' Oh, because I wanted to work very hard ! ' she said, 
 busying herself with the tea-cups. ' You see, my father 
 married Lucian Damerel' s aunt — a very dear, nice, 
 pretty woman — and I knew she would take such great 
 care of him that I could be spared. So I went in for 
 nursing, having a natural bent that way, and after three 
 or four years of it I came here; and here I am, absolute 
 she-dragon of the establishment.' 
 
 ' Is it very hard work?' he asked, as he took a cup 
 of tea from her hands. 
 
 * Well, it doesn't seem to affect me very much, does 
 it?' she answered. * Oh yes, sometimes it is, but that's 
 good for one. You must have worked hard yourself, 
 Lord Saxonstowe.' 
 
 Saxonstowe blushed under his tan. 
 
 * I look all right too, don't I?' he said, laughing. 
 ' I agree with you that it's good for one, though. I've 
 
 thought since I came back that ' He paused and 
 
 did not finish the sentence. 
 
 ' That it would do a lot of people whom you've met 
 a lot of good if they had a little hardship and privation 
 to go through,' she said, finishing it for him. ' That's 
 it, isn't it?' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 151 
 
 ' I wouldn't let them off with a little,' he said. ' I'd 
 give them — some of them, at any rate — a good deal. 
 Perhaps I'm not quite used to it, but I can't stand this 
 sort of life — I should go all soft and queer under it.' 
 
 ' Well, you're not obhged to endure it at all,' said 
 Sprats. * You can clear out of town whenever you 
 please and go to Saxonstowe — it is lovely in summer.' 
 
 * Yes,' he answered, * I'm going there soon. I — I 
 don't think town life quite appeals to me.' 
 
 ' I suppose that you will go off to some waste place 
 of the earth again, sooner or later, won't you?' she said. 
 ' I should think that if one once tastes that sort of thing 
 one can't very well resist the temptation. What made 
 you wish to explore?' 
 
 ' Oh, I don't know,' he answered. ' I always wanted 
 to travel when I was a boy, but I never got any chance. 
 Then the title came to me rather unexpectedly, you 
 know, and when I found that I could indulge my tastes 
 — well, I indulged them.' 
 
 * And you prefer the desert to the drawing-room?' 
 she said, watching him. 
 
 ' Lots ! ' he said fervently. ' Lots ! ' 
 Sprats smiled. 
 
 ' I should advise you,' she said, ' to cut London the 
 day your book appears. You'll be a Hon, you know.' 
 
 * Oh, but ! ' he exclaimed, * you don't quite recognise 
 what sort of book it is. It's not an exciting narrative — 
 no bears, or Indians, or scalpings, you know. It's — 
 well, it's a bit dry — scientific stuff, and so on.' 
 
 Sprats smiled the smile of the wise woman and shook 
 her head. 
 
 * It doesn't matter what it is — dry or delicious, dull or 
 enlivening,' she remarked sagely, ' the people who'll 
 lionise you won't read it, though they'll swear to your 
 face that they sat up all night with it. You'll see it 
 l5dng about, with the pages all cut and a book-marker 
 sticking out, but most of the people who'll rave to your 
 face about it wouldn't be able to answer any question 
 that you asked them concerning it. Lionising is an 
 
153 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 amusing feature of social life in England — if you don't 
 like the prospect of it, run away.' 
 
 ' I shall certainly run,' he answered. ' I will go soon. 
 I think, perhaps, that you exaggerate my importance, 
 but I don't want to incur any risk — it isn't pleasant to 
 be stared at, and pointed out, and all that sort of — 
 of ' 
 
 ' Of rot!' she said. ' No — it isn't, to some people. 
 To other people it seems quite a natural thing. It never 
 seemed to bother Lucian Damerel, for example. You 
 cannot realise the adulation which was showered upon 
 him when he first flashed into the literary heavens. All 
 the women were in love with him; all the girls love-sick 
 because of his dark face and wondrous hair; he was 
 stared at wherever he went; and he might have break- 
 fasted, lunched, and dined at somebody else's expense 
 every day.' 
 
 * And he liked — that?' asked Saxonstowe. 
 
 * It's a bit difficult,' answered Sprats, * to know what 
 Lucian does like. He plays lion to perfection. Have 
 you ever been to the Zoo and seen a real first-class, Ai 
 diamond-of-the-first- water sort of lion in his cage? — 
 especially when he is filled with meat? Well, you'll 
 have noticed that he gazes with solemn eyes above your 
 head — he never sees you at all — you aren't worth it. 
 If he should happen to look at you, he just wonders 
 why the devil you stand there staring at him, and his 
 eyes show a sort of cynical, idle contempt, and become 
 solenm and ever-so-far-away again. Lucian plays lion 
 in that way beautifully. He looks out of his cage with 
 eyes that scorn the miserable wondering things gathered 
 open-mouthed before him.' 
 
 ' Does he Uve in a cage?' asked Saxonstowe. 
 
 ' We all live in cages,' answered Sprats. ' You had 
 better hang up a curtain in front of yours if you don't 
 wish the crowd to stare at you. And now come — I will 
 show you my children.' 
 
 Saxonstowe followed her all over the house with 
 exemplary obedience, secretly admiring her mastery of 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 153 
 
 detail, her quickness of perception, and the motherly 
 fashion in which she treated her charges. He had never 
 I been in a children's hospital before, and he saw some 
 sights that sent him back to Sprats' s parlour a somewhat 
 sad man. 
 
 ' I dare say you get used to it,' he said, ' but the sight 
 of all that pain must be depressing. And the poor little 
 mites seem to bear it well — bravely, at any rate.' 
 
 Sprats looked at him with the speculative expression 
 which always came into her face when she was 
 endeavouring to get at some other person's real self. 
 
 * So you, too, are fond of children?' she said, and 
 responded cordially to his suggestion that he might per- 
 haps be permitted to come again. He went away with 
 a cheering consciousness that he had had a gUmpse into 
 a little world wherein good work was being done — it had 
 seemed a far preferable world to that other world of 
 fashion and small things which seethed all around it. 
 
 On the following day Saxonstowe spent the better part 
 of the morning in a toy-shop. He proved a good cus- 
 tomer, but a most particular one. He had counted 
 heads at the children's hospital : there were twenty-seven 
 in all, and he wanted twenty-seven toys for them. He 
 insisted on a minute inspection of every one, even to the 
 details of the dolls' clothing and the attainments of the 
 mechanical froga, and the young lady who attended 
 upon him decided that he was a nice gentleman and 
 free-handed, but terribly exacting. His bill, however, 
 yielded her a handsome commission, and when he gave 
 her the address of the hospital she felt sure that she had 
 spent two hours in conversation — on the merits of toys — 
 with a young duke, and for the rest of the day she enter- 
 tained her shopmates with reminiscences of the supposed 
 ducal remarks, none of which, according to her, had 
 been of a very profound nature. 
 
 Saxonstowe wondered how soon he might call at the 
 hospital again — at the end of a week he found himself 
 kicking his heels once more in the room wherein Noah, 
 his family, and his animals trooped gaily down the slopes 
 
154 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 of Mount Ararat. When Sprats came in she greeted him 
 with an abrupt question. 
 
 ' Was it you who sent a small cart-load of toys here 
 last week?' she asked. 
 
 ' I certainly did send some toys for the children,' he 
 answered. 
 
 ' I thought it must be your handiwork,' she said. 
 ' Thank you. You will now receive a beautifully 
 written, politely worded letter of thanks, inscribed on 
 thick, glossy paper by the secretary — do you mind?' 
 
 * Yes, I do mind!' he exclaimed. ' Please don't tell 
 the secretary — what has he or she to do with it ? ' 
 
 ' Very well, I won't,' she said. ' But I will give you 
 a practical tip : when you feel impelled to buy toys for 
 children in hospital, buy something breakable and cheap 
 — it pleases the child just as much as an expensive play- 
 thing. There was one toy too many,' she continued, 
 laughing, ' so I annexed that for myself — a mechanical 
 spider. I play with it in my room sometimes. I am 
 not above being amused by small things.' 
 
 After this Saxonstowe became a regular visitor — he 
 was accepted by some of the patients as a friend and 
 admitted to their confidences. They knew him as ' the 
 Lord,' and announced that ' the Lord ' had said this, 
 or done that, in a fashion which made other visitors, 
 not in the secret, wonder if the children were delirious 
 and had dreams of divine communications. He sent 
 these new friends books, and fruit, and flowers, and the 
 house was gayer and brighter that summer than it had 
 ever been since the brass plate was placed on its door. 
 
 One afternoon Saxonstowe arrived with a weighty- 
 looking parcel under his arm. Once within Sprats's 
 parlour he laid it down on the table and began to untie 
 the string. She shook her head. 
 
 * You have been spending money on one or other of 
 my children again,' she said. * I shall have to stop it.' 
 
 ' No,' he said, with a very shy smile. ' This — is — 
 for you.' 
 
 ' For me?' Her eyes opened with something like 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 155 
 
 incredulous wonder. * What an event ! * she said; * I so 
 seldom have anything given to me. What is it? — 
 quick, let me see — it looks like an enormous box of 
 chocolate.' 
 
 * It's — it's the book,' he answered, shamefaced as a 
 schoolboy producing his first verses. ' There ! that's it,' 
 and he placed two formidable-looking volumes, very new 
 and very redolent of the bookbinder's establishment, in 
 her hands. ' That's the very first copy,' he added. ' I 
 wanted you to have it.' 
 
 Sprats sat down and turned the books over. He had 
 written her name on the fly-leaf of the first volume, and 
 his own underneath it. She glanced at the maps, the 
 engravings, the diagrams, the scientific tables, and a 
 sudden flush came across her face. She looked up at 
 him. 
 
 ' I should be proud if I had written a book like this ! ' 
 she said. ' It means — such a lot of — well, of manliness, 
 somehow. Thank you. And it is really pubHshed at 
 last?' 
 
 * It is not supposed to be published until next 
 Monday,' he answered. * The reviewers' copies have 
 gone out to-day, but I insisted on having a copy sup- 
 pHed to me belore any one handled another — I wanted 
 you to have the very first.' 
 
 ' Why?' she asked. 
 
 * Because I think you'll understand it,' he said; ' and 
 you'll read it.' 
 
 ' Yes,' she answered, ' I shall read it, and I think I 
 shall understand. And now all the lionising will begin.' 
 Saxonstowe shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 * If the people who really know about these things 
 think I have done well, I shall be satisfied,' he said. 
 * I don't care a scrap about the reviews in the popular 
 papers — I am looking forward with great anxiety to the 
 criticisms of two or three scientific periodicals.' 
 
 ' You were going to run away from the lionising busi- 
 ness/ she said. * When are you going? — there is 
 nothing to keep you, now that the book is out.' 
 
156 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 Saxonstowe looked at her. He was standing at the 
 edge of the table on which she had placed the two 
 volumes of his book; she was sitting in a low chair at its 
 side. She looked up at him; she saw his face grow 
 very grave. 
 
 ' I didn't think anything would keep me,' he said, 
 ' but I find that something is keeping me. It is you. 
 Do you know that I love you? ' 
 
 The colour rose in her cheeks, and her eyes left his 
 for an instant; then she faced him. 
 
 ' I did not know it until just now,' she answered, 
 laying her hand on one of the volumes at her side. ' I 
 knew it then, because you wished me to have the first- 
 fruits of your labour. I was wondering about it — as 
 we talked.' 
 
 ' Well?' he said. 
 
 ' Will you let me be perfectly frank with you?' she 
 said. * Are you sure about yourself in this? ' 
 
 ' I am sure,' he answered. ' I love you, and I shall 
 never love any other woman. Don't think that I say 
 that in the way in which I dare say it's been said a 
 million times — I mean it.' 
 
 ' Yes,' she said; ' I imderstand. You wouldn't say 
 anything that you didn't mean. And I am going to be 
 equally truthful with you. I don't think it's wrong 
 of me to tell you that I have a feeling for you which 
 I have not, and never had, for any other man that I 
 have known. I could depend on you — I could go to 
 you for help and advice, and I should rely on your 
 strength. I have felt that since we met, as man and 
 woman, a few weeks ago.' 
 
 ' Then ' he began. 
 
 ' Stop a bit,' she said, ' let me finish. I want to be 
 brutally plain-spoken — it's really best to be so. I want 
 you to know me as I am. I have loved Lucian Damerel 
 ever since he and I were boy and girl. It is, perhaps, 
 a curious love — you might say that there is very much 
 more of a mother's, or a sister's, love in it than a wife's. 
 Well, I don't know. I do know that it nearly broke 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 157 
 
 my heart when I heard of his marriage to Haidee. I 
 cannot tell — I have never been able to tell — in what 
 exact way it was that I wanted him, but I did not want 
 her to have him. Perhaps all that, or most of that, feel- 
 ing has gone. I have tried hard, by working for others, 
 to put all thought of another woman's husband out of 
 my mind. But the thought of Lucian is still there — 
 it may, perhaps, always be there. While it is — even 
 in the least, the very least degree — you understand, do 
 you not?' she said, with a sudden note of eager appeal 
 breaking into her voice. 
 
 ' Yes,' he answered, ' I understand.' 
 
 She rose to her feet and held out her hand to him. 
 
 ' Then don't let us try to put into words what we can 
 feel much better,' she said, smiling. * We are friends 
 — always. And you are going away.' 
 
 The children found out that for some time at any rate 
 there would be no more visits from the Lord. But the 
 toys and the books, the fruit and flowers, came as regu- 
 larly as ever, and the Lord was not forgotten. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 During the greater part of that summer Lucian had 
 been working steadily on two things : the tragedy which 
 Mr. Harcourt was to produce at the Athenaeum in 
 December, and a new poem which Mr. Robertson 
 intended to pubHsh about the middle of the autumn 
 season. Lucian was flying at high game in respect of 
 both. The tragedy was intended to introduce somethmg 
 of the spirit and dignity of Greek art to the nineteenth- 
 century stage— there was to be nothing common or mean 
 in connection with its production; it was to be a gorgeous 
 spectacle, but one of high distinction, and Lucian's 
 direct intention in writing it was to set English dramatic 
 art on an elevation to which it had never yet been lifted. 
 The poem was an equally ambitious attempt to revive 
 the epic; its subject, the Norman Conquest, had filled 
 Lucian's mind since boyhood, and from his tenth year 
 onwards he had read every book and document procur- 
 able which treated of that fascinating period. He had 
 begun the work during his Oxford days; the greater 
 part of it was now in type, and Mr. Robertson was 
 incurring vast expense in the shape of author's correc- 
 tions. Lucian polished and rewrote in a fashion that 
 was exasperating; his pubHsher, never suspecting that 
 so many alterations would be made, had said nothing 
 about them in drawing up a formal agreement, and he 
 was daily obliged to witness a disappearance of profits. 
 ' What a pity that you did not make all your altera- 
 tions and corrections before sending the manuscript to 
 press ! ' he exclaimed one day, when Lucian called with 
 a bundle of proofs which had been hacked about in such 
 
 158 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 159 
 
 a fashion as to need complete resetting. ' It would have 
 saved a lot of trouble — and expense.' 
 
 Lucian stared at him with the eyes of a young owl, 
 round and wondering. 
 
 ' How on earth can you see what a thing looks like 
 until it's in print?' he said irritably. 'What are 
 printers for?' 
 
 * Just so — just so!' responded the publisher. * But 
 really, you know, this book is being twice set — every 
 sheet has had to be pulled to pieces, and it adds to the 
 expense.' 
 
 Lucian's eyes grew rounder than ever. 
 
 ' I don't know an5^ing about that,' he answered. 
 * That is your province — don't bother me about it.' 
 
 Robertson laughed. He was beginning to find out, 
 after some experience, that Lucian was imperturbable 
 on certain points. 
 
 ' Very well,' he said. ' By the bye, how much more 
 copy is there — or if copy is too vulgar a word for your 
 mightiness, how many more lines or verses?' 
 
 * About four hundred and fifty lines,' answered 
 Lucian. 
 
 ' Say another twenty-four pages,' said Robertson. 
 ' Well, it runs now to three hundred and fifty — that 
 means that it's going to to be a book of close upon four 
 hundred pages.' 
 
 * Well?' questioned Lucian. 
 
 ' I was merely thinking that it is a long time since 
 the public was asked to buy a volume containing four 
 hundred pages of blank verse,' remarked the publisher. 
 ' I hope this won't frighten anybody.' 
 
 * You make some very extraordinary remarks,' said 
 Lucian, with unmistakable signs of annoyance. * What 
 do you mean?' 
 
 ' Oh, nothing, nothing ! ' answered Robertson, who was 
 on sufficient terms of intimacy with Lucian to be able 
 to chaff him a little. * I was merely thinking of trade 
 considerations.' 
 
 * You appear to be always " merely thinking " of 
 
i6o LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 something extraordinary,' said Lucian. ' What can 
 trade considerations have to do with the length of my 
 poem ? ' 
 
 ' What indeed?' said the pubUsher. and began to talk 
 of something else. But when Lucian had gone he looked 
 rather doubtfully at the pile of interlineated proof, and 
 glanced from it to the thin octavo with which the new 
 poet had won all hearts nearly five years before. ^ ' I 
 wish it had been just a handful of gold hke that!' he 
 said to himself. * Four hundred pages of blank verse 
 all at one go !— it's asking a good deal, unless it catches 
 on with the old maids and the dowagers, like the Course 
 of Time and the Epic of Hades. Well, we shall see; 
 but I'd rather have some of your earlier lyrics than this 
 weighty performance, Lucian, my boy — I would 
 indeed ! ' 
 
 Lucian finished his epic before the middle of July, and 
 fell to work on the final stages of his tragedy. He had 
 promised to read it to the Athenaeum company on the 
 first day of the coming October, and there was still much 
 to do in shaping and revising it. He began to feel 
 impatient and irritable; the sight of his desk annoyed 
 him, and he took to running out of town into the country 
 whenever the wish for the shade of woods and the peace- 
 fulness of the lanes came upon him. Before the end 
 of the month he felt unable to work, and he repaired to 
 Sprats for counsel and comfort. 
 
 ' I don't know how or why it is,* he said, telling her 
 his troubles, ' but I don't feel as if I had a bit of work 
 left in me. I haven't any power of concentration left — 
 I'm always wanting to be doing something else. And 
 yet I haven't worked very hard this year, and we have 
 been away a great deal. It's nearly time for going away 
 again, too — I believe Haidee has already made some 
 arrangement.' 
 
 * Lucian,' said Sprats, ' why don't you go down to 
 Simonstower? They would be so glad to have you at 
 the vicarage — there's heaps of room. And just think 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER i6i 
 
 how jolly it is there in August and September— I wish I 
 could go ! ' 
 
 Lucian's face lighted up — some memory of the old 
 days had suddenly fired his soul. He saw the famiHar 
 scenes once more under the golden sunlight — the grey 
 castle and its Norman keep, the winding river, the shelv- 
 ing woods, and, framing all, the gold and purple of the 
 moorlands. 
 
 ' Simonstower ! ' he exclaimed. ' Yes, of course — 
 it's Simonstower that I want. ^ We'll go at once. 
 Sprats, why can't you come too?' 
 
 Sprats shook her head. 
 
 ' I can't,' she answered. ' I shall have a holiday in 
 September, but I can't take a single day before. I'm 
 sure it will do you good if you go to Simonstower, Lucian 
 — the north-country air will brighten you up. You 
 haven't been there for four years, and the sight of the 
 old faces and places will act like a tonic' 
 
 ' I'll arrange it at once,' said Lucian, delighted at the 
 idea, and he went off to announce his projects to Haidee. 
 Haidee looked at him incredulously. 
 
 * Whatever are you thinking of, Lucian?' she said. 
 * Don't you remember that we're cramful of engage- 
 ments from the beginning of August to the end of 
 September? ' She recited a list of arrangements already 
 entered into, which included a three-weeks' sojourn on 
 Eustace Darlington's steam-yacht, and a fortnight's stay 
 at his shooting-box in the Highlands. ' Had you for- 
 gotten?' she asked. 
 
 ' I believe I had!' he replied; ' we seem to have so 
 many engagements. Look here: do you know, I think 
 I'll back out. I must have this tragedy finished for 
 Harcourt and his people by October, and I can't do it if 
 I go rushing about from one place to another. I think 
 I shall go down to Simonstower and have a quiet time 
 and finish my work there — I'll explain it all to 
 Darlington.' 
 
 ' As you please,' she answered. ' Of course, I shall 
 keep my engagements.' 
 
 L 
 
i62 LUCTAN THE DREAMER 
 
 * Oh, of course,' he said. ' You won't miss me, you 
 know. I suppose there are lots of other people going?' 
 
 ' I suppose so,' she replied carelessly, and there was 
 an end of the conversation. Lucian explained to 
 Darlington that night that he would not be able to keep 
 his engagement, and set forth the reasons with a fine 
 air of devotion to business. Darlington sympathised, 
 and applauded Lucian 's determination — he knew, he 
 said, what a lot depended upon the success of the new 
 play, and he'd no doubt Lucian wouldn't feel quite 
 easy until it was all in order. After that he must have 
 a long rest — it would be rather good fun to winter in 
 Egypt. Lucian agreed, and next day made his prepara- 
 tions for a descent upon Simonstower. At heart he was 
 rather more than glad to escape the yacht, the Highland 
 shooting-box, and the people whom he would have met. 
 He cared little for the sea, and hated any form of sport 
 which involved the slaying of animals or birds; the 
 thought of Simonstower in the last weeks of summer 
 was grateful to him, and all that he now wanted was to 
 find himself in a Great Northern express gliding out of 
 King's Cross, bound for the moorlands. 
 
 He went round to the hospital on the morning of his 
 departure, and told Sprats with the glee of a schoolboy 
 who is going home for the holidays, that he was off 
 that very afternoon. He was rattling on as to his joy 
 when Sprats stopped him. 
 
 * And Haidee?' she asked. ' Does she like it?' 
 
 ' Haidee?' he said. * But Haidee is not going. 
 She's joining a party on Darlington's yacht, and they're 
 going round the coast to his place in the Highlands. 
 I was to have gone, you know, but really I couldn't 
 have worked, and I must work — it's absolutely neces- 
 sary that the play should be finished by the end of 
 September.' 
 
 Sprats looked anxious and troubled. 
 
 ' Look here, Lucian,' she said, ' do you think it's 
 quite right to leave Haidee like that? — isn't it rather 
 neglecting your duties?' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 163 
 
 ' But why?' he asked, with such sincerity that it 
 became plain to Sprats that the question had never even 
 entered his mind. ' Haidee's all right. It would be 
 beastly selfish on my part if I dragged her down to 
 Simonstower for nearly two months — you know, she 
 doesn't care a bit for the country, and there would be 
 no society for her. She needs sea air, and three weeks 
 on Darlington's yacht will do her a lot of good.' 
 
 ' Who are the other people?' asked Sprats. 
 
 ' Oh, I don't know,' Lucian replied. ' The usual 
 Darlington lot, I suppose. Between you and me. 
 Sprats, I'm glad I'm not going. I get rather sick of that 
 sort of thing — ^it's too much of a hot-house existence. 
 And I don't care about the people one meets, either.' 
 
 * And yet you let Haidee meet them ! ' Sprats ex- 
 claimed. ' Really, Lucian, you grow more and more 
 paradoxical.' 
 
 ' But Haidee likes them,' he insisted. * That's just 
 the sort of thing she does like. And if she likes it, why 
 shouldn't she have it?' 
 
 * You are a curious couple,' said Sprats. 
 
 ' I think we are to be praised for our common-sense 
 view of things,' he said. ' I am often told that I am a 
 dreamer — you've said so yourself, you know — but in 
 real, sober truth, I'm an awfully matter-of-fact sort of 
 person. I don't live on illusions and ideals and things 
 — I worship the God of the Things that Are!' 
 
 Sprats gazed at him as a mother might gaze at a child 
 who boasts of having performed an impossible task. 
 
 ' Oh, you absolute baby!' she said. ' Is your pretty 
 head stuffed with wool or with feathers? Paragon of 
 Common-Sense! Compendium of all the Practical 
 Qualities! I wonder I don't shrivel in your presence 
 like a bit of bacon before an Afric sun. Do you think 
 you'll catch your train? ' 
 
 ' Not if I stay here listening to abuse. Seriously, 
 Sprats, it's all right — about Haidee, I mean,' he said 
 appealingly. 
 
 ' If you were glissading down a precipice at a hundred 
 
i64 LUCIAN THE DREMIER 
 
 miles a minute, Lucian, everything would be all right 
 with you until your head broke off or you snapped in 
 two,' she answered. ' You're the Man who Never Stops 
 to Think. Go away and be quiet at Simonstower— - 
 you're mad to get there, and you'll probably leave it 
 within a week.' 
 
 In making this calculation, however, Sprats was 
 wrong. Lucian went down to Simonstower and stayed 
 there three weeks. He divided his time between the 
 vicarage and the farm; he renewed his acquaintance with 
 the villagers, and had forgotten nothing of anything 
 relating to them; he spent the greater part of the day in 
 the open air, Uved plainly and slept soundly, and during 
 the second week of his stay he finished his tragedy. 
 Mr. Chilverstone read it and the revised proofs of the 
 epic; as he had a great liking for blank verse, rounded 
 periods, and the grand manner, he prophesied success 
 for both. Lucian drank in his applause with eagerness 
 
 he had a great belief in his old tutor's critical powers, 
 
 and felt that whatever he stamped with the seal of his 
 admiration must be good. He had left London in some- 
 what depressed and irritable spirits because of his in- 
 ability to work; now that the work was completed and 
 praised by a critic in whom he had good reason to repose 
 the fullest confidence, his spirits became as light and 
 joyous as ever. 
 
 Lucian would probably have remained longer at 
 Simonstower but for a chance meeting with Lord Saxon- 
 stowe, who had got a little weary of the ancestral hall 
 and had conceived a notion of going across to Norway 
 and taking a long walking tour in a district well out of 
 the tourist track. He mentioned this to Lucian, and — 
 why, he could scarcely explain to himself at the moment 
 
 asked him to go with him. Lucian 's imagination was 
 
 fired at the mere notion of exploring a country which 
 he had never seen before, and he accepted the invitation 
 with fervour. A week later they sailed from Newcastle, 
 and for a whole month they spent nights and days side 
 by side amidst comparative solitudes. Each began to 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 165 
 
 understand the other, and when, just before the end of 
 September, they returned to England, they had becorne 
 firm friends, and were gainers by their pilgrimage in 
 more ways than one. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 When Lucian went back to town Haidee was winding 
 up a short round of visits in the North; she rejoined 
 him a week later in high spirits and excellent health. 
 Everything had been delightful; everybody had been 
 nice to her; no end of people had talked about Lucian 
 and his new play — she was dreaming already of the 
 glories of the first night and of the radiance which would 
 centre about herself as the wife of the briUiant young 
 author. Lucian had returned from Norway in equally 
 good health and spirits; he was confident about the 
 tragedy and the epic: he and his wife therefore settled 
 down to confront an immediate prospect of success and 
 pleasure. Haidee resumed her usual round of social 
 gaieties; Lucian was much busied with rehearsals at 
 the theatre and long discussions with Harcourt; neither 
 had a care nor an anxiety, and the wheels of their little 
 world moved smoothly. 
 
 Saxonstowe, who had come back to town for a few 
 weeks before going abroad again, took to calling a good 
 deal at the little house in Mayfair. He had come to 
 understand and to like Lucian, and though they were 
 as dissimilar in character as men of different tempera- 
 ment can possibly be, a curious bond of friendship, 
 expressed in tacit acquiescence rather than in open 
 avowal, sprang up between them. Each had a respect 
 for the other's world — a respect which was amusing to 
 Sprats, who, watching them closely, knew that each 
 admired the other in a somewhat sheepish, schoolboy 
 fashion. Lucian, being the less reserved of the two, 
 made no secret of his admiration of the man who had 
 done things the doing of which necessitated bravery, 
 endurance, and self-denial. He was a fervent wor- 
 shipper — almost to a pathetic extreme — of men of 
 action: the sight of soldiers marching made his toes 
 
 1 66 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 167 
 
 tingle and his eyes fill with the moisture of enthusiasm; 
 he had been so fascinated by the mere sight of a great 
 Arctic explorer that he had followed him from one town 
 to another during a lecturing tour, simply to stare at him 
 and conjure up for himself the scenes and adventures 
 through which the man had passed. He dehghted in 
 hearing Saxonstowe talk about his life in the deserts, 
 and enjoyed it all the more because Saxonstowe had 
 small gift of language and told his tale with the blushes 
 of a schoolboy who hates making a fuss about anjrthing 
 that he has done. Saxonstowe, on his part, had a 
 sneaking liking, amounting almost to worship, for men 
 who live in a world of dreams — he had no desire to 
 live in such a world himself, but he cherished an 
 immense respect for men who, like Lucian, could create. 
 Sometimes he would read a page of the new epic and 
 wonder how on earth it all came into Lucian 's head; 
 Lucian at the same moment was probably turning over 
 the leaves of Saxonstowe' s book and wondering how a 
 man could go through all that that laconic young gentle- 
 man had gone through and yet come back with a stiff 
 upper lip and a smile. 
 
 * You and Lucian Damerel appear to have become 
 something of friends,' Lady Firmanence remarked to 
 her nephew when he called upon her one day. ' I don't 
 know that there's much in common between you.' 
 
 ' Perhaps that is why we are friends,' said Saxon- 
 stowe. ' You generally do get on with people who are a 
 bit different to yourself, don't you?' 
 
 Lady Firmanence made no direct answer to this 
 question. 
 
 ' I've no doubt Lucian is easy enough to get on with,' 
 she said dryly. * The mischief in him, Saxonstowe, is 
 that he's too easy-going about everything. I suppose 
 you know, as you're a sort of friend of the family, that 
 a good deal is being said about Mrs. Damerel and 
 Eustace Darlington?' 
 
 ' No,' said Saxonstowe; ' I'm not in the way to hear 
 that sort of thing.' 
 
i68 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 ' I don't know that you're any the better for being 
 out of the way. I am in the way. There's a good deal 
 being said,' Lady Firrnanence retorted with some 
 asperity. ' I beheve some of you young men think it a 
 positive crime to hsten to the smallest scrap of gossip — 
 it's nothing of the sort. If you live in the world you 
 must learn all you can about the people who make up 
 the world.' 
 
 Saxonstowe nodded. His eyes fixed themselves on 
 a toy dog which snored and snuffled at Lady Fir- 
 manence's feet. 
 
 ' And in this particular case?' he said. 
 
 * Why was Lucian Damerel so foohsh as to go off in 
 one direction while his wife went in another with the 
 man she originally meant to marry?' inquired Lady 
 Firmanence. ' Come now, Saxonstowe, would you 
 have done that?' 
 
 ' No,' he said hesitatingly, ' I don't think I should; 
 but then, you see, Damerel looks at things differently. 
 I don't think he would ever give the foolishness of it 
 a thought, and he would certainly think no evil — he's as 
 guileless as a child.' 
 
 ' Well,' remarked Lady Firmanence, ' I don't admire 
 him any the more for that. I'm a bit out of love with 
 grown-up children. If Lucian Damerel marries a wife 
 he should take care of her. Why, she was three weeks 
 on Darlington's yacht, and three weeks at his place in 
 Scotland (of course there were lots of other people there 
 too, but even then it was foolish), and he was with her 
 at two or three country houses in Northumberland later 
 on — I met them at one myself.' 
 
 ' Lucian and his wife,' said Saxonstowe, ' are very 
 fond of having their own way.' 
 
 Lady Firmanence looked at her nephew out of her 
 eye-comers. 
 
 ' Oh ! ' she said, with a caustic irony, ' you think so, 
 do you? Well, you know, young people who like to 
 have their own way generally come to grief. To my 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 169 
 
 mind, your new friends seem to be qualifying for 
 trouble/ 
 
 Saxonstowe studied the pattern of the carpet and 
 traced bits of it out with his stick. 
 
 ' Do you think men like Damerel have the power of 
 reckoning things up?' he said, suddenly looking at his 
 aunt with a quick, appealing glance. ' I don't quite 
 understand these things, but he always seems to me to 
 be a bit impatient of anything that has to do with every- 
 day life, and yet he's keen enough about it in one way. 
 He's a real good chap, you know — kindly natured and 
 open-hearted and all that. You soon find that in him. 
 And I don't beheve he ever had a wrong thought of 
 anybody — he's a sort of confiding trust in other people 
 that's a bit amusing, even to me, and I haven't seen 
 
 such an awful lot of the world. But ' He came to 
 
 a sudden pause and shook his head. Lady Firmanence 
 laughed. 
 
 ' Yes, but,' she repeated. ' That " but " makes all 
 the difference. But this is Lucian Damerel — he is a 
 child who sits in a gaily caparisoned, comfortably 
 appointed boat which has been launched on a wide river 
 that runs through a mighty valley. He has neither 
 sail nor rudder, and he is so intent on the beauty of the 
 scenery through which he is swept that he does not 
 recognise their necessity. His eyes are fixed on the rose- 
 flushed peak of a far-off mountain, the glitter of the 
 sunshine on a dancing wave, or on the basket of provi- 
 sions which thoughtful hands have put in the boat. It 
 may be that the boat will glide to its destination in 
 safety, and land him on the edge of a field of velvety 
 grass wherein he can lie down in peace to dream as long 
 as he pleases. But it also may be that it will run on a 
 rock in mid-stream and knock his fool's paradise into 
 a cocked hat — and what's going to happen then?' asked 
 Lady Firmanence. 
 
 ' Lots of things might happen,' said Saxonstowe, 
 smiling triumphantly at the thought of beating his clever 
 relative at her own game. * He might be able to swim. 
 
170 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 for example. He might right the boat, get into it again, 
 and learn by experience that one shouldn't go fooling 
 about without a rudder. Some other chap might come 
 along and give him a hand. Or the river might be so 
 shallow that he could walk ashore with no more dis- 
 comfort than he would get from wet feet.* 
 
 Lady Finnanence pursed her lips and regarded her 
 nephew with a fixed stare which lasted until the smile 
 died out of his face. 
 
 * Or there might be a crocodile, or an alligator, at 
 hand, which he could saddle and bridle, and con- 
 vert into a park hack,' she said. * There are 
 indeed many things which might happen; what 
 I'm chiefly concerned about is, what would happen 
 if Lucian's Httle boat did upset? I confess 
 that I should know Lucian Damerel much more 
 thoroughly, and have a more accurate conception of 
 him, if I knew exactly what he would say and do when 
 the upsetting happened. There is no moment in life, 
 Saxonstowe, wherein a man's real self, real character, 
 real quality, is so severely tested and laid bare as that 
 unexpected one in which Fortune seizes him by the 
 scruff of his neck and bundles him into the horsepond 
 of adversity — it's what he says and does when he comes 
 up spluttering that stamps him as a man or a mouse.' 
 
 Saxonstowe felt tolerably certain of what any man 
 would say under the circumstances alluded to by Lady 
 Firmanence, but as she seemed highly delighted with her 
 similes and her epigrams, he said nothing of his convic- 
 tions, and soon afterwards took his departure^ 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 On a certain Monday morning in the following 
 November, Lucian's great epic was published to the 
 trade and the world, and the leading newspapers devoted 
 a good deal of their space to remarking upon its merits, 
 its demerits, and its exact relation to literature. Lucian 
 found a pile of the London morning dailies of the 
 superior sort awaiting his attention when he descended 
 to his breakfast-room, and he went through them 
 systematically. When he had made an end of them he 
 looked across the table at Haidee, and he smiled in 
 what she thought a rather queer way. 
 
 ' I say, Haidee ! ' he exclaimed, ' these reviews are — 
 well, they're not very flattering. There are six mighty 
 voices of the press here, — Times, Telegraph, Post, News, 
 Chronicle, and Standard — and there appears to be a 
 strange unanimity of opinion in their pronunciations. 
 The epic poem seems to be at something of a discount.' 
 
 The reviews, in fact, were not couched in an 
 enthusiastic vein — taking them as a whole they were 
 cold. There was a ring of disappointment in them. 
 One reviewer, daring to be bold, plain, and somewhat 
 brutal, said there was more genuine poetry in any one 
 page of any of Mr. Damerel's previous volumes than in 
 the whole four hundred of his new one. Another openly 
 declared his belief that the poem was the result of long 
 years of careful, scholarly labour, of constant polishing, 
 resetting, and rewriting; it smelled strongly of the lamp, 
 but the smell of the lamp was not in evidence in the 
 fresh, free, passionate work which they had previously 
 had from the same pen. Mr. Damerel's history, said a 
 third, was as accurate as his lines were polished; one 
 learned almost as much of the Norman Conquest from 
 his poem as from the pages of Freeman, but the spon- 
 taneity of his earliest work appeared to be wanting in 
 
 171 
 
172 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 his latest. Each of the six reviewers seemed to be 
 indulging a sentimental sorrow for the Mr. Damerel of 
 the earlier days; their criticisms had an undercurrent of 
 regret that Lucian had chosen to explore another path 
 than that which he had hitherto trodden in triumph. 
 The consensus of opinion, as represented by the critics 
 of the six morning newspapers lying on Lucian 's break- 
 fast-table, amounted to this: that Mr. Damerel' s new 
 work, unmistakably the production of a true poet though 
 it was, did not possess the quahties of power and charm 
 which had distinguished his previous volumes. And to 
 show his exact meaning and make out a good case for 
 himself, each critic hit upon the exasperating trick of 
 reprinting those of Lucian' s earlier lines which made 
 perpetual music in their own particular souls, pointing 
 to them with a proud finger as something great and 
 glorious, and hinting that they were samples of goods 
 which they would have wished Mr. Damerel to supply 
 for ever. 
 
 Lucian was disappointed and gratified; amused and 
 annoyed. It was disappointing to find that the incense 
 to which he had become accustomed was not offered 
 up to him in the usual lavish fashion; but it was pleasing 
 to hear the nice things said of what he had done and of 
 what the critics beheved him capable of doing. He 
 was amused at the disappointment of the gentlemen who 
 preferred Lucian the earlier to Lucian the later — and, 
 after all, it was annoying to find one's great effort some- 
 what looked askance at. 
 
 'I've given them too much,' he said, turning to con- 
 siderations of breakfast with a certain amount of pity for 
 himself.' I ought to have remembered that the stomach 
 of this generation is a weak one — Tennyson was wise 
 in giving his public the Idylls of the King in fragments — 
 if he'd given his most fervent admirers the whole lot 
 all at once they'd have had a surfeit. I should have 
 followed his example, but I wanted to present the thing 
 as a whole. And it is good, however they may damn it 
 with faint praise.' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 173 
 
 ' Does this mean that the book won't sell?' asked 
 Haidee, who had gathered up the papers, and was glanc- 
 ing through the columns at the head of which Lucian's 
 name stood out in bold letters. 
 
 ' Sell? Why, I don't think reviews make much 
 difference to the sales of a book,' answered Lucian. * I 
 really don't know — I suppose the people who bought all 
 my other volumes will buy this.' 
 
 But as he ate his chop and drank his coffee he began 
 to wonder what would happen if the new volume did not 
 sell. He knew exactly how many copies of his other 
 volumes had been sold up to the end of the previous 
 half-year: it was no business instinct that made him 
 carry the figures in his mind, but rather the instinct of 
 the general who counts his prisoners, his captured 
 eagles, and his dead enemies after a victory, and of the 
 sportsman who knows that the magnitude of the 
 winnings of a great racehorse is a tribute to the quality 
 of its blood and bone and muscle. He recalled the 
 figures of the last statement of account rendered to him 
 by his publisher, and their comfortable rotundity 
 cheered him. Whatever the critics might say, he had a 
 public, and a public of considerable size. And after 
 all, this was the first time the critics had not burned 
 incense at his shrine — he forgave them with generous 
 readiness, and ere he rose from the breakfast-table was 
 as full as ever of confident optimism. He felt as regards 
 those particular reviewers as a man might feel who bids 
 all and sundry to a great feast, and finds that the first- 
 comers are taken aback by the grand proportions of the 
 banquet — he pitied them for their lack of appetite, but 
 he had no doubt of the verdict of the vast majority of 
 later comers. 
 
 But if Lucian had heard some of the things that were 
 said of him and his beloved epic in those holes and 
 comers of literary life wherein one may hear much 
 trenchant criticism plainly voiced, he would have felt 
 less cock-sure about it and himself. It was the general 
 opinion amongst a certain class of critics, who exercised 
 
174 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 a certain influence upon public thought, that there was 
 too much of the workshop in his magnum opus. It was 
 a magnificent block of marble that he had handled, but 
 he had handled it too much, and the result would have 
 been greater if he had not perpetually hovered about it 
 with a hungry chisel and an itching mallet. It was 
 perfect in form and language and proportion, but it 
 wanted life and fire and rude strength. 
 
 ' It reminds me,' said one man, discussing it in a 
 club corner where coffee-cups, liqueur-glasses, and 
 cigarettes were greatly in evidence, ' of the statue of 
 Galatea, flawless, immaculate, but neuter, — yes, neuter 
 — as it appeared at the very moment ere Pygmalion's 
 love breathed into it the very flush, the palpitating, 
 forceful tremor of life.' 
 
 This man was young and newly come to town — the 
 others looked at him with shy eyes and tender sympathy, 
 for they knew what it was that he meant to say, and they 
 also knew, being older, how difficult it is to express 
 oneself in words. 
 
 ' How very differently one sees things ! ' sighed one of 
 them. ' Damerel's new poem, now, reminds me of a 
 copy of the Pink 'Un, carefully edited by a committee 
 of old maids for the use of mixed classes in infant 
 schools.' 
 
 The young man who used mellifluous words mani- 
 fested signs of astonishment. He looked at the last 
 speaker with inquiring eyes. 
 
 ' You mean ' he began. 
 
 * Ssh!' whispered a voice at his elbow, ' don't ask 
 him what he means at any time. He means that the 
 thing's lacking in virility.' 
 
 It may have been the man who Hkened Lucian's epic 
 to an emasculated and expurgated Pink 'Un to whom 
 was due a subsequent article in the Porthole, wherein, 
 under the heading Lucian the Ladylike, much sympathy 
 was expressed with William the Conqueror at his sad 
 fate in being sung by a nineteenth-century bard. There 
 was much good-humoured satire in that article, but a 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 175 
 
 good many of its points were sharply barbed, and 
 Lucian winced under them. He was beginning to find 
 by that time that his epic was not being greeted with 
 the enthusiasm which he had anticipated for it; the great 
 literary papers, the influential journals of the provinces, 
 and the critics who wrote of it in two or three of the 
 monthly reviews, all concurred that it was very fine as a 
 literary exercise, but each deplored the absence of a 
 certain something which had been very conspicuous 
 indeed in his earlier volumes. 
 
 Lucian began to think things over. He remembered 
 how his earlier work had been written — he recalled the 
 free, joyous flush of thought, the impulse to write, the 
 fertility and fecundity which had been his in those days, 
 and he contrasted it all with the infinite pains which he 
 had taken in polishing and revising the epic. It must 
 have been the process of revision, he thought, which 
 had sifted the fire and life out of the poem. He read and 
 re-read passages of it — in spite of all that the critics said, 
 they pleased him. He remembered the labour he had 
 gone through, and valued the results by it. And finally, 
 he put the whole affair away from him, feeling that he 
 and his world were not in accord, and that he had better 
 wrap himself in his cloak for a while. He spoke of the 
 epic no more. But unfortunately for Lucian, there 
 were monetary considerations at the back of the new 
 volume, and when he discovered at the end of a month 
 that the sales were small and already at a stand- 
 still, he felt a sudden, strange sinking at the heart. He 
 looked at Mr. Robertson, who communicated this news 
 to him, in a fashion which showed the pubUsher that he 
 did not quite understand this apparently capricious 
 neglect on the part of the public. Mr. Robertson 
 endeavoured to explain matters to him. 
 
 ' After all,' he said, ' there is such a thing as a vogue, 
 and the best man may lose it. I don't say that you have 
 lost yours, but here's the fact that the book is at a stand- 
 still. The faithful bought as a religious duty as soon as 
 we published; those of the outer courts won't buy. For 
 
176 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 one thing, your poem is not quite in the fashion — what 
 people are buying just now in poetry is patriotism up- 
 to-date, with extension of the Empire, and Maxim-guns, 
 and deification of the soldier and sailor, and so on.' 
 
 * You talk as if there were fashions in poetry as there 
 are in clothes/ said Lucian, with some show of scornful 
 indignation. 
 
 * So there are, my dear sir ! ' replied the pubHsher. 
 ' If you lived less in the clouds and more in the world 
 of plain fact you would know it. You, for instance, 
 would think it strange, if you had ever read it, to find 
 PoUok's poem, The Course of Time, selling to the extent 
 of thousands and tens of thousands, or of Tupper's Pro- 
 verbial Philosophy making almost as prominent a figure 
 in the middle-class household as the Bible itself. Of 
 course there's a fashion in poetry, as there is in every- 
 thing else. Byron was once the fashion; Mrs. Hemans 
 was once the fashion; even Robert Montgomery was once 
 fashionable. You yourself were very fashionable for 
 three years — you see, if you'll pardon me for speaking 
 plainly, you were an interesting young man. You had 
 a beautiful face; you were what the women call " inter- 
 esting "; you aroused all the town by your romantic 
 marriage — you became a personality. I think you've 
 had a big run of it,' concluded Mr. Robertson. ' Why, 
 lots of men come up and go down within two years — 
 you've had four already.' 
 
 Lucian regarded him with grave eyes. 
 
 ' Do you think of me as of a rocket or a comet?' he 
 said. ' If things are what you say they are, I wish I 
 had never pubhshed an3^hing. But I think you are 
 wrong,' and he went away to consider all that had been 
 said to him. He decided, after some thought and reflec- 
 tion, that his publisher was not arguing on sound Hues, 
 and he assured himself for the hundredth time that the 
 production of the tragedy would put everything right. 
 
 It was now very near to the day on which the tragedy 
 was to be produced at the Athenaeum, and both Lucian 
 and Mr. Harpourt had been worried to the point of death 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 177 
 
 by pressmen who wanted to know all about it. Chiefly 
 owing to their persistency the public were now in posses- 
 sion of a considerable amount of information as to what 
 it might expect to hear and see. It was to witness — that 
 portion of it, at any rate, which was lucky enough to 
 secure seats for the first night — an attempt to revive 
 tragedy on the lines of pure Greek art. As this attempt 
 was being made at the close of the nineteenth century, 
 it was quite in accordance with everything that vast sums 
 of money should be laid out on costumes, scenery, and 
 accessories, and it was well known to the readers of the 
 halfpenny newspapers that the production involved the 
 employment of so many hundreds of supernumeraries, 
 that so many thousands of poimds had been spent on the 
 scenery, that certain realistic effects had been worked 
 up at enormous cost, and that the whole affair, to put it 
 in plain language, was a gigantic business speculation — 
 nothing more nor less, indeed, than the provision of a 
 gorgeous spectacular drama, full of life and colour and 
 modem stage effects, which should be enthralling and 
 commanding enough to attract the public until a hand- 
 some profit had been made on the outlay. But the words 
 ' an attempt to revive Tragedy on the lines of pure Greek 
 Art ' looked well in print, and had a highly respectable 
 sound, and the production of Lucian's second tribute to 
 the tragic muse was looked forward to with much interest 
 by many people who ignored the fact that many 
 thousands of pounds were being expended in placing it 
 upon the stage. 
 
 M 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 At twelve o'clock on the night that witnessed the produc- 
 tion of the tragedy, Lucian found himself one of a group 
 of six men which had gathered together in Harcourt's 
 dressing-room. There was a blue haze of cigarette 
 smoke all over the room; a decanter of whisky with 
 syphons and glasses stood on a table in the centre; most 
 of the men had abready helped themselves to a drink. 
 Lucian found a glass in his own hand, and sipped the 
 mixture in it he recognised the taste of soda, and remeni- 
 bered in a vague fashion that he much preferred ApolH- 
 naris, but he said to himself, or something said to him, 
 that it didn't matter. His brain was whirling with the 
 events of the night; he still saw, as in a dream, the misty 
 auditorium as he had seen it from a box; the stage as he 
 had seen it during a momentary excursion to the back 
 of the dress-circle; the busy world behind the scenes 
 where stage-carpenters sweated and swore, and the dust 
 made one's throat tickle. He recalled particular faces 
 and heard particular voices; all the world and his wife 
 had been there, and all the first-nighters, and all his 
 friends, and he had spoken to a great many people. 
 They all seemed to swim before him as in a dream, and 
 th« sound of their voices came, as it were, from the 
 cylinder of a phonograph. He remembered seeing Mr. 
 Chilverstone and his wife in the stalls — their faces were 
 rapt and eloquent; in the stalls, too, he had seen Sprats 
 and Lord Saxonstowe and Mrs. Berenson; he himself 
 had spent some of the time with Haidee and Darlington 
 and other people of their set in a box, but he had also 
 wandered in and out of Harcourt's dressing-room a good 
 deal, and had sometimes spoken to Harcourt, and some- 
 times to his business manager. He had a vague recol- 
 lection that he had faced the house himself at the end of 
 everything, and had bowed several times in response to 
 
 178 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 179 
 
 cheering which was still buzzing in his ears. The night 
 was over. 
 
 He took another drink from the glass in his hand and 
 looked about him; there was a curious feeling in his 
 brain that he himself was not there, that he had gone 
 away, or been left behind somewhere in the world's mad 
 rush, and that he was something else, watching a sem- 
 blance of himself and the semblance's surroundings. The 
 scene interested and amused whatever it was that was 
 looking on from his brain. Harcourt, free of his Greek 
 draperies, now appeared in a shirt and trousers; he stood 
 before the mirror on his dressing-table, brushing his hair 
 — Lucian wondered where he bought his braces, which, 
 looked at closely, revealed a peculiarly dainty pattern 
 worked by hand. All the time that he was manipulating 
 the brushes he was talking in disconnected sentences. 
 Lucian caught some of them: ' Little cutting here and 
 there — that bit dragged — I'm told that was a fine effect — 
 very favourable indeed — we shall see, we shall see!' — 
 and he wondered what Harcourt was talking about. 
 Near the actor-manager, in an easy-chair, sat an old 
 gentleman of benevolent aspect, white-bearded, white- 
 moustached, who wore a fur-lined cloak over his evening- 
 dress. He was sucking at a cigar, and his hand, very 
 fat and very white, held a glass at which he kept looking 
 from time to time as if he were not quite certain what to 
 do with it. He was reported to be at the back of Har- 
 court in financial matters, and he blinked and nodded at 
 every sentence rapidly spoken by the actor-manager, 
 but said nothing. Near him stood two men in cloaks and 
 opera-hats, also holding glasses in their hands and smok- 
 ing cigarettes — one of them Lucian recognised as a great 
 critic, the other as a famous actor. At his own side, 
 talking very rapidly, was the sixth man, Harcourt 's 
 business-manager. Lucian suddenly realised that he 
 was nodding his head at this man as if in intelligent com- 
 prehension of what he was saying, whereas he had not 
 understood one word. He shook himself together as a 
 man does who throws drowsiness aside. 
 
i8o LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 * I'm sorry,' he said. ' I — I don't think I was pajdng 
 attention. I don't know why, but I feel half-asleep.' 
 
 'It's the reaction,' said Harcourt, hastily getting into 
 his waistcoat and coat. ' I feel tired out — if I had my 
 way there should be no such thing as a first night — it's a 
 most wearing occasion.' 
 
 The famous critic turned with a smile. 
 
 ' Think of being able to lie in bed to-morrow with a 
 sheaf of newspapers on your counterpane!' he said 
 pleasantly. 
 
 Then somehow, chatting disjointedly, they got out of 
 the theatre. Harcourt and Lucian drove off in a hansom 
 together — they were near neighbours. 
 
 ' What do you think?' asked Lucian, as they drove 
 away. 
 
 ' Oh, I think it went all right, as far as one could 
 judge. There was plenty of applause — we shall see what 
 is said to-morrow morning,' answered Harcourt, with a 
 mighty yawn. ' They can't say that it wasn't magni- 
 ficently staged,' he added, with complacency. ' And 
 everything went like clockwork. I'll tell you what — I 
 wish I could go to sleep for the next six months ! ' 
 
 ' I believe I feel like that,' responded Lucian. ' Well, 
 it is launched, at any rate.' 
 
 The old gentleman of the white beard and fur-lined 
 cloak drove off in a private brougham, still nodding and 
 blinking; the actor and the critic, lighting cigars, walked 
 away together, and for some time kept silence. 
 
 ' What do you really think ? ' said the actor at last. 
 ' You're in rather a lucky position, you know, in respect 
 of the fact that the Forum is a weekly and not a daily 
 journal — it gives you more time to make up your mind. 
 But you already have some notion of what your verdict 
 will be?' 
 
 ' Yes,' answered the critic. He puffed thoughtfully 
 at his cigar. ' Well,' he said, ' I think we have heard 
 some beautiful poetry, beautifully recited. But I con- 
 fess to feeling a certain sense of incongruity in the 
 attempt to mingle Greek art with modern stage acces- 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER i8i 
 
 sories. I think Damerel's tragedy will read delightfully 
 — in the study. But I counted several speeches to-night 
 which would run to two and three pages of print, and 
 I saw many people yawn. I fear that others will yawn.' 
 
 ' What would you give it? ' said the actor.' The other 
 ran for twelve months.' 
 
 ' This,' said the critic, ' may run for one. But I think 
 Harcourt will have to withdraw it within three weeks. 
 I am bearing the yawns in mind.' 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 Lucian's tragedy ran for precisely seventeen nights. 
 The ' attempt to revive Tragedy on the Hnes of pure 
 Greek Art ' was a failure. Everybody thought the 
 poetry very beautiful, but there were too many long 
 speeches and too few opportunities for action and move- 
 ment to satisfy a modem audience, and Harcourt quickly 
 discovered that not even magnificent scenery and crowds 
 of supernumeraries arrayed in garments of white and 
 gold and purple and green will carry a play through. He 
 was in despair from the second night onwards, for it 
 became evident that a great deal of cutting was neces- 
 sary, and on that point he had much trouble with Lucian, 
 who, having revised his work to the final degree, was not 
 disposed to dock it in order to please the gods in the 
 gallery. The three weeks during which the tragedy ran 
 were indeed weeks of storm and stress. The critics 
 praised the poetry of the play, the staging, the scenery, 
 the beauty and charm of everything connected with it, 
 but the public yawned. In Lucian's previous play there 
 had been a warm, somewhat primitive human interest — 
 it took those who saw it into the market-place of Ufe, and 
 appealed to everyday passions; in the new tragedy people 
 were requested to spend some considerable time with the 
 gods in Olympus amidst non-human characteristics and 
 qualities. No one, save a few armchair critics like Mr. 
 Chilverstone, wished to breathe this diviner air; the 
 earlier audiences left the theatre cold and untouched. 
 * It makes you feel, ' said somebody, ' as if you had been 
 sitting amongst a lot of marble statues all night and could 
 do with something warming to the blood.' In this way 
 the inevitable end came. All the people who really 
 wanted to see the tragedy had seen it within a fortnight; 
 during the next few nights the audiences thinned and the 
 advance bookings represented small future business, and 
 
 182 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 183 
 
 before the end of the third week Harcourt had withdrawn 
 the attempt to revive tragedy on the lines of pure Greek 
 Art, and announced a revival of an adaptation from a 
 famous French novel which had more than once proved 
 its money-earning powers. 
 
 Lucian said little of this reverse of fortune — he was to 
 all appearance unmoved by it; but Sprats, who could 
 read his face as easily as she could read an open book, 
 saw new lines write themselves there which told of sur- 
 prise, disappointment, and anxiety, and she knew from 
 his subdued manner and the unwonted reticence which 
 he observed at this stage that he was thinking deeply 
 of more things than one. In this she was right. Lucian 
 by sheer force of circumstances had been dragged to a 
 certain point of vantage whereat he was compelled to 
 stand and look closely at the prospect which confronted 
 him. When it became evident that the tragedy was a 
 failure as a money-making concern, he remembered, 
 with a sudden shock that subdued his temperamental 
 buoyancy in an unpleasant fashion, that he had not 
 foreseen such a contingency, and that he had confidently 
 expected a success as great as the failure was complete. 
 He sat down in his study and put the whole matter to 
 himself in commendably brief fashion: for several 
 months he and Haidee had been living and spending 
 money on anticipation; it was now clear that the anticipa- 
 tion was not to be realised. The new volume was selling 
 very slowly; the tragedy was a financial failure; very 
 little in the way of soUd cash would go from either to 
 the right side of Lucian' s account at Darlington's. And 
 on the wrong side there must be an array of figures which 
 he felt afraid to think of. He hurriedly cast up in his 
 mind a vague account of those figures which memory 
 presented to him; when he added the total to an equally 
 vague guess of what Haidee might have spent, he recog- 
 nised that he must be in debt to the bank to a consider- 
 able amount. He had never had the least doubt that 
 the tragedy would prove a gold-mine — everybody had 
 predicted it. Darlington had predicted it a hundred 
 
i84 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 times, and Darlington was a keen, hard-headed business 
 man. Well, the tragedy was a failure — to use the ex- 
 pressive term of the man in the street, ' there was no 
 money in it.' It was to have replenished Lucian's coffers 
 — it left them yawning. 
 
 Easy-going and thoughtless though he was, Lucian had 
 a constitutional dislike of owing money to any one, and 
 the thought that he was now in debt to his bankers irri- 
 tated and annoyed him. Analysed to a fine degree, it 
 was not that he was annoyed because he owed money, 
 but because he was not in a position to cancel the debt 
 with a few scratches of his pen, and so reheve himself 
 of the disagreeable necessity of recognising his indebted- 
 ness to any one. He had a temperamental dishke of 
 impleasant things, and especially of things which did 
 not interest him — his inherited view of Hfe had caused 
 him to regard it as a walk through a beautiful garden 
 under perpetual sunshine, with full liberty to pluck what- 
 ever flower appealed to his eye, eat whatever fruit 
 tempted his palate, and turn into whatever side- walk took 
 his fancy. Now that he was beginning to reahse that 
 it is possible to wander out of such a garden into a brake 
 full of thorns and tangles, and to find some difficulty in 
 escaping therefrom, his dislike of the unpleasant was 
 accentuated and his irritation increased. But there was 
 a certain vein of method and of order in him, and when 
 he really recognised that he had got somewhere where 
 he never expected to be, he developed a sincere desire 
 to find out at once just where he was. The present situa- 
 tion had some intellectual charm for him : he had never 
 in all his life known what it was to want money; it had 
 always come to his hand as manna came to the Israelites 
 in the desert — he wondered, as these unwonted con- 
 siderations for the present and the future filled him, what 
 would develop from it. 
 
 ' It wiU be best to know just where one really is,' he 
 thought, and he went off to find his wife and consult 
 with her. It was seldom that he ever conversed with 
 her on any matter of a practical nature; he had long since 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 185 
 
 discovered that Haidee was bored by any topic that did 
 not interest her, or that she did not understand. She 
 scarcely grasped the meaning of the words which Lucian 
 now addressed to her, simple though they were, and she 
 stared at him with puzzled eyes. 
 
 ' You see,' he said, feeling that his explanation was 
 inept and crude, 'I'd fully expected to have an awful 
 lot of money out of the book and the play, and now, 
 it seems, there won't be so much as I had anticipated. 
 Of course there will be Robertson's royalties, and so on, 
 but I don't think they will amount to very much for the 
 half-year, and ' 
 
 Haidee interrupted him. 
 
 ' Does it mean that you have spent all the money? ' she 
 asked. * There was such a lot, yours and mine, 
 together.' 
 
 Lucian felt powerless in the face of this apparently 
 
 childish remark. 
 
 ' Not such a lot,' he said. ' And you know we had 
 heavy expenses at first — we had to spend a lot on the 
 house, hadn't we?' 
 
 ' But will there be no more to spend? ' she asked. ' I 
 mean, has it all been spent? Because I want a lot of 
 things, if we are to winter in Egypt as you proposed.' 
 
 Lucian laughed. 
 
 ' I'm afraid we shall not go to Egypt this winter,' he 
 said. ' But don't be alarmed; I think there will be 
 money for new gowns and so on. No; what I just wished 
 to know was — have you any idea of what you have spent 
 since I transferred our accounts to Darlington's bank? 
 
 Haidee shrugged her shoulders. As a matter of fact 
 she had used her cheque-book as she pleased, and had 
 no idea of anything relating to her account except that 
 she had drawn on it whenever she wished to do so. 
 
 * I haven't,' she answered. ' You told me I was to 
 have a separate account, and, of course, I took you at 
 your word.' 
 
 ' Well, it will be all right,' said Lucian soothingly. 
 'I'll see about everything.' 
 
i86 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 He was going away, desirous of closing any discussion 
 of the subject, but Haidee stopped him. 
 
 ' Of course it makes a big difference if your books 
 don't sell and people won't go to your plays,' she said. 
 ' That doesn't bring money, does it?' 
 
 ' My dear child ! ' exclaimed Lucian, ' how terribly 
 perturbed you look! One must expect an occasional 
 dose of bad luck. The next book will probably sell by 
 the tens of thousands, and the next play run for a 
 hundred years!' 
 
 ' They were saying at Lady Firmanence's the other 
 afternoon that you had had your day, ' she said, looking 
 inquiringly at him. ' Do you think you have?' 
 
 ' I hope I have quite a big day to come yet,' he 
 answered quietly. ' You shouldn't listen to that sort 
 of thing — about me.' 
 
 Then he left her and went back to his study and 
 thought matters over once more. 'I'll find out exactly 
 where I am,' he thought at last, and he went out and 
 got into a hansom and was driven to Lombard Street — 
 he meant to ascertain his exact position at the bank. 
 When he entered, with a request for an interview with 
 Mr. Eustace Darlington, he found that the latter was out 
 of town, and for a moment he thought of postponing his 
 inquiries. Then he reflected that others could probably 
 give him the information he sought, and he asked to see 
 the manager. Five minutes after entering the manager's 
 private room he knew exactly how he stood with Messrs. 
 Dariington and Darlington. He owed them close upon 
 nine thousand pounds. 
 
 Lucian, bending over the slip of paper upon which the 
 manager had jotted down a memorandum of the figures, 
 trusted that the surprise which he felt was not being dis- 
 played in his features. He folded the paper, placed it in 
 his pocket, thanked the manager for his courtesy, and 
 left the bank. Once outside he looked at the paper 
 again : the manager had made a distinction between Mr. 
 Damerel's account and his wife's. Mr. Damerel's was 
 about eighteen hundred pounds in debt; Mrs. Damerel's 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 187 
 
 separate account had been drawn against to the extent 
 of nearly seven thousand pounds. Lucian knew what 
 had become of the money which he had spent, but he 
 was puzzled beyond measure to account for the sums 
 which Haidee had gone through within a few months. 
 
 Whenever he was in any doubt or perplexity as to 
 practical matters Lucian invariably turned to Sprats, 
 and he now called a hansom and bade the man drive 
 to Bayswater. He knew, from long experience of her, 
 that he could tell Sprats anything and everything, and 
 that she would never once say ' I told you so ! ' or 'I 
 knew how it would turn out!' or ' Didn't I warn you?' 
 She might scold him; she would almost certainly tell him 
 that he was a fool; but she wouldn't pose as a superior 
 person, or howl over the milk which he had spilled — 
 instead, she would tell him quietly what was the best 
 thing to do. 
 
 He found her alone, and he approached her with the 
 old boyish formula which she had heard a hundred times 
 since he had discovered that she knew a great deal more 
 about many things than he knew himself. 
 
 ' I say, Sprats, I'm in a bit of a hole ! ' he began. 
 
 * And, of course, you want me to pull you out. Well, 
 what is it?' she asked, gazing steadily at him and 
 making a shrewd guess at the sort of hole into which he 
 had fallen. ' Do the usual, Lucian, tell everything.' 
 
 When he liked to be so, Lucian was the most candid 
 of men. He laid bare his soul to Sprats on occasions 
 like these in a fashion which would greatly have edified 
 a confessor. He kept nothing back; he made no 
 excuses; he added no coat of paint or touch of white- 
 wash. He set forth a plain, unvarnished statement, 
 without comment or explanation; it was a brutally clear 
 and lucid account of facts which would have honoured 
 an Old Bailey lawyer. It was one of his gifts, and 
 Sprats never had an instance of it presented to her notice 
 without wondering how it was that a man who could 
 marshal facts so well and put them before others in such 
 
i88 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 a crisp and concise fashion should be so unpractical 
 in the stem business of life. 
 
 ' And that's just how things are,' concluded Lucian, 
 ' What do you advise me to do? ' 
 
 ' There is one thing to be done at once,' she answered, 
 without hesitation. ' You must get out of debt to Dar- 
 lington; you must pay him every penny that you owe 
 him as quickly as possible. You say you owe him 
 nearly nine thousand pounds: very good. How much 
 have you got towards paying that off?' 
 
 Lucian sighed deeply. 
 
 'That's just it!' he exclaimed. 'I don't exactly 
 know. Let me see, now; well, look here, Sprats — ^you 
 won't tell, of course — Mr. Pepperdine owes me a 
 thousand — at least I mean to say I lent him a thousand, 
 but then, don't you know, he has always been so good 
 to me, that ' 
 
 ' I think you had better chuck sentiment,' she said. 
 ' Mr. Pepperdine has a thousand of yours. Very well — 
 go on.' 
 
 ' I've been thinking,' he continued, ' that I might 
 now ask him for the money which my father left me. 
 He has had full charge of that, you know. I've never 
 known what it was. I dare say it was rather heavily 
 dipped into during the time I was at Oxford, but there 
 may be something left.' 
 
 * Has he never told you anything about it?' asked 
 Sprats. 
 
 ' Very little. Indeed, I have never asked him any- 
 thing — I could trust him with everything. It's quite 
 possible there may not be a penny; he may have spent 
 it all on me before I came of age,' said Lucian. ' Still, 
 if there is anything, it would go towards making up the 
 nine thousand, wouldn't it ? ' 
 
 ' Well, leave it out of the question at present,' she 
 answered. ' What else have you coming in soon?' 
 
 ' Harcourt has two hundred of mine, and Robertson 
 about three hundred.' 
 
 ' That's another five hundred. Well, and the rest?' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 189 
 
 ' I think that's the lot,' he said. 
 
 ' There are people who owe you money,' she said. 
 ' Come, now, Lucian, you know there are.' 
 
 Lucian began to wriggle and to study the pattern of 
 the hearthrug. 
 
 ' Oh ! ah ! well ! ' he said, ' I— I dare say I have 
 lent other men a little now and then.' 
 
 ' Better say given,' she interrupted. ' I was only 
 wondering if there was any considerable sum that you 
 could get in.' 
 
 * No, really,' he answered. 
 
 * Very well; then you've got fifteen hundred towards 
 your nine thousand. That's all, eh?' she asked. 
 
 ' All that I know of,' he said. 
 
 ' Well, there are other things,' she remarked, with 
 some emphasis. ' There are your copyrights and your 
 furniture, pictures, books, and curiosities.' 
 
 Lucian 's mouth opened and he uttered a sort of groan. 
 
 ' You don't mean that I should— sell any of these?' 
 he said, looking at her entreatingly. 
 
 'I'd sell the very clothes off my back before I'd owe 
 a penny to Darlington ! ' she repHed. ' Don't be a senti- 
 mental ass, Lucian; books in vellum bindings, and pic- 
 tures by old masters, and unique pots and pans and 
 platters, don't make life! Sell every blessed thing 
 you've got rather than owe Darlington money. Pay 
 him off, get out of that house, Hve in simpler fashion, 
 and you'll be a happier man.' 
 
 Lucian sat for some moments in silence, staring at the 
 hearthrug. At last he looked up. Sprats saw some- 
 thing new in his face — or was it something old? some- 
 thing that she had not seen there for years? He looked 
 at her for an instant, and then he looked away. 
 
 ' I should be very glad to live a simpler life,' he said. 
 ' I dare say it seems rather sentimental and all that, you 
 know, but of late I've had an awfully strong desire — 
 sort of home-sickness, you know — for Simonstower. 
 I've caught myself thinking of the old days, and—' 
 he paused, laughed in rather a forced way, and sitting 
 
190 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 straight up in the easy-chair in which he had been 
 lounging, began to drum on its arms with his fingers. 
 ' What you say,' he continued presently, ' is quite 
 right. I must not be in debt to Darlington — it has been 
 a most kind and generous thing on his part to act as 
 one's banker in this fashion, but one mustn't trespass 
 on a friend's kindness.' 
 
 Sprats flashed a swift, half-puzzled look upon him — 
 he was looking another way, and did not see her. 
 
 ' Yes,' he went on meditatively, ' I'm sure you are 
 right. Sprats, quite right. I'll act on your advice. I'll 
 go down to Simonstower to-morrow and see if Uncle 
 Pepperdine can let me have that thousand, and if there 
 is any money of my own, and when I come back I'll 
 see if Robertson will buy my copyrights — I may be able 
 to clear the debt off with all that. If not, I shall sell the 
 furniture, books, pictures, everything, and Haidee and 
 I will go to Italy, to Florence, and live cheaply. Ah ! 
 I know the loveliest palazzo on the Lung' Arno — I wish 
 we were there already. I'm sick of England.' 
 
 ' It will make a difference to Haidee, Lucian,' said 
 Sprats. ' She likes England — and English society.' 
 
 ' Yes,' he answered thoughtfully, ' it will make a 
 great difference. But she gave up a great deal for me 
 when we married, and she'll give up a great deal now. 
 A woman will do anything for the man she loves,' he 
 added, with the air of a wiseacre. ' It's a sort of fixed 
 law.' 
 
 Then he went away, and Sprats, after spending five 
 minutes in deep thought, remembered her other children 
 and hastened to them, wondering whether the most 
 juvenile of the whole brood were quite so childish as 
 Lucian. ' It will go hard with him if his disillusion 
 comes suddenly,' she thought, and for the rest of the 
 day she felt inclined to sadness. 
 
 Lucian went home in a good humour and a brighter 
 flow of spirits. He was always thus when a new course 
 of action suggested itself to him, and on this occasion 
 he felt impelled to cheerfulness because he was meditat- 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 191 
 
 ing a virtuous deed. He wrote some letters, and then 
 went to his club, and knowing that his wife had an 
 engagement of her own that night, he dined with an old 
 college friend whom he happened to meet in the smok- 
 ing-room, and to whom before and after dinner he talked 
 in lively fashion. It was late when he reached home, 
 and he was then more cheerful than ever; the picture 
 of the old palazzo on the Lung' Amo had fastened itself 
 upon the wall of his consciousness and compelled him 
 to look at it. Haidee had just come in; he persuaded 
 her to go with him into his study while he smoked a 
 final cigarette, and there, full of his new projects, he 
 told her what he intended to do. Haidee listened with- 
 out saying a word in reply. Lucian took no notice of 
 her silence : he was one of those people who imagine 
 that they are addressing other people when they are in 
 reality talking to themselves and require neither Yea 
 nor Nay; he went on expatiating upon his scheme, and 
 the final cigarette was succeeded by others, and Haidee 
 still listened in silence. 
 
 ' You mean to do all that?' she said at last. ' To 
 sell everything and go to Florence? And to Hve there? ' 
 
 ' Certainly,' he repHed tranquilly; ' it will be so 
 cheap.' 
 
 'Cheap?' she exclaimed. 'Yes — and dull! 
 Besides, why this sudden fuss about owing Darlington 
 money? It's been owing for months, and you didn't 
 say anything.' 
 
 ' I expected to be able to put the account straight 
 out of the money coming from the book and the play,' 
 he replied. ' As they are not exactly gold-mines, I 
 must do what I can. I can't remain in Darlington's 
 debt in that way — it wouldn't be fair to him.' 
 
 ' I don't see that you need upset everything just for 
 that,' she said. ' He has not asked you to put the 
 account straight, has he?' 
 
 * Of course not!' exclaimed Lucian. * He never 
 would; he's much too good a fellow to do that sort of 
 thing. But that's just why I must get out of his debt — 
 
192 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 it's taking a mean advantage of his kindness. I'm quite 
 certain nobody else would have been so very generous/ 
 Haidee glanced at her husband out of the comers 
 of her eyes: the glance was something like that with 
 which Sprats had regarded him in the afternoon. He 
 had not caught Sprats's glance, and he did not catch his 
 wife's. 
 
 * By the bye, Haidee,' he said, after a short silence, 
 * I called at Darlington's to-day to find out just how 
 we stand there, and the manager gave me the exact 
 figures. You've rather gone it, you know, during the 
 past half-year, you've gone through seven thousand 
 pounds.' 
 
 Haidee looked at him wonderingly. 
 
 ' But I paid for the diamonds out of that, you know,' 
 she said. ' They cost over six thousand.' 
 
 'Good heavens! — did they?' said Lucian. *I 
 thought it was an affair of fifty pounds or so.' 
 
 ' How ridiculous 1 ' she exclaimed. ' Diamonds — 
 like these— for fifty pounds ! You are the simplest child 
 I ever knew.' 
 
 Lucian was endeavouring to recall the episode of the 
 buying of the diamonds. He remembered at last that 
 Haidee had told him that she had the opportunity of 
 buying some diamonds for a much less sum than they 
 were worth. He had thought it some small transaction, 
 and had bidden her to consult somebody who knew 
 something about that sort of thing. 
 
 ' I remember now,' he said. ' I told you to ask 
 advice of some one who knew something about 
 diamonds.' 
 
 ' And so I did,' she answered. ' I asked Darlington's 
 advice — he's an authority — and he said I should be 
 fooUsh to miss the chance. And then I said I didn't 
 know whether I dare draw a cheque for such an amount, 
 and he laughed and said of course I might, and that he 
 would arange it with you.' 
 
 * There you are!' said Lucian triumphantly; * that's 
 just another proof of what I've been saying all along. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 193 
 
 Darlington's such a kind-hearted sort of chap that he 
 never said anything about it to me. Well, there's no 
 harm done there, any way, Haidee; in fact, it's rather 
 a rehef to know that you've locked up six thousand in 
 that way, because you can sell the diamonds and the 
 money will go towards putting the account straight.' 
 
 Haidlee looked at him narrowly: Lucian's eyes were 
 fixed on the curling smoke of his cigarette. 
 
 ' Sell my diamonds?' she said in a low voice. 
 
 * Yes, of course,' said Lucian; * it'll be rather jolly 
 if there's a profit on them. Oh yes, we must sell them. 
 I can't afford to lock up six thousand in precious stones, 
 you know, and of course we can't let Darlington pay for 
 them. I wonder what they really are worth? What a 
 lark if we got, say, ten thousand for them ! ' 
 
 Then he wandered into an account of how a friend 
 of his had once picked up a ring at one of the stalls on 
 the Ponte Vecchio in Florence, and had subsequently 
 sold it for just ten times as much as he had given for it. 
 He laughed very much in telling his wife this story, 
 for it had certain amusing points in it, and Haidee 
 laughed too, but if Lucian had been endowed with a 
 better understanding of women he would have known 
 that she was neither amused nor edified. 
 
 N 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 LuciAN came down to breakfast next morning equipped 
 for his journey to Simonstower. He was in good spirits : 
 the day was bright and frosty, and he was already 
 dreaming of the village and the snow-capped hills beyond 
 it. In dressing he had thought over his plans, and had 
 decided that he was now quite reconciled to the drastic 
 measures which Sprats had proposed. He would clear 
 off all his indebtedness to Darlington, pay whatever bills 
 might be owing, and make a fresh start, this time on the 
 lines of strict economy, forethought, and prudence. He 
 had very little conception of the real meaning of these 
 important qualities, but he had always admired them in 
 the abstract, and he now intended to form an intimate 
 acquaintance with them. 
 
 * I've been thinking,' he said, as he faced Haidee at 
 the breakfast-table and spread out the Morning Post, 
 ' that when I have readjusted everything we shall be 
 much better off than I thought. Those diamonds make 
 a big difference, Haidee. In fact we shall have, or we 
 ought to have, quite a decent little capital, and we'll 
 invest it in something absolutely safe and sound. I'll 
 ask Darlington's advice about that, and we'll never touch 
 it. The interest and the royalties will yield an income 
 which will be quite sufficient for our needs — you can 
 live very cheaply in Italy.' 
 
 ' Then you are still bent on going to Italy — to 
 Florence?' she asked calmly. 
 
 ' Certainly,' he replied. ' It's the best thing we can 
 do. I'm looking forward to it. After all, why should 
 we be encumbered as we are at present with an expen- 
 sive house, a troop of servants, and all the rest of it? 
 We don't really want them. Has it never occurred to 
 you that all these things are something like the shell 
 which the snail has to carry on his back and can't get 
 
 194 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 195 
 
 away from? Why should a man cany a big shell on 
 his back? It's all very well talking about the advan- 
 tages and comforts of having a house of one's own, but 
 it's neither an advantage nor a comfort to be tied to a 
 house nor to anything that clogs one's action.' 
 
 Haidee made no reply to those philosophic 
 observations. 
 
 ' How long do you propose to stay in Italy?' she 
 asked. ' Simply for the winter? I suppose we should 
 return here for the season next year?' 
 
 * I don't think so,' answered Lucian. ' We might go 
 into Switzerland during the very hot months — we 
 couldn't stand Florence in July and August. But I 
 don't intend returning to London for some time. I don't 
 think I shall ever settle here again. After all, I am 
 Italian.' 
 
 Then, finding that it was time he set out for King's 
 Cross, he kissed his wife's cheek, bade her amuse and 
 take care of herself during his absence, and went away, 
 still in good spirits. For some time after he had gone 
 Haidee remained where he had left her. She ate and 
 drank mechanically, and she looked straight before her 
 in the blank, purposeless fashion which often denotes 
 intense concentration of thought. When she rose from 
 the table she walked about the room with aimless, un- 
 certain movements, touching this and that object without 
 any reason for doing so. She picked up the Morning 
 Post, glanced at it, and saw nothing; she fingered two or 
 three letters which Lucian had left lying about on the 
 breakfast-table, and laid them down again. They 
 reminded her, quite suddenly, of a letter from Eustace 
 Darlington which she had in her pocket, a trivial note, 
 newly arrived, which informed her that he had made 
 some purchase or other for her in Paris, whither he had 
 gone for a week on business, and that she would shortly 
 receive a parcel containing it. There was nothing of 
 special interest or moment in the letter; she referred to it 
 merely to ascertain Darlington's address. 
 
 After a time Haidee went into the study and sought 
 
196 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 out a railway guide. She had already made up her 
 mind to join Eustace Darlington, and she now decided 
 to travel by a train which would enable her to reach 
 Paris at nine o'clock that evening. She began to make 
 her preparations at once, and instructed her maid to 
 pack two large portmanteaus. Her jewels she packed 
 herself, taking them out of a safe in which they were 
 usually deposited, and after she had bestowed them in 
 a small handbag she kept the latter within sight until 
 her departure. Everything was carried out with cool- 
 ness and thoughtfulness. The maid was told that her 
 mistress was going to Paris for a few days and that she 
 was to accompany her; the butler received his orders as 
 to what was to be done until Mrs. Damerel's return the 
 next day or the day following. There was nothing to 
 surprise the servants, and nothing to make them talk, 
 in Haidee's proceedings. She lunched at an earHer hour 
 than usual, drove to the station with her maid, dropped 
 a letter, addressed to Lucian at Simonstower vicarage, 
 into the pillar-box on the platform, and departed for 
 Paris with an admirable unconcern. There was a 
 choppy sea in the Channel, and the maid was ill, but 
 Haidee acquired a hearty appetite, and satisfied it in the 
 dining-car of the French train. She was one of those 
 happily constituted people who can eat at the greatest 
 moments of life. 
 
 She drove from the Gare du Nord to the Hotel Bristol, 
 and engaged rooms immediately on her arrival. A little 
 later she inquired for DarHngton, and then discovered 
 that he had that day journeyed to Dijon, and was not 
 expected to return until two days later. Haidee, in 
 nowise disconcerted by this news, settled down to await 
 his reappearance. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 LuciAN arrived at the old vicarage towards the close 
 of the afternoon. He had driven over from Oakborough 
 through a wintry land, and every minute spent in the 
 keen air had added to the buoyancy of his spirits. 
 Never, he thought as he was driven along the valley, 
 did Simonstower look so well as under its first coatmg 
 of snow, and on the rising ground above the village 
 he made his driver stop so that he might drink in the 
 charm of the winter sunset. At the western extremity 
 of the valley a shelving hill closed the view; on its 
 highest point a long row of gaunt fir-trees showed black 
 and spectral against the molten red of the setting sun 
 and the purpled sky into which it was sinking; nearer, 
 the blue smoke of the village chimneys curled into the 
 clear, frosty air— it seemed to Lucian that he could 
 almost smell the fires of fragrant wood which burned 
 on the hearths. He caught a faint murmur of voices 
 from the village street: it was four o'clock, and the 
 children were being released from school. Somewhere 
 along the moorland side a dog was barking; in the 
 windows of his uncle's farmhouse, high above the river 
 and the village, lights were akeady gleaming; a spark 
 of bright light amongst the pine and fir trees near the 
 church told him that Mr. Chilverstone had already lit 
 his study-lamp. Every sound, every sight was familiar 
 
 they brought the old days back to him. And there, 
 
 keeping stem watch over the village at its foot, stood 
 the old Norman castle, its square keep towering to the 
 sky, as massive and formidable as when Lucian had 
 first looked upon it from his chamber window the morn- 
 ing after Simpson Pepperdine had brought him to 
 Simonstower. 
 
 He bade the man drive on to the vicarage. He had 
 sent no word of his coming; he had more than once 
 
 197 
 
198 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 descended upon his friends at Simonstower without 
 warning, and had always found a welcome. The vicar 
 came bustling into the hall to him, with no sign of 
 surprise. 
 
 ' I did not know they had wired to you, my boy,' he 
 said, greeting him in the old affectionate way, ' but it 
 was good of you to come so quickly.' 
 
 Lucian recognised that something had happened. 
 
 ' I don't understand you,' he said. ' No one wired 
 to me; I came down on my own initiative — I wanted to 
 see my uncle on business.' 
 
 ' Ah ! ' said the vicar, shaking his head. ' Then you 
 do not know? — your uncle is ill. He had a stroke — a 
 fit — you know what I mean — this very morning. Your 
 Aunt Judith is across at the farm now. But come in, 
 my dear boy — how cold you must be.' 
 
 Lucian went out to the conveyance which had brought 
 him over, paid the driver, and bade him refresh himself 
 at the inn, and then joined the vicar in his study. There 
 again were the famiHar objects which spelled Home. 
 It suddenly occurred to him that he was much more at 
 home here or in the farmhouse parlour along the road- 
 side than in his own house in London, and he wondered 
 in vague, indirect fashion why that should be so. 
 
 ' Is my uncle dangerously ill. then?' he asked, looking 
 at the vicar, who was fidgeting about with the fire-irons 
 and repeating his belief that Lucian must be very cold. 
 
 * I fear so, I fear so,' answered Mr. Chilverstone. * It 
 is, I think, an apoplectic seizure — he was rather inclined 
 to that, if you come to think of it. Your aunt has just 
 gone across there. It was early this morning that it 
 happened, and she has been over to the farm several 
 times during the day, but this time I think she will find 
 a specialist there — Dr. Matthews wished for advice and 
 wired to Smokeford for some great man who was to 
 arrive an hour ago. I am glad you have come, Lucian. 
 Did you see Sprats before leaving?' 
 
 Lucian replied that he had seen Sprats on the previ- 
 ous day. He sat down, answering the vicar's questions 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 199 
 
 respecting his daughter in mechanical fashion — he was 
 thinking of the various events of the past twenty-four 
 hours, and wondering if Mr. Pepperdine's illness was 
 likely to result in death. Mr. Chilverstone turned from 
 Sprats to the somewhat sore question of the tragedy. It 
 was to him a sad sign of the times that the public had 
 neglected such truly good work, and he went on to 
 express his own opinion of the taste of the age. Lucian 
 listened absent-mindedly until Mrs. Chilverstone 
 returned with news of the sick man. She was much 
 troubled; the specialist gave little hope of Simpson's 
 recovery. He might linger for some days, but it was 
 almost certain that a week would see the end of him. 
 But in spite of her trouble Aunt Judith was practical. 
 Keziah, she said, must not be left alone that night, and 
 she herself was going back to the farm as soon as she 
 had seen that the vicar was properly provided for in 
 respect of his sustenance and comfort. Ever since her 
 marriage Mrs. Chilverstone had felt that her main object 
 in Hfe was the pleasing of her lord; she had put away 
 all thought of the dead hussar, and her romantic dis- 
 position had bridled itself with the reins of chastened 
 affection. Thus the vicar, who under Sprats 's regime 
 had neither been pampered nor coddled, found himself 
 indulged in many modes hitherto unknown to him, and 
 he accepted all that was showered upon him with modest 
 thankfulness. He thought his wife a kindly and con- 
 siderate soul, and did not realise, being a truly simple 
 man, that Judith was pouring out upon him the 
 resources of a treasury which she had been stocking 
 all her life. He was the first thing she had the chance 
 of loving in a practical fashion; hence he began to live 
 among rose-leaves. He protested now that Lucian and 
 himself wanted for nothing. Mrs. Chilverstone, how- 
 ever, took the reins in hand, saw that the traveller was 
 properly attended to and provided for, and did not leave 
 the vicarage until the two men were comfortably seated 
 at the dinner-table, the maids admonished as to lighting 
 a fire in Mr. Damerel's room, and the vicar warned of 
 
200 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 the necessity of turning out the lamps and locking the 
 doors. Then she returned to her brother's house, and 
 for an hour or two Lucian and his old tutor talked of 
 things nearest to their hearts, and the feehngs of home 
 came upon the younger man more strongly than ever. 
 He began to wonder how it was that he had settled down 
 in London when he might have lived in the country; the 
 atmosphere of this quiet, book-lined room in a village 
 parsonage was, he thought just then, much more to his 
 true taste than that in which he had spent the last few 
 years of his life. At Oxford Lucian had lived the life 
 of a book-worm and a dreamer: he was not a success 
 in examinations, and he brought no great honour upon 
 his tutor. In most respects he had lived apart from 
 other men, and it was not until the publication of his first 
 volume had drawn the eyes of the world upon him that 
 he had been swept out of the peaceful backwater of a 
 student's existence into the swirling tides of the full river 
 of Hfe. Then had followed Lord Simonstower's legacy, 
 and then the runaway marriage with Haidee, and then 
 four years of butterfly existence. He began to wonder, 
 as he ate the vicar's well-kept mutton, fed on the moor- 
 lands close by, and sipped the vicar's old claret, laid 
 down many a year before, whether his recent hfe had 
 not been a feverish dream. Looked at from this peace- 
 ful retreat, its constant excitement and perpetual rush 
 and movement seemed to have lost whatever charm they 
 once had for him. Unconsciously Lucian was suffering 
 from reaction: his moral as well as his physical nature 
 was crying for rest, and the first oasis in the desert 
 assumed the delightful colours and soft air of Paradise. 
 
 Later in the evening he walked over to the farmhouse, 
 through softly falling snow, to inquire after his uncle's 
 condition. Mrs. Chilverstone was in the sick man's 
 room and did not come downstairs; Miss Pepperdine 
 received him in the parlour. In spite of the trouble that 
 had fallen upon the house and of the busy day which 
 she had spent, Keziah was robed in state for the evening, 
 and she sat bolt upright in her chair plying her knitting- 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 201 
 
 needles as vigorously as in the old days which Lucian 
 remembered so well. He sat down and glanced at 
 Simpson Pepperdine's chair, and wished the familiar 
 figure were occupying it, and he talked to his aunt of 
 her brother's illness, and the cloud which hung over 
 the house weighed heavily upon both. 
 
 ' I am glad you came down, Lucian,' said Miss 
 Pepperdine, after a time. ' I have been wanting to talk 
 
 to you.' 
 
 ' Yes,' he said. ' What about?' 
 
 Keziah's needles cUcked with unusual vigour for a 
 
 moment or two. 
 
 ' Simpson,' she said at last, ' was always a sott- 
 hearted man. If he had been harder of heart, he would 
 have been better off.' 
 
 Lucian, puzzled by this ambiguous remark, stared at 
 Miss Pepperdine in a fashion indicative of his 
 3.nnazement . 
 
 ' I think,' continued Miss Pepperdine, with pointed 
 emphasis, ' I think it is time you knew more than you 
 know at present, Lucian. When all is said and done, 
 you are the nearest of kin in the male line, and after 
 hearing the doctors to-night I'm prepared for Simpson's 
 death at any moment. It's a very bad attack of apo- 
 plexy—if he lived he'd be a poor invalid all his life. 
 Better that he should be taken while in the full posses- 
 sion of his faculties.' 
 
 Lucian gazed at the upright figure before him with 
 mingled feelings. Miss Pepperdine used to sit like that, 
 and knit like that, and talk like that, in the old days— 
 especially when she felt it to be her duty to reprimand 
 him for some offence. So far as he could tell, she was 
 .wearing the same stiff and crackly silk gown, she held 
 her elbows close to her side and in just the same fashion, 
 she spoke with the same precision as in the time of 
 Lucian's youth. The sight of her prim figure, the sound 
 of her precise voice, blotted out half a score of years : 
 Lucian felt very young again. 
 
202 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 * It may not be so bad as you think,' he said. ' Even 
 the best doctors may err.' 
 
 Miss Pepperdine shook her head. 
 
 ' No,' she said, ' it's all over with Simpson. And 
 I think you ought to know, Lucian, how things are with 
 him. Simpson has been a close man, he has kept things 
 to himself all his life; and of late he has been obliged to 
 confide in me, and I know a great deal that I did not 
 know.' 
 
 ' Yes?' said Lucian, 
 
 ' Simpson,' she continued, ' has not done well in 
 business for some time. He had a heavy loss some 
 years ago through a rascally lawyer whom he trusted 
 
 he always was one of those easy-going men that will 
 
 trust anybody — and although the old Lord Simonstower 
 helped him out of the difficulty, it ultimately fell on his 
 own shoulders, and of late he has had hard work to keep 
 things going. Simpson will die a poor man. Not that 
 that matters — Judith and myself are provided for. I 
 shall leave here, afterwards. Judith, of course, is 
 married. But as regards you, Lucian, you lent 
 Simpson some money a few months ago, didn't you?' 
 
 ' My dear aunt ! ' exclaimed Lucian, ' I ' 
 
 ' I know all about it,' she said, ' though it's only 
 recently that I have known. Well, you mustn't be sur- 
 prised if you have to lose it, Lucian. When all is 
 settled up, I don't think there will be much, if anything, 
 over; and of course everybody must be paid before a 
 member of the family. The Pepperdines have always 
 had their pride, and as your mother was a Pepperdine, 
 Lucian, you must have a share of it in you.' 
 
 ' I have my father's pride as well,' answered Lucian. 
 ' Of course I shall not expect the money. I was glad 
 to be able to lend it.' 
 
 ' Well,' said Miss Pepperdine, with the air of one who 
 deals out justice impartially, ' in one way you were only 
 
 gaying Simpson back for what he had laid out on you. 
 [e spent a good deal of money on you, Lucian, when 
 you were a boy.' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 203 
 
 Lucian heard this news with astonished feelings. 
 
 ' I did not know that,' he said. ' Perhaps I am care- 
 less about these things, but I have always thought that 
 my father left money for me.' 
 
 ' I thought so too, until recently,' replied Miss Pepper- 
 dine. ' Your father thought that he did, too, and he 
 made Simpson executor and trustee. But the money 
 was badly invested. It was in a building society in 
 Rome, and it was all lost. There was never a penny 
 piece from it, from the time of your father's death to 
 this.' 
 
 Lucian listened in silence. 
 
 ' Then,' he said, after a time, ' my uncle was respon- 
 sible for everything for me? I suppose he paid Mr. 
 Chilverstone, and bought my clothes, and gave me 
 pocket-money, and so on?' 
 
 ' Every penny,' repUed his aunt. * Simpson was 
 always a generous man.' 
 
 ' And my three years at Oxford?' he said inquiringly. 
 
 'Ah!' replied Miss Pepperdine, 'that's another 
 matter. Well — I don't suppose it matters now that you 
 should know, though Simpson wouldn't have told you, 
 but I think you ought to know. That was Lord Simons- 
 tower — the old lord. He paid every penny.* 
 
 Lucian uttered a sharp exclamation. He rose from 
 his chair and took a step or two about the room. Miss 
 Pepperdine continued to knit with undiminished vigour. 
 
 ' So it would seem,' he said presently, * that I lived 
 and was educated on charity?' 
 
 ' That is how most people would put it,' she answered, 
 ' though, to do them justice, I don't think either Lord 
 Simonstower or Simpson Pepperdine would have called 
 it that. They thought you a promising youth and they 
 put money into you. That's why I want you to feel that 
 Simpson was only getting back a little of his own in the 
 money that you lent him, though I know he would have 
 paid it back to the day, according to his promise, if he'd 
 been able. But I'm afraid that he would not have been 
 
204 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 able, and I think his money affairs have worked upon 
 him/ 
 
 ' I wish I had known/ said Lucian. ' He should have 
 had no anxiety on my account/ 
 
 He continued to pace the floor; Miss Pepperdine's 
 needles clicked an accompaniment to his advancing and 
 retreating steps. 
 
 ' I thought it best/ she observed presently, ' that you 
 should know all these things — they will explain a good 
 deal/ 
 
 ' Yes/ he answered, ' it is best. I should know. But 
 I wish I had known long ago. After all, a man should 
 not be placed in a false position even by his dearest 
 friends. I ought to have been told the truth.' 
 
 Miss Pepperdine's needles clicked viciously. 
 
 ' So I always felt — after I knew, and that is but 
 recently,' she answered. ' But, as I have said to you 
 before, Simpson Pepperdine is a soft-hearted man.' 
 
 ' He has been a kind-hearted man,' said Lucian. He 
 was thinking, as he walked about the room, glancing at 
 the well-remembered objects, that the money which he 
 had wasted in luxuries that he could well have done 
 without would have reheved Mr. Pepperdine of anxiety 
 and trouble. And yet he had never known, never 
 guessed, that the kindly-hearted farmer had anything 
 to distress him. 
 
 * I think we all seem to walk in darkness,' he said, 
 thinking aloud. ' I never had the least notion of this. 
 Had I known anything of it, Uncle Simpson should have 
 had all that I could give him.' 
 
 Miss Pepperdine melted. She had formed rather hard 
 thoughts of Lucian since his marriage. The side-winds 
 which blew upon her ears from time to time represented 
 him as living in a style which her old-fashioned mind 
 did not approve : she had come to consider him as 
 extravagant, frivolous, and unbalanced. But she was 
 a woman of sound common sense and great shrewdness, 
 and she recognised the genuine ring in Lu clan's voice 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 205 
 
 and the sincerity of his regret that he had not been able 
 to save Simpson Pepperdine some anxiety. 
 
 ' I'm sure you would, my boy,' she said kindly. 
 ' However, Simpson has done with everything now. I 
 didn't tell Judith, because she frets so, but the doctors 
 don't think he'll ever regain consciousness — -it will only 
 be a matter of a few days, Lucian.' 
 
 * And that only makes one wish that one had known 
 of his anxieties sooner,' he said. ' Five years ago I 
 could have helped him substantially.' 
 
 He was thinking of the ten thousand pounds which 
 had already disappeared. Miss Pepperdine did not 
 follow his line of thought. 
 
 * Yes, I've heard that you've made a lot of money,' 
 she said. ' You've been one of the lucky ones, Lucian, 
 for I always understood that poets generally Hved in 
 garrets and were half -starved most of their time. I'm 
 sure one used to read all that sort of thing in books; 
 but perhaps t!mes have changed, and so much the better. 
 Simpson always read your books as soon as you sent 
 them. Upon my word, I'm sure he never understood 
 what it was all about, except perhaps some of the songs 
 and ballads, but he liked the long words, and he was 
 very proud of these little green books — they're all in 
 his bureau there, along with his account-books. Well, 
 as I was saying, I understand you've made money, 
 Lucian. Take care of it, my boy, for you never know 
 when you may want it, and want it badly, in this world. 
 There's one thing I want you to promise me. I don't 
 yet know how things will be when Simpson's gone, but 
 if he is a bit on the wrong side of the ledger, it must be 
 made up by the family, and you must do your share. 
 It mustn't be said that a Pepperdine died owing money 
 that he couldn't pay. I've already talked it over with 
 Judith, and if there is money to be found, she and I 
 and you must find it between us. If need be, all mine 
 can go,' she added sharply. ' I can get a place as a 
 housekeeper even at my age.' 
 
 Lucian gave her his promise readily enough, and 
 
2o6 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 immediately began to wonder what it might imply. But 
 he agreed with her reasoning, and assured himself that, 
 if necessary, he would live on a crust in order to carry 
 out her wishes. And soon afterwards he set out for the 
 vicarage, promising to return for news of Mr. Pepper- 
 dine's condition at an early hour in the morning. 
 
 As he walked back over the snow Lucian was full of 
 thought. The conversation with Miss Pepperdine had 
 opened a new world to him. He had always believed 
 himself independent: it now turned out that for years 
 and years he had lived at other men's charges. He owed 
 his very food to the charity of a relative; another man, 
 upon whom he had no claim, had lavished generosity 
 upon him in no unstinted fashion. He was full of honest 
 gratitude to these men, but he wished at the same time 
 that he had known of their HberaHty sooner. He felt 
 that he had been placed in a false position, and the feeling 
 lowered him in his own estimation. He thought of his 
 father, who earned money easily and spent it freely, 
 and reaUsed that he had inherited his happy-go-lucky 
 temperament. Yet he had never doubted that his father 
 had made provision for him, for he remembered hearing 
 him tell some artist friends one afternoon in Florence that 
 he had laid money aside for Lucian's benefit, and 
 Cyprian Damerel had been a man of common sense, fond 
 of pleasure and good living and generous though he was, 
 But Lucian well understood the story of the Roman 
 building society — greater folk than he, from the Holy 
 Father downwards, had lost money out of that feverish 
 desire to build which has characterised the Romans of 
 all ages. No doubt his father had been carried away 
 by some wave of enthusiasm, and had put all his eggs 
 into one basket, and they had all been broken together. 
 Still, Lucian wished that Mr. Pepperdine had told him 
 all this on his reaching an age of understanding — it would 
 have made a difference in many ways. ' I seem,' he 
 thought, as he plodded on through the snow, ' I seem 
 to have lived in an unreal world, and to have supposed 
 things which were not ! ' And he began to recall the days 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 20/ 
 
 of sure and confident youth, when his name was being 
 extolled as that of a newly risen star in the literary firma- 
 ment, and his own heart was singing with the joy of 
 pride and strength and full assurance. He had never 
 felt one doubt of the splendour of his career, never 
 accepted it as anything but his just due. His very 
 certainty on these matters had, all unknown to himself, 
 induced in him an unassuming modesty, at which many 
 people who witnessed his triumphs and saw him lionised 
 had wondered. Now, however, he had tasted the bitter- 
 ness of reverse; he had found that Fortune can frown 
 as easily as she can smile, and that it is hard to know 
 upon what principle her smiles and frowns are portioned 
 out. To a certain point, life for Lucian had been a 
 perpetual dancing along the primrose way — it was now 
 developing into a tangle wherein were thorns and briars. 
 
 He was too full of these thoughts to care for conversa- 
 tion, even with his old tutor, and he pleaded fatigue and 
 went to bed. He lay awake for the greater part of the 
 night, thinking over his talk with Miss Pepperdine, and 
 endeavouring to arrange his affairs so that he might make 
 good his promise to her, and when he slept, his sleep was 
 troubled by uneasy dreams. He woke rather late in the 
 morning with a feeling of impending calamity hanging 
 heavily upon him. As he dressed, Mr. Chilverstone 
 came tapping at his door — something in the sound 
 warned Lucian of bad news. He was not surprised when 
 the vicar told him that Simpson Pepperdine had died 
 during the night. 
 
 He walked over to the farm as soon as he had break- 
 fasted, and remained there until noon. Coming back, 
 he overtook the village postman, who informed him that 
 the letters were three hours late that morning in conse- 
 quence of the heavy fall of snow, which had choked up 
 the roads between Simonstower and Oakborough. 
 
 * It'll be late afternoon afore I've finished my rounds,' 
 he added, with a strong note of self-pity. ' If you're 
 going up to the vicarage, sir, it 'ud save me a step if 
 
2o8 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 you took the vicar's letters — and there's one, I believe, 
 for yourself.' 
 
 Lucian took the bundle of letters which the man held 
 out to him, and turned it over until he found his own. 
 He wondered why Haidee had written to him — she had 
 no great liking for correspondence, and he had not 
 expected to hear from her during his absence. He 
 opened the letter in the vicar's study, without the least 
 expectation of finding any particular news in it. 
 
 It was a very short letter, and, considering the char- 
 acter of the intimation it was intended to make, the 
 phrasing was commendably plain and outspoken. 
 Lucian 's wife merely announced that his plans for the 
 future were not agreeable to her, and that she was leaving 
 home with the intention of joining Eustace Darlington in 
 Paris. She further added that it was useless to keep 
 up pretences any longer; she had already been un- 
 faithful, and she would be glad if Lucian would arrange 
 to divorce her as quickly as possible, so that she and 
 Darlington might marry. Either as an afterthought, or 
 out of sheer good will, she concluded with a lightly 
 worded expression of friendship and of hope that Lucian 
 might have better luck next time. 
 
 It is more than probable that Haidee was never quite 
 so much her true self in her relation to Lucian as when 
 writing this letter. It is permitted to every woman, 
 whatever her mental and moral quality, to have her ten 
 minutes of unreasoning romance at some period of her 
 life, and Haidee had hers when she and Lucian fell in 
 love with each other's beauty and ran away to hide 
 themselves from the world while they played out their 
 little comedy. It was natural that they should tire of 
 each other within the usual time; but the man's sense of 
 duty was developed in Lucian in a somewhat excep- 
 tional way, and he was inclined to settle down to a 
 Darby and Joan life. Haidee had little of that particular 
 instinct. She was all for pleasure and the glory of this 
 world, and there is small wonder that the prospect of 
 exile in a land for which she had no great liking should 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 209 
 
 have driven her to the salvation of her diamonds and 
 herself by recourse to the man whom she ought to have 
 married instead of Lucian. There was already a guilty 
 bond between them; it seemed natural to Haidee to look 
 to it as a means of drawing her away from the dangers 
 which threatened her worldly comfort. It was equally 
 natural to her to announce all these things to Lucian in 
 pretty much the same terms that she would have em- 
 ployed had she been declining an invitation to some 
 social engagement. 
 
 Lucian read the letter three times. He gave no sign 
 of whatever emotion it called up. All that he did was 
 to announce in quiet, matter-of-fact tones that he must 
 return to London that afternoon, and to beg the loan 
 of the vicar's horse and trap as far as Wellsby station. 
 After that he lunched with Mr. and Mrs. Chilverstone, 
 and if they thought him unusually quiet, there was good 
 reason for that in the fact that Simpson Pepperdine was 
 lying dead in the old farmhouse behind the pine groves. 
 
CHAPTER XXV 
 
 Haidee, waiting for Darlington in Paris, spent the time 
 in a state of perfect peace, amused herself easily and 
 successfully, and at the same time kept clear of such 
 of her acquaintance as she knew to be in the French 
 capital at that moment. On the morrow Darlington 
 would return, and after that everything would be simple. 
 She had arranged it all in her own mind as she travelled 
 from London, and she believed — having a confident and 
 sanguine disposition — that the way in which the affair 
 presented itself to her was the only way in which it could 
 possibily present itself to any one. It had been a mis- 
 take to marry Lucian. Well, it wasn't too late to rectify 
 the mistake, and one was wise, of course, in rectifying it. 
 If you find out that you are on the wrong road — why, 
 what more politic and advisable than to take the shortest 
 cut to the right one? She was sorry for Lucian, but the 
 path which he was following just then was by no means 
 to her own taste, and she must leave him to tread it 
 alone. She was indeed sorry for him. He had been an 
 ardent and a delightful lover — for a while — and it was 
 a pity he was not a rich man. Perhaps they might be 
 friends yet. She, at any rate, would bear no malice — 
 why should she? She was fond enough of Lucian in one 
 way, but she had no fondness for a quiet life in Florence 
 or Pisa or anywhere else, and she had been brought up 
 to believe that a woman must be good to the man who 
 can best afford to be good to her, and she felt as near 
 an approach to thankfulness as she had ever felt in her 
 life when she remembered that Eustace Darlington still 
 cherished a benevolent disposition towards her. 
 
 Darlington did not return to Paris until nearly noon 
 of the following day. When he reached his hotel he was 
 informed by his valet, whom he had left behind, that 
 Mrs. Damerel had arrived, and had asked for him. 
 
 2IO 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 211 
 
 Darlington felt no surprise on hearing this news; nothing 
 more serious than a shopping expedition occurred to him. 
 He sent his man to Haidee's rooms with a message, and 
 after changing his clothes went to call upon her himself. 
 His manner showed her that he neither suspected nor 
 anticipated anything out of the common, but his first 
 question paved the way for her explanation. It was a 
 question that might have been put had they met in 
 New York or Calcutta or anywhere, a question that 
 needed no definite answer. 
 
 ' What brings you here? Frills, or frocks, or some- 
 thing equally feminine, I suppose?' he said carelessly, 
 as he shook hands with her. ' Staying long? ' 
 
 The indifference of his tone sounded somewhat harshly 
 in Haidee's hearing. It was evident that he suspected 
 nothing and had no idea of the real reason of her 
 presence. She suddenly became aware that there might 
 be difficulties in the path that had seemed so easy. 
 
 ' Lucian here? ' asked Darlington, with equal careless- 
 ness. 
 
 ' No,' she said. Then, in a lower tone, she added, 
 * I have left Lucian.' 
 
 Darlington turned quickly from the window, whither 
 he had strolled after their greeting. He uttered a sharp, 
 half -suppressed exclamation. 
 
 ' Left him? ' he said. ' You don't mean ' 
 
 His interrogative glance completed the sentence. 
 There was something in his eyes, something stern and 
 businesslike, that made Haidee afraid. Her own eyes 
 turned elsewhere. 
 
 ' Yes,' she said. 
 
 Dariington put his hands in his pockets and came and 
 stood in front of her. He looked down at her as if she 
 had been a child out of whom he wished to extract some 
 information. 
 
 * Quarrelling, eh?' he said. 
 
 ' No, not quarrelling at all,' she answered. 
 
 * Then— what?' 
 
 ' He has spent all the money,' she said, ' and lots 
 
212 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 beside, and he is going to sell everything in the house 
 in order to pay you, and then he wanted me to go and 
 live cheaply — cheaply, you understand? — in Italy; and 
 — and he said I must sell my diamonds.' 
 
 * Did he? ' said Darlington. ' And he is going to sell 
 everything in order to pay me, is he? Well, that's 
 honest; I didn't think he'd the pluck. He's evidently 
 not quite such an utter fool as I've always thought 
 him. Well?' 
 
 ' And, of course, I left him.' 
 
 ' That " of course " is good. Of course, being you, 
 you did, " of course." Yes, I understand that part, 
 Haidee. But ' — he looked around him with an expres- 
 sive glance at her surroundings, ' why — here?' he 
 inquired sharply. 
 
 ' I came to you,' she said in a low and not too con- 
 fident voice. 
 
 Darlington laughed — a low, satirical, cynical laughter 
 that frightened her. She glanced at him timidly; she 
 had never known him like that before. 
 
 ' I see!' he said. ' You thought that I should prove 
 a refuge for the fugitive wife? But I'm afraid that I 
 am not disposed to welcome refugees of any description 
 — it isn't my metier, you know.' 
 
 Haidee looked at him in astonishment. Her eyes 
 caught and held his: he saw the growing terror in her 
 face. 
 
 ' But ' she said, and came to a stop. Then she 
 
 repeated the word, still staring at him with questioning 
 eyes. Darlington tore himself away with a snarl. 
 
 ' Look here!' he said, * I'm not a sentimental man. 
 If I ever had a scrap of sentiment, you knocked it out 
 of me four years ago. I was fond of you then. I'd 
 have made you a kind husband, my girl, and you'd have 
 got on, fool as you are by nature. But you threw me 
 over for that half-mad boy, and it killed all the soft things 
 I had inside me. I knew I should have my revenge on 
 both of you, and I've had it. He's ruined; he hasn't a 
 penny piece that isn't due to me; and as for you — listen, 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 213 
 
 my girl, and I'll tell you some plain truths. You're a 
 pretty animal, nice to play with for half an hour now and 
 then, but you're no man's mate for life, unless the man's 
 morally blind. I once heard a scientific chap say that 
 the soul's got to grow in hiunan beings. Well, yours 
 hasn't sprouted yet, Haidee. You're a fool, though you 
 are a very lovely woman. I suppose — ' — he came closer 
 to her, and looking down at her astonished face smiled 
 more cynically than ever — ' I suppose you thought that 
 I would run away with you and eventually marry you ? ' 
 
 ' I — yes — of course ! ' ahe whispered. 
 
 ' Well,' he said, ' if I, too, had been a fool, I might 
 have done that. But I am not a fool, my dear Haidee. 
 Perhaps I'm hard, brutal, cynical — the world and its 
 precious denizens have made me so. I'm not going to 
 run away with the woman who ran away with another 
 man on the very eve of her marriage to me; and as to 
 marrying you, well — I'm plain spoken enough to tell 
 you that I made up my mind years ago that whatever 
 other silliness I might commit, I would never commit the 
 crowning folly of marrying a woman who had been my 
 mistress.' 
 
 Haidee caught her breath with a sharp exclamation. 
 If she had possessed any spirit she would have risen to 
 her feet, said things, done things : having none, like most 
 of her sort, she suddenly buried her face in her hands and 
 sobbed. 
 
 ' I dare say it doesn't sound nice,' said Darlington, 
 'but Lord knows it's best to be plain spoken. Now, 
 my girl, listen to me. Go home and make the best of 
 your bargain. I'll let Lucian Damerel off easily, though 
 to tell you the truth I've always had cheerful notions of 
 ruining him hopelessly. If he wants to live cheaply in 
 Italy, go with him — you married him. You have your 
 maid here? — tell her to pack up and be ready to leave by 
 the night train. I dare say Damerel thinks you have 
 only run over here to buy a new gown; he never need 
 know anything to the contrary.' 
 
214 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 * B-b-b-but I have t-t-told him ! ' she sobbed. ' He 
 knows ! ' 
 
 ' Damn you for a fool ! ' said Darlington, between his 
 teeth. He put his hands in his pockets again and began 
 rattling the loose money there. For a moment he stood 
 staring at Haidee, his face puckered into frowning lines. 
 He came up to her. ' How did you tell him?' he said. 
 ' You didn't— write it?' 
 
 ' Yes,' she answered. ' I did — I wrote him a letter.' 
 
 Darlington sighed. 
 
 ' Oh, well ! ' he said, ' it doesn't matter, only he'll be 
 able to get heavy damages, and I wanted to clear him 
 out. It's the fortune of war. Well, I'm going. Good- 
 day.' 
 
 He had walked across to the door and laid his hand 
 upon the latch ere Haidee comprehended the meaning 
 of his words. Then she sprang up with a scream. 
 
 ' And what of me?' she cried. ' Am I to be left 
 here?' 
 
 ' You brought yourself here,' he retorted, eyeing her 
 evilly. ' I did not ask you to come.' 
 
 She stared at him open-mouthed as if he were some 
 strange thing that had come into her line of vision for 
 the first time. Her breath began to come and go in 
 gasps. She was an elementary woman, but at this treat- 
 ment from the man she had known as her lover a natural 
 indignation sprang up in her and she began to find 
 words. 
 
 ' But this ! ' she said, with a nearer approach to 
 honesty than she had ever known, ' this is — desertion ! ' 
 
 ' I am under no vow to you,' he said. 
 
 ' You have implied it. I trusted you.' 
 
 ' As Lucian trusted you,' he sneered. 
 
 She became speechless again. Something in her looks 
 brought Darlington back from the door to her side. 
 
 ' Look here, Haidee,' he said, not unkindly, ' don't 
 be a little fool. Go home quickly and settle things with 
 your husband. Tell him you wrote that letter in a fit of 
 temper; tell him — oh, tell him any of the lies that women 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 215 
 
 invent so easily on these occasions! It's absolutely 
 hopeless to look to me for protection, absolutely impos- 
 sible for me to give it ' 
 
 He stopped. She was staring at him in a strange way 
 
 the way in which a dumb animal might stare if the 
 
 butcher who was about to kill it condescended to try to 
 explain to it why it was necessary that he should 
 presently cut its throat. Darlington hummed and ha'd 
 when he caught that look. He cast a furtive glance at 
 the door and half turned away from Haidee. 
 
 ' Yes, quite impossible,' he repeated. ' The fact is 
 
 well, you may as well knew it now as hear it later on — 
 
 I am going to be married.' 
 
 She nodded her head as if she quite understood his 
 meaning, and he, looking full at her again, noticed that 
 she was trying to moisten her lips with the tip of her 
 tongue, and that her eyes were dilated to an imusual 
 degree. 
 
 ' You can't say that I've treated you badly,' he said. 
 ' After all, you had the first chance, and it wasn't my 
 fault if you threw it away. There, now, be sensible and 
 go back to London and make it up with Damerel. You 
 can easily get round him — he'll believe anything you tell 
 him. Say you were upset at the thought of going to 
 Italy with him, and lost your head. Things will come 
 all right if you only manage your cards properly. Well, 
 I'm going — good-day.' 
 
 He turned slowly from her as if he were somewhat 
 ashamed of his desertion. They had been standing by 
 the side of a table, littered about on v/hich were several 
 odds and ends picked up by Haidee on the previous 
 day. Amongst them was an antique stiletto, sharp as a 
 needle, which had taken her fancy at a shop in the 
 Palais Royal. She had thought of using it as a hat-pin, 
 and was charmed when the dealer suggested that it had 
 probably tasted the heart' s-blood of more than one 
 victim. Its glitter caught her eye now, and she picked 
 it up and struck furiously at Darlington's back. 
 
 At that moment Lucian was being conducted to his 
 
2i6 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 wife's room by a courteous manager. At the threshold 
 they paused, brought to a simultaneous standstill by a 
 wild scream. When they entered the room, Darlington 
 lay crumpled up and dead in the centre of the floor, and 
 Haidee, gazing spellbound at him from the furthest 
 corner, was laughing — a long, low ripple of laughter that 
 seemed as if it would never cease. The stiletto, thrown 
 at her feet, flashed back a ray of sunlight from the 
 window. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 That afternoon Saxonstowe arrived in town from York- 
 shire with a grim determination in his heart to have it 
 out once and for all with Sprats. He had tried to do 
 his duty as a country squire and to interest himself in 
 country life and matters: he had hunted the fox and 
 shot pheasants, sat on the bench at petty and at quarter 
 sessions, condoled with farmers on poor prices and with 
 old women on bad legs, and he was still unsatisfied and 
 restless and conscious of wanting something. The folk 
 round about him came to the conclusion that he was not 
 as other young men of his rank and wealth — he seemed 
 inclined to bookishness, he was a bit shy and a little bit 
 stand-ofhsh in manner, and he did not appear to have 
 much inclination for the society of neighbours in his own 
 station of hfe. Before he succeeded to the title Saxon- 
 stowe had not been much known in the neighbourhood. 
 He had sometimes visited his predecessor as a schoolboy, 
 but the probability of his becoming the next Lord Saxon- 
 stowe was at that time small, and no one had taken much 
 notice of Master Richard Feversham. When he came 
 back to the place as lord and master, what reputation he 
 had was of a sort that scarcely appealed to the country 
 people. He had travelled in some fearsome countries 
 where no other man had ever set foot, and he haid written 
 a great book about his adventures, and must therefore 
 be a clever young man. But he was not a soldier, nor a 
 sailor, and he did not particularly care for hunting or 
 shooting, and was therefore somewhat of a hard nut to 
 crack. The honest gentlemen who found fox-hunting 
 the one thing worth living for could scarcely realise that 
 even its undeniable excitements were somewhat tame to 
 a man who had more than once taken part in a hunt in 
 which he was the quarry, and they were disposed to 
 
 217 
 
2i8 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 regard the new Viscount Saxonstowe as a bit of a prig, 
 being unconscious that he was in reaUty a very simple- 
 minded, unaffected young man who was a httle bit 
 embarrassed by his title and his wealth. As for their 
 ladies, it was their decided opinion that a young peer 
 of such ancient lineage and such great responsibilities 
 should marry as soon as possible, and each beUeved that 
 it was Lord Saxonstowe' s bounden duty to choose a wife 
 from one of the old north-country famihes. In this 
 Saxonstowe agreed with them. He desired a wife, and 
 a wife from the north country, and he knew where to 
 find her, and wanted her so much that it had long been 
 evident to his sober judgment that, failing her, no other 
 woman would ever call him husband. The more he 
 was left alone, the more deeply he sank in the sea of love. 
 And at last he felt that life was too short to be trifled 
 with, and he went back to Sprats and asked her firmly 
 and insistently to marry him. 
 
 Sprats was neither hurt nor displeased nor surprised. 
 She listened silently to all he had to say, and she looked 
 at him with her usual frankness when he had finished. 
 
 ' I thought we were not to talk of these matters?' she 
 said. ' We were to be friends — was there not some sort 
 of compact?' 
 
 ' If so, I have broken it,' he answered — ' not the 
 friendship — that, never! — but the compact. Besides, I 
 don't remember anything about that. As to talking of 
 this, well, I intend to go on asking you to marry me 
 until you do.' 
 
 ' You have not forgotten what I told you?' she said, 
 eyeing him with some curiosity. 
 
 * Not at all. I have thought a lot about it/ he 
 answered. ' I have not only thought, but I have come 
 to a conclusion.' 
 
 ' Yes? ' she said, still curious. ' What conclusion?' 
 
 ' That you are deceiving yourself,' he answered. 
 ' You think you love Lucian Damerel. I do not doubt 
 that you do, in a certain way, but not in the way in 
 which I would wish you, for instance, to love me, and 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 219 
 
 in which I believe you could and would love me — if you 
 would let yourself.' 
 
 Sprats stared at him with growing curiosity and sur- 
 prise. There was something masterful and lordly about 
 his tone and speech that filled her heart with a great 
 sense of contentment — it was the voice of the superior 
 animal calling to the inferior, of the stronger to the 
 weaker. And she was so strong that she had a great 
 longing to be weak — always providing that something 
 stronger than herself were shielding her weakness. 
 
 ' Well?' was all she could say. 
 
 ' You have always felt a sense of protection for him, ' 
 continued Saxonstowe. ' It was in you from the first — 
 you wanted something to take care of. But isn't there 
 sometimes a feeling within you that you'd like to be 
 taken care of yourself?' 
 
 ' Who taught you all this?' she asked, with puzzled 
 brows. ' You seem to have acquired some strange 
 knowledge of late.' 
 
 ' I expect it's instinct, or nature, or something,' he 
 said. ' Anyhow, have I spoken the truth?' 
 
 ' You don't expect me to confess the truth to you, do 
 you?' she answered. ' You have not yet learned every- 
 thing, I see.' She paused and regarded him for some 
 time in silence. ' I don't know why,' she said at last, 
 ' but this seems as if it were the prelude to a fight. I 
 feel as I used to feel when I fought with Lucian — there 
 was always a lot of talk before the tearing and rending 
 began. I feel talky now, and I also feel that I must 
 fight you. To begin with, just remember that I am a 
 woman and you're a man. I don't know anything about 
 men — they're incomprehensible to me. To begin with, 
 why do you wish to marry me? — you're the first man 
 who ever did. I want to know why — why — why?' 
 
 ' Because you're the woman for me and I'm the man 
 for you,' he replied masterfully. ' You are my mate.' 
 
 ' How do you know ? ' 
 
 • I feel it.' 
 
 ' Then why don't I feel it?' she asked quickly. 
 
220 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 ' Are you dead certain you don't?' he said, smiling 
 at her. ' I think, perhaps, that if you could just get 
 deep down into yourself, you do.' 
 
 ' But that doesn't explain why you want to marry 
 me,' she said inconsequently. ' You tell me that what 
 I have always felt for Lucian is not what I ought to feel 
 for the man I love. Well, if I analyse what I feel for 
 Lucian, perhaps it is what you say it is — a sense of 
 protection, of wanting to help, and to shield; but then, 
 you say that that is the sort of love you have for me.' 
 
 ' Did I?' he said, laughing quietly. * You forget that 
 I have not yet told you what sort of love I have for you 
 — we have not reached the love-making stage yet.' 
 
 Sprats felt femininity assert itself. She knew that she 
 blushed, and she felt very hot and very uncomfortable, 
 and she wished Saxonstowe would not smile. She was 
 as much a girl and just as shy of a possible lover as in 
 her tom-boy days, and there was something in Saxon- 
 stowe 's presence which aroused new tides of feeling in 
 her. He had become bold and masterful; it was as if 
 she were being forced out of herself. And then he sud- 
 denly did a thing which sent all the blood to her heart 
 with a wild rush before it leapt back pulsing and 
 throbbing through her body. Saxonstowe spoke her 
 name. 
 
 * Millicent ! ' he said, and laid his hand very gently on 
 hers. 'Millicent!' 
 
 She drew away from him quickly, but her eyes met 
 his with courage. 
 
 * My name ! ' she said. ' No one ever called me by my 
 name before. I had half forgotten it.' 
 
 ' Listen,' he said. ' I want you to think all this over, 
 like the woman you are. Don't waste your life on a 
 dream or a delusion. Come to me and be my wife and 
 friend so long as God lets us live. You are a true 
 woman — a woman in a thousand. I would not ask you 
 else. I will be a true man to you. And you and I 
 together can do great things, for others. Think, and 
 tell me your thoughts — afterwards.' 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 221 
 
 ' Yes, afterwards/ she said. She wanted him to go, 
 and he saw it and went, and Sprats sat down to think. 
 But for the first time in her hfe she found it impossible 
 to think clearly. She tried to marshal facts and to place 
 them before her in due sequence and proper order, but 
 she discovered that she was pretty much Uke all other 
 women at these junctures and that a strange confusion 
 had taken possession of her. For the moment there was 
 too much of Saxonstowe in her mental atmosphere to 
 enable her to think, and after some time she uttered an 
 impatient exclamation and went off to attend to her 
 duties. For the remainder of the afternoon she bustled 
 about the house, and the nursing-staff wondered what 
 it was that had given their Head such a fit of vigorous 
 research into unexplored corners. It was not until even- 
 ing that she allowed herself to be alone again, and by 
 that time she was prepared to sit down and face the situa- 
 tion. She went to her own room with a resolute deter- 
 mination to think of everything calmly and coolly, and 
 there she found evening newspapers lying on the table, 
 and she picked one up mechanically and opened it with- 
 out the intention of reading it, and ere she knew what 
 was happening she had read of the tragedy in Paris. The 
 news stamped itself upon her at first without causing her 
 smart or pain, even as a clean shot passes through the 
 flesh with little tearing of the fibres. She sat down and 
 read all that the telegrams had to tell, and searched each 
 of the newspapers until she was in possession of the latest 
 news. 
 
 She had gone into her room with the influence of 
 Saxonstowe's love-making still heavy upon her woman- 
 hood; she left it an unsexed thing of action and forceful 
 determination. In a few moments she had seen her 
 senior nurse and had given her certain orders; in a few 
 more she was in her outdoor cloak and bonnet and at the 
 door, and a maid was whistling for a hansom for her. 
 But just as she was running down the steps to enter it, 
 another came came hurriedly into the square, and Saxon- 
 stowe waved his hand to her. She paused and went 
 
222 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 back to the open door; he jumped from his cab and 
 joined her, and they went into the house together, and 
 into the room which she had just left. 
 
 ' I was going to you,' she said, ' and yet I might have 
 known that you would come to me.' 
 
 ' I came as soon as I knew,' he answered. 
 
 She looked at him narrowly : he was watching her with 
 inquiring eyes. 
 
 ' We must go there at once,' she said. ' There is time 
 to catch the night train?' 
 
 ' Yes,' he said, ' plenty of time. I have already made 
 some arrangements — I thought you would wish it.' 
 
 She nodded in answer to this, and began to take some 
 things out of a desk. Saxonstowe noticed that her hand 
 was perfectly steady, though her face was very pale. 
 She turned presently from packing a small handbag and 
 came up to him. 
 
 ' Listen,' she said; ' it is you and I who are going — 
 you understand?' 
 
 He looked at her for a moment in silence, and then 
 bowed his head. He had not understood, but he felt 
 that she had come to some determination, and that that 
 was no time to question her. In a few moments more 
 they had left the house and set out on their journey to 
 Paris. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 Our neighbours on the other side of the Channel are 
 blessed with many qualities which were not given to us 
 who reside in these islands, and amongst them is one 
 which most EngUshmen would not pay a penny for if it 
 were on sale in market overt. This is the quality of 
 
 sentiment a thing which we others strive to choke at its 
 
 birth, and to which at any time we give but an outside 
 corner of the hearth of life. It is a quality of which 
 one may have too much, but in its place it is an excellent 
 and a desirable quality, for it tends to the establishment 
 of a fitting sense of proportion, and makes people polite 
 and considerate at the right moment. Had the tragedy 
 of Haidee and Darlington occurred in England, there 
 would have been much vulgar curiosity manifested, for 
 amongst us we often fail to gauge the niceties of a situa- 
 tion. In Paris, sentiment fixed the affaire Darner el at 
 its right value in a few hours. It was a veritable tragedy 
 — one to be spoken of with bated breath — one of those 
 terrible dramas of real life which far transcend anything 
 that can be placed upon the stage. The situations were 
 pathetic, the figures of the chief actors of a veritable 
 notability. The young husband, great as a poet and 
 handsome as a Greek god; the young wife, beautiful and 
 charming; the plutocrat lover, of whom death forbade to 
 speak — they were all of a type to attract. Then the 
 intense tragedy of the final situation ! Who could tell 
 what had occurred between the lover and the wife in 
 that last supreme scene, since he was dead and she bereft 
 of reason? It had all the elements of greatness, and 
 greatness demands respect. Therefore, instead of being 
 vulgarised, as it would have been in unsentimental 
 England, the affaire Damerel was spoken of with a tender 
 respect and with few words. It was an event too deplor- 
 able to merit common discussion, 
 
 223 
 
224 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 Lucian had swept through London to Paris intent on 
 killing Darlington with his own hands. His mental 
 balance had been destroyed, and he himself rendered 
 incapable of hearing or seeing reason long before he 
 reached the French capital. The courteous manager 
 who replied to Lucian's calm inquiries for Mrs. Damerel 
 did not realise that the composure of the distinguished- 
 looking young gentleman was that of the cunning 
 madman. Inside Lucian's breast nestled a revelver — 
 his fingers were itching to get at it as he followed his 
 guide up the stairs, for he had made up his mind to 
 shoot his faithless wife and his treacherous enemy on 
 sight. 
 
 The sight of Haidee, mopping and mowing in her 
 corner, the sound of her awful laughter, brought Lucian 
 back to sanity. Living and moving as if he were in some 
 fearful dream, he gave orders and issued directions. 
 The people of the hotel, half paralysed by the strangeness 
 of the tragedy, wondered at his calmness; the police were 
 astonished by the lucidity of the statement which he 
 gave to them. His one great desire was to shield his 
 wife's name. The fierce resentment which he had felt 
 during his pursuit of her had completely disappeared in 
 presence of the tragedy. Before the end of the afternoon 
 some curious mental process in him had completely re- 
 habilitated Haidee in his estimation : he believed her to 
 have been deeply wronged, and declared with emphasis 
 that she must have killed Darlington in a fit of despera- 
 tion following upon some wickedness of his own. Her 
 incriminating letter he swept aside contemptuously — it 
 was a sure proof, he said, that the poor child's mind 
 was already unhinged when it was written. He turned 
 a blind eye to undoubted facts. Out of a prodigal 
 imagination and an exuberant fancy he quickly built up 
 a theory which presently assumed for him the colours 
 of absolute truth. Haidee had been tempted in secret 
 by this devil who had posed as friend; he had used his 
 insidious arts to corrupt her, and the temptation had 
 fallen upon her at the very moment when he, Lucian, 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 225 
 
 was worrying her with his projects of retrenchment. 
 She had taken flight, the poor Haidee who had Uved 
 in rose-leaf luxury all her days, and had fled from her 
 exaggerated fears to the man she believed her friend and 
 Lucian's. Then, when she had found out his true char- 
 acter, she — in a moment of awful fear or fright, most 
 probably — had killed him. That was the real story, 
 the poor, helpless truth. He put it before Sprats and 
 Saxonstowe with a childlike belief in its plausibility and 
 veracity that made at least one of them like to weep — 
 he had shown them the letter which Haidee had written 
 to Lucian before leaving town, and they knew the real 
 truth of the whole sorry business. It seemed best, after 
 all, thought Sprats, and said so to Saxonstowe when she 
 got the chance, that Lucian should cherish a fiction 
 rather than believe the real truth. And that he did 
 believe his fiction was soon made evident. 
 
 ' It is all my fault — all ! ' he said to Sprats, with bitter 
 self-reproach. ' I never took care of her as I should 
 have done, as I had vowed to do. You were right. 
 Sprats, in everything that you said to me. I wonder 
 what it is that makes me so bhnd to things that other 
 people see so clearly? I ought not to have let the poor 
 child be exposed to the temptations of that arch-devil; 
 but I trusted him implicitly. He always made the most 
 sincere professions of his friendship for both of us. Then 
 again, how is it, why is it, that people so constantly 
 deceive me ? I believe every man as I expect every man 
 to beHeve me. Do you think I ever dreamt of all this, 
 ever dreamt of what was in that scoundrel's mind? Yet 
 I ought to have foreseen — I ought to have been guided 
 by you. It is all my fault, all my fault ! ' 
 
 It was useless to argue with him or to condole with 
 him. He had persuaded himself without an effort that 
 such and such things were, and the only thing to be 
 done with him was to acquiesce in his conclusions and 
 help him as judiciously as possible. The two faithful 
 friends who had hurried to his side remained with him 
 until the troubled waters grew calm again. That was now 
 
 P 
 
226 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 an affair of time. Haidee was certainly insane, and the 
 physicians held out Uttle hope of her recovery. By their 
 advice she was removed to a private institution within 
 easy distance of Paris, and Lucian announced his inten- 
 tion of settling down in the gay city in order to be near 
 her. He talked of her now as if she had been a girl- 
 bride, snatched away from him by ruthless fate, and it 
 was plain to see that he had obliterated the angry 
 thoughts that had filled him during his frenzy of resent- 
 ment, and now cherished nothing but feelings of 
 chastened and tender regret. For Haidee, indeed, 
 frailest of frail mortals, became apotheosised into some- 
 thing very different. Lucian, who never did anything 
 by halves and could not avoid extremes, exalted her into 
 a sort of much-wronged saint; she became his dream, and 
 nobody had the heart to wake him. 
 
 Sprats and Saxonstowe worked hard for him at this 
 time, one relieving him of much trouble in making the 
 necessary arrangements for Haidee, the other of a large 
 part of the business affairs brought into active operation 
 by the recent tragedy. Saxonstowe, working untiringly 
 on his behalf, was soon able to place Lucian's affairs in 
 order. Lucian gave him full power to act, and ere long 
 had the satisfaction of knowing that the liability to 
 Darlington and Darlington had been discharged, that 
 Miss Pepperdine's mind had been set at rest as to the 
 preservation of the family honour, and that he owed 
 money to no one. He would be able to surround the 
 stricken Haidee with every comfort and luxury that one 
 in her condition could enjoy, and he himself need never 
 feel a moment's anxiety. For the affaire Damerel had 
 had its uses. Lucian came again in the market. Mr. 
 Robertson began to sell the thin green-clad volumes more 
 rapidly than ever before; even the portly epic moved, 
 and finally began racing its sister competitors for the 
 favour of the fickle public. Mr. Harcourt, with a rare 
 sense of fitness, revived Lucian's first play to crowded 
 houses; an enterprising Frenchman went over to London 
 and witnessed a performance, and within a few weeks 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 227 
 
 presented a version of it at ons of the Parisian theatres. 
 French translations of Lucian's works followed, and sold 
 Hke hot cakes; the Italian translations received a fillip, 
 and people in the United States became interested. 
 Nothing, said Mr. Robertson, could have been better, 
 from a trade point of view. 
 
 Lucian accepted all this with indifference and equani- 
 mity. All his thoughts were centred on the quiet house 
 in the little village outside Paris, where Haidee laughed 
 at her own fingers or played with dolls. Every afternoon 
 he left his appartement and travelled into the country 
 to inquire after his wife's health. He always carried 
 some little gift with him — flowers, fruit, a child's picture- 
 book, a child's toy, and the nurse to whom these things 
 were given used to weep over them, being young and 
 sentimental, and very much in love with Lucian's face 
 and hair, which was now turning a pretty and becoming 
 grey at the temples. Sometimes he saw the doctor, who 
 was sympathetic, and guarded in his answers, and some- 
 times he walked in the garden with an old abbe who 
 used to visit the place, and exchanged pious sentiments 
 with him. But he never saw Haidee, for the doctors 
 feared it, and thus his conception of her was not of the 
 madwoman, but of the young beauty with whom he had 
 made an impetuous runaway marriage. He used to 
 walk about Paris in those days with eyes that wore a 
 far-away expression, and the women would speak of his 
 beauty with tears in their eyes and shake their heads 
 over the sadness of his story, which was well known to 
 everybody, and in pecuniary value was worth a gold- 
 mine. 
 
CHAPTER XXVIII 
 
 When they had done everything that could be done for 
 him at that time, Sprats and Saxonstowe left Lucian in 
 Paris and returned together to London. He appeared 
 to have no particular desire that they should remam with 
 him, nor any dread of being alone. Sprats had seen to 
 the furnishing of his rooms and to the transportation of 
 his most cherished books and pictures; he was left sur- 
 rounded with comfort and luxury, and he assured his 
 friends that he wanted for nothing. He intended to 
 devote himself to intense study, and if he wanted a little 
 society, well, he already had a considerable acquaintance 
 amongst authors and artists in Paris, and could make 
 use of it if need were. But he spoke of himself as of an 
 anchorite; it was plain to see that he believed that the 
 joie de vivre existed for him no longer. It was also plain 
 that something in him wished to be clear of the old life 
 and the old associations. He took an affectionate fare- 
 well of Sprats and of Saxonstowe at the Gare du Nord, 
 whither he accompanied them on their departure, but 
 Sprats was keenly aware of the fact that there was that in 
 him which was longing to see the last of them. They 
 were links of a chain that bound him to a life with which 
 he wished to have no further connection. When they 
 said good-bye, Sprats knew that she was turning down 
 a page that closed a long chapter of her own life. 
 
 She faced the problem bravely and with clear-headed- 
 ness. She saw now that much of what she had taken to 
 be real fact had been but a dream. Lucian had awak- 
 ened the mother-instinct in her by his very helplessness, 
 but nothing in him had ever roused the new feeling which 
 had grown in her every day since Saxonstowe had told 
 her of his love. She had made the mistake of taking 
 interest and affection for love, and now that she had 
 found it out she was contented and uneasy, happy and 
 
 228 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 229 
 
 miserable, pleased and furious, all at once. She wanted 
 to run away from Saxonstowe to the very ends of the 
 earth, but she also cherished a secret desire to sit at his 
 feet and be his slave, and would rather have torn her 
 tongue out than tell him of it. 
 
 While they were father-and-mother-ing Lucian in 
 Paris, Saxonstowe had remained solid and grim as one 
 of the Old Guard, doing nothing but his duty. Sprats 
 had watched him with keen observation, and had 
 admired his stern determination and the earnest way in 
 which he did everything. He had taken hold of Lucian 
 as a big brother might take a little one, and had been 
 gentle and firm, kindly and tactful, all at once. She had 
 often longed to throw her arms round him and kiss him 
 for his good-boy qualities, but he had sunk the lover in 
 the friend with unmistakable purpose, and she was afraid 
 of him. She began to catch herself looking at him out 
 of her eye-corners when he was not looking at her, and 
 she hated herself. Once when he came suddenly into a 
 room, she blushed so furiously that she could have cried 
 with vexation, and it was all the more aggravating, she 
 said, because she had just happened to be thinking of 
 him. Travelling back together, she was very subdued 
 and essentially feminine. Her manner invited con- 
 fidence, but Saxonstowe was stiff as a ramrod and cold 
 as an icicle. He put her into a hansom at Charing 
 Cross, and bade her good-bye as if she had been a mere 
 acquaintance. 
 
 But he came to her the next afternoon, and she knew 
 from his face that he was in an urgent and a masterful 
 mood. She recognised that she would have to capitu- 
 late, and had a happy moment in assuring herself that 
 she would make her own terms. Saxonstowe wasted no 
 time. He might have been a smart young man calling 
 to collect the water-rate. 
 
 * The night that we went to Paris together,' he said, 
 ' you made an observation which you thought I under- 
 stood. I didn't understand it, and now I want to know 
 what you meant.' 
 
230 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 ' What I said. That we were going— you and I — 
 together,' she answered. 
 
 ' But what did that mean? ' 
 
 ' Together,' she said, ' together means— well, of 
 course, it means — together.' 
 
 Saxonstowe put his hands on her shoulders; she 
 immediately began to study the pattern of the hearthrug 
 at their feet. 
 
 ' Will you marry me, Millicent?' he said. 
 
 She nodded her head, but her eyes still remained fixed 
 on his toes. 
 
 ' Answer me,' he commanded. 
 
 ' Yes,' she said, and lifted her eyes to his. 
 
 A moment later she disengaged herself from his arms 
 and began to laugh. 
 
 ' I was going to extract such a lot of conditions,' she 
 said. ' Somehow I don't care about them now. But 
 will you tell me just what is going to happen?' 
 
 ' You knew, I suppose, that I should have already 
 mapped everything out. Well, so I have. We shall be 
 married at once, in the quietest possible fashion, and 
 then we are going round the world in our own way. 
 It is to be your holiday after all these years of work.' 
 
 She nodded, with perfect acquiescence in his plans. 
 
 ' At once?' she said questioningly. 
 
 ' A week from to-day,' he said. 
 
 The notion of such precipitancy brought the blood into 
 her face. 
 
 ' I suppose I ought to say that I can't possibly be 
 ready in a week,' she said, ' but it so happens that I can. 
 A week to-day, then.' 
 
 Mr. Chilverstone came up from Simonstower to marry 
 them. It was a very quiet wedding in a quiet church. 
 Lady Firmanence, however, was there, and before the 
 bride and bridegroom left to catch a transatlantic liner 
 for Ney York she expressed a decided opinion that the 
 fourth Viscount Saxonstowe had inherited more than 
 his share of the good sense and wise perception for which 
 their family had always been justly famous. 
 
CHAPTER XXIX 
 
 LuciAN settled down into a groove-like existence. He 
 read when he liked and worked when he felt any parti- 
 cular inclination to do so; he amused himself at times 
 with the life which a man of his temperament may live 
 in Paris, but always with the air of one who looks on. 
 He made a few new friends and sometimes visited old 
 ones. Now and then he entertained in a quiet, old- 
 fashioned way. He was very indulgent and caressing 
 to a certain coterie of young people who believed in him 
 as a great master and elevated his poetry to the dignity 
 of a cult. He was always a distinguished figure when 
 he showed himself at the opera or the theatre, and people 
 still pointed him out on the boulevards and shook their 
 heads and said what a pity it was that one so young and 
 handsome and talented should carry so heavy a burden. 
 In this way he may be said to have become quite an 
 institution of Paris, and Americans stipulated with their 
 guides that he should be pointed out to them at the first 
 opportunity. 
 
 Whatever else engaged Lucian's attention or his time, 
 he never forgot his daily visit to the quiet house in the 
 suburbs where Haidee still played with dolls or laughed 
 gleefully at her attendants. He permitted nothing to 
 interfere with this duty, which he regarded as a penance 
 for his sins of omission to Haidee in days gone by. 
 Others might forsake Paris for the sea or the mountains; 
 Lucian remained there all the year round for two years, 
 making his daily pilgrimage. He saw the same faces 
 every day, and heard the same report, but he never saw 
 his wife. Life became curiously even and regular, but 
 it never oppressed him. He had informed himself at 
 the very beginning of this period that this was a thing 
 to be endured, and he endured it as pleasantly and 
 
 231 
 
232 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 bravely as possible. During those two years he pub- 
 lished two new volumes, of a somewhat new note, which 
 sold better in a French translation than in the English 
 original, and at Mr. Harcourt's urgent request he wrote 
 a romantic drama. It filled the Athenaeum during the 
 whole of a London season, and the financial results were 
 gratifying in a high degree, for the glamour and mystery 
 of the affaire Damerel were still powerful, and Lucian 
 had become a personality and a force by reason of his 
 troubles. 
 
 At the end of two years, the doctor to whose care 
 Haidee had been entrusted called Lucian into his private 
 room one day and told him that he had grave news to 
 communicate. His patient, he said, was dying— slowly, 
 but very surely. But there was more than that: before 
 her death she would recover her reason. She would 
 probably recall everything that had taken place; it was 
 more than possible that she would have painfully clear 
 recollections of the scene, whatever it might be, that had 
 immediately preceded her sudden loss of sanity. It was 
 but right, said the doctor, that Mr. Damerel should know 
 of this, but did Mr. Damerel wish to be with his wife 
 when this development occurred? It might be a pain- 
 ful experience, and death must soon follow it. It was 
 for Mr. Damerel to decide. Lucian decided on the 
 instant. He had carried an image of Haidee in his mind 
 for two years, and it had become fixed on his mental 
 vision with such firmness that he could not think of her 
 as anything but what he imagined her to be. He told 
 the doctor that he would wish to know as soon as his 
 wife regained her reason — it was his duty, he said, to be 
 with her. After that, every visit to the private asylum 
 was made with anxious wonder if the tortured brain had 
 cleared. 
 
 It was not until the following spring — two and a half 
 years after the tragedy of the Bristol — that Lucian saw 
 Haidee. He scarcely knew the woman to whom they 
 took him. They had deluged him with warnings as to 
 the change in her, but he had not expected to find her a 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 233 
 
 grey-haired, time-worn woman, and he had difficulty in 
 preserving his composure when he saw her. He did not 
 know it, but her reason had returned some time before, 
 and she had become fully cognisant of her surroundings 
 and of what was going to happen. More than that, she 
 had asked for a priest and had enjoyed ghostly consola- 
 tion. She gazed at Lucian with a curious wistfulness, 
 and yet there was something strangely sullen in her 
 manner. 
 
 * I wanted to see you,' she said, after a time. ' I 
 know I'm going to die very soon, and there are things 
 I want to say. I remember all that happened, you 
 know. Oh yes, it's quite clear to me now, but somehow 
 it doesn't trouble me — I was mad enough when I did it.' 
 
 ' Don't speak of that,' he said. ' Forget it all.' 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 ' Never mind,' she went on. ' What I wanted to say 
 was, that I'm sorry that — well, you know.' 
 
 Lucian gazed at her with a sickening fear creeping 
 closely round his heart. He had forced the truth away 
 from him: he was to hear it at last from the lips of a 
 dying woman. 
 
 * You were to blame, though,' she said presently. 
 ' You ought not to have let me go alone on his yacht 
 or to the Highlands. It was so easy to go wrong there.' 
 
 Lucian could not control a sharp cry. 
 
 ' Don't!' he said, ' don't! You don't know what 
 you're saying. It can't be that — that you wrote the 
 truth in that letter? It was — hallucination.' 
 
 She looked at him out of dull eyes. 
 
 ' I want you to say you forgive me,' she said. ' The 
 priest — he said I ought to ask your forgiveness.' 
 
 Lucian bowed his head. 
 
 ' Yes,' he said, ' I forgive all you wish. Try not to 
 think of it any more.' 
 
 He was saying over and ovei to himself that she was 
 still disordered of mind, that the sin she was confessing 
 was imaginary; but deeper than his insistence on this 
 lay a dull consciousness that he was hearing the truth. 
 
234 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 He stood watching her curiously. She suddenly looked 
 up at him, and he saw a strange gleam in her eyes. 
 
 ' After all,' she said, half spitefully, ' you came 
 between him and me at the beginning.' 
 
 Lucian never saw his wife again. A month later she 
 was dead. All the time of the burial service he was 
 thinking that it would have been far better if she had 
 never recovered her reason. For two years he had 
 cherished a dream of her that had assumed tender and 
 pathetic tones. It had become a part of him; the ugly 
 reality of the last grim moments of her life stood out 
 in violent contrast to its gentleness and softness. When 
 the earth was thrown upon the coffin, he was wondering 
 at the wide difference which exists between the real and 
 the unreal, and whether the man is most truly blessed 
 who walks amongst stern verities or dreams amidst the 
 poppy-beds of illusion. One thing was certain : the face 
 of truth was not always beautiful, nor her voice always 
 soothing to the ear. 
 
CHAPTER XXX 
 
 After Haidee's death Lucian left Paris, and during the 
 rest of the spring and summer of that year went wander- 
 ing hither and thither about Europe. His mind was at 
 this time in a state of quiescence; he lounged from one 
 place to another, faintly interested and lazily amused. 
 He was beginning to be a little bored by life, and a little 
 tempted to drift with its stream. It was in this frame 
 of mind that he returned to London in the following 
 autumn. There, soon after his return, he sprang into 
 unwonted activity. 
 
 It was on the very eve of the outbreak of the war 
 in South Africa. Men were wondering what was going 
 to happen. Some, clearer of vision than their fellows, 
 saw that nothing but war would solve the problem which 
 had assumed vast proportions and strange intricacies 
 because of the vacillating poUcy of a weak Government 
 of twenty years before; the Empire was going to pay 
 now, with millions of its treasure and thousands of its 
 men, for the fatal error which had brought the name of 
 England into contempt in the Transvaal and given the 
 Boers a false notion of English strength and character. 
 Others were all for a policy of smoothing things over, for 
 spreading green boughs over pitfalls — not that any one 
 should fall into them, but in order to make believe that 
 the pitfalls were not there. Others again, of a breed that 
 has but lately sprung into existence in these islands, 
 advocated, not without success, a policy of surrender to 
 everybody and everything. There was much talking at 
 street comers and in the market-place; much angry 
 debate and acrimonious discussion. Men began to be 
 labelled by new names, and few took the trouble to 
 understand each other. In the meantime, events 
 developed as inevitable consequence always develops 
 them in such situations. Amidst the chattering of tiny 
 voices the thunders of war burst loud and clear. 
 
 235 
 
236 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 Lucian was furious with indignation. Fond as he was 
 of insisting on his ItaHan nationality, he was passionately 
 devoted to England and the English, and had a great 
 admiration for the history and traditions of the country 
 of his adoption. There had once been a question in his 
 mind as to whether he should write in English or in 
 Italian— he had elected to serve England for many 
 reasons, but chiefly because he recognised her greatness 
 and beheved in her destiny. Like all Italians, he loved 
 her for what she had done for Greece and for Italy. 
 England and Liberty were synonymous names; of all 
 nations in the world, none had made for freedom as 
 England had. His blood had leapt in his veins many a 
 time at the thought of the thousand and one great things 
 she had done, the mighty battles she had fought for truth 
 and liberty; he had drunk in the notion from boyhood 
 that England stood in the very vanguard of the army of 
 deliverance. And now she was sending out her armies, 
 marshalling her forces, pouring out her money like water, 
 to crush a tiny folk, a nation of farmers, a sturdy, simple- 
 minded race, one of the least amongst the peoples of the 
 earth! He shook his head as if he had been asleep, 
 and asked himself if the nation had suddenly gone mad 
 with lust of blood. It was inconceivable that the 
 England of his dreams could do this thing. He looked 
 for her, and found her nowhere. The streets were hot 
 all day with the tramping of armed men. The first 
 tidings of reverse filled the land with the old savage 
 determination to fight things out to the end, even though 
 all the world should range itself on the other side. 
 
 Lucian flung all his feelings of rage, indignation, 
 sorrow, and infinite amazement into a passionate sonnet 
 which appeared next morning in large type, well leaded 
 and spaced, in the columns of a London daily newspaper 
 that favoured the views of the peace-at-any-price party. 
 He followed it up with others. At first there was more 
 sorrow and surprise than anything else in these admoni- 
 tions; but as the days went on their tone altered. He 
 had endeavoured to bring the giant to his senses by an 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 237 
 
 appeal to certain feelings which the giant was too much 
 engaged to feel at that moment; eliciting no response, he 
 became troublesome, and strove to attract the giant's 
 attention by pricking him with pins. The giant paid 
 small attention to this; he looked down, saw a small thing 
 hanging about his feet with apparently mischievous 
 intentions, and calmly pushed it away. Then Lucian 
 began the assault in dead earnest. He could dip his pen 
 in vitriol with the best of them, and when he realised 
 that the giant was drunk with the lust of blood he fell 
 upon him with fury. The vials of poetic wrath had 
 never been emptied of such a flood of righteous anger 
 since the days wherein Milton called for vengeance upon 
 the murderers of the Piedmontese. 
 
 It is an ill thing to fight against the prevalent temper 
 of a nation. Lucian soon discovered that you may kick 
 and prick John Bull for a long time with safety to your- 
 self, because of his good nature, his dislike of bothering 
 about trifles, and his natural sluggishness, but that he 
 always draws a line somewhere, and brings down a 
 heavy fist upon the man who crosses it. He began to 
 find people fighting shy of his company; invitations 
 became less in number; men nodded who used to shake 
 hands; strong things were said in newspapers; and he was 
 warned by friends that he was carrying things too far. 
 
 ' Endeavour,' said one man, an acquaintance of some 
 years' standing, for whose character and abilities he had 
 a great regard, ' endeavour to get some accurate sense 
 of the position. You are blackguarding us every day 
 with your sonorous sonnets as if we were cut-throats and 
 thieves going out on a murdering and marauding expedi- 
 tion. We are nothing of the sort. We are a great 
 nation, with a very painful sense of responsibility, 
 engaged in a very difficult task. The war is bringing us 
 together like brothers — out of its blood and ashes there 
 will spring an Empire such as the world has never seen. 
 You are belittling everything to the level of 
 Hooliganism.' 
 
 ' What is it but Hooliganism? ' retorted Lucian. ' The 
 
238 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 most powerful nation in the world seizing one of the 
 weakest by the throat ! ' 
 
 ' It is nothing of the sort/ said the other. ' You know 
 it is your great curse, my dear Lucian, that you never get 
 a clear notion of the truth. You have a trick of seeing 
 things as you think they ought to be; you will not see 
 them as they are. Just because the Boers happen to be 
 numerically small, to lead a pastoral life, and to have 
 gone into the desert like the Israelites of old, you have 
 brought that far too powerful imagination of yours to 
 bear upon them, and have elevated them into a class 
 with the Swiss and the ItaHans, who fought for their 
 country.' 
 
 ' What are the Boers fighting for?' asked Lucian. 
 
 ' At present to grab somebody else's property,' 
 returned the other. ' Don't get sentimental about them. 
 After all, much as you love us, you're only half an 
 Englishman, and you don't understand the English feel- 
 ing. Are the English folk not suffering, and is a Boer 
 widow or a Boer orphan more worthy of pity than a 
 Yorkshire lass whose lad is lying dead out there, or a 
 Scottish child whose father will never come back again?' 
 
 Lucian swept these small and insignificant details aside 
 with some impatience. 
 
 * You are the mightiest nation the world has ever 
 seen,' he said. ' You have a past — such a past as no 
 other people can boast. You have a responsibility 
 because of that past, and at present you have thrown all 
 sense of it away, and are behaving like the drunken 
 brute who rises gorged with flesh and wine, and yells for 
 blood. This is an England with vine-leaves in her hair 
 — it is not the England of Cromwell.' 
 
 * I thank God it is not ! ' said the other man with 
 heartfelt reverence. ' We wish for no dictatorship here. 
 Come, leave off slanging us in this bloodthirsty fashion, 
 and try to arrive at a sensible view of things. Turn 
 your energies to a practical direction — write a new 
 romantic play for Harcourt, something that will cheer 
 us in these dark days, and give the money for bandages 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 239 
 
 and warm socks and tobacco for poor Tommy out at the 
 front. He isn't as picturesque — so it's said — as Brother 
 Boer, but he's a man after all, and has a stomach.' 
 
 But Lucian would neither be cajoled nor chaffed out 
 of his role of prophet. He became that most objection- 
 able of all things — the man who believes he has a mes- 
 sage, and must deliver it. He continued to hurl his 
 philippics at the British public through the ever-ready 
 columns of the peace-at-any-price paper, and the man 
 in the street, who is not given to the drawing of fine dis- 
 tinctions, called him a pro-Boer. Lucian, in strict 
 reality, was not a pro-Boer — he merely saw the artistry 
 of the pro-Boer position. He remembered Byron's atti- 
 tude with respect to Greece, and a too generous instinct 
 had led him to compare Mr. Kruger to Cincinnatus. 
 The man in the street knew nothing of these things, and 
 cared less. It seemed to him that Lucian, who was, 
 after all, nothing but an ink-slinger, a blooming poet, 
 was slanging the quarter of a million men who were 
 hurrying to Table Bay as rapidly as the War Office could 
 get them there. To this sort of thing the man in the 
 street objected. He did not care if Lucian's instincts 
 were all on the side of the weaker party, nor was it an 
 excuse that Lucian himself, in the matter of strict nation- 
 ality, was an Italian. He had chosen to write his poems 
 in England, said the man in the street, and also in the 
 English language, and he had made a good thing out of 
 it too, and no error, and the best thing he could do 
 now was to keep a civil tongue in his head, or, rather, 
 pen in his hand. This was no time for the cuckoo to foul 
 the nest wherein he had had free quarters for so long. 
 
 The opinion of the man in the street is the crystallised 
 common-sense of England, voiced in elementary lan- 
 guage. Lucian, unfortunately, did not know this, and 
 he kept on firing sonnets at the heads of people who, 
 without bluster or complaint, were already tearing up 
 their shirts for bandages. The man in the street read 
 them, and ground his teeth, and waited for an oppor- 
 tunity. That came when Lucian was ill-advised enough 
 
240 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 to allow his name to be printed in large letters upon the 
 placard of a great meeting whereat various well-inten- 
 tioned but somewhat thoughtless persons proposed to 
 protest against a war which had been forced upon the 
 nation, and from which it was then impossible to draw 
 back with either safety or honour. Lucian was still in 
 the clouds; still thinking of Byron at Missolonghi; still 
 harping upon the undoubted but scarcely pertinent facts 
 that England had freed slaves, slain giants, and waved 
 her flag protectingly over all who ran to her for help. 
 The foolishness of assisting at a public meeting whereat 
 the nation was to be admonished of its wickedness in 
 daring to assert itself never occurred to him. He was 
 still the man with the message. 
 
 He formed one of a platform party of whom it might 
 safely have been said that every man was a crank, and 
 every woman a faddist. He was somewhat astonished 
 and a little perplexed when he looked around him, and 
 realised that his fellow-protestants were not of the sort 
 wherewith he usually foregathered; but he speedily 
 became interested in the audience. It had been 
 intended to restrict admission to those well-intentioned 
 folk who desired peace at any price, but the man in the 
 street had placed a veto upon that, and had come in 
 large numbers, and with a definite resolve to take part 
 in the proceedings. The meeting began in a cheerful 
 and vivacious fashion, and ended in one dear to the 
 English heart. The chairman was listened to with 
 some forbearance and patience; a lady was allowed to 
 have her say because she was a woman. It was a sad 
 inspiration that led the chairman to put Lucian up next; 
 a still sadder one to refer to his poetical exhortations 
 to the people. The sight of Lucian, the fashionably 
 attired, dilettante, dreamy-eyed poet, who had lashed 
 and pricked the nation whose blood was being poured 
 out like water, and whose coffers were being depleted 
 at a rapid rate, was too much for the folk he essayed to 
 address. They knew him and his recent record. At 
 the first word they rose as one man, and made for the 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 241 
 
 platlorm. Lucian and the seekers after peace were 
 obliged to run, as rabbits run to their warrens, and the 
 enemy occupied the position. Somebody unfurled a 
 large flag, and the entire assemblage joined in singing 
 Mr. Kipling's invitation to contribute to the tambourine 
 fund. 
 
 In the school of life the teacher may write many 
 lessons with the whitest chalk upon the blackest black- 
 board, and there will always be a child in the corner 
 who will swear that he cannot see the writing. Lucian 
 could not see the lesson of the stormed platform, and 
 he continued his rhyming crusade and made enemies 
 by the miUion. He walked with closed eyes along a 
 road literally bristling with bayonets: it was nothing 
 but the good-natured English tolerance of a poet as 
 being more or less of a lunatic that kept the small boys 
 of the Strand from going for him. Men at street comers 
 made remarks upon him which were delightful to over- 
 hear: it was never Lucian's good fortune to overhear 
 them. His nose was in the air. 
 
 He heard the truth at last from that always truthful 
 person, the man in liquor. In the smoking-room of 
 his club he was encountered one night by a gentleman 
 who had dined in too generous fashion, and whose 
 natural patriotism glowed and scintillated around him 
 with equal generosity. He met Lucian face to face, 
 and he stopped and looked him up and down with a fine 
 and eminently natural scorn. 
 
 * Mr. Lucian Damerel,' he said, with an only slightly 
 interrupted articulation; ' Mr. Lucian Damerel — the 
 gentleman who spills ink while better men spend blood.' 
 Then he spat on the ground at Lucian's feet, and moved 
 away with a sneer and a laugh. 
 
 The room was full of men. They all saw, and they 
 all heard. No one spoke, but every one looked at 
 Lucian. He knew that the drunken man had voiced 
 the prevalent sentiment. He looked round him, with- 
 out reproach, without defiance, and walked quietly 
 
 Q 
 
242 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 trom the room and the house. He had suddenly real- 
 ised the true complexion of things. 
 
 Next morning, as he sat over a late breakfast in his 
 rooms, he was informed that a young gentleman who 
 would give no name desired earnestly to see him. He 
 was feeling somewhat bored that morning, and he bade 
 his man show the unknown one in. He looked up 
 from his coffee to behold a very young gentleman upon 
 whom the word subaltern was written in very large 
 letters, whose youthful face was very grim and earnest, 
 and who was obviously a young man with a mission. 
 He pulled himself up in stiff fashion as the door closed 
 upon him, and Lucian observed that one hand evi- 
 dently grasped something which was concealed behind 
 his back. 
 
 ' Mr. Lucian Damerel?' the young gentleman said, 
 with polite interrogation. 
 
 Lucian bowed and looked equally interrogative. His 
 visitor glowered upon him. 
 
 ' I have come to tell you that you are a damned 
 scoundrel, Mr. Lucian Damerel,' he said, ' and to 
 thrash you within an inch of your beastly life!' 
 
 Lucian stared, smiled, and rose lazily from his seat. 
 
 The visitor displayed a cutting-whip, brandished it, 
 and advanced as seriously as if he were on parade. 
 Lucian met him, seized the cutting-whip in one hand 
 and his assailant's collar in the other, disarmed him, 
 shook him, and threw him lightly into an easy-chair, 
 where he lay gasping and surprised. Lucian hung the 
 cutting- whip on the wall. He looked at his visitor with 
 a speculative gaze. 
 
 ' What shall I do with you, young sir?' he said. 
 ' Throw you out of the window, or grill you on the fire, 
 or merely kick you downstairs? I suppose you 
 thought that because I happen to be what your lot call 
 " a writin' feller," there wouldn't be any spunk in me, 
 eh?' 
 
 The visitor was placed in a strange predicament. 
 He had expected the sweet savour of groans and tears 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 243 
 
 frorrn a muscleless, flabby ink-and-parchment thing: 
 this man had hands which could grip Hke steel and 
 iron. Moreover, he was cool — he actually sat down 
 again and continued his breakfast. 
 
 * I hope I didn't squeeze your throat too much,' said 
 Lucian politely. ' I have a nasty trick of forgetting 
 that my hands are abnormally developed. If you feel 
 shaken, help yourself to a brandy and soda, and then 
 tell me what's the matter.' 
 
 The youth shook his head hopelessly. 
 ' Y — you have insulted the Army ! ' he stammered at 
 last. 
 
 * Of which, I take it, you are the self-appointed 
 champion. Well, I'm afraid I don't plead guilty, 
 because, you see, I know myself rather better than you 
 know me. But you came to punish me? Well, again, 
 you see you can't do that. Shall I give you satisfaction 
 of some sort? There are pistols in that cabinet — shall 
 we shoot at each other across the table? There are 
 rapiers in the cupboard — shall we try to prick each 
 other?' 
 
 The young gentleman in the easy-chair grew more 
 and more uncomfortable. He was being made ridicul- 
 ous, and the man was laughing at him. 
 
 ' I have heard of the tricks of foreign duellists,' he 
 said rudely. 
 
 Lucian 's face flushed. 
 
 ' That was a silly thing to say, my boy,' he said, not 
 unkindly. ' Most men would throw you out of the 
 window for it. As it is, I'll let you oft easy. You'll 
 find some gloves in that cupboard — get them out and 
 take your coat off. I'm not an Englishman, as you 
 just now reminded me in very pointed fashion, but I can 
 use my fists.' 
 
 Then he took off his dressing-gown and rolled up his 
 sleeves, and the youngster, who had spent many unholy 
 hours in practising the noble art, looked at the poet's 
 muscles with a knowing eye and realised that he was in 
 for a very pretty scrap. He was a Uttle vain of his own 
 
244 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 prowess, and fought for all he was worth, but at the end 
 of five minutes he was a well-licked man, and at the 
 expiration of ten was glad to be allowed to put on his 
 coat and go. 
 
 Lucian flung his gloves into the comer of the room 
 with a hearty curse. He stroked the satiny skin under 
 which his muscle rippled smoothly. He had the arm 
 of a blacksmith, and had always been proud of it. The 
 remark of the drunken man came back to him. That 
 was what they thought of him, was it? — that he was 
 a mere slinger of ink, afraid of spilling his blood or 
 suffering discomfort for the courage of his convictions? 
 Well, they should see. England had gone mad with 
 the lust of blood and domination, and after all he was 
 not her son. He had discharged whatever debt he owed 
 her. To the real England, the true England that had 
 fallen on sleep, he would explain everything, when the 
 awakening came. It would be no crime to shoulder a 
 rifle and strap a bandolier around one's shoulders in 
 order to help the weak against the strong. He had 
 fought with his pen, taking what he beheved to be the 
 right and honest course, in the endeavour to convert 
 people who would not be converted, and who regarded 
 his efforts as evidences of enmity. Very well: there 
 seemed now to be but one straight path, and he would 
 take it. 
 
 It was remembered afterwards as a great thing in 
 Lucian's favour that he made no fuss about his next 
 step., He left London very quietly, and no one knew 
 that he was setting out to join the men whom he 
 honestly believed to be fighting for the best principles of 
 liberty and freedom. 
 
CHAPTER XXXI 
 
 When the war broke out, Saxonstowe and his wife, 
 after nearly three years of globe-trotting, were in Natal, 
 where they had been studying the conditions of native 
 labour. Saxonstowe, who had made himself well 
 acquainted with the state of affairs m South Africa, 
 knew that the coming struggle would be long and bitter 
 He and his wife entered into a discussion as to which 
 they were to do: stay there, or return to England. 
 Sprats knew quite well what was in Saxonstowe s mind, 
 and she unhesitatingly declared for South Africa. Then 
 Saxonstowe, who had a new book on hand, put his 
 work aside, and set the wires going, and within a few 
 hours had been appointed special correspondent ot one 
 of the London newspapers, with the prospect of hard 
 work and exciting times before him. 
 
 ' And what am I to do?' inquired Lady Saxonstowe, 
 and answered her own question before he could reply. 
 
 * There wih be sick and wounded— m plenty, she said. 
 
 * I shall organise a field-hospital,' and she went to work 
 with great vigour and spent her husband's money with 
 inward thankfukiess that he was a rich man. 
 
 Before they knew where they were. Lord and Lady 
 Saxonstowe were shut up in Ladysmith, and for one 
 of them at least there was not so much to do as he had 
 anticipated, for there became little to record but the 
 story of hope deferred, of gradual starvation, and ot 
 death and disease. But Sprats worked double tides, 
 unflinchingly and untiringly, and ahnost forgot that she 
 had a husband who chafed because he could not get 
 more than an occasional word over the wires to England. 
 At the end of the siege she was as gaunt as a far-travelled 
 gypsy, and as brown, but her courage was as great as 
 ever and her resolution just as strong. One day she 
 received an ovation from a mighty concourse that sent 
 
246 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 her, frightened and trembling, to shelter; when she 
 emerged into the light of day again it was only to begin 
 reorganising her work in preparation for still more ardu- 
 ous duties. The tide of war rolled on northwards, and 
 Sprats followed, picking up the bruised and shattered 
 jetsam which it flung to her. She had never indulged in 
 questionings or speculations as to the rights or wrongs 
 of the war. Her first sight of a wounded man had 
 aroused all the old mothering instinct in her, and 
 because she had no baby of her own she took every 
 wounded man, Boer or Briton, into her arms and 
 mothered him. 
 
CHAPTER XXXII 
 
 A HUDDLED mass of fugitives — men, women, children, 
 horses, cattle — crowded together in the dry bed of a 
 river, seeking shelter amongst rocks and boulders and 
 under shelving banks, subjected continually to a hurri- 
 cane of shot and shell, choked by the fumes of the 
 exploding Lyddite, poisoned by the stench of blood, 
 saturated all through with the indescribable odour of 
 death. Somewhere in its midst, caged like a rat, but 
 still sulkily defiant, the peasant general fingered his 
 switch as he looked this way and that and saw no further 
 chance of escape. In the distance, calmly waiting the 
 inevitable end, the little man with the weather-beaten 
 face and the grey moustaches hstened to the never- 
 ceasing roar of his cannon demanding insistently the 
 word of surrender that must needs come. 
 
 Saxonstowe, lying on a waterproof sheet on the floor 
 of his tent, was writing on a board propped up in front 
 of him. All that he wrote was by way of expressing his 
 wonder, over and over again, that Cronje should hold 
 out so long against the hell of fire which was playing 
 in and around his last refuge. He was trying to realise 
 what must be going on in the river bed, and the thought 
 made him sick. Near him, writing on an upturned 
 box, was another special correspondent who shared the 
 tent with him; outside, poHshing tin pannikins because 
 he had nothing else to do, was a Cockney lad whom 
 these two had picked up in Ladysmith and had attached 
 as body-servant. He was always willing and always 
 cheerful, and had a trick of singing snatches of popular 
 songs in a desultory and disconnected way. His 
 raucous voice came to them under the booming of the 
 guns. 
 
 ' Ow, 'ee's little but 'ee's wise, 
 'Ee's a terror for 'is size, 
 247 
 
248 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 An' 'ee does not hadvertise: 
 Do yer, Bobs?' 
 
 * What a voice that chap has ! ' said Saxonstowe's 
 companion. 'It's like a wheel that hasn't been oiled 
 for months!' 
 
 * Will yer kindly put a penny in my little tambourine, 
 For a gentleman in khaki ordered sou-outh?' 
 
 chanted the poUsher of tin pans. 
 
 ' They have a saying in Yorkshire, ' remarked Saxon- 
 stowe, ' to the effect that it's a poor heart that never 
 rejoices.' 
 
 ' This chap must have a good 'un, then,' said the 
 other. Give us a pipeful of tobacco, will you, 
 Saxonstowe? Lord! will those guns never stop ? ' 
 
 ' For the colonel's lady and Judy O'Grady, 
 Are sisters hunder their skins,' 
 
 sang the henchman. 
 
 * Will our vocalist never stop?' said Saxonstowe, 
 handing over his pouch. ' He seems as unconcerned 
 as if he were on a Bank Holiday.' 
 
 * We wos as 'appy as could be, that dye, 
 Dahn at the Welsh 'Arp, which is 'Endon — ' 
 
 The raucous voice broke off suddenly; the close- 
 cropped Cockney head showed at the open flap of the 
 tent. 
 
 ' Beg pardon, sir,' said the Cockney voice, ' but I 
 fink there's somethin' 'appened, sir — guns is dyin' orf, 
 sir.' 
 
 Saxonstowe and his fellow scribe sprang to their feet. 
 The roar of the cannon was dying gradually away, and 
 it suddenly gave place to a strange and an awful silence. 
 
LUCIAN THE DREAMER 249 
 
 Saxonstowe walked hither and thither about the bed 
 of the river, turning his head jerkily to right and left. 
 
 'It's a shambles!— a shambles!— a shambles! he 
 kept repeating. He shook his head and then his body 
 as if he wanted to shake off the impression that was fast 
 stamping itself ineffaceably upon him. A shambles ! 
 
 he said again. , -, , -, j u- 
 
 He pulled himself together and looked around him. 
 It seemed to him that earth and sky were blotted out 
 in blood and fire, and that the smell of death had 
 wrapped him so closely that he would never breathe 
 freely again. Dead and dying men were everywhere. 
 Near him rose a pile of what appeared to be freshly 
 slaughtered meat— it was merely the result of the burst- 
 ing of a Lyddite shell amongst a span of oxen. Near 
 him, too, stood a girl, young, not uncomely, with a 
 bullet-wound showing in her white bosom from which 
 she had just torn the bodice away; at his feet, amongst 
 the boulders, were twisted, strange, grotesque shapes 
 that had once been human bodies. 
 
 * There's a chap here that looks like an Enghshman, 
 said a voice behind him. , i. j 
 
 Saxonstowe turned, and found the man who shared 
 his tent standing at his elbow, and pointed to a body 
 stretched out a yard or two away— the body of a well- 
 formed man who had fallen on his side, shot through 
 the heart. He lay as if asleep, his face half hidden 
 in his arm-pit; near him, within reach of the nerveless 
 fingers that had torn out a divot of turf in his last 
 moment's spasmodic feeling for something to clutch at, 
 lay his rifle: round his rough serge jacket was clasped 
 a bandolier well stored with cartridges. His broad- 
 brimmed hat had fallen off, and half his face, very white 
 and statuesque in death, caught the sunlight that 
 straggled fitfully through the smoke-clouds which still 
 curled over the bed of the river. 
 
 * Looks like an Englishman,' repeated the special 
 correspondent. * Look at his hands, too— he hasn't 
 handled a rifle very long, I'm thinking.' 
 
250 LUCIAN THE DREAMER 
 
 Saxonstowe glanced at the body with perfunctory 
 interest— there were so many dead men lying all about 
 him. Something in the dead man's face woke a chord 
 in his memory : he went nearer and bent over him. His 
 brain was sick and dizzy with the horrors of the blood 
 and the stink of the slaughter. He stood up again, and 
 winked his eyes rapidly. 
 
 ' No, no ! ' he heard himself saying. ' No ! It can't 
 be— of course it can't be. What should Lucian be 
 doing here? Of course it's not he— it's mere imagina- 
 tion — mere im-ag-in-a-tion ! ' 
 
 ' Here, hold up, old chap ! ' said his companion, pull- 
 ing out a flask. ' Take a nip of that. Better? Hallo 
 — what's going on there?' 
 
 He stepped on a boulder and gazed in the direction 
 of a wagon round which some commotion was evident. 
 Saxonstowe, without another glance at the dead man, 
 stepped up beside him. 
 
 He saw a roughly built, rugged-faced man, wrapped 
 in a much-worn overcoat that had grown green with 
 age, stepping out across the plain, swishing at the 
 herbage with a switch which jerked nervously in his 
 hand. At his side strode a muscular-looking woman, 
 hard of feature, brown of skin — a peasant wife in a 
 faded skirt and a crumpled sun-bonnet. Near them 
 marched a tall British officer in khaki; other Boers and 
 British, a group of curious contrasts, hedged them 
 round. 
 
 ' That's Cronje,' said the special correspondent, as he 
 stepped down from the boulder. ' Well, it's over, 
 thank God!' 
 
 The conquered was on his way to the conqueror. 
 
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 118. 
 
 122. 
 
 153- 
 156. 
 
 154. 
 
 112. 
 
 150. 
 
 25. 
 
 81. 
 
 91. 
 123. 
 105. 
 
 Complete List of Titles — continued 
 
 God, the Invisible King 
 
 The Passionate Friends 
 
 Tales of the Unexpected 
 
 The Research Magnificent 
 
 The First Men in the Moon 
 
 Tales of Life and Adventure 
 
 Marriage 
 
 In the Days of the Comet 
 
 Tales of Wonder 
 
 The Food of the Gods 
 
 Tono-Bungay 
 
 The History of Mr. Polly 
 
 Kipps 
 
 Love and Mr. Lewisham 
 
 The War in the Air 
 
 The World Set Free 
 
 A Modern Utopia 
 
 The Sleeper Awakes 
 
 The Invisible Man 
 
 The New Machiavelli 
 
 The Secret Places of the Heart 
 
 Mr. BritUng 
 
 The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman 
 
 More Salty 
 
 Cold Harbour 
 
 The Black Diamond 
 
 The Young Physician 
 
 Pilgrim's Rest 
 
 Woodsmoke 
 
 The Dark Tower 
 
 The Crescent Moor 
 
 
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