I ANN A -A* 
 ROGERS.
 
 We NEIL 
 
 334 D
 
 
 0. 
 
 
 VS. A-.
 
 PEACE AND 
 THE VICES
 
 PEACE AND 
 THE VICES 
 
 BY 
 
 ANNA A. ROGERS 
 
 AUTHOR OF "SWEETHEARTS AND WIVES' 
 
 " The common notion that peace and the virtues of civil 
 life flourished together, I found to be wholly untenable. Peace 
 and the vices of civil life only flourish together." RUSKIN. 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 NEW YORK ::::::::::::::::: 1904
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 Published, March, 1904
 
 00 
 
 THE MEMORY OF 
 
 MY MOTHER 
 
 2229142
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. SHORE DUTY ENDED BY ORDERS TO SEA . I 
 
 ii. DORA'S SECRET 32 
 
 III. LIFE UNDER THE "LONE PINE" . . . . 51 
 
 IV. TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG . . 69 
 
 V. FELLOWES IS MISSING 93 
 
 VI. UNDER THE CAMPHOR-TREES IO8 
 
 VII. KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT . .121 
 
 VIII. TOO MANY CHAPERONES 140 
 
 IX. UNDER ARREST 163 
 
 X. MAMMY SEES THE "WHITE LIGHT" . .173 
 
 XI. THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 185 
 
 XII. THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES .... 205 
 
 xni. A TEN O'CLOCK GUN 223 
 
 XIV. SECOND DAY OF THE COURT-MARTIAL . . 235 
 
 XV. A LAUGH AND A BLOW 249 
 
 XVI. LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 267 
 
 XVII. THE WIFE'S REWARD 289
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 SHORE DUTY ENDED BY ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 " Some with lives that came to nothing, tome with deeds as well undone." 
 
 IT was early June, and one of those warm, re- 
 laxing, humid days when Italy plucks at the 
 sleeve allusively. 
 
 The Departments still impounded the human 
 usury levied on the politicians by mongering con- 
 stituencies. Speeding westward along the broad, 
 deserted Avenue was a cable-car half-filled with 
 the Capital's usual off-hour, off-season ethnologic 
 medley. 
 
 Whites and blacks, and hybrids; a few rich, a 
 few poor, the many in between. Belated marketers 
 with bulging baskets from which came the crude 
 odor of uncooked things ; shoppers returning from 
 a morning of soul-rending compromises, thankful 
 to have saved car-fare from the frenzy. 
 
 In one corner huddled a shabby, uncatalogued 
 i
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 creature in pitiful, persistent mourning. She was 
 old and broken, shrunk in a sort of fidgety stupor, 
 the cause of which was supplied by the bloated 
 face and vinous breath. The knotted fingers 
 worked incessantly at the corner of her rusty cape. 
 Opposite her, and deploring it, was the familiar 
 figure in Washington of a vulgar old dandy, 
 dressed twenty years too youthfully and quite ten 
 behind the fashion of the day. The former fact 
 even he might have been brought to admit ; in de- 
 fence of the latter, he would have died. Day after 
 day, in his goings and comings, he tested his waning 
 attractiveness upon every pretty woman whose 
 eyes he could impel; day after day, of late, the 
 pathos of uncertainty was slowly turning into the 
 grim tragedy of fact. And still he fought on bit- 
 terly against entire displacement in the eyes of the 
 feminine world; where it could be humorously 
 seen, he had once reigned in dwarfed surround- 
 ings. He felt the challenge in the brutal youth 
 and good looks of the entirely unconscious little 
 attache leaning against the doorway, at the end 
 of the car, keeping his balance braced by one dark, 
 well-kept, spatulate hand, on which were three 
 rings. Every line of his face and perfectly clad 
 figure was tense with his scorn of things American. 
 
 2
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 Obliquely opposite the old beau, was a pair of 
 pretty brown eyes that saw him not, never dream- 
 ing of the dire offence of blindness that would 
 send him to his hall-bedroom home stricken, 
 bent, haunted, cursing himself for so passionately 
 caring. 
 
 The unwitting offender was a young woman, 
 well-dressed, and fair to look upon, a face full of 
 grave sweetness, strength, and sanity. 
 
 No life of them all, thus temporarily collocated, 
 but was worth the telling, but hap-hazard from 
 among that earful, the thread of one is lifted and 
 followed for a little. 
 
 She of the madonna-like brow and eyes (who 
 had seen no one in the car save the old tipsy wom- 
 an drowsing in the corner beside her, over whom 
 her regard brooded with a strange solicitude) got 
 off at the Navy Department. 
 
 She walked lightly up the broad stairway, and 
 in the great dim resounding corridor above, she 
 took the elevator. On an upper floor she stopped 
 at a door beside which sat an ancient messenger, 
 who had seen six administrations come and go, 
 and had learned the value of silence. 
 
 Greeting him familiarly, the young woman 
 wrote something on her card, and said: 
 
 3
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Please, O'Rourke, take this in to my brother, 
 Lieutenant Talty. Don't leave it, if he is not 
 there." 
 
 After a moment he shuffled back, anxious for 
 another word from the little lady who never for- 
 got to ask about his rheumatism, in that soft voice 
 that somehow gave one's private affairs their just 
 importance. 
 
 But Lieutenant Talty, albeit short and stout, 
 proved too quick for him, and called out over 
 O'Rourke's stooping shoulders: 
 
 "Hullo, Dora! What's up? What will Pel- 
 lowes say to your coming alone to the Department 
 and sending brazenly in for the best-looking chap 
 in the building, eh?" 
 
 She smiled, placed her hand on his arm, saying : 
 
 "Jack, I must see you at once about some- 
 thing. Where can we go?" 
 
 "That spells lunch ! An ice-cream soda wouldn't 
 fill the bill?" he coaxed. 
 
 "Listen, Jack I don't want to eat, I only want 
 to talk." 
 
 "'Only!' and I so young, alone, and unpre- 
 pared!" 
 
 "Do be serious. I want your advice." 
 
 "My what? At last I grasp the full horror of 
 4
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 this scene ! If I get out of this short of eighteen 
 dollars, it will be due to a superior article in gray, 
 hidden behind this Doric facade!" thumping his 
 brow; then as he saw his sister's lips begin to 
 tremble, he added hastily: "There, there, old 
 girl ! I'll be back in a minute, as soon as I shuffle 
 off this official coil." 
 
 When he returned they went down together to 
 the blazing entrance, whence they instinctively 
 sought the cool shade and privacy of Lafayette 
 Square at two in the afternoon. 
 
 Not until they were seated on one of the benches, 
 did Dora Fellowes break into her brother's unre- 
 mitting little stream of nonsense. 
 
 "Jack!" she ejaculated, and then withdrew into 
 a reserve, evidently habitual, her eyes running 
 swiftly from one object to another, as if again 
 testing alternative exits that would leave her the 
 great privilege of silence. 
 
 He turned and looked keenly at her, serious at 
 last. 
 
 "Kent?" he asked. She nodded slowly, then 
 bethought herself and cried out sharply: 
 
 "Oh, nol not what you are thinking. No!" 
 she repeated with an indignation that made the 
 man's eyes soften as he watched her. 
 
 5
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Do you think, Jack dear, it's wrong for a wife 
 to ask advice in any private matter connected with 
 her husband?" she finally asked. 
 
 "On the contrary, I could easily imagine times 
 when it would be both weak and what you bless 
 your heart ! call wrong, not to. There are a lot 
 of derelict ethics floating 'round loose, honey. 
 Keep your rudder clear of 'em, if you can." 
 
 "Kent's orders came this morning." 
 
 "Well, he's been on the lookout for them for 
 a month, I don't exactly see " 
 
 "He's ordered to the Asiatic Station," she said 
 slowly. 
 
 "To thunder he is! Why, Dora, he was slated 
 for the Home Squadron saw the detail myself! 
 And the other night at the Army and Navy Club 
 Rummels vowed " 
 
 "Mr. Peterson wanted the 'Dolphin,' and Mr. 
 Peterson of course got it. Senator Guppy, you 
 know." 
 
 "Now, little woman, don't be nasty. If we had 
 a Guppy we'd work him too 1" 
 
 "What I want to know is: oughtn't I to go 
 too? And if so, how can I make Kent consent 
 to it?" 
 
 He faced her with sudden excitement. 
 6
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 "Dora, listen to me ! Let nothing keep you on 
 this side of the world nothing ! There's no ques- 
 tion about it." 
 
 "Unfortunately there are several questions 
 about it. Oh, can't you see how complicated it is? 
 I took it for granted I was to go, and he you 
 know how sensitive he is he immediately thought 
 I did not trust him. He will not look at it in any 
 other light. And then he says we can't afford 
 such a journey; and then there's baby O Jack!" 
 she turned her head away pressing her hands to- 
 gether nervously. 
 
 "I see, I see," he mused; adding suddenly: 
 
 "Now you brace up, old lady, and leave it to me 
 the whole thing. I give you my word of honor 
 I'll not fail you. You play the pliable-wife act 
 for a few days all the same lay low and get 
 ready to go. See ? By the bye, how do the orders 
 read?" 
 
 " 'Take steamer sailing from San Francisco not 
 later than June twenty-first.' Kent says he'll have 
 to start a week from to-morrow." 
 
 "Dora er have you seen Imogen?" 
 
 "Not yet, I'm going there now." 
 
 "Well " it was his turn to hesitate "if I 
 were you I'd sort of skim over this matter lightly 
 
 7
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 with her very lightly indeed; and, Dora, don't 
 say you've seen me to-day." 
 
 They arose and walked across the park to the 
 carette station at the corner, and as he helped her 
 in, he said abruptly: 
 
 "Jove, I forgot! what's the ship?" 
 
 " 'Boston,' " she replied over her shoulder as 
 the vehicle lumbered forward with a lurch. She 
 turned and watched with loving eyes the sturdy 
 little figure crossing the Avenue with the long dis- 
 proportionate stride of a man who lives in habitual 
 protest against a small and unworthy exterior. 
 
 At the red brick boarding-house on a side street, 
 Mrs. Fellowes rang ineffectually many times be- 
 fore the colored maid opened the door. There 
 was about her a certain smiling familiarity of man- 
 ner that was not without interest to one not living 
 in daily contact with it. After a still longer delay, 
 the response to Dora's inquiry wandered back: 
 
 "Mrs. Talty's out. She's been out all day, 
 'Liza she says, m'm." 
 
 As Mrs. Fellowes went down the steps, a voice 
 came from within raised in song, dying away as 
 the maid sauntered back to her ever-belated work, 
 which she tasted slowly as if it were pleasure, in- 
 stead. 
 
 8
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 Dora Fellowes returned to the Navy Yard and 
 turning to the right from the gate, she soon came 
 in sight of her veranda, where a girl's white-clad 
 figure was pacing back and forth with a baby in 
 her arms. 
 
 "How's she been?" called out the young mother 
 as she opened the low iron gate, and smiled up into 
 the bright face of her young sister, who had made 
 her home with her since their father's death two 
 years before. 
 
 "Lift not the curtain from a fearful past, fond 
 mamma ! Be thankful with me, she's like a mouse 
 now sound." 
 
 "Now, Dell, was she really troublesome?" was 
 asked incredulously, as the mother took the child 
 hungrily into her arms, and sat down then and there 
 for a loving inspection of her treasure. 
 
 " 'Was she troublesome !' My dear, I'm a 
 wreck, a neurasthenic wreck ! Look at that hand 1" 
 exclaimed Dell, holding it out for inspection and 
 burlesquing agitation. 
 
 "Nonsense! Of course she is heavy for her 
 age." 
 
 The girl lifted both hands in speechless recogni- 
 tion of the irremediable, and turned away and 
 seated herself upon the low rail of the veranda. 
 
 9
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 The only points of resemblance between Adele 
 Talty and her older sister lay in the extreme sensi- 
 bility of both their faces, and in their voices, 
 strongly southern in accent. 
 
 Miss Talty's greatest external credential was 
 her coloring, not having really much more regular- 
 ity of feature than Jack himself. 
 
 A pile of glistening reddish-brown hair; eyes 
 that matched with jet black lashes and eyebrows; 
 a clear, very pale skin ; vividly scarlet lips, all went 
 to produce an almost artificial effect, in the con- 
 tention of a few people but who has not his de- 
 tractors, even in a Navy Yard? 
 
 It is almost unnecessary to add that she had 
 actively detested her own particular type of unde- 
 niable beauty all her life, vanity among women 
 taking much more often the negative form of self- 
 depreciation than the positive one commonly ac- 
 corded to it. 
 
 "See Jack's wife?" the girl asked, swinging a 
 tennis-clad foot. 
 
 "No, I called, but Imogen, as usual, was out." 
 
 "Well, you were gone long enough to have both 
 seen and heard her. At least so it struck my 
 febrile fancy with Julie yelling in my ears like an 
 adult fog-horn." 
 
 10
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 "ODell!" 
 
 "O Dora! I'll leave it to Doctor Robb; he 
 came in to see what on top of creation was the 
 matter with her." 
 
 "He may have come in, but that wasn't his rea- 
 son, miss." 
 
 "If you insist on details, here they are! At ten 
 minutes past two, the hour-hand and the minute- 
 hand settled right down together for a gossip and 
 a dish of tea, or a late lunch I could not quite 
 make it out all I'm sure about is that there they 
 sat, and hobnobbed for two hours two I sha'n't 
 take off a second. And the entire time Julie was 
 black in the face touched up with purple polka 
 dots; and I was sage-green and white, in stripes; 
 the doctor particularly dwelt upon it with scientific 
 interest. I'm astonished you didn't hear her your- 
 self, my dear." 
 
 "Dell, you are worse than Jack! I never saw 
 such a pair of clowns as you two are when you 
 once get started." 
 
 "My angel, haven't you observed that we Taltys 
 do everything well, even to playing the fool? Of 
 course you are not as talented as we are Jack 
 and I but in your own obscure way you are just 
 as thorough." 
 
 II
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Dora said nothing then, nor during the evening, 
 of her visit to the Department. 
 
 After luncheon, two days later, the sisters were 
 sitting together embarked upon the wide sea of 
 dress discussion, surrounded by a fog of pale ecru 
 point d' esprit. 
 
 "Red, with your hair?" ventured Mrs. Fellowes 
 with proper timidity, when her sister announced 
 with the aggressiveness of secret doubt, a projected 
 garniture of scarlet geranium. 
 
 "'Red with my hair!' 'Repeat your color,' 
 says a nation that ought to know ; and I say again, 
 'I shall be a dream!' Perhaps a trifle feverish, 
 I'll admit. But I do nothing thoughtlessly there 
 is a man going to this hop whose sleep I have never 
 disturbed. I've marked him for insomnia's own. 
 This confection, with me for a 'filling,' is about 
 to accomplish it." As she said the last word there 
 was a loud ringing of the front-door bell, that 
 had its own voice differentiated from that of all 
 others, after the manner of bells; and before the 
 housemaid could by any human possibility finish 
 doing that one thing that seems to become vitally 
 essential when a household bell sounds, there came 
 a louder peal. 
 
 "Imogen!" said Dell with conviction, her hands 
 
 raised in despair. 
 
 12
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 "Now, don't tease her, Dell," begged Dora 
 drearily. 
 
 "That great camelopard of a thing!" scorned 
 the other. 
 
 "O girls! have you heard?" came in resonant 
 tones from the hall below before the front door 
 was fairly ajar. There was a great rustling of 
 draperies, a stumbling step running up the stairs, 
 and a very tall, very thin woman burst in upon 
 them. Her hat was awry on her small head, her 
 black hair hung in strings all around her sallow 
 face and neck. She had huge faded gray eyes with 
 dilated pupils; a large nervous mouth which had 
 an exaggerated looseness of movement. Her voice 
 was unexpectedly deep. 
 
 Before any greetings were exchanged, she 
 tumbled into a chair and gasped: 
 
 "Jack's ordered to Asia !" 
 
 "You mean Kent, Imogen. I went to tell you 
 day before yesterday but " 
 
 "I mean my husband Jack Talty !" was reiter- 
 ated wildly. 
 
 Dora looked quickly up from her work. Dell 
 went quietly on measuring off the net for a final 
 flounce, holding it to her nose-tip with the left 
 hand, and stretching it out along her right arm 
 
 13
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 with a repeated sweep, counting in a detached 
 monotone: "five, six, seven, eight " 
 
 "I've just come from the Secretary!" an- 
 nounced Mrs. Talty, spurred to it by the failure 
 to produce the effect she expected. 
 
 "Imogen!" cried both sisters, Dora in reproach, 
 Dell in evident anger, her hands dropping to her 
 sides, as she stood glaring at her sister-in-law. 
 
 "Yes, and he was just as nice as could be, and 
 such a smile!" 
 
 "I can readily imagine you brought out the 
 er sunny side of his nature !" muttered Dell. 
 
 "He had on one of those new sporty waistcoats 
 that made me feel at home with him at once, 
 and " 
 
 "Just why?" snapped Dell. 
 
 "And so I was perfectly frank with him in 
 fact he became interested and drew me out, no one 
 could have listened more cordially. Jack's entitled 
 to six months more shore duty; and there are men 
 who haven't smelt sea-air for five years right here 
 under his very nose. Oh, yes, and he asked their 
 names and I gave them ! And then Jack was out 
 on that horrid old station before, where during 
 the rainy season you can pick mushrooms off your 
 best shoes every morning." 
 
 14
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 "How convenient!" 
 
 "Oh, you needn't stand there, Adele Talty, with 
 that superior smile. You haven't scraped the mil- 
 dew off your face in Hong Kong before you could 
 get down to washing it ; and sent to the oven for a 
 dress to get into and rush to a tea before it wilts 
 again! You haven't flopped about between Che- 
 mulpo, and Shanghai, and Tientsin and hardly 
 time for laundrying!" 
 
 "Did the Secretary perchance hear any of 
 this?" teased the red-haired one. 
 
 "Why, of course ! And I know he was im- 
 pressed because he rang his bell and told the mes- 
 senger to say he was engaged. And then I ended 
 by reminding him that Jack comes up for examina- 
 tion for his next grade in six months. Why every- 
 thing's against his going." 
 
 "Except the fact that he was ordered," sug- 
 gested Dell coldly. 
 
 "The worst of it is I can feel it in my bones " 
 
 "Poor Imogen!" 
 
 " that Jack's going. There's a look in his 
 
 eyes that I know " her voice broke and tears 
 began to well up and overflow. Soon she was full 
 length upon the lounge, weeping without restraint. 
 
 Dell swept up her belongings and left the room. 
 15
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Imogen had been hopelessly on her nerves for five 
 years; they had not a thought in common except 
 their mutual dislike. 
 
 Mrs. Fellowes breathed more easily after her 
 sister had gone, and essayed the soothing of the 
 supine figure of woe. 
 
 Presently Dora suggested, her intent always 
 kindly : 
 
 "Kent has to go too, Imogen." 
 
 Mrs. Talty sat bolt upright. 
 
 "Kent's entirely different. His time is up for 
 sea, he's never been out there! It's cholera, ty- 
 phoons, earthquakes, or missionaries, in one endless 
 round. They persist I mean the missionaries 
 in going to China and saving souls that don't in the 
 least want to be saved (and what's more oughtn't 
 to be, if there's going to be any really nice society 
 in heaven!). Then comes 'murder and sudden 
 death' and no time for 'battle' and a ship is sent 
 to restore order, and the wardroom have to give 
 up their state-rooms to the women and children 
 and live like pigs in a poke what on earth's a 
 poke, Dora? I ask you, Dora Fellowes, then 
 what happens ? Our poor boys are maligned as a 
 godless lot of heathens, and prayed for at meet- 
 ings openly prayed for! Can you imagine such 
 ingratitude?" ,
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 "Imogen, my dear!" laughed Dora. 
 
 Mrs. Talty had talked herself into her normal 
 degree of composure, and at last the other asked 
 the questions that stirred within her: 
 
 "What ship is Jack ordered to?" 
 
 "The same one that Kent is under orders for 
 the 'Boston.' " 
 
 Dora's face flushed with rising emotion. 
 
 "When did he tell you?" 
 
 "Yesterday evening. He came home very late 
 from the Department. What upset me was the 
 queer way he actually urged me to stay home this 
 time. As if I'd let him go out there alone! 
 Dora " she suddenly interjected, leaning for- 
 ward and touching her companion's knee "the 
 women out there, the Europeans, flirt like the very 
 well, they do! Go? I'd go if I had elephanti- 
 asis, neuritis, and creeping necrosis all over me 
 I don't know what any of them are, but they sound 
 awful and still I'd go !" 
 
 Dora had heard nothing since the direct answers 
 to her questions, and sat saying over and over to 
 herself: 
 
 "Dear, dear old Jack! He has sacrificed him- 
 self for my sake." 
 
 Before Imogen left, Kent Fellowes came in with 
 17
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 his brother-in-law, Jack, who announced that he 
 was going to stay to dinner and settle their plans, 
 once for all. 
 
 Lieutenant Fellowes was a tall spare man, with 
 a between-deck stoop of the high shoulders; a keen 
 grave, tense face, with sad eyes. A silent man with 
 helpful sympathetic ways about his house. His 
 thin conic-fingered hands were endlessly restless. 
 
 Jack assured his wife at once that there was no 
 chance whatever of the revocation of his orders, 
 and if she cared to go again out to the despised 
 station, all she had to do was to get ready he 
 would sail with Kent on the twenty-first. 
 
 Thereupon Imogen became hysterical, and 
 among other things, her visit to the Secretary of 
 the Navy came out quite against her intention. 
 The others incontinently fled from the room, al- 
 most falling over one another in their eagerness. 
 
 Talty's ruddy face slowly paled, he looked up 
 and down his tall wife's comfortless figure in help- 
 less fury. Then without a word he stalked to the 
 window and drummed on the panes with his pudgy 
 little hands. 
 
 Imogen followed and stood stricken beside him. 
 By far the most wearing feature of Talty's mis- 
 alliance was the fact that his wife loved him. 
 
 18
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 "Jack, please speak to me! Swear, if you want 
 to ! only say something to me." 
 
 "I have nothing new to say, Imogen." 
 
 "I did it impulsively, you know my way." 
 
 "So?" There was a silence and then he turned 
 and said harshly : 
 
 "Will you never comprehend that the one thing 
 I will not stand is your fingers meddling in my 
 official life ? This is the second time that you have 
 dared to Oh, what earthly use is it to talk to 
 you !" He turned away abruptly and left the 
 room, joining Fellowes in his den, where together 
 they packed books and pictures until dinner-time. 
 It was about all the packing there was to be done, 
 the furniture in the quarters belonging to the Gov- 
 ernment. 
 
 Then dinner was announced and served by a 
 tall, very erect, very black negress, dressed in black 
 relieved by a spotless white kerchief, deep cuffs, 
 and apron; about her very well-shaped head was 
 tied a white silk bandanna, two ends of which stood 
 up in front like a rabbit's ears listening. 
 
 At the table one place remained empty, and 
 Dora, who looked a little weary, explained that 
 Imogen had a slight headache and did not care for 
 any dinner. 
 
 19
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 There was a moment's silence as the soup was 
 served, during which the thought vibrations in the 
 room seemed almost phonetic, and the family 
 avoided one another's eyes. 
 
 While Lieutenant Fellowes was carving the 
 roast, Jack said aside to Dora : 
 
 "I believe, if you'll excuse me, I'll run up and 
 see how her head is." 
 
 When he had gone, the three looked up and ex- 
 changed glances, and Kent said : 
 
 "If ever there was a masculine angel " leav- 
 ing the sentence unfinished. 
 
 After dinner, over their cigars, Talty remarked 
 mendaciously to Fellowes: 
 
 "It looks as if we'd have to give in to the girls, 
 and take them along, doesn't it, old man ?" Low- 
 ering his voice he added with a roguish eye, be- 
 fore the other could reply: 
 
 "The fact is, Imogen has got it into her head 
 that I'm a sort of suppressed Lovelace (wasn't that 
 the name of that dead game sport of the last cen- 
 tury?) and that all I'm waiting for is a chance. 
 She's not going to give it to me this cruise, that's 
 sure ! I " he laughed comfortably "I've often 
 wondered, Kent, why marriage seems largely 
 to slay the power of woman over a man; I don't 
 
 20
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 go further than 'largely,' please note. Is it because 
 it concentrates It, or because it destroys it?" 
 
 "Depends a little on the wife perhaps either 
 way," laughed Kent. 
 
 "I dare say," grudged the other, suddenly re- 
 alizing that the bachelor rights to generalization 
 anent matrimony were no longer his. 
 
 "Why, I'd rather talk tobacco or even weather, 
 with a man, than sit under a May moon and ex- 
 change goo-goo eyes with Cleopatra herself, or 
 or any of those old girls." 
 
 "There was a time, Jack " suggested Kent 
 darkly, smiling as he knocked the ashes off his 
 cigar end, with a nervous little finger. 
 
 "And that traitor sitting there (smoking one of 
 my cigars, be it observed) calls himself friend!" 
 Jack apostrophized the ceiling with bitterness. 
 
 After a short silence Talty threw his cigar into 
 the empty grate, sat up and took out his note-book 
 energetically. 
 
 "Look here, Kent, I've been making some 
 calculations. Our mileage to San Francisco is two 
 hundred and sixty dollars. That will pay most of 
 Dora's and Imogen's expenses. Then they are 
 allowed two hundred and fifty pounds apiece trans- 
 Pacific baggage, as well as ourselves, so the wom- 
 
 21
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 en-folks will be very little expense by rail. And 
 the steam-ship company gave my wife, last time, 
 missionary rates half-fare; and I'm blest if she 
 didn't tell the agent she saw no reason they 
 shouldn't; it was only the difference between look- 
 ing after souls in retail and wholesale! That's 
 the fine thing about Imogen, she knows the ropes 
 like a C. S. C. with stripes to his elbows. Why, 
 Kent, that woman knows more about the Navy 
 than any man in the service. She watches every 
 private bill before Congress, and knows who's 
 boosting it along; the animus of the House 
 on appropriation bills; the bias pro or con of the 
 Naval committee, and who holds the deciding 
 vote, how he'll place it, and by George, why! 
 Such trifles as my exact place on the list, the aver- 
 age percentages of retirements and casualties 
 (she's downright spooky about casualties) are as 
 easy to her as (now what's that mysterious thing 
 women do with yarn ? You know they sit and count 
 the stitches of it, and chatter like magpies about 
 something else the whole blamed time) crochet- 
 ing? Well, you ought to know, Dora does it 
 well, an hour back I was saying that Navy politics 
 and policies were that easy to Imogen. I'll get 
 her some day to show you her Register ordinary 
 Egyptian hieroglyphics aren't in it," 
 
 22
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 Nothing in life seemed to Kent more pathetic 
 than Jack's inviolable loyalty to his wife, in face 
 of long dead illusions. 
 
 "And Dora doesn't know a paymaster from a 
 surgeon by his collar device," Fellowes said with 
 obvious complacency. 
 
 "Well, with Imogen to run us, we can get out 
 there without drawing more than two months' 
 advance pay. A 'deadhorse' of that size is 
 easily worked off out there. No crowned heads 
 to be feted to the glory of Uncle Sam, at our ex- 
 pense, as in Europe. Great country, ours, Kent, 
 but she isn't above letting her 'servants' stand 
 treat, is she ? England pays less wages, but signs 
 her own club dues, bless her!" 
 
 "We'll get there by and by," came dubiously 
 from his companion, carefully inserting his inch 
 length of tobacco into his amber mouth-piece. 
 
 "Yes, but we won't be there, by and by, you 
 and I!" 
 
 "Well, I suppose they'd all better go," assented 
 Kent presently. 
 
 Jack rubbed his fat hands together joyfully 
 under his coat-tails as he stood from habit, before 
 a fireless hearth. 
 
 "Dell's quite wild about it, and is going to take 
 Mammy along for the general comfort of us all. 
 
 23
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 I don't suppose, as she has her own purse, we can 
 very well object, and they'll both help Dora with 
 baby." Jack threw down his last card with a 
 bold front. 
 
 When they joined the others on the veranda, 
 they found them attacking the same subject from 
 a purely feminine stand-point, and a resurrected 
 Imogen had the floor: 
 
 "You remember my old black armure silk, 
 Dora? The one I sponged off with beer before 
 I went out last time ? I made it over with a guimpe 
 and belt of cut jet, remember? I thought you 
 would. Well, I had not been in Yokohama a 
 month (at that hotel that burned down later 
 what was the name? It began with a W. Jack, 
 surely you remember ! ) . Well, never mind : one 
 day I opened my trunk the big wicker one I got 
 at the Bon Marche, Dora, you always raved over 
 that top tray and at once a ghastly odor came 
 forth, and I plunged in, and found at the bottom, 
 three inches of gray fungus. Between the beer 
 and the dampness it was worse than spoiled, it was 
 putrid! I got the coolie to bury it." 
 
 "Well, now that it has gone to its long rest, 
 perhaps you'll tell us what we'll need in the way 
 of clothes, anything?" 
 
 24
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 "There, Dell! that's exactly what makes the 
 residents out there so furious! The way women, 
 bringing letters to them, persist in going out in 
 a steamer-trunk containing two shirt-waists and 
 one old high-necked Navy blue foulard, and wear- 
 ing a golf suit and a last year's hat and then 
 bragging the whole blessed time about the clothes 
 they left at home, and rushing to Chinese tailors 
 to get something suitable for the Imperial Flower 
 Viewings, or the ball to meet Prince This or That. 
 Why, it's the greatest station for clothes! We 
 must take all our evening toilets, whatever else we 
 leave behind; and something giddy for afternoon 
 teas; and as many hats as we can jam in. Oh, 
 yes! and gloves and shoes to burn." 
 
 A short altercation followed between Imogen 
 and Adele, into which Dora's soft voice interposed 
 peace, and Mrs. Talty was once more launched 
 and merrily on her way. 
 
 "Then another thing: you must decide where 
 you'll settle on the station. It's the only way. I 
 tried knocking about for one awful year, and it 
 played the very " 
 
 "Imogen!" warned Jack, persistently masterful 
 in minor matters at least. 
 
 "I was only going to say 'dickens' ! And you 
 25
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 know perfectly well, John Talty, that I had to 
 have Ah Ling six weeks the fat old Chinese nurse 
 who paid two hundred and eighty Mexicans for 
 a small- footed wife for her son, truth, my dear!" 
 
 "You were talking of the settling question," in- 
 terposed Adele firmly. The two men sat in that 
 expedient silence induced by a profound sense of 
 inferiority in the world feminine. 
 
 "Oh, yes, so I was ! Well, I can't decide it posi- 
 tively until after I've met and studied the ad- 
 miral. They all have fads, admirals, you know. 
 Corea was the hobby of the one last time. You 
 remember, Jack? I rather thought you would. 
 If we only have the luck to strike one with a 
 penchant for Japan 1 There was one once. How 
 is old Titterington on that, boys? Just give me 
 half an hour with him, and Jack not around 
 making faces at me, and I'll settle the whole ques- 
 tion." 
 
 "I do wish I had your tact about some things," 
 Adele felt compelled to contribute. 
 
 Imogen glanced suspiciously at her sister-in-law 
 in the half-light and then continued with a slight 
 retrenchment of tone: 
 
 "It's knowing the ropes, that's all. I study 
 up on the Anglo-Russian, Chino-Corean- Japanese 
 
 26
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 cutthroat game, and all the other combinations or 
 alienations, and then when I meet the command- 
 er-in-chief I stamp 'round heavily till I step on 
 whatever's his hobby and get a rise. Then I know 
 what's ahead of us. See? The heat will be ter- 
 rific just now, and I propose, till September or 
 October, that we go down to Yukosuka and take 
 a temple " 
 
 "Do what?" 
 
 "Rent a temple and stay till it gets cooler." 
 
 "Buddha for a summer-boarder!" shrieked Dell 
 in delight. 
 
 "No, no gentlemanly landlord !" chirped Dora 
 gayly. 
 
 "Esoterics scrambled on toast for breakfast; 
 Vedantism frappe for a light hot-weather tiffin; 
 and Nirvana piece montee for dinner, with a thick 
 cream sauce," Jack continued with unction. 
 
 "And fat old Hotei for punkah-wallah!" con- 
 tributed Kent, the devourer of books. 
 
 Imogen waited mirthlessly until the Taltys 
 emerged from one of their fusillades of nonsense, 
 which they at least heartily relished. 
 
 "Do they really do it?" Dora finally asked, 
 moved by her sister-in-law's peevish silence. 
 
 "Why, of course. I spent a month in one, our 
 27
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 last cruise; our consul's sister and I took it to- 
 gether. We just looked about till we saw a temple 
 we took a fancy to, then we hunted up the priest 
 and bought him. Then we got the temple furni- 
 ture cleared away, and there we were, matting 
 and all ! And you poke in the walls as you need 
 them." 
 
 "What darksome deed is covered by that, think 
 you?" interrupted Adele, and before she and Jack 
 had emptied their overflowing horn of nonsense, 
 Imogen arose, crossly demanded her hat and her 
 husband, and said good-night, and went back to 
 the city. 
 
 Dell flew upstairs to dress for the weekly hop 
 in the sail-loft, leaving the husband and wife alone 
 on the piazza. Kent drew his chair nearer Dora's 
 and leaning toward her whispered: 
 
 "I suppose you will not let me kiss you out here, 
 wee wifie mine ? Well, then give me your hand." 
 He took and caressed it, pressing it gently against 
 his cheek. 
 
 "I love you more and more, dear, every day 
 more and more. I wish to heaven I had it in me 
 to be worthy of you I" he suddenly added with bit- 
 terness. To turn his thought she said lightly: 
 
 "I think poor Imogen makes a splendid back- 
 28
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 ground for her sex generally. I've always noticed 
 you have a burst of admiration for your wife after 
 a visit from Jack's." 
 
 Laughing they arose and went into the house. 
 
 Adele wore that night her experiment in daring 
 coloration with such marked success that she re- 
 ceived two cordial invitations to remain in Amer- 
 ica. One was extended by Ensign Golden, the 
 leader of the cotillon, the other by the assistant 
 surgeon at the Yard, Doctor Robb his second 
 attempt in the same line. 
 
 But the doctor went home early, and the cotillon 
 was not considered at all up to Golden's standard; 
 the whole Yard felt that his indifference and lassi- 
 tude were insufferable, if not downright imperti- 
 nent, and the very next hop found him displaced 
 by a man of sustained enthusiasm, if of far less 
 originality. 
 
 "I'll admit, Doctor Robb, I think you must be 
 an acquired taste," Adele had vouchsafed after his 
 avowal that night, between dances before the Ger- 
 man began. They sat in the corner of a beflagged, 
 besabred loft, hidden by an enormous expansion 
 of Stars and Stripes, whose folds billowed dizzily 
 about them in the current of warm air blowing 
 from many open windows. 
 
 29
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 As he was beyond asking any more questions 
 that evening, she had to continue unsolicited: 
 
 "I observe that I let you go with more and more 
 regret as years advance. It honestly wouldn't 
 surprise me if " she paused, but again entire si- 
 lence defeated her rather hazy motives "if as 
 time rolls on and The Other cometh not between 
 us twain, and you'd catch me in exactly the right 
 mood and give me the chance, that really I mean 
 it!" 
 
 "Well, it's the last call for dinner, Miss Talty 1" 
 he said grimly. She laughed, humor being in her 
 very blood, relishing a man who was game to the 
 end. She put out her gloved hand, laid one finger 
 gently on his own and coaxed from the pure habit 
 of coquetry: 
 
 "Och, dochter de-ah, shure it's beginnin' Oi am 
 this blissed minute to fale the hunger!" 
 
 He sprang to his feet, white with indignation, 
 and standing before her he said furiously: 
 
 "All that so-called good women of your sort 
 lack, who pass from one safe flirtation to another, 
 is courage to come under quite another caption ! 
 The wish to make you my wife was the most 
 sacred thing in me; the deepest, strongest, clean- 
 est it deserves at least respect. Good-night and 
 
 30
 
 ORDERS TO SEA 
 
 good-by, I shall not see you again before you 
 leave," he bowed, turned on his heel and left her. 
 
 Tears rushed to her eyes, the hot color to her 
 cheeks, she shrank as if struck. 
 
 "This is our extra, Miss Talty. I like the way 
 you are trying to sneak out of it I It's a blow to 
 a man whose two-step has a national reputation," 
 cried a voice close beside her; and fighting com- 
 ically with, instead of for, the enveloping flag of 
 his country, Ensign Golden swept her away out 
 upon the glassy floor. 
 
 Four days later the party of seven started on 
 their long journey to the other ends of the earth, 
 with far less commotion than a respectable aver- 
 age leave for the sea-shore. 
 
 The most amusing incident of the voyage was 
 the discovery that Mammy had in her possession 
 a twenty-two calibre pistol, supposing that they 
 were going to the land of savagery; instead of in 
 reality the land of gentlest courtesy, of quaintest 
 ceremony the heaven of children and flowers.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 " How love might be, hath been indeed and is." 
 
 FELLOWES and Talty had been classmates 
 at Annapolis and close friends ever since. 
 A friendship which had stood the test of a cruise 
 together in the woful cementation of the steerage 
 mess, as it was in the old days. Fellowes was, 
 in all respects but one, Talty's ideal of an officer, 
 rarely efficient, almost fanatic in his devotion to 
 the service; and of a gentleman well-bred, loyal, 
 honorable. 
 
 For a healthy sanguine nature like Talty's (with 
 an inherent love of detail and adapting itself easily 
 to every environment) the long period of pre- 
 paredness for war, which best seems to insure peace 
 in these sapient days, carried with it no dangers. 
 But Fellowes had a temperament strung up for 
 action, for the full testing of twenty years of 
 theory; a mind that looked off over wide spaces, 
 beyond the minutiae of foreground that make for 
 
 32
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 sanity. He felt even under the padding of his 
 daily paper the ribs of history, to be studied later 
 by his children's children. Perhaps a blooded 
 horse gathered for tremendous effort and then sud- 
 denly checked, best offers a parallel of outraged 
 spirit and maddened nerves. 
 
 In one of these reactions on his first cruise as 
 an ensign in the days of the "Hump in the Line," 
 a pre-natal weakness, lying till then sleeping with- 
 in him, awoke; and a fight, which left life-long 
 scars, was on his hands; a conflict barren of glory; 
 his own soul the battle-field, ploughed up and 
 riven by bitter strife. 
 
 It was "a fine old gentlemanly vice" transmitted 
 by his maternal grandfather, the only legacy he 
 left. He had been himself in the United States 
 Navy during the Mexican War, and had died sud- 
 denly three months after the declaration of peace. 
 
 It was always peace, not war, that wrought dis- 
 aster with the Fellowes men. 
 
 For a hundred years, here and there in a genera- 
 tion, there had ever been a man carrying the poison 
 of drink in his blood. Kent's father was entirely- 
 free from it the boy was placed under the rigid 
 discipline of the Naval Academy at fifteen, never 
 again returning to his home in St. Louis except 
 
 33
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 as a hurried guest. Thus he was left in ignorance 
 of family traditions, and off his guard, until too 
 late. 
 
 Kent met Dora Talty on his graduation leave, 
 one week of which he spent with Jack in his home 
 in Richmond. And now and then he was again 
 thrown with her during a cruise on the Home Sta- 
 tion, at Old Point, Charleston, and New Orleans 
 during the Mardi Gras. 
 
 Toward the end of that cruise the two class- 
 mates were on deck one night, tramping out to- 
 gether the mid-watch. 
 
 The ship, under orders for the winter cruise, 
 was off Staten Island to take on powder. Life 
 seemed very simple, very plastic, during those 
 silent peaceful hours while the great world slept 
 under the stars, and the ship rode at anchor, at 
 war only with the tide. 
 
 After a long silence, Kent said bluntly: 
 
 "Jack, knowing me as only you do, answer me 
 square. Do you think I have a right to marry?" 
 
 And Talty with that half-comprehension of the 
 relentlessness of nature's laws, with which we 
 stumble through our youth, said impulsively: 
 
 "The one thing that will pull you up, old 
 chap I" 
 
 34
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 And Dora worked off the penalty for that short 
 sentence. Kent wrote to her the next day, and all 
 the rest followed, when the cruise was over. 
 
 Two years before, Jack also had married, 
 greatly to his own surprise. It was the result of 
 an indiscreet pity for a hysterical, anaemic girl 
 who clung convulsively to anything stable that 
 floated by her in the tossing rapids of her emo- 
 tional life. Although it be not in accord with the 
 traditions, the truth is that the most vulnerable 
 man in existence, to feminine charms real or 
 fancied the least cool in judgment, is a Naval 
 officer fresh from a cruise. 
 
 About a year after Dora's marriage, Kent, then 
 on shore duty at the Washington Navy Yard, was 
 ordered to New York on court-martial duty, his 
 first separation from his wife even for a day. 
 When Talty, who was in the office of Naval In- 
 telligence in Washington, heard that Willoughby 
 T. Hanks was on the same court, he experienced 
 his first twinge of anxiety about his brother-in-law 
 since the marriage. Lieutenant Hanks' superb 
 health, of mind and body, was a living refutation 
 of all croakings, religious or hygienic. He left 
 whatever physical debts might accrue to be paid 
 by unborn descendants, for whom he could scarcely 
 
 35
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 be expected to feel any great tenderness. He was 
 a magnificent pagan, bent upon the making of 
 proselytes very dangerous company for Kent 
 Fellowes. 
 
 Talty read in the evening paper before leaving 
 the Department, that the court had adjourned in 
 New York on the previous day, and he gave his 
 wife one of those connubial slips made facile by 
 certain classic shibboleths, and went on his wheel 
 down to the Navy Yard. 
 
 Up to that time Dora never even dreamed of 
 the volcano upon whose sunny slopes she had 
 planted her heart's vineyard with a laugh, and 
 a prayer, and the sense of peace that walks with 
 a great love. 
 
 The instant Jack saw his sister that afternoon, 
 his heart stood still with convicted dread. 
 
 She had seen him coming and stood in her open 
 doorway. 
 
 "O Jack, I'm so glad you came! I'm worried 
 to death about Kent. He got back late last night 
 in a high fever. He's sleeping so heavily, all 
 flushed and burning. Do please go right up and 
 see him." 
 
 The evident gravity with which Talty entered 
 and put down his hat, soothed at once the excited 
 
 36
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 wife. As he stooped to unfasten the bicycle-clips 
 from his trousers he asked : 
 
 "You didn't think it necessary to send for a 
 doctor?" 
 
 "Why, yes " Jack held his breath, but ex- 
 haled it in resonant relief as she added: 
 
 "But Dell made such fun of me, I waited. I 
 should have sent for Doctor Robb last night after 
 I had helped Kent upstairs think of it, Jack, I 
 had to help him, he was so dazed with the fever! 
 But Dell came out of her room, and said all the 
 poor fellow needed was sleep, and for gracious sake 
 to let him have it in peace ! He is better to-day, 
 undoubtedly, but sleeps so soundly. So I sent Dell 
 to the doctor's office, but she came back saying 
 Doctor Robb had gone to the city, and she has 
 no confidence whatever in the 'big' doctor. And 
 
 Jack, I forgot! The captain of the Yard sent 
 for Kent this morning. Dell spoke to the messen- 
 ger she said I'd exaggerate Kent's illness, and 
 have a medical survey sitting on him, first thing 
 
 1 knew. A lot of papers are here for Kent to 
 sign, and I hated to rouse him. You'll see to it 
 all, and straighten things out for us?" 
 
 "I'll see to it all, dear," repeated he gravely. 
 Then and there it began to be borne in upon him 
 
 37
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 that he had assumed a great moral responsibility 
 that dwarfed even his own witless marriage. 
 
 He began to pace slowly, up and down the hall, 
 with head bent, until Dora cried amazed: 
 
 "Why, aren't you going up to see what's the 
 matter with poor Kent?" 
 
 "Oh, yes!" he said, recalling himself to the 
 burden of the moment. "Don't come up, stay 
 here." 
 
 "Why?" she demanded, in wonder. 
 
 "Well, you see I'm much more likely to get at 
 the truth if I see him alone. To me he will not 
 pretend to be any more chipper than he really is. 
 I'll not be long." 
 
 He went slowly up the stairway, opened a door 
 and entered, closing and locking it after him. 
 
 The sound of heavy stertorous breathing came 
 from the bed in the darkened room, and now and 
 then a long sigh that was almost a groan. 
 
 Raising one of the window-shades Jack ap- 
 proached the bed. 
 
 With one bare glance down at the flushed dis- 
 figured face, he turned abruptly away. 
 
 "God in heaven, it has come 1" he muttered in 
 a whisper. 
 
 He went to the window, staring out with the 
 38
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 blank eyes of introspection, and during the ensu- 
 ing ten minutes he fitted a new burden to his shoul- 
 ders the real Kent, proud, sensitive, unselfish, fas- 
 tidious almost to a fault, loving his young wife 
 profoundly; the Kent lying there in a drunken 
 stupor. 
 
 And innocent, flower-like, gentle little Dora! 
 Purblind fool that he had been to sacrifice his sister 
 to his friend, in one of those obsessions of sympathy 
 that seemed doomed to wreck his own life and the 
 lives of those he loved. 
 
 The only expiation possible was to stand be- 
 tween Dora and the vice itself; and between his 
 friend and the consequences, as far as lay in his 
 power, from that hour on to the end. 
 
 The almost insurmountable difficulties of this 
 were not lost upon his quickened imagination ; the 
 close contact with men whose official duty it is to 
 demand of one another the highest possible stand- 
 ard of conduct; the publicity of life in the Navy 
 afloat or ashore. By his marriage he had become 
 part of the great staid social system, thereby 
 doubling the chances of discovery. The end 
 seemed inevitable save by a miracle. 
 
 Talty once more approached the bed and made 
 a fruitless attempt to rouse Fellowes, but the poison 
 
 39
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 in him had the exaggerated effect upon him that 
 it often has in the case of a transmitted vice. 
 
 Talty opened both windows, drew in the shut- 
 ters, covered the prostrate figure with an addi- 
 tional blanket, and with one agonized glance at 
 his unconscious friend, he left the room. 
 
 After listening over the balusters for an instant, 
 he tip-toed to Adele's room at the other end of the 
 upper hall. He tapped softly, whispering, as he 
 heard the handle turn: 
 
 "Dell, it's Jack ! Open the door quickly." 
 
 She did so, and they stood face to face, each 
 pair of eyes on guard, fencing with the truth. 
 There had always been something clairvoyant in 
 the action between their minds, there never was 
 the least use to try concealment. 
 
 A man seldom appears to less advantage than 
 when fighting for self-justification with a good 
 woman, roused, and rolling down bowlders of in- 
 fallibility from the higher levels where such wom- 
 en live out their sheltered lives. Until parley can 
 be had more on his level, there is little to do but 
 wait, under cover. 
 
 She beckoned him in and closed the door. 
 
 "How long have you known this, Jack?" were 
 her first words. 
 
 40
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 "From the first, but, Dell, listen " 
 
 "Before Dora's marriage?" 
 
 "Before their marriage." 
 
 "Oh, I see ! a sister crucified to save a classmate. 
 You're a good friend, Jack, at least. But how 
 could you, how could you ?" the girl walked about 
 excitedly striking one closed fist into her open 
 palm. 
 
 "I thought I hoped " 
 
 "Of course you did ! All blunders are built on 
 those two corner-stones. What amazes me is that 
 your mind could twist itself into believing it possi- 
 ble; the fact that your ethics could foist the ex- 
 periment upon your sister is secondary, bad as it 
 is. To use a woman's life as a moral lever to 
 turn a man from a sinner to a saint ! Would you 
 recommend the reversed role to any man of your 
 long list of friends? It's one of the 'female parts' 
 in the comedy, it seems!" 
 
 "When you are through, Dell and you're dead 
 right about the whole thing I have something to 
 say." 
 
 The rare sight of her brother's grave white face 
 silenced her as no argument could have done ; and 
 presently he added : 
 
 "We Taltys have got to pull together now, not
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 against one another. Officially it shall be my task, 
 socially yours. Go on, Dell, as you've so ably 
 begun. Of course I see your cognizant touch in 
 all that about the doctors everything, since last 
 night." 
 
 "I think, Jack, she had much better be told at 
 once. The danger is trebled by her very igno- 
 rance." 
 
 "To him, yes; but to her, Dell think a mo- 
 ment!" 
 
 "You're right, for a little while longer we must 
 keep it from her until " 
 
 "I will see him through this, she need not know. 
 But the marvel of her not knowing, Dell 1 I can- 
 not understand it, you knew !" 
 
 "Dora's nature has an affinity only for light, 
 truth, order, beauty, harmony. I have sometimes 
 thought the very force of her idealizing thought 
 created these along her path, and killed all else. 
 For instance, Mammy never used to let Dora see 
 the what shall I call it? the sinuosities of her 
 nature. She always used to say " 
 
 "Dell! I've got it. Send for Mammy Lina! 
 I'll share her wages with you, and I'll write and 
 wheedle Cousin Cartright into giving her up for 
 awhile anyhow. It was understood she was to 
 
 42
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 come if any of us wanted her. She's the smoothest 
 thing in liars alive ! There's a heap of it ahead of 
 us. Her talent may as well be utilized, even if 
 not really encouraged. Ah, it's not simple life 
 it's not simple." 
 
 There was a short silence between them, and 
 he continued his quarter-deck turn up and down 
 the room; then suddenly he stopped before her 
 and poured out the whole story of his intense love 
 for his friend; his honest belief that the marriage 
 would redeem him ; the great shock of the failure 
 they were now facing; ending, as he turned ab- 
 ruptly away from her, in almost incoherent self- 
 denunciation. All Adele's womanliness was at 
 once enlisted on her brother's side, and her tact 
 almost flawless when she chose to use it soon 
 quieted him and made it possible for him to de- 
 scend with her and rejoin the impatient wife. 
 
 "What does Kent say?" she cried at once. 
 
 "You've never been a judge advocate on a ten 
 days' court, Dora, or you wouldn't have to ask 
 that question. A fellow's either lucky or lazy if 
 he gets any sleep under the P.M. invoice. He's 
 all right; dead tired, and seems to have taken cold, 
 wants sleep; be all right to-morrow. Lord love 
 us ! even that other perfect man, Romeo, had dys- 
 pepsia and megrims " 
 
 43
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 " and insomnia," suggested Dell, mechan- 
 ically returning his lead; and their cross-ruff soon 
 had pliable, happy-natured Dora in a gale of pro- 
 testing laughter, as they belittled and held up to 
 ridicule her wifely alarms. 
 
 "No wonder Kent calls you two 'Bones and 
 Tambourine' 1" she finally managed to say, wiping 
 her pretty brown eyes. 
 
 "Meaning her as the latter!" clamored Jack, 
 patting a portly frontage, and strutting offensively 
 to countervail a face still white with anguish and 
 eyes that wept inwardly. 
 
 Adele went uptown to spend the night with 
 Mrs. Talty, the only way to insure her sister-in- 
 law's absence, and gain her husband's presence at 
 the Yard over night. 
 
 The birth of his little daughter, Julie, three 
 months after the disastrous home-coming from the 
 court-martial, kept Fellowes' path free from even 
 temptation for almost a year. Then came a day 
 when the child's life hung by a thread. 
 
 All had been done that could be, and there was 
 nothing for it but to wait, and try and read the 
 doctor's face stooping over the gasping child. 
 The tension, his utter uselessness, days of hasty 
 and irregular meals, drove the half-frantic father 
 
 44
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 downstairs, where he drank two glasses of port, 
 toward dawn. 
 
 To touch one drop was fatal to him, and it was 
 ten days before he was again entirely himself; al- 
 though going and coming on his daily round, and 
 sluggishly thankful that his child was living. 
 
 It was during one of those days that Dora sud- 
 denly came to, at least, a partial comprehension of 
 the truth; deeming it a single indiscretion induced 
 by excitement. 
 
 What day or hour it reached her consciousness, 
 Adele never knew, the wife's subterfuge was so 
 instinct with it. 
 
 But her dry alert eyes, the lines on the smooth 
 girlish brow, stencilling themselves deeper and 
 deeper as the weeks went on, the pitiful attempts 
 at a no longer genuine gayety, drove Adele to a de- 
 cision, indorsed by her brother. She went south 
 on a series of visits among her many relations in 
 the old city of her birth. 
 
 The family residence of her parents, neither of 
 whom was living, was then in the hands of a 
 collateral branch of her father's family; there only 
 she did not go, even turning away her head when- 
 ever they drove by, and they all understood and 
 sympathized. 
 
 45
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 When she deemed that her absence had relieved 
 her sister of the first great strain of readjustment 
 to a new and grievous condition, she returned 
 north, and with her an old negress, whose grand- 
 father had been sold to the ante-bellum Taltys 
 straight from the slave-ship which had brought 
 him over from Africa. Mammy Lina was of pure 
 negro blood, with full brownish lips, a flattened 
 nose, and hair like dyed sea-moss. A fine strong 
 black cruel face, softened by inexpressibly sad 
 loving eyes ; and a voice that held in solution every 
 human emotion, good or bad. An exquisite voice 
 that coaxed or commanded, sympathized or re- 
 pelled, loved unto death, hated in like measure, 
 rippled in delicious laughter or became merely sibi- 
 lant in wordless rage. To have seen and heard 
 her formless crooning over the Talty babies as they 
 had come one by one into her childless life, was 
 to have a sudden vision of a cleared space in a 
 jungle, where all young life survived only at the 
 price of a ceaseless vigilance. She had been named 
 Carolina, but insisted on the prefix S. lest she 
 should be taken for the worthless flotsam of a state 
 further north, and deemed less aristocratic. 
 
 In the meanwhile, after a second lapse on Fel- 
 lowes' part, Jack saw that he must break down 
 
 46
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 the pitiful wall of deception Dora had jealously 
 built between her secret and the whole prying 
 world. She was not in the least one of those unre- 
 corded heroines who fight, with a smile ready al- 
 ways on their lips, deceiving successfully as long 
 as life is in them; only in the facial helplessness of 
 death, laying bare the ravages of their agony. So 
 when her brother told Dora that he had long been 
 aware of her husband's weakness, she instantly 
 clung to him infinitely relieved. He let pass with- 
 out comment her piteous appeal that Adele should 
 never know. Of course each time should be the 
 last Kent was as sure as she of that to the end. 
 
 From the depression that inevitably followed 
 upon each attack of Kent's drinking mania, it re- 
 quired all Dora's loving sympathy to drag him 
 out sane. 
 
 Nothing but the genius of pure love gave her 
 the penetration to attach him little by little once 
 more to life; to reinstate some semblance of his 
 shattered self-respect. 
 
 When the madness was passed, and he lay white 
 and speechless in a hell of self-loathing, she sat 
 beside him, letting him cling in almost a frenzy of 
 humility to one of her hands; or gently forcing 
 upon him much needed nutrition, a spoonful at a 
 
 47
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 time, in heart-breaking pretence of being happy 
 to have him ill and helplessly dependent upon her. 
 In fact a great exhilaration always came to her 
 during the first days after they had together won 
 the battle, and the craving began to abate in nausea 
 and repulsion. Strangely enough (to the happy 
 lives that have been spared contact with a great 
 vice) those hours of sad victory knitted their two 
 souls together in a bond infinitely profound, un- 
 translatably exalted. 
 
 In these days of insistent pitiless individualism, 
 it is difficult to win for such as Dora aught but 
 contempt. Be that as it may, a few such women 
 there ever have been, to whom "until death us do 
 part" means more than until disillusion us do 
 part, the new woman claiming an almost comical 
 sex monopoly of a fairly common emotion. 
 
 When Kent's mental restlessness began (always 
 before the physical) Dora read to him almost in- 
 cessantly during his waking hours. As time went 
 on, she discovered that he was best diverted by 
 arctic adventures, or explorations into unknown 
 lands, and eventually they had a very complete 
 library of these tales, over which she drew a heavy 
 curtain when all need of them was for the time 
 being over. Then came his great bodily unrest, 
 
 48
 
 DORA'S SECRET 
 
 during which she walked with him almost hourly, 
 coming home only for meals, keeping her hat on 
 all day; often falling asleep from sheer exhaustion 
 as soon as she sat down. He was by no means a 
 brute, but he found that to let her have her way 
 with him was to minimize the strain upon her. 
 
 When he could speak at all it was to say: 
 
 "Don't read any more, dear, your voice is tired," 
 or "My little wife, I cannot let you walk again 
 with me this afternoon. Look at me, Dora, I 
 promise you I will not go outside the Yard, if you 
 will rest." 
 
 But there were club-rooms and thoughtless men 
 to beat down convalescent resolve, and so she 
 laughed and protested: "Won't you please let me 
 get two breaths of fresh air without such a fuss! 
 If I'm sleepy it's because I'm so vulgarly strong 
 and healthy. And Kent I'm only happy when 
 I'm with you, truly dear." 
 
 Then he would go to her, place his trembling 
 hands on her shoulders, stoop and kiss her brow 
 reverently and say in a broken voice : 
 
 "God bless you, my darling; come then with 
 me, for you are my lamp in all this darkness, and 
 I need you so." 
 
 His periodic disappearances from his duties 
 49
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 were covered by a rumor of malaria, started and 
 kept rolling by Passed Assistant Surgeon Robb, 
 loquaciously abetted by Talty, although no word 
 had ever passed between the two men upon the 
 subject. 
 
 The orders to sea at the end of three years' 
 shore duty opened a new vista of unfamiliar terrors 
 to the young wife; but Jack was to be with him, 
 and she herself not far away, and all would be 
 well. 
 
 If other human faculties had but half the vital- 
 ity of hope, threescore years would be but ado- 
 lescence.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 LIFE UNDER THE "LONE PINE" 
 
 " You like better to pleaie than to be loved." 
 
 THE two officers joined the "Boston" at 
 Hong Kong, leaving their families en 
 route at Nagasaki, as a compromise point between 
 China and Japan. 
 
 It was a mere euphemism for Talty to say he, 
 of his own volition, had aught to do with Imogen's 
 movements. She elected to remain temporarily 
 with her sisters-in-law because the fitting up of 
 their little home would include one of her sources 
 of intense excitement shopping. And then per- 
 haps there was hidden in the woman a mother's 
 instinct, denied its rightful outlet, which might 
 have made melody out of the harsh jangle of her 
 nature. 
 
 After a week at the hotel, through Imogen's 
 acquaintance with the wife of an American resi- 
 dent, they were able to take possession of a bunga- 
 low up on the abrupt hill-side, back from the Bund.
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Ippon Matsu," surrounded by its beautiful but 
 painfully becoddled garden, is one of the show- 
 places in the town ; in that it is built around a huge 
 living pine-tree, whose trunk, as in Hunding's hut, 
 is a salient part of the large entrance-hall, fitted 
 out as a conservatory. 
 
 Under the same local guidance they came into 
 possession of a Japanese cook, noted principally 
 for that purely American dish strawberry short- 
 cake (although admittedly weak in soups). This 
 talent at best of ephemeral value was always 
 brought conspicuously forward by him when seek- 
 ing American patronage, as was an equal one for 
 tarts or scones, if sought by English or Scotch 
 housewives. He was known only as u Cook-san." 
 Then Miss Springtime O Haru san became 
 Julie's extremely pretty little amah; and finally 
 Yamaguchi, who was gardener, momban, messen- 
 ger, gomiman all in one, and received six dollars 
 a month for his Protean office. 
 
 Mammy reigned contemptuously over them all. 
 The first day they moved in from the hotel, the 
 two sisters, with the insouciance of southern folk, 
 played cribbage in the summer-house, which over- 
 looks the harbor, while Imogen, breathless and im- 
 portant beyond all former conceptions of that 
 
 52
 
 LIFE UNDER THE "LONE PINE" 
 
 word, created chaos within the house, where other- 
 wise peace and order would soon have ruled under 
 the quieter manipulations of the Japanese. 
 
 Cook-san had appeared betimes, carrying over 
 his shoulder a branch of flame-colored azalea, fol- 
 lowed by a cringing coolie who bore a strangely 
 small bundle of primitive kitchen-utensils, and also 
 the provisions for the day, soon to be serenely 
 served, the azalea for table-decoration. Julie 
 meanwhile paddled about pendant from a blue rag 
 in the hands of her docile amah. Imogen stormed 
 about, Mammy worked in scornful silence, Cook- 
 san performed miracles of gustatorial economy 
 out of nothing, and was soon able to smoke many 
 pipes in peace on the door-step, his domain in per- 
 fect order. Yamaguchi and two coolies were as 
 leaves blown about in many winds. The sisters 
 laughed and trusted Mammy. 
 
 In twenty-four hours such order came out of the 
 ferment that Mrs. Fellowes could have given a 
 dinner to exactly six people, if Julie had consented 
 to go to sleep, thus releasing amah for the neces- 
 sary rapid and frequent washing of their meagre 
 table-equipment. 
 
 Even a make-shift five-o'clock-tea table and a 
 nest of Chinese poys, stood ready in a corner of 
 
 53
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 the drawing-room for the visitors Imogen vowed 
 were "positively champing" to call upon them. 
 
 Adele had declared for blue, after her first tour 
 about the native town, and blue chijimi draped the 
 windows, blue Osaka rugs covered the oiled floors, 
 blue Seto ware clattered in the dining-room. The 
 effect, if monotonous, was not wholly inartistic if 
 the small expenditure be taken as a basis of 
 reckoning. 
 
 Both Fellowes and Talty were men firmly op- 
 posed to their wives "following the ship," as the 
 saying is ; but the chasm between theory and prac- 
 tice yawned with especial width in both their cases. 
 Kent clung almost superstitiously to a belief in the 
 great moral effect upon him of his wife's nearness, 
 only too willing to yield to Jack's solicitations ; and 
 the latter had no longer even a rag of dogma to 
 swear by, as far as Imogen was concerned, and 
 fenced listlessly for peace only, as good men stulti- 
 fied by mis-marriage are prone to do. 
 
 Dora and Adele were better able to consider 
 Imogen in a humorous light, in face of her avowed 
 resolve to join her husband, as soon as he could tell 
 her the probable movements of the ship. It would 
 seem from this that her absence was assured him, 
 but he had long ago discovered the fallacy of any 
 
 54
 
 LIFE UNDER THE "LONE PINE" 
 
 such view; for after a few weeks of carefully fos- 
 tered uncertainty, she went anyhow. 
 
 "It seems a long way to come, just to sit and 
 wait once more for the postman," sighed Mrs. Fel- 
 lowes, standing on the veranda with eyes on the bay 
 far below, where the ships came and went. 
 
 "Wait till our first letters come from the ship, 
 and you'll see the difference," replied Imogen; 
 "our news will be six days old instead of almost 
 six weeks ; and it's a real bargain to cable ! 
 Twenty cents instead of one-fifty a word, think of 
 that! Then, as I tell Jack, I haven't a good 
 enough memory to be left at home for three years, 
 all my wifely constancy dependent on a poor photo- 
 graph of a man whose very voice I forget in two 
 months. No, there isn't an inch of Penelope about 
 me, thank you ! What was the name of that siren 
 that set her her fins for Mr. Penelope? Now 
 what was her name? Calliope? What say, 
 Dell?" 
 
 "I only said it was almost right, and I do wish 
 Yamaguchi would stop his everlasting manicuring 
 of this garden; he's just dusted the hedge from 
 end to end, and I'm all worn out !" groaned Adele 
 from the top step. 
 
 "It commences with a C, anyhow. Well, what 
 55
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 I was going to say, when I was interrupted, was 
 that I want to be right on hand and do my own 
 guessing about John Talty's lady friends! Your 
 brother is the most childlike, helpless, unobservant 
 man I ever knew 1" 
 
 "It's a wise husband who lets his wife think 
 that," murmured Adele, whose eyes still sucked 
 gloom from Yamaguchi's puerile efforts to be 
 noticed. 
 
 "Now, what do you mean by that? Dora, what 
 does Dell mean by that?" cried Imogen hysterical 
 at once; and only by a prompt belittling of Dell's 
 intellect could she be quieted. 
 
 Just as the disappointed gardener had in despair 
 resorted to a fit of plainly fictitious coughing, 
 Mammy appeared and reminded them of their 
 morning's task, and the three young women went 
 to work on the bedroom curtains, spread upon the 
 dining-table. 
 
 No unattached being has ever made that voyage 
 across the Pacific without a flirtation of greater or 
 less import, least of all Adele Talty, to whom it 
 was the breath of her nostrils. 
 
 "It's the greatest tonic in the world, my dear," 
 she wickedly persisted to a disgusted Imogen, "and 
 a positive cure for all purely nervous troubles. I 
 
 56
 
 LIFE UNDER THE "LONE PINE" 
 
 like it because one always likes to do what one does 
 well. In the first place I admit I hold good cards. 
 Eyes that answer to the strings ' I pull, even to 
 shedding very successful, if not saline, tears; 
 a large, soft, dimpled hand, the hand men like; 
 and a voice but you've all felt the charm of that. 
 Did you speak, Imogen? Oh, pardon me, I 
 thought you said (and you are right) the world is 
 only just beginning to see once again aught but 
 dishonor in the warm shade of my abundant hair, 
 so bepraised in cinquecento days. And then " 
 
 "Oh, for mercy sakes, Dell ! That may amuse 
 you, but it doesn't either your sister or me," where- 
 upon Dora swallowed her tributary giggles. 
 
 "Dat gent'mun wot was on de steamer wid us 
 toe see yer, Miss Dell," confided Mammy famil- 
 iarly from the door-way. 
 
 "It is he ! Down, flutterer, down, I say !" hissed 
 Dell, thumping her chest resoundingly. "Girls, 
 how do I look? Will I do? Mammy, come here 
 quick, pick me! pick me!" The girl whirled her 
 skirts wildly about, trying to get rid of adherent 
 scraps and threads. "Mammy, did you hear what 
 I said to you? Come here right away and pick 
 my dress clean!" 
 
 "I done hyar yer all right miff, Miss Dell I 
 57
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 reckon de onliest thing I didn' lose on dat yer ole 
 steamer was meh yars but, honey chile, all de 
 hens I'se ever picked has been daid ! I ain' never 
 pulled de feathers off'n one on de wing. I reckon 
 I'd bes' wait till yer light, miss I" 
 
 The laugh was on Dell, and Mammy kept up her 
 low chuckle as she relieved her now motionless 
 young mistress of her superfluous plumage ; whom 
 she then followed out of the room. As the girl 
 started toward the drawing-room Mammy's hand 
 stopped her, and the whispered words: 
 
 "Miss Dell, yer shorely ain' goin' right slam in 
 widout'n one weentsy-teentsy dash ob rice powder 
 on de nose ? De haidless ways ob young ladies now- 
 'days ! It sutney do shine, miss, like Aunt Bene's 
 Friday night silver. Yas, um, it do !" 
 
 "Mammy Lina, you're a downright corrupt ole 
 thing! You ought to be ashamed of yourself 
 teaching me tricks, your youngest baby, and the 
 flower of the family." 
 
 "Land sakes! ain' no tricks nobody kin teach 
 you, missy! An' dat's de blessed Lord's own 
 troof!" The black woman's great pride in the 
 perfidy of her adored mistress glowed in her eyes 
 as she watched the girl dancing down the hall 
 toward her victim. 
 
 58
 
 LIFE UNDER THE "LONE PINE" 
 
 "Well, Captain Fitchett, it's awfully nice to see 
 you again. So you found us at last ! I began to 
 think you had gone on to Shanghai," was her cor- 
 dially disingenuous greeting to a tall awkward 
 man, who bowed with a jerk of his very blond head. 
 His hand advanced only after she had withdrawn 
 hers, seeing which he blushed painfully. His face 
 bore the ineradicable look of a life on the sea; 
 the deep leather color paled a little by the joy of 
 seeing her, after many days of starving. He 
 stared at her with wide, unblinking eyes, uncon- 
 scious that he was smileless. 
 
 When he spoke, two facts were at once evident : 
 that New England was his birthplace, and that he 
 sprang from primitive people. Now and then 
 Britishisms adorned his artless speech. 
 
 "Miss Talty, what you have just said isn't 
 square. You told me not to come till to-day; and 
 you knew I was no more likely to go over to Shang- 
 hai till I did see you than well anything you 
 like to name. Now, didn't you?" 
 
 "Sit down, over there that's the only mascu- 
 line chair we have. I'll ring for tea." 
 
 "Please don't, I don't want what I've got to say 
 to get mixed up with 'how many lumps' and all 
 that ! 'Tain't easy to keep you on the right course 
 
 59
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 any time, let alone foolin' with crockery. Now, 
 didn't you know I'd come?" he persisted. 
 
 "Well, now you draw my attention to it so 
 forcibly, Captain Fitchett, I confess I rather 
 thought you'd come to say good-by to Julie." 
 
 For some reason her indirectness always gave 
 him intense pleasure, and he laughed suddenly, and 
 then his face fell into its usual gravity and he said 
 slowly : 
 
 "It's real holy to me, what I have to tell you 
 before I go. Somehow it's the best part of the 
 stuff I carry, and the deepest in the hold. A man 
 keeps things like that down in him in a strong box ; 
 sometimes he never comes across the key to it, and 
 it's buried just so with him, and that's the worst 
 of all. And sometimes he loses it after he's had 
 it; and sometimes he finds it and it fits all right 
 but all the same, it isn't meant for his key-ring, 
 and he's just got to let it lay and pass on whistling 
 and playing he don't care much one way or other, 
 so's nobody'll feel bad. Do you make anything 
 out of what I'm trying to say?" 
 
 "I think I understand," murmured a much-sub- 
 dued Adele, all gentleness with meekly folded 
 hands. 
 
 "I know your place in life, Miss Talty, and I 
 60
 
 LIFE UNDER THE :< LONE PINE" 
 
 know mine. It's just one of those facts (like a 
 mountain and a valley) that was so when we came 
 into the world. You can't change things like that 
 not rightly, now can you?" 
 
 "Please, please, Captain Fitchett, if you knew 
 what a vain, shallow, horrid nature I have; why, 
 yours is worth ten of mine truly!" she cried 
 earnestly. 
 
 "Yes, I know," was his calm reply; "you're not 
 more important than the flowers are, but it 
 wouldn't be much of a world to live in without 
 them, all the same. I guess flowers come naturally 
 to mean something special to sailors." 
 
 He stopped and for the first time his eyes left 
 her face, and wandered out of the window down 
 to the bay, where sampans danced about in the 
 sharp afternoon breeze that swept up from the 
 China Sea. 
 
 Adele was utterly at a loss with this man in his 
 present mood, with whom (among others less 
 primitive) she had amused herself on the steamer 
 coming over. 
 
 She sat ill at ease, somewhat awed, and humili- 
 ated by her undesired success. 
 
 "You asked me once about my life, but I couldn't 
 tell you with all those others round, always laugh- 
 
 61
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 ing. I've come to tell you to-day, and then I'm 
 going away. I've lived twenty years in Shanghai, 
 off and on. I take political prisoners, that come 
 round by Suez, up to the Russian penal colony at 
 Saghalien. Then we bring down coal to Port 
 Arthur. My passengers are mostly prisoners. A 
 man sees cruel things and he can't do much about 
 it, but look away. But I'm the skipper and I do 
 what I can. It's a hard life. Yes, that's the way 
 I learned to speak Russian, and know such a lot 
 of criminal yarns. You always used to wonder. 
 There's a heap of underground business going on 
 out here, that ain't got into the papers yet. It'll 
 be in books by and by. Oh, yes, I'm in it up to 
 the eyes, but so long as I'm in their employ, I'm 
 not talking much. They pay me all right those 
 Russian fellows and they let me be. There's 
 money in it, direct and indirect the cumshaw sys- 
 tem rules in China, no use fighting it. You give and 
 you take. And I want it for my little girl Manthy. 
 Oh, I knew I'd surprise you ! She was born twenty 
 years ago, and I never laid eyes on her till this 
 trip home first one in all that time. I left her 
 with mother, I wanted she should be brought 
 up pukka. She's neat and she's good, and goes to 
 church, and I dress her nice," he paused, watching 
 
 62
 
 LIFE UNDER THE "LONE PINE" 
 
 for the effect pathetically, and Dell did not dis- 
 appoint him. "Takes four and a half yards to 
 make those loose bodices women wear now, doesn't 
 it? I thought I had about the size of it. Well, I 
 got her six of 'em, all silk. I just let her choose, and 
 she'd laugh, and blush, and the clerks thought we 
 were a young couple. You see I took her down 
 to Boston to give her a good time. I fixed her 
 out real nice. I didn't stint any money on Manthy, 
 once I got back to her. I'd been saving a long 
 time, and I guess I can save again. I don't know 
 which I like the best: saving, or blowing it all in 
 at once. Two ancestors scrapping in me, you 
 think? Well, I guess that's just it! Hadn't 
 thought of that. Miss Talty" he hesitated, feel- 
 ing his own pulse, not hers, before going on : "I'd 
 like to tell you about the way Manthy and I met. 
 I never told anyone, even mother. I felt down 
 sick from excitement when I got home, and I saw 
 mother first (looking not a day older, by ginger!) 
 and I told her to send my baby in to me, and leave 
 us alone. And she came in and I couldn't speak, 
 and I had to sit down sudden, I felt so queer. 
 Somehow I'd got it into my head she'd be a little 
 bit of a girl, you see, although mother'd sent me 
 one or two pictures of her. There she stood in the 
 
 63
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 door-way tall, like me, and so clean and pretty, and 
 I liked the way she did her hair. And I knew in 
 a second by her eyes, as a man always knows, that 
 she was good. That's what I liked best of all. 
 And there we were, both of us plum scared to 
 death! But she was a grown-up woman, and I 
 was sort of surprised at mother leaving her alone 
 with me after Shanghai. I didn't think I had 
 any right to touch a big girl like that after 
 well, after the way men live out here. Oh, I was 
 all adrift, and in a fog, and couldn't get the sun. 
 I vow I'd a-been there yet if it hadn't been for 
 Manthyl She Miss Talty she waited and she 
 waited, staring, and then she must have felt sorry 
 for me, for she ran to me and she put her arms 
 around my neck and she whispered, shy-like, just 
 one word: 'Papa!' and I don't remember the rest 
 very well something burst inside of me," he 
 ended simply. 
 
 Dell's eyes were full and she caught her breath. 
 
 "I'm glad I told you I was afraid I wouldn't 
 be. I couldn't bring myself to talking with mother. 
 Mother she's a good woman, and strong, and did 
 well by Manthy; but my girl's mother was a 
 Roman Catholic, and mother'll never get over it 
 as long's there's life in her. Say, do you know 
 
 64
 
 LIFE UNDER THE "LONE PINE" 
 
 Vermont? Ever lived there? Well, I married 
 her just the same. And the candle of her life was 
 blown out just as the baby's was lit. Mother said 
 it was a judgment. I wouldn't even look at the 
 baby, never laid eyes on her! And there wasn't 
 anything to keep me, but I had my trade, and I 
 got this offer out here from the Russians, and I 
 came. Mother's been good to Manthy and raised 
 her nice, but she's a Presbyterian all right!" a smile 
 softened his face for an instant. "Every other 
 year I've got to go home now, Manthy says, or 
 she'll get married to punish me. I believe I'd kill 
 a man if he took her away from me now! Think 
 not? Well, perhaps; I can't have her out here, 
 you see. A little white thing like that in Shanghai, 
 and I away most of the time? No, I can't have 
 her, that's settled. She has ways like you, Miss 
 Talty; sort of saucy, and teasing and exciting 
 somehow; and she says more than she means or 
 lots less you never know. But you like it all the 
 same. There's something sort of naughty about it, 
 and yet a man knows down under, it really isn't. 
 I don't seem to be able to get hold of what I do 
 mean." 
 
 "And Manthy's mother, tell me about her?" 
 asked Dell, thinking only to please the man. 
 
 65
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 To her amazement he answered shortly: 
 
 "That's best left alone, I think." 
 
 "I did not mean I only I beg your pardon, 
 Captain Fitchett," poor Dell stopped, confused 
 for one of the few times in her life. 
 
 "That's all right, Miss Talty. I want you 
 should know everything you do is all right always. 
 But all that hurt so long, shut up alone with it, 
 that I can't touch it even for you; any more than 
 I'd let anyone speak of you to me. I guess I'm 
 saving in my affections same's my pocket, till it 
 comes to spending it on the two or three people I've 
 ever loved in all my life, then I'm game to the last 
 copper cash, and don't you forget it! And now 
 I must be going. I sail at six." He arose, 
 walked to the window, and with his back turned, 
 presently said: 
 
 "There's something, Miss Talty, that's been 
 teasing and teasing me for a week, I wonder 
 if you'd let me use a word once before I go? 
 I know I'd feel quiet if you'd let me say it." 
 
 "Oh, I'm so sorry about everything! Yes, 
 yes, I trust you absolutely Manthy's father? 
 Ah, how could I do otherwise?" 
 
 He crossed the room, and his great brown hands 
 swallowed her little white ones, and he said with 
 
 a quiet gentleness: 
 
 66
 
 LIFE UNDER THE "LONE PINE" 
 
 "It's all here the love but there's no use. 
 It's going to be a great comfort to me, just the 
 same, if you'd let me write to you about Manthy. 
 Good-by, dear dear!" he repeated lingeringly, 
 and then he was gone. 
 
 "Mammy, O Mammy! come here to me. this 
 minute, I want you !" wailed Dell in the hall, and 
 when the old woman came breathless, the girl threw 
 herself into the black arms that had framed all her 
 moods since she was born. And Mammy went 
 back to baby talk, rocking the girl back and forth 
 on her knee. 
 
 "Dere, dere ! Mammy'll take a sharp stick ter 
 dose ole silly teahs cl'ar out'n dis, spilin' de purty 
 eyes ! Ole debbil ob a man, raisin' a row jes co'se 
 she kyarn't marry him kyarn't marry all ob um !" 
 
 "Mammy, he didn't ask me. It isn't that. It's 
 because " 
 
 The old nurse heard only the first phrase, and 
 holding Dell off from her by the shoulders, she 
 sternly asked: 
 
 "He didn' done arsk yer? Wot yer mean, Miss 
 Dell? Wot fer yer wase'n de whole breathin' 
 arfternoon on him, 'less he was a co'tin' yer? Wot 
 fer yer bus' right out weepin' and wailin' like dis?" 
 
 "He's so so good and this time it wasn't any 
 
 fun at all!" 
 
 67
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Yer ain' got no call ter cry 'cause a man's good 
 'ceptin' an 'scusin' de rareness of it! I 'clar, 
 I'se right 'shamed 'bout dis, I sutney are, Miss 
 Dell ! Arfter yo' ma an' I raised yer so " 
 
 "Please don't scold, he would have asked me if 
 I had encouraged him, truly he would. And you'd 
 never understand, dear old Mammy, if I talked 
 a year." 
 
 "Oh, he would? Well, I reckon we-all '11 git 
 on s'prisingly well widout'n him! Nuthin' but a 
 po' white trash Yankee man, anyhow, an' Miss 
 Im'gen she 'grees wid me!" 
 
 The negress relaxed her grasp on Dell, and drew 
 her again toward her, emitting sundry sounds of 
 gradual pacification, and soon peace was once more 
 established between the two. 
 
 68
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 " Fate steals along with ilent tread." 
 
 OH, Dell!" cried Dora one afternoon, 
 
 prolonging the vowel in southern fashion : 
 "Come here, I've got something to tell you." 
 
 Mrs. Fellowes had just come in from her search 
 for salt-cellars, which furnished her the daily mo- 
 tive for long strolls about the native town, as its 
 cognates have generations of otherwise sane 
 Anglo-Saxons, when the Oriental seed of barter 
 once begins to germinate within them. 
 
 "Find any saka-dzuki-daif" asked Adele, ad- 
 vancing down the hall, her finger in a book. 
 
 "Yes, three perfect beauties! Darlingest old 
 hideous things you ever laid eyes on, outside of a 
 nightmare. I'll show you but that's not what 
 I want to tell you. Whom do you suppose I met 
 at old Sato's? Now, guess! I'll give you three 
 guesses I'll give you thirty-three ! Walked in as 
 cool as ever, twice as handsome, and I'll not tell 
 
 69
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 you another thing if you don't get a little excited 
 about it." Dell spurned all surmises, and her book 
 tucked under her arm, began to untie the queer 
 little packages pendant from bits of coarse split 
 straw-rope. 
 
 When Dora could no longer stand the irritating 
 silence, she exclaimed: 
 
 "Doctor Robb !" and openly revelled in her 
 sister's uncontrollable surprise and embarrassment. 
 
 "You don't mean Passed Assistant Surgeon 
 Stoneleigh Robb, United States Navy?" the girl 
 demanded hysterically. 
 
 Dora walked away toward her room, bent on 
 revenge. 
 
 "When's he coming?" cried Dell, starting after 
 her, full tilt, before she could lock her door. But 
 it was too good a chance shot to lose, and over her 
 shoulder Dora tossed: 
 
 "Coming? I didn't say he was coming. He's 
 going on the O. and O. steamer at five this after- 
 noon, as soon as they coal." 
 
 "Indeed I Any other news?" 
 
 Dell strove after vocal indifference, and over- 
 did it. 
 
 "Oh, then you wouldn't mind a little mundane 
 chatter after all? I wouldn't intrude for worlds I" 
 
 70
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 baited Dora, feeling for hat-spears before the 
 glass. 
 
 "Dora !" pleaded the one. 
 
 "Dell!" teased the other. 
 
 "Well, I want to talk too badly to waste any 
 more time. He's ordered to the 'Boston' I Doc- 
 tor Steinberg's eyes have given out isn't that per- 
 fectly lovely?" 
 
 "He probably would not agree with you," 
 carped Dell, at odds with life in general. 
 
 "Which he? what he? You've got me all 
 jumbled up but you know what I mean perfectly 
 well, Dell, you know you do. Anyhow, Doctor 
 Robb got his orders exactly two weeks after we 
 left, he said." 
 
 "Well, but what did he say about things gen- 
 erally ? About the family ? About good heavens, 
 did you two just sit and jabber about these silly old 
 salt-cellars the whole afternoon?" cried Dell with 
 asperity, sitting on the edge of the bed, and twitch- 
 ing once more at Dora's purchases. 
 
 "Never once mentioned salt-cellars and it 
 wasn't we two, it was we three!" Dora wanted 
 her sister to marry Doctor Robb, and her ways 
 were feminine. 
 
 "Three! That stands always for discord
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 old Sato is a chatter-box." Dell arose and started 
 for the door, so her back was turned when Dora 
 added: 
 
 "I forgot to say that he had a stunning creature 
 with him from the steamer; ashore together for 
 the day, sight-seeing and getting tortoise-shell and 
 photographs. He's been out before and knows 
 the ropes, you see. He introduced us, but Sato 
 came in with a perfectly heavenly salad-bowl (old 
 Imari, Dell, red and green!), and we all screamed 
 together, and I lost the name. Anyhow she had 
 gorgeous grayish-blue eyes, with golden lashes 
 sweetest effect you ever saw " 
 
 "Doesn't sound very attractive," said she of the 
 heavy brows, standing before a kakemono beside 
 the door, which she knew every line of already, 
 to the point of nausea. 
 
 "And such hair! And she wore one of those 
 new covert-cloth jackets with bands of " but the 
 door closed with a bang that set all the kakemonos 
 shivering sensitively against the walls. Reopening 
 her door to a crack, Dora laughingly called after 
 the retreating figure: 
 
 "O Dell! please tell Mammy Doctor Robb 
 asked about her, and sent his love." 
 
 Miss Talty's chagrin would have appreciably 
 72
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 diminished had she known that Doctor Robb's con- 
 duct in Nagasaki had been very carefully consid- 
 ered beforehand by that sagacious young man; 
 both as to what he had done and left undone, and 
 he had gone on his way rejoicing that for once 
 the Fates had graciously lent their aid. Her real 
 indifference might be cured by his assumed in- 
 difference. 
 
 Mammy's frank delight at the doctor's message 
 was but one more item in his nice calculation of 
 chances. She had her intensely strong likes and 
 dislikes among Miss Adele's many suitors. More 
 than once in the girl's brief social life in Richmond 
 the old woman had taken a man's card at the 
 door, and slipped it under the great dusty pile in 
 the punch-bowl on the hall-table; and said not a 
 word when her young mistress returned and de- 
 manded tidings. 
 
 The young naval surgeon had won, at their first 
 meeting, all of Mammy's intuitive approval and 
 active collusion, although no word had ever passed 
 between them anent an occult end. The old ser- 
 vant's general pride in Miss Talty's witcheries was 
 for once in abeyance before this one man's purpose. 
 
 About a week after the transit of Apollo, Miss 
 Talty entered the summer-house one hot afternoon 
 
 73
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 to find O Hani standing, her face hidden in one 
 of her long sleeves, from which loud and pro- 
 longed sniffles announced native feminine grief. 
 Yamaguchi, devoured by curiosity, clipped nearby 
 an inoffensive young cedar into the shape of a de- 
 formed stork, pretending absorption in his fell 
 work; his attention riveted on Mammy, who was 
 on her knees before the amah, sewing with wide 
 sweeps of her vigorous right arm. 
 
 "Why, Haru, what's the matter?" asked Dell. 
 
 "Wa-kari-ma-sen!" whined the amah, who in- 
 deed comprehended nothing of this assault. 
 
 "Mammy, what on earth are you doing?" de- 
 manded Miss Talty, catching up Julie and putting 
 her on the little centre-table, where she executed 
 a delighted pas seul, hanging to her aunt's fore- 
 fingers. 
 
 "I ain' goin' ter stan* it not another minute, 
 Miss Dell! Traipsin' roun' wid her skirts all 
 open down de front ! Dis heah klomono's goin' ter 
 be sewed right clean on up toe de torp 'scusin' 
 a plocket fo' de silly haid ter come froo. De ole 
 ones puttin' shoe black on dere teefs, makin' b'lieve 
 like dey done finish wid de vanities ob dis heah 
 worl' oh, I'se been readin' in de books all 'bout 
 itl an' all de endurin' time dey's splayin' dere 
 
 74
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 laigs ebry step, an' no stockings on, Miss Dell! 
 'Taint decent, an' I tole yo' ma long time 
 'go, I'd " 
 
 "Mammy, let Haru go, and go into the house; 
 I'll explain things there later on," said Dell, 
 smothering her glee on Julie's shoulder. The 
 negress obeyed, but for two days thereafter she 
 went about sunk into a fathomless sullen silence 
 that they all knew, and which no one ever dis- 
 turbed. A mood when the primitive savagery of 
 the creature for a time held complete sway over 
 her passionate nature. After a time the thin cob- 
 web of civilization was once more spun back and 
 forth, screening the old primal instincts, and she 
 cringed before the two sisters, wordlessly begging 
 for love and pardon. 
 
 The day that speech returned to Mammy, she 
 knocked at Miss Talty's door, and entering, drew 
 the bolt with one of her swift, noiseless gestures. 
 Then she advanced and handed Dell a pink paper, 
 which she read and reread with growing concern. 
 
 It was from Hong Kong, addressed to "Caro- 
 lina," and read: "K. needs D.," signed Talty. 
 
 It had been decided that Mammy, who could 
 read and write and upon whose tact and judgment 
 they had all their lives relied, was to remain in 
 
 75
 
 Nagasaki with little Julie, whithersoever all the 
 others might scatter in pursuit of pleasure, or in 
 obedience to official orders; and to her all cable- 
 grams were to be sent, at Jack's insistence. She 
 knew the whole tragedy of Dora's married life and 
 was the only creature allowed to see Kent when he 
 was "not himself." Imogen was still in entire 
 ignorance of the truth, and regarded Kent Fel- 
 lowes with about an equally divided feeling of ad- 
 miration and fear fear of his great reserve, dig- 
 nity, and that something sad and elusive about him 
 which she had always felt. Adele still kept up the 
 fiction of knowing nothing of the shadow over- 
 hanging her sister's life; so it will be seen that her 
 brother's brief message carried in its train many 
 perplexities. 
 
 "I don' reckon we'd bes' leave dis tablegram 
 roun' kyarless," Mammy said dryly, as she tore the 
 paper into the smallest bits. 
 
 Adele sat silent before her little chijimi draped 
 dressing-table, brushing her great cape of hair un- 
 consciously again and again in one spot. 
 
 "Any ray ob light pokin' he'self froo a chink in 
 yo' hay-lof yet, missy?" 
 
 "Not a ray, Mammy." 
 
 "Seems like pore Miss Im'gen done get mo' 
 76
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 an' mo' spur'flus like. She ain' bein' begged fo' 
 de pleasure ob her comp'ny in dis heah message 
 fum Mars' Jack, is she, Miss Dell?" 
 
 "No, Mammy." 
 
 "Mighty like Mars' Jack ter plump a thing 
 down like dat an' stroll off easy-like, an' leave de 
 projectin' ter we-all, ain' it, Miss Dell?" 
 
 "Mighty like, and I tell you right now, Mam- 
 my, I'm never, never going to marry!" and the 
 girl suddenly tossed back her hair and began to 
 arrange it. Mammy gave her low musical chuckle 
 as she stood handing the tortoise-shell hair-pins, 
 one at a time. 
 
 "Yo' ma, she say de same thing 'bout lemme 
 see well, 'bout fo'-five weeks prev'us to de wed- 
 din' ceremonies! Yas'm, she did! I done hyar 
 Ole Aunt Bene tell all 'bout it, at leas' a thousan' 
 times. Do yer know, Miss Dell, I'se been stud'n 
 on dis gettin' an' givin' in mar'age, a powerful 
 lot, I has; an' sometimes I think 'tain't a real nat- 
 chul dispoposition ! No'm, 'tain't. De man he 
 sutney do kick like a mule 'gains' it an' de gyrl 
 she strain herself pullin' away but, Gawd! when 
 de fever do begin ter take hole ! Den she kyarn't 
 sew fars' nuff gettin' ready, an' he? well, he ain' 
 doin' any more dem kickin' shines, he ain' ; 'ceptin' 
 
 77
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 'gainst de long, long time she do take ter git ready, 
 an' drivin' him jes' stark, starin', plum crazy!" 
 
 "You can go on chattering for a week, Mammy 
 Lina, but we've both got to come back to Mister 
 Jack's cable, just the same ; and what to do? What 
 to say? What not to say?" 
 
 "Oh ! it's all easy miff 'bout Miss Dora. I done 
 send dat deah old Yamagoosy man down erready, 
 Miss Dell, toe arsk 'bout de steamer, an' dere's 
 one to-morror; dat's all right, dat's nuffin. But 
 de real pebble in de shoe is Miss Im'gen! I 
 reckon she'll give Mars' Jack a s'prise party, an' 
 go on over ter Hong Kong widout'n a invitation, 
 don't you, missy?" 
 
 Adele had completely disappeared under a cur- 
 tain of hair suddenly let down over her face, in 
 that critical moment of nice quantitative judgment 
 which decides the success of a pompadour, and she 
 made no response. 
 
 "Fo' de pars' ten days, de cap'n's" Mammy 
 had always called Kent that "han'writin' show 
 jes' as plain dat de fight was a comin' ! Miss Dora 
 she notice it mighty quick; I see her settin' all 
 shrinked up intoe herself you know de way de 
 pore chile act when it comes? Jes' like a flower 
 look in de mo'nin' when Mars' Jack Frost been 
 
 78
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 payin' his compliments de night befo'. When de 
 cap'n he's all right, he done write big an' proud- 
 like, but when de debbil in him begin rub his eyes 
 an' wake up, he write all small an' scrouged-up, 
 like he 'shamed ob hisself." 
 
 "Yes, Mammy, I know," sighed Adele drearily. 
 
 After breakfast Mammy told Mrs. Fellowes the 
 news, berating herself soundly for losing the paper. 
 But from Lieutenant Talty's summons the sting 
 had been taken by the sagacious old woman. Even 
 then the young wife went restlessly about, her 
 sweet face pinched with the old dread. She told 
 her sister and Imogen that Kent was not particu- 
 larly well, and she thought best to join him for a 
 few weeks in Hong Kong. 
 
 Imogen's voluble rage and jealousy at not being 
 similarly solicited by her husband, when Kent had 
 obviously begged his wife to join him although 
 for some reason they would not show her the tele- 
 gram was for once welcome, and hid the general 
 embarrassment. 
 
 "Well, Lieutenant John Calhoun Talty, ap- 
 pointed from Richmond, Virginia, I'll see you 
 later! Amah, you go catchee my number one 
 trunk-box, chop-chop; have got kitchen-side," com- 
 manded Imogen in her pidgin English, which was 
 
 79
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 a wild, rootless, sporadic growth of her own, al- 
 most valueless as a means to an end. 
 
 "Yes, sir or madam, as the case mebbe," said 
 Ham proudly from the height of her newly 
 acquired phrase-book knowledge; and the laugh 
 which followed the tiny woman's exit had the 
 tonic effect it generally has upon a harassed house- 
 hold. 
 
 The next afternoon Dora and Imogen sailed 
 away on the great white Canadian Pacific steamer 
 "Empress of India," and one hour later a cable- 
 message, addressed directly to his wife, came from 
 Lieutenant Fellowes. Adele opened it : " 'Boston' 
 sails to-day for docking, Nagasaki," and she and 
 Mammy sat and stared blankly into each other's 
 eyes. Finally the former said slowly to herself: 
 
 "My brother sent that first message without 
 Kent's knowledge, trusting to Dora's tact. Kent 
 does not know Dora has started, as she said she 
 would not wire him until she reached Shanghai, 
 and could be more sure of the day and hour of 
 arrival in Hong Kong, to save him the strain of 
 longer waiting, and Imogen was silent because she 
 was furious. Mammy," Dell arose excitedly, "if 
 we can get word to them in Shanghai and they 
 can catch a return steamer at once, as the liners are 
 
 80
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 so much faster than any man-of-war, we can get 
 them back in time. Get my hat and parasol, quick, 
 quick!" 
 
 Mammy leaned over the gate and watched the 
 slim white figure running down to the Settlement. 
 
 "If de cap'n came, and find Miss Dora done 
 gone away, jes' now when he need' her so ! I doan 
 like de looks ob it, nohow !" and she got her sew- 
 ing and sat on the top step of the veranda and 
 waited. A prophetic thrill of impending disaster 
 ran through her a half hour later when she saw 
 her young mistress dragging herself slowly up the 
 lane, ill-tidings written large upon the relaxed, 
 weary face and figure. Mammy raised her head, 
 breathing deeply through her flattened nostrils, her 
 eyes fixed on the swaying tree-tops; and Adele 
 found her so, as she approached and stood wonder- 
 ing; and then frightened she shook her violently 
 by the arm, and the negress turned slowly and 
 looked at her with dazed eyes. 
 
 "Yer needn' tole me, Miss Dell; dere ain' no 
 steamer, an' de 'Boston' '11 be hyar befo' dey can 
 get away fum dat deah Shanghai-place. An' all de 
 res' is jes' damn !" 
 
 "Mammy, I forbid your using that word! I've 
 told you twenty times I will not allow it. I'm 
 
 81
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 ashamed of you!" and Miss Talty walked past 
 her into the house. The old woman sat and 
 grumbled to herself, breaking out now and then 
 viciously with the forbidden word; and then sink- 
 ing back into the old formless mumbling. 
 
 However, the emergency of the hour soon 
 brought them together again for counsel and sym- 
 pathy. The despatch to Shanghai was already on 
 its way, there was now absolutely nothing to do 
 but wait. 
 
 After the fourth day, mistress and maid took 
 turns speeding down to the Bund, every time a 
 salute was fired, in search of the white cruiser fly- 
 ing from its staff the Stars and Stripes. Adele had 
 asked at the American consulate if the "Boston" 
 had been in Nagasaki within a year, and the nega- 
 tive answer told her that the expected man-of-war 
 would salute the Japanese flag upon entering the 
 port. For that signal she waited in growing trepi- 
 dation. The consul had already been informed of 
 the coming of the American war-ship, as he had 
 to arrange with the Japanese authorities the ques- 
 tion of docking privileges. From him Adele 
 learned that the "Boston" was coming direct across 
 from Hong Kong, and from that moment she re- 
 nounced all hope of Dora's return in time. But 
 
 82
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 with all their watchfulness the ship slid to her 
 anchorage late one afternoon, unobserved, unan- 
 nounced, no salute being fired after sunset in any 
 port; and Imogen not there to tell them of the 
 simple fact. 
 
 An officer of the "Boston" had to go ashore at 
 once after anchoring, on business for the captain 
 at the consulate relative to the docking, and the 
 first lieutenant, knowing Mrs. Fellowes had set- 
 tled herself in Nagasaki, sent Fellowes. He start- 
 ed at once in the boat with the mail orderly. Just 
 as he was stepping into the steam-launch, Talty 
 ran down the ladder and said in a low tone to 
 his brother-in-law : 
 
 "Kent, I wish you'd wait for me. I'll be free 
 to go in fifteen minutes. I er have not told 
 you it was to be a sort of surprise between Dora 
 and me but there's just a chance she may have 
 started for Hong Kong." 
 
 "The deuce, you say!" cried Fellowes, his face 
 turning white with anger. 
 
 "Come back, old fellow, and wait for me. 
 We'll hunt them up together," begged Jack. 
 
 "Shove off !" ordered Fellowes savagely. 
 
 "It's only the merest chance !" called Talty after 
 the boat ; cursing inwardly his present unsuccessful 
 
 83
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 incarnation as he ascended the gangway with slow 
 steps. 
 
 Lieutenant Fellowes went directly to the con- 
 sulate, where he only saw a subordinate, and him 
 very briefly. He opened a telegram from Tokio 
 and wrote out a reply to it, as instructed, in the 
 captain's name, a copy of which was enclosed in 
 the commander's packet, sealed, and, with the 
 great bag of home mail for the ship, intrusted to 
 the mail orderly. 
 
 Kent could not bring himself to ask about his 
 wife's movements, and left the consulate still in 
 ignorance ; the nervous strain growing momentarily 
 upon him, that had commenced in the languorous 
 tropical atmosphere of Hong Kong. His mid- 
 watch thoughts had ever clung through all this 
 separation to the dear picture of Dora waiting for 
 him in some high-perched place, all trees and flow- 
 ers, and little Julie beside her dancing and laugh- 
 ing and calling out to him and they were always 
 in white the mother and child alike. 
 
 With one coolie in front and two atoshi behind, 
 his jinrikisha flew along the Oura road, over the 
 bridge, past the back of the hotel, from the open 
 windows and green swinging half-door of which 
 came a strong odor which started the moisture
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 upon the brow of the American officer, already 
 half ill from long battling with desire, to which he 
 had not yet yielded. 
 
 Something outside of himself could only at this 
 point rescue him from the fast mounting obsession 
 in possession of him, body and soul. Surely it lay 
 alone in Dora's sweet shy eyes, in the healing touch 
 of her cool soft hand, in his baby's little gurgle of 
 delighted recognition. 
 
 Fellowes reached the gate of "Ippon Matsu," 
 where his three coolies gladly dumped him, and 
 stood panting out their exaggerated fatigue. He 
 tossed upon the seat the usual overpayment of a 
 sailor's first day ashore, opened the gate of the 
 compound and entered. 
 
 It was all strange to him, the stiff lawn and the 
 redundantly cared for hedges and shrubs, the peb- 
 bled paths, the great gnarled pine coming through 
 the roof, unhomelike in its weirdness and silence 
 everywhere. It was far removed from what he 
 was longing for, in every strung-up fibre of his 
 tortured being. 
 
 Cook-san came running from his quarters in re- 
 sponse to the peal of the bell, and his "No have 
 got" was Kent's home-greeting. 
 
 Fellowes stalked into the bungalow to the con- 
 85
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 sternation of the hovering Japanese, who, after 
 one frightened glance, turned and disappeared. 
 
 Kent wandered forlornly from room to room 
 until he came to his wife's unmistakably hers 
 from a score of dear, sacred signs. He stood be- 
 side her dressing-table, looking down and gently 
 fingering those dainty little addenda of the femi- 
 nine toilet, familiar to him and yet forever enigma 
 to his masculine understanding. Then suddenly 
 he knew the truth. 
 
 Beside his framed photograph in uniform was 
 the tiny silver vase of flowers she always kept 
 there; and the clematis blossoms were faded, 
 shrivelled at the edges, a few petals fallen she 
 was gone! He broke away with a loud cry of 
 "Dora!" and threw himself down beside the bed 
 on his knees, buried his face in the pillows, his 
 hands outstretched and clinched over his head. 
 The door softly opened, Mammy's black eyes 
 looked in, saw it all, and gently withdrew. 
 
 Kent presently dragged himself slowly to his 
 feet, stood looking about as if bewildered, and 
 then left the room, closing the door behind him. 
 In the dining-room he poured out a glass of ice- 
 water to moisten a mouth and throat parched al- 
 most to the point of suffocation; after one swallow 
 
 86
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 he put down the glass hastily, with a shiver of dis- 
 gust. The man was in an agony only known to 
 the haunted of the earth. His senses were in such 
 a state of susceptibility that the mere coldness of 
 the glass of ice-water sent a sharp pain through 
 his arm; the odor of the morning coffee lingered 
 in the room sickeningly discernible to his irritated 
 sense of smell; he winced at the light peering 
 through the sudare overhanging the open win- 
 dows; the ticking of his watch affected him as 
 would the rapid thud of a great piece of machin- 
 ery. Such was his sensorial condition that it 
 seemed as if he "should die of that roar which lies 
 on the other side of silence." To bring back the 
 usual "well-wadded stupidity" of ordinary health- 
 ful being was what he longed for, not the means 
 itself; the effect of drink is the poisoned fang. 
 The taste of it was always hateful to Fellowes, as 
 to many another who dragged much heavier 
 chains. 
 
 He took his hat and went to the conservatory- 
 like entrance-hall, in which the great trunk of "Ip- 
 pon Matsu" formed the central object. The floor 
 was the pebbled earth, the walls and roof were 
 glass, and everywhere were ferns, and palms, 
 bamboos, camellias, huge gardenias, and vines run- 
 ning riot.
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Kent paced rapidly back and forth, and then, 
 sank into a wicker chair, his head fell back, his 
 eyes closed, his hat dropped from his trembling 
 hand. His fine face was congested, distorted as if 
 seen in a convex mirror. 
 
 Mammy found him there when with heavy 
 tread and loud exclamations of surprise she ap- 
 proached for the second time. 
 
 "How d'y do, Cap'n? It's mighty nice ter see 
 you, sah, deed'n it sutney is. Cook-san, he come 
 a flyin' an' cry out: 'Okii dannasan have got!' 
 (De fool way dey talk out hyar!) I was sound 
 'sleep, sah. Miss Dell an' little missy dey gone 
 down toe de flower-market. Dey'll be hyar to- 
 rectly." She picked up his hat and stood before 
 him with a feeling of helplessness novel to her. 
 He winced at her loud cheerful voice, but his rigid 
 lips fell into the pitiful lines of a forced smile, 
 and he opened his eyes and looked up at her smil- 
 ing black face, and held out his hand. 
 
 The instant she touched his burning palm, 
 and looked into his heavy bloodshot eyes, she 
 knew it was too late nothing could undo the in- 
 fluence of that first fatal ten minutes in the empty 
 house. But she would not yield without a fight. 
 She ran to the kitchen and ordered a cup of black 
 
 88
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 coffee at once, bringing back with her when she 
 returned a small soft pillow, which, while she chat- 
 tered on, she slipped quietly under his head. His 
 face twitched at the woman's gentle touch, and 
 suddenly he again seized her hand and wrung it in 
 silence. 
 
 "Yas, Cap'n, Mammy know all 'bout it. I un- 
 derstan', chile and I boun' ter help yer all I can, 
 sah ! It's a monstrous shame ter have things turn 
 out dis way! It is fo' shore! We jes' been 
 racin' and rarin' up an' down dat ole hill out 
 yonder fo' days an' days watchin' fo' you, sah, 
 an' Mars' Jack. Deed an' we has. I don't see 
 how come we-all missed de salute nohow ! Cap'n, 
 jes' think ob pore Miss Dora ! She jes' nuver will 
 get over dis mistake we-all made. Yer see, 
 sah, she was dat crazy toe see yer, we-all 'sided 
 she bes' go right on over ter Hong Kong an' she 
 no mo'n lef on de steamer dan 'long cum yo' own 
 tablegram, sah!" 
 
 "Mammy, tell me the truth, when will Mrs. 
 Fellowes return?" he asked hoarsely. 
 
 "Why, she's comin' right quick. She's on de 
 way now, yas, sah. De steamer comin' in any 
 minute now, an' den won't der be a grand confus- 
 tercation in dis heah funny ole bangalow? Dat's 
 
 89
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 what Miss Dell she call it, I dunno what fur, sah," 
 lied the negress grandly, as she always did when she 
 considered the truth inexpedient; seeing no evil 
 whatever in a lie told for love's sake, but he knew 
 in his heart she was misleading him, knew it abso- 
 lutely. 
 
 He started up suddenly and reached for his hat, 
 saying : 
 
 "I'm going for a long tramp, Mammy. I think 
 it will do me good. Hot? Is it? I don't seem 
 to feel it after Hong Kong." Then her great res- 
 onant voice broke out excitedly: 
 
 "Aw, Cap'n, not befo' little Miss Julie see her 
 papa? Not befo' why, Cap'n, yer jes' oughter 
 hyar dat chile say 'my ba-ba !' Has Miss Dora 
 tole yer 'bout dat? Keepin' it fo' a s'prise, I 
 reckon. I think dere's dey voices now, comin' up 
 de lane ! Yas, sah, dey shorely is." 
 
 "I want to go off alone and take a long walk," 
 he repeated obstinately. 
 
 Then the coffee came, and to please her he tried 
 to drink it, but again he turned from it with un- 
 controllable repulsion. 
 
 "Tell Miss Dell I'll be back for dinner. I 
 don't suppose you have it till eight. In summer 
 nobody does." He walked toward the door, 
 
 90
 
 TWO CABLEGRAMS FROM HONG KONG 
 
 Mammy had been thinking deeply, and she 
 started violently as she saw him slipping from 
 her grasp. With a gesture of desperation, she 
 exclaimed : 
 
 "Befo' yer go, Cap'n, jes' step inside, sah. No, 
 I'll bring it out hyar. Jes' wait one little teensy 
 minute, Cap'n, will yer, jes' ter please ole Mam- 
 my? Thank yer, sah !" She went into the house, 
 still talking all the time, with a soft coaxing note 
 in her voice. She returned carrying a lacquer tray, 
 on which stood a bottle of Scotch whiskey, a 
 siphon, and a tumbler full of ice. 
 
 Fellowes looked at her in amazement, and then 
 he understood the old servant's attempt to keep 
 him at home at all costs. 
 
 The blood ran into the man's face, and he stood 
 a moment in silence with bowed head, and then 
 said, gently: 
 
 "No, Mammy, none of that. I understand you. 
 Do not fear. Do you hear me? I'm coming back 
 to dinner," and he went down the steps, across the 
 lawn, and out of the gate. 
 
 The negress stood staring after him, tears run- 
 ning down her face, still holding the tray by which 
 she had sought to buy his presence, until the others 
 came to help her. 
 
 91
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "De cap'n done gone. Fo' Gawd, Miss Dora, 
 I done my bes' ter keep 'um !" 
 
 She sat down on the steps, the tray beside her, 
 and rocked herself back and forth in misery; and 
 Dell found her there a half hour later. 
 
 92
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 FELLOWES IS MISSING 
 
 " O beautiful awful Summer day, 
 
 What hast thou given, what taken away ! " 
 
 AFTER the long-delayed dinner to which 
 Kent did not return Jack left the house 
 on one of those pitiful subterranean hunts for a 
 lost soul, but it was three days before Kent was 
 found. 
 
 During that time Dora had returned, alone. 
 Imogen, in one of her febrile climaxes, refused to 
 leave Shanghai until requested to do so by a shame- 
 fully defaulting husband. 
 
 "Ippon Matsu" sheltered a silent and disinte- 
 grated household. Dora, after the first shock on 
 learning the truth from her brother, who met her 
 on her arrival, had no intercourse with anyone save 
 Mammy. She stayed in her own room with locked 
 door, pacing back and forth all through the day, 
 and lying listening all through the long terrible 
 nights for the wandering step that did not come. 
 
 93
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Each time the negress knocked at her door, Dora 
 flew and opened it, whispering: "Has he come? 
 have they found him?" Her face was very old, 
 and white, and thin; and the look in her young 
 eyes a thing to turn away from, shuddering. 
 
 Captain Pehoe, of the "Boston," was one of 
 those men who glory in their own limitations. His 
 virtues were best told in negatives. 
 
 He was a misplaced monk, with a gift for propa- 
 gandism not properly appreciated by his social 
 environment. 
 
 Pleasure, from music to golf; beauty, from a 
 violet to a sunset; all life's dear excess, was tem- 
 peramentally offensive to him, albeit he used other 
 captions than these. He was not only a bachelor, 
 but proud of it. A good officer, a man of flaw- 
 less rectitude, his ships were always the cleanest in 
 the Navy and always the most unhappy. 
 
 Fellowes' absence was reported by the executive 
 officer at quarters next morning, and a half hour 
 later Talty was called to the captain's cabin, and 
 in response to a question, replied: 
 
 "I do not know where Lieutenant Fellowes is, 
 sir." 
 
 "You went ashore together? Or you saw him 
 after leaving the ship anyhow?" 
 
 94
 
 FELLOWES IS MISSING 
 
 "Neither, sir." 
 
 "Has a search been made for him, Mr. Talty?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "That will do, Mr. Talty. Orderly, tell the 
 doctor I'd like to see him." And a few moments 
 later: 
 
 "Doctor, did you notice anything unusual in 
 Lieutenant Fellowes when you last saw him?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "Ah-h, been drinking?" 
 
 There was no answer. 
 
 "Doctor Robb, I ask you if in your opinion 
 Lieutenant Fellowes had been drinking." 
 
 "No, sir, not one drop." 
 
 "What was there unusual, then?" 
 
 "I noticed the extreme tension and irritability 
 of the man's whole nervous system, sir." 
 
 "Due to what?" 
 
 "Well, Captain, it's a long story. The objec- 
 tive symptoms as shown at that time, do not neces- 
 sarily give us the whole etiology of the case, sir," 
 and the doctor smiled kindly upon a world full 
 of faults. 
 
 "I can understand English about as well as the 
 average man, Doctor Robb, and I insist on your 
 putting into one word, or phrase, what you are 
 
 95
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 driving at." Pehoe's voice was in its most rasping 
 key. 
 
 "Very well, sir! In one word: Lieutenant Fel- 
 lowes' condition was largely due to the fact that 
 he was not drinking!" 
 
 "That will do! Orderly, tell Mr. Sault to be 
 ready to go ashore in the one o'clock boat." 
 
 At the twelve o'clock breakfast Doctor Robb's 
 place was vacant. He had shifted from uniform 
 into citizen's dress at once after leaving the cabin, 
 hailed a sampan and gone on twenty-four hours' 
 leave. As he went up the hotel steps, a Japanese 
 dressed in European clothes advanced toward him 
 from the veranda, where it was obvious he had 
 been waiting, and together they descended the steps 
 and walked slowly down the Bund, in absorbed 
 conversation; ending with the passing of money 
 from the white hand to the yellow. 
 
 Many previous visits to Nagasaki made the 
 finding of "Ippon Matsu" the matter of a few 
 minutes, and Robb rang at the closed and well- 
 barred door, shutting its teeth down over its own 
 heart-breaking secret. 
 
 Mammy opened it. He put his finger to his 
 lips, and beckoned her outside. 
 
 "Get yourself ready for a long ride we may 
 96
 
 FELLOWES IS MISSING 
 
 be out half the night. And, Mammy, I wish you'd 
 take off that turban of yours, I don't want people 
 staring at us." 
 
 "Yas, sah. Has has yer found him, sah?" 
 
 "No questions, please, Mammy; trust me, and 
 come quickly. I'll wait outside the gate." 
 
 "Yas, sah, torectly!" and she slipped inside, 
 one vast glow of joy from head to foot, the in- 
 stinct of trail- following tingling in her veins. 
 
 Doctor Robb had as good a head as hand, 
 when it came to human operations; and he was 
 absolutely sure of the negress' intelligence and 
 discretion. 
 
 Five minutes passed and then she rejoined him 
 as silently as a shadow, and he smiled his satisfac- 
 tion when he saw the long rain-coat that enveloped 
 her, the head-dress replaced by a large hat over 
 which a heavy veil served to further obliterate all 
 individuality. 
 
 "Yas, sah?" was all she said, the rising inflec- 
 tion suggestive of immediate further action. 
 
 "O o oh, Mammy!" called Dell's voice 
 softly from the gate, as the two turned the first 
 corner of the narrow road leading abruptly up the 
 hill. Doctor Robb felt the blood rush to his face 
 it had been an eternity since he had heard that 
 voice.
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 His heart cried out within him to go back and 
 touch the only hand in the world that brought him 
 healing; to turn back, at least, to see her for 
 whom he hungered. But he went sturdily on, 
 and Mammy, who had the head of a great 
 social schemer, chuckled and murmured, as if to 
 herself : 
 
 "I reckon it's somebody else 'sides yer ole Mam- 
 my yer callin' arfter, in dat deah sort er coaxin' 
 voice !" 
 
 The doctor looked sharply at the old woman, 
 but even his keen eyes could not penetrate that ex- 
 punging veil. 
 
 Farther on they took jinrikishas with three 
 coolies to each, and with the hoods raised to pre- 
 vent possible recognition, they started off toward 
 the road to Mogi. 
 
 The six natives toiled slowly up the long hill, 
 rested at the top, drinking tea between many tiny 
 pipes of tobacco, and then dashed down the lengthy 
 incline to the sea. Far away from humanity now, 
 save for a heavily laden peasant now and then, 
 upon whom the jinrikisha men tried their impudent 
 urban wit, as they swept by, inciting each other by 
 piercing cries to greater speed. Long after the 
 caravan had passed the peasants stood and stared 
 
 98
 
 FELLOWES IS MISSING 
 
 after it, and bethought themselves of very witty 
 answers when it was too late. 
 
 The smell of the beach came strongly to their 
 nostrils, long before their ears caught the soft sibi- 
 lant murmur of the sea "raking the sea-worn 
 pebbles up and down." 
 
 At the bottom of the hill they passed through 
 the little fishing village, and on to the two foreign- 
 ers' tea-houses nearer the beach, under wonderful 
 old twisted pines, which as usual gave a tragic note 
 to an otherwise commonplace scene. 
 
 Upon their arrival before the first chaya, the 
 doctor helped Mammy to alight, sure of the stiff- 
 ness that rendered her a little helpless for a few 
 moments. Walking her up and down briskly, he 
 asked her to raise her veil, as if to remove all ob- 
 stacles between his intelligence and her quick in- 
 tuition. It was a supreme test of her character to 
 which he was subjecting her, and that she was not 
 going to fail him he felt at her first words: 
 
 "I'se took de greates' fancy ter dem bamboo- 
 trees, Mars' Doctor, back yonder!" 
 
 "Have you, Mammy; how's that? I prefer 
 these pines." 
 
 "I dunno how 'tis, sah; but seems like dey's jes' 
 a passel er young folks tossin' dey little haids 'bout 
 
 99
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 an' foolin' an' laughin' in de warm sunshine. Dun- 
 no nuffin yet co'se not 1 De way you an' me an' 
 de pines know. Dat deah laugh don't come 
 quite so easy fo' us, do it, sah?" 
 
 Her wonderful voice played upon his sensibili- 
 ties as it always did on all who knew her, and he 
 turned abruptly from her and walked apart for a 
 moment. When he returned, he stood before her 
 and said : 
 
 "Now, Mammy Lina, listen! These two tea- 
 houses here may contain matters of interest to you. 
 I've seen them before. I must not know, see, hear 
 anything. Later on I might be called upon to talk 
 under oath." 
 
 "O-oh ! Mars' Doctor! Dat's not comin', is it? 
 Ain' der no way 'round it? Oh, my little Miss 
 Dora! Jes' kill 'er, sah! Kill 'er daid!" broke 
 out the old woman in a fierce whisper. 
 
 "Hush, Mammy, hush! I want all your wits 
 about you. If he's alive, he'll be court-martialed; 
 but you and I may save him from the very worst 
 that can happen." 
 
 "Yas, sah! Jes' you mek use er me anyways 
 you think bes', sah. I'll tell lies I'll kill anybody 
 you say, sah. Doan' yer hesitate at nuffin 't all! 
 I'se one ob de Taltys, I is, an' I ain' pesterin' 'bout 
 
 100
 
 FELLOWES IS MISSING 
 
 dis ole black soul ob mine, when de fam'ly intres' 
 is at state, sah!" 
 
 "All right, Mammy, all right! It need not go 
 as far as that," and he laughed, but with tears in 
 his eyes, at her sudden blaze of passion, the depth 
 of which he only half realized. Then he added: 
 
 "I am going over there to the beach. I want 
 to see the fish those fellows are bringing in in their 
 nets. Mogi is noted for its fish; people come out 
 here for fish tiffins, Mammy, in case anyone 
 should ask you. In the meantime, while I wander 
 about, you amuse yourself any way you like. After 
 you look around a little, if you'd like to stay awhile 
 say, till dark come out and tell me so. I'll 
 go back to Nagasaki ahead of you. I have an en- 
 gagement this evening. If you don't see anything 
 of enough interest to keep you, tell me when you're 
 rested, and we'll go back as soon as we have our 
 fish cooked and eaten. It's the thing to do at 
 Mogi." 
 
 "I understan', sah," said Mammy, who had 
 listened breathlessly. Doctor Robb slipped a fore- 
 finger into his vest-pocket and remarked: 
 
 "You may need a little silver key to open 
 doors with," and he put out his hand. The woman 
 drew back with a quick stiffening of her long neck: 
 
 101
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "No, sah; thank you, sah. My Miss Dell done 
 gim me her own purse befo' I lef de house. She 
 see me in de hall as I was a-creepin' out foxy-like, 
 an' she say dey might be 'mergencies wot would rise 
 up, sah." 
 
 The doctor went to the beach, and his compan- 
 ion took entire possession, after an insinuating 
 manner of her own, of the nearest tea-house. She 
 soon emerged followed by a flock of awe-struck 
 nesan, headed by a radiant obaasan, who took the 
 lead in kneeling and touching her old forehead to 
 the matting, greatly to Mammy's embarrassment. 
 The negress' face was stiffened with anxiety and 
 disappointment, as she walked from one chaya to 
 the other, a little nearer the beach. She went in 
 and was gone a much longer time. When she 
 came out and down the front steps, her eyes were 
 blazing with excitement, and she was whispering 
 to herself. 
 
 When she joined Doctor Robb down by the 
 boats, now beached, she had assumed a nonchalance 
 that her instinct told her this man demanded 
 of her. 
 
 "Any good eatin' kind o' fish, sah?" she asked 
 quietly. 
 
 "Good enough," said he, abstractedly, turning 
 102
 
 FELLOWES IS MISSING 
 
 to her and trying to read the black face that so 
 easily hides its secrets. 
 
 "You bes' get yo' little tuffin teffin tiffin 
 dat's de 'spression 1 An' go on back toe Nagasaki, 
 sah. De bright sun sutney done give me a misery 
 in my haid dis day, yas, sah. An' I ain' goin' ter 
 'spose myself toe it 'gain. I'll go on back bime- 
 by, when it gets dark an' cool. I think dis heah 
 Mogi right nice place, sah." 
 
 The doctor seized her hand and wrung it, 
 thereby causing gossip among the gaping fisher- 
 men. 
 
 "Mammy, you're great! If you had been born 
 white, and French, and two hundred years ago, 
 you'd have had a very popular salon!" And 
 so they separated. 
 
 It was after midnight when Mammy reached 
 "Ippon Matsu," so silently that even Dora (up, 
 dressed, alert and in the entrance conservatory 
 lying in a Hong Kong chair) heard nothing until 
 the woman walked swiftly up the steps. 
 
 "Mammy, quick, have you found him?" 
 
 "Yes'm, I has. Dere, dere, honey chile! You 
 go on ter de libra'y an' shut de do', an' say yo' 
 prayers till I come fo' yer. Don't yer worry yo' 
 little haid no mo' Mammy done brung de cap'n 
 home!" J03
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 The one resident European physician in active 
 practice an Italian was called in to attend 
 Kent, now physically ill from exposure and several 
 days' starvation, save from the poison that had 
 left him inhuman, unconscious, inert. 
 
 Jack, who remained on the ship, found his only 
 solace in the fact that Imogen's wrath still detained 
 and diverted her in Shanghai. 
 
 Dell kept him advised, ambiguously, of matters 
 at "Ippon Matsu," realizing with vividness what 
 was unescapably ahead of them. 
 
 Ensign Sault had been ashore for several days, 
 only going off to the ship each morning and report- 
 ing directly to Captain Pehoe. 
 
 Not until two days after Mammy's trip to Mogi 
 did the energetic young ensign report to the cap- 
 tain the whereabouts of the missing officer whom 
 he had been seeking. Then, acting under Captain 
 Pehoe's orders, he went up to "Ippon Matsu" in 
 uniform. Sault was very young, very ambitious, 
 very prone to overstep the unwritten laws con- 
 trolling all such instructions. 
 
 No one but Mammy had been allowed to re- 
 spond to any outside summons at "Ippon Matsu" 
 since Kent's return. She met the young ensign's 
 rather pale tense face with one of her most un- 
 principled smiles.
 
 FELLOWES IS MISSING 
 
 "I wish to see Lieutenant Fellowes," he an- 
 nounced, making a movement to enter. 
 
 "I'se so sorry, but de cap'n jes' dis minute gone 
 out, sah." 
 
 Mr. Sault took off his cap and wiped his smooth 
 brow and then said, avoiding the fearless black 
 eyes that smilingly confronted him: 
 
 "I have reason to think Lieutenant Fellowes 
 is in this house." 
 
 "Deed 'n I wish he was, sah, you'se so 'ticular 
 'bout seem' him!" Her smile was now one of 
 pure joy at seeing an old friend of the family 
 ingenuous, naive, childlike. 
 
 Sault received no inspiration whatever from his 
 boots, but continued to search for it. 
 
 "Miss Dell she's gone out too! I'd arsk yer 
 ter come right in an' wait, sah, but I happen toe 
 hyar her say she goin' ter tea at de Scotch lady's 
 crost de bay! I'se 'fraid dat means 'bout seven 
 o'clock, sah!" 
 
 "I came to see Lieutenant Fellowes on business 
 and I shall stay until he returns," interrupted 
 Sault, throwing himself with a boyish movement 
 into one of the chairs on the porch. 
 
 Mammy knew he must not remain there. 
 The house was very quiet just then, but it had not 
 
 105
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 always been so during those two days and nights. 
 She stood a moment contemplating the obstinate 
 figure of the intruder, and then she said : 
 
 "I'll jes' step in an' see if Mrs. Fellowes done 
 woke up yet. She's been mighty sick Miss Dora 
 has. Mebbe she can tell when the cap'n he comin' 
 in. Den you can come back hyar, bimeby, sah." 
 
 She turned, leaving the door barely ajar, assum- 
 ing Ensign Sault to be of gentle birth; but it so 
 chanced that he was not, and when she returned 
 he was standing in the hall. Every trace of smiling 
 was instantly stricken from Mammy's face; her 
 head went erect like a snake's, her nostrils flattened, 
 and her voice was unrecognizable as she whispered, 
 close to his face: 
 
 "I s'all have ter arsk yer ter step outside, sah, 
 not ter 'sturb Mrs. Fellowes on no 'count, de doc- 
 tor he say." 
 
 "I shall wait very quietly here," said the mis- 
 guided youth. 
 
 Mammy put her hand quickly inside her huge 
 white kerchief, and when she withdrew it, Sault 
 faced the barrel of a small pistol. 
 
 "I uster core apples wid dis heah gun when I was 
 a young nigger down in Virginia, I did ; an' I doan' 
 reckon I'd miss many pits, even now ! Yo' bes' get 
 
 106
 
 FELLOWES IS MISSING 
 
 out'n dis house mighty quick, sah!" she hissed, 
 in a sudden blaze of wrath, listening through all, 
 for the sound she dreaded, from the room beyond 
 the dining-room. 
 
 "This shall be reported to Captain Pehoe!" 
 Sault exclaimed too astonished for more. Even his 
 meagre experience recognized the all too evident 
 savage intensity of the thoroughly aroused creature 
 before him. He turned and went out. She 
 bounded after him, and when she had closed the 
 door behind her, her voice, out of its leash followed 
 him to the gate, as did the snap of her fingers as 
 she went on in a fury, all Africa in her face : 
 
 "Dat fo' yer ole ship ! Dat fo' yer sneaky ole 
 cap'n! Po' white trash, bot'n yer! Dis heah 
 my house, dese yere my folks I dass de whole 
 damn lot ob yer, yer hyar me?" 
 
 And then when he had gone, she sat down sud- 
 denly on a Chinese tabouret near the door, trem- 
 bling now from head to foot, whispering brokenly 
 to herself: 
 
 "I I'se mighty glad he 'sidered it bes' ter go 
 on away out'n dis I sutney are !" 
 
 And then came that loud, coughing unhuman 
 groan, as of a spirit adrift in hell, from the room 
 beyond the dining-room. 
 
 107
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 UNDER THE CAMPHOR-TREES 
 
 " My misfortune is that you have no need to be loved as I lore." 
 
 WHILE Mammy was making a display of 
 basic instinct roused in defence of fire- 
 sides, Adele wandered heart-sick, about the native 
 town, seeking streets unfrequented by the foreign 
 residents, with whom she had cancelled all engage- 
 ments. 
 
 She ended, from habit, on the seat among the 
 great camphor-trees back of the Osuwa Temple. 
 Anxious to the point of physical distress, isolated 
 socially as she had never before been in her life, 
 she sat completely absorbed in the tragedy at "Ip- 
 pon Matsu," to relieve which she was entirely 
 helpless. 
 
 She never wearied of the seat in the cool twilight 
 of those dense trees, which shrouded every out- 
 look, save where the boughs vouchsafed to frame 
 a small, circular, exquisite view of the bay far be- 
 low. No one was in sight. She was above the 
 
 108
 
 UNDER THE CAMPHOR-TREES 
 
 endless noisy circuition at the Temple of the Bronze 
 Horse; the cries of a passing dai-kagura, perform- 
 ing in the street below, had focussed all the wan- 
 dering children, and thus she had the loveliest spot 
 in Nagasaki to herself. 
 
 Taking off her hat and laying it beside her on 
 the bench, she leaned forward, her elbows on her 
 knees, her eyes on the Russian fleet below, down 
 there in the shimmering, sweltering sunshine. 
 
 " 'Man's merit, like the crops, has its season,' ' 
 she murmured to herself grimly, shuddering. 
 
 "Meaning me, and now?" demanded a cheerful 
 voice, and Doctor Robb sank upon the bench be- 
 side her. He would have been willing to offer any 
 odds during the twenty minutes he had deliberately 
 been following her, that she could do nothing 
 that would surprise him at this stage of their ar- 
 rested friendship, but it was as well no one had 
 been there to take him up, for he would have lost ! 
 
 She started violently, threw both her hands out 
 toward him, and with a long moan of "O-h, Doc- 
 tor!" she burst into tears, hiding her face in her 
 arms on the back of the seat. 
 
 In an instant he was close beside her, and after 
 that one swift precautionary glance about, that 
 becomes instinctive in a man of thirty, his arms 
 
 109
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 were about her, and he was whispering, his face 
 against hers : 
 
 "You do care! You did miss me! Ah, dear, 
 I'm so glad, so glad!" 
 
 After three or four sobbing breaths, and almost 
 before he had finished speaking, the ineradicable 
 diablerie of the girl's nature had returned, and 
 she gently disengaged herself, and moved shyly 
 away to the far end of the bench, and sat demurely 
 preening her ruffled plumage; murmuring with 
 bewitching coquetry: 
 
 "This is so sudden! and and you are sitting 
 on my hat!" 
 
 "The devil!" cried Robb, springing to his feet 
 and walking away in justifiable wrath. 
 
 Her heart sank as he went, her eyes clung com- 
 pellingly to his broad obstinate back; she gave a 
 distinctly coaxing cough and waited, breathless. 
 
 He returned suddenly, to find her absorbed in 
 her hat's rehabilitation. He stood in front of her 
 and began to laugh; and after one quick comical 
 glance up at him, she laughed too. Then he leaned 
 over, took her hand and shook it cordially, raised 
 his hat, and bowing low exclaimed : 
 
 "How do you do, Miss Talty? Such a de- 
 lightful surprise! Where did you drop from?" 
 
 no
 
 UNDER THE CAMPHOR-TREES 
 
 She beamed approval of his controlled mood, 
 and with her free hand tapped the bench beside 
 her invitingly. 
 
 She had never yet reached that point in her re- 
 lations with any man, when humor becomes an 
 intrusion when love feeds in mirthless silence. 
 
 Doctor Robb had yet a little more need of 
 patience, as he realized with a sigh, as he again 
 sat down beside her. He loved every atom of her 
 complex nature, most of all its complexity. 
 
 But her mood was already changing, the re- 
 action after the first genuine laugh following days 
 of genuine sorrow had set in, and the next glance 
 of her eyes showed them full of tears. 
 
 "Doctor, it has been terrible! Dora and of 
 course you know?" 
 
 "Yes, dear, I know," he answered gently, and 
 she did not reprove him. 
 
 "I am not wanted anywhere. I can do 
 nothing but leave them, and I wander about till 
 I'm ready to drop. Dora constantly asks Mammy, 
 in that awful whisper, where I am; and if she hears 
 I am out of the house, somehow it quiets her." 
 
 "Poor little girl!" 
 
 "Doctor, how will it end? If I only knew what 
 was ahead of us!" 
 
 in
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Prepare yourself for about the worst," he said 
 slowly, deeming it the kindest thing to do. 
 
 "It will kill her!" she cried, her voice sharp 
 with pain. 
 
 "No, it will not. A doctor gets to know women 
 pretty well only pretty well," he added gloomily, 
 and Dell shot a glance at him, "and your sister 
 is made of the brave old feminine stuff of a past 
 generation, which endures much and is but the 
 stronger and sweeter for it. There are very few 
 such left, I find. This younger generation of 
 women compels my professional admiration for 
 physique and altitude but it stops right there I" 
 
 "Father used to say that the cry of 'good old 
 times' was due to a very slow adjustment of one's 
 own optical apparatus," said Dell. "I remember 
 standing once before a great artist's painting of 
 a mountain scene, and I ventured to speak of the 
 incongruity between the discord in the foreground, 
 and the peace and repose in the background. He 
 replied : 'There always is discord in foregrounds ! 
 If we stood over there on that rugged mountain 
 peak, and looked over here, the effect would be 
 reversed.' ' 
 
 " Alack! If we only had as good eyes as the 
 birds, at once microscopic and telescopic," smiled 
 
 112
 
 UNDER THE CAMPHOR-TREES 
 
 the doctor, willing to be proved wrong; "all the 
 same, my little philosopher, our business is with 
 our own environment the foreground of thought, 
 and women are to-day proud of the wrong things. 
 Proud of so-called common-sense, that slays all 
 sentiment ; proud of the curse of introspection that 
 hourly takes its pulse to see if a husband agrees 
 or disagrees with her temperament if so be he 
 fails to agree, off with his head ! As if her nature 
 alone had rights his a glove-like flexible thing, 
 governed by the verb to fit. Luckily only one sex 
 has leisure for pulse-feeling! Her newly discov- 
 ered individualism is the real shrine before which 
 miladi worships the new woman, leader in this 
 age of divorce, discontent, discord, and undi- 
 gested development, that has not yet become wis- 
 dom!" 
 
 "I have a tremendous esprit de sexe, Doctor, 
 and you hurt me," she said softly. 
 
 "It's because I worship woman, that I regret I 
 do not like women better ! Do you suppose I like 
 to think this : that in my lowly, but honest, opinion 
 an enormous percentage of divorces of the day are 
 at the root fed not in the outgrowth, mind you, 
 by any means but at the root fed by the mod- 
 ern wife's incapacity to love? It's the great
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 disillusion of the day. Does a mother's love 
 shrivel up at the approach of evil, suffering, ill- 
 ness, moral or physical? Does a sister's? A 
 daughter's? In every other human relation wom- 
 an is strong, brave, fine. It's only wifehood that 
 has discovered her to be peevish, egoistic, selfish, 
 nowadays, oftener than is good for the world." 
 
 "Poor dear, he's always under her feet, you 
 see," chirruped Adele, obstinately frivolous, and 
 they both laughed. 
 
 "If she'd only feel that she is an essential part 
 of a great social (or divine, if you will) institu- 
 tion as dependent upon her integrity as a building 
 is dependent upon each single stone in its make- 
 up ! I tell you marriage is woman's work in the 
 world, the failures are at her door." 
 
 "Oh, think of Dora!" 
 
 "Just what I am thinking of! Her marriage 
 is not going to be a failure ! All the stuff is there 
 for failure, Heaven knows! But she has love's 
 genius, and it can redeem, and will all but a mere 
 brute. Can you stand any more ? I'm astride my 
 favorite in the stables !" 
 
 " 'Physicians mend or end us,' ' Adele com- 
 mented sadly. 
 
 "We Americans are just now passing through 
 114
 
 UNDER THE CAMPHOR-TREES 
 
 a sort of Virginolatry such as the world has never 
 seen. The girl is society ! She is an enfant gatee, 
 and as unhappy as such always are. The entire 
 social system is ordered from literature to table- 
 talk, with an eye both eyes to her really un- 
 important development." 
 
 "Unimportant, the future mother?" 
 "Yes, beside the great adult world of thinking 
 men and women secondary, quite ! One-third of 
 her life is spent in learning what is largely untrue, 
 one-third in unlearning it, and the last third in 
 learning the truth. Is there wisdom in that? 
 Does it make for harmony? Half the wretched 
 failures in marriage are due to her utterly false 
 estimates. If good came out of the American sys- 
 tem one could stand the tuning of life down to 
 her pitch, but does it? Her right to make stand- 
 ards, to be heard, felt, comes later, if it's in her at 
 all* We men aren't quite the fools we look, and 
 we learned long ago that unless a woman is content 
 in her world of manners, ethics (conservers of 
 great principles therein as your sister, God bless 
 her! is conserving marriage), beautifiers of life, 
 saints to the suffering, leaders in philanthropy, 
 education Lord, the field is broad enough 1 if she 
 is not content there, the poison spot is in her own 
 
 "5
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 heart she will be content nowhere she has for- 
 gotten how to love." 
 
 "Summer thoughts in camphor!" was Adele's 
 sole comment, looking about at the dark thick 
 foliage of the grove, and he shook his fist at her 
 in a shout of laughter. 
 
 "Is it at all worth while think you, O ^scula- 
 pius, for me to struggle on a little longer, ob- 
 scurely?" 
 
 "Oh, you! You haven't lost the art of loving 
 any more than your sister has." 
 
 "I haven't found it yet!" 
 
 "Dora Fellowes' power is in her goodness, yours 
 lies in your attractive faults." 
 
 "Captain Fitchett said the same." 
 
 "Fitchett? Don't know him. Who is he?" 
 The doctor's oracular tone had fled. 
 
 "A man." 
 
 "I hastily judged as much," and the young 
 officer's eyes dwelt upon the view that seemed 
 suddenly to have lost some of its charm. 
 
 There was a short silence. 
 
 "Will Dora's love really redeem him in the end, 
 Doctor?" the girl asked gravely. 
 
 "Life does not always deal out prizes to all 
 who deserve them not by a long shot. It's not 
 
 116
 
 UNDER THE CAMPHOR-TREES 
 
 so simple as that still, I've seen a miracle or two 
 in my day. I often think that some great soul- 
 satisfying exploitation of all his powers might 
 somehow readjust his balance. The best war 
 material often lies in just such men a little mad 
 under the restraint of peace." 
 
 "It is so cruel all this so logically relent- 
 less." 
 
 "Yes, my life-work deals with the hard logic of 
 existence, and that is why I need you so, dear 
 you " he turned to her with a great glow of love 
 upon his face. 
 
 "Me?" she cooed surprise. 
 
 "You are all the other side, the sunny, happy, 
 absurd, fantastic, adorable, beautiful, bewildering, 
 tantalizing, delicious side the everlasting femi- 
 nine! Ah, Adele!" 
 
 "I can think of two more adjectives, strangely 
 overlooked," she commented severely. 
 
 He slid along the bench toward her, and she 
 hastily lifted her hat and put it down carefully 
 on the other side, out of harm's way and he 
 laughed, threw his arm out along the back of the 
 seat behind her, and said abruptly and with smiling 
 assurance : 
 
 "Some day, young lady, you are going to love 
 117
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 me. It came to me suddenly, just now. You'll 
 stop flirting with me, stop all your little bedevil- 
 ments; and you'll find out, as I have, that love is 
 a tragedy, not a high comedy, and you will come 
 to me 'reverently, soberly, discreetly, advisedly, 
 and in the fear of God,' and you will give yourself 
 to me. I dare say you'll refuse me a few more 
 times in the interval, but you are coming just the 
 same some day." 
 
 Such assumption had to be punished and 
 promptly, and Adele arose and said coldly: 
 
 "And wither forever the life happiness of that 
 beautiful girl with Etruscan gold eyelashes? 
 Never!" 
 
 "What kind of a girl? Who?" 
 
 "The gorgeous creature who so absorbed you 
 the last time you were in Nagasaki. Glorious 
 azure orbs (two, if I mistake not), a covert " 
 
 "A what?" he cried, joyous at this first glimpse 
 of Cupid's avant-courier jealousy. 
 
 "Tan covert thing half fitting with straps 
 a dream! Oh, Dora told me. You dare not 
 deny it I" 
 
 "She hid this covert thing well; I never saw it 
 I don't even know what it is. What an absurd 
 girl you are! Don't you know who that was I 
 
 118
 
 UNDER THE CAMPHOR-TREES 
 
 took ashore that day and kowtowed to? All the 
 time my head full of another who didn't care to 
 see me, worse luck!" 
 
 "I have absolutely no curiosity about her, Doc- 
 tor Robb," replied the girl, opening her parasol 
 and holding it at the angle she had discovered 
 most aggravated the masculine heart. 
 
 "The admiral's wife! Daughter of the late 
 secretary all sorts of honorable things. Yes, in- 
 deed, and I made myself solid that day, I tell you, 
 over tortoise-shell hair-pins, for which her soul 
 thirsted." 
 
 Adele put back her parasol, as she walked beside 
 him, and smiled up in his face, and said with the 
 inflection of five tender years: 
 
 "I like you!" He looked away, and put his 
 hands into his pockets. 
 
 They stood a moment at the top of the long 
 flight of stone steps, dotted here and there with 
 bright baby-life. 
 
 As she looked out over the town, her face fell, 
 and she murmured: 
 
 "I have been so happy for a little while up 
 here." 
 
 "With me?" he coaxed. 
 
 "With you," she said softly, and then together 
 119
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 they started down the great stone stairway between 
 the temple lamps. Presently she swept him a 
 curtsy and a roguish smile, and gave him the tips 
 of her fingers, and he caught her meaning, and in 
 cadence, laughing into each other's eyes, the re- 
 mainder of the long descent was turned into a sort 
 of stately minuet. And the little native children 
 stood and stared at this new antic of those ever- 
 absurd ijin san. 
 
 At the bottom he put her into her jinrikisha, 
 arranged hurriedly to meet her at Sato's the next 
 day, and they separated. 
 
 As she passed the Italian doctor's house on her 
 way home, Captain Pehoe came out of it, jumped 
 hastily into a jinrikisha and dashed toward the 
 Bund. 
 
 120
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT 
 
 " No, when the fight begins within himself, 
 
 A man's worth something. God stoops o'er his head." 
 
 AT the end of three days Kent came out of 
 the wilderness, and took up his life once 
 more broken, speechless, pitiful. 
 
 Jack made it a point to be on hand to help Dell 
 carry the dinner through, for Dora's sake. After- 
 ward the two men went to the summer-house 
 with their cigars. It was a hot night; the intense 
 humidity which foreruns a typhoon saturated the 
 air. A large native paper lantern swung above 
 them, dyeing their white duck uniforms pink, and 
 furnishing enough light for each man to watch the 
 brief eccentric life of his own cigar, individual- 
 ized from any other one ever rolled into being. 
 After a long silence, for which each was deeply 
 grateful to the other, Kent cried suddenly: 
 
 "I'd rather put a bullet through my head than 
 go on with it!" 
 
 121
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Of course; anyone would, but it wouldn't be 
 quite so manly, do you think, Fellowes?" 
 
 "Oh! I'm not going to. And I'll spare you 
 even verbal heroics. The smugness of a slaked 
 desire, the easy repentance of satiety (curs at 
 best!), are a little less contemptible if they don't 
 bark. If you don't know what I feel, after all 
 these years, no amount of talk will help." 
 
 "You're dead right! I've never been able to 
 get at the enormous stress the churches lay upon 
 mere chin repentance. Repentance ought to act or 
 shut up !" 
 
 Another silence, and Fellowes again spoke: 
 
 "Jack, I shall report on board ship to-morrow 
 morning." 
 
 "Good!" 
 
 "I've got something worse than that to face; 
 something that " 
 
 "O Lord!" groaned Talty, following begrudg- 
 ingly a nimble imagination. 
 
 "I mean Dora. I have not dared tell her 
 that I shall at once be put under arrest on the ship, 
 and not see her again till the end. I have put 
 it off day after day; I cannot do it! It will be as 
 if I were to take that dear sweet face God in 
 heaven, man, she still smiles at me! and batter 
 
 122
 
 KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT 
 
 it in with my fist. That wonderful wife of mine 
 to be dragged down into the mire of the level I 
 have came to!" 
 
 Whatever Talty thought, he said: 
 
 "Your soul is as clean as Sunday-morning decks, 
 Kent. There's some confounded hitch in your 
 digestion. We'll find the remedy some day, old 
 man, I have not the least doubt." 
 
 The other man's bare quivering nerves felt the 
 healing of Jack's hearty tone, the great under- 
 lying kindness and forbearance in what was left 
 unsaid. 
 
 Suddenly he burst out with: 
 
 "Why should I be given such a wife? such a 
 friend?" 
 
 "We Taltys are no fools, Mr. Fellowes al- 
 though some of us look it you're a blasted nui- 
 sance, I admit but you are worth all we give you, 
 that's why 1" 
 
 And the other gave a little broken laugh, and 
 could not speak for awhile, and his cigar went out. 
 
 "I shall make no defence, Talty; just tell the 
 whole beastly truth and have it over. And start 
 in on sixty dollars a month somewhere!" 
 
 " 'Sixty dollars a month!' The infernal con- 
 ceit of some men ! 'Sixty dollars a' do you sup- 
 
 123
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 pose people are going to fling wealth at you be- 
 cause you've got a Greek profile! Don't be any 
 more of an ass than you can help, Fellowes. You'll 
 keep your present job, the one you are built for. 
 You'll get the best defence we can get hold of, 
 and you'll fight every inch of the way 1 The proof 
 is up to them. If it was a wretched orgy in a wife's 
 absence I'd be bowwowed if I'd lift a finger, but 
 I know better, Dora knows better, everyone 
 does." 
 
 "I refuse, utterly. It is not honest. I am guilty, 
 I deserve all they will give me. I refuse !" 
 
 Fellowes sprang to his feet and started down 
 the two steps of the summer-house. Jack said, 
 very gravely: 
 
 "My answer to all that, Kent, is one word 
 Dora." 
 
 His companion sank down suddenly where he 
 was, as if struck, and Jack finished his cigar, and 
 waited a long time, watching the other's relaxed 
 figure and bowed head. Then Fellowes slowly 
 arose, and with his eyes on the black shadow of 
 the lone pine overhanging his home, he said very 
 quietly: "You are right," and started across the 
 silent compound toward the house. As he did 
 so, Dell's voice swelled out into the night like an 
 
 124
 
 incense, singing after many days of silence, finally 
 yielding to Dora's entreaty. 
 
 " Songe a 1' adieu supreme, 
 Tant que mon cceur battra 
 Toujours il te dira 
 Rappelle toi ! ' " 
 
 That evening Kent kept silence, that his wife 
 might have the long refreshing sleep that always 
 came to her after he had emerged from his de- 
 mentia. And as she slept he watched, his soul 
 clinging to her like a punished child, craving affec- 
 tion without desert. 
 
 In the morning, after Talty had gone back to 
 the "Boston," Kent told Dora of the arrest and 
 court-martial that would follow his return to the 
 ship. 
 
 After the first great cry of uncontrollable an- 
 guish, she turned from him and rushed blindly 
 back and forth about the room, wildly gesticu- 
 lating, striking her breast roughly with her clinched 
 fist mad with suffering. After a desperate moral 
 wound, as after a physical, the body seeks the re- 
 lief of violent movement; perhaps the survival of 
 that primal instinct that sought frantically to expel 
 the embedded arrow. 
 
 125
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 He sat watching her with miserable eyes, put- 
 ting out his hand humbly in dumb entreaty, when- 
 ever she passed him. 
 
 By and by her steps began to falter, her arms fell, 
 she stood still, and turning she saw him for the 
 first time, so completely do life's crises isolate. Sit- 
 ting there, bent, broken, disparate by his own mis- 
 erable wrong-doing slowly there arose within her 
 this question: "In what way is this one defection 
 of his different from all the others, through which 
 I have not swerved in my devotion ? Only in this : 
 for the first time he is facing just punishment!" 
 It was her pride then that was in rebellion, not her 
 principle, not her love. More than ever her place 
 was beside him, not aloof. Never had he been 
 in such desperate need of her. There was a short 
 struggle more, and then she went to him, and put 
 her arms about him and drew his head back against 
 her breast and held it there, whispering over and 
 over the foolish words sacred to their little love- 
 story. And after that, the mere impetus of all 
 strong emotion once started, helped her. He 
 clung to her in an agony of relief and gratitude. 
 All lesser evils he could confront, if her love were 
 still his preserved to them both by her action 
 that morning. 
 
 126
 
 KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT 
 
 The last words she said to him as he was leaving 
 were: 
 
 "Fight, my darling! Fight for your sword 
 if not this time with it for my sake, and Julie's, 
 and your own," and she smiled, to put a little heart 
 into him. 
 
 The final glimpse he had of her, as he went out 
 of the gate and turned an agonized glance back- 
 ward was, strangely, the one he had pictured should 
 be the first, when he came: the wife standing on 
 the sun-flecked lawn waving her hand to him ; be- 
 side her the baby (both in white), imitating every 
 motion of her mother's, looking from one to the 
 other with quick motions of her pretty head, that 
 sent the curls whirling about each time, in a golden 
 arc. 
 
 And so Kent went down the hill to his judg- 
 ment. 
 
 Talty had found on his desk in his state-room, 
 when he went off to the ship that morning, a letter 
 from Imogen the first since Dora left her. The 
 contents severed once more the oft-repaired fila- 
 ments that his stanch nature had spun again and 
 again across the ever-widening space between their 
 two natures. 
 
 Every sentence contained its separate drop of 
 127
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 the poison of spite, vulgarity, chagrin, and selfish- 
 ness, and yet real longing for the man's love, which 
 she had forever lost. It began abruptly: "The 
 admiral's wife, who has the next room to mine at 
 this horrible hotel, got a letter this morning, from 
 Mr. Sault of the 'Boston' (he was one of her 
 proteges when he was a cadet), and you can imag- 
 ine my horror and mortification when she told me 
 this dreadful news about Kent Fellowes! Such 
 a perfectly disgusting thing to happen! He al- 
 ways did seem such a gentleman, although as queer 
 as Paddy's hat. It's the climate out here I've al- 
 ways told you ! I dare say you'll go off next, and 
 lose yourself. All I can say is, you'll stay lost for 
 all me ! I can at least have the satisfaction of know- 
 ing I tried to stay near you, as a moral help. If 
 disaster comes, it's your own fault, not mine. Mr. 
 Sault says a court will be ordered; he also hinted 
 that it was an old story with Kent Fellowes that, 
 of course, I was able to flatly contradict. If he's 
 dismissed for this, he'll go straight to the dogs, 
 of course, and I do hope Dora will have pride 
 enough, character enough, to take Julie and leave 
 him. Dora is a very weak, although sweet-tem- 
 pered, woman (which I can't say of all the Taltys 
 I've had the honor of meeting) , and I'm so afraid 
 
 128
 
 KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT 
 
 she will do something silly, which will spoil her 
 whole future. Thank goodness, I'm made of 
 stronger stuff, so there's no use trying any matri- 
 monial experiments on me! 
 
 "I must say I'm more than ever glad that 
 I obeyed the voice of self-respect, and remained 
 away from all that vulgar mess you Taltys seem 
 to have got yourselves into. Mrs. Titterington 
 keeps very much to herself, I must say, but she's 
 awful nice when I do see her only I don't like 
 the way she dresses you can't see her for clothes 
 during the day, and you can't see the clothes for 
 her at night ! And Mrs. Santley and I both think 
 she does something to her hair. The funniest part 
 of it is that I know Mrs. Santley does ! And she's 
 forty, if she's a week besides having an affair 
 with the Belgian consul, which would create a 
 scandal anywhere but in this 'Paris of the Orient,' 
 and the poor old chief coming up from the 'Alert' 
 at Woosung every four days, believing as firmly 
 in her as on the day he married her. The Belgian 
 has got on to the swing of the matrimonial pendu- 
 lum, so all goes well so far! Tell Dora if she 
 really needs me, to wire and I'll come over but 
 if she can get on without me till after the races, 
 I'd rather come then. As for you, I have nothing 
 
 whatever to suggest." 
 
 129
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Talty had not known how hard a thing a youth- 
 ful illusion is to kill until he read this letter and 
 realized that, after all, there had been a little some- 
 thing left within his very weary heart, with life 
 in it; and yet so happily was this man constituted 
 that he could lean back in his chair and laugh at 
 his wife's irresistibly dry humor, to which she was 
 so strangely unrelated. 
 
 There was at present only one thing to do: to 
 reply in such a way that Imogen would, for the 
 present, remain in Shanghai. This he did at once, 
 and with success. 
 
 When Lieutenant Fellowes went over the side 
 of the "Boston," the officer of the deck was his old 
 friend Nugent. 
 
 Fellowes, saluting him stiffly, reported: "Re- 
 turned on board, sir," and passed rapidly aft 
 toward the wardroom ladder ; his face very white, 
 his blue eyes almost black with the super-excitation 
 of his whole being. 
 
 The officer of the deck turned to his messenger: 
 
 "Tell the orderly to report to the captain that 
 Lieutenant Fellowes has returned on board." 
 
 Fellowes went directly to his state-room, drew 
 the curtain, and was shifting into uniform, when 
 there came a rap on his door-frame. 
 
 130
 
 KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT 
 
 "Well, what Is it?" 
 
 "The captain wishes to see you in the cabin, sir," 
 replied a formal military voice from the other side 
 of the curtain. 
 
 "All right. Tell the captain I'll report immedi- 
 ately." 
 
 A few moments later, at the cabin door, he said 
 to the marine on duty: 
 
 "Report my name to the captain," and he waited 
 with clinched teeth until the orderly returned, 
 saluted, and gave the captain's message. 
 
 Fellowes entered the cabin. It was a purely 
 official room; bare of all photographs, curios, 
 Oriental hangings, or even flowers, which so often 
 transform the cabin of a ship into a haven to eyes 
 an-hunger for home. 
 
 Captain Pehoe was a tall, sallow, dark-browed 
 man. He sat at his desk with his back turned, 
 writing, when Fellowes entered and stood in si- 
 lence. Those prolonged moments of studied negli- 
 gence stung the young officer like a lash across his 
 face. Finally the commanding officer turned 
 slowly about in his revolving chair, and said: 
 
 "Well, Lieutenant Fellowes, what explanation 
 have you to make for your absence?" 
 
 "I have none, sir."
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "I suppose you are aware of the gravity of your 
 offence?" 
 
 "I fully recognize it, sir." 
 
 "Consider yourself under suspension, sir. I 
 shall report the matter to the commander-in-chief 
 for such action as he may deem proper. I think 
 it only fair to warn you that I shall prefer charges 
 against you." Fellowes slowly inclined his head. 
 
 "Have you any further orders, sir?" 
 
 "No, sir," and the captain swung back to his 
 desk. 
 
 After Fellowes* dismissal, Captain Pehoe 
 pressed his bell, and upon the orderly's appearance, 
 commanded : 
 
 "Tell the officer of the deck to enter in the log 
 that Lieutenant Fellowes is under suspension to 
 await the action of the commander-in-chief," 
 and so Dora's secret was nailed to the mast, and 
 left flaunting for all eyes to read. 
 
 The suspended officer returned at once to his 
 state-room, where his brother-in-law soon joined 
 him, and remained with him from then to the end, 
 every moment his own duties made possible, to 
 emphasize an identity of interest in every way his 
 generous heart could devise. 
 
 Fellowes had always been an officer universally 
 132
 
 KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT 
 
 respected for his professional enthusiasm and de- 
 votion, and for his impeccable good-breeding, 
 which counts for so much in the close vicinage of 
 wardroom life. His was not the nature to com- 
 mand the great popularity and warm affection that 
 ran out so easily to Talty; ashore, from one end 
 of the service to the other; and afloat, from the 
 cabin to the forecastle. 
 
 But Kent had his few friends who never swerved 
 in their faith in him as an officer, held too long for 
 his own good, in the leash of circumstances. 
 
 At the noon breakfast in the wardroom an un- 
 premeditated, halting, but sincere effort was made 
 to draw the suspended officer into the general con- 
 versation, and relieve the painful tension of his 
 thin white face, and before the meal was over, 
 Talty was thankful to see it had obviously relaxed. 
 His heart glowed with gratitude toward his ship- 
 mates. When a soldier gets his bullet, the men 
 beside him in the ranks, in all the murk and roar, 
 are none the worse soldiers for dragging the 
 stricken one apart and lowering him gently to the 
 ground. 
 
 Three days after Captain Pehoe's report on Fel- 
 lowes' case had reached the admiral at Shanghai, 
 the flag-ship arrived in Nagasaki. And two hours 
 
 133
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 later the "Alert" followed, to help furnish the re- 
 quired quota of seven officers ranking Lieutenant 
 Fellowes, necessary to form a court, should one be 
 ordered by the commander-in-chief, after further 
 inquiry into Pehoe's charges. 
 
 As the American flag-ship was approaching her 
 anchorage, the clear notes of the "Boston's" bugle 
 rang out over the bay, calling away the gig. Cap- 
 tain Pehoe lost no time in taking his place alone in 
 the stern-sheets, and giving the order to shove off. 
 The men gave way together, steering for the flag- 
 ship, the "coach-whip," denoting an official visit, 
 fluttering from the bow-staff, on a line with the 
 captain's black brows. 
 
 As soon as he was announced on the flag-ship, 
 Pehoe went to the admiral's cabin. It was a suite 
 of rooms vivid with that daring Oriental scheme 
 of colors which never clashes. Brocades, embroid- 
 ered hangings, pillows from every port in the East; 
 a huge "hawthorne" vase from Canton; Benares 
 brasses; ivories from Colombo; precious old 
 monkey kakemonos from Kioto (thought, by the 
 admiral at least, to be the work of Sosen himself) ; 
 mon fitkusas, blue, with golden eyes; potted palms 
 and plants; and photographs everywhere bespoke 
 the soul gregarious. 
 
 134
 
 KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT 
 
 Over the admiral's desk, bristling with papers, 
 was a large water-color of his beautiful young wife. 
 The mahogany case enthroning the ship's silver 
 punch-bowl and candelabra, presented by the city 
 whose name she bore, challenged attention close 
 by the door. Captain Pehoe felt physically cold 
 and nauseated with repulsion. There was as great 
 a psychical difference as physical between the two 
 men. A perfect digestion, a persistent cheerful- 
 ness, a very kind heart, had preserved to the ad- 
 miral perennial youth. He was a large man, 
 rotund of figure, boyish blue eyes, a ruddy color 
 in his cheeks, and abundance of silvery white hair. 
 A heavy mustache, worn Prussian fashion, gave 
 him the air of a military fop, abetted by an im- 
 maculate uniform, every ornament of which shone 
 brilliantly. His speech and movements were free 
 from the lethargy of age. 
 
 After the ordinary greetings between the two 
 officers, the admiral went to his desk and withdrew 
 from a pigeon-hole a large official paper, and said 
 briskly : 
 
 "See here, Pehoe, do you insist on pressing these 
 charges against Lieutenant Fellowes? You know 
 what a remarkably fine officer he is. Sit down, 
 sit down-" 
 
 135
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 A look of intense irritation passed over the cap- 
 tain's face. 
 
 "Admiral, a drunkard has less right to be in our 
 service than in any profession on earth." 
 
 "You forget the Church, Captain," suggested 
 the admiral slyly. 
 
 "Pardon me, sir, I do not. That is a mission, 
 an inspiration, a consecration, not a profession!" 
 
 "Quite so, quite so!" cried the admiral, nervous- 
 ly beginning to finger his bell, and then recalling 
 himself with a jerk. 
 
 "As I ask only for justice myself, Admiral, I 
 give only justice," announced the man of poor 
 circulation. 
 
 "Now, do you know, Pehoe, I'm putting all my 
 pile on mercy? You may be able to bluff it on 
 justice, I confess I don't dare!" cried gayly the 
 man of perfect digestion, deeply regretting that 
 no one was there to hear him badger "old 
 Pehoe." 
 
 "I respectfully submit, sir, that Lieutenant Fel- 
 lowes should be court-martialed," Pehoe's voice 
 was as near a sneer as he dared venture. A quick 
 flash of temper darted from Admiral Tittering- 
 ton's eyes; it was his privilege to steer the con- 
 versation in that cabin, his alone! But after a 
 
 136
 
 KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT 
 
 moment's silence the handsome autocrat said 
 quietly, stroking his white mustache: 
 
 "It's his first offence, Captain Pehoe. I have 
 seen lives snuffed out by harshness. If you had 
 been willing, I was rather inclined to let it go with 
 a very severe reprimand and keeping it in the 
 squadron under the circumstances." 
 
 The particular circumstance through which the 
 admiral viewed the case happened to be the pretty 
 pleading of his wife the night he left Shanghai, 
 when she begged for all the leniency possible for 
 the man whose sweet-faced wife she had met 
 one afternoon in Nagasaki. The admiral found 
 nothing in life as difficult as to say nay to that 
 wayward, much-petted wife of his, accustomed to 
 having every mood taken seriously, every wish an 
 ticipated, always victorious because assuming blind- 
 ness to the possibility of defeat. 
 
 If Captain Pehoe had had the faintest inkling 
 of anything so shamelessly uxorious, his manner 
 would have indicated, even more plainly than it 
 did, his low estimate of the admiral's ethics. As 
 it was he said stiffly : 
 
 "It seems to me, Admiral, there is no surer guar- 
 antee for a second offence than to be lenient with 
 a first." 
 
 137
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Not always, not always," mused the admiral. 
 There was a short pause, and then he added 
 quickly : 
 
 "Well, Captain, of course if you insist, I shall be 
 compelled to order a general court, much as I re- 
 gret the necessity for it. My time is up in a few 
 months, it's been a happy cruise, I'm deeply sorry 
 for this," he added a little sadly. His use of the 
 word "happy" was sheer blasphemy to the ears 
 of the younger man, but he held his peace and 
 listened : 
 
 "But you know, Captain Pehoe, how very diffi- 
 cult it is to prove drunkenness; and one thing 
 strikes me in this report of yours: no one from 
 your ship saw Fellowes in this condition. What 
 evidence have you?" 
 
 "He was attended by a resident physician here, 
 sir. An Italian (or, as he put it, three-quarters 
 Italian, and one-half French ! ) ; I went to see 
 him and I have persuaded him, with difficulty, to 
 consent to testify before the court. He tells me 
 that Lieutenant Fellowes, during his absence, was 
 suffering from acute alcoholism." 
 
 The admiral's lips pursed themselves for a 
 whistle, and then meeting the other's eye aban- 
 doned it, knowing full well that this man ac- 
 
 138
 
 KENT GOES DOWN TO HIS JUDGMENT 
 
 corded him no appreciable specific gravity what- 
 ever. 
 
 "Well, that will be evidence sufficient to convict. 
 I will order the court to meet within a few days. 
 Sit down, Pehoe; what's the rush? I've got a 
 little liqueur Scotch here, the colonel of those Fusi- 
 lier fellows gave me in Hong Kong, I'd like you 
 to try it. I never saw anything to touch it my- 
 self. It disenfranchises a man of sixty in ten min- 
 utes, by Jove! What's that you say? Oh! that's 
 one on me! Beg pardon, Pehoe, I quite forgot 
 you do not drink. Of course, of course. I do, a 
 little now and then myself, because well, because 
 I haven't any reason not to. Some men have a 
 reason. I quite understand. Good-morning, good- 
 morning, sir," and then the admiral leaned back 
 and chuckled to himself. 
 
 139
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 " To be wise and love 
 Exceeds man's might." 
 
 " "TV J" AMMY, for gracious sake, take this hat 
 -L T JL away and bury it deep in the garden ! 
 In a shady noisome corner, please, where it's not 
 likely to take root. I think without a single ex- 
 ception I'm the most hideous-looking girl on earth 
 to-day ! Some days I'm not so bad but to-day I 
 look like a barmaid of thirty-eight thirsty sum- 
 mers. Mammy, come here, when I speak to you I 
 Now stand still not there right here I Now, 
 tell me on your word of honor, S. Carolina, does 
 it positively sicken you to look at me in this hat?" 
 
 "Toe tell yer de plain troof, Miss Dell, I ain' 
 feelin' fus' rate to-day!" said Mammy roguishly, 
 and Dell flew at her and shook her, till every tooth 
 in her black face showed in one great grin of de- 
 light. 
 
 Then the girl sat down breathless, professing a 
 140
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 marked relief. She was again seated in front of 
 the mirror, close beside which were two chairs, 
 piled with all of her hats and some of her sister's. 
 She slapped one after another viciously down upon 
 her now dishevelled head, removing each with a 
 louder groan of growing discontent. 
 
 "Why is it, Mammy, that there are days when 
 one looks like the very mischief, and nothing suits? 
 And days when one looks perfectly dear in any old 
 rag of a thing?" 
 
 "I'se come ter de 'elusion, Miss Dell, it all do- 
 pends on de eyes we's a dressin' fur," and Mammy 
 looked the picture of belated innocence, smooth- 
 ing down her kerchief over her ample bosom. The 
 answer was a discarded hat aimed at the turbaned 
 head, which Mammy deftly caught and replaced 
 upon the dressing-table, with a low gurgle of 
 laughter. 
 
 "I won't wear any I It's very smart not to I'll 
 be smart, for a change," announced Dell, spring- 
 ing to her feet. But Mammy became serious 
 at once, and scolded, oblivious of Miss Talty's 
 twenty years. 
 
 " 'Smart!' Dere ain' nuffin' smart 'bout gwine 
 out'n de do', in de bro-o-rd daylight, widout'n a 
 hat on de haid! No'm, dere ain'. It's bold an' 
 
 141
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 it's sassy! Young ladies ain' got no gumption 
 now'days, actin' like a passel ob boys! I ain' 
 s'prised de cer'mony ob matrimony are gettin' mo' 
 an' mo' onpop'lar eb'ry y'ar I Dat's so, Miss Dell ! 
 no use yer pokin' fun at yer ole Mammy. Come 
 heah, miss, an' 'have yo'self! Set right down, 
 an' mek up yo' min' ter wear one ob dese yere! 
 An', honey, jes' ter please yer ole nigger Mammy, 
 lemme tie on one er dose sorf ' purty white veils dat 
 look so sweet an' ladylike! Please, Miss Dell!" 
 
 Dell yielded to the coaxing voice, partly because 
 it merely indorsed her own old-fashioned preju- 
 dices, and selecting a simple straw hat trimmed 
 with white mulle, she skewered it on. Then, to 
 the old servant's unfeigned joy, she tied over all 
 a veil of thinnest white tulle. 
 
 Following a mental carom of her own, Mammy 
 said abruptly, with dancing eyes : 
 
 "I dunno if you rightly 'member a gent'man 
 who use' ter visit we-all in Washington, Miss Dell? 
 His name was now, I had dat name all right 
 minute ago! Oh, yes! Doctor Robb. 'Member 
 him, missy?" 
 
 "I recall, dimly, such a person. Go on with 
 your fairy story," replied a very haughty young 
 lady, absorbed in white castor gloves. 
 
 142
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 "Well, one day he up an' he says de mos' curious- 
 est thing ter me. I wan' ter arsk yer 'bout it, Miss 
 Dell, 'fo' I done fo'get all 'bout it. He says: 
 'Mammy, you're great' jes' like dat! Yes'm, he 
 did! An' den he says: 'If you'd a been French, 
 an' not a nigger, you'd er kep' a very pop'lar 
 saloon !' Yes'm, he sutney did ! An' yet de doctor 
 he's jes' de mos' puffeckest gent'man I ever did 
 see since yo' pa died!" 
 
 Even Dora's sad heart responded to the glad 
 young laugh that rang through the silent bunga- 
 low. But Dell went instantly to her sister in con- 
 trition, and did not leave her side until she had 
 brought the old sweet smile back upon her stricken 
 face, turned always toward the harbor and its ever- 
 changing colony of ships. 
 
 Then the bell rang and Dell's face flamed into 
 a sudden blaze, her eyes fiercely challenging com- 
 ment meanwhile. 
 
 Dora looked up, then down at the sewing 
 lying in her lap, and asked demurely : 
 
 "Going on a poster-hunt, dear?" 
 
 "No-o, not to-day. I'm going up on the ridge, 
 where one gets a view of the other side of things." 
 
 "Don't go so far alone; take Mammy." 
 
 "I shall not need Mammy." 
 143
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Oh 1 Well, bring him back to dinner. I mean 
 it, Dell, really. Of course I could not see anyone 
 else just now but somehow a doctor always un- 
 derstands things." 
 
 * 'Him? Doctor?' who under the canopy are 
 you talking about, Dora Fellowes?" 
 
 "I couldn't tell you why to save me, Dell, but 
 I suddenly thought of Leigh Robb." 
 
 "Well, I should think you couldn't 1" exclaimed 
 the other, then she stooped and caressed her sister, 
 whispering: "Are you sure, Dora, dear, you do 
 not mind my leaving you for a little while per- 
 fectly sure? And you will not come too?" 
 
 Just then Julie burst into the room, and pattered 
 straight to her mother's arms, chattering, gurgling, 
 panting, with a breathless amah at her heels. And 
 the young mother looked up smiling and said: 
 "You see?" and so Dell left her; going forthwith 
 to the drawing-room, where she displayed no sur- 
 prise upon finding Doctor Robb awaiting her, 
 looking very fresh, and boyish, and extremely 
 cheerful. They started out at once; and Dora 
 hearing the gate slam, arose and watched them 
 from her window, Mammy peering over her 
 shoulder, and when the two without had disap- 
 peared, the two within exchanged glances, and 
 
 144
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 shook their heads smiling, at the inexplicable ways 
 of Miss Adele Talty. 
 
 It seemed a pity after all the long haggling at 
 the kuruma stand below "Ippon Matsu," and the 
 careful selection of five muscular coolies, that they 
 were allowed so little figure in the expedition of 
 the young couple. The two natives whose lot it 
 was to draw the lighter burden of Miss Talty's 
 slight form, rejoiced loudly over the three to 
 whom the heavy bulk of the doctor had fallen; 
 who repaid the scorn later, with interest. For 
 after Robb had minutely exploited the back of 
 Adele's pretty head for half an hour, a strong 
 thirst for her face made him spring impatiently 
 out of his jinrikisha and catch up with hers; where 
 surcease of suffering came to him, tramping beside 
 her with his hand on her lacquered wheel-guard. 
 And so they went up the long incline. It was 
 now the turn of Robb's coolies to jeer and trail 
 along with uplifted shafts, watching with satisfac- 
 tion their brethren ahead, bent to their task and 
 panting rhythmically. 
 
 After once attaining the joy of Dell's profile, 
 it was not surprising that Robb's jinrikisha-men 
 continued to bless their good luck, and when they 
 reached the summit, they felt called upon to stand 
 
 145
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 treat at the tea-house for their dripping compan- 
 ions, congratulating them insolently upon their 
 muscle, feeling their legs and arms with long in- 
 drawn breaths of burlesque admiration, while they 
 waited for the tea and tobacco-fcow. 
 
 Walking a little apart from the clamor at the 
 chaya, Adele and the doctor stood upon a knoll 
 and looked off across the deep valley to the volcanic 
 pile of mountains beyond, the sapphire waters of 
 Shimabara Gulf on the right. The hot humid air 
 came in puffs, the threatened typhoon having sud- 
 denly veered off to sea, leaving only the taste and 
 smell of it in the air ashore and much grati- 
 tude. 
 
 They stood looking out beside each other, in 
 the silence always induced by great depths, great 
 heights, great distances vainly struggling after 
 the meaning that seems hidden, couchant, waiting 
 for recognition. One feels very close to nature's 
 secret at such times, and eyes look their longing 
 to surprise it, ears listen intently for the pulse of 
 it, the soul stretches to its limit in the effort to 
 grasp it. But no poet, no philosopher that ever 
 lived has caught more than a symbolic meaning 
 in nature the real message, unrelated to human- 
 ity, remains unread. And it always ends with a 
 
 146
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 sigh, a turning away, a reassertion of life's old 
 detail with which we must go on, pretending con- 
 tentment. 
 
 "It's not digestible a view like that, is it, Doc- 
 tor Robb?" murmured Dell. 
 
 He turned to her with an expression of pleas- 
 ure. 
 
 "I believe our minds have been running neck 
 and neck over the same course, Miss Adele. You 
 expressed my exact thought then. Oh, I do like 
 that so ! That mental kinship between a man and 
 a woman. I believe the world is divided, in some 
 esoteric fashion, into psychic tribes ; above all ques- 
 tions of blood, language, sex, or association. One 
 knows it instantly on meeting. Hatred is a tribal 
 antagonism; indifference, tribal incommunicable- 
 ness. I've felt it strongly with a woman of sixty, 
 and even more strongly with a little boy of five 
 both chance acquaintances. We looked into each 
 other's eyes and understood. It's one of the things 
 ahead of us, I suppose, that will be but the kinder- 
 garten of future generations." 
 
 " 'Oh! but the long, long while the World shall 
 last!'" she murmured, her eyes on the distant 
 mountains, and he suddenly stooped and kissed her 
 hand, and then turned away and said confusedly : 
 
 '47
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "I couldn't help it. I'll be good, as the children 
 say but you are such a such a satisfaction to 
 me somehow! Ridiculous, isn't it?" 
 
 "Very," she said serenely. 
 
 Then the young officer began that entirely fruit- 
 less search in Japan, within a certain radius of any 
 village, for a quiet spot to sit apart from either 
 the all-pervading paddy-fields, or the ubiquitous 
 curiosity of infant Japan. After much looking 
 about, they spied a little island of trees in an ocean 
 of "honorable rice," and taking the only path 
 vouchsafed them, they walked along the usual tiny 
 ridge of turf between the highly cultivated patches 
 of the sacred grain. 
 
 Under the largest bamboo, and further para- 
 soled by a dark-leaved camellia-bush, the doctor 
 spread a red jinrikisha blanket for Adele and then 
 he sank at her feet with a great sigh of content- 
 ment. 
 
 At last he had her to himself for one holy hour, 
 insulated from all other influences; the mystery of 
 that view at their feet, his only rival. He felt for 
 a manuscript in his breast, withdrew his hand and 
 waited for the right moment. To get her thus 
 apart from the hungry hordes of men whom his 
 rather bruised imagination always pictured clam- 
 
 148
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 oring for a glance from his lady-love's mischiev- 
 ous eyes, was almost too perfect a thing to have 
 happened he felt a sudden suspicion of it, alert 
 for disaster. It was just as well, for it came in the 
 form of one little native maid picking her way re- 
 lentlessly toward them over the ridge of grass. 
 Then in twos and threes and half-scores the chil- 
 dren of the village followed, and came and stood 
 beside the Americans and gazed upon them round- 
 eyed, silent, unobtrusive; but for all purposes of 
 successful courtship of a difficult young woman 
 with a rampant sense of the ridiculous, absolutely 
 fatal. Twenty-six little imperturbable chaperones 
 and others shouting shrilly in the distance, Adele 
 was safe from manuscripts for that day, and the 
 doctor's heart froze with disappointment one min- 
 ute, and blazed with fury the next. Of course Dell, 
 in the innocence of her affectionate heart, began 
 to smile and talk to them, in face of the doctor's 
 vehement protest. The children clustered closely, 
 boys came flying bare-legged over the ribbons of 
 turf; or girls more sedately, subdued betimes into 
 a joyless vicarious motherhood under the burden 
 of fat babies asleep strapped to their backs, in all 
 sorts of positions, mostly suggestive of instant 
 strangulation. This last phase of the calamity put 
 
 149
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 the finishing touches to the doctor's attack of irri- 
 tability and he cried in helpless wrath : 
 
 "Stop smiling at them! of course they'll hang 
 on like grim death, who wouldn't?" 
 
 "Now I know what it is to be 'the cynosure,' and 
 do you know, Doctor, I like it I" 
 
 "Oh, I didn't know. Tell me when you've had 
 enough," growled he, throwing himself flat and 
 burying tortured eyes. 
 
 "Oh, Doctor! please look at this tiny one with 
 the red tassel." No answer came, he did not 
 stir. 
 
 "I have my opinion of a man who has no place 
 in his heart for dear little innocent babies" ap- 
 parently this man had none. 
 
 There was a pause, and then in a plaintive tone 
 she murmured: 
 
 "All right, Doctor Robb, I will send them away. 
 There is something in your attitude that suggests 
 discomfort it is your afternoon. I'll give them 
 a few sen and then you tell them to go." The 
 doctor was on his feet shouting: 
 
 "Do nothing of the kind!" but it was too late. 
 The coppers had fallen into the little brown 
 hands, and high staccato cries had gone forth an- 
 nouncing that the foreign devils were paying 
 
 150
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 money for nothing, after the strange way they 
 often had heard about. The ridge of turf sil- 
 houetted a frieze of flying figures. 
 
 "Now please send them off, Doctor." 
 
 "Oh, yes! send them away! Sounds simple, 
 doesn't it? Now watch me try!" Gestures and 
 voice were indeed tragic as he yelled: 
 
 "Piggi! piggi- f this minute! you horrid little 
 heathens ! You observe how quickly they piggi?" 
 he sneered down at Dell parenthetically. 
 
 The little circle moved back a few steps to give 
 space for this fascinating impromptu performance 
 that was whiling away, so pleasantly, the long hot 
 afternoon. Again cries flew from throat to throat 
 that a strolling theatrical foreign troupe was 
 among them, and not only free as their own 
 saru-mawashi or dai-kagura, but giving money. 
 
 "You see how it works? Easiest thing! Watch 
 'em piggi O Lord!" groaned Robb, and Dell 
 went into shrieks of laughter which, after a time, 
 ended in a thin sort of whimper from sheer weak- 
 ness. This somehow struck the fancy of the chil- 
 dren, and they began to laugh too, inextinguish- 
 ably, jumping up and down with glee. It was 
 the best performance they had seen in many a long 
 day, away up there in their little mountain home !
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Drawing in a deep breath, once more the doctor 
 attacked them with his whole vocabulary: 
 
 "Now then, damatte, mina same and sore 
 hayaku! Mo yorashii, or I'll call the kebu, jiki nil 
 Do you hear? You'd better abunai, you little 
 kitanai nezumi! Watakushi's as mad as a hornet, 
 by jingo! Piggif sare! yuke! And and that's 
 every word I know of the confounded lingo 1" he 
 added, sitting down and wiping his dripping face. 
 And the others were in hysterics, Dell leading the 
 chorus. 
 
 Presently he turned toward his faithless com- 
 panion and remarked, with acerbity: 
 
 "So glad you're enjoying the afternoon, Miss 
 Talty." 
 
 "Oh, Doctor, if you could see your own face ! 
 I've always been told I had a contagious laugh, 
 but I see you're immune." Dell wiped her eyes 
 and fanned herself with his straw hat. 
 
 He turned a slow, grieving glance upon the 
 faithful, admiring circle hedging them in, and then 
 said gently: 
 
 "If you knew how I've thought and dreamed of 
 these hours you gave to me! It is maddening! 
 If it was something I could rise up and smite 
 
 but these little scraps ! It's the very " 
 
 152
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 "Yes, it is," she hastily interposed, and won a 
 rather stiff -lipped smile from her forlorn com- 
 panion. 
 
 And then they arose and he folded up the blanket 
 and they went their way back to the tea-house. 
 The audience followed and hived once more about 
 them, but the doctor's spirit was broken. To pla- 
 cate him, Dell proposed walking part way home 
 down the long hill, and he sent the jinrikishas on 
 ahead, telling them in his seaport jargon to await 
 them at the second tea-house. 
 
 "Ah! this is something like!" he cried, happy 
 once more, as they started away together. He held 
 over her head his large green-lined pongee sun- 
 umbrella, thereby winning proximity. She darted 
 right and left plucking wild flowers and ferns 
 along the banks of the road, bringing them to him 
 to carry for her, and everything she did was perfect 
 in his eyes. 
 
 He believed strongly that if this state of siege 
 at "Ippon Matsu" continued a week longer (bar- 
 ring out all men, but himself, by a miracle), he 
 would succeed in so surrounding her with his love 
 that the habit of looking to him for the dangerous 
 joy of being beloved would be formed, and work 
 eventually in his favor. If that week (however 
 
 153
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 full of agony to others) did not crown his life with 
 happiness, he should, to the end of his days, feel 
 that he had not deserved it. 
 
 But fortune was in a spiteful mood that day, 
 and bent on knotting threads. 
 
 The doctor had spied high up, growing appar- 
 ently out of bare rocks, a tiny clump of ferns and 
 climbed after them, returning to find Adele sailing 
 along far down the road, beside her a tall, heavily 
 built man, who had evidently just descended from 
 his private jinrikisha which was following empty, 
 at his heels; also three coolies in dark-blue livery 
 indicating a foreign resident of some consequence. 
 
 The brief ejaculation that fell from Stoneleigh 
 Robb's lips contained at least the vocabulary of a 
 prayer, if not the spirit. He felt rush over him 
 that first hot flush of resentment which introduces 
 us to an attack of jealousy, quickly followed by its 
 deadly chill. He lingered in the rear, feeding his 
 rage upon the fell sight ahead of him. Presently 
 Adele turned and awaited him, the enemy beside 
 her talking earnestly the while, his eyes never 
 leaving her face. 
 
 "We waited for you," she said inanely as one 
 does to tide over an awkward situation, recogniz- 
 ing the young officer's condition at a glance, and 
 
 154
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 rejoicing exceedingly in her power over men's 
 moods. 
 
 "So I observe," Robb heard himself say, with 
 disgust at his want of control over the forces 
 within him. 
 
 "Doctor D'Estrees, I want you to know my 
 friend and shall I say shipmate? Doctor Robb 
 of the 'Boston.' " 
 
 "Doctor Roobb ! Eet ees a gr-r-eat pleasure to 
 meet a colleague so far from our common base of 
 supplies." 
 
 The Italian bowed low, smiled radiantly their 
 hands met. 
 
 "About three miles and a half, I should say," 
 grunted the younger man, without enthusiasm. 
 
 "Ah-h ! You mistek' my meaning qui-i-te ! I 
 mean nort the chemist down there no 1 Bot the 
 great schools of our profession Paris, Vienna, 
 Bologna, yes and your New York al-so." 
 
 "Thanks," drawled Robb so offensively that 
 Dell gave him a glance meant to wither, and took 
 the lines of conversation in firm hands. Where- 
 upon the American experienced shame and remorse, 
 and sought to redeem himself but it was too late. 
 The Italian had taken in at once the whole situa- 
 tion, and from being amused by the other man's 
 
 155
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 mood, he had become suddenly enraged. He had 
 made one advance toward this cold calculating 
 American; it had been repelled. He should be 
 taught a lesson, this boy! The unquenchable 
 Italian instinct for drama was aroused, and for 
 the first time since meeting her at "Ippon Matsu," 
 there was crystallized within him an intention re- 
 garding the girl whose charm had abided with 
 him. The blood ran more quickly through D'Es- 
 trees' veins than it had in many a long day, as he 
 turned abruptly away from Robb toward Adele, 
 and said in his deep beautiful voice: 
 
 "As I was saying: I rode fourteen miles to my 
 pa-a-tient thees morning, I perform the I mean, 
 I did what I could four hours en route, remem- 
 ber ! And when I left the house the father now, 
 what do you the-e-nk he said to me? Eet seems 
 he stordies the English, as all the world must do 
 on the road to success. He bowed double, he drew 
 the long breath of ceremony, and said (one word 
 jumping over the back of the orther) : 'I hop' 
 you weel call again very soon, when you have a 
 leisure hour!'" Adele matched this with O 
 Hani's latest, and then D'Estrees looked at his 
 watch, apologized, shouted to his lagging kuruma- 
 men, and explained with his usual rush of words 
 
 and many gestures: 
 
 156
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 "The Canadian mail mos' be een, I mos' tear 
 myself away. And you weel give me the evening 
 for a dinner at my house? Choose exactly your 
 own day, guests, your chaperone, your menu. I 
 want you, Mees Tality all the rest ees bot the 
 fra-a-me. We weel have music together. You 
 sing, I can see by the throat. Doctor Roobb 
 have I the nem? you weel al-so give me the 
 honor? A rivederci!" With a shout and a dash 
 the liveried servants clattered off in a little cloud 
 of dust. 
 
 Adele's heart was beating fast from the clash 
 between her knights, which she felt as keenly as 
 a maiden might watching a joust with spears, in 
 the old days of deeds when words were only just 
 being born here and there out of the chaos of 
 silence. 
 
 "How long has this been going on, may I ask?" 
 came humbly from the suffering survivor. 
 
 "What an uncomplimentary question! As if 
 the date could be any other than the first day that 
 he saw me!" 
 
 She sought his glance smiling, but he looked 
 straight ahead, his handsome profile very white 
 and rigid. And then his obvious unhappiness went 
 to her heart, and to reinstate his peace, so repeat- 
 
 157
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 edly disturbed that afternoon, she crossed the road 
 and said the only thing in the only way that would 
 make him forget all else: 
 
 "Doctor, I'm so tired 1" 
 
 Instantly he was another man, full of gentle 
 solicitude, regrets, suggestions. He led her to 
 the roadside and sat beside her, holding the um- 
 brella with one hand and fanning her with the 
 other, and she thanked him pathetically, closing 
 her eyes. Whereupon he dropped all else and felt 
 her pulse; an impossible task, his own was so in- 
 sistent. 
 
 "I certainly am an utter brute I It's the sun, you 
 poor child!" 
 
 "I think so too I mean the sun!" murmured 
 the half-swooning one, always so pale she could 
 count upon herself without fear. Her only inten- 
 tion was to make him happy once more in the mere 
 joy of caring for her, which being accomplished 
 she revived slowly. Then he left her and went 
 on to recall their jinrikishas, as he would not con- 
 sent to her walking. 
 
 "Oh, I'm so glad I'm a woman!" the girl mur- 
 mured to herself when alone, leaning back against 
 a bowlder with closed eyes, smiling. 
 
 So they went back as they came, he walking be- 
 158
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 side her jinrikisha, at peace with the world. All 
 would have gone well if the coolies had not chosen 
 the Oura Road instead of the Maminohira Hill, 
 thereby passing D'Estrees' house, who may or 
 may not have been responsible for that choice. 
 
 At any rate there he was waiting at his gate, in 
 spotless white duck, dark-blue cummerbund and 
 flowing tie, and he pounced upon them as they 
 passed, with a boyish shout: 
 
 "Ah-ha! Mees Tality! I have been hoping 
 exactly thees would happen. I watch the sem as 
 an old cat for you and for Doctor Roobb," he 
 turned to the other man with the lowest of salutes, 
 a broad sweep of the arm, a shrug, an uplifted eye- 
 brow, a studiedly false smile. 
 
 Robb stood once more frozen, preoccupied by a 
 fast-growing hatred the sunshine gone, hope in 
 his breast simply awaiting burial. 
 
 "You weel come een and pour once the tea for an 
 old bachelor, yes? You and your friend. One 
 cup, two bites of hot toast, not ten minutes of your 
 time. Does that nort sound tempting? Confess! 
 Come ! while we spic', the toast ees getting cold, 
 come !" His hand was out, his manner irresistible, 
 and before she realized it Adele, with guilty plead- 
 ing eyes upon the younger man, was within the ene- 
 
 159
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 my's gates, avowing a great hunger and thirst. 
 Robb took his evil mood by the throat and they 
 went in. Tea was served on a little loggia at the 
 back of the house, overlooking a quaint Japanese 
 garden. Then they went into the house again, 
 and D'Estrees went to the piano and played an 
 andante of Beethoven's with that gentle padded 
 touch that cannot be taught; and Adele sang one 
 verse of "Lehn deine Wang an meine Wang," 
 with such exquisite tenderness that Robb forgot his 
 woes, and the Italian his English; and it darted 
 through him that perhaps he had commenced a 
 game with double-edged tools. 
 
 When they left, Adele's hands were full of 
 great pink lotus blooms, her cheeks aflame, her 
 eyes dancing in the old way that had wrought dis- 
 aster so often before. 
 
 At the gate D'Estrees, sure of the American 
 officer's eyes, travestied adoration, laughing and 
 saying in his deep vibrating voice : 
 
 "Senorina mia, I can see eet ees inevitable 
 eet has come there ees now no escap' for me! 
 And I mos', from now, see you each day, once 
 each day. Oh, I know well, you weel hide; your 
 black woman weel mek' the leetle fib at the door : 
 'Mees Dell she's gone out, so sorry, sahl' ' (He 
 
 160
 
 TOO MANY CHAPERONES 
 
 had Mammy's voice and smile to perfection.) 
 "But, just the sem', I shall see you each day. Eet 
 ees a pathognomonic of love, to be exacting the 
 whiter the fla-a-me, the greater the heat to main- 
 tain eet I appeal to your friend, no ? Good-night, 
 you have med me very happy, I thank you both. 
 Good-night." 
 
 He stood leaning over his gate and watched 
 them as they went up the road, and he said to 
 himself : 
 
 "So! A Saxon would teach a Latin the lesson 
 of woman ! Did he think the cold, inert, fish- 
 blooded thing! that a D'Estrees could be easily 
 overborne in an affair of this sort ? We shall see, 
 what we shall see!" 
 
 "Shall I throw these away?" asked Robb at 
 the gate of "Ippon Matsu," gazing down at the 
 wilted ferns in his hands to which he had been 
 faithful. 
 
 "Aren't you ashamed of yourself?" was her 
 answer, holding out her hand and fixing him with 
 reproachful eyes. And he was a long time trans- 
 ferring them from his hand to hers. At the door 
 he said, now quite master of himself: 
 
 "So the Italian pleases you?" 
 
 "As a friend, yes; as a lover, perhaps; but as 
 
 - ' 
 
 a ~ 161
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "As a ?" 
 
 "Never, never, never, as a " she got inside 
 the door, and peered back at him through a crack 
 "as a husband!" 
 
 "Adele!" he cried springing forward. But the 
 door was shut in his face, and there was no re- 
 sponse to his soft coaxing tattoo, save an exact imi- 
 tation of it on the inside of the door, and then 
 complete silence. 
 
 But somehow, Leigh Robb went back to the ship 
 happy. 
 
 162
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 UNDER ARREST 
 
 " What a thing friendship it, world without end!" 
 
 ONE intensely hot afternoon a few days later, 
 Fellowes and his brother-in-law were seated 
 in the state-room of the suspended officer, when 
 Lieutenant Nugent appeared in the open door, in 
 his hand a large official envelope. He was in frock- 
 coat and wore side-arms; his face was pale, and 
 as he saluted there was the look in his eyes of a 
 dumb animal in intense pain. There was a pause, 
 during which Fellowes arose, and squared his 
 shoulders unconsciously as he faced his brother 
 officer. Nugent's sad eyes clung to the port-hole 
 over Kent's shoulder, as he said in a voice devoid 
 of expression: 
 
 "I am directed, sir, by the commanding officer 
 to hand you the charges and specifications pre- 
 ferred against you by the commander-in-chief. 
 You are to consider yourself as under arrest, and 
 the and the captain has ordered me to demand 
 
 your sword." 
 
 163
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "He might have spared you that!" cried Talty. 
 Fellowes raised his hand commanding silence, and 
 with quiet dignity reached over for his sword and 
 belt and handed them to Nugent, who again salut- 
 ed, swung to the right on one heel and marched 
 stiffly away. 
 
 The other two listened in silence to the rattle 
 of the belt-buckle against the sword, growing 
 fainter and fainter as the bearer walked away. 
 
 "He might have spared you that, damn himl" 
 repeated Talty, of the two apparently much the 
 more moved. 
 
 Kent stood leaning against his bunk, his back 
 turned. 
 
 "You are not just, Jack. The captain is a per- 
 fectly fair, honorable man, and he's well within 
 the regulations." 
 
 "Only he isn't quite big enough to be merciful," 
 commented Doctor Robb's quiet voice at the door, 
 and they knew he had heard and understood. 
 
 Entering and drawing the curtain after him, he 
 added : 
 
 "Fellowes, if you do not fight this case you will 
 never get that sword back." Talty nodded ap- 
 proval behind Kent's back. When he at last 
 turned toward them, they saw the face of a man 
 
 164
 
 UNDER ARREST 
 
 suddenly stricken with age, and pinched with the 
 despair born of self-failure. 
 
 Handing the envelope to Talty, he sank on the 
 edge of his bunk saying: 
 
 "Read it, Jack, I cannot." 
 
 Talty now sat on the folding-stool, waving the 
 doctor into the one chair in front of the desk; then 
 with nervous hands he broke the seal, glanced over 
 the lengthy contents and ejaculated: 
 
 "Get a brace on yourself, old man, it's about 
 as bad as they could make it." The officer on 
 the bunk shrank, and his head sank lower on his 
 breast, and Talty made haste to read with monoto- 
 nous rapidity: 
 
 Charges, and specifications of charges, preferred by the 
 Commander-in-Chief United States Naval Force, Asiatic 
 Station, against Kent Fellowes, Lieutenant, United States 
 
 Navy: 
 
 CHARGE I. 
 
 Absence from station and duty without leave. 
 Specification. 
 
 In that the said Kent Fellowes, a lieutenant in the 
 United States Navy, attached to and serving as such on 
 board the United States ship "Boston," a vessel belonging 
 to the United States Naval Force on the Asiatic Station, 
 did on the second day of August, eighteen hundred and 
 ninety-seven, absent himself from said vessel without leave 
 
 165
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 from proper authority, and did remain so absent until the 
 seventh day of the month aforesaid. 
 
 CHARGE II. 
 Drunkenness. 
 
 Specification. 
 
 In that the said [and so forth, and so forth] was, while 
 absent from said ship and ashore, in the city of Nagasaki, 
 Empire of Japan, on or about the second day and so 
 forth, and so forth under the influence of intoxicating 
 liquor and unfit for duty. 
 
 CHARGE III. 
 
 Scandalous conduct tending to the destruction of good 
 morals. 
 
 Specification. 
 
 In that the said [and so forth, and so forth] did on or 
 about the second day of August, eighteen hundred and 
 ninety-seven, by reason of the excessive use of intoxicants 
 become incapacitated for the proper performance of duty, 
 this to the scandal and disgrace of the Naval service. 
 
 R. R. TlTTERINGTON, 
 
 Rear Admiral, U. S. Navy, 
 Commander-in-Chief, U. S. Naval Force, 
 Asiatic Station. 
 
 U. S. Flagship . 
 
 Nagasaki, Japan, August 13, 1897. 
 
 The only sound in the room was the buzz of 
 the electric fan, reasserting itself. 
 
 166
 
 UNDER ARREST 
 
 Robb broke the silence which followed the read- 
 ing, saying in his usual tranquillizing tone : 
 
 "How do they expect to prove charge second? 
 I managed to keep clear of all absolute knowledge 
 I can swear to it." 
 
 "Same here," said Talty dryly, who would have 
 used the vernacular at the gates of heaven. 
 
 "I shall plead guilty to all three charges," came 
 with decision from the bunk. 
 
 "You told me you would fight itl" cried Talty. 
 
 "I had not seen the charges I did not realize 
 it the spell of a man's home was upon me it 
 was not clear to me, before they took my 
 sword!" 
 
 His voice broke and then with rising excitement 
 he added : 
 
 "With that went everything! What have I 
 to save, even if I do consent to a lie? It's gone, 
 I tell you, my whole life's gone to smash ! I am 
 a disgrace to the service I would have died for! 
 I have only one thing left I have never yet told 
 a lie, let me keep that at least, gentlemen !" 
 
 Robb's sane voice broke the tension. 
 
 "Fellowes, you know as well as I do that plead- 
 ing is not a lie. It is a mere legal form, without 
 which equity would soon perish from the earth. 
 
 167
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Make them prove it, that is all. You shut out all 
 evidence at once by pleading guilty." 
 
 Talty's eyes leaped from one face to another. 
 
 "You'll get your punishment all right, Kent (if 
 that's what you feel the need of), on charge first; 
 you're dead sure of that; now then, 'stand mute' 
 on the other two, that's all we ask," he urged. 
 
 "Who will be judge-advocate?" the doctor sud- 
 denly demanded. 
 
 "Hopkins." 
 
 "Good! he's irritable, but you know he holds 
 to the old-fashioned idea that a prosecuting at- 
 torney exists to bring out the truth, whatever it 
 is I" 
 
 And so the two friends bent their wits toward 
 building up the stricken officer's self-respect, and 
 at the same time levelling the high altar of his 
 personal, almost fanatic, integrity, which blocked 
 the way of possible succor. Finally the doctor 
 suggested : 
 
 "Fellowes, may I tell you honestly as an old 
 friend and shipmate, what I'd like you to do? I 
 knew a case very much like yours where it was 
 done and done well, and saved the fellow's com- 
 mission. Go into court without counsel, and read 
 your own defence "
 
 UNDER ARREST 
 
 "I have no defence! Why do you and Talty 
 torture me!" broke in Fellowes irritably, for the 
 first time. 
 
 "One moment, please, my dear fellow. I was 
 about to say that I'd like you to present only what's 
 called the sentimental (that's not the word) 
 human side. Just tell the simple truth in the 
 simplest way. Your long fight O you know 
 what I mean and throw yourself on the mercy 
 of the Court." 
 
 "And to thunder with forms! I see the whole 
 thing," broke in Jack excitedly. 
 
 "It's not in me to do such a thing, Jack. It's 
 absolutely foreign to my whole nature such as I 
 have," said Fellowes bitterly. 
 
 "Will you let me do it for you?" came very 
 quietly from Robb. 
 
 "The very man!" exclaimed Talty, springing 
 to his feet. 
 
 "I don't know what to do! There is that same 
 preliminary lie staring at me from every exit. 
 Ah ! don't think, either of you, that I lose sight, 
 for one moment, of your endless kindness to me, 
 now that I have fallen so low. If anything can 
 redeem a poor devil it is friendship like yours!" 
 
 The others moved uneasily, trained shy of emo- 
 169
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 tlonal expression. But the ice about Fellowes' 
 heart had melted at last and the words poured from 
 his lips in a torrent : 
 
 "Oh, if some great orator could but translate 
 into speech the hell that is within me to-day, the 
 vice of drink would vanish from the earth! He 
 could use the lesson of my life and welcome I 
 should not have lived in vain. The long, long 
 years of fighting; the failures; the self-loathing; 
 the struggle to my feet again each time; the high 
 ideals; the low consummations; and the weariness, 
 weariness of wasted effort! Trained for battle, 
 and not even able to conquer myself! Craving 
 with almost frenzy the big things in living, and 
 not even making my home a happy one ! God ! 
 to get this thing outside of myself and strangle 
 it with my own hands!" he struck the wood-work 
 of his narrow bunk with his fist, as if he had at 
 last by the throat the vice that had been his un- 
 doing. The others sat with bowed heads, unwill- 
 ing to look at the man in his agony, shrinking 
 sensitively from each other's eyes. Fellowes 
 turned and looked at them and understood and 
 faltered out : 
 
 "I beg your pardon," then a rap on the door- 
 frame startled them all. 
 
 170
 
 UNDER ARREST 
 
 Talty drew the curtain, and the level voice of 
 the messenger sounded grotesque, in their over- 
 wrought mood. 
 
 "This note for Lieutenant Fellowes just came 
 off, sir. Any answer, sir?" 
 
 Jack handed it to his brother-in-law, and then 
 conversed aside with the doctor in low tones. 
 
 It was Dora's daily letter to her husband, and 
 his hungry eyes devoured the closely written pages 
 bearing witness to her unquenchable love, her in- 
 domitable courage. At the end were these words : 
 
 "They tell me, dear, you will not consent to 
 plead 'not guilty.' Of course I'm by no means a 
 Portia (and yet when one thinks of it, she is only 
 the queen of the literal, the common-sense view 
 of things, isn't she?) ; but it seems to me that the 
 world (social, political or commercial) would 
 come to a standstill but for the small change of 
 certain conventional fibs which come to have, as 
 so many words do, a second meaning, which has 
 wandered far away from the first one. The real 
 fault lies more in the paucity of words in any 
 language to express exact meaning, rather than in 
 the use of them to apparently a false end. I bid 
 my servants say 'out' at the door every day of my 
 life, a round of formal calls is one long articulated 
 
 171
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 falsehood, if you must know, sir! I think, dear, 
 you should yield to the advice of those about you. 
 A more honorable set of men I do not believe 
 exists. You all live quite apart from the world of 
 barter, in an atmosphere almost solely one of 
 striving after ideals patriotism, courage, honor. 
 Surely, dear heart, you can trust to the counsels 
 of such as these! Please be guided by them for 
 all our sakes, and God be with you to the end, 
 my love." 
 
 Scribbling a hasty reply at his desk, he dashed 
 it into an envelope, wrote the address, gave it and 
 a silver coin to the messenger, dragged the curtain 
 once more across the pole with a loud rattle of 
 the brass rings, turned abruptly to the doctor, and 
 said: 
 
 "I will fight the case. I will do exactly what 
 you bid me." 
 
 172
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 MAMMY SEES THE "WHITE LIGHT" 
 
 " "Ti an awkward thing to play with souls, 
 And matter enough to save one's own. ' ' 
 
 TWO days before Lieutenant Fellowes' trial 
 was the middle day of the Bon Matsuri 
 in Nagasaki. Differing little in spirit from All 
 Souls' Day in Latin Europe (and in form, mainly 
 that in the Western world the gift of flowers bore 
 the testimony of faithfulness to their dead), the 
 Feast of Lanterns in the older country places upon 
 the graves the tribute of the source of all life- 
 light ; a far deeper symbolism. 
 
 Adele had received that morning invitations 
 from her two doctors, Robb and D'Estrees, to go 
 to the midnight launching of the "straw-boats" at 
 Ohata, on the following evening (the third 
 and final of the festival), when the souls of the 
 departed return to their abode after the yearly 
 visit ashore, to collect their meed of loyalty. 
 
 Although D'Estrees' note offered the greater 
 173
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 ease of his private launch, and a gay supper after- 
 ward to his little party of four others besides them- 
 selves, she accepted Robb's, baited only with the 
 expressed hope that her sister would trust her to 
 him, and the promise of a hired sampan and two 
 tested sendo. He knew she was in no mood for 
 gayety. 
 
 When Yamaguchi started off with Miss Talty's 
 chit-book, containing her two replies, he naturally 
 delivered the Italian's first, at the foot of the hill 
 below "Ippon Matsu." After reading Miss Tal- 
 ty's "regret that a previous engagement would 
 prevent," and seeing the Naval officer's name be- 
 low his own in the tale-telling list of the chit- 
 book, D'Estrees became suddenly inflamed with 
 jealousy. 
 
 "About five minutes 'previous,' no more!" he 
 muttered to himself, as he dug his distorted ini- 
 tials into the page opposite his name and tossed 
 the book to his Japanese "boy." 
 
 It still lacked twenty minutes of the time to 
 close his morning office-hours, but D'Estrees broke 
 a hitherto inviolable rule and left the house at 
 once, impatient of inaction, and tore up the Bund 
 to the only shop in town which handled European 
 stationery, and demanded the dernier cri in femi- 
 
 174
 
 MAMMY SEES THE "WHITE LIGHT" 
 
 nine chit-books. After much cavil, he bought one 
 of dark-blue leather lined with velvet of the same 
 shade, a mere empty cover that told no tales on 
 the fair and generally perfidious owner. 
 
 Too irritated to await the slower development 
 of his small drama, the Italian went directly to 
 "Ippon Matsu," asked for Miss Tally, and 
 awaited her coming with an excitement which he 
 now no longer could stem. 
 
 It was as if the passion had been awaiting that 
 one spark of jealousy to burst into flame and 
 like most fires when once started, the end thereof 
 of disaster cannot be safely predicted. 
 
 He strode up and down the room, into which 
 Mammy had ushered him, pushing the chairs right 
 and left out of his path; and now and then wiping 
 his brow with a large handkerchief, from which 
 a faint perfume advertised a nature given to much 
 petting of its several senses. 
 
 His manner changed at once when Adele en- 
 tered. He became elaborately courteous, cold, 
 grave only there burned in his black eyes a dan- 
 gerous brilliancy. 
 
 "I have given to myself the pleasure, Mees 
 Tality, to breeng you a very leetle present. A 
 theeng you are much een the need of." 
 
 175
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Oh, how delightful! I do so love to be sur- 
 prised, it's my favorite emotion," cried the girl 
 seizing the package and pulling at the string with 
 a child's impatience. When at last, stripped of 
 its wrapper, she took the gift in her hand and ex- 
 amined it, she murmured: 
 
 "How dainty! But, please, what is it for? It 
 hasn't any true inwardness. It's only a cover, 
 but of what? for what?" 
 
 "A cover yes! Of what? Of the intricacies 
 (have I the word?) of a woman's caprice, vanity, 
 cruelty. For what? To spare perhaps a leetle pen 
 to the hearts who cannort hot care for her." 
 
 Whether the man really meant it, whether he 
 was merely carried along by the momentum of his 
 artistic nature (forever a recreation to one of his 
 temperament), Adele was at a loss to determine; 
 but she was experienced enough to assume the 
 latter to be the case, although his mood, his pale 
 face, his sonorous voice, affected her strongly. 
 
 "Tell me instantly, Doctor D'Estrees, how this 
 little thing produces such alarming effects?" 
 
 "Reduces, nort produces. I weel explen." 
 She seated herself and he stood before her. 
 
 "I nottice when your cheet-book cam' to me an 
 hour ago, Mees Tality, refusing to go weet me to- 
 
 176
 
 MAMMY SEES THE "WHITE LIGHT" 
 
 morrow night, that you had become possessed of 
 the old stupid kind the man's cheet-book, een 
 fact open, frank, nems all plen and clear; no 
 secrets to hide a man's li-i-fe!" 
 
 Adele gave a gentle, little cough and drooped 
 her eyes adorably, but he refused to be diverted. 
 
 "The ladies' book should nort be of that ingen- 
 u-ousness. (Ugh ! I li-i-ke nort that congested word 
 of yours!) That which you hold ees the proper 
 one, I beg you weel from now use no orther. No 
 record there of the affaires du cceur, en troika! 
 The note to say: 'y es >' beside the note to say: 
 'no,' to anorther. No! One at a time. Your 
 coolie's pouch only carries the truth. Do you see 
 the meaning, yes?" 
 
 Adele's flushed cheeks and conscious eyes be- 
 trayed her, although she vowed the mystery only 
 grew with the explanation. 
 
 After a short silence, he went to her and took 
 her hand, his own like ice and his face was greatly 
 moved, his voice recording tremendous heart-beats 
 as he said gently: 
 
 "I do nort want to care for you, my pretty child. 
 No ! nor ees my love precisely a blessing een any 
 woman's li-i-fe. Oh, do I nort know myself? 
 
 Bot " 
 
 177
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Mammy's soft, singing voice from the door 
 broke in suddenly: 
 
 "Miss Dell, I hope you-all please 'scuse me, 
 but Miss Dora she sent me ter find you ; I reckon 
 you'd bes' see her for one little minute, please 
 miss." 
 
 The Italian fled to the window. 
 
 Even Mammy's notoriously unprincipled soul 
 scarce deserved the fate to which he condemned it, 
 during that moment when he stood there with 
 clinched hands, raging at this interruption. 
 
 Adele, wondering, followed Mammy out of the 
 room. Never had she taken such a liberty before, 
 in fact had always stood a relentless guard over 
 her young mistress' social consummations. Once 
 safely out of hearing the negress turned swiftly 
 and whispered : 
 
 "Please, missy, came inter yo' room, quick. I 
 jes' 'bliged ter speak to yer." The girl obeyed in 
 amazement. Once inside, Mammy closed the 
 door and leaned against it with her full weight, 
 facing into the room. 
 
 "Wha' fer you snap yo' eyes at me, Miss Dell? 
 You know mighty well, yo' ole Mammy she jes' 
 only live' ter keep you-all happy. She ain' got 
 no life of her very own, honey. All right, all 
 
 178
 
 MAMMY SEES THE "WHITE LIGHT" 
 
 right, chile, ain' I tryin' my bes' ter tell yer? Miss 
 Dell, doan' yer give no 'fence toe dat deah I-talian 
 doctor out in de other room! Doan' yer do it, 
 honey! You jes' mine what dis ole nigger she 
 say dis day! You be mighty kyarful what you 
 say ter him. I was a-settin' over yonder mendin' 
 Miss Julie's dress, an' suddenly de white light 
 come ter me, miss! An' somethin' hit me spang 
 in de haid, an' it come ter me cl'ar, like de sun out 
 deah ! He's de onlies' puss on what has saw de 
 cap'n when he wasn' hlsself de onlies' one! 
 An' dis heah co't-martial sets day arfter to-morror, 
 miss, yer hyar me? We doan' want any ob dat 
 gent'man's hate jes' now, we doan'. Now you go 
 on back toe de parlor, Miss Del, but you be sorf 
 an' kitty-catty, an' smile, an' send him away chuck- 
 full ob hopefulness." 
 
 "Does Miss Dora really want me?" asked Dell 
 from the doorway. 
 
 "Well, I I doan' reckon she's jes' sot 'bout it 
 dis 'tick'lar second, miss," giggled the old woman. 
 
 Long ago Dell had learned that when the 
 "white light" came to Mammy, there was only 
 one wise thing to do obey at any cost and wait 
 a little. But for that, she would have at once put 
 an end that afternoon to Doctor D'Estrees' aspira- 
 
 179
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 tlons, whatever they were. As it was, she tried 
 all her expedients one after another, for diverting 
 the conversation into less personal channels: flat- 
 tery of his intellectual egoism, banter, cajolery, 
 musical preferences and prejudices and through 
 all he sat almost in silence, laughing slightly, and 
 biding his time. Not until she arose, tremulous 
 and pale, and said she feared she should have to 
 return to Mrs. Fellowes, did he act, begging for 
 but a few moments more. And she sat down 
 weaponless and helpless before him. Walking ex- 
 citedly up and down in front of her, he poured 
 out rapidly with instinctive dramatic effect the 
 story of his lonely life, the slow disintegration of 
 ambition in the Orient, the revelation of her 
 coming, the deep necessity of her remaining. It 
 was too perfectly done to convince her of aught 
 but his art and served but to salve her conscience. 
 But his obviously vast experience, his terrible in- 
 tuition, his dominating animalism, the very brill- 
 iancy and nimbleness of his brain left her appalled 
 at her task and she began to tremble under his 
 eyes. Seeing which, he broke into that curious un- 
 related laugh and walked away from her to get 
 himself well in hand, that he might not alarm her 
 by the one small glimpse she was about to be given 
 
 180
 
 MAMMY SEES THE "WHITE LIGHT" 
 
 of the storm within him. Returning to her he 
 dragged a chair near her, and again possessed him- 
 self of a little hand as cold as his own. He was 
 now quite assured of the end by her palpitating 
 silence, her evident embarrassment, her very pale, 
 excited face and frightened, downcast eyes. 
 
 Never until that hour had Dell been touched by 
 one single regret for her long career of conscience- 
 less coquetry with men, successfully launched dur- 
 ing her fifteenth year. 
 
 She felt as she sat there, her tongue tied by 
 Mammy's tragically urgent warning which her 
 own judgment indorsed that at last the punish- 
 ment had come of which she had so often been 
 warned by her half-laughing elders. If it had 
 been anyone less volcanic than this inscrutable Eu- 
 ropean, it would have been so simple ! And then 
 he spoke: 
 
 "Adelai'da, look up into my eyes. I love you, 
 I do not dare to tell you how moch ! I want you 
 een my li-i-f e ! Weel you come ? As my wi-i-f e you 
 shall be reech, more than you dream; we weel love, 
 and laugh, and mek the music together, you and I. 
 You have nort done one-half weet the voice that 
 you could; you can play la grace weet the hearts, 
 you! Say bot the word I want and pent for me 
 
 181
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 to-morrow's sunrise! AdelaTda, weel you nort 
 spic' ? Now, at once ! Dio, my leetle one, you are 
 so cruel!" 
 
 Broken hearts rose Macbeth-like in Dell's mem- 
 ory and passed in review before her inward trem- 
 bling vision. She moistened her parched lips and 
 essayed to speak, trying to withdraw her hand, 
 but his grasp was like iron, albeit he had the phy- 
 sician's soft, satin-skinned hand. Finally, almost 
 in a whisper, came: 
 
 "I will answer you in forty-eight hours." Jack 
 had said the Court would find a sentence after one 
 session. Dell longed, but did not dare ask, for 
 further respite from D'Estrees' inevitable anger. 
 
 The Italian was instantly on his feet, almost 
 flinging back her hand. 
 
 "So ! Eet was a game, after all. I am less to 
 you than that man of wood out there on the Amer- 
 ican ship! You amuse yourself hal I thought 
 as moch. I have the honor to bid you good-morn- 
 ing, Mees Tality." 
 
 "Doctor D'Estrees! please, one moment!" she 
 cried. He must not go like that; once outside the 
 house his animosity was assured; with a quick 
 thought of Dora she held out her hand to her 
 companion, who was again beside her, hat in hand. 
 
 182
 
 MAMMY SEES THE "WHITE LIGHT" 
 
 Putting out one hand she laid it gently on his 
 arm, which shook under the light touch, and then 
 with her head on one side, her eyes coquetting with 
 his, she pouted up at him: 
 
 "Just forty-eight hours? Surely when the big 
 things in life come to us, one must have time to 
 catch one's breath; to resign oneself if it be un- 
 happiness, to taste ah, Doctor! if it be happiness ! 
 That's right! I like your smile so much better 
 than that black scowl, I am so afraid of you then! 
 In the old days, a lady demanded as the price of 
 her hand the head of a very unsociable dragon, 
 or a gem from the brow of an Indian idol seven 
 times seven locked within his gates. And yet 
 when I ask you for what? forty-eight hours, look 
 at you ! Chivalry is indeed gone from the earth 
 if an Italian has it not!" 
 
 "Adorable child! Ah-h, do weet me what you 
 weel ! Eet ees yours forty-eight hours, my soul, 
 my weel, anytheeng, everytheeng! but you are 
 mine, do you hear?" 
 
 He was smiling, yielding completely to her se- 
 ductions, flexible in her hands so she thought 
 for which reason she was totally unprepared when 
 he suddenly gathered her into his arms and left 
 the scar of his passionate kiss upon her very soul. 
 
 183
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 And when he released her, the iniquity of her en- 
 forced silence was borne in upon her on a great 
 wave of shame. 
 
 He left the house at once; and she stood, her 
 hands to her reeling head, and knew for the first 
 time that she loved Leigh Robb I 
 
 184
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 " O how this spring of love rcsembleth 
 The uncertain glory of an April day ! " 
 
 DORA insisted that her sister should not 
 deny herself the few quiet pleasures possi- 
 ble under the circumstances, and it seemed but to 
 add to her burden if Adele isolated herself en- 
 tirely. By this time Robb had so endeared him- 
 self to the little household through all those long 
 hours of suspense, that a day was rare that did 
 not bring to one of them some evidence of his 
 unremitting thoughtfulness. 
 
 Even Dora now saw him freely and learned 
 from him of Kent's welfare, greedily drinking 
 from the cup of hope he held out to her in his 
 strong quiet hands. She had never left the com- 
 pound since the day she had arrived from Shanghai, 
 shrinking from alien, curious eyes, now that her 
 secret was common property. The shock had left 
 her as nearly morbid as it was in her to become;
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 the strain was telling on her cumulatively day after 
 day. Some slight peace seemed to come to her 
 only when left alone with Julie and O Haru, the 
 only persons she could be sure were not thinking 
 forbidden things in her presence. They were gay 
 and happy, and very busy in their own little round 
 of living, and they alone rested her. So she sat 
 all fair days, before and after the great heat of 
 the day, in the summer-house; and there was little 
 time for thought with Julie playing near, endlessly 
 restless, imperious, insistent of notice. And so 
 they left her, and Mammy watched from afar and 
 knew the need of her was fast approaching. 
 
 Since the Italian's morning call, Adele had not 
 had one happy thought. She saw very clearly all 
 around her action of that day; and although she 
 knew the climax had not been dreamed of by her, 
 she felt none the less guilty, contaminated, humil- 
 iated by the premises which had led up to it. She 
 had used her womanhood to gain an end for 
 others, to be sure, but that counted for little in her 
 present mood. She had been false to herself, that 
 was what mortified her. She felt intuitively that 
 no woman would ever mean more to the Italian 
 than a passing obsession, and her perfidy to him 
 troubled her only in its reflex action. For the first 
 
 186
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 time her relations with men, confessedly founded 
 on vanity alone, seemed stripped of their decent 
 frippery, and she saw them in a new light. But 
 above all else was the sudden revelation of her love 
 for Leigh Robb; which it now seemed to her she 
 had forfeited by that moment of horror in the 
 Italian's arms, which had ended the spring-time of 
 her life. 
 
 Silent, sleepless, haunted, she wandered about 
 in one of those tragic attacks of self-flagellation 
 that modify the Chauvinism of youth. 
 
 She had written Robb withdrawing her accept- 
 ance of his invitation for the third night of the 
 Bon Matsuri; but none of the excuses she gave 
 seemed to him at all important, and he arrived at 
 "Ippon Matsu" that evening determined to have 
 his way, and in consequence having it. 
 
 At once he noticed the change in Adele's looks 
 and manner, and noted the urgency with which 
 she coaxed Dora to accompany them, in which case 
 perhaps she might be brought to modify her de- 
 cision. But her sister shrank at the word. How 
 could they ask her to go down to the bay, to pass 
 so near the silent ship on which was imprisoned her 
 unhappy husband, whom she had not seen for ten 
 days! She looked at her companions reproach- 
 
 187
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 fully with her great sad eyes, and went to her sleep- 
 ing baby's crib and lifted her and held her close 
 and sat rocking far into the night, and hope and 
 peace came back to her. 
 
 When left alone with Adele, the doctor said: 
 
 "Mrs. Fellowes does not want either of us, we 
 simply hurt her continually ; and as for your head- 
 ache, I prescribe a sampan for two! So get thee 
 ready, fair maid, and come," and she did not even 
 smile, but sat in silence, refusing his eyes. 
 
 Presently she arose and left the room, returning 
 with a hat and light wrap, and he rejoiced, and 
 they went their way, down through the dark streets 
 of the foreign settlement to the Bund, where the 
 awaiting sampan bore witness to the doctor's self- 
 confidence. 
 
 Adele would have laughed a week ago, but now 
 it seemed but further corroboration of her weak- 
 ness of character and general unsoundness, and she 
 stepped in and took her place among the officer's 
 own cushions in the stern, in entire silence. And 
 he wondered greatly and made further, and much 
 more daring, resolutions. 
 
 It was a clear starlit night, perfect for the 
 apotheosis of the Feast of Lanterns. 
 
 There were two boatmen, one standing behind 
 188
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 them in the projecting stern, the other forward, 
 and as they headed for the Ohata landing, far up 
 the bay, they kept up a cadence of soft alternating 
 respirations. The short sturdy figure in the bow 
 (clad principally in tattooing) stood out against 
 the projected light from their one lantern far up 
 forward, turning its one bright eye toward the 
 darkness ahead. 
 
 For some time neither Adele nor her companion 
 spoke. Somehow her sense of humor was pecul- 
 iarly absent now that she was with Robb, and that 
 night she was depressed beyond all hiding. 
 
 The little harbor of Nagasaki, beautiful at all 
 times, lends itself pre-eminently to the illumina- 
 tion of the Bon Matsuri. The cemeteries cover all 
 the steep hill-sides that slope back from the old 
 part of the native town, and each grave of the 
 many thousands bore its little spark of light. The 
 crest of scintillation reached the sky-line, making 
 one great gold-studded curtain from almost the 
 water's edge to the zenith. 
 
 "The sky itself is dragged down to earth to 
 bear witness to the miracle of human fealty," mur- 
 mured the doctor. 
 
 "Why not the reverse of that? Human fealty 
 is so divine a thing that it has been lifted up to 
 
 189
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 heaven's rank. A love like Dora's?" her voice 
 broke at the end. 
 
 "You are right. And it's an easy thing to be 
 true to the dead, compared to the living. To place 
 a little light on the grave where the offending heart 
 had ceased to beat, is a small thing beside keeping 
 alight a love for an offending heart that beats 
 beside one," he replied gravely. 
 
 She looked at him sharply, wondering if there 
 was purpose in his saying that, to-night, to her. 
 
 They were slowly nearing the Ohata end of the 
 Bund, which was ablaze with light, packed with a 
 jostling, chattering crowd. Robb spoke to the 
 head sendo. 
 
 "The boats are not ready yet. I've told the 
 man to row us directly across the bay to get a 
 more distant view. By that time the boats for the 
 ferrying of the souls will be ready to be launched." 
 
 "Oh, Doctor! I thought we were to get off 
 here and see the people 1" she cried, dreading the 
 alternative isolation. 
 
 "Will you let me have my way for once?" 
 he laughed. "I think to come in contact with the 
 human side of this one festival of spirit-land is 
 a mistake." 
 
 She was helpless water cuts off all exits but a 
 
 final one, 
 
 190
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 The doctor could only account for Dell's un- 
 wonted mood by the impending trial of her 
 brother-in-law, and he sought to divert her, toning 
 down his own joyful frame of mind to the level 
 of hers. He tried one topic after another, and 
 she only half listened, leaning forward from the 
 low seat. Her hat was off, covertly harbored by 
 Robb, who found ecstasy thereby. 
 
 Her dress was a white organdie with a tracery 
 of pale green ferns, lost in the dim light. It was 
 rounded out at the neck, with a fall of finest East 
 Indian embroidery about it, and her throat rose 
 from that base like a miniature marble column. 
 The half-sleeves left bare her rounded forearms. 
 Now and then a passing sampan flashed a light 
 upon them, and a jewel on one of her fingers 
 sparkled like a firefly. The boatmen were killing 
 time, as they had been bidden, and rowed slowly, 
 their unending whispered duet had become a part 
 of the silence. Presently five bells in many voices 
 rang out all over the harbor. 
 
 "Uno bambino Napoli" suggested Adele, 
 sweeping one arm out over the arc of the town 
 at that moment upon their left. 
 
 Her use of Italian struck him as sinister, and 
 he began obser/ing her from a new footing. 
 
 191
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Before he had reached the point of a light reply, 
 a distant strain of music poured out its perfect 
 witchery into the night. The American admiral 
 was dining on the Russian flagship, and Mosz- 
 kowski's "False Romantiqtte" was being played as 
 the last bottle of champagne helped to cement an 
 expedient friendship between two great nations, 
 still in their vigorous youth. 
 
 "Ah! that's what I've been wishing for and 
 didn't know it a waltz !" exclaimed Robb. 
 
 Adele sat erect suddenly, and put one hand 
 nervously to her mouth. 
 
 "What is there in a waltz that tears at one's 
 heart sol I feel as if I could not stand it to- 
 night," she cried. 
 
 "That's a fact. Next to a funeral march some- 
 how it plays the worst havoc with one's nerves 
 if unhappy, and you seem " 
 
 "Oh ! the waltz is a hundred- fold worse, Doctor. 
 The march detaches one at once from life, but a 
 waltz like that distant coming and going 
 sweet as sweet as " 
 
 "Life is meant to be?" he softly suggested. 
 
 "Yes exactly that sweet as life was meant to 
 be; and it stands for all the dear old foolishness 
 of living that goes so soon, so soon." 
 
 192
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 "A waltz certainly knows a lot about human 
 nature," added he, glad that at last her thoughts 
 were finding an outlet, however devious, from the 
 source of her trouble. 
 
 "It says to me now listen, Doctor, there, there 
 that strain ! It says : 'I am the spirit of pleasure. I 
 was old when Athens was born. I cannot stay 
 anywhere long. Make the most of your chance !' ' 
 
 Her voice died away, the wind brought the 
 music close to them, and stirred him strangely into 
 a great impatience of the passing hours. 
 
 "It stands for sentiment only, not love, some- 
 how. I don't know why," he continued, lest silence 
 again should steal her from him. And she an- 
 swered : 
 
 "I remember your saying that love is a tragedy. 
 I think I begin to see what you mean." 
 
 A sharp pang went through Robb's heart, and 
 instantly he associated seriously, for the first 
 time, Adele and the Italian. He recalled the 
 man's name above his own in her blabbing chit- 
 book, and D'Estrees' agitated initials at the end 
 of the line. This curious change in the girl, her 
 laugh all gone, her aloofness from him, her be- 
 wildered feeling out into emotional spaces, her 
 bearing lost for the first time in her life all went 
 
 193
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 to indorse a dreaded theory. The music died 
 away, six bells struck in a jangled sequence. 
 
 "So it has come to you, at last!" he finally 
 ventured, his whole being in suspension for her 
 answer. 
 
 "Yes, it has come," she said sadly, their minds 
 at a tangent, and hers for once unwatchful of the 
 action of his. 
 
 "May I ask a question, Miss Adele?" he in- 
 quired in a changed voice after another long pause. 
 
 She nodded, sure without looking that his eyes 
 were upon her. 
 
 "Were you did you have you seen Doctor 
 D'Estrees since I last wrote you ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "I thought so;" she had never heard his voice 
 with that hard ring in it, and it roused her out of 
 her dream and she turned quickly to him: 
 
 "Oh, Doctor I if I could let it out to you ! If 
 I could only tell you what is in my heart to- 
 night!" 
 
 "Surely after all these years you can count ab- 
 solutely upon my friendship under any and all 
 contingencies." 
 
 "I cannot, I cannot! You of all people, and 
 that's what is hurting me so." 
 
 194
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 He turned toward her more fully, and said 
 almost roughly: 
 
 "Adele, you have got to tell me now! These 
 hints are unworthy of you, insulting to me. If 
 anything is in the way of your happiness, let mine 
 be the task to remove it. I love you first, then 
 myself. Be honest with me." 
 
 "I had nothing to tell you till yesterday, and 
 now I can never tell you." 
 
 "Very well, that ends it," he said, angry at her 
 persistent enigmas. He sat back and went over 
 in his mind (doubly clear under the light of this 
 unexpected fear) the possibilities of the situation. 
 That the Italian had seen her after receiving a 
 note from her was certain, and that in some way 
 she felt bound to him, also that she was not happy 
 in that bondage. Or was it the first mad revolt 
 of every caged bird, later on, to feed content- 
 edly from the hand that closed the door? Bent 
 on a certain course of action upon which he finally 
 decided, he remarked coldly: 
 
 "We shall miss the ceremony unless we go at 
 once." He gave a quick order to the sendo, and 
 the sampan lumbered forward clumsily. 
 
 She watched him with furtive eyes, aghast at 
 his sudden reserve and coldness. She longed for 
 
 195
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 his love and sympathy, upon which she had so long 
 unconsciously counted, but from which she felt for- 
 ever estranged; looking at her turpitude with the 
 morbid exaggeration of any pure young girl in her 
 first shocked contact with the brutal side of things, 
 from which the men who had hitherto loved her 
 had been the first to screen her. Her desire for 
 Robb's love battened upon the renunciation of it. 
 
 His loud cheerful tones broke in upon her 
 reverie : 
 
 "Here we are, Miss Talty! There are the 
 boats, over there on the right. See the food piled 
 In little heaps ? I believe the idea is that the souls 
 of the dead after being ashore for three days, re- 
 turn to-night to their abode, and food is placed 
 there for the mysterious voyage. You see in these 
 overpopulated, old countries the struggle for food 
 is tremendous. So it comes about that it represents 
 the most precious of all gifts, and upon that is 
 founded so many of the Japanese and Chinese 
 festivals or rather the form that tribute takes to 
 both the living and dead in such celebrations." 
 
 The more he expounded the less interested she 
 became. On he went relentlessly: 
 
 "In the old days these 'dead-boats' used to be 
 piled also with the lights brought down from the 
 
 196
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 graves, but there was a serious kerosene fire once 
 in the harbor, and the authorities put a stop to it; 
 and so much of the picturesqueness has gone. The 
 boats used to float off, manned only by the dis- 
 embodied, at the mercy of wind and tide, and many 
 strange things happened supposed to be full of 
 symbolic significance. Does it interest you at all? 
 Or are you disappointed?" 
 
 She could not answer him, so deep was her re- 
 sentment of his tone and manner. 
 
 "Are you disappointed?" he repeated, pretend- 
 ing to see nothing subjective in her grieved silence. 
 She suddenly sank down upon the seat. Keeping 
 his eyes out upon the little flotilla of boats, he 
 went on talking about his few facts and many 
 fancies regarding the Matsuri before them. He 
 gave a whispered order to the sendo in the stern 
 of the boat, who thereupon walked forward. 
 Then Robb heard the soft sound of a woman 
 weeping down beneath him in the darkness, 
 but still he held himself erect she should 
 be disciplined she should be forced to tell him 
 all there was to tell before she slept that night! 
 She was in some psychical tangle and needed him, 
 and she should ask for his aid before seven 
 bells. 
 
 197
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Not until he began to whistle softly did she 
 succumb. 
 
 "Oh, Doctor!" was all he caught, but less even 
 than that piteous reproach would have brought 
 him to his knees beside her. 
 
 "Yes, dear tell me all, I feel sure I can help 
 you." 
 
 She waited a moment clinging to his arm and 
 fighting down her sobs that she might speak. 
 
 "I'm going to be perfectly frank and tell you 
 something, Doctor Robb, and then I I'll go out 
 of your life forever." 
 
 "We'll see about that later just tell me first, 
 please, like a good little girl." 
 
 "You see, I could never have told you like this 
 boldly, brazenly " 
 
 "Quite so," he interjected. 
 
 " if it was not for the impassable barrier be- 
 tween us." 
 
 "Naturally," he was quite at his ease now but 
 so unprepared for her next words that from that 
 hour he ceased to claim any but the slightest 
 knowledge of feminine nature. 
 
 "I have discovered, Doctor, in a strange, strange 
 way, that Leigh! I know now, I'm sure of it! 
 At last I know that I love you !" There was a 
 
 198
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 moment of confusion, the silence only broken by 
 smothered ejaculations in a man's voice, roughened 
 by deep feeling. Then her voice arose from it, 
 sharp with excitement: 
 
 "Do not touch me! You misunderstand! I 
 told you there was something forever between us 
 listen to me. Oh, let me go! You must know 
 that but for that, and that I thought you fully 
 understood it, I would have died rather than tell 
 you such a thing!" She tried to rise, pushing him 
 from her with a strange strength. 
 
 "And the barrier?" he panted. She was silent. 
 His nimble mind darted right and left in search 
 of enlightenment; but she had admitted her love, 
 nothing else counted henceforth, people and cir- 
 cumstances should bend like reeds before his will. 
 
 To keep down his great exultation was now his 
 task, as the sampan sped homeward, and the 
 lights on the hills dropped one by one into the 
 well of darkness. Only the lamps of the sky 
 burned on steadfastly, far above the little fret of 
 life below. 
 
 "If I were the flaccid hero of an analytical 
 novel, Adele, I'd say with a tearful eye on the 
 evening star : 'All is over ! I accept my fate. The 
 occultism of your silence parts us forever.' And 
 
 199
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 I'd sail away and you'd marry the other fellow. 
 Not on your life ! You've said the one important 
 thing to-night and I'm here to stay!" 
 
 Her reply was that of an extremely injured 
 person : 
 
 "It seems strange to me that when you used to 
 be serious I always laughed, and now I am terribly 
 in earnest you are suddenly very jocund! If you 
 cannot take me seriously I shall not speak again." 
 
 "So long as I do take you, it shall be any old 
 way you like, dear." 
 
 There is no insult like an ill-timed optimism, 
 and for the first time in her life she felt resentful 
 of mirth and humor, such miracles does love 
 work! 
 
 "I bought something at the price of my integ- 
 rity!" she suddenly was goaded into saying. 
 
 "That's a very high price for anything I've seen 
 in Nagasaki." Then he added quickly: 
 
 "Does that mean you are engaged to that 
 to the Italian?" 
 
 "No, no! I'd rather die!" 
 
 "Naturally, anybody would," and he burst into 
 sudden loud ringing laughter, now sure of the 
 evening's end. 
 
 She breathed quickly, deeply, and struck her 
 200
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 hands together passionately, roused at last to a 
 beautiful fury: 
 
 "Oh, you may laugh and joke when I tell you 
 that my honor is smirched, that my heart is 
 broken, and that just at the moment that I begin 
 to love you, I must not! If you find all 
 that funny, go on laughing but take me home, 
 take me home, at once! I know from this that 
 you are a hard, cruel man, and I should have soon 
 learned to hate you. It's just as well I've found 
 it out in time. I am thankful !" He shook with 
 inward laughter and said not a word, now sitting 
 beside her, his hands together before him 
 waiting. 
 
 "You shall hear now, I'll spare you nothing! 
 And then laugh if you can! He he wants to 
 marry me he " 
 
 "Can't blame him for that," his dry tone 
 brought from her a sudden choked cry : 
 
 "He he kissed me odiously." 
 
 "Then it was against your will?" came quickly 
 from Robb in quite another tone. 
 
 "Leigh!" was all she said, but it was all he 
 needed. He comprehended in a flash of intuition 
 that he had no higher wall to vault than the dear 
 child's innocence of life's real values, in order to 
 
 reach his heaven. 
 
 201
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 He waited a moment, as it were, putting off his 
 shoes at the door of the holy temple; then very 
 gently he placed his arms about her and drew her 
 to him and whispered in her ear. After a fruitless 
 effort she found she was absolutely helpless. 
 
 "My blessed one, do you suppose for one in- 
 stant I'm going to let this mood of yours any 
 mood settle the question of our happiness ? Yes, 
 dear, I know, I know I do understand. And 
 shall I tell you what it says to me, this little soul 
 tragedy of yours ? It shows me the spotless purity 
 of your heart, the fine integrity of your woman- 
 hood, the cleanness of your very soul, my sweet- 
 heart. And I but honor you ten times the more 
 for it, and feel ten times the less worthy of you." 
 She was now crying softly against his broad breast, 
 clinging like a tired child. He stroked her hair 
 with the gentlest touch she had ever known, and 
 had the instinct to offer no further caress. 
 
 "There, there, poor little girl! It's a sad, old, 
 naughty world, isn't it? I said you'd come to 
 me some day, do you remember? Hereafter count 
 no words of mine empty, Mrs. Robb! Now, 
 there's no use in your struggling like that you 
 are going to be my wife. Wicked as you un- 
 doubtedly are, I want you. It's a great relief to 
 
 202
 
 THE FEAST OF LANTERNS 
 
 my mind to find that, after all, you are not per- 
 fect ! Adele, must I wait till the end of this cruise ? 
 Must I?" She did not answer, but he pretended 
 she did, and went on with a tenderness she had not 
 dreamed his voice capable of: 
 
 "Well, if you say I must, I suppose I'll have 
 to somehow. Oh, my darling, the joy, joy, joy, 
 of this moment," he burst out suddenly. A broken 
 word from her made him stoop, listening. 
 
 "No, Adele, not one more word about it to- 
 night. You are a good, true, little woman under- 
 neath all your deviltries alas! no less a word 
 expresses it. I want you to go home at peace and 
 happy as you can be after flinging yourself away 
 like this on a good-for-nothing, poverty-stricken 
 Naval surgeon, whose support will assure you 
 nothing but picturesque starvation to the end of 
 your days. Come to think of it, it's the only down- 
 right unintelligent thing I ever knew you to 
 do, Adele Talty! I confess, I'm a little disap- 
 pointed in you." 
 
 At last the dear, sweet laugh he had been listen- 
 ing for rippled out and he knew that he had won. 
 
 The boatmen still panted out their ceaseless 
 sibilation. 
 
 Then the American flagship struck seven bells 
 203
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 with Yankee smartness, the Russian followed with 
 ponderous dignity, and all the others tumbled into 
 line here and there over the bay, and sang their 
 little songs of sleepless vigilance. 
 
 And then they reached the landing, and walked 
 up the hill through the silent streets to "Ippon 
 Matsu." She did not speak, but just clung to his 
 arm and gave now and then a low happy laugh 
 as he doctored her wounded soul. At the door 
 he coaxed a little, and she yielded and put her 
 arms up about his neck, and repeated the words 
 he had dictated, and then Mammy opened the 
 door. 
 
 204
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES 
 
 " Now let it work : Mischief, thou art afoot." 
 
 AT eight o'clock the next morning the various 
 men-of-war lying in the harbor gently 
 asserted their several nationalities by a simul- 
 taneous slow hoisting of flags to the different staffs; 
 as if a bed of sleeping tulips, awakened by the 
 sun, had bloomed forth into many colors. The 
 American, German and Russian bands on the flag- 
 ships played their national airs, each its own first 
 and then that of Japan, followed by that of all 
 the ships-of-war present, according to the rank of 
 the admirals. The result of which courteous 
 interchange of peaceful amenities made for much 
 musical strife, from which the Russian hymn rose 
 triumphant by its very simplicity. During this 
 ceremony, the men and officers of the American flag- 
 ship stood at petrified attention, facing aft, ending 
 with a jaunty salute when the great fair-weather 
 ensign reached the top of the flagstaff. 
 
 205
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 About twenty minutes before ten o'clock a 
 boat from each of the other two American ships 
 put off and headed for their flagship, and their 
 freight of officers met and was discharged on the 
 starboard side. They greeted one another with 
 jocular familiarity as they ran up the gangway to 
 the deck, notwithstanding the fact that their uni- 
 forms of frock-coat and side-arms indicated an 
 occasion of more than ordinary ceremony. 
 
 As they stepped up on the quarter-deck the 
 shrill pipe of the boatswain's whistle, the lining 
 up of the "side-boys" standing at salute, further 
 denoted the status of the visitors, now frozen into 
 stiff observance. 
 
 A few moments before ten o'clock they, with 
 others, were chatting together standing about a 
 long table in the captain's cabin. There were two 
 smaller tables, at one of which was a stenogra- 
 pher; beside this, to the right, was placed a single 
 chair; the other table had two empty chairs behind 
 it. A young lieutenant of Marines acted as pro- 
 vost marshal at the door. 
 
 As the quick ringing of four bells ceased, Cap- 
 tain Penny rapped on the table, saying: 
 
 "The Court will come to order!" 
 
 All conversation stopped instantly, and out over 
 206
 
 THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES 
 
 the harbor rang the sharp report of one of the 
 flagship's six-pounders, and the Union Jack was 
 "broken" from the signal-yard, telling all the 
 world that Kent Fellowes' supreme hour of humil- 
 iation had come. 
 
 Captain Penny, the president of the Court, a 
 small man with a large, slow, dignified bearing, 
 seated himself at the upper end of the long table, 
 and the other members ranged themselves down 
 either side, according to rank. At the foot was 
 the judge-advocate, Lieutenant Commander Hop- 
 kins, prosecuting officer, a tall, very thin man with 
 a nervous manner. 
 
 In a level, official tone the president said: 
 "The judge-advocate will proceed." 
 Hopkins arose and in his long-skilled hands the 
 many details of the organization of a military 
 tribunal went speedily forward. Then an order 
 was given to the provost marshal and a pause fol- 
 lowed. 
 
 The door finally opened and Lieutenant Fel- 
 lowes, followed by his counsel, Dr. Robb (both 
 in undress uniform), slowly entered and walked to 
 their assigned table to the right of, and somewhat 
 behind, the judge-advocate. 
 
 Fellowes' pale, almost emaciated, face and the 
 207
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 unutterable anguish in his eyes, from which youth 
 seemed forever fled, sent a thrill around the table 
 and the men shifted their positions uneasily. 
 
 After being himself sworn by the president, the 
 judge advocate took the Bible from the table, and 
 holding it at arm's-length, the members of the 
 Court gathered in a circle about him, each placing 
 a hand on the outstretched book. Then the oath 
 was administered to them all by the judge-advo- 
 cate, who repeated in a solemn voice : 
 
 " 'You do swear that you will truly try, with- 
 out prejudice or partiality, the case now depend- 
 ing, according to the evidence which shall come 
 before the Court, the Rules for the Government 
 of the Navy, and your own conscience; that you 
 will not, by any means, divulge or disclose the 
 sentence of the Court until it shall have been ap- 
 proved by the proper authority ; and that you will 
 not, at any time, divulge or disclose the vote or 
 opinion of any particular member of the Court, 
 unless required so to do before a court of justice 
 in due course of law?' ' 
 
 "I do," each voice gravely replied, with that 
 marked variety in pitch that bears witness to the 
 miracle of nature's taste for multiformity in all 
 created things. 
 
 208
 
 THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES 
 
 The Court in secret session having pronounced 
 the charges "correct and in due form," the 
 judge-advocate turned to the accused officer, and 
 said: 
 
 "Are you ready for the trial?" 
 
 "I am," came the low reply. 
 
 "Please stand up." 
 
 Fellowes arose so slowly from his chair that for 
 an instant they thought him physically overcome, 
 and Robb leaned quickly forward and spoke to 
 him in a low tone. 
 
 The judge-advocate then read in an impressive 
 voice the endless repetitions in the charges and 
 specifications. Fellowes stood motionless until the 
 end, only putting out one hand involuntarily when 
 the arraignment began, and the sound of his own 
 name nailed down upon him the forerunning 
 charges. 
 
 Hopkins paused a moment to give the accused 
 a chance to recover himself, and then proceeded: 
 
 "Lieutenant Kent Fellowes, United States 
 Navy, you have heard the charges and the specifi- 
 cations of charges preferred against you, how say 
 you to the first charge guilty or not guilty?" 
 
 Again there was that curious hesitation as of a 
 man forced to do something against his own ap- 
 
 209
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 probation, then plainly yielding to a low-toned re- 
 monstrance from his counsel, Fellowes answered 
 faintly : 
 
 "Not guilty." 
 
 The judge-advocate's high disquieting voice 
 went through each charge and specification, ending 
 each time with the cadenced query: 
 
 "How say you, guilty or not guilty?" 
 
 And each time with ever-rising protest, Fel- 
 lowes looked into his counsel's dominating eyes 
 and answered: 
 
 "Not guilty." 
 
 When this was over, Hopkins, after a sharp 
 scrutiny of Kent's face, and reading there a more 
 than ordinary strain under arraignment, asked for 
 a recess. 
 
 The Court relaxed at once into smiles and 
 banter. Such of the members as were old friends 
 or quondam shipmates of the accused, went up to 
 him, held out their hands warmly, talking of old 
 cruises on other stations, or inquiring for his wife, 
 expressing a hope soon to pay their respects. A 
 casual on-looker dropping in would have had some 
 difficulty, for the moment, in pointing out the 
 man, in that small assembly, who was on trial for 
 his commission. 
 
 2IO
 
 THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES 
 
 Again Captain Penny's deep bass rumbled out: 
 
 "The Court will come to order," and once more 
 the room became a scene of military solemnity un- 
 matched in Naval life. 
 
 The first witness for the government was the 
 executive officer of the "Boston," who, sitting in 
 the lone chair to the right of the now busy stenog- 
 rapher, testified that he had on August first, at 
 twenty minutes past one o'clock, given Lieutenant 
 Fellowes permission to go ashore and remain till 
 quarters on August second. 
 
 He was followed by the officer of the deck, who 
 saw him go over the side. The third witness was 
 Lieutenant Nugent, who had the deck when Kent 
 returned to the ship. 
 
 Every man in the room felt a throb of emotion 
 at Nugent's really very unimportant testimony, 
 such was his evident reluctance and deep pain at 
 being compelled by his oath to add so much as a 
 straw to his old friend's disgrace. He sat in the 
 witness' chair, his very ruddy face bowed, his eyes 
 on the carpet, the picture of helpless guilt, expect- 
 ing no mercy, asking for none. When his brief 
 role was over, he turned and fled with so precipi- 
 tate a clatter, that one of those smiles rooted in 
 tears ran around the long table. 
 
 211
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 The judge-advocate then exhibited the " Bos- 
 ton's" log of August second, wherein was entered 
 Fellowes' absence without leave; and in the entry 
 of each four hours of watch through all those five 
 days, in relentless repetition, appeared the same 
 statement: "Lieutenant Fellowes absent without 
 leave." 
 
 As each witness finished his direct testimony, 
 Doctor Robb arose and said: 
 
 "I do not wish to cross-examine the witness." 
 
 At this point it was evident that the prosecution 
 was about to play its trump card. The presi- 
 dent relaxed nothing of his ponderous dignity, but 
 the great ennui in his face quickened with interest, 
 and he leaned forward against his folded hands 
 laid on the table. 
 
 Hopkins' tense face remasked itself with an 
 added decision. He drummed on the table ner- 
 vously and looked at his watch with an irrelevant 
 scowl; then bringing his hand down sharply on 
 the bell beside him, he said to the provost marshal, 
 who instantly appeared: 
 
 "Call Doctor D'Estrees." 
 
 Fellowes' eyes turned and clung to his counsel's 
 with almost hypnotic intensity. Leaning forward 
 he whispered: "As he has consented to testify I 
 
 212
 
 THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES 
 
 am lost! I lied for nothing!" Into Robb's mind 
 was coming a slow illumination of many things, 
 with Adele conspicuous and in high light, and he 
 answered: "Courage ! He's of the genus venal 
 that man unless I'm all astray!" Kent stared 
 with no comprehension in his strained eyes. 
 
 The door opened and every eye in the court- 
 room turned toward it, as D'Estrees entered 
 swiftly and then stood with his heels together, 
 bowing. Coming forward with his usual rapid 
 movements, he once more paused nearer the 
 tribunal, bowing low to Captain Penny, whose 
 rank his quick eye properly estimated, if his tongue 
 purposely overstated: 
 
 "Admiral gentlemen !" 
 
 They automatically acknowledged his effective 
 greeting, grateful for this touch of drama entering 
 into the midst of dry conventions. 
 
 D'Estrees was immaculate in white flannel with 
 a red carnation in his button-hole; a small black 
 loose tie at the throat, his broad cummerbund of 
 folds of black silk taking the place of a waistcoat 
 according to Far Eastern canons. 
 
 Tucking his thumbs into his sash he waited, look- 
 ing about smiling, his unnaturally brilliant eyes 
 taking inventory of a scene very much to his taste ; 
 
 213
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 the very apotheosis of prosperous complacency and 
 immense physical and mental vitality. 
 
 Robb felt every muscle in his body tingle as he 
 looked at him remembering and one of those 
 strong primitive instincts, familiar to every 
 healthy man, swept over him: a longing for the 
 Italian's sole society, space, air, and no favor. 
 
 The whole Court was now roused out of its 
 lethargy, responsive to the magnetism of the 
 Italian who was as aware of the effect he produced 
 as he was of everything else once within his cor- 
 rosive vision. 
 
 The judge advocate's voice broke the silence, 
 looking over the resplendent witness' head in proof 
 of entire disaffection. 
 
 "The president of the Court, Captain Penny, will 
 administer the oath, Doctor D'Estrees." 
 
 The witness ran his keen eyes about the room, 
 then one hand went to his Indian sash and he 
 briskly pulled therefrom a large paper, which he 
 unfolded with a slap of the other hand, and with 
 a step backward from the table he addressed the 
 president, colloquially, volubly, the degree of his 
 accent varying with his excitement: 
 
 "I have brought weet me thees summons, I pre- 
 sume you call eet, and I would much li-i-ke the 
 
 214
 
 THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES 
 
 honor to retain eet, both for the very great beauty 
 of the coat-of-arms of your most esteemed country, 
 and al-so as a memento of thees honorable occa- 
 sion. I have the pair-meesion, yes?" Ignoring 
 the cross-fire of glaring glances levelled at him from 
 the outraged president and extremely nettled 
 judge advocate, the paper was again folded and 
 restored to its snug place against his rotund form. 
 The eyes of the less responsible members of the 
 Court gleamed with expectation. 
 
 Fellowes leaned forward, his elbow on his knee, 
 his hand supporting his head. This introduction 
 of the burlesque was torture to him beyond all 
 bearing. 
 
 When the president arose, determined to put an 
 effectual end to this buffoonery, and held the Bible 
 out to D'Estrees, the latter' s flexible hand went up 
 in one of those complex gestures of Latin nega- 
 tion, and he cried: 
 
 "Oh, no! I take no oath. Eet ees very far 
 from my weesh to ex-pose myself to the unknown 
 terrors of American law. No, no, no not that! 
 Eef however there be some questions the honorable 
 Court " 
 
 A sharp rap brought the harangue to a close 
 and the Court to much-needed order. 
 
 215
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 The judge advocate's voice went through them 
 like a jagged knife, after the indescribable mellow- 
 ness of the Italian's. 
 
 "I call the witness to order! You are here to 
 answer questions. Your replies are worthless un- 
 less you are previously sworn, sir." 
 
 u Ees eet so? Par-don, I regret I cannot breeng 
 myself to the point of agreement. I am here, sir, 
 because I choose to come, no more, no less! You 
 have no jurisdiction over me. I am an Italian 
 subject. We are weethin treaty leemits of the Em- 
 pire of Japan, are we nort, gentlemen?" 
 
 "This is American soil I'll have you understand, 
 sir, as long as that flag is above us!" the judge 
 advocate made the mistake of saying. The shrug 
 that D'Estrees gave was of no top-soil growth, 
 but was deeply rooted in generations of the most 
 dramatic people on earth. 
 
 "Again I mos' ask the pardon of the honorable 
 Court. The soil under these two feet " a quick 
 stamp left no doubt as to his meaning "ees Ital- 
 ian, here afloat, there ashore, always Italian ! You 
 can compel me to do northing I do nort weesh to 
 do. I do nort weesh to take your oath so I do 
 nort take eet! Am I plen? But as I have said 
 
 already, sir, eef " 
 
 216
 
 THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES 
 
 The president rapped, an intermission followed 
 during which he and the judge advocate consulted 
 apart. D'Estrees started toward Fellowes smiling 
 and with extended hands, but experienced a check 
 by the prompt interposition of the provost mar- 
 shal. Apparently an informal court, within its 
 seemingly flexible lines, there lay laws of iron; 
 there must be no intercourse between a witness and 
 the accused. 
 
 Robb walked away and stood with his back 
 turned to the room, looking at a large photograph 
 of the flag-ship taken as her colors were raised on her 
 first commission. With this before his eyes, one 
 must dive under the surface to discover why he 
 muttered to himself: 
 
 "He is bought to the soul! He is working for 
 a reward; and that reward is Adele!" 
 
 Again the court-room came to order, and the 
 judge advocate turned once more to the impertur- 
 bable witness and said sternly: 
 
 "Doctor D'Estrees, some days ago in your own 
 office you told Captain Pehoe of the "Boston" that 
 you would testify on charge second and specifica- 
 tion in the case of Lieutenant Fellowes, you re- 
 peated the same thing to me day before yesterday. 
 What is the meaning of this sudden change of at- 
 
 217
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 titude toward this Court?" Robb's heart thumped 
 violently and the blood rushed to his face during 
 the slight pause which followed. Since his short 
 talk with Captain Penny during the intermission, 
 the judge advocate's voice and manner were some- 
 what moderated. In recognition of which, the 
 witness replied in his friendliest tone : 
 
 "Every word you have said, sir, ees true, ex- 
 actly as you have stated. I deespute northing, but 
 the question of the oath was nort discossed be- 
 tween us, and of course all thees meelitary pro- 
 cedure ees new to me. But I have an uncontrolla- 
 ble disgost for an oath. Eet ees qui-i-te weetout 
 value, sir. A man of honor does nort need eet, 
 a man of no honor does nort respect eet. My 
 testimony een thees case ees at your disposal, but 
 my pride forbids the oath, of which I am surprised 
 to find you make so moch." 
 
 Captain Penny's rough bass intervened before 
 the judge advocate's obvious irascibility found 
 vent: 
 
 "Doctor D'Estrees, you have, as I understand 
 it, come here of your own free will, in obedi- 
 ence to summons legally issued by the judge ad- 
 vocate of this Court, and now you refuse to tes- 
 tify." 
 
 218
 
 THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES 
 
 The Latin pantomimed fury finally controlled 
 before he replied: 
 
 "Your excellency, I do nort refuse to testify. 
 I am here for that purpose alone. I have made 
 myself plen, I theenk, on that point; but I am a 
 very busy man, matters of some moment await 
 me now I must ask for more speed, eef you 
 please. I cannort repeat again and again the sem 
 theeng." 
 
 "The court will be cleared!" thundered out 
 Captain Penny, "and Doctor D'Estrees will oblige 
 the Court by awaiting its decision." 
 
 The obstinate witness unconcernedly bowed with 
 something very like triumph in his eyes. 
 
 Everyone left the court-room except the seven 
 members, the doors were closed by the provost 
 marshal and a sentry was placed over them. 
 
 As Fellowes and Robb left the room, the latter 
 said with undisguised exultation : 
 
 "Old fellow, your commission is as safe as a 
 church!" 
 
 "I do not understand it, I do not understand 
 it I" repeated Kent in dull wonder. 
 
 The buzz of conversation outside was soon in- 
 terrupted by the muffled sound of a bell in the 
 court-room, and the marshal announced: 
 
 219
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "The Court is open." They filed in, and as 
 soon as it was quiet the president said : 
 
 "The Court decides that Doctor Teodoro 
 D'Estrees is not within its jurisdiction, and directs 
 that he be discharged." 
 
 As he said the last word Admiral Titterington's 
 orderly appeared at the door and addressed the 
 judge advocate: 
 
 "Captain Pehoe's compliments, sir, and will 
 Doctor D'Estrees please step into the admiral's 
 cabin before he leaves the ship?" 
 
 "Doctor D'Estrees, you heard the message. 
 Will you please see Captain Pehoe before you 
 leave the ship?" repeated Hopkins, putting as 
 much dispraise into his tone as he well could in so 
 commonplace a sentence. 
 
 "Weet moch pleasure. Your excellency, gentle- 
 men, I have the honor to bid you good-morn- 
 ing." 
 
 The broad back of the recalcitrant witness had 
 scarcely disappeared, when Hopkins arose and said 
 rapidly : 
 
 "May it please the Court, I am not ready to 
 proceed; and I would ask the Court to adjourn 
 until to-morrow morning." 
 
 "The Court is adjourned until ten to-morrow 
 220
 
 THE COURT-MARTIAL CONVENES 
 
 morning. The uniform will be service-dress, 
 white." 
 
 Fellowes left the cabin and ship at once, return- 
 ing directly to his ship, the provost marshal beside 
 him ; and in half an hour every man in the squadron 
 had heard some distorted story of the morning, 
 which grew with each repetition, until between- 
 decks on the "Boston," "old Dennis," the best gun- 
 captain in the fleet (and as sober as he ever was 
 except at target practice) swore to another jacky 
 that the Italian was at that moment in irons on 
 the flag-ship for insubordination to the admiral; 
 ending with: 
 
 "And it's thim dudes loike the prisent com- 
 mander-in-chief that's holy terrors whin they do 
 be started, moind that, me lad ! And it's the I-tal- 
 ian has me respectful sympathy." 
 
 Which was so far from the facts, that at that 
 very moment D'Estrees, flushed and exulting, was 
 walking down the deck of the flag-ship laughing 
 to himself. Returning the salute of the officer 
 of the deck, he ran lightly down the gangway and 
 got into his own launch, waiting below. As it 
 puffed its way across the bay, he slapped his knees 
 with both hands and laughed aloud, muttering in 
 Italian, safe in his isolation: 
 
 221
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Dio mio, but it has been a great morning! 
 They can do nothing, absolutely nothing. They 
 threaten, they cajole, they rage at me and I ? I 
 laugh in their pale faces. The men of this race 
 I hate, but the women esto perpetual" The 
 doctor's eyes flew up the green hills to "Ippon 
 Matsu," in smiling tribute, and then he added: 
 "The little Adelai'da, she will thank me how can 
 I wait? Oh, but you always had a good head, 
 Teodoro !" 
 
 222
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 A TEN O'CLOCK GUN 
 
 "Give sorrow words." 
 
 UNDER the shadow of "Ippon Matsu" they 
 had all united in the attempt to keep Dora 
 in ignorance of much that was going on down in 
 the harbor below, sparing her pride even to the 
 straining of the truth. But a letter had reached her 
 the day before the Court met, from Imogen, con- 
 taining these words: 
 
 "You poor thing! We all feel so sorry for you 
 over here. Yesterday Mrs. Titterington said she 
 could not imagine anything more awful than for 
 you to hear that gun every morning at ten o'clock 
 when your husband's character and habits are 
 turned wrongside out before that Court; and the 
 tears came to her queer-looking eyes as she spoke. 
 I thought you'd like to hear of her sympathy. 
 
 "As I get all my news from others nowadays, 
 I'll add that Mrs. Santley (she's got the homomania 
 bad, I can tell you!), well, she read a letter from 
 
 223
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 the chief, in which he said your husband looked 
 like death itself. Of course I'm awfully sorry for 
 you, but what can he expect? I'd go to you to- 
 morrow if your brother had not been acting so 
 very queerly of late. If he thinks I'm to be paci- 
 fied by a string of cheap jokes every mail, he's all 
 out! 
 
 "How does Julie stand the heat? I should not 
 think you'd dare keep her there all summer, no- 
 body does, you know." 
 
 She showed this tactful letter to no one, but the 
 effect of it upon her was apparent. She no longer 
 found solace on the knee-high levels of her little 
 daughter's busy life. She wandered about rest- 
 lessly day and night, eating nothing unless forced 
 to it by insistent Mammy. 
 
 Joy, happily for the world, expands; suffering, 
 also happily for the world, contracts. Isolated 
 by her agony, which had become incommunicable 
 from long habit, they could only help her by keep- 
 ing aloof. To hide her anguish from the house- 
 hold was now beyond her power, and in fact they 
 wisely encouraged the eccentricity of all supreme 
 emotion, rather than its repression. 
 
 When the morning came on which the Court 
 met, it was a very pale rigid little Dora whose 
 
 224
 
 A TEN O'CLOCK GUN 
 
 distended pitiful eyes continually wandered to the 
 clock, as the hands neared the hour of ten. Adele 
 noticed this in amazement, as they had counted 
 upon her ignorance of official matters to be kept 
 in doubt of both the hour, and the custom of firing 
 that single gun at the moment that the Court con- 
 vened. They had taken every precaution to leave 
 her uncertain of this, and other facts connected 
 with the trial of her husband. After a hasty con- 
 sultation with Mammy, who instantly spotted the 
 source of information, they tried to get Dora away 
 from the house and the sound of that terrible sig- 
 nal but without success. 
 
 They now hung over her doubly alarmed and 
 helpless, and also furtively watched the little trav- 
 elling clock on the mantel in her room. As the 
 hour drew near, Mammy, chattering with unnat- 
 ural loudness, bustled and banged around, drag- 
 ging about all the furniture in the room, declaring 
 she had lost her thimble, and knew in her heart 
 that Haru had stolen it. But before she had the 
 sly thing arrested and searched, she supposed she 
 had better look about to be on the safe side not 
 that she had the faintest idea of finding it else- 
 where than in the amah's kori. 
 
 Through all of this trumped-up ferment, Dora 
 225
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 stood unconscious of everyone in the open window 
 that looked down on the bay, her hands shading 
 her eyes from the hot sun which streamed in upon 
 her small rigid figure in its loose white wrapper. 
 Adele and the negress exchanged anxious glances, 
 and the latter fell violently upon the wardrobe, 
 dragging out the large drawer beneath, and just 
 as the short hand reached the hour of ten, Mammy 
 and her burden fell heavily to the floor and loud 
 lamentations filled the house. But there was no 
 escaping the significance of that single sharp re- 
 port from the harbor, and Mammy arose from 
 the floor her eyes full of disappointed tears and 
 she and Adele stood paralyzed, waiting behind the 
 stricken wife. Dora remained perfectly motion- 
 less after the first automatic start at the sound. 
 Then to her sister's horror she began to laugh, 
 at first very softly, whispering incessantly to her- 
 self: 
 
 "That was a good shot! It ought to be a good 
 shot. They've been aiming straight at your heart 
 for weeks and weeks and they waited till mine got 
 exactly in line that's why they were so long, 
 dear. I knew that's what they were waiting for, 
 and I stood in the window and wouldn't let Mammy 
 pull down the sudare. I wanted it to be over. I'm 
 
 226
 
 A TEN O'CLOCK GUN 
 
 so tired, I'm so tired! and you are so tired, my 
 poor darling. Yes, I know maybe we can sleep 
 a little now that the gun hit us both in the middle 
 of our hearts straight in the middle, and we will 
 not feel anything ever any more, ever any more, 
 amen, amen." 
 
 Convulsed with weeping, Adele clung to Mam- 
 my and whispered: 
 
 "Can't we do something? I am afraid, O 
 Mammy, I am afraid her mind has gone !" 
 
 "Pore little missy, her hour is come shore 'miff 
 please de Lord ! You go on out, Miss Dell, leave 
 her ter me, I'se got my 'structions from Doctor 
 Robb, don't you go and get scared. She's kyarin' 
 on fo' all de worl' de way he said he reckoned she 
 would. Go on out an' don't 'fusticate me, 
 honey!" The old woman's eyes never left Mrs. 
 Fellowes' tense figure, still standing raving, seeing 
 nothing but the phantasms of her own over- 
 wrought mind. Leaving the room for a moment, 
 the negress returned carrying a glass half full of 
 steaming hot milk. She went to the wash-stand 
 and dropped into the milk a white powder which 
 she took from her pocket. Dora's voice still went on 
 pouring out now in loud disjointed sentences the 
 long hidden misery of her overflowing heart, and 
 
 227
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 she did not seem aware of the servant's presence 
 until Mammy took quiet hold of her arm and 
 stroked it very gently and at the same time with 
 a firm sure touch. Dora lowered her uplifted eyes 
 slowly, and turned them with evident difficulty 
 until they took in the faithful old black face, which 
 she had known the longest of any living. 
 
 "Why, Mammy!" she murmured in slow 
 amazement, her voice pitched in a strident treble 
 instead of her usual deep contralto. 
 
 "Yes'm, it's your ole Mammy Lina, all right 
 'nuff ! An' I'se got a monst'ous nice piece of news, 
 missy. De cap'n's coming home ter dinner day 
 arfter to-morror!" 
 
 "Please say that again, I can't hear, you talk so 
 fast. Please don't talk so fast," cried Dora with 
 strong irritation, and brows knitted in her effort 
 to comprehend. 
 
 Very slowly, Mammy went several times over 
 what she had said, her reward being a vacant piti- 
 ful smile on the young wife's face, now flushed 
 and twitching. 
 
 "Now, 'open de mouf an' shut de eyes, an' I'll 
 give yer somethin' ter make yer purty.' One, 
 two, three, jes' see how quick yer can swaller dis 
 heah little bit er milk. Deah she goes ! Now, little 
 
 228
 
 A TEN O'CLOCK GUN 
 
 missy, gwine look mighty purty when Marster 
 Cap'n he comes home." 
 
 "Will it really make me pretty, Mammy?" 
 Dora asked in a pleased way that went to her old 
 nurse's heart. 
 
 "Deed'n 'twill, Miss Dora. An' yer mus' put 
 on dat long white dress, fussed up wid de Val'- 
 cinnes lace, co'se dat's de cap'n's favoritest of 
 all." 
 
 "And the pink sash ?" queried Dora, as the other 
 slowly drew her away from the window. 
 
 "Of co'se de pink sash, Miss Dora, an' a pink 
 rose fo' de hair. My Ian' ! but you'll be sweet 
 'nuff ter eat." 
 
 "I want to see the sash," said Dora. But after 
 it was placed in her hand, the cessation of Mam- 
 my's touch withdrawn for the moment, precipi- 
 tated another attack of frenzy and the old nurse 
 had it all to do over again ; from the gentle strok- 
 ing to the coaxing words: 
 
 "Why, chile, deah's y'ars and y'ars ob de sun- 
 nies', brightes', sorter weather 'haid you-all; but 
 yer mus'n get down-sick, an' look like nuffin' but 
 a scarecrow in a co'npatch." As the woman prat- 
 tled on, her familiar voice again brought peace, 
 if not entire understanding, to Dora whom she led 
 
 229
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 slowly toward the bed, her arm around her now 
 relaxed figure. Talking all the time in a comfort- 
 ing croon, Mammy sat down on the edge of the 
 bed beside her young mistress and softly drew the 
 hair-pins out of the head now drooping forward 
 against her. Once more Dora started wildly to 
 her feet, hearing in fancy again that fatal gun 
 from the flag-ship. But Mammy's patience was at 
 length rewarded, softer and softer her voice grew 
 and then ceased. A long piteous sigh came from 
 the now recumbent form on the bed and Dora slept, 
 the pink sash still in her grasp. After watching her 
 a long time, nothing but her great black eyes 
 moving, Mammy arose and gently drew down the 
 shades and left the room as softly as a snake. 
 
 Dell was waiting outside and to her the old 
 woman proudly babbled: 
 
 "She's ap' ter sleep 'bout fo' five hours, but 
 p'raps havin' conniptions now an' then, an' we-all 
 mus' stay near an' watch-out. He tole me larst 
 week dis heah boraxisym mighty like ter happen ter 
 Miss Dora. Who ? Why, dat deah Doctor Robb, 
 co'se! He's sutney some sorter conjureman, ain' 
 no two 'pinions 'bout dat, Miss Dell! Bes' not 
 have too much ter do wid dat sorter gent'man, dat's 
 my Vice, miss! He done give me dat sleepin' 
 
 230
 
 A TEN O'CLOCK GUN 
 
 po'tion ter use at my own digression, dat's what 
 he said, and dat's how-come I knows what ter do 
 fo' de pore chile." 
 
 "I think he might have trusted me," fumed 
 Dell from a jealous heart. 
 
 "Now, Miss Dell, you know mighty well you 
 ain't got a grain ob real sense, 'pared wid dat ole 
 nigger, S. Car'lina !" And Adele shook her finger 
 at her and smiled for the first time that day. But 
 it again fled when the other added: 
 
 "But, Miss Dell, what's buzzin' 'round inside 
 my haid, like ole Mister Bumblebee inside a win- 
 der on a hot day, is dis heah: s'pose dat ole gun 
 goin' froo de pore chile's heart to-morror, an' to- 
 morror, an' to-morror! I tell yer, miss, right now: 
 if dat co't down yonder sets on de cap'n fo' a 
 whole livin' week, Miss Dora she's never no mo' 
 goin' ter be de same again. She jes' nat'ully can' 
 stand it nohow." 
 
 Kent received no letter from his wife the first 
 day of his trial, and they did not dare tell him 
 why. 
 
 The drug Dora had twice been given left her the 
 next morning nerveless and obedient to the will 
 of others, and by nine o'clock they got her out of 
 the house, and they took jinrikishas and went far 
 
 231
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 into the native town where the sound of a gun of 
 so small a calibre could not be heard. At the 
 flower-market Dell and Mammy went through the 
 usual chaffering over prices raised at their ap- 
 proach. Dora sat veiled and motionless, Julie be- 
 side her, in her jinrikisha. Her glance wandered 
 about at the child's command, and then her head 
 would suddenly droop and her eyes close as the 
 sleeping draught reasserted itself. When the dread- 
 ed hour had passed unnoticed by Dora they returned 
 to "Curio Street," where of late the significant 
 addition of Russian to the native and English 
 signs over the shops bore witness to the slow 
 coming of "the great glacier"; the first small 
 harmless detritus of a terminal moraine, little sug- 
 gestive of the huge, silent, relentless, on-coming 
 forces back of it, to be stopped only at the sea's 
 edge if then. 
 
 Old Sato had sent word to Adele the week be- 
 fore, that he had returned from his quarterly 
 search through the provinces for treasures coveted 
 by "globe-trotters," who were happily ignorant of 
 a sharp crescendo of prices, once they were under 
 the shrewd old merchant's slender fingers. 
 
 Dora again sat outside watching the swarming 
 light-hearted children about them, and so she was 
 
 232
 
 A TEN O'CLOCK GUN 
 
 alone when Ensign Sault passed by, saw her, 
 started, blushed, tried to retreat and altogether 
 produced such an effect of lonely boyishness that 
 Dora's gentle heart was touched. She raised her 
 veil and spoke to him, holding out her hand, the 
 air having somewhat cleared her head and calmed 
 her. 
 
 "All by yourself, Mr. Sault? Isn't it rather 
 forlorn, shopping alone? I wonder if we could 
 not help you?" 
 
 He could not speak at first and tears sprang to 
 his eyes as he saw the shocking change in her sweet 
 face, long known to him in Washington remem- 
 bering how he had recently sought to injure her. 
 
 Again she misread his trouble and again the soft 
 motherly voice burned into his ears like hot irons. 
 Mammy saw it all from inside the shadowy shop 
 and muttered savage anathemas. 
 
 Finally Sault stammered out: 
 
 "You are very kind to care, Mrs. Fellowes: 
 Yes, it is lonely sometimes. The fellows like things 
 I don't care for, and and there isn't much else 
 but shopping." 
 
 "I understand. Dell must take you in hand. 
 I'm sure you get frightfully cheated. Come home 
 to tiffin with us, will you?" she wondered to hear 
 
 333
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 herself saying, but her heart yearned over all the 
 suffering and loneliness in the world, and he was 
 such a boy with such an earnest, clean face. 
 
 He would rather have been flayed alive than 
 broken bread with this one woman on this one 
 day, and he confusedly offered the easy excuse of 
 an officer attached to a ship. She made the baby 
 give him a white aster for his button-hole and shake 
 hands with him ; and he went on his way shaken to 
 his soul's centre, having learned his first lesson in 
 the perfect breeding of kindness; and something 
 of Dora's own distress was lifted from her, so 
 calculably exact is the ethical tonic of a gentle 
 word, both to the hearer and to the speaker. 
 
 234
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 SECOND DAY OF THE COURT-MARTIAL 
 
 "Betrayed by peace." 
 
 DURING the interval allowed him by the 
 Court, the judge advocate had been using 
 every effort to justify his captain's action in Fel- 
 lowes' case, which had counted so securely upon 
 the Italian's evidence. 
 
 Once again Hopkins had run down all the old 
 scents and again found them stale, in his search 
 for fresh evidence to produce in the second day's 
 session of the Court. Talty had stayed on board 
 continuously from the night that Lieutenant Fel- 
 lowes had gone ashore, till his return five days 
 later. Ensign Sault, known to have worked hard 
 the first few days pursuant to his rather confused 
 conception of his duty and self-advancement in his 
 captain's eyes, had failed altogether in his youth- 
 ful coup, about the details of which he was 
 strangely reticent. Ashore there were only Fel- 
 
 235
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 lowes' own family, and several natives to whom 
 a Christian oath carried less than no weight and 
 all of these were debarred as witnesses. 
 
 The morning of the reconvening of the Court, 
 Hopkins returned to the "Boston" for breakfast, 
 feeling himself not for the first time a victim 
 to one of those powerful, but altogether formless, 
 psychic energies having a rather varied nomencla- 
 ture but resolving itself into the force of circum- 
 stances plus the sinuosities of a certain Latin 
 conscience. 
 
 None knew better than Hopkins, in his long 
 career as a judge advocate, that in order to shield a 
 thing loved perfectly honorable men still resort to 
 the feint of the trailing broken wing of the mother 
 partridge. 
 
 This strongly cemented wall of silent protection 
 surrounded the accused, and the judge advocate 
 knew that he was beaten. He also knew that two 
 things really had saved Fellowes' commission : the 
 mysterious defection of D'Estrees, and Fellowes' 
 own fine character; which is in the end the one 
 unfailing shield, beaten out by a man in the daily 
 forge. 
 
 And yet, thought Hopkins, with a quizzical 
 smile, the moral standard of these same men de- 
 
 236
 
 SECOND DAY OF THE COURT-MARTIAL 
 
 feating him was high because of the very thing 
 that he, as judge advocate, stood for. 
 
 Yes, the case was lost except on the first charge ; 
 and Hopkins' manner was relaxed and purely per- 
 functory when the Court met and was called to 
 order, at ten o'clock. 
 
 Rising he said abruptly: 
 
 "May the Court please, I regret to say that I 
 have no further witnesses and must close the prose- 
 cution." Adding a word to the stenographer, he 
 sat down. 
 
 All his interest in the case had evaporated, his 
 keen professional relish for a legal "kill" had 
 melted once more into a pleasant old friend- 
 ship. 
 
 Whatever acrimony remained was entirely con- 
 centrated upon D'Estrees and his buffoonery, 
 which was not all buffoonery, as Hopkins had been 
 quite as quick to recognize as Robb, and quite with- 
 out the latter's premises. 
 
 There was a pause after Hopkins' last words, 
 and then he turned to Robb : 
 
 "I believe you have no witnesses, Doctor?" 
 
 "No, none; but I should like to say a few 
 words." 
 
 With eyes and voice expressive of an infinite 
 237
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 boredom, the judge advocate announced to the 
 Court: 
 
 "The counsel for the accused has no witnesses 
 and is ready to close the case. Proceed, sir." 
 
 Robb arose and stood an instant, insisting on the 
 close attention that absolute silence, if broken at 
 the right instant, alone best imposes. 
 
 When he spoke it was in that entirely rational 
 tone that breeds less antagonism in the masculine 
 mind than any other. He had no notes and re- 
 sorted to no gestures, one hand was straight down 
 at his side, two fingers of the other were tucked 
 into his tightly buttoned white duck blouse. 
 
 "I had at no time intended to do more than 
 invite the Court's attention to the human side of 
 this case, and the surprising fact that the judge ad- 
 vocate has been unable to produce a single witness 
 to support the second and third charges doubly 
 relieves me of any necessity of even touching upon 
 the legal aspect, supposed to exist before the judge 
 advocate closed for the prosecution. The tap-roots 
 of the law or rather its enforcement are em- 
 bedded in evidence, otherwise as the gentlemen of 
 the Court have just seen for themselves the er 
 fruitage may, without euphemy, be termed, I think, 
 meagre. The prosecution seems to have acted in 
 
 238
 
 SECOND DAY OF THE COURT-MARTIAL 
 
 this matter either too hastily, or not quite hastily 
 enough I will leave it to you to determine." 
 
 A smile ran around the table, which effect was, 
 in accordance with an old aphorism of the coun- 
 sel's: that laughter is the trumpet call to all other 
 salutary emotions. 
 
 Fellowes sat as before, turned sidewise in his 
 chair, his head leaning on his hand, his eyes on the 
 floor. To him it was all dust and ashes. He was 
 guilty all else was a mere farce and an utter 
 weariness. 
 
 The doctor's smooth, handsome face remained 
 set in grave imperturbable lines, as he continued: 
 
 "This fact, of course, makes it certain that the 
 accused must be acquitted of charges two and 
 three; and that being the case, releases me from 
 certain obligations of silence that would necessa- 
 rily have been imposed upon me, had there been 
 as I not unreasonably supposed evidence con- 
 cerning the statements in the specifications of those 
 charges. 
 
 "I will beg the indulgence of the Court, and 
 of the judge advocate, if in the remarks I wish to 
 offer I do not confine myself to the I was about 
 to say 'facts in evidence,' but as there are none, I 
 am compelled to repeat the expression legal as- 
 pects in this case. 
 
 239
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "I have known the accused over twelve years. 
 As his friend I can only tell you what every man 
 who has been thrown with him knows to be true : 
 he is incapable of conscious wrong; as his physi- 
 cian, I can tell you that civil war within the borders 
 of a man's own soul is the true 'fire and brimstone.' 
 Those of you who carry within you the peace of 
 inherited mental and physical balance are raw re- 
 cruits drawn up in judgment upon an old soldier, 
 worn, and scarred and very weary, after almost as 
 many spiritual battles as there are days of his adult 
 life. Fighting always alone, without the cheers of 
 comrades when winning; bearing in silence defeat. 
 If now and again we see him falter, shall we not 
 rather call out 'courage!' to so heavily burdened 
 a man, and trust that our very faith in him may 
 work for his good? I do not think the United 
 States will be the loser by trusting her honor a 
 little longer to such a man as the accused. The 
 best men at Apia shall we instance? were not 
 among the first-class conduct men, but were the 
 delinquents, masted everlastingly for unblacked 
 boots, bright-work neglected, bags not in order, 
 not irreproachable conduct ashore. And so I think 
 a war with elements outside of himself the war 
 we are all standing ready for every hour of our 
 
 240
 
 SECOND DAY OF THE COURT-MARTIAL 
 
 lives will act as the precipitate in this man's life 
 before us. Simply because well, Ruskin has said 
 it: 'The common notion that peace and the virt- 
 ues of civil life flourished together I found to be 
 wholly untenable. Peace and the vices of civil life 
 only flourish together.' A Naval officer is like his 
 ship a highly complex fighting machine full of 
 energies only kept free from rust by hard work. 
 But the human soul among us needs more than 
 readiness, it needs exploitation, fulfilment. It 
 needs the one supreme hour of battle, for which 
 everything on this ship exists, from the humblest 
 rivet doing its honest little task down in the bottom 
 of the boiler, to the commander-in-chief's plan of 
 battle, now lying at the captain's hand out there in 
 the cabin. Sometimes the pathos of all this sus- 
 pended energy is borne in upon me strongly. What 
 if an actor spent forty of his best years rehearsing 
 behind the curtain that never lifted before his eyes? 
 What if a lawyer was found in his office, his gray 
 head on his books, waiting for that first client that 
 never came ? Or a physician, listening for the hur- 
 ried step that had need of him all through his 
 youth, his best middle years, and on into old age 
 listening, ready, to the end? Is it then to be 
 wondered at that now and then among us Naval 
 
 241
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 officers, a man reaches out for something to bank 
 the fires within him ? It is not easy this waiting 
 for our chance for any of you gentlemen, per- 
 haps, albeit the blessing of health (or virtue, as you 
 choose) is yours; how much less easy for one " 
 
 "Who is guilty! I was, for four days, drunk!" 
 came like a thunderbolt upon them all, and Fel- 
 lowes was on his feet, his face that of one dead. 
 
 The habit of discipline was so ingrained in 
 these men that save for an added tenseness about 
 the mouth and a slight leaning forward in their 
 chairs, the Court was outwardly as before the ac- 
 cused had spoken, although the president rapped 
 for an unneeded order. 
 
 The judge advocate sprang to his feet and be- 
 gan to speak very rapidly. 
 
 "The case for the Government has been closed !" 
 cried Robb. 
 
 As he spoke, Fellowes' tall figure gave a sudden 
 lurch and before any one could reach him, he fell 
 heavily to the deck. Almost before his full length 
 was measured, Robb was kneeling beside the pros- 
 trate figure tugging at the collar. Captain Penny 
 cleared the court-room, the bell of the judge advo- 
 cate rang sharply for the provost marshal, whom 
 he waved toward the doctor, who gave him a rapid 
 
 242
 
 SECOND DAY OF THE COURT-MARTIAL 
 
 low-spoken order. There was no confusion and 
 the officers filed out silently. 
 
 Syncope, prolonged to the danger line, wiped 
 Kent's consciousness out of the reckoning for what 
 seemed an eternity to those who loved him, and the 
 cabin was turned over to Robb and his assistants. 
 
 Admiral Titterington came in once needlessly 
 tiptoeing, but thereby showing his sympathy, of 
 which Robb took hurried note, as in his shirt- 
 sleeves he worked unceasingly over the man who 
 was now no longer his client, but his patient. 
 
 "Heart?" asked the admiral standing beside 
 them looking down. 
 
 "Yes, sir. A big mental strain following a big 
 physical strain. There has been pronounced func- 
 tional trouble there for sometime; and possibly is 
 at the root of his other inherited troubles. But 
 he's coming round. Admiral, it would be as well 
 that no whisper of this reaches his wife her con- 
 dition just now is more pitiful than his. I prefer 
 telling her myself." 
 
 "Poor children! Poor children! Nice enough 
 world, Doctor, to live in if there was no continu- 
 ity between generations, eh? Some of you scien- 
 tific fellows ought to find out a way to disjunct 
 us from our ancestors, and our descendants from 
 
 243
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 us Jove ! that would ease things up a bit, wouldn't 
 it, Doctor?" 
 
 "It's the job for another set of men, Admiral 
 the priests. If they would preach the immortality 
 of acts, the immortality of souls would adjust itself 
 and we physicians would have a deal less work 
 to do," said Robb, looking up with twinkling 
 eyes. 
 
 "Once in awhile you doctors run the fleet, you 
 know, Robb," and the admiral smiled. "What do 
 you advise about this poor fellow?" 
 
 "Several weeks perhaps months rest ashore, 
 before he is ordered home, sir." 
 
 "Yokohama hospital?" 
 
 "No, sir, here at once. There's a little hospital 
 up on the hill over there, not far from 'Ippon 
 Matsu,' by the bye, and a French Sister running 
 things, and a flower garden, high up above the line 
 of fretting." 
 
 "Just say when," was the commander-in-chief's 
 sole comment. 
 
 So it came to pass that the first meeting between 
 Kent and Dora, after that heartbreaking separation, 
 took place late that night up in the large south 
 corner room of the high-perched hospital, whither 
 Fellowes had been carried by six sailors. 
 
 244
 
 SECOND DAY OF THE COURT-MARTIAL 
 
 Soeur Agnes herself opened the room door for 
 Dora and pointed to the bed, to which the wife's 
 eyes flew like weary birds back to their nest at 
 nightfall. 
 
 Soeur Agnes stood for a moment outside the 
 closed door and crossed herself; and then with 
 hurrying steps went to the great Russian sailor 
 who was dying across the hall, from a misstep on 
 the royal-yard of a merchantman the night before. 
 He clung to the Sister's hard hand, like a fright- 
 ened child, whimpering of his fear of death in a 
 tongue unknown to her. To touch a good wom- 
 an's hand was as near prayer as the sailor had 
 been for many a long year, in his life of two very 
 simple things: hard work afloat, and mad orgies 
 ashore. 
 
 It was best for the French Sister of the Order 
 of Les Soeurs de 1'Enfant Jesus not to have time 
 to think. She fought leisure as another might evil. 
 She was not of the line of saints whose motto is 
 "thou shalt not," like some fanatics of negation 
 and uselessness. Work was her mission, her recre- 
 ation, her sanctuary; in that she had found a great 
 peace. Her rugged humorous face was a very 
 happy one; her touch, the hard, firm one of the 
 unemotional, the insensitive; and yet she did not 
 
 245
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 wish to see the meeting between the young wife 
 and her husband in there across the hall! She 
 was glad, if this great Russian had to die, that his 
 release from his agony would come that night she 
 had no time for lesser matters. So she sat long 
 beside the restless giant, and neither could under- 
 stand the other; and no word passed between 
 them ; but his moaning ceased when she put a cruci- 
 fix in his hands, tragic from roughest labor. 
 
 "Do not touch me, please," were Kent's first 
 words to his wife, spoken slowly, coldly. But she 
 understood and waited, thankful for the dim light 
 in the room, that her self-control need be concen- 
 trated upon her voice alone. She laid aside her 
 hat, pushed open a shutter to let in the moonlight, 
 doing and undoing needless things, that his eyes 
 might become used to her and something of his 
 load of self-despising be finally lifted from him by 
 love's gradual reassertion. 
 
 "Dora !" presently burst from him with a long- 
 ing beyond all control and she went to him, and 
 spent upon him all the great treasure of her heart, 
 in which was jewelled the pure genius of loving. 
 
 "Dear, you can't separate yourself from me, 
 why will you insist on trying? Our lives are like 
 two drops of water run into one forever one. 
 
 246
 
 SECOND DAY OF THE COURT-MARTIAL 
 
 Can't you see it? feel it? I believe you dol I be- 
 lieve you just want to hear me say it over and over, 
 you vain person !" she prattled beside him, terribly 
 shocked at the nearer view of his face, but hiding 
 it as a brave woman must. 
 
 "Is your faith in me all gone?" he begged and 
 she stooped and placed the benediction of her kiss 
 upon his brow. 
 
 "Do not talk, dear heart. They'll tell me all 
 that's necessary, by and by. You must be very quiet 
 and happy up here for a little while, and I'll come 
 each day to you ! And perhaps if you are very, 
 very good, I'll bring the baby some day." He 
 smiled and then fell asleep at once, dropping sud- 
 denly off the edge of an exhausted consciousness. 
 
 Not until then did she give way to the pent-up 
 agony within her heart. She sought and found the 
 Sister of Mercy in the kitchen, the incense of a 
 steaming broth rising about her sturdy figure. 
 But Dora had need of another woman just then, 
 and she forced the Sister into a chair and knelt 
 before her and put her young head in the lap of 
 the religieuse and wept until quiet returned to her. 
 Only another woman understands when the hour 
 comes for feminine unmasking ; for she alone com- 
 prehends the great maternal necessity of that 
 
 247
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 mask. And above the kneeling figure bowed upon 
 her knees, Soeur Agnes's eyes were closed and her 
 lips on her little suspended cross, and she prayed 
 for forget fulness of a thing she had hoped for- 
 gotten. 
 
 After Talty had come and taken Dora away, 
 the Sister prepared the Russian for his final rest, 
 folding for him the great gnarled hands, now very 
 white and quiet at last. 
 
 248
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 A LAUGH AND A BLOW 
 
 "Whatsoever 
 It worthy of their love is worth their anger." 
 
 THE next day Jack brought up to "The Lone 
 Pine" the news of Kent's sentence. The 
 admiral had issued a squadron order, stating that 
 the Court had found Lieutenant Fellowes guilty 
 of absence without leave, but had acquitted him 
 of the other two charges. The sentence had been 
 two years' suspension, but in consideration of a 
 recommendation to clemency, signed by every mem- 
 ber of the Court, the period of suspension was re- 
 duced to one year. He was officially released from 
 arrest and his sword was returned to him. 
 
 The most successful teacher of gratitude is pain; 
 and the effect of this mitigation of Kent's sentence 
 produced a feeling of almost joy upon the san- 
 guine natures living under the great pine tree. 
 
 There being now no further objection to Imo- 
 gen's disturbing presence, Jack sent the cable 
 
 249
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 message she demanded, but it was almost a week 
 before the morbid excitation had worked itself out, 
 and she brought herself to the point of leaving 
 Shanghai for Nagasaki. 
 
 Doctor D'Estrees had called at "Ippon Matsu" 
 twice every day, since that fatal morning when 
 Adele discovered that there were other emotional 
 worlds besides the very small well-sheltered one to 
 which she had been accustomed; and twice every 
 day Mammy had invented a fresh reason for Miss 
 Talty's non-appearance. Finally Mammy took 
 matters in her own hands, after hearing Doctor 
 Robb at the dinner-table threaten desperate things 
 
 
 
 upon this very sore subject. One afternoon when 
 D'Estrees came laden with fresh flowers (but a 
 fast fading hope) she took them from his hands 
 beamingly at the door, laid them upon the circular 
 bench that ringed the old "Ippon Matsu" in the 
 entrance hall, and when he turned to go away she 
 followed him to the gate, saying in her privileged 
 tone: 
 
 "You'se been a mighty good friend toe we-all, 
 Doctor, an' so I'se gwine ter tole yer a piece o' 
 news, sah! If you sud hyar it, fo' de fus' time, 
 outen side ob our house, you'd be puffeckly jus'fied 
 ter feel right hurt 'bout it." 
 
 250
 
 A LAUGH AND A BLOW 
 
 "Well, well what ees eet? what ees eet?" 
 cried he irritably. 
 
 "My Miss Dell an' de orficer doctor on de 
 'Boston' gwine get maa'd, yas, sah! We-all's 
 mighty pleased 'bout it, fo' Miss Dell's she's pow- 
 ful oncertain kinder young lady, an' 'twould be a 
 great res' ter see her settled. I'll say ter Miss 
 Dell you sent yo' 'gratulations, s'all I, sah? Thank 
 you, sah. Good-mawnin' !" 
 
 "Lord-ee! if ever ole Mammy South Car-lina 
 see de debbil in her life, she jes' done seen 'um dis 
 heah minute in dat yaller man's eye !" she muttered 
 to herself, her own eyes bulging with genuine ter- 
 ror, as she recrossed the garden. 
 
 The accuracy of her intuition was shown by the 
 fact that within an hour after D'Estrees' call, Dell 
 and Robb sent for her and told her their news, and 
 sat smiling awaiting her comment; always consid- 
 ered of moment upon great occasions in the family 
 circle. She stood looking at them with eyes plain- 
 ly amused at their effrontery in telling her at this 
 late hour. Then she said, pouting her full lips and 
 pretending a sudden embarrassment: 
 
 "I I know puffeckly well Miss Dell was in lub 
 wid yer, Mars' Doctor Robb, well 'bout two 
 years ago," then she chuckled. 
 
 251
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "Mammy, you go on out to the kitchen and stay 
 there! The idea of your daring to say such a 
 thing! The biggest old taradiddle you ever told 
 in your life, and that's saying a great deal. Go on 
 out when I speak to you !" stormed Dell in sim- 
 ulated wrath, her southern accent of the strongest. 
 
 The great mouth of the negress was a dark wide- 
 open cave full of whitest stalactites and stalag- 
 mites, and her laugh was pure melody. 
 
 "Mammy Lina, why didn't you tell me instead 
 of keeping me on tenter-hooks all these years?" 
 demanded Leigh, one vast smile of unalloyed joy. 
 
 "I tell on my little missy befo' she's ready ter 
 tell on herself? De doctor dunno yer ole Mam- 
 my yit, do he, Miss Dell? An' as fer de tenting- 
 hooks, dunno nuffin' tall 'bout 'em, sah. I doan' 
 reckon we-all got 'em down south, does you, Miss 
 Dell? But anyhow I'se mighty glad fo' Miss 
 Dell, but you'se got bof yer hands chock full, sah, 
 an' no mistake, 'scusin' de liberty." And then 
 Adele sent her away. At the door the old servant 
 turned and said seriously: 
 
 "Deah's a big old Mister Snake in eb'ry gyardin 
 ob Eden ; 'tain't all apples. You-all mus' watch out 
 fo' 'um mighty spry." 
 
 "D'Estrees?" asked Robb after Mammy had 
 252
 
 A LAUGH AND A BLOW 
 
 gone, his face becoming grave as it always did 
 when the man's name was introduced. Dell 
 nodded and turned her face away, a shadow fall- 
 ing there too ; seeing which Robb said with gentle 
 gravity : 
 
 "However, Adele, we may regret the means by 
 which it was accomplished, you saved Kent's com- 
 mission by it. Try and remember that, dear, and 
 forget the rest." 
 
 It was several minutes before the restraint wore 
 away, and the growing ecstasy of their love again 
 held them in its spell deaf, dumb, and blind to 
 all else. Robb would have liked to come to a clear 
 understanding with the Italian, but Dell had the 
 American woman's dislike for interference in her 
 love affairs and forbade it positively. A morbid 
 fear of the man kept her from the direct way of 
 telling, or writing, him herself the simple truth; 
 so she took the easy sloping path of temporizing; 
 leaving that, with other disagreeable tasks, to a 
 spoiling Mammy. 
 
 Adele had a nature full of doors opening to all 
 points of the compass ; that she finally barred them 
 all but one, was a harder task to be given than if 
 the peace of solid walls encompassed her. Leigh 
 Robb knew that the light from many windows 
 
 253
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 would always come through to his sweetheart and 
 he rejoiced thereat, having a wise man's fear of 
 satiety. Such a fate seemed very remote that 
 afternoon as one hour after another sped by un- 
 reckoned. Then came a loud slam of the gate, 
 Jack's shrill whistle, his quick step through the en- 
 trance hall, an ostentatious banging and slamming 
 about, followed by a furious, affected cough out- 
 side the drawing-room door, all of which told its 
 tale to Dell who, blushing scarlet, cried reproach- 
 fully to her lover: 
 
 "You've gone and told him!" 
 
 "Yes, last night. It was either talk about it, or 
 go overboard," and then they both fell into shouts 
 of laughter as the cough at the door became inter- 
 rogative and more and more insistent, accompanied 
 by a timid rapping. 
 
 Not until Dell called out: 
 
 "Jack, you dear old idiot, come in!" was the 
 door carefully opened an inch at a time, amidst a 
 shower of "ahems," and then Talty's merry face 
 appeared with tight-shut eyes, lest they see too 
 much. 
 
 "Now, don't you dare to tell us, as Mammy did, 
 that you knew it nine or ten years ago," threatened 
 Dell. 
 
 254
 
 "My dear in fact, I think I may now say, 
 my dears I never was so surprised in my whole 
 life !" vowed Jack, striving after the expression of 
 inspired "putti" in sacred canvases. 
 
 Then ensued such a scene of fantastic nonsense 
 as had never before been heard in "Ippon Matsu." 
 Robb fired them on to fresh flights by his roars of 
 laughter, seeing under it all the perfect harmony 
 of their relationship; infinitely preferring it to ex- 
 perimenting with discord. 
 
 "Family honor, Robb, closes my mouth about 
 many things as to your choice ; all I can chivalrously 
 say " 
 
 "Mammy has already said it," said Dell dryly; 
 and then the doctor promptly broke the engage- 
 ment and started for the door under plea of false 
 pretences. 
 
 "One moment, beloved shipmate; I was about 
 to say that full compensation for an otherwise 
 grim fate lies in the acquisition of this sweet, 
 sunny and I think it best to be perfectly frank 
 effulgent spirit lying within," Jack tapped his chest 
 with one finger and drooped his eyes coyly: 
 "Briefly, old chap, you're in. for a soft thing in 
 brothers-in-law," he added, relaxing suddenly into 
 the colloquial. 
 
 255
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 So they went on revelling in the reaction from 
 much sorrow. Then the bell rang and Imogen 
 marched in unexpectedly, and only the long disci- 
 pline of Jack's life saved the situation. 
 
 "I can judge that I have not been deeply missed 
 by the howls of laughter that greeted me at the 
 gate. I confess I'm a little surprised, supposing I 
 was coming back to a house of mourning," she 
 grieved in the old familiar way. Jack's eyes alone 
 bore testimony to the great weariness within him. 
 
 "I came because the admiral cabled his wife to 
 come here, and there didn't seem to be anything 
 else to do but come over too." 
 
 A blight had fallen upon the room, however 
 hard the other two worked to prevent it for Jack's 
 sake; and the narrowest soul ruled supreme, as so 
 often happens in a weak, peace-loving world. 
 
 Resenting the sudden silence, and the slow with- 
 drawal of Dell and Robb to the farthest window, 
 Imogen cried in an access of peevishness : 
 
 "Is Mr. Fellowes in arrest yet? Where is he? 
 Where is Dora? Is he dismissed? For mercy's 
 sake do tell me something about things; are you 
 all struck suddenly dumb?" 
 
 "It was the Sun, in the fable, Imogen, that took 
 off the man's coat not the Wind," said Talry 
 
 gravely. 
 
 256
 
 A LAUGH AND A BLOW 
 
 "I don't know what you're talking about, and 
 I doubt if you do yourself," she snapped. 
 
 But the hopeless unhappiness in the worn face 
 went to his happy-loving nature and he went to her 
 and began to take off her gloves. 
 
 "Never mind, old girl. Where are your traps? 
 I'll call Mammy, and see if between us we can't 
 make you comfortable. Dora is up at the hospital 
 but I'll tell you all about it later. You look all 
 tired out I'm afraid you've had a bad crossing." 
 
 "The China Sea was as it always is, a pot of 
 pea-soup boiling over. I was sea-sick of course, 
 you know perfectly well I always am. And I can 
 tell you I'm also sick and tired of dragging about 
 after a man who" Jack led the way out of the 
 room. He knew he had only to caress her to buy 
 peace, and therein lay his martyrdom. 
 
 "It's thirteen years, eight months, twenty-one 
 days, seven hours, and forty-five minutes since I 
 kissed you, and I'm starving !" Robb promptly an- 
 nounced as soon as the door closed, seizing Dell's 
 hand and drawing her away from a tell-tale 
 window. 
 
 "Don't even remember the seconds !" she pouted, 
 trying to look unhappy. 
 
 But although his speech revelled in new-found 
 257
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 license, his touch was ever that of tenderness and 
 gentlest reserve. 
 
 It was quite another hour before they reached the 
 actual point of parting long enough for him to dash 
 down to the ship, visit his one patient in the sick- 
 bay, renew his leave, and get back to "Ippon Mat- 
 su" in time for the usual late dinner of the 
 Orient. 
 
 As he crossed the Bund to the landing he came 
 face to face with D'Estrees. The two men bowed 
 and passed on. An instant later the European 
 turned back hastily and cried: 
 
 "Doctor Roobb, one moment, please. I have hot 
 just heard of your happiness. Weel you accept my 
 felicitations? There ees perhaps no one een town 
 qui-i-te een the position that I am, to comprehend 
 the very rare charms of the fair lady who weel be 
 your wi-i-fe. That ees my message to her. May I 
 ask you to deliver eet? She weel explen'. I weel 
 dreenk le vin d'honneur ce soir a la belle foldtre!" 
 
 He was gone before Robb could bring himself 
 to believe the underlying meaning in the smooth, 
 smiling words. 
 
 When he did, he turned like a baited bull re- 
 sponsive to the banderillero, but there was nothing 
 nearer than a jinrikisha darting around the nearest 
 
 258
 
 A LAUGH AND A BLOW 
 
 corner with two atoshi at the back; and Robb 
 recovered his self-control and clear vision of 
 things. 
 
 "He wants me to risk my commission by follow- 
 ing him now in my uniform before my head clears. 
 He is not worth it. We Anglo-Saxons can wait 
 and not cool off too much. But I'll see you again 
 to-night before I sleep, as sure as there's a God 
 above usl" 
 
 He passed the whole evening beside Dell in a 
 sort of trance, waiting for the hour when he should 
 be free for what his soul panted. For the moment 
 the world of women but fretted him; there was 
 always something to be hidden from them. 
 
 He had come ashore in a white duck mess jacket 
 picked up at Colombo. He would remain at 
 "Ippon Matsu" until half-past ten, then he had 
 until midnight to do what he had to do. 
 
 Down on the Bund that night about ten o'clock, 
 there was the usual game of poker going on at the 
 club, in the small, back, second-story room where 
 it was good form to send in your name before en- 
 tering, unless by previous arrangement. 
 
 D'Estrees was there as usual, with the two British 
 residents one English, the other Scotch who 
 had taught him the game some four years back. 
 
 2 59
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 The fourth was a new-comer, a silent giant with 
 eyes like steel, and an unreadable face that made 
 his bluff on a bob-tail-flush a thing to talk about 
 for months to come. 
 
 In the afternoon he had said he was en route 
 from Shanghai to Port Arthur. That was all they 
 knew when they arranged a game for the even- 
 ing. He was English apparently but spoke with a 
 strange accent none of the others had travelled 
 widely enough to place geographically. About 
 quarter-past ten the Scotchman got thirsty, and 
 proposed that a plethoric "Kitty" should pay for 
 drinks. He clapped his hands for a "boy," signed 
 the chit, and then they all sat back in their chairs 
 and became human once more as they waited. 
 
 "By the bye," said the Scotchman quietly, "I 
 took tiffin off on the American flag-ship to-day 
 met some awfully decent chaps and heard a bit of 
 news." 
 
 "Fellowes* sentence?" yawned the Englishman. 
 
 "No, no a bit of romance if you please wed- 
 ding bells I" 
 
 "Oh, really!" only faintly suggested the exiled 
 young Englishman's simple delight at anything so 
 "homely," as he called it; "I'll have a look at me 
 'topper' to-night, by Jove !" 
 
 260
 
 A LAUGH AND A BLOW 
 
 "What weel you wager that I cannort give you 
 at once the nems?" 
 
 "Is this a club or what is it?" queried the 
 stranger, and they all understood. 
 
 "Oh, I weel nort mention the lady's nem, gentle- 
 men, have no fear of that," said D'Estrees, his face 
 very pale, his voice vibrating peculiarly, so that 
 the stranger turned in his chair and watched him 
 with interest. 
 
 "I'll lay you one-half your wine-chits for the 
 month," came from the cautious Scot and they all 
 laughed. 
 
 "The young medico avocat on the 'Boston' who 
 defended Fellowes defended hees future brother- 
 een-law and I'll trouble you to sign that een 
 blank, eef you please," cried the Italian excitedly, 
 pushing a paper toward the Scotchman who signed. 
 
 Then the Japanese "boy" entered with a tray 
 laden with a little colony of Tanzan, a bowl of ice, 
 quinine and bitters, and the sacred name of "Glen- 
 livet" written large ; and all but the Italian made 
 combinations therefrom, the "boy" unsolicited had 
 brought him his "D. O. M." in a tiny glass, which 
 he sipped daintily. Then when they all sat back sat- 
 isfied with their brewings, D'Estrees leaned foF- 
 ward glass in hand, his eyes alight, and remarked : 
 
 261
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 "I have a toast to offer, weel you dreenk weet 
 me? May a nem'less American find honey left 
 where a nem'less European has already seeped, 
 under the 'Ippon Matsu' I" 
 
 "You scoundrel!" shouted the stranger, and his 
 fist flew out across the table. There was a mo- 
 ment's confusion and the Scotchman locked the 
 door, while the Italian who had forgotten all lan- 
 guages but his own got up from the floor. But 
 when he was on his feet, Captain Fitchett's hand 
 went out again and took him by the collar and shook 
 a retraction out of him, word for word. 
 
 "Eet ees true, what I have said!" hissed the doc- 
 tor between each enforced word, English returning 
 to him. 
 
 "Well, I say it's a lie 1 Now, then go ahead 
 repeat what I told you and be quick about it, too !" 
 And when it was over, he flung the half-strangled 
 man from him, as he would have a discarded glove, 
 and D'Estrees fell against the door, felt blindly for 
 the handle, tugged at it, unlocked it, and fled. 
 
 Then Fitchett sat down and deliberately took 
 out a huge blue silk handkerchief and slowly wiped 
 his face, neck, and hands, and the others stood and 
 watched him smiling, glorying in the common blood 
 they shared with him. 
 
 262
 
 A LAUGH AND A BLOW 
 
 "It's a darned hot night, and it'll rain before an- 
 other morning," was all he said for sometime. A 
 little later he added: 
 
 "They are my friends at 'Ippon Matsu,' gentle- 
 men; and that Dago lied," and the gray eyes chal- 
 lenged in turn those of the other two, before he 
 went on: "I guess" (and the two listeners knew 
 him for exactly what he was) "if we do live out here 
 away from home eyes to help keep us straight, a 
 good woman's name is still a sacred thing among 
 us, I take it," was all the explanation he vouch- 
 safed, and they insisted on shaking his hand much 
 to his disgust; and then the German consul strolled 
 in with a privileged air, and the game went on. 
 
 Teodoro D'Estrees' ruling passion was vanity, 
 and after one look at his face in the mirror in his 
 own hall, he packed a dress-suit case, wrote a note 
 to the old French doctor up on the hill (whose re- 
 tirement had given the Italian his practice) turn- 
 ing over to him his patients temporarily, offering 
 too large a bonus to admit of refusal. Then 
 D'Estrees went at once on board the Nippon Yusen 
 steamer which sailed for Kobe at midnight that 
 night. And no one, not even the Frenchman, knew 
 his whereabouts for two months. Robb regretted 
 that evening to the end of his life. 
 
 263
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 The physical wound on D'Estrees' face from 
 Fitchett's blow, wore off far more quickly than the 
 moral on his soul. The man drifted about no 
 longer satisfied with himself. The memory of evil 
 done is (at no time, nor to anyone who ever sinned) 
 a pleasant companion. Surely no one but a saint 
 could have conceived of the necessity of any further 
 hell! 
 
 The day after the scene at the club, Dell received 
 a large package and a note, brought by a Russian 
 sailor to the door. Robb was with her when it 
 came and cut the string with his penknife and 
 watched the girl's pretty delight and wonder, as 
 the seductions of many yards of gorgeous white 
 Chinese brocade poured over her lap on to the floor 
 about her feet. 
 
 "Where's the letter? Quick, do find it! I can't 
 imagine who could have sent me such a thing as 
 this why " her eyes once upon the paper's con- 
 tents her voice died away, and presently she looked 
 up into Robb's face with tears running down her 
 own, and silently handed him the note. 
 
 "I am passing through on my steamer, out of 
 my usual course. I leave for Port Arthur in an 
 hour. I wish I could tell you of this great silent, 
 
 264
 
 A LAUGH AND A BLOW 
 
 creeping Russia but I can't, she's my boss. Some 
 day your children will study what I know and re- 
 cite it at school. And that brings me to what I 
 want to say: I heard last night the news of your 
 engagement to a Navy man. I'm glad he's an 
 American. I inquired around to-day, and I hear 
 he's the right thing; and so all I've got to say is 
 that I hope you'll be as happy as I know he will. 
 I was bringing you over this parcel anyhow and 
 now I've heard the news, perhaps you'll kindly ac- 
 cept it as a wedding present from Manthy and 
 me. I took her some like it when I went home and 
 she made such a fuss about it, I wanted you should 
 have some too. It wouldn't do for a wedding-dress, 
 would it? I liked getting it. I made believe 
 things to myself. I do, sometimes. I guess I'm 
 lonely. The kind of thoughts I have can't hurt 
 you, not a bit. It's just the same now as before, 
 as far as I am concerned it couldn't be, that's all. 
 But I'd like to know first rate, as years go on, if 
 you don't mind and he don't I'd like to know 
 once in a while, just to which port to consign the 
 freight of my very best thoughts, when I send them 
 out to you, as I've got to do till the end. God bless 
 you, dear. Good-by. 
 
 "EZRA FlTCHETT." 
 
 265
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Robb had to choke down something in his own 
 throat before he could quiet Adele, now openly 
 given over to woe and self-reproach. 
 
 "Even if I had not given myself to you," she 
 finally confessed in tones of deep abasement, 
 "I never, never should have flirted again as long 
 as I live, never ! This man and that other the 
 two extremes of masculine love, have cured me," 
 and Robb had the tact not to laugh. 
 
 "Adele, it isn't just you you pretty tantalizing 
 thing it's what you represent: the immutable 
 feminine, which we men began to fear was be- 
 coming extinct and so when we do find it we all 
 go a little mad, I suppose," he remarked sighing 
 for the others. 
 
 Before morning the warm rain began to fall; 
 gently at first and then in great whirling screaming 
 gusts. This continued for four hot, sticky, almost 
 unendurable, days and nights ; and when it cleared, 
 the scorching summer was at an end. 
 
 266
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 "A soft star trembles through the drifting clouds." 
 
 IT was many weeks before a medical board of 
 survey, of which the American fleet surgeon 
 was senior member, pronounced Lieutenant Fel- 
 lowes to be in a fit condition to return to the United 
 States by mail steamer, pursuant to his sentence. 
 There were days when even Dora was not al- 
 lowed to see him, and Soeur Agnes's cool disci- 
 plined hand alone served him, the very aloofness 
 of her quiet face giving him a feeling of deep peace. 
 The excess of her energy had once, during a time 
 when the little hospital was almost empty, over- 
 flowed into the making of a flower-garden, now 
 repaying her generously. This became Kent's 
 daily interest, and almost the sole topic of conver- 
 sation between them, for he spoke just enough 
 French to confine thought within safe limits, for one 
 in his condition. So he knew when the hibiscus 
 had begun to fade ; the miniature maples to show 
 
 267
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 the first signs of a later radiance; the quick sprout- 
 ing and promise among the chrysanthemums; the 
 marvel of the constancy of the amber-colored core- 
 opsis. And yet he seldom left his long Chinese 
 chair on the broad veranda, which Dora's insight 
 had so placed that his back was turned to the bay ; 
 and his eyes rested on the ring of trees about the 
 hospital, or the lesser growing things about, each 
 intent on its own little silent mission. Rest, silence, 
 nature, and the sense of distance above the busy 
 tangle of ordinary life below, on the other side of 
 the great screen of trees, slowly brought back 
 health to mind and body alike. With health re- 
 turned its unrest, interest in the world, the great 
 weariness of subjective thought, and his convales- 
 cence retrograded. 
 
 He stood back from his own life and groped for 
 the meaning of things, the reason of his recurrent 
 mania, the cause of that fatal dependence on some- 
 thing outside of himself to renew his balance not 
 only mental and moral but physical in these 
 strange conditions of cumulative psychical agony. 
 
 He was not a religious man and found no com- 
 fort in symbolism, nor in any of the other avenues 
 of introverted thought. An idea that found no ex- 
 ponent in action was a miscarriage of life's purpose. 
 
 268
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 To use a muscle was to keep it from deterioration. 
 He had always had a strong sense of the dispropor- 
 tion between his energies and the needs of his 
 environment. 
 
 One day Robb's short speech in the court-room 
 returned to Kent. Was reaction from desuetude 
 at the root of his vice ? Was it psychical? Or an 
 anaemic condition of the circulation, as Robb held. 
 Was it possible that cure would come if the needs 
 of his soul were fed in the one case, and of his body 
 in the other? With Dora's help, her love, her 
 inspiration perhaps some day it would all combine 
 to give him his freedom. Then suddenly a thought 
 struck him between the eyes like a blow ; and Sister 
 Agnes found him lying unconscious when she came ; 
 and she sent two messengers flying over the hills, 
 one for the French doctor, and the other for the 
 wife. But she brought him round before either 
 came; only there was a look in his eyes she had 
 not seen before. 
 
 With consciousness returned that terrible 
 thought (already part of his being thenceforth, 
 through that familiar miracle of mental alchemy) : 
 "If the great chance of war should come nowl 
 Now while I am thus temporarily stricken off the 
 fighting list! If there is goodness encompassing 
 
 269
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 us I will be spared that I That one thing ! I'll be 
 spared that!" 
 
 Only in sleep did this leave him, or when alone 
 with his wife, yielding to the unfailing regenera- 
 tion that reached him through the baptism of her 
 love. 
 
 To speak a dreaded thought is to give it added 
 vitality, and he was superstitiously silent; but not 
 until this obsession slowly wore away, did his real 
 recovery begin. No one knew what it was that so 
 mysteriously delayed a restoration fully warranted 
 by the diagnosis that found no organic trouble with 
 the patient's heart. As September drew to a close, 
 and she had been assured all fear of danger was 
 past but that Kent could not be sent home for many 
 weeks more, Dora insisted that life at "Ippon Mat- 
 su" should go on its way bravely, merrily, rejoicing 
 that all would soon be well. Anything less would 
 suggest a secret cause for shame and sorrow, not 
 for one moment warranted to her staunch mind 
 by Kent's "unhappiness," as she always called 
 it, on the very rare occasions when she referred to 
 their trouble at all. 
 
 Talty upheld her in this decision, sharing the 
 family preference for a flag flying to a flag furled. 
 
 And so "Ippon Matsu" brooded under its green 
 270
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 wings many happy, chirping hours, nestling a little 
 blindly against the warm maternal heart of things. 
 
 The "Boston" was in the Tategami dock; "high 
 and dry, southern exposure, superb view, noise to 
 beat the German band, board and lodging one dol- 
 lar Mex. a day," was Jack's summing up of the 
 situation. 
 
 The flag-ship remained because the admiral 
 thought that he had forgotten more about docking 
 a ship than "old Pehoe" ever had known. 
 
 There was tennis and inefficacious cake at the 
 club twice a week, hops on every flag-ship in the 
 harbor; dances at the hotel; teas, tiffins, dinners 
 everywhere. A perfect epidemic of social energy 
 had broken out now that the worst of the heat was 
 over, and the ships still lingered. Imogen and Dell 
 took a trip to Unzen, and a third of the American 
 Navy acted as escort; and the usual jokes were 
 made anent the geysers named "Middle Class 
 Hell," "The Loud Wailing," and "The Thousand 
 Odors." 
 
 Even Imogen bloomed stuntedly in her humor- 
 less (and yet comical) way, and was the promul- 
 gator of many and varied forms of human restless- 
 ness known as pleasure. There were picnics on Rat 
 Island where nobody did anything with the serene 
 
 271
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 conscience of the Orient. And always, when imagi- 
 nation grew weary, there was the usual daily bath- 
 ing down the bay at Pappenberg; day in and day 
 out, summer after summer, by the wise, and rather 
 weary, old residents. All there was of European 
 society the Americans met there on the beach, 
 which was dotted with a score of tea-tables, fully 
 and fastidiously equipped by the small army of 
 native servants. 
 
 The flotilla of waiting house-boats, and sam- 
 pans, tugged restlessly at their long ropes eager to 
 get back to their play with the wind and tide. 
 
 Undressing in their house-boats (on which the 
 sendo quickly rigged up strange canvas closets for 
 the purpose) the company soon reappeared and 
 plunged therefrom into the blue waters of the bay. 
 Men leaving the town grim and white with the 
 heat became in a few minutes rollicking boys, and 
 bald-heads challenged gray-heads with all of boys' 
 self-vaunting. The women and the children bathed 
 a little apart, that their timidity might escape ridi- 
 cule. Then followed the second disappearance into 
 the house-boats, from whence came smothered 
 shouts for towels, or mislaid shoes; and now and 
 then a howl of laughter from the huge house-boat 
 of the bachelors' mess. 
 
 272
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 From this eclipse they came forth one and all 
 ravenous for tea; and swarmed about the little 
 tables like a species of great white fly for all the 
 world wore white. The bachelors were distributed 
 about among the tea-centres, gratefully eating as 
 little as they could and still survive those sudden 
 gnawing pangs. 
 
 And by and by when the island's own shadow 
 overspread them, the tables were folded, the tea 
 paraphernalia packed as only the Japanese can, 
 the boats fell into line or spread out fan-like, and 
 "society" went home through the twilight. Sing- 
 ing sometimes as they went, old songs that unite 
 all English-speaking hearts exiled from home, all 
 over the face of the world songs which bring 
 back much the same memories, irrespective of many 
 accents. 
 
 Like one big tolerant family the Americans, 
 English, Scotch and Irish cooled off, some very 
 happy, some a little sleepy, all a little wistful 
 drifted up the pretty bay whose hill-sides are 
 wooded to the foot. 
 
 When all else of Adele's life in Japan became 
 blurred by time and change and elbowing circum- 
 stance, that pensive home-bound hour, with 
 Leigh beside her, remained forever a thing apart 
 
 273
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 in her memory ; untranslatably tender to hearts that 
 had not shared it. 
 
 "If it could only go on forever like this," she 
 brooded to him, as (now always behind the others) 
 they lingered in the summer-house at "Ippon Mat- 
 su," for the good-night benediction given and taken 
 in the kindly night, now fallen. 
 
 "May the day never come, sweetheart, when you 
 will pray for any change, so that it be a change, 
 for that is the sign of a starving heart. You are 
 happy ! That is as it should be. You were meant 
 for happiness, dear, it brings out the best of you. 
 Do you know to-night a real radiance comes from 
 you here in the dark! A sort of phosphorescence 
 is it love, do you suppose? Perhaps if very, 
 very perfect, love does become visible else what 
 should be that light? Tell me, is it love? Oh, my 
 darling, why can we not all (and always) take this 
 great gift of life and just be happy as you and I 
 are to-night?" 
 
 A little later she said : 
 
 "Well, for one thing let's agree not to expect 
 perfection until we're sure we're giving it. There's 
 a lot in that, I think. And I'll go further than 
 that, I wish as time went on you'd acquire a taste 
 for a slight imperfection." 
 
 274
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 "Oh, I have it now !" he laughed, and of course 
 she punished him by a system of small reprisals 
 quite their own; over which they were still dis- 
 puting, when Mammy's voice, full of a great ten- 
 derness, came to them through the dark: 
 
 "O O Miss Dell ! You-all bes' come on in ter 
 dinner, an' not gobble up all de dessert de fus' 
 thing, den yer ain' got no inclunation fo' de 
 soup." 
 
 "Soup !" groaned Robb. "O tempora, O mores ! 
 O Icarus! I, like thee, flew too near the sun!" 
 
 Then the three days in October given over to 
 the Osuwa Matsuri came and went, when Nagasa- 
 ki repeats the festival of the Guilds of Florence of 
 the Fourteenth Century, and all the world turns 
 child again and runs about the streets, frantic lest 
 something be missed. 
 
 Julie and Haru, with a rehabilitated Yama- 
 guchi for escort beside their jinrikisha, followed in 
 the wake of the great, green "Dragons," from 
 morning till night, enjoying the delights of pro- 
 tected terror. Their elders felt for symbols amidst 
 all that bewildering pomp and glitter, and strange 
 theatric conventions; but in vain; even among the 
 educated natives much of the meaning of one of 
 the most elaborate festivals of Japan is lost in the
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 long vista of centuries through which it has wan- 
 dered down to the present day. 
 
 Not until Soeur Agnes's chrysanthemums were 
 in full bloom, did Kent Fellowes walk down 
 to "Ippon Matsu," and take his place once more 
 in life's procession that halts for no one. The last 
 glimpse they had of the faithful Sister was just 
 before Kent, his wife beside him, dipped down over 
 the hill when he stopped and looked back. Sister 
 Agnes, thinking they had gone, was down upon her 
 knees in the kiku bed, pinching off buds of no 
 promise that the others might flourish, just as she 
 pruned her own daily flower-bed of thoughts; 
 and her face was hidden under the veil and wimple. 
 
 The younger officers of the American Squadron, 
 who were all more or less under the spell of Adele's 
 unquenchable charm, and who openly worshipped 
 Dora with great lumps in their throats that pre- 
 vented idle speech, were inclined to give the Fel- 
 lowes' party a hilarious send-off, the day they sailed 
 on the Pacific Mail steamer for the United States. 
 But the older men promptly vetoed it, having a 
 deeper insight into hearts. To keep down the num- 
 ber, they drew lots as to the privilege of going to 
 the steamer the day of sailing. 
 
 The admiral's cruise was at an end, and much 
 276
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 to his regret he had been ordered home ; going via 
 Suez. These last months of his last command 
 afloat were full of pathos to him. Not even to his 
 wife could he put into words what it meant to him. 
 Nothing that the service could offer him ashore, 
 would for one instant compensate for the renuncia- 
 tion of supreme command over his squadron, his 
 own will dominated alone by the winds of heaven; 
 the smell of the sea his rightful incense ; the limits 
 of the horizon his ever-changing empire; far, far 
 away, thank Providence ! from bureaucracy, and 
 meddling, ignorant, political fingers. They were 
 his last days of freedom and he knew it, and 
 he groaned aloud as he tramped the poop-deck 
 reserved to his use. 
 
 So Mrs. Titterington went home with the others. 
 Imogen remained, and she said and thought that 
 it was Jack's wish ; which is monument enough for 
 one man's honest endeavor to preserve social order, 
 all too ready to crumble. 
 
 Imogen had urged Adele to remain with her on 
 the station, and for once Robb formed a sympa- 
 thetic alliance with her, and went suddenly blind 
 as to her faults of character. But Adele and Mam- 
 my after many consultations, finally decided to go 
 with the others and help them through the year of 
 
 277
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 exile ahead of them. Adele knew by the cost of 
 this decision that it was right. Imogen (who had 
 counted much upon the reflected glory of her 
 strangely popular sister-in-law) became so abusive 
 the instant she decided to leave, that the burden of 
 Adele's resolution seemed lifted from her, save 
 when she met Robb's reproachful eyes. 
 
 It was a sunny day, cold with the nip of winter 
 in the air, when they bade farewell to "Ippon 
 Matsu," nothing but the leaven of homely detail 
 preventing tears. Whether the upflung arms of the 
 old pine over the house bade them begone, or cried 
 to heaven that they might remain, they could not 
 tell; but as they slowly steamed down the bay, it 
 was the last thing they saw ; all except Kent, whose 
 eyes clung to his ship's flag. 
 
 But the good-by on the steamer's deck was after 
 all a right merry one. Half the foreign residents 
 of the warm-hearted little town were there. The 
 bachelors' mess had achieved an imposing, un- 
 Japanese, composition in golden chrysanthemums 
 which, with similar offerings, lay at Adele's feet. 
 To Dora they brought a single late rose, or a hot- 
 house carnation, and the English boy who pro- 
 duced one mauve-colored orchid looted from a 
 great man's conservatory, was cheered for his 
 
 278
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 prowess if not his principles. Young Sault had 
 waited apart till they had all paid tribute to true 
 womanliness in Dora's form, and then he had ad- 
 vanced from cover and smuggled into her unwill- 
 ing hand a parting tiny gift of old gold lacquer 
 which represented, as she knew at a glance, every 
 dollar he had had "on the books." He stood be- 
 fore her flushed and glorying in the severe scold- 
 ing he was receiving for his extravagance. 
 
 "You've taught me such a lot, don't you know, 
 Mrs. Fellowes," he muttered, biting his lips to keep 
 from laughing from the pure joy of giving lavishly 
 for once in his life. 
 
 "The difference between Makusu and Nabashi- 
 ma or between old Imari and its imitations, and 
 and a few other things, perhaps what is that to 
 this exquisite priceless thing, you naughty boy!" 
 she cried. 
 
 "Well, I guess it's the 'few other things' that 
 got me ! Anyhow, lots of things look different since 
 you've been so good to me, Mrs. Fellowes. I've 
 learned the difference between the real and the imi- 
 tation in heaps of things beside Imari. I know 
 now what I did not before, that it's a fellow's busi- 
 ness to hustle along, all right, but to think a little 
 of his elbows and umbrella and other people's ribs 
 
 279
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 and eyes; that's the great act, after all! And 
 and all that! You know what I'm after. Father 
 says I have the vocabulary of a bootblack, and I 
 guess that's about the size of it." 
 
 Imogen was conspicuously present, with her nine 
 historic remedies for sea-sickness her sole topic of 
 smileless conversation, and yet furnishing uncon- 
 sciously the "comic relief" that prevented the ex- 
 pression of many strong emotions, as well kept 
 under on this occasion. 
 
 Jack Talty was here, there, and everywhere, 
 easily tracked by the wake of following laugh- 
 ter. 
 
 The admiral's beautiful gracious wife held a 
 court of her own a little apart from the others, the 
 admiral himself sunk in undisguised melancholy 
 from which she sought in vain to rally him. 
 
 Kent was already lying in his long chair, bundled 
 up to the eyes in rugs, and thither went in turn the 
 older officers with words of faltering cheer. 
 
 Julie, held for the last time in O Haru's loving 
 arms, received too her meed of attention. Half 
 the bachelors in town brought her a native toy 
 to help her and her elders through the long 
 voyage ahead. 
 
 Nearby tall, erect, silent, ever a striking 
 280
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 figure stood Mammy, with restless eyes roving 
 from group to group. 
 
 No one had need of her just then. Hours 
 ago she had placed all the staterooms of her 
 party in readiness for whatever betided outside; 
 and once in the Inland Sea there was time for more 
 leisurely unpacking. Now and then, when an 
 officer of the American fleet went up to Mammy 
 and bade her farewell, shaking her warmly by the 
 hand, her stern face melted into that smile they 
 all knew so well, and the beautiful voice made its 
 pleased response. 
 
 She alone of the whole household had heard, 
 through the colored steward of the club, of the 
 scene in the poker-room, of which the whole town 
 was now whispering. Not until all communication 
 with the shore had ceased and the steamer was well 
 under way, would Mammy feel safe from the 
 machinations of the Italian, whose blackness of 
 heart she greatly overestimated, with her innate 
 gift for drama. In the meantime she deeply en- 
 joyed her role as secret detective in that apparently 
 light-hearted company. 
 
 Later on Adele and Robb were seated in the 
 "Social Hall," holding hands face to face, white 
 and smileless with the pain of parting, which they 
 
 281
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 had not fully realized until now in the midst of it, 
 with the first gong impending. 
 
 "I wish to heaven I had insisted on your marry- 
 ing me here at once, and then you could have stayed 
 out here on the station till my cruise was over," 
 fumed he. 
 
 "I did want to." 
 
 "Adele! it isn't too late! I'll find Jack," and 
 he was half way to the door; and not until he heard 
 her laugh did he see the absurdity of it and return 
 to her side, his eyes glued to hers, an anguish in 
 his heart that seemed unendurable. 
 
 "Well, the day after I reach you at the end of 
 the cruise, swear that you'll marry me ? No fuss, 
 no feathers!" 
 
 "Dear, I love the fuss and I have a special yearn- 
 ing after the feathers of life. It's one of the im- 
 perfections you'll have to face, I'm afraid." 
 
 "You don't mean a church wedding, and ushers, 
 and things?" No less an emotion than horror was 
 written upon his face. 
 
 "If by 'things' you mean bridesmaids, my reply 
 is yes. I want the whole ceremony that gives me 
 to you for life to be very, very beautiful, with 
 music running through it all, from the: 'Dearly 
 beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight 
 
 282
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 of God,' down to : 'that ye may so live together in 
 this life.' It must all stand for harmony, to the 
 ear, to the eye, to the heart. I like, Leigh, dear, 
 to look upon it as a sacrament, not a social festivity 
 only." 
 
 "Ah, you women love symbols," he murmured, 
 his soul full of untranslatable poesy, as he watched 
 her uplifted eyes, the best that was in him stand- 
 ing bare-headed before her, worshipping. A mo- 
 ment later he added: "May I tell you why I feel 
 absolutely sure of my future happiness, sweetheart? 
 Because you have the same blood in your veins that 
 Dora and Jack have. The bacillus of divorce lies 
 in each of their marriages the possibility of chaos 
 and destruction lies in all marriages but each 
 goes bravely on with it, one with love to help, one 
 without even that. There's good strong stuff in 
 you, my darling, and I hope I may remain worthy 
 of it, not fall back upon it unworthily." 
 
 But the girl's thoughts were still on her 
 wedding-day, and he laughed aloud when she said 
 dreamily: 
 
 "And Mammy is to sit in a pew, way up in front 
 all by herself, where she can see my train. And 
 I'll wear Captain Fitchett's brocade, veiled a little 
 with chiffon. Oh, and I'll have my picture taken 
 
 283
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 and sent to him! Isn't that a heavenly idea, 
 Leigh?" 
 
 "It is a heavenly idea, sweetheart," he said 
 tenderly. 
 
 "And I want piles and piles of officers there in 
 special full-dress uniform Leigh, will they wear 
 it if I ask them?" 
 
 "Why, of course, dear child." 
 
 "And later I'll cut the cake with your sword, as 
 they do in the Army; and I'll have a ring, and a 
 thimble, and a sixpence in the wedding-cake; and 
 and then we'll go away together, love, just you 
 and I, and the door of my girlhood will be locked 
 forever behind me!" 
 
 "Adele, Adele, how can I wait?" She clung to 
 him, sobbing. 
 
 "You will be very, very good to me, Leigh? Oh, 
 you must be very kind to me ! And love me, love 
 me, love me always?" 
 
 "You drive me mad," he muttered choked with 
 feeling. He disengaged himself gently and walked 
 away striving for control, that she might not go 
 from him thus unhappily. 
 
 Presently he returned and sat once more beside 
 her, master of his own mood and hers, speaking 
 in the light tone that best quieted her, he said : 
 
 284
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 "Well, if you are determined, little woman, on. 
 having all the 'feathers' aforesaid, please for pity's 
 sake have the beastly things all ready to tie on when 
 I get free of the ship." 
 
 "They don't 'tie' on, but I'll have them ready, 
 sir, at your command," and she saluted him with 
 her one free hand in pale tearful imitation of her old 
 blithesome self, and the pathos of it went to his 
 heart suddenly and for a few minutes her pretty 
 ears burned with his ravings. 
 
 Then the first gong sounded and their eyes laid 
 in a store for future hungry hours. 
 
 "I don't care if the telescopes of Europe, Asia, 
 Africa, and America are upon us, I'm going to kiss 
 you good-by!" And he did, but no one saw them 
 save the cupids on the frescoed ceiling, and it was 
 right in their line, and they beamed a carmine 
 approval. 
 
 "I must say one word to Kent !" He flew out 
 across the gangway to the promenade deck. The 
 two men had but a moment together, with close- 
 clasped hands. 
 
 "A severe illness is a sort of rebirth, Fellowes. 
 You can begin now almost with new bricks and 
 build up to suit your healthiest self." 
 
 "And a year on your brother's ranch is best? 
 285
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 I don't feel sure, Robb; I don't feel sure!" mur- 
 mured Kent very shaken, very pale, leaning back 
 against his pillows in a strained tense way, the doc- 
 tor had no time to relieve. 
 
 "I know, Fellowes, take my word for it. Work, 
 work, work ! Let your only leisure be spent in the 
 deep sleep that will inevitably come to you; and 
 two quarts, at least, of milk a day between 
 meals!" 
 
 "All right, Doctor, but I loathe the stuff." 
 
 "You'll cry for it before long cry like a child 
 and now good-by, and peace be with you and 
 yours," and he had to run for the gangway. 
 
 As the steamer slowly headed about, the sur- 
 rounding boats stood away from it. The great 
 coal-barges with their swarm of nimble-handed 
 humanity, the most rapid coal-passers in the world 
 and the cheeriest; the steamship's launch crowd- 
 ed with the smiling waving townspeople; Ad- 
 miral Titterington's barge, in which he sat in 
 glorious solitude, his eyes clinging to a golden head 
 he loved ; the several cutters from the other Amer- 
 ican men-of-war filled with officers, laughing and 
 chaffing one another lest the home-longing in all 
 their hearts get the better of them. Standing in 
 one was Jack, pantomiming a frenzy of despair 
 
 286
 
 LAST WEEKS IN NAGASAKI 
 
 that made even the Japanese on-looking laugh in 
 quick sympathy. Imogen on the hotel launch 
 screamed out a forgotten message standing dis- 
 traught, dishevelled, so near the rail that a native 
 runner for the hotel politely touched her on the 
 arm, whereat she whirled upon him, with abundant 
 gesture, and so faded out of sight and hearing. 
 
 O Haru san and the other Japanese servants at 
 "Ippon Matsu," were in a sampan. After the 
 little amah's last glance up at Julie's tiny white 
 form in the arms of her black rival, she fell head- 
 long into her trailing sleeve in a paroxysm of weep- 
 ing ; and Yamaguchi gazed in pity down upon the 
 shiny black head so near his shoulder, and Mammy, 
 watching, formed a hasty conclusion. 
 
 And so the great home-bound steamer sped down 
 the bay, past the German flag-ship where the band 
 played Mendelssohn's "Consolation," a special 
 tribute to Adele from the captain, whose music- 
 loving heart she had won by her singing. The 
 other ships silently dipped their flags in reply. The 
 little party on the deck of the steamer lingered in 
 silence leaning on the rail, Kent among them, Dora's 
 hand on his arm. Then Mammy called her and she 
 left him. He looked back and sought and found 
 the flag of his ship and something tore at his heart. 
 
 287
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 A sound very like a groan came from him, and he 
 went back to his chair, lying with closed eyes, and 
 his mouth a hard line of bitterest agony. 
 
 But after awhile it came to pass that the ad- 
 miral's wife came and sat down in her steamer chair 
 on the left side of his, and after a long look at the 
 wan pinched face beside her she became alarmed 
 and leaned over and touched his arm. He opened 
 his eyes and spoke from his soul, as often seems 
 easier to do with strangers than to those closer to 
 the inward life. 
 
 "Suppose that war should come Cuba, Spain, 
 it's in the air now while I am out of it, like this !" 
 he said abruptly. 
 
 It so happened that she was a fine woman, and 
 strong (in herself and in her social relation) and 
 she understood at once and said, smiling into his 
 face: 
 
 "I make you a promise and I don't make many 
 if it comes you shall be in it remember!" 
 
 It must have been his weakened condition that 
 gave this daring statement from a young woman's 
 smiling lips sufficient import to bring him peace, 
 but it did. 
 
 288
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 "Rejoice that man is hurled 
 
 From change to change unceasingly, 
 His soul's wing never furled." 
 
 FOUR months later a man was riding home 
 along a dead flat road, through miles of 
 young orange-trees, planted pitilessly equidistant, 
 the rough dry ploughed earth beneath them unre- 
 lieved by a flower, a blade of grass, a single weed. 
 The endless heart-rending fight for moisture in the 
 great valleys of Southern California leads to the 
 uprooting of all vegetable life save that having a 
 market value. Over half the year the choking 
 desert is dependent on artesian wells, and is then 
 transformed into a wondrous plenitude by the few 
 inches of winter rain, which they were only learning 
 the secret of hoarding, by the erection of reservoirs 
 up among the foot-hills miles away. They were 
 facing a third dry season, with Polonius-like eyes 
 magnifying every passing bit of flying fleece in the 
 relentlessly blue sky.
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 In great following clouds of dust the man and 
 his horse went on, in the easy cheerful gallop of a 
 mustang who smells his stable, albeit three miles 
 away. As they crossed the county road, beyond 
 which lay the Ojitos Ranch, a man tore by at right 
 angles on a high raw-boned horse and shouted out, 
 tugging at his reins: 
 
 "Captain Fellowes! Wait a minute." He 
 finally succeeded in partly checking his hard- 
 mouthed beast, and turning about in his saddle he 
 leaned on his horse's flank, and yelled to the other 
 horseman : 
 
 "The 'Maine' has been sunk in the harbor 
 of Havana 1 The papers say it means war as 
 sure as the Lord made little apples I See you to- 
 morrow at the works. S'long!" And in an in- 
 stant, a great ball of dust bowling away was all 
 that marked his whereabouts. 
 
 Kent never remembered clearly the next ten min- 
 utes. He slid off his horse because he could not 
 stay on, and he stood leaning his weight against 
 the sweating, panting body, with one arm about the 
 neck of the wondering animal, who turned his head 
 to see what it meant; after one obstinate moment 
 of bracing for the expected cinch, which did not 
 come. And Kent clung there for sheer support, 
 
 290
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 and the touch of some warm living thing, until the 
 first whirl of the storm had passed. 
 
 The dumb brute's nose nuzzled against the 
 stricken man's shoulder inquiringly, and he started 
 and raised his face and with a broken laugh that 
 sounded strange in that great sea of dust-choked 
 silence, he said aloud: 
 
 "You want your supper, don't you, old fellow? 
 I haven't forgotten. You and I will go straight 
 home it's the best place for us to-night." 
 
 After a little he was able to remount his horse, 
 and turn his head from the county highway into 
 the ranch-road, heading away from the town, 
 where lay the post-office and its one mail a day, due 
 at six o'clock. Kent went for it every evening on 
 his way home from the water-works where his en- 
 gineering studies at the Academy had found an 
 unexpected outlet. Dazed, stooping low in his 
 saddle, his bronzed face blanched with the news, 
 Kent went home, almost walking his horse the whole 
 way, much to that intelligent beast's puzzlement. 
 Fellowes had expanded into a brawny, dust-colored 
 giant, with a hand as steady as a blacksmith's. Be- 
 tween his sad eyes was a deep furrow that stood for 
 he alone knew how many struggles with tempta- 
 tion, from all of which he had come off victorious. 
 
 291
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 The sun, and the rain, and the wind had melted, 
 and cleansed and blown away much of the strength 
 of the evil spirit within him, and each fight had 
 been easier to win than the preceding one. And 
 now to have this come to him from the outside 
 world, where men grow strong battling with human 
 certainties, not with the slow-moving uncertainties 
 of the elements, that relax one's whole being into 
 a fatalistic peace. After the first shock of the news 
 the innate national distrust of journalistic verities 
 reasserted itself in Fellowes' mind, and he made 
 for himself a tourniquet of doubt to stop the bleed- 
 ing of his wound. 
 
 As far as Dora's watchful eyes saw her husband's 
 figure coming in the yellow light, she noted with a 
 return of the old terror a change in his bearing. 
 She waited for him at the gate, within which was 
 the unpurchasable peace and beauty of a home, re- 
 deemed from that dry commercialism beyond the 
 low white fence. 
 
 There was a small two-story frame house, less 
 than commonplace save for the Virginia creeper 
 that burned its fingers on the chimneys and only 
 then withdrew ; and the fuchsias that peered saucily 
 into the nursery windows on the second floor. Be- 
 low, a lawn surrounded the house, and flower-beds, 
 
 292
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 and trees sheltered from the burning sun; palms 
 and eucalyptus, lemon-trees, towering magnolias, 
 prunes and almonds ; and under a great pepper-tree 
 a hammock hung, with books and magazines on 
 the grass below it. Julie and Mammy swung in 
 it. Dell's voice rang out singing somewhere in the 
 rambling house. It was a home in fact to which 
 Kent returned from the rugged 'raising ranges' out- 
 side, that bloomed only for the market-place. 
 
 His quiet greeting of Dora at the gate dispelled 
 at once her fear, but replaced it by another less 
 defined. 
 
 "Was there no mail, Kent?" cried Dell running 
 down the path. 
 
 "I have not gone for it yet," he said with a 
 gravity that changed the subject in that sympa- 
 thetic household. 
 
 "I'll take de horse 'round toe de stable, Cap'n. 
 Ah Song he's busy, sah," said Mammy taking the 
 bridle from him, quick to note changes in the moods 
 about her. 
 
 He went into the house where he removed the 
 ravages of the day, coming to the dinner-table with 
 himself well in hand, and wondering a little at the 
 store of strength within him, hitherto unknown. 
 
 Dora noticed that after the meal was over (when 
 293
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 they were wont to sit on the veranda while he 
 smoked, Dell with her guitar or ukulele) he lighted 
 neither cigar nor pipe, but went outside, took two 
 whiffs of a cigarette and tossed it out on the lawn. 
 Then coming to the door he called out : 
 
 "Dora, are you very busy?" 
 
 "Did you ever know a Talty who let work in- 
 terfere with pleasure?" was her answer going to 
 him and leaning against his shoulder, secure in the 
 dark that now enveloped their silent world. 
 
 "I must go in for the mail. I have ordered the 
 top-buggy, it will keep a little of the dust off. Will 
 you get on your things and come with me, please, 
 dear? I do not wish to be alone to-night." 
 
 He told her the news as they drove through the 
 night together. 
 
 She had the rare tact not to touch him in his 
 present mood, in which the man in him was crying 
 out for the world of men. She asked quick direct 
 questions, and took the answers in silence. 
 
 At the post-office they found an excited crowd 
 of men and boys, gathered from all the surround- 
 ing ranches within a radius of fifteen miles. The 
 old familiar forerunners of war-rumor were all 
 there, as in the larger cities all over the country that 
 night, from one ocean to the other. The relief of 
 
 294
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 much speech, the gathering about the loudest 
 speaker; the flaring posters, read and reread; 
 cheers, thin only through smallness of number, not 
 the lack of heart; and the outlet of much drinking, 
 as the wires remained dumb to their nervous im- 
 patience. 
 
 Fellowes gave the reins to his wife, in front of 
 the flaring drug-store, where she was at once joined 
 by the ambitious young apothecary, who mounted 
 guard over her with an eye to the future, having 
 twice laid eyes upon a red-haired goddess who lived 
 at Los Ojitos. 
 
 The crowd of men instantly gathered with shouts 
 about Fellowes, proud of a man among them who 
 knew the great official centre to which the eyes of 
 the nation were turned. In telling them the many 
 reasons why there might yet not come war, he con- 
 vinced and quieted himself. The news that day 
 made of many states, many political parties, much 
 social unrest, one solid people under one flag; 
 waiting to sign their names to the rolls: "Ready 
 and willing to march," as in the old days when the 
 continental army was being gathered together all 
 over the land. 
 
 When nothing else was to be wrung out of the 
 town, Kent and Dora went home. 
 
 29$
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 Night after night through all those weeks of 
 suspense from that early spring day, Dora went 
 with Kent for the mail and they counted together 
 in breathless silence those few pulse-beats of the 
 outer world, that came to them in their isolation. 
 
 And then the day came when the news flew out 
 to the Works, that the slow wrath of a great na- 
 tion poured itself out in the three words : "War is 
 declared!" 
 
 Beyond all imagining Fellowes tasted torment 
 from that moment, trebled by the questions asked 
 by men about him, ending in the hideous iteration: 
 "How will it affect you, Captain, d'yer mind telling 
 us?" "I'm officially as good as dead, that's all," 
 he would say, and turn and fly from them. Then 
 when it became unbearable, he went home. Nor 
 was there any peace there, although the questions 
 ceased, as he did not tell them then the news, at last 
 authenticated beyond all further doubting. 
 
 Dora's heart shrivelled up in her breast, as she 
 saw him start alone in the buggy after dinner, not 
 even asking her to join him as usual. At the gate 
 she ran to him and begged to be taken, and he 
 scarcely answered her in unwonted discourtesy that 
 told her the worst. 
 
 Lashing the horse he dashed out through the 
 296
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 night, the devil in him thoroughly aroused. He 
 wanted to be alone ! He was sick and tired of re- 
 straint. Tired of the dreary round of uncongenial 
 work amidst his mental inferiors; tired of the tiny 
 space within the low white fence, with the flowers 
 and trees just the same, month in and month out; 
 tired of the staring blue sky that never veiled its 
 brazen face; tired of the women, Dell, Mammy, 
 and yes sometimes tired of Dora too, God bless 
 her! tired of his child, soul-sick for the old life. 
 
 And now ah, he could see it all ! The repressed 
 fierce joy in all their hearts; no longer drooping in 
 routine. The ship's report-book empty of names. 
 The topers, sober; the lazy ones, working like bees; 
 the sullen men, laughing in loud bursts; the indif- 
 ferent, alert and keen of eye. And the ward-room ! 
 Each face came before him transformed in its own 
 way by this miracle of promised combat for the 
 nation's name and fame. 
 
 Dashing along through the clouds of stifling 
 dust, the light vehicle swaying from side to side at 
 every turn, the horse responsive to the man's mad- 
 dened mood, alone, beyond all human aid Kent's 
 great punishment came to him in that hour under 
 the quiet skies, and he cursed the day he was born 
 into the world. 
 
 297
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 And when the game of battle was fairly on ! His 
 memory abetted by imagination, spared him noth- 
 ing. His ship was there before his wide staring 
 eyes, and every animate and inanimate thing upon 
 it. Pehoe on the bridge, within the double ring of 
 hammocks rolled and on end, lashed all around; 
 his eyes riveted to the glass turned upon the enemy, 
 still miles away. The ship had been cleared for 
 action weeks before. Into the silence tears the 
 furious tantara of the drums beating to general 
 quarters; the electric gongs gone mad in every 
 compartment this furor for several minutes. 
 And then a voice from the bridge: "Silence!" 
 "Cast loose and provide!" the order echoed and 
 re-echoed by each division officer on the decks be- 
 low, "That was Jack's voice heaven help me, 
 that was Jack 1" Kent cried aloud. 
 
 "Load! common shell! Range 4,000 yards! 
 Train on the enemy, commence firing!" One voice 
 after another called out, Nugent's and again Tal- 
 ly's, and each divisional officer as his guns began 
 to bear. He heard Russell's high clear voice, Rus- 
 sell who had taken his place on the "Boston" I the 
 little niche he occupied so easily filled by another; 
 another man had charge of his guns, cheered 
 on or held in check his gun-crews, of eager men half 
 
 208
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 mad with excitement, only kept under by a disci- 
 pline relaxed to suit the moment, and a cool clear 
 head that saw only essentials. And gun after gun 
 thundered out over the water. The ship's routine 
 went to the winds ! The men roared when a shot 
 told, and roared when one fell short, cursed, and 
 stamped their feet, beating their great black hands 
 together, frantic with the inevitable restraint of the 
 ship's confining space ; there being no outlet for en- 
 ergy like a dash of infantry or cavalry, up and on, 
 following, ever onward ! Oh 1 it was easy ashore, 
 but here tied down in a hole, the shot only could 
 represent their courage, their fervor, their frenzy 
 of energy. The aim was corrected in quiet voices 
 by the divisional officers, and now and then: 
 "Steady, men, we can't afford to waste any shots" 
 and "old Dennis" (Fellowes' gun captain, now 
 Russell's) sings out "no fear!" And the men 
 laugh. And Kent saw with burning eyes that in- 
 corrigible old drunkard come into his best estate, 
 cool, stung to miracles of marksmanship. Every 
 now and then he tested the firing battery of his own 
 gun by placing the terminals on his tongue and 
 closing the circuit, with the air of a Faraday in 
 his laboratory and then crying out: "Ah, but we'll 
 put the fear of God in their hearts this day !" And 
 
 299
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 the crew about howled their approval, and Russell 
 smiled upon them like the wise man he was; and 
 sought to spare them from their frantic eagerness. 
 Like one in a dream, Kent heard the rush of the 
 ammunition rapidly "whipped up" the shoots; the 
 powder-men receiving it, knocking open the boxes 
 with battle-axes, and when empty, throwing or 
 kicking them overboard ; the two cadets under Rus- 
 sell sought to stop it, but he checked them: "Give 
 'em a loose rein, boys, it only frets 'em." The 
 splash of the enemy's return shots was lost in all 
 that uproar, and only the first lieutenant in the con- 
 ning tower gave them a thought, up somewhat 
 above the deafening din below. The constantly 
 changing ranges repeated by hoarser and hoarser 
 calls ; the division officers each working out his sal- 
 vation, doing his own exhorting, flattering, restrain- 
 ing of his gunners, like children in his hands. 
 
 "And I 'to stay scabbarded' here!" yelled Fel- 
 lowes, shaking his fist at the sky above him, that 
 drove him frantic by its very peacefulness. The 
 horse neighed at his voice and Kent laughed aloud, 
 art ugly laugh that told of desperation. And in 
 that mood, shaken from head to foot, his teeth set, 
 he reached the little town. Instead of hitching the 
 horse he took it to the stable, a significant action 
 
 300
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 not lost on the pair of eyes watching him from the 
 drug-store across the broad unpaved street. 
 
 Fellowes stood a moment looking at the knots 
 of excited men before each flaring saloon. His life 
 was his own to throw away if he chose ! But even 
 as he piled fuel on the fire of his despair, he sud- 
 denly became conscious that there was no answering 
 flame within him, no genuine desire for drink's res- 
 pite. It would be but coaxing embers into life if 
 he did evil that night. Half stunned by this self- 
 revelation and too excited fully to grasp its tre- 
 mendous import, he started slowly for the post- 
 office. 
 
 "Oh, Cap'n, hyar's two telegrams fer you, sah, 
 an' dey's marked 'rush' de gent'man at de pos'- 
 office says;" and there stood Mammy breathing 
 heavily before him. 
 
 "What are you doing in town this time of day?" 
 he asked coldly, suspiciously; showing his re- 
 pugnance to a presence beside him that night so 
 foreign to his mood. An influence impossible to 
 ignore absolutely, or to get roughly rid of as he 
 might have any other of the servants. He stood 
 and looked at her affectionate smile, helplessly. 
 Then bethought him of his telegrams, and with 
 her at his heels, he went across the street to the little 
 
 301
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 stuffy, oil-smelling public parlor of the only hotel 
 in town, and tore the first one open, and leaned over 
 to read it by the smoking lamp. 
 
 He read and reread and still found incompre- 
 hensible the contents: 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. C., April 25, 1898. 
 
 Lieutenant Kent Fellowes, U. S. Navy, Los Ojitos Ranch, 
 Seeley, California. 
 
 Promise not forgotten. 
 
 GRACE TITTERINGTON. 
 
 Bewildered by recent mental stress he stood 
 erect a moment and stared blankly at Mammy; 
 then suddenly remembering the other despatch he 
 opened it, and the gates of life swung open before 
 him, and night was day, and all things right in the 
 world ! Addressed like the other, this read : 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. C., April 25, 1898. 
 Remainder of suspension remitted. Proceed immedi- 
 ately New York. Report Commandant for duty on 
 "Indiana." MORGAN, Secretary. 
 
 The great, almost overwhelming, revulsion of 
 feeling, made him stagger for a moment, and 
 Mammy feared she had been too late, with all her 
 almost uncanny intuition to help her. Then he 
 
 302
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 sprang forward and took the astonished old wom- 
 an by the hand, and tears of pain stood in her eyes 
 when he let it go. 
 
 "Dear old Mammy Lina ! I want you to come 
 home with me at once. I have news, great news 
 I must talk, I must talk it out or I'll go mad ! As 
 you've got the mail, we'll go at once." 
 
 "Well, Cap'n, I cum in de market-wagon wid 
 dat deah ole Ah Song. I er I'se got de same 
 misery I gets eb'ry spring in my lef laig, an' I cum 
 toe de 'poth'cary shop, sah, fo' ter have my green 
 pills made up, yas, sah." Whenever she had ac- 
 complished a rather special thing in lies, she always 
 reaffirmed her statement at the finish. 
 
 Fellowes hustled her across the street to the 
 stable where a somewhat astonished boy brought 
 out the horse and buggy, not yet unhitched. Then 
 he bundled her in, crying: 
 
 "Hang Ah Song! Hang the market-wagon, 
 home you go with me !" And she scrutinized him 
 closely and sighed, thinking that the poison was 
 somehow already in his veins. 
 
 The lounging farmers called out after him their 
 disappointment at having no chance for a word, 
 to-night of all nights, when the whole countryside 
 was in town, wild with excitement at the news. But 
 
 303
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 heedless of all but the one supreme piece of news 
 he had to tell Dora (now returned to him on a 
 great wave of tenderness) he sent his horse flying 
 down the street, and out into the blackness beyond ; 
 and Mammy hung on for dear life, catching her 
 breath, what between the dust and the speed. She 
 only hoped the long drive home through the cool 
 night air would quiet him a little before they 
 reached Miss Dora. 
 
 "O Mammy, Mammy I it's such a good glad old 
 world, isn't it?" he exulted, innocent of her 
 maligning thoughts. 
 
 "I ain' seen no tick'lar change, sah, since I went 
 over dis road befo'," she answered with resent- 
 ment. 
 
 "It's the happiest day of my whole life I" he 
 went on, his eyes running far ahead in their im- 
 patience. 
 
 "Shorely, Cap'n, not countin' de mawnin' yer 
 done took Miss Dora fo' yer very own !" the wom- 
 an remonstrated peevishly. 
 
 He had received many telegrams and she had 
 never seen him like this. 
 
 "You mustn't be scared, Mammy dear, if I give 
 one great grand shout, that starts from my toes, 
 just to keep from bursting with joy 1" 
 
 304
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 "Yell away, Cap'n, if it's any sorter comfort ter 
 yer, honey," she said with a sob and a sniffle, thank- 
 ful poor little Miss Dora was not there to hear 
 him rave. 
 
 Then he asked her why she was so unhappy, and 
 after some hesitation, she told him. And there was 
 a short silence, and then gravely, like himself, he 
 told her the truth ; and a little later the two arrived 
 home in a perfect gale of laughter and loud talk- 
 ing, which Dora heard with dread and slipped 
 out to the gate, with eyes so full of pain, that 
 Adele went at once to her room with a sinking 
 heart. 
 
 But once realizing that it was Mammy with her 
 husband, she knew all would somehow be well, and 
 stood and wondered how it had come to pass. They 
 had not even missed her. 
 
 And then Kent went to his wife and put his arm 
 about her, and directed their steps to the ham- 
 mock, swinging ghost-like under the pepper-tree. 
 Seating her gently in it, he knelt on the soft deep 
 grass beside her, his head upon her knees. She had 
 known the instant that he touched her that he had 
 not been drinking, and she waited for him to speak, 
 her hands lying softly on his head. Then he looked 
 up, and kissed her and drew her white shawl more 
 
 305
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 closely about her with his old tenderness, and he 
 whispered : 
 
 "I owe everything to you, my wife every good 
 that has come to me, every evil that has been kept 
 from me. And to you, on my knees, I bring your 
 reward ; for that, I know is the dear, unselfish way 
 you'll look at it." 
 
 "Reward?" she whispered. 
 
 "Dora, Dora, my darling my sentence is re- 
 mitted ! I am back on the active list and war was 
 declared to-day I" he burst out, not meaning in the 
 least to tell her thus brutally, but borne off his feet 
 by the fact itself and the strong sense of haste im- 
 posed by the wording of the Secretary's order. 
 
 She raised both arms above his head, and sobbed 
 out: 
 
 "Thank God! O Kent, thank God with me! 
 If He had asked me what I most wanted I should 
 have said exactly that! To have you back once 
 more in the midst of Kent !" she cried suddenly 
 struggling to her feet: "Kent, what was that you 
 said just now ? War is declared did you say that ? 
 And you go at once? Let me see the orders 
 quick, let me see the orders !" He lighted several 
 matches and held them bunched while her eyes 
 flashed over the open telegram of the Secretary. 
 
 306
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 "What does 'immediately' mean?" she panted. 
 
 "Within twelve hours," he said; and then took 
 her into his arms and sought to comfort her. 
 Fighting down her own terrors at a cost to herself 
 that he never knew, presently she said brokenly, 
 with now and then a little laugh, dabbing at her 
 eyes impatiently: 
 
 "Dear, I want you to understand and remember 
 after you are gone that all these silly old tears are 
 from pure excitement. I want you to go ! Do you 
 suppose I'd let you stay away out of it! Why, 
 I'd hate you if you were not mad to go back into it 
 all, and have your chance with the rest! Life is 
 something more than three meals a day, isn't it, 
 dear? There are great big moments of living that 
 sweep one's soul clean, aren't there, Kent? And 
 you will be the happier, the better, the stronger 
 for it, I think. Who is it says : 'Go seek thy peace 
 in war'?" 
 
 "My love, my brave little wife," he murmured 
 with hidden face, "I shall with your help and 
 heaven's never again betray your trust and my 
 country's I know it to-night!" 
 
 Then she felt her control slipping away from 
 her, and she reached into his pocket for the mail and 
 scolded him, and bade him take it in to Adele, who 
 
 307
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 knew the China mail was due; and so she bought 
 a moment's solitude. As Kent rose to go, she said : 
 
 "Do not tell her the news that war is declared. 
 To-morrow will do. Let her be happy with her 
 letters. Warn Mammy." And while he was gone 
 her repressed agony found vent, and the quiet night 
 stooped and held her in its arms. 
 
 "Dell, Dell, where are you?" called Kent 
 through the house. 
 
 A voice from above replied and the girl ran 
 down the stairs. 
 
 " 'Cherries are ripe, 
 Cherries are ripe, 
 But baby shall have none!' " 
 
 he teased, holding several letters high above her 
 head. 
 
 To his surprise her eyes filled with tears, the 
 corners of her mouth went down like a hurt child's, 
 and she made no attempt to reach her letters. 
 
 "Why, girlie, what's the matter?" 
 
 "I I thought he had not written," she whim- 
 pered. Kent laughed and took her by the shoulders 
 and led her to the sitting-room lamp and looking 
 into her quivering face, he exclaimed: 
 
 "Well, Leigh Robb has really captured you, 
 308
 
 THE WIFE'S REWARD 
 
 hasn't he? And he holds you in his hand here, 
 there, everywhere, you little rascal of a woman! 
 He's a brave man, and a Prince Hal for self-confi- 
 dence to trust you." 
 
 Adele was once more the pretty malapert, and 
 smiled up at her brother-in-law from under heavy 
 brows : 
 
 "Trust me? Here? He knows Ah Song's the 
 only bachelor on the place. Why, Kent, if it wasn't 
 for a few old photographs, I'd forget what a mar- 
 ketable man looked like!" 
 
 Kent shook his head at her and his happy laugh 
 told Dora that her sister was with him, and even 
 amidst her tears, she smiled. 
 
 "And then " Adele paused. 
 
 "And then?" Kent mocked. 
 
 "He wrote last mail that he trusted to the all- 
 pervading orange blossoms at 'Los Ojitos' to re- 
 mind me every hour of the day and night, of well, 
 my fast approaching fate." Then he gave her the 
 letters and she flew to her room, singing as she ran. 
 And Kent went out once more to his wife, to whom 
 quiet had come, after the quick sharp storm. 
 
 He sat down beside her and silently gathered her 
 to him, and cheek against cheek, they slowly swung 
 in the hammock together under the trees. The 
 
 39
 
 PEACE AND THE VICES 
 
 silence was only broken now and then by the dis- 
 tant creak of the wind-mill dragging from the 
 depths of the earth the moisture denied by the sky, 
 which alone made all things possible in that west- 
 ern land. Again stillness, then Julie's little plaint 
 hushed by Mammy's muted lullaby; a moment 
 later the twitter of a sleepy quarrel for space in a 
 bird's nest above them, and then once more the 
 soundless perfumed place. Then a few notes on 
 the piano broke thrillingly the silence, and Adele's 
 deep pulsating voice floated out into the darkness, 
 carrying the burden of her love and longing: 
 
 " 'Bend low, O dusky night, and give my spirit rest. 
 
 Give back the lost delight that once my soul possessed.' ' 
 
 And about them Nature held all things within 
 her laws, and worked on in silence through the 
 night. As with Julie, so with the budding pushing 
 leaves on the orange-trees that reached right and 
 left to the horizon; as with the white fragrant 
 blossoms, so with Adele full of the pain and ecstasy 
 of a love still far from its harvesting time ; as with 
 the golden fruit coming to its full ripeness, so the 
 wife, rocked in the greater peace of life's fruition. 
 
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