ADRIENNE TONER
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 A Novel 
 
 BY 
 
 ANNE DOUGLAS SEDGWICK 
 
 (Mrs. Basil de Selincourt) 
 
 AUTHOR OF " CHRISTMAS ROSES, AND OTHER STORIES," " TANTE 
 " FRANKLIN KANE," " THE ENCOUNTER," ETC. 
 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
 
 HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 
 
 tEije Kifaersibe $Drc6s Cambridge 
 
 1922
 
 COPYRIGHT, IQ22, BY ANNE DOUGLAS DE sfiLINCOURT 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 
 
 CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS 
 PRINTED IN THE U . S . A
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 PART I
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 
 
 
 PART I 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 "CoME down to Coldbrooks next week-end, will 
 you, Roger?" said Barney Chad wick. He had been 
 wandering around the room, pausing once to glance 
 at the Cesar Franck on the piano and once at the 
 window to look down at the Thames, and his voice 
 now, though desultory in intention, betrayed to his 
 friend preoccupation and even anxiety. "There is 
 going to be an interesting girl with us: American; 
 very original and charming." 
 
 Roger Oldmeadow sat at his writing-bureau in the 
 window, and his high dark head was silhouetted 
 against the sky. It had power and even beauty, 
 with moments of brooding melancholy ; but the type 
 to which it most conformed was that of the clever, 
 cantankerous London bachelor ; and if he sometimes 
 looked what he was, the scholar who had taken a 
 double first at Balliol and gave brain and sinew to 
 an eminent review, he looked more often what he 
 was not, a caustic, cautious solicitor, clean-shaved 
 and meticulously neat, with the crisp bow at his 
 collar, single eyeglass, and thin, wry smile. 
 
 There was a cogitative kindness in his eyes and a 
 latent irony on his lips as he now scrutinized Barney 
 Chadwick, who had come finally to lean against the
 
 4 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 mantelpiece, and it was difficult before Roger Old- 
 meadow s gaze at such moments not to feel that you 
 were giving yourself away. This was evidently what 
 Barney was trying not to feel, or, at all events, not 
 to show. He tapped his cigarette-end, fixing his eyes 
 upon it and frowning a little. He had ruffled his 
 brown hair with the nervous hand passed through it 
 during his ramble, but ruffled or sleek Barney could 
 never look anything but perfection, just as, whether 
 he smiled or frowned, he could never look anything 
 but charming. In his spring-tide grey, with a streak 
 of white inside his waistcoat and a tie of petunia silk 
 that matched his socks, he was a pleasant figure of 
 fashion; and he was more than that; more than the 
 mere London youth of 1913, who danced the tango 
 and cultivated Post- Impressionism and the Russian 
 ballet. He was perhaps not much more ; but his dif 
 ference, if slight, made him noticeable. It came back, 
 no doubt, to the fact of charm. He was radiant yet 
 reserved; confident yet shy. He had a slight stam 
 mer, and his smile seemed to ask you to help him 
 out. His boyhood, at twenty-nine, still survived in 
 his narrow face, clumsy in feature and delicate in 
 contour, with long jaw, high temples and brown 
 eyes, half sweet, half sleepy. The red came easily to 
 his brown cheek, and he had the sensitive, stubborn 
 lips of the little boy at the preparatory school whom 
 Oldmeadow had met and befriended now many 
 years ago. 
 
 In Oldmeadow s eyes he had always remained the 
 "little Barney" he had then christened him even 
 Barney s mother had almost forgotten that his real 
 name was Eustace and he could not but know 
 that Barney depended upon him more than upon
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 5 
 
 anyone in the world. To Barney his negations were 
 more potent than other people s affirmations, and 
 though he had sometimes said indignantly, "You 
 leave one nothing to agree about, Roger, except 
 Plato and Church-music," he was never really happy 
 or secure in his rebellions from what he felt or sus 
 pected to be Oldmeadow s tastes and judgments. 
 Oldmeadow had seen him through many admira 
 tions, not only for books and pictures, but for origi 
 nal girls. Barney thought that he liked the unusual. 
 He was a devotee of the ballet, and had in his rooms 
 cushions and curtains from the Omega shop and a 
 drawing by Wyndham Lewis. But Oldmeadow knew 
 that he really preferred the photograph of a Burne- 
 Jones, a survival from Oxford days, that still bravely, 
 and irrelevantly, hung opposite it, and he waited to 
 see the Wyndham Lewis replaced by a later portent. 
 Barney could remain stubbornly faithful to old 
 devotions, but he was easily drawn into new orbits; 
 and it was a new star, evidently, that he had come 
 to describe and justify. 
 
 "What have I to do with charming American 
 girls?" Oldmeadow inquired, turning his eyes on 
 the blurred prospect of factory-chimneys and ware 
 houses that the farther waterside of Chelsea affords. 
 One had to go to the window and look out to see the 
 grey and silver river flowing, in the placidity that 
 revealed so little power. Oldmeadow lived in a flat 
 on the Embankment ; but he was not an admirer of 
 Chelsea, just as he was not an admirer of Whistler 
 nor - and Barney had always suspected it of 
 Burne-Jones. His flat gave him, at a reasonable cost, 
 fresh air, boiling-hot water and a walk in Battersea 
 Park; these, with his piano, were his fundamental
 
 6 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 needs; though he owned, for the mean little stream 
 it was, that the Thames could look pretty enough by 
 morning sunlight and like any river magical 
 under stars. After Plato and Bach, Oldmeadow s 
 passions were the rivers of France. 
 
 "She ll have something to do with you," said 
 Barney, and he seemed pleased with the retort. "I 
 met her at the Lumleys. They think her the marvel 
 of the age." 
 
 "Well, that doesn t endear her to me," said Old- 
 meadow. "And I don t like Americans." 
 
 "Come, you re not quite so hide-bound as all 
 that," said Barney, vexed. "What about Mrs. 
 Aldesey? I ve heard you say she s the most charm 
 ing woman you know." 
 
 "Except Nancy," Oldmeadow amended. 
 
 "No one could call Nancy a charming woman," 
 said Barney, looking a little more vexed. "She s a 
 dear, of course; but she s a mere girl. What do you 
 know about Americans, anyway except Mrs. Al 
 desey?" 
 
 "What she tells me about them the ones she 
 doesn t know," said Oldmeadow, leaning back in 
 his chair with a laugh. "But I own that I m merely 
 prejudiced. Tell me about your young lady, and 
 why you want her to have something to do with me. 
 Is she a reformer of some sort?" 
 
 "She s a wonderful person, really," said Barney, 
 availing himself with eagerness of his opportunity. 
 "Not a reformer. Only a sort of mixture of saint 
 and fairy-princess. She cured Charlie Lumley of 
 insomnia, three years ago, at Saint Moritz. Nothing 
 psychic or theatrical, you know. Just sat by him 
 and smiled she s a most extraordinary smile
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 7 
 
 and laid her hand on his head. He d not slept for 
 nights and went off like a lamb. Lady Lumley al 
 most cries when she tells about it. They thought 
 Charlie might lose his mind if he went on not sleep- 
 ing." 
 
 "My word! She s a Christian Science lady? A 
 medium? What?" 
 
 "Call her what you like. You ll see. She does 
 believe in spiritual forces. It s not only that. She s 
 quite lovely. In every way. Nancy and Meg will 
 worship her. The Lumley girls do." 
 
 Oldmeadow s thoughs were already dwelling in 
 rueful surmise on Nancy. He had always thought 
 her the nicest young creature he had ever known; 
 nicer even than Barney ; and he had always wanted 
 them to marry. She was Barney s second cousin, 
 and she and her mother lived near the Chadwicks in 
 Gloucestershire. 
 
 "Oh, Nancy will worship her, will she? She must 
 be all right, then. What s her name?" he asked. 
 
 Barney had given up trying to be desultory, and 
 his conscious firmness was now not lost upon his 
 friend as he answered, stammering a little, "Adri- 
 enne. Adrienne Toner." 
 
 "Why Adrienne?" Oldmeadow mildly inquired. 
 "Has she French blood?" 
 
 "Not that I know of. It s a pretty name, I think, 
 Adrienne. One hears more inane names given to girls 
 every day. Her mother loved France just as you 
 do, Roger. Adrienne was born in Paris, I think." 
 
 "Oh, a very pretty name," said Oldmeadow, not 
 ing Barney s already familiar use of it. "Though it 
 sounds more like an actress s than a saint s." 
 
 "There was something dramatic about the mother,
 
 8 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 I fancy," said Barney, sustained, evidently, by his 
 own detachment. "A romantic, rather absurd, but 
 very loveable person. Adrienne worshipped her and, 
 naturally, can t see the absurdity. She died out in 
 California. On a boat," said Barney stammering 
 again, over the b. 
 
 "On a boat?" 
 
 "Yes. Awfully funny. But touching, too. That s 
 what she wanted, when she died: the sea and sky 
 about her. They carried her on her yacht doc 
 tors, nurses, all the retinue and sailed far out 
 from shore. It s beautiful, too, in a way you know, 
 to be able to do that sort of thing quite simply and 
 unself-consciously. Adrienne sat beside her, and 
 they smiled at each other and held hands until the 
 end." 
 
 Oldmeadow played with his penholder. He was 
 disconcerted ; and most of all by the derivative emo 
 tion in Barney s voice. They had gone far, then, 
 already, the young people. Nancy could have not 
 the ghost of a chance. And the nature of what 
 touched Barney left him singularly dry. He was 
 unable to credit so much simplicity or unself-con- 
 sciousness. He coughed shortly, and after a decently 
 respectful interval inquired: "Is Miss Toner very 
 wealthy?" 
 
 "Yes, very," said Barney, relapsing now into a 
 slight sulkiness. "At least, perhaps not very, as rich 
 Americans go. She gave away a lot of her fortune, I 
 know, when her mother died. She founded a place 
 for children a convalescent home, or creche 
 out in California. And she did something in Chicago, 
 too." 
 
 And Miss Toner had evidently done something in
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 9 
 
 London at the Lumleys . It couldn t be helped 
 about Nancy, and if the American girl was pretty 
 and, for all her nonsense, well-bred, it might not be 
 a bad thing, since there was so much money. The 
 Chadwicks were not at all well off, and Coldbrooks 
 was only kept going by Mrs. Chadwick s economies 
 and Barney s labours at his uncle s stock-broking 
 firm in the city. Oldmeadow could see Eleanor 
 Chadwick s so ingenuous yet so practical eye fixed 
 on Miss Toner s gold, and he, too, could fix his. Miss 
 Toner sounded benevolent, and it was probable that 
 her presence as mistress of Coldbrooks would be of 
 benefit to all Barney s relatives. All the same, she 
 sounded as irrelevant in his life as the Wyndham 
 Lewis. 
 
 "Adrienne Toner," he heard himself repeating 
 aloud, for he had a trick, caught, no doubt, from his 
 long loneliness, of relapsing into absent-minded and 
 audible meditations. The cadence of it worried him. 
 It was an absurd name. "You know each other 
 pretty well already, it seems," he said. 
 
 "Yes; it s extraordinary how one seems to know 
 her. One doesn t have any formalities to get through 
 with her, as it were," said Barney. " Either you are 
 there, or you are not there." 
 
 "Either on the yacht, or not on the yacht, eh?" 
 Oldmeadow reached out for his pipe. 
 
 "Put it like that if you choose. It s awfully jolly 
 to be on the yacht, I can tell you. It is like a voyage, 
 a great adventure, to know her." 
 
 "And what s it like to be off the yacht? Suppose 
 I m not there? Suppose she doesn t like me?" Old- 
 meadow suggested. "What am I to talk to her 
 about of course I ll come, if you really want me.
 
 io ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 But she frightens me a little, I confess. I m not an 
 adventurous person." 
 
 " But neither am I, you know ! " Barney exclaimed, 
 "and that s just what she does to you: makes you 
 adventurous. She ll be immensely interested in you, 
 of course. You can talk to her about anything. It 
 was down at a week-end at the Lumleys I first met 
 her, and there were some tremendous big-wigs there, 
 political, you know, and literary, and all that sort of 
 thing ; and she had them all around her. She d have 
 frightened me, too, if I hadn t seen at once that she 
 took to me and wouldn t mind my being just or 
 dinary. She likes everybody; that s just it. She 
 takes to everybody, big and little. She s just like 
 sunshine," Barney stammered a little over his s s. 
 "That s what she makes one think of straight off; 
 shining on everything." 
 
 "On the clean and the unclean. I see," said Old- 
 meadow. "I feel it in my bones that I shall come 
 into the unclean category with her. But it ll do me 
 the more good to have her shine on me."
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 ROGER OLDMEADOW went to have tea with Mrs. 
 Aldesey next afternoon. She was, after the Chad- 
 wicks, his nearest friend, and his relation to the 
 Chadwicks was one of affection rather than affinity. 
 They had been extraordinarily kind to him since the 
 time that he had befriended Barney at the prepara 
 tory school, hiding, under his grim jocularities, the 
 bewilderment of a boy s first great bereavement. 
 His love for his mother had been an idolatry, and 
 his childhood had been haunted by her ill-health. 
 She died when he was thirteen, and in some ways he 
 knew that, even now, he had never got over it. His 
 unfortunate and frustrated love-affair in early man 
 hood had been, when all was said and done, a trivial 
 grief compared to it. Coldbrooks had become, after 
 that, his only home, for he had lost his father as a 
 very little boy, and the whole family had left the 
 country parsonage and been thrown on the 
 mercies of an uncle and aunt who lived in a grim 
 provincial town. Oldmeadow s most vivid impres 
 sion of home was the high back bedroom where the 
 worn carpet was cold to the feet and the fire a sulky 
 spot of red, and the windows looked out over smoky 
 chimney-pots. Here his stricken mother lay in bed 
 with her cherished cat beside her and read aloud to 
 him. There was always a difficulty about feeding 
 poor Effie, Aunt Aggie declaring that cats should 
 live below stairs and on mice ; and Roger, at mid day 
 dinner, became adroit at slipping bits of meat from
 
 12 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 his plate into a paper held in his lap and carried tri 
 umphantly to his mother s room afterwards. "Oh, 
 darling, you oughtn t to," she would say with her 
 loving, girlish smile, and he would reply, "But I 
 went without, Mummy; so it s quite all right." His 
 two little sisters were kept in the nursery, as they 
 were noisy, high-spirited children, and tired their 
 mother too much. Roger was her companion, her 
 comrade; her only comrade in the world, really, be 
 side Erne. It had been Mrs. Chadwick who had 
 saved Effie from the lethal chamber after her mis 
 tress s death. Roger never spoke about his mother, but 
 he did speak about Effie when she was thus threat 
 ened, and he had never forgotten, never, never, Mrs. 
 Chadwick s eager cry of, "But bring her here, my 
 dear Roger. I like idle cats! Bring her here, and I 
 promise you that we ll make her happy. Animals 
 are so happy at Cold brooks." To see Effie cherished, 
 petted, occupying the best chairs during all the years 
 that followed, had been to see his mother, in this 
 flickering little ghost, remembered in the only way 
 he could have borne to see her explicitly remem 
 bered, and it was because of Effie that he had most 
 deeply loved Coldbrooks. It remained always his 
 refuge during a cheerless and harassed youth, when, 
 with his two forceful, black- browed sisters to settle 
 in life, he had felt himself pant and strain under the 
 harness. He was fonder of them than they of 
 him, for they were hard, cheerful young women, in 
 heriting harshness of feature and manner from their 
 father, with their father s black eyes. It was from 
 his mother that Oldmeadow had his melancholy 
 blue ones, and he had never again met his mother s 
 tenderness.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 13 
 
 Both sisters were now settled, one in India and 
 one, very prosperously, in London; but he seldom 
 turned for tea into Cadogan Gardens and Trixie s 
 brisk Chippendale drawing-room; though Cadogan 
 Gardens was obviously more convenient than So- 
 mer s Place, where, on the other side of the park, 
 Mrs. Aldesey lived. He had whims, and did not 
 know whether it was because he more disliked her 
 husband or her butler that he went so seldom to see 
 Trixie. Her husband was jovial and familiar, and 
 the butler had a face like a rancid ham and a surrep 
 titious manner. One had always to be encountered 
 at the door, and the other was too often in the draw 
 ing-room, and Trixie was vexatiously satisfied with 
 both; Trixie also had four turbulent, intelligent 
 children, in whom complacent parental theories of 
 uncontrol manifested themselves unpleasantly, and 
 altogether she was too much hedged in by obstacles 
 to be tempting ; even had she been tempting in her 
 self. Intercourse with Trixie, when it did take place, 
 consisted usually of hard-hearted banter. She ban 
 tered him a great deal about Mrs. Aldesey, who, she 
 averred, snubbed her. Not that Trixie minded being 
 snubbed by anybody. 
 
 It was a pleasant walk across the park on this 
 spring day when the crocuses were fully out in the 
 grass, white, purple and gold, and the trees just 
 scantly stitched with green, and, as always, it was 
 with a slight elation that he approached his friend. 
 However dull or jaded oneself or the day, the 
 thought of her cheered one as did the thought 
 of tea. She made him think of her own China tea. 
 She suggested delicate ceremoniousness. Though 
 familiar, there was always an aroma of unexpect-
 
 14 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 edness about her; a slight, sweet shock of oddity 
 and surprise. 
 
 Mrs. Aldesey was unlike the traditional London 
 American. She was neither rich nor beautiful nor 
 noticeably well-dressed. One became gradually 
 aware, after some time spent in her company, that 
 her clothes, soft-tinted and silken, were pleas 
 ing, as were her other appurtenances; the narrow 
 front of her little house, painted freshly in white 
 and green and barred by boxes of yellow wallflower ; 
 the serenely unfashionable water-colours of Italy, 
 painted by her mother, on the staircase; and her 
 drawing-room, grey-green and primrose-yellow, with 
 eighteenth-century fans, of which she had a col 
 lection, displayed in cabinets, and good old glass. 
 
 Mrs. Aldesey herself, behind her tea-table, very 
 faded, very thin, with what the French term a souf- 
 freteux little face an air of just not having taken 
 drugs to make her sleep, but of having certainly 
 taken tabloids to make her digest seemed al 
 ready to belong to a passing order of things; an 
 order still sustained, if lightly, by stays, and keeping 
 a prayer-book as punctually in use as a card-case. 
 
 Oldmeadow owed her, if indirectly, to the Chad- 
 wicks, as he owed so much, even if it was entirely on 
 his own merits that he had won her regard. They 
 had met, years ago, in France; an entirely chance 
 encounter, and probably a futureless one, had it not 
 been for the presence in the hotel at Amboise of the 
 Lumleys. They both slightly knew the Lumleys, 
 and the Lumleys and the Chadwicks were old friends. 
 So it had come about; and if he associated Mrs. 
 Aldesey with tea, he associated her also with perfect 
 omelettes and the Loire. He had liked her at once
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 15 
 
 so much, that, had it not been for an always unseen 
 yet never-repudiated husband in New York, he 
 would certainly, at the beginning, have fallen in love 
 with her. But the unrepudiated husband made as 
 much a part of Mrs. Aldesey s environment as her 
 stays and her prayer-book. The barrier was so evi 
 dent that one did not even reflect on what one might 
 have done had it not been there; and indeed, Mrs. 
 Aldesey, he now seemed, after many pleasant years 
 of friendship, to recognize, for all the sense of sweet 
 ness and exhilaration she gave him, had not enough 
 substance to rouse or sustain his heart. She was, like 
 the tea again, all savour. 
 
 She lifted to-day her attentive blue eyes with 
 age they would become shrewd and gave him her 
 fine little hand, blue-veined and ornamented with 
 pearls and diamonds in old settings. She wore long 
 earrings and a high, transparent collar of net and 
 lace. Her earrings and her elaborately dressed hair, 
 fair and faded, seemed as much a part of her per 
 sonality as her eyes, her delicate nose and her small, 
 slightly puckered mouth that dragged provocatively 
 and prettily at one corner when she smiled. Old- 
 meadow sometimes wondered if she were happy ; but 
 never because of anything she said or did. 
 
 " I want to hear about some people called Toner," 
 he said, dropping into the easy-chair on the opposite 
 side of the tea-table. It was almost always thus that 
 he and Mrs. Aldesey met. He rarely dined out. 
 "I m rather perturbed. I think that Barney you 
 remember young Chadwick is going to marry a 
 Miss Toner a Miss Adrienne Toner. And I hope 
 you ll have something to her advantage to tell me. 
 As you know, I m devoted to Barney and his family,"
 
 16 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "I know. The Lumleys Chad wicks. I remember 
 perfectly. The dear boy with the innocent eyes and 
 sulky mouth. Why don t you bring him to see me? 
 He s dancing the tango in all his spare moments, I 
 suppose, and doesn t care about old ladies." Mrs. 
 Aldesey was not much over forty, but always thus 
 alluded to herself. "Toner," she took up, pouring 
 out his tea. "Why perturbed? Do you know any 
 thing against them? Americans, you mean. We poor 
 expatriates are always seen as keepers to so many 
 curious brethren. Toner. Cela ne me dit rien." 
 
 "I know nothing against them except that Mrs. 
 Toner, the girl s mother, died, by arrangement, out 
 at sea, on her yacht in sunlight. Does that say 
 anything? People don t do that in America, do they, 
 as a rule? A very opulent lady, I inferred." 
 
 "Oh, dear!" Mrs. Aldesey now ejaculated, as if 
 enlightened. "Can it be? Do you mean, I wonder, 
 the preposterous Mrs. Toner, of whom, fifteen years 
 ago, I had a glimpse, and used to hear vague ru 
 mours? She wandered about the world. She dressed 
 in the Empire period: Queen Louise of Prussia, 
 white gauze bound beneath her chin. She had a 
 harp, and warbled to monarchs. She had an astral 
 body, and a Yogi and a yacht and everything hand 
 some about her. The typical spiritual cabotine of 
 our epoch though I m sure they must always have 
 existed. Of course it must be she. No one else could 
 have died like that. Has she died, poor woman? 
 On a yacht. Out at sea. In sunlight. How uncom 
 fortable!" 
 
 "Yes, she s dead," said Oldmeadow resignedly. 
 "Yes; it s she, evidently. And her daughter is com 
 ing down to Coldbrooks this week-end. I m afraid
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 17 
 
 that unless Barney has too many rivals, he ll cer 
 tainly marry her. But what you say leads me to 
 infer that he will have rivals and to hope they may 
 be successful. She will, no doubt, marry a prince." 
 
 "Something Italian, perhaps. Quite a small for 
 tune will do that. Certainly your nice Barney 
 wouldn t have been at all Mrs. Toner s affaire. The 
 girl on her own may think differently, for your Bar 
 ney is, I remember, very engaging, and has a way 
 with him. I don t know anything about the girl. 
 I didn t know there was one. There s no reason why 
 she may not be charming. Our wonderful people 
 have the gift of picking up experience in a generation 
 and make excellent princesses." 
 
 "But she s that sort, you think. The sort that 
 marries princes and has no traditions. Where did 
 they come from? Do you know that?" 
 
 " I haven t an idea. Yet, stay. Was it not tooth 
 paste? Toner s Peerless Tooth- Paste. Obsolete; 
 yet I seem to see, reminiscently, in far-away nursery 
 days, the picture of a respectable old gentleman 
 with side- whiskers, on a tube. A pretty pink glazed 
 tube with a gilt top to it. Perhaps it s that. Since it 
 was Toner s it would be the father s side; not the 
 warbling mother s. Well, many of us might wish for 
 as unambiguous an origin nowadays. And, in Amer 
 ica, we did all sorts of useful things when we first, 
 all of us, came over in the Mayflower!" said Mrs. 
 Aldesey with her dragging smile. 
 
 Oldmeadow gazed upon his friend with an iron 
 ically receptive eye. "Have they ever known any 
 one decent? Anyone like yourself? I don t mean 
 over here. I mean in America." 
 
 "No one like me, I imagine; if I m decent. Mrs.
 
 18 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Toner essayed a season in New York one winter, and 
 it was then I had my glimpse of her, at the opera, in 
 the Queen Louise dress. A pretty woman, dark, 
 with a sort of soulful and eminently respectable 
 coquetry about her; surrounded by swarms of devo 
 tees all male, to me unknown ; and with some 
 thing in a turban that I took to be a Yogi in the 
 background. She only tried the one winter. She 
 knew what she wanted and where she couldn t get it. 
 We are very dry in New York such of us as sur 
 vive. Very little moved by warblings or astral bodies 
 or millions. As you intimate, she ll have done much 
 better over here. You are a strange mixture of 
 materialism and ingenuousness, you know." 
 
 "It s only that we have fewer Mrs. Toners to 
 amuse us and more to do with millions than you 
 have," said Oldmeadow; but Mrs. Aldesey, shaking 
 her head with a certain sadness, said that it wasn t 
 as simple as all that. 
 
 "Have you seen her? Have you seen Adrienne?" 
 she took up presently, making him his second cup of 
 tea. "Is she pretty? Is he very much in love?" 
 
 "I m going down to Coldbrooks on Saturday to 
 see her," said Oldmeadow, "and I gather that it s 
 not to subject her to any test that Barney wants me ; 
 it s to subject me, rather. He s quite sure of her. 
 He thinks she s irresistible. He merely wants to 
 make assurance doubly sure by seeing me bowled 
 over. I don t know whether she s pretty. She has 
 powers, apparently, that make her independent of 
 physical attractions. She lays her hands on people s 
 heads and cures them. She cured Charlie Lumley 
 of insomnia at Saint Moritz three years ago." 
 
 Mrs. Aldesey, at this, looked at him for some
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 19 
 
 moments in silence. " Yes," she assented, and in her 
 pause she seemed to have recognized and placed a 
 familiar object. "Yes. She would. That s just 
 what Mrs. Toner s daughter would do. I hope she 
 doesn t warble, too. Laying on hands is better than 
 warbling." 
 
 "I see you think it hopeless," said Oldmeadow, 
 pushing back his chair and yielding, as he thrust his 
 hands into his pockets and stretched out his legs, to 
 an avowed chagrin. "What a pity it is ! A thousand 
 pities. They are such dear, good, simple people, and 
 Barney, though he doesn t know it, is as simple as 
 any of them. What will become of them with this 
 overwhelming cuckoo in their nest." 
 
 At this Mrs. Aldesey became serious. "I don t 
 think it hopeless at all. You misunderstand me. 
 Isn t the fact that he s in love with her reassuring in 
 itself? He may be simple, but he s a delicate, dis 
 cerning creature, and he couldn t fall in love with 
 some one merely pretentious and absurd. She may 
 be charming. I can perfectly imagine her as charm 
 ing, and there s no harm in laying on hands; there 
 may be good. Don t be narrow, Roger. Don t go 
 down there feeling dry. " 
 
 "I am narrow, and I do feel dry; horribly dry," 
 said Oldmeadow. "How could the child of such a 
 mother, and of tooth-paste, be charming? Don t try 
 specious consolation, now, after having more than 
 justified all my suspicions." 
 
 "I m malicious, not specious; and I can t resist 
 having my fling. But you mustn t be narrow and 
 take me au pied de la lettre. I assert that she may be 
 charming. I assert that I can see it all working out 
 most happily. She ll lay her hands on them and
 
 20 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 they ll love her. What I really want to say is this: 
 don t try to set Barney against her. He ll marry her 
 all the same and never forgive you." 
 
 "Ah; there we have the truth of it. But Barney 
 would always forgive me," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 "Well then, she won t. And you d lose him just 
 as surely. And she ll know. Let me warn you of 
 that. She ll know perfectly." 
 
 "I ll keep my hands off her," said Oldmeadow, 
 "if she doesn t try to lay hers on me."
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 THE Chadwicks all had a certain sulkiness in their 
 charming looks, and where in Barney it mingled with 
 sweetness, in Palgrave, his younger brother, it min 
 gled with brilliancy. It was Palgrave who, at the 
 station, met the family friend and counsellor in the 
 shabby, inexpensive family car. He was still a mere 
 boy, home from Marlborough for the Easter holi 
 days ; fond of Oldmeadow, as all the Chadwicks were ; 
 but more resentful of his predominance than Barney 
 and more indifferent to his brotherly solicitude. He 
 had Barney s long, narrow face and Barney s eyes 
 and lips; but the former were proud and the latter 
 petulant. To-day, as he sat beside him in the car, 
 Oldmeadow was aware of something at once fixed 
 and vibrating in his bearing. He wanted to say 
 something, and he had resolved to be silent. During 
 their last encounter at Coldbrooks, he and Old- 
 meadow had had a long, antagonistic political dis 
 cussion, and Palgrave s resentment still, no doubt, 
 survived. 
 
 Coldbrooks lay among the lower Cotswolds, three 
 miles from the station, and near the station was the 
 village of Chelford where Nancy Averil and her 
 mother lived. Nancy was at Coldbrooks; Aunt 
 Monica she was called aunt by the Chadwick 
 children, though she and Mrs. Chadwick were first 
 cousins was away. So Palgrave informed him. 
 But he did not speak again until the chill, green 
 curve of arable hillside was climbed and a stretch of 
 wind-swept country lay before them. Then suddenly
 
 22 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 he volunteered: "The American girl is at Cold- 
 brooks." 
 
 "Oh! Is she? When did she come?" Somehow 
 Oldmeadow had expected the later train for Miss 
 Toner. 
 
 "Yesterday. She and Barney came down to 
 gether in her car." 
 
 "So you ve welcomed her already," said Old- 
 meadow, curious of the expression on the boy s face. 
 "How does she fit into Coldbrooks? Does she like 
 you all and do you like her?" 
 
 For a moment Palgrave was silent. "You mean 
 it makes a difference whether we do or not?" he 
 then inquired. 
 
 " I don t know that I meant that. Though if peo 
 ple come into your life it does make a difference." 
 
 "And is she going to come into our lives?" Pal- 
 grave asked, and Oldmeadow felt pressure of some 
 sort behind the question. "That s what I mean. 
 Has Barney told you ? He s said nothing to us. Not 
 even to Mother." 
 
 "Has Barney told me he s going to marry her? 
 No ; he hasn t. But it s evident he hopes to. Perhaps 
 it depends on whether she likes Coldbrooks and 
 Coldbrooks likes her." 
 
 "Oh, no, it doesn t. It doesn t depend on any 
 thing at all except whether she likes Barney," said 
 Palgrave. "She s the sort of person who doesn t 
 depend on anything or anybody except herself. She 
 cuts through circumstance like a knife through 
 cheese. And if she s not going to take him I wish 
 she d never come," he added, frowning and turning, 
 under the peak of his cap, his jewel-like eyes upon 
 his companion. " It s a case of all or nothing with a
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 23 
 
 person like that. It s too disturbing just for a 
 glimpse." 
 
 Oldmeadow felt himself disconcerted. Oddly 
 enough, for the boy was capricious and extravagant, 
 Palgrave s opinion had more weight with him than 
 Barney s. Barney, for one thing, was sexually sus 
 ceptible and Palgrave was not. Though so young, 
 Oldmeadow felt him already of a poetic temperament, 
 passionate in mind and cold in blood. 
 
 "She s so charming? You can t bear to lose her 
 now you ve seen her?" he asked. 
 
 " I don t know about charming. No; I don t think 
 her charming. At least not if you mean something 
 little by the word. She s disturbing. She changes 
 everything." 
 
 " But if she stays she ll be more disturbing. She ll 
 change more." 
 
 "Oh, I shan t mind that! I shan t mind change," 
 Palgrave declared. "If it s her change and she s 
 there to see it through." And, relapsing to muteness, 
 he bent to his brakes and they slid down among the 
 woods of Cold brooks. 
 
 For the life of him and with the best will in the 
 world, he couldn t make it out. That was Oldmead- 
 ow s first impression as, among the familiar group 
 gathered in the hall about the tea-table, Miss Toner 
 was at last made manifest to him. She was, he felt 
 sure, in his first shrewd glance at her, merely what 
 Lydia Aldesey would have placed as a third-rate 
 American girl, and her origins in commercial enter 
 prise were eminently appropriate. 
 
 She got up to meet him, as if recognizing in him 
 some special significance or, indeed, as it might be 
 her ingenuous habit to do in meeting any older per-
 
 24 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 son. But he was not so much older if it came to that ; 
 for, after he had met the direct and dwelling gaze of 
 her large, light eyes, the second impression was that 
 she was by no means so young as Barney had led 
 him to expect. She was certainly as old as Barney. 
 
 There were none of the obvious marks of wealth 
 upon her. She wore a dark-blue dress tying on the 
 breast over white. She was small in stature and, in 
 manner, composed beyond anything he had ever 
 encountered. With an irony, kindly enough, yet 
 big, he knew, with unfavourable inferences, he even 
 recognized, reconstructing the moment in the light 
 of those that followed, that in rising to meet him as 
 he was named to her, it had been, rather than in 
 shyness or girlishness, in the wish to welcome him 
 and draw him the more happily into a group she had 
 already made her own. 
 
 They were all sitting round the plentiful table, set 
 with home-made loaves and cakes, jams and butter, 
 and a Leeds bowl of primroses; Miss Toner just 
 across from him, Barney on one side of her his 
 was an air of tranquil ecstasy and little Barbara 
 on the other, and they all seemed to emanate a new 
 radiance; almost, thought Oldmeadow, with an 
 irritability that was still genial, like innocent sav 
 ages on a remote seashore gathered with intent eyes 
 and parted lips round the newly disembarked Chris 
 topher Columbus. Mrs. Chadwick, confused, as 
 usual, among her tea-cups, sending hasty relays of 
 sugar after the unsugared or recalling those sugared 
 in error, specially suggested the simile. She could, 
 indeed, hardly think of her tea. Her wide, startled 
 gaze turned incessantly on the new-comer and to 
 Oldmeadow, for all his nearly filial affection, the
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 25 
 
 eyes of Eleanor Chadwick looked like nothing in the 
 world so much as those of the March Hare in Ten- 
 niel s evocation of the endearing creature. Unlike 
 her children, she was fair, with a thin, high, ridicu 
 lously distinguished nose; but her mouth and chin 
 had Barney s irresolution and sweetness, and her 
 untidy locks Meg s beauty. Meg was a beauty in 
 every way, rose, pearl and russet, a Romney touched 
 with pride and daring, and the most sophisticated of 
 all the Chadwicks; yet she, too, brooded, half mer 
 rily, half sombrely, on Miss Toner, her elbows on 
 the table for the better contemplation. Palgrave s 
 absorption was manifest; but he did not brood. He 
 held his head high, frowned and, for the most part, 
 looked out of the window. 
 
 Oldmeadow sat between Palgrave and Nancy and 
 it was with Nancy that the magic ended. Nancy did 
 not share in the radiance. She smiled and was very 
 busy cutting the bread and butter ; but she was pale ; 
 not puzzled, but preoccupied. Poor darling Nancy; 
 always his special pet ; to him always the dearest and 
 most loveable of girls. Not at all a Romney. With 
 her pale, fresh face, dark hair and beautiful hands 
 she suggested, rather, a country lady of the seven 
 teenth century painted by Vandyck. A rural Van- 
 dyck who might have kept a devout and merry 
 journal, surprising later generations by its mixture 
 of ingenuousness and wisdom. Her lips were medi 
 tative, and her grey eyes nearly closed when she 
 smiled in a way that gave to her gaiety and extraor 
 dinary sweetness and intimacy. Nancy always 
 looked as if she loved you when she smiled at you; 
 and indeed she did love you. She had spent her life 
 among people she loved and if she could not be in 
 timate she was remote and silent.
 
 26 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 But there was no hope for Nancy. He saw that 
 finally, as he drank his tea in silence and looked 
 across the primroses at the marvel of the age. 
 
 Miss Toner s was an insignificant little head, if 
 indeed it could be called little, since it was too large 
 for her body, and her way of dressing her hair in 
 wide braids, pinned round it and projecting over the 
 ears, added to the top-heavy effect. The hair was 
 her only indubitable beauty, fine and fair and spark 
 ling like the palest, purest metal. It was cut in a 
 light fringe across a projecting forehead and her 
 mouth and chin projected, too; so that, as he termed 
 it to himself, it was a squashed-in face, ugly in struc 
 ture, the small nose, from its depressed bridge, jut 
 ting forward in profile, the lips, in profile, flat yet 
 prominent. Nevertheless he owned, studying her 
 over his tea-cup, that the features, ugly, even trivial 
 in detail, had in their assemblage something of un 
 expected force. Her tranquil smile had potency and 
 he suddenly became aware of her flat, gentle voice, 
 infrequent, yet oddly dominating. Sensitive as he 
 was to voices, he saw it as a bland, blue ribbon rolled 
 out among broken counters of colour, and listened 
 to its sound before he listened to what it said. All 
 the other voices went up and down; all the others 
 half said things and let them drop or trail. She said 
 things to the end : when the ribbon began it was un 
 rolled; and it seemed, always, to make a silence in 
 which it could be watched. 
 
 "We went up high into the sunlight," she said, 
 "and one saw nothing but snow and sky. The bells 
 were ringing on the mountains beneath; one heard 
 no other sound. I have never forgotten the moment. 
 It seemed an inspiration of joy and peace and 
 strength."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 27 
 
 "You ve walked so much in the Alps, haven t you, 
 Roger?" said Mrs. Chadwick. "Miss Toner has 
 motored over every pass." 
 
 "In the French Alps. I don t like Switzerland," 
 said Old meadow. 
 
 "I think I love the mountains everywhere," said 
 Miss Toner, "when they go so high into the sky and 
 have the sun and snow on their summits. But I love 
 the mountains of Savoy and Jura best." 
 
 It vexed him that she should. She was a person to 
 stay in and prefer Switzerland. "Joy and peace and 
 strength," echoed in his ears and with the words, 
 rudely, and irrelevantly, the image of the pink 
 glazed tube with the gilt stopper. Miss Toner s 
 teeth were as white as they were benignant. 
 
 " I wish I could see those flowers," said Mrs. Chad- 
 wick. " I ve only been to Vevey in the summer; oh, 
 years and years ago. So dull. Fields of flowers. 
 You ve seen them, too, of course, Roger. All the 
 things we grow with such pains. My Saint Brigid 
 anemones never really do though what I put in of 
 leaf-mould!" 
 
 " You ll see anemones, fields of them, in the Alpine 
 meadows; and violets and lilies; the little lilies of 
 Saint Bruno that look like freesias. I love them best 
 of all," the bland, blue ribbon unrolled. " You shall go 
 with me some day, Mrs. Chadwick. We ll go to 
 gether." And, smiling at her as if they had, already, 
 a happy secret between them, Miss Toner continued: 
 "We ll go this very summer, if you will. We ll motor 
 all the way. I ll come and get you here. For a whole 
 month you shall forget that you ve ever had a fam 
 ily to bring up or a house to take care of or anemones 
 that won t grow properly even in leaf-mould."
 
 28 ADR1ENNE TONER 
 
 Her eyes, as they rested on her hostess, seemed to 
 impart more than her words. They imparted some 
 thing to Oldmeadow. He had not before conjectured 
 that Eleanor Chadwick might be bored or tired, nor 
 realized that since Barbara s birth, fourteen years 
 ago, she had not left Coldbrooks except to go to 
 London for a week s shopping, or to stay with friends 
 in the English country. He had taken Eleanor Chad- 
 wick s life for granted. It seemed Miss Toner s 
 function not to take things that could be changed for 
 granted. It was easy to do that of course, when you 
 had a large banking account behind you ; and yet he 
 felt that M iss Toner would have had the faculty of 
 altering accepted standards, even had she been 
 materially unequipped. She and Mrs. Chadwick 
 continued to look at each other for a moment and 
 the older woman, half bashfully, seemed, with what 
 softness, compelled to a tacit confession. She d 
 never known before that she was tired. Springs of 
 adventure and girlishness within her were perhaps 
 unsealed by Miss Toner s gaze. 
 
 "And where do the rest of us come in!" Barney 
 ejaculated. He was so happy in the triumph of his 
 beloved that his eyes, their sleepiness banished, were 
 almost as brilliant as Palgrave s. 
 
 "But you re always coming in with Mrs. 
 Chadwick," said Miss Toner. She looked at him, if 
 with a touch of tender humour, exactly as she looked 
 at his mother; but then she looked at them both as if 
 they were precious to her. "I don t want you to 
 come in at all for that month. I want her to forget 
 you ever existed. There ought to be waters of Lethe 
 for everyone every now and then, even in this life. 
 We come out, after the plunge into forgetfulness, far
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 29 
 
 brighter and stronger and with a renovated self to 
 love the better with. Afterwards after she s had 
 her dip you ll all come in, if you want to, with me. 
 I ll get a car big enough. You, too, Miss Averil; and 
 Mr. Oldmeadow; though he and Barney and Pal- 
 grave may have to take turns sitting on the port 
 manteaus." 
 
 "Barney" and "Palgrave" already. Her unpre 
 tentious mastery alarmed almost as much as it 
 amused him. He thanked her, with his dry smile, say 
 ing that he really preferred to see the Alps on his legs 
 and asked, to temper the possible acerbity, "Do you 
 drive yourself?" for it seemed in keeping with his 
 picture of her as an invading providence that she 
 should with her own hand conduct the car of fate. 
 He could see her, somehow, taking the hairpin curves 
 on the Galibier. 
 
 But Miss Toner said she did not drive. "One 
 can t see flowers if one drives oneself; and it would 
 hurt dear Macfarlane s feelings so. Macfarlane is 
 my chauffeur and he s been with me for years ; from 
 the time we first began to have motors, my mother 
 and I, out in California. Apart from that, I should 
 like it, I think, with the sense of risk and venture it 
 must give. I like the sense of high adventure of 
 Childe Roland to the dark tower came ; don t you, 
 Palgrave? It s life, isn t it? The pulse of life. Dan 
 ger and venture and conquest. And then resting, on 
 the heights, while one hears the bells beneath one." 
 
 This, thought Oldmeadow, as he adjusted his glass 
 the better to examine Miss Toner, must prove itself 
 too much, even for Palgrave to swallow. But Pal- 
 grave swallowed it without a tremor. His eyes on 
 hers he answered: "Yes, I feel life like that, too."
 
 30 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "Oh, dear!" sighed Mrs. Chadwick, and Old- 
 meadow blessed her antidote to the suffocating 
 sweetness: " I m afraid I don t! I don t think I know 
 anything about risks and dangers ; or about conquest 
 either. I m sure I ve never conquered anything; 
 though I have been dreadfully afraid of ill-tempered 
 servants if that counts, and never let them see it. 
 Barbara had such an odious nurse. She tried, simply, 
 to keep me out of the nursery; but she didn t suc 
 ceed. And there was a Scotch cook once, with red 
 hair that so often goes with a bad temper, doesn t 
 it? Do you remember, Barney? your dear father 
 had to go down to the kitchen when she was found 
 lying quite, quite drunk under the table. But cooks 
 and nurses can t be called risks and I ve never 
 cared for hunting." 
 
 Miss Toner was quietly laughing, and indeed 
 everybody laughed. 
 
 "Dear Mrs. Chadwick," she said. And then she 
 added: "How can a mother say she has not known 
 risks and dangers? I think you ve thought only of 
 other people for all your life and never seen yourself 
 at all. Alpine passes aren t needed to prove people s 
 courage and endurance." 
 
 Oldmeadow now saw, from the sudden alarm and 
 perplexity of Mrs. Chadwick s expression, that she 
 was wondering if the marvellous guest alluded to 
 the perils of child-birth. Perhaps she did. She was 
 ready, he imagined, to allude to anything. 
 
 "You re right about her never having seen her 
 self," said Palgrave, nodding across at Miss Toner. 
 "She never has. She s incapable of self-analysis." 
 
 "But she s precious sharp when it comes to ana 
 lysing other people, aren t you, Mummy dear!" said 
 Barney.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 31 
 
 "I don t think she is," said Meg. "I think 
 Mummy sees people rather as she sees flowers; 
 things to be fed and staked and protected." 
 
 "You re always crabbing, Mummy, Meg. It s a 
 shame! Isn t it a shame, Mummy dear!" Barbara 
 protested, and Barney tempered the apparent criti 
 cism peacemaker as he usually was with : 
 "But you have to understand flowers jolly well to 
 make them grow. And we do her credit, don t we!" 
 
 Miss Toner looked from one to the other as they 
 spoke, with her clear, benignant, comprehending 
 gaze, and Mrs. Chadwick stared with her March 
 Hare ingenuousness that had its full share, too, of 
 March Hare shrewdness. She undertook no self- 
 justification, commenting merely, in the pause that 
 followed Barney s contribution: " I don t know what 
 you mean by self-analysis unless it s thinking about 
 yourself and mothers certainly haven t much time 
 for that. You re quite right there, my dear," she 
 nodded at Miss Toner, adding in a tone intended 
 specially for her: "But young people often exagger 
 ate things that are quite, quite simple when they 
 come."
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 "COME out and have a stroll," said Oldmeadow to 
 Nancy. Tea was over and a primrose-coloured sun 
 set filled the sky. They walked up and down the 
 gravelled terrace before the house. 
 
 Cold brooks stood high, yet encircled by still 
 higher stretches of bare or wooded upland. Its 
 walled garden, where vegetable beds and lines of 
 cordon apple-trees were pleasingly diversified by 
 the herbaceous borders that ran beneath the walls, 
 lay behind it ; most of the bedroom windows looked 
 down into the garden. Before it, to the south, lawns 
 and meadows dropped to a lake fed by the brooks 
 that gave the place its name. Beyond the lake were 
 lower copses, tinkling now with the musical run of 
 water and climbing softly on either side, so that 
 from the terrace one had a vast curved space of sky 
 before one. The sun was setting over the woods. 
 
 It was Barney s grandfather, enriched by large 
 shipping enterprises in Liverpool, w r ho had bought 
 the pleasant old house, half farm, half manor, and 
 Barney s father had married the daughter of a local 
 squire. But the family fortunes were much dwindled, 
 and though Barney still nursed the project of return 
 ing one day to farm his own land there was little 
 prospect of such a happy restoration. In spite of the 
 Russian ballet and London portents, he was fonder, 
 far, of Coldbrooks than of all of them put together. 
 But he could afford neither time nor money for 
 hunting, and his home was his only for week-ends 
 and holidays. It was the most loveable of homes,
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 33 
 
 more stately without than within, built of grey-gold 
 Cotswold stone with beautiful stone chimneys and 
 mullioned windows and three gables facing the 
 southern sky. Within, everything was rather bare 
 and shabby. There was no central heating, and no 
 bathrooms. The tiger-skin that lay on the stone 
 flags of the hall had lost all its hair. The piano rat 
 tled and wheezed in many of its notes. The patterns 
 of the drawing-room chintzes were faded to a mere 
 dim rosy riot, and stuffing protruded from the angles 
 of the leather arm-chairs in the smoking-room. But 
 it was, all the same, a delightful house to stay in. 
 Eleanor Chadwick s shrewdness showed itself in her 
 housekeeping. She knew what were the essentials. 
 There was always a blazing fire in one s bedroom in 
 the evening and the hottest of water with one s bath 
 in the morning. Under the faded chintz, every chair 
 in the drawing-room was comfortable. The toast 
 was always crisp ; the tea always made with boiling 
 water; the servants cheerful. Mrs. Chadwick had a 
 great gift with servants. She could reprove with 
 extreme plaintiveness, yet never wound a suscepti 
 bility, and the servants hall, as she often remarked 
 with justice, was smarter and prettier than the 
 drawing-room. Johnson, the old butler, had been at 
 Coldbrooks since before her marriage, and the grey- 
 haired parlourmaid had come with her when she had 
 come as a bride. These familiar faces added depth 
 to the sense of intimacy that was the gift of Cold- 
 brooks. Oldmeadow loved the place as much as any 
 of the Chadwicks did, and was as much at home 
 in it. 
 
 "There is a blackcap," said Nancy, "down in the 
 copse. I felt sure I heard one this morning."
 
 34 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "So it is," said Oldmeadow. They paused to 
 listen. 
 
 "It s the happiest of all," said Nancy. 
 
 He had been wondering about Nancy ever since 
 he had come. It was not her voice, gentle and medi 
 tative, that told him now she was unhappy. It was 
 rather in contrast to the bird s clear ecstasy that he 
 felt the heaviness of her heart. 
 
 "It s wilder than the thrush and blackbird, isn t 
 it?" he said. "Less conscious. The thrush is always 
 listening to himself, I feel. Do you want to go to the 
 Alps with Miss Toner, Nancy?" 
 
 Nancy would not see Miss Toner as an angelic 
 being and he wanted to know how she did see her. 
 The others, it was evident, thought her angelic by a 
 sort of group suggestion. She thought herself so, to 
 begin with ; snow, flowers, bells and all the rest of it ; 
 and they, ingenuous creatures, saw the mango-tree 
 rising to heaven as the calm-eyed Yogi willed they 
 should. But Nancy did not see the mango- tree. She 
 was outside the group consciousness with him. 
 
 "Oh, no!" she now said quickly; and she added: 
 " I don t mean that I don t like her. It s only that I 
 don t know her. How can she want us? She came 
 only yesterday." 
 
 "But, you see, she means you to know her. And 
 when she s known she couldn t imagine that anyone 
 wouldn t like her." 
 
 "I don t think she s conceited, if you mean that, 
 Roger." 
 
 "Conceit," he rejoined, "may be of an order so 
 monstrous that it loses all pettiness. You ve seen 
 more of her than I have, of course." 
 
 "I think she s good. She wants to do good. She
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 35 
 
 wants to make people happy; and she does," said 
 Nancy. 
 
 "By taking them about in motors, you mean." 
 
 "In every way. She s always thinking about 
 pleasing them. In big and little ways. Aunt Eleanor 
 loves her already. They had a long talk last night in 
 Aunt Eleanor s room. She s given Meg the most 
 beautiful little pendant pearl and amethyst, an 
 old Italian setting. She had it on last night and Meg 
 said how lovely it was and she simply lifted it off her 
 own neck and put it around Meg s. Meg had to keep 
 it. She gave it in such a way that one would have to 
 keep it." 
 
 " Rather useful, mustn t it be, to have pendants so 
 plentifully about you that you can hand them out to 
 the first young lady who takes a fancy to them? 
 Has she given you anything, Nancy?" 
 
 " I m sure she would. But I shall be more careful 
 than Meg was." 
 
 "Perhaps Meg will practise carelessness, since it s 
 so remunerative. What has she given Palgrave? 
 He seems absorbed." 
 
 "Isn t it wonderful," said Nancy. "It s wonder 
 ful for Palgrave, you know, Roger, because he is 
 rather sad and bitter, really, just now; and I think 
 she will make him much happier. They went off to 
 the woods together directly after breakfast." 
 
 "What s he sad and bitter about? You mean his 
 socialism and all the rest of it?" 
 
 "Yes; and religion. You remember; when you 
 were here at Christmas." 
 
 "I remember that he was very foolish and made 
 me lose my temper. Is there a chance of Miss Toner 
 turning him into a good capitalist and churchman?"
 
 36 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Nancy smiled, but very faintly. " It s serious, you 
 know, Roger." 
 
 "What she s done to them already, you mean?" 
 
 "Yes. What she s done already. She had Meg, 
 after lunch, in her room. Meg looked quite different 
 when she came out. It s very strange, Roger. It s as 
 if she d changed them all. I almost feel," Nancy 
 looked round at the happy house and up at the 
 tranquil elms where the rooks were noisily preparing 
 for bed, "as if nothing could be the same again, since 
 she s come." Her clear profile revealed little of the 
 trouble in her heart. They had not named Barney; 
 but he must be named. 
 
 "It s white magic," said Oldmeadow. "You and 
 I will keep our heads, my dear. We don t want to be 
 changed, do we? What has she done to Barney? He 
 is in love with her, of course." 
 
 "Of course," said Nancy. 
 
 He had never been sure before that she was in love 
 with Barney. She was nine years younger and had 
 been a child during years of his manhood. Old- 
 meadow had thought it in his own fond imagination 
 only that the link between them was so close. But 
 now he knew what Nancy herself, perhaps, had 
 hardly known till then. The colour did not rise in 
 her cheek, but through her voice, through her bear 
 ing, went a subtle steadying of herself. "Of course 
 he is in love with her," she repeated and he felt that 
 she forced herself to face the truth. 
 
 They stopped at the end of the terrace. A little 
 path turned aside towards the copse and the gras^ 
 beneath the trees was scattered with the pale radi 
 ance of primroses. Nancy seemed to look at the 
 flowers, but she sought no refuge in comment on
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 37 
 
 them ; and as they looked in silence, while the rooks, 
 circling and cawing above, settled on their nests, a 
 sense of arrested time came to Oldmeadow, and a 
 phrase of music, blissful in its sadness, where gentle 
 German words went to a gentle German strain, 
 passed through his mind. Something of Schubert s 
 - Young Love First Grief. It seemed to pierce 
 to him from the young girl s heart and he knew that 
 he would never forget and that Nancy would never 
 forget the moment; the rooks; the primroses; the 
 limpid sky. The blackcap s flitting melody had 
 ceased. 
 
 "Do you think she may make him happy?" he 
 asked. It was sweet to him to know that she had no 
 need of a refuge from him. She could take counsel 
 with him as candidly as if there had been no tacit 
 avowal between them. She looked round at him as 
 they went on walking and he saw pain and perplex 
 ity in her eyes. 
 
 "What do you think, Roger?" she said. "Can 
 she?" 
 
 "Well, might she, if Barney is stupid enough?" 
 
 "I don t feel he would have to be stupid to be 
 happy with her, Roger. You are not fair to her. 
 What I wonder is whether he will be strong enough 
 not to be quite swept away." 
 
 "You think she ll overpower him? Leave him 
 with no mind of his own?" 
 
 "Something like that perhaps. Because she s very 
 strong. And she is so different. Everything in her is 
 different. She has nothing nothing with us, or 
 we with her. We haven t done the same things or 
 seen the same sights or thought the same thoughts. 
 I hardly feel as if the trees could look the same to her
 
 38 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 as they do to us or the birds sound the same. And 
 she ll want such different things." 
 
 "Perhaps she ll want his things," Oldmeadow 
 mused. "She seems to like them quite immensely 
 already." 
 
 "Ah, but only because she s going to do something 
 to them," said Nancy. "Only because she s going to 
 change them. I don t think she d like anything she 
 could do nothing for." 
 
 Nancy had quite grown up. She had seen further 
 than he had. He felt her quiet comment big with 
 intuitive wisdom. 
 
 " You see deep, my dear," he said. "There s some 
 thing portentous in your picture, you know." 
 
 "There is something portentous about her, Roger. 
 That is just what I feel. That is just what troubles 
 me." 
 
 "She may be portentous, in relation to us, and 
 what she may do to us," said Oldmeadow, "but I m 
 convinced, for all her marvels, that she s a very 
 ordinary young person. Don t let us magnify her. 
 If she s not magnified she won t work so many mar 
 vels. They re largely an affair, I m sure of it, of 
 motors and pendants. She s ordinary. That s what 
 I take my stand on." 
 
 "If she s ordinary, why do you feel, too, that 
 she ll sweep Barney away?" Nancy was not at all 
 convinced by his demonstration. 
 
 "Why, because he s in love with her. That s all. 
 Her only menace is in her difference ; her complacency. 
 What it comes to, I suppose, is that we must hope, 
 if they re to be happy, that he ll like her things." 
 
 "Yes; but what it comes to then, Roger, is that 
 we shall lose Barney," Nancy said.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 Miss TONER did not come down to breakfast next 
 morning and Oldmeadow was conscious of a feeling 
 of disproportionate relief at not finding her in the 
 big, bare, panelled dining-room where a portrait of 
 Mrs. Chadwick in court dress presided over one 
 wall and Meg and Barney played with rabbits, 
 against an imitation Gainsborough background, on 
 another. Both pictures were an affliction to Barney; 
 but to Mrs. Chadwick s eye they left nothing to be 
 desired in beauty, and, when Barney was not there 
 to protest, she would still fondly point out the length 
 of eyelash that the artist had so faithfully captured 
 in the two children. 
 
 The sense of change and foreboding that he and 
 Nancy, with differences, had recognized in their 
 talk, must have haunted Oldmeadow s slumbers, for 
 he had dreamed of Miss Toner, coming towards him 
 along the terrace, in white, as she had been at dinner, 
 with the beautiful pearls she had worn, lifting her 
 hand and saying as the rooks cawed overhead for 
 the rooks cawed though the moon was brightly 
 shining: "I can hear them, too." 
 
 There had been nothing to suggest such a dream 
 in her demeanour at dinner; nothing portentous, 
 that is. Simple for all her competence, girlish for all 
 the splendour of her white array, she had spoken 
 little, looking at them all, and listening, gravely 
 sometimes, but with a pervading gentleness; and 
 once or twice he had found her eyes on his; those 
 large, light eyes, dispassionately and impersonally
 
 40 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 benignant, giving him, with their suggestion of seeing 
 around but also very far beyond you, a curious sense 
 of space. Once or twice he had felt himself a little at 
 a loss as he met their gaze it had endeared her to 
 him the less that she should almost discompose him 
 and he had felt anew the presence of power in her 
 ugly little face and even of beauty in her colourless 
 skin, her colourless yet so living eyes, and her crown 
 of wondrous gold. It had been, no doubt, this ele 
 ment of aesthetic significance, merging with Nancy s 
 words, that had built up the figure of his dream ; for 
 so he had seen her, grey and white and gold in the 
 unearthly light, while the rooks cawed overhead. 
 
 His friends this morning, though they were all 
 talking of her, possessed in their gaiety and lightness 
 of heart an exorcising quality. So much gaiety and 
 lightness couldn t be quenched or quelled if that 
 was what Miss Toner s influence menaced. Between 
 them all they would manage to quench and quell 
 Miss Toner, rather, and he recovered his sense of her 
 fundamental absurdity as he felt anew their instinc 
 tive and unself-conscious wisdom. 
 
 " Isn t it odd, Roger, she hardly knows England at 
 all," said Mrs. Chadwick, as he finished his porridge, 
 made his tea at the side-table, and took his place 
 beside her. "She s been so little here, although she 
 seems to have travelled everywhere and lived every 
 where." 
 
 "Except in her own country," Old meadow ven 
 tured the surmise, but urbanely, for Barney sat 
 opposite him. 
 
 "Oh, but she s travelled there, too, immensely," 
 said Barney. "She s really spent most of her life in 
 America, I think, Mother. She has a little sort of
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 41 
 
 bungalow on the coast in California, orange-trees 
 and roses and all the rest of it ; a fairy-tale place ; and 
 a house in the mountains in New England, high up 
 among the pine- woods." 
 
 "And a private train, I suppose, to carry her from 
 one to the other. What splendid pearls," said Old- 
 meadow, buttering his toast. "Haven t you asked 
 for them yet, Meg?" 
 
 Meg was not easily embarrassed. " Not yet," she 
 said. "I m waiting for them, though. Meanwhile 
 this is pretty, isn t it?" The pendant hung on her 
 breast. 
 
 " I believe she would give Meg her pearls, or any 
 of us. I believe she d give anything to anyone," 
 sighed Mrs. Chadwick. "She doesn t seem to think 
 about money or things of that sort, material things 
 you know, at all. I do wish I could get the map of 
 America straight. All being in those uneven squares, 
 like Turkish Delight, makes it so difficult. One can t 
 remember which lump is which though Texas, in 
 my geography, was pale green. The nice tinned 
 things come from California, don t they? And New 
 England is near Boston the hub of the universe, 
 that dear, droll Oliver Wendell Holmes used to call 
 it. I suppose they are very clever there. She has been 
 wonderfully educated. There s nothing she doesn t 
 seem to have learned. And her maid adores her, 
 Roger. I was talking to her just now. Such a nice 
 French woman with quite beautiful dark eyes, but 
 very melancholy; we make a mistake, I believe, in 
 imagining that the French are a gay people. I al 
 ways think that s such a good sign. So kind about 
 my dreadful accent." 
 
 "A good sign to have your maid like you, Mummy,
 
 42 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 or to have melancholy eyes?" Meg inquired. "I 
 think she s a rather ill-tempered looking woman. 
 But of course anybody would adore Adrienne. She s 
 an angel of patience, I m sure. I never met such an 
 angel. We don t grow them here," said Meg, while 
 Barney s triumphant eyes said: "I told you so," to 
 Oldmeadow across the table. 
 
 After breakfast, in the sunlight on the terrace, 
 Mrs. Chadwick confided her hopes to him. "She 
 really is an angel, Roger. I never met anyone in the 
 least like her. So good, and gifted, too, and all that 
 money. Only think what it would mean for dear 
 Barney. He could take back the farm ; the lease falls 
 in next year, and come back here to live." 
 
 "You think she cares for him?" 
 
 "Yes; indeed I do. She cares for us all, already, as 
 you can see. But I believe it s because she s adopt 
 ing us all, as her family. And she said to me yester 
 day that she disapproved so much of our English 
 way of turning out mothers and thought families 
 ought to love each other and live together, young 
 and old. That s from being so much in France, per 
 haps. I told her / shouldn t have liked it at all if old 
 Mrs. Chadwick had wanted to come and live with 
 Francis and me. She was such a masterful old lady, 
 Roger, very Low Church, and quite dreadfully 
 jealous of Francis. And eldest sons should inherit, 
 of course, or what would become of estates? My 
 dear father used always to say that the greatness of 
 England was founded on landed estates. I told her 
 that. But she looked at me quite gravely as if she 
 hardly understood when I tried to explain it all 
 goes in with Waterloo being won on the fields of 
 Eton, doesn t it? It s quite curious the feeling of
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 43 
 
 restfulness she gives me, about Barney a sort of 
 Nunc Dimittis feeling, you know." 
 
 "Only she doesn t want you to depart. Well, 
 that s certainly all to the good and let s hope Eng 
 land s greatness won t suffer from the irregularity. 
 Has she told you much about her life? her people?" 
 Oldmeadow asked. He could not find it in his heart 
 to shadow such ingenuous contentment. And after 
 all what was there to say against Miss Toner, except 
 that she would change things? 
 
 "Oh, a great deal. Everything I asked; for I 
 thought it best, quite casually you know, to find out 
 what I could. Not people of any position, you know, 
 Roger, though I think her mother was better in that 
 way than her father ; for his father made tooth-paste. 
 It s from the tooth-paste all the money comes. But 
 it s always puzzling about Americans, isn t it? And 
 it doesn t really make any difference, once they re 
 over here, does it?" 
 
 "Not if they ve got the money," he could not 
 suppress; it was for his own personal enjoyment and 
 Mrs. Chadwick cloudlessly concurred: "No, not if 
 they have the money. And she has, you see. And 
 besides that she s good and gifted and has had such 
 a wonderful education. Her mother died five years 
 ago. She showed me two pictures of her. A beauti 
 ful woman ; very artistic-looking. Rather one s idea 
 of Corinne, though Corinne was really Madame de 
 Stael, I believe; and she was very plain." 
 
 "Was she dressed like Queen Louise of Prussia; 
 coming down the steps, you know, in the Empire 
 dress with white bound round her head?" 
 
 "Yes; she was. How did you know, Roger? Ex 
 tremely picturesque; but quite a lady, too. At
 
 44 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 least" Mrs. Chadwick hesitated, perplexed be 
 tween kindliness and candour "almost." 
 
 "I heard about her from Mrs. Aldesey. You re 
 member my American friend. She didn t know her, 
 but had seen her years ago in New York in that 
 romantic costume." 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick felt perhaps the slight irony in hi 
 voice, for she rejoined, though not at all provoca 
 tively: "Why shouldn t people look romantic if they 
 can? I should think Mrs. Toner had a much more 
 romantic life than Mrs. Aldesey. She s gone on just 
 as we have, hasn t she, seeing always the same peo 
 ple; and being conventional. Whereas Adrienne and 
 her mother seem to have known everyone strange 
 and interesting wherever they went ; great scientists 
 and thinkers, you know; and poets and pianists. 
 Adrienne told me that her mother always seemed to 
 her to have great wings and that s just what I felt 
 about her when I looked at her. She d flown every 
 where." As she spoke Miss Toner appeared upon 
 the doorstep. 
 
 Although it was Sunday she had not varied her 
 dress, which was still the simple dress of dim, dark 
 blue; but over it she wore a silk jacket, and a straw 
 hat trimmed with a lighter shade of blue was tied, in 
 summer-like fashion, beneath her chin. She carried 
 a sunshade and a small basket filled with letters. 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick, both hands outstretched, went to 
 meet her. Oldmeadow had never before seen her kiss 
 an acquaintance of two days standing. "I do hope 
 you slept well, my dear," she said. 
 
 "Very well," said Miss Toner, including Old- 
 meadow in her smile. "Except for a little while 
 when I woke up and lay awake and couldn t get the
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 45 
 
 cawing of your rooks out of my mind. I seemed to 
 hear them going on and on." 
 
 "Oh, dear! How unfortunate! But surely they 
 weren t cawing in the night!" cried Mrs. Chadwick, 
 and Miss Toner, laughing and holding her still by 
 the hands, turned to tell Barney, who closely fol 
 lowed her, that his mother was really afraid, because 
 she had thought of rooks in the night, that their 
 Coldbrooks birds had actually been inhospitable 
 enough to keep her awake with their cawings. Meg 
 and Barbara and Nancy had all now emerged and 
 there was much laughter and explanation. 
 
 "You see, Mummy thinks you might work mira 
 cles even among the rooks," said Barney, while 
 Oldmeadow testily meditated on his own discomfort. 
 It might have been mere coincidence, or it might 
 he must admit it have been Miss Toner s thoughts 
 travelling into his dream or his dream troubling her 
 thoughts ; of the two last alternatives he didn t know 
 which he disliked the more. 
 
 " It s time to get ready for church, children," said 
 Mrs. Chadwick, when, after much merriment at her 
 expense, the rooks and their occult misdemeanours 
 were disposed of. "Where is Palgrave? I do hope he 
 won t miss again. It does so hurt dear Mr. Bodman s 
 feelings. Are you coming with us, my dear?" she 
 asked Miss Toner. 
 
 Miss Toner, smiling upon them all, her sunshade 
 open on her shoulder, said that if they did not mind 
 she did not think she would come. "I only go to 
 church when friends get married or their babies 
 christened," she said, "or something of that sort. I 
 was never brought up to it, you see. Mother never 
 went."
 
 46 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick s March Hare eyes dwelt on her. 
 "You aren t a Church woman?" 
 
 "Oh, dear, no!" said Miss Toner, and the very 
 suggestion seemed to amuse her. 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick hesitated: "A Dissenter?" she 
 ventured. "There are so many sects in America 
 I ve heard. Though I met a very charming Ameri 
 can bishop once." 
 
 "No not a Dissenter; if you mean by that a 
 Presbyterian or a Methodist or a Swedenborgian," 
 said Miss Toner, shaking her head. 
 
 Palgrave had now joined them and stood on the 
 step above her. She smiled round and up at him. 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick, her distress alleviated yet her 
 perplexity deepened, ventured further: "You are a 
 Christian, I hope, dear?" 
 
 "Oh, not at all," said Miss Toner gravely now and 
 very kindly. "Not in any orthodox way, I mean. 
 Not in any way that an American bishop or your 
 Mr. Bodman would acknowledge. I recognize Christ 
 as a great teacher, as a great human soul ; one of the 
 very greatest; gone on before. But I don t divide 
 the human from the divine in the way the churches 
 do; creeds mean nothing to me, and I d rather say 
 my prayers out of doors on a day like this, in the 
 sunlight, than in any church. I feel nearer God alone 
 in His great world, than in any church built with 
 human hands. But we must all follow our own 
 light." She spoke in her flat, soft voice, gravely but 
 very simply; and she looked affectionately at her 
 hostess as she added: "You wouldn t want me to 
 come with you from mere conformity." 
 
 Poor Mrs. Chadwick, standing, her brood about 
 her, in the sweet Sabbath sunlight, had to Old-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 47 
 
 meadow s eye an almost comically arrested air. 
 How was a creedless, churchless mistress of Cold- 
 brooks to be fitted in to her happy vision of Barney s 
 future? What would the village say to a squiress 
 who never went to church and who said her prayers 
 in the sunlight alone? " But, of course, better alone," 
 he seemed to hear her cogitate, "than that anyone 
 should see her doing such a very curious thing." 
 And aloud she did murmur: "Of course not; of 
 course not, dear. And if you go into the little arbour 
 down by the lake no one will disturb you, I m sure. 
 Must it be quite in the open? Mere conformity is 
 such a shallow thing. But all the same I should like 
 the rector to come and talk things over with you. 
 He s such a good man and very, very broad-minded. 
 He brings science so often into his sermons some 
 times I think the people don t quite follow it all; and 
 only the other day he said to me, about modern 
 unrest and scepticism: 
 
 There is more faith in honest doubt, 
 Believe me, than in half the creeds. 
 
 Mamma met Lord Tennyson once and felt him to be 
 a deeply religious man though rather ill-tempered; 
 he was really very rude to her, I always thought, and 
 I do so dislike rudeness. And travelling about so 
 much, dear, you probably had so little teaching." 
 
 Miss Toner s eyes were incapable of irony and 
 they only deepened now in benevolence as they 
 rested on her hostess. " But I haven t any doubts," 
 she said, shaking her head and smiling: "No doubts 
 at all. You reach the truth through your church and 
 I reach it through nature and love and life. And the 
 beautiful thing is that it s the same truth, really;
 
 48 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 the same beautiful truth that God loves us all, and 
 that we are all the children of God. I should be very 
 pleased to meet your rector, of course, because I like 
 meeting anyone who is good and true. But I was 
 taught. My mother taught me always. And she 
 was the freest, wisest soul I have ever known." 
 
 "I ll stay with you," said Palgrave suddenly from 
 his place on the step above her. His eyes, over her 
 shoulder, had met Oldmeadow s and perhaps what 
 he saw in the old friend s face determined his testi 
 mony. "Church means nothing to me, either; and 
 less than nothing. I m not so charitable as you are, 
 and don t think all roads lead to truth. Some lead 
 away, I think. You know perfectly well, Mummy, 
 that the dear old rector is a regular duffer and you 
 slept all through the sermon the last time I went; 
 you did, really! I was too amused to sleep. He was 
 trying to explain original sin without mentioning 
 Adam or Eve or the Garden of Eden. It was most 
 endearing ! Like some one trying to avoid the eye of 
 an old acquaintance whom they d come to the con 
 clusion they really must cut! I do so like the idea of 
 Adam and Eve becoming unsuitable acquaintances 
 for the enlightened clergy!" 
 
 "There is no sin," said Miss Toner. Barney was 
 not quite comfortable; Oldmeadow saw that. He 
 kicked about in the gravel, a little flushed, and when, 
 once or twice, the old family friend met his eye, it 
 was quickly averted. "God is Good ; and everything 
 else is mortal mind mistake illusion." 
 
 "You are a sound Platonist, Miss Toner," Old- 
 meadow observed, and his kindness hardly cloaked 
 his irony. 
 
 "Am I?" she said. When she looked at one she
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 49 
 
 never averted her eyes. She looked iintil she had 
 seen all that she wished to see. "I am not fond of 
 metaphysics." 
 
 "Socrates defined sin as ignorance, you know, and 
 in a sense it may be. All the same," said Oldmeadow, 
 and he felt that they were all listening and that in 
 the eyes of his old friends it was more than unlikely 
 that he would get the better of Miss Toner 
 "there s mortal mind to be accounted for, isn t 
 there, and why it gets us continually into such a 
 mess. Whatever name you call it by, there is some 
 thing that does get us into a mess and mightn t it be 
 a wholesome discipline to hear it denounced once a 
 week?" 
 
 "Not by some one more ignorant than I am ! " said 
 Miss Toner, laughing gently. "I ll go to church for 
 love of Mrs. Chad wick, but not for the sake of the 
 discipline!" 
 
 "Mr. Bodman never denounces. Roger is giving 
 you quite a wrong idea," said Mrs. Chad wick. She 
 had stood looking from one to the other, distressed 
 and bewildered, and she now prepared to leave them. 
 "And Palgrave is very, very unjust. Of course you 
 must not come, dear. It would make me quite un 
 happy. But Mr. Bodman is not a duffer. If Pal- 
 grave feels like that he must certainly stay away. 
 Perhaps you can teach him to be more charitable. 
 It s easy to see the mote in our neighbour s eye." 
 Mrs. Chadwick s voice slightly trembled. She had 
 been much moved by her son s defection. 
 
 "Come, Mummy, you re not going to say I m a 
 duffer! " Palgrave passed an affectionately bantering 
 arm round her shoulders. "Dufferism isn t my 
 beam!"
 
 50 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 But very sadly Mrs. Chadwick drew away, saying 
 as she turned into the house: "No; that isn t your 
 beam. But pride may be, Palgrave. Spiritual 
 pride." 
 
 Oldmeadow remained standing in the sunlight 
 with Miss Toner and the two young men. The girls 
 had followed Mrs. Chadwick, Meg casting a laugh 
 ing glance of appreciation at him as she went. Re 
 ligious scruples would never keep Meg from church 
 if she had a pretty spring dress to wear. 
 
 "After all," he carried on, mildly, the altercation 
 if that was what it was between him and Miss 
 Toner "good Platonists as we may be, we haven t 
 reached the stage of Divine Contemplation yet and 
 things do happen that are difficult to account for, if 
 sin is nothing more positive than illusion and mis 
 take. All the forms of ote-toi que je m y mette. All 
 the forms of jealousy and malice. Deliberate cruel 
 ties. History is full of horrors, isn t it? There s a 
 jealousy of goodness in the human heart, as well as 
 a love. The betrayal of Christ by Judas is symbolic." 
 
 He had screwed his eyeglass into his eye the better 
 to see Miss Toner and looked very much like a solici 
 tor trying to coax dry facts out of a romantic client. 
 And in the transparent shadow of her hat Miss 
 Toner, with her incomparable composure, gave him 
 all her attention. 
 
 "I don t account. I don t account for anything. 
 Do you? " she said. " I only feel and know. But even 
 the dreadful things, the things that seem to us so 
 dreadful isn t it always ignorance? Ignorance of 
 what is really good and happy and the illusion of 
 a separate self? When we are all, really, one. All, 
 really, together." She held out her arms, her little
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 51 
 
 basket hanging from her wrist. "And if we feel that 
 at last, and know it, those dreadful things can t hap 
 pen any more." 
 
 "Your if is the standing problem of metaphys 
 ics and ethics. Why don t we feel and know -it? 
 That s the question? And since we most of us, for 
 most of the time, don t feel and know it, don t we 
 keep closer to the truth if we accept the traditional 
 phraseology and admit that there s something in the 
 texture of life, something in ourselves, that tempts 
 us, or impedes us, or crushes us, and call it sin 
 evil?" 
 
 He was looking at her, still with his latent irony 
 though kindly enough indeed, and he had, as he 
 looked, an intuition about her. She had never been 
 tempted, she had never been impeded, she had never 
 been crushed. That was her power. She was, in a 
 fashion, sinless. It was as if she had been hypno 
 tized in infancy to be good. And while the fact made 
 her in one sense so savourless, it made her in another 
 so significant. She would go much further than most 
 people in any direction she wanted to go simply 
 because she was not aware of obstacles and had no 
 inhibitions. 
 
 "Call it what you like," said Miss Toner. She 
 still smiled but more gravely. Barney had ceased 
 to stroll and kick. He had come to a standstill beside 
 them, and, his hands in his pockets, his eyes fixed on 
 his beloved, showed himself as completely reassured. 
 Palgrave still stood on the step above her and 
 seemed to watch the snowy, piled-up clouds that 
 adorned the tranquil sky. "I feel it a mistake to 
 make unreal things seem real by giving them big 
 names. We become afraid of them and fear is what
 
 52 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 impedes us most of all in life. For so many genera 
 tions humanity has seen ghosts in the evening mists 
 and taken its indigestion for the promptings of a 
 demon. We ve got away from all that now, Mr. 
 Old meadow. We see that mists are mists and indi 
 gestion indigestion, and that there aren t such 
 things as ghosts and demons. We ve come out, all 
 together, hand in hand, on the Open Road and we 
 don t want, ever any more, to be reminded, even, of 
 the Dark Ages." 
 
 Before her fluency, Oldmeadow felt himself grow 
 less kindly. "You grant there have been dark ages, 
 then? I count that a concession. Things may not 
 be evil now, but they were once." 
 
 "Not a concession at all," said Miss Toner. 
 "Only an explanation of what has happened an 
 explanation of what you call the mess, Mr. Old- 
 meadow." 
 
 "So that when we find ourselves misbehaving to 
 one another as we march along the Open Road, we 
 may know it s only indigestion and take a pill." 
 
 She didn t like badinage. That, at all events, was 
 evident to him, even in her imperturbability. She 
 took it calmly not lightly ; and if she was not 
 already beginning to dislike him, it was because dis 
 liking people was a reality she didn t recognize. 
 "We don t misbehave if we are on the Open Road," 
 she said. 
 
 "Oh, but you re falling back now on good old- 
 fashioned theology," Oldmeadow retorted. "The 
 sheep, saved and well-behaved, keeping to the road, 
 and the goats all those who misbehave and stray 
 classed with the evening mists." 
 
 "No," said Miss Toner eyeing him, "I don t class
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 53 
 
 them with the evening mists; I class them with the 
 sick, whom we must be kind to and take care of." 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick was now emerging in her new 
 spring hat, which was not very successful and gave 
 emphasis to her general air of strain. Meg s hat was 
 very successful, as Meg s hats always were; and if 
 Nancy s did not shine beside it, it was, at all events, 
 exceedingly becoming to her. Nancy s eyes went to 
 Barney. Barney, in the past, had been very appre 
 ciative of becoming hats. But he had no eyes for 
 Nancy now. He had drawn Miss Toner aside and 
 Oldmeadow heard their colloquy: 
 
 "Would you rather I didn t go?" 
 
 "I d rather, always, you followed your light, dear 
 friend." 
 
 "I do like going here, you know. f It seems to be 
 long with it all and Mummy can t bear our not 
 going." 
 
 " It makes your dear mother happy. It all means 
 love to you." 
 
 "Not only that" Oldmeadow imagined that 
 Barney blushed, and he heard his stammer: " I don t 
 know what I believe about everything ; but the serv 
 ice goes much deeper than anything I could think 
 for myself." Their voices dropped. All that came 
 further to Oldmeadow was from Miss Toner: "It 
 makes you nearer than if you stayed." 
 
 "Confound her ineff ability !" he thought. "It 
 rests with her, then, whether he should go or stay." 
 
 It certainly did. Barney moved away with them 
 all, leaving Palgrave to the more evident form of 
 proximity. 
 
 "You know," Mrs. Chadwick murmured to Old- 
 meadow as they went, between the primroses, down
 
 4 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 the little path and through a wicket-gate that led to 
 the village "you know, Roger, it s quite possible 
 that they may say their prayers together. It s like 
 Quakers, isn t it or Moravians; or whoever those 
 curious people are who are buried standing up so 
 dismal and uncomfortable, I always think. But it s 
 better that Palgrave should say his prayers with 
 some one, and somewhere, isn t it, than that he 
 shouldn t say them at all?"
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 "MOTHER S got the most poisonous headache," said 
 Meg. " I don t think she ll be able to come down to 
 tea." 
 
 She had joined Oldmeadow on the rickety old 
 bench where he sat reading and smoking in a sunny 
 corner of the garden. A band of golden wallflowers 
 behind them exhaled the deep fragrance that he 
 always associated with spring and Sunday and Cold- 
 brooks, and the old stone wall behind the flowers 
 exhaled a warmth that was like a fragrance. 
 
 "Adrienne is with her," Meg added. She had 
 seated herself and put her elbows on her knees and 
 her chin in her hands as though she intended a solid 
 talk. 
 
 "Will that be likely to help her head?" Old- 
 meadow inquired. "I should say not, if she s going 
 to continue the discourse of this morning." 
 
 "Did you think all that rather silly?" Meg in 
 quired, tapping her smart toes on the ground and 
 watching them. "You looked as if you did. But 
 then you usually do look as though you thought 
 most things and people silly. I didn t I mean, not 
 in her. I quite saw what you did ; at least I think so. 
 But she can say things that would be silly in other 
 people. Now Palgrave is silly. There s just the 
 difference. Is it because he always feels he s scoring 
 off somebody and she doesn t?" Meg was evidently 
 capable, for all her devotion, of dispassionate in 
 quiry. 
 
 "She s certainly more secure than Palgrave," said
 
 56 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Oldmeadow. "But I feel that s only because she s 
 less intelligent. Palgrave is aware, keenly, of a crit 
 ical and probably hostile world; and Miss Toner is 
 unaware of everything except her own benevolence, 
 and the need for it." 
 
 Meg meditated. Then she laughed. "You are 
 spiteful, Roger. Oh I don t mean about Adrienne 
 in particular. But you always see the weak spots in 
 people, first go. It s rather jolly, all the same, if you 
 come to think it over, to be like that. Perhaps that s 
 all she is aware of ; but it takes you a good way 
 wanting to help people and seeing how they can be 
 helped." 
 
 "Yes; it does take you a good way. I don t deny 
 that Miss Toner will go far." 
 
 "And make us go too far, perhaps?" Meg mused. 
 "Well, I m quite ready for a move. I think we re all 
 rather stodgy, really, down here. And up in Lon 
 don, too, if it comes to that. I m rather disappointed 
 in London, you know, Roger, and what it does for 
 one. Just a different kind of sheep, it seems to me, 
 from the kind we are in the country ; noisy skipping 
 sheep instead of silent, slow ones. But they all fol 
 low each other about in just the same way. And 
 what one likes is to see someone who isn t following." 
 
 "Yes; that s true, certainly," Oldmeadow con 
 ceded. " Miss Toner isn t a sheep. She s the sort of 
 person who sets the sheep moving. I m not so sure 
 that she knows where she is going, all the same." 
 
 "You mean Be careful; don t you?" said Meg, 
 looking up at him sideways with her handsome eyes. 
 "I m not such a sheep myself, when it comes to that, 
 you know, Roger. I look before I leap even after 
 Adrienne," she laughed; and Oldmeadow, looking
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 57 
 
 back at her, laughed too pleased with her, yet a 
 little disconcerted by what she revealed of experi 
 ence. 
 
 "The reason I like her so awfully," Meg went on 
 while he reflected that, after all, she was now 
 twenty-five "and it s a good thing I do, isn t it, 
 since it s evident she s going to take Barney; but 
 the reason is that she s so interested in one. More 
 than anyone I ever knew far and far away. Of 
 course Mother s interested ; but it s for one ; about 
 one; not in one, as it were. And then darling old 
 Mummy isn t exactly intelligent, is she; or only in 
 such unexpected spots that it s never much good to 
 one; one can never count on it beforehand. Whereas 
 Adrienne is so interested in you that she makes you 
 feel more interested in yourself than you ever 
 dreamed you could feel. Do you know what I mean? 
 Is it because she s American, do you think? English 
 people aren t interested in themselves, off their own 
 bat, perhaps; or in other people either! I don t 
 mean we re not selfish all right!" Meg laughed. 
 
 "Selfish and yet impersonal," Oldmeadow mused. 
 "With less of our social consciousness in use, with 
 more of it locked up in automatism, possibly." 
 
 "There s nothing locked up in Adrienne; abso 
 lutely nothing," Meg declared. "It s all there 
 out in the shop-window. And it s a big window too, 
 even though some of the hats and scarves, so to 
 speak, may strike us as funny. But, seriously, what 
 is it about her, do you think? How can she care so 
 much? about everybody?" 
 
 He remembered Nancy s diagnosis. "Not about 
 everybody. Only about people she can do some 
 thing for. You ll find she won t care about me."
 
 58 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "Why should she? You don t care for her. Why 
 should she waste herself on people who don t need 
 her?" Meg s friendliness of glance did not preclude 
 a certain hardness. 
 
 "Why indeed? It could never occur to her, of 
 course, that she might need somebody. I don t 
 mean that spitefully. She is strong. She doesn t 
 need." 
 
 "Exactly. Like you," said Meg. "She s quite 
 right to pay no attention to the other strong people. 
 For of course you are very strong, Roger, and fright 
 fully clever; and good, too. Only one has to be 
 cleverer, no doubt, than we are to see your goodness 
 as easily as Adrienne s. It s the shop-window again. 
 She shows her goodness all the time ; and you don t." 
 
 Oldmeadow knocked the ashes out of his pipe and 
 felt for his tobacco-pouch. " I show my spite. No; 
 you mustn t count me among the good. I suppose 
 your mother s headache came on this morning after 
 she found out that Miss Toner doesn t go to church." 
 
 "Of course it was that. You saw that she was 
 thinking about it all through the service, didn t 
 you?" said Meg. "And once, poor lamb, she said, 
 Have mercy upon us, miserable sinners instead of 
 Amen. Did you notice? It will bother her fright 
 fully, of course. But after all it s not so bad as if 
 Adrienne were a Dissenter and wanted to go to 
 chapel! Mummy in her heart of hearts would much 
 rather you were a pagan than a Dissenter. I don t 
 think it will make a bit of difference really. So long 
 as she gives money to the church, and is nice to the 
 village people. Mother will get over it," said Meg. 
 
 He thought so too. His own jocose phrase re 
 turned to him. As long as the money was there it
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 59 
 
 didn t make any difference. But Meg s security on 
 that score interested him. With all her devotion to 
 the new friend she struck him, fundamentally, as 
 less kind than Nancy, who had none. But that, no 
 doubt, was because Meg, fundamentally, was hard 
 and Nancy loving. It was because of Miss Toner s 
 interest in herself that Meg was devoted. "You re 
 so sure, then, that she s going to take Barney?" he 
 asked. 
 
 "Quite sure," said Meg. "Surer than he is. Surer 
 than she is. She s in love with him all right; more 
 than she knows herself, poor dear. No doubt she 
 thinks she s making up her mind and choosing. 
 Weighing Barney in the balance and counting up his 
 virtues. But it s all decided already ; and not by his 
 virtues; it never is," said Meg, again with her air of 
 unexpected experience. " It s something much more 
 important than virtues; it s the thickness of his eye 
 lashes and the way his teeth show when he smiles, 
 and all his pretty ways and habits. Things like that. 
 She loves looking at him and more than that, even, 
 she loves having him look at her. I have an idea 
 that she s not had people very much in love with her 
 before; not people with eyelashes and teeth like 
 Barney. In spite of all her money. And she s get 
 ting on, too. She s as old as Barney, you know. It s 
 the one, real romance that s ever come to her, poor 
 dear. Funny you don t see it. Men don t see that 
 sort of thing I suppose. But she couldn t give Barney 
 up now, simply. It s because of that, you know" 
 Meg glanced behind them and lowered her voice 
 "that she doesn t like Nancy." 
 
 "Doesn t like Nancy!" Oldmeadow s instant in 
 dignation was in his voice. "What has Nancy to do 
 with it?"
 
 60 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "She might have had a great deal, poor darling 
 little Nancy; and it s that Adrienne feels. She felt it 
 at once. I saw she did; that Nancy and Barney had 
 been very near each other; that there was an affinity, 
 a sympathy, call it what you like, that would have 
 led to something more. It wouldn t have done at all, 
 of course; at least I suppose not. They knew each 
 other too well; and, until the last year or two, she s 
 been too young for him. And then, above all, she s 
 hardly any money. But all the same, if he hadn t 
 come across Adrienne and been bowled over like 
 this, Barney would have fallen in love with Nancy. 
 She s getting to be so lovely looking, for one thing, 
 isn t she? And Barney s so susceptible to looks. He 
 was falling in love with her last winter and she l:new 
 it as well as I did. It s rather rotten luck for Nancy 
 because I m afraid she cares; but then women do 
 have rotten luck about love affairs," said Meg, now 
 sombrely. "The dice are loaded against them every 
 time." 
 
 Oldmeadow sat smoking in silence for some mo 
 ments, making no effort to master his strong resent 
 ment; taking, rather, full possession of its implica 
 tions. "Somewhat of a flaw in your angel you must 
 admit," he said presently. "She doesn t like people 
 who are as strong as she is and she doesn t like peo 
 ple who might have been loved instead of herself. 
 It narrows the scale of her benevolence, you know. 
 It makes her look perilously like a jealous prig, and 
 a prig without any excuse for jealousy into the 
 bargain." 
 
 "Temper, Roger," Meg observed, casting her 
 hard, friendly glance round at him; "I know you 
 think there s no one quite to match Nancy; and I
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 61 
 
 think you re not far wrong. She s the straightest, 
 sweetest-tempered girl who ever stepped on two 
 feet. But all the same Adrienne isn t a prig, and if 
 she s jealous she can t help herself. She wants to 
 love Nancy; she thinks she does love her; she ll 
 always be heavenly to her. She can do a lot for 
 Nancy, you know. She will do a lot for her, even if 
 Nancy holds her off. But she wishes frightfully that 
 she was old and ugly. She wishes that Barney 
 weren t so fond of her without thinking about her. 
 She s jealous and she can t help herself like all 
 the rest of us!" Meg laughed grimly. "When it 
 comes to that we re none of us angels." 
 
 It was tea-time and the dear old gong sounded 
 balmily from the house. As they went along the 
 path the rooks again were cawing overhead and 
 dimly, like the hint of evening in the air, he remem 
 bered his dream and the sense of menace. "You 
 know, it s not like all the rest of you," he said. " It s 
 not like Nancy, for instance. Nancy wouldn t dis 
 like a person because she was jealous of them. In 
 fact I don t believe Nancy could be jealous. She d 
 only be hurt." 
 
 "It s rather a question of degree, that, isn t it?" 
 said Meg. "In one form of it you re poisoned and 
 in the other you re cut with a knife; and the latter is 
 the prettier way of suffering; doesn t make you come 
 out in a rash and feel sick. Nancy is cut with the 
 knife; and if she s not jealous in the ugly sense, she 
 dislikes Adrienne all right." 
 
 "Why should she like her?" Oldmeadow retorted, 
 and Meg s simile seemed to cut into him, too. "She 
 doesn t need her money or her interest or her love. 
 She doesn t dislike her. She merely wishes she were 
 somewhere else as I do."
 
 62 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 The garden path led straight into the house. One 
 entered a sort of lobby, where coats and hats and 
 rackets and gardening baskets were kept, and from 
 the lobby went into the hall. Tea was, as always, 
 laid there and Mrs. Chadwick, as Meg and Old- 
 meadow came in, was descending the staircase at 
 the further end, leaning on Adrienne Toner s arm. 
 
 "You see. She s done it!" Meg murmured. She 
 seemed to bear him no ill-will for his expressed aver 
 sion. "I never knew one of Mother s headaches go 
 so quickly." 
 
 "I expect she d rather have stayed quietly up 
 stairs," said Oldmeadow; "she looks puzzled. As if 
 she didn t know what had happened to her." 
 
 " Like a rabbit when it conies out of the conjuror s 
 hat," said the irreverent daughter. 
 
 That was precisely what poor Eleanor Chadwick 
 did look like and for the moment his mind was di 
 verted by amusement at her appearance from its 
 bitter preoccupation. Mrs. Chadwick was the rabbit 
 and Miss Toner was the conjuror indeed; bland 
 and secure and holding her trophy in a firm but 
 gentle grasp. Not until they were all seated did 
 Barney and Nancy appear and then it was evident 
 to him that if Miss Toner were jealous of Nancy she 
 did not fear her, for it was she who had arranged the 
 walk from which the young couple had just returned. 
 
 "Was it lovely?" she asked Barney, as he took 
 the place beside her. "Oh, I do wish I could have 
 come; but I knew your Mother needed me." 
 
 "The primroses are simply ripping in the wood," 
 said Barney. 
 
 Nancy carried a large bunch of primroses. 
 
 "Ripping," said Miss Toner, laughing gently.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 63 
 
 "How absurd of you, Barney. Could anything be 
 less ripping than primroses? How beautiful they are 
 and what a lovely bunch. One sees that Miss Averil 
 loves them from the way she has picked them." If 
 she did not call Nancy by her Christian name it was, 
 Oldmeadow knew, not her but Nancy s fault. 
 
 Nancy still stood beside the table and from the 
 fact of standing, while all the rest of them were 
 seated, from the fact of being called Miss Averil, 
 she seemed, for the moment, oddly an outsider; as if 
 she hardly belonged to the circle of which Miss 
 Toner was the centre. "Do come and sit near us," 
 said Miss Toner. "For I had to miss you, too, you 
 see, as well as the primroses." 
 
 "I d crowd you there," said Nancy, smiling. "I ll 
 sit here near Aunt Eleanor." From something in 
 her eyes Oldmeadow felt suddenly sure that not till 
 now had she realized that it had not, really, been her 
 and Barney s walk. She offered the primroses to 
 Mrs. Chadwick as she took the chair beside her, 
 saying, "They ll fill your white bowl in the morning- 
 room, Aunt Eleanor." 
 
 "Oh, I say; but I meant those for Adrienne, 
 Nancy!" Barney exclaimed, and as he did so Meg s 
 eyes met Oldmeadow s over the household loaf. 
 "She didn t see them in the wood, so she ought to 
 have them. Mummy is suffocated with primroses 
 already." 
 
 But Nancy showed no rash and only an acute 
 Meg could have guessed a cut as she answered: "I ll 
 pick another bunch to-morrow for Miss Toner, 
 Barney. They ll be fresher to take to London. 
 These are really Aunt Eleanor s. I always fill that 
 bowl for her."
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 "I DO so want a talk with you, Roger," Mrs. Chad- 
 wick murmured to him when tea was over. The 
 dining-room opened at one end of the hall and the 
 drawing-room at the other and the morning-room, 
 Mrs. Chadwick s special retreat, into which she now 
 drew him, was tucked in behind the dining-room and 
 looked out at an angle of the garden wall and at the 
 dove-cot that stood there. Mrs. Chadwick s doves 
 were usually fluttering about the window and even, 
 when it was open, entering the room, where she some 
 times fondly fed them, causing thereby much dis 
 tress of mind to Turner, the good old parlourmaid. 
 A pleasant little fire was burning there and, after 
 placing her primroses in the white bowl, Mrs. Chad- 
 wick drew her chair to it, casting a glance, as she did 
 so, up at the large portrait of her husband in hunt 
 ing dress that hung above the mantelpiece. It was 
 painted with the same glib unintelligence as the 
 dining-room portraits, but the painter had been 
 unable to miss entirely the whimsical daring of the 
 eyes or to bring into conformity with his own stand 
 ard of good looks the charm of the irregular and nar 
 row face. Francis Chadwick had been an impulsive, 
 idle, endearing man, and, remaining always in love 
 with his wife, had fondly cherished all her absurdities. 
 Since his death poor Mrs. Chadwick had been per 
 plexed by her effort to associate with gravity and in 
 spiration one who had always been a laughing incen 
 tive to inconsequence. Oldmeadow reflected, as he, 
 too, looked up at him, that Francis Chadwick would 
 neither have needed nor have liked Miss Toner.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 65 
 
 "It s so very, very strange, Roger, I really must 
 tell you," Mrs. Chadwick said. Her hair, still bright 
 and abundant, was very untidy. She had evidently 
 not brushed it since rising from her sofa. "I had one 
 of my dreadful headaches, you know. It came on at 
 church this morning and I really couldn t attend to 
 Mr. Bodman at all. Perhaps you saw." 
 
 "I heard. Yes. Miss Toner had disturbed you a 
 good deal." 
 
 "I did feel so bewildered and unhappy about it 
 all," said Mrs. Chadwick, fixing her blue eyes upon 
 the family friend. Eleanor Chad wick s eyes could 
 show the uncanny ingenuousness and the uncanny 
 wisdom of a baby s. "Nothing so innocent or so 
 sharp was ever seen outside a perambulator," her 
 husband had once said of them. "About her, you 
 know, Roger," she continued, "and Barney and 
 Palgrave. The influence. I could not bear them to 
 lose their faith in the church of their fathers." 
 
 "No," said Oldmeadow. "But you must be pre 
 pared to see it shift a good deal. Faiths have to shift 
 nowadays if they re to stand." 
 
 "Well. Yes. I know what you mean, Roger. But 
 it isn t a question of shifting, is it? I m very broad. 
 I ve always been all for breadth. And the broader 
 you are the firmer you ought to be, oughtn t you?" 
 
 "Well, Miss Toner s broad and firm," Oldmeadow 
 suggested. "I never saw anyone more so." 
 
 "But in such a queer way, Roger. Like saying 
 one s prayers out of doors and thinking oneself as 
 good as Christ. Oh, it all made me perfectly wretched 
 and after lunch my head was so bad that I went and 
 lay down in the dark ; and it raged, simply. Oh, dear, 
 I thought; this means a day and night of misery.
 
 66 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 They go on like that once they begin. Mamma used 
 to have them in precisely the same way. Absolutely 
 incapacitating. I can never see how anybody can 
 deny heredity. That s another point, Roger. I ve 
 always accepted evolution. I gave up Adam and 
 Eve long ago; gave them up as white and good- 
 looking, I mean; because we must have begun some 
 where, mustn t we? And Darwin was such a good 
 man; though you remember he came not to care 
 anything at all about music. That may mean a great 
 deal, if one could think it all out; it s the most re 
 ligious of the arts, isn t it? But there s no end to 
 thinking things out!" Mrs. Chadwick pressed her 
 hand against her forehead, closing her eyes for a 
 moment. "And Adrienne is very musical." 
 
 "You were at your headache," Oldmeadow re 
 minded her. It was customary in the family circle 
 thus to shepherd Mrs. Chadwick s straying thoughts. 
 
 "Yes, I know. But it all hangs together. Heredity 
 and Mamma and my headaches; and Adrienne s 
 mother, who was musical, too, and played on a harp. 
 Well, it was raging and I was lying there, when there 
 came a little rap at the door. I knew at once who it 
 was and she asked in such a gentle voice if she might 
 come in. It s a very soothing voice, isn t it? But do 
 you know I felt for a moment quite frightened, as if 
 I simply couldn t see her. But I had to say yes, and 
 she came in so softly and sat down beside me and 
 said : I used to help Mother, sometimes, with her 
 headaches. May I help you? She didn t want to 
 talk about things, as I d feared. Such a relief it was. 
 So I said : Oh, do my dear, and she laid her hand on 
 my forehead and said : You will soon feel better. It 
 will soon quite pass away. And then not another
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 67 
 
 word. Only sitting there in the dark, with her hand 
 on my forehead. And do you know, Roger, almost 
 at once the pain began to melt away. You know 
 how a dish of junket melts after you cut into it. It 
 was like that. Junket, junket, I seemed to hear 
 myself saying; and such a feeling of peace and con 
 tentment. And before I knew anything more I fell 
 into the most delicious sleep and slept till now, just 
 before tea. She was sitting there still, in the dark 
 beside me and I said: Oh, my dear, to think of your 
 having stayed in on this lovely afternoon! But she 
 went to pull up the blinds and said that she loved 
 sitting quietly in the dark with some one she cared 
 for, sleeping. I think souls come very close to 
 gether, then, she said. Wasn t it beautiful of her, 
 Roger? Like astral bodies, you know, and auras and 
 things of that sort. She is beautiful. I made up my 
 mind to that, then. She gives me such a feeling of 
 trust. How can one help it? It s like what one reads 
 of Roman Catholic saints and people in the Bible. 
 The gift of healing. The laying on of hands. We 
 don t seem to have any of them and we can t count 
 her, since she doesn t believe in the church. But if 
 only they d give up the Pope, I don t see why we 
 shouldn t accept their saints; such dear, good people, 
 most of them. And the Pope is quite an excellent 
 man just now, I believe. But isn t it very strange, 
 Roger? For a person who can do that to one can t be 
 irreligious, can they?" 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick s eye was now fixed upon him, 
 less wistfully and more intently, and he knew that 
 something was expected of him. 
 
 "Hypnotic doctors can do it, you know. You 
 needn t be a saint to do it," he said. "Though I
 
 68 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 suppose you must have some power of concentration 
 that implies faith. However," he had to say all his 
 thought, though most of it would be wasted upon 
 poor Eleanor Chadwick, "Miss Toner is anything 
 but irreligious. You may be sure of that." 
 
 "You feel it, too, Roger. I m so, so glad." 
 
 "But her religion is not as your religion," he had 
 to warn her, "nor her ways your ways. You must 
 be prepared to have the children unsettled; every 
 one of them ; because she has great power and is far 
 more religious than most people. She believes in her 
 creed and acts on it. You must give the children 
 their heads. It s no good trying to circumvent or 
 oppose them." 
 
 " But they mustn t do wrong things, Roger. How 
 can I give them their heads if it s to do wrong things? 
 I don t know what Mamma would have said to their 
 not going to church especially in the country. 
 She would have thought it very wrong, simply. 
 Sinful and dangerous." 
 
 "Hardly that," Oldmeadow smiled. "Even in 
 the country. You don t think Miss Toner does 
 wrong things. If they take up Miss Toner s creed 
 instead of going to church, they won t come to much 
 harm. The principal thing is that there should be 
 something to take up. After all," he was reassuring 
 himself as well as Mrs. Chadwick, "it hasn t hurt 
 her. It s made her a little foolish ; but it hasn t hurt 
 her. And your children will never be foolish. They ll 
 get all the good of it and, perhaps, be able to combine 
 it with going to church. 
 
 " Foolish, Roger?" Mrs. Chadwick, relieved of her 
 headache, but not of her perplexity, gazed wanly at 
 him. "You think Adrienne foolish?"
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 69 
 
 "A little. Now and then. You mustn t accept 
 anything she says to you just because she can cure 
 you of a headache." 
 
 "But how can you say foolish, Roger? She s had 
 a most wonderful education?" 
 
 "Everything that makes her surer of herself and 
 makes other people surer of her puts her in more 
 danger of being foolish. One can be too sure of one 
 self. Unless one is a saint and even then. And 
 though I don t think she s irreligious I don t think 
 she s a saint. Not by any means." 
 
 "I don t see how anyone can be more of one, 
 nowadays, Roger. She heals people and she says 
 prayers, and she is always good and gentle and never 
 thinks of herself. I m sure I can t think what you 
 want more." 
 
 A touch of plaintiveness and even of protest had 
 come into Mrs. Chadwick s voice. 
 
 " Perhaps what I want is less," he laughed. " Per 
 haps she s too much of a saint for my taste. I think 
 she s a little too much of one for your taste, really - 
 if you were to be quite candid with yourself. Has 
 she spoken to you at all about Barney? Are you 
 quite sure you ll have to reckon with her for yourself 
 and the children?" 
 
 At this Mrs. Chadwick showed a frank alarm. 
 "Oh, quite, quite sure!" she said. "She couldn t be 
 so lovely to us all if she didn t mean to take him! 
 Why do you ask, Roger? You haven t any reason 
 for thinking she won t?" 
 
 "None whatever. Quite the contrary." He didn t 
 want to put poor Mrs. Chadwick to the cruel test of 
 declaring whether she would rather have the children 
 go to church and lose Miss Toner and all her monev,.
 
 70 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 or have them stay away and keep Miss Toner. After 
 all such a test was not to be asked of her. Miss 
 Toner wanted people to follow their own light. "I 
 only wondered if she talked to you about him. 
 Asked any girlish leading questions." 
 
 "None, none whatever," said Mrs. Chadwick. 
 "But I feel that s because she thinks she knows him 
 far better than I do and that he s told her everything 
 already. It s rather hard to be a mother, Roger. 
 For of course, though she is so much better and 
 cleverer than I am, I feel sure that no one under 
 stands Barney as I do." 
 
 "She d be a little cleverer still if she could see that, 
 wouldn t she?" 
 
 "Well, I don t know. Girls never do. I was just 
 the same when I was engaged to Francis. Even now 
 I can t think that old Mrs. Chadwick really under 
 stood him as 1 did. It s very puzzling, isn t it? Very 
 difficult to see things from other people s point of 
 view. When she pulled up the blind this afternoon, 
 she told me that Nancy and Barney were down in 
 the copse and she seemed pleased." 
 
 "Oh, did she?" 
 
 "I told her that they d always been like brother 
 and sister, for I was just a little afraid, you know, 
 that she might imagine Barney had ever cared 
 about Nancy." 
 
 "I see. You think she wouldn t like that?" 
 
 "What woman would, Roger?" And he imagined 
 that Mrs. Chadwick, for all her folly, was cleverer 
 than Miss Toner guessed, as she added: "And then 
 she told me that she d made Barney go without her. 
 She wanted me to see, you know, that it depended 
 on her. That s another reason why I feel sure she is 
 going to take him,"
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 HE sat, for the first time, next Miss Toner that night 
 at dinner and Nancy sat across from them next Bar 
 ney. Nancy was pale, and now that he could scruti 
 nize her he imagined that the walk had been more of 
 an ordeal than a pleasure. Barney, no doubt, with 
 the merciless blindness of his state, had talked to her 
 all the time of Adrienne. But Nancy would not have 
 minded that. She was of the type that hides its cut 
 for ever and may become aunt and guardian-angel 
 to the other woman s children. It had not been 
 Barney s preoccupation that had so drained her of 
 warmth and colour, but its character, its object. 
 Her grey eyes had the considering look with which 
 they might have measured the height of a difficult 
 hedge in hunting, and, resting on Oldmeadow once 
 or twice, seemed to tell him that the walk had shown 
 her more clearly than ever that, if Barney married 
 Miss Toner, they must lose him. He felt sure that 
 she had lain down since tea with a headache to which 
 had come no ministering angel. 
 
 She and Barney did not talk to each other now, for 
 he had eyes and ears only for Miss Toner. At any 
 former time they would have kept up the happiest 
 interchange, and Oldmeadow would have seen Nan 
 cy s eyelashes close together as she smiled her loving 
 smile. There was a dim family likeness between her 
 face and Barney s, for both were long and narrow, 
 and both had the singular sweetness in the very 
 structure of the smile. But where Barney was
 
 72 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 clumsy, Nancy was clear, and her skin was as fair as 
 his was brown. To the fond onlooker at both, they 
 were destined mates and only an insufferable acci 
 dent had parted them. 
 
 Nancy was as much a part of the Coldbrooks 
 country as the primroses and the blackcaps in the 
 woods. Her life had risen from the familiar soil to 
 the familiar sky, as preordained to fitness, as ordered 
 by instinct and condition as theirs, and from her 
 security of type she had gained not lost in savour. 
 The time that unfinished types must give to growing 
 conscious roots and building conscious nests, Nancy 
 had all free for spontaneities of flight and song. 
 Beside her, to his hostile eye, Miss Toner was as a 
 wide-spread water-weed, floating, rootless and scent 
 less, upon chance currents: A creature of surfaces, of 
 caprice and hazard. If the multiplicity of her in 
 formation constituted mental wealth, its imper 
 sonality constituted mental poverty. She was as 
 well furnished and as deadening as a catalogue, and 
 as he listened to her, receiving an impression of 
 continual, considered movings-on, earnest pursuits, 
 across half the globe, of further experience, he saw 
 her small, questing figure on a background of rail 
 ways, giant lines stretching forth across plain and 
 mountain, climbing, tunnelling, curving; stopping 
 at great capitals, and passing on again to glitter on 
 their endless way under the sun and moon. That 
 was what he seemed to see as Miss Toner talked: 
 and sleeping-berths and wardrobe-boxes and lux 
 urious suites in vast hotels. 
 
 She wore again her white dress, contrasting in its 
 richness of texture with the simplicity of her day 
 time blue, and, rather stupidly, an artificial white
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 73 
 
 rose had been placed, in her braids, over each ear. 
 Her pearls were her only other ornament, and her 
 pearls, he supposed, were surprising. 
 
 Oldmeadow was aware, in his close proximity to 
 her, while she ate beside him with a meticulous 
 nicety that made the manners of the rest of them, by 
 contrast, seem a little casual and slovenly, of the 
 discomfort that had visited him in his dream. Yet 
 the feeling she evoked was not all discomfort. It was 
 as if from her mere physical presence he were sub 
 jected to some force that had in its compulsion a 
 dim, conjectural charm. It was for this reason no 
 doubt that he seemed to be aware of everything 
 about her. Her hands were small and white, but 
 had no beauty of form or gesture. She moved them 
 slowly and without grace, rather like a young child 
 handling unfamiliar objects in a kindergarten, and 
 this in spite of the singular perfection of her table 
 manners. She could have made little use of them, 
 ever, in games of skill or in any art requiring swift 
 accuracy and firmness. It was as if her mind, over 
 trained in receptivity and retentiveness, had only 
 dull tentacles to spare for her finger-tips. He was 
 aware of these hands beside him all through dinner 
 and their fumbling deliberation brought to him, 
 again and again, a mingled annoyance, and satisfac 
 tion. There was something positive and character 
 istic about her scentlessness, for if she smelt of any 
 thing it was of Fuller s Earth a funny, chalky 
 smell and beside Meg, who foolishly washed liq 
 uid powder over her silvery skin, Miss Toner s 
 colourlessness was sallow. She had hardly talked at 
 all the night before, but to-night she talked con 
 tinuously. It was Meg who questioned her, and Mrs.
 
 74 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Chadwick, and Oldmeadow guessed that his ingenu 
 ous friend, still perplexed by his use of the word 
 foolish, was drawing out and displaying her future 
 daughter-in-law for his benefit. 
 
 Miss Toner and her mother had been to Russia, 
 to India, to China and Japan. They had visited 
 Stevenson s grave at Vailima and in describing it 
 she quoted "Under the wide and starry sky." They 
 had studied every temple in Greece and Sicily and 
 talked of the higher education with ladies in Turkish 
 harems. "But it was always Paris we came back 
 to," she said, "when we were not at home. Home 
 was, and is, a great many places: California and 
 Chicago where my father s people live, and New 
 England. But Paris was, after it, closest to our 
 hearts. Yes, we knew a great many French people; 
 but it was for study rather than friendship we went 
 there. It is such a treasure-house of culture. Mother 
 worked very hard at French diction for several win 
 ters. She had lessons from Mademoiselle Jouffert 
 you know perhaps though she has not acted for 
 so many years now. Our friendship with her was a 
 great privilege, for she was a rare and noble woman 
 and had a glorious gift. Phedre was her favourite 
 r61e and I shall never forget her rendering of it: 
 
 Ariane ma sceur! de quel amour blessee 
 
 Vous mourtites aux bords ou vous fdtes laissee! 
 
 She taught Mother to recite Phedre s great speeches 
 with such fire and passion. There could hardly be a 
 better training for French," said Miss Toner, repeat 
 ing the lines with a curious placidity and perfection. 
 "I preferred Mademoiselle Jouffert s rendering to 
 Bernhardt s. Her Phedre was, with all the fire, more 
 tender and womanly."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 75 
 
 "Do you care about Racine?" Oldmeadow asked 
 her, while the lines rang in his ears rather as in 
 his dream the rooks cawing had done with an 
 evocative sadness that hung, irrelevantly, about 
 their speaker. "It s not easy for our English ears 
 to hear the fire and passion, is it; but they are 
 there." 
 
 "He is very perfect and accomplished," said Miss 
 Toner. "But I always feel him small beside our 
 Shakespeare. He lacks heart, doesn t he?" 
 
 "There s heart in those lines you ve just recited." 
 
 "Yes," said Miss Toner. "Those lines are cer 
 tainly very beautiful. It s the mere music of them, 
 I think. They make me feel "she paused. It 
 was unlike her to pause and he wondered what she 
 made of Ariane, off her own bat, without Mademoi 
 selle Jouffert to help her. 
 
 "They make you feel?" he questioned. 
 
 "They are so sad so terribly melancholy. The 
 sound of them. They make me want to cry when I 
 hear them. But I think it s the sound; for their 
 meaning makes me indignant. There is such weak 
 ness in them ; such acceptance of destiny. I want to 
 revolt and protest, too for women. She should 
 not have died." 
 
 Oldmeadow involuntarily glanced across at 
 Nancy. She was looking at Miss Toner and if she 
 had been pale before, she was paler now. Nancy 
 would never think of herself in connection with 
 Ariane and tragic grief; yet something in the lines, 
 something in Miss Toner s disavowal of their ap 
 plicability, had touched the hidden cut. And, once 
 again, it was Meg s eyes that met his, showing him 
 that what he saw she saw, too. Barney saw nothing.
 
 76 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 All his solicitude was for Miss Toner in her imagin 
 ary plight. "I m sure you never would!" he ex 
 claimed. " Never die, I mean !" 
 
 "You think Miss Toner would have come to 
 terms with Bacchus," Oldmeadow suggested. He 
 didn t want to take it out of Barney, though he was 
 vexed with him, nor to take it out of Miss Toner, 
 either. He only wanted to toss and twist the theme 
 and make it gay where Miss Toner made it solemn. 
 
 "Come to terms with Bacchus!" Barney quite 
 stared, taken aback by the irreverence. "Why 
 should she ! She d have found somebody more worth 
 while than either of the ruffians." 
 
 Miss Toner smiled over at him. 
 
 "I m sure that if Bacchus had been fortunate 
 enough to meet Miss Toner she d have converted 
 him to total abstinence in a jiffy and made a model 
 husband of him. He was a fine, exhilarating fellow; 
 no ruffian at all; quite worth reforming." Old- 
 meadow, as he thus embroidered his theme, was 
 indulging in his own peculiar form of mirth. 
 
 He saw Miss Toner laying her hand on the head 
 of Bacchus; Miss Toner very picturesque on the 
 rugged sea-shore in her white and pearls and roses, 
 and Bacchus dazed and penitent, his very leopards 
 tamed to a cat-like docility. His laugh was visible 
 rather than audible and that Miss Toner had never 
 before been the subject of such mirth was evident to 
 him. 
 
 She met whatever she saw or guessed of irrever 
 ence, however, as composedly as she would have 
 met Bacchus; perhaps already, he reflected, she was 
 beginning to think of him in the light of an unde 
 sirable wine-bibber. Perhaps even, she was begin-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 77 
 
 ning to think of him as a ruffian. He didn t mind in 
 the least, so long as he succeeded in keeping off her 
 solemnity. 
 
 "I should have been quite willing to try and re 
 form him," she said; "though it takes much longer 
 than a jiffy to reform people, Mr. Oldmeadow; but 
 I shouldn t have been willing to marry him. There 
 are other things in life, aren t there, than love- 
 stories even for women." 
 
 "Bravo!" said Oldmeadow. He felt as well as 
 uttered it. She wasn t being solemn, and she had 
 returned his shuttlecock smartly. " But are there?" 
 he went on. He had adjusted his eyeglass for a 
 clearer confrontation of her. 
 
 Miss Toner s large eyes, enlarged still further by 
 the glass, met his, not solemnly, but with a consider 
 ing gravity. 
 
 "You are a sceptic, Mr. Oldmeadow," she ob 
 served. "A satirist. Do you find that satire and 
 scepticism take you very far in reading human 
 hearts?" 
 
 "There s one for you, Roger!" cried Barney. 
 
 Oldmeadow kept his gaze fixed on Miss Toner. 
 " You think that Ariane might prefer Infant Welfare 
 work or Charity Organization to a love-story?" 
 
 "Not those necessarily." She returned his gaze. 
 "Though I have known very fine big people who did 
 prefer them. But they are not the only alternatives 
 to love-stories." 
 
 "I am sceptical," said Oldmeadow. "I am, if 
 you like, satirical. I don t believe there are any 
 alternatives to love-stories; only palliatives to dis 
 appointment." 
 
 Barney leaned forward: "Adrienne, you see,
 
 78 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 doesn t accept that old-fashioned, sentimentalizing 
 division of the sexes. She doesn t accept the merely 
 love-story, hearth-side role for women." 
 
 "Oh, well," Oldmeadow played with his fork, 
 smiling with the wryness that accompanied his 
 reluctant sincerities, " I don t divide the sexes as far 
 as love-stories are concerned. We are all in the same 
 boat. For us, too, Barney, it s love-story or pallia 
 tive. You don t agree? If you were disappointed in 
 love? Hunting? Farming? Politics? Post-Impres 
 sionism? Would any of them fill the gap?" 
 
 It wasn t at all the line he had intended the talk 
 to take. He knew that as he glanced across at 
 Nancy. Saying nothing, as if its subject could not 
 concern her, and with a dim little smile, she listened, 
 and he knew that for her, though she wouldn t die of 
 it, there would be only palliatives. If only Barney, 
 confound him, hadn t been so charming. 
 
 Barney did not know how to answer the last 
 assault, and, boyishly, looked across at his beloved 
 for succour. She gave it instantly. 
 
 "Sadness, sorrow, tragedy, even, isn t despair," 
 she said. "Barney, I believe, if sorrow overtook 
 him, would mould the rough clay of his occupation 
 to some higher beauty than the beauty he d lost. 
 To lie down and die ; to resign oneself to palliatives. 
 Oh, no. That s not the destiny of the human soul." 
 
 "Roger s pulling your leg, Barney, as usual," 
 Palgrave put in scornfully. He had been listening 
 with his elbows on the table, his eyes on the table 
 cloth. "He knows as well as I do that there s only 
 one love. The sort you re all talking about the 
 Theseus and Ariane affair is merely an ebullition 
 of youth and as soon as nature has perpetuated the
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 79 
 
 species by means of it, it settles down, if there s any 
 reality under the ebullition, to grow into the other 
 - the divine love; the love of the soul for the Good, 
 the True and the Beautiful," Palgrave declared, 
 growing very red as he said it. 
 
 "Really my dear child!" Mrs. Chadwick mur 
 mured. She had never heard such themes broached 
 at her table and glanced nervously up at old John 
 son to see if he had followed. "That is a very, very 
 materialistic view!" 
 
 Oldmeadow at this began to laugh, audibly as 
 well as visibly, and Palgrave, as their eyes met in a 
 glance of communicated comedy, could not with 
 hold an answering smile. But Barney s face showed 
 that he preferred to see Palgrave s interpretation as 
 materialistic and even Miss Toner looked thought 
 fully at her champion. 
 
 "But we need the symbol of youth and nature," 
 she suggested. "The divine love, yes, Palgrave, is 
 the only real one; but then all love is divine and 
 human love sometimes brings the deepest revelation 
 of all. Browning saw that so wonderfully." 
 
 "Browning, my dear!" Palgrave returned with a 
 curious mingling of devotion, intimacy and aloof 
 ness, "Browning never got nearer God than a wo 
 man s breast!" 
 
 At this, almost desperately, Mrs. Chadwick broke 
 in: " Did you ever see our Ellen Terry act, Adrienne? 
 I liked her much better than Madame Bernhardt 
 who had such a very artificial face, I think. I can t 
 imagine her as Rosalind, can you? While Miss Terry 
 was a perfect Rosalind. I met her once with Henry 
 Irving at a garden-party in London and she was as 
 charming off as on the stage and I m sure I can t see
 
 8o ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 why anybody should wish to act Phedre poor, 
 uncontrolled creature. Rhubarb-tart, dear, and 
 custard? or wine- jelly and cream? How beautifully 
 you speak French. How many languages do you 
 speak?" Mrs. Chadwick earnestly inquired, still 
 turning the helm firmly away from the unbecoming 
 topic. 
 
 Miss Toner kept her head very creditably and, 
 very tactfully, at once accepted her hostess s hint. 
 "Rhubarb-tart, please, dear Mrs. Chadwick. Not 
 so very many, really. My German has never been 
 good; though French and Italian I do know well, 
 and enough Spanish for Don Quixote. But," she 
 went on, while Mrs. Chadwick looked gratefully at 
 her, " Mother and I were always working. We never 
 wasted any of our precious hours together. She 
 couldn t bear the thought of missing anything in 
 life; and she missed very little, I think. Music, 
 poetry, painting all the treasure-houses of the 
 human spirit were open to her. And what she won 
 and made her own, she gave out again with greater 
 radiance. How I wish you could all have known 
 her!" said Miss Toner, looking round at them with 
 an unaccustomed touch of wistfulness. "She was 
 radiance personified. She never let unhappiness rest 
 on her. I remember once, when she had had a cruel 
 blow from a person she loved and trusted in the 
 middle of her sadness she looked at me and saw how 
 sad she was making me; and she sprang up and 
 seized my hands and cried: Let s dance! Let s 
 dance and dance and dance! And we did, up and 
 down the terrace it was at San Remo she in 
 her white dress, with the blue sky and sea and the 
 orange- trees all in bloom. I can see her now. And
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 81 
 
 then she rushed to get music, her harp, and flowers 
 and fruit, to take to an invalid friend, and we spent 
 the afternoon with her, mother surpassing herself in 
 charm and witchery. She was always like that. She 
 would have found something, oh, very beautiful, to 
 make from her sorrow if Theseus had abandoned 
 her! But no one," said Miss Toner, looking round at 
 Old meadow, now with a mild playfulness, "could 
 ever have abandoned Mother." 
 
 There was something to Oldmeadow appealing in 
 her playfulness; her confidence, when it took on this 
 final grace, was really touching. For Mrs. Toner the 
 light-giver he knew that he had conceived a rooted 
 aversion. And he wondered if she would go on, over 
 the rhubarb-tart, to tell, after the dancing on the ter 
 race, of the death at sea. But he was spared that. 
 
 "And your father died when you were very young, 
 didn t he, dear?" said Mrs. Chadwick, fearful of the 
 reference to Theseus. "I think your mother must 
 often have been so very lonely ; away from home for 
 such a great part of the time and with so few rela 
 tives." 
 
 Miss Toner shook her head. "We were always 
 together, she and I, so we could never, either of us, 
 be lonely. And wherever we went she made friends. 
 People were always so much more than mere people 
 to her. She saw them always, at once, high and low, 
 prince and peasant, as souls, and they felt it always, 
 and opened to her. Then, until I was quite big, we 
 had my lovely grandmother. Mother came from 
 Maine and it was such a joy to go and stay there 
 with Grandma. It was a very simple little home. It 
 was always high thinking and plain living, with 
 Grandma; and though, when she married and be-
 
 82 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 came rich, Mother showered beautiful things upon 
 her, Grandma stayed always in the little house, 
 doing for her poor neighbours, as she had always 
 done, and dusting her parlour a real New Eng 
 land parlour and making her own griddle cakes 
 such wonderful cakes she made! I was fifteen 
 when she died ; but the tie was so close and spiritual 
 that she did not seem gone away from us."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 " RATHER nice to think that there are so many good 
 and innocent people in the world, isn t it," Barney 
 remarked, when he, Palgrave and Oldmeadow were 
 left to their wine and cigars. It was evident that he 
 would have preferred to omit the masculine inter 
 lude, but Oldmeadow was resolved on the respite. 
 She had touched him because she was so unaware; 
 but he was weary and disconcerted. How could 
 Barney be unaware? And was he? Altogether? 
 His comment seemed to suggest a suspicion that 
 Miss Toner s flow might have aroused irony or re 
 quire justification. 
 
 "Miss Toner and her mother seem to have found 
 the noble and the gifted under every bush," he re 
 marked, and he was not sure that he wished to avoid 
 irony though he knew that he did wish to conceal it 
 from Barney. "It s very good and innocent to be 
 able to do that; but one may keep one s goodness 
 at the risk of one s discrimination. Not that Miss 
 Toner is at all stupid." 
 
 Palgrave neither smoked nor drank. He had 
 again leaned his elbows on the table and his head on 
 his fists, but, while Oldmeadow spoke, he lifted and 
 kept his gaze on him. "You don t like her," he said 
 suddenly. He and Oldmeadow had, irrepressibly, 
 over Mrs. Chadwick s conception of materialism, 
 interchanged their smile at dinner; but since the 
 morning Oldmeadow had known that Palgrave sus 
 pected him of indifference, perhaps even hostility, 
 towards the new-comer. "Why don t you like her?"
 
 84 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 the boy went on and with a growing resentment 
 as his suspicions found voice. "She isn t stupid; 
 that s just it. She s good and noble and innocent; 
 and gifted, too. Why should we pretend to be too 
 sophisticated to recognize such beauty when we 
 meet it? Why should we be ashamed of beauty - 
 afraid of it?" 
 
 Barney, flushing deeply, looked down into his 
 wine-glass. 
 
 "My dear Palgrave, I don t understand you," 
 said Oldmeadow. But he did. He seemed to hear 
 the loud beating of Palgrave s heart. "I don t dis 
 like Miss Toner. How should I? I don t know her." 
 
 "You do know her. That s an evasion. It s all 
 there. She can t be seen without being known. It s 
 all there; at once. I don t know why you don t like 
 her. It s what I want to know." 
 
 "Drop it, Palgrave," Barney muttered. "Let 
 Roger alone. He and Adrienne get on very well 
 together. It s no good forcing things." 
 
 "I m not forcing anything. It s Roger who forces 
 his scepticism and his satire on us," Palgrave de 
 clared. 
 
 "I m sorry to have displeased you," said Old- 
 meadow with a slight severity. "I am unaware of 
 having displayed my disagreeable qualities more 
 than is usual with me." 
 
 "Of course not. What rot, Palgrave! Roger is 
 always disagreeable, bless him!" Barney declared 
 with a forced laugh. "Adrienne understands him 
 perfectly. As he says: she isn t stupid." 
 
 "Oh, all right. I m sorry," Palgrave rose, thrust 
 ing his hands in his pockets and looking down at the 
 two as he stood above them. He hesitated and then
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 85, 
 
 went on: "All I know is that for the first time in my 
 life the very first time, mind you all the things 
 we are told about in religion, all the things we read 
 about in poetry, the things we re supposed to care 
 for and live by, have been made real to me out 
 side of books and churches. What do we ever see of 
 them at home here, with dear Mummy and the girls? 
 What do we ever talk of, all of us but the ever 
 lasting round hunting, gardening, cricket, hay; 
 village treats and village charities. A lot of chatter 
 about people - - What a rotter So-and-so is ; and 
 How perfectly sweet somebody else: and a little 
 about politics Why doesn t somebody shoot 
 Lloyd George? and How wicked Home Rulers 
 are. That s about all it amounts to. Oh, I know 
 we re not as stupid as we sound. She sees that. We 
 can feel things and see things though we express 
 ourselves like savages. But we re too comfortable 
 to think; that s what s the trouble with us. We 
 don t want to change; and thought means change. 
 And we re shy; idiotically shy; afraid to express 
 anything as it really comes to us; so that I some 
 times wonder if things will go on coming ; if we shan t 
 become like the Chinese a sort of objet (Tart set of 
 people, living by rote, in a rut. Well. That s all I 
 mean. With her one isn t ashamed or afraid to know 
 and say what one feels. With her one wants to feel 
 more. And I, for one, reverence her and am grateful 
 to her for having made beauty and goodness real to 
 me." Having so delivered himself, Palgrave, who 
 had, after his deep flush, become pale, turned away 
 and marched out of the room. 
 
 The older men sat silent for a moment, Old- 
 meadow continuing to smoke and Barney turning
 
 86 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 the stem of his wine-glass in his fingers. "I m aw 
 fully sorry," he said at last. "I can t think what s 
 got into the boy. He s in rather a moil just now, I 
 fancy." 
 
 " He s a dear boy," said Oldmeadow. "There s 
 any amount of truth in what he says. He s at an age 
 when one sees these things, if one is ever going to see 
 them. I hope he ll run straight. He ought to amount 
 to something." 
 
 "That s what Adrienne says," said Barney. 
 "She says he s a poet. You think, too, then, that 
 we re all in such a rut; living Chinese lives; autom 
 ata?" 
 
 " It s the problem of civilization, isn t it, to combine 
 automatism with freedom. Without a rut to walk in 
 you reach nowhere if we re to walk together. 
 And yet we must manage to ramble, too ; individuals 
 must; that s what it comes to, I suppose. Individu 
 als must take the risk of rambling and alter the line 
 of the rut for the others. Palgrave may be a rambler. 
 But I hope he won t go too far afield." 
 
 " You do like her, Roger, don t you?" said Barney 
 suddenly. 
 
 It had had to come. Oldmeadow knew that, as 
 the depth of silence fell about them. It was inevi 
 table between them, of course. Yet he wished it 
 might have been avoided, since now it must be too 
 late. He pressed out the glow of his cigar and leaned 
 his arms on the table, not looking at his friend while 
 he meditated, and he said finally and it might 
 seem, he knew, another evasion "Look here, 
 Barney, I must tell you something. You know how 
 much I care about Nancy. Well, that s the trouble. 
 It s Nancy I wanted you to many." ,
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 87 
 
 Barney had, held himself ready and a deep, in 
 voluntary sigh of relief, or of postponed suspense, 
 now escaped him. "I see. I didn t realize that," he 
 said. And how he hoped, poor Barney! it was all 
 there was to realize! "Of course I m very fond of 
 Nancy." 
 
 "You realize, of course, how fond she is of you." 
 
 "Well; yes; of course. We re both awfully good 
 pals," said Barney, confused. 
 
 "That s what Palgrave would call speaking like a 
 savage, Barney. Own to it that if Miss Toner hadn t 
 appeared upon the scene you could have hoped to 
 make Nancy your wife. I don t say you made love 
 to her or misled her in any way. I m sure you never 
 meant to at any rate. But the fact remains that you 
 were both so fond of each other that you would cer 
 tainly have married. So you ll understand that 
 when I come down here and find Miss Toner in 
 stalled as tutelary goddess over you all, what I m 
 mainly conscious of is grief for my dear little rele 
 gated nymph." 
 
 Still deeply flushed, but still feeling his relief, 
 Barney turned his wine-glass and murmured: "I 
 see. I quite understand. Yes; I should have been in 
 love with her, I own. I nearly was, last winter. As 
 to her being in love with me, that s a different mat 
 ter. I ve no reason to think she was in love. It 
 would just be a difference of degree, with Nancy, 
 wouldn t it ; she loves us all so much, and she s really 
 such a child, still. Of course that s what she seems to 
 me now, since Adrienne s come ; just a darling child." 
 
 " I suppose so. But you understand what I feel, 
 too. I feel her much more than a darling child, and 
 it s difficult for me to like anybody who has dispos-
 
 88 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 sessed her. I perfectly recognize Miss Toner s re 
 markable qualities and hope to count myself among 
 her friends one day ; but, being a satirist and a scep 
 tic, I rebel instinctively against goddesses of what 
 ever brand. Nymphs are good enough for me; and 
 I can t help wishing, irrepressibly, that nymphs had 
 remained good enough for you, my dear boy." 
 
 " It isn t a question of nymphs; it isn t a question 
 of goddesses," Barney said, glancing up now at his 
 friend. "I m awfully sorry about Nancy; but of 
 course she ll find some one far better than I am; 
 she s such a dear. You re not quite straight with 
 me, Roger. I don t see Adrienne as a goddess at all ; 
 I m not like Palgrave, a silly boy, bowled over. It s 
 something quite different she does to me. She makes 
 me feel safe ; safe and happy in a way I never imag 
 ined possible. It s like having the sunlight fall about 
 one ; it s like life, new life, to be with her. She s not 
 a goddess; but she s the woman it would break my 
 heart to part with. I never met such loveliness." 
 
 "My dear boy," Oldmeadow murmured. He still 
 leaned on the table and he still looked down. " I do 
 wish you every happiness, as you know." He was 
 deeply touched and Barney s quiet words troubled 
 him as he had not before been troubled. 
 
 "Thanks. I know you do. I know you care for 
 my happiness. And I can t imagine anything com 
 ing into my life that would make a difference to us. 
 That s just it." Barney paused. "It won t, will it, 
 Roger?" 
 
 The crisis was again upon them. Oldmeadow did 
 not look up as he said: "That depends on her, 
 doesn t it?" 
 
 "No; it depends on you," Barney quickly replied.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 89 
 
 "She likes you, quite immensely, already. She 
 says you make her think of one of Meredith s dry, 
 deep-hearted heroes," Barney gave a slightly awk 
 ward laugh, deprecating the homage as he offered it. 
 "She says you are the soul of truth. There s no 
 reason, none whatever, why you shouldn t be the 
 best of friends, as far as she is concerned. It s all she 
 asks." 
 
 "It s all I ask, of course." 
 
 "Yes, I know. But if you don t meet her half 
 way? Sometimes I do see what Palgrave means. 
 Sometimes you misunderstand her." 
 
 "Very likely. It takes time really to understand 
 people, doesn t it." 
 
 But poor Barney was embarked and could not but 
 ptrsh on. "As just now, you know, about finding 
 nobility behind every bush and paying for one s 
 goodness by losing one s discrimination. There are 
 deep realities and superficial realities, aren t there, 
 and she sees the deep ones first. It s more than that. 
 Palgrave says she makes reality. He didn t say it to 
 me, because I don t think he feels me to be worthy 
 of her. He said it to Mother, and puzzled her by it. 
 But I know what he means. It s because of that he 
 feels her to be a sort of saint. Do be straight with 
 me, Roger. Say what you really think. I d rather 
 know; much. You ve never kept things from me 
 before," Barney added in a sudden burst of boyish 
 distress. 
 
 "My dear Barney," Oldmeadow murmured. 
 
 It had to come, then. He pushed back his chair 
 and turned in it, resting an arm on the table ; and he 
 passed his hand over his head and kept it there while 
 he stared for a moment hard at the ceiling.
 
 90 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "I think you ve made a mistake," he then said. 
 
 "A mistake?" Barney faltered blushing. It was 
 not anger ; it was pain, simple, boyish pain that thus 
 confessed itself. 
 
 "Yes; a mistake," Old meadow repeated, not 
 looking at him, "and since I fear it s gone too far to 
 be mended, I think it would have been better if 
 you d not pressed me, my dear boy." 
 
 "How do you mean? I d rather know, you see," 
 Barney murmured, after a moment. 
 
 " I don t mean about the goodness, or the power," 
 said Oldmeadow. "She is good, and she has power; 
 but that s in part, I feel, because she has no inhibi 
 tions no doubts. To know reality we must do 
 more than blow soap-bubbles with it. It must break 
 us to be known. She s never been broken. Perhaps 
 she never will be. And in that case she ll go on 
 blind." 
 
 Barney was silent for a moment, and that it was 
 not as bad as he had feared it might be was apparent 
 from the attempted calm with which he asked, 
 presently: "Why shouldn t you be blind to evil and 
 absurdity if you can see much further than most 
 people into goodness? Perhaps one must be one 
 sided to go far." 
 
 "Perhaps. But it s dangerous to be one-sided - 
 to oneself and others. And does she see further? 
 That s the question. Doesn t she tend, rather, to 
 accept as first-rate what you incline to find second? 
 You re less strong than she is, Barney, and less good, 
 no doubt. But you can t deny that you re less blind. 
 So what you must ask yourself is whether you can 
 be sure of being happy with a wife who ll never 
 doubt herself and who ll not see absurdity where you
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 91 
 
 see it. Put it at that. Will you be happy with her?" 
 
 He was, he knew, justified of Miss Toner s com 
 mendation, for truth between friends could go no 
 further and, in the silence, while he sickened for his 
 friend, he felt it searching Barney s heart. How it 
 searched, how many echoes it found awaiting it, was 
 proved by the prolongation of the silence. 
 
 "I think you exaggerate," said Barney at length, 
 and in the words Oldmeadow read his refusal to 
 examine further the truths revealed to him. "You 
 see all the defects and none of the beauty. It can t 
 be a mistake if I can see both. She ll learn a little 
 from me, that s what it comes to, for all the lot I ll 
 have to learn from her. I ll be happy with her if I m 
 worthy of her. What it comes to, you see, as I said 
 at the beginning, is that I can t be happy without 
 her." He rose and Oldmeadow, rising also, knew 
 that they closed upon an unresolved discord. Yet 
 these final words of Barney s pleased him so much 
 that he could not leave it quite at that. 
 
 "Mine may be the mistake, after all," he said. 
 "Only you must give me time to find it out. I began 
 by telling you I couldn t be really dispassionate; 
 and I feel much better for our talk, if that s any 
 satisfaction to you. If you can learn from each other 
 and see the truth together, you ll be happy. You re 
 right there, Barney. That is what it comes to." 
 They moved towards the door. "Try not to dislike 
 me for my truth too much," he added. 
 
 "My dear old fellow," Barney muttered. He laid 
 his hand for a moment on his friend s shoulder, 
 standing back for him to pass first. "Nothing can 
 ever alter things between you and me." 
 
 But things were altered already.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 PALGRAVE had not gone to the drawing-room, and 
 that, at all events, was a comfort. A wood fire 
 burned on the hearth and near it Nancy was holding 
 wool for Mrs. Chad wick to wind. Barbara had been 
 sent to bed and Meg and Miss Toner sat on the sofa 
 hand in hand. Even in the pressure of his distress 
 and anxiety Oldmeadow could but be aware of 
 amusement at seeing Meg thus. It had, of course, 
 been Miss Toner who had taken her hand. But no 
 one else could have taken it. No one else could have 
 been allowed to go on holding it placidly before on 
 lookers of whose mirthful impressions Meg must be 
 well aware She didn t mind in the least. That was 
 what Miss Toner had done to her. She enjoyed 
 having her hand held by anyone so much interested 
 in her. 
 
 Barney walked to the fireplace and stood before 
 it. He had no faculty for concealing his emotions 
 and the painful ones through which he had just 
 passed were visible on his sensitive face. 
 
 "Give us a song, Meg," Oldmeadow suggested. 
 He did not care for Meg s singing, which conveyed, 
 in a rich, sweet medium, a mingled fervour and 
 shallowness of feeling. But to hear her sing would 
 be better than to see her holding Miss Toner s hand. 
 
 Barney crossed at once to the seat Meg vacated 
 and dropped down into it, no doubt thanking his 
 friend for what he imagined to be a display of tact, 
 and Oldmeadow saw the quiet, firm look that flowed 
 over and took possession of him. Miss Toner knew,
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 93 
 
 of course, that Barney had been having painful 
 emotions; and she probably knew that they had 
 been caused by the dry, deep-hearted Meredithian 
 hero. But after the long look she did not speak to 
 him. She sat in her pearls and whiteness and gave 
 careful attention to the music. 
 
 Oldmeadow accompanied Meg, tolerantly, and a 
 trifle humorously, throwing a touch of mockery into 
 his part. Meg s preference to-night seemed to be 
 for gardens; Gardens of Sleep; Gardens of Love; 
 God s Gardens. "What a wretch you are, Roger," 
 she said, when she had finished. "You despise feel- 
 ing." 
 
 "I thought I was wallowing in it," Oldmeadow 
 returned. "Did I stint you?" 
 
 "No; you helped me to wallow. That s why 
 you re such a wretch. Always showing one that one 
 is wallowing when one thinks one s soaring. It s 
 your turn, now, Adrienne. Let s see if he ll manage 
 to make fun of you." 
 
 "Does Miss Toner sing, too? Now do you know, 
 Meg," said Oldmeadow, keeping up the friendly 
 banter, "I m sure she doesn t sing the sort of rubbish 
 you do." 
 
 "I think they re beautiful songs," Mrs. Chadwick 
 murmured from her wool, "and I think Roger 
 played them most beautifully. Why should you say 
 he is making fun of you, Meg?" 
 
 " Because he makes you think something s beauti 
 ful that he thinks rubbish, Mummy. Come along, 
 Adrienne. You will, won t you? I expect my voice 
 sounds all wrong to you. I ve had no proper train- 
 ing." 
 
 "It s a very lovely voice, Meg, used in a poor
 
 94 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 cause," said Miss Toner smiling. "And it is badly 
 placed. I think I could help you there. I ve no 
 voice at all, but I have been taught how to sing. It 
 would be more to the point, though, if Mr. Old- 
 meadow were to play to us, for I hear that he is an 
 accomplished musician." 
 
 "I m really anything but accomplished," said 
 Oldmeadow; "but I can play accompaniments 
 cleverly. Do sing to us. I know you ll give us some 
 thing worth accompanying." 
 
 Miss Toner rose and came to the piano with her 
 complete and unassuming confidence. She turned 
 the pages of the music piled there and asked him if 
 he cared for Schubert s songs. Yes ; she was a watch 
 wound to go accurately and she could rely on her 
 self, always, to the last tick. Even if she knew 
 and he was sure she knew that he had been un 
 dermining her, she would never show a shadow or a 
 tremor; and she would always know what was the 
 best music. Only, as she selected "Litanei" and 
 placed it before him, he felt that over him, also, 
 flowed the quiet, firm look. 
 
 " Litanei " was one of his favourites in a composer 
 he loved, and, as she sang there above him, he found 
 the song emerging unharmed from her interpreta 
 tion. It was as she had said no voice to speak of; 
 the dryest, flattest little thread of sound; and no 
 feeling, either (what a relief after Meg!), except the 
 feeling for scrupulous accuracy. Yet her singing was 
 what he found in her to like best. It was disciplined ; 
 it accepted its own limits; it fulfilled an order. 
 There was no desecration of the heavenly song, for, 
 intelligently after all, she made no attempt upon its 
 heart.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 95 
 
 When she had finished, she looked down at him. 
 They were removed by half the length of the room 
 from the fireside group. The lamps were behind 
 them. Only the candles set in the piano-rack il 
 lumined Miss Toner; and while the white roses over 
 her ears struck him anew as foolish, her eyes anew 
 struck him as powerful. 
 
 "Thank you. That was a pleasure," he said. 
 
 It was a pleasure. It was almost a link. He had 
 found a ground to meet her on. He saw himself in 
 the future accompanying Barney s wife. He need, 
 then, so seldom talk to her. But, alas! she stepped 
 at once from the safe frame of art. 
 
 " If we can rise from loss to feel like that, if we 
 can lift our sorrows like that, we need never turn to 
 palliatives, need we, Mr. Oldmeadow?" she said. 
 
 Stupidity, complacency, or power, whatever it 
 was, it completely disenchanted him. It left him 
 also bereft of repartee. What he fell back upon, as 
 he looked up at her and then down at the keys again, 
 was a mere schoolboy mutter of "Come now!" 
 
 After all a schoolboy mutter best expressed what 
 he felt. She was not accustomed to having her 
 ministrations met with such mutters and she did 
 not like it. That was apparent to him as she turned 
 away and went back to the sofa and Barney. She 
 had again tried him and again found him wanting. 
 
 Barney and Miss Toner left in her motor next 
 morning shortly after breakfast, and though with 
 his friend Oldmeadow had no further exchange, he 
 had, with Miss Toner, a curious encounter that was, 
 he felt sure, a direct result of her impressions of the 
 night before. They met in the dining-room a few
 
 96 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 moments before breakfast, and as she entered, wear 
 ing already her motoring hat, closely bound round 
 her face with a veil, he was aware that she looked, if 
 that were possible, more composed than he had ever 
 seen her. He felt sure that she had waited for her 
 opportunity, and had followed him downstairs, 
 knowing that she would find him alone; and he 
 realized then that she was more composed, because 
 she had an intention or, rather, since it was more 
 definite, a determination. Determination in her 
 involved no effort: it imparted, merely, the added 
 calm of an assured aim. 
 
 She gave him her hand and said good morning 
 with the same air of scrupulous accuracy that she 
 had given to the rendering of "Litanei" and then, 
 standing before the fire, her hands clasped behind 
 her, her eyes raised to his, she said: "Mr. Old- 
 meadow, I want to say something to you." 
 
 It was the gentle little voice, unaltered, yet he 
 knew that he was in for something he would very 
 much rather have avoided ; something with anybody 
 else unimaginable, but with her, he saw it now, quite 
 inevitable. Yet he tried, even at this last moment, 
 to avoid it and said, adjusting his eye-glass and 
 moving to the sideboard : " But not before we ve had 
 our. tea, surely. Can t I get you some? Will you 
 trust me to pour it out?" 
 
 "Thanks; I take coffee not tea," said Miss 
 Toner from her place at the fire, "and neither has 
 been brought in yet." 
 
 He had just perceived, to his discomfiture, that 
 they had not. There was nothing for it but to turn 
 from the ungarnished sideboard and face her again. 
 
 "It s about Barney, Mr. Oldmeadow," Miss To-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 97 
 
 ner said, unmoved by his patent evasion. "It s be 
 cause I know you love Barney and care for his happi 
 ness. And it s because I hope that you and I are to 
 be friends, and friendship can only be built on truth. 
 Try to trust more; will you? That s all I want to 
 say. Try to trust. You will be happier if you do and 
 make other people happier." 
 
 Oldmeadow had never experienced such an as 
 sault upon his personality, and he met it gagged and 
 bound, for, assuredly, this was to be Barney s wife. 
 A slow flush mounted to his face. 
 
 "I m afraid I seem very strange and unconven 
 tional to you," Adrienne Toner went on. "You ve 
 lived in a world where people don t care enough for 
 each other to say the real things. They must be felt 
 if they ve to be said, mustn t they? Yet you do care 
 for people. I have seen that, watching you here ; and 
 you care for real things. It s a crust of caution and 
 convention that is about you. You are afraid of 
 expression. You are afraid of feeling. You are afraid 
 of being taken in and of wasting yourself. Don t be 
 afraid, Mr. Oldmeadow. We never lose ourselves by 
 trusting. We never lose ourselves by giving. It s a 
 realer self that comes. And with you, I see it clearly, 
 if you let the crust grow thicker, it will shut life and 
 light and joy away from you; and when light cannot 
 visit our hearts, they wither within us. That is your 
 danger. I want to be your friend, so I must say the 
 truth to you." 
 
 He knew, though he had to struggle not to laugh, 
 that he was very angry and that he must not show 
 anger ; though it would really be better to show that 
 than his intense amusement ; and it took him a mo 
 ment, during which they confronted each other, to
 
 98 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 find wordis ; dry, donnish words; words of caution 
 and convention. They were the only ones he had 
 available for the situation. " My dear young lady," 
 he said, "you take too much upon yourself." 
 
 She was not in the least disconcerted. She met his 
 eyes steadily. " You mean that I am presumptuous, 
 Mr. Oldmeadow?" 
 
 "You take too much upon yourself," he repeated. 
 "As you say, I hope we may be friends." 
 
 "Is that really all, Mr. Oldmeadow?" she said, 
 looking at him with such a depth of thoughtfulness 
 that he could not for the life of him make out whether 
 she found him odious or merely pitiful. 
 
 "Yes; that s really all," he returned. 
 
 The dining-room was very bright and the little 
 blue figure before the fire was very still. The mo 
 ment fixed itself deep in his consciousness with that 
 impression of stillness and brightness. It was an 
 uncomfortable impression. Her little face, uplifted 
 to his, absurd, yet not uncharming, was, in its still 
 force, almost ominous. 
 
 " I m sorry," was all she said, and she turned and 
 went forward to greet Mrs. Chad wick.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 IT was a soft June day and Oldmeadow was strolling 
 about Mrs. Averil s garden admiring her herbaceous 
 borders. It was a day that smelt of ripening straw 
 berries, of warm grass and roses, and the air was full 
 of a medley of bird voices, thrushes and blackbirds, 
 sweet as grass and strawberries, and the bubbling 
 rattle of the chaffinch as happy as the sunlight. 
 
 Adrienne Toner was Mrs. Chadwick now, and 
 she and Eleanor Chadwick and Barney were motor 
 ing together in the French Alps. Coldbrooks was 
 empty, and he had come to stay with Nancy and her 
 mother. 
 
 They lived in a small stone house with a Jacobean 
 front that looked, over a stone wall, at Chelford 
 Green, and had behind it a delightfully unexpected 
 length of lawn and orchard and kitchen-garden, all 
 enclosed by higher walls and presided over by a 
 noble cedar. Seen from the garden The Little Hou se 
 was merely mid-Victorian, but the modern additions 
 were masked by climbing roses and a great magnolia- 
 tree opened its lemon-scented cups at the highest 
 bedroom windows. The morning-room was in the 
 modern part, and from one of its windows, presently, 
 Mrs. Averil emerged, opening her sunshade as she 
 crossed the grass to join her guest. She wore a white 
 straw garden hat, tipping over her eyes and tying, 
 behind, over her thick knot of hair, in a manner that 
 always recalled to Oldmeadow a lady out of Trol- 
 lope. Her face was pale, like Nancy s, and her eyes 
 grey; but rather than blackcaps and primroses she
 
 ioo ADR1ENNE TONER 
 
 suggested lace tippets and porcelain tea-sets, and 
 though it was from her Nancy had her pretty trick 
 of closing her eyes when she smiled, Mrs. Averil s 
 smile was cogitative and impersonal, and in her 
 always temperate mirth there was an edge of grim- 
 ness. 
 
 "Well, Roger, I want to hear what you thought 
 about the wedding," she said. She had not gone to 
 church that morning with Nancy and it was, he 
 knew, because she wanted an interchange of frank 
 impressions. She had been prevented from attend 
 ing Miss Toner s London nuptials by a touch of 
 influenza and, as she now went on to say, she had 
 got little from Nancy, who had no eye for pageants 
 and performances. "Eleanor was so absorbed," she 
 went on, "in the fact that the Bishop had indigestion 
 and had, at her suggestion, taken magnesia with his 
 breakfast, that I could not get much else out of her. 
 She seemed to have seen the Bishop s symptoms 
 rather than Adrienne and Barney. Now from you I 
 expect all the relevant details." 
 
 "Well, if you call it a detail, Nancy was lovely," 
 said Oldmeadow. "She looked like a silver-birch in 
 her white and green." 
 
 "And pearls," said Mrs. Averil. "You noticed, of 
 course, the necklaces Adrienne gave them ; quite the 
 gift of a princess, yet so innocent and unobtrusive 
 looking, too. She has great taste in such matters. 
 Did she look well? Eleanor did say that she, like the 
 Bishop, was very pale." 
 
 "She was pale; but not a bit nervous. She rather 
 looked as if she had been married every day of her 
 life. Nothing ever puts her out, you know. She was 
 very grave and benign ; but she wasn t an imposing
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 101 
 
 bride and the wreath of orange-blossoms aged her. 
 Nancy and Meg and Barbara and the Lumley girl 
 aged her, too. She must be older than Barney." 
 
 "Yes; she is. A year older. But she s the sort of 
 woman who will wear," said Mrs. Averil, pausing 
 before a bed of rose-trees to snip off a fading flower. 
 "She ll not look very differently at fifty, you know; 
 and her hair is the sort that may never turn grey. I 
 can see her at seventy with those big golden braids 
 and all her teeth. There s something very indestruc 
 tible about her. Like a doll made of white leather 
 compared to one made of porcelain. She ll last and 
 last," said Mrs. Averil. "She ll outlast us all. Bar 
 ney was radiant, of course." 
 
 "Yes. But he was nervous ; like a little boy fright 
 ened by the splendour of his Christmas-tree. He 
 looked as though he were arm in arm with the 
 Christmas-tree itself as he came down the nave. A 
 rather dumpy little Christmas-tree, but exquisitely 
 lighted and garnished." 
 
 "Well, he ought to be radiant," Mrs. Averil ob 
 served. "With all that money, it s an extremely 
 good match for him. The fact of her being nobody in 
 particular makes no difference, really, since she s an 
 American. And she has, I gather, no tiresome rela 
 tions to come bothering." 
 
 "She s very unencumbered, certainly. There s 
 something altogether very solitary about her," 
 Oldmeadow agreed, watching Mrs. Averil snip off 
 the withered roses. "I felt that even as she came 
 down the nave on Barney s arm. It s not a bit about 
 the money he s radiant," he added. 
 
 "Oh, I know. Of course not. That was only my 
 own gross satisfaction expressing itself. He s as in
 
 102 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 love as it s possible to be. And with every good rea 
 son." 
 
 "You took to her as much as they all did, then?" 
 
 "That would be rather difficult, wouldn t it? And 
 Barney s reasons would hardly be those of a dry old 
 aunt. She was very nice and kind to Nancy and 
 me and she s evidently going to do everything for 
 them. Barbara s already, you know, been sent to 
 that admirable school that was too expensive for 
 Eleanor; riding and singing and all the rest of it. 
 And Meg s been given a perfect trousseau of fine 
 clothes for her London season. Naturally I don t feel 
 very critically towards her." 
 
 "Don t you? Well, if she weren t a princess dis 
 tributing largess, wouldn t you? After all, she s not 
 given Nancy a trousseau. So why be mute with an 
 old friend?" 
 
 "Ah, but she s given her the pearls," said Mrs. 
 Averil. "Nancy couldn t but accept a bridesmaid s 
 gift. And she would give her a trousseau if she 
 wanted it and would take it. However, I ll own, 
 though decency should keep me mute, that I should 
 find myself a little bored if I had to see too much of 
 her. I m an everyday person and I like to talk about 
 everyday things." 
 
 "I can hear her asking you, in answer to that, if 
 there is anything more everyday than the human 
 soul. I wish I could have seen you aux prises with 
 her," Oldmeadow remarked. "Did she come down 
 here? Did she like your drawing-room and gar 
 den?" 
 
 Mrs. Averil s drawing-room and garden lay very 
 near her heart. Eleanor Chadwick sometimes ac 
 cused her of caring more about her china and her
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 103 
 
 roses than about anything else in the world except 
 Nancy. 
 
 " I don t think she saw them; not what I call see," 
 Mrs. Averil now said. "Oh, yes; she came several 
 times and recognized, very appreciatively, the 
 periods of my Queen Anne furniture and my Lowe- 
 stoft. Beyond their period I don t think she went. 
 She said the garden was old-world," Mrs. Averil 
 added, looking about her and twirling her parasol on 
 her shoulder. 
 
 "She would," Oldmeadow agreed. "That s just 
 what she would call it. And she d call you a true, 
 deep-hearted woman and Nancy a gifted girl. How 
 do she and Nancy hit it off? It s that I want most of 
 all to hear about." 
 
 "They haven t much in common, have they?" 
 said Mrs. Averil. "She s never hunted and doesn t, 
 I imagine, know a wren from a hedge-sparrow. She 
 does know a skylark when she hears one, for she said 
 Hail to thee, blithe spirit while one was singing. 
 But I felt, somehow, it was like the Queen Anne and 
 the Lowestoft a question of the label." 
 
 Oldmeadow at this began to laugh with an open 
 and indulged mirth. He and Mrs. Averil, at all 
 events, saw eye to eye. "If you d tie the correct 
 label to the hedge-sparrow she d know that, too," 
 he said. " Poor girl. The trouble with her isn t that 
 she doesn t know the birds, but that she wouldn t 
 know the poets, either, without their labels. It s a 
 mind made up of labels. No; I don t think it likely 
 that Nancy, who hasn t a label about her, will get 
 much out of her beyond necklaces." 
 
 " I wish Nancy had a few labels," said Mrs. Averil. 
 " I wish she could have travelled and studied as Miss
 
 104 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Toner Adrienne that is has done. She is such 
 a little ignoramus. Adrienne may bore you and me, 
 but Nancy will never interest anyone except you 
 and me." 
 
 It was always amusing to Oldmeadow, if a little 
 sardonically so, to note that any conception of him 
 self as a possible suitor for Nancy had never entered 
 Mrs. Averil s mind. As a friend he was everything 
 a mother could desire ; as a match for Nancy almost 
 unimaginable. Well, he could not give a wife even 
 one hunter and he never had had any intention of 
 falling in love with his dear nymph ; yet that other 
 people might not do so was a suggestion he repudi 
 ated with warmth. 
 
 "Oh; in love, yes," Mrs. Averil agreed. "I don t 
 deny that she s very loveable and I hope she may 
 marry well. But that s not the same thing as being 
 interesting, is it? A man may be in love with a 
 woman who doesn t interest him." 
 
 "I dispute that statement." 
 
 "I m sure dear Eleanor never interested her hus 
 band devoted to the day of his death as he was. 
 There s something in my idea. To be interesting 
 one must offer something new. If Nancy had been 
 interesting to Barney she would now, I think, have 
 been in Adrienne s place. Not that it would have 
 been a marriage to be desired for either of them." 
 
 So he and Mrs. Averil had been thinking the same 
 thoughts. 
 
 "And you contend that if Nancy had been to 
 China and read Goethe and Dante in the originals 
 he d have been interested? I think he was quite 
 sufficiently interested and that if Miss Toner hadn t 
 come barging into our lives he d have known he was 
 in love."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 105 
 
 "Going to China is a figure of speech and stands 
 for all the things she hasn t got and doesn t know. 
 My poor little Nancy. All the same, she isn t a bore !" 
 said Mrs. Averil with as near an approach to acerbity 
 as she could show. 
 
 " No; she isn t a bore. The things she knows have 
 to be found out, by degrees, through living with her. 
 Barney hasn t been to China, either, so, accord 
 ing to your theory, Nancy didn t find him inter 
 esting." 
 
 At this Mrs. Averil s eyes met his and, after a 
 moment of contemplation, they yielded up to him 
 the secret they saw to be shared. "If only it were 
 the same for women ! But they don t need the new. 
 She s young. She ll get over it. I don t believe in 
 broken hearts. All the same," Mrs. Averil stopped 
 in their walk, ostensibly to examine the growth of a 
 fine pink lupin, "it hasn t endeared Adrienne to me. 
 I m too terre-d-terre, about that, too, not to feel vex 
 ation, on Nancy s account. And what I m afraid of 
 is that she knows she s not endeared to me. That 
 she guesses. She s a bore ; but she s not a bit stupid, 
 you know." 
 
 "You don t think she s spiteful?" Oldmeadow 
 suggested after a moment, while Mrs. Averil still 
 examined her lupin. 
 
 "Dear me, no! I wish she could be! It s that 
 smooth surface of hers that s so tiresome. She s not 
 spiteful. But she s human. She ll want to keep 
 Barney away and Nancy will be hurt." 
 
 "Want to keep him away when she s got him so 
 completely?" 
 
 "Something of that sort. I felt it once or twice." 
 
 "My first instinct about her was right, then," said
 
 io6 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Oldmeadow. "She s a bore and an interloper, and 
 she ll spoil things." 
 
 "Oh, perhaps not. She ll mend some things. 
 Have you heard about Captain Hay ward?" 
 
 "Do you mean that stupid, big, tawny fellow? 
 What about him?" 
 
 "You may well ask. I ve been spoken to about 
 him and Meg by more than one person. They are 
 making themselves conspicuous, and it s been going 
 on for some time." 
 
 "You don t mean that Meg s in love with him?" 
 
 " He s in love with her, at all events, and, as you 
 know, he s a married man. I questioned Nancy, who 
 was with Meg for a few weeks in London, and she 
 owns that Meg s unhappy." 
 
 "And they re seeing each other in London now?" 
 Oldmeadow was deeply discomposed. 
 
 "No. He s away just now. And Meg is going to 
 meet the bridal party in Paris at the end of July. 
 Nancy feels that when Meg gets back under Adri- 
 enne s influence there ll be nothing to fear." 
 
 "We depend on her, then, so much, already," he 
 murmured. He was reviewing, hastily, his last im 
 pressions of Meg and they were not reassuring. The 
 only thing that was reassuring was to reflect on his 
 impressions of Adrienne. "Grandma s parlour " 
 returned to him with its assurance of deep security. 
 Above everything else Adrienne was respectable. 
 
 "Yes. That s just it," Mrs. Averil agreed. "We 
 depend on her. And I feel we re going to depend 
 more and more. She s the sort of person who mends 
 things. So we mustn t think of what she spoils." 
 
 What Adrienne Toner had spoiled was, however, 
 to be made very plain next morning both to Nancy s
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 107 
 
 old friend and to her mother. Beside her plate at 
 breakfast was a letter addressed in Barney s evident 
 hand, a letter in a narrow envelope stamped with the 
 name of a French hotel and showing, over the ad 
 dress, an engraving of peaks against the sky. Nancy 
 met the occasion with perfect readiness, saying as she 
 looked at the letter, waiting to open it till she had 
 made the tea Nancy always made the tea in the 
 morning while her mother sat behind the bacon and 
 eggs at the other end of the table - " How nice; 
 from Barney. Now we shall have news of them." 
 
 Nothing less like an Ariane could be imagined 
 than Nancy as she stood there in her pink dress 
 above the pink, white and gold tea-cups. One might 
 have supposed from her demeanour that a letter 
 from Barney was but a happy incident in a happy 
 day. But, when she dropped into her chair and read, 
 it was evident that she was not prepared for what 
 she found. She read steadily, in silence, while Old- 
 meadow cut bread at the sideboard and Mrs. Averil 
 distributed her viands, and, when the last page was 
 reached, they both could not fail to see that Nancy 
 was blushing, blushing so deeply that, as she thus 
 felt herself betray her emotion, tears came thickly 
 into her downcast eyes. 
 
 "I ll have my tea now, dear," said Mrs. Averil. 
 "Will you wait a little longer, Roger?" She tided 
 Nancy over. 
 
 But Nancy was soon afloat. "The letter is for us 
 all," she said. "Do read it aloud, Roger, while I 
 have my breakfast." 
 
 Barney s letters, in the past, had, probably, al 
 ways been shared and Nancy was evidently deter 
 mined that her own discomposure was not to intro-
 
 io8 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 duce a new precedent. Oldmeadow took up the 
 sheets and read. 
 
 "DEAREST NANCY, How I wish you were with 
 us up here. It s the most fantastically lovely place. 
 One feels as if one could sail off into it. I dug up 
 some roots of saxifrage for your wall yesterday, such 
 pretty pink stuff. It s gone off in a box wrapped in 
 damp moss and I hope will reach you safely. A hor 
 rid, vandal thing to do; but for you and Aunt Mon 
 ica I felt it justified, and there are such masses of it. 
 I saw a snow-bunting yesterday, much higher up 
 than the saxifrage; such a jolly, composed little 
 fellow on a field of snow. The birds would drive you 
 absolutely mad, except that you re such a sensible 
 young person you d no doubt keep your head even 
 when you saw a pair of golden eagles, as we did, 
 floating over a ravine. I walked around the Lac 
 d Annecy this morning, before breakfast, and did 
 wish you were with me. I thought of our bird-walks 
 at dawn last summer. There were two or three dar 
 ling warblers singing, kinds we haven t got at home; 
 and black redstarts and a peregrine falcon high in 
 the air. I could write all day if I d the time, about 
 the birds and flowers. You remember Adrienne tell 
 ing us that afternoon when she first came to Cold- 
 brooks about the flowers. But I mustn t go on now. 
 We re stopping for tea in a little valley among the 
 mountains with flowers thick all around us and I ve 
 only time to give our news to you and Aunt Monica 
 and to send our love. Mother is extremely fit and 
 jolly, though rather scared at the hairpin curves; 
 Adrienne has to hold her hand. I m too happy for 
 words and feel as if I d grown wings. How is Chum-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 109 
 
 mie s foot? Did the liniment help? Those traps are 
 beastly things. I feel just as you do about the rab 
 bits. Adrienne reads aloud to us in the evenings; a 
 man called Claudel; awfully stiff French to follow 
 but rather beautiful. I think you d like him. Not a 
 bit like Racine! Best love to you and Aunt Monica. 
 Here s Adrienne, who wants to have her say." 
 
 Had it been written in compunction for Ariane 
 aux bords laissee ? or, rather, in a happy reversion to 
 sheer spontaneity, a turning, without any self-con 
 sciousness, to the comrade of the bird-walks who 
 would, after all, best feel with him about snow- 
 buntings and redstarts? Oldmeadow paused for the 
 surmise, not looking up, before he went on from 
 Barney s neat, firm script to his wife s large, clear 
 clumsy hand. 
 
 "DEAREST NANCY," ran the postscript, and it 
 had been at the postscript, Oldmeadow now could 
 gauge, that Nancy had first found herself unpre 
 pared. "I, too, am thinking of you, with Barney. 
 It is a great joy to feel that where, he says, I ve 
 given him golden eagles and snow-buntings he s 
 given me among so many other dear, wonderful 
 people a Nancy. I get the best of the bargain, 
 don t I? I can t see much of the birds for looking at 
 the peaks my peaks , so familiar yet, always, so 
 new again. Stern daughters of the voice of God 
 that they are. Radiantly white against a cloudless 
 sky we find them to-day. Barney s profile is beautiful 
 against them but his nose is badly sun-burned ! 
 All our noses are sun- burned ! That s what one pays 
 for flying among the Alps. 
 
 "Mother Nell we ve decided that that s what
 
 i io ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 I m to call her looks ten years younger all the 
 same, as I knew she would. We talk of you all so 
 often of you and Meg and Palgrave and Barbara, 
 and half a dozen times a day Barney wishes that one 
 or the other of you were with us to see this or that. 
 It s specially you for the birds I notice. You must 
 take me for some bird-walks at dawn some day and 
 teach me to know all your lovely English songsters. 
 . . . Dear little Cousin-Sister, I send you my love 
 with his and, with him, hold you warmly in my 
 heart. Will Aunt Monica accept my affectionate 
 and admiring homages? 
 
 "Yours ever 
 
 "ADRIENNE" 
 
 Oldmeadow had not expected that she could 
 write such a human letter; yet it explained Nancy s 
 blush. Barney s spontaneous affection she could 
 have faced, but she had not been able to face his 
 wife s determined tenderness. Adrienne had meant 
 it well, no doubt Oldmeadow gazed on after he 
 had finished, but she had no business to mean so 
 well, no business to thrust herself, in this commu 
 nity of intimacy, into what was Barney s place alone. 
 There was more in it, he knew, with Meg and Mrs. 
 Averil to help him, than the quite successful playful 
 ness. She was to be more intimate than Barney, 
 that was what it came to ; more, much more tender 
 if Barney was to be allowed intimacy and tender 
 ness. That was really what she intended Nancy to 
 see, and that Barney had no place at all where she, 
 Adrienne, did not also belong. 
 
 "Very sweet; very sweet and pretty," Mrs. Aver- 
 il s voice broke in, and he realized that he had al-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER in 
 
 lowed himself to drop into a grim and tactless 
 reverie; "I didn t know she had such a sense of 
 humour. Sun-burned noses and Stern daughters of 
 the voice of God. Well done. I didn t think Adri- 
 enne would ever look as low as noses. They must be 
 having a delightful tour. I know black redstarts. 
 There was one that used to wake me every morning 
 at four, one summer, in Normandy, with the most 
 foolish, creaking song; just outside my window. 
 Give Barney my love when you write and return my 
 niece s affectionate and admiring homages. Mother 
 Nell. I shouldn t care to be called Mother Nell 
 somehow." 
 
 So Mrs. Averil s vexation expressed itself and so 
 she floated Nancy along. But Nancy, long since, 
 had pulled herself together and was able to look at 
 Oldmeadow, while her lashes closed together in her 
 own smile, and to say that she d almost be willing to 
 lose her nose for the sake of hearing the new warb 
 lers. Mrs. Averil opened her "Times" and over 
 marmalade Nancy and Oldmeadow planned the trip 
 that they would take some day, when their ship 
 came in, the three of them , a bird-trip to the French 
 Alps.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 OLDMEADOW sat beside Adrienne Chadwick and 
 knew that from the other end of the room, where he 
 talked to Mrs. Aldesey, Barney s eyes were on them, 
 though he tried to keep them off. It was the first 
 dinner-party the young couple had given since they 
 had come up to town, for though they were estab 
 lished at Coldbrooks in the communal family life 
 Adrienne seemed to find to her taste, and though 
 Barney had at once immersed himself in country 
 pursuits, they had taken and furnished this large 
 house in Connaught Square and it was, apparently, 
 settled that the winter months were to be spent in 
 London. How that was to be combined with farm 
 ing at Coldbrooks, or whether Barney intended to 
 take a header into politics and felt a London house, 
 big enough for entertaining, part of the programme, 
 Oldmeadow hadn t an idea, and for the rather sinis 
 ter reason that he had hardly laid his eyes on Barney 
 since his return from his wedding- journey. Even 
 though asked to tea once or twice, while, established 
 in an hotel, they were finding and furnishing the 
 house, he had never found them alone and either 
 Barney had made no opportunity, or his wife had 
 seen to it that none should be made, for having a 
 tete-d-tete with his old friend. 
 
 Oldmeadow could not associate Barney with am 
 bitions, either social or political, nor, he was bound 
 to say, as he looked round the dinner-table, where 
 Adrienne sat at one end with Lord Lumley and Bar 
 ney at the other with Lady Lumley, could one infer
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 113 
 
 from its disparate and irrelevant elements any such 
 ambitions in Adrienne. He had taken Mrs. Aldesey 
 down and had felt her at moments to be almost too 
 resourceful, her air of graceful skill in keeping the 
 ball rolling seeming too much to emphasize its ten 
 dency to drop. Without Mrs. Aldesey, without 
 Meg vividly engaged at one corner with a fair 
 young American without himself, for he had 
 aided and abetted Lydia to the best of his ability, 
 the dinner would have been a dull one and he was 
 not sure that even their enterprise had redeemed it. 
 Adrienne had not any air of fearing dullness or of 
 being in need of assistance. Oldmeadow saw that 
 the blue ribbon was frequently unrolled and that, as 
 always, it made a silence in which it could be watched. 
 Lord Lumley, his handsome, official head bent in an 
 attitude of chivalrous devotion, watched earnestly, 
 and the fair young American paused in the midst of 
 whatever he might be saying to Meg to take almost 
 reverent note; but Oldmeadow fancied more than 
 once that he caught startled eyes fixed upon it, es 
 pecially when there emerged a lustrous loop of 
 quotation : - 
 
 "One who never turned his back but marched breast forward, 
 Never doubted clouds would break, " 
 
 The silence for that had been so general that even 
 Barney, far away, and protected by Mrs. Aldesey, 
 was aware of it. 
 
 "How wonderfully he wears, doesn t he, dear old 
 Browning," said Mrs. Aldesey, and in the glance 
 that Barney cast upon her was an oddly mingled 
 gratitude and worry. The fair young American, he 
 was very fair and had clear, charming eyes, finished
 
 114 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 the verse in a low voice to Meg and Meg looked at 
 him affectionately the while. He was evidently one 
 of Adrienne s appurtenances. 
 
 It was a dull dinner. Pretty, festive Mrs. Pope 
 and young Mr. Haviland, reputed to be a wit and 
 one of Meg s young men as Mrs. Pope was one of 
 Barney s young women, would not with any eager 
 ness again attend a board where the hostess quoted 
 Browning and didn t know better than to send you 
 down, the first with a stern young socialist who sat 
 silent for the most part and frowned when addressed, 
 and the second with a jocular, middle-aged lady 
 from California, the mother, Oldmeadow gathered, 
 of the clear-eyed youth, from whose ample bosom 
 Mr. Haviland s subtle arrows glanced aside leaving 
 him helplessly exposed to the stout bludgeonings of 
 her humour. Adrienne paused once or twice in her 
 conversation to smile approval upon her compatriot 
 and to draw Lord Lumley s attention to her special 
 brand of merriment, good Lord Lumley adjusting 
 his glasses obediently to take it in. 
 
 And now they were all assembled in the drawing- 
 room. Like everything about Adrienne, it was sim 
 ple and rather splendid. Barney had wisely kept his 
 modernities for his own study and it was a pity, 
 Oldmeadow reflected, that Adrienne had not kept 
 for her own boudoir the large portrait of herself that 
 hung over the mantelpiece, since it was a note more 
 irrelevant than any Post Impressionist could have 
 been and cast a shade of surmise over the taste dis 
 played in the Chippendale furniture and the Chinese 
 screens. 
 
 "Rather sweet, isn t it; pastoral and girlish, you 
 know," Barney had suggested tentatively as Mrs.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 115 
 
 Aldesey had placed herself before it. " Done in Paris 
 a good many years ago; the man was very much the 
 fashion then. Adrienne was only sixteen. It s an 
 extraordinarily perfect likeness still, isn t it?" 
 
 To which Mrs. Aldesey, all old lace and exquisite 
 evasion, had murmured, her lorgnette uplifted: 
 "Quite dear and ingenuous. Such a relief after your 
 arid Cubists. What would they make of Mrs. Bar 
 ney en bergere, I d like to know? A jumble of pack 
 ing-cases with something twisted in a corner to 
 signify a bleat." 
 
 For the picture, painted with glib assurance and 
 abounding in pink and azure, portrayed Adrienne 
 dressed as a shepherdess and carrying a flower- 
 wreathed crook. 
 
 Adrienne, to-night at all events, was looking very 
 unlike the shepherdess, but that might be because of 
 the approaches of her maternity. Mrs. Chadwick, 
 when he had last been at Coldbrooks, had told him 
 that the baby was expected in May and that Adri 
 enne was wonderful about it, dedicating herself to 
 its perfection in thought and deed with every con 
 scious hour. 
 
 " If only I d thought about my babies before they 
 came like that, who knows what they might have 
 turned out!" she had surmised. "But I was very 
 silly, I m afraid, and the only thing I really did think 
 of was how I should dress them. I ve always loved 
 butcher s-blue linen for children and I must say that 
 mine did look very nice in it. For everyday, you 
 know." 
 
 Oldmeadow found it extremely difficult to think 
 of Adrienne as a mother; it was much easier to think 
 of her as a shepherdess. Such solidities of experience
 
 n6 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 gave her even a certain pathos in his eyes, though 
 he was in no whit dislodged from his hostility 
 to her. She was as mild, as satisfied, apparently, 
 with herself and with existence, as ever, yet her eyes 
 and lips expressed fatigue and a purely physical sad 
 ness that was uncharacteristic, and it was unchar 
 acteristic that she should be rather thickly pow 
 dered. 
 
 They had not really met since the morning of her 
 adjuration to him at Coldbrooks and he wondered if 
 she remembered that little scene as vividly as he 
 did. She would be very magnanimous did she not 
 remember it unpleasantly ; and he could imagine her 
 as very magnanimous; yet from the fact that she 
 had kept Barney from him he could not believe that 
 she was feeling magnanimously. 
 
 She watched Barney and Mrs. Aldesey now, as 
 they stood before her portrait, and he fancied that 
 the sadness in her eyes, whatever might be its cause, 
 deepened a little. When she turned them on him it 
 was with an effect of being patiently ready for him. 
 Perhaps, really, she had been more patient than 
 pleased all evening. 
 
 "So you are settled here for the winter? " he said. 
 "Have you and Barney any plans? I ve hardly seen 
 anything of him of late." 
 
 "We have been so very, very busy, you know," 
 said Adrienne, as if quite accepting his right to an 
 explanation. 
 
 She was dressed in pale blue and wore, with her 
 pearl necklace, a little wreath of pearls in her hair. 
 In her hands she turned, as they talked, a small 
 eighteenth-century fan painted in pink and grey 
 and blue, and he was aware, as he had been at Cold-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 117 
 
 brooks, of those slow and rather fumbling move 
 ments. 
 
 "We couldn t well ask friends," she went on, 
 "even the dearest, to come and sit on rolls of carpet 
 with us while we drank our tea, could we? We ve 
 kept our squalor for the family circle. Meg s been 
 with us; so dear and helpful; but only Meg and a 
 flying visit once or twice from Mother Nell. Nancy 
 couldn t come. But nothing, it seems, will tear 
 Nancy from hunting. I feel that strange and rather 
 sad; the absorption of a fine young life in such primi- 
 tiveness." 
 
 "Oh, well; it s not her only interest, you know," 
 said Oldmeadow, very determined not to allow him 
 self vexation. "Nancy is a creature of such deep 
 country roots. Not the kind that grow in London." 
 
 "I know," said Adrienne. "And it is just those 
 roots that I want to prevent my Barney s growing. 
 Roots like that tie people to routine; convention; 
 acceptance. I want Barney to find a wider, freer 
 life. I hope he will go into politics. If we have left 
 Coldbrooks and the dear people there for these 
 winter months it s because I feel he will be better 
 able to form opinions here than in the country. I 
 saw quite well, there, that people didn t form opin 
 ions; only accepted traditions. I want Barney to be 
 free of tradition and to form opinions for himself. 
 He has none now," she smiled. 
 
 She had been clear before, and secure; but he felt 
 now the added weight of her matronly authority. 
 He felt, too, that, while ready for him and, perhaps, 
 benevolently disposed, she was far more indifferent 
 to his impressions than she had been at Coldbrooks. 
 She had possessed Barney before; but how much
 
 n8 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 more deeply she possessed him now and how much 
 more definitely she saw what she intended to do with 
 him. 
 
 "You must equip him with your opinions," said 
 Oldmeadow, and his voice was a good match for hers 
 in benevolence. "I know that you have so many 
 well-formed ones." 
 
 *Oh, no; never that," said Adrienne. "That s 
 how country vegetables are grown; first in frames 
 and then in plots; all guided and controlled. He 
 must find his own opinions; quite for himself; quite 
 freely of influence. That is the rock upon which 
 Democracy is founded. Nothing is more arresting 
 to development than living by other people s opin 
 ions." 
 
 "But we must get our opinions from somebody 
 and somewhere. The danger of democracy is that 
 we don t grow them at all; merely catch them, like 
 influenza, from a mob. Not that I disbelieve in de 
 mocracy." 
 
 "Don t you, Mr. Oldmeadow?" She turned her 
 little fan and smiled on him. " You believe in liberty, 
 equality, fraternity? That surprises me." 
 
 "Democracy isn t incompatible with recognizing 
 that other people are wiser than oneself and letting 
 them guide us; quite the contrary. Why surprised? 
 Have I seemed so autocratic?" 
 
 "It would surprise me very much to learn that 
 you believed in equality, to start with that alone"; 
 Adrienne smiled on. 
 
 "Well, I own that I don t believe in people who 
 have no capacity for opinions being impowered to 
 act as if they had. That s the fallacy that s playing 
 the mischief with us, all over the world."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 119 
 
 "They never will have opinions worth having un 
 less they are given the liberty to look for them. You 
 don t believe in liberty, either, when you say that." 
 
 "No; not for everybody. Some of our brothers 
 are too young and others too stupid to be trusted 
 with it." 
 
 "They ll take it for themselves if you don t trust 
 them with it," said Adrienne, and he was again 
 aware that though she might be absurd she, at all 
 events, was not stupid. "All that we can do in life is 
 to trust, and help, and open doors. Only experience 
 teaches. People must follow their own lights." 
 
 He moved forward another pawn, and though he 
 did not find her stupid he was not taking her seri 
 ously. "Most people have no lights to follow. It s 
 a choice for them between following other people s 
 or resenting and trampling on them. That, again, 
 is what we can see happening all over the world." 
 
 "So it is, you must own, just as I thought; you 
 don t even believe in fraternity," said Adrienne, 
 and she continued to smile her weary, tranquil 
 smile upon him; "for we cannot feel towards men as 
 towards brothers, and trust them, unless we believe 
 that the light shines into each human soul." 
 
 He saw now that unless they went much deeper, 
 deeper than he could be willing, ever, to go with 
 Adrienne Toner, he must submit to letting himself 
 appear as worsted. He knew where he believed the 
 roots of trust to grow and he did not intend, no 
 never, to say to Adrienne Toner that only through 
 the love of God could one at once distrust and love 
 the species to which one belonged. He could have 
 shuddered at the thought of what she would cer 
 tainly have found to say about God.
 
 120 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "You ve got all sorts of brothers here to-night, 
 haven t you," he remarked, putting aside the ab 
 stract theme and adjusting his glass. "Some of 
 them look as though they didn t recognize the rela 
 tionship. Where did you find our young socialist 
 over there in the corner? He looks very menacing. 
 Most of the socialists I ve known have been the 
 mildest of men." 
 
 " He is a friend of Palgrave s. Palgrave brought 
 him to see me. Oh, I m so glad Gertrude is going 
 to take care of him. She always sees at once if any 
 one looks lonely. That s all right, then." 
 
 Old meadow was not so sure it was as he observed 
 the eye with which Mr. Besley measured the beam 
 ing advance of the lady from California. 
 
 "I wonder if you would like my dear old friend, 
 Mrs. Prentiss," Adrienne continued, watching her 
 method with Mr. Besley. "The Laughing Philoso 
 pher, Mother used to call her. She is a very rare, 
 strong soul. That is her son, talking to Lady Lum- 
 ley. He s been studying architecture in Paris for the 
 past three years. A radiant person. Mrs. Prentiss 
 runs a settlement in San Francisco and has a brilliant 
 literary and artistic salon. She is a real force in the 
 life of our country." 
 
 "Why should you question my appreciation of 
 rarity and strength ? I can see that she is very kind 
 and that if anybody can melt Mr. Besley she will." 
 
 "Gertrude would have melted Diogenes," said 
 Adrienne with a fond assurance that, though it took 
 the form of playfulness, lacked its substance. "I 
 hope they will find each other, for he is rare and 
 strong, too. What he needs is warmth and happi 
 ness. He makes me think of Shelley when he talks."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 121 
 
 "He s too well up in statistics to make me think of 
 Shelley," Oldmeadow commented. Barney, he saw, 
 from his place beside Mrs. Aldesey at the other end 
 of the room, was still watching them, pleased now, 
 it was evident, by the appearance of friendly, drift 
 ing converse they presented. "He s not altogether 
 unknown to me for we often, in our review, get our 
 windows broken by his stones ; well-thrown, too. He s 
 very able. So you thought it might do the British 
 Empire good to face him? Well, I suppose it may." 
 
 " Which are the British Empire? " asked Adrienne. 
 "You. To begin with." 
 
 "Oh, no. Count me out. I m only a snappy, 
 snuffy scribbler. Good old Lord Lumley, of course, 
 with all his vast, well-governed provinces shimmer 
 ing in the Indian sun behind him. And Sir Archi 
 bald, who talks so loudly in the House. Palgrave 
 didn t bring him, I ll be bound." 
 
 "No. Lady Lumley brought him. He and Lord 
 Lumley are certainly more than odds and ends." 
 She had an air of making no attempt to meet his 
 badinage, if it was that, but of mildly walking past 
 it. "They are, both of them, rather splendid people, 
 in spite of their limitations. They ve accepted tra 
 dition, you see, instead of growing opinion. That is 
 their only trouble. I was afraid you were going to 
 say Mr. Haviland. He is certainly an odd and end." 
 
 Mr. Haviland and Mrs. Pope had found each 
 other and were indulging in mirthful repartee in the 
 back drawing-room. "I feel safe with Lord Lumley 
 and Sir Archibald," Adrienne added. 
 
 "I d certainly rather trust myself in their hands 
 than in Mr. Besley s. I d almost rather trust myself 
 in the hands of Mr. Haviland."
 
 122 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "You mean that they would, at least, keep you 
 comfortable and that Mr. Besley wouldn t." She, 
 too, had her forms of repartee. 
 
 "I expect it s just what I do mean," he assented. 
 "If Mr. Besley and his friends had their way, I for 
 instance, and workers of my type, would soon, I 
 suspect, have to forego our tobacco and our cham 
 ber-music. We re only marketable in a comfortable 
 world. And there are more comfortable people, I 
 maintain, under Lord Lumley, than there would be 
 under Mr. Besley." 
 
 " Heartily know, when half-gods go, the gods 
 arrive, " said Adrienne. "All revolutions must begin 
 by burning away the evil and the refuse. Not that I 
 am a revolutionist, or even a socialist." 
 
 "You can t separate good from evil by burning," 
 he said. "You burn them both. That s what the 
 French did in their lamentable bonfire, for which 
 they ve been paying in poorer brains and poorer 
 blood ever since. We don t want revolutions. All we 
 want is slow, good-tempered reform. Revolutions 
 are always ill-tempered, aren t they, and nothing 
 worth doing was ever done in an ill- temper. You 
 are making me very didactic." 
 
 "Oh, but I prefer that so much to persiflage," 
 said Adrienne, with her tranquillity. "And I am 
 glad to hear what you really believe. But it is sad to 
 me that you should see no ardour or glory in any 
 thing. With all its excesses and errors, I have always 
 felt the French Revolution to be a sublime expression 
 of the human spirit." 
 
 "It might have been; if they could only have 
 kept their heads metaphorically as well as liter 
 ally. But the glory and ardour were too mixed with
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 123 
 
 hatred and ignorance. I m afraid I do tend to dis 
 trust those states of feeling. They tend so easily to 
 self-deception." 
 
 She was looking at him, quietly and attentively, 
 and he was, for the first time since their initial meet 
 ing, perhaps, feeling quite benevolently towards 
 her; quite as the British Empire might feel towards 
 a subject race. It was, therefore, the more difficult 
 to feel anything but exasperation when she said, 
 having, evidently, summed up her impressions and 
 found her verdict: "Yes. You distrust them. We 
 always come back to that, don t we? You distrust 
 yourself, too. So that, when you tell me what you 
 believe, you can only do it in the form of making fun 
 of my beliefs. I feel about you, Mr. Oldmeadow, 
 what I felt that morning when I tried to come near 
 you and you wouldn t let me. I feel it more the 
 more I see you; and it makes me sad. It isn t only 
 that you distrust ardour and glory, all the sunlight 
 and splendour of life; but you are afraid of them; 
 afraid to open your heart to trust. You shut your 
 door upon the sunlight and take up your caustic pen; 
 and you don t see how the shadows fall about you." 
 
 It was indeed a dusty tumble from the quite civil 
 ized pavement of their interchange, and it was un 
 fortunate that upon his moment of discomfiture, 
 when he saw himself as trying to clap the dust off 
 his knees and shoulders in time to be presentable, 
 Barney and Mrs. Aldesey should have chosen to 
 approach them. Barney, no doubt, imagined it a 
 propitious moment in which to display to Mrs. 
 Aldesey his wife s and his friend s amity. 
 
 Adrienne was perfectly composed. She had borne 
 her testimony and, again, done her best for him,
 
 I2 4 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 pointing out to him that the first step towards en 
 franchisement was to open his door to the sunlight 
 that she could so bountifully supply. She turned a 
 clear, competent eye upon her husband and his com 
 panion. 
 
 1 Well, dear, and what have you and Roger been 
 so deep in?" Barney inquired, looking down at her 
 with a fondness in which, all the same, Oldmeadow 
 detected the anxiety that had hovered in his eye all 
 evening. "You ve seemed frightfully deep." 
 
 "We have been," said Adrienne, looking up at 
 him. "In liberty, equality and fraternity; all the 
 things I believe in and that Mr. Oldmeadow doesn t. 
 I can t imagine how he gets on at all, he believes in 
 so few things. It must be such a sad, dim, groping 
 world to live in when there are no stars above to 
 look at and no hands below to hold." 
 
 "Oh, well, you see," said Mrs. Aldesey with her 
 dragging smile, "his ancestors didn t sign the Decla 
 ration of Independence." 
 
 "We don t need ancestors to do that," Adrienne 
 smiled back. "All of us sign it for ourselves all of 
 us who have accepted OUT birthright and taken the 
 gifts that our great, modern, deep-hearted world 
 hold out to us. You are an American, Mrs. Alde 
 sey, so you find it easy to believe in freedom, don t 
 you?" * 
 
 "Very easy; for myself; but not for other people," 
 Mrs. Aldesey replied and Oldmeadow saw at once, 
 with an added discomfort, that she underestimated, 
 because of Adrienne s absurdity, Adrienne s intel 
 ligence. "But then the very name of any abstrac 
 tion freedom, humanity, what you will has 
 always made me feel, at once, dreadfully sleepy.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 125 
 
 It s not ever having had my mind trained, Mrs. 
 Barney. Now yours was, beautifully, I can see." 
 
 Adrienne looked up at her, for Mrs. Aldesey, her 
 lace about her shoulders, her lorgnette in her hands, 
 had not seated herself, and it was further evident to 
 Oldmeadow that she weighed Mrs. Aldesey more 
 correctly than Mrs. Aldesey weighed her. "Very 
 carefully, if not beautifully," she said. " Have I 
 made you sleepy already? But I don t want to go on 
 talking about abstractions. I want to talk about 
 Mr. Oldmeadow. The truth is, Barney," and her 
 voice, as she again turned her eyes on her husband, 
 had again the form but not the substance of gaiety, 
 "the truth is that he s a lonely, lonely bachelor and 
 that we ought to arrange a marriage for him, you 
 and I. Since he doesn t believe in freedom, he won t 
 mind having a marriage arranged, will he? if we 
 can find a rare, sweet, gifted girl." 
 
 Barney had become red. "Roger s been teasing 
 you, darling. Nobody believes in freedom more. 
 Don t let him take you in. He s an awful old humbug 
 with his Socratic method. He upsets you before you 
 know where you are. He s always been like that." 
 
 "Yes; hasn t he," Mrs. Aldesey murmured. 
 
 "But he hasn t upset me at all," said Adrienne. 
 " I grant that he was trying to, that he was doing his 
 very best to give me a tumble ; but I quite see through 
 him and he doesn t conceal himself from me in the 
 very least. He doesn t really believe in freedom, 
 however much he may have taken you in, Barney; 
 he d think it wholesome, of course, that you should 
 believe in it. That s his idea, you see ; to give people 
 what he thinks wholesome; to choose for them. It s 
 the lack of faith all through. But the reason is that
 
 126 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 he s lonely; dreadfully lonely, and because of that 
 he s grown to be, as he says, snappy and snuffy; so 
 that we must borrow a page from his book and find 
 what is wholesome for him. I know all the symp 
 toms so well. I ve had friends just like that. It s a 
 starved heart and having nobody to be fonder of 
 than anyone else; no one near at all. He must be 
 happily married as soon as possible. A happy 
 marriage is the best gift of life, isn t it, Mrs. 
 Aldesey? If we haven t known that we haven t 
 known our best selves, have we?" 
 
 " It may be; we mayn t have," said Mrs. Aldesey, 
 cheerfully; but she was not liking it. "I can t say. 
 Am I to have a hand in choosing his bride? I know 
 his tastes, I think. We re quite old friends, you see." 
 
 "No one who doesn t believe in freedom for other 
 people may help to choose her," said Adrienne, with 
 a curious blitheness. "That s why he mayn t choose 
 her himself. We must go quite away to find her; 
 away from ceilings and conventions and out into the 
 sunlight. I don t believe happiness is found under 
 ceilings. And it s what we all need more than any 
 thing else. Even tobacco and chamber-music don t 
 make you a bit happy, do they, Mr. Oldmeadow? 
 and if one isn t happy one can t know anything 
 about anything. Not really." 
 
 "Alas!" sighed Mrs. Aldesey, keeping up her end, 
 but not very successfully, while Barney fixed his 
 eyes upon his wife. "And I thought I d found it this 
 evening, under this ceiling. Well, I shall cherish my 
 illusion, since you tell me it s only that, and thank 
 you for it, Mrs. Barney. The Lumleys are going to 
 give me a lift and I see that their car has been an 
 nounced."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 127 
 
 "Stay on a bit, Roger," Barney murmured, as the 
 Lumleys approached. " I ve seen nothing of you for 
 ages." 
 
 Adrienne rose to greet her parting guests. 
 
 "Darling Adrienne, good-night. It s been per 
 fectly delightful, your little party," said Lady Lum- 
 ley, who was large, light and easily pleased; an 
 English equivalent of the lady from California, but 
 without the sprightliness. " Your dear young Mr. 
 Prentiss is a treasure. He s been telling me about 
 Sicilian temples. We must get there one day. Mrs. 
 Prentiss says they will come to us for a week-end 
 before they go. How extraordinarily interesting she 
 is. Don t forget that you are coming on the fif 
 teenth." 
 
 "I shall get up a headache, first thing!" Lord 
 Lumley stated in a loud, jocular whisper, reverting 
 to a favourite jest on Adrienne s powers. "That s 
 the thing to go in for, eh? I won t let Charlie cut me 
 out this time. Not a night s sleep till you come!" 
 
 "Go in for as many as you like, dear Lord Lum 
 ley," said Adrienne, smiling her assurance of being 
 able to deal with a series. 
 
 "Good-night, Mrs. Barney," said Mrs. Aldesey. 
 "Leave me a little standing-room under the stars, 
 won t you." 
 
 "There s always standing-room under the stars," 
 said Adrienne. "We don t exclude each other there." 
 
 The party showed no other signs of breaking up. 
 The Laughing Philosopher had melted, or, at all 
 events, mastered Mr. Besley, and talked to him 
 with, now and again, a maternal hand laid on his 
 knee. Mr. Haviland and Mrs. Pope still laughed in 
 the back drawing-room, Meg and Mr. Prentiss had
 
 128 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 come together again and Sir Archibald was engaged 
 with a pretty girl. After looking around upon them 
 all, Adrienne, with the appearance of a deeper fatigue, 
 sank back upon her sofa. 
 
 "You know, darling," Barney smiled candidly 
 upon his wife, "you rather put your foot in it just 
 now. Mrs. Aldesey s marriage isn t happy. I ought 
 to have warned you." 
 
 "How do you mean not happy, Barney?" Adri 
 enne looked up at him. "Isn t Mr. Aldesey dead?" 
 
 "Not at all dead. She left him some years ago, 
 didn t she, Roger? He lives in New York. It s alto 
 gether a failure." 
 
 Adrienne looked down at her fan. " I didn t know. 
 But one can t avoid speaking of success sometimes, 
 even to failures." 
 
 "Of course not. Another time you will know." 
 
 Adrienne seemed to meditate, but without com 
 punction. "That was what she meant, then, by 
 saying she believed in freedom for herself but not for 
 other people." 
 
 "Meant? How do you mean? She was joking." 
 
 "If she left him. It was she who left him?" 
 
 "I don t know anything about it," Barney spoke 
 now with definite vexation and Oldmeadow, in his 
 corner of the sofa, his arms folded, his eyes on the 
 cornice, gave him no help. "Except that, yes, cer 
 tainly; it s she who left him. She s not a deserted 
 wife. Anything but." 
 
 "It s only Mr. Aldesey who is the deserted hus 
 band," Adrienne turned her fan and kept her eyes 
 on it. "It s only he who can t be free. Forgive me if 
 she s a special friend of yours, Mr. Oldmeadow; but 
 it explains. I felt something so brittle, so unreal in
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 129 
 
 her, charming and gracious as she is. It is so very 
 wrong for a woman to do that, I think." 
 
 "Wrong?" Barney echoed, staring at Oldmeadow 
 while this firm hand was laid upon his Egeria. 
 "What the dickens do you mean, darling? She is a 
 special friend of Roger s. You don t surely mean to 
 say a woman must, under all circumstances, stick to 
 a man she doesn t love?" 
 
 "Anything but that, Barney. I think that she 
 should leave him and set him free. It s quite plain 
 to me that if a wife will not live with her husband it 
 is her duty to divorce him. Then, at any rate, he can 
 try for happiness again." 
 
 " Divorce him, my dear child! " Barney was try 
 ing to keep up appearances but the note of marital 
 severity came through and as it sounded Adrienne 
 raised her eyes to his: "It s not so easy as all that! 
 Aldesey, whatever his faults, may have given her no 
 cause to divorce him, and I take it you ll not suggest 
 that Mrs. Aldesey should give him cause to divorce 
 her." 
 
 On her sofa, more pallid under her powder, more 
 sunken than before, and with the queer squashed-in 
 look emphasized, Adrienne kept steady eyes up 
 lifted to her husband. "Not at all, dear Barney," 
 she returned and Oldmeadow, though hardened 
 against the pathos of her physical disability, saw 
 that she spoke with difficulty, " but I think that you 
 confuse the real with the conventional wrong. Mrs. 
 Aldesey would not care to face any unconvention- 
 ality; that is quite apparent. She would draw her 
 skirts aside from any conventional wrong-doing. 
 But the real wrong she would be blind to ; the wrong 
 of keeping anyone bound in the emptiness you have
 
 130 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 made for them. Setting free is not so strange and 
 terrible a matter as you seem to imagine. It s quite 
 easy for brave, unshackled people." 
 
 "Well, I must really be off," Oldmeadow now 
 seized the occasion to declare. " I believe, as a mat 
 ter of fact, that Mr. Aldesey lives very contentedly 
 in New York, collecting French prints and giving 
 excellent dinners. Anything open and scandalous 
 would be as distasteful to him as to his wife. They 
 are, both of them, happier apart ; that s all it comes 
 to. So you must read your lessons, even by proxy, to 
 more authentic misdemeanants, Mrs. Barney. All 
 right, Barney. Don t come down. I ll hope to see 
 you both again quite soon." 
 
 So he got away, concealing as best he might, his 
 sense of tingling anger. But it died away to a sense 
 of chill as he walked down Park Lane. Was not 
 Barney unhappy, already? What did she say to him 
 when she got him to herself? He felt sure that she 
 had never bargained for a husband who could look 
 at her with ill-temper.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 " ROGER, see here, I ve only come to say one word - 
 about the absurd little matter of last night. Only 
 one; and then we ll never speak of it again," said 
 poor Barney. 
 
 He had come as soon as the very next day to 
 exonerate, not to apologize; that was evident at 
 once. Oldmeadow had not long to wait before learn 
 ing what she had said to him when she got him to 
 herself, nor long to wait before realizing that if 
 Barney had been unhappy last night he thought 
 himself happy to-day. 
 
 "Really, my dear boy," he said, "it s not worth 
 talking about." 
 
 "Oh, but we must talk about it," said Barney. 
 He was red and spoke quickly. " It upset her fright 
 fully; it made her perfectly miserable. She cried for 
 hours, Roger," Barney s voice dropped to a haggard 
 note. "You know, though she bears up so marvel 
 lously, she s ill. She doesn t admit illness and that 
 makes it harder for her, because it simply bewilders 
 her when she finds herself on edge like this and her 
 body refusing to obey her. The baby is coming in 
 May, you know." 
 
 " I know, my dear Barney. The evening was very 
 fatiguing for her. I saw it all I think. I noticed from 
 the beginning how tired she looked." 
 
 "Horribly tired. Horribly fatiguing. I m glad 
 you saw it. For that s really what I came to explain. 
 She was tired to begin with and Mrs. Aldesey put 
 her on edge. I think I saw that myself at dinner -
 
 132 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 and, oh, before that; on the day we had tea with her, 
 when we first came up, in November Adrienne 
 felt then that Mrs. Aldesey didn t understand or 
 care for her. You know she is so full of love and 
 sympathy for everybody herself that she is liter 
 ally sickened when she is treated in that artificial, 
 worldly way. And you know, Roger, Mrs. Aldesey is 
 artificial and worldly." 
 
 That was how she had put it to Barney, of course. 
 But Oldmeadow saw further than Mrs. Aldesey and 
 her artificiality. He saw a dishevelled and weeping 
 Adrienne stricken to the heart by the sense of threat 
 ened foundations, aghast by what she had seen in 
 her husband s eyes; and he was aware, even while 
 he resented having it put upon Lydia, of a curious, 
 reluctant pity for the pale, weeping figure. Lydia 
 had, obviously, displeased her; but Lydia had been 
 the mere occasion; she could have dealt easily 
 enough with Lydia. It had been the revelation that 
 Barney could oppose her, could almost, for a mo 
 ment, dislike her, that had set her universe rocking. 
 Her first taste of reality, then. The thought came 
 rather grimly, with the pity. After all it was their 
 best chance of happiness; that she should learn to 
 accept herself as a person who could be opposed, 
 even disliked, in flashes, while still loved. He had 
 sat silent while he thought, one of his silences which, 
 when he emerged from them, he often recognized as 
 over-long. Barney must have felt the weight of all 
 he did not say when all that he found to say was: 
 "What it comes to, doesn t it, is that they neither of 
 them take much to each other. Lydia is certainly 
 conventional." 
 
 "Ah, but Lady Lumley is conventional, too,"
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 133 
 
 said Barney with an irrepressible air of checkmate. 
 " Hordes of conventional people adore Adrienne. 
 It s a question of the heart. There are people who 
 are conventional without being worldly. It s world- 
 liness that stifles Adrienne. It s what she was saying 
 last night: They have only ceilings; I must have the 
 sky. Not that she thinks you worldly, dear old boy." 
 
 "I hope you try to interpret me to her kindly," 
 said Oldmeadow, smiling. Even at the moment 
 when Barney, all innocently, was revealing to him 
 Adrienne s tactics, the fragments of her vocabulary 
 imbedded in his speech were affording him amuse 
 ment. "You must try and persuade her that I ve 
 quite a fondness for the sky myself, and even pub 
 lished a volume of verse in my youth." 
 
 "I do. Of course I do," said Barney eagerly. 
 "And I gave her your poems, long ago. She loved 
 them. It s your sardonic pessimism she doesn t 
 understand in anyone who could have written 
 like that when they were young. She never met 
 anything like it before in her life. And the way you 
 never seem to take anything seriously. It makes her 
 dreadfully sorry for you, even while she finds it so 
 hard to accept in anyone she cares for because she 
 really does so care for you, Roger" there was a 
 note of appeal in Barney s voice- "and does so 
 long to find a way out for you. It was a joke, of 
 course; but all the same we ve often wished you 
 could find the right woman to marry." 
 
 Barney, as he had done last night, grew very red 
 again, so that it was apparent to Oldmeadow that 
 not only the marriage but the woman the rare, 
 gifted girl had been discussed between him and 
 his wife.
 
 134 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "Adrienne thinks everyone ought to be married, 
 you see," he tried to pass it off. " Since we are so 
 happy ourselves." 
 
 "I see," said Oldmeadow. "There s another 
 thing you must try to persuade her of: that I m not 
 at all un jeune homme d marier, and that if I ever 
 seek a companion it will probably be some one like 
 myself, some one sardonic and pessimistic. If I 
 fixed my affections on the lovely girl, you see, it 
 isn t likely they d be reciprocated." 
 
 "Oh, but" - Barney s eagerness again out 
 stepped his discretion - "wouldn t the question of 
 money count there, Roger? If she had plenty of 
 money, you know, or you had ; enough for both ; and 
 a place in the country? Of course, it s all fairy-tale; 
 but Adrienne is a fairy-tale person ; material things 
 don t count with her at all. She waves them away 
 and wants other people to wave them away, too. 
 What she always says is: What does my money 
 mean unless it s to open doors for people I love? 
 She s starting that young Besley, you know, just 
 because of Palgrave; setting him up as editor of a 
 little review rotten it is, I think but Adrienne 
 says people must follow their own lights. And it s 
 just that; she d love to open doors for you, if it could 
 make you happy." 
 
 Oldmeadow at this, after a moment of receptivity, 
 began to laugh softly; but the humour of the situa 
 tion grew upon him until he at last threw back his 
 head and indulged in open and prolonged mirth. 
 Barney watched him bashfully. "You re not angry, 
 I see," he ventured. "You don t think it most awful 
 cheek, I mean?" 
 
 " I think it is most awful cheek; but I m not angry;
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 135 
 
 not a bit," said Oldmeadow. "Fairy-godmothers 
 are nothing if not cheeky ; are they? Oh, I know you 
 meant your, not her, cheek. But it s the fault of the 
 fairy-godmother, all the same, and you must con 
 vince her that I m not in love with anybody, and 
 that if ever I am she ll have to content herself with 
 my small earnings and a flat in Chelsea." 
 
 So he jested; but, when his friend was gone, he 
 realized that he was a little angry all the same and he 
 feared that his mirth had not been able to conceal 
 from Barney that what he really found it was con 
 founded impudence. Barney s face had worn, as he 
 departed, the look of mingled gratitude and worry 
 and Barney must feel, as well as he felt, that their 
 interview hadn t really cleared up anything ex 
 cept his own readiness to overlook the absurdities of 
 Barney s wife. What became more and more clear 
 to himself was that unless he could enable Adrienne 
 to enroll his name on her banner she would part him 
 from Barney and that her very benevolence was a 
 method. The more he thought of it the more uncom 
 fortable he felt, and his inner restlessness became at 
 length an impulse urging him out to take counsel or, 
 rather, seek solace, with the friend from whom Adri 
 enne could never part him. He would go and have 
 tea with Lydia Aldesey and with the more eagerness 
 from the fact that he was aware of a slight dissatis 
 faction in regard to Lydia. She had not altogether 
 pleased him last night. She had put herself in the 
 wrong ; she had blundered ; she hadn t behaved with 
 the skill and tact requisite ; and to elicit from her a 
 confession of ineptitude would make his sense of 
 solace the more secure. 
 
 The day was a very different day from the one in
 
 136 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 April when he had first gone to ask Mrs. Aldesey for 
 information about people called Toner. It was early 
 February, dull and cold and damp. No rain was fall 
 ing, but the trees were thick with moisture and Old- 
 meadow had his hands deep in his pockets and the 
 collar of his coat turned up about his ears. As he 
 crossed the Serpentine, an electric brougham passed 
 him, going slowly, and he had a glimpse within it, 
 short but very vivid, of Adrienne, Meg, and Captain 
 Hay ward. 
 
 Adrienne, wearing a small arrangement of black 
 velvet that came down over her brows, was holding 
 Meg s hand and, while she spoke, was looking stead 
 ily at her, her face as white as that of a Pierrot. 
 Meg listened, gloomily it seemed, and Captain Hay- 
 ward s handsome countenance, turned for refuge 
 towards the window, showed an extreme embarrass 
 ment. 
 
 They passed and Oldmeadow pursued his way, 
 filled with a disagreeable astonishment though, 
 absurdly, his mind was at first occupied only in an 
 attempt to recover a submerged memory that Cap 
 tain Hay ward s demeanour suggested. It came at 
 last in an emancipating flash and he saw again, after 
 how many years, the golden-brown head of his rather 
 silly setter, John, turned aside in shy yet dignified 
 repudiation, that still, by a dim, sick smile, at 
 tempted to conceal distress and to enter into the 
 spirit of the game as a kitten was held up for his 
 contemplation. A kitten was a very inadequate 
 analogy, no doubt, for the theme of Adrienne s dis 
 course; yet Captain Hay ward s reaction to a situa 
 tion for which he found himself entirely unprepared 
 was markedly like John s. And he, like John, had
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 137 
 
 known that the game was meant to be at his expense. 
 John and Captain Hayward got Oldmeadow out of 
 the park before he had taken full possession of his 
 astonishment and could ask himself why, if Adrienne 
 were engaged in rescuing Meg from her illicit at 
 tachment, she should do it in the company of the 
 young man. Yet, strangely enough, he felt, as he 
 walked, a growing sense of reassurance. For an 
 emergency like this, after all, given amenable sub 
 jects, Adrienne was the right person. He hadn t 
 dreamed it to be such an emergency; but since it 
 was, Adrienne would pull them through. As she 
 would have laid her hand on the head of Bacchus 
 and reformed him, so she would lay it on the head of 
 Captain Hayward.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 THE incident put Mrs. Aldesey quite out of his 
 mind, and it was not till he stood on her doorstep 
 and rang her bell that he remembered his grievance 
 against her and realized that it had been made more 
 definite by this glimpse of Adrienne s significance. 
 That his friend was prepared for him was evident at 
 his first glance ; she had even, he saw, been expecting 
 him, for she broke out at once with: "Oh, my dear 
 Roger what are you going to do with her?" 
 
 He was actually pleased to find himself putting 
 her, with some grimness, in her place. "What is 
 she going to do with us? you mean. You underrate 
 Mrs. Barney s capacity, let me tell you, my dear 
 friend." 
 
 But Mrs. Aldesey was not easily quelled. " Under 
 rate her! Not I! She s a Juggernaut if ever there 
 was one. Her capacity is immense. She ll roll on 
 and she ll crush flat. That poor Barney! She is as 
 blind as a Juggernaut, but he will come to see - 
 alas! he is seeing already though you and I 
 danced round him with veils and cymbals that 
 people won t stand being pelted with platitudes 
 from soup to dessert. The Lumleys will, of course; 
 it s their natural diet; though even they like their 
 platitudes served with a touch of sauce piquante; 
 but Rosamund Pope told me that she felt black and 
 blue all over and Cuthbert Haviland malicious 
 toad imitates her already to perfection : dreadful 
 little voice, dreadful little smile, dreadful little 
 quotations and all. It will be one of his London
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 139 
 
 gags. That shepherdess! My dear Roger, don t 
 pretend to me that you don t see it!" 
 
 Oldmeadow, sunken in the chair opposite her, 
 surveyed her over his clasped hands with an air of 
 discouragement. 
 
 "What I m most seeing at the moment is that 
 she s made you angry," he remarked. " If what you 
 say were all the truth, why should she make you 
 angry? She s not as blind as a Juggernaut. That s 
 where you made your mistake. She ll only crush 
 the people who don t lie down before her. She knows 
 perfectly well where she is going and over whom. 
 So be careful, that is my advice, and keep out of her 
 way; unless you want to lose a toe or a finger." 
 
 Mrs. Aldesey showed, at this, that he had ar 
 rested her. In spite of the element of truth in Adri- 
 enne s verdict upon her he knew her to be, when veils 
 and cymbals were cast aside, a sincere and gallant 
 creature. She did not attempt to hide from him now 
 and, after a moment of mutual contemplation, she 
 laughed a little, with not unreal mirth and said: 
 "I suppose I am angry. I suppose I m even spiteful. 
 It s her patronage, you know. Her suffocating su 
 periority. To have to stand there, for his sake, and 
 take it! You overrate her, Roger. No woman not 
 abysmally stupid could say the things she says." 
 
 "Your mistake again. She s able to say them be 
 cause she s never met irony or criticism. She s not stu 
 pid," he found his old verdict. "Only absurd. You 
 know, you gave yourself away to her. You showed 
 her what you thought of her. You patronized her." 
 
 "Is no retaliation permitted?" Mrs. Aldesey 
 moaned. " Must one accept it all? Be scourged with 
 the stars and Browning and then bow one s head to
 
 i 4 o ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 her caresses? After all, Barney is your friend, not 
 mine, and it s as your friend that I ve tried to be de 
 cent to his wife. But she hates me like poison. She 
 gave herself away, too, you know. I liked the way 
 she excluded me from her prospects for your welfare. 
 And of course she knew my marriage wasn t a happy 
 one." 
 
 " I don t think that she did. No; I don t think so. 
 You are poison to her cold poison," said Old- 
 meadow. "Don t imagine for a moment she didn t 
 see that you were dancing about him with veils and 
 cymbals. She didn t give herself away, for she had 
 nothing to conceal. She was candid and you weren t. 
 She didn t pretend that you were under the stars 
 with her; while you kept up appearances." 
 
 "But what s to become of your Barney if we don t 
 keep them up!" Mrs. Aldesey cried. "Is he to be 
 allowed to see that nobody can stand her except 
 people he can t stand? He ll have to live, then, with 
 Mrs. and Mr. Prentiss. Did you try to talk to Mrs. 
 Prentiss? Do you know that she told me that death 
 was perfectly sublime ?" 
 
 " Perhaps it is. Perhaps she ll find it so. They all 
 seem to think well of death, out in California" 
 Oldmeadow allowed himself to relax from his ad 
 monitory severity. "Mrs. Prentiss isn t as silly as 
 she seems, I expect. And you exaggerate Barney s 
 sensitiveness. He d get on very well with Mrs. Pren 
 tiss if you weren t there to show him you found her 
 a bore. He has a very simple side and we must hope 
 it may become simpler. The only chance for Bar 
 ney, I see it more and more, is that we should efface 
 ourselves as much as possible. The people who find 
 the Prentisses a bore, I mean. And it won t be dif-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 141 
 
 ficult for us to do that. She will see to it that we are 
 effaced. Only, of course, it s a grief. I m so fond of 
 him"; and as Oldmeadow stretched forth his legs 
 and put his hands in his pockets there drifted across 
 his mind, in a thin, sharp, knife-like stroke, the 
 memory of Barney tall eighteen-year-old Barney 
 with dear old Effie, luxuriously upturned in his 
 arms, being softly scratched Barney s hand with 
 a cat was that of an expert and told that she was 
 the best and most beautiful of cats. 
 
 "It s a great shame," said Mrs. Aldesey; "I ve 
 been thinking my spiteful thoughts, too, instead of 
 sympathizing with you. Of course, if it s any con 
 solation to you, one usually does lose one s friends 
 when they marry. But it needn t have been as bad 
 as this. What a thousand pities he couldn t have 
 fallen in love with a nice girl of his own kind. You 
 couldn t do anything about it when you went down 
 in the spring?" 
 
 Oldmeadow had never said anything to Mrs. 
 Aldesey about his hopes for Nancy. He had a se 
 cretive instinct for keeping his friendships in com 
 partments and discussed only those portions that 
 overflowed. "Nothing," he said. "And the mis 
 chief was that I went down hostile, as you warned 
 me against doing. Barney saw at once that I didn t 
 care for her; and she saw it at once. He even forced 
 a sort of expression of opinion from me and I know 
 now that it s always glooming there at the back of 
 his mind when he sees me. It was quite useless. 
 Once he d fallen under her spell it was all up with 
 him. She has her singular power and, for a man in 
 love with her, her singular charm. Even I, you 
 know, understand that."
 
 I 4 2 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Mrs. Aldesey contemplated him. "I confess I 
 can t," she said. "She is so desperately usual. I ve 
 seen her everywhere, ever since I can remember. 
 Attending lectures at the Sorbonne; listening to 
 Wagner at Bayreuth; having dresses tried on at 
 Worth s; sitting in the halls of a hundred European 
 hotels. She is the most unescapable form of the 
 American woman ; only not du peuple because of the 
 money and opportunity that has also extirpated 
 everything racy, provincial and individual." 
 
 "I don t know," said Oldmeadow. He mused, his 
 hands clasped behind his head. "She s given me all 
 sorts of new insights." His eyes, after his wont, were 
 on the cornice and his friend s contemplation, re 
 laxed a little from its alert responsiveness, allowed 
 itself a certain conjectural softness as she watched 
 him. "I feel," he went on, "since knowing her, that 
 I understand America, her America, better than you 
 do. You re engaged in avoiding rather than in un 
 derstanding it, aren t you? What you underrate, 
 what Americans of your type don t see because, 
 as you say, it s so oppressively usual is the power 
 of her type. If it is a type ; if she is as ordinary as you 
 say. It s something bred into them by the American 
 assumption of the fundamental Tightness of life; 
 a confidence unknown before in the history of the 
 world. An individual, not an institutional or social, 
 confidence. They do, actually, seem to take their 
 stand on the very universe itself. Whereas the rest 
 of us have always had churches or classes to uphold 
 us. They have all the absurdities and crudities of 
 mere individualism. They have all the illusions of 
 their ignorance. Yet I sometimes imagine, after 
 I ve seen her, that it s a power we haven t in the
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 143 
 
 least taken into our reckoning. Isn t it the only 
 racial thing that America has produced the only 
 thing that makes them a race? It makes them inde 
 pendent of us, when we ve always imagined, in our 
 complacency, that they were dependent. It enables 
 them to take what we have to give, but to do with 
 it what they, not we, think best. And by Jove, who 
 knows how far it will carry them! Not you, my 
 dear Lydia. You ll stay where you are with us. " 
 
 His eyes had come back and down to her, and her 
 gaze resumed its alertness and showed him that she 
 found the picture he drew disquieting. "You mean 
 it s a new kind of civilization that will menace ours? " 
 
 "It s not a civilization; that s just what it s not. 
 It s a state of mind. Perhaps it will menace us. Per 
 haps it does. We ve underrated it; of that I m sure; 
 and underrated power is always dangerous. It will 
 be faith without experience against experience with 
 out faith. What we must try for, if we re not to be 
 worsted, is to have both to keep experience and 
 to keep faith, too. Only so shall we be able to hold 
 our own against Mrs. Barney. And even so we 
 shan t be able to prevent her doing things to us 
 and for us. She ll do things for us that we can t do 
 for ourselves." His mind reverted to the faces of 
 the brougham. "In that way she s bound to worst 
 us. We ll have to accept things from her." 
 
 Oldmeadow s eyes had gone back to the cornice 
 and, in the silence that followed, Mrs. Aldesey, as 
 she sat with folded arms, played absently with the 
 lace ruffle at her wrist. The lace was an heirloom, 
 like her rings, and the contemplation of them may 
 have afforded her some sustainment. "She s made 
 you feel all that, then," she remarked. "With her
 
 I 4 4 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 crook and her hat and her rose- wreathed lamb. If 
 such a sardonic old lion as you does really grow 
 bodeful before the rose-wreathed lamb there is, I 
 own, reason to fear for the future. I m glad I m 
 growing old. It would hurt me to see her cutting 
 your claws." 
 
 "Oh, she won t hurt us!" Oldmeadow smiled at 
 her. "It s rather we who will hurt her by refus 
 ing to lie down with her lamb. If that s any com 
 fort to you." 
 
 "Not in the least. I m not being malicious. You 
 don t call it hurt, then, to be effaced?" 
 
 "Smothered in rose-leaves, eh?" he suggested. 
 "It would be suffocating rather than suffering. She 
 does give me that feeling. But you ll make her 
 suffer 1 you have, you know rather than she you." 
 
 "1 really don t know about that," said Mrs. 
 Aldesey. "You make me quite uncomfortable, 
 Roger. You make me superstitious. She s done that 
 to me already. I refuse to take her seriously, but I 
 shall avoid her. That s what it comes to. Like not 
 giving the new moon a chance to look at you over 
 your left shoulder."
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 ON a morning in early March Oldmeadow found, 
 among the letters waiting for him on his breakfast 
 table, one from Nancy. Nancy and he, with all 
 their fondness, seldom wrote to each other and he 
 was aware, on seeing her writing, of the presage of 
 something disagreeable that the unexpected often 
 brings. 
 
 "Dear Roger," he read, and in his first glance he 
 saw his presage fulfilled. "We are in great trouble. 
 Aunt Eleanor has asked me to write because she is 
 too ill and it is to me as well as to her that Meg has 
 written and she wants you to see Barney at once. 
 Here are Meg s letters. She has gone away with 
 Captain Hay ward. Aunt Eleanor and Mother 
 think that Barney may be able to persuade Ad- 
 rienne to bring her back. No one else, we feel con 
 vinced, will have any influence with her. Do any 
 thing, anything you can, dear Roger. Mother and 
 I are almost frightened for Aunt Eleanor. She 
 walks about wringing her hands and crying, and 
 she goes up to Meg s room and opens the door and 
 looks in as if she could not believe she would not 
 find her there. It is heart-breaking to see her. We 
 depend on you, dear Roger. 
 
 " Yours ever 
 
 "NANCY." 
 
 "Good Lord!" Oldmeadow muttered while, in 
 lightning flashes, there passed across his mind the 
 face of John the setter and a Pierrot s face, white
 
 146 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 under a low line of black velvet. He took up Meg s 
 letters, written from a Paris hotel. 
 
 " DARLING MOTHER, I know it will make you fright 
 fully miserable and I can t forgive myself for that; 
 but it had to be. Eric and I cared too much and it 
 wasn t life at all, going on as we were apart. Try, 
 darling Mother, to see it as we do see things now 
 adays. Adrienne will explain it all and you must 
 believe her. You know what a saint she is and she 
 has been with us in it all, understanding everything 
 and helping us to be straight. Everything will come 
 right. Iris Hayward will set Eric free, of course ; she 
 doesn t care one bit for him and has made him 
 frightfully unhappy ever since they married, and 
 she wants to marry some one else herself only of 
 course she d never be brave enough to do it this way. 
 When Eric is free, we will marry at once and come 
 home, and, you will see, there are so many sensible 
 people nowadays; we shall not have a bad time at 
 all. Everything will come right, I m sure; and even 
 if it didn t, in that conventional way I could not 
 give him up. No one will ever love me as he does. 
 "Your devoted child 
 
 "MEG." 
 
 That was the first: the second ran: 
 
 " DEAREST NANCY, I know you ll think it fright 
 fully wrong; you are such an old-fashioned little 
 dear and you told me often enough that I oughtn t 
 to see so much of Eric. Only of course that couldn t 
 have prepared you for this and I expect Aunt Mon 
 ica won t let you come and stay with us for ages. 
 Never mind; when you marry, you ll see, I m sure.
 
 ADR1ENNE TONER 147 
 
 Love is the only thing, really. But I should hate to 
 feel I d lost you and I m sure I haven t. I want to 
 ask you, Nancy dear, to do all you can to make 
 Mother take it. I feel, just because you will think 
 it so wrong, that you may be more good to her than 
 Adrienne who doesn t think it wrong at all 
 at least not in Mother s way. It would be fright 
 fully unfair if Mother blamed Adrienne. She did all 
 she could to show us where we stood and to make us 
 play the game, and it would be pretty hard luck if 
 people were to be down on her now because we have 
 played it. We might have been really rotters if it 
 hadn t been for Adrienne; cheats and hypocrites, I 
 mean; stealing our happiness. I know Adrienne 
 can bring Barney round. It s only Mother who 
 troubles me, just because she is such a child that it s 
 almost impossible to make her see reason. She 
 doesn t recognize right and wrong unless they re in 
 the boxes she s accustomed to. Everything is in a 
 box for poor, darling old Mummy. But I mustn t 
 go on. Be the dear old pal you always have and 
 help me out as well as you can. 
 
 " Your loving 
 
 " MEG." 
 
 "Good Lord," Oldmeadow muttered once more. 
 He pushed back his chair and rose from the table in 
 the bright spring sunlight. He had the feeling, al 
 most paternal, of disgrace and a public stripping. 
 He saw Eleanor Chadwick stopping at Meg s door 
 to look in at the forsaken room, distraught in her 
 grief and incomprehension. He saw Nancy s pale, 
 troubled face and Monica Averil s, pinched and dry 
 in its sober dismay. And then again, lighted by a
 
 148 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 flare at once tawdry and menacing, the face of Ad- 
 rienne Toner, the intruder, the insufferable meddler 
 and destroyer, a Pierrot among fire-works that had, 
 at last, set fire to the house. He found a taxi on the 
 Embankment and drove to Connaught Square. 
 Freshly decorated with window-boxes, the pleasant, 
 spacious house had a specially smiling air of wel 
 come, but the butler s demeanour told him that 
 something of the calamity had already penetrated. 
 Adrienne, if she had not heard before, would have 
 had her letters; Barney, who had been kept in the 
 dark, would have been enlightened, and the irre 
 pressible exclamations that must have passed be 
 tween them seemed dimly reflected on the man s 
 formal countenance. Mrs. Chadwick, he told Old- 
 meadow, was breakfasting upstairs with Mr. Chad- 
 wick, and he ushered him into Barney s study. 
 
 Oldmeadow waited for some time among the Post 
 Impressionist pictures, one of which remained for 
 ever afterwards vividly fixed in his memory of the 
 moment ; a chaotic yet determined picture ; feature 
 less yet, as it were, conveying through its unrecog 
 nizable elements the meaning of a grin. And, as he 
 stood in the centre of the room and looked away 
 from the derisive canvas, he saw on Barney s desk 
 photographs of Adrienne, three photographs of her; 
 one as a child, a sickly looking but beaming child; 
 one in early girlhood, singularly childlike still; and 
 one in her bridal dress of only the other day, it 
 seemed, mild and radiant in her unbecoming veil 
 and wreath. 
 
 It was Barney who came to him. Poor Barney. 
 He was more piteously boyish than ever before to 
 his friend s eye; so beautifully arrayed, all in readi-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 149 
 
 ness for a happy London day with his angel, so pale, 
 so haggard and perplexed. "Look here, Roger," 
 were his first words, "do you mind coming upstairs 
 to Adrienne s room? She s not dressed yet; not very 
 well, you know. You ve heard, then, too?" 
 
 "I ve just heard from Nancy. Why upstairs? 
 I d rather not. We d better talk this over alone, 
 Barney. All the more if your wife isn t well." 
 
 "Yes; yes; I know. I told her it would be better. 
 But she insists." 
 
 The effect of a general misery Barney gave was 
 heightened now by his unhappy flush. "She doesn t 
 want us to talk it over without her, you see. She 
 comes into it all too much. From Nancy, did you 
 say? What s Nancy got to do with this odious 
 affair? " 
 
 "Only what Meg has put upon her to interpret 
 her as kindly as she can to your mother. Here are 
 the letters. I d really rather not go upstairs." 
 
 "I know you ll hold Adrienne responsible 
 partly at least. She expects that. She knows that I 
 do, too; she s quite prepared. I only heard half an 
 hour ago and of course it knocked me up frightfully. 
 Meg! My little sister! Why she s hardly more than 
 a child!" 
 
 "I m afraid she s a good deal more than a child. 
 I m afraid we can t hold Meg to be not responsible, 
 though, obviously, she d never have taken such a 
 step unaided and unabetted. Just read these letters, 
 Barney; it won t take a moment to decide what s 
 best to be done. I ll go down to your mother and 
 you must be off, at once, to Paris, and see if you 
 can fetch Meg back." 
 
 But after Barney, with a hesitating hand and an
 
 150 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 uncertain glance, had taken the letters and begun 
 to read them, the door was opened with decorous 
 deliberation and Adrienne s French maid appeared, 
 the tall, sallow, capable- looking woman whom Old- 
 meadow remembered having seen at Coldbrooks a 
 year ago. 
 
 "Madame requests that ces Messieurs should 
 come up at once; she awaits them," Josephine an 
 nounced in unemphatic but curiously potent ac 
 cents. Adrienne s potency, indeed, was of a sort 
 that flowed through all her agents and Oldmeadow 
 thought that he detected, in the melancholy gaze 
 bent upon Barney, reprobation for his failure to 
 attain the standard set for him by a devotion whole 
 hearted and reverential. Mrs. Chadwick, he re 
 membered, had said that Adrienne s maid adored 
 her. 
 
 "Yes, yes. We re coming at once, Josephine," 
 said Barney. Reading the letters as he went, he 
 moved to the door and Oldmeadow found himself, 
 perforce, following. 
 
 He had not yet visited the morning-room and 
 even before his eyes rested on Adrienne they saw, 
 hanging above her head where she sat on a little 
 sofa, a full-length portrait of Mrs. Toner; in white, 
 standing against a stone balustrade and holding 
 lilies; seagulls above her and a background of blue 
 sea. 
 
 Adrienne was also in white, but she wore over her 
 long, loose dress a little jacket of pink silk edged 
 with swan s down and the lace cap falling about her 
 neck was resetted with pink ribbon. It was curious 
 to see her in this almost frivolous array, recalling 
 the shepherdess, when her face expressed, for the
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 151 
 
 first time in his experience of her, an anger and an 
 agitation all the more apparent for its control. She 
 was pale yet flushed, odd streaks of colour running 
 up from her throat and dying in the pallor of her 
 cheeks. Her condition had evidently much affected 
 her complexion and her nose, through its layer of 
 powder, showed a pinched and reddened tint. It 
 made Oldmeadow uncomfortable to look at her; 
 her mask of calm was held at such a cost; she was 
 at once so determinedly herself and so helplessly 
 altered; and it was not with an automatic courtesy 
 only that he went up to her and held out his hand. 
 An impulse of irrelevant yet irrepressible pity 
 stirred him. 
 
 She had fixed her eyes on him as he entered, but 
 now looking at her husband and not moving, she 
 said: "I do not think you want to take my hand, 
 Mr. Oldmeadow. You will think me a criminal too, 
 as Barney does." 
 
 "Darling! Don t talk such nonsense!" Barney 
 cried. "I haven t blamed you, not by a word. I 
 know you ve done what you think right. Look, 
 darling ; Roger has had these letters. Just read them. 
 You see what Meg writes there to Nancy 
 about your having done all you could to keep them 
 straight. You haven t been fair to yourself in talk 
 ing to me just now." 
 
 Adrienne, without speaking, took the letters and 
 Oldmeadow moved away to the window and stood 
 looking down at the little garden at the back of the 
 house where a tall almond-tree delicately and 
 vividly bloomed against the pale spring sky. He 
 heard behind him the flicker of the fire in the grate, 
 the pacing of Barney s footsteps as he walked up
 
 152 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 and down, and the even turning of the pages in Ad- 
 rienne s hands. Then he heard her say: "Meg con 
 tradicts nothing that I have said to you, Barney. 
 She writes bravely and truly; as I knew that she 
 would write." 
 
 Barney stopped in his pacing. "But darling; 
 what she says about straightness?" It was feeble 
 of Barney and he must know it. Feeble of him even 
 to think that Adrienne might wish to avail herself 
 of the loophole or that she considered herself in any 
 need of a shield. 
 
 "You can t misunderstand so much as that, Bar 
 ney," she said. " Meg and I mean but one thing by 
 straightness; and that is truth. That was the way I 
 tried to help them ; it is the only way in which I can 
 ever help people. I showed them the truth and kept 
 it before their eyes when they were in danger of for 
 getting it. I said to them that if they were to be 
 worthy of their love they must be brave enough to 
 make sacrifices for it. I did not hide from them that 
 there would be sacrifices if that is what you 
 mean." 
 
 "It s not what I mean, darling! Of course it s 
 not!" broke from poor Barney almost in a wail. 
 "Didn t you try at all to dissuade them? Didn t 
 you show them that it was desperate, and ruinous, 
 and wrong? Didn t you tell Meg that it would 
 break Mother s heart!" 
 
 The blue ribbon was again unrolled and Old- 
 meadow, listening with rising exasperation, heard 
 that the sound of her own solemn cadences sus 
 tained her. "I don t think anything in life is des 
 perate or ruinous or wrong, Barney, except turning 
 away from one s own light. Meg met a reality and
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 153 
 
 was brave enough to face it. I regret, deeply, that 
 it came to her tragically, not happily ; but happiness 
 can grow from tragedy if we are brave and true and 
 Meg is brave and true in her love. It won t break 
 your mother s heart. Hers is a small, but not such 
 a feeble, heart as that. I believe that the experience 
 may strengthen and ennoble her. She has led too 
 sheltered a life." 
 
 Oldmeadow at this turned from the window and 
 met Barney s miserable eyes. "There s really no 
 reason for my staying on, Barney," he said, and his 
 voice as well as his look excluded Adrienne from 
 their interchange. "I ll take the 1.45 to Coldbrooks. 
 What shall I tell your mother? That you ve gone 
 to Paris this morning?" 
 
 "Yes, that I ve gone to Paris. That I ll do my 
 best, you know. That I hope to bring Meg back. 
 Tell her to keep up her courage. It ll only be a day 
 or two after all, and we may be able to hush it up." 
 
 "Stop, Mr. Oldmeadow," said Adrienne in a 
 grave, commanding tone. It was impossible before 
 it to march out of the room and shut the door, 
 though that was what his forcibly arrested attitude 
 showed that he wished to do. "You as well as Bar 
 ney must hear my protest," said Adrienne, and she 
 fixed her sombre eyes upon him. "Meg is with the 
 man she loves. In the eyes of heaven he is her hus 
 band. It would be real as contrasted with conven 
 tional disgrace were she to leave him now. She will 
 not leave him. I know her better than you do. I ask 
 you" her gaze now turned on Barney "I de 
 sire you, not to go to her on such an unworthy er 
 rand." 
 
 "But, Adrienne," Barney, flushed and hesitating,
 
 154 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 pleaded, "it s for Mother s sake. Mother s too old 
 to be enlarged like that that s really nonsense, 
 you know, darling. You see what Nancy says. They 
 are frightened about her. It s not only convention. 
 It s a terrible mistake Meg s made and she may be 
 feeling it now and only too glad to have the way 
 made easy for her to come back. I promise you to 
 be as gentle as possible. I won t reproach her in any 
 way. I ll tell her that we re all only waiting to for 
 give her and take her back." 
 
 "Forgive her, Barney? For what? It is only in 
 the eyes of the world that she has done wrong and I 
 have lifted her above that fear. Convention does 
 not weigh for a moment with me beside the realities 
 of the human heart ; nor would it with you, Barney, 
 if it were not for the influence of Mr. Oldmeadow. 
 I have warned you before; it is easy to be worldly- 
 wise and cynical and to keep to the broad road ; it is 
 easy to be safe. But withering lies that way: wither 
 ing and imprisonment, and 
 
 "Come, come, Mrs. Barney," Oldmeadow inter 
 posed, addressing her for the first time and acidly 
 laughing. "Really we haven t time for sermons. 
 You oughtn t to have obliged me to come up if you 
 wanted to influence Barney all by yourself. He sees 
 quite clearly for himself the rights and the wrongs 
 of this affair, as it happens. If I were to preach for 
 a moment in my turn I might ask you how it was 
 that you didn t see that it was your duty to tell 
 Meg s mother and brother how things were going 
 and let them judge. You re not as wise as you im 
 agine far from it. Some things you can t judge 
 at all. Meg and Hayward aren t people of enough 
 importance to have a right to break laws; that s
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 155 
 
 all that it comes to; there s nothing to be gained by 
 their breaking laws; not only for other people, but 
 for themselves. They re neither of them capable of 
 being happy in the ambiguous sort of life they d have 
 to lead. There s a reality you didn t see at all in 
 your haste to flout convention. Barney could have 
 dealt with Hay ward, and Meg could have been 
 packed off to the country and kept there till she d 
 learned to think a little more about other people s 
 hearts and a little less about her own. What busi 
 ness had you, after all, to have secrets from your 
 husband and to plot with the two young fools be 
 hind his back? Isn t Meg his sister rather than 
 yours?" His bitterness betrayed him and conscious 
 hostility rose in him, answering the menace that 
 measured him in her eyes. "What business had you, 
 a new-comer among us, to think yourself capable of 
 managing all their lives and to set yourself up above 
 them all in wisdom? You take too much upon your 
 self" ; his lips found the old phrase: " Really you do. 
 It s been your mistake from the beginning." 
 
 He could not have believed that a face so framed 
 for gentleness could show itself at once so calm and 
 so convulsed. He knew that something had hap 
 pened to her that had never happened to her before 
 in her life. She kept her eyes steadily on him and he 
 wondered if she were not reciting some incantation, 
 some exorcism, derived from the seagulled lady 
 above her : Power in Repose Power in Love 
 Power in Light. Her mouth and eyes and nostrils 
 were dark on her pallor and he felt that she held 
 back all the natural currents of her being in order 
 to face and quell him with the supernatural. 
 
 "Never mind all that, Roger," Barney was
 
 156 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 sickly murmuring. "I don t feel like that. I know 
 Adrienne didn t for a moment mean to deceive me." 
 
 "We will mind it, Barney," said Adrienne, breath 
 ing with difficulty. "I had, Mr. Oldmeadow, the 
 business, first, of loyalty to another human soul who, 
 in the crisis of its destiny, confided in me. I have 
 been nearer Meg than any of you have guessed, 
 from my first meeting with her. You were all blind. 
 I saw at once that she was tossed and tormented. 
 I am nearer, far nearer her, than her brother and 
 mother. In them she would never have dreamed of 
 confiding and she came to me because she felt that 
 in me she would find reality and in them mere for 
 mulas. I do not look upon women as chattels to be 
 handed about by their male relatives and locked up 
 if they do not love according to rule and precedent. 
 I look upon them as the equals of men in every re 
 spect, as free as men to shape their lives and to 
 direct their destinies. You speak a mediaeval lan 
 guage, Mr. Oldmeadow. The world, our great, 
 modern, deep-hearted world, has outstripped you." 
 
 "Darling," Barney forestalled, breathlessly, as 
 she paused, any reply that Oldmeadow might have 
 been tempted to make, "don t mind if Roger speaks 
 harshly. He s like that and no one cares for us more. 
 He doesn t mean conventionality at all, or anything 
 mediaeval. You don t understand him. He puts his 
 finger on the spot about Meg and Hayward. It s ex 
 actly as he says; they re not of enough importance 
 to have a right to break laws. If you could have 
 confided in me, it would have been better; you must 
 own that. We d have given Meg a chance to pull 
 herself together. We d have sent Hayward about 
 his business. It s a question, as Roger says, of your
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 157 
 
 wisdom; of your knowledge of the world. You 
 didn t understand them. They re neither of them 
 idealists like you. They can t be happy doing what 
 you might be big enough to do. Just because they re 
 not big. Try to take it in, darling. And we really 
 needn t go on talking about it any longer, need we? 
 It isn t a question of influence. All we have to decide 
 on is what s to be done. Roger must go to Mother 
 and tell her I m starting this morning to try and 
 fetch Meg back. Imagine Mother with a divorce 
 case on! It would kill her, simply. That s all. Isn t 
 it, Roger?" 
 
 "Stop, Mr. Oldmeadow," said Adrienne, again. 
 She rose as she spoke. As he saw her stand before 
 them, her approaching maternity dominated for a 
 moment all his impressions of her. Veiled and 
 masked adroitly as it was, its very uncouthness 
 curiously became her. Her head, for once, looked 
 small. Like an archaic statue, straight and short 
 and thick, her altered form had dignity and ampli 
 tude and her face, heavy w r ith its menace, hard with 
 its control, might have been that of some austere 
 and threatening priestess of fruitfulness. 
 
 " Barney, wait," she said. Her arms hung straight 
 beside her, but she slightly lifted a hand as she spoke 
 and Oldmeadow noted that it was tightly clenched. 
 " It is I, not your friend, whom you must question as 
 to what it is right that you should do. I do not con 
 sent to his reading of my unwisdom and unworthi- 
 ness. I ask you not to consent to it. I ask you again 
 not to go. I ask you again to respect my judgment 
 rather than his." 
 
 "Darling," the unfortunate husband supplicated; 
 "it s not because it s Roger s judgment. You know
 
 158 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 it s what I felt right myself from the moment you 
 told me what had happened. You say people must 
 follow their own light. It is my light. I must do 
 what Mother asks and try to bring Meg back." 
 
 " It is not your light, Barney. It is craft and cau 
 tion and fear. More than that, do you not see, must 
 I make plain to you what it is you do to me in going? 
 You insult me. You treat what I have believed right 
 for Meg to do as a crime from which she must be 
 rescued. You drag me in the dust with her. Under 
 stand me, Barney" -the streaks of colour deep 
 ened on her neck, her breath came thickly "if 
 you go, you drag me in the dust." 
 
 "How can it drag you in the dust, Mrs. Barney, 
 if Meg wants to come back?" Oldmeadow interposed 
 in the tone of a caustic doctor addressing a malinger 
 ing patient. "We re not talking of crimes; only of 
 follies. Come; be reasonable. Don t make it so pain 
 ful for Barney to do what s his plain duty. You re 
 not a child. You have, I hope, courage enough and 
 humour enough to own that you can make mistakes 
 like other people." 
 
 "Yes, yes, Adrienne, that s just it," broke pain 
 fully from Barney, and, as he seized the clue thus 
 presented to him, Adrienne turned her head slowly, 
 with an ominous stillness, and again rested her eyes 
 upon him. "It s childish, you know, darling. It s 
 not like you. And of course I understand why; and 
 Roger does. You re not yourself; you re over 
 strained and off-balance and I m so frightfully sorry 
 all this has fallen upon you at such a time. I don t 
 want to oppose you in anything, darling do try to 
 believe me. Only you must give me the credit for 
 my own convictions. I do feel I must go. I do feel
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 159 
 
 Roger must take that message to Mother. After all, 
 darling," and now in no need of helping clues he 
 found his own and the irrepressible note of grief 
 vibrated in his voice, "you do owe me something, 
 don t you? You do owe us all something to make 
 up, I mean. Because, without you, Meg would 
 never have behaved like this and disgraced us all. 
 Oh I don t mean to reproach you!" 
 
 "Good-bye then, I m off," said Oldmeadow. 
 "I m very sorry you made me come up. Good-bye, 
 Mrs. Barney." She had not spoken, nor moved, nor 
 turned her eyes from Barney s face. 
 
 "Good-bye. Thanks so much, Roger." Barney 
 followed him, with a quickness to match his own, to 
 the door. But Adrienne, this time, did not call him 
 back. She remained standing stock-still in front of 
 her sofa. 
 
 "Tell Mother I m off," said Barney, grasping his 
 hand. "Tell her she ll hear at once, as soon as I 
 know anything. Thanks so awfully," he repeated. 
 "You ve been a great help." 
 
 It was unfortunate, perhaps, that Barney should 
 say that, Oldmeadow reflected as he sped down the 
 stairs. " But she s met reality at last," he muttered, 
 wondering how she and Barney faced each other 
 above and hearing again the words that must echo 
 so strangely in her ears: "Disgraced us all." And, 
 mingled with his grim satisfaction, was, again, the 
 sense of irrelevant and reluctant pity.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 IT was Saturday and he had to wire to Mrs. Aldesey 
 that he could not go with her next day to the Queen s 
 Hall concert they had planned to hear together. 
 
 Nancy was waiting for him at the station in her 
 own little pony-cart and as he got in she said: "Is 
 Barney gone?" 
 
 "Yes; he ll have gone by now," said Oldmeadow 
 and, as he said it, he felt a sudden sense of relief and 
 clarity. The essential thing, he saw it as he answered 
 Nancy s question, was that he should be able to say 
 that Barney had gone. And he knew that if he 
 hadn t been there to back him up, he wouldn t have 
 gone. So that was all right, wasn t it? 
 
 As he had sped past the sun-swept country the 
 reluctant pity had struggled in him, striving, unsuc 
 cessfully, to free itself from the implications of that 
 horrid word: "Disgraced." It was Adrienne who 
 had disgraced them ; that was what Barney s phrase 
 had really meant, though he hadn t intended it to 
 mean it. She, the stranger, the new-comer, had dis 
 graced them. And it was true. Yet he wished Bar 
 ney hadn t stumbled on the phrase just because 
 she was a stranger and a new-comer. And Barney 
 would never have found it had he not been there. 
 But now came the sense of relief. If he hadn t been 
 there, Barney wouldn t have gone. 
 
 "Aunt Eleanor is longing to see you," said Nancy. 
 "Her one hope, you know, is that he may bring Meg 
 back." Nancy s eyes had a strained look, as though 
 she had lain awake all night.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 161 
 
 "You think she may come back?" 
 
 He felt, himself, unable to form any conjectures as 
 to what Meg was likely to do. What she had done 
 was so strangely unlike her. 
 
 "Not if it means leaving Captain Hayward for 
 good," said Nancy. "But Aunt Eleanor and Mother 
 both think that she may be willing to come till they 
 can marry." 
 
 "That s better than nothing, isn t it," said Old- 
 meadow, and Nancy then surprised him by saying, 
 as she looked round at him: "I don t want her to 
 come back." 
 
 "Don t want her to come back? But you wanted 
 Barney to go?" 
 
 "Yes. He had to go. Just so that everything 
 might be done. So that it might be put before her. 
 And to satisfy Aunt Eleanor. But, don t you see, 
 Roger, it would really make it far more difficult for 
 Aunt Eleanor to have her here. What would she do 
 with her? since she won t give up Captain Hay- 
 ward ? She can love Meg and grieve and yearn over 
 her now. But if she were here she couldn t. It would 
 be all grief and bitterness." 
 
 Nancy had evidently been thinking to some pur 
 pose during her sleepless night and he owned that 
 her conclusion was the sound one. What discon 
 certed him was her assurance that Meg would not 
 leave her lover. After Adrienne, Nancy was likely to 
 have the most authentic impressions of Meg s atti 
 tude; and, as they drove towards Chelford, he was 
 further disconcerted by hearing her murmur, half to 
 herself: " It would be silly to leave him now, wouldn t 
 it." 
 
 "Not if she s sorry and frightened at what she s
 
 162 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 done," he protested. "After all the man s got a wife 
 who may be glad to have him back." 
 
 But Nancy said : " I don t think she would. I think 
 she ll be glad not to have him back. Meg may be 
 frightened; but I don t believe she ll be sorry; yet." 
 
 He meditated, somewhat gloomily, as they drove, 
 on the unexpectedness of the younger generation. 
 He had never thought of Nancy as belonging, in any 
 but the chronological sense, to that category; yet 
 here she was, accepting, if not condoning, the rebel 
 lion against law and morality. 
 
 Mrs. Averil had driven down to the Little House 
 where she was to be picked up and, as they turned 
 the corner to the Green, they saw her waiting at the 
 gate, her furs turned up around her ears, her neat 
 little face pinched and dry, as he had known that he 
 would find it, and showing a secure if controlled 
 indignation, rather than Nancy s sad perplexity. 
 
 "Well, Roger, you find us in a pleasant predica 
 ment," she observed as Oldmeadow settled the rug 
 around her knees. "Somehow one never thinks of 
 things like this happening in one s own family. Vil 
 lage girls misbehave and people in the next county 
 run away sometimes with other people s wives; but 
 one never expects such adventures to come walking 
 in to one s own breakfast- table." 
 
 " Disagreeable things do have a way of happen 
 ing at breakfast-time, don t they," Oldmeadow as 
 sented. The comfort of Mrs. Averil was that even 
 on her death-bed she would treat her own funeral 
 lightly: "I wonder it remains such a comfortable 
 meal, all the same." 
 
 "I suppose you ve had lunch on the train," said 
 Mrs. Averil. "Will you believe it? Poor Eleanor
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 163 
 
 was worrying about that this morning. She s got 
 some coffee and sandwiches waiting for you, in case 
 you haven t. I m so thankful you ve come. It will 
 help her. Poor dear. She s begun to think of all the 
 other things now. Of what people will say and how 
 they will hear. Lady Cockerell is very much on her 
 mind. You know what a meddlesome gossip she is, 
 and only the other day Eleanor snubbed her when 
 she was criticizing Barbara s new school. The 
 thought of her is disturbing her dreadfully now." 
 
 "I suppose these leech-bites do help to alleviate 
 the pain of the real wound," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 " Not in the least. They envenom it," Mrs. Averil 
 replied. "I d like to strangle Lady Cockerell myself 
 before the news reaches her." 
 
 Nancy drove on, her eyes fixed on the pony s ears. 
 "I don t believe people will talk nearly as much as 
 you and Aunt Eleanor imagine," she now remarked. 
 "I ve told her so; and so must you, Mother." 
 
 "You are admirable with her, Nancy. Far better 
 than I am. I sit grimly swallowing my curses, or 
 wringing my hands. Neither wringing nor cursing is 
 much good, I suppose." 
 
 " Not a bit of good. It s better she should think of 
 what people say than of Meg; but when it comes to 
 agonizing over them I believe the truth is that peo 
 ple nowadays do get over it ; far more than they used 
 to; especially if Aunt Eleanor can show them that 
 she gets over it." 
 
 "But she can t get over it, my dear child! " said 
 Mrs. Averil, gazing at her daughter in a certain 
 alarm. "How can one get over disgrace like that or 
 lift one s head again unless one is an Adrienne 
 Toner! Oh, when I think of that woman and of what
 
 1 64 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 she s done! For she is responsible for it all ! Every 
 bit of it. Meg was a good girl, at heart ; always. In 
 spite of that silly liquid powder. And so I tell 
 Eleanor. Adrienne is responsible for it all." 
 
 "I don t, Mother; that s not my line at all," said 
 Nancy. "I tell her that what Meg says is true." 
 Nancy touched the pony with the whip. "If it 
 hadn t been for Adrienne she might have done much 
 worse." 
 
 "Really, my dear!" Mrs. Averil murmured. 
 
 "Come, Nancy," Oldmeadow protested; "that 
 was a retrospective threat of Meg s. Without Adri 
 enne she d never have considered such an adventure 
 - or its worse alternative. Encourage your aunt to 
 curse Adrienne. Your Mother s instinct is sound 
 there." 
 
 But Nancy shook her head. "I don t know, 
 Roger," she said. "Perhaps Meg would have con 
 sidered the alternative. Girls do consider all sorts of 
 things nowadays that Mother and Aunt Eleanor, in 
 their girlhood, would have thought simply wicked. 
 They are wicked; but not simply. That s the differ 
 ence between now and then. And don t you think 
 that it s better for Meg and Captain Hayward to go 
 away so that they can be married than to be, as she 
 says, really rotters; than to be, as she says, cheats 
 and hypocrites and steal their happiness?" 
 
 "My dear child!" Mrs. Averil again murmured, 
 while Oldmeadow, finding it, after all, a comfort to 
 have a grown-up Nancy to discuss it with, said, 
 "My contention is that, left to herself, Meg would 
 have thought them both wicked." 
 
 "Perhaps," Nancy said again; "but even old- 
 fashioned girls did things they knew to be wicked
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 165 
 
 sometimes. The difference Adrienne has made is 
 that Meg doesn t think herself wicked at all. She 
 thinks herself rather noble. And that s what I mean 
 about Aunt Eleanor. It will comfort her if she can 
 feel a little as Adrienne feels that Meg isn t one 
 bit the worse, morally, for what she s done." 
 
 "Are you trying to persuade us that Meg isn t 
 guilty, my dear?" Mrs. Averil inquired dryly. "Are 
 you trying to persuade us that Adrienne has done us 
 all a service? You surely can t deny that she s be 
 haved atrociously, and first and foremost, to Barney. 
 Barney could have known nothing about it, and can 
 you conceive a woman keeping such a thing from her 
 husband?" 
 
 But Nancy was feeling the pressure of her own 
 realizations and was not to be scolded out of them. 
 " If Meg is guilty, and doesn t know it, she will suffer 
 dreadfully when she finds out, won t she? It all 
 depends on whether she has deceived herself or not, 
 doesn t it? I m not justifying her or Adrienne, 
 Mother; only trying to see the truth about them. 
 How could Adrienne tell Barney when it was Meg s 
 secret? We may feel it wrong; but she thought she 
 was justified." The colour rose in Nancy s cheek as 
 she named Barney, but she kept her tired eyes on 
 her mother and added, "I don t believe it was easy 
 for her to keep it from him." 
 
 "My dear, anything is easy for her that flatters 
 her self-importance!" cried Mrs. Averil impatiently. 
 "I ll own, if you like, that she s more fool than 
 knave as Meg may be ; though Meg never struck 
 me as a fool. Things haven t changed so much since 
 my young days as all that; it s mainly a matter of 
 names. If girls who behave like Meg find it pleas-
 
 i66 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 anter to be called fools than knaves, they are wel 
 come to the alternative. Noble they never were nor 
 will be, whatever the fashion." 
 
 Oldmeadow did not want the sandwiches, so, as 
 soon as they reached Coldbrooks, he was led up 
 stairs to Mrs. Chadwick s room. He found his poor 
 friend lying on the sofa, the blinds draw r n down and 
 a wet handkerchief on her forehead. She burst out 
 crying as he entered. Oldmeadow sat down beside 
 her and took her hand and, as he listened to her sobs, 
 felt that he need not trouble to pity Adrienne. 
 
 "What I cannot, cannot understand, Roger," she 
 was at last able to say, and he realized that it was of 
 Adrienne, not Meg, that she was speaking, "is how 
 she can bear to treat us so. We all loved and trusted 
 her. You know how I loved her, Roger. I felt Meg 
 as safe in her hands as in my own. Oh, that wicked, 
 wicked man! I hardly know him by sight. That 
 makes it all so much more dreadful. All I do know is 
 that his wife is a daughter of poor Evelyn Madder- 
 ley, who broke her back out hunting." 
 
 "I don t believe there s much harm in him, you 
 know," Oldmeadow suggested. "And I believe that 
 he is sincerely devoted to Meg." 
 
 "Harm, Roger!" poor Mrs. Chadwick wailed, 
 "when he is a married man and Meg only a girl! 
 Oh, if there is harm in anything there is in that! 
 Running away with a girl and ruining her life! Bar 
 ney will make him feel what he has done. Barney 
 has gone?" 
 
 " Yes, he s gone, and I am sure we can rely on him 
 to speak his mind to Hayward." 
 
 "And don t you think he may bring Meg back, 
 Roger? Nancy says I must not set my mind on it;
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 167 
 
 but don t you think she may be repenting already? 
 My poor little Meg! She was hot-tempered and 
 could speak very crossly if she was thwarted ; but I 
 think of her incessantly as she was when she was a 
 tiny child. Self-willed; but so sweet and coaxing in 
 her ways, with beautiful golden hair and those dark 
 eyes I always thought of Meg, with her beauty, as 
 sure to marry happily; near us, I hoped" - Mrs. 
 Chadwick began to sob again. "And now ! Will he 
 find them in Paris? Will they not have moved on?" 
 
 "In any case he ll be able to follow them up. I 
 don t imagine they ll think of hiding." 
 
 " No; I m afraid they won t. That is the worst of 
 it ! They won t hide and every one will come to know 
 and then what good will there be in her coming 
 back! If only I d had her presented last year, Roger! 
 She can never go to court now," Mrs. Chadwick 
 wept, none the less piteously for her triviality. "To 
 think that Francis s daughter cannot go to court! 
 She would have looked so beautiful, with my pearls 
 and the feathers. The feathers are becoming to so 
 few girls. Nancy could not wear them nearly so well. 
 Nancy can go and my daughter can t!" 
 
 "I don t think the lack of feathers will weigh 
 seriously upon Meg s future, my dear friend." 
 
 "Oh, but it s what they stand for, Roger, that will 
 weigh!" Mrs. Chadwick, even in her grief, retained 
 her shrewdness. <: It s easy to laugh at the feathers, 
 i)ut you might really as well laugh at wedding-rings ! 
 To think that Francis s daughter is travelling about 
 with a man and without a wedding-ring ! Or do you 
 suppose they ll have thought of it and bought one? 
 It would be a lie, of course ; but don t you think that 
 a lie would be justifiable under the circumstances?"
 
 168 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 " I don t think it really makes any difference, until 
 they can come home and be married." 
 
 "I suppose she must marry him now if they 
 won t hide and will be proud of what they ve 
 done ; she seems quite proud of it ! everyone will 
 hear, so that they will have to marry. Oh I don t 
 know what to hope or what to fear! How can you 
 expect me to have tea, Nancy!" she wept, as Nancy 
 entered carrying the little tray. "It s so good of 
 you, my dear, but how can I eat? I can hardly 
 face the servants, Roger. They will all hear. And 
 Meg was always such a pet of Johnson s; his favour 
 ite of all my children. He used to give her very rich, 
 unwholesome things in the pantry and once, when 
 her father punished her for disobeying him and put 
 her in the corner, in the drawing-room, one day, 
 after lunch, Johnson nearly dropped the coffee, when 
 he came in. It upset him dreadfully and he would 
 hardly speak to Francis for a week afterwards. I 
 know he will think it all our fault, when he hears, 
 now. And so it is, for having trusted to a stranger. 
 I can t drink tea, Nancy." 
 
 "Yes, you can, for Meg s sake, Aunt Eleanor, and 
 eat some tea-cake, too," said Nancy. " If you aren t 
 brave for her, who will be. And you can t be brave 
 unless you eat. I remember so well, when I was little, 
 Uncle Francis saying that when it came to the pinch 
 you were the bravest woman he knew. You ll see, 
 darling; it will all come out better than you fear. 
 Johnson and all of us will help you to make it come 
 out better." 
 
 "She is such a comfort to me, Roger," said Mrs. 
 Chadwick with a summoned smile. "Somehow, 
 when I see her, I feel that things will come out bet-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 169 
 
 ter. You will have to go to court, dear, next spring. 
 We can t have none of our girls going. And you shall 
 wear my pearls." Mrs. Chad wick s tears fell, but she 
 took up the tea-cup. 
 
 Nancy more and more was striking Oldmeadow 
 as the wisest person in the house. He walked with 
 her on the terrace after tea ; it was an old custom of 
 his and Nancy s to step outside then, whatever the 
 weather, and have a few turns. This was a clear, 
 chill evening and Nancy had wrapped a woollen 
 scarf closely round her neck and shoulders. Her 
 chin was sunken in its folds as she held it together 
 on her breast, and with her dropped profile, her sad, 
 meditative eyes, it was as if she saw a clue and, 
 far more clearly than he did, knew where they all 
 stood. 
 
 "Adrienne was bitterly opposed to Barney s go 
 ing," he said. "She seemed unable to grasp the fact 
 that she herself had been in error." 
 
 Nancy turned her eyes on him. "Did Barney tell 
 you she was bitterly opposed?" 
 
 "He didn t tell me. I was with them. It was most 
 unfortunate. She insisted on my coming up." 
 
 "Oh, dear," said Nancy. She even stopped for a 
 moment to face him with her dismay. "Yes, I see," 
 she then said, walking on, "she would." 
 
 "Why would she? Unless she was sure of getting 
 her own way? The only point in having me up was 
 to show me that she could always get her own way 
 with Barney." 
 
 "Of course. And to make it quite clear to herself, 
 too. She s not afraid of you, Roger. She s not afraid 
 of anything but Barney." 
 
 "1 don t think she had any reason to be afraid of
 
 170 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 him this morning. He was badly upset, of course. 
 But if I hadn t gone up, I imagine she d have kept 
 him from going. And you own that that would have 
 been a pity, don t you?" 
 
 "Yes. Oh, yes. He had to go," said Nancy, ab 
 sently. And she added. " Were you very rough and 
 scornful?" 
 
 " Rough and scornful ? I don t think so. I think I 
 kept my temper very well, considering all things. I 
 showed her pretty clearly, I suppose, that I con 
 sidered her a meddling ass. I don t suppose she ll 
 forgive me easily for that." 
 
 "Well, you can t wonder at it, can you?" said 
 Nancy. "Especially if she suspects that you made 
 Barney consider her one, too." 
 
 "But it s necessary, isn t it, that she should be 
 made to suspect it herself? I don t wonder at her 
 not forgiving me for showing her up before Barney, 
 and upholding him against her, but I do wonder that 
 one can never make her see she s wrong. It s that 
 that s so really monstrous about her." 
 
 " Do you think that anyone can ever make us see 
 we are wrong unless they love us?" Nancy asked. 
 
 "Well, Barney loves her," said Oldmeadow after 
 a moment. 
 
 "Yes; but he s afraid of her, too, isn t he? He d 
 never have quite the courage to try and make her 
 see, would he? off his own bat I mean. He d 
 never really have quite the courage to see, himself, 
 how wrong she was, unless he were angry. And to 
 have anyone who is angry with you trying to make 
 you see, only pushes you further and further back 
 into yourself, doesn t it, and away from seeing?" 
 
 "You ve grown very wise in the secrets of the
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 171 
 
 human heart, my dear," Oldmeadow observed. 
 "It s true. He hasn t courage with her unless 
 some one is there to give it to him. But, you know, 
 I don t think she d forgive him if he had. I don t 
 think she d forgive anyone who made her see." 
 
 "I don t know," Nancy pondered. "I don t love 
 her, yet I feel as if I understood her ; better, perhaps, 
 than you do. I think she s good, you know. I mean, 
 I think she might be good, if she could ever see." 
 
 "She s too stupid ever, really, to see," said Old- 
 meadow, and it was with impatience. "She s en 
 cased in self-love like a rhinoceros in its hide. One 
 can t penetrate anywhere. You say she s afraid of 
 Barney and I can t imagine what you mean by that. 
 It s true, when I m by, she s afraid of losing his 
 admiration. But that s not being afraid of him." 
 
 Nancy still pondered; but not, now, in any per 
 plexity. "She s afraid because she cares so much. 
 She s afraid because she can care so much. It s 
 difficult to explain ; but I feel as if I understood her. 
 She s never cared so much before for just one other 
 person. It s always been for people altogether; and 
 because she was doing something for them. But 
 Barney does something for her. He makes her 
 happy. Perhaps she never knew before what it was 
 to be really happy. You know, she didn t give me 
 the feeling of a really happy person. It s some 
 thing quite, quite new for her. It makes her feel 
 uncertain of herself and almost bewildered some 
 times. Oh, I m sure of it the more I think of it. And 
 you know, sometimes," Nancy turned her deep, 
 sweet eyes on him, "I feel very sorry for her, 
 Roger. I can t help it; although I don t love her at 
 all."
 
 172 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Yes. It must be true. Though he had seen Ad- 
 rienne s vanity rather than her love. Nancy and 
 Meg were united in their assurance and that must 
 be, he saw, because they both, in their so different 
 ways, knew what it was to care; to care so much 
 that you were frightened. It was strange that the 
 pang of pity that came with his new perception 
 should be for Adrienne rather than for his dear little 
 Nancy herself. Nancy had suffered, he knew, and 
 her life was perhaps permanently scarred; yet, 
 clear-eyed and unduped, he saw her as mistress of 
 the very fate that had maimed her. Whereas Ad 
 rienne was blindfolded ; a creature swayed and sur 
 rounded by forces of which she was unaware. 
 
 Nancy had deepened his sense of perplexity, his 
 sense of taking refuge from something, and what it 
 was came fully upon him that night when he was at 
 last alone. Meg and her misdemeanour sank into a 
 mere background for the image of the cold, con 
 vulsed face that he had seen that morning. Almost 
 angrily he felt himself pushing it back, pushing it 
 down, as if he pushed it down to drown, and again 
 and again it re-emerged to look at him. 
 
 He fell asleep at last; but as, a year ago, on the 
 first night of his meeting with her, he had dreamed 
 of her, so to-night he dreamed again. 
 
 He did not see her, but she was in some dreadful 
 plight and the sense of her panic and bewilderment 
 broke upon him in shocks of suffering. He could not 
 see her, but he was aware of her, horribly aware. 
 All remained a broken, baffled confusion, but it was 
 as though, unable to shape and assert itself, he yet 
 felt her very being wrestling with extinction. 
 
 The sharpness had gone out of the sunlight next
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 173 
 
 day and Mrs. Chad wick consented to come and sit 
 with them in the warmest corner of the garden, the 
 corner where, a year ago, Oldmeadow remembered, 
 Meg had sat with him and explained to him the 
 secret of Adrienne s power. Pitifully, with swollen 
 eyes and trembling fingers, Mrs. Chadwick resumed 
 her interrupted stocking while Oldmeadow read 
 aloud from a Sunday paper the leading article on 
 the critical situation in Ireland. "I suppose every 
 one in London will be talking about Ulster and Sir 
 Edward Carson, won t they?" said Mrs. Chadwick, 
 and it was evident that she derived a dim comfort 
 from the thought. The situation in Ireland, Old- 
 meadow reflected, had, at all events, been of so much 
 service. 
 
 Upon this quiet scene there broke suddenly the 
 sound of a motor s horn and a motor s wheels 
 turned into the front entrance. 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick dropped her stocking and laid her 
 hand on Nancy s arm. " Dear Aunt Eleanor you 
 know he couldn t possibly be back yet," said Nancy. 
 "And if it s anyone to call, Johnson knows you re 
 not at home." 
 
 "Lady Cockerell is capable of anything. She 
 might sit down in the hall and wait. She must have 
 heard by now," poor Mrs. Chadwick murmured. 
 "That married girl of hers in London must have 
 written. With the projecting teeth." 
 
 T ll soon get rid of her, if it s really she," said 
 Mrs. Averil; but she had hardly risen when the door 
 at the back of the house opened and they saw John 
 son usher forth a hurrying female figure, obviously 
 not Lady Cockerell s; a figure so encumbered by its 
 motoring wraps, so swathed in veils, that only Mrs.
 
 174 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Chadwick s ejaculation enlightened Oldmeadow as 
 to its identity. 
 
 "Josephine!" cried Mrs. Chadwick and then, be 
 tween the narrow framing of purple gauze, he rec 
 ognized the dramatic, melancholy eyes and pale, 
 pinched lips of Adrienne s maid. 
 
 "Oh, Madame! Madame!" Josephine was ex 
 claiming as she came towards them down the path. 
 Her face wore the terrible intensity of expression so 
 alien to the British countenance. "Oh, Madame! 
 Madame!" she repeated. They had all risen and 
 stood to await her. "He is dead! The little child is 
 dead ! And she is alone. Monsieur left her yesterday. 
 Quite, quite alone, and her child born dead." 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick faced her in pallid stupefaction. 
 
 "The baby, Aunt Eleanor," said Nancy, for she 
 looked indeed as if she had not understood. "Bar 
 ney s baby. It has been born and it is dead. Oh 
 poor Barney. And poor, poor Adrienne." 
 
 "Yes, dead!" Josephine, regardless of all but her 
 exhaustion and her grief, dropped down into one of 
 the garden-chairs and put her hands before her face. 
 "Born dead last night. A beautiful little boy. The 
 doctors could not save it and fear for her life. They 
 will not let me stay with her. Only the doctors and 
 the nurses strangers are with her." Josephine 
 was sobbing. "Ah, it was not right to leave her so. 
 Already she was ill. It could be seen that already 
 she was very ill when Monsieur left her. I came to 
 her when he was gone. She did not say a word to 
 me. She tried to smile. Mais fai bien vu qu elle 
 avail la mart dans I dme" 
 
 "Good heavens," Mrs. Chadwick murmured, 
 while Josephine, now, let her tears flow unchecked.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 175 
 
 "She is alone and Barney has left her! Oh, this is 
 terrible! At such a time!" 
 
 "He had to go, Aunt Eleanor. You know he had 
 to go. We will send for him at once," said Nancy, 
 and Josephine, catching the words, sobbed on in her 
 woe and her resentment: "But where to send for 
 him? No one knows where to send. The doctors 
 sent a wire yesterday, at once, when she was taken 
 ill; to the Paris hotel. But no answer came. He 
 must have left Paris. That is why I have come. No 
 telegrams for Sunday. No trains in time. I took the 
 car. The doctor said, Yes, it was well that I should 
 come. Some one who cares for Madame should 
 return with me. If she is to die she must not die 
 alone." 
 
 "But she shall not die!" cried Mrs. Chadwick 
 with sudden and surprising energy. "Oh, the poor 
 baby! It might have lived had I been there. No 
 doctor, no nurse, can understand like a mother. 
 And I shall be able to help with Adrienne. I must 
 go. I must go at once. Mademoiselle will see that 
 you have something to eat and drink, my poor 
 Josephine, and then you and I will return together. 
 It will not take me a moment to get ready." 
 
 "It will be the best thing for them all," Old- 
 meadow murmured to Mrs. Averil, as, taking Jo 
 sephine s arm, Mrs. Chadwick hurried her along 
 the path. "And I ll go with them." 
 
 A little later, while Mrs. Chadwick made ready 
 above and Josephine, in the hall, ate .the meal that 
 Johnson had brought for her, Oldmeadow and Nancy 
 stood outside near the empty waiting car. 
 
 "I ll wire to you at once, of course, how she is," 
 he said. Adrienne had put Meg out of all their
 
 176 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 thoughts. "But it s rather grotesque," he added, "if 
 poor Barney is to be blamed." 
 
 Nancy stood and looked before her, wrapped, as 
 she had been the day before, in her woollen scarf. 
 "Roger," she said after a moment, "no one can be 
 blamed; yet, if she dies, I shall feel that we have 
 killed her." 
 
 "Killed her! What nonsense, my dear! What do 
 you mean?" He spoke angrily because something 
 in his heart, shaken by his dream, echoed her. The 
 dreaming had now revealed itself as definitely un 
 canny. What had he to do with Adrienne Toner that 
 his sub-consciousness should be aware of her ex 
 tremity? 
 
 "I can t explain," said Nancy. "We couldn t 
 help it. It s even all her fault. But she never asked 
 to come to us. She never sought us out. She had 
 her life and we had ours. It was we who sought her 
 and drew her in and worshipped her. She never hid 
 what she was; never in the least little way. It was 
 for what she was, because she was so different and 
 believed so in herself, that Barney loved her. And 
 now because she has gone on believing in herself, 
 we have struck her down." 
 
 The rooks were cawing overhead and Oldmeadow 
 was remembering his dream of a year ago, how Ad 
 rienne had come to him along the terrace saying, as 
 she lifted her hand: "I can hear them, too." They 
 had drawn her in. Yet she had loved their life. She 
 had wanted to understand it and to be part of it. 
 He wished he could get the pale, streaked, drowning 
 face out of his mind. " It s generous of you, my dear 
 child," he said, "to say we. You mean you. If 
 anyone struck her down it was I."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 177 
 
 "You spoke for us all, Roger. And you only 
 spoke for us. You were always outside. I count my 
 self with them. I can t separate myself from them. 
 I received her love with them all." 
 
 "Did you?" he looked at her. "I don t think so, 
 Nancy." 
 
 Nancy did not pretend not to understand. "I 
 know," she said. " But I m part of it. And she tried 
 to love me."
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 OLDMEADOW sat in Barney s study, Mrs. Chadwick 
 beside him. It was Tuesday and the only news of 
 Barney had been a letter to his mother, from Paris, 
 where he had not found Meg, and two wires from 
 the South of France, one to Oldmeadow and one to 
 his wife, saying that he had found Meg and was re 
 turning alone. He had not, it was evident, received 
 the doctor s messages. 
 
 Oldmeadow had not seen his old friend since the 
 Sunday night when he had left her and Josephine 
 in Connaught Square, and in his first glance at her 
 this morning he saw that for her, too, Adrienne s 
 peril had actually effaced Meg s predicament. It 
 had done more. Faint and feeble as she must be, 
 scarcely able to take possession of her returning life 
 and, as Mrs. Chadwick told him, not yet out of 
 danger, Adrienne had already drawn her mother- 
 in-law back into the circle of her influence. 
 
 "You see, Roger," she said, sitting there on the 
 absurdly incongruous background of the Post Im 
 pressionist pictures and tightly squeezing her hand 
 kerchief first in one hand and then in the other, 
 "You see, when one is with her one has to trust her. 
 I don t know why it is, but almost at once I felt all 
 my bitterness against her die quite away. I knew, 
 whatever she had done, that she believed it to be 
 right; to be really best for Meg, you know. And oh, 
 Roger, Barney has hurt her so terribly! She can t 
 speak of him without crying. I never saw her cry 
 before. I never imagined Adrienne crying. She
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 179 
 
 feels, she can t help feeling, that it is because of that 
 they have lost their baby." 
 
 Oldmeadow ordered with difficulty his astonished 
 and indignant thoughts. "That is absolutely unfair 
 to Barney," he said. "I was with them. No one 
 could have been gentler or more patient." 
 
 " I know you were with them. It would seem like 
 that to you, Roger, because you are a man and men 
 still think of women as a sort of chattel. That s how 
 it looks to Adrienne. So much more independence, 
 you know, than we ever had. Oh, I don t say it s 
 a good thing! I feel that we are weaker and need 
 guidance." 
 
 "Chattels? Where do chattels come in here? 
 She said that to you. Barney merely pleaded with 
 her so that he could do what you wanted him to do." 
 
 "I know I know, Roger. Don t get angry. 
 But if I had been here and seen her I should have 
 known that he must not go. I should have seen that 
 she was in danger. A woman would have understood. 
 No; you didn t treat Adrienne like a chattel; no one 
 could treat Adrienne like one. It was poor little 
 Meg I meant. I see now how wrong it was to think 
 of taking her from the man she loves; when she has 
 gone, you know, so that everyone must know and 
 there can be no good in it. And they probably have 
 bought a wedding-ring. Oh, Roger, she does comfort 
 me about Meg. She makes me feel the deeper 
 things, the things conventions blind us to. She 
 makes me feel that the great thing, the only thing, 
 is to follow one s own light and that Meg did do 
 that. And after all, you know, Roger, Jowett had 
 George Eliot and Lewes to breakfast and they were 
 never married,"
 
 i8o ADR1ENNE TONER 
 
 "Ha! ha! ha!" Oldmeadow laughed. He could 
 not repress his bitter mirth. "Follow your light if 
 there s breakfast with a clergyman at the end of it!" 
 he cruelly suggested. Yet he was too much amused, 
 while so incensed, for there to be much cruelty, and 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick, gazing at him as if from under her 
 twisted straw, murmured: "He was a sort of clergy 
 man, Roger; and if people do what seems to them 
 right, why should they be punished?" 
 
 He saw it all. He heard it all, in her echoes. The 
 potent influence had been poured through her, all 
 the more irresistible for the appeal of Adrienne s 
 peril. Adrienne, bereaved and dying; yet magnani 
 mous, gentle and assured; always assured. How 
 could Mrs. Chadwick s feathers and wedding-rings 
 stand a chance against her? They had been swept 
 away, or nearly away, and what Nancy had seen as 
 a possible hope was now an accomplished fact. Mrs. 
 Chadwick had been brought to feel about Meg as 
 Adrienne felt about her, and Oldmeadow, for his 
 part, was not sure that the game was worth the 
 candle. There was something more than absurd 
 in his poor friend s attempts to adjust herself to the 
 new standards. They were pitiable and even a little 
 unseemly. She began presently softly to weep. 
 "Such a pretty baby it was, Roger. A lovely little 
 creature that was the first thing she said to me 
 
 - Oh, Mother Nell, it was such a pretty baby. 
 And all that she said this morning when it was 
 taken away was: I wish Barney could have been 
 in time to see our baby. Oh, it is terrible, terrible, 
 Roger, that he is not here ! Her heart is broken by 
 it. How can she ever forget that he left her alone at 
 such a time. And she begged him not to go. She 
 told me that she almost knelt to him."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 181 
 
 The tears, irrepressibly, had risen to Oldmeadow s 
 eyes; but as Mrs. Chadwick s sentence meandered 
 on, his thoughts were roughly jolted from their pity. 
 "But I tell you that that is absolutely unfair!" he 
 repeated, fixing his glass to look his protest the more 
 firmly at her. "I tell you that I was there and saw 
 it all. It wasn t for the baby. She was thinking of 
 the baby as little as Barney was; less than he was. 
 What she was thinking of was her power over Bar 
 ney. She was determined that she should not seem 
 to be put in the wrong by his going." 
 
 Like the March Hare Mrs. Chad wick was wild 
 yet imperturbable. "Of course she was determined. 
 How could she be anything else? It did put her in 
 the wrong. And it put Meg in the wrong. That s 
 where we were so blind. Oh, I blame myself as 
 much as anybody. But Barney is her husband ; and 
 he was with her and should have seen and felt. How 
 could she beg him to stay for her danger when he 
 would not stay for her love?" 
 
 Yes; Adrienne had her very firmly. She had even 
 imparted to her, when it came to the issue, some 
 thing of coherency. She was building up, in Bar 
 ney s absence, strange ramparts against him. Barney 
 had dragged her in the dust and there she intended 
 to drag him. Wasn t that it? Oldmeadow asked 
 himself as he eyed his altered friend, muttering 
 finally: "I m every bit as responsible as Barney, if 
 it comes to that. I upheld him, completely, in his 
 decision. I do still. Adrienne may turn you all up 
 side down; but she won t turn me; and I hope she 
 won t turn Barney." 
 
 "I think, Roger, that you might at all events re 
 member that she s not out of danger," said Mrs.
 
 1 82 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Chadwick. She may die yet and give you no more 
 trouble. You have never cared for her; I know that, 
 and so does she; and I do think it s unfeeling of you 
 to speak as you do when she s lying there above us. 
 And she looks so lovely in bed," Mrs. Chadwick be 
 gan to weep again. "I never saw such thick braids; 
 like Marguerite in Faust. Her hands on the sheets 
 so thin and white and her eyes enormous. I don t 
 think even you could have the heart to jibe and 
 laugh if you saw her." 
 
 "I didn t laugh at Adrienne, you know," Old- 
 meadow reminded her, rising and buttoning his 
 overcoat. "I laughed at you and Jowett. No; Ad 
 rienne is no laughing matter. But she won t die. I 
 can assure you of that now. She s too much life in 
 her to die. And though I m very sorry for her 
 difficult as you may find it to believe I shall re 
 serve my pity for Barney." 
 
 Barney needed all his pity and the sight of him 
 on the following Sunday evening, as he appeared on 
 his threshold, would have exorcised for Oldmeadow, 
 if Mrs. Chadwick had not already done so, the mem 
 ory of the pale, drowning face. He looked like a dog 
 that has been beaten for a fault it cannot recognize. 
 There was bewilderment in his eyes and acceptance, 
 and a watchful humility. To see them there made 
 Oldmeadow angry. 
 
 Barney had sent a line to say that he was back; 
 but his friend had been prepared not to see him. 
 Once engulfed in the house of mourning it was but 
 too likely that he would not emerge for many days. 
 And besides, what would Barney have to say to him 
 now? But here he was, with his hollow eyes and 
 faded cheeks, and it was with an echo of his old boy-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 183 
 
 ish manner of dropping in when beset by some per 
 plexity that, without speaking, he crossed the room 
 and sank on the sofa by the fireplace. But he had 
 not come to seek counsel or sustainment. Old- 
 meadow saw that, as, after he had offered cigarettes, 
 which Barney refused, and lighted his own pipe, he 
 walked to and fro and watched him while Barney 
 watched the flames. He had not come with a pur 
 pose at all. It was, again, precisely like the unhappy 
 dog who wanders forth aimlessly, guided merely by 
 a dim yearning towards warmth and kindliness. 
 Barney had come where he would be understood. 
 But it was not because he believed himself to be mis 
 understood that he came. 
 
 "I went to Cold brooks, first, you know," he said 
 presently, and with an effect of irrelevance. "I 
 thought I d find Mother there. So it was only on 
 that Thursday night I got back here. None of the 
 wires caught me." 
 
 "I know," said Oldmeadow. "It was most un 
 fortunate. But you couldn t have got back sooner, 
 could you, once you d gone on from Paris." 
 
 "Not possibly. I went on from Paris that very 
 night, you see. I caught the night express to the 
 Riviera. They d left Cannes as an address, but 
 when I got there I found they d moved on to San 
 Remo. It was Tuesday before I found them. My 
 one idea was to find them as soon as possible, of 
 course. No; I suppose it couldn t be helped; once 
 I d gone." 
 
 "And it was quite useless? You d no chance with 
 Meg at all?" 
 
 " None whatever. Quite useless. Never was such 
 a wild-goose chase. It was exactly as Adrienne had 
 said."
 
 1 84 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "Still it couldn t have been foreseen so securely 
 by anyone but Adrienne. Many girls would have 
 jumped at the chance." 
 
 "Not if they d had Adrienne to help them. We 
 might have realized that. That s what armed Meg. 
 I heard Adrienne in everything she said. Even 
 Mother thinks Adrienne was right, now, you know, 
 Roger. And it was all for Mother, wasn t it? that 
 I went. That makes it all so particularly ironic. 
 Only dear Mummy was never very strong at logic. 
 She takes the line now that we re narrow-minded 
 conventionalists, you and I, for thinking that a 
 girl oughtn t to go off with a married man. I can t 
 feel that, you know, Roger," said Barney in his 
 listless tone. " I can t help feeling that Meg has 
 done something shameful. You ought to have seen 
 her ! Positively smug ! sitting there with that ass of 
 a fellow in that damned Riviera hotel! I had the 
 horridest feeling, too, that Meg had brought him 
 rather than he her. I don t mean he doesn t care 
 for her he does; I ll say that for him. He s a stu 
 pid fellow, but honest; and he came outside and 
 tried to tell me what he felt and how it would be all 
 right and that he was going to devote his life to her. 
 But I think he feels pretty sick, really. While Meg 
 treated me as if I were a silly little boy. If anyone 
 can carry the thing through, Meg will." 
 
 "It won t prove her right because she carries it 
 through, you know," Oldmeadow observed. 
 
 "No," said Barney, "but it will make us seem 
 more wrong. Not that you have any responsibility 
 in it, dear old boy. I did what I felt I must do and 
 mine was the mistake. It s not only Mother who 
 thinks I ve wronged Adrienne," he went on after a
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 185 
 
 moment, lifting his arms as though he felt a weight 
 upon them and clasping them behind his head. 
 " Even Nancy, though she was so sorry for me, made 
 me feel that I d done something very dreadful." 
 
 "Nancy? How did you come to see Nancy?" 
 
 "Why, at Coldbrooks. She s still there with 
 Aunt Monica. That was just it. It was my going 
 there first, seeing her first, that upset her so. She 
 couldn t understand, till I could explain, how it 
 came about. She was thinking of Adrienne, you see. 
 And I, knowing nothing, had been thinking of 
 Mother all the time. It was too late, then, to go 
 back at once. The next train wasn t for three hours. 
 So I had to stay." 
 
 "And it was Nancy who had to tell you every 
 thing?" 
 
 "Yes; Nancy," said Barney, staring at the ceiling. 
 There was a note, now, of control in his voice and 
 Oldmeadow knew that if he had said no word of 
 what must be foremost in both their thoughts it was 
 because he could not trust himself to speak of it. 
 And he went on quickly, taking refuge from his in 
 vading emotion, "Aunt Monica wasn t there. I 
 didn t even see Johnson. I went right through the 
 house and into the garden and there was Nancy, 
 planting something in the border. Everything 
 looked so natural. I just went up to her and said 
 Hello, Nancy, and then, when she looked up at 
 me, I thought she was going to faint. Poor little 
 Nancy. I knew something terrible had happened 
 from the way she looked at me." 
 
 "Poor little Nancy. But I m glad it was she who 
 told you, Barney." 
 
 "No one could have been sweeter," said Barney,
 
 i86 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 talking on quickly. "She kept saying, Oh, you 
 oughtn t to be here, Barney. You oughtn t to be 
 here. But no one could have been sweeter. We sat 
 down on the old bench, you know, and she told me. 
 That Adrienne had nearly died. That the baby was 
 dead. I could hardly believe her, at first. I stared at 
 her, I know, and I kept saying, What do you mean, 
 Nancy? what do you mean? And she began to 
 cry and I cried, too. Men do feel, Roger, all the 
 same, even though they haven t the mother s claim 
 to feel. I thought about our baby so much. I loved 
 it, too. And now to think it s dead ; and that I 
 never saw it; and that it s my fault" -his voice 
 had shaken more and more; he had put his hand 
 before his eyes, and, then, suddenly, he leaned for 
 ward and buried his head on the arm of the sofa. 
 
 "My poor Barney! My dear boy!" Oldmeadow 
 muttered. He came and sat down beside him; he 
 laid his arm around his shoulders. "It s not your 
 fault," he said. 
 
 "Oh, don t say that, Roger!" sobbed Barney. 
 "It s no good trying to comfort me. I ve broken 
 her heart. She doesn t say so. She s too angelic to 
 say it ; but she lies there and looks it. My poor dar 
 ling! My poor, courageous darling; what she has 
 been through! It can t be helped. I must face it. 
 I m her husband. I ought to have understood. She 
 supplicated me, and I rejected her, and the child is 
 dead." 
 
 "The child s death is a calamity for which no one 
 can be held responsible unless it is Adrienne her 
 self," said Oldmeadow. While Barney sobbed he 
 was thinking intently, for this was a turning-point 
 in Barney s destiny. He would remain in subjuga-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 187 
 
 tion to Adrienne s conception of the wrong done her 
 or he must be enabled to regain the sense of inno 
 cence to which he had every right. "She forced the 
 situation on you. She chose to break rather than 
 bend," he said. "Listen to me, Barney. I don t 
 speak in any enmity to your wife ; but listen to me 
 and try to think it out. Don t you remember how 
 you once said that your marriage couldn t be a mis 
 take if you were able to see the defects as well as the 
 beauty of the woman you love. Don t you remem 
 ber that you said she d have to learn a little from 
 you for the much you d have to learn from her. 
 Nothing more reassured me than what you said that 
 night. And I was reassured the other day by your 
 firmness. It implies no disloyalty in you to see the 
 defects now. It was power over you she wanted the 
 other day and to see herself put in the right, before 
 me ; and to see me worsted, before you. You know it, 
 Barney ; you know it in your heart. And she knows 
 it too. There was no failure of love in what you 
 said. There was only failure of homage. You were 
 right in opposing her. She was wrong in the issue 
 she made. She was wrong from the first of the mis 
 erable affair in having concealed it from you. If 
 you d stayed behind as she wanted you to do, you d 
 have shown yourself a weakling and she d have been 
 further than ever from knowing herself in error. There 
 is the truth ; and the sooner you see it, the sooner she 
 will." 
 
 For some time after his friend had ended, Barney 
 lay silent, his face still hidden. But his sobs had 
 ceased. And his silence, at last, grew too long for 
 any disclaimer to be possible to him. He had been 
 Brought, Oldmeadow knew it from the very rhythm
 
 188 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 of his breathing, to the passionless contemplation 
 where alone truth is visible. And what he said at 
 last was: "She ll never see it like that." 
 
 "Oh, yes, she will," said Oldmeadow. And he re 
 membered Nancy s wisdom. "If you hold to it 
 firmly and tenderly and make her feel you love her 
 while you make her feel you think her wrong." 
 
 "She ll never see it," Barney repeated, and Old- 
 meadow now suspected, and with a deep uneasiness, 
 that Barney might be seeing further than himself. 
 "She can t." 
 
 "You mean that she s incapable of thinking her 
 self wrong?" 
 
 "Yes, incapable," said Barney. "Because all 
 she s conscious of is the wish to do right. And she is 
 right so often, she is so good and beautiful, that it 
 must be like that with her. She can break ; but she 
 can t bend." 
 
 Oldmeadow was silent for a moment and Barney, 
 on the arm of the sofa, was silent. "Of course," 
 Oldmeadow then said, "the less you say about it 
 the better. Things will take their place gradually." 
 
 "I ve not said anything about it," said Barney. 
 "I ve only thought of comforting and cherishing 
 her. But it s not enough. I ll never say anything; 
 but she ll know I m keeping something back. She 
 knows it already. I see that now. And I didn t 
 know it till you put it to me." 
 
 "She ll have to accept it; or to live with it un 
 accepted, then. You can t consider yourself a crim 
 inal to give her moral ease." 
 
 "No," said Barney after a pause. "No; I can t 
 do that. Though that s what Mummy wants me to 
 do. But I can be horribly sorry."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 189 
 
 "Horribly sorry. Let the rest sink into the un 
 spoken. When people love each other they can, I m 
 sure, live over any amount of unspoken things." 
 
 "It hasn t been unspoken between you and me, 
 though, has it, Roger?" said Barney, and he raised 
 himself and got upon his feet as he said it. "There s 
 the trouble. There s where I am wrong. For she d 
 feel it an intolerable wrong if she knew that it 
 hadn t been unspoken between you and me. And 
 she d be right. When people love each other such 
 reticences and exclusions wrong their love." 
 
 "But since you say she knows," Oldmeadow sug 
 gested after another moment. 
 
 Barney stood staring out of the twilight window. 
 
 "She doesn t know that I tell you," he said. 
 
 You ve told me nothing," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 "Well, she doesn t know what I listen to, then," 
 said Barney. 
 
 Oldmeadow was again conscious of the deep un 
 easiness. "It s quite true I ve no call to meddle in 
 your affairs," he said. "The essential thing is that 
 you love each other. Let rights and wrongs go 
 hang." 
 
 "You haven t meddled, Roger." Barney moved 
 towards the door. "You ve been in my affairs, and 
 haven t been allowed to keep out. Yes. We love 
 each other. But rights and wrongs never go hang 
 with Adrienne."
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 OLDMEADOW did not see Barney again for some 
 months. He met Eleanor Chadwick towards the 
 end of April, in the park, he on his way to Mrs. 
 Aldesey s, she, apparently, satisfying her country 
 appetite for exercise, since she seemed to be walking 
 fast and at random. He almost thought for a mo 
 ment that she was going to pretend not to see him 
 and hurry down a path that led away from his; but 
 his resolute eye perhaps checked the impulse. She 
 faltered and then came forward, holding out her 
 hand and looking rather wildly about her, and she 
 said that London was really suffocating, wasn t it? 
 
 "You ve been here for so long, haven t you," 
 said Oldmeadow. "Or have you been here all this 
 time? I ve had no news of any of you, you see." 
 
 " It s all been such a troubled, busy time, Roger," 
 said Mrs. Chadwick. "Yes, I ve been here ever 
 since. But, thank goodness, the doctors say she 
 may be moved now, and she and I and Barney are 
 going down to Devonshire next week. To Torquay. 
 Such a dismal place, I think; but perhaps that s be 
 cause so many of my relations have died there. I 
 never have liked that red Devonshire soil. But the 
 primroses will be out. That makes up a little." 
 
 "I m glad that Mrs. Barney is better. When 
 will you all be back at Coldbrooks?" 
 
 "In June, I hope. Yes; she is better. But so 
 feeble, still ; so frail. And quite, quite changed from 
 her old bright self. It s all very depressing, Roger. 
 Very depressing and wearing," said Mrs. Chadwick,
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 191 
 
 opening her eyes very wide and staring before her 
 in a way characteristic of her when she repressed 
 tears. "Sometimes I hardly know how to keep up 
 at all. For nothing cheers her. And Barney isn t 
 really much help. He has very little power of fight 
 ing against depression." 
 
 " You ve all been too much shut up with each 
 other, I m afraid." 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick still held her eyes widely opened. 
 
 "I don t think it s that, Roger. Being alone 
 wouldn t have helped us to be happier, after what s 
 happened." 
 
 Being with other people might. You must get 
 back to Coldbrooks as soon as possible and see 
 Nancy and Mrs. Averil and your neighbours. That 
 will help to change the current of your thoughts." 
 
 "People don t forget so easily as that, Roger," 
 Mrs. Chadwick murmured, and it was now with 
 severity, as though she suspected him of triviality. 
 "When something terrible has happened to people 
 they are in the current and Nancy and the neigh 
 bours are not going to change it. Poor Nancy; she 
 feels it all as much as we do, I m sure." 
 
 And that Mrs. Chadwick thought of him as un 
 feeling he saw. She thought of him, too, with Bar 
 ney, as criminal ; as responsible for the catastrophe. 
 The old phrase of presage floated back into his 
 mind: "She ll spoil things." She had spoiled, for 
 ever perhaps, this deepest, dearest relation of his 
 life. What was Coldbrooks to become to him with 
 Adrienne Toner in possession? He said, and he was 
 unable to keep a certain dryness that must sound 
 like lightness, from his voice: "You are in it but 
 you needn t keep your heads under it, you know.
 
 192 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 That s what people tend to do when they shut them 
 selves up with their misfortunes. You and Barney 
 and Mrs. Barney, I suspect, are engaged in drown 
 ing each other. If one of you puts their head up the 
 others pull it down." 
 
 41 1 suppose you mean Adrienne does," said Mrs. 
 Chadwick. He had not meant it at all ; but now he 
 felt sure that so, exactly, did it happen. Poor Mrs. 
 Chadwick left to herself would have drifted to the 
 shore by this time and Barney, at all events, would 
 be swimming with his head up ; it was Adrienne, of 
 course, that kept them suffocating under the sur 
 face. "Well, I think it a pity you three should go 
 off to Torquay alone," he evaded. "What s hap 
 pening to the farm all this time?" 
 
 "Nancy is seeing to it for Barney," said Mrs. 
 Chadwick. "She understands those things so well. 
 Barney would not dream of letting the farm come 
 between him and Adrienne at a time like this. He 
 wants to be with her of course." 
 
 "Of course. All I mean is that I wish he could be 
 with her at Cold brooks. I suppose the doctor 
 knows what s best, however." 
 
 "I m glad to hear you own that anybody can 
 know what s best Roger, except yourself," said 
 Mrs. Chadwick with her singularly unprovocative 
 severity. "Of course she must go to the sea and of 
 course Barney and I must be with her. She has two 
 excellent nurses; but I would never trust the best 
 nurse for certain things. I remember so well when 
 I was ill myself once and saw the nurse behind a 
 screen, eating raspberry jam out of the pot with her 
 finger. You can t trust anybody, really." And that 
 was all he got out of Eleanor Chadwick. Adrienne 
 had spoiled things.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 193 
 
 It was in June that he heard from Mrs. Averil 
 that she and Nancy were in London for a few days 
 staying with an old aunt in Eccleston Square. Mrs. 
 Averil asked him to come to tea and he asked her 
 and Nancy to do a play with him ; but before these 
 meetings took place he saw them both. It was at 
 a Queen s Hall concert on Sunday afternoon that 
 Mrs. Aldesey called his attention to his friends and, 
 to his surprise, Oldmeadow saw that Barney was 
 with them. They sat across the gangway at some 
 little distance and his first impression of the three 
 was that they were not happy. 
 
 "Did you know he was in town?" asked Mrs. 
 Aldesey. "How ill he looks. I suppose he was 
 frightfully upset about the baby, poor fellow." 
 
 Mrs. Aldesey knew nothing of the catastrophes 
 that had followed the baby s death. He had in 
 stinctively avoided any reference to the latest prog 
 ress of the Juggernaut. 
 
 "She s much better now, you know," he said, and 
 he wasn t aware that he was exonerating Barney. 
 "And they re all back at Coldbrooks." 
 
 "She s not at Coldbrooks," said Mrs. Aldesey. 
 "She s well enough to pay visits and Lady Lumley 
 told me she was coming down to them for this week 
 end. I wonder he hasn t gone with her." 
 
 Oldmeadow was wondering too. There was some 
 thing about Barney s attitude as he sat there beside 
 his cousin, silent and absent-minded it seemed, lis 
 tening as little to the music as he looked little at her, 
 that he would rather Lydia Aldesey had not been 
 there to observe. They had a curiously marital ap 
 pearance, the young couple, or, rather, Barney had ; 
 the air of being safe with some one with whom no
 
 194 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 explanations were needed and for whom no appear 
 ances must be kept up ; some one, even, with whom 
 he was so identified that he was hardly conscious 
 of her. Nancy was not so unconscious. Once, when 
 Barney leaned over to look at the programme, she 
 drew away a little ; and Oldmeadow even fancied a 
 slight constraint in her glance when, now and then, 
 he spoke to her. Had Adrienne spoiled things there, 
 too? Mrs. Averil next day, in Eccleston Square, 
 enlightened him as to Barney s presence. "It s 
 been most unfortunate. He had planned to come up 
 to this concert for a long time. He wanted Nancy 
 to hear the Cesar Franck with him. And then it 
 appeared that Adrienne had made an engagement 
 for them with the Lumleys. He refused to go, I m 
 afraid, and she made an issue of it and, from what 
 poor Eleanor told me, there was rather a row. So 
 Adrienne has gone off alone and Barney is here till 
 this evening. He s gone out now with Nancy to 
 show her some pictures by a friend of his. It had all 
 been arranged. So what were we to do about it, 
 Roger?" 
 
 "Do about it? Why just what you have done. 
 Why shouldn t she go with him?" 
 
 "Why indeed? Except that Adrienne has made 
 the issue. It s awkward, of course, when you know 
 there s been a row, to go on as if nothing had hap 
 pened." 
 
 Oldmeadow meditated. His friend s little face 
 had been pinched by the family s distress when he 
 had last seen it; it was clouded now by a closer, a 
 more personal perplexity. " I suppose she made the 
 issue on purpose so that Barney shouldn t come 
 up," he said at length.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 195 
 
 "I really don t know. Perhaps it had been ar 
 ranged first with the Lumleys. If it was to keep 
 him from coming, that didn t come out. She 
 wouldn t let it come out; not into the open; of 
 course." 
 
 "So things are going very badly. I d imagined, 
 with all Barney s contrition, that they might have 
 worked out well." 
 
 "They ve worked out as badly, I m afraid, as 
 they could. He was full of contrition. He was as 
 devoted as possible, when they came back in May. 
 But nothing altered her unflagging melancholy. 
 And I suppose what happened was that he got tired. 
 Barney was always like that, from the time he was 
 in the nursery. He d go on being patient and good- 
 tempered until, suddenly, everything would break 
 down and he would sulk for days. It s when he s 
 pushed too far. And she has pushed him too far. 
 She s set them all against him." 
 
 "Who is them?" Oldmeadow asked. "I saw, 
 when we met in London, that Mrs. Chadwick actu 
 ally had been brought to look upon Barney as a sort 
 of miscreant and Adrienne as a martyr. Who else 
 is there?" 
 
 "Well, no one else except Palgrave and Barbara. 
 Palgrave can be very exasperating, as you know, 
 and he takes the attitude now that Barney has 
 done Adrienne an irreparable injury. As you may 
 imagine it isn t a pleasant life Barney leads among 
 them all." 
 
 "I see," said Oldmeadow. "I think I see it all. 
 What happens now is that Barney more and more 
 takes refuge with you and Nancy, and Adrienne 
 more and more can t bear it."
 
 196 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "That is precisely it, Roger," said Mrs. Averil. 
 "And what are we to do? How can I shut my door 
 against Barney? Yet it is troubling me more than 
 I can say. We are forced to seem on his side and 
 against her. And Adrienne has her eye upon them." 
 
 "Let her keep it on them," said Oldmeadow in 
 strong indignation. "And much good may it do her ! " 
 
 "Oh, it won t do her any good nor us!" said 
 Mrs. Averil. "She s sick with jealousy, Roger. 
 Sick. I m almost sorry for her when I see it and see 
 her trying to hide it, and see it always, coming in by 
 the back door when she shuts the front door on it - 
 as it always does, you know. And Nancy sees it, of 
 course; and is quite as sick as she is; and Barney, of 
 course, remains as blind as a bat." 
 
 "Well, as long as he remains blind 
 
 "Yes. As long as he does. But Adrienne will 
 make him see. She ll pick and pull at their friend 
 ship until Nancy will be forced into drawing back, 
 and if she draws back Barney will see. What it s 
 already come to is that she has to stand still, and 
 smile, while Adrienne scratches her, lest Barney 
 should see she s scratched ; and once or twice of late 
 I ve had a suspicion that he has seen. It doesn t en 
 dear Nancy to Adrienne that Barney should scowl 
 at her when he s caught her scratching. 
 
 "What kind of scratches?" Oldmeadow asked, 
 but Mrs. Averil had only time to say, "Oh, all 
 kinds; she s wonderful at scratches," when the door 
 bell rang and Nancy, a moment after, came in. 
 
 Nancy, if anything so fresh and neat could be 
 so called, was looking rather dowdy, and he sus 
 pected that some self-effacing motive lay behind 
 her choice of clothes.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 197 
 
 "Oh, Roger, Barney was so sorry to have to miss 
 you," she said. And, at all events, whatever else 
 Adrienne had spoiled, she had not spoiled Nancy s 
 loving smile for him. "He had to catch the 4.45 to 
 Coldbrooks, you know. There s a prize heifer ar 
 riving this evening and he must be there to welcome 
 it. You must see his herd of Holsteins, Roger." 
 Friesians were, at that date, still Holsteins. 
 
 "I d like to," said Oldmeadow. "But I don t 
 know when I shall, for, to tell you the truth, I ve 
 not been asked to Coldbrooks this summer. The 
 first time since I ve known them." 
 
 Nancy looked at him in silence. 
 
 "You ll come to us, of course," said Mrs. Averil. 
 
 "Do you really think I d better, all things con 
 sidered ?" Oldmeadow asked. 
 
 "Why, of course you d better. What possible 
 reasons could there be for your not coming, except 
 ones we don t accept?" 
 
 " It won t seem to range us too much in a hostile 
 camp?" 
 
 "Not more than we re ranged already. Nancy 
 and I are not going to give you up, my dear Roger, 
 because Adrienne considers herself a martyr." 
 
 "I hope not, indeed. But it makes my exclusion 
 from Coldbrooks more marked, perhaps, if I go to 
 you. I imagine, though I am so much in her black 
 books, that poor Mrs. Chadwick doesn t want my 
 exclusion to be marked." 
 
 "You re quite right there. You are in her black 
 books; but she doesn t want it marked; she d like 
 to have you, really, if Adrienne weren t there and if 
 she didn t feel shy And I really think it will make 
 it easier for her if you come to us instead. It will
 
 198 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 tide it over a little. She ll be almost able to feel you 
 are with them. After all, you do come to us, often." 
 
 "And I ll go up with you to Coldbrooks as if 
 nothing had happened? I confess I have a curiosity 
 to see how Mrs. Barney takes me." 
 
 "She s very good at taking things, you know," 
 said Nancy. 
 
 Mrs. Averil cast a glance upon him. "It may be 
 really something of a relief to their minds, Roger," 
 she said, "if you turn up as if nothing had happened. 
 They are in need of distractions. They are all dread 
 fully on edge, though they won t own to it, about 
 Meg. The case is coming on quite soon now. Mrs. 
 Hayward has lost no time, and poor Eleanor only 
 keeps up because Adrienne is there to hold her up." 
 
 "Where is Meg? Do they hear from her?" 
 
 "They hear from her constantly. She s still on 
 the Continent. She writes very easily and confi 
 dently. I can t help imagining, all the same, that 
 Adrienne is holding her up, too. She s written to 
 Nancy and Nancy hasn t shown me her letters." 
 
 "There is nothing to hide, Mother," said Nancy, 
 and Oldmeadow had never seen her look so de 
 jected. "Nothing at all, except that she s not as 
 easy and confident as she wants to appear. Ad 
 rienne does hold her up. Poor Meg."
 
 THE picture of Adrienne holding them up was 
 spread before Oldmeadow s eyes on the hot July 
 day when Mrs. Averil drove him up from the Little 
 House to Coldbrooks. The shade of the great lime- 
 tree on the lawn was like a canvas, only old Johnson, 
 as he moved to and fro with tea-table, silver and 
 strawberries, stepping from its cool green atmos 
 phere into the framing sunshine. The Chadwick 
 family, seated or lying in the shade, were all nearly 
 as still as in a picture, and Adrienne was its centre. 
 She sat in a high-backed wicker chair, her hands 
 lying listlessly in her lap, a scarf about her shoul 
 ders, and in her black-veiled white, her wide, trans 
 parent hat, she was like a clouded moon. There was 
 something even of daring, to Oldmeadow s imagi 
 nation, in their approach across the sunny spaces. 
 Her eyes had so rested upon them from the moment 
 that they had driven up, that they might have been 
 bold wayfarers challenging the magic of a Circe in 
 her web. Palgrave, in his white flannels, lay 
 stretched at her feet, and he had been reading aloud 
 to her; Barbara and Mrs. Chadwick sat listening 
 while they worked on either hand. Only Barney 
 was removed, sitting at some little distance, his 
 back half turned, a pipe between his teeth and his 
 eyes on a magazine that lay upon his knee. But 
 the influence, the magic, was upon him too. He was 
 consciously removed. 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick sprang up to greet them. "This 
 is nice!" she cried, and her knitting trailed behind
 
 200 ADR1ENNE TONER 
 
 her as she came so that Barbara, laughing, stooped 
 to catch and pick it up as she followed her; "I was 
 expecting you ! How nice and dear of you ! On this 
 hot day! I always think the very fishes must feel 
 warm on a day like this! Or could they, do you 
 think? Dear Roger!" There was an evident al 
 tering in Mrs. Chadwick s manner towards him 
 since the meeting in the Park. She was, with all her 
 fluster, manifestly glad to see him. 
 
 Palgrave had hoisted himself to his feet and now 
 stood beside Adrienne, eyeing them as a faithful 
 hound eyes suspicious visitors. - 
 
 "Isn t it lovely in the shade," Mrs. Chadwick 
 continued, drawing them into it. "Adrienne darl 
 ing, Aunt Monica after all. And we were afraid the 
 heat might keep you away. I suppose the hill was 
 very hot, Monica?" Adrienne was still, apparently, 
 something of an invalid, for she did not rise to greet 
 them. Neither did she speak as she held out her 
 hand to each of them in turn, and while an envelop 
 ing smile dwelt fondly on Mrs. Averil, she made no 
 attempt to smile at Oldmeadow. 
 
 He found himself observing her with a sort of 
 wonder. All the flaws and deformities of her mater 
 nity had fallen from her and she had the appearance 
 almost of beauty. Yet he had never so little liked 
 her face. Her dimly patterned features made him 
 think of a Chinese picture he had once seen where, 
 on a moth- wing background, pale chrysanthemums, 
 mauvy-pink, a disk of carved jade with cord and 
 tassel and a narrow ivory box softly spotted with 
 darkness, conveyed in their seeming triviality an 
 impression almost sinister of impersonality and 
 magic. There was as little feeling in her face. It 
 was like a mask.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 201 
 
 "Where s Nancy?" Barney asked. He had got 
 up and joined them, giving Oldmeadow s hand, as 
 they met, a curiously lifeless shake. 
 
 "She had letters to write," said Mrs. Averil. 
 
 "Why, I thought we d arranged she was to come 
 up and walk round the farm after tea with me," 
 said Barney and as he spoke Oldmeadow noted that 
 Adrienne turned her head slowly, somewhat as she 
 had done on the ominous morning in March, and 
 rested her eyes upon him. 
 
 "Oh, I m so sorry," said Mrs. Averil cheerfully. 
 "She must have misunderstood. She had these let 
 ters to finish for the post." 
 
 Barbara was reconnoitring at the tea-table. 
 "Strawberries!" she announced. "Who said they d 
 be over? Oh, what a shame of Nancy not to come! 
 Roger, why aren t you staying here rather than 
 with Aunt Monica, I d like to know? Aren t we 
 grand enough for you since she s had that bathroom 
 put in!" Barbara had advanced to a lively flapper- 
 dom. 
 
 "You see, by this plan, I get the bath with her 
 and get you when she brings me up," Oldmeadow 
 retorted. 
 
 "And leave Nancy behind ! I call it a shame when 
 we re having the last strawberries and you may 
 have a bathroom with Aunt Monica, but her straw 
 berries are over. Letters ! Whoever heard of Nancy 
 writing letters except to you, Barney. She was 
 always writing to you when you were living in Lon 
 don before you married. And what screeds you 
 used to send her all about art! " said Barbara, and 
 that her liveliness cast a spell of silence was appar 
 ent to everyone but herself.
 
 202 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick took Oldmeadow s arm and drew 
 him aside. "You ll be able to come later and 
 be quite with us, won t you, Roger?" she said 
 "September is really a lovelier month, don t you 
 think? Adrienne is going to take Palgrave and Bar 
 bara for a motor-trip in September. Won t it be 
 lovely for them?" Mrs. Chadwick spoke with a 
 swiftness that did not veil a sense of insecurity. 
 "Barbara s never seen the Alps. They are going to 
 the Tyrol." 
 
 " If we don t have a European war by then," Old- 
 meadow suggested. "What is Barney going to do? " 
 
 "Oh, Barney is going to the Barclay s in Scot 
 land, to shoot. He loves that. A war, Roger? What 
 do you mean? All those tiresome Serbians? Why, 
 they won t go into the Tyrol, will they?" 
 
 "Perhaps not the Tyrol; but they may make it 
 difficult for other people to go there." 
 
 "Do you hear what Roger is saying?" Mrs. 
 Chadwick turned to her family. "That the Ser 
 bians may make war by September and that it 
 might interfere with the trip. But I m sure Sir Ed 
 ward will quiet them. He always does. Though he 
 is a Liberal, I ve always felt him to be such a good 
 man," said Mrs. Chadwick, "and really patriotic. 
 Simply sitting round a table with him cools their 
 heads more than one would believe possible. 
 Dreadfully violent people, I believe, killing their 
 kings and queens and throwing them out of the 
 window. I always think there s nothing in the 
 world for controlling people s tempers like getting 
 them to sit together round a table. I wonder why 
 it is. Something to do with having your legs out of 
 the way, perhaps. People don t look nearly so
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 203 
 
 threatening if their legs are hidden, do they? My 
 poor cousin, Fanny Jocelyn, used always to say that 
 if any of the clergymen in Fred s diocese got very 
 troublesome her one recipe was to ask them to 
 lunch, or, if they were very bad, to dinner. But she 
 had wonderful tact that gift, you know, for 
 seeming to care simply immensely for the person she 
 was talking to. Francis used to tell her that when 
 she looked at you as if you were the only person in 
 the world she loved she was really working out her 
 next menu." 
 
 " I m afraid if war comes it won t be restricted to 
 people, like Serbians and clergymen, who can be 
 quieted by being asked to dinner," said Oldmeadow 
 laughing. "We ll be fighting, too." 
 
 "And who will we fight?" Palgrave inquired. 
 After passing tea, he had resumed his place at Ad- 
 rienne s feet. "Who has been getting in our way 
 now?" 
 
 "Don t you read the papers?" Oldmeadow asked 
 him. 
 
 "Not when I can avoid it," said Palgrave. 
 "They ll be bellowing out the same old Jingo stuff 
 on the slightest provocation, of course. As far as I 
 can make out the Serbians are the most awful 
 brutes and Russia is egging them on. But when it 
 comes to a crime against humanity like war, every 
 one is responsible." 
 
 "Are you ready for strawberries, Aunt Monica," 
 Barbara interposed. "If there is a war, I hope we 
 may be in it so that I can do some of my first aid on 
 real people at last." 
 
 She was carrying strawberries now to Adrienne 
 who, as she leaned down, took her gently by the
 
 204 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 wrist, and said some low-toned words to her. "I 
 know, my angel. Horrid of me!" said Barbara. "But 
 one can t take war seriously, can one!" 
 
 "I can," said Mrs. Averil. "Too many of my 
 friends had their sons and husbands killed in South 
 Africa." 
 
 "And it s human nature," said Mrs. Chadwick, 
 eating her strawberries mournfully. "Like the poor: 
 whom you have always with you, you know." 
 
 "Human nature is altered already a good deal 
 more than governments imagine," said Palgrave, 
 "and they ll find themselves pretty well dished if 
 they try to bring on a capitalist war now. The 
 workers all over the world are beginning to see whose 
 the hands are that pull the strings and they ll refuse 
 to dance to their piping. They ll down weapons just 
 as they ve learned, at last, to down tools; and with 
 out them you can do nothing. That s the way hu 
 man nature will end war." 
 
 "A spirited plan, no doubt," said Oldmeadow, 
 "and effective if all the workers came to be of the 
 same mind simultaneously. But if those of one 
 country downed weapons and those of another 
 didn t, the first would get their throats cut for their 
 pains." 
 
 "It s easy to sneer," Palgrave retorted. "As a 
 matter of principle, I d rather have my throat cut 
 by a hired ruffian than kill an innocent man even 
 if he did belong to a nation that happened to be 
 cleverer and more efficient than my own. That s a 
 crime, of course, that we can t forgive." 
 
 "Don t talk such rot, Palgrave," Barney now re 
 marked in a tone of apathetic disgust. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," Palgrave sat up instantly,
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 205 
 
 flushing all over his face. "I think it s truth and 
 sanity." 
 
 "It s not truth and sanity. It s rot and stupid 
 rot," said Barney. "Some more tea, please, Bar 
 bara." 
 
 "Calling names isn t argument," said Palgrave. 
 "I could call names, too, if it came to that. It s 
 calling names that is stupid. I merely happen to be 
 lieve in what Christ said." 
 
 "Oh, but, dear Christ drove the money-lenders 
 out of the Temple very, very roughly," Mrs. Chad- 
 wick interposed with the head-long irrelevance char 
 acteristic of her in such crises. "Thongs must hurt 
 so much, mustn t they? He surely believed in pun 
 ishing people who did wrong." 
 
 "Which nation doesn t do wrong, Mummy? 
 Which nation is a Christ with a right to punish an 
 other? It s farcical. And punishing isn t killing. 
 Christ didn t kill malefactors." 
 
 "The Gadarene swine," Mrs. Chadwick mur 
 mured. "They were killed. So painfully, too, poor 
 things. I never could understand about that. I hope 
 the Higher Criticism will manage to get rid of it, for 
 it doesn t really seem kind. They had done no 
 wrong at all and I ve always been specially fond of 
 pigs myself." 
 
 "Ah, but you never saw a pig with a devil in it," 
 Oldmeadow suggested, to which Mrs. Chadwick 
 murmured, "I m sure they seem to have devils in 
 them, sometimes, poor dears, when they won t let 
 themselves be caught. Do get some more cream, 
 Barbara. It s really too hot for arguments, isn t it," 
 and Mrs. Chadwick sighed with the relief of having 
 rounded that dangerous corner.
 
 206 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Barbara went away with the cream-jug and John 
 son emerged bearing the afternoon post. 
 
 "Ah. Letters. Good." Palgrave sat up to take 
 his and Adrienne s share. "One for you, Adrienne; 
 from Meg. Now we shall see what she says about 
 meeting us in the Tyrol." His cheeks were still 
 flushed and his eyes brilliant with anger. Though 
 his words were for Adrienne his voice was for Barney, 
 at whom he did not glance. 
 
 Adrienne unfolded the foreign sheets, and held 
 them so that Palgrave, leaning against her knee, 
 could read with her. 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick had grown crimson. She looked 
 at Oldmeadow. " Dear Meg is having such an inter 
 esting time," she told him. "She and Eric are see 
 ing all manner of delightful places and picking up 
 some lovely bits of old furniture." Oldmeadow 
 bowed assent. He had his eyes on Adrienne and he 
 was wondering about Barbara. 
 
 "What news is there, dear? " Mrs. Chadwick con 
 tinued in the same badly controlled voice. Pal- 
 grave s face had clouded. 
 
 "I m afraid it may be bad news, Mother Nell," 
 said Adrienne looking up. 
 
 It was the first time Oldmeadow had heard her 
 voice that afternoon and he could hardly have be 
 lieved it the voice that had once reminded him of a 
 blue ribbon. It was still slow, still deliberate and 
 soft ; but it had now the steely thrust and intention 
 of a dagger. 
 
 " It s this accursed war talk ! " Palgrave exclaimed. 
 " Eric evidently thinks it serious and he has to come 
 home at once. What rotten luck." 
 
 Adrienne handed the sheets to Mrs. Chadwick.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 207 
 
 "It will all have blown over by September," she 
 said. "As Mother Nell says, we can trust Sir Ed 
 ward to keep us out of anything so wicked as a war. 
 I am so completely with you in all you say about the 
 wickedness of war, Paladin, although I do not see its 
 causes quite so simply, perhaps." 
 
 It was the first time that Oldmeadow had heard 
 the new name for her knight. 
 
 "For my part," said Barney, casting a glance at 
 the house, Barbara not having yet reappeared, "I 
 shall be grateful to the war if it dishes your trip to 
 the Tyrol. It s most unsuitable for Barbara." 
 
 He did not look at his wife as he spoke. His hat- 
 brim pulled down over his eyes, he sat with folded 
 arms and stared in front of him. 
 
 "You find it unsuitable for one sister to meet 
 another?" Adrienne inquired. Her eyes were on 
 Barney, but Oldmeadow could not interpret their 
 gaze. 
 
 "Most unsuitable, to use no stronger word," 
 said Barney, "while one sister is living with a man 
 whose name she doesn t bear." 
 
 "You mean to say," said Palgrave, sitting cross- 
 legged at Adrienne s feet and grasping his ankles 
 with both hands, "that Meg, until she s legally 
 married, isn t fit for her little sister to associate 
 with?" 
 
 "Just what I do mean, Palgrave. Precisely what 
 I do mean," said Barney, and his face, reddening, 
 took on its rare but characteristic expression of 
 sullen anger. "And I ll thank you in my house, 
 after all to keep out of an argument that doesn t 
 concern you." 
 
 "Barney; Palgrave," murmured Mrs. Chadwick
 
 208 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 supplicatingly. Adrienne, not moving her eyes from 
 her husband s face, laid her hand on Palgrave s 
 shoulder. 
 
 "It does concern me," said Palgrave, and he put 
 up his hand and grasped Adrienne s. "Barbara s 
 well-being concerns me as much as it does you ; and 
 your wife s happiness concerns me a good deal more. 
 I can promise you that I wouldn t trouble your hos 
 pitality for another day if it weren t for her and 
 Mother. It s perfectly open to you, of course, to 
 turn me out of my home whenever you like to make 
 use of your legal privilege. But until I m turned out 
 I stay for their sakes." 
 
 "You young ass! You unmitigated young ass!" 
 Barney snarled, springing to his feet. "All right, 
 Mother. Don t bother. I ll leave you to your pro 
 tector for the present. I only wish he were young 
 enough to be given what he needs a thorough 
 good hiding. I ll go down and see Nancy. Don t 
 expect me back to dinner." 
 
 "Nancy is busy, my dear," poor Mrs. Averil, 
 deeply flushing, interposed, while Palgrave, under 
 his breath, yet audibly, murmured: "Truly Kip- 
 lingesque! Home and Hidings! Our Colonial his 
 tory summed up!" 
 
 "She would be here if she weren t busy," said 
 Mrs. Averil. 
 
 "I won t bother her," said Barney. "I ll sit in 
 the garden and read. It s more peaceful than being 
 here." 
 
 " Please tell. dear Nancy that it s ten days at least 
 since I ve seen her," said Adrienne, "and that I miss 
 her and beg that she ll give me, sometime, a few of 
 her spare moments."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 209 
 
 At that Barney stopped short, and looked at his 
 wife. "No, Adrienne, I won t," he said with a 
 startling directness. "I ll take no messages what 
 ever from you to Nancy. Let Nancy alone do 
 you see? That s all I ve got to ask of you. Let her 
 alone. She and Aunt Monica are the only people 
 you haven t set against me and I don t intend to 
 quarrel with Nancy to please you, I promise you." 
 
 Sitting motionless and upright, her hand laid on 
 Palgrave s shoulder, her face as unalterable as a 
 little mask, Adrienne received these well-aimed 
 darts as a Saint Sebastian might have received the 
 arrows. Barney stared hard at her for a moment, 
 then turned his back and marched out into the sun 
 light and Oldmeadow, as he saw him go, felt that he 
 witnessed the end, as he had, little more than a year 
 ago, witnessed the beginning, of an epoch. What 
 was there left to build on after such a scene? And 
 what must have passed between husband and wife 
 during their hours of intimacy to make it credible? 
 Barney was not a brute. 
 
 When Barney had turned through the entrance 
 gates and disappeared Adrienne s eyes dropped to 
 Palgrave s. "I think I ll go in, Paladin," she said, 
 and it was either with faintness or with the mere 
 stillness of her rage. "I think I ll lie down for a 
 little while." 
 
 Palgrave had leaped to his feet and, as she rose, 
 drew her hand within his arm, and Mrs. Chadwick, 
 her eyes staring wide, hastened to her: but Adrienne 
 gently put her away. " No, no, dearest Mother Nell. 
 Paladin will help me. You must stay with Aunt 
 Monica and Mr. Oldmeadow." Her hand rested for 
 a moment on Mrs. Chadwick s shoulder and she
 
 210 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 looked into her eyes. "I m so sorry, Mother Nell. 
 I meant no harm." 
 
 "Oh, my darling child ! As if I did not know 
 that!" Mrs. Chad wick moaned and, as Adrienne 
 moved away, she turned as if half distraught to her 
 two friends. "Oh, it s dreadful! dreadful!" she 
 nearly wept. "Oh, how can he treat her so before 
 you all! It s breaking my heart!" 
 
 Barbara came running out with the cream. 
 "Great Scott!" she exclaimed, stopping short. 
 "What s become of everybody?" 
 
 "They ve all gone, dear. Yes, we ve all finished. 
 No one wants any more strawberries. Take yours 
 away, will you, dear, we want to have a little talk, 
 Aunt Monica, Roger and I." 
 
 "I suppose it s Barney again," said Barbara, 
 standing still and gazing indignantly around her. 
 "Where s Adrienne?" 
 
 "She has gone to lie down, dear. Yes. Barney 
 has been very unkind." 
 
 "About my trip, I suppose? He s been too odious 
 about my trip and it s only the other day he made 
 Adrienne cry. What possible business is it of Bar 
 ney s, I d like to know? One would think he 
 imagined that wives and sisters were a sort of 
 chattel. Why mayn t I stay, Mother if you re 
 going to talk about my trip? Adrienne has explained 
 everything to me and I think Meg was quite right 
 and I d do the same myself if I were in her place. So 
 I m perfectly able to understand." 
 
 "I know, dear; I know; Adrienne is so wonderful. 
 But don t say things like that, I beg of you, for it 
 makes me very, very unhappy. And please run away 
 for a little while, for we have other things to talk of.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 211 
 
 I m afraid there may be no trip at all, Barbara; 
 Meg may be coming home at once. The letters had 
 news about it, and Eric has to go to the war if 
 there is a war, you see." Mrs. Chadwick spoke with 
 a supplicatory note very unlike her usual placid if 
 complaining authority. 
 
 "But I d like to hear about the letters, then. Do 
 we really have to give up the trip? I m sure it s 
 Barney at the bottom of it. He s been trying to dish 
 it from the first and I simply won t stand it from 
 him." 
 
 "It s not Barney at all, Barbara. You shall hear 
 all that there is to hear. And you mustn t, really, 
 forget that Barney is your elder brother and has 
 some right to say what you should do even though 
 we mayn t agree with him." 
 
 "No, he hasn t. Not an atom," Barbara declared. 
 " If anyone has any right, except you, it s Adrienne, 
 because she s a bigger, wiser person than any of us." 
 
 "And since you ve borne your testimony, Bar 
 bara," Oldmeadow suggested, "you might obey your 
 mother and give us the benefit of your experience 
 on an occasion when it s invited." 
 
 "Oh, I know you re against Adrienne, Roger," 
 said Barbara, but with a sulkiness that showed sur 
 render. " I shan t force myself on you, I assure you, 
 and girls of fifteen aren t quite the infants in arms 
 you may imagine. If Adrienne weren t here to 
 stand up for me I don t know where I d be. Because, 
 you know, you are weak, Mother. Yes you are. 
 You ve been really wobbling like anything about 
 my trip and trying to wriggle out of it whenever you 
 had a loop-hole, and Adrienne thinks you re weak, 
 I know, for she told me so, and said we must help
 
 212 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 you to be brave and strong and that you belonged 
 to a generation that had its eyes tightly bandaged 
 from birth. So there!" And delivering this effec 
 tive shot, Barbara marched away, not forgetting to 
 pick up her plate of strawberries as she passed the 
 table. 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick attempted to conceal her confu 
 sion by following her child s retreating figure with 
 grave disapprobation and Oldmeadow seized the 
 propitious moment to remark: I can t.help feeling 
 that there s something to be said for Barney, all the 
 same. His wife has set you all against him, hasn t 
 she? I suspect Barbara s right, too, my dear friend, 
 and that in your heart of hearts you dislike this trip 
 of hers as much as he does. Certainly Barbara isn t 
 a very pleasing example of Adrienne s influence." 
 
 "She is very naughty, very naughty and rebel 
 lious, "poor Mrs. Chadwick murmured, twisting and 
 untwisting her handkerchief. "I know I ve not a 
 strong character, but I never spoiled my children 
 and dear Adrienne does, I feel, spoil Barbara by 
 taking her so seriously and talking to her as if she 
 were grown up, you know. I had an aunt who 
 married at sixteen; but it didn t turn out at all 
 happily. They quarrelled constantly and she had 
 two sets of twins, poor thing almost like a judg 
 ment, dear Mamma used to say. But of course Bar 
 bara is really too young to understand; and so I ve 
 told dear Adrienne. Not that she isn t perfectly 
 frank about it. She s told me over and over again 
 that weakness was my besetting danger and that 
 I must stand up straight and let the winds of free 
 dom blow away my cobwebs. So dear and original, 
 always, you know. And of course I see her point of
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 213 
 
 view and Barbara will, no doubt, be a bigger, finer 
 person" - Mrs. Chad wick s voice trailed off in its 
 echo. "But I don t agree with you, Roger; I don t 
 agree with you at all!" she took up with sudden ve 
 hemence, "about the trip. I don t agree that my 
 poor Meg is a leper to be avoided until a legal cere 
 mony has been performed. I think that a cruel con 
 vention cruel, base and cowardly. She must have 
 suffered so much already. Nothing will give her so 
 much courage as for us to be seen standing by her. 
 Adrienne has explained all that most beautifully to 
 Barbara. And how true love is the most sacred 
 thing in life." 
 
 " My dear friend, Meg isn t a leper, of course, and 
 we all intend to stand by her. But it is certainly 
 best that a young girl like Barbara shouldn t be 
 asked to meet, or understand, or exonerate such 
 difficult situations." 
 
 "That s what I ve tried to say to Eleanor," Mrs. 
 Averil murmured. 
 
 "And why not, Roger! Why not!" Mrs. Chad- 
 wick cried, surprisingly yet not convincingly 
 aroused. "Nothing develops the character so much 
 as facing and understanding difficulty. And as for 
 exoneration I don t agree with you, and Adrienne 
 doesn t agree. You and Monica are conventional 
 ists and we must live on a higher plane than conven 
 tion. I m sure I try to, though it s very hard some 
 times, but the noblest things are hardest. There is 
 nothing to exonerate. Meg was following her own 
 light in doing what she did." 
 
 " It s not a question of Meg, but of her situation," 
 Oldmeadow returned. 
 
 "And because of her situation, because she is so in
 
 214 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 need of help and loyalty, you ask that Barbara 
 should draw back her skirts from her ! Oh ! I knew 
 it!" cried Mrs. Chadwick, "I knew that you would 
 feel like that ! That is why I felt it would be happier 
 if you were not here with Adrienne. 
 
 "You need hardly tell me that," said Oldmeadow 
 smiling. "But it s not a question of convention, ex 
 cept in so far as convention means right feeling and 
 good taste. Meg, whatever her lights and per 
 sonally I don t believe that she followed them has 
 done something that involves pain and humiliation 
 for all concerned with her, and whether she was or 
 was not justified in doing it is a moral problem that 
 a child shouldn t be asked to meet. Such problems 
 should be kept from her until she is old enough to 
 understand them." 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick s vehemence had only fictitiously 
 sustained her. It dropped from her now and for a 
 little while she sat silent, and the confusion of her 
 heart was piteously revealed to her friend as she 
 said at last, " If there is a war, it will all settle itself, 
 won t it, for then Barbara couldn t go. I don t try 
 to wriggle out of it. That s most unfair and untrue. 
 I ve promised Adrienne and I agree with Adrienne 
 about it. I can t explain it clearly, as she does; it s 
 all quite, quite different when Adrienne explains it. 
 She seems to hold me up and you and Monica pull me 
 down oh, yes, you do, Roger. Of course it would 
 kill me - - I know that I should die, if Barbara were 
 to do what Meg has done; you mustn t think Ad 
 rienne wants her to behave like that, you know. 
 Adrienne only wants people to be brave and follow 
 their light; but your light needn t be a married man, 
 need it? And sometimes I think it isn t really so
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 215 
 
 serious falling in love, you know. I m sure I 
 thought / was in love half a dozen times before 
 Francis proposed. It s a question of seeing what s 
 best for you all round, isn t it, and it can t be best if 
 it s a married man, can it? Oh! I know I m saying 
 what Adrienne wouldn t like, now; because it sounds 
 so worldly and as if I believed in the French way. 
 But I don t at all. I think love s everything, too. 
 Only it always seemed to me when I was a girl that 
 love meant white satin and orange-blossoms; and 
 my poor, poor Meg can never wear those now. I 
 should feel miserable, quite miserable about her, of 
 course, if Adrienne were n t here to make me see the 
 big, real things instead of the little ones. And Bar 
 ney has been so unkind. Sneering and scoffing at 
 everything" -her voice quivered. "However, if 
 there s a war, that will settle it. Barbara couldn t 
 go if there was a war."
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 THE war thus had its uses to Mrs. Chadwick. Bar 
 bara did not go to the Tyrol. By the end of Septem 
 ber Oldmeadow and Barney were in training, one on 
 the Berkshire and one on the Wiltshire downs, and 
 Meg was ambiguously restored to her family at Cold- 
 brooks. 
 
 Oldmeadow had not seen Barney for many days, 
 when they met one afternoon at Paddington and 
 travelled together as far as Didcot. They had the 
 carriage to themselves and though Barney s de 
 meanour was reticent there were many things about 
 which, it was evident, he found it a relief to be com 
 municative. It was from him that Oldmeadow 
 learned of Meg s return. 
 
 "She ll be in a pretty box, won t she, if Hayward 
 is killed," he said, smoking his cigarette and not 
 looking at his friend. "He s over there, you know, 
 and for my part I think there s very little chance of 
 any of them coming back alive." 
 
 They both smoked in silence for a little while 
 after this, contemplating the ordeal in which their 
 country was involved rather than their own relation 
 to it; but Oldmeadow s mind returned presently to 
 Barney s difficulties and he asked him if it had been 
 to see Hayward off that he d just been up to London. 
 
 Barney, at this, had a quiet sardonic laugh. 
 "Good heavens, no," he said. "Hayward went in 
 the first week and Adrienne and Palgrave went up 
 with Meg to see him off. Even if I d wanted to, 
 I d have been allowed to have no hand in that.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 217 
 
 Adrienne is seeing to it all. Lawyers, money, I don t 
 know what. No ; I went up to spend my leave with 
 old Boyd at his place in Chelsea. I didn t want to 
 go home. Home is the last place I want to be just 
 now." 
 
 Oldmeadow at this maintained a silence that 
 could not pretend surprise and Barney continued in 
 a moment. "Palgrave isn t coming in, you know." 
 
 "You mean he s carrying out his pacifist ideas?" 
 
 " If they are his," said Barney in his colourless yet 
 sardonic voice. "Any ideas of Palgrave s are likely 
 to be Adrienne s, you know. She got hold of him 
 from the first." 
 
 "Well, after all," Oldmeadow after another mo 
 ment felt impelled to say, "She got hold of you, too. 
 In the same way; by believing in herself and by 
 understanding you. She thinks she s right." 
 
 "Ha! ha!" laughed Barney and for a moment, an 
 acutely uncomfortable one for Oldmeadow, he 
 turned his eyes on his friend. "Thinks she s right! 
 You needn t tell me that, Roger!" 
 
 It had indeed, Oldmeadow felt, hardly been de 
 cent of him. 
 
 " I know. Of course she would. But, all the same, 
 people must be allowed to hold their own opinions." 
 
 " Must they?" said Barney. "At a time like this? 
 Adrienne must, of course; as a woman she doesn t 
 come into it; she brings other people in, that is to 
 say, and keeps out herself. Besides she s an Ameri 
 can. But Palgrave shouldn t be allowed the choice. 
 He s dishonouring us all as Meg has done. Poor, 
 foolish, wretched Mother! She s seeing it at last, 
 though she won t allow herself to say it, or, rather, 
 Adrienne won t allow her " He checked himself.
 
 218 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "Dishonour is a strong word, Barney. Palgrave 
 is hardly more than a boy." 
 
 "Jim Errington is a year younger than Palgrave, 
 and Peter Layard six months. They re both in. I 
 don t think nineteen is too young to dishonour your 
 family. If Palgrave committed a murder, he d be 
 hanged. But it will no doubt come to conscription 
 and then we ll see where he ll find himself. Herded 
 in as a Tommy. All this talk of a few months is 
 folly." 
 
 "I know. Yes. Folly," said Oldmeadow ab 
 sently. "Have you tried to have it out with Pal 
 grave, Barney? If he only hears Adrienne s side 
 what can you expect of him? If you leave them all 
 to sink or swim without you, you mustn t blame 
 Adrienne for steering as best she can." 
 
 "Sink or swim without me!" Barney echoed. 
 "Why they d none of them listen to me. You saw 
 well enough how it was with them that day in July 
 when you came up. Adrienne is twice as strong as 
 I am when it comes to anything like a struggle and 
 she has them all firmly under her thumb. She steers 
 because she intends to steer and intends I shan t. 
 I ve tried nothing with Palgrave, except to keep my 
 hands off him. Mother s talked to him, and Meg s 
 talked to him; but nothing does any good. Oh, yes; 
 Meg hangs on Adrienne because she s got nothing 
 else to hang to; but she s frightfully down on Pal 
 grave all the same. They re all united against me, 
 but they re not united among themselves by any 
 means. It s not a peaceful family party at Cold- 
 brooks, I promise you. Poor Mother spends most of 
 her time shut up in her room crying." 
 
 Barney offered no further information on this
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 219 
 
 occasion and Old meadow asked for no more. It 
 was from Mrs. Aldesey, some weeks later, that 
 he heard that Eric Hay ward had been killed. 
 Mrs. Aldesey was his most punctual correspondent 
 and her letters, full of pungent, apposite accounts of 
 how the war was affecting London, the pleasantest 
 experiences that came to him on the Berkshire 
 downs, where, indeed, he did not find life unpleasant. 
 Mrs. Aldesey made time for these long letters after 
 tiring days spent among Belgian refugees and his 
 sense of comradeship had been immensely deepened 
 by the vast, new experience they were, from their 
 different angles, sharing. It was difficult, on the soft 
 October day, to dissociate the mere pleasure of read 
 ing her letter from the miserable news she gave. Yet 
 he knew, stretched at ease after strenuous exercise, 
 the canvas of his tent idly flapping above him and 
 the sunlight falling across his feet, that it was very 
 miserable news indeed and must miserably affect 
 his friends at Coldbrooks. What was to become of 
 poor Meg now? And after his mind had paused on 
 poor Meg a pang of memory brought back the face 
 of his setter John. Poor Hayward. 
 
 "She must, of course, find some work at once," 
 Mrs. Aldesey wrote. "The war does help to solve 
 problems of this sort as nothing else before ever 
 could. She must nurse, or drive an ambulance and 
 perhaps by the time it s all over we ll have forgotten 
 irrelevancies that happened so long ago. Sometimes 
 it feels like that to me and I know I m much too old 
 to face the world that will have grown up out of the 
 wreckage of the world I knew." Mrs. Aldesey, still, 
 always spoke of herself as antique, relegated and on 
 the shelf. Rather absurd of her, as her friend pointed
 
 220 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 out in his reply, when she was obviously one of the 
 people who were going to make the new world. She 
 was organizing the Belgians in the most remarkable 
 manner. 
 
 As to Coldbrooks he hesitated. He could hardly 
 see himself writing to Mrs. Chadwick or to Meg. 
 Of Nancy he felt a little shy. There would be too 
 much to say to Nancy if he said anything and he 
 allowed the anonymous calamity that had over 
 taken his friends to pass without comment or con 
 dolence. But after an interval of some weeks it was 
 from Nancy herself that he heard. Nancy seemed 
 always to be selected as the vehicle for other people s 
 emergencies. 
 
 "Dear Roger," she wrote. "You have heard how 
 very unhappy we all are. It is dreadful to see poor 
 Meg, and Aunt Eleanor makes it really worse for 
 her. Meg wears mourning, like a widow, and she is 
 terribly bitter about Palgrave, and about A.drienne, 
 too. Doesn t that seem to you very strange and un 
 just? Adrienne is doing for Palgrave what she did 
 for Meg standing by him. It is all more unhappy 
 than you can imagine. Palgrave is at New College, 
 now, you know, and I m writing, because Aunt 
 Eleanor s one hope is that you may be able to talk 
 to him. Kindly, you know, Roger; and not as if you 
 thought him a criminal or a coward; that is worse 
 than useless, naturally. Palgrave is very arrogant; 
 but you know what a tender heart he really has and 
 I am sure that he is very lonely and unhappy. So be 
 kind and understanding, won t you? He really cares 
 for you and trusts you more than he likes to show ; and 
 of course he would expect you to be against him." 
 
 Oldmeadow was going into Oxford in a week s
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 221 
 
 time and he wrote to Palgrave and asked him to 
 give him tea. "I ve got to talk to you, if you ll let 
 me," he said, "but I shan t make myself a nuisance, 
 I promise you. I only want to satisfy myself that 
 you have thought everything out, and if you have 
 I ll be able to tell your people that they must give 
 up tormenting themselves and you about it. I shall 
 like talking over your work with you, too, if I may, 
 and renewing my own Oxford memories." So con 
 ciliatory, so affectionate (and he found it easy to be 
 affectionate to poor Palgrave) was the tone of the 
 letter that he had a swift reply. Palgrave would be 
 very glad to see him. 
 
 It was a melancholy, deserted Oxford into which 
 Oldmeadow drove his lit^e car on a late October 
 afternoon. Most of the youths he saw were of a 
 nondescript variety, a type to whom Oxford means 
 scholastic opportunity and nothing more. There 
 were dark-skinned lads from distant parts of the 
 Empire looking, to Oldmeadow s eye, rather pitiful 
 and doomed to disappointment, and a hurrying, ab 
 sorbed little Jap had an almost empty Broad as a 
 setting for his alien figure. 
 
 Palgrave s name was freshly painted at the 
 bottom of a staircase in the Garden Quad and Old- 
 meadow mounted to rooms that most delightfully 
 overlooked the garden and its catalpa-tree. 
 
 Palgrave was ready for him. The tea was laid and 
 he stood at the table cutting a cake as Oldmeadow 
 entered. But some one else, too, was ready, for 
 there, in the window-seat, her gaze fixed on the wan 
 ing golds and russets beneath, sat Adrienne Toner. 
 Oldmeadow, very much and very disagreeably af 
 fected, paused at the door.
 
 222 
 
 "Come in, Mr. Oldmeadow, " said Adrienne, and 
 there was a strange, jaded eagerness in the gaze 
 she fixed on him. "I ve only come for tea. I have 
 to go directly afterwards. I am staying in Oxford, 
 now, you know. To be near Palgrave." 
 
 "Meg s turned her out of Coldbrooks," Palgrave 
 announced, standing still, over the tea-tray, his 
 hands in his pockets while, with bent head, he 
 looked from under his brows at Oldmeadow. " Meg, 
 you understand ; for whose sake she s gone through 
 everything. We re pariahs together, now; she and I." 
 
 " It s not quite true or fair to say that, Palgrave," 
 said Adrienne, whose eyes had returned to the gar 
 den. "Meg hasn t turned me out. I felt it would be 
 happier for her if I weren t there; and for your 
 Mother since they feel as they do about what has 
 happened; and happier for you and me to be to 
 gether. You can t be surprised at Meg. She is 
 nearly beside herself with grief." 
 
 Adrienne was very much altered. The magic of 
 the lime-tree scene no longer lay about her. Her 
 skin was sallow, her eyes sunken, her projecting 
 mouth was at once stubborn, weary and relaxed. 
 She had been almost beautiful on that July day and 
 to-day she was definitely ugly. Oldmeadow saw 
 that some intent inner preoccupation held her 
 thoughts. 
 
 "I am surprised at her; very much surprised," 
 said Palgrave, "though I might have warned you 
 that Meg wasn t a person worth risking a great deal 
 for. Oh, yes, she s nearly beside herself all right. 
 She s lost the man she cared for and she can t, now, 
 ever be made respectable. Oh, I see further into 
 Meg s grief than you do, my poor Adrienne. She s
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 223 
 
 just as conventional and unheroic at heart as 
 Mother; and that s what she minds more than 
 anything." 
 
 Old meadow, sunken in the deep chair Palgrave 
 had drawn for him to the table, watched the curious 
 interchange, and after a pause, in her jaded voice, 
 Adrienne from the window-seat commented: "I 
 understand her rage and misery. It s because her 
 grief is divided and spoiled and tainted like that 
 that she is distracted." 
 
 "Will you pour out tea?" Palgrave asked her 
 gloomily. "You ll see anyone s side, always, except 
 your own." 
 
 To this Adrienne, rising and coming forward to 
 the table, made no reply. She wore a dark dress that 
 recalled to Old meadow the one in which he had first 
 seen her; the short jacket tying across white in front 
 and white ruffles falling about her neck and hands. 
 A small, dark hat was bent down about her face. 
 
 Strange, brooding face. What was she thinking 
 of, Old meadow wondered, as he watched her hands, 
 impeded by the falling ruffles, moving with the old, 
 fumbling gestures among the tea-things; she had 
 constantly to throw back the ruffles, and the tea-pot, 
 after all, was too heavy for her. It slipped on one 
 side as she lifted it and the hot tea poured over her 
 hand. She kept her hold bravely and Old meadow 
 rescued her. 
 
 "How stupid I am!" she said, biting her lip. 
 
 "You ve scalded your hand," said Palgrave, eye 
 ing her with his air no longer of rapturous but of 
 gloomy devotion. 
 
 They made Oldmeadow think of comrade polit 
 ical prisoners moving off together in a convoy to
 
 224 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Siberia. There was something as bleak, as heavy, as 
 uninspired in their aspect. He could not think that 
 Palgrave could now catch much light or flame from 
 such a companion. They would trudge through the 
 snow; condemned, but together; to be together was 
 the best thing, now, that life offered them. 
 
 She said that the scald was nothing and asked to 
 be trusted to go on with the tea, grasping the handle 
 with resolution. Old meadow, however, standing 
 beside her, insisted on filling the cups for her. 
 
 "You can be allowed to put in the milk and 
 sugar, you see," he said. He was aware, as he thus 
 succoured and rallied her, of an influx of feeling like 
 the feeling that came with the uncanny dreams. 
 Here she was, and reality had caught her. She de 
 served to be caught, of course; tragic, meddling 
 Pierrot. But his heart was heavy and gentle ; as in 
 his dreams. 
 
 They sat round the table together. On the mantel 
 piece was a large, framed photograph of Adrienne; 
 on the walls photographs of a Botticelli Madonna, a 
 Mantegna from Padua and the da Vinci drawing for 
 the Christ of the Last Supper. Seeing Oldmeadow s 
 eyes on them Palgrave said: "Adrienne gave me 
 those. And lots of the books." 
 
 "And don t forget the beautiful cushions, Pal 
 grave," said Adrienne, with a flicker of her old, con 
 tented playfulness. "I m sure good cushions are the 
 foundation of a successful study of philosophy." 
 
 The cushions were certainly very good ; and very 
 beautiful, as Oldmeadow commented. "That gor 
 geous chair, too," said Palgrave. " It ought to make 
 a Plato of me." 
 
 It was curious, the sense they gave him of trusting
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 225 
 
 him. Were they aware, if only sub-consciously, that 
 he was feeling Adrienne, her follies and misdeeds 
 thick upon her, ill-used? Or was it only that they 
 had come down to such fundamental securities as 
 were left to them and felt that with him, at all 
 events, they were in the hands of an impartial 
 judge? 
 
 " It s a happy life Meg and Mother lead at Cold- 
 brooks, as you may imagine," Palgrave took up the 
 theme that preoccupied him. "They only see Nancy 
 and Aunt Monica, of course. Barbara is at school 
 and Barney, as you are probably aware, never comes 
 near his disgraced sister. Would you believe it, 
 Roger," Palgrave went on, while Oldmeadow saw 
 that a dull colour crept up to Adrienne s face and 
 neck as her husband was thus mentioned, "Meg 
 blames Adrienne now for the whole affair! About 
 Eric and herself! Actually! On the one hand Eric 
 is her hero for whom she ll mourn for ever and on the 
 other Adrienne is responsible for the fact that she s 
 not respectable and can t claim to be his widow. 
 Oh, don t ask me how she contrives to work it out! 
 Women like Meg don t need logic when they ve a 
 thong in their hands and want to use it. And 
 Adrienne s shoulders are bared for the lash! God! 
 It makes me fairly mad to think of it!" 
 
 "Please, Palgrave!" Adrienne supplicated in a 
 low voice. She did not eat. She had drunk her tea 
 and sat looking down at her plate. "Don t think of 
 it any more. Meg is very, very, unhappy. We can 
 hardly imagine what the misery and confusion of 
 Meg s heart must be." 
 
 "Oh, you ll make excuses for anyone, Adrienne! 
 You re not a shining example of happiness either, if
 
 226 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 it comes to that. It s atrocious of Meg to treat you 
 as she does. Atrocious of her to hold you respon 
 sible." 
 
 "But I am responsible," said Adrienne, while the 
 dull flush still dyed her face. "I ve always said that 
 I was responsible. It was I who persuaded them to 
 go." 
 
 "Yes. To go. Instead of staying and being lovers 
 secretly. I know all about it. And no doubt Meg 
 would rather it had been so now. And so would 
 Mother!" Palgrave ground his teeth on a laugh. 
 "That s where morality lands them! Pretty, isn t 
 it!" 
 
 A silence fell and then Adrienne rose and said that 
 Mr. Jackson would be waiting for her. "He s com 
 ing at half-past five," she said, and, with his gloomy 
 tenderness, Palgrave informed Old meadow that she 
 was reading logic and Plato; "to keep up with me, 
 you know." 
 
 Adrienne, smiling faintly, laid her hand for a 
 moment on his shoulder as she went past his chair. 
 "Come in to-night, after dinner, and tell me what 
 you decide," she said. 
 
 "I ll have no news for you," Palgrave replied. 
 
 Old meadow had gone to hold the door open for 
 her and, as she paused there to give him her hand, 
 he heard her murmur: "Will you come down with 
 me?" 
 
 "Let me see you to the bottom of the stair," he 
 seized the intimation, and, as she went before him, 
 she said, still in the low, purposeful voice, and he 
 felt sure now that this had been her intention in 
 coming to tea: "It s only so that you shan t think 
 I ll oppose you. If you can persuade him, I shall not
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 227 
 
 oppose it. I think he s right. But it s too hard. I 
 mean, I hope you can persuade him that it s right 
 to go." 
 
 She had stepped out on to the threshold at the 
 foot of the stairs and he paused behind her, aston 
 ished. "You want me to persuade him of what you 
 think wrong?" 
 
 She stood still looking out at the sunny quad 
 rangle. " People must think for themselves. I don t 
 know who is right or who is wrong. Perhaps I ve 
 influenced Palgrave. Perhaps he wouldn t have felt 
 like this if it hadn t been for me. I don t know. 
 But if you can make him feel it right to go, I shall be 
 glad." She stepped out into the quadrangle. 
 
 "You mean," said Oldmeadow, following her, and 
 strangely moved, "that you d rather have him killed 
 than stay behind like this?" 
 
 " It would be much happier for him, wouldn t it," 
 she said. " If he could feel it right to go." 
 
 They were under the arch of the Library, she still 
 going slowly, before him, and Oldmeadow stopped 
 her there. "Mrs. Barney, forgive me may I ask 
 you something? " He had put his hand on her shoul 
 der and she paused and faced him. " It s something 
 personal, and I ve no right to be personal with you, 
 as I know. But have you been to see Barney at 
 Tid worth?" 
 
 As Oldmeadow spoke these words, Adrienne 
 turned away vehemently, and then stood still, as 
 though arrested in her impulse of flight by an irre 
 sistible desire to listen. "Barney does not want to 
 see me," she said, speaking with difficulty. 
 
 "You think so," said Oldmeadow. "And he may 
 think so. But you ought to see each other at a time
 
 228 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 like this. He may be ordered to France at any 
 time now." He could not see her face. 
 
 "Do you mean," she said, after a moment, keep 
 ing the rigidity of her listening poise, " that he won t 
 come to say good-bye?" 
 
 "I know nothing at all." said Oldmeadow. "I 
 can only infer how far the mischief between you has 
 gone. And I m most frightfully sorry for it. I ve 
 been sorry for Barney; but now I m sorry for you, 
 too. I think you re being unfairly treated. But 
 yours have been the mistakes, Mrs. Barney, and it s 
 for you to take the first step." 
 
 Barney doesn t want to see me," she repeated, 
 and she went on, while he heard, growing in her 
 voice, the note of the old conviction: "He has made 
 mistakes, too. He has treated me unfairly, too. I 
 can t take the first step." 
 
 "Don t you love him, then?" said Oldmeadow, 
 and in his voice was the note of the old harshness. 
 
 "Does he love me?" she retorted, turning now, 
 with sudden fire, and fixing her eyes upon him. 
 "Why should he think I want to see him if he 
 doesn t want to see me? Why should I love, if he 
 doesn t? Why should I sue to Barney?" 
 
 "Oh," Oldmeadow almost groaned. "Don t take 
 that line; don t, I beg of you. You re both young. 
 And you ve hurt him so. You ve meant to hurt him ; 
 I ve seen it! I ve seen it, Mrs. Barney. If you ll 
 put by your pride everything can grow again." 
 
 "No! no! no!" she cried almost violently, and he 
 saw that she was trembling. "Some things don t 
 grow again! It s not like plants, Mr. Oldmeadow. 
 Some things are like living creatures; and they can 
 die. They can die," she repeated, now walking rap-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 229 
 
 idly away from him out into the large quadrangle 
 with its grass plot cut across by the late sunshine. 
 He followed her for a moment and he heard her say, 
 as she went: " It s worse, far worse, not to mean to 
 hurt. It s worse to care so little that you don t know 
 when you are hurting." 
 
 " No, it s not," said Oldmeadow. "That s only 
 being stupid; not cruel." 
 
 " It s not thinking that is cruel ; it s not caring that 
 is cruel," she repeated, passionately, half muttering 
 the words, and whether with tears of fury he could 
 not say. 
 
 He stood still at the doorway. "Good-bye, then," 
 he said. And not looking behind her, as she went 
 out swiftly into New College Lane, she answered, 
 still on the same note of passionate protest: "Good 
 bye, Mr. Oldmeadow. Good-bye." He watched her 
 small, dark figure hurry along in the shadow of the 
 wall until the turning hid it from view.
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 PALGRAVE, apparently, had formed no conjectures 
 as to their conversation and was thinking still of 
 Adrienne s wrongs rather than of his own situation. 
 "Did you take her home?" he said. "I see you re 
 sorry for her, Roger. It s really too abominable, you 
 know. I really can t say before her what I think, I 
 really can t say before you what I think of Barney s 
 treatment of her; because 1 know you agree with 
 him." 
 
 Oldmeadow felt all the more able, shaken though 
 he was by the interview below, to remember, be 
 cause of it, what he thought. "If you mean that I 
 don t consider Barney in the very least responsible 
 for the death of the baby, I do agree with him," he 
 said. 
 
 "Apart from that, apart from the baby," said 
 Palgrave, controlling his temper, it was evident, in 
 his wish to keep the ear of the impartial judge, 
 "though what the loss of a child means to a woman 
 like Adrienne I don t believe you can guess; apart 
 from whose was the responsibility, he ought to have 
 seen, towards the end, at all events, if he d eyes in 
 his head and a heart in his breast, that all she asked 
 was to forgive him and take him back. She was 
 proud, of course. What woman of her power and 
 significance wouldn t have been? She couldn t be 
 the first to move. But Barney must have seen that 
 her heart was breaking." 
 
 "Well," said Oldmeadow, taking in, with some 
 perplexity, this new presentation of Adrienne
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 231 
 
 Toner; "what about his heart? She d led it a pretty 
 dance. And you forget that I don t consider she had 
 anything to forgive him." 
 
 "His heart!" Palgrave echoed scornfully, yet 
 with a sorrowful scorn; "He mended his heart quick 
 enough. Went and fell in love with Nancy, who 
 only asks to be let alone." 
 
 "He s always loved Nancy. She s always been 
 like a sister to him. Adrienne has infected you with 
 her groundless jealousy." 
 
 "Groundless indeed!" Palgrave reached for his 
 pipe and began to stuff it vindictively. "Nancy sees 
 well enough, poor dear ! She s had to keep him off by 
 any device she could contrive. She s a good deal 
 more than a sister to him, now. She s the only 
 person in the world for him. You can call it jeal 
 ousy if you like. That s only another name for a 
 broken heart." 
 
 "I don t know what Barney s feeling may be, 
 Palgrave, but I do know, it was quite plain to me, 
 that Adrienne was jealous long before she had any 
 ground for jealousy. If Nancy s all Barney s got 
 left now, it s simply because Adrienne has taken 
 everything else from him. You don t seem to realize 
 that Adrienne drove him from her with her airs of 
 martyrdom. Took vengeance on him, too; what 
 else was the plan for Barbara going abroad with 
 you? I don t want to speak unkindly of her. It s 
 quite true; I m sorry for her. I ve never liked her 
 so well. But the reason is that she s beginning, I 
 really believe, to find out that her own feet are of 
 clay, while her mistake all along has been to imagine 
 herself above ordinary humanity. All our feet are of 
 clay, and we never get very far unless we are aware
 
 232 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 of the weakness in our structure and look out for a 
 continual tendency to crumble. You don t get over 
 it by pretending you don t need to walk and imagin 
 ing you have wings instead of feet." 
 
 Palgrave, drawing stiffly at his pipe during this 
 little homily, listened, gloomily yet without resent 
 ment. "You see, where you make your mistake 
 if you ll allow the youthful ass you consider me to 
 say so is that you ve always imagined Adrienne 
 to be a self-righteous prig who sets herself up above 
 others. She doesn t; she doesn t," Palgrave re 
 peated with conviction. "She d accept the feet of 
 clay if you ll grant her the heart of flame for 
 everybody ; the wings for everybody. There s 
 your mistake, Roger. Adrienne believes that every 
 body has wings as well as herself ; and the only differ 
 ence she sees in people is that some have learned and 
 some haven t how to use them. She may be mortal 
 woman bless her and have made mistakes ; 
 but they re the mistakes of flame ; not of earthiness." 
 
 "You are not an ass, Palgrave," said Oldmeadow, 
 after a moment. "You are wise in everything but 
 experience; and you see deep. Suppose we come to 
 a compromise. You ve owned that Adrienne may 
 make mistakes and I own that I may misjudge her. 
 I see what you believe about her and I see why you 
 believe it. I ve seen her at her worst, no doubt, and 
 to you she s been able to show only her best. So 
 let it rest at that. What I came to talk about, you 
 know, was you." 
 
 "I know," said Palgrave, and he gave a deep 
 sigh. 
 
 " Be patient with me," said Oldmeadow. " After 
 all, we belong to the same generation. You can t
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 233 
 
 pretend that I m an old fogey who s lost the inspi 
 rations of his youth and has marched so far down 
 towards the grave that the new torches coming up 
 over the horizon are hidden from him." 
 
 "That s rather nice, you know, Roger," Palgrave 
 smiled faintly. "No; you re not an old fogey. 
 But all the same there s not much torch about you." 
 
 "It s rather sad, isn t it," Oldmeadow mused, 
 "that we should always seem to begin with torches 
 and then to spend the rest of our lives in quenching 
 them. It may be, you know, that we re only trying 
 to hold them straight, so that the wind shan t blow 
 them out. However! you ll let me talk. That s 
 the point." 
 
 "Of course you may. You ve been awfully de 
 cent," Palgrave murmured. 
 
 "Well, then, it seems to me you re not seeing 
 straight," said Oldmeadow. "It s not crude animal 
 patriotism as you d put it that s asked of you. 
 It s a very delicate discrimination between ideals." 
 
 "I know! I know!" said Palgrave. The traces 
 of mental anguish were on his worn young face. He 
 knocked the ashes out of his pipe and rose to lean 
 against the mantelpiece. " I don t suppose I can ex 
 plain," he said, staring out at the sky. "I suppose 
 that with me the crude animal thing is the personal 
 inhibition. I can t do it. I d rather, far, be killed 
 than have to kill other men. That s the unreason 
 ing part, the instinctive part, but it s a part of one s 
 nature that I don t believe one can violate without 
 violating one s very spirit. I ve always been differ 
 ent, I know, from most fellows of my age and class. 
 I ve always hated sport shooting and hunting. 
 The fox, the stag, the partridge, have always spoiled
 
 234 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 it for me. Oh, I know they have to be killed poor 
 brutes! I know that; but I can t myself be the 
 butcher." 
 
 "You ll own, though, that there must be butch 
 ers," said Oldmeadow, after a little meditation. He 
 felt himself in the presence of something delicate, 
 distorted and beautiful. "And you ll own, won t 
 you, when it comes to a war like this, when not only 
 our national honour but our national existence is at 
 stake, that some men must kill others. Isn t it then, 
 baldly, that you profit, personally, by other people 
 doing what you won t do? You ll eat spring lamb as 
 long as there are butchers to kill the lamb for you, 
 and you ll be an Englishman and take from England 
 all that she has to give you including Oxford and 
 Coldbrooks and let other men do the nasty work 
 that makes the survival of England and Oxford and 
 Coldbrooks possible. That s what it comes to, you 
 know. That s all I ask you to look at squarely." 
 
 "I know, I know," Palgrave repeated. He had 
 looked at little else, poor boy. Oldmeadow saw 
 that. "But that s where the delicate discrimina 
 tion between ideals comes in, Roger. That s where 
 I have to leave intuition, which says No, and turn 
 to reason. And the trouble is that for me reason 
 says No, too. Because humanity all of it that 
 counts has outgrown war. That s what it comes 
 to. It s a conflict between a national and an human 
 itarian ideal. There are enough of us in the world to 
 stop war, if we all act together; and why, because 
 others don t, should I not do what I feel right? 
 Others may follow if only a few of us stand out. If 
 no one stands out, no one will ever follow. And you 
 can t kill England like that. England is more than
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 235 
 
 men and institutions," Palgrave still gazed at the 
 sky. "It s an idea that will survive; perhaps the 
 more truly in the spirit for perishing in the flesh, if 
 it really came to that. Look at Greece. She s dead, 
 if you like; yet what existing nation lives as truly? 
 It is Grecian minds we think with and Grecian eyes 
 we see with. It s Plato s conception of the just man 
 being the truly happy man even if the whole 
 world s against him that is the very meaning of 
 our refusal to go with the world." 
 
 "You ll never stop war by refusal so long as the 
 majority of men still believe in it," said Oldmeadow. 
 "There are not enough of you to stop it now. The 
 time to stop it is before it comes; not while it s on. 
 It s before it begins that you must bring the rest of 
 humanity not to behave in ways that make it in 
 evitable. I m inclined to think that ideas can per 
 ish," he went on, as Palgrave, to this, made no reply, 
 "as far as their earthly manifestation goes, that is, 
 if enough men and institutions are destroyed. If 
 Germany could conquer and administer England, 
 I m inclined to think the English idea would perish. 
 And war need not be unspiritual. Killing our fellow- 
 men need not mean hating them. There s less hatred 
 in war, I imagine, than in some of the contests of 
 peaceful civilian life. Put it fairly on the ground of 
 humanitarianism, then, Palgrave ; not of nationality. 
 It s the whole world that is threatened by a hateful 
 idea, by the triumph of all you most fear and detest, 
 and unless we strive against it with all we are and 
 have it seems to me that we fall short of our duty not 
 only as Englishmen, but as humanitarians. Put it 
 at that, Palgrave; would you really have had Eng 
 land stand by and not lift a finger when Belgium 
 was invaded and France menaced?"
 
 236 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Palgrave was not ready with his reply and he 
 turned away while he looked for it and shuffled the 
 papers on his desk with a nervous hand. "Yes, I 
 would," he said at last. "Hateful as it is to have to 
 say it I would have stood by." He came back to 
 his place at the mantelpiece and looked down at 
 Oldmeadow as he spoke. "The choice, of course, is 
 hateful; but I think we should have stood by and 
 helped the sufferers and let France and Germany 
 fight it out. It always comes back to them, doesn t 
 it? They re always fighting it out; they always will, 
 till they find it s no good and that they can t anni 
 hilate each other; which is what they both want to 
 do. Oh, I ve read too many of the young French 
 neo-Catholics to be able to believe that the hateful 
 idea was all on one side. Their ideals don t differ 
 much, once you strip them of their theological 
 tinsel, from those of the Germans. Germany hap 
 pens to be the aggressor now; but if the militarist 
 party in France had had the chance, they d have 
 struck as quickly." 
 
 "The difference and it s an immense one is 
 that the militarist party in France wouldn t have 
 had the chance. The difference is that it doesn t 
 govern and mould public opinion. It s not a menace 
 to the world. It s only a sort of splendid pet, kept 
 in a Zoo, for the delectation of a certain class and 
 party. Whereas Germany s the bona fide hungry 
 tigress at large. What you really ask of England, 
 Palgrave, is that she should be a Buddha and lie 
 down and let the tigress, after finishing France, de 
 vour her, too. It really comes to that. Buddhism is 
 the only logical basis for your position, and I don t 
 believe, however sorry one may be for hungry
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 237 
 
 tigresses, that the right way to deal with them is to 
 let them eat you. The Christian philosophy of the 
 incarnation is the true one. Matter does make a 
 spiritual difference. It does make a difference, a 
 real difference, that the ideal should be made flesh. 
 It s important to the world, spiritually, that the 
 man rather than the tigress should survive." 
 
 "Christ gave his life," said Palgrave, after a mo 
 ment. 
 
 "I m not speaking of historical personages; but 
 of eternal truths," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 But he knew already that he spoke in vain. Pal- 
 grave had turned away his eyes again and on his sad 
 young face he read the fixity of a fanatic idealism. 
 He had not moved him, though he had troubled him. 
 No one would move Palgrave. He doubted, now, 
 whether Adrienne herself had had much influence 
 over him. It was with the sense of pleading a lost 
 cause that he said, presently, "Adrienne hopes you ll 
 feel it right to go." 
 
 Palgrave at this turned a profound gaze upon 
 him. "I know it," he said. "Though she s never 
 told me so. It s the weakness of her love, its yearn 
 ing and tenderness, not its strength, that makes her 
 want it. Because she knows it would be so much 
 easier. But she can t go back on what she s meant to 
 me. It s because of that, in part at all events, that 
 I ve been able to see steadily what I mean to my 
 self. That s what she helps one to do, you know. 
 Hold to yourself; your true, deep self. It s owing 
 to her that I can only choose in one way even if 
 I can t defend it properly. It seems to come back 
 to metaphysics, doesn t it?" 
 
 " Like everything else," said Oldmeadow.
 
 238 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "Yes. Like everything else. It would take a 
 four-years course in Greats to argue it out, Roger. 
 Come back to me if you re here and I m here 
 then and we ll see what we can make of it." 
 
 "I will," said Oldmeadow, rising, for the room 
 was growing dark. "And before that, I hope." 
 
 "After all, you know," Palgrave observed, "Eng 
 land isn t in any danger of becoming Buddhistic; 
 there s not much nihilism about her, is there, but 
 hardly much Christianity, either. England has 
 evolved all sorts of things besides Oxford and Cold- 
 brooks. She s evolved industrialism and factory- 
 towns." 
 
 "I don t consider industrialism and factory- 
 towns incompatible with Christianity, you know," 
 Oldmeadow observed. "Good-bye, my dear boy." 
 
 "Good-bye, Roger," Palgrave grasped his hand. 
 "You ve been most awfully kind."
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 "ISN T it becoming to him, Mother? And how tall 
 he looks!" said Nancy, holding Oldmeadow off in his 
 khaki for displayal. 
 
 He had only written a line of his failure and that 
 he would come as soon as he could and see them all 
 and tell in full of his interview with Palgrave. And 
 he had motored over to The Little House this after 
 noon in early November. 
 
 Nancy was showing an unexpected gaiety. 
 "What a nice grilled-salmon colour you are, too," 
 she said. 
 
 He divined the self-protective instinct under the 
 gaiety. Most of the women in England were being 
 gayer and more talkative at this time, in order to 
 keep up. Nancy was thin and white; but she was 
 keeping up. And she had put on a charming dress to 
 receive him in. 
 
 "I ve been grilled all right; out on the downs," 
 he said. "But it s more like cold storage just now, 
 with these frosts at night. Yes ; the big cup, please. 
 I m famished for tea. Ah! that s something like! 
 It smells like your rose outside. I sniffed it as I 
 waited at the door. Wonderful for such a late 
 blooming." 
 
 "Isn t it," said Mrs. Averil. "And I only put it 
 in last autumn. It s doing beautifully ; but I ve cher 
 ished it. And now tell us about Palgrave." 
 
 He felt reluctant to tell about Palgrave. The im 
 pression that remained with him of Palgrave was 
 that impression of beauty and distortion and he did
 
 240 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 not want to have to disentangle his feelings or to 
 seem to put Palgrave in the wrong. It was so sweet, 
 too, after the long, chilly drive over the empty up 
 lands, to sit here and forget the war, although it was 
 for scenes like this, for girls like Nancy, women like 
 Mrs. Averil with so much else that the war 
 was so worth fighting. He turned his thoughts back 
 to the realities that underlay the happy appearances 
 and was aware, as he forced himself to tell, of what 
 must seem a note of advocacy in his voice. "He 
 can t think differently, I m afraid," he said. "It s 
 self-sacrifice, not selfishness, that is moving him." 
 
 "He can t think differently while Adrienne is 
 living there," said Mrs. Averil. "He didn t tell you, 
 I suppose, that she has now taken up her abode in 
 Oxford in order to study philosophy with him?" 
 
 He was rather uncomfortably aware of the disin- 
 genuousness that must now be made apparent in his 
 avoidance of all mention of Adrienne. 
 
 "I saw her," he said, and he knew that it was 
 lamely. "She was there when I got there." 
 
 "You saw her!" Mrs. Averil exclaimed. "But 
 then, of course you didn t convince him. I might 
 have known it. Of course she would not let you see 
 him alone." 
 
 "But she did let me see him alone. That was 
 what she wanted. And she was there only in order 
 to tell me what she wanted. She wants him to go." 
 
 Mrs. Averil was eyeing him with such astonish 
 ment that he turned to Nancy with his explana 
 tions. But Mrs. Averil would not leave him to 
 Nancy s sympathy. " It s rather late in the day for 
 her to want him to go," she said. "She may be sorry 
 for what she s done; but it s her work."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 241 
 
 "Well, she s sorry for her work. That s what it 
 comes to. And I m sorry for her," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 1 Good heavens ! The cleverness of that woman ! " 
 Mrs. Averil exclaimed. "If she can t be powerful, 
 she ll be pitiful! She s worked on your feelings; I 
 can see that, Roger. And I thought you, at least, 
 were immune. Well; she does not work on mine. I 
 am not in the least sorry for her." 
 
 "She s being unfairly treated," said Oldmeadow. 
 "It s grotesque that Meg should have turned upon 
 her." 
 
 "And Eleanor has, too, you know," said Mrs. 
 Averil. " It s grotesque, if you like; but I see a grim 
 justice in it. She made them do things and believe 
 things that weren t natural to them and now she s 
 lost her power and they see things as they are." 
 
 "It s because she s failed that they ve turned 
 against her," said Nancy. " If she d succeeded they 
 would have gone on accepting what she told them 
 and making her their idol." 
 
 "Adriennes mustn t fail," said Mrs. Averil dryly. 
 "The only justification for Adriennes is to be in 
 the right. If the blood of Saint Januarius doesn t 
 liquefy, why should you keep it in a shrine? She s a 
 woman who has quarrelled with her husband and 
 disgraced her sister and brother-in-law, and broken 
 her mother-in-law s heart. You can t go on making 
 an idol of a saint who behaves like that." 
 
 "She never claimed worldly success," said Nancy. 
 "She never told Meg to go so that she could get 
 married afterwards; she never told Palgrave that 
 war was wrong because it was easier not to fight." 
 
 "Oh, yes, she did claim worldly success, really," 
 said Mrs. Averil, while her eyes rested on her
 
 242 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 daughter with a tenderness that contrasted with her 
 tone. "Her whole point was that if you were right 
 spiritually - poised she called it, you remember 
 all those other things would be added unto you. 
 I ve heard her claim that if you were poised you could 
 get anything you really wanted. I asked her once 
 if I should find a ten-pound note under the sofa- 
 cushion every morning after breakfast if I could get 
 poised sufficiently!" Mrs. Averil laughed, still more 
 dryly while she still maintained her tender gaze and 
 Nancy said, smiling a little: "She might have put it 
 there for you if she d been sure you were poised." 
 
 "Well, let us bury Adrienne for the present," said 
 Mrs. Averil. " Tell Roger about your nursing plans. 
 She may go to London, Roger, this winter, and I m 
 to be left alone." 
 
 "You re to be left to take care of Aunt Eleanor, 
 if I do go," said Nancy; and Mrs. Averil said that 
 there must certainly be some one left to take care of 
 poor Eleanor. 
 
 Oldmeadow went up to Coldbrooks next morning. 
 The first person he saw was old Johnson at the door 
 and he remembered Eleanor Chadwick s griefs on 
 his account. Nothing, now, could have been kept 
 from Johnson and his face bore the marks of the 
 family calamities. He was aged and whitened and 
 his voice had armed itself, since the downfall of his 
 grave, vicarious complacency, with solemn cadences. 
 
 "Yes, sir. The ladies will be very glad to see you, 
 sir. These are sad days for them the family dis 
 persed as it is." 
 
 Johnson defined the situation as he felt that it 
 could be most fittingly defined and Oldmeadow in 
 wardly applauded his "dispersed."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 243 
 
 The drawing-room, into which Johnson ushered 
 him, had, for the first time in his memory of it, a 
 mournful air. It had always been shabby, and these 
 were the same faded chintzes, the same worn rugs; 
 but now, fireless and flowerless, it neither spoke nor 
 smiled and, with the sense it gave of an outlived 
 epoch, it was almost spectral. The photographs all 
 looked like the photographs of dead people and the 
 only similitude of life was the loud, silly ticking of 
 the French clock on the mantelpiece; Mrs. Chad- 
 wick s cherished clock ; one of her wedding-presents. 
 
 "I m afraid it s rather chilly, sir," said Johnson. 
 " No one has sat here of an evening now for a long 
 time." He put a match to the ranged logs, drew the 
 blinds up farther so that the autumnal sunlight 
 might more freely enter, and left him. 
 
 Oldmeadow went to the window and turned over 
 the magazines, a month old, that lay on a table 
 there. 
 
 He was standing so when Meg entered, and she 
 had half the length of the room to traverse before 
 they met. She was in black, in deep black ; but more 
 beautiful than he had ever seen her; her tossed 
 auburn locks bound low on her forehead with a black 
 ribbon, her white throat upright, her eyes hard with 
 their readiness, their resource. Beautiful and dis 
 tressing. It distressed him terribly to see that hard 
 ness in her eyes. 
 
 "How do you do, Roger," she said, giving him 
 her hand. "It s good to see you. Mother will be 
 glad." 
 
 They seated themselves on one of the capacious 
 sofas and she questioned him quickly, competently, 
 while the hard eyes seemed to measure him lest he
 
 244 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 measure her. It was almost the look of the dedassee 
 woman who forestalls withdrawal in an interlocutor. 
 But, as he answered her quietly, his fond regard 
 upon her, her defences began to fall. " It s the only 
 life, a soldier s, isn t it?" she said. "At all times, 
 really. But, at a time like this, anything else seems 
 despicable, doesn t it; contemptibly smug and safe. 
 The uniform is so becoming to you. You look a sol 
 dier already. One feels that men will trust and fol 
 low you. Didn t you burn with rage and shame, too, 
 when, for those four days, it seemed we might not 
 come in?" 
 
 "I felt too sure we should come in, to burn with 
 rage and shame," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 "Ah! but it was not so sure, I m afraid," said 
 Meg, and in her eyes, no longer hard, wild lights 
 seemed to pass and repass. "I m afraid that there 
 are nearly enough fools and knaves in England to 
 wreck us. Not quite enough, thank heaven! But, 
 for those four days, Eric was terribly afraid. He was 
 killed, you know, Roger, very splendidly, leading 
 his men." 
 
 " I know, Meg. My dear Meg," Oldmeadow mur 
 mured. 
 
 "Oh! I don t regret it! I don t regret it!" Meg 
 cried, while her colour rose and her young breast 
 lifted. " It s the soldier s death ! The consecrating, 
 heroic death ! He was ready. And deaths like that 
 atone for the others. He was not killed instanta 
 neously, Roger." 
 
 "I didn t know," said Oldmeadow, looking at her 
 with a pitying, troubled gaze. 
 
 "He lived for a day and night afterwards," said 
 Meg, looking back, tearless. "They carried him to
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 245 
 
 a barn. Only his man was with him. There was no 
 one to dress his dreadful wound; no food. The man 
 got him some water, at the risk of his own life. He 
 was conscious until the end and he suffered terribly." 
 
 Oldmeadow dropped his eyes before her fierce 
 stare while, strangely, dimly, there passed through 
 his mind the memory of the embarrassed, empty, 
 handsome young face in the brougham and, again, 
 the memory of his dog John. He had seen John die 
 and his eyes of wistful appeal. So Eric Hay ward s 
 eyes might have looked as he lay in the barn dying. 
 
 "Oh, Roger!" Meg said suddenly, seizing his 
 hand. "Kill them! Kill them! Oh, revenge him! 
 I was not with him! Think of it! I would have had 
 no right to have been with him had it been pos 
 sible. I did not know till a week later. He was 
 buried there. His man buried him." 
 
 " My poor, poor child," said Oldmeadow, clasping 
 her hands. 
 
 But, at once, taking refuge from his pity and 
 from her own desperate pain: "So you ve seen Pal- 
 grave," she said. "And he isn t going. I knew it 
 was useless. I told Mother it was useless with 
 that stranger that American, with him. She has 
 disgraced us all. Wretched boy! Hateful wo 
 man!" 
 
 "Meg, Meg; be soldierly. He wouldn t have 
 spoken like that." 
 
 "He never liked her! Never!" she cried. "I 
 knew he didn t, even at the time she was flattering 
 and cajoling us. I saw that she bewildered him and 
 that he accepted her only because she was mine. 
 How I loathe myself for having listened to her! 
 How I loathe her! All that she ever wanted was
 
 246 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 power! Power over other people s lives! She d com 
 mit any crime for that!" 
 
 "You seem to me cruelly unfair," he said. 
 
 "No! no! I m not unfair! You know I m not!" 
 she cried. "You always saw the truth about her 
 from the very beginning. You never fell down and 
 worshipped her, like the rest of us. And she knew 
 that you were her enemy and warned us against you. 
 Oh why did Barney marry her ! 
 
 " I never worshipped her; but I never thought her 
 base and hateful." 
 
 "You never knew her as I did; that was all. 
 And I never knew her until I came back and found 
 her doing to Palgrave what she had done to us. 
 Paladin! Did you hear her call him Paladin? Al 
 ways flattery! Always to make one think one was 
 wonderful, important, mysterious! She forced us 
 to go away, Roger. Sometimes I think it was hyp 
 notism; that she uses her will-power consciously. 
 We did not want to go. We did not want the di 
 vorce and the scandal." 
 
 "What did you want, then, Meg?" 
 
 She felt the gravity of his tone but, like a fierce 
 Maenad, she snatched at the torch, not caring how 
 it revealed her. "What of it! What if we had been 
 secret lovers! Who would have known! Who would 
 have been harmed! Some people go on for years 
 and years. His wife loved another man. He had no 
 one. Why should we have been pushed such 
 pitiful fools we were into displaying our love to 
 the world and being crushed by it! Oh, he was so 
 loyal, so brave; but it made him very, very un 
 happy. Oh, I was cruel to him sometimes! I used 
 to reproach him sometimes ! Oh, Roger! Roger! "
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 247 
 
 She broke into wild tears and stumbled to her 
 feet. 
 
 As she reached the door, covering her face with 
 her hands, her mother opened it and, meeting her 
 on the threshold, Meg, with almost the effect of 
 beating her aside with the other impediments to 
 her rage and grief, pushed past her so that the knit 
 ting Mrs. Chadwick held was flung to the floor, the 
 ball of khaki wool running rapidly away under a 
 sofa and the socks and needles dangling at her feet. 
 
 She stood looking down at them with a curious 
 apathy and, as Old meadow went to help and greet 
 her, he saw that as much as Meg was wild she was 
 dulled and quiet. 
 
 "Meg is so very, very violent," she said, as he 
 disentangled the wool and restored her sock and 
 ball to her. She spoke with listlessness rather than 
 sympathy. 
 
 " Poor child," said Oldmeadow. "One can hardly 
 wonder at it. But it makes a wretched existence 
 for you, I m afraid. You and she oughtn t to be 
 alone together." 
 
 He drew her to a chair and, seating herself, her 
 faded face and eyes that had lost their old look of 
 surprise turned to the light, Mrs. Chadwick as 
 sented, "It s very fatiguing to live with, certainly. 
 Sometimes I really think I must go away for a little 
 while and have a change. Nancy would come and 
 stay with Meg, you know. But I can t miss Bar 
 ney s last weeks. He comes to us, now, again. And 
 it might not be right to leave Meg. One must not 
 think of oneself at a time like this, must one?" The 
 knitting lay in her lap and she was twisting and un 
 twisting her handkerchief after her old fashion ; but
 
 248 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 her fingers moved slowly and without agitation and 
 Old meadow saw that some spring of life in her had 
 been broken. 
 
 "The best plan would be that Meg should, as 
 soon as possible, take up some work," he said, "and 
 that you and Nancy should go away. Work is the 
 only thing for Meg now. She ll dash herself to 
 pieces down here; and you with her. There ll soon 
 be plenty to do. Nursing and driving ambulances." 
 
 "Nancy is going to nurse, you know," said Mrs. 
 Chadwick. "But she won t go as long as we need 
 her here. She has promised me that. I don t know 
 what I should do without Nancy. I shouldn t care 
 to be nursed by Meg myself, if I were a wounded 
 soldier. She is so very restless and would probably 
 forget quite simple things like giving one a hand 
 kerchief or seeing that hot-water-bottles were 
 wrapped up before she put them to one s feet. A 
 friend of mine Amy Hatchard such a pretty 
 woman, though her hair was bright, bright red 
 and I never cared for that had the soles of her 
 feet nearly scorched off once by a careless nurse. 
 Dear Nancy. I often think of Nancy now, Roger. 
 I believe, you know, that if Adrienne had not come 
 Nancy and Barney might have married. How happy 
 we should all have been; though she has so little 
 money." 
 
 " I wish you could all think a little more kindly of 
 Adrienne," said Oldmeadow after a silence. Mrs. 
 Chadwick had begun to knit. " I must tell you that 
 I myself feel differently about her." 
 
 "Do you, Roger?" said Mrs. Chadwick, without 
 surprise. "You have a very judicious and balanced 
 mind, I know; even when you were hardly more
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 249 
 
 than a boy Francis noticed it and said that he d 
 rather go by your opinion than by that of most of 
 the men he knew. I always remembered that, after 
 wards. Till she came. And then I believed in her 
 rather than in you. You thought us all far too fond 
 of her from the very first. And now we have cer 
 tainly changed. Meg is certainly very violent; much 
 more violent than I could ever be. ... I am sorry 
 for Adrienne. I don t think she meant to do us any 
 harm as Meg believes." 
 
 "She only meant to do you good, I am sure of it. 
 I saw her in Oxford, let me tell you about it, when I 
 went in to see Palgrave. She is very unhappy. She 
 wants Palgrave to go. She wants him to feel it right 
 to go. It s not she, really, who is keeping him back 
 now." 
 
 "My poor Palgrave. Meg is very unkind about 
 him ; very bitter and unkind ; her own brother. But 
 it was very wrong of Adrienne to go and set up 
 housekeeping in Oxford near him. You must own 
 that, Roger. She may not be keeping him back ; but 
 she is aiding and abetting him always. It made 
 Barney even more miserable and disgusted than he 
 was before. And it looks so very odd. Though I 
 don t think that anyone "could ever gossip about 
 Adrienne. There is something about her that makes 
 that impossible." 
 
 "There certainly is. I am glad she is with Pal 
 grave, poor boy." 
 
 "I am glad you are sorry for him, Roger" 
 Mrs. Chadwick dropped a needle. "How clumsy 
 I am. My fingers seem all to have turned to thumbs. 
 Thank you so much. I try to make as many socks 
 as I can for our poor men; fingering wool; not
 
 250 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 wheeling, which is so much rougher to the feet. I m 
 sure I d rather march, and, if it came to that, die 
 in fingering than in wheeling. Just as I ve always 
 felt, foolish as it may sound, that if I had to be 
 drowned I d rather it were in warm, soapy water 
 than in cold salt. Not that one is very likely, ever, 
 to drown in one s bath. But tell me about Adrienne 
 and Palgrave, Roger, and what they said." 
 
 Mrs. Chadwick s discourse seemed, beforehand, 
 to make anything he might have to tell irrelevant 
 and, even while he tried to make her see what he 
 had seen, he felt it to be a fruitless effort. 
 
 There was indeed no enmity to plead against. 
 Only a deep exhaustion. Adrienne had pressed too 
 heavily on the spring and it was broken. 
 
 " I m sure she is very sorry to have made so much 
 mischief, but she isn t what I thought her, Roger," 
 she said, shaking her head, when he had finished. 
 "I m sorry for her, but I used to believe her to be a 
 sort of saint and now I know that she is very far 
 indeed from being one." 
 
 "The mere fact of failure doesn t deprive you of 
 sainthood," said Oldmeadow, remembering Nancy s 
 plea. "You haven t less reason now than you had 
 then for believing her one." 
 
 But even with her broken spring Mrs. Chad wick 
 had not lost all her shrewdness. It flickered in the 
 sad eyes she lifted from the khaki sock. "Some 
 kinds of failure do, Roger. That gift of healing, you 
 remember; all she could do for people in that way; 
 she has quite, quite lost it. That is a reason. It s 
 that more than anything that has made me feel 
 differently about her." 
 
 "Lost it?" He felt strangely discomposed, little 
 as the gift of healing had ever impressed him.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 251 
 
 "Quite," Mrs. Chadwick repeated. "I think it 
 distressed her dreadfully herself. I think she counted 
 upon it more than upon anything, perhaps without 
 knowing she did. It must have made her seem so 
 sure to herself, mustn t it? The first time was be 
 fore the war, just a little after you were here that 
 day in the summer dear me, how long ago it 
 seems; and I had one of my headaches, one of the 
 worst I ever had. I was so dreadfully troubled, you 
 know, about Barbara and Meg. And Adrienne 
 came and sat by me as she used to and put her hand 
 on my forehead; and I know it wasn t my lack of 
 faith, for I quite believed it would get well; but 
 instead of the peaceful feeling, it grew much worse ; 
 oh, much. As if red hot needles were darting through 
 my eyes and an iron weight pressing down on my 
 head. And such tumult and distress. I had to tell 
 her. I had to ask her to take away her hand. Oh, 
 she felt it very much, poor thing, and grew very 
 white and said it must be because she was still not 
 strong; not quite herself. But I knew then that it 
 was because she was not right; not what I had 
 thought her. I began to suspect, from that very 
 moment, that I had been mistaken ; because hypno 
 tizing people isn t the same as being a saint, is it, 
 Roger? and I think you said so once, long ago ; and 
 that was all that she had done; hypnotized us all 
 to think her good and wonderful. Later on, after 
 Meg had come, I let her try once more, though it 
 quite frightened me ; she looked so strange. And ! - 
 oh, dear it was dreadful. It distressed me dread 
 fully. She suddenly put her hands before her face 
 and sat quite still and then she burst into tears and 
 got up and ran out of the room, crying. It made me
 
 252 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 feel quite ill. And of course I knew there could be 
 nothing saintly about a person who made you feel 
 like that who could feel like that themselves, and 
 break down." 
 
 "Even saints have their times of darkness and 
 dryness," Oldmeadow found after a little time had 
 passed. The picture she put before him hurt him. 
 "It was an error of judgment to have believed her 
 a saint because she could hypnotize you if that 
 was what it was; but the fact that she can t hypno 
 tize you any longer that she s too unhappy to 
 have any power of that sort doesn t prove she s 
 not a saint. Of course she s not. Why should she 
 be?" 
 
 "I m sure I don t know why she should be; but 
 she used to behave as if she were one, didn t she? 
 And when I saw that she wasn t one in that way I 
 began to-see that she wasn t in other ways, too. It 
 was she who made me so unjust, so unkind to poor 
 Barney. She was so unjust and so unkind; and I 
 never saw it till then. I was blind till then ; though 
 you saw very well, that day you came to Con- 
 naught Square, that it was a sort of spell she cast. 
 It was a spell, Roger. The moment I saw her, after 
 the baby s death, I forgot everything she d done 
 and felt I loved her again. She willed me to. So as 
 to get power over me. Everything, always, with her, 
 was to get power over other people s lives," said 
 Mrs. Chadwick, and as he had, in the past, heard 
 echoes of Adrienne in all she said, now he heard 
 echoes of Meg, "It s by willing it, you know. Some 
 people practise it like five-finger exercises. You 
 have to sit quite still and shut your eyes and con 
 centrate. Meg has heard how it s done. I don t pre-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 253 
 
 tend to understand; but that must have been her 
 way. And she made poor Barney miserable and set 
 me against him at once ; you said so yourself, Roger, 
 and blinded me to all the cruel things she did. It 
 was to punish him, you know. To make him feel 
 he was dreadfully wrong and she quite right; about 
 Meg, and everything else ; for you came in, too. It 
 used to be so dreadful at Torquay. I knew it would 
 be sad there ; but I never guessed how sad it would 
 be with that horrid blue, blue sea. She used to 
 sit, day after day, on the terrace of the house, and 
 gaze and gaze at the sea and if Barney would come, 
 so lovingly, and ask her what he could do for her 
 and take her hand, oh, it was more and more mourn 
 ful, the way she would look at him; that dreadful, 
 loving look that didn t mean love at all, but only 
 trying to break him down and make him say that 
 he was down. I begged Barney s pardon, Roger, for 
 having treated him as I did. We treated him dread 
 fully, all of us; because she put him, always, in the 
 wrong. Oh, no, Roger, I m sorry for her, but she s 
 a dangerous woman; or was dangerous. For now 
 she has lost it all and has become like everybody 
 else; quite ordinary and unhappy." 
 
 He felt, in the little silence that, again, followed, 
 that he could hardly better this summing-up. That 
 was precisely what poor Adrienne Toner had be 
 come; ordinary and unhappy. The two things she 
 would have believed herself least capable of be 
 coming. There was nothing to be gained in urging 
 extenuating circumstances, especially since he was 
 not sure that there were any. Mrs. Chadwick, at 
 bottom, saw as clearly as he did. He asked her 
 presently, leaving the theme of Adrienne, whether
 
 254 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 she would not seriously consider going away for a 
 little while with Nancy. "Meg could go down to 
 The Little House," he said. 
 
 "Oh, no, she couldn t, Roger," said Mrs. Chad- 
 wick, "she won t go anywhere. She ll hardly speak 
 to Monica. She just sits out-of-doors, all day, 
 wrapped in a cloak, in the corner of the garden, 
 staring in front of her, and she pays not the slightest 
 attention to anything I say. And at night, in her 
 room, I hear her sobbing, sobbing, as if her heart 
 would break. I can t think hardly of Eric any 
 longer, Roger. Isn t it strange; but it s almost as if 
 he were my son that had been killed. And Barney 
 may be killed," the poor mother s lip and chin be 
 gan to tremble. "And you, too, Roger. I don t 
 know how we shall live through all that we must 
 bear and I keep thinking of the foolish little things, 
 like your having cold feet and wearing the same 
 clothes day after day in those horrible trenches. 
 He suffered it all, poor Eric. No, I can t think 
 hardly of him. All the same," she sobbed, "my 
 heart is broken when I remember that they can 
 never be married now."
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 "THAT S the way Mummy surprises one," said 
 Barney as he and Oldmeadow went together through 
 the Coldbrooks woods. "One feels her, usually, 
 such a darling goose and then, suddenly, she shows 
 one that she can be a heroine." 
 
 Barney was going to France in two days time 
 and Oldmeadow within the fortnight, and the Cold- 
 brooks good-byes had just been said. It had been 
 poor Meg who had broken down and clung and 
 cried. Mrs. Chadwick had, to the very last, talked 
 with grave cheerfulness of Barney s next leave and 
 given wise advice as if he had been merely leaving 
 them for a rather perilous mountain-climbing feat. 
 Oldmeadow could hardly believe her the same wo 
 man that he had seen ten days before. 
 
 He was staying at The Little House and had 
 come up on this afternoon of Barney s departure 
 to join him at Coldbrooks and walk down with him. 
 Barney had not yet seen or said good-bye to Nancy 
 and her mother, and Oldmeadow had seized this, 
 his only chance, of a talk with him. But, as they 
 left the woods and began to climb the bare hill-side, 
 Barney went on: 
 
 "I ve wanted a talk, too, Roger. I m glad you 
 managed this." 
 
 " It doesn t rob anyone of you, does it," said Old- 
 meadow. "We ll get to Chelford in time to give you 
 a good half-hour with them before your car comes 
 for you." 
 
 "That will be enough for Nancy," said Barney,
 
 256 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "The less she sees of me, the better she s pleased. 
 I ve lots of things I want to say, Roger. Of course 
 you understand that in every way it s a relief to be 
 going out." 
 
 "It settles things; or seems to settle them," said 
 Oldmeadow. "They take another place at all 
 events." 
 
 "Yes; just that. They take another place. What 
 difference does it make, after all, if a fellow has made 
 a mess of his personal life when his personal life has 
 ceased to count. I m not talking mawkish senti 
 ment when I say I hope I ll be killed if I can be 
 of some use first. I see no other way out of it. I m 
 sorry for Adrienne, after a fashion, for she s dished 
 herself, too. We made a hopeless mistake in getting 
 married and she knows it as well as I do; and when 
 a man and woman don t love each other any longer 
 it s the man s place to get out if he can." 
 
 "It was about Adrienne I wanted to talk to you, 
 Barney." For the first time in their long friendship 
 Oldmeadow felt that he spoke to an equal. Barney 
 had at last ceased to be a boy. "I ve seen her, since 
 seeing you that last time in the train." 
 
 "Well?" Barney inquired, as Oldmeadow paused. 
 "What have you got to say to me about Adrienne, 
 Roger? You ve not said very much, from the be 
 ginning; but everything you have said has been true 
 and I ve forgotten none of it. I m the more in 
 clined," and he smiled with a slight bitterness, "to 
 listen to you now." 
 
 "That s just the trouble," Oldmeadow muttered. 
 " You ve forgotten nothing. That s what I feel, with 
 remorse. That it was I who helped to spoil things 
 for you both, from the beginning. You d not have
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 257 
 
 seen her defects as you did if I hadn t shown them 
 to you; and if you hadn t seen them you d have ad 
 justed yourself to each other and have found them 
 out together. She d not have resented your finding 
 them out in the normal course of your shared lives. 
 It s been my opinion of her, in the background of 
 both your minds, that has envenomed everything." 
 Barney listened quietly. "Yes," he assented. 
 "That s all true enough. As far as it goes. I 
 mightn t have seen if you hadn t shown me. But 
 I can t regret you did show me, for anything else 
 would have been to have gone through life blind ; as 
 blind as Adrienne is herself. And it s because she 
 can t stand being seen through that she revealed so 
 much more; so much that you didn t see and that I 
 had to find out for myself. What you saw was ab 
 surdity and inexperience; they re rather loveable 
 defects ; I think I accepted them from the beginning, 
 because of all the other things I believed in her. You 
 said, too, you remember, that she d never know she 
 was wrong. Well, it s worse than that. She ll never 
 know she s wrong and she won t bear it that you 
 should think her anything but right. She s rapa 
 cious. She s insatiable. Nothing but everything 
 will satisfy her. You must be down on your knees, 
 straight down, before her; and if you re not, she has 
 no use for you. She turns to stone and you break 
 your head and your heart against her. It s hatred 
 Adrienne has felt for me, Roger, and I m afraid 
 I ve felt it for her, too. She s done things and said 
 things that I couldn t have believed her capable of; 
 mean things; clever things; cruelly clever that get 
 you right on the raw; things I can t forget. There s 
 much more in her than you saw at the beginning.
 
 258 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 I was right rather than you about that; only they 
 weren t the things I thought." 
 
 Oldmeadow walked, cutting at the withered way 
 side grasses with his cane. Barney s short, slow sen 
 tences seemed to sting him as they came. He had to 
 adjust himself to their smart; to adjust himself to 
 the thought of this malignant Adrienne. Yet what 
 he felt was not all surprise; he had foreseen, sus 
 pected, even this. "I know," he said at last; "I 
 mean, I can see that it would happen just like that." 
 
 "It did happen just like that," said Barney. "I 
 don t claim to have been an angel or anything like 
 one. I gave her as good as I got, or nearly, some 
 times, no doubt. But I know that it wasn t my 
 fault. I know it was Adrienne who spoiled every 
 thing." 
 
 They had come out now on the upland road. The 
 country dropped away beneath them wrapped in 
 the dull mole-colour, the distant, dull ultramarines 
 of the November afternoon. The smell of burning 
 weeds was in the air and, in the west, a long, melan 
 choly sheet of advancing rain-cloud hid the sun. 
 Oldmeadow wondered if he and Barney would ever 
 walk there together again, and his mind plunged 
 deep into the past, the many years of friendship to 
 which this loved country had been a background. 
 
 "Barney," he said, "what I wanted to say is this: 
 All that you feel is true; I m sure of it. But other 
 things are true, too. I ve seen her and I ve changed 
 about her. If I was right before, I m right now. 
 She s been blind because she didn t know she could 
 be broken. Well, she s beginning to break." 
 
 "Is she?" said Barney, and his quiet was im 
 placable. "I can quite imagine that, you know.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 259 
 
 Everyone, except poor Palgrave all the rest of 
 us, have found out that she s not the beautiful be 
 nignant being she thought she was, and that bewil 
 ders her and makes her pretty wretched, no doubt." 
 
 Oldmeadow waited a moment. "I want you to 
 see her," he said. "Don t be cruel. You are a little 
 cruel, you know. It s because you are thinking of 
 her abstractly ; remembering only how she has hurt 
 you. If you could see her, see how unhappy she is, 
 you d feel differently. That s what I want you to do. 
 That s what I beg you to do, Barney." 
 
 " I can t," said Barney after a moment. "That I 
 can t do, Roger. It s over. She might want me back 
 if she could get me back adoring her. It s only so 
 she d want me. But it s over. It s more than over. 
 There s something else." Barney s face showed no 
 change from its sad fixity. "You were right about 
 that, too. It s Nancy I ought to have married. It s 
 Nancy I love. And Adrienne knows it." 
 
 At this there passed before Oldmeadow s mind 
 the memory of the small, dark, hurrying figure, the 
 memory of the words she had spoken: "Some 
 things are like living creatures; and they can die. 
 They can die." 
 
 He felt rather sick. "In that case, how can you 
 blame your wife?" he muttered. "Doesn t that ex 
 plain it all?" 
 
 "No, it doesn t explain it all." There was no fire 
 of self-justification in Barney s voice. It was as 
 fixed and sad as his face. "It was only after Ad 
 rienne made me so wretched I began to find it out. 
 She was jealous of Nancy from the beginning, of 
 course. But then she was jealous of everything that 
 r wasn t, every bit of it, hers. She had no reason for
 
 260 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 jealousy. No man was ever more in love than I was 
 with Adrienne. Even now I don t feel for Nancy 
 what I felt for her. It s something, I believe, one 
 only feels once and if it burns out it burns out for 
 ever. With Nancy, it s as if I had come home; and 
 Adrienne and I were parted before I knew that I 
 was turning to her." 
 
 They had begun the final descent into Chelford 
 and the wind now brought a fine rain against their 
 faces.;: Neither spoke again until the grey roofs of 
 the village came into sight at a turning of the road. 
 "About money matters, Roger," Barney said. 
 "Mother and Meg and Barbara. If you get through, 
 and I don t, will you see to them for me? I ve ap 
 pointed you my trustee. I told Adrienne last sum 
 mer that I couldn t take any of her money any 
 longer, so that, of course, with my having thrown 
 up the city job and taken on the farms, my affairs 
 are in a bit of a mess. But I hope they ll be able to 
 go on at Coldbrooks all right. Palgrave will have 
 Coldbrooks if I don t come back, and perhaps you ll 
 be able to prevent him handing it over to his So 
 cialist friends." 
 
 "Palgrave would be safely human if it came to 
 taking care of his mother and sisters," said Old- 
 meadow. 
 
 "Would he?" said Barney. "I don t know." 
 
 Across the village green the lights of The Little 
 House shone at them. The curtains were still un 
 drawn and, as they waited at the door, they could 
 see Nancy in the drawing-room, sitting by the fire 
 alone. 
 
 "I want you to come in with me, please, Roger," 
 said Barney. "Nancy hasn t felt it right to be
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 261 
 
 very kind to me of late and she ll be able to be 
 kinder if you are there. You ll know, you ll see if a 
 chance comes for me to say what I want to say to 
 her. You might leave us for a moment then." 
 
 "You have hardly more than a half-hour, you 
 know," said Old meadow. 
 
 "One can say a good deal in a half-hour," Barney 
 replied. 
 
 Nancy had risen and, as they entered, she came 
 forward, trying to smile and holding out her hand 
 to each. But Oldmeadow was staying there. He 
 was not going in half an hour. There was no reason 
 why Nancy should give him her hand and Barney, 
 quietly, took both her hands in his. " It s good-bye, 
 then, Nancy, isn t it?" he said. 
 
 They stood there in the firelight together, his 
 dear young people, both so pale, both so fixedly 
 looking at each other, and Nancy still tried to smile 
 as she said, "It s dear of you to have come." But 
 her face betrayed her. It was sick with the fear 
 that, in conquering her own heart, she should hurt 
 Barney s; Barney s, whom she might never see 
 again. Oldmeadow went on to the fire and stood, his 
 back to them, looking down at it. 
 
 "Oh, no, it snot; not dear at all, "Barney returned. 
 "You knew I d come to say good-bye, of course. 
 Why haven t you been over to see me, you and 
 Aunt Monica? I ve asked you often enough." 
 
 "You mustn t scold me to-day, Barney, since it s 
 good-bye. We couldn t come," said Nancy. 
 
 "It s never I who scold you. It s you who scold 
 me. Not openly, I know," said Barney, "but by 
 implication; punish me, by implication. I quite 
 understood why you haven t come. Well, I want
 
 262 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 things to be clear now. Roger s here, and I want 
 to say them before him, because he s been in it all 
 since the beginning. It s because of Adrienne you ve 
 never come ; and changed so much in every way to 
 wards me." 
 
 He had kept her hands till then, but Oldmeadow 
 heard now that she drew away from him. For a 
 moment she did not speak; and then it was not 
 to answer him. "Have you said good-bye to her, 
 Barney?" 
 
 "No; I haven t," Barney answered. "I m not 
 going to say good-bye to Adrienne, Nancy. It must 
 be plain to you by this time that Adrienne and I 
 have parted. What did it all mean but that?" 
 
 "It didn t mean that to her. She never dreamed 
 it was meaning that," said Nancy. 
 
 "Well, she said it, often enough," Barney re 
 torted. 
 
 "Barney, please listen to me," said Nancy. " You 
 must let me speak. She never dreamed it was mean 
 ing that. If she was unkind to you it was because 
 she could not believe it would ever mean parting. 
 She had started wrong; by holding you to blame; 
 after the baby; when you and Roger so hurt her 
 pride. And then she wasn t able to go back. She 
 wasn t able to see it all so differently just to get 
 you back. It would have seemed wrong to her; a 
 weakness, just because she longed so. And then, 
 most of all, she believed you loved her enough to 
 come of yourself." 
 
 "I tried to," said Barney, in the sad, bitter voice 
 of the hill-side talk with Oldmeadow. "You see, 
 you don t know everything, Nancy, though you 
 know so much. I tried to again and again."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 263 
 
 "Yes. I know you did. But only on your own 
 terms. And by then I had come in. Oh, yes, I had, 
 Barney. You didn t know it. It was long, long be 
 fore you knew. But I knew it ; and so did she and it 
 was more than she could bear. What woman could 
 bear it? I couldn t have, in her place." Tears were 
 in Nancy s voice. 
 
 "It s queer, Nancy," said Barney, "that bar 
 ring Palgrave, who doesn t count you and Roger 
 are the only two people she has left to stick up for 
 her. Roger s just been saying all that to me, you 
 know. The two she tried to crab whenever she got 
 a chance. Well, say it s my fault, then. Say that 
 I ve been faithless to my wife and fallen in love with 
 another woman. The fact is there, and you ve said 
 it now yourself. I don t love her any longer. I shall 
 never love her again. And I love you. I love you, 
 Nancy, and it s you I ought to have married ; would 
 have married, I believe, if I hadn t been a blinded 
 fool. I love you, and I can say it now because this 
 may be the end of everything. Don t let her spoil 
 this, too. Nancy darling, look at me. Can t you 
 consent to forget Adrienne for this one time, when 
 we may never see each other again?" 
 
 "I can t forget her! I can t forget her!" Nancy 
 sobbed. "I mustn t. She s miserable. She hasn t 
 stopped loving you. And she s your wife." 
 "Do you want to make me hate her?" 
 "Oh, Barney that is cruel of you." 
 There was a silence and in it Oldmeadow heard 
 Barney s car draw up at the gate. He took out his 
 watch. There were only a few more moments left 
 them, Not turning to them he said. "It does her 
 no good, you know, Nancy dear."
 
 264 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "No. It does her no good," Barney repeated. 
 "But forgive me. I was cruel. I don t hate her. 
 I m sorry for her. It s simply that we ought never 
 to have married. Forget it, Nancy, and forget her. 
 Don t let it be, then, that I love you and don t love 
 my wife. Let it be in the old way. As if she d never 
 come. As if I d come to say good-bye to my cousin; 
 to my dearest friend on earth. Look at me. Give 
 me your hands. It s your face I want to take with 
 me." 
 
 Five minutes, Barney," Oldmeadow whispered, 
 as he went past them. Nancy had given him her 
 hands; she had lifted her face to his, and Barney s 
 arms had closed around her.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 MRS. AVERIL was in the hall. "Give them another 
 moment," he said. " I m going outside." 
 
 Tears were in his own eyes. He stepped out on 
 to the flagged path of the little plot in front of the 
 house where strips of turf and rose-beds ran be 
 tween the house and the high wall. Between the 
 clipped holly-trees at the gate he saw Barney s 
 car, and its lights, the wall between, cast a deep 
 shadow over the garden. 
 
 The rain was falling thickly now and he stood, 
 feeling it on his face, filled with a sense of appease 
 ment, of accomplishment. They were together at 
 last. It was not too late. At such a time, when all 
 the world hung on the edge of an abyss, to be to 
 gether for a moment might sum up more of real 
 living than many happy years. They knew each 
 other s hearts and what more could life give its 
 creatures than that recognition. 
 
 Suddenly, how he did not know, for there was no 
 apparent movement and his eyes were fixed on the 
 pallid sky, he became aware that a figure was lean 
 ing against the house in the shadow beside him. His 
 eyes found it and it was familiar. Yet he could not 
 believe his eyes. 
 
 She was leaning back, her hands against the wall 
 on either side, and he saw, with the upper layer of 
 perception that so often blunts a violent emotion, 
 that her feet were sunken in the mould of Mrs. 
 Averil s rose-bed and that the cherished shoots of
 
 266 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 the new climbing rose were tangled in her clothes. 
 The open window was but a step away. 
 
 She had come since they had come. She had 
 crept up. She had looked in for how long? and 
 had fallen back, casting out her arms so that it 
 might not be to the ground. Her eyes were closed ; 
 but she had heard and seen him. As he stood be 
 fore her, aghast, unable to find a word, he heard her 
 mutter: "Take me away, please." 
 
 Barney s car blocked the egress of the gate and 
 Barney might emerge at any moment. He leaned 
 towards her and found that she was intricately 
 caught in the rose. Her hat with its veil, her sleeve, 
 her hair, were all entangled. 
 
 Dumbly, patiently, she stood, while, with fum 
 bling fingers and terror lest they should be heard 
 within Mrs. Averil s voice now reached him from 
 the drawing-room Oldmeadow released her and, 
 his fingers deeply torn by the thorns, he was aware, 
 in all the tumult of his thought, more than of the 
 pain, of the wet fragrance of the roses that sur 
 rounded her. He shared what he felt to be her panic. 
 
 She had come hoping to see Barney; she had 
 come to say good-bye to Barney, who would not 
 come to her; and his heart sickened for her at the 
 shameful seeming of her plight. She knew now that 
 it must be her hope never to see Barney again. 
 
 There was a narrow passage, leading to the lawn 
 and garden, between the house and the stable walls. 
 Thickly grown with ivy, showing only a narrow open 
 ing above, where chimneys and gables cut against 
 the sky, it was nearly as dark as a tunnel, and into 
 this place of hiding he half led, half carried the un 
 fortunate woman.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 267 
 
 With the darkness, the pungent smell of the wet 
 ivy closed thickly, ominously about them. It was as 
 if he and Adrienne Toner were buried there together. 
 He heard a maid laugh far away and a boy passed 
 on the green stridently whistling "Tipperary." It 
 was like hearing, in the grave, the sounds of the 
 upper world. 
 
 Adrienne leaned against the wall. The ivy closing 
 round her, nearly obliterated her, but he could dimly 
 see the grey disk of her face, showing the unex 
 pectedness of contour that reveals itself in the faces 
 of the dead. The trivial features were erased and 
 only a shape of grief remained, strangely august and 
 emotionless. 
 
 An eternity seemed to pass before the front door 
 opened and Mrs. Averil s voice, steadied to a gal 
 vanized cheerfulness, came, half obliterated to a 
 wordless rhythm. Barney s voice answered her, and 
 his steps echoed on the flagged path. "Say good 
 bye to Roger for me if I don t see him on the road ! " 
 he called out from the gate. Then the car coughed, 
 panted; the horn croaked out its cry and, above 
 them, a shaft of light across the ivy, of which he had 
 till then been unaware, flitted suddenly away, 
 leaving the darkness more visible. 
 
 He heard then that she was weeping. 
 
 Putting his arm behind her, for the rain fell 
 heavily and the ivy was drenched with it, he drew 
 her forward and for a little while it was almost 
 against his breast that she lay while her very heart 
 dissolved itself in tears. 
 
 She had come, he knew it all, with a breakdown 
 of her pride, with a last wild hope and, perhaps, a 
 longing to atone, believing that she might snatch
 
 268 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 a word somewhere with her husband, and find her 
 way, at this last moment, back to the heart she had 
 so alienated. She had seen all. She had heard all. 
 He was sure of it. It had been as an outcast that he 
 had found her leaning there. He understood her 
 through and through and the tender heaviness that 
 had already so often visited his heart flooded it to 
 suffocation. 
 
 Among her sobs, he heard her, at last, speaking 
 to him. "Even Palgrave doesn t know. He told 
 me only this afternoon that Barney was here. 
 I thought I might find him. I was going to wait in 
 the road. And when I got here there was no car and 
 I was afraid that there was a mistake. That I had 
 missed him. And I went up to the house; to the 
 open window; and looked in; to see if he was there. 
 It was not jealousy: not now. I did not mean to be 
 an eavesdropper. But, when I saw them, I stayed 
 and listened. It was not jealousy," she repeated. 
 "It was because I had to know that there was no 
 more hope." 
 
 "Yes," said Oldmeadow gently, while, with long 
 pauses, she spoke on and on; to the impartial judge, 
 to the one sure refuge; and he said "Yes" again, 
 gently, after she had finished; a long time after. 
 She still half lay against his breast. He had never 
 felt such an infinite tenderness towards any crea 
 ture; not since his boyhood and his mother s death. 
 
 She drew away from him at last. "Take me," 
 she said. "There is a train; back to Oxford." She 
 had ceased to weep. Her voice was hoarse and faint. 
 
 "Did you walk up from the station? You re not 
 fit to walk back. I can get a trap. There s a man 
 just across the green."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 269 
 
 "No. Walking, please. I would be recognized. 
 They might know me. I can walk. If you will help 
 me." 
 
 He drew her arm through his. "Lean on me," 
 he said. "We ll go slowly. 
 
 They went past the drawing-room windows and, 
 softly opening, softly shutting, through the gate. 
 The road, when it turned the corner, left the village 
 behind; between its rarely placed trees, vague sil 
 houettes against the sky that seemed of one texture 
 with them, it showed its mournful pallor for only 
 a little space before them; there was not enough 
 light left in the sky to glimmer on its pools. The 
 fields, on either side, vanished into obscurity. Pale 
 cattle, once, over a hedge, put disconsolate heads 
 and lowed and a garrulous dog, as they passed by, 
 ran out from a way-side farm-yard, smelt at their 
 heels, growled perfunctorily and, having satisfied 
 his sense of duty, went back to his post. The sense 
 of dumb emptiness was so complete that it was only 
 after they had gone a long way that he knew that 
 she was weeping and the soft, stifling sounds seemed 
 only a part of nature s desolation. 
 
 Her head bent down, she stumbled on, leaning 
 on his arm, and from time to time she raised her 
 handkerchief and pressed it to her mouth and nose. 
 He did not say a word ; nor did she. 
 
 As he led her along, submissive to her doom, it 
 was another feeling of accomplishment that over 
 whelmed him; the dark after the radiant; after 
 Nancy and Barney, he and Adrienne. It was this, 
 from their first meeting, that he had been destined 
 to mean to her. She was his appointed victim. He 
 had killed, as really as if with a knife, the girl whom
 
 270 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 he had seen at Cold brooks, in the sunlight, on that 
 Sunday morning in spring, knowing no doubts. She 
 had then held the world in her hands and a guileless, 
 untried heaven had filled her heart. Between her 
 and this crushed and weeping woman there seemed 
 no longer any bond ; unless it was the strange aching 
 that, in his heart, held them both together.
 
 PART II
 
 PART II 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 OLDMEADOW sat in Mrs. Aldesey s drawing-room 
 and, the tea-table between them, Mrs. Aldesey 
 poured out his tea. So it was, after three years, that 
 they found each other. So it was, all over the world, 
 Oldmeadow said to himself, that the tea-table, or 
 its equivalent, reasserted itself in any interval 
 where the kindly amenities of human intercourse 
 could root themselves ; though the world rocked and 
 flames of anarchy rimmed its horizons. 
 
 It was more real, he felt that now, to sit and look 
 at Lydia over her tea than to parch on Eastern 
 sands and shiver in Western trenches; from the 
 mere fact that the one experience became a night 
 mare while the other was as natural as waking at 
 dawn. Horrors became the dropped stitches of life; 
 and though if there were too many of them they 
 would destroy the stocking, the stocking itself was 
 made up of tea-table talks and walks in the woods 
 with Nancy. He had just come from Coldbrooks. 
 
 So he put it, trivially, to himself, and he felt the 
 need of clinging to triviality. The dropped stitches 
 had been almost too much for him and the night 
 mare, at times, had seemed the only reality. At 
 times he had known a final despair of life and even 
 now he remembered that the worst might still come. 
 One might be called upon to face the death of the 
 whole order of civilization. Faith required one, per 
 haps, to recognize that the human spirit was bound
 
 274 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 up, finally, with no world order and unless one could 
 face its destruction as one had to face the death of a 
 loved individual, one was not secure of the spiritual 
 order that transcended all mundane calamity. He 
 believed, or hoped, that during these last three 
 years, in Gallipoli, Egypt and Palestine, when, to 
 the last fibre, he had felt his faiths tested, he had 
 learned to be ready for the great relinquishment, 
 should it be required of him; and it was therefore 
 the easier to doff that consciousness, as he might 
 have doffed a sword, and think of Lydia and of the 
 order that still survived and that she still stood for. 
 
 Lydia did not look the worse for the war; indeed 
 she looked the better. She looked as if, in spite of 
 long days in the hospital, she digested better and, in 
 spite of air-raids, slept better, and as they talked, 
 finding their way back to intimacy by the compar 
 ing of such superficialities, she told him that for 
 years she hadn t been so strong or well. "Nothing 
 is so good for you, I ve found out, as to feel that you 
 are being used; being used by something worth 
 while. People like myself must keep still about our 
 experiences, for we ve had none that bear talking 
 of. But even the others, even the people bereaved 
 unspeakably, are strangely lifted up. And I believe 
 that the populace enjoys the air raids rather than 
 the reverse ; they give them a chance of feeling that 
 they are enduring something, too ; with good-humour 
 and pluck. If anyone is pessimistic about the effect 
 of war on average human nature, I should only ask 
 them to come and talk to our men at the hospital. 
 Of course, under it all, there s the ominous roar in 
 one s ears all the time." 
 
 "Do you mean the air-raids?" he asked her and,
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 275 
 
 shaking her head, showing him that she, too, had 
 seen with him and, he believed, with him accepted : 
 "No; I mean the roar of nation after nation col 
 lapsing into the abyss. A sort of tumbril roar of 
 civilization, Roger. And, for that, there s always 
 the last resource of going gallantly to the guillotine. 
 But all the same, I believe we shall pull through." 
 
 It was the spring of 1918 and one needed faith to 
 believe.it. She asked him presently about his friends 
 at Coldbrooks. He had gone to Coldbrooks for 
 three days of his one week s leave. After this he 
 went to France. 
 
 "What changes for you there, poor Roger," said 
 Mrs. Aldesey. 
 
 "Yes. Terrible changes. Palgrave dead and Bar 
 ney broken. Yet, do you know, it s not as sad as 
 it was. Something s come back to it. Nancy sits 
 by him and holds his hand and is his joy and com 
 fort." 
 
 "Will he recover?" 
 
 "Not in the sense of being really mended. He ll 
 go on crutches, always, if he gets up. But the doc 
 tors now hope that the injury to the back isn t 
 permanent." 
 
 "And Meg s married," said Mrs. Aldesey after 
 a little pause. "Have you seen her?" 
 
 "No. She runs a hospital in the country, at her 
 husband s place, Nancy tells me ; and is very happy." 
 
 "Very. Has a fine boy, and is completely rein 
 stated. It s a remarkable ending to the story, isn t 
 it? She met him at the front, you know, driving her 
 ambulance ; and he has twice as much in him as poor 
 Eric Hay ward." 
 
 "Remarkable. Yet Meg s a person who only
 
 276 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 needs her chance. She s the sort that always comes 
 out on top." 
 
 "Does it comfort her mother a little for all she s 
 suffered to see her on top?" 
 
 " It almost comically comforts her. All the same, 
 Eleanor Chadwick has her depths. Nothing will 
 ever comfort her for Palgrave s death." 
 
 "I understand that," said Mrs. Aldesey. "Noth 
 ing could. How she must envy the happy mothers 
 whose boys were killed at the front. To have one s 
 boy die in prison as a conscientious objector must 
 be the bitterest thing the war has given any mother 
 to bear." 
 
 "He was a dear boy," said Oldmeadow. "Hero 
 ically wrong- minded." He could hardly bear to 
 think of Palgrave. 
 
 "He wasn t alone, you know," said Mrs. Aldesey 
 after a moment. Something was approaching that 
 he would rather not have to speak of; a name he 
 would so much rather not name. And, evading it, 
 feebly, he said, "His mother got to him in time, 
 I know." 
 
 "Yes. But all the time. She went and lived near 
 the prison. Adrienne Toner I mean." 
 
 Her eyes were on him and he hoped that no read 
 justment of his features was visible. "Oh, yes. 
 Nancy told me that," he said. 
 
 "What s become of her, Roger?" Mrs. Aldesey 
 asked. "Since Charlie was killed the Lumleys have 
 lived in the country and I hardly see them. I haven t 
 heard a word of her for years." 
 
 He was keeping his eyes on her and he knew from 
 her expression that he showed some strain or some 
 distress.
 
 ADR1ENNE TONER 277 
 
 " Nor have I. Nancy said that they hadn t either. 
 She went away, after Palgrave s death. Disap 
 peared completely." 
 
 "Nancy told you, of course, about the money; 
 the little fortune she gave Palgrave, so that he could 
 leave it to his mother?" 
 
 "Oh, yes. Nancy wrote to me of that." 
 
 " It was cleverly contrived, wasn t it. They are 
 quite tied up to it, aren t they; whatever they may 
 feel. No one could object to her giving a fortune to 
 the boy she d ruined. I admired that in her, I must 
 confess ; the way she managed it. And then her dis 
 appearance." 
 
 "Very clever indeed," said Oldmeadow. "All 
 that remains for her to do now is to manage to get 
 killed. And that s easily managed. Perhaps she is 
 killed." 
 
 He did not intend that his voice should be emptier 
 or dryer, yet Lydia looked at him with a closer at 
 tention. 
 
 " Barney and Nancy could get married then," she 
 said. 
 
 "Yes. Exactly. They could get married." 
 
 "That s what you want, isn t it, Roger?" 
 
 "Want her to be killed, or them to be married?" 
 
 "Well, as you say, so many people are being killed. 
 One more or less, if it s in such a good cause as their 
 marriage - 
 
 " It s certainly a good cause. But I don t like the 
 dilemma," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 He knew from the way she looked at him, discreet 
 and disguised as her recognition was, that he was 
 hiding something from her. Casting about his mind, 
 in the distress that took the form of confusion, he
 
 278 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 could himself find nothing that he hid, or wished to 
 hide, unless it was the end of Adrienne s story as 
 Barney s wife. That wasn t for him to show; ever; 
 to anyone. 
 
 " Perhaps she s gone back to America," said Mrs. 
 Aldesey presently, "California, you know. Or Chi 
 cago. She may very well be engaged in great enter 
 prises out there that we never hear of. They d be 
 sure to be great, wouldn t they." 
 
 "I suppose they would." 
 
 "You saw her once more, didn t you, at the time 
 you saw Palgrave," Mrs. Aldesey went on. "Lady 
 Lumley told me of that. And how kind you had 
 been. Adrienne had spoken of it. You were sorry 
 for them both, I suppose ; for her as well as for him, 
 in spite of everything. Or did she merely take it for 
 granted that the kindness to him extended to her?" 
 
 " Not at all. It was for her too," said Oldmeadow, 
 staring a little and gathering together, after this 
 lapse of time that seemed so immense, his memories 
 of that other tea-table set up in the chaos : Palgrave s 
 tea-table on that distant day in Oxford. What was 
 so confusing him was his consciousness that it hadn t 
 been the last time he had seen Adrienne. "I was as 
 sorry for her as for him," he went on. "Sorrier. 
 There was so much more in her than I d supposed. 
 She was capable of intense suffering." 
 
 "In losing her husband s affections, you mean? 
 You never suspected her of being inhuman, surely? 
 Lady Lumley blamed poor Barney for all that sad 
 story. But, even from her account, I could see his 
 side very plainly." 
 
 " Perhaps I did think her inhuman. At all events 
 I thought her invulnerable."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 279 
 
 "Yes. I remember. With all her absurdity you 
 thought she had great power." Mrs. Aldesey looked 
 at him thoughtfully. "And it was when you found 
 she hadn t that you could be sorry for her." 
 
 " Not at all," said Oldmeadow again. " I still think 
 she has great power. People can have power and go 
 to pieces." 
 
 "Did she go to pieces? That day in Oxford? I 
 can t imagine her in pieces, you know." 
 
 He had a feeling of drawing back; or of drawing 
 Adrienne back. "In the sense of being so unhappy, 
 so obviously unhappy, over Palgrave," he said. 
 
 He saw that Lydia would have liked to go on ques 
 tioning, as, of course, it would have been perfectly 
 natural for her to do. Was not Adrienne Toner and 
 her absurdity one of their pet themes? Yet she de 
 sisted. She desisted and it was because she felt some 
 change in him; some shrinking and some pain. 
 "Well, let s hope that she is happy, now, or as happy 
 as she can be, poor thing, doing great deeds in Amer 
 ica," she said. And she turned the talk back to civ 
 ilization and its danger. 
 
 They talked a good deal about civilization during 
 their last three days together. He wanted things, 
 during these three days of mingled recovery and 
 farewell, to be as happy as possible between him and 
 his friend, for he knew that Lydia s heart was heavy, 
 for him and not for civilization. The front to which 
 he was going was more real to her, because it was 
 much nearer, and his peril was more real than during 
 his absence in distant climes. He felt himself that 
 the French front, at this special time, would prob 
 ably make an end of him and, for the first time since 
 their early friendship, he knew conjecture as to his
 
 2 8o ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 relation with Lydia; wondered, if it had not been for 
 Mr. Aldesey in New York, whether Lydia might 
 have been in love with him, and realized, with a 
 curious sense of anxiety and responsibility, that her 
 friendship for him now was the closest tie in her life. 
 The war might to her, too, mean irreparable loss. 
 And he was sorry that it was so ; sorry to think that 
 the easy, happy intercourse had this hidden depth of 
 latent suffering. 
 
 Lydia s feeling, and its implications, became the 
 clearer to him when, on their last evening together, 
 she said to him suddenly: "Perhaps you ll see her 
 over there." 
 
 He could not pretend not to know whom she 
 meant, nor could he pretend to himself not to see 
 that if it troubled Lydia that he should be sorry for 
 Adrienne that could only be because she cared far 
 more for him than he had ever guessed. 
 
 He said, as easily as he could manage it, for the 
 pressure of his realizations made him feel a little 
 queer: "Not if she s in America." 
 
 " Ah, but perhaps she s come back from America," 
 said Mrs. Aldesey. "She s a great traveller. What 
 will you do with her if you do find her? Bring her 
 back to Barney?" 
 
 "Hardly that," he said. "There d be no point 
 in bringing her back to Barney, would there?" 
 
 "Well, then, what would you do with her?" 
 Mrs. Aldesey smiled, as if with a return to their old 
 light dealing with the theme, while, still in her 
 nurse s coiffe and dress, she leaned back against her 
 chair. 
 
 "What would she do with me, rather, isn t it?" 
 he asked. And he, too, tried to be light.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 281 
 
 "She ll be mended then, you think? Able to do 
 things to people again?" 
 
 "I m not at all afraid of her, you know. She 
 never did me any harm," he said. 
 
 "Because you were as strong as she, you mean. 
 She did other people harm, surely. You warned me 
 once to keep away from her unless I wanted to lose 
 my toes and fingers," Mrs. Aldesey still smiled. 
 "She does make people lose things, doesn t she?" 
 
 "Well, she makes them gain things, too. Fortunes 
 for instance. Perhaps if I find her, she ll give me a 
 fortune." 
 
 "But that s only when she s ruined you," she 
 reminded him. 
 
 "And it s she who s ruined now," he felt bound to 
 remind her; no longer lightly. 
 
 Leaning back in her chair, her faded little face 
 framed in white, Mrs. Aldesey looked at once 
 younger yet more tired than he had ever seen her 
 look and she sat for a little while silent ; as if she had 
 forgotten Adrienne Toner and were thinking only 
 of their parting. But all her gaiety had fallen from 
 her as she said at last: "I can be sorry for her, too; 
 if she s really ruined. If she still loves him when he 
 has ceased to care for her. Does she, do you think? " 
 
 With the question he seemed to see a fire-lit room 
 and lovers who had found each other and to smell 
 wet roses. Lydia was coming too near ; too near the 
 other figure, outside the window, fallen back with 
 outstretched arms against the roses. And again he 
 felt himself softly, cautiously, disentangle the sleeve, 
 the hair, felt himself draw Adrienne away into the 
 darkness where the smell was now of wet ivy and 
 where he could see only the shape of an accepting 
 grief.
 
 282 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "How could I know?" he said. "She was very 
 unhappy when I last saw her. But three years have 
 passed and people can mend in three years." 
 
 "Especially in America," Mrs. Aldesey suggested. 
 "It s a wonderful place for mending. Let s hope 
 she s there. Let s hope that we shall never, any of 
 us, ever hear of her again. That would be much the 
 happiest thing, wouldn t it?" 
 
 He was obliged to say that it would certainly be 
 much the happiest thing; and he was too unhappy 
 about Lydia to be able to feel angry with her. He 
 knew how tired she must be when, for the first time 
 in their long friendship, she must know that she was 
 not pleasing him, yet not be able to help herself.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 "GooD LORD!" Oldmeadow heard himself groaning. 
 
 Even as he took possession of his physical suffer 
 ing he knew that there was satisfaction in suffering, 
 at last, himself. Until now the worst part of war 
 had been to see the sufferings of others. This was at 
 last the real thing; but it was so mingled with ac 
 quiescence that it ceased to be the mere raw fact. 
 "We re all together, now," he thought, and he felt 
 himself, even as he groaned, lifted on a wave of 
 beatitude. 
 
 Until now he had not, as a consciousness, known 
 anything. There was a shape in his memory, a mere 
 immense black blot shot with fiery lights. It must 
 symbolize the moment when the shell struck him, 
 bending, in the trench, over his watch and his calcu 
 lations. And after that there were detached visions, 
 the ceiling of a train where he had swung in a ham 
 mock bed, looking up; clean sheets, miraculously 
 clean and the face of a black-browed nurse who re 
 minded him of Trixie. The smell of chloroform was 
 over everything. It bound everything together so 
 that days might have passed since the black blot 
 and since he lay here, again in clean sheets, the 
 sweet, thick smell closing round him and a raging 
 thirst in his throat. He knew that he had just been 
 carried in from the operating room and he groaned 
 again "Good Lord," feeling the pain snatch as if 
 with fangs and claws at his thigh and belly, and 
 muttered, "Water!" 
 
 Something sweet, but differently sweet from the
 
 284 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 smell, sharp, too, and insidious, touched his lips and 
 opening them obediently, as a young bird opens its 
 bill to the parent bird, he felt a swob passed round 
 his parched mouth and saw the black-browed nurse. 
 "Not water, yet, you know," she said. "This is 
 lemon and glycerine and will help you wonderfully." 
 
 He wanted to ask something about Paris and the 
 long-distance gun firing on it every day and he 
 seemed to see it over the edge of the trench, far away 
 on the horizon of No-man s-land, a tiny city flaming 
 far into the sky. But other words bubbled up and 
 he heard himself crying: "Mother! Mother!" and 
 remembered, stopping himself with an act of will, 
 that they all said that when they were dying. But 
 as he closed his eyes he felt her very near and knew 
 that it would be sweet to die and find her. 
 
 A long time must have passed. Was it days or 
 only the time of daylight? It was night now and a 
 shaded light shone from a recess behind him and 
 thoughts, visions, memories raced through his 
 mind. Nancy; Barney; he would never see them 
 again, then: poor Lydia and civilization. " Civiliza 
 tion will see me out," he thought and he wondered 
 if they had taken off the wings of the Flying Victory 
 when they packed her. 
 
 A rhythm was beating in his brain. Music was 
 it? Something of Bach s? It gathered words to it 
 self and shaped itself sentence by sentence into 
 something he had heard? or read? Ah, he was glad 
 to have found it. "Under the orders of your de- 
 , voted officers you will march against the enemy or 
 fall where you stand, facing the foe. To those who 
 die I say: You will not die: you will enter living 
 into immortality, and God will receive you into his
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 285 
 
 bosom." He seemed to listen to the words as he lay, 
 quietly smiling. But it was music after all for, as he 
 listened, they merged into the "St. Matthew Passion." 
 He had heard it, of course, with Lydia, at the Tem 
 ple. But Lydia did not really care very much for 
 Bach. She might care more for "Litanei." She had 
 sung it standing beside him with foolish white roses 
 over her ears. How unlike Lydia to wear those 
 roses. And was it Lydia who stood there? A men 
 tal perplexity mingled with the physical pain and 
 spoiled his peace. It was not Lydia s, that white 
 face in the coffin with wet ivy behind it. What 
 suffering was this that beat upon his heart? The 
 music had faded all away and he saw faces every 
 where, dying faces; and blood and terrible mutila 
 tions. All the suffering of the war, worse, far worse 
 than the mere claws and fangs that tore at him. 
 Dying boys choked out their breaths in agonies of 
 conscious loneliness, yearning for faces they would 
 never see again. Oh, how many he had seen die 
 like that! Intolerable to watch them. And could 
 one do nothing? "Cigarettes. Give them cigarettes, 
 he tried to tell somebody. "And marmalade for 
 breakfast; and phonographs, and then they will 
 enter living into immortality" No: he did not 
 mean that. What did he mean? He could catch at 
 nothing now. Thoughts were tossed and tumbled 
 like the rubbish of wreckage from an inundated 
 town on the deep currents of his anguish. A current 
 that raced and seethed and carried him away. He 
 saw it. Its breathless speed was like the fever in his 
 blood. If it went faster he would lose his breath. 
 Church-bells ringing on the banks lost theirs as he 
 sped past so swiftly and made a trail of whining
 
 286 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 sound. Effie! Effie! It was poor little Effie, 
 drowning. He saw her wild, small face, battling. 
 Bubbles boiled up about his cry. 
 
 Suddenly the torrent was stilled. Without com 
 motion, without tumult, it was stilled. There was 
 a dam somewhere; it had stopped racing; he could 
 get his breath. Still and slow; oh! it was delicious 
 to feel that quiet hand on his forehead ; his mother s 
 hand, and to know that Effie was safe. He lay with 
 closed eyes and saw a smooth waterfall sliding and 
 curving with green grey depths into the lower 
 currents of the stream. He remembered the stream 
 well, now; one of his beloved French rivers; one of 
 the smaller, sylvan rivers, too small for majesty; 
 with silver poplars spaced against the sky on either 
 bank and a small town, white and pink and pearly- 
 grey, clear on the horizon. Tranquil sails were 
 above him and the bells from the distant church- 
 tower floated to him across the fields. Soundlessly, 
 slowly, he felt himself borne into oblivion. 
 
 The black-browed nurse was tending him next 
 morning. "You are better," she said, smiling at 
 him. "You slept all night. No; it s a shame, but 
 you mayn t have water yet." She put the lemon 
 and glycerine to his lips. "The pain is easier, isn t 
 it?" 
 
 He said it was. He felt that he must not stir an 
 inch so as to keep it easier, but he could not have 
 stirred had he wanted to, for he was all tightly 
 swathed and bandaged. He remembered something 
 he wanted specially to ask: "Paris? They haven t 
 got it yet?" 
 
 "They ll never get it!" she smiled proudly. 
 "Everything is going splendidly."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 287 
 
 The English surgeon was such a nice fellow. He 
 had spectacles on a square- tipped nose and a square, 
 chubby face; yet his hair was nearly white. Old- 
 meadow remembered, as if of days before the flood, 
 that his name was a distinguished one. Perhaps it 
 was morphia they gave him, after his wound was 
 dressed, or perhaps he fainted. The day passed in a 
 hot and broken stupor and at night the tides of 
 fever rose again and carried him away. But, again, 
 before he had lost his breath, before he had quite 
 gone down into delirium, the quiet hand came and 
 sent him, under sails, to sleep. 
 
 Next day Oldmeadow knew, from the way the 
 surgeon looked at him, that his case was grave. His 
 face was grim as he bent over the dressing and he 
 hurt horribly. They told him, when it was over, that 
 he had been very brave, and, like a child, he was 
 pleased that they should tell him so. But the pain 
 was worse all day and the sense of the submerging 
 fever imminent, and he lay with closed eyes and 
 longed for the night that brought the hand. Hours, 
 long hours passed before it came. Hours of sun 
 light when, behind his eyelids, he saw red, and 
 hours of twilight when he saw mauve. Then, for a 
 little while, it was a soft, dense grey he saw, like a 
 bat s wing, and then the small light shone across his 
 bed ; he knew that the night had come, and felt, at 
 last, the hand fall softly on his head. 
 
 He lay for some time feeling the desired peace 
 flow into him and then, through its satisfaction, 
 another desire pushed up into his consciousness and 
 he remembered that, more than about Paris, he had 
 wanted to speak to the nurse about what she did 
 for him and thank her.
 
 288 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "It s you who make me sleep, isn t it," he said, 
 lying with closed eyes under the soft yet insistent 
 pressure. "I ve never thanked you." 
 
 She did not reply. She did not want him to talk. 
 But he still wanted to. 
 
 "I couldn t thank you last night," he said, "I 
 can t keep hold of my thoughts. And when morning 
 comes I seem to have forgotten everything about 
 the night. You are the nurse who takes care of me 
 in the daytime, too, aren t you?" 
 
 Again, for a moment, there was no reply; and 
 then a voice came. "No; I am the night nurse. Go 
 to sleep now." 
 
 It was a voice gentle, cold and soft, like snow. It 
 was not an English voice and he had heard it be 
 fore. Where had he heard it? Rooks were cawing 
 and he saw a blue ribbon rolling, rolling out across 
 a spring-tide landscape. This voice was not like a 
 blue ribbon; it was like snow. Yet, when he turned 
 his head under her hand, he looked round at Ad- 
 rienne Toner. 
 
 The first feeling that came uppermost in the med 
 ley that filled him at the sight of her was one of 
 amused vexation. It was as if he went back to his 
 beginnings with her, back to the rooks and the blue 
 ribbon. " At it again ! " was what he said to himself, 
 and what he said aloud, absurdly, was: "Oh, come, 
 now;" 
 
 She did not lift her hand, but there was trouble 
 on her face as she looked back at him. " I hoped you 
 wouldn t see me, Mr. Oldmeadow," she said. 
 
 He was reminded of Bacchus and the laying on of 
 hands ; but a classical analogy, even more ridiculous, 
 came to him with her words. ".Like Cupid and
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 289 
 
 Psyche," he said. "The other way round. It s I 
 who mustn t look." 
 
 The trouble on her face became more marked 
 and he saw that she imagined him to be delirious. 
 He was not quite himself, certainly, or he would not 
 have greeted Adrienne Toner thus, and he made an 
 effort to be more decorous and rational as he said, 
 "I m very glad to see you again. Safe and sound: 
 you know." 
 
 She had always had a singular little face, but it 
 had never looked so singular as now, seen from be 
 low with shadows from the light behind cast so 
 oddly over it. The end of her nose jutted from a 
 blue shadow and her eyes lay in deep hollows of 
 blue. All that he was sure of in her expression was 
 the gravity with which she made up her mind to 
 humour him. "We want you to be safe and sound, 
 too. Please shut your eyes and go to sleep." 
 
 "All right; all right, Psyche," he murmured, and 
 he knew it wasn t quite what he intended to say, 
 yet in his flippancy he was taking refuge from some 
 thing; from the flood of suffering that had broken 
 over him the other night after he had seen that dead 
 face with white roses over its ears. This queer face, 
 half dissolved in blue and yellow, was not dead and 
 the white coiffe came closely down about it. If he 
 obeyed her he knew that she would keep the other 
 faces away and he closed his eyes obediently and 
 lay very still, seeing himself again as the good little 
 boy being praised. This was Psyche; not Ariane. 
 "Ariane ma sceur," he murmured. It was Ariane 
 who had the white roses or was it wet ivy? and 
 after her face pressed all the other dying faces. 
 " You ll keep them away, won t you?" he murmured,
 
 290 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 and he heard her say: "Yes; I ll keep them quite 
 away," and, softly, a curtain of sleep fell before his 
 eyes crossed by a thin drift of mythological figures. 
 
 "I thought it was you who sent me to sleep," he 
 said to the English nurse next day. He could 
 hardly, in the morning light, believe it was not a 
 dream. 
 
 She smiled with an air of vicarious pride. "No 
 indeed. I can t send people to sleep. It s our won 
 derful Mrs. Chadwick. She does a good deal more 
 than put people to sleep. She cures people oh, I 
 wouldn t have believed it myself, till I saw it who 
 are at death s door. It s lucky for you and the others 
 that we ve got her here for a little while." 
 
 "Where s here?" he asked after a moment. 
 
 "Here s Boulogne. Didn t you know?" 
 
 "I thought I heard the sea sometimes. It s for 
 cases too bad, then, to be taken home. Get her here 
 from where?" 
 
 "From her hospital in the firing-line. Now that 
 we re advancing at the front everything there is 
 changed and she could come away for a little. Sir 
 Kenneth s been begging her to come ever since he 
 saw her. He knew she would work marvels here, 
 too." The nice young nurse was exuberant in her 
 darkness and rosiness with a Jewish streak of fer 
 vour in her lips and eyes. " It s a sort of rest for her," 
 she added. "She s been badly wounded once. You 
 can just see the scar, under her cap, on her forehead. 
 And she nearly died of fever out in Salonika. She 
 had a travelling ambulance there before she came to 
 France." 
 
 "It must be very restful for her," Oldmeadow 
 remarked with a touch of his grim mirth, "if she
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 291 
 
 has to sit up putting all your bad cases to sleep. 
 Why haven t I heard of her and her hospital?" 
 
 " It s not run in her name. It s an American hos 
 pital she is American called after her mother, 
 I believe. The Pearl Ambulance is what it s called 
 and everybody here knows about it ; all of us nurses 
 and doctors, I mean. Her organizing power is as 
 wonderful as her cures ; her influence over her staff. 
 They all worship the ground she walks on." 
 
 "Pearl, Pearl Toner," Oldmeadow was saying 
 to himself. How complete, how perfect it was. And 
 the nurse went on, delighted, evidently, to talk of 
 an idol, and rather as if she were speaking of a 
 special cure they had installed, a sort of Carrel 
 treatment not to be found anywhere else: Every 
 thing s been different since she came. It s almost 
 miraculous to see what the mere touch of her hand 
 can do. Matron says she wouldn t be surprised if 
 it turned out she was a sort of nun and wore a hair 
 shirt under her dress. Whatever she is, it makes 
 one feel better and stronger just to see her and one 
 would do anything for her just to have her smile at 
 one. She has the most heavenly smile." 
 
 It was all very familiar. 
 
 "Ah, you haven t abandoned me after all, though 
 I have found you out," he said to Adrienne Toner 
 that night. 
 
 He was able at last to see her clearly as she came 
 in, so softly that it was like a dream sliding into 
 one s sleep. She was like a dream in her nurse s 
 dress which, though so familiar on other women, 
 seemed to isolate and make her strange. Her face 
 was smaller than he had remembered it and had the 
 curious look, docile yet stubborn, that one sees on
 
 292 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 the faces of dumb-mutes. She might have looked 
 like that had she been deafened by the sound of so 
 many bursting shells and lost the faculty of speech 
 through doing much and saying nothing among scenes 
 of horror. But she spoke to him, after all, as natu 
 rally as he spoke to her, saying, though with no 
 touch of his lightness: " You mustn t talk, you know, 
 if I come to make you sleep. Sir Kenneth wants 
 sleep for you more than anything else." 
 
 "I promise you to be good," said Oldmeadow. 
 " But I m really better, aren t I? and can talk a little 
 first." 
 
 "You are really better. But it will take a long 
 time. A great deal of sleeping." 
 
 "No one knew what had become of you," said 
 Oldmeadow, and he remembered that he ought to 
 be sorry that Adrienne Toner had not been killed. 
 
 She hesitated, and then sat down beside him. He 
 thought that she had been going to ask him some 
 thing and then checked herself. "I can t let you 
 talk," she said, and in her voice he heard the new 
 authority; an authority gained by long submission 
 to discipline. 
 
 "Another night, then. We must talk another 
 night," he murmured, closing his eyes, for he knew 
 that he must not disobey her. All the same it was 
 absurd that Adrienne Toner should be doing this for 
 him ; absurd but heavenly to feel her hand fall softly, 
 like a warm, light bird, and brood upon his forehead.
 
 CHAPTER III . 
 
 THEY never spoke of Coldbrooks, nor of Barney, 
 nor of Palgrave ; not once. Not once during all those 
 nights that she sat beside him and made him sleep. 
 
 He had heard from Coldbrooks, of course; Otters 
 came often now. And the dark young nurse had 
 written for him since he could not yet write for him 
 self. He had said no word of seeing Adrienne. Nor 
 had he let them know how near to death he had 
 been and, perhaps, still was. He would have liked 
 to have seen Lydia and Nancy if he were to die; 
 but most of all he wanted to be sure of not losing 
 Adrienne. And he knew that were he to tell them, 
 were they to come, Adrienne would go. 
 
 She never spoke to him at all, he remembered 
 as getting stronger with every day, he pieced his 
 memories of these nights together unless he spoke 
 to her; and she never smiled. And it came upon him 
 one morning after he had read letters that brought 
 so near the world from which she was now shut out, 
 that she had, perhaps, never forgiven him. After 
 all, though he could not see that he had been wrong, 
 she had everything to forgive him and the thought 
 made him restless. That night, for the first time, 
 she volunteered a remark. His temperature had 
 gone up a little. He must be very quiet and go to 
 sleep directly. 
 
 "Yes; I know," he said. "It s because of you. 
 Things I want to say. I m really so much better. 
 We can t go on like this, can we," he said, looking
 
 294 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 up at her as she sat beside him. "Why, you might 
 slip out of my life any day, and I might never hear 
 of you again." 
 
 She sat looking down at him, a little askance, 
 though gentle still, if gentle was the word for her 
 changed face. "That s what I mean to do," she 
 said. 
 
 "Oh, but " Oldmeadow actually, in his alarm 
 and resentment, struggled up on an elbow - "that 
 won t do. I want to see you, really see you, now that 
 I m myself again. I want to talk with you now 
 that I can talk coherently. I want to ask you ; well, 
 I won t ask it now." She had put out her hand, her 
 small, potent hand, and quietly pressed him back, 
 and down upon his pillow while her face took on its 
 look of almost stern authority. "I ll be good. But 
 promise me you ll not go without telling me. And 
 haven t you questions to ask, too?" 
 
 Her face kept its severity, but, as he found this 
 last appeal, her eyes widened, darkened, looked, for 
 a moment, almost frightened. 
 
 "I know that Barney is safe," she said. "I have 
 nothing to ask." 
 
 "Well; no; I see." He felt that he had been 
 guilty of a blunder and it made him fretful. "For 
 me, then. Not for you. Promise me. I won t be 
 good unless you promise me. You can t go off and 
 leave me like that." 
 
 With eyes still dilated, she contemplated this re 
 bellion. 
 
 "You must promise me something, then," she 
 said after a moment. 
 
 He felt proud, delighted, as if he had gained a 
 victory over her.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 295 
 
 "Done. If it s not too hard. What is it?" 
 
 "You won t write to anybody. You won t tell 
 anybody that you ve seen me. Only Lady Lumley 
 knows that I am here. And she has promised not 
 to tell. Probably, soon, I shall have left France for 
 ever." 
 
 "I won t tell. I won t write. I can keep secrets 
 as well as Lady Lumley. She does keep them, you 
 know. So it s a compact." 
 
 "Yes. It s a compact. You ll never tell them; 
 and I won t go without letting you know. I promise. 
 Now go to sleep." 
 
 She laid her hand on his forehead, but, for a little 
 while, he heard her breathing deeply and quickly 
 and the sense of his blundering stayed with him so 
 that sleep was longer in coming. 
 
 All the same he was much better next day. He 
 was able to sit up and had the glory and excitement 
 of a chop for his midday dinner. And when the 
 pleasant hour of tea arrived it was Adrienne herself 
 who came in carrying the little tray. 
 
 He had not seen her in daylight before and his 
 first feeling was one of alarm, for, if she were afoot 
 like this, in daylight, must it not mean that she was 
 soon to leave the hospital? He felt shy of her, too, 
 for, altered as she was by night, the day showed her 
 as far more altered. Whether she seemed much 
 older or much younger he could not have said. The 
 coiffe, covering her forehead, and bound under her 
 chin in a way peculiar to her, left only, as it were, 
 the means of expression visible. 
 
 She sat down by the window and looked out, 
 glancing round from time to time as he drank his 
 tea and it was she who found the calm little sen-
 
 296 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 tences, about the latest news from the front, the 
 crashing of Bulgaria, that carried them on until he 
 had finished. When he had pushed down his tray 
 she turned her chair and faced him, folding her 
 hands together on her white apron, and she said, 
 and he knew that she had come to say it, "What 
 was it you wanted to ask me?" 
 
 He had had, while she sat at the window, her pro 
 file with the jutting nose, and her face, as it turned 
 upon him now, made him think suddenly of a sea 
 gull. Questing, lonely, with vigilant eyes, it seemed 
 to have great spaces before it ; to be flying forth into 
 empty spaces and to an unseen goal. 
 
 "Are you going away, then?" He had not dared, 
 somehow, to ask her before. He felt now that he 
 could not talk until he knew. 
 
 " Not yet," she said. " But I shall be going soon. 
 The hospital is emptying and my nights on duty 
 are very short. I have, really, only you and two 
 others to take care of. That s why I am up so early 
 to-day. And you are so much better that we can 
 have a little talk; if you have anything to ask me." 
 
 "It s this, of course," said Oldmeadow. "It 
 seems to me you ought to dislike me. I misunder 
 stood you in many ways. And now I owe you my 
 life. Before we part I want to thank you and to ask 
 you to forgive me." 
 
 Her eyes, seen in daylight, were of the colour of 
 distance, of arctic distances. That had always been 
 their colour, though he had never before identified 
 it. 
 
 " But there is nothing to thank me for," she said. 
 "I am here to take care of people." 
 
 "Even people who misunderstood you. Even
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 297 
 
 people you dislike. I know." He flushed, feeling 
 that he had been duly snubbed. "But though you 
 take care of everyone, anyone may thank you, too, 
 mayn t they?" 
 
 "I don t dislike you, Mr. Oldmeadow," she said 
 after a moment. "And you didn t misunderstand 
 me." 
 
 "Oh," he murmured, more abashed than before. 
 "I think so. Not, perhaps, what you did; but what 
 you were. I didn t see you as you really were. That s 
 what I mean." 
 
 The perplexity, which had grown, even, to 
 amazement, had left her eyes and she was intently 
 looking at him. "There is nothing for you to be 
 sorry for," she said. "Nothing for me to forgive. 
 You were always right." 
 
 "Always right? I can t take that, you know," 
 said Oldmeadow, deeply discomposed. "You were 
 blind, of course, and more sure of yourself than any 
 of us can safely afford to be; but I wasn t always 
 right." , 
 
 "Always. Always," she repeated. "I was blinder 
 than you knew. I was more sure of myself." 
 
 He lay looking at her and she looked back at him, 
 but with a look that invited neither argument no* 
 protest. It remained remote and vigilant. She 
 might have been the seagull looking down and not 
 ing, as she flew onward, that the small figure on the 
 beach so far below had ceased to be that of an as 
 sailant in its attitude. How remote she was, white, 
 strange, fleeting creature! How near she had been 
 once! The memory of how near rushed over his 
 mind. He had, despite the delirious visions of her 
 stricken face, hardly thought at all, since really see-
 
 298 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 ing her again, of that last time. Everything had 
 fitted itself on, rather, to his earliest memories of her, 
 tinged all of them, it was true, with a deeper mean 
 ing, but not till this moment consciously admitting 
 it. It rushed in now, poignant with the recovered 
 smell of wet, dark ivy, the recovered sound of her 
 stifled sobs as she had stumbled, broken, beside him 
 in the rain. And with the memory came the desire 
 that she should again be near. 
 
 "Tell me," he said, "what are you going to do? 
 You said you might be leaving France for ever. 
 Shall you go back to America?" 
 
 "I don t think so. Not for a long time," she 
 answered. "There will be things to do over here, 
 out of France, for a great many years I imagine." 
 
 He hesitated, then took a roundabout way. "And 
 when I get home, if, owing to you, I ever get there, 
 may I not tell them that you re safe and sound? 
 It would be happier for them to know that, wouldn t 
 it?" 
 
 Her vigilance still dwelt upon him as though she 
 suspected in this sudden change of subject some 
 craft of approach, but she answered quietly: 
 
 "No; I think it will be happier for them to forget 
 me. They will be told if I die. I have arranged for 
 that." 
 
 "They can t very well forget you," said Old- 
 meadow after a moment. "They must always won 
 der." 
 
 "I know." She glanced away and trouble came 
 into her face. "I know. But as much as possible. 
 You must not make me real again by telling them. 
 You have promised. You care for them. You know 
 what I mean."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 299 
 
 "Yes; I ve promised. And I see what you mean. 
 But," said Oldmeadow suddenly, and this, of 
 course, was what he had been coming to. "I don t 
 want to forget. I want you to stay real. You must 
 let me know what becomes of you, always, please." 
 
 Astonishment, now, effaced her trouble. "You? 
 Why?" she asked. 
 
 He smiled a little. "Well, because, if you ll let 
 me say it, I m fond of you. I feel responsible for 
 you. I ve been too deeply in your life, you ve been 
 too deeply in mine, for us to disappear from each 
 other. Don t you remember," he said, and he 
 found it with a sense of achievement, ridiculous as 
 it might sound, "how I held the tea-pot for you? 
 That s what I mean. You must let me go on hold 
 ing it." 
 
 But she could feel no amusement. She was 
 pressing her hands tightly together in her lap, her 
 eyes were wide and her astonishment, he seemed 
 to see, almost brought tears to them. "Fond? 
 You?" she said. "Of me? Oh, no, Mr. Oldmeadow, 
 I can t believe that. You are sorry, I know. You 
 are very sorry. But you can t be fond." 
 
 "And why not?" said Oldmeadow, and he 
 raised himself on his elbow the more directly to 
 challenge her. "Why shouldn t I be fond of you, 
 pray? You must swallow it, for it s the truth, and 
 I ve a right to my own feelings, I hope." 
 
 She put aside the playfulness in which his grim 
 earnest veiled itself. "Because you saw. Because 
 you know. All about me. From the first." 
 
 "Well?" he questioned after a moment, still 
 raised on his elbow but now with the grimness un 
 alloyed. "What of it?"
 
 300 ADR1ENNE TONER 
 
 " You remember what I was. You remember what 
 you saw. You would have saved them from me if 
 you could; and you couldn t. How can you be fond 
 of a person who has ruined all their lives?" 
 
 "Upon my soul," said Oldmeadow laughing, his 
 eyes on hers, "you talk as though you d been a 
 Lucrezia Borgia! What were you worse than an 
 exalted, stubborn, rather conceited girl? Things 
 went wrong, I know, and partly because of me. 
 But it wasn t all your fault, I ll swear it. And if it 
 was, it was your mistake; not your crime." 
 
 "Oh, no, no, no," said Adrienne, and the com 
 pulsion of his feeling had brought a note of anguish 
 to her voice. "It wasn t that. It was worse than 
 that. Don t forget. Don t think you are fond of 
 me because I can make you sleep. It s always been 
 so; I see it now the power I ve had over people; 
 the horrible power. For power is horrible unless one 
 is good; unless one is using it for goodness." 
 
 "Well, so you were," Oldmeadow muttered, fall 
 ing back on his pillow, her vehemence, her strange 
 passion, almost daunting him. "It s not because 
 you make me go to sleep that I m fond of you. 
 What utter rubbish!" 
 
 "It is! it is!" she repeated. "I ve seen it happen 
 too often. It always happens. It binds people to me. 
 It makes them cling to me as if I could give them 
 life. It makes them believe me to be a sort of saint ! " 
 
 "Well, if you can help them with it? You have 
 helped them. The war s your great chance in that, 
 you ll admit. No one can accuse you of trying to 
 get power over people now." 
 
 " Perhaps not. I m not thinking of what I may be 
 accused of, but of what happens."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 301 
 
 "It doesn t happen with me. I was fond of you 
 - well, we won t go back to that. And you did use 
 it for goodness. Power came by the way and you 
 took it. Of course." 
 
 11 1 thought I was using it for goodness. I thought 
 I was good. That was the foundation of everything. 
 We must go back, Mr. Oldmeadow. You don t see 
 as I thought you did. You don t understand. I 
 didn t mean to set myself up above other people. 
 I thought they were good, too. I was happy in my 
 goodness, and when they weren t happy it seemed 
 to me they missed something I had and that it was 
 a mistake that I could set right for them. I m going 
 back to the very beginning. Long before you ever 
 knew me. Everything fell into my hand. I loved 
 people, or thought I did, and if they didn t love me 
 I thought it their mistake. That was the way it 
 looked to me, for my whole life long, until you came. 
 I couldn t understand at first, when you came. I 
 couldn t see what you thought. I believed that I 
 could make you love me, too, and when I saw, for 
 you made it plain, that you disliked me, it seemed 
 to me worse than mistake. I thought that you must 
 be against goodness; dangerous; the way you 
 pushed me back back and showed me always 
 something I had not thought I meant at the bottom 
 of everything I did. I felt that I wanted to turn 
 away from you and to turn people who loved me 
 away from you, lest you should infect them. And 
 all the while, all the while I was trying to escape - 
 the truth that you saw and that I didn t." She 
 stopped for a moment while, sunken on his pillows, 
 Oldmeadow stared at her. Her breath seemed to 
 fail her, and she leaned forward and put her elbows
 
 302 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 on her knees and bent her forehead on her joined 
 hands. "It came at last. You remember how it 
 came," she said, and the passion of protest had 
 fallen from her voice. She spoke with difficulty. 
 "Partly through you, and, partly, through my fail 
 ure; I had never failed before. My failure with 
 Barney. My failure to keep him and to get him 
 back. I couldn t believe it at first. I struggled and 
 struggled. You saw me. Everything turned against 
 me. It was as if the world had changed its shape 
 and colour when I struggled against it. Everything 
 went down. And when I felt I wasn t loved, when 
 I felt myself going down, with all the rest, I became 
 bad. Bad, bad," she repeated, and her voice, heavy 
 with its slow reiteration, was like a clenched hand of 
 penitence beating on a breast: "really bad at last, 
 for I had not known before what I was and the 
 truth was there, staring me in the face. I did dread 
 ful things, then. Mean things; cruel, hateful things, 
 shutting my eyes, stopping my ears, so that I should 
 not see what I was doing. I ran about and crouched 
 and hid from myself; do you follow my meaning? 
 - from God. And then at last, when I was stripped 
 bare, I had to look at Him." 
 
 She raised herself and leaned back in her chair. 
 Her voice had trembled more and more with the 
 intensity of the feeling that upheld her and she put 
 her handkerchief to her lips and pressed it to them, 
 looking across at him. And, sunken on his pillows, 
 Oldmeadow looked back at her, motionless and si 
 lent. 
 
 Was it sympathy, pity or tenderness that almost 
 overwhelmed him as he gazed at her? He could not 
 have said, though knowing that the unity that was
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 303 
 
 in them both, the share of the eternal that upheld 
 their lives, flowed out from his eyes into hers as he 
 looked and from hers to his. They were near at last ; 
 near as it is rarely given to human beings to ex 
 perience nearness, and the awe of such a partaking 
 was perhaps the ground of all he felt. 
 
 "You see," he said, and a long time had passed, 
 "I was mistaken." 
 
 She did not answer him. Perhaps she did not 
 understand. 
 
 " I never knew you were a person who could come 
 to the truth like that," he said. 
 
 Still holding her handkerchief to her lips, she 
 slightly shook her head. 
 
 "Even you never thought that I was bad." 
 
 "I thought everybody was bad," said Old- 
 meadow, "until they came to know that goodness 
 doesn t lie in themselves. The reason you angered 
 me so was that you didn t see you were like the rest 
 of us. And only people capable of great goodness 
 can know such an agony of self -recognition." 
 
 "No," she repeated. "Everyone is not bad like 
 me. You know that s not true. You know that 
 some people, people you love are not like that. 
 They need no agony of recognition, for nothing 
 could ever make them mean and cruel." 
 
 He thought for a moment. "That s because you 
 expected so much more of yourself; because you d 
 believed so much more, and were, of course, more 
 wrong. Your crash was so much greater because 
 your spiritual pride was so great. And I thought 
 you were a person a crash would do for; that there d 
 be nothing left of you if you came a crash. That 
 was my mistake; for see what there is left."
 
 304 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 She rose to her feet. His words seemed to press 
 her too far. "You are kind," she said in a hurried 
 voice. "I understand. You are so sorry. I ve 
 talked and talked. It s very thoughtless of me. I 
 must go now." 
 
 She came and took the tray, but he put his hand 
 on her arm, detaining her. "You ll own you re not 
 bad now? You ll own there s something real for me 
 to be fond of? Wait. I want you to acknowledge it, 
 to accept it my fondness. Don t try to run 
 away." 
 
 She stood above him, holding the tray, while he 
 kept his hold on her arm. "All I need to know," 
 she said, after a moment, and she did not look at 
 him, "is that no one is ever safe unless they al 
 ways remember." 
 
 "That s it, of course," said Oldmeadow gravely, 
 "and that you must die to live; and you did die. 
 But you live now, really, and life comes through you 
 again. Your gift, you know, of which you were so 
 much afraid just now, lest it had enveigled me. 
 Don t you see it? How can I put it for you? You 
 had a sort of wholeness before. There must be 
 wholeness of a sort if life is to come through; har 
 mony of a sort, and faith. It wasn t an illusion 
 even then. When you were shattered you lost your 
 gift. The light can t shine through shattered things; 
 and that was when you recognized that without 
 God we are a nothingness ; a nothingness and a rest 
 lessness mingled. You know. There are no words 
 for it, though so many people have found it and 
 tried to say it. I know, too, after a fashion. I ve 
 had crashes, too. But now your gift has come back, 
 for you are whole again ; built up on an entirely new
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 305 
 
 principle. You see, it s another you I am fond of. 
 You must believe in her, too. You do believe in her. 
 If you didn t you could not have found your gift." 
 
 She had stood quite still while he spoke, looking 
 down, not at him but at the little tray between her 
 hands, and he saw that she was near tears. Her 
 voice was scarcely audible as she said: "Thank 
 you." And she made an effort over herself to add: 
 "What you say is true." 
 
 "We must talk," said Oldmeadow. He felt ex 
 traordinarily happy. "There are so many things 
 I want to ask you about." And he went on, his 
 hand still on her arm, seeing that she struggled not 
 to cry and helping her to recover: "You re not 
 going away for some time, yet, I hope. Please don t. 
 There ll soon be no need of hospitals of this sort, 
 anywhere, will there? and you must manage to stay 
 on here a little longer. I shan t get on if you go. 
 You won t leave me just as you ve saved me, will 
 you, Mrs. Barney?" 
 
 At the name, over- taxed as she was already, a 
 pitiful colour flooded her face and before his blunder 
 made visible his own blood answered hers, mounting 
 hotly to his forehead. "Oh, I m so sorry," he mur 
 mured, helpless and hating himself, while his hand 
 dropped. She stood over him, holding herself there 
 so as not to hurt him by the aspect of flight. She 
 even, in a moment, forced herself to smile. It was 
 the first smile he had seen on her face. "You ve 
 nothing to be sorry for, Mr. Oldmeadow," she said, 
 as she had said before. "You re very kind to me. 
 I wish I could tell you how kind I feel you are." 
 And as she turned away, carrying the tray, she 
 added: "No; I won t go yet."
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 HE did not see her again for two days; and she did 
 not even come at night. But he now kept possession 
 of his new strength and slept without her help. The 
 sense of happiness brooded upon him. He did not 
 remember ever having felt so happy. His life was 
 irradiated and enhanced as if by some supreme ex 
 perience. 
 
 It was already late afternoon when, on the second 
 day, she appeared ; but in this month of August his 
 room was still filled with the reflection of the sun 
 light and the warm colour bathed her as she entered. 
 She wore a blue cloak over her white linen dress and 
 she had perhaps been walking, for there was a slight 
 flush on her cheeks and a look almost of excitement 
 in her eyes. 
 
 She unfastened her cloak and put it aside and 
 then, taking the chair near the window, clasping her 
 hands, as before, in her lap, she said, without pre 
 amble and with a peculiar vehemence: "You hear 
 often from Barney, don t you?" 
 
 Oldmeadow felt himself colouring. "Only once, 
 directly. It rather tires him to sit up, you know. 
 But he s getting on wonderfully and the doctors 
 think he ll soon be able to walk a little with a 
 crutch, of course." 
 
 "But you do hear, constantly, from Nancy, don t 
 you," said Adrienne, clasping and unclasping her 
 hands but speaking with a steadiness he felt to be 
 rehearsed. "He is at Coldbrooks, I know, and 
 Nancy is with him, and his mother and Mrs. Averil.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 307 
 
 It all seems almost happy, doesn t it? as happy as 
 it can be, now, with Palgrave dead and Barney 
 shackled." 
 
 Startled as he was by her directness Oldmeadow 
 managed to meet it. 
 
 "Yes; almost happy," he said. " I was with them 
 before I came out this last time and felt that about 
 them. Poor Mrs. Chadwick is a good deal changed ; 
 but even she is reviving." 
 
 "She has had too much to bear," said Adrienne. 
 " I saw her again, too, at the end, when she came to 
 Palgrave. She can never forgive me. Meg is happy 
 now, but she will never forgive rne either. I wrought 
 havoc in their lives, didn t I?" 
 
 "Well, you or fate. I don t blame you for any of 
 that, you know," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 "I don t say that I blame myself for it," said 
 Adrienne. "I may have been right or I may have 
 been wrong. I don t know. It is not in things like 
 that that I was bad. But what we must face is that 
 I wrought havoc; that if it hadn t been for me they 
 might all, now, be really happy. Completely happy. 
 If I had not been there Palgrave would not have 
 been so sure of himself. And if I had not been there 
 Nancy and Barney would have married." 
 
 "I don t know," said Oldmeadow. "If Barney 
 hadn t fallen in love with you he might very prob 
 ably have fallen in love with some one else, not 
 Nancy." 
 
 " Perhaps, not probably," said Adrienne. "And if 
 he had he would have stayed in love with her, for 
 Barney is a faithful person. And it may have been 
 because I was so completely the wrong person for 
 him that he came to know so quickly that Nancy
 
 308 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 was completely the right one. What I feel is that 
 anybody but Nancy would always have been, really, 
 wrong. And now that he loves her but is shackled, 
 there s only one thing more that can be done. I 
 have often thought of it; I needn t tell you that. 
 But, till now, I could never see my way. It s you 
 who have shown it to me. In what you said the 
 other day. It s wonderful the way you come into 
 my life, Mr. Oldmeadow. You made me feel that I 
 had a friend in you ; a true, true friend. And I know 
 what a friend Nancy and Barney have. So the way 
 opens. We must set Barney free, Mr. Oldmeadow. 
 He and Nancy must be free to marry. You and I 
 can do it for them and only you and I." 
 
 "What do you mean?" Oldmeadow murmured 
 as, after her words, the silence had grown deep be 
 tween them. He repeated, using now the name in 
 evitably and forgetting the other day. "What do 
 you mean, Mrs. Barney?" 
 
 To-day she did not flush, but to-day there was a 
 reason for her acceptance. It was, he saw in her 
 next words, only as Barney s wife that she could 
 help him. 
 
 "He must divorce me," she said. "You and I 
 could go away together and he could divorce me. 
 Oh, I know, it s a dreadful thing to ask of you, his 
 friend. I ve thought of all that. Wait. Let me 
 finish. I ve thought of nothing else since the other 
 day. It came to me in the night after you had been 
 so wonderful to me; after that wonderful thing had 
 happened to us. You felt it, too, I know. It was as 
 if we had taken a sacrament together. I m not a 
 Christian. You know what I mean. We felt the 
 deepest things together, didn t we. And it s because
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 309 
 
 of that that I can ask this of you. No one else would 
 understand. No one else would care for me enough, 
 or for him. And then, you could explain it all to 
 him and no one else could do that. You could explain 
 that it had been to set him free. To set me free. 
 Because they d have to think and believe it was for 
 my sake, too, that you did it, wouldn t they? so as 
 to have it really happy for them ; so that it shouldn t 
 hurt. When it was all over you could go and explain 
 why you had done it. All we have to do, you know, 
 is to stay in a hotel together; I bearing your name. 
 It s very simple, really." 
 
 He lay staring at her, overwhelmed. The tears 
 had risen to his eyes as her beauty and her ab 
 surdity were thus revealed to him, and as she spoke 
 of their sacrament; but amazement blurred all his 
 faculties. He had never in his life been so amazed. 
 And when he began to emerge, to take possession of 
 himself again, it was only of her he could think; not 
 of himself or Nancy and Barney. Only of her and 
 of her beauty and absurdity. 
 
 "Dear Mrs. Barney," he said at last, and he did 
 not know what to say; "it s you who are wonderful, 
 you alone. I d do anything, anything for you that 
 I could. Anything but this. Because, truly, this is 
 impossible." 
 
 "Why impossible?" she asked, and her voice was 
 almost stern. 
 
 " You can t smirch yourself like that." It was only 
 one reason; but it was the first that came to him. 
 
 "I?" she stared. "I don t think it is to be 
 smirched. I shall know why I do it." 
 
 "Other people won t know. Other people will 
 think you smirched."
 
 3io ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "No one I care for. Everyone I care for will 
 understand." 
 
 "But to the world at large? Your name? Your 
 reputation?" Oldmeadow protested. "Do they 
 mean nothing to you?" 
 
 A faintly bitter humour touched her lips. "You ve 
 always taken the side of the world in all our 
 controversies, haven t you, Mr. Oldmeadow? and 
 you were probably right and I was probably wrong ; 
 but not because of what the world would think. I 
 know I m right now, and those words: name: repu 
 tation mean nothing to me. The world and I 
 haven t much to do with each other. A divorced 
 wife can run soup-kitchens and fever hospitals just 
 as well as the most unsmirched woman of the world. 
 I m not likely to want to be presented at courts, am 
 I? Don t think of me, please. It s not a question 
 of me. Only of you. Will you do it?" 
 
 "I couldn t possibly do it," said Oldmeadow, and 
 he was still hardly taking her monstrous proposal 
 seriously. 
 
 "Why not?" she asked, scrutinizing him. "It s 
 not that you mind about your name and reputation, 
 is it?" 
 
 "Not much. Perhaps not much," said Old- 
 meadow; "but about theirs. That s what you don t 
 see. That it would be impossible for them. You 
 don t see how unique you are; how unlike other 
 people. Nancy and Barney couldn t marry on a 
 fake. The only way out," said Oldmeadow, looking 
 at her with an edge of ironic grimness in his contem 
 plation, "if one were really to consider it, would be 
 for you to marry me afterwards and for us to dis 
 appear/
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 311 
 
 She gazed at him and he saw that she weighed the 
 idea. "But you d be shackled then," she said, and 
 her thoughts were evidently clear. " It would mean, 
 besides, that you would lose them." 
 
 "As to being shackled," Oldmeadow, still grimly, 
 met the difficulty, "that s of no moment. I m the 
 snuffy, snappy bachelor type, you remember, and 
 I don t suppose I d ever have married. As to losing 
 them, I certainly should." 
 
 "We mustn t think of it then," said Adrienne. 
 "You and Barney and Nancy mustn t lose each 
 other." 
 
 "But we should in either way. I could hardly 
 take up my friendship with them again after Barney 
 had divorced you on account of me, even if you and 
 I didn t marry. It would give the whole thing away, 
 if it were possible for them to meet me again. As I 
 say, they d feel they had no right to their freedom on 
 such a fake as that." 
 
 "They couldn t feel really free unless some one 
 had really committed adultery for their sakes?" 
 Again Adrienne smiled with her faint bitterness and 
 he wondered if a man and woman had ever before 
 had a more astonishing conversation. "That seems 
 to me to be asking for a little too much icing on your 
 cake. Of course it couldn t be a nice, new, snowy 
 wedding-cake; poor Mrs. Chadwick wouldn t like 
 it at all, nor Mrs. Averil; but it would be the best 
 we could do for them ; and I should think that when 
 people love each other and are the right people for 
 each other they d be thankful for any kind of cake. 
 Even if it were a good deal burned around the 
 edges," Adrienne finished, her slight bitterness evi 
 dently finding satisfaction in the simile.
 
 312 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "But they wouldn t see it at all like that," said 
 Oldmeadow, now with unalloyed gravity. "They d 
 see it as a cake they had stolen ; a cake they had no 
 right to. It s a question of the laws we live under. 
 Not of personal, but of public integrity. They 
 couldn t profit by a hoodwinked law. It s that that 
 would spoil things for them. According to the law 
 they d have no right to their freedom. And, now 
 that I am speaking seriously, it s that I feel, too. 
 What you are asking of me, my dear friend, is no 
 more nor less than a felony." 
 
 She meditated, unmoved, still almost sternly, 
 turning her eyes from him and leaning her elbow 
 on the window-sill, her head upon her hand. "I 
 see," she said at last. " For people who mind about 
 the law, I see that it would spoil it. I don t mind. 
 I think the law s there to force us to be kind and 
 just to each other if we won t be by ourselves. If 
 the law gets tied up in such a foolish knot as to say 
 that people may sin to set other people free, but 
 mayn t pretend to sin, I think we have a right to 
 help it out and to make it do good against its own 
 will. I don t mind the law; luckily for them. Be 
 cause I won t go back from it now. I won t leave 
 them there, loving each other but never knowing 
 the fullness of love. I won t give up a thing I feel 
 right because other people feel it wrong. So I must 
 find somebody else." 
 
 Oldmeadow looked at her in a culminated and 
 wholly unpleasant astonishment. "Somebody else? 
 Who could there be?" 
 
 "You may well ask," Adrienne remarked, glanc 
 ing round at him with a touch of mild asperity. 
 "You are the only completely right person, be-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 313 
 
 cause only you and I feel enough for them to do it 
 for them. What I must do now is to find some one 
 who would feel enough, just for me, to do it for me. 
 It makes it more unfair for him, doesn t it. He ll 
 have only the one friend to help. But on the other 
 hand it will leave them without a scruple. They d 
 know from the beginning that with you and me it 
 was a fake ; but with him it might seem quite prob 
 able. Yes; it s strange; I had a letter from him only 
 yesterday. I shouldn t have thought of him other 
 wise. I might have had to give up. But the more 
 I think," Adrienne meditated intently, her head on 
 her hand, her eyes turned on the prospect outside, 
 "the more I seem to see that Hamilton Prentiss is 
 the only other chance." 
 
 "Hamilton Prentiss?" Oldmeadow echoed faintly. 
 
 "You met him once," said Adrienne, looking 
 round at him again. "But you ve probably for 
 gotten. At the dinner we gave, Barney and I, in 
 London, so long ago. Tall, fair, distinguished look 
 ing. The son of my Calif ornian friend ; the one you 
 and Mrs. Aldesey thought so tiresome." 
 
 He felt himself colouring, but he could give little 
 thought to the minor discomfiture, so deeply was 
 his mind engaged with the major one. 
 
 "Did we?" he said. 
 
 "And you thought I didn t see it," said Adrienne. 
 "It made me dreadfully angry with you both, 
 though I didn t know I was angry ; I thought I was 
 only grieved. I behaved spitefully to Mrs. Aldesey 
 that night, you will remember, though I didn t 
 know I was spiteful. I did know, however, that she 
 was separated from her husband" again Ad 
 rienne looked, calmly, round at him "and it was
 
 3H ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 a lie I told Barney when I said I didn t. Sometimes 
 I think that lie was the beginning of everything; 
 that it was when I told it that I began to hide from 
 myself. However - " She passed from the personal 
 theme. "Yes; Hamilton is, I believe, big enough 
 and beautiful and generous enough to do it." 
 
 "Oh, he is, is he?" said Oldmeadow. "And I m 
 not, I take it. You re horribly unkind. But I don t 
 want to talk about myself. What I want to talk 
 about is you. You must drop this preposterous 
 idea of yours. Really you must. You ve had ideas 
 like it before. Re-member Meg; what a mess you 
 made there. I told you then that you were wrong 
 and I tell you you re wrong now. You must give it 
 up. Do you see? We re always quarrelling, aren t 
 we?" 
 
 "But I don t at all know that I was wrong about 
 Meg, Mr. Oldmeadow," said Adrienne. "And if I 
 was, it was because I didn t understand her. I do 
 understand myself, and I don t agree that I m 
 wrong or that my plan is preposterous. You won t 
 call it preposterous, I suppose, if it succeeds and 
 makes Barney and Nancy happy. No; I m not 
 going to drop it. Nothing you could say could make 
 me drop it. As for Hamilton, I don t set him above 
 you ; not in any way. It s only that you and he have 
 different lights. I know why you can t do this. 
 You ve shown me why. And I wouldn t for any 
 thing not have you follow your own light." 
 
 "And you seriously mean," cried Oldmeadow, 
 "that you d ask this young fellow I remember 
 him perfectly and I m sure he s capable of any 
 degree of ingenuousness you d ask him to go 
 about with you as though he were your husband?
 
 ADR1ENNE TONER 315 
 
 Why, for one thing, he d be sure to fall head over 
 heels in love with you, and where would you be 
 then?" 
 
 Adrienne examined him. "But from the point of 
 view of hoodwinking, that would be all to the good, 
 wouldn t it?" she inquired; "though unfortunate 
 for Hamilton. He won t, however," she went on, 
 her dreadful lucidity revealing to him the hopeless 
 ness of any protest he might still have found to 
 make. "There s a very lovely girl out in California 
 he s devoted to; a young poetess. He ll have to 
 write to her about it first, of course; Hamilton s at 
 the front now, you see; and I must write to his 
 mother. She and Carola Brown are very near each 
 other and will talk it out together and I feel sure 
 they will see it as I do. They ll see it as something 
 big I m asking them to do for me to set me free. 
 I m sure I can count on Gertrude and I m sure 
 Hamilton can count on Carola. She s a very rare, 
 strong spirit." 
 
 Oldmeadow, suddenly, was feeling exhausted, and 
 a clutch of hysterical laughter, as she spoke these 
 last words, held his throat for a moment. He laid 
 his head back on his pillow and closed his eyes, 
 while he saw Adrienne and Hamilton Prentiss 
 wandering by the banks of a French river where 
 poplars stood against a silver sky. He knew that 
 he had accepted nothing when he said at last: 
 "Shall we talk about it another time? To-morrow? 
 I mean, don t take any steps, will you, until we ve 
 talked. Don t write to your beautiful, big friend." 
 
 "You always make fun of me a little, don t you," 
 said Adrienne tranquilly. She seemed aware of some 
 further deep discomposure in him and willing,
 
 316 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 though not comprehending it, to meet it with 
 friendly tolerance. "If he is big and beautiful, why 
 shouldn t I say it? But I won t write until we ve 
 talked again. It can t be, anyway, until the war is 
 over. And I ve had already to wait for four years."
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 SHE might feel that he had cruelly failed her; but 
 when she came at the same hour next day it was 
 evident to him from her demeanour that she imag 
 ined him resigned, if not converted, to her alter 
 native plan. She carried a bunch of late roses and 
 said that she had been having a lovely drive with a 
 dear old friend from Denver, who had managed to 
 get to Boulogne to see her. 
 
 "Your friends all come from such distant places," 
 said Oldmeadow with a pretended fretfulness that 
 veiled an indescribable restlessness. "California, 
 Denver, Chicago. They have, all of them, an im 
 placably remote sound, as if they were carrying you, 
 already, off to other planets." 
 
 "Well, it doesn t take so long, really, to get to 
 any of them," said Adrienne, placing the roses in a 
 glass of water by his side, a close, funny little bunch, 
 red roses in the middle and white ones all round. 
 She had taken off her cloak and laid a newspaper 
 down on the little table, seating herself, then, in the 
 window and keeping in her hands a pocket-book 
 that, in its flatness and length and the way she held 
 it, reminded him of the little blue and grey fan of 
 the dinner-party where she had told her first lie. 
 His mind was emptied of thought. Only pictures 
 crossed it, pictures of Adrienne and the tall, fair 
 youth with the ingenuous eyes, wandering by the 
 French river; and, again, Adrienne on that night, 
 now as distant as California, when, with her fan and 
 pearl-wreathed hair, she had met his persiflage with
 
 3i8 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 her rebuking imperturbability. But under the pic 
 tures a sense of violent tension made his breathing 
 shallow. He fixed his eyes on the pocket-book and 
 wondered how she had nursed people with those in 
 effectual-looking hands. 
 
 "Where were you trained for nursing?" he asked 
 her suddenly. "Out here? or in England?" 
 
 "In England. In Oxford. Before Palgrave was 
 taken," said Adrienne. "I gave up my philosophy 
 very soon for that. I worked in a hospital there." 
 
 "And how came you to go out to Salonika? Tell 
 me about it. And about your hospital here," he 
 went on with a growing sense of keeping something 
 off. "It s your own hospital I hear, and wonder 
 fully run. Sir Kenneth was talking to me about you 
 this morning." 
 
 "What a fine person he is," said Adrienne. " Yes, 
 he came to see us and liked the way it was done." 
 She was pleased, he saw, to tell him anything he 
 chose to ask about. She told him about her hospital 
 and of all its adventures they had been under 
 fire so often that it had become an everyday event ; 
 and about how admirable a staff she had orga 
 nized "rare, devoted people" -and about their 
 wounded, their desperately wounded poilus and 
 how they came to love them all. He remembered, 
 as she talked, that she was rich; even richer than 
 he had thought, since she could leave a fortune to 
 Palgrave and yet equip hospitals in France and in 
 Salonika. She told him about Salonika, too. It had 
 been a fever hospital there and the misery and 
 suffering had seemed worse than the suffering here 
 in France. Yes; she had caught the fever herself 
 and had nearly died.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 319 
 
 She had no gift for the apt or vivid word. Her 
 nature had been revealed to him as barbarous, or 
 sublime, in its unconventionality, yet it expressed 
 itself only in the medium of trite convention. But 
 his time of jibbing at her platitudes was long since 
 passed. He listened, rather, with a tender, if super 
 ficial interest, seeing her heroic little figure moving, 
 unconcerned, among pestilences and bombard 
 ments. "It s not only what you tell me," he said, 
 when she had brought her recital up to date. "I 
 heard so much from Sir Kenneth. You are one of 
 the great people of the war." 
 
 "Am I?" she said. That, too, unfeignedly, left 
 her unconcerned. 
 
 "You ve the gift of leadership. The gift for big 
 things generally." 
 
 She nodded. "I m only fit for big things." 
 
 "Only? How do you mean?" 
 
 "Little ones are more difficult, aren t they. My 
 feet get tangled in them. To be fit for daily life and 
 all the tangles; that s the real test, isn t it? That s 
 just the kind of thing you see so clearly, Mr. Old- 
 meadow. Big things and the people who do them 
 are just the kind of things you see through." 
 
 "Oh, but you misunderstood me or misunder 
 stand," said Oldmeadow. "Big things are the con 
 dition of life; the little things can only be built up 
 on them. One must fight wars and save the world 
 before one can set up one s tea-tables." He remem 
 bered having thought of something like this at 
 Lydia s tea-table. "Tea-tables are important, I 
 know, and the things that happen round them. But 
 if one can nurse a ward of typhus patients single- 
 handed one must be forgiven for letting the tea-pot
 
 320 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 slip. Really I never imagined you capable of all 
 you ve done." 
 
 "I always thought I was capable of anything," 
 said Adrienne smiling slightly, her eyes meeting his 
 in a tranquil partaking of the jest, that must be at 
 her expense. " You helped me to find that out about 
 myself with all the rest. And I was right enough 
 in thinking that I could face things and lead people. 
 But I wasn t capable of the most important things. 
 I wasn t capable of being a wise and happy wife. I 
 wasn t even capable of being truthful in drawing- 
 rooms when other women made me angry. But I 
 can go on battle-fields and found hospitals and tend 
 the sick and dying. Shells and pestilences" -her 
 smile was gone "if people knew how trivial they 
 are compared to seeing your husband look at you 
 with hatred." 
 
 She had turned her eyes away as she was thus 
 betrayed into revealing the old bitternesses of her 
 heart and he dropped his to the little pocket-book 
 that now lay still between her hands. The feeling 
 in her voice, the suffering it revealed to him, with 
 the bitterness, woke an unendurable feeling in him 
 self. He did not clearly see what the test was to 
 which he put himself; but he knew that what he 
 must say to her was the most difficult thing he had 
 ever had to say ; and he found it only after the silence 
 had grown long. 
 
 "Mrs. Barney everything has changed, hasn t 
 it; you ve changed; I ve changed; Barney may 
 have changed. It was only, after all, a moment of 
 miserable misunderstanding between you. He never 
 really knew what you were feeling. He thought you 
 didn t care for him any longer, when, really, you
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 321 
 
 were finding out how much you cared. Don t you 
 think, before you take final decisions, that you 
 ought to see Barney again? Don t you think you 
 ought to give him another chance? I could arrange 
 it all for you, when I got home." 
 
 The flood of colour, deep and sick, had mounted 
 to her face, masking it strangely, painfully, to where 
 the white linen cut across her brow and bound her 
 chin. And, almost supplicatingly, since he saw that 
 she could not speak, he murmured: "You can be a 
 wise and happy wife now; and he loved you so 
 dearly." 
 
 She did not lift her eyes. She sat there, looking 
 down, tightly holding the pocket-book in her lap. 
 
 " Let me tell him, when I get home, that I ve seen 
 you again," he supplicated. "Let me arrange a 
 meeting." 
 
 Slowly, not lifting her eyes, she shook her head 
 and he heard her, just heard her say: "It s not 
 pride. Don t think that." 
 
 "No; no; I know it s not. Good heavens, I 
 couldn t think it that. You feel it s no good. You 
 feel that his heart is occupied. It is. I can t pretend 
 to hide from you that it is. But your place in it was 
 supreme. There would be no unfairness if you took 
 it again. Nancy would be the first person to want 
 you to take it. You know that that is true of 
 Nancy." 
 
 "I know. I heard her plead for me," said Ad- 
 rienne. 
 
 The sentence fell, soft and trenchant; and he re 
 membered, in the silence that followed, what she had 
 heard. He drew a long breath, feeling half suffo 
 cated. But he had met his test. It was inevitable,
 
 322 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 he knew it now, that she should say "Barney and I 
 are parted for ever." 
 
 Silence dropped again between them. He did not 
 know what was passing behind its curtain and 
 whether bitterness or only grief was in her heart. 
 
 He lay, drawing the slow, careful breaths of his 
 recovery, and saw her presently put out her hand 
 and take up her New York Herald and unfold it. 
 She looked down the columns unseeingly; but the 
 little feint of interest helped her. 
 
 Slowly the colour faded from her face and it was 
 as if the curtain lifted when, laying the paper down, 
 she said, and he knew that she was finding words to 
 comfort him : Really everything is quite clear be 
 fore me now. I shall write at once to Hamilton, and 
 to his mother. If he agrees, if they all agree, he and 
 I can go away very soon I think. Afterwards, I shall 
 stay over here. I ve quite made up my mind to 
 that. There ll be so much to do; for years and years ; 
 for all one s lifetime. Ways will open. When one is 
 big," she smiled the smile at once so gentle and so 
 bitter, "and has plenty of money, ways always do. 
 I m a deracinee creature; I never had any roots, you 
 know; and I can t do better, I m sure, than to make 
 soil for the uprooted people to grow in again. That s 
 what s most needed now, isn t it? Soil. It s the 
 fundamental things of life, its bare possibilities, 
 that have been so terribly destroyed over here. 
 America has, still, more soil than she can use, and 
 since I m an American, and a rich one, my best plan 
 is to use America, in my fortune and my person, for 
 Europe. Because I love them both and because they 
 both need each other." 
 
 She had quite recovered herself Her face had
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 323 
 
 found again its pale, fawn tints and she was looking 
 at him with her quietest contemplation while he, 
 in silence, lay looking at her. 
 
 "It s not about the things I shall do that I m per 
 plexed, ever," she went on. "But I m sometimes 
 perplexed about myself. I sometimes wish I were a 
 Roman Catholic. In an order of some kind. Under 
 direction. To put oneself in the hands of a wise di 
 rector, it must be so peaceful. Like French friends 
 I have; such wise, fine women; so poised and so 
 secure. I often envy them. But that can t be for 
 me." 
 
 She must feel in his silence now the quality of 
 some extreme emotion, and that she believed it to 
 be pity was evident to him as she went on, seeking 
 to comfort him; and troubled by his trouble: "You 
 mustn t be sorry. I am not unhappy. I am a happy 
 person. Do you remember that Sunday morning 
 at Cold brooks, long ago? How I said to Mother 
 to Mrs. Chadwick that I had no doubts? You 
 thought me fatuous. I dimly saw that you thought 
 me fatuous. But it s still true of me. I must tell 
 you, so that you shan t think I m unhappy. I ve 
 been, it seems to me, through everything since then. 
 I ve had doubts every doubt: of myself; of life; 
 of all the things I trusted. Doubt at last, when the 
 dreadful darknesses came Barney s hatred, Pal- 
 grave s death of God. We ve never spoken of 
 Palgrave, have we? I was with him, you had heard, 
 and at the very end it was he who helped me rather 
 than I him. He held me up. When he was dying he 
 held me up. He made me promise him that I would 
 not kill myself for he guessed what I was think 
 ing; he made me promise to go on. And he saved
 
 324 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 me. The light began to come back to me while I sat 
 beside him after he had died." 
 
 She had not looked at him while she spoke, but 
 down at her hands that, trembling, turned and re 
 turned the little pocket-book. And controlling her 
 voice as she sought to control the trembling of her 
 hands, she said: "Perhaps it is always like that. 
 When one confesses one s sin and hates it in oneself, 
 even if it is still there, tempting one, the light begins 
 to come back. After that it came more and more. 
 What you call my gift is part of it. Isn t it strange 
 that I should have had that gift when I was so 
 blind? But what you said was true. I had a sort of 
 wholeness then, because I was blind. And now that 
 I see, it s a better wholeness and a safer gift. That 
 is what I wanted to say, really. To explain, so that 
 you shan t be sorry. No one who can find that light 
 can be unhappy. It comes to me now, always, when 
 I need it. I can make it shine in other people as 
 Palgrave made it shine in me. Love does it. Isn t 
 it wonderful that it should be so? Nothing else is 
 real beside it. Nothing is real without it. And when 
 it happens, when one feels it come through and 
 shine further, it is more, far more, than happiness." 
 
 All the while that she had spoken, pale, and with 
 her trembling hands, he had lain looking at her in 
 silence, a silence that was dividing him, as if by a 
 vast chasm, from all his former life. 
 
 He and Adrienne stood on one side of this chasm, 
 and, while it seemed to widen with a dizzying rapid 
 ity, he saw that on the other stood Barney, Nancy, 
 Coldbrooks, and Lydia poor Lydia and that 
 they were being borne away from him for ever. He 
 saw nothing before him but Adrienne; and for how
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 325 
 
 long was he to keep her? That was his supreme 
 risk; but he could not allay it or step back to the 
 further brink. It was his very life that had fallen 
 in two while she had spoken and without the sense 
 of choice ; though he dimly saw that, in the restless 
 ness and urgency of the hours since he had seen her 
 last, the choice had been preparing. 
 
 He was taking the only step possible for him to 
 take on the narrow foothold of the present when he 
 said, in a voice so quiet that she might even be un 
 aware of his seeming gross irrelevance, "Do you 
 know, about your plan for Barney and Nancy 
 I ve been thinking it over and I ve decided that it 
 must be I, not Hamilton."
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 HER eyes met his for a long time before he realized 
 that she might find not only irrelevance but even ir 
 reverence. She had shown him her very soul and he 
 had answered with this announcement. Of course it 
 had been because of what she told him that he had 
 seen at last his own necessity; but he could not tell 
 her that. 
 
 "I m not sorry for you," he said. "I envy you. 
 You are one of the few really happy people in the 
 world." 
 
 "But I d quite given that idea up, Mr. Old- 
 meadow," she said. "What has made you change?" 
 
 He saw the trouble in her face, the suspicion of 
 her power and its compulsion over the lives of 
 others. He took the bull by the horns. 
 
 "You, of course. I can t pretend that it s any 
 thing else. I want to do it for you and with you." 
 
 "But it s for Barney and Nancy that it s to be 
 done," she said, and her gravity had deepened. 
 "It s just the same for them and you explained 
 yesterday that it would spoil it for them." 
 
 "It may spoil it somewhat," said Oldmeadow, 
 contemplating her with a curious tranquillity; she 
 was now all that was left him in life to contemplate; 
 and she was all he needed. "But it won t prevent it. 
 I still think it a wrong thing to do. I still think it a 
 felony. But, since I can t turn you from it, what 
 I ve come to see is that it s, as you said, for you and 
 me, who care for them, to do. It s not right, not 
 decent or becoming, that anyone who doesn t even 
 know them should be asked to do such a thing."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 327 
 
 "But Hamilton wouldn t do it for them," she 
 said. "It would be for me he would do it. And he 
 wouldn t think it a felony." 
 
 "All the more reason that his innocence shouldn t 
 be taken advantage of. I can t stand by and see it 
 done. It s for my friends the felony will be com 
 mitted and it s I who will bear the burden for them. 
 As to his doing it for you, I know you better than he 
 possibly can know you, and care for you more than 
 he possibly can. If you re determined on commit 
 ting a crime, I ll share the responsibility with you." 
 
 "I know you care more. You are a wonderful 
 friend. You are my best friend in the world." She 
 gazed at him and he saw that for once he had 
 troubled and perplexed her. "And it s wonderful 
 of you to say you ll do it. But Hamilton won t feel 
 it a burden; not as you will; and for him to do it 
 won t spoil it for them. If you do it, it will spoil it 
 for them. You said so. And how can I let you do a 
 thing you feel so wrong for my sake?" 
 
 "You ll have to. I won t have Hamilton sacri 
 ficed in order that their cake shall have no burnt 
 edges. They ll have to pay something for it in so 
 cial and moral discomfort. It would be nothing to 
 the discomfort of Miss Brown, would it? I shall 
 be able to put it clearly to Barney when I write and 
 tell him that it s for your sake as well as his and that 
 he and Nancy, who have never sought anything or 
 hoped for anything, are in no way involved by our 
 misdemeanour. I won t emphasize to Barney what 
 I feel about that side of it. He s pretty ingenuous, 
 too. It will be a less tidy happiness they ll have to 
 put up with. That s all it comes to, as far as they 
 are concerned.
 
 328 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 She was looking at him with the trouble and per 
 plexity and she said: 
 
 "They ll have to pay in far more than social and 
 moral discomfort." 
 
 "Well? In what way? How?" he challenged her. 
 
 "You said they d lose you." 
 
 "Only, if you married me," he reminded her. 
 
 But she remembered more accurately. "No. 
 They d lose you anyway. You said so. You said 
 that if they could ever see you again it would make 
 it too blatantly a fake. And it s true. I see it now. 
 How could you turn up quietly, as if nothing had 
 happened, after Barney had divorced me with you 
 as co-respondent? There s Lady Cockerell," said 
 Adrienne, and, though she was so grave, so troubled, 
 it was with a touch of mild malice. "There s Mr. 
 Bodman and Johnson, to say nothing of Mrs. Chad- 
 wick and Nancy s mother. No, I really don t see 
 you facing them all at Coldbrooks after we d come 
 out in the Daily Mail with head-lines and pic 
 tures." 
 
 Her lucidity could indeed disconcert him when it 
 sharpened itself like this with the apt use of his vo 
 cabulary. Tie had to stop to think. 
 
 "There won t, at all events, be pictures," he 
 paused by the triviality to remark. "We shan t 
 appear. It will be an hotel over here and the case 
 will be undefended. We needn t, really, consider all 
 that too closely. At the worst, if they do lose me, 
 it s not a devastating loss. They ll have each other." 
 
 "Ah, but who will you have?" Adrienne in 
 quired. "Hamilton will have Carola and they will 
 have each other. But who will you have?" 
 
 He lay and looked at her. There was only one
 
 ADR1ENNE TONER 329 
 
 answer to that question and he could not make it. 
 He was aware of the insufficiency of his substitute. 
 "I d have your friendship," he said. 
 
 "You have that now," said Adrienne. "And 
 though I m so your friend, I ll be leaving you, soon, 
 probably for ever. We ll probably never meet again, 
 Mr. Oldmeadow. Our paths lie so apart, don t they? 
 My friendship will do you very little good." 
 
 Her words cut into him, but he kept a brave 
 countenance. "I d have the joy of knowing I d 
 done something worth while for you. How easily 
 I might have died here, if it hadn t been for you. 
 My life is yours in a sense and I want you to use it 
 rather than Hamilton s. I have my work, you know; 
 lots of things I m interested in to go back to some 
 day. As you remarked, a divorced wife can run 
 soup-kitchens and in the same way a co-respondent 
 can write articles and go to concerts." 
 
 "I know. I know what a fine, big life you have," 
 she murmured, and the trouble on her face had 
 deepened. "But how can I take it from you? A 
 felony? How can I let you do, for my sake, some 
 thing you feel to be so wrong?" 
 
 "Give it up then," said Oldmeadow. And if he 
 had found it difficult to make his plea for Barney a 
 little while before, how much more difficult he 
 found it to say this, and to mean it, now. "Give it 
 up. That s your choice, and your only choice. You 
 owe that to me. Indeed you do. To give it up or to 
 accept me as your companion in iniquity. I m not 
 going to pretend I don t think it iniquity to give you 
 ease. You re not a person who needs ease. And I 
 can do without it, too. For your sake. So there you 
 have it."
 
 330 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "Not quite. Not quite," she really almost 
 pleaded. "I couldn t ask it of Hamilton if he felt 
 about it in the least little way as you do. And 
 Carola doesn t care a bit about the law either. She s 
 an Imagist, you know." Adrienne offered this 
 fact as if it would help to elucidate Carola s com 
 plaisances. "She s written some very original 
 poetry. If it were Hamilton no one would lose any 
 thing, and Barney and Nancy would be free. In 
 deed, indeed I can t give it up when it s all there, 
 before me, with everything to gain and nothing to 
 lose for anybody, if it s Hamilton." 
 
 "Then it must be me, you see," said Oldmeadow. 
 "And I shan t talk to you about the iniquity again, 
 I promise you. I ve made my protest and civiliza 
 tion must get on as best it can. You re a terrible 
 person, you know" - he smiled a little at her, find 
 ing the banter so that she should not guess at the 
 commotion of his heart. "But I like you just as 
 you are. Now where shall we go?"
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 HE could not have believed that it would be so de 
 licious to live with Adrienne Toner. 
 
 Even at the moment when he had known that he 
 loved her, he had been, though filled with the sense 
 of a present heaven, as aware as ever of the dis 
 crepancies between them, and during the three 
 months that separated them, he at Cannes, she 
 nursing in Paris, he knew many doubts; never of 
 his love, but of what it was making him do and of 
 where it was going to lead them. He couldn t for 
 the life of him imagine what was to become of them 
 if his hopes were fulfilled, for he hardly saw himself 
 following her off to Central Europe it was to 
 Serbia, her letters informed him, that her thoughts 
 were turning nor saw them established in London 
 under the astonished gaze of Lydia Aldesey. 
 
 She had selected Lyons as their place of meeting, 
 because of the work for the rapatries that she wished 
 to inspect there, and from the moment that he saw 
 her descend from the Paris express, dressed in dark 
 civilian clothes and carrying, with such an air of 
 competence, her rug and dressing-case, all doubts 
 were allayed and all restlessness dispelled. 
 
 He had arrived the day before and had found an 
 old-fashioned hotel with spacious rooms overlooking 
 the Saone, and, as they drove to it on that Novem 
 ber evening, she expressed herself, scrutinizing him 
 with a professional eye, as dissatisfied with his re 
 covery. 
 
 It was because of the restlessness, of course, that
 
 332 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 he had not got as well as he should have, and he 
 knew that he must, in the stress of feeling that now 
 beset him, look strangely, and he promised her, 
 feeling that he spoke the truth, that now that he 
 had his nurse again complete recovery would be only 
 a matter of days. 
 
 " I want you to see our view," he said to her when 
 the porter had carried up her little box and they 
 were left alone in the brocaded and gilded salon that 
 separated their rooms; "I chose this place for the 
 view; it s the loveliest in Lyons, I think." 
 
 There was still a little twilight, and standing at the 
 window they looked down at the lighted quai with 
 its double row of lofty plane-trees and across the 
 jade-green Saone at St. Jean, the grey cathedral, 
 and at the beautiful w T hite archeveche glimmering 
 in a soft, dimmed atmosphere that made him think 
 of London. 
 
 "There s a horrible modern cathedral up on the 
 hill," he said ; " but we don t need to see it. We need 
 only see the river and the archeveche and St. Jean. 
 And in the mornings there s a market below, a mile 
 of it, all under huge mushroom-coloured um 
 brellas; flowers and cheeses and every kind of 
 country produce. I think you ll like it here." 
 
 "I like it very much. I think it s beautiful," 
 said Adrienne. "I like our room, too," and she 
 turned and looked up at the painted ceiling and 
 round at the consoles and mirrors, inlaid tables and 
 richly curved, brocaded chairs. "Isn t it splendid." 
 
 "Madame Recamier is said to have lived here," 
 Oldmeadow told her. "And this is said to have been 
 her room." 
 
 "And now it s mine," said Adrienne, smiling
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 333 
 
 slightly as though she found the juxtaposition 
 amusing. 
 
 Already the stealing sense of deliciousness was 
 breathing over him. The very way in which she 
 said, "our room," was part of it. Even the way in 
 which she said that made him feel the peace, com 
 fort, and charm of a shared life as he had never be 
 fore felt it. And the sense grew and grew on that 
 first evening. 
 
 It was delicious to hear the waiters address her 
 as Madame, and to know that it was his madame 
 they imagined her to be, when he sat opposite to her 
 at their little table in the dining-room. She wore a 
 grey dress now and, with her quiet, her calm glances 
 cast about her, might indeed have been the veritable 
 Madame Oldmeadow inscribed at the bureau. If 
 they had the aspect of a devoted, long-mated 
 couple, it was because of her calm. But she would 
 have been as unperturbed, he felt sure, had she been 
 stopping there under her own name instead of his 
 and looked upon as his well-established mistress. 
 Situations would never embarrass her as long as she 
 knew what she was doing with them. That night 
 when she gave him her hand at bedtime she said, 
 looking at him with the affectionate, professional 
 eyes: " I ll come and put you to sleep if you need me; 
 be sure to let me know." 
 
 But he had no need to call her. He slept as 
 soundly as though she sat beside him with her hand 
 upon his brow. 
 
 So the mirage of conjugal felicity was evoked 
 about him. 
 
 She poured out his coffee for him in the morning 
 wearing a silk neglige edged with fur, and said, as
 
 334 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 they buttered their rolls, that they must buy some 
 honey for their breakfasts. She said, too, that they 
 must do a great deal of sight-seeing in the after 
 noons. "There is so much to be seen in Lyons. And 
 I shall finish with my rapatrie work in the mornings." 
 He asked if he might not come with her to the ra 
 patrie work, but was told that he was not yet strong 
 enough for more than one walk in the day. "In 
 our evenings, after tea," she went on, "I thought 
 perhaps you d like to study Dante a little with me. 
 My Dante is getting so rusty and I ve brought a 
 very fine edition. Are you good at Italian?" 
 
 He said he wasn t, but would love to read Dante 
 with her. 
 
 "And we must get a piano," she finished, "and 
 have music after dinner. It will be a wonderful 
 holiday for me." 
 
 So the days fell at once into a series of rituals. 
 He saw that she had always mapped them out con 
 scientiously, as Mrs. Toner had doubtlessly taught 
 her to do, careful of the treasure of time as Mrs. 
 Toner would have said entrusted to each soul 
 by life. So, no doubt, Adrienne would put it still. 
 And what he would, in first knowing her, have found 
 part of her absurdity, he found now part of her 
 charm. 
 
 That was what it all came back to. He saw, re 
 constructing their past, that from the beginning 
 she had had her deep charm for him. 
 
 It was the trivial word for the great fact ; the com 
 pulsion of personality; the overflow of vitality; the 
 secret at once of the saint and of the successful 
 music-hall singer. Her own absorption in life was 
 so intense that it communicated itself. Her con-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 335 
 
 fidence was so secure that it begot confidence. Her 
 power was implicit in all she did. It was not only 
 the rapatries she dealt with, as, at the first, she had 
 dealt with the wounded. She dealt as successfully 
 and as accurately with the little things of life. Honey 
 was on their breakfast- table ; flowers on the consoles ; 
 music on the piano. The gilded hotel salon became 
 a home. 
 
 She was still, in demeanour, the cultured, trav 
 elled American, equipped always, for their walks, 
 with a guide-book or history, from which she often 
 read to him as they paused to lean on the parapets 
 of the splendid quais. There were few salient facts 
 in the history of the potent city that were not im 
 parted to him ; and with anyone else what a bore it 
 would have been to have to listen ! But he was more 
 than content that she should tell him about the Ro 
 mans or Richelieu. It w r as everything to him to feel 
 that they shared it all, from the honey to Richelieu. 
 
 And with all the intimacy went the extreme re 
 serve. 
 
 She had showed him, when it was necessary for 
 their understanding as friends, the centre of her 
 life; yet she remained, while so gentle, so absorbed, 
 and even loving, as remote, as inaccessible, as he 
 had felt her to be on those first days in the hospital. 
 She never referred to her own personal situation nor 
 to any emotion connected with it. She never referred 
 to herself or expressed a taste or an opinion touched 
 with personal ardour. He did not know what she 
 was really feeling, ever. Though, when he looked at 
 her, sitting opposite him in her grey and addressed 
 by the assiduities of the waiters, he could imagine 
 that he was living with a wife, he could imagine
 
 336 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 more often that he was living with a nun. Her con 
 trol and her selflessness were cloistral. He could 
 not think her in any need of a director. 
 
 They walked one afternoon along the Quai des 
 Brotteaux, returning from the park of the Tete d Or, 
 where they had wandered on the gravel under the 
 tall, melancholy trees and fed the deer. The ugly 
 yet magnificent city was spread before them in one 
 of its most splendid aspects, climbing steeply, on 
 the further banks of the Rhone, to the cliff-like 
 heights of the Croix Rousse and marching, as it 
 followed the grandiose curve of the river, into a sun 
 set sky where the cupola of the Hospice hung like 
 a dark bubble against the gold and the Alps, not 
 visible from the river level, seemed yet to manifest 
 themselves in the illumined clouds ranged high 
 above the horizon. 
 
 Ten days of their appointed fortnight had now 
 passed and while Oldmeadow kept a half unseeing 
 yet appraising eye upon the turbulent glories of the 
 river, he was wondering when and how he should 
 make his revelation and his appeal. If her reserve 
 made it more difficult to imagine, her intimacy did 
 not make it more easy. It was because she was so 
 intimate that she had remained so unaware. For all 
 his self-command he felt sure that in any other cir 
 cumstances she could not, for these ten days, have 
 remained so blind. 
 
 Here she walked beside him, the Madame Old- 
 meadow of the hotel, looking before her as she 
 walked and thinking, he would have wagered, not 
 of him but of Serbia. 
 
 She wore a beautifully adjusted little costume, 
 conveying in its sober darkness the impression of
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 337 
 
 richness and simplicity that her clothes had always 
 given him. Fur was turned up about her ears and a 
 small hat of fur and velvet was turned down over 
 her eyes as she had always worn her hats. The 
 straight fringe of gold showed under its brim and 
 under the gold were those calm, those questing, 
 melancholy eyes. 
 
 Or perhaps he carried further his rueful rev 
 erie she was thinking about the date of the Hos 
 pice. He had the guide-book in his pocket. 
 
 "Isn t it jolly?" he suggested, as she looked up 
 at him, indicating the prospect spread before them 
 and adding, since he knew that his English instinct 
 for boyish understatement still puzzled her: "Like 
 a great, grim queen in shabby clothes; raised on 
 such a throne and crowned with such jewels that 
 one feels her glorious rather than ugly." 
 
 Adrienne studied the shabby queen attentively 
 and then looked back at him. Perhaps something 
 dwelling in his eyes, something for her only and not 
 at all for Lyons, caught her more special attention, 
 for she said suddenly, and so unexpectedly that, 
 with a sort of terror, he felt that his crisis might be 
 coming: "You ve been very dear to me, Mr. Old- 
 meadow, in all our time here. I feel it to have been 
 a great privilege, you know; a great opportunity." 
 
 " Really? In what way ?" He could at all events 
 keep his voice quiet and light. "I thought it had 
 been you who made all the opportunities." 
 
 "Oh, no. I never make any of the opportunities I 
 am thinking of," said Adrienne. " I only know how 
 to take them. It isn t only that you are more widely 
 and deeply cultured than I am though your Ital 
 ian accent isn t good!" she smiled; "but I al-
 
 338 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 ways feel that you see far more in everything than 
 I do, even when you seem to be seeing less. I have 
 to go carefully and pick up fact by fact, while you 
 see things in a sort of vision and they are all related 
 as they enter your mind. That s where my privilege 
 comes in. You make me share your vision some 
 times. You have the artistic mind, and I am not 
 really artistic at all though Mother always 
 wanted that for me more than anything; with all 
 that goes with it." 
 
 She was speaking of herself though it was only 
 in order to express more exactly her gratitude, and, 
 as he walked beside her, he was filled with the 
 mingled hope and terror. After all he had still four 
 more days of her. It would be terrible to spoil them. 
 
 "No; you aren t artistic," he agreed. "And I 
 don t know that I am, either. Whether I am or not, 
 I feel mine to have been the opportunity and the 
 privilege." 
 
 "I can t understand that at all," she said, with 
 her patent candour. 
 
 " It may be part of the artistic temperament to feel 
 things one can t understand. Though I do under 
 stand why I feel it," he added. 
 
 "And it s part of the artistic temperament not 
 to try" - Adrienne turned their theme to its more 
 impersonal aspect. "Never to try to enjoy any 
 thing that you don t enjoy naturally. I don t be 
 lieve I ever enjoy any of the artistic things quite 
 naturally. I ve always been trained to enjoy and 
 I ve always tried to enjoy; because I thought it was 
 right to try. But since I ve been here with you I ve 
 come to feel that what I ve enjoyed has been my 
 own effort and my mastery of the mere study, and
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 339 
 
 I seem to feel that it might be as well to give up 
 trying and training and fall back on the things that 
 come naturally; scenery artists would think senti 
 mental, and babies; and patriotic songs." She smiled 
 a little as she found her list. But she was grave, 
 too, thinking it out and adding another to her dis 
 covered futilities. 
 
 "It may be as well to limit your attention to the 
 sentimental scenery and the babies, since you ve so 
 many other things to do with it," he acquiesced. 
 "We come back to big people again, you see; they 
 haven t time to be artistic; don t need to be." 
 
 "Ah, but it s not a question of time at all," said 
 Adrienne, and he remembered that long ago, from 
 the very first, he had said that she wasn t stupid. 
 " It s a question of how you re born. That s a thing 
 I would never have admitted in my old days, you 
 know. I would never have admitted that any hu 
 man soul was really shut out from anything. Per 
 haps we re not, any of us, if we are to have all eter 
 nity to grow in. But as far as this life is concerned 
 I see quite clearly now that some people are shut 
 out from all sorts of things, and that the sort of mis 
 take I made in my old time was in thinking that any 
 one who had the will could force eternity into any 
 given fragment of our temporal life. I did do a little 
 philosophy, you see! That s what I mean and you 
 understand, I know. All the same I wish I weren t 
 one of the shut-out people. I wish I were artistic. 
 I d have liked to have that side of life to meet 
 people with. I sometimes think that one doesn t get 
 far with people, really, if all that one has to give are 
 the fundamental things like the care of their minds 
 and bodies. One goes deep, of course ; but one doesn t
 
 340 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 go far. You can do something for them ; but there s 
 nothing, afterwards, that they can do with you ; and 
 it makes it rather lonely in a way when one has 
 time to be lonely." 
 
 He did not know, indeed, whether she saw the 
 beauty of the scene spread before them as they 
 walked, and he was remembering, with a sort of 
 tranced tenderness, the flower-wreathed shepherd 
 ess and her crook ; and Mrs. Toner with her lilies and 
 seagulls. But why should she see beauty when she 
 made it? It was all that he could see in her now. 
 
 "What you can do for them afterwards is to pour 
 out their coffee for them in the most enhancing 
 way," he suggested, "and make sight- seeing a pleas 
 ure, and arrange flowers and place chairs and tables 
 so that a hotel salon becomes loveable. If you find 
 the person to whom you can give the fundamental 
 things and do all sorts of homely things with after 
 wards, why be lonely? We are very happy together, 
 aren t we? We get a great deal out of each other. 
 I can speak for myself, at all events; and you ve 
 just told me that I give something, too. So why 
 should you go off to Central Europe next week? 
 Why not go back with me to the South," he finished, 
 "and wander about together enjoying, quite nat 
 urally, the sentimental scenery?" 
 
 He held his breath after he had thus spoken, 
 wondering with intensity, while he felt his heart 
 beats, what she would make of it. He knew what 
 he could make of it, seizing his opportunity on the 
 instant, if only she would recognize the meaning 
 that underlay the easy words. And framed in the 
 little hat on the background of transfigured Lyons, 
 Adrienne s face was turned towards him and, after
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 341 
 
 he had made his suggestion, she studied him in si 
 lence for what seemed to him a long lapse of time. 
 Then she said, overwhelmingly: 
 
 "That s perfectly lovely of you, Mr. Old- 
 meadow." 
 
 "Not at all; not perfectly lovely at all," he 
 stammered as he contradicted her and he heard 
 that his voice sounded angry. "It s what I want. 
 I want it very much." 
 
 "Yes. I know you do. And that s what s so 
 lovely," said Adrienne. " I know you want it. You 
 are sorry for me all the time. And you want to 
 cheer me up. Because you feel I ve lost so much. 
 But, you know; you remember; I told you the truth 
 that time. I don t need cheering. I m not unhappy. 
 One can be lonely without being unhappy." 
 
 "I m not sorry for you," poor Oldmeadow re 
 joined, still in the angry voice. "I m not thinking 
 of you at all. I m thinking of myself. I m lonely, 
 too, and I am unhappy, even if you aren t." 
 
 She stopped short in her walk. He saw in her 
 eyes the swift, almost diagnosing solicitude that 
 measured his need and her own capacity. It was as 
 though his temperature had gone up alarmingly. 
 
 "Dear Mr. Oldmeadow," she said; and then she 
 faltered; she paused. She no longer found her 
 remedies easily. "It s because you are separated 
 from your own life," she did find. " It s because all 
 this is so bitter to you ; what you are doing now - 
 how could I not understand ? and the war, that 
 has torn us all. But when it s over, when you can 
 go home again and take up your own big life-work 
 and find your own roots, happiness will come back; 
 I m sure of it. We are all unhappy sometimes,
 
 342 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 aren t we? We must be; with our minds and hearts. 
 Our troubled minds; our lonely hearts. But you 
 know as well as I do, dear Mr. Oldmeadow, that 
 our souls can find the way out." 
 
 Her nature expressed itself in platitudes; yet 
 sometimes she had phrases, rising from her heart 
 as if from a fountain fed by unseen altitudes, that 
 shook him in their very wording. "Our troubled 
 minds. Our lonely hearts," echoed in his ears while, 
 bending his head downwards, he muttered stub 
 bornly: "My soul can t, without you." 
 
 She still stood, not moving forward, her eyes raised 
 to his. " Please don t say that," she murmured, and 
 he heard the trouble in her voice. " It can t be so, 
 except for this time that you are away from every 
 body. You have so many things to live for. So 
 many people near you. You are such a big, rare 
 person. It s what I was afraid of, you know. It 
 happens so often with me; that people feel that. 
 But you can t really need me any longer." 
 
 He said nothing, still not raising his eyes to hers, 
 and she went on after a moment. "And I have so 
 many things to live for, too. You ve never really 
 thought about that side of my life, I know. Why 
 should you? You think of any woman s life isn t 
 it true? as not seriously important except on its 
 domestic side. And you know how important I 
 think that. But it isn t so with me, you see. I have 
 no hearth and I have no home; I have only my big, 
 big life and it s more important than you could be 
 lieve unless you could see it all. When I m in it it 
 takes all my mind and all my strength and I m 
 bound to it, yes, just as finally, just as irrevocably 
 as a wife who loves is bound by her marriage vows;
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 34*3 
 
 because I love it. Do you see? They are waiting 
 for me now. They need me now. There are starving 
 people, dying people; and confusion; terrible con 
 fusion. I have a gift for all that. I can deal with it. 
 Those are just the things I can deal with. And I 
 mustn t put it off any longer when our time is up. 
 I must leave you, my dear, dear friend, however 
 much I d love to stay." 
 
 She was speaking at last with ardour, and about 
 herself. And what she said was true. He had never 
 thought about her work except in the sense that he 
 thought her a saint and knew that saints did good 
 deeds. That she was needed, sorely needed, by the 
 starving and dying, was a fact, now that it was put 
 before him, silencing and even shaming him. It 
 gave him, too, a new fear. If she had her blindness, 
 he had his. His hopes and fears, after all, were all 
 that he had to think of; she had the destinies of 
 thousands. He remembered Sir Kenneth s tone in 
 speaking of her; its deep respect. Not the respect 
 of the man for the tender-hearted, merciful woman ; 
 but the respect of a professional expert for another 
 expert; respect for the proved organizer and leader 
 of men. 
 
 "I have been stupid," he said after a moment. 
 "It s true that I ve been thinking about you solely 
 in relation to myself. Would you really love to stay ? 
 If it wasn t for your work? It would be some com 
 fort to believe that." 
 
 "Of course I d love to stay," she said, eagerly 
 
 scanning his face. "I d love to travel with you - 
 
 to pour out your coffee in Avignon, Nimes, Cannes 
 
 -anywhere you liked. I d love our happy time 
 
 here to go on and on. If life could be like that; if
 
 344 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 I didn t want other things more. You remember 
 how Blake saw it all: 
 
 He who bends to himself a joy 
 Doth the winged life destroy." 
 
 I mustn t try to bend and keep this lovely time. I 
 must let it fly and bless it as it goes. And so it 
 will bless me." 
 
 She seldom made quotations nowadays. For this 
 one he felt a gratitude such as his life had rarely 
 known. 
 
 "It s been a joy to you, too, then?" 
 
 "Of course it has," said Adrienne smiling at him 
 and turning at last towards the bridge that they 
 must cross. "It s been one of the most beautiful 
 things that has ever happened to me."
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 OLDMEADOW sat at the inlaid table in the gilded 
 salon on the afternoon of the last day. He had two 
 letters to write, for, as he had put off speaking to 
 Adrienne till their last evening, so he had put off 
 writing to Barney and to Lydia Aldesey till this 
 last afternoon, and he saw now how difficult it 
 would be to write coherently while his thoughts 
 stretched themselves forward to those few hours 
 of the night when his fate would be decided. 
 
 Adrienne had gone out. She had written her 
 short communication to Barney and brought it in 
 with its envelope and laid it before him, asking him 
 in the voice that, again, made him think of snow: 
 "Is that quite right?" 
 
 It was, quite, Re told her, after glancing through 
 it swiftly. It stated, in the most colourless terms, 
 the facts that Barney was to take to his solicitor. 
 "Quite right," he repeated, looking up at her. "Are 
 you going out? Will you post it? or shall I?" 
 
 "Will you post it with yours? Yes. I must go 
 out. But I ll try to be back by tea-time. It s very 
 disappointing; our last afternoon. But that poor 
 woman from Roubaix the one with consumption 
 up at the Croix Rousse is dying. They ve sent for 
 me. All the little children, you remember I told you. 
 I m going to wire to Josephine and ask her if she 
 can come down and look after them for a little 
 while." 
 
 "Josephine?" he questioned. He had, till now, 
 entirely forgotten Josephine. Adrienne told him
 
 346 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 that she was with her parents in a provincial town. 
 "They lost their only son and are very sad. Fine, 
 brave old people. He is a baker, the old father, and 
 makes the most wonderful bread. I went to see 
 them last summer." 
 
 Their packing was done and the room denuded; 
 the men had taken away the piano that morning. 
 He had his letters to write; so there was really no 
 reason why she should not go. And there was, be 
 sides, nothing that they had to say to each other, 
 except the one thing he had to say. 
 
 The silence that overtakes parting friends on a 
 station platform had overtaken them since the 
 morning, though, at lunch, Adrienne had talked 
 with some persistence of her immediate plans and 
 prospects and about the unit of doctors and nurses 
 who were to meet her in Italy. There was no 
 reason why she should not go, and he would even 
 rather she did. He would rather see no more of her 
 until evening when everything but the one thing 
 would be over and done with. And so he was left 
 with his letters, leaning his elbows on the table 
 over the hotel paper and staring out at the Saone 
 and the white archeveche. 
 
 Both letters were difficult to write; but beside 
 the one to Lydia, the one to Barney was easy. Bar 
 ney, after all, was to gain everything from what he 
 had to tell him, and Lydia was to lose; how much 
 was Lydia to lose? He recalled their last evening 
 together and its revelations and saw that the old 
 laughing presage was now more than fulfilled. 
 Lydia was to lose more than her toes and fingers; in 
 any case. Even if he returned to her alone, she cared 
 for him too much not to feel, always, the shadow of
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 347 
 
 his crippled heart; his heart not only crippled, but 
 occupied, so occupied that friendships, however 
 near, became, in a sense, irrelevancies. And if he 
 returned with Adrienne but could he return with 
 Adrienne? What kind of a life could he and Ad 
 rienne lead in London? even if Lydia s door, gen 
 erously, was opened to them, as he believed it would 
 be knowing her generous. 
 
 He laid down his pen and fixed his eyes on the 
 river and he tried to see Lydia and Adrienne to 
 gether. But it was a useless effort. From this 
 strange haven of the Lyons hotel where he had 
 spent the happiest fortnight of his life, he could not 
 see himself into any future with familiar features. 
 He could only see himself and Adrienne, alone, at 
 hotels. To attempt to place her in Lydia s gener 
 ous drawing-room was to measure more accurately 
 than he had yet measured it the abyss that separated 
 him from his former life. If it could be spanned ; if 
 Adrienne could be placed there, on the background 
 of eighteenth-century fans and old glass, she be 
 came a clipped and tethered seagull in a garden, 
 awkward, irrelevant, melancholy. Lydia might cease 
 to find her third-rate and absurd; but she wouldn t 
 know what to do with her any more than she would 
 have known what to do with the seagull. So what, if 
 Adrienne became his wife, remained of his friend 
 ship with Lydia? 
 
 He put aside the unresolved perplexity and took 
 Barney first. 
 
 "My dear Barney," he wrote, "I don t think 
 that the letter Adrienne has written to you will sur 
 prise you as much as this letter of mine. You will 
 understand from hers that she wishes to free herself
 
 348 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 and to free you. You will understand that that is 
 my wish, too. She only tells you that she has been 
 staying here with me, for a fortnight, as my wife; 
 that s for your solicitor; you will read between the 
 lines and know that it seemed worth while to both 
 of us to make the necessary sacrifice in order to gain 
 so much for you and for her. I hope that you and my 
 dear Nancy will feel that we are justified, and that 
 you will take your happiness as bravely as we secure 
 it for you. You ll know that our step hasn t been 
 taken lightly. 
 
 "But, now, dear Barney, comes my absolutely 
 personal contribution. It is a contribution, for it 
 will make you and Nancy happier to know that I 
 have as much to gain as you and she. I have fallen 
 in love with Adrienne and I hope that I may win 
 her consent to be my wife. Yes, dear Barney, un 
 believable as it will look to you, there it is; and she 
 dreams of it as little as you could have dreamed of 
 it. I met her again, as her letter informs you, at the 
 Boulogne hospital. She asked me to say nothing 
 about our meeting. She wanted to disappear out of 
 your lives. She saved my life, I think, and I saw a 
 great deal of her. What I found in her that I had 
 not seen before I need not say. 
 
 "My great difficulty, my burden and perplexity 
 now, lie in the fact that she has no trace of feeling 
 for me that might give me hope. We became, at 
 Boulogne, the best of friends; such friends that this 
 plan suggested itself to her; and we remain, after 
 our fortnight here, the best of friends; and that is 
 all. Yet I have hope, unjustified and groundless 
 though it may be, and had I not had it from the 
 beginning I couldn t have entered upon the enter-
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 349 
 
 prise; not even for you and Nancy. From one 
 point of view it s possible that you may feel that 
 I ve entered upon it in spite of you and Nancy. 
 You may feel inclined to repudiate and disown the 
 whole affair and to remain unaware of it. In that 
 case it would come down to an appeal from me to 
 you to carry it through for my sake. But from 
 another point of view it makes it easier for you; 
 easier for you to accept, since my hope gives integ 
 rity to the situation. That s another thing that 
 decided me. If it had been mere sham I don t think 
 I could have undertaken it. Adrienne felt none of 
 my scruples on this score. She walked over legal 
 and conventional commandments like a saint over 
 hot ploughshares. But I haven t her immunities. 
 I should have felt myself badly scorched, and felt 
 that I d scorched you and Nancy, if my hope hadn t 
 given everything its character of bona fides. 
 
 "Dear Barney, dear Nancy, please forgive me 
 if I ve been selfish. It hasn t all been selfishness, 
 that I promise you; it was in hopes for you, too; 
 and I have to face sacrifices. The worst of them 
 will be that if Adrienne takes me I ll have to lose 
 you. You can measure the depth of my feeling for 
 her from the fact that I can make such sacrifices. 
 Perhaps you ll feel that even if she doesn t take me 
 I ll have to lose you. I hope not. I hope, in that 
 case, that mitigations and refuges will be found for 
 me and that some day you ll perhaps be able to 
 make a corner in your lives where I may creep and 
 feel my wounds less aching. In any case, after Ad 
 rienne, you are the creatures dearest to me in the 
 world and I am always and for ever your devoted 
 friend, ROGER."
 
 350 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 And now Lydia. There was no use in thinking 
 about it. The plunge must be taken. 
 
 "My dear Lydia," he wrote, "I have fallen 
 in love with Adrienne Toner. I feel that with such 
 a friend as you it s better to begin with the bomb 
 shell. She doesn t know it, and if we are here in this 
 Lyons hotel together, it s only, she imagines, be 
 cause she wishes to set Barney free and that I ve 
 undertaken, for her sake and for Barney s, a repug 
 nant task. It is a repugnant task, in spite of what 
 it may mean to me of happiness. I hate it for her, 
 and for Barney and for myself. But since she was 
 determined on it and since, if it wasn t I it was to be 
 another friend, and since I have fallen in love with 
 her, I saw that it was only decent that the co-respond 
 ent in the case should be the man who married her af 
 terwards. For I hope to become her husband, and I 
 haven t one jot of ground for my hope. We are study 
 ing Dante together, and she shows me the sights 
 of Lyons. She is just the same. Yet completely 
 altered. 
 
 "I don t know whether you ll feel you can ever 
 see me again, with or without her. I don t want to 
 cast myself too heavily on your compassion, so I ll 
 only remind you that even if I return to England 
 alone I shall probably have to lose Nancy and Bar 
 ney and that you will be my only refuge. It will be 
 the culmination of my misfortunes if I have to lose 
 you. 
 
 "Dear Lydia, I am always your devoted 
 
 "ROGER" 
 
 But he hadn t lost her. He knew he hadn t lost 
 her; in any case. And the taste of what he did was
 
 ADR1ENNE TONER 351 
 
 sharp and bitter to him, for she was generous and 
 loyal and he had cut off her very limbs. When he 
 had addressed and stamped the letters he went 
 downstairs, and, for the sense of greater finality, 
 carried them to the post instead of dropping them 
 into the hotel-box. 
 
 He had almost the sense of disembodiment as he 
 returned to the empty and dismantled room. He 
 seemed to have become a mere consciousness sus 
 pended between two states of being. The past was 
 gone. He had dropped it into the post- box. And he 
 saw no future. He felt, for the moment, no hopes. 
 At the moment it seemed absurd to think that Ad- 
 rienne could ever love him. He tried to picture 
 Coldbrooks and Somer s Place when the bomb-shell 
 struck them. Would Barney show Nancy the letter? 
 Nancy would be pale, aghast, silent. Barney would 
 have to wait for days, perhaps, before saying to her: 
 "But, after all, it s for their sakes, too, Nancy dear. 
 See what Roger says." Mrs. Averil would cast up 
 her hands and cry "That woman ! " - but, perhaps, 
 with as much admiration as repudiation, and Meg, 
 if she were summoned to the scene of confusion, 
 would say, "So she s got hold of Roger, too." Fun 
 nily enough it was the dear March Hare, he felt 
 sure, who would be the first one to stretch out a 
 hand towards the tarnished freedom. "After all, 
 you know," he could hear her murmuring, "it 
 would be much nicer for Barney and Nancy to be 
 married, wouldn t it? And Adrienne wasn t a Chris 
 tian, you know, so probably the first marriage 
 doesn t really count. We mustn t be conventional, 
 Monica." Yes, perhaps it would go like that at 
 Coldbrooks. But at Somer s Place Lydia would sit
 
 352 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 among her fans and glass and wish that they had 
 never seen Adrienne Toner. 
 
 He paced up and down before the windows and 
 he had never been so lonely in his life. He was so 
 lonely that he became aware at last that his mere 
 negative state was passing into a positive and that 
 grief at the severance of old ties had become fear of 
 losing Adrienne. The fear and the loneliness seemed 
 actualized when, at five, the waiter appeared bear 
 ing the tea-tray on his shoulder. He had never had 
 tea alone before in this strange, foreign room. Ad 
 rienne always made a complicated and charming 
 ritual of the occasion, boiling the water on their own 
 little spirit- kettle and measuring the tea from her 
 own caddy the very same kettle and caddy, she 
 told him, that had accompanied herself and her 
 mother on all their travels. And to see the cups 
 and bread and butter and not to have her there, 
 added a poignant taste of abandonment to his lone 
 liness. 
 
 She kept the kettle in her room and when the boy 
 was gone he softly opened the door and went in. It 
 would keep his heart up to have the water boiling 
 in readiness for her arrival. He recognized, as he 
 stood, then, and looked about him, that his in 
 stinct had also been that of taking refuge. In her 
 room he could more closely recover the sense of her 
 presence. 
 
 She had finished all the essentials of her packing 
 and her box stood with its lid open ready for the last 
 disposals. Yet the room seemed still full of her per 
 sonality. He noted it all gazing around him with 
 eyes almost those of a solemn little boy permitted 
 to glance in at a Christmas-tree.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 353 
 
 Her dressing-table, improvised from the mantel 
 piece, was neatly laid out with small, worn, costly, 
 and immaculate appurtenances. He moved forward 
 and looked at them, not touching. The initials 
 intertwined on the backs of the ivory brushes were 
 her girlish ones: A. T. She had discarded, long 
 since, no doubt, her wedding toilet set. 
 
 If he became her husband, the thought crossed his 
 mind and quickened his heart, he might brush her 
 hair for her, that wonderful golden hair, before 
 many months were over. 
 
 Near the ivory hand-glass stood two photographs 
 in a folding frame of faded blue leather. He stooped 
 to look and saw that one was of Mrs. and the other 
 certainly of Mr. Toner, in their early days. Remote, 
 mysterious and alien, their formally directed eyes 
 looked back at him and in the father s ingenuous 
 young countenance, surmounted by a roll of hair 
 that was provincial without being exactly rural, the 
 chin resting upon a large, peculiar collar, he could 
 strangely retrace Adrienne s wide brow and stead 
 fast light-filled eyes. Mrs. Toner wore a ruffled 
 dress and of her face little remained distinct but 
 the dark gaze forceful and ambiguously gentle. 
 
 The room was full of the fragrance that was not 
 a fragrance and that had, long ago, reminded him 
 of Fuller s earth. A pair of small blue satin mules 
 stood under a chair near the bed. 
 
 Only after he had withdrawn, gently closing the 
 door behind him, did he realize that he had for 
 gotten the kettle and then he felt that he could not 
 go back again. A moment after the boy returned 
 with a note, sent, by hand, he was informed, from 
 the Croix Rousse.
 
 354 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "I am so dreadfully sorry, so disappointed," he 
 read. "Our last afternoon, but I can t get away yet. 
 Don t wait dinner for me, if I should be late, even 
 for that. I won t be very late, I promise, and we will 
 have our evening." 
 
 The note had no address. He rushed forth and 
 down to find the messenger gone. Had he only 
 known where to seek her in the vast, high, melan 
 choly district of the Croix Rousse he would have 
 gone to join her. His sense of loneliness was almost 
 a panic. 
 
 Of course, he tried to fix his mind on that realiza 
 tion, as he went back to the salon, her rapatries had 
 no doubt preoccupied her mind, from the first, quite 
 as much as their own situation. She had spoken to 
 him in especial of this family and of their sorrows. 
 One child they had left dead at Evian and the 
 mother, on the eve of their return to their Northern 
 home, had become too desperately ill to travel. 
 "Such dear, good, gentle people," he recalled her 
 saying. No; he must not repine. After all he had 
 only the one thing to say to her; and the evening 
 would be long enough for that. 
 
 It was nearly seven when he heard her quick 
 footstep outside. When she entered, the brim of 
 her little hat, in the electric light, cast a sharp 
 shadow over her eyes, but he saw at once that she 
 had been crying. 
 
 She came in so quickly that he had not time to 
 rise and, going to him, behind his chair, she put her 
 hands on his shoulders and pressed him down, 
 saying: "I m so sorry to have left you all alone." 
 
 It was astonishingly comforting to have her put 
 these fraternal hands upon him like this. She had
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 355 
 
 never done it before. Yet there was a salty smart 
 in her words to him. What else did she intend to do 
 but leave him all alone for always? 
 
 "I m dreadfully lonely, I confess," he said, "and 
 I see that you re dreadfully tired." 
 
 She went round to the other side of the table and 
 sat down, not looking at him and said, in a low voice : 
 "Oh the seas the seas of misery." 
 
 "You are completely worn out," he said. He was 
 not thinking so much of the seas of misery as of his 
 few remaining hours. Were they to be spoiled by 
 her fatigue? 
 
 "No; not worn out. Not at all worn out," said 
 Adrienne, stretching her arms along the table in 
 front of her as she sat, and though she had wept he 
 could see something of ardour, of a strength re 
 newed, in the lines of her pallid lips. "I ve sat 
 quite still all afternoon. I ve been with him. She 
 died soon after I got there. At the end she was talk 
 ing about the little girl s grave at Evian. I was able 
 to comfort her about that. She was so afraid it 
 would not be tended. That it would have no flowers. 
 Josephine will go to Evian afterwards and see about 
 it. There are always dear nuns to do those things. 
 There was a nun with her to-day. That was the 
 greatest comfort of all; and the priest who came. 
 But I was with the father and the five poor little 
 children; so frightened and miserable. I could not 
 leave them, you see. He talked and talked and 
 talked. It helped him to talk and tell me about their 
 home and how they had had everything so nice and 
 bright. Linen, a garden, a goat and fowls. Oh, if 
 only she could have seen her home again! That 
 was what he kept saying and saying. They were
 
 356 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 full of hope when they got to Evian. He told me 
 how the children sang at dawn when the train 
 panted up the mountain among the golden trees. 
 Like birds, he said, and Vive la France! They all 
 believed they were to be safe and happy. Et, Ma 
 dame, c etait notre calvaire qui commencait alors seule- 
 ment" 
 
 She spoke, not really thinking of him, he saw, 
 absorbed still in the suffering she had just left, 
 measuring her power against such problems and 
 the worse ones to which she was travelling to 
 morrow. 
 
 "Josephine will be with them, I hope," she went 
 on presently, "in three or four days. She will help 
 them to get home and then she will come back and 
 go to see about the grave at Evian. Josephine is a 
 tower of strength for me." 
 
 Her eyes were raised to him now, and, as they 
 rested, he saw the compunction, the solicitude, with 
 which they had met him on her entrance, return to 
 them. "I m not so very late, am I?" she said, 
 rising. "I ll take off my hat and be ready in a mo 
 ment." 
 
 "Don t hurry," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 She was tired, more tired than she knew. During 
 dinner she hardly spoke, and, finding the resolve 
 suddenly, he said, as they came back to their salon: 
 " Do you know what you must do now. Go and lie 
 down and rest for an hour. Until nine. It s not 
 unselfishness. I d rather have half of you to talk 
 to for our last talk, than none of you at all." 
 
 "How dear of you," she said. She looked at him 
 with gratitude and, still, with the compunction. 
 "It would be a great rest. It would be better for
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 357 
 
 our talk. I can go to sleep at once, you know. Like 
 Napoleon," she added with a flicker of her playful 
 ness. 
 
 When she had gone into her room Oldmeadow 
 went out and walked along the quai. The night was 
 dark and dimmed with fog, but there was a moon 
 and as he walked he watched it glimmer on the 
 windows of St. Jean. He seemed to see the august 
 form of the cathedral through a watery element and 
 the grey and silver patterns of the glass were like 
 the scales of some vast fish. A sort of whale waiting 
 to swallow up the Jonah that was himself, he re 
 flected, and, leaning his elbows on the parapet of 
 the quai, the analogy carried him further and he saw 
 the cathedral like a symbol of Adrienne s life her 
 "big, big" life looming there before him, be 
 coming, as the moon rose higher, more and more 
 visible in its austere and menacing majesty. What 
 was his love to measure itself against such a voca 
 tion? for that was what it came to, as she had 
 said. She was as involved, as harnessed, as passion 
 ately preoccupied as a Saint Theresa. How could 
 he be fitted in with Serbia and all the hordes of 
 human need and wretchedness that he saw her 
 sailing forward to succour? He knew a discourage 
 ment deeper than any he had felt, for he was not a 
 doctor and his physical strength was crippled by 
 his wounds; and, shaking his shoulders in the chilly 
 November air, he turned his back on the cathedral 
 and leaned against the parapet to look up through 
 leafless branches where the plane tassels still hung, 
 at the lighted windows of the hotel; their hotel, 
 where the room, still theirs, waited for them. He 
 felt himself take refuge in the banal lights. After
 
 358 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 all, she wasn t really a Saint Theresa. There was 
 human misery everywhere to succour. Couldn t she, 
 after a winter in Serbia, found creches and visit 
 slums in London? The masculine scepticism she 
 had detected in him had its justification. Women 
 weren t meant to go on, once the world s crisis past, 
 doing feats of heroism; they weren t meant for aus 
 tere careers that gave no leisure and no home. The 
 trivial yet radiant vision of intimacy rose again be 
 fore him. She slept there above him and he was 
 guarding her slumber. He would always watch over 
 her and guard her. He would follow her round the 
 world, if need be, and brush her hair for her in Ser 
 bia or California.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE gilt clock on the mantelpiece pointed to nine, 
 but when he went to Adrienne s door and listened 
 there was no sound within her room, and his heart 
 sank as he wondered if she might not sleep on, in 
 her fatigue, sleep past all possible hour for their col 
 loquy. Yet he did not feel that he could go in and 
 wake her. The analogy of the cathedral loomed be 
 fore him. It would be like waking Saint Theresa. 
 
 He walked up and down the empty, glittering 
 salon ; walked and walked until the clock struck ten. 
 Desperation nerved him then and he went again to 
 her door and knocked. 
 
 With hardly a pause her voice answered him; yet 
 he knew that he had awakened her and it echoed for 
 him with the pathos of so many past scenes of emer 
 gency when it must so have answered a summons 
 from oblivion: "Coming, coming." Among bomb 
 ings, he reflected; and sudden terrible influxes of 
 dying men from the front. 
 
 "Coming," he heard her repeat, on a note of dis 
 may. She had sprung up, turned on her light and 
 seen the hour. 
 
 He was reminded vividly, as he saw her enter 
 and it was as if a great interval of time had separated 
 them of his first meeting with her. She was so 
 changed; but now as then she was more composed 
 than anyone he had ever met. 
 
 But it was of much more than the first meeting 
 that the pale, still face reminded him. His dreams 
 were in it; the dream where she had come to him
 
 360 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 along the terrace, lifting her hand in the moonlight ; 
 and the dream of horror when he had again and 
 again pushed it down to drown. 
 
 "I m so ashamed," she said, and he saw that it 
 was with an effort she smiled. The traces of her 
 weeping were now, after her sleep, far more visible, 
 ageing her, yet making her, too, look younger; like 
 a child with swollen lids and lips. "I didn t know I 
 was so tired. I slept and slept. I didn t stir until I 
 heard your knock. Never mind. We ll talk till mid 
 night." 
 
 She was very sorry for him. 
 
 She sat down at the table and under the electric 
 chandelier her braided hair showed itself all ruffled 
 and disarranged. She had on her dark travelling 
 dress and she had thrust her feet into the pale blue 
 satin mules. The disparity of costume in one so 
 accurate, her air of readiness for the morrow, made 
 him feel her transitoriness almost more than her 
 presence, though his sense of that pressed upon him 
 with a stifling imminence. Even though she sat 
 there the room kept its look of desolate, glittering 
 emptiness and more than their shared life in it he 
 remembered the far places from which she had 
 come and to which she was going. It was as if she 
 had just arrived and were pausing for the night en 
 route. 
 
 As he had seen them years ago, so he saw again 
 the monster engines crossing the prairies at night 
 and flying illumined pennons of smoke against the 
 sky as they bore her away from blue seas, golden 
 sands, a land where the good and gifted lurked be 
 hind every bush ; and before her stretched the shin 
 ing rails, miles and miles of them, running through
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 361 
 
 ruin and desolation, that were to bear her ever on 
 wards into the darkness. This was what life had 
 brought her to. She had been only a sojourner 
 among them at Coldbrooks. The linked life of order 
 and family affection had cast her forth and he saw 
 her, for ever now, unless he could rescue her, with 
 only hotels to live in and only the chaos she was to 
 mould, to live for. She seemed already, as she sat 
 there under the light with her ruffled hair, to be 
 sitting in the train that was to bear her from him. 
 
 "I think you owe me till midnight, at least," he 
 said. He had not sat down. He stood at some little 
 distance from her leaning, his arms folded, against 
 a gilded and inlaid console. "We ve lots of things 
 to talk about." 
 
 "Have we?" Adrienne asked, smiling gently, but 
 as if she humoured an extravagance. "We ll be to 
 gether, certainly, even if we don t talk much. But I 
 have some things to say, too." 
 
 She had dropped her eyes to her hands which lay, 
 lightly crossed, on the table before her, and she 
 seemed to reflect how best to begin. "It s about 
 Nancy and Barney," she said. " I wanted, before we 
 part, to talk to you a little about them. There are 
 things that trouble me and you are the only person 
 with whom I can keep in touch. You will know how 
 I shall be longing to hear, everything. You ll let 
 me know at once, won t you?" 
 
 "At once," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 "There might be delays and difficulties," Ad 
 rienne went on. "I shall be very troubled until all 
 that is clear. And then the money. You know 
 about the money? Barney isn t well off and he was 
 worse off after I d come and gone. I tried to arrange
 
 362 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 that as best I could. Palgrave understood and 
 entered into all my feelings." 
 
 "Yes; I d heard. You arranged it all very clev 
 erly," said Oldmeadow. 
 
 He moved away now and, at the other end of the 
 room, his back to her, came to a standstill, while his 
 eyes dwelt on a large gilt-framed engraving that 
 hung there; some former Salon triumph; a festive, 
 spring-tide scene where young women in bustles and 
 bonnets offered sugar to race-horses in a meadow, 
 admired by young men in silk hats. 
 
 "Do you think this may make a difficulty?" Ad- 
 rienne asked. "Make him more reluctant to take 
 what is to come to him? It s Mrs. Chadwick s now, 
 you know." 
 
 " You ve arranged it all so well," said Oldmeadow, 
 noting the gardenias in the young men s button 
 holes, " that I don t think they can get away from it." 
 
 "But will they hate it dreadfully?" she insisted, 
 and he felt that her voice in its added urgency pro 
 tested, though unconsciously, against his distance; 
 " I seem to see that they might. If they can t take 
 it as a sign of accepted love, won t they hate it?" 
 
 "Well," said Oldmeadow, trying to reflect, 
 though his mind was far from Barney and Nancy, 
 "dear Eleanor Chadwick doesn t mind taking it, 
 whatever it s a sign of. And since it will come to 
 Barney through her, I don t think there ll be 
 enough personality left hanging about it to hurt 
 much." 
 
 "I wish they could take it as a sign of accepted 
 love," Adrienne murmured. 
 
 "Perhaps they will," he said. "I ll do my best 
 that they shall, I promise you."
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 363 
 
 It was one thing to promise it and another to 
 know his hope that it might be a promise never to 
 be redeemed. The cross-currents in his own thought 
 made him light-headed as he stood there, his back 
 to her, and examined the glossy creatures in the 
 meadow. "Do you think it will all take a long 
 time?" Adrienne added, after a little pause. "Will 
 they be able to marry in six or eight months, say?" 
 
 "It depends on how soon Barney takes action. 
 Say about a year," he suggested. "They d wait a 
 little first, wouldn t they?" 
 
 "I hope not. They ve waited so long already. I 
 hope it will be as soon as possible. I shall feel so 
 much more peaceful when I hear they re married. 
 Could you, perhaps, make them see that, too?" 
 
 And again he promised. "I ll make them see 
 everything I can." 
 
 He turned to her at last. She sat, her face still 
 downcast in its shadow, while the light glittered on 
 her wreaths of hair. Her hands still lay before her 
 on the table, and the light fell on her wedding-ring. 
 Perhaps she was looking at the ring. 
 
 " It all depends on something else," he heard him 
 self say suddenly. 
 
 She turned her head and looked round at him. 
 His attitude, his distance from her, drew her atten 
 tion rather than his words, for she repeated mildly: 
 "On something else?" 
 
 "Whether I can keep those promises, you know," 
 said Oldmeadow. "Yes, it all depends on some 
 thing else. That s what I want to talk to you 
 about." 
 
 He hardly knew what he was saying as he ap 
 proached the table and pushed the brocaded chair,
 
 364 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 companion to the one in which she sat, a little from 
 its place. He leaned on its back and looked down 
 at her hands and Adrienne kept her eyes on him, 
 attentive rather than perplexed. 
 
 "May I talk to you about it now?" he asked. 
 "It s something quite different." 
 
 "Oh, do," said Adrienne. She drew her hands 
 into her lap and sat upright, in readiness. And, 
 suddenly, as he was silent, she added: "About your 
 self? I ve been forgetting that, haven t I? I ve 
 only been thinking of my side. You have quite 
 other plans, perhaps. Perhaps you re not going 
 back to England for ever so long. Is it an appoint 
 ment?" 
 
 "No; not an appointment," he muttered, still 
 looking down, at the table now, since her hands 
 were no longer there. "But perhaps I shan t be 
 going back for a long time. I hope not." 
 
 "Oh," she murmured. And now he had perplexed 
 her. After what he had just promised her, his hope 
 must perplex and even trouble her. "Do tell me," 
 she said. 
 
 "It s something I want to ask you," said Old- 
 meadow "And it will astonish you. You may 
 find it hard to forgive; because I ve meant to ask 
 it from the beginning; from our deciding to go 
 away together. As far back as the time in the hos 
 pital." 
 
 "But you may ask anything. Anything at all," 
 she almost urged upon him. "After what I ve asked 
 you you have every right. If there s anything 
 I can do in the wide, wide world for you oh ! you 
 know how glad and proud I should be. As for for 
 giveness" he heard the smile in her voice, she was
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 365 
 
 troubled, yet tranquil, too "you re forgiven in 
 advance." 
 
 "Am I? Wait and see." He, too, tried to smile, 
 as he used the tag; but it was a mechanical smile 
 and he felt his heart knocking against the chair- 
 back as he went on: "Because I haven t done what 
 you asked me to do as you asked me to do it. I 
 haven t done it from the motive you supposed. It s 
 been for Barney and for Nancy and for you ; but it s 
 been most of all for myself." He screwed his glass 
 into his eye as he spoke with a gesture as mechan 
 ical as the smile had been and he looked at her at 
 last, thus brought nearer. "I want you not to go 
 on to-morrow." It was the first, the evident, the 
 most palpable desire that rose to his lips. "I want 
 you never to go on again, alone. If you can t stay 
 with me, I want you to let me follow you. When the 
 time comes I want you to marry me. I love you." 
 
 The light as it fell on her seemed suddenly 
 strange, almost portentous in its brilliancy. Or was 
 it her stillness, as she sat and gazed at him after he 
 had spoken the words, that was strange and porten 
 tous? It was as if they arrested the currents of her 
 being and she sat tranced, frozen into the fixed shape 
 of an astonishment too deep for emotion. Her eyes 
 did not alter in their gentleness; but the gentleness 
 became tragic and pitiful, like the inappropriate 
 calm on the mask of a dead face at Pompeii, fixed 
 in an eternal unreadiness by the engulfing lava. 
 
 She put up her hand at last and pushed back her 
 hair. With her forehead bared she became more 
 like the photograph of her father. When she spoke 
 her voice was slow and feeble, like the voice of a per 
 son dangerously ill. " I don t understand you."
 
 366 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 "Try to," said Old meadow. "You must begin far 
 back." 
 
 She still kept her hand pressed upon her hair. 
 "You don t mean that it s the conventionally 
 honourable thing to do? Oh, no; you don t mean 
 that?" Her face in its effort to understand was 
 appalled. 
 
 "No; I don t mean anything conventional," he 
 returned. "I m thinking only of you. Of my love. 
 I ll come with you to Serbia to-morrow if you ll 
 let me. I could kneel and worship you as you sit 
 there." 
 
 "Oh," she more feebly murmured. She sank back 
 in her chair. 
 
 " My darling, my saint," said Oldmeadow, gazing 
 at her; "if you must leave me, you ll take that with 
 you; that the man who destroyed you is your lover; 
 that you are dearer to him than anything on earth." 
 
 "Oh," she murmured again, and she put her 
 hands before her face. Her eyes were hidden; she 
 had spoken no word of reproach and he could not 
 keep himself from her. He knelt beside her, grasp 
 ing the chair across, behind her. She was so near 
 that he could have laid his head upon her breast. 
 "Don t leave me," he heard his pleading voice, but 
 she seemed so much nearer than his own voice; "or 
 let me come. Everything shall be as you wish and 
 when you wish. Tell me that you care, too; or that 
 you can come to care. Tell me that you can think 
 of me as your husband." 
 
 She was there, with her hidden eyes, within his 
 arms, and inevitably they closed around her, and 
 though he heard her murmur, "Please, please, 
 please," he could not relinquish her. She was free
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 367 
 
 and he was free. They had cut themselves off from 
 the world. They were alone in the strange city; in 
 the strange, bright, hallucinated room ; and he knew 
 from the ache and rapture of her nearness how he 
 had craved it. 
 
 But, gently, he heard her say again, "Please," 
 and gently she put him from her and he saw her 
 face, and her eyes full of grief and gentleness. " For 
 give me," she said. 
 
 "My darling. For what?" he almost groaned. 
 "Don t say you re going to break my heart." 
 
 She kept her hand on his breast, holding him 
 from her while she looked into his eyes. "It is so 
 beautiful to be loved," she said, and her voice was 
 still the slow, feeble voice of exhaustion. "Even 
 when one has no right to be. Don t misunderstand. 
 Even when one may not love back; not in that way. 
 Forgive me; not in that way; my dearest friend." 
 
 "Why mayn t you love back? Why not in that 
 way? If it s beautiful, why mayn t you?" 
 
 "Sit there, will you? Yes; keep my hand. How 
 weak I ve been, and cruel. It can t be. Don t you 
 know? Haven t you seen? It has always been for 
 him. He must be free; but I can never be free." 
 
 "Oh, no. No. That s impossible," Oldmeadow 
 said, leaning towards her across the table and keep 
 ing her hand in both of his. " I can t stand that. I 
 could stand your work, your vocation, better. But 
 not Barney, who loves another woman. That s im 
 possible." 
 
 "But it is so," she said, softly, looking at him. 
 "Really it is so." 
 
 "No, no," Oldmeadow repeated, and he raised 
 her hand to his lips and kept it there, a talisman
 
 368 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 against the menace of her words. "He lost you. 
 He s gone. I ve found you and you care for me. 
 You can t hide from me that you care for me. Just 
 now. For those moments. You were mine." 
 
 "No," she repeated. " I was weak and cruel, but 
 I was not yours." 
 
 She had been incredibly near so short a time ago 
 before. Now, looking at him, with her difficult 
 breaths and gentle, inflexible eyes, she was in 
 credibly remote. "I am his, only his," she said. 
 "I love him and I shall always love him. It makes 
 no difference. He loves Nancy, but it makes no dif 
 ference. He is my husband. The father of my 
 baby." 
 
 She tried to speak on steadily while she thus gave 
 him the truth that ended all his hope; but the des 
 perate emotion with which he received it made real 
 and overpowering to her her outlived yet living 
 sorrow. With all that she must relinquish laid bare 
 to her in the passion of his eyes she could measure 
 all that she had lost, as she had, perhaps, till then, 
 never measured it. "Don t you know?" she said. 
 "Don t you see? My heart is broken, broken, 
 broken." 
 
 She put her head down on her arms as she said 
 the words and he heard her bitter weeping. 
 
 He knew, as he listened, that it was all over with 
 him. Dimly, in the terrible suffering that wrenched 
 at him, he received his further revelation of the 
 nature already nearer him than any in the world. 
 Her strength would be in all she did and felt. She 
 had loved Barney and she would always love him. 
 Her marriage had been to her an ultimate and in 
 dissoluble experience. That was why she had been
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 369 
 
 so blind. She could not have thought of herself as a 
 woman to be again loved and wooed. 
 
 Her hair lay against his hands, still holding hers, 
 and he found himself stroking it, without tenderness 
 or solicitude it seemed. It seemed to be only auto 
 matically that his fingers passed across it, while he 
 noted its warmth and fineness and bright, lovely 
 colour, remembering that he had thought it at the 
 first her one indubitable beauty. 
 
 They sat there thus for a long time. The gilt 
 clock paused, choked, then in a voice of hurrying, 
 hoarsened silver rang out eleven strokes. Footsteps 
 passed and faded up the corridor; doors closed. A 
 tramway on the qua! clashed and clanged, came to 
 a noisy standstill, and moved on again with a rat 
 tling of cables and raucous blasts from a horn; and 
 in the profound silence that followed he seemed to 
 hear the deep old river flowing. 
 
 " Really, you see, it s broken," said Adrienne. 
 She had ceased to weep, but she still leaned forward, 
 her head upon her folded arms. "You saw it hap 
 pen," she said. "That night when you found me in 
 the rain." 
 
 "I ve seen everything happen to you, haven t 
 I?" said Oldmeadow. 
 
 "Yes," she assented. "Everything. And I ve 
 made you suffer, too. Isn t that strange; everybody 
 who comes near me I make suffer." 
 
 "Well, in different ways," he said. "Some because 
 you are near and others because you won t be." 
 
 His voice was colourless. His hand still passed 
 across her hair. 
 
 " Don t you see," she said, after a moment, "that 
 it couldn t have been. Try to see that and to accept
 
 370 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 it. Not you and me. Not Barney s friend and Bar 
 ney s wife. In every way it couldn t have done, 
 really. It makes no difference for me. I m a de- 
 racinee, as I said. A wanderer. But what would 
 have become of you, all full of roots as you are? 
 You can live it down without me. You never could 
 have with. And how could you have wandered with 
 me? For that must be my life." 
 
 "You know, it s no good trying to comfort me," 
 said Oldmeadow. "What I feel is that any roots I 
 have are in you." 
 
 "They will grow again. The others will grow 
 again." 
 
 "I don t want others, darling," said Oldmeadow. 
 "You see, my heart is broken, too." 
 
 She lifted her head at last and he saw her marred 
 and ravaged face. 
 
 "It can t be helped," he tried to smile at her. 
 "You weren t there to be recognized when I first 
 met you and now that you are there, I ve come too 
 late. I believe that if I d come before Barney, you d 
 have loved me. It s my only comfort." 
 
 "Who can say," said Adrienne. Her gaze, as she 
 looked at him, was deep with the mystery of her 
 acceptance. "Perhaps. It seems to me all this was 
 needed to bring us where we are enmity and 
 bitterness and grief. And my love for Barney, too. 
 Let me tell you. It s in the past that I think of him. 
 As if he were dead. It s something over; done with 
 for ever; yet something always there. How can one 
 be a mother and forget? Even when he is Nancy s 
 husband and when she is a mother, I shall not cease 
 to feel myself his wife. Perhaps you think that 
 strange, after Meg and what I believed right for
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 371 
 
 her. But it is quite clear to me, and simple. It isn t 
 a thing of laws and commandments ; only of our own 
 hearts. If we can love again, we may. But for me it 
 would be impossible. With me everything was in 
 volved. I couldn t, ever, be twice a wife." 
 
 Silence fell between them. 
 
 "I ll see about the little girl s grave," said Old- 
 meadow suddenly. He did not know what had 
 made him think of it. Perhaps something that had 
 gone on echoing in him after she had spoken of her 
 maternity. "I ll go to Evian to-morrow. It will 
 spare Josephine the journey and give me something 
 to do. You ll tell me the name and give me the di 
 rections before you go." 
 
 Tears filled her eyes as she looked at him; but 
 they did not fall. They could need no controlling. 
 The springs of weeping must be nearly drained. 
 "Thank you," she said, and she looked away, seem 
 ing to think intently. 
 
 It was now too late for the tramways. They had 
 ceased to crash and rattle by, but a sound of belated 
 singing passed along the quais, melancholy in its in 
 duced and extravagant mirth. 
 
 The horrible sense of human suffering that had 
 beaten in upon him at the hospital, pressed again 
 upon his heart. He saw himself departing next day 
 to find the abandoned grave and he saw himself 
 standing beside her train and measuring along the 
 shining rails the vast distances that were to bear her 
 away for ever. 
 
 "That s the worst," he said. "You re suffering 
 too. I must see you go away and know that you are 
 unhappy. I must think of you as unhappy. With 
 a broken heart."
 
 372 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 Her eyes, after she had thanked him, had been 
 fixed in the intent reverie. She, too, perhaps, had 
 been seeing those tides of misery, the sea of which 
 she had spoken, breaking in tragic waves for ever; 
 so unchanged by all the alleviations that love or 
 mercy could bring ; and it was perhaps with despair 
 that she saw herself as one with it. Her eyes as she 
 turned them on him were full of distance and of 
 depth and, with sickening grief, he felt that a woman 
 with a broken heart could do nothing more for her 
 self or for him. 
 
 But her thought, whatever the voids of darkness 
 it had visited, drew nearer and nearer to his need as 
 she looked at him. Something of her own strong vig 
 ilance was in the look, bringing the seagull to his mind. 
 The seagull caught and battered by the waves, with 
 sodden wings, half dragged down, yet summoning 
 its strength to rise from the submerging sea. 
 
 "But you can be happy with a broken heart," 
 she said. Their hands had fallen apart long since. 
 She stretched out hers now and took his in her small, 
 firm grasp. 
 
 "Can you?" he asked. 
 
 "You mustn t think of me like this," she said, 
 and it was as if she read his thoughts and their 
 imagery. "I went down, I know; like drowning. 
 Sometimes the waves break over you and pull you 
 down, and there seems nothing else in all the world 
 but yourself and what you ve suffered. But it 
 doesn t last. Something brings you up again." 
 
 Something had brought her up again now. His 
 darkness. His misery. It was as if he saw her spread 
 her wings and saw her eyes measuring, for them 
 both, the spaces of sea and sky.
 
 ADRIENNE TONER 373 
 
 He remembered a picture in a book he had loved 
 as a little boy: little Diamond held to the breast of 
 the North Wind as she flies forth in her streaming 
 hair against a sky of stars. So he felt himself lying 
 on her breast and lifted with her. 
 
 " I ve told you how happy I can be. It s all true," 
 she said. "It s all there. The light, the peace, the 
 strength. I shall find them. And so will you." 
 
 "Shall I?" he questioned gently. "Without 
 you?" 
 
 "Yes. Without me. You will find them. But you 
 won t be without me," said Adrienne. 
 
 Already she was finding them. He knew that, for, 
 as she looked at him, he felt an influence passing 
 from her to him like the laying of her hand upon his 
 brow. But it was closer than that. It was to her 
 breast that her eyes held him while, in a long silence, 
 the compulsion of her faith flowed into him. First 
 quietness ; then peace ; then a lifting radiance. 
 
 "Promise me," he heard her say. 
 
 He did not know what it was he must promise, 
 but he seemed to feel it all without knowing and 
 he said: "I promise." 
 
 She rose and stood above him. "You mustn t 
 regret. You mustn t want." 
 
 She laid her hands upon his shoulders as she 
 spoke and looked down at him, so austere, so radi 
 ant. "Anything else would have spoiled it. We 
 were only meant to find each other like this and 
 then to part." 
 
 "I ll be good," said Oldmeadow. It was like 
 saying one s prayers at one s mother s knees and 
 his lips found the child-like formula. 
 
 "We must part," said Adrienne. "I have my
 
 374 ADRIENNE TONER 
 
 life and you have yours and they take different 
 ways. But you won t be without me, I won t be 
 without you. How can we be, when we will never, 
 never forget each other and our love?" 
 
 He looked up at her. He had put out his hands 
 and they grasped her dress as a donor in a votive 
 altarpiece grasps the Madonna s healing garment. 
 It was not, he knew, to keep her. It was rather in 
 an accepting relinquishment that he held her thus 
 for their last communion, receiving through touch 
 and sight and hearing her final benison. 
 
 "I will think of you every day, until I die," she 
 said. "I will pray for you every day. Dear friend 
 dearest friend God bless and keep you." 
 
 She had stooped to him and for a transcending 
 moment he was taken into her strong, life-giving 
 embrace. The climax of his life was come as he felt 
 her arms close round him and her kiss upon his fore 
 head. And as she held him thus he believed all that 
 she had said and all for which she could have found 
 no words. That he should find the light and more 
 and more feel their unity in it: that the thought of 
 her would be strength to him always; as the thought 
 of him and of his love would be strength to her. 
 
 After she had gone, he sat for a long time bathed 
 in the sense of her life, and tasting, for that span of 
 time, her own security of eternal goodness. 
 
 THE END
 
 DATE DUE