a 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 Mtf 1. hM* A 
 MMn 
 0011 MDtlf 4
 
 HATCHWAYS
 
 BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 PROMISE 
 
 LE GENTLEMAN 
 
 HERSELF 
 
 SUCCESSION 
 
 A LADY OF LEISURE 
 
 DUKE JONES 
 
 THE ACCOLADE 
 
 $1.35 net 
 $1.25 net 
 $1.35 net 
 $1.50 net 
 $1.35 net 
 $1.35 net 
 $1.35 net 
 
 FOUR PLAYS FOR CHILDREN 
 
 " The Rose and the Ring " " The 
 Goody Witch " " The Goose Girl " 
 " Boots and the North Wind " . $1.00 net 
 
 BOSTON: SMALL, MAYNARD
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 BY 
 
 ETHEL SIDGWICK 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY 
 PUBLISHERS
 
 Copyright, 1916 
 
 BY SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY 
 
 (INCORPORATED) 
 
 8. J. PAKKHILL & Co., BOSTON, U.S.A.
 
 CONTENTS 
 PART I 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I BY BACHELORS 3 
 
 II SURFACES 21 
 
 III THE FACTS 36 
 
 IV THE DUCHESS DEALS FAITHFULLY .... 53 
 V ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 66 
 
 VI HOLMER IN TRIBUNAL 86 
 
 VII HATCHWAYS AT TEA 101 
 
 VIII BESS 116 
 
 IX MRS. REDGATE TAKES A HIGH LINE . . . .136 
 
 X WICKFORD 160 
 
 XI CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 178 
 
 PART II 
 
 XII LlSE 201 
 
 XIII LlSE WAITS ON THE DUCHESS 2 17 
 
 XIV SEQUEL TO THE FOREGOING 233 
 
 XV CAPTURE OF LISE 246
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XVI INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 277 
 
 XVII M. Du FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP . . . 300 
 
 XVIII THE TALE OF MARK 318 
 
 XIX THE WORST OVER 334 
 
 XX IMPLICATION OF ELEVEN INFANTS . . . 358 
 
 XXI IT 389 
 
 XXII CAPTURE OF THE HERO 409 
 
 XXIII CURTAIN DOWN 430
 
 PART I
 
 BY BACHELORS 
 
 "So, in short, you remain on the ground for the pres- 
 ent, and you choose our ground to remain on, Ga- 
 briel. That is pleasant of you, anyhow." 
 
 "I have not seen your ground," said Gabriel du 
 Frettay, "unless from several thousand metres above 
 it. So I alight, Sir George, and I take a level ob- 
 servation." He settled into his basket-chair, and 
 proceeded to do so. 
 
 "Level," said his host, "I feel sure it will be. 
 You want to look about you, eh"? And what sec- 
 tion of English society do you want to see*?" 
 
 "Every section," said M. du Frettay. "But I 
 like the upper layers best." 
 
 "You do?" He rested slightly on the pronoun. 
 
 "Evidently. When I was young, I preferred the 
 top layer of the chocolate-boxes always. But that 
 did not prevent me, with an open mind, from tasting 
 the rest." 
 
 "You like chocolate?" said his host, stopping in 
 
 3
 
 4 HATCHWAYS 
 
 his promenade to look at his young visitor with keen 
 kindly eyes. 
 
 "Madly," said du Frettay gravely. 
 
 "Excuse me so did your father. Dear me, the 
 time it seems. . . . Very good," he pursued, after 
 an interval. "Then, having not very long to spend 
 in our box of an island, you wish to see " 
 
 M. du Frettay's eyes glowed. "I wish to see a 
 Duke, if you please, and a Bishop, and a Baconian, 
 and a boxing professional. I should like to meet 
 an under-graduate, and what you call a an 
 Orange-man, and one of those who uphold the de- 
 funct Majesty Charles the First. Him I shall em- 
 brace very probably the boxing gentleman I shall 
 avoid it. I must meet women of all sorts : yet that, 
 I understand, in your box I am bound. Women are 
 in evidence, with you. The Bishop's large family 
 of daughters, all on platforms, eclipse the Bishop. 
 The Duchess eclipses the Duke. The bonnet eclipses 
 the Salvation lady, yet she also is to be seen." 
 
 "Distinctly," said Sir George. "But beware of 
 her, she is used to scoffing. . . . Well, Gabriel, you 
 have certainly come prepared. But are you aware 
 you have come to the wrong person*?" 
 
 "Not the least," said Gabriel, who was enjoying 
 by far the most sympathetic hospitality his letters of
 
 BY BACHELORS 5 
 
 introduction had yet unearthed for him in London. 
 He looked round him at the queer little quarters, 
 obviously a flitting home a foothold as the French 
 say with curiosity from which courtesy excluded 
 amusement. He knew his father's old friend had 
 simple tastes: still, he had expected at least a few 
 lion-skins, and a poisoned dagger or two some 
 local colour from the uncharted corners of the earth 
 in which Sir George Trenchard had spent most of 
 his life. There was nothing whatever, unless the 
 proofs on the table, to advertise the abode of a cele- 
 brated man. 
 
 Sir George replied to the expressive glance at once. 
 "I am only in England for short seasons myself," he 
 said, "and the whole time I spend in preparing 'to 
 plunge again. I see the people that need me" (he 
 had been summoned to Court, Gabriel knew, quite 
 recently) "to the exclusion often of my best 
 friends. I pick up such things as I need, tools and 
 weapons and medicines, and a book or two, and well- 
 seasoned young men who have not too great a value 
 for their existence, or whose families want to get rid 
 of them " 
 
 "Show me some of those," said Gabriel. 
 
 "Do I see one?" said Sir George. 
 
 "Ah ! no, I thank you. My family puts an un-
 
 6 HATCHWAYS 
 
 heard-of value on my existence. My mother shud- 
 dered at my venturing so far as London. What she 
 would sa> if I went to Nyassa, or Nyanza, is it*? 
 I dare not ask." 
 
 "Don't you like travelling 1 ?" the other enquired. 
 
 "I am travelling. Miles from home. Must I 
 repeat it*?" 
 
 Sir George, who had not spoken idly, he seldom 
 did, for he liked the look of the young man, and 
 would have been glad to attach one of his name to 
 his little band of experts and adventurers, retreated 
 again quietly. 
 
 "You speak English very well," he said with an- 
 other pleasant look, after an interval. 
 
 "It is my desire," said Gabriel, his brow bending, 
 "I should say my wish, to do so." 
 
 "Why not your desire 1 ?" 
 
 "Desire is a French word. The French words in 
 your vocabulary are only used by shopmen, footmen, 
 and the Gallicised individual." 
 
 "Which you are not*? Ah, dear me, well, you 
 may be right." He considered for a time. "Do 
 you like the country*?" 
 
 "Enormously, in England," said du Frettay. 
 "At home, I enjoy the town." 
 
 "I see, you adapt yourself. The fact is, there is
 
 BY BACHELORS 7 
 
 no town for the moment, in the sense you want. 
 Parliament is not sitting. The Dukes and Bishops 
 would be at home." 
 
 "Do you know a Duke*?" said du Frettay, fixing 
 him for the first time with his very bright blue eyes. 
 They were no sort of English blue, and set in the 
 French manner ; but they were the eyes of his family, 
 and Sir George remembered them at once. 
 
 "I know a Duchess," he said. 
 
 "Ah, bon! Typical, is she*?" 
 
 "Well, she is a useful woman." 
 
 "Interesting?' 
 
 "I can't answer for that. She is an old friend." 
 
 "Pardon." Du Frettay hung fire, watching the 
 serious brown face opposed to him. More and more 
 he liked the man. He would almost have faced 
 Nyanza to know him better, almost, not quite. 
 
 "The boys might suit you," said Sir George, who 
 was still pondering, seeking ways and means to 
 launch his guest amid his multiple businesses. 
 "They are not typical of anything, specially; still, 
 they're nice young fellows. How old are you, Ga- 
 briel 4 ?" He turned. 
 
 "Thirty, Sir George." 
 
 "No, are you really"? Dear, dear, how time goes 
 on. I remember though " He brought up
 
 8 HATCHWAYS 
 
 again in his musing, he was a very absent lion, 
 this. "But we were talking of the Duchess's boys. 
 Wickford is let me see twenty-eight. That 
 would suit fairly. The other's younger. They 
 would all be at Holmer now." He waited, cogi- 
 tating anew, his eyes wandering to his proofs. 
 
 "Don't bother about me, Sir George," young du 
 Frettay put into the pause, in his neat nimble utter- 
 ance. He had knowledge enough to use the title, 
 and he spoke it perfectly, only he scanned it 
 wrong. "Sir-George" observed it, absent as he was. 
 Our language, bad enough to master in its separate 
 details, has a last knock-down blow to offer the for- 
 eigner in the emphasis of locutions, which are worse 
 than words. M. du Frettay, who could probably 
 have scanned without a blink such nice little mouth- 
 fuls as irrefutable and conciliatory, was baffled by 
 the two syllables of Sir George's name. 
 
 "I was not serious," he explained. "Being 
 happy, I seldom am." 
 
 "I think," said Sir George, coming to a decision 
 and a stand, simultaneously, "you had better know 
 Ernestine." 
 
 "Is that the Duchess 4 ?" 
 
 "No, but next door to her. A better way than
 
 BY BACHELORS 9 
 
 mine. The question is Hullo, here's Marchant. 
 Now, this is luck. Marchant, here's a young man 
 who " 
 
 Seizing the new-comer by the arm, he was running 
 ahead reckless of forms, when he was reminded of 
 the habits of civilization by Gabriel's getting up. 
 Perhaps in the wilds of Uganda Sir George occa- 
 sionally forgot about the social forms, or took them 
 for granted; but Gabriel and Mr. Marchant would 
 not allow him. The new arrival, indeed, looked 
 extraordinarily correct, and a little frightened. 
 The fact of a Frenchman accounted, possibly, for 
 the shade of fear. 
 
 "Marchant," said Sir George, "is a Professor, Ga- 
 briel. A Professor of Forestry." 
 
 "Forestry," said Gabriel, looking intelligent. 
 "Enchanted." 
 
 "A professor," said Sir George, "is the top layer 
 of our society, whatever it may be of yours." 
 
 Mr. Marchant appeared a trifle more harassed, at 
 this. He was not an old man, but he had a world- 
 weary aspect, which hampered Gabriel at first. 
 Finding on further acquaintance that it did not the 
 least express his nature, he laid it finally to a pro- 
 longed struggle with the climate of a University 
 town.
 
 10 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "He will be extremely useful to you, oh, yes, 
 you will, Marchant, far more than I. He knows, 
 for instance, an undergraduate." 
 
 "More than one," said Marchant. 
 
 "Several. He knows a Bishop, certainly. I bet 
 he could find you a Baconian, to look at, and an 
 Orange-man, for that matter. We both could. 
 Hey?' 
 
 "Oh, Lord, yes, I suppose so," said Marchant, 
 having reflected. "But what's all this?" 
 
 "He is acquainted with a Duchess," pursued Sir 
 George. "Unluckily the same as mine." 
 
 "The same as most people's," said Marchant. 
 "The dear woman is really so active " 
 
 "Has she been interfering with the Forestry plan- 
 tations? I forgot you were on her ground." 
 
 "It's not her ground," said Mr. Marchant. "I 
 did a private deal with the Duke over that bit of 
 land. The Duke's of age. If her Grace comes 
 poaching " 
 
 "A private deal? With Wickford? My good 
 man, she'll never let you hear the last of it." 
 
 "Why not?" said Marchant, growing excitable. 
 "They want money, or so the Redgates inform me. 
 I want land, decent land, with stuff upon it fit to
 
 BY BACHELORS 11 
 
 grow. If Wickford can't stand up to her at his 
 age it's not my " 
 
 "Gently, gently," said Sir George. "Du Frettay 
 is out of all this. Now I will explain to you about 
 du Frettay, who loves Forestry plantations. They 
 are intensely English things " 
 
 "German," said Mr. Marchant. 
 
 "Oh, good heavens! Well, we will pass it over. 
 Du Frettay is a young man who flies." 
 
 "What?' 
 
 "Yes. He flies too much. He overdid it, and 
 his mother grew anxious. Since then, he has im- 
 proved flying for other people, and being an excit- 
 able and intensive sort of young man, he overdid it 
 again. He has now come to England, really on 
 secret service in the flying interest, ostensibly for a 
 holiday, of an instructive kind. He wants to take 
 notes of our place, and poke about a little, much 
 as I do in East Africa. He may or may not, in my 
 own manner, publish the results. He reserves the 
 right of choosing." (Sir George glanced at the 
 proofs, with resentment.) "He prefers the best 
 society " 
 
 "Unlike you," said Marchant. 
 
 "Most unlike. He is afraid of nobody, unlike 
 me again."
 
 12 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Can he face dinner-parties?" said Marchant. 
 "Mixed ones, George*?" There seemed to be some 
 private bearing, in these remarks. 
 
 "Good heavens, yes, chooses them probably. 
 Nothing daunts him: hostesses in diamonds, red 
 tape, black gaiters, blue ribbons " 
 
 "He had better know Ernestine," said Mr. Mar- 
 chant. 
 
 There was a pause. Trenchard's and du Fret- 
 tay's eyes met. Then, with a suden impulse, nec- 
 essary in this absent lion's haunts, both the guests 
 agreed to sit down. They found two chairs which 
 faced one another. Sir George still stood about the 
 hearthrug, in different corners of it, still, more or 
 less in place. 
 
 "Who is Ernestine*?" asked M. du Frettay. 
 
 "Ernestine," said Mr. Marchant, "is everybody. 
 Have you seen that old play somebody scraped up 
 recently and made the fashion, they call Everyman 4 ? 
 Well, Ernestine is Everywoman. She hardly ex- 
 ists, as a separate individual." 
 
 "Oh, come, come," said the gentler Sir George. 
 "Ernestine exists all right. You ask the boys." 
 
 "But this is excellent," said Gabriel. "All my 
 life it has been my desire wish to know all 
 women. I have not accomplished it. Even all
 
 BY BACHELORS 18 
 
 Frenchwomen, the majority, alas, escape me. Now 
 I shall attain it, in this lady's acquaintance*?" 
 
 "She'll see to you," was the Professor's reply. 
 He seemed curious, a little, about du Frettay, but 
 nothing offensive. Flying, then a new study, 
 was enough to spur curiosity. 
 
 "The question is," said Sir George, "how to get 
 hold of her: how to get hold of anybody. Here I 
 am, fixed." He struck his foot down. 
 
 "You're not, George," said Mr. Marchant. 
 "That's nonsense. A week-end at Holmer would 
 do you all the good in the world. Only you're sure 
 the Duchess would give a party for you if you 
 went. If that's the fact, why not admit it?' He 
 had a kind of angelic reproach fulness. 
 
 "Of course she would," said Sir George, looking 
 conscious. "Not but what I am fond of Gertrude, 
 in a general way. Even in having a party for me, 
 I should be certain she meant well. Only " 
 
 There was another easy interval. The friend- 
 ship of the two had a well-tested ease that spread 
 unaware to the third party. Indeed, it embraced 
 him. Marchant was now considering ways and 
 means in his interest, just like Sir George. It 
 greatly amused Gabriel, at his stage of life and ex- 
 perience, to be so taken in hand; but, passive of
 
 14 HATCHWAYS 
 
 intention, he listened and "laissait faire." That 
 something would come of it, granted these men, he 
 could not doubt, their goodwill was so genuine. 
 
 "I thought the boys might suit du Frettay," said 
 Sir George, now slightly deprecating. "They al- 
 ways seemed to me decent young fellows, and not 
 devoid of brains." 
 
 "The younger's brains of a sort," said Marchant, 
 with a passing professional grimness. 
 
 "Then there's Adelaide," pursued the lion, more 
 hopefully. "She's a fairly typical English girl." 
 
 "There's Lise," said Marchant. "Exquisite, if 
 
 exceptional. . . . Look here " He met M. du 
 
 Frettay's bright eyes, which had been shifting rap- 
 idly at all these names. "Suppose you drop George 
 leave him to his interviews and rubbish, and 
 come down with me for the week-end to Holmer 
 Hatch." 
 
 "Week-end," said M. du Frettay. "I shall be 
 delighted." Indeed, such an inimitably English 
 thing, who could refuse 1 ? "But you must not," he 
 carefully added, "put yourself out for me." 
 
 "I shan't," said the Professor simply. "I'm going 
 down in any case before term opens, to look at my 
 plantations. I've got a sort of a box, down there,
 
 BY BACHELORS 15 
 
 does for me and a pupil, at need. I can put you 
 up all right, granted you can manage with bach- 
 elor quarters " 
 
 M. du Frettay smiled. Happening to possess a 
 finished appearance, no one this side seemed to 
 reckon for the fact that he had ever roughed it in 
 camp. 
 
 "I'll introduce you to the Redgates," said Mar- 
 chant. "That's Ernestine, Mrs. Redgate is Ern- 
 estine's real name. That's all the start you'll want 
 for the Duchess, specially with George at your back. 
 Mention George, and Holmer magnificence will 
 crack at once. I shall have no trouble in getting rid 
 of you, M. du Frettay. I shall shunt you on to 
 Holmer within the week." 
 
 "Holmer is the Duchess*?" asked Gabriel. 
 
 "Holmer is the Duchess, Hatchways is Ernes- 
 tine. Personally," said Marchant, "I should rec- 
 ommend Ernestine's place in preference to the 
 Duchess's " 
 
 "So should I," said a dreamy voice in the back- 
 ground. "Oh, so should I." 
 
 "You see, he agrees with me. Ernestine lets you 
 alone, somehow, doesn't she, George? She looks 
 after you all right, but effaces herself sufficiently,
 
 16 HATCHWAYS 
 
 without prejudice to being there when she's wanted, 
 such as when the bath goes wrong. She hasn't any 
 little dogs and things that bark. She doesn't expect 
 you to talk in the morning " 
 
 "Perhaps," said Gabriel, "she talks herself." 
 
 "No, no, she does not. Talk*? Ernestine? 
 Of course, she says things, when you meet her about 
 the place. In the afternoon, she stops where she is, 
 you know where to find her. No racketing about 
 
 to lectures and stuff " The Professor, urged 
 
 no doubt by University memories, was getting 
 harassed again. On first falling upon the subject 
 of Ernestine, his expression had grown beautifully 
 calm. 
 
 "Even to an Oxford bachelor," joined in Sir 
 George, "fixed in the habits of luxury, and fussy 
 beyond belief, Ernestine, as you see, can do no harm. 
 She is particularly harmless. We love her " 
 
 "What?" said Mr. Marchant. 
 
 "Simply love her, all we selfish bachelors do. 
 We never say so, our hearts only melt within us 
 when, in the middle of all sorts of other things, we 
 are asked by her to come and stay. We drop the 
 other things, which for weeks have been our best 
 excuses. We go to Ernestine, and she meets us, 
 that is, she always meets me "
 
 BY BACHELORS 17 
 
 "Age," said Marchant, very unpleasantly. "She 
 makes no favourites." 
 
 "Does she not?" du Frettay asked. 
 
 "No. Hey?" For the lion had once more 
 ceased parade, his back towards them. 
 
 "Oh, I think she has a favourite," he said. "I 
 think so. I own it's uncommonly hard to 
 tell. . . ." 
 
 "Well," said Marchant, after a pause of regard- 
 ing him. "Anyhow, there you are. Couldn't do 
 better than Hatchways, could he, George?" 
 
 "No," said the lion. "Certainly not. . . . And 
 if, while you are about there, Stephen, you happen 
 to see a chance of suggesting I could come for a day 
 or two, some time when Gertrude is being detained 
 in London " 
 
 "I shall do no such thing!" cried Marchant. 
 "Where are the obligations of old friendship you are 
 always talking about? What's Hatchways to you? 
 If you won't stop with me at the Lodge, Holmer's 
 your business : the Avenue, and the Shrubberies, and 
 the portraits, and that dreary dinner-table in that 
 beastly dark room, and English pretension all mixed 
 up with Irish untidiness " 
 
 "Hush, hush," said Sir George, anxiously. 
 "Stop, Stephen, I won't have this. I can't, you
 
 18 HATQHWAYS 
 
 know. Holmer does make me shudder, if you like, 
 but it's not Gertrude's fault. Nothing in the world 
 could make a house like that attractive. It's not 
 her fault either if the Redgates have an attractive 
 little house half a mile away. Hatchways is easily 
 the prettiest bit of land I know, quite apart from 
 what Redgate has done for it. One's heart leaps 
 up, if one is English, merely stepping inside their 
 gate. Coming from East Africa particularly. 
 Coming from France " 
 
 "It shall leap," said Gabriel, wickedly. 
 
 "It will. It will, listen! There are larch- 
 trees, with branches like knotted string all bunched 
 with little cones. There are squirrels to eat them. 
 There are no glass-houses or view-points or vul- 
 garity " 
 
 "There is a view-point," interrupted Marchant. 
 "I found it last time I was there." 
 
 "Well, so did I, and it wouldn't be the same one. 
 Everyone for themselves, at Hatchways, nothing 
 prescribed, it's England, that. Gabriel thinks he 
 knows better, but then he never stayed there. 
 Perhaps, with all his arts, he never will. . . . Do 
 you know the long growth of primroses in a hazel- 
 wood, all dredged with last year's leaves'? How 
 you reach down inches of coolness to find the buds?
 
 BY BACHELORS 19 
 
 Do you know the chuckle of the nightingale those 
 first incredibly hot May days " 
 
 "Days?" said du Frettay. 
 
 "There you are! You only allow him to per- 
 form at midnight, probably. Do you know how he 
 ventriloquises, the times Iveagh and I have stalked 
 him, you'll like Iveagh, by the way, never any 
 luck! The bird's uncanny, the poets are right, 
 calling him a wandering voice " 
 
 "They didn't, that was the cuckoo," said Gabriel. 
 
 Sir George, dropping rhetoric, turned and faced 
 him, reproachfully grave. "Was it 1 ?" he said. 
 "Well, anyhow, that's Ernestine. That was what 
 we were making for, wasn't it 1 ? Ease and sun and 
 afternoon pleasantness, and any point of view you 
 like to take." He laughed at himself. "Odd it 
 works out like that, but it is so." He glanced at 
 his friend, who nodded. 
 
 "And shyness, like the primrose buds'?" asked 
 Gabriel. "And mystery, like the nightingale?" 
 
 "No, no, I think not." The lion pondered. 
 "She is very simple." 
 
 "All women are mysterious," the Frenchman sug- 
 gested. 
 
 "Ernestine isn't," cut in Marchant, seemingly 
 vexed. "No moonshine about her, don't you go
 
 20 HATCHWAYS 
 
 off with those ideas. Ernestine's English, she's as 
 straight as they make them. She she well, there 
 isn't much to say about her. She's just a nice 
 woman, explains herself, you wait and see her. 
 Not," finished Marchant with the same effort, 
 "that there's much to see." 
 
 "She is not beautiful then?" 
 
 "Good heavens, no! Don't go expecting," said 
 Marchant anxiously, "anything out of the way. 
 That's George's fault, maundering about the gar- 
 den. It's a pretty garden, of course, but there are 
 thousands in England as good " 
 
 "An Every-garden," murmured Sir George in a 
 far corner. 
 
 "But Madame Ernestine is not to be talked of, 
 then 4 ?" persisted du Frettay. "She is not spoken 
 of, though being so desired*?" As both the elder 
 men gazed at one another, as it were disturbed, 
 "You mean it is better to know her," he summed up 
 to relieve them. 
 
 "That's it, the only thing is to know her. Then 
 you're all right. And that," said Mr. Marchant, 
 as though recovering from an annoying diversion, 
 "is where we started from. . . . Now look here, du 
 Frettay. As to trains . . ."
 
 II 
 
 SURFACES 
 
 TRAINS were to the point. Gabriel met Ernestine 
 Redgate first in the train, or rather on the platform; 
 the same being an interesting addition to his notes 
 on London life. The week-end habit, being a 
 Parisian, was new to him : as also was that of living 
 out of town. Parisians live in a town, the more 
 in it the better, the closer, the dearer, the prouder 
 to cling to Paris' heart. The English avoid their 
 London, so pompously advertised, as much as pos- 
 sible. Needing London inevitably, they take trains 
 to and fro. That is to say, they take the train, 
 ordinarily, to good places like Holmer, there is but 
 one, each way, that is right and classical. 
 
 This was the train, needless to say, that Mr. 
 Marchant took. And so did Mrs. Redgate take it, 
 who had come up to shop seriously at the January 
 Sales. And so, it appeared, as names cropped up 
 in the discourse, one by one, did several other mem- 
 bers of their future society. Everybody met every- 
 body upon the platform, which, though not quite so 
 
 21
 
 22 HATCHWAYS 
 
 unsavoury as a French terminus platform, was still 
 a somewhat quaint background for a social gather- 
 ing. Thus, M. du Frettay began early to be 
 amused. 
 
 One of the Duchess's sons was in the train, he 
 learnt, as was also Miss Adelaide Courtier, hereto- 
 fore mentioned as the typical English girl. So, it 
 eventually appeared, and quite independently of his 
 daughter, was Miss Courtier's father, a Justice of 
 the Peace and everything he should be, including a 
 bully of the country-side. So, utterly independent 
 of either of these, was Miss Courtier's mother, who 
 lived (for some unexplained reason) in London, and 
 merely came to the Holmer train to call, so to speak, 
 upon her conveniently-collected friends. They 
 were all (except this last mysterious lady) going 
 home again, after a happy day's gadding for 
 various purposes. That is, the main body had been 
 gadding happily. Mrs. Redgate had been assidu- 
 ously engaged as Providence for others, the Duchess 
 to wit. 
 
 Gabriel guessed who she was from the simple fact 
 of his companion looking pleased at the sight of her. 
 He had observed him look frightened first, of every- 
 body else. Not but what Marchant could talk well, 
 and wittily even, when escape was really cut off.
 
 SURFACES 23 
 
 Only the Heaven of which he dreamed, and prac- 
 tically reached, at Oxford, was to meet nobody 
 at all. 
 
 "How do you do*?" said Ernestine, turning. 
 "Are you coming into residence*? Oh, that's nice." 
 She then smiled on introduction to Gabriel, no 
 more. She was distracted in mind, waiting for 
 various parcels and persons, essential to her day's 
 providences, and nonappearing. She had a pleas- 
 ant ordinary voice, and pretty smile, and she was 
 tall, to French ideas, that was all Gabriel noticed. 
 Her next remark was to ask the time of Professor 
 Marchant. 
 
 "Oh, dear, Bess," she said to herself. "Bad 
 girl, she promised. She will be late." 
 
 Gabriel wondered who Bess was; he felt a pang 
 of conjectural interest. However, too many stars 
 were rising and setting in this active little station 
 reception for him to spare much time for merely 
 conjectural divinities. Holmer society seemed to 
 contain, at least, a remarkable number of pretty 
 girls. They cropped up, one by one, unescorted, 
 swinging parcels and smiling at Ernestine. Some 
 of them spared a glance as well for M. du Frettay, 
 who, needless to say, looked back. First impres- 
 sions, he trusted, were pleasant all round. For him-
 
 24 HATCHWAYS 
 
 self, he was quite contented, seated in his carriage- 
 corner, arms folded, observing the world. 
 
 "I am taking down ten sacks " said Ernestine. 
 
 "Sacks'?" said Marchant. 
 
 "Yes. For the Duchess. Sacks of sand." 
 
 "Sand?" repeated Marchant. "What on earth 
 does she want sand for?" 
 
 "Nothing in your line," said Ernestine. "It's for 
 the school, the infants to play in. It's very kind 
 
 of Gertrude to Oh, Adelaide, dear. Have 
 
 you seen Bess?" 
 
 With the words, a very bright particular star 
 arose for du Frettay, in the person of Miss Courtier, 
 who, escorted by the Duchess's son, at this moment 
 made her appearance. The former, a plain young 
 man, merely nodded and went on down the train. 
 Miss Courtier smiled affably, her eyes at once taking 
 in the stranger, and moved, with a limp, in their 
 direction. 
 
 The Professor was frightened, of course: but 
 Ernestine was there, at the door of his carriage, to 
 protect him. The limp, calling for enquiry and 
 condolence, had first to be explained. They heard 
 all about it, from Adelaide, in loud and lively tones. 
 She had slipped on the ice, turned her ankle, a 
 "beastly bore." A party of them, including "Sam
 
 SURFACES 25 
 
 and Iveagh," had come up to skate, since nature re- 
 fused them that gratification in the country. They 
 had not been at it half an hour when sickening I- 
 spoilt their day. She took it, and her probable 
 pain, du Frettay thought, with exquisite good 
 humour. She was really a lovely girl. She was 
 clothed well, though gaily to his Parisian taste, in 
 crimson and white, and must have looked most ef- 
 fective, skating with the plain young man. For 
 that he had been her partner, du Frettay, at the pres- 
 ent stage, dared not doubt. 
 
 "Oh, that silly sand," said Adelaide, accepting 
 the subject. "Yes, that's the latest, hadn't you 
 heard*? Renie Allgood doesn't want sand for the 
 infants, it's only Lady Wick told her she did. She 
 ought to want it. Now, of course, sand's a neces- 
 sity of life, for everybody. Anyhow, none of our 
 lives will be fit for much, till it's properly dumped. 
 And of course Ernestine has got to dump it. No 
 one else has time." She turned rallying eyes on the 
 Professor's guardian. 
 
 "I hope, Mrs. Redgate," said Marchant, "Her 
 Grace does not intend to turn Holmer into a seaside 
 place. If she adds an esplanade, I should like to 
 be warned in time. As it is, there are too many 
 children about."
 
 26 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Then," said Ernestine, "you shan't come to my 
 children's party." 
 
 "May I?" ventured Gabriel, catching her eye. 
 
 "Oh yes, do," said Adelaide, calmly. "Men are 
 always useful, aren't they, Ernestine?" 
 
 Mrs. Redgate smiled merely. She was cer- 
 tainly not a loquacious lady. The next instant, in 
 obedience to a complicated private sign from a 
 porter, she disappeared. 
 
 Miss Courtier, to the Professor's confusion, did 
 not follow her. He had not reckoned, evidently, 
 on his smart young aviator letting him in for things 
 like this. Adelaide, up to now, had always been 
 kind enough to overlook him. Yet here she was 
 still, lively as ever, and inclined to besiege them 
 with confidence. 
 
 "Iveagh ought to be doing it," she observed of 
 the sand. "But he told Ernestine he wouldn't. 
 Iveagh's got enough to do looking after me." 
 
 "Did he say that*?" asked Marchant. 
 
 "Oh no, but you know Iveagh. His back's up, 
 having to come at all. He's just on the edge of 
 breaking out. Sand into the bargain would have 
 done for him, specially the Duchess's, Ernestine 
 knows. It's a rotten shame," said Adelaide cas- 
 ually, "she should be fagged for it. She's doing the
 
 SURFACES 27 
 
 infant's treat, as it is, which anyone would have 
 thought would be enough. I tell her, the only 
 thing's to stick out and refuse, but she never does. 
 So she gets put upon." Thus moralising, Miss 
 Courtier's independent glance met M. du Frettay's. 
 
 "If I could be of any use to Madame " he sug- 
 gested, stirring. 
 
 "Oh, you couldn't, I don't suppose." 
 
 "Is it necessary the sand should be personally con- 
 ducted 4 ?" Gabriel asked, re-settling at command. 
 
 "Of course," smiled Adelaide. "Goodness, do 
 you think it could get down to Holmer alone 1 ? It's 
 a very special sort, from a Froebel Institute, not just 
 from anywhere underground " 
 
 "Sterilised?" asked Gabriel. 
 
 "Sanitary*?" murmured Marchant. 
 
 "And the Duchess got it in person from a place 
 in the City, so you mustn't laugh. And she's not 
 able to see to it herself, naturally, since Wickford 
 can't ever be trusted to make a speech alone " 
 
 "So Mrs. Redgate must?" 
 
 "Oh, there's no necessity! Lady Wick wouldn't 
 like her to give up better things for it. If Ernestine 
 
 was engaged in more useful work " She 
 
 winked in the Professor's direction. 
 
 "You would have had to do," he suggested.
 
 28 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "I? The Duchess doesn't fag me ... Iveagh 
 might have had to, or a footman might have come 
 up. . . . I'm telling them all about you and Lady 
 Wick and the sandbags, Ernestine." 
 
 The Professor's harassed look melted again, sne 
 was back. 
 
 "I think they'll be all right now," said Mrs. Red- 
 gate, dusting her bare fingers. "And I've wired the 
 cart to come down. After that, really!" 
 
 "Hadn't you better walk up with them*?" scoffed 
 Adelaide. "Hullo!" 
 
 She broke off and turned about, as the late pas- 
 senger, a tall, handsome, fur-coated gentleman, with 
 an amazingly strong colour on him, shouldered his 
 way past, affording her a glance of recognition, 
 it really could not be called more, as he went. 
 
 "Why, there's my respected father," said Ade- 
 laide, much surprised. "What's he playin' at? 
 Oho !" She interrupted herself, turning to the com- 
 pany. "That'll be the limit, for Iveagh! Father 
 here, he needn't have come at all ! What a game, 
 I say. What do you bet he goes back*?" 
 
 "Anything you like," said Mrs. Redgate. 
 
 "He'll be savage, though," said Adelaide, com- 
 placently. "I rather like riling Iveagh, there's 
 always a kind of hope he may go over the edge.
 
 SURFACES 39 
 
 'Sides, Wick advised me not to." She made the 
 little click that one does on a coachman's box, just 
 audible, charming on her tongue. "Well, so long," 
 she added, swinging her gloves. "I'm going up." 
 
 "I hope you'll get a place, dear," said Ernestine. 
 
 "Oh, he'll keep one. Two, I said, to put my foot 
 up. I told him," was Miss Courtier's parting re- 
 mark, with an exquisite smile, "a smoker would do." 
 
 The Professor's and Mrs. Redgate's eyes met, at 
 her departure, but, perhaps because a stranger was 
 present, they made no comment. Du Frettay was 
 able to amuse himself with all kinds of conjectures 
 as to the position of that beautiful girl, in the un- 
 doubtedly elegant household it might shortly be his 
 luck to enter, entirely free from hampering facts. 
 That Mrs. Redgate held all the facts, in the quiet 
 depths of her, he was curiously convinced : since she 
 was a lady who looked at people in that way, and 
 said so little. 
 
 The next moment, even this train of thoughts was 
 arrested in him, for "Bess" appeared. Bess, long- 
 desired, with a large basket, an English country 
 market-basket, spread with a cloth, broke through 
 the bustle behind Mrs. Redgate, and Gabriel's con- 
 jectural interest bloomed into fact. Yet another 
 charming girl, what a country !
 
 30 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Bess, thank goodness!" was Ernestine's com- 
 ment, as the basket changed hands. "It's heavy, 
 goodness ! Dear, I hope you haven't had to rush." 
 She did not seem anxious, though: and certainly 
 Bess's looks left no room for anxiety. 
 
 "Now I've got to fly," said Bess, immediately. 
 "That makes the last, doesn't it, Ernestine*? the 
 rest they swore to send. What about the sacks'? 
 oh, that's all right. I saw Iveagh, he'll do it at 
 the other won't he"? Horrid boy, he might! 
 
 Good-bye, it's been too short, it always is " 
 
 And she kissed Ernestine. 
 
 "Till March fifteen," said Mrs. Redgate, holding 
 her: a date registered, of course, by an attentive 
 young man. "Oh, Bess, fancy! He hadn't got 
 any little trees! None left, and I do hate a bor- 
 rowed one, dropping needles about. Don't you 1 ?" 
 
 "Professor Marchant will give you one," said 
 Bess. "He's a nursery." And she went, buoy- 
 antly as she had arrived, just two minutes pre- 
 viously. 
 
 "What's that*?" fussed Marchant, awaking. 
 "What did she say? A nursery?" 
 
 "A little tree," explained Ernestine, with her nice 
 smile. "Late Christmas, you know. Bess was 
 naughty," she added, to explain.
 
 SURFACES 31 
 
 M. du Frettay gazed in the wake of the naughty 
 Bess with distinct regret. It was perfectly per- 
 ceptible. Why could she not enter the train, like 
 Adelaide? Why, like Adelaide's mother, should 
 she return to town? She looked more adapted to 
 the country, had she allowed him to explain. . . . 
 However, March fifteen. 
 
 On the Holmer platform, which, though limited 
 in size, was a very smart one, brand-new, ash-strewn, 
 and smelling of paint, du Frettay was properly pre- 
 sented to the Duke's brother, younger son of the 
 reigning family, and exchanged a few words with 
 him. 
 
 "You come for the huntin"?" said Iveagh, with 
 an expression of dogged sulks upon his countenance, 
 his eyes shifting watchfully in Adelaide's direction. 
 He was twenty-two at most, and built, for an 
 islander, very lightly. 
 
 "I am come," said du Frettay, in his nimble tone, 
 "for anything I can get. But above all, I believe, 
 to know Mrs. Redgate." 
 
 "Oh." Iveagh's sulky eyes shot to him. "Yes, 
 you'd hardly avoid that," he said evenly, "Mar- 
 chant bein' in her pocket." 
 
 "I do not wish to avoid it," Gabriel explained.
 
 32 HATCHWAYS 
 
 The Duke's brother produced what might be 
 called a smile: it just cancelled his determined ill- 
 temper for a moment. 
 
 "You know Trenchard, don't you*?" he pro- 
 ceeded, clouding again. 
 
 "That is, I have met him. My father knew." 
 
 "Did he? Where?" He struck at the "h" in 
 this word, Gabriel noted, more than any island 
 tongue he had yet come across. 
 
 "In Morocco first, and later in Marseille, and at 
 last in Paris," he answered. 
 
 Iveagh, again slightly abating his dreariness, 
 turned over the list. 
 
 "This is a fool of a place," he said, to du Frettay's 
 surprise. "However take what you can get, in 
 this life." 
 
 "I intend to," said Gabriel. 
 
 "You ride?" was Iveagh's next remark. He was 
 still carefully noting Adelaide's movements in the 
 distance. 
 
 "Anything I can find," said Gabriel. 
 
 "It's only Marchant's nothing, of course. Red- 
 gate's nothing to speak of. You'd better come up 
 in the Dash! all right." 
 
 He was cut off by a hail from Adelaide, who, in 
 the interval, had met her handsome father, and, as
 
 SURFACES 33 
 
 it were, renewed acquaintance, rather unfortunately. 
 She had better not have attempted it. Their scene 
 was loud. Iveagh marched off with an easy step 
 to take his destined part in it, which would not, du 
 Frettay imagined, be a noisy one. He had an un- 
 emphatic intonation, with a curl to it, difficult but 
 not disagreeable to the attentive foreign ear. 
 
 "I say, your sandbag's bleedin'," he called back 
 to Mrs. Redgate, in the act of leaving the station. 
 
 "Oh, Iveagh, get a needle!" she returned, her 
 gentle tone perturbed to passion almost, by this last 
 undeserved calamity. It was too true. Froebel 
 (or whoever it was) had not sewn those sandbags 
 up, according to his usual strict method. Being 
 too roughly hoisted from the trolley to the cart, one 
 of them had broken a seam, and determined at once 
 to lay down all its burdens, then and there, with a 
 sigh in the muddy road. We make no apology for 
 the metaphor. There is nothing, unless Death, to 
 equal for inevitability fine heavy sand, once it be- 
 gins to exude. It poured, it lapsed, it fled away. 
 The sack's hours were numbered. The top of it was 
 already bending languidly, the whole generous bulk 
 seemed to dwindle and faint, when Iveagh and the 
 needle returned together, in the nick of time. A 
 needle, in a brand-new country station, would have
 
 34 HATCHWAYS 
 
 seemed even to Gabriel's ingenuity a difficult thing 
 to find : yet this sulky young man found, offered, and 
 disappeared finally with the mocking and impatient 
 Adelaide. 
 
 Thereupon, the flow of the sack's life was as- 
 suaged, the two gentlemen doing first-aid, while 
 Mrs. Redgate sewed up the wound. Little had 
 been actually lost, Gabriel congratulated her 
 gravely. He was thoroughly amused by now, con- 
 tent to accept anything, take anything as entertain- 
 ment, in this quaint new country world. Her busi- 
 ness-like seriousness over the sacks amused him as 
 much as Adelaide's contempt, the porter's polite per- 
 plexity, and the Professor's intense discomfort in a 
 situation so palpably absurd. 
 
 Gabriel adored absurd situations in life, so long 
 as he was freely allowed to find them so. He 
 adored them whether they included himself or not. 
 And Mrs. Redgate, for all her seriousness over "Ger- 
 trude's" property, allowed him, accepted with com- 
 plete understanding all his jests. He even caught 
 her laughing herself, when the convalescent sack was 
 comfortable, carefully dumped in the cart, and lean- 
 ing its pathetically crooked cap against the rest. 
 
 "I suppose I can trust them to ride alone from 
 here to Holmer," she said to Gabriel. And again
 
 SURFACES 35 
 
 "I don't know why they make me think of pigs." 
 
 "Because their only virtue is to be corpulent," 
 confided Gabriel, "and they are aware of it. When 
 corpulence is threatened, crac! there is pathos. 
 Real pathos, the only, look at him supported by 
 his comrades." They laughed again. "Shake- 
 speare could do that sack," said Gabriel. "Or pos- 
 sibly Lafontaine." 
 
 "A fable, yes." As the Professor mounted first 
 into the dogcart, she added "Do you like things?" 
 
 "I love things" said Gabriel. "If for nothing 
 else, to be ridiculous. That consoles me, who am 
 less so." 
 
 "Oh! Are you quite sure?" 
 
 "Perfectly. Do you read French, Madame?" 
 
 "Yes, and speak it badly. YOU will find most of 
 us the same." 
 
 "Then I shall teach you all," said Gabriel, fol- 
 lowing the Professor into the dogcart. "If I stay 
 long enough." 
 
 The next instant, saluting, they left her in the 
 road.
 
 Ill 
 
 THE FACTS 
 
 ERNESTINE REDGATE, aged thirty-two, was not 
 "gracious" the least, she was sensible. She had a 
 sensible husband, aged forty-five, and they took the 
 fact that they had no child with equanimity. Her 
 London acquaintance was remarkably large: she 
 knew everybody, more or less, and she had the knack 
 of being there when things of note were happening. 
 As for her own "things," nobody ever knew why 
 they went off. There was no particular reason for 
 it, in herself or her surroundings. She had not been 
 a particularly clever girl, she was certainly not in 
 the common sense of the word "ambitious," above 
 all socially. She was not swimmingly "sympa- 
 thetic" to all sorts and kinds. She was not seduc- 
 tive to any kind, one might say. She was every- 
 thing, at the period of which we write, which nobody 
 had predicted of her. She was everything, and she 
 was nothing, in a manner of her own : perhaps there 
 was a grain of mystery in it, like the nightingale. 
 
 36
 
 THE FACTS 37 
 
 Her descent no one had troubled to track, beyond 
 the fact that she was northern, vaguely: possibly of 
 the industrial north. The unpretentious energy of 
 her was northern, her stability, in business and 
 friendship, and that staid serenity of demeanour 
 Sir George called "afternoon." If she and Rick 
 Redgate had ever been in love with one another, 
 nobody found it out. The Duchess of Wickford 
 said there was no billing and cooing in their estab- 
 lishment, and gave it as ground of her approval. 
 Yet the Redgate couple matched, at least. Neither 
 obliterated the other, when they appeared in con- 
 cert : both were in demand. Rick, who wrote arti- 
 cles, regularly, for quite good papers, might be 
 said to be the more popular. He had attractive 
 oddities, and said quaint things. Rick's wife had 
 no oddities, or none at all easy to detect. "Nesta," 
 as he called her, was not a character, a figure still 
 less. Nesta was merely necessary: and Rick, lack- 
 ing her, seemed to grow cumbrous and ill at ease. 
 
 To look at she was tallish and straight, square- 
 shouldered in the middle English style, in figure 
 neither gaunt nor exuberant. She was personable, 
 pleasant, as she should be. She would have looked 
 extremely well in officer's uniform: and it really 
 seemed a pity, once one had the idea, and in view
 
 38 HATCHWAYS 
 
 of the quiet official position she habitually assumed, 
 she could not wear one. As it was, she was far too 
 wise to attempt erratic styles in clothes. She found 
 little things about London that suited her, and at 
 times, with a smile to her intimate friends, exhibited 
 a complete new dress. "Rick likes it," she would 
 say, of one of these efforts, at the season's opening, 
 Rick having volunteered such praise, of course. 
 Laying herself out for notice or flattery was about 
 the last thing Ernestine could be said to do. Con- 
 sequently, men and women liked her equally. 
 
 She had the somewhat unfair advantage, in the 
 eye of the world, of an old acquaintance with the 
 Wickford family. She knew the Duchess Gertrude, 
 as has been hinted, well. She had known Ger- 
 trude's husband, that is, he had been memorably 
 gracious to her, once or twice, as a young married 
 woman. She knew Gertrude's own relations, the 
 Oxboroughs, quite well enough to realise by how 
 many degrees Gertrude was the best of them. She 
 knew the present young representative, and his 
 brother, Lord Iveagh Suir, when they were school- 
 boys at Eton. She knew Adelaide Courtier, whom 
 for years the Duchess had been trying to induce 
 Wickford to marry, fruitlessly. She knew Lise 
 Elphinstone, now in India, with whom Iveagh was
 
 THE FACTS 39 
 
 to his mother's ideas perpetually and idiotically 
 in love. She knew in short the Wickford's set, 
 their intimate set, not their London swirl. She was 
 in the Duchess's confidence, about her stupid sons. 
 
 She was moreover, and this exhibits Ernestine 
 in the sons' confidence also; to what extent, their 
 mother had no idea. 
 
 Wickford came, and sat in her drawing-room, in 
 the morning when she did not want him, and said 
 explosive things about marriage, which no Duke of 
 the realm should say, and just avoided, owing to 
 Mrs. Redgate's proximity, saying explosive things 
 about Adelaide also. That Wickford did not re- 
 gard Ernestine as extremely married, as aggres- 
 sively married, was obvious in his remarks. Nor 
 was it, she was given to understand, that Wickford 
 did not want to be married, nor even that he did 
 not intend to be, in his own good time. It was 
 merely that his mother did not know about it. His 
 mother did not know about the kid, either (Iveagh 
 was the kid). His mother was a good woman, and 
 all that. He wished he was out of it (probably 
 the Peerage). He wished the kid could get to 
 Africa, and forget that girl. He wished he could 
 write his book (something statistical and very dull) 
 in peace. He wished (once or twice and in a very
 
 40 HATCHWAYS 
 
 low tone) his father was alive. A man's father 
 understood, about girls and those things, anyhow. 
 
 Ernestine, who was not a "good woman and all 
 that," presumably, did not at once make a party for 
 the young Duke, her best acquaintance, invite a new 
 and dazzlingly attractive girl to meet him, and so 
 cut out her dear friend by marrying Wick over his 
 mother's head, as she could easily have done. She 
 let him talk, and attended, so far as she could follow 
 his lines of thought. He was extraordinarily bad 
 at expressing himself, and always had been from his 
 school-days. Iveagh also was an amazingly bad 
 hand in conversation, quite inconceivably, ex- 
 cept on the subject of Lise. 
 
 Lise, Iveagh's lily, his saint, was married; but it 
 made, as he did not trouble to explain to Ernestine, 
 though his mother harped on it, no difference. 
 She had captivated his Irish soul the Suirs were 
 Irish in maidenhood, and he swore by her perfec- 
 tions to all time. Nobody sang like Lise, spoke as 
 she did, looked so adorably, stirred so exquisitely, 
 sat, rose, kneeled, breathed, and laughed, just like 
 her. She had curled herself into Iveagh, into the 
 very core of his being, while she played to him, in 
 the candle-light, Irish songs. Three years since, 
 when both were under twenty, but what then?
 
 THE FACTS 41 
 
 And what now 1 ? Need a man forget her, merely 
 because she married Elphinstone, and left the hemi- 
 sphere where Iveagh corporeally dwelt? There 
 was no sense in forgetting, since he loved remember- 
 ing best. He had not shot himself, Wickford had 
 saved him, but he still did not think, in spite of 
 all his brother's "jawing," it would have been 
 wrong. Iveagh was the perfect lover, because he 
 was quite natural. He was as un-self -conscious as 
 Wickford, and as most well-descended Irish people. 
 He was very plain, like Wickford, cannily and com- 
 pactly made, sober and circumspect in the things of 
 life, like Wickford, always excepting Lise. In 
 that department madness, the true, inexpressible, 
 mystical Celtic madness, permanently hung. 
 
 Ernestine admitted that a pair of ordinary-fea- 
 tured, unheroic sons like Wickford and Iveagh were 
 hard on the Duchess. Indeed it was not only as a 
 duchess it was hard on her. Gertrude was, as a 
 woman, monumentally maternal. She was made 
 so, never stopped for a minute. Now, it struck 
 Ernestine, though it is possible and even necessary 
 to some women to be continuously maternal, it is 
 not possible to have a couple of grown-up sons in 
 a state of flat filiality all the time. More especially 
 Irish sons, with extremely natural manners, which
 
 42 HATCHWAYS 
 
 rarely did them justice in women's society, occa- 
 sional hot tempers, and alarmingly soft hearts. The 
 Duchess was striving, especially in Iveagh's case, 
 after an impossibility. Wickford, with all the 
 conscience of an eldest-born, with Iveagh and the 
 estates alike weighing his poor soul down, was a 
 blessing to his mother, and everything he ought to 
 be, now and then. 
 
 It may have been because Ernestine never dealt 
 with them in the maternal vein, any more than in the 
 married one, that the Suir boys, in society, were 
 found so constantly at her side. Nor, of course, 
 was she sisterly, Iveagh would have hated that, 
 she was merely Ernestine and nice to them. 
 
 Consequently we tremble to state it at twenty- 
 two and twenty-eight respectively, the Suir boys 
 liked Mrs. Redgate far better than their own 
 mother, which was a dreadful state of things, but 
 occurs much oftener in the world, at the age of evo- 
 lution and sensibility, than many mothers are aware. 
 Youth is a ticklish thing, the influences that work 
 its changes incalculable. The touch that, at eight- 
 een, would be wasted utterly, will at nineteen send 
 the subject racketing through change after change 
 with the startling effect of a kaleidoscope. In other 
 cases complete abstention from touching is the only
 
 THE FACTS 4S 
 
 hope. To judge how to touch, and whether, is, of 
 course, the parental privilege. But, when, in the 
 next world, pastors, educators, godfathers and 
 friends speak up, the natural authority will certainly 
 be amazed by their possession. Parents (if paren- 
 tal) cannot know, by their posture they are debarred 
 from it. Youth goes seeking in strange fields, tres- 
 passing, trampling and pirating invariably. It will 
 not stay at home. This is no more than its right, 
 in the strict ordering of our nature's "jungle law," 
 and people like Ernestine grasp it. 
 
 Besides, she liked Gertrude's boys. So did Rick 
 like Iveagh, Wickford was apt to bore him. He 
 called him a dreary beggar, and added that the eld- 
 est sons of distinguished people almost invariably 
 were so. He also bothered Nesta, said Rick. He 
 came too often, and he stayed too long. At one 
 time, when he was most anxious about Iveagh, he 
 was constantly hanging about. Wickford' s preoc- 
 cupation about Iveagh seemed to Rick always a lit- 
 tle odd, almost embarrassing. Why not slack off 
 a bit, said Rick, and let the young fellow go his own 
 way, being no fool? 
 
 "There would not be much of Iveagh left, if Wick 
 had done that," said Ernestine, in the non-committal 
 tone she used domestically.
 
 44. HATCHWAYS 
 
 "What, that shooting business*?" Rick frowned. 
 "You know, I always suspect 'em of exaggerating, 
 the Paddies do. A boy like that can't have 
 meant, seriously, to take his life." 
 
 "He was probably nervous," said Ernestine after 
 an interval. "And he only had a bicycle-lantern. 
 He might have missed." 
 
 She still spoke non-committally : but Rick dis- 
 covered that she disagreed with him. Later, 
 though, when he looked at Iveagh, the shooting- 
 business bothered him again. And when he saw the 
 two brothers together, jerking remarks at one an- 
 other in the worst of English, with their backs half- 
 turned, and making no attempt at all to be agree- 
 able to his wife, he found it still harder to believe 
 the dramatic scene by bicycle-lamplight had ever 
 taken place at all. 
 
 Rick's family had lived for generations in and 
 about the little town or big village of Holmer Hatch 
 in Berkshire; indeed they had been known there 
 long before the Wickfords; for it was only on her 
 husband's entrance into office that the Duchess, then 
 young and notable, took to inhabiting Holmer 
 House. The Duchess, whose married mission it had 
 been to rout out and red up things that had been
 
 THE FACTS 45 
 
 misused and overlooked in the dark period of her 
 predecessors, having had a go (we regret to be driven 
 to such terms) at Castle Wickford and the Irish ten- 
 antry, and having been completely baffled and borne 
 down by the soft atmosphere of contented incom- 
 petence that breathes across that beautiful land, 
 turned her attention in despair to the oddments of 
 English property, and thenceforth kept it there. 
 Holmer, she informed her husband, was a sweet 
 place, and had been strangely neglected. The 
 house was ugly and uncomfortable, the park shabby 
 and stodgy, the place was out-of-the-way with few 
 trains to it, and those at most unfashionable hours, 
 still, such simple obstacles are merely inspiring to 
 a vigorous mind. Much, she told the Duke, might 
 be done for Holmer. It might be "made," as a 
 residential district. 
 
 She proceeded to make it, the Duke being too busy 
 to attend to her. She made everything, even a sta- 
 tion and railway time-table eventually: not by 
 means of money, for the Suirs were anything but 
 rich, but by the power of personality. She made 
 the grounds, she made the drive, she made the motor 
 high-road. She even made the Duke and her silly 
 sons, all three sighing for Ireland, live at Holmer. 
 She made the school (for which the sand) and the
 
 46 HATCHWAYS 
 
 schoolmistress (a worthy girl) and she made, inevi- 
 tably, various dissensions and seams in the rural 
 peace ; because alas the Duchess made favourites. 
 She had a benevolent plan, in the first instance, of 
 making Mrs. Redgate, then young and new-married. 
 Only Mrs. Redgate, entering her defences in the 
 first half-year, made friends with her instead. 
 Thereafter the Duchess laid by her fashioning-tools, 
 in the case of Ernestine : borrowed receipts from her, 
 received her in gardening-clothes, told her all her 
 troubles, and took lessons from her, imperceptibly, 
 upon how to entertain. 
 
 The Duke's death, which shook the Duchess's 
 whole well-built being far more than she ever ad- 
 mitted to the world at large, for she draped her- 
 self at his demise superbly, regarding the shattering 
 blow to her private prospects proudly and steadily 
 as a loss to the nation, gave a fresh impulse to this 
 remarkable friendship with a younger woman, a 
 person of no pretension at all. It was a fact that, 
 during the first years of her loneliness, the Duchess 
 sought Ernestine much more than Ernestine the 
 Duchess. It was even rather awkward for her 
 young neighbour at times. Ernestine was indepen- 
 dent, and had no wish at all to be flooded and pur- 
 sued by the whole new department of society
 
 THE FACTS 47 
 
 Gertrude represented, above all by that "Oxborough 
 gang" with whom Gertrude was by birth bound 
 up, and of whom she was a shining light. The Ox- 
 boroughs were ponderous and pugnacious, hoofs 
 and horns, and Ernestine liked her hands free. It 
 was not that she dreaded patronage, being by nature 
 incapable of being patronised: it was simply she dis- 
 liked being hustled and walked upon by a number 
 of people for whom she had no use. It was an in- 
 finite relief to her when, after a prolonged quiet re- 
 sistance on her part, Isabel, the sister-in-law, gave 
 out as her astonishing judgment that she was an 
 artificial little lay-figure, all clothes; and the Ox- 
 boroughs, leaving her to poor Gertrude, whom 
 widowhood had sadly weakened, barged off (to 
 borrow a useful image from their nephews' vocab- 
 ulary) in another direction, snorting and shoulder- 
 ing aside more modest craft. 
 
 The Duchess, thus left alone, shone in her true 
 light, which was not really disagreeable, as the many 
 innocent comments hitherto recorded upon her will 
 bear witness. She was a "useful woman," and 
 would have been a nice one, if she had been content 
 to let others exist usefully, or uselessly, according 
 to their ideas. She was extremely generous on a 
 comparatively small income; only, reckoning the
 
 48 HATCHWAYS 
 
 resources of others with fearful exactitude, she re- 
 quired them to be generous in a just proportion. 
 They must do no more, nor less, than that: else 
 the Duchess really could not think highly of them, 
 nor ask them to tea. 
 
 She was, also, really by no fault of hers, a 
 rude woman: rude, of course, in the name of that 
 ill-treated female, Truth. Further, she was stiff- 
 necked beyond belief, above all when (owing to a 
 slight oversight) fate or her following, her dear son 
 Wickford above all, proved her wrong. Once 
 really launched on an ill-judged course of her own 
 choosing, the Duchess could be stupid: we shall have 
 occasion later to exhibit this. Otherwise she was 
 quite a clear-sighted person: was to be found right 
 in the middle and well to the forefront of all the 
 charitable movements, local, national, or interna- 
 tional, that were justice-seeking and righteous, 
 whether popular or not: and expressed herself in 
 public, especially impromptu, ten times better than 
 Wickford junior could ever have done, in this world 
 or the next. 
 
 Thus much of the grande dame who sat upon the 
 society of Holmer Hatch, at the period when M. du 
 Frettay, cheerful of tongue and spirit, easy in his 
 impudent national bearing of indifference to Duch-
 
 THE FACTS 49 
 
 esses and dairymaids alike, so long as they failed to 
 please his private taste, was ushered in among its 
 ingredients. He rapidly picked up all accessory 
 details about her: indeed, he had some idea he had 
 known all about her in advance. She was much, 
 he gathered, what anyone of intelligence from across 
 the Channel would have guessed. It was only her 
 sons, as belonging to her, who disturbed him a little, 
 faintly deranged his fixed ideas. 
 
 "The boys," as Sir George called Wickford and 
 Iveagh, titled elements of the British Peerage, 
 dropped in at Professor Marchant's forest lodge the 
 first morning ; not at all as if it was the proper thing 
 to do, nor exactly because they wanted to see Pro- 
 fessor Marchant, nor precisely because they were 
 curious about Professor Marchant's French visitor; 
 Gabriel, to his regret, was unable to make out any 
 generalisation from their probably polite proceed- 
 ing as to the habits of English society at large. 
 They just came. Iveagh, having looked at du Fret- 
 tay in the station, brought his brother along to look 
 at him too. They appeared, sat about, chaffed one 
 another, exchanged news, and especially in the 
 person of Iveagh asked questions. They asked 
 questions about Marchant's young forest, and about
 
 50 HATCHWAYS 
 
 the mechanical drawings on which Gabriel was en- 
 gaged. They both said Why"? and What? more 
 times than is customary, in France, at first acquaint- 
 ance; and said it with the h a little prominent, in 
 fact, in front of the rest. They found out a quan- 
 tity of Gabriel's past history, not at all intentionally 
 on his part, and when Iveagh asked casually 
 "Why had he come across*?" he very nearly told 
 him. All but disclosed a secret, a French one : 
 brought himself up with a jerk. . . . They had 
 quite common clothes on, and dirty boots. They 
 were respectful to the Professor, here was some- 
 thing to notice! Undergraduates, in England, are 
 respectful to Professors with a great P. Good! 
 Dukes, in England, are Dukes do Dukes say 
 Well, when Wickford was quite gone, du Frettay 
 remembered with a start that he was one. And 
 what are you to make of a society which introduces 
 its foremost figure to you like that? 
 
 They left again with no courtesies, beyond that 
 of proposing to du Frettay to walk back with them, 
 and "pick up" Mrs. Redgate; a proposal which, 
 owing to his business and the fact that it was raining 
 hard, he refused. 
 
 "Come to lunch," added Iveagh. "Mother isn't 
 there."
 
 THE FACTS 51 
 
 Wickford had the grace to raise his eyebrows at 
 this, otherwise that was literally all the evidence 
 as to the Suir boys' notable mother he gathered from 
 them. 
 
 Du Frettay refused, of course, yet more distinctly. 
 It was barely a decorous proposal, since their lady 
 mother was not at home, and he had not formally 
 made the family's acquaintance. He was older 
 than either of them, and knew perfectly and com- 
 pletely what to do. Only, when they had quite 
 gone, whistling to a dog or two, Gabriel rather re- 
 gretted his decorum. There was that (in Iveagh 
 especially) which destroyed decorum, and con- 
 science too. Marchant, though clever company, 
 was of a certain age, fixed in his habits, and fussy 
 slightly. The Suir boys possessed a fund of youth 
 as indifferent and impudent as Gabriel's own, in 
 Iveagh's case more so. And though Wickford the 
 landowner had on his brow certain lines of enforced 
 sobriety, he was not fussy or finicking, oh no! 
 Outside Mr. Marchant' s front door, he walked back- 
 wards straight into a pool of golden mud collected 
 round the roots of one of the baby trees, and splashed 
 himself from head to foot. Whereupon he roared 
 with laughter, and his very much younger brother 
 said "You ass!"
 
 52 HATCHWAYS 
 
 In short, when the "boys" had vanished, du 
 Frettay missed them. He began to wish he had 
 gone with them and the dogs, and dashed his, dia- 
 grams, even at the risk of splashing himself. He 
 remembered also, a little later, that "Sir-George" 
 in London had said he would like Iveagh. Well, 
 "Sir-George" was a gentleman of parts.
 
 IV 
 THE DUCHESS DEALS FAITHFULLY 
 
 THE Duchess came down next day, by the right 
 train, the other one, having collected opinions 
 upon Wickford's City speech in all the proper quar- 
 ters. Gabriel had forgotten to ask after that 
 speech, in the Duke's own society, but the Duchess 
 soon let him know. 
 
 He came upon her, all unprepared, in Mrs. Red- 
 gate's drawing-room, where he was paying his duty- 
 call, and neatly avoided a pitched battle with her 
 in the first five minutes. His manners were beaa- 
 tiful; still, for the first time, absolutely the first 
 since landing, he felt that subtle stirring of the 
 national fur which occurs to the most careful of us 
 at moments on the foreign soil. Gabriel's French 
 fur, well-brushed, just quivered at the roots, the 
 Duchess's English spines being upright during the 
 entire interview. Yet she fully approved of the 
 young man, she told Ernestine afterwards, being 
 adroitly flattered by him. She quite saw what 
 George meant, George, it seemed, had written to 
 
 63
 
 54 HATCHWAYS 
 
 her. She only wished the boys would take exam- 
 ple by his innumerable activities. He was (the 
 Duchess was inclined to think) a useful member of 
 society in the making, if only he would abandon 
 that air-nonsense, and take to bridges, like dear 
 Mark. 
 
 And here it will be wise to mention that Captain 
 Mark Elphinstone, the same that married Lise, was 
 the Duchess's relative, godson, and model young 
 man. It was by no means his fault, and he was 
 only too happy to marry Lise, and get out of range 
 of the Duchess's patronage, and avoid being thrown 
 continually at the head of the Duchess's sons. 
 Young du Frettay, once or twice that morning, re- 
 minded her of dear Mark, a certain look of intent- 
 ness: the difference being that Mark showed it all 
 the time, and this young fellow from Paris, rarely. 
 
 As for Gabriel, he contradicted her Grace flat 
 once, in his most attractive manner, and refused her 
 information steadily: but generally speaking he 
 thought her "typical" in a truly exquisite degree, 
 and let her alone. It is an immense consolation, 
 faute de mieux, to put your adversary down as 
 "typical." Think of the ready offence of telling 
 the other party he is behaving in a "truly English" 
 manner, or a truly Oxford (or Birmingham) man-
 
 DUCHESS DEALS FAITHFULLY 55 
 
 ner, or yet better "so like the family." The worst 
 case we ever noted of this was that of teacher telling 
 pupil it was a "thoroughly Fanny-ish" thing to do. 
 This last bit of impudent arrogance, on the teacher's 
 part, should be added to the lists of libel, clearly, 
 and brought before the law. 
 
 "Lady Wick," to use the young people's con- 
 venient extension of the Duke's nickname, was a 
 fair woman, rather worn-out, but still effective ow- 
 ing to her secure carriage, confident address, and the 
 uncompromising directness of her regard. She had 
 the insignificant features of the blonde, and fine 
 hands, with a few quite superb rings upon them. 
 She had been, in her youth, regarded as the prettiest 
 and mildest of the Oxboroughs: but middle-age, a 
 coronet, and above all a widow's veil, had changed 
 all that. Still, she had a sweet look occasionally, 
 during a few playful passes with Ernestine for ex- 
 ample, for which du Frettay watched. He saw 
 very well what she had been, and that of course al- 
 ways goes for something. If the Duchess had 
 guessed the attentive young foreigner was excusing 
 her in any degree owing to her past good looks, she 
 would never have spoken to him again. At her 
 present age, she had quite determined, clothes and 
 appearance were nothing, character and intentions
 
 56 HATCHWAYS 
 
 were all. She made this evident in dress and dis- 
 course, with men particularly, she rested unneces- 
 sarily upon it at times; especially since that vague 
 autumnal charm of hers was quite handy, and some- 
 times eluded her strong control. 
 
 Wickford's speech, she informed them, had been 
 pretty fair, better than she expected, considering 
 his great carelessness in co-ordinating his material. 
 She thought Wickford was improving: he stam- 
 mered less, stood better, 
 
 "Grand Dieu!" thought Gabriel: and tried to 
 imagine his mother venturing to speak of him in 
 such a manner in a stranger's hearing. She was, 
 however, he gathered, proud of Wickford, proud 
 of what he represented, and what he ought to be. 
 What Wickford was, Gabriel imagined he knew 
 already a good deal better than the Duchess, though 
 he had not been greatly struck by the elder Suir. 
 He simply took, in that matter, the prerogative of 
 one of Wickford's own generation. To her younger 
 son, she never even alluded, and when Mrs. Red- 
 gate did so once, looked cold. Cold or worried, it 
 was hard to say which. Maternal duty over- 
 clouded her. The remark concerning her family's 
 relative disadvantages, after Gabriel's departure, 
 was the nearest she approached to the subject.
 
 DUCHESS DEALS FAITHFULLY 67 
 
 Finally, as to the expected hospitality, George 
 was George, and of course she invited Gabriel. She 
 invited him immediately, the second thing she said. 
 She might be said to claim him. Owing to a very 
 full time-table, the following month, he had better 
 leave the Marchant place at once, and come to her. 
 
 "I am with Mr. Marchant for this week," said 
 Gabriel blandly. "I have promised him." 
 
 "Oh. . . . You are not on business*?" 
 
 "No, Madame." 
 
 An interval. Well then, he had better fill in the 
 intervening period somehow or other, and come to 
 them in February. It was a pity, because Wickford 
 would be busy then. As for the interval, he had 
 better (she debated how to dispose of him safely) 
 he had better come to Ernestine. 
 
 "Merci infmiment," said Gabriel. He looked at 
 Mrs. Redgate, who simply smiled, that nice smile of 
 hers, with just one hint of girlish mischief in it. 
 They exchanged in that look a complete understand- 
 ing. Ever since it had been Gabriel's fate, that 
 morning, to enter Hatchways ground, he had been 
 longing for nothing so much as an invitation, just 
 as Sir George had said. Still of course this 
 would never do! If it were only for Lady Wick's 
 instruction, Gabriel could not have this.
 
 58 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "A thousand thanks," he said. "I have to be in 
 London, as it occurs, these few next weeks. I have 
 some business to manage for my principals at the 
 Offices." 
 
 "For your Chief?" said the Duchess. "Which 
 offices?" 
 
 "The Admiralty." 
 
 "What business?" said the Duchess. 
 
 Now, it may have been the total lack of a pre- 
 liminary ^, but the Duchess's "which" and "what" 
 were singularly different from her son Iveagh's. 
 Gabriel had no inclination, nor yet the smallest in- 
 tention, of telling her what his business was. He 
 temporised prettily, skirmished about in dialogue, 
 and said smart things. 
 
 The lady of the manor could not understand him. 
 She tried to take hold of sense in what he said, to 
 seize plain facts, but he was unseizable. Yet he 
 seemed to be stating things, plenty of them, and he 
 spoke remarkably good English. It was then that 
 she made up her mind that dear Mark's unvarying 
 intentness was preferable. That solid ground is 
 preferable to volatile air, she added to the convic- 
 tion. She put him down as a young man from 
 Paris, simply, during the whole of that interlude. 
 She was herself betrayed into rudeness, direct in-
 
 DUCHESS DEALS FAITHFULLY 59 
 
 civility, which she had not at first intended. So 
 in short M. du Frettay scored. 
 
 However, she secured something. Gabriel would 
 come to her, by the usual train, on a certain date, and 
 Iveagh should meet him. The Duchess liked to 
 look ahead. If he could by any means dislodge 
 George, could he tell her what George was really 
 doing'? M. du Frettay, portentously serious, dared 
 not say. Would he undertake to uproot George, 
 and bring him down simultaneously for a country 
 rest 1 ? M. du Frettay, with frivolous blue eyes 
 turned to Ernestine, begged to be excused such re- 
 sponsibility. 
 
 "What is he doing?" said the Duchess. "Stupid 
 man ! I believe Ernestine knows." 
 
 "We none of us know," said Ernestine. 
 
 "Isabel does so want to meet him," said the 
 Duchess. Isabel was Lady Oxborough. 
 
 "Poor Isabel," said Ernestine. "I hope she's 
 better, Gertrude. Oh," she added, "there's Rick." 
 
 So, with Rick, the interview concluded. Rick, 
 bulky and beaming, with a clever head, relieved 
 guard, taking the Duchess on in capable style. 
 Mrs. Redgate and M. du Frettay, leaving them to 
 hammer at parochial affairs, took a turn about the 
 Hatchways grounds.
 
 60 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Ouff!" said Gabriel, when he was outside the 
 drawing-room windows, which constituted the way 
 into the garden. He had a fair excuse for saying 
 "ouff !" for the faint spring air creeping out of the 
 hazel copses was delicious. But only a fair excuse, 
 since he had just left the Duchess in the drawing- 
 room. 
 
 "Those are my five larch-trees," said Ernestine. 
 "And Professor Marchant says I must cut the 
 crooked one down!" 
 
 But there was a little, little dimple in the cheek 
 nearer du Frettay as she said it. Was that the 
 answer to his "oufl" concerning her dear friend? 
 
 Hatchways was lovely lovely lovely. No 
 words even of Gabriel's own tongue could be good 
 enough. French words sprang up in him, delicate 
 epithets, suggestive turns, in prose or verse. All 
 the epithets were pretty ones, and described what he 
 saw precisely: yet they did not serve. He saw at 
 once what every intelligent invader is willing to 
 admit, the individual genius of the land invaded. 
 And Ernestine at his side, without saying anything 
 to remember, or seeming the least remarkable, cen- 
 tralised and perfected these wandering influences. 
 Everything, he was somehow sure, that England
 
 DUCHESS DEALS FAITHFULLY 61 
 
 has both of strange and sweet, was represented in 
 her. 
 
 "But what a Heaven!" he said, in vigorous 
 fashion, stopping short at the entrance to the wood- 
 land path. 
 
 "People like it," she said. "People who come 
 down." 
 
 Yes, that was her spirit, not proprietary so much 
 as intendant, for others. For anyone, wherever 
 the English exclusiveness was, it was not here. 
 Hatchways was inclusive, its arms were wide. Du 
 Frettay noted his hostess's own beautiful arms in 
 her simple dress, it was the only personal beauty 
 of hers that reached him, that day, since he thus 
 figuratively expected it. They were strong for pro- 
 tection, not for mastery. There was no hint about 
 her of aggressiveness, of any of the kinds, class ag- 
 gressiveness, sexual, or national. She appeared con- 
 tent, but not an enclosed contentment. Even the in- 
 nocence he was given to expect of an Englishwoman 
 was not "cloistered," as her Puritan poet said. It 
 was large, and expanding. All her presence pro- 
 claimed a tranquil growth, like a forest tree. 
 
 All the same she was a little shy, or retiring: and 
 so was Hatchways. One felt abnormally settled 
 there, surrounded. How it was, or whither to be
 
 62 HATCHWAYS 
 
 sought, whether in the sleepy time of year, the 
 heavy earth, the dripping trees, all plants tucked 
 away in winter quarters and clothing, so that one 
 longed to snuggle like them into the moss, whether 
 in that not far-distant, never far-distant sea, sigh- 
 ing and sucking at the coastline, the stranger could 
 not say. Du Frettay had seen the wrinkled back 
 of that sea-serpent from far above ; he had noted the 
 silver ribbon of the Manche, with its foamy frill, 
 and speculated on the difference it might make, the 
 difference it was said to make, in national and im- 
 perial propensities. Now he felt the difference, 
 that was all : it crept into his consciousness. Selfish 
 content with themselves of course they were! 
 So were the angels, secure in Paradise. No wonder 
 other invaders, Normans and Romans in the past, 
 having got so far, reached Hatchways, seen Mrs. 
 Redgate, troubled to go no further. Why, for his 
 own part . . . 
 
 "Can I really come here 1 ?" said Gabriel suddenly. 
 He would not have thought of so inviting himself 
 anywhere, in France. 
 
 "I think," said Ernestine, quite easily, "you had 
 better go to Gertrude first. She expects it." 
 
 "Get it over*?" Pause. "Are there many," he
 
 DUCHESS DEALS FAITHFULLY 63 
 
 pursued, having reached the wood, "already taking 
 treatment*?" She glanced round at him. "On 
 your premises." 
 
 "Visitors? No, not this week. Rick and I are 
 alone." 
 
 "Are you not dull, alone*?" he asked slyly. 
 
 Ernestine shook her head. "I could wish," she 
 laughed, "we were duller. Christmas, you know. 
 We're not clear of a parish Christmas yet. And 
 Gertrude has been away so much " 
 
 "And you do her duties." 
 
 "Some of them, she lets me. I have her chil- 
 dren to-morrow." She added "You know about 
 that." 
 
 "Yes, I am coming to that. Miss Courtier asked 
 me." 
 
 "Do, because Rick can't. Rick's so rushed at 
 the beginning of the year. If you have nothing to 
 do," she added. 
 
 "Nothing more useful*?" said Gabriel with a 
 reminiscence. 
 
 "Nothing nicer," said Ernestine. 
 
 "I have nothing nicer to prevent my coming to 
 Hatchways, no. . . . Madame, listen. I am 
 supposed, while here in England, to be resting."
 
 64 HATCHWAYS 
 
 He had her full glance at once. "Have you been 
 ill?" 
 
 "Not precisely. I was run-down." He plumed 
 himself on this expression. "I think I was very run- 
 down, unhappy, enough to need a cure. When 
 I have been running anew over London, to the 
 Offices, all these weeks, my condition ouff !" 
 
 "You must go to Gertrude first." She smiled at 
 his expression, as of a rueful child. "Will you help 
 me in a plot, Monsieur*?" she asked. "I want Sir 
 George. I don't want him to go to Holmer. I 
 think he is really tired of London, he hates it, 
 he told me : and he likes coming. Once I had him, 
 and he said it did him good." 
 
 "He is consumed," said du Frettay fervently, 
 "with a passionate longing, pining for Hatchways 
 whenever he thinks of it. But so shall I be by then 
 undoubtedly. Madame, can I not come 1 ?" 
 
 "Really!" said Ernestine, and said no more for a 
 time. They were walking in the wood, and since 
 the visitor chose the way, walking was difficult. 
 "You can't mean you are afraid of Gertrude," she 
 presently observed, looking at his fine young figure 
 thoughtfully. 
 
 "No, no, I am not shy." 
 
 "I didn't suspect you of being shy."
 
 DUCHESS DEALS FAITHFULLY 65 
 
 "No? Had it not struck you? But it is grow- 
 ing on me," said Gabriel. "It is in the air, in the 
 blueness. I shall be as shy as Sir-George soon, and 
 long like him to conceal myself with your as- 
 sistance." 
 
 "I don't believe it," said Ernestine. "No French- 
 man does." 
 
 "Not want to hide? Why not?" 
 
 "Because you are all made to show yourselves." 
 
 "Tiens!" said Gabriel. He had suspected it: 
 still, it pleased him to hear it on a woman's tongue, 
 as it pleased him this woman should say it. She 
 realised exteriors, anyhow, not all of a saint, only 
 part. Only the pleasant part. 
 
 He got out of the wood on the wrong side, with 
 considerable stooping, holding back the hazel 
 branches for Ernestine to do the like. Then he 
 crossed a bit of marsh, where both had to step cau- 
 tiously: then by a plank across a charming runnel 
 over grasses called a ditch: and so through an un- 
 mended gap into a lane by a larch-wood. 
 
 "Now, where are we?" he demanded, pleased 
 with his prowess. 
 
 "On the Duchess's property," said Ernestine. 
 
 "Zut!" said M. du Frettay.
 
 V 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 
 
 AFTER that Gabriel plunged. He went head first 
 into that mixed Holmer society, as the Suir boys 
 seemed to require him to do. He made no distinc- 
 tions, since they did not. He called, in Iveagh's 
 company, on several people the following day, in- 
 cluding the schoolmistress (for the Duchess) and 
 the gamekeeper (for Wickford) and the grocer (to 
 buy chocolate, which was inferior) and the Rev. 
 Canon Lionel Oxborough, four villages away (the 
 same being the next best to a Bishop Iveagh could 
 do for him, after thought). 
 
 The day after that, failing Iveagh engaged, he 
 began to call alone, of necessity. He wanted to ob- 
 serve manners, and at Marchant's Lodge he saw 
 nobody except its master, and at times the ubiquitous 
 "boys." Most people he found at their own houses, 
 and everybody at Mrs. Redgate's, which was 
 treated by the young people, he discovered, as a 
 kind of club. Only the Courtier household he failed 
 with, since Adelaide's mysteriously absent mother 
 made overtures at the family mansion a little dif- 
 
 66
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 67 
 
 ficult. Gabriel gathered there had been no open 
 breach, only Mrs. Courtier found prolonged breath- 
 ing-places in London desirable for her health: the 
 while Adelaide, with a certain truculent valour he 
 learned to admire, managed her handsome father, 
 and lived down public opinion, in the intervals. 
 Before anyone could really gossip dangerously, Mrs. 
 Courtier came back (by the usual train) and smiled 
 for a period upon the domestic hearth. 
 
 Gabriel collected this, the genuine scandal of the 
 country-side, not from Ernestine, nor from Iveagh, 
 who did not willingly mention Adelaide, but 
 from Iveagh's mother when he went to tea. The 
 Duchess did not figure badly as a gossip, once one 
 learnt to manage her on her own lines. She liked 
 Gabriel to tea, he continued to make her think of 
 Mark at intervals, nor could she deny him certain 
 attractions of his own. She had to admit all kinds 
 of things about him finally, as well as good manners 
 and good looks, which by the Duchess's philosophy 
 mattered least. It is probable though, in the case 
 of Gabriel as of the original Mark, they went for 
 something. M. du Frettay was a handsome young 
 man, dare-devil and debonair in appearance, and in 
 mere personal effectiveness he beat most of the local 
 squires at Holmer hollow, including Rick and the
 
 68 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Duke. He "knew how to behave," certainly more 
 pleasantly than the Duchess's Oxborough brothers, 
 and a good deal more prettily than her Suir sons. 
 Indeed, having mastered behaviour in all its 
 branches by the age of seventeen, forgotten his man- 
 ners deliberately in camp and at the schools, picked 
 them up again and brought them, during a short in- 
 tensified experience of the social world, to a high 
 pitch of perfection, Gabriel was a little puzzled 
 by the Suir boys' lack of any manners at all. Com- 
 bined with their friendliness, which attracted him, 
 their bluntness, especially to women, often gave him 
 shocks. 
 
 Gabriel regarded the Suir boys, of course, as Eng- 
 lish ; he lumped them together, a still worse mistake 
 to those who really knew Wickford and Iveagh, and 
 proceeded to generalise from them, steadily, about 
 England at large. 
 
 They reminded him of the fact that the English 
 fail everywhere, not in material, but in technique. 
 Their material, in character as in food-stuffs, is very 
 fine. One has, however, but to dwell (and dine) 
 for a short period among them, to realise the French 
 genius for manipulation, for presentment, even of 
 an inferior thing. The English attitude "not worth 
 it" to an inferior thing, is hardly known in France.
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 69 
 
 Technique can always make it worth. This, ap- 
 plied to cookery, is a commonplace: but it goes 
 deeper, to character. At the worst you learn young, 
 across the Channel, how to present yourself, at the 
 very worst. At the best, such as Gabriel 
 
 Look at Iveagh. It was ages, that is two months, 
 before owing to a remark of Mrs. Redgate's, Gabriel 
 learnt the essential, almost staggering fact about him 
 that he was desperately in love with a married 
 woman, a fact which would simply have saved 
 him, once for all, in du Frettay's eyes. . . . Look 
 at Wickford. It was not till Gabriel had stopped 
 knowing Wickford altogether, and gone back to 
 France, that he solved the problem of his constant 
 preoccupation, and absences from Holmer headquar- 
 ters, by the facts that he was sorting material and 
 practising oratory (at which he could not possibly 
 shine), not in the interests of that Hereditary House 
 of his, whose privileges, at the time, were gravely 
 threatened: but in those of the docile, or Unionist 
 (questionably absurd) element in his native island. 
 That he was, in short, the very Orange-man, to whom 
 Sir George had once slyly alluded. And Gabriel 
 had been near him, at his elbow for weeks! Such 
 opportunities of sympathy and confidence, of self- 
 improvement, of satire, completely missed!
 
 70 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Well then there was the little matter of the 
 Duke's marriage with Miss Courtier. Gabriel, 
 thanks to the Duchess, was extremely well up in the 
 details of this nice arrangement, carefully planned 
 to suit all parties, well discussed by Wickford's 
 mother, with Miss Courtier's, whenever that lady 
 happened to be about. The Duchess had a strong 
 partisanship, closely resembling partiality, for Mrs. 
 Courtier, whose domestic troubles had her full sym- 
 pathy. She was a charming woman (Gabriel 
 learnt), much set upon by Fortune. She acted 
 cleverly too, her spirit in so constantly going to Lon- 
 don being only equalled by her saintly good sense 
 in coming back. Her lineage also was what it 
 should be, and her fortune large. All of it was set- 
 tled on her only child, whose father also intended to 
 dower her handsomely, dear Adelaide having, with 
 quite irreproachable motives, kept in with each side. 
 
 M. du Frettay's trained intelligence followed all 
 this perfectly. It was a situation to be treated with 
 tact, evidently, but his course was clear. Having 
 said all the right things to Wickford's mother, and 
 noted her gratification, having observed at every 
 turn the easy, almost daughterly bond that united 
 Miss Adelaide to Holmer House, he proceeded, 
 with all courtesy and caution, to congratulate her
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 71 
 
 and the Duke. . . . With what result^ Wick- 
 ford, with a little twitch of mouth that was habitual 
 with him, left an interval, and changed the subject. 
 Miss Courtier, at the pointed praises of Wickford 
 that were handed her, and accompanying hint at her 
 happy fortune as his noble bride, enquired with a 
 laugh "where on earth he had picked that up*?" 
 
 "From the Duchess," said du Frettay. "Perhaps 
 I intrude*?" he added cheerfully: and finished, with 
 an expression he had been recently cultivating 
 "My mistake." 
 
 "A bit off it, for once," chaffed Adelaide, who 
 had, however, changed colour a little. "Wick and 
 I are old friends, M. du Frettay. He told me his 
 scrapes at school. Not that he had many, he was 
 such a good little boy. Iveagh was a sight more 
 interesting." 
 
 "Ah." Gabriel took it in. "But surely," he 
 hinted, "if the alliance were presented, a chose faite, 
 you could not set yourself against*?" 
 
 Adelaide blushed again. "Really, you have 
 ideas! It can't be settled, unless I settle it. The 
 chose would be faite by me, Mother and the 
 Duchess might wish themselves blue in the face. I 
 should decide as I thought right in the matter, with- 
 out their putting their oar in."
 
 72 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Oar," said Gabriel, noting the sporting idiom. 
 But he noted absently, for he was perplexed. The 
 Duchess, he could not but feel, was right, and more 
 than right. A handsome, healthy girl : brilliant, he 
 presumed, he could not follow all her expressions, 
 but her way of talking had the effect of wit: "born," 
 of course, her mother strung the "honourable" be- 
 fore her name : a trifle boisterous, but that would be, 
 for Wickford's eminently English taste, an added 
 attraction. Certain squireens of the neighbourhood 
 called Miss Adelaide to him a "flyer." M. du Fret- 
 tay, as a flyer himself, felt a professional sympathy. 
 He pressed at once for a definition of the term, which 
 he assumed was complimentary. 
 
 Only of course the last thing the squireens could 
 do was to define: they sniggered merely. Gabriel 
 picked out a fairly intelligent specimen, Sam Cov- 
 erack, and with great and careless art, brought up 
 the subject. 
 
 "Addy's everything her own way nowadays," said 
 Mr. Coverack. "Since Lise dropped out, I mean. 
 Lise Fitzmaurice, she married, y'know." 
 
 "Aha," said Gabriel, who had heard of Lise. 
 
 "Lise dished Addy's little game every time," said 
 Mr. Coverack. "Did it o' purpose, for the lark. 
 You ask Mrs. Redgate."
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 73 
 
 "Dished," murmured Gabriel. 
 
 "I'd back Addy now to bring down the Duke," 
 said Sam, "in spite of the Duchess." 
 
 This was delightfully straightf 9rward : though 
 "bringing down," in such a case well, sporting 
 again. 
 
 "But the Duchess upholds the union," suggested 
 Gabriel. "She backs it, as you say." 
 
 "That's what I mean," grinned Sam. 
 
 "And the young lady, I think, is not adverse," 
 said Gabriel, regarding him intently. 
 
 "That's your idea, is it?" said Sam. 
 
 "I see." Gabriel smiled. "You mean, if her 
 Ladyship had the perspicacity to oppose, she would 
 attain her objects the more rapidly." 
 
 "I dare say," said Sam, amazed at this language, 
 "that is what I meant." 
 
 "Yes, yes, indeed, our side also I have heard 
 examples " Gabriel saw an objection. "But 
 your Lord Wickford is not like that. He has not 
 the spirit. No, nor the other, either. I cannot 
 imagine to that family the spirit for revolt, for 
 initiative, for passion above all." 
 
 "Spirit 1 ?" said Sam. He stared. "Iveagh, are 
 you alluding to*?" 
 
 No more was said, at least in the personal vein.
 
 74 HATCHWAYS 
 
 The squireen being stupid, and of course, friends 
 with those Suirs, Gabriel smoothed it over. He dis- 
 covered rapidly how impossible it was to criticise 
 either of the brothers, in the native or rustic com- 
 munity. Nor was it tuft-hunting (see Thackeray's 
 work) the least, it was simply because everybody 
 liked them. Gabriel himself, if you came to that 
 still, of course, one must investigate. 
 
 The conversation turned on hunting, Sam saying 
 really, it was time du Frettay got an idea how 
 things shaped in the hunting field. If he would 
 take Sam's advice. . . . Gabriel, knowing Mr. 
 Coverack to be a past expert in the national sport, 
 and being intent on doing all things to a turn as 
 they were done at Holmer, took it willingly. 
 
 Thus he next saw his little world on horseback, 
 and certainly, his ideas shifted a little. Adelaide, 
 it was true, was handsomer than ever, adequately 
 mounted in her elegantly simple garb of cloth. 
 But, oddly enough, though she was the only woman 
 out that day, in an excellent humour, and more than 
 willing to be gracious, Gabriel could not keep his 
 thoughts upon her. He was a judge of riding, if 
 of nothing else in the day's amusement, and the Suir 
 brothers, not to say the horses they bestrode, claimed 
 his strict attention.
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 75 
 
 But what disturbed his ideas yet more was that 
 Iveagh detached himself. He would not be lumped 
 with Wickford any longer, though he opened the day 
 quietly at his brother's side. A hitherto undreamed- 
 of inspiration radiated from Iveagh, and his won- 
 derful little mare, which had been Lise's, seized 
 the hearts of the hunt, and carried them with him 
 when the moment came. It was not only that he 
 rode superbly Wickford did that too. Both had 
 been born to the saddle, born in the saddle, one 
 might almost say: for Iveagh had been riding some- 
 thing or other in Galway at three years old. They 
 both had the slight compact nervous make of the 
 inevitable centaur, the steady eye, strong thigh 
 and light hand, but Iveagh had more. He had, 
 to mention nothing else, the intense, almighty seri- 
 ousness of his race, when engaged in this particular 
 sport, or art. The whole of his ideas, hopes, faiths, 
 including the Lise department of him, which the 
 little mare contributed, were strung up, concen- 
 trated, consecrated to one absorption alone. That 
 the absorption was a little yellow fox might have 
 seemed to du Frettay ridiculous, had not his ideas, 
 hopes, intentions and intelligence been concentrated 
 on doing like the English, looking, and if possible 
 thinking like them.
 
 76 HATCHWAYS 
 
 For it will barely be credited that, with Lise's 
 Emer to show the way, and Whiskylegs (well- 
 christened) to carry him, and Wickford's Playboy, 
 third of the line and name, cantering sweetly at his 
 side, M. du Frettay still thought the star he was 
 following was an English one, simply because it was 
 not French ! 
 
 It is true, he noted few peculiarities new to him 
 in Iveagh Suir. His accent changed a little, as did 
 Wickford's: both became a trifle harder to under- 
 stand. The individual music of their tongues 
 (which du Frettay had hitherto put down as Ox- 
 ford, or aristocratic) stood out, minute by minute, 
 in greater contrast with the throaty grunts of the 
 squireens. Since both were slangy at the best of 
 times, this meant that across country the Suir boys 
 became cryptic completely. It was hard on an en- 
 quiring Frenchman, who ached to pick up hunting 
 terms. . . . Also, the English huntsman being red 
 in the face, as everybody knows, Gabriel noticed 
 that in great heat and excitement, Iveagh turned 
 pale. He was really intensely pallid at one point, 
 when the dogs were baffled, snuffing round a horribly 
 unsavoury ditch: sitting Lise's Emer tense and rigid, 
 one hand on a quite impossible gate, most of the
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 77 
 
 other riders, apparently, attending to him. His 
 small grey eyes were darkened too, and languid: he 
 seemed sleepy a trifle, or bored, scanning his horse's 
 neck and ears. Not long after, with a perfectly 
 unintelligible remark to his brother, he circled about, 
 took the impossible gate and the unsavoury ditch in 
 one, to Gabriel's genuine terror, and trotted off 
 peacefully down a little lane. 
 
 Gabriel, open-mouthed, turned to the Duke for 
 explanation. 
 
 "The mare's had enough," said the Duke; and 
 added lower, as for his own consolation "The boy 
 he is!" 
 
 He said it gravely, but with the little twitch of 
 mouth that seemed to imply humour. Du Frettay, 
 retreating to Adelaide, turned over these things. 
 
 The "dogs" found soon after, so he had not im- 
 mediate leisure to compare impressions with Miss 
 Courtier, as he was quite longing to do, for she was 
 bound to be behind-scenes as to the Suir boys' 
 peculiarities, and their family affairs. The Duchess 
 gossiped with her, and Wickford, if nothing else, 
 was a close companion, Gabriel was growing heed- 
 ful, by now, with the term "friend." Also, she was 
 always kind to himself, interested in his difficulties,
 
 78 HATCHWAYS 
 
 and ready to patronise and instruct. Gabriel, 
 whose nature stood no patronage from man, sub- 
 mitted to it from woman willingly. Indeed, he 
 often acted more innocence than he possessed, in 
 order that the pretty girls of the district should tell 
 him things. His direct bright-eyed glance had the 
 effect of innocence; and all the young ladies of his 
 society, vigorously discussing him, had put him 
 down as younger than the Duke. 
 
 To his surprise, when Miss Courtier came to 
 realise the state of things with Iveagh, she changed 
 colour with vexation, reining back her horse. 
 
 "I never heard such nonsense!" she ejaculated, in 
 Wickford's direction. "A run like this. . . . But 
 that's Iveagh all over," she added, rather viciously. 
 "Why you let him Emer was all right." 
 
 "I can't prevent him, if he chooses," said Wick- 
 ford. 
 
 "An Englishman," observed du Frettay, "cares 
 for his horse as his mistress, I have heard that." 
 
 Adelaide giggled, and Wickford very slightly 
 frowned. Soon after he rode forward, abandoning 
 Adelaide to Gabriel. 
 
 "I never knew such things as you say," said Ade- 
 laide, turning an open smile to him, when they were 
 alone.
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 79 
 
 "What did I say?" said Gabriel. 
 
 "Oh, never mind. I should be careful with 
 Wick, though, when the kid's in question. That's 
 a tip, and I make you a present of it." 
 
 "Thank you," said Gabriel, "but I had observed." 
 He proceeded, with Adelaide in this unbending 
 mood, to other enquiry, airing such little points of 
 interest as had come up during the day. As to the 
 question of the hunting-complexion, Miss Courtier 
 was amused. 
 
 "Pity my respected father's not out," she said. 
 "He's got a shade might suit you." Gabriel was 
 rather shocked by this. It is hardly filial in a fair 
 girl, of exquisite natural colouring, to taunt her 
 father with his deficiencies. He shifted the subject 
 to Iveagh's huntsmanship. 
 
 "Ride?" said Adelaide. "Like a jockey, doesn't 
 he? It's hardly respectable. I told Lady Wick, 
 at the worst, they'd take Iveagh in a training-stable, 
 he goes light enough. Put the Duchess's back up, 
 rather. I don't see why he shouldn't make his liv- 
 ing that way as well as another, if he's got to." 
 
 "Ah," said Gabriel. "But has he got to make a 
 living?" 
 
 "Oh, rather! A younger son, you know. It's 
 not all skittles to be even a Duke, in these days,"
 
 80 HATCHWAYS 
 
 said Miss Courtier easily. "Wick's pretty bothered 
 about things at times." 
 
 "Aha," said Gabriel, his little sound of appre- 
 hending. He pondered of Dukes, death-duties, and 
 the democratic reaction. He made a mental note 
 on another page, as it were, and proceeded. 
 
 "Then what," he enquired, "is Lord Iveagh to 
 do?" 
 
 "Stinks," said Miss Courtier. 
 
 "Plait-il?" Gabriel was caught off his guard. 
 
 "That's what the boys say. You're learning 
 something this morning, aren't you? Science, and 
 physics, and all that. He was rather smart, at Eton. 
 At Oxford he played the fool, came a cropper, 
 you know that, don't you?" 
 
 Gabriel knew, he had heard as much from Mar- 
 chant already; only he was not, somehow, inclined 
 to seek an explanation from Adelaide. Her con- 
 stant innuendoes in Iveagh's direction perplexed 
 him, some clue or connection was lacking, to his 
 logical mind. All the time he chaffed with her 
 easily, he was searching about for it. 
 
 "He used to be keen on collecting," pursued Ade- 
 laide. "Botany and so on's his style, he calls it 
 something different, but it doesn't matter. What-
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 81 
 
 ever you say you're never right with scientific peo- 
 ple, are you? Both of them are nuts on natural 
 history " Gabriel was taxed, really, to keejp up 
 with her images. "Iveagh'll travel, probably." 
 
 "To be sure." Gabriel grasped this, remember- 
 ing what Sir George had said anent young men 
 whose families required to get rid of them. But 
 why should Iveagh's family so require? young as 
 he was, and useful, certainly. He was used by 
 everybody, Gabriel had observed, like a servant 
 almost, and, though odd in his ways, was far from 
 incompetent. There was room for a boy admittedly 
 "smart," on the large and hampered home estate, 
 either as secretary or overseer, one would have 
 thought. But this was England! 
 
 "Does his mother wish him to travel?" he asked 
 soon. 
 
 "Oh, Lord, anything to get rid of him, I should 
 say." Gabriel's brow knitted. "Lady Wick," 
 pushed on Adelaide, "has had enough of Iveagh, be- 
 tween you and me. I quite agree, it's time he 
 cleared off, hanging about like this. . . . Wick's 
 not so sure." 
 
 "Not so sure he should go? Why not?" 
 
 "Oh, fussy. He says it's a beastly climate,
 
 82 HATCHWAYS 
 
 wherever it is they want him to go. I never remem- 
 ber names. Wick's a donkey, really, he's so 
 nervous." 
 
 "But why not, for his brother*?" reasoned du 
 Frettay. "A man would be." 
 
 Adelaide thought differently, but she said nothing. 
 She was looking sulky, which really implied she was 
 debating how far she could go. She held plenty of 
 material, only it was private, and Wickford was a 
 stickler in the matter of confidence. Yet she was 
 not above the temptation to gossip, real gossip, 
 with so handsome and pleasant a partner. To have 
 a new man of any kind to impress with her knowl- 
 edge of the Duke's family secrets was something. 
 So she sulked, looking down. M. du Frettay, an- 
 noyingly at his ease, rode and enjoyed the view. 
 
 "Like to know what I believe," she said at last, 
 pressing her horse nearer to du Frettay's. "It's only 
 guess-work, really, for Wick's not easy to see 
 through when he chooses to shut up on certain sub- 
 jects. I believe he's afraid of Iveagh drinking, if 
 he goes out, taking to drink, you know. That's in 
 the family, as it happens, and people in the 
 tropics do." 
 
 "Psst!" said du Frettay, startled. It was a bit 
 of complete new light on some things he had ob-
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 83 
 
 served, and Sam Coverack had conveyed to him 
 equally. His respect for the Duke's intelligence 
 was increased at once, and the respect, which was 
 already there, for his fraternal affection also. He 
 made no comment, though, whatever, beyond the 
 single exclamation. To Adelaide's surprise, and 
 not a little to her resentment, he "shut up" pre- 
 cisely as Wickford did, in this matter, which might 
 be almost jocular, she thought, of Iveagh drinking 
 in the wilds. 
 
 His kind of Frenchman, Adelaide decided, was 
 disappointing. Gabbler as he was as all of them 
 were the last thing she had supposed of him was 
 that, thus invited, lured to the most suggestive con- 
 fidences, he should fail to "rise." She would not 
 have thought he could control, even if he would, the 
 spring of his insensate curiosity. He who was al- 
 ways poking about, explaining things which re- 
 quired no explanation, displaying jets of unexpected 
 knowledge of common friends, highly amusing 
 under their foreign colour ... it was flat of him, 
 really, to fall off like that ! 
 
 Du Frettay, riding home, referred himself, then 
 and there, to Mrs. Redgate for explanation. He 
 need trouble no more to speculate, since she held 
 the threads, for certain, of all he might seriously
 
 84 HATCHWAYS 
 
 need to know. Should he need, as friend, to hear 
 the facts of Iveagh's story, she would not fail him. 
 He could himself have produced two or three con- 
 jectures, none of which would have been far from 
 the truth of the little mystery. Lise was not there 
 yet, quite, but he adumbrated Lise. His experience 
 adumbrated another woman from Adelaide's man- 
 ner to Iveagh simply, persistently impatient and 
 unkind: from her darkened brow when she censured 
 his folly in dropping out of the sport he loved, when 
 the best run of the season was in progress. Even 
 for the Oxford debacle^ otherwise cropper, the dear 
 distraction necessary to account was there, shadow- 
 ing sweetly in the whole talk of this district con- 
 cerning her. What else was there, Gabriel argued, 
 that the world holds, to divert a mart's thoughts from 
 work he was said to love, and sport he was seen to 
 grace so perfectly? Quite apart from any little 
 stirring of sympathy for the boy so derided, reason 
 arrives at these things. Du Frettay, a man who 
 loved his work with almost romantic ardour, cher- 
 ished for it a secret devotion beside which all but 
 the greatest and deepest passions paled, could reason 
 it as well as another. 
 
 He began too, clever as he was, to suspect the 
 grouping, as well as the goddess or elf unseen: the
 
 ADELAIDE DOES OTHERWISE 85 
 
 phalanx that was gathering about that boy to protect 
 him, to save, in the only real sense of the word, 
 his life. And in that faithful phalanx, Miss Cour- 
 tier was not, he gathered : nor Iveagh's lady mother, 
 could it be? And Wickford was, rightly to 
 Gabriel's ideas: and Sir George the good lion, prob- 
 ably: and more sure, more natural, more right than 
 any, Ernestine Redgate in the midst of it.
 
 VI 
 HOLMER IN TRIBUNAL 
 
 Miss COURTIER was right, at least, as to the ma- 
 terial side of affairs at Holmer. Having caught 
 things from the Duke, at odd seasons when his 
 natural frankness led him to confide : having caught 
 other matters from her mother, when that lady had 
 been sitting and sighing for a period in the Duchess's 
 pocket: and since this practical young lady consid- 
 ered that it might very well, at some future time, 
 concern herself, she was pretty well up to date as 
 to the condition of the Ducal finances. 
 
 We have mentioned in passing that the Duchess 
 of Wickford, nee Oxborough, once launched on a 
 course of her own devising, was considerably hard 
 to turn. We have called her stiff-necked in certain 
 situations, such as when her son presumed to man- 
 age her. Now, the Duchess's own fortune, not a 
 prodigious, but yet a pretty one, was settled on her 
 younger son. During the short period of Wick- 
 
 86
 
 HOLMER IN TRIBUNAL 87 
 
 ford's minority, he was nineteen when his father 
 died, his mother had had all things in her hands, 
 and, with due respect to so downright a lady, had 
 muddled them very tolerably. The young Duke, 
 on coming to his own, took over the whole direction 
 of his much-embarrassed heritage, with the excep- 
 tion of his mother's own property, which he left to 
 her. He did not wish to do so, even then, knowing 
 his brother's future to depend upon it. He had an 
 anxious eye that way, at times, in the years that 
 followed, and more than once advisers whom he 
 trusted pressed him to intervene. His mother was 
 given to sudden enthusiasms, in life: "elle s'em- 
 ballait," as the French say, readily for the pic- 
 turesque. This, though beautiful in life and love, 
 is not encouraged by good counsellors when applied 
 to financial investment, in the case of widowed 
 ladies of just adequate means, especially. 
 
 Needless to say, the Duchess stood no attempt 
 at intervention. Wickford's occasional observa- 
 tions, blunt as usual, though entirely well-founded 
 and well-meant, drove her ever more obstinately 
 along her chosen courses. Never, the Duchess 
 wished her son to observe, had she admitted inter- 
 ference in this, her peculiar province. 
 
 "My father " began Wickford.
 
 88 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Your father never laid a finger on me in my 
 private affairs," said the Duchess. 
 
 She lied: but really, in the case of one's own son, 
 one has to disguise the truth occasionally. That 
 there are cases when loyalty to one's traditions, and 
 the dignity accruing to age, urges lying to one's chil- 
 dren, the Duchess was convinced. 
 
 Wickf ord said no more ; but he had, by the age of 
 five-and-twenty, very complete control of the ragged 
 remnant of the family fortunes, and its history both 
 in the present and the past. Further, boy as he had 
 been before his father's death, he had been entrusted 
 with certain confidences that he could not, in his 
 mother's presence, betray : so he knew she lied, per- 
 fectly. His father had not only attempted, but 
 succeeded in restraining her, just where he was fail- 
 ing to do so. He left the matter, with youthful 
 philosophy, till the next occasion when he could get 
 in a word. He did so regularly, once a year, for he 
 was a conscientious person: but to little avail. 
 
 He suspected, when the smash came, it would be 
 his fault, but it was not, fortunately: it was the 
 solicitor's and stockbroker's between them. His 
 mother was only regretful that, doubtless with the 
 best intentions, Wickford had not dispensed, once 
 for all, at his father's death, with old Fullalove's
 
 HOLMER IN TRIBUNAL 89 
 
 useless services. As for the other dotard but we 
 will let that sleep! The Duchess became, at the 
 upset of her cherished plans, patient, sorrowful and 
 resigned, the plaything of fortune. She retreated 
 into her widow's dignity, having two sorts to 
 choose from, and spoke to Iveagh herself. She 
 did not allow Wickford, still less the professional 
 to do so. This was his mother's affair. 
 
 "I have no doubt," said the Duchess in the ma- 
 ternal vein to Iveagh, "that your brother will help 
 you." 
 
 "He will not," said the Duke in the background. 
 "I've told him heaps of times he will get nothing 
 out of me. I want all the money there is, and 
 more." 
 
 "I am glad, Wickford," said the Duchess, after 
 a pause of wondering whether she had not better at 
 once admit the truth of this, "that there are no 
 strangers present to hear you make such statements." 
 
 "There's all that needs," said the Duke. He 
 turned a page of the book he was reading on the 
 chimney-piece while he warmed himself at the 
 hearth. 
 
 The Duchess looked from one to other of them 
 as they stood before her in the so-called back-draw- 
 ing-room, the most habitable of the reception-rooms
 
 90 HATCHWAYS 
 
 at Holmer: Wickford at the hearth, Iveagh at the 
 window, each half -turned away. They were, as 
 usual, annoying her extremely, not in anything they 
 said, so much as in their essence and general attitude. 
 What was more, as usual, their small sensible eyes 
 gleamed sympathy with, and approval of, one an- 
 other. 
 
 "You had far better," she resumed to Iveagh, 
 "avail yourself of my old friend Sir George's ex- 
 tremely promising offer, and go out to wherever it 
 is with him." 
 
 "I don't see," said the Duke in the background, 
 "how that's to make a living for him, however!" 
 He put an elbow on the mantelshelf, a masterpiece 
 of frightfulness in mixed marbles, as were nearly all 
 the fittings of Holmer House. 
 
 "He can write a book," said the Duchess. 
 
 "Yes, and who's to read it?" murmured Iveagh. 
 
 "I will," said Wickford after a pause, "granted 
 it's good enough. But I'd sooner hear ye talk, 
 and I'd sooner still Sir George did." 
 
 "Talked, or heard him talk*?" snapped his mother. 
 "Really you had better speak better yourself, Wick- 
 ford, before you try to direct other people." 
 
 "I'm not trying to direct him," said Wickford. 
 
 "You are," said Iveagh, quietly and evenly.
 
 HOLMER IN TRIBUNAL 91 
 
 "Well, I don't suppose for a minute you'll do 
 what I direct." 
 
 "No, you don't suppose that," said Iveagh. "It's 
 the difference." His eyes strayed. 
 
 "Iveagh," said the Duchess monumentally, "you 
 are in an extremely obstinate state of mind. I will 
 not, to my own son, say sulky. I don't know that 
 your brother's showing himself so disobliging makes 
 things any better, and I allow for some disappoint- 
 ment, in this matter of the money. Indeed, the 
 
 stupidity of that man Fullalove " and so on, 
 
 the Duke reading. Iveagh seemed to find interest 
 in the garden-view. "I shall do my best," she fin- 
 ished, "in strict economy, for such of my life as may 
 remain, to remedy " 
 
 It was not intended for apology, and would not 
 have become so probably, had her sons let her finish; 
 but Iveagh, at whom she might have railed forever 
 without effect, could not stand even the semblance 
 of apology from his mother, especially in such 
 terms. He and Wickford spoke simultaneously 
 
 "I never supposed He never supposed " 
 
 Iveagh was husky, so the Duke got the word. 
 "He never supposed for a minute. Mother, he'd be 
 independent of the ordinary efforts to get a liveli- 
 hood. Don't think it, I've seen to that. Besides
 
 92 
 
 which, if he was as rich as Crcesus, he'd better work, 
 and what's more he'd have to. I'm not wishing him 
 Fortunatus for his own sake," said the Duke, "nor 
 myself either, God knows " 
 
 "You can speak in my presence without swear- 
 ing," said the Duchess. "Well, go on. Let's hear 
 what you propose for him, if it's to the point." 
 
 "I'm not lecturing him," said Wickford hastily. 
 He turned about, book in hand. "I wish for him 
 what he wants, what he's wanting at this minute" 
 Iveagh's look shot round "which is to get quit 
 of us jawing him, jawing at him, what's worse. A 
 man, worth a man, knows what he can do best, when 
 he really has to do it. It's not a thing in which you 
 can lead anyone by the nose " 
 
 "If he had chosen to work at the proper age," put 
 in the Duchess, "he would be in his country's service 
 by this time." 
 
 "Which country?" said Iveagh: only he spoke 
 low. He was unusually non-politically-minded, 
 for one of his birth; and though his rebellious sym- 
 pathies had been enlisted young in the nationalist 
 cause, Wickford swayed him. Any real conviction 
 swayed Iveagh easily. He hovered, as a fact, be- 
 tween two extremes, extremes being essential to 
 his being, except when his mother took the ancient-
 
 HOLMER IN TRIBUNAL 93 
 
 military Oxborough line. Then he knew, naturally, 
 which to choose. 
 
 "I'd an idea he liked plants," pursued Wickford, 
 ignoring the cross scent, "and that's on the skirts of 
 Marchant's business " 
 
 "Mai-chant 1 ?" exclaimed the Duchess. "What 
 now?" 
 
 "I thought you'd got to there," said Iveagh, 
 across her. "There or thereabouts. That young 
 forest gets on your mind so, whenever you see Mar- 
 chant, at least when I'm there too. To grow an 
 oak-tree would be a great thing" he jerked about, 
 "granted you'd half a life to spare for it. About 
 then you'd see your oak-tree flower " 
 
 "Oaks do not have flowers," said the Duchess, 
 impatient of this triviality. 
 
 "Then what about the acorn*?" rejoined Iveagh, 
 without looking at her. "However, you needn't 
 trouble, either of you. I'll not go to Marchant, and 
 bring up young forests, no, I'll not " 
 
 "I see," said Wickford. "Then what's your 
 idea?' 
 
 "I dare say I'll go with Trenchard presently, 
 granted he shows me reason," said Iveagh, "and goes 
 to the right place. Not just to get out of your 
 way "
 
 94 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Don't lose your temper," said his mother. 
 
 "Well, it does look like dismissing him," said 
 Wickford. He added lower "Dismissing un- 
 tried." 
 
 "Wickford, if you begin by discouraging his 
 single spark of natural energy and initiative, I ask 
 you, where shall we get to*?" said the Duchess. 
 
 "I'll go now, if Mother says it," said Iveagh, 
 taking her aback. 
 
 "I never said I wanted you to go," she said. 
 "How tiresome you are, always taking offence. If 
 you can find a respectable profession at home, I'd 
 sooner you stayed " 
 
 "What'll suit you, the Church 4 ?" said Iveagh: 
 and went, by the garden window. 
 
 "He's not offended," said Wickford, when he had 
 vanished. "He's hurt, it's not the same." 
 
 "He's extremely absurd to be," said the Duchess. 
 "I can't bear," she pushed on, feeling for her orig- 
 inal dignity, "a proposal from a person like George, 
 who really might be said to condescend in making 
 it " 
 
 "Certainly," said her son as she waited. 
 
 "His serious proposal, for the boy's good, being 
 treated like that. Childish hug, nothing better. 
 It's intolerable."
 
 HOLMER IN TRIBUNAL 95 
 
 "I suppose," said Wickford, "you proposed it 
 first." 
 
 "And why do you suppose that 1 ?" 
 
 "Well, because certainly Trenchard would not 
 jump at Iveagh. Why should he? there are bet- 
 ter men." 
 
 "Well, and now you're back-biting," said the 
 Duchess after a pause, she had prepared herself 
 for another line of argument. "Wherever will you 
 be next, Wickford? I don't say George would 
 jump, or whatever your expression is, at your 
 brother. But I suppose I may take his own word 
 he'd be pleased to have at his side a son of mine?" 
 
 "That's what I mean," said Wickford quietly. 
 "He'd do it for your sake. The kid's been a hand- 
 ful, and is likely to be still, as none knows better 
 than Sir George." 
 
 "The discipline would be extremely good for 
 him," said the Duchess, rather acridly. "George, 
 in his fashion, is a martinet." 
 
 "I know it. I'm not denyin' it. He'd do what 
 he could," said Wickford, changing posture, "but 
 always because you ask it." 
 
 "What," said the Duchess, "is the object of talk- 
 ing like this? Is it your desire to throw the re- 
 sponsibility on me?"
 
 96 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "It is. Sooner than on Trenchard, anyhow. It's 
 fairer so." 
 
 "Fairer?" His back was turned to her again. 
 
 "Certainly, if it fails." 
 
 "Wickford," said the Duchess, after a fresh si- 
 lence, "you are doing your best to insinuate things 
 in this way, simply in order to disturb me. You've 
 tried before. -Just as though" she was getting 
 nervous "in this wretched business of Iveagh's, I 
 had not had disturbance and worry enough." She 
 waited, but still he was silent, an elbow on the 
 marble shelf. "What's the worst you think 
 might happen to your brother, in my old friend's 
 charge*?" 
 
 "The worst's that he'd drink himself to death," 
 said Wickfbrd, in an equal tone, like Iveagh's, that 
 sounded indifferent. 
 
 "You've no right to " 
 
 "And the best," said Wickford, "is not good 
 enough to risk that. I'm sorry to repeat it, Mother, 
 but I've said as much before." 
 
 "You've no right to say such things" she was 
 asseverating anew. 
 
 "I've the right of knowing him. You needn't 
 believe I like sayin' it. Knowing him happening 
 to know him desperate "
 
 HOLMER IN TRIBUNAL 97 
 
 "Nonsense!" rapped the Duchess, restored to 
 power. "A love-affair at nineteen, calf-love, 
 nobody dies of that." Silence. "Your father had 
 plenty at that age, and I never thought the worse 
 of him." Silence. "The girl's married, married 
 a decent man, and done with, thanks to mercy. 
 
 Luckily well out of the way, owing to " She 
 
 nearly said "owing to my management." As a 
 fact, Lise's engagement to the ideal Mark had taken 
 her distinctly by surprise. "You don't suppose her 
 attraction, at half a sphere's distance " 
 
 "I do not suppose, I know it," said Wickford. 
 
 Once more, and for the hundredth time, he re- 
 flected whether he could tell her about the shooting 
 incident, and the other evidence of Iveagh's indif- 
 ference to life he held. It might straighten matters 
 to offer such direct proof of his assertions, only 
 Wickford could not. To Mrs. Redgate he had been 
 able, once and with an enormous effort to do so : but 
 entering his mother's confidence with such a story 
 baffled him. "The kid trusted him not to" that 
 was what it came to. And besides who could say 
 how his mother would take it: in shame, anger, or 
 mere impatience and disgust? Each was equally 
 impossible to Wickford's feelings. And if she at- 
 tacked Iveagh on the subject, conscience-driven,
 
 98 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Good God we fear Wickford swore again in spirit 
 conceiving it. 
 
 He was not exaggerating, to his own mind, in this 
 pressing anxiety about his brother. Iveagh had 
 always, as he said, been a "handful," capable at in- 
 tervals of outrageous things. He was born an 
 intransigeant) it was all or nothing with him. 
 Things must be just so, for Iveagh, else, let others 
 look out. In his first youth, no doubt owing to these 
 implacable inward needs, he had had a terrific tem- 
 per, and only his father had been able to manage 
 him. He grew past that stage of expressiveness, 
 though he had had a few outbreaks at school, enough 
 to amuse Adelaide and the outsider, as has been 
 seen. He did well at Eton in his latter years, 
 since his needs chanced to be the same as those of 
 the authorities, but, quiet as he was, and watchful- 
 seeming, such as knew him felt the nature un- 
 changed beneath. Then, just as he was done with 
 scholastic rule, settling in his outlook, taking hold 
 of life as he preferred, and preparing to build stead- 
 ily, with a delicacy and caution inherited equally 
 from the paternal stock, Lise Fitzmaurice had 
 come home from school in France. 
 
 No more was needed to shake the structure to its
 
 HOLMER IN TRIBUNAL 99 
 
 foundation again. Wickford, who had had himself 
 in the early twenties an affair, completely unknown 
 to his mother, with a beautiful young actress in Lon- 
 don, was the only person fit, to Iveagh's ideas, to 
 share some of these storms. Wick knew, at least, 
 Iveagh had seen him, how he was with Maidie. 
 Maidie, naturally, was nothing to Lise, still, Wick 
 might know a thing or two without degrading Lise's 
 image in transference. 
 
 Wickford, untiring in patience and kindliness, 
 had carried him through the worst. It had been 
 hopeless, the boy's passion, almost from its outset. 
 Lise, little puss, never seriously looked his way, and 
 only looked Wickford's when she wished to annoy 
 Adelaide. She played with Iveagh's sulky devo- 
 tion, Celtic smoke and fire, tentatively until he 
 wearied her; then she discovered her own affections 
 in the nick of time, and pinned them to Mark : Mark 
 the absolute, the sedate and serious, and saintly, 
 according to the Duchess, only not in fact. Iveagh 
 had not even the consolation of despising Mark. 
 He liked him originally, and with the faith of a 
 well-tempered spirit continued to do so. Mark's 
 excellence only pointed more clearly the moral, the 
 emptiness of all things, and the worthlessness of any
 
 100 HATCHWAYS 
 
 course Iveagh might yet be expected, wanting Lise, 
 to run. He might not even, as it shortly appeared, 
 snap the rotten thread of his existence. Wick, at 
 the critical instant, got in his way.
 
 VII 
 HATCHWAYS AT TEA 
 
 IT was all this, or nearly all of it, that Ernestine 
 communicated to Gabriel, so soon as she saw he was 
 attracted, hanging, as it were, on the outskirts of 
 the party she had instituted for Iveagh's spiritual 
 recuperation and moral support. She did not let 
 him see he was being so drawn in to the core of the 
 real romance of the district: she made no untoward 
 effort to secure his interest, still less to invite co- 
 operation, which from a man and a foreigner she 
 could hardly expect. She merely told him things, 
 by degrees, that he really wanted to know. 
 
 Even so she did no wrong to Wickford's hard- 
 wrung confidence; she told him nothing about the 
 shooting affray, and nothing about the increasing 
 strain in her friend's family, which was Gertrude's 
 business, not hers. And she only told him of the 
 latest, or tropical terror of the Duke's, because Ade- 
 laide, to her sorrow, had already given that delicate 
 secret away. 
 
 She waited for him to come to her, under her roof, 
 101
 
 102 HATCHWAYS 
 
 before she enlightened him : and Gabriel also waited 
 for that unconsciously, confident that it would 
 happen in time. Both he and she, being busy peo- 
 ple, had plenty of other irons in the fire. It was 
 already March when Hatchways doors, or arms, 
 really opened to him, though his heart had been 
 planted beneath the larch-trees long previously. 
 He did his duty by his "chief" in the interval, and 
 his devoirs by the Duchess (who received him in 
 London, finally), and had his fill of exploring and 
 poking about. He was weighing several competing 
 attractions for the Easter weeks when her note came, 
 bidding him to Hatchways if he still cared for it; 
 and Gabriel dropped all the other things, just as 
 Sir George had once advised him, and went down 
 to Hatchv/ays as soon as might be, by the usual 
 train. 
 
 "He's the kind of nature takes to it easily," said 
 Ernestine of Iveagh, the second conversation they 
 had. "I think Wickford is right there, drink or 
 drugs." 
 
 "Restive?" queried du Frettay. "Rebellious?" 
 
 "Both. And he is very, very nearly at the end 
 of his tether. Was," she corrected. "He is better 
 now." 
 
 "Angel," thought du Frettay, as she looked abroad
 
 HATCHWAYS AT TEA 103 
 
 at the garden, leaning forward with her elbows on 
 her knees, a most unstudied attitude which might 
 have been a man's. "Women are the devil," he 
 said, still to himself, but audibly. "The number 
 of souls they have lost, oh, tossed away." 
 
 "Saved too," said Ernestine. 
 
 "Not so many," he declared. "Not nearly." 
 
 "Mothers " said Ernestine. He made a ges- 
 ture, granting mothers. "And mistresses," she pro- 
 ceeded, with the simplest deliberation. "Yes, 
 often, often." 
 
 "Rarely, rarely," he mocked. "I tell you, I 
 know. It is not the common desire, to save. The 
 common desire is to lead quoi done? to decoy by 
 any means, to the devil sooner than nowhere. Feu 
 follef, what is your word? and my faith, as 
 empty, vacuous. Drink at least fills the void." 
 
 She was silent, leaving it to him: she could not 
 pretend to his experience. 
 
 "Adelaide should not have told you," she 
 thought, looking at his faintly mocking face, the 
 cool glitter of his eyes: experience, not even such as 
 Iveagh's, lay behind that. "You were inclined to 
 like him simply, those first days. Now you have 
 been thinking in French about it. It was not right 
 of Adelaide. And for her . ."
 
 104 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Do you know women who take drugs, 
 Madame 4 ?" said Gabriel, right into her thought, 
 her start very nearly betrayed her. Her little flush 
 might have done so as she answered 
 
 "Yes, one or two." 
 
 'Tor what reasons?" 
 
 "Oh, disappointment, weariness." 
 
 "Sometimes the hope to prolong their youth and 
 brilliance, chance of success*?" 
 
 "Have you guessed that too*?" thought Ernestine. 
 But he was far from thinking of Adelaide. 
 "Women," she said in her non-committal manner, 
 rising, "may be restive and rebellious, as well as 
 men." 
 
 "To be sure. And never so much, it appears," 
 said Gabriel, who had been looking about London, 
 "as when they have full freedom." 
 
 Mrs. Redgate, who had risen to rearrange some 
 flowers in a jar, stood still a moment. The remark 
 struck her as clever. Nobody she had ever met 
 struck her as so simply clever as this young man. 
 He said things like that quite easily. Rick, who 
 wrote critical articles for the Times, was less given 
 to it. She debated it, comparing them equably, so 
 she forgot to reply. 
 
 "What a phrase-making fool I am," thought Ga-
 
 HATCHWAYS AT TEA 105 
 
 briel. We trespass on his thoughts like this, partly 
 to fill up interludes, for he and Ernestine did not 
 converse in any classical style. She did not talk, 
 as Marchant contended, she said things, and let 
 say "elle disait et laissait dire." Gabriel knew he 
 could say exactly what he liked, think aloud, which 
 was a great comfort after the Duchess. 
 
 "What was she like, the girl 1 ?" he said, recollect- 
 ing another question he wished to ask before the 
 herd came; for it was approaching the mystic or 
 club-hour of four o'clock. 
 
 "Lise? Oh, I don't think she flirted really, I 
 mean, not badly," said Ernestine. "She played a 
 little, tried experiments, she was only nineteen. 
 Perhaps mischievous." She dropped the word, 
 dubious. 
 
 "That is not mischief-making?" 
 
 "No." She laughed. "I think not. You would 
 have to see her, it is hopeless to describe. Lise was 
 like water, wonderful." 
 
 "Changeante?" 
 
 "Yes. It is odd," said Ernestine, growing grave, 
 "what appearance will do." 
 
 "It is miraculous what appearance will do," said 
 M. du Frettay. Meeting his eyes she laughed 
 again. "I can't help it somehow," she said, "think-
 
 106 HATCHWAYS 
 
 ing of Lise. She was quite a dear, though. She 
 writes to me." 
 
 "Is she happy*?" said Gabriel: and appended 
 "Pardon." It struck him he asked too many ques- 
 tions, like Iveagh. 
 
 "She married a good man," said Ernestine, carry- 
 ing the jar of flowers to its place. 
 
 "Ah, bon I You answer me." 
 
 Mrs. Redgate refused to smile any more : she had 
 smiled enough. It is something, in life, to marry a 
 good man, whatever he might choose to think. 
 Take any case of the contrary. . . . And dear Lise 
 she wrote nicely of Mark. And Mark was all he 
 should be not Iveagh. So thought Ernestine, dif- 
 ferently from the Duchess, oppositely. The Duch- 
 ess's way of thinking was, Iveagh was not Mark. 
 
 She excused herself to Gabriel, and left the room. 
 She had often left him alone before on his visits, 
 and he had no objection, felt no blank, which was 
 singular. He knew she was still there, of course, 
 about the place. 
 
 "Every woman," thought Gabriel, remembering; 
 and compared her with others that he had in mind. 
 Soon he was thinking more about the others than 
 about Ernestine. Not that she did not compare 
 with all of them favourably, and not that he was
 
 HATCHWAYS AT TEA 107 
 
 not, during the whole period of his contemplation, 
 wanting her back. Only well, she was the least 
 "troublante" personage du Frettay had ever come 
 across. She never troubled him, he only felt an oc- 
 casional need of her, perhaps a growing need. . . . 
 
 Presently "the husband" came in. 
 
 "Where is my wife^" said Rick, looking over the 
 spectacles, which he had lately taken to wearing, 
 learnedly. 
 
 "I have no idea," said du Frettay, waking. 
 
 "Where," pursued Rick, looking about him, "is 
 the tea 4 ?" 
 
 "I have," said du Frettay, with increased earnest- 
 ness, "no idea." 
 
 Withdrawal on the part of Rick. Young or 
 youngish men kicking their heels about his premises 
 seemed nothing to him. His wife, and the tea, were 
 all he came about: and he withdrew, contented, 
 without either. . . . Singular household. Won- 
 derful Hatchways. Marvellous England. . . . Du 
 Frettay dreamed. 
 
 Presently, everybody came at once, by windows 
 and doors, like an untidy stage entrance, Ade- 
 laide's voice and presence prominent, surely un- 
 necessarily so! Sam Coverack and others followed 
 her. The tea entered also, left centre. M. du
 
 108 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Frettay, with his elegantly crossed legs, right centre, 
 was no longer alone. Being M. du Frettay, how- 
 ever, he did not stir. Everybody else was stirring, 
 so it was better not to do so. 
 
 "Well, I'm blest!" said Adelaide, stopping short. 
 She pointed the finger of scorn at him. The com- 
 pany gathered to look at M. du Frettay, taking pos- 
 session in this manner of Hatchways, their clubroom, 
 in his new character as resident guest. He bore the 
 infliction confidently, one would have said he en- 
 joyed it. 
 
 Iveagh alone seemed indifferent to his reappear- 
 ance. He gave his hand, but hardly turned his 
 eyes. He was sulky. Adelaide, who had attached 
 Sam for the afternoon, had probably been teasing 
 him. Now, having M. du Frettay, she dropped 
 Sam also, for Sam's good. It was like that game 
 of cards where you aways exchange the less good for 
 the better, as your turn comes round, commerce, is 
 it not called 1 ? 
 
 In the intervals of replying in kind to Adelaide, 
 Gabriel tried to follow the dialogue of the two 
 young men beyond her, Iveagh and Sam. Nothing 
 could be less interesting. It was horses horses 
 eternally, and only remarks exchanged at that. 
 That Iveagh, among other offices, was his brother's
 
 HATCHWAYS AT TEA 109 
 
 self-constituted groom-in-chief, Gabriel had already 
 noted, without surprise. He had stopped being sur- 
 prised about the Suir boys. 
 
 He came back after an interval of Adelaide, and 
 listened anew. Horse-fairs, in some part of the 
 world. Bargains, on Sam's part, bargains, on 
 Iveagh's. Or rather, on Wickford's, for he gen- 
 erally seemed, in these recitals, to be spending his 
 brother's money. A shockingly dull pair of young 
 men. Vulgar, almost, some of their observations, 
 considering where they were exchanged. Did they 
 take Mrs. Redgate's drawing-room for a stable? 
 
 Presently, parrying Adelaide with some energy, in 
 order to have a breathing-space, he listened again. 
 Circuses! 
 
 "There's a circus comin' to Readin'," said Sam, a 
 trifle more for the benefit of the world, than 
 Iveagh's. Perhaps he faintly saw a need for conde- 
 scending to his immediate society. 
 
 "Is that a thing to see 1 ?" asked Gabriel, with 
 satiric intent. 
 
 "Oh well, you see decent ridin', specially the 
 girls." 
 
 "Ah." Gabriel tried not to begin to be inter- 
 ested. Mrs. Redgate's immediate environment at a 
 circus, he told himself, was unthinkable. It was
 
 110 HATCHWAYS 
 
 grotesque. But the worst of Suir society was that 
 it never minded such clashes, the least. It con- 
 stantly did the next thing, which was generally in- 
 appropriate. Gabriel began to get the feeling of 
 Suir again, and his politer London moods dropped 
 off him. 
 
 "Like our Concours Hippique, is it*?" he said, still 
 very cynical, across intervening parties, to Rick. 
 
 "Not at all," said Rick, looking like a benevolent 
 ogre. "I doubt if society will disturb itself, on the 
 occasion." He added, still more benevolently, 
 "I shouldn't go." 
 
 "Nobody's going," said Adelaide, contemptu- 
 ously. "It's only Iveagh rotting, as usual." 
 
 "You get out, it was me proposed it," said Sam 
 politely. "And what's more, we never asked you, 
 did we, Iveagh? Our party's made up." 
 
 This was funny, also stimulating, as it appeared. 
 
 "It might be rather a game," said Miss Courtier, 
 debating the attraction. "When is it, first week 
 in April? I say, look here. Suppose Wick mo- 
 tored us all over for the evening." 
 
 "He won't," said Sam, having consulted Iveagh's 
 expression. "Wick won't be let in again so soon, 
 I mean, we did it too thoroughly last time." 
 
 There was a ripple of appreciation. Gabriel at
 
 HATCHWAYS AT TEA 111 
 
 once determined not to ask Iveagh, in private, how 
 his brother had last been "let in" by the club in- 
 mates. It could not, he was certain, be worth hear- 
 ing. It had happened, of course, while he was in 
 London, doing far better things. 
 
 "Well, someone else can take us," said Adelaide. 
 "M. du Frettay, now, I'm sure he can drive. And 
 he wants to see life, don't you*?" She did not prod 
 him, precisely, but she moved her elegantly shod 
 foot as if she were about to do so. This, like her 
 little coachman's click, was comprised in Adelaide's 
 drawing-room deportment. 
 
 "There are performin' tigers," said Sam, gravely. 
 
 M. du Frettay laughed, throwing back his head. 
 He had a pleasant fashion of laughter, for so cynical 
 a young man. From the first, his present company 
 had approved of it. 
 
 "I shall be back in London by then," he explained. 
 
 "Oh, rats!" said Sam, helpfully. 
 
 "Come down for it," helped Adelaide. 
 
 "Bring Trenchard along to look after us," helped 
 Iveagh. 
 
 "Tigers!" cried Adelaide. Shrieks of laughter. 
 Gabriel laughed too, having quite laid aside his 
 cynical armoury. It seemed useless to preserve it. 
 
 "I don't think even tigers at Reading will stir Sir
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 George," he said to Mrs. Redgate, who, as usual, 
 had done little but contribute an occasional smile 
 to the subject, and cake, and cups of tea. 
 
 "The idea!" said Ernestine. 
 
 That was a fair specimen, all told, of conversa- 
 tion at Hatchways on club-days, and the proportions 
 about right. Rick one remark, Iveagh one remark, 
 or two at most: the incorrigible talkers, such as Ga- 
 briel, Adelaide, Sam, and (we may add) the Duch- 
 ess, doing the rest. Wickford, if he were there, and 
 not in London or toiling at his book, contributing 
 sense occasionally. Marchant, if he were there, and 
 not at Oxford, conversing in good language, once 
 he was driven from his academic pickets. Miss All- 
 good, the infant schoolmistress, if she were there, 
 making beautiful, complete remarks, each perfect of 
 its kind, and pitying all the lazy young people. 
 Iveagh's dogs, if they were there, wagging their bod- 
 ies, messing the place with crumbs, and disturbing 
 all effort at connected and profitable dialogue, un- 
 less the Duchess were there as well, when she turned 
 them out. 
 
 And Ernestine 1 ? She existed among them, and 
 passed their provisions, and removed the white dogs' 
 hairs from the velvet cushions, and just said "The 
 idea!" when they dragged down a hero's name.
 
 HATCHWAYS AT TEA 113 
 
 She sat and looked on, her nice capable hands locked 
 in her lap whenever they had an interval, not wear- 
 ing a quiet uniform with several medals on the 
 breast of it, but deserving it, surely. Life-saving 
 medals'? possibly: since hers was the greater war- 
 fare. Very possibly indeed, with eyes like that. 
 Such eyes had "seen life," to use Adelaide's ridicu- 
 lous expression, though not in the form of sawdust 
 and circus animals. She was seeing into life, quite 
 probably, now: aware of the grave background that 
 lay behind her giddy company: truth behind all the 
 young heads, and tragedy attending some. 
 
 Once, having held for some time a hand to Ade- 
 laide for her cup, and having acquired it at last, with 
 M. du Frettay's assistance, she made a remark, quite 
 "on her own." 
 
 "Rick says I've got to give up my blue dragons," 
 she said, referring, as it seemed, to the cup she held. 
 
 "Oh, Mrs. Redgate!" exclaimed a chorus. 
 
 "What for?" said Iveagh. 
 
 They had all always had those teacups with the 
 blue dragons when they came to call at Hatchways; 
 and since they all called constantly, they were as in- 
 dignant as children at the idea of anything being 
 changed in the ceremony they expected. Plate for 
 plate, cake for cake, it must be the same. It was in
 
 114 HATCHWAYS 
 
 the expectation of such protest that she had warned 
 them, doubtless. 
 
 "They're so ugly " began Rick. 
 
 "Oh, Mr. Redgate !" cried chorus. 
 
 "They were the worst of our wedding-presents," 
 explained Rick to du Frettay, across the intervening 
 items, "and consequently, no one ever breaks them. 
 Nothing sticks by one like a bad wedding-present, 
 unless a bad conscience. Strong measures, I tell 
 her, is the only thing. She's got quite a decent pink 
 set, and another white one, put away." 
 
 "But they're jolly nice" said Sam, looking at his 
 dragons. "Ain't they, what's-your-name*?" (This 
 was one of Gabriel's titles, in the district.) "Mrs. 
 Redgate, look here: you go on strike." 
 
 There was a laugh at this. 
 
 "Perhaps he'll forget about it, Ernestine," said 
 Adelaide in a stage whisper. "They do, if you let 
 'em alone." 
 
 Ernestine shook her head. "Tea-time," she ex- 
 plained, and it was enough. All-sufficing tea- 
 time, hour of mystery, when her husband and the 
 blue dragons must meet ! 
 
 "Keep 'em for us," said Iveagh of the dragons. 
 
 "Yes, keep 'em for us," agreed others : and added 
 in mischief to it, "Send him a pink one in there."
 
 HATCHWAYS AT TEA 115 
 
 So the little point was dealt with, and dropped 
 again. She belonged to them, on the whole, more 
 than to her husband. Shared among the district, 
 public property. . . . And the man accepted it!
 
 VIII 
 BESS 
 
 "A BLESSING," said Ernestine, consulting her tab- 
 lets. "Next week it will be Bess." 
 
 Ernestine was very free of drags on her in the 
 way of relations, which drags would have detracted 
 from her popular worth. But she had a niece, Bess 
 Ryeborn, who has already risen once on these pages, 
 and who appeared, in just that way, at Hatchways 
 occasionally. Bess was rather a grave girl, but it 
 was not a daunting kind of gravity : it chiefly meant 
 she had long periods of study when she got out of 
 the habit of society; and when she came to visit her 
 uncle Rick, she had to pick it up again. She en- 
 joyed small jokes, fun and fripperies, as those do 
 who seldom get the chance; and of course Uncle 
 Rick saw to it that she had all the chances possible. 
 
 Bess was an Art-student, a student especially of 
 animals, and she owned a consuming passion for 
 cats. Cats, great and small, were her pensioners. 
 Since she understood the ineffable feline, her studies 
 
 116
 
 BESS 117 
 
 of cat-life and character were very clever indeed: 
 and Ernestine, who had first set her on the track of 
 this pursuit, saw a good chance now of its becoming 
 a profession. A professional Bess was Ernestine's 
 desire, for the simple reason that the girl had not 
 much to live on. Mrs. Redgate's widower brother 
 was a poor schoolmaster, and could do little or noth- 
 ing towards Bess's future. Even the art-training 
 had been largely owing to Rick's generosity, supple- 
 menting the meagre allowance Bess had from home. 
 
 Both the Suir boys had met Miss Ryeborn, and 
 liked her in the easy modern give-and-take fashion 
 of young men. This was all very well : but it was 
 a great but to the Duchess it happened that Bess 
 was very pretty, with the same pleasant shape and 
 size and square shoulders of her aunt Ernestine, 
 dark-haired and with dark-blue eyes. 
 
 Now this, from the Duchess's point of view, was 
 wrong of Ernestine. It was all very well to have a 
 niece who was a needy art-student: but you ought 
 not to have a needy niece eternally staying with you 
 who looked like that. The Duchess, as was inevi- 
 table, at once accounted Miss Ryeborn a danger for 
 the Duke. That is, not as a danger, since Wick- 
 ford was going ultimately to marry dear Adelaide 
 Courtier : but as a distraction introduced, on the part
 
 118 HATCHWAYS 
 
 of Ernestine, at an interesting moment of Wick- 
 ford's mating, which fell short of her usual high 
 level of tact. 
 
 However, Ernestine did not stop having Bess to 
 stay with her, because of Gertrude's obvious reflec- 
 tions upon the proceeding. Since Bess was a bless- 
 ing, she had her rather frequently: and with Bess 
 came cats and kittens, either in covered baskets 
 among her hand-luggage, or collected for her delec- 
 tation by the Suir boys, from various corners of the 
 Wickford estate. The cats and kittens were not 
 always so much of a blessing as Bess: but for the 
 purposes of her study and eventual profit they were 
 tolerated gladly. Sometimes the Suir boys, who 
 took on animals, in daily life, as readily as persons, 
 helped Bess by posing them. 
 
 Wickford and Iveagh's terms with this pretty girl 
 afforded the ever-curious invader a new opportunity 
 for study, his ideas concerning them being by this 
 time in a state of fusion, as we have said. The Suir 
 boys were nothing if not unexpected, and Gabriel 
 had wisely dropped all attempt to summarise them, 
 by any classical standard. They had no manners, 
 for instance, properly so called: yet whatever the 
 unusual situations, of cats or persons, they discov- 
 ered on Mrs. Redgate's premises when, together or
 
 BESS 119 
 
 separately, they chose to call, they always worked 
 in. They made part of any such given situation 
 immediately. They plunged, committed them- 
 selves, sacrificed their identity, their dignity being 
 Wickford, they did not, with the beautiful British 
 blandness, hang outside. 
 
 It was this peculiarity which made them con- 
 stantly, and in spite of everything, essentials to their 
 lady mother in her social schemes at Holmer: and 
 that though she chose to carp and call their uses in 
 question all the time. At a real domestic crisis, the 
 Duchess needed her stupid boys, and betrayed the 
 need: such crises owing to Oxborough methods of 
 hospitality being not unknown in her vicinity. 
 Gabriel had seen both brothers, and the younger 
 especially, cut on sight, as it were, by the most casual 
 and homely means, the knot of the worst dilemmas 
 into which their mother's ill-mixed and ill-managed 
 house-parties had got themselves tied. They both 
 owned, had she ever been willing to admit it, the 
 trick which in the world's business is really the best 
 trick of all, that of living: or to put it more accu- 
 rately, living among their kind. They had it by 
 right of birth, Wick partially, and Iveagh in per- 
 fection; and in spite of their slang and savagery, 
 and talk of equine diseases in drawing-rooms, Ga-
 
 120 HATCHWAYS 
 
 briel began to grant it a point, a real scoring-point, 
 in the younger above all. 
 
 That he was suffering from what is called the 
 Irish charm, in thus thinking so constantly about 
 Iveagh, Gabriel had no idea. For the best of rea- 
 sons, Iveagh was not charming. It was impossi- 
 ble to connect the word with him, at least to Latin 
 minds. He did not even try to be. He was plain, 
 ugly if you chose to think so. He was slight and 
 unimportant. He looked alongside people, said 
 what occurred to him, smiled seldom, laughed never, 
 and went about his own concerns. 
 
 How much of this so-called attraction is mystery 
 simply, the animal-like evasive quality of a very old 
 race, hunting, and hunted of course, forced to 
 disguise itself, if not to obliterate, is a question for 
 the wise. Gabriel had heard, or read, of the Irish 
 charm, of course, as he had read of the Scotch crab- 
 bedness : but he had not expected that. You never 
 do expect them, it is their secret. Besides, in 
 order finally to bother the well-read foreigner, the 
 Suirs were the "other Irish," not quite the sort Ga- 
 briel had learnt by heart in literature on the Irish 
 theme. This is a trick of the racial type that needs 
 but mention to be admitted. Are we not most of 
 us the "other English," when foreigners really come
 
 BESS 
 
 to look into us? Have we not all of us met (thank 
 Heaven) the "other Scotch"? 
 
 It was this vague resemblance in Iveagh to an ani- 
 mal, Mrs. Redgate suspected, that attracted Bess. 
 Bess's eyes upon him, at times, had the lingering, 
 loving look they had when attached to a cat. She 
 certainly liked him, her face changed a little when 
 he came in. When Wickford came in without him, 
 Bess's eyes expressed it at once. The world, though 
 always pleasant to Bess, pleasant and serious, was 
 unaffected by Wickford. A Duke or two about the 
 place made no difference. Iveagh swayed things a 
 very little . . . still, they swayed. And Bess was 
 accustomed in life to have them steady. 
 
 So Bess's aunt, in the quiet depths of her, grew 
 anxious. Was handling, or no handling, necessary 
 to a situation like this? The future was not plain. 
 The Duchess, thinking about the Duke, was an ob- 
 stacle to quiet communing. Iveagh, walking alone 
 and thinking about Lise, was another. Iveagh's 
 habit of sharing with all men, outwardly, his com- 
 radeship with Bess over the cat-baskets, was not a 
 thing that could be checked. Wickford's habit of 
 looking at pretty blue-eyed girls of no account was 
 (unluckily for poor Gertrude) not a thing that could 
 be checked either. The Suir boys were both there,
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 mixed in with Hatchways and its fate for better or 
 worse. It was of course Ernestine's own fault to 
 have mixed them. 
 
 So things stood when Bess, blessing as she was, 
 jumped out at Holmer station on to the ash-strewn 
 platform, a basket on her arm. She was a blessing 
 in spite of all. Rick's face, beaming ogre-like when 
 he took her in his arms at the station-gate, proved 
 that. Ernestine's face under the larches proved it 
 too, not quite so expansively. 
 
 "Take care of it," pleaded Bess, as her uncle re- 
 lieved her of the basket, "it" being something 
 within, nobody could of course imagine what. 
 Cracking sounds, as though "it" were sharpening 
 small claws, came from the basket's depths at inter- 
 vals: and at intervals also, small protesting cries. 
 Not wild lamenting cries of a caged and outraged 
 kitten, but little cries of ennui, directed to a feeling 
 friend. Interludes interspersed them of audible 
 and equally unreasoning purr, sounds which 
 would have demonstrated, to such as Bess, that kit- 
 ten's age to a nicety. It had recently learnt to purr : 
 thus, even in annoying confinement, and the surging 
 of station circumstances, it was worth while prac- 
 tising the accomplishment, for "its" private consola- 
 tion and support.
 
 BESS 123 
 
 "How's everybody," said Bess, as she walked be- 
 neath the larch-trees, her arm in Mrs. Redgate's. 
 "Oh, there's a new bed, what's to be in it, 
 tulips'? Oh, why not tulips, Uncle Rick 1 ?" 
 
 "Because," said Ernestine sedately, "hyacinths 
 are coming up." 
 
 "Coming, are they?" Bess dropped on her knees 
 on the grass. "Is it the spring 1 ? I might have 
 known it would be at Hatchways. It's hopelessly 
 winter in town. . . . Please, that basket. May it 
 come out, Ernestine"? It's asking. Pickle, come 
 along." 
 
 "It" walked out on the grass, yawning: as though 
 bless you! it had not been so eager to come as 
 all that. Thus do its kind disconcert expectation, 
 only, unlike Iveagh, deliberately. They baffle and 
 disappoint of fixed intent. That kitten was de- 
 lighted, really, to be in the country, fingering the 
 sweet springing grass. It thought about squirrels 
 instantly, squirrels and mice. Out-of-door mice, 
 more delicate than the urban variety. Possible 
 brown bees in conjectural crocuses. But it yawned, 
 looked absent and offended slightly, and the in- 
 stant after sat down and passionately licked a pro- 
 truded leg. 
 
 Bess called her aunt "Ernestine" like all the
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 i 
 
 world, for her aunt was only a baker's dozen of years 
 older than she was, which, Bess considered, did not 
 count. Moreover, "aunt" as well as "Ernestine" 
 was supererogatory. "Aunt Nesta," a just possible 
 combination, appealed in public, before the Duchess 
 for example. Bess was equally frightened of the 
 Duchess, and bored by her. It is possible her 
 Grace, when she met Bess at Hatchways, and about 
 the village, had made her opinion of her presence 
 there too clear. It was so impossible for the 
 Duchess to disguise her true thoughts, it was al- 
 most wrong. She rarely did so, and never with 
 young girls. 
 
 "How's everybody 1 ?" said Bess again: meaning, 
 of course, "How's Iveagh?" She did not know she 
 meant it, probably; but Ernestine suspected, as 
 never before, what that slight colour in her serious 
 young face implied. That little pink spot of ex- 
 citement was not only the joy of getting to the 
 country from London : no, nor the rapture of being, 
 as she always was at her Uncle Rick's, an honoured 
 and important guest. It was other things, one 
 other thing, the other thing, to a healthy girl. 
 And she was too naturally clear and simple to con- 
 ceal it completely. 
 
 Later on, of course, she saw him; but she talked
 
 BESS 125 
 
 to Wickford, who made himself unusually agreeable 
 in respect of Bess. Quite uncommonly. Really, 
 had Wickford's lady mother been there, which she 
 was happily not, she would have been terrified. 
 The Duchess would have been the more terrified that 
 Bess with her little colour was unusually pretty that 
 night, deliciously dressed with her inevitable simple 
 taste, and just perceptibly shy in her son's company. 
 Her maternal terror would have been completed, 
 concentrated, consummated, by Adelaide's sudden 
 and violent dislike for Bess. 
 
 "Good heavens," thought Mrs. Redgate, in the 
 wise and secret depths of her. "What is coming 
 upon me*?" 
 
 She really did not know. She could not imagine, 
 granted Wickford. He was always a little hard to 
 understand, and incapable when it came to explain- 
 ing himself, especially in a delicate matter. Faced 
 with a delicate matter, Wickford tumbled over his 
 own feelings, as an incapable rider at a fence might 
 tumble over his horse's head. Still, his nature was 
 sensible, and he generally knew, when it came to 
 action, where he was going. His proceedings, if 
 nothing else, made it clear. 
 
 Well, this evening, the boys and Adelaide came 
 in after dinner, he made straight for Bess. Al-
 
 126 HATCHWAYS 
 
 ways sociable, Wickford was pleasant. More, he 
 monopolised her, at others' expense. M. du Frettay 
 called him "accapareur," and did not trouble to 
 translate the expression. He tried to get a winged 
 word in edgeways, tried hard, but the Duke, pre- 
 suming on his old acquaintance with the girl, pushed 
 steadily ahead, and ousted him clean ! 
 
 Iveagh, on the other hand, was worse than usual, 
 dull really to a marvel. He was silent, as he 
 had been at the long-past crisis of his fate with Lise. 
 He looked at once heated and pale in his manner, 
 sick and surly, and even Mrs. Redgate could draw 
 little response from him. Since boyhood he had 
 been subject to violent headaches at times: and she 
 could only suppose that, or a domestic fracas with 
 his mother. Of his brother, being so used to Wick- 
 ford's easy kindliness, and being absorbed by his 
 present manner to Bess, she did not think. 
 
 Yet, to her surprise and pain, she found it was 
 so. Later on, she had the history from Wickford 
 himself. As not infrequently in that country place 
 on a warm evening, they all walked back together, 
 Rick and Gabriel escorting Adelaide in the van- 
 guard, Ernestine and Bess the boys. 
 
 "Do you mind not walking so fast, Wick?" sug-
 
 BESS 127 
 
 gested Ernestine in the lane. "I'm not quite so 
 young as Bess." 
 
 "I'd sooner keep in hearing," said the young man 
 savagely: really, his tone was nearly that. The 
 roughness both brothers could show at moments was 
 at the worst. It was lucky, indeed, du Frettay was 
 not there, for it is more than probable he would have 
 cuffed him. 
 
 Ernestine was silent a second in sheer wonder. 
 "Wick, my dear boy, " she said. She could of 
 course only conceive of one explanation, jealousy. 
 What else could it possibly be? After an evening 
 of keeping Bess entirely to his little ducal self, 
 Wickford was jealous of Iveagh having her for five 
 minutes. It was really not more than that to the 
 Holmer lodge. 
 
 "Oh, Lord," muttered Wickford, just audible. 
 Then he turned to her. "You'd better hear. We 
 had a row after dinner. I shall have to write to 
 Trenchard, that's all. He'd better go and be 
 d done with." He just caught back a stronger 
 expression. "Sorry, Mrs. Redgate. I can't man- 
 age him alone, that's all. In that state he does for 
 me. Trenchard' 11 take him by the scruff, put the 
 fear of " Once more he swallowed the full
 
 128 HATCHWAYS 
 
 phrase, just in time. Wickford, decidedly, had 
 been moved, for him. 
 
 After a minute more of marvelling, a clear 
 thought came to replace the unjust one in Ernestine's 
 mind. Jealousy, indeed! when he was protecting 
 Bess ! Her Bess. 
 
 "Drinking again*?" she said gently. 
 
 "Mean you didn't see it*? Well, that's something 
 to be thankful for. I told him he was not to come 
 down to you. Course he did, wouldn't have other- 
 wise, I was a fool. I said I'd lock the spirits, 
 hang it, I'm master there ! He said I was welcome 
 and so on, do as I liked on my premises, he'd no 
 idea of remaining under my charge." 
 
 "Wick! You didn't quarrel?" 
 
 "No," said the Irishman grimly, "we nearly 
 fought. I said a few pretty healthy things, can't 
 help it for my life when he sneers, a kid like that. 
 You saw how his eyes looked. . . . He's not been 
 
 like that to me since since Look here," he 
 
 broke off. "I'd better go after them. Once 
 through the gate, it's as black as pitch in the avenue. 
 Will you let me, Mrs. Redgate^ Never mind what 
 I say." This last was a belated apology, on the 
 Duke of Wickford' s part. 
 
 "Wait." He was going, actually, to leave her
 
 BESS 129 
 
 in the lurch, but she stopped him. "Listen, Wick, 
 you're excited. Let me say one thing, Bess will 
 be better than you. Better for Iveagh. I don't 
 think," said Ernestine, "that anyone cares for Bess 
 more than I do, but I'm not afraid." 
 
 "I am," said Wickford wretchedly. "You don't 
 know him." 
 
 "You mean he would say anything to hurt her, 
 a girl?" 
 
 "Oh, Lord knows. He's not himself. He's been 
 up and down lately: but to-night it's down, very 
 low." 
 
 "It's not low down," said Ernestine. She was 
 not the least aware of making a joke. "I mean," 
 she resumed after a pause, as Wickford seemed to 
 be calming, "he would not make Bess suffer because 
 of his suffering, my Bess." 
 
 "No," muttered Wickford. Her Bess, that was 
 the point. His brother he knew, at the worst, would 
 have regard to anything that was hers. All the 
 time, Mrs. Redgate was repeating internally, "Is it 
 so 1 ? Are you in love with her? But how sudden, 
 how strangely sudden, Wickford, if it is." Nor, 
 till afterwards, did she think about the Duchess at 
 all, so greatly was she stirred and perplexed. 
 
 They came up with Bess and Iveagh standing
 
 130 HATCHWAYS 
 
 under the last of the thick trees' shadow, just before 
 the open drive swept round to the Duchess's door. 
 The Duke's drive and door they were, of course, 
 only the Duchess's hand, in Ernestine's memories, 
 was so clearly upon them. Iveagh and Bess were 
 not speaking. He stood very still in the shadow, 
 quiet as death. 
 
 "Won't you come in, Mrs. Redgate 1 ?" said Wick- 
 ford, in something like his ordinary tone. "Mother 
 is there, she'd like it." 
 
 "I think not, thanks," said Ernestine. "I told 
 Rick we would not keep him waiting. They'll be 
 back at the gate by now." 
 
 She gave her hand to Iveagh in the darkness, 
 he touched it merely, did not take. Taking that 
 hand would have committed him to a fresh effort, 
 it would have meant struggling further, a promise, 
 well he knew! He had promised enough, he 
 thought that night, to women: spent himself enough 
 for them. He had struggled sufficiently far. He 
 intended to rest now a bit, if he could get to London, 
 or Oxford, anywhere safe away. East Africa bet- 
 ter than nowhere, since Wick willed it now along 
 with the others, get a good start, and then drop 
 behind Sir George. . . . 
 
 "Good night, Miss Ryeborn," said Wickford.
 
 BESS 131 
 
 "Sorry you wouldn't come in. Come along " 
 The last to his brother, much as if he had been a 
 dog. 
 
 "Good night, Iveagh," said Bess. "I'm so sorry 
 about poor Timrnins." 
 
 Timmins ! Paralysis, on the part of the auditors, 
 Iveagh's relative, and Bess's. Paralysis, only to 
 be remedied by a violent move by Wickford, fetch- 
 ing, as it were, his enigmatic brother out of the toils. 
 
 Timmins! Timmins was the stable cat, a plain 
 torn tabby, that patrolled the yard at Holmer, care- 
 fully named by Bess and Iveagh according to his 
 dapper looks and excellent mousing disposition: 
 fetched to Hatchways for want of better one rainy 
 morning, long since, and drawn in a plain-cat atti- 
 tude, a smug attitude, as a "study of markings" 
 merely. Timmins, the conscientious model, since 
 dead of rat-poison, or poisoned rat, which, Iveagh 
 was uncertain, produced and pitied at such a mo- 
 ment, well ! 
 
 "Did Iveagh talk to you?" said Ernestine, when 
 they had got just far enough along the avenue, safe 
 from the retreating brothers, behind whom the door 
 of the mansion slammed, safe from Rick and the 
 clever Frenchman, back from escorting Adelaide, 
 leaning on the Holmer gate. "Did you talk*?"
 
 132 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "He didn't, much," said Bess, rather wistfully. 
 "He asked after the Pickle, though, remembered. 
 And he told me about Timmins, when I asked." 
 
 "I see," said Ernestine. "Asking about the 
 Pickle was wise, of Iveagh." A pause, reproachful 
 probably. "And asking about Timmins on your 
 part was, I suppose, polite." 
 
 "Don't be silly, Ernestine," said Bess. "As if 
 Timmins and the Pickle were equals, socially. . . . 
 I was rather glad he asked, though," she said, after 
 hesitation, and speaking lower, for they were near 
 enough now to the lodge-gate to catch the scent of 
 du Frettay's cigarette. "Because to-night, you 
 know, up at Hatchways, he seemed so very cross." 
 
 Cross! And in that little, shaken tone. . . . 
 
 "Wickford has better manners," said Ernestine, 
 guilty of experiment. But really, she did so want 
 to know, for Gertrude's sake. 
 
 "Oh yes, he's nice " In a most unsatisfied 
 voice. "I always liked Wickford," admitted Bess. 
 After another pause, a fresh effort at justice. 
 "They're both very good." 
 
 "Too good, do you think?" said Ernestine, in the 
 frightful pause that ensued. It was so very hard 
 on Wickford, after his efforts, too! 
 
 "No," said Bess, reflecting. "No. I don't mind
 
 BESS 133 
 
 a man simply for being good, it isn't fair. And 
 besides" growing warmer "think of Mr. Elphin- 
 stone! Mr. Elphinstone goodness! he was like 
 a man in a book. He always made me think of 
 Philip in that book, you know, standing and 
 showing Wickford how to do it, and what he ought 
 to be like. I don't wonder Guy killed Philip " 
 
 "It was the other way," said Ernestine. 
 
 "Was it*? Well, he did as bad, worse really 
 for Philip. Still," said Bess, "I don't wonder Guy 
 took his revenge like that " 
 
 "But, Bess, dear! He did not take his revenge. 
 He saved Philip's life at the expense of his own. 
 Really," said Ernestine, piqued -for the classics. 
 "Rick!" 
 
 "What's this," said Rick, in an avuncular tone, 
 for the parties were now united. 
 
 "Only she's libelling the Heir of Redcliffe. She 
 says he murdered Philip." 
 
 "It was the other way, so far as I remember," said 
 Rick. 
 
 "Coals of fire," said Bess indignantly. "Such 
 a cowardly revenge. And Philip quite unable 
 to do anything, too ill. No, Ernestine, listen! 
 Wickford would never do a thing like that, it's hope- 
 less to imagine it. He'd feel how stale it was be-
 
 134 HATCHWAYS 
 
 fore he started, started for Italy or wherever it 
 was. Yes, that's it," said Bess, pleased to have a 
 definition. "Wickford would never do anything 
 really stale. You could trust him not to, when it 
 came to the point." 
 
 "I see," said Ernestine, giving up the Heir of 
 Redcliffe. "And Iveagh'?" 
 
 "Oh, he couldn't," said Bess, hastily. "He 
 couldn't I don't know he couldn't be in that kind 
 of book. Iveagh's another author, isn't he, Uncle 
 Rick?' 
 
 "Another shelf," said Rick. "Bound differently, 
 quite right, Bessie. Wickford's a book I don't 
 much want to open, between ourselves." 
 
 "Oh, Uncle Rick, how nasty!" Bess put a re- 
 proachful, niece-like arm through his. The gesture 
 was one of complete agreement, though the words 
 were not. "I'm afraid, you know," said Bess, sud- 
 denly virtuous, "we've been talking personalities." 
 
 "The only subject to talk, Mademoiselle," said 
 Gabriel, speaking for the first time. He was sub- 
 ject to dreams to-night, as any man would be in 
 this exquisite half-darkness, moonsheen through the 
 larch-boughs, promise of hidden spring. 
 
 "Not for this girl," said Rick. "She's indifferent
 
 BESS 135 
 
 to persons, altogether, human persons, for at 
 least six hours of every day." 
 
 "Blessing," said Bess, thoughtfully. Her maiden 
 thoughts had left Mark Elphinstone, and Wick- 
 ford, and even Iveagh. They spurned Philip Mor- 
 ville and the good Sir Guy. They skipped M. du 
 Frettay, charming as he was, they avoided Uncle 
 Rick and his teasing, and moved forward to a bas- 
 ket. Bess's heart was straying, mislaying, evi- 
 dently : yet it was not lost beyond recall, since the 
 Pickle held part of it.
 
 IX 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A HIGH LINE 
 
 WELL, here was not material to give Mrs. Redgate, 
 Bess's aunt and the Duchess's friend, a quiet night. 
 Yet we regret thus to give our heroine away she 
 had one : because she was one of the healthy normal 
 people to whom the wakeful romantic form of night 
 was nearly unknown. That her thinking, when she 
 did it, was not real, hard thinking, we deny utterly. 
 Let him who denies it try to take Mrs. Redgate's 
 place, for just one Saturday at this period, when 
 both Holmer and Hatchways were full of guests. 
 We say Saturday, because the guests were largely 
 week-enders, Bess and M. du Frettay being the only 
 resident visitors at Hatchways, and four or five Ox- 
 boroughs, horribly noisy, the permanent residuum 
 at Holmer House. But week-enders, all the rest 
 of the time, must be reckoned for. Things must be 
 thought of for them, engagements made, tastes con- 
 sulted, the frightful question of household linen, 
 the dark problem of the country butcher, the peo- 
 ple whom they may meet, or must not meet, ear- 
 
 130
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 137 
 
 nestly reviewed: the tired ones (and so many of 
 these come from London) successfully concealed in 
 quiet rooms and shady hammocks: those that hate 
 cats and can barely tolerate kittens considered, 
 alas, for Bess! 
 
 It was over these debates, forethoughts and provi- 
 dences that Bess proved a blessing, invariably. She 
 wanted of course to paint, being in the country: 
 but she left her painting at any point when she saw 
 Ernestine in perplexity. How many art students 
 will do that 1 ? They regard their art so much more 
 than their aunt, do those student-maidens, com- 
 monly. And imagine a kitten-painter who has just, 
 after an hour's patient coaxing, got the model to 
 pose ! no, Bess was a blessing, quite exceptionally. 
 She went to the village, at a moment's notice, to 
 blarney the butcher, who then and there preferred 
 her to the Duchess, and allowed her the best joint. 
 She did the flowers, all of them: Ernestine, at her 
 advent, laid the whole floral scheme, for weeks, in 
 Bess's arms. She never messed things, or dropped 
 things, having the quick firm fingers of art. She 
 wrote a lovely picture-hand on the menu cards, 
 which was also readable. She washed the very 
 best-of-all white china, when Ernestine was not 
 quite sure of the new maid. She ironed too,
 
 138 HATCHWAYS 
 
 really we tremble to breathe in the ear of female, 
 and waste on the ear of male readers, what kind of 
 ironing, in the real rigour of week-enders, Miss Rye- 
 born did. Hatchways was not a large house, and 
 its hospitable doors often stretched, stretched to 
 straining. . . . M. du Frettay, profoundly inter- 
 ested in the ironing mysteries, mentioned, when he 
 took occasion to spy into the little wash-house be- 
 yond the scullery, that his mother did the same. 
 That he spied as often as he could, goes without say- 
 ing: for Bess in an apron at an ironing-board, with 
 her beautiful arms bare to the elbow, was delicious 
 to behold. 
 
 Enfin, as M. du Frettay said, pitch your 
 standard at a certain height, in hospitality, and no 
 thinking is like it: it is hard, hard work. Only 
 whatever you do, do not pitch it too high, or your 
 guests themselves become conscious of the soaring 
 standard, straining to breaking-point, threatening, 
 reproaching them, which never should be. 
 
 Ernestine's guests were not worried by her 
 thoughts for their good, they were all so silent. She 
 and Bess seemed always to be easy, and to have 
 plenty of time. Nobody in consequence ever in- 
 sulted her with "You must be tired, dear, do come 
 and rest a little," which being interpreted means
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 139 
 
 "You are getting old, and plainer than I remem- 
 bered, do for goodness' sake keep still." 
 
 Nobody ever said either "Ernestine, what a 
 sweet room this is, what good soup, how nicely 
 you do things": they forgot about their surround- 
 ings, and very often, about their food. They for- 
 got most things, at Hatchways, beyond that they 
 were thankful to get there, and powerfully sorry to 
 leave. And the weary, the really tired ones, 
 we will not speak of them. We have seen how, to 
 Sir George and such workers, the very thought of 
 Hatchways was peace. And it was they, needless 
 to say, wanderers and ponderers in the world's cause, 
 the worn official, the shrinking success, the con- 
 scious failure, that Ernestine was really happy to 
 have. 
 
 Only not cranks, she avoided them: or they 
 avoided her, we cannot be certain which. Ernes- 
 tine, and her husband as well, had a taste for sanity. , 
 
 The Holmer house-party did not invade the 
 Hatchways house-party often: though the invasion 
 was certainly that way round when it came. Hol- 
 mer hospitality, compact of "English pretension and 
 Irish untidiness," that most uncharitable saying of 
 Marchant's came to look, at times: to look at,
 
 140 HATCHWAYS 
 
 discontentedly, and see how Ernestine did it. The 
 Oxborough party assaulted her precincts in the 
 morning, by preference, when least required, both 
 sexes tightly bound in tweed and shod in calf, both, 
 as a rule, dropping their cigarette-ends into the 
 crocus-bed before they entered, but they came, al- 
 most invariably, to see where Wickford or Iveagh 
 was. Having attained some news of those truant 
 members of the Holmer household, that pair of 
 traitors to the Oxborough tradition, they generally 
 remarked on something they saw with unvarnished 
 sincerity, untainted by any courteous intention, 
 looked carefully at the "painting-girl" or blankly at 
 the Frenchman, and went away again. 
 
 Rarely, however, they pounced upon and carried 
 off the defaulting cousin, nephew, or grandson, 
 Iveagh or Wick. Iveagh always, and the Duke as 
 often as possible, melted into the atmosphere when 
 Oxboroughs were about. They disappeared with 
 the greatest precision and unanimity when especially 
 two Oxboroughs graced their mother's board, two 
 uncles, Giles and Oliver, loathed by both. Iveagh, 
 the more pure-blooded cave-dweller, was then never 
 to be found, no corner of the estate, treacherous 
 breeze or untrustworthy leaf, disclosed him. Wick- 
 ford, intermingled with a Saxon stock, was forced
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 141 
 
 at moments to materialise; but he was at his stiffest 
 and least expressive when he did so; and he had, 
 of course, at his uncles' hands, to suffer for two. 
 
 Things generally went from bad to worse on these 
 occasions, until, boisterously urged by all the family, 
 the Duchess was driven to intervene. 
 
 Thus, one fine morning, came the Duchess in 
 person, stepping under the larch-trees, and down the 
 Hatchways drive. She looked about her as she 
 came, keen-eyed, seeking her defaulters; and caught 
 a glimpse, through branches, of a hammock and a 
 tired guest. The branches were not leafy enough 
 yet to do their duty, and Ernestine had apologised 
 for them ; however, even the Duchess dared not push 
 her exploration further in that direction, so she pur- 
 sued her way. 
 
 Then she perceived Miss Elizabeth Ryeborn, 
 known to Oxboroughs as the painting-girl, peace- 
 fully installed with two cats and a sketch-book, on 
 a rug on the grass beneath the study window, where 
 there is no creeper, and one can have one's back to 
 the wall. 
 
 "Then he's not there," thought the Duchess, her 
 maternal thoughts, as usual, caressing her eldest- 
 born. "Let's hope, granted he's not there, he's 
 where he ought to be."
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 She pursued, stepping lightly and firmly, for she 
 was a well-set-up little woman, round the corner 
 where the pink tree or Pyrus is to the Hatchways 
 hall door. There was Rick, master of the estate, 
 not to say the pink tree or Pyrus, 'which was more 
 advanced than the Duchess's, sunning himself with 
 the Times newspaper. Whether his spectacles were 
 turned on one of his own articles we leave open to 
 conjecture, he seemed content. 
 
 "Hullo," said Rick. "Good morning. Come 
 after Nesta? She's somewhere about." 
 
 The Duchess lowered her sunshade with a click. 
 She was no stickler for decorum, at least from people 
 whom she regarded as her equals. 
 
 "I've come, Mr. Redgate," she said monument- 
 ally, "to find my sons." 
 
 "Really now, I haven't seen 'em," said Rick, 
 giving his learned mind to it. "There's du Frettay, 
 now, he might know about 'em, he's working in 
 there." 
 
 "Thanks," said the Duchess, who had seen M. du 
 Frettay's dark head in the study, to the rear of Miss 
 Ryeborn and the cats. Working, she privately 
 thought, was one way of putting it, considering a 
 girl under the window. Ernestine ought to look 
 after that child better, with Frenchmen about.
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 143 
 
 "No," said the Duchess aloud. "I can do with- 
 out M. du Frettay, since he is well occupied evi- 
 dently " 
 
 "A votre service," called M. du Frettay, from be- 
 hind the half-open study door. That was Hatch- 
 ways all over, doors and windows standing open, 
 all the morning air invading all the domestic in- 
 terior, there was no proper privacy when one ap- 
 peared at the unconventional hour. 
 
 "Stay where you are," called the Duchess, "unless 
 you know exactly where Wickford is, then you can 
 come out." 
 
 Silence, profound. M. du Frettay, taking her at 
 her word, had recurred to his so-called labours. He 
 repaid incivility with incivility, it is such nonsense 
 about his countrymen's manners! The Duchess 
 registered this as a specimen of French form, to be 
 discussed amid Oxboroughs that evening. 
 
 "Ask Bess where Nesta is," called Rick. Was 
 there ever such an easy-going establishment? 
 
 "Willingly," called M. du Frettay, reviving. 
 "Did I know where is your niece." 
 
 "You hypocrite !" thought the Duchess. 
 
 "Ernestine is down at the chickens," said a sweet 
 dreamy tone in the void : the voice of a young lady, 
 lost in art and circled by kittens, who was very
 
 144 HATCHWAYS 
 
 happy indeed. "I mean the incubators. Shall I 
 come, Uncle Rick 1 ?" 
 
 "No," said Rick. "You stop where you are." 
 And, folding up the Times newspaper, he escorted 
 the Duchess himself. 
 
 "You incubate, do you?" she said, on the way. 
 
 "She's taken to it," said Rick. "Only on trial, 
 though. If it doesn't work out, in money and 
 trouble, I advised her to give it up." 
 
 "I should say," said the Duchess, "she'd do that 
 without you, Mr. Redgate." 
 
 She put down certain sides of her friend Ernes- 
 tine, we may mention, as "commercial." She 
 thought, good style as dear Ernestine was, it would 
 not take very deep seeking to discover commercial 
 origins or roots to the Ryeborn family. It came 
 from the north, the north midland, and she 
 suspected Manchester. Both aunt and niece used 
 quaint northern phrases at times. When the 
 Duchess was really displeased with Ernestine, she 
 added to her image a Manchester background. Be- 
 ing very deeply displeased this morning, on Wick- 
 ford's account, she did so now. 
 
 "Well," said Ernestine's husband, "she's not 
 without a sense of finance, I'll grant you. Du Fret- 
 tay there is surprised I don't let her do more, give
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 145 
 
 her scope, as he calls it. We were talking about it 
 lately." 
 
 "Don't you give in to his ideas," said the 
 Duchess: who was all for the rights of woman, un- 
 less they happened to be upheld by France. Then 
 she upheld the rights of English custom, as opposed 
 to French custom, the man with a close hand on 
 the money-bags. As for her own case well, it was 
 exceptional. She was a widow, and a mother: 
 Wickford, man as he undoubtedly was, could not 
 be allowed to know which things were which, just 
 at present. 
 
 "I shouldn't think of giving in," explained Rick. 
 "His ideas are rubbish, half of 'em. But he's amus- 
 ing to listen to. Really, I like that young man." 
 
 The Duchess sniffed, faintly. She granted him 
 leave to like Gabriel du Frettay, within bounds, the 
 young fellow accruing to her personal estate, via 
 George. She undertook herself, in her single per- 
 son, to keep du Frettay in his place, if he became 
 nationally obstreperous. 
 
 They found Ernestine at the chickens, quiet trag- 
 edy upon her countenance. She extended her left 
 hand, mutely, to her husband as he came up the 
 path. 
 
 "Hullo!" said Rick, looking. "That's bad.
 
 146 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Not a fox, is it?" For she held a small, dead yel- 
 low chicken in one hand. 
 
 "That's not a fox," said the Duchess with an ex- 
 perienced eye. "That's a cat, probably." 
 
 "A cat?" Rick's face grew long as well. "All 
 right. Poor girl, we won't tell her. It got out, I 
 suppose?" 
 
 "I put them in the coop, for an hour, to run," 
 said Ernestine regretfully. "I thought the sun 
 wouldn't hurt them. I suppose there was a hole." 
 
 "Requiescat," said Rick, half sympathising, half 
 chaffing her. Indeed, there was no marked com- 
 merciality, that moment, about his wife. 'Til bury 
 it. Bess never counted 'em, did she? Very well, 
 then, we won't let on." 
 
 Thus Rick, the good uncle, and away he went, 
 with the chicken, to find a spade. Ernestine, hav- 
 ing reimprisoned the rest of the brood, left the 
 atmosphere of incubators, which was stuffy, rather, 
 for Gertrude, and went with her instead to a seat: 
 a seat in a place which was not precisely a view- 
 point, but urged one to get up, after resting a little, 
 and find a view. Many of the Hatchways seats 
 were unfixed like this, "wayside stopping-places" 
 (like Happiness) tempting one on. And yet you 
 could be happy upon any of them.
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 147 
 
 "Now, Ernestine," said the Duchess monument- 
 ally, sitting in the extreme corner of the seat, and 
 disdaining cushions extended. "Will you tell me 
 exactly where my boy is, with that girl of yours. 
 It's time I knew about it." 
 
 Mrs. Redgate, of course, had expected this, sooner 
 or later. Considering the week that lay behind her, 
 since Bess's arrival, and considering Gertrude's strict 
 watchfulness on all girls in her precious son's vicin- 
 ity at all times, it was bound to come. Yet not- 
 withstanding her expectation, her preparation, and 
 her clear conscience, she was startled by Gertrude's 
 tone. To disturb her, in the morning, with a tone 
 like that, was trying of Gertrude, it really was. 
 She would sooner, in the name of friendliness, have 
 been warned. 
 
 "I really cannot tell you," she said gently, though 
 in the manner of parrying. "Had you not better 
 ask himself?" 
 
 "Apart from the fact," said the Duchess, "that 
 Wickford makes himself, since my brother Giles' 
 arrival on Friday night, as hard as possible to find, 
 owing to his own brother's example " 
 
 "Unjust," said the little indicator in Ernestine; 
 her eyes merely wandered, seeking the elusive view. 
 
 " Quite apart from that," said the Duchess, "it
 
 148 HATCHWAYS 
 
 is highly improbable things are at a stage when any- 
 thing could be drawn from Wickford. I hope 
 naturally they will never reach a stage when I need 
 to enquire, still less when he comes to tell me of 
 his own accord. It is, however, time for me to face 
 the fact that he is flirting, if flirting he is: and I 
 expect I ask you as a friend to tell me." 
 
 Ernestine, having lifted her buckler a little higher 
 during the course of that speech, laid it down beside 
 her at the end. It was inevitable to think of her in 
 military panoply, armed, as she sat at the other end 
 of the Duchess's seat. 
 
 "Gertrude," she said, "you will excuse me, but 
 there is only one thing I can possibly say to reassure 
 you. I really don't think Bess cares for Wickford." 
 
 "Oh." Pause. "Well," said the Duchess, "that 
 is something, though " 
 
 "Excuse me, it is everything," said Ernestine. 
 Pause. "If you tell me," she resumed, "that Bess 
 would accept Wickford on any ground but that of 
 really caring for him " 
 
 Pause. "Well," said the Duchess, "this is hardly 
 on the point " 
 
 "It is exactly on it," said Ernestine. Were they 
 going to quarrel, really"? She felt some doubt, 
 knowing her friend's weaknesses and peculiarities.
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 149 
 
 But these things had to be said. It was better to 
 get them said, and come on to the kinder part, if it 
 could be managed, afterwards. 
 
 Now, the Duchess considered herself debarred by 
 friendship, which she took quite seriously, from 
 stating her real conviction, which was that a non- 
 descript little girl like Bess, of probably commercial, 
 and possibly Manchester, antecedents, is bound to 
 throw everything to the winds for the chance of a 
 Duchess's coronet. Instead, she gave Ernestine's 
 good sense the credit of knowing this, while she took 
 a high line in the matter for the sake of her dignity. 
 The Duchess hardly thought the worse of her for 
 it, either; though she could not believe Ernestine 
 had not been exulting in spirit during the critical 
 week past. 
 
 "May I ask," she said, after an interval, "what 
 evidence you have of Miss Ryeborn's indifference*?" 
 
 "Oh dear no, Gertrude, you mayn't indeed. 
 Why," said Ernestine, "I might as well ask you what 
 evidence you hold of your son's serious or of his 
 honest intentions." 
 
 "Ernestine !" 
 
 "Exactly," said Ernestine, and laughed, glancing 
 eye to eye. "You wouldn't like it." 
 
 The Duchess strove hard for anything like her
 
 150 HATCHWAYS 
 
 ordinary point of view. Things, for the moment, 
 seemed to be crumbling. "You're Manchester," 
 she said to herself. "You mayn't be more. I am 
 extremely modern and amiable not to snub you." 
 Thus she clutched things, and pulled them straight 
 again. 
 
 "Take it," she said dryly, "that I have been rather 
 full up with my people for a week past, too much 
 so to see as much as I might have seen, had I been 
 at liberty." 
 
 Ernestine assented. "Take it that I have too. 
 Still, since I know them both, I really see no harm 
 in it " 
 
 "No harm?' 
 
 "No harm, surely, in their understanding one 
 another, granted of course they know their own 
 minds. M. du Frettay," said Ernestine, "would be 
 rather shocked at me " 
 
 "M. du Frettay?" 
 
 "Yes. You know the French think that you and 
 I, because we're married, ought to know better 
 about such things than Wickford or Bess. I don't 
 think so, I told him I didn't " 
 
 "You spoke to him about the matter*?" 
 
 "No, we were talking generally. However" 
 she recurred "I really think Bess knows her own
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 151 
 
 mind, Gertrude. I really think you need have no 
 fear." 
 
 During the interval that ensued, the Duchess's 
 faded little Oxborough face was set. So far, the 
 morning's business had not turned out at all as she 
 had arranged it. She had come, speaking broadly, 
 of course, to scold Ernestine. Ernestine had hin- 
 dered that, by her high line, almost from the first. 
 Now she, the Duchess of Wickford, was to be re- 
 assured, it seemed, but not at all in the way she 
 wished. That Wickford should, in any circum- 
 stances, let himself in for a refusal . . . and yet she 
 knew too well she could count on neither of those 
 wretched boys for proper pride. Fear, even im- 
 minent fear, of a refusal would not stay Wickford, 
 should he so choose, from laying himself at Miss 
 Ryeborn's feet. A far more humiliating certainty 
 had not stayed Iveagh. . . . The Duchess's warrior 
 nostril dilated, and her brow knit. She would 
 greatly have liked, at that minute, to slap them 
 both. . . . 
 
 "Well," she said, moving. "I suppose that is 
 all you think you can tell me. I had an idea I knew 
 you better than that." 
 
 "I'm sorry, Gertrude, really. I have been a little 
 puzzled myself."
 
 152 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Indeed? On what grounds?" 
 
 "I thought it odd of Wickford, unlike him. 
 They have never been anything but friends before." 
 
 "Oh. Well, Wickford's not particularly given 
 to warning one of his intentions, if that's all. At 
 least they are not together at this moment?" 
 
 "No," said Ernestine. "When Bess is drawing, 
 she prefers to be alone." 
 
 "Oh, that's why, is it?" thought the Duchess. 
 "By the way," she said, "I meant to tell you. I 
 shouldn't trust that young fellow Frettay too far." 
 
 Mrs. Redgate coloured, and almost started. At 
 least she turned her head. "With Bess, do you 
 mean?' 
 
 "Whom else should I mean?" The Duchess 
 glanced coolly at her. It was fair return for the 
 stroke at Wickford, anyhow. 
 
 "Well?" she said, after a long interlude. 
 
 "I suppose it's extraordinarily hard for me to dis- 
 trust anybody," said Ernestine, slowly. "Certainly 
 I could not M. du Frettay. I was just wondering 
 if I could." 
 
 "He's a Parisian," said the Duchess, digging the 
 point of her sunshade in the soft grass. "Parisians 
 are all the same."
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 153 
 
 "They may be. But really, he works so hard." 
 
 "Works?" 
 
 "Yes. I never knew anyone so hard-working. 
 He simply slaves at those plans of his all the morn- 
 ing, even these lovely mornings, as you probably 
 saw. And goodness knows at what time of day he 
 starts. I asked him to let me know," said Ernes- 
 tine, "because of breakfast. I promised him food 
 at any hour after six he liked." 
 
 "Six*?" said the Duchess: who had not herself 
 troubled to feed M. du Frettay before half -past 
 nine, when under her charge. 
 
 "Yes, but he only laughed. He seems to think a 
 man can work for three hours on nothing at all. 
 It's not good for him," said Ernestine, "and when 
 he's supposed to be resting, too. Really, we shall 
 have to teach him better ways." 
 
 "You are talking a good deal this morning," 
 thought the Duchess ; a propos of nothing, of course, 
 unless the little flush in Ernestine's face, which was 
 still there. She was a person who changed colour 
 rarely. "You are quite a pretty woman still," she 
 added to the thought, as her friend got up of a sud- 
 den and walked away from the seat, as though to 
 discover that elusive view.
 
 154 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Well, so I suppose you got him to accept break- 
 fast," she said, still digging little holes in the turf, 
 when Ernestine came back. 
 
 "At seven, we compromised," said Ernestine, 
 who had found the view in the interval, and looked 
 more contented. She had had to overcome a rage 
 of anger with Gertrude: not at all uncommon, we 
 may mention, in that society. The flush had been 
 anger, purely; for, like all strong natures, she had 
 a store of deep anger within. . . . Doubly sus- 
 pected, twice insulted in one conversation. 
 Really, it was only Gertrude who could do such 
 things, and still expect to be liked! 
 
 "What does du Frettay work at?" said the 
 Duchess, watching her. They were now face to 
 face. 
 
 "Oh, plans of those machines. He has got hold 
 of a new idea for one, since he has been across, and 
 is trying it, trying to work it out. Iveagh under- 
 stands, it's too much for most of us. By the way, 
 Gertrude, " 
 
 "Well?' 
 
 "Perhaps I ought to tell you. They won't like 
 me for it. Have you any objection to Iveagh going 
 up?" 
 
 "Up?"
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 155 
 
 "Flying, yes. Because, unless you stop him, he 
 certainly will." 
 
 Another pause, during which the Duchess recov- 
 ered. We had perhaps better repeat, this was in 
 the infant days of English aviation, accidents at 
 every turn. 
 
 "If Iveagh asks my permission," she said coldly, 
 "I shall refuse it, naturally." 
 
 "Not otherwise?" 
 
 "Otherwise, he will do what he likes." 
 
 Mrs. Redgate walked away again, then came 
 back and stood beside her. "It's dangerous," she 
 mentioned. "Suppose he were killed." 
 
 "Suppose," said the Duchess, "your little French- 
 man was." 
 
 "If my little Frenchman was" her low tone con- 
 centrated "his mother would go down to the grave 
 sorrowing within a week. I am sure of that, any- 
 how, from Sir George." 
 
 "Ah," said the Duchess, dropping her eyes. "No 
 doubt." 
 
 "It was because of the danger, of course, Iveagh 
 accepted," pursued Ernestine, persisted, is a better 
 word. It took courage, with that face before her. 
 
 "I dare say. Iveagh will take any risks, won't 
 he? except the ones we advise."
 
 156 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Do you advise him risks'? I shouldn't, 
 Gertrude. I mean, he's far too fond of them. 
 He'll choose, of his own accord, the worst he can 
 find." 
 
 "So his brother tells me." 
 
 "And why, does Wickford say"? . . . Because he 
 cannot believe, nothing will persuade him, that 
 anybody really cares whether he lives or dies." 
 
 "Thank you, Ernestine. ... I care, and he 
 knows it. If he gives me a chance of stating my 
 feelings, about that flying nonsense, I shall do so, 
 gladly. Not otherwise." 
 
 "But you know he won't," thought Ernestine. 
 "You know he won't, Gertrude! So you don't 
 care. You don't care really. . . . Isn't it getting 
 a little cold*?" she said aloud. "There's a fire in 
 the breakfast-room, do come in." 
 
 Iveagh, who had been riding all day, nobody 
 knew where, brought home a young rabbit to Bess. 
 He laid it beside her on the grass in the evening 
 light, and prepared at once to depart again. But 
 her exclamation of rapture delayed him. 
 
 "Oh," said Bess. "Ok! Where's your 
 mother?" 
 
 She addressed the rabbit, which was petrified as
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 157 
 
 a little image with terror, having been carried for 
 an hour in a gentleman's pocket. 
 
 "I shot the mother," said Iveagh. 
 
 "You didn't !" She gazed frightened, indignant, 
 kneeling upon the grass, the rabbit in her hands. 
 "Oh, you're always shooting things. Go away!" 
 
 "Why*?" said Iveagh: and prepared to stay at 
 once : he had not meant to, previously. He stopped, 
 hung about, pretended to whistle, and picked up 
 Bess's drawing-book. 
 
 "You're a murderer," said Bess, cherishing the 
 orphan against her white neck. "Red-handed, I 
 hate you. Iveagh, I don't want you to look at 
 that. Put it down " Pause. "Please." 
 
 Iveagh put it down. "What did you kill it for?" 
 said Bess. 
 
 "Why wouldn't I, when the place is rotten," said 
 Iveagh, his eyes straying. "They're gnawin' up 
 Merchant's young trees. Marchant gettin' frisky 
 at Oxford, wired me to see to it, so I went." 
 
 "Why didn't you kill this, then?" Bess's accus- 
 ing eyes were upon him. 
 
 "Thought you'd like it," mumbled Iveagh. His 
 errant gaze met hers a second. "Do you?" 
 
 "Yes. Of course. It's as soft as soft. Where 
 are you going now?"
 
 158 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Home to dinner." 
 
 "Wickford will be horribly cross with you," said 
 Bess. "He's had a horrid day." 
 
 "I wouldn't make a third," remarked Iveagh, 
 with the shadow of a smile. "Addy in a wax isn't 
 entertainin'." 
 
 "There! You know all about it. Of course he 
 told me, at least not about her. Why couldn't 
 you be nice, and go? He's always doing things for 
 you." 
 
 Iveagh lifted his eyebrows, or rather one of them ; 
 and prepared again to depart. "Come up," he said, 
 in the act of leaving, "and see my Uncle Giles to- 
 morrow." 
 
 "Good gracious! Why?" 
 
 "Only he's worth seein'." 
 
 Bess considered whether she could venture. She 
 decided her courage would not stand it. "I can't," 
 she said, "unless your mother asks me. Or Wick- 
 ford." 
 
 "Hullo ! Why Wick more'n me?" 
 
 "Because," said Miss Ryeborn very clearly, "he 
 is the owner of the house you are asking me to." 
 
 "Good night," said Iveagh. 
 
 "Good night." Then a soft call. "Iveagh, 
 thank you."
 
 MRS. REDGATE TAKES A LINE 159 
 
 He swung round wondering, saw the child-rabbit 
 clasped to her throat as she knelt, and had the 
 thanks explained. He only looked direct at the 
 sight a moment, with that odd gaze of his, at once 
 deliberate and furtive, as though the use of his eyes 
 was destined really to something quite different. 
 Then he went. 
 
 "Oh, goodness," whispered Bess to the little rab- 
 bit. "I love him. I love him so. ... I don't 
 know why."
 
 X 
 
 WICKFORD 
 
 THINGS were in this condition when Lise came 
 home. 
 
 "Hard luck, Nesta!" said Rick, when the news 
 reached his wife. Rick, occupied with articles, did 
 not trouble much, as a rule, to enter into the bud- 
 ding romances of his district, but he knew when 
 Nesta was contented, as he knew when she was both- 
 ered, and he guessed this thunderclap might lay low 
 her hopes. 
 
 The Duchess brought the news. Harassed by 
 Oxboroughs, who would not go, the Duchess was 
 very downright on the subject, her expressions 
 hurt Ernestine, who upheld that Lise had done no 
 wrong. Lise had been too devoted, if anything, try- 
 ing to follow Mark into unfit regions whither his 
 work conveyed him, instead of staying where put 
 upon the healthful heights. And so, of course, her 
 health broke down : and Mark, much worried, seized 
 command and sent her back to England. Lise, who 
 
 160
 
 WICKFORD 161 
 
 was miserable at leaving Mark, but simply loved 
 to be commanded, came: stipulating a short visit 
 only before she returned to him and her duties. 
 
 Such behaviour, by all the rights of things, should 
 satisfy Gertrude, who idealised Mark: but Gertrude 
 was not so easily satisfied, in the circumstances. 
 She said, Mark's wife or no, she wouldn't have the 
 girl, nothing would induce her. Nor, she implied, 
 would Ernestine have Lise, if she had any regard for 
 friendship, far-sightedness, or general good feeling. 
 
 Ernestine differed here. She differed essentially 
 with Gertrude, though she found, at short notice, the 
 difference hard to explain. First and foremost, 
 Lise, if in England, must come to Holmer. There 
 was no escaping it, possibly, that at least her 
 friend should see. The Duchess was Captain 
 Mark's godmother, relation, and especial patroness. 
 The district was Lise's former home. The family 
 Fitzmaurice, it was true, had moved to Richmond 
 after the girl's marriage, but that made no differ- 
 ence, all her old friends were here. 
 
 Well then, so far clear: the delicate, dangerous 
 Lise must come. The next point was harder to 
 evolve. It was better she should come, better for 
 everybody, and, in a way, for Iveagh. Lise at 
 Richmond, to Tveagh, was questionably more dan-
 
 162 HATCHWAYS 
 
 gerous than Lise in India, and certainly more dan- 
 gerous than Lise at arm's length. It was not pos- 
 sible for Ernestine to explain to Iveagh's mother 
 how she knew this, the Duchess was so little aware 
 of her son's construction. There was no question 
 of forgetting, for Iveagh. That often-stated ad- 
 vantage of Lise at a distance did not exist, His 
 hunger for her, wearing, aching hunger, wher- 
 ever it was placed, between body and soul, between 
 heart and imagination, was not to be reduced by 
 losing sight of her. Surely Gertrude might guess 
 he was not that sort of boy ! To have her in Eng- 
 land, and just beyond reach, as her parents' present 
 home would be, was the surest way of maddening 
 her attraction, of inflaming him, body and soul, 
 anew. To have her here, quite suddenly, quite 
 simply, under his eyes at Hatchways, Lise as the 
 wife of Mark, devoted to Mark, dreaming of Mark, 
 it would be poignant, of course, but less perilous, 
 if only Gertrude would see ! 
 
 Gertrude did not, ever. When Ernestine wrote 
 to Richmond to invite Mrs. Elphinstone, in the last 
 week of March, to Hatchways, the Duchess, by her 
 change of manner, very nearly threw her off. It 
 was so simple, in the circumstances, the Duchess 
 thought, to be rude to Lise, brutal to her, as a pos-
 
 WICKFORD 163 
 
 sible scandal to a Suir, Ernestine did not think so. 
 Lise, in herself, was not a scandal: she was mis- 
 chievous at worst, barely more than became so ex- 
 quisitely pretty a girl. Lise was delicate Mark 
 wanted her cared for that finished it. All sick 
 and weary people, who had ever been friendly there, 
 came to Hatchways to recuperate. And Lise had 
 been friendly, sweet very often to Ernestine. A 
 wild thing of nineteen, half the district sighing after 
 her, of course Ernestine had taken charge. Why, 
 she had even cried to her her first confession of love 
 for Mark. . . . Was that not a bond, and lasting? 
 
 "No," said the Duchess. 
 
 So the strain on the former friendship grew very 
 marked. It waxed daily. It emerged, unadorned, 
 in the Duchess's letters to such Oxboroughs as were 
 distant, and those Oxboroughs smiled. Gertrude 
 "s'emballait," they implied, so heedlessly, and cast 
 off with a like ease. Isabel, Oliver, and Giles, still 
 on the premises, took in the facts beneath their eyes 
 by degrees, and made remarks on them. The chief 
 thing they observed was that it spoiled Gertrude's 
 temper, and made her say things to them which (as 
 the prettiest and mildest of the Oxboroughs) they 
 did not expect her to say. 
 
 "Gertrude seems to be rubbed up," said Giles to
 
 164. HATCHWAYS 
 
 Oliver after a week of it. But they did not take 
 the best way to relieve their nephew and remedy 
 matters, which was to go. It happened that 
 Wickford's stable, filled with Iveagh's bargains, 
 suited these Oxboroughs: so they stayed, and used 
 it. 
 
 Wickford took the news of the reappearance of 
 Lise in silence. He found nothing to say when his 
 mother told him the fact, wreathed in commentary 
 concerning Ernestine's obstinacy and strange lack of 
 taste. The Duke was dealing with his uncles at 
 the time single-handed not that he had not really 
 had to do so throughout for Iveagh was away. 
 Right off the scene, not merely lurking. Du Fret- 
 tay had been summoned, or summoned himself, to 
 an aviation meeting; and Iveagh went with him, 
 varying the programme in du Frettay's interest by 
 "lookin' in" on Marchant at Oxford, and getting 
 him to disclose some of the "shows" of that beloved 
 retreat. Wickford let his brother go without a 
 warning, for he had, unlike his mother, a complete 
 confidence in the Frenchman's good breeding and 
 good sense. It was enough for Wickford that du 
 Frettay was staying with Mrs. Redgate, even had 
 not Sir George's high opinion of his origins backed 
 her up. Origins, to a Suir, meant much, meant
 
 WICKFORD 165 
 
 all, in short. Origins, to an Oxborough, meant the 
 impossibility of doing certain things, all of which 
 Suirs did constantly: and the advisability of doing 
 others, which Suirs as often as not left out. Per- 
 haps the ideas of the race du Frettay did not tally 
 with the ideas of racial Suir completely: but they 
 were far nearer than Oxborough and anything 
 French could ever be. 
 
 "I feel as if I ought to apologise, Wick," said 
 Ernestine, when at last he got away alone to Hatch- 
 ways to see her about it. 
 
 "Oh, you needn't fag," said Wickford. "If 
 you'd not taken the girl, I should have had to, o* 
 course, and then " he flung himself down, with 
 excessive nonchalance, into a seat half- turned from 
 her "there we'd be!" 
 
 "I hadn't thought of that," admitted Ernestine. 
 Unseen behind him, her look melted. Wick's rare 
 "I" was as stately as it was simple. No artificial 
 dignities his mother lent him really equalled his 
 own, had she ever allowed him to assume it. Just 
 once or twice, when the Duchess omitted to worry 
 him in public, or when he forgot her ever-impending 
 presence, she had noticed that manner of his descend, 
 surprised. 
 
 "No, you never think o' me striking, do you 1 ?"
 
 166 HATCHWAYS 
 
 said Wickford, flicking the dust off his boot with 
 his whip as he gazed downward. "Only him." 
 
 "Gently," said Ernestine's manner, as it said to 
 the Suirs, not infrequently. 
 
 "Beastly sorry, Mrs. Redgate," said Wickford, 
 the other side of him. He turned his eyes, and 
 about half himself, in her direction. "It's jolly 
 good of you to do this, really, it's our job, by 
 rights. She'll be better here, of course, poor little 
 girl. No harm in her, beyond that, never was." 
 Another pause, then a painful breath. "Suppose 
 I've got to tell him, Mother won't." 
 
 "I will, if it bothers you," said Ernestine in the 
 next pause. Wickford' s face had grown blank, as 
 it always did when he faced a delicate business. 
 His thoughts grew blank, very often, simultan- 
 eously. 
 
 "I expect I'd best," he replied, gazing in front of 
 him, dragging at his lip in painful abstraction, 
 both brothers shaved clean. 
 
 "Why? Why, Wickford? Don't you trust 
 him to behave?" 
 
 "Not I," said the little Duke. "No chance of it, 
 now." 
 
 "Like touching dynamite, do you think?"
 
 WICKFORD 167 
 
 After a dubious glance in her direction "You 
 don't know what it is," growled Wickford. 
 
 In the next interval, he realised by degrees what 
 he had said, and woke right out of his trance, blush- 
 ing scarlet. "Mrs. Redgate, I'm sorry," he stam- 
 mered, drawing in his feet. "I never meant " 
 
 She broke into laughter, holding out her hand. 
 "Do you know what it is?" she asked him. 
 
 "Shouldn't wonder," said Wickford, after some 
 time. A false step of that sort threw him out in 
 dialogue dreadfully. "Needn't think I'm a saint, 
 anyhow," he contended. 
 
 "I don't, Bess doesn't either." 
 
 "Bess?" His eyes reached hers. 
 
 "She told Rick once that she thought neither of 
 you would die young of saintliness." 
 
 "She did? Well, I'm obliged to her. I only 
 wish some others had her sense." 
 
 "You are not in love with her, at least," reflected 
 Ernestine. "You are making that pretty clear. I 
 wonder if it should be only it would be like 
 you." 
 
 "You don't want to go to heaven before Iveagh," 
 she suggested, looking up at him as he rose to take 
 leave.
 
 168 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Not likely," said the Duke. "Goo'-bye." 
 
 "Good-bye. Your uncle and Adelaide, is it?" 
 for the usual clipped echo of the horse-hoofs had 
 come to her ears. 
 
 He nodded, watching across her the horses' heads 
 pass along the lane. 
 
 "Rotten position for a man," he spluttered sud- 
 denly, "if Mother knew, setting me up to talk to 
 him! Fairly amazin' she doesn't grasp it, con- 
 sidering but there's no letting a woman know! 
 You needn't laugh. Why, look here, when the kid 
 gets onto Lise, it's all I can do not to be jealous. 
 . . . You'd not understand. It's rippin' to see him 
 go off er decent or no. Not likely I'd tell 
 Mother that, though, wouldn't suit her, all my 
 ideas. She doesn't follow common little cattle like 
 Iveagh and me. I rag him, since I must, then I 
 translate it, and tell her, but I feel a fool, o' 
 course. Why, if I could love a girl like that, a 
 
 real girl, not a common charmer " He drew 
 
 in again perforce, and just in time. 
 
 "You will some day," said Ernestine. 
 
 "Please God," said the Duke profanely. 
 "Doesn't look like it. There are the nags. . . . 
 Look here, now " He returned to his duty, sud- 
 denly. "I'd better write to the boy, strikes me.
 
 WICKFORD 169 
 
 Then he could work some of it off on du Frettay, 
 he's a safe man." 
 
 "Do you think so?' 
 
 "Oh yes, he's all right, bother Aunt Isabel. 
 It's like this, what do you want me to tell him, 
 exactly? How much of it?" 
 
 "All the facts, hadn't you better? He probably 
 doesn't know them." 
 
 "Not he. Mother hides Elphinstone's letters like 
 the plague. As to her," said Wickford, "sometimes 
 I thought the kid wanted to know. I don't see why 
 he shouldn't, bein' interested. But Mother never 
 sees things as I do. She writes such beastly good 
 letters, Lise! So does Mark, of course, but " 
 
 "Yes, I know," said Ernestine. She recollected 
 anew Bess's parallel from Victorian fiction, Philip 
 and Guy. Mark's perfections, owing to the Duch- 
 ess's care, weighed more heavily on Wickford than 
 Iveagh. 
 
 "I'm afraid I've shown him a letter of Lise's be- 
 fore now," she said. 
 
 "Have you," said Wickford, his face clearing. 
 "Well, I'd sooner that, natural somehow, no 
 point in treatin' a man like a girl. I say, then 
 you think I needn't cut this business, leave things 
 out?"
 
 170 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "No. I should tell him she's ill, and why " 
 
 " 'Cause she's too fond of Mark, you mean." He 
 sent her a quaint look round the corner, having sub- 
 sided anew, hand in pocket, on the arm of a chair 
 rather nearer the door. 
 
 "Yes. But I'm afraid," confided Ernestine, 
 "Captain Elphinstone did not at all want her with 
 him, this last time." 
 
 "I see. Lise on duty Lord, can't you hear 'em 
 at it ! . . . Oh, well, I'll disguise Mark's unwilling- 
 ness. After all, it would have been for her good." 
 He glinted again. 
 
 "Don't you believe in Mark's fondness for Lise?" 
 asked Ernestine. 
 
 "Oh yes," said the Duke, rather hastily. "He's 
 as fond of her as his sort ever is. Don't imagine I 
 mean anything different. As for her, there's no 
 doubt of it, luckily. She thought worlds of him, 
 when she left." 
 
 "Worlds," assented Ernestine. 
 
 "And if it's come down a little " 
 
 "Go away and ride. Wick," said Ernestine. 
 "You're jealous." 
 
 "I'm jealous of any man on earth who marries a 
 pretty girl," explained Wickford. "All of 'em. 
 I've no down on Elphinstone, specially."
 
 WICKFORD 171 
 
 "Haven't you, indeed!" She added sugges- 
 tively "I've things to do." 
 
 "But look here," said Wickford, catching her arm 
 as she tried to pass him. "I got hold of a letter of 
 hers, don't say it wasn't a jolly nice one, in 
 which she said " 
 
 "Never mind. I should hope Lise may laugh at 
 her husband. She wouldn't be Lise if she did not." 
 
 "No, that's it," said the Duke. "She said an' 
 speaking of Iveagh too " 
 
 "Please go, Wickford. Adelaide and Sir Giles 
 are waiting." 
 
 "I'll tell you another time," he declared, rising at 
 ease from his low seat. "As for the way she sends 
 her love to all of us, at the tail of Addy's letters, 
 it's enough to " The whole of Wickford con- 
 tracted in silent mirth, and with a widespread ges- 
 ture of his whip, far from ungraceful, he finally left 
 the room. 
 
 "You're anything but a dull boy, really," re- 
 flected Mrs. Redgate, as she went on to the next 
 thing. "I wonder Rick can't see it. ... Mark 
 indeed!" 
 
 The foregoing dialogue contained the first hint 
 Ernestine or anybody had that Wickford, who al-
 
 172 HATCHWAYS 
 
 ways knew his own mind so much better than other 
 people knew it for him, was courting Miss Rye- 
 born in his late sedulous and serious fashion, solely 
 in his brother's interest. 
 
 Even Ernestine found it hard to believe at first. 
 It was, to say the least of it, an out-of-the-way pro- 
 ceeding. For another thing, Ernestine had really 
 accustomed herself, by now, to the other or first im- 
 pression, which had been Gertrude's too. Yet 
 clearly, it was not an impossible course, granted that 
 kind of genius of good sense Wickford had, in which 
 she shared and sympathised. His mother, all his 
 circle, were persistently on the edge of rudeness to 
 Bess, enough to frighten her. They displayed their 
 feelings frankly enough to make her shrink away, 
 drive her into those artistic fastnesses, that life of 
 silence, into which she was already too willing to 
 retreat. Iveagh the unaccountable attached her 
 rarely, though he constantly hovered near. To en- 
 gage Miss Ryeborn's attention, as it were, in 
 Iveagh's interest, until that young gentleman should 
 choose to see her eminent advantages, was well, 
 very like Wickford. It was like him too, once 
 launched on so practical a course (to Suir ideas) not 
 to observe that he was defeating his own ends by 
 daily increasing his family's enmity to Bess.
 
 WICKFORD 173 
 
 After the news of Lise's coming, Wickford met 
 Bess more carefully yet, compassionately, no 
 doubt as an attempt to apologise. Not that Bess 
 knew, of course, of Iveagh's devotion to the distant 
 elf, and the concern it had occasioned to Iveagh's 
 friends: that had never really spread beyond the 
 immediate Holmer circle. Of these friends, the 
 Redgates, Sir George, and Adelaide, alone knew the 
 truth, and even for some of them, as we have seen, 
 the truth was tempered. Sam Coverack had mis- 
 doubted it only at moments, and he had been one 
 of the people most frequently in Iveagh's company. 
 The Lise interlude about which Sam jested publicly, 
 with which he made most play when he wished to 
 exhibit the girl she had been, was the agreeable lit- 
 tle diversion with Adelaide concerning the Duke. 
 In the amusement of watching that we fear, bet- 
 ting upon it Sam had forgotten the chance of 
 Iveagh altogether. Iveagh, melting into the scen- 
 ery at will, was at all times easily overlooked. 
 
 Adelaide, of course, might have betrayed the 
 secret of his unhappy passion to Bess, as she had 
 practically done to Gabriel : but she did not care to. 
 There was no clear point to be scored by it, and she 
 had in these days to make every point she was worth 
 in Miss Ryeborn's company. From day to day,
 
 174 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Adelaide grew more anxious, more angry. Never, 
 anyhow in her sight, had Wick shown atten- 
 tions of that sort to a girl before. His attentions 
 to Lise had been mere pastime, compared with it. 
 He could not could not be serious! A girl from 
 nowhere, a middle-class girl, with no connections, 
 barely a penny to her name! . . . And yet, Wick- 
 ford was serious. 
 
 Adelaide strove angrily. She shook out her feath- 
 ers to the world. A girl of her make, with all the 
 money she wants to back her, can do much when 
 she tries. Wickford, bearing her various humours 
 whenever they met, and watching her peacock tail- 
 spreading in toilette, and sweep, and style, began to 
 realise perforce the little misunderstanding to which 
 his assiduity at Miss Ryeborn's elbow laid him open. 
 
 We regret to say that Wickford, when he did so 
 realise it, was, in the first place, exquisitely amused. 
 The thing that amused him most apart from the 
 ordinary amusement to which eligible man is prone 
 was that all these nice people who knew him best 
 imagined he would do such a thing. . . . Even 
 Mrs. Redgate! 
 
 Not but what Miss Bess would make a pretty 
 Duchess, Wickford allowed, so far as looks and 
 bearing went. She was an absolutely ripping girl,
 
 WICKFORD 175 
 
 good as they make them, sweet to consult, supple to 
 manage, and uncommon clever with her pencil "into 
 the show." But shade of his father! did they 
 imagine for an instant that would do for him? 
 Had they a notion of the house his fortunes required 
 him to build, or to rebuild? His mother should 
 have a better idea of him, at least. Mrs. Redgate, 
 for once, might be allowed scarcely to know about it. 
 
 Wickford's ideas, in short, would vastly have sur- 
 prised Adelaide, and his mother, and Sam, and 
 everybody who regarded him as homely and simple 
 and sentimental, and wanting in sufficiency and 
 self-regard. But he did not let Adelaide know 
 them. That was a little beyond the strength of 
 eligible or Irish man to attain. 
 
 He let Adelaide peacock it, setting herself off 
 against the other girl as women do, and watched her 
 thoughtfully. He had still, for all his mother's 
 teasing, not actually set her aside. She was almost 
 everything he wanted, as a fact, except lovable. 
 And even so, Wickford was sorry for her at times. 
 She had a wretched life of it, as he knew from Mrs. 
 Redgate, amid her home dissensions. Her father, 
 in his worst moods, was a beast. Her mother, 
 friend of a Princess, would very likely get a perma- 
 nent post at Court. Her parents' generous inten-
 
 176 HATCHWAYS 
 
 tions regarding her were unquestionable, "pots" 
 of money, every eye of her peacock train was 
 touched with gold. 
 
 And she was a handsome girl, and she cared for 
 him possibly. She was giving him daily reason 
 to suppose she did. 
 
 Alas, had any kind spirit been at hand to whisper 
 to Adelaide how golden her chance was with the 
 Duke, just these very days of Iveagh's absence when 
 she thought it least, before, in a fit of common jeal- 
 ousy, spite and heedlessness, she flung it away ! 
 
 What had not struck Wickford in the course of 
 his various debating was that Adelaide in her pres- 
 ent princess, peacock mood, would "wipe his eye" in 
 the matter of Lise, by informing Iveagh. That this 
 was a possible "score" for a sporting young lady 
 had not occurred to him, since really he could not 
 follow the bearing of all her scores. Adelaide had 
 long known she could "draw" Wick by teasing 
 Iveagh, especially on the subject of Lise. It was 
 an advantage she used in private, not infrequently. 
 Baiting Iveagh because Wickford advised her not, 
 was quite a natural diversion, as was any other 
 method of pricking Wickford to talk to her, quarrel 
 with her, or show his hand. The Suirs had a canny 
 little way of concealing their hands, for all their
 
 WICKFORD 177 
 
 easy-going friendliness, that was maddening to a 
 girl like Adelaide. Now, when this excellent 
 chance of baiting Iveagh, driving him off his head 
 for the public amusement, fell to her own hand 
 through the Duchess's indiscretion, she used it with- 
 out delay.
 
 XI 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 
 
 GABRIEL and Iveagh had a nice time. They did 
 not stop at Oxford, though they let Marchant know 
 they were staying with him, for his soul's good. 
 They saw over a great library, and a historic Hall, 
 and a very particular Press, and a few other im- 
 proving things, in his society: then they branched 
 out a little, and saw a public school, and a man-of- 
 war, and the House of Lords, in the company of 
 some people Iveagh annexed in London; and a 
 motor-works, and a cricket match, and a stable at 
 Epsom, all on their own. They did the aviation 
 meeting, du Frettay in his rights and glory, and 
 Iveagh incognito and inquisitive. They went to a 
 concert called Irish at Regent's Hall, and immedi- 
 ately after to the circus with the performing tigers 
 at Reading, in order to take the taste of the concert 
 out of their mouths. It so happened the prima- 
 donna had given one of Lise's songs, though du 
 Frettay could not know that. However, taking 
 
 178
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 179 
 
 Iveagh's word for it that nothing was right with the 
 lady in toilette, taste, mind or morals, he followed 
 him on to the tigers willingly, and instantly had his 
 reward in a fine specimen of ancient Saxon humour 
 presented by the circus clown. 
 
 They also saw some quite magnificent riding on 
 the part of two "Mexican" girls, who, when cross- 
 examined by Iveagh in the coulisses, turned out to 
 come from Cork. So, in short, Lise and her song 
 were indirectly avenged: and Iveagh and Gabriel 
 went back co the austere delights of a Sunday at 
 Oxford, temporarily satisfied and relieved in mind. 
 
 By the way, and imperceptibly to both of them, 
 they laid the foundations of the kind of friendship 
 that stays. They dovetailed, Iveagh and Gabriel, 
 if they did not coincide. Their humour matched 
 and that is such an immense thing almost to a 
 shade. There was eight years difference in age : but 
 then Iveagh, with his inheritance and experience, 
 was aged or possibly ageless. He had never had 
 the fledgeling simplicity of the Saxon. His out- 
 look on the world was seasoned by centuries of grief, 
 and strife, and wron|. This what we compla- 
 cently name the Celtic melancholy made him and 
 du Frettay practically equals in experience. None 
 of the blacker evils of the world surprised him: none
 
 180 HATCHWAYS 
 
 of the sweeter more evanescent delicacies of the 
 world escaped his subtle sense. On this latter side 
 Gabriel could actually learn; and, armed with his 
 own incisive and individualist Gallic wits, he ex- 
 plored his store of observation curiously. 
 
 Still unaware to himself, calling him most of the 
 time a dull boy, Gabriel delighted in his company, 
 his side-long sudden glances, quaint angles of view, 
 and the strict sane sense of his remarks. There is 
 no good sense like it, really, the practical Germanic 
 gets nowhere near. A sense that takes in half a 
 dozen points of view, as it must in any race with the 
 real dramatic gift, is surely so much more valuable 
 than a sense which takes in one! It is also instan- 
 taneously adaptable. Gabriel tried to picture 
 Iveagh in France, in his own delicately-arrogant, 
 though simple-seeming surroundings: and saw at 
 once he would do there, as easily as among Sam and 
 the rustic hawbucks, or among Ernestine, Bess and 
 the cats. . . . Then he reflected on aristocracy, 
 genuine aristocracy, and thought of those circus 
 girls' "Yes, m'lord," "No, m'lord," while brogue 
 was exchanging fast amid the sawdust and gas. 
 They had heard his name, doubtless: but the man- 
 ner was clear, very clear for such girls as those. 
 A world of aristocracy cleaves the high race from
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 181 
 
 the low race, even in Ireland. Even in Ireland! 
 He noted a few remarks on that. 
 
 So, finally, they said farewell to Marchant, and 
 du Frettay said all the correct things, which Iveagh 
 omitted, and Iveagh promised, if he could dodge 
 Miss Ryeborn anyhow, to shoot a few more rabbits, 
 and Marchant sent his love (or something he cer- 
 tainly meant for it) to Mrs. Redgate, and they went 
 back to Holmer Hatch by the usual train. 
 
 And then, without a warning, it happened ! The 
 overcharged cloud broke in Gabriel's presence. 
 
 "Iveagh, my dear !" said Ernestine. 
 
 She and Bess were sewing peacefully in her own 
 particular little bower in the Hatchways garden, 
 really hers, reserved to the household, when he 
 burst through the leaves. 
 
 He was heated, and white, ajid staggering, 
 scarcely able to stand, for he caught at the pergola- 
 pole. The idea that he was drunk took possession 
 of her immediately. How could Ernestine avoid 
 it 4 ? knowing that deadly temptation of the modern 
 world, latter-day Lethe, so easy to his hand, who 
 needed to forget. He had looked that way more 
 than once, she knew, since the moment of his first 
 despair. All his brother's warnings had not with-
 
 182 HATCHWAYS 
 
 held him once or twice, say in experiment, from 
 crossing the line. 
 
 "Don't go, don't let her go," stammered 
 Iveagh. For Bess, to whom her aunt's anxiety and 
 horror communicated itself almost before utterance, 
 had arisen, pale as he was, laying aside her work 
 mechanically. 
 
 "You wish Bess to stay?" 
 
 It was a test, that question: and she moved be- 
 tween them, markedly. Bess looked at both wide- 
 eyed, wondering, gathering, hardly able to doubt, 
 such was the stern ring of her tone. 
 
 "She needn't bother, it's all right," he said un- 
 steadily. "It's only I had to could I sit down?" 
 
 Bess's eyes met her aunt's, as he took the deck- 
 chair she advanced without apology, and leaning 
 forward, dropped his head in his hands. Wise in 
 the many chances of a hunting community, they had 
 another idea, and again, almost simultaneously. 
 
 "You did not fall off your horse?" said Mrs. 
 Redgate, coming behind him, and taking his head in 
 her hands. All the same she could bar r 'y credit it, 
 Iveagh and whatever horse were so little apt to 
 part company. Yet she could, for the moment, 
 think of nothing else. 
 
 "Horse? I hadn't got one. They had the
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 183 
 
 horses, four of 'em. We'd just come from town. 
 No, the other place, wasn't it? I forget." 
 
 Forget! Yes, these were the symptoms of con- 
 cussion rather than intemperance, decidedly. No 
 doubt he was hurt, her boy. At once her friendly 
 arms slipped across his shoulders, clasped the wrists 
 of his hands, apologising, of course, for her suspi- 
 cions. "Don't try to remember " she was be- 
 ginning in the right nurse's tone, which is far from 
 gentle, when he broke in. 
 
 "But I must it was Addy I wasn't dreamin', 
 can't have been. It was at the station, just out- 
 side it. I came on to ask you. Addy said " 
 
 Then she saw it, of course. Conviction flashed, 
 and action simultaneously. Wickford's careful let- 
 ter had gone astray. Adelaide's, of all unfriendly, 
 hostile hands had shot the bolt. Before an audi- 
 ence, uncles, she had seen the party start. Still 
 holding him, she turned. 
 
 "Go to the house, Bess, dear," she directed. 
 "No, nothing, send nothing. He will be all 
 right." 
 
 She knew though as she spoke that she must tell 
 Bess everything. Already she had debated it, but 
 there was no escaping it now. The boy under her 
 hands was sobbing almost, in deadly emotion, just
 
 184 HATCHWAYS 
 
 as he had been at the very worst. And why 1 ? 
 clear as daylight, to anyone knowing Adelaide. 
 She, Lise's rival, have mercy 4 ? Why should she*? 
 Chaffingly, idly, with silly circumvention and sense- 
 less enjoyment, she had reopened the wound, in 
 public, that was still the worst. The pair of stupid 
 military uncles, Sam the follower, du Frettay the 
 foreigner too. . . . Adelaide, to whom love, the 
 great power that shakes and welds the world, was 
 unknown except as a show, a vulgar entertainment, 
 a freak of nature to be played with, played at, 
 played upon ... a girl, Ernestine had sometimes 
 thought, like innumerable English girls, without any 
 of the forms of heart. Not even the friend's, not 
 even the old comrade's, since this was the way she 
 treated Wickford. Mrs. Redgate saw the "score" 
 very well, since it matched other scores of which 
 Adelaide had boasted in her presence. But some- 
 how, those had never shocked her: now she was 
 shocked. 
 
 There was another charge in her mind besides the 
 brutal ill-taste of it, that of cowardice. She 
 grasped as nobody else did, certainly not the brother, 
 and doubtfully du Frettay, the extent to which 
 Iveagh was in Adelaide's hands. Gabriel, ever 
 since that first day at the stations, had been surprised
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 185 
 
 at intervals by his submission, as much as by the 
 carelessness of the girl's baiting, she seemed to 
 know herself safe. So Adelaide* was, only Gabriel 
 missed the reason. Iveagh, in the matter of the 
 Courtiers, was not in his brother's confidence. He 
 did not ask confidence from his elder and head of 
 his clan concerning his matrimonial projects: that 
 was not the custom, could not be done. Thus, 
 placing Adelaide in his world's scheme as a probable 
 sister-in-law and future Duchess, the lordly central 
 Suir idea protected her perfectly. She might, for 
 Iveagh, already have been Wick's wife. 
 
 And Adelaide knew it! She knew, from Ernes- 
 tine's hints and protests, even had not her own 
 "sporting" instinct spied her advantage out. Hers 
 was the sporting instinct of the ferreter, not fair- 
 play big game, like Sir George. It distressed Mrs. 
 Redgate particularly when women, strong, young, 
 with all their chances, exhibit their primaeval cow- 
 ardice in this way. It would have distressed and 
 disgusted her, even had not this boy, proud, passion- 
 ate, and inexpressive, been the other party concerned. 
 
 She swept in the rest of the evidence, when Bess 
 had gone, without much trouble, though she hardly 
 needed it. 
 
 "She's ill?" Iveagh asked at last, coming out of
 
 186 HATCHWAYS 
 
 his hands. Of course, he had not even the facts, 
 facts were the last things Adelaide gave. 
 
 "No, not to matter. Tired, you know. We 
 thought of getting her here to rest. I won't though, 
 if it hurts you " 
 
 "Why would it hurt me*?" he shot swiftly. "It 
 was only she said case, case at Hatchways, 
 Ernestine's latest, that's you. I didn't trouble 
 just then, I was thinkin' of Emer, she was ridin' 
 her." (Emer was Lise's mare.) "She always 
 fetches out Emer when I'm away. I told him last 
 time I wouldn't have it." (Him was Wickford.) 
 "He might see to it, stand up to her a bit in the 
 stable. I can't be always bothered with the girl she 
 is." 
 
 "Go on," said Ernestine, as he waited to gather 
 his thoughts. He looked quite exhausted, blue be- 
 neath the eyes, as he lay searching for sentences, 
 catching the first words that came. His eyes them- 
 selves were darkened and languid with the look she 
 knew, the other-world look of Lise and though 
 shifting rapidly about to help his thoughts, they 
 never met hers, as he proceeded. We quote the 
 account, with a note on the text occasionally; for 
 certain of Iveagh's tricks, such as his liberal use of 
 the personal pronouns for individuals he affected,
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 187 
 
 made him a little hard to understand. Mrs. Red- 
 gate was used to him, of course : having been herself 
 one of his principal "shes" for eleven years back. 
 
 "So then she said (Adelaide) beginnin' with an 
 E. And some other ass said two E's, and that 
 started them off. And I didn't think of it how 
 would I? didn't trouble to, anyway, rottin' the 
 lot. E.F. she was in her letters, E.F.M was what 
 she liked. She's right enough too that lot of 'em 
 ought to have it. ..." 
 
 "Brilliant, Adelaide," thought Ernestine, watch- 
 ing him. "Most amusing, making him guess." 
 
 "You and Bess are E.R," pushed on Iveagh. 
 "There's that Ellis-woman Mother has, and Lady 
 Earraid, she's R.E. Besides, spellin's such a rotten 
 game! ... So I just observed I was sick of it, kind 
 o' style to stop the goat sniggerin', (Sam was the 
 goat) and Uncle Oliver seemed amazed at me, 
 wistful and wonderin', and the other one was red- 
 dish, and he got a hold on my arm. He set out 
 to dodge her (du Frettay, evidently), but no chance, 
 once the girl had put the game up, that game, 
 I could have told him there was no chance. Best 
 let her drip and have done with it," said Iveagh, 
 shifting the image competently, "that's what he 
 said to me, more or less, but I had to stop. . . .
 
 188 HATCHWAYS 
 
 So, after some more truck, the girl said she'd whisper 
 it to Emer, whisperin', I didn't like that. What's 
 she want talkin' to her, ridin's bad enough. . . . 
 So I came on to you," he concluded lamely. "See 
 you on the quiet, get some sense out " 
 
 "Sense," thought Ernestine, "and I received you 
 as if you were drunk!" She offered him the sense 
 that was his right, immediately. 
 
 "I have invited Lise to come here soon," she said, 
 "Monday week. But she is in England for another 
 month or so, would you rather we put it off*?" 
 
 "No, no," he shot again, impatient. "She'd best 
 get here. You'd better see to her, it was not that 
 I was meanin' at all." 
 
 It was a most complete testimonial to Mrs. Red- 
 gate's powers, far better than 'Wickford's, since 
 Iveagh exacted the best in earth and heaven for Lise. 
 
 "She is not ill," she once more assured him gently. 
 "Not really. That was another of Adelaide's 
 jokes." 
 
 His eyes, out of the falling dusk, rested on her 
 for a fraction of time. "Why has he sent her off?" 
 he said. 
 
 "Mark"? Because she would follow him, here, 
 there, and everywhere. You know what a rebel she 
 is."
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 189 
 
 Iveagh knew well enough. "Funny to send her 
 off," he repeated. 
 
 Ernestine was driven to excuse Mark. "He sent 
 her out of harm's way, and home was easiest. He 
 wanted home air, for Lise. So I offered to take 
 her." 
 
 "Oh yes," he said. "Why didn't Mother?" 
 
 Wretched boys for questions! She was held up. 
 
 "Wickford would have " she started. 
 
 "All right," said Iveagh. "You've all been 
 scrappin' and me out of it." He yawned a little, 
 and considered it, resting his head on his hand. 
 
 "She's been down on you?" he enquired casually, 
 meaning his mother this time. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Raggin' him?" 
 
 "Oh, I don't think so. I got the ragging." 
 
 "You?" 
 
 In the next silence, she had the impression, no 
 new one, that he was taking charge. His real self 
 in the twilight, attentive and gracious, came through. 
 "Gracious" was the word Mrs. Redgate (who had 
 not a large vocabulary) invariably applied, in mem- 
 ory, to Iveagh's father. It was also the word, to 
 her mind, most adapted to the underpart of him. 
 From the age of twelve he had condescended, at
 
 190 HATCHWAYS 
 
 times, to take charge of her, and it never failed to 
 delight her when he did. What his mother had 
 missed! thought Ernestine, often. But then Ger- 
 trude was the monumental type of mother, quite 
 marvellous. She seemed to think even sons like 
 Wickf ord grew on every bush ! 
 
 "It wasn't worth it," he said, having thought it 
 out carefully. "ScrappinV 
 
 "But we did not scrap. Your mother," said Mrs. 
 Redgate, gravely, "is much too well-bred." 
 
 "Oh, go on," returned Iveagh. "She did most of 
 it. Can't see you quarrellin', quite." He just 
 moved a hand, in her direction. 
 
 "Thank you." She took the hand. "Iveagh, 
 will you stay to dinner with me*?" she ventured. 
 She was a little afraid of him to-night. 
 
 "No, the man's comin'." (Du Frettay.) "I'd 
 better get up on home. There's something I meant 
 to say, before I did, though. Wait a sec." He 
 sought it. "While she's here, stoppin' along with 
 you, Lise " 
 
 "Yes," said Ernestine submissively. He had 
 dropped the name with the greatest care and deli- 
 cacy, just that there should be no mistake. 
 
 "Only, I'll not come often. Not awfully often. 
 I'll not play the ass, the way his little spirit's dis-
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 191 
 
 tressed about me in the evenin's." (Wickford, be- 
 yond a doubt.) "He can be easy, you can let him 
 know. I want to be over with this now, if you 
 don't mind, it's not been so enticin' I'd ask for 
 more of it." He waited for a time, the right time 
 too. This was a great occasion, and he was letting 
 her know it, while he guarded her carelessly. 'Til 
 get things goin' to-morrow or the next day, once I 
 see them straight. To-night I cannot, that girl's 
 done me, I give her credit." He shut his eyes, 
 and pressed his fingers to them. "Only I'll stick it 
 out. I'll see you through. I'll take the pledge." 
 Silence. She longed both to thank and bless him, 
 but dared not, he sat so still. This was his offering 
 to her, not Lise, she knew it. He had made it com- 
 pletely clear. 
 
 "You needn't think I can't if I want," he re- 
 sumed, dropping his hands. "That's how you all 
 go wrong. I can do the polite an' pleasin'," said 
 Iveagh, casting about wearily for images, "as well 
 as my brother in his sword and stockin's, when he 
 goes trucklin' to the English Court." 
 
 Silence: Mrs. Redgate, a most loyal subject, still 
 submissive. Nor did she resent the image of Wick- 
 ford, another perfectly loyal subject, truckling, 
 Iveagh had her in hand.
 
 192 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "I'll not go stravaguin," he pursued, dropping 
 into deep melancholy. "I'll stop about. I'll exer- 
 cise Emer when she's not wantin' her, you can tell 
 her that. Emer's all right, anyhow, will be. 
 Dare say she didn't care for that girl to-day " 
 
 "I shouldn't think her health had suffered," said 
 Ernestine, for his melancholy had grown fixed. 
 
 "Can't say, you never know," he returned, with 
 the utmost gravity. "I'll see to her to-morrow, not 
 to-night." Pause. "Sure she's not ill? Not any- 
 how?" This was not Emer, but Lise. 
 
 "Quite sure." Ernestine was convinced now that 
 every chance of the first three years of matrimony 
 had been swept by his half -paralysed thought. Or 
 was it only the expression that was paralysed? 
 more probable. His thoughts throughout the inter- 
 view, shattered as he looked, had been well in front 
 of hers. 
 
 "Dash, how giddy I feel," he remarked as he got 
 up. "Funny thing. You thought I'd been soakin', 
 didn't you? ... I say, by the way," he held her 
 simply by the upper arm to steady himself, "talkin 5 
 of giddy, those machines of his are toppin'. More 
 in them than I thought." 
 
 "What machines?" He nodded towards the
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 193 
 
 house. Now, there were only two gentlemen, at 
 present, in Hatchways house. 
 
 "Iveagh, you didn't go up*?" Ernestine was 
 moved. "No, you are naughty, both of you ! You 
 said you'd tell Wick or me before you did." 
 
 "I forgot," said Iveagh, with something like his 
 ordinary expression. "Don't excite," he added per- 
 suasively. "I told the Press-fellow there not to 
 mention it. ... The noise is enough to turn you 
 silly, though. They'll have to see to that. We 
 didn't go far. I couldn't 'a' got killed, not badly 
 killed, I dare say I'd 'a' got over it." He looked 
 her in the eyes, infinite tragedy in his, the tragedy 
 of all the ages. "Mention that to Mother when 
 you make it up with her," he said. "Good night." 
 
 "It was cruel," said du Frettay after dinner, "and 
 stupid consummately, oh, consummately! And 
 especially do I pity him that his uncles know. His 
 friend I think will have mercy : that young man has 
 some relics of sense." 
 
 "Oh, Sam is no harm," said Ernestine. "But of 
 course, he admires Adelaide." 
 
 "I cannot think, when he shall reflect upon it, he 
 will admire her," said du Frettay earnestly. "It
 
 194. HATCHWAYS 
 
 reminded me so strongly of something I saw lately 
 at Reading the circus clown. It was curious, 
 indeed, to have the two impressions so close, I 
 noted them." 
 
 "Oh, but really!" said Ernestine, dimpling. 
 "Rick, speak up for us. We can do better than 
 that." 
 
 "Go on," encouraged Rick. 
 
 Rick was delighted to have du Frettay back. He 
 and Ernestine had had Oxboroughs to all kinds of 
 meals, constantly, during the interval, in order to 
 relieve the Duchess. 
 
 "It was of the nature," said Gabriel, settling in 
 his chair, "of what we call the 'farce d'ecolier,' but 
 that terminates comes to an end as a rule, at 
 twelve years old. At eleven, we will say, for jus- 
 tice. It emerges again later, I do not deny it, in 
 the ebullience of admissibility, that is to say, first 
 examination results. But even so, however idi- 
 otic, the inspiration, the motive, is respectable. 
 There is one little matter I remember, concerned 
 with a hearse, and horses, the coffin absent. It 
 was brutal, yes, yet well inspired. The motive 
 was a just one, as it were, necessary. It made one 
 reflect " 
 
 He reflected. Rick, looking at his blue eyes bent
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 195 
 
 on his boyhood's memories, wondered which of his 
 college professors had gone down to an early grave 
 in consequence of the inspired motive he was dream- 
 ing of. 
 
 "But this," resumed Gabriel presently, "had no 
 such excuse. None. It was stupid merely, 
 formidablement bete. I regret to be obliged to 
 my own terms. She played with she knew not 
 what, quite purposeless " He glanced at Ernes- 
 tine. 
 
 "Quite," she said. 
 
 "Having no knowledge of the thing she played 
 with " He paused again, waiting. 
 
 "Go on," said Rick. "You'll get nothing out of 
 her." 
 
 "But she proved I think she proved it," argued 
 du Frettay with both of them. 
 
 Rick glanced at his wife in turn. "We trust," he 
 said, "Wickford will reason it out." 
 
 "Excellent," said Gabriel, subsiding. "You take 
 my point. I trust he will." 
 
 "I wish you wouldn't make points, you and Rick," 
 said Ernestine. 
 
 "Pourquoi?" asked Gabriel. 
 
 "It's his nature," said Rick. 
 
 "And yet," said Gabriel to Rick, pursuing, "it
 
 196 HATCHWAYS 
 
 takes a man of intelligence to reason it out, and the 
 Duke may well, he may not manage it." 
 
 "You're very unjust to Wickford both of you," 
 said Ernestine. 
 
 "Imagine," said Gabriel, looking at the ceiling, 
 "attached to so sensitive a gift for humour, what 
 Lord Wickford might have to suffer. And his 
 guests. ... I may smoke, Madame*?" 
 
 "Yes, and please don't ask." 
 
 "I forget I shall not ask, invariably. I will note 
 it. Ouff, I feel so well this evening," said Gabriel 
 suddenly. "It is that." He circled a hand in the 
 air. "It comes back upon me, when I am on earth 
 again." 
 
 "You had no business to go without warning us," 
 said Mrs. Redgate, very gravely. 
 
 "You would have been anxious 4 ?" As she did 
 not answer, working. "It is habit," he pursued. 
 "I never tell my mother till I am down again. 
 When I am completely down, most of me, I send 
 her a carte-lettre to quiet her. I have found it bet- 
 ter so. ... I asked Iveagh Suir, pardon, when 
 we were up, if he would come with me to France. 
 He said 'Yes' without emotion, without a blink. 
 He is a person I could fly with frequently quite 
 often "
 
 CAPTURE OF GABRIEL 197 
 
 "If you do " said Ernestine, stopping her 
 
 work. 
 
 "I shall not He rides too well. Those do not 
 need to fly, they are wasted. Their limbs are 
 wasted," explained M. du Frettay, crossing his own. 
 "It is another make." 
 
 Mrs. Redgate's look on his limbs across the hearth 
 suggested that she thought all the same they might 
 be wasted by the complicated fractures he seemed 
 to court for them so earnestly. However, there was 
 nothing to be done about it, since his own mother 
 was evidently helpless. So Ernestine said nothing, 
 as usual, and sewed. Both her men under her eyes 
 were very comfortable, two of her women dining at 
 Holmer, and Bess in bed. 
 
 She noted, though, his use of Iveagh's name, as 
 she had noted Iveagh's equally flattering use of the 
 pronoun, for him. She thought she saw under his 
 raillery and light treatment of Miss Courtier's 
 "clown- trick" the quick indignation of a friend. 
 He had come round again, she thought, from his 
 cynical outpost of observation, and was committed 
 once more to the boy's party, in with the defence. 
 He was so good for Iveagh. . . . He was fortu- 
 nately of a race where courage and sensitiveness go 
 hand in hand (as indeed does not real courage al-
 
 198 HATCHWAYS 
 
 ways'?) and he was of those that hold seriously, like 
 Sir George and all expert adventurers, that reckless- 
 ness, for whatever cause, detracts from valour's 
 worth. That was the friend Iveagh needed at this 
 crisis, eminently all that. It was fortunate. 
 
 And he was nice, courtly, gentle: Ernestine 
 liked him. He was really approachable, affable in 
 the French or Latin sense. Sir George had it too, 
 that gentleness of the tamed eagle. It surprised her 
 not the least, when her woman's mind swept about 
 the foundations of things, the family foundations, 
 that Sir George and this young man's father 
 should have been friends.
 
 PART II
 
 XII 
 USE 
 
 Du FRETTAY fell in love with Lise at first sight, 
 confessed to a hopelessly broken heart at their sec- 
 ond meeting, received Mrs. Elphinstone's insincere 
 commiseration on his sad condition, and thenceforth 
 tilted tranquilly with her as if he had known her all 
 his life. 
 
 She was indeed a sweet little creature, light and 
 airy, with a pallidly sallow skin, what Gabriel 
 called "cinder-coloured" hair, and dark brown eyes. 
 She was liquid, like water, as Ernestine said, shim- 
 mering, shadowing, and reflecting, he was certain, 
 at all times: but never more so than at the present 
 time, so he gathered from her friends, because of the 
 languor resulting from her shaken health. She 
 made little of her health, when asked, but the eager, 
 darting activity of her maidenhood, manifest in the 
 innumerable stories current of her in the country- 
 side, was checked, shattered for the moment, by the 
 
 cruel chances of the Indian climate. She slipped 
 
 201
 
 202 HATCHWAYS 
 
 about the walks at Hatchways, lay about on Ernes- 
 tine's sofas and hammocks, almost as though 
 crushed. She had quiet interludes when her eyes 
 were still and dark, like pools, reflecting that strange 
 new knowledge of wifehood, that strange patience 
 that comes with marriage to flickering rebellious 
 presences like hers. Gabriel the observer had 
 marked that in many a clever woman previously, 
 during the interval between wifehood and mater- 
 nity, which solves all. 
 
 But, like all natural transitions, simply reflected, 
 it was beautiful. It made Lise more wonderful, 
 much. She could never before, he was convinced, 
 have been so entrancing, so provoking. For, roused 
 to life and exchange, not a glance nor shaft of her 
 ancient maiden armoury was wanting. Her flexi- 
 ble little rapier, if a little out of practice, owing 
 to her Mark's irreproachable equipment, had never 
 been allowed to rust. Lise, in whatever virtuous or 
 exotic society, would have kept it in play. 
 
 Suir society responded at once, that was one of 
 the first things du Frettay noticed: especially the 
 head of it, Wickford seemed to change from top 
 to toe. Careful and troubled in advance, he let go 
 most of his anxiety at the sight of her, and let her 
 have it with him, as she pleased. It is possible, of
 
 LISE 203 
 
 course, that Lise and her like had always had it as 
 they pleased, in private, with Wickford, consider- 
 ing his high position, it may be better not to enquire. 
 At least he was "easy," to quote Iveagh, quite re- 
 markably from first meeting, and went on relaxing, 
 rapidly. There was that about Mrs. Mark Elphin- 
 stone, the presence of her, the sight, the sound 
 above all, which attuned her company, and com- 
 forted those Western hearts which, like the Duke's 
 and Iveagh's, must feel Midland Holmer a "fool of 
 a place" at times. 
 
 Lise had, at least, to be looked at. It might have 
 been regarded as heartless, considering Iveagh, but 
 they all came out upon the Hatchways drive to look, 
 when Lise and Emer, the first morning, fell into each 
 other's arms. Wreathed in Lise's white arms, Emer 
 endeavoured, all she knew, to return her kisses. 
 Such as Emer are sadly handicapped, when it comes 
 to kissing, but, snuffing and mumbling with velvet 
 lips, she did her best. 
 
 "Oh, she's being polite, ok, she's being polite to 
 me," moaned Lise, her cinder-coloured head against 
 Emer's neck. "Ok, she doesn't remember really, 
 it's only her beautiful, beautiful manners, all put 
 on! Tell me you haven't forgotten, my angel, the 
 times we had in the ferns when you would eat them.
 
 204 HATCHWAYS 
 
 And it's only the scent that's good for men and 
 horses, never the taste. ... I have seen nobody 
 like you, Emer, nobody! Nor you, will you just 
 assure me"? Best, my most beautiful, Iveagh, 
 how do you do?" 
 
 "You thought I was the groom," said Iveagh 
 equally. 
 
 "I did not, I was coming on to you in the eques- 
 trian order of things." (A ridiculous expression, 
 meaning nothing at all, but all Lise's circle accepted 
 it calmly.) "How nice it is to see you both," pro- 
 ceeded Mrs. Elphinstone, her hand in Wickford's, 
 perfectly natural tears in her lovely eyes. "Men 
 without moustaches. 0^, if you knew what it 
 means to me, home and Hatchways and the hairless 
 men! Perhaps M. du Frettay has got one, but we 
 will not look in his direction. . . . Very well, thank 
 you, there was no illness in it, really, nothing at 
 least all this will not soon cure. . . . Emer, your 
 robe is all silver, glancing, M. du Frettay calls it 
 a robe. You must come out of the stables of the 
 moon to look like that " She paused, as it were 
 enquiring. 
 
 "She comes out of mine," said Wickford. 
 
 "And what do I owe you*?" said Lise, carrying 
 Wickford, prepared for most things, right off his
 
 LISE 205 
 
 feet by the one question in the world he thought she 
 dared not ask. "Oh, but certainly" seizing her 
 advantage "I shall pay her pension, had you not 
 expected it*? Or rather my hus " 
 
 "If he dares!" spluttered Wickford. Then, as 
 she merely shook with laughter, her head in Emer's 
 neck, "Get out with you, Lise, insultin' me! 
 You've just been study in' all night for the worst 
 thing you could say! As if we hadn't all ridden 
 her up and down, every day of the week " 
 
 "We have not all," said Iveagh. 
 
 "Well, it was over Iveagh's body if we did not," 
 said the Duke, with a lack of strict sense that ran 
 Lise's late effort very close. "And most of us tried 
 to climb onto her in your absence. Addy, for in- 
 stance " 
 
 "She did so twice," said Iveagh, "and no thanks 
 to you if it was not twenty times " 
 
 "Hark at him accounting for his stewardship and 
 now they're quarrelling," cut in Mrs. Elphinstone, 
 all in one sweet stream. "Why shouldn't Ade- 
 laide, on earth, if she wants to, Iveagh? Where 
 is she, Wickford, and why has she not come down*? 
 I am sure I mentioned in heaps of letters she was 
 to, and Sam also, as soon as I got here, listen, now ! 
 I give the whole of you rendezvous by an oversight
 
 206 HATCHWAYS 
 
 at the same hour this evening, tea-time, I shall 
 have finished my sleep by then. Ernestine dearest, 
 I'm asking the neighbourhood to tea, you don't mind 
 it? I have a tropical trick" turning back to the 
 gentlemen "of slacking in the Iveagh, she likes 
 you best!" 
 
 The last was a little flash, or snap, of jealousy, 
 owing to certain amenities on the part of the beauti- 
 ful Emer to her "groom's" sly advances, while Mrs. 
 Elphinstone's attention had been otherwise engaged. 
 
 "She's only flirtin'," said Wickford, having looked 
 that way for a period. "Nothing in it, anyhow of 
 a nature to last." 
 
 "Well, if that's all she'll find the ground safer in 
 your direction," observed Lise. "I'm only advising 
 her " 
 
 "Harder, you mean*?" asked the Duke. Incor- 
 rigible, they were now playing above the dangerous 
 subject, yet somehow harmlessly. Grace and good- 
 will, those two great qualities in humour saved 
 them. Grace does not belong to the English, nor 
 goodwill to the French wit always: M. du Frettay 
 had a fine chance, really, of comparing the national 
 shades. 
 
 "Mark's love to you, Wickford," said Lise, 
 "well, is he not related? and I was to thank vour
 
 LISE 207 
 
 mother for endless obligations, in person, and my 
 best clothes. I have some nowadays, though you 
 might not think it." (Lise, for a little beauty, had 
 always been carelessly dressed.) "Mark's so anx- 
 ious I should do the right thing by all of you, and 
 your mother foremost, naturally. I am here, as one 
 might say, to represent him " 
 
 "You look it," said the brothers together. 
 
 "I am telling you the simple truth," said Lise. 
 "Just let me know when I can wait on the Duchess, 
 will you 1 ? I preserved that expression from a book 
 I was reading on the ship. I'll use that of Wick- 
 ford's mother when I get there, I said to meself, it 
 becomes my station exactly " 
 
 "Get out with you, station!" said the Duke. 
 
 " Being now a kind of poor dependent," con- 
 cluded Lise, preening herself in the sunshine, "of 
 your honourable house." 
 
 "You could hardly be more dependent than the 
 house is," said Wickford. "However, we'll get 
 some dinner for you the day you come up. The boy 
 there has been shootin' rabbits " 
 
 So they ran on, in great accord: and in league, 
 too, for any keen eye that could observe it. Lise 
 and Wickford, by common consent, were filling up 
 time, playing to the gallery, with the strong con-
 
 208 HATCHWAYS 
 
 sciousness of more serious drama in the rear. They 
 were hand in hand, and eye to eye in understanding, 
 a very pretty exhibition of friendship, though it 
 was perhaps fortunate Adelaide was not about. 
 There are grades, Adelaide might have thought, to 
 friendliness, she and Wickford might not have 
 agreed fully as to the grades. As for the Duchess 
 but then, Wickford would not have melted, had 
 his mother been present, so that worked out all right. 
 "Well, this is over for the time being, I will not 
 keep you," said Mrs, Elphinstone graciously, when 
 she had had enough of teasing Wick on the subject 
 of Mark. "You are both of you, surely, longing 
 to be away. My wonderful," with sudden arms 
 wreathing the mare again, "you may say thank you 
 to his younger lordship once, with propriety, don't 
 be led on by his artfulness to make too much of the 
 obligation, which is nothing to speak of, to those 
 really knowing his tastes. When we are alone to- 
 gether, Emer, you shall tell me about it, the times 
 you had, the trouble you had with them wanting 
 you, all of them, too many of them " Her 
 wicked voice died away in the mare's mane. "No, 
 Iveagh," she resumed with sudden energy. "No, I ' 
 am not dressed for it, do be sensible a little, look 
 at my silk!"
 
 LISE 209 
 
 "It was not your habit to wear silk in the fore- 
 noon," said the other brother, just behind her. 
 'That's to match Mark's moustache I shouldn't 
 wonder, up you go!" 
 
 "That's all right, good girl," thought Mrs. 
 Redgate: for again it was the Duke, ably ousting 
 his brother, who had his hand beneath her little shoe. 
 Between the two, Iveagh had not been able to touch 
 her, to approach even for more than a moment : and 
 now she sat her horse superbly, girl and horse silk- 
 robed in the sunshine, a sight to heal sore eyes. 
 
 Wickford led Emer once across the gravel sweep, 
 needfully, one hand up to the rider, for Lise, Mark's 
 or no, was a precious thing to be protected, and Emer 
 was saddled for a man. Lise, for herself, took no 
 pains: she leant to talk to him, chattering low, for 
 the whole distance, it was the chance for a little 
 real confidence, before Adelaide came. Finally, her 
 hand on his shoulder, she flew to the earth, and so 
 turned back to the house, languor once more veiling 
 her whole demeanour and gait. She passed Iveagh, 
 standing solitary and neglected on the garden drive, 
 without a word of farewell, nor even a smile to con- 
 sole him: and taking hold of Bess's arm, drew her 
 away in the direction of the orchard, where her ham- 
 mock was slung. Lise was behaving beautifully,
 
 210 HATCHWAYS 
 
 no doubt of it: it was all very, very well done, that 
 opening interview, on Lise's part. Only well, 
 how is it to be helped when young persons are made 
 pictorial, and have practised making pictures of 
 themselves and their surroundings all their life? 
 
 "That is the most beautiful sight I ever saw," 
 said du Frettay, quite seriously, when it was over. 
 "Oh, Madame, Madame, you are brave!" 
 
 "Do you think I am worse than brave 1 ?" she 
 asked, quickly for her. "Go beyond it*?" 
 
 "It is wonderful daring," said du Frettay. 
 "That is all I dare to say. You flash the fact of her 
 right in his face, liein? and so blind him." 
 
 "I do not at all wish to blind him," said Ernes- 
 tine. "Besides," she added, "it is very hard to do." 
 
 "Nevertheless, I think you have a great trust in 
 truth," said du Frettay. "In the whole truth, pre- 
 sented whole, not in parts of it. You think that 
 is healthy for the mind." 
 
 "Do \T she laughed. "Go on." 
 
 "I shall not go on, you are not interested. You 
 are far more interested," said Gabriel resentfully, 
 "in all that world of silly little persons, than in 
 yourself." 
 
 "I do like them," she admitted, "they are so funny 
 and troublesome. And their troubles," she added,
 
 LISE 211 
 
 flushing a very little, "are more important than 
 mine." 
 
 "That is it, that is it," he reflected. "You 
 think you are rangee, finished. How strange that 
 is, here, for women still beautiful and young!" A 
 little later, the other admission of the speech struck 
 him. "You have troubles," he thought, "troubles 
 of your own, I might have known it. I wonder 
 what they are?" 
 
 Lise continued to behave beautifully. Of course, 
 it was quite possible that at home, in private life, 
 she always had. Her mother loved her pas- 
 sionately, and it was all Mrs. Fitzmaurice could do 
 to spare her to Hatchways, even for a week. But 
 the regular Hatchways club-contingent of young 
 people had rarely, if ever, seen Miss Fitzmaurice at 
 home, since her mother was delicate. They had 
 seen her visiting, on the liberal terms de rigueur in 
 the Suir community: and flirting, each happy 
 gentleman in private, and combined, in the melee: 
 and hunting, mounted, vivid and wild as Diana let 
 loose ' for the chase. Domestically, for all they 
 knew, for all Mark and Mrs. Fitzmaurice had ever 
 let them know, she might be a pure star of pru- 
 dence and decorum. Iveagh was quite sure she was.
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Lise wrote to Mark every evening, sitting upright 
 at Ernestine's desk. It was true, her eyes melted 
 a little on her surroundings while she told him 
 things, but she told him her world was assured 
 the "simple truth." She practised her music, fit- 
 fully; then, obeying no doubt some bidding in her 
 atmosphere, she conceived a warm admiration for 
 Bess. Lise had never met Bess in the life, though 
 she had heard about her from the Suir boys, who im- 
 plied "the girl" was all a girl should be. Lise 
 agreed with the Suir boys: she cultivated Bess, and 
 drew her from obscurity. She thought her draw- 
 ings wonderful, clever beyond praise: she was im- 
 patient with Ernestine and du Frettay for not 
 admiring them more. She chased Bess, haunted her, 
 wooed her, sued for her affection. She was ready, 
 in the cause of Bess, to take three kittens on her lap 
 at once. 
 
 Not that this last was any sacrifice to Lise: a 
 kitten herself, she enjoyed them. She let the irre- 
 pressible Pickle, aspiring to her shoulder, make a 
 ladder of her silken skirts. She agitated an absent 
 finger, while conversing, in the right, the only way: 
 the movement which first stiffens an attentive kitten, 
 then causes its head to wave slightly as it focusses, 
 then illumines the focussed eyes to a haggard glare :
 
 LISE 213 
 
 lastly, provokes a terrific onslaught on the finger to 
 slay it, to finish it, to eat it up. At this awful junc- 
 ture Lise, instead of abstracting her pretty white 
 finger (which is unwise) let it lie dead in her lap, 
 quite dead, suppliant, appealing. Whereupon the 
 savage onslaught grows dubious, grows slack, grows 
 silly, the eyes question, the sharp teeth enter not, 
 and the whole drama ends with the tender and 
 tentative licking of the finger by a small rough 
 tongue. 
 
 Such are cat-manners, strange and delicate, which 
 Lise knew by instinct and imitation, and Bess by love 
 and study. Unquestionably, such knowledge is a 
 bond. Certainly, those two Elizabeths should have 
 joined forces over it. Yet, persistently, Bess was 
 shy of Lise. 
 
 Lise, observing it, chased her shyness. "Why 
 are you on your manners with me?" she asked, in 
 her careless little captivating fashion. "Ye" she 
 said faintly for the you, as Iveagh did, as Wick- 
 ford did sometimes. Bess's heart, having nothing 
 else to feed on for the moment, fed on the way she 
 spoke. 
 
 Bess could not answer the question, though, and 
 Ernestine would not. Ernestine said Bess was 
 always shy. "Yes, but why with me?" said Lise.
 
 214 HATCHWAYS 
 
 She asked, little by little, in the manner that proved 
 she guessed. 
 
 She approached Rick, flattering and cajoling, but 
 Uncle Rick was very careful. He hinted that the 
 Ryeborn family, in general, was a little stiff, in 
 the sense of straight, straight-backed. In a won- 
 derfully unassuming fashion, it held its head up. 
 You might almost call it pride, or dignity. Look 
 at Ernestine! 
 
 Mrs. Elphinstone looked, having never, like most 
 people, much thought of looking before. And she 
 saw, of course, the family resemblance, Mr. Red- 
 gate was right. And she had, by so looking, some 
 slight, slow illumination upon Bess. 
 
 "Where do they come from, really 1 ?" she asked 
 him in confidence. 
 
 "What do you mean by really?" said Rick, who, 
 being a Times critic, picked at words. 
 
 Lise meant the Duchess, of course, by really. 
 The Duchess having been, on one occasion, annoyed 
 with her dear Ernestine in Lise's company, had aired 
 the Manchester charge. The Duchess had an idea, 
 that day, that the Ryeborn people had their origins 
 there, or thereabouts. She was not convinced 
 (Ernestine had annoyed her so) that cotton-mills 
 and so on were not at the back of it. Or linen-mills,
 
 LISE 215 
 
 which is worse, because it contains a soupcon of Mr. 
 Ruskin, and his gentlemanly but rather trying ideas. 
 
 Lise explained that the Duchess was what her 
 "really" meant. She was very tactful and comical 
 over the Duchess, so Rick's literary horns lay down. 
 
 "They're a Northern lot, my wife's," said Rick. 
 "You've only to see 'em tackle a Midland gang, to 
 be sure of that." 
 
 "I saw so well, when she talked to Sir Giles," said 
 Lise. Rick's literary snail-horns retreated almost. 
 
 "Stuffy," said Rick, "the Midland people are. 
 Not a breeze about 'em." 
 
 "Quite windless," said Lise. "But Mark " 
 
 "Oh, the Captain's a man o' parts," said Rick, 
 pleasantly. "Brains, in any fellei, makes all the 
 breeze necessary." 
 
 "Dear Mark," said Lise, as was correct. She 
 clasped her little hands on her skirt, or rather on 
 the kitten that lay there. 
 
 "Then you think Miss Ryeborn is too proud to 
 talk to me," she said softly. 
 
 "I never said that," parried Rick. "Bess'll make 
 friends, right enough, if you leave her a little time. 
 You must give' em rope, if you understand me : not 
 follow too close." 
 
 "I love independence," said Lise. So she did, for
 
 216 HATCHWAYS 
 
 herself. She did not love independence of her, 
 though: and she barely understood it, except on one 
 theory that was growing in her daily. 
 
 When she left him alone, the master of Hatch- 
 ways looked before him, for some time, in medita- 
 tion. Then he said "Clever little puss," lifted 
 his brows, and took off his spectacles. Then he said 
 "Fancy me explaining her," and laughed. 
 
 He was not thinking of Bess, though; he was 
 thinking of Ernestine. Life, since he had known 
 the Ryeborns first, flashed before him, as he formu- 
 lated for Lise's information that simple phrase 
 "Not follow too close."
 
 XIII 
 LISE WAITS ON THE DUCHESS 
 
 LISE went on behaving beautifully. 
 
 She waited on the Duchess, up at the House. 
 Dressed in her best clothes, much advertised before- 
 hand to her former playmates, she prepared an as- 
 sault on the staid Victorian portals of Holmer, there 
 to assume her new "station" towards the Wickford 
 family, owing to Mark. She was to go alone, Mrs. 
 Mark Elphinstone in her own right, most enter- 
 taining. Three gentlemen at starting offered their 
 escort, but Lise proudly rejected them all. 
 
 "Will I do 1 ?" said Lise, entering carelessly upon 
 lots of people in the Hatchways drawing-room, at 
 the usual reception-hour, four o'clock. It happened 
 to be rather a selected day, two Justices of the 
 Peace were present, not to mention a pillar of the 
 Church. The pink china replaced the blue dragons 
 on the silver tray, Bess's daffodils were grouped 
 about, and the western sunshine flashing over all. 
 
 "How nice you all look," said Lise, with truth. 
 217
 
 218 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "How are ye, Canon Oxborough? How do ye do, 
 Sir Giles? Wickford, what are you here for"? I'm 
 just about to wait on you, up at the house." 
 
 There was protest, naturally: Wickford and 
 others said things, quite inadequate. There was 
 nothing at all adequate for man to say. Lise was 
 dressed in what she called "satiny velvet," of a dull 
 olive shade. She had lace ruffles, and long feathers, 
 and little pearls in her little ears, and goodness 
 knows what that was distracting. Canon Oxbor- 
 ough, who possessed what other Oxboroughs called 
 the "gift of the gab," to wit a pleasant social man- 
 ner, remarked that Mrs. Elphinstone, in so approach- 
 ing his sister, was taking an unfair advantage. 
 
 "I need all^me advantages," said Lise, looking 
 ravishing. "I'm going on business, for my husband 
 and others. I'm as frightened as possible. Take 
 that cat off me, Wickford, would you mind*?" 
 
 "Like me to hold on to," asked Wickford, remov- 
 ing the Pickle, like a burr, from her satiny skirts. 
 Two other persons offered their services, as has been 
 said. She really looked, as she stood before them, 
 too fragile and fine for business offices : and anyhow, 
 it seemed absurd for Lise to be alone. 
 
 "Have some tea before you go," said Bess behind. 
 
 "No," said Lise, turning that way, "I do not re-
 
 LISE WAITS ON THE DUCHESS 219 
 
 gard it as polite to the Duchess. I must suppose 
 her tea's at least as good as yours." 
 
 "But you know it is not," reasoned the Duke. 
 
 "That makes no difference to politeness," retorted 
 Lise. "Whenever did politeness and the truth take 
 hands'? I've learnt manners, I may mention, since 
 you saw me." 
 
 Still, lightly as she spoke, she eyed the pink tea- 
 cups and the steaming kettle wistfully. She felt 
 sleepy, tired: she longed to be told by Ernestine 
 or somebody authoritative that she might stay. Yet 
 the Duchess had signified by her son that she would 
 be at home to-day: Ernestine, engaged with Mr. 
 Courtier, who was honouring her by his half-yearly 
 visit, gave no lead: duty was duty, and Mark was 
 Mark. So Lise shook off those who would have de- 
 tained her, the Pickle included, and made her way 
 mournfully to the door. Canon Oxborough, getting 
 there before his brother with clerical cunning, opened 
 it and claimed a visit at his Canonry, simul- 
 taneously. 
 
 "Come and see my primulas," minced the Canon : 
 that is, Giles who attended called it mincing. Giles 
 hated Lionel, at the moment. Primulas, indeed! 
 
 Lise went on behaving beautifully.
 
 220 HATCHWAYS 
 
 At the Holmer entrance, near by the lodge, she 
 met M. du Frettay emerging. He was dressed as 
 for riding, but without a horse. Well, then, the 
 case was clear : he had been riding one of Wickf ord's 
 horses, had left his mount at the Holmer stable, and 
 was now going back to Hatchways to tea. He was 
 late for tea, but being French he took it uncon- 
 cernedly. He might not even be aware of it, since 
 he had been in the company, most probably, of 
 Iveagh, who judged hours out-of-doors, if he judged 
 them at all, by the sun. 
 
 "Madame!" said M. du Frettay, sweeping off 
 his hat in an agreeably excessive manner, and bring- 
 ing his heels together. "Toute seule !" Lise smiled 
 at M. du Frettay, and stopped in the road. 
 
 "I'm waiting on the Duchess," she explained. 
 "I'm getting frightened a little. Walk with me up 
 to the door." 
 
 M. du Frettay swung on his heel immediately. 
 And this though he had been making for refresh- 
 ment, after riding! A nice, self-denying foreign 
 man. 
 
 "I'll not take you further," said Lise consolingly. 
 "It's only the sight of these black trees rather put me 
 out. Once through them it's better, isn't it?"
 
 LISE WAITS ON THE DUCHESS 221 
 
 "The worst is over," Gabriel agreed. They en- 
 tered, and passed the Lodge. 
 
 "I was just wondering if I could manage it, when 
 you met me," said Lise. "So dark they are and 
 daunting. Often I've wondered Wick doesn't cut 
 them down." 
 
 Gabriel agreed again, heedlessly. Cut them 
 down ! Irreverent aliens ! Cut down Holmer Ave- 
 nue, fit entrance to its sacred haunts! What is a 
 residence without an Avenue, anyhow"? 
 
 "It's useful in a rainstorm, of course," said Lise, 
 looking up at the trees. "The times I've ridden 
 under them wringing wet after a long day. There 
 is one thing about Holmer, they dry you. Big fires 
 and so on, they dry you thoroughly well. I kept a 
 complete change of linen here," said Lise, pensively, 
 "and so did Adelaide. It was Wickford advised 
 us to do so, in case of catching cold." 
 
 "They are hospitable," said M. du Frettay de- 
 murely, but his eyes were dancing. However, he 
 was far too genuinely gallant to take advantage of 
 such innocent confidences. 
 
 "It seems to me wanting in features," he said, 
 criticising the Holmer property. "Perhaps I mean 
 personality."
 
 222 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "I expect you do," said Lise. "The features are 
 there all right. I'm surprised at you, M. du Fret- 
 tay. Have you never stood upon the Rustic 
 Bridge? Have you seen the Shrubberies, and the 
 Prospect? Has Wickford shown you the Belve- 
 dere?" 
 
 "I have not seen the Belvedere," admitted 
 Gabriel. 
 
 "Then you'll have to, I'll tell Ernestine. The 
 first fine day there is we'll go over en masse and look 
 at it. It's a good step from here, off that way, the 
 other side of their land. It's placed on a hill, and 
 faces the best view here, for miles round. You look 
 away eastward across the counties, and across Eng- 
 land, and Mr. Marchant says across Europe to the 
 Ural Mountains, but I'm not believing the stories 
 he tells. Anyhow it's all blue and wonderful where 
 the sky gets mixed with the land. I expect you 
 know the kind of view I mean." 
 
 "We saw the kind several times to-day," said 
 Gabriel. "You describe it perfectly. But the 
 Belvedere, Madame, for mercy's sake, why the 
 name?" 
 
 "I've not the least idea," said Lise. "Nor Wick- 
 ford, because I asked him. Why the Prospect, if 
 you come to that. There's no prospect in it but a
 
 LISE WAITS ON THE DUCHESS 223 
 
 pair of seedy yew-trees. The Belvedere's made of 
 plaster, chiefly, and half-peeled. It has little dolly 
 pillars you could pull down with one hand. Iveagh 
 says he will some night, they both hate it like 
 poison. And who wonders, with a view like that to 
 shame it? It has what's the three-cornered thing 
 on Italian temples pretending to be Greek; and in- 
 stead of letting ill alone, they have scraped an im- 
 proving saying on it out of Wordsworth, and the 
 Wickford arms." 
 
 "Oh, oh!" protested Gabriel. "Not both, Ma- 
 dame. You exaggerate." 
 
 "Not a bit of it," said Lise, with a charming 
 giggle. "You wait and see. There!" They 
 came out of the Avenue. "Now it feels better, you 
 can go back if you like. . . . Who's that in front 
 of us, the schoolmistress 1 ? Now what's Renie All- 
 good mean by going to see the Duchess the day I 
 call?" 
 
 "I can only be sure," said Gabriel, "that Miss 
 Irene Allgood has an excellent object, as much as 
 the Duchess in receiving her." 
 
 "But so have I an object," asserted Lise. "Here 
 I am doing the correct thing by my husband in com- 
 ing, as I take it, and keeping the peace." 
 
 "What," said Gabriel, "is the peace in danger?"
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "You know it is! Don't go pretending. And, 
 by the same token," said Lise, with an air of discov- 
 ery, "you might give me your ideas. Listen now, 
 if you want to take years from my age " 
 
 "I do not," said Gabriel, having calculated. 
 
 "Now be serious, because I am," entreated Lise. 
 "I really need to know this before I go in. Of 
 course, I notice Lady Wick's fallen out with Ernes- 
 tine. Now what I want to know " 
 
 "De grace, let me off," he said, turning graver. 
 
 "I will not, because I am sure you know it. Is 
 there anything," said Lise, "between Wickford and 
 that girl?' 
 
 "Miss Bess? I have reason," said Gabriel, after 
 an interval, "to believe there is not." 
 
 "Good. Is there anything between her and 
 Iveagh?" 
 
 "I am not certain perfectly," said Gabriel, after 
 another interval, "of the sense of your expression. 
 But I believe there is not." 
 
 Lise was silent, satisfied. She had her answer. 
 She was a woman, so she was not going to summon 
 a man, however foreign and ingenious, to declare 
 that "the girl" was in love with his own friend, un- 
 requited : but that was what he meant, she was sure. 
 If for no other reason, that he was even quicker in
 
 LISE WAITS ON THE DUCHESS 225 
 
 the uptake than she was ; and she had already scented 
 the fact. 
 
 Still behaving beautifully, Lise arrived at the 
 door of Holmer mansion, and stood upon the steps; 
 and still M. du Frettay followed, quiet and courtly, 
 seeing her safe. 
 
 "I'm frightened," she told him briefly again: and 
 it struck him, as a fact, she was. The Duchess, to 
 girls, was frightening; she always had been so, in 
 the past : and Lise, aged twenty-two, felt a girl again 
 on her premises. Her little pulses were beating 
 fast, audible in the gloomy silence, while they stood 
 waiting for the last barrier to fall. 
 
 "Enter the seneschal," said Lise, as steps were 
 heard. "It's like a tale of Scott's! I know the 
 man Michael well, but I dursn't look at him. Oh 
 dear!" The door opened. "Is the Duchess at 
 home?" said Lise, very grand. 
 
 Her Grace was, madam. 
 
 "You can go now," murmured Lise. "You want 
 food, and she gives you nothing to speak of." But 
 she looked pale, to du Frettay's eyes, and he followed 
 her on. 
 
 They crossed the stodgy hall, and passed the 
 frightful staircase to the door of the drawing-room,
 
 226 HATCHWAYS 
 
 which cracked as the man opened it to admit them. 
 It would be necessary to ask such as Ernestine why 
 some doors crack, excessive varnish in the past, 
 probably. Holmer House, for want of a single 
 graceful line, was varnished from top to toe. It 
 smelt of it, for all the Duchess could do. Most of 
 the woodwork was reddish, perhaps mahogany. 
 We have referred before to the chimney-marble. 
 We refrain from reference to the plaster-moulding, 
 grates, or the handles of the doors. 
 
 The only chance was arson, as Iveagh said. 
 
 "Ugh, what a place!" moaned little Lise, in to 
 herself. "Iveagh, I want you." Aloud she said 
 "This was the room where I met my husband first. 
 It's funny to think of it, wanting him." 
 
 Gabriel debated that "wanting." Which lan- 
 guage was it, and what did it stand for"? There are 
 so many possible shades of meaning to the word. 
 
 "That's Iveagh's father," said Lise, walking 
 across the room. She did not say Wickford's. 
 "He was a wonderful speaker, my husband says, 
 persuasive. He's the orator's mouth, wouldn't you 
 say"? And such sad eyes." 
 
 "Curious his sons have not inherited it," said du 
 Frettay, looking hard at the portrait's eyes, which
 
 LISE WAITS ON THE DUCHESS 227 
 
 gloomed a little, as Lise said. Sulky, almost, the 
 greatest wit of his generation. 
 
 "There's not much likeness to either of them 
 either," he said. 
 
 "He was a handsomer man." Lise changed place 
 again, restlessly, to the window, whence one gazed 
 upon the terrace and the Shrubbery, a trifle less un- 
 inviting than the room. "Mark says he was won- 
 derful with Iveagh, managing him in his little 
 tantrums when no one could. Mark remembers 
 more than Wickford even, he's older. He's told 
 me lots and lots about the early days. Once the 
 Secretary of State came in for a kind of confabula- 
 tion, and there was little Iveagh, asleep in the 
 Duke's big chair. Six he was, he'd had a bad day 
 of it, nurses, his mother at her wits' end, Wick 
 worried and Mark shocked." 
 
 "Shocked*?" asked Gabriel. 
 
 "Naturally. Mark had never seen such things, 
 it was his first visit. He can't ever understand 
 Iveagh anyhow. Of course he tries." 
 
 Odd, thought du Frettay, her little head was so 
 full of Iveagh. Was it merely the contrast with the 
 varnish and stodgery, or some other inward debate? 
 
 "Now you can go," said Lise, turning rather
 
 228 HATCHWAYS 
 
 abruptly to face him. "You don't like calling in 
 riding-clothes anyhow. It's a shame to be treating 
 you like Mark." 
 
 "Is that how you treat him'?" ventured Gabriel. 
 
 "Mark," said Lise, "can't stand doing anything 
 in the wrong clothes. It's a weakness of his, the 
 only one. Sometimes I catch him out, for the fun 
 of it, and he hates it. You're hating it now, don't 
 tell me, but you're too polite to say so. Go back 
 while you can, M. du Frettay, yes, I wish it." 
 She stamped her foot. "You're tired, really, and 
 Ernestine will see to you best. Go quick now, while 
 you have time." 
 
 M. du Frettay went. He had been in serious 
 danger for twenty minutes past of losing his head, 
 not to say heart, in this company. So he went, as 
 directed, while he had time. 
 
 The door cracked, as it closed behind him; Lise 
 was left alone. She sat down on the piano-stool, 
 yawned a little, and rested her elbow on the closed 
 keyboard. 
 
 "I want me tea," she observed, to the walls of 
 the drawing-room. She really did. She was too 
 tired to bear solitude. Du Frettay had helped 
 things along nicely while he lasted; now by her own
 
 LISE WAITS ON THE DUCHESS 229 
 
 choice she had dismissed him, and felt the gap the 
 more. 
 
 "Isn't the woman in, after all*? And why on 
 earth does he not tell me so 1 ?" 
 
 Thus soliloquised Lise, in the direction of the 
 Duke's portrait. She had an idea he was sympa- 
 thising, granted a lovely lady in satiny-velvet 
 clothes, in his own reception-room. Deserted, dur- 
 ing her state visit to his halls, surely, he could not 
 approve of it! 
 
 Suddenly Lise, having half-opened the piano-lid, 
 closed it again softly. She had an idea. 
 
 "Where's that girl?" she said, aloud as before. 
 
 The idea of the girl, Miss Irene Allgood, cer- 
 tificated Froebel instructress of youth, filled her 
 thoughts completely. It poured in, ousting every- 
 body, Mark and Iveagh included. Where, indeed, 
 was that girl, who had been on the steps of Holmer 
 just before her? Why, granted the Duchess de- 
 layed or not at home, was she not waiting too? 
 
 Slowly, as she sat at the piano, looking before her, 
 the blood of the Fitzmaurices mounted to Lise's 
 pretty sallow cheek. Her eyes sparkled, her back 
 straightened, her hand dropped from the piano's 
 closed keys. What*? . . . Almost in the same in- 
 stant, steps were heard.
 
 230 HATCHWAYS 
 
 The door cracked, and Michael entered, looking 
 very grave. 
 
 "Her Grace is sorry she is detained, madam," re- 
 hearsed Michael formally. "Business of some im- 
 portance. Her Grace wonders, with her excuses, if 
 you would care to show Mr. du Frettay the Shrub- 
 beries, for twenty minutes to half an hour, while 
 you wait." 
 
 Michael himself added the excuses, being an Irish 
 gentleman. His mistress, as a fact, had sent no 
 excuses to the girl at all. 
 
 Twenty minutes to half an hour! The idea of 
 it! Renie in front of her, openly preferred to her, 
 to herself, Mark's wife, come against the grain 
 in his interest, her very first call as his bride! 
 Treated like a girl, a common girl, to be snubbed, 
 swept aside, forgotten 
 
 "I'll pay her out!" thought Lise immediately. 
 
 Slowly, during the portentous pause, her eyes on 
 the footman altered. She had known him once 
 some time before they had been acquainted. 
 
 "M. du Frettay is gone, as you see, Michael," she 
 said. 
 
 Michael saw it, sorrowfully. Slowly, during the 
 next silence, he recognised Miss Lise. 
 
 "Is it a tadpole escaped 4 ?" said Lise suddenly.
 
 LISE WAITS ON THE DUCHESS 231 
 
 Michael believed not. Miss Allgood had not 
 told him, but he had an idea it was some matter of 
 the children's games. Games! Of course, if Lise 
 had studied with Froebel, she would have known 
 the profound historic significance and moral value 
 of games. But she was not Froebelian, nor Ger- 
 manic in any sense. 
 
 During the next interval, she seemed to be feeling 
 for a card. She sought it, could not find it at once, 
 thinking of other things. . . . 
 
 "Lord Iveagh might be there," mentioned Michael 
 hopefully. "He was round at the back, a minute 
 since, with Mr. Sam." 
 
 "I would not want to disturb them," said Mrs. 
 Elphinstone ; but her eyes were melting and shadow- 
 ing, and the card still eluded her search. 
 
 "I'd not wonder if they was in, by now," said 
 Michael, gaining courage, "in his Grace's room. 
 Unless Mr. Sam had gone." 
 
 "I'd not wish to trouble him, in any case," said 
 Lise, wearily. She left the card. "No, Michael, 
 I'm a little tired. I will wait here." 
 
 The door cracked behind Michael departing, 
 sure of his mission now. Ireland for ever! Lise, 
 on the piano-stool, smiled across at the Duke's por- 
 trait.
 
 232 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Serve her right," she said suggestively. After 
 all, had he not known the Duchess, well? Better 
 than anybody? 
 
 Lise had stopped behaving beautifully. She gave 
 herself a rest. She opened the Duchess's piano, con- 
 sidering that her station in that household entitled 
 her to it. If it did not, she did not care. . . . She 
 began to play the "White Rocks," quietly. Now, 
 the "White Rocks" was the elfin air from the far 
 west, which had first led Iveagh astray.
 
 XIV 
 SEQUEL TO THE FOREGOING 
 
 THAT which had passed between Iveagh and Sam 
 since Adelaide's public baiting of him would be dif- 
 ficult, indeed impossible, for an ordinary pen to 
 state. A constant exchange, a shifting as it were 
 of the ground of understanding, of the terms of their 
 acquaintance, had taken place; great sensitiveness 
 sacrificed, thrown into the pool, as it were, on 
 Iveagh's side, an unheard-of effort of comprehension 
 offered up by Mr. Coverack, before things between 
 them could be at all straight again. But the bond 
 held, triumphant, unshaken, and the return to abso- 
 lutely ordinary conditions was celebrated, this day, 
 by a solemn feast after riding in Wickford's room. 
 The end of it all was, a kind of compact : no terms 
 exactly stated, but all understood. As follows: 
 Sam would keep Iveagh's counsel, and do his best 
 for him, in the matter of Lise, whatever it was 
 Iveagh really wanted: Iveagh would, on his part, 
 forbear to let the Duchess know certain little pas- 
 
 233
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 sages, in recent times, between Adelaide and Sam. 
 
 The last was highly important, as Iveagh recog- 
 nised. He granted without a pang that Sam, whom 
 Addy had always attracted, should still sheepishly 
 cleave to her, in spite of her treatment of him: 
 because he knew what women are. He bore no 
 grudge to Sam for it whatever, though of course 
 he bade him, dutybound, look out for Wick. He 
 also gave up, though more regretfully, the possible 
 weapon against his mother that Adelaide's double 
 game, flirting with Samuel, presented. 
 
 All this really complicated business had been con- 
 cluded, needless to say, without the use of either of 
 the ladies' names. Lise had long been too dear to 
 Iveagh, and Adelaide was rapidly becoming too in- 
 teresting to Sam, for names to be at all in request. 
 The pronouns she and her, in each case, sufficed the 
 bargainers. Each supplied the other's favourite 
 female name, with ease. 
 
 That Wickford would not have liked a feast in his 
 room, goes without saying. All the dogs were there, 
 and he always tried to keep his ducal and literary 
 sanctum clear of Iveagh, Sam, and the dogs. Any 
 one member of the fraternity separately Wickford 
 could do with, so he patiently explained to them, 
 not the lot. Iveagh alone, Sam alone, Fricka the
 
 SEQUEL TO THE FOREGOING 235 
 
 wolf-hound, George the dachs, or Pat the terrier 
 alone respectively, were harmless and tolerable. 
 They were even consoling to ducal and literary soli- 
 tude at times. But he really could not bear the 
 whole Comus-rout of them, Sam's horrid tobacco in 
 the curtains, and crumbs all over his dearest papers 
 and books. Wick had made his room respectable 
 by the Oxford standards, not by the Oxborough 
 ones. He had a nice velvet carpet, walnut fittings, 
 and Mrs. Redgate (secretly) had ordered the cover- 
 ing of his chairs. Was it likely he wanted Pat, 
 fresh from a rat-hunt and brown with mud, curled in 
 one of them? Why, the Irish Secretary might be 
 sitting there to-morrow! He really thought Iveagh 
 might understand. 
 
 Iveagh did, intermittently. He had a real regard 
 for his brother as chieftain of the Suirs at times. 
 But the day of the pact was an exception, for one 
 thing, Wick was safely away. He was down at 
 Mrs. Redgate's, behaving nicely, and seeing to 
 Iveagh's uncles. His room was thus, being empty, 
 at others' service: to the true Suir nature, the mere 
 fact of its emptiness proved that. Iveagh and Sam, 
 albeit intensely curious, avoided reading Wick's 
 book, sheets of which lay spread on the table, be- 
 cause, before a book is printed or a speech heard, no
 
 236 HATCHWAYS 
 
 gentleman does such things. They did not avoid, 
 having laid it aside, setting a black kettle tempo- 
 rarily where it had lain; nor did their gentlemanly 
 instincts discourage George, who was always learn- 
 ing tricks which he never mastered, from nosing wet 
 morsels of much-begged cake about the velvet floor. 
 Such trifles they overlooked, in a crisis of friendship 
 and festivity: and Sam paid the finest tribute pos- 
 sible to Wickford's chairs by using two of them 
 for self and boots. 
 
 This was the intimate occasion which the foot- 
 man, fresh from Lise in the drawing-room, inter- 
 rupted. The occasion had just got going, when 
 Michael came. He stated the case, as he knew he 
 could to Iveagh, quite clearly. Mrs. Elphinstone 
 was in the back drawing-room, come to visit her 
 Grace. Her Grace happened to be engaged with 
 Miss Allgood about the children's games. She 
 would likely not go to Miss Lise for the matter of 
 half an hour. Miss Lise wished no one disturbed, 
 particularly. She was playing there on the piano 
 to pass the time. She had walked up, he thought 
 she seemed tired 
 
 It was sufficient, more than enough. Both 
 young men were on their feet, Iveagh speechless and 
 pale with rage.
 
 SEQUEL TO THE FOREGOING 237 
 
 "Half an hour*?" gaped Sam, who was also Lise's 
 old companion. "Well, that's a queer thing now! 
 Who's Miss Allgoodr 
 
 Iveagh said something about Miss Allgood which 
 had far better not be repeated. It was not even 
 true, for she was a young lady with nothing against 
 her, in life, a hard student, and what is more, she 
 had often weary work with the Duchess. It is prob- 
 able she was more to be pitied than blamed on this 
 occasion: only Lise's party was not in a state to 
 regard such arguments, naturally. 
 
 "I'll see to it," said Iveagh briefly to the messen- 
 ger. "Let you fetch some more cream and so on, 
 Fricka's drunk it, I'll see to the rest." 
 
 "Yes, my lord," said Michael softly, slipped out, 
 and shut the door cautiously behind him. He al- 
 ready had some idea, owing to natural sympathy 
 and an intense interest in his betters' concerns, that 
 caution in the case was necessary. Beyond that 
 Iveagh's command, however casual, secured atten- 
 tion, and his use of the verb "let" was individual, 
 it simply had to be obeyed. Anyhow, the Irish 
 servants respected him a good deal more than Wick- 
 ford: secretly, their first service was his. Why, it 
 would be hard to say, unless that Wickford, at 
 times, adopted his mother's kind condescension to-
 
 238 HATCHWAYS 
 
 wards them, studying their tastes. Iveagh could be 
 a horrid tyrant, always had been capable of it 
 from childhood. The real regard of Michael and 
 his kind for Iveagh dated back to the period when 
 his royal rages, now and again, stirred the -house 
 pleasurably from top to bottom : at top and bottom, 
 rather, since the Duke and his back kitchen en- 
 joyed it, and the Duchess and her well-trained staff 
 did not. We refer the curious to M. du Frettay's 
 profound observations on types of aristocracy, as 
 exhibited in our islands, for further light. 
 
 "Shall I go*?" growled Sam, much concerned to 
 stick by the terms of the celebrated bargain, what- 
 ever they were. 
 
 "No, you will not," said Iveagh evenly. "You'll 
 sit there, and take your feet off the chair, and 
 behave as well as ever you can, till I tell you. 
 She's Mark's wife, I'll ask you to remember, and 
 fond of him, and she's used to having things 
 nice, anyhow at Mrs. Redgate's, and she is not 
 well." 
 
 "Lord," thought Sam, "what a freak you are," 
 but he followed orders. 
 
 "Take that tea-pot out of the fender," said 
 Iveagh, "and put it where it ought to be, and get 
 some of the crumbs away, and put Wick's writin'
 
 SEQUEL TO THE FOREGOING 239 
 
 things straight on the table, and his book lyin' open 
 an' easy, just where it was." 
 
 "What's that for*?" Sam asked, puzzled by this 
 last direction. However, Iveagh was quite sure 
 about it. It made things altogether shades more 
 respectable and honourable to have Wick's statisti- 
 cal book. 
 
 "And open the window," he resumed instructions, 
 "and finish your pipe there if you have to, and turn 
 the dogs out, barring Fricka who I hope's to be 
 trusted," he looked at Fricka, who gently whined, 
 "and generally see things decent," finished Iveagh, 
 "till I come back." 
 
 So instructed, Sam was left to digest his strange 
 position: and Iveagh repaired to the back drawing- 
 room, whence the "White Rocks" was dimly steal- 
 ing, a passion of outraged love and hospitality 
 flooding his soul : a Suir passion of purest enmity to 
 Froebel and Oxborough and their attendant or 
 mutual usefulness. Usefulness! with Beauty de- 
 serted in the drawing-room, green-suited by the 
 fairies to delight them, and needing her tea! Lise 
 had not appealed to the spirit of the great Duke's 
 picture in vain. 
 
 Lise danced home to Hatchways that night in the
 
 240 HATCHWAYS 
 
 highest spirits, all her weariness miraculously done 
 away. Her reception by the Wickford family, she 
 gave the company to understand, had been a lordly 
 one, as indeed it had. Oh yes, she had had lots 
 to eat, oh yes, the entertainment had been ade- 
 quate. Why, was not the Duchess herself enter- 
 tainment sufficiently'? It was nice, Lise implied, to 
 feel one had done one's duty by the Duchess, 
 whether one's duty by Mark she did not say. 
 
 "I hope her Graciousness did not keep you wait- 
 ing?" said M. du Frettay, who never because he 
 did not care got titles right. 
 
 "I hardly noticed it," said Lise. "I was playing 
 on the piano when she came in. ... By the way, 
 Ernestine, I quite like Renie Allgood. She isn't 
 half a bad little sort of girl." 
 
 "Ah," said Gabriel, remembering. "She made 
 one of you." 
 
 "She came in when the Duchess did," said Lise. 
 That some forty minutes had intervened she did not 
 say. "Renie's a plain-faced girl and puts it on, but 
 she's well-meaning. There was some question of 
 the revival of old games they were talking of, over 
 the tea. I saw no harm at all in it, from what I 
 heard."
 
 SEQUEL TO THE FOREGOING 
 
 "Did you hear any harm from what you saw 6 ?" 
 said Mr. Redgate, picking at words as usual. 
 
 "I am glad you sympathised in that, Lise," said 
 Ernestine. "Gertrude is so glad to get musical peo- 
 ple's support." Ernestine, of course, knew from 
 Adelaide that the games matter was Gertrude's 
 "latest," subsequent to the sand even, quite the 
 newest of all. 
 
 "She seemed pleased about it," said Lise gaily. 
 "I called her Aunt Gertrude for Mark's sake and 
 she took it well. Then I played some of the little 
 tunes, and Renie sang baby-words to them, she's 
 quite a good little voice. I can't see why Iveagh 
 should be rude to her " 
 
 "Hullo," said Rick, "was Iveagh there'?" 
 
 "He and Sam joined on to us," said Lise, "when 
 they heard the music. It was quite a little concert 
 we had. You can always get Iveagh with music, 
 he's really very fond of it, I often tell my hus- 
 band " 
 
 "Oh, Lise, Lise, mischief, what have you been 
 up to?" sighed Mrs. Redgate in spirit: but she spoke 
 no word. 
 
 The next days were adventurous and interesting, 
 Lise being engaged in waiting for the Indian mail.
 
 242 HATCHWAYS 
 
 She was also feeling better for the home air of 
 Hatchways, daily less languid, and more inclined to 
 try her powers. She wished Mark would write, of 
 course, but in the interval she sat for her portrait 
 to Miss Ryeborn, out of doors since the weather was 
 agreeable, during the morning hours. Bess had 
 been afraid that sitting would bore her, but dear, 
 no, Lise was not dull ! M. du Frettay, for instance, 
 slaving at his aeronautic calculations in the study, 
 took a stroll at least once during the morning, to 
 cool his brain, and see how the orchard sitting was 
 getting on. The Duke, going up to London duti- 
 fully every day, called in for an orchard interlude 
 on his way to the station. Mr. Redgate was not too 
 immersed in articles to bend above his niece's easel, 
 and chaff the model, at times. Iveagh was there, 
 quite as often as anybody wanted. He lay reading 
 in the grass unnoticed, and saying no word. 
 
 "Now look here, Lise," said the Duke, during a 
 pause in Mrs. Elphinstone's selfless labours, one fine 
 morning. "It's no earthly use going on like this." 
 
 Wickford had captured her, as usual, on his road 
 to London, while Bess rested, and while Bess's 
 model, immensely pleased with self and circum- 
 stances, ate a bun. There is nothing so exhausting 
 to nature, it is well known, as sitting for one's por-
 
 SEQUEL TO THE FOREGOING 243 
 
 trait, and her appetite was improving: Lise bit her 
 bun with the greatest goodwill, as she strolled with 
 the Duke a pleasant change down the flowery 
 path that leads to the beehives. 
 
 "Like what 1 ?" said Lise, lifting her eyebrows. 
 
 "You'll make him as bad as ever," said Wick- 
 ford. "We shall have it all over again." 
 
 "I haven't the pleasure of understanding you, 
 Duke," said Lise. 
 
 "Oh yes, you have. There are limits, you 
 know. We've had bother enough. You know per- 
 fectly." 
 
 Lise knew, of course; but she did not see why 
 Wick should treat her like this about it. Wick 
 really had an exceptionally unadorned way of put- 
 ting things. M. du Frettay, now, would have 
 turned an observation like that quite nicely, so that 
 one need feel no faintest nudging of remorse. Lise 
 determined to be chilly with Wickford at once, even 
 though it should be at the bun's expense. 
 
 But it was no use. Wickford took the line of 
 the old companion, and argued unfluently in that 
 tone. Lise had to give in at last. 
 
 "Well," she said, with a naughty glint, "what do 
 you want me to do 1 ?" 
 
 "I want you not to do," said Wickford curtly.
 
 244 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "But I'm not doing anything." She looked 
 subtle, liquid, in her manner: and innocent as the 
 air. 
 
 "Give Miss Ryeborn a chance," blurted Wick- 
 ford. 
 
 "Oh, Wick!" Multitudinous, etherial reproach, 
 from every quarter of the woman's heaven, fell 
 upon the blunderer. He flushed up, but stuck to it. 
 
 "I mean it. That's the least you can do." 
 
 "You talk as if I'd done wrong," said Lise. 
 
 There was an interval, Wickford perplexed. He 
 wished to be just, of course. If Lise had, as she 
 implied, merely existed, breathed the air in his 
 brother's neighbourhood. ... It is rottenly hard to 
 know, with these girls ! 
 
 He looked at her. He had often looked at Lise, 
 in the old days. She was looking sidelong across 
 him, and it struck him she resembled a fawn. 
 Something in the setting of her eyes, the corners 
 of them. 
 
 "Can't you play about with the Frenchman, if 
 you need to?" 
 
 "WiekF 
 
 Useless : she had to look straight at last, and met 
 his eyes. Nice, honest eyes he had, with just the 
 right expression. Wickford understood coquetry by
 
 SEQUEL TO THE FOREGOING 245 
 
 nature, made every allowance, that was the fact. 
 Lise knew he did because well, they had tried some 
 passages in the past. Adelaide's fault entirely. 
 He was tackling her now, with hopeless unreadiness 
 of expression, but in just the right vein. He held 
 her, loosely and firmly as he held his horse. 
 
 "Are you going to beg my pardon 1 ?" said Mrs. 
 Elphinstone. 
 
 "Not just yet." 
 
 "You needn't think I'm going to make bargains 
 about a thing like that," said Lise. 
 
 "I don't," said Wickford. "I want you to think 
 it out." 
 
 "What?' 
 
 "Think it out," said Wickford. 
 
 "Well, I'm sure !" said Lise to her surroundings, 
 which were the beehives. They had arrived there. 
 
 She attended to her bun all the way back to the 
 orchard, exclusively, making up for lost time. 
 Wickford wheeled station-ward, when they reached 
 the orchard-turn. She took no notice of him when 
 he left.
 
 XV 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 
 
 SIR GEORGE came down to Holmer for the week-end 
 in order to (as his mother put it) see about Iveagh: 
 and of course, though knowing his profound dislike 
 for it, the Duchess gave a party for him. 
 
 The Duchess could not avoid the conviction that 
 it was good for George. She was the more con- 
 vinced of it that Mrs. Redgate made, in spite of 
 their recent estrangement, an attempt to dissuade 
 her. Wickford, it seemed, had seen a note from Sir 
 George to Mrs. Redgate, in which he was "hoping 
 to be able to see his friends and talk to the boys on 
 the quiet, this time," and other hints that equally 
 well conveyed his state of mind. It was his usual 
 state, shy and retiring, faithful to the friends he 
 cared for, and reckless of chatter and renown. 
 Wickford, too evidently urged by Ernestine, tried to 
 put a spoke in his mother's hospitable wheel: and 
 his efforts to discourage her had their invariable 
 stimulating effect. 
 
 246
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 247 
 
 Shaking off her eldest-born, a strictly maternal 
 attitude, the Duchess went ahead with her ar- 
 rangements. She planned a little dinner of a 
 dozen, on Saturday. She invited, for George's sake 
 and to silence Wickford, Dr. Ashwin of Harley 
 Street, one of George's oldest friends, who refused. 
 Well, there you were, one could do no more than 
 ask the man. She proceeded to ask a Bishop, be- 
 cause Bishops in the nature of things take to ex- 
 plorers, at least they ought. Disseminating the 
 true faith, first the ploughshare and then the seed, 
 she explained it to Gabriel du Frettay, who 
 seemed sceptical. She chose a Bishop who had been 
 attached to Wickford's school a dozen years back, 
 and addressed him as "my boy." The Duchess was 
 always doing things of this sort, and then being sur- 
 prised her sons were sulky. She invited Gabriel, 
 because he knew how to behave, not because George 
 had known his father. She did not invite Mr. Mar- 
 chant because, she told Wickford, he was not good 
 enough. Vulgarity of this sort one may allow one- 
 self in a strictly domestic circle. These, with her 
 sons and brother Giles Oliver had gone at last 
 made six men. 
 
 The question of women to match was more trou- 
 blesome, one had to pick and choose. The Duch-
 
 248 HATCHWAYS 
 
 ess picked her sister-in-law, who had been trying for 
 ages, by any means, to entrap Sir George. That 
 George had been trying, all he knew, to avoid Isabel, 
 made no difference, now they would have to meet. 
 She proceeded to pick Adelaide's mother, with whom 
 Isabel had never been able to get on : there was pro- 
 nounced hostility between the ladies. This, with 
 dear Adelaide (for Wickford's sake) and herself, 
 made four. 
 
 Two places were vacant. She turned over Lise. 
 She turned, re-turned, and adopted her, without an 
 idea that in so turning Lise she was turning herself. 
 Yet it was so. Lise, the naughty sprite, had cap- 
 tured the Duchess : she assumed and held her station 
 at Holmer in spite of all. And how? Hastily, 
 before the whole of our intelligent public forestall 
 us, let us explain. 
 
 First then, Lise herself had done most towards the 
 miracle, by her friendly interest in Miss Allgood's 
 activities, and her dainty fashion of playing the lit- 
 tle tunes. Pardon and favour crept towards Lise 
 on that occasion, and that in spite of the fact that 
 the Duchess's son, under her eyes, was attracted as 
 much as she was. It was still annoying about 
 Iveagh, of course, but somehow, Renie and the
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 249 
 
 games stood first. So many things had always been 
 able to oust Iveagh, as they took root and flourished 
 in his mother's active mind. The question of Wick- 
 ford could at any moment obscure him, the question 
 of any of the Duchess's "causes" could: the school, 
 of course, games could rout him, he could be par- 
 tially buried in sand. Last of all Mark, the dis- 
 tant, omnipotent Mark, outweighed Iveagh utterly, 
 as he outweighed Wickford also at need; and Mark, 
 since the occasion of Lise's call, had written to his 
 patroness. 
 
 Mark confided his little wife to her, that was 
 what it came to. It was belated, like all things out 
 of India, having been an afterthought, when Lise 
 had left. It was sedate, collected, like Mark: but 
 he was none the less worrying, dreaming over Lise 
 in every line of it: he was none the less secure in 
 his assumption of his Aunt Gertrude's motherly in- 
 terest in her, for his sake; and his Aunt Gertrude, 
 so far as she was capable of it, felt ashamed. 
 
 That and the games together, and perhaps Lise's 
 own gentleness and gaiety, though satiny-velvet 
 fripperies went for naught, was enough to unbend 
 her original attitude. She unbent faintly to Mrs. 
 Redgate too; only faintly, for we regret to say, as
 
 250 HATCHWAYS 
 
 soon as she really wanted Lise, she became jealous 
 of Hatchways for owning her: which was highly 
 undignified and illogical, but none the less Oxbor- 
 ough for that. 
 
 There remained a place for a girl at her table on 
 Saturday, which her sons assumed (for some reason) 
 Miss Ryeborn was to occupy. Her elder son let 
 her know he assumed it, and the Duchess set her 
 teeth. 
 
 "Gertrude wants you for the week-end, Lise," 
 said Ernestine. "I think you will have to go." 
 
 "Oh, I don't want to, Ernestine," said Lise, bury- 
 ing her cinder-coloured head in Mrs. Redgate's lap. 
 "I don't want to, I dislike it. Are you all tired 
 of me so soon 1 ?" 
 
 They were not all tired of her at Hatchways, 
 they liked her dearly. Even Bess could not avoid 
 it, though Bess's life moved quietly into the back- 
 ground to make room for Lise, was turning very 
 grey. She was studying Lise, for her soul's good, 
 daily. It may have been the kitten-aspect, but she 
 had made rather a wonderful little portrait, and it 
 was nearly done. Wickford, who watched its prog- 
 ress, declared his intention of showing it to his 
 mother, and getting her to buy it as a present for
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 251 
 
 Mark. And if she did not, said Wickford, he 
 would do so. Mark, when the worst was said, de- 
 served something, for granting them the light of 
 Lise. 
 
 "Find me an excuse, then," said Lise to every- 
 body. "I'm not well particularly, how's that 1 ?" 
 Ernestine shook her head for all answer. "Well 
 then, the painting," fixing one of the company. 
 "You'll want me sitting all day of my last days, 
 won't you 1 ?" Bess nodded and smiled. "Mention 
 I'm engaged, Ernestine," said Lise, leaning back 
 against her hostess. "I'm under vow, because of 
 next May's Academy. Without all day of Satur- 
 day and Sunday morning, there's no chance of me 
 looking my best." 
 
 Well, that was all very well, playfully: but Lise 
 was a person to whom play was apt to turn earnest 
 at once, if her wil fulness was aroused. This, by 
 way of the Froebel System, should have been a point 
 of sympathy with the mistress of Holmer; but when 
 the particular game was made known to her, the 
 Duchess did not find it so. 
 
 During the interval, George and the party loom- 
 ing nearer, it became increasingly clear to the Duch- 
 ess that she must have Lise, "elle s'emballait" 
 rapidly. She remembered yet another thing,
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 George, terrified of society women, enjoyed young 
 folk. Lise was not only a social acquisition of some 
 brilliance, she was a girl. Given a collection 
 which includes men like George, Giles, and the 
 Bishop, one had better have girls. It affords a di- 
 version after dinner, makes something to look at, 
 and keeps them awake. 
 
 Wickford, Iveagh, and Gabriel quite agreed with 
 the Duchess here: only, oddly enough, they did not 
 see the said girls as necessarily appertaining to the 
 Bishop, Sir George, and Sir Giles. 
 
 Iveagh, for instance, could have put his mother's 
 table together for her one-handed, granted the in- 
 gredients he foresaw. Lise to himself, for instance : 
 Bess to Wickford: Addy to du Frettay's able charge: 
 Trenchard to Mother, whom at least he knew and 
 trusted: Aunt Isabel to the Bishop, who could talk 
 her down : Mrs. Courtier, as was to be hoped, to the 
 utter prostration and finishing of Uncle Giles. 
 
 What could be nicer 1 ? But his mother did not 
 see thus reasonably. Wickford, for instance, as the 
 best man present (deny it who dared) would cleave 
 to Mrs. Courtier, a Baron's daughter, the best 
 woman. Pear Isabel must have George, because 
 she wanted him. Young Frettay, because of the 
 urgency of the table-game, would conduct herself,
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 253 
 
 that was nicely mixed already. Poor Giles 
 should have Lise because he liked her. The Bishop 
 would get along quite well with Adelaide. Iveagh 
 might not be there at all, if they could not sweep 
 up a girl for him. He could have an engagement, 
 or Ernestine, being prompted, could ask him down. 
 
 Anyhow, and before everything, Lise must be on 
 the scene, about the place, if as nothing else, as a 
 fireside ornament. Holmer firesides needed to be 
 concealed so badly ! Since the Duchess did not get, 
 on Friday morning, a reply in the form of full 
 capitulation from Hatchways, she walked down her- 
 self with Adelaide to see about it. 
 
 "The children are so happy, Gertrude," was 
 Ernestine's way of putting it. "We hoped you 
 would not break us up. She goes on Monday 
 early." 
 
 The children! including, the Duchess supposed, 
 her hopeful sons. It was true, Wickford had said 
 at breakfast he was taking the midday train to town ; 
 but with that painting-girl about, nobody knew 
 what his excuses were worth. Since Adelaide was 
 also taking the train, this was one of the things the 
 Duchess had come to see about. 
 
 "Where is she?" she demanded, meaning Lise. 
 
 "I think they're all in the orchard. Would you
 
 254 HATCHWAYS 
 
 care to come down the garden*? Rick's white iris is 
 coming out." 
 
 Cool, rather, thought the Duchess. A trifle mid- 
 dle-class in its coolness. It would have been better 
 form to call the girl in to attend her. However 
 she rose. 
 
 "I'll go down there," she said drily. "Don't dis- 
 turb yourself. Wickford is walking to the station 
 immediately. I'll send him in to pick up Adelaide." 
 
 Mrs. Redgate glanced at her wrist-watch. It 
 struck her that Wickford, if he meant to walk, was 
 running it fine. Still, he could always have Rick's 
 bicycle. 
 
 "Had you not better go on 4 ?" she suggested to 
 Adelaide. "Wick could catch you easily." 
 
 "I can walk as fast as Wick," said Adelaide 
 grumpily. She had crossed to the window in the 
 Duchess's wake, and stood there as though hesitating 
 whether to follow her out. Adelaide never liked to 
 be ordered about by "Lady Wick." She stood on 
 her rights there, far-sightedly. As well to begin in 
 good time. 
 
 Mrs. Redgate, who had plenty to do, remained 
 seated where she was, and looked at the girl, whose 
 fine vigorous figure seemed out of keeping with her 
 worn and rather sulky looks. She looked older than
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 255 
 
 she ought in the unflattering sunlight, even a little 
 ill. Ernestine, knowing her temptations, began to 
 reproach herself for forgetfulness. Adelaide had 
 not an easy time of it between her contending 
 parents, her life was one of saving appearances, 
 the most wearing life there is; and Holmer, of late, 
 had been small consolation. 
 
 "She's always sending me about with him," 
 jerked Adelaide with temper, her back turned. 
 "I'm getting sick of it." 
 
 "Well, he likes being with you," said Ernestine. 
 
 "I'm getting sick of it," the girl repeated in a 
 mutter. "Why doesn't he speak out*?" 
 
 The next instant, she regretted saying it. Luck- 
 ily, it was only Ernestine. She sent a furtive 
 glance towards her, but Mrs. Redgate was still 
 studying her watch. 
 
 "My hat's in the hall," she said. "I'll walk on 
 with you, if you are sure you want to walk. My 
 cycle is there." 
 
 Adelaide wanted to walk. She walked with 
 Ernestine, cross for the first ten minutes, but coming 
 round. 
 
 "You're breaking Sam's heart, you know," said 
 Mrs. Redgate, her first remark. 
 
 "It won't hurt him," said Adelaide, but she
 
 256 HATCHWAYS 
 
 looked relieved. She was glad Ernestine, anyhow, 
 had noticed Sam. Presently, having plumed her- 
 self a little, she took Mrs. Redgate's arm. 
 
 "Tit for tat," she suggested, with an uneasy 
 laugh. "Two can play at his game." She hoped 
 to hear that Wick had marked her retaliation. 
 Ernestine, of course, was "in the know." 
 
 "If you are flirting," said Ernestine gravely, "it's 
 very unkind to poor Sam." (Pooh, what did Sam 
 matter? said Miss Courtier's expression.) "And 
 Wick won't like you any the better for it." 
 
 "Ernestine! What do you mean*?" 
 
 "What Wick wants," said Ernestine calmly, "is 
 an apology." 
 
 "What? Ernestine, old girl, you're off you're 
 head." Adelaide was, of course, the only person in 
 the district who would have called Mrs. Redgate 
 "old girl." 
 
 "I am not," she answered, "really. I really 
 think, if you want to be friends again, that is your 
 only hope." 
 
 Friends! And this from Ernestine, who was 
 bound to be "up" in the Suir boys ! It was a pill to 
 swallow, indeed. 
 
 "I suppose you mean about the kid," said Ade- 
 laide, with a second uneasy laugh. Owing to Sir
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 257 
 
 Giles and the Frenchman, severally, she had suf- 
 fered from a doubt or two, since that scene at the 
 station. 
 
 "Yes. Of course you know you offended Wick- 
 ford." 
 
 "Ernestine, don't talk rot!" Adelaide, growing 
 anxious, hung on her arm. "Offended! You're 
 getting as bad as du Frettay." 
 
 It was news to Ernestine that Gabriel had fore- 
 stalled her; still, he had probably clothed his 
 friendly hints too well. Adelaide required naked 
 statements, in life; and even so, her independent 
 spirit often qualified them as "rot" or "rats," and 
 refused to take them in. 
 
 "But I tell you the fact," she said. "Wick was 
 hurt extremely. Indignant no, offended is the 
 word. It's not the sort of thing he is likely to bear. 
 How could you think it, Adelaide?" 
 
 "Why not?" the girl muttered, though she did 
 not want an answer. The clan-loyalty and simple 
 affection that bound the brothers, never concealed, 
 was the last thing Adelaide was ever likely to reckon 
 upon, concerning them: for the reason that she did 
 not wish to do so. She did not care to look upon 
 that side of Wickford; though it was true he had 
 made her feel it, now and then.
 
 258 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Who told on me 1 ?" she said, after a moody in- 
 terval. 
 
 "But don't you see, dear, everybody did, that last 
 time. You took no pains to be private, did you? 
 Iveagh's uncle has never stopped tormenting him, 
 and openly. They tease him about drinking to 
 drown sorrow, too," said Mrs. Redgate, pensively. 
 "That must surely be you, not Sam." 
 
 "Well, he does. Sam ought to know." 
 
 "Well, suppose he did even. Are you one to 
 talk?" 
 
 "Drop it," said Adelaide with a wince. This was 
 really bad form of Ernestine, she was going too far. 
 She might be said to be intruding, none of her 
 business. Adelaide gazed about the country, dur- 
 ing the next interval, with the furtive, stubborn look 
 Mrs. Redgate knew too well. One's own secret 
 temptation, or slavery, in life, is never in the same 
 category as other people's. It is distinguished from 
 them, proper in its place. 
 
 "There's no harm in drinking a bit," was Ade- 
 laide's way out of it. "Dozens of men do it, quite 
 good ones too. Oh, my Great-aunt, you ask 
 Mother " 
 
 Ernestine cut in on the Great-aunt. "You knew 
 it was Wickford's special anxiety, when you picked
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 259 
 
 up the story, and passed that phrase about. Didn't 
 you 4 ? M. du Frettay told me " 
 
 "Oh, dash!" said Adelaide. "I suppose I did. 
 Wick's a little goat. It was only rotting. Mean 
 he minds it really*?" She clasped the friendly 
 arm again, entreating or rather demanding reas- 
 surance. 
 
 "Of course he minds ! Iveagh's wildness, his bit- 
 terness, is not funny to us, we cannot think so. It 
 is beyond us," said Ernestine, with a thought to the 
 circus clown. It is so hopeless to argue on the point 
 of humour, ever. 
 
 "That kid!" muttered Adelaide. "I say, do 
 you mind, Ernestine?" 
 
 "I should have minded if the boy had died, two 
 summers since at Oxford, or lost his reason, as was 
 quite " 
 
 "Oh, rattlesnakes!" said Adelaide, cordially: and 
 nipped the friendly arm, as a broad hint she had 
 had enough of it. Rats and rattlesnakes was how 
 the fair Miss Courtier preferred to think of Iveagh's 
 business, exclusively. She could not change her 
 emblematic conception of it, really, at this time of 
 day. That was too much to expect of anyone. . . . 
 All the same she decided, before Wickford overtook 
 them, to say something or other to him: just enough
 
 260 HATCHWAYS 
 
 to straighten matters, if not quite an apology. It 
 was distinctly worth it, even at her present stage 
 with Sam, which Wick hardly realised, as it hap- 
 pened. Ernestine was right so far, though she 
 was certainly interfering more than a little so to talk 
 to her. She was (in the expression du Frettay 
 liked) putting in an oar. 
 
 Ernestine, returning to Hatchways as soon as 
 Wickford overhauled them, much feared she had 
 put the oar in too late to save Adelaide from the 
 rocks, as regarded that self-contained little person- 
 age, their noble Duke. She reflected with sorrow 
 that she was late in the matter. She had been so 
 anxious about Lise, so troubled over Bess, that she 
 had overlooked Adelaide altogether. Poor Ade- 
 laide. . . . Yet she greatly feared M. du Frettay 
 was right, and her idea of humour and Wickford' s 
 could never, never match. And if so, it was better 
 to stop thinking about marrying, really. It really 
 was. 
 
 ii 
 
 We return to the Duchess. 
 
 On the way down to the orchard, the Duchess 
 stopped by the white iris. Actually out! How 
 did the people manage it 4 ? That particular kind
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 261 
 
 had no business to be out till May. The Duchess 
 was, of course, something of a gardener, having 
 made, in her single person, Holmer House. Thus 
 she could reckon, almost to a day, the gross favourit- 
 ism exhibited by that flag-plant, flowering in April 
 at Hatchways. 
 
 Next, she passed a grey kitten, rolling in apparent 
 delirium among the bees in a row of pale-blue flow- 
 ers. The kitten, inordinately prolonged, and ex- 
 hibiting the wrong, or dappled side of its person in a 
 flagrant manner, did not interest the Duchess. The 
 blue flowers did, because she could not for the life 
 of her remember the name of them. It worried her 
 all the way to the orchard turn. 
 
 "Iveagh," she said in consequence, as soon as she 
 saw him. "What is that?" 
 
 She extended a blue flower, which she had picked. 
 She had picked a white iris, also. Iveagh, answer- 
 ing, observed the fact in consternation. His mother 
 had been taking things, unasked, out of Mrs. Red- 
 gate's borders ! 
 
 "Those are Mrs. Elphinstone's iris, M. du Fret: 
 tay says," remarked the Ryeborn girl, who was 
 painting under the shadow of blossoms. 
 
 "Fleur-de-lys," said Iveagh in that direction. 
 "Ripping, put one in."
 
 262 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Where is Lise*?" said the Duchess, having recog- 
 nised the Ryeborn girl; for the hammock near the 
 pair was empty, albeit faintly swinging: something 
 had recently been there. Wickford also was ab- 
 sent, nobody present, in short. The Duchess pre- 
 pared to go on. 
 
 "Mother, look here, look here, Mother," said 
 Iveagh, outraged. "You haven't looked, and it's 
 gettin' on for done." 
 
 She paused to glance passingly at the portrait. 
 It was not bad, obviously Lise. It had her look 
 about it. Yes, it was cleverish. . . . Iveagh, 
 kneeling at her side, stared in silence, eating grass. 
 Foolish and tiresome, she preferred not to have 
 him near her. 
 
 "Go and find her for me," she said, pushing him 
 slightly. Strange, the distaste she felt for him, 
 dislike almost, she dared not look into it. It was 
 growing daily. She trusted George would relieve 
 her sight. 
 
 He was on his feet almost as she touched him; 
 but paused, glancing as though for instruction at 
 the girl. 
 
 "She went to fetch her milk, I think," said Miss 
 Ryeborn, without looking up. "Down by the 
 kitchen, you will meet her coming back."
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 263 
 
 So that was it, a studio interval. The model 
 taking refreshment, the artist free, if a little fright- 
 ened. The Duchess, making up her mind, sat down 
 deliberately. Her countenance, no doubt, con- 
 veyed her intentions, for Iveagh, in the act of going, 
 hung on his heel. 
 
 If his mother was going to rag Bess in Wick's 
 absence, reflected Iveagh, it was as well somebody 
 should be about. There was, further, the question 
 of Lise's portrait, on which it was advisable some- 
 one of experience (in the Duchess) should keep an 
 eye. His mother had already been picking things 
 up about Mrs. Redgate's borders, she might easily, 
 unless observed, make off with Bess's portrait too. 
 Bess's or Lise's, Iveagh had not quite determined 
 the point, though he had devoted several odd half- 
 hours, of late, to chasing a solution. Two girls 
 were in it, two characters, one mirrored through 
 the other. To watch so mixed a thing as that por- 
 trait grow out of its earliest stages was fascinating : 
 more, it was mysterious. Iveagh took to such mys- 
 teries kindly, dreaming and reading alternately, 
 those long, lovely mornings of awakening summer. 
 At least, it was a precious thing. 
 
 He sank down again in the long grass at Bess's 
 side, a little nearer than before, and Bess's blue eyes
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 stole to him doubtfully. Did he, she wondered, 
 really mean to stay*? How naughty, when his 
 mother told him to go, and how brave ! Bess, of 
 course, was terrified of the Duchess, worse than 
 Lise. 
 
 "You paint on commission, Miss Ryeborn?" be- 
 gan the Duchess, settling to it. 
 
 "Oh no," said Bess. "I paint for love. I am 
 only learning at present," she added, shyly. 
 
 "I should say," said the Duchess, in an Oxbor- 
 ough manner of judgment, "you are well advanced." 
 
 "I should say you're gettin' on, Bess," said Iveagh. 
 
 "That portrait is not for sale, then," proceeded 
 the Duchess, disregarding Iveagh. He had always 
 been like that. Of old, his father had seen to him. 
 Now well, she left it to George. 
 
 "I understand from my son," she went on, still 
 graciously, "that you might take offers, if pressed." 
 
 "Wick been makin' you offers'?" asked Iveagh, 
 leaning neared. He whistled. "I say, I hadn't 
 heard that." 
 
 The corners of Miss Ryeborn's mouth twitched, 
 and her colour mounted faintly. He was behaving 
 very badly, and had better, if he could do nothing 
 more useful, go away. Bess touched the shadows
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 265 
 
 on Lise's painted hair, while she reflected thus, and 
 steadied her countenance. 
 
 "I told your son I would give it him," she said, 
 avoiding, with great propriety, the Ducal name. "I 
 mean, if he really thinks it good enough for Captain 
 Elphinstone. But it isn't fair," Bess added lower, 
 in her own person. 
 
 "Fair?" asked the Duchess. 
 
 "No. Because he has her," said Bess, "and we 
 shan't have anything to remind us. It hardly seems 
 fair he should have both." 
 
 "You're fond of her, then," said the Duchess : her 
 son being stationary, watching the moving brush. 
 
 "I don't see how anyone can help it," said Bess. 
 
 "She's good-looking, of course," said the Duchess. 
 "I suppose that is all artistic people mind." 
 
 "She is beautiful, but we mind about other 
 things," said Bess. 
 
 Iveagh's eyes had moved from the brush's point 
 to the hand guiding it. Bess had a beautiful, capa- 
 ble hand, like her aunt's, and as steady, usually. 
 
 "You're spoilin' it," he reproached her. "Let it 
 alone." Bess removed the brush-tip, and her hand 
 dropped beside her. She sat very still. 
 
 "So you study character, do you*?" said the Duch-
 
 266 HATCHWAYS 
 
 ess, condescending anew. "Let us hear what you 
 make of Mrs. Elphinstone's, it would be interest- 
 ing." 
 
 "I shouldn't have thought you wanted to ask," 
 said Iveagh, roughly, in the pause. 
 
 "That's it," said Bess, to shelter him. "I'm so 
 stupid. There's no way I can explain those things 
 except by drawing. Sometimes I get it then." 
 
 "Ah," said the Duchess. "Well, but you paint 
 creatures, I understand from. Ernestine. Rather 
 than persons, as a rule." 
 
 "Yes," said Bess, recovering. "And people tell 
 me there is only one kind of character in cats. I 
 can't explain to them there are hundreds. I can 
 only draw the difference, and hope they'll see." 
 
 "You take a look at her book," advised Iveagh, 
 subsiding into the grass. "Characters in it enough 
 to make a play. I expect she sees into us, too, 
 pretty fairly," he added lower. 
 
 "Why do you expect that 1 ?" said his mother 
 sharply. 
 
 "Always sittin' about and say in' nothing." He 
 threw a sly look sidelong. "Paintin's only an ex- 
 cuse " 
 
 "Iveagh, how hateful!" She turned on him. 
 "Do you pretend I spy?"
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 267 
 
 Used names, did they*? well! "Don't attend 
 to him," said the Duchess. She rose, having had 
 enough of them. "Ah, there is Lise." 
 
 There was Lise, certainly, hatless and sun- 
 warmed sweetly, and the Duke in attendance, carry- 
 ing an empty milk-glass. Lise had the same grey 
 kitten the Duchess had noticed in the flower-bed 
 across her arms, mother-wise, the kitten being still 
 inverted, languorous, and prolonged inordinately. 
 
 "Here he is," said Lise to the world. "The heat 
 of'm, feel, he's like a furnace." She thrust the 
 grey kitten at Iveagh. "You'd say he'd drink taken 
 by the look of'm, but it's milk at worst. . . . Oh, 
 good morning to you, Duchess. You don't mind 
 cats?' 
 
 The Duchess could stand cats, there were plenty 
 about at Holmer: though she had come upon more 
 serious business. The Pickle, right way up, lay 
 across Lise like a scarf while she explained it. The 
 Pickle, drunk with sun and sleep, and milk, and the 
 drone of bees, was in a malleable condition, suitable 
 for use as a stage property. That was no doubt why 
 Lise, with an instinct for properties, had assumed 
 him. All the same, her pretty dark eyes gazed 
 across the Pickle's drunken corpse, resting on the 
 Duchess's face, attentive.
 
 268 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Oh yes," said Lise, having been explained to. 
 "I like S' George. He's a flirt, oh, yes, he is, 
 Wickford. You get him alone and try." 
 
 "I have, but I never noticed it," said Wickford, 
 sitting down on one of the camp-stools. 
 
 "Well, try again," said Lise, encouraging. "It's 
 like this," to his mother, "for dinner on Saturday, 
 I shall be delighted, thank you, I've got a frock 
 that's been wasted, so far. But I'm booked to 
 Ernestine for this week " 
 
 "Oh, Ernestine will let you go," said the Duchess. 
 
 "But what if I'll not be let," smiled lise. "You 
 see, I'm not through with Hatchways, so to speak. 
 I've a way of getting behind in my duties always, 
 leaving things to the last " 
 
 "What courage, what glorious courage!" 
 thought Bess, putting in swift touches to the por- 
 trait, from the life, this time. Bess had always 
 known the Irish were valiant : but this ! 
 
 "There's this picture half-done," said Lise, re- 
 draping the Pickle, who had slumped a little. "Oh, 
 well, three-quarters, Bess. Destined to me hus- 
 band, you know, I'd not dare to show myself in 
 his presence less than complete. Mark'd never 
 understand artistic vaguery, would he, Wickford? 
 He'd expect me all properly noted down "
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 269 
 
 "It is practically finished," said the Duchess, who 
 of course, allowed for jesting. In the lifelong com- 
 pany of Suirs, one had to do so. "I have no doubt 
 Miss Ryeborn will touch it up," she continued, "and 
 let us see it on Sunday at the house. Sir 
 George " 
 
 "If she dares!" cried Lise. "Touch up me fea- 
 tures in me absence ! Excuse me, Duchess, but I've 
 not taken to that as yet, for all the chances of the 
 Indian climate. I trust me face still as me Creator 
 made it " 
 
 Wickford, the Duchess regretted to see, was 
 laughing, on his camp-stool, beneath his hand. It 
 was true, Wickford used improper language himself 
 at times. All the same, she began to realise slowly, 
 looking round her, that she was being resisted : what 
 is more, that the company, children, as Ernestine 
 rightly called them, were more or less at one, in 
 this silly game. Wickford on the camp-stool, 
 Iveagh in the grass, that little silent Miss Ryeborn, 
 eyes lowered demurely as she worked at her draw- 
 ing, could it be 1 ? The Duchess gathered her 
 dignity. 
 
 "I expect my turn, Lise," she remarked dryly. 
 "After all, Mark is something to me. I have a 
 letter from him "
 
 270 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Confiding me?" laughed Lise. "Ah, but that's 
 like him. I have a letter myself, as it happens, in 
 which he hinted as much. He wouldn't know, 
 though, I had accepted Ernestine, would he? It's 
 a pity I have so little time. ... By the way, does 
 he say in yours anything about this doing of his, for 
 which the Company praised him? I'm crazy to 
 know, and as usual he says nothing of himself. 
 Really," said Lise, "you'd think honours descended 
 by a chance of the climate on Mark, he deserves 
 them so little " 
 
 "He mentioned it," said the Duchess. 
 
 "To be sure," said Lise, "but does he explain?" 
 Her dark eyes across the Pickle were fixed again, 
 eagerly. She was not playing at anything now, she 
 wanted to know. 
 
 "I'll show you the letter^if you come up/' said 
 the Duchess. 
 
 "Oh, that's not fair!" from both her sons. 
 Mrs. Elphinstone's sallow cheek flushed slightly. 
 
 "Very well," she said rather quietly, relapsing 
 and leaning back. "I'll telegraph. I told Ernes- 
 tine I would this time, since he's annoyed me. I 
 will not discover my own husband's doings from the 
 papers, nor from others' letters, if it comes to that. 
 He hates wires about nothing, but he shall have a
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 271 
 
 long one. I hope he'll enjoy it. It'll be a lesson 
 to him to boast a little to me, once for all !" 
 
 Iveagh in the grass had turned, and was looking 
 towards her curiously. He saw something in her, 
 pride, wounded pride or affection wounded, that 
 he had never seen before. Nor was it his mother 
 who had hurt her, it was Mark. He marvelled, 
 too, what Mark had done, this time. . . . Bess 
 was also noting swiftly, delicately, the changes of 
 that lovely face: but her noting was not done in 
 thought. She had got the Fitzmaurice in Lise, and 
 was filling it into the painted character, while yet 
 she remained in the mood. Her watery nature 
 never tarried in one mood long. 
 
 "Blessed baby !" said Lise, kissing the Pickle, who 
 was sleeping. "Excuse me, company, he's so nice 
 to hold. . . . Aunt Gertrude, look here. I'll do 
 your dinner and the night, a bargain. That'll 
 give me good time to flirt with S' George. Sunday 
 I'll come back here, to Ernestine. The last Sunday, 
 I could not leave her in the lurch. If you had an 
 idea what she has done for me " 
 
 The Duchess had no idea, nor desired to have. 
 She was growing incensed, at such absurd behaviour. 
 What did the girl think she was, anyhow, to treat 
 her and her serious invitation like this"? That the
 
 272 HATCHWAYS 
 
 invitation crossed Mrs. Redgate's, trespassed on it, 
 the Duchess conveniently forgot, as she forgot she 
 had refused Lise in the original instance. 
 
 "You're poachin', Mother," said the Duke aside, 
 in the tennis-player's term. It made her angrier yet 
 to be so prompted, for of course she poached! 
 Oxboroughs, in our records, have always poached 
 upon their neighbours' rights. That Hatchways 
 land was a freehold for centuries past, had at many 
 times annoyed the Duchess. That Ernestine was 
 a freehold, even more a pride of our present state, 
 sister in spirit to Squire Hampden, right off-shoot 
 of the Commons' long strife in our noble history, 
 she forgot whenever she could. 
 
 "You'd better go in, Wickford," she said, being 
 annoyed with him. "You're keeping Adelaide." 
 
 He rose, at the reminder, with a glance at his 
 watch, but he lingered still. Wickford felt the 
 battle approached its climax. Lise was valiant, cer- 
 tainly, but she was not strong. Iveagh was hardly 
 to be trusted, in this company. Moreover, Wick- 
 ford had an idea his mother would be driven to hit 
 beyond Lise very shortly. Mrs. Redgate's repre- 
 sentative was there, after all, present to all their 
 consciousness in look, and bearing, and tranquil ab- 
 sorption in her private work. Further Addy was a
 
 273 
 
 good walker, in short, the Duke gave himself five 
 minutes longer to see fair play. He little thought 
 to be himself included. 
 
 "I couldn't think of making bargains of any sort," 
 his mother was saying. "I'm a little tired of non- 
 sense, Lise. Just tell me what you mean to do, 
 I can't stay playing all the morning." She was 
 treating Mrs. Elphinstone as a girl again, first sign 
 of vexation, one to Lise ! 
 
 "I'm thinking hard," said Lise, with the greatest 
 good-humour. "There's really only one other way 
 I can see of it, Aunt Gertrude, that would suit all 
 me obligations, and that " 
 
 "Well*?" said the Duchess patiently. 
 
 "That is that Bess should come up with me on 
 Saturday. Then we could paint in peace, see our 
 friends on the spot, and dine in comfort afterwards." 
 
 "Ripping!" from both the Duchess's sons. The 
 proposal seemed to be popular, with the gentlemen. 
 Bess herself moved and coloured, laying down her 
 brush. Like the Duke, she had not expected to be 
 comprised in the combat. She thought she had had 
 her share. 
 
 "Since she is dining already " proceeded Lise. 
 
 "Excuse me," said the Duchess. 
 
 "Well, is she not?" Lise was held up. "I'm
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 sorry, I'm dreaming. I thought Wickford 
 said " 
 
 "He had no business to." Greatly put out, the 
 Duchess rose. Things altogether were getting be- 
 yond her. 
 
 "I ask the company's pardon," said the Duke, 
 laying a competent grasp on things, as he always did 
 so soon as his mother showed a strain. Bess had 
 also arisen frightened. "My mistake only, it's 
 true I had no absolute authority. . . . Only what- 
 ever I did or did not say, Mother, Miss Ryeborn 
 comes to us now. We shall be extremely happy to 
 see her " 
 
 "Go it!" thought the born rebels, Iveagh and 
 Lise. 
 
 "Afterwards," said the Duchess, half-turning. 
 "I cannot change the length of my table even for 
 you." 
 
 "There's room at my table, I hope, for my 
 friends," said Wickford, his aspect changing 
 slightly. 
 
 "You really have such a number," said his 
 mother, audibly. She prepared to go. 
 
 "Mother, I'll trouble you !" cried Wickford, 
 furious : and broke off, every atom of expression fad- 
 ing from his face. He was holding in the Suir
 
 CAPTURE OF LISE 275 
 
 temper with both hands : Bess, had she been capable 
 of comparisons, would have been inevitably re- 
 mined of "that book, you know," Sir Guy of 
 sainted memory. The heir of Wickford was liter- 
 ally rigid with the strain, and quite incapable, alas 
 for those who had pinned their hopes to him ! 
 
 "Don't cry," said Iveagh, swift and low, kneeling 
 up in the grass at Bess's side. He saved the paint- 
 ing with a clever snatch, for she was reckless of it. 
 There was a moment of really painful suspense, 
 those that had pinned their hopes to her, in turn, 
 fearing that she must give way. But Bess did not. 
 
 "I'm sorry," she said gently, in Wickford's direc- 
 tion. "You are kind. I can't anyhow, as it hap- 
 pens. I am going I promised to help Irene with 
 the children's drawings on Saturday night." 
 
 First-class, could not be bettered ! Iveagh, still 
 guarding the portrait, turned inviting eyes, to his 
 mother. Now then 
 
 "I am sure we regret " began the Duchess, 
 
 quite mechanically. She found she had to say it, 
 for she was unhappy, shaken. She had clashed 
 badly with her son before the world, which hurt her 
 pride, maternal and other. She was rather white 
 in consequence. She hesitated a moment before the 
 girl's aspect, as Bess faced her gravely, so like
 
 276 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Ernestine. Then she turned about, and moved 
 away towards the outer gate, by the orchard path. 
 
 Victory to the rebel horde! only one, the latest, 
 had been wounded. 
 
 "I b beg your pardon, Miss Ryeborn," said 
 Wickford, recovering from the awful effort of his 
 self-control. "And I beg your aunt's. I lost my 
 
 temper. Of all b beastly " Whereupon his 
 
 Grace choked, and went off, in the other direction, 
 to Adelaide. 
 
 "She's crying, Lise," appealed Iveagh, indignant. 
 He had managed last time his mother hit a girl. 
 But what could a man do now? 
 
 "Well," said Mrs. Elphinstone, slowly reviving 
 out of her unusual stupor. "If that's not the sweet- 
 est lie I ever heard ! And using Renie, of all people 
 on this dear earth, to do for her!" 
 
 With which Lise and the Pickle combined, even 
 as one individual, fell into Bess's arms.
 
 XVI 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 
 
 "I LOVE her," said Lise to Ernestine, that evening. 
 "It was the way she said it, you ought to have heard. 
 It's not as if she takes naturally to untruth, 
 either " 
 
 Mrs. Redgate's expression, dimpling a little, ad- 
 mitted it. The Ryeborns had not that pure relish 
 for romance as such that distinguished the Fitz- 
 maurice family. They might be called sticklers for 
 the stiffer Puritan virtues, since they hailed from 
 the north. 
 
 "Don't you laugh at me," cried Lise, "when I'm 
 confessing." 
 
 "Are you^" 
 
 "To be sure. I'm coming on to it. I'm going 
 back on my ways," announced Lise, "from this 
 minute onward. Indeed, I've begun already, if you 
 knew. Ever since Mark wrote I've been thinking 
 of it I can't imagine why I did not sooner " 
 
 "Thinking of what?" said Ernestine. The girl 
 
 277
 
 278 HATCHWAYS 
 
 at her knee Lise was sitting on the floor was 
 silent. 
 
 "I'm not good, you know, by nature, " she be- 
 gan again. 
 
 "Good enough," said Ernestine. 
 
 "No Wickford beats me. Oh, dear life, his 
 face was like a play !" She slipped from strict con- 
 fession into mirth, remembering it. "I can't but 
 think, Ernestine, if Wick hit out at his mother once 
 he'd be the better for it. However, that's neither 
 here nor there " 
 
 "He's got to live with her," said Ernestine. 
 
 "Yes, that's the practical view," said Lise. "Go 
 on stroking my hair, that's what Mark does some- 
 times." She shut her eyes. "Ernestine, to resume, 
 I am not good. Now it's said there's no gain- 
 saying it. I'd not considered enough when I came 
 here. Wick's in the right of it, there are times 
 when it's best to think ahead. Now, for want of 
 doing my consideration in time, I've got to go back 
 on my ways, and that's difficult." She put her little 
 hands across her face. 
 
 "Is it really necessary, do you think?" said 
 Ernestine. It seemed so absurd, somehow, for Lise 
 to go back. 
 
 "Yes, I'm going to, don't you disturb me.
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 279 
 
 There's only one way to do it too, to my seeing," 
 said Lise. "And that's to show him my devotion 
 to Mark." 
 
 "Lise !" 
 
 For she had broken into tears. She had long 
 been wanting to abandon herself on this subject. 
 She had come near it, again and again, during these 
 evening interviews, but she could not. The pro- 
 found reticence of her race, that lies immediately 
 behind its surface fluency, withheld her. Of the 
 things that matter in life, it is all those people can 
 do to speak at all. Lise could have flickered, chat- 
 tered about her relations with Mark forever, mer- 
 rily, mockingly, half bitterly as she had done that 
 morning: but it took the supreme effort, even with 
 a woman, even with this woman, to give them 
 away. 
 
 And yet there was no transgression "in it," she 
 had given all she could find in her nature to Mark, 
 and there was much. It was simply the fact of 
 difference discovered, irremediable, that hurt her 
 affectionateness profoundly. Not once, but many 
 times he had wounded her, till it became just too 
 much, in the last letter, to be borne. 
 
 Ernestine, greatly touched to be trusted at this 
 stage, soon reached the bottom of it. Of course
 
 280 HATCHWAYS 
 
 there was difference, how could it be otherwise 1 ? 
 And of course Lise had thought that out, long before 
 her companion Wickford suggested that she should 
 do so. And of course so naturally the renewal 
 of Iveagh, the sight, sound, and feel of him, ardent, 
 supple, and responsive, had hammered in that dif- 
 ference, cold into Lise's soul. . . . What a torment, 
 thought Ernestine, is brain, real logic, in a woman! 
 She put Adelaide, and Adelaide's confidence, often 
 beside this girl, as the "confession" proceeded, torn 
 out of her, no truth spared, both little hands wrung 
 with the strain. Adelaide, of course, with a little 
 tempting, a little spurring, would have told anybody 
 anything. It would have dropped out dripped, 
 as Ivragh said and Adelaide, for all her restive 
 vanity, been unaware of the real betrayal. Ade- 
 laide was always betraying, the precious and worth- 
 less alike which she happened to be holding, having 
 no power to range those possessions of the spirit, and 
 to keep control. 
 
 Women perhaps more than men store this spir- 
 itual knowledge. They are not vessels, they are 
 caskets for the truths of life, with a constant chance 
 to sort, store, and give away. To throw away too, 
 for with respect to M. du Frettay's probable senti- 
 ments, all truth is by no means worth treasuring.
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 281 
 
 Ernestine stored like a good housewife, orderly and 
 attentive: she gave perhaps too cautiously, and 
 guarded for her musing too much. Lise had a few 
 jewels of great worth she clung to, and tossed the 
 rest of her glittering dust about the world. Ade- 
 laide had lost most of her possessions, or tarnished, 
 or borrowed for the moment's need. She was very, 
 very denuded, for a rich girl, so Ernestine had 
 thought that morning. 
 
 And Lise was rich : for she had, in spite of all, the 
 love and troth of a good man. She knew it. 
 
 "He loves me, he does," she sobbed, "and I am 
 a wretch to talk like this. I'll never forgive myself, 
 once I get to the end of it. It's beautiful, quite, 
 how he looks at me, when he's sure I'm not attend- 
 ing. It's only he will not will not show me the 
 best of him, when I know it's there! I ought to 
 be content with knowing it, ought I not, Ernestine? 
 If ever he lost his head a little, if ever he boasted, 
 or sulked, or swore at me, or stopped considering, 
 or kissed my shoe as Iveagh did in the garden, 
 the night I told him I'd promised myself away." 
 She shivered from head to foot, her fingers wrung, 
 with sheer longing for that remembered tenderness. 
 "But that's so degrading to a man a real man is 
 it not, Ernestine 4 ?"
 
 282 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Surely not, your shoe," thought Ernestine, but 
 she did not say it. It was not the moment, clearly, 
 to flatter Lise. She could see her, in fancy, flinging 
 herself at Mark again and again, baffled every time 
 by his foresight, "consideration," his excellent self- 
 effacement, his fine cool front. . . . Perhaps, after 
 this separation, there was hope of more from Mark : 
 not to mention that with Lise imploring like this at 
 the altars of Nature, Nature might step in. She 
 was so much the better for her stay in Eng- 
 land. . . . 
 
 Lise, led on to confidence, told her one or two of 
 her husband's "doings," extracted with pain from 
 him and others, more from others than from him. 
 Mrs. Redgate smiled listening, seeing her dark eyes- 
 shimmer like stars, there was a nobleness in both, 
 well-matching; and at once, rummaging in her 
 museum of useful memories, produced other in- 
 stances of Mark. It was easy, for there were heaps 
 of them, ridiculously many, once collected and built 
 up. Wickford, half mocking, half admiring, had 
 told her some. Gertrude had told her plenty, sol- 
 emnly. Sir George 
 
 "Oh, I'm glad to be seeing S' George," said Lise 
 contentedly. "There's a man I like! I was not 
 specially interested in Captain Elphinstone, Ernes-
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 283 
 
 tine, I may mention, when I last came across him. 
 That is, I was getting curious in my fashion about 
 the Duchess's young man, but not enough to make 
 indecent enquiries. Still, I had a notion even then 
 S' George knew a thing or two " 
 
 "He knew him better than anybody," said Ernes- 
 tine, "at one time, when the Captain, first went out, 
 when he lost half his bridge in the flood in Kash- 
 mir." 
 
 "It was somebody else's bridge," said Lise, 
 hastily. "I assure you, that was not Mark's fault, 
 I know about this. The good people despatched 
 him as usual to make the best of a bad job. Talk 
 of silk purses, the things he's had to do, shameful 
 sin it is not to give fresh work to such a worker, but 
 that's the world! Original genius," asserted Lise, 
 "muddles things up, and the workers put it straight 
 again. The man who invented that bridge died 
 young, Mark said, the gods wanted him. But the 
 Government wanted Mark. . . . Well, what are 
 you laughing at, it's the sober truth I'm telling you." 
 
 "Please go on with the truth," said Ernestine. 
 
 "Well, so he had barely time to think of planning 
 his purse, the poor boy, when the river came down 
 and carried off the sow, I mean the foundations. So 
 there he was. And he was rightly puzzled what to
 
 284 HATCHWAYS 
 
 do, since it flooded out his quarters simultaneously, 
 and washed most of the works away. So he spent 
 his time piling coals of fire on the people's heads 
 (which is his habit) by saving the cattle and stock." 
 
 "Not only the cattle," said Ernestine. 
 
 "And the mothers and babies," said Lise, "but 
 that's by the way, for Mark." Her eyes glimmered 
 for a little. "Ernestine, I hope you see how essen- 
 tially unimportant, compared with Government 
 heads of cattle, the mothers and babies are 1 ?" 
 
 "Very well, for the present," said Ernestine. 
 
 "We do not mention them, being Mark," said 
 Lise, cuddling down her cendre head. 
 
 "We do, being Sir George," said Mrs. Redgate. 
 "I have heard him mention them very eloquently." 
 
 "Have you*? Now that's remarkable." An- 
 other interlude of thinking it out. "Very well 
 listen I will get him to do so, to-morrow night. 
 He shall tell them how Mark fought with the river 
 in Kashmir, saving the whole population complete 
 and single-handed when he was no more thin 
 Iveagh's age well, hardly. And if the moral 
 needs pointing more," vowed Lise, "I'll do it me- 
 self." 
 
 This was her plan, as anyone knowing her might 
 have expected. Ernestine was only afraid she
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 285 
 
 would go too far, once launched on the interesting 
 course. Lise was tasting for the first time the bitter 
 joys of the penitentiary, quite new to her probably. 
 It is not entirely devoid of dramatic savour, the peni- 
 tent's attitude, and it is a pity not to test its possibil- 
 ities to the uttermost, whilst so righteously engaged. 
 
 Besides, she needed in any case some plan of 
 moral support, some general line of campaign, for 
 her evening at Holmer. A Fitzmaurice liked to 
 look forward to any kind of warfare, social or other- 
 wise. Lise was certain the Duchess, left to herself, 
 would make that dinner as dull as ditchwater: and 
 her spirit went feeling for the possible elements of 
 outbreak immediately. Iveagh, she knew, would 
 break out, or break up, at a touch from her : interest- 
 ing knowledge, though painful, since it hinted her 
 reproach. It had been a question to Lise's gentle 
 spirit, for some time, which it was best to do for 
 him. Now Wick, and Bess, and Ernestine, and 
 Mark (by sedulous revival and restoration) urged 
 her to break up Iveagh: to assume the wifely pos- 
 ture, poise the spear, and shiver him, once for all. 
 
 Well, dared anybody assert Mrs. Elphinstone was 
 not at liberty to do this, if she would*? She must 
 do something for Ernestine, and Bess, whom she 
 loved, before she left. The Holmer dinner (else
 
 286 HATCHWAYS 
 
 as dull as ditch water) was just a timely occasion for 
 a wifely gesture. Armed with Mark and the 
 mother and baby, clad in her nicest clothes, with 
 "S' George" to assist the proceedings, she would 
 simply walk over Iveagh, and leave him there. 
 
 Ernestine saw the plan. She longed, in the 
 sensible, sensitive depths of her, to beg Lise, with 
 the great power she wielded, to spare the boy. She 
 felt the other way, hers, of slow remedy and natural 
 growth was best. But there is no warring with 
 natures, none. She left Lise to her nature, her 
 "natural" as M. du Frettay called it, which was 
 a very sweet one. She only went to bed reflecting 
 how unfair the gifts to women are; that Adelaide, 
 needing to mate, and to make a higher grade than 
 Sam, should struggle in vain for the remotest portion 
 of that captivating power; and that Lise should 
 suffer and make suffer, in spite of her own gentler 
 wish, settled as she really was in life and spirit, 
 through having too much. 
 
 "Yes, yes," said Sir George to Wickford, who 
 travelled down with him on Saturday: assenting 
 and weighing in one, at internals, as a good phy- 
 sician does. 
 
 "Just so, yes," he said to Wickford and Gabriel
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 287 
 
 alternately, as they walked up with him from Hol- 
 mer station, one on each side. They discussed, shot 
 remarks at one another across him, they rotted too, 
 it pleased him to see the friends they were. He 
 clasped Gabriel's arm and not Wickford's, but that 
 was not favouritism, it was because Gabriel in- 
 clined to go too fast. Mentally, for Wickford, of 
 course: physically, for himself, Sir George could 
 have kept pace with six of him. He remained, de- 
 spite his long London sojourn, in splendid fighting 
 form. 
 
 "But he's better, the boy," he said at last. "He 
 must be better, for you to talk so of him. . . . Ah, 
 you never saw him at the worst," he spoke to his 
 left-hand neighbour. "We were anxious for a bit, 
 weren't we, Wick*? It was a bad age, a very bad 
 age." 
 
 "He's certainly better," said Wickford. "He's 
 not talked rot or used language real language 
 for quite a time. He still slangs the animals horrid, 
 Tim says, but that's more hopeful " 
 
 "I'll give him animals to slang," said Sir George 
 pensively, "if he comes with me. Not so easy to 
 be revenged on, either. . . . You were saying, 
 Wick?" 
 
 "Fleas?" asked Gabriel, interested.
 
 288 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Far worse," said Sir George. "Things you nice 
 young men never dreamed of. Sorry, Wick." 
 
 "He's still off and on about going," said Wick- 
 ford. "He's days when his one desire's to get rid 
 of us all, wish, all right, du Frettay. That's my 
 public stop, I use it sometimes to Mother. Now 
 don't interrupt again, because there's something I'm 
 trying to say." 
 
 "Don't," advised Gabriel in the next interval. 
 
 "Don't fight, boys," said Sir George, in the next. 
 
 "He puts me out by naggin' at my wordin'," ex- 
 plained Wickford. "On my honour, I believe he 
 thinks he talks English better than me " 
 
 "I," said du Frettay softly. The Duke pro- 
 ceeded. 
 
 "What I mean is this. Mrs. Redgate " 
 
 "To be sure. What of her*?" said Sir George. 
 
 "Well, she says it's only his stinkin' pride now 
 that's detaining him. He's got an idea we're send- 
 ing him for his good; well, at his worst, of course, 
 that made him want to go to the bad to pay us 
 out " 
 
 "Oh, come, come," said Sir George. "He doesn't 
 treat you like that." 
 
 Wickford paused and coloured. He had said 
 "we" for his mother, of course, in du Frettay's pres-
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 289 
 
 ence. Now he wondered if he should have attacked 
 the subject at all. So doubting and debating, he 
 was rapidly dropping into voicelessness, when Ga- 
 briel, from the other side, took up the tale. 
 
 "He only wants anyone he trusts to assure him 
 there are heaps of things he can do," he said rapidly. 
 
 "Is that for me?" asked Sir George. "But you 
 know, Gabriel, I am not so sure of it." 
 
 "Well, let him know that, sir, and he's finished," 
 said du Frettay. "He'll never stir, if you go to 
 take him on a convalescent trip or a Grand Tour to 
 change the scenery, believe me. He'd sooner 
 change the scene here, once for all, with a shot 
 through his head." 
 
 "Does he know?" signalled Sir George to Wick- 
 ford. 
 
 "Not unless the boy told him," said Wickford 
 beneath his breath. 
 
 Du Frettay glanced at them both bright-eyed, but 
 offered no question. He soon looked back at the 
 sky, as was his habit, when walking. He had no 
 wish at all to interfere with experts in any subject, 
 the sky sufficed his needs. 
 
 "You're a bright lad," said Sir George, taking 
 hold of his arm again. "And I wish to goodness 
 you'd come along yourself, and learn your own
 
 290 HATCHWAYS 
 
 planet before you start on the atmosphere " 
 
 "Yes, sir," said Gabriel, without lowering his 
 eyes. 
 
 "What things do you think Iveagh can do. Can 
 you tell us any 4 ?" 
 
 "He can shoot straight," said the Duke. 
 
 "Pfui!" said Gabriel. "I am alluding to his 
 head at present, not his power of emptying other 
 people's. Animals, pardon " 
 
 "People," admitted Sir George, "at times." 
 
 "Tiens! Then you shoot the German officials'? 
 I often wondered how you really got round them, 
 in some of your books. . . . Sir-George, listen! 
 Iveagh can do heaps of things. He's a head for 
 figures like few I've found. He notices all, when 
 he seems most sleepy. He's the eyes of a cat, and 
 the ear of whatever-it-is, and he draws ele- 
 gantly " 
 
 "Draws'?" 
 
 "To be sure. Accurate drawing, not your artistic 
 splashing about. He can draw what he sees," said 
 Gabriel with a reminiscence, "not what he thinks 
 you thought he was going to see " 
 
 "I'll set Miss Ryeborn on you," said Wickford. 
 
 "Who's Miss Ryeborn'?" said Sir George. 
 
 "She doesn't matter," said Gabriel.
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 291 
 
 "Oh, doesn't she!" said the Duke. 
 
 "Sir-George! Do stop-him-off ! I'm talking. 
 He's jealous of my facts, and wants to drown them 
 in sentiment " 
 
 "I'm not jealous," said Wickford, turning very 
 red. 
 
 "All right." Sir George laughed, and got hold 
 of Wickford's arm in turn. "We're neither of us 
 jealous, but really for an outsider he knows rather 
 much." 
 
 "He's staying with Mrs. Redgate," said Wick- 
 ford. They all walked on for a time, and felt bet- 
 ter by degrees. It was not an easy subject, of 
 course, to treat ensemble. 
 
 "Enfm " said Gabriel. 
 
 "Anyhow," said Wickford, "there we are. The 
 kid's no fool, is what du Frettay means, though he 
 may like to appear one. Of course, along of du 
 Frettay, he may not have chosen to, I can't say. I 
 always supposed du Frettay picked Iveagh out be- 
 cause he said least of us " 
 
 "You may go on," said Gabriel, studying the sky. 
 
 "Thanks. What are you looking at"?" 
 
 "He thinks we thought he was going to see an 
 aeroplane," said Sir George. "Get on, Wick, 
 really: you'll never be done."
 
 292 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "I can't somehow, when he's listening. . . . 
 Iveagh's a lot cleverer than I am," broke out Wick- 
 ford, "that's the fact of it. I swear I'm just put to 
 it to think what I'll do without him when he goes 
 on the estate, I mean. The people are all in his 
 pocket I'm nowhere with them, and if it's bad 
 here, it's worse in Ireland what are you laughin' 
 at?" He broke short. 
 
 "You may come into your own," suggested Sir 
 George, "if I carry him off." 
 
 "I might here," said the Duke, considering it. 
 "Not there, no chance! But we were talkin' of 
 his attainments, not his impudence, if I remember. 
 . . . He's beastly good on plants, and all these last 
 months, on and off, he's been reading like the deuce. 
 On my honour I believe he's been reading half the 
 time lately when Lise thinks he's looking at 
 her " 
 
 "Hullo!" said Sir George, his thoughtful brow 
 clearing. "Is Lise still here*?" 
 
 "Rather, sir, you're going to meet her. We've 
 got," said the Duke, duty-bound, "an appallin' 
 entertainment for you this evening " 
 
 "It's very kind of your mother," said Sir George, 
 his thoughtful brow clouding again. 
 
 "But you may have tea at Hatchways first."
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 293 
 
 This from Gabriel, who had had the immense satis- 
 faction of really seeing an aeroplane, while the lat- 
 ter conversation proceeded. It had flown singing 
 vrombissant delicately across his spirit's sky. Sir 
 George was too old, and the Duke too unintelligent, 
 to discover it. Iveagh, whom they patronised, 
 would have found it at once at once! It was 
 gratifying, altogether. . . . "You may have tea 
 with us," he said. 
 
 "No, no, Gabriel, I may not. I shall have tea 
 with Wickford's mother, who is my oldest 
 friend '" 
 
 "And talk all this through again, much more con- 
 nectedly. How fortunate, first," said Gabriel, 
 "that we have given you light." 
 
 Sir George glanced at Wick, to see how he was 
 taking it. "He really does talk English very 
 nicely," he suggested. "One can bear a good deal 
 of pertness, when it is put so well." 
 
 "He's welcome," said Wickford: and the friend 
 saw it was all right. The little Duke's singular 
 personal realm of pride was known to him, as was 
 Gabriel's native realm of impudence also. But he 
 saw that in this case, in the best accord of a common 
 object, a common desire, a common wish, the 
 nations had shaken down.
 
 294. HATCHWAYS 
 
 "George, thank goodness!" 
 
 "Gertrude, I am very glad." 
 
 They met as old friends, and both remarks were 
 heartfelt. Sir George was not at all glad to pay 
 week-end visits to the Duchess of Wickford, he dis- 
 liked it thoroughly: but he was glad to see Gertrude, 
 always. He was only sorry to find her looking so 
 aged and careworn. The first thing the friendly 
 eye noted was that she looked tired to death. 
 
 "I can't think what's come over me," she ad- 
 mitted, after a little desultory talk and feeding, 
 "but I'm afraid of this affair to-night. I have a 
 presentiment things will not go right with it." 
 
 "How's that?" said Sir George, who had never 
 heard Gertrude admit as much before, even of her 
 most ill-fated entertainments. It was remarkable. 
 
 "I can't think, for I've certainly done my best for 
 it. I suppose I'm rubbed-up," said the Duchess, 
 adopting the Oxborough expression out of the void. 
 "I've had extremely tiresome people laterly, that's 
 the fact. My temper's gone, George, I warn 
 you " 
 
 "You want Ernestine," said Sir George cheer- 
 fully. "She'll set you right as soon as she comes. 
 No more tea, thank you. I hope she's well*?" 
 
 "She's not coming to-night," said the Duchess.
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 295 
 
 "Not? Oh, I'm sorry, Gertrude. Don't say 
 that." 
 
 It was Gertrude's face that said, of course, more 
 plain than words, the state of things. She looked 
 miserable, really: even as, at the worst of Iveagh, 
 the friend had never seen her look. He searched 
 his spirit, during the subsequent minutes, to con- 
 ceive what it could be. Ernestine had stood out 
 about something, he saw it like that at once. She 
 was given to standing out, or standing up, at inter- 
 vals. Yet she was so very hard to quarrel with, so 
 straight, so liberal. . . . 
 
 "She's setting my own children against me," said 
 the Duchess. 
 
 "No, no," said Sir George quietly. "The con- 
 trary." 
 
 "How do you know?" 
 
 "How should I, but by knowing her*? I have 
 her letters. She has not spoken a word of this." 
 
 The Duchess was silent. She had spoken a word 
 of it, to various Oxboroughs, far from intimate; she 
 had had to, needing to defend herself. Yet it only 
 looked to her, in her aggrieved state, as if she missed 
 Ernestine more than Ernestine her, the idea of which 
 was absurd and shameful. Should it not be some- 
 thing to Ernestine, to have lost her regard"?
 
 296 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Iveagh's behaviour is abominable," said the 
 Duchess, by no distant line of communication. 
 "He can't even treat me with decent civility in pub- 
 lic. He is always," she added, "haunting that 
 place." 
 
 "Hatchways? But Lise has been staying there, 
 hasn't she?" 
 
 "Long before that." 
 
 "Gertrude, will you take my word that, by all the 
 evidence I ever had, Ernestine has kept Iveagh in 
 the ways of civility, and civilisation too, when it 
 was very difficult. How could she, caring for you, 
 do otherwise*?" 
 
 "She never cared for me." 
 
 "Caring for him, then," said Sir George patiently. 
 Things were certainly very bad. 
 
 "Oh, yes, I dare say! She never cared for me," 
 reiterated the Duchess. "It's all receiving, no re- 
 turning. Isabel says she's cold." 
 
 "Please do not give me Isabel. I value you so 
 much more. I remember a time," said Sir George, 
 "when you went down there for comfort, as you 
 would not to a cold woman. You needed her 
 then." You need her now, he thought. You need 
 her, you know it. 
 
 Gertrude did. Isabel, lately taken to her bosom,
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 297 
 
 faute de mieux, was but wretched consolation. 
 Gertrude was far too clever and complex for Isabel. 
 
 "Lise is a nice little thing," she said soon, again 
 by no distant line of connection. Lise was the lat- 
 est, on trial in Ernestine's place. 
 
 "Lise? oh, yes. I shall like to see her." He 
 followed quietly. 
 
 "She's come out a lot," said the Duchess. 
 "Mark's improved her. More character." 
 
 "Character? Surely she'd plenty before." 
 
 "Not much, I think: very pliable. Easily influ- 
 enced, for good or evil. Mark's could only be for 
 good." 
 
 "Certainly," said Sir George, following again. 
 "You have news of Mark?" 
 
 This was happier. Gertrude told him. He was 
 drenched with news of Mark, speculation concern- 
 ing him, hopes expressed, honours predicted, all 
 very like old times. 
 
 "If Iveagh could do something like that 
 now " said Sir George : wickedly, we fear. 
 
 "It's not in him," said Iveagh's mother, her face 
 darkening. "He's weak essentially, and worse. 
 Not to be trusted a moment. He's been drinking 
 again, Adelaide says." 
 
 "Adelaide! My dear Gertrude, I shall have to
 
 298 HATCHWAYS 
 
 ask you to choose your authority, before you quote 
 to me! Adelaide and Isabel! Where's yourself? 
 Where's Wickford? He told me his brother was 
 better, much." 
 
 "Drinking on his father's side," said the Duchess, 
 after a pause, somewhat put out. She had not 
 thought her son would forestall her here. 
 
 "What then? I was not suspecting yours. 
 Only don't you see how much better that makes it*?" 
 
 "Better?" 
 
 "To be sure. Granted a grain of inheritance, 
 and that temptation, and a state like that poor lad's 
 these two years. Wick says the struggle's been a 
 stiff one, and I don't doubt it. It isn't as if he 
 hadn't the opportunity to exceed, in your society. 
 It isn't as if he hadn't needed it " 
 
 "Needed? You amaze me, George." 
 
 "Probably," said Sir George, moving the tea- 
 things, "you have never felt the need. I 
 have . . ." 
 
 "George!" 
 
 "Yes. I thought I'd tell you, before Adelaide 
 spread tales about me. Just lately, Wick says, he 
 seems to have floored it entirely, turned the other 
 way, and looking low in consequence. On my 
 honour," said Sir George, twitching the table-cloth,
 
 INCLUSION OF SIR GEORGE 299 
 
 "I'd been settling to talk to him in an opposite sense. 
 I never did believe in abstaining, suddenly. ... I 
 won't, if you prefer it." 
 
 The Duchess was amazed. She could hardly get 
 over this easy disposal, by George, of her most 
 haunting shame, in the matter of Iveagh. She had 
 always, round the corner from her husband, backed 
 the cause of abstinence vigorously. Encourage a 
 boy to drink more, when he had dropped it! It 
 struck her as strange, of George, very, to take such 
 a line. Yet such careless, one-handed routing of 
 her most effective and well-stored arguments seemed 
 to remind her of something. It revived a certain 
 atmosphere, as her brothers had been unable to do, 
 in Holmer House. 
 
 It was good for the Duchess to be over-ridden, by 
 the few people in the world to whom she granted 
 leave to do it, that was the fact. 
 
 "It's nice to have a man about the place again," 
 she said suddenly, at a later period, when her son 
 and her guest had been dawdling about the half- 
 dark hall, smoking and comparing fire-arms, instead 
 of going to their rooms to dress. 
 
 "Now I call that hard on Wickford," remarked 
 Sir George.
 
 XVII 
 M. DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 
 
 MRS. ELPHINSTONE and M. du Frettay, convinced 
 that the Duchess's dinner-party would be as dull as 
 ditchwater unless they did their best for it, pre- 
 pared from the outset to take it in hand. 
 
 "I shall expect you to assist me," said Lise, in a 
 general manner, before setting out. 
 
 "I shall struggle after," said Gabriel, looking at 
 her in her last new dress with hopeless delight. 
 
 Must we describe it 1 ? Dress matters so little on 
 such persons. Lise, inside a friar's frock, inside 
 a Prussian lady's Reformkleid, would have been 
 delightful. She wore straw-coloured silk, lace- 
 draped, and she could bear it, for her smooth sallow 
 skin turned olive at night. The shadows on her 
 cendre locks darkened also; the whole of her little 
 head seemed pencilled, shaded, bewilderingly soft. 
 Of old it had been bewilderingly shaggy also, but 
 now Lise did her hair nicely, in deference to her 
 station and Mark. The tints of her draperies were 
 
 300
 
 DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 301 
 
 exquisite, like the blending of the fairy-tale dresses 
 of silver and gold. As for lace, her mother's old 
 Limerick could face any Duchess: and so could her 
 diamonds, being the Duchess's gift. It was prettily 
 done of her, Lise asserted, to put them on : whereto, 
 seeing how prettily it was done, her gasping public 
 agreed. 
 
 The pair departed on foot, though the Duchess 
 had offered the carriage : but Lise laughed in Wick- 
 ford's face. The idea of it! The lanes were dry, 
 weren't they? Or if they were not, entirely, in 
 places, she had yet another pair of shoes. Her 
 dance ones, for instance, though certainly they did 
 not suit her frock so well as the bronze she had on. 
 She asked M. du Frettay's opinion on the point, 
 before departure. Gabriel, whose main temptation, 
 in the matter of the little bronze shoes, was much 
 the same as Iveagh's, of old, in the garden, advised 
 her seriously to keep them, and as for the muddy 
 places in the lane, he would lay down his cloak. 
 
 Lise, who liked this sort of thing, danced along at 
 his side very happily. Compared with other things 
 in life, mud-stains on her shoes mattered very little, 
 she was not that sort of girl. They entered the 
 state drawing-room at Holmer together, under the 
 soft radiance of many candles, as charming a couple
 
 302 HATCHWAYS 
 
 as could have been chosen, from two capitals at 
 least: du Frettay half-smiling, as though foreseeing 
 for Lise the effect she must make. 
 
 "Dear me, that is a very fine young fellow," said 
 the Bishop, benevolently bending his glass. "I do 
 not seem to remember him." 
 
 The Bishop, it should be said, having haunted 
 Eton twelve years previously, considered that he 
 knew practically everybody of du Frettay's age, 
 everybody likely to dine at a Duke's table, anyhow. 
 His face fell, when he heard the truth from Wick- 
 ford. Evidently, so fine a young fellow should 
 have been Eton property; and record-breaking in 
 the air, a risky job, had better have been undertaken 
 under English auspices too. However, the Bishop 
 was gracious, on hearing that M. du Frettay longed 
 to be presented to him; nor could the Bishop realise 
 (as Sir George did) for how long this had been M. 
 du Frettay's desire, or wish. 
 
 "You're a ripper, go on," said the Duke to him 
 sotto voce, at least once during the evening: for 
 Wickford, very soon, was mightily tired of his part. 
 Of all the problems with which his mother had ever 
 faced him, this evening was the deadliest, bad 
 from the start. Adelaide, after their morning ride 
 to town, during which he had held her in her future
 
 DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 303 
 
 position, steadily, was waspish and truculent. His 
 aunt and the Honourable Mrs. Courtier were already 
 conveying innuendoes across intervening parties, 
 the first stage. The Bishop was beaming a very 
 plague of patronage, and clearing his throat in a 
 scholastic manner Wickford remembered, with 
 shrinking; and Sir George, their lion, the trump- 
 card of the evening, in the critical preprandial in- 
 stants, where was Sir George*? 
 
 "Well, my little boy," said Sir George quietly, in 
 the shadow of the further room, where another than 
 he was lurking, oddly enough, until the strictest 
 need. Iveagh's back was turned, and his head rest- 
 ing on his hands as he stood by the unused hearth. 
 "Wick tells me you're better, I hope it will last." 
 
 "I was never ill," said Iveagh, dropping an elbow 
 and allowing him a hand. "To mention," he 
 added, under the discerning eye. 
 
 Sir George, being a skilled wanderer, had more 
 than half a doctor's training, and double most doc- 
 tors' experience of mortal ills. He was the only 
 person, during the bad time, who had prescribed 
 physically for Iveagh, in the intervals of the moral 
 "ragging" which the Duke, lacking the necessary 
 power, had handed him to perform. Sir George
 
 304 HATCHWAYS 
 
 was a martinet, at root, as the Duchess had said: 
 when his back was straightened, he had a tremen- 
 dously sharp tongue. Slating, slanging, the real 
 sledgehammer, he was capable of any grade of the 
 process. Yet Iveagh, who had suffered the worst 
 from him, gave his hand without hesitation, sur- 
 prised in the half-dark and complete absence of 
 spirit as he was. 
 
 "Sleep, do you?" said Sir George. "Dream 
 less?' 
 
 "I've not been dreamin' lately." 
 
 "Dream come true, possibly." That was the sur- 
 geon, right to the middle of the wound. "Lise," he 
 added, "is very pretty to-night." He looked 
 through the intervening drapery into the other room, 
 where both could see some of the guests. 
 
 "She always is," said Iveagh. 
 
 "Right, I beg your pardon." Sir George 
 laughed, for he relished resistance. No sledgeham- 
 mer methods, he knew, would ever flatten Iveagh; 
 his elasticity would always slip round, wriggle out, 
 spring up again. He liked the knowledge, which 
 had been throughout the boy's best hope of safety: 
 it was a useful inheritance from a fighting race. Sir 
 George knew well, better even than Gertrude, how 
 splendid, in all its bearings, that inheritance was.
 
 DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 305 
 
 It was under the great Duke's auspices, under his 
 painted eyes often, as now, that he had "ragged" 
 the Duke's little boy. There was no harm in it, to 
 so deeply sweet and seasoned a nature, under its sur- 
 face sulks, which were simply racial. Even without 
 Ernestine's constant reassurance, he would have 
 known there was no harm. 
 
 "Can you tell me what my fate is, Iveagh?" he 
 said. "I'd sooner he warned." 
 
 "Dinner, you mean?" Iveagh told him, or rather, 
 gave him his view of the chances. "We," he said, 
 had changed pretty often. He said "we" for his 
 mother like Wickford, but not with the same purely 
 respectful intent. "It'll be Addy's mother, by 
 now," he judged. ''Question was, if you were for- 
 ward enough." 
 
 "Forward!" groaned Sir George. 
 
 "We tossed for a time between you and Wick," 
 explained Iveagh. "Now you've scored, strikes me. 
 It's your book bein' out, his isn't, won't be for 
 years. Did you see Mrs. Redgate comin' up 1 ?" 
 
 "No, we came straight through for once, no stop- 
 pages. I hear," said Sir George, "she's a niece with 
 her, who has been painting Lise. Is it a good por- 
 trait?" 
 
 Iveagh conveyed the portrait was decent. He
 
 306 HATCHWAYS 
 
 had an idea the girl was bringing it up to-morrow 
 show mother so on. If she did not too fright- 
 ened he purposed to go and fetch her. "She's 
 frightened of Uncle Giles," he added. 
 
 "Oxborough 1 ? Why 4 ? does he tease her*?" 
 
 "No frightened of lookin' at him somehow. 
 Lookin' his way." He had his completest cave- 
 dwelling gravity, as he peered through the curtains. 
 But it was his own gravity, his old self. 
 
 "Oh, you're better, much better," thought the 
 friend. "Ernestine's slyer than I thought, though. 
 Can that be her cure?" 
 
 Yet he knew it might mean little in the case, the 
 Suirs had always plenty of girls about. They never 
 reduced their chances of variety, in a life so full of 
 curious interest, by consorting with one sex only, any 
 more than with one class. Iveagh, at his worst, had 
 never abjured feminine society. It was, as one 
 might say, all the same to him. 
 
 Things being so promising for health inward 
 health, for outwardly the boy looked "low" and 
 languid as his brother said, it was not at all Sir 
 George's first instinct to torment him with histories 
 of his Magnificence Mark Elphinstone, urged by 
 Lise. It was not anybody's first instinct to torment 
 Iveagh. Adelaide, urged by jealousy, might enjoy
 
 DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 307 
 
 it, or Lise caught in a fine fury of self-purgation, but 
 not sensible, well-poised people like Ernestine and 
 Sir George. We only mention the unremarkable 
 fact that the guest of the evening was unwilling to 
 fall in with any such line of action, as prelude to the 
 less remarkable fact that he succumbed to Lise. 
 
 The fact was least remarkable of all, that Mrs. 
 Elphinstone faced him at the Duchess's table, the 
 while he had at his elbows those ill-wishing cats, 
 Lady Oxborough and Adelaide's mamma. It was, 
 of course, a highly honourable position; but the main 
 result was that the lion ate little, and said nothing 
 at all. Nothing, at least, of the kind that was to 
 be expected from him. 
 
 "Look, oh, look at the man!" almost groaned 
 the Duchess. "Wouldn't you say he was a school- 
 boy? Why, Wickford was better at school!" 
 
 "Wickford had excellent manners," said the 
 Bishop, and began to tell anecdotes of him to which 
 a mother should have attended: but the Duchess 
 could not. How could she? Her worst presenti- 
 ments were coming to pass: her table, faute de 
 George, falling to pieces beneath her eyes. Lise 
 was talking highly treasonable rubbish to Wickford 
 about the Eastern Service, instead of attending to 
 Giles. The Duchess's dear son Iveagh, to her right,
 
 308 HATCHWAYS 
 
 was behaving quite impossibly to the nice girl his 
 mother had found for him, whose usefulness in life 
 was manifest by her neglected clothes. Lise was 
 neglected too, a keen observer: her frock, though 
 good enough, was not put on with that attention to 
 rigid decorum the Duchess would have wished for 
 Mark. Adelaide was a model to everyone, smartly 
 simple, admirably maided, but not a man of them 
 really heeded her. One and all, Giles, George, even 
 the little wretch du Frettay, even the Duchess's 
 own Bishop, they looked towards Lise. 
 
 Meanwhile, of course, Lise saved the dinner-table 
 single-handed, and kept three men, at any rate, quite 
 happy in their minds. No one looking at her, or 
 listening, could be sensible of a duty ill-performed 
 to others. In vain the Duke, supported by his aunt, 
 Lady Oxborough, laid subtle siege to the lion at 
 their right hand. Lise, in the act of taking her seat, 
 had smiled across at "S' George" to cheer him up, 
 it seemed to have the opposite effect of entrancing 
 him. He endeavoured in vain to look at Adelaide's 
 bepowdered mother, at Isabel's broad face and 
 bovine eyes. Lise was nicer to look at, she was 
 nicer! She was wild, wicked, and she was saying 
 true things. Wit and truth about the powers that
 
 DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 309 
 
 be, and the powers that never should have bee^ in 
 India. 
 
 "She's right, the girl," said Sir George, and went 
 off for a time to Isabel. But it was useless: soon, 
 quite soon, his vague appearance showed he was 
 listening again. 
 
 Owing to the discomfort of his situation, as has 
 been said, Sir George almost failed to notice his 
 food; but the wine he could not fail to notice in this 
 house, for Wickford's father's famous cellar merited 
 a strict regard. It was right beyond criticism: it 
 baffled praise, unless a poet's : it incited the connois- 
 seur to dreaming, and the practical-minded Oxbor- 
 ough to drinking while others dreamed. Gertrude's 
 wine was one of the reasons why her brothers showed 
 such a clinging preference for her society ; and noth- 
 ing would induce us to disclose the dodges to which 
 she and her son resorted to keep them from despoil- 
 ing her of her best. Such a foundation of things at 
 Holmer was also, as Sir George had said, a tempta- 
 tion to the boys, or would have been, in his own 
 day. Oddly, the modem custom has turned against 
 it: and the temptation, owing to the strong hand of 
 fashion, is altogether less than it was.
 
 310 HATCHWAYS 
 
 All the same, SUITS were born with the taste, and 
 Sir George looked once or twice, with his long- 
 sighted hunter's glance, across and down the table to 
 Iveagh. Next he turned his attention to Michael 
 serving, but Michael never went near him. It was 
 collaboration, most clearly, and the boy's intention 
 that the company should overlook. 
 
 "I am so glad," said Iveagh's useful girl once: 
 and he found her busy blue eyes fixed on the water 
 in his glass. 
 
 "Cheek," thought Iveagh, but of course he did 
 not say it: one never says things like that to useful 
 girls. He attended to her at first in careless Suir 
 fashion, not flirting exactly, but satisfying her 
 greedy spirit, which was greedier, of course, than 
 that of less useful and excellent girls. Her head 
 craned lizard-like while she responded. Iveagh 
 thought, once or twice, how much nicer Bess would 
 have been beside him, chiefly because he could have 
 talked sense to Bess. Chiefly, there were other 
 things. The way she held her head, upright, not 
 poking eagerly: her beautiful white neck and blue, 
 but very far from busy eyes. The blessing, to be 
 looked at fully by a girl as Bess did, with eyes that 
 held, and helped, and took you in; and which then 
 dropped away shyly into private dreams, a private
 
 DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 311 
 
 world without any doubt sweet and worthy, a world 
 which any man on earth would want to know. . . , 
 It was strange how this lizard-like creature at his 
 side made him think of Bess, who ought by rights 
 to have been sitting in her chair. . . . He turned 
 his head slightly to Michael, who disturbed him 
 with decanters and a message from Wickford. 
 
 "Let him go to the deuce," said Iveagh, sliding 
 his sleepy eyes sidelong. "And don't come near me 
 again when I told you not." 
 
 "There you are !" said Michael to the other man 
 who had handed him this dangerous duty. "For a 
 week past he will not, and what's the use of trying 
 to turn him*?" 
 
 "He might come round," murmured the other 
 man. "He's wanting it, anyone can see." 
 
 "He couldn't be other than wanting it," said 
 Michael scornfully, "after a week. But they'd best 
 let him be, Sir George and his Grace as well. That 
 young lady is fast annoying him." 
 
 "Such an interesting head," said the useful girl, 
 who had been poking in Sir George's direction. 
 "Doesn't he remind you of a lion*?" 
 
 "I have not much acquaintance among lions " 
 began Iveagh.
 
 312 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Answer sensibly," said his mother on his other 
 side. 
 
 "And if I had," proceeded Iveagh, "I'd be won- 
 dering which you meant." 
 
 "You talk as though there were differences, in 
 animals," the useful girl pointed out. Iveagh's 
 thoughts strayed from her. 
 
 "I hear she is wonderfully musical," said the use- 
 ful girl, now poking at Mrs. Elphinstone. 
 
 "She is," said Iveagh. 
 
 "How nice for him," said the useful girl. 
 
 "Do you know Elphinstone?" said Iveagh, awak- 
 ing slightly. 
 
 "Why of course" said the useful girl. "I -worked 
 for him." 
 
 "By the powers, she's fond of Mark!" thought 
 Iveagh. As for what she worked at, he did not 
 think of asking, the other discovery was so much 
 more worth while. Besides, he had no intention 
 himself of engaging her services. Wick might if he 
 liked. 
 
 Finally, the lizard turned to his uncle, her other 
 neighbour, and Iveagh was, of course, alone. It 
 was not likely his mother would notice him, in the 
 circumstances. Things in general were too appall- 
 ing.
 
 DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 313 
 
 He watched the other girls: Lise, bless her, more 
 beautiful than words, throwing the treasures of her 
 wit and well-being into their pitiful stock. With 
 half an ear, all the time, he had heard her sweet 
 pliant tone, the ineffable cadence when the point 
 came, and the sure laugh that succeeded. But he 
 could worship it as well from where he was, he was 
 not envious of Wick's position. . . . Adelaide, 
 flirting with du Frettay, talking too loud, but that 
 was habitual. It was time, by rights, Addy turned 
 back to the Bishop, and released his mother, not 
 that he cared, but it was time. 
 
 Iveagh watched for the table break to travel 
 round because it amused him, it was so asinine. 
 Why should not people like Lise, Trenchard, and du 
 Frettay orate, and those listen who wished? Be- 
 sides, du Frettay would enjoy orating. . . . He 
 was now talking French to the Courtier- woman : 
 Iveagh liked to see him talking French. He was 
 ripping to see anyhow, fresh and keen beside Addy's 
 mother, whose artificial head was leaning almost to 
 his shoulder, fooling the poor old goat, no doubt. 
 Du Frettay was a caution with women, fooled the 
 lot. It was hardly fair on some of them. . . . 
 
 Dash, how his head w r as aching! This, with 
 Iveagh, was not an unheard-of evil, and he had a
 
 314 HATCHWAYS 
 
 familiar remedy he could drop into his glass at need. 
 He thought of sending Michael for it, and then let 
 it slide again. It would do later. In the act of so 
 thinking, he noticed Adelaide, in the seam of the 
 table-conversation, drop something into her cham- 
 pagne glass, and swallow it hastily. Spurred by the 
 coincidence he stirred, stared across at her face, bril- 
 liant, overheated, her fine languishing eyes. . . . 
 
 "That girl's going after her mother," reflected the 
 Duchess aloud, she having noted the action at the 
 same moment as he did. She had not meant to 
 speak aloud, but internal worry so produced it. 
 
 Drugs, was it*? Beastly, he must warn Wick. 
 That was really Iveagh's only thought about it. As 
 usual, his mind shied willingly from Adelaide, and 
 he prepared to depart elsewhere in spirit again. 
 
 "Isn't Poppy a clever girl?" said the Duchess. 
 (Poppy, was she?) "She took a first-class in 
 Mathematics." 
 
 "Rippin 3 ," said Iveagh. His mother always 
 threw people's classes at him, particularly girls. 
 
 "What did she talk about?" said the Duchess. 
 
 "Lions, I think," said Iveagh, who felt, in the 
 circumstances, that he had better not mention Mark. 
 
 "Have you a headache?" said the Duchess, chieily 
 because he was so civil.
 
 DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 315 
 
 'Til get through," said the boy. His mother 
 glanced at him sharply, she knew the look of his 
 eyes. 
 
 "You ought to get that Frenchman to teach you 
 English." (What had he said now?) ''Have you 
 got your thing*?" 
 
 "I've taken it," said Iveagh : a lie, but he did not 
 want a fuss. 
 
 The Duchess dropped silent, catching a glance 
 from her other son up the table. A new department 
 of inner discomfort stirred, that had not stirred for 
 long. These headaches of Iveagh's were direct in- 
 heritance, though his were worse than his father's. 
 Some doctor, a friend of George's, had once told her 
 to watch them: not, as she had at first supposed, in 
 the matter of his school-work, but in other things, 
 emotion, excitability. Emotion! She had a little 
 thrill of wonder, approaching to vulgar curiosity, if 
 that were really what Wickford's sharp, lingering 
 glance at them had meant. It would be queer in- 
 deed if he and George, in their perpetual work and 
 planning for the boy, these three years back, had had 
 that vision behind him. Unsteady, she had called 
 Iveagh to George: unsteady what? Morals, she 
 had supposed. But the brain is different. 
 
 The women left at last, but then it was Sir Giles.
 
 316 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Giles, being left out of the conversation at the end 
 of the table, spent most of the interlude in teasing 
 his younger nephew for his empty glass, and in re- 
 filling his own. The Duchess might say such temp- 
 tation was peculiar to her husband's side, but Ox- 
 boroughs drank a good deal: the main difference 
 being that they could stand it, while Suir nature 
 resisted the fumes less easily. Now, granted com- 
 parative solitude, the Frenchman across the table 
 did not count, and the Elphinstone girl's recent 
 departure from his other elbow, and the information 
 gleaned from Addy, and improved by jesting with 
 Sam, the chance for a little natural humour at the 
 expense of a boy whom he had never liked, was 
 quite a pretty one. Giles, undiscouraged by du 
 Frettay's sallies for diversion, made the best of his 
 pretty chance: and Iveagh grew whiter and more 
 savage, momentarily. 
 
 "You'd better," hinted du Frettay, snicking one 
 of the decanters. "That's no harm it will stop- 
 him-off, he is stupid." 
 
 "He is," said Iveagh, in the equal tone of perfect 
 obstinacy. 
 
 "You have not sworn off?" argued Gabriel, for 
 he could not conceive it. 
 
 "Till Monday."
 
 DU FRETTAY MEETS A BISHOP 317 
 
 "Never! why?' 
 
 "Nothin', I said I would." 
 
 "To your brother?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 Giles broke in with more open baiting, for Sir 
 George had left the table. He was obviously over- 
 doing things in all senses, when the Duke's attention 
 was attracted : and he and the Bishop between them 
 decided that the men should move. 
 
 "Well, we'll ask Mrs. Elphinstone," said Giles, 
 too loud, alluding to something, heaven knows what, 
 that he had lately said. 
 
 "I'd like you to," said Iveagh, expressively. 
 
 "Gently, my boy," said the Bishop, in his second 
 tone, neither pulpit nor society, something be- 
 tween.
 
 XVIII 
 THE TALE OF MARK 
 
 IT was into this atmosphere of brawl, artificially 
 heated, that the story of Mark's coolness, swiftness 
 and self-devotion, amid the sluicing torrents and 
 slippery muds of the Kashmir rains, eventually fell. 
 But we have to go back a little, for, well managed 
 by Lise, Sir George told the tale of Mark and the 
 mother and baby to an audience of women first. 
 
 Lise had leant down to the lion, on her way out, 
 and invited him to come early to the drawing-room ; 
 so Sir George, who was no great smoker, very natu- 
 rally went. Sir George was weak with girls, he 
 knew plenty in London. He brought them things, 
 tucked away in corners of his traveller's kit, from 
 opposite ends of the earth. He attended their wed- 
 dings, sure proof of the true taste, nor did he avoid 
 their nurseries afterwards. He liked them, as he 
 liked young men, as being necessary realities: but 
 he was not obsessed by the vision of cradle-rocking 
 exclusively. He was kind, on the present occasion, 
 to Iveagh's useful girl, who stuttered some of her 
 
 318
 
 THE TALE OF MARK 319 
 
 plans and aspirations to him: he was friendly and 
 flirtatious with Adelaide; only, having started from 
 Lise he came back to her, and settled down beside 
 her in the sofa-corner, as though for good. 
 
 "Drat the man," said Lady Oxborough to her 
 sister-in-law in confidence. "There he is now, tell- 
 ing tales to the Fitzmaurice girl like anything 
 no one to hear!" 
 
 "Who's he speaking of?" said the Duchess, who 
 had caught fragments. 
 
 "Mark." 
 
 "Speak up," said Lise to her companion. "They 
 all know him here, they're all wanting to listen to 
 you. Tell it out loud." 
 
 So Sir George told it out loud, and beautifully. 
 It was a very fine story, he thought himself, so he 
 failed it at no point. It was of general interest too, 
 as Lise said, for even Mrs. Courtier had known 
 Mark. Lise herself had only picked up the bare 
 bones of the incident from the Elphinstones. The 
 Duchess knew what Mark had chosen to tell her, 
 which went for naught. But Sir George, by a 
 charming coincidence, had been on the scene. 
 "Tied by the leg," as he put it, which seemed to 
 mean lamed in a hunting accident, and a few bones 
 broken, he had lived in Mark's half-drowned village
 
 320 HATCHWAYS 
 
 for several weeks. His fleshly eye had seen him 
 leap into the yellow torrent, his fleshly ear had heard 
 the woman's scream as the group of three were 
 hurled against the bridge. Facts seen, noted by an 
 orderly explorer in his journal the same evening, 
 even the cunning young Captain could hardly escape 
 from that. 
 
 "Pretty good," said Isabel, en route, to Gertrude. 
 "A brown woman, too, eh*?" But she got no an- 
 swer. Gertrude, of course, was soft about Mark. 
 Adelaide was thoughtful, seeming sleepy, or sulky: 
 Mrs. Courtier picking at the bangles on her wrist. 
 Heroism, yes: even the poorest of us know what 
 that is: and modest heroes, in England: and the 
 tribute eloquently paid by each to each. ... As 
 for Iveagh's little useful girl, it was as well he was 
 there no longer to observe her: for she was trem- 
 bling, crying very nearly, before the close. Had 
 she not worked for that hero once, and had he not 
 ignored her, civilly, from first to last, in the manner 
 girls of her devoted kind love best? Iveagh's in- 
 stinct was right, such mementoes were worth more 
 than mathematical first-classes to Miss Poppy; and 
 having no immediate Mark to worship, she fixed her 
 worship a little too eagerly upon Sir George. 
 
 Well, all he had got to do now, so Sir George
 
 THE TALE OF MARK 321 
 
 understood from Mrs. Elphinstone, was to say it 
 all over again, just like that, among the men-folk. 
 The very same words would do. She wanted Wick- 
 ford to hear particularly, he was so fond of him. 
 And Iveagh. . . . 
 
 "I see," said Sir George. He seemed to be con- 
 sidering. 
 
 "You'll find it come easy, the second time," en- 
 couraged Lise. 
 
 "To be sure," said Sir George: but he still pon- 
 dered. 
 
 "And you'll point the moral," said Lise, preening 
 her gold and silver plumage. Mark, well polished- 
 up by people who really knew his possibilities, was 
 something to have. 
 
 "I'm not sure what the moral is," said Sir George. 
 "That any man, granted the sight, would not have 
 done as much"? Because really " 
 
 Lise looked upon him reproachfully, trying to 
 steal her best feathers like that "The point's not 
 what any man would have done, but what any man 
 has, at the same age," she said severely. 
 
 "Ah." Sir George reckoned. "Your husband 
 was nearly twenty-five." 
 
 "Oh, bother you, don't be so pedantic," giggled 
 Mrs. Elphinstone. "Do you deny it was a thing of
 
 322 HATCHWAYS 
 
 beauty he did? Or that he was very young to be 
 where he was at the time, alone and unassisted*? 
 Well, point that." 
 
 "Yes, but our boy's poor, he's denuded. And 
 the Duchess did assist Mark, between ourselves. 
 And suppose," said Sir George, "in two years' time, 
 ours was " 
 
 "Well, he won't be," said Lise. "Except for 
 your and my intervention in his upbringing at this 
 point, and then he will." 
 
 Sir George considered again, both elbows on his 
 knees, gazing at the floor between them with his 
 hands to his temples: an odd position for flirting, 
 but perhaps he wished to conceal from Gertrude that 
 he was. 
 
 "About my own intervention in his upbringing, 
 Lise," he said. "I feel quite confident, up to the 
 present. About yours " 
 
 "Oh, do be quiet with you," gurgled Lise. "Do 
 you want her to hear*?" (This was the useful girl, 
 opposite.) "I've been feeling so nice and easy my- 
 self about it all, thanks to Ernestine. Now you 
 
 "What does Gabriel think*?" said Sir George. 
 Lise stiffened. 
 
 "I have not asked him, this time. I have no
 
 THE TALE OF MARK 323 
 
 need, on every occasion under the sun, of hearing 
 M. du Frettay's ideas." 
 
 "I see." Sir George got up, at leisure. "Very 
 well, Lise, I leave you. I might be giving you some 
 more of mine, if I stayed. Then I mayn't even 
 employ Gabriel as assistant, among the men-folk? 
 You know, I might want drawing out." 
 
 "Oh, Wickford'll draw you," said Lise carelessly. 
 "Isn't it what he's been trying to do, the entire 
 evening?" 
 
 "Has he?" The lion looked surprised. 
 
 "Now don't go pretending not to know it," said 
 Lise. The lion looked conscious. 
 
 "What do you suppose," said Lise, "you are here 
 for?" The lion looked more conscious than ever, 
 gazing down. 
 
 "What do you suppose," murmured Lise, leaning 
 back her cinder-coloured head, "would happen in a 
 place like this if I kissed you? Presently, when 
 you've said your task?" 
 
 The lion said nothing, but he looked at the 
 temptress. Eyes met, it was a bargain. Miss 
 Poppy, that useful member of society, was ashamed 
 of Lise. 
 
 Sir George, as a matter of fact, had no need of
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 drawing out, in the unmixed society of the men- 
 folk: especially when some such amalgamating proc- 
 ess was badly required. 
 
 Even for a Holmer situation, the situation later 
 on that night in the smoking-room was a stiff one, 
 it touched the serious, indeed. The Bishop, trying 
 in a professional manner to control Sir Giles, was not 
 behaving very wisely. Wickford was "sick" with 
 the Bishop, and worn with an anxious evening, the 
 weight of which, naturally, had fallen upon him. 
 Iveagh, sicker than he was, and with even better 
 cause, was too obstinate to save the position and 
 solve his brother's problem by retreat, which was 
 really the only way. 
 
 So Sir George, waking to a real need, told stories, 
 with Gabriel to assist : for Gabriel still lingered with 
 the house-party. Friendship only detained him, 
 since Lise was stopping for the night at Holmer: 
 friendship, and the desire, like Sir George, to offer 
 the young host a helping hand. 
 
 Neatly prompted by Gabriel, who knew, by 
 means of the lion's books, and his own father's sto- 
 ries, most of the background of that remarkable 
 career, Sir George told many things, feats by field 
 and flood, good things and evil things and merely
 
 THE TALE OF MARK 325 
 
 funny ones, that had struck him in his experience; 
 and the Bishop beamed resplendent on the pride of 
 England, and the burly Oxborough Giles grew 
 silent by degrees. These were stories for men, no 
 doubt of it. He looked at the traveller's wiry form 
 and brown face, ever more attentively, as the re- 
 cital went on. Trenchard was given, Giles gathered 
 from Gertrude, to interfering at Holmer, and he 
 differed perpetually, in what he said and thought, 
 from Oxborough fixed ideas. Still, apart from say- 
 ing and thinking, he had actually accomplished a 
 thing or two. For all his cranks, he was a fellow 
 worth knowing, worth quoting even in the proper 
 places, Isabel was right. 
 
 " 'Fore George," swore Giles, of the Mark story, 
 just like Isabel. "That's not bad. That's as good 
 as I've heard, for a young fellow. A brown woman 
 too. ... I'd never have thought it of that one, 
 either," he pushed on weightily, the company and 
 his nephews granting him leave. "Not but what he 
 was good stuff, Mark, but he thought too much of 
 himself; I always thought him, between ourselves, 
 a bit of a prig." 
 
 "So did I, between ourselves," said Sir George. 
 "And so did Wickford."
 
 326 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Well, he was," apologised Wickford, who could 
 have produced plenty of other Mark stories, of a 
 different nature, if required. 
 
 "He was not," said Iveagh, as usual. It was as 
 though Iveagh could not hear an opinion pronounced 
 by three people in turn without making one against 
 them. One to three, a sufficient Suir minority. 
 
 "Now then, water-drinker," gibed his uncle. 
 "You'd have avoided water-drinking, on that oc- 
 casion, I suppose." 
 
 "I daresay I would," said Iveagh, turning whiter. 
 
 "It's my idea any of us would have jumped " 
 
 began Sir George. 
 
 "It's my idea none of us would," murmured 
 Iveagh. 
 
 "Speak for yourself," ruffled Giles. "Mean I 
 should not, or Wickford?" 
 
 "The question is," proceeded Sir George, "if we 
 should have come out again. It was the cleverness 
 got me, more than the courage, which is com- 
 moner " 
 
 "Not so common as you think, Trenchard," said 
 Giles. "You'd naturally make a mistake on the 
 point " 
 
 "Let's hear the end, Trenchard," said the Bishop. 
 
 Sir George, striving against the spirit of brawl,
 
 THE TALE OF MARK 327 
 
 tried to finish his story. The beauty of it, in his 
 own view, was still to come in Mark's ingenious ex- 
 trication of the trio from a terribly tight place. The 
 fact of prompt leaping, granted a mother and child 
 in danger, whether brown, yellow or white, seemed 
 to him a commonplace. It could not seem so to 
 Giles, who, though plucky enough, did nothing in- 
 stantly. The Oxboroughs were "good men," in the 
 popular phrase, but, given a Kashmir river in full 
 flood, the crucial minute would have passed by sev- 
 eral seconds, by the time Giles jumped. He would 
 have lost three lives (to do him justice) rather than 
 saved two, on the occasion. That was the differ- 
 ence, shortly formulated, between Oxborough Giles 
 and Elphinstone Mark. 
 
 For the moment the point he dimly chased, for 
 the purpose of Iveagh's teaching, was more to this 
 Oxborough. He scored it successfully. 
 
 "You'd have gone in on top, to save Elphinstone, 
 wouldn't you*? That's the kind of thing we expect 
 from you." 
 
 The remark fell on silence, horrified silence. 
 The Duke stiffened, Iveagh stared. So Sir Giles 
 pushed on, for their benefit, making it clear. 
 
 "Granted a pretty wife in the background " 
 
 "Look out, Wick," said Sir George quickly: but
 
 328 HATCHWAYS 
 
 it was Gabriel who arose. "Just beg the boy's par- 
 don, will you, Oxborough'? It was a stupid thing 
 to say." 
 
 "Oh, he needn't bother," said Wickford, gazing 
 at the floor. His mother's brother had reached the 
 limit now, and the Duke, so to speak, retired. Still, 
 stinkin' pride, dating back several centuries before 
 Oxboroughs were invented, enveloped Wickford like 
 a garment. Iveagh beyond him had made one vio- 
 lent movement, but like his brother's, it had come 
 to naught, though for a different reason. The shock 
 of anger had precipitated the revolt of his nerves, 
 fortunately. He remained rigid, helpless to all ap- 
 pearance, breathing a little short, his eyes distracted 
 with physical pain, as, Sir George would have 
 thought, the most fuddled ass could see. 
 
 "R right !" said du Frettay softly. He had laid 
 aside his cigarette, and his grasp on Iveagh's arms 
 seemed rather to encourage than to control. His 
 serene balance in all situations was a blessing, not 
 for the first time, a man who always kept his 
 head. 
 
 "What?' said Sir Giles, still groping for his lost 
 point. "Why, he's been a fool about the girl for 
 ages, Addy told us. Been avoiding temptation all
 
 THE TALE OF MARK 329 
 
 the week, give you my word for it, liquor as 
 well." 
 
 "You have not, my friend," said the Bishop, and 
 cleared his throat. He was an Eton Bishop, and 
 liked the boys. Giles (not that it mattered at all) 
 was Harrow. 
 
 "Just listen," said Sir George, an eye on Gabriel 
 and Iveagh, about whom he was uncertain equally. 
 "Elphinstone was not married, at the time I'm talk- 
 ing of, nor even engaged. These boys have always 
 been friends with him, haven't you, Wick*? Iveagh 
 spoke for him lately " 
 
 "Mark can do without our speakin'," said Wick- 
 ford. 
 
 "Just so, a good man. We all, I think, grant 
 it. Anyone counter'?" ("Ahem!" said the Bishop, 
 moved.) "Well now, Oxborough " 
 
 "Not likely I should beg his pardon, is it?" said 
 Sir Giles, almost pathetic. "Boy like that, till 
 he can show me as good." 
 
 "Must we have examples'?" asked Sir George, sur- 
 prising him again. "Wick, will you oblige us*?" 
 
 "So," said Wickford. 
 
 "Gabriel, off the ground? Will you give us a 
 testimonial 1 ?"
 
 330 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "No," said Gabriel. 
 
 Sir Giles looked about him, open-mouthed. 
 Fetching in the Frenchman, were they? What in 
 the name of of the ground? 
 
 "Off the ground, Oxborough," said Sir George un- 
 kindly, "and not in the water, one better than 
 Mark." 
 
 "Ahem!" said the Eton Bishop, getting there. 
 He became amused. 
 
 "I should be extr remely happy," said M. 
 du Frettay, with a singular gleam of his blue 
 eyes, "any time he is at liberty, to conduct Sir 
 Giles." 
 
 "What?" said Giles. "Where?" He gaped yet 
 more at the young man's expressive gesture, up- 
 wards, to the empyrean. He was a very dramatic 
 young man, painfully so. Everybody in the room 
 was now looking at Giles attentively, earnestly; 
 even the Bishop. What was the sense of it? What 
 were they all playing at? It was like a night- 
 mare. 
 
 "Should you care to follow your nephew," ex- 
 plained the French young man, in a mild tone, and 
 excellent English. "I am qualified to assist, I as- 
 sure you. Tenez " he passed a card. 
 
 A card, worse and worse. That used to stand
 
 THE TALE OF MARK 331 
 
 for a challenge. What outlandish tricks were these? 
 Giles groped for a solution, regarding it. It had 
 a name printed, the young man's name and letters 
 after; or rather words shortened up, with stops be- 
 tween. The name of a new society, very new. 
 Ass. Aer. . . . Aerl 
 
 There is an expression, in Gabriel's language, 
 called "raising the heart," which does not mean that 
 exactly. It stands for a sensation from which none 
 of us, even the bravest, are exempt, especially after 
 a large meal, when faced with some material dis- 
 turbance. Sir Giles, on this occasion, had dined 
 well : he loathed the sea always : but he would sooner, 
 any day, have entered a Channel boat than a lighter- 
 than-air-boat, even the commonest dirigible. As for 
 a heavier-than-air Something rose in him, a lit- 
 tle lower than the heart while he strove with the 
 mystic words on Gabriel's card. His complexion 
 showed it. He was, however, getting to the facts, 
 though painfully, when he discovered everybody 
 laughing! Everybody, the boy Iveagh too. This 
 finished Giles, for, having himself scored the jest 
 of the evening, what was there for them to be 
 amused at? 
 
 "Drop it, du Frettay," said the Duke, gathering 
 himself out of collapse, from many causes. "Oh,
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Lord, you're a caution ! and let the kid go, he's all 
 right. Have some whisky, Iveagh, and don't be a 
 little ass " 
 
 "I will not," said Iveagh: but he looked better, 
 far, for du Frettay's happy diversion. Such a man 
 for ideas! It did him more good than whisky, or 
 brandy either. If they could, if they only could 
 in combination, manage it. ... He kept hold of 
 du Frettay's arm, lovingly, though du Frettay had 
 long let go of him. 
 
 "I'll have a drop, when they're gone," he mur- 
 mured in strict confidence, protected by the general 
 move outward to the stairs. 
 
 "Good child," said Gabriel, in his own tongue, 
 approving: and picked up his cigar again. 
 
 "Very neat, young man, on my word," said the 
 Eton Bishop, a hand on his shoulder, as he passed 
 to the door. 
 
 "Talk of extrication from tight places " mur- 
 mured Sir George, as he passed in turn. 
 
 "Your Church is not half-bad," said Gabriel to 
 Wickford, having saluted the Bishop. "I am grati- 
 fied to have met it " 
 
 "Don't go by that," said Wickford, hastily. 
 "Thanks, I say. What on earth we'd have done
 
 THE TALE OF MARK 333 
 
 without you " He laughed hopelessly again. 
 "Good night." 
 
 "After all," resumed du Frettay in French to 
 Iveagh, dealing capably with the drinks when they 
 were solitary. "Whoever it was you promised could 
 not have reckoned on a provocation like that." 
 
 "No, she could not," agreed Iveagh, dreamily 
 watching him. Such sense in the man, too, one 
 had happily no need of the effort of thought in his 
 society. 
 
 "And to think," ejaculated du Frettay, pushing 
 across the glass he had prepared, "that the hands are 
 tied, in your country ! Sacr-r-r " 
 
 "They were," said Iveagh. 
 
 "I don't mean that. It need not have been you, 
 in any case. Nor your brother, for that matter. In 
 the case of an uncle," said Gabriel with a reminis- 
 cence, "the Prayer Book forbids it " 
 
 "It's not the Prayer Book, that's marryin'," said 
 Iveagh, who understood French very well, though 
 he did not often choose to speak it. "I say," he 
 confided, at a later stage, with his eyes shut. "That 
 was a fairly rippin' thing about Mark."
 
 XIX 
 
 THE WORST OVER 
 
 THE Suir brothers had a veiled debate the following 
 morning, on the subject of Miss Ryeborn's coming 
 to Holmer: interesting as character to anyone who 
 knew them, but certainly not interesting in anything 
 it betrayed to the world at large. It happened in 
 Wickford's sanctum during the peaceful period of 
 the morning while the Bishop was looking about for 
 people to take to church. Iveagh proposed, in the 
 formula known to them, that Wick should lay him- 
 self out to please the girl, spare her the sight of his 
 uncle, and have her to tea comfortably in his pri- 
 vate room. Wickford conveyed in the same lan- 
 guage that he thought his mother, with Addy actually 
 in the house, would not stand it. Iveagh adum- 
 brated that it could not matter if she did not. She 
 deserved it, he sketched that also. Wickford 
 thereupon turned his back completely, it had been 
 only half-turned hitherto, and let fall the gen- 
 eral idea that he ought to get some writing done, and 
 
 334
 
 THE WORST OVER 335 
 
 if Iveagh had any relics of decency he would free his 
 hands for the afternoon, and see to the girl him- 
 self. Iveagh sniffed at this, suggesting he had 
 meant to do something quite different; however, 
 Wickford grasped he might condescend to something 
 of the sort if, before three o'clock, Wick saw no 
 other way out of the hole. 
 
 Other people besides his brother found Iveagh a 
 handful that Sunday; for, though he walked down 
 to Hatchways with Sir George in the afternoon, con- 
 fided him to Mrs. Redgate, and carried off Bess, all 
 in very capable style, Sir George's early remarks to 
 his hostess were in no sense flattering to him. Sir 
 George remained for some time after landing at 
 Hatchways insensible of the honour lately done him, 
 anything but obliged. 
 
 "He's a young cub," said Sir George. "He's as 
 surly as a hedgehog, all spikes. I can't do anything 
 with him. He can go where he likes, for me." Er- 
 nestine smiled. "All very well your laughing," said 
 Sir George, "but I haven't the time to waste he 
 seems to think. I let him know it was yes or no 
 to come with me yesterday, by Wickford. Take it 
 or leave it, hey? Perhaps that was unwise." Er- 
 nestine looked serious. "Anyhow I can't change my 
 habits all in a moment for a young ruffian's
 
 336 HATCHWAYS 
 
 crotchets. That's the way I do business, and he'd 
 better know." 
 
 "Of course," said Ernestine. "Is the sun worry- 
 ing you*?" 
 
 "Lord no, I love it. Wonderful weather, won- 
 derful to be here at last, where were we*? Yes, 
 well, to-day I led off with soft-sawder, persuading. 
 Perhaps that was unwise again. Anyhow my lord 
 had his nose in the air, looking about, not taking any, 
 for a good half of the way. About the Lodge," said 
 Sir George, "I lost my temper and said personally 
 I could do without him very well. Then he turned 
 pleasanter, if you call it so, and let me know he 
 wouldn't be sorry, granted he could be certain of 
 being free. Free! ... So I said, perhaps a little 
 testily, what the what on earth did he propose to 
 do, then. And blest," said Sir George, indignantly, 
 "if he hadn't got another post up his sleeve, paid 
 post, African too, it gave me quite a shock!" 
 
 "Is that the Morocco one*?" said Ernestine. 
 
 "You're in it, are you? Ah," said Sir George, 
 concentrating, "but I know who's at the bottom of 
 that. The place showed me. Only if the du Fret- 
 tays think they're going to come their paid posts over 
 me, they're mistaken. You can tell him so. Mo-
 
 THE WORST OVER 337 
 
 rocco indeed! Why, it's the place of all places I 
 want to go back to myself! The idea of that little 
 beggar . . . Anyhow, I let Iveagh know. I don't 
 propose," said Sir George firmly, "to be cut out by 
 the du Frettays at this time of day. So I took a 
 kind of racy line with the youngster you know 
 ragging him hard about paid work and the peerage. 
 I suppose he'd drop his title?" He diverted to her 
 of a sudden. 
 
 "Nothing would induce him," said Ernestine, dim- 
 pling again. She was very happy, shyly delighted, 
 to have her lion at last, and her young looks showed 
 it. 
 
 "Oh, Lord, well, I shall never get to the bottom 
 of them! Anyhow I ragged my nastiest, and he 
 took it as usual. Never knew a boy with a nicer 
 temper really ahem! because, after all, it isn't 
 his fault. Neither peerage nor poverty either, he'd 
 every right to be independent two years back. . . . 
 And so," finished Sir George, "we got to Hatchways 
 gate." 
 
 "And after that*?" said Mrs. Redgate, removing 
 the Pickle, like a burr, from the best velvet sofa 
 cushion. 
 
 "Well, there isn't much time after that, is there?
 
 338 HATCHWAYS 
 
 However, I gathered my lord'd come, on certain con- 
 ditions. Now," said Sir George, suddenly mild, "I 
 had an impression, if I took an inexperienced lad 
 along to Zanzibar, I should make the conditions my- 
 self." 
 
 "I should think so!" said Ernestine: just as she 
 had once said "The idea !" Absently, as she spoke, 
 she removed the Pickle from the velvet cushion a 
 second time. He was strictly not allowed there, 
 even by Bess. 
 
 "Well, as to his conditions, not that I should 
 adopt them, the chief is, to keep it dark till the 
 end, if he consents, from his relations. Well 
 that's Giles, I gather, after last night." 
 
 "Gertrude too," said Ernestine. 
 
 "No ! But why should he keep things dark from 
 Gertrude? What's up there, hey? What's she 
 been doing that he should speak, or not speak, of her 
 as he does?" Mrs. Redgate shook her head merely, 
 looking despondent. "But I will know," challenged 
 Sir George. "She's my oldest friend, and I care 
 for her. She used to be as anxious as we were, 
 surely she was! Wasn't she? Why wasn't she? 
 It's only she likes Wick best, not much wonder. 
 The boy's trying, at times. Cross as a little crab to- 
 day."
 
 THE WORST OVER 339 
 
 "They both can be," said Ernestine, once more 
 displacing the persistent Pickle. "Then you have 
 to manage them backwards. . . . Often it means 
 he's not been well." 
 
 "Does it 4 ? Backwards," said Sir George after a 
 pause. "Yes, that's what it comes to. Only is isn't 
 hard to do, with either of them. Is it? Being the 
 kind they are." 
 
 Having so answered the first part of her remark, 
 he waited, thinking. So did Ernestine. And while 
 the persons in the room were thus absorbed, the 
 Pickle sprang silently upon the velvet cushion again. 
 Being thus easily victorious, for he would have 
 jumped back thirty-nine times if necessary, the 
 Pickle curled his grey paws under his chest, and 
 watched them, not malicious, but benignly blinking. 
 For it was not possible to his nature to believe, 
 having his present will and finding comfort, he 
 should ever be disturbed again. 
 
 "That's a pretty creature," said Sir George pen- 
 sively. "By the way, you know, that's another 
 bother, with Gertrude. Health, I'd an idea you 
 still went to a boy's mother for a testimonial as to 
 that. What's she doing having boys otherwise? 
 It's important." 
 
 "It's essential," said Ernestine.
 
 340 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "She talked to me," said Sir George, folding his 
 arms, "about the schoolmistress. It seems, she's been 
 having a sore throat." 
 
 "Yes, laryngitis," said Ernestine. "Poor 
 Renie." 
 
 "Confound her, what does her throat matter 1 ?" 
 
 "A good deal," said Ernestine, "to the children. 
 She wants her voice all the time. Iveagh doesn't 
 need his head at a dinner-party half so much " 
 
 "He did before the evening was out," said Sir 
 George. "Oh, by the way, you know all that*? 
 Who's been gabbing, Gabriel ? Of course it was ! 
 I'd uncommonly have liked to knock the sot down 
 when he insulted them," said Sir George. "How- 
 ever, we all did our duty by Gertrude, and Gabriel 
 cleared the score. Did he tell you that 4 ? Of course 
 he did ! I say, do you like Gabriel *?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "I thought you would," said Sir George, con- 
 tented. "So does she." Pause. The intervals, of 
 course, were well-filled, at Hatchways. In fact, 
 talking fast as Sir George had been doing, he had 
 really been wasting time. Now he spent it wisely, 
 looking about him, the while the tea entered left 
 centre, and Mrs. Redgate tracked her late thoughts 
 through to an end.
 
 THE WORST OVER 341 
 
 "Wonderful this is," he said again. "Nice the 
 garden looks. Same old china. Rather a dreadful 
 lot of people up there, you know." He resumed. 
 "Well, aren't you going to tell me anything*?" 
 
 "About Gertrude? I'd rather not." 
 
 "He's not offended her, the little lad? Said 
 what he thought too freely? Chaffed her? 
 Cheeked her? Come on!" 
 
 "I hardly know," she said. "Very likely." 
 
 "Don't you see her? Don't you see them to- 
 gether?" pursued Sir George. "Ernestine I beg 
 your pardon " 
 
 "Why not?" she said with a smile. 
 
 "I never have, to your face. However, if you 
 don't mind it. Are you finished with Gertrude? I 
 ask for her sake. Really broken? She hinted it." 
 
 "I hardly know," she said again, looking con- 
 scious, and unhappy. "If she hinted it, I suppose 
 it is so. There's been some misunderstanding, over 
 the children; but I can't, at least at present, put it 
 right. I'm sorry I can't, think I could really, if 
 she'd ever let me come near enough, but that's it," 
 said Ernestine. 
 
 "Ha! That's it with Wickford too, Manner 
 mannerism it distresses him. I've seen it." 
 
 "I think she distresses Iveagh worse," said Ernes-
 
 342 HATCHWAYS 
 
 tine. "I think she must have done it, long ago, past 
 bearing. Quite long, when he was little. I doubt, 
 now, if she will ever get him back." She lowered 
 her head. "I doubt if she wants to." 
 
 "Ha! You know I feared it." 
 
 There was silence anew. Neither of these two 
 persons owned children, but there they were, quite 
 in agreement as to how mothers should behave. 
 Perhaps the Pickle was satirical, really as he blinked 
 at them, or simply soporific, one can never know. 
 
 "Odd, for a woman," said Sir George. "Yet it 
 happens, naturally. Or unnaturally. Anyhow, it 
 occurs. ... I say, one would have thought she 
 would have been interested, such a romance as he's 
 had ! And, though I say it, such a heroine ! Does 
 she realise Lise*?" 
 
 "Not as Iveagh does. Nor Wick either, for that 
 matter." 
 
 "Little Lise. . . . They're jolly nice lads. But 
 I say," said Sir George, who was boyish in this com- 
 pany, "you'd have thought a woman would be in- 
 terested, wouldn't you 1 ? Common interest. After 
 all, she's had her romance." 
 
 "Yes," agreed Ernestine. "But then, she liked 
 the hero."
 
 THE WORST OVER 343 
 
 "But this one's like that one. Isn't he?" 
 
 "Perhaps that's why." 
 
 "Ernestine, that's a dark saying." She dimpled 
 again, in her sweet fashion, and leant sidelong, one 
 elbow on the couch. Since he was being a boy, she 
 was a girl too, for the moment, her attitude showed 
 it. "Oughtn't she to like him better, because he's 
 like her hero, because he really is." 
 
 "One weakness in a life is enough for Gertrude." 
 
 "You never mean she's ashamed of it ! No, look 
 here, really, that's too hard. . . . Besides, there's 
 Mark, she was weak about him. Ah, now I've 
 done you," resumed Sir George after a minute. 
 "What about that*? Why Mark in front of her 
 own boys? Why the devil Mark?" 
 
 "Oh, stop examining me! She cared for Mark 
 like a protege, like a production. It's not a bit 
 the same." 
 
 "You care for Iveagh like a production," said Sir 
 George, gazing immutably at her. "Like a pro- 
 tege anyhow, you must. Is he your Mark?" 
 
 "Goodness no! Poor boy." She laughed sud- 
 denly. "It's only he would hate it so," she ex- 
 plained. 
 
 "You don't make an idol of him, a model?"
 
 344 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Goodness no, how could anybody?" Pause, 
 while she watched the blue dragon china, the smile 
 dying on her face. 
 
 "Ernestine," challenged Sir George, "you never 
 cared for the Captain." 
 
 "I didn't much," said Ernestine shamelessly. She 
 added "He may have improved." 
 
 "No, no. Lise has improved. You ask Ger- 
 trude." 
 
 "Pish!" said Mrs. Redgate's expression at the 
 blue dragons, it really did. Sir George observed 
 the expression contentedly. He often wondered if 
 it was Ernestine who was Hatchways, or Hatchways 
 Ernestine. He now decided it was Ernestine who 
 was Hatchways, her face was so full of character, 
 originality, one might almost say. And it may 
 have been the charming attitude, but she seemed to 
 him very young. 
 
 "Haven't you got a model young man*?" he chaffed 
 her. "Can't you show as good as Gertrude*? Come 
 now, at your age !" 
 
 She remained silent, still gazing, though the col- 
 our just dawned in her face. Mark indeed! . . . 
 Then she raised herself from her elbow rather 
 quickly, for the Hatchways gentlemen came in at 
 the door.
 
 THE WORST OVER 345 
 
 "Tiens, le malin!" exclaimed the younger of the 
 Hatchways gentlemen ; and before he realised it, the 
 Pickle was raised, cushion and all, swung about, and 
 projected like a bomb off his throne through the win- 
 dow into the garden. Thus did M. du Frettay dis- 
 close at once his deep knowledge of the rules of that 
 household, and his care for Mrs. Redgate's property; 
 and thus, not for the first time, was the Pickle made 
 aware of French impulsiveness, vigilance, and deter- 
 mination, which he loathed, because they resem- 
 bled his own. Twice he walked round the garden, 
 shaking his tail in bitterness of spirit : twice he swore 
 eternal enmity to all things French: before he saw 
 a sparrow and forgot about it. 
 
 Meanwhile, peace began to be patched up on 
 Holmer terraces, all unaware to these debaters. And 
 how? How, but by way of the schoolmistress's 
 sore throat. 
 
 Bess told the Duchess, shyly, that owing to poor 
 Renie, who was nearly at the end of her resources, 
 Ernestine had persuaded that conscientious young 
 woman to give the children a whole morning off on 
 Tuesday, and take them out for the day, provided 
 always the weather remained like this. Renie, that 
 very morning after church, had gone under to Bess's
 
 346 HATCHWAYS 
 
 counsel and coaxing. She had agreed, on condition, 
 first, that the parents were warned : and second, that 
 the whole of this delightful and exceptional holiday 
 should be known to her flock as Nature Study. 
 
 The Duchess listened charmed, literally 
 charmed, to Miss Ryeborn's recital. The whole 
 thing bore the badge of Renie, the hall-mark of her 
 practised utility, so plainly. It may have been 
 partly owing to Wickford's absence, but the Duchess 
 began, during the dialogue, to think Miss Ryeborn 
 rather a pretty girl. She also, for the sake of her 
 resemblance to Ernestine, forgave Ernestine another 
 stage, though there was still much, very much, to be 
 explained between them. 
 
 Next Bess, yet more shyly, wondered if the Duch- 
 ess would be at liberty to come with them"? 
 
 Well, no, she could not promise that, precisely. 
 She had "things" on Tuesday, she had "people." 
 Still, for all her things and people, towards such a 
 laudable object as Nature Study, the Duchess was 
 gracious, granting what she could. The run of the 
 park was as nothing, that was dropped absently, 
 while she looked about for means of more material 
 helpfulness. So seeking, her maternal eye fell on 
 Iveagh, and at once she offered him. His knowledge 
 of plants
 
 THE WORST OVER 347 
 
 General mirth, to her surprise, greeted the sug- 
 gestion. Even the Bishop laughed, himself an in- 
 structor in the past. The Ryeborn girl laughed, 
 though she coloured simultaneously. Iveagh al- 
 lowed himself nearly a whole smile. His mother 
 had seldom made such a good joke in his memory, so 
 she needed to be encouraged. 
 
 "So fond of the kiddies, aren't you, Iveagh'?" 
 jested Adelaide. 
 
 "Help the schoolmarm," jested Sam. "Chances 
 are, those kids know more than you." 
 
 "They know a perfectly terrible amount," said the 
 Ryeborn girl. 
 
 "Irene is an excellent teacher," said the Duchess. 
 
 "Sam shall tell 'em about birds," said Iveagh, 
 pleasantly extending his mother's helpfulness. "We 
 won't let on he uses 'em to make holes in. Wick 
 shall tell 'em about snails. No, he can't. 
 About " 
 
 Fish, fossils, architecture, were suggested as 
 subjects for Wickford by a frivolous world. Iveagh 
 denied his knowledge of the former, and "There 
 isn't any," said Sam, of the last. 
 
 "No architecture in the park, Sam?" cried Mrs. 
 Elphinstone. "What about the Belvedere?" 
 
 The Duchess strove against the tide of frivolity,
 
 348 HATCHWAYS 
 
 making sensible suggestions. She proposed a place 
 not far from the Belvedere, where there was a camp 
 and shed used of old for holiday picnics. The shed 
 was broken down, but it would provide a shelter in 
 case of rain. Her spirit, from Holmer, would watch 
 over them. She would send a tarpaulin, a tea-ket- 
 tle if necessary. No, tea would be too late for 
 Renie. Deep within her, owing to this link of 
 Renie, the Duchess began to long to go down to 
 Hatchways, and see Ernestine about it. Girls were 
 so little good. . . . However, she made the best of 
 Bess. She was shy, the Duchess was pleased to 
 note, in Holmer company; and what was more, she 
 did not, in any uncomfortable degree, remember 
 things. 
 
 About and around the pair, the dropping fire of 
 unpractical commentary proceeded. The subject, 
 for a Sunday, was good enough. Lady Oxborough 
 had produced the disturbing theory that architecture 
 was not Nature Study. The Bishop, in his Sunday 
 mood, contributed that the proper study of mankind 
 was man, and our monuments were chiefly to be val- 
 ued as reflecting the hand that made them. Lise 
 said that the Bishop had not seen the Belvedere, or 
 he could never be so hard on his fellow-creatures. 
 Sam required merely to know if Mrs. Redgate was
 
 THE WORST OVER 349 
 
 giving the feed; because if so, he and Iveagh would 
 come along and study the nature of it, willingly. 
 
 In fact, everybody got such facts and such fun 
 out of the situation as they required. As for ren- 
 dezvous, the Belvedere itself sufficed as an objec- 
 tive. In a forest-ring of half a mile from that 
 blameless erection, given a squeaking pack of kids, 
 the gentlemen, if they chose, could find the party 
 easily. It is probable, but for the food, and the 
 girls, Iveagh and Sam would have avoided the oc- 
 casion, which was too like a school-treat to move 
 their taste. Even as it was, they were too wise to 
 promise. With the weather like this, they might be 
 wanted in quite another direction. Still, they were 
 young, and picnics (such as Mrs. Redgate manages) 
 have their points. Renie, whatever Lise might say 
 of her, had her points as well. As for Miss Rye- 
 born, Sam at least put her under Mrs. Redgate's 
 wing, and was quite incapable of saying a rude or 
 critical word about her. Added to which, Sam was 
 entirely and utterly prostrated, that afternoon, by 
 the portrait of Lise. 
 
 Iveagh, in default of Wick, who remained rig- 
 idly in retirement, did all that was expected of him, 
 as he could quite well at need. He dodged his 
 mother and his uncle, had a restricting hand on Sam,
 
 350 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Mrs. Courtier, and the Bishop, though Lise helped 
 him ably in the latter case, and he gave the three 
 girls on his premises (for, of course, Addy counted) 
 entertainment, food, flirtation behind the Bishop's 
 back, and a very nice time. Nobody, in short, could 
 have complained of him seriously: which really, in 
 the Sunday afternoon atmosphereiof Holmer, steeped 
 and re-steeped in varnish of all sorts, was creditable. 
 Iveagh reckoned it up himself as "about right" 
 when Lise, with all her pretty remembered airs and 
 gestures, took to the piano-stool finally: and when 
 his mother, of all miraculous symptoms of serenity 
 and slackness, went to sleep. 
 
 About when the light failed, Iveagh came in from 
 the stable, where he had been "tucking up" Emer, 
 and returned to Wickford's study, whence he had 
 issued primed to represent him, in the first hours 
 of the day. He broke in carelessly in his manner, 
 and finding a nice fire, things were apt to be very 
 complete and tasteful in his quarters premises to- 
 wards the dinner hour, he collapsed into the chair 
 alongside, and lay pensive, reviewing his feat of 
 arms. 
 
 "Got a minute*?" said the lordly author: it being 
 obvious by Iveagh's attitude that he had several. 
 
 "No," said Iveagh, suspecting figures: however,
 
 THE WORST OVER 351 
 
 he soon held out his hand. On and off he had 
 helped a good deal in that book's compilation. It 
 was particularly uninteresting, to any but the eco- 
 nomical expert, but Wickford loved it. Iveagh al- 
 lowed for his love, though his own book, one of these 
 days, was going to be a better thing. Nor would 
 he slave Wick to do sums for him, when he was 
 sleepy after stable-work, no chance! For the 
 time, being wanted, he gave the statistical pages his 
 attention, and checked results with a beautifully 
 sharpened pencil, handed him by Wick. 
 
 "Did you get through, out there, without scrap- 
 pin'?" his Grace asked presently. 
 
 "We did," said Iveagh. "She played." 
 
 "She" was Lise, naturally: no one else played. 
 That she had done so was good hearing, to Wick- 
 ford, for she did not always consent. It needed the 
 mood : but he supposed the mood of imminent part- 
 ing from Hatchways was favourable. When Iveagh 
 said "played," he meant playing. That was a 
 thing that passed time and saved tempers as well, 
 real "playing" from Lise. 
 
 "It was kind of her," said Wickford gravely. 
 "Did she not sing?" 
 
 His brother shook his head. At the end of the 
 column he remarked
 
 352 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "She says that's gone to glory, nowadays. She 
 says she keeps her singin' for Mark." 
 
 Wickf ord whistled, leaning back. "She ought not," 
 he observed, "to say things like that in public." 
 
 "It's nothin' to Mother," said Iveagh, dreamily, 
 "if Mark has the ear of an elephant. Granted a 
 good moustache on the man, it's nothin' to her." 
 
 An interlude of respective industry ensued. 
 Iveagh, on the whole, was the more industrious. 
 Wickford began to prefer talking. The Duke had 
 had a prolonged period of unusual quietness that 
 day, of real privacy such as was his right, so he had 
 been missing Iveagh's interruption, for some time 
 before it came. Iveagh was always interrupting 
 others, being lawless. He spent his life in it. One 
 side of Wickford liked peace, respect, and stateli- 
 ness: the other enjoyed Iveagh and variety. 
 
 His inviting attitude had no effect on " the kid," 
 who was now pencilling things all about the place, 
 on the back of one of Wickford's magazines. He 
 liked playing with figures, by nature : only he looked 
 weary and pallid still, and it occurred to Wick that 
 such games, though useful, are trying to the brain. 
 
 "Did you see the girls home*?" he asked: meaning 
 the two Elizabeths, bound for Hatchways. 
 
 "I did not," said Iveagh, after the usual interval.
 
 THE WORST OVER 353 
 
 He added, as he noted a total "To mention." 
 
 "Till where did you take them 1 ?" said Wickford, 
 letting his language go. After all, he had been com- 
 posing excellent sentences for hours. 
 
 "To the trees," said Iveagh. "After that, they 
 did not need my squiring and they let me know it." 
 
 "Indeed," said Wickford, curious. "What did 
 she say?" 
 
 "She said they wished to talk of me, which they're 
 welcome," said Iveagh, occupied. 
 
 No question again which that "she" was. Wick- 
 ford smiled. Iveagh in the chair was smiling also, 
 or nearly; he did not quite set it free. 
 
 "That little beggar, she says the first thing," 
 murmured the Duke, digesting by degrees his enter- 
 tainment. 
 
 "Mark'll have suffered from that," said Iveagh: 
 and then yawned, and covered his eyes with his 
 hand. "Tschah, that's wrong, oh, the devil's in 
 it," was his next remark. 
 
 Wickford got up, with decision. "Drop it, 
 kiddy," he said briefly, in his English tone, and ex- 
 tended a hand. 
 
 "What for?" said Iveagh, hanging on to the pa- 
 pers. 
 
 "What for you like, I want my property."
 
 354 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Let you sit down," advised Iveagh pleasantly, 
 and corrected three of the figures on the page. 
 
 "What did the other girl say when you left 
 them 1 ?" said Wickford a little later, when he had 
 sat down as directed, and shortly after, got all his 
 papers back. He managed Iveagh, or the other 
 way, whichever it was, like that. One yielded to 
 win, with him, invariably, having been careful first 
 to define a clear position. It was not hard, as Sir 
 George said, especially to another Suir nature. 
 Wickford learnt how to do the trick with his hand- 
 ful of a brother before he was twelve: his mother 
 had never learnt yet, at fifty. 
 
 "I forget," Iveagh answered his question, with 
 obvious untruth. He looked at Wickford's beauti- 
 ful pencil, which he then stored away in his pocket. 
 "She said," he observed slowly, "that I had better 
 rest." 
 
 "Rest?' 
 
 "It was the word. I thought it strange of the 
 girl." 
 
 "You having walked to Hatchways and back 
 once during the day," said Wickford, in rapid satire. 
 
 "She knows nothing of my doings, how would 
 she*?" said Iveagh. "I've been for an hour at the 
 horses since then."
 
 THE WORST OVER 355 
 
 "She might have guessed, whatever it was, you 
 wouldn't do it for the asking," said Wickford. 
 
 Iveagh agreed with him, settling into a book. 
 Ten minutes later the Duke, glancing that way, dis- 
 covered him fast asleep in his chair, one of the fine 
 nervous hands he wasted on groom's work commonly, 
 across his face. 
 
 "The worst's over," thought the wise brother, and 
 sat a little, debating of the difficult years past, just 
 closing as he trusted, before he went to dress. 
 Wickford had many feelings during those moments, 
 common relief at responsibility removed being 
 merely one. But beyond that single phrase we 
 quote he made no further effort to express them, 
 so why need we? 
 
 Lise left next day, finishing her visit beautifully 
 as she began it: taking it quietly rather, for she was 
 sorry to go. M. du Frettay kissed her hand in the 
 hall, and she clung to Ernestine as far as the larches : 
 but the Suir boys alone "squired" her to the station, 
 and saw her off with all honour from the ash-strewn 
 platform their mother had instituted, in the great 
 days when Holmer was first made. To be seen off 
 by a peer of the realm and his brother is not, of 
 course, a very common event in life: but Lise for-
 
 350 HATCHWAYS 
 
 got about it. She only remembered Wick and 
 Iveagh belonged to her old life, to her own people, 
 and that they were both very nice. 
 
 "Good-bye," said Wick and Iveagh politely, since 
 every human being in the station bounds had a lin- 
 gering eye fastened upon them, or rather upon Lise. 
 
 "Good-bye, ye nice people," said Mrs. Elphin- 
 stone, longing to kiss them both: only such natural 
 impulses of our being must, in certain circumstances, 
 be restrained. 
 
 "Won't you give us a keepsake 1 ?" said Wickford 
 with pathos, hanging on the train. 
 
 "There's a shamrock," said Lise condescendingly, 
 taking an extremely dead bit of clover out of the 
 breast of her coat. It might have been hay by the 
 look of it. "Don't give it the animals to eat," en- 
 couraged Lise. "Keep it yourselves. You can di- 
 vide it." 
 
 "Which of us'll divide it 1 ?" said Iveagh, fixing 
 her with his sad eyes. 
 
 "You," across Wickford, very soft. 
 
 "Lise," began the Duke, nobly protesting, as 
 Iveagh, without the smallest hesitation, pocketed the 
 whole of the hay. 
 
 "There's no time for it," urged Lise, leaning 
 down from the train with an arm on Wickford,
 
 THE WORST OVER 357 
 
 holding him close, to the scandal of the porters. 
 "Let him, it's like Esau. He'll always dispute 
 your heritage with you, and be snatching things, and 
 tearing things, and bother your life out, and not 
 be worth the trouble you've taken for him in the 
 end. You're the best of the two, Wick, and I tell 
 you so " 
 
 "But he'll be first in the story," said Wickford, 
 with a little smile. 
 
 "Oh, I don't know," gasped Lise. "He got in 
 front, somehow. It's a way they have, me dear. 
 It can't be helped." 
 
 Then she went, crying, though she did not mean 
 Iveagh to see it. He was not worth crying for, 
 either of them, and she was going very soon to 
 Mark. Yet they were her own people, brothers in 
 tears and laughter, and, even had one of them 
 never worshipped her, and kissed her shoe in the 
 garden, that is much. It is well behind the great 
 passions of life, the purple patches, the high hero- 
 isms, such as Mark's plunge in the Indian torrent; 
 but it is the warm corner, to which Irish hearts at 
 least cling very fondly. 
 
 So Lise cried for Iveagh, most of the way to Lon- 
 don, though she loved Mark.
 
 XX 
 
 IMPLICATION OF ELEVEN INFANTS 
 
 ABOUT the surprising incident at the infant-school 
 picnic we find no note whatever in M. du Frettay's 
 journal, which, attentively adapted, has been of 
 such service to us hitherto. He simply leaves it out, 
 as though such little things occurred daily, in the 
 strange country he was visiting. Whether it was 
 that he felt himself out of it, as regarded the cen- 
 tral occurrence, which was quite the most thrilling 
 thing that ever happened at Holmer; or whether it 
 was that the thing itself was too outre for his nice 
 French taste, we cannot say. There is, as now pub- 
 lished, a general tone of easy cynicism about his 
 English notes, to which the incident is ill-adapted. 
 It approached a "trick effect," which of all things, 
 in clothes, conversation, life and manners, the du 
 Frettay standard of elegance abhorred. The Ox- 
 boroughs thought people from Paris passed their 
 
 358
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 359 
 
 lives in making trick effects, though they admitted 
 this particular young Parisian's clothes were decent; 
 so they would be equally astonished at our theory 
 and his view. But we only advance it modestly; 
 for it is quite possible a fresh and unexpected flash 
 of cynicism from M. du Frettay, by post after pub- 
 lication, would explode it quite. He might, for in- 
 stance, say he left the incident expressly for Miss 
 All good's interpretation and commentary, since she, 
 as Certificated Nature Student, and exponent of 
 Prussian methods by violence, was better qualified. 
 We should be bound, however, to reply to M. du 
 Frettay, that Sir George took the matter seriously: 
 and he, in the sort of case, was the best qualified Na- 
 ture Student of all. Sir George considered that, 
 even if the picnic in general had not been in danger, 
 that April day, a small wandering item of the picnic, 
 one of Renie's and Lise's beloved "babies," might 
 have been. Shocking danger, almost too bad, in 
 the precincts of England, and neighbourhood of 
 Hatchways, to be believed. This was the point in 
 the day's doings that stirred the women-folk so 
 deeply: and which brought the Duchess and Mrs. 
 Redgate, with slightly different points of view but 
 just the same anxiety, back into the ways of under- 
 standing again.
 
 360 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Sir George heard the news that the creature had 
 escaped, on arriving at Reading platform, where, 
 since he took the unclassical train to town, he had 
 to change. He might have heard it before, of 
 course, had anyone at Holmer read the papers; but 
 the Duchess, when she had things and people, only 
 skimmed it: and Wickford though he read atten- 
 tively, read the wrong part. At first Sir George 
 was indifferent: until some station official told him 
 that the "tiger," everyone from first to last called 
 it a tiger, though it was a young leopard, merely, 
 had been tracked by the circus-manager among the 
 farms in the Harkfield direction. It had killed a 
 goat. 
 
 Sir George, at this, stood still on his two feet a 
 moment, and then walked to the bookstall and 
 bought a map. Harkfield he knew as the residence, 
 more or less, of Canon Oxborough, the youngest and 
 liveliest of Gertrude's three brothers, but he could 
 not recollect its situation. He found it ten miles 
 away from Holmer north; and the Belvedere he re- 
 membered (having a geographical mind) was to the 
 north of Holmer. 
 
 Folding up the map, which he stowed away for 
 future reference, Sir George therewith determined 
 three things: to miss his train to London: to wire
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 361 
 
 both ways, to Wickford and the friend in town who 
 was expecting him: and to go and see the circus 
 manager. The reason of these decisions was double : 
 first, that Sir George was fond of children, and sec- 
 ond, that he had never happened to meet a tiger 
 face to face. His visiting list was limited to lions, 
 elephants, bears, and a panther or two. A tiger, if 
 it was one, even born in a cage, struck Sir George 
 as just worth looking up. 
 
 Even thus he proceeded. He wired to Wickford 
 "Circus big cat escaped chances dangerous return- 
 ing Trenchard." He wired to his friend Ashwin in 
 Harley Street "Tiger hunt here will try evening 
 George" : a form of words which (being exactly like 
 him) infuriated a busy doctor, and upset the economy 
 of a careful house. Then, having thus simply re- 
 lieved his mind of his social responsibilities, Sir 
 George stepped off with his light stalking tread to 
 interview the circus manager on the outskirts of the 
 town. 
 
 The manager was having a bad time between the 
 police and the reporters, and having lost valuable 
 property into the bargain, was able to turn in no 
 new direction without swearing. He swore at Sir 
 George, not knowing his name at first, nor caring 
 when he knew it: and he had good reason before
 
 362 HATCHWAYS 
 
 he had done with him. The interview, since Sir 
 George wanted that tiger as much as the manager, 
 was of a peculiar nature. First Sir George, in busi- 
 ness terms, with a card and references, betrayed his 
 interest. Were they looking for the beast 4 ? Of 
 course they were, two of his men were at Hark- 
 field. Might he take a hand, just on his own, 
 gratuitously? The manager supposed so, if he 
 thought himself good for anything. How old was 
 the creature? Seventeen months. Born in captiv- 
 ity? Yes. Healthy? Yes, confound it. Tame? 
 No, plague take it. Vicious? Not exactly, it de- 
 pended, tricky, like all its beastly kind. Ever at- 
 tacked anybody? Once, it had. Why? The man- 
 ager dodged the question. Why called a tiger on 
 the circus bills? Because it performed, or was sup- 
 posed to. Performing tigers more stylish than per- 
 forming leopards, any fool could see. Besides there 
 had once been a tiger, of sorts, now the lot were 
 rather mixed. Might the visitor look at the mixed 
 lot, some time? O' course, if he paid his place. 
 Might he not, say by paying two places, have a 
 private interview? The man dared say, with a sus- 
 picious glance, he could. (He began to take him 
 for an inspector, disguised, at this point.) How 
 did they hope to take the truant? Lord knew, in
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 363 
 
 a net, if asleep. If not, he supposed, cripple and 
 cure it later. Horrid waste of cash. Cursed swin- 
 dle. Somebody was a fool. 
 
 Sir George then went off "on his own," with the 
 remark at parting that should he see the beast, 
 chances were he should shoot it. He did not cot- 
 ton to hunting with fishing-nets, at his time of life. 
 
 "Then you'll pay for it," said the manager. 
 
 "Right," said Sir George, "but I keep the skin. 
 Is it in decent condition*?" 
 
 The man, now finally convinced of his identity 
 as an agent of a certain detested Society, burst into 
 profanity, and the interview at Reading closed. 
 
 Next arose the bitter question of fire-arms. Sir 
 George's own trusted weapons were in town, most of 
 them being seen to. Wickford, of course, had the 
 British sportsman's kit. On the other hand, given 
 Harkfield as the centre, Holmer was out of the way. 
 Harkfield was easier to reach from Reading, too, 
 trains stopped there more constantly; and the Canon 
 Lionel Oxborough (being more Oxborough than 
 Canon) owned both a revolver and a gun. Thus, 
 having warned Gertrude's family of the peril, which 
 might be none at all, Sir George settled to make for 
 Harkfield and Lionel direct, by the immediate train. 
 
 We pass in this rapid review of the day's ex-
 
 364s HATCHWAYS 
 
 perts to Miss Ryeborn. The hunter was prom- 
 inent and interesting on the occasion, doubtless, but 
 there was a more prominent and interesting figure 
 still; and for any really sympathetic light on the 
 movements and aims of that four-legged figure, the 
 world had ultimately to go to Bess. True, Bess did 
 not know about leopards so fully as Sir George, but 
 she knew, in really intimate and all-round fashion, 
 about the leopard's little kinsfolk, cats. A leopard 
 bred in captivity is little other than a cat. The fe- 
 line race, speaking broadly, were darlings, to Bess: 
 and this biggish cat remained a darling, in spite of 
 all, whenever referred to afterwards in really con- 
 fidential talk. She took the greatest pains, later, 
 out of sheer love, to follow its programme, during 
 its day and a half of unfamiliar freedom: the rea- 
 sons for its movements, and the excuses for its crimes. 
 She explained it to the farmer whose stock had suf- 
 fered ; she would gladly have explained it to Renie's 
 children who, led by Renie and the Duchess, in- 
 clined to think it a horrible ogrish beast. She pas- 
 sionately longed, for the sake of the other mixed 
 cats still in his power, to explain it to the circus- 
 manager; though, for this particular spotted cat, 
 such interpretation would have come too late. 
 
 Nor were any of these people really interested.
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 366 
 
 Long after, in the presence of various open-mouthed 
 Oxboroughs, Bess ran through the leopard's pro- 
 gramme, and the whole of the picnic-day incident, 
 from his sole point of view. She was asked to do 
 so, for the benefit of Sir George and another jungle 
 expert, who, vastly admiring such accurate informa- 
 tion and imaginative sympathy, dwelt on every word. 
 
 We shall take occasion to wander into Bess's do- 
 minion later, nor will there be any doubt when we 
 do so, it differs in kind so greatly from Nature 
 Study according either to Froebel, du Frettay, or 
 Sir George. The psychological study of beasts is 
 still a science in infancy, but it progresses. A whole 
 mass of accurate and loving information will be at 
 the service of its first exponents, so soon as the sci- 
 ence is allowed to take its place. England, owing 
 to her collector-students, her sportsmen, and spinster 
 ladies, may well be foremost among the countries 
 that contribute; and it will be a legitimate feather 
 in her cap, if she so should be. 
 
 We come on (and it is time) to Miss Allgood. 
 Irene has only been treated by allusion and innuendo 
 so far in this history, which is extremely unfair to 
 an excellent little "sort of girl." Irene had no voice 
 that day, in the physical sense, but she had lots of 
 voice in the moral. She showed the courage of a
 
 366 HATCHWAYS 
 
 little lion, and she kept her frightened flock in hand. 
 Mrs. Redgate had no trouble with her, when the 
 moment came to break the news of the creature's 
 probable proximity. She whitened, for she feared 
 wild beasts, when not in the tale of Red Riding- 
 hood, or outlined on Kindergarten cards. Even 
 cats she did not love, though she took picked infants 
 to see Miss Ryeborn's "dear pussies" occasionally. 
 She was a shocking little pedant, as Gabriel and 
 Rick had long since agreed; but she was essentially 
 valiant and self- forgetting, as are most of our won- 
 derful little army of mothering-teachers : and she sat 
 in the Duchess's broken shed, telling stories with her 
 thread of a voice, while men, guns, and an unknown 
 terror were circling beyond her, as women have 
 done to stay panic on ship-board, when secretly 
 warned the ship was going down. 
 
 So du Frettay noted, correcting several of his easy 
 impressions about her, as, armed with a stick alone, 
 he guarded the wide entrance to the children's re- 
 treat. And thereafter, when he met Renie tripping 
 nose in air about the village, he swept his hat off 
 with the same agreeable excessiveness he had used, 
 in the Holmer roadway, to lovely Lise. Courage 
 and self- forgetting are not all one requires, certainly, 
 of a woman, but they were much, in du Frettay's
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 367 
 
 view; and when a girl is ill with laryngitis, hard- 
 ened by the daily posture of infallibility, and badly 
 spoiled by a Duchess into the bargain, one appre- 
 ciates the appearance of those high qualities in a 
 crisis all the more. 
 
 We pass to at least we glance at Rick, the 
 Times critic, whose courage failed. We would not 
 for a moment be taken as asserting that courage, 
 even in a man, is everything, nor that critics, as 
 such, fail in it, nothing in life admits of such arbi- 
 trary standards. Also, Rick had the excuse of 
 vagueness, or very inexact information as to the crea- 
 ture's whereabouts. He was vague altogether, 
 thinking out an article, when, on his way back from 
 his wife's woodland lunch, he met the keeper. Ti- 
 gers, he agreed with du Frettay, were rather ridicu- 
 lous, and it sounded uncommonly like a cock-and- 
 bull story of the keeper's boy, as told to him. Rick 
 also knew there were no less than four able-bodied 
 young men more or less in reach of that picnic party, 
 and neglected (being no sportsman) the little fact 
 that they might have but one gun, and that not of 
 the best, between them. That he might be of in- 
 estimable service, then and there, by fetching an- 
 other gun, was far from Mr. Redgate's thoughts at 
 the moment; nor could it enter his wise head that,
 
 368 HATCHWAYS 
 
 failing him, his wife would have to do it; managing 
 all those boys of hers to let her, since, in the nature 
 of things, no man of them could be spared from 
 the children's guard. 
 
 All these, the mere spiritual necessities of the case, 
 given those men and women, did not reach Rick's 
 mind; being perhaps more used to dealing with art, 
 the reflection of life, than the spiritual facts of life 
 itself. Personally he knew, with his bad sight, with 
 gun or stick either, he would be good for naught: 
 and, since the keeper with a loaded gun was going 
 on to warn them, Rick went home. That is all that 
 happened, simply. He was very glad to see du Fret- 
 tay and Nesta safe home again at tea-time, espe- 
 cially as he wanted his tea, and he never discovered 
 Nesta had known he met the keeper. She would not 
 have thought of pressing such a point, when he had 
 been so sensible, and done what she expected, in 
 getting home as fast as possible. That is all about 
 Rick. 
 
 Having thus given away the plot, we proceed to 
 the drama of the day, which was very commonplace 
 drama, much like all other picnics to start with, and 
 never getting to more than rather broad and absurd, 
 and perhaps rather strained drama at the worst. It 
 started with fire-building and fun for the children,
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 369 
 
 and proceeded to food, of course. Later in the day, 
 everyone was to be serious. Nature Study, not to 
 say a demonstration in front of the gentlemen, was 
 lurking among Miss Allgood's intentions, a serious 
 consultation with Mrs. Redgate on the subject of 
 Adelaide was at the back of Sam's mind: art, as 
 usual, occupied the entire outlook of Bess. Or, if 
 not the entire outlook well, there was not much, 
 that day, to be expected anywhere else. 
 
 Iveagh, from his first appearance, dissociated him- 
 self markedly. There were really too many kids 
 about for him to care to take a hand. Even the 
 food, which so firmly attached Mr. Coverack to that 
 picnic's fate, hardly seemed to do for him. His 
 ideas were otherwise absorbed, and his eyes as so 
 often out-of-doors seemed to be made for some 
 other purpose than that of looking at people. He 
 just dropped down one or two things his mother had 
 sent, without comment or message, in the picnic's 
 midst, and stood a moment, taking things in with 
 his sniffing expression, more as overseer, it seemed, 
 than as guest, or host. Granted he found things 
 about right in this part of his brother's estate, his 
 expression said, he was going on again, shortly. 
 
 "Glory, what a smoke," was his only remark, 
 which was, indeed, inevitable.
 
 370 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Oh, Rick, really /" said Ernestine. "Bess!" 
 
 Rick was engaged in making the fire, well, as 
 he considered. It was true the fire "ran to smoke," 
 but then, he explained to du Frettay across his shoul- 
 der, out-door fires always did. He had excellent 
 material, lots of it, which the children had collected : 
 he even had a basket grate in the shelter of the 
 broken-down shed. He watched the fire running to 
 smoke with great complacency, and expended count- 
 less matches, which strewed the ground. 
 
 At this point came Bess, despatched by Ernestine, 
 and fell upon the malefactor. 
 
 "Look," said Bess, falling on her knees, "at that 
 nice little flame, all wasted! What's the point of 
 a flame like that, unless it's doing something?" She 
 fed it carefully with four small sticks. "And look 
 at the way he's choked the poor thing up " She 
 abstracted tight balls of paper. "And fancy clap- 
 ping the most indigestible great things down 
 first, Renie! Why Iveagh would have known 
 better!" 
 
 Iveagh believed, with indifference, he'd have let 
 the air under. 
 
 "Of course you would, science ! There " said 
 Bess to the fire, soothingly. "You have to look well 
 forward. You mustn't discourage any hopeful
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 371 
 
 sign. You must give it first what it likes, of course, 
 only " 
 
 "With an eye to the event," said her uncle, ob- 
 serving her. "I say, strikes me this is education, 
 rather than science. What do you say, Miss All- 
 good?' 
 
 Miss Allgood, sitting on the wood-pile in the for- 
 est clearing, smiled demurely. She could have done 
 the fire, of course, if wanted : only now it seemed to 
 be getting on. Getting things on was most of Miss 
 Allgood's business. What she undertook in that 
 way came off, generally: her "seed-leaves" turned to 
 radishes, and her tadpoles turned to frogs. Her 
 children turned to men and women, too, eventually, 
 only they did not interest her greatly beyond the 
 age-limit, eight years old. Very, excessively com- 
 plicated or irregular things did not interest Irene, 
 she preferred them compact. She herself was com- 
 pact, as she sat upon a log, hands folded; Iveagh, 
 when his eyes passed over her, thought so: and so, 
 in Adelaide's absence, did Sam. But they were both 
 a trifle shy of her; for, though dainty and pleasant 
 to the eye, she was given to "crushing" her unpro- 
 fessional surroundings in daily life. 
 
 After dinner, dinner it was, with pies, and roast 
 potatoes charmingly charred in a wood fire, the best
 
 372 HATCHWAYS 
 
 there are, serious purpose, such as the Duchess most 
 approved, descended on the company. Bess, who 
 had been playing with the infants, took up her ma- 
 terials, and went away towards the view to sketch. 
 Rick, having smoked a pipe with the young fellows, 
 set out homewards, Nature Study was not his line. 
 Sam went a stroll with Mrs. Redgate, retained be- 
 forehand. Irene "took" the children, she always 
 "took" both persons and subjects, within hearing 
 of M. du Frettay, who, being from France, would 
 be safe to be impressed. Child Study, in the high- 
 est sense, is unknown in France, Nature Study also. 
 She classified the "specimens" the infants brought 
 her, calling each woodland thing in turn by its Latin 
 name. 
 
 "Is she right?" signalled Gabriel once sidelong, 
 hoping to stir criticism: but Iveagh was not crit- 
 ically inclined. He was not even attending much, 
 he was restless. 
 
 "I'm goin'," he observed to his surroundings. 
 "Right," said Gabriel, "if you can't be pleasant." 
 "Mother's makin' a glass house," remarked Iveagh, 
 still to nobody in particular. 
 
 "What, to be enabled to cast more stones'?" 
 "No, to stick things in. Tricky little things, 
 tropical. I got her one or two."
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 373 
 
 "You imply the Duchess requires your friendly 
 assistance? That you ought to be at her right 
 hand?" 
 
 Iveagh sniffed. "I gave her hope, some time." 
 He added, after a pause "She had the look of 
 needin' me, at breakfast." 
 
 "Never !" Gabriel glanced, amused. "What do 
 you want, you oddity?" he thought. 
 
 "I suppose you'll be all right here," said Iveagh, 
 lifting an eyebrow at the picnic scene. 
 
 "I? or the company? I think, do you know, 
 with my hostess's help, we shall manage to get 
 through." 
 
 "He'll be along himself, with luck," murmured 
 Iveagh. 
 
 It was, Gabriel began to see, a clash between 
 tribal duty to Mrs. Redgate on Holmer land, and his 
 own more sylvan, savage mood. Receiving Mrs. 
 Redgate out of doors was something of a puzzle, to 
 Iveagh's instincts. Himself, i.e. Wickford, a tamer 
 character in training of the English Court, might be 
 able to manage it. Gabriel, so interpreting, volun- 
 teered a solution. 
 
 "I will tell her," he said, "that you are at her 
 service, if required. Will that do?" 
 
 It did: Iveagh went, at once. Probably not to
 
 374 HATCHWAYS 
 
 the glass house, but du Frettay did not enquire into 
 it. He smoked in the thin shade of the April trees, 
 thinking about him, till the keeper came. 
 
 ii 
 
 "Is Mrs. Redgate here, sir?" said the keeper, look- 
 ing upon the group of children with a dubious eye. 
 
 "Just beyond there," said du Frettay. He lazily 
 watched the interview of the keeper and Ernestine 
 returning, for Sam had gone on his way. He saw 
 her stand, for an instant, very still: but then, she 
 often did that. Still lazy, skimming surfaces only, 
 he looked at her capable form, easeful carriage, and 
 hatless head with the pleasure she never failed to 
 awaken in him. Her cordial face made one with 
 the rest, as a rule, but for the moment, he could not 
 see her face. He noted, though, that beside the 
 keeper, a splendidly tall man, she looked tall no 
 longer. Such was England. 
 
 "It's killed a goat, 'm," was the keeper's informa- 
 tion, the end of it. "Mauled it something hor- 
 rible. And if my boy's right, it was seen close here 
 this morning." 
 
 Close here in the safe precincts of an English 
 wood and killed a goat. . . . Mauled it, muti- 
 lated. . . . She turned and looked upon the group
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 375 
 
 of children, her eye counting them up. Eleven, that 
 was right, but Bess 
 
 "Which direction was it seen in*?" 
 
 "Up by the Belvedere, 'm." Oh, Bess! 
 
 "Did you see Mr. Redgate?" 
 
 "Yes'm, just mentioned it. Hadn't much 
 time." 
 
 "Have you told the Duke?" 
 
 "No'm. I thought his Grace was hereabouts." 
 
 "He's at the house, I think." It was two to three 
 miles back to Holmer. 
 
 "Better get 'em into the shed," said the keeper, an 
 eye shifting to the Nature Study party. 
 
 "Yes, poor dears." Ernestine had time to think 
 that it spoilt their happy day. 
 
 "I sent my boy back to Holmer," said the keeper. 
 "But Mr. Warrener's is nearer here. Or Mr. Mar- 
 chant's." 
 
 "Has Mr. Marchant fire-arms?' 
 
 "Not likely, 'm. Mr. Warrener would have 
 shotguns, same as this is. Better'n nothing. Shall 
 I get on there " 
 
 "I'll go," said Mrs. Redgate. "You must stay 
 here, please, till the Duke comes. Irene, dear, M. 
 du Frettay!" 
 
 Gabriel was on his feet. He had never been sum-
 
 376 HATCHWAYS 
 
 moned in that clear tone before: it was something, 
 he was then certain. The next instant Wickford 
 himself, unarmed, having of course missed the mes- 
 senger, walked tranquilly upon the scene. 
 
 "I thought I'd look you up " he was begin- 
 ning, host, like Iveagh. He had not been able, quite, 
 to keep away. Being busy that day he had, on a 
 sudden impulse, put his lunch in his pocket, and 
 done the three miles easy, as a midday walk. 
 
 "Oh, Wick, just listen " said Ernestine. 
 
 He joined the group, and they all listened to the 
 story of the keeper's son, which Rick had heard 
 previously : the skulking yellow thing that had been 
 seen in the covert, not two hours since, fresh from a 
 farm-yard crime. 
 
 "Good Lord!" said Wickford. "I say, this'll 
 be rather a jar, for Trenchard." 
 
 He looked at du Frettay, smiling, and received, in 
 response, a smile. Really, for grown men who were 
 not existing either in a jungle, or a fairy-tale, the 
 thing seemed a little wild. A tiger, in England! 
 
 "It's mauled a goat," mentioned the keeper. 
 
 Gravity on all faces, at once: and glances at the 
 children. Even the most ignorant of us, brought up 
 on romances, know the difference to original ferocity 
 made by the taste of blood. Irene's eleven children
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 377 
 
 would have repeated it pat, if applied to. Not 
 likely, though, anyone would ask them. No, 
 Wickford turned grave. 
 
 "I seen the goat " began the man, with the usual 
 relish. 
 
 "Drop it," said Wickford, seeing poor Irene's 
 whitening face. Not even well, the girl, it was 
 beastly hard lines on her. Nor could she be in any 
 way spared, as it happened. 
 
 "Could you tell them about their flowers in the 
 shed 4 ?" suggested Ernestine. The little school- 
 marm went, in silence. 
 
 "I'm going in because of my throat," they heard 
 her murmur, in her professionally encouraging tone. 
 "Who's coming?' 
 
 All came, chattering and tumbling. The chil- 
 dren out of sight, the remaining group of four felt 
 better. "Who's missing, else?' said Wickford 
 curtly. 
 
 "Bess." 
 
 "Painting*?" She indicated the direction. 
 "Where's the lad?' 
 
 "Iveagh went home, I think," said du Frettay. 
 
 "Dash!" said Wickford, and the keeper knew 
 why. Iveagh was much the best shot. 
 
 "Give us that gun, you," said the Duke, taking it,
 
 378 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "and get along all you know to Warrener's, keepin' 
 the paths, and goin' quietly " 
 
 "No," said Mrs. Redgate. "I'm going, I told 
 him. You are all wanted here." 
 
 Then came the battle, foregone, though, in its 
 conclusion. "You ought to ha' seen Mrs. Redgate 
 take charge of his Grace," the keeper grinned to an 
 audience later, but it was the fact. Habit is 
 everything, in a crisis. Wickford had been a 
 schoolboy when he had known her first, always, 
 though so little older, in the character of his moth- 
 er's friend. He was far from weak, yet it was odd 
 how, almost from the first, his look strayed towards 
 Gabriel, the stranger and foreigner, appealing. 
 But Gabriel himself grew helpless when he really 
 met her eyes. It struck him he had hardly known 
 her eyes' colour before, they were blue-grey, greyer 
 than Bess's. Ernestine was in uniform now, most 
 visibly. She was armed too, at once, with a stick 
 from the forest pile. 
 
 'Til take that," she said, "but it's most unlikely 
 the animal would attack, if one goes quietly. 
 That's Bess's best chance too, she will be sitting 
 still. Cat-things are shy, and it has been used to 
 man all its life, it's not as if we were in India " 
 
 "But it's mauled a goat," said Wickford's and
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 379 
 
 Gabriel's eyes, though their tongues did not say it. 
 
 "I'm as strong as lots of men. Go and find Bess, 
 Wick dear, if you want to help me " 
 
 "Madame," the young Frenchman broke out, "I 
 cannot have it! Can you not see*? Failing your 
 husband " 
 
 Failing him, yes, for she would have obeyed 
 Rick : they all knew that. She turned back, having 
 started, to face him. 
 
 "I leave you my children, M. du Frettay," she 
 said. "Mine, if you please, not Renie's. I brought 
 them out. If one is missing, when I come back, 
 even the littlest, Peter " 
 
 Her eyes were alight, but her mouth was dimpling, 
 actually. Ernestine was not especially Manchester, 
 at that moment. Or perhaps she was. Such dog- 
 gedness, in the spirit of those Northern towns, 
 such abominable independence of judgment, in crit- 
 ical times! 
 
 "Bon j'y renonce," said M. du Frettay to every- 
 body. "Je m'en charge, Madame, de la famille, 
 et de Peter surtout." 
 
 He went away with the keeper to find sticks. 
 
 "Take the rope, I say," said du Frettay, just as 
 Wickford was leaving in turn. The rope of the big
 
 380 HATCHWAYS 
 
 picnic-hamper, slip-knotted, lay on the ground. Its 
 long coil suggested a lasso, to a hunter's eye. 
 
 "What the deuce for?" said Wickford, whose 
 ideas of the chase resembled Sir George's. Ropes 
 and nets did not enter into it. However, when du 
 Frettay reminded him of an owner in the back- 
 ground, and the truant's probable value, he took it 
 up, though his appearance protested. He really had 
 no notion of using it, though a rope added vaguely 
 to his resources, in the singular affray. Wickford 
 was not frightened, but the concurrence irked his 
 nerves, rubbed him up, in the Oxborough phrase, 
 because is was strange. He liked things regular, 
 the good day's shooting, to him was the classical day. 
 On horse-back, thanks to the Irish inspiration, he 
 lost himself a little: whispers from the other-world 
 of the romantic reached him, and could, in the proper 
 setting of turf and bogland, send him off his head. 
 But not often, and not at Holmer : here, at least, he 
 preferred to have things governed, fairly straight. 
 
 "Shall I come, your Grace," said the keeper, in 
 the low henchman's tone. It meant that, as a 
 unique object, not easily matched, the Duke's person 
 was to be protected. Wickford shied at once. 
 
 "WTiy should you*?" he said snubbingly. "Stay 
 where you are, and look out. If the people come,"
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 381 
 
 he added to du Frettay, "stick them round the wood. 
 It's probably taken to cover, after that feed. I only 
 hope the light will hold." 
 
 He glanced upward; then, with a last look round 
 upon the broken shed, with its faintly steaming fire, 
 doorless entrance, and precious contents, he went. 
 Wickford could not get the scene into focus, some- 
 how: it had all come on him too unexpectedly. 
 Here, on Victorian Holmer land, in reach of the 
 Shrubbery and the Prospect, close to the Belve- 
 dere! A tiger-hunt! No, it did not do. Picture 
 his mother's face, hearing of it! Imagine his Uncle 
 Oliver! As he proceeded, the Duke's mouth gave 
 its little twitch, sardonical. 
 
 From the moment that he heard his brother's 
 whistle, in the thicket off to the left of the path, 
 which spread up the swelling hillside the Belvedere 
 dominated, he found things begin to slip into their 
 places and proportions again. Nothing the world 
 held was too weird for Iveagh, anyhow. A tiger in 
 Berkshire was matter-of-course, compared with him, 
 the kind of thing he stood for, in Wickford's mind 
 and memory. No one, of course, knew Iveagh's con- 
 tents better than he did, had more reason to know. 
 If nothing else, the magnificent scene by bicycle- 
 lamplight, staged not so very far, as it happened,
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 from this spot, was always there, haunting the 
 back of the brother's consciousness, quickly recalled 
 by a look or a tone. Wickford had been lifted to 
 his level on that occasion, easily: he had surprised 
 himself, not a little. Now 
 
 Iveagh had forgotten all about the glass house, 
 and his mother's rare aspect of needing him, evi- 
 dently, long since. He was grubbing round a tree- 
 trunk for some favourite funguses, quite happy and 
 absorbed, when he was disturbed by Wick, a loaded 
 gun, a lasso-looking rope, and the unusual bit of 
 news. Or rather not disturbed, he was inter- 
 rupted. He gazed levelly, his eyes still cave-dwell- 
 ing, fungus-hunting, and unconcerned. 
 
 "Rats !" he remarked, at the tiger's name. It was 
 instinctive. 
 
 "Where's Miss Ryeborn'?" said Wickford. 
 
 "She's up beyond, there, paintin'. Said she was 
 goin' up, to get the view." Iveagh took a look round 
 at the thicket he stood in, dusting his fingers, which 
 were earthy. "I've not seen anything about," he 
 said suggestively. "Crocodiles or anything, I've 
 had lots to do." 
 
 "The brute's mauled a goat," said Wickford. 
 "Hudson had seen it, down at Finch's farm. 
 Mauled it horrid. It was marked close here."
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 383 
 
 Iveagh's eyes changed. "Who marked it*?" 
 
 "Jem Hudson, the young one. Close to the 
 path." 
 
 "Jem's a liar," said Iveagh, weighing it. "How- 
 ever just hand me those traps." 
 
 "What?" said Wickford, clutching the gun, and 
 the rope: for it was that, quite evidently, that his 
 brother's careless hand required. 
 
 "Granted it's here, and not in Jem's fat head, I'll 
 find it," elucidated Iveagh. "As for shootin', we'll 
 see to that, or rather the gun will. That one might 
 shoot a sparrow, at need." He ran a chaffing eye 
 over Wickford's equipment, and added casually 
 "I'll manage it. Let you get down to the kids." 
 
 "What's that?" gasped Wickford. "You just re- 
 peat that, ye little " 
 
 "Come on," said Iveagh patiently. He did not 
 say he was the better shot, but it was apparent. It 
 was far too apparent in his whole behaviour. "Dan- 
 gerous for Dukes," he proceeded, as Wickford's 
 deep emotion kept him silent, this was Iveagh's 
 chance, as a rule. "You might be wanted." 
 
 "Who by?" 
 
 "Oh, well, Mother." He smiled completely. 
 
 "Look out, now, playin', you'll waste a charge " 
 
 He spoke cajoling, quite charming for the instant.
 
 384 HATCHWAYS 
 
 The uncanny look shifted like a shadow, and in a 
 flash Wickford saw his father clear. A hundred 
 delightful memories sprang to light in his manner 
 and his eyes. Confident and competent, and more, 
 the whole promise of the future in that one flash 
 from the past. 
 
 "I'll not waste it, I can tell you, if you speak so 
 to me," spluttered Wickford. Was he six years 
 older than Iveagh, or was he not? 
 
 "You will," returned Iveagh, "you'll waste it 
 worse." He snapped his fingers. "Come on, the 
 girl's waitin'," he said, and his eyes moved away up 
 the path. 
 
 It was then Wickford had his idea. 
 
 "He d disarmed me," he stammered to du 
 Frettay, arriving disconsolate and discomposed. 
 "He said it was d dangerous for Dukes. He's a 
 cheeky little blackguard. I can't do with him al- 
 ways." 
 
 He sank down on the logs by the shed, hand to 
 brow, quite overcome. 
 
 "All right," said du Frettay. "You did the only 
 thing." 
 
 "Th think so?" 
 
 "Of course, very smart."
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 385 
 
 He quite understood it, the keeper did too. 
 They both looked aside till Wickford recovered. 
 He had done the only thing, the clever thing really 
 in giving way, abandoning the lead at such a critical 
 juncture, but his pride had suffered, naturally: du 
 Frettay could guess how much. The keeper, who 
 had seen shades of the same thing, often, when 
 Iveagh, with a flash of that irresistible assumption, 
 "wiped his brother's eye" in the sporting field, was 
 just as sympathetic. Neither of them noticed the 
 Duke had been knocked out, and Wickford recovered 
 tone almost immediately, and got up. 
 
 "Give us a stick," he said, and snatched one. 
 "Oh, Lord!" he whitened, "What's that?" 
 
 "Sacr r r " muttered du Frettay, with a 
 
 low thunder of French r's. A snarl, distant but un- 
 mistakable, fierce and fearsome, broke the silence on 
 the hill. Then a second long choking snarl: then 
 silence. 
 
 It was the bad moment, within the shed, and 
 without it. Wickford had vanished like a shade. 
 Gabriel before the door stood at attention, carrying 
 his stick like a sabre, his blue eyes well open, fixed 
 on the leafage at the turn of the path. No tiger was 
 to get by him alive, that was evident. The keeper, 
 a tall man (and a father), retiring, spread his arms
 
 386 HATCHWAYS 
 
 across the doorway. Neither knew the least, of 
 course, what to expect. Behind both, the children's 
 little frightened questions chirping faintly, and 
 Irene's clever laugh as she responded. 
 
 "A wild pussy, Peter. Only a poor pussy. You 
 just wait." 
 
 They all just waited, for what seemed an inter- 
 minable period. No sign of Bess, Wickford, or 
 Iveagh, who had all melted for good, as it seemed, 
 behind that screen of leaves. No cry, growl, rustle, 
 nor further sign. Then en fin! Two sharp re- 
 ports, one close after the other, relieving the cruel 
 silence. 
 
 "That's a revolver," said du Frettay, turning 
 sharply. "Who has a revolver, round here 4 ?" 
 
 "Couldn't say, sir," said the keeper, "unless it 
 should be Mr. Warrener. Not my old gun, any- 
 how, I'm sure of that." He searched the leaf- 
 scrub with a restless eye. "Hope they potted it," 
 he murmured. "No fun, sir, such things about, 
 children and all, excuse me." 
 
 "No excuse necessary," said du Frettay. "It is 
 no fun." 
 
 "If it was his lordship, I'd trust him," elucidated 
 the keeper, still searching. "But Mr. Warrener's 
 fellows potting about on our land "
 
 ELEVEN INFANTS 387 
 
 "You would not trust," supplied du Frettay. 
 "Perfectly, I apprehend you." He stayed a space 
 listening and looking, like his companion, intently. 
 "I wish the girl would show up," he said to him- 
 self. 
 
 "That's it, sir," said the keeper. "Miss Bess, 
 she's Mrs. Redgate's niece, sir " 
 
 "I am aware of it." 
 
 "I mean " 
 
 "I know what you mean. Mrs. Redgate will be 
 anxious. I am very glad," mused du Frettay, "she 
 was not here lately, to hear those sounds." 
 
 "I was thinking the same, sir, at the moment, ex- 
 cuse me " 
 
 "You require no excuse." 
 
 "No, sir, but " 
 
 "I know. It is your habit," said du Frettay with 
 sympathy. "Centuries old." He remained an- 
 other space, listening closely. "Now," he said, lift- 
 ing his alert young head, "I will tell you something, 
 with your excuses." 
 
 "Yes, sir," submitted the keeper, who had been 
 looking at him puzzled, yet appreciative. The 
 whole of the Holmer out-door staff regarded Gabriel 
 like that. He was a gentleman anyone would be 
 proud to serve, to look at him. He was even hand-
 
 388 HATCHWAYS 
 
 somer than Captain Elphinstone, as athletic, and 
 much more affable. But he said such things. 
 
 "It is my impression," said Gabriel seriously to 
 the keeper, "since those revolver-shots, that the cir- 
 cus-proprietor will be disappointed. I cannot say 
 why. There was about them, to my mind, I cannot 
 say what of reassuring. Of clean, of cocksure, 
 of chic, no, that is French." 
 
 "Yes, sir," said the keeper. 
 
 "Well, find me a word for it then! You know 
 my meaning, Lord Iveagh on horseback has it also. 
 The masterly, and masterful, sapristi! The 
 style pre-natal, which potting persons like myself 
 and you and the Warreners shall seek for ever and 
 vainly to imitate. The style intuitive, which is 
 the only existing adorable Aha, Sir George!"
 
 XXI 
 
 IT 
 
 WE move into Bess's realm, with excuses, like the 
 keeper: just at the minute when Iveagh entered it 
 also, bearing the gun. The footpath he followed 
 upward emerged upon the hill-top, and there came 
 the view, so perfectly described to du Frettay by 
 Lise. And there also, in all its solemn absurdity, 
 barring "the counties, and England, and Europe to 
 the Ural Mountains," with its clap-trap plaster 
 columns and pseudo-classical effect, stood the Belve- 
 dere. And there, on the step of the little temple, 
 had Miss Ryeborn prepared to establish herself hap- 
 pily for the after-dinner hours, since it was sunny 
 and warm. And there, since it was sunny and 
 warm, and quiet, no harrying farmers with forks 
 about, had another personage already determined 
 to be established, for a nice sleep and sun-bath, after 
 a full meal. Inverted, prolonged inordinately, 
 just like the Pickle in the flower-bed: smooth tawny 
 paws curling and spreading, sheathing and unsheath- 
 ing slightly, just like the Pickle's too: blissful, 
 
 389
 
 390 HATCHWAYS 
 
 blinking eyes, nose vibrating to an inward simmer- 
 ing, a slumber-tune, deep-seated, sometimes a 
 heave of a happy person, slipping a little further 
 into the sunshine, snake-like, oh! 
 
 "Oh!" said Bess. "Ok!" And nothing more, 
 for long. 
 
 "It" blinked at her, curious, wondering, then 
 settled again, without need of more enquiry. That 
 was all right. . . . 
 
 It thought (Bess explained later) the pillars, and 
 the shadows of the pillars! were like bars, a trifle. 
 Like enough to feel at home, with a charming differ- 
 ence, for here you could get out between. You 
 just fitted between, which pleased you. There is 
 that, in your exact fastidious nature, which loves to 
 fit. The Pickle, at times, had fitted into Uncle 
 Rick's hat, for the same reason. Uncle Rick did not 
 appreciate the reason, but Bess did. Nice adjust- 
 ment, adequacy, finish, the genius of the just-so, 
 that is It. 
 
 Bess began to draw, rapidly, furtively, mapping 
 in its long lovely lines. Its face would come pres- 
 ently, if she had time for it, if, of course, it was 
 kind enough to allow her time. She knew all about 
 the risks of mood-changing, from the Pickle : and also 
 that the after-dinner, or Oriental, mood is best. Of
 
 IT 391 
 
 course, she meant to go and tell Ernestine, away 
 down there, sooner or later, only well art is art. 
 Not twice, nor once in a lifetime usually, does a pas- 
 sionate student of the cat-tribe get the chance. 
 
 A shadow touched her page, and a light Suir step 
 was audible. They moved so well, those boys, no 
 hint of the Oxborough clumping. Of course, their 
 woodland studies helped them, but it was part of 
 their pleasant presences too. She was sure it was 
 he or Wickford, before she looked behind her. She 
 looked and saw the right one. Did her face be- 
 tray it, welcoming? 
 
 "Oh, Iveagh," said Bess, with a kind of fearful 
 joy. "Look what I've found! It's purring!" 
 
 Bess had made friends with the "tiger." 
 
 Iveagh was an Irishman, luckily. He laid his gun 
 down inconspicuously in a dry place, and moved 
 with a smooth step to her side. The creature was 
 passive after a full meal, so much was evident. One 
 could not judge for what its taming went, there 
 was no instant danger, anyhow, if danger at all. 
 Still, his eyes fixed it attentively as he approached, 
 the hunter's look, alert and steady. His attitude 
 was not Bess's, quite. The depredator of his broth- 
 er's farm had something to answer for. 
 
 "Hullo !" said the leopard, lifting its head a little,
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 eyes wide. "Another of 'em. Who are you*?" 
 
 "I'm her brother, if that does," said Iveagh. 
 
 "Not so sure," said the leopard, but it laid its 
 head back again. It rolled a little, lazily playful 
 in the sunlight. It had been through some bad 
 hours, since yesterday, anxious ones, really hor- 
 rid, but it felt better, much better, for goat. 
 
 "Happen to know it's been killin' farm-stock," 
 said Iveagh, through his teeth. "Better get out of 
 it, do you mind? Wick's below there, waitin'." 
 
 "Oh, but " said Bess. Seeing his steady gaze 
 
 fixed past her, she added unwillingly "All right." 
 
 When she moved, the rolling creature looked at 
 her, over its own head. It ceased its lazy sinuous 
 movements, and, still comfortably reclining, stared 
 up, curling a paw. "Oh, come, don't go," it said. 
 "We were so comfortable. What's all this about 1 ?" 
 
 "Go on," said Iveagh, as the girl stopped, dubious. 
 
 "It's rather a darling," she murmured. "It was 
 so good with me." 
 
 "Go on." 
 
 "But I mean it mightn't be if oh, Iveagh!" 
 She had seen the gun. 
 
 "Go on," he said patiently. "I won't let it fol- 
 low. You'll be quite safe."
 
 IT 393 
 
 "Safe 4 ?" She saw the noosed rope in his hand, 
 and realised his intention simultaneously. The next 
 instant heaps of things occurred. He threw the 
 lasso, since the animal lay stationary, watching 
 them, over the head. Then, with miraculous swift- 
 ness, he ran the other long end round a column of the 
 Belvedere, and knotted it with the knot that does 
 not slip. Plenty of wise, grown men, Professor 
 Marchant, for instance, would have fumbled de- 
 laying at that critical instant, while others the world 
 calls dull or vague note things like the non-slipping 
 knot from their earliest years. After which Iveagh 
 retreated to his gun, while the leopard, waking with 
 a sharp snarl, straining every way on the rope with 
 wonderful, seeking, passionate movements, found 
 itself fast. 
 
 "Oh, how beautiful, how beautiful!" almost 
 
 sobbed Bess. "Oh, look, look at it! Mayn't 
 J <2 
 
 "You may not," he returned. "Go on down." 
 His gun was in his hand, raised, levelled, the hor- 
 ror of it seemed imminent, to Bess's eyes. 
 
 "Please don't kill it," she gasped, with a real sob. 
 
 "I'll not, if I can help it," he repeated, in that 
 patient tone which struck her, it was so unlike him.
 
 394 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Go on, it's really all right, Miss Ryeborn. It can't 
 get off." 
 
 Miss Ryeborn ! Was it that, the title offered her, 
 that betrayed his real anxiety 4 ? Woman-like, that 
 detail told her eyerything, all she needed to know. 
 Ropes taken from picnic-baskets are not of necessity 
 reliable, ropes may break. Pillars of Early-Vic- 
 torian temples, half -strangled forest animals, 
 cats, beautiful cats, clever cats, the most cunning of 
 created things 
 
 Bess whitened, and went. Before she went, she 
 put a cold little hand down on his warm one. 
 "Iveagh, don't let it kill you " 
 
 As her steps retreated down the path, something 
 happened in Iveagh, quiet as he stood, his eyes upon 
 the furious animal. His pale face flushed slightly, 
 slowly, and his mouth's line changed. Some idea or 
 prospect, beyond the immediate one of the cat in the 
 temple, seemed to creep into his consciousness. It 
 filled him^-conviction he did not want to be killed ! 
 Perhaps an hour before, groping in the great blank 
 of life since Lise's departure, he would rather have 
 welcomed the opportunity offering at present, a bat- 
 tle royal with a worthy foe : a violent, possibly dis- 
 agreeable, but at least respectable end. But now 
 no! Sooner would he kill that leopard-cat (against
 
 IT 395 
 
 orders) than that leopard-cat kill him! His face 
 took on the arrogant, human, hunting-light. He 
 and the leopard were "social equals" no longer ! 
 
 "Curse you, whoever you are," snarled the Cat, 
 rolling and straining here, there, and everywhere, in 
 magnificent attitudes, a paw to the rope about its 
 throat. "Get me out of this, 1 don't care for it, 
 it hurts." 
 
 "Get yourself, if you can," said Iveagh. "Only 
 look out." 
 
 "Good, there's a strand gone," said the Cat. 
 "Look out yourself, you common little man." 
 
 "Do you know what this is 1 ?" enquired Iveagh. 
 
 "Not specially, I've forgotten," sneered the Cat. 
 Carelessly, as it lay, it eased the strain on its throat 
 by winding the rope twice about a strong leg. 
 "Lord, I've a throat-ache! What if I pulled this 
 toy-temple down?" 
 
 "Try and see," said Iveagh. 
 
 "You silly young ass," said the Cat, its gloomy 
 eyes reddening. "That's what the goat said." 
 (Crack.) "Seen that goat"?" 
 
 "Found the stone-edge to work on," commented 
 Iveagh. "Good line that. You'll hardly get hung 
 at this rate. Shame to shoot you. Rotten shame." 
 He aimed between its eyes.
 
 396 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "I give it up," said the Cat, looking past him arro- 
 gantly. "I don't want to get off, never meant to, 
 really. I rather like ropes." 
 
 "Know about 'em anyhow," said Iveagh. 
 
 "You're not so clever as you think you are," 
 sneered the Cat, shifting its head. 
 
 "I ain't boasting', am I?" said Iveagh, shifting the 
 gun. 
 
 "I'm better-class than you," said the C!at. 
 
 "You ain't," said the son of Suir. 
 
 "My ancestors " said the Cat, and paused. 
 
 "I say, suppose you go and call that man of mine. 
 My collar hurts a bit. ... Or that young lady 
 with the pretty paws. She'd do, I liked her quite 
 a lot. I've something to (Crack) say to her, in 
 private." 
 
 "I'd like to be sure this'd slay anything bigger 
 than a weasel," said Iveagh, to himself. 
 
 "What's that?' said the Cat, who did not under- 
 stand English. "It hurts, I tell you. My neck's 
 sore " 
 
 "Do you mean your leg?" said Iveagh. 
 
 "You're quite a nice young fellow," said the Cat. 
 "I dare say your family's decent. (Crack.) Bar- 
 gain, I say. Just look here " 
 
 Crack. Snap. Rumble. Two shots following
 
 IT 397 
 
 one another in close succession. A roar, fading to 
 a choking snarl. A beautiful, sand-coloured, strug- 
 gling heap in the pathway, right outside the ruined 
 temple, completely clear of it 
 
 "You young idiot!" said Sir George Trenchard, 
 cheerfully, coming with Canon Oxborough (of all 
 people) round the other corner of the Belvedere. 
 "Didn't I say dangerous, in my telegram 4 ?" 
 
 "She she told me not to kill it," stammered 
 Iveagh, hopelessly taken aback by this denoument, 
 and the sudden slackening of the strain. He stared 
 as though fascinated at the sandy shape of Bess's 
 Cat, the little trickle of fatal red by the shoulder, 
 at which the Canon's dogs were sniffing, dubiously. 
 
 "Ah, well, I'm afraid it's dead," said the hunter. 
 "Twice over, probably. Hold up, now." Laying 
 a hand on the boy's arm, for caution, he took the 
 still-loaded gun from him. "Here's your uncle. I 
 say, Lionel, hard luck on him. Perhaps we ought to 
 apologise." 
 
 "Yes," minced the Canon (who ought not to have 
 been carrying fire-arms). "Rather beastly, nippin' 
 in under his nose like that. Picking up the swag, 
 eh? I say, Iveagh, my lad, just look at this temple ! 
 Whatever will your mother say?" 
 
 What is a Duchess to do. we appeal to a re-
 
 398 HATCHWAYS 
 
 spectful world, engaged in making a glass house 
 entirely for the good of her family, as the crown of 
 her life's devotion to her son's domain, deserted by 
 a second son whose rare chance for real usefulness 
 had been pointed out to him quite clearly at the 
 breakfast-table, slaving for others' interests, in 
 gardening-clothes, amid dust and paint and centi- 
 pedes, who is faced in succession, at the tail-end 
 of the working morning, by such a telegram as 
 George's, and such news as was handed her by the 
 keeper's boy? 
 
 "Jem," said the Duchess, "I hope you have not 
 been drinking." (This, for the Duchess, repre- 
 sented Iveagh's "Rats.") 
 
 "No, my lady," said Jem, dreadfully frightened. 
 "It's gospel truth I saw it. It crossed, like, and 
 jumped the ditch. All yaller, my lady." 
 
 "A cat," said the Duchess, wonderfully serene: 
 but her eyes were on George's telegram. 
 
 "No, my lady. Beggin' your pardon," said Jem, 
 "I knows cats. I went home and told 'em. Father 
 went off." 
 
 "Oh, your father believed you, did he? Well" 
 she folded the telegram neatly "as it happens, 
 I have confirmatory evidence. So you may be right 
 about it."
 
 IT 399 
 
 "I saw it, my lady." 
 
 "Very well," said the Duchess, glancing over the 
 details of the glass house, at which various people 
 resumed work as soon as she glanced. "And where, 
 exactly 1 ?" 
 
 "Up by the Belvedere, my lady." (Heavens, 
 Renie!) "It'd been eating one of Finch's goats." 
 
 "Rubbish!" said the Duchess steadily. 
 
 "I didn't see the goat," said Jem (who meant 
 to). "But Jack did, and Father." 
 
 "Never mind about Jack. Do you mean the goat 
 was killed?" 
 
 "They had to kill it, my lady." 
 
 "Oh." Merciful Heaven, those children! The 
 Duchess's Oxborough nature took time, for dignity's 
 sake, but any accustomed eye could have seen her 
 bitter disturbance. "Go to the kitchen, Jem, and 
 get your dinner. Mention there," said the Duchess, 
 ever more incisively, "that I shall not require lunch- 
 eon. Nor the Duke, do you hear? I want him." 
 As the keeper's boy retreated, saluting, she raised her 
 voice in his wake. "And tell Michael, if you see 
 him, Sir George will be back for the night, another 
 night, make it clear." 
 
 Then, the messenger having gone, she dropped 
 her trowel, took off her gardening-gloves, and threw
 
 400 HATCHWAYS 
 
 them down, one upon the other. She gave no 
 orders, left the glass house to its probable fate (con- 
 sidering the goat-and-tiger diversion) and, stepping 
 swiftly in her trim firm fashion, made a bee-line for 
 her son's study windows. 
 
 "Conor!" she called sharply beneath them, using 
 the earliest of the three names to which it had been 
 Wickford's fate to answer, in the course of his young 
 life. At times of stress, his mother recurred to it 
 unconsciously. 
 
 Conor was not there. Somebody was, though. 
 "Michael, where his Grace?" 
 
 Gone away down the park, Michael at the win- 
 dow informed her. 
 
 Had he taken a gun? 
 
 He had not. It was to sec Mrs. Redgate his 
 Grace was going. 
 
 Mrs. Redgate, indeed! Much more likely an- 
 other person. However, for once Wickford had 
 gone in the right direction for his mother's needs. 
 He had anticipated her. Renie and the children 
 filled her horizon, not her own children, nor her 
 neighbours and friends. We shall not seek to ex- 
 plain it, at this point, nor need we, to those who 
 s'emballent. That is the principle of their living, 
 one thing after another, to the exclusion of all the
 
 IT 401 
 
 rest. It is with us at every turn in England and 
 America and Germany not France: so we pro- 
 ceed. 
 
 "Where is Lord Iveagh'?" said the Duchess. 
 
 "I can't say, your Grace." Nobody ever could. 
 Still, the chances were fair, that he and Sam and so 
 on were circling round that picnic party. The 
 chances were pretty fair. 
 
 "Fetch me a gun, Michael," said the Duchess. 
 "The best you can find." She added "Two guns." 
 
 "Yes, your Grace." An English servant would 
 have gaped, most probably. Michael merely fol- 
 lowed orders, alert and interested. He also knew 
 which guns were which, as few of the house-servants 
 could be expected to do. Michael possessed that 
 inestimable talent called curiosity, an open mind 
 beyond his own concerns. It made him a bad foot- 
 man, naturally, but a first-rate friend to the house- 
 hold. For once, the Duchess profited by Michael's 
 open-minded friendliness, which customarily she 
 condemned. He took her order as a matter of 
 course, and filled it out intelligently from his own 
 ideas, as was proved by the kind of gun he brought 
 her. A little later, Michael had the keeper's boy's 
 ideas in the kitchen to help him, but by that time 
 he hardly needed them. His vivid imagination had
 
 403 HATCHWAYS 
 
 got well ahead, and painted something approaching 
 to a tiger, already. 
 
 The Duchess set out : a solitary, sufficient* little 
 figure, carrying two guns. There was something 
 magnificently mediaeval in it, thoroughly obsolete 
 and Oxborough, which the staff of Holmer from the 
 windows watched and admired. The Duchess 
 might, of course, have summoned a man, even a 
 man and a dog-cart, to assist her; but this matter 
 of the school-children, and their defence on her land, 
 was hers. No doubt the Duchess trusted her boys, 
 already on the spot, more than she realised. Guns 
 or no guns, those boys would manage it. Not for 
 a minute did she admit such dependence on her off- 
 spring, she had not come to that, but it was un- 
 questionably there. Unquestionably. . . . Besides, 
 George was returning, he said so. 
 
 She had given orders, all round, before she left, of 
 course. The proper thing, to the rear of her, was 
 being done. Messengers scurrying to all the neigh- 
 bours, mediaeval again. Lionel warned, the only 
 brother in reach. Warrener warned, and the lodges, 
 more especially the lodges with children. Keep 
 those children at home, if you please, or have noth- 
 ing more to do with the Duchess. And the "men" 
 informed, of course, that is, the keepers, even
 
 IT 403 
 
 Mr. Marchant. He came after the lodges and the 
 keepers in k-er thoughts, but still, Mr. Marchant 
 mooning in the woods might be in danger. Why 
 not"? But to the Belvedere, Renie, and the chil- 
 dren, the Duchess went alone. 
 
 She met them all returning: the Ryeborn girl, 
 and the eleven infants, all chirping about the "ti- 
 ger" cheerfully : Conor and Iveagh, as usual : Lionel, 
 not quite as usual (knee-breeches) : and George. 
 George's presence made all comfortable, even before 
 he reassured her with a word. The pest was done 
 with, dead. Just as it should be. Just as circled 
 by her stupid sons the Duchess had somehow 
 thought probable. But where was Renie? And 
 where 
 
 "Behind," said Wickford, shortly, "just a bit be- 
 hind. Miss Allgood's a ripping little girl, but she 
 broke down." 
 
 "Was she frightened?" said the Duchess. Her 
 eyes lightened reproach on everybody, Iveagh espe- 
 cially. Reproach in reserve for the Ryeborn girl, 
 thus distracting Wickford from his obvious duty at 
 Renie's side. What, could he call her a ripping 
 little girl, quite rightly, and still come on in the 
 advance guard*? Shame on him, what was he think- 
 ing of? his mother's son!
 
 404 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Mrs. Redgate's there." 
 
 Oh. . . . Well, that was all right, then. . . . 
 
 "Go on," said the Duchess, to her little world, 
 with urbanity. "Was it a tiger, Peter*? Really? 
 Yes, you shall tell me about it all, to-morrow, I'll 
 come down. . . . You'll stay dinner, Lionel? 
 They're expecting you at the house, George. Oh, 
 nonsense, he can manage without you." (Dr. Ash- 
 win, in London.) "What?" as Iveagh, relieving 
 his mother of her warlike panoply, the guns, which 
 she had forgotten, casually informed her that the 
 Belvedere was down. Down? The Belvedere? 
 Wretched boy, what did he mean by it? However, 
 that would do later on. Renie came first, and who- 
 ever was 
 
 "Go on," said the Duchess to the world again. 
 
 "That will come straight now," said George to 
 Lionel. "Mark my words." 
 
 "No accounting for Gertrude," said Lionel, with 
 fraternal philosophy. "Now then, my young 
 friends, weigh up!" Lionel, in his capacity as 
 Canon, was kindly helping Miss Ryeborn. School 
 treats, of course, were nothing to him: he could 
 steer a crew of eleven kids with one hand, his 
 nephews rather admired him. He was, in any case, 
 that one of their uncles they could do with most
 
 IT 405 
 
 easily: Iveagh went of his own accord to pay him 
 visits, as we mentioned once before. 
 
 The infants and the guard went on. The Duch- 
 ess went backward, back along the path, through the 
 budding copses, where the nightingales gurgled dis- 
 creetly in the gloaming, and the other wandering 
 voice of the cuckoo echoed by day: across the clear- 
 ing, to the little broken shed. Picnic remnants, in- 
 cluding Rick's matches by the dozen, strewed the 
 foreground; for once, the Redgates had neglected to 
 tidy : they were absolutely trustworthy people at the 
 close of picnics, as a rule. This picnic had not been 
 quite like the common run of Hatchways picnics, it 
 would appear. The fire was steaming faintly, 
 mingling with the dim blue April mists. The light 
 was failing a little. A deserted battle-field pos- 
 sibly. 
 
 Not quite deserted. Renie was in the shed, cry- 
 ing, her head on Mrs. Redgate's shoulder. She had 
 done brilliantly, nobly, a ripping little girl, but she 
 had broken down. Her voice was tired, her 
 throat ached like the tiger's. Her celebrated 
 "method" did not include live tiger-leopards, nor 
 dead ones, nor men with revolvers still smoking, 
 nor that awful unforgettable snarl upon the hill. 
 It was not fair on her, as Wickford contended, her
 
 406 HATCHWAYS 
 
 life altogether was too little for it. And her Peter, 
 he was too little for it too. . . . 
 
 "All right, my dear," said the Oxborough Duch- 
 ess, kind as Ernestine. "There was no earthly 
 danger, probably" she remembered George's tele- 
 gram "Still, it's a nasty kind of thing to happen, 
 of course. Stupid of Jem Hudson not to tell you 
 in time, he's a stupid boy, all the family." She 
 caught the sly glint of steel in the shadow. "Oh, 
 you've got a gun too," said the Duchess. 
 
 "Look out, Gertrude," said Mrs. Redgate, "it's 
 loaded. I must return it to-morrow to Mr. War- 
 rener, by the cart." 
 
 "Warrener's, is it? You went there? Fetched 
 it"? Ah yes, perhaps it was wiser. One never quite 
 knows," said the Duchess, dreamily, "with children 
 about. . . . Ernestine. . . ." 
 
 No, there was no accounting for Gertrude, cer- 
 tainly! Except by old friends, like George, and 
 other women, like Ernestine: who knew quite well. 
 
 Mrs. Redgate, returning later to Hatchways, 
 from Holmer, found her husband expecting her, as 
 has been said: and M. du Frettay expecting, be- 
 cause, owing to the Duchess's great need of Ernes- 
 tine, he had reached home first. As for Bess, her
 
 IT 407 
 
 aunt could not at once discover her, though she 
 looked all about. She grew a trifle anxious, debat- 
 ing of claws, poisoned scratches, and what not : since, 
 to judge by Iveagh's account, Bess and the creature 
 had been at close quarters, hand to hand. 
 
 She unearthed her at last. Bess and the grey kit- 
 ten were in one another's arms in the wash-house, 
 the little wash-house beyond the scullery, and Bess 
 was in tears, what next"? First Renie, then Ger- 
 trude, now Bess of all people! She hardly ever 
 cried. 
 
 "My dear child, what is it*?" said Mrs. Redgate, 
 coming up to her hastily. Bess might have been 
 through something, indeed she had been going 
 through much, for long, but she had faced her for- 
 tune upright, bravely. Now 
 
 "You weren't frightened'?" said Ernestine, half- 
 chaffing, to encourage her. But no, it was not fear. 
 Fear was about the last thing it was, in Bess's case. 
 
 "Oh," gasped Bess. "Oh, Ernestine, he killed it! 
 Not him, Sir George did, and it's dead ! Killed 
 it with a horrible gun, and I liked it so dreadfully. 
 It was sweet with me, purring, I could have 
 made it good. It might have stayed the night 
 here at Hatchways, and gone on to Reading in the 
 morning. It needn't have been shot like that for
 
 408 HATCHWAYS 
 
 nothing. N nothing but a goat. It didn't un- 
 derstand property acts. It was hungry, like 
 Pickle. When Pickle is hungry, we give him 
 things, lots of things, he's so greedy! It hadn't 
 had a nice life." (A gasp of agony.) "It only 
 wanted talking to, explaining. Now I can't ex- 
 plain, and it can't purr any longer. Oh, and it 
 liked me, trusted, and I left it " 
 
 Thus Bess, and her voice died fur-muffled, ago- 
 nised under fur. The Pickle served her, unwill- 
 ingly, for a pocket-handkerchief. She was mourn- 
 ing for that leopard-cat, dead on the heights in his 
 young glory, beside the broken Belvedere. Her 
 point of view was not Sir George's, nor Gertrude's, 
 nor Ernestine's, nor the circus-manager's, least of 
 all ! Only Iveagh came anywhere near it, as usual. 
 Bess was Bess. 
 
 "Goose," said Ernestine, kissing her. "What 
 else do you expect of an African hunter? And the 
 goat might have Peter. Come to tea."
 
 XXII 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 
 
 M. DU FRETTAY went back to France, his mother 
 wanted him. It had been pending for long, mena- 
 cing in the Parisian background, now it took place. 
 
 "Come, Gabriel," directed Madame du Frettay, in 
 a severe telegram: not to be disregarded, as he ex- 
 plained. He had to explain it, because the Suir 
 boys, grouped round the telegram on the Holmer 
 chimneypiece, scoffed at it. Sam scoffed too. Ade- 
 laide scoffed, almost violently. 
 
 "You never mean yotfre tied to apron-strings," 
 scoffed Adelaide. "You?" 
 
 M. du Frettay, bold and experienced, adventur- 
 ous, a flyer, gazed at the telegram. He indi- 
 cated it, mutely. There it was. It faced them. 
 Let them say what they liked, that message in two 
 words replied. 
 
 "Certainly you had better go," said the Duchess. 
 
 "Of course," said Ernestine. 
 
 M. du Frettay swr>t the Suir boys aside. He 
 
 409
 
 410 HATCHWAYS 
 
 neglected Sam, he wiped out Adelaide. He passed 
 the Duchess over, with the requisite flourish of 
 courtesy. But he took Mrs. Redgate to task. 
 
 "You have had enough of me," he delicately sug- 
 gested, remembering Lise. 
 "Not at all," said Ernestine. 
 "Anything but it," said Rick. 
 "Still, you send me, Madame. You despatch*?" 
 "Not at all," said Ernestine. "Your desire des- 
 patches you." She added "Your wish." 
 "My wish to leave Hatchways, hem 1 ?" 
 "Not the least. Your wish to go home." 
 "I am devoted," said M. du Frettay, gazing at 
 the sky, for they were out of doors, "to my mother. 
 I have every intention, always, within reason, of 
 doing what she says. But how can I leave Hatch- 
 ways'?" He lowered his blue eyes. 
 It was suggested by the usual train. 
 
 M. du Frettay left Hatchways by the usual train. 
 He did what was required of him, by the best 
 judges, and Mme. du Frettay: but first, he defined 
 his position. He simply had to, it- was his French 
 nature. You would not have had him leave Hatch- 
 ways all anyhow, without rendering account to him- 
 self (as he would say) of his exact relation to it and
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 411 
 
 all its contents, to its mistress above all 1 ? No, the 
 effort was necessary. 
 
 It was also interesting. It took him a whole 
 night. 
 
 "I love her," premissed M. du Frettay. "Cer- 
 tainly. I worship her almost, like Iveagh. No, 
 not like him, he knew her as a little schoolboy, 
 how could it be the same? I am of her age, 
 virtually, so my devotion means more. She is 
 unique, she is delightful. She is everything I 
 have hitherto dreamed woman could be. Cold, 
 she*? Common, that? She is unmatchable, cer- 
 tainly in France, in her country, most probably. 
 She is unmatchable: and she is ill-matched." 
 
 Then he thought about that, the menage, for a 
 period: the palpably ridiculous combination with 
 Rick. Useless! Quite useless: criticise as he 
 would, rally it, rail at it, he could not see it other- 
 wise. Not care for her husband"? But she did, she 
 was devoted. She was satisfied too, in her beauti- 
 fully modest way. She had opened her heart to all, 
 in default of Rick, and so found satisfaction, was 
 that it? But that would mean he, Gabriel, was one 
 of a crowd, just as others to her, just comprised in 
 the glow her great benevolence projected upon the 
 common human family. The masses. No!
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 No: she liked him, his own person, especially. 
 Not as Iveagh, not as Rick, she had shown it him 
 many times. Discreetly, sweetly, still she had 
 shown it him, perhaps not intentionally. He was 
 what she considered a man should be. ... Well, 
 then! Gabriel had dealt before, in life, with that 
 situation. He had but to rouse himself, resume all 
 those delicately polished weapons he had left behind 
 for a period, owing to the irresistible monoplane. 
 He had proved them, in so many encounters, for- 
 merly. He had but to rouse, work this leave-taking 
 to his advantage, and so forth, that was all. 
 
 Yes, but he did not want to! He did not want 
 to change her, even if he could. His desire wish 
 was to have her, now and for ever, just as she 
 was. Radiant, still, suffusing, as those early au- 
 tumn days, that are so much more beautiful than 
 the summer, so much more cordial, pensive, Heav- 
 ens, how lovely were certain looks, certain attitudes, 
 in service or in meditation. And she knew trouble, 
 too, she had told him. There was storm behind. 
 Was that the difference, possibly, that she stood for 
 conquest"? Three uncommonly pretty girls, in first 
 youth, it had been M. du Frettay's far from dis- 
 agreeable fate to set beside her, one lovely quite
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 413 
 
 without the common rule. Yet she had emerged 
 triumphant. Triumphant, conquering, unconquer- 
 able? Ha, voila! 
 
 Exquisite problem of her being, never to be 
 solved. How could it be? If he did not solve it, 
 no other man would, he was certain. Had he not 
 been certain of that but he was. This was his 
 chance, his alone, and he refused it. What then 
 could be his real position? How could he so feel, 
 ardently, humbly, and renounce? Adore, and 
 leave, as he was doing: as he fully purposed to do. 
 And come back at the first opportunity ! R-rather ! 
 For Ernestine held him fast in her delicate indefina- 
 ble toils. He was bound, literally bound, to return 
 to Hatchways, whenever he could, and as fast as 
 possible. Heavens, here was the crux! 
 
 Just towards the daylight, when the Holmer cocks 
 began to crow, and the Hatchways swallows to twit- 
 ter, when M. du Frettay, outwearied with earnest 
 philosophical researching, for hours, was dropping 
 asleep, abandoning the fray, alas, or postponing 
 it, in a half-sleeping, half-waking flash, his defini- 
 tion came to him. He had it. Had he it? No, 
 yes. He was in love with not being in love with 
 her. That is to say, with loving her merely.
 
 414 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Which was where he started. . . . Excellent, 
 charming! More, it was the case! 
 
 Done it, as the boys said: the nice boys, sleeping 
 out there at Holmer. Done it, thank Heaven! 
 M. du Frettay turned his dark head on his white 
 pillows, content, and slept. 
 
 "Good-bye," said Ernestine under the larch-trees. 
 "Come again." 
 
 "Come again soon," said pretty Bess, with the 
 Pickle on her arm. "Don't forget us." 
 
 Forget them! arm-in-arm as they stood, in the 
 soft swaying shadows of feathery larch. 
 
 "Come on, man," said Rick. "You'll be late." 
 
 He kissed their hands in turn, hands very like in 
 their strength and shapeliness. He did not thank, 
 for how on earth could he begin to thank her"? She 
 had taught him, only taught him, what England 
 could be. Bess, with her sweet oddities and whims 
 among animals had helped, she was very English: 
 but Ernestine held the secret: held it and would 
 hold, for Gabriel's spirit for ever. Fresh earth, soft 
 shadows, and grey skies. Rare sunshine, the more 
 loved when coming. Much rain, wisely tolerated. 
 Tranquil lives of give-and-take with the simpler 
 creatures. Heroes and hero-worship. Fixed hearts,
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 415 
 
 clear eyes, and open arms. That was Hatchways, 
 and England probably! 
 
 "They are a well-intentioned people," said a per- 
 son behind du Frettay, on the Dover boat, as a group 
 of his countrymen stood to watch the retreating 
 cliffs. "If not effective always however, I salute 
 their good intentions." 
 
 "I salute Ernestine," said du Frettay in spirit: 
 and he left these shores. 
 
 As it happened, he left something behind him, 
 besides his heart, which goes without saying. He 
 was thinking about the monoplane and other matters 
 while he packed: and besides, he made the mistake 
 of refusing assistance. Miss Ryeborn, as her aunt 
 was engaged, offered her help upon the staircase: 
 but M. du Frettay, whose thoughts were already in 
 France, since he was packing to return there, refused 
 gravely. He thought it indecorous to have a young 
 and pretty girl packing with him in his room. He 
 was thinking so Frenchly, that it even seemed to him 
 Bess should not have proposed it. ... Later, he 
 regretted it, of course. He had accumulated stacks 
 of things at Hatchways, things for himself, and 
 things for his friends, and for his mother, and for 
 the young lady he might marry some time, who all
 
 416 HATCHWAYS 
 
 gave him commissions. It was really quite a dis- 
 tracting business, getting them together, and reckon- 
 ing them up. 
 
 Consequently, M. du Frettay left an intensely 
 precious "carnet," and commissioned Iveagh by let- 
 ter and several telegrams to look for it, somewhere 
 towards the end of May. Again, he would have 
 done far better to commission the Hatchways ladies, 
 but he was too polite. Besides, the carnet being 
 pocket-size, might be anywhere, hence the tele- 
 grams. He kept on thinking of new places where it 
 might be. 
 
 The Wickford family was by then in town, for 
 Gabriel did not get to work immediately on reaching 
 home. He had to look up various friends in Paris : 
 including the people who had really (unknown to 
 everybody except Iveagh) sent him to England. 
 He had to give these latter a free translation, 
 couched in terrible slang, of what the "types" at the 
 English Admiralty said. All this took time. Fur- 
 ther, Iveagh, though interested by the telegrams, 
 postponed for a time the friendly duty they sug- 
 gested. He intended to look for Gabriel's thing, 
 down at Holmer, long before he did. Iveagh had 
 a habit, contracted early in life, when habits are 
 firmest, of believing things never really get lost,
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 417 
 
 merely lie about visibly appertaining to their own- 
 ers until somebody puts a hand upon them. He 
 had once left a saddle in the main street of Castle 
 Wickford for three days including market-day, no- 
 body thinking of touching it, since it was known to 
 belong to a certain horse. "That'll be Rory's sad- 
 dle," said the passers, at intervals. "They'll be 
 fetching it from the Castle soon." Thus Irishly 
 may he have thought of Gabriel's carnet. However 
 it may be, it was not till the Duchess came down for 
 a late Whitsun week-end that Iveagh, graciously 
 attaching himself to his mother's house-party for the 
 purpose, really got to work. 
 
 Even then, Saturday he was still busy in the sta- 
 bles and about the place; but Sunday morning 
 church-time really suited him. It seemed appropri- 
 ate. He routed about with Michael's assistance in 
 Wick's room and elsewhere on Holmer premises; 
 and then having acquired all sorts of things, but 
 not the carnet strolled down the Avenue and lane 
 to Hatchways: where he was received, after an in- 
 terval, in a painting pinafore, by Bess. 
 
 "How's yourself?" asked Iveagh, not at all sur- 
 prised to see her, though she was no more a matter 
 of course than he was. She was merely down at her 
 aunt's for a Whitsun week-end too. Bess having
 
 418 HATCHWAYS 
 
 been early to church like a good girl, was now hav- 
 ing a quiet working-morning without anybody, while 
 the household sat at the Vicar's sermon. Iveagh 
 entered into her feelings at being disturbed, and of- 
 fered to go away again "till she felt like it," they 
 were such nice sympathetic boys. However, Bess 
 took a time off, and soon extracted his business. 
 
 "It isn't here," said Bess, of the carnet, "or Ernes- 
 tine would have sent it long ago." 
 
 This was a new light to Iveagh, that anyone could 
 say for certain whether a thing was in a house or no. 
 
 "He might have mislaid it," he murmured 
 vaguely. 
 
 Thereupon, Bess let him look, just to show him 
 what order, in a house like theirs, amounted to. She 
 took him to her uncle's study, and the library, and 
 Gabriel's room upstairs, and opened drawers for 
 him, and threw cupboard doors wide, in silent 
 demonstration. Iveagh was soon discouraged visi- 
 bly, as to the chances of "mislaying" anything, for 
 good, at Hatchways. He became cast-down, as he 
 should be, and stood in perplexity. 
 
 "He has it in his pocket, the man," he murmured. 
 "One of his coats." All Iveagh's immediate ac- 
 quaintance had tried to make him pronounce Ga-
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 419 
 
 briel's first name, which they were certain he used, 
 fruitlessly. "He" or "the man" sufficed him. 
 
 "I don't think M. du Frettay is at all like that," 
 objected Bess. "And if he had found it himself," 
 she added, "he would have telegraphed." 
 
 "Why?" said Iveagh. 
 
 "Is it dreadfully important?" said Bess presently. 
 They had now got down to Hatchways door. 
 
 "Well he wired three times in two weeks he 
 wanted it." 
 
 "Oh, Iveagh!" dimpling in despair of him. 
 "And you only tell us now." Pause, Bess hanging 
 on the door. "He carried his notebooks about with 
 him everywhere," she ventured. "Always taking 
 things down." 
 
 Iveagh agreed. "He set me right from one of 
 them once about my mother's own relations. Even 
 the Elphinstones," said Iveagh, chucking a stone at 
 a bird, "he had straight in his mind before he left. 
 You would have said it concerned him. . . . But 
 this was not that sort," he added. "It's figures, he 
 says." 
 
 "Oh. Perhaps," said Bess demurely, "it's in one 
 of your pockets. You did figures for him, didn't 
 you?"
 
 420 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "I did," said Iveagh. They had now got away 
 from Hatchways, on towards the larch-trees, Bess 
 having left her pinafore, par prudence., behind her 
 in the hall. "You might bring me," he hinted, "a 
 bit along the road." 
 
 "I'm not really dressed, you know," said Bess, 
 coming. "We might meet some Church people." 
 
 Iveagh admitted they might. They went along 
 the road. It was a nice day, uncertain, with bits of 
 sun. There was a little breeze about, occasionally, 
 making the leaves twinkle, and turning the dust. 
 The lane smelt of what lanes do smell of, in May 
 that is nearly June. The principal scent (exclud- 
 ing dust) was that little herb-plant called ground- 
 ivy, and of course omnipresent grass. Grass makes 
 a good half of the scents of England, at least until 
 the hay: and none of the Holmer fields were cut as 
 yet. 
 
 "Are you off soon 4 ?" said Bess shyly: he was so 
 silent. 
 
 "When I've picked up a few diseases." 
 
 "Diseases? Oh, must you be inoculated? 
 Doesn't it hurt?" 
 
 "I'll tell you in a week's time," said Iveagh, hold- 
 ing the Holmer gate open. "Come a little along 
 the Avenue," he mentioned. "Mother's at church."
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 
 
 "I shall be in London in a week," said Bess, com- 
 ing doubtfully. 
 
 "So will I be. Why," challenged Iveagh, as the 
 gate fell behind him, "do we never see you in Lon- 
 don, Bess?' 
 
 Well, how should they 1 ? Wickford would not 
 have asked such a question. One would not "drop 
 in" on the Wickfords in London as in the country, 
 not that she did here. Besides, Iveagh's mother did 
 not like her, she thought he might have realised 
 that. 
 
 "I don't do much calling," she said gently. "I've 
 really hardly got the clothes." 
 
 Clothes'? Iveagh glanced at her sidelong. Her 
 little blue cotton gown and fluttering white collar 
 made him think of a certain butterfly of the uplands, 
 he knew the name. It was cleft at the throat 
 according to the fashion of that year, which was a 
 good fashion. Altogether, Iveagh could not con- 
 ceive his Aunt Isabel, on a Sunday, looking half so 
 nice. 
 
 Bess blushed when his eyes turned in her direction. 
 
 "I'm poor," she said, perhaps a little fiercely. 
 
 "There's a pair of us then," Iveagh consoled her. 
 "Do you like these trees'?" 
 
 "No, I can't abide them," said Bess, still fierce.
 
 422 HATCHWAYS 
 
 "Of course," she added, "they belong to your 
 brother. Never mind what I say." 
 
 "I'll tell him you can't abide them," said Iveagh, 
 propitiating. "He's with you too, and so was she, 
 but there'll never be anything done with them while 
 mother's alive. . . . Bess." 
 
 "Well?' said Bess. 
 
 "You've the clothes to ride in, anyhow. Suppose 
 we fetched you one mornin' for ridin', any you 
 like." He was clearly pleased by this solution, the 
 common one in a Suir world, horses. 
 
 "Thank you." She laughed sweetly, having re- 
 covered. "There's only one objection, Iveagh, 
 rather serious, though. I don't ride." 
 
 He swung on his heel and transfixed her fully, 
 really looked her in the face. Not ride? Equally 
 amazing he had never dreamt of it, owing to the 
 excuse of that eternal easel when their parties 
 formed. Iveagh seemed really put out for the mo- 
 ment. Next he grew grave to sourness, walking at 
 her side. All along the Avenue he had nothing to 
 say, looking in front of him: but within he was 
 thinking urgently, modelling all things with rapid 
 fingers to a new need. Not ride, the girl? Impos- 
 sible! Not to be borne for a minute, for more 
 than three minutes.
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 423 
 
 As they came out upon the drive, behold, a 
 glistening horse. A chestnut, well-kept and nicely 
 saddled for a lady, held by Tim. Tim was in the 
 act of turning its head towards the stable. 
 
 "There's Ebony, that'll do us," remarked Iveagh: 
 he being acquainted with every horse in the district, 
 and having bought most of them. 
 
 "Oh, but it's Adelaide's," said Bess. Nowadays 
 she hardly knew Adelaide. She continued her pro- 
 tests, growing alarmed: but Iveagh was calm, 
 cloudless. What could it matter whose the horse 
 was, since he needed him 4 ? Up she went! 
 
 "We'll come round the long way to the stable," 
 said Iveagh, casually dismissing Tim. Tim, aban- 
 doning the bridle to him, looked on cannily, but 
 quite without surprise. One had, being Tim, only 
 to change countries to follow Lord Iveagh's pro- 
 ceedings perfectly. Over there, the mere adopting 
 of another lady's horse for twenty minutes or so, 
 was as natural as rain out of a blue sky, which hap- 
 pens there constantly. It was true, Tim's respected 
 master was dealing, at this minute, with an English 
 young lady: still, he trusted him by old experi- 
 ence, having picked her out of the mass, to work her 
 in. 
 
 Bess, palpitating with mingled pride, panic, and
 
 424 HATCHWAYS 
 
 shyness, was worked in rapidly. She set her little 
 slipper in his hand, as directed, and was lightly 
 lifted upon Ebony, Adelaide's horse. (Why 
 Ebony, for a chestnut, everyone had forgotten, it 
 was a joke.) Panic was not the smallest part of 
 her sensations. Horses were quite without the 
 range of her studies hitherto: and "Oh, will it 
 move*?" was in consequence her first remark. 
 
 "He will not, at present," said Iveagh, exquisitely 
 amused. Of all things in heaven or earth this, of 
 all girls! He could hardly believe it. However, 
 he was serious, or nearly so; and since it was evident 
 Bess did not know by the light of nature where knee, 
 elbow, and ankle ought to be, he put them right 
 with gentle touches, and, gathering up the reins, 
 slipped them through her hand. Then he removed 
 her other hand from Ebony's mane, absently. Then 
 he took a general view of her with one eyebrow 
 lifted, not bad. It seemed, he did not despair of 
 her figure on horseback eventually, some time 
 hence. 
 
 "Now then," he encouraged, a hand to the horse's 
 head, and at once Bess clutched him. Clutched 
 his shoulder, this was cowardly! 
 
 "You must not," said Iveagh, as, apologising with 
 a look to Ebony, he stopped him again.
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 425 
 
 "I'm sorry," said Bess, drooping. "I was afraid 
 you were going " 
 
 "I'll not leave you," said Iveagh quietly. "This 
 horse is eleven years and three months, not a frolic 
 in him." 
 
 Bess drooped more, her blue eyes lowered humbly. 
 Such knowledge of a horse's birthday reduced her 
 quite. That he should have to say it, too, to 
 Ebony's face 
 
 "Don't make it go fast," she murmured. 
 
 "Him," said Iveagh. "And leave that looser, 
 I'll see to it." His hand came back to hers, for the 
 moment, then slipped behind her. "If you fall, 
 you'll fall on to me," he said, encouraging. "But 
 you cannot, if you sit easy. Walkin', it's not pos- 
 sible. Now then " 
 
 Well, it was nicer than Bess had thought. 
 Ebony was real, came to life beneath her, a big 
 breathing animal. He had a personality, a pres- 
 ence majestic, if saturnine. He had manners too. 
 He must, of necessity, have been scoffing in spirit, 
 exchanging bright glances with the Suir beside him, 
 and used to adequate Amazons, like Adelaide. 
 Still he contained his equine mirth, phlegmatically, 
 better than Iveagh did. Ebony was an Oxbor- 
 ough, possibly.
 
 426 HATCHWAYS 
 
 They went the long way to the stable by the 
 Shrubberies, under shadow, then sun, then shadow 
 again. Bess rode in dreamland, in a legend some- 
 where, a very ancient legend, wondering if it 
 were real. So far from home, how she even came 
 there 
 
 "Is that right?" said Iveagh presently, slipping 
 back a look. 
 
 "It's lovely," murmured Bess. "He's a darling. 
 I never knew " 
 
 "Of course ye did not," said Iveagh, consoling. 
 "You'll come on to it." He considered whether to 
 tell her that she sat quite well, and decided against. 
 Next time, if her present progress continued. . . . 
 "Will you go on to the yard, or dismount here 1 ?" 
 
 "Oh, here, please," said Bess, with a thought of 
 eyes, professional though polite, about the stables. 
 She was not even attired correctly, far from it. 
 Her cotton skirt was a trifle short. . . . And Sun- 
 day. . . . No, better dismount where she was, in 
 the discreet depths of the shrubbery. It was quiet. 
 . . . Quiet! Little did she know his tricks! No 
 quieter corner on the estate than the Holmer Shrub- 
 beries of old cropped hawthorns, which surging over 
 them made dimness, the scent of the leaves hanging
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 427 
 
 round. Hawthorn leaves, sweeter to breathe than 
 its cruel flowers, ever crueller as the season ages. 
 . . . But now the flowers were done, and the apple- 
 scent of the leaves hung only, mellower, more last- 
 ing, fresh as a final truth. . . . Besides, how should 
 Bess, unused to horse-company, realise what "dis- 
 mounting" meant? Mounting, though breathless a 
 little, had been swift, soon over. Now she came 
 right into his arms and 
 
 "Iveagh!" she said, with a litle sob. 
 
 "Quiet," he said softly to the horse, which being 
 loosened, snatched at the leaves. "Are you fright- 
 ened, darlin'?" 
 
 Frightened? with him? The day changed col- 
 our. The leaf-scent swept over her like immortal 
 incense. Every lazy little piping bird of Holmer 
 shrubberies broke into song. It was so, this was 
 himself, his arms about her, the hand she had always 
 loved and trusted gathering her face with delicate 
 strength to his. 
 
 "Not here," she gasped, the Puritan of the north 
 striving in her. "Not now " 
 
 "Don't you believe I may?" His strange melan- 
 choly pierced her, at very close quarters. "It was 
 not for want of wishing but she never let me,"
 
 428 HATCHWAYS 
 
 came the confession, true into her spirit, from his 
 eyes. "Do you believe that?" he asked, in his own 
 person. 
 
 "I'm afraid," she confided, shuddering at herself, 
 "I shouldn't care." 
 
 He laughed, breathing easily now. Utterly his, 
 he had known it. No hint of smallness, jealousy, 
 carping, she could not. 
 
 "You're the girl of all girls," he swore. "There 
 was never much doubt of it." 
 
 "But you're very insulting, Iveagh, never much 
 doubt!" 
 
 "Well, I'm goin' to insult you further. Come 
 on, coquettin'." 
 
 Coquetting! when she was trying to behave! 
 "Say something nicer first," she pleaded. 
 
 "I'll show you nicer." 
 
 "But it's Sunday." 
 
 "Well, there are six worse days." 
 
 "Oh," she gasped, hiding her head. "I don't 
 know why I like you." 
 
 "You don't like me, you do not, Bess. Let's 
 see how little you do," said Iveagh. 
 
 "I don't know" muffled, "what you want me 
 to " 
 
 She never finished. The terror of love, and its
 
 CAPTURE OF THE HERO 429 
 
 truth, for they are one and simultaneous, met her 
 and carried her away. Lost for ever, no doubt of 
 it: and found, in the same breath. And Iveagh 
 found himself too quite easily: took the last step 
 to safety: touched the other end of his youth's 
 troubled tangle without fumbling, in the lips of an 
 honest girl.
 
 XXIII 
 CURTAIN DOWN 
 
 BESS hoped Tim did not notice the difference when 
 she reached the stable, though how anyone in the 
 
 world should not ! Tim, oddly enough, looked 
 
 much the same. He seemed chiefly concerned about 
 Ebony. Obviously, he did not dare to question 
 Iveagh's doings in delaying the Duchess's visitor's 
 horse from proper care for so long a period, for 
 several centuries. Anyhow, Tim gave no sign. 
 Nor did he seem aged, he was young and cheery. . . . 
 But there was worse to come. 
 
 Hardly were she and Iveagh out of the stable- 
 yard, through the gate into the garden, making, of 
 course, for Hatchways by a roundabout route when 
 what do you think? The Honourable Mrs. Cour- 
 tier in a habit (horror!) and Lady Oxborough, and 
 the Duchess of Wickford in person, without ex- 
 ception the three most overpowering feminine pres- 
 ences in that countryside, were seen issuing from 
 the Duchess's new glass house. Two of them back 
 from church in a loftily-surperior after-sermon 
 
 430
 
 CURTAIN DOWN 431 
 
 mood: one of them calling with a piece of confi- 
 dential information. Bess stopped, horror-struck. 
 If they went on, by the path they were following, 
 they must meet them, all in a row! 
 
 "What's the matter?' said Iveagh idly. "That's 
 only my mother and my aunt and another woman." 
 Another woman ! when they had been stealing her 
 horse ! 
 
 "Can't we go back*?" she murmured. 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 So like him, wonderful gallantry, pride, and 
 firmness! Only well Bess would have to share 
 his assumptions now. She bit her lip. 
 
 "Let me tell her," she murmured. 
 
 "Why?" said Iveagh again: smiling, bold and 
 bad, heavens, what a handful of a husband! No 
 doing anything with him, either: he was bound to 
 get his way. 
 
 "Very well," said Bess, gently resigning. 
 
 "Let you if you want to, darlin'," said Iveagh, 
 passionately. "You'd do it best." 
 
 Dear me! however, he was too close to her. 
 Bess put a hand on his arm to hold him off. As 
 they approached the other party, the Duchess looked 
 more overpowering, Sunday-like, and serious. Lady 
 Oxborough was petrifying, so pink and placid.
 
 432 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Mrs. Courtier in a habit was Hyde Park Corner con- 
 vention personified. . . . No, she could not! 
 
 "Be good," she whispered. "You shall do it. 
 Only remember " 
 
 "I'm rememberin'." The parties met. 
 
 ''Iveagh, you'll do, what's the silly name of that 
 
 thing your mother has on the " etc., from the 
 
 aunt. 
 
 "Iveagh, go and tell them in the stable Mrs. Cour- 
 tier is ready for her " etc., from the mother. 
 
 "Iveagh, I hear you're off," drawled Mrs. Cour- 
 tier: but civilly, in something the right tone. 
 
 None of them noticed Bess, not one of them. She 
 might have been one of the housemaids, walking 
 along in her little cotton gown at his side. It was 
 true, the Duchess's eyes, at the encounter, had swept 
 from face to face : a sharp look, dubious, she was a 
 mother. But she was greatly occupied by this news 
 of Adelaide's engagement her friend had brought. 
 It had been hard to keep her lofty level of serenity 
 on the occasion, and console Mrs. Courtier as was fit- 
 ting, it was distinctly hard. She feared a new 
 strain with Wickford, which she really could not 
 stand, would certainly result. Especially as it 
 would be her melancholy duty, as his mother, to 
 point the moral of his slackness, amusing himself
 
 CURTAIN DOWN 433 
 
 too long with another girl. The sight of Bess, of 
 course, revived her slumbering hostility. Still hang- 
 ing about Hatchways, was she? showing herself 
 here, not even decently dressed! 
 
 "We're off in six weeks or so," said Iveagh, 
 confining his reply to the visitor, not to either 
 of his relations. "That's time enough to see to 
 things, and pull through our diseases. She's comin' 
 along." 
 
 Bess blushed pink, as his hand found her again, 
 it had left her for five minutes. Such a way of doing 
 it, and when she had entreated him to remember, 
 to be considerate! Iveagh, in so replying, was re- 
 membering possibly. 
 
 Mrs. Courtier, a woman of fashion and funda- 
 mental breeding, recovered her balance first. 
 Neither of the Oxboroughs made the least attempt 
 to adapt themselves, not the slightest. But Mrs. 
 Courtier did. She addressed, and congratulated, 
 Miss Ryeborn. Why"? Because she had to. She 
 placed Bess on the instant in her social hand of cards, 
 high up, and so recovered her tone for the occasion. 
 She recognised, admirably competent as she was, this 
 news knocked hers out completely, by her own rules. 
 This little cotton-robed painting-girl would take 
 precedence, not only of Addy, but of herself. A
 
 HATCHWAYS 
 
 duke's daughter-in-law (we can only suppose) over 
 trumps a baron's daughter, in Mrs. Courtier's fav- 
 ourite game. 
 
 For, note well, as M. du Frettay said, there was 
 no question whatever that this dreadful boy, who 
 had worried poor Gertrude's life out, would do what 
 he said. He might be doing it out of spite, either to 
 his mother, his brother, or the Fitzmaurice girl, but 
 do it he would and stylishly. Iveagh's style, 
 though admittedly singular, had often struck Mrs. 
 Courtier. It was better than his brother's, really, 
 more savage, as it were, more chic. She was cer- 
 tain, if he chose to drag the girl out of obscurity, tour 
 the world with her, and bring her back to London, 
 money or no, he would get her through. For, as to 
 giving yourself tropical diseases, and travelling, 
 even into the most ghastly places, that is quite all 
 right. Heaps of people one knows do it. The 
 reception given, by quite inexpressible persons, to 
 Sir George Trenchard, during the season under Mrs. 
 Courtier's view, proved that. 
 
 "I'm afraid," said Bess, trembling, "he put me on 
 your horse. It was rather naughty but we saw it 
 -Ebony " 
 
 "Ah yes, what do you think of him*?" drawled 
 Mrs. Courtier, in a really paralysing manner; as
 
 CURTAIN DOWN 435 
 
 though Bess had done her a favour, and was to be 
 presumed a judge. 
 
 "He's a darling," said Bess: which was, as it hap- 
 pened, the perfect answer. "But I don't know how 
 to ride," she added, with native sincerity. 
 
 "Ah well, he's a safe old beast," said Ebony's 
 mistress, and looked at her watch. "Gertrude, I 
 must be off. Congrats, all round. Don't put your- 
 selves out" to the young couple, with great civility. 
 
 "Iveagh " said the Duchess, awfully. 
 
 "Iveagh " breathed Bess: such a different 
 
 tone ! "Please do your duty and leave me," it said. 
 
 "You go along to the glass house, darlin'," said 
 Iveagh. "Look at all the little things on the right 
 side till I tell you their names. Don't believe the 
 names that are stuck on them. I'll not be five 
 minutes. Mother " 
 
 It was the crux. Had the Duchess struck at that 
 point but she did not. She could not, somehow. 
 Isabel waited for her, she strove visibly, valiantly, 
 and then went under to her handful of a son, like 
 the rest. 
 
 "You'll lunch with us, Elizabeth " Vic- 
 tory! Mrs. Courtier knew it. He had carried 
 Bess with him already, through the first and stiffest 
 line.
 
 436 HATCHWAYS 
 
 L. 
 
 There is little more, but notes, to add to this 
 
 history. 
 
 "Dear Iveagh, dear boy," said Ernestine. "I 
 don't know why I am so glad about it." 
 
 Her face was pressed in her hands as she sat, late 
 that night, on a cushion at her husband's feet. It 
 was her way to sit on the floor at times, when none 
 of the young fry were about. A long time ago, 
 when she was engaged herself, she had done it, Rick 
 remembered, still more frequently. 
 
 "I'm sure you deserve it," said Rick, a broad 
 hand on her hair. "You've worked enough. Now 
 you'll have to start again on somebody else, won't 
 you? What about 'tother one, he'll be stiffer 
 work, I fancy." 
 
 "I leave Wick to Gertrude," said Ernestine, smil- 
 ing faintly; but he saw her wet eyes. To see that 
 boy, of all boys, happy, it was enough for her. 
 Enough for a lifetime really. But then nobody 
 else, unless Wick, had ever seen Iveagh at the 
 worst. Three Whit-Sundays since, she had been 
 remembering that morning, she had prayed for his 
 life, no less, before her little country altar, while his 
 mother sat with absent eyes and darkened brow, and 
 his brother's head was buried in his arms, like hers.
 
 CURTAIN DOWN 437 
 
 And Lise, sweet little Lise, cut church and walked 
 with Mark, as her Bess had done with Iveagh 
 that morning. . . . Wonderful, evidently, nature's 
 change, nature's grouping, no work of hers. 
 
 It never is the work of people like Ernestine, you 
 may have noticed : no doubt because they work with 
 nature. 
 
 "Ripping, Bess, I'm so glad," said Wickford, on 
 the terrace of the House of Commons, where they 
 caught his Grace at teatime, most correct. 
 
 "No, ye don't," said Iveagh, cutting in between 
 them, just in time. "You've flirted about long 
 enough, as it is, for me." 
 
 "Later," telegraphed the Duke, across him, with 
 a clear wink, not quite adapted to his present po- 
 sition. However, there was no one else very near, 
 except a fair girl, sandy rather whom he and 
 Iveagh called Janet familiarly, though Bess sus- 
 pected her of being something rather grand. 
 
 Wick had to make the party up, of course, when 
 he asked the other girl to tea. The Suirs did things 
 nicely. 
 
 "Can you put up Bess as well*?" telegraphed
 
 438 HATCHWAYS 
 
 Iveagh to M. du Frettay, he being under the obli- 
 gation of finishing his diseases, and finding fire-arms, 
 in Paris. 
 
 "Enchanted felicitations mention whether mar- 
 ried or no, for Mamma," telegraphed back M. du 
 Frettay, causing shocks to all the nice girls in the 
 telegraph offices, as the message made its way across. 
 But Parisian people, friends especially, are never to 
 be trusted, as any of the Oxboroughs would have 
 told you. Wickford and Iveagh, equally amused, 
 set that telegram up on the chimneypiece in the hall 
 at Holmer, till their aunt tore it down and burnt it. 
 
 Madame du Frettay, who was about ten times as 
 particular about things in general as the Duchess, 
 and lived on terms with the raw materials of her 
 hospitality which would have shocked the Duchess's 
 maid, mentioned in a letter to her married daughter 
 that the young "Lord Suir," Gabriel's friend, was 
 by several degrees the least conceited Englishman 
 she had ever come across, and his wife an able de- 
 signer, and a teachable girl. The rest of the letter 
 was about Gabriel, whose disgusting application to 
 those machines was making it more and more diffi- 
 cult for her to get him safely married to the girl she 
 meant. Whether she did or not, we leave to those
 
 CURTAIN DOWN 439 
 
 who know French mothers, and their various di- 
 vergences from English, to determine. A few years 
 after, Gabriel's machines became the mode, and him- 
 self as well : but that is in everybody's memory. 
 
 Gabriel worked with nature too, like Ernestine, 
 but subtly, to defeat nature, such is the mocking 
 Gallic spirit. And he succeeded, he and his friends, 
 in the course of quite a few majestic and memorable 
 years. Nor will he and his kind ever cease to lend 
 humanity wings, however humanity, blind and 
 thankless, disregard and desecrate their inventions. 
 Looking at the sky as they do constantly, well above 
 men's heads, they are not easily depressed ! 
 
 Conor Arthur William Suir, Viscount Kells in the 
 English, and Duke of Wickford (with earlships 
 more ancient) in the Irish peerage, brought home in 
 his own good time an absolutely irreproachable girl 
 to his mother, whom the Duchess had never hap- 
 pened to meet, though both the boys seemed to know 
 her familiarly. "Janet," as they called her, owned 
 coal-mines as well as an unblemished Gaelic escutch- 
 eon. She was pretty (trust Wick!) albeit sandy a 
 trifle, and perfectly conversant, what was oddest of 
 all, with his affairs. Wickford, it seemed, had laid 
 these before her, in great detail, the day he proposed,
 
 440 HATCHWAYS 
 
 since he and Janet had been friends for long, and he 
 was far too honest to deceive her. The fact that 
 he offered her a coronet (between. friends) was over- 
 looked. That is to say, Wickford overlooked it. 
 Whether or no Lady Janet did, we simply cannot 
 say. She was of unblemished Highland origin. 
 
 Lise, losing her first delicate baby, had no second 
 child, a tragedy. She suffered bitterly as such 
 natures do: but she rose to tragedy as she rose to 
 comedy, fully and easily, facing it straight. Mark 
 loved her with a tenderness he was quite unable to 
 express, more passionately and inconspicuously, of 
 course, when tragedy made its quiet appearance be- 
 tween them. Wickford, we are sorry to say, simply 
 hated him at their last encounter: it was all anybody 
 could do to keep the peace. Iveagh was far more 
 tolerant. But then, he always had been, because 
 he loved Lise. 
 
 That the man who loved an Elizabeth Fitz- 
 maurice, faithfully as Iveagh did, may love an 
 Elizabeth Ryeborn just as well, should need, and 
 shall have, no explantion. Did not Shakespeare 
 give a Rosaline to his Romeo, before ever Juliet 
 came to make his love immortal *? Could his author 
 not have suppressed Rosaline, and soothed senti-
 
 CURTAIN DOWN 441 
 
 mentality, had he chosen? And need a man know 
 better than Shakespeare, or than Romeo, in this life? 
 
 Iveagh did not. His was the same courtly ideal, 
 the service of a boy's dreamland to Lise, for 
 ever, and a man's love to Bess. He and Bess 
 were delightfully happy, delightfully fond of one 
 another, and he carried her about with him all over 
 the world. They shot back to London occasionally, 
 Iveagh to see his brother, and Lady Iveagh her aunt. 
 It would have been far nicer, of course, if they had 
 come, respectively, to see their parents : but the nice 
 thing, on this earth, is so seldom done. The Duch- 
 ess remained to the end impatient with Iveagh. 
 She never quite forgave him for marrying that girl ; 
 nor for making himself, in the end, a bigger news- 
 paper name than Wickford's. But that was 
 George's fault, entirely. George, persistently curi- 
 ous about uncharted and unhealthy districts always, 
 dragged everybody attached to him, Iveagh in- 
 cluded, in his triumphant train. 
 
 There is also, we believe, a small tropical water- 
 plant, to be seen at Kew, named Suirii. And as 
 this gives a good idea of the impossibilities attempted 
 by Science, and the absurdities reached by it, with a 
 glance of sympathy towards Lady Oxborough, we 
 close this tale.
 
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